Dog-Whistling for Christmas

Steyn on the Oakley Show
December 19, 2019

https://www.steynonline.com/9933/dog-whistling-for-christmas

On Wednesday I kept my midweek date with John Oakley on Toronto's Global News Radio 640. We discussed the pseudo-impeachment America's Democrats voted for yesterday evening. Trump was elected because his voters wanted a disrupter. In attempting to disrupt his disruption and prevent him governing, Democrats are making the whole rotten system the central issue of this election. John and I then moved on to what lessons Canadian Tories can learn from their victorious UK cousins, and the apparently serious question of whether "Merry Christmas!" is a racist alt-right dog-whistle. Click below to listen:

If you like me in audio, I'll be back this evening, Thursday, with the seventh of our Christmas stories by Canada's L M Montgomery.

On the other hand, if you're one of that brave band that enjoys me on camera, I'll be south of the border an hour or so later with Tucker Carlson - and right here this weekend for the 2019 Mark Steyn Christmas Show, including, among our stellar Canadians, rock legend Randy Bachman and peerless jazz artiste Carol Welsman. Don't miss it.

We had a grand turnout from Canadians on September's sold-out Second Annual Mark Steyn Cruise. So we hope more than a few Oakley listeners will want to join Conrad Black, John O'Sullivan and my other guests on next year's Mediterranean cruise. But don't leave it too late, as the accommodations are more favorably priced the earlier you book.

Looking for a Christmas present with a difference? There's always a Mark Steyn Club gift membership.

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36 Reader Comments

Andrew A • Dec 19, 2019 at 21:12

Merry Christmas everyone, from the bottom of my beerkeller! I had no idea...

Matthew McWilliams • Dec 19, 2019 at 20:41

I finally got a look at the articles of impeachment and now see what everyone is talking about. If I read this right, the obstruction of Congress charge essentially says that the President is being impeached for impeding the impeachment investigation. The highest form of process crime; you're charged with not helping us invent the crime we wanted to charge you with. The other article, abuse of power seems to have been wholly invented in Adam Schiff's basement. If this is all they've got after three years of investigation no wonder they're reluctant to send it over to the Senate unless and until they can find a way to rig that process too. What's the plan now? Try to find him guilty of not sufficiently assisting their attempt to find him guilty?

Brawndo • Dec 19, 2019 at 17:00

I don't care if it is a dog-whistle. If I'm not a dog, I won't hear it. As for impeachment, the only answer is to drum the Democrats out of office in a rout similar to what just happened to Labour.

Owen Morgan • Dec 19, 2019 at 16:18

The Democrats have started a tradition. From now on, every President faced with a hostile House of Representatives will be impeached and every Senate will throw impeachment out. Even if the President is guilty of high crimes, it won't make any difference.

Barack Obama was guilty of all sorts of offences, but the Republicans never impeached him, even when they had a majority in the House. There were three reasons for that. One was that the Republican leadership was extraordinarily supine. The second was that impeachment would never have passed the Senate, anyway. The third was that Obama and the Democrats in general could rely on the media to watch their backs.

I am quite sure that I know, here in Hampshire, a great deal more about "Fast and Furious," or the IRS scandal, than a surprising number of people in the United States do. Either scandal should have brought down Obama, but the media ensured that hardly anybody knew of those scandals, to the extent that one of the most corrupt Presidents in the history of the United States could claim, at the end of his term, to have led a scandal-free administration. A scandal isn't actually scandalous, if no-one knows anything about it.

By now, the media in the United States have been pumping out any amount of twaddle in favour of impeaching Donald Trump without convincing anyone other than that very odd lady who shrieked when he was inaugurated. Unless the voters are convinced, to the extent that Senators can be persuaded by public opinion to break party lines, impeachment is nothing but a charade and, as I say, destined to become a tradition, along the lines of Black Rod's role in the opening of Parliament.

Paul Nachman

Owen Morgan • Dec 20, 2019 at 00:32

Andrew McCarthy published an excellent book in 2014, _Faithless Execution: Building the Political Case for Obama s Impeachment_

And one day a few years ago I wrote my own list of major offenses by Obama, just out of my head (and overlooking the IRS scandal Owen mentioned):

1. Interfering with valid contracts in Chrysler's bankruptcy. (Bondholders must be made whole before anyone else gets paid; instead, he strong-armed the creditors so that the union got a better deal than the bondholders.)

2. Passing the 2010 health-care law and then -- for purposes of political advantage or re-election survival -- violating the same "signature" law several score times.

3. "Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing," to impose central cities' dysfunction on suburbs by taking their zoning authority away.

4. Recess appointments made when the Senate wasn't in recess. Flagrantly unconstitutional.

5. He's a racial arsonist, egging on "Black Lives Matter" and all the other lethal nonsense manufactured over the violent deaths of young thugs like Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown, plus all the BS about differential incarceration rates being a result of "racism."

6. With re-election in mind, keeping companies with fedgov contracts that would be negatively affected by a potential fedgov shutdown from notifying their employees of the possibility, said notification being required by federal law.

7. Trying—sometimes succeeding—to force private entities to provide health-care coverages for their employees that violate fundamental principles of the imposed-upon organizations. I'm an atheist and abortion doesn't upset me, but when it comes to the treatment of Hobby Lobby and Little Sisters, I'm a Christian, even a Catholic.

8. The fraudulent and dangerous Iran deal and all the chicanery associated with it.

9. The refusal to acknowledge Islam as the source of Islamic terrorism, and the related attempted ruination of fedgov employees who are trying to honestly do their jobs. Consult Philip Haney's book _See Something? Say Nothing_.

10. "Fast & Furious"

11. His administration's vile treatment of Israel.

Owen Morgan

Paul Nachman • Dec 20, 2019 at 09:19

A very good list. I think you could include Solyndra in #1, because I think Obama did something similar there. Democrat donor backers of Solyndra, already rewarded with half a billion dollars of taxpayers' money, were rewarded a second time when they still couldn't make Solyndra work, by being allowed to jump to the head of the queue of its creditors.

I read Andrew McCarthy's book at the time and I agree: it is excellent. McCarthy makes the point that no impeachment is going to be effective, without the backing of very strong public opinion. As long as the impeachment is seen as purely political, it is not going to excite any kind of intensity of feeling among the wider public. The Democrats know this, because they smothered all the Obama scandals which you meticulously documented and they have frenziedly been doing that plasticine-thing with what the current impeachment grounds are, or may be, in the hopes of getting one - just one - accusation which resonated widely.

Unless Mitt Romney manages to clone himself twenty times, Donald Trump's impeachment is not getting through the Senate. The Democrats, however, will immediately start to impeach the President again. For a while now, they have been making insinuations about VP Pence. Adam Schiff's eyeballs are so big that you can almost see into the vacuum behind; his motives are even more transparent: he imagines he can put a Democrat (Nancy Pelosi) into the White House, without an election.

That is not going to happen, of course. Trump and Pence will stay in office and, I expect, be re-elected. Idiotic Telegraph journalists will suggest that impeachment is a "black mark," but, seriously, is any head of government around the world going to refuse to deal with President Trump on account of the Democrats' stunt?

Impeachment should be a last resort, but Democrats made it a first resort, as soon as Donald Trump won. This insanity is infectious at a certain level. Within hours of the election result in the UK, irony-free, black-clad "anti-fascists" were parading past the Cenotaph in Whitehall, disdaining Boris Johnson as "Not my Prime Minister." This effect is sinister, the idea that election results are now optional, but the Left has attempted too much. Nobody believes their propaganda.

All the same, impeachment is destined to become the new normal for any sucker who is daft enough to end up in the Oval Office. Necessarily, it will become meaningless. As I said before: it is a new tradition.

RAC • Dec 19, 2019 at 16:03

I was amused by recent entries criticizing Trump's tepid response to the Pensacola murders. Every President since at least the Carter years has had to kowtow to the Saudi's and few American's (even on this site) seem to understand why. I was shocked when Matt Gaetz, perhaps the smartest man in Washington came right out with it during an interview last week with Tucker. He mentioned almost in passing something about the international oil market only being priced in dollars. No one seems to remember past attempts to uncouple the dollar from the global oil market. China, Russia, Iran, Syria, Iraq and Venezuela are just a few that have been thwarted by the big dog, Saudi Arabia. It's a classic M.A.D. doctrine. Both countries made a pact with the devil to insure their survival. We defend the very weak Saudi's from their many enemies and they agree to block a plan that would almost certainly end our reign as the owner of the world's reserve currency. America is the only country on this planet that can fund continued prosperity with borrowed dollars. Borrowed dollars that America has no intention or conceivable ability to ever pay back. Consider this - that $5 trillion national debt that bush inherited in Jan, 2001 is still on the books, so is the nearly $9 trillion gifted to Obama in Jan, 2009, so is the $19.7 trillion Trump inherited in Jan, 2017. Trump has already added another roughly $3.4 trillion in less than three years for a grand total of $23.133 trillion (I just just checked). See the problem here? There is a rather important difference between paying a debt and retiring said debt. The recent horrendous $1.4 Trillion spending bill (2,371 pages!) only accelerates this insanity. America should have been fired as the owner of the world's reserve currency long ago. By the way the current annual deficit is $1.041 trillion and the actual annual deficit is $1.291 trillion. Anyone on this site care to explain this?

Robert Bridges

RAC • Dec 19, 2019 at 16:36

You explained well. Glenn Beck a few months ago went over the Faustian deal the US made with Saudi Arabia to assure "stability" of post-WWII world via the link of US dollar to oil payments. That relationship is now upside down with the US being an oil exporter and Saudis against the wall economically as shown by their recent attempts to create ventures with public offerings going nowhere. The attacks on Saudi oil production are now a serious financial blow to them as then need money to prop up their government. That said.... once the dollar is no longer the reserve currency the US is at risk but where will the world turn to... China and its own problems? This may be the only saving grace for the dollar.

Walt Trimmer

RAC • Dec 19, 2019 at 19:10

RAC, the difference between the current deficit and the actual deficit is called government "accounting," a mysterious process. You will be delighted to find out the the debt will go up even more than your $1.291 trillion figure. There are also unfunded liabilities that you didn't count. Another part of this has to do with the Social Security actuaries insisting that there is real money in the SS Trust Fund. I won't go into the Federal Reserve's balance sheet for purposes of simplicity.

As to retiring the debt, it is done with inflation. In 1975 at the end of the Vietnam War the dept was $500 billion. Inflation from then to now is about five times (500%,) so in today's dollars that would be $2.5 Trillion. That's an average inflation rate of 3.6%. The Feds say inflation today is 1.6%, so as you can see, we have nothing to worry about. I like to call it, *No Visible Means of Support*. For our Commonwealth friends that is the language that was used to charge people with vagrancy,

The mechanism of the U.S. Dollar is really quite simple. If people continue to buy your bonds, then there is no problem. I was happy to help. Don't be afraid to ask for clarification on any of my points.

Matthew McWilliams

RAC • Dec 19, 2019 at 21:24

I can't say that I share your concern regarding the deficit. Do I wish it were lower? Of course. Do I wish it were zero or a surplus? Absolutely. But everything must be judged in the context of the times. When I voted for Trump in 2016 I told my wife that I was voting for him on the basis of two issues; the Supreme Court and immigration. Anything else he might do or not do is fixable in the long term. However, putting a liberal majority on the high court would create mischief that would not be fixable. And as Mark has often said, transformative demographic change is not fixable. Trump has exceeded my expectations with regard to not only the Supreme Court, but also his appointments to the lower Federal courts. A win in 2020 would cement the Federal Courts for the remainder of my lifetime. His results on immigration have been more of a mixed bag, but certainly far better than we would have gotten under HRC. So, when you think about things like the annual Federal deficit or unfunded liabilities, keep in mind that we are in the middle of an epochal struggle to determine the future course of the Nation, not to mention the western World. If the Left succeed with their designs for the country and the World, the annual deficit will be an afterthought.
With respect to the dollar's status as the reserve currency of the World, as another has pointed out; where else is the World gonna go? The Renminbi is worth whatever the Chinese politburo says it is, just like the annual deficit and GDP in China are whatever the Chinese politburo says they are. That's not to mention the fact that the Chinese would use their status as reserve currency to benefit themselves to the detriment of all other nations and as a cudgel to advance their own agenda, like say reincorporating Taiwan into the PRC. No one wants to go there. The Euro? Would you want a reserve currency that is tied to the Greeks? What else is there? The mythical basket of currencies, which would necessarily feature both the Renminbi and the Euro? To paraphrase, the dollar is the worst reserve currency out there, except for every other currency.

Paul Nachman

Walt Trimmer • Dec 20, 2019 at 00:11

"... has to do with the Social Security actuaries insisting that there is real money in the SS Trust Fund."

Walt, I recall statements explicitly to the contrary, though maybe never from the SS trustees. Here's an example from a 2010 Congressional Budget Office document. See particularly the last sentence:

"The HI [Hospital Insurance, part of Medicare] trust fund is part of the federal government, so transactions between the trust fund and the Treasury are intragovernmental and have no net impact on the unified budget or on federal borrowing from the public. From a unified budget perspective, any increase in revenues or decrease in outlays in the HI trust fund represents cash that can be used to finance other government activities without requiring new government borrowing from the public. Similarly, any increase in outlays or decrease in revenues in the HI trust fund in some future year represents a draw on the government's cash in that year. Thus, the resources to redeem government bonds in the HI trust fund and thereby pay for Medicare benefits in some future year will have to be generated from taxes, other government income, or government borrowing in that year. The HI trust fund and other trust funds have important legal meaning but little economic or budgetary meaning."

https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/111th-congress-2009-2010/reports/01-22-hi_fund.pdf

Walt Trimmer

Paul Nachman • Dec 20, 2019 at 12:16

Thank you Paul for pointing out that I need to improve my sarcastic writing style so it is more clear to the readers. The rather dense gov-speak you cite is typical of the propaganda about Social Security. The Social Security Administration says that they have $3 trillion in a Trust Fund but those reserves are I.O.U.'s that will have to be redeemed by the Treasury borrowing more money. This $3T is not part of the "Official" Federal debt numbers.

Social Security and Medicare are pay-as-you-go but the excess taxes in previous years was spent and lowered the "Deficit" in those years. The balanced budgets of the 1990's were balanced. SSA says the Trust Fund will last until 2035 for Social Security retirement and until 2026 for Medicare.The Treasury "pays" $90 Billion per year interest on the Trust Fund money. But if you look at the cash deficits and how you massage the *Interest* numbers, the break even point was in 2011 or thereabouts. (cfrb.org -- The Real Story on Social Security Deficits) This means we have to borrow $100 Billion this year and the number will be increasing by about another $100 Billion for each of the years in the near future.

Government accounting has less to do with reality than it does with optics. Items are placed in different categories and journal entries of $90 Billion have "little economic or budgetary meaning." If a businessman kept his books like that the Internal Revenue Service would put him in gaol (jail.)

RAC

Robert Bridges • Dec 20, 2019 at 15:35

Germany would be a far more responsible owner. Whatever one thinks of this somewhat anti-American country they do have their fiscal house in order. Robert can you honestly say that about the United States?

RAC

Walt Trimmer • Dec 20, 2019 at 16:24

Walt - Of course I understand that - give me a break will you? I was attempting to engage others on this site. A different answer than you provided involves the rules that the Dept. of the Treasury must follow. They are required to include various off-budget items (it's somewhat more complicated than that) and so we get the 'official' annual deficit along with the actual number. Even the actual number is likely understated as you pointed out. I have been writing about the imaginary S.S. Trust Fund for decades. I've asked many bright friends to explain it for years and always strike out. I'm very impressed because you are among the roughly 1% that know that the current balance isn't $2.9 trillion but actually is $0.00 as it has been since the SS Act was created in the late '30s. You can find this $2.9 trillion balance in the Federal budget under intra-governmental debt. This is the debt obligation that the treasury supposedly owes to the SS program. By law the SS Administration can claim this as an asset - hence the confusion. By design of course. The payment by the treasury to cover the annual shortfall (with borrowed funds) is not subject to Congressional appropriations.
This $2.9 trillion 'owed' to the SS program is absurd on it's face. Another way of putting it is that the treasury owes the treasury $2.9 trillion dollars.

RAC

Matthew McWilliams • Dec 20, 2019 at 16:36

I don't wish anything Matt. At least you're with the majority on the deficit. Almost know one else cares about it either - including the Republican and Democrat parties. So keep your head in the sand along with other wishful thinkers. Everything is just fine. Mind blowing nonsense in this entry. Very disappointing.

RAC

Robert Bridges • Dec 21, 2019 at 20:43

Robert - Notice that I didn't suggest a viable alternative. My point simply was that America has betrayed the sacred trust that the world has placed with us. Daisy-chaining debt is against the law in every country in the world. No exceptions! Many con men pulling this illegal stunt are sitting in our federal prisons. If you take exception with any fact or numbers that I cited I'd like to hear from you. I appreciate your reply Mr. Bridges - we are pretty much on the same page on this issue.

Walt Trimmer • Dec 19, 2019 at 13:29

The four Democrat Senators running for President will have to vote to convict President Trump on Article 1 which alleges Abuse of Power in using his political influence to attack a political rival, Joe Biden. It's lucky for them that they have no morals or self awareness, otherwise they would have to think about that contradiction before proceeding.

I also noted Tulsi Gabbard showed a profile in courage by voting Present on the Articles of Impeachment saying she made a stand for the Center. I will comment further if I ever figure out what she said about why.

I have grown weary hearing Democrats (all Constitutional Scholars - Mark shouldn't wait to get his certification, it obviously doesn't mean anything) talk about Alexander Hamilton and cite the Federalist Papers. The D's knowledge of Hamilton is limited to what they saw in the musical where Hamilton is a woke immigrant of color not the aide to General Washington who personally stormed the trenches and barricades at Yorktown. The last I heard, the Commie D's wanted to replace AH's portrait with Elanor Roosevelt on the ten dollar bill.

Raymond Swenson

Walt Trimmer • Dec 19, 2019 at 16:28

Speaking of Democrat constitutional scholars, the worshippers of Barack Obama never tire of proclaiming that he was the student elected "president" of the Harvard Law Review and a professor of constitutional law at the University of Chicago for a couple of years. That does NOT mean he was editor in chief of the HLR but more the social coordinator. During his time with the HLR, he never produced any actual legal research and writing with his name on it, which is frankly a failure at one of the primary duties of the students tasked with producing the journal. Apparently no other legal scholarship was produced by him during the time before he was elected president.

I was on the law review editorial staff at my law school, and wrote an article based on original historical research in previously unread archives. In later years I wrote several original articles for legal journals in my area of practice. Obama has no record of legal scholarship. My observation of Mark's writings is that he has a much clearer grasp of the US Constitution and how it was designed to work than Obama ever manifested in his career, including his time in the White House. In particular, I recall Obama criticizing the Supreme Court justices to their face during a State of the Union speech over their decision in Citizens United that the First Amendment's protection of free speech overrides limits on how much an individual or organization can donate to political advertising.

Segnes Schonken • Dec 19, 2019 at 12:07

Great show: did much to make my Christmas merrier. Thanks.

Paul Cathey • Dec 19, 2019 at 11:57

Mark, if "laughter is the best medicine" (as with the late, and deeply lamented Reader's Digest) then those in charge of John Oakley's health ought to be sending you flowers every time you appear on his program. Hearing him laugh at you makes me laugh even more at what you say. That reminds me of one of the best diagnostic indicators of the Hard Left: They Have No Humor. None; nothing but malice presented as sniggering snarkery.

Sol • Dec 19, 2019 at 11:56

"...the whole rotten system the central issue of this election."

Yes! - exactly. It's the system itself that Eisenhower worried the military-industrial complex would become.

The House of Representatives has now trained its sights directly on real Americans - and fired.

Robert Bridges • Dec 19, 2019 at 11:44

A dead White slave owning President once said that a nation can not exist both free and ignorant . Since human nature has not changed throughout recorded history, all that is being done now is verifying the same results that has collapsed other cultures and civilizations. Spoiler alert....Ben Franklin was right... Keeping a Republic is an energy expending exercise many are too lazy to care about.

Stuart Speer

Robert Bridges • Dec 19, 2019 at 12:05

Yes, the errors of the past are often repeated by those who are either ignorant of or neglectful of the past. Objectively, the ignorant are probably in the more defensible position.

Walt Trimmer

Robert Bridges • Dec 19, 2019 at 13:53

The problem with history is that it is filled with humans. To keep a republic you have to have a citizenry that rises above their animal instincts and becomes both thinking and moral. But don't worry, we are importing a whole new group of people to replace the ones that we currently have, so the problem is well in hand.

Paul Nachman

Walt Trimmer • Dec 19, 2019 at 23:30

"To keep a republic you have to have a citizenry that rises above their animal instincts and becomes both thinking and moral."

Mark was on this subject back in 2010: "The election of Barack Obama was a fundamentally unserious act by the U.S. electorate, and you can't blame the world's mischief-makers, from Putin to Ahmadinejad to the many Gitmo recidivists now running around Yemen, from drawing the correct conclusion."

Laura Rosen Cohen • Dec 19, 2019 at 10:46

Andrew Scheer is about as exciting as unsalted margarine.

If the "Conservatives" had any balls whatsoever, they would have made a Day-O commercial, ripping into PM Minstrel for his blackface obsession or savaging him on SNC Lavalin or his treatment of women. They couldn't even bring themselves to mention the whole Mammy-singer thing, or make fun of it, never mind actually using it to destroy Trudeau.

Pathetic.

Scheer's preferred pronoun is loser. Hope his kids enjoy public school now.

Mark replies:

That's an insult to unsalted margarine, Laura, which I'd vote for as Tory leader over Scheer any day.

Brian from Minneapolis • Dec 19, 2019 at 10:35

I don't think the radical leftists care about just having the "black mark" of impeachment on Trump's record as a reason why you shouldn't vote for Trump. Impeachment at this point is just a recommendation for removal. No far leftist is going to settle for a silver lining victory.

Todd Lewis • Dec 19, 2019 at 10:31

Mark always implies that he much prefers codes and conventions over checks and balances. I confess I've never really been able to wrap my head around that. Codes and conventions seems vague and malleable to me. In any case, both concepts will be rabidly attacked by the Left until they cease to be of any importance. They are meaningless for those who think politics is absolutely everything. Along those lines, the impeachment process has sucked all of the oxygen out of the room for a long time and has put on obvious display all of the dark arts of inside-the-beltway politics. It has also made clear that good government is maintained by things outside of government. That's the only understanding by which we can keep the Republic.

Mark replies:

As judges and bureaucrats and Schiff-like legislators have demonstrated over the last three years (and indeed much of the last century), Todd, checks and balances are at least as "vague and malleable". As I said on air, both systems presume the participation of gentleman - or, to put it in American terms, a republic presumes virtue, or it can be no such thing.

Tim Underhay

Todd Lewis • Dec 19, 2019 at 11:58

Call me a gloomster for asking (though this is the Mark Steyn Club, after all!), but can the republic, in fact, be kept? Can one keep something that one no longer has? I submit that what exists now is a simulacrum of the United States. Sure, the trappings of the structures are there, but does the country founded on principles of self-governance and federalism, in any meaningful way still exist? Do Americans really self-govern any longer? Are there any matters of public importance for which unelected judges aren't the final arbiters? Is there really much holding the place together?

In my humble, or not-so-humble, opinion, America is now a sham republic. It's only when her people are able to take an honest assessment of the true state affairs that they'll be able to ask themselves, "now what are we going to do about it?"

Todd Lewis

Todd Lewis • Dec 19, 2019 at 13:40

Forgive me if I belabor this point a little. The thing that is hard for me is that codes and conventions appear to me to presume a very high degree of virtue and collegiality. That would be great if you can get it. Sometimes you can, but not often. Checks and balances assume evil as the baseline of human motivation and behavior. Thankfully we have means of curbing and overcoming evil but we must, nevertheless, assume it is always a clear and present danger. I believe this is true and that's why it resonates more with me. If we didn't assume evil, especially in the machinations of government, I think we would be clueless fools.

Maybe this isn't a perfect analogy, but President Trump is hated and attacked night and day because he disregards the codes and conventions of the administrative deep state. These people do think their codes and conventions are right, true. and unassailable. However, President Trump functions at all times within the constraints of checks and balances, the claims of his enemies notwithstanding. He regards the codes and conventions that have been established to be stupid, dishonest, and destructive of the common good. This critique must be allowed. He is not engaged in pursuing unaccountable power and lawless retribution.

Robert Bridges

Tim Underhay • Dec 19, 2019 at 15:01

The key questions are what is recoverable and where is the point of no return? I think you are correct that the ponderous inertia of a drifting ship of state has lost any rudder control and engine power. The crew and passengers are mistakenly content with momentum and speed rather than for true direction and course...oblivious to what lies below the surface of their "calm" seas. There is plenty of champagne and now plenty of ice to chill it per a certain liner's experience in Atlantic waters April 14, 1912.

Stuart Speer • Dec 19, 2019 at 08:58

The left has routinized impeachment.

Robert Bridges

Stuart Speer • Dec 19, 2019 at 11:36

Agree....from now on the first point of business for a new Congress is for the ruling party to impeach the President . Once done, they they can get on with other work.

The question us, "what if they impeach the President and nobody cares?"

Stuart Speer

Robert Bridges • Dec 19, 2019 at 11:53

Then it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.

David Coats • Dec 19, 2019 at 08:56

I'm dreaming of an alt-right racist dog whistle, just like the ones I used to know... that's very catchy!

Lawrence Edwards • Dec 19, 2019 at 08:54

I agree with Mark's views on impeachment. It seems to me that it's being pursued by the hard left in the Democrats (who aren't actually that interested in it) as a purity test for the 2020 Democrat candidates. As with Momentum in in the Labour Party in the UK, it's a sinister route to taking control of the party. It will probably end in the same way it did for the hard left in the UK because swing voters are generally against highly partisan political moves.