January 19, 2020 --

A Way for Republicans to Respond to Mike ($50 billion-plus) Bloomberg …

The vast wealth of Democratic presidential Michael R. Bloomberg makes it possible for him to suffuse the media with his campaign ads.  The Republican National Committee might consider a fundraising campaign seeking $100, in three or four installments, from ten million of the 63 million Trump voters in 2016.   That would create a political nest egg of one billion dollars.   This campaign might be called: "A billion to beat Bloomberg (and the other guys)."

It is noteworthy …

… that the Times reported on January 5 that Democrats in Washington were suspicious "about the intelligence that led to the killing" of Gen. Solomeini.    Democrats eagerly accepted intelligence suggestions of collusion between the Trump 2016 presidential campaign and Russians.  Apparently in Washington, these days, there is very little that has not been tainted with the brush of partisanship.

On the spelling of a certain  name in the news …

At The New York Times, it is "Qasim Suleimani."   At other media outlets, including The Wall Street Journal, it is "Qassem Soleimani."    (LPR follows the Journal's lead on this.)

Speaking of The Wall Street Journal …

Peggy Noonan seemed to chide President Trump, in the January 11-12 edition, for having "repeatedly referred to Iran's rulers as a 'regime,' not a government."   An article on Soleimani,  in the Review section of the paper, that day, began: "In 2003, in the run-up to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, the Iranian regime was ridden with anxiety."

Just wondering …

The operation that killed General Soleimani also killed Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, an Iraqi official said to head "militias and close to Iran," and eight others.   How conducive to stability in Iraq are "militias" led by officials "close to Iran?"

January 5, 2020 --

A quick LPR  prediction for 2020 and beyond …

If President Trump is re-elected and the Democrats hold their House majority,
not only will the president be the first impeached president to be elected to a
second term, he also will be the first president to be impeached twice.

Another 2020 LPR Prediction …

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky will be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize -- for resisting pressure to investigate a political rival of President Trump.

A Comment About Sen. Sanders that Calls to Mind the War against  President Trump …

The Hill, December 26, quoted the following comment from Sanders aide, David Sirota:  "Bernie Sanders is under no illusions that if you defeat the establishment in an initial election that the establishment will simply melt away and go away."

Given calendar the change …

...that turned Washington's Birthday in Presidents' Day that always falls on a Monday, will, someday, New Year's be celebrated on the first Monday in Jannary, and the Fourth of July on the firs Monday in July?

There are, after all, people, like my late parents, Sol and Anna Zukerman who were married on February 21, 1935, confident that the day after their anniversary would always be a holiday!

And what's this with, say, "One Year Anniversary?"

Whatever happened to first anniversary, "anniversary' itself referring to a yearly event. Or were ordinal numbers outlawed while we weren't looking?

Barton Swaim on R.R. Reno ...

Mr. Swaim reviewed  three books on Liberalism in The Wall Street Journal, December 28-29. LPR was struck by this comment on Reno's Return of the Strong Gods; "'Mr. Reno explains, better than any book I can remembers, the present-day progressive's paranoid fear of fascism and neurotic determination to ferret out racism where none exists."

A Meeting in Israel?

Russia's President Vladimir Putin is scheduled to take part in Israel's commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the liberation by the Soviet army of the Auschwitz death camp, later this month. If Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky joined the commemoration, it would offer him the chance for continuing settlement talks on Donbas with Mr. Putin, with the mediating assistance of Israel's Prime Minister Benyanim Netanyahu.

Dissembling by the press has its own rewards.

A columnist like Michelle Goldberg makes big bucks writing presidentia;  insults for The New York Times, calling President Trump "a gangster," "a dictator-worshiping buffoon," while denouncing him "as an existential threat." The next time she accuses the president of presenting an authoritarian  threat to freedom of the  press, just think how much she gets for being an outright liar.