Topic #1
Virginia’s attempt at gun control has brought about 2nd amendment sanctuary counties and local militias. I see this happening in many states throughout the upcoming year.
A few facts:
1. There were 600,000 deer hunters in Wisconsin this year. That number would make them the 8th largest army in the world. Larger than Iran. More than France & Germany combined.
2. Michigan had 700,000 deer hunters. Pennsylvania had 750,000. West Virginia had another 250,000.
3. Those 4 states alone would make up the largest army in the world.
4. The number of hunters in Texas alone would be the largest standing army in the world all by itself.
The point? Japanese Admiral Yamamoto was asked during WWII “Why did the Japanese not invade the US? His answer was, “Behind every blade of grass in the US is an American with a gun.”
The 2nd amendment is a matter of national defense.
Would you support gun confiscation laws such as those proposed in Virginia?
If not, would you support 2nd amendment sanctuary counties in Missouri and the formation of local militias if necessary?
2nd topic:
A continuum of criticism of Capitalism, glorification of Socialism, & climate change hysteria getting even worse than in 2019 as the year 2020 moves along toward the political conventions.
Democrats don’t want to be labeled as socialists, but the ideology is popular enough among some Democratic voters to become an important point of debate this election cycle. A 2018 Gallup poll found that most Democrats had a positive view of socialism, while less than half of young Americans between ages 18 to 29 had a positive view of capitalism.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has continuously rejected the socialist label for the democratic party. She argued in an interview with “60 Minutes” that Democratic lawmakers “know that we have to hold the center.” She added that if people in her party support socialism, “that’s their view. That is not the view of the Democratic Party.”
At least 46 democratic socialists running in the 2018 midterms won their primaries, while others were elected to public office in various local jurisdictions. Three democratic socialists won alderman positions in Chicago’s elections earlier this year, and most recently Tiffany Cabán ran a successful primary campaign for Queens District Attorney in New York.
So, while some centrist Democrats continue to distance themselves from democratic socialists, the party’s far left base sees an opportunity to keep winning in 2020.
It is this grass roots, ground up movement that needs to be watched.
3rd topic:
Donald Trump ordered an airstrike that killed Iran’s most powerful general in the early hours of Friday, January 3rd.
Qassem Suleimani was hit by the drone strike while local allies from the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF) drove him from Baghdad airport. The leader of the PMF, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, a close Suleimani associate, was also killed in the attack.
“General Suleimani was actively developing plans to attack American diplomats and service members in Iraq and throughout the region,” a Pentagon statement said. “This strike was aimed at deterring future Iranian attack plans.”
The strike came at a time when Iraq was already on the brink of an all-out proxy war, and hours after a two-day siege of the US embassy in Baghdad by a mob of PMF militants and their supporters.
That siege followed US airstrikes on camps run by a PMF-affiliated militia particularly closely aligned with Tehran, which in turn was a reprisal for that militia’s killing of a US contractor in an attack on an Iraqi army base on Friday.
The US Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, said Trump had “tossed a stick of dynamite into a tinderbox”. His fellow Democratic hopefuls Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders warned the attack could spark a disastrous new war in the Middle East.
What are your thoughts. Was Trump justified in taking out this Iranian General?
4th topic:
Major shake-ups and surprises in the Democrat presidential sweepstakes early-on in 2020 and playing out before the Democrat National Convention.
1884: “Rum, Romanism and Rebellion”
In 1884, James G. Blaine, the Republican presidential nominee from Maine, attended a GOP meeting in October when a Presbyterian minister named Dr. Samuel Buchard accused the Democrats of representing “rum, Romanism, and rebellion” — that is, alcohol, Catholics, and the Confederacy.
Blaine didn’t object, a silence he later claimed was because either couldn’t hear the comment or wasn’t paying attention. But that didn’t matter: the public furor that followed cost Blaine thousands of votes from anti-prohibitionists, Roman Catholic immigrants, and southerners. The comment energized Irish voters in New York to vote against Blaine in droves, likely costing him the state—and with it, the election which Grover Cleveland won.
1980: Iran Holds Carter’s Campaign Hostage
In the Carter-Reagan election, October Surprises entered the world of conspiracy theories. As the story goes, Ronald Reagan was worried that a last-minute deal to release the American hostages in Iran would give President Jimmy Carter the support he needed to win reelection. Then, days before U.S. voters cast their ballots, Iran announced that the it would not release the hostages until after the election.
Allegations quickly took root over the cause of Iran’s statement. Jack Anderson of the Washington Post claimed that President Carter had been planning a military operation to save the hostages, hoping it would save him the election. Others alleged that Ronald Reagan had made a secret deal with the Iranians to postpone the hostage release and rob Jimmy Carter of victory.
That November, Reagan defeated Carter, and Iran continued to hold 52 Americans hostage, releasing them mere minutes after Ronald Reagan completed his inaugural address in January 1981. Political figures and hostages themselves demanded a probe into the timing of the incident, but Congress didn’t bite until later, when two congressional investigations found no evidence of a conspiracy between Reagan and Iran.
2000: George W. Bush’s DUI
George W. Bush and Al Gore were tied in national polls in the days leading up to the 2000 presidential election, but then Fox News Channel broke the biggest scandal of Bush’s campaign: 24 years earlier, Bush had been arrested for drunk-driving in Maine.
Though the Bush campaign told reporters that the incident was so long ago that it would do little to change voters’ minds, ten years later, Bush strategist Karl Rove wrote that he believes the scandal cost Bush five states. Though many would question that math—Rove believes that without the DUI news, Bush would have won the popular vote and the mess in Florida would have been avoided.
5th Topic: Education. I see a movement by the states to push for more trade schools, charter schools and home schooling in the upcoming year.
The Trump administration renewed its push for school choice on Thursday with a proposal to provide $5 billion a year in federal tax credits for donations made to groups offering scholarships for private schools, apprenticeships and other educational programs.
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos unveiled the plan as a “bold proposal” to give students more choices without diverting money from public schools.
“What’s missing in education today is at the core of what makes America truly great: freedom,” DeVos said. “Kids should be free to learn where and how it works for them.”
Legislation for the tax credits is being introduced by Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Rep. Bradley Byrne, R-Ala.