Pence vs. Obama

Vice President-elect Mike Pence and lame duck President Barack Obama headed to Capitol Hill today. Each caucused with their respective political parties -- Pence encouraged Republicans to repeal and replace Obamacare, while Obama urged his party to fight to the death to save his legacy.

Some legacy.

Since becoming law, Obamacare has stifled job creation, done nothing to limit healthcare costs and has been used by the left to push radical social policies in violation of religious liberty. Fortunately, there is some good news on that last point.

Over the weekend, a federal judge in Texas blocked an Obama regulation that forced religious organizations to provide "gender transitions and abortions, regardless of their contrary religious beliefs or medical judgment." According to one analysis, Obama's rule essentially declared that "a gynecologist couldn't refuse to perform a cervical Pap test for a transgender man."

Just one more example of how the left demands that reality and common sense give way to its radical agenda.

Obama may have noticed in his meeting with congressional Democrats that there were a lot fewer of them in the room today than when he first took office.

Assange On Hannity

Sean Hannity's full interview with Julian Assange ran last night on Fox News. Assange continued to insist that Russia was not Wikileaks' source for the emails obtained from the Democratic National Committee and John Podesta's email account.

Assange reminded Hannity of how reckless Podesta was in maintaining computer security. For example, his password to prevent unauthorized access to his communications was "password."

Wow! No hacker would ever figure that out. (Sarcasm alert!)

Hillary Clinton violated every security protocol in the State Department's handbook. Assange suggested that a 14 year-old could have hacked Clinton's or Podesta's emails.

I have no idea what the facts are. Putin's Russia is not our friend. But no one has made a credible case for why Putin would prefer the election of Donald Trump, who is committed (along with the Republican Congress) to rebuilding our military, over Hillary Clinton, a key member of the Obama Administration, which appeased Russia for the last eight years.

Schumer Rejects Trump Court Nominee

What's that, you say? Senate Democrat Leader Charles Schumer won't allow Donald Trump's Supreme Court appointee to be confirmed? But Trump hasn't named a Supreme Court nominee yet.

No matter. Schumer is not waiting to find out who the nominee will be. He told MSNBC's Rachel Maddow that he will do his "best to hold the seat open." Perhaps even throughout Trump's entire first term.

"We're not going to make it easy for them," Schumer said. "If they don't appoint someone who's really good, we're gonna oppose him tooth and nail."

And, of course, what Schumer means by "really good" is "really liberal."

But give Schumer credit for this. He believes he can stop Trump's Supreme Court appointees because he thinks some unknown number of Senate Republicans will refuse to do everything necessary to ensure that President Trump's nominees are confirmed.

"They won't have 60 votes to put in an out-of-the-mainstream nominee and then they'll have to make a choice: Change the rules," Schumer said. "It's gonna be very hard for them to change the rules because there is a handful of Republicans who believe in the institution of the Senate."

In other words, Schumer thinks some Republicans will put the rules of the Senate above saving religious liberty and restoring the sanctity of life.

In another interview, Sen. Schumer extended an olive branch to President-elect Trump, sort of. Schumer told CNN, "The only way we're going to work with [Trump] is if he moves completely in our direction and abandons his Republican colleagues."

As I mentioned before, my friends, the battle did not end on November 8th. While the election gave Republicans the right to set the agenda, Democrats are digging in for trench warfare, vowing to fight for every inch of ground they gained over the last eight years.

An Encouraging Sign

One of the major attractions of Donald Trump is that he promised to be a man of action, a leader who keeps his word. Well, here's an encouraging sign that the president-elect is a man of his word.

Reuters reports that in early December members of the Trump transition team contacted the Department of Homeland Security asking for "copies of every executive order and directive sent to immigration agents since Obama took office in 2009."

In addition, they also demanded "documents and analysis . . . to assess all assets available for border wall and barrier construction."

It looks like we're getting ready to build the wall!