Here’s How Trump Wants to Streamline Government

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The Trump administration proposes to reform and reorganize government by streamlining food regulation, merging two Cabinet departments, and consolidating housing programs.

Combining the Education and Labor departments is among 32 proposals in a plan released Thursday by the Office of Management and Budget in response to a charge President Donald Trump issued 14 months ago.

“We wanted to change the dialogue in Washington, to say it’s not acceptable to have things that just don’t make sense,” Margaret Weichert, OMB’s deputy director for management, told The Daily Signal.

Weichert did not provide an estimate of savings, but said it would be clear in the administration’s next budget proposal.

Mick Mulvaney, director of the Office of Management and Budget, lauded the report’s recommendations Thursday during a Cabinet meeting convened by the president.

The OMB’s 132-page plan also would merge the food component of the Food and Drug Administration, now part of the Department of Health and Human Services, into a Department of Agriculture entity to be known as the Food Safety Agency.

The report notes that the USDA regulates chicken, but the FDA oversees eggs—if the eggs are in shells. If the eggs are processed and in a carton for pouring, then it’s the USDA’s job.

What’s more, the FDA regulates cheese pizza but the USDA regulates pepperoni pizza.

“Our favorite one is an open-face roast beef sandwich is regulated by the Department of Agriculture,” Weichert said. “If you stick a layer of bread on top of it, and you add new bureaucracy, it switches to FDA. That just doesn’t make sense.”

Since the Labor Department and the Education Department both are responsible for learning and skills for Americans, the Trump administration wants to create a single Department of Education and the Workforce.

The merger, if approved by Congress, would put the United States in line with most other developed nations that are part of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Weichert said.

“When it comes to education and labor, most OECD countries managed education and labor missions in an integrated fashion. It’s actually part of the kind of competitive advantage dialogue that you can see in Europe and China,” Weichert told The Daily Signal, adding:

Lifetime learning and whatever form of education is needed to both drive the needs of society broadly, but also to drive the economy, is integrated. The House committee itself that has jurisdiction over these two agencies is a single committee.

Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., chairwoman of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, called the proposed change a long overdue recognition of the connection between the two missions.

“We welcome the administration’s focus on education and workforce issues together, and as we continue our oversight over the Department of Education and the Department of Labor, we look forward to working with the administration on the proposal and how the new department could function to best serve American students, workers, job creators, and families,” Foxx said in a public statement.

The merger idea already is getting pushback, though, including from unions.

“The proposed merger of the departments of Labor and Education is yet another attempt by the Trump administration to weaken programs that serve and protect working families and to concentrate even more power in the hands of large corporations,” Chris Shelton, president of the Communication Workers of America, said in a formal statement.

In general, the OMB report calls for combining the functions of several departments and agencies and largely eliminating duplication.

Between a quarter and a third of the recommendations may be done through executive action, but the bulk of them would require congressional action, Weichert said.

In April 2017, Trump signed Executive Order 13781, which directed the Office of Management and Budget to propose a plan that would reorganize governmental functions to limit duplication.

The resulting plan contains solid ideas, said Paul Winfree, who was director of budget policy at the White House when Trump asked for the reorganization plan. Winfree since has returned to his position as director of the Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation.

“The Heritage research team started thinking through a reorganization proposal more than three years ago,” Winfree said in a statement provided to The Daily Signal. “Early in the administration, I drafted the executive order that established the plan for assembling the proposal, which the president signed.”

“OMB worked closely with the Heritage team,” Winfree said, “and it’s obvious from reading the administration’s proposal that everyone is moving in the same direction.”

The federal government spends about $250 million a year for education programs on financial literacy across more than 20 agencies. The report recommends consolidating programs to save time and taxpayer resources.

The plan also calls for moving programs providing rural housing loan guarantees and rental assistance out of the Agriculture Department and into the Department of Housing and Urban Development, locating all federal housing programs in a single Cabinet department.

“To be sure, there’s going to be a lot of good public-sector drama around some of these proposals,” Weichert said, adding:

But I hope underneath all of that, we can find a spirit of willingness to actually do the right thing for the American people. Frankly, all of us know we need to do something. That’s why this president was elected. That’s why the American people wanted a businessman to come to Washington, was the fact that so much business as usual in Washington doesn’t make sense.

Past presidents, going back decades, have tried to reorganize and reform government but haven’t reached the desired effect, said Max Stier, president of the Partnership for Public Service, a nonpartisan research group.

“No one can reasonably dispute that our government needs reform, but structural reorganizations are rarely the most effective way to improve service to our citizens,” Stier said in a public statement.

The OMB report notes that President Warren Harding created the Bureau of the Budget in 1921 in one of the earlier reorganization attempts of the 20th century.

President Jimmy Carter carried out a personnel reform agenda that was fully implemented under President Ronald Reagan. And Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama all pushed efforts to reduce duplication and increase public-private sector cooperation.

“For the administration’s reorganization plans to succeed, the president and members of his administration must articulate a government-wide vision for reform, the rationale for each proposal, and how the administration will implement changes and measure progress,” Stier said. “The White House also must get congressional buy-in and bipartisan support, make substantial, upfront investments, and plan for sustained attention over many years.”

Still, Weichert contends now is a time for action.

“Our system was designed after World War II, addressing legacy problems that in many cases are not problems today, and, we are 20 years into the 21st century, fundamentally. We have no time to waste,” she said.

COLUMN BY

Portrait of Fred Lucas

Fred Lucas

Fred Lucas is the White House correspondent for The Daily Signal and co-host of “The Right Side of History” podcast. Send an email to Fred. Twitter: @FredLucasWH.

Dear Readers:

With the recent conservative victories related to tax cuts, the Supreme Court, and other major issues, it is easy to become complacent.

However, the liberal Left is not backing down. They are rallying supporters to advance their agenda, moving this nation further from the vision of our founding fathers.

If we are to continue to bring this nation back to our founding principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism, we need to come together as a group of likeminded conservatives.

This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.

We are looking for a select few conservatives to become a Heritage Foundation member. With your membership, you’ll qualify for all associated benefits and you’ll help keep our nation great for future generations.

ACTIVATE YOUR MEMBERSHIP TODAY

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is of White House Budget Director Mick Mulvaney presenting proposals to consolidate the work of executive agencies during a meeting Thursday of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet. (Photo: Jonathan Ernst/Reuters/Newscom)

Trump Orders Fix to Family Separation on Border, Calls for ‘Comprehensive’ Immigration Solution

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President Donald Trump signed an executive order Wednesday to halt separating families that illegally cross the border, but also said he wants to sign a “comprehensive” immigration bill from Congress.

In signing the executive order, Trump said, “We are going to have a lot of happy people.”

“It’s about keeping families together while at the same time being sure that we have a very powerful, very strong border,” the president said. “Border security will be equal, if not greater, than previously. So we are going to have strong, very strong borders, but we are going to keep the families together. I didn’t like the sight or the feeling of families being separated.”

Trump added, “It continues to be a zero tolerance. We have zero tolerance for people who enter our country illegally.”

“Zero tolerance” marked a tougher approach by the Trump administration in enforcing existing immigration law by arresting those who enter the country illegally.

The order is a temporary fix, and is titled “Affording Congress an Opportunity to Address Family Separation.”

The executive order says:

The Secretary of Homeland Security (Secretary), shall, to the extent permitted by law and subject to the availability of appropriations, maintain custody of alien families during the pendency of any criminal improper entry or immigration proceedings involving their members. … The Secretary shall not, however, detain an alien family together when there is a concern that detention of an alien child with the child’s alien parent would pose a risk to the child’s welfare.

Trump was accompanied in the Oval Office Wednesday by Vice President Mike Pence and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen

“This is a situation that president after president hasn’t dealt with for decades,” Nielsen said. “This one is willing to stand up and fix it. We ask Congress to do their part.”

Pence called it a “false choice between being a country of law and order and a country that demonstrates compassion and heart of the American people.”

Trump said that Congress must act, not only to address the minors situation but also for a “comprehensive” bill to address immigration.

“We are also wanting to go through Congress. We will be going through Congress,” Trump said. “We are working on a much more comprehensive bill.”

Past “comprehensive” proposals have awarded legal status to illegal immigrants, while increasing border security.

Trump met with 11 Republican senators and five GOP House members earlier Wednesday in the Cabinet Room of the White House where he first announced he would be signing the order, and also called for a broader measure.

Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., asserted that immigration has “bedeviled” lawmakers for 40 years.

“You’re the president who can help us solve the immigration problem with your leadership,” Alexander said. “You may be able to do for immigration what Nixon did for China and Reagan did for the Soviet Union and a lot of us would like to work with you on that.”

At least two bills have some GOP support in the House.

House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., sponsored a more conservative bill that requires employers to use E-Verify, to check immigration status of employees, gives renewable legal status to beneficiaries of the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program for three years, authorizes a border wall, and ends chain migration.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., has a “compromise bill” that gives DACA beneficiaries a pathway to citizenship and includes $25 billion for a border wall.

Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., told Roll Call of the two bills, “We don’t like any of them,” and said that “Immigration is kind of my sacrosanct. You’ve got to do this the right way. You just can’t do this badly.”

The detention of children has been a raging controversy as the administration increased enforcement.

According to immigration experts, under the federal government’s Flores settlement of 1997, the federal government would release unaccompanied minor illegal immigrants after no more than 20 days of detention. A separate 2008 law required unaccompanied minors be transferred out of custody of the Department of Homeland Security to the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services.

Then, a 2016 judicial interpretation expanded the Flores settlement to include minors brought into the country with their parents. So, conforming to the expanded interpretation of the settlement and the existing law, the DHS enforcement agencies, after arresting illegal immigrant parents, have transferred minor children to the custody of the HHS Office of Refugee Resettlement, which tries to place them with relatives or a caretaker.

During the meeting with members of Congress, Pence told lawmakers the administration was limited.

“We don’t want children to be taken away from parents, but, right now under the law, and we sit with these lawmakers, we only have two choices before us,” Pence said. “No. 1 is don’t prosecute people who come into our country illegally, or prosecute them and then under court cases and the law, they have to be separated from their children.”

The executive order references the Flores settlement.

The Attorney General shall promptly file a request with the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California to modify the Settlement Agreement in Flores v. Sessions, CV 85-4544 (“Flores settlement”), in a manner that would permit the Secretary, under present resource constraints, to detain alien families together throughout the pendency of criminal proceedings for improper entry or any removal or other immigration proceedings.

The order is not a policy departure for the president, said Hans von Spakovsky, senior legal fellow for The Heritage Foundation.

So to the extent the 1997 Flores settlement and the 9th Circuit’s misinterpretation of it prevents DHS from holding juveniles for more than 20 days, this language gives DHS the exception they need to still separate families if they have to in order to comply with Flores.

As I expected, the [executive order] also tells the AG in Sec. 3 (e) to file a request with the court in the Flores case to allow DHS to detain families together “throughout the pendency of criminal proceedings for improper entry or any removal or other immigration proceedings.”

So the president is not backing down from prosecuting all illegal aliens who cross the border, which is what the critics wanted.

Pence reiterated the president’s call for a comprehensive measure when talking to lawmakers.

“The president’s vision, as articulated in his State of the Union address, was let’s solve the whole problem,” Pence said. “Let’s build a wall, let’s close the loopholes, let’s solve the problem for 1.8 million people that were brought into this country through no fault of their own, and let’s deal with law and order and compassion with this issue of family separation at our border.”

COLUMN BY

Portrait of Fred Lucas

Fred Lucas

Fred Lucas is the White House correspondent for The Daily Signal and co-host of “The Right Side of History” podcast. Send an email to Fred. Twitter: @FredLucasWH.

RELATED ARTICLES:

How Immigration Officials Cooked the Books and Fooled Congress for Years

Who’s Responsible for Separating Alien Kids From Their Parents? Many People, but Not Trump

Dear Readers:

With the recent conservative victories related to tax cuts, the Supreme Court, and other major issues, it is easy to become complacent.

However, the liberal Left is not backing down. They are rallying supporters to advance their agenda, moving this nation further from the vision of our founding fathers.

If we are to continue to bring this nation back to our founding principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism, we need to come together as a group of likeminded conservatives.

This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.

We are looking for a select few conservatives to become a Heritage Foundation member. With your membership, you’ll qualify for all associated benefits and you’ll help keep our nation great for future generations.

ACTIVATE YOUR MEMBERSHIP TODAY<

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is of President Donald Trump holding a signed executive order to keep families together at border in the Oval Office of the White House, in Washington, D.C., on June 20, 2018. Photo by Olivier Douliery/ Abaca Press (Newscom TagID: sipaphotoseight258174.jpg) [Photo via Newscom]

Fact-Checking 4 Claims About Detaining Children at the Border

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The Trump administration is taking heat from Democrats and Republicans for separating parents and children after they illegally crossed the southern border.

Over the six weeks from April 19 through May 31, federal officials separated about 2,000 children from their families at the U.S.-Mexican border, the Associated Press reported last week.

President Donald Trump blamed the procedure on Democrats in Congress.

“They’re obstructing. They’re really obstructionists and they are obstructing,” Trump said Monday at the White House. “The United States will not be a migrant camp and it will not be a refugee holding facility. It won’t be.”

“If you look at what’s happening in Europe, if you look at what’s happening in other places, we can’t allow that to happen to the United States—not on my watch,” he said.

During the White House press briefing Monday, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said: “This is a very serious issue that has resulted after years and years of Congress not taking action.”

Here’s a look at four of the more questionable claims made about the enforcement action.

1. Democrats’ Law or Trump Policy?

“The Democrats forced that law upon our nation,” Trump asserted last week.

Democrats, backed by some media commentators, counter that it’s not the law but a Trump administration policy.

Actually, experts say, the situation is a combination of a bipartisan law and a Clinton administration policy.

In 1997, the Clinton administration entered into something called the Flores Settlement Agreement, which ended a class action lawsuit first brought in the 1980s.

The settlement established a policy that the federal government would release unaccompanied minors from custody to their parents, relatives, or other caretakers after no more than 20 days, or, alternatively, determine the “least restrictive” setting for the child.

In a separate development, in 2008 the Democrat-controlled Congress approved bipartisan legislation to combat human trafficking and President George W. Bush, a Republican, signed it into law.

Section 235 (g) in that law, the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, states that unaccompanied minors entering the United States must be transferred to the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Refugee Resettlement rather than to the Department of Homeland Security.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit expanded the Flores settlement in 2016 to include children brought to the country illegally by their parents.

For consistency between the provision of the anti-trafficking law and the 9th Circuit’s interpretation of the Flores agreement, children who came into the country illegally with parents had to be taken into HHS custody, said Art Arthur, former general counsel for Immigration and Naturalization Services (now known as Immigration and Customs Enforcement) as well as a former federal immigration judge.

“As soon as their parents are detained, the children are classified as unaccompanied,” Arthur, now a resident fellow for law and policy at the Center for Immigration Studies, told The Daily Signal.

2. Unprecedented Action by Trump Administration?

Some media outlets have called the practice of separating children from parents at the border “unprecedented” or a “new low” for the United States.

What’s different under the Trump administration, though, is a “zero tolerance” approach to enforcing existing immigration laws and policy.

On May 7 in Scottsdale, Arizona, Attorney General Jeff Sessions directed federal prosecutors to prosecute all adults who illegally enter the country, including those accompanied by their children, under a provision of federal law (8 U.S.C. § 1325(a)) that covers illegal entry.

“If you’re smuggling a child, then we’re going to prosecute you, and that child will be separated from you, probably, as required by law,” Sessions said. “If you don’t want your child separated, then don’t bring them across the border illegally. It’s not our fault that somebody does that.”

Since it takes more than 20 days to adjudicate an asylum claim, the 9th Circuit’s interpretation of the Flores Settlement Agreement essentially provides three options, said David Inserra, a homeland security policy analyst for The Heritage Foundation.

“The Trump administration currently faces two options: Either release every family that crosses the border and claims asylum and know that most of them will never show up at their immigration court hearing; or release the child as required by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals’ interpretation of the Flores settlement while holding the parents while awaiting trial,” Inserra told The Daily Signal.

“A third, better solution is to fix the loophole created by the 9th Circuit with regard to Flores and improve the asylum process to discourage frivolous asylum claims, while also better serving those with legitimate asylum cases,” Inserra added.

Proposed legislation by Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va.; Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C.; and House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis. would reverse the 9th Circuit’s interpretation.

“This would mean only a brief period of separation while the parents are prosecuted,” Arthur said.

Depending on the outcome, the family would be reunited and either be released or deported together.

3. ‘Concentration Camps’?

Much of the criticism of separating children from parents at the border has been from Democrats.

However, former CIA Director Michael Hayden, who served under President George W. Bush, and former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele, who was once lieutenant governor of Maryland, both compared the practice to Nazi concentration camps.

The Department of Homeland Security rejected the comparison, noting that most children caught crossing the border illegally are not detained by federal officials.

“We have high standards,” Nielsen said during the White House press briefing Monday. “We give them meals and we give them education and we give them medical care. There are videos, there are TVs. I visited the detention centers myself.”

In the last fiscal year, 90 percent of apprehended children were released to a sponsor who was either a parent or close relative, according to the department.

Homeland security officials also say they work with HHS to improve and ease communication between detained parents and their children in HHS care.

Sponsors may be “a parent, adult sibling, relative, or appropriate home that meets criteria for the safety of the child and continuation of any immigration proceedings,” according to DHS. Also, a parent who is prosecuted and later released can be a sponsor and ask HHS to restore custody of the child.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement has dedicated a facility to operate primarily as a family reunification and removal center. ICE staff who interact with parents will receive training in trauma-informed care, and the agency will assign staff trained in mental health care to detained parents who have been separated from children, according to DHS.

4. Taking Babies From Nursing Mothers?

CNN reported last week on an illegal immigrant from Honduras who claimed her nursing daughter was pulled away from her before she was handcuffed. CNN cited a lawyer from a liberal legal group called the Texas Civil Rights Project.

In a conference call with reporters last week, a senior Department of Homeland Security official said this was not the case.

“We do not separate breastfeeding children from their parents. That does not exist. That is not a policy. That is not something that DHS does,” an official told reporters Friday. “We believe that that is false.”

An estimated 14,500 to 17,500 individuals are smuggled into the United States each year. For perspective, that number constitutes about 5.7 percent of total apprehensions of illegal immigrants in 2017, though apprehensions don’t account for all border crossings.

This article has been modified since publication.

COLUMN BY

Portrait of Fred Lucas

Fred Lucas

Fred Lucas is the White House correspondent for The Daily Signal and co-host of “The Right Side of History” podcast. Send an email to Fred. Twitter: @FredLucasWH.

RELATED ARTICLES:

The Left Is Spreading Misinformation About Our Border Crisis. Here’s What’s Really Happening.

House ‘Compromise’ Immigration Bill Fails to Adequately Address Broken System

Trump Is More Right Than Wrong About Migrant Crime in Germany

Here Are Horrifying Photos Of Obama’s Illegal Alien Facilities The Media Refuses To Show You.

13 Facts the Media ‘Pros’ Don’t Want You to Know About ‘Family Border Separation’

Dear Readers:

With the recent conservative victories related to tax cuts, the Supreme Court, and other major issues, it is easy to become complacent.

However, the liberal Left is not backing down. They are rallying supporters to advance their agenda, moving this nation further from the vision of our founding fathers.

If we are to continue to bring this nation back to our founding principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism, we need to come together as a group of likeminded conservatives.

This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.

We are looking for a select few conservatives to become a Heritage Foundation member. With your membership, you’ll qualify for all associated benefits and you’ll help keep our nation great for future generations.

ACTIVATE YOUR MEMBERSHIP TODAY

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen is by Leah Millis/Reuters/Newscom.

Sports Tickets, Other Freebies for FBI Leakers Raise ‘Bribery’ Issues, Legal Experts Say

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The Justice Department’s internal watchdog is investigating FBI leakers, as legal experts say revelations about gifts in an inspector general’s report this week raise new legal and ethical issues.

“We will separately report on those investigations as they are concluded,” @JusticeOIG says.

The Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General noted that “dozens” of FBI agents had contact with the news media, and many were taking sports tickets, golf outings, and other gifts from reporters to whom they were leaking unauthorized information about a criminal investigation.

The FBI’s Office of Integrity and Compliance discourages the acceptance by agents of anything of value, said Ron Hosko, a former FBI assistant director.

The liberal Left continue to push their radical agenda against American values. The good news is there is a solution. Find out more >>

“Accepting something from someone who clearly expects something back has the whiff of a quid pro quo,” Hosko told The Daily Signal.

“Any agreement for something of value in exchange for information—particularly, information related to an investigation—would constitute a corrupt relationship and warrants the strongest sanction,” he added.

The inspector general’s report about the FBI’s handling of Hillary Clinton’s private email server scandal, released on Thursday, said:

We have profound concerns about the volume and extent of unauthorized media contacts by FBI personnel that we have uncovered during our review.

In addition, we identified instances where FBI employees improperly received benefits from reporters, including tickets to sporting events, golfing outings, drinks and meals, and admittance to nonpublic social events.

We will separately report on those investigations as they are concluded, consistent with the Inspector General Act, other applicable federal statutes, and OIG policy.

The report goes on to recommend that “the FBI evaluate whether (a) it is sufficiently educating its employees about both its media contact policy and the Department’s ethics rules, and (b) its disciplinary penalties are sufficient to deter such improper conduct.”

The Office of Government Ethics describes specific restrictions on executive branch employees accepting gifts. A “prohibited source” of a gift is “seeking official action” or “has an interest.”

The question arises if and when that affects a news organization with an interest in information held by a government employee who is taking gifts, potentially using that job for personal gain.

“We are looking at two potential crimes. One is potential disclosure of classified information. The second is potential bribery,” Curt Levey, president of the Committee for Justice, a nonprofit conservative legal group, told The Daily Signal. “Under bribery statutes, the Supreme Court has determined you have to prove a quid pro quo.”

That would be a difficult case to prosecute, because bribery is often thought of in the context of giving a government official “cash or a Rolex,” said David Rivkin, a lawyer who served in the White House Counsel’s Office under President George H.W. Bush.

“If an FBI agent received meals and benefits in exchange for providing this information, it might fall under the bribery statute,” Rivkin told The Daily Signal. “You might convince a grand jury, but can you convince a jury?”

Rivkin said another potential offense would be FBI agents misusinggovernment property or the authority of their office to advance a purely personal agenda.

While Justice Department Inspector General Michael E. Horowitz determined political bias didn’t affect the outcome of the investigation into Clinton’s email scandal, Rivkin thinks the FBI employees demonstrated an agenda.

FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page were the only named individuals, while others were identified only as FBI employees or agents.

“I found the totality of the messages, not just Strzok and Page, but ‘Agents 3 and 4,’ absolutely appalling,” Rivkin said. “I have never seen anything like this in my years at the Department of Justice.”

On Oct. 28, the day then-FBI Director James Comey notified Congress he had reopened the Clinton probe, “FBI Employee 1” wrote, “I mean, I never really liked the Republic anyway.”

“FBI Employee 3” responded, “As I have initiated the destruction of the republic … Would you be so kind as to have a coffee with me this afternoon?”

“FBI Employee 4” chimed in, “I’m clinging to small pockets of happiness in the dark time of the Republic’s destruction.”

Fewer jokes were exchanged the day after the election, Nov. 9, 2016. “FBI Attorney 2” wrote, “I am numb.”

“FBI Employee” (no number assigned) replied, “I can’t stop crying.” “FBI Employee” later said, “You promised me this wouldn’t happen. YOU PROMISED.”

“FBI Attorney 2” wrote, “I am so stressed about what I could have done differently,” adding, “I don’t know. We broke the momentum.”

As a reassurance, “FBI Employee” wrote, “All the people who were initially voting for her would not, and were not, swayed by any decision the FBI put out. Trump’s supporters are all poor to middle class, uneducated, lazy POS that think he will magically grant them jobs for doing nothing.” (“POS” is an acronym for a barnyard epithet.)

“They probably didn’t watch the debates, aren’t fully educated on his policies, and are stupidly wrapped up in his unmerited enthusiasm,” the message continued.

What upset Rivkin the most about the messages was that no FBI employees seemed to object.

“If you looked at all the people involved in those chains of messages with disdain and anger, you don’t see any Boy Scouts,” Rivkin said. “That’s very depressing to me.”

COMMENTARY BY

Portrait of Fred Lucas

Fred Lucas

Fred Lucas is the White House correspondent for The Daily Signal and co-host of “The Right Side of History” podcast. Send an email to Fred. Twitter: @FredLucasWH.

Dear Readers:

With the recent conservative victories related to tax cuts, the Supreme Court, and other major issues, it is easy to become complacent.

However, the liberal Left is not backing down. They are rallying supporters to advance their agenda, moving this nation further from the vision of our founding fathers.

If we are to continue to bring this nation back to our founding principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism, we need to come together as a group of likeminded conservatives.

This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.

We are looking for a select few conservatives to become a Heritage Foundation member. With your membership, you’ll qualify for all associated benefits and you’ll help keep our nation great for future generations.

ACTIVATE YOUR MEMBERSHIP TODAY

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is by Yuri Gripas/Reuters/Newscom.

Senators Announce Bill to Protect States’ Legalization of Marijuana

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One likes to think of policymaking as a deliberative process, one where legislators base their debates on scientific information to craft evidence-based bills. Au contraire, mes amis.

For several years, an emerging marijuana industry has poured money into sponsoring ballot initiatives and lobbying state legislators to legalize marijuana. Industry’s money not only legalized pot for medical use in 31 states and for recreational use in 8 of those states, but also silenced the nonprofit voices of prevention, treatment, and public health that lack the wherewithal to compete. The legislative playing field is by no means level.

In January, Attorney General Jeff Sessions rescinded the Obama Administration’s Cole Memo, which gave the industry a pass from federal enforcement so long as it adhered to eight conditions (all of which were violated within weeks without follow-up enforcement).

Infuriated by Sessions’ action, Colorado Sen. Cory Gardener put a hold on all judicial candidates nominated by President Trump until he capitulated in April, promising he would uphold states’ rights to legalize pot.

Last week, Senators Gardener and Elizabeth Warren (MA) introduced the Strengthening the Tenth Amendment Through Entrusting States (STATES) Act. Representatives Jared Polis (CO), David Joyce (OH), and Earl Blumenauer (OR) introduced the companion bill in the House. President Trump announced he would support the bill.

The STATES Act would exempt states that have legalized marijuana from the US Controlled Substances Act. If Congress passes the Act, the marijuana industry will not only be able to expand in states that have made pot legal, it will amass even more money to lobby for full legalization in the 42 states that haven’t.

Americans have no idea how much money is being spent by the marijuana industry to get what it wants: full legalization nationwide at the expense of public health.

Read ABSNews story here.

Yes, You Can Become Addicted to Marijuana. And the Problem is Growing.

Although many Americans are unaware that marijuana can cause addiction, in the public health and medical communities, “it is a well-defined disorder that includes physical withdrawal symptoms, cravings and psychological dependence,” and increasing numbers of people are seeking treatment for it, notes this Pew Charitable Trusts story.

Experts are trying to find out why. Some think the intense levels of THC in marijuana strains (up to 20%) and concentrates (up to 80%) are responsible for the upsurge. Others think it may be because more users are taking the drug multiple times a day.

Nearly 3 million Americans meet the diagnostic criteria for marijuana dependence.

This article chronicles the trajectory of marijuana addiction in one young man, Quintin Pohl, pictured above, now age 17. Quintin began smoking marijuana in middle school and is now free of the drug thanks to treatment at a California residential treatment center and extensive follow-up aftercare.

Read this Pew Charitable Trusts story here.

Vermont Marijuana: What Parents Should Know about Pot and Juuling THC

The latest fad for teens and tweens is “to Juul.” Picture above, Juuls are e-cigarettes popular with young people who often post pictures of themselves on social media inhaling candy-flavored liquids from them. Juuls and other e-cigarettes heat the liquids and produce vapors which can then be inhaled.

The liquids can contain nicotine or cannabis oil. No one can tell the difference, but both can be harmful to health. Some chemicals in e-cigarette liquids are carcinogenic.

Schools are developing policies that ban Juuls on campus and recommend that parents reinforce that message at home with their teenagers. Legal marijuana will soon be available in Vermont but not for anyone under age 21. This article offers six tips to parents to help them talk with their teenagers about marijuana.

Read the Burlington Free Press article here.

Helping to End Addiction Over the Long-term (HEAL)

The directors of the National Institutes of Health, the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke; and the National Institute on Drug Abuse lay out a research plan for ending addiction over the long term.

Read the JAMA article here.

The Marijuana Report is a weekly e-newsletter published by National Families in Action in partnership with SAM (Smart Approaches to Marijuana).

Visit National Families in Action’s website, The Marijuana Report.Org, to learn more about the marijuana story unfolding across the nation.

Subscribe to The Marijuana Report.

Our mission is to protect children from addictive drugs by shining light on the science that underlies their effects.

Addictive drugs harm children, families, and communities.

Legalizing them creates commercial industries that make drugs more available, increase use, and expand harms.

Science shows that addiction begins in childhood.

It is a pediatric disease that is preventable.

We work to prevent the emergence of commercial addictive drug industries that will target children.

We support FDA approved medicines.

We support the assessment, treatment, and/or social and educational services
for users and low-level dealers as alternatives to incarceration.

About SAM (Smart Approaches to Marijuana)

SAM is a nonpartisan alliance of lawmakers, scientists and other concerned citizens who want to move beyond simplistic discussions of “incarceration versus legalization” when discussing marijuana use and instead focus on practical changes in marijuana policy that neither demonizes users nor legalizes the drug. SAM supports a treatment, health-first marijuana policy.  SAM has four main goals:

  • To inform public policy with the science of today’s marijuana.
  • To reduce the unintended consequences of current marijuana policies, such as lifelong stigma due to arrest.
  • To prevent the establishment of “Big Marijuana” – and a 21st-Century tobacco industry that would market marijuana to children.
  • To promote research of marijuana’s medical properties and produce, non-smoked, non-psychoactive pharmacy-attainable medications.

SPLC’s Dangerous Bigotry: Empowered by Facebook, Twitter, Google, & Amazon

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2ndVote readers are familiar with the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). The famed civil rights organization has devolved into little more than a left-wing fundraising machine, naming Christian organizations “hate groups” for doing nothing more than holding to traditional values on sexuality.

In a rational world, SPLC would be out of business for its dangerously false designations, which have been linked to at least one attempted mass shooting. Instead, it has massive corporate support, is regularly given credibility by mainstream media outlets, and — as was uncovered last week by The Daily Caller News Foundation (DCNF) — is consulted by Google, Facebook, Twitter, and Amazon for censorship purposes.

The DCNF reports that of the four organizations, Amazon gives SPLC the greatest free rein:

“We remove organizations that the SPLC deems as ineligible,” an Amazon spokeswoman told TheDCNF.

Amazon grants the SPLC that power “because we don’t want to be biased whatsoever,” said the spokeswoman, who could not say whether Amazon considers the SPLC to be unbiased.

The Smile program allows customers to identify a charity to receive 0.5 percent of the proceeds from their purchases on Amazon. Customers have given more than $8 million to charities through the program since 2013, according to Amazon.

Only one participant in the program, the SPLC, gets to determine which other groups are allowed to join it.

Christian legal groups like the Alliance Defending Freedom — which recently successfully represented a Christian baker at the Supreme Court — are barred from the Amazon Smile program, while openly anti-Semitic groups remain, The DCNF found in May.

One month later, the anti-Semitic groups — but not the Alliance Defending Freedom — are still able to participate in the program.

The other social media giants are not far behind in using SPLC to punish groups with which don’t follow left-wing ideology. Google uses SPLC to police alleged hate speech on YouTube even as it has been accused of demonetizing YouTube videos with conservative content. Facebook and Twitter both consult with SPLC to police alleged hate speech.

Conservatives at the Family Research Council, Alliance Defending Freedom, and the Ruth Institute haven’t bowed to SPLC’s bullying, and the DCNF’s new report gives more credibility to conservative concerns. The refusal to back down has brought adherents from the mainstream press. The Atlantic published a defense of one of SPLC’s Muslim targets while former Politico reporter Ben Schreckinger and former Bloomberg columnist Megan McArdle criticized SPLC’s overall methodology.

Now it’s your turn. We urge you to use your second vote to let SPLC’s corporate backers know that you won’t stand for the SPLC’s dangerous bigotry against conservatives:

Abbott Laboratories
Apple
Bank of America
Charles Schwab
Deutsche Bank
Disney
Freddie Mac
JPMorgan Chase
Kraft Heinz
Liberty Mutual
Lyft
MGM
Newman’s Own
Pfizer
Progressive Insurance
Shell
Verizon

Learn more about the corporate support for SPLC at our resource page here.

Help us continue providing resources like this and educating conservative shoppers by becoming a 2ndVote Member today!

Trump Challenges NFL Players to Put Up or Shut Up

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President Donald Trump gave an interesting answer to a reporter about the National Football League’s national anthem problem.

“I’m going to ask all of those people to recommend to me—because that’s what they’re protesting—people that they think were unfairly treated by the justice system,” Trump said at the White House before departing for the G-7 summit, according to the New York Post.

“I’m going to take a look at those applications, and if I find—and my committee finds—that they’ve been unfairly treated, then we’ll pardon them,” the president said. “Or at least let them out.”

Trump already has posthumously pardoned boxing legend Jack Johnson and said he’d consider Muhammad Ali as well, whether that’s necessary or not.

He’s clearly been on a pardon spree.

The response to Trump’s proposal to the players will be quite telling.

One of the problems with the NFL’s kneeling movement is that it has a specific target—the national anthem and the American flag—yet nebulous demands.

Despite players’ claims otherwise, many fans say they believe the players are protesting America, the military, and law enforcement in general.

Trump’s proposal puts players on the spot. If they have specific concerns that they want addressed, certain injustices that are intolerable, the president says he will work with them to rectify those issues.

It has been said that baseball is America’s pastime, but football is America’s passion.

Major League Baseball doesn’t quite sit at the cultural height it once did in this country. The game has receded during the seemingly inevitable rise of the National Football League in particular.

But now the NFL has a huge problem on its hands.

The national anthem controversy has damaged the league among its most passionate fans. And it clearly has played a key role in the swift decline in viewers, especially in the past year when the protests and media coverage of them exploded.

This statistic, noted by New York Daily News, should be particularly concerning:

A survey conducted by The Wall Street Journal and NBC News revealed that adults who say they follow the league closely have dropped 9 percent since 2014. And strikingly, men aged 18 to 49—the league’s core demographic—who say they follow the NFL closely are down from 75 to 51 percent over the same period.

This is not a league that can thrive without a passionate fan base.

The NFL notably changed its policy for the upcoming season, electing to fine teams—though not individuals—for kneeling in protest during the anthem. Players who wish to protest now will be allowed to stay in the locker room while the song is played.

This is no guarantee that angry fans will suddenly be pleased again. And as we saw with the aborted White House visit by the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles, the protests and contention haven’t abated.

While many of these fans may never come back to the NFL, Trump has offered at least one resolution to the league’s problem.

Protesting players who are sincere about their goals should take the president’s challenge seriously.

If, instead, the movement is simply focused on protesting America as a racist country or is just resistance to Trump from the sports world, then the players and league will become further isolated from their unhappy fans, who mostly dislike the protests.

And if the league wants to save itself from constant protest, declining fan interest, and permanent politicization, then the players would be wise to at least consider Trump’s proposal and look to work with the president when he offers an olive branch.

COMMENTARY BY

Portrait of Jarrett Stepman

Jarrett Stepman

Jarrett Stepman is an editor and commentary writer for The Daily Signal and co-host of “The Right Side of History” podcast. Send an email to Jarrett. Twitter: .

Dear Readers:

With the recent conservative victories related to tax cuts, the Supreme Court, and other major issues, it is easy to become complacent.

However, the liberal Left is not backing down. They are rallying supporters to advance their agenda, moving this nation further from the vision of our founding fathers.

If we are to continue to bring this nation back to our founding principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism, we need to come together as a group of likeminded conservatives.

This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.

We are looking for a select few conservatives to become a Heritage Foundation member. With your membership, you’ll qualify for all associated benefits and you’ll help keep our nation great for future generations.

ACTIVATE YOUR MEMBERSHIP TODAY

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is by Curtis Compton/TNS/Newscom.

Zuckerberg Admits Mishandling Controversy in Labeling Conservative Pundits as ‘Dangerous’

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Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg admitted Monday that his company “mishandled” the controversy of labeling Diamond and Silk—two popular conservative personalities—“dangerous” and “unsafe to the community” in early April.

Facebook restricted the two conservative social media personalities on its platform on April 5 after being given the labels. The two are highly popular on Facebook for making pro-President Donald Trump videos and shattering racial and gender stereotypes.

dcnf-logo

“We mishandled communication with Diamond and Silk for months,” Zuckerberg said in a response to Congress that was released on Monday, two months after his highly publicized congressional testimony. “Their frustration was understandable, and we apologized to them. The message they received on April 5, 2018, that characterized their page as ‘dangerous’ was incorrect and not reflective of the way we seek to communicate with our community and the people who run Pages on our platform.”

“As part of our commitment to continually improve our products and to minimize risks where human judgment is involved, we are making a number of changes,” Zuckerberg added.

The original message Facebook sent to Diamond and Silk on April 5 read: “The Policy team has came to the conclusion that your content and your brand has been determined unsafe to the community. This decision is final and it is not appeal-able in anyway.”

One of the changes Facebook plans to implement is using conservative leaders, including a former Republican senator from Arizona, Jon Kyl, to help audit Facebook for political bias.

“We have engaged an outside adviser, former Sen. Jon Kyl, to advise the company on potential bias against conservative voices,” Zuckerberg said. “We believe this external feedback will help us improve over time and ensure we can most effectively serve our diverse community.”

COLUMN BY

Kyle Perisic

Kyle Perisic is a member of the Young Leaders Program at The Heritage Foundation.

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is of Viral video personalities Lynnette “Diamond” Hardaway (L) and Rochelle “Silk” Richardson speaking  at the annual National Rifle Association (NRA) convention in Dallas, Texas, U.S., May 4, 2018. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson (Newscom TagID: rtrlnine895711.jpg) [Photo via Newscom]. Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities for this original content, email licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

The Meaning of the Stars and Stripes

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“What are you doing to celebrate Flag Day?”

It’s a question you probably won’t hear in the checkout line at the grocery store or around the dinner table with friends this week.

That’s because, unlike other hallmark holidays of summertime—Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day—Flag Day isn’t always celebrated with grand gestures, gatherings, or parades. More often it passes by with perfunctory commemorations at best. At worst, it is all but forgotten.

Yet it wasn’t meant to be that way. When Congress approved and President Harry Truman signed the national observance of Flag Day into law on June 14, 1949, it was for an important reason: “It is our custom to observe June 14 each year with ceremonies designed not only to commemorate the birth of our flag,” Truman said, “but also to rededicate ourselves to the ideals for which it stands. This beloved emblem, which flies above all our people of whatever creed or race, signalizes our respect for human rights and the protection such rights are afforded under our form of government.”

Truman’s words cut right to the heart of this holiday. Our flag is far more than fabric stitched together in stars and stripes. She is a tangible symbol of our national identity, reminding us of who we are, and how far we’ve come.

I wrote a salute to “Old Glory,” which hangs on the wall in my office in Washington, D.C. In part, it reads:

Today, as we pledge our loyalty to this flag,
Think about what she has stood for, think about where she has been.

From the home of Betsy Ross, to the streets of Concord, to the fields of Gettysburg.
From the rocks of Iwo Jima, to the Tundra of Korea, to the jungles of Vietnam,
And the deserts of the Middle East.

She has stood in your front yards, and she has stood on the moon.
She has been sadly placed over coffins, and proudly raised at the Olympics.

This is our flag—a symbol revered and cheered for. Battled and bled for. Both an embodiment of the collective struggles and triumphs of a nation over centuries and a symbol of the individual sacrifice of each man or woman who has fought and died beneath her stripes and stars.

In my district, there was an installation of 1,000 flags placed across 10 acres at Arlington Memorial Gardens in Springfield Township, Ohio, for Memorial Day this year. It was called the “Field of Memories.”

Visible from the highway, each flag was dedicated to a former or active military member, but the 3 feet by 5 feet pieces of fabric also represent a lifetime of memories. Birthdays missed. Joyful reunions after long deployments. Inside jokes shared over the phone across continents. Moving trucks headed to the next base, in the next state. The empty chair at the table. The memories of a single life, and a nation’s life, all stitched into one red, white, and blue emblem.

We don’t just honor our flag—it is also itself a symbol of the utmost honor. On the Thursday evening before Memorial Day, every available soldier in the U.S. Army’s Old Guard walks the rows of more than 228,000 headstones in Arlington National Cemetery, placing an American flag one foot in front of each grave marker with perfect precision. Throughout the weekend, the Old Guard will stay in the cemetery, making sure a flag remains in front of each grave.

This national tradition is called “Flags In” and has been conducted every year since 1948. It is more than a bright display—it is 228,000 distinct reminders of why these men and women gave their lives in the struggle for a more perfect union, and a more free world.

Each flag is a small but powerful statement that this field of memories does not lie forgotten. The freedom that these Americans fought for, and that our flag stands for, lives on.

This week, on Flag Day, Democrats and Republicans will gather on one field to play ball in the annual Congressional Baseball Game in Washington, D.C. This is an event where for one night, both sides come together for charity, putting political differences aside and playing under one flag. It is a fitting moment to “rededicate ourselves to the ideals for which it stands,” as Truman said so many years ago.

I hope that’s what you think of when you see our flag flying this week, and every week. I hope you join me in taking a moment to pause and honor her—to ponder the magnitude of what she represents. The tribute that I wrote to our flag finishes likes this:

She flies through the air. She sails across the sea. She marches over the land.

She has stood for freedom in places around the world,
Until freedom could stand,
On its own two feet.

Evildoers have feared her,
Those in need have prayed for her arrival.
She has always stood for exceptionalism,
And for that we do not apologize.

Whether you honor her by raising her in your own front yard or visiting a veterans’ cemetery, by reciting the Pledge of Allegiance or singing “The Star-Spangled Banner,” this week, please join me in honoring our grand United States flag, and all she represents.

COMMENTARY BY

Portrait of Brad Wenstrup

Brad Wenstrup

Brad Wenstrup is the U.S. representative for Ohio’s second congressional district. Twitter: .

RELATED ARTICLE: The Value in Learning the Army’s History

Dear Readers:

With the recent conservative victories related to tax cuts, the Supreme Court, and other major issues, it is easy to become complacent.

However, the liberal Left is not backing down. They are rallying supporters to advance their agenda, moving this nation further from the vision of our founding fathers.

If we are to continue to bring this nation back to our founding principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism, we need to come together as a group of likeminded conservatives.

This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.

We are looking for a select few conservatives to become a Heritage Foundation member. With your membership, you’ll qualify for all associated benefits and you’ll help keep our nation great for future generations.

ACTIVATE YOUR MEMBERSHIP TODAY

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image of the American flag is by franckreporter/Getty Images.

Vitriol Goes from Zero to DeNiro…

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For the handful of Americans sitting at home watching the Tony Awards, it must have been a confusing scene. Actor Robert DeNiro walked out on stage, pumped his fists in the air, and started talking. The audience went wild with applause — but since CBS producers had scrambled to bleep out the Godfather star’s profanity, no one was quite sure what all the frenzy was about. Unfortunately for the liberals who are trying to knock off President Trump in two years, they do now. “I’m going to say one thing,” DeNiro started. “F— Trump. It’s no longer down with Trump. It’s f— Trump.” After a gasp, the whole room stood and cheered. Though, 24 hours later, no one is quite sure why. Though plenty of liberal activists probably agree with DeNiro, they also know the kind of damage this kind of anti-Trump rage can do.

As commentators on the Right and Left pointed out, the only one who stands to gain from it is the man he’s trying to shame!

“These idiots are going to make sure Trump is president forever,” tweeted one liberal pundit. People like Laura Ingraham can’t believe the Left continues to be so out of touch with America. “Another ‘celebutainment’ gift to the GOP & @realDonaldTrump.” It might as well be, Becket Adams agreed in the Washington Examiner, “an early in-kind donation to the committee to reelect Trump.” Over at the Atlantic, Sophie Gilbert called it “toothless,” saying, “It’s easy to be angry. It’s easy to take a platform that offers easy (if bleeped-out) access to millions of people and use profanity to capture a mood, to express an emotion. But the outrage that will doubtless ensue is a distraction from what really matters, and what’s much harder to realize: the work of trying to change a situation, not just rage against it.”

Once again, some on the Left are coming unhinged. There’s no longer even a fig leaf of impartiality with the entertainment industry and liberal extremists. This administration, through their reversal of President Obama’s anti-family, anti-faith policies, is clearly revealing what the 2016 election did: the fault lines in America. As we’ve seen with Meryl Streep, Avenger director Joss Whedon (who tweeted a death wish for the president), the curtain is now clearly pulled back on America’s so-called cultural elite (and I have to say “so-called,” because their limited four-letter word vocabulary shows how they truly lack culture).

There was a time when civil society didn’t allow for such language in public. Now, some want to feign disgust at the president while, as former press secretary Sean Spicer pointed out, “they engage in the same behavior they find reprehensible – except,” he points out, “they do it in public, on public airways where every American can see and see just how deplorable they are.” The hypocrisy is astounding. So is the elitists’ belief that this condescension is working. The more they sneer and belittle Trump’s base, the more committed voters will be.

When it comes to Hollywood, regular folks — the New York Post’s Salena Zito warns — have had enough.

Tony Perkins’ Washington Update is written with the aid of FRC senior writers.

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RELATED  VIDEO: Dan Bongino on Robert De Niro’s Tony speech: “Captain String Bean. Look at this guy. Limpy with his arms here. I think cause he played Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver and LaMotta in Raging Bull, I swear to you this guy thinks he’s a real life tough guy.”

An Interview With Tucker Carlson on What Makes Trump a ‘Political Genius’

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Tucker Carlson, host of the popular Fox News show “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” spoke to Daily Signal Editor-in-Chief Rob Bluey at The Heritage Foundation’s 41st annual Resource Bank meeting in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Carlson received the prestigious Salvatori Prize, recognizing his work to uphold and advance the principles of America’s founding. The full video, plus an edited transcript of the interview, is below.

Rob Bluey: It is a true honor to celebrate the work that you’ve done, and I want to begin with the advice that you left this audience on how conservatives can take back the culture. You had two pieces of advice. Tell us about them.

Tucker Carlson: Well, have more children. I grew up in a world where it was considered embarrassing to have more than two children. I don’t think that’s the case now among middle-class, upper middle-class people, but it was.

First of all, it’s the most rewarding, greatest, most fun thing you can do. But it’s also the most profound thing. If you don’t like the direction of the country, have children, raise them the way that you want, consistent with your beliefs. It seems like all the answers are basic, nature-based answers, in my opinion. To everything. That’s the most basic of all, have more kids. Raise decent children.

And the second was just say what you think is true. I don’t actually think you get a ton out of confronting people and getting in people’s faces. I don’t think you’re going to convince anybody that way. But I think there’s inherent value in speaking principle out loud without shame or fear. And again, without the expectation that you’re going to win people over right away, because most times you’re not going to.

Aggression really doesn’t help much. I’ve definitely concluded that after years of being aggressive. But I think telling the truth is an inherently valuable act.

Bluey: You’ve had tremendous success with your show. It’s highly rated and millions of people are tuning in. How does that last point inform the work that you do on a day-to-day basis?

Carlson: The show’s successful because it’s on Fox News, which is successful. I’ve worked at a lot of different TV networks, and the network is what matters most.

I don’t imagine that my show is successful because I’m so great. I do think much more about what I say because there’s a bigger audience and because we’re in the middle of this revolutionary moment, and I’m counterrevolutionary.

I don’t say a lot of things without thinking them through, which is good. I mean, occasionally I do and get in trouble for it. But I really try to think through what I really believe and what I really think is true.

Bluey: But I’d say the topics you cover and the way that you conduct your questioning is different and unique from other TV hosts.

Carlson: Well, I don’t have a lot to add. I would just say two things. I think President Trump is interesting, and I agree broadly with his agenda. I certainly agree with immigration, that’s for sure. But I don’t think that every story is about Donald Trump, and most other people at the other networks think every story is about Trump.

I don’t have anything to add to that; I don’t think it’s that interesting. I don’t want to talk about Trump five hours a week, I just don’t. And not because I have some political agenda and it’s bad to talk about; I’m just not that interested, actually. There’s a lot of interesting stuff going on. I try to talk about that.

The second thing is, I really try to have an honest conversation. By the way, my mind occasionally changes. There are a bunch of topics, several topics, where I’ve totally changed my views because someone else had a better point than I did. And I love that.

Tucker Carlson at The Heritage Foundation’s Resource Bank. (Photo: Ivan Apfel Photography for The Heritage Foundation)

Bluey: You have a book coming out this fall called “Ship of Fools.” I want to hear about it because it relates a bit to Trump, right? I mean, you’re going after the elites, the ruling class.

Carlson: The book, like the show, is based on the most obvious questions. I’m not a super-clever person, I try to keep it very simple. Why would America elect Donald Trump president?

And the explanation in Washington is, well, they didn’t really. Putin did. Or voters were just so dumb, they didn’t know the difference. Or America’s racist, so they elected a racist. Those are contemptible nonexplanations. Those are stupid.

The real answer, obviously, is that people were so dissatisfied with the leadership in place as of the first Tuesday in November of 2016, that they decided to punish them by electing Trump.

This was a referendum on the ruling class; and by the way, we have a ruling class, and I’ve lived in it most of my life, so I know it’s real. It’s not a conspiracy, but we have a class system, increasingly, in this country.

The people in charge have done a really bad job on the big things, on foreign policy and the economy; and they’ve gotten us into a number of counterproductive wars. That was a bipartisan effort. It was started by Bush, but it was applauded by Clinton. So it wasn’t one party, it was both parties.

They made a bunch of assumptions about the economy that turned out to be wrong, and they helped destroy the American middle class, and then they don’t care. So they’re terrible. They’re deeply unwise and selfish and stupid.

Trump is the result of decades of unwise, selfish, and stupid leadership. It’s so obvious. I’m not a genius, I’m hardly a genius. It’s just so clear, and no one says that. I’m not sure why.

Carlson: He’s certainly made the divisions clear, which was always his role. Trump is whatever the opposite of a technocrat is; it’s Donald Trump. He’s not a detail man, to put it mildly.

He hasn’t swept into town with the “Mandate for Leadership” that Heritage produced in 1980 to guide the Reagan transformation of Washington. Here is how you handle every department of government. There’s nothing like that. And that really wasn’t the point. One hopes that there will subsequently be someone like that, but that’s not Trump’s role.

Trump’s role was to realign, or to make what had already happened obvious to everyone—which is that Republican Party really didn’t represent its voters very well, and the Democratic Party didn’t represent its voters very well either.

Actually, it’s not a contest between left and right so much as it’s a contest or a struggle between people who’ve benefited from the way things were going—me and all my neighbors—and everyone else who has gone backward, particularly economically.

If I could just say, the one sort of sin that conservatives like me committed was not paying attention to the massive transfer of wealth upward, and the stagnation in the middle. We thought that income inequality was something that you weren’t supposed to talk about, or you only cared about if you were Bernie Sanders and against capitalism. I’m totally for capitalism, but that’s bad.

You don’t want to live in a country where a small group of people control everything because you will have a revolution, and the system will be destroyed. Conservatives missed that and liberals were benefiting from it, so they didn’t say anything. That’s what the book’s about.

Bluey: You brought up Bernie Sanders and the left, and we’re having a conversation right now about whether we’re going to have a huge wave of progressives come into Congress next year. What is the left’s end game in view?

Carlson: The end game is always the same, which is to take back power. And Trump is offensive to them probably for a bunch of reasons, but the core offense is taking power away from them, disempowering the technocratic class.

Trump is the candidate for people who didn’t go to Choate and Princeton and Harvard Business School, and work at McKinsey. Those are his voters. The people who did buy into the system—with the expectation they would be in charge—are deeply offended by that, deeply offended by the power transfer.

So the point always is to take back control. But below that, a bunch of different things are going on. And politically, I think it’s pretty obvious now there’s no actual agenda. It’s not like they’re mad about trade.

They don’t like Trump, and Trump’s weird kind of unintentional political genius is to drive his opponents crazy. So all of a sudden you have liberals, some of whom are kind of reasonable, smart people, defending MS-13 and the dignity of porn stars. They basically are pivoting against Trump in such a way where whatever he’s for, they’re against and vice versa. Whatever he’s against, they’re for.

But then do they really want to be on the side of no borders, or calling ICE the stormtroopers, or defending Salvadoran gang members? Like, what?

He’s driven them crazy, and how does that work itself out? I don’t really know, it’s amazing to watch it, though, I’ll tell you that.

Fox News host Tucker Carlson received the prestigious Salvatori Prize, recognizing his work to uphold and advance the principles of America’s founding. The award was presented by The Heritage Foundation’s David Azerrad, director of the B. Kenneth Simon Center for Principles and Politics and AWC Family Foundation fellow. (Photo: Ivan Apfel Photography for The Heritage Foundation)

Bluey: It sure is amazing to watch. Tucker, finally, I want to ask you: You started your career at The Heritage Foundation as a writer for Policy Review. Here you are today receiving the Salvatori Prize. What does it mean to you to win this high honor?

Carlson: I’ve always been grateful to Heritage for doing the most important thing you can do for a young person, particularly a young man, and that’s give him a job—making $14,000 a year! But no one else was hiring me, and Heritage did.

Adam Meyerson, who ran Policy Review, hired me and really kind of systematically taught me journalism. He was conservative, it was a conservative publication. But I actually didn’t write about politics, I wrote about the police and it was kind of nonpolitical. It was more a study in how to gather information, organize it coherently in an expository essay, just the basics. They’re not very complicated, but someone needed to teach me, and he did.

The Heritage Foundation made that possible and I’ve always been grateful for that. I don’t know why they hired me. I wouldn’t have hired me. I was a total loser. But they did, and so I’ve never stopped being thankful for that, ever.

Bluey: We’re so glad it worked out.

Carlson: Thank you. I am too.

Bluey: Make sure you watch his show, “Tucker Carlson Tonight.” Pre-order the book, “Ship of Fools.” Tucker, great to be with you.

Carlson: Great to see you, Rob.

INTERVIEW BY

Portrait of Rob Bluey

Rob Bluey

Rob Bluey is editor-in-chief of The Daily Signal, the multimedia news organization of The Heritage Foundation. Send an email to Rob. Twitter: @RobertBluey.

Dear Readers:

With the recent conservative victories related to tax cuts, the Supreme Court, and other major issues, it is easy to become complacent.

However, the liberal Left is not backing down. They are rallying supporters to advance their agenda, moving this nation further from the vision of our founding fathers.

If we are to continue to bring this nation back to our founding principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism, we need to come together as a group of likeminded conservatives.

This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.

We are looking for a select few conservatives to become a Heritage Foundation member. With your membership, you’ll qualify for all associated benefits and you’ll help keep our nation great for future generations.

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G7 — World Throws Tantrum As President Trump Puts America First

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Leading up to the G7 summit, the entirety of the world Left, from Eurocrats to Media to American Democrats, are angry and supposedly fearful over President Trump starting a new trade war and tearing down the post World War II world order. They claim he is destabilizing the western world and much of the globe.

But that stability was for too long built on America shouldering everyone else’s load, from military protection for Europeans who could afford to do more for their own defense to unfavorable trade deals with those same Europeans and non-allied competitors such as China. In the decade or two after WWII decimated the world, that probably made sense. Maybe even through the fall of the Soviet Union in 1988, although that is less clear. But by 2018?

A shakeup in that part of the Post-War order is long overdue, and many common-sense Americans know this. And it may ultimately be good for the Europeans, depending on their long-term response.

The global pre-G7 hand-wringing and anger of the elitist Left is more akin to a child who has been coddled and spoiled and is suddenly being held to account for his actions. That child is naturally going to be angry and throw a tantrum.

This is most clear with our cushioned western European allies. Our eastern European allies are less elitist, less cushioned and have a more pro-American take.

Donald Tusk, President of the European Council and an elitist bureaucrat among elitist bureaucrats, arrogantly dismissed President Trump as mere “seasonal turbulence.” It’s really pitch perfect for exactly what is wrong in Europe, including that this man, a “president,” is utterly unaccountable and unreachable by any European voters.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said after Trump criticized European leaders for not spending what they promised to spend on military as part of NATO — part of America shouldering an undue share of their burden: “the times when we could fully rely on others are to some extent over.”

Germany has been one of the biggest leeches on the American military, and thus American taxpayer, even though they were at the front line of the Iron Curtain. If Merkel is saying “fully rely” on America to carry too much of the German defense burden, then hopefully she is right. It doesn’t mean we aren’t allies

But Merkel, arguably the worst Post-War German Chancellor (counting only West Germans when the nation was divided) has continued on her anti-Trump, and anti-America-first rhetoric leading up to the G7.

Just Wednesday, she said, “That was my takeaway from the NATO summit, and in the meantime I continue to feel confirmed by my statement…All of that confirms the assessment that the world is being reorganized.”

Merkel, along with French, Belgium, Norway, Sweden and other western European leaders combine the NATO comments with Trump’s decision to exit from the Paris global climate treaty — which has since been revealed to be the empty vessel it was — and his exit from the Iran nuclear “accord” last month with his push for more fair trade for Americans, as a threat.

It’s only a threat to the coddled. Ultimately, forcing the Europeans to stand more firmly on their own two legs, and compete for fairly, will be good for them unless they just lay on the floor scream in tantrum mode. They probably will not. After an adjustment period, they will begin altering policies to reflect the new reality and potentially become more lean and competitive and be able to carry more of their own defense load.

Because the reality is that the American economy is rocking from top to bottom, and a lot of it is due directly to the election of Trump and his deregulation and tax policies.

Here is a telling confession from a top American economist: “A lot of us economists have had our long-term forecasts ruined by the election of Donald Trump,” Moody Managing Director and Chief Economist John Lonski told Fox Business Network’s Stuart Varney. “The idea was that growth would be stuck at 2 percent indefinitely, stagnation had set in for the long run and now we’re not so sure that is necessarily going to be the cast.”

GDP growth is now estimated to be 3.5 percent this year. Trump has changed the domestic paradigm as he is working on the international paradigm.

Trump upsetting the table cart domestically has meant net good things for all Americans who don’t want to just live on the dole. It can mean the same for our European allies, too. But they’ll have to adjust.

We won’t see that sentiment at the G7 summit. But we might down the road.

RELATED ARTICLES: 

Larry Kudlow: “Trump Is Presiding Over Extraordinary Growth. G-7 Leaders Should Notice.”

Peter Navarro: The Era of American Complacency on Trade Is Over

Donald Trump Calls for Total Tariff Removals at G7 Summit.

Trump Takes On World Leaders For The Betterment Of American Businesses

President Trump Stomps On “Fake News” CNN at Quebec G7 Presser (VIDEO)

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in The Revolutionary Act.

Majority of Democrats find Pornography ‘Morally Acceptable’

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DETROIT (ChurchMilitant.com) – Recent Gallup polls are showing the moral divide between political parties is widening.

“For the first time on record, a majority of Democrats (53 percent) say pornography is morally acceptable,” Gallup writes. Published Tuesday, their annual poll on Morals and Values found 43 percent of Americans overall find porn “morally acceptable.” This is a jump of seven percent over 2017 and the highest level of acceptance since 2011 — the first year the question was asked.

Gallup also found that Republicans are increasingly accepting of pornography, although at roughly half the rate of Democrats. Twenty-seven percent of Republicans now think pornography is morally acceptable, a two percent increase over 2017. In that same time span, acceptance by Democrats jumped 11 percent. The poll also tracked Independent voters, whose acceptance rates climbed from 40 to 45 percent.

“From 2011 onward, notable shifts in opinion are apparent for actions such as doctor-assisted suicide, gay/lesbian relations, sex between unmarried people and having a baby out of wedlock,” Gallup reports, noting views on pornography have changed more than any of the other in the poll.

Gallup also found that America is the most liberal it has ever been. The results show record high acceptance for birth control, divorce, pre-marital sex, gay relations, doctor-assisted suicide and polygamy, while a record number of people find testing on animals and the death penalty morally wrong.

“Across a number of issues related to sexuality and sex, Americans have … been adopting a more permissive viewpoint, including such behaviors as sex between unmarried people and gay/lesbian relations.” Gallup notes. “Even behaviors that most Americans still consider beyond the pale, such as polygamy, have seen a notable increase in acceptability. In this context, it is hardly surprising that a similar change would be observed with respect to perceptions of pornography.”

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Gallup Morals and Values Survey

Gallup did not pinpoint a reason for Americans accepting pornography as normal, although they suppose the public scandal involving Stormy Daniels and Trump may have influenced public opinion.

“The cause of the single year shift on this item, though, is less clear,” according to Gallup.

In line with the increasing acceptance of sexual permissiveness is the increasing number of transgender or openly gay political candidates elected since Trump took office. The Victory Fund, “the only national organization dedicated to electing openly LGBTQ people,” has listed over 120 openly LGBTQ candidates.

Their website notes that they have helped to get thousands of pro-LGBT politicians elected, saying, “These LGBTQ voices have made significant contributions to advancing equality … from passing non-discrimination laws to defeating amendments to ban marriage equality.”

Gallup also found that 83 percent of Democrats favor same-sex “marriage” — nearly twice the rate of Republicans. Only 44 percent of Republicans favor it, a three percent drop from 2017.

Seventy-one percent of independent voters support same-sex “marriage.”

“The trend toward increased public support for same-sex marriage could very well continue, given that there is still room for increased support among Democrats and independents,” Gallup predicts. “Reaching a national consensus on the issue would depend more on greater acceptance among Republicans, who remain mostly opposed to legally recognized same-sex marriages.”

Gallup also found 71 percent of Americans are dissatisfied with the moral and ethical climate and 77 percent feel it is getting worse.

Overall, 49 percent of Americans rate the country’s values are poor.

RELATED ARTICLES: 

Open Pedophile Running for Office in Virginia by Anita Carey 

Podcast: Trump’s Record on Pro-Life Issues

Government Is the Greatest Purveyor of Inequality

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Thomas J. Eckert The government itself is inequality.

by Thomas J. Eckert

With June being celebrated as Gay Pride month, every year around this time we seem to experience an increase in conversations and media attention regarding the fight against inequality. Across the country, massive celebrations are held, often meant to highlight the differences human beings can have with one another while maintaining a peaceful coexistence, as equals. And while I applaud this mindset of peace and tolerance towards others, there is a growing miscalculation in this fight against inequality.

The Largest Purveyor of Inequality

More and more people have begun to buy into the notion that the current societal problems ailing us are a direct consequence of inequality. Now, whether you believe this to be the case, these problems, we’re told, “require” the all-too-eager hand of government to resolve. But, as we’ll see, if fighting inequality is your goal, applying a bit of an objective lens to your campaign will uncover that government, as it turns out, is the largest purveyor of inequality that has ever existed; and fighting inequality means fighting government.

Let’s start by highlighting the fact that government itself is inequality, in that it falsely grants some individuals the authority to rule over others, essentially creating two classes of individuals; rulers and the ruled. For obvious reasons, they have tried to blur these lines over time by creating alternative forms of governance like democracy, whereby they repeat nonsensical idioms like “we’re all the government” until the ruled class begins to believe it.

To prove this isn’t true, you could simply walk up to your local police officer and proceed to order them around by telling them you’re the government or try walking into your state representative’s office and tell them you’d like to speak on the floor today using the same line. You’ll either quickly learn which class you belong to, or chances are, end up in a jail cell if you persist long enough.

Throughout history, the most successful groups who’ve pushed for inequality (such as the Ku Klux Klan, slaveholders, etc.) all used government institutions to further this unequal divide, oftentimes under the guise of pushing for equality—think Jim Crow’s “separate but equal.” It’s important to recognize this division if you wish to quash inequality. Because too often, solutions put forth to combat this inherent flaw in government are met with opposition from those ignorant of the facts; usually making outrageous claims to keep government programs in place because private solutions could possibly yield inequality.

Private Solutions to Government Inequality

A good example is when we’re told we can’t privatize the police because it will result in two tiers of policing, with rich neighborhoods receiving exceptional service from their ability to pay, and poor neighborhoods getting none at all. Except that two-tiered policing already exists and is arguably much worse due to government’s monopoly control of it.

We continuously see those with money and governmental connections getting away with crimes, often involving a multitude of victims unable to shoulder the cost to fight back. Meanwhile, those in low-income neighborhoods are routinely profiled and preyed upon by police for victimless crimes, which regularly carry draconian sentences due to mandatory minimums and the War on Drugs; all because they can’t afford to endure the arduous court battles. And when it is pointed out that police do make a mistake, it’s nearly impossible to ensure they are held accountable—unless paid leave is to be considered punishment enough for wrongful deaths.

This one-size-fits-all, governmental approach to policing leaves those worst off among us the least represented. And, thanks to government regulation, it’s difficult for private alternatives to easily enter the market. Even so, we’re still seeing people opt out of using police, instead choosing private security companies wherever possible. So much, in fact, that private security officers now outnumber police in many countries around the world. And that’s not the only place we see government fostering inequality.

The same arguments used to defend the monopoly on police are also used—even more aggressively—against those who wish to end public schools. Rich neighborhoods, we’re told, would hire all the good teachers, have the best equipment, etc., while poor neighborhoods would be left with sub-par teaching staff and a shortage of necessities. Resulting in poor students being uncompetitive after graduation and ultimately ending up in an inter-generational cycle of poverty. Which is absolutely terrible, until you realize that’s already the exact system we have today.

With public schools, students in low-income neighborhoods are forced to attend the poorly-run schools within their city’s borders, while state-mandated accreditation and licensing restrictions keep cheaper, alternative schools from coming in and alleviating part of this problem. It’s so bad in fact, that the inter-generational poverty gap exists in large part thanks to government. Whereby kids in inner-city, public schools are more likely to go to prison than college due to gangs and other criminal activities that have crept into these mismanaged government schools; effectively turning them into a “lack of” concentration camp.

Neither of those two examples comes close to the worst one on our list, though. Healthcare in the United States is a blatant example of the government granting itself a monopoly over an entire industry in the all-too-logical hopes of avoiding the problems associated with a monopoly.

With Obamacare adding more than 20,000 pages of regulation to our healthcare system alone, they have effectively created the same, unequal system we’ve shown already exists in police and education. Prices have sky-rocketed for insurance and simple medicines like Epi-pens, while the “free” market is blamed, rather than the labyrinth of red-tape mandated from the FDA. Which, as of 2014, resulted in the cost of bringing new drugs to market to hit more than $2 billion dollars. This leaves the poorest among us unable to get the medical care they need, while simultaneously making it harder for free-market oriented hospitals to enter the market and alleviate this crisis. When we couple all that with the infuriating notion that those who passed the ACA made sure they could opt-out if they’d like, and the Orwellian tactic of naming it “The Affordable Care Act,” it becomes almost indefensible to say that government is not a nefarious source of inequality today.

What we need is a wake-up call to these egregious scenarios we find ourselves in when we defend the government as it tramples on the rights of individuals. We need to highlight the blatant hypocrisy of asking them to fix this manufactured inequality in our society. But most of all, if we ever hope to improve the well-being of those most vulnerable and poorest among us, we need to realize that inequality isn’t the cause of our problems, but rather a clever symptom distracting from of a much larger disorder: The State.

Reprinted from Being Libertarian.

AUTHOR

Thomas J. Eckert

Thomas J. Eckert

Thomas J. Eckert is a Copy Editor for Being Libertarian. With a passion for politics, he studies economics and history and writes in his spare time on political and economic current events. He is a self-described voluntarist.

VIDEO: Scott Israel May as Well Have Bought the Gun for Parkland Killer — He Enabled Him

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“Sheriff Scott Israel worked hand in hand with Robert Runcie to hide criminal actions, misdemeanors, felonious behavior of students like this murderer. They enabled him to avoid having a record established that would have prevented him from legally purchasing a firearm. In my opinion, Sheriff Scott Israel may as well have walked into the gun store and bought it for him.” —Dana Loesch

The Real Story of Parkland: Failed Leadership and Failed Cover-Ups

“The real story of how this murderer could pull off his plan undeterred is and has always been about those who were tasked with recognizing the threat that he posed before that fateful day.” —Dana Loesch