Trump Supporters Protest Bill Kristol Fundraiser In The Rain

Cleveland Deplorables

This just in: Patrick Howley at Big League Politics reports:

 A handful of indefatigable Deplorables protested Bill Kristol’s appearance at a $300-a-plate luncheon for the Cuyahoga County Republican Party in Ohio Friday.

#NeverTrump town crier Kristol’s speech at the luncheon inflamed Trump-supporting Ohio Republicans, who remember the difficulties of taking on the GOP Establishment to elect Trump on John Kasich’s home turf.

Brian Wollet, an executive committee member of the Cuyahoga County party, had his Trump sign ready to go to meet Kristol and the luncheon guests.

Wollet described it as “A cold and rainy morning that felt more like November than May.”

Nevertheless, Wollet told Big League Politics that the protest was “fun.”

Cleveland Tea Party and Main Street Patriots co-founder Ralph King told Big League Politics that the public appreciated the protest, which took place outside the Marriott East.

“The weather was literally terrible. It was cold, it was windy, it was rainy. But we had a good reception among the cars that were driving by. So we were well received by traffic and the public. Friday morning, raining, nasty, blowing, I was happy with the response,” King said.

“I’m still floored that they had William Kristol to come in to address anybody. When you read this guy’s stuff or look at what he stands for, two things come to mind. The snobbery of the Establishment elite is why the American public rejected both the Democrat and Republican parties and elected Donald Trump. William Kristol, listening to him talk, you would think the Democrat Party would bring him in to talk. The way he continually criticizes President Trump? He should be used as a fundraiser for the Cuyahoga County Democrats.”

King pointed to Kristol’s current Weekly Standard article “After Trump,” which he calls “absolutely ridiculous.”

“William Kristol is a cheerleader for the Democrats. You know, being in DC, that the Democrats and establishment Republicans are the same. There’s no difference,” King said.

“The party was doing everything they could to increase attendance. Most of the people I associate with would never go to anything like this,” he continued.

“They don’t get why Donald Trump was elected. They think it was because of the Republicans. No! It didn’t have anything to do with you. Conservatism? That was rejected too. Ted Cruz didn’t win. People wanted somebody to get things done. If they wanted conservative ideology, they would have elected T-shirt Ted Cruz, the T-shirt preacher.”

Kristol, his preferred candidates vanquished in the primaries, led a harebrained scheme to run a third-party challenger against Trump in the general election to help Hillary Clinton’s chances. General James Mattis, now the Defense Secretary, considered Kristol’s offer but turned him down. After a lot of searching and speculation — involving Mitt Romney among others — Kristol backed no-name National Review writer David French for president. French declined to run. Kristol then supported the independent bid of Evan McMullin, who ran in Utah to peel off Mormon votes from Trump to try to stop the Republican nominee from reaching 270 in the Electoral College.

McMullin, known colloquially as “McMuffin,” and Kristol failed.

Kristol’s star has dimmed considerably since the Iraq War, a failed experiment based to a large degree on Kristol’s own inaccurate and dishonest projections. But despite helping to tank a Republican administration and fighting tooth and nail against a Republican nominee, Kristol still lingers in Republican circles, talking to people for $300 a pop. 

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Obamacare Repeal, Replace, or just more Kabuki Theatre?

Photo credit: toki/tokyo

Lots of chatter over the House passing the Replacement (not the Repeal Only) bill to rid us of Obamacare, but my guess is it’s just more Kabuki Theater. Kemberlee Kaye at Legal Insurrection is probably on the mark:

The bill now heads to the Senate where as Politico reports, “Republicans have expressed deep reservations about it.”

. . .

Seeing as the vote immediately preceding the Obamacare repeal vote was to exempt Congress from their own health insurance legislation, I remain fairly skeptical of what lies ahead.

Read the article here.

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The lies we were told about who would silence free speech

art credit: National Coalition Against Censorship

John Kass at The Chicago Tribune comments on the liberal reaction to conservative speech, which is, essentially: “Shut Up.”

The lie we were told as kids was this: The end of American liberty would come at the hands of the political right.

Conservatives would take away our right to speak our minds, and use the power of government to silence dissent. The right would intimidate our teachers and professors, and coerce the young.

And then, with the universities in thrall, with control of the apparatus of the state (and the education bureaucracy), the right would have dominion over a once-free people.

. . .

But the lie is obvious now, isn't it?

Because it is not conservatives who coerced today's young people or made them afraid of ideas that challenge them. Conservatives did not shame people into silence, or send thugs out on college campuses to beat down those who wanted to speak.

The left did all that.

It's there in front of you, the thuggish mobs of the left killing free speech at American universities. The thugs call themselves antifas, for anti-fascists.

They beat people up and break things and set fires and intimidate. These are not anti-fascists. These are fascists. This is what fascists do.

. . .

What is the cost for all this?

Free speech, without which there is no republic.

American universities were once thought to be the last great refuge of ideas, where ideas could flourish and be challenged and debated. But today, the university is the place where liberty and ideas go to die.

. . .

Right-wing provocateur Ann Coulter has been silenced at Berkeley, where the free speech movement was born. And other intellectuals, including Charles Murray and Heather Mac Donald, have been silenced at other colleges, attacked by mobs.

If the left agrees with your views, you may speak. If the left doesn't agree, they will shut you down. This is America now.

. . .

University administrators have made a show of wringing their hands. But they're hypocrites. They're part of this. They are of the same cloth. They allowed this seed to bloom. They watered it, by giving in to the young who demanded a safe space from intellectual challenge.

Safe spaces are not about learning or critical thinking. Safe spaces belong to education camps, where future bureaucrats are trained in the Orwellian shaping of language and the culling of threatening ideas.

. . .

All speech challenging the status quo is offensive — to the establishment. And free speech is what American liberty is about.

Unless, of course, you're of the hard left, and can hunt free speech at American universities and crush it.

That's not fiction. That's not fantasy. And it is not a lie. It's happening now, in the United States.

Read the rest here.

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Richard Dreyfuss on Fox

Photo credit: pinterest

 

When Fox News dumped Bill O’Reilly and 'The Factor,' it moved Tucker Carlson into the 8pm slot. While I have not watched most of his debut week, I did watch his interview with Richard Dreyfuss. This was not your usual Hollywood celebrity interview. Have a look (Dreyfuss segment starts around the 1:15 mark):

 

 

Dreyfuss's website describing the initiative to reinstate civics in school curricula is here. 

 

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Trump Derangement syndrome

Cartoon credit: A.F. Branco at Liberty Alliance via RedState

We've seen the syndrome before with George W. and Sarah Palin. It's baaaaack with a vengeance. American Thinker contributor David Zukerman reports that “Trump Derangement Syndrome sends NYT’s David Brooks off the deepend”

Once upon a time, David Brooks was considered the house conservative at the New York Times.  But in his April 21 New York Times column, he put President Donald J. Trump on a list of "strong men" that includes Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and North Korea's Kim Jong-un.  Mr. Brooks noted that Erdoğan has "dismantle[d] democratic institutions and replace[d] them with majoritarian dictatorship."  The Times columnist went on to assert: "While running for office, Donald Trump violated every norm of statesmanship built up over these many centuries[.]"  Mr. Brooks, however, does not elaborate, explain, or elucidate the nature of the alleged violations.

But when it comes to discussion of President Trump, NeverTrumps like David Brooks feel no need to place their anti-Trump views on a foundation of fact.  For Trump-haters, the truth is in the accusation.  And so, comparing President Trump to Turkey's Erdoğan, Mr. Brooks does not set forth the democratic institutions dismantled by Mr. Trump, nor does he provide evidence of the "majoritarian dictatorship" that was constructed during the first 100 days of the Trump administration.  How could he, there being no such dismantling, no such dictatorship here?

Mr. Brooks recognizes "the collapse of liberal values at home," citing "fragile thugs who call themselves students [who] shout down and abuse speakers in a weekly basis."  But are these illiberals to be found under the banner of Trumpism – or under the banner of the totalitarianism of left?

. . .

The threat to the American spirit of liberty is not to be found among conservatives, or in the corridors of today's White House.  The threats to democracy, to free speech, to the free flow of information are to be found on the left side of the political divide, from neo-totalitarians who, like the execrable Howard Dean, would limit free speech to persons who agree with the political biases of leftists – with the encouragement of NeverTrumps in the media like David Brooks, who lack the ability to distinguish a duly elected American president from the brutal dictator of a totalitarian state.

Read the rest here.

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Word of the day: “electable”

From Fox News Insider, when Mitch McConnell 

claimed 'We're Going to Crush Tea Party Everywhere' in Primaries"

Alexander Bolton at The Hill reports ("Picking 2018 candidates pits McConnell vs. GOP groups"):

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and conservative groups are headed toward a showdown over GOP primaries in 2018.

McConnell has voiced confidence that Republicans will nominate “electable” candidates as they seek to grow their narrow majority during an election cycle in which Democrats will be defending 23 seats to just eight for the GOP.

. . .

A few battles are already shaping up in 2018.

In Ohio, it is unclear whether the GOP establishment will back Mandel, who lost to Brown in 2012.

The Club for Growth is backing Mandel. In 2010, it helped defeat former Sen. Bob Bennett (Utah), one of McConnell’s best friends, in a GOP primary.

Rep. Pat Tiberi (R-Ohio), a senior member of the Ways and Means Committee, has amassed $6.3 million in campaign funds and might be seen as a stronger candidate by Washington Republicans.

“We’re supporting Josh Mandel in Ohio. I think the establishment would probably prefer Pat Tiberi, but any competent Republican consultant would strongly advise Tiberi not to run,” said Andrew Roth, vice president for government affairs at the Club for Growth. “The establishment should like Mandel.

That word “electable.” The GOPe wanted Jeb! as the 2016 candidate, because he was “electable.” That’s how they described Mitt Romney. Sounds like the GOPe is going to go to the mat to keep the UniParty intact (read: their noses in the trough).

Read the rest here.

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Marine amputee runs Boston Marathon carrying American flag

Photo credit: Runner's World

The Boston Marathon took place earlier today, and The Washington Examiner reported the following inspirational story:

Retired Texas Marine Staff Sgt. Jose Sanchez is a recovering amputee, but that didn't stop him from leaving an indelible mark on this year's Boston Marathon.

Sanchez was injured in 2011 while serving in Afghanistan and has been private about the incident until now.

For five years, a gift Sanchez received from his fellow Marines remained unopened. Yet, it was that gift that changed his perspective and spurred him from his antisocial state.

The gift was a large American flag signed by his fellow troops with notes of encouragement and inspiration.

Sanchez was determined to not merely put the flag away, but to display it in honor of the troops who motivated him to get past his anger and depression and find a positive outlet to give back. So he proudly displayed the flag as he ran the Boston Marathon.

Read the rest here.

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Easter Egg Rolling at the White House

“A color-tinted magazine illustration of children 

being watched by their caretakers 

at an 1880s White House Easter Egg Roll. 

Source: whitehousehistory.org”

It was probably First Lady Dolley Madison who introduced the egg roll to Washington, DC.  A White House “frozen in time” page provides the history of the White House egg roll here.

The countdown to the Trump Administration's first Easter Egg Roll is here. (And if you do an online search, you will find the usual media carping about the 2017 White House Easter Egg Roll, from Vanity Fair wailing over how disorganized the administration is, to the NY Times reporting in its "Politics" section how behind the staff is in its planning, to claims that the Egg Roll was cancelled for this year. Is there anything the MSM won't use to try to discredit the Trump Administration?

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Pentagon awards contract to United Airlines

Michael Yon's FB page linked to this gem:

Pentagon awards contract to United Airlines to forcibly remove Assad

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Coulter on free market healthcare

Image credit: North Country Public Radio

Sorry, I have been off the air for a couple of weeks, and when I got back online this weekend, I found a column by Ann Coulter on HER solution to the healthcare repeal-replace dilemma. Here’s are several extracts and the whole thing (from a little over a week ago) is here.

It’s always impossible to repeal laws that require Ann to pay for greedy people, because the greedy run out on the streets wailing that the Republicans are murdering them.

Obamacare is uniquely awful because the free stuff isn’t paid for through income taxes: It’s paid for through MY health insurance premiums. This is unfortunate because I wanted to buy health insurance.

Perhaps you’re not aware — SINCE YOU EXEMPTED YOURSELVES FROM OBAMACARE, CONGRESS — but buying or selling health insurance is illegal in America.

Right now, there’s no free market because insurance is insanely regulated not only by Obamacare, but also by the most corrupt organizations in America: state insurance commissions. (I’m talking to you, New York!)

Federal and state laws make it illegal to sell health insurance that doesn’t cover a laughable array of supposedly vital services based on bureaucrats’ medical opinions of which providers have the best lobbyists.

As a result, it’s illegal to sell health insurance that covers any of the medical problems I’d like to insure against. Why can’t the GOP keep Obamacare for the greedy — but make it legal for Ann to buy health insurance?

This is how it works today:

ME: I’m perfectly healthy, but I’d like to buy health insurance for heart disease, broken bones, cancer, and everything else that a normal person would ever need, but no more.

INSURANCE COMPANY: That will be $700 a month, the deductible is $35,000, no decent hospital will take it, and you have to pay for doctor’s visits yourself. But your plan covers shrinks, infertility treatments, sex change operations, autism spectrum disorder treatment, drug rehab and 67 other things you will never need.

INSURANCE COMPANY UNDER ANN’S PLAN: That will be $50 a month, the deductible is $1,000, you can see any doctor you’d like, and you have full coverage for any important medical problems you could conceivably have in a million years.

Mine is a two-step plan (and you don’t have to do the second step, so it’s really a one-step plan).

STEP 1: Congress doesn’t repeal Obamacare! Instead, Congress passes a law, pursuant to its constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce, that says: “In America, it shall be legal to sell health insurance on the free market. This law supersedes all other laws, taxes, mandates, coverage requirements, regulations or prohibitions, state or federal.”

The end. Love, Ann.

There will be no whining single mothers storming Congress with their pre-printed placards. People who want to stay on Obamacare can. No one is taking away anything. They can still have health insurance with free pony rides. It just won’t be paid for with Ann’s premiums anymore, because Ann will now be allowed to buy health insurance on the free market.

Americans will be free to choose among a variety of health insurance plans offered by willing sellers, competing with one another to provide the best plans at the lowest price. A nationwide market in health insurance will drive down costs and improve access — just like everything else we buy here in America!

Within a year, most Americans will be buying health insurance on the free market (and half of the rest will be illegal aliens). We’ll have TV ads with cute little geckos hawking amazing plans and young couples bragging about their broad coverage and great prices from this or that insurance company.

The Obamacare plans will still have the “essential benefits” (free pony rides) that are so important to NPR’s Mara Liasson, but the free market plans will have whatever plans consumers agree to buy and insurance companies agree to sell — again, just like every other product we buy here in America.

. . .

Until the welfare program is decoupled from the insurance market, nothing will work. Otherwise, it’s like forcing grocery stores to pay for everyone to have a house. A carton of milk would suddenly cost $10,000.

. . .

STEP 2: Next year, Congress formulates a better way of delivering health care to the welfare cases, which will be much easier since there will be a LOT fewer of them.

No actual money-making business is going to survive by taking the welfare cases — the ones that will cover illegal aliens and Mara Liasson’s talk therapy — so the greedy will get government plans.

But by then, only a minority of Americans will be on the “free” plans. (Incidentally, this will be a huge money-saver — if anyone cares about the federal budget.) Eighty percent of Americans will already have good health plans sold to them by insurance companies competing for their business.

With cheap plans available, a lot of the greedy will go ahead and buy a free market plan. Who wants to stand in line at the DMV to see a doctor when your neighbors have great health care plans for $50 a month?

. . .

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Action Alert: American Health Care Act

art credit: Click Americana

From Ralph King at the Main Street Patriots blog:

Action Alert: American Health Care Act

The GOP should be ashamed of themselves — Speaker Ryan for introducing such a bad bill, and the so-called conservatives for allowing him to take the lead on repealing Obamacare!  After seven years of campaigning to repeal Obamacare and Paul Ryan’s “American Health Care Act” is the best they can come up with?!?

While we applaud some members of the GOP fighting to make Speaker Ryan’s bill better – had some of them fought this hard against him becoming Speaker – we would not be in the position we are today.

Knowing the tentacles of Obamacare would run deep when the over 2,000-page Obamacare bill was passed in 2009, most of us knew it would not be easy to repeal, and there was no one magic bill that would undo it.  Speaker Ryan needs to understand that his American Health Care Act is a terrible starting point, and while no starting point will satisfy those of us who want Obamacare repealed in its entirety, it is a starting point if amendments are allowed.

In the Senate, Mitch McConnell has already said he is open for amendments. In addition, as proposed by Rep. Louie Gohmert, the “Byrd Rule” needs to be thrown out so that more amendments are allowed during the reconciliation process.

If amendments are allowed in both the House & the Senate, and if “We the People” remain engaged, then hopefully something acceptable can be cobbled together.  President Trump is a deal maker – and if we do not get a good deal, we can urge him to use his pen and veto the final version of the bill.

As the bill stands, without substantive amendments, it is a non-starter. The legislative process needs to be played out, and we need to remain engaged.

Call Speaker Paul Ryan (202) 225-3031 and tell him to allow Amendments to be made to the American Health Care Act.

Call your Congressman and tell them to push Speaker Ryan to allow amendments. To find your Congress members contact information click here.

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Happy St Patrick's Day

From the Townhall cartoon page, cartoon by Steve Kelley:

And here is the latest from Sundance on the run-up to President Trump's meeting with the Freedom Caucus on the Health Care bill. (Let's hope the take is not overly optimistic.)

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The War Against Trump

David Horowitz of the Freedom Center was raised a Communist. He rejected Communism in favor of freedom, and his perspective is always inspiring and insightful. And he knows how to call them [the Progressive left] out. Here’s his short piece on Front Page Magazine today (I’d bookmark it or email it to yourself for reference when you anticipate a discussion around the dinner table!):

the Democrats and their media accomplices have declared all-out war on the Trump White House. Under the guise of “resistance” – as though the Trump was the head of an occupying army rather than an elected president - they have set out to destroy his administration. They are not “sore losers,” as many had surmised when their hysterical attacks on Trump as an American Hitler began, they are an army of saboteurs bent on destroying the government the voters preferred. Their general, Barack Obama, is an unrepentant radical who abused the office of the presidency when he was in power, and as ex-president is now leading a war to overthrow his successor.  

With the election over, the Democratic Party is now in the hands of the Bernie Sanders-Tom Perez-Keith Ellison-Barack Obama radical left. Abetted by a corrupt media, funded by the anti-American billionaire George Soros, egged on by Obama’s corrupt attorney general, Loretta Lynch, and a collusive press, the left has launched vile and violent demonstrations in the streets, rancid witch-hunts in the halls of Congress posing as “confirmation hearings,” and treasonous intelligence leaks, which have already claimed Trump’s National Security advisor General Michael Flynn as their victim. Their next target Attorney General Jeff Sessions is already in their crosshairs, the object of character assassinations by senators Schumer, Warren, and other Democrats, and by their disgraced and disgraceful media accomplices. 

For none of this would have been possible without the active collusion of the Washington Post, the New York Times and the media networks who have promoted the false narrative of an alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians to fix with the election. There is zero evidence of such collusion but plenty of evidence that Obama and his cohorts have disregarded the Constitution and the law to spy on reporters they don’t like, to use the IRS and other government agencies to take down their opponents and undermine the democratic system.

As I explained in my book Big Agenda: President Trump’s Plan to Save America, the source of this civil war mentality is a profound rejection of the American idea. This is the idea that we are equal citizens regardless of our origins, and that we are accountable as individuals for what we do. The left’s creed – identity politics – is an anti-American, racially charged determination to reject individual accountability and individual freedom, and to establish in their place group privileges, and racial/gender hierarchies. These hierarchies are based on the malicious premise that whites, heterosexuals and males are oppressors and - in the words of the Democratic platform - America is a society governed by “systemic racism,” which needs to be fundamentally transformed.

This collectivist, racial creed is the heart and soul of today’s Democratic Party and its allies in the mainstream media. It is the inspiration for the war Democrats have declared on the newly elected government of Donald Trump. In his inaugural address, Trump addressed the war in uncompromising but thoroughly American terms. “Through our loyalty to our country, we will rediscover our loyalty to each other…. When you open your heart to patriotism, there is no room for prejudice…. Whether we are black or brown or white, we all bleed the same red blood of patriots, we all enjoy the same glorious freedoms, and we all salute the same great American Flag.” This is the American creed, and it is the voice of the American people who elected Trump in November 2016.

A War Against Trump??? Surely that is an overstatement. Um, ask Monica Crowley. (And for back-up on CNN's Crowley hit job, see here.) And look what CRTV / Mark Levin / and “a billionaire named Cary Katz” just did to Mark Steyn. And that’s on top of  Michael “Hockey Stick graph” Mann’s lawsuit again Steyn -- that is still stuck in the circuit court.

Unfortunately, it does not seem possible to overstate the case, and Horowitz sums it up.

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Spirit of America Rally in Cleveland - video #3

The Spirit of America Rally in Cleveland yesterday, March 4, was video-taped by our roving photographer, Pat J Dooley. Here is the third of 3 videos (this is the one with Rev. Darrell Scott):

Speakers included:

Main Street Patriot Ralph King emceed and introduced the presenters

Debbie Vance

Navy Veteran

Michael Onitskansky

Immigration

Steve Loomis

Cleveland Police Patrolman’s Assoc.

Mike Petruziello

Business Owner

Pastor Darrell Scott

National Diversity Coalition

New Spirit Revival Center

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Spirit of America Rally in Cleveland - video #2

The Spirit of America Rally in Cleveland today was video taped by our roving photographer, Pat J Dooley. Here is the second of 3 videos:

Speakers included:

Main Street Patriot Ralph King emceed and introduced the presenters

Debbie Vance

Navy Veteran

Michael Onitskansky

Immigration

Steve Loomis

Cleveland Police Patrolman’s Assoc.

Mike Petruziello

Business Owner

Pastor Darrell Scott

National Diversity Coalition

New Spirit Revival Center

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Spirit of America Rally Cleveland - Video #1

The Spirit of America Rally in Cleveland today was video taped by our roving photographer, Pat J Dooley. Here is the first of 3 videos:

Speakers included:

Main Street Patriot Ralph King emceed and introduced the presenters

Debbie Vance

Navy Veteran

Michael Onitskansky

Immigration

Steve Loomis

Cleveland Police Patrolman’s Assoc.

Mike Petruziello

Business Owner

Pastor Darrell Scott

National Diversity Coalition

New Spirit Revival Center

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Spirit of America Rally Cleveland
Report 

 Keynote speaker Rev. Darrell Scott greets patriots

 Steve Loomis, Cleveland Police Patrolman's Assoc.

Keynote speaker Rev. Darrell Scott

Main Street Patriots founder and rally host, Ralph King

THANK YOU to all who emailed with positive messages, patriots who contributed to the GoFundMe page or the Big Box at the Rally, and THANK YOU to everyone who joined us at the Spirit of America Rally! And a big shout out to The Cleveland Police Department, who were there on horseback, on bikes, on foot, on rooftops, and onstage. 

Next up on this blog ~ Spirit of America Rally Cleveland: The Video. If you could not make the rally (or if you would like to enjoy some of it again), I'll post several segments later today. Meanwhile, cleveland.com updated its report this morning:

Supporters of President Donald Trump are scheduled to gather in downtown Cleveland and nine other locations around the state on Saturday to show support for the newly elected commander in-chief .

The prime organizer of the "Spirit of America" rallies is the Main Street Patriots., whose slogan is "It's not about left or right, it's about right or wrong."

. . .

The rallies are geared less toward countering Democratic opposition to Trump and more to expressing displeasure with the establishment Republicans that have not rallied around the new president, said Bedford resident Ralph King, who besides being a founder of Main Street Patriots, was a Trump elector and cofounder of the Cleveland Tea Party.

"Donald Trump's biggest road block is going to be the Republicans," King said. 

. . .

Other locations hosting 'Spirit of America" events in Ohio are Toledo, Belmont County, Boardman, Jackson, Zanesville, Marietta, Mansfield area, Clark County and Cincinnati.

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