Total government spending is well past the point of adding value

Wayne Winegarden, here:

At one-third of the size of the economy, total government spending is well past the point where additional expenditures add value.

Actually, it's higher than one third, as I previously pointed out here. In 2016 total government spending hit 36.1% of GDP. 

Noted in passing: Publius Decius Mus is Michael Anton, appointed by Trump to the NSC

Reported here. Anton, no surprise, cops to being a devoted Straussian.

The best part about the interview is that he thought Bill Kristol was his friend, until Kristol insinuated that Anton was a Nazi.

Kristolnicht. The guy can't be all bad, then.

Michael Mukasey says Loretta Lynch ordered the surveillance of Trump

From the story here:

“I think he’s right in that there was surveillance and that it was conducted at the behest of the attorney general – at the Justice Department,” Mukasey told ABC’s “This Week.” 

Laura Ingraham on Friday interviewed Mukasey saying the same thing.

Trump's right: It was Obama who tried to sell-out the country to Russia and keep it a secret

Here.

Former Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch calls for more marching, more blood, more death in the streets

The "E" used to stand for "eats too much". In the current video she appears to have lost weight since leaving office.

The video ends showing that it's under the auspices of the Democrats in the US Senate, here. Democrats. The Party of Violence.

Watch gun sales soar again.

Grand Rapids, Michigan, climate update for February 2017

Average temperature was 34.7 degrees F in February 2017 in Grand Rapids, Michigan, 10.3 degrees above normal, the warmest February on record, beating out 1998's 34.1.

Monthly lowest minimum was 4.0 F. The mean is -2.0.

The high was 66.0 F. The mean is 50.

Precipitation was 2.05 inches. The mean is 1.76.

February snowfall was 2.4 inches. The mean is 13.

Heating degree days came to 842. The mean is 1137.

Mark Levin: Obama's police state used intelligence services to spy on Trump campaign and leak the info

Here:

"We absolutely know this is true, the FBI did a preliminary criminal investigation based on a potential connection between a server in Trump Tower and a couple of Russian banks. That turned out to be a dry hole, but one of the most outrageous things I've ever seen... totally uncovered by the media. Instead of closing the investigation, the Obama administration tried to turn it into a FISA court investigation in June [2016]. Apparently the first application they submitted named Trump."

"Even the FISA court said no. There wasn't enough evidence to make out probable cause involving Donald Trump," he said. "In the middle of the campaign the administration was actively having Trump investigated."

Pelosi caught in lie just like McCaskill about meeting Russians

Black lefty, who once worked for Glenn Greenwald but was fired, arrested for threatening Jews nationwide

What, I thought Trump supporters were behind these bomb threats?!

Story here, where you'll discover he used the very same m/o which got him fired from The Intercept.

Flashback August 2015: 30 Senate Democrats meet with Russian and Chinese diplomats behind closed doors to discuss Iran nuclear deal

Two-faced lyin' hypocritical wankers.

Here:

"Other lawmakers attending the briefing included Sens. Al Franken . . .."

Obama actually has more flexibility now that he's out of office than after he was reelected

Now he can openly conspire against America as a private citizen without fear, with a little help from Valerie Jarrett, who is oddly moving in to the DC residence, and from a federal pension and a fat book contract for tens of millions of dollars.

Obama hated Great Britain, but he's going to take its tradition of shadow government and give it an, er, unAmerican twist, guarded by the Secret Service.

America still has cancer.

Story here. 

Ben Carson confirmed by Senate to HUD 58-41 and Rick Perry to Energy 62-37

"Carson and Perry are the 17th and 18th of Trump's 22 Cabinet and Cabinet-level nominations to win Senate approval."

Bravo Sen. Ted Cruz: Sen. Sessions meeting ambassador a nothing burger

Here:

Jeff was being asked about the Trump campaign communicating with the Russians. I think he understood that he was answering in that capacity. And that is perfectly understandable. 

Reuters/CNBC oil headline says Russian production cuts stall, when the truth is Russia is cheating

So who's working in sympathy with the Russians now, huh?

"US oil settles at $52.61 a barrel, down $1.22 after Russian output cuts stall" says the headline.

"Russia's February oil output was unchanged from January at 11.11 million barrels per day (bpd), energy ministry data showed, with cuts remaining at 100,000 bpd or just a third of the levels pledged by Moscow under the agreement with the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries" says the story, here.

Headline should have read: "Russian oil output cuts fall 66% short of those promised two months in a row".

Bravo Sen. Joe Manchin: "We meet all the ambassadors"

Here.

Missouri should get a new senator to replace Claire McCaskill, who can't remember her own shit

Foreign influence flashback March 2016: Top donor to Hillary, Saudi Arabia, also bankrolled Trump critic Senator John McCain

This is real news. Jeff Sessions is fake news, which is why Jeff Sessions is being crucified, and John McCain rolls in the dough. The elites protect their own.

Reported here:

A nonprofit with ties to Senator John McCain received a $1 million donation from the government of Saudi Arabia in 2014, according to documents filed with the U.S. Internal Revenue Service. ...

Founded in 1998 to raise money for then-President Bill Clinton’s presidential library, the Clinton Foundation accepted millions of dollars from foreign governments over the years, including while Hillary Clinton, now running for president, served as secretary of State during President Barack Obama’s first term. The foundation says that Clinton was not involved in its work when she worked for the Obama administration.

The Saudi donation to the McCain Institute Foundation may be the first congressional instance of that trend coming to light.

“The extent of this practice is difficult to gauge, of course,” Holman said, “because we only know about it when a nonprofit or foreign government voluntarily reveals that information.”

There's lots to like in Trump's speech, but . . .

We can't afford $1 trillion in infrastructure spending and it won't accomplish what people say it will. We are $34 TRILLION behind in spending of all kinds, but that's obviously out of the question. Debt service payments at rock bottom interest rates already exceed 10% of the $4 trillion budget. This is the price we are paying now . . . FOR PREVIOUS "PROSPERITY", which was only borrowed.

Paid family leave, a new entitlement, will cost government and employers a fortune, subduing hiring.

Adding refundable tax credits for health insurance premiums paid by taxpayers to a tax system which already includes the Earned Income Tax Credit is a back door introduction of another new entitlement. It could end up costing the country tens of billions in lost tax revenue each year.

These proposals could be political feints on which he will ultimately never deliver, simple red meat for moderates and liberals thrown out there to garner bipartisan support for his overall program.

Only time will tell.  

Ryan Zinke confirmed by Senate to Interior Dept. 68-31

WaPo admits part of the delay had to do with politics, here.

President Trump sends Vice President Mike Pence to sell his speech to conservative talk radio

So far today I've heard Pence live on segments with Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage and Sean Hannity.