Tag: Republicans

Destroying Iran: The magnificance of capitalism

I’m not that surprised that President Trump attacked the Fordow site in Iran, along with two others, where the nuclear program was reported to be in the process of development.  From what Trump knew, taking away any leverage of fear from a nuclear power development plan from the number one state sponsor of terrorism in the world, and the Revolutionary Army of the current regime was on their heels, the timing was right.  With this move, Trump can accomplish several essential things simultaneously.  Given this air raid of Iran, it might look risky to be pulled into a prolonged war.  But the reports told Trump what he needed to know in the wake of the conflict between Iran and Israel.  Iran was out of missiles.  They had been able to bomb Israeli cities like Tel Aviv and get through the Iron Dome defense network by overwhelming the system.  But missiles cost money, and Obama isn’t around anymore to sneak money to the Iranian government to antagonize Western civilization, and the rockets ran dry.  To make a show of continued force, Iran has still been launching missiles into Israel, but at a much reduced rate, leaving the Iron Dome to pick them off easily.  Iran was in trouble.  The Ayatollah was in hiding.  Many of the senior revolutionary leadership were killed off or in disarray.  So the time was ripe for a strike, and Trump did it.  If he had resisted, he would have lost an opportunity. Iran was already falling, so it was a good time to send a message to the rest of the world, pass the Big Beautiful Bill, and crush the Russian resistance to end the Ukraine war.  Cut the ties China has with Iran by taking them off the map.  And pave the way for the people of Iran to take back their country and remove it from being a Marxist stronghold in the Middle East.  With the bombing of those three sites, Trump was able to get a lot done, so the time to strike was open.

Trump could have crushed Iran just with his mouth, as he had been doing.  However, an opening was obvious, and people often need to see decisive action. Moreover, nothing unites people more than military action.  As controversial as it is, Trump needs the Big Beautiful Bill to pass the Senate because the tax cuts in it, if made permanent, are key features to the future of the American economy and the improvements we have been seeing in all our wallets.  With the Fed resisting a lowering of interest rates, the tax cuts become even more critical. To unify everyone in passing the Bill for a very nice Fourth of July in 2025, destroying a long-known enemy of America was a smart move to drive resistance to the Bill to act quickly and decisively.  For Trump, he will be remembered as the President who crushed Iran with a marvelous attack that was very successful.  However, for the rest of the world, it was a significant statement and a display of military force.  And it was just enough to get the war hawks on Capitol Hill engaged enough to cheerlead passage of Trump’s Bill, which will secure all his campaign promises.  It will also add a lot of debt to an already escalating pile.  But strategically speaking, this raid on Iran in the middle of the night was an all-in poker move, and Trump has been successful at those before. This is undoubtedly what I voted for, and so did many others.  Likely, even people who didn’t want Trump are suddenly quite happy that he’s in the White House.

Regarding Article II powers, Trump is well within his rights as President to call such a strike.  All this talk of impeachment by Democrats isn’t going to go anywhere.  Ground troops were not involved, so that kept things straight legally on the side of Trump’s decisive action.  For those who fear retaliation, and that, because of Trump’s actions, it puts everyone at risk, they have been deceived into believing that Iran was more powerful than it really was.  The fear is that Iran will close the Strait of Hormuz, located between the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman.  The simple answer is that ships traveling through the area can hug the coast of the United Arab Emirates and avoid Iranian patrols.  However, in truth, Iran lacks the firepower to establish a blockade that would prevent ships from traveling through it.  These are not the Obama days when ships could be stopped by Iranian patrols and harassed.  The Iranians know that they can’t afford retaliation, so there isn’t any real way to provoke more trouble to pour on themselves.  So, any fear of such a thing is misplaced in those who thought of Iran as more potent than it was.  The media and their leftist partners in the world propped up Iran to be a bully so that Marxist ideology could thrive.  And Trump just took that leverage away from the world with that one act.  Ultimately, the fight was always between capitalism and various degrees of communism hidden behind religious fundamentalism, which is why Democrats are so unhappy with the attack because it exposes what they already know but were trying to hide from the world.  Iran was a paper tiger of antagonism that was keeping the world in a terrible state.  And that they used that leverage to spread big government socialism as a reaction to it.  And now that paper tiger is gone. 

When it’s said that nobody else in the world could have performed an attack like this, with B-2 Spirit stealth bombers dropping six GBU-57A/B Massive Ordnance Penetrators, (bunker busters) that could destroy targets 300 feet underground, every country suddenly has to perk up differently when Trump picks up the phone, especially China, and Russia.  And the European Union.  And all the bill whipping that Trump will do in the last week before the Fourth of July to pass his bill and seal his campaign promises, which will fund a repayment of the debt incurred, and then some, will take on a whole new meaning.  As China plans to replace the dollar as the world’s currency standard at the upcoming BRICS summit, set to take place on July 6, 2025, just a few weeks away, it will now have to reconsider all its thoughts.  And in that vacuum of consideration, Trump’s economic plans will have a chance to take flight, and the world will be reeling from their commitments to global communism and socialism.  And only capitalist governments will find success, with the United States pulling way out in front of everyone.  And all the posturing of China to antagonize Taiwan are suddenly not very attractive when America can send bunker busters from halfway around the world and devastatingly cripple a target, essentially ending the life of a country in a few minutes, and still be home in time for dinner.  No, this attack was about more than helping Israel.  It was a final blow against communism, forcing the world to compete in ways they weren’t ready for.  And it will be remembered as one of the most incredible achievements of any American president, not for the action itself, but for what came after. 

Rich Hoffman

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

Vote for Mark Welch as Trustee of West Chester, Ohio: The island of misfit toys wants to ride the success of good politics

Mark Welch, the long-standing trustee of West Chester, Ohio, has undoubtedly been one of the main reasons that the northern Cincinnati community is one of the best places to live in the world.  And that’s not just me saying that because I like West Chester, Ohio.  Years ago, some effective policies were implemented to limit government overreach and foster a free enterprise approach to the growing community. This was achieved through a collaborative effort, led by then-trustee George Lang, with Mark Welch subsequently elected to provide a much-needed second vote.  It used to be that George was always outvoted two to one, and he needed someone who could share his vision with him. The result was a period of prosperity in West Chester, Ohio, which has made it unquestionably one of the best places to live anywhere in the world.  As a result, many people have moved into the area, bringing with them political ideas reflective of their origins, which have evolved.  George is now Senator Lang of Ohio, representing the 4th District.  However, Mark Welch remains a trustee who is now up for re-election in 2025.  With his excellent track record, he should have an easy re-election to his seat.  But we don’t want to take anything for granted.  Another long-time holdout, Lee Wong, who is very sympathetic to Chinese causes, is also up for re-election.  He is the kind of person who a lot of Democrats vote for, so he tends to get support from the many moderate Republicans, and the Democrats so there is some concern that in a race that is introducing the long term police chief to the mix Joel Herzog, that if Republicans don’t work together, that damage could be done to the seats in West Chester. 

Most of the time, there aren’t many people who run for these spots, and it could be assumed that Mark would win his seat back and that there would be room for Joel Herzog to join him.  Lee Wong, under all considerations, is vulnerable for many reasons, but he plays nicely enough with Republicans to avoid drawing too much hate, which is part of his strategy.  In a three-way race for two seats, it can get tricky.  The ideal situation would be for Republicans to show up and support Mark and Joel, thereby putting Lee in third place.  However, as I mentioned earlier, Lee will likely draw Democrat votes without needing to do much campaigning.  And the way these elections work is that it’s the best of the candidates who get the highest vote count.  Therefore, the top two vote-getters will win the seats.  And if it were just between these three, I would say Mark Welch would have no problem retaining his seat.  Joel Herzog is a good guy who comes highly recommended by everyone who knows him.  I have mentioned that, as a former police chief, it would be challenging for him to negotiate police contracts as a trustee with impartiality.  But most people agree that the good stuff with him is so good that that’s not a concern in his regard.  To regain the support of two conservative West Chester trustees, it will require a coordinated effort to retain Mark and help Joel win without one of them losing to Lee Wong.  The current belief is that Lakota schools will attempt to put a levy on the ballot, which is expected to attract many big-spending Democrats, making the math for Lee much more favorable than in previous years.

Then there is the issue of Ann Becker. A couple of other prominent Democrat challengers, affiliated with the Kathy Wyenandt area Democrats, who are certainly in the minority, are also running. Still, they are organizing to tag-team their efforts with the Lakota school levy push, so they hope to have higher than normal voter turnout to capture some advantage.  Ann Becker is the third trustee who was formerly a Tea Party conservative, serving as president of the Cincinnati Tea Party and the West Chester Tea Party.  She used to have a show on 55 KRC to discuss Tea Party topics, but Ann Becker is long gone these days.  She used to be a good tag team vote with Mark Welch, but she has changed quite a lot over the years, to the point where she might as well be a Democrat.  Therefore, electing Joel and retaining Mark become that much more critical.  When I first met Ann, whom I have been good friends with for a long time, she was associated with the levy supporters of Lakota, and we were at odds politically.  However, I always liked Ann, and she made a transition into the Tea Party movement, where we saw many things eye to eye.  People would warn me that she used to be a Democrat.  But I liked her anyway.  I also like Kathy Wyenandt, too, as a person.  However, Democrats are not adept at handling money or policy, and the needs of West Chester require a particular kind of mind. Unfortunately, Ann has lost her way and reverted to the person she was before I met her, before the Tea Party movement.  These individuals might be friendly, but they shouldn’t be in government. 

The other two candidates stepping into the crowded race for those two trustee seats are both Democrats: Alyssa Louagie and Amanda Ortiz.  I don’t think either one of them has a chance, but they think they do because they plan to tag-team the Lakota levy, which many are counting on Ann to lend her support as well.  So, we suddenly have a lot of Democrats taking a calculated leap into the mix, hoping that something will stick.  There is also a risk of losing what made West Chester great and falling into the same trend that muddles so many other communities, which assume that their success stories can survive with Democrats moving into positions of leadership.  People see things going well, so they give the misfit toys a chance, out of the luxury of success.  Then democrats ruin everything, and they want to attach themselves to the success story of West Chester, and the game for the rest of us is to preserve that success by re-electing Mark Welch and adding Joel Herzog.  However, the Democrats want to capitalize on the success to fund their social engineering projects, which will then alter everything great about West Chester, turning it into just another typical community that has seen its success fade because it was taken for granted.  And if we let the Democrats have a greater share of the seats at the table, we could easily end up with three Democrats as trustees, which would be detrimental to the interests of the other parties. That provides some early math to put the situation in perspective.  I think it will be good for Lakota to put out their ridiculous school levy because it will bring out more MAGA, Trump-voting Republicans, who will only help Mark hold his seat.  I think the math works in Mark’s favor to pick up votes this year, given the anger at Lakota schools over their proposed tax increases.  But we’ll see.  What we do know is who is running, and it’s now that the strategies for preserving West Chester need to be developed, before it’s too late.  And taking a long view, Joel would be great, but the more strategic seat comes up in a few years. To protect West Chester, we need a strategy and a lot of players willing to support the long view, especially in a crowded field.

Rich Hoffman

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

Jim Comey Needs to be in Jail: Trying to intimidate the Supreme Court, and others to outlast Trump’s administration

Jim Comey knew what he was doing when playing with seashells on a beach and took a picture of an arrangement he made for his Instagram account.  That he denied he didn’t know what “8647” meant shows now, in hindsight, what a pervasive liar he has been on everything.  This is something that Democrats have been doing for a while to send a signal out to their deranged base of lunatics to do something stupid with a dog whistle meant for them.  Jim Comey was calling for the removal, by the understood means of assassination, by using the number “86” and putting it on his social media to connect with people who would do just that.  And by itself, it’s a serious matter.  But Jim Comey is on the outside now because he actively tried to remove Trump himself with all kinds of illegal activity, making up dossiers and passing them off as fact, faking FISA warrants, lying to congress, lying to the President and voters, Jim Comey, as I told CNN long ago, was a no good loser who was corrupt and took the FBI down a dark path for which it will never recover.  And given his history, and the known assassinations that were already attempted against Trump, the context of this recent case of Comey getting caught doing it is unforgivable, and he should be in jail for his misdeed.  It doesn’t matter that the FBI interviewed him and his intentions. Comey is a known, professional liar, and he knowingly put up a mark on his social media account as the former Director of the FBI, and the consequences for that action should be jail time at a minimum.  His intent is well chronicled and can be supported in a court of law beyond a reasonable doubt. 

But there is a bigger problem looming in the background, and this is about the Supreme Court ruling against Trump’s Article II powers to deport criminal thugs and cartel members operating in the United States.  On the same day we learned about Comey’s activism, we also learned that the Supreme Court, including all of Trump’s picks, went against him on deporting the illegal alien gang members, that have been hotly debated.  Seeing the Supreme Court punt with a 7-2 decision surprised everyone.  Well, I’m not surprised.  I was just at the Supreme Court recently, and know the vibe there firsthand.  There is a lot of pressure on them to distance themselves from the Trump administration because, after all, the polite society types know that Trump is temporary, and judges tend to wait for a lifetime appointment.  They will be around long after Trump is gone, so the assumption goes, and what the Supreme Court doesn’t want are people like James Comey, who are all over the intelligence community, putting out “86” hits on them to be performed by some crazy hitman lunatic driving by on a scooter outside their home and erasing them from existence while they are getting their mail.  Because that’s what’s bad about this hit request from Comey, is that he knows as an insider, that baked into his actions is an unprovably assumption about an underbelly of criminal conduct that works continuously in the background and turns the timid types, like judges on the Supreme Court into cowards worried about their future as the system itself will dispose of them at their first chance.  In this way, Comey commanded from his former title, showing that he’s like a mob boss still calling the shots from jail.  Members of the Supreme Court are afraid of these people for good reasons. 

Obama was the autopen

Trump’s picks are going out of their way to show they are independent of the President because the pressure on them is intense.  And when Comey put that message on his Instagram account, he didn’t mean it for Trump.  He meant it for the people who work for Trump and around him, as a rallying cry to resist him.  He will be gone and won’t be able to protect them at some point.  So they better get with the program.  We’ve seen Chuck Schumer beg a mob of malcontents to attack members of the Supreme Court for their previous rulings, and we’ve seen other assassination attempts against Trump where the FBI practically left the door open for the killers to kill.  This isn’t an accident; it’s a method of behavior that Democrats are counting on.  And they are bold about it.  And based on Comey’s past behavior, we were aware that he openly worked against the taxpayer selection of a representative in the White House; there is no way to deny what Comey was up to.  He and “they,” the Democrat mob who have found themselves out of power, are showing emotional leverage of the Supreme Court through well-planted acts of potential violence to steer them away from hard rulings and to punt this deportation case back down to the 5th circuit to stall Trump’s efforts, which won’t work in the end.  There are other ways to skin this cat.  However, the Supreme Court invalidated itself in the process because of the apparent threats from the hard left, of which Comey is a part.  There are a lot of his type in the law and order community at all levels, and they are arrogant because they think the rest of everybody is too stupid to know what they are up to.  Well, people see it, and they know what was going on in this case, and nobody believes what he’s saying.  It was this same Comey FBI that hid the Anthony Weiner laptop, whose wife is the new woman for little Alex Soros, and the Hunter Biden laptop, which showed all kinds of legal infractions.  And did not move to put Hillary Clinton in jail for her email scandal, but instead ran cover for her, because they were trying to keep Trump out of office. 

When you have people like Comey in the intelligence agencies, even when Trump has picked better people to run the Department of Justice now than we had, you still have these people on the payroll, and they are just holding their nose and waiting for Trump to be out of office once more.  And messages like Comey’s seashells are obvious intimidation tactics to show the masses that the mob is really in charge, and even members of the former administrations are always just a call away.  That insurrection through mob rule still dominates this material world.  Isn’t that the message of Hiram Abiff?  What say you, Master Masons?  The mob kills, and we must surrender this world and keep our eyes on the next.  So that cowards can justify turning their cheek away from evil and not face it, even when it presents itself on a beach by the former Director of the FBI.  And when caught, he lied and said it didn’t mean what we all know it meant.  Jim Comey is a dirty cop who wants crime to exist so that Democrats can stay in power.  And they want to tie up the Supreme Court so that violence can overthrow the order of a Trump administration before it can do all the great things promised during the 2024 campaign.  These are not lovers of America; they want to overthrow it, and their best weapon of choice is to inspire derelicts to action, which was what Jim Comey intended.  He needs to be put in jail and made an example of. 

Rich Hoffman

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

The Value of Frisch’s in Cincinnati: Anti family efforts by lots of bad people show just what they want to do to America

The trouble started for Frisch’s restaurants in the Cincinnati area when they allowed a private equity acquisition from NRD Capital to bring in a bunch of woke ideas that started a chain reaction beginning in 2015 that essentially killed the business during the self-made government Covid crises that sealed the deal.  Sadly, Frisch’s has always been a big part of my family’s life; but these days, they are empty everywhere.  I saw the writing on the wall the day I tried to order a Coke, and they told me they had switched to Pepsi products.  That was in 2015, ahead of President Trump’s first term, and I shook my head at my wife at the impending doom that was to come.  Pepsi tends to support a client base that is more liberal than Coke, which has, over the years, marketed toward more traditional audiences.  And Frisch’s was always about respect for tradition, family strength, and the morning breakfast bar.  It has been very sad to see so many of Frisch’s restaurants closing, especially the one in Fairfield off Seward Road, and the one right in the heart of Sharonville.  A few are still fluttering along, but when I drive by them at 6:30 AM, they are as closed as a barn door to a stable full of wild horses.  A self-imposed exile caused by parasitic lending practices and people in finance who thought they could loot benefit from a solid Cincinnati tradition, when they set up a lease agreement that just financially crushed the restaurant chain that relied on family tradition and a community experience to survive.  Other similar restaurants, such as Denny’s, Applebee’s, and Red Lobster, have all been going through the same kind of challenges.  But adding to the problem were the Covid shutdowns, for which Frische’s never recovered, and changes in social discourse that has an anti-family slant to it, and what we are seeing now with the closure of over 40 locations, 20 of them just in 2024 alone, is the foolish and parasitic imposition of government and short sighted financial institutions destroying American business.

No people at the breakfast bar at 7 AM

I have unique knowledge about this decline as I used to work at Frisch’s as a waiter during the 90s, a period that had crushing difficulty for me.  I was going through a lot of what Frisch’s is now at that time in my life, with serious lawsuits and government trouble that were crushing.  A lot of people would not have blamed me for committing suicide, given the level of pain and suffering I was enduring at this time.  It was so severe and complex that Job from the Bible was fortunate.  People had no idea how I would survive or if I would.  Without being too ostentatious, I can say that it was horrible, and at the time, I saw no way out.  I was acting as my own lawyer in several lawsuits, which did not have a very good track record of success.  Looking back on it, believe what you want about God, but he was testing me, and I passed the test primarily by dusting myself off and becoming a waiter at Frisch’s while I spent the next five years digging out of that bottomless hole with extraordinarily high tips from a public who had come to like me quite a bit.  I was their area philosopher, and people would come to eat at the Frisch’s restaurant that I worked at on Fields Ertle Road to hear me talk and give them advice.  And I learned a lot about people during this critical time that I use daily.  And the wisdom I gained from all that crushing pain was better than all the gold available to the masses of humanity.  And thinking back on it, I couldn’t have had it any other way. 

I picked that particular restaurant to work at because it was where my wife and I went all the time as a young couple, and on the first day that my first daughter was born, coming home from the hospital, we ate there with her all cuddled up in a blanket on the table.  So I picked that moment to make a massive life recovery, and hustled back to health.  I put on a smile and a whole lot of hustle, worked all I could and I won my cases, fought off a lot of very evil people and I made a small fortune in unnaturally high tips because of my personality and the families who came to eat at the restaurant that I was working at to have me work their table.  They would ask for me at the front specifically.  I understood why Frisch’s was such a great place as a host to the family experience, and I wanted to help with that effort any way I could, literally being at the bottom of the barrel myself.  I learned that a healthy dose of optimism can carry you through anything, for a large part, that was the marketing plan for Frisch’s to provide a platform for the public to engage in positive community interaction.  It’s where people went to see their friends and neighbors and to have good food, which started with the Car Hop days, where personal automobiles fused with American lifestyles centered around freedom and independence. 

You can’t live in the past, and things do change.  But what happened to Frisch’s is a massive social breakdown where people don’t go out into the community for a shared experience anymore, and that is a government policy problem attached to the United Nations.  The breakdown of the family structure is very much a globalist trend that interferes with places of business like Frisch’s.  I was also so pro-family that my customers would give me their checks worth of tips to show their appreciation, tipping at a rate of 80% or more, with 100% not uncommon.  Rob Dibble, the former Reds pitcher from the Nasty Boy days used to stop by and eat at my station quite often and would leave me $100 tips for a ten-dollar check, to hear me talk.  People went to Frisch’s for the company and the food.  The globalism that attacked American ideas was against both things that migrated into our local community through hostile lending practices, leaving behind a lot of history and tradition. And Frisch’s and its excellent breakfast bars are now a thing of the past.  And the writing was on the wall when they switched from Coke to Pepsi in 2015.  It was too late when they tried to correct that mistake just a few years ago and return to Coke.  They had blown their market viability and been destroyed by forces that took it for granted that Frisch’s would always have its lights on.  And now people don’t do things as a family like they used to, leaving Frisch’s out of the consideration by a public that used to value those experiences and has not yet replaced the sentiment with other options in the marketplace.  This wasn’t a natural market-driven killing. It was the purposeful destruction of many hidden elements that are parasitic in nature and anti-American at heart.  And Frisch’s was, and whatever survives from all this, a very pro-American family gathering place that shows what the efforts of globalism always intended for them and us as a whole.  Without Trump, America would be just as Frisch’s is now, only a memory with empty storefronts and massive debts as a distant memory of what it once was. 

Rich Hoffman

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

Republicans Can Win A Super Majority: Democrats only won anything with election fraud

I keep hearing that Democrats are holding their noses trying to get to the midterms, where traditionally, voters pick the other party once the party in power has had a chance to do their damage.  Democrats think that automatically, they’re going to win back at least the House, that they will be able to stop the Trump agenda, and that everything will snap back to normal.  But I don’t think so.  Democrats, more than ever, have a terrible platform that Americans are rejecting.  And of course, you know what I always say, that Democrats can’t win anything if they don’t cheat.  In the last election, many of the close calls we saw in the House and Senate races came in areas where election fraud occurred.  So if Republicans had watched the election results better, there would be more Republicans in the House than there are, and the majority could be much larger.  I think Republicans, if they prevent Democrats from committing election fraud, can gain a super majority and take their current results to even better standings.  And I think that is because of the current temperament of the country.  I do not see Democrats picking up any seats, even in local elections.  Based on their performance, they have destroyed their brand and are struggling to find any message that resonates with voters, and they don’t have it.  This is a different time than anything we had seen, so historical precedent is entirely out the window.  I do not see a scenario where Republicans lose anything so long as they keep the elections honest, because it is that bad for Democrats.  And even among themselves, they have a lot of people who have crossed over and joined Republicans because the Democrat brand is so bad. 

Oh, you might say we can’t prove election fraud, that there is no evidence.  Here’s the thing: just because people refuse to look at the evidence doesn’t mean that it’s not there.  Our court system let us down with election fraud cases because lawfare is dangerous to our society.  In most of the places where Republicans lost seats to Democrats, they were in areas where voter ID laws allowed undocumented immigrants to vote.  In places where voter ID made it hard to cheat, Republicans generally won.  What does that tell you?  Are the places where there are measures against election fraud Republican areas?  That controlling election fraud is a Republican concern?  Or that by default, anywhere that Democrats can cheat, they have the opportunity where there are loose laws allowing them to do so.  Whichever it is, that is not good math for Democrats.  They don’t hold an equal presence at the ballot box, which is now more apparent than ever.  So there isn’t any hint that Democrats will pick up anything in the upcoming midterms.  The horse race the media likes to go through during each election cycle isn’t there.  The Democrats don’t have anybody who can win a national election because their platform has been rejected as a failure.  That’s why Trump has won three elections in a row, and what started a decade ago was the hint of things to come, that people were done with the kind of politics that gave us the socialist disaster of Barack Obama.  Building a platform off guilt just wasn’t a smart move, and now that people have seen an option, they will never go back.  And Democrats just aren’t prepared for it.

Did you see the sit-in that Democrats did on the steps of the Capitol?   My wife and I were just in Washington, D.C., and saw some of the typical protestor types there and down on the Mall, and they came out flat.  Nothing is resonating with Democrats, none of their usual talking points.  And I think it is mainly because President Trump is a kind of traditional Democrat who pulled away so many other Democrats from the party, like RFK Jr., Tulsi Gabbard, and Elon Musk.  As a Republican, I’m not exactly happy about any of that.  I don’t like Democrats; I see them generally as broken people with broken ideas.  However, regarding party politics, I understand the need for a big tent party with many people who think different things.  That’s how you win elections, when many people want to head in the same direction.  So, an America First policy has allowed Democrats to join Republicans and for the GOP to expand its tent to accommodate all newcomers.  But you don’t see the same thing ever happening with Republicans joining Democrats.  We have been purging the RINOs from the party for several years now.  You don’t hear about the Mitch McConnell types or the Mitt Romneys.  Many party bosses who held the order of political theater together are gone, leaving Trump to control most political perceptions.  And as we visited Washington, D.C. this time with Trump in office, it was apparent everywhere.  The entire place felt different, even out by the airport.  No, this was a different kind of Republican Party than what we have had in the past, and suddenly nothing is appealing about any Democrat, leaving those most hopeful to leave the party in favor of the public sentiment. 

So, election fraud is the key.  We still haven’t properly prosecuted the election fraud that we know about.  The system hopes everyone will go back to sleep, but I don’t see that happening.  If Republicans make it hard for Democrats to cheat, especially on the voter ID issue, I’m saying that Democrats can’t win those elections, and Republicans will pick up many seats, even to the point of a super majority.  And a super majority is determined here by control of at least 60% of a body.  Looking at the math, Republicans could have come close in the last 2024 election to getting such a majority, but they went to sleep.  Everyone was watching Trump, and the momentum shifted so dramatically in his direction that even the fraudsters didn’t have the heart to fight anymore.  But a lot of those regional races where Democrats just barely beat the Republicans to keep it close in the House and Senate, most of those races were won by Democrats through fraud.  And if the mechanism were in place to prevent that fraud, the Republicans would have won.  This is why Democrats are so adamant about the illegal aliens.  They need them for voters, and they can’t afford for over 10 million illegals to be deported, because that is most of their voting base.  And even with them, people from other countries are voting for the America First position.  They aren’t voting for Democrats.  So don’t assume that Democrats will win back the House, or anything in the upcoming midterms.  I think Republicans can completely control their destiny if they take away the potential of election fraud.  And that if they do, Democrats may never win another election on any level, because their brand is so bad.  But now is not the time to play nice.  Reform elections so that voter ID is a requirement everywhere, and Democrats will not be able to win.  Republicans can win a super majority if only they support elections that prevent fraud with voter ID.

Rich Hoffman

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

The Wall Street Casino: Never build an economy off slot machines

I’ve heard a lot of dumb talk about the state of the economy at the end of Trump’s first 100 days in office, but people who have been profiting off the chaos for a long time expect it to continue.  Specifically, the condition of the stock market and GDP growth are at a very slow 1.7%.  I would say to everyone, don’t be a sucker, all the economic reporting over the last several years has been phony bologna built on a house of wet cards.  We’ve been in depression territory most of the Biden years, and it was never reported that way because of the Fed’s Modern Monetary Theory of printing fake money to prop up our entire monetary system artificially.  And because they don’t like Trump, they are turning off the faucet to make him look bad.  But real value, where things matter, is improving dramatically, especially on the energy front.  There is a lot of opportunity for massive economic growth, but the control over the usual measures has been ripped away from the bad guys, who aren’t happy about it.  So don’t be a sucker and listen to their cries for help.  And certainly don’t think the stock market is a good measure of economic growth.  At best, the stock market is a gambling casino.  It is designed so the house always wins; sometimes, they let out enough money to encourage people to play.  But you can’t build a policy based on it.  Just as nobody in their right mind would call spending money and reporting winnings from a casino or horse racing as real value, other than in just getting lucky.  You cannot build a national monetary policy around the casino game of stock market investments.  And if anybody thought that the stock market provided guarantees on investments, then they are the victims of a sucker’s game meant to take advantage of the gullible. 

I have been saying this for a long time, and have cautioned Trump people to attach their name to any stock market increases.  The stock market has exploded since Trump was in office the first time, but that isn’t because of Trump’s economic policies, it as a move by the Fed to wash printed money into Wall Street so that firms like BlackRock could gain purchasing power to leverage debt and produce buyouts of companies so that radical leftist boards full of woke politics could take over and manage American companies and they were controlled by the direct CEO letters that Larry Fink would send out to the market, and people would listen because people’s 401K plans were used to hide the ruse.  People would not question this insurrection of America’s monetary policy if they thought they were making a lot of money on the stock market.  But in truth, it was an artificial bubble created by deceit to gain control of American industry and to implement DEI policies to control their management systems.  I have had a front row seat to all this, and I can say that what I’m saying is that I’m putting it nicely.  Maybe too nicely.  But I am sympathetic to all the suckers out there who have fallen for this trick.  If everyone had just thought of the stock market for what it is, a casino, there would be a lot fewer broken hearts now.  I’m not against casinos or the stock market.  But know the game we are playing.  The system is not designed to make people wealthy,  Only to convince them to play the game so they can wash all that phony money injected into the market with real value from the suckers who play the slot machines in the casino, where the house always wins.  And in this case, the home is the Fed. 

Trump would do better to separate himself from the Stock Exchange and stick to tangible assets, such as drilling for oil and an energy policy that can be exported and has real value.  But the liberal media reporting has cooked the books for a long time and isn’t suddenly going to print the truth.  They didn’t suddenly become honest with Trump’s first 100 days in his second term, after Biden was pushed out of office with a massive election victory.  The financial media need suckers from their gambling tables, and BlackRock and the other money managers need real value to wash the money of the fake stuff the Fed has been printing.  They don’t want the GDP to grow without their fingers on that growth so that they can manipulate the results.  And they certainly don’t want their scam to end.  I would recommend that Trump’s White House separate itself as much as possible from Wall Street because a massive correction is coming, and many people will be very upset.  But a lot of real wealth will also be created.  But not from the casino of Wall Street.  Real value in housing, energy, defense, technology, and health will emerge under the capitalism of the Trump administration, and a hateful media culture will not like it.  And they will try to steer people away from Trump’s policies because they know they will lose control of the process during this next Trump term.  The stock market was always a house of cards that would fall at the slightest gust of wind. 

Andrew Jackson warned of this condition when he was president in the early part of the 19th Century and had his famous war with the banks.  We are in a battle for who controls our finances.  Financial people have been happy to let Tea Party types who have grown into MAGA supporters talk about free speech and fiscal responsibility, so long as they continued to seek value for their money from their casinos.  But there isn’t a single money manager out there who is selling investments that do not attempt to take advantage of the short gains of the casino slot machines that come in the form of quarterly reports in industries propped up with phony Fed money, while in reality, socialist policies have capped off our markets in detrimental, and truly destructive ways.  The flashy lights keep everyone from seeing the drunks playing the game with free alcohol provided by the house to numb our senses, and convince us to be easy suckers with prostitutes on our arms posing to be future wives so long as they continued to hit it big.  And to do that, you had to keep playing the game.  No, that game is for idiots; if you have been one of them, that’s on you.  We are taking control of our monetary system, and the casinos aren’t going to be happy about it, and don’t expect them to be.  But don’t expect the United States to build its economy on a gambling platform only.  You can’t make a society off a policy meant to protect stock market gains that were purely fictitious.  And the Fed has dumped so much phony money into the system, they fear people finding out about it.  So, for Trump’s part, let them learn the hard way and don’t attach any part of the administration to the stock market.  It was always a bad measure that bad people controlled for manipulations that have been bad for America.  And it’s time to stop playing that corrupt game rooted in dishonesty and villainy. 

Rich Hoffman

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

The Roger Reynolds Story: Politcal Revenge is a target rich environment

I supported Roger Reynolds, the old Butler County Auditor, when it wasn’t cool to do so.  And I must remind everyone that the story initially broke when Fox 19 in Cincinnati, Ohio, was looking to do a hit piece against the Republican Party of Butler County that started the whole mess.  So don’t be so surprised that they carried Roger’s story about a bloody dispute with the very popular Sheriff Jones and State Attorney General David Yost.  I get where Roger is; he wants to clear his name of any wrongdoing.  He wants to be back in politics.  I get the hurt feelings.  Many people did terrible things to each other, and the abuse of power that was on display is embarrassing and gives politics a bad name.  When David Yost, with the help of Sheriff Jones, tried to put Roger in jail for an improper interest in a public contract, we all knew that there was a lot more going on, and Roger found himself outside of a political party looking to cut him out of it.  And I was there for Roger in the worst of that.  But he wants revenge; they almost put him in jail and cost him a fortune to defend himself in court.  But changing people for who they are just isn’t going to happen.  If you want to be in politics, then you have to beat your enemies in politics, and don’t turn toward the courts, which those in power control, to do your business.  Get back on the horse, ride it, and play politics the way the game is played. 

But as far as I’m concerned, this story ended when Roger was cleared of wrongdoing in the courts.  No political apparatus should be able to destroy other people with the court system, but we’ve seen several instances of that happening in Butler County over the last couple of years, and it wasn’t good on any measure.  But crying about its unfairness and hoping that public sentiment will restore your good fortune is not the way to solve these problems.  And spitting in the face of people who were most supportive of you along the way is a good way to make political enemies.  And by how things work, Roger Reynolds has made himself a political enemy to my way of thinking because of his actions in the wake of this mess, so he’s not doing himself any favors.  Regarding Butler County politics, from my perspective, if you get sideways with Nancy Nix, the new auditor, then I won’t have a lot of sympathy for you.  Nancy, I think, is what all politicians should aspire to be.  She’s a sincerely good person in a very cutthroat profession, and she manages to still be very good at her job.  And she is doing a great job in Butler County as she moved to fill in that auditor seat that Roger had to vacate due to the criminal prosecutions he had to endure.  Roger went immediately to try to get his old job back, which would have been damaging to Nancy Nix personally and the team she has built at the auditor’s office, to make Roger happy, and that’s not a good way to go about things.  And in the upcoming elections, Roger wants to either run against Nancy for his old job back, which puts him against the person who went to court for him in a supporting role and helped him get back on his feet during all this, and was a very loyal friend until he turned on her after these court proceedings.  Or he wants to run for Butler County Commissioner, which will put him against Michael Ryan, the person I have already endorsed, so that will make it so I have to campaign against Roger, which won’t be a good thing for anybody. 

But don’t think that the media of Fox 19 and Channel 5 with Karen Johnson are suddenly pro Roger Reynolds.  I was surprised they picked up his story where he did his article on what had happened to him.  I had done it before for him over the past couple of years and talked about who did what to whom.  But this was the mainstream media getting Roger’s story out from his own lips, which they caused to happen in the first place.  So they aren’t suddenly anybody’s friends.  They are the same malcontents that they always were.  But they see blood in the water of Butler County politics, and if they can use Roger to harm Sheriff Jones, or David Yost, they will undoubtedly do it, and they did during the first week of April of 2025.  I read Roger’s story about the political hit job against him, where he named names and got specific.  But to what end?  Sheriff Jones is getting up there in age and has been vulnerable, especially in this last election season, where he didn’t get a warm endorsement from the Central Committee, because of stories like this one.  He’s good with the immigration issue now that Trump is back in office, and I agree with him on many things.  But politically, if Roger wanted to be a tough guy, he’d go right for the horse and not turn on his once very good friend, Nancy Nix, for his political comeback. 

Then there is Attorney General David Yost.  He wants to run for Governor against Vivek Ramaswamy, the Trump-endorsed candidate.  Yost is very vulnerable to having his entire political career destroyed, especially after what he did to Roger.  If I wanted revenge by the game of politics, you attack where people most want to be, and that is where he should focus.  They are trying to get Roger back in the ring as opposition who wish to divide up whatever party unity has been built now that Trump has been re-elected.  He is only hurting himself by splitting the party into either supporting him over Nancy Nix, or attacking a good commissioner candidate, which would drain away votes for both of them, opening the door for a third-party Christian conservative to win with their typical 35 to 40%.  Meanwhile, these liberal media hacks, like Karen Johnson and Fox 19 in general, get what they want: a damaged Republican Party.  So that’s why I didn’t pick up the phone immediately when Roger called with his story.  I wasn’t ignoring him.  I like him still.  I’ve even met with him a few times to see if there was a way I could help him out.  But once he got sideways with Nancy Nix, that’s the line for me.  And that’s a shame, because if he wants to get tough in politics, we are dealing with a target-rich environment.  And if you wish to take revenge, there are many political ways to get it.  But we all know how politics works, you have to build teams.  You don’t destroy them.  And the media coverage of his story wasn’t for his benefit.  It was to harm the Republican Party using him as the vehicle to do it.  And if you don’t love the Party for what it can do for people, then why do anything?  And why destroy friendships that were very real?  Nancy Nix could only harm herself by going to court to support Roger during all this.  But she did it because she’s the real deal and didn’t want to see something terrible happen to her friend.  And that friend turned against her because he didn’t want to go after the bigger fish that brought him harm in the first place, which does not come out well in a primary consideration, that could become bloody for no good reason.  In these kinds of things, you have to fight the right fight, not the one that you think is easiest, and turning on friends isn’t very enduring.

Rich Hoffman

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

If Trump or Any Politician Supports Pot Legalization: Smoke shops produce stringy haired losers and depreciated value

To answer a question that should be obvious at this point, but it needs an updated clarification, I am more than 100% against pot, or any marijuana support, and I will not endorse or support in any way a politician who is in support of marijuana legalization.  This came up in a recent discussion about political endorsements, and I had to explain to several people that just because pot was legal in Ohio, I did not recognize it as such and that I am more against pot sales and use than I ever was.  For me, it’s a Jesus in the temple against the money changers kind of thing.  I do not see marijuana as anything good for anybody, and it’s certainly not a free market right.  And to go to that next step, which evolved out of the question, would I feel the same about President Trump if he proved to be supportive of a federal policy on marijuana legalization?  The answer is that if Trump became pro-pot, that would be the day I work against him.  Everyone knows how supportive of Trump I have been over these last eight years, but the line in the sand would be pot legalization from his administration.  On that day, I would never be supportive of Trump again and would actively work against him.  That’s how serious I am about the matter, and life would go on if that turns out to be the case.  I know there are lots of discussions, especially from the Roger Stone crowd, to bend Trump’s ear to federal legalization.  If he did that, in my opinion, he would become the enemy, and I would actively look for his replacement.  That might be good news for people looking to drive a wedge between Trump and his base.  But because of all the talk in the background, I have to say it before it’s too late.

I don’t think Trump would do something so stupid.  He’s a states’ rights guy, and federal legalization would go against that position.  If states are that stupid to legalize pot, that’s their problem.  Now, Ohio just legalized pot, but not without some progressive gymnastics on constitutional technicalities that were very disingenuous.  There was a significant amount of outside money and influence that needed to be removed from the system, and I will certainly apply my efforts in that direction.  Just because radical leftist losers slid the issue under the door in Ohio, it does not mean I accept it.  And yes, there are a lot of Republicans who think that being pro-pot is being pro-business.  They tell me that the former Speaker of the House, John Boehner, supports the legalization of pot as a lobbyist.   My response is that I don’t like John Boehner; he cries too much and has smoked like a train chugging up a long hill for way too long.  Even though we share mutual friends, that does not mean I like what everyone does, nor do I endorse it.  I am not a libertarian.  I do not believe in the ‘live and let live’ philosophy, where you do whatever you want as long as it doesn’t impact me.  I believe in free markets, but I also think that we need rules in society that can make for a civilized nation, such as people shouldn’t have sex with kids under 18.  People shouldn’t drink until they are 21.  If I had it my way, people would never drink.  Kids shouldn’t drive a car until they are 16.  And people shouldn’t do drugs.  Any drugs.  I’m even against marijuana for medical use.  I hate the stuff and see it as the gateway drug to a weak society poised to collapse on itself.  Nothing good comes from pot legalization. 

As far as it being a pro-business stance, since pot was legalized in Ohio, we have all these embarrassing smoke shops everywhere.  They always have beat-up cars and stringy-haired losers coming and going from them.  Sure, plaza owners love them because they don’t want to see part of their buildings empty of a paying tenant. However, the quality of those tenants is detrimental to a community.  Smoke shops and dispensaries are no different than porn shops like the Hustler Store in Monroe are.  Nobody of any quality wants those reminders of human garbage around their homes.  They are bad businesses that lower the quality of our society; they certainly don’t enhance it.  To the short-sighted, smoke shops and pot sales might represent an expanding economy, but at the cost of other profitable aspects of society.  You might sell more pot to a bunch of losers, but those losers aren’t going to be inventing the next great thing, so in the long run, you cost business opportunities by having a pro-pot society of lazy slugs who adopt political socialism to feed their entitled personalities.  The billions of dollars of revenue that keep being passed around regarding the legalization of pot come at a cost of much more than that, primarily in the hard-to-define opportunity cost of a society that spends its recreational activity pursuing intoxication.  The same type of people pushing pot legalization are also advocates of a 40-hour work week, so they can stop work as soon as possible and hit the bottle or smoke more pot sooner, and the way I think about things, if they worked more and worked harder, they’d be intoxicated less.  And that is probably good for them, rather than giving them more leisure time that they will waste anyway. 

Would I throw away all that time I spent investing in Trump over just one issue of pot legalization?  Yes.  That’s how strongly I feel about it.  Pot is a nonstarter for me; there is nothing good to come out of it but short-sighted gains built on the backs of stupidity.  Strategically speaking, this is, of course, what the enemies want: to put Trump in a corner, make these tariffs a chopping block where he seeks an approval rating spike by pandering to the pot heads.  And if they can separate Trump from people like me, they would love it.  But it’s not too late, and I don’t think Trump will do it.  But there are politicians I like quite a lot who have embraced the legalization of pot in Ohio, and support a nationwide deregulation of it.  They compare it to the prohibition period against liquor and want to think that the two are the same, that if you have a society of alcohol abuse, then pot consumption is the next logical step.  But I say you have to draw a line somewhere, and for me, that is between alcohol and pot.  Ultimately, we shouldn’t have a society that embraces drug abuse no matter when or where.  That this is an issue at all says a great deal about our culture, which needs significant reform.  And there are a lot of people in the world that I have alienated just over the consumption of pot.  And I’ve always been this way, and I’ve no intention of ever changing my position on it.  I dislike the substance and the people who use it.  And in most cases, once I find out about it, I never speak to those people again.  So needless to say, when it comes to endorsements, if a politician, even if it’s Trump, supports the legalization of pot in any way, our relationship will literally go up in smoke. 

Rich Hoffman

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

More Kristi Noem Please: The best torture of drug cartel members is to have to look at the Secretary of Homeland Security in those tight pants

I was surprised by Megan Kelly’s obvious girl jealousy of Kristi Noem when the Secretary of Homeland Security went to the El Salvador Terrorism Confinement Center maximum security facility and stood before the recent prisoners there, just dropped off by Noem and the Trump administration for their terrorist connection to the government of Venezuela in the form of drug cartels.  I thought it was great; one of the reasons I wanted Kristi Noem to be Trump’s VP was that she has a great sense of style.  I will never forget how proud I was of her for riding her horse onstage at the town square in Deadwood, South Dakota, during the Sturgis motorcycle rally, carrying an American flag and waving it proudly in the air.  Kristi Noem gets it, and I am glad that President Trump put her in a position to utilize her talents for the security of America.  After all the controversies over those prisoners and whether or not a district judge had the power to intrude on President Trump’s Article II powers, Kristi Noem had the guts to visit the prison personally dressed in skin tight jeans, a very tight shirt to highlight her female attributes, while wearing a $50K Rolex and forced all those shirtless, tattooed drug gang members to look at her from behind knowing they weren’t going to have any female company for a long time, and listen to her spike the football right in front of their faces.  As I like to say, that is how you make spaghetti in the kitchen.  That’s the only kind of language that these violent drug cartel members understand, and it’s about time that we start playing the game better than them.  Kristi Noem was wearing lip gloss and had her hair nicely styled, further demonstrating her excessive femininity. As a result, the world came unglued, including Megan Kelly, the former Fox host and current podcast commentator. 

Let me go on to say that with all the talk about Noem’s costly Rolex watch, there is much more to that than anybody wants to admit.  The jealousy among various members of the media society, raised on Marxism, was overtly ostentatious.  Kristi Noem is a successful person who has survived numerous hardships, and she is now in her grandmother years, looking like a pretty hot tamale.  She hasn’t let herself go like many women of her age, and to all those who have, and look like rotting potatoes left two weeks too long in the cellar, Kristi Noem has exposed the heart of the problem.  That when we talk about girl power and all this equality nonsense, the real motivation isn’t for excellence, but it’s to bring down all the pretty women in the world to the level of most everyone else who don’t look so good.  It’s a communist assumption that expresses jealousy for those who have and the mob’s ability to take it and to destroy it, or redistribute it under the flag of equality.  Where everyone is equally ugly.  Megan Kelly’s reaction was the jealous socialite who is concerned that a woman like Noem might steal her man with expressions of feminine charms, so she thought she needed to pile on to all the left leaning media attacks, because as the head of Homeland Security Kristi Noem looked like too much of a woman and not enough of an authority figure.  Sure, Noem could have worn a baggy jacket to cover her body, but she wanted to show off a bit, just as she does at rodeos and public appearances like motorcycle rallies.  She knows what America likes, and they like women with very tight jeans, tight shirts, long hair, and lip gloss.  And to rub a little salt in the wound, Kristi wore her charming Rolex watch.

Who are we trying to impress with a less-than-excellent appearance anyway?  Playing down to the crowd and trying to look more “professional,” which in this case is the same as saying, “more average” lets other people know that you are just like them, butt ugly, lazy, and broke.  But that’s not the message here.  Kristi Noem is a good-looking woman who knows she’s attractive, and she took to the streets to lead raids against dangerous drug cartels, helping to make America safe again.  Most of the prisoners she was standing in front of are dangerous people.  It sounds like there were a few mistakes mixed into that prisoner population, but so what?  What matters is that we commit Homeland Security to get rid of drug cartels who are operating as a hostile foreign insurgent within our borders and openly trying to poison Americans for conquest.  Sheriff Jones once tried to get me to do an article to show just how bad the border violence is, where these drug cartel members are in open war with border property owners and openly cut off the heads of people who stand up to them and stick them on fence posts.  And if they see a woman they like, they take her and rape her and dare anybody in law enforcement to do something about it.  And it happens every day along the border.  That’s the kind of stuff that Megan Kelly should be worried about.  Not how good Kristi Noem looks as a very hot grandmother.  When I see Kristi Noem, I think of American pride.  When I see Megan Kelly, especially after her reaction to Noem, I see a woman who appears to be jealous and insecure about her ability to keep the men in her life interested in her, which is at the heart of the criticism.

I told the Sheriff that I couldn’t use the violent pictures he showed me, because they were just too horrible.  As a media contributor, that is my editorial judgment because it crosses the line.  I don’t mind writing about it, but the visuals are horrible and more people should see them.  There are ways to do so, but the media’s responsibility is to let people know that the border violence that happens with these drug cartels is open warfare.  And it’s not just on our borders anymore, it’s in the middle of America, in just about every city in North America.  They are a purposeful invasion of our country, and we should rub it in their faces when we catch them, deport them, and put them into maximum security prisons for containment and punishment.  And yes, for a bunch of dudes stuck in a rigorous prison system, having to bunch together with a bunch of shirtless dudes and stare at the back of Kristi Noem’s tight jeans is torture in a good way.  And I’m glad Kristi Noem had the guts to do it, and the showmanship.  The Secretary of Homeland Security has written best-selling books and achieved great success in life.  What else is she going to spend her money on?  A Rolex is a symbol of success, and she should wear it proudly and audaciously.  Especially if it makes lazy people jealous and insecure people reveal who they are. Which is what Megan Kelly revealed about herself.  Women, no matter who they are, tend to be very jealous of women they think are prettier than they are, and they adopt levels of Marxism in their lives to make things “fair” for them.  So they can go to the grocery store without makeup and dress in sweatpants and a dirty old T-shirt without feeling bad about themselves, until Kristi Noem walks by in a cowboy hat, tight jeans, long cowboy boots, and a perfumed body, complete with gleaming lip gloss.  And when their men look and admire how attractive Kristi Noem is, women like that punish their men for all the things they didn’t do, and want the world to be just a little bit lazier so they don’t have to feel bad about themselves.  Nope, that’s not how we make America great again.  More people like Kristi Noem do, however, and I am very proud of her for what she has done and plans to do in the immediate future.  More Kristi Noem, please!

Rich Hoffman

Click Here to Protect Yourself with Second Call Defense https://www.secondcalldefense.org/?affiliate=20707

Steve Bannon Pleads Guilty to Fraud: Why people like outlaws, but not criminals

It can get pretty murky whenever money is involved as to the final outcome, which to me was the case with Steve Bannon, the popular WarRoom podcaster and former strategic advisor to President Trump.  He recently pleaded guilty to defrauding investors on a private effort to fund the southern border wall in the U.S.  The hitching point for prosecutors was that the investors believed that 100% of the money was to go to construct the wall, so if some of that money goes to buying a pack of gum for instance, or some administrative cost such as buying paper for a copier, then that could and would be considered fraudulent behavior and a political enemy could then use that technicality to call the behavior fraudulent.  It can get pretty wild and scary with all the emails that start dealing with money.  I have a standard policy of keeping any money out of it when I do something with others to avoid the pitfalls Bannon found himself in.  When you find yourself a prominent national figure, some people will always seek to sink you on any technicality.  So, of course, the radical leftists think this admission of guilt from Bannon is going to hurt him in the eyes of his very vast podcasting public, and I hate to break it to everyone, but America likes bandits and outlaws, so long as they are not bad guys themselves and are seen as fighting against a corrupt system.  In that case, people will find the criminal behavior to be good and will punish the bad guys who attempt to get control of the law so they can define good and bad behavior.  People still have a sense of justice that extends beyond what some central authority tries to impose, which is exactly how President Trump ended up back in the White House and where the mug shot he received from the Fulton County Jail over the case there regarding overturning the election of 2020 is now seen hanging outside the Oval Office in the White House.  People are pretty smart and not just compliant followers, and they could smell a rat in that case; the more Trump’s political enemies dug in, the more they supported Trump and, of course, people like Steve Bannon.

A good soundboard on this strange mystery can be seen in my favorite steak house in Cincinnati.  I think it’s the best steak house in the Midwest, and it is certainly on par with any restaurant, wherever they are, in Los Angeles, New York, Paris, London, or anywhere else.  It’s called Son of a Butcher in Liberty Township, Ohio.  Growing up in Liberty Township, I never imagined in my wildest fantasy that something like Son of a Butcher would be located where it would be and that some of what went on in that location would be some of the most essential things in the business and political world.  But we’re talking about bad guys here and can’t stray too far off the mark.  If you have ever been to Son of a Butcher, it is known for its very wild interior decorating with lots of art painted all over the walls and crazy chandeliers hanging from the ceiling everywhere.  Every room in the restaurant has a kind of artistic expression reflecting contemporary pop culture.  For instance, in one room looming over what they call the Godfather table, indicated so from the popular movie series, is a painting of the Joker from the Batman movies.  Another room is filled with paintings of books from popular literature.  It’s a wild place artistically and looks more like a kind of dive bar in New York than something you’d find anywhere in Cincinnati, let alone Liberty Township, Ohio. 

Of course, the food is even better than the decorations, as they know how to pack a punch for food preparation.  They have some very expensive steaks at the S.O.B., as it’s known, and a couple of people eating there could very easily spend 1K per couple.  Some of the food items are moderately priced, but they are on the high end of the menu offerings and is often one of the most interesting places I find myself in routinely. It’s the perfect place to meet people for complicated conversations, to say things appropriately.  When I am there, I am usually put into a back room, which is my favorite place, that seats about 8 to 10 people, has crystal skulls all over the place and is pretty wild in a place of wild rooms.  They call this place the Criminal Room, and it has pictures of famous outlaws popularly known.  Painted on those walls is a large mural of Bonnie and Clyde.  Around the circumference of the room are two large paintings of very well-known pop culture icons, Marylin Monroe and the other Snoop Dogg.  Marylin Monroe was arrested several times for driving without a license and driving too slow in one instance.  Another time, it was for a peaceful protest.  The room paints her with a mug shot, illustrating that just about anybody can be seen as an outlaw if people dig far enough. Then there is Snoop Dogg, who lately has been trying to change his image into something more kid-friendly and popular rather than the thug gangster rapper who advocated for lots of recreational pot use.  Snoop Dogg was arrested for his role in a murder investigation, the details of which have just been sealed from public record in 2024, about the time that the popular rap star and Corona beer commercial spokesman started to change his image to a broader audience.  The murder was a 1993 case that didn’t quite get to prosecute him for extended jail time, but the charges were severe.

The point of the matter is that even with the murder charge hanging over Snoop Dogg’s head, the public didn’t care.  They bought his records anyway, turning him into one of the world’s superstars in music.  And I probably wouldn’t know much of that story if he wasn’t painted on the Son of the Butcher walls that I see at least once a month.  That is certainly the case with Steve Bannon and even President Trump.  Republicans have been harming themselves with their brand by trying to push out the bad boys that all the women like and put in place all the embarrassing stiff pencil necks that they think adhere to the law, but when they get pushed around by the political left, they end up being seen as George McFly from the Back to the Future movies.  Steve Bannon sees himself more like John Paul Jones, the popular pirate from the Revolution, so he understood all this well before others did in the GOP.  But the lesson is, if you want to win people over to your point of view, a background as an outlaw only helps you.  Being a criminal, however, hurts you, so there is a very fine line to walk. The difference is public judgment; if the public sees lawfare occurring, they will support the victim if they stick up for themselves, which is why having those celebrities in that room at the S.O.B. is so artistically revealing. We love people who challenge the law that corrupt people use to hold back our society.  But people do not love criminals who unfairly seek to exploit people in a weakened position.  And the more that the bad guys have tried to prosecute Steve Bannon, who just stepped out of a jail term right before the election of 2024.  The more popular and influential they have made him.

Rich Hoffman

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