Trump’s ‘Accidental’ Win on the Citizenship Question

Whether by accident or by design, President Trump has alighted upon the exact right solution for ascertaining the truest enumeration of American citizens. Not only that, but his workaround solution should have been done regardless of the recent opinion by the Supreme Court. That is, even if the Court had found that the administration could include the citizenship question in the census, Trump should still have directed his agencies, especially the Social Security Administration, to have their computer programmers write simple little programs to count up the people on their databases by citizen and all other categories.

Americans who care about citizenship or just the corruption of our data should rejoice over Pres. Trump’s announcement on July 11. And here’s what’s nifty about the president’s directive — we don’t need to wait for 2020 to get a much better idea of how many citizens are in the country, we should be able to get that data very soon. One datum I’m anxious to learn is the number of U.S. citizens still residing in California, the state with the largest number of illegal aliens.

Americans are a highly mobile lot, and for quite some time now they’ve been fleeing California and New York for other states because of high taxes, cost of living, and undesirableness. Wouldn’t it be a kicker if Trump’s computer reports showed that those states are overrepresented in Congress? But here’s the real question for America: Should we be counting noncitizens to determine the number of congressional districts in the states? This citizen thinks not.

The number of illegal aliens in the country can only be an estimate. The number that gets bandied about is 11 million, but some think it could be twice that. Getting an exact count of those in our midst who shouldn’t be here isn’t likely to be provided by the census. Foreigners who have repeatedly snuck into our country and have been repeatedly deported aren’t likely to cooperate with the census. And if they do cooperate, they might tell census takers that they have a lot more children than they do, just so more federal money will come their way.

Here’s another nifty thing about the president’s directive: the counts on the computer reports can be compared to the counts on the census. That should give us a clearer idea of how accurate the census is, and whether we should continue conducting it in the way we have been. When it comes to counting citizens and legal residents, I’d say the computer reports we’ll be getting are the census.

For years now, I’ve been writing about using the federal databases to do the census and to establish voter registries. The feds are continually archiving and maintaining data on citizens, and have virtually all citizens on file already. There is the odd exception, like the case of the Schultz sisters, daughters of American citizens who had to take DNA tests to get their Social Security cards. But almost all Americans are registered with the feds (i.e. entered into the SSA database) and get their SSNs soon after birth and naturalization. That means citizens can be counted up at any time just by running a computer program.

Any professional in Information Technology who is not totally worthless will recognize the righteousness of the president’s solution. And these computer reports are going to be revealing. One thing they’ll reveal is whether or not the I.T. people in the central government are competent and can do their jobs.

Last September, Federal Computer Week (FCW) ran “GAO: $15.6 billion census cost estimate not reliable.” It seems the Government Accountability Office had taken issue with the Census Bureau’s $15.6 billion estimate of the cost of the 2020 census; it was $3B more than the initial projection. But why pay anything; let computers do the counting?

(In 2010, this writer wrote two articles that ran elsewhere which dealt with the census. Appearing at GOPUSA, “Counting Foreigners in the U.S. Census” quoted from a constitutional law professor who had qualms about the way the feds do the census: “The census has drifted far from its constitutional roots, and the 2010 enumeration will result in a malapportionment of Congress.” “The Senseless Census: A Solution” ran at James Glassman’s TCS Daily. Both articles are in line with the president’s workaround directive of July 11. If you want a different take on the census, you might read them.)

If one believes that apportionment should be based on the number of citizens in each state, then this problem with the census could be fixed by merely changing the word “persons” in the 14th Amendment, Section 2 to “citizens.” If we ever have an Article V convention, changing that word should be one of the first items on the agenda, because right now the sovereignty of the People, i.e. the citizens, is being drained away from them by the way we do the stupid census.

If the most accurate count of U.S. citizens would come from federal databases, then the only reason to conduct a census is to count up illegal aliens. States like California want their illegals counted in the census because it gets them more representatives in Congress and more federal money, which Congress must borrow. I wonder what Wyoming residents think of that?

One doesn’t need many facts to suspect that there’s a lot of malapportionment going on. All one needs to know is that we have 435 congressional districts, and then plug in a population estimate. A U.S. population of 350 million would give us districts comprised of 804,597 “persons,” while a population of 300 million would give us districts with 689,665 “persons.” Using the estimate of 11 million illegal aliens, America would seem to have 13.6 to 15.9 congressional districts reserved just for illegal aliens. That would mean we have maybe 15 members of the U.S. House of Representatives whose constituents are not supposed to be in America. If the illegal population is 22 million, as some assert, then it’s perhaps 30 members.

The “sanctuary” policies of Blue States like California should incense the citizens of other states. The Golden State is overrepresented in Congress due to the state’s swelling ranks of illegal aliens. And then California expects the rest of the nation to help pay for public assistance for the illegals the state have given sanctuary to, (see this April 29 article in the Los Angeles Times). With congressional districts currently set for about 711,000 constituents, California’s 53 districts would suggest a state population of around 37,683,000 as based upon the 2010 census. How many of those 37.7M were citizens and how many were illegal aliens? Perhaps Trump’s computer reports can shed light on this mystery.

Parts of the federal government are little more than “jobs programs.” The census falls in that category. Given the huge deficits Congress has been running, it’s scandalous that the feds even do a census. If one believes that the enumeration called for by the Constitution should be of citizens only, then the census is little more than a $15.6 billion scam on the taxpayers of America, especially when we have computers that can do the job for free.

The real question for the citizens of America should be: Are we going to count illegal aliens in reapportionment of congressional districts in the states? After all, unlike American citizens, illegal aliens are all deportable. And if they were all deported, then California would have fewer seats in Congress.

Jon N. Hall of ULTRACON OPINION is a programmer from Kansas City.

Whether by accident or by design, President Trump has alighted upon the exact right solution for ascertaining the truest enumeration of American citizens. Not only that, but his workaround solution should have been done regardless of the recent opinion by the Supreme Court. That is, even if the Court had found that the administration could include the citizenship question in the census, Trump should still have directed his agencies, especially the Social Security Administration, to have their computer programmers write simple little programs to count up the people on their databases by citizen and all other categories.

Americans who care about citizenship or just the corruption of our data should rejoice over Pres. Trump’s announcement on July 11. And here’s what’s nifty about the president’s directive — we don’t need to wait for 2020 to get a much better idea of how many citizens are in the country, we should be able to get that data very soon. One datum I’m anxious to learn is the number of U.S. citizens still residing in California, the state with the largest number of illegal aliens.

Americans are a highly mobile lot, and for quite some time now they’ve been fleeing California and New York for other states because of high taxes, cost of living, and undesirableness. Wouldn’t it be a kicker if Trump’s computer reports showed that those states are overrepresented in Congress? But here’s the real question for America: Should we be counting noncitizens to determine the number of congressional districts in the states? This citizen thinks not.

The number of illegal aliens in the country can only be an estimate. The number that gets bandied about is 11 million, but some think it could be twice that. Getting an exact count of those in our midst who shouldn’t be here isn’t likely to be provided by the census. Foreigners who have repeatedly snuck into our country and have been repeatedly deported aren’t likely to cooperate with the census. And if they do cooperate, they might tell census takers that they have a lot more children than they do, just so more federal money will come their way.

Here’s another nifty thing about the president’s directive: the counts on the computer reports can be compared to the counts on the census. That should give us a clearer idea of how accurate the census is, and whether we should continue conducting it in the way we have been. When it comes to counting citizens and legal residents, I’d say the computer reports we’ll be getting are the census.

For years now, I’ve been writing about using the federal databases to do the census and to establish voter registries. The feds are continually archiving and maintaining data on citizens, and have virtually all citizens on file already. There is the odd exception, like the case of the Schultz sisters, daughters of American citizens who had to take DNA tests to get their Social Security cards. But almost all Americans are registered with the feds (i.e. entered into the SSA database) and get their SSNs soon after birth and naturalization. That means citizens can be counted up at any time just by running a computer program.

Any professional in Information Technology who is not totally worthless will recognize the righteousness of the president’s solution. And these computer reports are going to be revealing. One thing they’ll reveal is whether or not the I.T. people in the central government are competent and can do their jobs.

Last September, Federal Computer Week (FCW) ran “GAO: $15.6 billion census cost estimate not reliable.” It seems the Government Accountability Office had taken issue with the Census Bureau’s $15.6 billion estimate of the cost of the 2020 census; it was $3B more than the initial projection. But why pay anything; let computers do the counting?

(In 2010, this writer wrote two articles that ran elsewhere which dealt with the census. Appearing at GOPUSA, “Counting Foreigners in the U.S. Census” quoted from a constitutional law professor who had qualms about the way the feds do the census: “The census has drifted far from its constitutional roots, and the 2010 enumeration will result in a malapportionment of Congress.” “The Senseless Census: A Solution” ran at James Glassman’s TCS Daily. Both articles are in line with the president’s workaround directive of July 11. If you want a different take on the census, you might read them.)

If one believes that apportionment should be based on the number of citizens in each state, then this problem with the census could be fixed by merely changing the word “persons” in the 14th Amendment, Section 2 to “citizens.” If we ever have an Article V convention, changing that word should be one of the first items on the agenda, because right now the sovereignty of the People, i.e. the citizens, is being drained away from them by the way we do the stupid census.

If the most accurate count of U.S. citizens would come from federal databases, then the only reason to conduct a census is to count up illegal aliens. States like California want their illegals counted in the census because it gets them more representatives in Congress and more federal money, which Congress must borrow. I wonder what Wyoming residents think of that?

One doesn’t need many facts to suspect that there’s a lot of malapportionment going on. All one needs to know is that we have 435 congressional districts, and then plug in a population estimate. A U.S. population of 350 million would give us districts comprised of 804,597 “persons,” while a population of 300 million would give us districts with 689,665 “persons.” Using the estimate of 11 million illegal aliens, America would seem to have 13.6 to 15.9 congressional districts reserved just for illegal aliens. That would mean we have maybe 15 members of the U.S. House of Representatives whose constituents are not supposed to be in America. If the illegal population is 22 million, as some assert, then it’s perhaps 30 members.

The “sanctuary” policies of Blue States like California should incense the citizens of other states. The Golden State is overrepresented in Congress due to the state’s swelling ranks of illegal aliens. And then California expects the rest of the nation to help pay for public assistance for the illegals the state have given sanctuary to, (see this April 29 article in the Los Angeles Times). With congressional districts currently set for about 711,000 constituents, California’s 53 districts would suggest a state population of around 37,683,000 as based upon the 2010 census. How many of those 37.7M were citizens and how many were illegal aliens? Perhaps Trump’s computer reports can shed light on this mystery.

Parts of the federal government are little more than “jobs programs.” The census falls in that category. Given the huge deficits Congress has been running, it’s scandalous that the feds even do a census. If one believes that the enumeration called for by the Constitution should be of citizens only, then the census is little more than a $15.6 billion scam on the taxpayers of America, especially when we have computers that can do the job for free.

The real question for the citizens of America should be: Are we going to count illegal aliens in reapportionment of congressional districts in the states? After all, unlike American citizens, illegal aliens are all deportable. And if they were all deported, then California would have fewer seats in Congress.

Jon N. Hall of ULTRACON OPINION is a programmer from Kansas City.

via American Thinker

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: https://www.americanthinker.com/

LIMBAUGH: Trump And America Vs. The Commie Quad Squad

In one sense, the Commie Quad Squad (CQS) has done us all a favor by flushing out the extremism of the Democratic Party for conspicuous public display.

House Leader Nancy Pelosi is quaking in her boots, realizing that it is getting increasingly difficult to hide her party’s radicalism from American voters, many of whom still cling to the fantasy that the Democratic Party is predominantly pro-American.

Pelosi at least has the sense to know this extremism won’t play well in national elections — even today — and she is struggling to cover it up. Her feud with the CQS, to be sure, is about control of the party, but it’s also her effort to allay Americans’ fears that her party has lost its mind — and moral compass.

But the women of the CQS don’t care. They are so adamantly against the America that you and I grew up to love that they will not contain their animus. And they’re arrogant enough to believe that a majority of Americans shares their antipathy.

Pelosi is in a precarious position, desperately seeking to contain the crazy in her party while convincing her rabid base that deep down she shares its craziness — wink, wink. Pelosi knows that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is like a 4-year-old at a restaurant — you just won’t get her to shut up. But unlike many parents, Pelosi can’t just leave the restaurant, and she’d prefer not to make any further public spectacles disciplining her kid in front of the other patrons.

If you doubt that Pelosi is trying to play both sides, then explain, in a paragraph or less, why Pelosi sprinted quickly to the dark side the other day in calling President Trump a racist — and saying that he wants to “make America white again.” Playing the race card is a great way to ingratiate yourself with the race-baiting CQS and its minions.

With the election of Donald Trump, we could safely say that America’s silent majority had awoken from its slumber mad as Hell and not willing to take it anymore. They didn’t pick this fight but now understand that those attacking everything they believe in are relentless and implacable. Thanks to the CQS, the silent majority has further strengthened its resolve.

Many have assumed that despite President Trump’s remarkable record on policy, he has lost some of his good will with the voters because of his manners and tweets and the rest. That may have been true at the margins, but he has regained whatever ground he lost and more from this dust-up with the CQS. Its members are poster children for the malcontent left — and have placed in stark relief the contrast between the Democrats’ and Republicans’ respective visions for America. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

For those of you who believe the two parties still share common goals, I have a treasure chest of pyrite I would like to show you. Just consider the Democrats’ extreme position on abortion, open borders, sanctuary cities, guns, judicial activism, the administrative state, Israel, the America-hating United Nations, socialism, universal health care, entitlements for illegal immigrants, radical environmentalism, forced income equality versus equality of opportunity, identity politics, radical gender ideology, intersectionality, toxic masculinity, multiculturalism, white privilege, reparations, cultural appropriation and patriarchy. I could go on, but then you might not want to read my upcoming book. The point is Pelosi can try to distance herself from the CQS until she’s blue in the face, but she can’t credibly distance her party from its radical positions — there is not a scintilla of moderation remaining in it anymore.

Leftists don’t fight fair, and the Unfair Foursome — er, I mean the CQS — is demonstrating that in spades, as are so many Democratic Party leaders. They cannot debate any issues on the merits anymore; all they can do is smear their opponents — us — with false charges of bigotry. These radicals apparently believe their destructive ideas are so self-evidently superior that they can safely imply that if you oppose them, you are racist. That’s what they have reduced themselves to. It’s sickening, outrageous and sure to keep the American people mad as Hell and unwilling to take it anymore.

There is no downside in bringing this fight to a head now because if a majority of Americans really believe that America-loving Trump supporters, conservatives and Republicans are irredeemable racists, bigots, sexists and homophobes, we are in grave trouble anyway. I’m betting that’s not the case, and as long as the CQS keeps flapping its race-baiting jaws, we are going to have a referendum on this question in 2020.

So, let the CQS continue name calling and exposing itself to the American people.

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. To read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com

via Daily Wire

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: https://www.dailywire.com/rss.xml

PRAGER: We All Wanted To Love The Women’s Soccer Team

For the first time in my life, I did not root for an American team. Whatever the sport, I have always rooted American. But if those who called into my radio show were representative of my audience, many millions of Americans made the same sad choice.

It takes a lot for people like me not to root for an American team. But Megan Rapinoe, the foul-mouthed star of the team, and her fellow players made it possible.

The U.S. women’s team disgraced itself. Either its members were cowed into submission by Rapinoe or they agreed (or, at least, never disagreed) with her attacks on the president, her reference to the White House as the “f—-ing White House,” her refusal since 2016 to participate in the national anthem and her repeatedly shouting during the team’s parade in New York City, “New York, you’re the motherf—-ing best!”

For example, Rapinoe said, “Every member of the team that I have talked to would not go” to the White House.

Rapinoe is a great soccer player. Other than that, she is unimpressive. She comes across as arrogant, a fool and a lowlife.

Why a fool? Because she thinks she has something important to say to the American people and that we need to hear it because she is a great soccer player. She is not alone in this conceit. Tom Steyer and other billionaires think the same thing about themselves: that because they are better at making money than almost everybody, they must be wiser than almost everybody.

People who excel in one thing are tempted to think they are smart about everything, but that is almost never the case. There is no reason at all to assume that people who excel in anything (other than wisdom) are wiser than anybody else. And here’s the kicker (no pun intended): People who think they are wise because they excel at something unrelated to wisdom are fools.

And why is Rapinoe a lowlife? What would you label any adult who constantly used the F-word in public (especially during events when children are expected to be present or watching)? Or does being a star — like the foul-mouthed Robert De Niro — make you less of a lowlife?

The American women’s soccer team is unified in protesting on behalf of “equal pay for equal work.” They regard their team as a perfect example because its members receive less money than members of the U.S. men’s soccer team — despite the fact that the women have a much better record.

But there is a reason the male players earn more. Among other things — such as the women’s team’s vote for financial security in the form of guaranteed salaries rather than revenue share — men’s soccer generates far more money than women’s soccer.

According to the Los Angeles Times: FIFA’s “2018 financial report said it earned revenue of $5.357 billion from the men’s tournament in Russia. … Forbes estimated the Women’s World Cup will generate about $131 million for the four-year cycle ending in 2022.”

So, unless people should be paid according to gender (which they now are in Norway) rather than according to revenue and profits, male soccer players will earn more money than female soccer players.

There are only two ways to equitably ensure male and female players earn the same amount of money. One is to pool all the money earned by both teams and then distribute an equal amount to all the players, men and women. The other is to end sex-based teams: Men and women compete to play on one team (composed of both men and women), and any woman who makes the team is guaranteed the same income as any man on the team.

Until then, the women’s soccer team and the left want to have their cake and eat it, too. (Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, for example, tweeted this non sequitur: “Here’s an idea: If you win 13-0 — the most goals for a single game in World Cup history — you should be paid at least equally to the men’s team.”) They want women to have their own soccer teams — because biology has made it impossible for almost any woman to successfully compete with men in sports — yet earn the same amount as men do. But the reality is more people will watch men play soccer, just as more people watch major league baseball than minor league baseball — which is why major league baseball players earn more money than minor league players. But if we applied the equal-pay-for-equal-work principle to baseball, minor league and major league players would be paid the same amount.

With their politicization of their victory, their expletive-filled speech and their publicly expressed contempt for half their fellow citizens, the women of the U.S. women’s soccer team succeeded in endearing themselves to America’s left. But they earned the rest of the country’s disdain, which is sad. We really wanted to love the team.

What we have here is yet another example of perhaps the most important fact in the contemporary world: Everything the left touches it ruins.

Dennis Prager is a nationally syndicated radio talk-show host and columnist. His latest book, published by Regnery in April 2018, is “The Rational Bible,” a commentary on the book of Exodus. He is the founder of Prager University and may be contacted at dennisprager.com.

via Daily Wire

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: https://www.dailywire.com/rss.xml

Migrant Death Rate Under Trump 20 Percent Lower than Obama Years

Deaths of migrants who illegally crossed the border during the first two years of the Trump administration fell about 20 percent from the eight-year average under the Obama era. This is in sharp contrast to the political rhetoric of Democrat presidential candidates and certain media outlets decrying the treatment of migrants under President Donald Trump’s watch.

During the eight years of the Obama administration, 2,977 migrants died after illegally crossing the southwest border with Mexico — 372 per year on average, according to a report obtained from U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials.

During the first two complete fiscal years of the Trump administration, 581 migrants died — an average of 291 per year. Despite massively higher border apprehensions in Fiscal Year 2019, the number of deaths appears to be on par with the two prior years, according to the International Organization for Migrants’ Missing Migrant Project. This represents about a 20 percent drop from the Obama administration’s reported migrant deaths.

However, Democratic presidential candidates wasted no time in blaming President Donald Trump’s “inhuman and immoral immigration policy,” according to an article by National Review on Thursday.

The article cites tweets from several Democrat presidential candidates following the drowning death of a Salvadoran migrant and his 23-month-old daughter in June:

Several Democratic presidential candidates tweeted their outrage. Senator Kamala Harris, tweeted: “Trump says, ‘Go back to where you came from.’ That is inhumane. Children are dying. This is a stain on our moral conscience.” Beto O’Rourke tweeted: “Trump is responsible for these deaths.” Senator Cory Booker, tweeted: “These are the consequences of Donald Trump’s inhumane and immoral immigration policy.”

Former Vice President Joe Biden also tweeted about the tragic photo: “This image is gut-wrenching. The cruelty we’re seeing at our border is unconscionable. History will judge how we respond to the Trump Administration’s treatment of immigrant families & children — we can’t be silent. This isn’t who we are. This is not America.”

Former Vice President Biden did not mention the deaths of the 2,977 migrants who died during the eight years he served as Obama’s vice president.

Breitbart News reported extensively about the deaths of migrants during both the Obama and Trump administrations. During the Obama administration, Breitbart wrote 20 times about the deaths of 535 migrants who died in one Texas county alone — Brooks County. The county is located about 80 miles north of the Texas-Mexico border and is home to the Falfurrias Border Patrol Checkpoint on U.S. Highway 281. There doesn’t appear to be any record of Biden discussing the “cruelty” of the Obama administration or about its policies being “unconscionable.”

The CBP report on migrant deaths also indicates a shift in where migrant deaths occurred since about 2015. From 2002 until 2014, the Tucson Sector led the nine sectors that make up the southwest border with Mexico. However, that changed in 2014 when the Rio Grande Valley Sector became the deadliest sector for migrants seeking to enter the U.S. illegally.

“The demagoguery of left-wing politicians and media pundits created a false narrative that the policies of the Trump administration have resulted in these types of border deaths even though they have existed for nearly two decades,” the National Review concluded. “Americans deserve to know the truth about this topic.”

Bob Price serves as associate editor and senior political news contributor for the Breitbart Border team. He is an original member of the Breitbart Texas team. Follow him on Twitter @BobPriceBBTX and Facebook.

 

via Breitbart News

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: https://www.breitbart.com

‘Four Horsewomen Of The Apocalypse’ — Sen. John Kennedy Rips Squad ‘Whack Jobs’

He’s hilarious. Via Daily Caller: Louisiana Republican Senator John Kennedy defended President Donald Trump from accusations of racism stemming from a series of tweets, then blasted the four members of the “so-called ‘Squad’” as “whack jobs” who are “destroying the Democratic Party.” On Tuesday night’s edition of “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” the Louisiana Senator expressed his […]

via Weasel Zippers

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: https://www.weaselzippers.us

HAMMER: Why Is No One Discussing The Drug Trafficking Aspect Of Our Southern Border Crisis?

The sheer scope of the systemic, all-encompassing sovereignty crisis at our southern border is staggering.

From both a constitutional and a philosophical perspective, the federal government has no more important responsibility to its citizenry than securing the border. Period.

From a national security perspective, it is stupefying to ponder the reality that we are releasing tens of thousands of barely vetted aliens into the interior each month due to a brutal combination of catch-and-release tomfoolery, limited bed space due to the under-funding of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and the erroneously decreed Flores settlement. Indeed, we know from the intrepid reporting of journalist extraordinaire Todd Bensman that the predominantly Central America-fleeing economic migrants have no shortage of dangerous Middle Easterners mixed in among them. Furthermore, we are letting in no shortage of migrants afflicted with deadly diseases.

From an assimilation perspective, the huge number of Central Americans absconding into the nation’s interior due to the de facto amnesty of catch-and-release only exacerbates our increasingly stark crisis of national unity — including but hardly limited to our ability to (literally) all speak a common language.

From a crime perspective, we know that non-citizen aliens commit a disproportionate share of federal crime — 44.2% of it over the course of 2011 – 2016, according to statistics from the U.S. Sentencing Commission. And from a pure common sense perspective, it ought to make sense that vulnerable unaccompanied alien youths showing up at our border would be more susceptible to recruitment by MS-13 and other Central America-originating transnational gangs. In fact, both MS-13 and the cartels operate so fluidly throughout the U.S. due in no small part to the ongoing surfeit of prospective gangsters and drug mules who reach our border and are released into the interior. Consider this harrowing story out of Los Angeles:

But perhaps the singular least discussed aspect of the ongoing crisis at our southern border is that the illegal alien influx there has dramatically metastasized America’s already-dire drug epidemic. An eye-opening report in the Washington Examiner this morning shines a spotlight on the extent to which the border crisis has frozen our Department of Homeland Security (DHS) human assets — redirecting those officials who would normally be in the business of interdicting contraband 50-100 miles inland to deal with apprehension and toddler daycare duty at the border itself. Per the Examiner:

Border Patrol highway checkpoints in the southern New Mexico region that normally seize seven figures worth of drugs annually have not seized a dollar in nearly four months after being shuttered in late March, allowing drugs to flood into the country. Meantime, with the added supply, prices for illicit drugs are dropping precipitously.

Those seven checkpoints have sat unattended after Border Patrol closed them to move all personnel to the border to assist with apprehending, processing, and caring for the high number of migrant families arriving. …

Officials have also noted upticks in methamphetamine and fentanyl seizures since March. Black said the cost of a pound of meth has been slashed in half since then, from $4,700 when the checkpoints first closed to $2,500 by late June. The price dropped because the market is saturated.

To summarize, then, Border Patrol assets who are normally tasked with interdicting contraband have been, due in no small part to the current under-funding of DHS, redeployed to the border to deal with the sundry maladies transpiring there. As a consequence, drugs trafficked in by the cartels and their terrorist allies (like Hezbollah) are not being seized. There is now a huge, unprecedented glut of deadly narcotics pouring into the nation. Recall that a sugar packet-sized dose of fentanyl can kill a whole room full of people. And now, so much meth is being trafficked into the interior that prices in Las Cruces, New Mexico have been cut by nearly half in just four months! That is simply astonishing.

America’s drug overdose epidemic, while misdiagnosed as an “opioid” epidemic, is really a more general narcotics epidemic that has fentanyl, cocaine, meth, and heroin as its leading contributors. Our under-funded DHS and political unwillingness to stanch the illegal alien influx bleeding at our border is not just resulting in machete-style MS-13 murders in Los Angeles. It is also leading to an unprecedented crisis of drugs so potent that — in the case of fentanyl — they might be reasonably compared to cartel-driven chemical warfare against our inner cities and collective progeny.

This is a huge, huge problem. Drugs are literally destroying countless small towns across the nation. And now our political elites, by ignoring the border crisis as they have, are somehow making the drug epidemic crisis even worse than it already is. It is nothing short of a blemish upon our entire political ruling class.

via Daily Wire

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: https://www.dailywire.com/rss.xml

‘Unplanned’ Opens Strong in Theaters Across Canada, Despite Being Labelled ‘Hate Propaganda’

Pro-life film Unplanned made it to 56 movie theaters across Canada despite opposition from pro-abortion activists who refer to the film as a “piece of hate propaganda.”

The U.S. film brings to the screen the memoir of Abby Johnson, a former Planned Parenthood manager-turned pro-life activist.

Unplanned opened to $353,510 on its opening weekend at the Canadian box office, noted the Hollywood Reporter, despite controversy and even death threats to independent theater owners.

Many Canadian theaters reported sold-out showings, though abortion activists denounced the film and protested it vehemently.

Joyce Arthur, executive director of the coalition, expressed concern about the safety of Canadian abortion providers due to the screening of the film.

According to CBC, Arthur referred to the film as a “piece of hate propaganda.”

“The film’s vicious falsehoods against providers could incite hatred and violence against them, including here in Canada,” she said. “But the film also aims to challenge abortion rights. That’s a non-starter in Canada, where women and transgender people have a Charter right to abortion based on their rights to bodily autonomy and equality.”

Katie Telford, chief of staff to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, also tweeted on numerous occasions her contempt for the film and pro-life activists.

Telford recommended to her followers an opinion piece by an abortion advocate with the headline, “Unplanned and anti-choice activism, and the lies that they tell.”

When the film opened in Canada last Friday, Planned Parenthood Newfoundland and Labrador decided to sponsor a showing of the film Mean Girls as a “fun alternative” to Unplanned, rather than hold a formal protest to the U.S. movie.

Considering the controversy, Canadian film and television producer Martin Katz, marveled at the movie’s distribution, CBC observed.

“My understanding is that it’s quite terrible, but there are a lot of terrible films that get released,” said Katz. “What I think is drastic is that there’s a lot of great Canadian films that don’t get released, if they do get released, they get released on a screen or five screens or six screens, not [almost] 60 screens.”

The CEO of Cineplex, Canada’s largest cinema chain, ultimately justified screening the film based on the principle of free speech.

“Canada is a country that believes in and rallies behind freedom of expression, but that isn’t always an easy thing to do and it certainly doesn’t always make you popular,” said Ellis Jacob. “In this instance many of us will have to set aside our own personal beliefs and remember that living in a country that censors content, opinions, and points of view because they are different from our own is not a country that any of us want to live in.”

The film’s success led to screenings at Cineplex’s rivals, including Cinema Guzzo in Quebec and Imagine Cinemas, Landmark Cinemas, and some independent houses in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Ontario, observed THR.

Unplanned stars Ashley Bratcher in the role of Abby Johnson:

As of July 15, Unplanned‘s North American box office take was at $18.55 million.

via Breitbart News

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: https://www.breitbart.com

New RNC ad: AOC & the Squad want anarchy, you know

The RNC rolled out a new ad aimed at bolstering Donald Trump’s standing, and it has … not a single frame or mention of Trump at all. Instead, the ad asks viewers to contemplate the alternative, in the alternative’s own words. It focuses on the frosh “Squad” — Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez most of all, but also her pals Ilhan Omar, Ayanna Pressley, and Rashida Tlaib — and their incendiary rhetoric. And, the ad strongly implies, the violence that their rhetoric incites (via Twitchy):

Those who immerse themselves in the daily political cycle won’t find anything new in the ad except for the slick packaging. But this ad isn’t meant for insiders; it takes aim at those who are either completely disengaged with politics or only paying scant attention. It’s effective, especially at the end when three of the four refuse to provide a condemnation of Antifa and its violent tactics.

By the way, did Tlaib not get asked the question? Or did she actually respond with a condemnation when asked? Her absence from that montage is intriguing, at the least.

Expect to hear plenty of griping from the Left about the RNC’s attempts to tie political speech from the Squad to Antifa violence. Fifteen years ago, I might have had some sympathy for that complaint, but the same people who will make those complaints now have been declaring for years that conservative speech is violence, while excusing actual violence by their allies as free speech and punishment for it as political.  This is a response in kind, which doesn’t exactly make it correct, but it certainly evens the playing field.

The ad falls short in one respect. The Squad’s ultimate goal isn’t anarchy, just as it isn’t for the anarchists, either. Their ultimate goal is a totalitarian system which they run and impose their agenda on everyone else by force. Anarchy is just a means to that end, a strategy that we have seen play out over and over again for the past century or more.

By the way, expect ads like this to be a Republican genre of 2020 for a couple of reasons. First, Donald Trump isn’t popular enough to conduct a blanket ad campaign focusing solely on him. Second and most importantly, Democrats have become so unhinged that the most effective way to elect Republicans is to amplify what Democrats are actually saying and doing. In this cycle, the cliché “the ads write themselves” might be closer to the truth than ever.

The post New RNC ad: AOC & the Squad want anarchy, you know appeared first on Hot Air.

via Hot Air

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: https://hotair.com