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Sky Links, 1-19-19
It’s not widely known, but the Constitution requires that the president deliver some version of a State of the Union message. Article II, Section III states that the president “shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient.” President George Washington read “from time to time” as “annually,” and a tradition was born. Both Washington and his successor, John Adams, chose to meet this obligation with speeches, but the Constitution doesn’t stipulate how the information must be conveyed. Beginning with Thomas Jefferson in 1801, the “annual message,” as it was then called, was delivered as a written document. That practice continued unbroken until 1913, when Woodrow Wilson (who never passed up a chance to elevate the office to ecclesiastical heights) delivered the message as a speech. Though both Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover tried to revert to the written format, a speech delivered before both houses of Congress has been the default since Franklin Roosevelt’s 1934 address.
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Abolishing the State of the Union would also accomplish something loftier than presidential self-preservation: it would rid us of a spectacle that runs counter to republican values. Jefferson’s rationale for moving to a written document, though sometimes attributed to his weakness as a public speaker, was at least partially motivated by his revulsion at a practice that he thought of as quasi-monarchical, analogizing it to the King of England’s remarks at the opening of Parliament. According to Jefferson’s telling, contained in a letter to future president Martin Van Buren, even his longtime antagonist Alexander Hamilton, no enemy of executive pomp, agreed with him on this point.
- Freshman Rep. Jared Golden (D-Me.), is urging his party’s leaders to negotiate with Trump and the Republicans. Democrat leaders and Trump need “to stop hiding and show a little leadership” to bring the longest-lasting federal government shutdown in the nation’s history to an end, he said.
- Freshman Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) said “there’s a number of us on the Democratic side who are quite concerned that we’re not working on negotiated positions and taking the bull by the horns and trying to think about what it would look like.”
- Freshman Rep. Max Rose (D-N.Y.) told local media he was “sick and tired” of government shutdowns being used “as a form of brinksmanship—a tool of negotiation.”
“All we’ve done in the House is repass the Senate bill,” he said. “Now that will allow us some freedom, some space, some real debate. The Senate though has to show their independence. I just got out of a bruising fight with my House leadership … Let’s open the government back up and let’s get back to work.”
- Freshman Rep. Anthony Brindisi (D-N.Y.), acknowledged he has been defying Pelosi and negotiating directly with GOP lawmakers.
"I’ve been meeting with several representatives from across the country, both Democrats and Republicans,” Brindisi said. “And I’ve been trying to force leadership on both sides of the aisle to work out a compromise to this shutdown.”
“If you listen to all the experts, they’ll say some elements of physical barriers where it makes sense are in order,” he said. “We need more border agents, we need more technology at our border crossings and ports of entries so trucks and shipping containers are inspected before coming into our country.”
- Freshman Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.), is taking heat from her constituents.
“If I am getting comments and contact from my constituents expressing concern that the Democrats are not prioritizing security, then I think we can do better,” she said.
Freshman Rep. Colin Allred (D-Texas), said he would consider supporting appropriations needed to build the wall.
“I’m not going to rule anything out, I really am not,” he said.
- Freshman Rep. Lucy McBath (D-Ga.), said she is optimistic a deal can be brokered.
“I hope that we can all come to a compromise because that’s the way things get done,” she said. “If we don’t compromise, the American people are the ones who get hurt. Right now, they are hanging in the balance.”
- Freshman Rep. Jeff Van Drew (D-N.J.) said he would vote for wall funding.
“If I had the opportunity to vote for some sort of a deal, I would,” he said. “I think if we work on the border security, in my opinion, the president would be willing to work on some of these other issues.”
- Rep. Ami Bera (D-Calif.) told Vice News that plenty of Democrats outside the freshman cohort are bucking Pelosi’s refusal to negotiate.
“I think we all want to see DACA protections, so I think there’s an opportunity to, if they give something — it’s called negotiation, right?” Bera said. “Give us a chance to protect the Dreamers; maybe we can give something on border security.”
Some in the House Democrat leadership are also diverging from Pelosi’s position.
- Rep. Cheri Bustos (D-Ill.) said some kind of border barrier is necessary.
“If we have a partial wall, if we have fencing, if we have technology used to keep our border safe, all of that is fine,” Bustos, who chairs the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), said on CNN last week.
- Rep. Katherine Clark (D-Mass.), vice chairman of the House Democrat conference, said on MSNBC that a barrier of some kind would work in parts of the U.S.-Mexico border. “You know, I think there are parts of the border that would benefit from repairing fencing and other barricades that already exist there,” she said.
Fire the TSA
-Investor's Business Daily
TSA screeners have repeatedly failed to do their one job: prevent passengers from bringing contraband onto planes.
In 2006, undercover agents were able to get fake bombs past screeners 75% of the time. They were able to do so 96% of the time in a 2015 test. And in 2017, agents were able to beat TSA agents some 80% of the time.
Just this month, a passenger — inadvertently — made it through security at Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson with a gun and boarded a plane bound for Tokyo. The agency's response: "TSA has determined standard procedures were not followed."
Audits by the Department of Homeland Security's inspector general have uncovered vast amounts of waste. In one case, the TSA spent $160 million on body scanners that failed 96% of the time. A congressional investigation found that the agency dumped $44 million on "explosive trace detectors" that it didn't need.
'I'm black': David Webb to CNN analyst accusing him of white privilege
-Madeline Osburn
The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the state of Texas can strip taxpayer subsidies from Planned Parenthood, primarily based on evidence found in undercover videos of the abortion provider’s involvement in harvesting and selling aborted baby body parts for profit.
-Josh Shepherd
On Thursday, a few thousand pro-life activists from dozens of U.S. states gathered in Washington, D.C. for the March for Life Conference. The day-long event offered educational sessions, film screenings, ample free materials from pro-life exhibitors and networking opportunities for leaders and students.
It preceded the 46th annual March for Life on Friday, which drew an estimated 100,000 people from across America.
Maybe 300,000
While I live-streamed, several commenters asked how many people I thought were in the #MarchForLife crowd. Too many to count, that’s for sure, folks! Best estimate I got from an organizer was 200,000-300,000, which seems plausible to me.
-Madeline Osburn
As an adult, I received a BA in modern dance from the University of California Riverside, a MA in worship (with an emphasis in dance) from Hope International University in Fullerton CA, and a California secondary teaching credential. I am also the founder of Soul to Sole Choreography and DA:NCE (Dance Awareness: No Child Exploited). Beyond that, I’ve led a dance ministry at my church for over 20 years and I’ve written a book on that subject. In 2016, I fell in love with ‘LaLaLand’ as well as the new documentary on Misty Copeland, the first black dancer chosen to be a prima ballerina for the American Ballet Theater. It’s safe to say that I am a cheerleader for dance.
But I need to pause here. Because our culture is inundated with children involved in dance and because I am a dance educator, lean in...
I care about maintaining the artistry of dance, and I care about nurturing children from an educational perspective. So here goes. In many dance studios around the nation, there has been an increase in sexualized, objectified movement for children under 12. These studios/teachers often unknowingly model their movement choices on what they see in the media culture. I’ll label this cultural shift the difference between healthy, age-appropriate dance versus unhealthy, age-inappropriate dance.
People, wake up! Do you think the likes of Pelosi, Schumer et al give a horse apple about anything but power? The ultimate goal of this diabolical duo is to naturalize millions of new Democrat voters, creating an unbeatable majority that wants to turn our nation into a godless, socialist purgatory.
And with socialism comes totalitarianism. You can’t have one without the other because force is the only way the elite can stay on top.
Anybody with enough sense to walk through a door without bumping their head can see where this is heading, knows that a properly built wall will stem the flow of illegals and knows that the Democrats know it will work, and therein is the rub.
There are sections of walls that work now. San Diego, El Paso and other border areas have short stretches of wall that have been extremely effective, and the Democrats know it. And they also know that if Trump builds the wall, it will severely curtail their dreams of ultimate power and a stranglehold over everything in the United States. Plus, it will reveal, that as in so many other things, they don’t know what they are talking about.
In Schumer-Pelosi’s ideal America:
Guns would be confiscated. There would be no restrictions whatsoever on abortion. Taxes would be through the roof. Global warming – the new religion of the left – would become front and center, and American manufacturing would, again, begin a monolithic evacuation.
Self-proliferating bureaucracies would spring up and regulate every facet of personal life in this nation. Eventually, you would have to get a permit to dig a hole in your own back yard.
Think that’s impossible?
Ask someone in Holland where you have to get a permit to build a dog house.
Getting any kind of license would become a nightmare as self-governing bureaucracies would hire inept political cronies, and inefficiency would slow the process down to a snail’s pace.
Think that won’t happen?
Ask the people in Italy where the licensing offices only work four days a week, use any excuse for a holiday and make even obtaining a marriage license like taking a trip down Alice’s rabbit hole.
Do you want to live in such a country?
If you don’t, you’d better let your voice be heard because with the Democrat/media cartel it can happen very quickly, and you could wake up one morning to find out that your country has been pulled right out from under you
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