The Media's Double Standard Dress Code Between Democratic and Republican Women

Did you know that First Lady Melania Trump wore a $51,500 Dolce & Gabbana Coat in Italy during the Trump foreign trip? You would if you read the New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today, and scores of other papers, or watched ABC or CNN. SF Gate, the internet site of the San Francisco Chronicle told us her coat was only $5,500 below the 2015 median household income in the United States. The New York Times on page 2 today said her “glamorous wardrobe … rotated between Michael Kors and Dolce & Gabbana.” Did you know on January 6, 2016 in her victory speech after winning the New York primary Secretary Hillary Clinton wore a $12,695 Georgia Armani jacket while speaking out against income inequality? Probably not; the media did not cover it. Governor Sarah Palin received the republican nomination for Vice President in 2008 under Presidential nominee Senator John McCain. She was a self-proclaimed “hockey mom” representing the people. The media trashed her in October 2008 because the GOP spent about $150,000 on clothes for her and her family for the campaign: $75,062 at Neiman Marcus, $49,425 at Saks Fifth Ave., $5,102.71 at Bloomingdales, $789.12 at Barneys New York. The clothes were to be donated to charity after the campaign The New York Times on October 22, 2008 wrote “so much for an ‘average hockey’” with the “expensive clothing from high-end stores.” ABC’s The View, NBC, Time, U.S. News & World reports, Washington Post, Vanity Fair, Huffington Post, Politico, Slate and a host of others joined the attacks. Senator McCain was roasted over his 8 homes, but not a peep about the sweetheart arrangement that the Obamas received on their Chicago house. The purpose was to make the McCain-Palin ticket out of touch with America at a time Americans were hurting economically. The vicious attacks on Governor Palin were non-stop by the media. Many in the media touted First lady Michelle Obama as the second coming of Jacqueline Kennedy. Michelle was not Jackie. Nor could she be. Every presidency is unique. So too is every First Lady. Each is a star and exemplar in her own right. I would say that both Michelle Obama and Melania trump are beautiful women who exude class. Big items, little items; it's all part of a campaign to bring down conservatives and in this case the Trump Administration. The media keeps lowering and belittling itself from their constant, personalized attacks on conservatives

1967: The Summer of Love; 2017: The Summer of Hate?

Memorial Day Weekend is the traditional kickoff of summer. 1967 was the Summer of Love, emanating out of San Francisco and the Haight Asbury. San Francisco had earlier gone through the Folk Era and Carol Doda and Topless on Broadway. None approached the Summer of Love in fame and tourist dollars dropped in San Francisco. San Francisco’s Folk Era featured the Smothers Brothers, The Kingston Trio, and the Limeliters. Rock had pushed folk out by 1967, but the San Francisco scene had evolved into psychedelic rock. Grace Slick and the Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin and Big Brother and the Holding Company, the Grateful Dead, Quicksilver Messenger Company, Sly and the Family Stone, Santana, often at Billy Graham’s Fillmore Theatre. The first and last Monterey International Pop Festival June 16-18 in the Summer of 19967 brought them all together from around the world: American, British (the Beatles Sgt. Pepper also was released in June), folk, rock, psychedelic rock. Scott McKenzie sand “If you’re going to San Francisco, be sure to wear flowers in your hair.” Check out the 3:03 music video on YouTube. Eric Burdon and the Animals released San Franciscan Nights and Monterey. The Haight Asbury Hippies, the counter culture, drugs, head shops, peace symbols, underground papers, especially the Berkeley Barb, long hair, love beads, posters, Flower Children Jann Wenner published Vol. 1, No. 1 of Rolling Stone The Summer of Love, Free Love I had a ringside seat to the Summer of Love. The University of San Francisco is 6 blocks from the famous corner of Haight and Ashbury. I often walked to USF that summer along Haight Street. Haight Street was a phenomenon greater than Broadway a few years earlier. The sidewalks and cars were so jammed together that the quickest way to walk along Haight would have been on the roofs of the cars. Mondays and Fridays saw long lines around the block from the Bank of America as the Flower Children and Hippies were cashing their checks from home. This summer is the Summer of Hate, mostly directed at Donald Trump and conservatives. 1967 was the summer of the Flower Children. 2017 is the summer of the Snowflake. The mainstream print media drips a daily drop of venom on President Trump. The TV stations selectively edit the day’s news to diminish the President and his team. Fake news shows up on both. 1967 was the Summer of Love. 2017 witnesses college professors and students wanting President Trump impeached, killed, silenced, imprisoned. The campus snowflakes and academic Neanderthals want trigger warnings and safe spaces for themselves, but not only seek to muzzle opposing speakers but also often engage in violence. Conservative professors are muzzled. Professor Laura Kipnis at Northwestern is learning the price of deviating from the academy’s orthodoxy. Administrators have been cashiered. Berkeley students rioted in the 1960’s for free speech. Berkeley students in 2017 riot to suppress speech. A Fresno State history professor tweeted President Trump “must hang.” An Orange Coast Community College professor in class called trump’s election “an act of terrorism.” She was voted Faculty of the Year while the student who secretly taped her class was initially suspended. An assistant math professor of color at the University of Hawaii has demanded that white professors get out of the way, quit their jobs or take a demotion. Many of our colleges and professors are teaching hate in 2017. And then there’s the California Democratic Party. The Party met in Sacramento a week ago to elect its new officers. John Burton, the former Congressman and alcoholic, and outgoing chair of the California Democratic Party, raised a one finger salute to President Trump and then led the delegates in a rousing chant of “F--- Donald Trump.” Such is the state of discourse in America today.

California Democrats Are Hyperventilating Over Single Payer Healthcare

A modern cliché is that California leads the nation. Justice Brandeis wrote a century ago that states are the laboratories of democracy. If so, California’s Democrats are attempting to experiment with a single payer healthcare system. The California Senate will vote this week on S.B. 562, The Health California Act, and send it to the House. If enacted, the State California will become the payer of all healthcare costs California. It will lead the nation, as the final coffin is nailed on our once great private healthcare system. California has increasingly become a one–party state, with the Democrats controlling all state elected positions and a supermajority in both branches of the legislature. The progressive Sanders wing of the party is becoming the dominant force, pushing California ever-further to the left. They know no restraint. California thereby wishes to replace the cold, heartless, greedy capitalistic, profit seeking, but efficient, insurance companies with a cold, heartless, bloated, inefficient state bureaucracy. Three modern examples should show the failures of single payers. The first is the United States Veterans Administration. (VA). Second, the Indian Health Service has not received the same poor publicity as the VA, but its record is very poor. If we cross the Atlantic to England, we find that England’s National Health Service is the largest employer in England, but not noted for efficiency. Its rules “guarantee” an appointment on routine matters within 18 weeks! S.B. 562 proposal is both regressive and reactionary. The progressiveness speaks for itself. It’s reactionary as a reaction to the complaints and horror stories of insurance companies. Thus there are no cost controls built into the plan. All residents of California will be covered, including the undocumented and the homeless who will flock to California. No co-pays No more Medicare premiums/co-pays No out-of-pocket costs for covered services No deductibles Access to all providers No referrals required; i.e. no gatekeeper The plan will include medical, dental, vision, mental health, and nursing homecare. Lower prescription costs It’s truly “pie in the sky” The legislators are hyperventilating on the prospects of single payer. Or Are they hallucinating on medical marijuana? In true liberal legislation, the Legislature is unconcerned about costs. It thereby includes no provisions for financing the program. The Legislative Analyst estimates the cost of the programs would be $400 billion annually. Governor Brown’s proposed state budget for next year, which includes education, prisons, medical, entitlements and everything else, is $290 billion. The state estimates that it currently has access to, and thus can redirect, about $200 billion in healthcare revenues through Medi-Cal, Medicare, Obamacare subsidies, and public health funds. California spends $106 billion on Medi-Cal, of which $68 billion comes from the federal government. That leaves a deficit of $200 billion. No taxes are in the bill. Therefore, it does not need a super-majority to pass the Legislature. The legislature is supposed to develop “a revenue plan” in the future. Whenever! Estimates are that a 15% employment tax will be needed to fund the program. That 15% would be on top of the existing 15.2% federal tax. It will be a job killer in California. Passage in the House and Senate are essentially assured. The only question is if Governor Brown will sign or veto it. The last time California enacted a truly radical proposal was about 2 decades ago when it purported to deregulate electricity while ignoring all basic rules of economics. It mandated the private utilities sell off ½ their fossil fuel capacity. It deregulated the wholesale price of electricity while freezing, thereby regulating, the retail price charged consumers. The bill prohibited the three private utilities from entering into long term contracts with electricity suppliers. Instead, they could only buy a day forward in the wholesale market. The state had not built new generating facilities in over a decade while its population grew. The state had limited transmission capacity between Northern and Southern California. California’s electric supply was ripe for manipulation, which Enron and others quickly realized. A drought in the Pacific Northwest reduced electricity to California. Suddenly, in 2000-01 the state was hit with rolling blackouts. Pacific Gas & Electric entered bankruptcy while Southern California Edison came perilously close when the wholesale daily rates shot through the roof. California just might do it. Unlimited demand; no increase in supply. The powerful California Nurses Association is the sponsor of the bill. It says “You’re going to pay less and get better service, and your money’s worth.” Just like ObamaCare. A recipe for disaster. It will be quite an experiment. Californians may pine for the return of ObamaCare.

The CBO Issues Yet Another Fundamentally Flawed ObamaCare Financial Report

The House of representatives passed a repeal and reform of ObamaCare. The bill is before the Senate, which will make substantial changes to it. The House acted without a scoring by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). The Contortionist Budget Office issued its contorted report Wednesday. The headlines screamed “23 million to lose healthcare under Republican Plan.” Democrats are ecstatic. The numbers did not make sense, but it took a few days to get the details. Three major groups of individuals are in ObamaCare. The first is over a million individuals forced into Obamacare when their pre-existing health plans were cancelled by ObamaCare. They would love to get back that which they had before, but that probably can’t happen. Remember President Obama’s repeated claims “If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor,” and “If you like your insurance company, you can keep it?” That was at best a gross misrepresentation. The second group are the young adults forced into ObamCare by the individual mandate. They want out. Many would have been satisfied with a catastrophic health insurance plan, but not the high premium, high deductible, poor coverage plans forced upon them. The CBO estimates 2 million dropping down to a limited benefits plan, such as catastrophic health insurance. THE CBO labels them “uninsured.” The third group are those who want to and need to be on ObamaCare – those with preexisting conditions who could not previously obtain health insurance. Contrary to Democratic demagoguery, the Republicans have clearly provided that these beneficiaries will not be stripped of their medical coverage. The CBO predicted enrollment in the exchanges of 7 million in 2014 13 million in 2015 24 million in 2016 26 million in 2017 The actual enrollment figures are 6 million in 2014 11 million in 2015 12 million in 2016 10 million in 2017 The CBO overestimated the exchange enrollment by 160%. It appears that the missing 16 million have already lost coverage under current ObamaCare. Yet with total enrollment of 10 million, the CBO projects 14 million Americans will lose their coverage in 2018 and 23 million by 2026 compared to the status quo of ObamaCare. A critical part of ObamaCare is to increase enrollment in Medicaid, enacted in 1966 as part of President Johnson’s Great Society to provide medical care to the poor. A major restriction was that eligibility would exist for those living under the poverty level. The ObamaCare Medicaid expansion raised the limit to 138% of the poverty level and eliminated other restrictions. 31 states and the district of Columbia signed onto the Medicaid Extension. The first three years brought a 100% reimbursement from the federal government to attract the state buy in. It is being phased down to 95% this year and 90% by 2020. About 12 million have taken advantage of the Medicaid extension. The 10 million in Obamacare and the 12 million in the Medicaid Extension add up to 22 million. Simple question: How did the CDC arrive at a loss of 23 million? The CDC estimated in 2014 that the Medicaid Extension would cost the federal government $42 billion in 2015. The actual cost was $68 billion, a 62% error. Why believe the CBO numbers? Medicaid is not necessarily a Godsend to beneficiaries. Reimbursement rates to medical providers are often very low, resulting in large numbers of doctors rejecting Medicaid patients. The beneficiaries are thus in many states subject to poor access with limited reimbursements. The CBO projections were hopelessly flamed for three reasons. The first was a poor model. With all due respect to Professor Jonathon Gruber, models cannot predict human and market behavior in situations like this. The second reason is poor assumptions that were plugged into the model. The old adage is at work: Garbage in, garbage out.” The third reason is that the “non-partisan” CBO spent months massaging the figures with Congressional Democrats to give the CBO figures a favorable number. The CBO has not acted in a non-partisan manner throughout the ObamaCare debate. The 2010 CBO projections showed a favorable $940 billion effect on the federal budget. This magic number was reached by including all 10 years of tax increases, but only 6 years of spending on ObamaCare. Like a magician, the CBO numbers disappeared. The CBO revised its numbers in 2012 to project a $109 billion budget deficit over 2013-2022 - a one trillion dollar, negative adjustment! The Contortionist Budget Office in 2015 predicted that repealing ObamaCare would add $353 billion to the budget deficit. The CBO now projects the Republican House bill will reduce the budget deficit by $119 billion. The CBO is clueless! Obamacare was always from the beginning an income redistributionist scheme. It raised and imposed dozens of taxes totaling over $1 trillion. The House Bill reduces taxes by $662 billion, which will provide a boost to the economy. ObamaCare is in a death spiral. Individual insurance premiums have risen 105% on the exchanges since 2013, according to the Department of Health and Human Services. Premiums are skyrocketing, deductibles are high, and coverage limited while insurers are bailing out. Supporters of the statute blame the current instability in the insurance market on President Trump, who has made it clear that he wants to stop the subsidies to the insurance companies. Aetna, Humana, and United Healthcare announced prior to the 2016 election, an election in which Secretary Clinton, was projected to win in a landslide, that they were baling out of the exchanges. The insurance companies have lost over $5.8 billion on the existing plans despite federal subsidies. The underlying problem in any plan is the pre-existing condition patient. That was the problem facing the ObamaCare planners. That is the problem facing the Republicans today. It is not easy to solve.

The Media, and Presidents Nixon, Ford, George H. W. Bush, George W. Bush and President Trump

Rush Limbaugh stirred up controversy when he said 4 days before President Obama’s inauguration: “I hope he fails.” He subsequently “clarified” his statement: “I want him to fail, if his agenda is a far-left collectivism.” Unfortunately, President Obama succeeded in fulfilling much of his far-left collectivism, but failed the American people. The media and politicians were outraged by Russ’ statement; they went ballistic. Today’s mainstream media not only wants President Trump to fail, but they also are in a campaign to destroy his presidency. Their actions are the most vicious since President Nixon’s Administration. They believed that they through Woodstein brought down the Nixon Presidency and forced his disgraceful resignation. “Watergate” was a Washington Post exclusive. It was based on a series of leaks by Mark Feld, the disgruntled Deputy Director of the FBI. He had been passed over for FBI Director by President Nixon. The Watergate Hearings were broadcast live with John Dean’s testimony riveting. The media and President Nixon had a tortured relationship going back to 1948. Richard Nixon as a Representative and then as a Senator got famous for his actions against Communists in the government. He was instrumented in the unmasking of Alger Hiss as a communist spy. Direct evidence is lacking today of Hiss’ spying, but with the release of the Soviet archives, consensus has developed that Alger Hiss was guilty. Vice President Nixon narrowly lost the 1960 Presidential election, perhaps because of voter fraud in Chicago and Texas. Not a peep from the media. They loved JFK. The Vice President was defeated for Governor of California by incumbent Pat Brown. He uttered these remarks in his concession speech: “You don’t have Nixon to kick around, because, gentlemen, this is my last press conference.” Richard Nixon is proof of the adage that “Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get you.” Some commentators believe President Ford lost the 1976 election because of Chevy Chase and Saturday Night Live. Chevy portrayed President Ford as a stumbling, fumbling, klutz Also stupid, eventhough President Ford was a graduate of Yale Law School. Chevy Chase subsequently admitted he wanted Jimmy Carter to win. They tried and failed with Reagan, portraying him as a stupid, trigger happy, loose cannon. President George H.W. Bush was pictured as out of touch with ordinary Americans. President George W. Bush, a graduate of Yale and Harvard Business School, was stupid. He was also incompetent, as shown by the government’s response to Katrina. The reality is that it was the Democratic Governor Blanco and New Orleans Mayor Ray Negrin who were responsible for the post hurricane chaos in New Orleans. George W. Bush turned the economy around and recorded large gains in employment until the real estate market collapsed on his watch setting off the Great Recession. The media kept saying as employment grew that the job increases were in ow paying jobs. So too with President Obama's tepid job growth equally in low paying jobs, but they were silent on the type of jobs. If the media is obsessed with lies and fact-checking President Trump, then what about President Obama? Where do we begin? I guess those jobs weren’t so shovel ready after all If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor You can keep your insurance company Benghazi Fast and Furious Details of the Iran deal VA IRS How about nobody’s “been a better friend of Israel” eventhough he dispatched money and operatives to Israel to defeat Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu? Obama’s Misstatements Where to begin? I’ve campaigned in all 57 states with one to go. How about his statement about the founding of America: Islam was one of America’s founding religions “woven into the fabric of our country since its foundation.” America was founded as a WASP country, White, Anglo-Saxon Protestant. Vice President Dan Quayle, also portrayed as stupid, was reviled by the media for saying “potato” could be spelt with an “e”, as in “potatoe.” George W. Bush The New York Times and other newspapers sent a team to Florida to independently recount the votes in Florida. President Bush also won that recount. The media and Democrats castigated the Bush Administration on Valerie Plame’s disclosure of being a CIA agent by a columnist As to Governor Sarah Palin, Vice President Candidate, the media “parachuted” a couple dozen parachutists into Anchorage and Wasilla, Alaska to flyspeck her public and personal life, and to question her intelligence Tina Fay and Saturday Night Live (once again) destroyed her image “I can see Russia from my house.” That was Tina, not Sarah. Any misstatement blown up But not Obama 57 states and one to go Obama’s lies How about Clinton’s Russian connection? Uranium deal Hacked emails Clinton Foundation The donations The expenditures The compulsive lying? The media ignores the constant drip of misstatements by Vice President Joe Biden. The media is unabashly trying to destroy President Trump and his agenda. The late show hosts take mean shots at President Trump to boost their ratings. Stephen Colbert has lashed out in an vicious, expletive deleted rant against president TrumpIt takes no courage to lash out at someone when they are not there to protect themselves or respond. President Trump’s problem is that he ran an unconventional campaign with many snarly remarks. He vows to “drain the swamp.” He has expressed contempt for the media, as do his supporters. It’s a problem because the swamp does not want to be drained. It is fighting back through leaks to a complaint media. Russ Limbaugh said of President Obama “I hope he fails.” Representative John Lewis told NBC President Trump was not “a legitimate President.” Representative Maxine Waters called for impeachment almost as soon as President Trump’s inauguration. 67 Democrats boycotted the Trump Inauguration. The media in its animus towards President Trump will not let the facts get in the way of a good anti-Trump story. The Washington Post was wrong over a week ago in writing FBI Director James Comey had requested more funding. Denials came from every direction. The Washington Post was wrong a few days back in saying Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein threatened to resign. Denials came from every direction. The Washington Post reported yesterday that President Trump breached national security by giving secret intelligence information to the Russians. Denials all around; the story was false. The New York Times is now reporting on a memo Comey wrote in which he said President Trump asked him to drop the investigation into General Flynn. At least that’s what we’ve told the memo says. Even the Times has not seen it yet. If we are going to see that memo, then we should also see all of Comey’s letters relating to President Trump or Secretary Clinton. Not happening, at least yet. The New York Times and Washington Post have not yet reached the level of the Los Angeles Times in an editorial entitles “Our Dishonest President.” It included such words and phrases as ‘Narcissist,” “demagogue,” “magnitude of train wreck,” and “his utter lack of regard for truth.” MSNBC hit a journalistic low in another way. Mika Brzezinski on “Morning Joe” revealed ioff the record comments that Trump Campaign Manager and now White House Counsel Kellyanne Conway had supposedly said highly negative things about President trump. Once of President Nixon’s aides say to the President that the media was extremely biased. President Nixon essentially replied “Get over it.” A double standard clearly exists in the media in covering conservatives.

President Trump Showed he Is a Decisive Leader in Firing FBI Director James Comey

President Trump sent a message when he sent 60 cruise missiles to Syria. President Trump sent the same message yesterday when he fired FBI Director James Comey. President is a strong, decisive leader. He will take action when he thinks it is needed. No dithering No appeasement No apologies Bold, decisive action His version of President Reagan and the air traffic controllers And the Democrats? A reflexive call for “Special Prosecutor!” The Democrats and media are hyperventilating over the firing of Comey, just as they hyperventilated many times in the election, Trump’s first 100 days, and in future. Maybe, one of these times, they might connect with the American public. But after months of lambasting Comey, they are now trying to make him a martyr. You have to read George Orwell’s 1984 to understand the gyrations. Steve Carrell went onto his show and announced that President Trump had fired James Comey. The audience cheered – not the reaction the anti-trump Colbert expected. The Democrats and media are proclaiming a constitutional crisis. Senator Blumenthal (D. Ct.) joined Representatives Maxine Waters, Al Green, Jared Huffman, John Yarmuth, Mark Pocan, Hakeen Jeffries, Tulsi Gabbard, Keith Ellison, Joaquin Castro, and Jamie Raskin in using the “impeachment” word. And for James Comey? He should have been fired months ago. Incompetence Grandstanding He has a history of mistakes at the FBI. The San Bernardino and Orlando Pulse Nightclub occurred on his watch as the FBI flubbed the investigations. He followed up the San Bernardino tragedy by demanding Apple provide the tools to unlock the shooter’s IPhone5S four digit pin number. He wanted the ability to break into any IPhone, using San Bernardino as the lever to do so. Apple stood by its customers. An outside supplier ultimately sold a solution to the Justice Department. He appointed his good pal, Pat Fitzgerald (two peas in a pod) as special prosecutor in the Valerie Plame investigation. Valerie was a CIA analyst, whose CIA identity was ostensibly disclosed eventhough she was not undercover. The question was who leaked it to Robert Novak, the columnist? The media and Democrats went ballistic, hoping to nail the Bush Administration, especially Karl Rove, for illegally disclosing her identity. They were even dreaming at the prospect of an indictment of the Vice President. Fitzgerald quickly identified the source, Richard Armitage, an assistant to Secretary of State Colin Powell, and an opponent of the war. Fitzgerald though did not stop at that point; instead, he continued the investigation. He indicted Scooter Libby, the national security advisor to Vice President Chaney on five counts of providing false statements to an FBI agent. He mishandled the Clinton email scandal. He has been quiet about the leaks of the President’s telephone calls and of General Michael Flynn. Rod Rosenstein, the career prosecutor, confirmed three weeks ago by the Senate as Deputy Attorney General, wrote a letter recommending the termination. He represented the view of the career FBI agents and United States Attorneys who were shocked and chagrined by Comey’s July and October unprofessional behavior. The FBI investigates and U.S. Attorneys prosecute. They have separate and distinct roles. Comey both investigated and made the decision to not prosecute. Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein wrote: “[T]he FBI Director is never empowered to supplant federal prosecutors and assume command of the Justice Department.” Comey’s press statement on July 5 was “a textbook example of what federal prosecutors and agents are taught not to do.” He usurped the powers of the Attorney General. Attorney General Lynch may have been compromised because of the tarmac meeting with President Clinton, but she had not recused herself. If she couldn’t make the decision, then the Deputy Attorney general, Sally Yates, could have done so. The FBI Director took it upon himself to make the decision to not prosecute. Not only did he violate Justice department protocol in doing so, but he also rewrote the statute to include an intent requirement. Her conduct of gross negligence violated the statute. He further failed to understand a rule of the FBI. The Director of the FBI, unlike a prosecutor, does not revel in the limelight. As Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein wrote: “It is not the function of the director to make such an announcement. … Compounding the error, the director ignored another longstanding principle: We do not press conferences to release derogatory information about the subject of a declined criminal investigation.” James Comey acquired a reputation both as a shrew political operative and as untouchable in his job. The Democrats wanted Comey fired because he cost Secretary Clinton the election. Now he is a martyr, the victim of a conspiracy, a cover up. Nixon, Nixonian, Watergate, Saturday Night Massacre are flooding the airways. To understand how the Democrats and media could turn in an instance, please read George Orwell’s 1984. Senator Ron Wyden echoed Watergate: “Follow the Money.” By all means follow the money to the Clinton Foundation and President Clinton in Secretary Clinton signing off on a Russian company acquiring 20% of the United States uranium supply. Follow the money on Secretary Clinton’s Russian reset. James Comey became FBI Director on September 13, 2013 after prostrating himself before President Obama. Comey wanted the position. He then owed President Obama. The debt was paid in the October news conference when he exonerated Secretary Clinton. We are witnessing the next 3½ years as the Democrats and media combine to trash President Trump every conceivable second for any conceivable reason. Right or wrong, he will always be wrong and his motives questioned in their eyes. They won’t let the facts get in the way of sliming President Trump. It didn’t work during the campaign. It won’t work now. They still don’t understand President Trump. He may be unconventional, but he is decisive.

Harvard Students Are Overly Stressed by a Fifty Cent Library Fine

Harvard announced it was eliminating standard fines of fifty cents/day for overdue library books. The fines were too stressful for students. Steven Beardsley, Harvard’s associate director for access services administrative operations and special projects, emailed: “We have witnessed first-hand the stress that overdue fines can cause for students.” That must have been very traumatic! Beardsley added: “Eliminating standard overdue fines and standardizing loan periods across Harvard’s libraries should help students focus on their scholarship, rather than worrying about renewing library books every 28 days in order to avoid fines.” The best and brightest, the future leaders of America and the Free World, the pinnacle of American higher education, cannot handle a fifty cent fine. They cannot handle a 28 day return period. They’re freaked out by $.50. Forget the $50,000 tuition and fees. Don’t worry about the parking tickets in Boston and Cambridge. What if they don’t pay a speeding ticket or fail to appear for a DWI? Do they understand what a bench warrant is? Wait until they face their student loans. What if they miss a car payment? Or rent? How about broken relationships? What will happen when their computer crashes? How will they handle a rejection letter from a prospective employer or graduate program? Maybe their helicopter parents can’t fly in to fix the 50 cent fine. Just wait to they have to join the real world and face real deadlines with real demands from real employers in a real job with real performance requirements. Perhaps the real problem is that their generation is not used to hard copy. They’re wizzes on the mouse and the IPhone, but they can’t adjust if it’s not available on Apple. Taking responsibility is a critical stage in growing up. Our generation was told to “suck it up,” “grow up,” “get over it,” and “deal with it.” This generation is told to seek counseling. And they do. 40% of Harvard’s seniors said they used the University Health Service during their 4 years. They reported stress at higher rates than the national average. 20-25% of the undergrads report using the mental health service each year. It can’t be the academics. The median grade at Harvard is an A- with the most common grade a straight A. 90% graduate with honors. The Harvard degree opens the door to graduate and professional schools and the job market. Too many are on psychotropics when they enter Harvard, or the nation’s other top universities. They’re missing out on fundamental life skills. Instead they’ve being encouraged in their self-indulgence. Whiners are coddled. Their sense of entitlement keeps growing.

Yale Republicans Fired up the BBQ Next to Symbolic Non-hunger Hunger Strikers

Yale grad students are on a hunger strike demanding Yale engage them in collective bargaining. Hunger strikes can be effective in creating change, but not this time. Gandhi engaged in 17 fasts/hunger strikes totaling 135 days in South Africa and India. His noble purposes were to promote Indian independence and the plight of the India people. He rode trains around Indi, always in third class, the cramped, non-air conditioned, often standing accommodations. This class became known as Gandhi Class. The “hunger” striking Yale graduate students currently receive free tuition and a stipend of $30,000. If they are single, they receive half of the health insurance premiums if married. They receive 100% if married with a child. They earn Yale degrees. Gandhi suffered for the people, his people. The Yalis are doing it for themselves. Women suffragettes engaged in hunger strikes a century ago in England and the United States in the noble cause of woman suffrage. Several died in the effort. They suffered for women rights. Our Yale “hunger” strikers are engaged in a symbolic hunger strike. They are free to eat when they feel hunger pangs. They’re not suffering. Several imprisoned IRA members engaged in hunger strikes in Belfast prison in 1980 and 1981. Ten died, including Bobby Sands who was elected to Parliament during his fast. They suffered for the Irish people, Catholic and Protestant. Cesar Chavez often engaged in hunger strikes for the farm workers, his people, the under-privileged farm workers. The Yalis are of the privileged class in America. I have trouble picturing them chanting “Solidarity Forever” even if they are members of Local 33 Unite Here International Union. They are not the UAW workers at the Ford Overpass 80 years ago May 26, 1937. The Yale graduate students are not the GM workers staging a sit-in in Flint, Michigan on December 29, 2036. Those strikers risked their lives. Our Yale students are making, at best, a symbolic sacrifice. Yale has not recently been the champion of promoting free speech and open dialogues. It scraped John C. Calhoun because of his slavery past. It refused to support two masters because some students were offended by their statements 1 1/2 year ago. Yale might under different circumstances have shut down the BBQ because it is “offensive” to other students. However, Yale has a three decade record of fighting employee and staff organizing and collective bargaining.