Good morning!

Blessings on you and your family, and from all the Huckabee staff!

Today's newsletter includes:

• Bible Verse Of The Day
• Impeachment "trial" starts this afternoon
• Self-service checkout lanes lead to rise in shoplifting
• Catholic Bishops respond to Joe Biden
• "Follow the science"
• Self-fulfilling Prophecy News

Sincerely,

Mike Huckabee

BIBLE VERSE OF THE DAY 

Impeachment "trial" starts this afternoon

By Mike Huckabee

If you have a strong stomach and want to watch the Senate impeachment "trial" that starts Tuesday, THE RIGHT SCOOP is carrying it live, starting at 12 noon EST.

This gigantic embarrassment to our country will likely stretch into next week, with one break. Since one of Trump’s lawyers, David Shoen, is Jewish, he has requested that the “trial” be suspended by 5PM on Friday and re-convene on Sunday.

As laid out by the NEW YORK POST, the sham proceedings on the first day will go on for up to four hours, with the time divided equally between House impeachment managers and Trump’s attorneys. This is when they’re going to argue for and against the constitutionality of the proceedings before the trial begins, so be prepared for a lot of lies and false accusations about Trump.

Yesterday, we talked about what Jonathan Turley and other legal experts have had to say about this “trial” --- notably, its lack of constitutionality. Trump’s lawyers will be making those same points today. Since the Democrats don’t have the law on their side, and they know it, be prepared for a hate-filled, Jake Tapper-like focus on Trump the man. Realize that the House managers can say anything they want about Trump (and his supporters) on the Senate floor, and no one can do a thing about it.

The tone of their argument will be like this: Who needs to follow legal standards and precedent and offer even the most basic rights when it’s the evil Trump who stands accused? Why, this was a “coup” staged by him and a pack of domestic terrorists to overturn a “perfect” election and the will of the American people. We HAVE to circumvent the Constitution in this case to protect our democracy!

And Biden talks about “unity.” It occurs to me that there are actions we could have impeached President Obama for --- when he was still in office --- but we didn’t. I suppose that if it’s okay to impeach a President after he’s left office, Republicans in Congress could put together a list of charges against Obama, including things we learned about after he was out, and simply wait for a House majority. So far, we haven’t let Democrats drag us down to that level, and we shouldn't, but if they insist on treating Republican leaders this way, “revenge politics” could become the norm and the whole system would crash.

But Trump’s lawyers released a very positive statement, expressing appreciation that “Senate Republican leadership stood strong for due process and secured a structure that is consistent with past precedent. This process provides us with an opportunity to explain to Senators why it’s absurd and unconstitutional to hold an impeachment trial against a private citizen.”

Trump IS a private citizen. And with everything they’ve thrown at him, and even a bout with coronavirus, he seems as energetic as ever. When I think of them impeaching Trump NOW, when he's gone, and how ludicrous and surreal that is, I imagine him grooving to that song by the Eagles…

"And I’m al---ready gone

And I’m fee—eeelin’ strong

I will sing --- this vict’ry song

Woo-hoo-hoo...woo-hoo-hoo!”

Anyway, the Senate will end their first day with a simple-majority vote on constitutionality, which will probably come out the same as the 55-45 vote they’ve already taken. As Sen. Rand Paul has pointed out, this vote already tells Democrats that they don’t have the votes to convict, even with those ten "Republican" senators who voted to let this farce go forward.

Since this vote will really be just a formality, we assume that starting at noon on Wednesday, each side will present its case in up to 16 hours of “trial” spread out over two days. Neither side can go over eight hours total. After the opening statements, senators will have up to four hours to ask questions. If the House managers want to subpoena witnesses and documents, up to four hours will be allowed for arguments. Or, if they decide not to go that way, the “trial” will shift to four hours of closing arguments, additional time for deliberations as requested, and a vote.

Again, Democrats can say anything they want about Trump during opening and closing arguments. They don't need evidence to back it up. This might be their last big opportunity to trash him in such a formal setting, with TV cameras, so they'll pull out all the stops. Imagine the worst lies ever told by Adam Schiff, Eric Swalwell and Chuck Schumer, combined, and make that to the tenth power.

(It occurs to me that you really might not want to watch this. You know what we say here: "We watch the news...so you don't have to!")

Speaking of Sen. Shumer, he said of this process that “if the former President is convicted, we will proceed to a vote on whether he is qualified to enjoy any office of honor, trust or profit under the United States.” Schumer is talking about whether or not Trump is to be disqualified from running for President again, but constitutional scholars have said that the presidency is not an “office of honor, trust or profit.” Those are APPOINTED positions. The writers of the Constitution did not want senators to be able to override voters on their choice for elective office.

So --- hypothetically speaking, as the necessary 2/3 vote to convict seems unachievable --- if they did convict Trump and “disqualify” him from holding elected office again, the Supreme Court would have to decide if that was constitutional, and it almost certainly would not be. Most likely, in the end, the House and Senate will have wasted a week (and much more prep time) on this stagecraft, just to enjoy railing at an empty chair where their collective hallucination of Trump is sitting, and then they’ll vote, their vote will fall short, and it will be over.

Until somebody tries some other way to get Trump.

Does this whole thing sound psychotic to you? We agree with Roger L. Simon: it's pathological.

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Self-service checkout lanes lead to rise in shoplifting

By Mike Huckabee

The great basketball coach John Wooden famously noted that “the true test of a man’s character is what he does when no one is watching.” Unfortunately, it seems that stores with self-checkout lanes are going to have to start watching a lot more closely.

GetPocket.com reports that the rise of self-service checkout lanes has made shoplifting easier, and many people are taking advantage of that, and even sharing theft tricks on the Internet. A survey of shoppers found that 20% admitted to having stolen in the past. And some are making it a regular habit: a recent audit of supermarket sales in Great Britain found that out of $21 million in sales, $850,000 worth of merchandise left the store without being scanned.

One anonymous Reddit poster declared, “Anyone who pays for more than half of their stuff in self checkout is a total moron. There is NO MORAL ISSUE with stealing from a store that forces you to use self checkout, period. THEY ARE CHARGING YOU TO WORK AT THEIR STORE.” Others claim they would never steal a $20 bill from another shopper, because a person would miss the money and be harmed, but a big store isn’t.

Aside from the fact there isn’t an asterisk next to “Thou shalt not steal” that leads to a footnote saying, “Except from big stores,” the whole premise is false. I’m not crazy about stores replacing workers with self-checkouts, but supermarkets operate on very small profit margins already.

With the level of theft mentioned above, this is bound to result in the stores either closing (and people complaining that they now live in a “food desert”), getting rid of self-checkout lanes (some already are, leading to complaints about longer checkout lines), or higher prices. That means the cost of the stuff thieves steal will come right out of the pockets of the other shoppers the thieves claim they would never steal from because that would harm innocent people. I guess if it harms all of us, it’s okay.

Maybe we should rephrase Coach Wooden’s definition of character to what a person does when he THINKS no one is watching, as a reminder that God is always watching. He must be sorely disappointed with a lot of people in checkout lanes these days. I hope your “free” jar of olives is worth it.

Catholic Bishops respond to Joe Biden

By Mike Huckabee

Remember when it looked certain that Joe Biden would become President, and the Washington Post ran a gushing feature about how he was going to “redefine what it means to be a Catholic in good standing,” meaning more focus on "’Catholic teachings on poverty, refugees and the environment’ than on those doctrines used by some to fight LGBT rights and reproductive freedom.”

(For those not fluent in leftist euphemisms, “reproductive freedom” means “killing babies in the womb.” Another way they fuzzy-up reality is by calling it “reproductive justice,” although I doubt it feels like justice to the innocent children being slaughtered.)

Well, now that he’s in office and doing everything possible to empower and fund abortionists and, via executive order, force American taxpayers to pay for abortions in other nations, here’s a statement from Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities, and Bishop David J. Malloy, chairman of the Committee on International Justice and Peace. It doesn’t sound as if they think Biden’s “redefining what it means to be a Catholic in good standing” so much as violating the faith’s most sacred beliefs:

“It is grievous that one of President Biden’s first official acts actively promotes the destruction of human lives in developing nations. This Executive Order is antithetical to reason, violates human dignity, and is incompatible with Catholic teaching. We and our brother bishops strongly oppose this action.”

“We urge the President to use his office for good, prioritizing the most vulnerable, including unborn children.”

But then, they’re just Catholic Bishops. How could they possibly know as much about what the Catholic faith stands for as the Washington Post?

"Follow the science"

By Mike Huckabee

We get lectured a lot from the left telling us to “follow the science!” And sometimes it’s more than a lecture. We get screamed at. Follow the science! Listen to the scientists!”

It’s just hard to figure out what science these folks are following themselves. When I’m told that a biological boy can declare himself to be a girl and even participate in girls sports, I’m wondering what the science is that says that makes sense? When I was a little boy, I used to pretend to be a cowboy, a soldier, a super-hero, or a policeman. But not one person in my neighborhood actually believed I was any of those things. I sometimes even got a yardstick and the lid from a metal garbage can and pretended to Sir Lancelot with my imaginary sword and shield, but I never really believed that I was Sir Lancelot. I really wasn’t thinking about the science, I was just living in a place called reality. My God-given biological assignment as a boy couldn’t be imagined away and if I had tried to insist that everyone call me Marianne instead of Mike and had worn a dress to school in the 2nd grade, I can assure you that no one would be applauding me for my courage in demanding that I be called by my preferred pronouns.

Have you noticed that boys who pretend to be girls usually win athletic contests for girls, but do you ever hear of a girl winning in sports against boys when she declares she’s a boy? If gender is just something I can choose the same way I choose an ice cream flavor, why aren’t the results the same? Maybe science can explain that.

And abortion supporters say we need abortion because it’s to protect women’s health. But how is a woman’s health protected by conducting an unnatural irreversible surgical procedure that results in the death of a baby, especially when the baby is a girl, or a future woman. Sure didn’t protect HER health! Doesn’t science really say that when 23 male chromosomes unite with 23 female chromosomes, those 46 chromosomes become a unique human being, and has the biological imprint of his or her DNA that will be his or hers for the rest of one’s life.

We get it that climate does change, but it’s always been changing. Most real scientists believe that climate is cyclical-not linear, meaning that there are patterns that repeat themselves rather than climate operating in a straight line. The people who are most alarmed that we’re making too big a carbon footprint by using oil and gas are also the ones who fly around in jets, live in large and energy consuming homes, and get driven in large, chauffeured vehicles.

And hasn’t science always said that in an outbreak of severe disease, we must isolate the sick people from the healthy people? Then why in the time of Covid-19 did we isolate the healthy people and quarantine THEM? Doesn’t seem very scientific.

I wasn’t the best science student in my high school, but I learned enough to know that I couldn’t pretend to be a girl when I wasn’t; I couldn’t think it was okay to take the life of an innocent baby because that would make a woman healthier, or that if we’d walk or ride bicycles everywhere we could somehow save polar bears and the coastline.

I’m for science. But some of the insanity the left is peddling is far from being scientific. It’s not science, it’s just plain silly.

Self-fulfilling Prophecy News

By Mike Huckabee

A “study” by the New York University Stern Center for Business and Human Rights claims that it’s a “false allegation” that social media discriminates against and silences conservatives. Here’s a quote:

“The claim of anti-conservative animus is itself a form of disinformation: a falsehood with no reliable evidence to support it. No trustworthy large-scale studies have determined that conservative content is being removed for ideological reasons or that searches are being manipulated to favor liberal interests.”

(Hope you weren’t swallowing coffee when you read that. Try searching for any story involving the name Trump on Google and see what comes up if you don’t believe searches are being manipulated to favor liberal interests.)

As Paula Bolyard at PJ Media points out, you have to get to page 20 of this manure pile to find that the data available to researchers on whether social media companies harbor an anti-conservative bias is not sufficiently detailed to answer that conclusively. But that didn’t stop the authors from conclusively declaring that complaints of bias are a “false allegation.” That’s even the name of their study!

Read the whole thing. Also, bonus points to Ms Bolyard for quoting from George Orwell’s “1984,” which seems to have become the left’s how-to manual:

“Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it.”

As for the claim that there is no bias against conservatives in social media…I have no words.

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