State Rep. Rick Roth Updates Us on the 2019 Session
Our May meeting featured HD85 Representative Rick Roth, who described some of the significant actions taken by the Florida Legislature in the just completed session.
For a description of the various bills that emerged, please see: 2019 Legislative Session Update.
Villagers for Trump Letter on Voter Fraud
March Brunch – “Los Tres Amigos” – 2019
In what has become an annual event, the March meeting of the RCNPB featured “Los Tres Amigos”. This year’s lineup consisted of Palm Beach Gardens Councilman Matthew Lane, CD21 likely candidate Christian Acosta, and the perennial favorite, former PBCGOP Chairman Sid Dinerstein. Florida Representative Rick Roth also made an appearance.
Matt Lane, who took this opportunity to announce his bid for re-election next March, described his view of the responsibilities of a city official. First up is public safety and security, and the Gardens is now providing city police resources to patrol the local schools. With increased demands following the Parkland shootings, the School system was grateful to accept the help and is paying the city for the effort. After the Pittsburg synagogue shootings, the city is also stepping up security activities surrounding the Jewish centers around Hood Road.
Other priorities include fiscal restraint with the public purse and transparency of government operations. As we have witnessed on multiple occasions, Matt will frequently pull large dollar items from the consent agenda for public discussion, particularly when it is not clear that an open bidding process was used. In Matt’s view, understanding the way contracts are adopted is the way to keep tabs on public spending.
Lastly he mentioned term limits, pointing our that he was the lone vote against placing the ballot questions in 2018 that sought to weaken the charter provisions that had only recently passed. Fortunately, the voters soundly rejected this attempt and the 2 terms of 3 years is still in effect.
The second amigo to speak was Christian Acosta who has announced his exploratory quest to unseat CD21 Congresswoman Lois Frankel in 2020. This D+17 seat was uncontested in 2018, allowing the incumbent to remain in office without campaigning for the privilege. Stretching along the coast from Singer Island through Delray Beach and encompassing most of the county south of Southern Boulevard, including Wellington, it deserves a Republican challenger.
Christian is a resident of Boynton Beach and teaches Electric Power Engineering at Palm Beach State. A nuclear engineer and Pittsburg transplant, Christian has been making the rounds of the Republican clubs and plans to introduce himself at the Trump-45 Club next month. He claims that he is no relation to that “other Acosta” who is known for his rude behavior in the White House press corps.
Although not billed as one of the “tres amigos”, FH85 Representative Rick Roth spoke briefly about some bills of interest that are moving through Tallahassee. The Republican controlled legislature did not always work smoothly with Rick Scott, but so far they are in a honeymoon period with Rick DeSantis. The allowance for smokable medical marijuana is moving through the process at the Governor’s request, and they appear willing to embrace his initiatives in education, the environment and water policy, and health care reform. The Legislature also may be able to place a ballot question next year that would end the constitutional revision commissions that work their mischief every 20 years. The onerous multiple-issue questions that last year’s commission placed on the ballot may have been enough to spur action.
Keynoting the meeting was Sid Dinerstein. With a couple of pages of handwritten notes, he took the audience on a tour of all the hopeful things that have happened since the last election, and why the loss of the House was a two edged sword.
Arguing that following the 2016 election (which was a peak year for the GOP), we are now in a sweet spot, Sid explained that yes, the Democrats run the House, but the GOP didn’t do much with their majority when they were in charge. This led to the shutdown which we lost, because to win you need to have the media on your side. Consider that a “bottom”.
The Democrats can always be counted on to overplay their hand. For example, by delaying the State of the Union for a week, Pelosi didn’t realize that she moved it just past the greatest jobs report ever, completely strengthening the President’s hand. Putting on a great show, which was a masterfully done tribute to America, Trump was able to “hold the cross up to the vampires” by declaring “America will never be a Socialist Nation!”. Thus begins the 2020 campaign.
One of the President’s most valuable skills is to get his enemies to actually tell the truth.
In the past few months we have seen them reveal what they really think:
– How great is Venuzuela
– How they will not rebuke their anti-semites – Farrakhan, Sharpton, Omar
– How abortion is not enough – we need nothing less than infanticide
– That their signature transportaion project – the California “train to nowhere” is a failure
– How they will not deal with their three “friends in Virginia”
– Jesse Smollett
– Green new deal (“kill all the cows”) – is outlawing volcanos next?
– We don’t want your stinking jobs (Amazon in NY)
– Dem PACs pulling out of Ohio
– Reuters sitting on the Beto hacking story
Making the case that Trump will likely win 44 states, Sid ended on a note of optimism. Hugging the flag at the beginning of the CPAC speech says it all – that is the entire campaign.
Los Tres Amigos 2019
Saving Western Civilization from Itself
“Rational Centrists”, the term our speaker Ken Abramowitz uses for the third of western society that thinks like “us”, are surrounded by the dark forces of Big Government, Isolationists, Political Islam and the United Nations. Although still a minority, we have improved our market share since the time of Abraham when the ratio was more like 1%.
Describing the threats to Israel as a precursor of threats to the west, he sees many of the same forces at work. Iran (who would like to wipe out the US as well as Israel), the Muslim Brotherhood and other Radical Islamists (Hezbollah, Al Queda/Daesh, etc), Globalist world organizations who reject national sovereignty (UN, EU, NGOs, etc), all figure prominently.
In order to prevail and maintain our way of life, Ken sees three key solutions.
We must maximize economic growth (happiness), protect the people intellectually, culturally and legally (liberty), and protect the people physically (life). Although Ken’s handouts went into some depth in these solution areas, he did not dwell on specifics in his talk.
Asked to grade President Trump on the defense of the west, most in the room gave all “A”s. Ken leans more towards a “B” grade though, as he objects to some specifics of the Trump agenda. While no one would argue that the economy is not booming, he faults the President for not taking on entitlements. While generally supporting the culture, he could do more on resisting aspects of Sharia in the US. On protecting physically, while the border fight is good, Ken believes pulling troops out of Syria is a big mistake. President Trump is a major improvement over his predecessor though, as he gives Obama three “F” grades.
Ken is the Chairman of “Citizens for National Security.” CFNS is a group of academic, scientific, intelligence, counter terrorism and defense experts who were involved in their respective fields decades before the 9/11 attacks on America.
Present at the meeting were County Commissioner Hal Valeche and PBG Councilman Matt Lane.
5 eyes. 5 arms. 4 legs. All American
Rep. Brian Mast, R-Fla., an Army veteran, welcomed two fellow wounded veterans, Rep. Jim Baird, from Indiana, and Rep. Dan Crenshaw, from Texas, to Congress by tweeting a remarkable photo with his Republican colleagues.
Ken Abramowitz at January Meeting
RCNPB December Meeting
Tony Khawam at October 14th Meeting
The Ethical Lapses of Andrew Gillum
The following is excerpted from the Sunshine State News:
Now that Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum is the Democratic Party nominee for governor, the press and voters need to take a much closer look into his service as our ceremonial mayor.
Gillum has been consistently involved in issues that the FBI is investigating as part of their work into corruption at City Hall and the Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA).
While Gillum alleges he was told by the FBI that he’s not a subject of their investigation, no one has ever corroborated that statement.
First and foremost is the ethical concerns around the New York City trip that Gillum took for his former employer. We now know, after persistent questioning by the Tallahassee Democrat, that Gillum stayed on after that meeting, relocating to a plush NYC hotel, the Millennium Hilton, attending the “Hamilton” Broadway play where tickets cost hundreds of dollars, and even going on a boat ride around Manhattan and the Statute of Liberty with Adam Corey and Mike Miller, where pictures were taken.
Gillum has recently told The Washington Post that sometimes his brother Marcus Gillum pays some of his expenses, and he has said that his brother paid his expenses in NYC.
