The Dems really need a new playbook. Isn’t their impeachment strategy just a rerun of their Kavanaugh strategy? You do a lousy job when the ball was in your court and then you bring in a bunch of bs at the last minute to try to gain an advantage. In Kavanaugh it was Blaisey Ford and Julie Swetnick and now it’s the GAO and another untrustworthy shill — Parnas — the Michael Avanatti of this rerun. Even Jake Tapper said Parnas was not credible. All his bs was known months ago but held until now. Please Republicans stand up to this nonsense.

The Dems know they failed in their rush to make sure they could say Trump has been impeached forever without any evidence that he did anything wrong. And BTW, I don’t think anything they are so proud about is wrong in anyway. They know that their failure to subpoena the witnesses they wanted or to pursue enforcement of them in court means they impeached a president without ANY evidence. So now they want to bring out after the fact nonsense to try to get the senate to do the job they didn’t.

Recognize the playbook and reject it. Listen to their bs and then respond — and Trump’s legal team will eat Schiff and Nadler alive. Then end it period!!

Just saw that both the FBI and ICE are apparently investigating Ilhan Omar for what I have previously ranted about, namely immigration fraud, tax fraud, perjury and bigamy. It’s about time that this antisemetic fraud be brought to justice!

I intended to rant about this earlier today when it was first reported that the GAO said Trump violated the law when he delayed aid to Ukraine. Some of what I’m about to say was said a little while ago by a caller on the Howie Carr show, and I considered not ranting because it was pretty much out there. However, most of you probably didn’t hear it so I will lay it out.

First, the GAO Is a congressional entity. It’s supposed to be nonpartisan, but so is the FBI, CIA and IRS. It is a partisan part of the swamp. The Comptroller General, the head of that agency was appointed by Obama for a 15 year term.

Second, GAO opinions are non binding. OMB has said they strongly disagree and GAO has had to reverse their positions on many cases in the past.

Third, and maybe most importantly, they don’t just run around issuing opinions on whatever they want. A member of Congress asks them to look into an issue. Want to bet on which of the House managers requested that opinion?

Lastly, if you believe the timing of this opinion was purely coincidental, then I have some swamp land I would love to sell you.

I wasn’t going to rant on this, but since it came up today with regard to Apple won’t help the FBI access the cellphones of the Pensacola shooter. First I’m on Apple’s side. I don’t want the FBI who has proven itself to be unworthy of trust to have unfettered access to my phone. This is especially true because they want a built in backdoor. This would be like the FISA court without even having to file a bogus affidavit.

But here’s the reason for this rant. On Saturday I got a new iPhone 11 because the last iOS upgrade for my iPhone 7 screwed it up and made it difficult if not impossible to use it unless it was plugged in. I was due for an upgrade anyway and so for a onetime thirty dollar fee, I was able to get the much newer phone. It is radically different. First there is no home button and so no thumbprint access. Instead, there is face recognition. So anytime I lift the phone in front of my face it opens up. It really is much more convenient.

However, here’s the rub. If the FBI or your wife or your girlfriend wants to access your phone all they have to do is get it and hold it up in front of your face — even if you’re sleeping or dead and it will open. I don’t know how old the shooter’s phone was but if it didn’t have face recognition, it certainly had thumbprint recognition. Turn it on and press his thumb on the home button. The only reason this wouldn’t work is that if he was smart enough to have only allowed access by entering a six digit code. Maybe, but I didn’t want to enable face recognition but it quickly became apparent that that was a pain in the ass to enter the code every time I picked up the phone. I find it hard to believe that anyone using an iPhone on any regular basis hasn’t enabled the easy way.

I heard today that one theory of why Pelosi has been delaying sending over the bogus articles of impeachment is so that when Trump gives his state of the union address he will be in the middle of the senate trial making him look bad. I don’t think Pelosi is that smart but if she sends them over before the state of the union, I think Trump should send over a written statement, there is no requirement that he gives a speech, and then holds a Trump rally on the scheduled date. It would would be the perfect f u.

Today was really strange for me and I was originally only going to rant on the deja vu elements but have decided to take it further. Strap in and pour yourself a nice drink.

First I drove over to Greensboro today to take one of my twin boys to lunch for his birthday. On the way back, listening to talk radio, it was reported that apparently the Ukrainian airliner shot down in Tehran on the night of the Iranian bogus missile attack was by a Russian supplied Iranian fired missile. Now for two days all the media have been reporting that the tragedy was caused by an engine failure. However, the morning after it happened, I read and heard that the plane was either shot down or a bomb on the plane was detonated. People, I don’t have access to inside information. I probably read and listen to more sources than you but this was out there. I do know stuff you don’t based on my education and career, but the same is true of each of you.

So this was a deja vu moment for me. Also remember that Iran originally refused to let anyone have access to the black box which was recovered. Now the reason I’m going further on this is because of a comment I heard on the radio today, and it may have been from Rush. Although he obviously claims credit for other people’s insights, I don’t want to do that. It may have been someone else. At any rate, whoever said it raised the question of who was on the plane. Now I bring this up because folks are saying that this was an accident because of the fear that Trump had unleashed the wrath of god on them in retaliation for their missile launches and mistakenly thinking that the plane was there to attack them. Here’s the problem with this bs. The plane took off from Tehran. It was outgoing and not incoming and within two minutes of takeoff was radar painted and then two surface to air missiles were fired at it. So I really like the question of who was on that plane.

The second deja vu moment was when Newsmax started reporting that they are going to start replacing plaques in Glacier National Park which say that the glaciers will be gone by 2020. Now this is a deja vu moment because this was reported way back in 2017 and I may have even commented on it in the old blog. So I looked into what was going on and it turns out that the National Park Service (NPS) claimed they didn’t have the money to remove and replace the Obama propaganda signs. How much would it cost to take down the bogus signs? This is the swamp in action. Now they are going to replace them with plaques saying we don’t know when the glaciers melt it all depends on how swiftly and decisively we act to counteract nonexistent global warming. The NPS is not supposed to be a political entity. It is and Trump needs to drain this swamp.

Yesterday it was reported that CNN settled with Nicholas Sandman over his $275 million defamation suit based on their false reporting about the Indian pounding the drum in his face. Yesterday one of you asked me about it and I pointed out that what CNN and the others being sued are really worried about is having an appeal going to the Supreme Court that could result in the overturning of New York Times v. Sullivan. Sullivan was decided in 1964 and is the case that basically gave media the ability to defame public officials and figures unless the plaintiff could prove that the newspaper or other media outlet knew the published defamation was false and did it anyway. Basically ignorance was an absolute defense.

Obviously the case is old and media has changed considerably since then. I believe Justice Clarence Thomas and others have recently questioned the constitutional legitimacy of that decision. (As an aside when I was a Senior Executive Fellow at Harvard, Sydney Pollock showed up to screen and get our comments on his film on this subject — Absence of Malice — before it opened in theatres. It is a very good movie starring Paul Newman, Sally Fields and my look a like Wilfred Brumley, and I highly recommend it.)

So my take is that the last thing these media folks want is to see a case as egregious as this one go to the Supremes and have their ability to lie with impunity disappear. I expect that the others being sued will also settle to preserve their right to publish nonsense with impunity.

BTW can you imagine where Justice Kavanaugh might go after all the non vetted bs against him was published?

When I ranted last night there were a few things that I didn’t know. For one, it was reported today Iran notified the US and Iraq ahead of time that the attack was coming so they could protect their troops. Also, it now appears that Iran intentionally missed the supposed targets by enough so that damage was minimal but the mullahs could pound on their chest and claim they had killed a bunch of soldiers.

So when all was said and done, Iran engaged in a face saving mostly political stunt. Trump is right to retaliate by further increasing economic sanctions and not military action. I believe Iran knows that Trump is not someone to be played with. They clearly knew that there would be hell to pay had they actually killed our soldiers, and they also now know that Trump will hold them responsible for their proxy wars. No more hiding behind the terror groups they fund and direct.

One last point. The noise on the left is about the draft and boots on ground. There is no draft and there will be no boots on the ground. Trump is not interested in regime change or nation building. If Iran does something stupid, then the response will come from the sky and then we will leave.

I just checked the fake news channels and predictably they are all sticking with their narrative. They are claiming that Trump didn’t think passed killing Sulemani. He plays checkers and everyone else plays chess. I saw one idiot saying that Trump should just let them have this one without retaliation because he was wrong. Screw them. Trump needs to and I believe he will respond with overwhelming force. It’s time to let the world know there’s a new sheriff in town and his name is Donald Trump. Yippee kiyo kiyay Mother f-er!!

Lastly I have seen that even on Fox they are saying that what happens next depends on whether or not they crossed Trump’s redline. However they seem to think the redline means that these attacks have to have killed an American. That’s not true. Trump indicated that the redline was killing an American or attacking our forces. The redline was crossed!

I have waited a few days before commenting because I wanted to get the lay of the land.. First I have learned that when Susan Rice and Samantha Powers claimed that the Obama administration never had the opportunity to take out Sulemani, it was a complete lie. Quelle surprise! Back in the Obama administration, Obama was given a heads up by Israel that they were going to take down Sulemani and not only did Obama discourage it, he picked up the phone and called Iran to warn them. I’m sorry but Obama was an antisemitic Muslim.

I also saw that Obama ordered 2800 air strikes that no one in Congress approved. And lest you forget, Obama had a drone kill list including offing an American citizen without a warrant or any other authorization. Make no mistake, he did the right thing but I am sick of the hypocrisy. Obama kills Bin Laden and the left cheers. Trump takes out someone worse and somehow he is committing high crimes and misdemeanors. Please. This is just Trump Derangement Syndrome.

Now the most ridiculous thing that the left has been saying is that Trump should have notified Congress before he killed Sulemani. Really? The last thing anyone with a brain would do is give critical information to Schiff! Listen folks, as I have previously said, the President needs the ability to take action to protect Americans and has it under the constitution. On the other hand, I would have no problem with a law limiting the president’s authority to 90 days without congressional approval before getting us into a real war. You can’t have a situation where the President can’t act without congressional approval. That would take away any real ability to protect us. You can’t spend weeks or months debating military action. All that does is give the enemy time to prepare.

And lastly, contrary to John Bolton, I am not interested in regime change. If Iran retaliates, then we need to hit them overwhelming hard where it hurts and then get out. I don’t care how crazy they want to be in their country. I just want them to know that screwing with us is seriously bad news. Obama and before him Carter never acted when they should have. Carter because he was a stupid pacifist and Obama because he was on their side.