Trump administration

5 Former Presidents Have Run Again After Losing; Only 1 Succeeded

Featured image 1945’s Brent Eastwood raised an interesting point in an article titled “The End of Donald Trump Has Arrived.” He noted that, of the five former U.S. presidents who have run for the presidency after having lost their previous bids for reelection, only one, Grover Cleveland, was successful. Eastwood wrote: But that is precisely what he is trying to accomplish – running again after losing the White House in a comeback. »

Give Birx the works

Featured image Michael Senger read Deborah Birx’s memoir Silent Invasion: The Untold Story of the Trump Administration, Covid-19, and Preventing the Next Pandemic Before It’s Too Late so that we don’t have to. In Senger’s judgment, Birx’s book “reads like a how-to guide from the front lines of subverting a democratic superpower from within.” Given late-breaking events yesterday, I can’t declare this the quote of the day, but it deserves special attention: »

Today at the Show Trial

Featured image I tuned in for quite a bit of today’s January 6 committee hearing with “surprise” witness Cassidy Hutchinson, and it was gripping viewing indeed. Many of the things she related in her videotaped deposition (excerpted liberally in her committee room appearance) sounded plausible, such as alleged statements by Trump on January 6. And Hutchinson seemed a credible witness. But second thoughts ought to grow in the aftermath of her appearance. »

One damn thing after another

Featured image I have four propositions with which many readers will disagree. First, William Barr was an outstanding Attorney General of the United States in the Trump administration. Second, if it weren’t for Barr, the Mueller investigation would still be going strong persecuting innocent citizens. We would be entertaining proposals to convert it into a permanent commission. Third, I agree entirely with his critique of President Trump’s endgame on January 6. (I »

Clinton did it, WSJ edition

Featured image I took the occasion of the testimony in the Sussman trial last week to weigh “Watergate in the balance.” John reviewed what we already knew in “Hillary did it.” On Saturday, the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal — I think this is Kim Strassel’s beat as a member of the board — plays it straight in the editorial “Hillary Clinton did it.” The Journal editorial lays out the »

Watergate in the balance

Featured image With perfect timing Christopher Caldwell reviews what we have learned about Watergate in the past 50 years. Caldwell’s First Things essay is titled “Regime change, American style.” The occasion of Caldwell’s essay is the publication of Garrett Graff’s Watergate: A New History. Caldwell’s essay usefully reminds us that, 50 years later, we still have no idea what the Watergate burglars were looking for. Whatever it was, however, they came away »

The Latest Trump Scandal: Never Mind

Featured image Two days ago the media and TDS sufferers everywhere got a fresh hit of dopamine from the latest Trump scandal: the Oval Office telephone call logs had a seven-hour gap on January 6, 2021, when the “insurrection” was under way up at the capitol. This made the famous 18 minute gap in Nixon’s Watergate tapes seem minor league by comparison. Trump must have been using “burner” cell phones to direct »

A controlled experiment

Featured image President Biden sought a clean break with Trump administration policies from day one of his administration last year and the results furnish a stark contrast. You could say it’s like night and day, but between night and day we have a period of twilight. Not so with the imposition of the lunatic left agenda in the Biden administration. We have gone straight to nightmare. Christopher DeMuth is in pursuit of »

Did Chris Christie deliver?

Featured image Earlier this week, I wrote about how Chris Christie ripped his former ally Donald Trump for not delivering on key agenda items as president. I agreed generally with Christie’s complaint, but noted that, as Trump’s term went on and he replaced some of his early appointees, the delivery improved. I suggested several possible explanations for why Trump got off to a slow start, but omitted an important one — Chris »

Milley promotes himself

Featured image Senator Marsha Blackburn asked Joint Chiefs Chairman Milley about the books in which he is quoted to inflammatory effect. He acknowledged that he had sat for interviews with the authors of each of the books she specified. In his Washington Examiner Daily Memo yesterday, Byron York cited them and extracted a few of the quotes: Three of the biggest such books, all bestsellers, were Peril, by Bob Woodward and Robert »

Trump DOJ sought records of Trump White House counsel

Featured image Former White House counsel Don McGahn and wife have been notified by Apple that the Trump Justice Department requested information on them in 2018. So reports the Washington Post. It’s not clear what the DOJ was investigating that led to the request. Nor is it clear whether its investigators were targeting McGahn or just came across his name while viewing the records of others. McGahn figured in Robert Mueller’s investigation. »

The Trump DOJ’s exemplary record on civil rights [UPDATED]

Featured image Friday was my friend Eric Dreiband’s last day as Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights. Eric will take the rest of the month off and then return to private practice. Eric accomplished a lot in his two years and two months in charge of the Civil Rights Division. Some of the Division’s accomplishments under Eric’s leadership are set forth in this DOJ announcement. Eric defended the Trump administration’s record on »

Let’s not leave court of appeals judgeships on the table

Featured image The presidential race is all over but the shouting (and long may the shouting continue). President Trump is now a lame duck. But this doesn’t mean Trump is without power. He has the power, for example, to nominate federal judges. And with the GOP in control of the Senate, he ought to be able to have them confirmed. As I understand it, there are three vacant court of appeals positions »

“Anonymous” no more

Featured image In September 2018 the New York Times published the column by a purported “senior official in the Trump administration” who vowed relentlessly to thwart Trump. The Times identified the author of the column as “Anonymous.” Wow. What a scandal! More proof that Trump was unfit for office. Even those who worked directly with him saw it! Who was that masked man? “Anonymous” has come out. He is Miles Taylor, who »

Not tired of it, but there has been plenty of winning under Trump

Featured image This George Will column is called “Republicans, are you tired of winning yet?” Oddly, Will makes no real effort to assess the extent to which, from a conservative Republican perspective, America has been winning under President Trump. Instead, Will devotes the first part of his column to complaining that America is having difficulty managing the mechanics of voting. But this difficulty is due to the challenges of a pandemic, coupled, »

DOL wants more time to mull appealing meritless Oracle case

Featured image Who is running the Trump Department of Labor? Ostensibly, it’s Secretary of Labor Gene Scalia. And, ostensibly, Kate O’Scannlain is running the DOL Solicitor’s office. After all, she is the Solicitor. However, the DOL’s unwillingness to let go of its baseless discrimination case against Oracle suggests that leftist career employees are in control of that litigation, and who knows what else. It has been obvious all along that, under any »

How to break the left’s chokehold on the teaching of American History

Featured image The left has hijacked American history. Due to its unrelenting attacks on America, our brilliant but flawed history is now presented to students at all levels with the brilliance excised and the flaws vastly overstated. We have discussed the hijacking in posts like this one and this follow up. The questions are: (1) will patriotic Americans muster the determination to reverse the hijacking and (2) what is the best way »