May 18, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
The influx of illegal immigrants seeking asylum in the U.S. has overwhelmed facilities along the Texas border with Mexico. Consequently, hundreds of these detainees will be flown to San Diego for processing. The plan calls for three flights a week carrying about 130 people per flight to arrive in the San Diego area from the Rio Grande Valley in Texas. Similarly, the Trump administration is preparing to send a thousand
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May 17, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
If you consume the mainstream media, you might be under the impression that President Trump is about to take the U.S. into war with Iran. Even if you only watch Fox News, you might believe that John Bolton is pushing Trump to go to war. Tucker Carlson says that Bolton wants a war with Iran. This is fake news. There’s no evidence that Bolton desires a war with Iran and
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May 17, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
I want to add a few observations to those of Scott and Heather Mac Donald regarding the “adversity score” that the College Board offers to provide to colleges along with applicants’ SAT scores. First, college admissions offices already know the information that yields this score. Charles Deacon, the dean of undergraduate admissions at Georgetown acknowledged: We have so much personal data on all our applicants that we don’t feel the
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May 16, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
At the Los Angeles Times, Scott Martelle attacks Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey for signing and praising Alabama’s ban on abortion bill while also backing and overseeing the death sentence for seven inmates. Martelle purports to find a contradiction here. I say “purports” because I doubt Martelle is blind to the obvious way Gov. Ivey’s two positions can be reconciled. She wants to ban abortions because she considers innocent life sacred.
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May 16, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
President Trump presented his new immigration plan today. It focuses on enhancing border security and basing entry into this country on merit. The plan is perhaps most notable for what it doesn’t do. It offers nothing for the “Dreamers” or even the smaller DACA population. And it does not decrease the amount of legal immigration. For every potential immigrant who loses out due to the slashing of chain migration, another
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May 16, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
Sen. Marco Rubio is the U.S. Senator best attuned to and most focused on the problem China poses to the U.S. and the world at-large. At least that’s what I infer from his public pronouncements on the subject. In an interview with the Washington Post, Rubio maintained that a significant part of our problem with China stems from shortsighted American corporate CEO’s. He stated: If you go to China, they
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May 15, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio will announce his candidacy for president on Thursday. I’ve lost track of the number of Democrats now in the field. but I believe it’s almost two dozen. In trying to get a handle on this mad scramble of a race, I have suggested that there are three Democratic lanes — the establishment lane, the hard left lane, and the diversity lane. De Blasio
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May 15, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
I normally don’t suggest that Power Line readers vote for a Democrat. If I have ever done so, I’ve purged it from my memory. However, voting for a Democrat is something that readers who are registered to vote in Arlington County, Virginia should consider. The race in question is the Democratic primary contest for Commonwealth’s Attorney. The Democrat worthy of support is the incumbent, Theo Stamos. The primary is “open”
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May 15, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
In this post, I discussed Donald Trump Jr.’s refusal to appear for second time before the Senate Intelligence Committee. I argued that he should testify. Now, following the issuance of a subpoena, Trump Jr. has agreed to testify. Under a deal reached with the Committee, he will testify for up to four hours and questions will be limited to six broad categories, not ten as the Committee contemplated. It’s a
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May 14, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
Bloomberg reports: A senior Labor Department official with outsize control of agency operations is leaving after a White House investigation into complaints about mistreating staff and misleading Trump administration personnel, sources with direct knowledge of the probe told Bloomberg Law. That aide is Nick Geale, Alex Acosta’s chief of staff. Bloomberg’s sources declined to identify who made the final decision to demand Geale’s ouster. However, Bloomberg notes that Mick Mulvaney,
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May 14, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
Seeking to follow the path blazed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, someone called Mckayla Wilkes is challenging House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer in the Democratic primary in Maryland’s 5th congressional district. Wilkes doesn’t quite have Ocasio-Cortez’s credentials. As far as I can tell, she never tended bar. Instead, Wilkes is (according to The Intercept) a 28-year-old administrative assistant, part-time student, and mother of two. Thus, even without bartending, her resume is sufficiently
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May 14, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
It’s way too early to answer this question in the affirmative. However, it’s not a ridiculous question. Reportedly, Kavanaugh has been in the majority more often than any other Justice so far this term. This suggests that Kavanaugh, not Chief Justice Roberts, is at the ideological center of the Court — the place where Kennedy resided after Justice O’Connor retired. It doesn’t mean that Kavanaugh is as centrist as Justice
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May 13, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
Rep. Rashida Tlaib is under fire for saying this: I think two weeks ago or so we celebrated, or just took a moment I think in our country to remember the Holocaust. There’s always kind of a calming feeling I tell folks when I think of the Holocaust, and the tragedy of the Holocaust, and the fact that it was my ancestors — Palestinians — who lost their land and
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May 13, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
I filed this post under “media bias.” “Media stupidity” might be a better tag. Today, President Trump tweeted: Has anyone noticed that all the Boston @RedSox have done is WIN since coming to the White House! Others also have done very well. The White House visit is becoming the opposite of being on the cover of Sports Illustrated! By the way, the Boston players were GREAT guys! At Politico, Caitlin
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May 13, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
Joe Biden’s entry into the presidential race has solidified his status as the clear frontrunner for the Democratic nomination. He’s the first choice of around 40 percent of Democrats, according to polls . No other candidate is close. But how do the friends and associates of Barack Obama feel about Biden? The Washington Post tried to find out. It says it interviewed 53 “former Obama advisers, senior White House and
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May 12, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
That’s the headline of a Washington Post story (print edition) about the clash between the White House and House Democrats over the latters’ investigations of the former. The article notes that President Trump “is blocking more than 20 separate Democratic inquiries.” According to the Post, this “amount[s] to what many experts call the most expansive White House obstruction effort in decades. The Post’s claim of obstruction is dishonest in at
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May 12, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
On May 12, 1969, the St. Louis Cardinals defeated the Los Angeles Dodgers 6-2 at Busch Stadium. Bob Gibson pitched a complete game for the Cards, allowing two runs on seven hits. He struck out six and walked one. There was nothing exceptional about Gibson’s pitching performance that day. It was a typical one for him that year, except for the relatively low number of strikeouts. But Gibson’s contributions weren’t
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