By Mike Huckabee
November 5, 2021
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THE MORNING EDITION By Mike Huckabee
Good morning! Here are some stories from me that I think you will want to read.
THE LATEST
Photo credit: Reuters
1. DURHAM DOES IT AGAIN WITH ANOTHER INDICTMENT: Igor Danchenko, the Russian national living in the Washington DC area who was allegedly Christopher Steele’s primary sub-source for the fictional “dossier” –- in reality, opposition research funded by Hillary’s presidential campaign –- has been indicted by Special Counsel John Durham, who is looking into the origins of the Trump-Russia “collusion” scandal, otherwise known as the Trump-Russia HOAX or, as we like to call it, “My Big Fat Russia Conspiracy Theory.”
The Special Counsel seems to be very gradually and methodically connecting all the dots leading back to Hillary and her 2016 presidential campaign. As law professor Jonathan Turley said Thursday, “Danchenko’s arrest is a seismic development and confirmed Durham is far from done with his investigation.”
https://jonathanturley.org/2021/11/04/igor-danchenko-arrested-as-part-of-durham-investigation/
Danchenko has been charged with five counts of making false statements. According to Turley, he had told the FBI that Steele asked him to look for compromising material on Trump and also said the dossier was “unsubstantiated” (that part’s true). Danchenko had his own source for crazy dossier stories, and he’s listed anonymously in Durham’s indictment as “PR – Executive -1,” now confirmed to be a man named Charles Dolan, described by Turley as “a close Clinton adviser who had held high positions within the Democrat Party and prior Clinton campaigns.”
In fact, Dolan’s attorney, Ralph Martin, has come out and said Dolan is the PR executive. And it appears that Dolan had the very kind of contacts within the Russian government that Trump and his campaign were falsely accused of having. Joel B. Polack at BREITBART has more details from the indictment.
Dolan apparently gifted Danchenko with an autobiography of Hillary Clinton, with the handwritten inscription, “To my good friend [Igor]. a great Democrat.” Dolan definitely fits the description; he has served “as chairman of a national Democratic political organization” and “state chairman of former President Clinton’s 1992 and 1996 presidential campaigns,” as well as “adviser to Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign.” He had also been appointed by President Bill Clinton to two four-year terms with an advisory commission at the State Department. During the 2016 Hillary campaign, he actively campaigned and participated in calls and events on behalf of Hillary Clinton.”
Turley thinks Danchenko is the sort of participant that prosecutors think they can “flip” to give information on the key players who used him in this effort. These might range from Steele himself to Clinton counsel Marc Elias to Clinton campaign officials.
Samuel Chamberlain at the NEW YORK POST calls Charles H. Dolan, Jr., “an elusive ally” of the Clintons. The charging document accuses Danchenko of intentionally misleading the FBI when he told them he hadn’t spoken to Dolan about any material in the Trump-Russia file.
The evidence shows he had, though. In August of 2016, Danchenko emailed Dolan to say he was working on “a project against Trump” and to ask him for “any thought, rumor or allegation” (!) about Paul Manafort, who had recently resigned as Trump’s campaign chairman. Dolan emailed him back to dish some dirt that he said he got from former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski over a drink. That email appears almost verbatim in the Steele dossier.
But the indictment says that Dolan told the FBI that the “drink with a GOP friend” was made up, and that all he gave to Danchenko was gleaned from news reports.
Adam Goldman and Charlie Savage reported on the Danchenko indictment for THE NEW YORK TIMES.
The dossier was intended to show that then-candidate Donald Trump was “colluding” with the Russian government for help in getting himself elected President. Nothing of consequence in Steele’s series of memos has ever been verified, but that didn’t stop Trump’s enemies from issuing hysterical made-up media reports in service to the hoax, some of which persist to this day.
Also, it was because of the Steele dossier that a FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) warrant was granted in October 2016 for the FBI to spy on Trump campaign adviser and American citizen Carter Page. Through him, they were able to spy on the entire campaign and even go ‘back in time’ to look at previous communications. And the fabricated contents, which included a salacious story involving Russian prostitutes at the Moscow Ritz-Carlton (we all know the one; it likely came from Dolan), were printed by BUZZFEED just days before Trump’s inauguration.
Though primary source Danchenko is Russian by birth, he resides in the Washington DC area and the material he related was thirdhand at best. The FBI knew after they interviewed him that his “information” was not necessarily true, but they went with it anyway, after Hillary’s attorney’s pressured them from every side.
According to the NYT, a “Justice” Department inspector general report from 2019 sharply criticized the FBI “for continuing to cite material from the dossier after the Bureau interviewed Mr. Danchenko without alerting judges that some of what he had said had cast doubt on the contents of the dossier.”
Danchenko was also interviewed by the NYT, and said that he had been tasked only with providing “raw” information to Steele. He apparently has been investigated to see if he’s a Russian agent, but he denies that strongly.
As the NYT reports –- they must be trying to get ahead of this story –- “Mr. Steele’s business intelligence firm was a subcontractor to another research firm, Fusion GPS, which in turn had been hired by the Perkins Coie law firm, which was working for the Hillary Clinton campaign.
Mr. Danchenko said he was not aware of who Steele’s client was at the time and considered himself a “nonpartisan analyst and researcher.”
But Danchenko worked for the extremely anti-Trump “think-tank” the Brookings Institution from 2005 to 2010. Last February, Durham used a subpoena to retrieve from there his old personnel files and related documents. If you have time, it’s interesting to see what the NYT reporters wrote about that back in April.
TOWNHALL also reported Danchenoko's indictment.
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/leahbarkoukis/2021/11/04/igor-danchenko-n2598565
Finally, recall that the person who apparently introduced Danchenko to Steele was...(drum roll, please)...“Trump impeachment star” Fiona Hill. REDSTATE reported this back in January. But they assumed this story would go away; they weren’t counting on Durham piecing it all together.
DAILY BIBLE VERSE
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2. UPDATES ON TUESDAY'S ELECTIONS: Incumbent New Jersey Democrat Phil Murphy declared victory and the AP named him the winner, but not so fast. Republican Jack Ciatarrelli already blasted that call as irresponsible, and he’s now made it clear that he has not conceded.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/jack-caittarelli-refuses-to-concede-nj-gubernatorial-race
Ciattarelli says it’s premature to call a winner when there are still thousands of mail-in and provisional votes yet to count, and the two are separated by only a fraction of a point out of 2.4 million votes. Ballots arriving by November 8th are still eligible to be counted (I bet Democrats are suddenly cursing those “count votes that come in for a week after the election” rules they pushed.) The state legally has until November 18th to finish counting and certifying the vote. Even if Ciatarrelli loses, with a margin this razor thin, he has until November 18th to demand a recount, so you might have finished your Thanksgiving dinner by the time this is over.
In the meantime, Ciatarrelli advised supporters that "while consideration is paid to any and all credible reports” of vote fraud, they shouldn’t believe “wild conspiracy theories or online rumors.” I assume he means stories like this, although I’m not sure yet which of those two categories it falls into:
3. EVEN MORE ELECTION UPDATES: Before any Democrats start screaming about Ciatarrelli assaulting democracy, note that Democrat State Senate President Steve Sweeney is also refusing to concede to truck driver Edward Durr, who apparently dealt him a stunning defeat with his low budget, grassroots campaign. Sweeney says they should wait until all the votes are counted, and besides, 12,000 votes were just found in one unnamed New Jersey county.
While that’s a lot to take in, let me call attention to one phrase that’s especially concerning: “There were 12,000 ballots recently found in one county.” “Found?” That seems to imply that they were lost or misplaced. Aren’t poll workers supposed to know where all the ballots are at all times? That seems like a pretty basic duty of the job.
And in Texas, eight proposed state constitutional amendments all passed overwhelmingly, including a couple that were obviously rebukes to government overreach during the pandemic. Proposition 3, to bar the prohibiting or limiting of religious services, passed 2-1. Proposition 6 allows nursing home residents to choose an essential care giver who cannot be blocked from visiting. That passed by nearly 88% to 12%. Just in case any Democrats are still under the delusion that their COVID policies are actually popular.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/texas-amendments-2021-state-constitution
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4. OSHA REGULATION ISSUED:
OSHA has issued its federal regulation mandating COVID vaccinations or weekly testing for all businesses with over 100 employees. And if you think that’s a clear overreach of government authority, then that’s just the start of this 490-page document.
The story at the link explains the many ways in which this is unscientific, likely unconstitutional, and less a public health measure than an authoritarian power grab designed to punish and shame anyone who resists the vaccine. For instance, if you get the vaccine and experience side effects (hey, they actually admitted those exist!), your employer has to give you paid sick leave. But if you opt for weekly testing, you have to pay for it yourself.
While President Biden seems to think the message of Tuesday’s elections was “Thank you, sir, may we have another?,” various red state Governors, including those from Texas, Florida and South Dakota, are already planning to file lawsuits to block the rule the minute it takes effect on January 4th. A group of health care workers in Pennsylvania are already suing over their vaccine mandate, arguing that the issue has become so politicized that getting vaccinated is now a political act, and forcing someone to engage in a political act they oppose is a violation of the First Amendment right to freedom of speech.
The RNC is also suing, and they make the interesting point that if the justification for OSHA’s ironfisted policy is that it’s a public health “emergency,” then why are they waiting until after the holidays to impose it? Is it not enough of an emergency to risk infuriating voters any more than they already have by ruining their Thanksgivings and Christmases, too?
Ben Shapiro waded through OSHA's document and listed seven areas where OSHA appears to be planning a web of draconian regulations that will treat businesses as if we’re in a permanent pandemic as deadly as the black plague. These include eventually getting rid of testing to force everyone to get vaccinated; wearing even more restrictive masks; never-ending social distancing, barriers and ventilation requirements; making fully vaccinated people wear masks; and no exceptions for people with natural immunity from having already had the disease.
The good news: they’re forced to take public comments, so I assume they will get PLENTY of those. Also, Shapiro urges Senate Republicans to press Democrats for a Congressional Review Act vote to intervene. As he puts it, “Force the Democrats to sign on to this authoritarian nonsense.” They can either continue to abuse federal power against the American people and businesses and get this week’s voter revolt times 100 next November…or they can vote to rein it in. Either way, it’s going to get reined in. They just have to decide whether it will happen with them or without them in office.
5. STILL A SKUNK: When it comes to parental anger over Critical Race Theory being forced onto their kids in school, the left’s response is to deny that CRT exists or that it’s taught any lower than universities. It doesn’t exist, and it’s also racist to oppose it. Got that?
Well, denial ain’t just a river in Egypt (and if you attend one of today’s public schools, that may be the most you’ll ever learn about geography.) The Twitter blue checks, liberal media figures and school board members might claim CRT isn’t in public schools, but a growing number of teachers are standing up to say yes, it is, and they’re fed up with it.
This week, a couple of videos went viral in which an Indianapolis educator/administrator and a Wisconsin teacher blew the whistle, explaining how CRT is everywhere. They just carefully avoid calling it that. But a skunk by any other name would smell as bad (that’s also as close to that dead white male Shakespeare as you’ll ever get from today’s public schools.)
HYMNAL: THY STRONG WORD
Listen: https://youtu.be/KijpAFL1Iss
Thy strong word
did cleave the darkness;
at thy speaking it was done;
for created light we thank thee,
while thine ordered seasons run:
Alleluia, alleluia!
Praise to thee who light dost send!
Alleluia, alleluia!
Alleluia without end!
Lo, on those who dwelt
in darkness,
dark as night and deep as death,
broke the light of thy salvation,
breathed thine own
live-giving breath:
Alleluia, alleluia!
Praise to thee who light dost send!
Alleluia, alleluia!
Alleluia without end!
Thy strong word
bespeaks us righteous;
bright with thine own holiness,
glorious now,
we press toward glory,
and our lives our hopes confess:
Alleluia, alleluia!
Praise to thee who light dost send!
Alleluia, alleluia!
Alleluia without end!
God the Father, Light-Creator,
to thee laud and honor be;
to thee, Light of Light begotten,
praise be sung eternally;
Holy Spirit, Light-Revealer,
glory, glory be to thee;
mortals, angels, now and ever
praise the Holy Trinity.
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