Ready for the Fight

For John, BLUF:  The State of Georgia came ready for its interview by News Interviewer Chris Cuomo.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Georgia Election Official Brings Receipts, Embarrasses CNN’s Chris Cuomo in Heated Exchange on Primary Issues

From Red State, by Sister Toldjah, 10 June 2020.

Here is the lede plus one:

Apparently there were long lines and voting issues galore Tuesday during Georgia’s primary, and naturally Democrats and the media rushed to blame it on “voter suppression” and likening the situation to 2018, when Democrat gubernatorial nominee Stacey Abrams lost the election to Republican Brian Kemp and falsely claimed it was due to state efforts to suppress the black vote.

CNN’s Chris Cuomo was one of many in the mainstream media who took the “voter suppression” ball and ran with it in a heated back and forth with Statewide Voting Implementation Manager Gabriel Sterling, who made it clear he was not going to be trifled with nor was he going to allow his state to be smeared by yet another media lie about how elections are run in Georgia.

Cuomo hit Sterling with Democratic talking point after talking point about polling places allegedly being deliberately shut down in places where there tend to be higher numbers of black Democrats who vote, claiming it was a repeat of 2018.  Sterling corrected him everytime by laying out what really happened, saying much of it was related to the Wuhan virus outbreak:

Good on Mr Sterling.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

The Story Slowly Turns

For John, BLUF:  Why has it taken so long to come this far?  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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New FBI document confirms the Trump campaign was investigated without justification

From The Hill, by Mr Kevin R Brock, 27 May 2020.

Remember the line attributed to President Trump—"They aren't coming for me.  They are coming for you.  I'm just in the way."

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

People Migrate

For John, BLUF:  I don't think this is a surprise, but it is interesting confirmation—Native Americans didn't spring up here, but migrated across what is now the Bering Strait.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Scientists discover oldest link between Native Americans, ancient Siberians

From United Press International, by Mr Brooks Hays, 20 MAY 2020.

Here is the lede plus one:

Using genomic analysis, scientists have traced the oldest link between the earliest Native American populations and the people of Siberia's Lake Baikal region.

Modern humans have populated the lands surrounding Lake Baikal since the Upper Paleolithic.  Previous studies of the region's population dynamics suggest the transition from the Neolithic to the Bronze Age was marked by genetic turnovers and admixture events, but the timing of the human migrations and cultural interactions that characterized this place and time in human history aren't well understood.

New genomic analysis of ancient remains in Siberia -- detailed this week in the journal Cell -- have offered scientists fresh insights into the movements of human populations across Eurasia and into the Americas at the end of the Stone Age.

"Previous studies observed the genetic differences between individuals from different time periods, but didn't investigate the differences by dating the admixture events," lead study author He Yu, postdoctoral researcher at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Germany, told UPI in an email.  "Our study reports a 14,000-year-old individual, which actually fills in a large blank of ancient genomes in this region, between 23,000 and approximately 8,000 years ago."

Interesting.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

Impeachment Reprise

For John, BLUF:  There is little doubt that a significant number of Democratic Party Leary’s are just not able to move on, even if it harms the Republic.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Trump Derangement Syndrome Has Introduced Impeachment 2.0

From The Federalist, by Opinion Writer Tristan Justice, 18 May 2020.

Here is the lede plus one:

After spending the months preceding the global pandemic in a futile impeachment attempt, House Democrats are now again trying to impeach President Donald Trump.

The lower chamber majority told the Supreme Court on Monday that they are in the middle of an “ongoing presidential impeachment investigation” that requires redacted information from the grand-jury proceedings that were part of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s two-and-a-half-year probe.

Since Trump was finally acquitted of two articles of impeachment in February, Democrats have expressed a desire to try again, requesting that the nation’s highest court grant them classified material that they have pledged not to leak under “special protocols.”

Is anyone shocked by this?.

This is a roll of the dice.  The House Democrats might actually come up with something, although I am very doubtful.  Maybe they are hoping to dirty up the President in a close election.  Or maybe they are going to irritate the electorate close to the November voting.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

Screw Up and Move Up

For John, BLUF:  We are in the middle of a never-ending story of bureaucrats abusing the rights of Citizens, and getting away with it.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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MSNBC And NBC News Hire Lisa Page As A Legal Analyst

From Hot Air, by Mr John Sexton, 5 June 2020.

Here is the lede sentence:

Today, MSNBC announced it had hired Lisa Page as a legal analyst.

Don't remember her?  She is the potty mouth Department of Justice lawyer who exchanged EMails with FBI Agent Peter Strzok, during the period when the FBI was abusing the civil rights of Trump Campaign workers.  Because:  Trump.

But, in its own way it makes sense.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

Voting in November

For John, BLUF:  The view of some has grown fairly extreme in understanding how the year will evolve.  Much of it centers on what President Trump may or may not do.  In a way, it is sad.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Will We Actually Get to Vote in November?

From The New Yorker, by Ms Sue Halpern, 4 June 2020.

Here is the lede plus two, plus the final:

I’ve kept a copy of Timothy Snyder’s book “On Tyranny” on my desk since it was published, in 2017. It’s a small volume—the cover is about the size of an index card. Most of the time, it’s buried under stacks of paper from stories I’ve been working on.  Snyder is a historian of the Holocaust and of fascism, at Yale, and this book, subtitled “Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century,” is a claxon rung to get our attention.  “Listen up,” Snyder seems to be saying to Americans.  “Tyranny, fascism, authoritarianism could happen here, too.”

The juxtaposition of those two things—Snyder’s book, which was published shortly after Donald Trump took office, and my stack of papers, which focus mostly on aspects of American democracy—has not been lost on me.  If it were simply a contest of words, and the contest were confined to my desk, democracy would be winning.  But we know this is not the case.  American democracy is imperilled, and not just because of Trump and Trumpism but because of an ingrained and widely shared belief that the Founders of this country insulated us from the excesses of government with the power of the ballot.  We heard it the other day from Representative John Lewis, the civil-rights leader and icon.  “To the rioters here in Atlanta and across the country,” Lewis said, “I see you, and I hear you.  I know your pain, your rage, your sense of despair and hopelessness.  Justice has, indeed, been denied for far too long.  Rioting, looting, and burning is not the way.  Organize.  Demonstrate.  Sit in.  Stand up.  Vote.  Be constructive, not destructive.”  These are vital words, earned words, wise words.  But they also come from an abiding trust that, no matter what, the electoral system many of us were born into, and others, like Lewis, had to bleed for, will prevail.

We have now crossed the threshold where we must think about the unthinkable:  what happens if the November election is subverted.  For the past three and a half years, we’ve watched the Trump Administration, along with its enablers in Congress and in the courts, ignore or decimate democratic norms.  Since January 20, 2017, we’ve seen this play out in ways big and small—the Muslim ban, the children in cages, the demonization of the press as “fake news,” to name just a few.  Each outrage has undermined a basic tenet of our democracy: the American government will not discriminate based on religion, asylum seekers will be granted court hearings, and government officials will uphold and respect the freedom of the press.  If we shook our collective head each time there was a new evisceration of a democratic principle, it was always with the understanding that, after four years of cruelty and kleptocracy, the American people would go to the polls and vote Donald Trump and his collaborators out of office.  Even those who expected the Trump campaign to flood the zone with disinformation and find new ways to cheat, and its candidate to lie, most likely believed that if enough people voted, none of that would matter.

. . .

But the lesson of Snyder’s book that I keep going back to, and the one that seems to acquire more salience the longer Trump remains in office, is the one where he exhorts readers to “defend institutions,” because they cannot protect themselves.  “The mistake is to assume that rulers who came to power through institutions cannot change or destroy those very institutions—even when that is exactly what they have announced they will do,” Snyder wrote.  “Sometimes institutions are deprived of vitality and function, turned into a simulacrum of what they once were.”  I would like to believe that, if we are lucky, we will mail in our ballots or go to the polls in November, and the election will be free and fair.  But, truly, luck will play no part in it.

There is always the view that President Trump will go rogue, that he will not operate under the same rules that have governed the nation for over 200 years.  Yes, that is possible.  However, it is more projection than likelihood.  It comes from people who would be willing to engage in a soft coup in order to rid us of this President.

I will take the bet regarding the election.  I bet it happens, and notwithstanding the high handed actions of people like Governor Gavin Newsom of California, will go as per usual.

Regards  —  Cliff

MAS

For John, BLUF:  "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Minneapolis City Council members intend to defund and dismantle the city's police department

From CNN, by Reporters Dakin Andone, Christina Maxouris and Josh Campbell, 8 June 2020.

Here is the lede plus two:

Nine members of the Minneapolis City Council on Sunday announced they intend to defund and dismantle the city's police department following the police killing of George Floyd.

"We committed to dismantling policing as we know it in the city of Minneapolis and to rebuild with our community a new model of public safety that actually keeps our community safe," Council President Lisa Bender told CNN.

With nine votes the city council would have a veto-proof supermajority of the council's 13 members, Bender said.

Defunding the police seems like a splendid geopolitical act.

It will turn the United States into Sicily.  (MAS, or Make America Sicilian).  Of course, organized crime, which depends upon some level of civil control, or policing, will quickly figure out that they need to act. Thus we will have the kind of thing Mexico sees, with the Drug Cartels enforcing the rules.  So, we will more or less go back on an even keel, except the voters having a say will be much less direct.

At the same time, like with Sicily, there will be mass emigration.  I am guessing masses of people will leave the US for Russia, which is suffering from severe depopulation.  Russia will be swamped and we may see efforts to limit immigration.

The Greens and Ultra-Progressives will be thrilled with the reduction in the human footprint.  They will double down on the reduced pollution by killing the space program.  This will increase emigration of aerospace engineers, who will go to Russia and help them in their race with China, to colonize Mars.  America will be happy, what is left of it.  Russia, although being swamped with Americans, will be happy.  However, China will not be happy.

But, happiest of all will be long haul movers.

I am counting on some California Avocado Rancher to incorporate this into a novel, which will be published, in French, under a pseudonym (Monsieur Mec du Vin), and he will use the profits to keep his Avocado Ranch going, and, with movie rights, fund Small Wars Journal.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff