When I read that liberal Democrat officials in the state of Maine are defying federal law by rejecting President Trump’s new Title IX rules barring biological men from participating in women’s sports, my initial thought was: What do they care? Many of Maine’s citizens long ago quit having children. Like much of secular New England, Maine is a national leader in birth control. The wealthy, liberal New England states — specifically, Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont, and New Hampshire — have the lowest fertility rates. Time to violate Title IX laws, liberals! Grab your Confederate flags! So, unlike states with residents giving birth to and raising children, Maine’s citizens as a whole can be less concerned about boys beating up their girls in sports. But that aside, what’s especially striking is that the Maine case offers yet another example of how liberals can be states’ rights fanatics. Yes, it’s true. Progressives provide examples constantly. Sure, progressives howl that invocations of states’ rights are the unique province of racist Republicans. If you’re a Republican supporting states’ rights — that is, federalism, the 10th Amendment of the Constitution — then you’re an ugly segregationist. You’re sounding a “dog whistle” for your advocacy of Jim Crow laws. Where’s your white hood, closet Klansman? I noted in a review here a couple of weeks ago how Reagan biographer/character assassin, Max Boot, employs this slimy tactic against an iconic president who was reelected by winning 49 of 50 states. And Boot is hardly alone. Left-wing polemicists and Democrat hacks wield this race club all the time. “States’ rights,” they say, is “code language” for Republican “racism.” It’s the cry of loathsome confederates. But now, here we are, at the start of the second Trump term, and liberal Democrat governors and state officials are once again — predictably — adamantly asserting states’ rights. They are doing so to resist the Republican administration, this time on immigration, sanctuary cities, deportation, birth control, education, to allow boys in girls’ locker rooms, and a myriad of other issues. “The federal government has no right to deport [illegal] migrants from our cities!” shouts the liberal mayor or governor. “States’ rights!” “Abortion access is safe in New York,” declares New York Democrat Governor Kathy Hochul. “To the women of Texas, I want to say I am with you. Lady Liberty is here to welcome you with open arms.” She vows: “We will help you find a way to New York.” To any federal authorities who try to stop this interstate commerce, Gov. Hochul hoists her middle finger and snaps defiantly: “States’ rights!” The liberals in Hochul’s state and nationwide applaud and cheer her on: “States’ rights! States’ rights! States’ rights!” A few years ago, liberal Democrat officials were states’ rights fanatics in a particularly aggressive way when they carried out their COVID shutdowns and lockdowns and mask and vax mandates. Now, they’ve again emerged as unflagging states’ rights advocates, and nary a progressive will step forward to bat an eye. This hypocrisy will go utterly unremarked upon by the MSNBC moonbat. To be sure, the rare thoughtful liberal, as if struck by lightning, might on occasion notice the hypocrisy on display. See, for instance, a July/August 2013 (pre-Trump) piece in The Atlantic magazine called “States’ Rights Are for Liberals.” That liberal author noted how leftists were fully embracing states’ rights to push for everything from marijuana legalization to same-sex “marriage” (this was pre-Obergefell). So, that thoughtful liberal noticed. But unfortunately, most liberals aren’t thoughtful. They’re dictated by emotion. For conservatives, it rather sucks to have deranged ideological opponents who every time you disagree with them start hyperventilating, foaming at the mouth, and screaming “RACIST HATER!!!” at the top of their lungs. But alas, that’s our cross to carry in dealing with these people. Anyway, liberals decade after decade have generously invoked states’ rights for themselves and their projects while not even seeming to realize that when conservatives do the same they denounce the act as some sort of hate crime. (Actually, state-based hate crimes are another example of where liberals aggressively invoke states’ rights.) Decade after decade? Yes, of course. Barry Goldwater over 60 years ago in his classic The Conscience of a Conservative quoted at length New York Democratic Governor Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The liberal icon was a vigorous promoter of states’ rights in defense of what he called “a great number of … vital problems of government, such as the conduct of public utilities, of banks, of insurance, of business, of agriculture, of education, of social welfare, and a dozen other important features.” FDR was adamant: “Washington must not … interfere” in these areas that are the domain of states. Democrat Extremism on States’ Rights Democrats were the ultimate extremists on states’ rights, which they pushed to enshrine the inhuman institution of slavery. The Democratic Party was the party of slavery, segregation, and Jim Crow. Abraham Lincoln’s Republican Party was founded as the anti-slavery party. In fact, when today’s liberal Democrats assert that Republicans want states’ rights to push segregation, they’re historically confusing Republicans with Democrats; that is, with their own party. They should be looking in the mirror. Democrats have long been states’ rights fanatics, for a variety of evolving issues over the centuries. To be clear, let it be understood that the U.S. Constitution most certainly recognizes states’ rights. The 10th Amendment asserts: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Indeed, that’s why both Democrats and Republicans have invoked that power and their prerogative of states’ rights for centuries, sometimes rightly and sometimes wrongly. The only times these claims are consistently objected to are by liberals looking to slime their opponents as racists, acting as if states’ rights advocates exist only on the right. It’s mindless hypocrisy. And now, the liberals of Maine invoke states’ rights for their ideological preferences. The executive director of the Maine Principals Association (MPA) asserts that the New England state will not abide by President Trump’s executive order to “keep men out of women’s sports.” And Maine is just one example. Time to violate Title IX laws, liberals! Grab your Confederate flags! The hypocrisy never ceases to take your breath away. My advice: Keep track of these daily appeals to states’ rights by liberals over the next four years. You’ll find a new example somewhere in America every day. Meet the great states’ rights advocates once again: Democrats. They’re baaack! READ MORE from Paul Kengor: The Price of Eggs at CNN Who Made It Into the ‘Hall of Evil’? The post The Democrat States’ Rights Supremacists appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

Jim Holmes, Chair of Maritime Strategy at the Naval War College and Distinguished Fellow at the Krulak Center at the Marine Corps University, is one of our country’s leading public intellectuals. He is a throwback to Alfred Thayer Mahan, a naval officer and perhaps our country’s greatest public intellectual of the late 19th-early 20th century. Holmes has an interesting take on President Donald Trump’s approach to governing in his second term, comparing Trump to Niccolo Machiavelli, the brilliant Florentine statesman and the author of timeless classics on politics, including The Prince and Discourses on Livy. Burnham understood that political change often results from … the “circulation of elites” — when a new ruling class takes power from the old ruling class. Holmes’ piece in The National Interest titled “Donald Trump’s Machiavellian Instincts” sheds light on the flurry of Executive Orders and policy changes Trump is pursuing in his first month in office. Trump seems to understand not only the wisdom of Machiavelli, but also the political realities explained by a group of thinkers that the political philosopher James Burnham called “the Machiavellians.” Burnham wrote The Machiavellians during the Second World War, shortly after he broke with Trotskyism and began the remarkable intellectual journey that ended with his becoming a senior editor and the most important writer for National Review. People who have studied Burnham’s career judge The Machiavellians to be the key to Burnham’s political thought. Burnham developed a “science” of political power through synthesizing the ideas of Machiavelli and four intellectual disciples of the great Florentine: Gaetano Mosca, Vilfredo Pareto, Robert Michels, and Georges Sorel. Holmes credits Trump with wielding two Machiavellian insights in his early moves in his second term. First, Trump is introducing massive changes that have produced great resistance from the old order he is seeking to replace. Trump calls the old order the “deep state,” and as Holmes notes its “stakeholders” have attacked Trump with “partisan zeal.” Holmes rightly views Trump as a “counterrevolutionary” who intends to “uproot what he considers the excesses of past presidencies” and who wants to “restore past eminence” (“make America great again”). Resistance has come from the bureaucracy, Democrats (and some Republicans — Mitch McConnell for example) in Congress, and especially from the courts. Trump’s second Machiavellian insight is to “strike quickly.” Holmes writes that Trump is “mounting a lightning assault on what he sees as the defenders of a corrupt old order within the Beltway.” Holmes compares Trump’s approach to “savvy field generals” who strike “blow after blow in swift succession to keep adversaries stunned and off balance.” Unlike in his first term, Trump has quickly moved to install loyalists to head the bureaucracies and announced new rules and policies that seek to reverse the agenda of the old order. Machiavelli would surely approve. Ruling Class Struggle Back to Burnham. In The Machiavellians, Burnham, channeling Mosca, wrote about how “ruling classes” seek to protect their power and privileges by force and fraud, and by what Sorel called “myths” and violence. The “myths” of today’s old order include, among others, “green energy,” “diversity, equity and inclusion,” “democracy versus autocracy,” and the “rules-based international order.” Trump is moving to uproot all of them which is an attack on the elite of the old ruling class. Burnham, channeling Robert Michels, understood that the struggle for power in every society is waged by elites — Michels called it the “iron law of oligarchy.” “[T]he primary goal of every ruling group,” Burnham wrote, “is the maintenance of its own power and privilege.” It is this factor, not the ideal of “preserving democracy” that motivates the resistance to Trump. Trump and the key players in his second administration are a new ruling class who tapped into a political movement that originated in the presidential campaigns of Ross Perot and Pat Buchanan, and later morphed into the Tea Party. Trump calls it MAGA. Burnham understood that political change often results from what Vilfredo Pareto called the “circulation of elites” — when a new ruling class takes power from the old ruling class. Holmes’s piece in The National Interest is correct. Trump’s instincts are Machiavellian in the best sense of that word. Holmes, like Burnham, understands that the conventional view of Machiavelli as an amoral political manipulator is wrong. Burnham called Machiavelli and his intellectual disciples “defenders of freedom” because they conveyed the truth about politics and power. We are seeing the truth of their observations and analyses play out every day in the moves and countermoves of Trump’s new ruling class and the resistance of the old order. READ MORE from Francis P. Sempa: Forty Years Ago Reagan Began to Undo the Stain of Yalta Wilsonian Foreign Policy Is Dead — For Now The post Trump Is Displacing the Old Ruling Class appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

Test your Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) knowledge with this multiple-choice quiz. One answer is correct. The quiz is based on reports of what Elon Musk and his merry band of tech nerds have uncovered.  1.In 2023, the National Science Foundation granted a college $288,563 to fund: A. Inclusive bird watching societies. B. Taxidermy courses for BIPOC students. C. LGBTQIA+ D&D campaigns. 2.In 2022, the U.S. State Department granted $70,000 to an Irish group to produce: A . DEI marionette puppet show. B.  DEI juggling demonstration. C.  DEI music festival. 3. In 2022, the State Department also granted $25,000 as part of a public diplomacy program in Bogota, Colombia, to produce: A. “As One,” a coming-of-age story and opera about a transgender woman. B. “Am I me?” an operetta about a transgender white man becoming the center on the Harlem Globetrotters. C. “Alphabet,” an opera seria examining whether letters in LGBTQIA+ can be recited like numbers in π. 4. The U.S. State Department in 2022 and 2023 spent $32,000 to produce a superhero comic book in Peru titled and featuring: A. “The Power of Math,” featuring a transgender woman named Alex with a gift for solving advanced algebraic equations. B. “The Power of Education,” featuring a gay hero named Alex who addresses social and mental health issues. C. “The Power of Pottery,” featuring a non-binary craftsperson named Alex who uses telekinesis to form clay bowls on a pottery wheel. 5. From February 2023 to October 2024, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) allocated $1.5 million to promote: A. The inclusion of LGBTQ people in the Serbian workplace. B. The inclusion of African-Serbians in organized ice hockey leagues. C. The exclusion of white gay Serbians from LGBTQ African-Serbian ice hockey leagues. 6. USAID during the Biden Administration allocated $20 million to create: A. “Dora testechev Ghaza tahat ardul al-anfak” — Dora the Explorer navigates the peaceful tunnels underneath Gaza where medication and food are stored for the population and not Hamas freedom fighters. B. “Ahlan Simsim Iraq” — Sesame Street in Iraq where Elmo possibly instructs civilians how to identify and disarm roadside improvised explosive devices. C. “Where in the World is Yahya Sinwar?” A colorful picture-book in which the reader must identify the heroic Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar hiding in Gaza amongst thousands of innocent Palestinian civilians and Israelis taken hostage on October 7, 2023. 7. The Biden Administration approved more than $20,600 to fund: A. Ten drag musical performances of “Oklahoma” in Guyana. B. Eleven drag queen storybook hours in Brazilian libraries. C. Twelve drag theater performances in Ecuador. 8. USAID allocated more than $425,000 in 2022 to help: A. Indonesian coffee farmers become more climate and gender friendly. B. Nike sneaker assemblers in Cambodia quickly diagnose the onset of repetitive motion injuries among 11-year-old laborers. C. Biologists in Wuhan, China, safely wrangle poisonous bats on behalf of Dr. Anthony Fauci. 9. The State Department allocated $16,500 to: A. Foster a united and equal queer-feminist discourse in Albanian society. B. Foster a united and unilateral feminist BIPOC-queer discourse in Albanian society. C. Foster a united BIPOC feminist non-binary male discourse in Albanian society. 10. The State Department during the Biden administration spent $14 million on: A. Prepaid cellphones for migrants to arrange amnesty hearing dates. B. Cash vouchers for migrants at the southern border. C. Middle-of-the-night airline trips to deposit southern migrants in Red State cities. Answers: 1 A; 2 C; 3 A; 4 B; 5 A; 6 B; 7 C; 8 A; 9 A; 10 A READ MORE from Matt Manochio: In Defense of Fact-Checkers Unravelling the Events of Trump’s Spectacular Year The post Test Your Knowledge of Government Efficiency appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

President’s Day often brings out the most uninformed opinions regarding favorite presidents. Many people will name popular figures or those they learned about in school who accomplished the most. American voters typically desire a president who will do more but rarely expect them to do less. Fortunately, during his time in office, Calvin Coolidge embodied a conservative philosophy that limited government power, allowing America to thrive under his leadership. Coolidge’s presidency was a boon to the conservative movement, and he inspired … President Ronald Reagan and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. John Calvin Coolidge was born on July 4th, 1872, in Plymouth, Vermont (the only President born on Independence Day) to a traditional New England-style family. He grew up earning the nickname “Silent Cal” due to his shy nature. But despite his silent persona, he was a man of ambition. He graduated from Amherst College with a law degree, then became a City Councilman, working his way to becoming President of the Massachusetts Senate, Lt. Governor, and then winning election to become the 48th Governor of the Bay State. His tenure as Governor prompted Coolidge to national prominence in the Republican Party. He staked his political reputation on facing down the Boston Police Department when they went on strike in 1919. He asserted, “There is no right to strike against the public safety by anyone, anywhere, any time.” So he fired the whole police department and started anew. The country took notice that there was a Republican politician with principles, and so did the National Republican Party, who selected Coolidge to be Warren G Harding’s Vice Presidential running mate in 1920, and they won. According to AEI scholar Matthew Continetti, the Harding/Coolidge Administration was the beginning of the conservative movement’s dominance in the Republican Party, which situated itself against President Wilson’s progressive policies. Coolidge’s presidency marked a significant shift in American politics, signaling a return to normalcy in America and a resurgence of conservative values. When President Harding died suddenly in 1923, Coolidge became President and did not deviate from the conservative constitutionalist ways set forth by Harding. President Coolidge continued most of his predecessor’s economic agenda, which included significantly lowering federal taxes and government spending. With World War I in the rearview mirror, President Harding had slashed the top income tax rate from 71 percent to 46 percent. However, Coolidge went further. He signed into law three Revenue Acts that reduced the total tax rate to 25 percent. Secretary of Treasury Anthony Mellon coined the phrase “Scientific Taxation,” which turned out to be a winning formula for the 1920s economy. For instance, the real GDP surged to a yearly rate of 4.7 percent between 1922 and 1929, and the unemployment rate plummeted from 11.9 percent in 1921 to 3.2 percent in 1929. The Coolidge Administration reduced the national debt from $22.3 billion to $16.9 billion (one-third) by producing a surplus each year due to balancing the budget and cutting federal spending. Coolidge was only President for six years but left office with a smaller federal budget than when he arrived in Washington, a feat that no President, Republican or Democrat, has been able to replicate to this day. The Coolidge White House also paved the way for reducing the size of the federal bureaucracy. Coolidge made good use of his pocket veto, and vetoed a farm subsidies bill twice even though he grew up as a farmer. He firmly believed that it wasn’t the job of the federal government to help farmers. His stance on government intervention was clear, and he consistently vetoed bills that he believed overstepped the government’s role. He also vetoed two bills for veteran’s bonuses and pensions and kept defense spending at roughly the same levels from 1923 to 1927. Coolidge believed in American exceptionalism and wanted America to be ready for war. But he believed that America’s strength came from its industrial and agricultural sectors, and that the best thing government can do to strengthen warfighting capability was to enhance its ability to borrow and pay down debt. It should come as no surprise that Coolidge, the “Great Refrainer,” won his re-election handily in 1924 with 54 percent of the vote, more votes than Democrats and Progressives combined. Coolidge’s slogan, “Keep Cool with Coolidge,” resonated with Americans, who were coming out of the volatile progressive era of the Wilson Administration, which saw a World War, the influenza pandemic, and social upheaval. The “Roaring 20s” were in full swing. The standard of living improved for most Americans, as by the end of the decade, most families could afford a car, electricity, and a running toilet. This was attributed to “Coolidge Prosperity.” Despite his reserved and humble nature, Coolidge made a significant impact on Americans. He was the first president to utilize radio for a presidential address, with five million people tuning in. He would go on to address the nation with approximately 50 radio broadcasts and hold the most press conferences of any president, a feat that would put former President Biden’s lack of public dialogue to shame. We often associate FDR with fireside chats and Trump’s social media presence with connecting to the people. But Coolidge was the pioneer in modernizing public discourse for presidents. Coolidge was also a visionary who championed equal rights. Shortly after assuming office in 1923, he declared to Congress that the rights of African Americans were “as sacred as those of any other people” and that it was both a “public and private duty to safeguard those rights.” He advocated for anti-lynching legislation but was blocked by congressional Democrats. Coolidge’s opposition to racism and prejudice saw millions leave the KKK, and the lynching of blacks decreased. His central piece of Civil Rights legislation was the granting U.S. Citizenship to Native Americans living on reservations. It’s fair to say that Coolidge’s biggest failure was not running for re-election in 1928. Like George Washington, he thought the country needed a new leader. It’s unfortunate that the successor to Coolidge was the return of big government Republicanism under Herbert Hoover and a depression, helped along by central planning and easy money lending from the Fed. FDR’s progressive policies in the 1930s contributed to the depression’s length and severity. Coolidge doesn’t get the recognition he deserves because our education system is dominated by liberals and pro-Democrat public sector unions that favor  progressives from the early 20th century. Coolidge’s presidency was a boon to the conservative movement, and he inspired other great leaders such as President Ronald Reagan and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. Coolidge never won a Nobel Peace Prize like Obama or had a bill written in Congress to be on Mt. Rushmore like Trump, but it is past time for both Republicans and Democrats to admit that Calvin Coolidge was one of the best presidents to helm the Oval Office. READ MORE from Alex Adkins: Conservatives Must Thwart Anti-Semitism Lori Chavez-DeRemer Will Not ‘Work’ as Secretary of Labor The post The Greatest President You Never Learned About appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

from SGT Report: Robert F. Kennendy Jr. had some pretty amazing things to say about his boss Donald J. Trump upon being sworn in as the top man at HHS, Kennedy declared “Everything President Trump told me he was going to do, he has done, and I genuinely believe [he is] a pivotal historical figure.” […]

from HopeGirl Alternative News: TRUTH LIVES on at https://sgtreport.tv/

by Hannah Knudsen, Breitbart: $1.9 billion was “misplaced” by the Biden administration, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) announced this week in detailing the startling discovery. “$1.9 billion of HUD money was just recovered after being misplaced during the Biden administration due to a broken process,” DOGE revealed on X, posting screenshots of the receipts. […]

Bakers, this is required reading. READ MORE...