Help! Fascistic President Biden IS INVADING AMERICA WITH REFUGEES TO BE DEM FOREVER!!

NOVEMBER 15, 2022 BY JOHN HINDERAKER at Power Line:

ABBOTT CALLS OUT THE GUARD

This could be huge news: Texas Governor Greg Abbott has summoned the National Guard and the Texas Department of Public Safety to repel the invasion of Texas from its southern border. Abbott invokes the Invasion Clauses of the U.S. and Texas Constitutions:

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Some notable points:

* Texas will build its own border wall.
* I love the reference to gun boats.
* Abbott contemplates entering into one or more compacts with other states to deal with the invasion.
* He also intends to “enter into agreements with foreign powers to enhance border security.”

I believe by the “Invasion Clause” of the U.S. Constitution, Abbott means Section 4 of Article IV, which provides:

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.

Article IV of the Texas Constitution bestows powers on the governor of that state. Article IV, Section 7 provides:

GOVERNOR AS COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF OF MILITARY FORCES. He shall be commander-in-chief of the military forces of the State, except when they are called into actual service of the United States. He shall have power to call forth the militia to execute the laws of the State, to suppress insurrections, and to repel invasions.

At first look, I think Abbott is on solid ground under the Texas Constitution. I assume the relevance of the U.S. Constitution is that the federal government has breached its duty to protect Texas against invasion.

I think Abbott’s long-overdue move has the potential to generate a crisis of federalism. Immigration is constitutionally regulated by the federal government, but the federal government has not only failed to enforce its own laws, it has deliberately encouraged the violation of those laws on a massive scale. States like Texas have been left holding the bag. When the federal government abdicates its constitutional duties, and actively tries to undermine the constitutional framework, does a state have the right to step in? One would think so, but the Biden administration no doubt disagrees.

Can a state enter into an agreement with a foreign government? I don’t know. The concept seems extraordinary. No doubt legal scholars will enlighten us.

We have been on a collision course between ever-expanding but incompetently applied federal power on one hand, and the interests and powers of sovereign states like Texas and Florida on the other hand, for a while now. Fundamental issues of federalism like those posed by Abbott’s orders need to be resolved. I hope they are resolved in favor of the states. As I have written before, given the bitterly divided condition of our populace, the alternative to a renewed commitment to federalism may be disunion.

Perhaps Governor Abbott’s declaration will turn out to be a historic step toward restoring the Founders’ constitutional vision.

Achieving Civility DURING THE JOE BIDEN ERA? HAH!

NOVEMBER 15, 2022 BY STEVEN HAYWARD at Power Line:

THE DAILY CHART: HOW ARE THOSE RUSSIA SANCTIONS WORKING?

The “severe” sanctions the West (supposedly) imposed on Russia were supposed to be “crippling” to the Russian economy. Joe Biden promised us, after all. But after an initial swoon, the Russian Ruble has rebounded, and concerning Russian exports, well. . .

“But, hey: they are “deniers,” just like Holocaust deniers, so all argument is at an end.”

 NOVEMBER 14, 2022 BY JOHN HINDERAKER at Power Line

ABOUT “DENIERS”

It all started with Holocaust deniers. That phrase has a clear meaning: it refers to someone who denies that the Holocaust took place.

But liberals saw potential in the locution, an opportunity to disqualify their opponents without actually making an argument. Thus, they started labeling people as “climate deniers.” What does that mean? Someone who denies that we have a climate? There is no such person. Someone who denies that our climate changes? There is no such person. No: a “climate denier” is anyone who questions any of a long list of theories that liberals string together to justify devastating our standard of living for no good reason.

But, hey: they are “deniers,” just like Holocaust deniers, so all argument is at an end.

Liberals must have thought that strategy worked, because now we have “election deniers.” Again, one asks, what is an election denier? Someone who denies that we have elections? No. An election denier is anyone who worries that our elections might not be entirely on the up-and-up. Someone other than a Democrat, of course. Democrats have denied the legitimacy of every Republican president since George H.W. Bush, and many other elections besides. Cf. Stacey Abrams. But that’s different.

Of course, it is a fact that our elections are not always on the up-and-up, as the Democrats themselves have often alleged. But if a Republican makes that observation, he is a “denier” like the Iranian mullahs.

Does the Democrats’ crude strategy work? I don’t think so. Despite the Dems’ propaganda blizzard, Americans remain concerned about the integrity of our elections. Rasmussen’s most recent survey documents the point:

Most voters believe cheating may have influenced this year’s elections, and think voting by mail makes it easier to cheat.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 57% of Likely U.S. voters believe it is likely that the outcome of some elections this year will be affected by cheating, including 30% who say it’s Very Likely. Forty percent don’t think election outcomes this year are likely to be affected by cheating, including 18% who say it’s Not At All Likely. …

…Fifty-six percent (56%) of voters believe it’s more important to make sure there is no cheating in elections, while 41% think it’s more important to make it easier for everybody to vote.

So if you are an “election denier,” you are part of the majority. Poll after poll has shown that Americans of both parties want honest elections. Something like 70% to 75% of Americans want voter ID requirements, which the Democrats have desperately tried to make illegal. That makes me wonder: who is the real “election denier”? The person who wants honest, verified elections, or the person who wants to open the door to wholesale fraud?

Wisdom Appears!

November 15, 2022

Trump/DeSantis 2024

By Brian C. Joondeph at American Thinker:

As election day, November 8, is turning into election week or month, the outcomes are being dissected through the lens of the 2024 presidential election. What looked like a red wave initially is turning out otherwise as several swing states, perhaps after discovering on election day that their preferred Democrat candidate lost, delayed releasing any official results until they could “recount” the ballots or “find” additional ballots to put their preferred candidate in the lead. Interestingly, these delays only seem to favor Democrat candidates.

This is a repeat of 2020, and the feckless GOP leadership appears to have learned nothing over the past two years, or else they prefer to remain in minority status.

Florida was a major success with Governor Ron DeSantis winning bigly, along with Senator Marco Rubio. DeSantis should be the role model for the other 25 or so Republican governors, as he gave a master class in handling COVID prudently, based on science rather than hype, and punched back hard against the woke leftist culture infecting the rest of the country.

Many Republicans left blue hellholes like New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Illinois, turning Florida into a deeper shade of red, leaving the hellholes a deeper shade of blue, simply by virtue of migration. This partially explains Florida’s electoral results, but much credit goes to Governor DeSantis and his governorship.

As such, DeSantis has become the darling of the media, Trump-hating RINOs, and much of the Republican establishment. Are they enamored over his ability to punch back against the Left? Or is their newfound affection due to DeSantis possibly displacing former President Donald Trump as the Republican nominee in 2024? For the anyone-but-Trump crowd, DeSantis is a gift from the heavens.

Should he win the nomination, the left will turn on him on dime, as they did on Trump once he became the nominee in 2016. Trump quickly morphed from being a regular on Morning Joe to his new persona as a racist buffoon as soon as he became Hillary Clinton’s electoral opponent.

At the time of this writing, neither Trump nor DeSantis have announced any run for President, although Trump has hinted at it and teased a big announcement, which most assume will be his declaration of a presidential run. Maybe, maybe not? DeSantis has said nothing and is now coming off a campaign and reelection, not the time to announce that he is running for President.

If both run, it would be hard fought and nasty, as was the 2016 GOP primary season. Trump is the master at branding his opponents and not in a flattering way. The last Florida governor to learn this was “Low Energy Jeb.” Will the next one be Ron “DeSanctimonious”?

Primaries are a time of choosing as each candidate makes their case to their party’s electorate. Whoever emerges victorious, assuming the candidates don’t annihilate each other, will be primed for the main event. Democrats and the media hope that Trump and DeSantis destroy each other, leading to a Pence/Pompeo or Haley/Noem ticket that loses genteelly in a McCain or Romney fashion, allowing the deep state and ruling class to return to some semblance of pre-Trump normalcy.

I offer another possibility, or suggestion, as I have zero inside knowledge, only an obsessive interest in all of this. Suppose all the Trump vs DeSantis sparring is nothing but theater? What if the two Florida residents have discussed plans and strategy already? Interestingly, Trump just retruthed a Truth Social comment, “Trump masterfully started this fake ‘fight’ with DeSantis…” perhaps acknowledging this theory.

Trump still has his strong MAGA base, and in a CPAC straw poll a few months ago, was the favored 2024 nominee over DeSantis by 69-24 percent. It’s still Trump’s party.

DeSantis is an exemplary governor but has no national governing experience, unlike Trump who has already spent four years as President. DeSantis, not being independently wealthy, will be beholden to the donor class supporting his candidacy, possibly clipping his wings should he become President. Trump doesn’t have this conflict of interest.

Trump has his baggage, his brash personality and inability to turn the other cheek, features that both annoy and thrill his detractors and supporters respectively, as few Republicans have the ability to punch back against the leftist forces against them — Hollywood, academia, corporate media, Wall Street, big pharma, big sports, and the coastal latte-sipping elites.

The ruling class would like nothing better than for Trump and DeSantis to split the GOP vote, leaving the door wide open for another destructive Democrat administration. Watch the media do their best to set up this scenario.

My theory is that Trump and DeSantis formed a secret alliance, allowing the Trump-hating RINOs to pour hundreds of millions into DeSantis’s potential campaign. The two can feud publicly, sucking the air out of the political room for the next year, then join forces. Not only will they have a huge campaign war chest, but the NeverTrumpers who loved DeSantis one minute will have no idea what to do when they get their wish, except that their guy is running for the White House with another guy they loathe.

This would be an unbeatable ticket, assuming the election systems, particularly in swing states, get fixed. DeSantis would have four years as an understudy, and after Trump cleans up the numerous flaming bags of poop created by the Biden-Obama administration, DeSantis would be well positioned to continue making America great again for another four or eight years. All Trump would have to do is claim New York as his primary residence to avoid the Constitution’s effective prohibition on the president and vice president coming from the same state.*

If the election systems aren’t fixed, this is all moot. This includes ballot “counting” extending days or weeks past the election, bags of ballots found in mountain ravines, cameras monitoring ballot tabulation suddenly going offline in Jeffrey Epstein fashion, or “drop and roll” ballot dumps that always favor the Democrat candidates.

Under such electoral malpractice, the Democrat or uni-party candidate will always win. Republicans focus on voting while Democrats focus on the far more important and downstream ballots and counting the votes. As Joseph Stalin observed, “The people who cast the votes don’t decide an election, the people who count the votes do.”

If the GOP cannot understand or fix this, they will be a perpetual minority party. And a DeSantis candidacy will take a wonderful governor from Florida, leaving him on the political ash heap of Republican losers.

Predictions are a dime a dozen these days, but Trump and DeSantis are too smart to destroy each other. Trump helped DeSantis win the governorship and DeSantis knows Trump could dispatch him as he did to 16 talented and experienced primary opponents in 2016, few of whom still have a political future.

Don’t listen to the hype from Fox News and other Trump-hating media that Trump is finished. This gaslighted “feud” is designed to dispirit Republican voters and boost sagging media ratings. Maybe this is all part of “the plan.” Regardless, buckle up as the next two years will be a wild ride!

Brian C Joondeph, MD, is a physician and writer.

WHERE ARE TODAY’S REPUBLICANS WITH BRAINS AND LEADERSHIP?

Republican Leaders Have A Choice: Roll Back Early Voting And Mail-In Ballots Or Learn To Take Advantage Of Them

BY: EDDIE SCARRY at the Federalist:

NOVEMBER 14, 2022

There isn’t just one reason for the midterm shortcomings but none are more important than the party’s neglect in adapting to our new jungle of an election process.

EDDIE SCARRY

Republicans apparently learned very little from the 2020 election which turned voting and vote counting into a chaotic multi-week affair, all to the great advantage of Democrats.

After finding their party blown out of the water by early votes and mail-in ballots, both vastly expanded to accommodate the pandemic hysteria, elected GOP leaders seem to have thought to themselves, “Well, better luck next time!”

And here we are. In an election year that should have seen major gains for Republicans across the board, the party failed to take the Senate, could still (a week after Election Day) fail to secure the House, and is now on life support for the governorship in Arizona. There isn’t just one reason for the shortcomings but none are more important than the party’s neglect in adapting to our new jungle of an election process.

For the past two years, every Republican should have been either attempting to beat back the flood of “no excuse” mail-in ballots saturating swing states, or building up a party network that could adapt to it. There were some efforts to manage the mail-in voting problem in Arizona and Georgia but otherwise the party said its prayers and hoped for the best heading into the midterms.

We see how that strategy turned out. Democrats once again turned on the ignition and their army of activists began knocking on doors and dialing up their reliable voters to be sure that every single one of them knew the time to vote was now. Whether it was three weeks or a month before actual Election Day, it didn’t matter. Now. In response, Republicans donned a toothy smile and told their voters to keep Tuesday open. Wait in line— no matter how long it takes.

True, Republicans tend to be a lot more motivated than Democrats to vote in a non-presidential campaign year. They’re happy to drive to the booth and wait their turn. But the new reality is that elections are happening for weeks before the designated day for official in-person voting. That’s a lot of time for dedicated activists to call or visit the homes of their voters, no matter how unmotivated they are, and tell them that they don’t have to wait at all. They can cast their ballot right now. Want me to do it for you?!

Where is Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel on this? Where is National Republican Congressional Committee Chair Tom Emmer? Where is National Republican Senatorial Committee Chair Rick Scott? They’re the ones responsible for leading on these things but they did nothing. Now they’re cheerfully making plans for their future leadership positions and fundraising operations.

If elected Republicans aren’t prepared to roll all of it back to the pre-pandemic way of doing things — I know, the media will call you racist, boo-hoo — then they’ll have to adapt and develop their own way of pushing their voters to cast ballots for weeks leading up to Election Day. That’s what Democrats are doing and it’s working.

Eddie Scarry is the D.C. columnist at The Federalist and author of “Liberal Misery: How the Hateful Left Sucks Joy Out of Everything and Everyone.”

THE TIMES DISCOVERS A THOUGHT!

NOVEMBER 14, 2022 BY JOHN HINDERAKER at Power Line

THE TIMES HAS SECOND THOUGHTS

The day is coming–rather soon, I think–when the current mania for drugging adolescents and carving up their bodies will be viewed with horror as one of the great crimes of our century. The costs of the “trans” fad have already become evident, to the point where the New York Times wants to position itself somewhere in the middle.

The Times story is headlined: “They Paused Puberty, but Is There a Cost?” Good question! The subhed: “Puberty blockers can ease transgender youths’ anguish and buy time to weigh options. But concerns are growing about long-term physical effects and other consequences.”

Here is one paragraph from the long article:

In a 2020 paper, 31 psychologists, neuroscientists and hormone experts from around the world urged more study of the effects of blockers on the brain. “If the brain is expecting to receive those hormones at a certain time and doesn’t, what happens?” said Dr. Sheri Berenbaum, head of a gender research lab at Penn State, and one of the authors of the paper. “We don’t know.”

In one sense, puberty blockers are the least of it. We certainly do know what happens when doctors slice off a boy’s penis or scrape away a teenage girl’s breasts and mangle her genitals. Do we have any idea what the long-term psychological and physical consequences of these surgeries will be? I think so, actually.

Ann Althouse quoted from, and linked to, the Times story, and welcomed comments. They are generally hostile, to put it mildly, to the “trans” fad and the Times’s belated second thoughts. A friend comments:

Unbelievable. And the mealy-mouthed Times diction is priceless. It’s got “growing numbers”, “experts” “data” “research”…and my favorite, “concerns” “are growing”…their concerns have concerns they are so concerned…and in “growing numbers”…

He also excerpted some of the many comments:
 

D.D. Driver said…
The concerns are “growing.” No one had concerns right out of the gate? We needed to send young, otherwise healthy human guinea pigs through an experiment to see if it helps before we had “concerns” (which are growing, btw).
11/14/22, 10:33 AM

cubanbob said…
Transgenderism is a mental disorder. Pretending it isn’t especially in a child is monstrous. Doctors who perform these “treatments” on minors are on the Mengele spectrum.
11/14/22, 10:45 AM

Fred Drinkwater said…
My blood pressure just sprayed out of my ears. I don’t believe in Hell, but some folks are going there regardless.
11/14/22, 11:01 AM

Pianoman said…
I guess we’ve reached the peak for “minor gender-affirming care”. When the NYT is pushing back, you know things have hit a tipping point.
11/14/22, 11:04 AM

JaimeRoberto said…
It would be a start if we didn’t call it “gender affirming care”. The treatment doesn’t affirm their gender. It changes it.
11/14/22, 2:11 PM

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said…
“But concerns are growing about long-term physical effects and other consequences.”

No shit? I don’t even need to read the excerpt. Idiocy so manifest, expertise so corrupted by ideology, that gales of laughter are the only response.
11/14/22, 11:05 AM

DarkHelmet said…
It’s bad and should be illegal except in very, very rare cases where something other than gender confusion is at issue.

That this even needs to be debated is evidence that our culture has gone insane.
11/14/22, 11:05 AM

Also this:

Owen said…
Pianoman @11:04: “…When the New York Times is pushing back…”. Yes. But rather than being “pushback” that aims directly to check or reverse this evil, I think it is mostly CYA so the NYT can later claim that it was not aiding and abetting the evil, not 100% and loudly, anyway. Possibly also the purpose is battlespace prep: the NYT can see an approaching tsunami of public horror and revulsion, and wants to frame the fight in the least-bad terms.

Pass the popcorn.

A small number of people are making a great deal of money from the “trans” fad at the expense of troubled children. Liberals in general, and the Democratic Party and the New York Times in particular, have been their enablers. A reckoning is coming–and, as I said, sooner rather than later.