Author: Rick

On January 3 2020 President Donald Trump authorized a drone strike that killed Qasem Soleimani, General of the Iranian army in Iraq. There were a wide range of reactions here in the United States. There was criticism that we killed a diplomat. His death was equaled to the deaths of Elvis and Princess Diana . This is the U.S. media, mind you. Qasem Soleimani was first designated a terrorist and sanctioned by the U.S. in 2005 for his role as a supporter of terrorism .

Qasem Soleimani had links to Russia in regards to providing intelligence against Syria. Providing militants information on disrupting United States caravans in Iraq with IED’s. You get the idea, he is linked to maybe 1100 U.S. military deaths

.Let’s take a couple of steps back before we finish. After the 2001 terrorist attacks Congress passed the Use of Force Authorization Act.  The joint resolution, adopted unanimously in the Senate and 420-1 in the House, authorized President Bush to “use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks” as well as against anyone who “harbored” them. So this was never removed or undone by Congress.

Now let’s take a look at the War Powers Act. War Powers Resolution of 1973 or the War Powers Act) (50 U.S.C. 1541–1548) is a federal law intended to check the U.S. president’s power to commit the United States to an armed conflict without the consent of the U.S. Congress. The definition of armed conflict is: An armed conflict is a contested incompatibility that concerns government. and/or territory where the use of armed force between two parties, of which at least one is the government of a state, results in at least 25 battle-related deaths in one calendar year. Well, 9 folks were dispatched on January 3rd. Iran’s response of two missiles did not kill anyone.

Since taking out Qasem Soleimani the House of Representatives has looked to expand on the War Powers Act. Nancy Pelosi says she was never informed of the strike that took out Qasem Soleimani. There are other reports that say she refused to take a call from Vice President Mike Pence on the day of the strike.

Here is my take. Both sides, to my surprise, have come out against President Trump in the strike. I think if you look at the evidence I presented earlier in this article President Trump was well within his rights to take out Qasem Soleimani. Congress did not need to be notified or regardless of your politics answer the phone!!

When I started this blog, I thought one important thing to do was get a copy of the Constitution. The name of my blog and what I wanted to address made it imperative to comment on political figures and potential laws. I did that thru Hillsdale College via a small donation.

Moving on. Article V of the Constitution says:

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which , in either Case shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress; Provided that no Amendment which may be made prior to the Year One thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any Manner affect the first and fourth Clauses in the Ninth Section of the first Article; and that no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate

Now we have all been witness to the dysfunction going on in Congress. It is not the first time, it won’t be the last time. In fact it seems as though both Republicans and Democrats continue to devolve into a couple of warring factions of neanderthals, no offense to neanderthals!! They seem to forget about the will of the people. Now some of this dysfunction may be fixed come the 2020 election. I lean not, Political Action Committees, Lobbyists and in general, corruption will continue the quid pro quo in Washington D.C.

Here is my take, based on Article V, we the people have an out, a fix. We can take back the Government. The convention of States is our hope! We need 33 states to group together to end this madness. It would take 38 states to make an Amendment to the Constitution. How do we do this you may ask? We have more access to local elected officials than we do our representatives from the house or senate. We elect state officials that support this measure. This is your mandate. Overall, you see a more diverse elected group of folks at the state and local level than you do nationally. That group is usually more open to new ideas than our “esteemed” representatives and senators.

Think of the possibilities, Congressional term limits! Force the Government to balance the budget! Eliminate political action committees, lobbyists. Instead of Congress dictating when they work, we do. Give Congress a “no conflict of interest” clause. Get rid of the filibuster. Have a potential bill stand up on it’s own, not attached to other bills. You get the point, it’s up to us!!

All we hear is Impeachment, impeachment, impeachment!! Democrats insist there is quality in the articles they have presented. Republicans and myself included agree there is nothing there, I read the transcript multiple times. So this begs the question, what has the Government been doing?

So a quick little look into what is happening in the House revealed that they are passing bills. These bills are then going to the Senate for them to pass, where they go to die. Mitch McConnell apparently has a new nick name, the Grim Reaper. The bills go to the Senate to die!!

There are 9,847 bills and resolutions before Congress as a whole. This week there are a whopping 22 bills and resolutions up for debate !! Renaming a mountain! Collect information regarding accurate data usage in rural areas! Banning smoking on Amtrak!! These are three, they seem very innocuous, kind of busy work. If I appear to be busy and say look how many bills I have passed, I am doing my job!!

Here is my take. I am a small business owner, my business has grown over the six years. I had to hire my wife to help me grow my business and maintain a work life balance. There are days that balance is out of wack. We have to make extra stops! We have to run out of order! We are missing product and fix it! Bottom line is we do what is right for our customers, we don’t dictate terms to them. The members of Congress work for us and should not dictate when and how they work. If their work load per day is 22 bills and there are 9,847 bills to debate, that would take 448 days to cover. Wait, some of them are only there for two years, wait, more bills are introduced everyday! We the people, in this case are the customers, they seem to drag their feet and drag everything. People get fired for not doing their jobs, in this case, the voting booth is our only recourse!

September 24th started the impeachment inquiry, it is now December 1st. Let me say it again, impeachment inquiry, not actual impeachment. It started with Adam Schiff’s parody phone call between President Donald Trump and the new President of the Ukraine Volodymyr Zerensky. During that “parody” Adam Schiff said this is how I see the phone call going. So this craptastic show could go on for months.

Adam Schiff chose all of the witnesses. He chose who would speak to them and what questions to ask. When he did allow witnesses to be asked questions, the gavel came out. More disturbing was the fact he would turn off microphones of Republicans who wanted to ask questions. Due process was throw out the window and a kangaroo court ensued. When cross examination did finally happen, all of the witnesses testimony came down to hearsay. We heard things like, “I thought,” “I felt,” ” He said,” “She said,” Tell me where is the “evidence.” I read the transcript, I did not find any quid pro quo.

So only one other President has had an impeachment inquiry to deal with, President Nixon, he resigned before Congress came down on him. In 243 years and 45 Presidents this is the second time in our history an inquiry has happened. Two Presidents have been impeached by the House of Representatives Andrew Jackson and Bill Clinton. Neither was removed from office because you need the Senate to remove the President with a two thirds vote. Bottom line, the Democrats don’t have the votes in the Senate to remove Donald Trump from office.

All that being said, where does all of this get us, nowhere!! The last time I looked there were 706 pending bills that needed to be debated on the House floor. It’s Washington D.C. being Washington D.C., all talk and no show!! How much time has been wasted? How much money has been wasted? No talk of the illegal immigrants, are they not there anymore? I guess they all went home, no T.V. coverage? The 16 billion missing from Baltimore, not talked about. Come on pick a hot topic of the last six months, they have all disappeared because of this inquiry.

Here is my take. The Democrats are all in on smearing Donald Trump, not about impeachment at all. The 2020 election is a year away and the writing on the wall is already there, they have no chance. President Trump has actually kept some of his campaign promises. Despite some of the elites hoping for a recession, it hasn’t happened. So a group of fully grown adults who don’t like the current President and don’t see some of their peers as the answer to the 2020 election, have turned to this craptastic show just to smear President Trump. Good luck and focus on your local elections!

So the folks over at Judicial Watch came across how the Federal Government is spending $125 million. Would you believe it is for illegal immigrants? Well, it is and some of the specifics kind of make you shake your head.

First, unaccompanied alien children, let’s start at this point. We’ve been hearing all year about how the government is separating children from their parents. So now you are telling me children are making the trek from their home country a couple of thousand miles by themselves, got it. Some of these children are pregnant, again the trek, pregnant and time, “makes sense!” Let’s add gang affiliated minors, unaccompanied no less, hey a gang implies something doesn’t it?

All these children make it to the United States, unaccompanied. Once here they are referred to the Office of Refugee Resettlement. In that office they will give you a place to live, health care, mental health services, supervision and will cater to your particular language to integrate you into society of the United States. Some of these minors would be considered flight risks but we will “monitor” these minors

Many of the UACs are disbursed to one of 170 facilities across the U.S. operated by the agency, these care providers include group homes; long-term, therapeutic, or transitional foster care; residential treatment centers; staff-secure and secure facilities, and shelters. Our facilities provide housing, nutrition, routine medical care, mental health services, educational services, and recreational activities such as arts and sports.” Once they are released to a “sponsor,” the UACs continue to receive “ongoing assistance” from the government guaranteed to be “culturally and linguistically-appropriate to the unique need of each individual. All of that is pretty specific care for illegal immigrant minors.

Here is my take. As I finish this article we just passed Veterans Day. We continue to thank them more and more every year for their sacrifice to our Country. On the flip side we see more and more how much Veterans needs are not being taken care of by the Government. The VA is a horror show. Our country as a whole can’t take care of the citizens within it’s own four walls, homelessness, hunger and drug abuse just a few at the top of the list. Yet our elected leaders vote to spend $125 million on specific care on non citizens, who may at some point may flee or get deported, that seems like a good investment! In closing, Congress is broken, far beyond repair, in my opinion. We need to vote them all out, they seem to care more for illegal immigrants than actual citizens.

You get called all sorts of names bigot, racist or unhinged. Our current ongoing impeachment hearing has revealed many things, your mental genius.

Ever since you have been elected, it has been a fight from the get go and you continue to rise to the occasion. Nobody blinked and eyelash that the Bush Presidents were connected to oil. Nobody blinked that security contracts were connected to Vice President Dick Cheney and his involvement to Halliburton. These parties are both Republican affiliated. You talked putting a Trump Tower in Moscow and NOW there is and issue.

Obviously this has been going on for three years. Three years too many. In 2012 we were told to sit down, shut up and get to the back of the bus. Thankfully you were too smart to repeat those twelve words. Had any of us independent or republican folks even mentioned what former President Obama said we would have been “lynched!”

So that brings me to the latest tweet from President Trump. The typical tweet from President Trump referring to impeachment has been witch hunt. The latest tweet brought up lynching instead of witch hunt. Well low and behold the bait was taken and ran with by some democrats. The biggest being Joe Biden, who condemned President Trump for using the word lynched. So in our current society, if you said something 20 years ago it can and will be used against you. There were at least three other prominent democrats who condemned President Trump for using the word “lynched”

Twenty one years ago President Clinton was impeached in the House of Representatives for his conduct regarding Monica Lowinski. The House of Representatives was controlled by the Republicans and President Clinton was in fact impeached by the House. On the flip side the Senate was in control of the Democrats and to impeach a President it takes both houses of Congress to impeach a President. Who controls the Senate right now…..?

Here is my take. Back in 2016 my wife and I were talking about who to pick for President. Hilary did nothing for us. We eventually settled on Donald Trump from the get go. Yes, be mad, be upset, good for you!! Donald Trump upsets the whole we vote for ” insert name” every four years. This blog would not have started if Donald Trump was not elected President. Donald Trump continues to bring the dysfunction of Democrat party to the fore front. My first comment to my wife was the Democrats can’t make Donald Trump a sympathetic character, here we are three years in and guess what they continue to jump up and down and now people are tired of this sham!! The general public just may feel sorry for Donald Trump. Until next time!

Wow, what a week or so for the NBA. One tweet from the Rocket’s General Manager sent China into a hissy fit and a lot of its fans. Everybody who is somebody had a take on this mess. The General Manager put out a tweet in support of the Hong Kong protesters, who are looking for their freedom back from the Chinese government.

Just a brief history on Hong Kong. Hong Kong was under British rule from 1842 until 1997. Japan occupied Hong Kong from 1941 to 1945 during World War II. In 1984 Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher signed an agreement with the Chinese to hand power back to the Chinese. Part of that agreement was that communist China would allow Hong Kong to enjoy all of the western freedoms for 50 years. Post World War II Hong Kong basically became the New York City of Asia. A lot of the financial power brokers did business in Hong Kong.

Fast forward to 2003, protests over Article 23, Hong Kong Basic Law Article 23 is an article in the Basic Law of Hong Kong. It states that the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region “shall enact laws on its own to prohibit any act of treason, secession, sedition, subversion against the Central People’s Government, or theft of state secrets, to prohibit foreign political organizations or bodies from conducting political activities in the Region, and to prohibit political organizations or bodies of the Region from establishing ties with foreign political organizations or bodies.” An attempt to implement the article was the National Security Bill 2003 which caused a great controversy and a massive demonstration on 1 July 2003. Since then, the bill of implementing the article has not been reintroduced.

The 2016 Legislative council election saw the localists emerging as a new political force behind the pro-Beijing and pan-democracy camps by winning six seats in Hong Kong’s geographical constituencies. However, six candidates were barred from contesting by the Electoral Affairs Commission, due to their association with the Hong Kong independence movement. Another six localist members who were elected were disqualified in the Hong Kong Legislative Council oath-taking controversy. After the 5th Hong Kong Chief Executive Election, Carrie Lam became the first female Chief Executive of Hong Kong. However, her proposal of the Fugitive Offenders and Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters Legislation (Amendment) Bill 2019 has led to mass demonstrations against its implementation. The bill would make it legal for China to extradite criminals from Hong Kong, potentially including political prisoners. It is feared that the bill would cause the city to open itself up to the reach of mainland Chinese law and that people from Hong Kong could become subject to a different legal system.

These last two paragraphs I got directly from Wikipedia just to show how you could become somewhat informed in a pretty short time. Now I am no politician but I think I could make a somewhat informed opinion from what i just read. So my opinion would be that the people of Hong Kong are standing up for their “western rights” provided by the agreement in 1984. Every company doing business in China has to aqueous to certain western practices China does not approve, that is the nature of doing business overseas. It is estimated that the NBA makes about 4 billion a year in China alone. I heard this morning that Lebron himself does about 1 billion in business in China.

Here is my take. This whole thing came down to money. Bad timing of the tweet by the Rocket’s General Manager. Adam Silver had to appease the fans in America and his business in China. Lebron, since he is the face of the NBA, was harassed about his opinion. The social justice warriors being the NBA and Lebron had to put themselves in bad positions to save the money they make out of China. I say social justice warriors because both parties have put themselves out there to the public in America as an organization and an individual who will stand up for oppression of people. They were in a no win situation. The Rocket’s General Manager, I don’t feel was at fault either, people in Hong Kong have been shot in the street. In the end it shows where the priority is, the all mighty Dollar.

The inquiry into the impeachment of Donald Trump has started. I called that it was going to happen. As the information continues to come to light I can’t help but to feel more disgusted as the days pass. I read the transcript of the conversation and I found no impeachable offense. Mr. Schiff head of the House Intelligence Committee read what he called a parody of the phone call from President Trump to the newly elected President of the Ukraine, implying what President Trump meant.

Mr. Schiff you are the head of the Intelligence Committee, how could you read a parody? I see it as a lie. You hold a post, a prominent post in this Government and covering your tracks by calling it a parody just sent you and your committee to, as I see it, disastrous levels of incompetence. How can you ever ask a legitimate question and want the truth?

As I learned today you sent someone from your staff to the Ukraine two weeks before the “whistle-blower” came to light, to meet with the former President of the Ukraine. He lost in a landslide by the way and you were looking for dirt on President Trump.

The other thing I learned today was in 1998 President Clinton signed an agreement with the Ukraine for bi-lateral information exchange of criminal activity. Bottom line is even if the Democrats want the quid pro quo for impeachment, that treaty basically null and voids the basis of that argument. President Trump asked questions and made statements that fit within the confines of that treaty.

Here is my take. Mr. Schiff since you are part of the problem, you will continue to be part of the problem. There is really no recourse to remove you from your post unless you resign. You won’t do that, it would be the right thing to do. Hopefully you loose in the next election, that is the only recourse. In ending this post, you have now created a new defense for anything you say that is a lie. I will call it the parody defense. Anyone could come before your committee and lie to your face and call the parody defense. You did it so why not the rest of us, thanks Mr. Schiff!!

The talk of the Democrat party since Donald Trump was elected, is impeachment. Hashtag resist. Just wait we will find something. He will do something illegal, it is only a matter of time. Russian interference in the 2016 election. Fail!! The Mueller report, fail!!

For those that remember, Bill Clinton was impeached, The House of Representatives adopted Articles of Impeachment in December of 1998. He was found not guilty by the Senate. The historical reference here is, the House was controlled by the Republicans and the Senate by the Democrats. You need both houses of Congress to agree on the impeachment to remove a President.

The Democrats at this point are looking for a “quid pro quo” statement from President Trump to impeach him in regards to his phone conversation with the President of the Ukraine. The statement quid pro quo, means if you do something for me, I will do something for you. Apparently there is a whistle-blower that has information damning to President Trump. Under pressure from the Democrats, the President released the phone call, saying there is nothing here to look at.

I read the transcript. I read three different articles in reference to the transcript. I listened to so called experts on the matter. Will the Democrats go for impeachment, I say yes. Should they go for impeachment, I say no. Impeachment will obviously pass the House, no doubt. Just like Bill Clinton, the Senate will not come back with a guilty charge.

Here is my take. Impeachment will not only waste time, energy and resources of this country. It will give the Democrats another opportunity to try to smear President Trump before the 2020 elections. In 1998 Nancy Pelosi even said the Republicans hate Bill Clinton so much they will do anything to impeach him. Wow, some things never change. In the end Donald Trump will still be President and the end all be all of this charade will be Joe Biden and his son Hunter will be investigated for Russian collusion. Hmmmm! As some people have said, “stable genius.”

Today is the 18th anniversary of the attacks in New York. Anniversary doesn’t seem to be the right term to attach to this day of remembrance. I do believe we still need to talk about that day because so many people were affected that day. I have three stories that were close to me on September 11th 2001.

I was working for Outback Steakhouse at the time near Atlantic City, New Jersey. Atlantic City sits about 130 miles away from New York City. I had a court appearance that morning and was due in at 9:30 am. I was up and showered by 9:00 am, turned on the T. V. Flight 11 had already hit the North Tower and it was burning. Watching live I witnessed flight 175 hit the South Tower. Thinking, is this real, you start flipping channels. Coverage on every channel, including MTV, VH1, Food Network just to name a few. I have my day in court, it lasts roughly 10 minutes. A few other cases come before the judge and then he dismisses court for the rest of the day based on what is happening in New York. I fill out some paperwork and go home. In the end someone in the court office must have been deeply affected by what was going on. My paperwork was never filed, no fines or associated things with my case ever came to fruition. My life went on as if my day in court never happened

My second story still involves Outback Steakhouse. My friend John was at Outback headquarters in Tampa Bay with other managers from around the country for a rah, rah go Outback meeting. He was supposed to fly home that day and all domestic flights were grounded at that point. Planes were directed to land at the nearest airport and everything was shut down. Chris Sullivan, Bob Basham and Tim Gannon, the founders of Outback Steakhouse, must have had some high level connections. They own two private jets, the Bloomin Onion one and two. There are two jets because of insurance reasons they all can’t be on the same plane at the same time. Somehow some way they managed, in all of the chaos, to get John on one of the private jets with supplies from the local area to go to ground zero. I suppose John landed somewhere in North Jersey, a 1000 mile trip, and had two F-16’s as an escort the whole trip.

In keeping with the theme my third story has Outback Steakhouse in it as well. Outback has a catering arm of the company in basically every region. I became the first one to head that arm in our region of eastern Pennsylvania, South Jersey and Delaware. The day after 9/11 all of the roughly 25 stores in our region were contacted by the district manager. We are cooking at ground zero across the river in Jersey City for the first responders. Any and all product you can spare for this operation, please do. The two catering trucks were already on their way to us. Steaks, burgers, buns, bread, onions, potatoes, etc all went up to New York. We were up there for three or four weeks helping out as best we could.

Here is my take, my stories by no means even relate to 2,977 people that lost their lives that day. Today as I write this all of those names are being read aloud at the site of the Freedom Tower. The further we get away from 2001, it is possible that the feelings and loss of that day will diminish. Millions of us were affected personally that day. If we share those stories to our family and friends maybe as time continues to pass, it will hopefully lead those closest to us to search out the real heroes and remember the victims. In doing so maybe we can keep September 11, 2001 from becoming just another day in history.