Defending the Texas Border Means Defying Joe Biden

Texas Border enforcement has become a cat-and-mouse game with the federal government

by Cary Cheshire for American Greatness

As the State of Texas attempts to secure its border and stop the invasion of illegal aliens that are flooding our state, the majority of the pushback isn’t coming from the narcoterrorist cartels who have complete operational control of the border region—it’s coming from Joe Biden.

Since Gov. Greg Abbott tapped former Border Patrol agent Mike Banks to lead Operation Lone Star, Texas Department of Public Safety officers, members of the Texas National Guard, and other members of the state’s response team have been working to secure the Texas Border and prevent illegal entry only to see their work undermined by U.S. Border Patrol officers who admit illegal aliens into Texas on Joe Biden’s orders.

Over the past several months, Texas Border enforcement has become a cat-and-mouse game between Texas and the federal government.

Texas law enforcement closes a gate to prevent illegals from coming in, their federal counterparts open it back up. The federal government builds a new illegal alien processing camp, Texas lays concertina wire to block access to it.The latest move by Texas is the installation of a marine barrier comprised of a string of buoys that block off sections of the Rio Grande River, and the latest response by Democrat President Joe Biden is to sue the State of Texas in federal court and demand they be removed.

It’s all part of what the Center for Immigration Studies’ Todd Bensman calls a “Cold Border War.”

“It’s become a war: Texas actually enforcing the law, and the Biden administration fighting it at every step,” wrote Bensman in the New York Post.

To his credit, Abbott should be commended for doing more than any other governor, but he’s also had to deal with a far more serious crisis than any other governor.

Since Joe Biden took office and reversed much of the Trump administration’s actions to deter illegal crossings, Title 42, Remain in Mexico, etc., the result has been what can only be described as an invasion.

Since 2021, more than 8 million illegal aliens have entered the United States. Not only has President Joe Biden refused to deploy resources necessary to secure the Texas Border, but he has actually aided and abetted illegal aliens in coming to Texas.

Increasingly, the Biden administration has been using the CBP One app to enable foreign nationals in Mexico to sign up for a bus ride into the United States. This strategy of funneling illegal aliens through ports of entry is a means of concealing the scale of the border crisis. These brazen actions plainly contradict federal immigration law, but by the time one parole scheme is struck down in court, another is created in its place.

The Biden administration’s abuse of the asylum process, removal of barriers erected by the Texas Department of Public Safety, and latest legal efforts to stop Texas from securing its own border make clear it is time for Texas to take its security into its own hands.

In his communications with Biden, Abbott has rightfully accused the president of violating Article IV, § 4 of the U.S. Constitution which charges the federal government with defending the States from invasion.

“Your ongoing violation of Article IV, § 4 of the U.S. Constitution has left me no other choice,” Abbott wrote to Biden last week in defense of his maritime border installation.

Abbott is entirely correct. Given the continued deterioration of the Texas Border he’s been forced to surge thousands of law enforcement officers and spend millions of Texas taxpayer dollars on border barriers to stem the flow of illegal aliens.

But he can’t stop there.

Joe Biden’s decision to betray his oath of office, facilitate the invasion of our state, and prosecute the State of Texas for the alleged crime of defending herself should be cause for greater escalation by the Lone Star State.

Joe Biden has made it clear he has no intention of securing the Texas Border. The Governor of Texas has a moral, statutory, and constitutional duty to protect citizens from foreign invasion. It’s time for Abbott to do so.

The safety and sovereignty of Texas citizens should not be resigned to waiting for a complicated judicial process or a change in presidential administrations. Instead of telling the president to see him in court, the commander-in-chief of the Texas Military Forces should dare the federal government to meet him at the Rio Grande.

X22, And we Know, and more- August 13

 

Depending on how the next 5 days go, the writers strike could actually end soon. Pray that that happens.

The Regressive Left’s Counter-Revolution

The Left's 'democracy' means the unchecked 

power of a tyranny of the majority

by Thaddeus G. McCotter for American Greatness

Previously, I made a brief survey of American students’ ominous decline in history and civics; the education establishment’s risible attempt to escape any blame; and the Left’s elation that its efforts to indoctrinate young minds increases as students’ knowledge in these subjects decreases. As quoted at the time:

The state-subsidized NPR bears the bad news to America’s parents and citizens: “[The 2022] history scores are the lowest recorded since the assessment began in 1994, and the new data mark the first-ever drop in civics . . . continuing a downward trend that began in 2014. Only 14% of students reached at or above ‘proficient’ mark in history, and in civics only 22% of students met the same benchmark.”

In sad truth, too, while this decline is hastening, it is not new. For Republican populist politicians who want to strengthen our free republic, the problem is not merely academic but practical: how can a center-right candidate court the votes of an electorate steadily losing its knowledge of history and civics?

The GOP’s Leftist opposition courts voters by advocating what they term “our democracy,” wherein their covert and inverted messaging is that self-government is selfish and dangerous, and those who support it are fascists. Due to this deluded definition, the Left contends it is championing “our democracy,” even as they destroy it to advance their autocracy.

From the United States of America’s birth and its foundational documents, our free republic is a revolutionary exercise in self-government. As such, citizens consent to delegate their sovereign power to the government to do only those things they and/or others cannot do for themselves. They are endeavoring to control their own destiny to the greatest extent feasible. They do not want to be governed any more than is necessary to protect their God-given, constitutionally recognized and protected rights, because they know an intrusive government will infringe upon their ability to make their own decisions in forging and pursuing their happiness.

In the Left’s ideology, their “democracy” means the unchecked power of a tyranny of the majority that will delegate their sovereignty (likely in perpetuity) to empower an elite of “experts” to control the citizenry, including themselves. Rights will be determined not by God but by this claque of elitists, who will trammel unfettered upon said rights as the mood moves the administrative state Leviathan.

This is the antithesis of America’s revolutionary experiment in self-government and, in fact, democracy – unless one is deluded enough to believe in “democracies” like the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. In a true democracy, the people remain sovereign not unelected bureaucrats. Yet, this is the basis of the Left’s administrative state: the rule of an elite who will map out and control the general populace’s pursuit of happiness and, indeed, all aspects of their lives.

Consequently, when elected officials abide and/or abet the rule of this elite and its ideology, the Left perversely deems it “democracy.” The Left’s rhetorical trick is a simple as it is insidious: it focuses on the process by which the sovereign citizens cede their rights not the result of it. To the Left, their “democracy” celebrates the means by which you subjugate yourself to the state; devolve from a sovereign citizen to a serf; and terminate America’s revolutionary experiment in self-government. Liberty must be sacrificed on the altar of the Left’s collective; and, yes, equality will follow, for dissent will not be suffered by the high priests of the Leftist elite.

The Left’s goal is the return of a hierarchical, feudalistic control of the populace without external restraints upon the elite governing them – namely, a 21^st Century twist on the divine right of kings the American Revolution inverted when it booted out King George III and vested our fledgling nation’s sovereign power in the people. Today, however, we are in danger of the people ceding their sovereignty for the siren song of an illusory “safety;” and being governed by an imperial presidency and his or her unaccountable, baronial administrative elite. For those still tempted to cede their self-determination to the state in return for a Leftist autocracy’s illusory safety, a friendly reminder: in an autocracy, be it Left of Right, the only safety is in doing what you are told.

Sure, the public will likely be allowed to continue voting, but it will be only on those issues the state deems permissible for public discussion (but not for dissent), largely because the outcome has been predetermined. It will be like how the former Soviet Union risibly claimed it was “democratic”: “Of course you can vote…for your choice of communists.”

The Left’s duplicitous agenda to cajole and coerce the people into surrendering their sovereignty into the prehensile hands of a ruling elite is regressive, running counter to the expansion of human liberty, agency, and dignity; and it is a radical, dangerous, and autocratic counter-revolution to America’s revolutionary experiment in self-government.

Tragically, as the citizenry’s eroding knowledge of their country’s history and political system, the regressive Left will continue its remorse march to autocracy. For the Left, ignorance is a blissful boon for counter-revolution.

CNN Sweeps the Leg out From Under 'Bidenomics' With Brutal Report on How Much More We're Paying

Nick Arama reporting for RedState 

We’ve seen Joe Biden make up all kinds of stories during his time in office.

Perhaps one of the things that affects all of us the most is his claim that “Bidenomics” is working, that somehow he’s made things so much better for Americans with his “plan.”

Listen as he claims he’s “lowered costs”—and that’s “Bidenomics.”

However, CNN managed to blow that up with a little reality. When even CNN is doing in Joe Biden, you know how bad it must be. But it’s hard to argue with the numbers and the real impact this is having on Americans.

Business reporter Matt Egan explained the results from Moody’s Analytics’ Mark Zandi, that the typical US household is spending $709 more each month than two years ago — on the same goods and services. Brianna Keilar did the math, and observed that the huge increase added up to more than $8,500 a year. Egan explained that’s why some families are having trouble getting by. No kidding. That kind of an increase can do you in, especially if you’re on a tight budget.

Egan said that while we aren’t near the “nightmare numbers” of last summer under Joe Biden, “inflation can be cumulative.” In other words, Bidenflation has done a lot of economic damage. He said we’re still facing the snowballing effect of two years of price spikes. He also said people were having to spend more on everything from housing and groceries to cars and recreation.

While CNN is terming inflation as having “cooled,” as we reported, it took an uptick from June. So yes, it’s cooled from the highs of 2022, but it just went up again and it’s still higher than what it was when Joe Biden came in. And we’re all still spending a lot more. Energy prices were also up—something we’re again seeing reflected in the gas prices, which have ticked up again.

On top of that, interest rates have been jacked up to try to cool the rampant inflation that Biden helped to make higher with his rampant spending. They’re at a 22-year high. So, we’re paying more for everything that way as well, and that’s making it very hard to do things like buy a house when you consider what you might now have to pay with the rates.

We saw Fitch just downgrade us for only the second time in history. The first time was under Obama/Biden. So, Biden has been in the mix both times.

That doesn’t sound like “restoring the American dream.” Indeed, it sounds like he’s doing everything he can to kill the American dream. Not to mention making us beholden to and at the mercy of foreign governments with his bad energy policies.

This perhaps explains why his poll numbers, particularly on the economy are so bad — because this is continually hitting people right in the wallet. As CNN’s Harry Enten says when you look at his approval on the economy, “It stinks.”

People weighed in on their opinion of this report and Joe Biden’s “Bidenomics.”

US Government Credit Is Sinking, But Spending Is Still Running Wild

posted by Ward Clark at RedStateVIP 

America’s credit rating is dropping, and there’s every reason to believe it hasn’t hit bottom yet.

There is an apocryphal story about Ronald Reagan, in which a staffer said something about Congress “spending like drunken sailors.” President Reagan corrected the speaker, pointing out that drunken sailors are spending their own money.

In 1929, the first year for which numbers are available, annual federal spending was about 3 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). In 1989, when Reagan left office, federal spending was about 20 percent of GDP, almost exactly where it had been in 1980 when he was elected President. Today, federal spending is about 25 percent of GDP, down from over 31 percent during the COVID mess. The source for this data is here.

Gross federal debt presents an even more horrifying picture, with federal debt as a percentage of GDP in 1939 at 52 percent (bear in mind this was towards the end of the Great Depression), at 50 percent in 1989, and today this figure is at 121 percent. Find the source for this data here.

Now, the U.S. government’s credit rating has been downgraded, and that will have adverse effects across the economy.

“US mortgage rates jumped above 7% in a week that government bond yields spiked following a surprise decision by Fitch Ratings to lower the nation’s credit rating,” Bloomberg’s Augusta Saraiva reports. “Mortgage rates are benchmarked to 10-year Treasury yields, and those hit the highest level of the year last week after Fitch stripped US government debt of its prized AAA rating.”

That makes sense. Fitch lowered the credit rating (as it warned it might) because the U.S. government is perceived as an increasingly risky borrower, and riskier borrowers have to pay more to lenders.

“The rating downgrade of the United States reflects the expected fiscal deterioration over the next three years, a high and growing general government debt burden, and the erosion of governance relative to ‘AA’ and ‘AAA’ rated peers over the last two decades that has manifested in repeated debt limit standoffs and last-minute resolutions,” Fitch noted. Among other concerns, it pointed to the current debt-to-GDP ratio of 112.9 percent and growing budget deficits.

This is the second time the U.S. has been dinged; Standard & Poor’s downgraded U.S. credit in 2011.

Note the reasons given for the downgrade: “A high and growing general government debt burden” and “current debt-to-GDP ratio.” These things have one cause: Runaway spending.

When a person or organization is in a hole, the first rule is to stop digging. But the federal government just keeps digging, and keeps piling up that debt. The problem is spending, which is out of control; that 25 percent of GDP amounts to right around $6,500,000,000 in Q2 of 2023. That’s 6.5 trillion. With a T. Have a look at a graph of Federal spending from 1947 to date:

To say this is unacceptable is to describe the 2020 riots as a “mild social deviation.”

The Biden Administration continues to push for more spending and more spending and more spending as the source for all of our economic ills. Republicans talk about spending reductions, but somehow those reductions never materialize. Meanwhile, candidates for President offer platitudes.

In Ernest Hemingway’s book The Sun Also Rises, he described a conversation about one of the characters going bankrupt:

“How did you go bankrupt?” Bill asked.

“Two ways,” Mike said. “Gradually and then suddenly.”

Look at the numbers, and it becomes apparent that we are moving towards the “suddenly” part of the process.

In 1980, we could have grown our way out of this problem. In 2000, it would have been harder but we could have done it. But now? If we are to avoid further credit downgrades and quite probably actual default, then spending cuts have to mean actual cuts. Eliminating entire agencies, especially the myriads of them not authorized in the Constitution, would be a good start.

One of my recurring fantasies about being President (not one of the ones that results in my waking up screaming) is submitting to Congress a budget that involves reducing the federal government to pre-Civil War levels, and happily vetoing any budget that spends a penny more than I proposed. But I’m not President and I’m not likely to be, mostly because I don’t want the job. In fact, I’d sooner shovel manure than enter politics; the smell is better and at least shoveling manure is honest work.

Politicians of both parties pay lip service to fiscal sanity but do little about it. The Republicans preach spending restraint but are content with tiny decreases in the rate of growth; the Democrats ignore the Laffer curve and shout for tax increases. None of this addresses the spending and debt issues. The United States’ credit ratings will continue to drop, the shockwaves throughout the economy will continue to grow worse, and sooner or later, somehow, Stein’s Law will assert itself, quite possibly in a manner that will make the Great Depression look like the wildest times of decadent indulgence.

We have mortgaged our grandchildren’s futures, and history will rightly damn us for it.

Biden DHS Wants Congress to Allow Change From 'Detention' to 'Temporary Housing' for Illegal Alien Families

Becca Lower reporting for RedState 

As we reported earlier in the week, the Biden Administration is likely to ask Congress to loosen its purse strings and appropriate another $13 billion for Ukraine, according to a new report based on Associated Press sources. But now we’re starting to hear about some of the other items hidden in the emergency $40 billion ask by the White House—and one of them relates to the ongoing crisis at our southern border.

Axios is reporting that the Biden Department of Homeland Security (DHS) wants to radically change the way illegal aliens, particularly families made up of illegals, are housed at the border:

The Biden administration is asking Congress to approve a temporary housing program for migrant families that illegally cross the southern border — a plan that would give them more freedom than traditional detention….

• The administration’s ask is part of a $40 billion emergency funding request to Congress. The package includes nearly $2.7 billion for the Department of Homeland Security’s various border efforts.

Driving the news: DHS wants the ability to use funds to set up new types of facilities to hold migrant families as they go through an expedited asylum and deportation process.

• • Migrant family members would be able to come and go as they please during the day, but would be required to check in and stay the night on the campus, a DHS official told Axios.
  • “We do not view this as family detention,” the official said.
  • The facilities would allow immigration agencies to more easily keep track of migrants throughout the asylum process, but also could ease the burden on local shelters near the border to house recent arrivals, officials say.
  • DHS also is asking Congress for permission to look into for-profit contractors or non-governmental organization grantees to run the facilities.

This is so typical of the left, which only seems capable of providing touchy-feely non-solutions when it comes to illegal aliens. Just this week, Democrats were crying about the alleged inhumanity of imaginary “chainsaw devices” in Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s floating barriers.

The “check-in” program described here sounds like the type of temporary shelters nonprofits provide to homeless people, but there’s a major difference. These are not homeless people we’re talking about. These are people who purposely crossed our border illegally. And it actually does not inspire more sympathy that they brought their family members with them. Putting women and children at peril is not laudable.

As much as progressives would like to pretend otherwise, these people engaged in criminal behavior, and they should not be rewarded for it by getting more freedom in our country. Anyone who commits a crime is more likely to commit another one. They should not be allowed to freely roam about our border cities during the day, which is what this proposed change would do.

It’s not a serious solution to the border crisis, in other words. Controlling the flow of illegals needs to be the number-one focus, not making Democrats more comfortable about the reality of illegals being detained. Republicans in Congress need to firmly put their foot down here.

Fox Appointed to Guard the Henhouse

That'll keep the chickens from coming home to roost

posted by Dianny at Patriot Retort

On Friday, Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed US Attorney David Weiss of Delaware as special counsel to investigate Hunter's dirty business deals, effectively shielding Weiss from testifying to the House about how the Justice Department slow-walked and obstructed the investigation into Hunter's dirty business deals.

Isn't that convenient?

One could almost conclude that Merrick Garland is trying to slow-walk and obstruct the investigation into Hunter's dirty business deals.

I was under the impression that a special counsel has to be someone independent of the federal government.

Every other recent special counsel was an attorney no longer serving in the Justice Department or the federal government.

Mueller was outside. Durham was outside. So is Jack Smith.

Even Robert Hur, the special counsel appointed to run the investigation into the classified documents kept by Joe Biden, is a former US attorney, not a current one.

So why did Merrick Garland appoint current US Attorney for Delaware David Weiss?

I thought the point of a special counsel is to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest.

Shouldn’t Garland appoint someone who isn't accused of helping to obstruct the very investigation Garland appointed him to oversee?

Weiss was in charge when prosecutors in the US Attorney's Office in Delaware negotiated that ridiculous plea deal so Hunter could avoid prison.

This is like appointing the fox to guard the henhouse.

In his announcement yesterday, Garland claimed appointing Weiss "reinforces for the American people the department's commitment to both independence and accountability in particularly sensitive matters."

As one criminal defense attorney said on Twitter (sorry, X):

Appointing the U.S. Attorney, whose office gave the court-scrutinized deal to Hunter, as Special Counsel is quite literally the exact opposite of independence and accountability.

While appearing on Fox News yesterday, former US Attorney Andy McCarthy called this special counsel investigation a "sham" and suggested that Garland appointed Weiss to ensure that the Justice Department is "maintaining control of an investigation that they are not pursuing."

And according to McCarthy, I was right. A special counsel is supposed to be "brought in from outside the United States government.”

I don't care how many conservatives despise Mitch McConnell. I am forever grateful that he blocked Merrick Garland's nomination to the Supreme Court.

Garland is a political hitman, targeting the president's opponents while bending over backward to protect his corrupt boss.

He makes Eric Holder look even-handed and politically neutral, and that's not an easy feat.

The media keeps referring to David Weiss as a "Trump appointee" as if that makes a difference.

Trump appointed a lot of terrible people.

Christopher Wray and Gen. Mark Milley were Trump appointees too.

If Merrick Garland wanted an independent investigation into the Biden family, he should not have chosen the guy who spent years letting the Justice Department call the shots.

This stinks to high heaven.

Then again, everything about the Merrick Garland Justice Department is malodorous.

The goal is to run out the clock while making it harder for Republicans in the House to investigate the Biden family's influence peddling.

And no, it isn't shocking that Garland would do that.

What's shocking is that he is so "in your face" about it.

Then again, when you know that you have the entire System, from the government to the media, backing your every move, there's no need to hide your partisan hackery.