This is it:
Blessings on you and your family from all the Huckabee team! Today’s newsletter is below.
Sincerely,
Mike Huckabee
P.S. The Morning Edition is a reader-supported publication. It delivers Monday-Saturday.
Daily Bible Verse
O Lord, thou art my God; I will exalt thee, I will praise thy name; for thou hast done wonderful things; thy counsels of old are faithfulness and truth.
Isaiah 25:1
This is it:
The final weekend before the election, and I have a very special episode of “Huckabee” on TBN tonight to mark the occasion. I’ll be talking to RNC Chairman Michael Whatley and Troy A. Miller, president and CEO of National Religious Broadcasters. Master magician Dustin Tavella returns, this time to talk about the magic of adoption. And I’ll have an interview and a rare duet performance from two show business legends: Crystal Gayle and the Glenn Miller Orchestra!
It all gets underway tonight at 8 and 11 EST, 7 and 10 CST, or Sunday at 9 EST/8 CST on TBN. To find out how to watch TBN, from local cable and broadcast channels to streaming, visit https://www.huckabee.tv and click on “Channel Finder” on the top menu. You can stream previous episodes, highlights and online-only “Digital Exclusives,” including extended interviews, “In Case You Missed It” and “Facts of the Matter” segments, plus extra performances by our great musical and comedy guests and links to all their sites, at https://www.huckabee.tv. You can also find past shows, highlights and digital exclusives on YouTube and my Facebook page
And be sure to watch or set your DVRs for my new daily show on TBN, every weekday at 6:30 pm EST, 5:30 Central.
Common Sense in the Federal Government
By Tony Vacha
A general feeling of disconnectedness exists between Americans and their Federal Government. This is particularly true in what the bi-coastal crowd calls ‘flyover country.’ The Federal Government appears cold, distant, and impotent to address or solve the issues impacting people's lives. This played out most recently with many Citizens living in Appalachia in North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, and Georgia in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene. However, that is not the only instance. It echoes the feelings and comments of citizens in East Palestine, Ohio and Lahaina, Hawaii.
Those connected to the power structures in D.C. and in the east and west coast urban centers may pan these concerns as more perception than reality, but it is a general feeling that seems to be growing. The feeling is continually reinforced by the rhetoric and actions of the civil servants in the Departments and Agencies in Washington, D.C. While a much-circulated video of the Federal Emergency Management Agency discussing “disaster equity” did not show an actual disaster preparedness meeting, it still showed a horrific lack of empathy for American Citizens. The fact that a bureaucrat unabashedly talked about shifting any Federal program, let alone emergency management, away “from utilitarian principles” and providing the “greatest good for the greatest amount of people” to “disaster equity” is appalling. What’s even further shocking is that no one in the group had the moral courage to say, ‘What are you talking about?’ Were the Americans in Marshall, North Carolina or East Palestine, Ohio not deserving enough for prompt emergency response and assistance?
It is not just in emergency response. The same duplicity exists in the Federal justice system. The application of Federal law is proportional to your connection and utility to the power structures in Washington, D.C. That is apparent in the case of Kevin Clinesmith. As an attorney, an officer of the court, working for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, he lied about evidence used to secure a surveillance warrant on an American Citizen from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. His punishment? He was sentenced to 12 months of probation and 400 hours of community service. Contrast that to the almost Jacobin-like fervor the Biden Administration’s Department of Justice employed against people who trespassed in the Nation’s Capitol on January 6th. The DOJ charged Rebecca Lavrenz, the so-called “J6 Praying Grandma,” on four federal misdemeanor charges and a potential year in prison and $200,000 in fines. Her offense? She entered the Capitol for ten minutes and prayed. Does that warrant a harsher and more vigorous prosecution than a government lawyer that lied on a subpoena?
Granted, anyone who rioted, destroyed property, or assaulted police officers at the Nation’s Capitol deserves rigorous prosecution. Yet the DOJ and FBI lacked the same vigor to pursue and prosecute the organizers and perpetrators of massive riots by BLM and ANTIFA that objectively caused more death and damage to public and private property than January 6.
Showing the inherent duplicity, FBI Agents while on duty kneeled in solidarity with BLM and ANTIFA rioters, possibly in violation of the Hatch Act. FBI leadership coyly lauded the move. Would the same standard apply had they kneeled on January 6? Definitely not.
Disconnectedness is also evident in the Federal Government’s interaction with private commerce. The National Marine Fisheries Service felt a necessity to monitor the herring fishing industry. Instead of securing Congressional funding for the program, the bureaucracy felt empowered to pass the costs of the program onto private commercial entities. They imposed a tax of approximately $710 per day on each fishing vessel to pay for the privilege of Federal oversight. The edict smacked of the Colonial Stamp Act against the then British Colonies. How do private enterprises thrive with this sort of ‘oversight?’
Many civil servants faithfully live up to the oath of office they swore to. They work diligently on behalf of their fellow Citizens in their assigned function. Arguably the disconnect between the Federal Government is born out of the general hubris and sense of arrogance in the culture of the DMV (District of Columbia, Maryland, and Virginia). A type of group think develops that solutions for everyday problems start and end inside the Beltway. Peter Strzok, the disgraced Federal Bureau of Investigation Agent, is undoubtedly the quintessential icon of the smug Beltway hubris. He famously remarked to his paramour while visiting a Wal Mart in southern Virginia that he could “SMELL the Trump support.” His aristocratic sense of self-superiority precluded him from mingling with the subjects.
So, what is the fix to restore the faith and credibility of the Federal Government? If elected, former President Trump plans to initiate a commission led by Elon Musk to look at efficiency in the Federal Government. Musk recently stated he believes such a commission could eliminate $2 Trillion in Federal spending. The first level of analysis of this task-force should look at functions. What Departments and Agencies duplicate each other’s services? Does the Federal Government still need 18 different agencies for intelligence? Perhaps it is necessary, or more likely, throughout the Cold War we built redundant and duplicative capabilities and no one has questioned their necessity anymore. Next, what functions, currently controlled at the Federal level, could gain efficiency by delegating them to states. This is the ideal nature of our Constitutional Republic and was the intent of the Founding Fathers. It affords more local control and places accountability in State Capitols with elected officials from our citizen’s own neighborhoods. The growth of the mega-centralized Federal government that started with FDR requires a review and potentially rebalancing.
A second necessary step is to evaluate what Departments, Agencies, and Bureaus should remain in D.C. It makes sense that any Department, Agency, or Bureau focused on National Security should remain in proximity to the Chief Executive. Other entities could disperse through the rest of the country. The COVID lockdown demonstrated the power of modern technology for distributed meetings and productivity. Every government employee is familiar and comfortable with Microsoft Teams, Zoom and other teleconferencing platforms. The idea of a Nation’s Capital focused on every function of governing and co-located in one geographic area is outdated.
Perhaps the Department of Agriculture should move to Omaha, Nebraska or Des Moines, Iowa near the center of U.S. agribusiness. Or the National Marine Fisheries Service could move to Bangor, Maine or Astoria, Oregon. Maybe the Department of the Interior should be somewhere in the interior, such as Salt Lake City, Utah or Denver, Colorado. If the civil servants drafting these policies and regulations had to live among the population impacted by their decisions, it would force more ‘common sense’ into their thinking. Currently a civil servant crafts policies in a corner office in D.C. and commutes home to live somewhere in the DMV among other civil servants. Imagine if the person crafting the policy lives in the same neighborhoods, has kids in the same youth sports leagues, or worships with the Americans impacted by the policy it would force more ‘common sense’ into our governance. Thomas Paine would concur!
Message from Mike
Bee Time
I know everyone is feeling the tension from the Tuesday election. The best way to deal with that is to GET OUT AND VOTE! But afterwards, relax and laugh with the Babylon Bee’s take on the past week’s worth of insane news stories…
https://babylonbee.com/news/biden-calls-on-deplorable-garbage-nazis-to-tone-down-the-rhetoric
https://babylonbee.com/news/report-millions-of-garbage-bags-seen-lining-up-outside-polling-station
https://babylonbee.com/news/biden-fitted-with-muzzle-so-he-cant-bite-any-more-babies
https://babylonbee.com/news/trump-scores-coveted-endorsement-from-hefty
https://babylonbee.com/news/kids-at-tim-walzs-door-disappointed-as-he-fills-candy-bags-with-tampons
https://babylonbee.com/news/san-francisco-parents-find-piece-of-candy-in-childs-bag-of-needles
https://babylonbee.com/news/yankees-defeat-yankees-in-world-series
Justice and Free Speech
One of Kamala’s big knocks on Trump that isn’t working is that he will weaponize the justice system to target his enemies. This isn’t registering because everyone knows that Trump declined to prosecute Hillary Clinton, which she richly deserved, while the Biden-Harris DOJ has done everything in and beyond its powers to jail and bankrupt Trump. Maybe their real fear isn’t that Trump will unfairly weaponize the Justice Department, but that he will order it to enforce the laws equally. If that happens, a lot of them may be headed to the Gray Bary Hotel.
Their contempt for laws that they rigidly enforce on Republicans was on full display this week. For instance, the White House press office allegedly edited the official transcript of Biden’s “garbage” remarks to insert an apostrophe to try to bolster his feeble excuse that he wasn’t referring to Trump supporters. Problem: Altering an official government transcript, even by just adding an apostrophe, is a crime. It’s a violation of the Presidential Records Act. You know, that law that Biden’s DOJ used as an excuse for a guns-drawn raid of Mar-A-Lago and the indictment of Trump. I look forward to the guns-drawn raid of the White House press office and the arrest of whoever tried this.
Then, there’s unfunny late night “comedian” Jimmy Kimmel, who has substituted bashing Trump for telling jokes. He devoted nearly 20 minutes of his show to slamming Trump and trying to convince viewers to vote for Kamala. That’s stupid, but not illegal. However, it is illegal to try to mislead someone into giving up their right to vote, and he jokingly told anyone who still wanted to vote for Trump to vote late, like next Thursday or Friday.
That’s not just a typically unfunny Jimmy Kimmel joke, it’s felony election interference. Kimmel has an audience of about 2 million masochists. Meme maker Douglass Mackey has only 58,000 Twitter followers. But Mackey was indicted and sentenced to seven months in prison for making a humorous meme in 2016 that told Hillary supporters to vote by text. By any measure, Kimmel’s “joke” was virtually identical in content, but with far greater potential impact (although I doubt any Trump voters watch Kimmel, and all of them are smart enough to recognize a joke when they hear it – that’s why none of them watch Kimmel.)
To be clear, I don’t think anyone should be charged with a felony for making a joke, which should be protected free speech. But this is the standard that the Biden-Harris DOJ created for their opponents. Until their side is forced to abide by the same standard as our side, they will never back off. So when will we see the arrest of Jimmy Kimmel?
On the civil court front, President Trump has launched a lawsuit against CBS for election interference for allegedly trying to tip the election to the Democrats by editing Kamala Harris’ interview answers to make her look better. His suit claims this has caused immense harm to him, his campaign and tens of millions of voters. The damage amount he’s seeking: $10 billion!
Finally, as long as we’re discussing holding Democrats to the same legal standards that are imposed on Republicans, I might as well toss in this story, too, even though it’s not related to the election: The House Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic referred former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo for criminal prosecution for “knowingly and willingly” making false statements to Congress about his deadly decision to place COVID patients into nursing homes.
As the article notes, nothing will come of this because the referral is to Merrick Garland’s DOJ and Cuomo is a Democrat, so laws that apply to Republicans like Steve Bannon don’t apply to him. But with a little luck, and if everyone reading this goes out and VOTES, maybe there will be a new sheriff in town come January, and equal justice under the law will make a comeback. I think that’s what really terrifies the Democrats most about a Trump reelection.
Joe Rogan revealed that Kamala Harris refused to do a longform interview on his popular podcast, with her campaign demanding that Rogan come to them and agree to no more than an hour. He refused, offering to meet her in his studio at any time, day or night, but her people wouldn’t budge. So instead, he interviewed Trump’s running mate, J.D. Vance, who stayed for over three hours. Trump tweeted that in that one show, Vance spent more time being interviewed than Kamala has during the entire campaign.
Listeners said Vance came across as incredibly intelligent, well-informed, funny and personable. I’d be happy to do away entirely with the phony, slanted “debates” and make It mandatory for both candidates to submit to a longform interview like this, where you’ll really learn what they’re all about with the constant interruptions and canned answers.
It’s worth listening to the entire show just to hear Vance compare his toddler’s excuse for stealing Oreos from the kitchen to the way Kamala lies. If you don’t have time to listen to the entire show, you’ll find that excerpt and more here:
https://redstate.com/nick-arama/2024/10/31/jd-vance-on-rogan-n2181367
But if you do have over three hours to spare, you can listen to it all here, while quietly thanking God that you’re not listening to over three hours of Kamala Harris.
Must-Read
This is why we desperately need Trump in office to appoint Elon Musk to a government waste task force. The Biden-Harris Administration constantly points to the laughably-named “Inflation Reduction Act,” which actually increased inflation by adding another trillion dollars or so to the national debt. They’re terrified that if Trump gets in, he’ll rescind what’s left of that profligate spending before the money can be squandered.
So, as James Varney at RealClearInvestigations reports, the White House is quietly and quickly handing out billions of dollars in grants to cronies with shady “nonprofits,” many of them “green”-related. The EPA is passing out the green via these massive grants, which it’s never done before.
Some of these alleged “green nonprofits” got their tax-exempt status as recently as last spring. One showed revenues of only $100 in 2023, yet it was just given a grant of $2 billion of our money. Trump’s former EPA chief said, “These groups are political front groups that are simply created to funnel billions of taxpayer dollars to Democrat campaigns under the guise of doing something good.” The director of the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Center for Energy and Environment said, “It’s worse than a slush fund – it’s a slush fund to create non-profit slush funds.”
Read the whole thing, but I warn you: It may cause global warming due to it making so many readers’ blood boil.
RELATED: Here’s what some experts hope to see out of Trump’s government efficiency agency (Let’s hope it doesn’t do nothing and keep demanding budget increases, like all the other agencies in DC):
Excellent article from Victor Davis Hanson
Typically excellent article from Victor Davis Hanson about how the Kamala Harris campaign started out “joyful” and is ending with angry lies and smears reminiscent of the McCarthy era.
I don’t believe this really represents a change in her approach, though, so much as the inevitable result of what happens when you try to hide what you are. The whole “Joy” schtick was created as a PR rebranding effort to try to turn her off-putting habit of inappropriate cackling into a positive. But it’s not joyful when the Riddler does it on “Batmen,” and it’s not joyful when Kamala does it. There’s a reason why her support drops the more people see of her, just as it did in 2019.
She’s not cackling, ranting, finger-pointing and devolving into word salads because she lost touch with her “joy.” She’s just being Kamala Harris. Here’s Kurt Schlichter on what that would mean if she actually gets into office.
So get out there and vote for Trump as if your life and your country depend on it, because they just might!
Hilarious
You have to read this piece by Scott Pinsker at PJ Media about why he’d never accept a job doing PR for Trump, if for no other reason than the hilarious story he tells about how Trump got tons of publicity for a magnificent hotel/casino in South America that didn’t even exist.
I Just Wanted to Say
Thank you for reading my newsletter.
Mike, thank for all you do trying to help We, the People. Please take tome to listen to Tucker Carlson's interview of Stefan Passantino. Very enlightening about some of the interviews of J6 defendants and why and who the FBI picked to interview for the Kangaroo Kommittee to gather fodder.
Thank you 🙂🦅🇺🇸