Uncategorized
Kavanaugh’s accuser wants FBI to investigate before hearing
WASHINGTON — Christine Blasey Ford wants the FBI to investigate her allegation that she was sexually assaulted by Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh before she testifies at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing next week, her lawyers said in a letter to the panel.
The lawyers wrote that Ford, who is now a college professor in California, wants to
An FBI investigation “should be the first step in addressing the allegations,” the lawyers wrote in the Tuesday letter, which was obtained by The Associated Press.
The development came after President Donald Trump showered sympathy on his embattled nominee and as Senate Republicans and Democrats fought determinedly over who should testify at a high-stakes hearing on the allegation just six weeks before major congressional elections.
Trump has already rejected the idea of bringing in the FBI to reopen its background check of Kavanaugh. Should he order such a review, it would likely delay a confirmation vote until after the election. Republicans hope to have Kavanaugh confirmed by Oct. 1, the start of the next Supreme Court term.
In a tweet Tuesday night, Trump wrote: “The Supreme Court is one of the main reasons I got elected President. I hope Republican Voters, and others, are watching, and studying, the Democrats Playbook.”
Meanwhile, Republicans are suggesting that Ford, whose allegations have upended Kavanaugh’s nomination — the committee’s vote was already pushed from Thursday to likely next week — will have one chance to testify, and one chance only.
“Monday is her opportunity,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Tuesday, a line that was echoed by other Republicans throughout the day.
McConnell expressed confidence that Kavanaugh would be confirmed. “I’m not concerned about tanking the nomination,” he said.
The GOP chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Chuck Grassley of Iowa, said an FBI investigation wouldn’t have bearing on Ford’s testimony so “there is no reason for further delay.”
Grassley said the committee offered Ford “the opportunity to share her story” in a public or a private hearing, or staff interviews, “whichever makes her most comfortable. The invitation for Monday still stands.”
Said Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah, a key Republican on the panel, said, “We should proceed as planned.”
The furious jockeying over Ford’s testimony underscores the political potency so close to an election that will decide control of both the House and Senate, not to mention the confirmation of a conservative justice likely to serve on the high court for decades.
Democrats complain that Ford was not consulted before the hearing was announced. They also want more witnesses besides Kavanaugh and Ford, hoping to avoid what they said would turn into a “he-said-she-said” moment.
The lawyers for Ford predicted the hearing, as now scheduled, “would include interrogation by senators who appear to have made up their minds” that she is “mistaken” and mixed up.
But Democrats also said Tuesday they were planning to attend the hearing even if Ford did not show up.
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said he had “a lot of questions” for Kavanaugh. “A simple denial is not the end of questioning.”
As Democrats press for more time to investigate, Republicans have been careful to say that Ford should have her chance to speak, and they have stressed that they are willing to move Monday’s hearing behind closed doors, if she prefers.
“Were planning on a hearing Monday. It can be open. It can be closed, whatever Ms. Ford wants,” said Sen. John Kennedy, a member of the Judiciary panel from Louisiana. “We’re ready to hear anything she has to say. I am, anyway, and I think most of us are.”
GOP Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee — among a handful of Republicans who insisted on hearing from Ford before voting — said it would be a “shame” if Ford didn’t show up to testify. But he suggested Republicans will not bend from their offer of a hearing Monday.
“That would be quite something if she decided she did not want to testify,” Corker said. “I’d assume the committee would then move on as they should.”
One witness the Democrats want to hear from is Kavanaugh’s high school friend Mark Judge, who Ford said was in the room when she was assaulted. Kavanaugh has denied Ford’s allegation, and Judge says he doesn’t remember any such thing. “More to the point, I never saw Brett act in the manner Dr. Ford describes,” Judge said in a letter to the panel.
The risks of a public hearing starring the all-male lineup of Republicans on the committee could be high. Republicans said late Tuesday they were considering hiring outside attorneys, presumably including women, to question the witnesses. But that may be moot if Ford declines to appear.
Kavanaugh, 53, was at the White House on Tuesday for a second straight day, but again did not meet with Trump. The president said he was “totally supporting” Kavanaugh and felt “terribly” for him and his family.
“I feel so badly for him that he’s going through this, to be honest with you, I feel so badly for him,” said Trump, who has himself faced numerous accusations of sexual harassment that he’s denied. “This is not a man that deserves this.”
The No. 2 Senate Republican leader, John Cornyn of Texas, noted that Ford has admitted she doesn’t remember some details of the incident. He called the allegations a “drive-by attack” on the judge’s character.
“There are gaps in her memory,” Cornyn said. “She doesn’t know how she got there, when it was and so that would logically be something where she would get questions.”
Criticism like that fed a Democratic narrative that the GOP’s handling of Ford could jeopardize that party’s election prospects in the age of #MeToo, the response to sexual abuse that has torched the careers of prominent men.
“Now this is really what #MeToo is all about, if you think about it,” said Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, the top Judiciary Committee Democrat. “That’s sort of the first thing that happens, it’s the woman’s fault. And it is not the woman’s fault.”
Meanwhile, Kavanaugh has been calling Republican senators, including Kennedy, who said the nominee was committed to moving forward.
“He’s not happy, he’s upset,” Kennedy said. “He said very clearly and unequivocally, ‘This did not happen.'”
Ford went public with her story Sunday, telling The Washington Post that Kavanaugh had forced himself on her in a bedroom at a party when he was 17 and she was 15, attempting to remove her clothes and clapping his hand over her mouth when she tried to scream. She says she escaped when Judge jumped on the bed.
___
Associated Press writers Kevin Freking, Mary Clare Jalonick, Juliet Linderman and Catherine Lucey contributed from Washington.
Alan Fram And Lisa Mascaro, The Associated Press
From the Canadian Taxpayers Federation
By Carson Binda
BC Government promised carbon tax would reduce CO2 by 33%. It has done nothing.
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation is calling on the British Columbia government to scrap the carbon tax as new data shows the province’s carbon emissions have continued to rise, despite the oldest carbon tax in the country.
“The carbon tax isn’t reducing carbon emissions like the politicians promised,” said Carson Binda, B.C. Director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. “Premier David Eby needs to axe the tax now to save British Columbians money.”
Emissions data from the provincial government shows that British Columbia’s emissions have risen since the introduction of a carbon tax.
Total emissions in 2007, the last year without a provincial carbon tax, stood at 65.5 MtCO2e, while 2022 emissions data shows an increase to 65.6 MtCO2e.
When the carbon tax was introduced, the B.C. government pledged that it would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 33 per cent.
The Eby government plans to increase the B.C. carbon tax again on April 1, 2025. After that increase, the carbon tax will add 21 cents to the cost of a litre of natural gas, 25 cents per litre of diesel and 18 cents per cubic meter of natural gas.
“The carbon tax has cost British Columbians a lot of money, but it hasn’t helped the environment as promised,” Binda said. “Eby has a simple choice: scrap the carbon tax before April 1, or force British Columbians to pay even more to heat our homes and drive to work.”
If a family fills up the minivan once per week for a year, the carbon tax will cost them $728. The carbon tax on natural gas will add $435 to the average family’s home heating bills in the 12 months after the April 1 carbon tax hike.
Other provinces, like Saskatchewan, have unilaterally stopped collecting the carbon tax on essentials like home heating and have not faced consequences from Ottawa.
“British Columbians need real relief from the costs of the provincial carbon tax,” Binda said. “Eby needs to stop waiting for permission from the leaderless federal government and scrap the tax on British Columbians.”
From the Fraser Institute
By Tegan Hill and Jake Fuss
This fiscal year (2024/25), the federal government and eight out of 10 provinces project a budget deficit, meaning they’re spending more than collecting in revenues. Unfortunately, this trend isn’t new. Many Canadian governments—including the federal government—have routinely ran deficits over the last decade.
But why should Canadians care? If you listen to some politicians (and even some economists), they say deficits—and the debt they produce—are no big deal. But in reality, the consequences of government debt are real and land squarely on everyday Canadians.
Budget deficits, which occur when the government spends more than it collects in revenue over the fiscal year, fuel debt accumulation. For example, since 2015, the federal government’s large and persistent deficits have more than doubled total federal debt, which will reach a projected $2.2 trillion this fiscal year. That has real world consequences. Here are a few of them:
Diverted Program Spending: Just as Canadians must pay interest on their own mortgages or car loans, taxpayers must pay interest on government debt. Each dollar spent paying interest is a dollar diverted from public programs such as health care and education, or potential tax relief. This fiscal year, federal debt interest costs will reach $53.7 billion or $1,301 per Canadian. And that number doesn’t include provincial government debt interest, which varies by province. In Ontario, for example, debt interest costs are projected to be $12.7 billion or $789 per Ontarian.
Higher Taxes in the Future: When governments run deficits, they’re borrowing to pay for today’s spending. But eventually someone (i.e. future generations of Canadians) must pay for this borrowing in the form of higher taxes. For example, if you’re a 16-year-old Canadian in 2025, you’ll pay an estimated $29,663 over your lifetime in additional personal income taxes (that you would otherwise not pay) due to Canada’s ballooning federal debt. By comparison, a 65-year-old will pay an estimated $2,433. Younger Canadians clearly bear a disproportionately large share of the government debt being accumulated currently.
Risks of rising interest rates: When governments run deficits, they increase demand for borrowing. In other words, governments compete with individuals, families and businesses for the savings available for borrowing. In response, interest rates rise, and subsequently, so does the cost of servicing government debt. Of course, the private sector also must pay these higher interest rates, which can reduce the level of private investment in the economy. In other words, private investment that would have occurred no longer does because of higher interest rates, which reduces overall economic growth—the foundation for job-creation and prosperity. Not surprisingly, as government debt has increased, business investment has declined—specifically, business investment per worker fell from $18,363 in 2014 to $14,687 in 2021 (inflation-adjusted).
Risk of Inflation: When governments increase spending, particularly with borrowed money, they add more money to the economy, which can fuel inflation. According to a 2023 report from Scotiabank, government spending contributed significantly to higher interest rates in Canada, accounting for an estimated 42 per cent of the increase in the Bank of Canada’s rate since the first quarter of 2022. As a result, many Canadians have seen the costs of their borrowing—mortgages, car loans, lines of credit—soar in recent years.
Recession Risks: The accumulation of deficits and debt, which do not enhance productivity in the economy, weaken the government’s ability to deal with future challenges including economic downturns because the government has less fiscal capacity available to take on more debt. That’s because during a recession, government spending automatically increases and government revenues decrease, even before policymakers react with any specific measures. For example, as unemployment rises, employment insurance (EI) payments automatically increase, while revenues for EI decrease. Therefore, when a downturn or recession hits, and the government wants to spend even more money beyond these automatic programs, it must go further into debt.
Government debt comes with major consequences for Canadians. To alleviate the pain of government debt on Canadians, our policymakers should work to balance their budgets in 2025.
Tegan Hill
Director, Alberta Policy, Fraser Institute
Jake Fuss
Director, Fiscal Studies, Fraser Institute
Nanaimo syringe stabbing reignites calls for involuntary care
Electronic monitoring of repeat offenders begins
FDA bans highly used food dye
Canadian judge rejects complaint against maskless workplaces as frivolous
Cancer drug pioneer praises RFK Jr., suggests link between childhood cancer and COVID shots
Taxpayers Federation calling on BC Government to scrap failed Carbon Tax
50,000 Students Missing: Trudeau’s Immigration Circus Hits New Low
-
Daily Caller2 days agoBiden Pardons His Brother Jim And Other Family Members Just Moments Before Trump’s Swearing-In
-
International2 days agoBiden preemptively pardons Fauci, Cheney, Milley on way out
-
Business2 days agoCarney says as PM he would replace the Carbon Tax with something ‘more effective’
-
International1 day agoTrump orders U.S. withdrawal from World Health Organization
-
Business2 days agoFreeland and Carney owe Canadians clear answer on carbon taxes
-
Business2 days agoUK lawmaker threatens to use Online Safety Act to censor social media platforms
-
Daily Caller1 day agoTrump Takes Firm Stand, Exits Paris Agreement Again
-
illegal immigration2 days agoTrump to declare national emergency on border, issue executive orders