Fake or not the bomb damage has been extensive

Posted on October 28, 2018 by lawofmarkets

That headline is the entire point, and found at Drudge as well. The message: violence on the right is just as bad – worse – than violence on the left. The bomber is actually just a lone nutter, everyone’s favourite version even on the right. Such people are bound to show up in a free society from time to time but have nothing to do with the values of the people on our side.

Very comforting, I suppose, in its own way. But that is not how I see this at all. In my view, he was almost certainly the frontman in a very elaborate and cleverly constructed anti-Trump deep state operation. But the question I was asked was whether the bomber would really be willing to spend the next twenty years in some maximum security prison. And while there are many who would, I am not sure the way this is shaping up now that the smoke is beginning to clear.

This is how the bomber gets off with a ridiculously light sentence: Report: Bodybuilder Cesar Sayoc Admits the “Pipe Bombs” Wouldn’t Hurt Anyone – And He Didn’t Want to Hurt Anyone. In fact, that is so obviously true, that the defence almost writes itself. As Steve Hayward at Powerline observed:

The bombs-that-weren’t-bombs (apparently—reports still conflict about this) were so obviously amateurish that it is hard to rule out the possibility that it is the product of a prankster who just wanted to see how crazy he could make everybody.

That was exactly the point. Everything about the operation made it look like amateur hour and unserious. A harmless kook. Slap-on-the-wrist territory so far as personal punishment goes, but with the media in the meantime going full bore about violence from the right, sentiment is shifted by the busload. You may be sure that this will nevertheless be an event we are reminded about years into the future, along the lines of Columbine. The phrase I now hear all the time is that this was the MAGA bomber. It is now part of the left’s arsenal of lies.

Clever beyond imagination. A deep state enterprise all round since the only value of the story is to stop Republican momentum as much as possible before November 6. By the time we end up with a trial of the bomber, even if he goes away for a couple of years, since he wasn’t really trying to hurt anyone, the election will be long past and he will get his reward.

Suspicion about who was actually behind the planting of the bomb among Trump and his associates must be at least as high as mine, but down this particular path they cannot go, not even to suggest any investigation might be of some interest. This is what the President said, but he can say nothing else.

Call for unity with those who are immune to any attempt to be reconciled with the President will work on his own side of the fence but cut zero ice on the left. Meanwhile, equivalence between violence on the left and right has now become established.

And then there was this: CESAR SAYOC: ‘MAGA BOMBER’ FACEBOOK BETRAYS DEMOCRAT TRUMP INFILTRATOR, ANTI-GOP POSTS. I hate the “MAGA Bomber” reference, but that aside:

Elsewhere on the internet, just seconds after Cesar Altieri Sayoc’s apprehension, his public listing identified him as a Democrat. (Below) Moments later, the listing was updated by someone, changing his listing from Democrat, to “Republican.” While it’s been noted that MyLife is a publicly edited page, I captured his Democrat party affiliation within seconds of the announcement of his apprehension and then watched in amazement as his party affiliation changed from Democrat to Republican before my very eyes, capturing screenshots as quickly as I could to document the changes. (Photos)

You know why it was done. The real question was who.

Après Donald le déluge

Posted on October 26, 2018 by lawofmarkets

3:00 AM UPDATE:

GOT HIM?
SUSPECT IN CUSTODY

.SUSPECT'S TRUMPMOBILE...

(From Central Casting)

________

I can see many advantages to the Democrats from the fake bomb business. It changes the subject from how well PDT and the American economy is doing as the US heads into the last week before its mid-term elections. They get to pretend they are victims, which is an important leftist meme. The party of Antifa gets to harangue on the importance of civility in politics. All of the media can go off on another set of rants about Republicans. Best of all, no Democrat was ever in the slightest danger of harm since none of the ones on the target list open their own mail.

And no matter how I look at it, I cannot see this as anything other than a very sophisticated Democrat operation. All these bombs and not an arrest in sight. The kind of deep knowledge one would need to pull off even one of these without detection is quite intense, never mind eight or nine, with the numbers still rising. And if they do pin it on someone eventually, I suspect it will be along the lines of the chap Hilary stitched up for the murders in Benghazi because of some video he had produced. Not only liars to the core, but presenting their lies to some of the most willingly gullible who have ever lived. Just the kinds of people who will take global warming and Keynesian economics as valid reflections of reality.

In my view, but who knows, we are never going to know who really sent these fake bombs to this almost perfectly concocted target list. And I can only say there must be some really irritated lefties who feel genuinely affronted by not having been included in the A list of targets. Meanwhile, GOP candidate received letter threatening his 7 children.

Criticizing a candidate on the issues is part of politics. Threatening my children is not. We are thankful for the… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…—
Jay Webber (@JayWebberNJ) October 24, 2018

That one looks a lot more genuine than the rest. And for the record, I am also as cynical about the fall in share markets around the world. How hard would it be for George Soros and his mates to sell off a parcel of shares all by themselves just to depress the market for a week or two even while the Fed starts to raise rates?

Meanwhile, there are all those people who are voting for a living, and they enter the US by the caravan full: Half America Gets More In Welfare Than Pays In Taxes…

Donald Trump has been a respite from this relentless effort to undermine the values and integrity of the West and our way of life. Enjoy it while you can for après Donald le déluge.

PROVIDING BALANCE: There is, of course, the possibility that whomever has been sending these phoney bombs through the mail is actually a Republican. How can this be denied, since we have zero idea of who has done it or why. To provide us with the additional certainty such moments require is what CNN is for: Debunking the despicable ‘false flag’ theory on the mail bombs. Summarising:

Campaign politics tends to be a lowest-common-denominator business. If something works — no matter how loathsome or even untrue — then it gets used. The end always justifies the means — and the end is always and only winning.

And yet, even by that incredibly low bar, what some right-wing pundits have done in the wake of 10 mail pipe bombs being sent to prominent prominent Trump critics, Democratic politicians, party donors and CNN’s New York office is astonishing. In short: They have suggested — with zero evidence — that is all one big hoax designed to help Democrats in the 2018 midterms, a classic “false flag” operation….

This is both hugely cynical and incredibly logistically difficult. The cynical part is self-explanatory. But consider what Limbaugh and his ilk are suggesting — from a purely logistical perspective. Here’s what would have had to happen for the events of Wednesday to be a false flag:

1. Someone or someones who wanted to help Democrats — and the media, I guess, somehow? — would send a series of pipe bombs to prominent Democrats around the country.

2. Then Democrats or the media or, again, someone, would have to have coordinated with the state and local police — not to mention federal authorities — so that law enforcement said that these were functional bombs (even though, again, according to this theory, they weren’t).

Which, um, is not what happened. As any reasonable person — regardless of your political affiliation — can recognize that that sort of broad conspiracy not only stretches the bounds of the possible but snaps them in two.

It is all so obvious, I am amazed such clarity has only occurred within the Democrat media and to no one else.

“Everything you touch turns to gold”

Posted on October 23, 2018 by lawofmarkets

PDT comes in at around the 13-minute mark, but goes for the next hour. In contrast, Mr Nobody: Barack Obama Is Back On The Campaign Trail And Back In A Box. A handful of people to listen to him drone on about his inconsequential legacy, aside from his most important legacy of all, the election of Donald Trump as President. Here is the report. No video, not that it would interest anyone to watch it. “The current Senator” is the incumbent Republican Senator from Nevada who began as a #NeverTrumper and ended with this, “Everything you touch turns to gold,” Heller told Trump the other day. Meanwhile, Mr Nobody spoke to a largely empty hall.

“The current senator — he doesn’t seem to be willing to stand up to this,” Obama told an audience of 2,000 in a gymnasium, avoiding mentioning the senator by name, and adopting a tone of amused disappointment. “He just goes along — even when you get a sense that he knows it’s not right.”

Obama spent much of his speech on a long defense of his own presidency, and condemnation of Republican governance.

“When you hear all this talk about ‘economic miracles’ right now, remember who started it,” Obama said. He denounced Trump’s attempts to pressure the FBI and Department of Justice to target political foes.

“That is not how America works. That is how some tin-pot dictatorship works,” he said.

But Obama didn’t come to Nevada to make news, and he mostly didn’t. This is the box he’s in now. Even as he’s edged away from the tradition of post-presidential silence, there’s a more practical reason for his muted campaigning: He’s said to be afraid his presence would backfire, give Trump a foil, and energize the Republicans who Democrats hope will stay home in November.

It’s a dangerous world out there

Posted on October 20, 2018 by lawofmarkets

Body slamming a journalist is not the way to behave but even worse is the media lying

Posted on October 19, 2018 by lawofmarkets

Here’s today’s story: Trump praises U.S. congressman from Montana who body-slammed reporter.

Trump, who has called the media the enemy of the American people and regularly derides journalists as “fake news,” made his latest remarks during a campaign rally in Montana.

Representative Greg Gianforte, who made brief remarks at the rally with Trump, was ordered to perform community service as part of his sentence for attacking Ben Jacobs, a correspondent for Britain’s Guardian newspaper, on May 24, 2017, the day before a special election to fill Montana’s sole congressional seat.

“Any guy that can do a body-slam … is my guy,” Trump told supporters at the rally, adding that he was concerned at first that the incident would jeopardize Gianforte’s campaign.

“I said: ‘Oh, this is terrible, he’s going to lose the election.’ Then I said: ‘Well, wait a minute, I know Montana pretty well, I think it might help him,’ and it did,” Trump said.

Want the background. This is what I posted at the time.

Fascinating story. This is how it begins.

The Republican candidate for Montana’s congressional seat slammed a Guardian reporter to the floor on the eve of the state’s special election, breaking his glasses and shouting, “Get the hell out of here.”

This is how it continues:

A statement by campaign spokesman Shane Scanlon blamed Jacobs for the altercation, saying that he “entered the office without permission, aggressively shoved a recorder in Greg’s face, and began asking badgering questions”.

“Jacobs was asked to leave,” the statement reads. “After asking Jacobs to lower the recorder, Jacobs declined. Greg then attempted to grab the phone that was pushed in his face. Jacobs grabbed Greg’s wrist, and spun away from Greg, pushing them both to the ground.

“It’s unfortunate that this aggressive behavior from a liberal journalist created this scene at our campaign volunteer BBQ.”

This is what happened next: Body-slamming a reporter just made Greg Gianforte a whole lot of money:

Montana Republican Greg Gianforte’s congressional campaign has raised $100,000 and counting in the hours since he allegedly “body-slammed” Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs.

And this is how it ended:

Republican businessman Greg Gianforte won Montana’s sole House district in a special election Thursday, keeping a seat in Republican hands despite facing assault charges for allegedly attacking a reporter who’d asked him about the GOP’s health-care bill.In his victory speech, Gianforte admitted to the attack and apologized for it.“I shouldn’t have treated that reporter that way,” he told supporters at his rally here.

No doubt about it, you shouldn’t get into a fight with journalists however obnoxious they are. But all the same, if the media are going to tell the story, a bit of context might go a long way. And if you want to see just how deceptive the slag media in the US tells the story, this is from CNN: What Donald Trump did Thursday night in Montana is really dangerous.

Sins of commission and omission the standard operating procedure.

NPC

Posted on October 18, 2018 by lawofmarkets

From the New York Times: What Is NPC, the Pro-Trump Internet’s New Favorite Insult? Excerpts:

NPC means “nonplayable character” or “nonplayer character.” It’s a term, borrowed from the world of video games, for a character that is controlled by the computer rather than by a player. An NPC often advances the game’s plot by saying scripted lines, or assisting the playable characters in some way….

It’s a long story, but the short version is that a group of young, extremely pro-Trump internet trolls have spent the past several years mocking anti-Trump people as whiny, easily triggered snowflakes who are primarily motivated by social acceptance rather than by logic and critical thinking….

Late last week, a group of users on r/the_donald, Reddit’s largest pro-Trump forum, decided to take the NPC meme to a wider audience. They created dozens of Twitter accounts using fictional NPC personalities, the NPC Wojak avatar and bios like “fighting against Nazi Racist Drumpf Fascist Cheetofinger.” They used these accounts to follow and tweet at one another, as well as at liberals, creating the semblance of an army of resisters mindlessly repeating anti-Trump talking points….

The campaign began as a joke. But a few of the accounts started posting misleading information about the midterm elections, including encouraging liberals to vote on Nov. 7. (Election Day is Nov. 6.)

Evidence suggests that these are mostly just attention-starved gamers looking to impress one another by “triggering the libs” with edgy memes. But not everyone gets the joke. State officials are already worried that voters will be fooled by deliberate social media campaigns that contain incorrect voting information. Similar types of disinformation spread on social media in 2016, which makes companies like Twitter nervous….

Twitter has therefore barred hundreds of right-wing accounts for posing as soulless, “nonplayable” liberal activists.

Apparently there were 1500 of them.

And now this video explains it even more clearly:

AND NOW HERE’S SOME MORE:

PDT’s 60 Minutes Interview

Posted on October 16, 2018 by lawofmarkets

Apparently now deleted by CBS but here it is all the same.

The Interviewer thought she had his number, that she would take him apart. But she is dealing with the absolutely best, most articulate president possibly in history. A masterclass, as is every public presentation he gives.

And more than anything else, he demonstrates that the American media is almost entirely corrupt. “Angry, bitter and partisan” is almost perfect as a descriptor of the media people he has to deal with.

UPDATE: Transcript and some parts of the video if you cannot get sufficient volume on the link above. Sorry about that.

A Kavanaugh post mortem

Posted on October 7, 2018 by lawofmarkets

As I began to think about Kavanaugh’s confirmation, my first thoughts were along the lines of there was once a time we could agree on many things, but most importantly we could agree on the processes by which we sorted out our differences. But if even the process of working and living together are gone, what really is left?

Yet the process did work. But in working it further exposed the raw timber of a corrupt media and political class. The system tilts not just left, but crazy left. It is no longer a case where there is overlap between the two sides. On the right, there is common sense and a continuity with our own past. On the left, there is a mad socialism, the identity politics of victimisation, and via migration and other policies of that kind, a clear desire to throw overboard all that has made Western Civilisation what it is.

Donald Trump is either a turning point, or a last ditch effort to save our way of life before the deluge. I am pleased to see Kavanaugh confirmed, but it is only a minor skirmish amid much larger issues. The best recap of what has gone on is from Conrad BlacK: Trump the Indestructible. A headline writer’s view of what he said, and it was published by the #NeverTrump National Review.

If Judge Kavanaugh is confirmed and the Republicans hold both houses of the Congress, it will be the greatest and swiftest ascension to comprehensive power in all branches of American government in history. A measurement of how the tide has shifted is the disappearance from public consciousness of the Mueller inquiry. The number of Trump-haters who are still clinging to that waterlogged life-vest is statistically trivial. It was just six weeks ago, when Michael Cohen’s plea bargain was announced and Paul Manafort was convicted (of offenses that occurred a decade before he knew the president), that Trump’s enemies ululated their triumph and proclaimed, in the words of one often-published Trump-hater, that “The fat lady is singing; it’s almost over.” She wasn’t and it isn’t. It has only just begun, and it will get better. Trump isn’t an aberrant interlude; he is a sea change. He has a mandate to clean up Washington and he plans to fulfill it.

Hope so. I nevertheless remain pessimistic for the long term. But there is Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court, and there behind him is PDT, so hope does remain.

INSTAPUNDIT UPDATE: And I certainly agree with both.

OCTOBER 6, 2018

(1) THE DEVIL WENT DOWN TO D.C.:

18Posted at 11:15 pm by Glenn Reynolds

(2) NARRATOR VOICE: YES. YES THEY ARE. Stephen Colbert Writer Brags That “We Ruined Brett Kavanaugh’s Life.” Is CBS Proud of Ariel Dumas?

As Glenn has tweeted, “Trump’s greatest gift is getting various institutions to make clear in obvious ways that they’re as corrupt as he says they are.”

54Posted at 11:01 pm by Ed Driscoll

A political horror story

Posted on October 6, 2018 by lawofmarkets

From The Oz: Brexit is diverting attention from Jeremy Corbyn’s red flag radicalism. And do not for a second think this might not happen here.

Jeremy Corbyn vowed to reverse Thatcherism at last month’s British Labour conference in Liverpool. Picture: AFP

By BOB CARR
12:00AM OCTOBER 6, 2018
60 COMMENTS

If next year Jeremy Corbyn becomes prime minister of Britain, this political figure, hitherto dwelling in the margins of politics, becomes a world historical figure.

Historic figure? After being in politics for 35 years and serving on the frontbench only when he became leader? But how else to view it? Corbyn is proposing the reversal of Thatcherism, the 1980s program of privatisation and union-busting implemented under the Iron Lady’s leadership, and thought by all to be irreversible.

One columnist has branded Corbyn’s program an “unapologetic onslaught on the crumbling neoliberal order”. He should have added, “And not just in Britain.” If Corbyn wins and starts peeling Thatcherism from the statutes, he will provide an irresistible model for other European centre-left parties being devoured by right-wing nationalists.

Given this, it’s surprising the reaction to his speech to the British Labour Party conference on September 26 was so muted. Here he was proposing the renationalisation of water, rail and the Royal Mail; a tax on second homes to fund expansion of public housing; board-level representation of employees; and pulling 65 per cent of workers under 25 on to a guaranteed minimum wage. Most radically, his government would appropriate 10 per cent of every company’s shareholdings on behalf of employees and the state. Plus grant free childcare.

In 1983, the last time the Left controlled British Labour, MP Gerald Kaufman branded its explicitly socialist manifesto “the longest suicide note in history”. It helped Margaret Thatcher consign Labour to 27.6 per cent of the vote in her 1983 landslide.

Right now, however, the red flag radicalism is escaping attention because the debate over Brexit is sucking the air out of British politics. But there is another factor: a striking shift in opinion. Fear of nationalisation and chaotic economic management were, until Tony Blair, well-tested rallying cries against Labour. No more. Expanding the state is popular. Two-thirds of the electorate wants railways back in public ownership. Only 17 per cent of the electorate think capitalism is working for them. Voters born after Thatcher are Corbyn’s strongest supporters.

Perjury traps

Posted on October 4, 2018 by lawofmarkets

The Fake Perjury Claims Against Kavanaugh Show Why Trump Won’t Talk To Mueller. The central point:

The alacrity with which the Kavanaugh story went from being about attempted rape to alleged perjury was surely not lost on him. For more than a year now, pressure has mounted for him to make himself available to the Robert Mueller probe into Russian interference in the election. His attorneys, most notably Rudy Giuliani, have again and again asserted that they will not allow the president to take part in a perjury trap.

While most on the left have laughed this off, and suggested that if the president just tells the truth he has nothing to worry about, what happened to Kavanaugh is incontrovertible evidence that such a position is stuff and nonsense. It is absolutely clear that Democrats and many in the media latched onto laughable examples of supposed lying under oath and ran with them until they ran out of gas. Can there be any doubt that the exact same thing would happen were Trump to testify without limitations to Mueller?

If Mueller asked Trump whether he has ever done drugs and Trump said no, does anyone think it’s unlikely that two people could come forward saying they saw him blowing lines at Studio 54? If questions about business dealings emerge, can we doubt that Democrats and their media allies would be pulling out shovels digging for anyone, regardless of how credible that could cast doubt on his claims?

Meanwhile, Christine Blasey Ford should go to jail for the barefaced lies she told. If this was a perjury trap, she sprung the trap herself.

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