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WASHINGTON A group of progressive lawmakers that includes Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) slammed the Trump administrations support for the right-wing leaders who have taken power in Bolivia following the ouster of socialist President Evo Morales, saying Friday that the White Houses dangerously misguided backing risks creating a full-blown humanitarian emergency in the South American nation.

We are troubled by statements from Administration officials, including President Trump, that welcome these developments in Bolivia that bear the hallmarks of a military coup dtat,the group of lawmakers said in a letter drafted by Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.), a progressive who has been outspoken on human rights issues in Latin America throughout his career in Congress.

The letter was sent to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Friday.

Morales, who was first elected in 2005, resigned on Nov. 10amid pressure from Bolivias armed forces as protests erupted across Bolivia after a disputed October election, in which his opponents accused him of fraud. The Organization of American States, a regional body of governments from across the Americas, said in a preliminary audit that it had found serious irregularities in the election. Morales (who says he is the victim of a coup and has fled to Mexico), his supporters, and some independent groups have questioned the evidence behind the OAS findings.

Morales decision to seek a fourth term even after he initially lost a 2016 referendum asking Bolivians to alter constitutional term limits to allow him to do so and the fraud allegations sparked the protests that led to his resignation. But his departure came two months before his current term would have ended in January. And his ouster paved the way for the rise of right-wing figures including Jeanine ez, a conservative senator who declared herself interim president to power.

JOSHUA LOTT via Getty ImagesPresident Donald Trump talks to the media on the South Lawn of the White House on November 20, 2019.

President Donald Trump welcomed Morales ouster as a a significant moment for democracy in the Western Hemisphere, and his administration immediately recognized ezs legitimacy as interim leader.

But since taking power, ez and her allies have threatened lawmakers from Morales Movement for Socialism party and journalists with prosecution while also unleashing the military, which they exempted from prosecution, to crack down on pro-Morales demonstrations.

Protesters have accused the military of killing at least eight people during a demonstration last week.

We urge you to consider an immediate change in course and to take action to support democracy and human rights in Bolivia, the lawmakers wrote.While there is legitimate debate surrounding Morales decision to run for a fourth term, it is simply not acceptable for the U.S. administration to welcome the forced removal of a democratically-elected leader before the end of their mandate.

Our government should call for the prompt restoration of constitutional order, and for an immediate end to all persecution and attacks targeting leaders and supporters of Evo Morales and his political party, they said. Additionally, we call for the adoption of protective measures for those facing threats.

Warning that Bolivias escalating crisis threatens to spiral into violent internal conflict, the progressives argued that the administrations backing of the current Bolivian leadership could well contribute to a further breakdown in the rule of law in Bolivia and a full-blown humanitarian emergency, with large migrant outflows.

We strongly urge you to revise this approach and support the prompt restoration of constitutional order, dialogue between opposing political factions, fair and inclusive elections and respect for the human and cultural rights of all Bolivians, they wrote.

Although it was addressed to the Trump administration, the letter also marked the latest effort from progressive lawmakers to set themselves apart from Democratic leadership on foreign policy and human rights issues, particularly in the Americas.

In March, progressives came out against the Trump administrations decision to back Venezuelan opposition to socialist President Nicolas Maduro, who has become increasingly autocratic and authoritarian as an economic crisis has crippled his country. Millions of people have fled Venezuela, and Trump has aggressively supported efforts to remove Maduro from office by imposing economic sanctions and making thinly veiled threats of military force.

Progressive lawmakers argued in March that Trumps sanctions and threats of American military-led regime change would only hurt ordinary people and exacerbate Venezuelas crises.

Progressive Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) said at the time that the coordinated effort to challenge the White House even as top Democrats backed Trumps strategywas a deliberate move to reshape foreign policy conversations within the party.

Khanna was not among the 14 lawmakers who signed the Friday letter about Bolivia. The signatories were Reps. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.), Susan Wild (D-Pa.), Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.), Jared Huffman (D-Calif.), Debra Haaland (D-N.M.), Jim McGovern (D-Mass.), Jesus Chuy Garca (D-Ill.), Bobby Rush (D-Ill.), Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), and Alan Lowenthal (D-N.Y.).

Eleanor Holmes Norton (D), Washington D.C.s representative to Congress, also signed the letter.

Ocasio-Cortez and Omar have both previously called Morales ouster a coup. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). Sanders and Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard are theonly Democratic presidential candidates to have done so.

picture alliance via Getty ImagesSupporters of the resigned Bolivian head of state Morales march in La Paz, the capital, carrying a coffin with the remains of a victim killed in the recent violent clashes and demanding the end of the current interim government.

Pompeo, in a new statement Thursday, reiterated the United States support for ezs transitional government and renewed condemnations of Morales and other party officials who Pompeo said were responsible for egregious irregularities and manipulation of the vote in Octobers elections.

But he also said the United States opposed crackdowns on the press and protesters.

We support robust press freedoms and peaceful assembly and protest. Violence, repression, and political intimidation have no place in a democracy, Pompeo said. We call on all parties to refrain from such violence, to observe the rule of law, and to respect the rights of all citizens to participate in building Bolivias future, whatever their views. Security services must respect the rights of peaceful protestors, and the Bolivian authorities must ensure accountability for any violations of the right of citizens.

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House Progressives Blast Trump For Embrace Of Right-Wing Bolivian Leaders - HuffPost

As the impeachment hearings continued, Attorney General Bill Barr on Friday trash-talked Democrats for attempting to drown the executive branch with oversight demands, saying they were working for political gain without thinking of the consequences.

In waging a scorched-earth, no-holds-barred war against this administration, it is the left that is engaged in shredding norms and undermining the rule of law, Barr told a room of attorneys at the annual gathering of the Federalist Society, a conservative legal group that has been influential in determining President Donald Trumps nominees for federal judges.

The remarks about Democrats ignoring the rule of law were especially ironic because they came a mere hours after Roger Stone, one of Trumps previous advisers, was convicted on all counts for lying to Congress during its probe into Russias interference in the 2016 election. The attorney generals speech also came on the second day of presidential impeachment hearings examining allegations that Trump attempted to interfere in the 2020 elections by asking Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter.

Barr criticized Democrats for launching a holy war and using any means necessary to gain momentary advantage, while he said conservatives tend to have more scruple over their political tactics and rarely feel that the ends justify the means. He said:

In any age, the so-called progressives treat politics as their religion. Their holy mission is to use the coercive power of the State to remake man and society in their own image, according to an abstract ideal of perfection. Whatever means they use are therefore justified because, by definition, they are a virtuous people pursing a deific end. They are willing to use any means necessary to gain momentary advantage in achieving their end, regardless of collateral consequences and the systemic implications. They never ask whether the actions they take could be justified as a general rule of conduct, equally applicable to all sides.

Conservatives, on the other hand, do not seek an earthly paradise. We are interested in preserving over the long run the proper balance of freedom and order necessary for healthy development of natural civil society and individual human flourishing. This means that we naturally test the propriety and wisdom of action under a rule of law standard. The essence of this standard is to ask what the overall impact on society over the long run if the action we are taking, or principle we are applying, in a given circumstance was universalizedthat is, would it be good for society over the long haul if this was done in all like circumstances?

For these reasons, conservatives tend to have more scruple over their political tactics and rarely feel that the ends justify the means. And this is as it should be, but there is no getting around the fact that this puts conservatives at a disadvantage when facing progressive holy far, especially when doing so under the weight of a hyper-partisan media.

Barr reportedly received a standing ovation, but outside the halls of the Federalist Society, his remarks sparked outrage and intensified calls from the left to impeach not only the president, but the attorney general himself. Others were quick to roast Barr for his statements. Bill Barr is the type of bare knuckles lawyer the Church would have hired thirty years ago to cover up sex abuse cases, Richard Painter, a former White House ethics counsel, tweeted.

Yesterday AG Barr addressed a radical political group and gave one of the most vicious partisan screeds ever uttered by a US cabinet officer, Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-N.J.) tweeted Saturday morning. Barr says trump should have king-like powers. Barr is a liar and a fanatic and should be impeached and stripped of his law licenses.

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Attorney General Bill Barr Is Getting Roasted for His Outrageous Speech Blasting Progressives - Mother Jones

ANALYSIS Only a few months from now, populist Democratic progressives around the country hoping to elect one of their own to the White House will need to choose between VermontSen.Bernie Sanders and MassachusettsSen.Elizabeth Warren.

Do they back the angry Democratic socialist, or the feisty, anti-corporate populist who wants to break up the banks and big tech companies? One says he is trying to lead a revolution. The other calls for dramatic change, often dismissing critics in her own party for regurgitating Republican talking points.

Only one ofthem is now a front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination. That would be Warren.

Sanders is passionate and intent on becoming the Democratic standard bearer, and hes running well in key state and national polls. But its still very difficult to see the 78-year-old Vermonter becoming the Democratic nominee next year.

This is Sanders second presidential rodeo, but unlike four years ago, he isnt a quirky novelty this time. He now shares his lane with another top-tier hopeful who echoes his populism. That alternative, Warren, is a woman, is eight years younger than Sanders, and is a strong enough speaker to have moved from near obscurity in the race to the top tier.

And unlike the Vermonter, Warren hasnt embraced socialism.

ButSanderscampaign, which has plenty of money, shows no signs of stopping after a relatively brief medical scare. Hes a man on a mission, and people like that dont quit easily. He took on Hillary Clinton (and the Democratic National Committee), after all, when nobody else was willing to do so. Its hard to believe he could be scared out of the presidential race by Warren.

And that is a problem for the Massachusetts Democrat. For as long as Sanders remains in the contest, Warren will have a hard time consolidating support among the partys left.

But Warren has another problem, which follows from her partys desire to beat Trump next year. Many Democrats in the business and financial communities believe her ultimate agenda is not very different from Sanders when it comes to raising taxes, sticking it to corporate America, distrusting the free market, adding new entitlements and piling on layers of additional debt to pay for new government programs.

Warrens continued embrace of Medicare for All has become a substantial problem for her. Its not just the cost of that program. Its the larger message that the government knows what is good for you better than you do. Many in the party prefer Medicare for All Who Want It or Obamacare with a public option, both of which seem more appealing and manageable to pragmatic legislators and voters.

Warren has had plenty of chances to slide to the right slightly, but she never takes them. On health care, all she needed to do to broaden her appeal was to emphasize her willingness to negotiate with others in her party. She could make it clear that while she prefers Medicare for All, she is certainly open to compromise.

But would Warren undermine her own appeal with populist, grassroots progressives, who favor dramatic proposals and not piecemeal changes, by giving herself some wiggle room on health insurance? Possibly. But it might also make her seem more reasonable to those worried about her agenda.

Not satisfied to paint herself into a corner on only one issue, Warren has unveiled a K-12 education plan that goes after charter schools. The Washington Post editorial board immediately challenged her, arguing that when it comes to education, Ms. Warren has a plan that seems aimed more at winning the support of the powerful teachers unions than in advancing policies that would help improve student learning.

On one hand, you can say that Warren is simply protecting her left flank, making sure that she doesnt lose true believers to Sanders. But the problem isher positions are less about campaign strategy and more about her views of government and her views of corporate America and the affluent.

Warren may not call herself a Democratic socialist, but her rhetoric and overall approach to issues like health insurance and education puts her far enough left that she would have a hard time appealing to pragmatists and political independents.

Of course, Warren (or Sanders) would energize the Democratic base and turn out voters who sat on their hands (or voted third party) in 2016, and that could be enough to flip the White House. But Warren and Sanders populist progressive positioning would also make it much easier for the GOP to make the 2020 election about them and socialism than about Donald Trump. And that may be the only way the president can win a second term.

Democratic candidates often move left in the primary but right if and when they make it to the general election, so its possible that Warren is merely following that well-traveled path. Maybe, if she gets her partys nomination, she will zig and then zag toward the center.

But like Sanders, Warren rarely (really, never) conveys the impression that she is prepared to build coalitions, negotiate with friends and foes alike, and eventually forge compromises to enact legislation. Put another way, both Sanders and Warren are as much prisoners of their ideology as Trump is a prisoner of his narcissism.

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Progressives are going to have to pick: Sanders or Warren? - Roll Call

A soldier stands in front of a courthouse in Pittsboro, N.C. He stands at ease, his fingers wrapped around the barrel of a bronze musket, his Confederate uniform gone green with age. He has stood there peacefully for more than a century but just last August, the Chatham County Board of Commissioners ruled that the statue was to be taken down.

Protestors gathered in two groups by the statue, on either side of the adjoining Sanford Road. On the left side of the street were progressives holding anti-racist signs, demanding that the statue a symbol of a racist history be demolished. To the right of the road were Chatham residents who stood in the defense of their heritage, waving Confederate flags.

The scene at the protests, each side spitting rude labels across the road, embodies the long-standing clash between progressive and conservative values in America. It is easy to point to the achievements of progressive movements emancipation, suffrage, civil rights, labor laws and decide that the clash has been settled: Progressives move history forward, while conservatives dig their heels into the ground to hold it back. The argument is not without merit; throughout the arc of history, every bend toward justice has been met by the conservators of an unjust status quo.

But this argument also leaves us with a troubling, divisive stereotype: Progressives are the party of justice, while conservatives stand in the way of progress. The very connotation held by these words progression against conservation leaves us with a reductive and unhelpful view of their underlying philosophies. Similarly unhelpful stereotypes are made of progressives, that they are the starry-eyed idealists, their naive aspirations having no hold on the real world.

The fact that these philosophies have come to be associated with Democrats or Republicans sticks us, politically, on either side of Sanford Road. Each group misapprehends the goals of the other, thus turning their opponents into boogeymen. Conservatives become guardians of broken, racist and unjust systems, while progressives are intent on ruining the nation in their attempts to perfect it.

The true ideology of conservatism has nothing to do with bigotry or injustice. Its foundations are in the respect for tradition and a belief in the maintenance of certain values whether these be religious, constitutional or cultural.

Take the policies of democratic socialism, one of the most progressive movements currently moving through our nation. The movement aims to take the policies of socialist countries like Sweden and Denmark and apply them to America. Democratic candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders has said of these policies: When I talk about democratic socialism, what I mean is moving away from where we are right now.

To a conservative, the idea of trading away ones values and way of life for free health care and college tuition is fundamentally objectionable. In light of the fact that Sweden and Denmarks socialist giveaways have saddled them with some of the highest tax rates in the world, the conservative desire to maintain American traditions seems somewhat more reasonable.

But what about the great American traditions of injustice, racism and inequality? Many criticize conservative thinking as regressive, the kind of stuck-in-its-ways mentality that has allowed injustice to persist for as long as it has. Even today, many necessary advancements are stalled back by a desire to keep things more or less the same.

Still, conservatism cannot be written off as regressive, or worse, racist in itself. The respect for tradition is not a bad thing; there are a great many traditions that we would respecting a respect for the rules of our Constitution. This respect is only faultworthy where the traditions are unjust, and though progressives have historically challenged injustice and exclusion, this does not make progressivism the righter of conservative wrongs.

Progressivism is often enough wrong or at least misguided on its own. The democratic socialist idea of free college tuition sounds like a fair and promising progression, but the same could not be said of its likely outcomes.

One reason for this is that free tuition actually raises drop out rates, as there is less incentive for students to complete their degrees. One Manhattan Institute study found that graduation rates were actually higher in G-7 countries that charged tuition as opposed to those with free college. This, on top of a host of other practical issues a direct harm to private colleges, an overcrowding of schools and a $70 billion price tag shows us that a more conservative approach might be better suited to the problem.

The bottom line is that neither progressivism nor conservatism can be removed without our country stagnating. Without a healthy clash of ideology, the state has only one voice and one direction not necessarily the right ones. The idea that growth is always achieved by progressives keeps us shouting from either side of the road; it keeps us from meeting somewhere in the middle and moving forward.

Dillon Cranston is a sophomore writing about politics. His column, Holding Center, runs every other Wednesday.

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Progressivism is not better than conservatism - Daily Trojan Online

President Donald Trump made an unannounced visit Saturday afternoon to the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland.

The White House said the visit was for a "quick exam and labs" to kick-off the initial phase of his annual physical exam in anticipation of a "very busy 2020," according to CNN. Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham told Fox News' Jeanine Pirro on Saturday evening that the president is as "healthy as can be."

"He has more energy than anybody in the White House. That man works from 6 a.m. until very, very late at night," Grisham added.

Assurances from the White House did little to quash rumors and speculation about the 73-year-old president's health and joke about possible ailments.

Vox journalist Aaron Rupar tweeted that "Trump's trip to the hospital was 'routine' in the same way his call with the Ukrainian president was 'perfect.'" Meanwhile, progressive website DailyKos published a post early Sunday morning titled "Trump and his 'chest discomfort' go to Walter Reed" with screenshots of unsubstantiated internet rumors about the president's health.

Former Hillary Clinton campaign staffer Charlotte Clymer joked the "chest pain" rumors were "absurd" since "Trump doesn't have a heart," she tweeted.

Feminist author Amy Siskind used the occasion to attack Trump and urge journalists to investigate his hospital visit, as it could push the GOP to abandon the president. "I hope our media is digging into the truth behind this. We all know that dictators are only able to maintain power from strength. The moment Republicans smell weakness, they will turn on Trump like hyenas," she said on Twitter.

Progressive political pundit Bill Palmer joked that Trump's visit to Walter Reed was the start of a bad day that could culminate with the president "going to prison."

Another former Clinton aide, Claude Taylor, speculated on Twitter that the president was being treated for a "panic attack."

Whatever may have prompted the president's visit to Walter Reed Hospital on Saturday, Trump was apparently back to his usual self by Sunday.

The commander in chief addressed his unannounced trip and spent much of the day tweeting. "Visited great family of a young man under major surgery at the amazing Walter Reed Medical Center, said the president. "Also began phase one of my yearly physical. Everything very good (great!). Will complete next year."

President Trump then spent much of the morning praising allies, like Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) and former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, as well as taking shots at foes, including the New York Times' Paul Krugman and former Republican Matthew Dowd.

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Progressives joke and speculate about Trump's health after an unscheduled hospital visit - TheBlaze