- Reuters interviewed Donald Trump and asked him about Donald Trump Jr.’s meeting with a Russian lawyer who promised dirt on Hillary Clinton. Trump said, “I think many people would have held that meeting.” The wrong sort of people would have held that meeting, which is the problem.
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The Associated Press believes Donald Trump has a made-up friend in Paris named Jim:
The way Trump tells it — Jim is a friend who loves Paris and used to visit every year. Yet when Trump travels to the city Thursday for his first time as president, it’s unlikely that Jim will tag along. Jim doesn’t go to Paris anymore. Trump says that’s because the city has been infiltrated by foreign extremists.
Whether Jim exists is unclear. Trump has never given his last name. The White House has not responded to a request for comment about who Jim is or whether he will be on the trip.
- The Senate parliamentarian ruled in Republicans’ favor on using reconciliation to pass the House’s ObamaCare “reform” bill.
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The State Department approved the sale of seven Patriot missile systems to Romania.
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Oregon’s legislature passed a bill making abortion free, both for residents and non-residents. Governor Kate Brown is expected to sign the bill — she’s a former abortion lobbyist.
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A Dallas County, Texas grand jury indicted Miguel Hernandez on a charge of illegal voting during May’s election:
He’s accused of visiting a woman in April and collecting her blank absentee ballot, then filling it out and forging her signature before mailing it to the county. Dozens of senior citizens in West Dallas and Grand Prairie filed complaints about receiving mail-in ballots they had not requested.
- Helen Raleigh explains why China’s government is afraid of dissident Liu Xiaobo even though he’s on his deathbed from liver cancer:
Since 1989, Chinese authorities have punished Liu for his various pro-democracy activities by putting him in prison several times. In 2008, modeled after Czechoslovakia’s Charter 77, Liu co-authored Charter 08, a manifesto calling for Chinese government to implement things Americans have taken for granted, such as freedom of expression, an independent judiciary, and freedom of association. Liu was promptly arrested and later sentenced to 11 years in prison. He has been in prison ever since.
What China didn’t expect was that its repression probably helped turn Liu into an internationally renowned political activist. In 2010, Norway’s Nobel committee awarded Liu the Nobel Peace Prize. Beijing was so furious, it froze diplomatic ties with Norway and heavily censored any Nobel-related news that year.
Liu was the first Chinese citizen to win a Nobel Prize, but he wasn’t allowed to claim it and his wife has since been put under house arrest. The picture of an empty chair representing him at the Nobel Prize ceremony is as iconic an image as the photo of the “tank man.” Both symbolize the Chinese people’s struggle for freedom.
Later:
The news of Liu’s illness has renewed people’s interest in him and brought back discussions of his work, his struggle, and the part of China’s history that the government still eagerly suppresses. Liu’s ailing picture has cast a long shadow on China’s painstakingly crafted image of a benevolent and progressive global leader. Liu said before that he hoped he “will be the last victim of China’s endless literary inquisitions and that from now on no one will be incriminated because of speech.” Unfortunately, Liu won’t be China’s last sacrificial lamb. China today is less free than back in the 1980s, and the fight for freedom goes on, only becoming more difficult.
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China dispatched troops to its first overseas naval base, which is in Djibouti.
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Former Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva was convicted of corruption charges and sentenced to nine and a half years in prison. He’ll appeal the conviction.
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The New York Times published photos of what’s left of Mosul after ISIS was (largely) driven from the city.
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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan won’t end the state of emergency that’s been in place since last year’s failed coup. Five Swedish members of parliament filed a lawsuit calling for Erdogan to be charged with genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes.
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Self-immolation is now the second most common form of suicide in Tunisia. The self-immolation of a Tunisian street vendor triggered the Arab Spring uprisings.
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The EU trained and funded Libya’s coast guard to help with the flow of refugees crossing the Mediterranean Sea, but now that warlord-led coast guard is accused of beating up refugees, stealing from them, housing them in squalid detention camps, and engaging in human trafficking.
Tag: Libya
Links for 6-9-2017
- British Prime Minster Theresa May’s gamble on a snap election failed — the Tories lost 13 seats and their majority in Parliament. May plans to build a minority coalition government with the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), assuming she survives as Tory leader. UKIP failed to win a single seat, prompting Paul Nuttall to resign as party leader. The Scottish Nationalist Party got clobbered — the party’s leader in the House of Commons, Angus Robertson, even lost his seat.
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Matthew Vadum makes an excellent argument for a convention of states.
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Senator Bernie Sanders imposed an unconstitutional religious test for government employment when he declared during a confirmation hearing that Russell Vought is unfit for a job in the Office of Management and Budget because he’s a Christian:
In other words, Sanders understands Vought’s a Christian, he just didn’t think Vought was that kind of Christian. Neither did Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, who defended Sanders, saying, “I don’t think anybody was questioning anybody’s faith here.” Van Hollen then questioned Vought’s faith and claimed his theology is all wrong: “I’m a Christian, but part of being a Christian, in my view, is recognizing that there are lots of ways that people can pursue their God.”
It should go without saying that this is the sort of thing that should never come up in a Senate confirmation hearing. But it helped illuminate what progressives like Sanders and Van Hollen really think about religion, and especially Christianity. It’s okay to say you’re a Christian if, like Van Hollen, you don’t really think Christianity is the one true path to salvation. But if your version of Christianity lays claim to exclusivity—as orthodox Christianity does—then you’re a bigot who, as Sanders said of Vought, “is really not someone who is what this country is supposed to be about.”
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The Office of Special Counsel warned Trump administration social media director Dan Scavino that his tweet threatening Congressman Justin Amash violated the Hatch Act.
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Congressman-elect Greg Gianforte will plead guilty to assaulting reporter Ben Jacobs. Gianforte will be arraigned and sentenced on Monday.
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Immigration and Customs Enforcement is reopening deportation cases where the Obama administration gave illegal immigrants reprieves. The Obama administration decided that it would only deport illegal immigrants who committed crimes (other than entering the country illegally, of course); the Trump administration is reopening some of the cases the Obama administration dropped.
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The U.S. Air Force grounded its F–35s at Luke Air Force Base after pilots reported problems with its oxygen system.
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The federal government spent $20 billion on electronic medical records and it was a complete flop.
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The first shipment of liquified natural gas exported from the U.S. arrived in Poland. If the U.S. can build on this, it will help Poland, the Baltic states, and other allies reduce their dependence on Russian natural gas.
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Japan’s Diet enacted a law allowing Emperor Akihito to abdicate the throne due to his age (he’s 83). Akihito is expected to abdicate at the end of 2018, at which time Crown Prince Naruhito will replace him.
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A U.N. report claims air power supplied by the United Arab Emirates has driven Libyan rebel Khalifa Haftar’s recent success on the battlefield. If this is true, the UAE has been violating a U.N. arms embargo.
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Syrian troops and their allied militias reportedly reached the Iraqi border in southeastern Syria, which means they’re close to the At Tanf base where American special forces troops train “friendly” forces. American forces shot down a Syrian drone that bombed those friendly forces.
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A female suicide bomber killed 31 people in Musayab, Iraq. ISIS claimed responsibility.
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Not surprisingly, the Iraqi government and Turkey both oppose Iraqi Kurdistan’s referendum on independence.
Links for 5-28-2017
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A U.S. Navy SEAL skydiver died during New York’s Fleet Week festival when his parachute failed to open during an exhibition jump.
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The U.S. Navy is deploying a third carrier battle group, the USS Nimitz, to the western Pacific. The USS Carl Vinson and USS Ronald Reagan are already there.
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A Mississippi man, Willie Corey Godbolt, killed eight people last night, including a sheriff’s deputy.
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The group that attacked the American diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Ansar al-Sharia, claims it has disbanded. The group says its leadership was wiped out while fighting the Libya National Army.
Links for 5-26-2017
- Gunmen attacked a bus carrying Coptic Christians to a monastery in southern Egypt, killing 29 people and wounding 24. In response, Egyptian fighter jets attacked camps in eastern Libya where the gunmen were allegedly trained.
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The New York Times did a scene-by-scene breakdown of the video showing Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s goon bodyguards and other people attacking protesters outside the Turkish embassy in Washington, D.C. Erdogan’s personal involvement is obvious from their analysis.
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The latest video from the Center for Medical Progress was pulled from YouTube because a judge ruled that its release violated a preliminary injunction that he ordered in a civil case against David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt. There’s also a criminal case against Daleiden and Merritt, brought by California Attorney General Xavier Becerra. The video that was published to YouTube is part of the public record in the criminal case, but the judge in the civil case doesn’t want you to see it.
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Newly declassified documents show that the FISA court reproached the FBI for illegally sharing raw intelligence information about Americans with unauthorized third parties.
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American intelligence agencies are still leaking information about Donald Trump. An anonymous source told The Washington Times that intelligence agencies intercepted Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak telling his superiors that Jared Kushner asked for a secret, secure communication channel between Trump’s transition team and the Kremlin. Kushner supposedly asked for this during a meeting at Trump Tower that Michael Flynn attended.
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The Senate Intelligence Committee asked Donald Trump’s presidential campaign for all Russia-related records, starting from the campaign’s launch in June 2015.
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Republican Greg Gianforte won the special election to become Montana’s congressman despite physically assaulting a reporter for The Guardian the night before the election. Gianforte apologized while delivering his victory speech.
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Education Secretary Betsy DeVos unexpectedly failed to announce a national school choice program. Instead she did the right thing and said states ought to decide how to implement school choice.
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Next week the U.S. will test the ability of missile interceptors stationed in California to destroy an intercontinental ballistic missile from the other side of the Pacific.
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On five occasions people warned British authorities about the Manchester suicide bomber, but they did nothing in response. From the linked article:
Two friends of Abedi also became so worried they separately telephoned the police counter-terrorism hotline five years ago and again last year.
“They had been worried that ‘he was supporting terrorism’ and had expressed the view that ‘being a suicide bomber was ok’,” a source told the BBC.
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There was heavy fighting in Tripoli between the U.N.-backed government, Khalifa Ghwell’s Islamist “national salvation government,” and a militia led by Salah Badi.
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Two Chinese J–10 fighters buzzed a U.S. Navy P–3 about 150 miles southeast of Hong Kong.
Links for 5-24-2017
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The Department of Health and Human Services issued a report stating that individual health insurance premiums more than doubled between 2013 and 2017. So much for President Obama’s promise that an average family’s health insurance premiums would decrease $2,500 a year under ObamaCare.
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The Congressional Budget Office released its score for TrumpCare and it qualifies for reconciliation in the Senate. The CBO scores for ObamaCare were completely divorced from reality and the Senate is going to re-write TrumpCare, so the debate you’ll see over this new CBO score is a waste of time.
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Shortly before it left office, the Obama administration informed the FISA court that more than 5% of NSA searches of Internet data on Americans violated the Fourth Amendment safeguards the administration promised to follow in 2011.
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The Philippine government released a transcript of a phone call between Donald Trump and Rodrigo Duterte where Trump told Duterte that he’s doing a “great job” with the drug problem in the Philippines. Duterte’s solution to the drug problem amounts to encouraging vigilantes to kill drug addicts, which is not the sort of thing you’d expect an American president to condone. Duterte just declared martial law in Mindanao to deal with the Abu Sayyaf terrorist group, and hinted that he’s willing to expand that to the entire country.
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The USS Dewey sailed to within 12 miles of Mischief Reef in the Spratly Islands, which is one of China’s artificially created islands. This was the first time the U.S. Navy conducted a “freedom of navigation operation” in an area claimed by China during the Trump administration.
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The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is paying Boeing $146 million to build a prototype spaceplane capable of delivering small satellites to orbit on a daily basis.
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Two poll workers in Harris County, Texas pleaded guilty to unlawfully casting a ballot for another person, a misdemeanor. They each served a day in jail.
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During California’s Democratic Party convention, an establishment candidate narrowly defeated a Bernie Sanders supporter in the election for state party chair. The losing candidate and her supporters are claiming there was vote fraud — in particular, the party didn’t check IDs as people voted. This is one of those rare occasions when Democrats are concerned about vote fraud.
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Target paid $18.5 million to settle state lawsuits over a 2013 hacking incident that compromised the credit and debit cards of more than 40 million customers. Target got off easy.
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Authorities in Tripoli, Libya arrested the father and younger brother of the Manchester bomber, Salman Abedi. The younger brother reportedly confessed that he knew about the Manchester plot and that he considers himself a member of ISIS. Authorities in the U.K. discovered bomb-making materials in Salman Abedi’s home. Another report claims Salman Abedi had ties to al Qaeda.
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The Syrian army claims they killed ISIS’ military commander in Syria, Abu Musab al-Masri.
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Bellingcat produced a catalog of ISIS drone bombs and where to find them.
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Sir Roger Moore passed away at age 89, and there’s a tremendous story about him circulating on social media that you should read.
Links for 5-2-2017
- Jim DeMint is officially out as president of the Heritage Foundation. Heritage’s statement is here and DeMint’s response is here. Mollie Hemingway writes that DeMint’s ouster was a palace coup by Michael Needham, who leads Heritage Action, the 501(c)(4) to Heritage’s 501(c)(3). In Washington, palace coups often end up badly for the coup plotters — we’ll see what happens this time.
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Kevin Williamson writes on the current state of federal separation of powers:
For decades, the Left has advanced its agenda by using the courts to effectively amend the Constitution without going through the amendment process. Want a constitutional right to abortion? Harry Blackmun will oblige. But there is a Jacksonian version of that: amending the Constitution through obstinacy and demagoguery. In the matter of creating a categorical exemption from prosecution in certain immigration cases, the Obama administration took an action that President Obama himself had earlier argued was beyond the legal power of the president. Donald Trump had insisted that the Obama administration required congressional authorization before making war on Syria, but he quickly reversed himself once the power was his. Those issues remain unresolved: An injunction was issued against the Obama administration’s expanded amnesty, and a 4–4 Supreme Court decision denied the administration a rehearing of the case. The Trump administration’s actions in Syria have not been litigated at all.
The only thing about any of this that seems to me obvious is that our tripartite government is a tricycle with a wonky wheel — the presidency. Though there are ancient intellectual disputes about such questions as judicial review, a reasonably effective and stable modus vivendi has evolved for relations between the judicial and legislative branches. And there was, until fairly recently, a reasonably effective (though less stable) settlement between the presidency and the other branches. Congress expanded the executive branch, for instance with the creation of the Department of Education, and it constrained the executive branch, too, through legislation such as the War Powers Resolution and the Hatch Act. But the presidency is an opportunistic political organism, and it has grown, for good reasons and bad, particularly during the administrations of Richard Nixon and those who came after. Claims of executive privilege grew to such an extent as to amount to something like immunity from congressional oversight, particularly in matters related to political scandals. The role of the president as “Commander-in-Chief” was inflated to princely proportions. And now, President Trump wants a bigger presidency, too.
We should not give it to him.
- Dennis Prager on the Second Civil War:
In order to understand why more violence might be coming, it is essential to understand that left-wing mobs are almost never stopped, arrested, or punished. Colleges do nothing to stop them, and civil authorities do nothing to stop them on campuses or anywhere else. Police are reduced to spectators as they watch left-wing gangs loot stores, smash business and car windows, and even take over state capitols (as in Madison, Wisc.).
It’s beginning to dawn on many Americans that some mayors, police chiefs, and college presidents have no interest in stopping this violence. Left-wing officials sympathize with the lawbreakers; and the police, who rarely sympathize with thugs of any ideology, are ordered to do nothing by emasculated police chiefs. Consequently, given the abdication by all these authorities of their role to protect the public, some members of the public will inevitably decide that they will protect themselves and others.
Later:
So, here’s a prediction: If college presidents, mayors, and police chiefs won’t stop left-wing mobs, other Americans will. I hope this doesn’t happen, because electing conservative Republicans and not donating money to colleges would be more effective. But it is almost inevitable.
Then the left-wing media – the mainstream media – will enter hysteria mode with reports that “right-wing fascists” are violently attacking America.
And that’s when mayors and college presidents will finally order in the police.
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The State Department is still finding Hillary Clinton emails containing classified information.
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Former Charleston, South Carolina police officer Michael Slager pleaded guilty to violating Walter Scott’s civil rights when he shot Scott five times as he was running away. The plea deal means Slager won’t be retried on state murder charges (his first trial ended in a hung jury).
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Vladimir Putin critic Alexei Navalny lost 80% of his vision in one eye after someone threw green liquid in his face last week.
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Rival Libyan governments held talks in Abu Dhabi, and reportedly agreed to hold elections early next year.
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Brazilian prosecutors filed charges against former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s chief of staff, Jose Dirceu. He’s accused of accepting $755,880 in bribes from two construction companies.
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A border wall in San Diego dramatically dropped the crime rate and encouraged economic development:
Links for 3-15-2017
- Three U.S. Air Force special forces airmen died in a training crash in New Mexico. They were flying a U–28 single engine turboprop aircraft.
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Eight more U.S. Navy sailors were charged with corruption in the “Fat Leonard” bribery case, including an admiral.
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The Iowa House passed the Convention of States resolution today.
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A federal district court judge in Hawaii determines American immigration policy. Who knew?
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In 2005, Donald Trump paid an effective tax rate of 79%. Sad!
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Judicial Watch sued the Department of Justice for records relating to former Attorney General Loretta Lynch’s meeting with Bill Clinton on the tarmac at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport.
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Ted Cruz told a FreedomWorks rally that Republicans will be considered a laughingstock if they fail to repeal ObamaCare.
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Michael Needham and Jacob Reses explain why a simultaneous repeal and replace of ObamaCare is difficult, particularly when your starting point is ObamaCare Lite:
It would be a difficult thing to repeal and replace Obamacare simultaneously and end up at the sweet spot of the kind of free-market system America has never really had in its history, no matter how deeply committed those involved in the drafting were to achieving that outcome. The AHCA, though a serious effort, demonstrates that difficulty. And while it is not inconceivable that through the process of amendment, the sweet spot might be attainable, it would take much work.
Such amendments would need to more fully deconstruct Obamacare’s progressive regulatory architecture, repealing not merely the law’s narrow age-rating bands and actuarial-value requirements but also its benefit mandates, one-size-fits-all rules banning lower premiums for healthier enrollees, arbitrary restrictions on out-of-pocket costs, and broad duplication of state regulatory authority. The promise of the current bill — that Secretary Tom Price will use his full authority to mitigate the damage caused by these insurance mandates — is insufficient. Executive action can always be reversed by a new regime and even this current iteration of re-rulemaking process will take time. As Heritage Action argued last week in a piece for the Conservative Reform Network, “In leaving this sweeping federal regulatory authority on the books for a future left-wing administration to abuse, conservatives are unwittingly laying the groundwork for full centralization of all aspects of health coverage under the auspices of unaccountable bureaucrats in Washington.” The only impediment to preventing successful repeal of these regulations is the subjective interpretation of complex Senate rules by an unelected lawyer.
- A group of Republican senators asked Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to investigate claims that the Obama administration used taxpayer money to fund George Soros-backed groups in other countries.
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John McCain accused Rand Paul of working for Russia in a speech on the Senate floor. Paul objects to Montenegro joining NATO, which isn’t surprising since Montenegro will be a liability:
Libertarian Doug Bandow made the case against admitting Montenegro last week in a piece at Forbes. The country is indeed tiny and able to contribute little to NATO’s defense; adding them to NATO at this point is mainly a statement of resolve in the face of Russia’s meddling that the west won’t be intimidated into rescinding its invitation to Montenegro to join. But that comes at a steep price: Article 5 obligations to go to war on the country’s behalf with Putin’s Russia if the Kremlin decides to double down and continue interfering with Montenegro even after it’s been admitted to the alliance. Is the country so important strategically to the United States that it’s worth committing the U.S. military to its defense? More germanely, are you working for Vladimir Putin if you want to slow down the ratification process and have a fuller debate on that subject in the Senate? According to McCain, you are.
So why wasn’t McCain censured for saying this?
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According to federal prosecutors, cyber attacks targeting Yahoo were orchestrated by two Russian FSB officers, Dmitry Dokuchaev and Igor Sushchin. The FSB officers directed two criminal hackers, Alexsey Belan and Karim Baratov, who did the heavy lifting. Belan was arrested in Canada yesterday, and prosecutors are working to get him extradited.
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Vladimir Putin ordered the Russian military to incorporate the forces of South Ossetia, a region of Georgia that Russia seized in 2008. On paper Russia has treated South Ossetia as an independent state, but no more.
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Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau not only wants to spend foreign aid money on abortions, but he wants to encourage other countries “to adopt the Canadian system of abortion on demand at any time and for any reason.”
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German prosecutors raided multiple Audi and Volkswagen locations as part of an American investigation into emissions test cheating on 3.0 liter V6 diesel engines.
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The drone boats filled with explosives that Houthi rebels are using to attack ships off Yemen were supplied by Iran.
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There was heavy fighting in Tripoli, Libya involving the U.N.-backed government and a slew of rival militias.
