"America has racked up non-stop trade deficits since 1976"

As a result, millions of U.S. manufacturing jobs have been lost to high-tariff countries.

World Trade Organization (WTO) data shows that every major country in the world charges higher tariffs on American-made goods than we do in return. China imposes tariffs three times higher than average U.S. tariffs. India’s tariffs are four times higher than ours.

Members of Congress are starting to grasp this.

A group led by Rep. Sean Duffy (R-Wis.) introduced legislation that would allow the president to increase tariffs on items from countries that persist in maintaining a tariff imbalance. The goal of their “U.S. Reciprocal Trade Act” would be to “pressure other nations to lower their tariffs and stop taking advantage of America.”

Essentially, the bill could provide the leverage needed to coerce other countries to finally lower their tariff barriers — and actually achieve the open trade that previous presidents have championed.

1/29/2019 - By Michael Stumo  

'Ruth Bader Ginsburg watch nears the end of its second month'

January 29, 2019

It has been 54 days since the public laid eyes on the 85-year-old Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and her absence is prompting calls for proof of life.  The last time she was seen was on December 6, 2018, when she heard arguments in person at the Court. Since then, she underwent surgery on December 21 of last year after two cancerous growths from her left lung were discovered and removed. 

The reason her absence is so monumental is that if her health has compromised her ability to do her job as a member of the highest court in the United States, her removal will give President Trump his third justice nomination of his first term.  This would be an apocalypse to the liberal Democrats, who would be faced with the most conservative Supreme Court in modern history for decades to come.

By Taylor Day  

Confirming Trump's judicial and executive branch picks

Senate Republicans are intent on making it easier to confirm President Donald Trump's nominees. And they're going to make a move with or without Senate Democrats. The GOP is planning to cut debate time on some lower-level nominees and accelerate confirmation of Trump's judicial and executive branch picks, said Senate Rules Chairman Roy Blunt (R-Mo.)

"I expect we will move a bill through the committee sometime before the end of March," Blunt said. "Whether that's two weeks from now or mid-March, I don't know. But I think this is something we will deal with one way or another."

Blunt's timeline is less aggressive than one laid out by Sen. Todd Young (R-Ind.), who last week suggested the rules change could be immediate. Republicans can invoke a unilateral rules change with a simple majority vote, also known as using the "nuclear option" if they can't get Democratic support.

By BURGESS EVERETT    

AMERICA IS WORKING AGAIN

Walmart, America’s largest private employer, plans to hire hundreds more truck drivers in 2019 while boosting the pay of its current drivers. Walmart added 1,400 truck drivers to its 2.3 million-strong workforce in 2018, joining the hiring boom that added over 2.6 million jobs to the economy that year.

Starting February, the company will also increase its drivers’ per-mile rates and other pay, hiking the average salary to $87,500, Walmart stated in a Jan. 23 release.

Less than 200,000 Americans applied for unemployment benefits in the week ending Jan. 19, the least since 1969, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics data. When adjusted for population, the jobless claims dropped to another historic minimum, below 61 per 100,000, breaking the record of a bit over 61 set just 18 weeks ago.

“If you’re looking for good news on the economy, look no further than the labor market,” said Jim Baird, chief investment officer at Plante Moran Financial Advisors in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

Workers at the Hollywood Bed Frame Company attend an event to mark the company’s upcoming expansion which will double the manufacturer’s workforce.

ANALYSIS: 

Why Trump went for a 21-day suspension of the partial shutdown and what happens next

"President Trump’s Rose Garden declaration of an end to the partial shutdown was a tactical retreat, a rejection of a Little Big Horn strategy. He found himself in a no-win situation, and rather than bear unacceptable costs, has redefined the contest on better terms. Democrats naturally are gloating, calling it a surrender and admonishing Trump to “learn his lesson”

Nonetheless, as President Trump correctly noted in the Rose Garden address, it was an “agreement.” The Dems agreed to procedural rules that can be used to make the case for border barrier construction. The deal will be hashed out in the conference committee, which will then submit the same legislation to both Houses of Congress, with the 21-day clock ticking. Either chamber can modify the legislation, but that happens under the gun of the ticking clock.

The shutdown had to end because a choke point had been discovered: commercial aviation. It was obvious when the Air Traffic Controllers demonstrated their ability to stymie air travel at the nation’s busiest airports that President Trump, having declared ownership of the shutdown, would be blamed for strangling the economy, and was on the hook for any air traffic control disaster that might, God forbid, happen

Read it all by Thomas Lifson

*********

Trump Agrees to End Shutdown, Setting Up New Border Fight in Three Weeks

WASHINGTON -- President Trump and congressional Democratic leaders agreed to reopen the government Friday, ending a 35-day shutdown, but that doesn't mean some 800,000 federal workers won't see their paychecks disappear again in three weeks.

Trump said the 21-day continuing resolution would allow time for a bipartisan conference committee of House and Senate lawmakers and leaders to "immediately begin reviewing the requests of our Homeland Security experts" and come up with a plan to "show all Americans, and people all around the world, that both political parties are united when it comes to protecting our country and protecting our people."

"Many disagree, but I really feel that, working with Democrats and Republicans, we can make a truly great and secure deal happen for everyone," he told reporters at the White House.

"In 21 days President @realDonaldTrump is moving forward building the wall with or without the Democrats," tweeted press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders. "The only outstanding question is whether the Democrats want something or nothing."

BY BRIDGET JOHNSON 

********

Another caravan coming from Central America

 Donald J. Trump ✔@realDonaldTrump

JAN 22, 2019

With a new migrant caravan on the way, Tijuana Mayor Juan Manuel Gastélum issued a statement this week refusing to apologize for the initial shelter conditions when migrants arrived in November, saying his primary obligation is to the residents and city of Tijuana.

“No, I’m not going to apologize,” said Gastélum. "Better, I’d say that the federal government, the Latin American governments and all those people who are against the people of Tijuana, apologize to us.”

Across Tijuana, resources remain strained, volunteers are weary and conditions are crowded. Beleaguered aid workers are barely able to look up from one dire situation to the next.

The temporary shelter set up at Unidad Benito Juarez in Tijuana is packed full in the gym to include the baseball field where tents and makeshift tents have been set up for people from the Central American migrant caravan. (Nelvin C. Cepeda / San Diego Union-Tribune)

By WENDY FRY - LA Times

"The American political press has become increasingly isolated in the security of its own liberal bubble of privilege. Reporters' skin colors and sexes may be varied, but their groupthink and herd mentality is all the same. The political press, like so much of the political left, has decided to build narratives instead of report facts."

(Excerpt)

Increasingly, it seems that the political press is becoming the enemy of half the country.

The press reaction to the news of Covington Catholic is one of a long series of stories of reporters dripping with contempt and being quick to come to conclusions about people the press thinks need to be taken down. There have been supposedly legitimate news stories about whether the boy was smirking at the drummer and what that smirk was supposed to mean. This is not journalism.

Before the story about the Covington students at the March for Life, reporters attacked Karen Pence, the second lady of the United States, for teaching art to students. Karen Pence had worked at the same school for 12 years. It is a small Christian school in Springfield, Virginia. My kids go to a Christian school with a moral code reflecting my faith. The contempt and belittling reporting on Karen Pence was an attack on my faith and family, too.

I increasingly feel, as a Christian and a conservative, that the press is not interested in telling the truth and facts, but is heavily invested in ruining people like me. 

Read it all @ Confession and Apology

About the author: Erik Erickson joined the conservative blog RedState in 2005.He later served as its editor-in-chief. Erickson was CEO of RedState, Inc. While working at RedState, Erickson developed a reputation as one of the most influential American conservatives. In January 2016, Erickson launched the conservative website The Resurgent. 

In 2016, Mr. Erikson disliked candidate Trump so much he endorsed National Review columnist David French, the NeverTrump candidate proposed by Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol. This made Erickson an original Never-Trump GOP.

But things change. In Oct. 2018 he wrote that voting to re-elect the president is his intention.

UPDATE: 1/28

IRAN BANGS WAR DRUMS... 

WIPE ISRAEL OFF MAP... 

Hezbollah chief warns against continuing strikes in Syria... 

Threatens attack on Tel Aviv... 

The ground-to-ground missile aimed at the Golan on Sunday, Jan. 20 was fired by Al Qods and made in Iran. IDF army spokesman Brig. Gen. Manelis said in a statement on Monday, Jan. 21 that Sunday’s missile attack on the Golan was aimed at civilians and carried out by the Iranian command – not local militias. It was a Fateh-110 missile, which carries a quarter-of-a-ton warhead to a range of 300km. It was intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome air defense system.

For the first time, an Israeli military spokesman named the Al Qods Brigades (of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards under the command of Gen. Qassem Soleimani) as being present in the Damascus region. He said the Iranians “had planned the attack in advance for the purpose of deterring Israel from continuing its operations against them,” stressing: “This was an Iranian attempt to attack Israel.”

Early Monday, Jan 21, the IDF struck Iranian Al Qods forces, command centers and ammo dumps in Syria for 50 minutes in volleys of guided missiles from the air and the ground, coming from three directions – Lebanon and two northern Israeli regions of Galilee and the Kineret (Sea of Galilee). The IDF called this its most extensive operation ever against Iranian Al Qods chief Qassem Soleimani’s forces in Syria.

read

'Rapid military escalation' between Iran and Israel...

Yesterday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo delivered a video-conference message to the assembly of international economic leadership in Davos.

Q: We have the situation with Iran – where do you see the Middle East moving and what is really the U.S. policy moving forward?

SECRETARY POMPEO: The threat from the Islamic Republic of Iran is very real. You mentioned Yemen. You mentioned Syria. I think you talked about the challenges of Lebanese Hizballah in Lebanon. It’s still the case that Iran is striving to reduce Iraqi freedom, sovereignty, and independence. Those are places where Iran is truly the malign actor.

The American Psychological Association has, in its words, issued “its first-ever guidelines for practice with men and boys.” These guidelines “draw on more than 40 years of research showing that traditional masculinity is psychologically harmful and that socializing boys to suppress their emotions causes damage.”

Three observations:

1) The last thing American males need today is less masculinity.

If you need proof, ask women who are looking for a husband whether the men they date exhibit too much masculinity, too little masculinity, or just the right amount. I have talked to hundreds of women on my radio show (every week I have a “Male/Female Hour”), at speeches, and in private who are dating to find a spouse. Not one has said men today are too masculine. Virtually all of them have said men today lack masculinity.

2. This is another example of the most important rule of contemporary life: The left ruins everything it touches.

The left has ruined the arts; the universities; high schools; the nuclear family; mainstream Protestantism, Catholicism, and Judaism; the Boy Scouts; and journalism. And it is now doing the same to the sciences: Universities are increasingly choosing science faculty based on gender and race rather than on scientific expertise.

3. The APA statement makes choosing a psychotherapist simple.

Any therapist who cannot unequivocally condemn the APA statement is unworthy of your time and your money, let alone your psyche.

Read it all @ Men Wanted

  Dennis Prager@DennisPrager