Wednesday, July 31, 2019

How to Tell If a Trump Supporter Is Racist


By Dennis Prager | Townhall.com



Every non-liberal leftist -- that is, nearly every Democrat running for president, New York Times and Washington Post columnist, CNN and MSNBC host, and your left-wing brother-in-law -- labels every Trump supporter and, of course, President Donald Trump, a "racist."

And they don't stop there. Leftists don't only label the half of the country that supports the president "racist," they label all whites and America itself "racist." If your son or daughter attends or recently attended an American university, it is close to certain he or she was repeatedly told that America and all whites are racist. According to the left, whites are divided between those who admit they are racist and those who don't admit it.

Every conservative and many liberals know this is a big lie. The great question is: Do leftists believe it? It is impossible to know. But this we do know: If you repeat something often enough, and if your Weltanschauung (worldview) and that which gives your life meaning are dependent upon believing something, you will eventually believe it.

So here is a way to show it is a lie.

Ask any white conservative, including one who supports Trump, the following three questions:

1) Do you have more in common with, and are you personally more comfortable in the company of, a white leftist or a black conservative?

2) Would you rather have nine white leftists or nine black conservatives on the U.S. Supreme Court?

3) Would you rather your child marry a black Christian conservative or a white non-Christian liberal?

A white racist would prefer the whites in each case.

I have asked these questions of thousands of Trump supporters at lectures and on my radio show. Not once has a white Trump-supporting conservative said he or she would be more comfortable in the presence of a white leftist than a black conservative, or would prefer an all-white liberal Supreme Court to an all-black conservative Supreme Court. Not once has a white Christian conservative said he or she would prefer their child marry a white non-Christian liberal to a black Christian conservative.

If you're an honest leftist, this should present a powerful challenge to your belief that all white conservatives are racist.

But it won't. Leftists have too much at stake to confront the truth about conservatives. Everything the left has ever believed has depended upon lying about opponents. From the day Stalin labeled Trotsky -- who served as the head of the Red Army and who, along with Lenin, founded the Bolshevik Party -- a "fascist," leftists have lied about their opponents.

Some liberals lie and some conservatives lie, but the truth is both a liberal and conservative value. It has never been a left-wing value. Any leftist who would commit himself to the truth would cease being a leftist. He would either become an anti-left liberal or an anti-left conservative.

"America is racist." "Whites are racist." "Trump supporters are racist." These are all big lies.

So, then, given how important it is to leftists to maintain the lie of conservative racism -- along with xenophobia, misogyny, transphobia and Islamophobia -- how would they rebut conservatives' answers to these questions?

Presumably, they would argue that every conservative who responds to these questions as I described is lying.

But these questions are important -- no matter how much leftists ignore or dismiss them -- because they perform an important service for conservatives.

I know this from Jewish history. There was so much Jew-hatred in the medieval Christian world that Jews sometimes wondered if there was any truth to the attacks on them. When a whole society denigrates a group, members of the denigrated group start wondering whether any of the attacks on them have any truth. But when the charge of blood libel -- that Jews killed Christian children to use their blood to bake matzos for Passover -- arose, it liberated Jews from taking any of the anti-Semites' attacks seriously. Every Jew knew the blood libel was a lie -- Jews never consumed animal blood, let alone human blood.

Every conservative knows his responses to these three questions are heartfelt and true, so these questions can help conservatives come to see the left's charge of conservative racism as medieval Jews came to see the anti-Semites' blood libel charge: as a lie.

Dennis Prager is a nationally syndicated radio talk-show host and columnist. His latest book, published by Regnery in April 2018, is "The Rational Bible," a commentary on the book of Exodus. He is the founder of Prager University and may be contacted at dennisprager.com.

___________________

RELATED ARTICLE

Being a Racist Is Easy Today

By Walter E. Williams | Townhall.com




Years ago, it was hard to be a racist. You had to be fitted for and spend money on a white gown and don a pointy hat. You celebrated racism by getting some burlap, wrapping it around a cross, setting it ablaze and dancing around it carrying torches. Sometimes, as did Lester Maddox [a Democrat], you had to buy axe handles for yourself and your supporters to wield to forcibly turn away black customers from your restaurant. Or, as in the case of Theophilus "Bull" Connor [a Democrat], you had to learn to direct fire hoses and vicious police attack dogs against civil rights demonstrators.

Younger racists, along with their parents, had to memorize poems for whenever a black student showed up for admission to their high school or college. For example, "Two, four, six, eight, we don't want to integrate!" Of course, there were a host of racial slurs and epithets that could be hurled, with impunity, at any black person in your presence. In earlier times, you didn't have to be sophisticated, but it took a bit of work, to be a racist.

Today, all that has changed. To be a racist today takes little effort. For example, one can sit back in his easy chair and declare that he's for across-the-board tax cuts. That makes you a racist. If you don't believe me, think back to 1994 when the Republican-led Congress pushed for a tax-cut measure. Former U.S. House of Representatives member Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., denouncing the Republicans' plan before a Manhattan audience as a form of modern-day racism said: "It's not 'spic' or 'n-----' anymore. (Instead,) they say, 'Let's cut taxes.'" A few months later, he compared the GOP's "Contract with America" to measures in Nazi Germany saying, "Hitler wasn't even talking about doing these things."

One can be labeled a racist through a set of "microaggressions" listed in "Diversity in the Classroom, UCLA Diversity & Faculty Development" from 2014.

Here are a few statements one should avoid: "You are a credit to your race." "Wow! How did you become so good in math?" "There is only one race, the human race." "I'm not racist. I have several Black friends." "As a woman, I know what you go through as a racial minority."

But most instances of microaggressions are less overt. There are college microaggressions such as a male student rolling his eyes when a female student speaks, or people not wanting to be in study groups with those of different races.

Perhaps the easiest way to be labeled a racist is to suggest that a wall be built on our border with Mexico in order to keep people from Mexico and points south from entering our nation illegally. Also, a slam-dunk charge of racism is to say that the standard practice of separating children from parents is Nazi-like. But imagine you are stopped with your child in the car and charged with a DUI in any of our 50 states. You're going to be arrested and your child taken to protective child services. The identical practice on our southern border becomes racism.

As veteran journalist Brit Hume said about the uproar over President Donald Trump's latest bomb-throwing: "Trump's 'go back' comments were nativist, xenophobic, counterfactual and politically stupid. But they simply do not meet the standard definition of racist, a word so recklessly flung around these days that its actual meaning is being lost." The president cleaned up his remarks a few days later saying: "These are people that hate our country. If you're not happy in the U.S., if you're complaining all the time, very simply, you can leave." By the way, leaving isn't Trump's idea. Many leftists pledged to flee America altogether if Trump were elected president.

The bottom line is that when leftists have no other winning argument, they falsely accuse others of racism. Republicans cower at the charge and often give the leftists what they want. Black Americans who are octogenarians, or nearly so, need to explain what true racism is, not to correct white liberals but to inform young black people.

Walter E. Williams is a professor of economics at George Mason University.

Tuesday, July 30, 2019

The president is right about Baltimore. Are Democrats really prepared to defend failure?

By James S. Robbins, Opinion columnist | USA TODAY



Baltimore is one of the least livable, most dangerous cities in America. It's not racist to point that out.

Ask yourself honestly: Would you ever consider living in West Baltimore? And are you a racist if you say no?




Baltimore ranks in the top 10 of the least livable cities in America. Until this week, it was not controversial to point that out. But now that President Donald Trump has tweeted about Baltimore, it seems as though anyone who criticizes the awful conditions there is opening themselves up to charges of prejudice.



The flap began last week when Rep. Elijah Cummings, whose 7th district covers much of Baltimore City, lashed out at acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan at a hearing on conditions inside illegal alien detention centers. “What does that mean when a child is sitting in their own feces, can’t take a shower?” Cummings shouted. “Come on, man. What’s that about?”

President Trump responded with tweets saying Cummings’ district was “FAR WORSE and more dangerous” than the detention facilities, “a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess.” The president suggested Cummings focus more on cleaning up this “dangerous & filthy place” than on bullying in hearings about the border issue. 




The president’s remarks were immediately denounced as racist by Democrats and the usual frantic pundits, even though the tweets had no racial content. Trump responded that “Democrats always play the Race Card, when in fact they have done so little for our Nation’s great African American people.”

More on Cummings' story:Donald Trump's depressing racist vitriol brings out the worst in too many Americans

Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders said Sunday that it was “unbelievable that we have a president of the United States who attacks American cities.” But it was perfectly fine four years ago when Sanders said during a visit to West Baltimore, "Anyone who took the walk that we took around this neighborhood … would think that you were in a Third World country." 




Sanders’ comment came in the wake of riots sparked by death of Freddie Gray while in police custody. Articles from that period routinely cited the city’s endemic poverty as a root cause of the rioting. A typical 2015 report from the Associated Press noted that Baltimore “struggles daily with pervasive poverty and widespread joblessness, failing schools, drug addiction, a crumbling infrastructure and corruption.”

President Barack Obama said then that difficult conditions in Baltimore required national “soul searching” — because the $1.8 billion stimulus bonanza he had lavished on the city didn’t seem to solve anything. 




Many Americans probably imagine West Baltimore as the gritty, open-air drug mart  portrayed in HBO's “The Wire,” and they aren’t that far off. Last year, USA TODAY reported that “Baltimore is the nation's most dangerous big city.”

The poverty rate is over 22%, and the population is shrinking. The city’s politics are riven with endemic corruption — former Mayor Catherine Pugh resigned in disgrace this May. She's the third Baltimore mayor in a row to leave in the wake of intense scandal. Baltimore is dotted with thousands of vacant buildings, and as for rodents, exterminator Orkin listed Baltimore in the top 10 of its annual survey of “rattiest cities.” The 1970s promotional nickname “Charm City” is as ironic as ever.

The city's premier newspaper failed to represent its own territory accurately.


The Baltimore Sun rose gamely to the city’s defense against President Trump, editorializing that Baltimore is better than you think, citing inter alia “the beauty of the Inner Harbor or the proud history of Fort McHenry.” (Note that the gentrified Inner Harbor neighborhood is one of the whitest neighborhoods in the city at 68%, so maybe not a great example for the Sun’s purposes.)

“If there are problems here, rodents included,”the newspaper claimed, “they are as much (Trump’s) responsibility as anyone’s, perhaps more because he holds the most powerful office in the land.”

It is a bit of a reach to argue a president in office since 2017 bears more responsibility for city sanitation issues than the local congressman elected to his safe seat in 1996. Maybe the people of the 7th district just need a more effective champion.

It’s hard to say when this latest tweet-based freakout will subside. Will Democrats carry the #WeAreAllBaltimore banner into the 2020 election? Is Baltimore now the model city they will present to the country as the representative product of Democratic social and economic policies in action? Good luck with that.

Critics can continue to shout about racism, but that is no replacement for a rational discussion about the problems of poverty, crime, drug abuse, family breakdown and lack of educational attainment. A job-creating economy will do more in the long run to help the people of Baltimore than endless political posturing about race. It probably already has.

James S. Robbins, a member of USA TODAY's Board of Contributors and author of "Erasing America: Losing Our Future by Destroying Our Past," has taught at the National Defense University and the Marine Corps University and served as a special assistant in the office of the secretary of Defense in the George W. Bush administration. Follow him on Twitter: @James_Robbins

Democrats Defend Rats




Source: KC Meme

Monday, July 29, 2019

The Democrats, Not Trump, Are the Racists


BY ROGER L. SIMON | PJ Media


 Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) speaks to media on Capitol Hill on June 27, 2018. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

It doesn't take Nostradamus, or even a Coney Island fortune teller, to predict the coming Democratic presidential debates will be filled to overflowing with accusations of racism toward Donald Trump.

Not only that, the candidates will certainly be doing their bests, directly or by innuendo, to tarnish each other with the same ugly brush in an almost always fallacious manner. But when it comes to the real, down-home, George-Wallace-Segregation-Now-Segregation-Forever racial bigotry, it will be Donald Trump by a landslide. To them, POTUS is the big, bad, racist wolf.

This is, will be, and has been from the beginning one of the purest examples of projection since Sigmund Freud described this form of psychological hysteria in The Neuro-Psychoses of Defence (1894).

The Democrats are the true racists. The more they and their press lackeys call others racist, the more racist they are — and the more racism they generate. These days one might as well call the Democratic Party The Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Racism.

They do this every day through the promulgation of identity politics, which is no more than segregationism repurposed and given a slick veneer for the 21st century via intersectionality and similar bogus academic nonsense. But it doesn't end there. It's a daily, even hourly, assault, the latest occurrence being the uproar over Trump's characterization in a tweet of Rep. Elijah Cummings' Baltimore as "violent & filthy."

Did this have anything to do with Cummings being black? Of course not. But it certainly has to do with Cummings' own over-the-top characterization of our southern border, which Trump considered radically unfair and purely politically motivated. Tit for tat. We've seen that from Trump before and will again. He punches back, sometimes too easily. But color is of no consequence, not even slightly. You could be a card-carrying member of the DAR descended directly from Betsy Ross and Trump would go after you if you went after him.

Nevertheless, it had to be called racism by the real racists — projection again. (This creepy, psychologically-deformed behavior was frequently lampooned by Aristophanes in his plays, long before Freud gave it a name. Molière also had a good time with this hypocrisy in The Miser and The Misanthrope. Only now it's not a laughing matter.)

And speaking of unfair, exactly what is the condition of Baltimore today? Like most American cities governed for decades by Democrats — from Detroit to now Los Angeles, San Franciso, and Seattle with their ghastly homeless epidemics — the word "miserable" seems appropriate or perhaps "wretched" or "revolting" (but not in the sense of revolutionary; in the sense of "What a revoltin' development this is" in The Life of Riley).

And is Baltimore safe? US News gives it a poor rating, 3.9/10, stating: "Baltimore's crime rate is significantly higher than the national rate, with the metro area experiencing its fair share of violent crime – particularly within the city proper." As for Trump's accusation of its being "rat-infested," it ranks eighth nationally hereand ninth here. That's out of some 35,000 cities in this country. I'm not sure how many of those got surveyed by Orkin, but Baltimore's results are not exactly auspicious.

The conclusion we are supposed to glean from this, the rule of rules that must be obeyed at all costs, is that whites are always wrong when criticizing blacks. That conception is quite simply mentally deranged. It is sick, completely reactionary politically and inherently racist in and of itself. And yet it is adhered to by the Democratic Party and their media lackeys with an orthodoxy even Opus Dei would envy.

And we are soon going to see it revved up even further. During the coming debates, desperate candidates like Cory Booker and Beto O'Rourke are likely to hurl unfounded accusations of racism at Biden and Sanders. (These men have many failings, but racism isn't one of them.). Kamala Harris will continue her equally unfounded attack on Biden. Pete Buttigieg will try to find some way to deflect racism charges against him by his black constituents back home, possibly by making the most vicious attacks on Trump of all. (Easy enough. His background is Gramscian, so the ends justify the means.). And so it will go. None of this will have anything to do with reality.

Nor will the corresponding attacks for sexism. Speaking of desperation, Kirsten Gillibrand, currently without enough votes to be high school class treasurer, will be going after Biden for his alleged discrimination against women. As her spokesperson said, "Kirsten believes we need to have a broader and more intentional conversation about valuing women in this country and even this primary, and she intends to do so in the coming days. Stay tuned."
No, thank you. Identity politics gives me hives.

(NOTE TO KIRSTEN: Have you noticed vastly more young women are attending college these days than young men, making the future particularly grim for males? I guess not.)

Roger L. Simon was a civil rights worker in the sixties, donor to the Black Panthers in the seventies (apologies for that one), writer for Richard Pryor in the eighties, and leader of the Writers Guild's rebuilding South Central libraries after the King riots in the nineties. He is now, he assumes, in the eyes of most Democrats, a racist. His new novel — THE GOAT — will be published September 1, pre-orders available soon. 

Trump blasts 'con man' Al Sharpton, as feud with Dems over Baltimore heats up





President Trump on Monday blasted Rev. Al Sharpton as a "con man," claiming he "hates whites & cops," after the MSNBC host said he would travel to Baltimore amid the controversy over the president's comments about the city and its Democratic lawmakers.

Sharpton tweeted Sunday evening that he would travel to Baltimore to "address Trump's remarks & bi-partisan outrage in the black community" over them. Trump responded by slamming Sharpton, saying they have known each other for decades and used to attend fights together. But the president did not pull any punches when weighing in on Sharpton's character.


“I have known Al for 25 years. Went to fights with him & Don King, always got along well. He “loved Trump!’ He would ask me for favors often,” the president tweeted. Trump then continued, “Al is a con man, a troublemaker, always looking for a score. Just doing his thing. Must have intimidated Comcast/NBC. Hates Whites & Cops!" he tweeted.

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I have known Al for 25 years. Went to fights with him & Don King, always got along well. He “loved Trump!” He would ask me for favors often. Al is a con man, a troublemaker, always looking for a score. Just doing his thing. Must have intimidated Comcast/NBC. Hates Whites & Cops! 

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Minutes later, the president added: "Al Sharpton would always ask me to go to his events. He would say, “it’s a personal favor to me.” Seldom, but sometimes, I would go. It was fine. He came to my office in T.T. during the presidential campaign to apologize for the way he was talking about me. Just a conman at work!"



The president's tweets come after Sharpton, on Sunday night, posted details of a press conference he planned to give Monday “to address Trump’s remarks & bi-partisan outrage in the black community.” This was in response to Trump's criticism of Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., and the condition of his district, which includes Baltimore.

Sharpton also called into MSNBC's "Morning Joe" Monday, saying Trump is "going to attack the most visible black person that comes across his desk and he thinks can set a tone," but that he is "not going to bite the bait." Sharpton then continued to discuss his history with Trump, and accused the president of "peddling racism and dividing this country."

"Trump says I’m a troublemaker & con man. I do make trouble for bigots. If he really thought I was a con man he would want me in his cabinet," Sharpton tweeted later Monday morning.

The Baltimore controversy came after Cummings criticized border patrol officials during a House Oversight Committee hearing. Trump, over the weekend, claimed that conditions in Cummings' Baltimore district were "more dangerous" than those at the border, described it as "rodent infested," and said that "no human being would want to live there."

Democrats immediately rallied to Cummings' side, such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and accused Trump of being racist.


The president continued his attacks against Cummings on Monday, tweeting that while Cummings has been in office, Baltimore “has the worst Crime Statistics in the Nation,” and described Cummings’ representation as “25 years of all talk, no action!” He then lumped the congressmen in with other Democrats he has feuded with in recent weeks, the "Squad" of Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Ayanna Pressley, and Rashida Tlaib.

"If the Democrats are going to defend the Radical Left "Squad" and King Elijah's Baltimore Fail, it will be a long road to 2020," Trump said.

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If the Democrats are going to defend the Radical Left “Squad” and King Elijah’s Baltimore Fail, it will be a long road to 2020. The good news for the Dems is that they have the Fake News Media in their pocket!

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Sunday, July 28, 2019

Baltimore Ambush: Trump forces Democrats to defend the indefensible, again


By Monica Showalter  | American Thinker


Rep, Elijah Cummings has been a brutal bully.

President Trump has done it again.

Just as he forced Democrats to defend the far-left 'Squad' in his unexpected ambush on Rep. Ilhan Omar and her pals, he's now forcing Democrats to own the urban shambles and filth that characterize one-party blue-city rule, putting all Democrats on their backfoot. That's what's behind his surprise Twitter assault that began with Rep. Elijah Cummings and his rat-infested Baltimore district, which pretty much came out of the blue.

Here's his unusually long string of street-fighting tweets, all of them calculated to hit Democrats where it hurts:

 ---------------------------




Rep, Elijah Cummings has been a brutal bully, shouting and screaming at the great men & women of Border Patrol about conditions at the Southern Border, when actually his Baltimore district is FAR WORSE and more dangerous. His district is considered the Worst in the USA......

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....As proven last week during a Congressional tour, the Border is clean, efficient & well run, just very crowded. Cumming District is a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess. If he spent more time in Baltimore, maybe he could help clean up this very dangerous & filthy place

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Why is so much money sent to the Elijah Cummings district when it is considered the worst run and most dangerous anywhere in the United States. No human being would want to live there. Where is all this money going? How much is stolen? Investigate this corrupt mess immediately!

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Elijah Cummings spends all of his time trying to hurt innocent people through “Oversight.” He does NOTHING for his very poor, very dangerous and very badly run district! Take a look.... #BlacksForTrump2020 https://twitter.com/w_terrence/status/1155168907654774784 …





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.@RepCummings, why don’t you focus on your district!?




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More trash. More concerned residents. People live in the home with the silver van. This is @RepCummings district. This has nothing to do with race. Let us all pray the city removes the trash & install cameras to catch the individuals dumping on the property. #WestBaltimore



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.@RepCummings — your district! 







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So sad that Elijah Cummings has been able to do so little for the people of Baltimore. Statistically, Baltimore ranks last in almost every major category. Cummings has done nothing but milk Baltimore dry, but the public is getting wise to the bad job that he is doing!

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Someone please explain to Nancy Pelosi, who was recently called racist by those in her own party, that there is nothing wrong with bringing out the very obvious fact that Congressman Elijah Cummings has done a very poor job for his district and the City of Baltimore. Just take...

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....a look, the facts speak far louder than words! The Democrats always play the Race Card, when in fact they have done so little for our Nation’s great African American people. Now, lowest unemployment in U.S. history, and only getting better. Elijah Cummings has failed badly!

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“Elijah Cummings has had his chance to address it (crime & conditions in Baltimore) for decades, and he hasn’t gotten it done.” @PeteHegseth @foxandfriends How can he get it done when he just wants to use his Oversight Committee to hurt innocent people and divide our Country!

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What's he doing? Forcing a new narrative as election time kicks in, making Democrats have to address the reality that they have been in power for decades in one-party blue districts and cities, and they have left those districts smoking ruins, rat-infested hellholes, "places no human being would want to live," complete with live-action shots. The video of the Baltimore resident decrying the Democratic area's neglect is absolutely deadly.

Obviously, Trump's aim is to cut deep into the black vote, by laying the blame for the decayed urban cities many are forced to live in, on Democrats and forcing them to defend that record. Blacks are Democrats' political base, and they're also the prime victims of blue-city policies as well as all the neglect inherent in them as Democrats focus on saving the earth by banning plastic straws or else offering free health care to every illegal border crosser, so it's an unusually bold attack.

How are Democrats going to defend themselves from this one? In one-party blue cities, states and districts, there's no one to blame but themselves. Trump's tactic is particularly ripe for propagation in solid-blue, shambling expensive California and already Trump is moving his attack onto Pelosi with his latest tweets.

Thus far, Democrats are fighting back by yelling 'racism.' It's a tired, weak weapon, grotesquely overused, and unlikely to rally black voters to Democrats, given the truth of Trump's tweets. What's more, it can't be employed by Pelosi, who's white. The issue and the narrative Trump is pushing out there is that all-blue cities are hellholes and they've been made hellholes because Democrats did it.

This is political brutality cubed, a sign that Trump is a going to be formidable candidate to Democrats seeking to unhorse him. 

What it shows is Trump not only means to 'win' against his opponents, he intends to annihilate them. His election game is on and he's not playing beanbag. He using the same powerful tactics he was able use on Pelosi and her bickering 'squad' which had the effect of forcing Pelosi to defend the indefensible and making Rep. Ilhan Omar the face of the Democratic Party.

Now he's making urban decay the second face of the Democratic Party.

His poll numbers went up after the first one. Count on them going up again after this.

ANOTHER FLASHBACK - Baltimore Among Most Rat-Infested Cities In U.S.: Orkin


By Elizabeth Janney, Patch Staff | Oct 16, 2017 | 12:27 pm ET

BALTIMORE, MD – Charm City is among America's "Rattiest Cities," according to a new report from pest control company Orkin. Baltimore comes in at No. 8.
This the third year that Orkin has compiled the rankings, which are based on the number of rodent treatments the company performed from Sept. 15, 2016 to Sept. 15, 2017. It includes residential and commercial treatments.
Baltimore dropped two slots from last year, when it was ranked sixth. The city has undertaken several rat control measures recently, including the issuance of municipal garbage cans to contain waste.
Here are the 10 "Rattiest Cities" in the U.S., according to Orkin:
1.     Chicago
2.     New York
3.     Los Angeles
4.     San Francisco – Oakland
5.     Washington, DC
6.     Philadelphia
7.     Detriot
8.     Baltimore
9.     Seattle - Tacoma
10.     Dallas - Fort Worth
Tips For Rat Control
Fall is the start of rodent season, according to Orkin. As the weather gets colder, rats and mice seek out food, water and shelter to survive the winter.
According to the National Pest Management Association, more than 20 million rodents invade homes each year.
"Rats and mice begin looking for warmer, more insulated places to get through the winter, and these too often happen to be our homes or businesses," said John Kane, entomologist and technical director of Orkin's Midwest Region. "Rodents like to chew on wood and electrical wires, increasing the fire danger behind your walls and potentially damage to your home."
Rodents can contaminate food and transmit pathogens through urine, feces and bites that affect health. Kane added it's not hard for rodents to get inside a home or business. Rats can enter through a hole the diameter of a quarter, while mice can enter through a hole the diameter of a dime.
Orkin provided these tips to help people avoid the health and safety risks because of rat and mice infestations:
·         Inspect both inside and outside the home for rodent droppings, burrows and rub marks along baseboards and walls. The sooner they're detected, the easier the problem is to manage.
·         Look for possible entry points outside the home and seal cracks and holes if any are found. It'll be hidden, dark, probably warm, and difficult to reach!
·         Install weather strips around entryways, especially under doors, to help block rodents from sneaking inside.
·         Store food properly by keeping it sealed tightly in rodent-proof containers like plastic bins or metal canisters.
·         Clean up crumbs and spills as soon as they happen to avoid leaving food residue or sugary substances that can attract rodents.
·         Cut back trees and bushes to at least three feet away from homes to avoid giving rodents a "jumping off" point to access the gutters, roof or other hidden openings.