Radio America Online News Bureau

Cohen Accuses Trump, Rep. Hunter Indicted, Media & Mollie Tibbetts

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America serve up three bad martinis.  They begin by discussing Michael Cohen accusing President Trump of conspiring with him to break federal campaign finance laws and discuss how this is likely to play out.  They also recoil at the indictment of Republican California Rep. Duncan Hunter for fleecing his campaign accounts to fund lavish personal vacations and other expenditures.  And they slam the media for showing immediate disinterest in the Mollie Tibbetts story once they learned the man charged with her murder came to the U.S. illegally.

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Jordan: GOP Must Do What We Promised

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Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, says he is focusing on helping Republicans retain their House majority before he worries about his bid for Speaker of the House but he says GOP lawmakers need to prove to voters they will do what they’ve promised the past four election cycles and that’s exactly how he would lead in the next Congress.

The race for speaker was triggered by Speaker Paul Ryan’s decision that he is retiring from Congress come January.  House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, D-Calif., is considered Ryan’s natural successor, but Jordan says the past two years have shown plenty of conservative actions from President Trump but very little from Congress in comparison.

He applauds Trump’s actions on the Iran deal, moving the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, and cutting taxes and regulations.  He says the legislative branch is failing to do its part.

“We certainly helped with the tax cuts and we shouldn’t downplay that.  But where’s the border security wall we promised?  Where’s the Obamacare repeal?  Where’s the welfare reform?  Where’s defunding Planned Parenthood?  Where are those key issues that we told the American people we were going to get done?

“We haven’t accomplished those, so if we keep the majority and I’m given the chance to lead the House, we’re going to focus on one simple message: doing what we told the American people we were going to do,” said Jordan.

Jordan chalks up the dearth of legislative achievements to “lack of political will” on the part of current Republican leaders.  He says that cannot continue for another two years.

“It boils down to a simple fact.  You’ve to be willing to actually engage in the debate and have the fight.  You can’t just forfeit before the referee even blows the whistle and starts the game,” said Jordan.

He says the point of no return on the existing GOP leadership came earlier this year when it snatched defeat from the jaws of victory and agreed to major spending increases in an omnibus bill.

“Instead of doing what the swamp always does, which is spend more money on everything and make up excuses for why we can’t do what wee told the people we were going to do and more importantly what they elected us to do, we should have fought on that omnibus spending bill.

“Remember, (Senate Minority Leader) Chuck Schumer had shut the government down before that.  When Chuck Schumer said amnesty was more important than funding our troops, we were well-positioned, we were poised, we were right on the cusp of victory, and yet we did what the swamp always does.

“We were ready to win and do what had to be done for national defense, hold the line on the other spending, fund the border security wall.  We were in a position to do that and yet our leadership didn’t do that and Republicans failed to deliver on the promises we had made,” said Jordan.

He says Republicans have a chance to prove they can be trusted when they return to work next month.

“When we go back in September, we better put the border security wall funding on the spending bill and send that to the Senate,” said Jordan.

With all of the alleged failures of Republicans to fulfill promises in this Congress, why should GOP voters bother heading to the polls in November?  Jordan says the alternative will be disastrous.

“You elect Democrats, they’re going to raise your taxes, they’re going to abolish ICE, they’re going to socialize medicine and they’re going to impeach the president,” said Jordan.

Jordan’s efforts to ascend the Republican leadership ladder was quickly met with accusations that he knew about and failed to report the sexual abuse of wrestlers by a team doctor while an assistant wrestling coach at Ohio State University in the 1980s and 1990s.

Those accusations were met with a long list of former coaches and athletes who said Jordan never covered anything up and never would.  Some of the allegations were eventually retracted.

Jordan says the bias of the media was on full display with that story.

“If you’re a conservative, they’re out to get you.  If you support the president and you’re fighting to support the president, particularly in this issue of the Department of Justice, they’re out to get you,” said Jordan.

He also categorically denies any such cover-up and says it’s completely contrary to his fighting spirit.

“I’ve taken on the Speaker of the House from my own state.  I’ve taken on the IRS when they were targeting people.  I’ve taken on the Department of Justice and the FBI for the wrong they did when they took this dossier and took it to a secret court to spy on President Trump’s campaign.

“The idea that I would not stand up for our wrestlers is just ridiculous and everyone sees through that story,” said Jordan.

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Trump Rolls Back Obama EPA Rule, Media Sugarcoat Socialism, Security Clearance Roulette

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America applaud the Trump administration for rolling back the burdensome EPA clean power plant regulations and giving the states more flexibility in how they deal with emissions.  They also unload on CNN and other media outlets for reporting on tearful reunions among family members living in North and South Korea after nearly 70 years, blaming the separation on the Korean War rather than a brutally repressive communist regime in North Korea.  And they shake their heads as President Trump takes to Twitter and muses about pulling security clearances based on what former national security officials say about him on cable television.

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Trump Pollster: GOP Must Motivate Trump Voters for Midterms

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President Trump’s 2016 pollster says Republicans can hang on to their majorities in the midterm elections, but to do they’ll need the new voters Trump attracted in 2016 and that means passing more of the president’s agenda before November.

“The Republicans in Washington need to get their act together, to vote on things, to motivate these 2016 Trump voters and get them back out,” said John McLaughlin, CEO of McLaughlin and Associates and a key aide for Trump in 2016.

“The voters want to see a member of Congress who supports the president’s agenda moving forward,” added McLaughlin.

McLaughlin says while Trump got the attention of new voters with his personality, it’s the issues that drove them to the polls: immigration, securing the border, making tax cuts permanent, strengthening defense, and fixing the health care system.

He says Democrats will have no trouble turning out the anti-Trump vote but Republicans will have a tougher time.  While Trump’s approval rating is at or near 50 percent, McLaughlin’s own polling shows the approval rating for Republicans in Congress is only 40 percent and a quarter of GOP voters give Congress a thumbs down for not doing more to advance the Trump agenda.

That is translating to poor turnout for the Republicans and much closer elections in supposedly safe districts.  McLaughlin says the recent special election in Ohio’s 12 district is a perfect example.

Even though Troy Balderson appears to have defeated Danny O’Connor, McLaughlin says a look at the numbers ought to frighten Republicans.

“There were 206,000 voters that came out in that district in November of 2016 for President Trump.  In the special election for Congress, only 102,000 people voted for the Republican.  So you have 104,000 Trump voters sitting there that they have to motivate now to get back out in November to re-elect the Republican,” said McLaughlin.

It’s not just Ohio.  When Democrats scored victories in the Alabama U.S. Senate race and a special House race in Pennsylvania, the same dynamic played out.

In Alabama, 2.1 million voters went to the polls in 2016 and Trump won two-thirds of the vote, but only 1.4 million turned out for the special election in which Democrat Doug Jones narrowly defeated Roy Moore.

In the special Pennsylvania House contest, McLaughlin says 102,000 fewer people voted for Republican Rick Saccone than voted for Trump less than two years earlier.

McLaughlin know exactly what it takes to bring Trump voters to the polls.  After Trump secured the delegates to win the GOP nomination in 2016, he asked McLaughlin how he would defeat Hillary Clinton.

McLaughlin said they would take the traditional steps of shoring up the anti-Hillary and anti-Obama votes and reach out to Libertarians, but also he knew Trump would need more votes and then figured out where those votes could come from.

“They’re mainly working class voters.  A lot of them were from the Rust Belt states as well as the Sun Belt states.  It was really a heartland coalition.  They were working  middle class voters that the president, this New York City billionaire, had an appeal for because they relate to him on issues like trade, immigration, draining the swamp in Washington – anti-establishment issues that they came out and voted for,” said McLaughlin.

“Nine million more people came out in 2016 than 2012.  In the record turnout we had, there were 63 million Trump voters.  A lot of those voters did not vote in 2014.  So the success for the Republicans is really about motivating those 2016 Trump voters to come back out,” he said.

Not all of the Trump agenda is conservative but McLaughlin says passing it will only boost Republican totals in November.

“They really need to vote on things that the majority of Americans support – even paid parental leave.  The president’s got a plan for paid parental leave but Republicans in the House and Senate aren’t going to vote on it until next year.  Seventy-five percent of voters approve of that.

Congress needs to get things done because they’re on the ballot this November, not the president,” said McLaughlin, pointing out that President Obama suffered major losses in midterm elections because Democrats couldn’t re-create the turnout he enjoyed in presidential races.

McLaughlin firmly believes Republicans can hang onto majorities in both the House and Senate, but not if they fail to push more of the Trump agenda across the finish line.

“Republicans have a chance because there is time.  If Republicans motivate their base, if they have critical votes in September and October on important issues to the Trump coalition, then I think we get our base out and we can hold the House, and we’ll definitely gain Senate seats.

“It’s really up to what they do in Washington right now.  If the people see them voting on things that matter to them, we will be able to hold the House and pick up Senate seats,” said McLaughlin.

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Cramer’s Great Ad, Facebook Censors Prager U, London’s Pathetic Terrorism Response

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Jim is back!  Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America applaud North Dakota Rep. Kevin Cramer for his powerful ad slamming Sen. Heidi Heitkamp for supporting sanctuary cities and for doing so with the right tone.  They also hammer Facebook for censoring numerous Prager U videos and labeling them “hate speech” when there’s nothing hateful about them, and wonder whether Facebook’s monitors have no idea what conservatism is or whether they just give in to the liberal mob.  And they shake their heads in disgust after London Mayor Sadiq Khan responds to a vehicular terrorist attack by wanting to ban vehicles in that part of the city.

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Why the Left is Lurching Towards Socialism

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A new Gallup poll shows a majority of Democrats are favorable towards socialism and their opinion of capitalism is quickly souring, a trend that one respected expert chalks up to the political rise of Sen. Bernie Sanders and a full century of education steering America’s youth to appreciate a system that has failed everywhere it’s been tried.

In the survey, 57 percent of Democrats and Americans who lean to the political left have a favorable view toward socialism.  That is largely unchanged since 2016 and only five points higher than in 2010.

However, only 47 percent of Democrats have a favorable view towards capitalism.  Fifty-six percent of Democrats endorsed capitalism in 2016.

In contrast, 71 percent of Republicans and GOP-leaning independents approve of capitalism.  Just 16 percent are favorable towards socialism.

Not only are Democrats willing to back socialism in opinion polls, they are making political stars out of figures like Sanders, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, and New York congressional candidate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

So how did socialism become so popular just one generation after the fall of the Iron Curtain?  Heritage Foundation Distinguished Fellow Lee Edwards says this supposedly sudden shift is really decades in the making.

“This is really the result of about one century of progressive politics in education, going all the way back to Woodrow Wilson and Teddy Roosevelt through President Franklin D. Roosevelt to [Lyndon B. Johnson], culminating with Mr. Obama and his Obamacare.

“All of those are marks of socialism and progressive belief that the government knows better than the average American what to do with his life,” said Edwards, who is also chairman of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation.

Edwards points out that socialism has failed everywhere it’s been tried, from the Soviet Union to China to Cuba, and resulted in mass repression or even mass murder by the tens of millions.

Still, he says the allure of getting something for nothing is very strong.

“They think it’s a free lunch.  Remember our friend Milton Friedman used to say there’s no such thing as a free lunch.  But those people, young millennials particularly, think they can get not only a free lunch and a free breakfast, a free dinner, free education, and maybe a job guaranteed,” said Edwards.

He says young people trying to navigate adulthood are especially susceptible.

“Democrats, particularly, young Democrats, particularly millennials looking for answers to life are saying, ‘Gee, socialism sounds wonderful.  Let’s try that.’  Then some of these victories have come along like the lady up in New York City and people say that is the future.

“What they don’t realize of course is that socialism has never worked.  It’s failed in every single country where it’s been tried in the last one hundred years,” said Edwards, adding that young progressives people love the benefits of capitalism without even realizing it.

“I have to wonder if these millennials would be willing to give up their iPhones.  I don’t think so, but that is what would happen if you take socialism to its logical outcomes,” said Edwards.

Socialists push back against the argument that socialism is a universal failure, often pointing to Scandinavian countries as success stories.  Edwards says there’s just one problem with that assertion.

“Denmark and Sweden, which are always held up as examples by the socialists in this country are not socialist.  Yes, they have high taxes, but both of them are on the record as saying, ‘We believe in private ownership of major industries and we are not socialist.’  Recently, the prime minister of Denmark said that here in Washington, D.C.,” said Edwards.

Criticizing the fundamentals of the American system is now mainstream among liberals.  Gov. Andrew Cuomo, D-N.Y., drew strong condemnation Wednesday for dismissing the notion of American greatness.

“We’re not going to make America great again.  It was never that great.  We have not reached greatness,” said Cuomo, arguing that greatness cannot be achieved until more equality is achieved on behalf of women.

Edwards was floored.

“That is all too predictable, because a socialist is not a patriot.  He is not for the country in which he lives.  He’s an internationalist, so he is not for private property.  He is for the government dictating or circumscribing what people are going to be allowed to do with their own property.

“Mr. Cuomo ought to be ashamed of himself.  It was his father who fought for this country and was a patriot and was proud of it.  His forebears came from Italy and they made their way here.  Why?  Because they thought America was great,” said Edwards.

The challenge for Edwards and his allies is to combat the messages of socialism throughout our culture.  He says education got us into this mess and it is the only way to turn the tide back towards freedom.  He says it’s not hard to punch holes in the case for socialism.

“It does sound good until you begin to pick it apart and until you begin asking questions like who’s going to pay for it and what are you going to have to give up to get all of this wonderful free stuff.

“It seems to us at Heritage that it’s a matter of education and of setting the record straight about the absolute, abject failure of socialism for a century and more,” said Edwards.

Edwards says conservatives also need to do a better job of proclaiming the virtues of capitalism and free enterprise, but he believes there are already some signs of improvement.

“I see some encouraging signs of teaching high school teachers what socialism is all about, taking that message back and then educating our young people.

“We have to do it.  We can’t let this thing slip and slide until we find ourselves in the murky socialist depths,” said Edwards.

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Nelson’s ‘Four Pinocchios,’ GOP Senators AWOL, Losing House Good for Trump?

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David French of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America applaud the Washington Post for assigning “Four Pinocchios” to Florida Sen. Bill Nelson’s claim that the Russians had already infiltrated his state’s election systems, even though every relevant office in federal and state government had no idea what he was talking about.  They also hammer Republican senators for wasting their time in session this month because seven GOP members failed to show up this week, handing Democrats a functional majority while critical votes are supposed to be happening.  And they scratch their heads over a new rationale among some Republicans that Democrats winning control of the House in the midterm elections would actually be a very good thing for President Trump’s re-election prospects in 2020.

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Cuomo & American Greatness, Warren’s Terrifying Economic Plan, Swalwell 2020?

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David French of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America react to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo slamming President Trump’s ‘Make America Great Again’ slogan by saying “it was never that great.”  So what do most on the left really believe?  They also shudder at Elizabeth Warren’s plan to make any company earning more than a billion dollars in revenue each year to get permission to operate from the federal government and allow the government to dictate compensation, personnel policies, and who can be on the board of directors.  And while David remembers his own consideration of a 2016 presidential run, they marvel that people like California Rep. Eric Swalwell are seriously considering a 2020 bid.

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Coalition Urges McConnell to Confirm Trump Judicial Nominees

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While conservatives and liberals prepare for the Supreme Court confirmation hearings of Judge Brett Kavanaugh, a coalition of conservative legal voices are pleading with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to brush aside stalling tactics from Democrats and confirm a major backlog of judicial nominees before Kavanaugh’s hearings next month.

Led by Rob Henneke of the Texas Public Policy Foundation, the coalition sent a letter urging McConnell to change the rules if necessary to allow up or down votes in 152 district and appellate court nominees.

“The quality of the pending nominees and confirmed judges is outstanding. The confirmation of constitutionalist judges to these lifetime appointments will impact our nation for decades to come and will be the lasting legacy of this period in history,” states the letter.

Henneke says the Senate needs to buckle down and get these nominees across the finish line.

“There is a backlog.  It is growing every day, and it’s presenting a problem as far as the judiciary being able to get it’s job done,” said Henneke.

The nominees have all had confirmation hearings and committee votes, but Democrats are using Senate rules to grind the confirmation process to a halt.  Henneke says McConnell must be willing to make rule changes, starting with the 30-hour rule to debate each nominee.

“The Democrats are claiming that 30 hours for every nominee.  They’re not actually talking about the nominee.  There’s nobody on the Senate floor.  They’re just forcing that clock to run for each and every single nominee to slow down the process,” said Henneke, who has two ideas to trump the Democrats’ strategy.

“One is to shorten the period of time from 30 hours to a much more reasonable period of time and then to actually require and then to actually require there to be debate or discussion about a particular nominee or that time period would be waived or would expire,” said Henneke.

McConnell cancelled some of the August recess.  Lawmakers returned to Washington Wednesday and plan to tackle two nominations this week.  Henneke says they need to do better.  He wants to see Republicans willing to put in the long hours to “clear the deck” of these stalled nominations.

“The Senate needs to put more hours into this process.  We would encourage the Senate to be working 24/7 to clear the deck and to confirm all of the pending nominees.  That may require later hours and more days for the Senate to be in session,” said Henneke, who says McConnell needs to stop considering rule changes and just implement them.

“The threats need to turn into action and we need our Senate leadership and Leader McConnell to impose what he can do to get the job done,” said Henneke.

He says getting all 152 confirmed would have a major impact on the federal judiciary.

“I think it would be transformative in putting constitutional, rule of law jurists on the bench who will decide cases, not based on partisanship or policy but on what the law says and what the United States Constitution says, which is what the role of the judiciary is and should be,” said Henneke.

He says allowing the backlog to persist would shift from frustrating to disastrous if Democrats win the majority in the midterm elections.

“They don’t get confirmed, and we lose this opportunity for now and for generations to come to have reform of the federal judiciary that’s going to uphold the Constitution and defend the rule of law and that would be catastrophic for the future of our country,” said Henneke.

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West Virginia Removes Entire Supreme Court

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All five members of West Virginia’s supreme court are off the bench following a corruption scandal resulting in three impeachments, two resignations, and one plea bargain to a felony charge.

Chief Justice Margaret Workman and justices Allan Loughry and Beth Walker still face trial in the West Virgina Senate.  Justice Menis Ketchum reached a plea bargain with federal prosecutors before the impeachment votes began.  Justice Robin Davis resigned following the votes in the House of Delegates.

At issue is illegal payment to senior status judges, including the falsifying of 1099 IRS forms.  The judges also spent lavishly to redecorate their offices, which was what initially caught the attention of local WCHS-TV reporter Kennie Bass, who discovered the renovation expenses in Freedom of Information forms.

But the 1099 forms immediately gave the issue import to lawmakers.  Judges falsified the forms to provide additional payment to senior status judges.  Those are retired judges to come in to fill vacancies.  State law only allows senior status judges to earn $126,000 per year, but three of the justices fudged the tax forms to get extra money to those judges.

“Not every justice was charged in this article (of impeachment).  Loughry, Workman, and Davis were charged this way.  That’s because they signed the IRS form to circumvent the law.  It was a scheme to circumvent the state law.  Once the judges hit that threshold of $126,000, they would convert them to 1099 employees and continue to pay them,” said West Virginia Republican Del. Michael Folk, a leading voice in the impeachment effort.

“It’s a criminal statute that if you sign a document as a public official, as an officer, in this case the chief justice of the supreme court with the intent to enable or assist to obtain money to which he was not entitled, you’re guilty of a felony,” said Folk.

Folk says the actions are in clear violation of the West Virginia constitution as well.

“In West Virginia, it could be maladministration under our constitution, high crimes and misdemeanors, neglect of duty, and a few others,” he said.

He says it is especially galling conduct since there were plenty of other senior status judges who had not reached their payment limit.

Folk says the reaction of justices to the initial reports of lavish spending were also very troubling.

“In the case of Loughry, he basically blamed other people and said he didn’t know anything about how much his floor cost and pretty much didn’t have anything to do with the design work.  Once it was dug into, they had found where he had done detailed drawings of the floor exactly how he wanted it done,” said Folk.

“David reacted nonchalantly saying, ‘Yeah, it’s mine but I’m allowed to spend it,'” he added.

It will take two-thirds majorities in the West Virginia Senate to convict Workman, Loughry, or Walker, which may be an uphill climb given the large but not always lopsided impeachment votes in the House.

Since Ketchum and Davis resigned, their seats will be up for election in November.  If any of the impeached justices are convicted, Republican Gov. Jim Justice would appoint replacement, who would then face the voters in 2020.

Folk is not done rooting out corruption and waste of taxpayer dollars.  He is appalled that West Virginia University President E. Gordon Gee travels by plane from the campus in Morgantown to the state capitol in Charleston when they’re only 140 miles apart.

He’s even more upset about how it’s being paid for.

“He’s using student tuition money to fly from Morgantown to Charleston and back and he does that a lot.  He wastes about a million dollars a year,” said Folk.

As for the current scandal, Folk says legislators really had no choice.

“We should expect a lot more from our higher court than what we’ve been receiving in recent years,” he said.

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