Voting for losers = bad results

A friend told us recently that he had voted Republican all his life until the last election, and then he had voted for the third party candidate.

Why? Because he found President Donald Trump despicable, or some such term.

“But would you have rather had Hillary Clinton in the White House?” we asked, understanding he has a right to his opinion

That’s when he told us he had voted for the Libertarian candidate.

We recall that many Americans voted for Texan Ross Perot in 1992 when Bill Clinton defeated the incumbent Republican president George H.W. Bush. (We might have been among them.) Bush sorta signed his own death warrant when he broke his 1988 “read my lips, no new taxes” pledge and then caved in to Democratic tax hikers.

Clinton received 44,909,889 votes, Bush 39,104,548 and Perot 19,743, 821.

Although Bush had alienated many conservatives, the Bush-Perot vote total together exceeded Clinton’s vote total.

Clinton won the electoral college vote 370-168. Perot got none.

We can’t remember either Bill Clinton or Hillary complaining about the Electoral College vote at that time although Bill didn’t win the majority of the votes cast as Hillary did after the 2016 election. There weren’t as many illegal aliens voting then, either, we’re pretty sure.

We have said repeatedly that President Trump wasn’t our choice for the Republican nomination two years ago, but we have been pleasantly surprised by what he has accomplished despite a constant attack by the nation’s left-wing major news media and undermining attacks from within the Washington D.C. establishment.

Bill Clinton was (and is) a clever politician and by co-opting conservative programs had a fairly successful administration.

Bill Clinton was eventually followed by left-wing demagogue Barack Obama, whose effect may explain the distress across America today.

Hillary Clinton served as Obama’s secretary of state for a period of time and appeared ready to continue the Obama policies that would have destroyed the Constitution and the free America that hopefully a majority of Americans still love and appreciate.

Apparently a majority of American voters remembered the Perot experiment and while the message of the third party candidates was appealing, they stayed on point to give Donald Trump a resounding Electoral College victory.

President Successful Despite Left’s Collusion

While Trump continues to battle against a biased national media that has attempted to destroy his presidency, he has taken many positive stands that don’t mesh with leftist goals.

He has appointed two Supreme Court members that the Left fought tooth and nail( and nastily) to defeat and may very well appoint a third.

Another Conservative Justice in Offing

Recent reports on the health of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a leftist icon, indicate she may soon retire from the Supreme Court.

South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, now chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, says he is determined that the next Supreme Court vacancy is filled by a Constitution-abiding justice.

He credits the previous Democrat Senate President Harry Reid of Nevada with opening the way for Republicans to ensure a conservative on the court by eliminating the filibuster for appellate judicial nominees in 2013.

“My Democratic colleagues felt when they were in charge we should confirm judges by a majority vote,” Graham told Fox News’ Chris Wallace in a recent interview.  “They changed the rules to accommodate President Obama. They tried to stack the court. They never thought [Hillary] Clinton would lose. So what you’re gonna have is Harry Reid’s and Chuck Schumer’s desire to stack the court on their Democratic watch has come back to haunt them.

“If there is an opening, whether it’s Ginsburg or anybody else, I will urge the president to nominate a qualified conservative and hopefully those people will get through – that person will get through,” Graham continued. “And I expect it to be along party lines, and this is what happens when you change the rules. This has come back to bite ‘em. I predicted it would. And we’ll see. I hope Justice Ginsburg serves for a long time. But if there’s an opening on this court, I’m going to be hell-bent to put a conservative to replace whoever steps down for whatever reason.”

Pressed by Fox’s Chris Wallace as to whether it was appropriate to nominate a conservative to replace a liberal icon like Ginsburg, Graham again said liberals have only Reid to blame – and he suggested Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s treatment meant that all bets are off.

The Wall and Democrats

Graham asserted that President Trump is still ready and willing to make a deal with congressional Democrats to end the ongoing partial federal government shutdown, although the window is rapidly closing.

The shutdown revolves around the president’s demand for a $5.7 billion appropriation to build a wall at the nation’s southern border to keep out illegal immigrants from Mexico and central America.

President Trump has suggested he may declare a national emergency at the border in order to sidestep the House of Representatives’ new Democratic majority’s opposition to the wall.

John G. Malcolm, vice president of the Institute for Constitutional Government and director of the Edwin Meese III Center of Legal and Judicial Studies cites legal standing to do that although legal challenges can be expected.

Here are some of the points the administration has been making for its case:

•Arguing that the flow of drugs across the border has dramatically increased, claiming that 90 percent of illegal drugs entering our country come across the southern border and that during the last fiscal year, there was a 73 percent increase in fentanyl (amounting to 2,400 pounds) and a 38 percent increase in methamphetamine and heroin coming over the southern border.

•Citing profits being made by “coyotes” who carry migrants across the border as well as the horrific conditions to which those migrants are subjected. The administration claims that criminal organizations derive $2.5 billion in profits every year from smuggling migrants into the U.S., and that 68.3 percent of all migrants report having been subjected to an act of violence and 31 percent of female migrants report having been sexually assaulted while en route.

•Highlighting the fact that during the last fiscal year, Customs and Border Protection agents stopped 17,000 adults at the southern border who had criminal records, and that Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents apprehended 6,000 known or suspected gang members at the border.

•Pointing to the mayhem wrought by many of the illegal aliens who successfully entered our country. In his speech, the president noted that over the last two years, 266,000 illegal immigrants have been charged or convicted of 100,000 assaults, 30,000 sex crimes and 4,000 murders.

•Arguing that with caravans of people arriving at the border, the system is simply overwhelmed. The administration is claiming that during the last fiscal year, 60,000 unaccompanied children and 161,000 family units arrived at the border; that 98 percent of family units and unaccompanied alien children are never removed; that there has been a 2,000 percent increase in asylum claims over the last five years; and that immigration courts currently have a backlog of nearly 800,000 cases.

•Noting that many Democrats who now oppose building a wall once supported the concept. Indeed, in 2006, 26 Democratic senators–including Chuck Schumer, Dianne Feinstein, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and Joe Biden–voted in favor of the Secure Fence Act, which empowered the Department of Homeland Security to build “physical infrastructure enhancements” along the border. Congress, however, has never appropriated the funds for this purpose. Malcolm lists some of the laws President Trump might use to validate his declaration:

Laws Trump Might Use

to Make His Case

Although it is always perilous to speculate about what authorities the president might cite should he declare a national emergency, there are a few likely candidates.

There is a provision in the Immigration and Nationality Act that gives the president authority to tap into an Immigration Emergency Fund in the case of an “immigration emergency,” which is defined as:

[A]n actual or imminent influx of aliens which either is of such magnitude or exhibits such other characteristics that effective administration of the immigration laws of the United States is beyond the existing capabilities of the Immigration and Naturalization Service … in the affected area or areas. Characteristics of an influx of aliens, other than magnitude, which may be considered in determining whether an immigration emergency  exists include: the likelihood of continued growth in the magnitude of the influx; an apparent connection between the influx and increases in criminal activity; the actual or imminent imposition of unusual and overwhelming demands on law enforcement agencies; and other similar characteristics.

It is highly unlikely, however, that this vehicle would provide sufficient resources to build the wall, since Congress appropriates only $20 million per year for that fund.

There are two other laws that the president might cite, but both come with some important caveats.

The first would apply if a president were to declare a national emergency “that requires the use of the armed forces.” If that were to happen, the secretary of defense could authorize the military departments to “undertake military construction projects … that are necessary to support such use of the armed forces” so long as the amount spent on such projects does not exceed “the total amount of funds that have been appropriated for military construction, including funds appropriated for family housing, that have not been obligated.”

The second would apply if a president were to declare a national emergency “that requires or may require the use of the armed forces.” If that were to happen, the defense secretary would be empowered to “(1) terminate or defer the construction, operation, maintenance, or repair of any Department of the Army civil works project that he deems not essential to the national defense, and (2) apply the resources of the Department of the Army’s civil works program, including funds, personnel, and equipment, to construct or assist in the construction, operation, maintenance, and repair of authorized civil works, military construction, and civil defense projects that are essential to the national defense.”

Utilizing one of these authorities, the president does have a valid case to make that he has the authority to act unilaterally.