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Former Obama Official: Warnings on Russian Trolls, Potential Election Meddling Were Ignored

 

A former Obama White House official said the U.S. government could have prevented Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

Brett Bruen, who served as the White House director of global engagement from 2013 to 2015, told CNN that in 2014 he warned his colleagues on former President Obama's National Security Council that Russian trolls interfered in Ukraine's 2014 election and could do the same to the United States.

"I was sitting in the Situation Room saying, 'This is something that's going to march across Western Europe. It's something that's going to march over to our shores, and we need to be ready,'" Bruen told CNN, explaining the State Department dismissed his idea of a "command center" to counter Russian disinformation.

More @ Fox

Senator will introduce bill that would send illegal border crossers immediately back to home country

Via Billy

 

Oklahoma’s senior senator says he has a novel way to end the controversial practice of “catch and release” on the border.

Instead of releasing illegal immigrants once they are caught trying to enter the country – and hope they show up to immigration court – Sen.  Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., proposes sending them back to their home country. That way, he said, the illegal immigrants don’t become “absorbed” in the U.S. after they fail to show up to court. 

More @ Fox

Home Invasion Prank Gone Wrong

Via Wire Cutter

"Better than the circus"

Via Wire Cutter

Good Fences Make Good Neighbors

 

It has been argued that the Civil War was a conflict between the abstract principles of the North and the concrete loyalties of the South. What this amounts to is two distinct concepts of liberty. Lincoln conceived liberty as a kind of Platonic ideal to be pursued by a benevolent central government and enforced, if need be, at the point of a bayonet. 

A review of Regionalism and Nationalism in the United States: The Attack on Leviathan by Donald Davidson (Transaction Books, 1991).

August 18, 1993 will mark the centennial of Donald Davidson’s birth. On April 25 of that year, he will have been dead a quarter of a century. During his lifetime Davidson was considered the most minor of the major Fugitives, and nothing has happened since his death to force a revision of that judgment. In a recent essay, M. E. Bradford noted that today when Davidson is discussed as poet, he is portrayed as ‘“an anachronism’ and belated romantic, merely a voice of nostalgia with no irony and no sense of the ‘proper strategy for a poem.’” Those who consider his criticism point out that while Ransom, Tate. Brooks, and Warren were editing major literary quarterlies. Davidson largely confined his critical and editorial labors to the book page of the Nashville Tennessean. Finally, Davidson maintained an obstinate loyalty to the Agrarian faith when his Vanderbilt soulmates had moved on to other interests and other allegiances. Such is the conventional wisdom.

More @ The Abbeville Institute

Goodies From Ol' Remus

 

 Ol' Remus 

It's said a mild Scottish accent is most attractive to western ears—a Scottish lass told me so, but I have a different candidate, namely, English as spoken by General Lee in Turner's Civil War films. It shares a membrane with Shakespeare, frames even trivial thoughts in biblical terms, yet is often astonishing in its directness. Some of Lee's contemporaries, those who dared expressed an opinion, said he spoke like an old lady, which may or may not have been a compliment, impossible to say at this remove. I suspect not.

  Zero Hedge - 25 Year Sentence for Driving Drunk Versus Probation for Prison Guard Who Raped Inmate

  Natural News - When Obama and Facebook teamed up in 2012 that was “technological genius,” but when Trump does the same thing, it’s a “scandal”

  WND - Bizarre twist in Seth Rich murder probe ... Washington-based attorney and lobbyist on the hunt for slain DNC staffer Seth Rich’s killer was shot at and run over by former U.S. Marine he hired to help

  Art of Manliness - How to Fall Asleep in 2 Minutes or Less ... it's a skill, and like all skills, you shouldn’t expect to have it work the first few times you try.

  Bridge, Taki's Magazine - Because of the left’s “diversity or die” crusade, Florida International University and Munilla Construction Management felt the need to present the bridge as the product of “diversity.” They couldn’t just say, “Hey, look at this cool bridge we built.” They had to add, “And diversity dunnit.” Because that’s all that matters. Not the quality of the work, but the gender and color of the workers. And if the rubble of Diversity Bridge is to hold any significance at all, let it be this: Let’s dial back the “diversity in STEM” fanaticism just a tad. Let’s get back to focusing on the quality of the work, and not whether our engineering classrooms and construction companies resemble a 1970s Coke commercial.

Who Runs March for Our Lives?

Via West

Follow the money.

It’s a strange political fact, but nearly every major anti-gun group has been a front group. The NRA is maligned 24/7 and yet it’s completely obvious whom it represents. Despite the efforts to tie it to everyone from firearms manufacturers to the Russians (if you can’t tie any random Republican thing to the Russians these days, you won’t be working at the Washington Post or CNN for very long), it represents its five million members. Anti-gun groups tend to represent shadowy networks.

Take Everytown, the noisiest and most dishonest anti-gun group on the scene. The one consistent thing about anti-gun groups is that that they are usually the opposite of what their name says they are.

Everytown for Gun Safety was formed out of two other groups: Moms Demand Action and Mayors Against Illegal Guns. Both are actually front groups for Michael Bloomberg, the lefty billionaire and former boss of the Big Apple, who used New York City resources to host at least one of its websites.

So Everytown is really New York City.

More @ Canada Free Press

Republicans Gaining Ground in Midterm Election Polls

 

 Breitbart

Congressional Republicans are surging in polls against Democrats on the generic ballot, narrowing Democratic leads in a Fox News poll, presenting evidence that increasingly suggests the GOP might retain control of Congress in the U.S. House after the November 2018 midterm elections.

The generic ballot asks voters nationwide who they plan to vote for in the next congressional election. Democrats sometimes hold a slight lead in modern elections even when Republicans keep their majority on Election Day.

Fox News’s generic congressional poll gave Democrats a 15-point lead in October, beating a generic Republican 50 to 35. Now, that poll gives Democrats only a five-point lead, 46 to 41.

By contrast, Fox News reports that in 2014, the Democrats held a two-point lead, and Republicans gained 13 seats. That is a gain, not a loss. And in 2010, Republicans held a four-point lead over Democrats and picked up a historic 63 seats in the House to retake control of the chamber.

This shift toward the GOP seen in the Fox News poll is also mirrored by other polls. A Quinnipiac poll released on March 5 showed Democrats with a ten-point lead 48 to 38, but that lead was cut almost in half to a six-point lead in a March 20 poll, 49 to 43.

While the shift in some of these polls could be attributable to the margin of error the past couple months have all trended Republican or held steady. The RealClearPolitics average of polls showed a 9.6-point lead for Democrats on February 26, which by March 25 had shifted to only a 5.8-point lead over Republicans.

While those polls are for House races, the math in the Senate is overwhelmingly in Republicans’ favor. Democrats must defend three seats for every seat being defended by Republicans. President Trump won ten of the states held by some of those 24 Democrats and won five by double digits.

The Fox poll regarding House races consisted of 1,014 registered voters and was conducted March 18–21. It has a margin of error of three percent.

Revolt Against California’s ‘Sanctuary State’ Laws Grows in Orange County

 

The revolt against the State of California’s “sanctuary state” laws is growing in Orange County, with supervisors scheduled to discuss a resolution Tuesday condemning the state’s defiance of federal immigration law, and possibly directing the county to join the federal lawsuit against the Golden State.

The discussion, the Los Angeles Times notes, will take place in closed session, but the results will be closely watched, as numerous cities within the county are considering following the lead of Los Alamitos, which voted last week to defy the “sanctuary state” laws and join the federal lawsuit.
The Times reports:

More @ Breitbart

Amnesty for Illegal Aliens Would Cost U.S. Taxpayers $2 Trillion

Via Mike

Giving amnesty to the millions of illegal aliens living across the United States will cost American taxpayers about $2 trillion, a researcher predicts.

Princeton Policy Adviser President Steven Kopits says in his latest research on illegal immigration that handing over amnesty to illegal aliens would come with a “steep” price tag for American taxpayers.

Kopits notes that if illegal aliens are given amnesty, they will “sooner or later” become “eligible for government programs.”

Although not many illegal aliens have reached retirement age yet, Kopits predicts that by 2025 and into the 2030s, more and more illegal aliens will become eligible for taxpayer-funded retirement programs like Social Security and Medicare.

More @ Breitbart

Sociologist: Less Than 10 Percent Of March For Our Lives Participants Were Children

 

  Dingbat

A sociologist on MSNBC threw cold water on all the media’s claims that the March For Our Lives protests were spontaneous and led by the nation’s children during a “Morning Joe” segment on Monday.

 University of Maryland sociologist Dana Fisher conducted a study of the demographics of Saturday’s march in Washington, D.C., and discovered that only less than 10 percent of those in the crowd were under the age of 18.

More with video @ The Daily Caller

The odds that you know all 9 of these odd firearms are slim

 

Rock Island Auction company always has a collection of interesting pieces at their events, but their upcoming April Premiere auction has some seriously strange guns.

This is a First Model P.W. Porter Turret Rifle, of which just 300 were made in the 1850s. The cylinder has nine shots that all face outward rather than forward like a traditional revolver– making the prospect of a chain-fire downright dangerous.

More @ Guns

American who escaped al-Qaeda captivity in Syria says the FBI under Mueller and Comey 'betrayed' him

 

An American photojournalist who managed to escape al-Qaeda captivity in Syria five years ago claims the FBI betrayed him and that agents put intelligence gathering ahead of his safety.

Matt Schrier, now 39, was taken hostage by Jabhat al-Nusra, a militant group aligned with al-Qaeda, while he traveled through Syria back in December 2012.

He claims he was tortured and beaten by Syrian rebels who accused him of working for the CIA and imprisoned him in dark cell for seven months until he managed to escape.

More @ Daily Mail

Guns: Tucker Carlson Forced To Cut Off An Fiery Interview With Erica Thomas

Trump pushing Pentagon to pay for border wall

Via Billy

President Trump is privately pushing for the Pentagon to pay for his proposed border wall between the U.S. and Mexico, according to a new report.

The Washington Post reports that Trump made the suggestion to several advisers last week, saying it was a "national security" issue that the wall be funded.

Trump reportedly told Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) in a meeting last week that the military should pay for the wall. Ryan offered little reaction to the idea while senior Capitol Hill officials called its prospects unlikely, the newspaper reported.

More @ The Hill

Mike Huckabee to Protesters: "Emotion is a terrible substitute for truth.“

 

Mike Huckabee is well known for his calm, warm approach to politics and life — and the former pastor and Arkansas governor just became the voice of reason during the “March For Our Lives” protests.

While appearing on “Fox and Friends,” the politician-turned-commentator addressed the recent demonstrations that are supposedly about stopping violence, but have become essentially anti-Second Amendment rallies where law-abiding gun owners are vilified for the actions of one criminal.

“I salute these students for their passion and their energy, and for their interest in helping to shape public policy,” Huckabee began, extending an olive branch to the young people protesting. “But I would say this to them: Emotion is a terrible substitute for truth.“

More @ Conservative Tribune

Retired Supreme Court Justice Stevens says Second Amendment should be repealed

Via Billy

 

Good luck.

John Paul Stevens, the 97-year-old retired Supreme Court justice, is calling for the repeal of the Second Amendment and is encouraging anti-gun protesters to do the same.

Stevens, once the leader of the court's liberals, said the “schoolchildren and their supporters” who have been demonstrating against school shootings should “seek more effective and more lasting reform.”

“They should demand a repeal of the Second Amendment,” Stevens wrote in an op-ed for the New York Times on Tuesday.

More @ Fox

Two found guilty, given jail time in removal of tarps

Via Billy

Two men — one local and one from Richmond — have both been found guilty of trespassing and vandalism and sentenced to jail time in several instances of the removal of tarps from the Robert E. Lee and Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson statues in Charlottesville.

Monday’s decision is the latest in the back-and-forth about the statues in Emancipation and Justice parks. The statues were covered in tarps in August as a sign of mourning for Heather Heyer, who died while counter-protesting the Aug. 12 Unite the Right rally.

The tarps were torn down numerous times this winter before being ordered removed in February by Judge Richard E. Moore.

In taking the unusual step of assigning jail time for misdemeanor charges, Judge Joseph Serkes said he was emphasizing the importance of following the legal process and appealing city decisions through the courts.

More @ The Daily Progress