Archive for the 'Politics' Category

David Codrea:

I’m not going to speak ill of the dead. McCain’s record in life was clear and my differences with him – and there were many — were expressed then. It’s more productive for the purpose of defending against some of those differences to look at what his ostensible political opponents, his friends across the aisle and in the media, are saying about him now.

Barack Obama recalled a “shared… fidelity to something higher.” Joe Lieberman “lost a dear friend.” Joe Biden “will miss him dearly.” Bill and Hillary Clinton noted “He frequently put partisanship aside to do what he thought was best for the country, and was never afraid to break the mold if it was the right thing to do.”

And on and on the effusive praise goes.  It’s all lies of course, but they would rather have a deep-stater like McCain than anyone else on the GOP side.

Like David, there are things I won’t criticize.  I won’t speak ill of his time in Vietnam.  If I wasn’t there, I don’t know what happened in that prison in Hanoi.  And you don’t either.  And as for the torture he endured, I’m sure I would crack like an egg.  Unless I was in that position, I won’t comment on what I would do in that position.

But I will certainly speak ill of the man, life or death.  Virtually no one else had so much blood on his hands in American politics as McCain.  He is responsible, at least in part, for the North African horror we are witnessing, which leads irreversibly to the falling of Europe to Islam.

The criticism doesn’t have to stop there.  There is no reason other than spite, vengeance and hatred to come out of semi-retirement to kill a bill that might have helped to end socialized medicine in America.  He hated you, and he hated me.  We can all consider him responsible for the pain and suffering of millions of men, women and children who see their financial wherewithal to retain good medical care taken away, only to be redistributed by the state.

The catalog I’ve given above is just the beginning, and readers could add more, although the list I’ve given is sufficient.  I bid good riddance to the man.

Make sure to watch all of it.  Matt is at his best here.

This is a trend, one that doesn’t surprise me in the least.  Nor should it surprise you.

News from South Africa:

THE South African government has begun the process of seizing land from white farmers.

I have thought for a number of months that the smarter farmers would have seen the signs of the times and sold several years ago, moving all of their estate to Australia, New Zealand or the U.S.  Now it’s too late.  The only recourse now is to lose everything or go to war.

Via WRSA, can London be far behind?

Politico:

A woman whose son was killed on Mexican soil by a U.S. Border Patrol agent in Arizona can sue for damages, a federal court ruled Tuesday.

The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Border Patrol agent Lonnie Swartz is not entitled to qualified immunity, saying that the Fourth Amendment — which prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures — applies in this case.

“Based on the facts alleged in the complaint, Swartz violated the Fourth Amendment. It is inconceivable that any reasonable officer could have thought that he or she could kill J.A. for no reason,” Judge Andrew J. Kleinfeld wrote in the majority opinion. “Thus, Swartz lacks qualified immunity.”

Swartz, who was found not guilty in April of second-degree murder for the 2012 shooting, has said he shot at people throwing rocks through the border fence in Nogales, Arizona. A retrial in the case will take place in October.

Okay then.  Since non-citizens get these rights under a constitution to which they are not subject, then the next step is for the Ninth Circuit to issue a cease-and-desist order for all SWAT raids where people get shot by cops in their own homes on American soil.

Right?

The Oregonian:

The state police SWAT officer who investigators say fired five times at refuge occupation spokesman Robert “LaVoy” Finicum said Monday he second-guessed himself when he learned of an unaccounted-for bullet hole in the roof of Finicum’s truck.

In the days after the Jan. 26, 2016, shooting in Harney County, the officer wracked his brain trying to figure out how it could have occurred, considering that none of the FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team agents at the scene said they had fired any shots.

“I never thought I did it, but there were times I was thinking, ‘I don’t know. This doesn’t make any sense,”’ he said. “If that was going to be attributed to me and I had no recollection of it … could I continue in this profession?”

When he learned investigators had tracked all his shots and the magazine of his AR-15 rifle was missing five bullets, he said he told them: “The FBI has a big effing problem, and this is serious.”

The testimony from “Officer 1” – the only identification of the SWAT officer used in court because of government concerns over militia threats – is crucial to the prosecution’s case in the trial of an FBI agent at the scene that day.

Agent W. Joseph Astarita is accused of lying about having fired two disputed shots at Finicum’s truck as state police and the FBI moved to arrest leaders of armed occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. One struck the roof and one missed entirely.

Astarita’s lawyers have argued that other people at the scene, and most likely Officer 1, could have fired the shots.

Officer 1 said he knew he hadn’t fired the shots in question because investigators found only 24 rounds remaining in the magazine of his AR-15 rifle, which he said he loaded with 29 rounds.

He had fired three times as Finicum’s truck was speeding toward a roadblock set up on U.S. 395 as the refuge leaders left the bird sanctuary. They each struck the front of the truck. He then fired two times and struck Finicum’s back after Finicum had walked away from his truck and reached into his jacket, according to investigators.

Officer 1, now a captain who has worked for the state police for 20 years, was the lieutenant and commander of the agency’s SWAT team at the time of Finicum’s shooting.

Officer 2, the second state police officer who shot Finicum that day, also testified – the first time either of them have publicly spoken about their roles in what happened. He fired once, his bullet also hitting Finicum in the back. He’s now a sergeant with the tactical team, having worked 21 years with the agency.

Their superiors worried from the outset that they would face threats, so much so that the night of the shooting they directed investigators to take photos of each officer with a paper bag concealing their faces when documenting their clothing and equipment.

Prosecutors sought to portray the state police officers who fired their rifles that day as having acted according to state police policy while the FBI agents skirted standard protocol.

The two state police officers said they immediately alerted supervisors that they had fired and surrendered their rifles and ammunition.

In contrast, prosecutors showed that FBI agents were seen on aerial video scouring the scene for items and ducking under trucks after the shooting. The FBI agents also failed to ensure a shell casing spotted on the ground was marked as evidence and then in a highly unusual move, demanded they be interviewed as a group by detectives, prosecutors said.

Defense lawyers have painted a much different portrait of state police, suggesting Officer 1, who was supposed to be in a command role that day, instead ran aggressively to confront Finicum in a risky maneuver without any cover causing a potential cross-fire situation with another state trooper.

They pointed out that state police didn’t immediately create a crime scene log to control who entered or exited the area and allowed other police vehicles to pass through.

They suggested state police officers heightened the tension from the beginning by firing a less- lethal sponge bullet at Ryan Payne, the front seat passenger in Finicum’s truck, who was about to surrender when authorities first stopped the two-car caravan of refuge leaders earlier on the highway.

They also revealed that Officer 1 exchanged text messages about the shooting, witness officers’ statements and evidence with state SWAT officer Joey Pollard, who witnessed the shooting, and their boss, Travis Hampton, now state police superintendent. The exchanges came before his interview, held five days after the shooting.

[ … ]

Prosecutor Gary Sussman followed up, asking if that was because Pollard’s focus was elsewhere. Pollard said he was looking at Finicum’s hands when Finicum stepped out of the truck and heard a “loud bang.”

After the shooting, Pollard drove Officer 1 from Burns to the Deschutes County Sheriff’s Office in Bend. Deschutes County was tasked with leading the investigation of the shooting. After Officer 1 and Officer 2 turned in their gear and were photographed, Pollard drove each officer home.

In the days that followed, testimony Monday revealed Pollard exchanged multiple text messages with Officer 1 and instructed Officer 1 on Feb. 1 about the bullet hole that forensic investigators found in the roof of Finicum’s truck.

Good Lord.  What a circle jerk.

Remember folks, this didn’t arise out of thin air.  The whole thing began as a protest against the FedGov over trumped-up charges against ranchers whose land the BLM wanted because it had been promised to Uranium One in exchange for donations to The Clinton Foundation, all approved and catalyzed by The State Department.

Never forget that.  These officers are under cross examination right now because they did the bidding of Bill and Hillary Clinton and their band of demons.

HuffPo:

Well, I’ll say it if Trump won’t.  Hey Trey, are you listening?

The NSA and CIA are among the most wicked organizations on the planet, and cannot be trusted.  You can throw the DOJ and FBI into that mix as well.

As for Gowdy, what do you think the chances are of Trey having been method-actor this whole time, working for the deep state, always outraged, never bringing anyone to justice, and always preventing the need to take anything to court or hold anyone accountable for their illegal actions?

Via WRSA, the British authorities knew all along that the Pakistani rape gang existed in Rotherham a full decade before investigating.  Furthermore, the police knew and ignored it.

Here in the states, Mueller has offered Tony Podesta immunity for testifying against Paul Manafort.  John and Tony Podesta both ought to be in prison as we speak.

And yet here we are with the swamp creatures alive and well.  Do you understand?

Via WRSA, pardons for the ranchers.

U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday pardoned two imprisoned Oregon ranchers whose sentencing on arson convictions sparked the 2016 occupation of a wildlife refuge, part of a long-simmering dispute over federal land policies in the U.S. West.

The armed standoff at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in southeast Oregon followed a judge’s ruling that sent Dwight Hammond and his son, Steven, back to prison to serve more time after their initial release. Police shot one of the occupiers dead during the 41-day midwinter protest.

The takeover was another flare-up in a decades-old conflict over federal control of millions of acres of public land in the Western United States. In Oregon, about half of all land is controlled by the federal government.

Right.  “Arson.”

It’s really important to remember what these charges are all about, and it isn’t arson.  Here it is.

Dwight and Steven admitted to having started two fires, for which the court found them guilty. One of the fires was a prescribed burn in 2001 that, according the court record, accidentally spread onto 139 acres of BLM land. Those 139 acres happened to be located on one of the family’s federal grazing allotments. The other fire, from 2006, was a back-burn. Steven had set the fire on the family’s private property in order to protect their winter feed from a lightening fire that had started on adjacent BLM land. That fire accidentally spread to one acre of BLM land.

They were going to have to sell their ranch in order to pay fines and legal fees.  Sell their ranch.  Folks were interested in buying it.

But for what purpose?  Uranium and gold.  That’s right, the Clinton Foundation / Clinton Global Initiative and deals cut with the BLM were behind all of this.  These men weren’t guilty of arson.  It was an accident, and a small amount of land was burned anyway, and for good reason.

David Codrea:

“Did the State Department issue the Justice Department a license or a written waiver in order to allow for the transfer of thousands of weapons across the U.S.-Mexico border?”

[ … ]

If an answer was provided to those questions, it is not reflected in the 100 page June 29 response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed against State by attorney Stephen Stamboulieh representing Kent Terry, the brother of slain Border Patrol agent Brian Terry, and me.

Read the whole thing.  Yea, it’s very difficult to get any government agency to respond to embarrassing FOIAs.  I’ve still never gotten an answer to my FOIA on who issued arming orders to the National Guard or other troops involved in Hurricane Katrina gun confiscations, and I’ve asked multiple times.

Ignoring FOIA requests is part and parcel of .gov, whether local, state or federal.  The law may as well not exist as far as I’m concerned.

When the sheepdog turns on the sheep and couples up with the wolves, who will protect the sheep?  What happens when the sheepdog goes corrupt and ignores the safety of the flock when they’re merely doing the bidding of the wicked shepherd?