Liberty & Prosperity Blog

Today is the last day of the Supreme Court's 2022-23 session. The last opinion issued was Biden, President of the United States v. Nebraska. This is Biden's student loan 'forgiveness' program. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion in the case. Chief Justice Roberts wrote "The issue presented in this case is whether the Secretary has authority under the Higher Education Relief Opportunities for Students Act of 2003 (HEROES Act) to depart from the existing provisions of the Education Act and establish a student loan forgiveness program that will cancel about $430 billion in debt principal and affect nearly all borrowers. Under the HEROES Act, the Secretary 'may waive or modify any statutory or regulatory provision applicable to the student financial assistance programs under title IV of the [Education Act] as the Secretary deems necessary in connection with a war or other military operation or national emergency.' §1098bb(a)(1). As relevant h...

To: Joe Biden or whoever reads his mail when he's having a bad day (any day that end with the letter Y) From: Gary Gross, weary patriot Subject: Lots of different stuff Joe, please stop giving public speeches about Bidenomics. Either that or stop insisting that the economy is doing well. Our paychecks don't stretch as far as 2+ years ago. It isn't close actually. The CPI has slowed from its high of 9.1% but it's still high. When a 6ft. tall, 175 lb. guy gains 50 lbs., people notice in a hurry. His physician likely will tell him to change his diet and lose weight. If that guy gains another 25 lbs., that guy can't walk into his physician's office and convince his physician that 'at least I'm doing better. You still gained another 25 lbs. The story still is that you still haven't figured out how to curb inflation and lower prices. If that doesn't happen ASAP, we'll be in worse shape 6 months from now. If you don't fix the inflation proble...

Clarence Thomas is often seen as the most quiet justice on the Supreme Court. It's time to stop thinking of Justice Thomas that way. In his concurring opinion in Students for Fair Admissions v. University of North Carolina and Students for Fair Admissions Inc. v. President & Fellows of Harvard College, Thomas wrote "With the passage of the Fourteenth Amendment, the people of our Nation proclaimed that the law may not sort citizens based on race. It is this principle that the Framers of the Fourteenth Amendment adopted in the wake of the Civil War to fulfill the promise of equality under the law." Later in his concurring opinion, he disagrees with Justice Ketanji Brown-Jackson's minority opinion, saying "Nor do JUSTICE JACKSON’s statistics regarding a correlation between levels of health, wealth, and well-being between selected racial groups prove anything. Of course, none of those statistics are capable of drawing a direct causal link between race—rather tha...

Whatever you think of Donald Trump's foreign policy accomplishments, they don't tell the entire story of his foreign policy/national security portfolio. When it comes to war, Donald Trump is pretty wimpy . Joe Rogan praised Trump after Trump's CNN Town Hall for his answer on the Russia-Ukraine War. During that townhall, Trump boldly said "If I'm president, I will have that war settled in one day, 24 hours" before saying that he'd meet with both presidents. When asked who he wants to win, Trump said "I want everybody to stop dying. They're dying. Russians and Ukrainians. I want them to stop dying. And I'll have that done. I'll have that done in 24 hours. I'll have it done. You need the power of the presidency to do it." That's the definition of wimpy. When he was president, Ronald Reagan called the Soviet Union the Evil Empire. He was right in giving the Soviets that title because that's who they were. President Reagan also...

Joe Biden is hurting himself by insisting that 'Bidenomics' is helping Americans. From the start of his administration, Biden's been touting job creation as his proof that his plan is working. That's foolish in light of the fact that inflation is killing families' budgets. That's the best argument against Bidenomics but it isn't the only argument. Another fantastic argument against Bidenomics is -- get ready for it -- the truth. I wrote this post to highlight Biden's propensity for lying. In that post, I quoted principal deputy press secretary Olivia Dalton as saying "we find that when we go out and we talk to people about it, they support Bidenomics." QUESTION: Is anyone in this administration capable of telling the truth? The reason I ask this question is because an AP/NORC poll from June 22-26 asked if they approved of the job Biden was doing on the economy. One-third said yes while 64% said they disapproved of his handling of the economy...

Tuesday was a fun day if you care about economic facts. At the daily WH press briefing, principal deputy press secretary Olivia Dalton said "Well, what I would say is that the president's economic policies are incredibly popular. When you ask people what they think about investing in our roads, bridges and airports, what you - when you ask people what they think about educating and empowering workers, when you ask people about how they feel about reshoring, manufacturing jobs and investing in America, those things are incredibly popular." She continued, saying "And we find that when we go out and we talk to people about it, they support Bidenomics. And so that's exactly what the president is going to be doing in Chicago tomorrow. That's exactly why we're talking to Americans about everything that he's doing to make sure that we grow the economy by growing the middle class and give people the support that they need to grow our economy for us." I...

Just when Hunter Biden seemed to have disappeared from Joe Biden's list of things to worry about, he figures out a way to ruin a perfectly good weekend at Camp David. Bill McGurn shows that Hunter is a total pain in the butt he is in his latest column . According to Mr. McGurn, Joe Biden's headaches are caused by Jamie Comer, the GOP Chairman of the House Oversight Committee. In his column, McGurn writes "House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer has forced into public the existence of a Federal Bureau of Investigation FD-1023 form detailing an informant’s claim that a Burisma executive paid $5 million each in bribes to then-Vice President Biden and his son. After the bureau begrudgingly let a few members of Congress look at the document, Sen. Chuck Grassley revealed the FBI had redacted the part about the executive saying he had 17 audio recordings of conversations with Joe and Hunter Biden." This thing stopped being a nothingburger when Sen. Grassley took to th...

Ron DeSantis is serious about finishing building Trump's wall. Most importantly, he's got a detailed plan that will finish building the wall that Trump didn't. Gov. DeSantis starts his plan by saying "As president I will put an end to this moral and humanitarian catastrophe by shutting down illegal entries and building the wall, once and for all. There are more than 600 miles of the US-Mexico border without an effective barrier to illegal crossings: I will use every ounce of my executive power and political capital to get the wall built." Next, Gov. DeSantis highlights his competence, stating "We know how to get infrastructure built quickly and cut through red tape. After Hurricane Ian, Pine Island in Florida was completely cut off from the mainland. I ordered the Florida Department of Transportation to assist, and within 24 hours, we had more than 130 trucks rolling in and crews got to work. We didn’t just get it done—we got it done in three days, and emerg...

You'd think that Mike Pence would know better than to side with Disney. Then again, you'd think that Nikki Haley wouldn't side with Walt's woke mob, too. Actually, this reeks mostly like desperation when VP Pence said "when the governor of Florida decided to launch a full-scale campaign of governmental retribution against Disney, he wasn't taking a page out of the conservative playbook—he was following in the footsteps of the radical left." To paraphrase the great Dagen McDowell, "desperation is the world's worst aphrodisiac." Why would Mike Pence, perhaps the most fiscally conservative candidate in the GOP presidential race, say that corporate welfare to a woke corporation is a positive? Disney lobbied on behalf of teachers teaching K-3rd grade students about gender identity. That's what perverts do. Hitting Disney in the wallet is the right thing to do in that situation. The only thing worse is Nikki Haley inviting Disney to South Caro...

Is the MSM protecting Joe Biden like Merrick Garland and the FBI are trying to protect Hunter Biden? If they say they aren't protecting Scranton Joe, my first question at a rare Garland press conference would be "If you aren't protecting Joe Biden, what would you do different than what you're doing now?" I wrote this article yesterday because John Ratcliffe highlighted specific things that the judge overseeing the case could reject the plea deal over. Several of the reasons include Gary Shapley's testimony given for his deposition before the House Ways and Means Committee. This morning, Miranda Devine wrote this article highlighting Mr. Shapley's bombshell testimony. She wrote "Both strands are covered in Shapley’s bombshell testimony unsealed last week, and is backed up with new evidence he provided, including documents and messages retrieved from a search warrant of Hunter Biden’s iCloud, memorialized conversations of internal IRS and DOJ meetings...

Salena Zito is the best on-the-ground political reporter in the U.S. She has been the best for longer than she'd like to admit. Like the old EF Hutton commercials, when Salena talks, I listen. When Salena wrote this article , it confirmed what she wrote earlier -- that Trump's support is softening. Salena's news article opens by saying "Alex Anastasio voted for Donald Trump for president twice, attended Trump rallies, organized events for him, and placed signs in front of her home. And she was deeply hopeful in the early days following the 2020 election that once all of the votes were counted, he would serve a second term — so hopeful, indeed, that she was initially involved in a voter recount effort in support of that." In other words, she wasn't a passive Trump supporter. The article continues, saying "Three years later, she said she has no doubt his indictment is politically motivated, but that does not mean she is supporting him in 2024. "We need...

If former DNI John Ratcliffe is right, who appeared on Trey Gowdy's Sunday Night in America program, the judge in this case might reject the deal. Ratcliffe said "the judge in this case shouldn't accept the plea because, as you know, judges are required to look at all of the defendant's conduct. In this case, you start with some of that conduct being on videotape and showing felony possession of a firearm while using a controlled substance. That's a felony that carries a maximum penalty of 10 years and depending on who you talk to, the judge is probably going to be aware that either never in the history of the Department of Justice or rarely in the history of the Department of Justice has that resulted in a misdemeanor with pretrial diversion." Ratcliffe continued, saying "But even if you get past all that, Trey, the judge is going to be aware of all that, uh, is going to be aware of whistleblower testimony that the very prosecutors in this case, accordin...

Since Election Night 2020, Donald Trump has insisted that he won re-election. I think he believes that. The problem is that the ballots tell a different story. In battleground state after battleground state, Trump ran behind the rest of the GOP ticket. That's on top of new battleground polling, which I wrote about in this post . In that polling, Biden defeats Trump in Arizona, Georgia and Pennsylvania by 2 points, 3 points and 3 points respectively. By contrast, DeSantis defeats Biden by 6 points in Arizona, 3 points in Georgia and 3 points in Pennsylvania. For all of Trump's talk about being a winner, the truth is that he's a loser. He's won 1 race, in 2016. After that, he's lost. In 2018, Trump lost the suburbs . For instance, a "USA TODAY analysis of midterm election returns across the nation found more than 80 suburban counties and cities, with high incomes and a large number of college-educated voters, voted more Democratic compared to 2016." That...

Merrick Garland appears to be heading towards impeachment in the House of Representatives. There's a dispute between Gary Shapley, the IRS whistleblower, and David Weiss, the U.S. attorney for Delaware. CNN is quoting Weiss as saying "I have been granted ultimate authority over this matter, including responsibility for deciding where, when, and whether to file charges and for making decisions necessary to preserve the integrity of the prosecution, consistent with federal law, the Principles of Federal Prosecution, and Departmental regulations." During Garland's press conference, he was asked "whether DOJ leadership stepped in at any point to stop Weiss from charging Hunter Biden with more serious crimes in other jurisdictions." Rather than answering directly Garland replied "I’m saying he was given complete authority to make all decisions on his own." What Garland didn't say was whether that authority was stripped from him at any time. That ap...

Apparently, you've got lots of friends if you're the son of a famous fossilized politician, especially if that famous fossilized politician should've retired 2+ decades ago. Gary Shapley testified in front of the House Ways and Means Committee in the form of a deposition. Shapley is an "IRS Criminal Supervisory Special Agent." In his testimony, Shapley said that the plea deal reached with Hunter Biden was lenient. Specifically, Shapley said "The recommended felony tax evasion charges, that's 7201, is tax evasion, and 7206(1) is a false tax return, also a felony, for the tax years 2014, 2018, and 2019. And for Title 26 7203, which is a failure to file or pay, that is a misdemeanor charge for '15, '16, '17, '18, and '19." That means Hunter didn't pay taxes for 5 straight years! How does the average taxpayer earn millions of dollars over 5 years get a lenient penalty and no jail time? Anyone who isn't the president's son...

House Oversight Committee Chairman Jamie Comer and his committee have been doing a terrific job of investigating what's often called the Biden Family Crime Syndicate. House Democrats have criticized the investigation but it's still uncovered lots of information. The investigation done by the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee is less heralded but is well-researched, too. A quick perusal of the HSGAC investigation's executive summary is eye-popping. For instance, the executive summary reports that "On April 16, 2014, Vice President Biden met with his son’s business partner, Devon Archer, at the White House. Five days later, Vice President Biden visited Ukraine, and he soon after was described in the press as the 'public face of the administration’s handling of Ukraine.' The day after his visit, on April 22, Archer joined the board of Burisma. Six days later, on April 28, British officials seized $23 million from the London bank accounts o...

When it comes to bragging up his own accomplishments, Tim Walz won't hesitate in making it sound like he's accomplished something historic. The truth is that the Walz-Flanagan-DFL agenda is a disaster. Yes, we'll have low unemployment. That's because our 3 biggest employers are the federal government, state government and municipal government. The problem with DFL governance is that they aren't interested in economic growth. Recently, the Walz-Flanagan-DFL 'leadership team' visited the White House. According to the Tim Walz-Peggy Flanagan email , "Governor Tim Walz, Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan, Senate Majority Leader Kari Dziedzic, and House Speaker Melissa Hortman today met with senior White House officials in Washington D.C. to celebrate Minnesota’s economic development and infrastructure investments and paid family and medical leave legislation." Further, Gov. Walz said "Thanks to the leadership and partnership of the Biden-Harris Ad...

Apparently, Randi Weingarten and the American Federation of Teachers have met their match. Struggling mightily to maintain their stranglehold on their monopoly on parents and the educational product, AFT and other teacher unions are fighting a losing fight against parents and organizations like American Federation for Children . According to this article , one of the groups of parents that are helping win the fight are conservative Christians. According to the article, "eight states – including Arizona, Florida, Indiana, and West Virginia – have approved 'universal' or near-universal school choice laws since 2021. They open the door completely to school choice by making all students, including those already in private schools and from wealthy families, eligible for about $7,000 to $10,000 in state funding each year for their education." When Randi Weingarten pushed the Biden administration into keeping schools closed by working in conjunction with the CDC, she pi$$ed ...

Keith Ellison is part of 15 state attorneys general that are reminding Target of their obligations to the LGBTQIA+ community. In their letter, these state AGs state "LGBTQIA+ Americans have faced an increasing number of politically motivated attacks over the past two years. A number of legislatures around the country have adopted laws barring public schools from discussing LGBTQIA+ identity, limiting gender-affirming care, prohibiting transgender individuals from using bathrooms or playing on sports teams aligned with their gender identity, and restricting drag performances." Their letter continues, saying "At the same time, the LGBTQIA+ community has also increasingly been targeted by harassment and hate, including escalating threats of violence and a spike in baseless and pernicious accusations that LGBTQIA+ individuals seek to abuse or convert children." Let's be clear about this. These children don't reach the conclusion that they're anything other ...

People have said for quite a while that Gov. DeSantis would need to directly challenge Donald Trump if he wants to win the nomination. According to Sister Toldjah's article , it appears as though that ass-paddling arrived this week. It started with a simple gotcha question of "Will you support Trump if he won the GOP nomination?" Rather than answer that question, Gov. DeSantis replied "So, what I would say is this. When you are saying that Cuomo did better on Covid than Florida did, you are revealing yourself to just be full of it. Nobody believes that. And you know why I know that? Because I remember in 2020, in 2021, when he was praising Florida for being open, saying we did it much better than New York and Michigan and everyone was coming to Florida, and that [I was] one of the great governors in the United States. And he used to say that all the time." What I'd say is that Gov. DeSantis is right. Trump is revealing himself "to be full of it." H...

Yesterday, Adam Schiff was censured by the House of Representatives. The charge against Rep. Schiff is that he's accused of lying to Congress and disgracing the House. Instead of admitting that he's a dishonest low-life loser in need of moral rehabilitation, Schiff said that this censure was a badge of honor. That's proof of Schiff's extremely loose grip on reality. Let's go through the things that earned Schiff his 'badge of honor.' Devin Nunes wrote this letter that cites the findings of the Horowitz Report. The Horowitz Report isn't cause for celebration. From that Report, Nunes cited " on December 9, 2019, U.S. Department of Justice Inspector General (IG) Michael Horowitz published the results of his investigation of the FISA warrant and renewals obtained by the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) and the Department of Justice (DOJ) to spy on Trump campaign associate Carter Page. The IG’s findings of pervasive, major abuses by the FBI dramat...

Donald Trump's strategy is crystal clear. Trump's overarching strategy is this- 'everyone should clear the field because I'm inevitable. Why waste the time if you're going to lose anyway?' Trump's shills (I'm looking at you, Mark Simone.) play their role by suggesting that Ron DeSantis has a great chance at the nomination ... in 2028. Simone actually said that last night on Kudlow. With all due respect to Mr. Simone, those of us who watch these things have noticed that Trump's polling isn't that strong, especially in battleground states. One thing that GOP voters are thirsting for is defeating Joe Biden. If the election were yesterday and the GOP defeated Biden, it wouldn't be soon enough. We want him and Kamala out yesterday, if not last year. It's that simple. Kurt Schlichter's column takes a few shots at Trump. For instance, Schlichter writes "Trump presents himself as unbeatable with an insurmountable lead, though his lead h...

Kelley Robinson, the president of the Far-Left leaning Human Rights Campaign, made the mistake of testifying on a panel with Riley Gaines . Their testimony was before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Ms. Robinson's first mistake was insisting that Serena Williams would beat male tennis players because she's stronger than them. At that point, Ms. Gaines noted that "Both Serena and Venus lost to the 203rd ranked male tennis player." Things went downhill for Ms. Robinson after that. Before leaving this point, it's worth pointing out that Bonchie wrote this article for RedState.com. In his article, Bonchie stated that "the Williams sisters once lost to the 203rd-ranked male player after he downed several beers." That doesn't put Ms. Williams' theory into question. That story, if accurate, blows Ms. Williams' theory into outer space. I don't doubt that it's accurate, either, thanks in part because of Riley Gaines' testimony, especiall...

Today's censure vote against Rep. Adam Schiff, the Democrat who said he had "more than circumstantial proof" that Trump had colluded with Russians, will finally get censured by the House of Representatives today. Last week, he avoided censure because Rep. Anna Paula Luna, (R-FL), included a whereas clause in her resolution that would've called for fining Rep. Schiff, (D-CA), $16,000,000 if the House Ethics Committee found "Schiff 'lied, made misrepresentations, and abused sensitive information.'" This time, the glide path to Schiff's censure is smooth and certain. Rep. Luna "made a number of changes to the resolution from last week to this week, and she said she now has enough votes for the measure to be approved." Further, Rep. Luna said "I have spoken to many of my colleagues. A majority of the 20 will be changing their vote to support the motion, as well as other Members who were not in town for the initial vote have let me/my ...