Mike Huckabee

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

Today's newsletter includes:

• Bible Verse of the Day - Psalm 19:1
• "MacGuffins"
• Biden's invisible gremlin
• Haitian migrants update
• A mess of his own making
• More Election Audit Fallout
• Answer to reader about edited Maricopa County audit report

Sincerely,

Mike Huckabee

"Macguffins"

By Mike Huckabee

There are many people who suspect, with good reason, that a number of the stories the White House and media are obsessing over, from horseback Border Patrol agents "whipping" migrants to vaccine mandates, are all what Hitchcock called “MacGuffins,” just inventions meant to distract you from the real story, and that’s the horrifying situation Biden created in Afghanistan.

At the link, former US ambassador to El Salvador and Afghanistan war veteran Ron Johnson recaps what’s actually happened in Afghanistan over the past few weeks and debunks some of the many lies we’re being told about it.

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/biden-afghanistan-fiasco-horrors-amb-ron-johnson

And there’s the latest from the new, “moderate,” businesslike Taliban that Biden thinks we can trust and deal with: they’re now displaying dead bodies in public and leaving one swinging from a crane as a lesson to the public.

https://www.theblaze.com/news/taliban-hang-bodies-crane-afghanistan

And yes, it’s being reported (not by liberal outlets, of course) that there are still many Americans and allies of America stuck in Afghanistan, left behind to face the Taliban’s brutality by the Biden Administration

https://redstate.com/jeffc/2021/09/25/president-biden-is-still-leaving-americans-others-stranded-in-afghanistan-n447923

Biden's invisible gremlin

By Mike Huckabee

Like the little boy in “Family Circus” who blames everything he breaks on an invisible gremlin named “Not Me,” nothing is ever President Biden’s fault. Friday, he again tried to blame his myriad self-caused disasters on his predecessor, Donald Trump, whining, “Take a look at what I inherited when I came into office.”

https://www.westernjournal.com/biden-attempts-blame-trump-crises-mount-look-inherited/

That prompted several conservatives to comply by listing just a few things that Biden inherited from Trump: the most secure Southern border in history, two vaccines (and a distribution system that was already inoculating nearly 100,000 Americans a day), energy independence, an intelligent and safe Afghanistan withdrawal plan, and Bagram Air Base and 2500 soldiers to provide flexibility. I might add that he also inherited an incredibly strong economy that was bouncing back after being artificially shut down over COVID, cases of which were declining (Reminder: Biden blamed Trump – not China – for every COVID death on Trump’s watch, and now he blames Trump supporters for every COVID death on his own watch.)

Oh, and he also blamed the weather. And “racist” Border Patrol agents who whipped Haitians, even though they really didn’t (that was just their reins flying; they don’t carry whips or whip people with their reins.) And the Haitians wouldn’t even have been there if it weren’t for his calamitous border policies that are luring illegal immigrants into the USA by the tens of thousands.

https://www.westernjournal.com/biden-admin-released-12000-haitians-us-thousands-processing/

That unfounded attack on the Border Patrol agents proved too much even for former Democratic Presidential candidate and Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, who blasted Biden for acting as judge, jury and executioner by smearing the agents as violent racists without waiting for any evidence. She said, “He’s absolutely wrong and he needs to apologize to the American people for saying what he said.”

https://www.westernjournal.com/tulsi-gabbard-savages-biden-issuing-warning-absolutely-wrong-needs-apologize-american-people/

I won’t hold my breath waiting for Biden to apologize or even to acknowledge his own part in setting the various fires that are nipping at his feet (he learned from Obama to accuse people of racism and wait for the facts to appear later), but I do have some good news for those falsely-accused Border Patrol agents. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said he wants them to know, “If they are at risk of losing their job by a President who is abandoning his duty to secure the border, you have a job in the state of Texas. I will hire you to help Texas secure our border.”

They should be working for Texas instead of the feds, anyway. They know how to ride a horse, which is obviously something nobody in Washington understands at all.

Haitian migrants update

By Mike Huckabee

Speaking of the 12,000 Haitian illegal immigrants that have disappeared from under the bridge in Del Rio, there seems to be some confusion about where they disappeared to. DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas claimed they are in immigration proceedings, with the implication being that they were returned to Mexico or wherever they had been living.

But former Acting ICE Director Tom Homan accused Mayorkas of misleading the public. He says, as we reported here last week, that they were just given “notices to report.” That means they were released into the United States and will only be in “immigration proceedings” if they actually honor the government’s “request” that they show up at an ICE office to turn themselves in.

https://www.foxnews.com/media/homan-mayorkas-haitian-migrants-border-numbers-wallace

I’d say that’s about as likely as President Biden honoring my request that he resign.

A mess of his own making

By Mike Huckabee

More Election Audit Fallout

By Mike Huckabee

On Monday, Dan Bongino provided an overview of the numbers that came out of the Maricopa County election audit and presented some of his “major concerns.” Keep in mind that in the entire state of Arizona, the so-called margin of victory between Biden and Trump was just over 10,000 votes. It’s impossible to overstate how important accuracy was in this unbelievably close election, especially in a huge metropolitan area such as Maricopa County.

Bongino introduced his discussion by explaining the difference between RELIABILITY and VALIDITY. If a scale is calibrated to measure 10 pounds over what the real weight is, that is a reliable measure, even if it’s wrong. You know it’s always going to be 10 pounds heavier than what the scale says. “Something can be reliable but reliably wrong,” he said. So the result it's giving you is not VALID. It’s inaccurate, and you’d have to take that into account.

Likewise, even if you know that elections are reliably off by one or two percentage points because of fraud, that doesn’t mean the results are valid. In a case where the “winner” is shown to be ahead by less than the reliable margin of error, there is NO valid measure of the outcome. I would add that in an election as close as Arizona’s, that would seem to be the case.

Let’s look at a few of these numbers. At first glance, they are staggering. Just in Maricopa County, roughly 23,300 mail-in ballots came from people who were not residing at the address from which they voted.

Also, there were 17,300 duplicate ballots, as well as 2,300 voters who cast a vote in Maricopa County but had moved out of that county.

But voting officials say they can explain at least some of this. For example, of the 23,000 mail-in voters who didn’t reside at the address the ballots had been mailed from, it appears that about 15,000 had simply moved within the county and put the old address on the envelope. So those 15,000 weren’t necessarily from people who voted twice, and they do count. Even so, and very importantly, that still leaves 8,000 ballots.

Officials also say that about 1,700 of those 23,000 had moved out of Maricopa County entirely and were living elsewhere in Arizona, so they were still entitled to vote for President. They weren’t necessarily committing fraud (unless they voted again in their new county; we don’t know).

Officials also determined, he said, that about 33 percent of those mail-in ballots with different addresses were from Republican voters. The rest, presumably, came from Democrats. (I could make a joke here about Democrats being twice as likely not to even know their own addresses, but I will refrain.)

There were also 3,432 “excess” votes. That means they were part of the count but didn’t show up as actual votes. County election officials have offered an explanation: that those votes might have been cast might by victims of domestic abuse who were under protective orders and whose records were not publicly available for the audit. That does seem like a great many people, county-wide, to be under protective orders; I’m sure that figure will be looked at more closely in coming days. Could officials not make available the redacted records, just to show there really were that many?

Of the more than 17,000 duplicate ballots, officials say that about 9,000 were “cured.” In other words, about 9,000 people submitted one ballot but were called back because of some problem with it. Then they submitted a new, corrected ballot, and presumably, that was the only one counted. I don’t know how auditors check that; maybe there’s a way. But even if those are explained, that still leaves about 8,000 cases of duplicate balloting that are NOT explained. Combine that with the roughly 8,000 ballots that had unexplained incorrect addresses and you’ve got 16,000 potential tabulation errors in Maricopa County alone. Again, the margin for the ENTIRE STATE was just over 10,000.

“Arizona’s got some explaining to do,” Bongino said, wondering what it is about facts and data that seem to bother people so much when you bring them up. “If there was fraud, wouldn’t you want to know that?” he asked.

Well, I'd say that if you’re a Democrat --- or an anti-Trump Republican --- and the discovery of the fraud might mean the Democrat didn’t really win, the answer to that question is a hearty NO. You would not want to find that out. It’s quite simple, really.

And in battleground states such as Arizona, state officials are fighting tooth-and-nail to avoid election audits. What does this tell us? Even if the fraud isn’t to the level that would prove Trump actually won, Bongino said, “the Democrats still don’t want you to see the extent to which our elections are a mess without really good, strong voter I.D. where it’s easy to vote and hard to cheat.”

Of course, this audit didn’t even get into the accuracy of the voting machines. Not that the auditors hadn't hoped to, but neither government officials nor Dominion Voting Systems cooperated. Apparently there’s one master administrative password that Dominion won’t relinquish. They’ve tried to have it both ways by withholding supposedly exculpatory evidence AND suing their critics.

So far, they’ve sued or threatened to sue a host of entities, including NEWSMAX, OAN, OAN CEO Robert Herring and his son, OAN president Charles Herring, FOX NEWS, Lou Dobbs, Judge Jeanine Pirro, Rudy Giuliani, Patrick Byrne (who was working with the Arizona audit), Mike Lindell and others. They say they’re considering suing Donald Trump. They’ve sent out over 150 cease-and-desist letters. Smartmatic, another electronic voting systems company, is suing Lou Dobbs, Judge Pirro and Maria Bartiromo.

Dominion made a splash suing Sidney Powell, hoping that would silence her, and the litigation did dramatically lessen her media presence. But now Powell is countersuing Dominion, saying that company has adopted litigation as a public relations strategy. As part of its “lawfare” campaign, she says, Dominion has “filed billion-dollar-plus lawsuits against separate defendants at critical and strategically planned times.” She claims that this behavior is an abuse of process and demands $10 million in damages, plus punitive damages. She also warns that “continued scrutiny of the vulnerabilities of the Dominion voting systems would likely open its executives to criminal and civil liability.” Despite executives’ sworn statements and assurances, she says, “the Dominion patents and manuals expressly provide for remote access to real-time election results, to adjudicate or flip votes, to delete audit logs and votes and other vulnerabilities.”

Powell hits them with no less than 25 different affirmative defenses. Details here.

https://presscalifornia.com/2021/09/27/kitty-sidney-powell-countersues-dominion-for-bad-pr-and-fraud/

Please note that unlike the linked-to opinion piece detailing Powell’s defense, we are not calling the Dominion executives “illegal fraudsters.” Certainly not. But there is still no valid reason we have seen to discount the possibility that they are. Perhaps if they gave auditors the password and allowed a transparent analysis of their system, that would give us a reason. In the meantime, they do seem to be using offensive tactics as their defense, which strongly suggests that they HAVE no real defense besides "lawfare" and withholding evidence that auditors need.

LEAVE ME A COMMENT, I READ THEM>>>

Answer to reader about edited Maricopa County audit report

By Mike Huckabee

This reader comment was in response to our piece, “Who edited the Maricopa County audit report?”

From Howard A:

You got trolled by a fake leaked draft. I guess you missed the part of the actual final report where they announced that Joe Biden got more votes than Donald Trump.

From the Gov:

No, we certainly were not “trolled,” as we made it clear we were still verifying the draft as authentic. “It has been reported...” we said. “If this is true...” “If that’s the case...” “No accusations, just a call for answers.”

Does that sound like we bought into it at the outset? If just calling for answers is going to be criticized, there is little hope for enlightening discourse in this country.

But mostly, we wonder where you got YOUR information, about the earlier draft being fake. If you go to Patrick Byrne’s website, he has that original draft right there --- complete with the part about the election results not being reliable or certifiable, the part that does not appear in the final version. If that draft was fake, why is it on Patrick Byrne’s own website?

https://www.deepcapture.com/2021/09/based-on-these-factual-findings-the-election-should-not-be-certified-and-the-reported-results-are-not-reliable/

And, no, we didn’t miss the part of the report that said Joe Biden got more votes than Donald Trump. In fact, we referred to the problem with that count as being that they were “just recounting the same ballots over again.” It does no good simply to recount the same issue-plagued ballots, and for that reason the recount was just one of many things the auditors were looking at.

Byrne also has an exhaustive list of other problems turned up by the audit that we haven’t yet had a chance to go through. After that loooooong list, he says, “Which our craven and literacy-challenged MSM reports as, “Maricopa County audit shows Biden still won.” You're just repeating what our craven and literacy-challenged MSM told you. So, Howard, who was really trolled here, us or you?

Mike Huckabee

Friday, the findings were announced from the Arizona Senate audit of the 2020 Presidential vote in Maricopa County. The way it was reported reminded me of the classic movie “Rashomon,” which invented the concept of completely different versions of the same story being told by different narrators.

Conservative outlets focused on the many irregularities that the audit turned up, such as over 17,000 duplicate ballots, 23,344 mail-in ballots voted from people’s prior addresses, 2,382 in-person voters who’d moved out of the county outside the window of eligibility, and other issues. The total ballots that had something questionable about them was 57,734, far more than Biden’s 10,457-vote margin of victory in Arizona.

https://www.westernjournal.com/az-auditors-say-17000-duplicate-ballots-found-maricopa-county-1-5-times-biden-won/

Meanwhile, liberal outlets trumpeted the finding that the hand recount of ballots that were accepted in the county showed Biden did win, even picking up a few hundred more votes than originally reported. This wasn’t unexpected, since they were just recounting votes that had already been recounted (and I’ve noticed that whenever you do that, the Democrat total always increases for some reason.)

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/maricopa-county-gop-audit-confirms-biden-2020-victory-in-arizona/ar-AAONkSM?ocid=BingNewsSearch

Incidentally, does anyone else find it amusing that after months of attacking the auditors as crazy, unqualified, unreliable hacks who shouldn’t be listened to, that when they produced a finding Democrats liked, liberal media outlets trumpeted the news as, “Audit vindicates Biden!”

So what conclusion can be drawn from this? Frankly, nothing solid, other than that Arizona needs to get a firm grip on its election procedures going forward. The auditors were blocked from obtaining all the data they needed, and while they found a lot of suspicious irregularities, they also found no hard proof that Biden didn’t win. None of this is going to undo the 2020 election results, no matter how much a growing number of Americans wish it would.

So I’ll just remind you of what I’ve said on several occasions since the November election: it’s not necessary to believe in rigged voting machines or stuffed ballot boxes or any other elaborate chicanery with the altered voting rules to conclude that this was not a fair election. Even if you put all that aside, we know it wasn’t fair because the people who ensured it was unfair not only admitted it, they bragged about it.

We’ve all read about how news outlets and social media platforms proudly threw out any pretense of objectivity to become organs of the Biden campaign, censoring conservative voices, trumpeting any negative news (even fake) about Trump and casting doubt on anything positive about him. Meanwhile, they promoted Biden relentlessly and hid damaging stories like the Hunter Biden laptop revelations from the voters (they called that “disinformation” until Biden was safely elected, and now it’s just “information.”) The media collusion with the Democrats alone was enough to certify this as a blatantly unfair election.

And if anyone on the left protests that their collusion with the Democrats is not rigging an election, remember: they still cling to the claim that the 2016 election was rigged because Trump colluded with Russia to manipulate the media, and that didn’t even turn out to be true.

Mike Huckabee

Kash Patel, former lead investigator for the Republican-led House Intelligence Committee, appeared on EPOCH TV over the weekend to talk about the Sussmann indictment. This video provides a concise overview of what we’ve been talking about the past week and offers additional details as well.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/kashs-corner-more-indictments-are-coming-unraveling-the-origins-of-the-russia-collusion-hoax_4015931.html?utm_source=ATLNewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2021-02-19

For example, Patel said that Sussmann and Marc Elias were the two top lawyers at Perkins Coie overseeing all legal issues of the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee. Sussmann is not some peon.

He also commented, as we have, about the unusual length of the indictment, saying this is not at all a typical indictment for one count of making a false statement, which might run a couple of pages, This runs 27 pages and is what’s known as a “speaking indictment.”

Sussmann and Elias brought in “tens of millions of dollars” to handle “everything from election law to campaign finance to any criminal allegations that might come up, to state law...” Indeed, we saw how Elias jetted around to different states before the election with a brigade of attorneys filing lawsuits to change state election laws.

Patel described Perkins Coie as a “behemoth.” It had to be one, to handle all the legalities –- and illegalities, ha –- of the Democrats’ run for President. These two attorneys also went out and hired “internet research” (campaign dirt) firm Fusion GPS, paying founder Glenn Simpson million of dollars for whatever his team could come up with, including the “Russia” stories. Of course, Simpson hired Christopher Steele. As you and I knew, it all traces back to Hillary Clinton.

Patel laid all this out in a most understandable way, so if you know people who are confused by all the twists and turns, just send them our summary, which includes the link, above.

He noted that opposition research is a normal part of political campaigns, and I can tell you from experience that this is true. Candidates even run oppo research on themselves, just to see what comes up. If they find something that might be an issue, their opponent certainly will.

It was just a few days before the election that the phony Alfa Bank story hit. And Hillary tweeted: “It’s time for Trump to answer some serious questions about his ties to Russia.” There was no basis in fact here at all, but the tweet included these fake bullet points:

1. Donald Trump has a secret server. [Aside: I know. That was HRC!]

2. It was set up privately to communicate with Putin-tied Alfa Bank.

3. When a reporter asked about it, they shut it down.

4. One week later, they created a new server with a different name for the same purpose.

As we now know, the FBI used this information in its FISA request for surveillance. Sussmann was the one who passed it to them. And then he lied about working on anyone else's behalf.

In examining what happened, Patel did what we like to do, which is to turn it around and ask “what if” the Trump campaign were found to have hired a law firm to research and “find” a connection between Clinton campaign headquarters and the Russian government, created a fake story about the Clinton campaign “pinging” back and forth through a bank to coordinate with the Russians, and released this to the media and the FBI right before the 2016 election?

“That would’ve been international headline news,” he said, and we all know that’s true. But it’s just the opposite when the CLINTON campaign is found to have done this. The media give it the tiniest bit of coverage possible. But Patel doesn’t think they can get away with that much longer.

He noted in this interview that Robert Mueller’s special counsel investigation was charged with (among other things) finding out how the Alfa bank story fit in and if there was really anything to it. The House Intelligence Committee was looking into this at the same time and hadn’t come out with their report, as they were “just staffers on the Hill,” operating without subpoena power, etc. Mueller had sweeping subpoena power and cooperation from law enforcement.

Patel puts this Sussmann indictment together with that of Kevin Clinesmith, whom you’ll recall was charged with altering an official record that was used against Carter Page in the FISA warrant to spy on him. When looking at both of these, he sees that together they cover “two big components” of the investigation into the Russia Hoax. The former deals with the phony media campaign, outside the government, and the latter with the phony investigation going inside the government. “So, I think there’s a larger conspiracy at play here,” he said.

He sees this in the long “speaking indictment” that Durham has filed. Though most of the conspirators aren’t named, he's pretty confident of most of those identities, “if not all of them.”

“I think he’s just started,” Patel said of Durham.

IMPORTANT POINT: One thing the media are saying right now is that Durham’s investigation has gone on so long, he’s coming to the end of his official funding in just a few days and needs to wrap it up. (They wish!) According to Patel, the investigation cannot be shut down because Durham has just issued a federal indictment and this case has to be adjudicated in some fashion, by plea or by trial, which typically takes 12-18 months. In the meantime, Durham gets to continue his work. “So, I laugh at anyone in the media who tells me they’re worried about Durham being defunded,” he said. “He literally CAN’T, because he’s in the middle of a federal prosecution.”

It occurs to me that this might be another reason for Durham’s under-the-wire timing of the Sussmann indictment.

One concern Patel does have is a potential conflict of interest for the judge assigned Sussmann’s case: U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper. His wife, prominent DC attorney Amy Jeffress, is a former top aide to then-Attorney General Eric Holder. She has represented...(drum roll, please)...Lisa Page, who reported to Andrew McCabe and, along with him, is one of the most central figures in this scandal. She worked for FBI general counsel James Baker, who is the one who reviewed the FISA applications, and also teamed (very closely) with Peter Strzok, who led “Crossfire Hurricane”!

I’m sorry, but that big a conflict just will not fly. How did this judge GET the case, anyway?

As Patel pointed out, Lisa Page might very well be a witness in Sussmann’s trial. (I would add that apparently there WILL be a trial, as Sussmann has already pleaded “not guilty.”) Conflicts of interest can be cited simply over the possibility of such things happening. As wild as it seems, unless the case is reassigned, we could easily have a situation in which a witness in the case has been represented by the judge’s wife.

The judge should recuse himself, or the attorney general should reassign the case. But with Merrick Garland at the helm, how do we trust this process?

Mike Huckabee

After House Speaker Nancy Pelosi caved to the Squad and stripped $1 billion in funding for Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system from a budget bill, the House on Thursday voted overwhelmingly to pass a bipartisan stand-alone bill to fund it.

https://redstate.com/bonchie/2021/09/23/aoc-starts-crying-as-the-lunatics-come-out-to-play-during-the-iron-dome-funding-vote-n447132

The usual small coterie of far-left anti-Semites opposed the bill, couching it as opposition to (as Rep. Rashida Tlaib put it) enabling and supporting “war crimes, human rights abuses and violence.” FYI: the Iron Dome is a purely defensive system that intercepts terrorist missiles fired by Hamas at Israeli civilians. I’m not sure how it’s a “war crime” to prevent terrorists from blowing up Jewish children.

In a remarkable sideshow to the vote, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez proved once again that while her ideas on politics and economics may be stunningly stupid, she’s a genius at media manipulation. It was reported that she planned to vote “no” along with her fellow anti-Semitic radical colleagues, but when the time came, she voted “Present,” likely because she didn’t want that “no” on her record – especially not if she has to deal with a newly redrawn district that will contain more Jewish voters.

HOWEVER...AOC did treat us to a prime slice of hammy political theater. Check out the video of her after the bill passed, showing her “crying” and hugging a colleague as she dabs away her tears. Also note how she walked up next to another Representative who was speaking at the time, which “coincidentally” ensured that her theatrical tears were nationally-televised. Madonna couldn’t have done it better (to cite another great media manipulator who also reminds us of Evita Peron.)

But as the writer Bonchie at Redstate.com asks, WHY was she crying? Was that meant to show us how upset she is at all those alleged war crimes and human rights violations that Israel commits in defending itself against terrorists that want to wipe it off the face of the Earth? Because the only other explanations are (A.) she’s upset that Hamas missiles won’t be able to blow up Israeli children, or (B.) she’s upset about Congress spending a billion dollars. Which of those explanations seems less likely to you?

Mike Huckabee

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

Today's newsletter includes:

• Bible Verse of the Day - Philippians 4:7
• Russia hoaxers said one thing under oath, another under TV lights
• Sources name names in Durham's conspiracy case
• He's running
• God help us
• New podcast episode
• Reader testimonials
• Hymnal

Sincerely,

Mike Huckabee

DAILY BIBLE VERSE

7 And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.

Philippians 4:7

Russia hoaxers said one thing under oath, another under TV lights

By Mike Huckabee

Yesterday’s installment on the significance of Special Counsel John Durham’s 27-page indictment of Hillary attorney Michael Sussmann included insights from Kash Patel, lead investigator for Rep. Devin Nunes’ investigation into the “Russia Hoax.” As it happens, Thursday’s edition of the NEW YORK POST had a story relating to those very House Intelligence Committee transcripts Patel was assembling. It shows how different the hoaxers’ sworn testimony was from what they were saying publicly.

https://nypost.com/2020/05/11/obamas-top-brass-contradict-statements-about-collusion-under-oath/

For example, let’s take James Clapper, former Director of National Intelligence. (The DNI’s job is to coordinate the huge and sticky web of government intel agencies.) We already knew that Clapper’s vow to tell the truth doesn’t mean much, as he has told some enormous whoppers, notably that the National Security Agency didn’t intercept Americans’ phone messages “wittingly.”

But as Emily Jacobs points out in her report for the NYP, Clapper stepped carefully during his testimony in July 2017 before the House Intel Committee, informing the committee that he “never saw any direct empirical evidence that the Trump campaign or someone in it was plotting [or] conspiring with the Russians to meddle with the election.”

What the hey?? As DNI, Clapper would have been privy to everything that was being gathered about Trump “colluding” with Russia. And he was saying hadn’t seen any direct evidence at all? Amazingly, yes, though he went on to try to make it sound as if there were SOME reason to suspect it.

“That’s not to say that there weren’t concerns about the evidence we were seeing...anecdotal evidence...[redacted],” he said. “But I do not recall any instance when I had direct evidence of the content of these meetings. It’s just the frequency and prevalence of them was of concern.”

Contrast this careful, noncommittal statement with what he had said a couple of months before to Chuck Todd on NBC’s MEET THE PRESS. On NBC, when he wasn’t under oath, he sensationalized quite a bit, using the cloak of “classification” to keep from having to be at all specific about any conversations but saying his “dashboard light was clearly on.”

A month after that, speaking with reporters on a trip to Australia, Clapper said the Russia investigation had far surpassed Watergate. “I think if you compare the two that Watergate pales, really, in my view, compared to what we’re confronting now,” he told them.

In light of what is said today in Durham’s indictment, we find Clapper’s comparison of Trump/Russia “collusion” to Watergate quite hilarious. If anything is reminiscent of Watergate, it’s the coordinated antics of these deep-state clowns working overtime to frame then-candidate Trump with fake “Russia” stories in fictional “dossiers” and surveillance warrants.

As Jacobs reports, Clapper was beating this dead horse as recently as February 2019, saying on CNN that “it was a possibility” that President Trump was a “Russian asset,” “whether witting or unwitting.”

Clapper’s not the only one who tread lightly in sworn testimony while stomping like Riverdance for the TV news cameras. Former deputy director of the CIA Andrew McCabe told Nunes’ committee that investigators had not been able to verify the claims in the Steele dossier. When asked to confirm that he didn’t know if the dossier was true, Steele testified, “That’s correct.”

But he spoke differently in his role as CNN contributor (!) and in other TV appearances. In February 2019, in an interview on 60 MINUTES, McCabe dramatically described Trump as “the man who had just run for the presidency, and won the election for the presidency, and who might have done so with the aid of the government of Russia, our most formidable adversary on the world stage.” As he had already told the Intel Committee in December 2017 that he had no verification of any claims, he had to know that what he was saying to the TV audience was a huge fragrant pile of bull droppings, yet he told the TV audience it “troubled” him “greatly.”

The same kind of discrepancy is evident in the word-craft of Ben Rhodes, officially Obama’s deputy national security adviser but in practice his personal narrative writer. When asked under oath by the Intel Committee if he had any evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, he said no. But in 2019, after then-Special Counsel Robert Mueller testified before Congress (remember that train wreck?), Rhodes tweeted, “Russia attacked our democracy. Trump campaign sought its help, had many contacts with Russians, lied about it and obstructed the investigation into it. Several Trump associates were convicted of crimes. Trump would’ve been indicted if he wasn’t the President. Not complicated.”

If anything isn’t complicated, it’s that Rhodes is good at using what little he has to work with to craft a story that really is based on nothing. No Trump associates were convicted of crimes that had anything to do with Russian collusion. “Contacts with Russians” is meaningless. Rhodes had seen no evidence of any of this, as he himself had testified under oath.

(By the way, if I hear the phrase “our democracy” one more time from some sanctimonious leftist, please forgive me in advance for the way I might respond. Leftists are perfectly willing to upend “our democracy” with strategies designed to fracture the election system, facilitate fraud and shut down transparency. They quite obviously think of it as THEIR democracy –- to be manipulated at will to keep THEM in control –- and they consistently show themselves to be unclear on the concept of a democratic republic. I digress.)

Jacobs also mentions former U.N. ambassador Samantha Power. When Power was asked under oath by the Intel Committee if she’d seen evidence of Russian interference, she said, “I am not in possession of anything –- I am not in possession and didn’t read or absorb information that came from out of the intelligence community.” But that didn’t stop her from tweeting in November of last year: “Every day Donald Trump finds new ways to compensate Vladimir Putin for his election interference. And every day, Putin gains additional incentive to interfere again on Trump’s behalf in 2020.”

She failed to provide examples, but that’s because this was totally made up, and it’s a lot easier and safer to generalize than offer specifics. (One could easily make the case that Trump was HARD on Russia.) Again, Power had testified that she didn’t read or even “absorb” information about this.

Finally, there’s Obama’s national security adviser Susan Rice, whom we already knew can lie with ease, as she did repeatedly to cover for the State Department after the Benghazi attack. In 2017, Rice told House investigators that she’d seen no evidence Trump colluded with Russia to win in 2016. But in July 2018 on ABC’s THIS WEEK, she said it was “legitimate” to question whether Trump had been compromised by Russia because his decisions were in the service of Vladimir Putin. Good grief.

So you see how Trump’s adversaries could take essentially NOTHING –- no evidence whatsoever, as they testified under oath –- and whip it into a tale as tall as Trump Tower. But it was just full of froth. If only Durham could indict them all for lying on TV.

LEAVE ME A COMMENT, I READ THEM!!!

Sources name names in Durham's conspiracy case

By Mike Huckabee

We recently reported on the fact that Jake Sullivan, one of the players in the anti-Trump “Russia Hoax” being investigated by John Durham, is now a member of the current administration, working as Biden’s national security adviser. In a new piece for REAL CLEAR INVESTIGATIONS, investigative reporter Paul Sperry looks deeper into Sullivan’s role in the hoax. Sperry’s sources tell him that this has grown into a full-blown conspiracy case.

Consider Sperry’s report your weekend reading assignment, one that focuses on Sullivan’s involvement in a “confidential project” within Hillary’s campaign to link Trump to the Kremlin “through dubious email-server records” provided to intel agencies. These so-called records must relate to those phony communication “pings” between Trump Tower and Alfa Bank.

Sullivan isn’t identified by name in Durham’s 27-page indictment of Sullivan, but his campaign position is provided, so we know it’s him.

There’s also more detail on what we reported concerning the use of university researchers to collect data for the Clinton campaign. They were working from a five-page document dubbed the “Trump Associates List” to compile a “digital dossier” on several Trump officials, including Gen. Mike Flynn, Paul Manafort, George Papadopoulos and Carter Page. According to Sperry, “This effort exploited highly sensitive, nonpublic Internet data related to their personal email communications and web-browsing...” Are you getting sick yet?

Look, I know politics gets dirty. I’ve always said that no one should run for office who can’t stand the sight of his own blood. But this crosses the line into outright surveillance. Still, it's hard to say if this is a new low for Hillary, because she operates down there all the time and always has. The Clinton machine soils everything it touches. And even if Hillary slips away from the law, we will all know what she did, and what she is.

According to Sperry’s sources, Sullivan is in legal trouble over this because he lied about it to investigators. Apparently, Durham has emails between Sullivan and Perkins Coie attorney Marc Elias about the Alfa Bank scheme. Sullivan denied in congressional testimony that he knew anything about Fusion GPS and their involvement in the Alfa Bank opposition research. He said he didn’t know what the nature of their work was or who was funding it.

Sperry’s report is quite detailed. You’ll see how the Alfa Bank story was exploited long after the FBI had determined there was nothing to it. Sullivan and another anti-Trump hoaxer named Daniel Jones formed a nonprofit group called --- get ready --- the Democracy Integrity Project. I am not kidding. It raised $7 million or so, mostly from Silicon Valley Tech executives, and used it to hire computer researchers, as well as more "oppo" researchers and Christopher Steele (again) to try to “prove” the rumors in the Steele “dossier.” Then they would feed information to the media, leading Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee, and the FBI.

I think we’ll be hearing a lot more about Daniel Jones in the near future. For now, just read Sperry’s piece when you have some time, and see how disgusting politics can be when it’s in the service of Hillary Clinton.

https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2021/09/23/biden_security_adviser_sullivan_tied_to_16_clinton_plan_to_co-opt_cia_and_fbi_to_tar_trump_795498.html

Related reading

Over the past week, morning newsletter subscribers have been treated to a detailed look at the Durham investigation. 

9/23: Durham's detailed indictment tells us much more

9/22: Why is Durham taking so long? HERE'S THE ANSWER

9/21: Durham's probe suggests biggest political hoax in history

9/17: Grand Jury indicts Michael Sussman for providing false information to the FBI

9/16: Durham seeks indictment of Perkins Coie lawyer

He's running

By Mike Huckabee

At 4 a.m. on Friday morning, Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley tweeted the news that he has decided to run for reelection. Democrats were hoping that the 88-year-old Grassley would retire and create an open seat, but his tweet pointed out that he’s in great shape because he’s up at 4 a.m. and literally running six days a week, so he’s running for reelection. He said, “This election is about stopping socialism and saving freedom.” I couldn’t agree more.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/sen-chuck-grassley-iowa-republican-to-seek-8th-term

"Voting With Their Feet"

By Mike Huckabee

God help us

By Mike Huckabee

People ask me almost daily if I think America will survive the divisive, leftist-driven assault on traditional American virtues of freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and free enterprise that once made our nation the envy of the world. I still have hope, but must admit that I’m believing more and more that the only hope is an intervention of God Himself in the form of a deep to the bone spiritual awakening. Just this week, we’ve seen multiple signs of a nation that has gone astray from its ideals and principles.

Reports that Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley colluded with the Communist Chinese Military in the closing days of the Trump Presidency to assure them he would give them a head’s up should President Trump prepare to start a war and that he instructed his subordinates to ignore orders from the President unless they had been cleared by him are shocking, if true. I say “if true” because they come from a new book from Bob Woodward, who is known to fudge the truth and sometimes just flat-out make it up in order to push his book sales. But Milley has already proven to be an incompetent politically driven General by his failed leadership in the Afghanistan withdrawal and his bizarre testimony to Congress that the biggest threat to America is white rage, whatever that is even supposed to mean. Does he honestly believe that a minuscule number of guys waving Confederate battle flags and armed with deer rifles have a shot at defeating Milley’s military that has F-35’s, F-22’s, tanks, aircraft carriers, Blackhawk helicopters, fully-automatic weapons and even nuclear weapons? If Milley believes his forces are that weak, he really should resign. But if he went around the elected President and the civilian Commander in Chief to place himself above his chain of command, he shouldn’t be allowed to simply resign. He should be court-martialed for treason.

We also witnessed the heart-breaking and gut-wrenching testimony of female US Olympic gymnasts before the Senate who graphically testified as to the humiliating sexual assault by pedophile team doctor, Larry Nassar, who violated the girls trust as well as their bodies for years. We learned that their desperate attempts to get the US Olympic officials to intervene fell to deaf ears, but that even worse, the FBI was fully informed of the criminal acts of Nassar toward these minors and not only covered up the misdeeds, but lied to the girls and did absolutely nothing to stop the sadistic and deviant sexual behavior of the team doctor. As of now, one person at the FBI got fired, but no one has been yet to be charged with having lied about the case or failing to report the assaults to the local authorities. Basically, just as it was with FBI agents lying about President Trump colluding with Russia and using the power of the government to try and bring him down even after he was elected by the people to be President, the FBI and Dept of Justice seemed more concerned about protecting themselves than these young women. It’s beyond disgusting knowing that if you or I break the law, we might have a swarm of FBI agents all over our home at 5 in the morning, breaking in our door and pointing automatic weapons at us and frog-marching us to jail, but if the agents break the law, their higher-ups cover for them and at most let them retire with a pension and become analysts on CNN.

And this week, Nancy Pelosi ordered that we put up another fence around the US Capitol. You know—the same Nancy Pelosi who lives behind a wall but who says walls on the Southern border don’t work—that Nancy Pelosi put up a wall around the nation’s Capitol. Makes me wonder if it’s to keep bad people out like us out or to keep even WORSE people like her IN so they can’t hurt the country any more than they already have! Will our country survive? Only if God helps us…so I say, “God help us!”

LEAVE ME A COMMENT HERE, I READ THEM>>>

New podcast episode

This week on The People’s Podcast, Governor Huckabee sits down with Nancy Grace, host of Crime Stories with Nancy Grace on Fox Nation, to discuss the latest in the disappearance of Gabby Petito.

LISTEN AND SUBSCRIBE HERE>>>

Reader testimonials

From Ron: Just wanted to say thank you so much for what you are doing. I love watching your video -- you sure have a good sense of humor. I get your emails everyday and look forward to reading them; puts a smile on my face for the day. Also love the scriptures; sure wish a lot of more people would read the Bible. Anyway, Mike, thank you and God bless you.

From Margaret: THANK YOU FOR ALL YOUR DILIGENCE IN KEEPING US INFORMED ABOUT ALL THE STUFF GOING ON IN D.C. !!! <3 YOUR SYNOPSIS & THOROUGH DISSEMINATION OF INFORMATION PROVIDES US WITH CLEAR POINTS OF EACH TOPIC... GOD BLESS YOU FOR YOUR PERSISTENCE IN GETTING THE TRUTH !!! <3 LOVE YOUR SHOW ON THE WEEKENDS & ALL THE INTERVIEWS, COMEDY & MUSIC !!! <3

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Hymnal

A reader suggested we highlight favorite hymns.  Today's edition:

Praise God, from whom all blessings flow

By Thomas Ken

Praise God, from whom all blessings flow;

Praise Him, all creatures here below;

Praise Him above, ye heav’nly host;

Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost!

Praise God the Father who’s the source;

Praise God the Son who is the course;

Praise God the Spirit who’s the flow;

Praise God, our portion here below!

Mike Huckabee

Yesterday’s installment on the significance of Special Counsel John Durham’s 27-page indictment of Hillary attorney Michael Sussmann included insights from Kash Patel, lead investigator for Rep. Devin Nunes’ investigation into the “Russia Hoax.” As it happens, Thursday’s edition of the NEW YORK POST had a story relating to those very House Intelligence Committee transcripts Patel was assembling. It shows how different the hoaxers’ sworn testimony was from what they were saying publicly.

https://nypost.com/2020/05/11/obamas-top-brass-contradict-statements-about-collusion-under-oath/

For example, let’s take James Clapper, former Director of National Intelligence. (The DNI’s job is to coordinate the huge and sticky web of government intel agencies.) We already knew that Clapper’s vow to tell the truth doesn’t mean much, as he has told some enormous whoppers, notably that the National Security Agency didn’t intercept Americans’ phone messages “wittingly.”

But as Emily Jacobs points out in her report for the NYP, Clapper stepped carefully during his testimony in July 2017 before the House Intel Committee, informing the committee that he “never saw any direct empirical evidence that the Trump campaign or someone in it was plotting [or] conspiring with the Russians to meddle with the election.”

What the hey?? As DNI, Clapper would have been privy to everything that was being gathered about Trump “colluding” with Russia. And he was saying hadn’t seen any direct evidence at all? Amazingly, yes, though he went on to try to make it sound as if there were SOME reason to suspect it.

“That’s not to say that there weren’t concerns about the evidence we were seeing...anecdotal evidence...[redacted],” he said. “But I do not recall any instance when I had direct evidence of the content of these meetings. It’s just the frequency and prevalence of them was of concern.”

Contrast this careful, noncommittal statement with what he had said a couple of months before to Chuck Todd on NBC’s MEET THE PRESS. On NBC, when he wasn’t under oath, he sensationalized quite a bit, using the cloak of “classification” to keep from having to be at all specific about any conversations but saying his “dashboard light was clearly on.”

A month after that, speaking with reporters on a trip to Australia, Clapper said the Russia investigation had far surpassed Watergate. “I think if you compare the two that Watergate pales, really, in my view, compared to what we’re confronting now,” he told them.

In light of what is said today in Durham’s indictment, we find Clapper’s comparison of Trump/Russia “collusion” to Watergate quite hilarious. If anything is reminiscent of Watergate, it’s the coordinated antics of these deep-state clowns working overtime to frame then-candidate Trump with fake “Russia” stories in fictional “dossiers” and surveillance warrants.

As Jacobs reports, Clapper was beating this dead horse as recently as February 2019, saying on CNN that “it was a possibility” that President Trump was a “Russian asset,” “whether witting or unwitting.”

Clapper’s not the only one who tread lightly in sworn testimony while stomping like Riverdance for the TV news cameras. Former deputy director of theMcCabe testified, “That’s correct.”

But he spoke differently in his role as CNN contributor (!) and in other TV appearances. In February 2019, in an interview on 60 MINUTES, McCabe dramatically described Trump as “the man who had just run for the presidency, and won the election for the presidency, and who might have done so with the aid of the government of Russia, our most formidable adversary on the world stage.” As he had already told the Intel Committee in December 2017 that he had no verification of any claims, he had to know that what he was saying to the TV audience was a huge fragrant pile of bull droppings, yet he told the TV audience it “troubled” him “greatly.”

The same kind of discrepancy is evident in the word-craft of Ben Rhodes, officially Obama’s deputy national security adviser but in practice his personal narrative writer. When asked under oath by the Intel Committee if he had any evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, he said no. But in 2019, after then-Special Counsel Robert Mueller testified before Congress (remember that train wreck?), Rhodes tweeted, “Russia attacked our democracy. Trump campaign sought its help, had many contacts with Russians, lied about it and obstructed the investigation into it. Several Trump associates were convicted of crimes. Trump would’ve been indicted if he wasn’t the President. Not complicated.”

If anything isn’t complicated, it’s that Rhodes is good at using what little he has to work with to craft a story that really is based on nothing. No Trump associates were convicted of crimes that had anything to do with Russian collusion. “Contacts with Russians” is meaningless. Rhodes had seen no evidence of any of this, as he himself had testified under oath.

(By the way, if I hear the phrase “our democracy” one more time from some sanctimonious leftist, please forgive me in advance for the way I might respond. Leftists are perfectly willing to upend “our democracy” with strategies designed to fracture the election system, facilitate fraud and shut down transparency. They quite obviously think of it as THEIR democracy –- to be manipulated at will to keep THEM in control –- and they consistently show themselves to be unclear on the concept of a democratic republic. I digress.)

Jacobs also mentions former U.N. ambassador Samantha Power. When Power was asked under oath by the Intel Committee if she’d seen evidence of Russian interference, she said, “I am not in possession of anything –- I am not in possession and didn’t read or absorb information that came from out of the intelligence community.” But that didn’t stop her from tweeting in November of last year: “Every day Donald Trump finds new ways to compensate Vladimir Putin for his election interference. And every day, Putin gains additional incentive to interfere again on Trump’s behalf in 2020.”

She failed to provide examples, but that’s because this was totally made up, and it’s a lot easier and safer to generalize than offer specifics. (One could easily make the case that Trump was HARD on Russia.) Again, Power had testified that she didn’t read or even “absorb” information about this.

Finally, there’s Obama’s national security adviser Susan Rice, whom we already knew can lie with ease, as she did repeatedly to cover for the State Department after the Benghazi attack. In 2017, Rice told House investigators that she’d seen no evidence Trump colluded with Russia to win in 2016. But in July 2018 on ABC’s THIS WEEK, she said it was “legitimate” to question whether Trump had been compromised by Russia because his decisions were in the service of Vladimir Putin. Good grief.

So you see how Trump’s adversaries could take essentially NOTHING –- no evidence whatsoever, as they testified under oath –- and whip it into a tale as tall as Trump Tower. But it was just full of froth. If only Durham could indict them all for lying on TV.

LEAVE ME A COMMENT, I READ THEM!!!

Mike Huckabee

Someone who might have been in the best position to know how the Russia Hoax was created --- aside from those who actually faked it themselves --- was Kash Patel, chief investigator for California Rep. Devin Nunes, then-chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. Patel, a former DOJ national security prosecutor, headed Nunes’ small group they informally dubbed “Objective Medusa” to uncover the plot against Trump. It was Objective Medusa that discovered in October 2017 that the Steele “dossier” had been funded by the Clinton campaign.

As Patel explained to Dana Perino on FOX NEWS, he was also the staffer who took the deposition that is cited in Special Counsel John Durham’s indictment of Perkins Coie partner and attorney Michael Sussmann. Sussmann, he said, is the key figure who ties Hillary Clinton and her campaign to Fusion GPS and Christopher Steele “and the false information they fed to the FBI and the DOJ to spy on a presidential campaign.”

https://bongino.com/kash-patel-durham-probe-into-clinton-campaign-developing-into-a-very-well-laid-out-conspiracy-charge

Patel sees this as a very-well laid out conspiracy charge that will expand to include other figures.

If you’ve read Lee Smith’s “THE PLOT AGAINST THE PRESIDENT: The True Story of How Congressman Devin Nunes Uncovered the Biggest Political Scandal in U.S. History,” which has served as major reference material for us since it came out in 2019, you’re not surprised to hear Patel say this. Check out Chapter 9, “The Press Breaks,” in which Smith details the carefully set-up media explosion surrounding the phony “dossier.” The Alfa Bank story was key.

As Smith explains, on October 31, 2016 –- days before the election –- Franklin Foer, after receiving a manufactured story from Fusion GPS, wrote in SLATE that Russia-connected Alfa Bank’s computer servers were in contact with those of the Trump Organization. That article, along with what Steele had put in his “dossier,” tied Trump to Putin by way of Alfa Bank. And what did Hillary do, after her Fusion GPS operatives had planted this story? Why, put out a press release about it and retweet this lie: “Computer scientists have apparently uncovered a covert server linking the Trump Organization to a Russian-based bank.” The only thing “computer scientists” might have had to do with this story was to figure out how to fake those mysterious “pings.”

The Alfa Bank story was shown to be false in no time, but, as Smith details in his book, it didn’t really go away. It just became part of the lore, along with all the other fake stories that were never verified or had been debunked outright. Thank goodness Alfa Bank sued Steele (among others) for libel, because that forced Steele to go on record about his dicey sources and lack of any real verification.

We highly recommend the book, as it’s especially timely now. And it reads like a thriller. But as Patel says at the end, this effort still isn’t finished. “There’s no actual accountability yet,” he admits. “When we have that, then I’ll be satisfied.” Smith concludes by saying Hillary, with her fears of losing and of being exposed as the dirty politician she is, was the “center of gravity” for this phony operation, adding that if she had won in 2016, we never would have known about any of it.

But as Victoria Taft writes for PJ MEDIA, it’s all coming out, and we’ve just heard the clunk of another shoe dropping. (How many shoes will this centipede end up having?) The part of the Sussmann indictment that especially caught her attention was on Page 10. We haven’t discussed Page 10 yet, but that’s where Durham alleges that “Tech Executive 1,” who hoped to work in cybersecurity for the Clinton White House, used proprietary information to conjure up phony links between Trump and Alfa Bank. He got this information from his own companies, Unbelievably, he also used contracts with an American university to use their researchers to “search and analyze their holdings of public and non-public internet data for derogatory information on Trump” to “support an ‘inference’ and ‘narrative’ regarding Trump that would please certain VIPs.” VIP, I would point out, rhymes with “HRC.” And the narrative they were tasked with supporting was “Russia Russia Russia!”

This is just shocking shocking shocking.

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/victoria-taft/2021/09/22/latest-durham-indictment-may-make-russiagate-the-most-corrupt-scandal-in-u-s-history-n1480603

As Taft explains, “The indictment illustrates how Tech Executive 1 used government connections, his companies, contracts with a U.S. university, Perkins Coie, Sussmann, and other political players to Get Trump.”

The indictment even mentions that the major players in this scheme discussed how to fake the computer links to show to the media and the FBI. (See, I was only half-kidding when I quipped about what the computer scientists were really for!)

Taft says that internet sleuths have already pretty much figured out who these major players were, including Tech Executive 1 and the university. We think we might be able to guess some of these as well but sure wouldn't want to be wrong. So we’ll wait for a few more shoes to drop from the centipede.

In the meantime, here’s something else to ponder about Sussmann. We’ve mentioned before that he was representing the DNC when they were supposedly “hacked by the Russians.” (NOTE: We don’t know for sure that it was a hack, as opposed to an internal leak, and there’s no proof that it was done by the Russians.) According to Technofog, writing on SUBSTACK, as soon as Sussmann was told by the DNC of the so-called hack, he contacted an old friend at CrowdStrike, Shawn Henry, who was also the former head of the FBI’s cyber division. CrowdStrike is the company that kept the servers when the DNC refused to turn them over to the FBI. Conveniently, Perkins Coie and CrowdStrike happened to be protected by attorney-client privilege.

According to the indictment, “Within the day, the CrowdStrike team concluded that the intruders were Russian government operatives.” Whew, that was fast. That is some efficiency right there. And I guess they stuck with that, even though Julian Assange insisted that the source for the DNC data he published in Wikileaks had not come from anyone working on behalf of any government, including Russia’s.

What really happened with the DNC servers is an enduring question that Sussmann likely could answer.

https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F84cab5f0-c880-4586-8f1d-8c5f3521e493_624x445.png

Sussmann was incredibly well-connected and seemed to know all the players. We’ll leave you with an excellent article from REAL CLEAR INVESTIGATIONS that explains how these scams are accomplished in DC: through a network of friends.

https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2021/09/22/how_russiagate_became_a_story_of_old_friends_indeed_795476.html

LEAVE ME A COMMENT BELOW, I READ THEM!!!

RELATED READING

Over the past week, morning newsletter subscribers have been treated to a detailed look at the Durham investigation. Below, are the links to each story for my evening newsletter subscribers:

9/22: Why is Durham taking so long? HERE'S THE ANSWER

9/21: Durham's probe suggests biggest political hoax in history

9/17: Grand Jury indicts Michael Sussman for providing false information to the FBI

9/16: Durham seeks indictment of Perkins Coie lawyer

Mike Huckabee

Monday, Pfizer reported that its COVID vaccine is safe for 5-11-year-olds. This was taken as a likely sign that the FDA will approve it and the Biden Administration might mandate it, since the Delta variant is more transmissible and has infected more children. But that was a bridge too far for many parents who think it should be their decision whether the risks of COVID to their children outweigh the risks of possible side effects from a vaccine with no longterm studies.

That hesitancy caused some media figures like columnist David Frum to slam reluctant parents as “Anti-vaxxers,” which has become a kneejerk pejorative hurled at anyone who has questions about the vaccines, no matter how reasonable. Megyn Kelly took Frum to the woodshed over that.

https://redstate.com/sister-toldjah/2021/09/20/david-frum-cant-deal-after-megyn-kelly-buries-him-during-child-vaccination-debate-n445633

As I’ve said repeatedly, I’ve been vaccinated, and like the vast majority of people, I’ve had no negative side effects. But that doesn’t mean that other people who might be particularly susceptible, or especially parents concerned about their children, should be attacked, ridiculed or told to just shut up when they have legitimate concerns that deserve to be addressed.

It’s likely that the questions are going to multiply in light of the latest undercover video release by James O’Keefe’s Project Veritas. It came from a whistleblower who’s a registered nurse at a Health and Human Services-affiliated medical center. She recorded conversations with doctors and other nurses about the high number of patients with serious vaccine side effects and their concern that these reactions weren’t getting reported by the government. One doctor complained that they want “to shove it under the mat.”

https://www.projectveritas.com/news/federal-govt-whistleblower-goes-public-with-secret-recordings-government/

If the CDC and other government health agencies want Americans to trust them, then they need to openly address people’s concerns and stop trying to bully them into submission. That only makes them more suspicious. If they’re ever going to win back the public’s trust, the first step would be to start acting trustworthy.

Mike Huckabee

The fact that Special Counsel John Durham would release 27 pages of detailed narrative to indict one measly person on one count of making a false statement to the FBI got us wondering immediately what his purpose might have been. We’re not attorneys, but over the next couple of days, some of our favorite legal minds noticed the same thing.

Over the years, you and I have learned not to expect much in the way of justice from the “Justice” Department --- especially now, with an obvious political hack like Merrick Garland running it --- but the indictment of this Clinton attorney might be the harbinger of bigger things to come. It is likely that Hillary will escape jail once again, as she did even after using a private server to circumvent FOIA requests and destroying evidence with BleachBit and hammers, but remember: even though Nixon escaped legal accountability in the Watergate scandal, the whole story did come out. What we’re looking at is probably another situation like that.

For now, many thanks to Dan Bongino for pointing us to a superb analysis of Sussmann’s indictment on SUBSTACK by Shipwreckedcrew’s Port-O-Call. This is long but important to read.

https://shipwreckedcrew.substack.com/p/the-sussmann-indictment-reads-like

“The Sussmann indictment reads like overt acts in furtherance of a conspiracy,” he writes, “because that’s what it is.”

He explains that the indictment on that one charge is contained in just one paragraph, Paragraph 46, which reads, “On or about September 19, 2016, within the District of Columbia, MICHAEL A. SUSSMANN, the defendant, did willingly and knowingly make a materially false, fictitious and false statement or representation in a matter before the jurisdiction of the executive branch of the Government of the United States, to wit, on or about September 19, 2016, the defendant stated to the General Counsel of the FBI that he was not acting on behalf of any client in conveying particular allegations concerning a Presidential candidate, when in truth, and in fact, and as the defendant well knew, he was acting on behalf of specific clients, namely – Tech Executive 1 and the Clinton campaign.”

That’s it. That’s what he stands accused of. What are all those other pages for? A “false statement” charge doesn’t require all that narrative. What Durham filed is called a “speaking indictment,” which “discloses information in a public document that would not otherwise be known if the indictment set forth only facts needed to meet the requirements of due process.”

“Shipwrecked” says, “In over 30 years of practice as both a federal prosecutor and a defense attorney specializing in federal cases, I’ve never before seen anything remotely resembling the Sussmann indictment in a single ‘false statement’ case.”

He writes that the facts Durham has alleged probably have at least a dozen “strings” hanging off them. Some of these are legal and others are “more in the ‘court of public opinion.’” (See Nixon, above.)

Those who are understandably cynical about the process as it typically applies to Hillary & Co. and dismayed at the length of time Durham has taken to come up with this one indictment should definitely read this analysis. “Shipwrecked” explains why it has taken as long as it has, notably regarding Durham’s search for source materials. Some materials he needed to look at could only be sought by grand jury subpoena if they were over six months old. Anything more recent needed “probable cause.”

So, what materials was Durham waiting on? At least some of them must have been billing records for Perkins Coie, some of which showed Sussmann billing Hillary’s campaign for his work relating to the phony Alfa Bank story. These were absolutely key to the indictment on the false statement. One might imagine that even after being hit with the grand jury subpoena, Perkins Coie put up a huge fight over turning over that information, as it involves attorney-client communications and attorney work product information, both of which would typically be shielded from disclosure to a grand jury.

Perhaps Durham made it clear to Perkins Coie that they themselves could be held criminally liable for their attorney’s misconduct, and that they’d better darn well cooperate.

But even if they did, attorney-client privilege applies to clients as well, which in this case include the DNC, the Clinton campaign and “Tech Executive 1.” They would have had to waive THEIR privilege for some reason. What might that reason be? This situation suggests to me that they might face some pretty fierce legal jeopardy themselves --- that they knew it could be even worse for them if they didn’t cooperate. This is one area that I hope legal experts like "Shipwrecked" will explore in detail.

He does note something called “the crime-fraud exception,” which applies when the normally privileged communications relate to a fraud that is currently occurring or might be contemplated by THE CLIENT (as opposed to the law firm) in the future. That would make sense to me, since clients like the DNC and Hillary can’t go one day without contemplating more fraud. Perhaps it had something to do with their ongoing anti-Trump activities after he was in office.

But, anyway, if you’ve been wondering, “Why is Durham taking SO LONG?,” this legal fight is one reason why.

Something else of interest: we recently reported that Marc Elias had left Perkins Coie to open his own separate firm dedicated to the Dark Art of getting more Democrats elected to office and furthering the progressive agenda. Sussmann was gone, too, on leave until resigning the day of his indictment. As “Shipwrecked” explains, catapulting these two partners might have been one way that Perkins Coie showed its willingness to cooperate with investigators to save its own sorry hide.

The reason we haven’t known about this legal fight is that Durham apparently didn’t take it before a DC grand jury. He could keep it quiet by going to any district where he had a grand jury convened. As “Shipwrecked” points out, disputes over the production of documents to a federal grand jury typically take place behind closed doors –- or, in the age of COVID, on a private Zoom call; no travel required –- and are not part of the public docket. All references to the dispute would be sealed,

I highly recommend this article, as it’s very clearly written for the non-lawyer and brings up a number of considerations we haven’t seen anywhere else. This apparently is the first installment of a series; we’re grateful for the insight and eagerly anticipate the next one. The writer mentions as a tease that another “scene of the crime” (that’s my phraseology) mentioned in the indictment as being outside the District of Columbia, is likely the CIA (“Agency -2”), headquartered in Langley, Virginia. So this gets more interesting all the time.

Mike Huckabee

I’m not surprised at all to discover that yet another liberal media narrative about President Trump has proven to be false. Because of his support among Evangelicals, it was predicted that people would flee from that religious designation and Trump would “hollow out” Evangelical Christianity. But according to a new Pew Research Survey, that’s not what’s happened.

https://www.foxnews.com/faith-values/more-americans-identify-evangelical-after-trump-years

There are a lot of stats at the link, but this one will give you an idea of the general direction. When Trump was elected in 2016, 25% of White Americans self-identified as Born Again or Evangelical Protestants. By 2020, the figure was up to 29%. Not exactly an Exodus.

The Rev. Franklin Graham told Fox News that many Presidents paid lip service to Evangelicals but Trump was the first in decades who welcomed people of faith around him and was willing to fight for their side. But Graham also reminds us that the Bible says we should pray for those in authority, so he prays for President Biden. I also pray for him to have good health and wisdom, but not for success in imposing his agenda. Preventing that is covered by the other prayer I pray: “God, save America.”

Mike Huckabee

In a move that infuriated both Republicans and moderate Democrats, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi caved in to the anti-Semitic socialists of “The Squad” and cut $1 billion in funding for Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system from a short-term government funding bill. Pelosi can lose only a few votes or the bill won’t pass, since Republicans unanimously oppose the bill because they’re fighting over raising the federal debt limit.

https://nypost.com/2021/09/21/aoc-squad-force-dems-to-cut-1b-for-iron-dome-from-spending-bill/

I can understand why someone might oppose the entire bill on general principle, but why would anyone publicly hold it hostage over just one provision: not funding Israel’s defense from terrorist missiles? Note that this wasn’t new or increased spending. It was standard support for our closest ally for a purely defensive weapons system that stops missiles fired by Hamas terrorists (4400 just last spring) from killing innocent Israeli men, women and children. Why would US Congress members choose to take a hard stand on the side of terrorists who are trying to kill Jews? Well, read some of their previous comments, and I think you’ll figure it out.

Other Democrats say the funding will be added to a larger defense bill or introduced as a stand-alone measure, and it should pass with bipartisan support. But the Squad’s opposition to that one issue tells us a lot about what we’re dealing with from them. Michigan Democrat Rep. Elissa Slotkin said the removal of the funding was “devoid of substance and irresponsible.” That’s a pretty good description of the entire Squad.

Kenneth Allard

Well maybe but no one in authority ever seems to have asked Bob Woodward about that or to question the ethics of transforming national secrets into highly profitable book sales. Looking over his 50-year track record, Washington insiders know that it pays to stay on Woodward’s good side. If you give him the juicy gossip and inside-the-Beltway psycho-babble he craves, you can be assured of favorable treatment, either in his books or maybe in the pages of the Washington Post (possibly one and the same). An essential part of the gamesmanship includes the pre-publication leaking of lurid headlines. Specifically:

• Shortly before the 2020 election, GEN Milley called his Chinese counter-part to re-assure him that the US would not attack China. “If we’re going to attack, I’m going to call you ahead of time. It’s not going to be a surprise,” Milley reportedly said.
• Similar reassurances were repeated shortly after the January 6 riot on Capitol Hill; “We are 100 percent steady. Everything’s fine. But democracy can be sloppy sometimes.” (Lolita C. Baldor, AP, “Milley: Calls were perfectly within scope of the job,” Sept. 17)
• Also according to the AP, “Milley believed the president suffered a mental decline after the November election, agreeing with a view shared by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in a phone call they had on Jan. 8, according to officials. Milley also asked senior officers to swear an “oath” that Milley had to be involved if Trump gave an order to launch nuclear weapons, according to the book.” (Mary C. Jalonick, AP, “Jan 6 Committee seeking records on Milley’s China calls,” Sep 17)

As you would expect, outraged Republicans called for General Milley to be fired while Democrats from President Biden to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin expressed continued confidence in his judgment.  Since Milley and Austin will testify before the House Armed Services Committee on September 28, the controversy will likely simmer for at least another week: Exactly as Bob Woodward and his media colleagues would have anticipated. Not only is this kind of publicity essential in fueling sales, but it also helps to move the Afghanistan and Southern Border fiascos off the front pages. 

As it happens, my Harvard dissertation and first book was a history of the American command and control system. Shortly thereafter, I had the privilege of working for Congressman Bill Nichols as Congress reformed that system in 1986, including the powers exercised by every subsequent JCS Chairman, including General Milley. If he was indeed free-lancing with his Chinese counter-part, those particulars will certainly become known in our immediate future.

But in that last AP story refenced above, there is a question most observers have missed. Did General Milley actually require senior officers to swear an oath promising to short-circuit the nuclear command and control exercised by President Trump? And if so, what was his authority for making such an extraordinary (and possibly illegal) demand? You see, in their sweeping 1986 reforms, Congress firmly chose to place the JCS Chairman outside the chain of command extending from the National Command Authorities (i.e. the President and SECDEF) directly to the Commanders of our combatant forces in the field.  The principle: Civilians make the decision to go to war while commanders on the ground employ forces and direct missions. The JCS Chairman is expected to give military advice while administering our global command and control systems.

But he is only a Washington staffer, like so many others. That is a distinction General Milley should know well: Bob Woodward not so much!

 LEAVE KEN A COMMENT BELOW, WE KNOW HE WILL APPRECIATE IT!

NOTE: Colonel Allard is the author of Command, Control and the Common Defense, winner of the 1991 National Security Book Award. After leaving active duty, he became an on-air military analyst for the networks of NBC News.

Mike Huckabee

I think it’s safe to assume that you didn’t watch the Emmy Awards last night (yes, that was actually on last night.) That’s not just a statement about conservatives; I think the only people who watch the Emmys anymore are the nominees. You didn’t miss much, but there was one thing of note: it provided the final punchline to a long stretch of escalating elitist liberal mask hypocrisy.

The same leftist politicians and celebrities who love to berate the masses for not wearing three masks whenever they step outside their bedrooms have given us a number of high profile examples of their “Rules for thee but not for me” philosophy. One biggie was Obama's birthday bash. Last week, the mayor of San Francisco and a co-founder of BLM were among the leftist elites caught defying the city’s mask mandate at a jazz club (where the staff, of course, had to wear masks)…

https://reason.com/2021/09/17/london-breed-san-francisco-mask-covid-hypocrisy/

There were also the notorious photos of the ultra-swank Met Gala in New York, where AOC wore her designer “Tax The Rich” gown but like all the other swells, did not wear a mask (the staff, of course, had to wear masks.) And then last night at the Emmy Awards, hundreds of celebrities gathered close together without masks (the staff, of course, had to wear masks.)

Seth Rogan even remarked on the hypocritical flouting of the rules, noting that it had been described as an outdoor event, but there were way too many people in a hermetically-sealed tent.

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/spencerbrown/2021/09/19/liberal-elites-gather-for-emmys-in-la-where-apparently-covid-doesnt-exist-n2596147

I know hypocrisy is nothing new. These are the same liberal celebrities and the same events where they used to preach to normal Americans about how sexist and unwoke we were, while protecting powerful celebrities who were later revealed to be serial rapists and child molesters. Now, they lecture us about not wearing masks while not wearing masks.

But kudos to everyone who pointed out that in the background, the wait staff and security people are always wearing masks. I guess COVID only attacks hourly wage workers, not celebrities. The same way it knew to spread only at Trump rallies and never at BLM protests.

Mike Huckabee

Here are the latest dispatches from Afghanistan, where we’re continually assured that only about 100 Americans are still waiting to get out and that we’ll be able to work with the new, more moderate Taliban.

After weeks of the Taliban holding up flights of evacuees, one plane was finally allowed to take off.

https://redstate.com/nick-arama/2021/09/17/finally-action-on-taliban-hostage-situation-with-americans-in-mazar-i-sharif-n444641

As for the others, in spite of the Taliban’s claims that it will be more moderate and cooperative, Biden spokesman Ned Price said they’ve “pulled every lever available” but the Taliban are still holding up the flights. Which sounds an awful lot like a hostage situation. Really, Joe? Have you REALLY pulled every lever available?

Here’s a heartbreaking story about an American citizen who lost 18 of her family members in the Kabul suicide bombing and is stuck there and terrified. She broke down while telling a TV reporter how the State Department is ignoring her pleas for help and saying, “Sorry, we can’t do anything for you.”

https://www.westernjournal.com/terrified-american-trapped-afghanistan-breaks-live-tv-pins-biden-administration/

While it’s getting harder to get reliable news out of Afghanistan, here’s a report that the Taliban are methodically tracking down Afghans who helped the US (and whom Biden promised to evacuate, then didn’t.) It includes a report of women being watched constantly and terrified to go to school or work, and Taliban militants decapitating two boys, ages nine and ten.

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/guybenson/2021/09/17/reports-taliban-decapitates-children-hunting-down-us-collaborators-n2596061?utm_campaign=rightrailsticky1

And this is why the Biden-supporting media want to talk about nothing but vaccine mandates.

Mike Huckabee

On the subject of masks, I previously reported on a Canadian university study that found that the type of cloth masks most people wear are only about 10% effective at stopping the spread of COVID (prompting one of my writers to observe, “So to stop a disease that we have a 99.7% chance of surviving, we have to wear masks that have a 90% chance of failing.”)

Now, at long last, there’s finally a large-scale study awaiting peer review that assesses the real-world effectiveness of masks. It was a “cluster randomized trial” done in Bangladesh and involved over 342,000 unvaccinated people in 600 villages. Some villages had no masks and people were just told to social distance, some had typical cloth masks, and some had more effective surgical masks. Here’s a video explaining the results.

https://youtu.be/fFCYv0X4kf4

As usual, there are various caveats that you can hear about in the video, but in a nutshell: surgical masks made enough of a difference in infection rates to be noticeable, but the difference between those using the cloth masks most people wear and those with no masks at all was “statistically insignificant.”

Yet in some liberal cities, actual criminals are being let out of jail while people are being arrested for refusing to wear masks. So to avoid jail in a leftist-run city, you can rob a convenience store, just as long as you're wearing a mask.

Congratulations on some exciting news for our contributor Laura Ainsworth, who in addition to being a top notch writer/news researcher is also an award-winning retro jazz singer in the Julie London/Rosemary Clooney tradition.

Her three CDs and best-of LP were recently picked up for distribution in Japan and proved so popular that an expanded CD best of, “Top Shelf,” has just been released there. It includes 16 tracks (one a previously-unreleased Irving Berlin classic), all remastered by Jessica Thompson, who was Grammy-nominated for her work on Erroll Garner’s “The Complete Concert by the Sea.” It includes a 16-page color booklet on Laura’s music and her unique upbringing as the daughter of musician Billy Ainsworth, who played with Tommy Dorsey, Freddy Martin and other legendary big band leaders.

The new Japanese CD just debuted and is available in the US, along with all her other music, through her website, www.lauraainsworth.com.

If you love great American music, here’s your chance to pick up some terrific CDs for yourself or Christmas gifts, and support one of the “Huckabee” family. You can also follow her on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/lauraainsworthsings and on Twitter at @lauraainsworth1.

Just to give you a taste, here she is singing a great old Mills Brothers tune on “Huckabee”:

https://youtu.be/AGorRNgp4t4

Larry Gatlin

PROLOGUE

On a cold January day in 1842, a half-starved soldier – slumping across the neck of a dying horse - appeared at the gates of Jalalabad, Afghanistan. The horse and rider had survived a 10 day, 90-mile “retreat” over and through the Spin Ghar Range that sprawls between Kabul through Jalalabad to the Khyber Pass. Behind them lay the frozen, mangled bodies of General Sir William Elphinstone and more than 4,500 soldiers of The British and East India Expeditionary Force. The General had been promised a safe withdrawal to India by Muhammad Akbar Khan, the leader of the Afghan tribesmen who had revolted against British rule; but after evacuating Kabul, the British force was attacked by Khan’s tribesman army at Gandamak, where the British Force made a valiant but futile last stand. When Dr. William Brydon, the lone survivor of that first Battle of Kabul was asked where the rest of the army was, he simply answered, “I am the army.”  In 1879, Dr. Brydon and his horse were immortalized on canvas by Elizabeth Thompson, Lady Butler. Her painting, “Remnants of an Army,” ranks with Picasso’s “Guernica,” Goya’s “The Third of May,” Emanuel Leutze’s “Washington Crossing the Delaware,” William Bass’ “The Battle of Bosworth Field,” Paul Phillipoteaux’s “The Battle of Gettysburg” and God knows too many more paintings depicting the horrors of war.

CHAPTER ONE

On a hot August day in 2021, I was reminded of Lady Butler’s painting as I watched another “remnant of an army,” General Chris Donahue, retreat from this most recent Battle of Kabul, a retreat which I’m guessing was against the General’s will and better military judgment. General Donahue, Commander of the vaunted 82nd Airborne, was “captured on film” by a night vision camera as he solemnly trudged up the gangway of a C-17 to leave Afghanistan and GOD only knows how many American citizens behind.

Over the last “fortnight” as the Brits would say, I have searched my heart, soul and mind, trying to get my brain wrapped around the events of the last two weeks. President Biden’s shameful, cowardly, militarily indefensible, politically-motivated decision to surrender the most powerful military force on the planet to a rabble of 7th century Neanderthals - murderers, terrorists, and rapists - the Taliban. I confess that I am so damned mad at the “Surrenderor-in-Chief that any clear-eyed assessment of the situation on my part is difficult if not impossible. What I really want to say cannot be printed “in these pages” and if it could be printed, would probably prompt a visit to my house by “employees” of one or more security agencies of the United States government. At the very least, I would be cancelled from Facebook and Twitter (I don’t “do” either one, BTW.)

CHAPTER TWO

In order to try to accomplish that probably impossible task, I decided to try to get some historical perspective regarding wars - the victories, defeats, surrenders and retreats - the cowards and the heroes from the past. I went back and re-read some of the classical writers on warfare: Herodotus, Thucydides, Gibbon and more recent writers, Stephen Crane, Eric Maria Remarque, and finally my contemporary literary hero, Ernest Hemingway, because I remembered what he had said when asked how he started a new novel, “I just sit down at my typewriter and bleed.” So this morning over coffee, I re-read for the umpteenth time, parts of Hemingway’s “For Whom the Bell Tolls” on the chance that it might help me understand this latest chapter (THE BIDEN BLUNDER) of what Captain Arthur Conolly and Rudyard Kipling long ago dubbed “The Great Game,” the fight for Afghanistan and Central Asia.

Since I don’t own a typewriter, and since my iPad is a cold, black piece of metal and composite poly something or other and has no soul, I sat down at my writing table, the surface of which are my two priceless 1798 Imperial Editions of Charles Knightly’s “The Plays of William Shakespeare;” took my Palomino Blackwing 602 Pencil in hand; and let it “bleed” onto a piece of unlined white paper.

It bled:

1)      I am not a warrior. 

2)      I have never REALLY been shot at. (Once in Somalia...a few rounds fired over my head...different story for another time)

3)      I have never shot at anything that didn’t have 4 legs or 2 wings.

4)      I have never been in that “hell” that General Sheridan called war.

5)      I’ve never seen another human being blown apart in front of my eyes.

6)      I’ve never heard the dogs of war howling all around me, or felt the earth shake from exploding ordinance on a killing field where life seemed to be so cheap and so costly at the same time, so how can I possibly write anything that matters?

The answer is, maybe I can’t; but this morning I watched and listened as a “30-something preppy-looking buttoned-down Ivy League-looking” robot was trotted out by the Pentagon to try to convince me and my fellow Americans that we need not worry about the $90,000,000,000 worth of state-of-the-art military equipment that was left behind in this latest retreat from Afghanistan and that it poses no threat to us. I respectfully offer that those who believe that are either heartlessly indifferent, woefully naive, ignorant of history, just plain stupid or all of the above; and I will state emphatically that there is a danger looming in those remote mountains that has been, for almost 300 years, and still is one of the most strategically important places in the world - the Khyber Pass between Afghanistan and Pakistan and our “friends and “allies” to whom we have given almost $80,000,000 since 1948. And our “friends” have nukes…a lot of nukes…and they have friends called the Taliban...and the Taliban has poppy fields…a lot of poppy fields…which means money...a lot of money…which means weapons...a lot of weapons...which means dead bodies...a lot of dead bodies...because the Khyber Pass is still right there where it has been since the beginning of time - at the crossroads between England, through Europe, through the Straits of Bosporus to Central Asia, India, Arabia and Russia to Africa, intersecting the Silk Road from China to Africa and the Mediterranean. And whoever controls it, to a large extent, controls half of the world.

[SEE: Tom Clancy’s “Sum of All Fears,” wherein the bad guys obtain fissile material from an unexplored Israeli nuke and make a “ dirty bomb” that they explode at The Super Bowl in D.C.] The scariest thing of all is that Joe Biden and “all the usual suspects,” his lemmings/handlers/sycophants, are still in charge of keeping America safe and protecting America’s interests, including the above-mentioned Khyber Pass....and…

THEY JUST DONT GET IT...HELP US!! So Clueless Joe Biden surrendered...again, GOD HELP US!!

Dr. Brydon and his fellow British soldiers were fighting to keep the Khyber Pass open because it was the gateway for trade, for “goods and services” back and forth between England and India, the Jewel of The British Empire. The passing of “goods and services” is no longer the reason to secure “THE KHYBER,” unless by “goods and services” you mean nukes or fissile material, and I’m afraid that there will be nothing “good” passing through The Khyber any time soon.

EPILOGUE

George Santayana wrote, “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” I would offer that Clueless Joe can’t remember what he had for breakfast, and he is repeating the same old mistakes.

And finally, Plato wrote that “Argument based on knowledge implies instruction, and there are some one cannot instruct.” Clueless Joe has proven that being knowledgeable is not one of his strong suits, and that he cannot be instructed unless by “instructed” you mean, “I was instructed to call on Kelly O’Donnell,” etc. etc.”

I would offer that there are some whom one cannot even shame, which is, in fact, a shame.

Charlie Wilson said, “Three things happened. They were glorious. They changed the world. Then we f’d up the end game.”

I would offer that because we “f’d up” the end game back in ‘88, we had to go back to Afghanistan, and that’s what precipitated this latest tragic episode - Clueless Joe Biden’s disastrous surrender of Afghanistan to the Taliban.

GOD HELP US...Dr. William Brydon must be rolling over in his grave.

Mike Huckabee

Are the media barricades against admitting the efficacy of natural immunity from COVID finally starting to crumble? There are some positive indications, like the growing coverage of the recent large-scale Israeli study, and now this shocking twist: the “fact-checking” site Politifact actually admitted that a politician’s statement that people who have recovered from COVID-19 have “very strong immunity” to the virus is “Mostly true.”

And what’s even more shocking: it was Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis whom they admitted was right!

PJ Media has the full story, but it’s behind a paywall.

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/stacey-lennox/2021/09/16/politifact-abruptly-breaks-with-the-preferred-covid-19-narrative-on-recovered-immunity-n1479353

If you’re not a subscriber, here’s why they said it was only “mostly true.” Politifact says the Israeli study did find that natural immunity gives longer-lasting and stronger protection than the Pfizer vaccine. However, “the same study said natural immunity plus a single vaccine dose gave the best protection.” But, fact-checking the “fact-checkers,” PJ Media’s Stacey Lennon adds the “missing context” that the difference between vaccinated and unvaccinated recovered patients was so small, it was ruled “statistically insignificant.”

Still, as far as earth-shattering news goes, Politifact admitting that Gov. DeSantis was correct is right up there with “Man Bites Dog, and Gives It COVID.”

Mike Huckabee

Isn’t it great to have competent, adult leadership in the White House that will make other nations respect us again? Yet for some reason, all our allies are furious with us. And in a stunning move on Friday, our oldest ally, France (which helped the Colonies win the Revolutionary War) recalled its ambassador from Washington, DC. French leaders are furious at the Biden White House for blocking them out of a national security pact with the UK and Australia and agreeing to provide nuclear submarines to Australia (France also recalled its ambassador to Australia.) It will cost France billions because Australia canceled a contract to buy subs from France. This follows hot on the heels of Biden pulling disastrously out of Afghanistan without informing our allies such as France.

https://www.westernjournal.com/nation-recalls-us-ambassador-biden-carelessly-humiliates-americas-oldest-ally/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=huckabee

French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian railed, “This brutal, unilateral and unpredictable decision reminds me a lot of what Mr. Trump used to do. I am angry and bitter. This isn’t done between allies.”

I should point out that Le Drain, a former Socialist Party member, probably felt he had to include that kneejerk slap at Trump. But guess how many times France recalled its ambassador while Trump was President.

Mike Huckabee

I haven’t spent much time talking about the fallout from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wearing a designer “Tax The Rich” gown to the ultra-swank Met Gala ($30,000 a ticket/$200,000 a table) because it seemed like one of those “good for a laugh for one day” stories. But it just keeps hanging on because it’s such a perfect illustration of the stunning hypocrisy of the limousine socialist crowd. Some of the latest developments:

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/aoc-a-closet-capitalist

The Met claims the ticket was comped. Conservative watchdogs are demanding that the cost of her ticket be declared as taxable income or a campaign contribution. Even Bill Maher felt compelled to school AOC on the fact that most taxes are already paid by the rich.

https://www.bizpacreview.com/2021/09/18/bill-maher-slams-aoc-and-her-met-dress-you-wear-tax-the-rich-on-your-ass-lets-not-lie-1136121/

Many people seem to have overlooked that AOC was also carrying a “Tax the Rich” handbag by the same designer. AOC defended her as a “black woman immigrant” who started in flea markets. She now sells those handbags for $995 each and is dating billionaire Seagrams heir Benjamin Bronfman.

Meanwhile, socialist fashionista AOC is now selling her own “Tax the Rich” T-shirts for $27 and hoodies for $56. Priced for the proletariat, relatively speaking.

That’s why I had to revisit this story. Because it shows what can only happen in America: two minority females, one a struggling immigrant. One is now a fabulously successful designer dating a billionaire, and the other is a Congress member making six figures, attending $30,000 celebrity galas, wearing designer gowns and selling tons of swag on her website.

Both are a shining example of the greatness and wide open opportunities of the American capitalist system!

Too bad they’ll have to give up so much of the fruits of their labor when they get their enormous tax bills.

Mike Huckabee

The security fence has been put back up around the Capitol Building in advance of a rally Saturday in support of January 6th arrestees who are not accused of committing violence, yet some are being held indefinitely without charges and allegedly under appalling conditions such as solitary confinement. The rally is called “Justice for J6.”

https://www.dailywire.com/news/thats-a-setup-capitol-fence-comes-back-up-trump-weighs-in-on-rally

The organizer said they’ve already held two events, at the prison and the DOJ, and there have been no incidents. He urged anyone who might commit violence to stay away.

However, many Republicans, including President Trump, say they’re staying away from the rally and urge others to as well. Trump told the Federalist that it’s “a set-up”: “If people don’t show up they’ll say, ‘Oh, it’s a lack of spirit.’ And if people do show up they’ll be harassed.”

There’s also the potential that leftist agitators from groups like Antifa will show up dressed as Trump supporters and start violence. Not that that would EVER happen, of course. But if they wanted to, they probably could, since most of them who were ever arrested for rioting or attacking federal buildings were immediately released.

I think it’s also worth noting that Democrats like Nancy Pelosi insist that it’s crazy to think a border wall would provide any security, but the minute they feel even slightly threatened, what happens? They put up a security wall.

Mike Huckabee

While we’re on the subject of comparing Joe Biden to LBJ, some media outlets are trying to do that favorably by comparing the $3.5 trillion spending boondoggle bill he’s attempting to force through Congress to FDR’s “New Deal” and Lyndon Johnson’s “Great Society.” Anyone who studied history before it was subverted by leftist politics should feel his blood run cold at the very thought. Those two massive expansions of government are almost entirely responsible for the bloated, Constitution-shredding government, corrosive welfare state and back-breaking national debt that we’re now enjoying.

Like Biden, those Presidents claimed that their massive spending and government programs were going to result in countless jobs, as if jobs were created by government, not the private sector when government gets out of the way and off its back.

At The Hill Newspaper, Amity Shlaes has a MUST-READ article about FDR’s New Deal, its similarities to the plan by Biden and today's Democrats, and why in most ways, it failed to work and made things worse for years.

https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/552354-biden-as-the-new-fdr-its-the-same-old-bad-deal-for-jobs

In a statement that could easily apply to today’s Democratic socialist schemes, the chief economist at Chase Bank, Benjamin Anderson, said of the New Deal that after failing by playing God, the government chose not to retire but simply “to play God more vigorously.”

Finally, a hat tip to Instapundit for reminding everyone of this 2015 study by UCLA economists that found that FDR’s New Deal actually prolonged the Depression for seven years past the point when it should’ve ended. Coincidentally, the Obama-Biden Administration managed to drag out the 2009 recession for seven years past the point when it should’ve ended. And now, Biden’s trying to do it again with the pandemic shutdown recession.

https://www.ff.org/fdrs-policies-prolonged-depression-by-7-years-ucla-economists-calculate/

These people just keep repeating history, maybe because they keep flunking it.

Mike Huckabee

All the cries from the left to expand and pack the Supreme Court for not giving them what they want have led to a rare flurry of public responses by members of the Court from across the ideological spectrum. Over the past week, Justices Steven Breyer, Amy Coney Barrett and Clarence Thomas have all spoken up against politicians and the media pressuring the Court to be more political or reading political motives into their decisions.

Liberal Justice Breyer said judges are not “junior league politicians,” while Barrett said the Justices are not “partisan hacks,” and she sometimes doesn’t like the results of her own decisions, but it’s not her job to decide cases based on the outcome she wants. Last night, Justice Thomas voiced agreement to an audience at Notre Dame University.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/clarence-thomas-media-supreme-court-texas-abortion

Since this latest round of “Pack the court” screeching was sparked by the SCOTUS not blocking Texas’ new abortion law, Thomas said the media make it sound as if the Justices always go to their personal preference; for instance, if they’re personally pro-life, they’ll always rule that way and become like a politician. Thomas said, “We have lost the capacity" as leaders "to not allow others to manipulate our institutions when we don't get the outcomes that we like." Because of this politicization, he said, "The court was thought to be the least dangerous branch, and we may have become the most dangerous."

One of the main reasons leftists want to pack the SCOTUS is their fear that Roe v. Wade will be overturned, and for the record, Thomas has called on the Court to do just that. But it’s not because he’s personally pro-life. As he explained in 2007, the Roe v. Wade decision has "no basis in the Constitution." And last year, he said Roe is "grievously wrong for many reasons, but the most fundamental is that its core holding -- that the Constitution protects a woman's right to abort her unborn child -- finds no support in the text of the Fourteenth Amendment. "

It’s ironic that the very people who are accusing conservative Justices of acting politically are actually terrified that a conservative majority would overturn decisions that were based purely on the Justices’ liberal political views.

Laura Ainsworth, Staff writer

Several days ago, I related a story about my personal experience with someone who exhibited blind, irrational fear of a non-vaccinated person (me), even though the non-vaccinated person had already had COVID-19 and as a result possessed natural immunity that studies increasingly suggest surpasses the protection provided by vaccines.

The reason for telling this story in the first place was to show that we really are living in a time of mass hysteria --- a time when facts don’t much matter because everyone believes he HAS the facts and “the science is settled” –- and that in many cases our fears are being exploited to achieve desired behavior. How does the government get everyone to do what it wants them to do? By scaring them half to death.

We received numerous reader comments, a few of which we highlighted. One we did not include but that I’d like to address now came from a reader named Chris who identifies himself/herself as a “pediatric technician.” Chris is about to become famous as “Exhibit A” in my case that logic flies right out the door when fear climbs in the window. Here’s the letter, with slight editing...

………………………

You and the Christian Broadcasting Network are totally immoral and irresponsible. You all claim to be "Pro-Life" and you are all miserable hypocrites in the eyes of the world. You don't follow scripture or read your own revised Bible.

Kids are dying daily by the thousands in America and the Pediatric wards are packed with kids who have COVID. YOU ARE KID - KILLERS AND THAT IS HOW YOU WILL BE REMEMBERED. Infants are dying. Toddlers are dying. Small children are dying. You are not pro-life. You are anti-science and anti-fact. You are ignorant and stupid! You can't fix stupid. Too much inbreeding in your own family.

COVID is preventable by a simple vaccine but because you want money from the Trump base, you keep quiet while many children are being killed by their parents and their miserable stupidity. Pure GREED. This is not your finest moment. Maybe your grandchildren will be waiting on a ventilator soon....possible, because of the stupidity that runs in your family.

By remaining quiet you are executing children......you are kid - murderers and kid - killers. No different than serial killers and rapists but you all claim to speak the "truth" and follow Jesus. What a joke.

You are weak and cowardly and you will be judged on this by the big guy in the sky. BURN IN HELL.

You can take that banjo and Bible of yours and shove it up your a--.

…………………………...

Okay, where to start? Do you sense the terror that has transported this person to Crazy Town? First of all, in his (her?) rage, Chris directed this abuse at “all” of us “miserable hypocrites,” including Gov. Huckabee, when I’m the person who wrote the piece. I guess if anyone is going to be judged by “the big guy in the sky” and “burn in hell,” it is me. Though I’m tempted to say this person is not guilty by reason of insanity, I think he or she or xi owes the Gov. an apology. The individual who wrote this also owes the “Christian Broadcasting Network” --- does he mean Trinity Broadcasting Network? --- an apology. Gov. Huckabee, CBN/TBN, the pro-life movement, Christian believers in general, and the version of the Bible the Gov. prefers to read (I have no idea) have absolutely nothing to do with the commentary on vaccines and virus-fear, which I wrote, would write again, and proudly put my name on.

So, Chris, let’s talk about what has inflamed you so and how much truth there is to it. As you are an irrational person, this analysis will not change your mind at all --- probably just anger you more, if that’s possible --- but there are other, sane readers who might benefit from the discussion. Let’s look at a few things you claimed in your letter:

1. “Children are dying daily by the thousands in America and the pediatric wards are packed with children who have COVID.” This is wildly incorrect. Can you even imagine what it would be like in our country if this were actually happening to our children? The total number of children who have died of COVID-19 in the U.S. since the pandemic began is just over 400. Of course, that’s a terrible tragedy, but it’s not thousands of deaths a day. A Johns Hopkins research team looked at records from 48,000 cases in young people under 18 from April to August of 2020. At that time, they found zero deaths that didn’t involve a serious comorbidity such as leukemia. More here…

https://www.wsj.com/articles/cdc-covid-19-coronavirus-vaccine-side-effects-hospitalization-kids-11626706868

So, who fed you that lie about thousands of children dying every day? Someone has an interest in making you believe this. And if you’re really a “pediatric technician,” it stands to reason that you would know it’s false. You certainly haven’t witnessed it on your job, because it isn’t happening.

2. “You are not pro-life. You are anti-science and anti-fact.” Chris, you are stating opinions that are not based in any fact at all. To say Gov. Huckabee is not pro-life is like saying Dr. Kevorkian was not pro-death. And nothing makes a real scientist cringe like the phrase “follow the science.” That is a talking point; you do not understand how science works. Instead of discussing the research, you stoop to crass personal insults.

3. “COVID is preventable by a simple vaccine but because you want money from the Trump base, you keep quiet while many children are being killed...” Chris, the vaccine can provide a lot of protection and lessen the severity of symptoms but it does not PREVENT infection. Gov. Huckabee has said numerous times that he personally has been vaccinated, and he advises everyone to seek their doctor's advice. He would never tell someone not to get vaccinated, and neither would I.

Again, though every death from this virus is tragic, it’s not true that “many children are being killed.” This is true though vaccines weren’t even approved for children until very recently, and then only for kids 12 and older.

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/in-depth/covid-19-vaccines-for-kids/art-20513332

Ah, and we see from your reference to “the Trump base” that it really does come down to politics. Chris, this has nothing whatsoever to do with Trump or his base. You are off-base. But I would say the current administration has worked hard to make you believe it does, so that you'll associate your fear with Trump, and they have succeeded.

4. “Maybe your grandchildren will be waiting on a ventilator soon.” Chris, I can tell from this remark that you are one of those compassionate liberals I’ve heard so much about.

Finally, what was that banjo remark? The Gov. plays bass. Facts matter!

Chris, your letter is so out-there that at first I thought it might even be an attempt at satire. Satire is very challenging to do well –- and even to recognize in this age when real stories can be as crazy as made-up ones. If you were just impersonating a crazy person, you succeeded. Be well.

Mike Huckabee

Sen. Ted Cruz went to Del Rio, Texas, to highlight the massive surge of illegal immigration. Fox News reported that the number of people trying to cross the border doubled from 4,000 to 8,000 in one day. Cruz said when he arrived, there were an estimated 10,503 illegal immigrants gathered under the Del Rio International Bridge.

https://www.foxnews.com/media/hannity-questions-faa-grounded-drones-southern-border-cover-up-bidens-failures

But don’t worry, the Biden Administration is doing something about this. Fox News reported that “for special security reasons,” the FAA declared a two-week temporary flight restriction over the bridge, so Fox can’t fly its drone cameras overhead and show viewers pictures of the massive crowd of illegal entrants.

And that should stop the coverage, since liberal outlets certainly aren't covering the border crisis.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/washington-secrets/media-coverage-of-border-mayhem-drops-94-under-biden

Problem solved! Well, Biden’s problem. Not America’s.

Mike Huckabee

The Pentagon seemed to confirm Bob Woodward’s claim that Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Mark Milley attempted to usurp President Trump’s powers by calling his Chinese counterpart and assuring him he would give China advance warning if Trump launched an attack.

https://www.westernjournal.com/pentagon-appears-confirm-bombshell-gen-milley-report/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=huckabee

I’m not going to quote their statement verbatim (you can read it at the link), since it went on at length in the kind of gaseous government-speak that’s meant to make outrageous acts sound not merely defensible and reasonable but downright laudable. Indeed, a lot of liberal news outlets (those that aren’t ignoring this story entirely) are trying to present it that way and hail Milley as a heroic figure for protecting America from the “unhinged” duly-elected Commander-in-Chief that they hated. Biden spokeswoman Jen Psaki called Milley a “patriot.” So chalk up “insurrection” and “undermining our democracy” as yet another area in which the Democrats’ sacred principles are highly situational.

Even Biden himself reportedly said he has “great confidence” in Milley.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/biden-great-confidence-in-milley-china-calls

Really? So Joe Biden wants to keep a guy around him who has a history of trying to overthrow Presidents whom he thinks are showing mental decline? REALLY?!

If Milley thought it was his duty to step in and take control away from a cognitively-challenged President who was about to commit a dangerous foreign policy blunder, then why didn’t he do that two months ago?

Finally, the line of the day is about this story, and it’s courtesy of former Rep. Trey Gowdy, who said you know who would have appreciated an advance call to warn him of an attack? The Afghan aid worker who was blown up by a drone while loading water cans into his car.

Mike Huckabee

In breaking news Wednesday night, THE NEW YORK TIMES reports that Special Counsel John Durham has informed the Department of Justice that he will seek a grand jury indictment against Michael Sussmann of the law firm Perkins Coie for making a false statement to the FBI.

John Durham, remember him? Even President Trump has wondered from time to time what happened to him. Apparently, he’s just had his head down working, ever since he was assigned to the case by Bill Barr...in 2019. His status was raised to Special Counsel in December of 2020.

The NYT is subscription-only, but Rebecca Downs at TOWNHALL has details.

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/rebeccadowns/2021/09/15/durham-indictment-n2595973?utm_campaign=rightrailsticky1

No discussion of the “Russia Russia Russia!” hoax would complete without bringing in the huge role played by Perkins Coie, the Clinton-affiliated law firm that in 2016 paid opposition research company Fusion GPS to hire former MI-6 spy Christopher Steele to dig up dirt and provide a report on then-candidate Donald Trump. That scheme produced the infamous “dossier” that contained outrageously fake stories like the one we all know involving Trump and some prostitutes in a Moscow hotel. We’ve covered the story of the phony “dossier” from the start and had always hoped the story of how it came to be would be completely exposed. Now, perhaps this is the first shoe dropping.

Incidentally, Perkins Coie was involved in shady activities in 2020 as well. For the year preceding the Trump/Biden race, it was Marc Elias, a partner at Perkins Coie, who coordinated the state-by-state effort to change election laws and procedures in ways that made it much easier to cheat almost undetectably. And never mind that these changes were supposed to be made by the state legislators, not judges and bureaucrats. All those millions of ballots being mailed out to every name on out-of-date voter rolls and stuffed into unmanned dropboxes? For destroying all trust in our election system, we have Marc Elias of Perkins Coie largely to thank.

Sussmann, a former federal prosecutor, is a partner at the firm as well. As reported by the NYT, he represented the Democratic National Committee “on issues related to Russia’s 2016 hacking of its servers.” As you can see, I’m quoting the TIMES there, as we do not actually have evidence that this “hacking” of the DNC servers was carried out by Russia. It’s part of their narrative that the mainstream media take as a given and keep repeating. We don’t.

But the fact that Sussmann was representing the DNC on this matter should tell you he is the Mother Lode of information on what really happened with that and where all the bodies are buried, so to speak. Not that we can pry it all out of him. There’s this little inconvenience called “attorney-client privilege” that limits what investigators can ask.

Anyway, the Special Counsel has been investigating Sussmann’s activities conveying “certain suspicions” about Trump and Russia –- related to what we have come to know as “the Russia Hoax” –- to James Baker at the FBI in September of 2016. Specifically, investigators want to know who his client was at the time. Investigators have been looking into whether he was secretly working for Hillary’s campaign. He denies that.

Sussmann’s reason for meeting with Baker was to further a long-since-debunked story about covert communication through suspicious “pings” between computer servers associated with the Trump Organization and Alfa Bank, a Russian financial institution linked to the Kremlin. That story has been so thoroughly discredited that Special Counsel Robert Mueller didn’t even mention it in his final report. But there was Sussmann, apparently trying to hand the FBI a fake story. I would add that this was the James Comey FBI, which was eager to run with all the anti-Trump stories it could find.

Baker, now out of the FBI, reportedly told investigators he recalled Sussmann saying he was not meeting him on behalf of any client. Likewise, according to Sussmann’s lawyers, Sussmann simply wanted to give the FBI a “heads-up” because he thought the NEW YORK TIMES was about to publish a story about the Alfa Bank allegations. Wasn’t that nice of him? (The NYT didn’t mention Alfa Bank at all until six weeks later.)

One problem, though: in a 2017 deposition before Congress, Sussmann testified that he had sought the meeting on behalf of an unnamed client, a cybersecurity expert whom he said had helped analyze the Alfa Bank data.

Second, even bigger problem: Durham has obtained billing records from Perkins Coie that show some of Sussmann’s time working on the Alfa Bank matter was billed to...(drum roll, please)...the 2016 Hillary Clinton campaign.

By the way, just a month ago, Marc Elias left Perkins Coie to form a separate law firm, Elias Law Group LLP. The press release says this new spinoff firm “will represent candidates, party committees, political committees, nonprofit organizations, entities and voters. Elias Law Group will be mission-driven, focusing on electing Democrats, supporting voting rights, and helping progressives make change.” More details here.

https://www.perkinscoie.com/en/news-insights/perkins-coie-and-its-political-law-group-announce-the-formation-of-the-independent-firm-elias-law-group-llp.html

This new separation “will provide Elias Law Group with the independence to broaden its advocacy and types of matters on which it works, including by engaging more directly in the political and electoral process.”

As if Elias and Perkins Coie haven’t been engaged enough in that already. Elias will have offices in both DC and Seattle, where they’ll be “focused on helping Democrats win, citizens vote, and progressives make change.” And anyone who thought Perkins Coie was some little boutique law firm should think again: Perkins Coie is a huge international operation with 1,200 lawyers in offices “across the United States and Asia.” Watch out –- they’ve made this move as part of their gearing-up for the 2022 elections and are looking ahead to 2024, and judging from their past behavior, I don’t think they’ll waste much time debating the ethics of what they’re doing.

For now, though, Michael Sussmann is a major player who finally appears to have been caught in Durham’s net. Colton Salaz at JUST THE NEWS also has a write-up, and we look forward to investigative reporter John Solomon’s take as well, as he’s been all over this story for years.

https://justthenews.com/government/courts-law/special-counsel-seeks-indictment-against-lawyer-center-steel-dossier

“Mr. Sussmann has committed no crime,” his attorneys told the NYT. “Any prosecution here would be baseless, unprecedented and an unwarranted deviation from the apolitical and principled way in which the Department of Justice is supposed to do its work.”

Are these really Sussmann’s attorneys or a comedy writing team? Because that line about the DOJ is pretty darn funny.

Pat Reeder, Staff writer

As the person who covers the entertainment world, it falls to me to write show biz obituaries. While it’s always a sad duty, this one hits especially hard for me and my wife/co-writer, Laura Ainsworth. Comedian Norm MacDonald has died at 61 of cancer, which he had reportedly been fighting for nine years. His producing partner Lori Jo Hoekstra said he kept it a secret because comedy came first and he never wanted that to color how people saw him.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/norm-macdonald-snl-comedian-dies-age-61/

For a comic who never became a major star, Norm’s death was met with a massive outpouring of grief and accolades from fellow comedians and hardcore fans like us. Seth Meyers called him the “gold standard” of comedy and admitted the hardest part of doing “Saturday Night Live’s” Weekend Update was not reading jokes the way Norm would say them.

He had a distinctive voice and delivery, a unique and unpredictable perspective, and most importantly of all in this cancel culture age, he was utterly fearless. If he thought a joke was funny (and to those of us who “got” his sense of humor, he was gutbustingly funny), no matter how bizarre the premise, he would pursue and expand on it, even if the audience greeted it with silence (you could usually hear a few fellow comedians in the back, howling with laughter.) One of the funniest things you’ll ever see on TV is Norm on Conan O’Brien’s show, using up his entire segment to tell an ancient, rambling, deadpan shaggy dog story with a groaner of a punchline that somehow was hilarious all the way through.

When Laura and I used to write our syndicated topical radio service, the Comedy Wire, nothing made me prouder than to write a joke that I could describe as “a Norm MacDonald line.”

These days, what passes for a “joke” on “SNL” is a smug two-minute political lecture. Norm could pack more laughs into two short sentences (“College radio reports that the #1 band this summer was Better Than Ezra. At #2: Ezra!”) He defied orders to stop doing O.J. Simpson jokes even when it got him fired. He didn’t care if he bombed, got fired, the audience didn’t get it or Twitter mobs cried about being offended: if he thought it was funny, he went with it. And to me, he was always right. He ruthlessly mocked leftist icons like Bill and Hillary Clinton at a time when other comics were giving them a free ride. He even dared to joke about COVID (“None of us know how we’re going to die… Well, we know NOW.”)

He was also surprisingly intelligent, once taking home $500,000 on a charity celebrity edition of “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” (he also knew the answer to the million dollar question, but Regis talked him out of trying for it.) I still remember him lecturing a comic on a talent show for performing a lazy Christian-bashing bit that the other judges loved.

Norm was a “comedian’s comedian,” but to his cult fan base like us, he was one of the funniest men of all time. You never knew what might come out of his mouth, but you knew it would be hilarious and like nothing that anyone else would think of. And if someone didn’t like it and took offense, he couldn’t care less. Let’s hope more comedians take inspiration from him and reclaim comedy from the humorless woke mobs.

Here are a few of Norm’s more mainstream funny moments, courtesy of Fox News. You’ll find many, many more on YouTube.

https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/norm-macdonald-snl-late-night-funniest-moments

Laura Ainsworth, Staff writer

Thanks to all who responded to my story about the government’s latest very successful fear campaign --- the one against the unvaccinated.

By the way, since then it’s become obvious that the same motivation was just used in California to help a failing governor survive a recall election. To keep his office when California is a disaster on so many fronts, Gov. Newsom needed people to be AFRAID of the alternative, Republican opponent Larry Elder. And how was that going to happen, given that Elder is a genial, self-made black man who wants to fix problems and make life better for everybody in California? That’s easy: liken him to the biggest object of fear to the left, former President Trump.

An aggressive fear campaign had already been waged against Trump for years, and so progressives are TERRIFIED of him. To them, he’s the COVID-19 of political leaders. If you know the George Orwell novel “1984,” Trump is Emmanuel Goldstein in the daily government-mandated “Two Minutes Hate.” I’m talking abject, screaming-at-the-sky fear and loathing, as satirized in this masterpiece must-see video that I wish I could take credit for...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6fNtODWUwY

You understand, of course, that these people aren’t terrified of the actual Trump, about whom they typically know little, but of the imaginary Trump that has been created out of the thin air in their heads. You know, the evil white supremacist who thinks the KKK are “fine people” and collaborated with Putin to become President. THAT Donald Trump. I’d be scared of him, too, if he existed. The real Trump, I like.

But the Democrats’ anti-Trump fear campaign wasn’t aimed at me.

And it laid the foundation for Newsom’s recall election. This time, it was pounded into California voters’ heads that Elder was, in effect, Trump. Newsom then ran against Trump. He'd say, “A vote for Elder is a vote for Trump.” Or even, “Larry Elder is a clone of Donald Trump.” (They wanted voters to forget Elder is black.)

So, in the end, Newsom beat Trump---I mean, Elder.

But back to my story. I received some great comments on my real-life tale of being leper-ized by someone out of his mind with irrational fear...

From Tyna:

My daughter works FROM HOME and is an HR generalist. She sees NO patients or co-workers. She was given an ultimatum to get vaccinated or she will be terminated. She already has had Covid, and she has a health condition that was supposed to kill her by age 14. She wants to see her kids and grands grow up and get married. What happened to FREEDOM?

From Laura:

Someone who works from home can’t transmit anything to patients or co-workers but a computer virus! This makes no sense. And your daughter likely has better immunity than someone who hasn’t had COVID but took the vaccine. The decision should be hers, with advice from her doctor. Good luck to her with her employer. Time is on her side if she can stall; I think personal choice in this matter will win in the courts.

From Kathleen:

I was helping a neighbor with her yard sale a few weeks ago. A young man drove up in a Tesla; I had never been close to one and asked if I could sit in it. He had a “VACCINATED” button on his shirt, and I said, “By the way, I am not vaccinated.” Upon hearing that, he said I could not sit in the car. Then he went on a ten-minute rant on why everyone should get vaccinated. All the friends at the sale were friends and were not vaccinated, and we all felt sorry for the fool.”

From Laura:

I can picture this guy finishing his rant; hearing the rest of you weren’t vaccinated, either; speeding off in a panic and driving his Tesla smack into a tree.

If he’s vaccinated, he must not have much confidence that it will protect him. Why would your vaccination keep him safe if his own is that iffy? Again, none of this is rational.

From Prudence (excerpt):

Hello, Laura -- Thank you for your spot-on article. You are not alone. I experienced a similar incident two weeks ago. My regular doctor is out with cancer and so I had to see her colleague to get a prescription refilled...This doctor's visit was almost surreal! He wanted to know why I wasn't vaccinated, and I explained that I've had adverse reactions to vaccines in the past, including the flu shot. He began to berate me, telling me I believed all the rot on the internet and bought into all the foolishness, continuing to give me his "expert" advice on why he felt I needed to just take the vaccine. I'd never seen this idiot doctor before and will never seen him again.

My doctor knows my circumstances and respects my wishes on why I won't take the shot. Unfortunately, not only are people divided on the vaccines, so is the medical community! I didn't mention to him about my conversations with my doctor for fear of her receiving retribution from her colleague if and when she returns.

From Laura:

Your concern for your own doctor was well-founded. Doctors are also running into problems within their profession for prescribing treatments such as ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine. I hope your independent-minded regular doctor is soon able to return to her practice.

From Mike:

Very disappointed you have decided not to be vaccinated, I had Covid in February 2020 when doctors didn’t really know what it was. I was diagnosed with severe bronchitis. Haven’t smoked in 36 years, [am] a jogger, and I developed COPD and my antibodies were gone in 60 days. Please rethink you position.

From Laura:

I’m grateful for your concern, Mike, but am hesitant because of some vascular issues in my family that might be hereditary. If I hadn’t had the virus, I definitely would have gone ahead and been vaccinated, but my personal risk analysis is telling me to stick with natural immunity. Also, my understanding is that the antibody test after one is recovered is not necessarily an accurate measure of one’s immune response once the virus is re-introduced. Thanks and be well!

Finally, a reader with a wicked sense of fun left me this gem…

From Doug:

I was just reading your latest article, "The Latest Government Fear Campaign," when I got to the part where you said that YOU HAVEN'T BEEN VACCINATED!!! Needless to say, I IMMEDIATELY stopped reading your unvaccinated words, erased the article from my tablet, wiped down the tablet with an anti-bacterial wipe, then bleach, then ran an antivirus program on said tablet. Fortunately, it came up clean, so I am hopeful that I avoided exposure to the Delta Variant that you are most assuredly carrying and exposing everyone to, YOU HEARTLESS, SELFISH, EVIL, TRUMP-LOVING, PLAGUE-CARRYING RADICAL RIGHT FASCIST!!!!

By the way, I went to the public library to write this comment to you because I didn't want to expose my device to your plague. Pretty smart, huh?

From Laura:

You can’t be too careful! Uh-oh, you’re reading my unvaccinated words again.

Mike Huckabee

In Tuesday’s election, Californians went for the “Thank you, sir, may I have another?” option, and Gov. Gavin Newsom easily escaped being replaced by about 67-33%. It was disappointing but hardly unexpected, as the recall was always a longshot. That’s why we have the saying, “You can’t fix…California.”

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/the-nos-have-it-gov-gavin-newsom-survives-in-california-recall-election

Newsom claimed that what the election was about was, "We said yes to science, yes to vaccines, yes to ending this pandemic." Funny, just one day before, he was claiming that the election was about protecting “racial justice” by not replacing the wealthy white guy with a black man who grew up poor.

Also, his policies of shutting down churches while allowing BLM protests, closing neighborhood restaurants while he dined in fancy French restaurants and let Hollywood productions set up big catering stations, and forcing other people’s kids to wear masks at summer camp while sending his son to one that didn’t require masking don’t exactly scream, “I care about science.”

Here’s a good analysis of the race and its likely aftermath from Joe Cunningham at Redstate. He expects Democrats to do what they always do: interpret this win as a mandate to inflict more disastrous, freedom-crushing policies that will eventually hurt them in the upcoming general election.

https://redstate.com/joesquire/2021/09/15/gavin-newsoms-win-will-end-up-dragging-democrats-down-n443242

I expect that the immediate result will be that more people will decide California is beyond redemption and move out. But wherever you end up, please don’t forget what you came there to escape and vote for more Gavin Newsoms to ruin your new home. It’s bad enough that Texas has to deal with Austin now. They don’t need “Beto” O’Rourke actually getting elected to anything important.

Mike Huckabee

The report from the 2020 Maricopa County election canvass conducted by Liz Harris of the Voter Integrity Project and sponsored by Arizona Senate Republicans, which we brought to you last week, has drawn "fact"-checkers like a picnic draws ants, so let’s take a look.

Keep in mind that, as we pointed out in our original commentary, this two-month effort was NOT part of the official audit currently going on in Maricopa County. The huge, official one has no set deadline and keeps stretching into the future because, according to auditors, they haven’t been getting cooperation from either state officials or Dominion Voting Systems, who have withheld materials the auditors say they need. That’s something we know is true.

So, we just have to cool our heels, as the official report will take as long as it takes. In the meantime, the Voter Integrity Project did their own canvass of just mail-in votes. Something else we know is true: the sudden and widespread implementation of mail-in balloting, in itself, doesn’t prove cheating but sure does make it easier. And, the easier it is to cheat and the more difficult it is to detect, the more likely there is to BE cheating. The key question is, “How MUCH cheating?”

One story we linked to, from THE GATEWAY PUNDIT, had a headline we made clear was theirs, not ours, as it out-and-out said that “Election steal is now confirmed.” We advised readers to look at the story and come to their own conclusions, which I assume they did.

One thing we credited these canvassers with was transparency. It’s possible to go back and see their methodology. It was made clear that, unlike the enormous official audit, this was another one of those attempts to extrapolate from a limited sample. For example, from the 330 registered voters –- 34 percent of their total sample –- who claimed they had voted but whose votes couldn't be unaccounted for, they came up with an estimate, county-wide, of 173,104 votes that were cast but not counted.

Opinion writer Laurie Roberts at the ARIZONA REPUBLIC predictably made fun of the canvass for its process of statistical sampling and the “conspiracy crowd” that was “abuzz with excitement” about it.

https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/laurieroberts/2021/09/09/canvass-report-arizonas-election-out-and-is-indeed-shocking/8258447002/

As for “ghost” voting --- mail-in ballots cast by people that residents said they didn’t know or had moved away --- the same extrapolating was done. Canvassers looking at a sample of voters ended up talking with 164 people who told them this had happened. They extrapolated from that number to get their rough estimate of 96,389 “ghost” votes counted county-wide.

Even so, Arizona state Rep. Mark Finchem is premature in saying the statewide election should be decertified. He’s running for secretary of state and wants to show how proactive he is, but we’re not there yet. Quite possibly we will be after the full audit is complete, but not now. They can’t decertify with only rough estimates based on statistical samples. Still, this does give us a pretty good idea of what probably happened.

“Our questions were really simple,” Harris said. What method did you use to vote? Did you receive extra ballots? What did you do with those extra ballots? How many registered voters are supposed to be here, and how many actually voted? Not once do we ask who the person voted for.”

See her interviewed by Steve Bannon here.

https://www.worldtribune.com/decertify-maricopa-county-canvas-found-173000-lost-votes-96000-ghost-votes/

The canvassers did run into trouble identifying a couple of properties as vacant lots. One of these appears to be a mistake; there’s actually a house with a pool at that address. The other, which was unfortunately used in a cover photo for the report –- inviting ridicule –- is something we’re checking into. There’s data from 2019 showing that it was a mobile home park and from 2021 showing it to be vacant lot, under construction. So, was anyone at that address actually registered to vote at the time of the 2020 election? We’re not sure; it’s possible. But the issue with that one property is just a small part of the big picture this canvass paints, the one that “debunkers” desperately want to turn your attention from.

As Bannon says of Liz during the interview, “She never states here that this is definitive or final. But this is why you need a full canvass to be part of a full forensic audit.”

Exactly. But that doesn’t matter to agenda-driven “fact”-checkers determined to discredit any challenge to the 2020 election. They’re jumping all over this as if it WERE intended to be a definitive accounting. That’s what Lead Stories does --- they criticize Harris for using only “rough reckoning,” when, of course, that’s all it’s intended to be and, given realistic budget restraints, all it really CAN be.

https://leadstories.com/hoax-alert/2021/09/fact-check-arizona-republicans-estimates-do-not-document-173104-lost-votes.html

“Has an Arizona Republican’s door-knocking campaign and back-of-the-envelope estimate proved there were “173,104 lost votes and 96,389 ‘ghost’ votes in Maricopa County’s 2020 election,” asks Dean Miller. “No, that’s not true.” The problem with his critique is that Harris doesn’t claim her canvass IS proof of those exact counts.

Lead Stories also points out that there are problems when people are just asked for their responses, because they don’t always answer accurately. And that is right; people might not want to tell the truth, or they might not remember correctly. This is the same problem pollsters have. But, again, Harris’ report is not intended to provide a perfect, definitive vote count, just an idea of how bad the problems were with all those mail-in ballots in 2020. In a state with a tiny margin of “victory” of just over 10,000 votes, these problems essentially render the real election outcome unknown. For this reason, the report proposes banning mail-in voting.

Harris did tweet that those who “knew the election was stolen” and had been ridiculed as conspiracy theorists should feel vindicated, and it would have been better for her to hold off on that until the official audit is done. Similarly, GATEWAY PUNDIT should not have oversold this as they did. As bad as the results look, it’s not time to decertify the Arizona election at this point, which is not to say that we won’t get there.

But to the “fact”-checkers: You dissected Harris’ study so you could say she didn’t “prove” those numbers when she wasn’t even claiming to –- and, of course, so you could get in some digs at the right. We think, though, that your main goal here was to pull focus from the real take-away, which is that there are massive problems with mail-in ballots and even more reasons to suspect the Biden win in razor-close Arizona.

RELATED READING:

Important follow-up: Maricopa County "discrepancies"

Maricopa County canvassing uncovers huge discrepancies

Mike Huckabee

In yesterday’s newsletter, we discussed the way fear has been used to make Americans do what their government wants them to do, most recently to get vaccinated (two or maybe even three times, whether they need it or not) for COVID-19. Staff writer Laura Ainsworth related how she had just witnessed firsthand the cold, irrational fear someone was experiencing just from being in the same room with an unvaccinated person. This was the case even though he knew the unvaccinated person had previously had COVID, which appears to provide far better immunity, especially against variants, than the vaccines do.

So, would it surprise you to know that according to a new Scott Rasmussen poll, a majority of Democrat voters believe that Trump supporters and unvaccinated Americans pose a bigger threat to the nation than either the Taliban or China? I am not kidding. That’s what it’s like on Planet Democrat, now that a relentless and apparently successful propaganda campaign has been waged against both of these groups. These days, who needs a terrorist attack aided and abetted by the Taliban when you can feel terror just from the presence of an unvaccinated neighbor or friend? Even when that neighbor or friend has already recovered from COVID and has virtually zero chance of giving it to anyone.

The poll is real. Breakdown at the link.

https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/polling/democrats-believe-trump-supporters-and-unvaccinated-pose-bigger-threat

I’m reminded of that infamous video of Maxine Waters urging people to harass former Trump administration officials and “tell them they’re not welcome.” The unvaccinated, even those with natural immunity (which, for some reason, doesn’t count), are now in that category of deplorables as well. Socially aware people see the unvaccinated as ignorant, extremist, irresponsible, uncaring, and dangerous. Never mind that they might have a heart condition, clotting disorder, autoimmune disease or...pregnancy, or that about 40 percent of health care workers are vaccine-hesitant. If “those people” don’t worship at the altar of Dr. Fauci, they’re to be feared and marginalized, barred from as much of public life as possible.

Governments know: nothing motivates the populace to do what you want more than fear. And, at least among Democrats, this fear campaign is working. Ironically, that’s a little scary.

Mike Huckabee

Mike Huckabee

Showing the deep-seated love of “DEMOCRACY” for which the left has become famous lately, leftist agitators disrupted California gubernatorial candidate Larry Elder’s public appearances Wednesday, shooting pellet guns at his security detail. And one “activist” (that’s the current leftst term for “thug”) in a gorilla mask rode by on a bicycle and tried to throw eggs at Elder, but missed.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/larry-elder-says-his-security-details-was-hit-by-pellet-gun-while-campaigning

Ed Driscoll at Instapundit noted that this is now the Los Angeles Times headlined that story: “Larry Elder cuts short Venice homeless encampment tour after hostile reception.” Notice how it’s obviously meant to imply that Elder is unpopular, not that he was targeted by a handful of violent radicals.

https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/472670/

Now, try to imagine the L.A. Times headline if a conservative activist in a GORILLA (!!) mask had thrown eggs at a Democrat who was seeking to become the first black Governor of California. Think maybe the word “racist” would’ve been in that headline somewhere?

Conservative media seems to have noticed the glaring double standard and the deafening silence from “progressives”…

https://redstate.com/jenvanlaar/2021/09/09/whether-its-racism-mental-illness-or-intentional-progressives-silence-on-the-larry-elder-attack-is-deafening-n440203

Mike Huckabee

Elsewhere today, we linked to a Fox News article about precisely what’s in the new Texas election integrity law that Democrats are howling about. But for those who have subscriptions to the Wall Street Journal, this is also worth a read.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/whats-really-in-the-texas-voting-law-elections-republicans-11630533819

The Journal editorial board talks about what’s in the law, but also explains why the hysterical attacks on it as “voter suppression” are ludicrous. For instance, while 24-hour voting is banned, since letting people drop off ballots at 3 a.m. makes fraud easier, in some cases, voting hours are actually expanded. 24-hour voting and drive-in voting are banned (except the latter is okay for disabled people), but they were only allowed for the first time last year due to the pandemic.

The editors also point out that in a previous case in Georgia, when the ACLU argued that expecting people to buy a stamp to mail in their ballots was an “unconstitutional poll tax,” the judges said that “bordered on the frivolous.” I’d say that like most leftists these days, it showed no respect for borders at all.

Just bear in mind that when everything Biden has touched, from the border to the economy, has turned into a blazing dumpster fire, and he’s just surrendered Afghanistan and $85 billion worth of weaponry to the Taliban on the eve of the 20th anniversary of 9/11, while leaving unknown numbers of Americans and allies behind in the process, it’s not surprising that the Democrats are desperate to distract the public with anything else.

I guess, “Look, Texas is securing elections and protecting babies’ lives! GET ‘EM!!” is the best they can come up with.