The Great Smoky Mountain Journal

Staff Reports

Posted: Sunday, January 21, 2018 07:30 PM

OUR VIEW: The Greatest Single Year Of Any President Ever Will Bring Out The Crickets From The MSM

Mind you, you won't hear any of what we're about to describe from the mainstream liberal corrupt media, but put your seat belt on because we're about to spread truth here about Presient Trump’s first year, not fake news.

It goes without saying that you know you've had a good year when those in Congress who once hated you are singing your praises and gushing with excitement about their 2018 chances for re-election during the upcoming November midterms.

Case in point is Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) who, just before Christmas joined President Trump along with jubilant Republicans for a tax bill celebration at the White House last week making this past summer's debacle of failing to repeal Obama Care and creating a personal rift with him and the President, a distant memory. (There were no Democrats present because no Democrat voted for tax reform)

Shortly after McConnell went on Kentucky radio stations proclaiming this has been one of the greatest years of accomplishments by any President in his recent memory. Not that Mitch McConnell's memory is that good anyway, but we'll take what we can get.

It underscores how despite internal squabbles that captivated the media the Trump administration has a lot to be proud of this past year and without a doubt the nation is better off because of these accomplishments.

From the confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch, to regulation rollbacks, to Wall Street gains, to the passage of the tax bill, and the routing of ISIS in the Middle East, as Trump's former foe McConnell put it, “This has been a year of extraordinary accomplishment for the Trump administration.”

No offense Mitch, it's been better than that.

To be sure, there have been some campaign promises that Trump did not fulfill in his first year: a wall has not yet been built on the border with Mexico, Obama Care hasn’t been repealed (though the individual mandate has), and an infrastructure package hasn’t yet passed in Congress.

Meanwhile, Trump's White House has been hampered at times by Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s corrupt Russia investigation and daily drama, often the result of tweets fired off by the president himself.

But Republicans inside and outside of the White House, even some that were not on the Trump Train at the beginning, contend that the media, which hammer Trump on every misstep, aren't giving him due credit for the 2017 gains his administration has made in a combative political environment. You think?

While tax reform has been widely described as Trump’s first major legislative win, there has actually been 81 pieces of Trump-backed legislation that are now law.

That's in addition to 15 congressional review acts whereby the president took a look at laws that were passed without the benefit of congressional review, and decided to reverse or undo them, according to White House officials.

Trump rightly predicted before the holidays that the “Fake Mainstream Media will NEVER talk about our accomplishments in their end of year reviews.”

I'd argue that President Donald Trump has secured a legacy as the most successful first-year president ever and without a close second.

This past week, the House and Senate passed a tax bill that arguably makes the most sweeping changes to the tax code since Ronald Reagan.

The bill will slash corporate taxes by more than either of Trump's last two Republican predecessors could. It will cut taxes dramatically for a wide swath of small businesses, namely those who file on a pass-through basis.

It will double the child tax credit. The left-leaning Tax Policy Center estimates that 80 percent of taxpayers will see a tax cut, while less than 5 percent would see a tax increase of more than $10.

While it may be an imperfect bill and as our Congressman Phil Roe (R-TN) told us last week "one that I would have written a little differently," it is a significant piece of legislation that will have notable effects on the budgets of most families and especially businesses across the country. Everyone will be positively affected.

The tax bill repealed the Affordable Care Act's individual mandate, arguably the most noxious portion of Obamacare viewed through a limited government, classical liberal perspective. Just two weeks ago, this was viewed as an iffy prospect at best, because the mandate is viewed as so integral to the ACA succeeding, to the extent that is even theoretically possible, long-term, given other components of the law.

With the signing of the tax bill, the individual mandate will be history. So are ACA cost-sharing reductions, or subsidies, which Trump already nixed. We have faith Congress will get its act together in 2018 and comes up with a health care system that works for all and keeps the nation out of socialized medicine.

In addition to the victory on taxes, President Trump rolled back loads of government regulations, partly thanks to his "two out, one in" policy by which every new regulation can only come into effect if two existing regulations are repealed.

It’s likely that in 2018 Office of Management and Budget Chief Mick Mulvaney will head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau as a longer-term fixture, a crippling blow to its ex-head, Richard Cordray, and ideological parent, Elizabeth Warren.

He pulled the U.S. out of the Paris climate accord and the toxic Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal. He put the North American Free Trade Agreement seriously under the gun, with the likelihood higher than ever that Canada and Mexico will simply walk away from it due to American demands.

He has made good on promises to vastly increase deportations of unlawful immigrants and curtail legal immigration. The Supreme Court seems inclined to uphold his Middle East travel ban despite every liberal judge's effort to block it.

One of his greatest moves in my opinion is that he did more than give lip service to declaring Jerusalem as Israel's eternal capital. He actually did it and announced the United States was moving its embassy there to solidify our recognition of the Ancient City as such. Even the great Ronald Reagan did not have the courage to do what President Trump DID. How refreshing 2017 has been to see a year of action and not just talk.

Another key aspect of his first year is the reshaping of the U.S. Judicial branch through his numerous conservative judges that he got confirmed including one extraordinary Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch whose position will affect American law and jurisprudence for decades or more to come in a positive, conservative way.

President Trump also put 12 circuit court judges on the bench, the most during a president's first year in office in more than 100 years.
 

Then there are his efforts on illegal immigration.

The President made it clear this week there won't be protection for young immigrants brought into the country illegally unless he gets funding for a border wall and other items. Trump said on Twitter Friday: "The Democrats have been told, and fully understand, that there can be no DACA without the desperately needed WALL at the Southern Border and an END to the horrible Chain Migration & ridiculous Lottery System of Immigration etc." He added: "We must protect our Country at all cost!

The battle over immigration has been delayed until next year. Democrats want protections for the young immigrants, who are referred to as "Dreamers." But while there is significant bipartisan sympathy for these immigrants, GOP demands for Trump's border wall and for immigration agents have proved difficult to resolve.

There can be NO amnesty for these "Dreamers" no matter how compassionate we feel we have to be. President Trump recognizes the need to be both compassionate and uphold the laws of the land. That too has been a tremendous accomplishment of his in 2017.

Trump promised to protect DREAMers, calling them "people that were brought here, people that have done a good job and were not brought here of their own volition."

On the foreign policy front, President Trump has taken innovative and aggressive action to protect our people and eliminate threats to the homeland at their source.

America may not be liked by every nation in the world, but I can assure you we are slowly but surely once again being respected. Being liked and respected are two different things, something that President Obama never learned.

Obama would shake hands smiling while his international counterparts were sticking their feet up America's backside and taking advantage of us left and right. They may have thought BHO to be a "cool dude" personally, but secretly they scorned his lack of leadership style and mocked America because Obama felt it best to “lead from behind.” That translated to America didn’t lead at all for the past eight years on the world stage and it showed.

President Trump on the other hand is not the "cool dude on the block," to other world leaders, but he turned out to be true LEADER who refused to allow other nations of the world to take advantage of us any more.

He has been criticized for believing China is our friend and seeking to help us with North Korea. That's not a failure on President Trump. Every President going back to Dwight Eisenhower has trusted the Chinese to do the right thing and been deceived into thinking they would do so.

I heard one Democratic Party liberal sycophant "expert" slam Trump for being "duped" by the Chinese after it was discovered this week the Chinese were secretly shipping oil to North Korea against U.S. sanctions the Trump administration has levied all year trying to keep NOKO from a nuclear weapon.

This same expert forgot to mention the numerous times Barrack Obama was duped by Muslim and other rogue nations, mainly Iran, into believing their intentions were just and honest. Obama gave Iran nearly $15B in cash on a tarmac thinking it was payment for Iran to behave itself on the world stage. As I famously say, “You do the math.”

If the Chinese want a nuclearized Korean peninsula then so be it. It may not end well for them or Russia once a war breaks out when the U.S. has to step in and face punch the North Korean regime by destroying their missile bases. President Trump will be blamed for this, but he's been the one acting in good faith with the Chinese who are not worthy of any trust.

That’s not poor leadership, that’s what it means to be President of the United States and dealing with dishonest leaders.

During 2017, President Trump also announced new policies to secure America’s borders in setting the highest standards ever for United States visa and immigration vetting and adjudications so that the United States can validate traveler identities, prevent fraud, and ensure individuals do not represent a public safety or national security threat.

According to President Trump's "America First" strategy he released just last week, his administration has "implemented enhancements that have raised the bar for refugee vetting and screening
In addition, the United States withdrew from negotiations on the Global Compact on Migration to ensure America’s control of its borders.

President Trump successfully prosecuted the war against ISIS by empowering commanders with broad authority to defeat the terrorist group. The coalition against ISIS has recaptured over 95 percent of the territory previously held by ISIS in Iraq and Syria, the government of Iraq has liberated its territory from ISIS, and millions have been freed from the terrorist group’s stranglehold. He got more done in one year than Obama did in eight.

It makes you begin to believe the sentiment that it’s amazing that ISIS started running out of money and territory when Barrack Obama left office.

On the North Korea front, President Trump has dramatically increased pressure on the rogue regime to end its WMD and missile programs by doing the following:

• Initiated the toughest sanctions ever on North Korea that cut off 30 percent of its oil imports, and—when combined with previous resolutions—that banned over 90 percent of the country’s exports
• Designated North Korea as a State Sponsor of Terror
• Pressured China to reduce banking ties to North Korea
• Encouraged action against North Korea from countries around the world such as Malaysia, Kuwait, Peru, and Sudan

He took the bold step of declining to certify that what Iran gave up under the nuclear deal was appropriate and proportionate to the benefits it received, while making clear that the United States demands that Iran fully and strictly comply with all of its nuclear-related obligations.

The President launched sanctions against 93 Iran-related entities and individuals to counter Iran’s non-nuclear destabilizing behavior and called on Pakistan to do more to combat terrorism within its borders.

In another act of Presidential moral courage this past year he made it clear to all the world this past year that the use of chemical weapons will not be tolerated, as demonstrated by his swift and decisive order to strike the Syrian air base responsible for launching the horrific chemical weapons attack on April 4, 2017, in Khan Shaykhun, Syria, killing innocent civilians.

Obama told Syria if they did this it would be a “red line.” That “red line” is still drawn in the sands of a myriad of useless threats by Obama during his tenure. We don’t have a commander in chief who just threatens and backs down. He acts when he warns nations the United States will take action.

On the domestic home front, President Trump ordered a dramatic rebuilding of the Nation’s crucial military capacities and capabilities and worked with Congress on a defense budget that would reverse the sequester. He requested and received an additional $21 billion in Department of Defense funding to address urgent readiness shortfalls and ordered a nuclear Posture Review to ensure America’s nuclear forces are up to date and serve as a credible deterrent.

This past year the President also ordered $367 million in missile defense investments for fiscal year 2017 and $4 billion for 2018 to defend against the threat of North Korean missiles. He directed the elevation of US CYBERCOM to a unified combatant command, improving leadership, operational effectiveness and resourcing for cyber efforts

Because of his leadership President Trump caused spending by NATO on defense to increase 4.3 percent, or $12.4 billion, over the previous year while increased troop contributions to Afghanistan have contributed to the record highest fill rate of 93 percent.

He has worked with partners and allies in the Middle East to enhance counterterrorism cooperation, including through the creation of the U.S.-Gulf Cooperation Council Terrorist Financing Targeting Center and joint sanctions designations of Al al-Qa’ida and ISIS terrorists.

On his first trip abroad, President Trump visited the historic homes of three great world religions, meeting with leaders of more than 50 Muslim majority nations in Saudi Arabia, reassuring America’s key ally in Israel, and meeting with the Pope in the Holy See.

President Trump traveled to Europe where he revitalized the NATO alliance and attended meetings of the G-7 and G-20.

In November, President Trump conducted the longest trip to Asia by an American president in 25 years where he rallied Asian nations to maximize pressure on North Korea, outlined his vision for a free and open Indo-Pacific region, and advanced fair and reciprocal trade.

He exhorted Muslim nations to fight extremism in Riyadh, stood up for Western values in Warsaw, faced down the North Korean threat in Seoul, and delivered a clear vision of nation-state sovereignty and principled realism at the United Nations.

If this is what the first year of a Trump presidency looks like, I don't know about you, but I'm sure ready for year two.
 

Salute Mr. President. It's been one hell of year in 2017.

We here in real America appreciate what you've done and no matter the crickets from the mainstream media, our voice is loud and clear saying THANK YOU and HAPPY NEW YEAR to you, your family and all of America.

Thank you for making America Great again and putting us back on the path to true prosperity and sending notice to the world we are not going to be pushed around any longer. Here’s to a great 2018!
 

Christopher McDonald, Publisher, Editor in Charge

Great Smoky Mountain Journal