Please note that you can leave a comment on any of our posts at our Facebook page.  Subscribers can also comment at length at our Angel's Corner Forum.

Our Angel's Corner archive is here.

I appeared on Silvio Canto Jr's talk show from Dallas yesterday.  It's here.

MAY 8,  2017

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 9:16 P.M. ET: 

OH PLEASE! – FROM AP:  Neither Bill Clinton nor James Patterson has ever tried something like this before.  The former president and the best-selling novelist are collaborating on a thriller, "The President is Missing," to come out June 2018 as an unusual joint release from rival publishers — Alfred A. Knopf and Little, Brown and Co. In a statement Monday provided to The Associated Press, the publishers called the book "a unique amalgam of intrigue, suspense and behind-the-scenes global drama from the highest corridors of power. It will be informed by details that only a president can know."  Knopf has long been Clinton's publisher, and Patterson has been with Little, Brown for decades. "The President is Missing" is the first work of fiction by Clinton, whose best-known book is the million-selling "My Life." For Patterson, it's the chance to team up with a friend who knows as well as anyone about life in the White House.  Actually, it's a good idea.  Clinton can instruct Patterson on how you get away with a lot of very bad stuff, including lying under oath.  I can't wait.

HUGE – FROM BLOOMBERG:  Sinclair Broadcast Group Inc. is buying Tribune Media Co. for about $3.9 billion, a deal made possible after the U.S. Federal Communications Commission voted last month to ease a limit on TV-station ownership in the U.S.  Sinclair will pay $43.50 a share to gain Tribune TV stations in big media markets like New York, Chicago and Miami, strengthening its hand in negotiations with pay-TV distributors and major broadcast networks like 21st Century Fox Inc.  The marriage of Sinclair and Tribune, two of the largest local TV station owners in the U.S., creates a U.S. broadcasting behemoth to face down online competitors vying for a piece of the local advertising pie.  We've watched Sinclair become a major factor in broadcasting.  One of their on-air stars is the great Sharyl Attkisson, the former CBS reporter who refused to go along with the mainstream media's party line, and now reports independently.  We hope this move boosts her.

NEW SCARE IN FRANCE – FROM AP:  Police poured into Paris' Gare du Nord station late Monday, evacuating passengers from platforms and sealing off the area for several hours in a new security scare to hit the French capital.  Paris police spokeswoman Johanna Primevert told The Associated Press that the operation was aimed at "removing doubt" and ended with no arrests, but she would not say what prompted it. A station employee said the operation focused on a train from Valenciennes in northern France.  The busy station is the terminus of a large suburban and national rail network as well as Eurostar trains from London.
France is under a state of emergency imposed after a series of Islamic extremist attacks. The operation came the day after a tense and closely watched presidential election that was won by independent Emmanuel Macron, who has said one of his top priorities will be ensuring France's security.  Police started pouring into the station just after 11 p.m. and asked where the train from Valenciennes was, according to a station employee, who was not authorized to be publicly named. Station staff directed officers to platform 10, where they were quickly joined by more and more police. Within minutes, authorities began evacuating the entire station, the employee said.  France is on edge, and will remain so.  For whatever reason, it is a main focus of terrorist attacks, as it was in the 1980s.

May 8, 2017       Permalink

BACK TO COURT – AT 10:33 A.M. ET:  The president's travel ban directive, frozen by unfriendly court decisions, is going back to court.  From Fox: 

President Trump's revision of his controversial executive order imposing a travel and refugee ban on certain countries will get an important legal test on Monday, when a federal appeals court in Virginia weighs whether the administration overstepped its authority.

At issue is whether the ban violates the Religion Clause of the First Amendment, the Due Process Clause of the Fifth and 14th Amendments, and the ban on nationality discrimination in the issuance of immigrant visas contained in a 65-year-old congressional law.

The case will be a major test of presidential power, especially in the area of immigration.
The White House frames the issue as a temporary move involving national security. A coalition of groups in opposition call the order blatant religious discrimination, since the six countries involved have mostly Muslim populations: Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen.

Nearly all of the 15 full-time judges on the Richmond-based 4th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals are expected to hear the case in a public oral argument, a move to expedite the issue eventually to the Supreme Court in coming months for final review. Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson, a conservative on bench, is expected to recuse since his son-in-law will be arguing the case for the Trump Justice Department. A majority of the active bench were nominated by Democratic presidents.

COMMENT:  No way to predict this.  Trump's orders have been blocked by the San Francisco-based Ninth Circuit, the darling circuit of the liberals.  Fourth Circuit, despite the number of Democratic appointees, should be more reasonable.  We should get some sense of the Court's leanings by the questions the judges ask.

May 8, 2017       Permalink

SMALL BUSINESS VS. OBAMACARE – AT 9:38 A.M. ET:   The Dems never much liked small- business people.  You know, not big enough to make major campaign contributions, entrepreneurial, independent, champions of free enterprise.  Yuch!  Who needs people like that?  Deplorables!

Yeah, but we have a lot of fantastic small-business people in America.  They are the rock of our local economies, the people we know.  And they don't like Obamacare.  Their opposition is a powerful political force in the current health-care debate.  From CNBC:   

Across America many small-business owners are cheering at the GOP win on repealing and replacing Obamacare. After years of debate, the House voted Thursday to repeal key parts of the Affordable Care Act and replace them with new provisions that change the way the federal government funds purchases of individual health plans and Medicaid.

Health care has become an ongoing source of pain for many small-business owners. It was the top issue owners wanted Trump to address in a survey of 700 owners and prospective buyers in late February by BizBuy Sell, a marketplace for small businesses.

Among respondents, 60 percent favored an ACA repeal. The major reason: spiraling health insurance premiums — often a result of insurance companies fleeing the marketplace.

It is a trend affecting business owners in all states. Ross Coulter, 49, and his wife, who run a two-person public relations firm in Dallas, have been hunting for a new health insurance plan after Humana notified them it was discontinuing their current one. They had no immediate plans to slow their search after the House vote. They are looking for an affordable replacement by July 1 for the high-deductible plan, for which premiums are $900 a month for the couple and their three children.

COMMENT:  We need more stories like this from the media to show the disaster that Obamacare is.  Really, it's a scam. 

The House-passed Republican health bill now goes to the Senate, where it will be sliced up and rewarmed.  Negotiations with the House will then take place.  The GOP is on the line.  It must come up with a final bill that will pass both houses.  Trump will sign.

May 8, 2017       Permalink

THE BATTLE LINES ARE BEING DRAWN – AT 9:09 A.M. ET:  Obama is back, and is now honored by the Kennedys.  There is method to the madness.  From the New York Post: 

BOSTON — Former President Barack Obama returned to the spotlight Sunday to accept an award for political courage from the John F. Kennedy family, days after House Republicans won passage of a bill dismantling much of his signature health care law.

The Democrat has made few public appearances since leaving office in January, and has avoided mention of his Republican successor in the White House, even as President Donald Trump has criticized the previous administration numerous times while moving to undo many of Obama’s initiatives.

Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama arrived at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum for a dinner and ceremony to accept the annual Profile in Courage award, named for a 1957 Pulitzer Prize-winning book by Kennedy that profiled eight U.S. senators who risked their careers by taking principled though unpopular positions.

Among the long line of guests who made their way down the red carpet into the library for the event Sunday night were members of the Kennedy family, members of Congress, former Obama staffers and celebrities including former late-night talk show host David Letterman.

COMMENT:  Oh, another one who's back, and already planning political activities, is Hillary Clinton.  There is no love lost between the Clintons and the Obamas, or between the Clintons and the Kennedys.  Recall that it was Ted Kennedy's endorsement of Obama in the 2008 presidential primaries that put Obama firmly on the road to defeating Clinton for the nomination.  It was a deep wound, for President Clinton tried to pattern himself after Jack Kennedy. 

There are rumors that Caroline Kennedy, just back from an Obama-appointed stint as ambassador to Japan, might try to run for office in New York.  There are rumors that Hillary will make another White House run, and that daughter Chelsea might try to find a receptive congressional district, also in New York.  The Kennedys have unveiled Caroline's son, Jack, President Kennedy's non-look-alike grandson, presumably also headed for politics.  The legend of the Hatfields and the McCoys comes to mind.   The Kennedys vs. the Clintons, with Obama giving weight to the former.

A good novel, soon to be a Ken Burns documentary.

May 8,  2017     Permalink

MAY 7,  2017

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:56 P.M. ET: 

MACRON WINS IN FRANCE – FROM FOX:  Emmanuel Macron, the centrist and political newcomer, defeated far-right candidate Marine Le Pen Sunday to win the French presidential election.  With all votes counted, the passionately pro-European Union Macron had garnered 66 percent of the vote to just 34 percent for Le Pen, who had promised a “Frexit” referendum should she win the election.  At a victory party outside the Louvre Museum in Paris, Macron supporters roared with delight at the news, waving red, white and blue tricolor flags. The jubilant crowd swelled to thousands as the night wore on.  "A new page in our long history is opening tonight. I want it to be one of hope and renewed confidence," Macron said. The 39-year-old investment banker became the youngest president in the 59-year-history of the French Fifth Republic with his victory.  He's young, he's good-looking, he married his teacher.  In other words, he's French.  Now let's see what he can do to revive a France that has become a welfare state, and one saddled with new immigrants who refuse to assimilate.

AN ASSAULT ON THE ROYAL HOUSE - FROM THE DAILY MAIL:  The BBC was last night accused of inflicting ‘deliberate pain’ on Prince Harry by dredging up an unfounded slur that he is not Prince Charles’s son.  The outrageous and discredited insinuation that Princess Diana’s lover James Hewitt is his father is repeated in the controversial BBC2 drama King Charles III, to be screened this week. The timing is especially cruel so close to the 20th anniversary of Diana’s death, and those close to the Royal Family say the hurtful claims should never have been included in a BBC programme.  Diana’s closest confidante, Rosa Monckton, said: ‘The BBC is deliberately causing pain to a real living person in a salacious fashion. Prince Harry was 12 when his mother died and she is no longer around to reassure him. I don’t think this is why millions pay their licence fee.’  The Brits, too, have their problems with sleazy TV, but those wonderful accents save them.

NEWT EXAMINES LATE-NIGHT COMEDIANS – FROM DAILY CALLER:   Newt Gingrich identified a major problem with late-night comedians, asserting that they are too angry with President Trump to be funny.  “Fox News Sunday” host Chris Wallace showed his panel, which included the former Speaker of the House, a clip of Jimmy Kimmel’s monologue about health care and Stephen Colbert’s arguably homophobic comments about Trump.  Gingrich was seemingly not amused.  “The problem you have with humor in America today is that Hollywood is so enraged at Donald Trump that they can’t be funny,” Gingrich responded. “All they’ve got is pure anger.”  “They think it must be funny because they’re called comedians, so they exhibit their anger almost as a pathology on late-night television, and you’re supposed to laugh because after all they’re comedians,” he ranted.   And I think Newt has nailed it. 

May 7, 2017       Permalink

REPLY TO HILLARY – AT 1:31 P.M. ET:  Piers Morgan, the British journalist who didn't quite make it with a CNN talk show here, now writes a fine column for London's Daily Mail.   In a superb piece, Morgan destroys Hillary Clinton's excuses for losing the election.  He holds nothing back:

Hillary Clinton is on her loser tour.

It’s been going on for a few months now, and it follows a familiar theme: she gives defiant speeches or interviews to empathetic audiences in which she makes it very clear there are myriad reasons why she lost the US election – but absolutely none of them has anything to do with her.

Tuesday, speaking at a ‘Women for Women’ event in New York, Hillary reached dizzying new heights of self-delusion as she tried to explain away the most humiliating loss in American political history.

‘I take absolute personal responsibility,’ she said, and then proceeded to do the complete opposite.

1) It was the Russians’ fault.  Vladimir Putin hates her, she insisted, because she said one of his Russian presidential elections was rigged, so he was determined to wreak revenge by rigging THIS election so she would lose.

She categorised this as ‘unprecedented interference, including from a foreign power whose leader is not a member of my fan club.’

No matter that there remains no hard evidence proving Putin rigged anything, let alone that he did it with Trump’s help, which is another of Hillary’s wild, unsubstantiated claims.

2) It was FBI director James Comey’s fault.  His decision to publicly re-open the investigation into her notorious emails a week before the election swung it Trump’s way. ‘I was on the way to winning,’ she whined. ‘Until a combination of Jim Comey’s letter and Russian Wikileaks raised doubts in the minds of people who were inclined to vote for me but got scared off.’

Hmm, perhaps they were scared off by the fact that someone they already deeply distrusted after decades of dodgy behaviour set up a secret private email server while Secretary of State, a massive and inexcusable breach of protocol. And that she deleted 33,000 emails before investigators could see them. And that the server was linked to Anthony ‘I’ll show you my weiner’ Weiner, the predatory sex-mad husband of her right hand woman Huma Abedin and about as big a security risk imaginable.

COMMENT:  There's much more.  Please read the whole thing.  This is the best summary of the case against Hillary that I've read.  It's timely, as she's now plunging back into politics, perhaps to run again in 2020, or maybe just to settle in as Queen Mother.

May 7, 2017       Permalink

TEMPER TANTRUM – AT 1:14 P.M. ET:  Just a sample of what's coming out of North Korea these days.  It is unrelenting, and its own people are reading this stuff.  From Britain's Sun: 

NORTH Korea has threatened to nuke the White House and reduce it to ashes as Kim Jong-un’s regime bragged the days of the US are now “over”.

In a punchy editorial published by the state media agency KNCA, Pyongyang slammed President Donald Trump’s decision to dispatch its naval fleet to the Korean Peninsula.

And it went on to vow it will be victorious over an enemy made up of “murderous ogres”, “robbers”, “air pirates” and “warriors who master the occult arts”, reports the Express.

And I thought "couch potato" was a serious curse.

North Korea’s military commander said the White House would be “reduced to ashes”, as the editorial claimed the US was planning to destroy Pyongyang.

The editorial read: “This is a stern warning to the US imperialists and their stooges running amuck for aggression and war moves.

“The world will clearly witness how the crime-woven history of the US imperialists will be over, how the despicable remaining days of the South Korean puppet forces will come to an end and how national reunification, the cherished desire of the Korean nation, will be achieved.”

And...

North Korea also accused the US of being a “hotbed of evil” which needed to be hit with an “indiscriminate preemptive nuclear strike” to transform the superpower into “something that cannot come back to life again”.

Earlier this week, a top security expert warned North Korea could carry out a horror attack on the US by hiding a huge nuclear bomb inside a shipping container.

COMMENT:  Some will dimiss the above as overheated rhetoric, but I would take it seriously.  The North Korean regime feeds this to its people all the time.  They get nothing else.  And North Korea has not stepped back from its nuclear or missile programs.  This is still our biggest national-security threat, at least for now.

May 7, 2017       Permalink

THE FRENCH ARE VOTING – AT 11:47 A.M. ET:  And already there are comparisons with our last election because there's been a big computer hack of one of the candidates.   Frankly, I don't see much of a comparison beyond that.  From Reuters: 

French voters were choosing on Sunday between a young, pro-European Union centrist and a eurosceptic, anti-immigration far-rightist for their next president, with official figures and estimates indicating a low turnout.

Opinion polls predicted that the 39-year-old former economy minister Emmanuel Macron would win the five-year presidency, seeing off the National Front's Marine Le Pen after an election campaign full of scandal and upsets.

Voting was not due to end until 8 p.m. (1800 GMT), but Belgian media published what they said were surveys taken on Sunday by four unnamed pollsters among people who had voted or intended to vote.

The Belgian public broadcaster RTBF said the surveys put Macron's share of the vote at between 62 and 67 percent.

The information could not be verified by Reuters. Pollsters are not allowed to publish election-day surveys in France before voting closes.

But the reported surveys were broadly in line with the last opinion polls on Friday, and pre-election surveys proved accurate for the tight first round between 11 candidates last month.

COMMENT:  Trump has said some nice things about Le Pen.  Barack Obama has essentially endorsed Macron.  Both should have shut up. 

I'd be shocked if Macron didn't win.  Results later today.

May 7,  2017     Permalink