President Trump held a bilateral meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on the sidelines of the 2019 NATO Summit in the U.K.  Against the backdrop of President Trump favoring increased tariffs against the EU to initiate a new trade deal based on reciprocity; and against the intransigence of Chancellor Merkel refusing to live up to the NATO Wales Accord and pay two percent of GDP for defense; there is some diplomatic tension.
We can sense a more determined tone from President Trumy as both he and Chancellor Merkel took questions from media. [Video and Transcript Below]

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[Transcript] – PRESIDENT TRUMP: Well, thank you very much. We had a very successful NATO meeting. I think it was one of the most successful. We’re just discussing that the best, certainly, that I’ve been — I’ve been to three of them now, and this was really something very special. There’s great spirit. A lot of people are putting up a lot of money. We have $130 billion more. And within three years, we’ll have $400 billion more put up by other countries. So that’s really something. And it was a great meeting.
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Earlier today President Trump held a cabinet meeting and permitted the U.S. media to stay in attendance for the first hour.  No U.S. President has ever allowed this level of transparency in government.  After brief statements, the president took multiple questions from the assembled press pool. [Video and Transcript Below]

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[Transcript] – THE PRESIDENT: Okay. Thank you very much. We have a Cabinet meeting. We’ll have a few questions after grace. And, if you would, Ben, please do the honors.

SECRETARY CARSON: Our kind Father in Heaven, we’re so thankful for the many blessings that you have bestowed upon us in this country. And we’re thankful for the people of courage who have been here before us, who have fought hard for the rights of our country.

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Vice President Mike Pence and U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are holding a joint press conference following discussions with President Recep Erdogan of Turkey.  The Turks invasion of Syria and regional conflict with Kurdish forces are the primary issue.
UPDATE: Video Added

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Eight years ago Zurich Mike penned an analogy of the ‘Islamist Spring’ that still rings true today, when he said: President Obama helped kill the zookeepers and unleashed the big cats…. The Turkish movement into Syria is all part of this continuum.
When President Obama ignited the “Islamist Spring” with his speech in Cairo Egypt, what he really articulated was a shift in U.S. foreign policy to support The Muslim Brotherhood.

Political Islam, writ large, is represented by The Brotherhood.  Turkish President Recep Erdogan sees himself as the modern leader of political Islam using the Brotherhood to recreate the Ottoman Empire.
Ben Ali (Tunis), Hosni Mubarak (Egypt) and Khadaffi (Libya), were the first zookeepers removed.  Obama’s U.S. foreign policy supported Muslim Brotherhood replacements like Mohamed Morsi in Egypt.  However, Obama failed in the effort to remove Bashir Assad in Syria; as a result all extremist factions of the Brotherhood gathered to form ISIS.
Factions like al-Qaeda, al-Nusra and ISIS all fall under the umbrella of The Muslim Brotherhood.  The exiled Brotherhood leaders initially fled Egypt to Qatar until they were further driven-out by the Gulf Cooperation Council and ultimately given safe-harbor in Turkey, by Recep Erdogan.
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House Intelligence Committee Rep. Devin Nunes discusses former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch testifying to her friends in congress during the Democrats’ “chaotic circus” of an impeachment inquiry.

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Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her Lawfare allies can change House rules (they did). Pelosi and Lawfare can also change House impeachment rules (they did). Pelosi/Lawfare can change committee rules (they did); and in doing so they can remove House republicans from the entire process… Which They Did.  However, what Lawfare and Pelosi cannot change is The U.S. Constitution, which they are desperate to confront.
Speaker Pelosi’s ‘Lawfare House rules‘ and/or ‘Lawfare impeachment rules‘ cannot supersede the constitutional separation of powers.
Nancy Pelosi cannot decree an “official impeachment inquiry”, and as a consequence nullify a constitutional firewall between the Legislative Branch and Executive Branch.

~ Speaker Pelosi and House Attorney Douglas Letter ~

All of that said, there is a distinct difference between a congressional subpoena intended to compel generic testimony, and a congressional subpoena intended to compel impeachment testimony.
Attempting to compel testimony that crosses through the separation of powers; and goes even further in an attempt to penetrate the firewall around executive privilege; requires the House -or a committee therein- to carry “Judicial Authority“.
“Judicial Authority” is not absolute authority, but rather a legal reference and framework that forms the basis for an impeachment ‘compulsion demand‘ (or subpoena) by the House.  Judicial Authority is the House saying they have a legal basis to make a demand.
The reason judicial authority is necessary, is because creating Judicial authority, via the Legislative Branch full chamber vote, gives the Executive Branch access to appeal any legislative demand via the Judicial Branch (federal courts).
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U.S. Ambassador Gordon Sondland was directed by the State Department not to appear Tuesday for an interview with House committees leading the fraudulent impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump. The non-appearance follows Chairman Adam Schiff’s manipulative media releases based on Ambassador Kurt Volker testimony.
Knowing that testimony from “impeachment inquiry” participation is being selectively used to create a false narrative; and knowing the committees’ will not release full transcripts and or documents gained therein; the administration is not going to assist Pelosi and Schiff’s scheme to create the illusion of something that doesn’t exist.
These “requests for interviews” are not legal subpoenas because the House has not created judicial authority within the committees’ by holding a full House vote to authorize. Therefore non-appearance puts more pressure on Pelosi to hold a House vote. Republican members Jim Jordan, Matt Gaetz, Mark Meadows and Lee Zeldin explain:

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Chairman Adam Schiff, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence; Chairman Elijah E. Cummings, Committee on White House Oversight; Chairman Eliot L. Engel, House Committee on Foreign Affairs, continue sending carefully worded letters under the guise of ‘subpoenas’ today.  [Main Link Here]

However, you’ll notice in these latest versions they are modifying: (#1) now they actually include attachments that would be “subpoenas”; yet they shift language to ‘subpoena schedules’.  Why?  Because (#2) the letters and subpoenas omit any penalty for non-compliance.  They cannot assign a penalty because the letters do not carry judicial authority.
Obviously Lawfare, instructing Pelosi’s group, realizes the larger American electorate has caught on to the impeachment word games. The “official impeachment inquiry” is all a one-party partisan ruse.  Here’s the issue they cannot overcome.
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For two days the mainstream media were breathlessly reporting on an “urgent request” from the State Department Inspector General for a closed-door meeting.
Media sources whipped their left-wing audiences into an anticipatory frenzy with predictions of devastating information soon to come from an “explosive” and “highly unusual” request.  It must must be connected to President Trump and Secretary Mike Pompeo hiding devastating information, they said…

Well, the super-anticipated ‘closed door’ briefing was held today, and the IG handed out packets of information related to revelations of Democrats colluding with the Ukraine government.  The exact opposite of what the media and the professional left anticipated.

WASHINGTON –  The State Department’s Inspector General shared a packet of months-old news stories and other Ukraine-related documents during an “urgent” briefing with Congressional staffers on Wednesday, sources told the Daily Caller.
Sources familiar with the meeting said the IG handed over a packet containing, among other old materials, news articles written this past spring by The Hill’s John Solomon about Democratic ties to Ukraine.

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White House Senior Policy Adviser, Stephan Miller, appears on Fox Business with Lou Dobbs to explain the apoplexy coming from DC’s administrative state. Miller outlines the deep fear held by many in the professional political class in/around DC toward ongoing investigations by U.S. AG Bill Barr and U.S. Attorney John Durham.
In framing the opposition to the Trump administration, Mr. Miller identifies the Marxist roots that bind governmental ideologues in united resistance.  Impeachment is their best hope of defense.

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