Brutal: Examining Ocasio-Cortez’s Painful Answer on Funding Her Socialist Utopia

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As we flagged on Friday, media sensation and instant lefty icon Alexandria Ocasio Cortez appeared on the Daily Show last week, where she was confronted with a relatively simple question by host Trevor Noah. Ocasio Cortez is campaigning on a laundry list of new government programs and entitlements, including “Medicare for All,” free college, and a “universal jobs guarantee.” But how does she intend to pay for for this calorie-exploding buffet of government largesse? Her response to that fundamental challenge was a bit of a jumbled mess, to put it rather mildly:

After muttering some words about “back of the envelope” calculations and touting a discussion with a Nobel Prize-winning economist, she exclaimed that if wealthy people and corporations would just pay their “fair share,” her dreams could become realities. What was remarkable about her answer was not that she deployed standard-issue Democratic talking points invoking Warren Buffett’s secretary; you could abruptly wake virtually any left-of-center political figure from a deep sleep and quiz them about long term federal debt, and he or she would groggily start mumbling and “fairness.” No, what was most interesting about AOC’s reply was how simultaneously honest and incoherent it was. She proposes “reversing” the tax reform law, which would result in a $2 trillion tax increase on families and businesses. The economy is booming in large measure because job creators have finally been afforded precious certainty, and because America’s grossly uncompetitive corporate tax rates were made much more competitive. Meanwhile, millions of Americans are feeling better about their economic conditions because they have more disposable income, thanks to an across-the-board lowering of the federal tax burden, across all income groups. AOC wants to undo that progress and apply the additional revenue toward government programs.

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Ocasio Cortez’s idea is to reduce spending on the military…in order to vastly expand already-troubled healthcare and retirement programs. The math doesn’t even come close to adding up. Defenders of Cortez’s socialist vision have responded to these inconvenient realities by contending that other western nations manage to pull of government-run healthcare, so we make it work — or by flatly stating that specifics aside, we’ll somehow find a way to finance the scheme:

(Read more from “Brutal: Examining Ocasio-Cortez’s Painful Answer on Funding Her Socialist Utopia” HERE)

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Major U.S. City Terminates Contract With ICE

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Caving to progressive demands, the city of Philadelphia announced it is ending a major contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement sharing real-time arrest information. . .

The information, contained in Philadelphia’s Preliminary Arraignment Reporting System (PARS), alerts authorities when new arrests are made, and includes arrestee’s full names, countries of origin, and Social Security numbers. While PARS does not indicate immigration status, Democrats charged that ICE nevertheless abused the database to investigate potential immigration violations.

Anyone who interacts with law enforcement is entered into the database, including those who are arrested, victims and witnesses, with some limits on what ICE officers can view. (FoxNews.com)

“I cannot in good conscience allow the agreement to continue,” Democratic Mayor Jim Kenney, who celebrated the city’s sanctuary status last month, told the Philadelphia Inquirer. “We’re not going to provide them with information so they can go out and round people up.” . . .

[I]n a statement to Fox News, ICE officials reiterated that the agency had not breached its agreement with Philadelphia in any way, including by engaging in racial profiling or accessing information without the city’s approval. They added that they were “deeply disappointed” in the city’s decision, saying the city had not pointed to any specific instances of alleged misconduct by ICE.

(Read more from “Major U.S. City Terminates Contract With ICE” HERE)

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Man Steals Border Patrol ATV After Knocking Agent off It With Rock. So Agents Pull out Their Guns.

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By The Blaze. A man reportedly brought a rock to gun fight with Border Patrol agents — and wasn’t terribly successful in the end.

San Diego police said the man — believed to be 19 years old — was stopped by agents in an area known as Spooner’s Mesa near the U.S.-Mexico border around 2:30 a.m. Sunday, KSWB-TV reported.

Police said a fight broke out and an agent was knocked off his ATV with a rock, the station reported, adding that the suspect jumped on the agent’s ATV and took off.

A pursuit ensued but soon ended when the suspect lost control of the ATV, crashed into a fence, and was taken into custody, KSWB reported.

During the incident, at least two agents fired their weapons at the suspect and hit him at least once, the station said. The suspect was taken to a hospital for treatment of a gunshot wound that wasn’t believed to be life-threatening, police told KSWB. (Read more from “Man Steals Border Patrol ATV After Knocking Agent off It With Rock. So Agents Pull out Their Guns.” HERE)

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Border Patrol Shoots Teen Suspected of Throwing Rock, Stealing Agent’s ATV

By Fox 5. A man is accused of hitting a Border Patrol agent with a rock and stealing his ATV before he was shot by agents and arrested near the Tijuana River estuary early Sunday.

The man was taken to a hospital for treatment of a gunshot injury, which was not believed to be life-threatening, police said.

The incident began around 2:30 a.m. in an area known as Spooner’s Mesa, between the US-Mexico border and Monument Road, San Diego police Homicide Captain Thomas Underwood said. “In the course of that contact a fight ensued, and an agent was knocked off his ATV with a rock. The suspect then jumped onto the agent’s ATV and a pursuit ensued where the suspect eventually lost control, crashed and was taken into custody. During the incident at least two border patrol agents fired their weapons at the suspect.” (Read more from “Border Patrol Shoots Teen Suspected of Throwing Rock, Stealing Agent’s ATV” HERE)

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Trump Asked If He Has a ‘Red Line’ on Border Funding — His Response Invokes Obama

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By The Daily Caller. President Trump answered tough questions about his border wall and immigration plan Monday at the White House during a joint press conference with Italian Prime Minister Giuesppe Conte. . .

“Are you saying you would be willing to shut the government down in September if it does not fully fund $25 billion for the border wall and also deliver the immigration priorities that you listed in your tweet? Or are you leaving some room for negotiation there?” [Saagar] Enjeti asked. Earlier Monday, Trump threatened shutting down the government in a tweet:

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As a follow up, Enjeti asked “Is the $25 billion a red line for you?” The Trump administration is requesting $25 billion for the creation of a border wall.

Trump took the opportunity to dunk on his predecessor President Obama in the response.

“I have no red line unlike President Obama. I just want great border security. Okay?” Trump said. (Read more from “Trump Asked If He Has a ‘Red Line’ on Border Funding — His Response Invokes Obama” HERE)

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Trump Praises Italy’s Immigration Policies

By Reuters. U.S. President Donald Trump praised Italy’s increasingly hard-line approach to immigration on Monday, at the start of a meeting with Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte at the White House.

“I agree very much with what you are doing with respect to migration, and illegal immigration, and even legal immigration,” Trump told Conte in the Oval Office. “He has taken a very firm stance on the border, a stance that few countries have taken. And frankly he is doing the right thing in my opinion.”

Conte took office last month promising to bring radical change to Italy, including more generous welfare provision and a crackdown on immigration.

Immigration was a major election issue after an influx of hundreds of thousands of mostly African asylum seekers. Italy has seen more than 650,000 migrants reach its shores since 2014.

Conte has said his government would end “the immigration business.” (Read more from “Trump Praises Italy’s Immigration Policies” HERE)

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Kavanaugh Has His Most Important Meeting yet for the Supreme Court

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Judge Brett Kavanaugh met with Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia for 90 minutes Monday, his first private interview with a Democratic lawmaker since his nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Manchin, who is standing for re-election this November in a state President Donald Trump won by 40 percentage points, pressed the judge on health care, as another challenge to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) advances through federal courts.

“Judge Kavanaugh and I had a productive meeting and talked about his experience, record and a variety of issues that will impact West Virginians, including his views on healthcare,” Manchin said after the interview. He noted another challenge to the ACA is currently advancing through the federal courts, which could imperil insurance coverage for some 800,000 of his constituents with pre-existing conditions.

Kavanaugh’s record with the ACA is somewhat complex. He was openly hostile to the law’s contraception mandate in a 2015 decision, arguing it placed a substantial burden on the rights of religious dissenters. However, in a 2011 opinion he declined to strike the ACA down, instead finding that the case before him should be dismissed for technical reasons.

In arguing for dismissal, Kavanaugh maintained that the ACA’s individual mandate — which requires people to obtain health insurance or pay a penalty — qualified as a tax for purposes of a federal law called the Anti-Injunction Act. One year later, a five-justice majority on the Supreme Court also concluded the mandate was a tax, but on different grounds than Kavanaugh. (Read more from “Kavanaugh Has His Most Important Meeting yet for the Supreme Court” HERE)

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Police Refused to Help ICE Agents Who Called 911

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Portland, Oregon, police refused to respond to at least two 911 emergency calls from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) employees inside their offices where violent protesters held week-long demonstrations.

The National Immigration and Customs Enforcement Council, a union representing ICE employees, wrote a cease-and-desist letter to Mayor Ted Wheeler, asking him to ensure the police enforce the law equally and protect innocent people.

“Your current policy forbidding Portland law enforcement agencies from assisting employees of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency who request law enforcement assistance while at or away from work is a violation of the United States Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause,” the letter says.

Demonstrators, some affiliated with the domestic terrorist organization Antifa, set up a city of tents outside the ICE offices. After setting up camp, they became violent and incited violence several times.

“Every person in law enforcement knows there are few things as dangerous or as unpredictable than an angry mob,”said Chris Crane, president of the national union, WWeek reported Monday. “No one could have responded quickly enough to protect our employees who were trapped inside this building. All of this because the Mayor of Portland has a beef with the president of the United States.” (Read more from “Police Refused to Help ICE Agents Who Called 911, Agents Say” HERE)

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Nunes Sends Ominous Warning About What Was Really Redacted in FISA Documents

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By The Daily Caller. House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes claimed Sunday that the American public will be “shocked” when it sees the remaining blacked out portions of the FBI’s applications for spy warrants against former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.

“We are quite confident that once the American people see these 20 pages, at least for those that will get real reporting on this issue, they will be shocked by what’s in that FISA application,” Nunes said in an interview with Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo.

Nunes’ comments raise expectations about what information remains hidden behind 20-plus pages of the FBI’s fourth and final application for a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant against Page. . .

Nunes and his fellow Republicans on the Intelligence Committee asked President Donald Trump in a June 14 letter to declassify 21 pages from the final FISA application, which was signed by deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.

The unredacted portions of the applications confirmed much of what has already been made public through two memos released earlier this year by Republicans and Democrats on the House Intelligence panel. (Read more from “Nunes Sends Ominous Warning About What Was Really Redacted in FISA Documents” HERE)

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FBI, DOJ Stalling, Hoping GOP Loses House in Midterms, Rep. Nunes Says

By Fox Business. President Trump’s team is likely reviewing requests to declassify parts of the heavily-redacted Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) application used by the FBI to obtain a warrant to surveil former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page during the 2016 election.

“I think his lawyers are looking at this to see if they can declassify it sooner rather than later,” said House Intelligence Committee chair Devin Nunes, R-Calif., during an interview on “Sunday Morning Futures.” “But the sooner this comes out, the better off we all are because what I’ve said is what’s left that’s redacted, the American people really need to know what’s underneath it.”

Nunes, who along with his team sent a letter to the White House in June asking for just 20 pages of the FISA application to be declassified, remarked that he is unsure whether Trump himself has read the committee’s document, but added that Americans “will be shocked by what’s in that FISA application” if they look at the pages that could become declassified. The California Republican said the 20 pages contain the “bulk” of what the committee wants to see, though he wouldn’t be opposed to the release of even more declassified material from the application. (Read more from “FBI, DOJ Stalling, Hoping GOP Loses House in Midterms, Rep. Nunes Says” HERE)

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U.S. Cardinal Steps Down Amid Mushrooming Sex Abuse Scandal

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Pope Francis on Saturday accepted the resignation of Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, one of the U.S. Catholic Church’s most prominent figures who has been at the centre of a widening sexual abuse scandal.

McCarrick, 88, the former archbishop of Washington, D.C., is the first cardinal in living memory to lose his red hat and title. Other cardinals who have been disciplined in sexual abuse scandals kept their membership in the College of Cardinals and their honorific “your eminence”.

The allegations against McCarrick, which first surfaced publicly last month, came with Francis facing an image crisis on a second front, in Chile, where a growing abuse scandal has enveloped the Church in the Latin American country. . .

McCarrick’s sudden fall from grace stunned the American Church because he was a widely respected leader for decades and a confidant of popes and presidents. . .

Since then, another minor has come forward with allegations that McCarrick abused him when he was 11 years old, and several men have come forward to allege that McCarrick forced them to sleep with him at a beach house in New Jersey when they were adult seminarians studying for the priesthood. (Read more from “U.S. Cardinal Steps Down Amid Mushrooming Sex Abuse Scandal” HERE)

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First Academy Football Player Declares He’s Homosexual; Military in Complete Support; But Does He Shower Separately?

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Bradley Kim, a defensive back at the Air Force Academy, announced on Friday that he is gay. Kim, who shared his story on his Instagram account and through an interview with OutSports, is the first active player at a service academy to publicly come out.

“The biggest reason I want to share this is to be able to reach people who are in similar situations struggling with the same things I have struggled with,” Kim told OutSports. “I want to be that example for kids that you can be gay, you can pursue your dreams, and you can have an athletic career. . .

Jeremiah 29:11🙏🏽 God made me this way for a reason. I did not think this day would ever come, but I’ve finally reached the point where I am comfortable and confident enough with myself to say that I am gay. It’s been a long road to get to this point and I definitely would not be here without the love and support of my amazing family, teammates and coaches here at the academy, and my equally amazing friends. I feel blessed to have such receptive and understanding people in my life. I hope that I can serve as an example to those who are allowing their fear of acceptance to change who they are. I almost gave up my dream of playing division 1 football for fear of not being accepted by everyone, but today I am happy to say that I am a cadet at the Air Force Academy playing the sport I love with amazing people standing behind me and supporting me. If anyone feels like they don’t have a voice or feel like they are alone, just know there are plenty of people out there like you and me, and more that are willing to talk to you about it. God bless all and thank you to everyone who has made me feel comfortable to live my most genuine life.🙏🏽 Twitter/Instagram: @bradleykkim [email protected]

A post shared by Brad (@bradleykkim) on

Before going public with his story, Kim, a safety for the Falcons, informed his fellow defensive backs and received a standing ovation in response.

According to OutSports, Kim had previously come out to his parents and various other Air Force teammates and coaches, all to responses of complete support. The Air Force Academy provided a statement to the Colorado Springs Gazette that said, “The academy strives to foster a culture where everyone gives and receives dignity and respect so that each individual has the opportunity to fulfill their potential.” (Read more from “First Academy Football Player Declares He’s Homosexual; Military in Complete Support; But Does He Shower Separately?” HERE)

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Trump Claims He Has Highest Poll Numbers in the History of the Republican Party

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By Daily Wire. . .The president doesn’t name the poll or polls referenced in the tweet, nor does he elaborate in subsequent tweets.

According to a New York Times chart compiled using data from Gallup, President Trump’s approval among Republicans is indeed quite high, sitting at roughly 90%. However, at this point in his presidency, he still falls well below George W. Bush, who saw an incredible increase in support following the 9/11 terror attacks.

Moreover, as many other media outlets are reporting, reliable presidential approval polling doesn’t appear to stretch any further back than Harry Truman, who became president in April of 1945 following the death of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Election polling by Gallup appears to go back to 1936. (Read more from “Trump Claims He Has Highest Poll Numbers in the History of the Republican Party” HERE)

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Trump Backers Stand by President in Face of Russia Criticism — CBS Poll

By CBS News. Nearly all Americans say Russian meddling in the 2018 midterm elections would be unacceptable, even if their party was the beneficiary of any interference. But the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 campaign remains a divisive political issue, with Republicans more likely to doubt the FBI and U.S. intelligence agencies and more likely to back the president, a new CBS News poll found.

Half of Republicans say that hearing criticisms of President Trump on the Russia issue makes them want to defend him more. Another 42 percent say they want to wait to see what the facts show.

Seventy percent of Republicans call the Russia investigation a “witch hunt,” while Democrats call it a “critical” matter of national security (77 percent). Democrats, however, say they believe the issue speaks to the president’s character (79 percent) as well as national security, but Republicans disagree, seeing it as a deliberate attempt to slow the president’s agenda (81 percent) and feeling he is facing more resistance from the political establishment than other presidents have (86 percent). (Read more from “Trump Backers Stand by President in Face of Russia Criticism — CBS Poll” HERE)

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