But not too much of it.
Uncovering fraud pays
Trump is instituting a new program:
President Donald Trump announced monetary awards for any American who offers tips that lead to successful fraud convictions or significant action.
The program is called the Fraud Whistleblower Incentive Program (WHIP).
The website America.gov/fraud said a tipster can earn up to $30,000.
However, Trump said the person could receive 1% of the amount of fraud they report …
Nick Shirley has already gotten $10K; he’s the guy who exposed a great deal of fraud in Minnesota.
Will the Powerline guys get a reward if Ilhan Omar is convicted of fraud? Just wondering. They would deserve it, IMHO.
How do you know it’s a political prosecution (lawfare)?
“And all I said was that if you’ve done something illegal, if you’ve used the government inappropriately and against the law, you should be held accountable,” she said in response to Trump’s criticism, according to Robinson.
But Slotkin’s original remarks weren’t simply about prosecuting identifiable crimes. They were about sending a warning to young people considering employment in the Trump administration.
They were about intimidation – political “lawfare” of a type quite common with Democrats.
For another excellent example, please see the Dershowitz quotes in this post about The 65 Project, a group promoting lawfare designed to intimidate lawyers who might work for Trump. From Dershowitz:
There is a nefarious group that calls itself The 65 Project that has as its goal to intimidate lawyers into not representing Trump or anyone associated with him. They have threatened to file bar charges against any such lawyers. When these threats first emerged, I wrote an op-ed offering to defend pro bono any lawyers that The 65 Project goes after. So The 65 Project immediately went after me, and contrived a charge based on a case in which I was a constitutional consultant, but designed to send a message to potential Trump lawyers: if you defend Trump or anyone associated with him, we will target you and find something to charge you with. The lawyers to whom I spoke are fully aware of this threat — and they are taking it seriously.
As usual with lawfare, The 65 Project describes itself as defending democracy and the rule of law. Orwellian.
How can one tell the difference between a bona fide prosecution and lawfare? For many people, it’s simple: if my party does it, it’s a bona fide prosecution. If the other party does it, it’s nefarious lawfare. But of course, that’s an obviously partisan test.
The real test goes like this:
(1) Is the evidence solid?
(2) Is the violation one that isn’t suddenly made up, nor is the statute stretched beyond recognition?
(3) Were the defendant’s rights violated in building the case?
(4) Are known felons the only people ready to testify against the defendant?
There’s probably more, but you get the idea.
Open thread 10/21/2026
News you can use? But I doubt it “shocks” anyone:
They seem to have Ilhan Omar’s DNA
Anyone who reads Powerline regularly probably concluded a long time ago that Ilhan Omar likely married her brother in an attempt to commit immigration fraud.
But can it be proven? And is this report true?:
People familiar with the years-long criminal probe said the feds have made use of whistleblowers, government records and now obtained DNA in an effort to substantiate decade-old allegations that Omar — and possibly members of her family like her father — defrauded immigration authorities.
One source said the DNA evidence was critical to proving an allegation that Omar married her brother when she wed Ahmed Nur Said Elmi in 2009 because she was trying to help him get a green card — which never came to fruition.
It’s unclear whether the DNA was taken before or after Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) searched the congresswoman’s home in Washington, DC, last Monday, when federal agents were seen exiting the bungalow with boxes marked “Seized Property Evidence.”
Interesting.
Is France burning?
Short answer: yes.
Is Paris Burning? is the name of a 1966 movie about France’s liberation from the Nazis. This is how it ended:
… [F]ighting breaks out in the streets and civilians join in the battle. Allied troops reach Rue de Rivoli and enter Choltitz’s office at the Hotel Meurice, asking him to have German officers accompany Free French troops throughout the city under white flags to convey the surrender order to his troops. French tanks reach Notre Dame Cathedral and reactivate the bells after years of silence. The crowd cheers and sings “La Marseillaise.” Free French forces parade down the streets of Paris led by General de Gaulle. Against a backdrop of cheering crowds, a phone receiver is shown dangling off the hook with a German voice repeatedly asking “Is Paris burning?” Aerial footage shows Paris intact, and the view switches from the black and white of 1944 to contemporary colour footage.
Contemporary in 1966, that is. France suffered widespread riots a bit later, in 1968. But they were somewhat different than today’s riots, and France was very different as well:
May 68 (French: Mai 68) was a period of widespread protests, riots, strikes, and general civil unrest in France that began in May 1968 and became one of the most significant social uprisings in modern European history. Sparked by student demonstrations against university conditions and government repression, the movement quickly escalated into a nationwide general strike involving millions of workers, bringing the country to the brink of revolution.
Note it started with students – or appeared to do so, much like today’s riots. The left took over pretty quickly, just as it’s doing now. Then again, there was no “green” back then in a red-green alliance. Most of the people involved were French rather than children of so-called “migrants” who are heavily involved today.
In 1968:
Inspired by countercultural, anti-imperialist, Marxist, and anarchist ideologies, students increasingly viewed themselves as part of a revolutionary struggle against capitalism and authoritarianism. At the same time, the French working class was dissatisfied with stagnant wages and poor working conditions, despite growth. The political order, dominated by President Charles de Gaulle’s Fifth Republic, was seen by many as outdated and repressive.
It was, after all, the 60s. As such, it was typical of the 60s, but French-style. France has a history of large leftist demonstrations/riots. You might say the original of the genre was the French Revolution.
What ultimately happened in 1968? De Gaulle made some economic concessions and the whole thing petered out. But France has been a welfare state for quite some time, and the French have gotten very very accustomed to being taken care of.
What will happen now? Darned if I know, but the consensus is that these riots will ultimately benefit Le Pen, and that the French economy is in bad enough shape that the Macron forces can’t satisfy the mob by upping the benefits:
Elections next year will see President Emmanuel Macron step down after a decade in power. The unrest is likely to boost far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen, who is already the frontrunner in polls and has long talked tough on law and order.
“Le Pen no longer needs to spend any money to campaign,” Jean-Baptiste Moreau, a former lawmaker from Macron’s camp, told Reuters. “It’s not just a clear path ahead of her, it’s a six-lane highway.”
Time will tell.
Obama knows exactly what he’s doing
[Hat tip: commenter “Mike Plaiss.”]
Obama: knave, not fool. Here’s an excellent opinion piece in the WSJ by Elie Wiesel’s son Elisha. An excerpt:
Mr. Obama said of the Jewish people that after millennia of persecution, “they took land off people, and they were excessive. And those people understandably said, ‘This is injustice and I want my land back.’ ” …
Consider the word “excessive.” Was it excessive for Jews to buy land, at fair or often inflated prices, from absentee landlords in Beirut and Damascus who were glad to sell malarial swamps? Was it excessive for the Jews of Hebron, a community that had prayed there for centuries, to be slaughtered by rioters in 1929, nearly 20 years before there was a Jewish state, an occupation or a West Bank settlement to blame? Was it excessive for Jews to accept the United Nations’ 1947 partition plan while facing an impending invasion by five armies in 1948? To offer peace at Camp David in 2000, and again in 2008? To pull every soldier and settler out of Gaza in 2005?
Is it excessive to want to live in peace?
And what does “understandably” demanding one’s land back look like? Understanding Palestinian grievances isn’t the same as excusing Hamas, and Mr. Obama knows the difference. But words have consequences. The partition of India in 1947 uprooted more than 10 million people, Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs alike. No American president would tell a crowd that the grandchildren of those who were displaced “understandably” want those homes back, because everyone knows where that leads. We saw where it leads on Oct. 7, 2023. Hamas’s leaders have since vowed to do it again and again until Israel is gone. There can and should be no understanding of those ambitions.
The deeper problem is the story itself. In Mr. Obama’s telling, Jews were oppressed in Europe and then arrived somewhere else and took too much. Jewish history in the land disappears. My father drew a line when he wrote in the New York Times in 2001: “To compromise on territory might seem, under certain conditions, imperative. . . . But to compromise on history is impossible.” That is the line Mr. Obama crossed in Belfast.
The timing of his remarks matters. This week he will rally in Detroit for Abdul El-Sayed, Michigan’s Democratic U.S. Senate nominee, who has accused Israel of “genocide” and “apartheid,” called it “bloodthirsty” and a “rogue state,” and, when asked three times on CNN whether Israel has a right to exist, refused to say yes.
Wiesel goes on to add that his father respected Obama but differed with him on Iran, and attended Netanyahu’s speech to Congress taking a stand against Obama’s Iran Deal. After that, Obama never spoke to him again. This surprises me not at all. He used Wiesel when he was pretending to be friendlier to Israel than he ever was, and dropped him when it no longer served him.
That’s not unusual for politicians. But I wrote long ago (although I don’t know how to find the post; this one written during his first campaign comes closest but isn’t quite it) that Obama was unusual at the time in that he pretended to be far more moderate than he was. I say “was unusual at the time” because now it’s the standard among Democrats. As with so many other things, Obama paved the way.
Yes, many politicians hide things – sexual promiscuity, for example, or their academic records. And sometimes they change their minds on something or even several things. But I can’t offhand think of another president who ran for office in the first place on a lie about who he was and what he intended. Obama did exactly that.
When arguing with people on the topic of Israel, I’ve often brought up India and Pakistan. They all have looked at me blankly; they either have no idea what I’m talking about and/or they don’t care because to them analogies are dangerous because they threaten their entrenched views about Israel. Can’t have that.
Wiesel ends his piece this way:
I hope Mr. Obama reconsiders his words and takes them back. It would be an act worthy of his friendship with my father.
That’s where he shows that he doesn’t quite understand what Obama is about.
Open thread 10/20/2026
The far left is usually a minority, but relies on the inaction and cowardice of others
This seems correct to me, both then and now:
Communists triumphed in Russia not because of a popular uprising, but because a small group of disciplined and armed intellectuals, ready to use maximal violence, staged a coup. They could do so because liberals, anarchists, populist socialist revolutionaries, and other Marxists resisted them, if at all, only when it was too late. “Condemn terror?” indignantly asked Kadet leader Ivan Petrunkevich. “That would be the moral death of our party!” “No enemies to the left!” was an article of faith that Lenin, who was unprincipled on principle, knew how to exploit.
In the 1960s and ’70s, I was surprised my liberal friends would rather side with Communists, who rejected their core beliefs, than with conservatives, who differed only on details of policy. Better those a mile to one’s left than an inch to one’s right! It was a matter of identity: If you grow up regarding yourself as the opponent of conservatives, it becomes psychologically impossible to join them. Is that why liberal Democrats back Hasan Piker, who praises Stalin’s USSR and Mao’s China? More terrifying than Abdul El-Sayed, Graham Platner, and Zohran Mamdani is the readiness of those who are neither totalitarians nor antisemites to support them. It is that support that may enable their eventual triumph.
I see this operating constantly. There is the reflexive reluctance and often absolute refusal to vote for a Republican, however bland or moderate, combined with a willingness to hold one’s nose and vote for the most extreme and vicious (and/or most stupid) of leftists – or to sit the election out, which has much the same effect.
Plus, once an extreme leftist wins a Democrat Party nomination, there is sometimes a fatalism if the state or city is very blue. This depresses turnout immensely. Why bother to go to the polls if the outcome appears to be a foregone conclusion?
But Yeats said it better, and he said it a long time ago:
”
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
In the life of this blog, there are certain poems and scenes I’ve quoted over and over. One is the Yeats poem I quoted above, “The Second Coming.” Another is the Kipling poem “The Gods of the Copybook Headings.” And still another is this scene from the movie A Man For All Seasons.
Evergreens, I’m afraid.
Elections are coming up in Israel
Can Netanyahu pull it off again?
Trump has endorsed him, and Israel is one of the few countries where that would seem to be a plus. The elections are on October 27, and as usual, they promise to be complicated because of the challenges of forming a coalition government no matter who wins:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed concern over the possibility of failing to win the upcoming election during an interview with Radio North on Sunday.
“We need to make sure we win. I am not certain of my victory, and I am very worried,” he said.
Netanyahu also addressed the possibility that he might fail to form the next government. Asked whether he would retire from politics if he lost, Netanyahu replied, “No, I will not retire from politics.”
Netanyahu alPso criticized his political rivals, including Gadi Eisenkot, Naftali Bennett, and Avigdor Liberman, claiming that a government led by them would depend on the support of Arab parties.
Polls – for what they’re worth – generally say that Eisenkot leads. But in the sort of parliamentary system Israel has, that’s not necessarily all that important:
With just nine days left until the election, Gadi Eisenkot’s Yashar party has maintained a consistent lead over Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud in four recent election polls, but neither political bloc comes close to securing the 61 seats needed for a Knesset majority, according to surveys published by Maariv, Channel 13, Kan News, and Channel 12.
The four surveys paint an almost identical picture: the Zionist opposition averages 51.25 seats, compared with 51 for Netanyahu’s bloc, a virtual tie that leaves the Arab parties and smaller factions hovering around the electoral threshold in key positions ahead of election day.
Netanyahu has held the position of prime minister longer than anyone in Israel’s history: from 1996 to 1999, from 2009 to 2021, and from 2022 till now. So I would never count him out. He’s seventy-six years old at present, but that doesn’t seem such an advanced age these days for a head of state.
Elissa Slotkin isn’t hiding her intent
Slotkin admits wants to frighten young conservatives out of working for the current administration:
During an Oct. 13 University of Chicago event focused on her political path and the future of the Democratic Party, Slotkin said she wants to pursue “signature cases” against people who “enabled” President Donald Trump.
“I want to look at these signature cases and not just focus on the president, but on the people who enabled him,” the Michigan Democrat said. Slotkin went on to describe how she wants prospective administration employees to weigh the risks.
“I want young people coming out of school to say, should I go work for the Trump administration? Like, that sounds fun, I might get an opportunity. I want them to be like, Lord, that might be buying myself a ton of problems that I don’t want, and so let me avoid participating in that,” she said. “I want that deterrence message.”
This has been Democrats’ policy for a long time, either through lawfare or financial pressure or social or career ostracization or through actual violence and public harassment. What’s new is admitting it so blatantly.
I think the “admitting it” part comes from Slotkin’s belief that the left has successfully implanted the idea in the minds of half the country (or more?) that this administration is not just one with which the left disagrees, but is in fact evil and must be stopped by any means. The survival of “our democracy” depends on it.