{"id":104098,"date":"2022-08-23T17:54:18","date_gmt":"2022-08-23T21:54:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thedailygouge.com\/?p=104098"},"modified":"2022-08-23T17:54:23","modified_gmt":"2022-08-23T21:54:23","slug":"the-daily-gouge-archive-monday-august-22nd-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thedailygouge.com\/?p=104098","title":{"rendered":"The Daily Gouge Archive, Monday, August 22nd, 2022"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s Monday, August 22nd, 2022…but before we begin…Jim Geraghty calls our attention to…<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Remarkable Apathy about Biden-Family Corruption<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/h1>\n

\u2018Ten Percent for the Big Guy<\/span><\/a>\u2019<\/span><\/h3>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

“Ira Stoll, writing\u00a0in the\u00a0New York Sun\u00a0a few days ago<\/a><\/span><\/em><\/span>:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

America may not realize it, but it has the upper hand.<\/span> Even China\u2019s own bogus economic data show high unemployment and slowing economic growth there. It turns out that communism doesn\u2019t work<\/em><\/span>.<\/span> Goldwater was correct.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

A weaker American position will only fuel suspicions of corruption \u2014 \u201c10 percent for the big guy.\u201d Why are the Chinese Communists so desperate to buy off American elites?<\/span> Because on some basic level, deep down, they know the truth is Goldwater was right. Communism is<\/em><\/span> beyond hope.<\/span> The Communist Party in China, like the Soviet one before it, is just buying time until the eventual ineluctable reckoning with freedom.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

There is a remarkable national lack of curiosity about that message, \u201c10 percent for the big guy.\u201d<\/span> If I said to you that a company that was effectively controlled by the Chinese government paid Hunter Biden almost $5 million for vaguely defined \u201cconsulting\u201d and legal work, wouldn\u2019t that bother you? Even if you\u2019re a loyal Democrat \u2014 even if you were so progressive you\u2019re to the left of Bernie Sanders \u2014 do you\u00a0want<\/em><\/span>\u00a0members of president\u2019s family to get in bed with the Chinese government*?<\/span> (*I know, I know: Insert an Eric Swalwell joke here.)<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

There is no argument on any part of the American political spectrum that it is\u00a0good<\/em><\/span>\u00a0for the kids (or siblings!<\/em>)<\/span> of politicians to cash in on their parents\u2019 connections by accepting fortunes from hostile foreign states.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

…Once again, it seems fair to ask just what Hunter Biden offered a de facto Chinese government entity that would justify paying him nearly $5 million. For those who want to say it was his expertise and insight, keep in mind,\u00a0according to Hunter Biden\u2019s own memoir<\/a><\/em><\/span>, \u201cFrom 2016 to 2019, Hunter Biden\u2019s life was a mess.<\/span> He and his wife divorced, and he drank and smoked crack just about every day.\u201d The president\u2019s son characterizes this time as \u201cI was smoking crack every 15 minutes.\u201d<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The only<\/em><\/span> value that Hunter Biden could possibly<\/em><\/span> have to the Chinese government was as a conduit to his father<\/em><\/span>. No one in their right mind<\/em><\/span> saw Hunter Biden as a financial genius or an astute analyst.<\/span> He was the former vice president and potential future president\u2019s severely<\/em><\/span> screwed-up man-child who was desperate for cash<\/em><\/span> \u2014 exactly<\/em><\/span> the sort of target that Chinese foreign-influence operations desired.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

And as the\u00a0Post\u00a0<\/em>reported, the Chinese reached out to Hunter Biden when everyone could see he was in dire straits:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

During divorce proceedings with his wife Kathleen, a court filing in the case described \u201coutstanding debts [that] are shocking and overwhelming,\u201d with the couple carrying maxed-out credit cards, double mortgages on both properties they owned and a tax debt of $313,970. Three checks to their housekeeper had bounced, and they owed money to medical providers and therapists, according to a February 2017 filing in D.C. Superior Court.<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

An intermediary from CEFC initially reached out to Hunter Biden in December 2015 to set up a meeting between the then-vice president\u2019s son and Ye Jianming, the founder and chairman of the Chinese firm, according to\u00a0verified emails<\/a><\/em><\/span>\u00a0from a purported copy of the laptop hard drive reviewed by the outside experts for The Post.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

What do you<\/span><\/em> think the Chinese government wanted from Hunter Biden that was worth millions of dollars?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

…In November, Xi Jinping will travel to the G-20 Summit in Bali, Indonesia, and is expected to have his first in-person meeting with Joe Biden since Biden was elected president. What kind of thoughts will go through Xi\u2019s mind, when he sits across the table from the American president?<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI can roll<\/span> this guy\u201d? \u201cI can buy<\/span> this guy\u201d?<\/span> \u201cI\u2019ve got leverage<\/span> over this guy\u201d?<\/em><\/strong><\/span>“<\/p>\n

We’re going with “This guy is bought and paid for<\/em><\/span>!”<\/strong><\/p>\n

Here’s the juice: Whenever a politician or bureaucrat enacts a policy or makes a decision which leads you scratching your head, just follow the money<\/em><\/span>!!!\u00a0 It’s how a career politician never earning much money affords a multi-million dollar beach house in Delaware.<\/strong><\/p>\n

As had been noted by one relatively incorruptible American of note:<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

As we noted this past Friday of Joe Manchin’s inexplicable reversal on the manifestly misnomered Inflation Reduction Act, “the question isn\u2019t\u00a0whether<\/em><\/span>\u00a0Manchin has been bought off, only\u00a0how much<\/em><\/span>\u00a0it took,\u00a0when<\/em><\/span>\u00a0the payoff will be made and in\u00a0what form<\/em><\/span>\u00a0it will come.\u00a0 On one thing you can depend: The payoff will benefit Manchin<\/em><\/span>…<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

…not<\/em><\/span> the good citizens of West Virginia, leaving the rest of us, along with our descendants, to foot the bill.\u00a0 We’d like to think some Republicans like Tom Cotton, Jim Jordan and those similarly concerned more with the country than their bank accounts are different, but unfortunately there’s not enough of them.\u00a0 And Kevin McCarthy, if you’ll check his record, ain’t one of ’em.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Now, here’s The Gouge<\/em>!<\/strong><\/p>\n

First up, since we’re on the subject of corruption, Andy McCarthy recounts…<\/strong><\/p>\n

What Mike Pence Gets Wrong about the FBI<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/h1>\n
\n

The bureau can still be a valuable force for good, but not if we close our eyes to its very real, serious flaws<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/h3>\n<\/section>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

“S<\/strong><\/span><\/span>o<\/span>\u00a0. . . does Mike Pence think Mike Horowitz should stop criticizing the FBI?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Does the former vice president believe the lives of those he this week called the \u201cbrave men and women who stand on the thin blue line<\/a><\/em><\/span>\u201d at the bureau have been put at risk by the hundreds of pages of reports (see, e.g.,\u00a0here<\/a><\/span><\/em><\/span>,\u00a0here<\/a><\/span><\/em><\/span>,\u00a0here<\/a><\/span><\/em><\/span>,\u00a0here<\/a><\/span><\/em><\/span>,\u00a0here<\/a><\/span><\/em><\/span>,\u00a0here<\/a><\/em><\/span>,\u00a0here<\/a><\/span><\/em><\/span>,\u00a0here<\/a><\/em><\/span>,\u00a0here<\/a><\/em><\/span>, and\u00a0here<\/a><\/em><\/span>) in which Horowitz, the Justice Department\u2019s own inspector general, has scalded the bureau for serial abuses of its national-security surveillance powers, shocking political bias, lying under oath to investigators, leaking investigative information, usurping the authority of federal prosecutors, petty corruption, and so on?<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Or perhaps Pence thinks that it is the federal judges of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) who have imperiled the lives of FBI agents? In late 2016, the judges lambasted the bureau for its institutional \u201clack of candor.\u201d<\/span> They weren\u2019t referring to the FBI\u2019s misconduct in connection with that year\u2019s election \u2014 that<\/em><\/span> rebuke would come later. Instead, they were exasperated by the bureau\u2019s years of systematically flouting restrictions on its surveillance authority and misrepresenting the scope of that illegality to the court \u2014 with the result that millions of innocent Americans were swept into its national-security monitoring.<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

…As someone who criticizes the FBI out of reverence for the institution and what it should be, I no longer believe the bureau can get its priorities straight. We have to be honest: Things are headed in the wrong direction.<\/span> Over the last decade, as it took on the cast of a spy agency, the bureau returned to its Hooverian roots, becoming enmeshed in politics and serving a partisan agenda \u2014 inevitably that of the Democratic Party because Democrats are the party of government and the bureau knows where its bread is buttered. There is a reason the FBI, taking cues from its political masters, now translates the term\u00a0domestic terrorism<\/em><\/span>\u00a0to mean\u00a0the right-wing extremism of white supremacists<\/em><\/span>, even as left-wing radicals and the criminals they coddle destroy America\u2019s cities<\/span><\/em>.<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Funny, but I don\u2019t recall Vice President Pence\u2019s being a ferocious defender of the FBI while his boss, to whom he was the very model of obsequiousness, spent four years attacking it. If he gave a \u201cNow, now, Mr. President, let\u2019s not throw out the thin-blue-line baby with the Hoover Headquarters bathwater,\u201d I\u2019m afraid I missed it.<\/span> But if he really<\/em><\/span> thinks that negative criticism of the FBI, on the current record, is a form of dangerous incitement, then he has no business running for president<\/em><\/span>.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve never been a big Pence fan, glad as I am that he showed backbone in resisting a hare-brained election-theft scheme that he had to know had no chance of success.<\/span> I genuinely admire the unflinching courage he exhibited during the Capitol riot, but politically he has always seemed more opportunistic than courageous to me. He is, in any event, a wonky good-governance type, so I\u2019d have thought he\u2019d be familiar with the criticisms of the FBI raised by the Justice Department and the federal courts, which address a depth of malfeasance well beyond<\/em><\/span> a few bad apples in the front office.<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

And does he actually believe that saying \u201cDefund the FBI\u201d is the same as saying \u201cDefund the Police\u201d? The FBI is not a safe-streets police force.<\/span> It is mainly designed to counter sophisticated criminal syndicates that operate across state or national borders; its best work is deliberate and analytical, not instant and reactive policing. Defunding the police destroys communities; no one calls the FBI when a store gets robbed or an old lady gets mugged \u2014 they call the police, and they complain that if police were on the beat the neighborhood would be safe.<\/span> If the FBI\u2019s budget were zeroed out (a bad idea, to be clear) while municipal police forces were fully funded and encouraged to enforce the laws (a good idea), crime would be reduced dramatically<\/span><\/em>.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The FBI can still be a valuable force for good, but not<\/em><\/span> if we close our eyes and swallow our tongues regarding its problems.<\/span> I believe it must be converted strictly<\/em><\/span> into a federal law-enforcement agency, one that sticks to investigating serious crime and assisting the Justice Department in prosecuting it. Though that\u2019s a hard job, it\u2019s one the FBI can still do well.<\/span> But the bureau should get out of domestic security and foreign counterintelligence. Those missions should be transferred to an intelligence agency that has no police powers<\/em><\/span> \u2014 one that has liaison with law-enforcement agencies but does not<\/em><\/span> do law enforcement, one that is bound to honor the Constitution<\/em><\/span> in its domestic operations and subjected to exacting oversight<\/em><\/span>.<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

You may think that is the right way to go, or you may think I\u2019ve misdiagnosed the problem. But you\u2019d be hard-pressed to deny that there\u00a0is<\/em>\u00a0a problem \u2014 and to be solved, problems have to be confronted.<\/span> In a functioning free society, sensible people do not shrink from addressing serious challenges just because doing so might provoke the\u00a0most irrational of their fellow citizens<\/a><\/em><\/span>. In a functioning free society, violence is aggressively prosecuted,\u00a0regardless of the -ism that motivates it<\/a><\/em><\/span>, and the specter of violence isn\u2019t allowed to become a shield against accountability.<\/span> Mike Pence should<\/em><\/span> know that.<\/strong><\/span>“<\/p>\n

He undoubtedly\u00a0does<\/em><\/span>…which makes his defense of the indefensible even more unforgivable, and is in part why he garners such little support in our current poll at the top right of the page.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Next, NRO<\/em>‘s Kevin Williamson provides the latest on…<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Left\u2019s Opt-In Totalitarianism<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/h1>\n

Pressuring your opponents into silence doesn\u2019t make their views disappear<\/span><\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/h3>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

“H<\/strong><\/span><\/span>ere\u2019s<\/span>\u00a0a remarkable \u2014 stupid, awful, ghastly \u2014 document of our times: A group calling itself Physicians for Reproductive Health has published an open letter to the nation\u2019s reporters and news editors, demanding that they pretend anti-abortion activists do not exist.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The group writes:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

We are writing today with a big request: stop giving air-time to anti-abortion activists. . . . We know your reporting standards are to cover \u201cboth sides\u201d of any debate.<\/span> Allow us to be clear: Medicine and science are not up for debate. Health care is not a matter of opinion, it is a matter of fact.<\/span> And the fact is, abortion is not in the realm of theory or belief. Abortion belongs in health care, social services, and public health reporting.<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

With this in mind, we are asking for a commitment from the community of media outlets reporting on abortion to keep in mind the true danger that you present when interviewing anti-abortion extremists. You are giving the opportunity for dangerous lies to spread.<\/span> You are, by way of asking them questions, legitimizing their answers. You are allowing hateful, dangerous harassers to build a base that encourages protesting at clinics, stalking and harming clinic staff and abortion providers, and online and in-person abuse of people who have abortions and those who support them in getting that care.<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

This is mad and foolish in several ways.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

For one thing, medicine and science are, in fact, \u201cup for debate,\u201d and health care is, in fact, very often a \u201cmatter of opinion.\u201d<\/span> Hence the ubiquity of such expressions as, \u201cIn my medical opinion\u201d and \u201cget a second opinion.\u201d Debate is essential to science.<\/span> This point may seem<\/em><\/span> an obvious and trivial one, but it apparently<\/em><\/span> needs repeating.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

For another thing, the status of abortion is a matter of ethical and political debate, not scientific debate.<\/span> There isn\u2019t much scientific debate about what happens in the course of a typical abortion: A living individual organism<\/em><\/span> of the species\u00a0Homo sapiens<\/em>\u00a0is destroyed<\/em><\/span> at an early stage of development. Scientists, pro-lifers, and honest abortion advocates mostly agree about that.<\/span> The question is whether it matters, and, if it does matter, whether it matters in a way that ought to make it subject to legal regulation \u2014 as, indeed, it is in practically every decently governed nation on this Earth: At the moment, Switzerland and France have more restrictive abortion regulations than do New Jersey and California. There is<\/em><\/span> a rumor afoot that they have scientists and doctors in Europe, too.<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

…<\/span>Of course, Physicians for Reproductive Health wouldn\u2019t dare to ask such a thing if so many reporters hadn\u2019t already given themselves over partially to propaganda. But nobody would have dared to demand that Twitter and Facebook act as arms of the Biden campaign if those social-media giants hadn\u2019t already shown themselves so eager to do so, and nobody would expect Harvard to engage in ritual self-abasement if it weren\u2019t already on its knees.<\/span> At some point, the leaders of these institutions will have to learn to stand up for their own interests, or they will see themselves surpassed by new institutions that do the things their institutions used to do. At some level<\/em><\/span>, institutional leaders understand that: The panicked sneering<\/em><\/span> at the plans for a University of Austin is terrific proof of just how fragile<\/em><\/span> the status-farming syndicates at the top of the educational world know themselves to be.<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Newborn children and adult idiots both operate under the misapprehension that\u00a0if they close their eyes the room becomes empty<\/a><\/em><\/span>.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

You can try dropping those with views contrary to your own into a dank, dark, media oubliette, and you may even get a little something out of it.<\/span> But the real world doesn\u2019t go away<\/em><\/span> just because you\u2019ve stopped looking at it<\/em><\/span>.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

You\u2019d think the abortion lobby would have figured that out after\u00a0Dobbs<\/em>.<\/strong><\/span>“<\/p>\n

Here’s a second shot of the juice: They have<\/em><\/span>, but they can’t admit it<\/em><\/span>, as Progressive politics are one vast house of cards in which the removal of one would bring all of their programs and policies crashing down.\u00a0 So, in for a dime, in for the future of the Dimocratic Party.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

And in the Entertainment Section<\/em><\/span>, FOX<\/em>\u00a0once more misinforms us…\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Finnish PM Marin Sanna says she took drug test as new video of her dancing with man not her husband surfaces<\/span><\/a><\/h1>\n

Leaked video shows Sanna Marin, who is married, dancing with Finnish pop star Olavi Uusivirta, who leans in close<\/span><\/span><\/a>\u00a0*<\/h3>\n

* Which is it FOX<\/em>: Marin Sanna or Sanna Marin?\u00a0 Does ANYONE at FOX News<\/em> proofread this crap?!?<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

“…Marin dismissed any speculation\u00a0of drug use at the party and contested any claims that her behavior was “inappropriate.”\u00a0“I did nothing illegal,” Marin told reporters, according to a\u00a0translation from the BBC.<\/span> “Even in my teenage years I have not used any kind of drugs.”\u00a0Marin\u00a0said she took the drug test solely as a show of good faith to her detractors in the public and in parliament.\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Alcoholic beverages can be seen in the video, but in the brief clips Marin is not depicted drinking or doing drugs, leading many of her supporters to declare criticism of her behavior unreasonable. “I think my ability to function was really good.<\/span> There were no known meetings on the days I was partying,” the Finnish leader added. “I trust that people understand that leisure time and work time can be separated.”<\/span><\/strong><\/span>…”<\/p>\n

Sanna Marin\/Marin Sanna’s behavior reminds us of this scene from Jurassic Park<\/em>:<\/strong><\/p>\n