ALERT What to expect in the first days of the Biden Democracy

[marsh]

OOOOOh look, fascism

Zerohedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

Biden's COVID "Supply Commander" Is Bad Medicine

Wed, 12/02/2020 - 21:00
Authored by Bradley Thomas via The Mises Institute,

Included in his plans to fight the coronavirus, presumptive president-elect Joe Biden has pledged to appoint "a fully empowered supply commander in charge of filling in the gaps" in the production and supply of "essential" items needed to fight the virus.

On his website, Biden elaborates on his plan, declaring that his "supply commander" would "take command of the national supply chain for essential equipment, medications, and protective gear."

This very Soviet-sounding position is necessary, Biden insists, because "We can no longer leave this to the private sector."


Leaving aside Biden & Company’s laughable assertion that America’s medical industry reflects any sort of unfettered laissez-faire operation, his proposal for a centralized, command-driven medical "supply chain" under the direction of a government commander betrays a stunning ignorance of the complex and interconnected patterns of production and exchange that make up the economy.

As George Mason University economist Don Boudreaux explained in an April 2020 article published by the American Institute for Economic Research, "The first reality is that, in our modern economy nearly every productive enterprise is connected to every other productive enterprise. This connectedness is the phenomenon alluded to by the term 'supply chain.'"

But this term, however, is "highly misleading," Boudreaux wrote. "Today’s economy is not a series of supply chains running side by side with each other, each largely distinct from, and independent of, the others."

"Instead of a collection of distinct supply chains," he continued, "our modern economy is a single globe-spanning web of interconnectedness. Within this web every output is the product of countless inputs and each kind of input typically is used to produce countless different kinds of outputs."

The complex nature of this process of deploying a dizzying array of scarce resources with alternative uses for use in different finished products does not occur in cleanly separated and hermetically sealed "supply chains."

"This web of interconnectedness—the complexity of which is beyond human comprehension—is indispensable for our modern mass prosperity. Yet its existence—its 'everything-is-connected-in-some-way-to-everything-else' reality—means that there are no objective and clear lines separating 'critical supplies' from 'uncritical' ones," Boudreaux added.

To help clarify the interconnectedness of our economy, Leonard Read’s classic 1958 essay "I, Pencil" can prove instructive.

When asking what will be considered "essential equipment, medications, and protective gear," we must further examine the inputs required to produce these items.

Read highlighted how the pencil requires cedar wood from Oregon, which in turn requires saws and trucks and ropes to transport the raw wood to the sawmill in California, which itself requires steel for its equipment along with electricity, land, concrete, and countless other inputs. And that is just the tip of the iceberg for the wood. The lead itself, the rubber for the eraser, and the lacquer for the finish each likewise require many inputs from around the world, all necessary in order to complete the pencil.

Now imagine just how complex the processes are for producing medications, medical equipment, and protective gear. And the inputs required to produce these items will also require other inputs. If we trace back the process far enough for items like medicine and medical equipment, the list of raw materials, capital goods, labor, etc. that need to be diverted from other uses, the list would become unfathomable—certainly so for any single “supply commander.”

Moreover, not just the production process itself, but also the distribution and storage of such "essential" goods to hundreds of millions of people and healthcare workers across the nation will require substantial resources.

Importantly, nearly every resource directed to the production and distribution of these "essential" items will have alternative uses for which they will no longer be available. The result is that the "supply chains" for each and every one of these alternative products and inputs will be impacted, for instance in the form of shortages or inflated prices.

How many of these impacted items would also be considered "essential," but for noncovid purposes? For instance, other lifesaving medicines or critical medical supplies, or food supplies? And to what degree?

No central authority could possibly know this; indeed, the top-down "supply commander" model could end up doing more harm than good.

Too often, progressives and other interventionists view an unhampered market as "chaos," something needing to be reined in under the direction of a wise central planner, or "commander.”"

However, the impulse to default to centralizing economic decision-making over such a complex ecosystem as the economy is a threat not just to our liberty, but to our well-being. The need for market prices based on private property to freely function and efficiently direct scarce resources to where they are needed most becomes even more critical in times of emergency.

 

[marsh]

Firm Linked To Joe Biden Scrubs Website Of All China Related Business | The Gateway Pundit | by Mike LaChance

One of the main criticisms by conservatives of Joe Biden over the last 12 months is that he has too many questionable ties to China.

www.thegatewaypundit.com

Firm Linked To Joe Biden Scrubs Website Of All China Related Business

By Mike LaChance
Published December 2, 2020 at 11:16pm

One of the main criticisms by conservatives of Joe Biden over the last 12 months is that he has too many questionable ties to China.

Some have even suggested that Biden is even compromised by his ties to China, and can’t fairly represent the United States.

Now a firm linked to Biden, through someone he wants to add to his team, is fueling speculation by scrubbing their business links to China.

The Washington Free Beacon reports:

Biden-Linked Firm WestExec Scrubs China Work From Website

The Washington, D.C., consulting firm cofounded by President-elect Joe Biden’s secretary of state nominee, Antony Blinken, has removed from its website details of its China-related business as the firm’s work has drawn scrutiny following Biden’s election victory.

As recently as late July, WestExec Advisors touted its work helping major American universities court donations in China without jeopardizing Pentagon-funded research grants.

An archived version of the WestExec site states that “U.S. research universities” were among the company’s clients and that the consultancy worked with schools to “remain a trusted partner for DoD-sponsored research grants while expanding foreign research collaboration, accepting foreign donations, and welcoming foreign students in key STEM programs.”

The company deleted references to such work from its website between July 26 and August 2, weeks before Biden accepted his nomination at the Democratic National Convention in late August.

The consultancy’s work is under the microscope because Biden has tapped, or is considering tapping, several of its principals and advisers who have thus far refused to disclose their clients or elaborate on the precise nature of their work.

Biden is eyeing Blinken’s WestExec cofounder, the former Pentagon official Michèle Flournoy, as a potential secretary of defense.

This seems a little suspicious, doesn’t it?





Watch closely, as the liberal media ignores all of this.
Cross posted from American Lookout.

 

[marsh]

Report: Corrupt Joe Biden would Like to Keep Corrupt Chris Wray as FBI Chief | The Gateway Pundit | by Jim Hoft

They both need to go — Joe Biden to assisted living and Chris Wray to obscurity.

www.thegatewaypundit.com

Report: Corrupt Joe Biden would Like to Keep Corrupt Chris Wray as FBI Chief

By Jim Hoft
Published December 3, 2020 at 12:27pm

They both need to go — Joe Biden to assisted living and Chris Wray to obscurity.

According to The New York Times Joe Biden would like to keep corrupt Chris Wray on if he becomes president that way they can continue to spy on Republicans and investigate fake nooses in race car garages.


Chris Wray along with fired Director Jim Comey have turned the FBI into an assault arm of the DNC.

It comes as no surprise that Biden’s puppeteers would want to keep it that way.
The FBI is a disgrace.



Let’s hope Trump fires Wray.

 

[Dozdoats]

Joe Biden has pledged to appoint "a fully empowered supply commander in charge of filling in the gaps" in the production and supply of "essential" items needed to fight the virus.

But you can bet those vaccine trains will run on time!

 

[Dozdoats]

90 Miles From Tyranny : Biden Advisers And CNN Anchors Attended A Major Chinese Communist Conference With Xi Jinping (ninetymilesfromtyranny.blogspot.com)

Biden Advisers And CNN Anchors Attended A Major Chinese Communist Conference With Xi Jinping



CNN Host Fareed Zakaria and an adviser to Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign attended the recent Understanding China Conference, which counted Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping and high-level apparatchiks in attendance.

The conference, themed “Huge Shake-up, Big Test, Great Cooperation: China’s New Journey toward Modernization and Building a Community with a Shared Future for Mankind,” argued for increased cooperation between the Chinese Communist Party and the broader world.

Featuring nearly 20 Chinese speakers – all boasting high-level involvement with the Chinese Communist Party – the conference depends on Western figures to grant legitimacy to the event.

Zakaria, who hosts CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS and writes for The Washington Post, along with Lawrence Summers were keen on assisting the Chinese Communist Party in their quest.

Summers, a former Obama-era National Economic Council Director, has also been identified as “advising Joe Biden’s...



Read More HERE

Posted by Mike Miles at Thursday, December 03, 2020

 

[packyderms_wife]

View attachment 236312

And they want us imprisoned or dead.

 

[marsh]

Biden Camp Refuses To Rebuke China For US Intel Report Revealing ‘Influence Campaign’ Targeting Transition » The National Pulse+

The Biden campaign refused to condemn the Chinese Communist Party for targeting members of and “people close” to its transition team. While speaking at the Aspen Institute, William Evanina, chief of the counterintelligence branch for the Director of National Intelligence, detailed China’s...

thenationalpulse.com

Biden Camp Refuses To Rebuke China For US Intel Report Revealing ‘Influence Campaign’ Targeting Transition

• DECEMBER 3, 2020
• NATALIE WINTERS

BEIJING, CHINA – DECEMBER 04: CHINESE VICE PRESIDENT LI YUANCHAO (R) INVITES U.S VICE PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN (L) TO VIEW AN HONOUR GUARD DURING A WELCOMING CEREMONY INSIDE THE GREAT HALL OF THE PEOPLE ON DECEMBER 4, 2013 IN BEIJING, CHINA. U.S VICE PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN WILL PAY AN OFFICIAL VISIT TO CHINA FROM DECEMBER 4 TO 5. (PHOTO BY LINTAO ZHANG/POOL/GETTY IMAGES)

The Biden campaign refused to condemn the Chinese Communist Party for targeting members of and “people close” to its transition team.

While speaking at the Aspen Institute, William Evanina, chief of the counterintelligence branch for the Director of National Intelligence, detailed China’s influence missions targeting the former Vice President and his inner circle.

He noted:

“We’ve also seen an uptick, which was planned and we predicted, that China would now re-vector their influence campaigns to the new [Biden] administration.”

Evanina continued, describing the “malign foreign influence” as being “on steroids”:

“And when I say that, that malign foreign influence, that diplomatic influence plus, or on steroids, we’re starting to see that play across the country to not only the folks starting in the new administration, but those who are around those folks in the new administration.”

In its reporting of the story, establishment outlet Reuters noted that when they reached out for comment, “Biden’s transition team declined to comment.”

Many have feared that Biden’s son’s business deals with Chinese Communist Party-owned and linked entities would compromise his alleged administration’s ability to get tough on the foreign government. And refusing to condemn the U.S. intelligence community’s findings on the Chinese Communist Party’s attempt to corrupt a potential Biden administration appears to confirm these fears.

 

[Bps1691]

I'm still sticking with this timeline as most probable IF the demon-crats steal the two seante seats:

 

[marsh]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/12/03/coronavirus-covid-live-updates-us/

Biden asks Fauci to serve as chief medical adviser, will urge Americans to wear masks during first 100 days

Anthony S. Fauci, the country’s top infectious-disease expert, said Thursday that he plans to stay on in his role as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases after the Biden administration takes office.

In an interview with CBS News’s Major Garrett, Fauci said that he has spoken several times with Ronald A. Klain, Biden’s incoming chief of staff, and that he would meet by teleconference later Thursday with the entire Biden “landing team,” a group that facilitates the presidential transition.

“Today will be the first day where there will be substantive discussions about the . . . transition, between me and the Biden team,” Fauci said during a podcast interview with Garrett.

Before Trump gave the go-ahead to the General Services Administration to allow the transition to proceed, Biden had warned that the delay meant that his team would potentially be weeks or months behind in planning its response to the coronavirus pandemic, which has claimed the lives of more than 273,000 people in the United States.

Fauci said in the CBS interview that he wished the transition had been allowed to begin earlier. He noted that having been through five presidential transitions over the course of his career, “I know that transitions are really important if you want to get a smooth handing-over of the responsibility.”

“I would have liked to have seen us getting involved with the team as early as we possibly can, because we want the smooth transition to occur,” he added.

“Everyone believes that a smooth transition is certainly better than no transition.”
Later Thursday, in an interview with CNN, Biden said he has asked Fauci to serve as a chief medical adviser and as part of his pandemic response team.

“I asked him to stay on the exact same role he’s had for the past several presidents, and I asked him to be a chief medical adviser for me as well, and be part of the covid team,” Biden told CNN’s Jake Tapper.

Biden added that he plans to ask Americans to commit to wearing masks during the first 100 days of his presidency to slow the spread of the virus.

“Just 100 days to mask, not forever. One hundred days. And I think we’ll see a significant reduction,” he said.

 

[Dozdoats]

Fauci - revolting.

 

[rob0126]

If biden becomes the 'legal' president, there won't be a 2024 presidential race because there wont be an america.

So the hope is that trump uses the military to take care of the treasonous traitors, and restore america somewhat.

 

[marsh]

Biden: I'll Mandate Masks in Interstate Transportation, Federal Buildings, Ask People to Mask for 100 Days

During a portion of an interview with CNN released on Thursday, Joe Biden said that he will order that people wear masks in federal buildings and | Clips

www.breitbart.com

Biden: I’ll Mandate Masks in Interstate Transportation, Federal Buildings, Ask People to Mask for 100 Days

IAN HANCHETT3 Dec 20202,263

During a portion of an interview with CNN released on Thursday, Joe Biden said that he will order that people wear masks in federal buildings and interstate transportation, and that he will ask the public to wear masks for the first 100 days he is in office.

Biden said, “[W]here the federal government has authority, I’m going to issue a standing order that in federal buildings, you have to be masked. In transportation — interstate transportation, you must be masked, in airplanes and buses, etc. And so, it’s a matter of — and I think my inclination, Jake, is in the first day I’m inaugurated to say I’m going to ask the public, for 100 days, to mask, just 100 days, to mask. Not forever. 100 days. And I think we’ll see a significant reduction if we occur that — if that occurs with vaccinations and masking, to drive down the numbers considerably.”

 

[marsh]

Report: Biden’s DHS Pick Alejandro Mayorkas Ignored Asylum Fraud

CIS produced a scathing report on Joe Biden’s pick to head DHS, claiming Alejandro Mayorkas ignored asylum fraud serving under Barack Obama.

www.breitbart.com

Report: Joe Biden’s DHS Pick Alejandro Mayorkas Ignored Asylum Fraud at Previous Post

12

AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster
PENNY STARR3 Dec 202015

The Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) produced a scathing report on former Vice President Joe Biden’s pick to head the Department of Homeland Security if he is inaugurated as president, including reports that Alejandro Mayorkas ignored asylum fraud while serving as director of the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services under Barack Obama.

“A damning December 2015 GAO report found that FDNS asylum fraud prosecutions rarely, if ever, occurred during the Mayorkas years,” the CIS analysis said. “It found that half of the eight USCIS field divisions had referred either one fraud case to U.S. attorney’s offices from 2010 to 2014 or none at all.”

“One office reported that not a single referral had been accepted in the prior two years,” CIS reported. “Another reported that its U.S. attorney had accepted no asylum fraud referrals since 2010.”

If Biden is sworn in, Mayorkas’ nomination will be reviewed by the Senate’s homeland defense committee, likely chaired by Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH).

Portman is up for reelection in 2022, and voted against Mayorkas in 2013. The other GOP members include Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), James Lankford (R-OK), Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT), Sen Mike Enzi, R-WY), Rick Scott (R-FL), and Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO).

The CIS report provided more details about Mayorkas’ record on asylum enforcement:

In October 2010, about a year after Mayorkas’s appointment to head USCIS, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) penned a complaint to then-DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano. Its contents, though a decade old now, raise questions about Mayorkas’s fealty to immigration and asylum law enforcement.

The Grassley letter, citing anonymous employee allegations, accused the top USCIS official of laying heavy-handed pressure on career employees to squeeze out higher volumes of immigration application approvals for the agency’s “customers”, while undermining fraud and ineligibility detection efforts.

After receiving an “inadequate response” from Mayorkas, Grassley’s office interviewed seven employees, examined hundreds of pages of supporting documents, and presented the results in the letter to Secretary Napolitano.

“Unfortunately, the evidence suggests that Director Mayorkas is fostering an environment that pressures employees to approve as many applications as possible and condones retaliation against those who dissent,” Grassley wrote.

Among the inquiry’s chief findings:

• Mayorkas had become “visibly agitated” during a visit to USCIS’s California offices when told employees there wanted to root out fraud. “Why would you be focusing on that instead of approvals?” he reputedly demanded. A witness said “his message was offensive to a lot of officers who are trained to detect fraud.”
• At a management conference, Mayorkas directed top officials to find ways always to “get to yes” regarding “customer” immigrants who filed visa applications. He told his subordinates to “look at petitions from the perspective of the customer” and that the goal was “zero complaints”, implying that approvals were the means to that end.
• At a conference in Landsdowne, Va., Mayorkas said there were some “managers with black spots on their hearts” who can’t see their way to grant benefits and that he was “dealing” with them and also subordinates “too close” to them, with immediate involuntary re-assignments.
• The California USCIS office was told to abandon an important anti-fraud measure that checked for high-risk applicants on a government database, and fraud specialists had to stop investigating such applications.

 

[marsh]

Vatican Hopes Biden Presidency Will Inject New Life in Paris Climate Deal

The Vatican suggested Thursday that a Biden presidency might inject new life into the stagnant Paris Climate Accord.

www.breitbart.com

ROME — The Vatican suggested Thursday a Biden presidency might inject new life into the stagnant Paris Climate Accord after President Trump pulled the U.S. out of the deal in 2017.

The Vatican COVID-19 Commission announced Thursday that it is organizing a webinar next week in preparation for a December 12 global climate summit to be co-hosted by the United Nations and the UK to mark the fifth anniversary of the Paris Agreement.

In its preparatory document, the Vatican team lamented the lack of initiative and commitment around the Paris climate goals, something it said needs to gain renewed momentum ahead of the U.N. Climate Change Conference (COP 26) to be held in Glasgow in November 2021.

“More than 195 Paris Agreement signatories have promised to update their 2015 commitments before the end of 2020, but no major emitting countries have formally submitted new commitments to the UNFCCC,” the text states. “The result of US elections can play a key role in the next weeks’ developments.”



When President Trump withdrew the U.S. from the 2015 Paris accord, he said he did so to fulfil his “solemn duty to protect America and its citizens.”

“The Paris Climate Accord is simply the latest example of Washington entering into an agreement that disadvantages the United States to the exclusive benefit of other countries,” Mr. Trump declared, “leaving American workers — who I love — and taxpayers to absorb the cost in terms of lost jobs, lower wages, shuttered factories, and vastly diminished economic production.”

“As someone who cares deeply about the environment,” Trump said, “I cannot in good conscience support a deal that punishes the United States… while imposing no meaningful obligations on the world’s leading polluters.”

“This agreement is less about the climate and more about other countries gaining a financial advantage over the United States,” he said, noting that large polluters like China and India are not subject to the same requirements imposed on the United States.

In Thursday’s text, the Vatican states that governments “need an immediate response to shifting the global economy from fossil fuels” in order to avoid “catastrophic effects, including destabilizing heat waves, severe floods, and a sharp rise in sea level.”


“Particularly, industrialized countries must act quickly to meet their net-zero targets before 2050 to achieve the Paris targets,” the document declares. “Adequate and consistent financial support must be delivered to vulnerable countries to adapt to the climate-related devastation that they are already experiencing.”

At the upcoming climate summit, “national governments will be requested to present more ambitious, high-quality climate plans involving government leaders, the private sector, and civil society,” the Vatican text states. “More than ever, the ethical imperative of climate inaction will be accentuated. This summit should remind us of the urgent need to take concrete action to recognize our reliance on a healthy planet and to work together for transformative change.”

 

[marsh]

John Ratcliffe: 'If' Biden becomes president, he needs to rise to the China challenge

Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe isn't ready to concede Joe Biden will take office in January. But "if" he does, President Trump's spy chief says, the Democrat needs to heed the "clear" intelligence showing that China is the "greatest national security threat" facing the United…

www.washingtonexaminer.com

John Ratcliffe: 'If' Biden becomes president, he needs to rise to the China challenge

by Jerry Dunleavy, Justice Department Reporter |
| December 03, 2020 04:51 PM
| Updated Dec 03, 2020, 05:14 PM

Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe isn't ready to concede Joe Biden will take office in January. But "if" he does, President Trump's spy chief says, the Democrat needs to heed the "clear" intelligence showing that China is the "greatest national security threat" facing the United States.

Ratcliffe, a former Texas Republican congressman who has served as the director of national intelligence overseeing the nation’s 17 spy agencies since May, told the Washington Examiner on Thursday that he is speaking publicly now, less than two months before Inauguration Day, so that people will be more fully informed about the geopolitical challenge no matter who is in the White House.

“One country and one country alone, China, aspires to be the world’s superpower and has the resources to do it. So what this administration has done for four years is to try and level the playing field economically with sanctions and through tariffs and identify where they’re stealing intellectual property and through prosecutions and calling out China for who they are on the world stage through Huawei,” Ratcliffe said. “That needs to continue, and I’m hoping that, if the Biden administration takes office, that political arguments and politicizing intelligence can stop, and when the intelligence is so clear that China is increasingly the threat to American supremacy, that we rise to meet the challenge and they continue on the path that this administration has started.”

Last month, the Washington Examiner learned about the Trump administration’s intentions to ramp up pressure on China over the next weeks. Trump refuses to concede to President-elect Biden, but part of the goal of the Trump administration's China moves is to make it untenable for the next president to backpedal on the China crackdown.

Ratcliffe repeatedly stressed that Russia and terrorism also pose threats but argued the challenge from China is greater.

“I want to make it real clear in what is a hyperpolitical environment where people are promoting narratives for political reasons and politicizing intelligence and saying things like, ‘Oh, well, actually, Russia is actually a greater national security threat’ or ‘the DNI is falsely equating Russia to China’ — those are arguments that are being made by people who don’t have access to the intelligence that I do, and they’re spinning a false narrative or a political narrative that has not been helpful,” Ratcliffe said. “But now that election is over and I can’t be accused of being political and being pointed with the intelligence, I’ve got it down to where I can classify it and talk about as much of it as I can, and again, the point that I make is that China intends to dominate — economically, militarily, and technologically, they want to replace us as the world’s superpower.”

The spy chief noted he manages an $85 billion budget and said he has shifted those resources to focusing more on China.

“But you have analysts that have been here from the Cold War era and are used to it being Russia, or in the last 20 years, it has been about counterterrorism — and again, I’m not minimizing those — but the greatest threat that we face and a greater amount of our focus needs to be on China,” Ratcliffe said, adding of Russia, "they’re a dangerous adversary, they have a Soviet-era stockpile of nuclear weapons, they’re always going to be a threat. But the people that make the false equations about Russia — the top 10 economies in the world, the United States is No. 1, China is No. 2, and Russia isn’t on the list.”

Multiple members of the Chinese military were charged by the Justice Department this summer for concealing their ties to China's military and allegedly committing visa fraud while acting as researchers at U.S. universities.

The State Department also forced the closure of the Chinese Consulate in Houston over claims of espionage. A top Justice Department official said on Wednesday that more than 1,000 foreign researchers affiliated with the Chinese military left the U.S. this year amid the crackdown.

“Those numbers are out there publicly, and I’ve seen that, again, people who don’t have access to intelligence sort of disputing that,” Ratcliffe said when asked about the 1,000 figure. “A lot of the things relate to that do remain classified, but without getting into the specific numbers, on all fronts, it is consistent with what we’ve seen in China’s quest to replace us.”

Numerous researchers have been arrested for concealing their ties to China’s Thousand Talents program, and the U.S. has arrested scientists, including Harvard’s chemistry department chairman, Charles Lieber, and has publicly charged numerous Chinese hackers while calling attention to China’s efforts to blackmail Chinese Americans. FBI Director Christopher Wray said in July that the FBI has more than 2,000 active investigations traced back to the Chinese government.

The Washington Examiner also learned that Ratcliffe raised concerns about China's influence over digital currencies with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Ratcliffe further detailed his China warnings in an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal on Thursday in which he revealed China targets members of Congress in influence operations with 6 times the frequency of the Russians and 12 times that of Iran.

“It is driven by their belief that they need to be globally dominant with regard to information, and so, they’re stealing information through 5G, through Huawei networks, they’re stealing through cyberwarfare, through hackers, through software and cloud service providers, they’re stealing through universities and research institutions, they’re stealing health information — they have … influence on members of Congress,” Ratcliffe told the Washington Examiner. “All of those things again underscore the point I am making about why China is the only country that through all of those threat streams … China is at the top or near the top with regard to all of that.”

 

[marsh]

'They hate him': Tucker Carlson plays montage of Biden picks criticizing and mocking him

Several of President-elect Joe Biden's picks for administration roles have a history of criticizing their new boss.

www.washingtonexaminer.com

'They hate him': Tucker Carlson plays montage of Biden picks criticizing and mocking him
by Spencer Neale, Breaking News Reporter |
| December 03, 2020 11:11 PM

Several of President-elect Joe Biden's picks for administration roles have a history of criticizing their new boss.

Fox News host Tucker Carlson aired a montage of clips featuring top hires in the Biden-Harris White House, beginning with a 2019 video clip of incoming White House press secretary Jen Psaki, who appeared to mock Biden's gaffes openly.

"Last year, interestingly, Jen Psaki wasn't on Team Biden at all," Carlson said before playing a clip of Biden answering a question about HIV rates among black Americans during a presidential town hall in October 2019. In the clip, Biden said, "Back 15 to 20 years, we talked about this, and San Francisco was all about gay bathhouses. It's all about round-the-clock sex. Come on, man!"

Carlson then played a clip of Psaki poking fun at Biden, who she said was appealing because "he says things your uncle says" while a female colleague hung her head to hide laughter.

"There have been a number of moments where even those of us who have affection for Vice President Biden think, 'What on the Earth is happening now?'" Psaki said.

Video on website 5:12 min

Carlson recounted how Biden's alleged allies, including Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, threw Biden under the bus repeatedly while campaigning against him. Carlson played a clip of Harris saying she believed some women who alleged Biden assaulted them.

"I believe them, and I respect them being able to tell their story, and I encourage them to do it," Harris said at the time.

Finally, Carlson played a video of Harris's chief spokeswoman Symone Sanders, who in 2016 suggested that Democrats don't need "white people leading" the party.

"Joe Biden isn't just assembling a team of rivals, he's assembling a team of people who will refuse to take the same elevator with him, so how is this going to work out exactly?" Carlson asked. "They hate him, but they're working for him?"

 

[marsh]

Joe Biden Seeks to Tie Climate Change Reforms to Coronavirus Relief

Facing the prospect of a GOP Senate, Joe Biden's team is exploring ways of tying climate change legislation to coronavirus relief efforts.

www.breitbart.com

Report: Joe Biden Exploring Ways to Tie Climate Change Legislation to Coronavirus Relief

2

Mark Makela/Getty Images
HARIS ALIC4 Dec 202060

Facing the prospect of a Republican-controlled Senate, former Vice President Joe Biden’s team is exploring the possibility of tying climate change legislation to economic relief efforts related to the novel coronavirus, according to a report.

Biden, who campaigned for the White House promising to be the most progressive president since FDR, is now facing the reality that at least the first two years of his term may be under a divided government. As such, Biden’s transition team is planning ways in which they can both work with Republicans and circumvent them if necessary.

One of the areas that Biden is eyeing is legislation to address both the economic and public health aspects of the novel coronavirus pandemic. According to the Associated Press, the former vice president’s team is hoping to use coronavirus stimulus talks as leverage to secure passage of climate change proposals that would otherwise be anathema to Republicans.

“People close to Biden’s transition team say they’re looking at that stimulus as a potential avenue for enacting some climate reforms — like aid for green jobs or moving the nation toward a carbon-free energy system — that might be tougher to get on their own,” the outlet noted Friday.

The Biden team’s planning comes as control of the United States Senate is set to be determined by two runoff elections in Georgia in early January. Republicans, who have held the Senate in 2015, need only to win one of the contests to maintain control of the chamber.

If the GOP were to retain control, many believe that some of Biden’s biggest campaign promises would be unlikely to receive congressional approval, especially on issues relating to climate change.

Biden, whose environmental agenda is heavily influenced by the recommendations of a unity task force set up with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) after the Democrat primaries, has proposed spending $2 trillion over four years to combat climate change.

A major portion of the money will be used to create one million new jobs in the auto industry by boosting the production of energy-efficient vehicles. In order to achieve the goal, Biden is backing legislation, introduced by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), to incentivize individuals to trade in their gas-powered vehicles for ones running on either electricity or hydrogen.

The former vice president has also proposed to adopt a 100 percent clean-electricity standard by 2035. A similar idea was initially raised by Gov. Jay Inslee (D-WA) during his own ill-fated run for the Democrat nomination in 2019. If implemented, it would ensure that all electricity produced in the United States would be “carbon-free.”

Such an ambitious agenda would likely be viewed negatively by Republicans, many of whom have expressed a desire to rein in federal spending.

Although GOP control of the Senate is by no means certain, as polling shows Democrats running close in both Georgia contests, Biden appears to be planning for it either way. For instance, the Washington Post reported last month that the former vice president’s team is readying a bevy of executive orders to issue on his first day in office.

Most of the orders deal with hot button topics, such as immigration and national security, where there is likely to be little bipartisan consensus, even if Republicans do not maintain control of the Senate.

Biden, in particular, plans to reverse some of the Trump administration’s key actions, including revoking protections for illegal immigrants through the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program and leaving the Paris Climate Accord.

 

[marsh]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/pentagon-blocks-biden-transition-team/2020/12/04/2e7042fa-3656-11eb-a997-1f4c53d2a747_story.html

Pentagon blocks visits to military spy agencies by Biden transition team

The Pentagon is pictured on Oct. 9, 2020. It lies in Arlington, Va., across the Potomac River from Washington. (Carlos Barria/Reuters)
By
Greg Miller and
Missy Ryan

Dec. 4, 2020 at 5:52 p.m. EST

The Trump administration has refused to allow members of President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team to meet with officials at U.S. intelligence agencies that are controlled by the Pentagon, undermining prospects for a smooth transfer of power, current and former U.S. officials said.

The officials said the Biden team has not been able to engage with leaders at the National Security Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency and other military-run spy services with classified budgets and global espionage platforms.

The Defense Department rejected or did not approve requests from the Biden team this week, the officials said, despite a General Services Administration decision Nov. 23 clearing the way for federal agencies to meet with representatives of the incoming administration.

The delays came even as Biden advisers spent much of this week meeting with officials at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the CIA, intelligence agencies that are independent of the Defense Department.

This video is currently not available

But Pentagon officials said their agency was taking steps required to provide outside officials access.

Sue Gough, a Defense Department spokeswoman, said Friday that the Biden team “has not been denied any access.” After being asked by The Washington Post about the apparent standoff, Gough said the requested meetings could take place as early as next week.

By then, Biden advisers will have waited more than a month since the election to have meaningful contact with intelligence agencies that have multibillion-dollar budgets, satellite networks that ring the planet and vast surveillance authorities.


The delays have added to the unprecedented tensions surrounding the transition, fueled by a president who refuses to concede that he lost the election and spent much of his tenure accusing the nation’s spy agencies of disloyalty to him.

A Biden transition team spokesman declined to comment, as did NSA and DIA officials.

Current and former officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter, said the delays have impaired the Biden team’s ability to get up to speed on espionage operations against Russia, China, Iran and other U.S. adversaries.

The inability to meet with the NSA was described as particularly worrisome. The agency is the largest U.S. intelligence service, and its eavesdropping capabilities have been a critical source of intelligence on threats as varied as weapons proliferation and foreign interference in U.S. elections.

Officials said that rejections relayed this week to the Biden team cited seemingly petty procedural barriers.

One person said the Pentagon had asked repeatedly for rosters of those who would take part in a visit, lists of topics and estimates of time to be allotted — information that in some cases had been provided at the outset.

“If they were in a cooperative mood, none of this would be happening,” said another person with knowledge of the interactions.

The Pentagon has been in significant turmoil since the election. Acting secretary of defense Christopher C. Miller was installed last month after Trump fired Mark T. Esper, his Pentagon chief.

Miller has presided over the removal of senior Pentagon officials, replacing them with perceived Trump loyalists including chief of staff Kash Patel and Ezra Cohen-Watnick, who is serving as interim undersecretary of defense for intelligence. In her statement to The Post, Gough indicated that Cohen-Watnick’s office has played a central role in matters related to the transition.

Pentagon officials in turn blamed Biden advisers. One defense official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, citing the sensitivity of the subject, said that Biden transition officials had improperly contacted agencies directly to arrange visits and briefings, and were told that they instead needed to submit requests to the Pentagon.

The result has been an awkward standoff in which former officials were spurned by agencies they formerly helped run. Among those ex-officials is Vincent Stewart, a retired three-star U.S. Marine Corps general who previously served as DIA director and is a leading member of the Biden intelligence transition team.
Other spy agencies have been far more receptive. At the CIA, for example, the Biden transition team has had extensive access to senior officials, computer equipment connected to the agency’s classified systems, and office space at “Scattergood,” a historic homestead on the CIA compound often used for hosting VIPs.

Biden recently named Avril D. Haines, a former top White House official and deputy director of the CIA, as his nominee to be director of national intelligence. Biden has made no other announcements about his intelligence team, but former deputy CIA director David S. Cohen is seen as a top candidate to be the director of that agency.

While scrutiny intensifies of the transition at Defense Department intelligence agencies, officials have taken steps to advance that effort at the Pentagon itself. The first virtual meeting between the Pentagon's internal transition task force and the Biden team occurred Nov. 25. Since then, officials have taken administrative actions including granting access badges for the Biden team and completing non-disclosure agreements, Pentagon officials said.

Ellen Nakashima, Shane Harris and Greg Jaffe contributed to this report.

 

[rob0126]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/pentagon-blocks-biden-transition-team/2020/12/04/2e7042fa-3656-11eb-a997-1f4c53d2a747_story.html

Pentagon blocks visits to military spy agencies by Biden transition team

The Pentagon is pictured on Oct. 9, 2020. It lies in Arlington, Va., across the Potomac River from Washington. (Carlos Barria/Reuters)
By
Greg Miller and
Missy Ryan

Dec. 4, 2020 at 5:52 p.m. EST

The Trump administration has refused to allow members of President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team to meet with officials at U.S. intelligence agencies that are controlled by the Pentagon, undermining prospects for a smooth transfer of power, current and former U.S. officials said.

The officials said the Biden team has not been able to engage with leaders at the National Security Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency and other military-run spy services with classified budgets and global espionage platforms.

The Defense Department rejected or did not approve requests from the Biden team this week, the officials said, despite a General Services Administration decision Nov. 23 clearing the way for federal agencies to meet with representatives of the incoming administration.

The delays came even as Biden advisers spent much of this week meeting with officials at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the CIA, intelligence agencies that are independent of the Defense Department.

This video is currently not available

But Pentagon officials said their agency was taking steps required to provide outside officials access.

Sue Gough, a Defense Department spokeswoman, said Friday that the Biden team “has not been denied any access.” After being asked by The Washington Post about the apparent standoff, Gough said the requested meetings could take place as early as next week.

By then, Biden advisers will have waited more than a month since the election to have meaningful contact with intelligence agencies that have multibillion-dollar budgets, satellite networks that ring the planet and vast surveillance authorities.


The delays have added to the unprecedented tensions surrounding the transition, fueled by a president who refuses to concede that he lost the election and spent much of his tenure accusing the nation’s spy agencies of disloyalty to him.

A Biden transition team spokesman declined to comment, as did NSA and DIA officials.

Current and former officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter, said the delays have impaired the Biden team’s ability to get up to speed on espionage operations against Russia, China, Iran and other U.S. adversaries.

The inability to meet with the NSA was described as particularly worrisome. The agency is the largest U.S. intelligence service, and its eavesdropping capabilities have been a critical source of intelligence on threats as varied as weapons proliferation and foreign interference in U.S. elections.

Officials said that rejections relayed this week to the Biden team cited seemingly petty procedural barriers.

One person said the Pentagon had asked repeatedly for rosters of those who would take part in a visit, lists of topics and estimates of time to be allotted — information that in some cases had been provided at the outset.

“If they were in a cooperative mood, none of this would be happening,” said another person with knowledge of the interactions.

The Pentagon has been in significant turmoil since the election. Acting secretary of defense Christopher C. Miller was installed last month after Trump fired Mark T. Esper, his Pentagon chief.

Miller has presided over the removal of senior Pentagon officials, replacing them with perceived Trump loyalists including chief of staff Kash Patel and Ezra Cohen-Watnick, who is serving as interim undersecretary of defense for intelligence. In her statement to The Post, Gough indicated that Cohen-Watnick’s office has played a central role in matters related to the transition.

Pentagon officials in turn blamed Biden advisers. One defense official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, citing the sensitivity of the subject, said that Biden transition officials had improperly contacted agencies directly to arrange visits and briefings, and were told that they instead needed to submit requests to the Pentagon.

The result has been an awkward standoff in which former officials were spurned by agencies they formerly helped run. Among those ex-officials is Vincent Stewart, a retired three-star U.S. Marine Corps general who previously served as DIA director and is a leading member of the Biden intelligence transition team.
Other spy agencies have been far more receptive. At the CIA, for example, the Biden transition team has had extensive access to senior officials, computer equipment connected to the agency’s classified systems, and office space at “Scattergood,” a historic homestead on the CIA compound often used for hosting VIPs.

Biden recently named Avril D. Haines, a former top White House official and deputy director of the CIA, as his nominee to be director of national intelligence. Biden has made no other announcements about his intelligence team, but former deputy CIA director David S. Cohen is seen as a top candidate to be the director of that agency.

While scrutiny intensifies of the transition at Defense Department intelligence agencies, officials have taken steps to advance that effort at the Pentagon itself. The first virtual meeting between the Pentagon's internal transition task force and the Biden team occurred Nov. 25. Since then, officials have taken administrative actions including granting access badges for the Biden team and completing non-disclosure agreements, Pentagon officials said.

Ellen Nakashima, Shane Harris and Greg Jaffe contributed to this report.

The takeway from the article is that trump is hindering a legit transition (but it is not).

There was nothing about an ongoing investigation into voter fraud, perpetrated by the biden clan, which dictates that he get no clearances.

Will anyone report the truth?

 

[FREEBIRD]

I refuse to use the words "democracy" or "democrat" for the leftists. "Dictatorship" and "dictator" are adequate to the task.

 

[marsh]

Chuck Schumer: Biden's DHS Chief Will Help Pass Amnesty for Illegals

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) says Joe Biden's pick to lead DHS will help Senate Democrats pass an amnesty.

www.breitbart.com

Chuck Schumer: Biden’s DHS Chief Will Help Pass Amnesty for Illegal Aliens

6

AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana
JOHN BINDER5 Dec 202013

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) says Democrat Joe Biden’s pick to lead the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will help Senate Democrats pass an amnesty for the majority of the illegal alien population living in the United States.

During an online summit with the American Business Immigration Coalition, a pro-mass immigration group of corporate interests and donors, Schumer suggested he had spoken to Biden’s DHS Secretary nominee, Alejandro Mayorka, and that the two had agreed to help pass an amnesty for the roughly 11 to 22 million illegal aliens in the U.S.

“The big picture is this: We need to pass comprehensive immigration reform, once and for all,” Schumer said. “It is one of my top goals, it is one of my dreams. I’ve always believed that immigration is an area where the Senate can find bipartisan ground … we have broad-based support.”

“[Mayorkas] said, ‘We’re going to do it together,'” Schumer said of his conversation with Mayorkas.

House Democrats are currently drafting an amnesty plan that is expected to allow the majority of illegal aliens to eventually apply for American citizenship. Senate Republicans such as John Cornyn (R-TX) and Susan Collins (R-ME) have said they are planning to support an amnesty for illegal aliens enrolled and eligible in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA).

An amnesty would come as about 24.5 million Americans are either jobless or underemployed. An amnesty would immediately flood the U.S. labor market with a newly legalized population of millions who would begin competing for work against America’s working and middle class.

Every year, already, about 1.2 million legal immigrants are rewarded green cards and another 1.4 million foreign nationals are given visas to arrive in the U.S. These legal immigration admissions are in addition to the hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens who annually cross U.S. borders and overstay their visas.

Exit polling after the election reveals that voters across party and racial lines overwhelmingly want less overall immigration to the U.S. More than 3-in-4 voters, for instance, said it is important to reduce immigration with continued high unemployment, and more than 62 percent said, even after unemployment has leveled off, immigration should remain lower than its current levels.

 

[marsh]

Jackson: 'Something is Going on with Joe Biden's Health'

Dr. Ronny Jackson (R-TX) joined SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Saturday and discussed the health saga surrounding Joe Biden.

www.breitbart.com

Dr. Ronny Jackson: ‘Something Is Going On with Joe Biden’s Health’

7

Spencer Platt/Getty Images
KYLE MORRIS5 Dec 202023

Congressman-elect and former White House physician Dr. Ronny Jackson (R-TX) joined SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Saturday and discussed the questionable health saga surrounding former Vice President Joe Biden.

Last week, it was reported that Biden had fractured his right foot while playing with his dog. Consequently, Biden was seen in public this week wearing a walking boot.

“Anybody can slip and fall, obviously. I actually broke my ankle during the campaign … but here’s the issue: I still maintain that something is going on with Joe Biden’s health. You can look back at what he previously looked like early on in the campaign,” Jackson said, questioning if the 78-year-old is being “medicated at this point.”

“He’s got good days. He’s got bad days,” Jackson continued. “I think he’s in a transition period right now where he’s developing some early cognitive issues that are just age-related, and I don’t think it’s gonna be good to be commander in chief in that situation.”

“God forbid he becomes our president,” Jackson said. “I’m a firm believer that if he gets in, he won’t be there for more than a year before something comes up and they have to remove him from office, and Kamala Harris is our president.”

Jackson said he also believes Biden’s stepping down once he assumes office and handing the reins to Harris has been a part of the “grand plan from the beginning,” as “soon as they realized they were stuck with him as their candidate.”

“I have no confidence in his cognitive or physical ability to serve as our commander in chief and our head of state,” Jackson added. “He doesn’t have the cognitive resources or the physical stamina, in my mind, to do this job.”

To listen to Jackson’s full interview with Breitbart News, which includes remarks about the Georgia Senate runoff elections, click here. Audio interview 12:30 min

 

[marsh]

Ron Klain, Biden chief of staff, called ‘park ranger’ for swamp

Few people in Joseph R. Biden’s inner circle have thrived in the swamp of Washington more swimmingly than Ron Klain.

www.washingtontimes.com

Biden's chief of staff pick called 'park ranger' for swamp
Ron Klain equipped for 'herculean' task ahead

FILE- In this Oct. 22, 2014, file photo, reporters take notes as Ebola coordinator Ron Klain listens to President Barack Obama speak to the media about the government’s Ebola response in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington.

By Dave Boyer - The Washington Times - Sunday, November 29, 2020

Few people in Joseph R. Biden’s inner circle have thrived in the swamp of Washington more swimmingly than Ron Klain.

Mr. Klain, tapped by the presumed president-elect to become White House chief of staff, also served as Mr. Biden’s chief of staff during his tenure as vice president. The Harvard Law School graduate has worked three stints in the Clinton and Obama administrations, along with top jobs as a Democratic Senate aide.

The Indiana native has mingled his government service with lucrative revolving-door detours into the private sector as a K Street lobbyist and lawyer. He has worked for special interests including Big Tech, Fannie Mae, a pharmaceutical firm and a company that has been called a front for the asbestos industry.

“If you’re thinking of a swamp having park rangers, then Ron Klain is a park ranger,” said Tom Fitton, president of the conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch. “He’s someone whose job is to protect it.”

Mr. Klain, 59, also worked as general counsel for a venture capital firm created by AOL founder Steve Case. Mr. Case has called him “a talented manager and a wise counselor who understands government, business and the nonprofit sectors.”

As the postelection point man for Mr. Biden, Mr. Klain has been prominent in publicly pressuring President Trump to allow his administration to cooperate on the transition with the Biden team.

“Donald Trump doesn’t get to decide if Joe Biden is president or not. The American people decided,” Mr. Klain said.

Mr. Trump relented last week, although he said it wasn’t a sign that he was conceding the election to Mr. Biden.

The “sheer magnitude” of the job facing an incoming White House chief of staff is daunting even in a normal transition, said David Cohen, a political science professor at the University of Akron who has studied the West Wing post.

“Any incoming chief of staff at the beginning of a new administration has to design and stand up a completely new organization, the White House, in just a matter of weeks — 400-plus White House staff positions (not to mention thousands in the executive branch) plus a new organizational chart,” Mr. Cohen said. “And the chief must do this while making the new organization’s staff structure, the decision-making process, and the policy process compatible with the wishes and work style of the president-elect. It’s a herculean task.”

He said Mr. Klain‘s biggest challenge is “helping put together a White House staff and Cabinet that balances the competing interests of the progressive, liberal and centrist wings of the Democratic Party.”

“The coalition that elected Biden is very broad, and each faction will expect representation in the Biden administration and will be keeping score,” he said.
The Biden campaign didn’t respond to requests for comment for this article.

When Mr. Biden announced his choice of Mr. Klain, he said his longtime aide’s “deep, varied experience and capacity to work with people all across the political spectrum is precisely what I need in a White House chief of staff as we confront this moment of crisis and bring our country together again.”

Mr. Klain had a prominent role early in Barack Obama‘s presidency, when Mr. Biden administered the oft-criticized $821 billion economic “stimulus” plan.

Democrats said the measure helped pull the nation out of the Great Recession, although Mr. Obama later acknowledged that many “shovel ready” projects did not pan out.

Ray LaHood, a Republican who served as transportation secretary in the Obama administration, worked closely with Mr. Biden and his team on the recovery plan that delivered $48 billion to Mr. LaHood’s agency. He gave Mr. Klain high marks for his knowledge of how Washington works and his organizational skills.

“Biden and Klain really ran a tight ship,” Mr. LaHood said in an interview. “They wanted to make sure the money was being spent correctly. They wanted to know where it was going, how many people were being employed.”

Still, examples of waste in the stimulus plan are legendary, and Mr. Klain was near the center of one of the most infamous cases.

The solar panel company Solyndra received a $535 million loan guarantee in 2009. The company was backed by the family foundation of George Kaiser, a major Obama fundraiser.

Mr. Biden was eager for the company to receive the money about the same time he was to deliver a major speech on green energy in September 2009. Mr. Biden said the government aid for Solyndra “is exactly what the Recovery Act is all about.”

The next year, with mounting evidence that Solyndra was in dire financial condition, Mr. Obama was preparing to visit the company. Presidential adviser Valerie Jarrett emailed Mr. Klain to express concern that “we clearly need to make sure that they are stable and solid.”

Mr. Klain looked into the matter and wrote back to her, “Sounds like there are some risk factors here — but that’s true of any innovative company that POTUS would visit. It looks OK to me, but if you feel otherwise, let me know.”

He told Ms. Jarrett in another email, “The reality is that if POTUS visited 10 such places over the next 10 months, probably a few would be belly-up by election day 2012 — but that to me is the reality of saying that we want to help promote cutting edge, new economy industries.”

Mr. Obama went ahead with his visit in May 2010 and praised Solyndria as a shining example that was “leading the way toward a brighter and more prosperous future” for the U.S. and the rest of the world.

“You’re demonstrating that the promise of clean energy isn’t just an article of faith — not anymore,” Mr. Obama said. “It’s happening right now. The future is here.”

Five months later, just before the midterm elections, Solyndra announced it was closing its original plant and laying off hundreds of workers. An alarmed White House energy adviser emailed Mr. Klain and others, “No es bueno.”

Solyndra filed for bankruptcy less than one year later.

Mr. LaHood, who also served as chief of staff to Republican House Minority Leader Robert Michel, said Mr. Klain clearly enjoys the trust of Mr. Biden.

“They’re good friends, and the chemistry is certainly there between Ron and President-elect Biden,” he said. “They’ve spent their whole lives working in government, they know how the wheels of government work, they know the people to call. They know the agencies to tap into when they want to solve a problem.”

He said the experience of both men in the Senate will serve Mr. Biden well as the administration pushes a liberal agenda in a closely divided Congress.

“Ron has friends on both sides of the aisle,” Mr. LaHood said. “But more importantly, I think Biden has the cachet to be able to work both sides of the aisle. I’m convinced that President Biden is going to be on the phone with senators. I think his style will be a lot like Lyndon Johnson, in the sense that he can pick up the phone and call just about any senator.”

Mr. Obama chose Mr. Klain in October 2014 as his “Ebola czar,” a post that lasted about five months. Although Mr. Klain had no expertise in public health, his supporters say he handled the role well and that it was good training for the task of handling the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“During the 2014 Ebola outbreak, Ron Klain got it exactly right,” Dr. Tom Frieden, former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said in a post on Twitter. “He got all of government working together in a concerted way and always respected public health and science.”

Long after the 2009 H1N1 swine flu pandemic, Mr. Klain reflected on the Obama administration’s response this way: “We did every possible thing wrong. … It is purely a fortuity that this isn’t one of the great mass casualty events in American history.”

Mr. Klain, like his boss, has criticized Mr. Trump severely for his response to the COVID-19 outbreak.

“If you are not at your job today, it is because Donald Trump did not do his job (to fight #coronavirus) in January and February,” Mr. Klain tweeted in March.

He also was among the Democrats clamoring for Mr. Trump‘s impeachment last winter over his dealings with Ukraine.

“American foreign policy has become a cross between the Three Stooges and the Godfather,” Mr. Klain said on MSNBC last November. “It’s an amazing mix of venal, violent corruption, and complete and utter incompetence. The level of insanity, and craziness and venality is just unmatched.”

Mr. Klain clerked for Supreme Court Justice Byron White in 1987 and 1988. He is married to Monica Medina, an environmental lawyer at the National Geographic Society who led the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in the Obama administration. They have three children.

 

[marsh]

Joe Biden Seeks to Tie Climate Change Reforms to Coronavirus Relief

Facing the prospect of a GOP Senate, Joe Biden's team is exploring ways of tying climate change legislation to coronavirus relief efforts.

www.breitbart.com

Report: Joe Biden Exploring Ways to Tie Climate Change Legislation to Coronavirus Relief

17,877

Mark Makela/Getty Images
HARIS ALIC4 Dec 20207,602

Facing the prospect of a Republican-controlled Senate, former Vice President Joe Biden’s team is exploring the possibility of tying climate change legislation to economic relief efforts related to the novel coronavirus, according to a report.

Biden, who campaigned for the White House promising to be the most progressive president since FDR, is now facing the reality that at least the first two years of his term may be under a divided government. As such, Biden’s transition team is planning ways in which they can both work with Republicans and circumvent them if necessary.

One of the areas that Biden is eyeing is legislation to address both the economic and public health aspects of the novel coronavirus pandemic. According to the Associated Press, the former vice president’s team is hoping to use coronavirus stimulus talks as leverage to secure passage of climate change proposals that would otherwise be anathema to Republicans.

“People close to Biden’s transition team say they’re looking at that stimulus as a potential avenue for enacting some climate reforms — like aid for green jobs or moving the nation toward a carbon-free energy system — that might be tougher to get on their own,” the outlet noted Friday.

The Biden team’s planning comes as control of the United States Senate is set to be determined by two runoff elections in Georgia in early January. Republicans, who have held the Senate in 2015, need only to win one of the contests to maintain control of the chamber.

If the GOP were to retain control, many believe that some of Biden’s biggest campaign promises would be unlikely to receive congressional approval, especially on issues relating to climate change.

Biden, whose environmental agenda is heavily influenced by the recommendations of a unity task force set up with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) after the Democrat primaries, has proposed spending $2 trillion over four years to combat climate change.

A major portion of the money will be used to create one million new jobs in the auto industry by boosting the production of energy-efficient vehicles. In order to achieve the goal, Biden is backing legislation, introduced by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), to incentivize individuals to trade in their gas-powered vehicles for ones running on either electricity or hydrogen.

The former vice president has also proposed to adopt a 100 percent clean-electricity standard by 2035. A similar idea was initially raised by Gov. Jay Inslee (D-WA) during his own ill-fated run for the Democrat nomination in 2019. If implemented, it would ensure that all electricity produced in the United States would be “carbon-free.”

Such an ambitious agenda would likely be viewed negatively by Republicans, many of whom have expressed a desire to rein in federal spending.

Although GOP control of the Senate is by no means certain, as polling shows Democrats running close in both Georgia contests, Biden appears to be planning for it either way. For instance, the Washington Post reported last month that the former vice president’s team is readying a bevy of executive orders to issue on his first day in office.

Most of the orders deal with hot button topics, such as immigration and national security, where there is likely to be little bipartisan consensus, even if Republicans do not maintain control of the Senate.

Biden, in particular, plans to reverse some of the Trump administration’s key actions, including revoking protections for illegal immigrants through the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program and leaving the Paris Climate Accord.

 

[Dozdoats]

Marsh,

Do you feel the need to take a bath after posting some of this horror? I do, just after reading it. YUCK!

 

[marsh]

It is everything I spent a 30 year career fighting all rushing back like a broken sewer main.

 

[marsh]

Pentagon Blocks Team Biden from Meeting with Military Intel Agencies

The Biden transition team is upset because its efforts to meet with military intelligence agencies have not yet taken place.

www.westernjournal.com

Pentagon Blocks Biden from Meeting with Military Intel Agencies

By Jack Davis
Published December 6, 2020 at 12:01pm

The Pentagon has so far blocked meetings between the Biden transition team and officials with the intelligence agencies that are part of the Department of Defense, according to two new reports.

However, defense officials and the Biden team differ on the reason why the meetings have not yet taken place.

Presumptive potential President-elect Joe Biden has formed a transition team that to facilitate a transfer of power. The General Services Administration has been given a green light to assist the transition team and meetings have been taking place with various agencies.

However, Biden’s transition officials have not yet met with representatives of the military intelligence agencies that are part of the Defense Department such the Defense Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency, according to CNN.

In its reporting, CNN framed the delay as the fault of the Trump administration, basing its report on what it terms as “a former senior intelligence official familiar with intelligence transition discussions.”

CNN reported that what it called a “senior defense official” said that the transition team has been briefed on some facets of the Defense Department’s work, but not yet on intelligence.

The Washington Post called the issues that delayed the meeting “seemingly petty procedural barriers” that included information about who would be visiting the Pentagon and what would be discussed.

“If they were in a cooperative mood, none of this would be happening,” the Post wrote, citing what is claimed was a “person with knowledge of the interactions.”

CNN went further, quoting the former intelligence official as saying “That’s a big FU from Defense to the incoming intelligence community transition team.”

But there are two sides to the issue.

What the Post called “one defense official” said Biden’s transition team members did not follow the right chain of protocol in setting up their planned visits.

In CNN’s reporting, the source it said as “a defense official” told the network that Biden’s team “made direct coordination with DOD intelligence agencies for interviews, briefings and site visits,” but “the schedule change/delay happened because the [Biden team] didn’t reach out to DOD before scheduling a meeting with DOD agencies, PER THE GUIDANCE and MOU. They weren’t denied, they just had to follow the proper procedure.”

Sue Gough, a Defense Department spokeswoman, issued a statement pouring cold water on the notion that there was even a problem.

“The DOD Agency Review Team has not been denied any access,” Gough said in a statement. “We continue to work with the DOD ART to schedule all requested interviews, briefings and updates.”

In a statement issued Saturday, acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller said the department was “fully cooperating with the Biden transition team, placing national security and the protection of the American people at the forefront of any and all discussions.”

 

[marsh]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQnpNy_w9Qg
1:49 min
THE JOE BIDEN CHRISTMAS SONG FUNNY CHRISTMAS PARODY SPOOF

•Nov 16, 2020


whatswrongwiddya
JOE BIDEN AND FRIENDS SING AND PERFORM A CHRISTMAS PARODY OF "HERE COMES SANTA CLAUSE" JUST IN TIME FOR CHRISTMAS

 

[marsh]

Biden Nominates California AG Xavier Becerra For Health And Human Services Secretary

President-elect Joe Biden has picked California Attorney General Xavier Becerra to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, The New York Times reported.

dailycaller.com

Biden Nominates California AG Xavier Becerra For Health And Human Services Secretary

JOSH EDELSON/AFP/Getty Images

• ANDREW TRUNSKYELECTIONS REPORTER

December 06, 20206:53 PM ET

President-elect Joe Biden has selected California Attorney General Xavier Becerra to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, The New York Times reported Sunday evening.

Becerra emerged as a surprise frontrunner for the post in the past few days, sources familiar with the Biden transition told the Times. Multiple recent reports had listed New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy as leading contenders, but Grisham reportedly fell out of favor with the transition and Biden’s team announced last week that he would nominate Murthy to return to his old post.

Becerra’s nomination may also end what had become a politically delicate selection process surrounding Biden’s HHS secretary, the Times reported. Leaders of the Congressional Black Caucus and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus had voiced their concerns in recent days that Biden’s cabinet risked lacking qualified nominees of color.

Alejandro Mayorkas, a Cuban-American who Biden nominated to lead the Department of Homeland Security, is Biden’s only other Hispanic nominee.

As attorney general of the most populous state in the country, Becerra focused extensively on criminal justice reform, immigration and health care. He led the defensive effort against Republican attorneys general who sought to overturn the Affordable Care Act, according to the Times.

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra and New York Attorney General Letitia James walk out of the Supreme Court in Washington, D.C. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

If confirmed by the Senate, he will likely enter his position amid a raging pandemic and the early distribution of an effective coronavirus vaccine. Coronavirus cases, hospitalizations and deaths have been surging across the country, and CDC Director Robert Redfield said last week that the next three months could likely be “the most difficult in the public health history of this country.”

Before serving as California’s attorney general in 2017, Becerra represented Los Angeles for 12 terms in Congress.

 

[et2]

China Joe.

 

[marsh]

Chinese Foreign Minister Calls for ‘Reset’ in Relations Under Biden

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi looks forward to a “reset” in relations with the United States under a Joe Biden administration.

www.breitbart.com

Chinese Foreign Minister Calls for ‘Reset’ in Relations Under Biden

43

Drew Angerer/Getty Images
JOHN HAYWARD7 Dec 202046

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told the board of the U.S.-China Business Council on Monday that his country looks forward to a “reset” in relations with the United States under a Joe Biden administration.

The South China Morning Post (SCMP) quoted Wang using the coronavirus pandemic as a reason for Washington to seek better relations with Beijing:

Wang’s remarks, made during a video dialogue with the board of the US-China Business Council, included various suggestions for improving the two countries’ tumultuous ties, including strengthening communication at all levels and expanding areas of cooperation — including getting the coronavirus pandemic under control.

“The most urgent task currently is for the two sides to work together to remove all sorts of barriers to achieve a smooth transition in China-US relations,” he said, according to a brief on the Chinese foreign ministry’s website.

“At the same time, based on the direction of mutual benefits for our two peoples and countries, we need to strive to restart dialogue, return to the right track, and rebuild trust in this next phase of relations.”

CNBC reported Wang had some suggestions for how the United States could “change its approach” to improve relations, such as reducing its “interference” in what Beijing regards as its internal affairs. This is generally code for China telling the rest of the world to stop complaining about its human rights abuses in places like Tibet, Hong Kong, and Xinjiang province.

“The U.S. should also abide by the norms of international relations, not frequently intervene in China’s internal affairs, and not hinder Chinese people’s right to pursue a better life,” Wang said, after instructing American leaders to stop viewing China as an adversary.

CNBC reported that Wang’s audience included American chief executives Mary Barra of General Motors, Jim Umpleby of Caterpillar, Ryan McInerney of Visa, Rajesh Subramaniam of FedEx, and Steve Mollenkopf of Qualcomm.

“China’s top leadership continues to support engagement with business leaders from American industry during a year of heightened tensions. This sends a necessary, positive signal to Chinese industry that, despite tensions, it’s okay for U.S. and Chinese companies to do business together,” Matt Margulies of the U.S.-China Business Council said of the videoconference with Wang.

As CNBC pointed out, former Vice President Joe Biden has not yet committed to lifting the punitive trade measures President Donald Trump imposed on China, and the Trump administration continues to impose more of them.

Biden has discussed the need to “get tough with China” and “build a united front of U.S. allies and partners to confront China’s abusive behaviors and human rights violations,” but also urged the U.S. to “cooperate with Beijing on issues where our interests converge, such as climate change, non-proliferation, and global health security” — sometimes in the very same campaign speech or opinion piece.

Another factor to consider is the Biden campaign’s general acceptance of Communist China’s coronavirus narrative, which holds Beijing blameless for the spread of the pandemic and pins all of the death and economic damage in the United States completely on Trump.

Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s discussion of improving communication and cooperation between the U.S. and China to fight the pandemic blends smoothly into Biden’s campaign themes, and it would be difficult to imagine a Biden administration rebuffing China’s overtures in any way that would imply Trump was correct to blame the Chinese Communist Party and entities under its influence, such as the World Health Organization (W.H.O.).

Last week, Biden boasted of his many meetings with Chinese dictator Xi Jinping and promised he would “make it real clear to China there are international rules that if you want to play by, we’ll play with you,” but in the next breath, he said he was not interested in “punishing” Beijing for the coronavirus. He said he would halt Chinese intellectual property theft, especially in the realm of artificial intelligence research, and halt some abusive Chinese business practices, without giving any indication of how he would accomplish either goal.

 

[marsh]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acZXridt7wM
7:08 min


王禁书
一名中共专家近日在演讲中自爆拜登若上台中共窃喜，以及中共过去几十年如何利用华尔街搞定美国的内幕，其演讲视频在网络广传。
Has subtitles - How the Chinese bribe Americans to do what they want

 

[marsh]

Biden's COVID Czar Hosted Hunter Biden-Linked Chinese Elites at WH

Jeff Zients, Joe Biden's coronavirus czar, hosted a group of Chinese business elites after prodding from Hunter Biden’s associates.

www.breitbart.com

Joe Biden’s Coronavirus Czar Hosted Hunter Biden-Linked Chinese Elites at White House

42

Alex Wong/Getty Images
HARIS ALIC7 Dec 202022

Jeff Zients, the man whom Joe Biden is entrusting to run his administration’s response to the novel coronavirus pandemic, once hosted a select group of Chinese business and political elites at the Obama-era White House after prodding from Hunter Biden’s business associates.

On Monday, Biden’s team announced that Zients would serve as “coordinator of the COVID-19 Response and counselor to the president” when the new administration takes office in January. Zients, who serves as co-chair of Biden’s presidential transition task force, will lead the White House’s response to the coronavirus outbreak.

The role is likely to have extensive purview as Biden has signaled that tackling the virus will be an administration-consuming effort.

Zients, who managed the Obama administration’s rollout of the Affordable Care Act’s health insurance exchange website, has been praised as a good fit for the post. He could be a controversial appointee, however, among Republicans, who are probing whether Hunter Biden’s professional work overlapped with his father’s political influence. Zients, in particular, is likely to face questions over a meeting he helped host at the Obama-era White House in November 2011 with the Chinese Entrepreneur Club (CEC).

The CEC, founded in 2006 and often referred to as the “richest club” in the People’s Republic of China, counts among its members some of the richest and most influential personalities in Chinese society. At the time, Zients was the deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), a position in which he was tasked with restructuring the Obama administration’s trade agencies.

The meeting did not draw much attention when it first took place. However, emails published earlier this year by Peter Schweizer, a senior contributor at Breitbart News and president of the Government Accountability Institute, indicated just how important a role Hunter Biden and his business associates, including Devon Archer, played in making the White House visit happen.

The emails showed that on November 5, 2011, a colleague of Archer’s reached out to suggest there was an opportunity to gain “outstanding new clients.” According to the email, copies of which were published exclusively by Breitbart News, the colleague told Archer that the CEC had been trying for some time to arrange meetings with high-ranking Obama administration officials when they visited Washington, DC, in mid-November.

“A tour of the White House and a meeting with a member of the chief of staff’s office and [then-Secretary of State] John Kerry would be great,” the colleague wrote.

Up to that point, the CEC had tried and failed to obtain access to the Obama administration.

“From the DC side as you will see below they [CEC] have written letters to several members of the administration and others and have so far not had a strong reaction,” the colleague wrote Archer.

Archer discussed the CEC’s request with two other associates, Gary Fears and Bevan Cooney. Fears, in particular, told Archer to follow up on the request since the CEC delegation could be “perfect” for a fertilizer mining venture the trio was then pursuing.

Although it is unclear exactly what transpired after the emails reached Archer, only nine days later, on November 14, 2011, the CEC had secured its meeting at the Obama White House. Administration records indicate that a delegation of 30 CEC members received a tour of the White House and met with then-Commerce Secretary John Bryson.

The delegation also, according to its members, met privately with Hunter Biden’s father, then-Vice President Joe Biden. At the time, the vice president was playing a leading role in the Obama administration’s policy towards Beijing. Just that past May, Biden had taken part in talks between the U.S. and China on how to improve “strategic and economic” relations.

Exactly how Archer and his associates arranged the meeting for the CEC is unknown. Visitor logs, though, show that Zients was the official host for the CEC delegation. It is unclear if any arrangements made by Hunter Biden or associates for the CEC ran through Zients or the OMB.

After the meeting, Zients would go on to be promoted to acting director of OMB after his superior, Jack Lew, ascended to the position of White House Chief of Staff. In March 2014, Zients was appointed to lead the National Economic Council, a position he held until Obama left office in 2017.

 

[vestige]

Dicksucker

 

[marsh]

Zerohedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

"Don't Need Congress - Just Flick Of Pen": Schumer Demands Day 1 Biden $50K Student Debt Cancelation

Mon, 12/07/2020 - 18:44

"You don’t need Congress - All you need is the flick of a pen," Sen. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer demanded of President-Elect Joe Biden during a Monday press conference outside his Midtown Manhattan office, continuing to pile on the pressure for a controversial immediate student debt forgiveness of $50,000 for each and every borrower (with the exception of course for all who've previously dutifully paid off their debt).

Schumer is urging Biden to act on the very first day he takes office after January 20. "We have come to the conclusion that President Biden can undo this debt, can forgive $50,000 of debt the first day he becomes president," he said.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1335997989270253569

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1335997989270253569
1:30 min

But given that analysts speaking from the perspective of both sides of the aisle are unanimous in saying there's no way the Schumer-Warren plan would ever get past Congress, Schumer is pushing for an "overnight" solution to what would be the inevitable impasse crucially without legislation.

Biden has previously vowed to forgive up to $10,000 in student debt for all (with an additional slashing of all debt for public university and Black college attendees whose families are below a certain income level); however, progressives are angered that it's 'simply not enough' especially amid the coronavirus pandemic, they argue.



Biden's current plan would result in, according to some common estimates, a whopping $1.7 trillion outstanding student loan debt being wiped out.
But it's far from enough, says Schumer - echoing statements of Elizabeth Warren - in the Monday press conference which was held alongside New York congressman-elects Mondaire Jones, Jamaal Bowman and Ritchie Torres.

"College should be a ladder up but student debt makes it an anchor down. For far too many students and graduate students, some years out of school, student loans and federal student loans are becoming a forever burden," Schumer said.


But look at the language and word choice:

"They stand in the way of people getting the job they want, they stand in the way of buying a home, of starting a family, of buying a car and they hurt our economy dramatically," Schumer added.

So apparently if someone doesn't get something for nothing this is a supposed barrier to a job, home, and even starting a family.

Progressive Dems have already been attempting to lay legal groundwork in an effort to bypass Congress, as noted in CNBC:

During the 2020 Democratic presidential primary, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren vowed to forgive student loans in the first days of her administration, including with her announcement an analysis written by three legal experts, based at the Project on Predatory Student Lending at Harvard Law School, who described such a move as "lawful and permissible."

"The Federal Reserve says this would be a huge shot in the arm to the economy," Schumer claimed.

Just like that. Really the senator should stop with the medical analogy and go with something else like... Poof! it's magic.

But, pushing back against such wishful and fanciful imaginings of the woke, here's Goldman Sachs with a new report out which shows Even Substantial Student Debt Relief Would Only Have a Small Effect on GDP and in particular that—

Most student debt—and the vast majority of debt with a large balance—is held by households with a graduate or professional degree that have high earnings potential and are less likely to be resource constrained.

* * *
Here's the executive summary of Goldman Sachs' research (emphasis ZH)...
Barring surprise Democratic wins in the Georgia Senate runoffs, a divided government appears most likely, meaning any fiscal expansion will likely be limited by Senate Republicans. Against this backdrop, some Democrats have recently proposed forgiving existing federal student debt through executive action. In this US Daily we consider student debt relief proposals and analyze their potential effects on the federal budget and GDP.



President-elect Biden will likely have the authority to forgive federal student debt through executive action. Although some Democrats have suggested wiping away all federal student debt (or all loans under $50k), we think smaller-scale debt forgiveness up to $10k/borrower would be more likely if the incoming Biden Administration chooses to act. In light of tax rules, this might be structured as a payment reduction rather than immediate cancellation.

There are several reasons to be skeptical that forgiving student debt would provide a large boost to consumption. Most student debt—and the vast majority of debt with a large balance—is held by households with a graduate or professional degree that have high earnings potential and are less likely to be resource constrained.



Furthermore, student loan payments reflect a modest share of after-tax income for most borrowers, partly because many lower-income households already qualify for debt relief.



We estimate that forgiving federal student loans up to $10k would add less than 0.1% to the level of GDP starting in 2021, and cumulatively add only $0.43 in real GDP for each $1 of forgiven debt over the next 10 years.

A more generous debt relief program that forgives federal loan balances up to $50k would provide a slightly bigger boost to GDP, but would have a smaller per-dollar impact.



Forgiving federal student loans up to $10k would likely cost around $300bn (1.6% of GDP), while forgiving loans up to $50k would cost around $800bn (4.1% of GDP).

However, since these loans have already been funded through prior Treasury issuance, the impact on Treasury financing would be spread out over many years due to the lack of interest and principal payments. If loans were forgiven immediately, Treasury’s financing needs might actually decline, as tax payments on the forgiven amounts would likely more than offset the lack of scheduled loan payments.

 

[marsh]

Schumer: Biden 'considering' cancelation of $50K in student loan debt for every borrower making under $125K a year

Translation: A massive tax increase for many Americans

www.theblaze.com

NEWSDECEMBER 07, 2020

Schumer: Biden 'considering' cancelation of $50K in student loan debt for every borrower making under $125K a year

Translation: A massive tax increase for many Americans
Photo By Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call
PHIL SHIVER

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Monday that former Vice President Joe Biden is "considering" forgiving $50,000 in federal student loan debt for every borrower with an annual salary of under $125,000 — a move that would place an incredibly heavy burden on taxpayers.

More than 40 million Americans currently have outstanding federal loans, amounting to a whopping total of $1.54 trillion in debt.

What did he say?

"We have come to the conclusion that President Biden can undo this debt, can forgive $50,000 of debt the first day he becomes president," Schumer announced to supporters outside of his New York office. "You don't need Congress; all you need is the flick of a pen.

"I have told him how important it is. He is considering it," Schumer added after a reporter asked if he had spoken to Biden about the proposal. "We believe he does [have the executive authority], and he's researching that. I believe that when he does his research, he will find that he does."

During the 2020 Democratic primary, Biden expressed support for a Democratic legislative proposal that would immediately cancel up to $10,000 in debt for each borrower. But since then, progressives in the party have been urging the former vice president to bypass Congress and cancel the debt by executive fiat.
Whether it is constitutional for a president to take such an action remains in question.

What else?

Later during the event, a reporter pressed Schumer on the equity of debt cancelation.

"What about the families that have made sacrifices to pay off the student loans for their students? What about the students who have paid off their student loans?" the reporter asked.

"Look," Schumer responded, "lots of students paid off student loans, but it's such a burden it's good for everybody to make sure this debt is vanquished."

After the event had concluded, one of individuals standing next to Schumer, mocked the reporter's question, brushing it off as just the "Fox News perspective" on the issue.

"These people have great futures, but they are burdened by debt ... we want to remove it," Schumer had plainly stated during the event.

Yet, despite Schumer's portrayal of debt cancelation as an obvious, kind solution, in reality, it is far from either. As TheBlaze previously reported, contrary to what progressive politicians claim, "'canceling debt' is not something that actually exists. Lawmakers could remove a borrower's liability for re-paying the debt, but the debt will be shifted onto someone" and "in the case of federal student loans, the burden would be further shifted onto taxpayers."

 

[marsh]

AP sources: Biden picks Lloyd Austin as secretary of defense - Breitbart

President-elect Joe Biden will nominate retired four-star Army general Lloyd J AP sources: Biden picks Lloyd Austin as secretary of defenseBy ROBERT

www.breitbart.com

AP sources: Biden picks Lloyd Austin as secretary of defense

AP7 Dec 20200
President-elect Joe Biden will nominate retired four-star Army general Lloyd J
AP sources: Biden picks Lloyd Austin as secretary of defenseBy ROBERT BURNS, MICHAEL BALSAMO, JONATHAN LEMIRE and ZEKE MILLERAssociated PressThe Associated PressWASHINGTON

WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Joe Biden will nominate retired four-star Army general Lloyd J. Austin to be secretary of defense, according to four people familiar with the decision. If confirmed by the Senate, Austin would be the first Black leader of the Pentagon.

Biden selected Austin over the longtime front-runner candidate, Michele Flournoy, a former senior Pentagon official and Biden supporter who would have been the first woman to serve as defense secretary. Biden also had considered Jeh Johnson, a former Pentagon general counsel and former secretary of homeland defense.

The impending nomination of Austin was confirmed by four people with knowledge of the pick who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the selection hadn’t been formally announced. Biden offered and Austin accepted the post on Sunday, according to a person familiar with the process.

As a career military officer, the 67-year-old Austin is likely to face opposition from some in Congress and in the defense establishment who believe in drawing a clear line between civilian and military leadership of the Pentagon. Although many previous defense secretaries have served briefly in the military, only two — George C. Marshall and James Mattis — have been career officers. Marshall also served as secretary of state.

Like Mattis, Austin would need to obtain a congressional waiver to serve as defense secretary. Congress intended civilian control of the military when it created the position of secretary of defense in 1947 and prohibited a recently retired military officer from holding the position.

One of the people who confirmed the pick said Austin’s selection was about choosing the best possible person but acknowledged that pressure had built to name a candidate of color and that Austin’s stock had risen in recent days.

Austin is a 1975 graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and served 41 years in uniform.

Biden has known Austin at least since the general’s years leading U.S. and coalition troops in Iraq while Biden was vice president. Austin was commander in Baghdad of the Multinational Corps-Iraq in 2008 when Barack Obama was elected president, and he returned to lead U.S. troops from 2010 through 2011.
Austin also served in 2012 as the first Black vice chief of staff of the Army, the service’s No. 2-ranking position. A year later he assumed command of U.S. Central Command, where he fashioned and began implementing a U.S. military strategy for rolling back the Islamic State militants in Iraq and Syria.

Austin retired from the Army in 2016, and he would need a congressional waiver of the legal requirement that a former member of the military be out of uniform at least seven years before serving as secretary of defense. That waiver has been granted only twice — most recently in the case of Mattis, the retired Marine general who served as President Donald Trump’s first Pentagon chief.

The Mattis period at the Pentagon is now viewed by some as evidence of why a recently retired military officer should serve as defense secretary only in rare exceptions. Although Mattis remains widely respected for his military prowess and intellect, critics say he tended to surround himself with military officers at the expense of a broader civilian perspective. He resigned in December 2018 in protest of Trump’s policies.

Loren DeJonge Schulman, who spent 10 years in senior staff positions at the Pentagon and the National Security Council, said she understands why Biden would seek out candidates with a deep understanding of the military. However, she worries that appointing a general to a political role could prolong some of the damage caused by Trump’s politicization of the military.

“But retired generals are not one-for-one substitutes of civilian leaders,” she said. “General officers bring different skills and different perspectives, and great generals do not universally make good appointees.”

Austin has a reputation for strong leadership, integrity and a sharp intellect. He would not be a prototypical defense secretary, not just because of his 41-year military career but also because he has shied from the public eye. It would be an understatement to say he was a quiet general; although he testified before Congress, he gave few interviews and preferred not to speak publicly about military operations.

When he did speak, Austin did not mince words. In 2015, in describing how the Islamic State army managed a year earlier to sweep across the Syrian border to grab control of large swaths of northern and western Iraq, Austin said the majority of Iraqi Sunnis simply refused to fight for their government.

“They allowed — and in some cases facilitated — ISIS’s push through the country,” Austin said.

He earned the admiration of the Obama administration for his work in Iraq and at Central Command, although he disagreed with Obama’s decision to pull out of Iraq entirely in December 2011.

Austin was involved in the Iraq War from start to finish. He served as an assistant commander of the 3rd Infantry Division during the invasion of Iraq in March 2003 and oversaw the withdrawal in 2011. When Austin retired in 2016, Obama praised his “character and competence,” as well as his judgment and leadership.
One person familiar with the matter said Biden was drawn to Austin’s oversight of the Iraq pull-out, especially given the military’s upcoming role in supporting the distribution of the coronavirus vaccines.

Like many retired generals, Austin has served on corporate boards. He is a member of the board of directors of Raytheon Technologies.

Word of Austin’s selection broke a day before a meeting between Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris and civil rights groups, many of whom had pushed the president-elect to pick more Black Cabinet members.

The Rev. Al Sharpton, the civil rights activist, said Monday: “It’s a good choice that I think many in the civil rights community would support. It’s the first time we have seen a person of color in that position. That means something, in a global view, especially after such an antagonistic relationship we had with the previous administration.”

Sharpton, who is set to be in the meeting with Biden on Tuesday, called the choice “a step in the right direction but not the end of the walk.”
Politico first reported Biden’s selection of Austin.

 

[marsh]

Rand Paul: I'm Worried About Becerra's Abortion Positions

On Monday's broadcast of the Fox News Channel's "The Story," Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) expressed his concern about the abortion positions of Joe Biden's HHS | Clips

www.breitbart.com

Rand Paul: I’m Worried about Becerra’s Abortion Positions

IAN HANCHETT7 Dec 20206

On Monday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “The Story,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) expressed his concern about the abortion positions of Joe Biden’s HHS Secretary pick, California Attorney General Xavier Becerra (D).

Paul said, [relevant remarks begin around 5:00] “I’m concerned about the reports that say that he’s been a champion for late-term abortion and at the time of birth abortion, and that’s outside the norm. Even pro-choice people a lot of times will say they believe in some restrictions, but to believe in sort of complete, unlimited abortion until the time of birth or after, I think is something that’s a very radical position, and I would hate to have him in charge of trying to dispense government monies towards that kind of policy. So, we’ll look long and hard and I’ll try to keep an open mind, but my first impression of what I’m hearing about him is that he may be way outside the mainstream of what anybody in Kentucky would think is right.”

 

[marsh]

Soros foundation president resigns in suspected anticipation of joining Biden administration

George Soros’s Open Society Foundations President Patrick Gaspard is resigning from his position to reportedly pave the way for a potential job in the Biden administration.

www.washingtonexaminer.com

Soros foundation president resigns in suspected anticipation of joining Biden administration
by Michael Lee

| December 06, 2020 09:54 AM

George Soros’s Open Society Foundations President Patrick Gaspard is resigning from his position to reportedly pave the way for a potential job in the Biden administration.

“Fundamental social change doesn’t customarily occur in a revolutionary moment. Instead, what is needed is the partnership of activists, government, and the nonprofit sector, collaborating over time and space in unity and solidarity,” Gaspard said in a statement. "This is what I worked to do at Open Society. My commitment now will be to re-enter the world of politics and ideas, where I can continue the struggle against oppression everywhere.”

Gaspard previously served in the Obama administration between 2013 and 2016 as the U.S. ambassador to South Africa. He has also served as the director of the White House Office of Political Affairs.

He then worked on the Soros founded board for three years before the announcement that he is stepping down at the end of the year.

Speculation has spread that Gaspard could land a spot as Biden’s labor secretary, according to an Axios report. Gaspard does have previous experience with labor unions, including time working for the Service Employees International Union.

Soros, a billionaire who donates millions to left-wing causes, called Gaspard a “champion of all rights: whether for workers, for women, or for underserved groups.”

“His dedication to those challenging power is precisely why I invited Patrick to join Open Society,” Soros said. “I have great admiration for the way he led the Foundations in a world beset by illiberalism, and I applaud him.”

 

[Dozdoats]

If DJT abandons us to this pack of hyenas, ....