Wikileaks, You Done MESSED UP Now

Wikileaks, the anti-government creation of Julian Assange, leaked the personal information of CIA Director John Brennan today. Wikileaks claims that it was able to hack Brennan's personal server, which stored the information from his AOL email address.


It's pretty weird that, in 2015, there is still someone using an AOL email address. But it was for Brennan's personal email, so that's okay - it doesn't look like there were any classified documents in the AOL account. Brennan is no Hillary Clinton, that's for sure.

Rumor has it that Wikileaks got into Brennan's account by contacting Verizon and pretending to be an employee. I'm not sure if I buy it - how would Verizon fall for something like this? It's such a rookie move.

Wikileaks has leaked Brennan's drafts of policy proposals from 2006 and 2007, and suggestions for whoever the next president would be. (One such suggestion? "Hit the ground running on Iran." It was probably good advice, for the record.) There is nothing scandalous there, and nothing in the emails - so far, at least - that would incriminate Brennan or the CIA in anything scandalous.

The leak contains Brennan's personal information, as well as his wife's social security number and other information on his family members. Wikileaks did not redact this information, so it's now effectively public knowledge. NOT COOL, Wikileaks. NOT. COOL.

I'm not sharing Brennan's information here, nor will I link to it, because I am not The Worst. But I'm raising the issue to demonstrate that Wikileaks is not the humanitarian transparency advocates that some of its supporters would have you believe. This leak doesn't make anything better for Americans, or anyone else, for that matter. It just endangers the head of the CIA in the short term, and all of us in the long term.

And Wikileaks has tweeted a threat to do it again tomorrow. There's supposedly another Brennan email dump coming - on the same day of Hillary's Benghazi testimony, no less. There's a ton of email trouble in Washington, and it's going to be all over the news. Yikes.

Up and Running: Vice President Joe Biden

He’s running. It’s all-but-official. He has campaign staff ready to go, future endorsements secured, and big donors lined up. Both a GOP and a Democrat source have "leaked" to the press that he'll announce within the next day and a half. I say "leaked" in quotes because it's not information dripping out of an unfortunate crack in a system...it's the deliberate release of information, by specific people, at an agreed-upon time, to agreed-upon news outlets. ANYWAY.

Joe Biden has been an insider since before I was born. He also ran for the Democratic nomination in 2008, and lost to both Hillary and Obama.  But Toto, I don't think we're in 2008 anymore. No one trusts Hillary Clinton, and Obama can't seek a third term (nor would he win one, after how the past seven years have gone). Joe Biden has been around a very long time. But he gets to escape the “career bureaucrat” image because he’s a total goofball. He’s an insider without the baggage that comes with being an insider.

I am so torn about Joe Biden running for President. On the one hand, he has a good shot at winning the primary, and he’ll be very tough for any Republican candidate to beat in a general election. This is a country that votes with its heart, and we love Crazy Uncle Joe. That doesn't mean that we should put him in charge of the country, but most voters won't make that distinction - they like the guy, and they'll vote for him, and that's that.

And THAT is how you get THIS guy in the Oval Office.

 But on the other hand, a Biden campaign makes it more likely that Hillary will be indicted, and she should be - after all, it is public knowledge that she committed perjury. A Biden campaign might just be able to light a fire under President Obama and his AG, Loretta Lynch, to actually prosecute a blatant and serious crime carried out by the highest level of government. 

The first candidate to feel the Biden Effect will be Bernie Sanders. Bernie's been enjoying a nice poll bump from the youth vote - but even young voters are hesitant about putting a socialist in the White House. Young people are the ones most likely to be out of a job - and unless our education system is doing an even worse job than I thought, Millennials are going to know well enough that a socialist president would only make the unemployment problem worse. My prediction is that the youth vote leaves Bernie and sticks with Biden. 

Joe Biden does have a problem, though, and that problem is that he served as Obama's second-in-command. All the other candidates can distance themselves from Obama's failed policies. Obama's Vice President cannot. But! Considering that the Democrats' other options are a robotic, corrupt woman under FBI investigation and a screaming socialist, this could be Joe Biden's moment. 

For more of the Up and Running series, click here.

What to Expect at Tonight's #DemDebate

The latest news cycle - thanks to John Boehner and Kevin McCarthy - has been all about GOP "infighting," "chaos," and how the Right side of the aisle is supposedly a total mess. Yet no matter how chaotic Republicans get, we're still able to fill the debate stage (or rather, two debate stages) with competent, well-spoken people presenting a diversity of viewpoints. The Democrats don't have that. What they do have is five people, none of them particularly great candidates, who will debate on CNN tonight.

I have some predictions about what you're going to see:

Hillary Clinton will repeatedly nod her head in a way that is vaguely human-like. They'll feed her a softball question about her email server, and she'll respond with some variation of "It was completely secure," "Nothing I did was illegal," and "We have moved on." (Each of those statements is, of course, a lie.)

Bernie Sanders will talk about fighting against "big business," "corporate interests," and so on. I'd say drink when you hear a buzzword, but please don't do that - you might be passed out by the first commercial break.

Martin O'Malley - by far the youngest person in the Democratic race - will come out swinging, trying to outdo the others in energy. This will not be difficult.

Jim Webb and Lincoln Chaffee will also attend the debate.


The viewership numbers will be way down from the record-breaking crowd brought in by the first GOP debate. Why? They don't have a Donald Trump. They don't have a Ben Carson or a Carly Fiorina. They don't have any outsiders to challenge the insiders.


The CNN moderators will be polite, reserved, not very challenging. Remember, they like everybody on that stage. It's not until the general election debates that they will unleash the tough questions.

Joe Biden will watch this debate at home, drink in hand, and see how the poll numbers shake out on Wednesday and Thursday. If Hillary continues to drop in the polls, Biden will jump in the race.

Make Me Speaker of the House

As you've heard by now, Congress needs a new Speaker of the House. Our options aren't great, because so many of the best members of Congress simply don't want the job. Paul Ryan is getting peer pressured into the role, but he hasn't officially decided yet. There's even been talk of Newt Gingrich, and as much as I love the 90s, there are some things I don't think we ought to bring back.


There's been some chatter about having a Speaker of the House who is not a member of Congress. I think it's a great idea. The people love political outsiders! Look at the rise of Trump/Carson/Fiorina, and even Bernie Sanders. This country is desperately seeking leadership from outside of the entrenched career politicians.

We want Congress to work efficiently, to find solutions, to innovate - and that's why I think we ought to have a Millennial in the front seat. Here's a question for ya: When Millennials like me are over 15% of the voting public, why does my generation hold precisely zero of the 535 seats in Congress? If you think it's because we can't be trusted to write legislation or vote, then I've got great news for you - a nonmember Speaker does neither of those things.

Inviting an outsider to serve as Speaker of the House is a relatively low-risk way to put a totally new voice at a high level in government. A nonmember speaker wouldn't vote on bills except in extremely rare circumstances, like a tiebreaker. A nonmember speaker doesn't participate in debates, but sometimes presides over them (i.e., calls on members of Congress to speak). 

I'm an outsider. I've never worked on Capitol Hill. And I have a strong command of what issues are priorities for conservatives in the legislature: Securing the border, simplifying the tax code, making America a great place to raise a family and to start a business - in short, getting government out of the way! I've also got a background in international relations - Georgetown School of Foreign Service, Class of 2012.

The Speaker also appoints members of the Rules Committee, and other Committee chairs. If there's a clear expert on the topic at hand - and many times, there is - I'll put that person in charge. If there's more than one expert, or I can't decide, then I'm putting those decisions to a popular vote. You will be swiping left and swiping right on members of Congress and their policy positions. It will be a little weird at first, but it will work and you will love it.


Speaker of the House is a fairly simple job, though not a particularly enjoyable one. The Speaker's job - as head of the People's House - is to serve the people by making the House run effectively. A young person might not be able to fix it all, but we also couldn't make it much worse. So. Low risk - new voice - forward thinking. Spread the word. #Bear2theHouse.

Hillary Clinton Opposes Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)

I have two questions about this.

For starters, Hillary's State Department helped negotiate the Trans-Pacific Partnership. It's a little weird, is it not, to be against something you invented? I'd imagine that's how the inventor of jeggings feels every day of his life. (Or maybe not, since he's probably a gazillionaire by now. But I digress.)

As CNN's Jake Tapper pointed out in June, Hillary has touted the benefits of TPP no less than forty-five times. Ambassador Susan Rice named TPP as one of Hillary's accomplishments as Secretary of State. Yet, Hillary has claimed that State didn't work directly on TPP...a claim that, thanks to Wikileaks, we now know is patently false.

Hillary even enshrined her support for TPP in her latest book, which is called - ahem - Hard Choices. And then she decided to oppose the deal, after spending years telling us all that it's fantastic.

So, my first question for Hillary is: What changed? What was it that took TPP from being fantastic, rah-rah let's do this thing, to being a dud?

I can't venture a guess here, since the text of TPP has not yet been released. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack says it will be released within 30 days. Lawyers are still working on it. All we have now is vague outlines of what is included in TPP, and a leaked version from a few weeks ago, but there's no telling what has changed since then.

So, my second question for Hillary is: Have you even read this thing? And if you did, who gave you the text? If you haven't read this thing, what evidence do you have that it's a bad deal?

Those are the questions I hope the media will ask Hillary.

"Recess Consultants" are the Latest Left-Wing Nonsense in Public Schools

If you were to make a list of what's wrong with education in America, where would you start? You could mention how we're falling behind other countries in science and math. You could talk about how schools hardly teach civics anymore, let alone how to balance a checkbook or file taxes. You could talk about the challenge of separating the truly great teachers from the ones who have their students watching movies every single day.

Some school administrators decided to skip all of these real issues, and instead spend huge chunks of cash on fixing one thing that isn't broken: recess. A school district in Minnesota has hired "recess consultants" to the tune of $30,000. They're not alone: Recess consultants are employed at schools in 20 states, and at 19 schools in Washington, DC.

The way recess works under these consultants is pretty darn creepy. Kids select games and activities from a pre-approved list. The consultants monitor the children and conduct "playground assessments." They even police the children's language: The Minnesota Star-Tribune reports that "phrases like 'Hey, you're out!' are replaced with 'good job' or 'nice try."

There are no winners and losers in these playground games. No skinned knees, no picking teams. These kids are being denied the opportunity to learn how to resolve conflicts for themselves. They will continue to rely on adult intervention. If everything goes through an adult mediator, how is Little Susie going to learn how to interact with her peers?

I understand wanting kids to be active. But if you've ever met a kid, you know they're already really good at that. No one has to teach kids how to have fun.

U.S. Military Bombs Doctors Without Borders Hospital in Afghanistan

That's a headline you never want to see. But that's what happened early Saturday morning, in the city of Kunduz. Twenty-two people - at least three of them children - were killed in the attack. Dozens more are wounded.


NATO initially said that Taliban fighters were operating out of the hospital, and firing from its windows. Doctors Without Borders says that's not true. The bombing of this hospital shows that our Commander in Chief might not know what he's doing. That 50 CENTCOM employees have alleged doctored intelligence shows that our Commander in Chief might not want to know what he's doing.

Terrorist groups use instances like this for recruiting. Remember how the U.S. accidentally droned a wedding party in Yemen a few years back? Yeah, Yemen is an al-Qaeda hotbed now. These guys run a propaganda machine dedicated to making the U.S. look like a heartless warmongering behemoth. Bombing a hospital only helps their case.


It is in the best interest of the United States to have a strong relationship with Afghanistan's president, Ashraf Ghani. We need President Ghani and the Afghans to clean house and get rid of the terrorists, and to stand with us in matters dealing with Pakistan (Afghanistan's next-door neighbor). This makes President Ghani and the Afghan civilians far less likely to trust us ever again.

There is no apology big enough for bombing a hospital. (The U.S. Embassy in Kabul offered condolences in the form of a Facebook post...it's something, I guess, but it's weak.) President Obama should at the very least try to demonstrate sympathy. Issuing a statement and then hopping in a helicopter to a golf course is, um, not a good look. Ideally, he would fly to Kunduz and meet with the families of the victims. At least send Kerry or Biden. A Nobel Peace Prize winner like President Obama should have made sure that things like this don't happen - and if they do, he and the military he supposedly commands should have a strategy for aiding victims and repairing damage done.