Infrastructure Insanity
Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Democrats worked late into the night Friday, scrambling to pass Joe Biden's $1.2 trillion physical infrastructure bill. After last week's shellacking at the polls, Democrats desperately needed a win. And they got it, thanks to an assist from 13 weak-kneed House Republicans.
Yes, you read that right. Thirteen Republicans gave Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden a big victory and cleared the way for the House to begin consideration of the far worse $1.75 trillion reconciliation bill. (It's really $4 trillion.) Here are the Republicans who bailed out Pelosi and Biden:
- Bacon (NE)
- Fitzpatrick (PA)
- Garbarino (NY)
- Gonzales (OH)
- Katko (NY)
- Kinzinger (IL)
- Malliotakis (NY)
- McKinley (WV)
- Reed (NY)
- Smith (NJ)
- Upton (MI)
- Van Drew (NJ)
- Young (AK)
Four of these Republicans – Gonzales, Katko, Kinzinger and Upton – also voted to impeach Donald Trump. They not only wanted to get rid of Trump, but they couldn't even fight a "green" pork bill.
For all the talk of "roads and bridges," CNN reports that only "$110 billion [is] for roads, bridges and major infrastructure projects." That's not even 10% of the bill's total cost.
What's the rest of it? Well, PBS called this infrastructure bill, "the most significant climate legislation to come out of Congress yet." In other words, there's a lot of the Green New Deal in it.
I know there's a lot of justifiable anger that Republicans put this bill over the top. But here's the bottom line: Its passage was determined on Election Day 2020. Nancy Pelosi still controls the majority, and she is a legislative bulldozer, a master of beating and bribing her members into line.
Now we'll see whether she can do it again on the reconciliation bill, which will sink the tentacles of socialism deeply into the soil of the United States.
And to just be clear: I will vehemently oppose any House Republican who votes for the Biden/Schumer/Pelosi reconciliation bill. No Republican can justify voting for that monstrosity under any circumstance.
More Bad News For "Sleepy" Joe
Joe Biden didn't have long to celebrate his legislative win before he was hit with another round of bad news. This time it came from the latest USA Today national poll.
Biden's approval rating has collapsed to 38%, while 59% of Americans disapprove of his job performance. If you think that's bad, our cackling vice president's approval rating is just 28!
The poll found that only 20% of Americans feel the country is on the right track, and 64% of Americans don't want Joe Biden to run again in 2024. If the 2020 election were held today, Donald Trump would beat Biden by at least four points.
It's not hard to understand why so many Americans are so upset. Joe Biden is scheming to give hundreds of thousands of your hard-earned tax dollars to illegal aliens. Only 17% of Americans think that's a good idea.
His energy secretary went on TV and laughed at your pain at the pump. Secretary Granholm blamed OPEC, but she also blamed U.S. energy companies for not "flipping the switch as quickly as the demand requires."
Flipping switches is how the lights go on and off. That's not how energy is produced.
But Biden and Granholm have made it impossible for U.S. energy companies to do more to get the energy we need the next time we flip a switch. They've shut down pipelines (here and here) and canceled drilling leases (here and here).
Joe Biden vowed to kill the fossil fuel industry, which provides 80% of our energy. He's acting on that promise, and you're paying for it.
The supply chain crisis isn't getting any better, and Biden thinks you're too stupid to understand it. By the way, his vaccine mandate will only make it worse. (See below.)
The Biden/Harris ship is sinking, and we all know that when the ship starts going down . . . the rats start jumping off the ship. Watch for more Democrats to start sprinting for the nearest exit, announcing their retirements next year. The USA Today poll also found that the GOP is up 8 points in the 2022 race for control of Congress.
Mandate Stopped For Now
Over the weekend, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals temporarily blocked Biden's vaccine mandate, citing "grave statutory and constitutional issues." That's good news because now the CDC wants us to keep wearing masks to prevent colds and the flu. Seriously. They've gotten a taste of power, and they're not letting go!
I'm glad to see the courts step in. Far too many good people were being put in an impossible situation by this overbearing regime. Biden and his cronies have vilified our frontline heroes – the doctors, nurses, firefighters, police officers, and military personnel – who did so much to help us last year.
No American should have their livelihood and their family's well-being put in jeopardy by big government mandates!
For all those who say, "There's not a dime's worth of difference between the two parties," this is a huge difference.
It's the Democrat Party that believes it can tax you for not making certain purchases.
It's the Democrat Party that believes it can take away your job over a vaccination.
It's the Democrat Party that believes it can limit your First and Second Amendment rights.
The left is all about big government controlling your life. Conservatives believe in smaller government and more freedom.
On a related point, Dr. Ben Carson was asked this weekend whether he supported the CDC's decision to approve COVID vaccinations for children. Dr. Carson was unequivocal, saying:
"Absolutely not. The mortality rate for children from COVID-19 is 0.025, which is very similar to the rate for seasonal flu. . . Plus, we don't know what the long-term impact of these vaccines is. So, this is really sort of a giant experiment.
Do we want to put our children at risk, when we know that the risk of the disease to them is relatively small, but we don't know what the future risks are? Why would we do a thing like that? It makes no sense whatsoever."
Durham's On Track
A number of people who are closely following the investigation of Special Counsel John Durham are noting that he's pursuing two tracks in his slow, methodical work.
The first track involves tackling those connected to the Clinton political machine who implemented Hillary's plan to smear Donald Trump in a Russian collusion scam, thereby casting doubt on the legitimacy of the 2016 election and crippling his presidency. Sadly, the smear succeeded to a considerable extent.
The second and most important track involves individuals inside the Deep State. These individuals eagerly embraced the false collusion narrative even when the facts were obvious, and even after they had credible information that it was nothing more than a Hillary dirty trick.
The FBI interviewed Igor Danchenko in 2017 and he vehemently denied that his information was accurately reflected in the dossier. But lied to the FBI about his sources for the dossier – Clinton confidant Charles Dolan, Jr.
The CIA notified the FBI that it had evidence that some Russians were working with the Clinton campaign to smear Trump with false claims of collusion. But former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe said that the CIA notification went to Peter Strzok, who failed to act on it. Strzok, you may recall, was fired from the FBI for his blatant anti-Trump bias.
The FBI, knowing the dossier was fatally flawed, nonetheless used it before the FISA courts to monitor various people in the Trump Administration. All of this raises serious questions about other fired officials like Bruce Ohr, Andrew McCabe and James Comey.
By the way, don't forget that John Durham isn't the first special counsel to investigate the Russian collusion hoax. And that begs the question: Why didn't Special Counsel Robert Mueller uncover any of what John Durham has discovered?
I think we all know why. Robert Mueller was never in charge of his own investigation. That was obvious from his congressional testimony. The coverup here is huge!
This was the biggest dirty trick in the history of American politics. Years from now, political science students will be studying "Hillarygate" instead of Watergate. It deeply damaged one of the most consequential presidents in modern history, and it shattered the reputation of the FBI.
Meanwhile, many neo-con Never Trumpers are silent about the remarkable charges filed by Durham and what those charges suggest was done to destroy Donald Trump.
January 6th was a protest that got stupidly out of control. What the Deep State did in 2016 and throughout the entire Russian collusion hoax and Ukraine phone call impeachment hoax – yes, they're linked! – was nothing short of a coup attempt. That's the real threat to our constitutional Republic!
So, here's an interesting question: Will Durham, who's known for moving slowly and methodically, bring more astonishing indictments before next November's congressional election or during the 2024 presidential contest?
And where does Donald Trump go to get his reputation back from this disgusting smear that he was elected by colluding with the Russians, when it was Hillary Clinton who colluded with Russians?
