In the news: Richard Cordray, candidate for Governor of Ohio

art credit: telegraph.co.uk

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was set up under the Obama administration, and it was designed to be exempt from checks and balances and accountability. An overview at Competitive Enterprise Institute sums it up in an article titled “Unconstitutionally Structured and Harmful to Consumers”; article is here.

Cleveland.com has a report by Eric Heisig with the headline

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau loses lawsuit

against Cleveland debt collection firm

A federal judge has ruled against the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in a lawsuit it filed against Cleveland debt collection firm Weltman, Weinberg & Reis.

. . .

Senior U.S. District Judge Donald Nugent wrote in an opinion released Wednesday that the CFPB did not prove that Weltman, Weinberg & Reis sent demand letters that were false, misleading or deceptive.

The CFPB sued Cleveland firm Weltman, Weinberg & Reis in April 2017, saying the firm's attorneys were not sufficiently involved in sending out the letters, even though the letters prominently mention they were sent out by a law firm and occasionally raise the possibility of legal action for unpaid debts.

. . .

Nugent also wrote that Weltman, Weinberg & Reis sent out similar letters when Alan Weinberg was hired to collect debts for the state of Ohio between 2009 and 2011 under then-Attorney General Richard Cordray.

The point was significant because Cordray, a Democrat who is campaigning for Ohio governor, was the head of the CFPB between 2012 and last year. He was at the federal agency when it sued Weltman, Weinberg & Reis and authorized the lawsuit, the judge wrote.

The Cleveland firm considered calling Cordray as a witness during the trial, which took place before and after Ohio's primary elections, but chose not to do so.

…

Read the rest here. I haven’t followed this one, but I would not trust the CFPB under Cordray from here to the door. From the Wikipedia page:

On May 21, 2018, the bureau was weakened after US President Donald Trump signed into law Congressional legislation repealing the enforcement of automobiles lending rules.  On May 24, 2018, Trump signed into law further Congressional legislation exempting dozens of banks from the CFPB's regulations.

I wish President Trump would just shut the thing down. And Mr. Cordray is running for Governor. 

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Desperation at MSNBC

Art credit: quotesgram.com

Today’s headline at Breitbart:

‘Woke Nation’: Joe Scarborough Rebrands ‘The Resistance’ as Tea Party of 2018

Cultural appropriation?

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Happy birthday Cleveland

Public Square, Cleveland

Photo credit: Library of Congress via cleveland.com

Happy birthday Cleveland

Founders Day July 22, 1796

Cleveland turns 222 years old tomorrow, on July 22. For the occasion, cleveland.com recently posted a great collection of historical photos, mostly of downtown Cleveland. Click here.

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Ohio Libertarian Party regains ballot access

Splitting the vote? Here’s part of a report by Tyler Arnold from Ohio Watchdog on the upcoming elections and the consequences of Libertarian candidates qualifying to run in this cycle:

The Libertarian Party of Ohio regained ballot access this year, which means its candidates’ names will appear alongside of Republican, Democrat and Green Party candidates. This could affect the hotly contested race for Ohio governor.

“We feel fantastic that our party has support from all 88 Ohio counties and over 102,000 of our fellow citizens were willing to put their name to support the efforts of liberty and choice for all Ohioans,” Libertarian Party of Ohio Communications Director David Jackson told Watchdog.org.

The Libertarian Party of Ohio passed the signature threshold needed to regain “minor party” status, which allows its candidates to be on the ballot for the first time in four years. The party has more than 20 candidates running for state or national office in Ohio this November.

“It would not take many Libertarian votes to affect the election outcome in a close race,” Ohio State University political science professor Vladimir Kogan told Watchdog.org. One of Kogan’s areas of expertise is state politics.

Republicans are likely to hold onto most U.S. House seats in Ohio while the Senate seat will likely go to the Democrat, analysts predict. However, the governor’s race is closely contested with polls showing Democrat Richard Cordray ahead of Republican Mike DeWine by just 1.6 percent on average. The Green Party candidate is Constance Gadell-Newton and the Libertarian Party candidate is Travis Irvine.

Read the rest here.

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Impeachment in the news

Impeachment proceedings against President Andrew Johnson 

Image credit: TheNation.com

The word “impeachment” is being bandied about everywhere, both from the media and members of Congress screaming for President Trump’s head, and from the House judiciary panel and conservatives preparing articles of impeachment against Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein for “stonewalling their requests for documents”. So here is a link to a web page that provides an overview of the impeachment process, whether of the President or of a federal official. This overview concludes:

Historically, Congress has issued Articles of Impeachment for acts in three general categories:

·         Exceeding the constitutional bounds of the powers of the office.

·         Behavior grossly incompatible with the proper function and purpose of the office.

·         Employing the power of the office for an improper purpose or for personal gain.

The impeachment process is political, rather than criminal in nature. Congress has no power to impose criminal penalties on impeached officials. But criminal courts may try and punish officials if they have committed crimes.

The rest of the overview is here. 

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Trump blimp photo

Reports of the Trump blimp "dominating the London landscape while Trump is in England" seem to be, er, over-inflated. Spot the giant "baby Trump" blimp in downtown London:

image credit: powerline blog 

Two more photos here.

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Bad news from the UK: Brexit is dead

image credit: kapustafinancial.com

Over the weekend, while the media and chattering classes have been hyperventilating over President Trump’s scheduled announcement this evening of his Supreme Court nominee, there was an ominous development in the UK. It’s bad news for those who share the core Tea Party values of fiscal responsibility, limited government, and free [and fair] markets. 

James Delingpole reports today at Breitbart London:

Brexit is dead –  strangled at the weekend by Prime Minister Theresa May and her cabal of Remainer cronies.

It was a brilliant coup, masterfully conducted with a sadist’s attention to detail.

All the ministers in the Cabinet were hauled up to Chequers, the Prime Minister’s country residence, where their phones were confiscated, as though they were naughty children. Then the stubbornly pro-Brexit ones who were rightly disgusted by the shaming sell-out deal May had cobbled together with her virulently Remainer civil servants were given the same choice Rommel was in 1944: cyanide pill or slow career death.

. . .

In June 2016, 17.4 million people — more than had ever voted for anything in British history — voted Brexit to free themselves from the clutches of that Remainer establishment. Now the Remainer establishment has responded as only it knows how: by ignoring the democratic will and shoring up its power base by whatever means necessary.

. . .

Delingpole’s full report is here. 

President Trump is scheduled to visit the UK at the end of this week, despite planned protests (but at least the anti-Trump balloon over Parliament will now have to share the spotlight with the anti-Mayor Khan balloon).

Exit question: will President Trump be meeting with Nigel Farage this Friday?

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