Category Archives: Politics

What Happened to The Storm ?

Posted on by
Reply

Despite the hype and expectations for “a storm,” Jan. 20 marked another relatively peaceful transition of power, from one presidential administration to the next. Yes, there were more law enforcement than spectators at this strange inauguration, reminiscent of a Soviet May Day parade, but it was anticlimactic, at least to the many expecting a long-awaited storm, unleashed by Trump supporters, supposedly on the deep state, during former (I hate to use that word) President Trump’s final days in office.

This past week in any case, rumors swirled of something big and stormy happening. An unprecedented number of military and National Guard descended on Washington D.C. There were fences around the Capitol and adjacent buildings. The razor wire atop the fences was facing inwards, supposedly to keep those inside from escaping.

This, a conspiracy theory went, was a giant trap for the deep state, President Biden’s inauguration luring the deep state into the witch’s oven, ready to be arrested by thousands of National Guard members recently deputized as U.S. Marshals, yet all secretly disloyal. In this soup of nuttiness we also heard that major Democrat players were already arrested, awaiting trial or execution.

This would make for a great Robert Ludlum or Tom Clancy novel but was nothing more than fanciful delusion for Trump supporters disillusioned at the president’s loss.

The only storm on inauguration day was in the Oval Office as Biden signed 17 (a poke at Q followers?) executive orders or actions, promptly reversing much of what Trump accomplished during his presidency.

We will be treated to a storm instead of 100 days of mask-wearing, a reentry into the corrupt World Health Organization, and a rejoining of the nonsensical Paris climate agreement. The Keystone XL pipeline and energy independence will be destroyed, going the way of Trump. Non-citizens will be counted in the U.S. Census, padding congressional seat counts for Democrats, and making election rigging unnecessary.

Border wall construction will cease, and aspiring terrorists will once again be able to travel to the U.S. During the height of a global COVID pandemic, we are opening our borders to anyone and everyone. But don’t worry, the masks will keep us safe and healthy.

What happened to Trump’s claim against his Spygate conspirators of: “We caught them all” and “We have it all”? Whatever anyone has will blow away in the flurry of wind, never to be seen again, from Joe’s workout of the week, signing his name 17 times.

Federal prosecutors quietly closed the General Flynn leak investigation, finding no wrongdoing. This sounds familiar, just like the 2020 presidential election, where former Attorney General Bill Barr found nothing amiss. This was echoed by state and federal legislators as well as a slew of courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court.

The kraken remained as elusive as Bigfoot, the Loch Ness monster, and JFK Jr, the latter rumored to magically appear as Trump’s running mate before the November election. There were white hats and black hats, although in reality most wore one of the fifty shades of gray, some days looking like good guys, other days like bad guys. Who really knows? None have been indicted and none are heading to prison.

Declassification of Spygate documents is a day late and a dollar short. Mark Meadows, when he was still in the House in 2019, not yet Trump’s chief-of-staff, said the declassified documents “will curl your hair.” Sorry but my hair is still straight, as is the hair (or lack of) on the heads of conspirators John Brennan, James Clapper, James Comey, and others.

In the waning days of his presidency, Trump finally declassified and released “more than a foot-high stack of documents” related to Spygate. So what? If a declassified document falls in the D.C. forest but no one hears it, did it make a sound?

Those documents might have been more useful a couple of years ago, when Trump’s DOJ could have (but probably would not have) done something about it. Does anyone think the media will devote a second to these documents now that they are busy gushing over “historic” Kamala Harris, soon to be President Harris once Joe resigns or meets the 25th Amendment? Not surprisingly, just after Biden was safely inaugurated, the DNC media now feels free to discuss “Biden’s cognitive decline.”

Biden will reclassify everything, from Spygate to Ukraine, including his son Hunter’s laptop, all under the guise of “national security,” burying everything as deep as Anthony Weiner’s laptop, never to be seen or spoken of again. Those daring to raise these issues will be banned from social media and ostracized from their jobs and life in general. Although the year is 2021, it is actually 1984.

DNC media propagandists are resurrecting the “Russian collusion” narrative to distract from actual “China collusion” via Rep. Eric Swalwell, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, and the Biden family. How soon until Biden’s DOJ fires John Durham, special counsel to supposedly investigate Spygate, and replace him with an Eric Holder or a Loretta Lynch as a new special counsel to hound Trump and his family to the ends of the earth?

Biden, or his puppet-masters, will go after Trump in a way that makes Inspector Javert, of Les Misérables, look like a piker in his pursuit of Jean Valjean. So much for “the best is yet to come,” the parting words from Trump and Pence. Many of us were waiting for those words to come true over the past four years. But the party is over, and the lights are out. Nothing is left but cleaning up the post-party mess.

Trump knew what was done to him and his administration, beginning before he was even elected, then at the end of his term a stolen election, and a second impeachment based on a staged surge on the U.S. Capitol for which he was blamed. Conveniently after inauguration, the Washington Post acknowledged that Trump did not incite the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, that it was planned in advance. Trump knows what a threat he is to the deep state and the Pelosi-McCarthy-Schumer-McConnell uniparty.

Trump had to realize much of what he accomplished in four years would be undone by the stroke of a pen on day one, which is exactly what happened. Electoral fraud has been institutionalized, making talk of “We’ll get ‘em next time” pure folly. There will not be a next time, for Trump or any serious MAGA-type Republicans. The ruling class Republicans will remain in minority power, useful idiots for Democrats to use as they enact their far-left agenda and rewrite of the Constitution.

Was Trump compromised or did he simply realize that the only storm was the one he was spitting into, fighting his battles alone, without assistance or support from his own party? He was “the boss” for four years, the executive branch of government under his command. I hate to say it, but he lost, at least for now and in the most important battle.

Trump picked a fight against the global deep state. He had them on the ropes but didn’t deliver the knockout punch. The deep state is like cancer, unless you eliminate it completely, it returns, sometimes with a vengeance.

Does he have a plan? Who knows? It is not in Trump’s nature to lose. He did the improbable by winning in 2016 and he will not want his blood, sweat, and tears shed for the America he loves and reveres to all be for naught.

That’s the lifeline of hope for his 75 million-plus supporters. Perhaps a storm is coming, but we have been waiting for four years and thus far it’s only been a breeze. When a storm eventually arrives, it will not likely be what we have been hoping for, but perhaps instead a Hurricane Bernie or a Hurricane AOC. Buckle up and pray for Trump and America.

Brian C. Joondeph, M.D., is a physician and freelance writer. He is on sabbatical from social media.

Recent Articles

Blog Posts

Monthly Archives

Read more: https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2021/01/what_happened_to_the_storm.html#ixzz6kQMMroau
Follow us: @AmericanThinker on Twitter | AmericanThinker on Facebook

An Open Letter to Businesses Interested in an Innovative and Dynamic New Market

Posted on by
Reply

75 million. Seventy-five million, if not more. That is the potential market for existing companies and start-ups that reject cancel culture and freely open their products and services to Trump supporters.

And it’s more than just a wide-open market that awaits. We are dedicated and loyal customers who will aggressively fight any efforts to shut you down and reward you for standing tall against the cancel mob.

Ask Chick-fil-A and Goya about their sales growth after liberal boycott attempts. Just being pro-Trump (or even neutral in the face of political correctness) will all-but-guarantee liberal boycott efforts and the resultant sales boost that comes with such.

Heck, there is a BBQ chain down here in Texas that had Rep. Castro calling for a boycott after revealing the owner donated to Trump. The drive-through lanes were subsequently jammed for months. I drove 30 miles to patronize their nearest location.

Conversely, look at Kohls and Bed, Bath and Beyond. They cancelled My Pillow products in their stores and on their websites. In response, I just bought two pillows from the My Pillow website even though I didn’t really need new pillows. And I am certain that there are many more like me.

And beyond that, I will never spend a dime at those two chains as well. And I am looking for other places, friendly or at least neutral to Trump supporters, where I can spend my money that used to go to those shortsighted businesses.

75 million wallets await.

Become. That. Business.

How to Cope With a Dictatorship

Posted on by
Reply

It’s a very sad time. However, take some cheer in these words on how to handle dictators, offered by Dan Bornt:

“Ridicule, disdain, derision, sarcasm, contempt, and non-compliance – these are the tools that challenge unearned authority. Ignore them. Pretend they don’t exist. Don’t give them time of day. Laugh derisively in their faces, and walk away. When that’s not possible, smirk with undisguised contempt. Treat them like the pompous, fatuous, overweening little petty tyrants [they] are. Bullies want people to bow down to them and kiss their asses. When they find out they can’t intimidate, and people continue to stand tall and glare at them with a sneer and a shrug, they’ve lost.”

#NotMyDictatorship

A Disgruntled Democrat

Posted on by
Reply

A TOTALLY DISENCHANTED DEMOCRAT SENT THIS. TRY TO PUNCH HOLES IN THIS! These facts speak volumes about the DNC.

The woman who researched and wrote this lives in Sedona Arizona and is a retired lawyer. She writes in simple language as a former Democrat to all Democrats in general:

Democrats –

Now I know you don’t like President Trump. That’s a given, SO let’s move on from that.

How about the division of America. Do you really blame Trump for that? How about when NONE of the DEMOCRATS showed up for his inauguration? Don’t you think that started the division? He hadn’t even been president yet, and EXCEPT for Clinton and Obama, not one Democrat showed up. Is that when Trump divided America? Can you imagine if the REPUBLICANS didn’t show up for Obama’s inauguration because they lost? Can you even start to imagine what would have happened?

How about when 19 minutes after Trump was inaugurated, the Washington Post declared the IMPEACHMENT CAMPAIGN has STARTED? Was that when Trump divided America?

How about when Nancy Pelosi ripped up Trump’s state of the union right in front of the world, showing complete disrespect for the President of the United States? Did that bring the country together and is THAT when Trump divided America?

How about when America had to endure 3 years and over 30 million dollars spent on trying to PROVE that Trump only won because of RUSSIAN COLLUSION and NOT because America voted him in. And 17 democrats did EVERYTHING in their power to PROVE that there was Russian Collusion. and came up with ZERO? Was THAT when Trump divided America?

I can’t even start to go over the NEGATIVE PRESS he’s received since his surprise win. Remember, the DONORS, the likes of Bloomberg, who gave 27 million, Tom Steyer who gave 17 million, George Soros who gave 9 million and MANY MORE that gave MULTI-MILLIONS to Hillary, wanted a return on their investment. Do you really think that donors give MILLIONS UPON MILLIONS just because they love Hillary? NO, these weren’t campaign donations, they were INVESTMENTS into what HILLARY had promised them when she became President. They were so sure she would win and they would be SHOWERED with HUGE RETURNS, and when it didn’t happen and they LOST all those millions, they went all out to TAKE TRUMP out of OFFICE by any means possible.

DID YOU KNOW that 90% of the Mainstream media and the corporations that own them, are owned by or run by BIG DEMOCRAT DONORS? You can verify all of that for yourselves. I did. Since the moment Trump won, even before he was inaugurated, the mainstream media’s reporting was 92% negative on Trump, do you know why? It was those big donors that lost their dream of MILLIONS of dollars, on their returns that they were going to receive when Hillary was President and they weren’t going to take that loss lightly. They needed to PUNISH TRUMP and those that VOTED HIM IN.

I’ve said this since the night he was elected. “There is NOTHING the left won’t do to take down our President”, our country and us, no low they won’t go to, to get their power back”, and sadly, we have seen this every single day since his election.

Let me ask you this. Have you ever listened to Trump or appreciated any accomplishment or campaign promises he’s kept, have you ever gone to one of his rallies or have you just closed your mind to anything he does? Please ask yourselves the following questions, if you dare.

What has Joe Biden done for America for the last 47 years that he’s held an office? What did Joe Biden ever do for BLACKS when HE and Obama were in office? What has Joe Biden ever done in his entire life to create a private-sector job? What has Joe Biden done to help the American middle class worker? Let me also ask you this. Why do you think there are so many people tearing down statues, our burning flag, beating up police officers, disrespecting our founders and hating our country? It comes straight from our SCHOOLS that have slowly been tearing down our history. If there is a teacher out there, please tell me the following:

Do you teach the truth that it was the DEMOCRATS that were the KKK? That the GRAND LEADER of the KKK was Robert Byrd, who was elected to congress as a DEMOCRAT and served for decades, and that it was Hillary, Bill, and Obama that gave his EULOGY praising him? That the DEMOCRATS fought the Civil war to KEEP SLAVERY? That the inner-city ghettoes were created by DEMOCRATS to keep control of slaves after they were freed? That planned parenthood was founded in inner cities to CONTROL the BLACK POPULATION? Is any of this in your history books?

Let me ask you this as well: Can a student speak up when he/she disagrees with a teacher when they say that Trump is a horrible President or the electoral college has to be eliminated? I don’t think so? Well, I know a student that actually happened to. When the teacher said it had to be eliminated because Hillary lost, and he stated the reason it should stay, she ripped him apart and gave the entire class a 5 hour test, and stated it was because he DARED to disagree with her. Is that happening in your schools?

I’m only asking questions. I’d like your answers.

President Trump and his entire family has been vilified, demeaned and disrespected, for one reason and one reason only. HE WON.

Have you noticed the DEMOCRATS only throw tantrums and OBJECT to everything he does and have NEVER ONCE gotten behind him to make America the best it can be? WHY? They can’t afford to get behind him. he would WIN AGAIN, and they can’t let that happen. if he wins again, the Democrat party will be destroyed and they know it.

Did you notice that the “CAGES” the left claimed that Trump built to put Illegal children in, WERE BUILT BY OBAMA for the very purpose of PUTTING ILLEGAL CHILDREN IN? Was THAT all over the news when Obama did it? The very same “CAGES”. but the media was silent!

How about when Trump commuted Roger Stone’s sentence, and was DEMONIZED 24/7 but NOT A WORD when Obama commuted 1,715 inmates, which included 330 that he granted on his last day in office. DID WE EVEN HEAR one WORD about it?

Were there reporters even reporting it. NO! Just look at the difference in the reporting. By the way, since Trump’s been in office he’s commuted 10 people. compare that to Obama. Is that reporting fair?

How about when Biden and Obama allowed the H1N1, the SWINE FLU, to INFECT MILLIONS of Americans before declaring it a health emergency. Was the press losing it’s minds and calling it the OBAMA FLU AND BLAMING OBAMA and BIDEN for the spread? —— SILENCE!

Compare this to the NEGATIVE COVERAGE that Trump got when, he immediately halted travel from China. Then, in February, Nancy Pelosi went to Chinatown and said come on down, or when DeBlasio, in March, said ride the subways and go to Broadway. BUT those same people are blaming Trump for the spread of coronavirus.

A FINAL QUESTION:

What have the DEMOCRATS done to help make America the best, to get behind a president that works tirelessly to care about WE THE PEOPLE instead of using us as political pawns? What have the democrats done for people of color EXCEPT for GIVING ILLEGALS more rights than citizens and having us pay for it?

JUST imagine what this country could accomplish if the Democrats worked with him on the economy, the coronavirus, the inner cities where he’s created opportunity zones, job training etc. When Trump tried to get school choice for inner-city students they ran Betsy Devos out!! The democrats running those inner city schools wanted no part of school choice. Have you ever wondered why it’s cities that have been run, for decades, that have the MOST HOMELESS, the MOST CRIME, the most MURDERS, the worst INNER CITY schools, ARE ALL RUN BY DEMOCRATS?

If you haven’t started asking yourselves those questions, maybe you should. As I said, my entire family used to be Democrats, but NOT ONE will ever vote for a Democrat again. They asked themselves the same questions and the answer was clear.

**feel free to copy and paste as I did!

The Wisdom of Ayn Rand on Love

Posted on by
Reply

Love, friendship, respect, admiration are the emotional response of one man to the virtues of another, the spiritual payment given in exchange for the personal, selfish pleasure which one man derives from the virtues of another man’s character. Only a brute or an altruist would claim that the appreciation of another person’s virtues is an act of selflessness, that as far as one’s own selfish interest and pleasure are concerned, it makes no difference whether one deals with a genius or a fool, whether one meets a hero or a thug, whether one marries an ideal woman or a slut.
Romantic love, in the full sense of the term, is an emotion possible only to the man (or woman) of unbreached self-esteem: it is his response to his own highest values in the person of another—an integrated response of mind and body, of love and sexual desire. Such a man (or woman) is incapable of experiencing a sexual desire divorced from spiritual values.

There are two aspects of man’s existence which are the special province and expression of his sense of life: love and art.

I am referring here to romantic love, in the serious meaning of that term—as distinguished from the superficial infatuations of those whose sense of life is devoid of any consistent values, i.e., of any lasting emotions other than fear. Love is a response to values. It is with a person’s sense of life that one falls in love—with that essential sum, that fundamental stand or way of facing existence, which is the essence of a personality. One falls in love with the embodiment of the values that formed a person’s character, which are reflected in his widest goals or smallest gestures, which create the style of his soul—the individual style of a unique, unrepeatable, irreplaceable consciousness. It is one’s own sense of life that acts as the selector, and responds to what it recognizes as one’s own basic values in the person of another. It is not a matter of professed convictions (though these are not irrelevant); it is a matter of much more profound, conscious and subconscious harmony.

Many errors and tragic disillusionments are possible in this process of emotional recognition, since a sense of life, by itself, is not a reliable cognitive guide. And if there are degrees of evil, then one of the most evil consequences of mysticism—in terms of human suffering—is the belief that love is a matter of “the heart,” not the mind, that love is an emotion independent of reason, that love is blind and impervious to the power of philosophy. Love is the expression of philosophy—of a subconscious philosophical sum—and, perhaps, no other aspect of human existence needs the conscious power of philosophy quite so desperately. When that power is called upon to verify and support an emotional appraisal, when love is a conscious integration of reason and emotion, of mind and values, then—and only then—it is the greatest reward of man’s life.

To love is to value. Only a rationally selfish man, a man of self-esteem, is capable of love—because he is the only man capable of holding firm, consistent, uncompromising, unbetrayed values. The man who does not value himself, cannot value anything or anyone.

To love is to value. The man who tells you that it is possible to value without values, to love those whom you appraise as worthless, is the man who tells you that it is possible to grow rich by consuming without producing and that paper money is as valuable as gold . . . . When it comes to love, the highest of emotions, you permit them to shriek at you accusingly that you are a moral delinquent if you’re incapable of feeling causeless love. When a man feels fear without reason, you call him to the attention of a psychiatrist; you are not so careful to protect the meaning, the nature and the dignity of love.

Love is the expression of one’s values, the greatest reward you can earn for the moral qualities you have achieved in your character and person, the emotional price paid by one man for the joy he receives from the virtues of another. Your morality demands that you divorce your love from values and hand it down to any vagrant, not as response to his worth, but as response to his need, not as reward, but as alms, not as a payment for virtues, but as a blank check on vices. Your morality tells you that the purpose of love is to set you free of the bonds of morality, that love is superior to moral judgment, that true love transcends, forgives and survives every manner of evil in its object, and the greater the love the greater the depravity it permits to the loved. To love a man for his virtues is paltry and human, it tells you; to love him for his flaws is divine. To love those who are worthy of it is self-interest; to love the unworthy is sacrifice. You owe your love to those who don’t deserve it, and the less they deserve it, the more love you owe them—the more loathsome the object, the nobler your love—the more unfastidious your love, the greater your virtue—and if you can bring your soul to the state of a dump heap that welcomes anything on equal terms, if you can cease to value moral values, you have achieved the state of moral perfection.

Keep it Real by Keeping it Honest

Posted on by
Reply

One of the biggest impediments to human associations is the unwillingness to say what you think and ask for what you want. Note the word “ask”; no one is entitled to anything from another person simply because he or she wants it. We are entitled to make the request, but that person is equally entitled to say no. And this applies not only to strangers, but to family and loved ones as well.

If I ask somebody for something, I’m counting on one very important thing: If they say they’re willing to do it, then they mean it. We’re all entitled to this authenticity from others. But sadly, most of the time we don’t get it. This doesn’t mean that most people are willfully malicious and seek to lie, but the unfortunate lack of authenticity can definitely lead to problems. It’s actually a form of lying, even if you don’t have malicious intentions. Like regular lying, the creation of one inauthentic statement leads to creating others in order to disguise the inauthenticity of the first, therefore heaping lie upon lie. For example, “Oh, I love doing that with you. Let’s do it again sometime.” The truth might be different: “Good God, I hope I don’t have to do that again.” And then wouldn’t you know it, you’re invited to do the same thing again! You dug this hole all by yourself.

You might sometimes run into passive-aggressive behavior where a person says they want to do something, or that they like something, but their actions suggest the total opposite. And wouldn’t you know it: They fail to show up, or they show up late, or they seem half-hearted about the whole thing. Usually the best way to handle these situations is to say, in one form or another, “Please be straight with me. I’m OK with what you say. Just be honest. That’s the only way we can resolve this.” I call it the “invitation to authenticity,” and it applies to every kind of relationship and association from the most intimate to the most distant and professional.

People might say this is risky. “I can be authentic, even in a calm and diplomatic way. But the truth sometimes hurts and I’ll lose people over it.” OK. So what? If you lose somebody simply because they discover something about you that they don’t like, then why not lose them? It’s OK to lose people, especially when keeping them in your life would necessitate continued misrepresentation on one or both of your parts.

The truth always works even when it hurts. If somebody rejects you for something you’re proud of, then you don’t want that person anyway. If somebody rejects you for something you’re ashamed of, then it’s something they should have been calling to your attention in the first place. By rejecting you, that authentic person did you a favor. Yes, the truth can hurt, but hurting is not necessarily bad! Hurting is often how we get to a place where we’re stronger and can hurt less.

Running from the truth is what creates the buildup in stress, anxiety, depression, and all the other things psychology and psychiatry attempt to treat. Inauthenticity takes too much work, and can be destructive.

I am NOT saying that you should go out of your way to give uninvited advice in an attempt to be “real.” That’s just rude and is not my point. What I mean by “being real” is never saying or doing anything that isn’t part of your authentic self. You don’t have to impose yourself on others, but you don’t have to fake it, either. That’s my point.

If you promise yourself to always keep things real in your relationships, you might lose some people along the way. But the ones you keep will be the most valuable, and your self-respect will shine even brighter.

Michael J. Hurd, Daily Dose of Reason

Biden’s America: One Nation or Us Versus Them

Posted on by
Reply

We have met the enemy and he is us,” said Walt Kelly’s cartoon character Pogo, half a century ago, about what we Americans were doing to our environment.

Rereading President Joe Biden’s inaugural address, Pogo’s remark comes to mind.

Biden began on a lofty, hopeful and familiar note:

“This is a great nation. We are a good people.”

He ended in the same vein: “So, with purpose and resolve, we turn to those tasks of our time. Sustained by faith. Driven by conviction. And, devoted to one another and the country we love with all our hearts.”

Within the address itself, however, Biden recited what he believes to be the historic crimes of the nation and the sins of the soul that torment a considerable portion of our population.

Among the afflictions from which America suffers, said Biden, are “political extremism, white supremacy” and “domestic terrorism.”

How do we overcome these evils?

Said Biden, “Unity is the path.”

But how can good Americans unite with white supremacists and domestic terrorists? Ought we not separate ourselves and do battle with them? And who exactly are they?

Surely, among the enemy is the mob that invaded and trashed the Capitol on Jan. 6. But what of the hundreds of thousands who came out for Trump rallies? What of the 75 million who voted for Donald Trump?

Are all the deplorables outside the company of the saved? Are they, as Hillary Clinton once said of them, “irredeemable”?

“Today, we celebrate the triumph not of a candidate but of a cause,” said Biden, “the cause of democracy.”

The clear implication here is that a victory for Trump on Nov. 3, would have been a defeat for democracy. How unifying is that?

“Today, on this January day,” said Biden, “my whole soul is in this: Bringing America together. Uniting our people. And uniting our nation. I ask every American to join me in this cause.”

He then enumerated the characteristics of our enemy: “Anger, resentment and hatred. Extremism, violence and lawlessness.”

Yet, on inauguration night, antifa mobs attacked the Democratic Party headquarters in Portland and torched American flags in Seattle, the same kind of left-wing mobs that gave us a long hot summer of rioting, looting and arson after the death in Minneapolis of George Floyd.

Has Biden ever condemned by name these mobs the way he did the mob that invaded the Capitol on Jan. 6?

Biden went on to describe U.S. history as he sees it, as a long Manichaean struggle for the soul of America.

“The forces that divide us are deep and they are real. … Our history has been a constant struggle between the American ideal that we are all created equal and the other harsh, ugly reality that racism, nativism, fear and demonization have long torn us apart.”

But if our history has been an endless struggle against racism, nativism and demagoguery, and today’s struggle is against rampant anger, resentment, hatred, extremism, violence and lawlessness, as well as “white supremacists and domestic terrorists,” how can we credibly call ourselves a “great nation” and “good people”?

While Biden identifies the demonic character of the enemy, he does not name them. Who are they? How can we defeat them if the president will not identify them? And if they are evil and we are good, then why should we unite with them rather than ostracize and crush them?

In Joe’s depiction: “We can see each other not as adversaries but as neighbors. We can treat each other with dignity and respect. We can join forces, stop the shouting and lower the temperature. For without unity, there is no peace only bitterness and fury.”

But is “fury” not a legitimate attribute of those fighting the hateful enemies Biden describes?

“Today in this time and place, let’s start afresh. All of us. Let’s begin to listen to one another again. Hear one another. See one another. Show respect for one another.”

This call to unity is followed by another call, to “reject the culture in which facts themselves are manipulated and even manufactured.”

After this, Biden went off on a tear against mendacity.

“Recent weeks and months have taught us a painful lesson. There is truth and there are lies. Lies told for power and for profit.”

All our leaders have a duty and responsibility “to defend the truth and defeat the lies.”

But who are the liars? And if we are to do battle against the liars, why did Biden declare a minute later: “We must end this uncivil war.”

It was said of Warren Harding’s inaugural address that it was “an army of pompous phrases marching across the landscape in search of an idea.”

Joe Biden’s inaugural was the most confusing, contradictory and incoherent ever delivered from the steps of the Capitol, reflective of the mind of its author and the state of the Union he now leads.

Good luck, Mr. President. You will need it, and so will we.

Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of “Nixon’s White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever.”

Copyright 2021 Creators.com.

Industrial-Scale Election Fraud–Did it Happen ?

Posted on by
Reply

I’ve read pieces from congresspeople, CEOs of tech companies, from hacks on television (like Karl Rove) that there was no election fraud, let’s move on.

Wait just a minute.

I led the team that built the fraud detection engine for the largest online auction house on the planet. They were on the front page of USA Today because some mother never received that gift for her child after sending in her last dollar. The auction house publicly said their multi-billion-dollar brand was in jeopardy.

I led industrial-scale fraud investigations in the biggest of the big leagues, and proved fraud.

Cyberauction fraud is really complicated. A perp runs a scam where they sell a computer, for instance, get paid and ship the product. They do this for weeks, building trust. Then they sell 20 computers, keep the dough, ship nothing, and off they go.

What can the auction house do?

They kick the perp off the site. What does the perp do? He changes his name, credit card, mailing address, every bit of information about himself and rejoins as a new, clean seller. And another bunch of customers gets screwed!

The Secret Service, the FBI, about every fraud detection company tried to solve a problem where the perp changed every identifier thus left no trail. No pattern recognition. No matching on any field. Neural net = zero. Nothing.

Well, my team built a cyber-fraud technology and solved the problem. We broke insurance fraud rings where the insurance firm’s 30-person, police trained, 25-year experienced fraud team said there was no fraud. The funniest example is where we flagged a doctor, the recipient of a decade’s worth of six figure checks from this insurer. The fraud team said the guy was clean. Nothing to see here!

The CEO, sitting at the head of the board room table looked at us. We smiled. We then showed the address to which they had sent several million dollars was a federal prison.

We were hired by most of the top 10 property and casualty insurance firms to find fraud they could not find any other way, fraud that their expert teams said did not exist. It did, at industrial scale.

We quickly learned fraud is icky, unsightly, uncomfortable and those with a vested interest in not finding it, because they couldn’t, denied it. Happens all the time.

My team and I know industrial-level fraud and I can tell you with 100% certainty that the 2020 presidential election had massive, organized, discoverable fraud in most of the swing states.

How do I know this in the face of virtually every media company denying significant fraud?

Let’s do a fraud look-see, actually several, together.

Industrial fraud in insurance, Medicaid, or credit cards never starts with a flashing red light with letters, in English and Spanish, saying fraud, look here! There must be a starting point and the starting point is often only one or two cases that lead to tens of thousands of incidents across hundreds of participants.

Let’s see if there are any starting points here:

Jesse, a truck driver, has a semi-tractor rig delivering dogfood to pet shops across America. This particular brand is the expensive stuff yuppies buy for their Schnoodle dogs bred by crossing Schnauzers and Poodles and costing about $1,000. Only the best for Pierre.

Jesse, our truck driver, sees something sketchy. He has been driving this route for months, yet something this day is different. Jesse looks into the truck and sees the labels do not quite look the same. He reports it to his boss, then to the trucking service, and nobody does anything.

Jesse, a dog lover, goes to PETA and they do a video. Jesse signs an affidavit under penalty of perjury, gets on TV for a couple of days saying this dog food may not be the real thing. It might be fake, from China. He just wants someone, anyone to look into it.

Jesse, a dog lover, goes to PETA and they do a video. Jesse signs an affidavit under penalty of perjury, gets on TV for a couple of days saying this dog food may not be the real thing. It might be fake, from China. He just wants someone, anyone to look into it.

Dog lovers across America would stop buying that dog food until the company had an open, public investigation. The board of directors would probably fire the CEO if an investigation showed she was not all over this possible claim. Sales would collapse. No major pet chain would carry the dog food until everything was investigated.

Ya think maybe there would be a full-scale investigation? Do you think people would stand up and say: “…there is no evidence! There is no reason to investigate!”

A third-tier media company obtains the laptop from the cocaine addicted, meth-addled son of the Borthreed Aerospace CEO Joe Asterisk. It is legally secured from a computer repair store where it was abandoned.

On the laptop, there are emails saying that the CEO Asterisk and his loser son have done a deal with China and the “Big Guy,” probably the CEO, gets 10% of the take.

What would the board do?

Faster than a flying bullet they suspend the CEO, call in the FBI, bring in an outside law firm, and publish every detail of every discovery. The FAA, FBI, state agencies, foreign governments launch investigations. Every email on that laptop would become public.

For either of these examples, who would stand up in public and say: “Where’s the evidence?”

You just love that new Asian fusion place in downtown, on that gentrified block where the African Americans have been pushed out so Millennial snowflakes can open coffee shops.

One night you are watching TV, that bottle of Chardonnay at hand. You see a TV crew in front of the restaurant. The health inspectors are there for a sanitary inspection. But the employees are putting cardboard over the windows so the inspectors cannot see in. You hear the manager say: you can look in, through the edge of the cardboard, but you must stand 30 feet back. COVID policy!

Do you think this may be a starting point? Are you going to call in there for your next takeout meal?

One more: It’s a local school board election. At risk is the charter school your entire neighborhood loves. It is the only hope for your kids getting into college.

The night of the election, they announce there is a water main break and everyone needs to leave.

A few days later, you learn there was no water main break. Then a video comes out showing they were taking ballots from under the tables and tossing them, unexamined, unvetted, and unwitnessed, in with all the rest.

Oh, the charter school was voted to be closed. There was overwhelming support for shutting it down. Everyone you know wanted it open, but alas, no, it is to be closed. The people have spoken.

Would you believe in that result? Would you be cool with “…no evidence of fraud here. Nothing to see.”

So, in the 2020 Presidential election, where is the evidence of fraud?

All you have to do is change the context to dog food labels, to the local restaurant health inspector, to Borthreed Aerospace, or the school election — in that context, yes, there was enough obvious fraud to do investigations at industrial scale.

In these examples, there was enough evidence to destroy CEO careers, shut manufacturing plants down, upend careers.

After you get your starting point, and they are everywhere, the first question you should ask is: “who benefits from denying fraud with all these obvious starting points?”

You know you would not buy that dog food, you would not eat at that restaurant, you would not buy Borthreed stock, and you would not believe that charter school vote without complete investigations.

So why do you believe Karl Rove?

Jay Valentine’s web site is http://www.JayValentine.com

Philosophy of Capitalism

Posted on by
Reply

“I am not primarily an advocate of capitalism, but of egoism; and I am not primarily an advocate of egoism, but of reason. If one recognizes the supremacy of reason and applies it consistently, all the rest follows. This—the supremacy of reason—was, is and will be the primary concern of my work, and the essence of Objectivism.”

“…Reason in epistemology leads to egoism in ethics, which leads to capitalism in politics.”

— Ayn Rand*

Capitalism is commonly taken as an economic system, that can be grafted onto any political system. Yet, economics is not a self-evident primary. An economic system (in our case, the free-market) does not exist in a vacuum but, like a house or skyscraper, is an expression of a specific intellectual foundation — a philosophy.

What is philosophy?

One’s view of what is the proper social system for human beings depends on how one views the nature of existence, how one grasps the world one lives in, and how one views human nature. It depends on one’s philosophy — an integrated, systematic view of existence.

According to philosopher Ayn Rand, philosophy consists of three primary branches:

  • Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the nature of reality (that which is); it answers the question: “what kind of world do I live in?”
  • Epistemology (epistēmē is the Greek word for knowledge) is the branch of philosophy that studies the nature and means of human knowledge, of grasping reality; it answers the question: “how do I know it?”
  • Ethics is the branch of philosophy that defines a code of values that one should live by. It answers the question: “what should I do?”

The answers to these fundamental questions will, in part, determine the answers to the branch of philosophy known as politics.

  • Politics is the application of ethics to social issues. Politics seeks to answer, “how should one live with other individuals in an organized society?”

The importance of philosophy

Philosophy is important. It is not a mere plaything of ivory-tower professors or a “…bauble of the intellect, ” writes Professor Leonard Peikoff,

“…but a power from which no man can abstain. Anyone can say that he dispenses with a view of reality, knowledge, the good, but no one can implement this credo. The reason is that man, by his nature as a conceptual being, cannot function at all without some form of philosophy to serve as his guide.” [1]

If one’s philosophy is that one lives in a world of miracles (religion), where truth is by revelation (faith), and morality means sacrificing oneself for others (altruism), one’s politics will be very different from someone who believes in a world of cause and effect (science), that one can understand rationally (reason), to pursue and achieve personal happiness (self-interest).

To concretize this point further, observe that if one’s philosophy is that of a religious fundamentalist then abortion is murder, and a fetus has the right to live in a woman’s body irrespective of the woman’s thoughts on the subject. Life comes from God, and what God giveth let no man (or women) take away.

If one is an advocate of statism, then the individual has no rights but lives by permission of the state, and the government can revoke (alienate) this permission at whim. The right to abortion becomes a matter of dictatorial vote, i.e., political might makes ethical right. The state may force one to have an abortion or prevent one from having an abortion as it sees fit for the “good of society.”

Observe that on this political issue, the answer is not determined purely by “playing politics,” but is justified by one’s fundamental philosophy. ‘

Politics is an inseparable branch of the tree of philosophy. Separate a fruitful branch from the tree of good philosophy, and graft it onto the tree of bad philosophy and that once fruitful branch will wither, crumble and die.

Philosophy is a matter of life and death.

It is on the withered cross of anti-reason, altruistic (self-sacrificial), collectivist philosophy that capitalism is being crucified.

The philosophy of anti-capitalism

In philosopher Ayn Rand’s view, the reason why capitalism is attacked and misrepresented (even by its alleged defenders) is because of the anti-enlightenment philosophies that dominate our culture:

“It is often asked: Why was capitalism destroyed in spite of its incomparably beneficent record? The answer lies in the fact that the lifeline feeding any social system is a culture’s dominant philosophy and that capitalism never had a philosophical base. It was the last and (theoretically) incomplete product of an Aristotelian influence. As a resurgent tide of mysticism engulfed philosophy in the nineteenth century, capitalism was left in an intellectual vacuum, its lifeline cut. Neither its moral nature nor even its political principles had ever been fully understood or defined. Its alleged defenders regarded it as compatible with government controls (i.e., government interference into the economy), ignoring the meaning and implications of the concept of laissez-faire. Thus, what existed in practice, in the nineteenth century, was not pure capitalism, but variously mixed economies. Since controls necessitate and breed further controls, it was the statist element of the mixtures that wrecked them; it was the free, capitalist element that took the blame.

“Capitalism could not survive in a culture dominated by mysticism and altruism, by the soul-body dichotomy and the tribal premise. No social system (and no human institution or activity of any kind) can survive without a moral base. On the basis of the altruist morality, capitalism had to be—and was—damned from the start.” [2]

It is the altruist-collectivist moral base that capitalism must be “saved” from.

Laissez-faire capitalism is a political-economic system that requires a specific philosophical framework. If capitalism is built upon an improper philosophical base, it will be like a towering skyscraper built on quicksand.

The philosophy of capitalism

What is the proper philosophical base? In the words of the American philosopher Ayn Rand:

“It is . . . by reference to philosophy that the character of a social system has to be defined and evaluated. Corresponding to the four branches of philosophy, the four keystones of capitalism are: metaphysically, the requirements of man’s nature and survival—epistemologically, reason—ethically, individual rights, politically, freedom.” [3]

This site holds that the philosophy that provides a proper foundation for capitalism is Ayn Rand’s revolutionary philosophy: Objectivism.

Objectivism holds that one should live by one’s mind and efforts, in the pursuit of one’s rational self-interest, neither sacrificing oneself to others, nor sacrificing others to oneself (ethics); that one can understand reality by reason and logic (epistemology), as one lives in a world of cause and effect where there are no contradictions (metaphysics).

A complete, systematic presentation of Objectivism is beyond the scope of this site. For a comprehensive presentation of Rand’s philosophy, I recommend Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand by Dr. Leonard Peikoff.

How Does One Apply Rational Egoism in a Mixed Economy, Welfare State? BY JAANA WOICESHYN | JAN 15, 2021 | BUSINESS

Posted on by
Reply
While the welfare state cannot be transformed into a free-market system overnight, businesspeople can help by speaking up (in forums open to them) when restrictions on freedom of business are being proposed by government and other groups.

I recently taught a short course introducing business ethics and rational egoism to Executive MBA students. One student observed that it would be easier to apply egoist principles in free markets where acting on such principles, for example, rationality, productiveness, and justice, would be rewarded and profit-making valued. But, the student asked, how does one apply rational egoism in a mixed economy, the prevailing welfare state system?

The student’s question was apt: the welfare state system makes it challenging for business to pursue its (owners’) self-interest—long-term profit maximization—because the rational egoist moral principles are at odds with the dominant moral code on which the welfare state is founded: altruism. It is a code that guides putting others’ interests always ahead of one’s own. This contrasts with the free-market system—capitalism—that is based on in rational egoism. This code advocates the pursuit of self-interest that allows only voluntary and mutually beneficial interactions and renounces the initiation of physical coercion against others.

In a welfare state, many investors, customers, employees, and the government expect business to act altruistically at least some of the time. The business is expected to sacrifice profits for the causes that these stakeholders favor, such as fighting climate change, reducing income inequality, and for various government programs that support them. In contrast, in capitalism, business is expected to focus on creating material values on which people’s lives depend and on trading these values for profit.

The social pressures to conform to others’ altruistic expectations can be significant in a welfare state system and can lead to business appeasing them. As an example, in 2019, the Roundtable of CEOs of 200 major corporations re-defined the purpose of the corporation from creating wealth for its shareholders to serving all its stakeholders equally, including “communities.”

However, if business wants to perform its proper—necessary—role as the creator of material values, such appeasement will not do. It must pursue its long-term self-interest, guided by the rational egoist principles. For that, business must claim the moral high ground. This requires recognizing that business is a tremendous force for good in society. Businesses produce the goods and services that not only make people’s lives possible, but make them better: from food to medicine to energy and beyond. Businesses do this by trading freely with their employees, customers, and suppliers, without violating anyone’s rights.

Understanding that business is a moral endeavor which enhances human life gives businesspeople the courage to defend their companies’ profit-maximization against demands for altruistic sacrifice for the sake of social and environmental goals. A good recent example of moral clarity and courage is Adam Anderson, CEO of Innovex Downhole Solutions in Texas, who wrote an open letter defending his company and industry to North Face. The latter had refused an order of 400 jackets with Innovex logo. North Face did not want to sell branded products to companies in the oil and gas industry because of their CO2 emissions (despite the fact that North Face’s products are derived from oi).

In a welfare state, it may not be always possible for business to pursue self-interest by applying the rational egoist principles, or to benefit from doing so. In such a system, the government controls the economy and business to varying degrees. Governments can prevent the creation of material values altogether, for example, by banning the production of fossil fuels, construction of oil pipelines, or operations of new businesses that disrupt existing industries (such as ride-sharing services Uber and Lyft). In addition, welfare state governments use cronyism to grant favors (exclusive contracts, tax breaks, coercive monopolies, etc.) to some businesses, thus disadvantaging others. Governments also curtail companies’ profits through regulations and welfare programs.

Therefore, business claiming the moral high ground is not enough for it to be able to pursue rational self-interest. It must demand also freedom to operate: being left alone by the government. But once the morality of business has been asserted, this is easier to do. Because the mixed economy welfare state is unstable, always being pulled to the opposite directions of its main elements—government control and freedom, it is possible to help move it to either direction.

While the welfare state cannot be transformed into a free-market system overnight, businesspeople can help by speaking up (in forums open to them) when restrictions on freedom of business are being proposed by government and other groups. This way, business can move the needle towards more freedom, and therefore, towards more value creation, more prosperity, and more human wellbeing.