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BY MIKE HUCKABEE
Blessings on you and your family from all the Huckabee staff!
Thank you for subscribing and I hope you enjoy today’s newsletter.
Mike
DAILY BIBLE VERSE
No evil shall befall you, Nor shall any plague come near your dwelling; For He shall give His angels charge over you, To keep you in all your ways.
Psalm 91:10-11
READ MY SHOW MONOLOGUE
Governing and the Debt Deal
I spent the biggest part of this past week with all 7 of my grandchildren on a trip to the beach. I have spent most of the week dodging flying food, picking up more towels than you’d find in a Super Bowl locker room, and answering the same question 300 times a day, “Can I have a snack?” I fully expected to be duct-taped to a lawn chair in retaliation for not thinking that chocolate ice cream is not a proper breakfast food or that 6 popsicles a day is an adequate allotment of sugar. But, folks, I survived! And boy did I look forward to getting here to the studio this week!
I fully understand that Republicans only hold one half of the legislative branch of government while the other half is controlled by very liberal Democrats and that the Executive Branch is led by the most liberal President in history. I wasn’t expecting that the fight over the debt-ceiling would be something to cheer about, but I did hope that Speaker McCarthy would sit tight and play hard since the Republicans in the House were the only ones to actually pass a bill and put something specific on the table as opposed to Joe Biden and the Senate which did nothing. Biden wouldn’t even meet with McCarthy for 100 days and only got interested when the entire economy was at risk over the brinkmanship.
I wasn’t privy to the details of the negotiation so I’ll be somewhat cautious in my assessment of the “deal” that was made, but time will tell if we ended up with more symbolism than substance; more caving than taxpayer saving; more surrender than success.
The late, great Kenny Rogers had a famous song that reminded us that you “have to know when to hold ‘em; know when to fold ‘em. Know when to walk away. Know when to run.”
I sure wish Kenny Rogers had been in the room! Not sure, but I kind of think Kenny would for sure walked away and very likely would have run from a deal. But it’s probably the best we can get given that Republicans have a very slim majority in the House and the Dems control the Senate and some Democrat controls the White House, but we doubt it’s Joe Biden. Over 60% of Americans said they didn’t want a debt ceiling agreement that didn’t have spending cuts. We slowed some stuff, but didn’t stop it. Kind of like how Southerners in small towns don’t actually stop at stop signs, they just slow down and roll through them.
Governing is hard. Much harder than campaigning. I’ve done plenty of both. And both are much harder than commenting on elected officials and the things they do. It’s what I do now so I’ll tell you it’s the easiest job of all, so I am trying to be charitable and wait until we understand all the details. But what I’ve seen so far isn’t exactly making me giddy with joy that we have stood up to the big spenders in Congress and said, “NO! We need to live within a budget we can afford, just like all the taxpayers have to do.” Both the far left and the far right hate the bill and voted against it, which may be a good sign that no one loved it and most just accepted it as better than defaulting on our debt.
And that’s really the point. Do I want the government to default? Of course not. But neither do I want them to pretend that we can just keep spending money we don’t have and borrowing money we have no way to pay back.
Our world is crazy enough with retailers like Target choosing to become groomers and entice children to cross dress and parade perversion like it’s as normal and pretending to be a cowboy or princess. Disneyland now has a mustached man dressed like a woman to welcome children into one of its attractions. I don’t find ANYTHING attractive about it. So with all the crazy happening in the commercial world, I’d love to see our government act like responsible adults and start building budgets that won’t bankrupt our children and grandchildren and turn our nation into a future socialist cesspool. But it doesn’t look like that will be happening any time soon.
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BIDEN SCANDAL WATCH
FBI to bring House Oversight “the” Form 1023 alleging Biden bribery
Today’s the day that Kentucky Rep. James Comer, chairman of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, is supposed to be able to go into a “SCIF” and read the 5-6 pages of a Form 1023 alleging in detail that then-Vice President Biden took a $5 million bribe from a foreign national in exchange for a “desired outcome” on policy decisions. Earlier reports were that Comer would go alone to FBI headquarters to view it, but now Wray is supposed to deliver the document to the Oversight Committee at the Capitol building.
In an intriguing update, former Acting U.S. Attorney General Matt Whitaker told FOX NEWS Sunday evening that the alleged bribe is “from a country that’s not China, Russia Ukraine or Romania.” It’s from a “new country” that we haven’t heard about before allegedly influencing the Biden family. Whitaker also said “the redactions are going to be very interesting” and also that if it turns out the FBI never investigated this lead, “that raises many more questions than this document’s ever going to answer.”
Funny, from Biden’s behavior as President, any onlooker would be inclined to think it was China. (Maybe it was China, TOO.) For example (I’ll have more on this elsewhere today)…
Comer and Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, who heads a Senate committee dealing with whistleblowers, have been trying for weeks to gain access to the original unredacted document, which a whistleblower says contains a “precise description” of the criminal scheme. They issued a subpoena about a month ago, but the FBI refused to comply, citing the usual need to protect “sources and methods.”
From what he knows about the form, Comer can say it “tracks closely with what we are seeing in our investigation into the Biden family’s influence peddling schemes.”
Grassley has said a big concern of his was that the document would “become” classified. At the time of this writing, that hasn’t happened. Maybe they know they’d never survive the blowback from an action that looks THAT Nixonian.
As we mentioned Friday, Grassley says he’s actually seen this document. According to Margot Cleveland, he and Comer have had some time to run down leads and may have found more “evidentiary support” for the document’s claims. Good summary...
FOX NEWS Digital says, “The FBI offered to allow Comer and Grassley to review the document at FBI headquarters and later agreed to bring the physical document to Capitol Hill on Monday to review in a secure SCIF. The FBI is also expected to deliver a briefing to the lawmakers in that same setting on the Biden document and the allegations on Monday.”
Thanks to a FOX NEWS source, we’re tentatively learning more about the confidential human source (CHS) whose allegations were written up in the Form 1023 dated June 30, 2020. Yes, this person apparently had been used as a CHS before, going back “at least several years,” on multiple matters that were separate from the Biden case. He’d been consistently reviewed for his work with the FBI since the Obama years and been found “highly credible.”
The information in a “1023” has not yet undergone any further verification. The fact that a CHS brings it to the FBI does not in itself make it true. But if a “highly credible” CHS --- someone with whom they had a long history of receiving solid information --- came to them with such a serious, potentially treasonous, impeachment-worthy allegation, and they DIDN’T follow up, that tells you all you need to know about the level of corruption within the FBI. So it’s not just the Biden family in trouble here. It’s the very foundation of our ‘justice’ system, which, if this is how the sham “investigation” went down, appears to have rotted away.
The White House responded to FOX NEWS Digital with the exact same hyperbolic statement previously released by spokesman Ian Sams. If you didn’t see it or don’t recall how lame and over-the-top it was the first time they used it, it’s included here. It’s really fun to pick his words apart and note the various elements of unintentional humor.
GATEWAY PUNDIT has their own write-up of the scheduled document hand-over, with a link to Senior Editor-at-Large Joel Pollak’s piece from March saying Biden could potentially be impeached for bribery. Why, yes.
Constitutional scholars disagree on whether a President may be impeached for acts committed prior to taking office. (Never mind that he was VP during this activity.) According to Pollack, though, the Democrats undermined their own argument when they said Trump could be impeached over “emoluments” the moment he took office. They even put Trump on trial in the Senate after he had already left the Presidency!
But Pollak’s second point about impeachment makes more sense: that “it could well be argued that Biden’s foreign policy is an ongoing act affected by past financial benefit.” Before we can make that argument, though, we do need to know the nature of the specific quid pro quo named in the “1026” and which foreign entity was --- and possibly still is --- benefiting. It might even cross the line into treason, depending on what we learn.
https://www.breitbart.com/
House Oversight Committee member Anna Paulina Luna of Florida appeared Sunday with FOX NEWS’ Maria Bartiromo to say that the allegations against the Biden family are turning into a “hard case” with “literal bank documentation.” Luna believes that the allegations are true, and if they are shown to be, they are grounds for impeachment and for a “house cleaning” within the DOJ. The DOJ and FBI are protecting the Biden family, she said.
(By the way, in other news, Luna said of California Rep. Adam Schiff, “I have a privilege resolution that I’m bringing to the floor and we’re going to fine that man $16 million for using his position to lie to the American people…” In a separate resolution made last week, she called for his expulsion from Congress.)
https://nypost.com/2023/05/24/
Continuing, Bartiromo also gave an update on Israeli Defense Force Col. Gal Luft, the missing witness in the Oversight Committee’s Biden investigation. Luft had told the FBI during an interrogation in Brussels --- four weeks before Biden announced for President --- about payments made to Hunter and Jim Biden by Chinese energy company CEFC, and said later that Hunter’s laptop had verified his claims. He was being held on charges by the Biden administration of being an arms dealer, which he says he has never been, but jumped bail and is now hiding out. “DOJ is trying to bury me to protect, Joe, Jim and Hunter Biden,” Luft told the NEW YORK POST.
It was Luft who said Hunter had a mole, dubbed “One Eye” (not making this up) inside the FBI who advises Hunter’s team and tipped off the CEFC executives that they were under investigation. Luna said that by looking into this, all the members of the Oversight Committee have “big targets on their backs” but that they’re “doing right by the American people.” The details here make this a must-read.
Former FBI Director James Comey has been making the interview rounds with CNN and MSNBC; we had several we could’ve linked to but decided to spare you. However, one, with MSNBC correspondent Jen Psaki (I know, right?), deserves comment.
Comey has a new talking point: He fears that if Trump gets back in the White House, his will be a “retaliatory” presidency in which he’ll order the prosecution of his enemies. Okay, we’ll pause while you roll around on the floor laughing helplessly. Imagine an administration using the legal system to go after their political enemies! What would James Comey possibly know about THAT?
And then there’s this from Comey: “The President must be someone who abides by the law and our Constitution. And there is no one else but Joe Biden.” Again, pause for laughter.
Comey yet again brings up Russia, too, saying Putin does not want Biden to be President. But “he would very much like to see Donald Trump to be President again.” Good grief, that again? Recall that it was during Biden’s administration that Putin invaded Ukraine.
He warns that Trump would come at our agencies with “a flamethrower.” Personally, given what they’ve become, I can hardly think of a better reason to vote for Trump.
https://www.thegatewaypundit.
Bonchie at REDSTATE has an opinion piece on Comey’s interview in which he sounds a lot like me: “Yes, I can think about what four years of a retribution presidency might look like,” he says, “and I’m not seeing the problem with it.” In fact, it’s exactly what we need.
Another new poll shows that Americans do want sweeping changes at the FBI.
https://issuesinsights.com/
It shows that despite the best efforts of “news” outlets like MSNBC, the American people are somehow getting informed.
IN OTHER NEWS
Today’s “Huckabee” video links
I answer questions from viewers/readers, including the White House’s reaction to Biden corruption allegations and what changed Trump’s views on abortion.
https://www.mikehuckabee.com/
Here’s this weekend’s full episode of “Huckabee” from TBN, now viewable online. With Sen. Josh Hawley, comedy from “In Case You Missed It” and the hilarious Ross Bennett, music by Gordon Mote and much more.
https://www.mikehuckabee.com/
My interview with Sen. Josh Hawley on why he voted “No” on Speaker McCarthy’s debt ceiling bill.
https://www.mikehuckabee.com/
And for those who would like a readable text version of my TV monologue on Governing and the Debt Deal, just click here:
https://www.mikehuckabee.com/
Overlooked: The Plan to invade Iran
You might have wondered why I haven’t written anything yet about that alleged tape proving that Trump knew he’d removed a classified document from the White House. That’s because I applied my “72-hour rule.” Whenever the media go into foaming-at-the-mouth mode about some new “revelation” that’s for sure going to “get Trump this time” (yes, the walls are closing in, and he’ll soon be perp-walked into prison!!! – Rachel Maddow built a lucrative career on this stuff), I wait 72 hours for some facts to come out that will make it crumble like a month-old cupcake. I’ve yet to be disappointed.
But for once, this one brought a new twist. Not that I think there’s anything to the “Trump’s toast!!!” narrative, but it’s eye-opening to discover what this alleged, maybe-classified document was. Ben Bartee at PJ Media has the stunning details that the “Get Trump” media overlooked.
While outlets like CNN focused entirely on whether a secondhand claim that a portion of an audio tape of a 2021 meeting showed that Trump knew a document he had might still be classified (note that it’s an unnamed source quoting an out-of-context portion of a meeting for which there is allegedly only audio – and there’s a reason why radio is called “Theater of the Mind;” your imagination fills in the details), they didn’t tell us what that document was.
It’s been reported that it was a harebrained plan to potentially start World War III by invading Iran, drawn up by the liberal media’s idea of a great military leader, former Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark “Woke Pentagon” Milley. He was pushing this idea on President Trump, who, thank God, had the good sense to reject it. As Bartee notes, if this was classified, then it probably shouldn’t have been.
Now, as for all the “We’ve got him now!” stuff about whether Trump did or did not know whether a document he still had hadn’t been declassified yet: I could argue points of law and the Constitution, and remind you again that Presidents have the power to declassify documents in any way they want, that Congress can’t criminalize it because of separation of powers, and no previous President’s policy issued by executive order is binding on any subsequent President.
But I’m not going to wade into those weeds because frankly, I’m sick of it. All the furrow-browed talking heads on CNN, and all the liberal lawyers posting hour-long lectures on YouTube about how this is the greatest crime in history can go take a flying leap. I just don’t care. I don’t want to hear any more of your hypocritical balloon juice as you try to inflate this hole-ridden baggie into the Hindenburg. You're like Wile E. Coyote obsessing over catching the Roadrunner, only to have your plans blow up in your face for the 10,000th time.
Even if Trump had a document that was once classified and he can’t absolutely prove he didn’t wave his hand over it and say, “I declassify thee!” three times, I don’t care. He was the President. I know he saw classified documents. I know he had the power to declassify any of them. If some of them were packed up and inadvertently moved to his home, where they were in a locked room protected by Secret Service and armed private security until they were sorted and identified and any sensitive ones returned, I’m fine with that.
I honestly believe that the reason for all this hysteria over “Trump had a classified document!!” is the same reason behind most of the Trump Derangement Hysteria of the past six years. His opponents have never been able to wrap their tiny minds around the fact that he was actually the President, and Presidents have the power to do things like look at and declassify secret documents. We know Hillary Clinton has never been able to accept it; she even called Trump an “illegitimate President,” and nobody at MSNBC or CNN branded her as an election denier or an insurrectionist (although they should have; read the Durham Report.)
If you really want to convince me you care about the handling of classified documents, then let’s see some indictments of Hillary Clinton for leaving them on her personal devices (that she then destroyed while they were under subpoena), or of Joe Biden for leaving them in his garage where for all we know, Hunter rolled them up and snorted coke through them. But no, no reasonable prosecutor would charge Hillary, and the people investigating the Bidens were conveniently removed from their jobs.
FYI: Unlike Trump, neither of them had been President at the time and had any power to declassify documents. God willing, Hillary never will be.
So until I see some consistency in the left’s moral outrage over the handling of classified documents, they can just keep being hysterical over Trump, an actual President, possessing them. But that doesn’t mean I have to waste any more of my time listening to them prattle about it.
DC Security Breach
There were several tense hours Sunday after a private jet entered the no-fly zone over the US Capitol. Residents were even more alarmed when they heard two loud booms, but those were just the sonic booms of two F-16 fighter jets sent to intercept the plane.
https://www.foxnews.com/us/
It turned out not to be a threat. But sadly, the pilot of the Cessna was unresponsive. The plane later crashed near Montebello, Virginia. First responders said there were four people on board and no survivors. The plane was registered to the owner of Encore Motors of Melbourne Inc. It was reportedly carrying his daughter, his two-year-old granddaughter, her nanny and the pilot. We extend our prayers and sympathies to them and to their families.
GENDER POLITICS
Get Woke, Go Broke Update
Over the past couple of weeks, Target has lost nearly 20 percent of its market value, and leftist media outlets can’t seem to decide how to cover up that story. Oops, sorry: “how to COVER that story.” So they’re running with it in two opposite directions.
For instance, Newsweek insists that any conservative reaction to Target’s in-your-face promotion of “Pride Month” children’s clothing, including “tucking” swimsuits for little boys whose parents have decided that the kid knows he’s “trans,” was “probably negligible” to their falling stock price. No, that was just because of a flat first quarter sales report and a “gloomy forecast” for the rest of 2023, due to the pandemic boom being over.
On the other hand, the Washington Post thinks Target is suffering because of “bigoted” right-wing “extremists” having an “anti-democracy” boycott. I never knew you were endangering democracy by buying underwear and Hot Pockets at Walmart instead of Target.
https://www.theblaze.com/news/
And a commentator on MSNBC railed that the conservative boycott of Target is “economic terrorism. Literally terrorism.”
I’m sure he would argue that the many, many, many leftist boycotts designed to use economic pressure to make companies do what leftists want are not “literally terrorism,” but just capitalism at work. But I digress.
The amazing thing to me is that it took conservatives this long to figure out that giving their money to Target was enriching policies and organizations that had them and their values targeted for destruction. Last week, I reminded you that Target was the first major chain to allow men into women’s restrooms and fitting rooms, and I mentioned that they’ve always been a liberal company. The CEO even boasted of how “woke capitalism” was good for their business (maybe he’s changed his mind now, I hope.)
But just to hammer it home, Hannah Grossman at Fox News has compiled a lengthy list of some of the radical organizations that Target has funded over the years. In addition to various CRT, DEI, defund the police and anti-Second Amendment groups, the company donated to a group that demands the US return all public lands to indigenous tribes, including Mount Rushmore, because it’s “an international symbol of White supremacy and colonization.” How leftist are you when you're targeting Mount Rushmore?
Related video: An asset manager explains to Jesse Watters why corporations “go woke” even when they know they’ll go broke.
Define Woke
The wokesters have a new defense, now that they see Americans are on to their con game. It’s one of their favorite dodges: playing innocent and claiming that, why, they don’t even know what “woke” means! They’re daring their opponents to define “woke.”
https://instapundit.com/
https://instapundit.com/
They know it’s difficult because “woke” is like the Supreme Court’s ruling on pornography: it’s hard to describe exactly what it is, but you know it when you see it. That’s because it covers so much territory, from lying about American history and culture while claiming to be correcting historical misinformation, to bringing back racist concepts like judging people by their skin color while claiming to be fighting racism, to pushing dangerous quack science like “transgender” surgery on confused children while claiming to be “protecting” children. It’s all in the effort of dividing Americans, pitting us against each other, weakening our common bonds and values, and turning children against their own nation, religions and cultural heritage because a house divided against itself cannot stand, and making America crumble is the goal.
Wokeness is an assault on decency, science, the truth and common sense while claiming to be the only defenders of decency, science, the truth and common sense. And anyone who opposes it is just a stupid, racist, transphobic hater, because while leftist wokesters are champions of diversity, nobody’s view but theirs has any legitimacy. In short, it’s the American version of China forcing a dunce cap on anyone who questions the communist regime's dogma and parading them down the street to be jeered and beaten until they admit that things they know are true are false and things they know are false are true.
Gov. Ron DeSantis was challenged to define “woke,” and he didn’t hesitate to respond:
https://www.yahoo.com/
“Look, we know what woke is, it’s a form of cultural Marxism. It’s about putting merit and achievement behind identity politics, and it’s basically a war on the truth. And as that has infected institutions, and it has corrupted institutions. So, you’ve got to be willing to fight the woke, we’ve done that in Florida, and we proudly consider ourselves the state where woke goes to die.”
So don’t fall for the disingenuous “define ‘woke’” challenge. Just tell anyone who says it that first, they have to define what a “woman” is.
Related: Stephen Kruiser at PJ Media on how we’re only five days into Pride Month, and most Americans are already bone weary of hearing about it. Also, the attitude of “You will be made to care!” seems to be working, but not in the way radical activists intended.
Taylor Swift pushes radical trans/LGBTQAI+++/pro-abortion propaganda to her young fans
Taylor Swift built a massive following by wisely staying out of politics and concentrating on music, fashion and fun. But a few years ago, under pressure from the leftwing music media and Twitter mobs, she abandoned that stance and dived headfirst into the Democrat-endorsing business. Now, Christian and conservative parents of “Swiftie” ‘tween girls might be shocked if they saw just how hard Taylor is pushing the radical trans/LGBTQAI+++/pro-abortion propaganda to her young fans on her current tour.
Not that kids aren’t already getting that forced onto them everywhere else, even in schools. Check out this infuriating story out of Kellogg High School in Kellogg, Idaho (a state you’d think would have more respect for free speech and common sense.)
Graduating seniors were asked to share words of wisdom with underclassmen, so Travis Lohr said this: “Guys are guys and girls are girls. There is no in-between.”
Oh my gosh, grab the smelling salts! For stating the obvious, Lohr was banned from participating in the graduation ceremony. That sparked a huge protest by parents, and to their immense credit, many of his classmates walked out in protest of his punishment. But school officials refused to back down and instead postponed the graduation, claiming that “threats” had made it “unsafe.”
So here we go with that again. Leftists try to stomp on the rights of conservatives, and if the conservatives protest, the leftists cry that they feel “unsafe” from all these “threats!” I suspect the only threat they’re really afraid of is the threat of losing their jobs, which should be more than a threat.
The most mature person quoted in this entire story is 18-year-old Travis Lohr. He said kids today have a lot of support for gays and transgender people and other groups, “but yet I don’t see any support for people who just believe in two (genders). I don’t have any hatred toward gay people or transgenders — just like I hope they wouldn’t have any resentment toward me for believing what I believe…Everyone can speak freely, I can’t see why I can’t voice my opinion.
The people running that school should listen to his “words of wisdom.” The only thing he got wrong is that what he said isn’t an opinion. It’s a biological fact.
Permalink: https://www.mikehuckabee.com/2023/6/huckabee-post
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