January 20, 2024
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Blessings on you and your family from all the Huckabee team! Today, if you have a moment, leave me a comment about something you read. Comments help me fine tune what I am writing, and they show that we have an active community of readers.
Sincerely,
Mike Huckabee
Daily Bible Verse
But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.
Isaiah 40:31
Newsletter Notes
18 stories
3,240 words
Reading time: About 15 minutes
“Huckabee” Preview
Join me tonight for a special “The show must go on!” episode of “Huckabee” on TBN (You’ll see what I mean when you tune in.) My news-making guests include Rep. Jim Jordan and Sen. Josh Hawley. Platinum-selling country singer/songwriter Granger Smith will tell us why he walked away from the music business to become a minister. And we’ll have some inspiring music from Grammy-winning artist Victory.
Just curl up in front of your warm TV tonight at 8 and 11 EST, 7 and 10 CST, or Sunday at 9 EST/8 CST on TBN. To find out how to watch TBN, from local cable and broadcast channels to streaming, visit https://www.huckabee.tv and click on “Channel Finder” on the top menu. You can stream previous episodes, highlights and online-only “Digital Exclusives,” including extended interviews, “In Case You Missed It” and “Facts of the Matter” segments, plus extra performances by our great musical and comedy guests and links to all their sites, at https://www.huckabee.tv. You can also find past shows, highlights and digital exclusives on YouTube and my Facebook page.
More on the March
Friday, thousands of pro-life supporters defied the snow and frigid temperatures to gather in Washington, DC, for the annual March For Life. Fox News has some of the highlights, including speeches by House Speaker Mike Johnson and University of Michigan football coach Jim Harbaugh.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/top-4-moments-2024-march-for-life
Here’s more on the event and Harbaugh’s appearance from Breitbart News.
New Hampshire update
On the eve of the New Hampshire primary, a judge threw out another attempt to block Trump from the ballot by the defenders of "our democracy." Here’s more on that and the reactions, including Sen. Tim Scott’s decision to endorse Trump.
Updates:
Friday, divorce attorneys for the wife of Georgia Trump special prosecutor Nathan Wade filed court documents that include bank and credit card records to support the claim that Wade went on lavish trips and cruises with DA Fani Willis. But they don’t show whether they shared a room or Willis reimbursed Wade.
Willis is trying to get a subpoena from Wade’s wife Joycelyn quashed, but her attorneys called her legal arguments “disingenuous and specious.” Hardly the first time that's been said of her legal arguments.
Also, since playing the racist and sexist cards against a fellow black woman probably wouldn’t work, Willis tried attacking Wade’s wife with the Democrats' favorite fallback smear: accusing her of trying to discredit her to help Donald Trump. Yes, I’m sure that helping Trump is the reason she’s divorcing her husband and asking questions about his alleged mistress and the nearly $700,000 in payments approved by her that he allegedly conveniently forgot to mention to her.
About that crazy J6 pipe bomber video that makes no sense...
If you’ve read our commentary from yesterday about the video of the discovery of the DNC pipe bomb on January 6 and agree with us that something was very wrong, you’ll be gratified to know that former Secret Service agent Dan Bongino thinks so, too. And because he smells a rat, he made this strange video the entire subject of his Friday podcast. What we see on video makes no sense to him, either.
As thoroughly well-versed in law enforcement and Secret Service protocol as he is, he’s in a position to know when something’s “off.” And he simply can’t explain the abnormal reaction of these agents to the tip-off that there’s a bomb nearby. Even the tipster’s behavior, he observes, is oddly relaxed.
To cite just a few of the questions this video raises, why would the agents just be meandering around instead of taking fast, professional action, especially since, as we would come to know almost a year later, the soon-to-be Vice President of the United States was in that building? Why was she there in the first place? Why would the administration lie for almost a year and claim she was in the Capitol building, a more logical place for her to be that day, and had to be evacuated from there? Why would agents not immediately cordon off the area near the bomb instead of letting a group of children (!) walk right by. Why, these officials acted as if they knew the bomb wouldn’t really go off. How on earth would they have known that? And if they did know that, why did they send in the little robot bomb defuser? Was that possibly just for show?
All this is a head-scratcher for Bongino, who not only asks the same questions we did but seems to be about 97.9 percent sure of the answer. We’ll tell you one thing: it’s not “conspiracy theory” to be asking questions about this mystery and for real journalists to try to find the answers themselves.
https://bongino.com/ep-2169-explosive-video-surfaces-about-the-jan-6th-bomber
Must-Read!
The Media Research Center uncovered a plan by the Biden DHS to skew the 2024 election using our taxpayer dollars against us. By perverting an anti-terrorism program, they not only plan to brand Trump and his supporters as terrorists to silence them in the media, but also to fund “education” seminars to train leftist teachers to spread their bile; and to pay people to write blog posts about how dangerous Trump and MAGA people are to America and how they must be stopped. The MRC even has a list of some of these DHS-funded propaganda pieces that have already appeared, but of course, were not labeled as paid political ads.
Victoria Taft at PJ Media has that list and far more details about the Biden Administration’s latest attempt to utilize the political communications tactics pioneered by Joseph Goebbels.
The Biden White House spews false border narratives
There are times when it’s hard to write about the statements coming out of the Biden White House because the sheer gall of their transparent lies is so infuriating. Like (with a straight face) blaming the Republicans for the illegal immigration crisis that Biden deliberately caused from his very first moments in office when he started reversing all of Trump’s border policies.
Or this week, when they had the audacity to try to blame Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and the Texas National Guard for the drowning deaths of three would-be illegal immigrants in the Rio Grande because Abbott removed the purposely ineffective US Border Patrol from that area and replaced them with the state Guard.
This false narrative was started by Texas Democratic Rep. Henry Cueller and amplified by the Biden White House, which falsely claimed that the Texas Guard physically blocked the Border Patrol from providing aid to the drowning migrants. The DHS said Abbott’s policies were "cruel, dangerous, and inhumane, and Texas’s blatant disregard for federal authority over immigration poses grave risks." That was in a (false) filing to the Supreme Court, as part of their appeal to stop Texas from doing the feds' duty that they refuse to do. Naturally, this story got big play in liberal media outlets.
If there’s still anyone in the media or the Democratic Party (but I repeat myself) who cares about facts, here are a few inconvenient ones:
1. Patrolling that side of the river is Mexico’s responsibility. Nevertheless, on that night, the Border Patrol alerted the Texas Military Department to a possible migrant distress situation. The TMD sent a boat to investigate and found nothing. They later saw Mexican authorities responding to an incident on their side of the river, but were told they needed no assistance.
2. Nobody on our side of the border was even notified of these tragic drownings until at least an hour after they happened. Even if the feds had still been in that area, it would have made no difference.
3. The TMD has water rescue equipment and provides medical aid to migrants when needed.
4. The Border Patrol union approved of Abbott taking control of that area, calling it a “force multiplier” that allowed them to concentrate on other areas of the border. A spokesman said, "Governor Abbott is not harming Border Patrol operations, he is enhancing them." Translation: “Thank God someone in charge is finally doing something to secure the border.”
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/spencerbrown/2024/01/12/border-patrol-union-abbott-eagle-pass-n2633551
5. In light of all this, the Biden DHS was forced to retract its slander against Abbott and Texas, which I seriously doubt will get the same coverage as the initial false accusation. Indeed, I expect Biden to add this to the repertoire of debunked lies he keeps repeating, like the “very fine people” hoax.
6. Since Biden took office, over 1,000 illegal immigrants have died trying to enter the US, not to mention all the women who’ve been raped and the children who’ve been trafficked. This White House has shown precious little concern for any of them until it found three deaths that it could exploit to falsely smear its political enemies.
If Biden and his minions want to see who is really responsible for the deaths of those three people who thought they could cross the river and easily enter the US, I assume that with all the egomania in politics, there must be plenty of mirrors in DC that they can gaze into.
Which leads me to this final, highly related fact:
7. All 18 Republicans on the House Homeland Security Committee voted unanimously to impeach DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas for creating an unprecedented illegal immigration crisis by “consistently, willfully and systemically” refusing to follow the laws, abusing his authority, breaching the trust of Congress and the American people, and failing to fulfill his oath of office. They called it “a crisis that has cost the lives of thousands of Secretary Mayorkas’ fellow Americans,” thanks to the criminals and drugs that have poured in.
I suppose you can also add those to the list of deaths that the Biden Administration doesn’t care about because they’re just not politically useful.
A somewhat positive Trump ruling
In a somewhat positive but predictably lenient ruling, Judge Tanya Chutkan sided with Donald Trump’s attorneys and ordered “special counsel” Jack Smith to stop issuing discovery demands to the defense while the case has been stayed. But of course, she found enough wiggle room in the language of her own order to deny their demand that Smith be held in contempt of court, as any other prosecutor who blatantly violated a court order would have been.
https://www.westernjournal.com/dc-judge-sides-trump-reins-jack-smith/
I wonder if the language of her ruling would have been so malleable if the situation were reversed, and it was Smith demanding that Trump’s attorneys be held in contempt for ignoring Chutkan’s orders? I’ll let you ponder that puzzler.
Amicus brief filed
In other Trump lawfare news, on Thursday, three former US Attorneys General filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court, opposing efforts to keep him off the ballot under the 14th Amendment. They argue that the people pushing this are misrepresenting the meaning of the Amendment, which clearly does not apply to Presidents, and if the SCOTUS rules in their favor, it “would create a precedent with ruinous consequences for our democratic republic.”
Interesting detail: One of the Attorneys General is Bill Barr, one of Trump’s most outspoken critics. But apparently, he loves the Constitution more than he dislikes Trump. Let’s hope all the people like that vote in November.
Related: A judge in Washington State rejected a 14th Amendment challenge and ruled that Trump will remain on the ballot there.
Hearing scheduled
The Georgia judge overseeing Fulton County DA Fani Willis’ crackpot RICO case against former President Trump and his associates has scheduled a hearing into allegations that Willis has an improper personal, financial and professional relationship with her special prosecutor, Nathan Wade.
I expect irony alarms to go off all over the place when Willis starts complaining about how unfair and traumatic it is to be hauled into court to face accusations of improper conduct by her political enemies. Especially when they have more evidence of actual wrongdoing that she does.
A firestorm
Milford Regional Medical Center in Massachusetts set off a firestorm after a video was posted online of chief medical officer Dr. Peter Smulowitz warning potential patients that they may be denied care if they make comments that might be offensive about “others’ race, ethnicity, accent, religion, gender, sexual orientation or other personal traits.” This also includes “body language” or a “hostile tone of voice.” So I guess you can be denied medical care if someone thinks you don’t look or sound woke enough.
This is allegedly to protect the hospital’s “safe, caring and inclusive environment.” Funny, doesn’t sound very safe, caring or inclusive to me. I thought hospitals were supposed to include anyone who, you know…needs a hospital! They’re turning away patients for not being politically correct enough? Who’s running this place, Jimmy Kimmel?
Luckily for the sick and injured, they will get a chance to explain themselves. Hope they can do it quickly before they bleed out.
I see that this video is now “unlisted” on the hospital’s YouTube channel. I would advise everyone in the area to unlist this hospital from their emergency contacts list.
Appeals Court upholds block on new Texas law
The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a block on a new Texas law requiring publishers to designate books as having either sexually relevant or sexually explicit content before they can be sold to public schools. Publishers sued to overturn the law, claiming it’s “unduly burdensome, logistically unattainable, and risked pushing some businesses out of the public school market” (Heaven forbid anyone should be pushed out of the business of exposing minors to porn.) The Appeals panel sided with them, claiming that it violates the publishers’ First Amendment rights.
That seems a bit bewildering, considering it doesn’t ban the sale of books, it just requires the labeling of their contents before they can be sold to schools and seen by children. Does this mean that the Hollywood movie rating label system that restricts audiences under 13 or 17 from seeing certain films is also unconstitutional? Here are more details on the case…
https://dallasexpress.com/state/block-of-txs-sexually-explicit-book-law-upheld/
The law’s creator, state Rep. Jared Patterson, said a number of attorneys worked on the bill and reviewed Supreme Court cases in writing it, and they will appeal. He said the law isn’t about censoring characters or stories, but “content that is just radically vulgar and obscene.” He gave an example from a book found in Dallas school libraries that was described as “inappropriately crude and even pornographic,” but I’m not going to repeat it here. You can click the link and read it yourself if you’re over 17.
I wonder what the Founders would say if they knew that one day, a major political party in power in America would interpret the First Amendment to mean that you could censor and jail people for criticizing the government, but giving pornography to school children is free speech?
Spot-on perfect
Why am I not at all surprised to learn that Adam Schiff’s latest crusade is a bill to protect rats?
FYI: This is not a defense of glue traps, which have been banned in many places for being needlessly cruel and unhygienic. Still, you have to appreciate how spot-on perfect it is that the person who’s the face of being kind to rats is Adam Schiff.
Photo of the Day!
First Lady Jill Biden visited Hunter High School in Utah, where she set the Internet rolling with laughter by being photographed under a big banner reading, “HUNTER HIGH.” Not exactly a state secret.
https://www.westernjournal.com/jill-biden-becomes-victim-poor-sign-placement-high-school-visit-utah/
Taking flak
Super Bowl organizers are taking flak for announcing that this year’s opening ceremony will include performances of the National Anthem, “America the Beautiful,” and “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” which has become known as the “black national anthem” in the wake of the BLM movement.
https://www.westernjournal.com/nfl-announces-black-national-anthem-performer-super-bowl/
To be clear, there’s nothing wrong with the song, which is a hymn of thanksgiving dating back to 1900. It’s just that many people believe it’s being used as a tool to foster racial divisiveness because black people don’t need a separate national anthem. They already have a national anthem. It’s called “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and the whole point of America is that we all share it together.
Kurt Schlichter’s Latest:
He’s a DeSantis supporter, but he recognizes that Trump is going to be the nominee. He also warns that Republicans need to put aside their resentments and hurt feelings and start working together, because if you care about the continued existence of America, the ONLY thing that matters is that the next President be a Republican.
So true
Good article from Derek Hunter about how the media is no longer in the business of finding the truth and reporting it; they’re in the business of unquestioningly broadcasting Democratic Party lies. And he brings the evidence to prove it.
RIP Peter Schickele (aka P.D.Q. Bach)
By “Huckabee” pop culture guru Pat Reeder (http://www.hollywoodhifi.com)
I am very sad to have to report that composer and classical music satirist Peter Schickele has died at his home in Bearsville, New York, at 88.
Many people might not realize that he was a serious composer whose works were performed by such prestigious artists as the New York Philharmonic and the Minnesota Opera. He also wrote scores for films such as “Silent Running” and musical numbers for Broadway. But he was reportedly a bit irked that he would always be best known for creating his musical alter ego, history’s most questionable classical composer, P.D.Q. Bach – the “last and by far the least” of Johann Sebastian Bach’s 20-odd children, “and certainly the oddest.”
Known as the Spike Jones of the classical world, Schickele was inspired by pianist/comedian Victor Borge. He created hilarious parodies and pastiches of classical works allegedly by Bach’s misfit offspring, with titles such as “Concerto for Two Pianos vs. Orchestra” and “Hansel and Gretel and Ted and Alice,” “an opera in one unnatural act.” He also became famous for his entrances to concerts, such as swinging down from the balcony on a rope or being chased down the aisle by a gorilla. He won five Grammy Awards, one for his serious classical works and four for Best Comedy Album, including “Oedipus Tex and Other Choral Calamities” and “Music for an Awful Lot of Winds and Percussion.”
And like Spike Jones, who gave us the Latrine-o-phone (a musical toilet seat), he invented such bizarre instruments as a combination trombone and bassoon called the Tromboon, and the “left-handed sewer flute,” which was made of plumbing pipes.
While he might have sometimes felt overshadowed by his creation, he deserves a place in the classical music hall of fame, not just for his serious works but for his brilliant parodies, which introduced more people to classical music than anyone since Bugs Bunny. RIP.
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