A GOP Divided Cannot Stand

posted by Jasmine Campos at American Thinker 

On Sunday, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida ended his presidential bid and announced his endorsement of former President Donald Trump after landing just over 20% of the Iowa caucus vote. The race is down to two, and after primaries in New Hampshire left Nikki Haley in the dust, it’s looking like Trump will lead the party this November. Nevertheless, party infighting only continues with online attacks and congressional hold ups threatening the unity of the GOP. 

The Republican party needs to reset its priorities: There will be plenty of time to fight over budgets, abortion rights, and foreign policy after securing the presidency. Until then, any internal squabbles can be used as free ammunition by the Democratic party. Republicans will need to get their house in order to secure a majority vote in November. 

Moments after DeSantis declared his campaign over, many prominent figures in the Republican party took to Twitter to express their personal feelings on the matter. Many people reacted specifically to Charlie Kirk’s X post that DeSantis should have to give back any money he raised since he wasted people’s time. Things have only escalated following the New Hampshire primary where Haley came in second and claimed that there are “dozens of states yet to go” while people such as Ronna McDaniel, RNC Charwoman, are calling for Haley to bow out. 

This infighting regarding the two top Republican candidates comes on the heels of some equally dirty debate fighting. During the final pre-caucus debate on January 10, Ambassador Nikki Haley and Gov. DeSantis argued back and forth on CNN while Trump held his own town hall on Fox News. The programs were like an infomercial on mud-slinging, with Haley and DeSantis repeatedly accusing each other of lying. Haley demonstrated her ability to sow further division in the party by announcing that DeSantis has so many lies that she had to create a website to show them all, desantislies.com, while DeSantis continued to attack Haley for her support of Trump policies.

Now that DeSantis is out of the way, Haley has aimed both barrels at the former president, who is likely to be the Republican nominee. Haley has attacked Trump’s relationship with the Chinese leader, his age, and his unwillingness to debate her -- all in the three days since the Florida governor’s departure from the race.

All of this points to larger issues playing out on X within members of the party: No one wants to unify. Just days before announcing he was going to drop out, DeSantis himself was participating in the slander by telling people that if they want to succeed around Trump they just have to “kiss the ring.” How can any candidate in good faith recommend their supporters move to another candidate they just finished attacking?

It’s not just the candidates engaging in this infighting. During the middle of this cycle, when Rand Paul (R-KY) endorsed Trump, he not only vowed to support his chosen candidate, but made it clear that he was “never Nikki.” Meanwhile, conservative commentator Candace Owens is having to dedicate an entire portion of her show to explaining how supporting or liking Vivek Ramaswamy was not in fact a “betrayal” to President Trump.

Even Congress reflects this internal division. Just months ago Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) was ousted from his position, by his own party, over budget disagreements. Now again, Republicans are unhappy with some of the conciliatory moves from new speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and are threatening another removal. 

YouGov polls reveal that since last year, unfavorability of the Republican party has risen from 49% to nearly 58%. Meanwhile, Pew is reporting that as of December, Republicans rank below Democrats in almost every measure of leadership, including “tries to unite the country” and “is concerned with the needs of people like me.” 

These poll numbers mark the severity of the situation. At some point, Republican party members must admit these political fights, low punches, and X spats are more damaging than any actual policy disagreement there may be. These debates may be important, but they won’t mean anything at all if Republicans can’t win an election. 

The presidential election will take place in under 300 days, at which point the Republican party needs to have demonstrated to the country’s voters why their party is the best. That argument is made all the more impossible when throwing baseless accusations at their own side that will later be used by the opposing party. 

In his video ending his campaign, DeSantis harkens back to Reagan’s “Time for Choosing” speech, reminding the Republican party that it’s not about fighting one another, but about fighting against opposing forces. His message rings especially true for Trump and Haley, who at some point must realize that only one person can obtain the nomination, and whoever it is must gain the support of the other to win the general election. It’s time to rally, stop the pettiness, and get to work. There is a country to fight for. 

X22, And we Know, and more - January 31

 

Fort Sumter on the Border

A more robust federalism that empowers states to act where the federal government is overburdened or unwilling to enforce its own laws would relieve some pressure on the existing system.

by Christopher Roach for American Greatness

President Biden has been derelict in his duties to protect our country’s borders. He rescinded sensible policies dissuading illegal immigrants from jumping the fence, and this soon led to a tsunami of fake asylum claimants flooding over our southern border. In just three years, apparently six million people have made it across.

Like most forms of government failure, the burden is not equally distributed. Border states have been hit particularly hard, and Texas has had enough.

Seeking to fix the problem—and also secure some clout—Governor Abbott sent the Texas National Guard along with the fully independent Texas State Guard down to the Rio Grande to secure the porous border.

Biden and His People Fight for an Open Border

Instead of joining forces and thanking locals for help, Biden and Alejandro Mayorkas, the Department of Homeland Security Secretary, are trying to continue the current farce. They challenged Texas’ policy of reinforcing the border in court.

They have also humiliated the Border Patrol by turning them into the welcome wagon, tasking agents with dismantling barriers, and directing the flow of illegal immigrants to processing centers. The administration has made it clear that it does not want to stop the flow of immigrants but merely wants to render that influx more orderly and less visible to the public.

Current policies, like giving the fence jumpers parole and court dates years from now, provide almost no disincentive for illegal entry. Illegals are allowed to stay and work for years until their cases are decided. The consequences of this insanity are severe and are now starting to affect the entire country. Immigration in these enormous numbers from the world’s most destitute people increases crime, reduces wages, and hurts the middle class.

Nonetheless, for all those same reasons, Democrats are big fans. They know illegal aliens or their kids will reliably vote for Democrats, a larger welfare state, and that their presence in such large numbers will undermine the quality of life for native-born Americans.

Immigration is a Federal Responsibility (and That’s Unfortunate for Texas’ Lawsuit)

Texas sued and obtained an injunction from the Fifth Circuit prohibiting the DHS’s dismantlement of the barriers Texas constructed pending the ultimate resolution of the issues on appeal. This week, the Supreme Court dissolved the injunction in a short order. This is not a final resolution, nor does it require Texas to do anything in particular. The Supreme Court has simply returned the parties to the status quo ante.

As much as I don’t like the policy here, the federal government’s authority to control immigration and the border is not really in doubt. There is a long line of precedents holding that immigration is almost exclusively a federal responsibility over which it has “plenary” power. Combined with existing preemption doctrines, this means that the federal government typically gets to decide who, how, and how much is undertaken to enforce immigration laws, and states are not allowed to interfere with that determination, either by independently seeking harsher or more lenient degrees of enforcement.

The case law views immigration rules and regulations as an adjunct to foreign policy. This is why the Clinton administration was able to intervene in an ongoing state court custody dispute to swoop up young Elian Gonzalez and send him back to Cuba to live with his father, even though his mother died at sea trying to bring her son to the United States.

Texas’ position is that the federal government has been so derelict in its performance that the states are entitled to engage in self-help. Although I am very sympathetic with Texas’ policy argument and, like every real American, am appalled by the de facto foreign invasion taking place on our borders, it would arguably conflict with established precedent to allow Texas to defy the federal government.

As the Department of Homeland Security argued in its brief seeking to reverse the Fifth Circuit’s injunction, “The court of appeals’ contrary ruling inverts the Supremacy Clause by requiring federal law to yield to Texas law. If accepted, the court’s rationale would leave the United States at the mercy of states that could seek to force the federal government to conform the implementation of federal immigration law to varying state-law regimes.”

There is still much to be done on these cases. But I expect it will be almost impossible for even the most conservative members of the Supreme Court to overturn long-established immigration precedents.

I am not just being contrary here. In the abstract, these are not even bad principles. Federal supremacy in the areas of its responsibility is set forth in Article 6 of the Constitution itself. And these same precedents are what empowered Trump to enact the ban on immigration from certain terrorist-supporting countries, among other salutary policies he enacted.

Plenary federal authority over immigration makes sense in almost every situation other than the one we find ourselves in: rule by a Quisling American president who is completely indifferent about the fate of the country and his countrymen.

A Dangerous Clash of Competing Sovereigns

Texas’ continuation of its policies without the protection of an injunction exemplifies the rebellious and independent spirit of Texas, and this is heartening. At the same time, the entire episode reminds one of the nullification crisis of the early 19^th century, and, as such, it is rather dangerous. Texas has not merely challenged the federal government in court but declared its rights under the Constitution to defy certain federal statutes while deploying its own troops to create facts on the ground.

Governor Abbott has issued a strongly worded statement announcing his defiance of federal requests that Texas dismantle its border barriers. And, at the time of this writing, 25 additional states have expressed solidarity with Texas and its right to defend itself from an invasion. We now have two levels of government fighting over matters of policy and principal, each with well-armed men at its disposal.

I believe part of the reason this is happening is that everyone involved thinks that the risk of real violence is low. Biden, after all, could federalize the Texas National Guard in the same manner President Eisenhower did to desegregate Little Rock High School in Arkansas in 1957. This would take most of the power away from the Texas governor.

It seems that Governor Abbott calculated that because Biden’s unpopularity arose from his shambolic performance on the border, there is no politically palatable way Biden could use the military to stop Texas or open the border. The risk of defiance by the Texas National Guard also presents an unacceptable potential cost if Biden were to federalize the guard in order to control its actions.

Crazy as always, purists in Biden’s own party are asking for violence and crying “insurrection,” even though Texas is not actually defying any court order at the moment.

We haven’t had intergovernmental violence on any large scale since the Civil War. There were sometimes hints of it during the labor troubles of the early 20^th century and also in connection with the civil rights movement, but the scale of any such conflict was minor. Today, state, federal, and local law enforcement generally cooperate with one another or at least stay out of each other’s way.

When societies devolve into internal conflict, it is rarely a grass-roots affair. Typically, these conflicts happen when one faction of elites is fighting another. During the final days of the Soviet Union, the regional party bosses became more nationalistic and dissatisfied with the central committee of the communist party. In fighting for their local rights, they eventually dissolved the entire union. In the American Civil War, the southerners rallied around their strong state governments in defiance of the federal government.

For all the recent talk about a “second civil war” and the grave danger of January 6, until now most of these claims were merely click bait. No one was really that worried, but things are getting real. An actual civil war is never more likely than when different levels of government are defying one another in a federal system.

Texas is making a stand on an issue where it is right on the policy merits, where the Texan and American public are behind it, and where it has put Biden in a “lose-lose” situation of either tolerating open defiance of federal authority or using force to open the borders to the hordes of third-worlders swarming our country.

But none of this is a guarantee that Biden or someone else will not do something stupid.

Higher Law

A shootout between federal and Texas forces would likely quickly shock the nation’s conscience and put the majority of the public on the side of “law and order.” This would not, however, resolve the issue. Both sides would claim that mantle, and each side would likely blame the other for starting or continuing the violence.

While I think the federal government probably has a strong legal argument that it can continue to pursue its misguided policies, in general, resistance to federal tyranny has to be creative. The best moves will not necessarily be consistent with the positions of yesteryear or the letter of the law. After all, the Boston Tea Party was illegal, and we live in a similarly fraught time.

Calls to respect the process presuppose that we live in a country filled with Americans, live under an honest and working federal government, and that court rulings come from a judiciary that is not corrupted by ideological activists who routinely ignore the Constitution. None of these conditions are presently extant.

Governments, constitutions, and laws do not last forever. They must be a product of consensus, they must further the common good, and there must be some agreement regarding who constitutes the nation. A “second civil war” is neither a likely nor desirable outcome amid massive ideological divisions, but it is a risk, and it is a risk worth avoiding.

Just as Trump’s election relieved some pressure on the existing system, so too would a more robust federalism that empowers states to act where the federal government is overburdened or unwilling to enforce its own laws, particularly on issues like border security.

For now, Texas is trying to solve a big problem not of its own making. While it may be acting “above the law,” its approach exposes the Biden administration as the militant defender, not of the nation, but of open borders. In today’s environment, that means Biden will lose politically, even if he prevails in the courts.

Attention, Deep State: You Are Headed for a Shellacking Come November

The Trump Train’s momentum cannot be stopped.

by Paul Ingrassia for American Greatness 

President Donald Trump heads into February’s South Carolina primary in a formidable position—the strongest ever in his political career. Following Iowa’s near-clean sweep, in which the 45^th President picked up 98 of 99 counties in the Hawkeye State (and the one county he lost by just a single vote), he routed the New Hampshire primary with a double-digit victory, once again winning all but a single county in the Granite State. The momentum he carried into New Hampshire was so resounding that it forced Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, once hyped as President Trump’s successor not so long ago, to drop out of the race days before the first official vote was even tallied. The New Hampshire result, which saw Trump thrash Haley with a 54% to 43% margin, would have been wider, but for all the former-Democrats-turned-undecideds in the state, who teamed up with left-leaning independents to artificially tilt the scales towards Haley. Thus, to the extent Haley put up any numbers on the board, it was because of her reliance on left-leaning voters, many of whom would otherwise not vote for her in a general election matchup against Biden (or whoever the Democratic nominee will be come November). This is confirmed by several features on cable news in which these voters outright admitted their participation in the New Hampshire primary was merely a protest vote against Trump, and they otherwise would never vote for a Republican in any race in which a Democrat was also on the ballot. Given that fact, it further underlines the significance of the New Hampshire victory while also serving as a necessary reminder of the fraud and corruption that still exist in our elections.

Even so, President Trump’s back-to-back victories in Iowa and New Hampshire have been so prolific that they have scared some top Democratic donors, such as Reid Hoffman, from further investing in Haley until they can discern a pathway to victory. Hoffman is presently undertaking what may be described as a multipronged election interference operation by not only funding Nikki Haley but, furthermore, bankrolling E. Jean Carroll’s crazed lawsuit against Donald Trump in New York State Court. (Of note, Carroll, a well-documented narcissist, cannot recall basic facts about the incident, such as the date in which the alleged abuse took place, and bizarrely waited thirty years before telling anyone about it.)

As a billionaire tech entrepreneur and one of the co-founders of the social media platform LinkedIn, Hoffman’s role in this year’s race is emblematic of the kind of campaign that all of Trump’s primary opponents, save perhaps Vivek Ramaswamy, ran this election cycle: as empty vessels for the globalists and America’s ruling class. With DeSantis out of the race now, these donors have had no choice but to coalesce around Haley, whose campaign is basically a mouthpiece for Raytheon and Silicon Valley at this point, in a last-ditch attempt to foil Trump in his tracks. Indeed, just several days before the New Hampshire primary occurred, global elites were meeting at their annual conference in Davos; one such clip from the conference that went viral was that of Alex Soros, son of George Soros, doomsaying about the prospect of Donald Trump returning to the White House.

That concern is not without merit. There is good reason for the so-called Party of Davos to be afraid: President Trump’s poll numbers, fueled by the momentum of these unconstitutional lawsuits and now two convincing primary victories, are the best they have ever been this early in the presidential primary: the RCP average has Trump leading Biden by a 4-point spread in the general election. Several other polls considered reputable, such as Harvard-Harris and Rasmussen, have put that advantage up to nearly ten points over Biden. In general election terms, a ten-point lead over an opponent would equate to what one former president memorably described as a “shellacking.” To give things a historical perspective, Reagan trounced Carter by 9 points in 1980—tantamount to the lead the aforementioned polls give Trump—where Reagan carried nearly 500 electoral votes to Carter’s measly 49.

Now that is not to say Republicans should rest on their laurels: there remains a ton of work to be done, with many unforeseeable obstacles along the way no doubt between now and November. But it is to say that President Trump is in a very strong position, despite the ongoing election fraud and concerted efforts by the deep state to sabotage his chances, throw him in jail with one or several of these indictments, and remove him from the ballot. Luckily, the unelected judges and bureaucrats who make mincemeat of the Constitution like petty tyrants have run against a major obstacle in the court of public opinion, which increasingly recognizes these sham court proceedings, where judges hand out arbitrary and capricious decisions with impunity, for the witch hunt they are. The public also finds itself in dire straits, being unable to afford daily necessities like groceries and pay utility bills because of rising costs associated with lasting inflation, which remains at historic highs with no reversal in sight, even if the rate of inflation growth has slowly cooled off ever so slightly in recent months.

The harsh economic realities America faces are deep-seated and go far, far deeper than just the higher costs of groceries. Real wages have not increased at all over Biden’s four years in office, labor force participation rates continue to lag historic norms, higher-skilled laborers have been forced out of the markets through a combination of aging out and DEI initiatives, which ruthlessly select against generally more competent, older white professionals (see the airline industry as one notable example), and COVID mandates, reducing both the quantity and quality of the overall labor force. Meanwhile, supply chains have not, despite Biden’s insistence on the contrary, bounced back to pre-COVID levels. They remain in tatters, a condition that is not helped by Biden’s placement of climate-related initiatives, such as prioritizing electric vehicles while stubbornly refusing to “drill, baby, drill,” i.e., tap into America’s own vast oil reserves, which only compound other systemic monetary and fiscal woes.

Crumbling infrastructure, such as New York City’s century-old subway system, already in a state of chronic disrepair, is only worsened by the illegal migrant crisis that has infiltrated cities across the land, whose mayors and officials have proven themselves utterly incapable of quelling record homelessness and rising crime. The amalgamation of crime, homelessness, and illegal migrants has been an unmitigated disaster for everyday Americans. Economically, they are being forced to pay for housing, food, schooling, and healthcare for illegals—many of whom are military-age men trafficking in drugs and committing other crimes—from not only Mexico and El Salvador but from all over the world.

Many Americans now also feel like they put their lives at risk every time they leave their homes to go to work, knowing that under the Biden regime, dangerous criminals and illegals run around with impunity while law enforcement has been effectively handcuffed, such as by eliminating stop-and-frisk, from doing their jobs competently. The fact that the federal government now issues arbitrary decrees, such as the one handed down by the Supreme Court this past week involving Texas, in which the feds unilaterally and outrageously decreed that states have no right to preserve their own sovereignty and that they must let the entire third world flood their borders or else face the wrath of the FBI, is the textbook definition of tyranny. When states are handcuffed by federal authorities from being able to fight for their most basic right of self-preservation, it is the ultimate telltale that the country is on life support and liberty hangs in the balance.

Americans have long been known for their dynamism and freedom-loving instincts. At least, that was the case for most every other generation up until our own. The outcome of this year’s presidential election will ultimately come down to whether that instinct, however diminished, still exists or whether Americans, so browbeaten by the deep state into licensing their great replacement by perfidious foreign ideologies, customs, and invaders, no longer meaningfully exist.

The momentum fueling the Trump movement would suggest that a heartbeat is still there, however faint, and, with that hope, a chance for renewal. Of course, the deep state will try every trick in the book, and then some, to derail the Trump Train for all time. They will become more and more vindictive as they come to terms with the fact that it cannot be stopped.

Ultimately, their nefarious, freedom-denying playbook will not stand. The reason is simple: Americans from coast to coast cherish their sacred liberties and will fight for their freedoms to the end. While Donald John Trump is the avatar for that national renewal, the movement he spearheaded will long outlast him and, in that respect, transcend any single man or woman. If the enemies of the American experiment and its hallowed Constitution attempt to bring him down, the enemies of that project will have only signed their death warrant, for such occurrence would convert the oppressed sheeple into ravenous lions, who, like their forefathers, will fight to their graves so that they might remain free.

Joe Biden Got Free Services From Hunter's Business Associate, Eric Schwerin

Nick Arama reporting for RedState 

Hunter Biden business associate Eric Schwerin testified to Congress behind closed doors on Tuesday in their impeachment investigation of Joe Biden. 

The Oversight Committee wanted Schwerin's testimony because not only was he a business associate of Hunter, but he also took care of the finances for Joe Biden, including his taxes and other matters. So when Joe Biden said he never spoke with any of Hunter's associates, that was just untrue, as not only did he speak with others, but he spoke a lot with Schwerin because of the financial work he did for the family.  

According to Schwerin's opening remarks, he maintained that he was 'not aware of any financial transactions or compensation' Joe Biden received through his family's businesses. He also called Republican allegations otherwise 'preposterous.'

But Republicans say Schwerin's testimony pokes holes into Biden's claim that there has always been an 'absolute wall' between himself and his family's business. 

A source told DailyMail.com that Schwerin confirmed he interacted with then-Vice President Biden on 'multiple' occasions and was not paid to provide several professional services - including bookkeeping and tax preparation. 

Schwerin was also appointed by Biden to the Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad, which other top donors and friends sat on.

House Oversight Chair James Comer (R-KY) said Joe Biden got free professional services from Schwerin and "it is unethical for the VP to receive gifts of this nature." 

So much for no contact with Hunter business associates and so much for the "word of a Biden." 

Joe Biden swapped emails at least 54 times with Schwerin during his vice presidency, according to prior disclosures — as then-second son Hunter Biden courted business from countries where his father held sway, such as China and Ukraine.

Some of the emails were sent at roughly the same time that Joe Biden was making official trips to Ukraine as the head of US policy — while Hunter was earning a $1 million salary sitting on the board of natural gas company Burisma Holdings beginning in the spring of 2014

Some of those emails also involved the infamous Joe Biden pseudonyms that the Republicans wanted to ask him about during the deposition. 

Comer appeared on Sean Hannity's show on Tuesday and said this confirmed there wasn't a wall between Joe Biden and Hunter's business as Joe had claimed. He also said that providing such services was an ethics violation. 

Cori Bush Responds to Reports She's Under Criminal Investigation by Biden DOJ

Spencer Brown reporting for Townhall 

Proud 'Defund the Police' squad member Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) confirmed that she is the subject of a criminal investigation led by the U.S. Department of Justice on Tuesday afternoon and denied any wrongdoing in response to the allegations that she misused federal (read: taxpayer) funds for her private security.

In a statement, Rep. Bush said that she holds herself, her campaign, and her position "to the highest levels of integrity" and insisted she "also believe[s] in transparency," hence her confirmation that "the Department of Justice is reviewing my campaign's spending on security services."

Bush said that she is "fully cooperating" with the criminal probe and presented her side of the story billed as "the facts and the truth."

Since before I was sworn into office, I have endured relentless threats to my physical safety and life. As a rank-and-file member of Congress I am not entitled to personal protection by the House, and instead have used campaign funds as permissible to retain security services. I have not used any federal tax dollars for personal security services. Any reporting that I have used federal funds for personal security is simply false.

Given these threats Bush outlined, one would expect her to retain the best professional security services available. Yet, as Guy noted last spring, Bush's then-highest-paid private security guard "claims he can summon tornadoes at will, cause earthquakes with his hate, and conduct blood rituals to bring ruin upon his enemies" and portends to be an "intergalactic master of psychic self-defense born 109 trillion years ago."

Now facing scrutiny for her security expenses, Bush didn't miss the opportunity to lob some partisan attacks in the statement defending her actions before broaching the topic of her security guard-husband:

In recent months, right-wing organizations have lodged baseless complaints against me, peddling notions that I have misused campaign funds to pay for personal security services. That is simply not true. I have complied with all applicable laws and House rules—and will continue to prioritize the rules that govern us as federal elected officials.

In particular, the nature of these allegations have been around my husband's role on the campaign. In accordance with all applicable rules, I retained my husband as part of my security team to provide security services because he has had extensive experience in this area, and is able to provide the necessary services at or below a fair market rate.

Like most spouses, Bush's husband began as just her boyfriend. Then, according to KSDK, he was hired to be a part of her private security detail after they began dating. They then were engaged and married, and he continues to collect a check as her security guard.

Still, Bush remains confident that none of the investigations into her security arrangement will lead to the discovery of any wrongdoing:

These frivolous complaints have resulted in a number of investigations, some of which are still ongoing. The Federal Election Commission and the House Committee on Ethics are currently reviewing the matter, as is the Department of Justice. We are fully cooperating in all of these pending investigations. In September of last year, after conducting a months-long investigation, the Office of Congressional Ethics found no wrongdoing and voted unanimously to dismiss the case. I look forward to this same outcome from all pending investigations. 

"I am under no illusion that these right-wing organizations will stop politicizing and pursuing efforts to attack me and the work that the people of St. Louis sent me to Congress to do: to lead boldly, to legislate change my constituents can feel, and to save lives," Bush's statement concluded. 

Perhaps if she wants to save lives she'll stop advocating against police and public safety funding — for the sake of her constituents who can't afford to hire (and marry) private security.

This Forgotten ’90s Movie Eerily Predicted The Current Immigration Standoff

If you want to understand how mass immigration became the biggest flashpoint in American politics, a surprisingly entertaining and unjustly forgotten HBO movie deserves to be watched.

posted by Mark Hemingway at The Federalist

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before — a red-state governor, in the midst of a nationwide immigration crisis, defies the president and shuts down the state’s borders to prevent more immigrants from coming in. This leads other states suffering from the effects of mass illegal immigration to rally around the state defying the president, and they all send troops to the state’s borders. Incredibly, this is the plot of “The Second Civil War,” a made-for-HBO movie in 1997. The film languishes in obscurity despite its notable prescience. Which is a shame, because it’s also a surprisingly incisive, entertaining, and well-made film.

But for “The Second Civil War” to have a second life, first you’d have to know about the film. In my case, while staving off boredom at the gym, I listened to a ton of episodes of “The Movies That Made Me,” which is a podcast where they interview a number of actors and major film industry figures about the movies that most influenced them, hosted by screenwriter Josh Olson and director Joe Dante. In particular, Dante’s presence makes the podcast. He’s worked in Hollywood since the 1960s, and his memory of the industry is truly encyclopedic — if for some reason you need to know who the director of photography was on “Logan’s Run,” he can probably tell you off the top of his head.

And if Joe Dante’s name doesn’t ring a bell, his work probably should. He’s directed one classic film, “Gremlins,” and a handful of much-beloved ’80s films that I’d say are remembered fondly enough for whatever reason that we’ll call them near classics — “Innerspace,” “Explorers,” “The Howling,” “The ‘Burbs,” and “Matinee” all stick out in this regard. With a few exceptions, he’s mostly worked in TV since the ’90s. At some point after listening to the podcast last year, I did a deep dive into Joe Dante’s filmography.

Well, after the hype surrounding the recent trailer for the upcoming “Civil War” movie, I remembered that in 1997 Dante directed “The Second Civil War,” and not only that, Dante is on record saying he considers it the best film he’s ever done. You can rent it on Amazon Prime’s video service, so we watched it this past weekend.

The film takes place “somewhere in the near future” and is a broad and consistently amusing satire that takes aim at just about every political center of power in America. The movie employs a very meta but very effective plot device, almost all of the action is explicated through reporters on the scene of various locations — the White House, a state capitol, and reporters embedded with the military — and the on-the-scene reporters are in turn in communication with the producers at the fictional cable newsroom where they all work. Naturally, those producers are all having internal arguments about how to cover the unfolding crisis as they ping back and forth between the on-the-ground perspectives of reporters at different locales. Telling the story this way could have been a mess, but in the hands of a skilled veteran director such as Dante, it works quite well. And while the film did not predict the perversity of online discourse, the illustration of the media’s disturbing incentives is nonetheless accurate and perceptive.

It further helps that the movie has a helluva cast, including James Earl Jones, James Coburn, Dan Hedaya, Beau Bridges, Denis Leary, Elizabeth Pena, and Ron Perlman, and it’s worth the price of admission alone just to see the late, great Phil Hartman play the president. If that weren’t enough, it’s stuffed with great bit players — Kevin Dunn, Brian Keith, Dick Miller, Kevin McCarthy, William Schallert — a lot of, “Oh, it’s that guy!” in this movie.

As for the plot, obviously things are more complicated and less bang-on accurate to the current Texas standoff than the very brief summary up top might indicate — but that doesn’t make things any less trenchant. (There are some mild spoilers ahead.)

The state is Idaho, not Texas, but the way the immigration crisis is illustrated is something. For instance, Chinese immigrants have completely taken over Rhode Island and now dominate the state’s politics, but an all-new wave of immigrants now threatens the Chinese character of the state such that they are riding to support Idaho, now populated largely by white militia types, in its standoff with the Feds. The mayor of Los Angeles holds a press conference all in Spanish where he denounces Anglo control of California before the presser is interrupted by a hail of bullets from black gangs upset with Hispanic control of the city. Sikhs now dominate Alabama and speak with hick accents. There’s a Nation of Islam caucus in Congress, and one of these congressmen confronts James Earl Jones’ character over the fact that he’s a black man married to a Jew. It’s implied that Jones’ character met his wife in the “back of a bus” when they were both Freedom Riders fighting for civil rights, which is just a damning and ballsy confrontation of black racism.

In fact, mass immigration has so thoroughly corrupted America’s politics that there’s a running joke throughout the film about the White House trying to cobble together enough electoral votes by appealing to various balkanized regional ethnic factions. It’s remarkable to see all this acknowledged frankly, let alone played for laughs. If you suggest today that mass illegal immigration is being tolerated because there’s the expectation these millions of people will become voters someday, dilute the voting power of existing citizens, and be exploited for the benefit of the guy in the White House… well, we’re told over and over this is the “great replacement theory” and anyone who suggests this is a possibility is a racist nutcase enabling mass shooters.

And yet 25 years ago, earnest liberals saw this as a logical outcome of what’s happening. Indeed, I know Dante and most of the people involved in this film are the furthest thing from right-wing. (On an episode of the “Movies That Made Me,” Dante nearly did a spit take when legendary director William Friedkin, of “French Connection” and “Exorcist” fame, expressed some Trump sympathies. Though it’s worth saying that Martyn Burke, the screenwriter behind “The Second Civil War,” deserves tremendous credit here. He’s also done an adaptation of Animal Farm and a documentary on the KGB that suggests he’s appropriately skeptical of the left, as well as the right.)

In the end, what makes “The Second Civil War” so good and perceptive is that its satire is omnidirectional and not bound by conventional right-left ideological sympathies. Understanding “The Second Civil War,” as well as our present crisis, ultimately involves examining to what extent reflexive tribalism is a collective manifestation of individual corruption.

In any event, this film is an odd window into a time when good liberals, and I mean that phrase sincerely, used to believe that being an American meant forging consensus around shared ideals. Of course, there’s been a lot of polarization since this film was unceremoniously dumped onto HBO decades ago, and the result is that Americans on the right now worry the left has abandoned forging consensus on American ideals such as free expression and equality among races, while liberals no doubt worry that the backlash to the current mess is white nationalism and a lack of compassion directed toward immigrants.

In sum, “The Second Civil War” deserves a wide audience, and it’s an excellent starting point for Americans of every stripe to reexamine their own assumptions that led us to a very ugly place politically. I suspect good liberal Joe Dante and I probably don’t agree on much politically, but I respect the hell out of the point of view in this film — and what this film got right 27 years ago is pretty astonishing in light of America’s present immigration crisis.

Tucker Interviews Russell Brand, on Information Warfare and Government Targeting

posted by Sundance at Conservative Treehouse 

Russell Brand is a former lefty who took the red pill and over time joined the great awakening.  As an outcome of his current perspectives and influence, Brand is currently labeled a dissident threat and targeted by the globalist system.

Tucker Carlson invited Brand to appear on his broadcast for a discussion of the big picture amid the current era of information warfare.  Brand is an eloquent voice who frames the arguments very clearly and quickly, thus his growing influence represented a threat to the system and a process of Lawfare attacks was launched against him.  The British government then asked all Big Tech platforms to remove Brand from visibility.  The only tech platform that refused to acquiesce to the Five-Eyes demand was Rumble.

This is a very good interview, well worth the 40 minutes of time.

Here's the Latest Undemocratic Activity Embraced by Congressional Staffers

Matt Vespa reporting for Townhall 

These kids need to be smacked with a frying pan. Not that I’m approaching AARP age, but in my day, when you were an intern or entry-level employee, the task was simple: do your job and keep your mouth shut. The latter applies double for interns—you’re meant to be seen, not heard. On the Hill, we’ve seen scores of Biden staffers revolt against their bosses in the aftermath of the Israeli invasion of Gaza. Bloomberg wrote about a new trend: unelected staffers pushing back against their bosses, also known as elected lawmakers (via Bloomberg Government): 

Congressional staff … are increasingly challenging their own bosses in a bid to shift the balance of power on Capitol Hill, representing a sea change in the relationship between lawmakers and the legions of workers who ensure the House and Senate function. 

A combination of factors, ranging from the Jan. 6 attacks to generational divides, are propelling unprecedented levels of organizing and activism among staff and leading to questions about the limits of those activities and convincing some to give up their jobs. 

“They’re asserting themselves more,” said Bradford Fitch, president and CEO of the Congressional Management Foundation. 

[…] 

Advocacy spread even to the official business of Congress and the Supreme Court, especially through the work of nonpartisan staff associations. 

Hispanic staffers want Congress to provide a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants who came to the country as children so they can work on the Hill. 

LGBTQ+ staffers have called out House lawmakers for denigrating the transgender community, applauded passage of legislation codifying federal protections for same-sex marriages (Public Law 117-228), and rebutted a Supreme Court case carving out religious exemptions for contractors to those weddings. 

Staff associations representing staffers of color opposed legislation eliminating the House’s diversity and inclusion office, and one representing Korean-Americans on the Hill applauded introduction of a non-binding measure condemning discrimination against Asian-Americans during the pandemic (H. Res. 153). 

[…] 

Lawmakers’ staff have always challenged their bosses’ positions, albeit behind closed door or by leaking to the press. 

[…] 

Michael Thorning, director of structural democracy at the Bipartisan Policy Center, said staffers’ authorship of letters, even anonymously, could be “potentially really harmful to the institution” if it reveals internal operations or deliberations. He said training for staffers and members alike could help offices navigate these new dynamics. 

“You have to, I think, either be willing to accept your boss’s decisions or be willing to find somewhere else to work,” Thorning said.

No one elected these little brats. You’re meant to answer calls and emails, pass along messages, and do whatever rudimentary work entails concerning elected representatives' daily activities. For senior staff, whatever the boss wants is the goal. Sure, you’ve earned the privilege of chiming in on specific aspects of strategy in achieving that aim, but that doesn’t entail leaking sensitive details to the press or committing sabotage. If you feel that strongly, you need to find another job. 

The actions of the deep state from supposed apolitical actors in the bureaucracy and intelligence community have leeched into the worst individuals in recent college graduates in the Capitol Building who will execute kamikaze runs to try and steer their bosses and themselves on remaining on what they view as the right side of history. It's this addiction to being on the correct side of that arc that's led to truly anti-democratic antics from the Left. 

You weren't elected, kids. And to the folks at the DOJ, FBI, CIA, and elsewhere in DC who have done similar things because they disagreed with Trump, the same principle applies to you, too.