RealClearInvestigations' Picks of the Week
April 21 to April 27 Featured Investigation They're from the "party of government" and they share big ideas about how to transform the country. But prominent Democratic presidential candidates who serve or have served in Congress share something else in common: little or no legislation passed. And, as Max Diamond of RealClearInvestigations reports, it's not for lack of proposing. Drawing on data extending through the last completed congressional term, Diamond reports: - Sen. Cory Booker, in office since 2013, sponsored 118 bills and two became law.
- Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, in office since 2009, sponsored 302 bills and one became law.
- Sen. Kamala Harris, in office since 2017, sponsored 45 bills and none became law.
- Sen. Amy Klobuchar, in office since 2007, sponsored 365 bills and 14 became law.
- Sen. Bernie Sanders, in office since 2007, sponsored 214 bills and two became law.
- Sen. Elizabeth Warren, in office since 2013, sponsored 105 bills and none became law.
- Former Rep. Beto O'Rourke, in office 2013-2019, sponsored 65 bills, and one - naming a post office - became law.
- Former Vice President Joe Biden, newly announced presidential candidate, sponsored 351 bills during his time in the Senate from 1973 to 2009, of which 20 became law.
Diamond reports that those are success rates of less than 2% or worse, with the exceptions of Klobuchar's 3.8% and Biden's 5.7%. And even though the latter is the top legislative achiever in this group, few would be apt to call him Joltin' Joe if he were playing baseball with a career batting average below .060. Granted, Diamond notes, tallying bills passed into law is an imperfect gauge of congressional effectiveness, especially considering recent Republican control of the Senate. In fact, he adds, the candidates may deserve a pass given the current climate of acrimony in which they participate: In a partisan era, being an "effective" legislator can actually hurt a lawmaker in a presidential race, especially with others in the current Democratic field unburdened by such records. Read Full Article The Trump Investigations: Top Articles Obama's Campaign Gave $972,000 to Law Firm That Paid Fusion GPS
The Federalist
Was the Trump-Russia narrative backed with money from Barack Obama's official campaign organization? Since April 2016, The Federalist reports, Obama for America has paid over $972,000 to Perkins Coie, the Democrat-tied law firm that funneled money to Fusion GPS, the opposition research outfit that commissioned the discredited, so-called Steele dossier on Donald Trump and Russia. It's been confirmed that the Democratic National Committee and the Hillary Clinton campaign used the law firm to pay Fusion. Now Federal Election Commission records show large Obama for America payments to Perkins Coie around the same time. Marc Elias, the Perkins lawyer who handled payments to Fusion GPS, also represented Obama for America. The purpose of the Obama group has evolved from supporting President Obama's agenda -- at least somewhat. In 2016, the group reorganized: to oppose Trump. Mueller Report Hid Russian Dirt on Bill-Monica Phone Sex
Washington Examiner
Robert Mueller's report mentions the spurious "pee tape" in the discredited Steele dossier, but it hid an arguably more plausible episode: Bill Clinton having phone sex with Monica Lewinsky. As the Washington Examiner reports, the version of the special counsel's report released to the public redacted a longstanding claim that Russians recorded the 42nd President having steamy telephonic congress with the White House intern. Like much about Mueller's work, that redaction doesn't sit well Republicans, since the report openly references the unsupported claim that Donald Trump paid to watch prostitutes urinating on a Moscow hotel bed in a room once occupied by the Obamas. It is said that Clinton was recorded by Russia in the 1990s, allowing the Kremlin to learn before American officials about the Clinton-Lewinsky affair. The given reason for the Mueller redaction was to protect "personal privacy," but sources told the Examiner that the context makes clear what was blacked out. FBI Admits Clinton Emails Found in Obama's Office, Judicial Watch
How Team Obama Took Early 2016 Aim at a Russiagate Angle, The Hill
Page, Strzok on Enlisting Trump Informers Post-Election, saraacarter.com
FBI Investigated Michael Flynn Earlier than Previously Thought, Daily Caller
Other Noteworthy Articles and Series
Persistence and Political Correctness at Amherst
RealClearInvestigations
When is a campus kumbaya moment not really? When it involves the left and the right and political correctness, evidently. Richard Bernstein unpacks a recent episode at Amherst College and finds it revealing less as a victory for free inquiry than a tactical retreat for P.C. - illustrating how, even when defeated, the cult of campus identity politics lives to fight another day. Last month the elite western Massachusetts college issued, then withdrew the Amherst Common Language Guide, a brochure with definitions of "key diversity and inclusion terms" including the oppressive white male "cisheteropatriarchy." While both the left and right objected, they did so for different reasons. For liberal Amherst faculty members, the problem was not the brochure itself, but the way it was rolled out: It seemed to teach students what to think, not how to think. The entrenched diversity bureaucracy has duly taken note. Secrecy, Self-Dealing, Greed at the NRA
The Trace, New Yorker
The National Rifle Association is troubled, this collaborative deep dive reports. In recent years, it has run annual deficits of as much as $40 million, and has cut back gun education to less than 10 percent of its total budget while becoming mainly a media company promoting the gun lifestyle and defending it. Marquee faces like Dana Loesch are highly paid by an Oklahoma public-relations firm. Reporter Mike Spies concludes that "a small group of N.R.A. executives, contractors, and vendors has extracted hundreds of millions of dollars from the nonprofit's budget, through gratuitous payments, sweetheart deals, and opaque financial arrangements." Discount Florida Plastic Surgery Clinics Run by Felons Left 13 Dead
USA Today
If you go for a Brazilian butt lift in Florida, that New Agey-sounding clinic could be run by an ex-con. State law prohibits anyone with a felony conviction from operating a massage parlor or pawn shop, but even someone convicted of bilking Medicare of $1 million can hang out his tummy-tuck shingle. USA Today reports that four convicted felons ran places that became hotspots for patients across the country looking for the latest body-sculpting procedures on the cheap. At least 13 women died after their surgeries. Nearly a dozen others were hospitalized with critical injuries. One woman went into kidney failure and almost bled to death. Other women have died after their doctors injected fat too deeply into their muscles.
Navy SEALs Were Warned Against Reporting Chief for War Crimes
New York Times
People tend to think of soldiers as deferential to a fault. Not so the Navy SEAL commandos who reported their platoon chief for horrible acts in Iraq, including "stabbing a defenseless teenage captive to death, picking off a school-age girl and an old man from a sniper's roost, and indiscriminately spraying neighborhoods with rockets and machine-gun fire." After months of official inaction, seven platoon members went to their commander. But instead of welcoming criticism, he delivered a blunt message: "Stop talking about it." The case, detailed in investigation records, is just a recent example of blots on the reputation of what's often regarded as America's preeminent commando force. The Convicted Terrorist Who Became a U.S. Citizen
CNN
Left and right radically disagreeabout immigration, but they can probably agree convicted terrorists shouldn't be let in, let alone become American citizens. But CNN reports that a one-time Islamic jihadist locked up Israel for attempting to bomb a bus was given U.S. citizenship and was able to stay in the country for nearly a decade. Vallmore Shqaire, 51, carried out the attack in Israel in 1988 and was "acting on the direction" of a cell of the Palestine Liberation Organization. Despite his conviction, Shqaire's application was approved and he took the oath of allegiance in 2008. And it wasn't the first time a convicted terrorist won citizenship after 9/11. Rasmieh Odeh pled guilty in 2017 to illegally obtaining her U.S. citizenship by not disclosing her 1970 conviction in Israel for her part in two bombings, one of which killed two people. How Nest Security Effectively Allowed Hackers In
Washington Post
"There's a monster in my room," said Tara Thomas's nearly 3-year-old daughter. Actually, the noise was sounds of porn playing through the Nest Cam installed as a monitor in the California child's room. This is because it's almost getting to the point where a 3-year-old can hack into such devices. Many companies, including Nest, have effectively chosen to let some hackers slip through the cracks rather than take steps that inconvenience users. Upshot: bedtime for fail-safe privacy. |
