January 4, 2018: President Trump Can't Find the Voter Fraud, and Doesn't Like the Right to Protest Much, Either

 

1/4/18: The president decides he can’t let an entire day go by without undercutting fundamental democratic institutions. So, he does what he does best. He studies policy. 

Of course, he doesn’t. 

 

Standing up by kneeling down? 

Did you know his Commission on Voter Fraud just disbanded? “Many mostly Democrat States refused to hand over data from the 2016 Election to the Commission On Voter Fraud,” Trump tweet-moans. “They fought hard that the Commission not see their records or methods because they know that many people are voting illegally. System is rigged, must go to Voter I.D.” (For the biggest case of voter fraud in recent memory, see: 12/4/18.) 

You may not remember, but last summer a “handful” of states, a mere 44, refused to provide all the information Trump and his enablers demanded...also the District of Columbia. Alabama did comply with the administration order which makes it even more depressing for the president to realize accused child molester Roy Moore still couldn’t get elected. 

Kansas also complied. Kansas is the state where the head of the Commission on Voter Fraud, Kris Kobach, got his start cleaning up all the rampant fraud in elections. He worked like a right-wing beaver, Kobach did. He scrubbed and he scrubbed, and managed to secure nine whole convictions for voter fraud, over the course of multiple elections, in a state with a population of 1.8 million.

 

* 

TRUMP TWEETS ONCE, then mulls his course. What to do next with his valuable time? He decides to flog a favorite target: Minorities. No, I mean, “kneeling NFL players.” They just happen to be almost all African American. 

In any case, he tweets again, this time providing a link to the picture below, from last September. His tweet reads, “So beautiful.... Show this picture to the NFL players who still kneel!” 

 

Let this blogger interject. Much respect to all who have fallen in the fight for freedom and to their loved ones who pay an almost unbearable price. 

As a patriotic American, who enlisted in the Marines in 1968, I can see why players protest. If I were to kneel during the National Anthem, would I be disrespecting the flag, or would I be standing up by kneeling down? I’m a huge fan of the right to protest and the First Amendment. You know who I think really, really disrespected our flag. I think it was Don Jr. and Jared when they met with Russians in hopes of getting dirt on Hillary Clinton. (See: 1/3/18.) 

 

As for minority players kneeling, Mr. Trump, perhaps they’re protesting this kind of symbolism and support for your positions, and your disinclination to condemn such individuals: 

 

Or it might be they’re protesting this kind of police abuse (and no, not all police are abusive):

 

Walter Scott, unarmed and fleeing, is shot in the back.

 

Again, all sympathy to that soldier’s poor wife (pictured above) and to the child who will never know its father. 

That doesn’t mean Walter Scott’s family doesn’t also have a grave to visit and to weep over too.

 

* 

THE DEPARTMENT OF INTERIOR decides to open almost all U.S. coastal waters to offshore drilling. This plan, carefully crafted by Secretary Ryan Zinke, is a work of genius. (See: 1/9/18.) 

 

POSTSCRIPT: Lawyers for the president go to court to try to halt publication of the new book, Fire and Fury. (See: 1/3/18.) 

Because that’s what we do in Trumpistan. 

We ban books.

January 28, 2019: Texas "Discovers" Massive Voter Fraud - Just like Florida - and Trump Wants the Bible Taught in Public Schools

 

1/28/19: Fox News announces that Texas has found 95,000 non-citizens on its voter rolls. State officials say that includes 58,000 who voted illegally! Once again, this proves to fans of Donald J. Trump, who also love Fox News – which if we drew a Venn diagram would almost perfectly overlap – that what we need is a giant wall and maybe a voter ID law based on skin tone. 

____________________ 

Texas and the myth of illegal immigrant voters.

____________________ 

 

The president himself is quick to tweet: “58,000 non-citizens voted in Texas, with 95,000 non-citizens registered to vote. These numbers are just the tip of the iceberg. All over the country, especially in California, voter fraud is rampant. Must be stopped. Strong voter ID! @foxandfriends[.]” 

Then again, some of us remember these same scary stories from past years. First, if you read the entire article, you learned that a grand total of 33 people had been prosecuted for voter fraud in Texas in 2018. That’s out of a population of 16 million and we don’t even know if any were illegal immigrants. 

We do know “33” is not as scary as “58,000.” 

You can read a bit further and see that between 2005 and 2017 there were 97 prosecutions for the same crime. (See: 1/31/19.) 

Finally, the reported 58,000 illegal votes were cast in elections from 1996 through 2018. And if you’d like to see how “accurate” state records have been in such matters in the past, consider Florida.

Scary numbers! Less scary truths.

Back in 2012, Florida announced that it was purging 186,000 non-citizens from its voting rolls. 

Authorities went feverishly to work. First, they checked their original scary list and discovered that the actual number of non-citizens registered to vote was…2,600. Still too many!!!! Then they checked again. The list shrank to 198! Then they found out that among the tens of thousands of voters they had purged was a Brooklyn-born, decorated World War II vet. 

That was embarrassing for everyone involved. Except the vet. He was plenty mad. 

By the time Florida authorities cleaned up their records the 186,000 had shriveled to 85 cases, not a scary number at all.

 

For additional reading, it can be fun to consider the sterling record of Kris Kobach of Kansas, once the pillar of voter registration “reform.” Kobach was the foremost champion of purging voter rolls, supposedly weeding out millions and millions of illegals who went out and voted in 2016, in his state of Kansas and across the nation, very nearly throwing the election Hillary’s way. 

And it came to pass, that as Kansas Secretary of State, Kobach wielded the Sword of Ballot Purity. He uncovered nine cases of Kansans voting illegally over four or five years, at least one of whom did so by mistake. 

Those nine included two Republicans, if not more.

 

* 

WHILE REPUBLICANS stay busy trying to find Illegal Immigrant Waldo among the legit voters, Trump has a plan to make public schools great again. 

Classes on the bible! 

Is there any evidence he has ever read the Good Book, himself, or tried to live according to the teachings of Christ? If there is, this blogger is not seeing it; and he has read every word in that book. Including “Numbers.” 

As noted by CBS News, on Monday Trump tweeted out his support for the idea after his favorite show, Fox & Friends, ran a segment on the topic. So you know the president has been thinking about the bible a lot! “Numerous states introducing Bible Literacy classes, giving students the option of studying the Bible. Starting to make a turn back? Great!” he tapped away at his phone.

 

Christian lawmakers in several Republican-controlled state legislatures have been pushing for legislation that would allow public schools to offer elective classes on the New and Old Testaments. 

I am thinking, does President Trump know what the bible says about the punishment for adulterers? 

As a former history teacher this blogger would like to say that bible literacy is fine; but you should probably deal with it through church. Otherwise, do teachers have to say, “Look, class, every word of this book is literally true?” Or do they dare speak about the “figurative” nature of language? 

Or can a public school teacher now up and say, “This story about Noah can’t possibly be true.” If the flood covered all the land, including Mt. Everest, and did it after forty days and forty nights of rain, then that would mean rain had to have been falling at the rate of 726 feet per day. 

Finally, do Muslim or agnostic parents have to pay taxes so public schools can teach other parent’s kids about the bible? 

Let the pastors of the world address this topic themselves.

May 20, 2019: Judge Rules Trump Accountants Must Cough Up Records

 

5/20/19: President Trump loses Round One in a ruling by U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta, who says his accountants must turn over financial records subpoenaed by Congress. 

“Courts have grappled for more than a century with the question of the scope of Congress’s investigative power,” Mehta writes in his decision. “The binding principle that emerges from these judicial decisions is that courts must presume Congress is acting in furtherance of its constitutional responsibility to legislate and must defer to congressional judgments about what Congress needs to carry out that purpose.”

 

Chairman Elijah Cummings (D-MD), of the House Oversight and Reform Committee, which formally requested documents on Trump and the Trump Organization, calls Mehta’s ruling “a resounding victory for the rule of law and our constitutional system of checks and balances.” 

Naturally, the president says the decision is shocking and appalling, and nasty and a disgrace. “It’s totally the wrong decision by, obviously, an Obama-appointed judge.” 

Obviously. 

Now, a Trump judge? Yeah, those guys you can totally trust.

 

* 

SPEAKING OF TRUST, Kris Kobach, is considering an offer to become Trump’s “immigration czar.” 

Now that he has cleaned up all the illegal voting by immigrants, which no one else could find  – for example, nine whole cases in Kansas, where he was attorney general for years – Kobach is ready for a fresh challenge. 

There are, however, a few conditions before he accepts the position. First, Kobach wants to be a four-star general in the Trump Air Force, whereby members of the cabinet waste millions flying hither and yon in the most expensive fashion possible. Kobach wants a government jet on call 24 hours a day. Kobach expects to have an office in the West Wing and guaranteed weekends off to be with family. He expects to be the main TV spokesman for the administration – which means Press Secretary Pinocchio can spend her time lying about other matters for a change.

Kobach had about as much success hunting down illegal voters as people do hunting Bigfoot.

Donald J. Trump's Hallucinatory Quest: Catching the Illusive Illegal Immigrant Voter!

IF YOUR DEMOCRACY-LOVING HEAD is spinning, who would blame you? In four short months, we have seen President Trump (a.k.a. Orange Mussolini ) vilify the press, chastise an independent judiciary and work to block an F.B.I. investigation. Even though, trust Trump and his sycophants: There’s no there, there. 

James Comey? 

Sad!

Unfortunately, Trump’s efforts to undermine democracy may prove more dangerous than we fear, abetted by a supine GOP that finds it difficult to win elections fairly. 

You may not know anything about Secretary of State Kris Kobach of Kansas. Trust me: the man is dangerous. Having spent the last two years hunting illegal immigrant voters in every sunflower patch in his state, Kobach is about to take futility national. As the Kansas City Star reported earlier this month, “Kobach, who repeatedly has made questionable claims of rampant voter fraud, will co-chair President Donald Trump’s new Commission on Election Integrity.” 

Did you know Trump had created a Commission on Election Integrity? Now you do!

For good reason people who care about civil rights were quick to criticize the choice of Kobach. For his part, the Kansas Secretary of State was “very excited and honored to have this opportunity to serve the country.” “The commission,” he claimed, “does not begin with foregone conclusions. All members…are approaching it with an open mind…The objective is to go where the facts lead us.”

That’s the problem: where “the facts” lead Kobach.

THE POOR FELLOW IS NUTS.

Not quite the face of the illegal immigrant voter the GOP has in mind.

Unfortunately, it has become increasingly clear in recent years that the GOP’s fundamental problem is dark-skinned people voting. Hispanics voting legally? A terrible idea. African Americans? You get the impression Trump & Co. would be delighted to repeal the Fifteenth Amendment.

In fact, the GOP is intent on making it hard for college kids to vote, perhaps because many are working on their tans.

Those commies!

Take for example a strict Texas voter ID law, which has been struck down repeatedly by the courts. A variety of judges have described it as a thinly veiled attempt to keep 600,000 otherwise eligible, but mostly dark-skinned or tanned young citizens from casting ballots. Under the proposed law, a voter must have one of a handful of proper kinds of photo IDs to vote. Many poor Hispanic and African American voters don’t have the official birth certificate needed to get the ID they require. Then again, if you show up at the polls you can vote if you present a concealed carry license. You can’t vote, though, if all you have is a photo ID from, say, the University of Texas.

Makes sense, right? 

THIS IS WHERE KOBACH and the “Commission on Election Integrity” take their bows. According to Trump a tidal wave of three to five million imaginary illegal immigrant voters swamped the polls in 2016. Every one voted for “Crooked Hillary.” Not one imaginary voter pulled an imaginary lever for Orange Mussolini.

(Actually, that’s true, in an imaginary way.)

Luckily, in Kansas, that tide was staunched by Secretary of State Kobach. Out on the Great Plains, he was doing his best to save America, so Trump could make it great again and maybe bring back the poll tax. For two years, under Kansas law, Kobach was hard at work ferreting out trillions and trillions of illegals who, he insisted, infested voter registration rolls across the nation. In fact, if you recall Trump’s insistence that he would have won the popular vote if all those illegals hadn’t voted, you might keep in mind Kobach was his main source for his absurd claims.

This is where the delusions of Trump and the anti-democratic instincts of the GOP intersect to perfection. If you set out to suppress the vote and capture Bigfoot you need a leader who believes Bigfoot exists to lead the search—and suppress the minority vote in the process. Using rare powers vested in him by a GOP-controlled legislature, Kobach left no suffrage stone unturned. He cleaned out criminals left and right. 

Like fascist right. 

This past April the Kansas City Star proudly proclaimed that, “Victor David Garcia Bebek has pleaded guilty to voter fraud.”

Bebek is dark-skinned for sure, a native of Peru, who ran afoul of Kobach after qualifying for citizenship and applying to vote legally. It turned out Bebek had been confused about his legal status, had already cast ballots in two elections, and a brand new citizen was hauled into court and fined $5,000.

With that, the total number of illegal immigrant voters caught and convicted by Kobach since July 2015 rose to…one.

One!

HERE A LIBERAL—OR ANY LOGICAL HUMAN—might suggest Bebek voted because he got mixed up, not because he was part of a nefarious plot to subvert the nation. Bebek wouldn’t be the first citizen, new or used, to be unclear how democracy works. It took Trump five years to figure out Hawaii was part of the United States and President Obama was therefor an American citizen. In a recent poll 57% of adults couldn’t name a single justice on the Supreme Court, even though they had nine chances. (You figure they didn’t know there were nine justices, either.) In another stunner, only 1 in 3 Americans could correctly name the three branches of government, and 1 in 8 agreed the U.S. Constitution guaranteed the right to own a pet. During the 2016 campaign, 59% of Trump supporters still believed Mr. Obama was the first alien to land in the Oval Office. 

So it’s no surprise that Trump, who has clearly never read the U.S. Constitution, and many loyal Trumpsters believe Bigfoot exists.

Look at the evidence from Kansas!

According to the Topeka Capital-Journal, Kobach has managed to prosecute a total of nine people for voter fraud in two short years, collecting $30,000 in fines in the process. Sadly, eight of nine convictions involve noticeably white, native-born citizens, who voted in two different states during one election. The Wichita Eagle highlighted Kobach’s “success” in May 2016, when Ron Weems, 77, pled guilty to three misdemeanors, including double voting in Kansas and Colorado.

Soon a fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth criminal fell to the blazing guns of the Kansan Kobach.

Nine cases—out of 1,788,673 registered Kansas voters.

Sure, the “fake news” folks might quibble. CNN might point out that one Kansan criminal, Randall Kilian, 62, was a registered Republican.

MSNBC might focus on Steven Gaedtke, also surprisingly white, who paid a fine after voting in Kansas and Arkansas in 2010.

Some damn liberal might point out his crime was committed six years before Trump ran for office.

When Kansas newspapers (and even Fox News) scoffed, Kobach defended his efforts, claiming he had uncovered many more cases. In Sedgewick County he said he had turned up 25 illegally registered criminals, their evil deeds spread over a a lawless period of thirteen years. Some had even cast ballots! In many cases, Kobach discovered “criminals” who registered to vote, realized they weren’t eligible, and didn’t. In one particularly egregious case five Kansans in one county illegally registered—and then self-reported their errors. And it was too bad when a Shawnee County judge struck down new voter registration rules, pushed by Mr. Kobach, on the judicially flimsy grounds that…um…18,000 Kansans who had every right to vote would have been denied ballots.

SADLY, WE’VE SEEN THIS SORRY SAGA play out before. In North Carolina a federal appeals court ruling that another GOP-supported voter ID law was drafted in a way to “target African Americans with almost surgical precision” and insure they didn’t cast ballots was upheld (meaning the law was nullified) by the U.S. Supreme Court.

And consider the case of Florida. With an estimated 850,000 illegal immigrants residing in that state, Governor Rick Scott set out in 2012 to purge the voting rolls and protect democracy at its roots. First, the Florida Department of State created a list of 182,000 men and women who might be voting illegally. 

Bigfoot! Sooooo scary!

A second careful check of records, duplicate names, wrong addresses, and more, quickly cut that figure to 2,700.  

Less scary!

Then more checking reduced the total to 200 possible illegals, one of whom turned out to be an 85-year-old World War II veteran. 

Eventually, after many tax dollars wasted, the state did manage to purge 85 names from the rolls.

Not at all scary! 

(Unless you care about the tens of thousands of eligible voters who nearly got kicked off the rolls.)

IN ANY CASE,, President Donald J. Trump pledges a massive effort to catch millions of illegal voters. He has promised to spend millions and millions in taxpayer dollars on his hallucinatory quest.

Kris Kobach will do his part to find Bigfoot and work hard to justify keeping as many dark-skinned individuals as possible away from the polls. “This is really a first-of-its-kind enterprise,” he told reporters after hearing of his appointment. “For the first time having a national body gather data from all 50 states. The objective of the commission is to bring those hard facts together on a national level.”

So, good luck, Mr. Kobach. Sometime soon, we know you’ll find Illegal Immigrant Voter #2.

MAYBE THE K.K.K will even pitch in and help you.