Reader’s Links for January 11, 2018

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About Eeyore

Canadian artist and counter-jihad and freedom of speech activist as well as devout Schrödinger's catholic

115 Replies to “Reader’s Links for January 11, 2018”

  1. Trump Needs to Transfer All Federal Land Back to the States

    The Utah and Bundy Ranch cases are a reminder of just how constitutionally untenable and corrupting federal ownership is.

    With President Trump’s recent order to “shrink” two massive federal land grabs in Utah and a shocking turn of events in the Bundy Ranch/BLM controversy, the issue of federal land ownership is back in the news. Both events illustrate how the federal government has used its massive land holdings to control the lives of Americans. And lurking in the background of these events is the constitutionality of federal land ownership, an issue that has been ignored for generations by politicians, the courts, and the media. Indeed, the evidence is fairly clear that our founding fathers did not design the federal government to be America’s largest landowner with all the abuses that entails.

    The federal government now has a total of 640 million acres under its control — almost a third of the nation’s land. The majority of land in Nevada, Alaska, Utah, Oregon and Idaho is owned by the feds. In Arizona, California, Wyoming, New Mexico, and Colorado, federal ownership exceeds a third. Indeed, if all 11 Western states were combined into one territory, the feds would own nearly 50% of it. This land is primarily administered by the United States Forest Service (USFS), the National Park Service (NPS), the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), and the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS). The Department of Defense also owns 20 million acres.

    But if liberals had their way, even more land would be seized by the feds. Fortunately, it is unlikely this administration will engage in any state land confiscations. Indeed, Trump’s action to decrease the acreage of the two Utah “monuments” is a good start in rolling back this abuse of federal power. These monuments were created by decree under President’s Clinton and Obama by abusing the narrow intent of the 1906 Antiquities Act. Combined, the two preserves originally encompassed 3.2 million acres, but Trump knocked them down to 1.2 million acres. Not surprisingly, the left went ballistic, but the truth is Trump is the one acting in accord with the Constitution and in the best interest of the people of Utah, and even the environment.

    https://spectator.org/trump-needs-to-transfer-all-federal-land-back-to-the-states/?utm_source=American+Spectator+Emails&utm_campaign=feac5649df-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_01_11&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_797a38d487-feac5649df-104523669

    • Yes the land should be returned to the states and in some cases to the families that were forced to sell off the family ranch.

      I have heard rumors that the radical environmentalists want to take all of Montana and Wyoming and turn them into grazing land for massive herds of Buffalo. While they are doing this they also want to forbid humans from ever setting foot on that region again.

      I am not sure how this is going to turn out but unless we take the land back from the Feds the Deep State/The Sewer will end up either forcing all US citizens off the land or selling it to foreign companies to exploit mineral resources that they refuse to let American citizens and companies exploit.

  2. Judicial Anarchy Over DACA
    Another activist judge runs roughshod over the separation of powers.
    January 11, 2018
    Joseph Klein

    A federal judge, U.S. District Judge William Alsup, took it upon himself to order that the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA), put in place by former President Obama’s executive order and wound down towards ultimate termination by President Trump’s own executive order last September, must stay in place at least for the time being. The judge issued a preliminary injunction against ending DACA while lawsuits over President Trump’s decision go forward. The effect of Judge Alsup’s order is to throw out a temporary lifeline to the illegal immigrant “Dreamers” who have or have had DACA protection to be able to continue staying and working in the country while they apply for renewals.

    Needless to say, President Trump was not happy with this latest example of judicial overreach.

    “It just shows everyone how broken and unfair our Court System is when the opposing side in a case (such as DACA) always runs to the 9th Circuit and almost always wins before being reversed by higher courts,” President Trump tweeted, referring to the District Court judge from the United States District Court for the Northern District of California.

    https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/268989/judicial-anarchy-over-daca-joseph-klein

  3. The Imaginary Hispanic: What the Illegal War is About
    And why a border wall is a threat to the survival of the Democrats.
    January 11, 2018
    Daniel Greenfield

    There are two statistics that explain the Democrat obsession with illegal immigration and open borders.

    97% of immigrants in the appropriate grouping identify themselves as Hispanic, but by the fourth generation that number falls to half. Only 7% of immigrants describe themselves as Americans, but 56% in the third generation call themselves Americans. Even the use of Spanish is slowly declining.

    If a minority stops existing after a few generations, did it ever actually exist?

    The Democrats had abandoned their working class base to chase what they pretended was a racial group when what they were actually chasing was the momentum of unlimited migration.

    In the economics of identity politics, Hispanics, unlike African-Americans, are not an enduring group. And that is a serious challenge for Democrats and their leftist allies who treat politics as a game of demographic Risk played with minorities across the states and cities of the United States.

    Democrats have pinned their hopes for a national majority on a European origin group whose minority status is cultural and linguistic. And even without the old melting pot, foreign languages and cultural affinities decline across generations as immigrants become Americans. What Democrats really want aren’t a lot of Hispanics, but an endless firehose of first generation immigrants.

    https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/268953/imaginary-hispanic-what-illegal-war-about-daniel-greenfield

  4. Feinstein’s Fusion Flop
    Glenn Simpson’s evasive testimony opens door for new revelations.

    This week Sen. Dianne Feinstein released the transcript of an August 22, 2017, Senate Judiciary Committee interview with Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson. The Washington Post said the committee has been probing charges that the Trump campaign “coordinated with the Kremlin,” escalating the issue from mere “collusion.” Readers of the 312-page transcript, available here, might form their own judgments.

    Simpson was not under oath but the Fusion GPS founder still brought along attorney Joshua Levy. Simpson gave the names of Fusion partners but they are blacked out. There may be others, but Simpson could not recall their names.

    Simpson said Fusion did provide information to journalists but did he ever tell clients Fusion could find or distribute information that would launch an investigation? Levy questioned whether this was within the scope of the interview and no answer emerged.

    Was Fusion’s compensation based on whether they achieved an investigation? Simpson, formerly with the Wall Street Journal, could not answer that. Was Fusion’s oppo research in presidential elections accurate? “In a shorthand way, yeah,” Simpson answered.

    In September or October of 2015 somebody wanted Fusion to take a look at Trump, but Simpson’s lawyer would not let him identify the client. Simpson did say he ordered all books about Donald Trump, explaining, “He was not a serious political figure that I ever had any exposure to. He’s a New York figure, really.”

    That inquiry ended in the spring 2016 but then another client engaged Fusion to conduct research on Trump. Levy told the committee Simpson would decline to give any information on this client. Simpson would not answer whether payment came through an intermediary and did not agree that Fusion GPS was a Democrat-linked firm.

    “We don’t hire people who have strong partisan affiliations,” Simpson said. “We prefer journalists who don’t see things through ideological prisms.”

    The committee wanted to know why Fusion engaged Christopher Steele in May-June 2016. Simpson said “Chris” Steele was a leading Russia investigator at MI6, and a friend who could “share interests on Russian kleptocracy and organized crime issues.” Simpson said he had worked with Steele since 2009 and he is “basically a Boy Scout.”

    “It was opaque what Donald Trump had been doing on those business trips to Russia,” Simpson said. “So we gave Chris a sort of assignment which would be typical for us which was pretty open-ended.” Did the clients know Fusion had hired Steele? Simpson could not answer that one…….

    https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/268991/feinsteins-fusion-flop-lloyd-billingsley

  5. Women’s March Dumps ‘Pussyhats’ for Racist Transphobia
    January 11, 2018
    Daniel Greenfield

    The #Resistance revolution continues eating its own. Yesterday’s social justice mandate is today’s problematic issue and tomorrow’s bigoted no platform position. The arc of history always bends toward the guillotine. And identity politics works until you run out of other people.

    And thus the tragedy of the left catches up to the most iconic garb of the #Resistance.

    A year ago, they stormed the streets of big cities and small towns to make their views known: Women’s rights are human rights. Many wore on their heads what became the de-facto symbol of feminism in 2017, the pink pussyhat.

    That’s stupid enough. But the left never settles for stupid enough. It’s always got to take its stupid to the next level.

    But this time when marchers take to the streets in cities from Lansing to Las Vegas, there could be fewer pink pussyhats in the crowds.

    The reason: The sentiment that the pink pussyhat excludes and is offensive to transgender women and gender nonbinary people who don’t have typical female genitalia and to women of color because their genitals are more likely to be brown than pink.

    #Knapsackunpacked.

    Everything in the left exists in two phases.

    https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/268996/womens-march-dumps-pussyhats-racist-transphobia-daniel-greenfield

  6. Sessions Restarts Obama’s Aborted Hezbollah Investigation
    January 11, 2018
    Daniel Greenfield

    Obama Inc. shut down a DEA investigation of Hezbollah, an Iranian backed Islamic narcoterror group whose drug smuggling extends to the United States, to avoid offending his murderous new pals in Iran. After the recent expose of the shutdown, the investigation is being restarted.

    Here’s some brief background.

    The campaign, dubbed Project Cassandra, was launched in 2008 after the Drug Enforcement Administration amassed evidence that Hezbollah had transformed itself from a Middle East-focused military and political organization into an international crime syndicate that some investigators believed was collecting $1 billion a year from drug and weapons trafficking, money laundering and other criminal activities.

    Over the next eight years, agents working out of a top-secret DEA facility in Chantilly, Virginia, used wiretaps, undercover operations and informants to map Hezbollah’s illicit networks, with the help of 30 U.S. and foreign security agencies.

    They followed cocaine shipments, some from Latin America to West Africa and on to Europe and the Middle East, and others through Venezuela and Mexico to the United States. They tracked the river of dirty cash as it was laundered by, among other tactics, buying American used cars and shipping them to Africa. And with the help of some key cooperating witnesses, the agents traced the conspiracy, they believed, to the innermost circle of Hezbollah and its state sponsors in Iran……..

    https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/268997/sessions-restarts-obamas-aborted-hezbollah-daniel-greenfield

  7. 44 bomb-laden vehicles seized in Turkey’s Diyarbak?r in 2017: Governor (hurriyetdailynews, Jan 11, 2018)
    http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/44-bomb-laden-vehicles-seized-in-turkeys-diyarbakir-in-2017-governor-125598

    “The governor of the southeastern province of Diyarbak?r has said Turkish security forces seized a total of 44 bomb-laden vehicles across the province last year as part of anti-terror operations.

    The seized motor vehicles were planned to be used in attacks in Diyarbak?r as well as in other parts of Turkey, Diyarbak?r Governor Hasan Basri Güzelo?lu said on Jan. 11.

    “Our security forces have seized these [vehicles] after meticulous works. A huge success was reached to prevent such traitorous actions from taking place,” he said.

    Güzelo?lu’s comments came during a meeting with Gendarmerie Regional Commander Major Gen. Halis Zafer Koç, Police Commissioner Tacettin Aslan, and Provincial Brigadier Gen. Ali Demir assessing 2017 in terms of general security.

    The governor also released important statistics regarding the fight against the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in Diyarbak?r, saying in 2017 the number of operations against the group had increased by 378 percent compared to the previous year, reaching 3,677. In the operations in 2017, a total of 98 PKK militants were “neutralized,” he said.

    Authorities use the term “neutralized” in statements to imply the militants in question were either killed, wounded or captured.

    Of the 98 PKK militants, 74 were captured dead and 19 alive, while the remaining five had surrendered, the governor added.”

  8. Man sets ablaze newly-wed wife in Islamabad (tribune, Jan 11, 2018)
    https://tribune.com.pk/story/1606078/1-man-sets-ablaze-newly-married-wife-islamabad/

    “A man allegedly killed his wife by dousing crude oil over her and then setting her ablaze in Islamabad on Thursday.

    Ambreen Bibi, the victim, was taken to the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) with critical burn injuries where she died in early hours of Thursday.

    Initially, the woman’s husband, identified as Zubair, claimed she sustained the injuries from a cylinder blast.

    However, the victim’s mother and other family members suspected his involvement and approached the police…”

  9. Yemeni forces capture military base in southwestern Saudi Arabia (Video) (alalam, Jan 11, 2018)
    http://en.alalam.ir/news/3281021/yemeni-forces-capture-military-base-in-southwestern-saudi-arabia–video-

    “Yemeni forces have captured a Saudi military base in the kingdom’s border region of Najran during a retaliatory operation, killing several of the troops stationed there.

    (Presstv) — A video released by the Houthi Ansarullah movement on Wednesday shows the Yemeni forces ambush the base, using simple weaponry.

    According to the al-Masirah television network, the Yemeni forces seized Saudi weapons after capturing the base…”

  10. Turkey: No extraditions to US until Gulen handed over (alaraby, Jan 11, 2018)
    https://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/news/2018/1/11/turkey-no-extraditions-to-us-until-gulen-handed-over

    “Turkey will cease to hand over suspects to the US if Washington does not extradite the cleric Ankara blames for orchestrating a failed 2016 military coup, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened on Thursday.

    “We have given the United States 12 terrorists so far, but they have not given us back the one we want. They made up excuses from thin air,” Erdogan told local administrators at a conference in his presidential palace in Ankara, Reuters reported.

    “If you’re not giving him [Fethullah Gulen] to us, then excuse us, but from now on whenever you ask us for another terrorist, for as long as I remain in office, you will not get them,” he said…”

  11. Iranian cleric leaves Germany under threat of prosecution (memo, Jan 11, 2018)
    https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20180111-iranian-cleric-leaves-germany-under-threat-of-prosecution/

    “A senior Iranian cleric under investigation in Germany for alleged crimes against humanity left the country on a homeward-bound flight on Thursday, cutting short his stay at a Hanover clinic, a German official said.

    Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, a former chief justice, was in Germany for treatment at the clinic of Iranian-German neurosurgeon Majid Samii when activists referred him to prosecutors, citing what they called his record of passing death sentences.

    The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), an exiled opposition group, said his issuing of “thousands” of death sentences amounted to a crime against humanity and urged German prosecutors to investigate.

    Prosecutors said they were investigating the referrals, including one from senior Green politician Volker Beck. Later, the NCRI reported that Iran had reserved tickets for Shahroudi and his entourage to leave the country.

    A German government official told Reuters on Thursday afternoon that Shahroudi was aboard an Iran-bound plane…”

    • Britain to join France in West Africa counter-terrorism mission (middleeasteye, Jan 11, 2018)
      http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/britain-expected-join-french-west-africa-counter-terror-mission-1931687346

      “Britain is in talks with France to join a French-led campaign in West Africa, with British deployment looking set to include military helicopters and surveillance aircrafts, according to a British government source.

      British deployment would bolster French ground forces that have been sent to quell militancy across the restive Sahel region. British troops are not thought to be on the cards.

      “We are looking at rotary support or Istar [Intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition, reconnaissance],” a Whitehall source said to the Times. “The effort is counter-terrorism, to counter organised crime and to help re-establish state authority.”

      The talks come amid French efforts to secure funding and military support for Operation Barkhane, which includes 4,500 French troops deployed across the former French colonies of Mali, Chad, Burkina Faso, Niger and Mauritania, known collectively as the G5.

      According to the Times report, Paris is also considering whether to increase its commitment to the US-led campaign against the Islamic State (IS) group in Iraq and Syria in return. ..”

  12. Saudi state to ‘take control’ of Binladin group after chairman’s arrest (middleeasteye, Jan 11, 2018)
    http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/saudi-state-take-managerial-control-bin-laden-construction-group-745588584

    “Saudi Arabia is taking managerial control of the Saudi Binladin Group and discussing a possible transfer of some of the construction giant’s assets to the state while its chairman and other family members are in detention, sources have told the Reuters news agency.

    Binladin, which had over 100,000 employees at its height, is the biggest builder in the country and important to Riyadh’s plans for large residential, industrial and tourism projects to help diversify the economy beyond oil.

    However, the group has been hurt in the past couple of years by a slump in construction and a temporary exclusion from new state contracts after a crane accident killed 107 people at Mecca’s Grand Mosque in 2015. It is run by the Bin Laden family, but the company stresses it has no ties with the late al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden.

    Riyadh’s move comes after the government, under the direction of the crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, arrested scores of senior officials and businessmen in October for “corruption”. The Binladin group’s chairman Bakr bin Laden and several family members were arrested in that crackdown…”