HOuse

Open Thread

Mark Noonan9 Comments

They got Trump on trial and so he goes and visits a bodega in NYC where the owner was persecuted by the DA for defending himself…large, friendly crowd. To be sure, Harlem is rapidly gentrifying so its not like Trump got popular in the ‘hood…but, still: it is NYC.

Do they get him convicted? Possibly, but I rate it at best 50/50 for them. It only takes on juror to have a mistrial…and the charges are so obviously politically bogus that even a NYC jury might refuse to play along. And it isn’t like the New York government is ragingly popular these days. Acquitting Trump is an excellent way to poke it in the eye. If they get a conviction it is over trivial charges which are likely unconstitutional…so, Trump doesn’t go to jail.

Democrats are crowing that while they have Trump in court he can’t campaign while Biden is free to hit the trail. That’s saying the quiet part out loud! But the fly in their ointment is that Biden can’t actually hit the trail. His latest mental breakdown had him claiming an uncle was eaten by cannibals in World War Two. That was before he warned Israel not to move on Haifa, a city that has been Israeli since 1948. Anyways, the cannibals thing stems from an uncle of his who was in the Army air corps in WWII. The poor man was a passenger and the plane went down in the ocean. One man survived but all others – including the plane – were never located. So, where Biden gets cannibals into this, I don’t know. And the man died before Biden was 2 years old, so its not actually a memory, just something Biden was told about and mangled by his desire that every story about him be the most interesting story there is.

There are some less-bad polls for Biden out there, keeping in mind that to get past 270, he’ll have to get atop Trump by more than 3 percentage points (and anything below 5 is dicey). Other polls show Trump lead steady. Doesn’t really matter. The Mrs paid $4.88 for gas today. If Biden wins in spite of that, we never had a chance. That is, we lost our country ages ago and have just been going through the motions. But those gas prices, those food prices, Biden’s bizarre mental ramblings and increasing physical breakdown, the open border, the crimes committed by illegals, the wars in the Middle East and Ukraine (which is tipping towards disaster, by the way; the MSM isn’t covering it because nothing good for Biden is about to happen there), the sense that nobody is in charge…all of that, and more, is making Trump 2017-2019 shine in retrospect. He’s not nearly as hated as some think.

And if you drill down into the “Biden wins” analysis, it is all based upon a low-turnout election where Democrat GOTV swamps Trump just enough to give Biden 4 more years. Maybe it will be that way. But if its a high turnout election, then it looks like the higher the number of voters, the more Trump is going to get (in some polls of people who didn’t vote in 2020, Trump is up by double digits). Nobody can really know this – there’s no way to know, for certain, who will actually show up. Sure, we can know that a certain number almost certainly will show…but even among the most consistent voters there is some up and down election to election. For those who are occasional voters, its a crap shoot. And as GOP voter registrations continue to improve, we’re getting a class of voters who rarely or never vote. Absolutely no way to know how many of them show – can’t even take a guess at it. The “good” polls for Biden are all D+5 to D+7, predicated upon the GOP just staying home out of disgust for Trump. But if the electorate is R+1, the polls showing it good for Biden are worthless. R+2 or 3? Political earthquake.

More trouble in the House. MAGA blames RINOs, RINOs blame MAGA. There is blame to go around – and MAGA does need to get a larger sense of the possible here, especially with a razor thin majority. But most of the blame must lay at the Speaker’s feet. The Speaker has immense power in the House – Democrats made sure of that over the years. You’ll note that when Nancy was running the show, nothing good for GOPers ever got to the floor. Johnson can do that, too. Democrats can pass whatever they want through the Senate given their majority and our RINOs, but Johnson can pretty much spike anything unless he gets what he wants. And his job was to get us something. We know with a Democrat Senate and White House we’re going to have to put up with huge amounts of Commie garbage. Way of the world, GOP. Do better at the next election. But we did win the House…and that means every bit of Commie garbage should have something MAGA attached to it – if Democrats get money for an NGO to send migrants to the border, then we get money to pay for Texas to build a fifty foot high wall. Like that – and so on and so on. But we got nothing. We always get nothing. And Johnson and the RINOs are smart enough to know that if we don’t get something, there will be trouble. If Johnson falls – and even if we get a Democrat Speaker – then let the lesson be learned: don’t betray the GOP base. Make certain to stroke us. This is the growing pains of a new GOP, guys. Don’t get too upset about it. In the 1850’s the House was a complete mess because the new GOP also hadn’t figured itself out and so essentially handed power to Democrats. It takes time to change.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan84 Comments

Still no major movement into Gaza and now we’re providing aid for Hamas. But don’t worry, Pudding Brain’s people say that if Hamas tries to steal the aid, they’ll condemn it. This is not looking good.

On the other hand, the IDF is still talking victory – that they will totally destroy Hamas in Gaza. Can’t see how they do that while allowing us to feed Hamas…but I can only assume they at least think they’ve got a plan that’ll work. We’re going to find out.

Pudding Brain went to Israel and it was just so entirely humiliating…this aged, senile crook out there to provide cover for aids who are desperately trying to get Israel to surrender to Hamas. We are a very pathetic nation right now. The pissant King of Jordan refused to even meet with Biden. I’m sure the Israelis didn’t want to…but as he’s the guy signing the checks, they had to put up with it. While Israel has built a robust domestic arms industry, there are still come crucial elements which come from us so I guess Israel still feels over a barrel.

For future reference on Israel’s part, I’d buy about 100 Panzerhaubitze 2000 from the Krauts (given the past, the Germans would likely do an easy-payment deal); its a 155mm self propelled howitzer which has an effective range of 67 kilometers. This means, depending on where positioned on Israeli-controlled territory, it can hit anywhere in Gaza or the West bank and very deep into Lebanon and Jordan, as well. Get about a million rounds of ammo for it (the stuff keeps forever) and anytime anyone in range causes trouble, just level an area with cannon fire. 155 mm is very common and no matter what is going on, you’d be able to replenish ammunition from some source. One thing the IDF has always had a lack of is tube artillery; when fighting conventional forces, that isn’t much of a handicap but when confronting dug in irregular forces like Hamas, it is just what the doctor ordered.

The GOP still can’t come up with a Speaker. The battle is between those who want a MAGA purist and those who want a conventional GOPer who can be relied upon to fully fund Democrat priorities. To me the easy deal is to agree to the RINO with a proviso that any funding bill will, once it gets to the floor, be stripped down to its components for an up or down vote. For instance, Pudding Brain wants us to cobble together a bill for Ukraine, Israel and border security. Fine. But once it comes time for a vote, it is broken up into 3 separate bills. This doesn’t mean all of it fails…but it does mean there will have to be some real horse trading…like in return for Ukraine aid, we get, say, funding to Texas for building a border wall (if we give the money to Biden, his people either won’t spend it or will buy something ineffective). On and on like that.

This battle over the Speakership is causing all sorts of heartache…in government and the pundit class. Most Americans are probably only vaguely aware of it and don’t care one way or the other. This will not hurt GOP prospects for 2024 unless something really ridiculous happens, like some RINOs joining Democrats to make Jeffries Speaker. I really do discount this – though the rumor does abound. Any GOPer voting for such a thing has got to know the career ends with that vote. There will be a successful primary challenge.

Meanwhile, GOP prospects brighten by the day – some recent polling shows any of Trump, DeSantis or Haley beating Biden (keeping in mind that anything less than Biden +5 in the popular vote likely means a GOP victory). This is not because the GOP is any good – it isn’t, and we just about universally despise it, as a thing – but because Biden is just so very bad. There have been rumors of Democrats trying to ditch Biden but I don’t think it’ll happen. Though Obama and Clinton people are all over the Democrat establishment, they generally don’t like each other and getting them to agree to an alternative is going to be hard (especially as Clinton’s people would probably want Clinton to be the alternative); if they don’t come together, then the Biden people hold sway…and as they only survive in power as long as Joe does, they simply will not let it go. Unless Biden dies, he’s the guy. And there may come a point when the Democrat powers that be just let it alone – knowing that Joe is a goner. Trump if he gets back in is only for one term; if its DeSantis they figure they can still win Congress in 2026 and do to him in 2028 what they did to Trump in 2020.

As the Gaza war has gone on we’ve been treated to some MSM lies astonishing in their scope and, indeed, arrogance. Some people are pretending to be shocked about this. They also pretend to be shocked when the corruption of our government is revealed. Everyone knows. It isn’t a surprise. The MSM lies, it lies all the time and about everything. So, too, the government. But here’s why a lot of people pretend it is all shocking: they know what it means to admit that our government and media are just liars. It means we can’t allow either to go on as is.

I’ve been pointing out for a while that the First Amendment cannot sanely be construed to protect lying. That our Founders knew we would have liars does not mean they were trying to secure a right to lie. They were trying to secure a right to tell the truth – what we Catholics called rightly ordered freedom: The freedom to do what is right. While we all can do evil, we are not being free when we do so…we are, in fact, enslaving ourselves when we do wrong. What I’m saying is that we, the people, can enact laws punishing lies. We can make anyone who publicly utters a lie pay for it – in civil or criminal court, or both. And we are going to have to do this – because the MSM cannot at this point correct itself. It is, as it were, determined to lie at this point. In a sense, they’ve told so many lies that they are committed to lying. Not really, of course; anyone can repent. But in their minds to admit that they’ve been lying for years is too humiliating. So, they’ll just double and triple down on the lies. But we can’t have a Republic if liars are allow to lie with impunity…so we will have to stop them.

The other thing I’ve been yammering on about is the need to end government secrecy. It really does have to go, and in its entirety. Whatever tiny advantage we gain against foreign adversaries by having secrets is vastly outweighed by government’s ability to hide corruption and incompetence under a veil of secrecy. For us to have a Republic we must know what the government is doing as it does it. Only thus can we judge if our agencies of government are working in our interest. We must enact laws requiring the government to do everything out in the open. No secrets. Ever.