Month: December 2018

The Deep State now is publicly baring its fangs at us, laughing at ineffective attempts to hold it accountable for abuse and worse.  I hate to be alarmist, but we have police agencies misbehaving and then destroying the evidence and refusing to cooperate with constitutional oversight functions.  Just in the last couple of days, we have learned that critical form 302 records were altered months after they were first created regarding the FBI interview upon which General Michael Flynn was prosecuted.  And we learned that the Special Counsel’s Office of Robert Mueller scrubbed access to the text messages of Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, the texting blabbermouths who revealed the D.S. “insurance policy” in the event Trump won the presidency.

And now we know that the FBI is flouting a congressional subpoena for documents that would explain why it raided the home of a whistleblower in the Uranium One case.  (Readers may recall that that case, implicating Secretary Clinton and the Clinton Foundation, was prosecuted by Rod Rosenstein, then the U.S. attorney in Baltimore, and investigated by James Comey’s FBI.)

Gregg Re of Fox News explains the FBI’s obstruction of oversight – in other words, its declaration that it is above the law and not accountable to Congress investigating what looks like abuse of a whistleblower who is embarrassing the Bureau.

The Justice Department and FBI have missed a Wednesday deadline to provide information about the government’s mysterious raid on a former FBI contractor-turned-whistleblower’s home last month.

Sixteen FBI agents on Nov. 19 raided the home of Dennis Nathan Cain, who reportedly gave the Justice Department’s Inspector General (IG) documents related to the Uranium One controversy and potential wrongdoing by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The documents in question allegedly showed that federal officials failed to investigate possible criminal activity related to Clinton, the Clinton Foundation and Rosatom, a Russian nuclear company.  Its subsidiary purchased Canadian mining company Uranium One in 2013.

The remedy to this outrageous defiance ought to be prosecution.  But the Department of Justice can stonewall and refuse to prosecute.

An unaccountable police agency?  ”What, me worry?” seems to be the attitude of the media and Democrats.  

Photo credit: pxhere.

The Deep State now is publicly baring its fangs at us, laughing at ineffective attempts to hold it accountable for abuse and worse.  I hate to be alarmist, but we have police agencies misbehaving and then destroying the evidence and refusing to cooperate with constitutional oversight functions.  Just in the last couple of days, we have learned that critical form 302 records were altered months after they were first created regarding the FBI interview upon which General Michael Flynn was prosecuted.  And we learned that the Special Counsel’s Office of Robert Mueller scrubbed access to the text messages of Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, the texting blabbermouths who revealed the D.S. “insurance policy” in the event Trump won the presidency.

And now we know that the FBI is flouting a congressional subpoena for documents that would explain why it raided the home of a whistleblower in the Uranium One case.  (Readers may recall that that case, implicating Secretary Clinton and the Clinton Foundation, was prosecuted by Rod Rosenstein, then the U.S. attorney in Baltimore, and investigated by James Comey’s FBI.)

Gregg Re of Fox News explains the FBI’s obstruction of oversight – in other words, its declaration that it is above the law and not accountable to Congress investigating what looks like abuse of a whistleblower who is embarrassing the Bureau.

The Justice Department and FBI have missed a Wednesday deadline to provide information about the government’s mysterious raid on a former FBI contractor-turned-whistleblower’s home last month.

Sixteen FBI agents on Nov. 19 raided the home of Dennis Nathan Cain, who reportedly gave the Justice Department’s Inspector General (IG) documents related to the Uranium One controversy and potential wrongdoing by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The documents in question allegedly showed that federal officials failed to investigate possible criminal activity related to Clinton, the Clinton Foundation and Rosatom, a Russian nuclear company.  Its subsidiary purchased Canadian mining company Uranium One in 2013.

The remedy to this outrageous defiance ought to be prosecution.  But the Department of Justice can stonewall and refuse to prosecute.

An unaccountable police agency?  ”What, me worry?” seems to be the attitude of the media and Democrats.  

Photo credit: pxhere.

After 40 years, the perpetually butthurt discovered the display.

Via KPTV:

A nativity scene displayed at a public park in Woodland was moved to private property after a handful of complaints, according to the city.

Tuesday, the Public Works Department helped move the set from Horseshoe Lake Park to a privately-owned vacant lot at the corner of Goerig Street and Buckeye Street.

City leaders told FOX 12 they didn’t want to move the manger but made the decision after seeking guidance from the city attorney, who advised that keeping it on public property was a violation of federal and state laws.

“I wouldn’t have chosen to do this, but it’s in the best interest of the city to do so,” said Mayor Will Finn by phone Tuesday night. “The feedback I’m getting is that it’s in a better spot.”

Finn said he personally sought out the new location and permission from the property owner after the city received complaints about the display within the last week.

According to City Administrator Peter Boyce, the nativity scene itself is privately-owned, but the city has allowed it to be displayed at the park for the last few decades.

Finn estimates the manger has been set up in the park every December for the last 40 years.

Jenny Tingley was able to see the nativity scene from her home and was surprised and disappointed to see it removed.

“Our grandkids love it when they put little baby Jesus out,” Tingley said. “I didn’t think it was offensive at all. I thought it added to the look of our town when it’s the holidays.”

“I’m just sorry that people got offended by it, because we enjoy it – everybody we know enjoys it,” Tingley added.

Boyce said he’s unaware of complaints in years prior, but said the city recently received about five recent complaints.

Keep reading…

On second thought, maybe taking the aid wasn’t such a bad idea after all.

Such is the thinking of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro, who seems to be reaching out to the United Nations for aid in the wake of the hideous socialist failure of the Venezuelan economy.

According to the Washington Post:

CARACAS, Venezuela — Venezuela may have reached a tipping point.

The country, of course, is still a mess, with almost 12 percent of the population malnourished and infectious diseases spreading rapidly, according to UNICEF. Making matters worse, an independent national survey of 40 hospitals found that a third of beds aren’t operative, half of emergency rooms do not have vital medicines, and 95 percent of CT scans and 51 percent of X-ray machines aren’t working.

So why the celebration among some Venezuela watchers? It’s because the government of President Nicolás Maduro has essentially admitted the depths of the humanitarian crisis in his country and agreed to accept some financial help — albeit a modest amount.

Not exactly an advertisement as to the glories of socialism.

What it shows is that socialism is no road to self-sufficiency – it actually makes a country permanently dependent on the international bureaucracies – the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund, the Hague courts, the World Bank, joining the welfare class of nations that aren’t really nations without the aid, and putting them in a position of always looking for a handout, not primarily to feed the people but to prop the regime – and its way of governing – up.

Studies show that becoming one of those nations that’s always looking to the UN for help is a great route to permanent underdevelopment. Why, because actual nations are nations because they can hold themselves up, pay their way, live like adults instead of children. Anything else and they end up as wards of some empire. In this case, Maduro is choosing the UN.

And that reveals a lot about where Venezuela is heading – its pattern downstream and off the falls is exactly that of other socialist regimes, starting with its mentor-state, Cuba.

A socialist always looks to another socialist, a bigger socialist, to bail him out, because socialism is inherently unsustainable. Castro did it, using the Soviet Union when his hellhole went bust, and then Venezuela until the money ran out. Vietnam, Laos, Mongolia, Ethiopia, Allende’s Chile, they’ve all been Soviet client states living on handouts. Someone supports North Korea. Surprise, it’s communist China.

And note that Maduro refuses to take any of our money to help, as President Trump generously offered. No, he wants only U.N. money – and International Monetary Fund Money. He’s a beggar who’s going to be a chooser.

With Hugo Chavez-cheerleader Michelle Bachelet now running the U.N. agency Maduro is seeking help from, one can expect this will be a crony-cozy relationship. Bachelet is a Chilean lefty strongly connected to Allende’s Chile, and an ex-president of Chile who left power on sour terms, as well as a big fan of the United Nations with all its money and power. Now she’s got a new gig there and is one of the officials who’s going to be propping up the Venezuelan hellhole regime with UN money, ensuring his permanent state of power.

Get a load of the adoration from this photo of the two in Costa Rica three years ago. It’s love…

Maduro and Bachelet in 2015 // Source: Gobierno de Chile, CC BY-SA 2.0

And that looks like the next stage of the game in Venezuela’s long socialist slide downward – becoming a permanently underdeveloped client state with an entrenched socialist power structure.

Why the U.N. has money is because the U.S. supports it. If the U.N. is going to be propping up socialist hellhole regimes that should have been overthrown long ago, it raises questions as to what the U.N. is really about and why Americans should continue to support this operation. President Trump has a negative view of the place, and has downgraded its importance to America by dropping the U.N. ambassador position as a cabinet post. If the U.N. is going to be propping up Maduro, maybe he should defund it altogether and just pull the U.S. out.

 

On second thought, maybe taking the aid wasn’t such a bad idea after all.

Such is the thinking of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro, who seems to be reaching out to the United Nations for aid in the wake of the hideous socialist failure of the Venezuelan economy.

According to the Washington Post:

CARACAS, Venezuela — Venezuela may have reached a tipping point.

The country, of course, is still a mess, with almost 12 percent of the population malnourished and infectious diseases spreading rapidly, according to UNICEF. Making matters worse, an independent national survey of 40 hospitals found that a third of beds aren’t operative, half of emergency rooms do not have vital medicines, and 95 percent of CT scans and 51 percent of X-ray machines aren’t working.

So why the celebration among some Venezuela watchers? It’s because the government of President Nicolás Maduro has essentially admitted the depths of the humanitarian crisis in his country and agreed to accept some financial help — albeit a modest amount.

Not exactly an advertisement as to the glories of socialism.

What it shows is that socialism is no road to self-sufficiency – it actually makes a country permanently dependent on the international bureaucracies – the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund, the Hague courts, the World Bank, joining the welfare class of nations that aren’t really nations without the aid, and putting them in a position of always looking for a handout, not primarily to feed the people but to prop the regime – and its way of governing – up.

Studies show that becoming one of those nations that’s always looking to the UN for help is a great route to permanent underdevelopment. Why, because actual nations are nations because they can hold themselves up, pay their way, live like adults instead of children. Anything else and they end up as wards of some empire. In this case, Maduro is choosing the UN.

And that reveals a lot about where Venezuela is heading – its pattern downstream and off the falls is exactly that of other socialist regimes, starting with its mentor-state, Cuba.

A socialist always looks to another socialist, a bigger socialist, to bail him out, because socialism is inherently unsustainable. Castro did it, using the Soviet Union when his hellhole went bust, and then Venezuela until the money ran out. Vietnam, Laos, Mongolia, Ethiopia, Allende’s Chile, they’ve all been Soviet client states living on handouts. Someone supports North Korea. Surprise, it’s communist China.

And note that Maduro refuses to take any of our money to help, as President Trump generously offered. No, he wants only U.N. money – and International Monetary Fund Money. He’s a beggar who’s going to be a chooser.

With Hugo Chavez-cheerleader Michelle Bachelet now running the U.N. agency Maduro is seeking help from, one can expect this will be a crony-cozy relationship. Bachelet is a Chilean lefty strongly connected to Allende’s Chile, and an ex-president of Chile who left power on sour terms, as well as a big fan of the United Nations with all its money and power. Now she’s got a new gig there and is one of the officials who’s going to be propping up the Venezuelan hellhole regime with UN money, ensuring his permanent state of power.

Get a load of the adoration from this photo of the two in Costa Rica three years ago. It’s love…

Maduro and Bachelet in 2015 // Source: Gobierno de Chile, CC BY-SA 2.0

And that looks like the next stage of the game in Venezuela’s long socialist slide downward – becoming a permanently underdeveloped client state with an entrenched socialist power structure.

Why the U.N. has money is because the U.S. supports it. If the U.N. is going to be propping up socialist hellhole regimes that should have been overthrown long ago, it raises questions as to what the U.N. is really about and why Americans should continue to support this operation. President Trump has a negative view of the place, and has downgraded its importance to America by dropping the U.N. ambassador position as a cabinet post. If the U.N. is going to be propping up Maduro, maybe he should defund it altogether and just pull the U.S. out.

 

After it was revealed that members of Congress were allowed to tap public money to pay off women who had been sexually harassed, embarassed lawmakers from both parties began working on legislation that would force members to pay off sexual harassment claims on their own dime.

Yesterday, by voice vote, the House and Senate approved a measure that would cap court damages at $300,000 but there would be no limit on private settlements.

Reuters:

“Time is finally up for members of Congress who think that they can sexually harass and get away with it. They will no longer be able to slink away with no one knowing that they have harassed. … They will pay back the U.S. Treasury,” one of the House co-sponsors, Representative Jackie Speier, a Democrat, told reporters.

“We want to thank 1,500 former staff members of Congress who wrote a letter to us who made the case all too clear, that sexual harassment in Congress was a huge problem,” she said.

Congress acted more than a year after the #Metoo battle began against sexual harassment of women. Hundreds of high-profile men around the world have been fired or have resigned from their jobs in politics, media, entertainment and business after facing allegations of sexually harassing or assaulting women and men.

Over the past year, several U.S. lawmakers have left office following sexual misconduct allegations, including Democratic Senator Al Franken, Democratic Representative John Conyers, and Republican Representatives Trent Franks and Blake Farenthold. They all denied the allegations.

Speier has been a driving force behind the legislation, having been a victim of harassment when she was employed on Capitol Hill. 

The legislation says Congress must also regularly report and publish settlements, a departure from past practices in which settlements were secret.

Farenthold left Congress in April, several months after Politico reported he settled a sexual harassment lawsuit with taxpayer funds. He denied wrongdoing, but pledged to pay the money back.

The bill takes other steps to strengthen worker protections for congressional employees, such as eliminating month-long periods for “counseling” and “cooling off” that were required of employees who made harassment claims.

Will this help change the culture on the Hill where women are routinely harassed and even assaulted? It will certainly make it harder for members and their top staff to hide their harassment. It will also make members more careful.

But while dozens of women have been victims, rocking the boat by accusing a member is still a career ender. It’s a horrible choice, to be sure and in a perfect world, women shouldn’t have to make it.

But at least now the public won’t be paying for a member’s indiscretions. 

After it was revealed that members of Congress were allowed to tap public money to pay off women who had been sexually harassed, embarassed lawmakers from both parties began working on legislation that would force members to pay off sexual harassment claims on their own dime.

Yesterday, by voice vote, the House and Senate approved a measure that would cap court damages at $300,000 but there would be no limit on private settlements.

Reuters:

“Time is finally up for members of Congress who think that they can sexually harass and get away with it. They will no longer be able to slink away with no one knowing that they have harassed. … They will pay back the U.S. Treasury,” one of the House co-sponsors, Representative Jackie Speier, a Democrat, told reporters.

“We want to thank 1,500 former staff members of Congress who wrote a letter to us who made the case all too clear, that sexual harassment in Congress was a huge problem,” she said.

Congress acted more than a year after the #Metoo battle began against sexual harassment of women. Hundreds of high-profile men around the world have been fired or have resigned from their jobs in politics, media, entertainment and business after facing allegations of sexually harassing or assaulting women and men.

Over the past year, several U.S. lawmakers have left office following sexual misconduct allegations, including Democratic Senator Al Franken, Democratic Representative John Conyers, and Republican Representatives Trent Franks and Blake Farenthold. They all denied the allegations.

Speier has been a driving force behind the legislation, having been a victim of harassment when she was employed on Capitol Hill. 

The legislation says Congress must also regularly report and publish settlements, a departure from past practices in which settlements were secret.

Farenthold left Congress in April, several months after Politico reported he settled a sexual harassment lawsuit with taxpayer funds. He denied wrongdoing, but pledged to pay the money back.

The bill takes other steps to strengthen worker protections for congressional employees, such as eliminating month-long periods for “counseling” and “cooling off” that were required of employees who made harassment claims.

Will this help change the culture on the Hill where women are routinely harassed and even assaulted? It will certainly make it harder for members and their top staff to hide their harassment. It will also make members more careful.

But while dozens of women have been victims, rocking the boat by accusing a member is still a career ender. It’s a horrible choice, to be sure and in a perfect world, women shouldn’t have to make it.

But at least now the public won’t be paying for a member’s indiscretions. 

The mission of the Media Research Center is to create a media culture in America where truth and liberty flourish. The MRC is a research and education organization operating under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, and contributions to the MRC are tax-deductible.

Copyright © 2017, Media Research Center. All Rights Reserved.

That pesky First Amendment once again is frustrating Representative Ted Lieu over items like this one from me: Dem Rep. Ted Lieu says that he’d ‘love to be able to regulate the content of speech’.  Paul Crookston writes in the Free Beacon:

Rep. Ted Lieu (D., Calif.) released a statement Thursday saying he supports the First Amendment and criticizing “conservative media” for mischaracterizing him. (snip) on CNN Wednesday, Lieu made news by saying, “I would love to be able to regulate the content of speech. The First Amendment prevents me from doing so, and that’s simply a function of the First Amendment, but I think over the long run, it’s better the government does not regulate the content of speech.”

Some questioned whether he’s committed to the principle of free speech given the content of that statement, and he hit back Thursday by saying he considers himself an “ardent defender of the First Amendment” and on CNN he was merely making the point that the First Amendment prevents him from regulating speech.

So, what did he mean by saying that he’d “love to be able to regulate the content of free speech.”? Who says such things, other than people who lust to silence their opponents?

“In the interview, I again stated the First Amendment prevents government from regulating the content of speech. I also made the point that it was the First Amendment that prevents me from regulating speech. I have been, and always will be, an ardent defender of the First Amendment,” he said.

Let’s try an analogy. What if Ted had said, “I’d love to be able to rape attractive women, but the criminal justice system prevents me from doing so, and that’s simply a function of the criminal justice system, but I think over the long run, it’s better that the government regulate rape.”? Do you think that the feminists would be cool with a powerful lawmaker saying that but for the law he’d be out there raping attractive women?

He slammed “conservative media,” including Fox News host Tucker Carlson, for its response to his comment on CNN.

I’m jealous that I was not named, but then like everyone else Lieu disagrees with, I must be “stupid.” Take a look at who and what he regards as stupid:

That pesky First Amendment once again is frustrating Representative Ted Lieu over items like this one from me: Dem Rep. Ted Lieu says that he’d ‘love to be able to regulate the content of speech’.  Paul Crookston writes in the Free Beacon:

Rep. Ted Lieu (D., Calif.) released a statement Thursday saying he supports the First Amendment and criticizing “conservative media” for mischaracterizing him. (snip) on CNN Wednesday, Lieu made news by saying, “I would love to be able to regulate the content of speech. The First Amendment prevents me from doing so, and that’s simply a function of the First Amendment, but I think over the long run, it’s better the government does not regulate the content of speech.”

Some questioned whether he’s committed to the principle of free speech given the content of that statement, and he hit back Thursday by saying he considers himself an “ardent defender of the First Amendment” and on CNN he was merely making the point that the First Amendment prevents him from regulating speech.

So, what did he mean by saying that he’d “love to be able to regulate the content of free speech.”? Who says such things, other than people who lust to silence their opponents?

“In the interview, I again stated the First Amendment prevents government from regulating the content of speech. I also made the point that it was the First Amendment that prevents me from regulating speech. I have been, and always will be, an ardent defender of the First Amendment,” he said.

Let’s try an analogy. What if Ted had said, “I’d love to be able to rape attractive women, but the criminal justice system prevents me from doing so, and that’s simply a function of the criminal justice system, but I think over the long run, it’s better that the government regulate rape.”? Do you think that the feminists would be cool with a powerful lawmaker saying that but for the law he’d be out there raping attractive women?

He slammed “conservative media,” including Fox News host Tucker Carlson, for its response to his comment on CNN.

I’m jealous that I was not named, but then like everyone else Lieu disagrees with, I must be “stupid.” Take a look at who and what he regards as stupid:

Contrary to liberal media reporting, the Oval Office meeting with President Trump, Democratic House leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer was a win for Trump, both in substance and in tone.

The meeting gave people an opportunity to see who fears transparency, who’s misrepresenting his/her position and who is being the aggressor in the border debate, and it’s not Donald Trump.

Instead of listening to the media’s version, watch the video. President Trump set the tone of the meeting, and it was decidedly cordial, saying it was a great honor to have Pelosi and Schumer there and acknowledging that they’ve worked very hard on various bipartisan initiatives, such as criminal justice reform and the farm bill.

Trump then turned to “the wall,” saying Republicans support it and he would like to avoid a government shutdown over the issue while acknowledging that it is a very difficult issue because Republicans and Democrats are “on very opposite sides.”

When Trump surrendered the floor to Pelosi, she immediately invoked the subject of a government shutdown, saying the American people recognize that we must keep the government open — as if that, and not border security, were the overriding issue — and warning, “You should not have a Trump shutdown.”

Notice the blatantly calculating way she spun this as a “Trump shutdown” rather than a possible impasse that could lead to a government shutdown. Also note: Pelosi drew first blood, and it was deliberate.

After a minor skirmish over whether Trump should initiate a bill in the House that would be sure to fail in the Senate, Pelosi, playing to the camera, said, “We’re here to have a conversation in a prayerful way, so I don’t think we should have a debate in front of the press.” Pelosi knows that a House bill could not survive a Democratic filibuster in the Senate, yet she continued to press Trump to offer a bill.

Schumer began his remarks by insulting Trump, saying The Washington Post gave him “a whole lot of Pinocchios” on the wall and stressing that Democrats have “a disagreement … not on border security but on the wall.” He chided Trump for calling for a shutdown 20 times, ignoring that Trump had specifically said in this meeting that he does not want that.

Then a frustrated Pelosi said they needed to call a halt to the discussion because they had come in to the meeting in good faith to discuss with Trump how they could keep the government open. Again, Trump was not the one talking about a shutdown; he was talking about the wall and border security, the former being indispensable to the latter. Like Pelosi, Schumer said they should “debate in private,” while Pelosi was insultingly mumbling, “We have taken this conversation to a place that is devoid, frankly, of fact.” In other words, “You’re lying, President Trump, because you won’t agree to our partisan version of reality.”

Schumer insisted that border security is possible without a wall and that experts say a wall would be wasteful — implying, with a straight face, that the Democratic leadership can get exercised over the expenditure of government money. Pelosi lamented again that they were having the debate in public after having come in to the meeting in good faith, and Trump rightly noted, “It’s not bad, Nancy. It’s called transparency.” So it was Nancy’s “good-faith” expectation that Trump would just sit back and take their insults and not discuss the issue that could lead to the dreaded shutdown?

Pelosi responded, “It’s not transparency when we’re not stipulating to a set of facts.” Are you kidding me? Unless you agree with Democrats on the facts, the discussion can’t be transparent? This is the same logic by which leftists ban expression of opinions that don’t agree with theirs. I hope people are paying attention.

Just as the mood was beginning to soften, Schumer again turned to Trump and accused him of wanting to shut the government down, and again Trump denied it. It was only after repeated haranguing that Trump indicated he was tired of playing semantic games and said that if they want to put the shutdown on him, fine, he would be willing to shut down the government if he could not get the wall.

How can anyone believe that the Democrats support border security — wall or no wall — when they have repeatedly broken their promises to work with Republicans on it, when they demonize all opponents of illegal immigration and amnesty as racists, when they oppose all reasonable measures to guard the border, and when many of them actually advocate the elimination of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement?

After the meeting, Pelosi and Schumer continued vilifying Trump, with Schumer describing Trump’s behavior in the meeting as a “temper tantrum” and Pelosi telling colleagues, “It goes to show you: You get into a tinkle contest with a skunk, you get tinkle all over you. … It’s like a manhood thing for him — as if manhood could ever be associated with him.”

It’s undeniable that Pelosi and Schumer initiated the aggressive exchanges, that they personally insulted Trump and were rude and condescending to him, that they openly objected to transparency, and that they misrepresented their own position on border security.

Say what you want about Trump, but he very honestly said that he was determined to get a border wall, that he preferred to have this discussion in front of the entire world and that he would be willing for the government to shut down over it. Pelosi and Schumer are just as willing to shut down the government over it but unwilling to be honest about it.

I applaud President Trump for bringing this issue front and center and exposing the fraudulent and reckless position of the Democratic leadership on border security.

David Limbaugh is a writer, author and attorney. His latest book is “Jesus Is Risen: Paul and the Early Church.” Follow him on Twitter @davidlimbaugh and his website at www.davidlimbaugh.com.

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Eenie meenie, chili-beanie, the spirits are about to speak! The Washington Post does some reading of the Robert Mueller tea leaves today after a week in which the special counsel’s filings seem ever closer to threatening Donald Trump’s presidency. But is it really just getting closer to an anti-climax? Michael Cohen’s sentencing signals a potential end, even if it’s not the one Trump’s foes think:

In the cases of Cohen, former campaign adviser George Papadopoulos, former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, and former national security adviser Michael Flynn, Mueller has proceeded to the sentencing of each without first making him testify at trial against others.

That’s at odds with the common practice of prosecutors — which is to hold the stick of a tougher prison sentence over defendants until they have completed all of their cooperation, particularly any public testimony.

While the recent legal action has led to speculation that prosecutors are narrowing in on the president in anticipation of more criminal charges, Mueller’s sentencing timeline suggests a different outcome to some legal experts — that the accounts of those cooperating witnesses will appear in a written report, not in court.

That would come as no surprise to Andrew McCarthy, who’s been making this argument for weeks. Nor should it be a surprise to the rest of us, since the Department of Justice’s legal policy is that they cannot indict a sitting president. As special counsel, Mueller is bound by that finding, and Mueller is not the kind of person to go rogue, at least not in that sense. The special counsel probe wasn’t going to end in a presidential perp walk, no matter what the fantasies of the fever swamp might be.

Cooperators “usually go last,” former Whitewater independent counsel Robert Ray tells the Post, because they’ve usually been asked to testify in a trial. With Flynn, Papadopoulos, and now Cohen all cooperating and sentenced (Flynn’s sentencing hearing will come next week), Ray concludes that “we are nearing the end.”

What about Roger Stone and Jerome Corsi, though? The situations of those presumed persons of interest still have not been settled, or at least that’s what it seems. That might mean that we’re not quite nearing the end, but it’s a bit curious to see Mueller settle up with all of his cooperators — and to settle a score with Paul Manafort for not cooperating as agreed — before that point. Cohen wouldn’t likely have had much to do with Stone or Corsi, but Flynn and Papadopoulos theoretically might have, or at least have testimony that would be useful in a trial.

If Ray’s right, then it might be that Mueller will finish without trying anyone on the core issue of supposed Russia collusion. That would be an even larger anti-climax, with nothing but a report along with some process-crimes plea deals in hand. That is, however, the consistent track record of special counsels. And it would fit with McCarthy’s read of the situation before the Cohen plea deal was announced:

First, he is not going to indict the president, which would precipitate a trial at some point. The convicted liars are not going to be jury-trial witnesses, so Mueller is not concerned about their lack of credibility. The report will detail disturbing — and thus politically damaging — connections between Trump associates and Kremlin cronies. But there will be no collusion crime, and thus no charges and no need for witnesses.

Second, with the media as his biggest cheerleader (other than Jeff Flake), the false-statements pleas create the illusion of a collusion crime, and thus appear to vindicate Mueller’s sprawling investigation. As I’ve previously explained, the game works this way: The media reports that Mueller is investigating Trump–Russia collusion and that dozens of people have been charged or convicted; but the media omits that no one has been charged, much less convicted, of any crime involving collusion between Trump and Russia. The great mass of people who do not follow the news closely come away thinking a Trump–Russia collusion crime is an established fact; by now, Mueller must be tightening the noose around Trump because he’s already rolled up a bunch of the apparent accomplices.

Third, defendants convicted of making false statements are very useful because Mueller is writing a report, not preparing for a jury trial. Convicted liars never get cross-examined in a report. Nor do they give the bumpy, inconsistent testimony you hear in a courtroom. Instead, their version of events is outlined by a skilled prosecutor, who writes well and knows how to make their stories sing in perfect harmony. They will sound far better in the report than they would on the witness stand. We’ve already gotten a taste of this in the offense narratives Mueller has incorporated in each guilty plea. Read the criminal information in Cohen’s case and ask yourself whether Mr. Fixer could have recited matters with such clarity.

That doesn’t mean that Trump’s out of the woods yet. Mueller might still have some surprises up his sleeve, and the report might contain a lot of damning information that could prompt Congress to act. But at least based on what we’ve gleaned from the filings, that may just come down to questionable accusations of campaign-finance violations, far short of what people expected.

There’s another reason to think that the end is nigh. Don’t forget that William Barr will likely get confirmed as Attorney General very early next year, which will put him in charge of the special-counsel probe. Mueller probably feels a lot more comfortable handing his report to Rod Rosenstein rather than Barr, and Rosenstein will need to decide what to do with it before Barr becomes his boss. The clock is ticking loudly on that option, and Mueller knows it.

The administrators are protecting the snowflakes from ‘hate speech’.

Via Washington Times:

A non-profit group filed a First Amendment lawsuit Thursday against officials at the University of Texas, accusing them of crimping free speech on campus.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in the Western District of Texas, follows a spate of incidents at the system’s flagship campus in Austin and some satellite campuses. Most recently, the Young Conservatives of Texas were attacked by angry liberal students when the group set up a table on a quad to express support for Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Speech First Inc., the plaintiff, said the university has a speech code that’s both “vague and overbroad,” in an attempt to stymy viewpoints some students deem offensive.

“We had heard some really bad stories from our members there, and we were following reports from there, and it just sort of became a perfect storm,” said Nicole Neily, president and founder of Speech First, which has also initiated a First Amendment lawsuit this year against the University of Michigan.

Ms. Neily also cited the conclusion of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, which gives the University of Texas a “red light” for speech codes it says are at odds with the First Amendment and principles of free speech.

School system President Gregory L. Fenves, along with several other top administrators, were named as defendants in the lawsuit.

The Austin campus did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Speech First said the school deploys a Campus Climate Response Team to police speech, swooping down on what the administrators label “campus climate” or “bias” incidents.

Since September 2017, the Response Team has investigated more than 100 reports of alleged bias, according to Speech First.

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