By John Semmens — Semi-News — A Satirical Look at Recent News

After a year of trying to hype the Fusion GPS “dossier” on Donald Trump into alleged “proof” of his illicit collusion with Russia the Democrats have seen the escapade backfire big time. An expose in the Washington Post, of all places, disclosed that the Democratic National Committee paid up to $9 million for the political hit piece. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, chair of the DNC at the time these payments were made, and Hillary Clinton, Democratic candidate for president at that time, both denied any knowledge of the payments.

Clinton pointed out that “we spent a billion dollars on the campaign. In that context, a $9 million payment to an obscure opposition research outfit was peanuts. Why would I be expected to have any knowledge of it?”

Well, there were a series of progressively desperate tweets from the candidate starting in August 2016 and periodically repeated up to October 31 querying the absence of media coverage of Trump’s supposed collusion with Russia to rig the election. Despite Hillary’s efforts, though, media outlets refused to publish any of the dossier’s content on the grounds that the charges couldn’t be independently verified.

Editors at the Los Angeles Times—one of the 99 percent of newspapers that endorsed Clinton for president—dismissed the question of who paid for the smear, saying that “who paid is not as pertinent as the seriousness of the charges made in the dossier.” As for the lack of corroboration of any of the “serious” charges, the Times editors asserted that “the leveling of even false allegations in a political campaign is protected freedom of speech. The media must bear a large share of the responsibility for its refusal to go public with the dossier’s details when it could have made a difference in the election’s outcome. A finicky aversion to publish allegations out of an overwrought fear that they might later be proven untrue may have saddled the nation with a man unfit to hold the office of president.”

Obama’s former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper attempted to rescue the situation by arguing that “the absence of evidence behind the dossier’s claims doesn’t preclude the possibility that they might be true. I mean, no one’s produced definitive evidence verifying the existence of ‘big foot,’ but that doesn’t prove the creature doesn’t exist. Our spying on Trump and his associates was never 24/7. They had unobserved moments where they could’ve done the things the dossier said they did. Until they come forward with a persuasive accounting for every minute of their time over the last few years I think we have to assume they’ve got something to hide.”

Former Clinton spokesperson and current CNN contributor Brian Fallon called the “latest kerfuffle over whether the dossier is factual is irrelevant. The more important thing about these types of campaign documents is ‘are they effective.’ If I had known about it before the election I would’ve shouted it to the rooftops. The campaign’s failure to do that exhibited a timidity unbecoming of someone who truly wants to wield political power. In my book, you use every weapon you have to win. After you win no one will dare question whether your tactics were dirty. And if they do, you’ll have numerous tools you can use to make them regret raising the issue.”

White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders called the recent turn of events “ironic. The scheming of the Democrats reminds me of the whole Watergate affair. Rather than take their issues to voters as President Trump did, they put their energy into concocting a false narrative aimed at muddying up their opponent. Nixon paid ‘plumbers’ to spy on his 1972 election opponent. Even though he was heavily favored to win and did win, his underhanded tactics eventually brought him down. While Mrs. Clinton’s underhanded tactics didn’t win her the election, they may yet bring her down to a worse place than merely being an ‘also ran.’”

In related news, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz). strove to minimize his role in hyping the dossier, reminding everyone that, “I had a brain tumor when I did that. Who knows what I was thinking or why I did what I did?”

UK Law Enforcement Shift Spurs Soaring Crime Rate

The shift of law-enforcement focus from “ordinary crimes” to “hate crimes” has coincided with a surge of 19 percent in violent crime, 22 percent in rapes, and, surprisingly, given the country’s strict gun-control laws, 27 percent in crimes committed by firearm-toting thugs. While budgetary concerns have had a role in the reduced arrest records (down 48 percent over the last nine years) the shift of emphasis toward cracking down on “hate crimes” is also a factor.

In London, arrests for “offensive comments” are up by 53 percent in the last year. A spokesman for the Metropolitan Police explained that “in our view, a hateful comment is a more serious matter than the run-of-the-mill crimes committed by ordinary criminals. Hateful comments spring from hateful thoughts. If we don’t take the initiative to suppress hateful thoughts they could lead to a wider social break down.”

A particular focus of the anti-hate crime effort has been “the noxious animus against people of Asian descent. The clash of cultures between white values and foreign values adds an ugly racist taint to the ways long-term residents perceive newer arrivals. The Mayor has emphasized that we must spare no effort in nipping this in the bud.”

While “nipping” hateful thought in the bud has shifted police from patrolling the streets to perusing Facebook and Twitter in search of hateful words, Muslim immigrants have played a significant part in the rise of ordinary crimes—attacking “unbelievers” and sexually assaulting “loose women” in emulation of the Prophet and as prescribed in their holy Quran.

In related news, Sweden issued an ultimatum demanding that “all European Union countries must take more refugees, or else.” Prime Minister Stefan Löfven contends that “xenophobia is a major threat to Europe” and that “the best way to combat this threat is to speed our transition to Islam. The sooner we all join the umma, the sooner the terrorism will stop. Surely it is better to simulate the required five daily prayers than to endure the constant risk of being killed for our resistance.”

Evidence Obama Administration Discriminated Against Conservatives

This week evidence of a comprehensive policy of illegal discrimination by the Obama Administration against conservatives emerged on two fronts.

First was the discovery of an internal IRS email outlining an intentional plan to obstruct Tea Party organizations from obtaining tax-exempt status for educational activities. An April 1, 2011 email from Elizabeth Kastenberg, an official in the agency’s exempt organizations division, confirmed that “these cases are held back primarily because of their political party affiliation rather than specifically any political activities.” The IRS also illegally colluded with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to crack down on conservative nonprofits during the 2012 election cycle.

IRS Commissioner John Koskinen tried to brush off the email as “an obvious ‘April fool’ joke. Look at the date on the email. To say this is a ‘smoking gun’ is absurd.” Koskinen’s contention is rebutted by the demonstrated pattern of discrimination and harassment conservative groups faced from the IRS in the post-2011 period.

Second was a Department of Justice scheme to ensure that nearly a billion dollars in settlements from businesses sued by the Obama Administration would be donated exclusively to left-wing political organizations. Records obtained from the Obama era Office of the Assistant Attorney General (OAAG) and the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) revealed a conscious intent to exclude conservative or non-partisan groups from receiving any of the settlement money.

With respect to the settlement scheme, current Attorney General Jeff Sessions characterized the scheme as “essentially, political extortion. Under the threat of prolonged and expensive litigation, the previous DOJ allowed targeted businesses to opt out by agreeing to accept a plea and pay a fine. The money obtained from those fines was used as a ‘slush fund’ to aid left-wing interest groups like National Council of La Raza, Urban League and National Community Reinvestment Coalition.” Sessions ordered an end to the policy, saying that “if real damages are incurred due to torts committed by any defendants payments should be paid to the injured parties not politically favored pressure groups.”

With respect to the IRS discrimination, it has be announced that Koskinen will be replaced by the Treasury Department”s assistant secretary for tax policy, David Kautter as acting commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service beginning November 12.

Obama Briefed on Uranium One Scandal

The confidential informant recently released from the non-disclosure agreement forced on him by the Obama Administration Department of Justice passed on evidence that Russian nuclear officials were engaged in bribery, kickbacks, extortion, and money laundering to his FBI superiors for inclusion in President Obama’s daily briefing. A $500,000 share of the bribes went into the pocket of former President Bill Clinton as a “speaking fee” and $145 million went to the Clinton Foundation in the form of “donations” from principals who profited from the sale of 20 percent of the U.S. uranium supply to a firm owned by the Russian government.

Obama professed to “have no recollection of the matter. As my successor can attest, these briefings are boring and repetitive. My mind may have wandered during the briefing where this uranium thing was mentioned. I was probably thinking about the NCAA basketball tournament and how my brackets were holding up.”

Rep. Louie Gomert (R-Tex) dismissed the ex-President’s lame excuse as “par for course. I’m more interested in the role the FBI superiors have played in this whole affair.

Mueller was the Director at that time. Rosenstein was a high-ranking official. It was Rosenstein who subsequently appointed Mueller as special counsel in charge of investigating supposed collusion between Trump and the Russians. The involvement of these men in what now has the appearance of a massive attempt to divert attention away from this earlier real collusion raises serious concerns of a cover-up to protect the guilty with a ploy to implicate the innocent.”

A Satirical Look at Recent News

John Semmens is a retired economist who has written a weekly political satire for The Arizona Conservative since 2005. He says working on his satires is one of the ways he tries to honor the liberties our Founding Fathers tried to protect.

Please do us a favor. If you use material created by The Arizona Conservative, give us credit and DO NOT change the context. Thank you.

By John Semmens — Semi-News — A Satirical Look at Recent News

Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-NY) advised Party colleagues facing a tough reelection fight in states carried by Trump last November to mute criticism of gun ownership ahead of the 2018 mid-term balloting.
“We all agree that we need more restrictions on gun ownership,” Schumer conceded. “But if too many red-state voters perceive this is our intent we could lose seats in the Senate and House. What I am urging is that we be smart. There is no need to fully reveal what we stand for, especially if it might cost votes. This is a case where an elected Democrat’s silence on the issue will be the best strategy.”

Instead, the Minority Leader suggested that imperiled Democrats “could focus on economic issues. The Trump Administration is pushing a huge tax cut. We can point out that transferring more of the nation’s resources from the public sector into the hands of selfish private individuals endangers the progressive transformation of the United States that former President Obama worked so hard to accomplish. Trump has foolishly boasted that his tax cut will be ‘rocket fuel’ for the economy and will create millions of jobs. This will lure more Americans into the labor force, undoing the leisure gains of the Obama years.”

“Already, the baleful signs of what is to come from the Trump tax cut plan can be seen in surging employment opportunities,” the Senator observed. “Just last month the number of applications for new unemployment benefits fell to a 44-year low. This vital safety net for the work-averse would be torn to shreds by the tax cut ‘rocket fuel’ Trump would unleash on our economy. Standing against such a calamity would, in my opinion, redound to the benefit of every Democrat come November 2018.”

Evidence of Russian Influence Seeps Out

This week evidence showing Russian bribery aimed at manipulating US Government policies began to trickle into the media sphere. It seems that the State Department’s 2010 decision to permit a Russian-owned uranium firm to acquire 20% of the US supply of this nuclear resource proceeded amid a flurry of donations to the Clinton Foundation.
While FBI field agents uncovered the bribery trail, then Director, Robert Mueller successfully suppressed the investigation obtaining a Department of Justice (DOJ) “gag” order that is still in effect today. This past week, Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, called for current DOJ Attorney General Jeff Sessions to lift the gag order, but was rebuffed by the Trump appointee.

“There are many complicated issues to consider,” Sessions said. “For one, there is the reputation and privacy of current and formerly highly placed government officials to be taken into account. Right now Robert Mueller is a special counsel looking into other matters. His effectiveness on that assignment could be impeded if he were to be queried on the uranium deal. Another factor that looms large in my mind is whether the Statute of Limitations may have expired on any crimes committed so long ago. Raising issues that couldn’t be tried in court because of this would be fruitless and embarrassing.”

Grassley declared “Sessions’ refusal to lift the suppression of evidence by his AG predecessor is an unacceptable infringement on Congress’ responsibility to scrutinize the actions of the executive branch. Why he is honoring an illegal gag order defies understanding. If we are to ‘drain the swamp’ we must have access to witnesses holding crucial evidence.”

In related news, former Attorney General Eric Holder defended former FBI Director James Comey’s exoneration of Hillary Clinton prior to completion of an investigation, calling it “an efficient way of disposing of the matter. Comey knew that there was no way that AG Lynch was going to pursue a case against Mrs. Clinton. Writing the exoneration memo in advance was a way to more efficiently close the whole thing down and save the government a lot of heartaches and headaches.”

GOP Virginia Gubernatorial Campaign Called “Racist”

Republican candidate for Virginia Governor Ed Gillespie’s vow to implement policies that would crack down on the notorious Latino gang known as MS-13 was dubbed “racist” by his Democratic opponent Ralph Northam. “That a man aspiring to the highest office in this state would single out these immigrants and children of immigrants is repugnant,” Northam insisted.

State and local law enforcement officers, however, regard MS-13 as a serious threat to the inhabitants of the communities in which they carry out their criminal depredations. Alexandria, Virginia Police Chief Earl Cook called the gang “more vicious and violent than the Mafia. Our streets cannot be safe if we don’t exert the extra effort and vigilance needed to combat these criminals.”

Northam maintains that “I am not opposed to law enforcement directed at criminal activity. But I do think it needs to be more balanced in terms of the racial composition of suspects arrested and prosecuted. Making scapegoats of the youths who belong to MS-13 is the kind of bigotry inspired by Donald Trump and his minions, one of whom is my opponent in the upcoming election.”

“No law-abiding person denies the need to crack down on these violent criminals,” Gillespie countered. “The notion that we should seek a racially-balanced prison population as a meaningful way to promote public safety is deluded and counterproductive. In my view, given its tactics and the frequency with which they assail victims, MS-13 should be at the top of our ‘most wanted’ list.”

Bush Assails Culture of Bigotry

Fresh off eight years of rest during the Obama Administration, former President George W. Bush decried what he called the current “culture of bigotry” in American politics. Based on the content of his remarks, the “bigotry” in question appears to be Donald Trump’s characterization of Washington as a “swamp.”

“When a prominent member of government attacks government in this way it undermines the people’s confidence in their rulers,” Bush declared. “The loss of confidence creates a very real danger of disobedience toward those in charge. This is the path to anarchy.”

“Clearly, bringing in an outsider who knows nothing of the fellowship of friendly adversaries that runs our country was a mistake,” the former President lamented. “How we correct this mistake is the sacred mission of those of us who understand the process of ruling a country.”

Former President Barack Obama hailed what he characterized as “a long overdue admission of guilt from one of this nation’s leading anti-progressives. If Mr. Bush had joined with the Democratic wing of America’s governing fraternity to back Secretary Clinton’s bid for the presidency we wouldn’t now be talking about the ‘swamp.’”
“There is a very palpable risk that the transformation of America that I put into motion may be undone,” Obama warned. “Trump’s recent moves to reverse my executive actions granting amnesty to ‘dreamers’ and subsidies to insurance companies on the grounds they were usurpation of powers the Constitution delegated to Congress puts form over substance. Isn’t whether an action is right more important than whether it is legal?”

Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md), an advocate of removing President Trump via the 25th Amendment’s “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office” clause was “cheered by the agreement between our last two Chief Executives that Trump is unfit for the office he holds. Perhaps this will give Vice-President Pence the courage to lead Republicans in a joint effort with Democrats to end Trump’s nightmare regime. It’s not as if the GOP will lose the presidency. Removing Trump would make Pence the president. If I were in his shoes, that alone would be enough to spur me into action.”

In related news, 18 states have filed suit asking the courts to block Trump’s move to discontinue illegal subsidies to health insurance companies. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman contended that “since many states have come to depend on these illegal subsidies to sustain insurers allowed to operate in their states it would be unfair to revoke them. It is analogous to taking food away from a baby just because his father stole the money to pay for it. States need these subsidies to feed the insurers. Need has to take priority over a sterile insistence on rigidly following the law. Maintaining these subsidies is a matter of equity and social justice.”

DNC Purges Bernie Supporters

Citing the “need to avoid a repetition of last year’s Seth Rich problem,” Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez announced the ouster of officials aligned with former presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (Vt). The vacancies will be filled with Hillary Clinton supporters, much like Special Counsel Robert Mueller staffed his investigation of Trump’s alleged collusion with Russia investigation with Clinton supporters.

DNC spokesperson Michael Tyler maintained that the replacement of Sanders supporters with Clinton supporters was “coincidental. The more important goal was to get a better racial mix among those on the committee. We’re proud to say that the number of Native Americans and Puerto Ricans has been substantially increased making the DNC membership more diverse.

The ousted James Zogby wondered “whether diversity of skin color ought to always supersede diversity in viewpoint. I fear the Party may be painting itself into a corner with its slavish devotion to such a one-dimensional criterion in the selection of its DNC members.”

A Satirical Look at Recent News

John Semmens is a retired economist who has written a weekly political satire for The Arizona Conservative since 2005. He says working on his satires is one of the ways he tries to honor the liberties our Founding Fathers tried to protect.

Please do us a favor. If you use material created by The Arizona Conservative, give us credit and DO NOT change the context. Thank you.

By John Semmens — Semi-News — A Satirical Look at Recent News

The Obama Presidential Library revealed that it won’t be providing any original documents written by Obama. Instead of having the former president’s manuscripts, documents and letters from his tenure in office—items presidential centers around the country all have—the Obama Library will have space for outdoor functions and picnics, a basketball court, recording studio, sledding hill, children’s play garden, and more. The decision has scholars puzzled and disappointed.

University of Chicago Professor of Black Studies Richard Buttkiss could hardly contain his dismay that “the written words of the greatest man to ever walk the Earth will not be available for historians to directly access. It’s as if the apostles had been barred from hearing Jesus speak. It seems like the world will be denied the opportunity to advance to a higher state of consciousness.”

Obama Foundation CEO David Simas explained that “President Obama did not want his legacy to be defined by a sterile preservation of his actual words, but to be a living record that evolves to meet the changing needs of an America on the move. What he wrote or said is not as important as what he meant or intended. By sloughing off the detritus of the past this President’s library will remain eternally relevant.”

Simas advised those who want to keep up with this evolving legacy “to buy his forthcoming books. The genius of this approach is that rather than rely on fallible outsiders to sift through an archive of old documents to craft a history of his era, President Obama will be cornering the market by blocking access to obsolete artifacts. A not insignificant byproduct will, of course, be the higher profits he will garner from book sales and speaking engagements as the sole source of insight for his term in office.”

Trump Revises Obamacare Rules

This week President Trump made some administrative revisions to the Affordable Care Act health insurance program. Using latitude granted to the president in the original legislation, Trump issued an executive action that allows individuals more choices in how to insure themselves. This expansion of choice was denounced by key Democrats.
Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-NY) called Trump’s move “a stab in the back. Allowing people more choices is the exact opposite of what is needed if the changes made by Obamacare are to be made permanent. People will choose selfishly. They will only buy coverage they think they need. They won’t opt to pay for the coverage that government experts say others need. Under the President’s executive action a person who opposes abortion won’t have to pay to cover it for others. This extreme individualism undermines the collective welfare of society.”

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif) called Trump’s move “sabotage. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) is a very delicately balanced system of cross-subsidization. If individuals who don’t need certain medical procedures are allowed to opt out of paying for them others who do need these procedures will be hurt. For example, under Trump’s rules a person who doesn’t want a sex change won’t have to pay for insurance to cover it for others. How is this fair? The notion that each person should be free to choose what he wants to buy is not the kind of America I want to live in.”

Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) issued a press release seconding the “sabotage” accusation, saying “the Republicans already had their chance to repeal the ACA, but failed. Taking executive action to get around that failure is not the kind of bipartisanship Mr. Trump implied just a few weeks ago. For him to say he is merely exercising the same executive latitude that President Obama did is not an adequate justification. Since when do two wrongs make a right?”

Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards complained that “ending the requirement for everyone to purchase abortion coverage allows Christians to impose their views on others. Women have an inalienable right to terminate unwanted offspring. It is everyone else’s obligation to provide the financial means necessary to implement this right. The ACA regulations proclaimed by President Obama’s executive action are the crucial legal mechanism by which these rights were realized. By allowing individuals to buy insurance that doesn’t pay for abortions this country has taken a major leap backward.”

Clintons Should Run Puerto Rico Relief Effort

Former presidential candidate and Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean criticized the Trump Administration’s handling of post-hurricane relief efforts for the island of Puerto Rico. While the federal government has delivered massive amounts of supplies to the island it has not been uniformly successful in getting them distributed to those in need. Part of the hang-up has been local politicians laying claim to supplies. Another part has been unions seeking higher pay for transporting the supplies locally.

Dean’s proposed solution: “let the Clinton Foundation take over from here. They have the know how and a demonstrated history of success. When Haiti was struck by an earthquake in 2010 the Foundation sprang into action and assisted this nation’s recovery.”

Whether Dean’s confidence in the Clinton Foundation is warranted seems dubious. The record in Haiti is not as glorious as Dean remembers. Funds raised in the name of “relief” were doled out to companies that made large donations to the Clinton Foundation. Very little was accomplished on behalf of people living in the 100,000 homes that were destroyed in the quake.

Dean insists that critics of the Clinton’s performance in Haiti “aren’t seeing the complete picture. Haiti is a third world Hell-hole run by crooked politicians. The expectation that the relief funds would trickle down to the little people is unrealistic. That a substantial portion of the donated money was channeled to major Democratic donors is an overlooked success. What I’m saying is that a similar level of success is possible in Puerto Rico if the right people are put in charge of the operation.”

In related news, now that the sexual crimes of one of her presidential campaign’s donors have burst into a national scandal, Hillary Clinton has promised to re-donate his contribution to charity. “Luckily, the Clinton Foundation is both a handy and reputable institution to which these ill-gotten gains can be redeployed,” she observed.

Carter Offers Self as “Human Shield”

This week, former US President Jimmy Carter offered himself to North Korea’s communist government to “act as a human shield against an attack by the Trump Administration” contending that “even a madman like Trump would surely pull back if he knew an innocent American’s life was at stake.”

Fortunately for the ex-president, North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un rebuffed the offer. “Our might is supreme,” Kim boasted. “We have no need for shields—human or otherwise. Mr. Carter, like all of my enemies, will die at a time and place of my choosing. Even those who to attempt to hide like my brother did will be found and killed by my unstoppable assassins.”

Twitter Blocks Candidate’s Mention of “Aborted Baby Parts”

A tweet from Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) that mentioned Planned Parenthood’s sales of aborted baby parts led to Twitter blocking a campaign ad in her bid for a US Senate seat in her state.

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey labeled Blackburn’s tweet “inflammatory and likely to evoke a strong negative reaction. On the one hand, there’s the woman who already has to deal with the emotionally difficult decision to terminate her pregnancy. Awareness that her baby might be cannibalized and sold for parts like a junked car would add unnecessary trauma to that decision.”

“On the other hand, there is potential financial damage to Planned Parenthood,” Dorsey continued. “If the notion spreads that babies aborted in their facilities could be chopped up and sold instead of being incinerated as hazardous waste, women might stop seeking the procedure from Planned Parenthood’s doctors. We cannot in good conscience allow our network to be used to inflict this kind of damage on this vital organization.”

In related news, Apple’s Vice President of Diversity Denise Young Smith apologized for publicly suggesting that diversity of thought is important. The apology followed a storm of left-wing criticism of her earlier remarks asserting that skin color wasn’t the sole criteria for achieving diversity. “Last week I made some comments as part of a conversation on the many factors that contribute to diversity and inclusion,” she said.

“My comments were not representative of how I think about diversity or how Apple sees it. I’m sorry.”

Housing a “Necessary Right” Says Congresswoman

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif) declared “it is everyone’s human right to have a suitable house to live in. Life, liberty and pursuit of happiness mean nothing if you don’t have a decent place to live.”

Waters demanded that Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson “implement a program that provides a house to everyone that needs it. For too long access to a decent home has depended on the ability of individuals to afford to pay for it and maintain it. This is an injustice when we have the means to solve this problem.”

Part of the Congresswoman’s reasoning cited “the fact that many rich people have more than one house or a bigger one than they need shows we have a housing surplus that could be redistributed or shared. We could take a big bite out of homelessness without having to spend any government money. If there are any homeless after the redistribution and sharing is put into effect then the government can build more and better than the crappy public project apartments that we foist on the poor. Why should they have to live in these crime infested slums?”

A Satirical Look at Recent News

John Semmens is a retired economist who has written a weekly political satire for The Arizona Conservative since 2005. He says working on his satires is one of the ways he tries to honor the liberties our Founding Fathers tried to protect.

Please do us a favor. If you use material created by The Arizona Conservative, give us credit and DO NOT change the context. Thank you.

By John Semmens — Semi-News — A Satirical Look at Recent News

Hollywood big shot Harvey Weinstein took a hint from his good friend Hillary Clinton and blamed a vast right-wing conspiracy for a recent New York Times article detailing his long history as a serial sexual harasser. Hurt that his generous donations to Democratic politicians and payoffs to his victims weren’t sufficient to suppress this information, the bloated movie mogul lamented that his reputation may have been “irretrievably damaged.”

“The unfairness of it all just boggles my mind,” Weinstein admitted. “Others have done far worse and come away smelling like a rose. Bill Clinton raped a woman and committed perjury, but is still admired enough to land half-million dollar speaking gigs. I never raped anyone. Why am I being singled out?”

A clue to Mr. Weinstein’s anomalous fate may have been Hillary’s offhand disparagement of his “measly $600,000 donation to the Clinton Foundation. Others have given much more. Harvey certainly had the means to give more. If he had I might not have suffered the injustice of being denied the presidency. Ironically, if I had won I could’ve pardoned Harvey and put this whole ugly episode behind us.”

In a bid to placate the women he has offended and curry favor with the courts, Weinstein vowed to “channel my anger by driving the NRA out of business” and reminded everyone that he is “making a movie about Trump that is so damning that he will resign in disgrace.” Whether either of these actions will deter lawyers in pursuit of monetary compensation for the aggrieved women Weinstein degraded seems doubtful.

In related news, Chelsea Clinton demanded that a court dismiss author Christopher Kimberley’s plagiarism lawsuit against her. Kimberley alleges that a significant portion of her children’s book She Persisted was based on content he shared with her publisher when he was attempting to sell his book idea. Clinton’s lawyers asserted that “first, Kimberley’s idea wasn’t copyrighted. Second, our client’s mother was the candidate that coined the phrase ‘she persisted’ during her recent unsuccessful run for the presidency. Third, the Clinton’s are one of this country’s foremost families. Their stature must supersede this little known writer’s claim that his 2013 bid for a book deal entitles him to compensation. Fourth, even if his idea was stolen, the statute of limitations for this alleged crime ought to rule out any legal action at this late date.”

Massacre in Vegas Spurs Gun Control Effort

Like clockwork, the murderous rampage in which a sniper shot more than 500 people, killing 58 of them, from a Las Vegas high-rise hotel last Sunday has inspired renewed calls for gun control legislation. Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-NY) called for “Republicans to join Democrats in order to pass legislation that will once-and-for-all disarm those who have no need for guns.”

From what we know about the alleged shooter it seems unlikely that any gun legislation would be effective in deterring this type of crime. After all, murder is already illegal and carries the most severe penalties under existing laws. A person willing to violate the law against murder does not seem likely to be deterred by adding a weapons violation, especially when mass killers usually are killed in shootouts with law enforcement officers or commit suicide. Another inconvenient fact is that some of the places in the US with the strictest gun control laws and very low rates of National Rifle Association (NRA) membership have disproportionately high rates of gun violence.

Facts and logic did not dissuade Schumer from accusing the NRA with complicity in gun-related deaths. “The NRA has bought the votes of congressmen who oppose reining-in this evil organization,” he argued. The Senator rebuffed “the right to bear arms” as “an obsolete concept. When the Second Amendment was adopted ordinary citizens needed firearms to hunt for food or to defend themselves when help was hours or days away. Well, everyone I know buys their food at a grocery store or restaurant. And with 911, help is only minutes away. The need for individuals to have personal arms just isn’t there anymore.”

Schumer hailed late night comedian Jimmy Kimmel as an example of how civilized people should behave. “He didn’t go out and buy himself a bunch of guns,” the Senator pointed out. “He just beefed up his armed security detail. Not only are the guns protecting Mr. Kimmel in the hands of trained professionals, he is also providing jobs for ex-military and retired police. I call that a win-win solution for America.”

While Schumer expressed outrage that the NRA would provide campaign contributions to legislators who oppose gun control he seemed unperturbed by Planned Parenthood donating to legislators who oppose abortion. Since 1973—the year the US Supreme Court created a universal right to abortion—there have been 1.5 million gun-related deaths vs. 55 million abortion-related deaths. Some of the gun-related deaths were accidental. Some were suicide. But all of the children killed by abortion were intentional homicide. Statistically, the votes “bought” to oppose abortion have taken a far greater toll on human lives than any votes “bought” by the NRA.

IRS Gives Contract to Equifax

Despite a hack of its database that exposed the personal information of 145 million of its customers, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) granted a no-bid $7.5 million contract to Equifax. Under the terms of the contract the company will handle the personal information of millions of taxpayers.

Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) called the contract “bad on so many levels. What kind of fool trusts a firm that has just experienced a huge data breach to handle more of the same kind of data? On top of this, the ‘no-bid’ process evades procurement guidelines calling for competitive bids from multiple firms. This is designed to ensure fairness and value for the taxpayers’ dollars. The no-bid option is only there for instances where there is only one possible source for providing the services requested. That clearly isn’t the case here.”

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) concurred with Grassley’s concerns, “the IRS lacks the cybersecurity needed to safeguard taxpayer information that most private corporations have. I would think that the demonstrated breach suffered by Equifax would make them, at least for the time being, an unqualified bidder. This deal smells.”

IRS Commissioner John Koskinen characterized the Senators’ fears as “overwrought. Our mission at the IRS is to maximize the revenue extracted from taxpayers. While we’d naturally prefer that personal data be secured from hackers it is not essential to our mission to achieve that level of security. We may have ‘bent’ the rules a bit with the no-bid contract, but I’d like to point out that this saved the IRS the trouble of having to scrutinize a bevy of competing firms and freed up internal resources to make them available for scrutinizing right-wing political groups seeking nonprofit status.”

Lawyer Says Dems Ordered Falsification of Records

Democratic National Committee IT aide Imran Awan has been indicted for bank fraud and is suspected of pilfering computer equipment and selling classified materials to the highest bidders. Aaron Page, one of his lawyers says that his Democratic congressional employers told him to falsify records in order to conceal how they were spending public funds.

The alleged falsification scheme entailed bogus invoices showing a expensive equipment incorrectly inventoried at under $500 in value, but with an attached “service plan” to compensate the vendor for the full cost of the item. Later these items frequently disappeared because items listed as under $500 in value are not as closely watched.
One of Awan’s employers, Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-NY), discovered that $120,000 worth of equipment went missing from her office. Rather then report a theft, her chief of staff quietly filed papers erasing any record of the equipment from the office inventory.

Clarke dismissed the controversy as “a minor matter. The government is a trillion dollars in the red every year. The total debt is twenty trillion. In that context, the fate of a piddling 120 thou is inconsequential. What we should be focusing on is the racism that is denying Colin Kaepernick his rightful place in the National Football League.”

Judge Bars Cooperation with Commission on Election Integrity

Judge Tim Sulak, a Democrat who serves on the 353rd District Court located in Travis County, Texas filed a restraining order blocking the Secretary of State from turning over voter registration information to President Donald Trump’s Advisory Commission on Election Integrity. Texas law requires the Secretary of State to release the information to any person or organization that fills out the form, pays the fee and signs an affidavit certifying that the information will not be used for commercial purposes.

In his ruling Sulak maintained that “the entire Trump Administration is nothing more that a gigantic marketing campaign to sell the deranged rantings of a megalomaniac as the legitimate policies of a duly elected government. This is obviously a commercial purpose. As such, I judge the affidavit as false and forbid the Secretary of State from cooperating in anyway with the Trump criminal conspiracy.”

Interestingly, the State of Texas has 12 counties in which there are more registered voters than there are adults. The Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF) notes that Texas is not unique in this regard. Their research found 248 counties in 24 states with similarly odd disparities.

Sulak insisted that “odd disparities don’t prove election fraud. Until fraud is proven I can see no legitimate grounds for permitting our state to participate in Trump’s witch hunt.”

A Satirical Look at Recent News
John Semmens is a retired economist who has written a weekly political satire for The Arizona Conservative since 2005. He says working on his satires is one of the ways he tries to honor the liberties our Founding Fathers tried to protect.

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