When is a bribe not a bribe? When it's a "voluntary contribution"
At least according to NC Governor Roy Cooper.
The Carolina Journal reports:
Responding to questions from the General Assembly’s senior nonpartisan staff, officials from Gov. Roy Cooper’s budget office said a $57.8 million agreement Cooper made with the operators of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline is a “voluntary contribution” that will be distributed by a yet-to-be-named board of directors.
The response came in a memo Mark Trogdon, director of the legislature’s Fiscal Research Division, shared Friday, Feb. 2, with legislative leaders. Trogdon said the budget office’s reply was “not responsive” to the legislature’s questions and suggested Cooper or members of his administration may wish to explain the agreement in detail to lawmakers.
This looks exactly like the pay-to-play culture that Democrats employed in their governing of the state for more than a century. The party maintained control via a spoils system and patronage. It all came crashing down in 2010, when Republicans won control of the legislature following a decade of Democratic scandals (leading to federal convictions of the Speaker of the House and the Agriculture Commissioner).
Pay-to-play does not require the money go to campaign coffers. In this case, it's a fund controlled solely by the Governor - to be disbursed to organizations or agencies of his choosing.
This allows him to derive political benefit.
Governor Roy Cooper was a part of the Democratic machine that was run out of power eight years ago.
We should be concerned that he might be trying to resurrect that old corrupt system.
Democrats leak their response to GOP memo
I'm old enough to remember when it was outrageous that some reporters were leaked advance copies of "Nunes memo."
From National Review:
Representative Jerrold Nadler of New York, the senior Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, has written a six-page response to the FISA-abuse memo published Friday by the committee’s Republican staffers under the direction of Chairman Devin Nunes (R., Calif.).
I won’t get sidetracked by the fact that Nadler’s “Dear Democratic Colleague” letter has been “exclusively obtained” by NBC News — i.e., that it was leaked to the media, whereas the so-called Nunes memo was provided to committee Democrats before publication so they could seek changes. The Nunes memo had to be subjected to a rules-based process because of classified-information issues. The Nadler memo does not seem to contain classified information; it just responds to what the Republicans have produced, which is now public record.
Read the full post to see how Andrew McCarthy shreds this Democratic response.
Congressman: Farrakhan is "an outstanding human being"
From the Daily Caller (and being reported by no other major media outlet for some reason):
Democratic Illinois Rep. Danny Davis defended Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan as an “outstanding human being” on Monday.
Farrakhan is known for embracing radically anti-Semitic and anti-white views, as even the left-wing Southern Poverty Law Center has acknowledged. Farrakhan’s history of racially extreme comments includes blaming Jews for the September 11 attacks, saying white people “deserve to die” and praising Adolf Hitler as a “very great man.”
A bombshell new photo emerged last week, showing former President Barack Obama smiling with Farrakhan at a Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) meeting in 2005. The journalist who took the photo said he suppressed its publication to protect Obama’s presidential aspirations.
Maybe I have a different idea of what an "outstanding human being" is.
It's a Democratic wave!
Eight of the ten Senate seats most likely to flip are currently held by Democrats, according to CNN.
"Victimhood culture" is killing academia
From Campus Reform:
A forthcoming book by two sociology professors contends that victimhood culture is causing a new “moral conflict” across college campuses.
The Rise of Victimhood Culture, to be published next week by Palgrave MacMillan, eschews traditional thinking about campus culture and asserts that conflict arises when “a more traditional culture of dignity” comes into tension with the nascent “culture of victimhood.”
This is a really interesting analysis. Essentially, the power is in being the victim.
Jimmy Kimmel says I'm smart
The anointed "Conscience of America" has endorsed my intellect.
Kind of...
At an event for the insufferable left-wing podcast “Pod Save America,” [Jimmy] Kimmel insisted, “It just so happens that almost every talk show host is a liberal, and that’s because it requires a level of intelligence.”
Hmmm.
Upon second reading, it appears Kimmel doesn't actually define WHAT level of intelligence, though.