Yes, Despite Dems and Reps, Donald Trump WAS A Good President!

January 6, 2023

Trump Hatred Is Not Cheap

By John Green at American Thinker:

We have a close family friend who voted for Joe Biden. Yup, she’s really a friend — proving that us semi-fascist conservatives are more tolerant than members of the coexist party. We’ll call her Pat. She voted for gropey Joe even though she disagrees with almost all the radicalism that he and the Democrats are pushing. Her reasoning is quite simple. She refused to vote for Donald Trump because he is too personally offensive to her.

Pat is no puritan. She’s made her share of bad choices in life, and doesn’t hold the occasional mistake against the Donald. But she just can’t get past his personality. The bragging, exaggerating, and needless personal attacks are more than she’s willing to tolerate. Of course, it doesn’t help that Trump won’t do anything to dispel his image as a juvenile schoolyard bully. Did you hear he just called a reporter an unattractive whackjob who’s dumb as a rock because he didn’t like her report about Jared Kushner?

So, Pat has her reasons — which make perfect sense to her. But that level of Trump hatred does come with a price tag. It didn’t take long to realize that the Trump alternative — Joe Biden — came with some hidden costs of his own, that Pat didn’t know about. Now that we’re two years into his presidency, we can actually quantify some of those costs.

Immediately upon assuming office Joe got with his pals in Congress and went on a spending binge. We shouldn’t be surprised. That’s what socialists do — spend other people’s money. Joe, San Fran Nan, and little Chucky Schumer had a grand time, spending almost five trillion bucks and driving the national debt up another three trillion dollars. But Joe never considered the post-party hangover — a 40-year high inflation level. That ear-popping inflation isn’t going down either, unless there are some serious changes in fiscal behavior. With the recently passed omnibus spending bill, there’s no indication that anybody, in either party, intends to change behavior.

The Congressional Joint Economic Committee has found that inflation alone is costing American families an additional $635 per month. That’s the equivalent of a nice car payment to fund Joe’s big spending, energy choking, regulation expanding, experiment with banana republicism.

Via inflation, the Biden administration has delivered a $7,620 annual cost increase to the average family. That may not be a big deal to Hunter Biden — who pulls down $80K per month to snort cocaine and impregnate strippers. But to Pat, it’s a lot. In fact, it’s enough to add 12 years to her retirement preparations. She’ll either need to work 12 more years or get a lot more modest in her post-career expectations.

But the price increases from inflation aren’t the only price of admission to the Biden presidency. To fight inflation, the Federal Reserve has been raising interest rates. Now Pat can’t qualify for a mortgage on the home she wanted or afford to buy a new car, take a vacation, or buy any number of luxury items. She’s learning that she’ll just have to do without a few things. But doing without things should be counted as part of the cost of supporting lunch-bucket Joe — no?

Let’s ignore all of the other wish list items and just focus on the mortgage cost — because unless you live in California, everybody needs a place to live. At the end of the Trump administration the average house payment was $1,496. But with interest rate increases, a home of the same price now has a monthly mortgage payment of $2,305. Now it’s 800 bucks per month more expensive to buy the average American home. That’s an additional $9,600 per year. Call it the “don’t have to see Donald Trump on the White House lawn” fee.

Pat’s economic problems are further exacerbated by the fact that she’s not making as much under Biden as she was during the 2016-2020 dark ages. When I point out Biden’s remarkable achievement of creating over a million new jobs (according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, not the Federal Reserve), she just grits her teeth and gives me the stink eye. You see, she’s one of those people that helped Joe juice up his jobs numbers by trading a single good-paying job for two part-time crap jobs.

So Pat, like many Americans, has been tapping into her savings to pay for luxury items like groceries and heat during the winter. Pat lives in Minnesota, so heat in the winter is kind of a big deal.

According to a Northwestern Mutual study, the average American family’s savings went down by $11,000 between 2021 and 2022. The study is proof that in Joe’s America it costs more to live than you are likely to earn. Pat’s retirement preparations are looking shakier by the day. That drain on savings can’t go on forever. Eventually the savings will be gone, the pipes will freeze, and Minnesotans will start getting cranky.

Between inflation and elevating interest rates, it will cost Pat $68,800 to purchase four years of enhanced decorum in the White House. Except little glitches like:

• Calling a reporter a stupid son of a b***h
• Speeches referring to political opponents as fascists
• And dropping f-bombs on anybody concerned about the border

It’s none of my business what Pat spends her money on, and avoiding Trump’s quirks clearly has some value to her. But almost $69K — to avoid mean tweets. Wow, she must have more disposable income than I do!

John Green is a political refugee from Minnesota, now residing in Idaho. He has written for American Thinker, and American Free News Network.  His work has been featured on the Dan Bongino Show, World View Weekend Broadcast with Brannon House, and Steel on Steel with John Loeffler. He can be followed on Facebook or reached at greenjeg@gmail.com.

That Great Leader OF “NOTHING GOOD MCCONNELL” SHOULD BE FIRED, NOT MCCARTHY!

KRAYDEN: It’s McConnell, Not McCarthy!

• by: David Krayden
• 01/05/2023

It is clear that Republicans in Congress are upset.

They have every right to be.

But it’s McConnell, not McCarthy!

​​​​Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) just conspired with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) to pass a Frankenstein Monster piece of legislation that is among the ugliest, the thorniest, the longest and the most destructive bills ever devised by the Washington politicians who have proven again that they don’t give a damn about anything but their own careers.

Could McConnell have been so focused on this $1.7 trillion boondoggle that he forgot the Republicans are moving into the House majority position? Or does he just know he was recently re-elected, and senators don’t have to worry about the consent of the people very often when they serve six-year terms?

That said, perhaps McConnell earned the moniker of “Cocaine Mitch” because he sometimes behaves like a drug addict who is so enamored with his own longevity in the Senate that policy just doesn’t matter anymore. This week old Mitch set a record for longest-serving Senate leader. Does that inspire awe in your soul or nausea in your stomach? Mitch has been a well-preserved piece of dead wood for a long time, and it’s time to bid him and his dismal career adieu.

At any rate, he has assiduously earned the title of top RINO of 2022, and if there isn’t anyone in Kentucky who can bring down this decrepit excuse for a Republican than someone with a glimmer of conservative principles needs to move to the state.

“If a truly bipartisan full-year bill without poison pills is ready for final Senate passage by late next week, I’ll support it for our Armed Forces,” the pathetic McConnell told Fox News Digital. “Otherwise, we’ll be passing a short-term continuing resolution into the new year.”

Yeah, this is the best he can say about a bill that pays for Ukraine’s border security but ignores the ongoing catastrophe at America’s southern border? Maybe when the illegals start transgressing the Kentucky border, McConnell will take notice.

So what is happening in the House of Representatives on Tuesday as Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) apparently never thought about the rule of thumb that one should count your votes before running for Speaker of the House. Doesn’t any politician in these languorous times read political history or biography and discover how the late President Lyndon Johnson tallied his support in Congress before moving on legislation?

But the Republicans are making an appalling situation even worse by refusing to gather around McCarthy and nominating people who have no desire to run for Speaker and no idea of fulfilling the role if they are elected. Like Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman said about running for the presidency, “If nominated, I will not run. If elected, I will not serve.”

McCarthy is certainly to blame for failing to secure a first-ballot victory, but the Republican squad that refuses to even consider a McCarthy speakership is adding not just insult to injury but madness to injury. The Republicans need to start governing: they need to start examining President Joe Biden’s career-long political corruption, and they need to impeach that horse’s ass of a Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who has been such an abject failure in his job while delivering such a degree of strident delusion that he is either in need of remedial training or a 12-step program.

If the Republicans continue to squabble about McCarthy or can’t find a suitable alternative pretty damn quickly, the GOP is going to look like a party that cannot even govern themselves, let alone the nation. This is pure political embarrassment.

You might not think McCarthy is an ideal Republican, but he has demonstrated a willingness to embrace the often quixotic trends of the Republican Party. Do you remember Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) and how that RINO often seemed he was presiding over a Democratic majority in the House? Or look how Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) whose primary objective during the first two years of former President Donald Trump seemed focused on ignoring the president and sabotaging his agenda.

If this B.S. continues through the week, it will make it difficult to support a new Republican agenda in the House that can possibly even make it through the Senate as the Democrats falter.

And that needs to be remembered. The Republicans have no reason to be seriously divided. Their work ahead is both clear and urgent. The Democrats are the party of a few sane people, a lot of unprincipled politicians, and a communist rump that denies reality.

Get with it, GOP.*****
Editor’s Note: Human Events believes that during times of intra-movement disagreements, it is important to consider varied arguments. Opinion pieces at Human Events do not necessarily represent the views of the outlet or its Editorial Board.

“MANIFESTATION”

Jan. 6 Is Important Because It’s Epiphany, Not The Solemn Anniversary Of A Fake Insurrection

BY: JOHN DANIEL DAVIDSON at the Federalist:

JANUARY 06, 2023

Don’t allow a hysterical media to capture Jan. 6 for their purposes. Let’s reclaim it as the glorious celebration of Christ’s manifestation.

JOHN DANIEL DAVIDSON

Today, as with one voice, the entire corporate news media and the left-wing blue checks of Twitter will wail, rend their garments, and lament the second anniversary of the worst day in American history since the attack on Pearl Harbor: the “insurrection” of Jan. 6, when Trump and his bigoted minions almost destroyed American democracy.

This is all you will hear about today, if you pay attention to those people. Don’t listen to them. The only reason Jan. 6 is important, this year or any year, is because it’s the feast of Epiphany, the day Christians worldwide celebrate the revelation of Jesus Christ as God incarnate.

Epiphany means “manifestation,” and in the Roman Catholic Mass it is celebrated by a commemoration of the triple manifestation of Christ: first to the Magi or Three Wise Men, who represent the Gentiles; then at the baptism of Christ, when a voice from heaven declared, “This is my beloved Son”; and finally at the wedding feast of Cana, when Jesus changed the water into wine.

For centuries, Christians have marked Epiphany, sometimes called Three Kings’ Day, with a rich and sometimes odd variety of rituals, feasting, and merry-making. It’s the day when the faithful will chalk their doors with the letters “C,” “M,” and “B,” the initials of the three Magi (Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar), or Christus mansionem benedicat (“May Christ bless this house”), or simply “IIIK” to symbolize the three kings.

There’s a lovely medieval European Epiphany tradition called three kings cake or galette des rois, when a small fève or trinket, sometimes a figurine, symbolizing the Christ Child, is hidden in a cake or pastry. Pieces of the cake are distributed randomly and whoever gets the piece with the fève is crowned “king” or “queen” and presented with a paper crown. Finding the fève is considered an auspicious sign that will bring good luck in the coming year. (In Louisiana, the tradition of galette des rois comes with a twist: If you’re crowned king or queen, you’re responsible for making next year’s cake or hosting the next Mardi Gras party.)

The Eve of Epiphany is celebrated as Twelfth Night, which is traditionally when Christians would take down their Christmas decorations and have a party. Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night” was likely commissioned as part of such celebrations, and indeed its first documented public performance in 1602 fell on Candlemas, which marks the formal end of Epiphanytide. 

There are plenty of other Epiphany traditions, like winter swimming, Epiphany singing (which is like Christmas caroling, except with children dressed as the Magi carrying a giant star), and of course attending Mass or divine liturgy.

I mention all this only to say that most likely you won’t hear about Epiphany today — and, unless you’re a tradition-minded Christian, sadly will probably not participate in any of it. Corporate media outlets and talking heads will instead spend the day clutching their pearls in feigned outrage and dismay over the Jan. 6 riot in 2021 at the U.S. Capitol. Why? Because they desperately want to commemorate it as another Pearl Harbor or 9/11, and use the anniversary as a political weapon to slander former President Donald Trump and his supporters as domestic terrorists and insurrectionists.

Some of these people, because they have no sense of history and proportion, and because they are blinded by their priors, really believe this. But many of them don’t, and will engage in performative outrage to demonstrate instead that they are not “one of those people,” that they are just as horrified at what happened on Jan. 6 as anyone else. Plenty of so-called conservatives will strike this pose today, I guarantee it.

But none of that is important, and if we want to restore our civilization and save our country, we should reclaim Jan. 6 for God. What is important today, and every Jan. 6, is that Jesus Christ “was manifested in the substance of our mortal flesh, with the new light of His own immortality He restored us.” Our hearts and minds today should not be focused on the political vicissitudes of our ailing republic or the petty propagandizing of our corrupt media. It should be on Epiphany, as is proclaimed in the Introit of the Epiphany Mass: “Behold the Lord the Ruler is come: and the Kingdom is in His Hand, and power, and dominion.”

John Daniel Davidson is a senior editor at The Federalist. His writing has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the Claremont Review of Books, The New York Post, and elsewhere. Follow him on Twitter, @johnddavidson.

—”fueled by lies, cover-ups, and careerism—the Biden regime has transformed an unruly, four-hour protest into an act of domestic terror”.

January 6: A Day That Will Live in Alchemy

In a feat of political sorcery—fueled by lies, cover-ups, and careerism—the Biden regime has transformed an unruly, four-hour protest into an act of domestic terror.

By Julie Kelly at American Greatness:

January 5, 2023

Afew weeks before Christmas, federal authorities arrested a Washington state couple for their participation in the Capitol protest on January 6, 2021.

The FBI investigated Scott and Holly Christensen for more than 14 months; agents interrogated coworkers, scoured social media accounts, reviewed hours of security video from inside the Capitol building and body cam footage from law enforcement, and issued a search warrant to confirm the couple’s whereabouts that day. 

“According to records obtained through legal process served on AT&T, cellphones associated with [the Christensens] were identified as having utilized a cell site consistent with providing service to a geographic area that included the interior of the United States Capitol building, on January 6, 2021, from 2:43 EST to 3:51 EST. AT&T records confirm that both devices belong to Scott CHRISTENSEN of Puyallup, Washington,” an unidentified agent on the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force wrote in a November 2022 criminal complaint.

So, what exactly did these alleged “domestic terrorists” do? They entered the Capitol through open doors as police officers stood by. Carrying no weapons, the couple took photos inside the Rotunda and wandered through some hallways; surveillance video shows Holly Christensen talking to a Capitol police officer. At another point, Scott Christensen chatted with a D.C. Metro police officer, a conversation captured on a body-worn camera. Police led the pair toward an exit door about 45 minutes later without arresting them.

For that uneventful jaunt through a public building that posed a threat to no one, the Christensens will now be destroyed by the Department of Justice, the federal court system, and the news media. Although both were charged with nonviolent misdemeanors—the same four offenses that represent the overwhelming majority of charges—journalists dishonestly portrayed the couple as traitors to their country. “Washington state couple to face Jan. 6 insurrection charges,” an Associated Press headline blared on December 12.

Which, of course, is music to the ears of the Biden regime. Two years after the events of January 6, the Justice Department is preparing to accelerate its retaliatory, destructive manhunt for Trump supporters. More than 950 people have been arrested and charged so far, a figure expected to at least double by the time the dust settles. Last year, U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Matthew Graves, the Biden appointee handling every January 6 case, hinted the total number of defendants could reach 2,000.

The newly-appointed head of the FBI’s Washington, D.C. field office warned this week the agency’s work on January 6 cases will continue for “months and years to come.” Attorney General Merrick Garland released a statement to commemorate the second anniversary of the “attack on the Capitol” with a similar sentiment. “Our work is far from over,” Garland said, boasting how the prosecution “continues to move forward at an unprecedented speed and scale.”

And why shouldn’t it? After all, 18 GOP senators voted to pass the $1.7 trillion omnibus bill last month, which included a $3.5 billion raise for the Justice Department, millions of which will be spent on hiring more government lawyers to prosecute January 6 cases. The FBI won a $570 million boost, bringing the bureau’s total annual budget to more than $11 billion.

Nothing like feeding the wolves eating your herd.

Joe Biden continues to fixate on January 6 in an attempt to brand Trump supporters, or any American who does not blindly embrace the Dear Leader, as “insurrectionists” and “terrorists” endangering the safety of the country. To honor the second anniversary of January 6, Biden will make remarks and hand out Presidential Citizens Medals to individuals who gave televised performances before the January 6 select committee.

The family of Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick will receive a posthumous medal for “[losing] his life protecting our representatives.” Biden, who has difficulty telling the truth about the circumstances of his own son’s death, shamelessly perpetuates the falsehood that Sicknick and several other police officers died as a result of January 6. (In his statement, Garland claimed five police officers died.)

Of course, January 6 propagandists have to lie about what happened to justify comparisons to Pearl Harbor, the Oklahoma City bombing, and 9/11. Their hope is to rally support around the new war on terror, one taking direct aim at Americans on the Right. If Trump supporters are truly America’s version of ISIS, as the regime and the news media insist, then no amount of funding is too much and no criminal prosecution is too excessive to defeat the sworn enemy. Any dissent is unpatriotic.

It’s a feat of political sorcery—fueled by lies, cover-ups, and careerism, not entirely unlike the first war on terror—to transform an unruly, four-hour protest into an act of domestic terror. American families such as the Christensens are merely collateral damage along the way.

“his faculties are declining”…..Staring Our President Ilk Biden!

JANUARY 6, 2023 BY SCOTT JOHNSON IN 2024 ELECTION, BIDEN ADMINISTRATION, ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION, JOE BIDEN

BORDERING ON NULLITY

President Biden let it be known first thing yesterday morning that he would visit El Paso this coming Sunday. The visit is notable for two reasons. First, it’s a rare weekend when Biden will not be on vacation. He has spent 40 percent of his term in office so far on vacation. At age 80, the guy needs his r & r.

Second, for “El Paso” read “the border.” For the first time in his political life Biden will visit the border. This can mean only one thing. Biden is preparing to announce his candidacy for a second term in office.

This raises the question whether he will be fit for a second term. We can answer that question definitively in the negative insofar as he is not fit for his present term. Moreover, his faculties are declining. He’s not getting shaper with age.

On Biden’s first day in office as president he undid approximately everything President Trump had done to achieve control of our border. During his campaign for the Democratic nomination he made it clear that he would open the border and he has made good on his promise.

Biden has dissolved our southern border. The official statistics reflect 4,000,000 illegal crossings in fiscal years 2021 and 2022. The first of those two years set a record that was broken by the second of the years. Nearly 5,000,000 illegal aliens have entered the United States since Biden took office.

Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas has repeatedly assured us that the border is secure. He has established himself as the Baghdad Bob of the Biden administration. He ought to be run out of town on a rail, but it should be noted that he has faithfully executed administration policy.

Biden followed up word of his weekend trip to El Paso with a late morning speech pretending that he will do something to stem the tide of illegal immigration. The White House has posted the transcript of his remarks here. The AP account of his remarks is here.

As usual, Biden stood before a teleprompter in the Roosevelt Room and struggled to read the text as it scrolled before him. Biden opened his remarks by blaming Republicans for the crisis that Mayorkas has declared not to exist. Further into his remarks Biden announced “one significant step we’re taking[.]” He observed: “Over the summer, we saw a huge spike in the number of Venezuelans traveling through — through Mexico and attempting to enter the United States without going through our legal processes. They res- — we responded by using and ensuring that there are two safe and lawful ways for someone leaving the country to come to America. And that was one of the reasons you — you were proposing.” I found the meaning not entirely clear.

He then described the administration’s response to the flood of Venezuelans:

First, if they’re seeking asylum, they can use an app on their cell phone called CBP One — O-N-E — CBP One — O-N-E. That’s to spell it out, not the number “1.” To schedule an appointment at a port of entry and make their asylum claim there without crossing the border unlawfully and have a decision determined by an asylum officer, do they qualify.

Second, in October, we worked with the Mexican government to launch a new parole program. There’s another program called the — you all know it, but the public may not — called the “parole program” that immediately showed results by reducing the number of people crossing the border unlawfully. The way this parole program works: One must have a lawful sponsor here in the United States who agrees to sponsor you to get here.

Then, that person has to go — undergo rigorous background checks and apply from outside the United States and not cross the border illegally in the meantime.

If they apply and their application is approved, they can use the same app, the CBP One app, to present at a port of entry and be able to work in the United States legally for two years. That’s the process.

But if their application is denied or if they attempt to cross into the United States unlawfully, they will be returned back to Mexico and will not be eligible for this program after that.

Biden’s plan to “stiffen enforcement,” as he put it, is to extend this program to those seeking emigration from Nicaragua, Cuba, and Haiti. “We anticipate this action is going to substantially reduce the number of people attempting — attempting to cross our southwest border without going through a legal process.”

And that’s not all: “In fact, today I’m announcing that Mexico has agreed to allow up to re- — to return up to 30,000 persons per month who try, get caught, and get sent back from those four countries who are apprehended while attempting to unlawfully cross the border — the southwest border.”

For some reason 30,000 is the magic number. Biden’s plan provides that the United States will accept 30,000 immigrants per month from the four nations for two years and offer the ability to work legally, as long as they meet the conditions set forth. By my calculation, that will increase legal immigration by 360,000 per year. Even the AP story pauses to note that this is “a huge number.”

In the news stories I don’t find anyone in the world of immigration enforcement seconding Biden’s plan. What are the prospects that it will cut the flow of illegal immigrants rather than exacerbate the problem?

This is ludicrous:

Most people would much rather stay in the country they are if they can feed their families, be safe, send their kids to school, and have opportunity.

It’s not like people — you’ve heard me say it before: It’s not like people are sitting around a table in — somewhere in Central America and saying, “I got a great idea. Let’s sell everything we have. Let’s give it to a coyote, a smuggler. They’ll take us on a harrowing journey for thousands of miles to get to the United States, then we’re going to illegally cross the border. They’re going to drop us in a desert. And we’re — in a place where we don’t speak the language. Won’t that be fun?” I’m not being facetious.

Note the correction of his reference to “President Harris” as he continued:

Well, [Vice] President Harris led this effort — led this effort to make things better in the countries from which they are leaving. And thanks to her leadership, she’s been able to generate more than $3.2 billion from the private sector to create jobs and opportunities in El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala to help people stay in their own countries — home countries where it’ll be safer and they have some opportunities.

By contrast with the reference to “President Harris,” the White House has let this stand uncorrected in the transcript: “[S]ince August of last year, Customs and Border Patrol have seized more than 20,000 pounds of deadly fentanyl. That’s enough to kill — kill as many as 1,000 people in this country. Twenty thousand pounds of fentanyl. It’s a killer. It’s a flat killer.” It’s a killer, indeed, when you demonstrate that you don’t know what you’re talking about.

I should add that Biden’s “plan” was decried by the advocates of illegal immigration, although it seems to me highly likely to exacerbate the crisis that it allegedly addresses. There is no app for that hitch in the fix, or “fix.”

“China has by no means abandoned its goal of taking control of Taiwan…”

What in the World Will Happen in 2023?

Ten predictions for the world in 2023.

Article by Richard Haass

Originally published at Project Syndicate

January 3, 2023 2:13 pm (EST)

Iranian women protest during unrest in Tehran, Iran, on October 28, 2022. West Asia News Agency/Reuters

The American baseball player Lawrence “Yogi” Berra is widely quoted as observing, “It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.” Whether or not he actually said it, the point is valid. Nevertheless, here are ten predictions for the world for the year just getting underway.

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Does Putin’s Gamble Make Russia’s War in Ukraine More Dangerous?

First, the war in Ukraine, the dominant issue of 2022, will continue, albeit at a less intense level. Neither Russia nor Ukraine will be able to achieve a complete military victory, if victory is defined as routing the other side and dictating the terms of a post-war territorial or political settlement.

More on:

Iran

Russia

Ukraine

Japan

North Korea

Nor will the diplomats achieve victory, if victory is defined as reaching an arrangement both governments are willing to sign and abide by. Peace requires leaders who are willing and able to compromise, two elements that are conspicuously absent (if for very different reasons) on both sides.

The World This Week

A weekly digest of the latest from CFR on the biggest foreign policy stories of the week, featuring briefs, opinions, and explainers. Every Friday.

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Second, while many policymakers are focused on the potential for a war over Taiwan, this seems highly unlikely in 2023. Chinese leader Xi Jinping has his hands full contending with a surge of COVID-19 cases that is overwhelming his country’s health-care system, raising questions about the competence of the ruling Communist Party, and further weakening what was a slowing economy. China has by no means abandoned its goal of taking control of Taiwan, by force if necessary; but while it will continue to raise the pressure on Taiwan, it has most likely put off highly aggressive action for at least a few years.

Third, the sleeper story of the year will be Japan’s emergence as a major geopolitical actor. Economic growth in the world’s third-largest economy has been revised upward to 1.5%, and defense spending is now on track to double, reaching 2% of GDP. Japan, with one of the most capable militaries in the region, will also more closely align itself with the US to deter or, if necessary, defend against Chinese aggression against Taiwan. Even more than is the case with Germany, 2023 will be the year Japan enters the post-post-World War II era.

Fourth, North Korea will almost certainly carry out what will be its seventh nuclear test, in addition to frequent missile tests. Neither South Korea nor the US will be able to prevent such actions, while China, the only country in a position to do so, will hold off using its considerable leverage lest it weaken its neighbor and set in motion dynamics that could cause instability on its periphery.

Fifth, transatlantic relations, stronger for now because of a shared willingness to stand up to Russia’s invasion and help Ukraine, will suffer from increased friction, owing to Europeans’ unhappiness with US economic protectionism and Americans’ unhappiness with the continent’s continued economic dependence on China. Ties could also suffer from emerging differences over the extent of military, economic, and diplomatic support for Ukraine and levels of defense spending.

Sixth, the global economy is likely to expand more slowly than most observers currently forecast. The International Monetary Fund is predicting 2.7% overall growth, but the reality could well be lower, owing to the knock-on effects of China’s mismanagement of COVID-19 and the trajectory of the US Federal Reserve, which seems determined to continue to raise interest rates in an effort to bring down inflation. Political instability in parts of Africa and Latin America, extreme weather events, and supply-chain disruptions will also prove to be a drag on global economic performance.

Seventh, the annual United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP28, set to meet in Dubai) will continue to disappoint. With near-term economic concerns trumping medium- and long-term climate considerations, the effects of global warming are likely to get worse before they get … even worse.

Eighth, Israel-Palestinian relations will become more violent as Israeli settlement activity expands and diplomacy shows no prospect of bringing about a Palestinian state on terms both Israelis and Palestinians could accept. Instead, a future that could be described as a “one-state non-solution” will come closer to becoming reality.

Ninth, India will continue to frustrate those who predict great things for it. India will continue to buy arms and oil from Russia and cling to a posture of non-alignment even as it seeks greater help from the West against China. And at home, the danger is that India will continue to become progressively more illiberal and less secular.

Lastly, Iran will likely be the dominant issue of 2023. The protests against the regime will gain traction against the backdrop of worsening economic deterioration and emerging divisions within the leadership over whether to compromise with the protesters or arrest and kill them. The 2015 nuclear deal will not be revived, given Iran’s military assistance to Russia and the US desire to avoid throwing an economic lifeline to the embattled regime.

Iran’s leaders may opt to continue to advance their nuclear-weapons program in the hopes of either achieving a breakthrough or triggering an Israeli strike, a development that would allow them to call for national unity in the face of external attack. Another possibility is that the cohesion of the security forces will give way to something resembling a civil conflict. For the first time since the fall of the Shah in 1979, the future of the Islamic Republic will be in serious doubt.

All this may not make for a happy new year, but it will ensure an interesting one.

Nancy Pelosi….AMERICA’S GREATEST FASCIST COMMUNIST OPERATOR EVER IN CONGRESS!

January 5, 2023

Nancy Pelosi calls House Democrats ‘The greatest collection of intellect, integrity, and imagination assembled

By Eric Utter at American Thinker:

Just when one thinks one has heard everything…one is proven wrong.

Outgoing speaker of the Blouse Louse House Nancy Pelosi recently wrote her last “Dear Colleague” letter to her Democrat co-conspirators/comrades.  In this missive, she stated, “During the 117th Congress, President Biden and Congressional Democrats have put forth a shining vision of justice for all.  Together, we have worked tirelessly to infuse this value into our legislative efforts.  We can all take immense pride in our achievements toward that goal, which is making a real difference in the lives of the American people.”

Justice?  For all?  Tell that to all those still rotting in prison, without conviction or charge, for strolling through the People’s House on January 6, 2021.  Tell that to those who were snatched from their homes in the wee hours of the morning by armed feds when a simple summons to appear would have sufficed.  Tell that to all those whose jobs were considered unessential.  Tell that to all those in the military who were discharged because they wouldn’t accept an experimental substance into their bodies.  Tell that to all those who have lost loved ones to violent crime, rates of which skyrocketed in the past two years due to Democrat policies — or to those who have lost loved ones to fentanyl because Democrats absolutely refuse to police our southern border.  And tell it to America’s rapidly dwindling middle class, beset by historic inflation, supply chain problems, and rising taxes.

“Democrat” is to “justice” as “atheist” is to “faith.”

Pelosi closed her letter by stating that she was confident that the new House Democrat leadership would do a bang-up job, too, and would always remain faithful “to our shared mission to safeguard our treasured Democracy For The People.”

There it is again: “our treasured Democracy.”  “For The People.”  In all capitals.  She must really mean it.  Of course, what Democrats really mean when they speak of how much they treasure our democracy is “don’t anyone even think of challenging our power and control.”

Before closing, Pelosi penned what should be a shoo-in for the Most Preposterous Statement of the Year…if not in recorded history.  She wrote: “One final thought that I wanted to leave with you is my belief that the House Democratic Caucus is the greatest collection of intellect, integrity and imagination assembled for the good of the American people.”

She was referring to the likes of Adam Schiff, Maxine Waters, Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, and Jerrold Nadler, all of whose I.Q.s wouldn’t add up to Thomas Jefferson’s.

You could find a greater collection of intellect in any daycare center in America.  You could find a greater collection of integrity in any whorehouse or prison.  Imagination?  Well, Pelosi might be closer to the truth on that one…given her statement on House Democrats’ intellect and integrity.

Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.

“Any European empire seeking to expand eastward must pass through Ukraine;”

In Every Modern War, Ukraine Has Been the Big Prize

By Hal Brands at American Prize Institute:

Bloomberg Opinion

January 01, 2023

The biggest story of 2022 was the war in Ukraine, which put that country on the front lines of the great struggle of this century: the contest between democracy and authoritarianism. But if the war surprised many observers, the position in which Ukraine finds itself is remarkably familiar.

With only modest exaggeration, we could call the past 100 years or so the Ukrainian Century, for that country has figured centrally in every great global clash of the modern era.

Ukraine is a strategic prize due to resources and geography. Occupying some of the richest agricultural land anywhere, it produces large shares of the world’s wheat, corn and barley; it accounts for 6% of all calories traded on international food markets. Ukraine is Europe’s second-largest country by geographical size, and overlooks the Black Sea, which links European Russia to the world.

Most important, Ukraine is the hinge connecting what the great geopolitical thinker Halford Mackinder termed the Eurasian Heartland, with its enormous lands, agricultural riches and energy resources, to the economically advanced countries of Europe.

Any European empire seeking to expand eastward must pass through Ukraine; any Eurasian power seeking to project influence into Europe must do likewise. Mackinder had Ukraine (and Poland) in mind when he argued in 1919: “Who rules East Europe commands the Heartland; Who rules the Heartland commands the World-Island; Who rules the World-Island commands the World,”

Hyperbole, perhaps, but a formula that helps explain why Ukraine has been so tragically prominent in so many terrible struggles.

“As much as anything, World War I turned on the fate of Ukraine,” the scholar Dominic Lieven wrote. Conquering the area, then part of the Russian empire, was central to Germany’s plans to create a resource-rich Mitteleuropa from the North Sea to the Caucasus. When German armies wrested Ukraine away from a post-revolutionary Russia in 1918, Berlin briefly achieved its Eurasian vision — which crumbled when Germany lost the war on the Western front, thereby undoing its Eastern conquests and allowing Lenin’s Soviet Union to create its own Eurasian empire under Communist rule.

Ukraine again loomed large in Adolf Hitler’s dreams of hegemony. It possessed the “living space” and the foodstuffs that could render Germany impregnable against the continent-sized enemies — the British Empire and America — that Hitler ultimately planned to fight for global primacy.

The Nazis’ genocidal “hunger plan” envisioned looting Ukrainian wheat, corn and agricultural products, and leaving as many as 30 million citizens there and elsewhere in the Soviet Union to starve. (In effect, it was a replay of the “red famine” that Joseph Stalin had inflicted on Ukraine in the 1930s as a means of consolidating Moscow’s rule there.) Some of the most desperate battles of World War II were fought on Ukrainian soil, as giant armies collided in this vital zone.

The Allied victory ensured merely that Ukraine remained subordinated to a totalitarian Soviet empire. As the Cold War began, the US sought to exploit the resulting dissatisfaction by parachuting Ukrainian paramilitaries into the country to foment violent resistance.

That initiative was a bloody fiasco, but the geopolitical logic behind it wasn’t entirely wrong. When the Soviet Union began to fragment decades later, it was Ukraine’s decision to bolt by declaring independence — and refusing to participate in schemes to hold a looser union together — that helped seal the system’s fate.

“Without Ukraine, Russia ceases to be an empire,” former national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski observed in 1994, “but with Ukraine suborned and then subordinated, Russia automatically becomes an empire.”

That’s a good guide to understanding why Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his project to restore Moscow’s mastery, beginning with Russia’s meddling in Ukrainian elections in 2004 and culminating in the full-on invasion in February.

Putin targeted Ukraine in hopes of subduing one crucial piece of the post-Soviet landscape, and thereby bringing others, from Belarus to Kazakhstan, into line. A quick Russian victory would have been a testament to the strength and strategic cunning of the world’s autocracies. It would have fundamentally changed the strategic situation in Europe by casting pervasive insecurity from the Black Sea to the Baltic, and left a freshly invigorated Chinese-Russian partnership clearly dominant within Eurasia.

Not much has gone according to plan, and a Ukrainian victory would bring very different consequences. It would make one the world’s leading tyrants look pathetic rather than preeminent. It could create tension in Russia’s partnership with China by forcing an enfeebled Putin to beg for assistance that Beijing would be reluctant to give. It would produce a revitalized Western community with a commanding position against a dangerous but degraded Russia. Once again, a war involving Ukraine will shape the contours of world order.

The war is also a reminder about how core features of geopolitics remain the same, even as so much in the world changes. Geography still matters. Land-hungry tyrants still seek to dominate their surroundings through conquest and murder.

In every generation, optimists hope that the world has left these ugly truths behind. As Ukraine’s experience teaches us, we forget them at our peril.

“But are severe weather events actually increasing?”

JANUARY 5, 2023 BY JOHN HINDERAKER at Power Line:

EXTREME WEATHER EVENTS DECLINING

Some years ago, environmental alarmists decided to hedge their bets by talking about “climate change” rather than “global warming.” These days, any inconvenient weather event is chalked up to “climate change.” If a tornado hits Florida, it’s climate change. If rain spoils your picnic, it’s climate change.

But are severe weather events actually increasing? No, they are not:

[D]ata for all year 2022 tropical storms shows that global wide, storms were at their lowest strength levels in the last 42 years (since 1981) as shown by the ACE (Accumulated Cyclone Energy reflecting the combined frequency, intensity and duration of all storms) data below from Colorado State University’s Department of Atmospheric Science which tracks NOAA’s National Hurricane Center tropical storm data.

Similar charts at the link show no increase in hurricane activity by hemisphere, etc.

This chart by Dr. Roger Pielke covers the broader range of “Global Weather and Climate Disasters.” Again, the trend is downward:

Tornadoes, like hurricanes, are trending downward:

Most of our reporters–ignorant, mendacious, or both–routinely recite as fact that the number of extreme weather events is rising, due to climate change. It simply isn’t true.