Tensions with Russia rise as US says Assad must abide by deal not to use chemical weapons but fails to outline objectives
Source: Syria: US warns Assad over using chemical weapons again | World news | The Guardian
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Trump’s Options for North Korea Include Placing Nukes in South Korea – NBC News
8 AprThe National Security Council has presented President Trump with options to respond to North Korea’s nuclear program, including putting American nukes in South Korea or killing dictator Kim Jong-un, multiple top-ranking officials told NBC News. Both scenarios are part of an accelerated review of North Korea policy prepared in advance of Trump’s meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping this week. Tune in to Nightly News tonight at 6:30 p.m. ET for more on this story.
Source: Trump’s Options for North Korea Include Placing Nukes in South Korea – NBC News
Mark Caserta: Will Trumpgate become a modern-day Watergate?
7 AprMark Caserta: Free State Patriot editor
April 7, 2017
It was arguably the biggest political scandal in our nation’s history.
In the early morning hours of June 17, 1972, burglars were arrested inside the office of the Democratic National Committee, located in the Watergate building in Washington, D.C., attempting to wiretap phones and steal secret documents.
Subsequent investigations would reveal the crime was connected to President Richard Nixon’s re-election campaign. Ultimately, 40 government officials would eventually be indicted or jailed and the president of the United States would be forced to resign in 1974.
In January, a New York Times column by Charlie Savage, reported “the new rules significantly relax longstanding limits on what the NSA may do with the information gathered by its most powerful surveillance operations.”
The column detailed methods by which information may be acquired such as satellite transmissions, phone calls, emails and messages between people abroad. The ultimate result would be more officials searching through more data containing private information about innocent people.
But, why, after eight years in office, did Obama feel compelled to change this intelligence sharing just before leaving the White House?
Allow me to share what many believe transpired.
These new rules were signed into effect just weeks after Obama and the Democrats were shocked by the stunning presidential victory of Donald J. Trump. Reeling from their sense of loss and hopelessness, I believe there was an initiative to begin gathering any available information that would help delegitimize the incoming administration.
And liberals are so pleased with themselves, some just can’t keep their mouths shut about it.
On March 2, on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe”, Mika Brzezinski interviewed a former top Obama administration official who acknowledged efforts by “colleagues” to gather intelligence on Trump’s ties to Russia before Donald Trump took office and to “conceal the sources of that intelligence from the incoming administration.”
Predictably, liberal Democrats and the mainstream media have attempted to deflect the real story of illegal wiretapping and sharing of information with a bogus narrative suggesting the Russians influenced the 2016 presidential election.
Yet, not an ounce of proof has been submitted that the Russians influenced a single vote in the election.
If the Obama administration committed a premeditated act to acquire intelligence on Donald Trump, and the required privacy protections were not enacted before disseminating, the Justice Department must hold them accountable.
Democrats may, indeed, have “re-enacted the villainy” of Watergate, with this so-called Trumpgate.
If so, indictments and jail time should be forthcoming.
Mark Caserta is a conservative blogger and a Cabell County resident.
Doug Smith: The Tyranny of Perfection
5 AprMy country ’tis of thee…
Doug Smith: Author and historical, social and political editor for Free State Patriot
April, 5, 2017
My wife is a perfectionist.
So, I live with this phenomenon and understand it. She was the sort of Straight A student who would be very upset at getting a 99, if someone else had ever gotten a 100, or getting a 100 if extra credit made a 103 possible. This all made her a driven and excellent student, but not a very happy one.
Nothing she ever did was going to be good enough for her. Now, being a much more laid back sort, I find myself shaking my head at this attitude, because it is amazing that a straight A, Summa Cum Laude student so frequently growls “Stupid, stupid, stupid” at herself. You think you might get a little credit for those A s, and the long nights? No?
Now, she is not alone. The Utopians among us, clear back to Plato, and moving all the way to today’s progressives and socialists, build in their mind a perfect society; one which has never existed, but might, if only they were put in charge. Now not to pop their collective little bubbles, but if some 6,000 years of human civilization has never produced a Utopia, what in the world would make them think they are so much smarter, wiser, and better than a Solomon or Marcus Aurelius that they will finally get it done?
And there has not been a perfect society or civilization, ever. But the Utopians live lives of noisy misery, focused on every fault of the best civilization the world has seen. By their emphasis on the problems, they miss the joy of what they have, lack appreciation of the good, and buy into many Brooklyn Bridge fantasies of how good things could be if only. Moral relativism is a miserable frame of mind when it leads you to long for the gulags and empty shelves of Russia, and decry the missing 10 % in the 90 % society.
Western civilization, and American civilization, is the highest, best, and most desirable the world has yet seen. (Easy snowflakes, don’t have your stroke just yet. I’m not done assaulting your sensibilities.) It is not perfect, but then all nations, being peopled by, well, people, are imperfect. Still, the horse kissers, (as in gift), who decry the blessings they enjoy by being born into or permitted to live in the greatest nation in the history of the world, have a peculiar blindness and tunnel vision when it comes to the nation and culture which spawned and nurtured them.
Let s review the record.
Ok right up front. The United States had slavery. Yep. Sure, did. And in the 16th through 18th century, so did a large portion of the world. The countries from which many American slaves came had a long history of capturing and selling slaves. And in fact, many still do. Slavery is rampant today, in the 21st century, throughout the Muslim world, for which the critics and snowflakes of America love to act as apologists.
The United States also had a long growing moral objection to slavery, nearly derailing the formation of the nation’s Constitution. It took several decades, but then erupted into a war which raged for four years, left over half a million dead, and devastated the country. Aside from the revolt of Spartacus, which was fought BY the slaves, trained as gladiators, and ended in disaster, what nation has ever in history fought such a war to destroy an economy based on slavery, and free slaves? Feel free to do your own research, but spoiler alert: none, ever.
It was a long an arduous process bringing former slaves closer to parity with the rest of the citizenry, and we are not without problems yet. But a quick look at Ben Carson and Barack Obama must tell anyone looking, that tremendous progress has been made.
Yet there are those who still focus on Thomas Jefferson holding slaves. As though nothing else has ever happened in our nation. We ought to be judged by who we were in the world as it stood then, and what we have done in the meantime. So many want to judge us based on some impossible perfection standard, or judge the United States of 1800 by the standards of 2000.
As though the United States, alone, has not fought more, bled more, spent more, to free more people from tyranny than any other nation in the history of mankind. No nation as powerful as the United States has ever, from the outskirts of Eden to now, spent its treasure, and blood, and young men to free other nations from tyranny, and taken possession of only the amount of ground necessary to bury our 10,000 dead in French soil. French soil. Not occupied France. Not the American zone. French. French soil holds the blood and bodies of the men of the 29th Infantry Division, just above the beach on which they died. It was named Omaha, for a city in America, but it was, and remained, a French beach.
The United States has given more to the world than any other nation, ever. The British Empire can make a claim for a near second, yet the United States has done more to lift more people, both our own citizens and others, out of poverty than any other nation in history. The United States has fed more of the world than any other nation, ever. The United States has given the world light bulbs, (thanks Tom Edison), electricity, education, literature, the Panama Canal, eradicated polio, nearly eradicated malaria (until one of the “aint it awful crowd” pulled DDT from the shelves and signed a death warrant for 100 million). Absent the United States, totalitarian empires would have plunged the world into a dark age from which it might never emerge.
Who would give the world advances in food production, medicine, balance the power of despots and tyrants, raise the standard of living of the world to a higher level than it has ever seen, serve as the example and shining city on the hill to which millions aspire if not the United States? To which other country would so many risk life and limb and imprisonment to come? They know, unlike the horse kissers who refuse to appreciate what we have been blessed with, how truly superior in so many ways are the United States of America.
So many of the Occupy Antarctica Snowflake Brigade focus on every fault, and deny every virtue of this, the greatest nation in the history of mankind. They roll their eyes, and look down their sniffing little noses at “flag waving” and patriotism.
Well, I am a patriot, and I have a flag flying on the back of my home. I served in the uniform of my country, and saluted that flag every day for years. I learned the history and tradition of the Navy whose uniform I wore, and of the Sailors and Marines who fought and died for this country with that flag as their symbol and rallying point. I served in a difficult, demanding, dangerous job, which required us to be the deadliest force imaginable. If we were ordered to do so, we would have killed thousands. If caught, we would have been sunk and killed. We did the job because we believed in it, and the country. Value judgement: It is worth my life to protect this country; it is worth causing the deaths of thousands I would never see if so ordered to keep the country safe. We took an oath which said “I promise to protect, preserve, and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. “I did not see any expiration date when I took it.
I love this country, and while recognizing its faults, still believe it is the greatest country ever. I am unashamedly a fan and supporter of the United States, and her friends and allies, and all others take a back seat.
If it comes to the interests of the United States or any other country, this country, which houses my children, and the ideas which let them live as they wish comes first.
Always. Forever. And without apology.
Associated Press: Bit by bit, Trump methodically undoing Obama policies
3 AprSource: Associated Press
Mark Caserta: Obamacare repeal and replace simply delayed
1 Apr
Mark Caserta: Free State Patriot editor
Mar 31, 2017
Last week’s charade in the House of Representatives confirmed the level of ineptitude on Capitol Hill. For the GOP to have had eight years to reach consensus on a viable healthcare alternative to Obamacare and to be so unprepared is embarrassing.
But “let not your heart be troubled.” Obamacare will eventually be eliminated and replaced with a sustainable healthcare bill that will be affordable for all Americans.
However, what we saw legislatively last week was exactly what we “didn’t” see during the Obama administration – legitimate legislative debate on the content of a proposed healthcare initiative.
Remember, in 2010, when former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi spoke at a legislative conference and said, “We have to pass the bill,” speaking of the Affordable Care Act, “so that you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy.”
Well, it turns out the intended lack of transparency shrouded the multitude of liberal lies about Obama’s signature healthcare law and facilitated its passage.
The GOP establishment, while debilitatingly dimwitted along the way, debated, argued and disagreed on provisions of the American Healthcare Act and ultimately couldn’t agree on the initial piece of legislation. I’m truly encouraged that true conservatives ultimately blocked a potentially flawed bill.
Finally, Americans receive some representation.
But that’s not what you’ll hear from liberal Democrats or the mainstream media. And frankly, the Democrat’s lack of genuine concern for the uninsured is very telling. Obamacare is in a death spiral and liberals seemingly couldn’t care less what happens to the average American, as long as they “win one for Obama.”
So, here’s what we can expect moving forward.
Successfully rewriting one-fifth of the economy will take time, but I assure you the House will eventually have the votes needed to pass a viable healthcare bill, probably in 2017. They don’t want to be unemployed the next election cycle. Subsequently, it will move on to the Senate, where it could be further amended.
But Republican Senators lack the 60 votes needed to pass any sort of healthcare legislation, no matter how good it is. They must resort to a process known as “reconciliation,” which requires only a majority vote and negates a Democrat filibuster. This is the legislative procedure Democrats used to pass portions of Obamacare.
An additional hurdle the GOP must clear is the “Byrd Rule,” named after our beloved Robert C. Byrd. As part of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, the Byrd Rule states that reconciliation can only be used on legislation that impacts the federal deficit.
Now, clearly this is budgetary in nature, but if it rises to the level of debate in the Senate that I expect, the presiding officer of the Senate, the vice president of the United States, has the final word on what’s permissible on reconciliation and what’s not.
So, despite liberal Democrats presenting this as an Obamacare victory, it necessarily delayed the inevitable.
As part of making America great again, Donald Trump will ensure every American has access to affordable healthcare.
Just as he promised.
Mark Caserta is a conservative blogger, a Cabell County resident and a regular contributor to The Herald-Dispatch editorial page.
Doug Smith: The Loyal Opposition?
27 Mar
Doug Smith: Author, historian and political, historical and social editor for Free State Patriot.
March 27, 2017
That is what the party out of power is supposed to be. However, that is not what the current Democrat party will be, ever. But more on that later. The Dems and the Left will only oppose Trump in the most vicious, “un” Democratic way possible.
The Loyal Opposition from come from within the President’s own party. The Freedom Caucus. The Heritage Foundation.
Me.
So, here goes. No, Mr. President, the Freedom Caucus was not to blame for the failure of the Ryan Health Care bill to get the required votes. But they did help, and for that, kudos to them.
The Democrats, as you should know (you are not stupid, but impulsive in the extreme, and for God’s sake give your phone to Reince Preibus and enough with the 2 am tweets!) will never support anything you say or do. You never were going to get any vote to touch a hair on the head of Obamacare, or Planned Parenthood from the Left side of the aisle. Well, maybe Joe Manchin, but he is fighting for survival in a WV that is getting redder every day. And he doesn’t want to come back to Morgantown and practice law.
But I think you already knew all this, and so did Paul Ryan.
Not everything is the art of the deal. There is also the value of rigorous honesty.
Paul Ryan seems, from one perspective, to be angling for the GOP to repeat a hat trick they have done successfully over and over. We need more!
Give us the House, and we will repeal Obamacare. So, the get the House. Then, to avoid a government shutdown caused by Obama and Reid, but blamed in the press on the GOP (have you figured this out yet? EVERYTHING is going to be the fault of you and the GOP. Get used to it, and just do the right, and smart, thing.) the GOP House caved on funding, where they did have power, then voted for a “clean bill” to repeal, and sent it to the Senate, where they did not have power, to die.
Lather, rinse, repeat. Give us the Senate.
We did.
Same routine.
Give us the White House.
We did, well, sort of. You are not what the GOP had in mind, and it is somewhat amusing to find them in this state.
But as we got closer over the last 6 years to giving the GOP everything relating to power in DC, a curious rot has set in. We need to repeal it, root and branch, thundered Mitch McConnell. We need to fix the parts that are broken, whimpered Jeb Bush, with all the passion of an artichoke.
Huh?
We need to repeal and replace it, as we have been promising the American people, sang the GOP in DC, in 216-part harmony. Wait a minute, now, just wait one doggone minute. What is this, trying for a soft landing.
It just doesn’t work like that. You sign a contract, or make a promise, and then as it gets close to time to deliver, you start to change the words, and alter the terms. You start to wax eloquent about the terms of the deal that only you are party to, and how you feel obligated to keep that promise.
And you know what? The folks who were promised a Mercedes, and now hear about the Prius you say you promised them, are going to feel betrayed, and suspicious. We are also going to wonder, if you didn’t keep the first promise, why would we expect you to keep the second one when the going gets tough?
We need to fix the parts that are broken? Yes. And it is all broken. As any big government takeover of a business necessarily will become. The bigger, the worse, and quicker it will break.
One argument is the phased repeal: keep Obamacare in place for a while so Secretary Price can reverse the many discretionary rules and changes of Secretary Sibelius.
Anyone see the problems there? Anyone? Beuhler?
Ok, first, if that is what the GOP, or you, Mr. President, want to do, Secretary Price is in office right now. He can busily spend his day reversing every move that Kathleen Sibelius took to try and prop up Obamacare, including eliminating the Cornhusker Kickback, and have it done right now. He has a staff. They can pull up every move she made and right a simple change: this is eliminated, and Tom Price can sign it.
Secondly, and one of the major flaws of Obamacare: what the Secretary giveth the Secretary, or a future one, can take. The law is so nebulous the Secretary of HHS can do whatever they want at any time. Forever. Uncertainty is deadly for a business. And this provision inserts it into the entire industry.
So, use the power you inherited now (after all, if you don’t, why would we think you will after the next bill is passed?) and do it.
Secondly, it has not been that long since we had an administration and Congress force feed us a bill in record time, without giving a clear picture of what was in it. Pelosi s famous “We have to pass the bill, to see what’s in the bill. “You did, we have, and we don’t like it. Furthermore, we don’t want bills passed like that again.
A lesson for you from Obama, one which he did not learn: POTUS is not a king, and must often persuade and negotiate, rather than rule, bully, and bluster.
You and Ryan have told us this is the best you get. Ignore the previous promises, just be grateful we are giving you something. We are at a crisis, and if you don’t pass it right now (this sounds so very much like 2009 all over again) the seas will rise, buildings will crumble, and you will be stuck with Obamacare till it crashes and burns, and we will blame it on the Democrats, and any of you, our own folks, who did not go along.
But that is not going to work this time. The common sense, conservative core of the Republican voting base has been lied to by our leadership far too many times to let it happen again without consequences. You, Mr. President, are one of those consequences, and the reasons Jeb or Marco are not planning the Easter Egg hunt.
Ryan is playing by the old boy rules. He is trying to craft a bill which would pass the old Senate rules. But of course, Harry Reid blew up long standing convention, so all bets are off in that august body. And if anything, his first bill should be WAY over to the other side, leaving room to negotiate back to the center. You never make a deal by starting out with all you want and saying That’s it, no negotiating.
Have you ever read “The Art of the Deal, “by Donald Trump?
If the GOP passes, and you sign, a bill which leaves most of Obamacare intact and just paints the walls in a house on fire, the folks who voted for you, and them, will feel, correctly, that they have been betrayed.
The Democrats were and are never going to support anything you do. The loyal opposition is not going to chant your name and give you a rubber stamp. We are going to support you when you are right (well done with Gorsuch and extreme vetting, nice start with the EPA) and when you are wrong, let you know.
The last real journalist I can remember speaking the truth to power when it came to POTUS was Sam Donaldson. He did a nice job of keeping Carter and Reagan’s feet to the fire. I can still hear him now.
Hold On, Mr. President.
That is the title of HIS book. It might be good reading for you, Mr. President. At 2 am. Instead of tweeting.
As I’m sure you have discovered, you are sitting in the hottest seat around. There are some of us around who will loyally support you, but still hold your feet to the fire when your misstep and try to urge you back on the right path.
I expect you will make missteps. You are human, after all. Smart humans learn from their mistakes and don’t repeat them. That is my hope for you.
So, to summarize, here, from the loyal opposition, Hold On, Mr. President.
That is not what we sent you there to do. Take a breath. Have a steak, well done, with ketchup, and try again.
James Caserta: Finally Stepping Into The Light – Part 3
27 MarTaking Back My Fire
Sunday, March 26, 2017
“Look, I have given you authority over all the power of the enemy, and you can walk among snakes and scorpions and crush them. Nothing will injure you.”
Luke 10:19 NLT
A couple weeks ago I took it upon myself to begin this blog, to document my journey to better health and regaining the life I had taken for granted; a life I sacrificed in exchange for immediate satisfaction. Each week I sit here at the family computer, and I put on my uplifting music, and I lift up this new entry to God, to use for His divine purpose.
Now, I’m finally beginning to see some of those results I’ve been looking for. The exciting part is hearing many others comment on how I look like I’ve lost weight; it’s like fuel to the fire for me. I could not be happier with how this is going so far, and the minor improvements in my mobility and stamina are all testaments to my daily efforts to control how much food I intake.
However, this is only half the battle for me. During my low points, those times when I felt hopeless and past the point of no return, my spiritual fire was decimated. I completely lost my faith in God, and I felt as if He wasn’t even listening. Those voices had me convinced that I had thrown my life away, and God wasn’t going to answer my tear-filled cries for help. So taking back my fire is just as critical to my overall well-being as my physical health is.
The voices are still there, but I have a choice as to how much power they have over my mind and the choices I make. So I’m making it my goal to arm myself with the knowledge that comes from the Bible, and to reignite my dormant inner being, because I refuse to let my weight or my food addiction dictate my identity any more. I can’t take this for granted, or make excuses like I have so many times before.
And so, for my health, for my wife, for my family, and most of all for my God, I’m taking the fight to the enemy, and taking back my fire, once and for all.
Free State Patriot 