May 2017 Archives

John Hinderaker writes that the leaks from the White House and the breathless stories in the media have had only one significant effect.

The Democrats desperately hope that someone on Trump's campaign team may have conspired with the Russians to phish the DNC's email server, as well as the RNC's. (Not sure how that works, but liberal conspiracy theories don't have to make sense.) But we know there is no such evidence. If there were, Democrats in the intelligence agencies, who, it now appears, were violating the law to a massive extent in search of dirt on Donald Trump, would have leaked it before the election.

Absent evidence of collusion, the Left's hysteria over Russia is going to fizzle out. In the end, it will look silly. Meanwhile, everyone knows that the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN, NBC, CBS, ABC, MSNBC, the Associated Press, etc., are using anonymous leaks in an effort to bring down the Trump administration on behalf of their party, the Democrats. I doubt that ten percent of the population could deny that proposition, and pass a lie detector test. So if nothing else, we have achieved clarity.

Information like this is good, because it helps people make decisions in the market of ideas. Citizens can observe the chaos in Washington and decide how to vote locally and in the midterm elections in 2018.

California is considering implementing a single-payer health system for everyone in the state. If such a system is created I think the results would be disappointing, but I'm completely in favor of the state giving it a shot.

Overall, many of the details behind California's single-payer proposal remain in flux. Under questioning from fellow lawmakers, Lara said the 15 percent payroll tax is "hypothetical" and "we don't have a financing mechanism yet for this bill."

Lara said he has sought a review from researchers at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst into potential funding sources for the measure. Lara also said there's no guarantee the Trump administration would grant the federal waivers necessary for California to shift Medicare and Medicaid funding into a single pot for universal health care.

States should be free to experiment, and I hope the federal government gives California the leeway it needs to make the best possible attempt.

The Manchester concert bombing is an example of the limits of defensive security.

There was security at the concert, but the bomber apparently didn't try to get into the venue, instead blowing himself up in an entrance foyer area as concertgoers flooded out of the arena. Prime Minister May said the attacker had deliberately chosen "his time and place to cause maximum carnage" in the young crowd.

No matter how you play defense, no matter where you put the security perimeter, you can't avoid creating a choke-point that is itself a soft target for an attack. Security waiting lines, entrances and exits, are impossible to secure by their very nature.

This harsh reality is why relying on defensive measures against terrorism is a fool's game. We can only win by going on the offense.

A report by Luke Rosiak claims that shady IT service providers might be blackmailing House Democrats.

Congressional technology aides are baffled that data-theft allegations against four former House IT workers -- who were banned from the congressional network -- have largely been ignored, and they fear the integrity of sensitive high-level information.

Imran Awan and three relatives were colleagues until police banned them from computer networks at the House of Representatives after suspicion the brothers accessed congressional computers without permission.

Five Capitol Hill technology aides told The Daily Caller News Foundation's Investigative Group that members of Congress have displayed an inexplicable and intense loyalty towards the suspects who police say victimized them. The baffled aides wonder if the suspects are blackmailing representatives based on the contents of their emails and files, to which they had full access.

"I don't know what they have, but they have something on someone. It's been months at this point" with no arrests, said Pat Sowers, who has managed IT for several House offices for 12 years. "Something is rotten in Denmark."

President Trump has scored another impressive deal for American industry: opening the Chinese beef market to American beef.

Well, I was wrong. Several weeks ago in this blog, I expressed my skepticism that China would act anytime soon on its promise to open its borders to direct import of U.S. beef. I based my skepticism on the past 13, now nearly 14, years of hollow promises by the Chinese government that it would relent.

And I based my skepticism on the fact that China has stringent import requirements that serve as non-tariff trade barriers. The main hurdles are no use of ractopamine and a national animal ID system. While the U.S. has infrastructure in place to deal with both those, I was sure that China would hold the line on animal ID. Since the U.S. can't meet the nationwide animal ID requirement, I was sure the deal would fall apart once again.

I got Trumped.

I'm not tired of winning yet.

Victor Davis Hanson outlines four Never-Trump nightmares, and I want to highlight one of them and then his conclusion.

First: violence. For all the bloviating about Trump as a rising fascist dictator, the only political violence that has occurred since he entered the race for President has come from the left.

So far all the political violence associated with the election of Trump, from Inauguration to the latest campus rioting, has been on the Left. No pro-Trump crowds don masks, break windows or shut down traffic.

Political violence has no place in American politics; it should be condemned by everyone, and vigorously pursued by law enforcement.

Finally, VDH points out that Trump's election is the result of the Republican party's failure. When the "reasonable" politicians ignore people for too long, they create an opening for an "unreasonable" politician.

Finally, there was something deeply wrong in the Republican Party that at some point required a Trump to excise it. The Republican Party and conservative movement had created a hierarchy that mirror-imaged its liberal antithesis, and suggested to middle class voters between the coasts that the commonalities in income, professional trajectories, and cultural values of elites trumped their own political differences. How a billionaire real estate developer appeared, saw that paradox, and became more empathetic to the plight of middle-class Americans than the array of Republican political pundits is one of the most alarming stories of our age.

Trump was not so much a reflection of red-state Americans' political ignorance, as their weariness with those of both parties who ridicule, ignore, or patronize them--and now seek to overturn the verdict of the election.

President Trump's firing of FBI Director James Comey completes Comey's hero's journey. I agree with Scott Adam's assessment: Comey didn't want to take away America's ability to choose our president. You can say, "that wasn't his job", or "he should have just followed the law", or whatever. All true. It's hard to know what's right/best when you're in the middle of a disaster.

In this case, the disaster was created by Hillary Clinton, and Comey did what he thought was best for America. It cost him his job and reputation, but he was successful in exposing Hillary's guilt without hamstringing America's democracy. If you don't like the outcome (the election of President Trump) then blame Hillary for her actions, not Comey for revealing them.

My opinion of Comey's handling of the Clinton email issue remains the same. I believe he sacrificed his career and reputation to avoid taking from the American voters their option of having the leader of their choice. If Comey had pushed for Clinton's indictment, the country would have ended up with a President Trump without a "fair" election. That was the worst-case scenario for the country and the world. Comey prevented that disaster while still making it clear to the American public that Clinton was not guilt-free with her email server. He let the voters decide how much weight to assign all of that. In my opinion, Comey handled the Clinton email situation like a patriot. The media is spinning the situation as "making it all about himself." That's true in the same sense that a Medal of Honor winner who jumped on a grenade to save his buddies is "making it all about himself." I don't disagree with the characterization that Comey was trying to be the "hero" because that's how it looks to me too.

I once heard a story about a guy who pulled a woman out of a car that was on fire. He got burns on his arms doing it. He saved her life, but I don't like him because he was trying to be a hero. That guy made it all about himself.

Megan McArdle sees Comey's firing as autocratic and inept.

Start with the reason Comey was fired. Coming from the man who basked in chants of "Lock her up!" at his campaign rallies, firing someone for mishandling the investigation into Hillary Clinton's emails does no more than provoke helpless laughter, liberally mixed with tears. Politico's reporting offers a much more plausible explanation: Trump was frustrated by the investigation into his campaign's Russia connections, and wants it to go away. So he fired the guy at the head of the agency that's conducting it.

This is not the behavior of an American president; it is the behavior of a tinpot autocrat who thinks that the government exists to serve him, rather than the country. And it's almost as troubling that Trump seems unaware that he is not a tinpot autocrat; he is the head of a state with a long (if perhaps somewhat checkered) democratic tradition.

However, the fact is that Comey was irrevocably tainted by his heroism. He bravely went outside the law to do what he thought was best for America, and thereby damned himself. Democrats have been demanding his ouster for months -- does anyone think that a President Hillary Clinton would have kept him as FBI director? Of course not.

It makes for a certain type of good story when the hero triumphs and prospers, but that's not always how things work in real life.

Kurt Schlichter asks a good question (among some provocative hyperbole):

Here's a little test. It's been about six months since Trump treated The Smartest Most Accomplished Woman In The World like a NordicTrack treats Harry Reid, and does anyone know even one person who has said, "You know, I voted for Trump, but now after Neil Gorsuch, General Mattis and H.R. McMaster, I really wish I had checked the box for Felonia von Pantsuit?"

There are people who disliked Trump before the election and still do; there are people who are disappointed with what he has accomplished so far; there are people who think he's doing a great job -- but is there anyone who voted for President Trump and now wishes that Hillary Clinton had won?

I doubt it.