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In 2006, federal judge Garland E. Burrell sentenced Hamid Hayat of Lodi, California, to 24 years in prison for, as the U.S. Department of Justice explained, “a series of terrorism charges related to his 2003/2004 attendance at a jihadi training camp in Pakistan and his 2005 return to the United States with the intent to wage violent jihad.” As prosecutors charged, the man with “a jihadi heart and a jihadi mind” intended to target hospitals, banks and grocery stores. Hayat boasted about giving money to Sipah-e-Sahaba, a group that Pakistan declared a terrorist organization. The case was one the first...

Long before today's acid relations between Republicans and Democrats, President Trump and "the squad," friendships mattered over daily politics. In a classic example, a letter going up for auction next week highlights that mood, now some 30 years ago. Columnist Paul Bedard on the expanded Washington Examiner magazine Watch Full Screen to Skip Ads It is from famous letter-writer President George H.W. Bush to his long-time pal, then Rep. Dan Rostenkowski, the Democratic chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, and during a heated fight over tax cuts. A few weeks before the vote to give Bush his tax...

He is using the office he holds to advance his extraordinary lifetime project of assigning unchecked power to the president. Buried behind our president’s endless stream of lies and malicious self-serving remarks are actions that far transcend any reasonable understanding of his legal authority. Donald Trump disdains, more than anything else, the limitations of checks and balances on his power. Witness his assertion of a right to flout all congressional subpoenas; his continuing refusal to disclose his tax returns, notwithstanding Congress’s statutory right to secure them; his specific actions to bar congressional testimony by government officials; and his personal attacks...

Pierce Bush, a grandson and nephew of presidents, announced Wednesday he is considering running for a Texas seat held by Republicans for decades until last year. Bush, 38, is eyeing the Lone Star State's 7th Congressional District, in the Houston suburbs. His grandfather George H.W. Bush, represented a version of the district from 1967 to 1971. The former congressman, CIA director and vice president, a Republican, became president for one four-year term in 1989. Bush, CEO of Houston-based Big Brothers Big Sisters Lone Star, is the son of Neil Bush, 64, who is the brother of former President George W....

Former First Lady and family matriarch Barbara Bush was once described as 'a silver-haired pearl draped howitzer'. But a combination of blows in her life in the mid-seventies sent her spiraling into a depression that almost led to her taking her own life. Among the causes of her despair was a woman who would stay by her husband George's side for more than 12 years. Her name was Jennifer Fitzgerald (circled in main, sitting beside George and in front of Barbara in 1975) and she was his aide – and according to some, his mistress, reveals Susan Page, author of...

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) issued a barrage of criticism about the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 on Wednesday, which marked the 16th anniversary of the start of one of America's longest-running armed conflicts. In a series of tweets, the Minnesota congresswoman labeled the George W. Bush administration's invasion of Iraq "illegal" and called for those involved in the explanation and lead up to the war to be held accountable. "16 years ago the U.S. illegally invaded Iraq, leaving a trail of destruction and lives lost," Omar tweeted. "4,496 U.S. troops lost their lives. 100,000+ Iraqi civilians [were] killed." "We...

This nation is mind-bogglingly generous. But decades of lies make it impossible for even the most tender-hearted American to fall for this bait-and-switch one more time. Every politician swears up and down that he wants a "secure border." But then these same politicians go absolutely berserk when Trump says he wants to build a wall.

Congress has tried to sneak through amnesties three times in a little more than a decade. Every time, the American people somehow found out -- despite the best efforts of the press -- rose up in a rage and killed the proposed bills. In 2006, President Bush got the brilliant idea to push amnesty on the country. His party was wiped out the very next time voters could get to the polls. Liberals like to claim that their brave opposition to the Iraq War led to the midterm slaughter, but, as I recall, they were against that war in the...

BROWNSVILLE, Texas - If you want a short course in understanding why border relations between the U.S. and Mexico tend to be a bit shaky, I heartily recommend a visit to the place where the border wall begins. That’s in this city at the eastern end of the Rio Grande near where it empties into the Gulf of Mexico. To get to the wall, which was built during the Bush 43 administration, you drive to the campus of Texas Southmost College and then follow a dirt road as it runs along an eight-foot fence. The fence soon turns into a...

Former President George W. Bush and his wife, Laura Bush, delivered pizzas to Secret Service members on Friday, calling for lawmakers "on both sides" to end the ongoing partial government shutdown.

Whatever you might think of the Bush dynasty’s legacy, no one can ever accuse the family of not showing class and decency. And their sterling example of this, while saying goodbye to their beloved patriarch, has also served as an important reminder of just how awful the McCain family is.

President Trump wants to nominate William Barr, the George H.W. Bush-era leader of the Justice Department, as his next attorney general, sources told Fox News.

As with the passing of former President Ronald Reagan, the media are in full praise mode following the death of former President George Herbert Walker Bush. Where were they when the one-term President needed them? In Reagan's case, even his haters grudgingly acknowledged the overall success of his presidency. As for Bush 41, the media's praise of Bush's "grace" and "class" serves to indirectly to attack President Donald Trump by showing the contrast between the two Republicans' styles and characters. But what did much of the liberal media think and say about Bush at the time? When Bush announced his...

On November 30, 2018, George H.W. Bush, 41st President of the United States, died of vascular Parkinsonism, a disease with many of the same risk factors as those for strokes and a heart attack. However, he did not have the two major risk factors for heart attacks: He was not overweight and he exercised regularly (and vigorously, at least in his younger days). -snip- details -snip_ He Did Everything Right Readers of my biographical articles on the deaths of notable people often comment on how frequently I criticize my subjects for their self-destructive lifestyle choices -- lack of exercise, a...

President Trump exchanged greetings with his predecessor Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama after arriving at George H.W. Bush ’s funeral Wednesday, but there was a noticeable lack of warmth between the commander-in-chief and the woman he defeated to win the White House. Bush’s funeral brought together all of the living former presidents – Obama, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Jimmy Carter – as well as Trump and first lady Melania Trump. The pair was seated in the front row of the Washington National Cathedral next to the Obamas. Trump shook hands with Obama and former first...

Trump and first lady Melania Trump took their place in the front row at President George H. W. Bush's funeral at National Cathedral yesterday morning, right next to the Obamas. It was a bit awkward considering the past war of words between the two couples. Trump has accused Obama of authoring some of the worst deals the U.S. has ever signed and is currently upending his predecessor's legacy, while Obama has sounded off on Trump's policies. Meanwhile, Michelle Obama wrote some unflattering things about 45 in her new book, including how she'll never forgive him for his role in...

There is no light coming from the Washington Post, but only the kind of darkness that corrosive hatred brings The Washington Post headline on the Bush funeral shouts volumes: ‘Bush funeral: Trump sits with fellow presidents but still stands alone’. WaPo wants a grieving world to believe that “from the moment he crossed the transept of the soaring Washington National Cathedral, tore off his overcoat and took his seat in the front pew, President Trump was an outsider.” Wrong: Donald Trump “was an outsider” from the day he won the 2016 presidential election, something the mainstream and social media saw...

God rest the soul of George H.W. Bush. But God forbid that President Trump should receive credit for according H.W. all possible honors and conducting himself with grace during the funeral service. That latter, ungracious, thought was on John Avlon's mind this morning. The CNN commentator, on New Day, reacted to a statement by former Bush 43 aide Scott Jennings, praising President Trump's handling of the passing of H.W. Sneered Avlon: "I don't think you want to give out too many medals for not screwing up a presidential funeral. The President was on best behavior this week, but that's a...

Alan Simpson will speak today at George H. Bush’s tribute. His speech will be likely heart felt and perhaps sometimes light-hearted. Here are some of his funnier lines from the past._____________ “I watch Republicans, they give each other the saliva test of purity, and then they lose and they bitch for four years.” — — On the need for a socially tolerant, big tent Republican Party, in a Feb. 2012 interview with CBS’s Bob Schieffer. “[Social Security is] a milk cow with 310 million tits.” — in an August 2010 email, which he later apologized for. “If this had happened...

George H.W. Bush, the 41st U.S. president and father of the 43rd president George W. Bush, died on November 30, 2018, at the age of 94. He passed away less than eight months after his wife, former first lady Barbara Bush, died at the age of 92. The former president will lie in state in U.S. Capitol from Monday to Wednesday. There will be a state funeral for George H.W. Bush on Wednesday at the Washington National Cathedral, and a memorial service for the former president will be held on Thursday in Houston. He will be laid to rest at...