US Army Retired

US Army Retired

Thursday, October 4, 2018

News and Interesting Stuff for October 4, 2018

Why the Brett Kavanaugh Smear
It took all the way to the end of this opinion piece to get down to the bottom line.
By smearing the ultimate Boy Scout, the Democrats signal that they are determined to go lower than anyone has ever gone in American history. They intend to deter normal people from serving in Republican administrations, or accepting appointments from Republican presidents, or, ultimately, from identifying themselves with the Republican party. Given that strategy, the fact that they are smearing a man of obviously sterling character on absurdly flimsy grounds is not a bug, it is a feature. The fact that the Democrats’ smears are so patently false is ultimately their main point.
The Democrats are telling us: Republicans, beware–if this can happen to Brett Kavanaugh, it can happen to anyone. You’d better go quietly and cede power to us.

Dems Risk Losing Suburban Women with Kavanaugh Attacks
I think the Dims have overplayed their hands. It’s not that women don’t grieve for victims of sexual assault but that they also find unfounded attacks on families abhorrent.
A bungled political assassination attempt on Brett Kavanaugh will cost the Democrats more than a seat on the Supreme Court: The party might also have killed its edge with suburban women just weeks before the pivotal midterm elections. The near-unanimous reaction to this travesty among my fellow suburban moms is unlike anything I’ve seen in the Trump era.
Until now, Democrats have been confident that women living in the suburbs would propel the much-vaunted “blue wave” this fall because President Trump remains unpopular with this traditionally Republican constituency. Polling conducted over the summer indicated suburban women had a strong preference for Democratic candidates over their Republican opponents. Several vulnerable Republican-held congressional districts are located in suburban area
Fine to show the world when it goes her way.
Cory Booker: It doesn’t matter if Kavanaugh is "innocent or guilty” @ https://www.westernjournal.com/ct/booker-makes-shock-kavanaugh-admission-abandons-due-process-bizarre-rant/

A Showdown Like No Other
The Dims and Never Trumpers are finally awakening to the power of Donald J Trump in gaining popular support for his agenda – and what the American people so loudly spoke up about in 2016. Their desperation is clear and their tactics reach beyond anything seen before in the American political arena.
What we are witnessing is the parting fusillade of the NeverTrumpers and goal-line stand of the Democrats who have only recently realized that they had a serious survival problem on their hands, and that Trump is a formidable enemy and cannot easily be banished.
This is a two-front war; the Democrats are trying to block a conservative majority on the Supreme Court and are trying to bait the president and his Senate colleagues into language and actions that would inflame the hypersensitive and volatile feminist-activist vote and deliver the Congress to the Democrats in the midterm elections.
The stakes are very high and vastly transcend the protagonists. Both Judge Brett Kavanaugh and his accuser Christine Blasey Ford performed well, though histrionically, before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday, and the pressure on them was visibly intense. It may have been unseemly for a long-serving circuit court of appeal judge to be on the edge of tears for more than 10 minutes, but it was not affected. Senator Chris Coons’ (D-Del.) near-tearful performance the next day was tougher to explain. It does not lie in the mouths of those who have not faced such pressures to be cynical about Ford’s references to threats she has received and Judge Kavanaugh referring to his reputation and the lives of his family having been “destroyed.”

The American Voter Is the Firewall to Democrats Disgracing the Senate Confirmation Process
Can any one of you name a single US Senator you would want to be your friend, look after your children, or be your next door neighbor?
They make $170,000+ a year and are treated like royalty in spite of the fact that most of us would not hire them to clean our bathrooms.
This is America. We know what fair is and we know what right is. Most Americans are so busy getting on with their lives, they don’t give a flip about the inside Washington baseball which is all that is talked about in … Washington, New York and Los Angeles.
If Chuck Schumer and his pals think that somehow the Democratic Party has covered itself with glory in the past two weeks, just wait until November this year and in 2020.
And then, they’ll see that elections really do have consequences.

The Trump way often works
And the Left is still flummoxed by it. I smile every time he shows up on TV/
It drives the media, Democrats and more than half of America mad, but President Trump's unorthodox, jam-your-opponent style can be effective.
What he's done: He erased NAFTA, as a word, and replaced the trade pact with a different name (the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA) and better terms for America. Sure, he infuriated Canada and Justin Trudeau, but he delivered the goods. (And helped some farm-state candidates just before midterms.)
  • His tax cut, jammed through last year, continues to juice a red hot economy that has consumers confident, stocks soaring, joblessness sinking. 
  • His wild, improvisational press conferences and rallies still grab massive audiences — and drive the media conversation. 
  • And his no retreat, no surrender approach has helped Brett Kavanaugh survive brutal hearings, and put the conservative judge on the cusp of a lifetime Supreme Court seat.
The White House says it's as simple as Trump sticking to, and delivering, what he promised — defying low expectations amid chaos and distractions.
A veteran Democratic presidential adviser said that the Trump formula is taking a clear position and driving toward it — making sure everyone knows where he stands, and only focusing on one or two policy goals at a time.
  • The adviser pointed to the cap on deductibility of state and local taxes — included in Trump's tax-reform plan — as an enviable achievement.
  • "Presidents going back to Ronald Reagan have tried to do this," the Democrat said. "He had the determination and skill to get it done. Clinton didn't. Obama didn't."
After his surprise NAFTA win, Trump was sunny at the White House yesterday, and preened at a rally in Tennessee last night about his dominance in news coverage:
  • "You know what it’s called? Earned media," he said. "And I earned it."
With midterms 35 days away, there’s some evidence that Trump's recent campaign to make this election about his favorite topic — him — plus the court fight has Rs more energized than at any point this year.
  • Polling has swung sharply against Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.), with analysts pointing to Kavanaugh's popularity in the state as a factor.
  • Trump's message and travel have greatly strengthened Republican Senate challengers in Missouri, Montana and West Virginia.
From Axios

What is cloture and why will Mitch McConnell call for it?
This helps explains what McConnell is doing and how there will be a floor vote on Kavanaugh’s nomination.
by Debbie Lord, Cox Media Group National Content Desk, NCD an hour ago
As members of the U.S. Senate await the report from the FBI on allegations that Brett Kavanaugh was involved in sexual misconduct when he was in high school and college, the vote on his nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court is on hold.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, told reporters on Tuesday that after the investigation is completed and the FBI report is sent to the White House and shared with members of the Senate, the procedure for the vote on Kavanaugh’s confirmation will be restarted.
"The time for endless delay and obstruction has come to a close. Judge Kavanaugh's nomination is out of committee. We're considering it here on the floor and ... we'll be voting this week," McConnell said.
The process began Friday when, following the dramatic vote in the Senate Judiciary Committee and a call for the investigation into claims against Kavanaugh, the full Senate voted on a motion to proceed with Kavanaugh’s nomination. That motion officially brought his nomination to the floor of the Senate.
The next step would have been for McConnell to call for a cloture vote, or a vote to end debate on the nomination. A cloture vote, if passed, would move the nomination on to the confirmation vote by the Senate.
McConnell held off on the call for that vote, allowing for the one-week investigation to take place. He is expected to invoke cloture as soon as the report is released and read.
Once cloture is invoked, the Senate takes a series of steps to cut off debate on the nomination and move toward a vote.
Here is the procedure for invoking cloture:
At least 16 senators must sign a petition to invoke cloture.
The petition is then presented by interrupting the speech of another senator.
The petition is presented to the clerk who reads it to the Senate members.
Then, the petition is ignored for a day. The day the petition is left to sit is a day in which the Senate must be seated and in session. That 24-hour period is known as a legislative day. For instance, if a petition for cloture is filed on a Wednesday, the Senate will not go back to the motion until Friday.
On that day, after the Senate has been sitting for one hour, a quorum call is taken. A quorum call is a roll call of those present in the Senate. It is used to determine if a majority, or quorum, of senators, are present in the chamber.
The Senate majority leader, McConnell, then presents the cloture petition.
A vote on the petition is called.
A simple majority of those present is needed to invoke cloture.
Once cloture has been invoked, this is what happens:
There will be no more than 30 more hours of debate on the matter in which cloture was invoked. In this case, Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court.
No amendments may be moved concerning the matter unless they were filed on the day between the petition being presented and the cloture vote. Those must be relevant to the debate.
No senator may speak for more than one hour.
Some usual procedural motions are suspended.
No other matters may be considered until the matter under which cloture was called is decided.
Epic Moments in U.S. Senate Filibustering History
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., joined at left by Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., speaks to reporters about the political battle for confirmation of President Donald Trump's Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, following a closed-door GOP policy meeting, at the Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, Oct. 2, 2018.

North, South Korea start clearing mines from demilitarized zone
This is huge and I don’t see anything in the media about it.
The two Koreas are starting to clear mines from the heavily fortified demilitarized zone (DMZ) from October 1. The move is a first step after the two states agreed to disarm the border area starting with land mines. During 20 days from Monday, Seoul and Pyongyang plan to remove all mines from the Joint Security Area (JSA) along the DMZ, the Ministry of National Defense in Seoul said on Sunday. “The two Koreas will engage in joint works to remove mines and explosives on the JSA and upland areas in Cheorwon, Gangwon Province,” according to a military official.
North and South Korea begin disarming their heavily fortified border @ https://www.businessinsider.com/north-and-south-korea-begin-to-disarm-dmz-border-landmines-2018-10

Weak 4: NFL Stadiums Remain Full of Empty Seats
The last time I posted about this, I got all sorts of rants that it was “pre-game” and I was trolling, etc. You NFLers simply cannot comprehend that Middle America is sick and tired of your wimpy “protests” and go to watch the games, not politics.
Sure doesn’t look pre-game to me!
Tweet after Tweet showing empty seats and fans leaving early @ https://www.breitbart.com/sports/2018/09/30/weak-4-nfl-stadiums-remain-full-of-empty-seats/ and don’t give me this crap about the source!


Too much oil? Texas boom outpaces supply, transport networks
Years of ignoring the infrastructure is causing all sorts of problems. No new refineries for decades. Pipelines unable to carry the flow. Land and rail transport inadequate.
All that oil means pipelines from the shale patch are full, so producers are paying more to transport oil on trucks and rail cars. Shortages of labor, water and even the fuel used in fracking are driving up production costs.
Smaller producers without contracts to use pipelines are getting hurt most because they are forced to use trucks and railcars. Shipping oil by truck to Gulf Coast refinery and export hubs costs $15 to $25 a barrel, compared to $8 to $12 a barrel by rail and less than $4 a barrel by pipeline, according to market sources.
The shift is leading to traffic jams on highways and rail crossings in far-flung parts of the Permian shale fields. It also means fuel for supply vehicles and fracking equipment can be in short supply locally.
Truck traffic is unlike anything we’ve ever seen,” said James Walter, co-CEO of Colgate Energy, a Midland-Texas based oil producer, who adds his company has agreements to transport all of its crude and gas production via pipelines.


Teen Pot Users Struggle with Reasoning, Memory, and Inhibitions Later in Life
Oh yeah. Cannabis is a harmless substance. Not a thing wrong with smoking or otherwise using it.
Yeah? Not according to this study.
Researchers also found that cannabis use in any given year was linked to impaired inhibitory control and working memory one year later.
'We were surprised that the effects of cannabis were more pronounced than the effects of alcohol,' senior author and investigator Dr Patricia Conrod, of the department of psychiatry at the University of Montreal, told Daily Mail Online.
'And we were surprised of the lasting effects. Even if a young person reduced their use, you could still see effects from the previous year. It was more than we expected.'

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