By Mike Huckabee
March 28, 2022
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Good morning! Blessings on you and your family, and from all the Huckabee staff!
Today's newsletter includes:
- The deeper significance of Hunter Biden laptop story, Part 3
- New Podcast Episode
- A note on the Oscars
- And much more
Sincerely,
Mike Huckabee
1. DAILY BIBLE VERSE
Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.
Ephesians 4:32
If you have a favorite Bible Verse you want to see in one of our newsletters, please email [email protected].
2. The deeper significance of Hunter Biden laptop story, Part 3
Part 2 observed that many of the same people who originated the Russia Hoax also were involved in Trump’s impeachment over his (appropriate) phone call with Ukrainian President Zelenskyy. Paul Manafort, described as “ground zero for all manufactured Trump scandals,” was alleged to have dark dealings as a lobbyist in Ukraine, and we expressed curiosity as to how he, of all people, ended up as Trump’s campaign manager. George Soros, described as probably the most influential man in Ukraine, also ties into the story, through funding for an entity called the Democratic Integrity Project --- that name is so funny --- founded by Dianne Feinstein staffer and (yes) former FBI analyst Dan Jones, who gave Fusion GPS $3.3. million. Dan Jones brought in Hillary campaign chairman John Podesta, and their purported field of endeavor was –- egad –- to study how Russian intel operations were influencing elections.
Recall that during Trump’s impeachment, which would’ve been exposed as a joke if the existence of Hunter’s laptop had been revealed by the FBI, a parade of pro-Soros, pro-”Anti-Corruption” Action Center (AntAC) witnesses was brought in by committee chairman Adam Schiff. That’s about where we left off last week.
One quick update before we get into Part 3: Margot Cleveland has another great piece involving the laptop, this one analyzing the strategy behind the New York Times’ admission –- finally –- that it was real. First, she makes the point that if the laptop is real, that means the scandals are real, not “Russian disinformation” as was falsely maintained by so many, as calculated election interference. Like many, she also sees this admission as an attempt to “get ahead of the story” before it gets much worse. She outlines possible charges, some quite serious. Finally, she dissects the persuasive technique used by the NYT propagandists to downplay the seriousness and gain sympathy for Hunter. This last part, especially, is a must-read.
Back to Ukraine. As we said, when a new Ukrainian prosecutor tried to investigate Soros-funded AntAC, he met resistance from our own U.S. embassy staff. “We ran right into a buzz saw and we got bloodied,” is how one Ukrainian official put it. That buzz saw consisted of the Obama administration, the U.S. State Department, some in the FBI, and, of course, Soros and his Open Society Foundation.
John Solomon uncovered a memo dated around the time Manfort joined Trump’s campaign that contained a chart of people to BE investigated, including “some with ties to Manafort.” It’s thought that this refers to Ukrainian billionaire Dmitry Firtash, who was a business rival of Soros who had already been looked into on a civil charge of money laundering and cleared.
This was also the time when Glenn Simpson was doing oppo research on Trump and Manafort, and the DNC’s Alexandra Chalupa, from Ukraine, was bad-mouthing Manafort in America. She visited the Obama White House 27 times.
AntAC was the perfect vehicle for going after Manafort. But as Dan Bongino points out, if AntAC really had wanted to root out corruption in Ukraine, they might have taken a peek into Burisma’s showering of money on the American Vice President’s son. As Bongino puts it, “...when your benefactor is an enormous investor in the Democratic Party committing to spending millions to try and stop Trump, maybe that investigation isn’t very appealing.”
A Latvian investigative agency, the Office for Prevention of Laundering of Proceeds Derived from Criminal Activity, was actually trying to look into it, and they sent a memo to Ukrainian officials on February 18, 2016, notifying them that a transaction involving Hunter Biden and Burisma had been flagged.
Ukrainian officials failed to respond.
Later, when COVID hit, and hospitals and relief organizations needed all the help they could get, Soros gave $3 million –- not to help with THAT, but to Priorities USA Action, the Democrats’ Super PAC. It was earmarked specifically to fund a series of ads slamming Trump’s response to the virus. Soros had already just given them $2 million in January. Priorities indeed.
Bongino calls the Obama White House “an unofficial club for Ukraine obsessives.” There are other connections between AntAC (thus, Soros), the Obama White House and the FBI. Of these, Daria Kaleniuk, who now heads AntAC, met at the White House on December 9, 2015, with Eric Ciaramella, who would later come to fame as the anonymous “whistleblower” from Trump’s impeachment. At the time, he was a CIA employee working as a Ukraine (yes) specialist on the National Security Council. Later he was replaced in that position by Alexander Vindman, who also ended up testifying at Trump’s impeachment. Ciaramella had also worked with Joe Biden and John Brennan. It’s as I said: the same people just keep turning up again and again!
Since Ciaramella’s identity was kept secret during the impeachment, nothing was ever said about why he’d been moved out of the White House: he’d been accused of “leaking and working against Trump.” (Remember the huge concern with White House leaks during Trump’s early days in office?) That revelation would've done a lot to “impeach” this whistleblower.
As for the call from Trump to Zelenskyy that supposedly sparked the complaint, there was no wrongdoing in it at all. Certainly, no quid pro quo took place, because Zelenskyy got his military aid package and there was no investigation into Burisma and the Bidens, much as it was needed. Also, there was no cover-up, as Trump countered the false characterization of his call by releasing the full transcript himself. Of course, after that, Democrats continued to mischaracterize it and “mind-read” to cast his motives in the worst light they could, as they've always done with Trump about everything he's ever said or done.
Again, the laptop was central to the whole issue. It was evidence of the legitimate need to investigate the Bidens in Ukraine, and the FBI withheld it. Attorney General Bill Barr didn’t mention it, either, even after Biden lied about it, so the media were still able to present the false narrative that it was a Russian plot. Here’s the significance of Barr’s glaring omission.
Ciaramella filed a complaint about Trump’s phone call with Intel Community IG Michael Atkinson and also summarized it in unclassified letters to Intelligence Committee chairs Adam Schiff and Richard Burr. He claimed he had “received information from multiple government officials that the President of the United States is using the power of his office to solicit interference from a foreign country in the 2020 U.S. election.”
It seems so strange to read those words now, as we know today that Hillary’s campaign is the one that did this very thing, through the solicitation of information for the Steele “dossier.” It was also pro-Hillary people in our State Department --- oh, and Joe Biden ---who tried to intimidate Ukrainian prosecutors who might have looked too closely at Hunter.
Bongino’s Chapter 8 in FOLLOW THE MONEY reveals even more connections and conflicts, some involving Adam Schiff and IG Atkinson, who defied a Justice Department order when he set events in motion to notify Schiff about the false whistleblower complaint. Highly recommended reading!
UPDATE: In very welcome breaking news, California Rep. Darrell Issa has announced that if (when!) Republicans take back the House this year, he will lead an investigation of the 2020 election-related suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story.
The Epoch Times has a report --- it's "premium," but we'll have the full story coming up.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/republicans-plan-to-investigate-hunter-biden-laptop-story-issa
YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE:
The deeper significance of Hunter laptop story, Part 2
The deeper significance of Hunter laptop story, Part 1
3. New Podcast Episode
Today on “The People’s Podcast,” Governor Huckabee is joined by Breitbart Political Editor Emma-Jo Morris to discuss Miranda Devine’s book on Hunter Biden ‘Laptop from Hell.’
4. Latest Ukraine developments
Here’s today’s link to Fox News’ continually-updated bulletins on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine:
https://www.foxnews.com/live-news/ukraine-russia-live-updates-03-28-2022
Latest developments: Ukrainian officials claim that Russia plans to split the country in two, like North and South Korea. President Zelenskyy laid out a roadmap for peace, but Russia censored his interview. Ukraine said it’s investigating graphic videos posted on the Internet that allegedly show Ukrainian soldiers shooting Russian POWs in the legs. But Ukraine’s top military commander accused Russia of staging the videos as propaganda.
The big story is once again a reaction to something that fell out of President Biden’s mouth with a clank: A Kremlin spokesman called it “alarming” that Biden said of Putin, "For God's sake, this man cannot remain in power." The 24/7 emergency verbal spill squad at the White House had to rush to “clarify” that Biden was not calling for regime change in Russia, which, as much as anyone might wish for it, is not something Presidents say out loud because they don’t want to spark World War III.
While Biden’s staffers desperately try to convince us that he “didn’t really mean it” for the 400th time, other liberals in the media are trying to spin it as brave truth-telling, or comparing it to Reagan’s famous quote, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!” Except they can’t decide between claiming that was also a slip of the tongue by Reagan (it wasn’t) or comparing Biden’s unfiltered blurt to Reagan (it’s a very different thing to challenge a leader to tear down a wall and to publicly call for a rival nation’s leader to be overthrown, particularly when that nation has nukes and you don’t know what he’ll do or if his replacement might be even worse.)
Do I personally wish Putin weren’t the leader of Russia? Of course! But would his downfall necessarily result in someone better taking his place? Considering the most likely successors, that’s an open question. The point is, I can talk about that because I’m not the President, but Joe Biden is. Yes, I’m as annoyed about that as you are.
As for all the panicking and spinning about Biden calling for Putin to be overthrown, then all the backtracking about how he didn’t really mean it that way...Okay, let me get this straight:
So Democrats are NOW saying that even if the President thinks Putin is a monster and shouldn’t be in power, he can’t actually come right out and SAY that because it might have enormous negative consequences. Privately, he might deplore Putin, but he has to publicly show respect because calling for him to be overthrown could spark World War III. They’re now embracing Will Rogers’ century-old definition of “diplomacy,” that it’s the art of saying “Nice doggy” until you can pick up a rock.
Here’s my question: when did this standard come back? I heard for four years that if Trump didn’t publicly denounce Putin, if he “made nice” with him at summits, etc., it meant he was a tool of the Russians. If he even admitted that Putin was smart while criticizing him for taking advantage of dumb US policies, it meant he "admired" Putin or was colluding with Russia. But now, we must understand that Presidents can’t just blurt out any random nasty thought about Russia that crosses their minds because their words carry weight.
Funny how it took having a Democrat President who blurts out any random thought that crosses his mind for them to finally realize that.
5. A note on the Oscars
By “Huckabee” pop culture guru Pat Reeder (http://www.hollywoodhifi.com)
Since I’m the resident showbiz historian, trivia expert and movie lover, it would normally fall to me to report on last night’s Oscarcast. But I didn’t watch it. And if I didn’t watch it, I can’t imagine who did.
Oh, I took a stab at it. But I only lasted until the end of the three-way monologue in which Regina Bell, Wanda Sykes and Amy Schumer did lines about how sexist and racist Hollywood is (gee, it must be run by Republicans! Oh, wait...) and took a gratuitous swipe at Mitch McConnell (yeah, that’s who Americans are riled up at as they put their mortgage payments into their gas tanks – way to read the audience, ladies.) They ended by taunting viewers in Florida and chanting, “Gay, gay, gay,” proving that they not only didn’t understand what the NOT-“Don’t Say Gay” bill is, they also didn’t care if one of our most populous states immediately tuned out. Heck, I’m in Texas, and that’s the point where I switched to the “Hometown” marathon on HGTV.
By the way, were I writing their material, I wouldn’t be so eager to embrace the sexualizing of young children. Do you really want to remind the audience of what a hotbed of pedophilia Hollywood is? Or make us think about the former king of the Oscars, Harvey Weinstein, who’s currently doing a 23-year prison sentence for rape and facing additional charges? Since the holier-than-thou stars already seem to have forgotten about all that pesky MeToo business, here’s a reminder of it from Kyle Smith in 2018:
https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/11/hollywood-sex-grooming-gang-les-moonves-harvey-weinstein/
I caught up with the rest of the show later through reviews and clips, and it’s obvious that as with most of this year’s movies, I didn’t miss anything worth seeing. The only major nominees I saw were “Lucy and Desi” (I liked them; didn’t like the movie) and “Nightmare Alley,” because my wife Laura is a film noir fan. It was a remake of someone else’s original that was lavishly produced, only gorier, more lurid, not as well written and 40 minutes longer than the original. So pretty much the standard Hollywood product these days. That’s why most of the movies I saw in theaters in the past year were TCM revivals.
There were all the expected genuflections to current liberal political obsessions like trans people; plus the usual dumb production decisions, like replacing the tech awards with an idiotic Twitter poll, having “who the heck is that?” presenters instead of actual movie stars, and showing disrespect for the “In Memoriam” honorees by turning it into a production number. If they were going to set it to music, why not “Take Me When I’m Gone to Forest Lawn”?
But then the whole thing went permanently off the rails when Will Smith reacted to Chris Rock’s joke about his wife, Jada Pinkett-Smith by charging out of the audience and slapping Rock while twice yelling, “Keep my wife’s name out of your f---ing mouth!” That was bleeped on American TV, but went out over foreign broadcasts and is all over the Internet.
Instead of being arrested (and where was security, by the way?), Smith went back to his seat and was later rewarded with a Best Actor Oscar. He used his speech to cry, defend the assault as protecting his family, and apologize to the Academy (but not the guy he punched.) Several commentators noted that if it had been anyone else, he would have at least been removed if not arrested (and if he were white, charged with a hate crime), but certainly not rewarded and given an uninterrupted TV platform.
Incidentally, far funnier than Rock’s joke was a CNN commentator’s attempt to blame Smith’s assault on – you guessed it -- Donald Trump.
Now, you might argue that Rock’s joke was tasteless or cruel (and it was), and Smith was being gallant in defending his wife. But it’s hard to claim that this is the most glamorous, sophisticated night of the year when the most memorable moment was a star having a meltdown and assaulting a comedian for telling a joke he didn’t like while shouting the F-word twice. It made a WWE Smackdown look sophisticated. And these people dare lecture the rest of us on how we’re supposed to behave because WE’RE not tolerant enough?
FYI: Please don’t claim that Will Smith is the exception. Here’s a story about Sally “The Flying Nun” Field threatening to physically assault Govs. Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott (who’s in a wheelchair, by the way) because she disagrees with their views on unfettered abortion and sexualizing kindergartens.
There’s a famous book called “Everything I Need to Know, I Learned in Kindergarten.” Judging from this year’s Oscars, today’s celebrities act as if they’re still in kindergarten, and the only things they’ve learned there so far are sex lessons and gender politics.
6. “Where’s the beef?”
Is anyone old enough to remember Wendy’s “Where’s the beef?” commercials? (Bonus points if you remember the name of the lady who said it: Clara Peller.) Well, Bill Gates, who can afford all the beef he can eat, thinks you need to eat fake beef grown in labs.
Gates took a break from trying to force vaccines onto the entire world to promote a new scheme to save the planet: using government coercion and regulation to force people in wealthier nations to eat only “synthetic beef” (he assures us we’ll get used to the taste.) Lucky poor nations would still be allowed to eat real beef, but we’d replace their native livestock with genetically-modified animals that produce more beef per emissions.
No, I kid you not. This is not the plot of an old sci-fi dime novel. This is what happens to someone who has so much money, he starts mistaking himself for God.
If President Biden really wants to tax billionaires, I suggest that he tax a few billion from Bill Gates and use it to buy every American a Whopper, to repay us for the agony of having to deal with Windows and the hubristic emissions of Bill Gates.
7. News You Might Be Able To Use
A study from Italy uncovered some new information about the persistent symptoms of “long COVID” and who’s most likely to suffer from it.
https://www.foxnews.com/health/long-covid-symptoms-may-depend-variant-individual-contracted
8. Comparing leadership styles
This is a thought-provoking op-ed by Kevin McCullough at Townhall.com comparing the “leadership” style of President Biden to that of the winningest coach in college basketball history, Mike Krzyzewski. It might have you wishing Mike Krzyzewski was President instead. But then, you were probably already wishing that.
https://townhall.com/columnists/kevinmccullough/2022/03/27/the-embarrassment-in-chief-n2605091
I Just Wanted to Say
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