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World

USS-Theodore-Roosevelt

USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier depicted in this filed photo dated 1999, moved through the Persian Gulf. (Photo: AP/DoD)

The United States has pulled the USS Theodore Roosevelt from the Persian Gulf, marking the first time since 2007 the U.S. Navy has had no aircraft carrier in the region. While the administration is claiming the carrier needs to “undergo maintenance” and the move was a result of mandatory budget cuts, it is undoubtedly a show of weakness and invites further aggression.

“Without that carrier, there will be a detriment to our capability there,” Admiral John Richardson recently said during a hearing in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

The USS Theodore Roosevelt, a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier that has played a pivotal role in the half-hearted military against the Islamic State (ISIS) since August 2014, is slated to be replaced in the region by the USS Harry S. Truman, which is based out of Norfolk, Virginia. The Pentagon would not offer a comment or explanation as to why the ships were not rotated out as to ensure no lapse in a U.S. presence in region would occur.

The development comes as Russian President Vladimir Putin has tested the resolve of President Obama and NATO, significantly escalating the Syrian civil war by ordering airstrikes on U.S.-backed rebels.

The U.S. pulled the USS Theodore Roosevelt

Policy

Why is It Obama Never Tells Us What Gun-Safety Laws He Wants to Pass?

Obama-UCC-Statement

President Barack Obama gives a press conference in response to the shootings. (Photo: Kevin Dietsch/EPA)

I don’t necessarily blame President Obama for seeking to politicize tragic mass shootings. His actions may be a bit unseemly, but also understandable if he truly believes that disarming law-abiding people is the best way to reduce carnage.

That being said, this charitable interpretation only applies if the President sincerely pushes his preferred policies. Yet, Charles Krauthammer, writing for National Review, points out that there’s a remarkable disconnect. The President constantly talks about the need to enact common-sense” gun laws, but he never tells us what those laws would be.

Within hours, President Obama takes to the microphones to furiously denounce the NRA and its ilk for resisting “commonsense gun-safety laws.” His harangue is totally sincere, totally knee-jerk, and totally pointless. …Nor does Obama propose any legislation. He knows none would pass. But the deeper truth is that it would have made no difference. …notice, by the way, how “gun control” has been cleverly rechristened “commonsense gun-safety laws,” as if we’re talking about accident proofing.

I’m not someone can be simultaneously sincere and evasive, but let’s set that aside. Dr. Krauthammer explains that Obama engages in empty rhetoric because his real goal is truly radical and impractical.

the only measure that might actually prevent mass killings has absolutely no chance of ever being enacted. …As for the only remotely plausible solution, Obama dare not speak its name. He made an oblique reference to Australia, never mentioning that its gun-control innovation was confiscation… Obama can very well say what he wants. If he believes in Australian-style confiscation — i.e., abolishing the Second Amendment — why not spell it out? Until he does, he should stop demonizing people for not doing what he won’t even propose.

So why doesn’t the President say what he believes?

Is it because he respects the Constitution? (it was hard to write that sentence without laughing)

Is it because he knows it is political poison? (a rather plausible answer)

Is it because he knows it will lead to massive civil disobedience? (if ObamaCare is any indication, he doesn’t care whether laws actually work)

I’m not sure what motivates the President, but this very clever video from Reason TV shows what would be needed to confiscate guns.

[brid video=”17685″ player=”1929″ title=”How to Create a GunFree America in 5 Easy Steps”]

As we’ve come to expect from the folks at Reason, an excellent job of combining humor and reality. Sort of a mix of this satirical video and this fact-based video.

By the way, since many statists think Australia is a role model for gun confiscation. let’s take a closer look at that issue. Here are two charts from the guys at Powerline Blog. The first chart shows the big drop in murder rates in the United States during a period when gun ownership was increasing and citizens enjoyed greater freedoms such as concealed carry.

Now look at the data on the murder rate in Australia, with special attention to the change (actually lack of change) following the 1996 gun ban.

John Hinderaker helpfully explains what is shown in these charts.

Whatever Australia did, it was not as successful in reducing homicides as what we have done here in the U.S. This chart comes from the Australian government. Note that there was no apparent reduction in homicides after the gun confiscation/ban/buyback of 1996. Years later, the homicide rate declined slightly, as it did throughout the developed world… But nowhere near as sharply as the homicide rate has declined here in the United States since the mid-1990s. Whatever we have done in the U.S., whether or not you credit more liberal carry laws and more widespread ownership of handguns, it has worked far better than the approach to homicide that has been taken in Australia

There are lots of factors that determine gun violence, of course, so I’m not hopeful many statists will be convinced by John’s comparison. But I do hope that this evidence, when combined with all the other research ongun ownership and crime, may lead more middle-of-the-road people to the right conclusions. In the meantime, our leftist friends can rely on their version of social science research.

The President constantly talks about the need

Books, Entertainment

“Government Zero is Absolute, Unchecked Government Power and Zero Representation of the People”

Government-Zero-Cover-SavageBestselling author and conservative talk radio giant Michael Savage spoke to People’s Pundit Daily Thursday to discuss his new book GOVERNMENT ZERO: No Borders, No Language, No Culture. Dr. Savage, host of The Savage Nation and author of Stop the Coming Civil War, will release his new book through Center Street on October 27.

As I admitted during the opening of our interview, both the chapter content and overall thesis are so timely that it reads as if he wrote the book this week. From immigration, to the Syrian Refugee Crisis, to the division in the Catholic Church over Pope Francis, Savage offers a well-researched explanation of the troubling current events that are shaping our time.

That explanation is refreshingly straightforward: It is all the result of living under Government Zero, which is waging a war on our freedoms by attacking our “borders, language and culture.”

What is Government Zero? Admittedly, Dr. Savage reminded me how Pol Pot, the leader of the Khmer Rouge, was chasing his socialist dream of Year Zero when he slaughtered some 500,000 Cambodians. Pol Pot claimed to want to return his nation to a peasant economy in “building socialism without a model,” but the result was very different. By comparison, America was never supposed to flirt with socialism, leaving statists with the task of “fundamentally transforming” the nation into one that would not only flirt with it but embrace it.

“We are supposed to be a nation where the government is ‘of the people, by the people, and for the people,'” Savage explains. “It is a government of itself, by itself, and for itself, run by lobbyists. In short, Government Zero is absolute, unchecked government power and zero representation of the people.”

Is he not on to something? Millions of Americans, both on the right and left, obviously agree. It is that very sentiment that has driven the dynamic of the 2016 Republican nomination, in which the top three candidates are all billing themselves as “outsiders” and claiming over half the primary vote. It is also that same sentiment that forced Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., to withdraw his bid for speaker on Thursday.

Dr. Savage makes no secret about supporting outsider and current frontrunner Donald Trump, who brought the immigration issue to the forefront of the race for the GOP nomination. Trump, who is dominating the Republican field, has done so by rallying the GOP base behind a nationalist message, which as Savage argues in the book, is the most powerful tool against Government Zero.

“Trump’s slogan ‘Make American Great Again’ is a nationalist theme,” he said. “I’m advocating for national borders, language and culture. You would think no one would argue we don’t need that.”

But, as he demonstrates in his book and noted on the phone, progressives not only argue against common borders, language and culture, but aim to subvert and marginalize the idea. He makes a strong case that both illegal immigration and what he calls the Progressive-Islamist takeover are in reality tools used by allies of Government Zero to achieve an end–statism. Considering the politically correct narrative force-fed to Americans by a collaborating media, even he admits it sounds like an alarmist point of view.

“It may be hard for most people to imagine how committed atheists could possibly be working with committed religious fanatics.” Savage says. “Yet, everywhere we look, we see American progressives defending Islam. They make excuses for radical Islam’s atrocities while branding anyone who criticizes them as bigots.”

Unlike Glenn Beck, who has put forward conspiracy theory-like scenarios depicting George Soros and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi hatching out their plot against the West in a dark room, Savage’s interpretation is intellectual and believable. To be clear, he characterizes the strange relationship between leftists and Islamists–two philosophies seemingly antithetical to one another–as an alliance shared by “kindred spirits.”

“I’m not talking about a conscious conspiracy between the two groups, per se. They are more like kindred spirits. They may not have the same vision for what society should look like when they’re finished with it, but they share the belief that American society as it is today must be destroyed. That’s the linkage,” he explains. “Both groups also believe in absolute, autocratic rule over the people. They both want to run every aspect of your life. If you haven’t noticed, every Islamic nation has a socialist economy. That’s because socialism and autocracy are one and the same.”

Indeed, aside from Israel, the last true market-based economy in the Middle East vanished when leftwing intellectuals argued mass Muslim migration into Lebanon was humane. As far as the media, both Trump and Dr. Ben Carson have been on the receiving end of relentless attacks in response to their positions on immigration and Islam, respectively.

Regarding the latter, the “mainstream” media had a meltdown when Dr. Carson said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he “would not advocate that we put a Muslim in charge of this nation” because Islam is not consistent with core values and American principles. However, according to recent polling, the majority of Americans agreed with that statement and said they would not be willing to vote for a Muslim president.

But under Government Zero that doesn’t matter, because it doesn’t represent the interests or opinions of anyone except for Government Zero. Americans are sick and tired of Government Zero, even if they do not yet know it exists, which is what Dr. Savage hopes to change.

“That’s why I do the show. That’s why I write these books,” he said. “I’m doing what I can, my part to get the message to those who are still persuadable.”

Much of the various criticisms of Michael Savage leveled by the left and, indeed, by some on the right, have more than implied a level of pessimism is the core of his on-air content and written works. Yet, within minutes of our one-and-one conversation, it quickly became apparent that these criticisms are unfounded. In fact, he is undoubtedly an optimist, which is what one should expect from a conservative who genuinely believes progressive philosophy and policy are so fundamentally flawed that they are self-defeating.

“I have to be [an optimist],” he told me. “They’ve already made these mistakes. We’re seeing the results now in Syria, with Putin, in the Middle East. Maybe I’m an idealist, but in the end I believe the good guys win.”

[mybooktable book=”government-zero-no-borders-no-language-no-culture” display=”summary”]

Best-selling author and conservative talk radio giant

Politics

Officials Conclude Sanctions Relief Violates Existing Federal Law Signed by Obama, Himself

Tehran-Iran-burn-flags

Iranians burn the American and Israeli flags following the announcement of the negotiated nuclear agreement in Tehran. (Photo: Hamed Malekpour)

A key provision in the Iran deal negotiated by the Obama administration and the regime in Tehran violates existing federal law, according to a new report. U.S. officials have concluded a provision regarding billions of dollars in sanctions relief, according to State Department correspondent James Rosen at Fox News, cannot be implemented without conflicting with and violating existing federal statutes passed by Congress and signed by the White House.

Of course, the president alone, irregardless of a treaty, does not have the power to supersede legislation and law, though it is unclear what impact there may be on the Senate-GOP’s capitulation over procedural rules for approving the Iran nuclear agreement.

In the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, specifically, Section 5.1.2 of Annex II, says the U.S. “shall…license non-U.S. entities that are owned or controlled by a U.S. person to engage in activities with Iran that are consistent with this JCPOA.” In other words, foreign subsidiaries of U.S. parent companies under certain circumstances will be permitted to conduct business with Iran. However, the Iran Threat Reduction and Syria Human Rights Act (ITRA), which was actually signed into law by President Obama, himself, in August 2012, explicitly closes what is known as the “foreign sub” loophole.

And that’s not all.

Read Full Article

A key provision in the Iran deal

Video

“This Guy Should be Writing about the Dos and Don’ts of Pocket Squares,” Not Politics

Barry Bennett, Dr. Ben Carson’s presidential campaign manager, responded Thursday night to an article entitled “FU@K Ben Carson” in the left-wing fashion magazine GQ.

“It’s kind of the high of hypocrisy, isn’t it. I mean the enlightened left is full of intolerance and hatred,” Bennett said. “It’s amazing, this guy should be writing about the dos and don’ts of pocket squares. When it comes to political thought, he needs to get out of the building.”

Barry Bennet, Dr. Ben Carson's campaign manager,

US

Northern-Arizona-University-Shooting

Northern Arizona University campus entrance sign.

One person has been killed and three others injured in an early-morning shooting at Northern Arizona University early Friday, police and officials said. Eric Dieterle, spokesman for the Flagstaff university, said the shooting occurred in a parking lot near Mountain View Hall, a student residence on the eastern end of campus located near the school’s football stadium. The still-unidentified shooter was taken into custody, police said.

“Four people were shot at the Northern Arizona University campus in Flagstaff, AZ, early Friday,” reads a statement (full below) from the university. “According to the Northern Arizona University Police Department, the four victims included one dead, and three wounded. The shooter is in custody. Campus is not on lockdown.”

Wounded victims were being treated at Flagstaff Medical Center near the NAU campus, but their conditions are unknown. NAU is a public university with over 27,000 students, about 20,000 of whom are enrolled at the school’s main campus in Flagstaff. Dieterle said the shooting occurred at approximately 1:20 a.m. local time. Mountain View Hall residents were told to stay indoors, but the campus was not placed on lockdown. It was not immediately clear whether the shooter or victims were students.

The development comes as President Barack Obama is set to travel to Roseburg, Oregon in what is a rather unwelcome visit to “console” the victims and families of the Umpqua Community College shooting last week. In reality, the president is hoping the visit will draw attention to his gun control agenda, despite a Defend Roseburg Facebook page garnering attention for their serious attempt to cancel the president’s visit.

FULL STATEMENT BELOW

Four people were shot at the Northern Arizona University campus in Flagstaff, AZ, early Friday. According to the Northern Arizona University Police Department, the four victims included one dead, and three wounded. The shooter is in custody. Campus is not on lockdown.

The three victims are being treated at Flagstaff Medical Center.

The incident took place outside Mountain View Hall on the northeast end of the Flagstaff Campus. The first call of shots fired came in at 1:20 a.m.

NAUPD is working on the investigation with the Flagstaff Police Department at the scene. A press conference will be held at 6 a.m. in the Agassiz room of the High Country Conference Center.

Parents may call 928-523-0007. A Family Assistance Center has been set up in the ballroom of 1899 Bar & Grill, 307 W Dupont Ave, Flagstaff, AZ 86001.

The Hot Spot in the University Union will open at 6 a.m.

One person has been killed and three

Science

Pluto-Blue-Sky

Oct. 8, 2015: This image released by NASA shows regions with exposed water ice highlighted in blue in this composite image taken with the New Horizons spacecraft’s Ralph instrument. The image combines visible imagery from the Multispectral Visible Imaging Camera (MVIC) with infrared spectroscopy from the Linear Etalon Imaging Spectral Array (LEISA). The scene is approximately 280 miles across. (NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI via AP)

In the first images from NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft taken during the historic flyby of the icy dwarf planet in July, scientists discovered Pluto has a blue sky. The images of Pluto’s blue atmospheric haze were returned last week from Pluto currently orbiting on the far reaches of the solar system, known as the Kuiper Belt, and released by NASA on Thursday.

“Who would have expected a blue sky in the Kuiper Belt? It’s gorgeous,” said Alan Stern, principal scientist for New Horizons from Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), Boulder, Colorado.

NASA scientists say the particles in the atmospheric haze are likely red and gray, but the way the particles scatter blue light tells them much of the composition in the dwarf planet’s atmosphere.

“That striking blue tint tells us about the size and composition of the haze particles,” said science team researcher Carly Howett, also of SwRI. “A blue sky often results from scattering of sunlight by very small particles. On Earth, those particles are very tiny nitrogen molecules. On Pluto they appear to be larger — but still relatively small — soot-like particles we call tholins.”

Because the dwarf planet is 3.6 billion miles from the sun, it is constantly twilight. Scientists believe these findings show Pluto is comparable to Saturn’s moon Titan. NASA explains the interaction of molecules further:

Tholin particles form high in the atmosphere, where ultraviolet sunlight breaks apart and ionizes nitrogen and methane molecules and allows them to react with one another to form more and more complex negatively and positively charged ions. When they recombine, they form very complex macromolecules, a process first found to occur in the upper atmosphere of Saturn’s moon Titan. The more complex molecules continue to combine and grow until they become small particles; volatile gases condense and coat their surfaces with ice frost before they have time to fall through the atmosphere to the surface, where they add to Pluto’s red coloring.

In another discover, which scientists are calling a “significant finding,” images uncovered numerous ice patches on Pluto’s surface. The exposed water ice appears to be, mysteriously, red. Scientists said they are uncertain why the ice appears in certain places at Pluto and not others.

“Large expanses of Pluto don’t show exposed water ice,” said science team member Jason Cook, of SwRI, “because it’s apparently masked by other, more volatile ices across most of the planet. Understanding why water appears exactly where it does, and not in other places, is a challenge that we are digging into.”

Launched in 2006, New Horizons is now 63 million miles beyond Pluto. Johns Hopkins University in Maryland is operating the spacecraft for NASA.

In the first images from NASA's New

Policy

Bobby-Jindal-Dubuque-Iowa

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal during a town hall-style meeting in Dubuque, Iowa. (Photo: AP/Nicki Kohl/Telegraph Herald)

Give him credit. Most elected officials are content to tinker at the edges, but Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal actually wants to solve problems. Look what he’s done, for instance, on fiscal policy. He sought to abolish his state’s personal income tax, a step that would have dramatically boosted the states competitiveness. That effort stalled, but he actually has been successful in curtailing state spending. He’s amassed one of the best records for frugality of all governors seeking the GOP presidential nomination.

GOP-Governors-per-capita-annual-spending

Data for average annual spending per capita for states run by Republican governors running for president.

And he’s now joined the list of presidential candidates seeking to rewrite the internal revenue code. Since we’ve already reviewed the tax reform plans put forth by Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush, and Donald Trump, let’s do the same for the Louisiana governor.

Regular readers hopefully will recall that there are three big problems with the current tax code.

  1. High tax rates that undermine incentives for work and entrepreneurship.
  2. Double taxation of income that is saved and invested, reducing capital formation and wages.
  3. Loopholes that hinder economic efficiency by distorting the allocation of resources.

Let’s see whether Governor Jindal’s plan mitigates these problems. On the issue of tax rates, the Louisiana Governor replaces the seven rates in the current system with three rates, starting at 2 percent. And instead of a top rate of 39.6 percent, the maximum penalty on work and entrepreneurship would be 25 percent.

He also abolishes the marriage penalty and gets rid of the alternative minimum tax (a perverse part of the code that forces people to calculate their taxes a second time, based on a different set of rules, with the IRS being the only beneficiary).

Regarding double taxation, one of the big problems in the current system is that corporate income is taxed at both the business level and the shareholder level. Most proposals seek to fix this problem by reducing or eliminating the tax burden on dividends on households. Governor Jindal, by contrast, would keep that tax and instead abolish America’s corporate income tax, which is probably the worst in the world.

In one fell swoop, that bold piece of reform also solves many other problems. You don’t have to worry about the tax bias of depreciation. You don’t have to worry about the anti-competitive policy of worldwide taxation. And you wipe out a bunch of corrupt tax preferences. The plan also would create universal savings accounts that would be free of double taxation (a policy that has been very successful in Canada). Jindal’s plan also eliminates the death tax, though there would still be a capital gains tax.

Shifting to loopholes, the disappointing news is that the charitable deduction is untouched and the home mortgage interest deduction is merely trimmed. But the positive news is that the state and local tax deduction apparently goes away. And because the abolition of the corporate income tax automatically gets rid of the loophole for fringe benefits such as health insurance policies, the Governor also proposes to create an individual deduction for those costs.

The net effect of all these changes is that the tax code will be far less punitive.

The Tax Foundation is the go-to place for analysis on the economic and revenue impact of tax reform plans. Here’s what they predicted would happen to the economy if Jindal’s plan was adopted.

Jindal-Tax-Plan-Growth-Effects

(Source: Tax Foundation)

Now let’s end with two observations that may be more political than economic.

First, Jindal’s plan is a huge tax cut. About $10 trillion over 10 years according to the experts at the Tax Foundation. In this regard, Jindal is in the same league with Trump, who also proposed a very large tax cut. Paul, Rubio, and Bush, by contrast, have much more modest tax cuts.

This is a good thing, of course, assuming candidates have serious plans to restrain – and perhaps even cut – federal spending. I don’t lose sleep about whether there’s a balanced budget in year 5 or year 10, but a tax reform plan with a big tax cut isn’t serious unless there’s a concomitant proposal to shrink the burden of government spending. Second, Jindal proposes to have all Americans pay some income tax. That’s the purpose of the 2-percent rate in his plan. His argument is quite explicit: “Every citizen needs to help row the boat, even if only a little.”

This is an appealing argument. While Mitt Romney was wrong in his assertion that 47 percent of the population was part of the dependent class, we don’t want too many people riding in the wagon and thinking government is “free.”

P.S. If you’re curious about Jindal’s position on other policy issues, he has a good track record on education. He implemented some good school choice reform, notwithstanding wretched and predictable opposition from the state’s teachers’ union.

Most elected officials are content to tinker

US

US-Serviceman-Heroes-France

Spencer Stone, left, Alek Skarlatos and Anthony Sadler prevented what a French official said would have been “a terrible tragedy. (Photos: AP)

The Sacramento Police Department released a statement shortly after a press conference Thursday following the stabbing of Spencer Stone, one of three American heroes who thwarted a terror attack on a train in France. Despite what has been reported, police say alcohol and not terrorism was behind the altercation that led to Stone being stabbed “multiple times in his upper body” Thursday.

“It is believed that Stone was out with a group of friends when a physical altercation led to him being stabbed multiple times in his upper body. Immediately after the assault the assailants fled the scene. Felony Assault Detectives were called to the scene to conduct an investigation,” they said in a statement. “We firmly believe that this is not a terrorism related event and that it is in no way related to the incident that occurred in France.  The assault does not appear to be a random act and is believed to be a nightlife related incident.”

The police said they are looking for two Asian men who fled the scene in what looks to be a gray or black Toyota Camry made between 2009-2012. However, some outlets took this to be “code” for Muslim men, which there is absolutely no evidence to support at this time. Again, let us be crystal clear, we have scene the surveillance tape, which is very graphic and it shows what appears to be a drunken brawl, not an act of Muslim retribution.

Mr. Stone appears to hold his own against multiple attackers during what he probably thought was just a fist fight. While the video does not show the stabbing, as a witness put it, “it looks like someone lunges and everyone disperses from there and there is this discoloration on his shirt and he just walks out of the camera.”

Meanwhile, the family via the hospital released a statement thanking supporters for their thoughts and prayers, but asked the media to respect their privacy at this trying time.

“The family of Airman Spencer Stone appreciates the outpouring of love and support,” the statement from the UC Davis Health System read. “Airman Stone is in serious condition. His family requests that the media respect his right to privacy at this time.”

The Sacramento Police Department released a statement

Politics

Rep-Paul-Ryan

House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis.. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)

Ways and Means Chair Paul Ryan, R-Wis., reacted Thursday to the news that House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., has dropped out of the race. The surprise decision will postpone the vote for speaker.

“Kevin McCarthy is the best person to lead the House, and so I’m disappointed in this decision,” Ryan said. “Now it is important that we, as a Conference, take time to deliberate and seek new candidates for the speakership. While I am grateful for the encouragement I’ve received, I will not be a candidate. I continue to believe I can best serve the country and this conference as Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee.”

It’s unclear what specifically made McCarthy change his mind and drop out, but he came under fire after a Fox News interview last week where he appeared to link Hillary Clinton’s dropping poll numbers to the congressional Benghazi committee. Democrats cited the comment as proof the Benghazi select committee was political in nature, which GOP members and leaders vehemently deny.

Nevertheless, Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, the chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, called the comments irresponsible and threw his hat in the ring along with Daniel Webster, R-Fla., who earned a surprising amount of votes in the last election for speaker. Webster, though, has won over the conservative wing of the party. The House Freedom Caucus–with its 30-40 members–decided it would unite and back Webster Wednesday evening.

It is difficult to imagine solid conservatives throwing any support behind Chaffetz, considering the history. Conservatives have referred to McCarthy has open-minded and a good listener, something that can not be said of Chaffetz. He stripped Rep. Mark Meadows of his subcommittee chairmanship after he defied party leaders on the controversial trade bill that gave the president fast-track authority, though he buckled shortly after conservatives pushed back and reinstated Meadows as subcommittee chairman.

Conservative talk radio host Mark Levin referred to the top three House leaders—Boehner, McCarthy and Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La.—as “Moe, Larry and Curley,” with Chaffetz being the “shrimp in there somewhere.”

Meanwhile, Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., the head of the special Benghazi Committee who has been pushed to run for majority leader by Chaffetz and speaker by other conservatives, said he wishes Ryan would jump into the race. However, Gowdy said he understands why Ryan isn’t interested in the job.

“To me, just speaking as one member, the smartest kid in the class is Paul Ryan,” Gowdy said. “If I had one draft choice and I was starting a new country, I would draft Paul to run it. Not because I agree with him on everything, but because he’s super, super smart. And when someone is super, super smart and is not interested, that tells you something. It tells me a lot.”

Ways and Means Chair Paul Ryan, R-Wis.,

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