Barr writes " And his truculent, petty, and toxic persona—"
That's his argument. But not a word about Trump's policies which were spot on. Below are the words of Bill Barr from an article he wrote last year....
"...efforts generated the strongest and most resilient economy in American history—one that brought unprecedented progress to many marginalized Americans. He had begun to restore U.S. military strength by increasing spending on new-generation weapons, advanced technology, and force readiness. He correctly identified the economic, technological, and military threats to the United States posed by China’s aggressive policies. By brokering historic peace deals in the Mideast, he achieved what most thought impossible. He had the courage to pull us out of ill-advised and detrimental agreements with Iran and Russia. And he fulfilled America’s long-delayed promise to move its Israeli embassy to Jerusalem...."
But that's the point, isn't it? Trump's persona eclipses his national performance results. His persona diminishes actual results and divides the populace. He gets results, but he is not a leader. An effective president will get results while promoting respect, harmony and national pride while making us all want to be better Americans. His is the smarmy salesman who has good numbers but doesn't make the company better. My concern is about Trump's judgement. He led us down an ill-advised, disastrous path during covid that will likely have long-term health implications for a large majority of our citizens and future generations. He spent money like a drunken sailor and irresponsibly increased our deficit to the point that our children may not financially recover.
I don't recall any experts advising Trump to continuously "act out" (as they say these days) as a petulant narcissist who attacks his own team and teammates at the drop of a hat. Nor do I recall any expert advising him to insert himself into eminently winnable Senate races last year and endorse poor candidates who went on to cost his party seats in New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Arizona. (And, in the process, the Senate.)
You are free to compartmentalize the man from the policies, but that cuts both ways, sir. M Palmer and anyone else has the right to include personal demeanor and behavior in their own assessments and voting behavior.
Trump would have been re-elected with ease if he'd show a semblance of couth now and then. That he chooses not to is on him, not others who recoil at his comportment. Many if not most people aren't going to support a leader who acts like a jackass more than once in a great while. He could change that tomorrow if he chose. (It worked for Nixon; most Americans still love second chances.)
As best as I can recall, nearly every adviser Trump has had (including Barr) has advised him to tone things down and stop getting in his own way, and it's usually around then that he terminates them. But again, that's on him. Voters have every right to judge candidates based on personal behavior.
Well, to me it is OBVIOUS that he won the election. The people who actually vote love him. It is the chattering classes, whose work mainly seems to consist in the purposive sowing of confusion, who hate him.
And the Left "acts out" EVERY SINGLE DAY. What Trump did is mirror, in a greatly attenutated way, the ridiculousness with which all conservatives who try to do ANYTHING honest and beneficial to America are treated.
Personally, I LIKED that he told idiots they were idiots and liars that they were liars. If that offended you, well, maybe you have good reason to feel offended.
It's one thing to call out an idiot or a liar. It's another to call a serviceman who got shot down over enemy territory a loser when you got multiple draft deferments for physical reasons but still manage to play golf all the time.
One of those two is a loser, all right, but it's not the fellow who served.
I'm neither a Democrat nor a matter of the chattering class, but no way would I vote for anyone who authored that POS remark.
By the time Biden completes his first term, he will have spent approximately 11.5% more than Trump did. That’s the worst fiscal record of any president. But Trump is second worst.
The House appropriates funds, the Senate approves them, and the President signs off on the budget.
Ronald Reagan is remembered for "his" Defense spending, but what is little recalled is that spending on Welfare of all sorts also increased continually in the 80's under a Democrat led Congress. Reagan had little choice but to sign their bills, or he would have been unable to pursue his own agenda.
True. We have a complicated system. One of the great things about bureaucracy for those working within one is that it's always possible to pass the buck and claim that "It wasn't me, I didn't make that decision." If anything is to change someone needs to stand up like Pres. Truman and say, "The buck stops here," and take responsibility.
I'm a big fan of Ronald Reagan, the best President of my lifetime. The spending that was done under his administration bought the fall of the Soviet Union. That's a lot of benefit for the price. That said, overspending is still a problem. In the Reagan administration it was a "necessary evil," but at least we got something great from it. What have we gotten from the massive overspending by Presidents Obama, Trump, and Biden? Does anyone even know?
Trump is only better than Biden. That’s why if the Democrats would drop the guy that most of them don’t even want and instead run a younger candidate, who can at least pretend to be a moderate, they would beat Trump without any problem.
Or if the Republicans dropped Trump, I'd vote for their candidate. I'm a Democrat, and Democratic leadership knows that they need Trump to pull moderates their way.
Who in your view would best address the patent politicization of our legal system? Who would address the patent and pervasive fraud the Democrats have been using to maintain majorities even when unpopular?
And if these things are not addressed, in what meaningful respect are we still a nation which is ruled by the people and for the people?
If cheating is allowed, the Democrats could win with a blind chihuahua.
How about No Labels? In my view, a split ticket from No Labels would best address the commandeering of our constitutional system by the two legacy parties, and more specifically the far right and far left forces who call the shots for each party. (And yes, I agree the Democrats have surpassed the GOP the past 8 years on constitutional commandeering.)
I say this because I don't see a way to fix things and thrive again until we get a handle on the D-R holy war. The legacy parties know how to posture and fight each other to the death, but that's about all they do any more. Everyone I've shown No Labels' 30-point plan to says it's closer to their own views than their own party's positions.
No one, except possibly the man himself, thinks Trump is perfect. I'm supporting Vivek Ramaswamy but I can read the polls from Iowa, New Hampshire and elsewhere. There is no coalition of support behind any non-Trump candidate, DeSantis, Haley, et al. Unless he's barred from the ballot, Trump will likely to be the GOP nomineee.
Thank you. Any sane conservative might enact the same policies, and do it more effectively by virtue of being a statesman -- or, shit, even just a normally polite and intelligent person -- rather than a truculent moron. As you suggest, I myself detest Trump to the point where I can't 'see past him' to notice the considerable number of good policies.
Nope, not petulant, but like those of us in the Anglosphere who remained loyal to the Crown, we have higher standards of decorum for our PMs than you have for your presidents. BTW, my blindness there was rhetorical otherwise -- as you might note -- I did in fact refer to 'the considerable number of good policies' -- thus I am aware of them, it's just that the odiousness of the Man makes it harder.
You know, from this side of the Atlantic, it is obvious that the failure of the rule of law is probably farther along there than it is here. You don't have had a Freedom of Information Act, you don't have a Bill of Rights, and you don't have anything like our Constitution. You have a set of institutional habits of long standing, which include an hereditary aristocracy that includes kings and queens.
If you are more zealous in your demand that your leaders keep their private iniquities out of the public eye, please forgive me if I don't view that as an improvement.
Trump cheated on his wives. When people lie about him and attack him, he calls them names, including "liar". But I feel very confident that had he gotten credit for winning reelection his COVID policies would have been very different from the fascistic ones pushed by Boris Johnson.
As an American, I will always take substance over appearance. Trump viewed his campaign promises as a To-Do list, and he got a lot of them done in the face of a weathering storm of crooks and emotionally fragile imbeciles. In a second term he will either take on the endemic corruption of our government, or the rule of law will fail here, too, and we will have people getting arrested for misgendering lunatics.
I guess the question is do you want good policies or someone who behaves the way you want. Right now in the US we have poor choices. I watch UK politics with interest. The record of the last few PM's there makes me wonder what exactly are the qualifications across the pond. I say that as someone who respects the UK and the relationship with the US.
Let's see......Trudeau? Ardern? TrussNak? Or maybe the reconstituted prison colony down under that locked up its disarmed citizens for daring to go maskless?
"loyal to the Crown" Exactly WTF does that mean? You still consider the monarchy as in charge of the government? Or you're just OK with them being around to suck in tourist dollars?
Look around. That’s why we ended up with this goofball. So don’t vote and see what you get instead of sallowing the pill, doing something you hate because not doing is worst .
It's an issue, no doubt. Yeah everyone is spin doctored. Still, some politicians have been in public service for long enough that one can get to know them. And unfortunately policy positions can be lies.
I don't like remiss overspending by any elected official. I don't care who overspent what. I care about what the next person is going to do to control spending. I cannot live without sticking to a budget and spending within my means and neither should the government. It is irresponsible and detrimental.
Over the course of my lifetime it feels like every president has managed to exceed the overspending of the last president. "Obama did it too" neither excuses it nor makes it right.
M Palmer-- I agree. Also, if Trump wins there will be chaos and anger and if Trump loses there will be chaos and anger and maybe violence (like the last time). Trump is a no-win solution. I wish there was a another choice besides these two guys.
I think you are missing the point. Bill Barr limited his analysis to the applicability/validity of the Colorado and Maine actions in regards to Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.
Trump's truculence is undisputable. It's part of his marketed persona.
In support of M Palmer's comment, integrity is the most obvious delineator of good and bad people. Integrity; honesty of purpose; fidelity, are defining attributes of good people. When a good person fails to act with integrity, they do all within the power to correct/make amends for their failure, and then strive to never make the same mistake again.
Bad people may manifest attributes of integrity, but it does not define them. They frequently shrug off their failures; caste the blame on other; refuse to accept responsibility. Whatever is necessary to acquire whatever it is they desire.
Trump is not a good person. I agree that a lot of this policies were good. That he delivered on most of his promises. But given his behavior of the last 3 years; He called for the suspension of the Constitution because he did not get what he wanted.
He cannot be trusted with the power of the presidency. He called for the suspension of the Constitution because he did not get what he wanted.
But your assessment of Trump’s character, while accurate in my opinion, isn’t at all relevant. As Barr notes in apparent agreement with your position: “I am firmly opposed to Trump’s candidacy. While I think it is critical the Biden administration be beaten at the polls, Trump is not the answer.”
The answer is “So what?” Right now, and likely unless the authoritarian measures to remove Trump from the ballot succeed, the only realistic alternative to another Biden/democrat term is to elect Trump. As much as I would prefer DeSantis, he will lose the primary to Trump in a landslide. Honestly, we need to confront reality and get behind either Biden or Trump. There is no productive result from all the handwringing about Trump and his personality or character.
We have seen the awful mess created by Biden in only three years, and any democrat will just continue our slide into economic ruin and social chaos. I’m far more concerned that every dollar I’ve saved over a lifetime has lost 20% of its value than I care about Trump’s character and personality. And what will remain of free speech with another democrat term? We need to make a choice between one of the two extremely likely candidates and end the eternal quest for a perfect candidate that will never appear.
I disagree, what we need to do it hold our officials to a higher standard and force both Trump and Biden out of the race. Unrealistic? Probably. But I would rather lose standing upon my principles, than win having abandoned principle.
I would suggest your principles should not be just some internal sense that you are acting morally, but be expanded to include the real world effects of four more years of what we’ve experienced in the last three. This is not a thought experiment.
Agreed. It is not a thought experiment. Which is why I expend a significant amount of time teaching, encouraging and promoting those principles. In the end, voting for "the lesser of two evils" is still voting for evil. If we succumb to the notion that we cannot overcome the status quo, we doom ourselves to an ever-degrading scenario.
Neither Biden nor Trump are Constitutionalists. Neither is truly a champion of liberty. they must be opposed.
Mr. Skinny, Likely not. President Clinton may actually be a rapist. I think if cause found to convict Harvey Weinstein is applied to a few Clinton accusations Mr Clinton is in trouble. The leftists and particularly the shrewmenist movement show themselves to be shills for the progressives and without real concern for women.
Then you have just come out against America. Your fuckwittery, if followed by enough folk, would enslave 350 million people, you sir are a fucking arse.
Art, I completely agree with you that more years of a Biden presidency will do great damage to the economy. I agree that Trump would have better policies, probably economically, and in terms of foreign policy, then Biden. I even think it’s possible that Joe Biden may be the most personally corrupt president of my lifetime, maybe in history. And yet, I will not vote for Trump.
The issue to me is not the damage that will be wrought over the next four years. It is about the damage that is done to the fabric of the Republic. Donald Trump tore great rips in that fabric following the 2020 election. He most certainly should have been convicted by the Senate and disqualified from office. He violated his oath of office even worse than Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton. I’d love to go into more detail on my thoughts, but this is too long already. Art, I definitely do respect your opinion, but I just think more is at stake than the economy and the social agenda (of either side). I wish we could put forward someone else against Biden —I think ANY of the other 2016 Republican wannabes would easily defeat Biden this year, but it’s going to be Trump, whether I cast my primary ballot for Haley or DeSantis. Regardless, I’m willing to endure the next four years looking for a worthy Republican.
78 million voted for Trump. Do you think they were idiots? Not me. I have seen the destruction the leftist democrat have bestowed on America. I voted for Clinton but will never vote for a democrat again. After seeing what leftist (starting with Obama) did to our country, hold could any sane person do that? Brainwashing comes to mind. When they control the media and social media all you hear is what they are told to say.
The problem is that no national leader can be counted on for integrity or honesty. It used to be an old stand-by that politicians all lie. Maybe they do, but politicians at the national level rarely say anything that is true.
I think it's time for a new deciding factor. "have a beer with him" didn't work. "hope and change" didn't work. Guaranteed that "vote for the high integrity guy" will result in record low turnout.
What a shit show choice we have. I worry, as the polls show, that Trump will get trounced by any other generic Dem. Biden drops out and Trump loses. Suckered again. Let's not forget Trump's nonexistent coattails. How many times could he have torpedoed the slam dunk of the Georgia Senate races? I'm not pitching for Haley but polls show her beating Biden by double digits in friggen NY. I want some insurance if Biden drops out. If Biden stays in, Trump will win and in two years his hand-picked congressional ring kissers will lose both houses of Congress because they are unappealing know-nothings.
Since I'm old, and can't see a way out of this dilemma, I choose my only logical choice, fuck 'em all. Party on Garth.
I think one or two of them generally act with integrity. No, I won't name names. It isn't to my intention to endorse a candidate within this forum. That is not the purpose of the forum/comments section IMHO.
You gotta name names. I don't think you'll be able to. And that's not on you, or your ability to spot integrity. It's because there is no integrity in the ecosystem.
The following people, from what I have been able to observe, model integrity; that is to say, if they do not act with integrity, they make the effort to correct their mistakes and course-correct.
Regardless of whether or not you like them or agree with them. Everyone of them has made mistakes, and I don't mean political mistakes. I mean instances where they have failed to act with integrity.
There are plenty of other conservative candidate choices who can do the “good policies” thing without ripping the fundamental foundations of our country to shreds with the civil discontent that would inevitably follow.
And Barr said he saw no sign of election fraud without saying but there were many irregularities and failed to call for a review of election laws which allowed same.
Actually, what he said was that the numerous cases of election fraud were each small and collectively would not have changed the outcome of the election.
True. Elsewhere I used widespread fraud. But that does not change the gist of my comment. And as I have pondered it further I definitely think he was derelict in not noting irregularities in the 2020 voting process. First it created a false impression that there was nothing to worry about and in fact there was. And is. Second he said that in early December, the 5th I think. Could much investigation have been done that quickly?
Ken Block, the voting data expert hired by the Trump campaign to find evidence of fraud in the 2020 election, reflected on the experience in an op-ed for USA Today. “The findings of my company’s in-depth analysis are detailed in the depositions taken by the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol,” he wrote. “The transcripts show that the campaign found no evidence of voter fraud sufficient to change the outcome of any election. … And yet, the cries that the election was lost or stolen due to voter fraud continue with no sign of stopping. Whether a stump speech, outrageous lawsuits like the so-called Kraken cases filed by Sidney Powell, Rudy Giuliani’s lies or the ongoing misguided efforts of people determined to prove the election was stolen, the constant drumbeat hardens people’s hearts and minds to the truth about the 2020 election.”
But you have to balance out his reckless spending. His election strategies in 2018, 2020 and 2022 - by helping to nominate nut cases was a disaster for conservatives. The GOP would have had 3-4 more senators and at least a dozen representatives had he not intervened with the loons he did.
It is widely reported (not necessarily true) that most of "Trump's" policies were in fact pushed by the sorts of advisors who steered him away from his worst instincts. Trump has essentially vowed to double down on being Trump and it is at best questionable whether he will have the same sorts of advisors this time around. We can be pretty sure he has blocked the Federalist Society's phone number, so who knows what kind of judges he will appoint.
Trump’s policies that were “spot on” were the result of advice and work of quality people around him, not his own ideas. Those quality people were all removed, because they also had a spine, which doesn’t work for Trump. Trump never had any patience and any interest in developing policies, and that’s because Trump never cared for America or the American people; Trump always cared for Trump only and he made that crystal clear. Even his most ardent (rabid?) supporters are perfectly aware of that. Nobody ever confused Trump with somebody who “serves the country”. He would actually be offended to be described as such.
MIchael G, Whatever Barr thinks that Trump got right, or not, has nothing to do with his well-wrought piece here in the Sun. Nor do Trumps accomplishments mitigate, in any way, those personality traits, so succinctly characterized by Barr, that render him a less than desirable candidate. Sad as that may be, to you, or me, or Mr Barr.
❤️❤️❤️❤️🇮🇱🇮🇱🇮🇱a million hearts Michael, bring the man back now for all of the reasons above and more - the best President we ever had America was Great under his leadership.
None of that is relevant to this article and you know Barr's position on the administrations achievements. Folk don't have to kiss your butthole every time they speak.
Trump is not a threat to the administrative state. We already tried that. Ramaswamy is the only threat to DC tyranny with his plan to fire half of these assholes based on the last number of their SSN being odd or even.
There’s a 95% chance Ramaswamy is a con artist but he is the only person expressing ideas that will help us reverse the path to Argentina so it’s worth a shot.
There are 20 million government employees in the United States with 3 million being federal. Obviously it is totally indecent and corrupt to allow these people to vote and they all vote and they all vote Democrat. Not to mention the 25 million obese people receiving free food and healthcare, bought for them with money stolen from their fellow citizens, who also should clearly not be allowed to vote.
So just chop about 45 million votes off of the Democrat vote totals, and that’s about how many votes they would actually have if we lived in a decent society.
“ 95% chance Ramaswamy is a con artist” . Based on what? The only dirt anyone has dug up on him is he won a a Soros scholarship as a student. That is it. If you don’t like him , that’s your perigative bit it in no way makes him a con man. He is smart and working hard to connect with every voter in Iowa and New Hampshire. zHe came out within minutes of the Colorado ruling against Trump that he will withdraw his name from the ballot unless Trump is back on. He is smart and articulate. He is Maga without the Trump baggage. If he does well in Iowa it’s a whole new race. Give him a chance please
Personally I am neither pro-Trump nor anti-Trump. In my view, Trump-as-savior and Trump-Derangement-Syndrome are two sides of a political phenomenon that is poorly understood by mainstrean conservatism....at least as discussed in MSM. "It is possible that future historians might see the perceived vulgarity of the Trump phenomenon as an inchoate (and of course in many ways flawed) early attempt to break out of conservatism’s imprisonment in a political etiquette that is a philosophical stacked deck." https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/p/invasion-of-the-virtue-signallers
Populism is simply opposition to corrupt elites. When the corrupt elites being targeted are government/intellectual/non-productive elites, it is almost always valid and more often should just be called patriotism.
The version where you are angry because Bezos has a yacht is almost always not valid.
The people who try to connect populism to emotions and rage are almost always just trying to provide cover for corrupt elites by painting their critics as dangerous irrational cornered animals.
I would like to see your spreadsheet. I have been listening to Vivek since before his candidacy, and I have found him focused and basically unchanged in his positions on issues.
I'm for Vivek. The more you listen to him the more one can understand and like him. Too many people are saying he has no chance, he's a this or that and don't take the time. Read his books, listen to his townhalls. He is a young guy and he is growing/ getting better every day. Of course he will have some slip ups, he is deliberately being provocative to gain attention. I think he will surprise in Iowa because he is really putting in the work on the ground. Well maybe that's wishful thinking but hey......
If the young voters( who have never caucused before and are therefore not polled) turn out for him ... it is time for young, fresh smart , uncorrupt , leadership. I do not see him as a car salesman at all but if he repulses something that is a reason not to vote for him. He is working hard, has a strong, focused well thought out and well articulated message. If he does well in Iowa, it’s a a new race
Vivek’s snarkiness concerns me. He is excessively cocky and self-assured. In short, he’s a younger version of Trump. You have to pay attention to the little clues.
I agree. I think Ramaswamy was just a Trump proxy during the debates, meant to take down Haley. If Vivek continues to act like an ass, he's just a MiniMe of Trump. When Ramaswamy told Chris Christie to "go enjoy a meal," he was showing everyone that he is as horrible as Trump. Times are indeed strange when Chris Christie is the only gentleman in the room.
At most, 5% of Democrat voters are doing something other than just leeching off the system and being corrupt lazy perverts.
The greatest datapoint of the last hundred years is Elon Musk firing 80% of a company, that was previously publicly traded, and exposing those people as useless.
That’s actually securities fraud and embezzlement I think. Definitely defrauding shareholders.
Every time I have a stock go down more than like 10% I get a notification from my trading platform that there is a law firm suing them via class action for defrauding shareholders or whatever.
Twitter was never profitable except for one or two quarters one year and it absolutely is because of that 80% of DEI parasites they hired. There is so much money in corporate litigation if someone can figure out how to sue these guys for the administrative college-educated bloat.
You only need to take down one company like Bud Light and there would be mass firings of Democrat busybodies across corporate America.
I started using Twitter again when Elon Musk expressed his intention to buy it. So I have followed the news about Twitter with considerable interest. The fact that so many people got fired without the site losing functionality was very much a testament to the utter uselessness of the majority of the employees.
The Twitter Files, which showed the extent to which bias was being enforced AT GOVERNMENT BEHEST was a disturbing revelation. But even more disturbing was the extent to which Democrats have largely IGNORED or even denied those revelations. That is the cherry on the top of their cow-pie of rejecting inconvenient facts.
| The fact that so many people got fired without the site losing functionality was very much a testament to the utter uselessness of the majority of the employees. |
True enough but if we continue to automate away jobs and there aren't enough for people who want to work we're going to keep ending up with even more "rust belt" type cities.
I don't know what the solution is. We have an increasing population but a decreasing number of "real" jobs. Some of the ideas people float make some sense but would be a seismic shift -- four day workweeks, UBI (a terrible idea IMO), have fewer kids (people are doing this and it's sounding alarm bells), etc.
How many have second and third jobs and are STILL hand to mouth?
Immigration, both legal and illegal depresses wages; slave labour abroad depresses wages. Get rid of these market distortions and those 2nd and 3rd jobs are freed up for others.
The public schools aren't educating the children properly. They are telling the children they (the children) are giving the correct answers ,when they aren't and giving them good grades, whether it is an A or a B, or a 4 or a 5, depending how the school system grades. The teachers pretty much give the answers to the tests. If the teachers complain to the principal , they know they will get a bad evaluation or the following year they will lose their job. The parents aren"tsmart enough to know that their children really aren't that smart. The parents are on instagram, Facebook,TikTok, etc, One of our principals encourages that the teachers use Tik Tok. The administration of our school system are all Dems, and are proud of this fact. What's right is wrong, what's wrong is right. Sad state of affairs.
The parents are smart enough. But when they question the leftist pukes on the school boards the demonic dwarf who runs the Injustice Department sics the Stasi on them.
I am convinced that if the Marxist/Dem stay in power, I believe that under their tyranny all of us who disagree with the Marxists will be summarily executed or sent to labor camps.
Not only public schools. In some states also in private schools. I work in one of them. The (maybe?) well- intended but detrimental "no child left behind" BS has created falsely idealistic, lazy teachers mostly on a public school level, resulting in also non-interested children (why make an effort?) . And the focusing away from a solid curriculum, well explained and presented as a fun activity to learn math and being able to read , in order to preach about hate and discrimination with CRT is utterly vile and at best complete nonsense for kids. Children aren't born racist. They are repeating what they hear their parents say and/or their being taught at school. And some still wonder why the education in this country is so far behind other countries. It's a disgrace and oh, by the way, "my" school is closing. Surprised?
It seems everything in the curriculum is presented in a fun and entertaining way. We should be teaching critical thinking and in math they should be memorizing math facts. On by the way, math can't be racist!
Heard an educator on a talk show say that math is racist. What utter nonsense!
My son has taught high school for 28 years. He and his fellow teachers are not evil mind benders. True, there has been inappropriate grade inflation. True, mamby pamby discipline is counterproductive. True, some, definitely not all, administrators have drifted from common sense. My son says that far more significant than any of these factors is the incredible classroom disruption and coopting of student attention by smartphones. Smartphones are ruining the classroom experience. Don't demonize teachers; they deserve your gratitude. Ridicule of police has reduced recruitment in law enforcement. We need bright young people going into teaching--don't chase them away with hyperbolic criticism. And do pay them.
This isn't just going on at bad schools. At GOOD schools parents raise holy hell at the School Board if little Johnny doesn't get A's because it could wreck his chances of getting into a good college. Most of the older teachers fighting against grade inflation have retired and the younger ones are demoralized so they just keep their heads down and go with it.
Um... Trump fired James HomeyComey - the black heart of the Deep State - in the spring of 2017 and Trump has been legally harrassed like no other since.
That is what happens when you attack the Deep State. I like Vivek, but the UniParty is the problem; when the bureaucrats are in charge of child porn on your devices... Blackmail is the currency of Sodom on Potomac.
I really like Vivek as well; almost everything I've heard or read from him, I've thoroughly agreed with. My only concern is his previous work in pharma and ties to Soros groups.
On the government job front take a peek of how much of that gleefully lauded "record job growth" offered to dispute the inflation is rampant argument is public sector. Talk about manipulation of numbers.
Don’t forget all the obese people demanding and getting free extra seats on Southwest Airlines, and getting you and me kicked off our fully booked flight.
I like what he had to say. But I think he lacks the experience to put his vision into action. And the thing I think most overlook is this needs to be a package deal - President and Congress - to effect real change.
Yeah and obviously it’s your imagination that he *doesn’t* have a grifter vibe.
It’s subjective but I’m skeptical you don’t see it. It’s like someone saying they don’t feel like Pence has an overly-pious vibe. Like, come on.
His policy proposals are the best. I’m almost positive he stole from me the one where we arm every citizen of Taiwan because it’s highly specific and I have written that before.
The reason I’m fine voting for a likely grifter is you can often get them to do what the voters actually want because that’s how they stay relevant/popular.
I think his age is giving you that impression. He speaks like an impatient younger man, which he is. My bad vibes come from the fact that if he somehow won and tried to dismantle the administrative state that he might not complete his first term.
"Trump is not a threat to the administrative state"
It's them perceiving Trump to be a threat. Trump is more a monster imagined in their own heads than the real person that he is. He has lots of serious flaws but he's not the anti-Christ they perceive him to be.
See the word “fire” from the quote 2.5 inches above this? The goal is to fire them, you bad faith lowlife. Zero violence ever.
Don’t come in here and try to SWAT me. That’s a felony, Mr. L’Boullion.
Did you just watch an MSNBC segment about how there are more calls for violence and now your goal is to get people sent to prison camps for disagreeing with you? Scumbag.
This is a Cluster B narcissistic reversal on your part. You are obviously the offender here, not me, and I’m justified in using whatever language I want to describe your repulsive behavior.
Click on my profile and use the ‘block’ function so I don’t have to see you ever again.
Considering that Democrats have openly talked about disenfranchising GOP voters (which I am not, BTW), I think Kevin is suggesting that whatever measures the Dems consider feasible could be turned against them.
As Bill Barr noted, if declaring a person an "insurrectionist" is a one-official game, it would be quite possible to strip people of their voting rights on the basis of anything that any given official deems "insurrection." Having participated in the Summer 2020 protests/riots, for example. Having bailed out rioters, as Kamala Harris did.
You shouldn’t be able to vote if you are receiving the stolen money. It’s one of the concessions you should be forced to make when you agree to receive the stolen money.
Your right to vote is restored when you’re off welfare.
I would GLADLY give up my right to vote in exchange for just simply being given my tax money back. It’s a more than fair concession to ask in exchange for the lifetime guaranteed benefits and income they receive which on average exceeds the passive income you would get if you had invested $4 million in cash.
Hey dipstick - this article was about disenfranchising American voters by taking Trump off the ballot. If you had a brain and a smidgeon of integrity you'd have simply acknowledged that "KD" never said a word about violence. But you doubled down and got owned. That's how it works here.
Well, they are government employees. As are cops. Also not known for overwhelming Democratic support. I get your point about many government people simply wanting the gravy train to continue on (maybe gravy is the wrong term, based on how poorly government employees are paid vs. the private sector--they want the gruel train to continue).
But the bloated size of government has been in Republican and Democrat administrations and Congresses. In the same way that Dems have betrayed their supporters by abandoning free speech (among other fake promises), Republicans have also betrayed their supporters by not impacting the size of the government (especially not the military), and haven't gotten prayer in school, etc. Both parties lie to us all the time. And both serve the same economic elite masters.
Active duty military not included but Pentagon bureaucrats like the Space Force transvestite who just did a video about how we need to recruit mental-ill people to the military definitely count. I think cops were counted I forget.
Both parties are not what I want at all but one is a Satanic cult so comparing them like they are similar just helps Satan.
Your con artist remark on Ramaswamy is a good one. He is a Trump mini-me who evidently forgot that he would stand a far better chance if the guy he models himself with wasn't around. Why go for the diet version of Coke when the real thing is still available? Though, having said that - I'm not sure he would blurt out 'immigrants are poisoning the blood of our country' - considering the color of his skin..
I haven’t read the article, went straight to the comments section just to get a feel of the people - to be honest I’m so sick and tired of Bill Barr, James called him a treasonous rat I am calling him much worse than that, silently of course! Have a good year you all!
As a lawyer, I believe his legal analysis of the circumstances of the attempts to disqualify Trump are correct and the Supreme Court should so rule along the lines outlined by him. Political discord in the country will only get worse with either one of these poorly qualified to lead us. I would prefer Niki Haley.
It truly has become so distasteful to run for office, I must agree with you that no decent person would want to roll in the excrement that is the campaign trail.
This lawyer concurs with your opinion. Mr. Barr's legal analysis is right on. Destroying due process in the attempt to "get Trump" will inevitably result in damage to all of us and set precedents that we later regret. The ends seldom justify the means.
Under a President Haley, get ready for war in Iran, Taiwan, and elsewhere in Europe than Ukraine. And those won't just be fought with our money. Our kids will die in those ones.
Simple, he did not do what Donald Trump wanted All The Time. And he didn't announce the election was stolen. For some on The Right this is the Unforgivable Sin.
The election was stolen but I don’t think that’s the reason The Right hates him. You are right, he didn’t do what Trump told him to do in contract to the a-hole Garland. He does everything someone at the White House tells him to do (it ain’t Biden, that’s for sure). Barr is a Swamp creature and that’s why we hate him.
And you've hit on the biggest problem with Barr. He's a product of the Swamp, the Deep State, the Professional Political class, the Washington Establishment, or whatever else you want to call it. And I believe that's where his first loyalty lies.
But the enemy of whom? I always understood treason to mean betraying one’s country. I think that’s the generally understood meaning. Who or what did Bill Barr betray?
Skinny, why would you be ‘so sick and tired’ of Bill Barr? Is it because he is a corrupt elite lawyer who elucidates reasons why he doesn’t like your man? Having worked with Trump for a couple of years, he would have had a very good vantage point by which to pass judgement.
You are correct ‼️ The establishment wants to be able to continue their corruption and the fleecing of Americans. The only thing I agree on with regards to Bill Barr is the danger of keeping President Trump off the ballot. Otherwise Bill Barr is part of the corrupt establishment.
100% they view him as a threat and why deep state Barr comes after him ad hominem instead of on substance. This executive order,overturned by Biden on his first day in office, is one of the reasons why:
It is important to understand what "our" means when Democrats say: "Trump is a threat to our democracy." It is important to know they quote the horrors of the words of Chairman Mao and his philosophy on what constitute "the people" and "democracy".
And, hey Bill, since when does the “public interest” trump (sorry) a defendant’s right to have an adequate time to prepare for trial? This rush to judgment is particularly galling in light of their foot-dragging on anything adversely affecting the Left.
And I could imagine a rush to trial where Trump is convicted before the election only to appeal and then have the conviction overturned by the appellate court after the election. That is something of a nightmare scenario when you consider that a trial court conviction could very well end a viable Trump candidacy.
I am one of those who sees a second Trump presidency as “an existential threat to the country”. But then I also see a second Biden presidency in the same light. Some of the accomplishments during the Trump presidency were great (including the 2017 tax bill, the Abraham accords and the three new Justices on the Supreme Court)but his constant whining and tantrums assaulted the dignity of the office. His tariffs were a disaster and he readily acceded to trillions of bogus new spending. So yes his record was mixed at best.
As a non partisan, the group which now decides elections, I disagree. And quite frankly, am offended you partisans think you are going to save the country by making up your own laws. As we see the current administration doing. You don't save democracy by violating the tenants of democracy. Regardless of your faulty, wacko, logic for doing so. The left created Trump. The left has kept Trump in the front of the public for three years. We are a country of legal and Constitutional systems. If you don't trust the system you are the insurrectionists. As we have seen 60 times the system has dealt successfully with Trump's version of a rigged election. It was rigged, but the rigging was ans is being successfully suppressed. (Research how many voters would have changed their vote from bidne had they known about hunter's laptop) But quite frankly, no way would any person of good conscience vote for the Dems who believe they can make up their own laws as they go along. Like suppressing free speech through coercion of the social media platforms. You are the existential threat to this country. You are the ones who don't trust the system that has been developed over 200+ years. You are then ones who follow the man who said he would fundamentally change this country. The same man who has admitted numerous times he is the perpetrator of a Quid Pro Quo with foreign leaders. You are the spinless and duplicitous ones who realize, but ignore out of fear, there is a system in the Constitution to change Constitutions. But don't have the integrity nor balls to use that system.
Please tell us, how could Trump become the dictator of this country? Change executive institutions leadership to those who support him? biden has already done that. Issue edicts that he would know are unconstitutional and legislative in nature? biden has already done that. Allow his allies to invade the country from an open border? biden has already done that. Weaken the military and indoctrinate them with radical theories that have nothing to do with their fighting ability? biden has already done that. Pick out one group of citizens to demonize and turn the country against to the point their deaths were celebrated? biden and Hitler have already done that. Please explain the difference between joe's current hate speeches against those he calls, and defines, as MAGA and Hitlers, 30 January 1939 Reichstag speech.
Ironically, but typically, all the things the Dems say the fear of Trump, has been projected from what biden has already done. Your kind are an impotent and irrelevant voting minority. So are the Republican's base and radicals. You play well to the base, but the base elects no one. And those who do decide elections, independents, have no inclination to buy your conspiracy theories and partisan clap trap for the benefit of the worse president in the history of this countrymen.
Bottom line, if you and yours continue with idiotic and ill advised actions towards Trump, you will have the distinction of being the ones who created Trump and got him elected the second time. Those who oppose the 45th are not the many. You and yours are quickly making that a smaller and smaller minority.
Some cut off their nose to spite their face. Dems slit their own throats.
In fact Trump IS a threat to American democracy. He has already proven that numerous times, starting with his refusal to respect a defeat at the ballots and his unprecedented call for help to "Russia", to hack into Hilary Clinton's e-mail to help his campaign, both during public presidential debates live on TV. His refusal to acknowledge his election defeat in 2019, his unsuccessful attempt to steal the election by pressuring officials to rig the election results and his dubious role during the failed coup attempt in January 2020 complete the picture not only of a sore loser, but a credible threat to democracy, that needs to be eliminated in whatever way necessary or the US will end up falling prey to a tyrant, who will cling to power by any means available to him and who will not be followed by a democratically elected president, but a "crown prince" of his own choosing. American democracy is already seriously damaged by Trump and his not just possible, but even quite likely return to the White House (If not by a clean majority at the polls then by a finally successfully rigged election. He already laid the groundwork for a steal of the coming election by installing his lackeys in positions enabling them to "overrule" the will of voters at the polls!) can easily deliver the "coup de grass" to American democracy.
That's at least the state of affairs from the viewpoint of Americans who still believe that democracy should prevail in their country.
On the other hand it could even be good for the rest of the world if Trump can continue to destroy democracy in the USA and weaken the last remaining super power to a point where it's global domination will be so much eroded that it will cease to exist and the world can be freed from American tyranny and arrogance once and for all. Maybe the country will even fall apart and the resulting fragments will be much less frightening and threatening to the freedom of all non-americans in this world.
That's why I also believe, that other nations will meddle in the upcoming presidential election to support Trump, especially countries hostile to the US, which have an interest to destabilize and even destroy the USA. The election campaign in 2016 set the precedence, when Putin's Russia could almost openly intervene without having to face any consequences because mostly the Trump supporters were caught completely off guard and even welcomed the outside influence. Even when Trump finally invited the Russian foreign minister Lavrov into the Oval Office for secret talks behind closed doors (or to celebrate their shared election victory. We will never find out what truly happened at this meeting, because there were no witnesses to it!) there was no public outcry. It seemed as if Americans simply looked away when their democracy was corrupted, because they didn't want to see the obvious.
In conclusion: I already get ready to see the funeral of American democracy, that is about to come up within the next couple of years, because there is no one in sight in the entire political spectrum of the US, who can come to the rescue. Biden is just as corrupt and unfit for office as Trump is, the only difference being, that he at least keeps democratic institutions intact, but he will certainly not be the one who can save America from the looming tyranny, he and his democratic convictions are too weak for that and his rhetorics are hollow and reflect this weakness.
Have You popcorn ready and let the show begin.
By the way, I've already decided not to renew my membership in "The free press", because it is not the open platform where different viewpoints come together as I was hoping it would be, but just another bubble in a very segmented society, where the segments are getting ever more isolated from each other, which contributes immensely to the downfall of this country. It's not worth the money to be part of just another playground where right-wingers tell each other what they already believe to know. Which is certainly true for the comment section, but more and more for the content part as well. Especially the exclusively pro Ukrainian and pro Israel regimes stances here tell me that this is not a platform for controversial discussions but just another propaganda megaphone, not much different from the others.
Good bye, my American fellow human beings, You collectively deserve what is rolling Your way! You've all been to complacent for way too long.....I, as a German by birth know this playbook all too well, because that once happened in my country of birth too!
Do you not believe your own eyes? Did you not see Trump say about January 6th, "Be there will be wild."? or His subservient kowtowing to Putin? Or hear his conversation with Georgia election officials saying, "I need you to find me 11,800 votes."? Or his bizarre behavior stalking Hillary from behind at the 2nd debate? Or Trump being found liable for forcing his way into the women's dressing room at Nordstrom and grabbing E. Jean Carroll by the 'P' and worse? I prefer that my government officials have a little more class than the typical sex offender. In fact, not being a sex offender is on my "must-have" list for the leader of the free world.
The question is who is delusional. I'm not writing for likes. The biggest delusion of all is actually the one that makes You believe that if You get a lot of likes in social media You are right with You're views. In fact it just means Your views are more fashionable. You don't get likes for inconvenient truths.
Note the language: "many" not "all". Many have been taken in that there was an "insurrection"; just as many know full well there was no such thing. Like them, you do not get to make up your own narrative.
The elephant in the room is the integrity of our voting process that Bill Barr doesn’t mention. It is the most important element of our democracy. Otherwise, we are not better than a dictatorship where “who’s counting” wins elections.
Or who is harvesting ballots. Or how people are paid to harvest ballots. Or who is paying people to harvest ballots. Or how ballot "drop boxes" are monitored. Or how voting equipment is selected. Or how actual ballots, used and unused, are accounted for (in my jurisdiction when you vote in person every single ballot, even unused or damaged ones, are accounted for, how is that handled in massive mail-in situations?).
All true, but the really critical thing is who is on the voter registration lists? Almost all vote integrity procedures are just to verify that voters are registered. If the list is full of noncitizens, dead people and people who no longer live in the state, a lot of fraudulent votes can be cast without being caught.
Guess which party fights against every effort to verify voter registration lists.
All those questions about how the voting is conducted are important, Lynne, but rules for how candidates get on the ballot in the first place are also very important, e.g. how many petition signatures are required, and does that number depend on whether it's a general election or a party primary, and if general whether the candidate is running as a major party nominee, a minor party nominee, or an independent.
True. I have not researched it but my reading suggests that there is authoritative caselaw that says primaries are private business and not subject to regulation, either legislative or judicial. I see these ballot disqualification attempts as an end run around that. Well that and distraction, frivolous litigation expense for Republicans, and opportunity to spread mis-,mal, and dis-information to inflame emotions. But it matters not who is on the ballot if casting the ballot is not legitimate because the state next door allows impropriety. When the Supreme Court weighs in it will apply the law of the state where the appeal stems from. And there are several now. This may be where I get my desired official recognition that election laws can.be readily manipulated.
I would guess because they are the pre-cursors to the regular elections. But it is an interesting question. I wonder how caucuses are funded. Taxpayers pay for all sorts of private business enterprises. Like NFL stadiums.
It could be argued, NFL is a business. The state has no interest in primaries. Only the parties do. People can be elected without primaries. RCV as one example.
Take it one more important step further. The requirements that the Repubs and Dems have put in place to deny a third party from even considering making a run for elected office. Where in the Constitution does it say someone needs x amount of signatures to run for elected office?
I agree that primary elections should be the private business of the parties, unless we're talking about a "jungle primary", which is really the first round of a general election. But the private primaries should not be financed or conducted by the government.
To dan brandt's point, I agree that the major parties have made it unreasonably difficult for third party or independent candidates to get on the ballot. I also don't think signature requirements for general (public) elections should depend on party membership. But if there are no restrictions on being listed on the ballot other than the requirements for holding the office being sought, like age, citizenship, residence in a relevant jurisdiction, a working brain (no, that's too restrictive!), etc., then there's nothing to stop some party or other group from persuading a huge number of people to run for the same office, thereby making any kind of printed ballot hopelessly unwieldy. One rather radical "solution" to this problem is to dispose entirely of the idea of "getting on the ballot" by having only write-in candidates. Anyone meeting the general requirements for serving in the elected position could file as a write-in, and voters could consult the list of write-ins for their desired choice(s). That could still result in a large number of candidates receiving votes, perhaps too many for a simple plurality to suffice for choosing the winner, which would require some sort of runoff or other method.
I get what you're saying, Lynne. Many commenters here say the same. And yet from what i've read, Republican voters for example in Florida, Pennsylvania and Arizona do enjoy voting by mail. It's convenient, and who doesn't like that? And how does anyone know how many Republican votes are in ballots being harvested? there might be quite a few. Don't GOP operatives on the ground harvest votes as well? Senior citizens aren't all Democrats.
We have mail-in voting in Texas. But you have to qualify - be out of town during voting, be over a certain age, or a have a disability which precludes your appearance in person (that last is paraphrasing but the term disability is used and the election administer cannot question the nature of the disability - that is how mail-in balloting was greatly expanded during covid). So when you request the ballot you have a recent signature to compare to your ultimately submitted ballot. When you as a mail-in voter fill out your ballot (keep in mind that recent article on TFP about the poll indicating 17-21% admitted filling out someone else's ballot, signing someone else's ballot, or sending a ballot yo a state they no longer lived in) you put the ballot in an envelope and seal it. You then confirm.your current address and sign the envelope. You place that envelope in another envelope which is deposited in the mail.or delivered to the election administrator. When the ballots are received the are accumulated and groups of poll workers open the outer envelope, review the inner envelope to verify the signature and address by comparing them.to the voter registration rolls and the mail-in ballot request. It is quite tedious but meticulously performed in my experience. If there are questions that envelope is delivered to the election administrator and she contacts the voter. If there are no questions the ballot is separated from.the envelope and placed in the to be tabulated pile. This process is not as secure as a live person with a photo ID but it is reasonably secure. My jurisdiction also accounts for each blank ballot. They are a hand numbered by the election judge. Some are voted and cast. Some are spoiled - the voter makes a mistake and gets a new ballot or the machine misfeeds; these are collected and turned in at the close of the day in the event of early voting or close of the polls on election day. If a person issued a mail-in ballot shows up to vote in person they can but they either have to surrender the mail-in ballot or file an affidavit saying they had one, have not voted it, and did not surrender it. ICBW but I think they then vote provisionally until it can be ascertained that the mail-in ballot was not used - IOW that the voter is not attempting to cast multiple ballots or that someone else has not used the mail-in ballot. Again this is possible because the ballots themselves are tracked. So I am not opposed to mail-in ballots but I guess I prefer doing so for cause not mere convenience because as I hope you see from.my explanation it is not convenient for the election system itself. I have no idea how the universal or the more liberal mail-in states secure their ballots. But I hope you see the potential for abuse without stringent precautions.
If you recall the "hanging chad" controversy from 2000 was objectionable because it took so long. So we sought to avoid that by going to machines but the reliance in mail-in in 2020 and 2022 meant some elections were not decided for weeks.
Both parties and many PACs try to get out the vote both. But harvesting is either directly approaching the voter in their environment or, creating events to attract potential voters, as Robert Francis O'Rourke did with Soros and Sam Bankman-Fried money. Literally, I am not making it uo. And in my county it worked like a charm. All they knew was "Vote Blue, No Matter Who". As a result they elected a 19 year old lawn boy with no courthouse experience as the District Cletk of one of the fastest growing counties in the US. Clerks are the backbone of courthouses. He could not spell subpoena much less issue one. He did not know how to summons jurors and when he finally put together a list and a form summons he addressed them to his office not to the venireman's address. It is embarassing. As for harvesting in general, most harvesting is in urban areas because population density makes it easier. Urban areas tend to be blue.
As for senior citizens there are reports of nursing homes(Michigan? Wisconsin?) that voted 100% Democrat. That environment took is ripe for abuse.
I want everybody entitled to vote to vote. Whether they vote the way I do or not. I just want one vote per registered voter cast by that voter.
The mass mailing of unsolicited ballots to every warm (or even cold) body certainly invites abuse. Also, even if the rules are fair, a successful election requires that a large percentage of the voters actually think about the candidates and issues at stake. Perhaps that is too much to hope for? Otherwise we end up with the District Clerk you mention, and lots more like him.
The answers to most of your queries here are all in the public record. This stuff really isn’t done in secret, it’s just that so many people won’t do the actual work to find the answers from county and state election offices.
You are wrong and I am rarely so blunt. County and state election offices monitor and administer elections. Nothing more and nothing less. They are concrrned with the nuts and bolts of the election - voter registration, integrity of the election equipment, selection of pollingnplaces, integrity of ballots, staffing polling places, verifying mail-in ballots and tabulating votes. At best they would have numbers on total ballots issued - in person, mail-in, used, unused, and spoiled. They would always lose some in the mail-in sphere as some are mailed out but not returned. But no matter how diligent they would have no way of knowing why they were unused or what happened to them. This would be particularly true in jurisdictions where the voter is not required to request a mail-in ballot or qualify to use mail-in balloting but rather they are sent out unsolicited. Mail-in ballots are verified, to the extent they are verified, by the signature of the voter.
The donations to campaigns are public record. The donations to 501(c)(3)s and 501(c)(4)s are public as are their expenditures if you wade through their tax returns. PACs are in this category. But to be thorough you would need to know the identity of each entity paying for harvesting. Research that and get back to me please. Private persons paying for ballot harvesting would not be subject to public disclosure at all. Neither the identity of the harvester, nor amount paid thereto, would be subject to public disclosure if the payer were a private entity. Private persons directly harvesting ballots would not be subject to scrutiny at all.
Indeed, why getting money out of our electoral process is the single most important issue of our time. If we wish to remain a republic by democratic representation. Otherwise we will continue to fall down the oligarchical rabbit hole until it’s eventually end somewhere around a plutocratic authoritarian system
Economic studies have shown money is not a tipping point once past a certain point. The real thing we need are clean voter rolls, voter ID, and tighter restrictions on things like mail in balloting and ballot harvesting.
I find it hard to believe that beyond a certain point money doesn’t play a role. When such large sums of money are pooled toward a party administration it’s only logical that they would seek to continue and strengthen that funding by passing favorable legislation.
Voting is important to me. I do come home about once a year. Also elections happen more than once every four years am I supposed to schedule my life around election times to come home and show up in person to request an absentee ballot for every election? Makes no sense whatsoever. Absentee ballots have been is use for decades and with no verified claims of widespread voter fraud. It is only the past two elections, especially 2020, where all of a sudden it was a huge issue.
It seems to me you are discounting every single US military person, along with tens of thousands of other Americans who support the military, who live overseas.
Good point. Seems to me that we're edging closer to global feudalism with intrigues by our "nobles" starting to rival the worst excesses of the old "nobility" who were nothing but a class of brigands and "mafia dons" kept in power by hired guns.
I've read similar articles. The top .01% of people decide what policies will be applied and those only occasionally align with what the majority of people want. I understand we're a Republic and that you can be in the minority and still have your rights respected, but it's been a LONG time since politicians have done anything to better the lives of the average person.
The federal government, which has painstakingly examined the events of January 6, has not charged President Trump with insurrection or even incitement. “
Painstakingly?? As in suppressing exculpatory evidence? Trump told people to be peaceful, to go home. There were FBI agents fomenting a riot.
And as for the voters deciding, how many illegals will the democrats register and pay to vote? There is no proof of citizenship required to register. Just a signature attesting to citizenship which can be lied about. No one validates these registrations.
In addition, Trump offered 10,000 troops to the Speaker of the House to protect the Capitol - the Speaker is in command of Capitol police - and she refused while her daughter filmed the government staged event.
Yes, the Capitol chief of police has a lot to say about how his services were ignored by Pelosi. Was any of this covered in the so-called J6 investigation?
Funny how the 'J6 committee' has officially been 'deleted' after it was never legally constituted(opposition party members were not picked by the opposition party).
They don’t need to pay people to vote. They only need to collect the ballot, which they can do by having stacks of them mailed to communal homes or abandoned properties. That’s why the DHS is issuing ID cards to illegals.
Your other point is a good one: not even a completely partisan kangaroo court that threw the “I” word around almost as much as “a”, “an” and “the” was willing to charge Trump with “insurrection”.
This is not new. Illegals have been registered by Democrats in Chicago for a long time. They use addresses for parking ramps and doctors offices. When I volunteered for True the Vote we caught these.
News to me; not that there is fraud like this, but how they do it; thank you for posting. This must stop of course; investigative journalists need to get the news out and spread it widely.
This is true. In Nevada as well. It's about clean voter rolls too. In Chicago, it's a joke but it is true there are plenty of dead people on voter rolls.
The joke is that during Election Day, great winds lift spirits out of cemeteries and somehow they are able to cast a vote. The sad thing is they often do.
Also in Chicago and many parts of the country, they have legalized some kinds of procedures that contribute to fraud. In Chicago, if your signature doesn't match up to your registration, you are still allowed to vote. "Maybe that person had a stroke or something and can't write the same......"
You guys need signatures to vote? Here in VA we don't need to sign anything. Poll workers just check our picture ID with the voter roll, and we're good to go.
As you may have heard, tho it is not advertised, many states are allowing these illegal immigrants to get drivers licenses, so they can drive to their "job". At the same time, most or all of these states will automatically register a driver to vote. This new driver has to "opt out" if they dont want this on their record. Now, I assume, but am not sure, that if the "driver" accepts voter registration, they get to pick D or R, but I am skeptical it is that easy. My feeling is that D is offered with positives, and R is offered with negatives. Call me a skeptical, but this new process for voter registration is heavily skewed to D's.
AND, last I heard, you have to be a LEGAL citizen of the USA to vote, not some illegal immigrant.
** also, Trump and Vivek, both clearly said "illegal immigrants are poisoning the blood of our country". Simply being an immigrant was not used in the statement. As usual, Trump was misquoted, to fit the hate for him.
Estimates of noncitizen voting range from 1 million to 5 million. That's before the millions Biden has allowed into the country in the last three years.
I despise Trump, but I despise the extra-legal attempts at removing him from ballots even MORE. And I TRULY despise those Demoncrats who are cheering this on! Can I just be put into a coma and awakened after January 21, 2025?
Very Well Put. It shouldn't mater if someone Does or Does Not like/support him.
1. A reason he is doing as well as he is, Is because of all of these legal attacks on him. It is just Not Fair.
2. Makes many people wonder if The Democrats/Media (but I repeat myself) really Want Donald Trump to be the GOP nominee, because they think he's the easiest to beat?
One need not be a fan of Trump or even intend to vote for him (I'm not and I don't) to think that the largely illegal efforts that Democrats have been making to bring him down reflect really horribly upon the Democrats. The Russian Collusion scam implicates the Obama administration in stuff that is far sketchier than Watergate; but with the support of the media, the Democrats have managed to prevent any similar widespread furor.
I wish Trump would go away. But the Democrats' efforts to take him down are actively destroying any pretense that we live in democratic republic. They are also revealing the fascism that is now at the heart of the Left. Not a good look.
I don't personally blame anyone who does vote for Trump in 2024, but I am deeply concerned about what the Leftists will do if Trump should somehow win again. I think they will make the summer of 2020 look like a picnic.
Personally, I intend to vote third party, unless someone other than Trump manages to secure the nomination, which does not look likely at this point. It is long past time for a viable third party, and the only way we are going to get there is by voting for it.
100% with you on all three sentences above. Going with No Labels. The current D-R Jihad is accomplishing nothing except more constitutional vandalism. Even if No Labels doesn't win in the Electoral College, at least it will pull the parties back toward the center, as Perot's 1992 candidacy did for the ensuing eight years.
I too wish there was a viable third party but it is just a wish. There are no viable third parties and every vote for one is, in my opinion ,a wasted vote and as good as a vote for the Marxist Party.
Well, the polls indicate that 70% of voters do not want a Biden-Trump rematch, while 60% of Repubs and 65% of Dems do not want their own guy to run again.
If that's not enough to drive us to vote for a third party ticket, what is?
Trump cannot go away until we resolve our internal conflict. We are in the weeds being strangled. The only way out is with an outlier who challenges the corruption of the current establishment. A ‘good’ challenger would only be crucified. We need someone who is one of them and not afraid to break them with a caricature of their wanton depravity for having gotten us to this state. Never fear. Strap on. The only way out is through.
Its one of the things drives his supporters (along with the way he has been treated). This goes back to 2015-16. "He Fights!" This is what I saw going all the way back.
True. Because he doesn't roll over and show the belly. See Romney in his debate with Obama and the CNN reporter stepping in to save Obama for one example of what supporters hated.
This. I kept waiting for Milquetoast Mitt to respond to Biden's scurrilous accusations that "he'll put y'all back in chains" and the fool never did.
Mitt fancies himself a genteel politician, but with his "it's not a tax, it's a fee" regarding who'd pay for his healthcare plan as governor of MA, he just showed that he's a RINO and Uniparty stooge.
So what? I despise Biden to the point that'd I'd love personally to throttle the corrupt, divisive scumbag if given the chance. The point is that, neither Trump nor Biden has been convicted of a crime. Although the mounting evidence that the Big Guy is a corrupt traitor would give any sentient being a good reason to remove him from office, let alone the ballot.
Why do you despise Trump so much? Biden, and his administration are the ones you should despise. Trump told us what Biden was going to do, and he was correct. Why would any sane person want open borders? Why would you want a University president who plagarizes and condones the genocide of Jews? Why is there a Supreme Court Justice who can't define what a woman is?Big surprise, there are two genders, male and female. Let's stop all this nonsense and lying. Get back to common sense.
I don't despise Trump, at all. Was your comment directed to someone else or was my point unclear? I absolutely detest Biden. I don't love Trump but will happily vote for him.
So sorry, I read your comment quickly. I need to slow down. I am so upset by what Biden, personally I think it is Obama who is running the show, is doing..Biden hasn't been convicted of a crime, but having an open border is treason. He should be impeached, but that has to be passed by the Senate, which isn't going to happen ,because the Dims have the majority in the Senate. What is going to happen to this country?? I am not looking forward to the mess the Democrats are going to put us through in the upcoming months until the election in November. Very concerned. I also will happily vote for Trump. Anyone who votes for Biden hates this country.
The border has been a problem for both Republican and Democratic presidents. The last president who made a real attempt to solve it was Reagan--by granting amnesty to people who came here illegally--and that didn't work either. The President has some powers in terms of immigration but it's Congress that sets the actual policy and they haven't done anything in a long, long time beyond fundraise for their own reelections and give the President and courts powers that should have remained with Congress.
As for the President of Harvard, I don't think Biden has a say in that, which is a good thing as the President of the U.S. shouldn't be deciding who runs private universities or companies.
Who cares what one Supreme Court justice says at this point. McConnell made sure the court is now just another arm of the Republican Party.
I'm in Independent, not a Democrat, but I don't get why conservatives constantly complain when they're the ones who benefit most from how our system is set up because their votes count disproportionately due to the Senate and the Electoral College.
I am a conservative and I definitely am not benefitting from how are system.is set up. Neither is any American citizen. There are flaws in our system and they are being exploited. Largely because Congress does not perform its function which leaves the executive branching control. This has been true for so long that we are now ruled - ruled, not governed - by executive branch mandate. And worse, as is abundantly clear from the Twitter files the career bureaucrats in the executive branch alphabet agencies are no longer loyal to the President. Which you may think one or another is not worthy of their loyalty, but it means they are accountable to no one.
I was around when Reagan granted amnesty to millions of illegal aliens. It was done with assurances from Democrats that immigration reform would be had. It never happened. I was in lae school. It was the first time I saw in real time how deceitful Democrats are.
I agree that Congress does not perform its function. They're supposed to control the purse strings and they can't even do THAT anymore without drama of a default every few months.
The wall already has holes in it. It was just a vanity project. Walls and technology can't keep out people who REALLY want to get in. Look at Israel. They had MACHINE GUNS lining their walls and Hamas still broke through.
REPUBLICANS are the ones who brought this case in Colorado in the first place. As I've said before, it's purely a stunt. They get Trump disqualified in a state or two, then they can raise money and scream and yell that Trump has been disqualified in a state or two.
Low information voters hear about this and assume two things 1. that Trump has been removed from the ballot in the general election which hasn't happened anywhere yet and 2. Democrats did it.
Low information folks fail to understand that there are Republicans in Name Only that are really Uniparty adherents and that those adherents despise Trump. Low information folks also fail to understand that genuine Democrats/Progressives are willing to change their party designation to further their Democrat/Progressive goal, like voting in Republican primaries to obtain fringe nominees.
I've played this game before. Tried registering as a Republican in order to vote for Jon Kasich (and not TRUMP) in our state b/c I was hoping to have a not-Trump alternative in 2016.
I think it is possible, and even legal, to do. But I also think it is is gamesmanship about something that is not a game. And dishonest. And very, very disrespectful to your voting peers.
Democrats are trying to get another Republican to win the nomination so Trump will run 3rd party and split the vote, handing the country and the money back to the Regime.
Scott D, I read this comment of yours awhile back and it has changed everything for me. And, why isn't it discussed every second? I haven't read the Colorado SC case to understand the standing analysis in the case, but it doesn't make any sense that the Dems would have filed the initial claim b/c they will get overruled in by SCOTUS. And, all this nonsense is (again, gross) just helping Trump be Trump. Do you have any more information on the original claimants? Thanks!
No, no comas for you. wink wink . . . I know this is tongue in cheek; even so, each of us has to fight the enemy, so you've got to stay awake and engage and fight, right?
I agree with Bill Barr's great article—the well-written explanation of section 2383 and the congressional process needed to pull this off. I always found it interesting why the world Insurrection for January 6th.
It was a riot, plain and simple. It was rattling the political class cages, and it got out of hand. I am in complete agreement with those who were destructive getting an appropriate amount of fines and prison time.
But this leftist and media propaganda program is an example that these people are worse than Trump. Barr is so right when he describes Trump as a person not capable of winning a decisive victory and his truculent, petty, and toxic persona. I would add he was a terrible executive who couldn't build a consensus outside of his toadies who worship him. But this is a choice, and in the GOP primary, I will vote against him, but in the general election, he is a better alternative to incompetent leftists in office.
This whole process of barring him from the ballot shows that they are everything they say Trump is as an authoritarian but worse. The woman in Maine is trying to get money and fame as a grifter, not someone trying to save the republic. 2024 is becoming a choice between awful and really awful. Thanks for a great article that sheds light on this sham process.
How do you build a consensus with people who are using every dirty trick, legal and illegal to not only get you but, anyone who works for you? Bill Barr, was put in the A.G. position for one reason only. To cover their asses. They don't call him bondo Barr, for nothing.
Who appointed Bill Barr? Ohhhhh, right, it was Donald Trump. So is Trump part of the conspiracy to provide ass cover? Then it's odd that he just wrote this article criticizing people who are trying to get Trump removed from states' ballots. Maybe Barr is just a guy who knows the law and thinks it should be followed.
Also, isn't it weird that so many people who were associated with Trump end up with unfavorable opinions of him. Are they all just "plants" by the establishment? Or does he bear some responsibility for the people he appointed and their unfavorable opinions of him?
Building a consensus is not with everyone but another 10-15%. The goal is to get around 60% approval ratings. Trump is too much of an egomaniac, thin-skinned crybaby who needs people's lips on his ass to get anything done. This makes his unforced errors sky-high. But the answer to your question is the discipline that Trump has none of.
You didn't answer my question. I didn't ask if you thought Trump was an egomaniac. I didn't ask if he was thin-skinned crybaby. I didn't ask if he liked people that kissed his ass. I asked how do you form a consensus with people who will do anything legal or illegal to destroy you or anyone affiliated with your administration.
My answer is that you don't. They are 35-40% of the population. Trump gets 45-47%. To build a consensus you need the people who see the egomaniac crybaby jackass and want no part of him. The people you describe are not the whole other side, most people are repelled by Trump thus he can't forge a consensus. Does that do it?
I'm thankful to Bill Barr for this article. He is a sharp man and has spent a lifetime in service to our country. I'm thankful for his insight, his clear logic, and his commitment to conservative pinciples. I appreciate that he's from a generation that had a sense of duty instead of a need for "likes," and popular approval.
Albert, I guess I will have to do the same: vote against Trump in the primary, but for him (I can't believe I will have to betray myself in that way) in the general.
Also, do any of the readers know about the write-in rules for election? I'm assuming they are governed by each state.? In my dream world, normal Americans would write in a reasonably intelligent and mature candidate (whether D or R) and do an end run around the scenario that we might be faced with in November. Where's Ross Perot when you need him? (Kidding, he died in 2019).
The behavior of people on the left and the right in their deification or demonization of Trump has generally left me wiping my hands and walking away towards a middle position. I don’t want to be involved in these debates because the anxiety that comes with it is not a good use of time.
However, the actions of CO and ME disquiet me, as it has now created a slippery slope precedent to be misused by either party on the basis of pettyness and “we owned you” types of behavior. This needs to go to the Supreme Court, as this measure is a subversion of voter’s rights in a democracy.
Whether Trump wins or loses, pretty sure there’s going to be riots from either side.
I am no fan of McConnell as he is Exhibit A on my Uniparty theory, but he did not really change the rule he just expanded it using the Democratic playbook. The rule, since the 1950s, had been a 60 vote "supermajority" was required to confirm all federal judicial and executive branch nominations. In 1993 Democrat Senator Harry Reid fought and won to lower the requirement to a simple majority for all positions except the Supreme Court to facilitate Obama nominations. The vote was 52-48 along party lines and is referred to as the "nuclear option". McConnell said at the time you will regret this when it is used against you. And he made good on it because when Trump's nominees faced filibusters as Obama's did when the nuclear option was deployed, McConnell oversaw an expansion of the rule change to include Supreme Court nominees. So if McConnell was wrong so was Reid.
Barr hates President Trump for personal reasons...very petty personal reasons. The fact is that Barr deliberately conspired with the FBI to cover up the Hunter Biden laptop issues...issues that clearly show Joe Biden is a crook. Barr also stated that DOJ investigated the fraudulent Nov 2020 election when in fact he did no such thing.
The science of math and statistics...the law of large numbers and the central limit theorem show with mathematical certainty that the Biden votes were illegal fraudulent votes. It's not an opinion...its math.
What Barr is doing here is more cover up. Of course there is no legal basis to remove President Trump from any ballots so Barr states that in an effort to show he is fair. He is guilty of criminal conspiracy against the US election of Nov 2020 and must be prosecuted when President Trump is back in the Oval Office in Jan 2025. Barr knows this and he is worried about it. Hence this article.
Totally agree. I never thought much of Barr and felt he was just a do getter who Trump thought would be great. The deep state is DEEP and has existed as far back as Clinton but became evil when Obama was elected with his “ don’t let a crisis go to waste”. Our country is in one hell of a mess now. No one until Trump had the guts to attack the deep state and many people saw this. That’s why he is so popular. Though he wasn’t a politician, he saw the evil being done. He is a fighter, just needs the right people to help him cleanup this bloated bureaucracy. Don’t know if he can but the pool is slim now. God save America.
I agree with one small quibble. There really is not much federal.election law. It is mostly about campaign finance. Because elections are governed by state law. So when hecsaid I saw no evidence of widespread fraud that is likely true as far as his jurisdiction. But he also saw what you and I saw, and all those people who went to DC saw, and what the President saw that left us scratching our heads and he, in his capacity as AG, did not call for a review and analysis of election law. Which is sorely needed.
Deviation from Benford's Law does not prove election fraud, as discussed here: https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN27Q3A9/. It may be a red flag, but it's not conclusive evidence. Barr does hate Trump and Biden is crooked, but there's no solid evidence that he stole the election, as Barr has stated.
Barr did not even consider the numbers, much less the probabilities. All he said was he did not see evidence of widespread fraud. Which he would not see in his federal jurisdiction because almost all election law is state law. Elections are administered at the state level. Federal election law is primarily campaign and campaign finance related. But in hindsight it is obvious that the election was manipulated -both by suppression of information and numerous last minute changes outside of required legislative approval. Ad a result review and reform.of election laws is vital. If we can have uniformity of state child custody laws so they are enforceable from state to state we can have election laws that protect the sanctity and integrity of the individual's vote in each state.
The federal government has an election crimes branch. And before the 2020 election Barr authorized federal prosecutors to investigate suspected offenses of election law, for which he received criticism. He also criticized the use of mail-in ballots as allowing greater opportunities for fraud.
Here is how investigating crimes does not usually work: make a claim that there must be a crime committed somewhere and task law enforcement with finding it. Here is how investigating crimes does work: report suspicion of a specific crime to law enforcement who investigates that specific crime, such as that related to voting machines. That was investigated, but not prosecuted for lack of evidence.
Curiously I find no data regarding actual prosecutions.
So I stand by my comment.
To be clear I make no allegation of election fraud as defined in 2020 election laws. I will leave that to others. But it is beyond obvious that those laws were manipulated. And will be again if election laws are not reformed.
Edited to add: the nation is replete with law enforcement and prosecutorial task forces that do indeed begin with a proposition that a crime must be being committed and then seek it out. Examples include, but are by no means limited, to: DWI/DUI, child porn, drugs, money laundering . . ..
First, this is a telephone opinion poll, so I think we would agree that it's not a smoking gun regardless of the responses. Second, assuming that the poll revealed accurate information, 19% of the respondents indicated that they assisted someone in filling out their ballot, not that they changed someone's ballot or that they voted for someone who chose not to vote. Third, whether or not this type of assistance constitutes fraud would depend on state law, which varies on this subject. Some states permit it, others don't, while others require that voters indicate whether or not they received such assistance. If my elderly grandmother says she wants to vote for Trump, and I help her fill out her ballot because she has vision problems and arthritis, and I fill it out exactly as she wants, I wouldn't consider this as fraud and it definitely isn't something that's going to change an election result.
I wish the poll would have asked if the person had changed a ballot, or manufactured one, or sent one in from someone who was deceased, etc. That would have given a better hint at whether or not there may have been widespread meaningful fraud.
I'm in my 50s, so I'm all grown up, thanks. I never denied that voter fraud exists, thus my wording: "widespread meaningful fraud." But that fact doesn't change the results of an election. I believe that there's fraud in almost every election and I support tighter measures to combat it, like requiring photo i.d. for voting. But every time the candidate I favor loses an election, I don't claim that the election was stolen without quite of bit of evidence. I didn't like it when Gore supporters falsely claimed this in 2000, and I didn't like it in 2020 either.
Actually it does. A mathematical "law" is a known truth, such as the law of sin's. Reuter's s attempting to deflect from this by making a false corollary with criminal law in which the only "solid evidence" would be finding the actual fraudulent ballots among the millions cast - the proverbial needle in the haystack. Reuters likely knows this but is engaging in more yellow journalism to again prop up their narrative.
Actually, that's not what the article does. It makes a similar case to the one made by that bastion of yellow journalism, the American Statistical Association, here: https://chance.amstat.org/2022/04/benfords-law-votes/.
There are cases in which use of this law may apply and those in which it does not, such as human height, weight, or IQ. Application of this law has been used to detect accounting fraud, but it is not sufficient to do so, either practically or legally. That is because other factors may influence the numbers so further investigatin is needed. As the ASA article explains, Benford's Law has been used detect voter fraud in elections (Iraq anyone?), and, when applied to county vote totals, may indicate fraud. But again, this is only an initial indicator that there MAY be fraud, not definitive proof that there definitely is. If someone shows me more conclusive evidence of fraud, I'd be happy to consider it, but application of this statistical tool doesn't provide it.
Bedfords law is immutable but will always be variable dependent and subject to GI = GO. I don't have the wherewithal this morning to dissect all of their individual analysis' other than to say: "lies,damn lies and statistics"; This is often quoted for a reason.
FWIW however, I have seen/read comparisons between questionable precincts in the 2020 election vs the statistical analysis from previous elections and using this "apples to apples" comparison it showed that Biden's vote totals were substantially higher than what would have been expected based on past performance. This also doesn't "prove" anything but is another "red flag".
As to Reuters, the headline from the article - "Benford's Law does not "prove'' election fraud" - which, as I said, would require finding the actual fraudulent ballots. This was intentionally written due to Reuters bias' where they misled readers to believe that the statistical claims of election fraud were not reliable. Reuters set up a straw man argument under the guise of a "fact check" that they then proceeded to tear down like a pinata. As an aside, wasn't it Reuter's who had their news office over a ISIS bomb-making operation and then claim to know nothing about it?
We agree about the red flags, which I think should be investigated, to a point.
And to your point, I think too many people only look at statistics from a perspective that supports their conclusions.
From a recent article published in Research Integrity and Peer Review:
"Whilst it is provable mathematically that a scale-neutral, random sample of numbers selected from a set of random probability distributions will follow Benford’s Law, Benford’s Law is not immutable or irrefutable for real data. Whilst we can observe that Benford’s Law holds remarkably well for certain datasets, reflecting Hill’s theoretical proof and the idea that such data is ultimately the product of random processes and random sampling, in reality we know that no such dataset is truly completely random in its construction or sampling. As such, we can expect minor deviations from Benford’s Law even in datasets which fit all of the supposed criteria for suitable data. Thus, it is not possible to prove unquestioningly that some set of data should, or should not, follow an exact distribution such as Benford’s Law."
If Trump has 50.5% of votes and Biden 49.5% (not exactly what happened but stay with me), a 1% lead with 98% of the votes in, and the polls shut down for the night to only a handful of election officials, in order for Trump (or anyone) to lose Biden would have to get at least 75% of the remaining 2% of uncounted votes to win.
Even in the most crooked county in America, Cook, no one gets 75% of votes.
I appreciate your explanation, but isn't part of the problem that media outlets report 90% etc. of vote in, but isn't that usually counties or precincts reporting? Because you wouldn't really know percentage of voters unless you already knew voter turnout, which you wouldn't until you'd counted all the votes. So if the media reports only 5% or 2% outstanding, but they mean counties or precincts, then the size of that outstanding vote can be significant relative to the entire total, for example if the outstanding counties or precincts heavily favor one party or another. There are a lot of these counties in which 70% or more vote Democrat, and they tend to be large urban areas with lots of votes so it takes longer to report. I'm not saying that this is always the case, but it could be for some of them.
Could could could...yes, anything COULD happen, but urban areas and large cities tend to get counted first. The remaining uncounted votes usually come from far away districts, which BTW are usually conservative, in any state.
Believe me, in Cook County, Illinois, hardly a swing state, no Democrat ever gets 70%.
I just think you're dead wrong about this. Small rural counties count up votes quickly, as there aren't many, especially when using voting machines, which many do. Large urban centers a lot more voters, plus bureaucracies, etc. Here in Ohio, Cuyahoga County precincts (Cleveland) almost always report last. And weren't the problems in Georgia related to Fulton County (Atlanta), in which they suspended vote-counting after much of the state was already in? I think this was the case in
Also, counting of absentee ballots in many states isn't completed until several days after in-person voting has concluded. And more absentee or mail-in ballots in urban areas, which you would expect, would delay reporting even more.
And in Cook County in the last 3 elections, Obama, Clinton, and Biden all got over 70% and Hillary almost cracked 75%. And you don't have to believe me. You can look it up yourself.
Oh please... If the trial involving E. Jean Carroll's vaginal penetration by Trump in the women's dressing room of Nordstroms were a criminal trial, Trump would be a registered sex offender. As it is, he's still a sex offender. Not being a Sex Offender is on my list of "Must Have" for the leader of the free world.
Any cites/evidence that Barr conspired with the FBI to cover up laptop issues? Or more specific info on where votes were fraudulent and how the law of large numbers and central limit theorem show what you say they show? Not familiar with these claims and would like to read up. Thanks.
100% agree. The problem with intellectual elites, or elites of any kind, is their fear-based bias. They lose objectivity and create intellectual reasons for their fear- Sam Harris. We are human. No one human has the answers. We MUST learn to discern.
I would also be “truculent” if my own government worked in secret to subvert my presidency. Where were you William Barr, when the purveyors of “Russiagate” needed to be held accountable? This is the exact reason voters are pissed off (truculent) and Trump’s popularity continues its entrenchment - the political class is exempt from accountability.
What the Dems did to RFK jr is equally abhorrent and unAmerican. He is a worthy candidate who would make an excellent president. The Dems are beyond salvation
I am watching to see which way his independent run will affect the election. I think it has the potential to be disruptive. I wish the disruption had the potential to be a positive, but, alas….
Dems are anything but. Recall how their use of "superdelegates" against Bernie Sanders promoted the establishment candidate - crooked Hillary?
Both parties have large contingents of angry members who won't "go along to get along"; Ross Perot split off a large enough group of Republicans to hand Slick Willie his first term. His economic and foreign policy decisions (plus his moral failings and credible accusations of being a rapist) made enough of the country accept Bush V.2.0.
To follow that up though, the Republican Party put forth $&L McCain and then Milquetoast Mitt - both who were just part of the sleazy uniparty that could only advocate for more big government rather than any actual conservative values. I held my nose and only voted for either because their special interests were more aligned to my special interests, not because they were good candidates.
Yes, they were able to take out Bernie in 2020 by having the intelligence community say his campaign was being helped by "Russia!". And the media went along.
This shows how evil the democrats are. By any means possible, by well paid media, by controlled social media, any means possible. But Bernie is a communist. Plain & simple.
I can't stand Bernie - he's a total sellout. But what they did to him was terrible and unfair. It's the exact same thing they are doing to Trump and it is why so many are growing sympathetic to Trump.
If removing someone from a ballot can happen ... we are gone as a country. Technically, I think it's been done quietly over the years (like when they can keep a Green party candidate off the ballot), but now they are just drunk with power about it and getting sloppy.
Don’t think that will happen. Bari is reaching for some kind of truth, and I commend her for it. But as much as she strains to escape the swamp, her feet remain stuck in the mud.
Barr is a strong administrative state supporter. He was a terrible Trump appointee as he did nothing to reform the corruption of the FBI and DOJ as he was spawned among that group.
I agree what the states are doing to manipulate ballots is corrupt. These people put themselves or party above the constitution. Sadly many Federal judges do as well. I don't like being told the obvious by Barr who pretends to be all pious when he is corrupted by the administrative state as bad as any.
Vivek understands the problems. Has the intellect and restrained personality to be far more effective than Trump. Trump cares about America but his public behavior and temperament damage his effectiveness. To be fair, few other presidents were attacked by media and corrupt administrative state and Congress as Trump was. So perhaps Trump was created by Chuck, Nancy, Comey and the corrupt attorney general and corrupt judges of the FISA courts that still lurk in the shadows never held to account for the malevolent warrants they approve.
Trump's temperament effectively kept us out of new wars. This is a reason the administrative state despises him and spent all their energy trying to bring him down then and now.
Vivek is the best candidate for Republicans.He is young and beholden to no one. Many like him but think he is too young. I disagree. The constitution says otherwise. For a young, super talented person is willing to throw himself into the ugly business of politics , he should be lauded. He could serve 2 terms and invigorate and inspire the youth of this flailing country. He has carefully researched bold ideas for what he could do as president that is constitutional and doesn’t require congress’ approval. I for one am glad that Vivek Ramaswamy is in the fight. I would not write him off yet.
RFK jr is the other candidate that is unsullied by the swamp and worthy of the office. I want a decent uncorrupt person first and foremost.
Frankly, most latinos, the largest group crossing the border illegally, are religious and socially conservative. But they can't vote. Republicans could easily win them over if they really wanted to, though.
Gotcha, thanks. IMO, dems are befuddled that some people aren't able to be bought off. I recall Barry Sotero making a comment that coal miner's in W VA weren't "voting their interest" because as part of shutting down the mines, he was promising them a government handout.
Seems to me like the comments are skewing towards far right fanaticism. While I agreed with many of Trump’s policies and felt we were better off than we are with the Biden administration, he is too divisive at a time when we need sane leadership. Unfortunately, that ship may have sailed.
Hi Robert, which comments are you referring to as “far right fanaticism”? I am asking to try to understand what that term means.The comments I read seem to be well thought out and backed up with decent arguments. As far as divisive behavior, Trump has been attacked (unfairly in many instances) by democrats and media, and fought back. I do not like His petty name calling , but I am not sure how I would react if put in the same position. Thanks for listening....
I would assume he’s referring to the comments that are only focused on criticizing Bill Barr or reacting to the title, “I oppose Trump.” A lot of people didn’t read the article. Also keep in mind that when Robert published his comment at 7:48am, there were dozens fewer comments than when you published yours at 8:23am.
Look at what he accomplished. He cleaned up the Hudson River. He sues the EPA and knows well the corruption of these agencies including the corrupt FDA. He does not buy into the climate agenda. Holding corporations accountable for dumping toxic wastes in waterways and poor areas is not at all similar to the climate agenda fascist who want to take away everyone’s cars and gas stoves.
RFKjr is smart and accomplished. He is open to unscripted questions from both the right and the left. He is not beholden to big Oacs or the political machinery of any party. The only two uncorrupt candidates that I see are RFK jr and Vivek Ramaswamy. Trump is not corrupt in the classic sense,, but he is a coarse boor whose only agenda is Trump. He has hired a few fired so many good people, that the best and brightest will not work for him. For those who love him, Vivek is the smarter, younger , more focused version of the MAGA ideas.
RFKjr or Vivek Ramaswamy should not be written off.
Ramaswamy would get exactly zero support for anything from anyone on the left. He'd bring a new level of hate from Democrats, and after 2 years would lose any advantage/majority in Congress.
Some people are good at giving orders and running businesses as a sole proprietor, a monarchy or dictatorship if you will. Elon Musk is totally that way. So is Trump.
That personna and style goes nowhere in politics as we've seen with Trump.
Who needs Trump.2 when we have other worthy choices?
Maybe he just goes at it with a hatchet because he doesn't know any better. That would be fun and also keep the opposition from knowing what to do as he would be very unpredictable.
"handle the Swamp" is an important skill and it does require some experience in politics to know when to nudge and when to plow into its power. Trump's every problem requires a hammer in many ways decreased his ability to achieve goals.
Definitely, don't throw away the hammer! There are many issues that will require nudges with gentle and sharp elbows to get across the aisle agreements and then hammer out the details to achieve effective and rational legislation that benefits the nation and its citizens.
Each party is playing the anvil chorus to the determinant of the country.
What will we call the people who no doubt will riot, block roadways, burn down businesses and police stations, if Trump is elected? If you’re on the left you’ll call them patriots. Democrats on the left will tell them to get in the faces of Trump voters, scream at them, dox them, swat them, confront them in restaurants and at their homes. They’ll start fundraisers to bail them out of jail if they get arrested. They won’t be labeled as insurrectionists even if they burn down police stations. They won’t hold committee hearings to decide what should be done to them.
So if you want to know why people support Trump, Mr. Barr, these are most likely the reasons they do, rightly or wrongly.
Alas, a true summing up. As a New Yorker, I loathe Donald Trump (and also acknowledge the good things he did as president). But as someone who lived through the 2020 riots, and has seen what our democratic-socialist City Council has done to our once energetic, functioning city, I loathe leftists even more.
A state and city that tolerate the disruption of commerce, transportation, and daily living and the vandalizing of our streetscapes by pro-terrorist Muslim agitators and their college and street-thug comrades are not fit to govern. I despair.
True enough, but if it goes the other way you don't think Trump supporters will stage another 1/6? Maybe not at the capitol but certainly in the states. It's going to be a shit show either way.
No. I think they will be doing what they do everyday..... going to work and paying taxes. Trump supporters are not on Soros, Unions and Antifa payrolls. They have to support themselves.
In your comment is the implicit assumption that 'if Trump is elected' - Biden concedes defeat. And at that point Dems on the ground run amok in anger. But what happens if it is Biden who's elected? Does Trump concede? What does the recent past tell you?
I think if he beats him handily he will concede right away. If it is like 2020 then he will not concede right away. The problem, in my opinion, is there is too short a time between the election and the certification. If there are irregularities there is not enough time to properly investigate them. I'm hoping one of them wins big enough to avoid this situation.
If the likes of Bill Barr could explain why in the five contested states they shut down the vote count in the wee hours of the morning (at the same time) with Trump leading then several hours later they all resumed vote counting (at the same time) with Biden ahead (it's a miracle) I wouldn't be here thinking Trump is right, the election was stolen. Can Barr explain the video showing in Fulton County Georgia republican observers to the vote count being run out of the room with the claim of a water main leak then watching the democrats drag out hidden boxes of "new" votes? How about all the drop boxes that were stuff as shown in the movie 2,000 mules? Nothing that has been offered has adequatly explained how a dottering old fool who did not even run an election champainge except from his basement could have garnered the largest vote count in history. Until that has all been explained I will never believe the election of 2020 was free and fair.
Barr calls for a trial...wait didn't the J6 clown committee delete all their files? If it's such a preponderance of evidence, shouldn't that be in some national archives for all of us to see and examine and catalog for history? Barr stands on a knife edge in this piece, talking out both sides of his mouth. I hope The Fee Press allows someone like Victor David Hansen of Jonathan Turley to write a piece. I will give Barr 1 positive. He did mention summer of love, so maybe Kamala Harris will be charged for bailing out the anarchists in those arrests? Or we could whip up some fake charges, like Russia collusion on some Dems. Don't they see this is down the rabbit hole?!
“Many who oppose the 45th president hail these legal maneuvers as a neat way to stop Trump—who they view as an existential threat to the country”
Wrong. They view him as a threat to their protected status as members of a corrupt administrative state.
Barr writes " And his truculent, petty, and toxic persona—"
That's his argument. But not a word about Trump's policies which were spot on. Below are the words of Bill Barr from an article he wrote last year....
"...efforts generated the strongest and most resilient economy in American history—one that brought unprecedented progress to many marginalized Americans. He had begun to restore U.S. military strength by increasing spending on new-generation weapons, advanced technology, and force readiness. He correctly identified the economic, technological, and military threats to the United States posed by China’s aggressive policies. By brokering historic peace deals in the Mideast, he achieved what most thought impossible. He had the courage to pull us out of ill-advised and detrimental agreements with Iran and Russia. And he fulfilled America’s long-delayed promise to move its Israeli embassy to Jerusalem...."
But that's the point, isn't it? Trump's persona eclipses his national performance results. His persona diminishes actual results and divides the populace. He gets results, but he is not a leader. An effective president will get results while promoting respect, harmony and national pride while making us all want to be better Americans. His is the smarmy salesman who has good numbers but doesn't make the company better. My concern is about Trump's judgement. He led us down an ill-advised, disastrous path during covid that will likely have long-term health implications for a large majority of our citizens and future generations. He spent money like a drunken sailor and irresponsibly increased our deficit to the point that our children may not financially recover.
He followed the advice of his experts in an election year.
Obviously.
He should have fired Fauci, but how would that have been played out in the media?
And has not most of the spending happened under Joe Biden?
Try harder. No: just try. Don't repeat: think.
I don't recall any experts advising Trump to continuously "act out" (as they say these days) as a petulant narcissist who attacks his own team and teammates at the drop of a hat. Nor do I recall any expert advising him to insert himself into eminently winnable Senate races last year and endorse poor candidates who went on to cost his party seats in New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Arizona. (And, in the process, the Senate.)
You are free to compartmentalize the man from the policies, but that cuts both ways, sir. M Palmer and anyone else has the right to include personal demeanor and behavior in their own assessments and voting behavior.
Trump would have been re-elected with ease if he'd show a semblance of couth now and then. That he chooses not to is on him, not others who recoil at his comportment. Many if not most people aren't going to support a leader who acts like a jackass more than once in a great while. He could change that tomorrow if he chose. (It worked for Nixon; most Americans still love second chances.)
As best as I can recall, nearly every adviser Trump has had (including Barr) has advised him to tone things down and stop getting in his own way, and it's usually around then that he terminates them. But again, that's on him. Voters have every right to judge candidates based on personal behavior.
Well, to me it is OBVIOUS that he won the election. The people who actually vote love him. It is the chattering classes, whose work mainly seems to consist in the purposive sowing of confusion, who hate him.
And the Left "acts out" EVERY SINGLE DAY. What Trump did is mirror, in a greatly attenutated way, the ridiculousness with which all conservatives who try to do ANYTHING honest and beneficial to America are treated.
Personally, I LIKED that he told idiots they were idiots and liars that they were liars. If that offended you, well, maybe you have good reason to feel offended.
It's one thing to call out an idiot or a liar. It's another to call a serviceman who got shot down over enemy territory a loser when you got multiple draft deferments for physical reasons but still manage to play golf all the time.
One of those two is a loser, all right, but it's not the fellow who served.
I'm neither a Democrat nor a matter of the chattering class, but no way would I vote for anyone who authored that POS remark.
By the time Biden completes his first term, he will have spent approximately 11.5% more than Trump did. That’s the worst fiscal record of any president. But Trump is second worst.
The House appropriates funds, the Senate approves them, and the President signs off on the budget.
Ronald Reagan is remembered for "his" Defense spending, but what is little recalled is that spending on Welfare of all sorts also increased continually in the 80's under a Democrat led Congress. Reagan had little choice but to sign their bills, or he would have been unable to pursue his own agenda.
True. We have a complicated system. One of the great things about bureaucracy for those working within one is that it's always possible to pass the buck and claim that "It wasn't me, I didn't make that decision." If anything is to change someone needs to stand up like Pres. Truman and say, "The buck stops here," and take responsibility.
I'm a big fan of Ronald Reagan, the best President of my lifetime. The spending that was done under his administration bought the fall of the Soviet Union. That's a lot of benefit for the price. That said, overspending is still a problem. In the Reagan administration it was a "necessary evil," but at least we got something great from it. What have we gotten from the massive overspending by Presidents Obama, Trump, and Biden? Does anyone even know?
Trump may not be perfect but he is better than any alternative right now.
Trump is only better than Biden. That’s why if the Democrats would drop the guy that most of them don’t even want and instead run a younger candidate, who can at least pretend to be a moderate, they would beat Trump without any problem.
This is 100% TRUE! If only people could see the INEVITABILITY of this!
I voted for TRUMP twice- rather, voted against Clinton and against Biden.
2024- if Trump & Biden are still the Candidates, then my vote goes to RFK Jr
Or if the Republicans dropped Trump, I'd vote for their candidate. I'm a Democrat, and Democratic leadership knows that they need Trump to pull moderates their way.
“Trump may not be perfect” could win the most gigantic understatement of the year, no, century award.
Who in your view would best address the patent politicization of our legal system? Who would address the patent and pervasive fraud the Democrats have been using to maintain majorities even when unpopular?
And if these things are not addressed, in what meaningful respect are we still a nation which is ruled by the people and for the people?
If cheating is allowed, the Democrats could win with a blind chihuahua.
The Democrats did win with blind chihuahua. Haven't you heard Biden barking up the wrong tree?
How about No Labels? In my view, a split ticket from No Labels would best address the commandeering of our constitutional system by the two legacy parties, and more specifically the far right and far left forces who call the shots for each party. (And yes, I agree the Democrats have surpassed the GOP the past 8 years on constitutional commandeering.)
I say this because I don't see a way to fix things and thrive again until we get a handle on the D-R holy war. The legacy parties know how to posture and fight each other to the death, but that's about all they do any more. Everyone I've shown No Labels' 30-point plan to says it's closer to their own views than their own party's positions.
No one, except possibly the man himself, thinks Trump is perfect. I'm supporting Vivek Ramaswamy but I can read the polls from Iowa, New Hampshire and elsewhere. There is no coalition of support behind any non-Trump candidate, DeSantis, Haley, et al. Unless he's barred from the ballot, Trump will likely to be the GOP nomineee.
Sad
You are correct!
Thank you. Any sane conservative might enact the same policies, and do it more effectively by virtue of being a statesman -- or, shit, even just a normally polite and intelligent person -- rather than a truculent moron. As you suggest, I myself detest Trump to the point where I can't 'see past him' to notice the considerable number of good policies.
Admiting the petulant nature of your blindness is a good first step.
Nope, not petulant, but like those of us in the Anglosphere who remained loyal to the Crown, we have higher standards of decorum for our PMs than you have for your presidents. BTW, my blindness there was rhetorical otherwise -- as you might note -- I did in fact refer to 'the considerable number of good policies' -- thus I am aware of them, it's just that the odiousness of the Man makes it harder.
I was quoting you.
You know, from this side of the Atlantic, it is obvious that the failure of the rule of law is probably farther along there than it is here. You don't have had a Freedom of Information Act, you don't have a Bill of Rights, and you don't have anything like our Constitution. You have a set of institutional habits of long standing, which include an hereditary aristocracy that includes kings and queens.
If you are more zealous in your demand that your leaders keep their private iniquities out of the public eye, please forgive me if I don't view that as an improvement.
Trump cheated on his wives. When people lie about him and attack him, he calls them names, including "liar". But I feel very confident that had he gotten credit for winning reelection his COVID policies would have been very different from the fascistic ones pushed by Boris Johnson.
As an American, I will always take substance over appearance. Trump viewed his campaign promises as a To-Do list, and he got a lot of them done in the face of a weathering storm of crooks and emotionally fragile imbeciles. In a second term he will either take on the endemic corruption of our government, or the rule of law will fail here, too, and we will have people getting arrested for misgendering lunatics.
I guess the question is do you want good policies or someone who behaves the way you want. Right now in the US we have poor choices. I watch UK politics with interest. The record of the last few PM's there makes me wonder what exactly are the qualifications across the pond. I say that as someone who respects the UK and the relationship with the US.
Let's see......Trudeau? Ardern? TrussNak? Or maybe the reconstituted prison colony down under that locked up its disarmed citizens for daring to go maskless?
"loyal to the Crown" Exactly WTF does that mean? You still consider the monarchy as in charge of the government? Or you're just OK with them being around to suck in tourist dollars?
Ray, you have the most intelligent responses whenever you post. Couldn’t agree more with you!
Look around. That’s why we ended up with this goofball. So don’t vote and see what you get instead of sallowing the pill, doing something you hate because not doing is worst .
It's an issue, no doubt. Yeah everyone is spin doctored. Still, some politicians have been in public service for long enough that one can get to know them. And unfortunately policy positions can be lies.
Obama overspent trillions before Trump did...
I don't like remiss overspending by any elected official. I don't care who overspent what. I care about what the next person is going to do to control spending. I cannot live without sticking to a budget and spending within my means and neither should the government. It is irresponsible and detrimental.
Over the course of my lifetime it feels like every president has managed to exceed the overspending of the last president. "Obama did it too" neither excuses it nor makes it right.
Totally agree- but there’s no way Democrats are going to pin this solely on Trump
And Reagan and Bush 2 did before Obama. Clinton produced one balanced budget. We stopped caring (apparently) about spending a long time ago.
No, the people we elected just enriched themselves. Can’t blame any one party. Sad.
M Palmer-- I agree. Also, if Trump wins there will be chaos and anger and if Trump loses there will be chaos and anger and maybe violence (like the last time). Trump is a no-win solution. I wish there was a another choice besides these two guys.
What results? His character and personality resulted in his defeat and the total reversal of all his policies that were good.
brilliantly said!
I think you are missing the point. Bill Barr limited his analysis to the applicability/validity of the Colorado and Maine actions in regards to Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.
Trump's truculence is undisputable. It's part of his marketed persona.
In support of M Palmer's comment, integrity is the most obvious delineator of good and bad people. Integrity; honesty of purpose; fidelity, are defining attributes of good people. When a good person fails to act with integrity, they do all within the power to correct/make amends for their failure, and then strive to never make the same mistake again.
Bad people may manifest attributes of integrity, but it does not define them. They frequently shrug off their failures; caste the blame on other; refuse to accept responsibility. Whatever is necessary to acquire whatever it is they desire.
Trump is not a good person. I agree that a lot of this policies were good. That he delivered on most of his promises. But given his behavior of the last 3 years; He called for the suspension of the Constitution because he did not get what he wanted.
He cannot be trusted with the power of the presidency. He called for the suspension of the Constitution because he did not get what he wanted.
That is not an endorsement of his opponents.
But your assessment of Trump’s character, while accurate in my opinion, isn’t at all relevant. As Barr notes in apparent agreement with your position: “I am firmly opposed to Trump’s candidacy. While I think it is critical the Biden administration be beaten at the polls, Trump is not the answer.”
The answer is “So what?” Right now, and likely unless the authoritarian measures to remove Trump from the ballot succeed, the only realistic alternative to another Biden/democrat term is to elect Trump. As much as I would prefer DeSantis, he will lose the primary to Trump in a landslide. Honestly, we need to confront reality and get behind either Biden or Trump. There is no productive result from all the handwringing about Trump and his personality or character.
We have seen the awful mess created by Biden in only three years, and any democrat will just continue our slide into economic ruin and social chaos. I’m far more concerned that every dollar I’ve saved over a lifetime has lost 20% of its value than I care about Trump’s character and personality. And what will remain of free speech with another democrat term? We need to make a choice between one of the two extremely likely candidates and end the eternal quest for a perfect candidate that will never appear.
I disagree, what we need to do it hold our officials to a higher standard and force both Trump and Biden out of the race. Unrealistic? Probably. But I would rather lose standing upon my principles, than win having abandoned principle.
I would suggest your principles should not be just some internal sense that you are acting morally, but be expanded to include the real world effects of four more years of what we’ve experienced in the last three. This is not a thought experiment.
Agreed. It is not a thought experiment. Which is why I expend a significant amount of time teaching, encouraging and promoting those principles. In the end, voting for "the lesser of two evils" is still voting for evil. If we succumb to the notion that we cannot overcome the status quo, we doom ourselves to an ever-degrading scenario.
Neither Biden nor Trump are Constitutionalists. Neither is truly a champion of liberty. they must be opposed.
Did you have the same principles when Bill Clinton was President?
Yes. And Bush (both father and son).
Mr. Skinny, Likely not. President Clinton may actually be a rapist. I think if cause found to convict Harvey Weinstein is applied to a few Clinton accusations Mr Clinton is in trouble. The leftists and particularly the shrewmenist movement show themselves to be shills for the progressives and without real concern for women.
Then you have just come out against America. Your fuckwittery, if followed by enough folk, would enslave 350 million people, you sir are a fucking arse.
That was unnecessary and a weak response.
What? How would encouraging people to only support leaders who are honest, faithful and support our Constitutional Law enslave anyone?
Decaf, bro. Decaf.
ENSLAVE LOL I needed a good laugh! Get a grip. The anti-Biden vote is the only way in 2024.
Art, I completely agree with you that more years of a Biden presidency will do great damage to the economy. I agree that Trump would have better policies, probably economically, and in terms of foreign policy, then Biden. I even think it’s possible that Joe Biden may be the most personally corrupt president of my lifetime, maybe in history. And yet, I will not vote for Trump.
The issue to me is not the damage that will be wrought over the next four years. It is about the damage that is done to the fabric of the Republic. Donald Trump tore great rips in that fabric following the 2020 election. He most certainly should have been convicted by the Senate and disqualified from office. He violated his oath of office even worse than Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton. I’d love to go into more detail on my thoughts, but this is too long already. Art, I definitely do respect your opinion, but I just think more is at stake than the economy and the social agenda (of either side). I wish we could put forward someone else against Biden —I think ANY of the other 2016 Republican wannabes would easily defeat Biden this year, but it’s going to be Trump, whether I cast my primary ballot for Haley or DeSantis. Regardless, I’m willing to endure the next four years looking for a worthy Republican.
78 million voted for Trump. Do you think they were idiots? Not me. I have seen the destruction the leftist democrat have bestowed on America. I voted for Clinton but will never vote for a democrat again. After seeing what leftist (starting with Obama) did to our country, hold could any sane person do that? Brainwashing comes to mind. When they control the media and social media all you hear is what they are told to say.
Plus, who would agree to work in his administration? People of quality hate the guy and refuse to work for him. We'd be playing with the D Team.
The problem is that no national leader can be counted on for integrity or honesty. It used to be an old stand-by that politicians all lie. Maybe they do, but politicians at the national level rarely say anything that is true.
I think it's time for a new deciding factor. "have a beer with him" didn't work. "hope and change" didn't work. Guaranteed that "vote for the high integrity guy" will result in record low turnout.
What a shit show choice we have. I worry, as the polls show, that Trump will get trounced by any other generic Dem. Biden drops out and Trump loses. Suckered again. Let's not forget Trump's nonexistent coattails. How many times could he have torpedoed the slam dunk of the Georgia Senate races? I'm not pitching for Haley but polls show her beating Biden by double digits in friggen NY. I want some insurance if Biden drops out. If Biden stays in, Trump will win and in two years his hand-picked congressional ring kissers will lose both houses of Congress because they are unappealing know-nothings.
Since I'm old, and can't see a way out of this dilemma, I choose my only logical choice, fuck 'em all. Party on Garth.
My name is Anmif, and I endorse Martin’s message.
Even his Republican opponents?
I think one or two of them generally act with integrity. No, I won't name names. It isn't to my intention to endorse a candidate within this forum. That is not the purpose of the forum/comments section IMHO.
You gotta name names. I don't think you'll be able to. And that's not on you, or your ability to spot integrity. It's because there is no integrity in the ecosystem.
The following people, from what I have been able to observe, model integrity; that is to say, if they do not act with integrity, they make the effort to correct their mistakes and course-correct.
Regardless of whether or not you like them or agree with them. Everyone of them has made mistakes, and I don't mean political mistakes. I mean instances where they have failed to act with integrity.
There are others, but these are top-of-mind:
Nikki Haley
Dan Crenshaw
Joe Manchin
Andy Beshear
Marco Rubio
Mitt Romney (whom I personally detest)
Sarah Sanders
There are plenty of other conservative candidate choices who can do the “good policies” thing without ripping the fundamental foundations of our country to shreds with the civil discontent that would inevitably follow.
And Barr said he saw no sign of election fraud without saying but there were many irregularities and failed to call for a review of election laws which allowed same.
Actually, what he said was that the numerous cases of election fraud were each small and collectively would not have changed the outcome of the election.
True. Elsewhere I used widespread fraud. But that does not change the gist of my comment. And as I have pondered it further I definitely think he was derelict in not noting irregularities in the 2020 voting process. First it created a false impression that there was nothing to worry about and in fact there was. And is. Second he said that in early December, the 5th I think. Could much investigation have been done that quickly?
Yes it can. The following is from one of my other regular news sources:
https://thedispatch.com/newsletter/morning/jimmy-lais-trial-spotlights-beijings-reach/?utm_source=ActiveCampaign
Ken Block, the voting data expert hired by the Trump campaign to find evidence of fraud in the 2020 election, reflected on the experience in an op-ed for USA Today. “The findings of my company’s in-depth analysis are detailed in the depositions taken by the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol,” he wrote. “The transcripts show that the campaign found no evidence of voter fraud sufficient to change the outcome of any election. … And yet, the cries that the election was lost or stolen due to voter fraud continue with no sign of stopping. Whether a stump speech, outrageous lawsuits like the so-called Kraken cases filed by Sidney Powell, Rudy Giuliani’s lies or the ongoing misguided efforts of people determined to prove the election was stolen, the constant drumbeat hardens people’s hearts and minds to the truth about the 2020 election.”
That was well after the fact. I stand by my comments. Justify the outcome as you will.
But you have to balance out his reckless spending. His election strategies in 2018, 2020 and 2022 - by helping to nominate nut cases was a disaster for conservatives. The GOP would have had 3-4 more senators and at least a dozen representatives had he not intervened with the loons he did.
It is widely reported (not necessarily true) that most of "Trump's" policies were in fact pushed by the sorts of advisors who steered him away from his worst instincts. Trump has essentially vowed to double down on being Trump and it is at best questionable whether he will have the same sorts of advisors this time around. We can be pretty sure he has blocked the Federalist Society's phone number, so who knows what kind of judges he will appoint.
Michael Greenberg
Trump’s policies that were “spot on” were the result of advice and work of quality people around him, not his own ideas. Those quality people were all removed, because they also had a spine, which doesn’t work for Trump. Trump never had any patience and any interest in developing policies, and that’s because Trump never cared for America or the American people; Trump always cared for Trump only and he made that crystal clear. Even his most ardent (rabid?) supporters are perfectly aware of that. Nobody ever confused Trump with somebody who “serves the country”. He would actually be offended to be described as such.
Well he did donate his 1st quarter salary as president to the National Park Service, so there’s that!
I guess someone bought Bill Barr.
A long time ago
MIchael G, Whatever Barr thinks that Trump got right, or not, has nothing to do with his well-wrought piece here in the Sun. Nor do Trumps accomplishments mitigate, in any way, those personality traits, so succinctly characterized by Barr, that render him a less than desirable candidate. Sad as that may be, to you, or me, or Mr Barr.
❤️❤️❤️❤️🇮🇱🇮🇱🇮🇱a million hearts Michael, bring the man back now for all of the reasons above and more - the best President we ever had America was Great under his leadership.
None of that is relevant to this article and you know Barr's position on the administrations achievements. Folk don't have to kiss your butthole every time they speak.
Trump is not a threat to the administrative state. We already tried that. Ramaswamy is the only threat to DC tyranny with his plan to fire half of these assholes based on the last number of their SSN being odd or even.
There’s a 95% chance Ramaswamy is a con artist but he is the only person expressing ideas that will help us reverse the path to Argentina so it’s worth a shot.
There are 20 million government employees in the United States with 3 million being federal. Obviously it is totally indecent and corrupt to allow these people to vote and they all vote and they all vote Democrat. Not to mention the 25 million obese people receiving free food and healthcare, bought for them with money stolen from their fellow citizens, who also should clearly not be allowed to vote.
So just chop about 45 million votes off of the Democrat vote totals, and that’s about how many votes they would actually have if we lived in a decent society.
“ 95% chance Ramaswamy is a con artist” . Based on what? The only dirt anyone has dug up on him is he won a a Soros scholarship as a student. That is it. If you don’t like him , that’s your perigative bit it in no way makes him a con man. He is smart and working hard to connect with every voter in Iowa and New Hampshire. zHe came out within minutes of the Colorado ruling against Trump that he will withdraw his name from the ballot unless Trump is back on. He is smart and articulate. He is Maga without the Trump baggage. If he does well in Iowa it’s a whole new race. Give him a chance please
He’s reversed himself totally on too many things in rapid succession. I don’t have a spreadsheet. Also his affect is very used car salesman.
But, as I said, he’s the only one who is even pretending to recognize what the problem is so it’s worth a shot.
Personally I am neither pro-Trump nor anti-Trump. In my view, Trump-as-savior and Trump-Derangement-Syndrome are two sides of a political phenomenon that is poorly understood by mainstrean conservatism....at least as discussed in MSM. "It is possible that future historians might see the perceived vulgarity of the Trump phenomenon as an inchoate (and of course in many ways flawed) early attempt to break out of conservatism’s imprisonment in a political etiquette that is a philosophical stacked deck." https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/p/invasion-of-the-virtue-signallers
Pretty astute observations GC.
Thank you.....there's more of same at: https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/
Very interesting observation.
Great article by Graham thanks for sharing
Hmmm. Interesting take.
So in other words, Graham, populism?
Populism is simply opposition to corrupt elites. When the corrupt elites being targeted are government/intellectual/non-productive elites, it is almost always valid and more often should just be called patriotism.
The version where you are angry because Bezos has a yacht is almost always not valid.
The people who try to connect populism to emotions and rage are almost always just trying to provide cover for corrupt elites by painting their critics as dangerous irrational cornered animals.
I would like to see your spreadsheet. I have been listening to Vivek since before his candidacy, and I have found him focused and basically unchanged in his positions on issues.
We should listen to Kev when the funnies stop.
The used car salesman actually fits with him. thanks
I'm for Vivek. The more you listen to him the more one can understand and like him. Too many people are saying he has no chance, he's a this or that and don't take the time. Read his books, listen to his townhalls. He is a young guy and he is growing/ getting better every day. Of course he will have some slip ups, he is deliberately being provocative to gain attention. I think he will surprise in Iowa because he is really putting in the work on the ground. Well maybe that's wishful thinking but hey......
If the young voters( who have never caucused before and are therefore not polled) turn out for him ... it is time for young, fresh smart , uncorrupt , leadership. I do not see him as a car salesman at all but if he repulses something that is a reason not to vote for him. He is working hard, has a strong, focused well thought out and well articulated message. If he does well in Iowa, it’s a a new race
Vivek’s snarkiness concerns me. He is excessively cocky and self-assured. In short, he’s a younger version of Trump. You have to pay attention to the little clues.
I agree. I think Ramaswamy was just a Trump proxy during the debates, meant to take down Haley. If Vivek continues to act like an ass, he's just a MiniMe of Trump. When Ramaswamy told Chris Christie to "go enjoy a meal," he was showing everyone that he is as horrible as Trump. Times are indeed strange when Chris Christie is the only gentleman in the room.
Your last sentence made me laugh.
That last sentence is highly debatable lol.
If Ramasmarmy leaves the race, he has no chance.
You left off the equally corrupt public school "teacchiz" and their Democrat goons of "da teachiz yoonyun."
At most, 5% of Democrat voters are doing something other than just leeching off the system and being corrupt lazy perverts.
The greatest datapoint of the last hundred years is Elon Musk firing 80% of a company, that was previously publicly traded, and exposing those people as useless.
That’s actually securities fraud and embezzlement I think. Definitely defrauding shareholders.
Every time I have a stock go down more than like 10% I get a notification from my trading platform that there is a law firm suing them via class action for defrauding shareholders or whatever.
Twitter was never profitable except for one or two quarters one year and it absolutely is because of that 80% of DEI parasites they hired. There is so much money in corporate litigation if someone can figure out how to sue these guys for the administrative college-educated bloat.
You only need to take down one company like Bud Light and there would be mass firings of Democrat busybodies across corporate America.
I started using Twitter again when Elon Musk expressed his intention to buy it. So I have followed the news about Twitter with considerable interest. The fact that so many people got fired without the site losing functionality was very much a testament to the utter uselessness of the majority of the employees.
The Twitter Files, which showed the extent to which bias was being enforced AT GOVERNMENT BEHEST was a disturbing revelation. But even more disturbing was the extent to which Democrats have largely IGNORED or even denied those revelations. That is the cherry on the top of their cow-pie of rejecting inconvenient facts.
Read "Elon Musk" by Walter Isaacson. It's fantastic.
You won't be disappointed. Bari Weiss and Nellie Bowles are noted during his process of acquiring Twitter.
| The fact that so many people got fired without the site losing functionality was very much a testament to the utter uselessness of the majority of the employees. |
True enough but if we continue to automate away jobs and there aren't enough for people who want to work we're going to keep ending up with even more "rust belt" type cities.
I don't know what the solution is. We have an increasing population but a decreasing number of "real" jobs. Some of the ideas people float make some sense but would be a seismic shift -- four day workweeks, UBI (a terrible idea IMO), have fewer kids (people are doing this and it's sounding alarm bells), etc.
Quit importing cheap labor. This is a simple solution to this issue. Yes, most job sites won’t have a wine bar but tuff stuff.
https://www.adambcoleman.com/p/the-working-poor-and-the-luxury-of
How many have second and third jobs and are STILL hand to mouth?
Immigration, both legal and illegal depresses wages; slave labour abroad depresses wages. Get rid of these market distortions and those 2nd and 3rd jobs are freed up for others.
The public schools aren't educating the children properly. They are telling the children they (the children) are giving the correct answers ,when they aren't and giving them good grades, whether it is an A or a B, or a 4 or a 5, depending how the school system grades. The teachers pretty much give the answers to the tests. If the teachers complain to the principal , they know they will get a bad evaluation or the following year they will lose their job. The parents aren"tsmart enough to know that their children really aren't that smart. The parents are on instagram, Facebook,TikTok, etc, One of our principals encourages that the teachers use Tik Tok. The administration of our school system are all Dems, and are proud of this fact. What's right is wrong, what's wrong is right. Sad state of affairs.
The parents are smart enough. But when they question the leftist pukes on the school boards the demonic dwarf who runs the Injustice Department sics the Stasi on them.
I am convinced that if the Marxist/Dem stay in power, I believe that under their tyranny all of us who disagree with the Marxists will be summarily executed or sent to labor camps.
LP...glad to see you commenting...haven't heard from you in awhile(unless I missed some of your comments in other articles) 😊
They've done it before. Here. Many times.
Not only public schools. In some states also in private schools. I work in one of them. The (maybe?) well- intended but detrimental "no child left behind" BS has created falsely idealistic, lazy teachers mostly on a public school level, resulting in also non-interested children (why make an effort?) . And the focusing away from a solid curriculum, well explained and presented as a fun activity to learn math and being able to read , in order to preach about hate and discrimination with CRT is utterly vile and at best complete nonsense for kids. Children aren't born racist. They are repeating what they hear their parents say and/or their being taught at school. And some still wonder why the education in this country is so far behind other countries. It's a disgrace and oh, by the way, "my" school is closing. Surprised?
It seems everything in the curriculum is presented in a fun and entertaining way. We should be teaching critical thinking and in math they should be memorizing math facts. On by the way, math can't be racist!
Heard an educator on a talk show say that math is racist. What utter nonsense!
meant Oh ,not on the way.
Because. The.Village.Is.Raising.The.Kids. And if you are one of those sucker parents who are not okay with that, you are being investigated.
My son has taught high school for 28 years. He and his fellow teachers are not evil mind benders. True, there has been inappropriate grade inflation. True, mamby pamby discipline is counterproductive. True, some, definitely not all, administrators have drifted from common sense. My son says that far more significant than any of these factors is the incredible classroom disruption and coopting of student attention by smartphones. Smartphones are ruining the classroom experience. Don't demonize teachers; they deserve your gratitude. Ridicule of police has reduced recruitment in law enforcement. We need bright young people going into teaching--don't chase them away with hyperbolic criticism. And do pay them.
This isn't just going on at bad schools. At GOOD schools parents raise holy hell at the School Board if little Johnny doesn't get A's because it could wreck his chances of getting into a good college. Most of the older teachers fighting against grade inflation have retired and the younger ones are demoralized so they just keep their heads down and go with it.
The younger teachers like Tik Tok and aren't very intelligent themselves. Some are demoralized and go along with it.
Very sad and really very terrifying.
Um... Trump fired James HomeyComey - the black heart of the Deep State - in the spring of 2017 and Trump has been legally harrassed like no other since.
That is what happens when you attack the Deep State. I like Vivek, but the UniParty is the problem; when the bureaucrats are in charge of child porn on your devices... Blackmail is the currency of Sodom on Potomac.
I really like Vivek as well; almost everything I've heard or read from him, I've thoroughly agreed with. My only concern is his previous work in pharma and ties to Soros groups.
On the government job front take a peek of how much of that gleefully lauded "record job growth" offered to dispute the inflation is rampant argument is public sector. Talk about manipulation of numbers.
Yes, article in WSJ by Alyssia Finley (sp?) recently.
Don’t forget all the obese people demanding and getting free extra seats on Southwest Airlines, and getting you and me kicked off our fully booked flight.
I like what he had to say. But I think he lacks the experience to put his vision into action. And the thing I think most overlook is this needs to be a package deal - President and Congress - to effect real change.
"There’s a 95% chance Ramaswamy is a con artist" ??
Based on what? Imagination?
Based on looking like a duck; quacking like a duck and walking like a duck. He's all the sign of snake-oil.
So your imagination. Got it.
Yeah and obviously it’s your imagination that he *doesn’t* have a grifter vibe.
It’s subjective but I’m skeptical you don’t see it. It’s like someone saying they don’t feel like Pence has an overly-pious vibe. Like, come on.
His policy proposals are the best. I’m almost positive he stole from me the one where we arm every citizen of Taiwan because it’s highly specific and I have written that before.
The reason I’m fine voting for a likely grifter is you can often get them to do what the voters actually want because that’s how they stay relevant/popular.
I think his age is giving you that impression. He speaks like an impatient younger man, which he is. My bad vibes come from the fact that if he somehow won and tried to dismantle the administrative state that he might not complete his first term.
always so refreshing Kevin!
😇😇🤓🤓
"Trump is not a threat to the administrative state"
It's them perceiving Trump to be a threat. Trump is more a monster imagined in their own heads than the real person that he is. He has lots of serious flaws but he's not the anti-Christ they perceive him to be.
Are you saying fire them, or murder them? Not clear.
“his plan to fire half of these assholes”
👆👆
See the word “fire” from the quote 2.5 inches above this? The goal is to fire them, you bad faith lowlife. Zero violence ever.
Don’t come in here and try to SWAT me. That’s a felony, Mr. L’Boullion.
Did you just watch an MSNBC segment about how there are more calls for violence and now your goal is to get people sent to prison camps for disagreeing with you? Scumbag.
Anger management issues buddy? Scumbag.
This is a Cluster B narcissistic reversal on your part. You are obviously the offender here, not me, and I’m justified in using whatever language I want to describe your repulsive behavior.
Click on my profile and use the ‘block’ function so I don’t have to see you ever again.
Thank you, I did just that.
Nah.
My hero. dhiy-up, LeBoot.
Nowhere does Kevin suggest murdering them.
He’s a Soros sock puppet or a useless government employee.
How else do we 'eliminate' the votes? Foolish comment. They may be fired, but they'll still vote. Or is he suggesting we change the Constitution?
Considering that Democrats have openly talked about disenfranchising GOP voters (which I am not, BTW), I think Kevin is suggesting that whatever measures the Dems consider feasible could be turned against them.
As Bill Barr noted, if declaring a person an "insurrectionist" is a one-official game, it would be quite possible to strip people of their voting rights on the basis of anything that any given official deems "insurrection." Having participated in the Summer 2020 protests/riots, for example. Having bailed out rioters, as Kamala Harris did.
You shouldn’t be able to vote if you are receiving the stolen money. It’s one of the concessions you should be forced to make when you agree to receive the stolen money.
Your right to vote is restored when you’re off welfare.
I would GLADLY give up my right to vote in exchange for just simply being given my tax money back. It’s a more than fair concession to ask in exchange for the lifetime guaranteed benefits and income they receive which on average exceeds the passive income you would get if you had invested $4 million in cash.
Hey dipstick - this article was about disenfranchising American voters by taking Trump off the ballot. If you had a brain and a smidgeon of integrity you'd have simply acknowledged that "KD" never said a word about violence. But you doubled down and got owned. That's how it works here.
Really would not have been half as fun if he didn’t have the French last name for me to shit all over.
😂😂😂
Bruce, I bet you can't get through one single comments board without insulting your fellow commenters. Not one. You'll insult me in response to this.
Settle down this is Kevin being Kevin
How is he not clear? It is Democrats voicing putting conservatives in re-education camps.
No one would think "murder them?" who is tracking intellectually or morally. ugh
Only to the obtuse.
Hey Kev, I'm fairly confident the military hasn't all voted Democrat...ever.
Unrelated.
Well, they are government employees. As are cops. Also not known for overwhelming Democratic support. I get your point about many government people simply wanting the gravy train to continue on (maybe gravy is the wrong term, based on how poorly government employees are paid vs. the private sector--they want the gruel train to continue).
But the bloated size of government has been in Republican and Democrat administrations and Congresses. In the same way that Dems have betrayed their supporters by abandoning free speech (among other fake promises), Republicans have also betrayed their supporters by not impacting the size of the government (especially not the military), and haven't gotten prayer in school, etc. Both parties lie to us all the time. And both serve the same economic elite masters.
Active duty military not included but Pentagon bureaucrats like the Space Force transvestite who just did a video about how we need to recruit mental-ill people to the military definitely count. I think cops were counted I forget.
Both parties are not what I want at all but one is a Satanic cult so comparing them like they are similar just helps Satan.
Your con artist remark on Ramaswamy is a good one. He is a Trump mini-me who evidently forgot that he would stand a far better chance if the guy he models himself with wasn't around. Why go for the diet version of Coke when the real thing is still available? Though, having said that - I'm not sure he would blurt out 'immigrants are poisoning the blood of our country' - considering the color of his skin..
In your analogy Trump is the diet version. Vivek has serious proposals that actually fix things. I’m just skeptical because he has a grifter vibe.
That said, Mike Pence vibes like a creepy televangelist who is having affairs but I’m pretty sure he’s a very sincere Christian.
I’m just skeptical of Vivek’s vibe. He’s right on almost all policy stuff.
I share the grifter vibe on Vivek. Sometimes I'm so turned off on him I switch off before I hear what he wants to say..
And as for Pence, why do I have visions of him in toilet stalls surrounded by other men? But I digress..
I haven’t read the article, went straight to the comments section just to get a feel of the people - to be honest I’m so sick and tired of Bill Barr, James called him a treasonous rat I am calling him much worse than that, silently of course! Have a good year you all!
As a lawyer, I believe his legal analysis of the circumstances of the attempts to disqualify Trump are correct and the Supreme Court should so rule along the lines outlined by him. Political discord in the country will only get worse with either one of these poorly qualified to lead us. I would prefer Niki Haley.
Greatest nation in the world, and these two elderly jokers are the best we can produce to run for president. I’ve been shaking my head since 2015.
Who would really want the grief? There was a time when servants to the people of this Republic had to coaxed forth.
It truly has become so distasteful to run for office, I must agree with you that no decent person would want to roll in the excrement that is the campaign trail.
As a welder and fabricator I agree.
No Neocon Nikki.... Please
This lawyer concurs with your opinion. Mr. Barr's legal analysis is right on. Destroying due process in the attempt to "get Trump" will inevitably result in damage to all of us and set precedents that we later regret. The ends seldom justify the means.
I agree except on Niki, I'm for RFK Jr leading the country to a more peaceful, intelligent place.
So who says there aren't political dynasty in the US?
Under a President Haley, get ready for war in Iran, Taiwan, and elsewhere in Europe than Ukraine. And those won't just be fought with our money. Our kids will die in those ones.
You got one right.
Discovered Prevagen?
And be at war forever
Against who or what did Bill Barr commit treason?
Simple, he did not do what Donald Trump wanted All The Time. And he didn't announce the election was stolen. For some on The Right this is the Unforgivable Sin.
The election was stolen but I don’t think that’s the reason The Right hates him. You are right, he didn’t do what Trump told him to do in contract to the a-hole Garland. He does everything someone at the White House tells him to do (it ain’t Biden, that’s for sure). Barr is a Swamp creature and that’s why we hate him.
And you've hit on the biggest problem with Barr. He's a product of the Swamp, the Deep State, the Professional Political class, the Washington Establishment, or whatever else you want to call it. And I believe that's where his first loyalty lies.
Swamp Rats, they like vermin so hard to get rid of in fact virtually impossible.
Hate is such a strong emotion. Why hate? Why not detached indifference in well formulated opposition?
Hate is easier to spell
Yip - so well posted Darek! Thank you
Aid and comfort to the enemy, which is Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer.
That is clarifying.
But the enemy of whom? I always understood treason to mean betraying one’s country. I think that’s the generally understood meaning. Who or what did Bill Barr betray?
Bill Barr was put into position to swat away all the illegal crap that the Obama administration used to handcuff Trump's administration.
Why?
Skinny, why would you be ‘so sick and tired’ of Bill Barr? Is it because he is a corrupt elite lawyer who elucidates reasons why he doesn’t like your man? Having worked with Trump for a couple of years, he would have had a very good vantage point by which to pass judgement.
Read the article, Skinny. It’s excellent.
Will do
You are correct ‼️ The establishment wants to be able to continue their corruption and the fleecing of Americans. The only thing I agree on with regards to Bill Barr is the danger of keeping President Trump off the ballot. Otherwise Bill Barr is part of the corrupt establishment.
100% they view him as a threat and why deep state Barr comes after him ad hominem instead of on substance. This executive order,overturned by Biden on his first day in office, is one of the reasons why:
https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-creating-schedule-f-excepted-service/
Bingo.
It is important to understand what "our" means when Democrats say: "Trump is a threat to our democracy." It is important to know they quote the horrors of the words of Chairman Mao and his philosophy on what constitute "the people" and "democracy".
And, hey Bill, since when does the “public interest” trump (sorry) a defendant’s right to have an adequate time to prepare for trial? This rush to judgment is particularly galling in light of their foot-dragging on anything adversely affecting the Left.
And I could imagine a rush to trial where Trump is convicted before the election only to appeal and then have the conviction overturned by the appellate court after the election. That is something of a nightmare scenario when you consider that a trial court conviction could very well end a viable Trump candidacy.
Well put.
I am one of those who sees a second Trump presidency as “an existential threat to the country”. But then I also see a second Biden presidency in the same light. Some of the accomplishments during the Trump presidency were great (including the 2017 tax bill, the Abraham accords and the three new Justices on the Supreme Court)but his constant whining and tantrums assaulted the dignity of the office. His tariffs were a disaster and he readily acceded to trillions of bogus new spending. So yes his record was mixed at best.
As a non partisan, the group which now decides elections, I disagree. And quite frankly, am offended you partisans think you are going to save the country by making up your own laws. As we see the current administration doing. You don't save democracy by violating the tenants of democracy. Regardless of your faulty, wacko, logic for doing so. The left created Trump. The left has kept Trump in the front of the public for three years. We are a country of legal and Constitutional systems. If you don't trust the system you are the insurrectionists. As we have seen 60 times the system has dealt successfully with Trump's version of a rigged election. It was rigged, but the rigging was ans is being successfully suppressed. (Research how many voters would have changed their vote from bidne had they known about hunter's laptop) But quite frankly, no way would any person of good conscience vote for the Dems who believe they can make up their own laws as they go along. Like suppressing free speech through coercion of the social media platforms. You are the existential threat to this country. You are the ones who don't trust the system that has been developed over 200+ years. You are then ones who follow the man who said he would fundamentally change this country. The same man who has admitted numerous times he is the perpetrator of a Quid Pro Quo with foreign leaders. You are the spinless and duplicitous ones who realize, but ignore out of fear, there is a system in the Constitution to change Constitutions. But don't have the integrity nor balls to use that system.
Please tell us, how could Trump become the dictator of this country? Change executive institutions leadership to those who support him? biden has already done that. Issue edicts that he would know are unconstitutional and legislative in nature? biden has already done that. Allow his allies to invade the country from an open border? biden has already done that. Weaken the military and indoctrinate them with radical theories that have nothing to do with their fighting ability? biden has already done that. Pick out one group of citizens to demonize and turn the country against to the point their deaths were celebrated? biden and Hitler have already done that. Please explain the difference between joe's current hate speeches against those he calls, and defines, as MAGA and Hitlers, 30 January 1939 Reichstag speech.
Ironically, but typically, all the things the Dems say the fear of Trump, has been projected from what biden has already done. Your kind are an impotent and irrelevant voting minority. So are the Republican's base and radicals. You play well to the base, but the base elects no one. And those who do decide elections, independents, have no inclination to buy your conspiracy theories and partisan clap trap for the benefit of the worse president in the history of this countrymen.
Bottom line, if you and yours continue with idiotic and ill advised actions towards Trump, you will have the distinction of being the ones who created Trump and got him elected the second time. Those who oppose the 45th are not the many. You and yours are quickly making that a smaller and smaller minority.
Some cut off their nose to spite their face. Dems slit their own throats.
Anyone but biden or those who follow his cult.
👆BOOM!!!👆
In fact Trump IS a threat to American democracy. He has already proven that numerous times, starting with his refusal to respect a defeat at the ballots and his unprecedented call for help to "Russia", to hack into Hilary Clinton's e-mail to help his campaign, both during public presidential debates live on TV. His refusal to acknowledge his election defeat in 2019, his unsuccessful attempt to steal the election by pressuring officials to rig the election results and his dubious role during the failed coup attempt in January 2020 complete the picture not only of a sore loser, but a credible threat to democracy, that needs to be eliminated in whatever way necessary or the US will end up falling prey to a tyrant, who will cling to power by any means available to him and who will not be followed by a democratically elected president, but a "crown prince" of his own choosing. American democracy is already seriously damaged by Trump and his not just possible, but even quite likely return to the White House (If not by a clean majority at the polls then by a finally successfully rigged election. He already laid the groundwork for a steal of the coming election by installing his lackeys in positions enabling them to "overrule" the will of voters at the polls!) can easily deliver the "coup de grass" to American democracy.
That's at least the state of affairs from the viewpoint of Americans who still believe that democracy should prevail in their country.
On the other hand it could even be good for the rest of the world if Trump can continue to destroy democracy in the USA and weaken the last remaining super power to a point where it's global domination will be so much eroded that it will cease to exist and the world can be freed from American tyranny and arrogance once and for all. Maybe the country will even fall apart and the resulting fragments will be much less frightening and threatening to the freedom of all non-americans in this world.
That's why I also believe, that other nations will meddle in the upcoming presidential election to support Trump, especially countries hostile to the US, which have an interest to destabilize and even destroy the USA. The election campaign in 2016 set the precedence, when Putin's Russia could almost openly intervene without having to face any consequences because mostly the Trump supporters were caught completely off guard and even welcomed the outside influence. Even when Trump finally invited the Russian foreign minister Lavrov into the Oval Office for secret talks behind closed doors (or to celebrate their shared election victory. We will never find out what truly happened at this meeting, because there were no witnesses to it!) there was no public outcry. It seemed as if Americans simply looked away when their democracy was corrupted, because they didn't want to see the obvious.
In conclusion: I already get ready to see the funeral of American democracy, that is about to come up within the next couple of years, because there is no one in sight in the entire political spectrum of the US, who can come to the rescue. Biden is just as corrupt and unfit for office as Trump is, the only difference being, that he at least keeps democratic institutions intact, but he will certainly not be the one who can save America from the looming tyranny, he and his democratic convictions are too weak for that and his rhetorics are hollow and reflect this weakness.
Have You popcorn ready and let the show begin.
By the way, I've already decided not to renew my membership in "The free press", because it is not the open platform where different viewpoints come together as I was hoping it would be, but just another bubble in a very segmented society, where the segments are getting ever more isolated from each other, which contributes immensely to the downfall of this country. It's not worth the money to be part of just another playground where right-wingers tell each other what they already believe to know. Which is certainly true for the comment section, but more and more for the content part as well. Especially the exclusively pro Ukrainian and pro Israel regimes stances here tell me that this is not a platform for controversial discussions but just another propaganda megaphone, not much different from the others.
Good bye, my American fellow human beings, You collectively deserve what is rolling Your way! You've all been to complacent for way too long.....I, as a German by birth know this playbook all too well, because that once happened in my country of birth too!
Hmmm.... zero likes.
It appears everyone else here thinks you are as delusional about Trump as I do.
Do you not believe your own eyes? Did you not see Trump say about January 6th, "Be there will be wild."? or His subservient kowtowing to Putin? Or hear his conversation with Georgia election officials saying, "I need you to find me 11,800 votes."? Or his bizarre behavior stalking Hillary from behind at the 2nd debate? Or Trump being found liable for forcing his way into the women's dressing room at Nordstrom and grabbing E. Jean Carroll by the 'P' and worse? I prefer that my government officials have a little more class than the typical sex offender. In fact, not being a sex offender is on my "must-have" list for the leader of the free world.
The question is who is delusional. I'm not writing for likes. The biggest delusion of all is actually the one that makes You believe that if You get a lot of likes in social media You are right with You're views. In fact it just means Your views are more fashionable. You don't get likes for inconvenient truths.
Note the language: "many" not "all". Many have been taken in that there was an "insurrection"; just as many know full well there was no such thing. Like them, you do not get to make up your own narrative.
Much like Bill Barr.
The elephant in the room is the integrity of our voting process that Bill Barr doesn’t mention. It is the most important element of our democracy. Otherwise, we are not better than a dictatorship where “who’s counting” wins elections.
Or who is harvesting ballots. Or how people are paid to harvest ballots. Or who is paying people to harvest ballots. Or how ballot "drop boxes" are monitored. Or how voting equipment is selected. Or how actual ballots, used and unused, are accounted for (in my jurisdiction when you vote in person every single ballot, even unused or damaged ones, are accounted for, how is that handled in massive mail-in situations?).
All true, but the really critical thing is who is on the voter registration lists? Almost all vote integrity procedures are just to verify that voters are registered. If the list is full of noncitizens, dead people and people who no longer live in the state, a lot of fraudulent votes can be cast without being caught.
Guess which party fights against every effort to verify voter registration lists.
Very, very true.
All those questions about how the voting is conducted are important, Lynne, but rules for how candidates get on the ballot in the first place are also very important, e.g. how many petition signatures are required, and does that number depend on whether it's a general election or a party primary, and if general whether the candidate is running as a major party nominee, a minor party nominee, or an independent.
True. I have not researched it but my reading suggests that there is authoritative caselaw that says primaries are private business and not subject to regulation, either legislative or judicial. I see these ballot disqualification attempts as an end run around that. Well that and distraction, frivolous litigation expense for Republicans, and opportunity to spread mis-,mal, and dis-information to inflame emotions. But it matters not who is on the ballot if casting the ballot is not legitimate because the state next door allows impropriety. When the Supreme Court weighs in it will apply the law of the state where the appeal stems from. And there are several now. This may be where I get my desired official recognition that election laws can.be readily manipulated.
Why is it that tax payers are made to pay, through government, for those private business primaries?
I would guess because they are the pre-cursors to the regular elections. But it is an interesting question. I wonder how caucuses are funded. Taxpayers pay for all sorts of private business enterprises. Like NFL stadiums.
It could be argued, NFL is a business. The state has no interest in primaries. Only the parties do. People can be elected without primaries. RCV as one example.
Take it one more important step further. The requirements that the Repubs and Dems have put in place to deny a third party from even considering making a run for elected office. Where in the Constitution does it say someone needs x amount of signatures to run for elected office?
I agree that primary elections should be the private business of the parties, unless we're talking about a "jungle primary", which is really the first round of a general election. But the private primaries should not be financed or conducted by the government.
To dan brandt's point, I agree that the major parties have made it unreasonably difficult for third party or independent candidates to get on the ballot. I also don't think signature requirements for general (public) elections should depend on party membership. But if there are no restrictions on being listed on the ballot other than the requirements for holding the office being sought, like age, citizenship, residence in a relevant jurisdiction, a working brain (no, that's too restrictive!), etc., then there's nothing to stop some party or other group from persuading a huge number of people to run for the same office, thereby making any kind of printed ballot hopelessly unwieldy. One rather radical "solution" to this problem is to dispose entirely of the idea of "getting on the ballot" by having only write-in candidates. Anyone meeting the general requirements for serving in the elected position could file as a write-in, and voters could consult the list of write-ins for their desired choice(s). That could still result in a large number of candidates receiving votes, perhaps too many for a simple plurality to suffice for choosing the winner, which would require some sort of runoff or other method.
Yes - all and more part of integrity including primaries..,
I get what you're saying, Lynne. Many commenters here say the same. And yet from what i've read, Republican voters for example in Florida, Pennsylvania and Arizona do enjoy voting by mail. It's convenient, and who doesn't like that? And how does anyone know how many Republican votes are in ballots being harvested? there might be quite a few. Don't GOP operatives on the ground harvest votes as well? Senior citizens aren't all Democrats.
We have mail-in voting in Texas. But you have to qualify - be out of town during voting, be over a certain age, or a have a disability which precludes your appearance in person (that last is paraphrasing but the term disability is used and the election administer cannot question the nature of the disability - that is how mail-in balloting was greatly expanded during covid). So when you request the ballot you have a recent signature to compare to your ultimately submitted ballot. When you as a mail-in voter fill out your ballot (keep in mind that recent article on TFP about the poll indicating 17-21% admitted filling out someone else's ballot, signing someone else's ballot, or sending a ballot yo a state they no longer lived in) you put the ballot in an envelope and seal it. You then confirm.your current address and sign the envelope. You place that envelope in another envelope which is deposited in the mail.or delivered to the election administrator. When the ballots are received the are accumulated and groups of poll workers open the outer envelope, review the inner envelope to verify the signature and address by comparing them.to the voter registration rolls and the mail-in ballot request. It is quite tedious but meticulously performed in my experience. If there are questions that envelope is delivered to the election administrator and she contacts the voter. If there are no questions the ballot is separated from.the envelope and placed in the to be tabulated pile. This process is not as secure as a live person with a photo ID but it is reasonably secure. My jurisdiction also accounts for each blank ballot. They are a hand numbered by the election judge. Some are voted and cast. Some are spoiled - the voter makes a mistake and gets a new ballot or the machine misfeeds; these are collected and turned in at the close of the day in the event of early voting or close of the polls on election day. If a person issued a mail-in ballot shows up to vote in person they can but they either have to surrender the mail-in ballot or file an affidavit saying they had one, have not voted it, and did not surrender it. ICBW but I think they then vote provisionally until it can be ascertained that the mail-in ballot was not used - IOW that the voter is not attempting to cast multiple ballots or that someone else has not used the mail-in ballot. Again this is possible because the ballots themselves are tracked. So I am not opposed to mail-in ballots but I guess I prefer doing so for cause not mere convenience because as I hope you see from.my explanation it is not convenient for the election system itself. I have no idea how the universal or the more liberal mail-in states secure their ballots. But I hope you see the potential for abuse without stringent precautions.
If you recall the "hanging chad" controversy from 2000 was objectionable because it took so long. So we sought to avoid that by going to machines but the reliance in mail-in in 2020 and 2022 meant some elections were not decided for weeks.
Both parties and many PACs try to get out the vote both. But harvesting is either directly approaching the voter in their environment or, creating events to attract potential voters, as Robert Francis O'Rourke did with Soros and Sam Bankman-Fried money. Literally, I am not making it uo. And in my county it worked like a charm. All they knew was "Vote Blue, No Matter Who". As a result they elected a 19 year old lawn boy with no courthouse experience as the District Cletk of one of the fastest growing counties in the US. Clerks are the backbone of courthouses. He could not spell subpoena much less issue one. He did not know how to summons jurors and when he finally put together a list and a form summons he addressed them to his office not to the venireman's address. It is embarassing. As for harvesting in general, most harvesting is in urban areas because population density makes it easier. Urban areas tend to be blue.
As for senior citizens there are reports of nursing homes(Michigan? Wisconsin?) that voted 100% Democrat. That environment took is ripe for abuse.
I want everybody entitled to vote to vote. Whether they vote the way I do or not. I just want one vote per registered voter cast by that voter.
The mass mailing of unsolicited ballots to every warm (or even cold) body certainly invites abuse. Also, even if the rules are fair, a successful election requires that a large percentage of the voters actually think about the candidates and issues at stake. Perhaps that is too much to hope for? Otherwise we end up with the District Clerk you mention, and lots more like him.
The answers to most of your queries here are all in the public record. This stuff really isn’t done in secret, it’s just that so many people won’t do the actual work to find the answers from county and state election offices.
You are wrong and I am rarely so blunt. County and state election offices monitor and administer elections. Nothing more and nothing less. They are concrrned with the nuts and bolts of the election - voter registration, integrity of the election equipment, selection of pollingnplaces, integrity of ballots, staffing polling places, verifying mail-in ballots and tabulating votes. At best they would have numbers on total ballots issued - in person, mail-in, used, unused, and spoiled. They would always lose some in the mail-in sphere as some are mailed out but not returned. But no matter how diligent they would have no way of knowing why they were unused or what happened to them. This would be particularly true in jurisdictions where the voter is not required to request a mail-in ballot or qualify to use mail-in balloting but rather they are sent out unsolicited. Mail-in ballots are verified, to the extent they are verified, by the signature of the voter.
The donations to campaigns are public record. The donations to 501(c)(3)s and 501(c)(4)s are public as are their expenditures if you wade through their tax returns. PACs are in this category. But to be thorough you would need to know the identity of each entity paying for harvesting. Research that and get back to me please. Private persons paying for ballot harvesting would not be subject to public disclosure at all. Neither the identity of the harvester, nor amount paid thereto, would be subject to public disclosure if the payer were a private entity. Private persons directly harvesting ballots would not be subject to scrutiny at all.
But Barry, do we still have a democracy? There was a study by Princeton showing that even though we claim democracy, our policies are largely oligarchical: https://thenewamerican.com/us/politics/constitution/princeton-northwestern-study-seems-to-conclude-u-s-an-oligarchy/
I think we need to come to terms with the reality that we no longer have a democracy, even though we like to believe we do. Which is why I think we need to revisit even participating in our presidential elections: https://unorthodoxy.substack.com/p/why-we-need-to-stop-voting-in-presidential
A kindly reminder that democracy is ugly when 2 out of 3 can vote you out; we have a constitutional republic.
Indeed, why getting money out of our electoral process is the single most important issue of our time. If we wish to remain a republic by democratic representation. Otherwise we will continue to fall down the oligarchical rabbit hole until it’s eventually end somewhere around a plutocratic authoritarian system
Economic studies have shown money is not a tipping point once past a certain point. The real thing we need are clean voter rolls, voter ID, and tighter restrictions on things like mail in balloting and ballot harvesting.
Amen. And Democrats will do everything they can to prevent any of that.
I find it hard to believe that beyond a certain point money doesn’t play a role. When such large sums of money are pooled toward a party administration it’s only logical that they would seek to continue and strengthen that funding by passing favorable legislation.
Getting money out of the process is the second most important criteria.
The first is to reestablish in person voting with a photo id.
Want an absentee ballot? Apply in person with photo id and have it in by election day.
I am a US Citizen living overseas. How would I "Apply in person with photo id"
If voting is important to you, as it should be, make a return trip back home once every 4 years.
Life is about trade-offs, and if you can't come home once every four years, I wonder why you retain your US citizenship.
Voting is important to me. I do come home about once a year. Also elections happen more than once every four years am I supposed to schedule my life around election times to come home and show up in person to request an absentee ballot for every election? Makes no sense whatsoever. Absentee ballots have been is use for decades and with no verified claims of widespread voter fraud. It is only the past two elections, especially 2020, where all of a sudden it was a huge issue.
It seems to me you are discounting every single US military person, along with tens of thousands of other Americans who support the military, who live overseas.
Or, revolution. The most reassuring fact, the left wants to bring feelings to a gun fight. Guess who would win?
Good point. Seems to me that we're edging closer to global feudalism with intrigues by our "nobles" starting to rival the worst excesses of the old "nobility" who were nothing but a class of brigands and "mafia dons" kept in power by hired guns.
I've read similar articles. The top .01% of people decide what policies will be applied and those only occasionally align with what the majority of people want. I understand we're a Republic and that you can be in the minority and still have your rights respected, but it's been a LONG time since politicians have done anything to better the lives of the average person.
More food for thought. I stop at the design by our founding fathers and the additional amendments passed within the design.
We don't have a democracy because we have lazy citizens.
And Barr could have done something about the corrupt electoral practices but didn’t.
We are there. We have been for decades.
The federal government, which has painstakingly examined the events of January 6, has not charged President Trump with insurrection or even incitement. “
Painstakingly?? As in suppressing exculpatory evidence? Trump told people to be peaceful, to go home. There were FBI agents fomenting a riot.
And as for the voters deciding, how many illegals will the democrats register and pay to vote? There is no proof of citizenship required to register. Just a signature attesting to citizenship which can be lied about. No one validates these registrations.
In addition, Trump offered 10,000 troops to the Speaker of the House to protect the Capitol - the Speaker is in command of Capitol police - and she refused while her daughter filmed the government staged event.
Yes, the Capitol chief of police has a lot to say about how his services were ignored by Pelosi. Was any of this covered in the so-called J6 investigation?
Funny how the 'J6 committee' has officially been 'deleted' after it was never legally constituted(opposition party members were not picked by the opposition party).
I wonder how much they got paid for being on that committee
No kidding. The net worth of Lizard Cheney was reported at $6M when when entered congress and >$40M when she left.
But Nancy would NEVER share inside information with Paulie - he's just a financial wizard! Like the Obamas...
They don’t need to pay people to vote. They only need to collect the ballot, which they can do by having stacks of them mailed to communal homes or abandoned properties. That’s why the DHS is issuing ID cards to illegals.
Your other point is a good one: not even a completely partisan kangaroo court that threw the “I” word around almost as much as “a”, “an” and “the” was willing to charge Trump with “insurrection”.
You've got a point of course, re: possible illegal voters. I would not have thought of that.
This is not new. Illegals have been registered by Democrats in Chicago for a long time. They use addresses for parking ramps and doctors offices. When I volunteered for True the Vote we caught these.
News to me; not that there is fraud like this, but how they do it; thank you for posting. This must stop of course; investigative journalists need to get the news out and spread it widely.
There are no longer investigative journalists. They were the first to go when money got tight in the news industry.
This article from 2020 explains some of the techniques used:
https://nypost.com/2020/08/29/political-insider-explains-voter-fraud-with-mail-in-ballots/
This is true. In Nevada as well. It's about clean voter rolls too. In Chicago, it's a joke but it is true there are plenty of dead people on voter rolls.
The joke is that during Election Day, great winds lift spirits out of cemeteries and somehow they are able to cast a vote. The sad thing is they often do.
Also in Chicago and many parts of the country, they have legalized some kinds of procedures that contribute to fraud. In Chicago, if your signature doesn't match up to your registration, you are still allowed to vote. "Maybe that person had a stroke or something and can't write the same......"
You guys need signatures to vote? Here in VA we don't need to sign anything. Poll workers just check our picture ID with the voter roll, and we're good to go.
I think the Dem's give them voter registration cards as they arrive at their destination. Have you read or seen this?
As you may have heard, tho it is not advertised, many states are allowing these illegal immigrants to get drivers licenses, so they can drive to their "job". At the same time, most or all of these states will automatically register a driver to vote. This new driver has to "opt out" if they dont want this on their record. Now, I assume, but am not sure, that if the "driver" accepts voter registration, they get to pick D or R, but I am skeptical it is that easy. My feeling is that D is offered with positives, and R is offered with negatives. Call me a skeptical, but this new process for voter registration is heavily skewed to D's.
AND, last I heard, you have to be a LEGAL citizen of the USA to vote, not some illegal immigrant.
** also, Trump and Vivek, both clearly said "illegal immigrants are poisoning the blood of our country". Simply being an immigrant was not used in the statement. As usual, Trump was misquoted, to fit the hate for him.
all the best in 2024
rich
I agree. I mean who believes people crossing the border illegally will become honest as soon as they cross the river?
Estimates of noncitizen voting range from 1 million to 5 million. That's before the millions Biden has allowed into the country in the last three years.
Registrations are indeed validated. The processes used are available to you. Make a public records request from whichever election office you want.
Are you suggesting that some bureaucrat checks every registration against birth certificate records and naturalization records?
What about address records? Is this why people who recently bought a home get voting info addressed to the people who lived in that house 5 yrs ago?
I despise Trump, but I despise the extra-legal attempts at removing him from ballots even MORE. And I TRULY despise those Demoncrats who are cheering this on! Can I just be put into a coma and awakened after January 21, 2025?
Very Well Put. It shouldn't mater if someone Does or Does Not like/support him.
1. A reason he is doing as well as he is, Is because of all of these legal attacks on him. It is just Not Fair.
2. Makes many people wonder if The Democrats/Media (but I repeat myself) really Want Donald Trump to be the GOP nominee, because they think he's the easiest to beat?
Number 2 is what they thought in 2016.
One need not be a fan of Trump or even intend to vote for him (I'm not and I don't) to think that the largely illegal efforts that Democrats have been making to bring him down reflect really horribly upon the Democrats. The Russian Collusion scam implicates the Obama administration in stuff that is far sketchier than Watergate; but with the support of the media, the Democrats have managed to prevent any similar widespread furor.
I wish Trump would go away. But the Democrats' efforts to take him down are actively destroying any pretense that we live in democratic republic. They are also revealing the fascism that is now at the heart of the Left. Not a good look.
Trump go away is my mantra for 2024. These fools only make him stronger. They need Trump to ventilate their hate.
Celia, you know how I feel about Trump but I will vote for him because he is the lessor of two evils.
We cannot let the Marxist Party win!
I don't personally blame anyone who does vote for Trump in 2024, but I am deeply concerned about what the Leftists will do if Trump should somehow win again. I think they will make the summer of 2020 look like a picnic.
Personally, I intend to vote third party, unless someone other than Trump manages to secure the nomination, which does not look likely at this point. It is long past time for a viable third party, and the only way we are going to get there is by voting for it.
100% with you on all three sentences above. Going with No Labels. The current D-R Jihad is accomplishing nothing except more constitutional vandalism. Even if No Labels doesn't win in the Electoral College, at least it will pull the parties back toward the center, as Perot's 1992 candidacy did for the ensuing eight years.
I too wish there was a viable third party but it is just a wish. There are no viable third parties and every vote for one is, in my opinion ,a wasted vote and as good as a vote for the Marxist Party.
Well, the polls indicate that 70% of voters do not want a Biden-Trump rematch, while 60% of Repubs and 65% of Dems do not want their own guy to run again.
If that's not enough to drive us to vote for a third party ticket, what is?
Trump cannot go away until we resolve our internal conflict. We are in the weeds being strangled. The only way out is with an outlier who challenges the corruption of the current establishment. A ‘good’ challenger would only be crucified. We need someone who is one of them and not afraid to break them with a caricature of their wanton depravity for having gotten us to this state. Never fear. Strap on. The only way out is through.
What you said in #2 AND Trump makes their jobs so easy…no shortage of provocative material when he’s around!
Its one of the things drives his supporters (along with the way he has been treated). This goes back to 2015-16. "He Fights!" This is what I saw going all the way back.
True. Because he doesn't roll over and show the belly. See Romney in his debate with Obama and the CNN reporter stepping in to save Obama for one example of what supporters hated.
This. I kept waiting for Milquetoast Mitt to respond to Biden's scurrilous accusations that "he'll put y'all back in chains" and the fool never did.
Mitt fancies himself a genteel politician, but with his "it's not a tax, it's a fee" regarding who'd pay for his healthcare plan as governor of MA, he just showed that he's a RINO and Uniparty stooge.
So what? I despise Biden to the point that'd I'd love personally to throttle the corrupt, divisive scumbag if given the chance. The point is that, neither Trump nor Biden has been convicted of a crime. Although the mounting evidence that the Big Guy is a corrupt traitor would give any sentient being a good reason to remove him from office, let alone the ballot.
Why do you despise Trump so much? Biden, and his administration are the ones you should despise. Trump told us what Biden was going to do, and he was correct. Why would any sane person want open borders? Why would you want a University president who plagarizes and condones the genocide of Jews? Why is there a Supreme Court Justice who can't define what a woman is?Big surprise, there are two genders, male and female. Let's stop all this nonsense and lying. Get back to common sense.
I don't despise Trump, at all. Was your comment directed to someone else or was my point unclear? I absolutely detest Biden. I don't love Trump but will happily vote for him.
So sorry, I read your comment quickly. I need to slow down. I am so upset by what Biden, personally I think it is Obama who is running the show, is doing..Biden hasn't been convicted of a crime, but having an open border is treason. He should be impeached, but that has to be passed by the Senate, which isn't going to happen ,because the Dims have the majority in the Senate. What is going to happen to this country?? I am not looking forward to the mess the Democrats are going to put us through in the upcoming months until the election in November. Very concerned. I also will happily vote for Trump. Anyone who votes for Biden hates this country.
I agree with everything you wrote.
Hopefully more and more people are waking up to the insanity of the Democrat Party.
The border has been a problem for both Republican and Democratic presidents. The last president who made a real attempt to solve it was Reagan--by granting amnesty to people who came here illegally--and that didn't work either. The President has some powers in terms of immigration but it's Congress that sets the actual policy and they haven't done anything in a long, long time beyond fundraise for their own reelections and give the President and courts powers that should have remained with Congress.
As for the President of Harvard, I don't think Biden has a say in that, which is a good thing as the President of the U.S. shouldn't be deciding who runs private universities or companies.
Who cares what one Supreme Court justice says at this point. McConnell made sure the court is now just another arm of the Republican Party.
I'm in Independent, not a Democrat, but I don't get why conservatives constantly complain when they're the ones who benefit most from how our system is set up because their votes count disproportionately due to the Senate and the Electoral College.
I am a conservative and I definitely am not benefitting from how are system.is set up. Neither is any American citizen. There are flaws in our system and they are being exploited. Largely because Congress does not perform its function which leaves the executive branching control. This has been true for so long that we are now ruled - ruled, not governed - by executive branch mandate. And worse, as is abundantly clear from the Twitter files the career bureaucrats in the executive branch alphabet agencies are no longer loyal to the President. Which you may think one or another is not worthy of their loyalty, but it means they are accountable to no one.
I was around when Reagan granted amnesty to millions of illegal aliens. It was done with assurances from Democrats that immigration reform would be had. It never happened. I was in lae school. It was the first time I saw in real time how deceitful Democrats are.
I agree that Congress does not perform its function. They're supposed to control the purse strings and they can't even do THAT anymore without drama of a default every few months.
That I agree with. Plus oversight. And declaring war.
Correction.....the last president to do something about the border was Trump.
He started a wall that Biden stopped. I trust he'll finish it given a chance next time....and deport all who crossed illegally.
As an aside, he would do himself & us a favor if he'd engage in a debate sometime to clarify points like this.
The wall already has holes in it. It was just a vanity project. Walls and technology can't keep out people who REALLY want to get in. Look at Israel. They had MACHINE GUNS lining their walls and Hamas still broke through.
You cannot deny the levels of immigrants coming across the border now is not insanely higher than when Trump was President. It was working.
A vanity project? Holes in it? Have you been there and inspected it?
MACHINE GUNS?! This is news to me. Who did they shoot?
How were 1200 killed, and hundreds taken hostage?
Was their aim that poor?
When Hamas stormed into Israel Oct. 7 they were not stopped by machine guns, sling shots, or pea shooters.
Get a grip, dude.
REPUBLICANS are the ones who brought this case in Colorado in the first place. As I've said before, it's purely a stunt. They get Trump disqualified in a state or two, then they can raise money and scream and yell that Trump has been disqualified in a state or two.
Low information voters hear about this and assume two things 1. that Trump has been removed from the ballot in the general election which hasn't happened anywhere yet and 2. Democrats did it.
Low information folks fail to understand that there are Republicans in Name Only that are really Uniparty adherents and that those adherents despise Trump. Low information folks also fail to understand that genuine Democrats/Progressives are willing to change their party designation to further their Democrat/Progressive goal, like voting in Republican primaries to obtain fringe nominees.
I've played this game before. Tried registering as a Republican in order to vote for Jon Kasich (and not TRUMP) in our state b/c I was hoping to have a not-Trump alternative in 2016.
I think it is possible, and even legal, to do. But I also think it is is gamesmanship about something that is not a game. And dishonest. And very, very disrespectful to your voting peers.
No, CREW is not “republicans” and its president is part of DHS in the Biden administration.
Democrats are trying to get another Republican to win the nomination so Trump will run 3rd party and split the vote, handing the country and the money back to the Regime.
Scott D, I read this comment of yours awhile back and it has changed everything for me. And, why isn't it discussed every second? I haven't read the Colorado SC case to understand the standing analysis in the case, but it doesn't make any sense that the Dems would have filed the initial claim b/c they will get overruled in by SCOTUS. And, all this nonsense is (again, gross) just helping Trump be Trump. Do you have any more information on the original claimants? Thanks!
You can read the court decision at https://law.justia.com/cases/colorado/supreme-court/2023/23sa300.html
Four of the plaintiffs are Republican and two independent. Of course, the case also has at least two dozen lawyers racking up huge fees.
A few Never Trump Republicans lent their names to a suit brought by an organization of D.C. insiders.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/washington-watchdog-gets-victory-in-trump-colorado-disqualification-case/ar-AA1lTsBI
Don't forget the 'Republicans' are chiefly involved with removing Trumps freedoms.
You might want an extension option on that. This going to get worse before it gets better
Robert - I second that.
No, no comas for you. wink wink . . . I know this is tongue in cheek; even so, each of us has to fight the enemy, so you've got to stay awake and engage and fight, right?
I agree with Bill Barr's great article—the well-written explanation of section 2383 and the congressional process needed to pull this off. I always found it interesting why the world Insurrection for January 6th.
It was a riot, plain and simple. It was rattling the political class cages, and it got out of hand. I am in complete agreement with those who were destructive getting an appropriate amount of fines and prison time.
But this leftist and media propaganda program is an example that these people are worse than Trump. Barr is so right when he describes Trump as a person not capable of winning a decisive victory and his truculent, petty, and toxic persona. I would add he was a terrible executive who couldn't build a consensus outside of his toadies who worship him. But this is a choice, and in the GOP primary, I will vote against him, but in the general election, he is a better alternative to incompetent leftists in office.
This whole process of barring him from the ballot shows that they are everything they say Trump is as an authoritarian but worse. The woman in Maine is trying to get money and fame as a grifter, not someone trying to save the republic. 2024 is becoming a choice between awful and really awful. Thanks for a great article that sheds light on this sham process.
How do you build a consensus with people who are using every dirty trick, legal and illegal to not only get you but, anyone who works for you? Bill Barr, was put in the A.G. position for one reason only. To cover their asses. They don't call him bondo Barr, for nothing.
Who appointed Bill Barr? Ohhhhh, right, it was Donald Trump. So is Trump part of the conspiracy to provide ass cover? Then it's odd that he just wrote this article criticizing people who are trying to get Trump removed from states' ballots. Maybe Barr is just a guy who knows the law and thinks it should be followed.
Also, isn't it weird that so many people who were associated with Trump end up with unfavorable opinions of him. Are they all just "plants" by the establishment? Or does he bear some responsibility for the people he appointed and their unfavorable opinions of him?
Building a consensus is not with everyone but another 10-15%. The goal is to get around 60% approval ratings. Trump is too much of an egomaniac, thin-skinned crybaby who needs people's lips on his ass to get anything done. This makes his unforced errors sky-high. But the answer to your question is the discipline that Trump has none of.
You didn't answer my question. I didn't ask if you thought Trump was an egomaniac. I didn't ask if he was thin-skinned crybaby. I didn't ask if he liked people that kissed his ass. I asked how do you form a consensus with people who will do anything legal or illegal to destroy you or anyone affiliated with your administration.
My answer is that you don't. They are 35-40% of the population. Trump gets 45-47%. To build a consensus you need the people who see the egomaniac crybaby jackass and want no part of him. The people you describe are not the whole other side, most people are repelled by Trump thus he can't forge a consensus. Does that do it?
I'm thankful to Bill Barr for this article. He is a sharp man and has spent a lifetime in service to our country. I'm thankful for his insight, his clear logic, and his commitment to conservative pinciples. I appreciate that he's from a generation that had a sense of duty instead of a need for "likes," and popular approval.
Albert, I guess I will have to do the same: vote against Trump in the primary, but for him (I can't believe I will have to betray myself in that way) in the general.
Also, do any of the readers know about the write-in rules for election? I'm assuming they are governed by each state.? In my dream world, normal Americans would write in a reasonably intelligent and mature candidate (whether D or R) and do an end run around the scenario that we might be faced with in November. Where's Ross Perot when you need him? (Kidding, he died in 2019).
The behavior of people on the left and the right in their deification or demonization of Trump has generally left me wiping my hands and walking away towards a middle position. I don’t want to be involved in these debates because the anxiety that comes with it is not a good use of time.
However, the actions of CO and ME disquiet me, as it has now created a slippery slope precedent to be misused by either party on the basis of pettyness and “we owned you” types of behavior. This needs to go to the Supreme Court, as this measure is a subversion of voter’s rights in a democracy.
Whether Trump wins or loses, pretty sure there’s going to be riots from either side.
Worse than riots, if Trump wins.
But it can only go to the Supreme Court if someone brings a case, as happened in CO and Maine. So let’s cool our jets and see what SCOTUS rules
Exactly.
The actions of those willing to win at any cost is the only thing we should fear.
Yes, and the Supreme Court has two justices put there by Mitch McConnell who engaged in his own "we owned you" behavior to get them there.
I am no fan of McConnell as he is Exhibit A on my Uniparty theory, but he did not really change the rule he just expanded it using the Democratic playbook. The rule, since the 1950s, had been a 60 vote "supermajority" was required to confirm all federal judicial and executive branch nominations. In 1993 Democrat Senator Harry Reid fought and won to lower the requirement to a simple majority for all positions except the Supreme Court to facilitate Obama nominations. The vote was 52-48 along party lines and is referred to as the "nuclear option". McConnell said at the time you will regret this when it is used against you. And he made good on it because when Trump's nominees faced filibusters as Obama's did when the nuclear option was deployed, McConnell oversaw an expansion of the rule change to include Supreme Court nominees. So if McConnell was wrong so was Reid.
Were those the ones appointed by Trump?
The President nominates justices. The Senate confirms them. Trump nominated three - Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett. All three were confirmed.
Right, so the responsibility for those justices being on the court belongs to Trump, not McConnell.
Trump and the Senate. People are nominated and not confirmed. That is the burr in Garland's saddle.
Barr hates President Trump for personal reasons...very petty personal reasons. The fact is that Barr deliberately conspired with the FBI to cover up the Hunter Biden laptop issues...issues that clearly show Joe Biden is a crook. Barr also stated that DOJ investigated the fraudulent Nov 2020 election when in fact he did no such thing.
The science of math and statistics...the law of large numbers and the central limit theorem show with mathematical certainty that the Biden votes were illegal fraudulent votes. It's not an opinion...its math.
What Barr is doing here is more cover up. Of course there is no legal basis to remove President Trump from any ballots so Barr states that in an effort to show he is fair. He is guilty of criminal conspiracy against the US election of Nov 2020 and must be prosecuted when President Trump is back in the Oval Office in Jan 2025. Barr knows this and he is worried about it. Hence this article.
Totally agree. I never thought much of Barr and felt he was just a do getter who Trump thought would be great. The deep state is DEEP and has existed as far back as Clinton but became evil when Obama was elected with his “ don’t let a crisis go to waste”. Our country is in one hell of a mess now. No one until Trump had the guts to attack the deep state and many people saw this. That’s why he is so popular. Though he wasn’t a politician, he saw the evil being done. He is a fighter, just needs the right people to help him cleanup this bloated bureaucracy. Don’t know if he can but the pool is slim now. God save America.
Ditto, thank you for doing the work here! ☺️
I agree with one small quibble. There really is not much federal.election law. It is mostly about campaign finance. Because elections are governed by state law. So when hecsaid I saw no evidence of widespread fraud that is likely true as far as his jurisdiction. But he also saw what you and I saw, and all those people who went to DC saw, and what the President saw that left us scratching our heads and he, in his capacity as AG, did not call for a review and analysis of election law. Which is sorely needed.
Deviation from Benford's Law does not prove election fraud, as discussed here: https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN27Q3A9/. It may be a red flag, but it's not conclusive evidence. Barr does hate Trump and Biden is crooked, but there's no solid evidence that he stole the election, as Barr has stated.
Barr did not even consider the numbers, much less the probabilities. All he said was he did not see evidence of widespread fraud. Which he would not see in his federal jurisdiction because almost all election law is state law. Elections are administered at the state level. Federal election law is primarily campaign and campaign finance related. But in hindsight it is obvious that the election was manipulated -both by suppression of information and numerous last minute changes outside of required legislative approval. Ad a result review and reform.of election laws is vital. If we can have uniformity of state child custody laws so they are enforceable from state to state we can have election laws that protect the sanctity and integrity of the individual's vote in each state.
The federal government has an election crimes branch. And before the 2020 election Barr authorized federal prosecutors to investigate suspected offenses of election law, for which he received criticism. He also criticized the use of mail-in ballots as allowing greater opportunities for fraud.
Here is how investigating crimes does not usually work: make a claim that there must be a crime committed somewhere and task law enforcement with finding it. Here is how investigating crimes does work: report suspicion of a specific crime to law enforcement who investigates that specific crime, such as that related to voting machines. That was investigated, but not prosecuted for lack of evidence.
It does and fraud is a category.
https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/federal-prosecution-election-offenses
But it is largely unused for a myriad of reasons as discussed herein:
https://www.justice.gov/criminal/file/1029066/download
Curiously I find no data regarding actual prosecutions.
So I stand by my comment.
To be clear I make no allegation of election fraud as defined in 2020 election laws. I will leave that to others. But it is beyond obvious that those laws were manipulated. And will be again if election laws are not reformed.
Edited to add: the nation is replete with law enforcement and prosecutorial task forces that do indeed begin with a proposition that a crime must be being committed and then seek it out. Examples include, but are by no means limited, to: DWI/DUI, child porn, drugs, money laundering . . ..
"Solid" being the operative, subjective word, open to definition & debate.
Enough for careful investigation, wouldn't you agree?
https://gvwire.com/2023/12/13/mail-in-voting-fraud-exposed-in-recent-rasmussen-survey/
First, this is a telephone opinion poll, so I think we would agree that it's not a smoking gun regardless of the responses. Second, assuming that the poll revealed accurate information, 19% of the respondents indicated that they assisted someone in filling out their ballot, not that they changed someone's ballot or that they voted for someone who chose not to vote. Third, whether or not this type of assistance constitutes fraud would depend on state law, which varies on this subject. Some states permit it, others don't, while others require that voters indicate whether or not they received such assistance. If my elderly grandmother says she wants to vote for Trump, and I help her fill out her ballot because she has vision problems and arthritis, and I fill it out exactly as she wants, I wouldn't consider this as fraud and it definitely isn't something that's going to change an election result.
I wish the poll would have asked if the person had changed a ballot, or manufactured one, or sent one in from someone who was deceased, etc. That would have given a better hint at whether or not there may have been widespread meaningful fraud.
I was a volunteer and poll watcher in 2020. I witnessed election fraud first hand.
You can believe whatever you want, but to deny there is no fraud is very naive.
Maybe a child believes all people are honest, until they grow up.....
I'm in my 50s, so I'm all grown up, thanks. I never denied that voter fraud exists, thus my wording: "widespread meaningful fraud." But that fact doesn't change the results of an election. I believe that there's fraud in almost every election and I support tighter measures to combat it, like requiring photo i.d. for voting. But every time the candidate I favor loses an election, I don't claim that the election was stolen without quite of bit of evidence. I didn't like it when Gore supporters falsely claimed this in 2000, and I didn't like it in 2020 either.
Actually it does. A mathematical "law" is a known truth, such as the law of sin's. Reuter's s attempting to deflect from this by making a false corollary with criminal law in which the only "solid evidence" would be finding the actual fraudulent ballots among the millions cast - the proverbial needle in the haystack. Reuters likely knows this but is engaging in more yellow journalism to again prop up their narrative.
Actually, that's not what the article does. It makes a similar case to the one made by that bastion of yellow journalism, the American Statistical Association, here: https://chance.amstat.org/2022/04/benfords-law-votes/.
There are cases in which use of this law may apply and those in which it does not, such as human height, weight, or IQ. Application of this law has been used to detect accounting fraud, but it is not sufficient to do so, either practically or legally. That is because other factors may influence the numbers so further investigatin is needed. As the ASA article explains, Benford's Law has been used detect voter fraud in elections (Iraq anyone?), and, when applied to county vote totals, may indicate fraud. But again, this is only an initial indicator that there MAY be fraud, not definitive proof that there definitely is. If someone shows me more conclusive evidence of fraud, I'd be happy to consider it, but application of this statistical tool doesn't provide it.
Bedfords law is immutable but will always be variable dependent and subject to GI = GO. I don't have the wherewithal this morning to dissect all of their individual analysis' other than to say: "lies,damn lies and statistics"; This is often quoted for a reason.
FWIW however, I have seen/read comparisons between questionable precincts in the 2020 election vs the statistical analysis from previous elections and using this "apples to apples" comparison it showed that Biden's vote totals were substantially higher than what would have been expected based on past performance. This also doesn't "prove" anything but is another "red flag".
As to Reuters, the headline from the article - "Benford's Law does not "prove'' election fraud" - which, as I said, would require finding the actual fraudulent ballots. This was intentionally written due to Reuters bias' where they misled readers to believe that the statistical claims of election fraud were not reliable. Reuters set up a straw man argument under the guise of a "fact check" that they then proceeded to tear down like a pinata. As an aside, wasn't it Reuter's who had their news office over a ISIS bomb-making operation and then claim to know nothing about it?
We agree about the red flags, which I think should be investigated, to a point.
And to your point, I think too many people only look at statistics from a perspective that supports their conclusions.
From a recent article published in Research Integrity and Peer Review:
"Whilst it is provable mathematically that a scale-neutral, random sample of numbers selected from a set of random probability distributions will follow Benford’s Law, Benford’s Law is not immutable or irrefutable for real data. Whilst we can observe that Benford’s Law holds remarkably well for certain datasets, reflecting Hill’s theoretical proof and the idea that such data is ultimately the product of random processes and random sampling, in reality we know that no such dataset is truly completely random in its construction or sampling. As such, we can expect minor deviations from Benford’s Law even in datasets which fit all of the supposed criteria for suitable data. Thus, it is not possible to prove unquestioningly that some set of data should, or should not, follow an exact distribution such as Benford’s Law."
Rick. Please show your math. I am more than open to the proof, but don’t just say it, show it.
I'll take a swing at your question.......
If Trump has 50.5% of votes and Biden 49.5% (not exactly what happened but stay with me), a 1% lead with 98% of the votes in, and the polls shut down for the night to only a handful of election officials, in order for Trump (or anyone) to lose Biden would have to get at least 75% of the remaining 2% of uncounted votes to win.
Even in the most crooked county in America, Cook, no one gets 75% of votes.
https://gvwire.com/2023/12/13/mail-in-voting-fraud-exposed-in-recent-rasmussen-survey/
I appreciate your explanation, but isn't part of the problem that media outlets report 90% etc. of vote in, but isn't that usually counties or precincts reporting? Because you wouldn't really know percentage of voters unless you already knew voter turnout, which you wouldn't until you'd counted all the votes. So if the media reports only 5% or 2% outstanding, but they mean counties or precincts, then the size of that outstanding vote can be significant relative to the entire total, for example if the outstanding counties or precincts heavily favor one party or another. There are a lot of these counties in which 70% or more vote Democrat, and they tend to be large urban areas with lots of votes so it takes longer to report. I'm not saying that this is always the case, but it could be for some of them.
Could could could...yes, anything COULD happen, but urban areas and large cities tend to get counted first. The remaining uncounted votes usually come from far away districts, which BTW are usually conservative, in any state.
Believe me, in Cook County, Illinois, hardly a swing state, no Democrat ever gets 70%.
I just think you're dead wrong about this. Small rural counties count up votes quickly, as there aren't many, especially when using voting machines, which many do. Large urban centers a lot more voters, plus bureaucracies, etc. Here in Ohio, Cuyahoga County precincts (Cleveland) almost always report last. And weren't the problems in Georgia related to Fulton County (Atlanta), in which they suspended vote-counting after much of the state was already in? I think this was the case in
Also, counting of absentee ballots in many states isn't completed until several days after in-person voting has concluded. And more absentee or mail-in ballots in urban areas, which you would expect, would delay reporting even more.
And in Cook County in the last 3 elections, Obama, Clinton, and Biden all got over 70% and Hillary almost cracked 75%. And you don't have to believe me. You can look it up yourself.
Right after he locks up Hilary and builds the wall with Mexican pesos.
Oh please... If the trial involving E. Jean Carroll's vaginal penetration by Trump in the women's dressing room of Nordstroms were a criminal trial, Trump would be a registered sex offender. As it is, he's still a sex offender. Not being a Sex Offender is on my list of "Must Have" for the leader of the free world.
Any cites/evidence that Barr conspired with the FBI to cover up laptop issues? Or more specific info on where votes were fraudulent and how the law of large numbers and central limit theorem show what you say they show? Not familiar with these claims and would like to read up. Thanks.
100% agree. The problem with intellectual elites, or elites of any kind, is their fear-based bias. They lose objectivity and create intellectual reasons for their fear- Sam Harris. We are human. No one human has the answers. We MUST learn to discern.
I would also be “truculent” if my own government worked in secret to subvert my presidency. Where were you William Barr, when the purveyors of “Russiagate” needed to be held accountable? This is the exact reason voters are pissed off (truculent) and Trump’s popularity continues its entrenchment - the political class is exempt from accountability.
Jeff Sessions was attorney general while Russiagate was going on.
Very well said.
I sure hope the next FP article is entitled "I Oppose Joe Biden, and any Efforts to Prevent an Honest Democrat Party 2024 Primary Election Process".
What the Dems did to RFK jr is equally abhorrent and unAmerican. He is a worthy candidate who would make an excellent president. The Dems are beyond salvation
I am watching to see which way his independent run will affect the election. I think it has the potential to be disruptive. I wish the disruption had the potential to be a positive, but, alas….
MSM is doing everything they can to convince us he'll take more votes from a Republican, and therefore we should disparage him at every opportunity.
They could not be more wrong!
Dems are anything but. Recall how their use of "superdelegates" against Bernie Sanders promoted the establishment candidate - crooked Hillary?
Both parties have large contingents of angry members who won't "go along to get along"; Ross Perot split off a large enough group of Republicans to hand Slick Willie his first term. His economic and foreign policy decisions (plus his moral failings and credible accusations of being a rapist) made enough of the country accept Bush V.2.0.
To follow that up though, the Republican Party put forth $&L McCain and then Milquetoast Mitt - both who were just part of the sleazy uniparty that could only advocate for more big government rather than any actual conservative values. I held my nose and only voted for either because their special interests were more aligned to my special interests, not because they were good candidates.
Yes, they were able to take out Bernie in 2020 by having the intelligence community say his campaign was being helped by "Russia!". And the media went along.
This shows how evil the democrats are. By any means possible, by well paid media, by controlled social media, any means possible. But Bernie is a communist. Plain & simple.
I can't stand Bernie - he's a total sellout. But what they did to him was terrible and unfair. It's the exact same thing they are doing to Trump and it is why so many are growing sympathetic to Trump.
If removing someone from a ballot can happen ... we are gone as a country. Technically, I think it's been done quietly over the years (like when they can keep a Green party candidate off the ballot), but now they are just drunk with power about it and getting sloppy.
That the Marxist/Dems allow a hard-core commie to be a senate committee chairman tells you just who they are.
I am deeply skeptical of anyone who believes the ends justify the means.
Yes he is and has been since he was a kid, hard core communist.
Don't hold your breath.
Don’t think that will happen. Bari is reaching for some kind of truth, and I commend her for it. But as much as she strains to escape the swamp, her feet remain stuck in the mud.
Agree
Barr is a strong administrative state supporter. He was a terrible Trump appointee as he did nothing to reform the corruption of the FBI and DOJ as he was spawned among that group.
All true. That doesn't mean he's wrong about this.
I agree what the states are doing to manipulate ballots is corrupt. These people put themselves or party above the constitution. Sadly many Federal judges do as well. I don't like being told the obvious by Barr who pretends to be all pious when he is corrupted by the administrative state as bad as any.
I agree.
His fear-based bias corrupts his analysis.
Vivek understands the problems. Has the intellect and restrained personality to be far more effective than Trump. Trump cares about America but his public behavior and temperament damage his effectiveness. To be fair, few other presidents were attacked by media and corrupt administrative state and Congress as Trump was. So perhaps Trump was created by Chuck, Nancy, Comey and the corrupt attorney general and corrupt judges of the FISA courts that still lurk in the shadows never held to account for the malevolent warrants they approve.
Trump's temperament effectively kept us out of new wars. This is a reason the administrative state despises him and spent all their energy trying to bring him down then and now.
Vivek is the best candidate for Republicans.He is young and beholden to no one. Many like him but think he is too young. I disagree. The constitution says otherwise. For a young, super talented person is willing to throw himself into the ugly business of politics , he should be lauded. He could serve 2 terms and invigorate and inspire the youth of this flailing country. He has carefully researched bold ideas for what he could do as president that is constitutional and doesn’t require congress’ approval. I for one am glad that Vivek Ramaswamy is in the fight. I would not write him off yet.
RFK jr is the other candidate that is unsullied by the swamp and worthy of the office. I want a decent uncorrupt person first and foremost.
A RFK/Ramaswamy ticket would be a helluva curveball.
I couldn't vote for a candidate who promotes the "great replacement theory" when he himself is part of the "replacement."
Why don't you believe D's are importing their next constituency?
Frankly, most latinos, the largest group crossing the border illegally, are religious and socially conservative. But they can't vote. Republicans could easily win them over if they really wanted to, though.
Gotcha, thanks. IMO, dems are befuddled that some people aren't able to be bought off. I recall Barry Sotero making a comment that coal miner's in W VA weren't "voting their interest" because as part of shutting down the mines, he was promising them a government handout.
Seems to me like the comments are skewing towards far right fanaticism. While I agreed with many of Trump’s policies and felt we were better off than we are with the Biden administration, he is too divisive at a time when we need sane leadership. Unfortunately, that ship may have sailed.
Hi Robert, which comments are you referring to as “far right fanaticism”? I am asking to try to understand what that term means.The comments I read seem to be well thought out and backed up with decent arguments. As far as divisive behavior, Trump has been attacked (unfairly in many instances) by democrats and media, and fought back. I do not like His petty name calling , but I am not sure how I would react if put in the same position. Thanks for listening....
I would assume he’s referring to the comments that are only focused on criticizing Bill Barr or reacting to the title, “I oppose Trump.” A lot of people didn’t read the article. Also keep in mind that when Robert published his comment at 7:48am, there were dozens fewer comments than when you published yours at 8:23am.
What Beth said. 😉
Please keep an open mind to Ramaswamy or RFK jr. Either is a huge improvement over Trump and Biden
My only problem with JFK jr is that he is an environmental lawyer. Do I say more?
Look at what he accomplished. He cleaned up the Hudson River. He sues the EPA and knows well the corruption of these agencies including the corrupt FDA. He does not buy into the climate agenda. Holding corporations accountable for dumping toxic wastes in waterways and poor areas is not at all similar to the climate agenda fascist who want to take away everyone’s cars and gas stoves.
RFKjr is smart and accomplished. He is open to unscripted questions from both the right and the left. He is not beholden to big Oacs or the political machinery of any party. The only two uncorrupt candidates that I see are RFK jr and Vivek Ramaswamy. Trump is not corrupt in the classic sense,, but he is a coarse boor whose only agenda is Trump. He has hired a few fired so many good people, that the best and brightest will not work for him. For those who love him, Vivek is the smarter, younger , more focused version of the MAGA ideas.
RFKjr or Vivek Ramaswamy should not be written off.
Ramaswamy would get exactly zero support for anything from anyone on the left. He'd bring a new level of hate from Democrats, and after 2 years would lose any advantage/majority in Congress.
Some people are good at giving orders and running businesses as a sole proprietor, a monarchy or dictatorship if you will. Elon Musk is totally that way. So is Trump.
That personna and style goes nowhere in politics as we've seen with Trump.
Who needs Trump.2 when we have other worthy choices?
They won't help any Republican so you might as well vote for whom you want.
I like Ramaswamy. I think he has a bright future. I do not think he has the experience to handle the Swamp in 2024.
Maybe he just goes at it with a hatchet because he doesn't know any better. That would be fun and also keep the opposition from knowing what to do as he would be very unpredictable.
"handle the Swamp" is an important skill and it does require some experience in politics to know when to nudge and when to plow into its power. Trump's every problem requires a hammer in many ways decreased his ability to achieve goals.
I hear you Joanne. But at this point hammer it is as far as I am concerned.
Definitely, don't throw away the hammer! There are many issues that will require nudges with gentle and sharp elbows to get across the aisle agreements and then hammer out the details to achieve effective and rational legislation that benefits the nation and its citizens.
Each party is playing the anvil chorus to the determinant of the country.
But that is Congress. IMO a far bigger problem is Congress abandonment of its responsibilities.
What will we call the people who no doubt will riot, block roadways, burn down businesses and police stations, if Trump is elected? If you’re on the left you’ll call them patriots. Democrats on the left will tell them to get in the faces of Trump voters, scream at them, dox them, swat them, confront them in restaurants and at their homes. They’ll start fundraisers to bail them out of jail if they get arrested. They won’t be labeled as insurrectionists even if they burn down police stations. They won’t hold committee hearings to decide what should be done to them.
So if you want to know why people support Trump, Mr. Barr, these are most likely the reasons they do, rightly or wrongly.
Alas, a true summing up. As a New Yorker, I loathe Donald Trump (and also acknowledge the good things he did as president). But as someone who lived through the 2020 riots, and has seen what our democratic-socialist City Council has done to our once energetic, functioning city, I loathe leftists even more.
A state and city that tolerate the disruption of commerce, transportation, and daily living and the vandalizing of our streetscapes by pro-terrorist Muslim agitators and their college and street-thug comrades are not fit to govern. I despair.
True enough, but if it goes the other way you don't think Trump supporters will stage another 1/6? Maybe not at the capitol but certainly in the states. It's going to be a shit show either way.
No. I think they will be doing what they do everyday..... going to work and paying taxes. Trump supporters are not on Soros, Unions and Antifa payrolls. They have to support themselves.
How many people are going to risk getting hauled off to jail, left to rot, and denied their right to due process? You? Not me or anyone I know.
In your comment is the implicit assumption that 'if Trump is elected' - Biden concedes defeat. And at that point Dems on the ground run amok in anger. But what happens if it is Biden who's elected? Does Trump concede? What does the recent past tell you?
I think if he beats him handily he will concede right away. If it is like 2020 then he will not concede right away. The problem, in my opinion, is there is too short a time between the election and the certification. If there are irregularities there is not enough time to properly investigate them. I'm hoping one of them wins big enough to avoid this situation.
I agree with that. A decisive victory, please.
Pretty please lol.
If the likes of Bill Barr could explain why in the five contested states they shut down the vote count in the wee hours of the morning (at the same time) with Trump leading then several hours later they all resumed vote counting (at the same time) with Biden ahead (it's a miracle) I wouldn't be here thinking Trump is right, the election was stolen. Can Barr explain the video showing in Fulton County Georgia republican observers to the vote count being run out of the room with the claim of a water main leak then watching the democrats drag out hidden boxes of "new" votes? How about all the drop boxes that were stuff as shown in the movie 2,000 mules? Nothing that has been offered has adequatly explained how a dottering old fool who did not even run an election champainge except from his basement could have garnered the largest vote count in history. Until that has all been explained I will never believe the election of 2020 was free and fair.
The water main break was very suspicious and there never was an explanation. Who wouldn't think that that was suspicious?
Exactly!!
Barr calls for a trial...wait didn't the J6 clown committee delete all their files? If it's such a preponderance of evidence, shouldn't that be in some national archives for all of us to see and examine and catalog for history? Barr stands on a knife edge in this piece, talking out both sides of his mouth. I hope The Fee Press allows someone like Victor David Hansen of Jonathan Turley to write a piece. I will give Barr 1 positive. He did mention summer of love, so maybe Kamala Harris will be charged for bailing out the anarchists in those arrests? Or we could whip up some fake charges, like Russia collusion on some Dems. Don't they see this is down the rabbit hole?!
Too late for you…you defiled the nation and the presidency, while pretending to be AG.
You sir, are a treasonous rat-bastard.