Davy Crockett, the Tennessee Mounted Volunteers, and the Texans Would Stand with President Trump Fighting for America -- Remember the Alamo When You Say MAGA

THE BATTLE OF THE ALAMO. The battle of the Alamo was fought over issues like federalism, slavery, immigration rights, the cotton industry and above all, money. General Santa Ana arrived at San Antonio with his Mexican army and with some justice regarded the Texans as barbarians -- surely he didn't mean Davy Crockett and the contingent of Tennessee Volunteers who were there. In "Gone to Texas, David Folds tells the story of Davy Crockett leaving Memphis to head for Texax, claim some land and try to serve as a representative at the upcoming Texas Constitutional Convention. However, to do so, he needed to travel across Texas to the town of San Antonio de Bexar, where the anti-Jacksonians had congregated. Folds says : "East Texas was full of Jacksonians, and Crockett was no longer on their good side due to his opposition to many of Andrew Jackson’s policies. While in Nacogdoches, two of Crockett’s companions decided that they didn’t want any part of the political turmoil, so they headed back to Tennessee, choosing not to give up their US citizenship. Meanwhile, Crockett and Patton joined up with a volunteer army group opposed to military commander and Jacksonian, Sam Houston. The group, lead by 25-year old William B. Harrison of Ohio, decided to take on the name, “The Tennessee Mounted Volunteers,” in honor of their newly joined celebrity, David Crockett. They headed west, arriving in San Antonio on February 8, 1836, two days after delegates to the Constitutional Convention had been elected and sent to Washington-on-the-Brazos. After celebrating George Washington’s birthday on February 22, 1836, the Texan garrison of San Antonio de Bexar was caught off guard by the leading troops of General Santa Anna’s military force approaching the town the following morning. The garrison rushed into the Alamo, an old adobe mission across the San Antonio River from the town, to use as their fortress. Although some improvements had been made to the wall for such an occasion, the mission fortress was too large for such a small occupying force. Despite internal strife over leadership between Colonel William Barrett Travis and Colonel James Bowie, brother of Resin Bowie, maker of the famous Bowie knife, the garrison managed to hold out for 13 days. Crockett actually declined an official leadership position in the fort, choosing instead to hold the post of 'a high private.' The Mounted Tennessee Volunteers were given the defense of the weakest position in the fort, the wooden palisade extending from the Alamo chapel across to the south wall. Though the weakest position in the fort, it was one of the last to fall during the final assault by the Mexican troops. Before dawn of March 6, 1836, the Mexicans launched their great assault. They retreated twice before successfully entering the fort through a breach in the north wall. The battle only lasted for 90 minutes with all Texan defenders killed, except for the possibility of a few taken captive and then tortured and killed. Some Mexican accounts claim Crockett was one of these few taken captive." The Tennessee Mounted Volunteers and Texans -- about 180 in all -- defended the Alamo, fighting for Texan independence from Mexico. The defeat at the Alamo in 1836 was significant for Texas because it gave the Texans a reason to fight for their independence. The small number of Texans who fought at the Alamo and were tortured and killed led to a greater stimulus for gaining independence from the rule of Mexico for the Texans. Remembering how badly the Texans had been defeated at the Alamo, on April 21, 1836, the Texas militia under Sam Houston launched a surprise attack against the forces of Mexican General Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto, near present-day Houston, Texas, in what is called one of the most decisive and important battles in American history. This decisive battle is historically significant because a small Texan military force defeated a larger and more experienced Mexican army which resulted in the ultimate independence of Texas from Mexico. Lulled into overconfidence by his initial easy victories, Santa Anna was taken by surprise at San Jacinto, and his army was annihilated on April 21, 1836. The captured Santa Anna, fearing execution, willingly signed an order calling for all Mexican troops to withdraw. Texas became an independent republic. Soon after, Houston was elected president of the Republic of Texas. Having retreated from politics in 1855, Santa Anna remained disconnected until his death in 1876. Santa Anna died at his home in Mexico City on 21 June 1876 at age 82. Folds reminds us : "Whether he was or not [captured and tortured], Crockett, a 49-year old man who went to Texas out of despair in hopes of finding his fortune, died a hero fighting a small battle in a remote frontier. This stand changed the course of history, and although Crockett wasn’t one of the commanders, wasn’t wealthy, wasn’t a great success during his lifetime, he gained the legendary and beloved status we know him by today." • • • IF WE FEEL LIKE SHOUTING "REMEMBER THE ALAMO," THERE MAY BE A REASON. And, the reason has to do with more than the border crisis or any one issue confronting us who wear the MAGA hat today. "Remember the Alamo" has been a battle cry for 183 years, calling Americans to do their duty by performing near-impossible tasks. Today, we have leader who stands in front of us. President Trump will not surrender or compromise away our freedom as Americans. But, his task is every bit as dangerous and daunting as that of the Tennessee Mounted Volunteers and Texans at the Alamo. His battle list is so long that we would be excused for forgetting some items occasionally. And, every day new items crop up on the list. Here are some of the most recent ones. • CLAPPER SAYS OBAMA ORDERED THE INTEL ASSESSMENT OF TRUMP. The Gateway Pundit's Jim Hoft reported last week that : "...former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper went on with CNN’s Anderson Cooper to discuss the Mueller Report after its release....After two years of investigation Special Counsel Robert Mueller and his team of angry Democrats did not find any collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia. Mueller also did not find any evidence of conspiracy after President Trump fired crooked leaker FBI Director James Comey. Clapper defended the Obama administration’s spying on their political opposition during the election. And then Clapper appeared to put blame on Barack Obama for spying on his opponent during the 2016 presidential election. Via Red Right Videos : "ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: The 2017 assessment....how can we reconcile the President attacking you, but apparently after a very long time finally, allegedly saying -- or saying he allegedly agrees with the product of the intelligence community that you, yourself oversaw? JAMES CLAPPER: One point I’d like to make, Anderson, that I don’t think has come up very much before, and I’m alluding now to the President’s criticism of President Obama for all that he did or didn’t do before he left office with respect to the Russian meddling. If it weren’t for President Obama, we might not have done the intelligence community assessment that we did that set off a whole sequence of events which are still unfolding today, notably, special counsel Mueller’s investigation. President Obama is responsible for that, and it was he who tasked us to do that intelligence community assessment in the first place. I think it’s an important point when it comes to critiquing President Obama." The CNN video is available on You Tube at : < https://youtu.be/XnKK5NnPJcQ >. • How much closer to the truth does the DOJ need to be before it opens a special counsel investigation into the Obama-led cabal against his political opponent, Donald Trump? • • • HOUSE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE SUBPOENAS MUELLER REPORT. Fox News's Brooke Singman reported on Wednesday that the House Judiciary Committee has voted to approve subpoenas for the full, unredacted Mueller report. The authorization of subpoenas gives Democrats on the committee the option to issue them....The House Judiciary Committee voted along party lines Wednesday to authorize subpoenas for Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s full report after the Justice Department missed a Democrat-imposed deadline, in a major escalation of the battle between Congress and the Trump administration over access to underlying documents and evidence from the Russia probe. The vote was 24-17, with all Democrats supporting and all Republicans opposed. The authorization of subpoenas does not mean the Committee will issue them but gives Democrats on the panel the option to do so. Republicans fumed over the move, accusing their counterparts of 'political theater' since the DOJ has already pledged to cooperate." • Attorney General Bill Barr says his team must first redact sensitive information, but Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., said Democrats want access to the totality of the documents : "The Trump administration has an idea. They want to redact the Mueller report before they provide it to Congress. The Department of Justice says the proposal is a means to protect sensitive information that would not ordinarily be made part of the record. But we have reason to suspect this administration’s motives....And, in any event, this committee has a job to do. The Constitution charges Congress with holding the President accountable for alleged official misconduct. That job requires us to evaluate the evidence for ourselves -- not the Attorney General’s summary, not a substantially redacted synopsis, but the full report and the underlying evidence." Ranking Judiciary Committee Member Doug Collins, R-Ga., fired back at Nadler, noting that authorizing subpoenas, and threatening to use them, "is confusing since the Attorney General is doing exactly what he said he would be doing -- making as much of the report public as possible under federal law and department policy....Why are we here doing preemptive subpoenas?" Last week, AG Barr announced that the Justice Department and the special counsel were “well along in the process of identifying and redacting” sensitive material in the more than 300-page report and would likely have it to Congress by mid-April, “if not sooner.” But Democrats set a deadline of April 2 for the full report to be released to Congress and to the public. That deadline was missed. • We know what Nadler's real job is -- take over the Mueller probe, re-label it congressional "oversight," and try to find any concoction of words and innuendo that will permit the House to impeach President Trump. • • • FIRMS TIED TO FUSION GPS, CHRISTOPHER STEELE WERE PAID $3.8 MILLION BY SOROS-BACKED GROUP. That is what Daily Caller reporter Chuck Ross published on Monday. Ross reported : "The Democracy Integrity Project [TDIP], a nonprofit that receives funding from George Soros, paid firms tied to Fusion GPS and Christopher Steele more than $3.8 million in 2017. Tax filings show that The Democracy Integrity Project provided its research to 'government entities.' The group’s founder [Daniel J. Jones], a former staffer for Dianne Feinstein, has described it as a 'shadow media organization' that helps the government....The payments made by The Democracy Integrity Project are more than three times what the DNC and the Clinton campaign paid Fusion GPS and Steele during the 2016 presidential campaign to investigate Donald Trump’s possible ties to Russia. Perkins Coie, the law firm that represented the DNC and Clinton campaign, paid $1 million to Fusion GPS in 2016 to investigate Trump. Fusion GPS in turn paid Steele, a former MI6 officer, nearly $170,000 for a project that resulted in the infamous Steele Dossier. Steele’s report, which alleged a 'well-coordinated conspiracy' between the Trump campaign and the Russian government, has come under intense scrutiny in the wake of the special counsel’s findings in the 22-month Russia probe....Jones, a former staffer to California Democrat Sen. Dianne Feinstein, founded TDIP on Jan. 31, 2017, seemingly to resume Democrats’ investigation of Trump’s possible links to Russia....The group paid $3.3 million to Bean LLC., the holding company that controls Fusion GPS. Another $250,000 was paid to Walsingham Partners Ltd., a London-based firm owned by Steele and his partner, Christopher Burrows. TDIP paid another London-based intelligence firm called Istok Associates Ltd. nearly $150,000, also for 'research consulting.'....Nearly $130,000 was paid to Edward Austin Ltd., a London-based intelligence consultancy operated by Edward Baumgartner, a Fusion GPS contractor. Another $148,000 was paid to the law firm Zuckerman Spaeder, which has represented Fusion GPS in a variety of Dossier-related legal matters....Adam Waldman, an attorney with links to Christopher Steele, revealed text messages showing that Jones took credit for a Reuters news article that raised questions about Russian purchases of Trump properties in Florida. 'Our team helped with this,' Jones wrote Waldman on March 17, 2017, in a text message provided to the Daily Caller News Foundation. Waldman testified to the Senate Intelligence Committee in November 2017 that Jones told him that SOROS, the progressive billionaire financier, was one of TDIP’s backers. That was confirmed in October, when the New York Times reported that SOROS donated at least $1 million to TDIP." • The Daily Caller has since found that a California-based nonprofit called the Fund for a Better Future (FBF) contributed nearly $2.1 million to TDIP in 2017. It is not clear who provided the donation to FBF as the group does not disclose its donors....The company’s founder is Neil Barnett, a former journalist who has recently investigated possible Russian influence in the Brexit campaign. Barnett co-authored a report released on Oct. 17, 2018, for The Atlantic Council, a Washington, DC, think tank, which focused on British businessman Arron Banks’ contributions to the Brexit campaign. Barnett also suggested in the report that the Trump campaign received millions of dollars in illicit donations, possibly from foreign adversaries. Barnett’s argument hinged on a large amount donations under $200, which is the cutoff point where donors are required to disclose their names and addresses. Politicians typically hype small-dollar donations, which are seen as one gauge of grassroots support for political campaigns. But Barnett seemingly saw something more nefarious in the outsize ratio of small-dollar contributions flowing to the Trump campaign." • What is INTERESTING about Barnett is his connection to Atlantic Council. Back in the 2016-2017 period, when the Democratic National Committee hack was hot news, I posted a blog about Atlantic Council and its relationship with CrowdStrike, the private company that investigated the hacked DNC servers, after the DNC refused to allow the FBI to do the job. • Daily Caller published a similar article by Justin Caruso on June 24, 2017. Caruso wrote : "The Democratic Party and mainstream media have become increasingly consumed with the narrative that Donald Trump’s election win is largely influenced by Russian hacking. The narrative is centered around two hacks -- the hack of a DNC server that led to the release of embarrassing emails during the Democratic National Convention, and the hack of John Podesta’s email which led to several embarrassing moments for the Clinton campaign in October 2016. Both are supposedly the result of the Russians....The analysis that alleged that Russia was behind the DNC server breach was carried out not by the US government, but by the private security group CrowdStrike. CrowdStrike is the sole source of this claim, with their June 2016 report, “Bears in the Midst : Intrusion into the Democratic National Committee” being the basis of the DNC’s Russian hacking allegations. Here are five key points about CrowdStrike that the mainstream media is ignoring : (1). Obama Appoints CrowdStrike Officer To Admin Post Two Months Before June 2016 Report On Russia Hacking DNC. In April 2016, two months before the June report that alleged a Russian conspiracy, former President Barack Obama appointed Steven Chabinsky, the general counsel and chief risk officer for CrowdStrike, to the Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity....(2). The FBI Never Looked At The DNC’s Servers -- Only CrowdStrike Did....There has been no corroboration or second opinion on who may have hacked the server. The only source for this claim is CrowdStrike, who began monitoring the DNC system on May 5th, 2016, according to DailyMail.com. The DNC also reportedly paid $168,000 to CrowdStrike. (3). Comey Contradicted The DNC’s Story On The FBI Asking To See The Server. The DNC claimed in January that the reason the FBI never examined their hacked server was simple -- the FBI never requested to do so....However, this claim was contradicted by then-FBI Director James Comey, who said in a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing in January that there were 'multiple requests at different levels' to look at the DNC’s servers. Instead, Comey said a 'highly respected private company' got access to the servers–meaning CrowdStrike....As Josephine Wolff of Slate pointed out, “...whether because they were denied access or simply never asked for it, the FBI instead used the analysis of the DNC breach conducted by security firm CrowdStrike as the basis for its investigation. Regardless of who is telling the truth about what really happened, perhaps the most astonishing thing about this probe is that a private firm’s investigation and attribution was deemed sufficient by both the DNC and the FBI.”....(4). CrowdStrike Co-Founder Is Fellow On Russia Hawk Group, Has Connections To George SOROS, Ukrainian Billionaire. Co-Founder and CTO of CrowdStrike Dmitri Alperovitch is a nonresident senior fellow on the Atlantic Council. The Atlantic Council is hawkish on Russia, previously publishing reports about topics like how the West can 'get tougher' on Russia....Further, the Atlantic Council is funded by NATO, enhancing the hawkish view on Russia. The Atlantic Council is also funded by the “OPEN SOCIETY Initiative for Europe,” a program of leftist billionaire George SOROS’ Open Society Foundation. The Open Society Initiative for Europe has written that they support, 'initiatives that strengthen the protection of migrants and the politics of inclusion, giving the leading role and voice in advocating policies and social change to migrants and refugees, their descendants, and their allies in civil society.' The Atlantic Council is also funded by the Victor Pinchuk Foundation. Pinchuk is a Ukrainian billionaire who reportedly gave $25 million to the Clinton Foundation, and was invited to Clinton’s home for a dinner in 2012 while she was Secretary of State, despite an earlier denial from a Clinton spokesperson that the dinner 'never on her schedule' during her time as Secretary. (5.) CrowdStrike Is Funded By Clinton-Loving Google $$. Finally, it’s worth pointing out that CrowdStrike received $100 million in investments led by Google Capital (since re-branded as CapitalG) in 2015. CapitalG is owned by Alphabet, and Eric Schmidt, Alphabet’s chairman, was a supporter of Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. More than just supporting Clinton, leaked emails from Wikileaks in November 2016 showed that in 2014 he wanted to have an active role in the campaign. According to the Wall Street Journal, Schmidt 'sent a Clinton campaign official a lengthy memo with advice on running the campaign. He told campaign officials he was ‘ready to fund, advise recruit talent,’ and ‘clearly wants to be head outside advisor,’ according to a 2014 email from Clinton campaign Chairman John Podesta to campaign manager Robby Mook.' And Politico reported in November 2016 that Schmidt 'served in a personal capacity as an advisor to the Clinton operation,' and wore a 'staff' badge at her election night party." • So, Neil Barnett -- who wrote for Atlantic Council, with ties to Soros and Hillary Clinton -- is now head of a privately and secret funded organization that has contributed to TDIP, a SOROS-backed private organization that is continuing the Fake anti-Trump news. What goes around comes around...right? • • • AMANPOUR WANTS TO GAG TRUMP SUPPORTERS. BizPac Review reported on Wednesday that : "CNN’s Christiane Amanpour remarkably asks Comey if FBI should have ‘shut down’ Trump supporters’ chants at rallies," suggesting that "the Trump supporters who playfully chanted 'lock her up' at President Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential election campaign rallies should have been apprehended and potentially thrown in the hole by the Justice Department." Christiane Amanpour issued the suggestion while speaking with disgraced former FBI Director James Comey about the President’s calls for the investigators who investigated him to be investigated. • BizPac Review states : "Because of a preponderance of evidence suggesting that the Russian collusion investigation was an illegal operation launched for political reasons, both the President and congressional Republicans have called for a second special counsel to investigate the Justice Department’s potential misconduct. As one of those suspected of corruption, Comey opposes this move. 'Investigative what?" he defiantly declared to Amanpour early Tuesday afternoon. "Investigate that investigations were conducted? And what would be the crime you’d be investigating? So, it’s a terrible cycle to start. He’s already started it with calling for the locking up of his political opponents, including people like me. And so, it would just be more of that dangerous step.'....'Of course, lock her up was a feature of the 2016 Trump campaign,' she said. 'Do you, in retrospect, wish that people like yourself, the head of the FBI, I mean, the people in charge of law and order had shut down that language, that it was dangerous potentially, that it could have created violence, that kind of hate speech? Should that have been allowed?' " • Even Comey balked at Amanpour's suggestion, saying : "That’s not a role for government to play. The beauty of this country is people can say what they want even if it’s misleading and its demagoguery'....But what’s far more disturbing than the former FBI director’s clear-cut sanctimony is the fervent willingness by Amanpour, a so-called objective 'journalist,' to call for the punishment of dissidents who chant phrases or sayings that she finds offensive. And to be clear, that’s what so-called 'hate speech' generally refers to : Content that some find offensive. Keep in mind that to the far-left, of which Amanpour seems to be a proud member, practically every conservative idea or thought counts as hate speech, including the right’s otherwise reasonable views on illegal immigration, affirmative action, political correctness and identity politics." • The Daily Caller on Thursday said of Amanpour's outburst : "As the liberal media continues to grapple with the results of the 2016 presidential election, one CNN host suggested that it might be time to do away with the First Amendment. In an interview with former FBI director James Comey, CNN’s Christiane Amanpour suggested that Comey’s FBI should have stepped in to stop Trump supporters from chanting 'lock her up' about former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Comey told Amanpour that the First Amendment would have prevented the FBI from stopping the chants." The CNN video is available at < https://youtu.be/bbZFysLfSDw>. • • • McCONNELL USES THE NUCLEAR OPTION. Finally, Senate Republicans have voted to use the "nuclear option" in order to confirm President Trump's appointees languishing under Senate Democrat obstruction. The Daily Caller summarized the GOP move on Wednesday : "The Senate voted Wednesday to shorten Democrats’ time obstructing President Donald Trump’s nominees on the floor in order to speed up the nomination process. The vote was set up by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell...with expectations that it would fail so that the so-called nuclear option could be used. McConnell introduced a procedural cloture vote Wednesday that was shut down 51-48. The cloture needed 60 'no' votes to fail, so McConnell entered a motion to reconsider the failed cloture vote, making it so Republicans only need a majority vote in order to use the nuclear option. Senators voted 51-48 in order to speed up Trump nominees’ confirmation processes, which Democrats have continued to stall. Republican Senators Mike Lee of Utah and Susan Collins of Maine voted against the rules change. The nuclear option will cut Democrats’ debate time from thirty hours to two hours, making the confirmation process for Trump’s nominees faster. Republicans would only need 51 votes to confirm a Trump nominee after the change." • Majority Leader McConnell called the Democrats’ actions “systematic obstruction,” saying it is “not targeted, thoughtful opposition to a few marquee nominations or rare circumstances. But a grinding, across-the-board effort to delay and obstruct the people this President puts up. Even if they have unquestionable qualifications. Even if the job is relatively low-profile.” Iowa Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, former chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said on the Senate floor that Democrats will oppose any Trump nominee : “Over the past two years, some in this body have decided that they will oppose any nominee suggested by President Trump. There isn’t a Senator in this room who serves their state’s interest when qualified, noncontroversial nominees are prevented from being confirmed. However, some members continue to do just that by slow walking the President’s nominees for partisan purposes.” The President himself has often called out Democrats for “slow walking” his executive nominees. In a February tweet, President Trump said : "Democrats in the Senate are still slow walking hundreds of highly qualified people wanting to come into government. Never been such an abuse in our country’s history.” • In the United States House of Representatives, the filibuster (the right to unlimited debate) was used until 1842, when a permanent rule limiting the duration of debate was created. In 1917, at the urging of President Woodrow Wilson, the Senate adopted a procedure known as the cloture vote, which could end a filibuster. If a cloture vote was called for, a super-majority (2/3) of Senators could force an end to debate and bring the question under consideration to an up-or-down vote. In 1975, the Senate revised its cloture rule so that three-fifths of sworn senators (60 votes out of 100) could limit debate, except for changing Senate rules which still requires a two-thirds majority of those present and voting to invoke cloture. In November, 2013, Senate Democrats led by Majority Leader Harry Reid used the nuclear option to eliminate the 60-vote cloture rule on executive branch nominations and federal judicial appointments, but not for the Supreme Court. In 2017, GOP Senate Majority Leader McConnell made that rule apply to Supreme Court appointments before Justice was confirmed. • On Wednesday, when the latest change came, Senator Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) called it "Miguel Estrada's revenge." Senator Schumer and other Democrats blocked Miguel Estrada’s nomination to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals by using the 2/3 cloture rule, and then changed it to a 60-vote cloture rule. • Politico reported : "His [McConnell's] move is particularly consequential in divided government when much of the Senate’s time is now spent confirming executive nominees and lifetime judicial appointments. Under the change, debate time on District Court nominees and sub-Cabinet executive nominees is slashed from 30 hours to two hours, a shift that will allow Republicans to fill dozens more vacancies over the coming months." • Mitch McConnell said on Wednesday : “It is time for this sorry chapter to end. It’s time to return this body to a more normal and reasonable process for fulfilling its constitutional responsibilities no matter which party controls the White House. This is new. And it needs to stop.” GOP Senate Majority Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) called Democrat resistance to Trump’s nominees “offensive.” “ • As of February 2019, a three-fifths majority vote is still required to end debates on legislation. But, Senators in both parties fear that the legislative filibuster will be next. That’s particularly true if one party wins the White House, House and Senate in 2020 and finds its big ideas stymied by a Senate minority. McConnell said on Wednesday : "“The legislative filibuster is central to the nature of the Senate. It has always been, and must always be, the distinctive quality of this institution. We all know that both parties will possess future 51-vote majorities somewhere down the line. It will happen. The Senate’s long traditions on legislation, therefore, need to remain in place.” • • • DEAR READERS, in these fractious times, a bare majority seems to be the rule rather than the exception. It makes President Trump's task of getting his agenda enacted very difficult. Mitch McConnell has finally removed one of those obstacles that is particularly pernicious because it prevents President Trump from having a full senior staff to work on his agenda. So, the next time you put on your red MAGA cap and stand in support of the President, if you need a little extra oomph -- try saying "Remember the Alamo" and you can be sure that Davy Crockett and the rest of the Tennessee Mounted Volunteers and Texans will be right there with you in spirit, fighting for America.

Immigration : President Trump Stakes Out His Ground in the Fight with Congress and Mexico

FAKE NEWS OUTDID ITSELF ON APRIL FOOL'S DAY. Even if they were trying to be serious. NBC Nightly News actually saw the Fake catastrophe coming if President Trump closes the southern border. Wait for it -- NO guacamole !!! NO margaritas !!! What they left out -- details, my dear Watson -- was that it would also mean no more 500,000+ illegal immigrants sneaking into the US in 2019. • • • PRESIDENT TRUMP IS DONE BEING THE NICE GUY. That's how Fox News First put it on Monday : "President Trump has threatened to shut down the southern border this week to combat the illegal immigration crisis and in a tweet sent Sunday night, he suggested he was done playing Mr. Nice Guy...'The Democrats are allowing a ridiculous asylum system and major loopholes to remain as a mainstay of our immigration system,' Trump tweeted. 'Mexico is likewise doing NOTHING, a very bad combination for our Country. Homeland Security is being sooo very nice, but not for long!' " • Fox News first also reminded us that President Trump has also vowed "to cut direct aid to El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras as their citizens flee north toward the US in caravans. Mexican officials said Sunday they will give out humanitarian visas on a "limited basis" to some of the roughly 2,500 Central American and Caribbean migrants gathered in the southern state of Chiapas. • • • HOMELAND SECURITY IS UPPING ITS ACTION. Newsmax reported on Monday that : "The Trump administration will speed up the deployment of hundreds of officers on the southern border of the United States and will dramatically expand a policy of returning migrants seeking asylum to Mexico, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said on Monday. The US Customs and Border Protection agency first announced the redeployment of 750 officers to process a surge of migrant families entering the United States last week. In a written statement, Nielsen said she had ordered CBP Commissioner Kevin McAleenan to undertake 'emergency surge operations' and immediately speed up the reassignment. CBP also has the authority to raise the number of redeployed personnel past 750, and will notify Nielsen if they plan to reassign more than 2,000 officers." • Newsmax also reported that DHS "will also 'immediately expand' a policy to return Central American migrants to Mexico as they wait for their asylum claims to be heard....That would be a dramatic expansion of the policy, dubbed the Migrant Protection Protocols, put in place in January. As of March 26, approximately 370 migrants had been returned to Mexico, a Mexican official told Reuters last week. Asked about the numbers, a DHS spokeswoman declined to confirm them and said the policy 'is still in the early stages of implementation.' The policy is aimed at curbing the flow of mostly Central American migrants trying to enter the United States. Trump administration officials say a system that allows asylum seekers to remain in the country for years while waiting for their cases to move through a backlogged immigration court system encourages illegal immigration." • The American Civil Liberties Union and other groups sued the Trump administration over the policy, claiming it violates US law. But, Newsmax states that : "Following a March 22 hearing on whether the program should be halted, US District Judge Richard Seeborg in San Francisco ordered both sides to submit further briefing on the question of whether or not the California court has jurisdiction to preside over the case, likely prolonging any decision on the policy." • • • WILL PRESIDENT TRUMP NAME AN IMMIGRATION 'CZAR' ?? On Monday, in a separate article, Newsmax reported that : "As he threatens to shut down the southern border, President Donald Trump is considering bringing on a 'border' or 'immigration czar' to coordinate immigration policies across various federal agencies, according to four people familiar with the discussions. Trump is weighing at least two potential candidates for the post : Former Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach and former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli -- two far-right conservatives with strong views on immigration, according to the people, who spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the conversations publicly." Kris Kobach previously served as vice chair of the President's election fraud commission, which was disbanded after many states refused to provide it with needed information and data. Cuccinelli, says Newsmax, "has advocated for denying citizenship to American-born children of parents living in the US illegally, limiting in-state tuition at public universities only to those who are citizens or legal residents, and allowing workers to file lawsuits when an employer knowingly hires someone living in the country illegally for taking a job from a 'law abiding competitor.' " • Thomas Homan, the former acting ICE director, has also been mentioned as a potential pick, people familiar with the talks told Newsmax. • • • OF COURSE THERE IS AN 'EMERGENCY' AT THE SOUTHERN BORDER. Patriot Post's Cal Thomas asked on Tuesday : "If Not an Emergency, What Is It?" Thomas wrote : "The flood tide of illegal immigrants crossing our southern border cannot and must not continue. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) has said of it, 'The system is broken and overwhelmed. It is a national emergency.' The definition of emergency might help focus attention : 'A sudden, urgent, usually unexpected occurrence or occasion requiring immediate action.' This is an issue that should command immediate congressional action. Graham told the Washington Times that virtually every immigrant entering the country illegally over the last six months has ignored deportation orders and failed to appear at court hearings. Graham said he got his information from Immigration and Customs Enforcement Acting Director Ron Vitiello. The Department of Homeland Security issued a press release last month warning that the situation at the border had reached a 'breaking point.' DHS reported that illegal immigration just hit a 12-year high, with more than 76,000 immigrants illegally crossing the border in February. Agents are overwhelmed, and no one in Congress seems concerned about the cost to local services and American citizens who are footing the bill." • And, Cal Thomas reminds us that : "More migrants are on the way. According to the UK‘s Daily Telegraph, Mexico’s interior secretary, Olga Sanchez Cordero, has warned 'the mother of all migrant caravans' is forming in Honduras. Sanchez Cordero said that the caravan includes about 20,000 migrants, and that another caravan of 2,500 migrants is currently heading north.' If these were members of a military force it would be called an invasion. President Trump has threatened to close the border 'or large sections of the border' this week if nothing is done to stem the tide. He should." • Here is what President Coolidge did, as told by Cal Thomas : "In 1921, during the Warren Harding administration, Congress decided the massive immigration that had occurred in the previous decade should be limited so that newcomers to America could be properly assimilated. During the Calvin Coolidge administration, Congress toughened that law, capping immigration at 2 percent of a country’s residents living in the United States. This lasted until the 1960s, when immigration laws became more liberal. According to the website u-s-history.com, “After July 1, 1927, the two percent rule was to be replaced by an overall cap of 150,000 immigrants annually...'College students, professors and ministers were exempted from the quotas. Initially immigration from the other Americas was allowed, but measures were quickly developed to deny legal entry to Mexican laborers. The clear aim of this law was to restrict the entry of immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe, while welcoming relatively large numbers of newcomers from Britain (and) Ireland.' Try this experiment to help focus on what America will become without proper border control. Take a glass of milk and begin pouring water into it. At first, the milk is diluted. If the pouring continues, the water will replace the milk. This is what is taking place along the border. It must be stopped or the America we have known and loved will be no more." • • • EVEN OBAMA DHS SECRETARY SAYS THERE IS A BORDER CRISIS. Patriot Post reported on Tuesday : "Illegal entry has been routinely called a non-crisis by much of the media and congressional Democrats. Even Jeh Johnson, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security under President Barack Obama, has called it that. Appearing on CBS last month, Johnson said : 'The facts are that illegal migration on our southern border is a fraction of what it used to be....But a security crisis per se? No. I would not characterize it that way. I think there is some fear-mongering going on.' HOWEVER, on Saturday Johnson said on Fox News’s Cavuto LIVE, 'By anyone’s definition, by any measure, right now we have a crisis at our southern border. According to the commissioner of [Customs and Border Protection], there were 4,000 apprehensions in one day alone this past week, and we’re on pace for 100,000 apprehensions on our southern border this month.' " • BizPac Review posted an article by Frieda Powers on Wednesday that states : "President Trump’s administration is pursuing an 'aggressive effort' in a crackdown on illegal immigration which Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said has reached the level of a 'Cat 5 hurricane disaster.' This crisis was likened to a catastrophic disaster by Nielson as she spoke with Fox News’ Tucker Carlson on Tuesday, on the situation along the southern US border. 'We are bringing all of the agencies together, we’re asking everybody to chip in,' Nielsen said on Tucker Carlson Tonight....Carlson questioned Nielsen about some of the administration’s plans, asking 'Why wouldn’t we put the US military along our border if it’s really a crisis of that magnitude?' 'I think we’re looking into that. We’ve made the request. I’m in constant contact with the acting Secretary of Defense. I talked to some of the combatant commanders today. We are in fact pushing more and more military resources to the border,' Nielsen replied. She also indicated that other options, such as signing an order to end 'birthright' citizenship and expanding the E-Verify system are under consideration. 'We have to stop the drugs. We have to stop the smuggling and trafficking gangs. He’s very serious about it, so yes, I think everything is on the table,' Nielsen said. • The President repeated his threat to close down the border this week, calling on Mexico to use its own 'strong' immigration laws in the effort to combat illegal immigration. And Mexican officials have sounded the alarm over the forming of another potential caravan of people from El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Venezuela, which they believe could reach about 20,000 in number. Trump also cut aid to El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala. 'We were paying them tremendous amounts of money. And we’re not paying them anymore. Because they haven’t done a thing for us. They set up these caravans,' he said. Trump’s renewed threat to shut down the southern border came as US Customs and Border Protection reported that March was on track to become 'the highest month' for border apprehensions in over a decade. 'We’re going to have a strong border, or we’re going to have a closed border,' Trump told reporters at the White House on Tuesday, according to Fox News. As the White House prepares for a possible shutdown of the border between the US and Mexico, there is also an ongoing effort to utilize the authorities in existing laws to more vigorously combat illegal immigration and legal immigration fraud, senior adviser Stephen Miller told The Daily Caller. 'There’s going to be an aggressive effort to utilize every existing authority in statute,' the senior advisor to the president said, pointing to existing immigration laws, such as the 1996 Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, which are being explored. The White House is 'systematically reviewing all authorities that are already on the books, both in terms of cracking down on illegal immigration and […] the abuse of our legal immigration system,' Miller said, such as immigrants who overstay their visas and 'combating or addressing legal benefit seeking in the legal immigration system.' Miller pointed out an existing statute in a law, mandating a 'significant financial penalty' for each day that an immigrant stays in the country after being ordered removed, as an example of executive action that can be taken by the Trump administration as it seeks to deal with about one million illegal immigrants at large in the US who have already been issued final removal orders. 'This law has been on the books for a very long time and has not been utilized. That’s the example of the kind of legal authority that already exists that is the kind of thing we can deploy to restore integrity to the immigration system,' Miller said. Though he did not specify a timeline for the roll-out of the more aggressive actions, Miller noted that 'this is going to begin right away.' With an eye on more assertively targeting abuses such as 'welfare seeking' by legal immigrants or 'welfare tourism,' Miller expounded on the goal which is to 'dramatically raise the pressure on Congress and, in particular, the congressional Democrats' to pass laws reforming the US immigration system. The latest push to more fervently target abuses comes after many actions already undertaken in the last two years and with more regulations that “are nearing their completion date,' Miller explained. 'Now that this crisis is upon us, it’s the time to take that effort to the next level,' he said. • • • KEEPING ASYLUM SEEKERS IN MEXICO. The Daily Caller reported on Wednesday that the Trump administration is expanding a program that boots asylum seekers back to Mexico : "Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen announced Monday she will be expanding the 'Migrant Protection Protocols' program, more popularly known as 'Remain in Mexico.' Nielsen, in a memo sent to the federal border chief, ordered Customs and Border Protection agents deployed on the US-Mexico border to begin reviewing hundreds of migrant cases a day to determine if they should be booted back to Mexico. "[The Department of Homeland Security] will require more migrants to wait in Mexico, with appropriate humanitarian protections, during their immigration proceedings to prevent fraud & ensure they don’t escape the law and disappear into the country,' Nielsen tweeted Monday. The 'Remain in Mexico' program, which started in late 2018, bars non-Mexican immigrants from immediately entering the US interior after claiming asylum at the US southern border. Instead, the policy mandates they wait in Mexico as their cases make their way through the immigration court system. The directive is aimed at the vast number of Central American migrants who have reached the US-Mexico border and lodged asylum claims. President Donald Trump has maintained many of the asylum claims are bogus and used simply as a means to enter the US. 'Remain in Mexico' has currently been confined to only several ports of entry in El Paso, Texas, and San Diego. However, the Homeland Security Secretary is now directing officers across the southern border to implement the more stringent program." • DHS Secretary Nielsen also asked lawmakers in a letter sent last Thursday to Congress to allow her department to quickly deport unaccompanied alien children from Central America. The rise in the numbers of families and unaccompanied minors attempting to cross the southern border has, according to Nielsen, overwhelmed existing US resources Neilsen wrote to Congress : "We are grappling with a humanitarian and security catastrophe that is worsening by the day, and the Department has run out of capacity, despite extraordinary intra-Departmental and interagency efforts. Accordingly, DHS requests immediate Congressional assistance to stabilize the situation.” • Patriot Post reported that Chris Farrell of Judicial Watch "visited Guatemala earlier this year to get a firsthand look at the first of several caravans headed toward our southern border. Patriot Post reported that : "Contrary to reports in the media and those who support unfettered immigration that the migrants were mostly women and children, Farrell observed that while there were women and children in the caravan, he estimated that between 90% and 95% of them were men 15 to 45 years old. The children, he said, were 'recovered from a human smuggling operation using the caravan as ‘cover.’ He said that it’s 'A highly organized, very elaborate and sophisticated orchestration,' not a sudden movement of thousands of people who just happened to all decide to travel north at the same time. It’s an 'organized group of people pushing a certain political agenda by a group called Pueblos Sin Fronteras being aided by hundreds of that organization’s workers.' This effort, he estimated, cost several millions of dollars for food, water, transportation, medical equipment, mobile hospitals, and child services, which reminded Farrell of a complex military operation. And while they did walk portions of the tremendous distance through Mexico, they primarily traveled on chartered tour buses. The media reports of the plight of the migrants say that 'they are trying to escape daily violence and daily threats. People are dying left and right. The conditions are extraordinarily dangerous.' Farrell interviewed some of the marchers. He started every interview with, 'Why are you coming to America?' 'They all said that their reason for joining the ‘caravan’ was economic,” he said. 'It was job driven. And then, someone would say, ‘Oh, yeah,...we’re also fleeing violence’ as an after-thought.' And then, Farrell asked the obvious question : 'Well, if things are so bad, why did you leave your family back home? Of course, they couldn’t answer that question,' he said." • • • TRUMP WHITE HOUSE STUDYING BORDER SHUTDOWN OPTIONS. TheHill reported on Tuesday that the White House is studying options to shut down southern border, but : " 'expressed hope the drastic move could be avoided. Eventually, it may be that it’s the best decision that we close the border,' White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters, while adding that 'this isn’t our first choice.' Sanders said President Trump 'is not working on a specific timeline' to decide whether to close down the border with Mexico, as he threatened to do last week. But she said the White House Council of Economic Advisors has begun studying the impacts of shuttering certain entry points in anticipation of briefing Trump on his options. 'We’re looking at all options when it comes to closing the different ports of entry,' she said." • President Trump’s threat to close down the US-Mexico border in order to stop illegal immigration has, according to TheHill, "sparked alarm from congressional Republicans and Democrats, who warned it could deal a serious blow to the US economy. Sanders said Trump 'certainly doesn’t want to hurt' economic growth, but added that his 'No. 1 job as president is to protect life, to protect Americans. Democrats are leaving us absolutely no choice at this point,' she said. But, congressional Democrats and some Republicans have blasted Trump’s proposals for addressing the growing number of migrants entering the US, including the border blockade and cutting off aid to Central American countries, as too extreme. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Tuesday called them 'two of the worst ideas' and said closing down the border 'is an applause line, not an idea.' That's the Guacamole-and-margarita crew at work. WH press secretary Sanders expressed hope the Mexican government would continue to apprehend migrants traveling from Central American countries and housing a certain number of people seeking asylum on the US on their side of the border 'so that we don’t have to' take drastic action." • Patriot Post states : "Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said on Fox News’ America’s Newsroom that his state cannot deal with the number of illegals entering it, and the same situation exists for other border states. The Los Angeles Times addressed the border shutdown in February : 'Fortunately for Trump, the law on immigration and related matters favors the President. Legal precedents have traditionally accorded the chief executive complete and nearly unchecked power to deny foreigners permission to enter the United States. The exclusion of aliens is a fundamental act of sovereignty...inherent in the executive power,' the Supreme Court said in 1950. And the [LA] Times added, 'Congress adopted a provision in 1952 saying the President ‘may by proclamation...suspend the entry of all aliens and any class of aliens as immigrants or non-immigrants’ whenever he thinks it ‘would be detrimental to the interests of the United States.’ That does not, however, preclude a block by an activist liberal judge." • • • WILL CONGRESS FINALLY ACT?? Patriot Post says : "Had Congress taken administration warnings seriously and acted to relieve the situation months ago, this crisis could have been resolved. Representative Henry Cuellar (D-TX) noted that in the heat of summer 'it’s going to be very, very dangerous in this part of the country to have young kids, women and other folks to come in.' Cuellar said, after speaking to Customs and Border Patrol agents, that he had discovered a disturbing trend of adults 'renting' children in Central America in order to increase their chances of being able to stay in the US once they cross over. • The Washington Times writes : "President Trump delivered an ultimatum to Congress on Tuesday, saying either lawmakers change immigration laws to stop the surge of illegal immigrants streaming north from Central America or he will take unilateral action to 'close' the border. The mere talk of such a move set alarms ringing among business groups, which said the economic consequences would be a disaster and would harm the same farmers and manufacturers already reeling from tariff battles. But Mr. Trump said he is willing to take the risk of deeper economic pain if it means stopping illegal immigration. 'Security is more important to me than trade,' he told reporters in the Oval Office. 'We’re going to have a strong border, or we’re going to have a closed border.' " • On Tuesday, DHS Secretary Neilsen announced the creation of a special "Interagency Border Emergency Cell' to coordinate the government’s efforts. She named 30-year Border Patrol Agent Manuel “Manny” Padilla to head the group and gave him use of the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s response center to use as an operations center. The goal, says the Washington Times, is to "try to change the incentive structure that is drawing Central Americans to make the trip in record numbers through Mexico and to the US. Mr. Trump said Mexico needs to do more, but he added that the nation’s southern neighbor has started arresting migrants in the thousands in the past few days." • BUT, the President has also targeted Congress, notes Patriot Post, "which he said must change the policies that allow illegal immigrants to game the US system and ensure that it takes years to try to deport them. By then, they have put down roots, disappeared into the shadows and ignored their deportation orders, analysts say. The President said he needs to see action by both Mexico and Congress. 'If they don’t, or if we don’t make a deal with Congress, the border’s going to be closed, 100 percent...We’re going to close the border. That’s going to be it. Or, we’re going to close large sections of the border, maybe not all of it. But, it’s the only way we’re getting a response, and I’m totally ready to do it.' " • The Washington Times states that : "Key members of Congress waved aside his ultimatum. 'The economic disaster to the country would be huge,' said Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, New York Democrat. 'My guess is cooler heads will prevail upon the president not to do it. It would be a disaster for him and for the country.' Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Kentucky Republican, also warned Mr. Trump about severe economic consequences. The National Association of Manufacturers said US farmers, manufacturers and other businesses would lose $726 million per day for every day the border is closed. The group said 1 million US manufacturing jobs 'would be immediately at risk' from shutting off cross-border commerce and another 3.3 million jobs related to exports would be endangered. The National Association of Manufacturers and the US Chamber of Commerce said the solution is a broad bill that would combine security with amnesty for millions of illegal immigrants -- and perhaps a new flow for guest workers. Asked about the potential economic impact, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said closing the border is 'not our first choice,” but she added that the President’s top priority is to protect lives. 'Democrats are leaving us absolutely no choice at this point,' Mrs. Sanders said. 'It may be that it’s the best decision that we close the border.' The Homeland Security official who briefed reporters said plans to close border crossings have been in place for years. 'The bottom line is all options are on the table right now,' the official said....White House economic advisor Larry Kudlow told CNBC that the administration is looking at ways to minimize economic pain and keep truck lanes open in the event of a border closure. But officials at the US Chamber of Commerce said that won’t help the 500,000 tourists, students, shoppers and others who cross the US-Mexico border each day, nor the stores, schools and other border businesses that rely on that commerce. 'The nature of the US-Mexico commercial relationship, it’s not just about goods being shipped on trucks or trains. It’s broader than that,' said Neil Bradley, executive vice president at the US Chamber of Commerce." • • • IS PRESIDENT TRUMP TARGETING BIG BUSINESS?? American Thinker editor Thomas Lifson thinks he is. On Tuesday, Lifson wrote : "Simply stated, at home, Trump wants big business, as embodied in the US Chamber of Commerce, to grasp that he will not allow them to continue to stonewall on open borders, targeting their donations to prevent any legal reform. Ever since NAFTA, huge investments have taken place predicted on the free movement of good across the border. Those investments are now held hostage by Trump’s threat. The implicit deal: either loudly and emphatically lobby for a simple revision to immigration law to allow asylum claimants to wait on the southern side of the border while their claims are adjudicated or endure a semi-catastrophic disruption. Trump knows that he has an excellent public case to make for this simple reform. With illegals now well aware that bringing along minors and an asylum claim guarantee admission to the USA, a hundred thousand a month are flooding in. The claims of a 'manufactured crisis' look silly. Even Jeh Johnson, Obama’s DHS secretary admits it is real. But with the C of C directing massive donations to Republicans to help sabotage reform, and to Democrats to stonewall it, no progress can be made. If Trump is able to carry out the threat and make it stick, the C of C and its big business constituents might well decide that a push for asylum claim reform is in their interest. Especially since the change in asylum reform would have minimal impact on the availability of laborers. The problem is with families and children....The unlimited flow of phony asylum seekers could easily bring millions of dependents -- not men willing and able to work as before, but dependents who need a lot of social services -- is an existential threat to our social order....Of course, there would be media attention to families 'torn apart by the border closure.' Stand by for comparisons to North Koreans cut off from the relatives in South Korea. But the human interest angle would be secondary to reports of layoffs as factories, cut off from parts and other supplies from Mexico, or factories sending their output to Mexico for final assembly that must shut down. The most serious headlines and pressure will be : 'Trump kills the economic recovery (that Obama started)' and the like. But with his credibility enhanced and that of his Democrat critics diminished, Trump already is thinking the unthinkable and may well gamble on doing it." • • • MITCH FEELS THE PRESIDENTIAL HEAT. BizPac Review's Samantha Chang said it on Wednesday : "Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell admits there is a serious illegal-immigration crisis at the US-Mexico border. However, he warned against the 'potentially catastrophic economic impact' if President Trump closed the border. 'We certainly have a crisis on the border,' McConnell told reporters. 'I think the President’s right about that. But closing down the border would have potentially catastrophic economic impact on our country. And I would hope we would not be doing that sort of thing.' ....The President was reacting to reports that another massive caravan -- this time an army of 20,000 illegal immigrants from Central America -- is marching to the US to demand entry. ‘Mother of all caravans’ 20,000 strong headed to US border, helpless officials brace for chaos, lawlessness https://t.co/B7tCGVs17g pic.twitter.com/dAqwKJoM6z — Conservative News (@BIZPACReview) March 30, 2019.'....Mitch McConnell got dragged on Twitter for his weak leadership and refusal to back President Trump once again." • Here are some of the tweets Samantha Chang noted : "Mitch McConnell : 'We can't fund the wall. We can't close the border. We can't repeal and replace Obamacare.' What CAN you do?" /// .” /// Put #Mitch #McConnell on the border. He won't let anything pass.#NoWall #FamiliesBelongTogether." • • • DEAR READERS, Patriot Post's Rich Lowry wrote on Tuesday : "When historians look back to this era, they will wonder why we insisted on outsourcing our border control to a foreign country. President Donald Trump’s threat to close down the southern border with Mexico isn’t a sign of strength, but of frustration fading into desperation. He is reacting with understandable alarm at a spiraling migrant crisis on the border, and is looking to Mexico to address it because we are unwilling to do it on our own -- not unable, unwilling....It’s not that border control has been tried and failed; it hasn’t been tried. Thanks to court decrees and congressional enactments, we don’t permit ourselves to quickly return minors from Central American countries, or to detain them for any significant period of time. They get released, along with the adults accompanying them. The asylum process is broken. The initial so-called credible-fear interview to determine whether asylum-seekers get to the next step of the process approves almost all of them, even if they are unlikely ultimately to win asylum. In the meantime, they are waved into the country and probably never removed. The migrants coming in increasing numbers realize that we are helpless to exclude them and, indeed, surrender to Border Patrol agents when they get here." • As Lowry states, "Congress could fix all this in an afternoon, with a few key changes in the law." BUT, the problem is Nancy Pelosi, "since Pelosi is unmovable, Trump has to try to work the Mexican president....Mexico has done more to play ball with the US under Trump than most people would have thought possible, yet all the migrants showing up at our border are still traveling through the country. Mexico doesn’t make controlling these migrants a high priority because they will end up here, not there. The talk of cutting off the border isn’t aimed at the migrants, who largely don’t come through ports of entry, but at forcing the Mexican government to do more. Maybe the mere threat of the resulting economic disruption will work. But if Trump goes through with closing the border, the strategy has some of the same weaknesses as the government shutdown earlier this year. Where does it end? If Mexico doesn’t act quickly, how long are we going to keep the border closed? The longer it’s closed, the more pain will be felt in the US economy at a time when there are already signs of softness. What if Mexico initially buckles, then backslides? Will we shut down the border again, or threaten to?" • As long as the Democrat Party sees open borders and unrestricted immigration into the US as a political plus for their candidates, Pelosi will do nothing to help stem the genuine crisis. President Trump will not shut down the entire border, but use strategic closures to force Congress, Mexico, and Central America to do what is right. The President will have to continue to sweet talk, cajole and bully Mexico to help, even as he shuts off the aid to Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador that lines the pockets of their socialist paradise leaders. In a United States where the Democrat Party actually put America first and tried to help it survive as a constitutional Republic, this would not be happening. Do not blame President Trump. He is the Dutch boy with his finger in the dyke. Blame the outrageously anti-American Democrat Party. The flood of illegal aliens crossing into the US suits their radical socialist-marxist plans for America just fine.

Democrat Brainlessness Can Be Wearying, Especially When They Are Losing

THE POST-MUELLER REPORT AFTERSHOCKS KEEP COMING. And, they are jolting more and more Collusion Delusion skeletons out of the Democrat closets. • • • SENATOR RAND PAUL BLOCKED DEMOCRAT RESOLUTION FOR RELEASE OF COMPLETE MUELLER REPORT. Gateway Pundit wrote last Friday that : "Senator Rand Paul blocked a resolution by Senate Democrats for the release of the Mueller Report. Paul also wants communications released of Crooked Obama officials who spied on candidate Trump including : John Brennan, Peter Strzok, Loretta Lynch and Bruce Ohr....arguing that Congress should also call for the release of communications and testimony from Obama-era officials. Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), who is one of several Democratic Senators running for President, tried to get unanimous consent for the Senate to pass the resolution, which cleared the House in a 420-0 vote earlier this month. 'We still have not seen the report. I have urged the Department of Justice to release the report, and the administration should not delay in producing the report to Congress,' Klobuchar said. But Paul objected because Klobuchar wouldn’t agree to amend the nonbinding resolution to include provisions calling for the public release of communications between several Obama-era officials including former President Obama, former FBI Director James Comey and former CIA Director John Brennan. 'We need to know was there malfeasance, was there misuse of power, did President Obama’s administration get involved in an election to infiltrate the Trump campaign to trap them?...We need to know that,' he said. 'What we need to discover and we do not yet know : Was President Obama involved?' ” • But, the House Democrats are determined to get their hands on the full Mueller Report. The Washington Post reported ooon Monday that : “The House Judiciary Committee plans to vote Wednesday to authorize subpoenas to obtain the full report of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, escalating a feud with the Justice Department over a lengthy document detailing findings about Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. Representative Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.), the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, on Monday announced plans for the panel’s vote, which would take place a day after a deadline the committee set for Attorney General William P. Barr to share the report. Barr pledged last week to release a redacted version by mid-April, well after Nadler’s deadline. Nadler’s committee is seeking to obtain the ‘full and complete report,’ which spans nearly 400 pages, as well as underlying evidence. ‘As I have made clear, Congress requires the full and complete Special Counsel report, without redactions, as well as access to the underlying evidence,’ Nadler said in a statement Monday, in which he urged Barr to reconsider meeting his Tuesday deadline.” • These frothing-at-the-mouth ProgDems ought to be careful what they wish for. • • • JUDICIAL WATCH IS GOING AFTER BRENNAN AND CLAPPER RECORDS. Liberty Headlines reported last Thursday that : "With the Mueller Report‘s debunked allegations of Russian collusion behind us, conservatives increasingly have sounded a drumbeat to hold accountable those responsible enough for the real misinformation campaign. Once again, Freedom of Information (FOIA) requests from the transparency / accountability guardians at Judicial Watch may be the catalyst that helps set it in motion. The salacious and since-discredited Steele Dossier lies at the center of a massive web of collusion, which likely enmeshed the Hillary Clinton campaign, intelligence community, White House, media outlets and the opposition research firm FusionGPS in a plot that itself may have been orchestrated by the Kremlin. And yet, all were willing participants due to the partisan, anti-Trump elements who were willing to cash in all ethical scruples in service of a higher mission : undermining the GOP President while deflecting from Clinton’s potentially criminal conduct." • Liberty Headlines says Judicial Watch is about to dig in to the records : "Judicial Watch announced a FOIA lawsuit on Wednesday seeking records of communication between the liberal CNN network and two Obama-era intelligence officials : former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and former CIA Director John Brennan. The two men, both of whom later became CNN analysts, are believed to have had a hand in leaking Steele Dossier to the network, it said in a press release. 'Judicial Watch is again in court trying to get the truth about the Obama gang illegal leaks and conspiracy targeting President Trump,' said its president, Tom Fitton. The organization’s previous FOIA lawsuits on Clinton’s role in covering up the 2012 embassy attacks in Benghazi, Libya -- just prior to President Barack Obama’s re-election -- uncovered perhaps an even greater conspiracy with the revelation in early 2015 that Clinton had maintained a private email server to dodge transparency laws. The hunt for the missing emails triggered a cursory FBI investigation that turned up little before being dismissed with no charges, but it also led Russian-backed agents to hack the servers of the Clinton campaign and DNC, where the published emails revealed a number of shady dealings. To deflect, Clinton sought help from the FBI and other intelligence bureaus in disseminating to the press a phony narrative that Trump was working with the Russians. Some, such as FBI Director James Comey, may have seen an ongoing investigation as the leverage needed to hold their position in the new administration." • Judicial Watch thinks : "Others, like Clapper and Brennan, may have had more subversive, partisan motives. 'Clapper and Brennan were key proponents of the big lie, exposed by the Mueller report, that President Trump colluded with the Russians,' Fitton said. 'Judicial Watch FOIA litigation is the best hope for getting full accountability on this attack on our constitutional Republic.' Brennan, whose attacks on Trump resulted last year in the revocation of his security clearance, is known to have lied previously to Congress about the collateral damage involved in drone warfare. Although he claimed that the Dossier had little bearing on investigations into Trump, subsequent reporting undercut his denials. Following the release of Mueller’s conclusions, he issued a mea culpa, declaring he must have been the recipient of bad intelligence. Reporting by the National Review in June 2018 revealed that not only was he a conduit for spreading the fake news to the media, but he also likely urged others to use it in their intelligence assessments, even while knowing that it had originated with the Clinton campaign. According to the National Review‘s Victor Davis Hanson, Brennan 'almost certainly did not tell the truth to Congress when he testified in answer to Representative Trey Gowdy’s questions that he neither knew who had commissioned the Steele Dossier nor had the CIA relied on its contents for any action.' " • During a lecture sponsored by Queens University, in Charlotte, NC, on Tuesday, Comey also hinted at the deeper motives of the intelligence heads when he recounted a story about an intelligence briefing with President Barack Obama shortly before the Dossier rumors hit the press. He said the discussion -- at which Brennan was also present -- included deliberations on whether to notify the new President–Elect about the sexual innuendo contained in the Dossier. Ultimately, Comey said, they decided to do so because 'one of the ways you undermine an adversary is to tell them you know all about it.' ” BUT, BlabberBuzz reported last week that : "US District Judge James Boasberg in Washington ordered the FBI to turn over Comey’s ‘Trump memos’ -- both clean and redacted versions by April 1st as he weighs releasing them to the public....Judicial Watch, CNN and other news outlets filed a FOIA lawsuit in an effort to make Comey’s Trump memos public. The FBI pushed back on March 1st and wrote to Judge Boasberg, an Obama appointee, saying that the memos were still redacted and classified and should remain under seal to avoid interfering with Mueller’s inquisition -- Mueller’s witch hunt ended a week ago so the judge is weighing the release of Comey’s memos. Judge Boasberg did not give a time frame when he’d decide whether to release the memos. Then-FBI Director James Comey penned 7 memos stemming from 9 conversations he had with President Trump. 4 out of 7 of the memos were considered to be classified, however, experts argued that all 7 of Comey’s memos are classified. Immediately after James Comey was fired by President Trump as FBI Director on May 9th, 2017, he gave portions of his memos to a friend to leak to the New York Times in order to prompt a special counsel investigation into President Trump. • The digging of Judicial Watch and others, such as conservative GOP Representatives Nunes, Meadows and Jordan, is inching us closer to the Obama White House and to President Obama himself. • • • OBAMA LIKES TLAIB AND THE NEW CROP OF DEMOCRAT ANTI-SEMITE ANTI-AMERICANS IN THE HOUSE. Ben Sellers of Liberty Headlines wrote on Friday : "In merely three months, new Democratic members of Congress have made the dialogue on Capitol Hill more hostile, wedge-based and radical. They have encouraged profanity and threatened removal of the President with no evidentiary basis. They have taken identity politics to a new level, launching anti-Semitic attacks into the Twittersphere and then claiming those who criticize them are Islamophobic. They have forced mainstream Democrats -- many from vulnerable, conservative districts -- to take a position on a vastly unrealistic, irresponsible and widely mocked proposal to spend $93 trillion on socialism-friendly environmental initiatives. Now, their Papa Bear, former President Barack Obama, has acknowledged he couldn’t be happier. Obama met with the more than 60 freshman Democrats on March 25 at an event organized by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, reported Newsweek. According to Representative Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich. -- whose outrageous conduct included her widely condemned vow to 'impeach the motherf***er' in reference to President Donald Trump -- Obama made a point of expressing his approval. '@BarackObama met with us new members of Congress and we had a thoughtful discussion about serving our country. The best part was when he looked straight at me and said, “I’m proud of you.” pic.twitter.com/cPDOth0B5i — Rashida Tlaib (@RashidaTlaib) March 28, 2019." • Meanwhile, Sellers reported that Obama tweeted : "It’s a young, diverse class, stocked with a bunch of my campaign and administration alums who’ve taken the torch. This group is going to be driving progress for a long time to come.” Sellers says the only caution Obama gave was "about passing radical proposals like the Green New Deal and Medicare for All without a logistical support plan. 'He said we shouldn’t be afraid of big, bold ideas -- but also need to think in the nitty-gritty about how those big, bold ideas will work and how you pay for them,' said an unnamed source who was present." • The longer Barack Obama is out of the White House, the more rumors and fact tidbits about his seeming anti-Semitism and pro-Islam positions emerge. And the more suspicious his actions and inactions with reference to Donald Trump -- candidate and President -- become. • Canada Free Press's Robert R. Owens wrote a week ago : "After 675 days of investigation, 2,800 subpoenas, 500 warrants, and 500 witness interviews here are a few things that never happened in the time-consuming, money-wasting, slanderous attempt to erase the results of the 2016 election known as the Mueller investigation : After endless speculation and daily smears Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner, and other people whose supposed legal jeopardy was the subject of around-the-clock media speculation in the last year were not indicted. No one in the Trump campaign or his inner circle was implicated or charged with conspiring with Russia to fix the 2016 election, as the media authoritatively claimed day-after-day throughout the last two years. The President was not subpoenaed though the almost hysterical pundits of the propaganda arm of the Democrat Party known as the drive-by media assured us he would be. Though endless hours of speculation centered on the President’s imminent firing of Mueller it never happened. The ceaseless attacks against President Trump disguised as news constantly told us the President obstructed justice by interfering with the Mueller investigation. However, in a letter to Congress, Attorney General Barr after mentioning he was required to notify lawmakers if any top Justice Department officials ever interfered with the Mueller investigation stated, 'There were no such instances.' Completing an investigation initiated by the CABAL in the Justice Department dedicated to reversing the outcome of the 2016 election, an investigation which did not meet the Justice Department’s own standard for appointing a Special Prosecutor, the presence of an underlying crime, Mueller is finally finished. Not long after the news broke, Fox News White House correspondent John Roberts said, 'The feeling at the White House right now is that this is finally over.'....Unfortunately....Mueller’s report not recommending any additional indictments doesn’t mean that the Democrats have given up on their eternal Trump-Russia investigation. Since those who knew there was nothing to this in the first place anticipated this possibility. This is why the House Democrats jump started new Trump-Russia investigations to ensure it will never be over. Does anyone doubt such investigations will continue, at least until the 2020 elections? In reality this has been and is government-funded media-fueled opposition research and Democrat campaigning for whichever socialist they eventually nominate....even the dying CNN, nest of the most outspoken of the so-called journalists suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome, had to admit this was a “Huge Victory for the President,” and that Trump was 'Vindicated.'....Their Commander Wolf Blitzer said, 'President Trump has won a huge victory.' Evan Pérez commented, 'He’s been vindicated by them.' The rabidly anti-Trump Gloria Borger agreed, 'And then he’s now vindicated, exactly.' She added, 'You know -- how do you manage that politically? I mean, we obviously can’t jump the gun here. We have to see what comes out from Barr, and what’s in the report. But if I’m at Mar-A-Lago with the President, as Pamela has been reporting, the lawyers are....that I would be very happy.'....Does anyone believe if the highly politicized Obama IRS of Commissioner Douglas Shulman and Lois Lerner had found any irregularities in Trump’s returns they wouldn’t have been leaked? Does anyone in the Democrat echo chamber media ever mention that Nancy Pelosi refuses to make her tax returns public?....Let’s hope there’re enough people who’ve swallowed the red pill, had the scales wiped from their eyes, and realize the entire Trump-Russia side show was designed to front for a silent coup and to cover up the only real colluding that took place in the 2016 election. Hillary colluding with DNC to rig the nomination process against Bernie. And Hillary’s campaign colluding with Fusion GPS who hired former British spy Christopher Steele to compile a 'Dossier' filled with fake news and garbage that was all dressed up by the FBI, taken to the FISA Court, and presented as a legitimate intelligence document. Let’s hope." • • • MUELLER : THE WATER BOY. American Thinker's Neil Braithwaite wrote last Thursday : "Make no mistake, the Robert Mueller who was heralded by Democrats and clueless Republicans is anything but upstanding and honest. Robert Mueller is an agent of the Deep State who was hand-picked by another Deep State operative, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. As special counsel, Robert Mueller became an integral part of the ongoing Deep State insurance policy to destroy and eventually impeach and unseat President Trump and provide cover for Hillary Clinton, the Obama administration and Deep State operatives in the FBI and DOJ. What’s shocking is that Mueller operated under a cloak of secrecy and protection provided by our own government....In a nutshell, Robert Mueller succeeded in putting President Trump and his Republican supporters in the untenable position of having to commend his work as special counsel because the report totally exonerated President Trump and his campaign of any collusion with the Russians. If you don’t believe this, just watch Senator Lindsey Graham’s press conference about Mueller’s report where he all but nominates Mueller for a Medal of Honor for his esteemed investigative work. However, the most crucial task for Mueller was to provide Democrats and the MSM with an arguable reason to continue their investigation and attack of President Trump in their quest for his impeachment. And Mueller did exactly that by deferring his judgment on any obstruction of justice charges against President Trump to Attorney General Barr. This worked like a charm because since AG Barr put out his summary of the Mueller report, almost every Democrat and MSM fake news outlet have been aggressively reporting that AG Barr is President Trump’s hand-picked operative and can’t possibly be trusted because he is doing Trump’s bidding. As a result, the Democrats and MSM can use whatever they can parse out of Mueller’s report to twist into an obstruction of justice charge against President Trump. So, there you have it. Robert Mueller has done his job and the deep-state insurance policy to destroy President Trump and provide cover for the deep-state is still very much in effect and will continue to be for as long as Donald Trump is President. • As a follow-up on this, National Review wrote on Monday about House Judiciary Committee Chairman Nadler’s New York Times op-ed that demands the full release of the entire Mueller report by tomorrow : "He never quite gets around to mentioning what’s holding up the release of the Mueller report, which is the need to remove information related to grand jury deliberations or other ongoing investigations that have been referred to other offices....there are good reasons why prosecutors generally don’t release grand jury information. In his letter to Congress, Attorney General William Barr specifically cited Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 6(e), which provides that government attorneys and the jurors themselves, among others, 'must not disclose a matter occurring before the grand jury.' Barr didn’t make this rule up, it’s not obscure or optional, and Nadler knows darn well about its importance. Barr stated in a letter to Nadler and the judiciary committee that the special counsel’s office is assisting in identifying portions that are grand-jury testimony or relate to ongoing investigations or prosecutions. But because the Democrats prefer a narrative of a sinister cover-up, Nadler just averts his eyes and pretends the rules on grand jury testimony don’t exist. Late last week we heard that Mueller’s report is more than 300 pages. Barr thinks he’ll have the redactions finished by the middle of this month. Maybe that strikes you as too much time, or too little time, or maybe it seems just right. But, if Barr had done as Nadler seems to want, and skipped the redaction process entirely, he would be violating federal law and perhaps lousing up other investigations and prosecutions of other federal law enforcement offices. (No doubt some House Democrats would probably want Barr removed from office for recklessly releasing grand-jury information.) The guys who claim to be standing for the rule of law are demanding that the law be violated....Separately, Nadler asks, '[Barr] declined to charge the President with obstruction in part because there was no underlying crime to obstruct. Did he discuss that conclusion with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein -- who, while a federal prosecutor, routinely charged individuals with obstruction without charging the underlying crime?” Right in Barr’s letter, it says : 'After reviewing the Special Counsel’s final report on these issues; consulting with Department officials, including the Office of Legal Counsel; and applying the principles of federal prosecution that guide our charging decisions, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and I have concluded that the evidence developed during the Special Counsel’s investigation is not sufficient to establish that the President committed an obstruction-of-justice offense.' Nadler closes his op-ed with a perfectly cynical statement that “if President Trump’s behavior wasn’t criminal, then perhaps it should have been.” Nadler is demanding the immediate release of the report...and he’s already decided what he concludes from its findings." • • • DEAR READERS, On Monday, UPI (US News) reported that : "House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerrold Nadler said Monday the committee will vote Wednesday whether to subpoena the full Mueller report without redactions....'Congress requires the full and complete special counsel report, without redactions, as well as access to the underlying evidence,' Nadler said in a statement. 'The full and complete report must be released to Congress without delay....Nadler said he's disturbed by the reluctance to release the report and asked Barr to join the panel in seeking a judge's approval to release all grand jury information from the investigation. In an op-ed for the New York Times Monday, Nadler called for the report to be made public." • The silliest comment -- and Representative Nadler makes many silly comments -- Chairman Nadler made was this : "Relying on Barr, a political appointee of Trump, to determine whether the President's campaign colluded with the Russians 'undermines the work and the integrity of his department.' " • Should we point out to Jerry Nadler -- who is, after all, chairman of the House JUDICIARY Committee -- that EVERY Attorney General ever appointed has been a "political appointee." The Constitution and federal law provide that the President will name the members of his cabinet -- the Attorney General is a Cabinet officer -- and the Senate's role is to concur or reject the President's "political appointees." • It is wearying sometimes, isn't it??

Socialism, the Radical American Democrat Party, and the Wealth of Their Elites

JUST WHAT IS SOCIALISM ??? We all use the term every day to describe what we don't like about what the Democrat Party is trying to do with America. What do we mean? Merriam-Webster defines "socialism" as : "1 : any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods. 2a : a system of society or group living in which there is no private property. : b a system or condition of society in which the means of production are owned and controlled by the state. 3 : a stage of society in Marxist theory transitional between capitalism and communism and distinguished by unequal distribution of goods and pay according to work done." • In America, Democrats like to talk about "democratic socialism," which Merriam-Webster defines as a type of "social democracy" : "1 : a political movement advocating a gradual and peaceful transition from capitalism to socialism by democratic means 2 : a democratic welfare state that incorporates both capitalist and socialist practices." • In fact, any form of socialism rests on the belief that the government should control the means of production and the workers who do the producing. So, it tends to move toward communism in the sense that under communism there is no private property and all means of production and workers are the property of the state. • Compare this with "liberal democracy," which operates under the principles of liberalism -- the word once meant traditional free-market conservatism, but its popular meaning has shifted dramatically to the Left. Traditionally, "liberalism" meant protecting the rights of the individual, generally enshrined in law, officially recognized, and protected, and in which the exercise of political power is limited by the rule of law and power is transferred by the vote of citizens. • • • THE RESULTS OF SOCIALISM IN EUROPE. Money and Markets posted an article by JT Crowe last Thursday with the title "France Is the Socialist Future All Americans Should Dread." Crowe says : "Socialism always fails, and a lot of time is being spent these days trying to explain to a generation of young voters why that is always the case. Not only does socialism fail from an economic standpoint, but oftentimes it also is a source of pain and oppression for the masses. And yet here we are, with Senator Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and those among the far left making socialism more acceptable and even chic in some circles....An August Gallup poll even showed that Democrats are more positive about socialism than capitalism. When hearing so much talk about how awful Venezuela and Cuba are, how is this possible?" • Crowe uses the European models provided by The American Institute for Economic Research -- the Cuban Model, the Swedish Model, and the French Model. • Explaining the Cuban Model, Crowe says that younger Americans don't understand "how Venezuela and Cuba ended up being such horrible places (in some cases, we even have to explain that yes, indeed, these are horrible places). Until Venezuela was in the news on a regular basis because of the approach of its people toward starvation...there were plenty of intellectuals praising the system. And let’s not forget the praises or lack of condemnation for the oppressive regime that is Cuba coming from many world leaders after Fidel Castro finally died." • The Swedish Model probably pleases Sanders, says Crowe, "because when they talk about socialism, they aren’t talking about expropriating property rights, nationalizing all businesses, or eliminating all but one -- the state’s -- television channel. They aren’t talking about Venezuela or Cuba. Instead, they are talking about Denmark and Sweden....It is true that Sanders and his people fail to understand that socialism exists on a spectrum. On one side you have the dictatorships, while on the other side you have the social democracies. Both sides of the spectrum use oppression and compulsory taxation to achieve their goals. But the degree to which they do so varies a great deal....No one seriously ever thinks of French president Emmanuel Macron as a despot (even though his own people happen to call him tyrannical on a regular basis) in spite of the gigantic size of the French state and the enormous amount of taxes extracted by the regime....Yet, it is also true that all varieties of socialism fail to achieve their goals for the same reason: All varieties attempt, to one degree or another, to substitute the decisions of government planners for those of private citizens interacting in competitive markets. And in doing so, all varieties of socialism suffer from the insurmountable knowledge problem." • The French Model. Crowe states : "What Sanders and AOC actually have in mind is a regime more like that of France. When Sweden and Denmark each had in place a regime closer to what Sanders is talking about, the results were so bad that each of these countries put in place pretty dramatic free-market reforms. These two countries are by no means libertarian paradises, but thanks to large spending cuts and lower taxes, they aren’t the hot mess that they once were. France is, though, such a mess. That’s because there is one aspect in particular that the AOCs and Sanderses of the world fail to mention to their followers... : All of the goodies that they believe the American people are entitled to receive in fact come at a great cost -- and so the only way to pay for these goodies is with oppressive and regressive taxes (i.e., taxes heaped on to the backs of the middle class and the poor). France was once a role model for what big government can do for its people. But it has become an embarrassing example since 'The Gilets Jaunes' took to the streets to demonstrate against the insane amount of taxes they pay. These guys aren’t upper class. They are the people who have until now supported the policies that are inevitable when you have the government providing so many services and involved so deeply in so much of the economy." • JT Crowe quotes the Wall Street Journal on taxes : "The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) released its annual Revenue Statistics report this week, and France topped the charts, with a tax take equal to 46.2% of GDP in 2017. That’s more than Denmark (46%), Sweden (44%) and Germany (37.5%), and far more than the OECD average (34.2%) or the US (27.1%, which includes all levels of government). France doesn’t collect that revenue in the ways you might think. Despite the stereotype of heavy European income taxes on the rich, Paris relies disproportionately on social-insurance, payroll and property taxes. Social taxes account for 37% of French revenue; the OECD average is 26%. Payroll and property taxes contribute 3% and 9%, compared to the OECD averages of 1% and 6%." Crowe adds : "As a reminder, the payroll tax is very regressive; it consumes a larger share of low and middle class earners than rich people. In addition : Then Europe adds a regressive consumption tax, the value-added tax. In France, VAT and other consumption taxes make up 24% of revenue, and that’s on the low side compared to an OECD average of 33%. Consumption taxes often fall hardest on the poor and middle class, who devote a greater proportion of their income to consumption. To be sure, the spending is also more regressive in France in that the biggest share goes to the middle and low-income earners. But it is a stupid system in which you tax one group to redistribute to that same group." • For JT Crowe, the bottom line is this : "All those people in America who currently fall for the socialism soup that AOC and Sanders are selling need to realize that if their dream came to pass, they, not the rich -- not the bankers and politicians -- will be ones suffering the most from the high taxes, high unemployment, and slow growth that go hand in hand with the level of public spending they want. Everyone would suffer, of course. But those who will be screwed the most are definitely those at the bottom." • • • SOCIALISM AND THE "ELITES." Nathan Bryant says in Medium : "Socialism itself is elitist. It does not eliminate the upper class -- to the contrary, it just increases its exclusivity....Only an exceptionally elite class of perhaps a few hundred government bureaucrats has access to the very best of everything." • The Daily Bell published an editorial titled "A Note on Socialism as Elitism," by Tibor Machan on January 03, 2013. Machan made the point that "...free people tend at times to overrate the work and products of their fellows....The suggestion advanced in turn is that we should have a central governing body of people who will make certain that such mistakes do not happen -- even if it takes the use of firing squads to accomplish this noble result....The body of select people is no less a body of people than the body of people that makes up the free market place!....We are asked to believe that some people are inherently different from the rest of us. We are told that the select group -- the leaders of socialist/egalitarian governments via their schemes of distribution and equalization -- is immune from the errors of the rest of us. That the likes of Ralph Nader, Chuck Schumer, Joe Biden, et al., are really inherently better and wiser folk than are we all is what the citizenry is supposed to accept! The conclusion is interesting. Because starting from a desire for equality -- fair pricing, lessening the frequency of over- and underestimation of work, etc. -- we are led to the establishment of public policies that grant some people the legalized position of institutionalizing their (elitist) errors....The simple fact is -- known since the time of Thomas Aquinas -- that we are best off taking the risk with the free market. The 'utopian vision' of perfect judgments needs to be abandoned. We should all try to implement the best judgments we can make, at least within our own market activities, and maybe even in cases where our help is asked for or freely accepted. It is futile to argue that market decisions could not be better than they are. But it is far sillier to hold that institutionalizing the will of some of us can produce a guaranteed utopia. In that path lies disaster -- and we are now tasting its beginnings in our own land. You don’t have to play by the rules of the corrupt politicians, manipulative media, and brainwashed peers." • In saying that governmental elites cannot do better than, or as well as, the free market, Machan is also driving home the truth that the notion of elites making choices for an economy or social system stems from the belief of those elites themselves that they really are a superior class, that they know better than we do what is rigfht for us as a society and nation. In the past in America, we called them Democrats, and they have now morphed into radical socialist-marxist Democrats. • • • SOCIALIST-DEMOCRAT ELITISM IN AMERICA. Let's make the story of socialist elitism a little more personal for Americans. It begins by recognizing that the Democrat elites have for many years felt no compunction in using their elevated political status for personal financial gain. The current college entry scam is merely the latest version of it. For some time, we have been reading about the children of the Democrat elites doing VERY well VERY early in their careers -- many of us would say suspiciously well and suspiciously early. • But, one example stands out, although the mainstream media has rarely touched the story. • The New York Post, on March 15, 2018, published an article by Peter Schweizer titled "Inside the shady private equity firm run by Kerry and Biden’s kids." In the article, Schweizer discussed the little-noticed private equity firm run by the sons of Democrats Joe Biden and John Kerry, as detailed in the NYPost's exclusive first excerpt of "Secret Empires." • Schweizer states : "Joe Biden and John Kerry have been pillars of the Washington establishment for more than 30 years. Biden is one of the most popular politicians in our nation’s capital....As he reminds the American people on regular occasions, he has little wealth to show for his career, despite having reached the vice presidency. One of his closest political allies in Washington is former Senator and former Secretary of State John Kerry. 'Lunch Bucket Joe' he ain’t; Kerry is more patrician than earthy. But the two men became close while serving for several decades together in the US Senate....So their sons going into business together in June 2009 was not exactly a bolt out of the blue. But with whom their sons cut lucrative deals while the elder two were steering the ship of state is more of a surprise." • Here are the details, as told by Schweizer : "What Hunter Biden, the son of America’s vice president, and Christopher Heinz, the stepson of the chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations (later to be Secretary of State), were creating was an international private equity firm. It was anchored by the Heinz family alternative investment fund, Rosemont Capital. The new firm would be populated by political loyalists and positioned to strike profitable deals overseas with foreign governments and officials with whom the US government was negotiating." • Schweizer explains the operation : "Hunter Biden, Vice President Joe Biden’s youngest son, had gone through a series of jobs since graduating from Yale Law School in 1996, including the hedge-fund business. By the summer of 2009, the 39-year-old Hunter joined forces with the son of another powerful figure in American politics, Chris Heinz. Senator John Heinz of Pennsylvania had tragically died in a 1991 airplane crash when Chris was 18. Chris, his brothers, and his mother inherited a large chunk of the family’s vast ketchup fortune, including a network of investment funds and a Pennsylvania estate, among other properties. In May 1995, his mother, Teresa, married Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts. That same year, Chris graduated from Yale, and then went on to get his MBA from Harvard Business School. Joining them in the Rosemont venture was Devon Archer, a longtime Heinz and Kerry friend. The three friends established a series of related LLCs. The trunk of the tree was Rosemont Capital, the alternative investment fund of the Heinz Family Office. Rosemont Farm is the name of the Heinz family’s 90-acre estate outside Fox Chapel, Pennsylvania. The small fund grew quickly. According to an email revealed as part of a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation, Rosemont described themselves as 'a $2.4 billion private equity firm co-owned by Hunter Biden and Chris Heinz,' with Devon Archer as 'Managing Partner.' The partners attached several branches to the Rosemont Capital trunk, including Rosemont Seneca Partners, LLC, Rosemont Seneca Technology Partners, and Rosemont Realty. Of the various deals in which these Rosemont entities were involved, one of the largest and most troubling concerns was Rosemont Seneca Partners [NOTE that Canada Free Press states that Chris Heinz was not a managing partner of Seneca Partners**]." • Schweizer tells us : "Rather than set up shop in New York City, the financial capital of the world, Rosemont Seneca leased space in Washington, DC. They occupied an all-brick building on Wisconsin Avenue, the main thoroughfare of exclusive Georgetown....less than a mile from John and Teresa Kerry’s 23-room Georgetown mansion, and just two miles from both Joe Biden’s office in the White House and his residence at the Naval Observatory. Over the next seven years, as both Joe Biden and John Kerry negotiated sensitive and high-stakes deals with foreign governments, Rosemont entities secured a series of exclusive deals often with those same foreign governments. Some of the deals they secured may remain hidden. These Rosemont entities are, after all, within a private equity firm and as such are not required to report or disclose their financial dealings publicly. Some of their transactions are nevertheless traceable by investigating world capital markets. A troubling pattern emerges from this research, showing how profitable deals were struck with foreign governments on the heels of crucial diplomatic missions carried out by their powerful fathers. Often those foreign entities gained favorable policy actions from the United States government just as the sons were securing favorable financial deals from those same entities." • Schweizer used China as his main example : "Rosemont Seneca joined forces in doing business in China with another politically connected consultancy called the Thornton Group. The Massachusetts-based firm is headed by James Bulger, the nephew of the notorious mob hitman James 'Whitey' Bulger. Whitey was the leader of the Winter Hill Gang, part of the South Boston mafia....James Bulger’s father, Whitey’s younger brother, Billy Bulger, serves on the board of directors of the Thornton Group. He was the longtime leader of the Massachusetts state Senate and, with their long overlap by state and by party, a political ally of Massachusetts Senator John Kerry. Less than a year after opening Rosemont Seneca’s doors, Hunter Biden and Devon Archer were in China, having secured access at the highest levels. Thornton Group’s account of the meeting on their Chinese-language website was telling : Chinese executives 'extended their warm welcome' to the Thornton Group, with its US partner Rosemont Seneca chairman Hunter Biden (second son of the now Vice President Joe Biden).' The purpose of the meetings was to 'explore the possibility of commercial cooperation and opportunity.' Curiously, details about the meeting do not appear on their English-language website. Also, according to the Thornton Group, the three Americans met with the largest and most powerful government fund leaders in China -- even though Rosemont was both new and small. The timing of this meeting was also curious. It occurred just hours before Hunter Biden’s father, the vice president, met with Chinese President Hu in Washington as part of the Nuclear Security Summit." • Schweizer stated : "There was a second known meeting with many of the same Chinese financial titans in Taiwan in May 2011. For a small firm like Rosemont Seneca with no track record, it was an impressive level of access to China’s largest financial players. And it was just two weeks after Joe Biden had opened up the US-China strategic dialogue with Chinese officials in Washington. On one of the first days of December 2013, Hunter Biden was jetting across the Pacific Ocean aboard Air Force Two with his father and daughter Finnegan. The vice president was heading to Asia on an extended official trip....it was the visit to China that had the most potential to generate conflict and controversy....For Hunter Biden, the trip coincided with a major deal that Rosemont Seneca was striking with the state-owned Bank of China....Vice President Biden, Hunter Biden and Finnegan arrived to a red carpet and a delegation of Chinese officials. Greeted by Chinese children carrying flowers, the delegation was then whisked to a meeting with Vice President Li Yuanchao and talks with President Xi Jinping. Hunter and Finnegan Biden joined the vice president for tea with US Ambassador Gary Locke....What was not reported was the deal that Hunter was securing. Rosemont Seneca Partners** had been negotiating an exclusive deal with Chinese officials, which they signed approximately 10 days after Hunter visited China with his father. The most powerful financial institution in China, the government’s Bank of China, was setting up a joint venture with Rosemont Seneca....The Bank of China is an enormously powerful financial institution....The Bank of China is government-owned, which means that its role as a bank blurs into its role as a tool of the government. The Bank of China provides capital for 'China’s economic statecraft,' as scholar James Reilly puts it. Bank loans and deals often occur within the context of a government goal. Rosemont Seneca and the Bank of China created a $1 billion investment fund called Bohai Harvest RST (BHR), a name that reflected who was involved. Bohai (or Bo Hai), the innermost gulf of the Yellow Sea, was a reference to the Chinese stake in the company. The 'RS' referred to Rosemont Seneca. The 'T' was Thornton. The fund enjoyed an unusual and special status in China. BHR touted its 'unique Sino-US shareholding structure' and 'the global resources and network' that allowed it to secure investment 'opportunities.' Funds were backed by the Chinese government. In short, the Chinese government was literally funding a business that it co-owned along with the sons of two of America’s most powerful decision makers....In 2015, BHR joined forces with the automotive subsidiary of the Chinese state-owned military aviation contractor Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC) to buy American 'dual-use' parts manufacturer Henniges. AVIC is a major military contractor in China. It operates 'under the direct control of the State Council' and produces a wide array of fighter and bomber aircraft, transports, and drones -- primarily designed to compete with the United States. The company also has a long history of stealing Western technology and applying it to military systems. The year before BHR joined with AVIC, the Wall Street Journal reported that the aviation company had stolen technologies related to the US F-35 stealth fighter and incorporated them in their own stealth fighter, the J-31. AVIC has also been accused of stealing US drone systems and using them to produce their own. In September 2015, when AVIC bought 51% of American precision-parts manufacturer Henniges, the other 49% was purchased by the Biden-and-Kerry-linked BHR." • AND, Canada Free Press took the story further in an April 11, 2018, article titled "Biden's Nepotism and Hypocrisy in Ukraine," written by James A. Lyons, Jr., Admiral, USN (ret). Admiral Lyons notes : "It would be hard to name another sitting vice president whose reckless nepotism impacted another country, as Biden did with Ukraine. Vice President Biden routinely complained about 'backsliding' over Ukraine’s fight against corruption, while at the same time, his son, Hunter, with no background in the gas industry, earned a huge salary as a consultant to gas mogul Mykola Zlochevsky’s Burisma Holdings, which is mired in allegations of corruption. This example of nepotism is, as reported in the Washington Post, a problem for US soft power as Hunter Biden’s appointment 'looks nepotistic at best, nefarious at worst.'....Prior to Burisma, Hunter Biden teamed up with his Yale roommate, Devon Archer to create Rosemont Capital and Rosemont Seneca. Their first forays were in China, including in a nuclear company under FBI investigation. But the good times did not last, as Archer was charged in May 2016 with 'conspiracy to commit securities fraud' against Native Americans....Author Oliver Bullough asked in The Guardian : 'Hunter Biden is an undistinguished corporate lawyer, with no previous Ukraine experience. Why would a Ukrainian tycoon hire him?' It would be duplicitous to deny there was a link between Biden and his son in Burisma. There cannot be any reason other than that his father was vice president as to why Hunter Biden was hired in April 2014, only two months after the success of the Euromaidan Revolution....Burisma is the third largest gas producer in Ukraine, controlling a quarter of private gas production. Nevertheless, it is not viewed by the Ukrainian government as a legitimate gas company. Meanwhile, Burisma’s close ties to oligarch Igor Kolomoisky place it beyond the pale for President Poroshenko, who clashed with the tycoon after he brought armed paramilitary thugs into downtown Kiev. The entangled web of Biden and son in Ukraine’s corruption is made more curious by the coincidence of dates when Biden visited Ukraine. During one of those visits in early 2016, a criminal investigation into stolen IMF credits to the tune of $1.8 billion was closed down by Ukraine’s prosecutor’s office. This $1.8 billion was only a part of the $5.5 billion reportedly laundered by Kolomoisky through PrivatBank over a ten-year period. The massive fraud uncovered by a Kroll Associates investigation was launched at the request of President Poroshenko." • MRC NewsBusters brought the Hunter Biden story up to date in a March 21, 2019, article by Ryan Foley, who reports that : "On Wednesday's Ingraham Angle, host Laura Ingraham covered the paperback release of a book written by Peter Schweizer that revealed 'that a private equity firm managed by the son of former Vice President Biden struck a deal with China’s state-owned bank in 2013 at the same time that Biden was in the country to meet with President Xi Jinping.' Not surprisingly, the rest of the media did not share her interest in covering this story. Ingraham interviewed Schweizer, who explained that Vice President Biden’s son Hunter Biden travelled to China with his father in December 2013 before mentioning that ten days after they returned from the trip, 'Hunter Biden’s small private equity firm called Rosemont Seneca Partners gets a $1 billion private equity deal with the Chinese government, not with the Chinese corporations, with the Chinese government.' After highlighting how Biden went 'soft on Beijing' following his overseas trip, Schweizer accused China of 'buying off Biden through his son.' " • Schweizer told Ingraham that "the trial of Biden’s business partner enabled him to gain access to the financial records of Rosemont Seneca Bohai, a 'pass-through' [entities with US tax 'pass throughs' to their principals] where most of the money ended up going to the former Vice President’s son." Schweizer proceeded to outline in detail “the money going into the account,” which included “$3.1 million from corrupt Ukrainian oligarchs,” “$1 million from the Chinese,” “moneys from a Kazak oligarch, and “$1.2 million from some LLC from a Swiss bank that’s been implicated in money laundering.” • Ingraham pointed out, as reported by Foley, "that the media and the left have spent the past two years accusing President Trump of being bought off by the Russians and yet the same media haven't shown the same interest in the Biden family’s ties to China and other shady foreign government officials. Ingraham concluded the segment by noting the “stunning lack of curiosity on the part of CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS, Washington Post, New York Times.” Based on the media’s almost cheerleader-like coverage of Biden’s possible presidential run, it makes perfect sense why this story "just gets buried,” as Ingraham put it. • • • DEAR READERS, Democrat socialist Elites ??? We know about the stories that made the internet media about Senator Feinstein's ties to China. An April, 2018, Politico exposé reported : "According to four former intelligence officials, in the 2000s, a staffer in Senator Dianne Feinstein’s San Francisco field office was reporting back to the MSS [China’s Ministry of State Security, its intelligence and security apparatus]. While this person, who was a liaison to the local Chinese community, was fired, charges were never filed against him. (One former official reasoned this was because the staffer was providing political intelligence and not classified information -- making prosecution far more difficult.) The suspected informant was ‘run’ by officials based at China’s San Francisco Consulate, said another former intelligence official. The spy’s handler ‘probably got an award back in China’ for his work, noted this former official, dryly." In 1979, reports The Federalist : "Feinstein, then mayor of San Francisco, established a 'sister city' relationship with Shanghai, one of the earliest and most robust such relationships in US-China history. Soon after, Feinstein led a mayoral delegation to China joined by her husband, investor Richard Blum, a trip they took together many times over the ensuing years as the relationship between both Feinsteins and China grew. During the 1980s, as mayor of San Francisco, Feinstein developed a close friendship with Shanghai Mayor Jiang Zemin. This substantially enhanced Feinstein’s foreign policy profile, and created an important linkage to the US government for China’s Communist Party (CCP). Just as Feinstein rose to a prominent position in foreign affairs and national security in the US Senate, first on the Foreign Relations Committee and later as chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Jiang rose to the top of Chinese leadership, serving as chairman of the Central Military Commission, general secretary of the CCP, and president of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Under Jiang’s leadership, the PRC initiated a brutal crackdown against practitioners of Falun Gong, including mass imprisonments, beatings, torture, rape, organ harvesting, and murder, and engaging in alleged human rights atrocities against Tibetans. Feinstein never renounced her friendship with Jiang, in spite of these acts. Feinstein and Jiang reportedly visited each other regularly in the 1980s, with Jiang once spending Thanksgiving in San Francisco with Feinstein and her husband....In 1986, Feinstein and Jiang designated several corporate entities for fostering commercial relations, one named Shanghai Pacific Partners. Feinstein’s husband served as a director. His financial position was relatively small, less than $500,000 on one project, the only such position in China the Feinstein family held when Feinstein entered the Senate in 1992. ‘They said that Feinstein’s consistent support for China’s interests cannot help but benefit her husband’s efforts to earn profits there.’ That project, however, which Blum’s firm participated in alongside PRC state-run Shanghai Investment Trust Corp., was one of the first joint ventures between San Francisco and Chinese investors, reportedly 'cited by Chinese officials as a testament to the friendly business ties between Shanghai and San Francisco that Feinstein had initiated.' Subsequently Blum’s investments in the Middle Kingdom mushroomed. In May 1993, Feinstein expressed her strong support on the Senate floor for continued trading with China. Contemporaneously, her husband was seeking to raise up to $150 million from investors, including himself, for a variety of Chinese enterprises. In August 1993, Feinstein and her husband visited Beijing for extensive meetings with Chinese leaders at President Jiang’s invitation. As the Los Angeles Times reported in a 1994 exposé on Feinstein’s husband’s business ties and the potential conflict of interests they presented : 'Such encounters are fondly remembered when deals are clinched back in China, according to American experts in Chinese business practices. They said that Feinstein’s consistent support for China’s interests cannot help but benefit her husband’s efforts to earn profits there.'....under his Newbridge Capital investment company...the fund invested in several state-owned and Chinese government-linked businesses. Blum’s firm’s largest holding -- at the time his China investments began to draw scrutiny in 1997 -- was its stake in Northwest Airlines. The then-estimated $300 million position was poised to significantly appreciate in value, as Northwest happened to be the sole airline operator providing nonstop service from the United States to any city in China. When questioned on his China investments, Blum pledged to donate future profits from the holdings to his nonprofit foundation to help Tibetan refugees, thereby 'remov[ing] any perception that I, in any way, shape or form benefit from or influence my wife’s position on China as a US Senator.' But these conflict of interest issues persisted....In 2004, Newbridge Capital purchased an 18% stake in Shenzhen Development Bank, the first time a foreign company took effective control of a Chinese lender. From 2001 to 2005, Feinstein served as chair of the Senate Military Construction Appropriations Committee. During this time, defense companies in which Blum’s firms were invested signed billions of dollars in military contracts approved by Feinstein’s committee. This suggests a parallel pattern in the Feinstein family’s political and business dealings that adversaries like China surely could have sought to exploit. When pressed on conflicts of interest, however, on multiple occasions Feinstein has flippantly responded by rhetorically asking what she could do to satisfy those raising the issue, short of getting divorced....Few American officials could have been as potentially exposed to the PRC’s skilled intelligence service as Feinstein. Here we have not only proof of a spy, but real evidence of consistently pro-Chinese policy that at very best created the appearance of a financial conflict of interest." • The Democrat Socialist Elites exist, and they profit from their positions. But, their propagandist mainstream media will continue to make it difficult for ordinary Americans to have the facts about them and their politically-acquired personal wealth.