We use Cyberlink 365 Video‚ Photo and Audio Software Magnum 4 is a 1990 Ocean game compilation released for the Atari ST. We excitedly purchased this pack in 1990 from an import shop here in California‚ but as we did mostly in the late 80’s and 90’s got rid of the box and instructions.A few weeks back‚ I was able to purchase the full boxed version pack again from Paul Nuriman or Nurix from the intellivisionaries podcast when he was selling it at the VFC So Cal show.  The games in the self described GIANT Multi-Disk Pack areBatman The Caped Crusader‚ After Burner‚ Operation Wolf and Double Dragon.After Burner‚ the Sega super scaler arcade cabinet port was actually released in 1988 by Activision. You will find that many of these budget compilations include games from  other companies than the one who put together this pack. Sometimes‚ and maybe even this time‚ the non-publisher games are of dubious quality. Batman the Caped Crusader from 1988‚  is not to be confused with Batman the Movie‚ the side scrolling‚ platform action  and first person driving game that drove 1 million Amiga sales in 1989‚ but actually a pre-cursor to that title which is both a comic book style adventure and a action game Double Dragon also NOT an Ocean title‚ but a 1988 Taito released Technos designed arcade conversion from Melbourne House / Virgin Lastly‚ we have the game I have probably already played the most in this pack. Operation Wolf‚ a Taito licensed arcade port developed by Ocean France and released in the UK‚ like the rest of the games in this pack‚ in 1988.  Let’s get started with after burner/  After Burner was originally released in 1988 by Activisoon / Mediagenic and was developed by Argonaut‚ yes that Argonaut‚ the developer of Star Glider on the ST and Amiga and of course the Super FX chip and Star Fox on the SNES. It’s a port of the 1987 mega hit Sega Arcade cabinet and not one that I am very fond of unfortunately. The ST was actually the lead 16-bit computer platform for the UK release that the ONE Magazine gave 63% saying “All that’s left is a run of the mill 3D shoot’em up and most of the shooting is done for you” referring to the fact that your main guns auto fire with the button being used to fire your missiles when you are “locked on”. Atarimania visitors have rated it a very similar 6.5/10 I find Afterburner to be a decent gaming experience and probably in 1988‚ when 16 bit gaming was just beginning to get a foot-hold‚ it might have impressed a few people. The controls leave a lot to be desired as you can use a joystick or mouse‚ but neither seem to play well enough to make you feel like you are in control. In both modes you guna are auto fired‚ and your lock-on missiles are fired with button one. With the joystick you press the spacebar to speed up and with the mouse you press button 2. The mouse mode would have been so much more playable simply making you fire your guns with button one and lock on missiles with button 2/ It was a lost opportunity and the game really feels like nothing more than a slide show you watch and not really play. Batman The Caped Crusader‚ a Special FX developed title‚ was originally released in 1988. Special FX‚ also responsible for coding for some great ST titles like Hudson Hawk and Midnight Resistance‚ created this game as an adventure  split into two distinct chapters that could be loaded and played separately.  One quest  involves the Penguin the other the Joker. The game-play is more than simple action with both many complicated joystick commands for action beat-em up fun  and a full utility screen for adventure-like inventory and puzzle solving‚ accessed by pulling down and pressing the fire buttonAs with Afterburner and as was very typical of the early ST years‚ the Atari was the lead platform and The One Magazine was quite impressed‚ giving it 84% on both the ST and Amiga‚ and to paraphrase their review‚ “It’s frustratingly difficult‚ but precisely as it should be in a game like this.  Atarimania user though rate it closer to Afterburger at 6.8/10 Hmm‚ this one is odd. The instructions give little idea exactly what you are trying to do‚ and that is usually OK if the controls and input are simple enough to get done easily. The fighting is simplistic‚ but animated well‚ and the adventure elements seem to be picking up and using objects but no instructions I found gve example of which icons to what in you inventory‚ and figuring out controls while watching Batman get more and more angry is not really the type of adventuring that I like.  Double Dragon is a 1988 Binary Design coded‚ Virgin distributed Taito / Technos arcade port that received 5th  place on the Atari ST Format most violent games list.  The fun of the arcade version was two players at once battling gangs of thugs in a scrolling environment that includes objects to pick up and use in the fight. At first glance it seems that the ST version is every bit as good as the arcade because the box and instructions describe all of these various elements. Reviews were not so great though‚ with The One Giving the ST version 55%‚ 4 points lower than the 4 color PC CGAS version‚ calling the ST version sloppy with messy small sprites.  Atarimania users seem to like it more with a 7.9/10 and I actually had a pretty fun time with it and will give it more playtime in the future. As will it will be in contention with the other Atari systems in a future proving ground episode.  I disagree with these reviews playing it today. I never played  this much on any other system‚ because these types of scrolling fighters were not my cup of java back then‚ so the single button of the ST version  doesn’t bother me at all. It’s fun‚ well optimized and the controls are easy to understand. It;s get repetitive pretty fast but if you are having fun with the repetition‚ then it’s a winner for me and one of the better beat’ems up I’ve played on the ST‚ Operation Wolf‚ the 1988 Taito Coin-Op conversion‚ code by Ocean France‚ responsible for hidden ST gems Beach Volley‚ Ivanhoe and Toki‚ is probably the game in this pack I have played the most on the ST. This was the one that got the most disk usage as  I recall when we had this in the early 90’s and one that we would bring to our buddy Brandon (Rest in peace‚ good friend) and play on his 520 ST a lot. While I find it slower and not quite as optimized as follow up. Operation Thunderbolt‚ contemporary reviews were very good‚ with the One giving it 89% on bothe the ST and Amiga calling it a “Perfect Conversion”. Atarimania users the collective feel it is a little more ordinary‚ rating it 7.4/10. I think it certainly deserves to be an 8 at least. Looking at it now it’s hard to stress just how amazing this was when it came out. To us‚  it WAS the arcade machine. Yes there is some slow down‚ but it is far superior to any similar game on an 8-bit computer or console that time. This is a real highlight of the ST’s library. One note. If you can find it‚ play the Atari Legend one disk floppy version instead of the 8bitchip hard drive version. It has better cheats and doesn’t crash my Atari ST or my emulator. The Magnum pack as a whole is a very nice collection of the better‚ but not the best Atari ST licensed games from 1988. Ocean did a good job of collecting 4 distinct game types in one collection. I did not find any reviews for the collection in my review database or on the internet. Afterburner remains the weakest game of the bunch and while I want to give Batman another chance and my joystick is ready to tackle a few rounds of Double Dragon‚ I find Operation Wolf to still be my favorite of the bunch.Thanks for watching‚ have fun playing your favorite licensed titles on the system of your choice‚ in the vertical blank. Oh yeah‚ if you want to‚ please like and subscribe‚ it really help small channels like our grow‚

It was inevitable that the corporate media would applaud President Biden’s State of the Union address if he had the vitality to stand upright for two hours and the vision to read a teleprompter. For ordinary voters who aren’t paid to praise him‚ Biden’s performance last Thursday night probably confirmed many of their fears about leaving him in office for another term. This‚ for example‚ is how he described the current state of our domestic politics: “Not since President Lincoln and the Civil War have freedom and democracy been under assault here at home as they are today.” If your uncle said that during a family dinner everyone would agree that another trip to rehab was in order. The Biden campaign is reduced to promoting a survey showing that only 31 percent of respondents have “a lot of confidence” in the President’s ability to carry out his official duties. Biden’s speech was full of similarly crazy claims. Predictably‚ he brought up the fabled Jan. 6 riot and claimed‚ “Insurrectionists stormed this very Capitol and placed a dagger at the throat of American democracy.” Never mind that no one involved was ever charged with insurrection. Ignore the polls showing that most Americans saw the event simply as “a protest that went too far.” Biden insisted that democracy is in mortal danger and the locus of the threat is former President Trump‚ the Republican Party and the voters who support them: “My predecessor and some of you here seek to bury the truth of January 6th … This is a moment to speak the truth and bury the lies. ” All of this nonsense was delivered in a weirdly angry and arrhythmical rhetorical cadence punctuated by “strategic shouting‚” as Harold Meyerson generously describes it in the American Prospect: He obviously had to deal with the age issue‚ in all its various facets. He dispelled‚ I think‚ the accusation of lack of energy‚ not least by virtually shouting at least half of his address. This was a departure from past State of the Union practice‚ but given his age‚ a necessary one … Yes‚ words were slurred and misspoken; that’s an artifact of age he clearly won’t dispel. Republicans will continue to highlight that‚ though if Biden takes to the stump with the energy and the messages he displayed Thursday night‚ those where-did-they-come-from nouns should matter less to at least a portion of the public. If Meyerson actually harbored hopes that Biden’s SOTU speech portended an improvement in his stump performance‚ they were dashed the next day. Friday afternoon‚ as he walked toward Air Force One‚ Biden was accosted by reporters about his use during the SOTU of a verboten adjective to describe the murderer of Laken Riley: “Do you regret using the word ‘illegal’ to describe immigrants last night?” Biden responded with the following gibberish: “Well‚ I probably‚ uhhhh‚ I don’t re— it‚ uhhh‚ aghhh‚ technically not supposed to be here…” That answer should have been a warning to Biden’s staff to keep him away from the news media for the rest of the day. It was clearly a harbinger of worse things to come. (READ MORE from David Catron: Biden’s Cognitive Decline Continues Apace) Sure enough‚ when Biden spoke at several Pennsylvania rallies meant to build on his SOTU “momentum‚” he flubbed his lines horribly. In one speech he told confused Keystone State voters‚ “Pennsylvania‚ I have a message for you: send me to Congress!” A few minutes later he boasted‚ “We added more to the national debt than any president in his term in all of history!” At a different rally‚ he invited voters to conduct a thought experiment: “Imagine if tobacco had the same limitations companies that gun manufacturers!” Meanwhile‚ the polls began to trickle in on the SOTU address. Biden’s campaign has been touting CNN’s post-speech poll‚ but it paints an unflattering picture of public confidence in his mental acuity: Following the speech‚ 31% of those who watched said they have a lot of confidence in Biden’s ability to carry out his duties as president‚ 28% that they have some confidence‚ and 41% that they have no real confidence. That’s a slight uptick from a survey conducted in the days before the speech‚ when 25% of those same people expressed a lot of confidence in his ability‚ 27% some confidence‚ and 48% none at all … The CNN poll was conducted by text message with 529 US adults who said they watched the State of the Union on Thursday‚ and are representative of the views of speech-watchers only. Think about this for a moment. The Biden campaign is reduced to promoting a survey showing that only 31 percent of respondents have “a lot of confidence” in the President’s ability to carry out his official duties. Moreover‚ this was a poll of adults—not registered or likely voters. That almost certainly means actual voters are even less confident in Biden’s capacity to handle his job. Thus‚ his surrogates were out in force Sunday morning spinning the SOTU like crazy. One of the most absurd claims came from Democrat Sen. Raphael Warnock during an appearance on NBC’s Meet the Press: “As I sat the other night and listened to the president’s speech‚ I said to my colleagues‚ ‘I don’t know if that was Joe Biden or Joe Lewis!’” (READ MORE: Non-Citizens Have Been Voting Since 2008) On CBS’s Face the Nation‚ Democrat Rep. Hakeem Jeffries was asked why the President is polling so poorly with black voters. He denied that it was a serious problem because they “understand that [Biden] has delivered over and over and over again.” The problem‚ of course‚ is what he has delivered — high prices‚ crime‚ the border crisis‚ ad infinitum. Black voters can also see what all voters see when he stumbles around and mumbles incoherently in response to questions. It’s obvious that the “state of the President” is bad and getting worse. If the Democrats and the corporate media continue to insult the intelligence of the voters about his condition‚ no amount of lawfare or ballot harvesting will save them. The post The State of the President appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

For as long as I’ve been alive‚ the Left has dominated the media. Though its earlier minions weren’t psychotic or Orwellian about it as they are now. They didn’t cancel or ban non-compliant journalism‚ fiction‚ and even social media messaging as they are now. And they stopped well short of lunatic fantasy‚ like men can be women and get pregnant. Until they realized they could force their fantasies on normal people too spineless to resist their indoctrination. Irish voters overwhelmingly rejected two constitutional amendments that sought to broaden (read woken) the definition of “family.” Eventually‚ they discovered that the more they pushed extremity‚ the more the masses bent to it. Hence‚ President Obama could go from publicly opposing same-sex marriage in 2008 (“I believe that marriage is a union between a man and a woman … For me as a Christian‚ it is also a sacred union.”) to lighting up the White House in rainbow colors the day the Supreme Court legalized the practice in 2015. Then‚ just two years later‚ the state of Colorado could sue a Christian baker for denying his craft to a gay wedding celebration. At least the Supreme Court ruled rightly if incompletely in his case on the basis of religious freedom. (READ MORE from Lou Aguilar: The Star Trek Election‚ Part II: Biden’s Brain) Around the same time‚ with the internet exploding‚ media leftists discovered they could convert cultural influence into political power to overcome popular common sense. Consequently‚ they got progressive simps Justin Trudeau elected Prime Minister of Canada‚ Leo Varadkar Taoiseach of Ireland‚ and Hillary Clinton almost President of the United States. Clinton’s tight loss to Donald Trump in 2016 shocked the Left into violating all ethical standards before the 2020 presidential election. After the totally fabricated hoax about Russia collusion did President Trump serious political damage‚ the media and Deep State took two historically unprecedented and contemptible steps ahead of Election 2020. One‚ they banned and cancelled the New York Post – America’s oldest newspaper‚ founded by Alexander Hamilton — for accurately reporting on the Hunter Biden laptop. Twitter and Facebook even disabled the Post account‚ and that of any person commenting on it. Two‚ they published a letter by 51 corrupt and partisan former intelligence officials dismissing the Post story as Russian misinformation. The erasure of this completely true reportage helped defeat Trump and elect the ultimate progressive simp‚ Joe Biden‚ President. The following year‚ Justin Trudeau was re-elected PM of Canada‚ and one year after that‚ Varadkar of Ireland. It seemed as if Marxist beta-manhood leadership was globally on the march. But several poli-cultural events since then appear to tell a different tale of woe for the Left. By far the most significant was Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter in April 2022. Ironically‚ thanks to Musk‚ future generations may not suspect just how close America came to losing one of its greatest constitutional rights — the Freedom of Speech. The Left’s total monopoly of communication and assault on its free exercise‚ under the pretense of quashing “disinformation and hate speech‚” was almost a fait accompli. (READ MORE: The Conservative Writer’s Block) Only a man as powerful as Musk could have stopped this‚ for those even close to his level — such as Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg — were and are against him. The proof lies in the ongoing corporate-media-statist attacks on him. Not only did major companies stop advertising on X (formerly Twitter) over a lie about Musk being antisemitic‚ but last month‚ a Delaware court voided his $56-billion Tesla pay package. Judge Kathaleen McCormick probably couldn’t run a coffeehouse‚ let alone put men on Mars‚ yet she can cancel a legitimate hard-earned transaction. Nonetheless‚ Musk’s X purchase seems to have helped break the Left’s hegemony‚ at least internationally. In November of 2023‚ conservative candidate Javier Milei won the Argentinian presidential election by‚ as CNN put it‚ “wrenching his country to the right with a bombastic anti-establishment campaign that drew comparisons to former U.S. President Donald Trump.” Last week‚ Milei fired 5‚000 government employees so he’ off to a great start. Last month‚ rightist El Salvadoran president Nayib Bukele won a landslide re-election (85 percent of the vote). His incredible victory came after‚ as Reuters put it‚ “voters cast aside concerns about erosion of democracy to reward him for a fierce gang crackdown that transformed security in the Central American country. Bukele is another world leader the Left compares to Trump. Across the Pond‚ in my troubled Camelot‚ Great Britain‚ the most successful author of all time has had enough‚ and she’s gone on X to show it. J.K. Rowling began her defense of women a few years ago as a kinder‚ gentler critic of transgender activism. But after enduring some of the bitterest‚ angriest insults on record‚ plus the usual lefty attempts to cancel her and her properties‚ like the Harry Potter video game Hogwart’s Legacy‚ Rowling has become a witty Voldemort. On Sunday‚ she “tweeted‚” “Happy Birthing Parent Day to all whose large gametes were fertilized resulting in small humans whose sex was assigned by doctors making mostly lucky guesses.” (READ MORE: The Decline and Fall of Hollywoke) And just in time for St. Patrick’s Day‚ last Saturday‚ Irish voters overwhelmingly rejected two constitutional amendments that sought to broaden (read woken) the definition of “family.” One of the amendments would have removed the statement that a woman’s place is in the home. It went down in flames‚ burning insufferably progressive PM Varadkar‚ who had aggressively pushed for the reform. “When you lose by this kind of margin‚ there are a lot of people who got this wrong‚” Varadkar said. “And I am certainly one of them.” Hopefully‚ his American counterpart will be blathering a similar sentiment in November.   The post When Rightist Eyes Are Smiling appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

If you listened to President Biden’s State of the Union speech on Thursday night‚ you were treated to a stack of lies and half-truths that was higher than the Washington Monument. They were shouted by an angry old man determined to prove he was still sentient. Principal among the lies were Biden’s shouts about how Republicans — and‚ specifically‚ Donald Trump — are the primary obstacles between him and the border security he says he wants. Biden and Co. will do anything to prevent border security‚ but we’ll get back to that in a minute. Biden’s lies were interrupted by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green who shouted that Biden should say the name of Laken Riley‚ the University of Georgia student who was allegedly murdered by illegal alien Jose Ibarra. Today‚ if you’re better off now than you were four years ago‚ you must be an illegal alien. Biden responded by saying‚ “Lincoln Riley‚ an innocent young woman who was killed by an illegal. That’s right. But how many thousands of people are being killed by legals?” Seriously? To Biden that would justify or diminish the murder of that young girl. Biden’s mind — however little of it is functioning — substituted itself for judge and jury to establish Ibarra’s guilt. (READ MORE from Jed Babbin: The Coming Ramadan War) What bothered Biden’s handlers about that? Biden later corrected himself‚ saying that he was wrong to say that Ibarra was an “illegal.” Is there anything Biden won’t say or do to keep our borders open? Clearly not. If you look at the statistics published by the Border Police and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency (ICE)‚ you see more than enough to condemn — and justify the urgent reversal of — Biden’s border policy. The odd thing about those stats is that they report so few murders. Are the agencies hiding something or are all their numbers suspect? I suspect the latter. Since Biden became president‚ according to other statistics from the same sources‚ at least seven and a half million people came across our southern border. That doesn’t count the one and a half million more‚ the “gotaways‚” who evaded the Border Patrol and entered the U.S. virtually undetected. Very few of those millions are arrested because they had already been convicted of criminal acts either here or abroad. Last year‚ more than fifteen thousand were arrested — and only perhaps deported — and almost six thousand have been arrested so far this year. Many of those arrested had already been deported repeatedly but Biden’s open border keeps letting them in. Which brings to mind the fact that there is virtually no screening done on the illegals entering America. If there were‚ those with criminal records would be kept out. Or would they? As this column has reported several times‚ hundreds of people — mostly men of military age — are coming in from China‚ the Middle East‚ Russia and other nations. They are “arrested” by the Border Police and released pending hearings on their — mostly false — applications for asylum. Remember‚ please‚ that FBI Director Christopher Wray told a Senate hearing last December that he had never seen a time during his decades-long career when so many threats against the U.S. were all as elevated as they are now. He told senators that he sees “blinking lights everywhere.” Terrorists‚ saboteurs‚ and criminals of all sorts are pouring over our border and Biden is doing nothing to stop them. We’ve already seen too many incidents of violence committed by illegal aliens. In February‚ men belonging to the Venezuelan hyper-violent Tren de Aragua criminal organization‚ were arrested for beating New York City policemen. The Venezuelan strongman‚ Nicholas Maduro‚ is emulating the late unlamented Fidel Castro’s 1980 “Mariel boatlift” in emptying his jails and sending the criminals to America. And Maduro is refusing to take any back‚ so we can’t deport them. We could send them back to Mexico‚ from where they entered the U.S.‚ but Biden won’t. Mexican President Lopez Obrador won’t allow it and it may be contrary to unwise international agreements we have signed. (LISTEN: The Spectacle Ep. 68: Border Crisis Reveals Rot in the GOP Yet Again) Remember when‚ in his 2016 campaign‚ former president Trump said that countries weren’t sending their best people here? ICE announced in February that they had arrested only 171 people who were accused or convicted of murder‚ rape‚ and assaults against children. I’m sure many are coming here because their futures are bleak where they come from. Many are decent people‚ but we apparently don’t have the ability to reject even those who have been deported before. Biden has pulled every trick in the book to prevent further construction of a border wall. Last week‚ a federal judge ruled that diversion — “reprogramming” — of such funds for things such as “environmental remediation” is illegal because congress had specified their use. Biden will never build the wall Trump proposed to protect our border. Biden has reversed essentially all of the border control orders that Trump had signed‚ and signed dozens of executive orders to open the borders in their place. If he really wanted to secure the border‚ he would put those policies back in place. The worst Biden reversals of Trump actions came early in his administration. For example‚ on January 20‚ 2021 — the day he was inaugurated — Biden revoked Trump’s Executive Order 13768. Biden’s order reversed Trump’s policy‚ which‚ according to the Center for Migration Studies had “called for the prompt removal of all undocumented immigrants living in the United States and withdrew federal funding from so-called sanctuary states. Biden’s executive order directs relevant federal agencies to issue new guidance about immigration enforcement priorities.” On that same date‚ Biden signed another order which lifted restrictions on immigrant visas (which Trump had put in place) for nationals of Burma‚ Eritrea‚ Iran‚ Venezuela‚ Kyrgyzstan‚ Libya‚ North Korea‚ Somalia‚ Sudan‚ Syria‚ Tanzania‚ and Yemen. Biden wants you to believe that the Republicans are blocking immigration reform. They are but only because the bill Biden calls “bipartisan” is an intolerable scam that wouldn’t improve border security one little bit. As I have written before it would‚ for example‚ institutionalize the flow of at least five thousand illegals into our country every day. That’s almost two million each year. Biden’s border bill is a sham that would merely enable the “processing” of more illegal aliens and their release into the country. (READ MORE: Another Bad Border Deal) The crime wave that has resulted from the influx of illegal aliens is nationwide. Some “sanctuary cities” are overwhelmed. As are other towns and cities. Biden‚ in 2023‚ flew at least 320‚000 illegals to various parts of the country at taxpayer expense. New York state is now deploying national guardsmen on New York City subways to quell the violence that has resulted from the combination of prosecutors who won’t prosecute and illegals coming into the city. Remember the statement Ronald Reagan made in a debate that sank Jimmy Carter? He told the American people to ask themselves if they were better off today — after almost four years of Jimmy — than they were before. Today‚ if you’re better off now than you were four years ago‚ you must be an illegal alien. Biden’s open border policy is a significant danger to our national security. It has — along with the Soros prosecutors who won’t do their jobs — unleashed a crime wave that affects almost all of us. At this point all we can do is vote and hope that Trump wins the election and reverses everything that Biden has done. Secure the border. Build the wall. And deport quickly all those who can legally be deported. The post Biden’s Border Lies appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

The miracle of the free market and its unparalleled ability to generate wealth relies on trust. To the maximum degree possible‚ trust allows the exchange of goods to be defined only by the willingness of buyers and sellers coming together to make the best deal the parties can agree to. When trust is absent‚ the skids are greased for a slide into what used to be called a panic‚ then later‚ a depression — credit dries up‚ no one trusts that the wealth one offers in for exchange will be paid as agreed and as trust requires. Ms. James doesn’t trust you to eat right. She doesn’t trust you to do anything right. She trusts herself. Doubters have always held that free markets will tend towards exploitation and the success of the most devious. They see always the panic‚ the depression‚ or the rogue player who despoils those gullible enough to buy in. (READ MORE from Shmuel Klatzkin: Biden’s State of the Union: A Druggie Living in an Alternate Reality) It is true that there always lurks the possibility of exploitation or failure in free markets‚ just as the possibility for injustice lurks in a free judicial system. There have been murderers who have been wrongly acquitted and they are now untouchable under the Fifth Amendment’s double jeopardy prohibition. Only utopian dreams are perfect; but utopian expectations forcibly imposed on others look like the Gulag Archipelago more than Utopia. The author of the book that coined the name was slyly hinting at an uncomfortable truth — utopia comes from the Greek ou topos — no place.  The modern utopian dreamers are busy destroying the trust that has brought about the greatest and most widely distributed prosperity the world has ever known. Readers of The American Spectator are not unread and know of the multi-pronged woke assault‚ debasing the dollar‚ concentrating economic power in a disengaged central bureaucracy instead of in the distributed and coordinated multi-processor intelligence of the marketplace‚ and in the medievalism of compelling the market to serve political ends that have nothing to do with the agreement to exchange goods‚ services‚ and wealth in the way that best suits market participants.  The history of American business shows the growth of trust. While economic freedom has sometimes been exploited by bad actors‚ freedom has allowed the market to find a way to earn an uncompelled trust.  A great example comes from the 19th century. After the Civil War there was an explosion of retail business in department stores and catalog stores and at all levels of retailing. At the same time retailers voluntarily adopted “money-back guarantees.” Part of the success of great commercial empires such as Montgomery Ward‚ Sears Roebuck‚ Gimbel’s‚ Macy’s‚ and others was the satisfaction-guaranteed-or-your-money-back promise that was suddenly everywhere. Trust of the merchant led to increased sales volume. By replacing the grim dog-eat-dog attitude of caveat emptor with faith in the store and its brand‚ business thrived. Increased satisfaction resulted in increased purchasing. But there are those who do not believe in such virtues as trust and who put their faith in their own utopian dreams and the power they can concentrate in their own hands. Their track record does not show the sustained growth of satisfaction and prosperity. Ask restaurant owners driven from the business by utopian woke legislators jacking up the wages restaurant employees must be paid beyond their ability to stay in business. Ask the people whose restaurant choices are shrinking; ask the young folks who can’t find the starter jobs that train them to the discipline of working for others that so many use as their first step in their life as an economic provider. (READ MORE: Britain Again Has a Choice: Civilization or Savagery) Ask the owner of Panera and his good friend Gavin Newsom‚ whose campaign the Panera owner contributed. As a result‚ unlike every other restaurant‚ Panera was exempted from the mandatory $20 minimum wage for labor that is driving small owners down and out. No trust in the process and its participants leads to no trust in the ability to make a living‚ leads to no trust in the ability to find a job‚ and no trust in a locale as being the kind of pleasant place people would like to live in. As Woody Guthrie used to sing: California’s a Garden of Eden A paradise to live in or to see. But believe it or not‚  You won’t find it so hot‚ If you ain’t got the do-re-mi. Then as now — except for the well-connected‚ who trust no one but themselves. New York is going even deeper‚ though‚ in destroying trust‚ particularly in the judiciary and the laws together with the business climate. Letitia James is the poster child of this violent‚ theater-wide attack on trust‚ having run for her elected job of the state’s chief law enforcement officer on the pledge of taking down Donald Trump. Yes‚ yes‚ we know exactly who the criminal is and don’t worry‚ we will find the crime. And she did‚ subverting centuries of business law as she did so. For the main thrust of trustworthy business law is to uphold freely arranged agreements adhered to by willing participants‚ and providing recompense for those hurting through violation of those agreements. This summary of business law goes far back and precedes English Common Law by many centuries. Rules governing Jewish commerce and ethics in business is well-developed‚ and there are centuries of case law on the books that turn on the principle of informed consent to binding deals‚ invalidating deals made by withholding information or otherwise rendering meaningless the informed consent that lies at the core of any deal. So important is this idea that one of the great rabbis of the Talmud taught that the first question a soul will be asked on coming to heavenly judgment was not “did you adhere to the rituals?” but “did you conduct your business dealings in good faith?” Jewish law goes so far as to say that the specifics of the Talmudic system are not as important as the customs of local businesspeople‚ for that is what is expected and understood and that is what fosters trust. The key is the good faith and trust that people stick to agreements made with full knowledge and judged by both sides to be in their best interest. (READ MORE: Mr. Biden‚ Why Do You Hide Your True Self?) But trust has mattered little to Ms. James. Strikingly‚ she prosecuted Trump for defrauding people who suffered no loss by the exchange‚ who testified that they had done their own due diligence and were satisfied with the valuations Trump submitted to them in his loan application. They did not want to press any charges. As far as Deutsche Bank is concerned‚ they were not defrauded and only profited by the business they did with Trump. They trusted their own experts at the highly specialized field of evaluating high-end properties‚ and never complained‚ even after the fact — and testified as much. The terms of the loan were met‚ interest and principle were paid timely and in full. Where was the breach of trust? On the part of Attorney General James‚ who sent the message that the customs of business mean nothing‚ that trust means less‚ and that prosperity and a free marketplace are sacrificed now to achieve a political aim through using laws in an unprecedented way‚ against all the great traditions that have made trust the keystone of an abundant society. Ms. James is not confining things to using law to demolish a political enemy. Just this week‚ she took on a meat company‚ JBS USA‚ the world’s largest beef distributor. James claims that JBS is hurting New York’s consumers because:  the beef comes from cows‚  and cows emit gasses‚  and our politics are built on the myth of the Imminent Climate Catastrophe which is caused by things such as cow gas  as well as gas-oline.  Ms. James is an advocate of this woke form of Adventism‚ whose true believers advocate a millennium achieved by forcing everyone — except the elect few — to give up all modern amenities to propitiate the fierce and ever-changing god Climate.  Ms. James doesn’t trust you to eat right. She doesn’t trust you to do anything right. She trusts herself‚ for which she will likely reward herself with exemptions from any discomfort that results from her policies‚ as do her political allies such as Ms. Pelosi and Mr. Newsom. (READ MORE: Gavin Newsom’s Surplus of Bad Ideas) Broken trust results in many other broken things. Unless James’ lawfare is resoundingly rejected by the courts and by the people‚ ugly consequences are in the works for her state and all states following that path. We are the people. Our American forbears‚ our civilizational forbears‚ trusted us to carry on this heritage of trust‚ freedom‚ and abundance that we have so enjoyed. Our children and our children’s children are looking at us in trusting expectation to be worthy of this moment.    The post New York and California Are Destroying Trust appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

The World That Wasn’t: Henry Wallace and the Fate of the American Century By Ben Steil   (Simon &; Schuster‚ 704 pages‚ $40) When you arrive at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum on the grounds of the Roosevelt home in Hyde Park‚ New York‚ you are greeted by National Park Service staff at the Henry A. Wallace Visitor Center‚ named after the man who was FDR’s Secretary of Agriculture from 1933-1940‚ Vice President during FDR’s third term‚ and the Progressive Party’s presidential candidate in 1948 who ran against Democrat Harry Truman and Republican Thomas Dewey with the open and welcome support of the Communist Party of the United States (CPUSA). The National Park Service‚ using your tax dollars‚ honors a man who blamed Harry Truman‚ not Josef Stalin‚ for starting the Cold War.  Steil gives Wallace the benefit of the doubt‚ calling him a “distinctly progressive idealist who staked his career on a categorical error of judgment.” As Benn Steil points out in his fascinating new biography of Wallace‚ The World That Wasn’t‚ had the Democrats in 1944 picked Wallace to be FDR’s running mate that November‚ Wallace would have become President of the United States upon FDR’s death in April 1945‚ and as a result “there would have been no Truman Doctrine. No Marshall Plan. No NATO. No West Germany. No policy of containment.” Henry Wallace opposed them all. He trusted Josef Stalin more than Harry Truman. As a “progressive‚” Wallace was ideologically closer to communism than capitalism. All of Wallace’s enemies were on the right. (READ MORE from Francis P. Sempa: Nixon‚ Not Kissinger‚ Was the Architect of ‘Detente’) Henry Wallace was born in Iowa. His father was a successful farmer and later served as Secretary of Agriculture under Republican Presidents Harding and Coolidge. Henry’s politics would turn in another direction. Steil notes that Wallace was both an intellectual and a spiritualist who experimented with theosophy‚ described by Steil as “an occult movement‚ popular in the 1920s among artists‚ intellectuals‚ and progressives‚ defined by a belief in a divine wisdom residing in the Beyond but accessible to a small spiritual elite.” Progressives like Wallace had a “universalist outlook” that led them to “embrace utopian ventures — in Wallace’s case‚ he found utopia in Lenin’s and Stalin’s Soviet Union. Universalist progressives like Wallace‚ Steil explains‚ love “humanity” but not individual people. Wallace once wrote that Lenin was “one of the few men of [the] century whose earnestness deserves to rank with that of [the prophet] Amos and [the theologian] John Knox.” Wallace respected Lenin’s “power to transform society in line with [his] vision.” He praised Stalin’s collectivization of the farms‚ even as it was killing by starvation and other means millions of Russians and Ukrainians. While Agriculture Secretary‚ he bizarrely dabbled in secret plans to work with a Russian mystic to create a new central Asian power named “Shambhala.” Steil suggests that Wallace’s central Asian fiasco‚ which included embarrassing correspondence (“Guru letters”) between Wallace and the mystic was covered-up by Roosevelt and one of FDR’s former political aids who became a judge.  That was the man that FDR and Democratic insiders selected to be FDR’s vice-presidential running mate in 1940‚ when Roosevelt sought an unprecedented third term. As Vice President‚ Wallace presided over the Senate — a job he hated. During the Second World War‚ FDR made Wallace chairman of the Economic Defense Board‚ later renamed the Bureau of Economic Warfare. When the Soviet Union became our ally in the war‚ Wallace in a speech before the Free World Association called the Bolshevik seizure of power in 1917 an event that “spoke for the common man in blood.” Wallace and Roosevelt promoted “economic democracy” and believed it was a common bond between the U.S. and U.S.S.R. Like FDR‚ Wallace sought the dissolution of the British empire after the war and looked to a partnership with the Soviet Union to establish the postwar order.  Robert Nisbet called Roosevelt’s approach to Stalin a “courtship.” Steil views Wallace’s approach as more of an ideological endearment. Both Roosevelt and Wallace established an environment in which Soviet spies and agents of influence flourished. Steil details the significant Soviet penetration of Wallace’s Bureau of Economic Warfare where Stalin’s agents “operate[d] unimpeded.” Wallace‚ Steil writes‚ “would become an evermore valued target for both Soviet and CPUSA manipulation.” (READ MORE: What Else MacArthur Said About Taiwan) As the 1944 presidential election grew closer‚ the FBI and some Democrat Party officials began to worry about who would be Roosevelt’s successor if he won a fourth term. Wallace traveled to Siberia and praised labor conditions there — in the very heart of Stalin’s Gulag. Soviet intelligence officers‚ Steil writes‚ “transformed sites along the vice president’s route into Potemkin villages‚ scrubbing all traces of Gulag life.” Steil notes‚ however‚ that like other American and Western “political pilgrims” to the Soviet Union‚ Wallace saw what he came to see — the great Soviet experiment in economic democracy. Wallace also saw another such experiment developing in China with Mao Zedong’s communists leading the way. “Wallace‚” Steil writes‚ “was trying to shape the postwar Asian architecture in a manner decidedly friendly to Soviet interests.”  Democratic Party politicos and Roosevelt insiders knew that the president was dying as the 1944 election approached. This made the choice of his running mate extremely important — it was likely that whomever was picked would play a key role in shaping the postwar world. Steil notes that Roosevelt — deceitful man that he was — promised at least three potential candidates‚ including Wallace‚ that each was his favorite. The future of the postwar order was at stake but Roosevelt‚ as always‚ was playing politics.  Thankfully‚ the party bosses settled on Truman‚ and FDR went along with the decision. The American and Western side in the coming Cold War was in much better hands with Truman than it would have been with Wallace. FDR made Wallace Secretary of Commerce‚ where Wallace’s cadre of communists and Soviet sympathizers continued to influence him. As the Cold War developed‚ Wallace repeatedly blamed Truman for the deterioration of U.S.-Soviet relations. Wallace became one of the leading American critics of anti-communism. He was already planning a presidential run for 1948‚ but he had to decide whether to run as a Democrat or a third party candidate. He eventually chose to run on the Progressive Party ticket. He welcomed the support of the CPUSA. He secretly met with Soviet officials who wanted to help his campaign. Wallace conveyed to Soviet officials that a Wallace presidency would mean no Cold War. Steil writes that Wallace was “skating the borders of U.S. law.” Here‚ unlike the more recent case with Donald Trump‚ there was real evidence of “collusion between the Wallace campaign and the Soviet Union.” (READ MORE: Ranking Presidents‚ Miseducating Our Children) Wallace denounced American actions during the Berlin Airlift. He denounced the formation of NATO. He decried the policy of containment. But at some point‚ Steil writes‚ Wallace had an epiphany of sorts. He began to see that his support of Stalin was erroneous. Steil gives Wallace the benefit of the doubt‚ calling him a “distinctly progressive idealist who staked his career on a categorical error of judgment.” It was an error of judgment that progressives made throughout the Cold War because progressives and communists share ideological and philosophical roots. That common vision was perhaps best explained by Whittaker Chambers in Witness: “It is the vision of man’s mind displacing God as the creative intelligence of the world. It is the vision of man’s liberated mind‚ by the sole force of its rational intelligence‚ redirecting man’s destiny and reorganizing man’s life and the world. It is the vision of man‚ once more the central figure of the Creation‚ not because God made man in His image‚ but because man’s mind makes him the most intelligent of the animals.” It was Henry Wallace’s vision. It is still the vision of American progressives today.    The post Henry Wallace and the Progressive Link to Communism appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

Russia’s steady westward advance following the fall of Avdiivka has Europeans in a panic. Frenzied calls between German generals agonizing about giving long range missiles to Ukraine get intercepted by Russia and EU governments quarrel over French proposals to send soldiers to stop Putin as he brandishes his latest ICBMs and slips on aviator glasses to pilot a Tupolev bomber around Finland. Poland is hosting big NATO exercises this month to ward off Vlad the Impaler who is more likely eyeing Ukraine’s vulnerable Balkan neighbor‚ Moldova‚ ridden by ethnic tensions that his revamped secret services are experts at manipulating. Its poorly equipped 6‚000-man army would be unable to cope with even low intensity attacks for very long. A poor ex Soviet republic about the size of Maryland where ethnic Russians rule a sliver of territory garrisoned by 2‚000 Russian troops‚ Moldova seems ripe for the picking by Putin who used the purported victimization of ethnic Russians in Ukraine’s Donbass region to justify his “special military operation” entering its third year. Moldova’s decidedly pro Western government under president Maia Sandu‚ an ethnic Romanian‚ is primarily focused on joining the EU and has managed to resist attempted power grabs by Moscow so far. This week‚ she called for the withdrawal of Russia’s military from the territory of Transnistria. But Putin persists. (READ MORE from Martin Arostegui: Russia Is Winning in Ukraine. The US Should Step Up) Controlling Moldova would strengthen Russia’s position in NATO’s Balkan underbelly and sever Ukraine’s road and rail links to its Danube river ports‚ a vital alternative route for grain exports as Russia intensifies missile strikes against its Black Sea ports of Odessa. The opening of a new southern front would also greatly complicate matters for Ukraine’s overstretched army if it has to divert diminishing resources away from central sectors of the front. Russia tried coordinating a coup in Moldova with the invasion of Ukraine back in February 2022 but the plan collapsed when Russian forces failed to take Odessa. A pro-Russian insurrection orchestrated by the Kremlin’s secret service FSB which recruited top Moldovan politicians petered out as the Russians were pushed back to the Dnieper River and their Black Sea Fleet’s flagship was sunk. The Moldovan government further broke up the plan with the arrest of a former president accused of leading the rebellion. Russia tried again in 2023 with a more wide ranging operation organized this time by its military intelligence service GRU which took over foreign operations from the FSB following the Kremlin spy unit’s failures during the Ukraine invasion. Violent protests staged in the Moldovan capital ChiÈ™inău were coordinated with false flag RPG attacks in Transnistria‚ which Russian propaganda blamed on Romanian nationalists. The GRU went so far as flying in football hooligans from Serbia to stage incidents. Once again‚ Moldova’s efficient internal security unit‚ the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) headed by officers deeply familiar with Russian spy methods‚ having themselves undergone KGB training when Moldova formed part of the Soviet Union‚ broke up the scheme financed through the oligarch Ilan Shorr‚ who used his dual Israeli nationality to launder Russian funds and flee the country. He is believed to be funding a separatist movement among Moldova’s Turkik minority in the south of the country with Russian backing . This past week‚ SIS revealed that Russia is preparing another “intervention at an unprecedented scale” to sabotage the re-election of president Sandu and a referendum on joining the EU scheduled for this fall by “degrading institutions and candidates promoting European integration.” SIS chief Alesandru Musteata‚ says that Moscow plans “hybrid attacks” against Moldova in 2024-2025 . (READ MORE: Russian Support for Catalan Separatists Keeps Spain’s Socialists in Power) Part of the strategy involves “extensive use of social media to promote protests and confrontations inciting interethnic hatred and promoting disinformation” as well as using channels such as Tik Tok and Telegram to promote pro-Russian political figures. Cyber attacks would also be launched to crash official websites and confuse reporting of electoral data. A recent analysis by the Royal United Services Institute‚ semi-official think tank of the British ministry of defense says that after “the failure of the second attempt to destabilize Moldova‚ Russian disinformation targeting the country became much more consistent and mutually reinforcing. Russia shifted to strengthen the public association between Moldova’s aspiration to join the EU and President Maia Sandu while at the same time targeting Romanian nationalists to amplify their voices‚ and in doing so exacerbate the threat felt by Moldova’s Russian-speaking population to increased alignment with Europe.” Forty-five Russian intelligence agents have been expelled from Moldova since last year‚ including much of the embassy staff and technicians operating about a dozen Russian communication antennas in ChiÈ™inău. But the GRU may now be relying more on “illegal” or deep cover agents to conduct “active measures” abroad‚ as part of the unit’s recent restructuring‚ according to RUSI. Politicians suspected of harboring close ties with the Kremlin remain in powerful positions. It’s noted that the mayor of ChiÈ™inău‚ known for past Russian sympathies‚ was in Moscow at the time that Russia invaded Ukraine. Russia spent about $50 million‚ much of it covertly‚ to fund socialist and communist anti-government parties in recent local elections‚ according to a high level Moldovan official who spoke to The American Spectator on condition of anonymity. The government won with a plurality of 30 percent but its support could evaporate if the economy tanks. Last month‚ Transnistria’s Supreme Council of the Perestrovian Moldavian Republic appealed for Russian “defense and protection” against “growing pressures” from Sandu’s government which levied new tariffs on its agricultural goods. Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov immediately accused the Moldovan government of “applying economic pressure on Transnistria” and “moving in Kyiv’s footsteps” by “discriminating against Russian speakers” and “blocking” negotiations. Shares in Moldovan companies fell on the Budapest stock exchange following the pronouncements. “Russia is trying to leverage fear‚” according to a Moldovan official. “If people think that joining the EU will trigger Russian reaction‚ they could vote for pro-Russian candidates in the elections and scare away investors‚” he says. (READ MORE: Putin’s March to the Red Sea) Russia can black out Moldova‚ which gets 80 percent of its electricity from Transnistria powered by Russian gas‚ with a flip of a switch. Moldova could connect to neighboring Romania’s power grid but its higher EU prices would fuel inflation‚ according to officials. Transnistria’s foreign minister Vitaly Ignatov‚ who is “Russia’s man” according to Moldovan officials‚ is seeking “money from the Russians‚” according to the sources. Moscow could be taking a gamble by cutting electricity to Moldova as it would deprive Transnistria of its main source of revenue and push ChiÈ™inău further into the arms of the EU. Supporting a mini puppet state in the middle of a war could become a drain for the Kremlin if Sandu’s government remains resilient. It would be difficult for Russia to resort to a full military invasion as long as Ukraine can deny the local air space and the Black Sea to Russia‚ which lost another frigate to Ukranian drones this week. But the GRU could engineer covert military operations by activating a Wagner type paramilitary company in Transnistria supplied clandestinely through Serbia. Russian drones launched from Crimea‚ already crossing Moldovan skies to strike Ukraine’s Danube ports‚ could support undercover Spetsnaz teams with targeted hits on key objectives in ChiÈ™inău. Moldova cannot be fast tracked into NATO because neutrality is enshrined in its constitution. Its poorly equipped 6‚000 man army would be unable to cope with even low intensity attacks for very long. President Sandu recently signed a security agreement with France which is supplyng a radar system  and has special forces stationed in neighboring Romania. French president Emanuel Macron just announced that France is opening a “military mission” to train and advise Moldova’s armed forces. But Putin is not scared of the French‚ who he recently chased out of Africa. ChiÈ™inău has been relying primarily on U.S. Ukrainian aid for its security‚ according to officials. That’s now in doubt and Europe’s military bureaucracies‚ which are having a hard time securing sensitive teleconferences among their top brass and bean counting artillery shells for Ukraine‚ don’t appear to be in shape to deal with a GRU engineered “gray zone” in Moldova.               The post Is Moldova Next on Putin’s List? appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

“I shouldn’t have used illegal‚” Joe Biden told MSNBC’s Jonathan Capehart. “It’s undocumented.” The mea culpa pertained to the president describing a Venezuelan in the United States illegally who murdered a nursing student jogging in Athens‚ Georgia. Marjorie Taylor-Greene‚ who represents a Georgia district‚ prompted Biden to address the murder during the State of the Union address. One gleans from this not merely that Democrats remain unserious about solving the illegal immigration problem but that they do not regard illegal immigration as a problem. “Lincoln Riley‚ an innocent young woman who was killed by an illegal‚” Biden told the joint session of Congress‚ “to her parents‚ I say my heart goes out to you.” His brain went out to somewhere else. Lincoln Riley‚ of course‚ coaches the University of Southern California Trojans football team. ESPN’s Pat McAfee confessed that he emerged from an event to discover the coach’s death (a fate for a USC coach even worse than losing to UCLA) trending online. “Lincoln Riley’s dead?” he asked. “Wait a second‚ who said that? The president? Lincoln Riley’s dead?” (READ MORE from Daniel Flynn: Grumpy Old Man Mumbles State of the Union) The slain student’s mom reacted‚ “Biden does not even KNOW my child’s name — it’s pathetic!” Activists and journalists‚ and activist-journalists‚ fixated on neither the murder nor the fact that the president did not know the victim’s name but that he called an illegal alien “illegal.” Hmmm. “We remind President Biden that no human being is illegal — and dangerous rhetoric inevitably leads to more violence against our community‚” responded Faisal Al-Juburi of the Texas immigrant-support group RAICES. The media followed suit in condemning imaginary violence allegedly brought on by the correct use of a word rather than the actual violence brought on by treating illegal behavior as legal behavior. The New Republic reacted to Biden’s off-script remark by insisting‚ “He really‚ really shouldn’t have.” CNN’s Dana Bash pressed Democrats in interviews about the use of the word. As CNN put “illegal” in scare quotes on the chyron‚ Senator Laphonza Butler of California conceded to Bash that she considered it “unfortunate” that Biden “fell into the trap of the language.” A frazzled Nancy Pelosi‚ who understands the optics (and the humanity) of all this better than her less experienced colleagues‚ told Bash: “He should have said ‘undocumented‚’ but that’s not a big thing.” Many in Congress did not require Fourth Estate prompting to rush to defend the murderer —rather than condemn the murder — from a label they regard as unduly harsh. “Let me be clear: No human being is illegal‚” Rep. Ilhan Omar responded. “As a proud immigrant‚” Rep. Chuy Garcia tweeted. “I’m extremely disappointed to hear President Biden use the word ‘illegal.’ He should have said undocumented.” “There was a lot of good in President Biden’s speech tonight‚ but his rhetoric about immigrants was incendiary and wrong‚” Congressman Joaquin Castro of Texas similarly tweeted. He added‚ “The rhetoric President Biden used tonight was dangerously close to language from Donald Trump that puts a target on the backs of Latinos everywhere.” (READ MORE: History Remembers Mitch McConnell Differently Than 2024 Does) An illegal alien‚ already pinched for criminal offenses but somehow not deported‚ bashed-in a 22-year-old jogger’s skull. Their impulses compel them to largely stay mute in response to the horrific crime but react to outrage when a president of their own party acknowledges the perpetrator’s illegal status. To them‚ failing to deploy a euphemism‚ rather than erasing a young woman‚ amounts to the offense worth making a fuss about. It all seemed not merely obtuse but upside-down. One gleans from this not merely that Democrats remain unserious about solving the illegal immigration problem but that they do not regard illegal immigration as a problem. Biden‚ by apologizing for saying what he should have said more than a week earlier‚ illustrates the degree to which the party remains enwalled by ideological precepts regarding the border. Bill Clinton elicited jeers from Republicans by saying to a voter‚ “I feel your pain.” A new generation of Democrats‚ far more ideological and less human than the 42nd president‚ exacerbates rather than feels others’ pain. That once-mocked empathy appears wholly absent from large swaths of the Democratic Party. Republicans surely long for that compassionate Democratic Party over this sadistic one. He felt our pain. They inflict it. The post Biden Takes It Back: ‘I Shouldn’t Have Used Illegal’ appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.