In the fading hours of arguably the worst administration since Herbert Hoover, Joe Biden's Social Security Commissioner, former Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley signed a five-year contract with the American Federation of Government Employees guaranteeing continued work-from-home, or telework, for up to four days per week for the agency's workers. //

This points to two major problems in the federal workforce. First, the idea that a union should represent federal employees is ridiculous. The whole thing is a gift. That's a subject for a different day. The second problem is that telework and its abuse are the norm, and there is no doubt it cheats taxpayers out of money and services. //

While the reporter for GovExec claims SSA has a "1.3%" telework rate, in terms of numbers, that would mean only 780 people of SSA's 60,000 employees work from home. If that was the case, then it hardly seems like something that AFGE would make a big deal about. The truth is probably much worse. Ernst's investigation found a space utilization rate of just 7% at the SSA headquarters campus; see page 3. The union claimed that work-from-home was all that was holding back a cascade of resignations and retirements. //

There are several areas of waste, fraud, and abuse at work here. The one most overlooked is the cost of leasing and operating massive buildings that only have, on average, a 12% utilization rate. And then there is the flagrant abuse of a privilege.

There is an objective approach that DOGE could apply that would substantially reduce the footprint of the federal government called CPI-X: A Novel Method to Decrease Spending and the National Debt.

In short, CPI-X (CPI minus X) would tether federal spending to the Consumer Price Index (CPI), using the CPI as a baseline, and accomplishing actual spending cuts via the “X” in the equation. The X-factors in CPI-X are derived from benchmarking the spending of the U.S. federal government, states, and other countries along 10 basic policy areas, such as defense, health, education, etc.

CPI-X was originally developed in the early 1980s and used to reduce spending under UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s privatization plan. In the 1990s, it was also utilized in Australia to regulate the pricing of public utilities. In both instances, CPI-X was successful.

Revolutionary reform concerning how the U.S. government functions and spends taxpayer dollars is long overdue. //

For instance, did you know the federal government does not even know precisely how many agencies and departments currently exist? According to the National Archives, the number stands at 435, whereas the Office of Personnel Management lists 646. //

C-K
3 hours ago edited
I was in the Federal government or a contractor for 23 of my 40 working years. The biggest problem I saw was an agency has to spend all the money it was allocated in a fiscal year otherwise their budget would be cut by the amount of underspend the next year. When large pieces of capitol equipment needs replacing or facilities need to be built or renovated, a separate appropriation over and above the annual operating budget must be approved.

Why not change the laws to allow agencies to “bank” underspend for X number of years in interest bearing instruments? This accumulated underspend plus interest could then be used to help offset future capitol expenditures.

Agencies having to spend all their allocated funds in one fiscal year is insane and leads to wasteful spending. //

Vahn Geo
3 hours ago
This is a smoke and mirrors plan. And its bullshit. A chainsaw and an axe are what is required. Period. //

S'Naut Right
3 hours ago
Formulaic paths to cuts are rife with opportunities for finagling. I dont like this idea, at all. Just straight with the broad axe, please. //

anon-umsv
4 hours ago
This is just another over-thought proposal of incrementalism along the same vein as the ridiculous Penny Plan. Slowly attempt to starve the swamp over 20 years to bring the budget down to $6 TRILLION, while the country is suffering from government bloat. No, Trump only has four years. He needs to ruthlessly attack the beast. Fight! Fight! Fight! //

surfcat50
4 hours ago
This would be a great idea IN ADDITION TO using the chainsaw during Trump’s term. ///

Also switch from baseline budgeting to zero based budgeting. Don't start with last year's budget, start from zero and justify each line item.

There are a lot of ways the government can overreach, but I've always considered its ability to worm its fingers into controlling how parents raise their children to be the most despotic of all, and it's still an issue that's happening today.

I think many people pardon this intrusion because it's based on care for the children, which you'll find this is an excuse used by a lot of authoritarians to pass off their control-focused legislation with.

But the brutal truth is that this kind of "care" isn't care at all. It rips apart families on the basis that the government can do a better job parenting your children than you can. It's a signal to Americans that the government has more authority over your child than you do, and that it will wield that authority if you give them any flimsy excuse.

I can't help but wonder how many parents keep their children locked up in America and under constant supervision, not because they're terrified they might come to harm or be kidnapped, but because the state will come down on them after one phone call from a nosy Karen. I have a very strong feeling that America isn't a country of helicopter parents, it's just filled with parents unwilling to risk being taken from their kids.

What kind of free country are we living in, if that's our mentality?

And what does this do to our children? Nothing good. //

Not that there hasn't been state-level pushback. To be fair, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Colorado, and others have been passing laws over the past five years that protect parents who let their kids roam.

My advice? Familiarize yourself with your state's laws, and if they're too tight, make it clear they need to be loosened. Make it a big deal. Get your friends and family involved. Get your neighbors to raise a stink about it.

First, one (mis)attributed to Solzhenitsyn:

They are lying. We know they are lying. They know we know they are lying. Yet, they are still lying.

Next, one (correctly) attributed to Theodore Dalrymple (Anthony Daniels):

When people are forced to remain silent when they are being told the most obvious lies, or even worse when they are forced to repeat the lies themselves, they lose once and for all their sense of probity. To assent to obvious lies is in some small way to become evil oneself. One’s standing to resist anything is thus eroded, and even destroyed. A society of emasculated liars is easy to control.

Zman makes the interesting and controversial point that endemic lying is an inevitable feature of democracy:

In a world where the standard is public opinion, winning public opinion is what matters most. In fact, it must count for more than the truth, as the public often accepts as true things that turn out to be false. If the goal is to win the crowd, then playing to their deeply held misconceptions is just as good, if not better, than disabusing them of those misconceptions.
…
Like the Athenians, we have embraced the democratic spirit to the point where factual reality is just one tool in the toolkit of persuasion that may or may not be used by the successful. The modern sophist is untethered from the truth, both spiritually and emotionally, because the only thing that matters is tricking some portion of the public.

Whether or not his thesis is correct, the trajectory is accurately delineated and the West appears to have arrived at the endpoint he describes.

The House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic released its final report Monday, making numerous findings that would have gotten people deplatformed four - or even three - short years ago, and some of the points upon which there was bipartisan consensus will rock the minds of the Covidian cult.

Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-OH), a physician, chaired the committee.

Entitled “After Action Review of the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Lessons Learned and a Path Forward," the report begins with Wenstrup outlining those points of bipartisan consensus:

1. The possibility that the COVID-19 virus emerged because of a laboratory or research related accident is not a conspiracy theory.
2. EcoHealth Alliance, Inc., and Dr. Peter Daszak should never again receive U.S. taxpayer dollars.
3. Scientific messaging must be clear and concise, backed by evidentiary support, and come from trusted messengers, such as front-line doctors treating patients.
4. Public health officials must work to regain Americans' trust; Americans want to be educated, not indoctrinated.
5. Former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo engaged in medical malpractice and publicly covered up the total number of nursing home fatalities in New York.

According to Wenstrup, the committee also made numerous findings, including (but not limited to):

1. The U.S. National Institutes of Health funded gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
2. The Chinese government, agencies within the U.S. Government, and some members of the international scientific community sought to cover-up facts concerning the origins of the pandemic.
3. Operation Warp Speed was a tremendous success and a model to build upon in the future. The vaccines, which are now probably better characterized as therapeutics, undoubtedly saved millions of lives by diminishing likelihood of severe disease and death. //

Contrary to what was promised, the COVID-19 vaccine did not stop the spread or transmission of the virus.

Vaccine mandates trampled individual freedoms and harmed military readiness.

And, most importantly, the committee found that "a lab-related incident involving dangerous gain-of-function research in China is the most likely origin of the COVID-19 pandemic." //

TXavatar
11 hours ago edited
I work in clinical drug trials and the key words missing from the discussion is "informed consent" which is the moral and legal bedrock of all medical treatments. With such a limited time to test, the drugs were not vaccines but rather experimental treatments and given liability exemption as a result. That could have been acceptable if presented as such to the concerned populace. However, when they were falsely promoted as vaccines and the population was coerced/mandated in to receiving them, "informed" and "consent" was thrown out the window.

“There have been no squirrel to human rabies transmission ever documented in this country,” said Rensimer, a Texas infectious disease specialist who has been studying rabies for decades.

“I can’t imagine, frankly, what their thinking was, if they knew anything about this area,” he added.

The social-media famous pet squirrel and Fred — a young raccoon kit being nursed back to strength — were euthanized by the Department of Environmental Conservation in October just hours after they were seized from the upstate home of caretaker Mark Longo, who runs an animal sanctuary on his property. //

“Some animals almost never get rabies,” the New York Department of Health states on its rabies fact sheet — specifically naming “small rodents such as squirrels” as only ever catching it under “rare circumstances.”

And while raccoons are generally agreed to be more prevalent carriers, the actual number of confirmed cases appears to be extremely low, according to data collected by New York state. There were just 35 lab-confirmed cases of rabies in raccoons in the 17 years since records were first kept in 2007, the data show. //

While the exact timeline for rabies infections in raccoons and squirrels is not entirely known, Rensimer said similarly sized animals like cats, dogs, and ferrets will almost always show symptoms within 10 days.

As Fred had been in Longo’s care for well more than 10 days, and P’Nut had been living with him for seven years — facts readily available due to Longo’s widely viewed social media — there was ample evidence to suggest the animals were rabies-free. //

And even if the DEC agent was especially worried about rabies — which is typically fatal in humans once it reaches the brain — Rensimer said a bite to the hand from an infected animal would take about 45 days or longer to transmit to the brain. //

Test results later showed that neither P’Nut nor Fred had rabies.

The DEC did not respond to request for comment on the agency’s employee immunization practices, and have still not provided any documentation that P’Nut bit anyone during the raid.

But all of the DEC’s explanations about squirrel bites and rabies fears were cast into doubt after The Post reported officials were plotting to euthanize P’Nut and Fred at least seven days before the supposed bite — and P’Nut’s caretaker has now filed claim to sue the state to find some answers.

No one on the left liked the idea of Javier Milei winning in Argentina, especially The Economist.

The publication has changed its tune since Milei, who has been president for a year, has elevated Argentina with his libertarian ways.

Gee, maybe, just maybe, people should listen to us libertarians. //

Yes. Milei is a true libertarian who has embraced small government, free markets, and Austrian economics. That is why Milei is the only politician I genuinely adore and support. I cannot believe I am agreeing with The Economist:

The left detests him and the Trumpian right embraces him, but he truly belongs to neither group. He has shown that the continual expansion of the state is not inevitable. And he is a principled rebuke to opportunistic populism, of the sort practised by Donald Trump. Mr Milei believes in free trade and free markets, not protectionism; fiscal discipline, not reckless borrowing; and, instead of spinning popular fantasies, brutal public truth-telling.

—

What is fascinating is the philosophy behind the figures. Mr Milei is often wrongly lumped in with populist leaders such as Mr Trump, the hard right in France and Germany or Viktor Orban in Hungary. In fact he comes from a different tradition. A true believer in open markets and individual liberty, he has a quasi-religious zeal for economic freedom, a hatred of socialism and, as he told us in an interview this week, “infinite” contempt for the state. Instead of industrial policy and tariffs, he promotes trade with private firms that do not interfere in Argentina’s domestic affairs, including Chinese ones. He is a small-state Republican who admires Margaret Thatcher—a messianic example of an endangered species. His poll ratings are rising and, at this point in his term, he is more popular in Argentina than his recent predecessors were.

Milei practices what he preaches. //

Tiki | November 30, 2024 at 6:48 pm
Funny how the economist doesn’t mention how Kirchnerism (crony socialism) ruined Argentina.

There’s gonna be a major US-Argentine trade pact. Musk will be siting his southern hemisphere IT hub there. Watch to see who gets picked to be ambassador.

The Europeans/Internationalists want to lock us out of Brazil and SA, but Milei/Musk will to lock them out of SA tech.

Milei is powering an industrial renaissance via a deregulated oil industry.

Milei didn’t fall into the IMF trap.

Bernie Sanders
@SenSanders
·
Follow
Elon Musk is right.

The Pentagon, with a budget of $886 billion, just failed its 7th audit in a row. It’s lost track of billions.

Last year, only 13 senators voted against the Military Industrial Complex and a defense budget full of waste and fraud.

That must change.
12:07 PM · Dec 1, 2024. //

Elon Musk

@elonmusk
·
Follow
Gonna happen 😂
ALEX

@ajtourville
The IRS getting audited by the @DOGE
Embedded video
10:51 AM · Nov 27, 2024

Listen, I think you should have the Biden administration look at itself. What is the qualification of Tony Blinken to become secretary of state? Well, he organized 51 so-called intelligence experts to put together a fake letter saying that the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation. That must have qualified him to be secretary of state. President Trump is entitled to name his appointees. That is exactly what he's doing, and I'm going to support this appointment. Kash has worked at national security. He's worked at the Department of Justice, and he's somebody that has been willing to uncover the wrongs at the FBI. He's the one that uncovered for the American public what happened with Russia-gate. He's the one that can see through the fix here. //

Chelan Jim Random US Citizen
5 hours ago
I think the Republicans have always been acutely aware of the leftist bias of the media but they did not feel they dare tackle it if they wanted to avoid crossfire and stay in office. Now that a majority of the population recognize this bias exist, the politicians are more immune to the the influence media has.

I have always said, the reason Republicans lose races are often because they are honest. The left has always been dishonest and the media gives them cover. So I don't fault the Republicans that know they could have been ruined by the media if the media decides they are a target.

Some may say the Republicans are cowards. Well, I live in a state that we can't seem to elect a Republican to save our soul in a statewide election. I almost wish a few of them would just not be so obvious about all of their views until they get elected. It is all in the perspectives you have. //

anon-skk0
4 hours ago
Biden appointed his team to play defense. Trumps picks are going to play offense. //

Largo Patriot
4 hours ago
One of the criticisms of Patel is he is not an FBI agent who came up through the ranks, but neither did James Comey and Christopher Wray. The problem with the FBI is an internal one, which is why an outsider is needed to clean it up. The FBI Director's first duty is to the American people, not his fellow FBI agents, and the "we investigated ourselves and determined we did nothing wrong" is not working for the American people, especially those who find themselves staring down the barrel of a gun pointed at them by FBI swat team members in the middle of the night.

Not even trying
Here in the UK HMRC will spend that on creating a 4 page document outlining its strategy to publish a statement of intent showing a roadmap to publish detailed steps in formulating a high level view of the processes involved in changing the shade of green on the logo and its environmental, cultural and social impact. These Indians aren't even trying to waste money.

A scathing new report claims that the Biden administration's Department of Education's (ED) enforcement actions were focused at least 70 percent on Christian and career-based schools, even though they represent less than 10 percent of the students in the nation. This uncovers an unseen campaign that persisted over the administration's term and can hardly be seen as impartial.

https://www.foxnews.com/media/new-report-shows-70-biden-administrations-education-enforcement-targeted-christian-colleges

The Supreme Court, which dealt a major blow to the power of federal agencies in June, agreed on Friday to consider another: whether Congress violates the Constitution by delegating broad discretion to them.

The so-called nondelegation doctrine has been largely dormant since 1935, when the Supreme Court struck down New Deal laws for granting too much leeway to agencies with insufficient guidance. //

Judge Andrew S. Oldham of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit wrote in the majority ruling that deemed the program unconstitutional:

“The universal service contribution mechanism’s double-layered delegation is incompatible with our constitutional structure.”

The Liberty ship Robert E. Peary was built in four days, 15 hours, and 29 minutes — entire ship built in under a week. If government wanted to get things "done" in North Carolina, things would get done. Government in western North Carolina isn’t solving problems; it is doing what it does best: It’s putting up roadblocks. Literal roadblocks. //

Ryan - Wake up America
@RyanLayne17
·
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We had the same game going on 321 in East TN (Poga and Elk Mills area) with TDOT and the Tennessee Highway Patrol putting up barricades then gates then concrete blocks to try to stop us from accessing our own road 4 weeks after storm. The game went on for 2 weeks of them putting… Show more
Embedded video
Embedded video
10:55 PM · Nov 19, 2024 //

Is government helping to house people who lost everything?

While federal employees are mostly working from home, people in western North Carolina don’t have homes. FEMA people are cutting videos and claiming they are doing their best. Are they? //

Matt Van Swol
@matt_vanswol
·
Follow
🚨#BREAKING: Officials at FEMA have just posted a new video touring brand housing units they say are available to #WNC.

What they fail to mention in the video is that in the 2 months since in the hurricane... only FOUR UNITS have been delivered.

You read that right.

Four. Show more

5:40 PM · Nov 20, 2024 //

Random US Citizen
7 minutes ago
Every tiny slice of power you give to the federal government is an opportunity for them to abuse it. Which is why the Founders attempted to restrain it. It’s human nature to reward friends and punish opponents, and that’s exactly what FEMA is doing.

Emergency relief is not among the federal governments enumerated powers.

To paraphrase some guy: if ye love convenience better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the federal hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen.

Stewart's comment about "institutional thinking" is spot-on. Hicks is looking at the audit as an annoyance that she can ignore. In reality, failing multiple audits in a row should mean that dozens of careers come to an abrupt halt.

This video should put Pete Hegseth on notice that when he is confirmed, he will lead a morally broken Department of Defense that believes it is allowed to play by its own rules. He needs to take office in a way that makes Genghis Khan look like the Tooth Fairy. He needs to use the results of the last two audits to remove or reassign senior bureaucrats who can't be bothered to care what happens to the national wealth with which they are entrusted. //

Dan Hodges
2 hours ago
In order to solve a problem you first have to admit there is a problem. If you don't admit there is a problem than there is not a problem. This is how the brain of a bureaucrat works. Remember Catch-22. //

flyovercountry
2 hours ago
I would say the four star idiot, currently SECDEF, who left over a billion dollars of US military hardware in Afghanistan to the Taliban, is guilty of FWA.

FortCourage flyovercountry
2 hours ago
It was $80 BILLION left behind in Afghanistan……

Friday, Socialist Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders used a post on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, to announce that he was willing to work with the incoming Trump administration to accomplish mutually beneficial legislation.

I look forward to working with the Trump Administration on fulfilling his promise to cap credit card interest rates at 10%.

He received a quick reply from Missouri Republican Senator Josh Hawley. "An anti-usury bill capping outrageous credit card rates," said Hawley, "ought to be a top priority of the next Congress." //

In my view, the number of times the government has intervened in markets directly and produced the intended result can probably be counted on the fingers of one hand. The obvious problem with a return to the medieval system of slapping usury laws on lenders is that when interest rates spike, banks lose the ability to adjust their interest rates. This, by definition, creates a drought in the credit market, which is quickly felt by commercial enterprises that rely on credit card transactions. If one is hellbent on regulating credit cards to save people from themselves, then allow a certain rate against the Fed's bank rate. //

Years ago, the Fed sponsored a study of the impact of usury ceilings:

Economic research clearly supports the current legislative moves toward deregulation of usury ceilings. The evidence on the impact of usury ceilings shows that they have not achieved their objectives. According to the empirical studies surveyed, usury ceilings have significantly reduced the availability of credit and created hardships for those who were supposed to be protected. Ceilings have encouraged lenders to use credit rationing devices such as higher down payments, shorter maturities, higher fees for related non-credit services, which increase the effective interest rate. They have curtailed the amount of credit available to lower income and higher risk borrowers, harming primarily those individuals whom the ceilings are intended to benefit. Finally, the lack of uniformity in usury laws across states has distorted credit flows and economic activity, favoring those states and regions which are less regulated.

What is worse, a guy holding a credit card that carries a 30% interest rate or his car breaking down and losing his job because he can't get to work all due to some well-meaning Karen in DC deciding it is more virtuous for him to be destitute than enrich some bank?

Trump needs to back off faux-populist issues like this. I understand the sugar rush of applause as well as the next guy, but cutting off credit card access from banks doesn't mean that poor people won't pay exorbitant interest rates.

How much does a payday loan cost? //

We have two parties here, and only two — one is the evil party, and the other is the stupid party. I’m very proud to be a member of the stupid party. Occasionally, the two parties get together to do something that’s both evil and stupid. That’s called bipartisanship. —M. Stanton Evans //

DaleS an hour ago edited

The graphes don't go back that far, but I'm old enough to remember when the federal funds rate (the rate when banks borrow from each other) was well over 10%. What do you suppose happens to the credit card market when credit card holders can borrow from the bank at a lower rate than they can borrow from each other?

Even if you thought an anti-usury law was a good idea, it would be madness to peg it to a fixed rate. I believe every card I've ever had (ignoring promotional rates) has been set at an offset on prime. Pegging the maximum interest to Prime+5 would still allow the banks to offer credit cards as a product no matter where interest rates go -- but it would be to a far smaller group of consumers. Markets work better than government. Lowering interest rates for everybody means that good credit risks lose their rewards, and bad credit risks lose their credit. This would not be a good thing. //

Musicman an hour ago

The Founding Fathers created a government that required consensus to get anything done. But don't confuse consensus with "bipartisanship." Bipartisanship means each Party gets something it wants. And often that means the two most extreme elements of our body politic--the far right and the far left--get something they want. It's also called log rolling. It's too often a compromise that benefits Washington insiders rather than the country. It's why we have a 35 trillion dollar debt.

A consensus is where you can get more than a pure majority, say 60 or 70 % of the people behind something. Or in the case of a Constitutional Amendment, 75% (of the states). Trump can reach a consensus without giving the Dems--or at least their left wing base--a damn thing. He just needs to get most Republicans and independents, and then a slice of the Democrat Party behind whatever he does. That is how to build a lasting movement.

Kyrsten Sinema @kyrstensinema
·
What’s the one tool that requires the Senate to work in a bipartisan way?

Oh look, the filibuster.

Burgess Everett @burgessev
Schumer to Republicans: "Take care not to misread the will of the American people"

"Do not abandon bipartisanship. It's the best and most effective way to get things done"
2:22 PM · Nov 18, 2024 //

The less Washington gets done, the better for everyone involved. We don't need a Congress that can make sweeping, dramatic changes to the nation based on winning an election by a few percentage points. That's how you end up with internal unrest under the tyranny of the majority.

It may not be a popular position on the right given we just won a sweeping victory, but strengthening, not removing the filibuster is the right move. There's nothing the government can do for me that is that important. I'd rather the behemoth stay out of my way more often than not, and the moment the filibuster ends, it's never coming back. That'd be very bad news the next time Democrats take power. Republicans should use their current leverage to ensure that can't happen.

people are sick and tired of people in Washington, D.C., doing nothing as these people tried to destroy the country and getting upset at someone who actually might root out the corruption there.

We don't have a Department of Justice.

We have a Department of Injustice, and that's why you get Matt Gaetz as a nominee. //

ConservativeInMinnesota
4 hours ago
The deep state themselves offer the strongest possible endorsement of Gaetz. By all reports they are in a complete panic. We’re not hearing rallying cries of ‘resist’. That means the deep state fears Gaetz.

Gaetz spent years battling the deep state and knows their ways. Trump only asked for recess appointments from a new Senate leader to get Gaetz in. Trump has carefully chosen Gaetz for good reason.

Doni 🤓🏴🏴‍☠️
@DoniTheMisfit
·
Follow
I remember when the government decided which jobs were "essential" and which weren't. Politicians on the left, along with their pundits, dismissed the livelihoods of countless families with a callous:

"Oh well, find a new career."

That same indifference resonates with me now in… Show more
celia
@_celiabedelia
Quick question - when 3 million civil servants lose their jobs, can’t pay their bills, taxes, contribute to the economy….how does that HELP the economy?
2:42 PM · Nov 16, 2024. //

Pastor in OKC
14 hours ago edited
As someone who was DoD contractor for years and still does some consulting, let me tell you that the bureaucratic workforce today is lazy and incompetent. Over the last 10 years many quality personnel have retired and some quit because it was not based on merit. In so doing, the contracts I see now are so poorly written and administered it is embarrassing. A purge of federal employees will be good and they get jobs they are more qualified for like fast food. //

anon-x8p1
18 hours ago
When 99% of all government employee political donations go only to Democrats, we have a wretched "spoils system" already in place.

Bust it up and ban all government employee unions.

Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody has filed a federal lawsuit alleging that FEMA Director Deanne Criswell and FEMA reservist Marn'i Washington violated the civil rights of conservative Floridians by denying services to anyone displaying Trump campaign signs or banners. //

This saga began with a whistleblower leaking internal FEMA communications to the Daily Wire after they were ordered to avoid residences displaying items supporting President-elect Trump's candidacy. //

The supervisor who, in imitation of an episode of The Wire, documented a criminal conspiracy to violate the civil rights of Trump voters, has confirmed in television interviews on two occasions, the last being today, that what she did was carry out agency policy. According to her, workers were told to treat the homes of Trump supporters as though there were vicious dogs on those properties. //

charlie
an hour ago
This behavior is reminiscent of Hitler's treatment of Jews, gays, and gypsies. Yet we on the right are called fascists, and Trump is called Hitler. Seems to me there is a tremendous amount of projection in the thinking and behavior of the left. If there had been rainbow signs in those yards rather than Trump signs, the left would be exploding with rage. Why isnt this behavior considered a "hate crime" and punished as such? IMO, the FEMA employees who crafted and implemented this 'rabid dog' policy should be facing 25 to life sentences

In its Tuesday night hit piece on Hegseth, authors Joe Gould, Robbie Gramer, Paul McLeary, Connor O’Brien, and Jack Detsch published critical remarks from an anonymous defense lobbyist, who gave the game away by lamenting how the Trump nominee isn’t embedded in D.C.’s military-industrial complex.

“Who the f-ck is this guy?” the source reportedly said. The lobbyist wanted “someone who actually has an extensive background in defense. That would be a good start.”

The authors went on to fearmonger that Hegseth’s nomination “will do little to quell fears inside the Pentagon” that the former president will select a defense secretary who agrees with his agenda — something presidents have been doing for centuries. They also noted, “Trump’s campaign trail rhetoric has primed fears that his second term could see a swift and divisive overhaul at the Pentagon.”

Got that? The left’s problem with Hegseth isn’t that he’s a Fox News commentator. It’s that he’s someone from outside the incestuous government-defense contractor system who actually cares about the men and women in uniform. //

For all of their unhinged outrage about his nomination, Hegseth understands the biggest problems plaguing the military better than the Democrats and media hacks calling him “unqualified.”

During his recent interview with fellow veteran Shawn Ryan, the Army veteran eloquently explained how the sole purpose of the military should be winning wars — not conducting left-wing social experiments. He further chastised the Pentagon bureaucracy for its ineptitude and detailed the ongoing threat that Red China poses to the United States and the global security environment. //

For the left, Hegseth’s biggest crime is his willingness to buck the corrupt system that’s been allowed to fester in D.C. for decades. Unlike many of his predecessors, he understands that the men and women who wear the uniform are devoted human beings and not pawns in a geopolitical chess match that can be cast aside to fulfill the wants of the Pentagon blob that’s shepherded Washington’s failed foreign policy for decades.

His outsider status makes him a threat to the bureaucratic rot infecting the highest levels of the military. And that’s the reason he’s the perfect man for the job.