PDT’s letter to the Speaker

I went looking for Donald Trump’s letter to Nancy Pelosi on google and eventually gave up since every one linked on the first six pages was from some deranged media source which meant to link I would have to also link to their comments that went straight into the headline. So here it is for you to read for yourself taken from The White House: Dear Madam Speaker. It is a statement for the record putting down for the sake of history a summary of the insanity that has gripped the American political system since 2016.

You can also find a discussion of the letter here: Trump Unbound posted at Powerline. Here is the conclusion from the letter also found at the link.

It is time for you and the highly partisan Democrats in Congress to immediately cease this impeachment fantasy and get back to work for the American People. While I have no expectation that you will do so, I write this letter to you for the purpose of history and to put my thoughts on a permanent and indelible record.

One hundred years from now, when people look back at this affair, I want them to understand it, and learn from it, so that it can never happen to another President again.

These people he is dealing with are nutters. Beyond delusional, beyond even madness, but evil. The American economy is booming, constitutional freedoms are being entrenched more deeply and in every direction. There is no crisis, other than the terror no doubt felt among Democrats that they may really be about to lose their grip on power for a generation.

Nevertheless, impeachment next.

Captain Planet

I was sitting in the barber’s chair and chatting with the barber about her children (it’s a husband and wife barber shop where the kids wander through all the time) so I asked about what kind of environmental instruction her kids get, thinking mostly about the oldest girl who is around 13. But it was her son, in his first year at Kinder, who was being drenched with it. In fact, she told me, he is now a young fanatic, and was that very day going to be singing the Captain Planet song before the whole school. Me, never heard of Captain Planet, but clearly I am way behind the times. So if you are now to succeed me as the last person never to have heard of Captain Planet, you can learn more here.

Here are the words. And I noticed first off that their science goes back to the ancient Greeks with the division in fire, water, earth and air. Heart, I suppose, is to replace reason.

Earth!
Fire!
Wind!
Water!
Heart!

Go planet!

By your powers combined, I am Captain Planet!

Captain Planet, he’s our hero,
Gonna take pollution down to zero,
He’s our powers magnified,
And he’s fighting on the planet’s side

Captain Planet, he’s our hero,
Gonna take pollution down to zero,
Gonna help him put asunder,
Bad guys who like to loot and plunder

“You’ll pay for this Captain Planet!”

(chanting)
We’re the Planeteers,
You can be one too!
‘Cause saving our planet is the thing to do,
Looting and polluting is not the way,
Hear what Captain Planet has to say:

“THE POWER IS YOURS!!”

And these were the top 30 comments. If you want to know the kind of slide we are on, and how steep that slide is, read these through:

  1. We all let this dude down
  2. Sad kids don’t get messages like this these days
  3. When cartoons used to have substance.
  4. I still don’t litter because of Captain planet!
  5. i wish captain planet was real so he could save are planet right now
  6. Remember guys, Captain Planet isn’t real, but his enemies are. We have a duty to protect this planet. It is our only home. We don’t get another. Save the Amazon.
  7. I feel so depressed looking at this now, thinking how optimistic we were in the early ’90s, and how few people took the message to heart. The power was ours… and we wasted it.
  8. Ah 90s Saturday mornings!
  9. I still finish every last bit of product in my bottles because of captain planet.
  10. Memories of playing ‘Captain Planet’ with friends at the time and no one would want to be ‘Heart’ because it was the shit one.
  11. Need him to save the Amazon right now
  12. It’s too bad almost all of the Planeteers left to get real jobs
  13. The should make a 2019 movie of Captain Planet
  14. The Planeteers: The first benders.
  15. THE POWER IS YOURS! legendary 😂😂
  16. i wish i could have a time machine and go back to enjoy again those times
  17. The world trully needs Captain Planet right now.
  18. When cartoons were actually teaching kids good stuff…
  19. They should invite this guy to the next global warming conference
  20. Who’s watching this in 2019 and remembering their childhood?
  21. Me as a teenager: “Captain Planet is so corny. The save the trees message is so hamfisted! I can’t believe I ever watched this!” Me now: “I was fool! A fool! Please come back, Captain Planet! You were right all along!”
  22. Watched it when I was a kid I remember the lyrics
  23. When you realize the kids from Captain Planet came from The Magic School Bus!🤔😅
  24. 2019? Sad that this cartoon is still relevant to this day.
  25. Omg the nostalgia!! I used to LOVE this show. I tuned in EVERY morning to watch it. (luckily for me it was before school, so I was able to see it!!)
  26. “The Power is Yours” !! goosebumps ❤❤ people haven’t realised yet the power is in us to save this planet…
  27. Just a little trivia…Ted Turner created this animated series. Great job, Ted…1990…almost 30 years ago!
  28. Ahh the good old days when the environmental movement was cool and actually cared about the planet before it was taken over by politics and fear mongering pseudoscience
  29. We need you captain planet, more than ever. Come back for real.
  30. My mom just digged out Captain Planet bedding it’s in great condition my sons just watched this with me#2019

We have reverted back to the Dark Ages if not farther.

Inflation and its consequences

As you read this, remember that “inflation” in pre-Keynesian times did not mean a rise in the price level but an increase in credit and money. Sometimes prices also rise but sometimes they do not which is why Mises describes a rise in prices as the consequence of inflation. With the advent of Keynesian economics, the very fact that a Keynesian policy was by definition inflationary had to be discarded, so inflation just turned into a rise in the price level, with the mechanism no longer mentioned. This is from, Ludwig Von Mises: The Theory Of Money And Credit. And while it’s about money and credit, the argument is really about Keynesian macro which I have attempted to highlight by bolding certain passages.

…the advocates of public control cannot do without inflation. They need it in order to finance their policy of reckless spending and of lavishly subsidizing and bribing the voters. The undesirable but inevitable consequence of inflation, the rise in prices, provides them with a welcome pretext…The illusory profits which the inflationary falsification of economic calculation makes appear are dealt with as if they were real profits; in taxing them away under the misleading label of excess profits, parts of the capital invested are confiscated. In spreading discontent and social unrest, inflation generates favourable conditions for the subversive propaganda of the self-styled champions of welfare and progress. The spectacle that the political scene of the last two decades has offered has been really amazing. Governments without any hesitation have embarked upon vast inflation and government economists have proclaimed deficit spending and ‘expansionist’ monetary and credit management as the surest way towards prosperity, steady progress, and economic improvement. But the same governments and their henchmen have indicted business for the inevitable consequences of inflation…they blamed private enterprise for charging outrageous prices and profiteering…And millions of voters have swallowed all this.

There is need to realize that the economic policies of self-styled progressives cannot do without inflation….Monetary policy is considered – wrongly, of course – as an instrument for keeping wage rates above the height they would have reached on an unhampered labour market…for many years there has been little opposition to credit expansion for the sake of ‘creating jobs’, i.e. for providing business with the money needed for the payment of the wage rates which the unions, strongly aided by the government, force business to grant….

Inflation and credit expansion are the means to obfuscate the fact that there prevails a nature-given scarcity of the material things on which the satisfaction of human wants depends…One of the foremost concerns of all parties hostile to economic freedom is to withhold this knowledge from the voters. The various brands of socialism and interventionism could not retain their popularity if people were to discover that the measures whose adoption is hailed as social progress curtail production and tend to bring about capital decumulation. To conceal these facts from the public is one of the services inflation renders to the so-called progressive policies. Inflation is the true opium of the people administered to them by anti-capitalist governments and parties.

Excerpt from Ludwig Von Mises. “The Theory Of Money And Credit” (1953)and posted on a previous thread by David Brewer.

Geoff Mann in a Marxist critique of Keynesian economics

The video is found at the book launch of Geoff Mann’s In the Long Run We are All Dead.

Geoff Mann lives in Vancouver, where he teaches political economy and economic geography at Simon Fraser University, and he directs the Centre for Global Political Economy.

In the ruins of the 2007–2008 financial crisis, self-proclaimed progressives the world over clamoured to resurrect the economic theory of John Maynard Keynes. The crisis seemed to expose the disaster of small-state, free-market liberalization and deregulation. Keynesian political economy, in contrast, could put the state back at the heart of the economy and arm it with the knowledge needed to rescue us. But what it was supposed to rescue us from was not so clear. Was it the end of capitalism or the end of the world? For Keynesianism, the answer is both. Keynesians are not and never have been out to save capitalism, but rather to save civilization from itself. It is political economy, they promise, for the world in which we actually live: a world in which prices are sticky, information is asymmetrical, and uncertainty inescapable. In this world, things will definitely not take care of themselves in the long run. Poverty is ineradicable, markets fail, and revolutions lead to tyranny. Keynesianism is thus modern liberalism’s most persuasive internal critique, meeting two centuries of crisis with a proposal for capital without capitalism and revolution without revolutionaries.

If our current crises have renewed Keynesianism for so many, it is less because the present is worth saving, than because the future seems out of control. In that situation, Keynesianism is a perfect fit: a faith for the faithless.

Far-left, all about Hegel and Marx, but not an ounce of economic understanding from what he has to say. But the book is coming and will see what we find then. His conclusion is that “poverty is produced by the system itself”. This is the kind of drongo idiocy only a self-satisfied utterly pampered member of the academic bourgeoise would believe.

Germany joined authoritarian regimes

German commissioner says Merkel’s envoy boosting antisemitism at UN. From the post:

A German state commissioner to combat antisemitism told The Jerusalem Post that his country’s UN ambassador promotes antisemitism at the United Nations when he compared the Jewish state with Hamas.

“The comparison made by [Christoph] Heusgen between Israel’s actions and the terrorism of Hamas damages solidarity with Israel and is unfortunately apt to promote Israeli-related antisemitism,” Uwe Becker, the commissioner tasked to fight antisemitism in the state of Hesse, told the Post….

On Friday, Germany joined authoritarian regimes like the Islamic Republic of Iran to vote for seven of eight resolutions against Israel. Berlin merely abstained in the eighth anti-Israel resolution.

“Linking Heusgen to antisemitism is absurd,” said deputy Foreign Office spokesman Rainer Breul, according to Deutsche Welle….

Heusgen declared: “We believe that international law is the best way to protect civilians and allow them to live in peace and security and without fear of Israeli bulldozers or Hamas rockets.”

The Wiesenthal Center noted in its justification that Bild, the largest circulation paper in Germany, “accused Heusgen in an editorial of ‘pure malice’ against the Jewish state.”

The Center continued that “Heusgen cast 16 anti-Israel votes at the UN in 2018, abstaining once. In 2019, he voted for nine anti-Israel resolutions, including one labeling Jerusalem’s holiest sites as ‘Palestinian Occupied territory,’ while abstaining three times and opposing only one anti-Israel resolution.”

How difficult is it for someone to work out that voting with Iran in support of Hamas is not a form of solidarity with Israel or with the Jewish people.

Apologies everywhere but no remorse

UPDATE: The President weighs in.

President Donald Trump called out James Comey, the former FBI director, in  a series of tweets on  Twitter saying, 'So what are the consequences for his unlawful conduct. Could it be years in jail?'Trump mentioned Inspector General Michael Horowitz, who Trump claims didn't expose the 'tremendous bias and guilt exposed' during the FBI's Russia interference investigation and has lost credibility

 
________________And from before

What a strange day. Must be partly Boris Johnson, partly that impeachment has gone into reverse and partly a recognition that the left agenda is near terminal, green new deal included. So first we have this: Comey: ‘I Was Wrong’ — FBI’s FISA Abuse ‘Was Not Acceptable’.

And then there was this: Schiff: ‘I Had No Idea FBI Was Committing Serious Abuses When I Said All That Stuff’.

And even this: Greta Thunberg Apologizes After Saying World Leaders Should Be ‘Put Against a Wall’ in Speech.

This might be part of the reason why: Barr Puts Obama & Company on Notice, Signals Hell Is Coming.

And this: [VIDEO] Adam Schiff Mercilessly Booed on Stage at an Event Last Night in Glendale, California.

Plus this: Supreme Court Hands Trump Huge Win, Makes Impeachment Article 2 Null & Void.

Not to mention this.

The left are now finding out that they are not as popular as they think they are. In fact, most people of sense find them repulsive, and will not vote for them if given the chance.

Impeachment only shows how vacuous the left has become

HIDDEN BY IMPEACHMENT: ONE OF TRUMP’S ‘BEST WEEKS YET.’

Added to the list of accomplishments this week:

  • An agreement on a new U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade deal.
  • A new budget including more than $1.3 billion for a border wall and blocks a government shutdown.
  • House approval of the U.S. Space Force, a brand-new branch of the military.
  • Government family leave that will be a model for a proposal for the public.
  • Tentative agreement on trade with China.
  • Approval of Trump’s 50th federal appeals judge.
  • Confirmation of a new Food and Drug Administration chief.
  • The signing of a pro-Israel anti-Semitism executive order.

Plus, advisers noted, Wall Street hit another record, and Pelosi conceded that on impeachment, “It’s been going on 22 months — two and a half years, actually.”

And, the advisers added, with impeachment likely, the president was assured by McConnell that the Senate would move fast on a trial that will end in acquittal and might include the support of two Senate Democrats, according to Sen. Rand Paul.

“There is one world where the mainstream media is covering impeachment, but there is another world where Trump is racking up a myriad of accomplishments, many of which have the support of the same Democrats who want to remove him from office,” said political communications strategist Ron Bonjean.

His enemies are the most repulsive people alive today

But he has done something: Trump’s anti-Semitism order is a Rorschach test for Jews:

If you are against federal action to stop anti-Semitic discrimination on college campuses just because Trump is doing it, then you’re the one with the problem.

Not to mention this: Trump lashes out at ‘Do Nothing Dems’ for impeachment, says they’ve become ‘Party of Hate’.

How can he say he has done nothing?

Physics is their thing not politics

Both via Instapundit.

THIS PIECE IS NOT ACTUALLY A PARODY, IT JUST READS LIKE ONE:

After Tuesday’s massacre in Jersey City, New Jersey’s Jews are still in shock, just like the Jews in Pittsburgh last year. When our Shabbat services ended the day of that shooting, I left the sanctuary to be greeted by a fleet of police cars surrounding our synagogue. As I learned what happened 350 miles to the west I thought of Sinclair Lewis’ ironically titled 1935 novel, “It Can’t Happen Here.” What he meant, of course, was it can happen here. And it just did. . . .

And, perhaps, this latest massacre will increase the momentum for the serious and effective gun policies this country so obviously needs.

All of which is well and good. But, If antisemitic incidents are on the rise, we Jews have to figure out what we do next. Then, I thought, who better to ask than a Muslim?

Who, indeed?

,
PLUS
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BECAUSE THEY’RE MORE LOYAL TO LEFTY POLITICS THAN TO JUDAISM: Caroline Glick: Why Leftist Jews Slander President Trump.

In its Twitter feed, the New York Times reported Trump’s action thus: “President Trump will sign an executive order defining Judaism as a nationality, not just a religion, thus bolstering the Education Department’s efforts to stamp out “Boycott Israel” movements on college campuses.”

This tweet was so off-base that it is impossible to view it as a mere misunderstanding by the paper of record for the liberal establishment. The assertion that Trump’s move “defined Judaism” smacks of cultural appropriation, and as such, it sounds like an act of aggression against Jews.

By falsely claiming Trump defined Judaism as a nationality, the Times made it sound like Trump was saying that Jews aren’t American nationals.

And by writing the purpose of the effort was to “stamp out ‘Boycott Israel’ movements on college campuses,” rather than protect Jewish students from anti-Semitic harassment, the Times made the order seem like a political ploy rather than a civil rights action long supported by Democrats and Republicans alike.

Liberal Jews pounced on the message and ran with it. Halie Soifer, the executive director of the Jewish Democratic Council of America accused Trump of being “partially responsible” for the rise of anti-Semitism in America.

“If President Trump truly wanted to combat anti-Semitism,” she said, “he would accept responsibility for his role in perpetuating anti-Semitic conspiracy theories and emboldening white nationalism.”

“We said it before and we’ll say it again – Donald Trump is the biggest threat to American Jews,” she added.

J-Street’s executive director Jeremy Ben-Ami echoed the criticism of BDS advocates in Congress and on campuses by claiming that the executive order harms the free speech rights of anti-Israel activists. In his words, “The executive order, like the stalled congressional legislation it is based on, appears designed less to combat anti-Semitism than to have a chilling effect on free speech and to crack down on campus critics of Israel.”

Undoubtedly, Soifer and Ben Ami were directing their statements towards the “a-political” Jewish establishment in the hopes of mobilizing them against the pro-Jewish executive order.

In the event, they failed. The Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee both applauded Trump’s executive order.

But Soifer and Ben Ami had grounds to think the ADL and AJC would join them in characterizing Trump’s friendliness and support for Jewish people as anti-Semitism. Earlier this week they did.

Which ties into Ken Stern’s (below) bogus comments about Trump’s use of “anti-semitic” tropes.

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