BREAKING. Sir John Major: "Complacency and nostalgia are the route to national decline"

"We are no longer a great power. We will never be so again. In a world of nearly 8 billion people, well under 1% are British"

"We are a top second-rank power"

2) John Major: "Our hefty international influence rested on our history and reputation, buttressed by our membership of the EU and our close alliance with the US.
Suddenly, we are no longer an irreplaceable bridge between Europe and America. We are now less relevant to them both"

3) Sir John: "I do find it surprising that – in the midst of the Covid crisis – the Government appears to be fostering disputes with the Judiciary [...]; the Civil Service, upon whose help the Government depends; and the BBC, still the most respected broadcaster on the planet"

4) Sir John: "#Brexit divided England & Wales from Scotland and Northern Ireland. It divided political parties and families; the young and their elders; business and trade unions; and friend from friend. As its full impact becomes apparent in the New Year, old wounds may re-open"

5) John Major: "There is no consensus on #Brexit, and never has been. It was a bitterly divisive policy, and uncorked a populism that may be difficult to quell.
The Referendum debate was unlike any I have known before. Emotion overcame reality".

This Flint MI rally for Biden is a joke. Barry begging somebody to honk for Joe and I didn’t hear one horn. Then he had to scream Joe three times to get him to come out of hiding. Then Biden starts out with 8 yrs under Barry and not one scandal! 😂 Not one but about ten at least

I have a memory of @anandMenon1 et al writing about a TM deal being greeted with a surge of ‘it’s a deal’ goodwill (it wasn’t) but the argument seems to hold true for the current deal.

Some of it is relief that we have all avoided no deal although I’d argue that much of the no deal furore was prestidigitation (as it has always been).

Some of it is exhaustion. Everyone (apart from enthusiasts and lunatics) is very tired indeed, especially after this annus horrificis.

Everyone wants to move on. Labour is a great example. That they were going to vote for the deal was visible from space. If Labour can banish the twin albatrosses of Corbyn and Brexit then, hey presto, it becomes competitive again.

So almost overnight a new consensus seems to form. The Christmas gift isn’t just a deal it’s a new beginning, again.

🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 Situation Update, Dec. 31st – Game-changing bombshells to be unveiled before Congress on January 6

In today’s SU, we reveal Trump’s plan to unleash bombshell evidence in front of Congress on the 6th, right before Congress votes on which slate of electors to accept.

1. @JonathanTurley
Trump has only been out of office and, therefore, no longer (purportedly) immunized from criminal prosecution for ~1 month. Also, because of R delay, Garland is still awaiting confirmation. Once Garland is AG, expect a thorough



2. investigation of Trump for inciting insurrection in violation of 18 U.S.C. 2383, together with other federal crimes. Once that investigation is completed, based on the information that is currently public, there is a good chance that Trump will be prosecuted for violating

3. 18 U.S.C. 2383, together with other federal crimes. Not absolutely guaranteed. But a very good chance. The only element of inciting insurrection that is open to credible dispute is Trump’s intent. Is there sufficient evidence that he intended his speech to incite imminent

4. lawlessness? As you know (or should know), criminal intent is invariably established by circumstantial evidence. That means prosecutors must analyze everything Trump did and said (and didn't do or say) before, during and after his incendiary speech.

5. That investigation takes time. Sometimes a lot of time to empanel a grand jury and begin issuing subpoenas and seeking warrants. The fact that Trump's previous crimes, including the 10 felonies outlined in Vol. II of Mueller's report, haven't been prosecuted is irrelevant.

Good to see @Marthakearney on @BBCr4today taking @pritipatel to task over the numbers of lorries in Dover - now 1,500 in Stack (M20) and Manston airfield combined - rather more than 170 that @BorisJohnson said yesterday, baffling haulage groups /1

@BBCr4today @pritipatel @BorisJohnson She won't say whether lorry drivers will have to take a PCR test (long-winded, requires RNA extraction etc. 24-48hrs) rather than much faster (and less sensitive) lateral flow test. Short Strait will struggle to operates with PCR tests. You'd need one yesterday for tomorrow! /2

@BBCr4today @pritipatel @BorisJohnson Because of the delays that have empty lorries already stuck in the queues, in an earlier interview British Retail Consortium @the_brc Andrew Opie said fresh food shortages would occur within days because lorries couldn't get back to Spain etc to reload /3

@BBCr4today @pritipatel @BorisJohnson @the_brc Haulage experts like @RHADuncanB are always at pains to explain that the lorries at Dover (and GB-IE, for that matter) are flowing in a continuous cycle. More than 85% are from EU countries. So if you block one side, or artery the whole system starts to grind to a halt/4

@BBCr4today @pritipatel @BorisJohnson @the_brc @RHADuncanB This episode has been a bit of a teaching moment, exposing the canard that the UK can unilaterally "take back control of its borders". It can't. Borders are membranes. Traffic flows in both directions. Actions by one side impact the other - as French move has demonstrated. /5

So the SCOTUS said no. They won't hear the case. Cue crazy leftists and their inane celebrations. You're probably pissed off by now because you thought the SCOTUS was going to take this case. Trump never needed them to begin with. This is an easy one to explain.................

When it comes to elections there is no HIGHER or FINAL authority than the state legislatures. No, not even the Supreme Court has the final say in this, believe it or not. Trump knew this case would get thrown out..because Texas filing was weak.

Their argument was REALLY weak, so weak that both of the Levin's would have told Trump days ago that this case wasn't going to get heard.

In fact...Mark Levin DID say it wasn't going to get heard on his radio show...all week long and he was right.

Justice Alito was right in his decision. He argued that the state of Texas wasn't, in so many words, as serious about a resolution as they pretended to be. He said there weren't "interested" in real resolution...and he was right.

He stated that just as in Arizona vs California 589 U.S. where they disputed over the distribution over the water from the colorado river, the actions of what state cannot disenfranchise the actions of another.

Sources : Makkal Neethi Maiyam Chief Kamalhasan was furious for my interview that I termed him a B Team of BJP. Link of the interview is as follows :

Kamalhassan furiously tweeted, “ I am not anyone’s B Team”
An hour ago, Kamal tweeted as follows : Two girls, “Arshitha Agarwal” and “Kunisha Agarwal” had helped poor students, who are not able to get gadgets 2/n

to help poor students for attending online classes.
People are wondering who are these Arshitha Agarwal and Kunisha Agarwal. They both are the daughters of Chennai City Commissioner Mahesh Kumar Agarwal IPS. 3/n

Today morning, I tweeted, in regard to the participation of Mahesh Kumar Agarwal’s daughters in the event held at Chennai CoP office with regard to the above event where iPads were distributed for poor girls, which was held in Chennai Commissioner’s office. 4/n

While it is a semi-official function, Mahesh Kumar’s Agarwal’s daughters participated in the event.
I had tweeted as follows : “The @chennaipolice_ Commissioner is doing a great job of distributing free iPads to poor students with the help of NGOs. 5/n

Just a reminder: unofficial channels have already been used once to demonstrate the Bidens are a very real national security threat compromised by hostile foreign powers.

It happened once.

If it has to, it will happen again.

There are people who take their oaths seriously.

1. When I hear @clairecmc talk about Dems learning to talk to the Piggly Wiggly crowd, I hope she'll want to join/help w my moderate messaging electioneering overall for Ds effort. BC its CRUCIAL to understand- Ds & outside groups tried already to cater to these voters on the

2. persuasion. That in fact, this cycle was the product of a very concerted effort of that strategy driven by high profile data firms on the D side (many of which who've been critical of my work) & it was a complete and total failure for 2 reasons. The main 1 is that it wants

3. to ignore the effect that polarization is having on voter behavior & the limitations that is placing on certain electioneering techniques that USED TO BE EFFECTIVE and are now not. I want to make something really clear- it is only in places where at least 1 element of the D's

4. operation "went rogue" that Biden pulled out wins: GA, where Abrams made electioneering about turning out the new coalition, AZ, where the AZ state party did the same, but with Latino voters, MI & WI where the state parties put into effect base-centric voter turnout strategies

5. at odds w the party's conventional playbook to focus on turnout, and/or places where concentrations of the D's new coalition: college-educated whites + minority voters (and young voters) are so high (like NE 2) that sub-par strategy doesn't matter, turnout surges are naturally

Trump is trying to overturn the election results. I doubt he’ll be successful. But I don’t know it for sure.

In the coming weeks, I’ll be watching two things:

1. Certifications
2. GOP state legislators and

There are two things that are set to happen with the election results in the coming weeks that ordinarily would be formalities, but in a disputed election are crucial.

First is the states' certifications of their results. Second is the selection of electors.

Right now, both processes are clearly on track to make Biden the next president.

Trump's only hope is to upset the apple cart on one or both. Blocking or delaying certifications somehow, or getting partisan GOP state legislators in states Biden won to appoint Trump electors.

Re: certifications, Trump will get little help from officials in the key states— they're mostly Democrats or bipartisan boards, except for GA Sec of State Brad Raffensperger.

Raffensperger is being pressured from the right, but he's pushed back so far

With dim prospects for getting state officials to block certifications, Trump has been trying to get judges to do that, by filing lawsuits.

These lawsuits seem weak so far. But watch if judges start to take any of them

Latest: The Trump administration made a series of surprising moves regarding Asia policy over the last week, while @JoeBiden revealed the candidate for the new role overseeing Indo-Pacific region. I talked to @kharisborloff about what these mean:

"With less than a week from leaving the office, the Trump administration has been making some major moves regarding Washington’s policies for Asia Pacific."

"On January 9, U.S. Secretary State Mike Pompeo announced that the U.S. would scrap all existing limitations on interaction between Taiwanese and U.S. officials and on January 12, the White House declassified a security paper related to the Indo-Pacific Strategy."

"Some experts think that the Trump administration’s latest move to declassify the national security paper is to put the Biden administration on the spot."

"Kharis Templeman, an advisor to the Project on Taiwan and Indo-Pacific at Stanford University’s Hoover Institute, said following the declassification, if the Biden administration wants to disavow parts of the Indo-Pacific strategy in the future, they will have to do it publicly.

1) A LOT of balls in the air today on Capitol Hill, as is per usual here in December.

The House is expected to vote on a short-term spending bill today to avoid a government shutdown this weekend. Remember, this was supposed to be the easy part of the puzzle.

2) There are dozens of unresolved issues. So the new deadline for government funding will be 11:59:59 pm on December 18.

It’s possible the Senate could take up the stopgap funding bill today. But unclear. That may have to wait until tomorrow.

3) The Senate could also vote today to align with the House and pass the final version of the defense bill. But that could wait until tomorrow or even next week.

A veto override fight is brewing on this with President Trump.

4) The House scored WELL above the two-thirds necessary to override Mr. Trump’s threatened veto. In fact, the vote total last night went well above what the House had to approve the initial version of the legislation in the summer.

5) Based on the Senate’s vote total on the original version (86 yeas), senators should have the necessary votes to sync with the House and override the President later this month.

Congress has never overriden one of President Trump’s eight vetoes.

[thread]

I am going to do a thread on several numbers

1

2,996

4,494

43,730

106,158

Now

We go back into the dim and distant past in British politics

We go back over 2 decades

A lesson from the past

Now I am going to focus on the words of two politicians

Two politicians who have held high offices in this land

And I am going to agree with their words

So those with a long memory

May have already figured out perhaps what I am going to do based on the first two numbers

And you'd be right

So let me get going on the journey

In my first post

I deliberately anonymised those numbers

Let me now give them context

1 Princess Diana or Margaret

2,996 9/11

The final 3 are UK coronavirus death tolls:

4,494 (5th April 2020)

43,730 (30th June 2020)

106,158 (1st February 2021)

We promised people that if we won the Senate, we would send out $2,000 survival checks. They delivered us to victory—and now we MUST deliver.

“Targeting” checks to a smaller group fails to do that. People need help like never before, and we must put money in their pockets.

“Targeting” checks isn’t just bad for people, it’s bad policy too! It’s not humane, it's not smart, it’s not effective, and it’s not even fiscally responsible. Not to mention that it doesn't meet the scale of this crisis.

Help me spread the word about 4 obvious reasons why:

1⃣The survival checks often use 2019 tax data to measure someone’s income.

Millions lost their jobs in 2020 due to COVID—that’s the whole point of this relief!—and therefore their income from 1 or 2 years ago is no longer accurate. They need help now and we must provide it.

Even if someone isn’t one of the nearly 1 million additional people losing their job EVERY single week, they likely lost hours and therefore had their overall income significantly reduced.

By “targeting,” we cut out people who are desperately in need of help.

2⃣The data from people who filed for unemployment shows that more than 20% of those earning between $50k and $70k were still food insecure.

That's up 16% from 2019—and it's why food banks have such long lines. We need to put money in their pockets so they can feed their family.

THREAD: January 6

1. It’s the first day of 2021 and I’ve been pondering some election questions that no-one is really asking.

But first, let's revisit some context:

- Trump said in 2016 that HRC would be arrested if he won office, AND that he would drain the DC swamp.

2.
- Trump said in 2019 that he’d beaten the Deep State and that no one else could have done it.

- Trump enacted EO on September 12, 2018 in order to track electoral fraud.

- Trump ignored obvious fraud in the 2018 US mid-terms, where video evidence was also submitted.

3.
- Trump held rallies like no other President, in front of crowds that were unprecedented.

Every indication was that a landslide was the only scenario unfolding and everyone who was watching closely, saw it.

Biden couldn't gather an audience, let alone a crowd!

4. To expose any election fraud, a landslide victory would always be necessary, or else it would be too easily covered up.

Post-election, we see Trump golfing, tweeting about election-fraud and appearing very calm.

It is all very odd, for a man who truly believes he was robbed!

5. On this evidence, I would question if he even cares about his own role as President?

However, I absolutely believe he cares about the rights of the people and their right to a fair election. This has always been Trump’s passion.

He is refusing to fight for himself.

1) Congress is incentivized to see Pence's role as passive.

But Constitutional scholars differ and/or acknowledge that varying interpretations exist.

Note: I am NOT predicting what Pence will do. I will just be highlighting some ambiguities.

(Apologies - will be long thread)

2) Edward Foley is head of Election Law Dept at Ohio U.

He is Left & originator of Blue Shift theory

What follows are quotes from his "war-game" paper published in the Loyola University Chicago Law Journal - Preparing for a Disputed Presidential

3) "As part of an effort to prepare for the risk of a disputed presidential election in 2020, it is imperative to consider how the embarrassingly deficient procedures might operate if they were actually called into play."

4) "The Constitution itself says remarkably little relevant to this topic, and what it does say is shockingly ambiguous."

Here is the applicable text of the Twelfth Amendment:

5) "The first thing to observe about this constitutional language is that the critical sentence is written in the passive voice: “the votes shall then be counted.” Here, thus, is the first frustrating ambiguity."

Thread: THIS WAS ALWAYS GOING TO COME DOWN "TO THE WIRE."
President Trump is going through EVERY SINGLE LEGAL & CONSTITUTIONAL Process available to him in orders of magnitude.
What do I mean by that?
His numerous Paths to Victory in the 2020 Election are failing one by one.

The coming year will see Biden Democrats walking slowly through a vast field of small businesses exhausted by the battle with the coronavirus, shooting any who can still move. Big Tech will hold a pillow over the faces of those who cry out too loudly.

The destruction of the independent American middle class is one of the highest policy goals of the hard Left. It is finally at hand, thanks to the coronavirus and its political aftershocks. A year ago, they could not have dreamed they would get such a perfect kill shot.

A true middle class has economic interests that run counter to command economics, confiscatory taxation, centralized power, and other features of socialism. It also has the numbers to protect those interests at the ballot box. Of COURSE the Left hates it and wants to subdue it.

Small business is the vital engine of middle class prosperity, and the specific enemy the Left hates the most. Small business owners - and their sharpest, most ambitious employees - place a high value on capitalist freedom and competitiveness. They know the value of a dollar.

The small business experience is defined by the atmosphere of competitiveness that statism and socialism are sworn to destroy. Local enterprises appear quickly in response to demand that cannot easily be seen by distant central planners. Entrepreneurship requires agility.