Robert Miller on LinkedIn: I like Greg Gutfeld's take on the latest rehabilitation effort on Joe… (2024)

Today was the big day for the Trump immunity case to hatch. I am really not prepared to discuss it in detail, but let's just say that when someone told me that Alito wrote the decision for the majority I was feeling pretty good about it. I, of course, went down to the Supreme Court Building to soak up the atmosphere. Naturally I was in my usual Trump attire. This garnered the usual gaggle of press vultures to approach me to try to get me on the record with my opinion. They all got the same opinion. I don't trust the press and therefore don't talk to them. One guy said he was from Japan, I said I didn't care if he was from the moon. There is nothing in it for any Trump supporter to talk to the mainstream press in my opinion. They are only there to make you look stupid, and as I told one of them. I don't need their help to do that. Perhaps as revenge for me not talking to them, a bunch were busy taking my picture. That's fine with me. There is no law as yet against wearing a Trump shirt. As I said, I will get into this in depth when I have a chance to read the decision in its entirety and perhaps get some legal perspective on it from the WSJ or Fox News. But, my general impression is that it is back to square one for Jack Smith and the DC appeals court. I said all along that the ruling that a former president has no more immunity from prosecution for acts taken as president makes absolutely no sense. I am still amazed that a three judge appeals panel came up with something this egregiously wrong. But, when it comes to Trump, I have given up trying to figure out what is too much injustice for the system. Speaking of which, one of the conservatives I was chatting with said that she assumed that there was nothing left but for them to throw Trump in jail. I am quite sure that will be what the CNN and MSNBC hosts will be saying. As I have said, throwing the presumptive Republican nominee for president in jail for a "process crime" in a local jurisdiction during a campaign is a nutty idea. But, then again, what nutty idea have Trump haters not thought up? I frankly don't know what the response would be from the Republican Party is Merchan really does order Trump to jail for the duration of the 2024 campaign. I know what they ought to do. They ought to rise up as one and condemn it in the strongest possible terms and demand the Supreme Court immediately reverse it. But, who knows. Maybe Merchan will show some mature professional judgment. Maybe he will get some advice not to turn Trump into a political martyr. What I do know though is whatever happens it will only be what Biden and the Democrats think will help them the most or hurt them the least. It won't be what justice, democracy, or the voters demand.

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Great lead editorial today in the WSJ about the pickle the Democrats find themselves in after Joe Biden revealed in his debate with Trump that the Emperor does not have any clothes. The editorial is titled "The Mess Democrats Have Made." And that can be summarized as "Imagine if Biden had chosen a VP for competence rather than identity politics." Then perhaps Democrats would have less anguish in deciding whether to encourage Biden to step aside to let his VP head the ticket. But, since Kamala Harris's poll numbers are even lower than Biden's such an arrangement is not politically helpful. Hence, Democrats are pretty well stuck with Biden whether they like it or not. While much of the blame for having a lame candidate running for a second term falls on the Democrat Party and the failure of Democrats to speak up and tell the truth about what they were seeing first hand. That is an increasingly physically and mentally frail old man in steep decline, the WSJ does not let the mainstream media off the hook. The media carried water for Biden and his team in misleading the public by uncritically just repeating all of the falsehoods from the likes of Karine Jean-Pierre about how vigorous and alert Biden was in private. Moreover, the same media also trashed Fox News and others for trying to warn the public that they should trust their own eyes as opposed to the gaslighting they were getting from the mainstream media. The list of enablers is long and I don't think it is necessary to mention each by name. If you were watching any other channels than Fox News, you know who they are. And the list of newspapers as well. The editorial concludes suggesting that the only responsible thing for the Democrats to do now is to hold an open convention. But, that seems like a long shot. Biden has said he is not going anywhere, and his delegates are pledged to him. Word from the White House is that Biden is set on running, and once again any replacement of Biden by anyone other than Harris would raise red flags with the Black Caucus who is solidly behind keeping her on the ticket. No chance, in my opinion, that Democrats would risk offending the Black Caucus at this stage with Trump already making dents in the black vote. So, Democrats are in a mess. The country is at risk as a result. Some who don't like Trump are suggesting he too should step down. But, all of this wishful thinking comes too little too late to stop these two trains from being on a collision course. The public will have a binary choice. And as I have said before, at least I will be voting for the candidate of my choice, not the lesser of two evils. That is for Democrats and Never Trump Republicans.

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I did a comprehensive summary of key Supreme Court decisions issued last week, but I would like to revisit one of them for a deeper dive. That was the so-called "Chevron" decision clipping the wings of the federal bureaucracy to use its regulatory powers to broadly interpret laws in order to "administratively" punish industries for various financial, environmental, or labor violations. The Court in a 6-3 decision ruled that this gave the executive branch too much authority to abuse its legislative mandates and deprived businesses and industries of the right to a trial.The original Chevron decision created by the Court in 1984 stood for the concept that judges should defer to executive branch agencies in interpreting ambiguities or gaps in laws they implement "so long as those interpretations are reasonable." How this theory evolved in practice since that time, however, struck the majority as becoming increasingly "unreasonable." Therefore, the bureaucracy having shown that it will stretch any point to its illogical conclusion essentially proved itself unworthy of such trust. Having spent 40 years myself both interpreting and writing regulations for the Federal bureaucracy, I know whereof the majority of the Court speaks. Trust me, the bureaucracy is filled with lots of managers who closely resemble Jack Smith. That is, you give them an inch and they will take a mile. You tell a manager that the regulation says something "should" or shouldn't be done and they will tell you should has no meaning. In other words, the only the word managers understand is "must." Anything vaguer than "must" is meaningless to them. Same thing with the word "rare or rarely." You turn a manager down for something they want because it should only "rarely" be granted, and they say their case is "rare." They all are. In short, the only way to keep the bureaucracy in check is to write laws and regulations that are idiot proof. Or otherwise, put a check over them as the Court decided in this case. My favorite anecdote on why this is necessary is the one year we in HR sent out an advisory in front of a national holiday telling managers they could let their employees out "up to four hours before the end of the day." This resulted in a flood of inquires as to what "up to" meant. Having learned our lesson, from that time forward, we just said give them four hours off. That is why the Chevron deference to bureaucrat judgment was not sustainable.

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As is my wont, when it is Sunday and the WSJ is not published I turn to other sources for inspiration. Often it is whatever copy of the New Yorker my wife has thrown on my side of the bed after she has finished with it. So, I picked up the June 24th edition and went to the Talk of the Town articles which basically are the Op-ed section. The lead Op-ed is by Adam Gopnik bewailing the right turn of Western European voters. A trend which Gopnik sees happening in America as well. This recent fascination with what Gopnik calls neo-fascism is happening everywhere. And he takes a shot at giving the coastal elite diagnosis as to why. He calls it "the vote of those dispossessed by globalization." The same electorate that in this country favors Trump. That is the old against the young. The rural against the cosmopolitan. Those without diplomas against those with them. And what motivates these old, rural, and uneducated voters in Europe and in America is "perceived fear of uncontrolled immigration." Gopnik explains, "No country, including the United States has ever dealt happily mass migration of refugees and asylum seekers no matter how unfounded the panic might be." Apparently, for Gopnik and no doubt for liberals everywhere, fear of foreign invasion is at the heart of all populist voter revolt. As a result, authoritarian, anti-democratic , demagogues such as Trump and Marine Le Pen arise to challenge the leaders preferred by liberal, educated, city dwellers who stand for liberal democracy, pluralism, and tolerance. And you wonder why the left calls Trump supporters deplorable? The condescension Gopnik has for voters who don't have diplomas in art history just drips from the page. He refers to the "anti-democratic Electoral College" as a way that these rural yahoos manage to have undue influences on our elections. Perhaps if Gopnik had his way anyone without a college degree might only get two-thirds of a vote. How dare the plumber Gopnik calls to unplug his toilet have his vote count as much? Leaving aside the issue of how real the fears are of the "dispossessed" about mass migration sweeping their borders in a clandestine fashion. The real issue for Gopnik it seems is having large numbers of voters he doesn't approve of choosing leaders he doesn't approve of. Yet, he and other liberals continue to say their concerns are to protect "democracy." Protect it from who? The voters? Isn't there an inherent contradiction in there somewhere?

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The anti-death penalty people are here for their annual protest in front of the Supreme Court. I caught up with them today and provided them with my annual support for the death penalty. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind these folks. They are harmless. I just don't agree. I frankly think death penalty cases should be expanded to cover more crimes. The real problem with the death penalty as it is practiced in the United States these days is that someone can be sentenced to death, but may end up living on death row for two decades before they run out of appeals. That is just ridiculous. I quoted Josef Stalin to them "Better 100 innocent men be killed than one guilty man go free." Not a proposition that I subscribe to, but you really have admire Stalin's willingness to put his cards on the table. I studied some of Stalin's writing in college, and was frankly surprised at how clearly he expressed his political philosophy. Not one to mince words. The anti-execution people weren't as impressed with Stalin's quote as I was. They like to point to the rare cases where a person sentenced to death has his case overturned, proving that the system doesn't always work. On that score, I agree with them. In this country you need to be a multi-millionaire to afford the kind of attorney where you can get good representation. Those court appointed attorneys are only good for pleading the guilty out to lesser crimes. Although this last quote from Stalin has nothing to do with the death penalty, I still will share it because it is pithy and will make the gun-boys happy. "Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns, why should we let them have ideas." That Stalin, what a card.

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After the shock of Biden's performance in the debate, and Biden's response to calls for him to drop out which he refused, the rehabilitation of Biden by the media is resuming. The debate performance by Biden rocked his campaign the way the Access Hollywood tape rocked the Trump campaign. But, it seems that campaigns can recover from such shocks and go on. The beginning of the rehabilitation of Biden came when CNN suggested that some of Biden's blank looks were a result of "technical difficulties" of the equipment. Then Biden went back to the campaign trail, seemed to recover some energy, and declare himself the "come back kid." As the shock is wearing off, the surrogates like Obama, are starting to reassure the voters that they are still in Joe's corner. Joe will return to his teleprompter and the pretorian guard that surrounds him to keep him at a safe distance from reporters. And we will again get the airbrushed, filtered, and fully scripted Biden for the next several weeks. Joe and the media will count on the public to get amnesia, and the campaign will go on like debate night was a blip. As Dana Perino on The Five suggested, the early date that the Biden campaign picked for the first debate was designed specifically to not be too close to the election. Trump and his campaign will no doubt run endless clips of Biden during various embarrassing moments during the debate. But, repetition may backfire as shock just turns into boredom at seeing the same thing. What would help though is getting the Robert Hur transcripts out. No doubt there is ten times the confused and confusing Biden there in his own mumbling words. The public deserves to hear it for themselves. DOJ has no legitimate reason to hide the deposition since the transcript is out. Is it possible that there won't be a second debate in September? I am already hearing rumblings of that. It is possible that Trump figures Joe can't do worse than he already did, and so might not wish to give Joe a rematch. Having not watched the debate myself, assuming it would only be cringe worthy, I really don't care if they debate again. I would say that I am still optimistic about Trump's chances of winning in November, but I always have to temper that with knowing that the machine behind Biden is enormous, powerful, and relentless. Much of the electorate have had their minds poisoned by the mainstream media who have lied about Trump for years and are still lying about him. Therefore, I still have to think Trump is the underdog. As one pollster said prior to the 2020 election, Trump has to get 7% more votes than Biden to make up for the expected cheating. That is asking a lot.

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Call me a weasel. I did something this evening that I said I would never do. The wife and I went to dinner at a local restaurant in DC. Shortly after we sat down, my wife motioned to me to look around at who just entered and sat behind us. It was Alejandro Mayorkas, my former bosses boss when I worked at USCIS at DHS. I turned and sure enough it was Ali, I called to him and reminded him the last time we met. I said to him, nicer than the last time we met at the LAX airport men's room. That was between administrations and Ali was back as a private practice attorney. He was very gracious when we met at LAX and I introduced him to my wife. He couldn't have been nicer. Then came the Biden administration and Mayorkas became head of DHS and has in the position disappointed me with his open border policies. A direct affront to the work I had done under him at USCIS in Fraud Detection and National Security where I felt my boss had his full support for our program. But, on a personal level, Ali seems to have never changed. He showed up at the restaurant with just his wife. No entourage. No security detail standing in the back of the restaurant. Just the unassuming and regular guy I remembered. After my wife and I finished dinner, I stopped off to say hello. As before, he could not be more gracious. I assume he vaguely knew who I was. He introduced us to his wife. I told him he looked great for a man with the enormous responsibility he had. I told him that I would always remember working for him fondly. We briefly talked about restaurants in DC. And then we said goodbye. I told him I would let my boss know we met. I am sorry. Mayorkas may be worst DHS Secretary in the history of the agency. He may be responsible for what I would consider is great harm to our legal immigration system. But, on a personal level, he is a gentleman. He is unpretentious. He is charming. And I admit falling for it yet again. I can't help it. I really am proud of working for DHS when he was the Administrator. And I guess old loyalties die hard.

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Interesting article in the Review Section of the WSJ concerning churches which have rigid rules for its members trying to modernize without losing those who believe strongly in their churches traditions. The sect that is being discussion could broadly be called Mennonite. In the same general vein as the horse and buggy Amish. The article seems to point to the impossibility of relaxing strict religious tradition and keeping the zeal going that was built on a shared tradition of "being in the world, but not of the world" as Paul's scripture put it. On a smaller scale, this is what mainline Protestant denominations faced, and it is how denominations like the Methodists ended up with schisms and loss of membership. Seems like to me, the only religious sects around the world that are growing are the fundamentalist ones. Whether it is Islam, Judaism, Christianity, or Hinduism, it is the extreme versions that are growing. So, the ironic thing is that those denominations that "modernized" in order to attract new members who didn't want strict religious controls actually went backwards. It was like adding sand to a sock with a hole in the bottom.I personally have had similar feelings about church. I like that old time religion, but also didn't care for the insularity of it. On the other hand, the "modern" version of the Church of What's Happening Now seemed inauthentic. I mean, what's the point of studying the Bible if you are told much of it should be taken figuratively instead of literally. Sure, I know folks will defend the modern church as being "inclusive" and "welcoming." But, I am not an inclusive or welcoming kind of guy myself. I read my Bible and believe it has truths to live by. I also sometimes think that Erich von Däniken might be right and everything we think of a God's and angels ancient aliens whose technology our ancestors mistook for supernatural power. Who knows, maybe in our lifetime if we actually get a visit from either Jesus or alien astronauts we can learn the truth. Some think the Vatican already knows. But, nothing wrong with believing in miracles. Hence, I like to think November 2024 may bring one.

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I never particularly like it when the stock market is down on a Friday. Bad way to go into the weekend. This Friday all the major indexes were down at the closing bell. Dow down 45, S&P down 22, and NASDAQ down 126. Usually on a day like that I don't bother to look at my account since I know I will have lost money. The thing is though that my account doesn't always exactly track the markets, so sometimes I am down when the market is up and visa versa. So, I peeked. I had to laugh when I did. After all was said and done I was down $20. I just looked again and I guess late settling overseas accounts pushed my loss to $398. But, still a pretty good showing for a day when all the indexes were negative. I will have to remember that the next time I want to complain to my wealth manager about why my account wasn't up more on a good day. It is enough that it isn't down too far on a bad day. And of course, if Donald Trump is elected, then I can expect every day will be a good day.

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