17 April, 2021

April 17, 1964

The Ford Mustang Debuts at the World’s Fair!

Another InstaPundit Post I Must Quote In Its Entirety

Instapundit » Blog Archive » JIM TREACHER: Ted Cruz Stops Wearing a Mask After Getting the Vaccine, Which Is Somehow Newsworthy. … (pjmedia.com)

JIM TREACHER: Ted Cruz Stops Wearing a Mask After Getting the Vaccine, Which Is Somehow Newsworthy.

Why?

This isn’t a rhetorical question. If these vaccines work, why do vaccinated people need to wear masks?

Why?

People are getting kicked off passenger flights for allowing their children to eat without masks, as if it were somehow possible for them to eat with their mouths covered.

Why?

Jen Psaki regularly stands at a podium in front of the White House press corps, all of whom are wearing masks, and she never wears a mask.

Why?

There hasn’t been a single reported case of someone getting COVID-19 from touching a surface, yet there’s still all this cleaning theater going on. A public figure walks away from a microphone, and somebody rushes in and sprays down everything he might’ve touched or breathed on.

Why?

Now one of the vaccines has been pulled entirely because there’s literally one chance in a million that if you’re pregnant or on birth control, you could get blood clots. That’s a 0.0001% chance.

Why?

None of this crap makes sense. There’s nothing scientific about any of this. It’s just hysteria. Superstition.

From everything I’ve seen and read, these vaccines work wonderfully. Miraculously, even. I’m getting my second dose next week, and I can’t wait. I’m not spending one more minute living like this than I have to.

Ron DeSantis has the best response to the multi-mask-obsessed left:

I had my 2nd vaccine dose almost a week ago. When my two week period is up, I probably won’t stop wearing masks entirely, but I’ll start limiting use. And I expect by the end of next month to only be wearing masks where required by the proprietor of wherever I’m entering.

And I may ask them why it’s necessary.

We need to go back to living normal lives. This whole China Virus hysteria has to end. And it has to end soon.

A Bad Day for @Jack, I think

After Twitter Banned James O’Keefe, Conservatives Accuse Them Of Protecting CNN: ‘They’re All On The Same Team’ (lifezette.com)

Donald Trump Jr. says what we’re all thinking.

This is how it works. This is the propaganda arm of the Democratic Party. No unfiltered or unapproved message is allowed to be published. And absolutely nothing that might go against the narrative or bring harm in any way to the left. Such voiced must be silenced. Permanently.

Welcome to Biden’s America.

#IToldYouSo

Live From New York—It’s Project Veritas!

BREAKING: Project Veritas confronts Brian Stelter after CNN director admits to creating propaganda | The Post Millennial

Brian Stelter becomes the first of what I predict will be many at CNN to learn that it’s foolish to make enemies of Project Veritas.

I Noticed This Had Happened During My Two Weeks of Catching Up on Blogging, but Wasn’t Sure of Details

BREAKING: Twitter permanently bans Project Veritas founder James O'Keefe | The Post Millennial

I don’t see how they can back this up. He posted some undercover videos. Unless they are planning on shutting down “60 Minutes” and “20/20” and other “news magazine” shows that do the same thing, they don’t have a legal leg to stand on.

Update: Twitter responded to queries saying that "The account was permanently suspended for violating the Twitter Rules on platform manipulation and spam."

Uh huh. He tweets to promote his videos. If they banned people for that, they’d lost 3/4 of their “blue checkmark” members

I agree with Andy Ngo here:

Prediction: this will not end well for Twitter.

Or CNN.

I’ve Not Posted on This Even Though It Occurred Right Here

I don’t know what to say. At least there so far does not appear to be a rush to judgment on this one.

I’m just going to provide some links. Read or not, as you will. I may have more comments in the coming days.

Eight Dead in Indianapolis FedEx Shooting – PJ Media

Indianapolis FedEx facility gunman identified | One America News Network (oann.com)

The Indianapolis shooter had previous FBI contact due to mental health related issues and threats – The New Neo

CBS News Caught Lying—Again

Never forget. This is the news network that brought you Rathergate.

CBS News slammed for cropping bodycam footage of Adam Toledo holding gun before fatal shooting | Fox News

I can’t imagine that CBS would deceptively edit anything, can you?

Maybe we should ask Governor Ron DeSantis (R-FL).

Not only did Florida Democrats speak out in defense of DeSantis, "60 Minutes" was caught editing an exchange between the governor and correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi that omitted his explanation of what led to a coronavirus vaccine distribution deal with the company.

Oh yeah, that’s right. This is nothing new for them.

This Is Only True If You Are Willfully Blind

CNN's Lemon: 'You Don't See Racists' Flourishing in the Democratic Party (breitbart.com)

I’ll be blunt. The Democratic party was founded upon racism. It has always been built upon racism. And it always will be. It’s part of being a Democrat.

The Week in Pictures

“I’m finally caught up”

Via Power Line Blog:

 

She’s Right

Breonna Taylor’s Mother Claims BLM Louisville Is A ‘Fraud’ That Exploited Her Daughter’s Death | The Daily Wire

She’s Right.

Breonna Taylor’s death is tragic.

But it’s the result of standing next to a person wanted on drug charges who opened fire on police officers.

That is always going to be a very high risk place to be. You want to avoid getting shot by police? Don’t put yourself in such a situation.

Tamika Palmer, the mother of 26-year-old Breonna Taylor, said in a Facebook post that the Black Lives Matter organization is a “fraud” that exploited her daughter’s death. Taylor was killed last year when plainclothes police officers executed a no-knock warrant on her Louisville, Kentucky home.

It’s worth pointing out for the record, once again, that while police had a no-knock warrant, they did not execute a no-knock warrant, as the paragraph above states. They did, in fact, knock. Sadly, that may have been the cause of the shooting.

Breonna’s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, heard the knock, and knew the police were there for him, and he started shooting. They fired back. Breonna was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Had they actually executed a no-knock warrant, Breonna Taylor might still be alive.

Ugh. No. If You Vote for This, You’re Admitting That You’re Not Qualified To Be In Congress, Because You Don’t Understand 7th Grade Civics

Full House Will Vote to Make Washington D.C. a State Tuesday (breitbart.com)

The founders had very good reasons for this. It’s spelled out in the Constitution and in their writings of the time. Even if you think they’re wrong, the answer isn’t to make D.C. a state, but to merge it back into Maryland and Virginia.

This is beyond stupid.

[T]wenty-two state Attorneys General sent a letter Tuesday to President Joe Biden and Congress arguing Washington, D.C., cannot transition into a state via legislation, but only through the method of a Constitutional amendment.

The primary arguments against D.C. statehood are:

  1. Our nation’s capital was always meant to be unique. The Framers established in the Constitution’s District Clause that the nation’s capital is a federal district, existing beyond the borders or influence of any state.
  2. H.R. 51 is doubly unconstitutional, violating both the plain meaning of the District Clause as well as the necessary implications of the Twenty-Third Amendment.
  3. Even those who support D.C. statehood admit district residents enjoy special benefits due to where they live and would enjoy an outsize influence in Congress.

I no longer understand Democrats. And they clearly don’t understand the United States.

Oh, That #FakeNews

Master List Of Official Russia Claims That Proved To Be Bogus - TK News by Matt Taibbi (substack.com)

Too many to quote here. Read the whole thing.

An excerpt:

Ex-spy Christopher Steele was a “credible source,” October 31, 2016. In Mother Jones, David Corn cited a “senior U.S. government official,” who characterized an ex-spy who claimed Russia had been cultivating Donald Trump for at least five years, and could “blackmail him.” Corn’s senior official said the ex-spy, who we later found out was Christopher Steele, was “a credible source with a proven record of providing reliable, sensitive, and important information to the US government.”

But Steele was subsequently dismissed as an FBI source for his “completely untrustworthy” decision to talk to the media, and Horowitz not only discovered that both the FBI and the CIA (who dismissed his reports as “internet rumor”) had many reservations about his credibility, but that his famed “blackmail” claims about pee and prostitutes had been made in “jest,” over “beers.”

And:

Updated 3/29/21 More than Circumstantial Evidence” for collision [sic], Meet The Press, March 22, 2017. The ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff, was asked by Chuck Todd on Meet the Press if he only had a circumstantial case for collusion against Donald Trump.

“Actually no, Chuck,” he said. “I can tell you that the case is more than that and I can't go into the particulars, but there is more than circumstantial evidence now.”

Schiff never had such evidence, and never explained what he meant. Moreover, in secret testimony, he would repeatedly seek confirmation of his public statements, and would repeatedly be shot down. In July of 2017, he asked former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper if such evidence existed. Clapper said he “never saw any direct empirical evidence that the Trump campaign or someone in it was plotting/conspiring with the Russians to meddle with the election.”

Far more at the link. Read the whole thing.

Social Distancing and Masks Can’t Last Forever

CDC: Just 5,800 known "breakthrough" COVID infections in more than 66 million fully vaccinated people so far – HotAir

These so-called breakthrough cases, which are defined as positive Covid-19 test results received at least two weeks after patients receive their final vaccine dose, represent 0.008% of the fully vaccinated population

And yet, you’re still not allowed out without a mask. The China Virus hysteria has gone on long enough. It’s time to end it. I think it will end on its own. I think people are sick and tired of social distancing and mask wearing, and they see the numbers daily on increasing vaccinations, and they are going to say in one collective voice “enough”. And that will be it.

I predict this happens by Memorial Day, the unofficial start of summer.

The Left Doesn’t Care About Misinformation—They Care About Losing Their Stranglehold On It

This was huge news at the time. But just one more drop in the bucket of fake news about the President.

U.S. Officials Walk Back Claim that Russia Paid Bounties – PJ Media

There’s no excuse for the Times running this story. Will anyone hold them to account?

According to the officials on Thursday’s call, the reporting about the alleged “bounties” came from “detainee reporting” – raising the specter that someone told their U.S.-aligned Afghan jailers what they thought was necessary to get out of a cage. Specifically, the official cited “information and evidence of connections to criminal agents in Afghanistan and elements of the Russian government” as sources for the intelligence community’s assessment.

Without additional corroboration, such reporting is notoriously unreliable.

Obviously, the Times didn’t get “additional corroboration.” They saw a juicy anti-Trump story and ran it without checking it.

“All the news that’s fit to fake.”

Oh, that #FakeNews.

There’s a reason President Donald Trump referred to you as “enemies of the people.”

Boy Did You Step In It. I Bet Georgians Are More Glad Than Ever That You’re Not Their Governor

Stacey Abrams Group Tells Hollywood To Nix Boycotting Georgia | The Daily Wire

Abrams was up in arms on the new law and encouraging others, including corporations, to be up in arms as well.

Then she saw the results and figured out what it would mean to Georgia.

Oops.

An organization founded by failed gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams has called upon Hollywood to continue standing against Georgia’s voter integrity laws while not hurting the state economically.

In a statement to Newsweek, Fair Fight, the voter organization founded by Stacy Abrams, told Hollywood to “stay and fight” the new law as opposed to cutting and running.

When one of your political leaders in a state chases businesses away, that’s a bad thing.

“[Governor] Brian Kemp [(R-GA)] and Georgia Republican lawmakers are singularly responsible for any job that is lost and any dollar that goes out of Georgia, because they prioritized suppressing voters of color over the economic well-being of all Georgians,” Fair Fight spokesman Seth Bringman told Newsweek.

No. Not the Governor. You. These businesses didn’t consider leaving until you started lying about the law and trying to drum up outrage. You’re lying now. This is all your fault and you know it. You’re stupid and pathetic and it’s clear that Georgians would be much better off if you would just shut up and go away.

Biden Said the D.C. Riots Would Have Been Handled Differently If The Perpetrators Were Black—He’s Absolutely Right

WALSH: Ashli Babbitt Was Killed By Capitol Police On January 6. They Still Won’t Tell Us Who Did It Or Why. | The Daily Wire

If Ashli Babbitt had been a Person of Color, we would have had this information within days of the January 6 riot, probably hours.It has been three months and we still don’t know. Compare with the shooting of Daunte Wright.

Less than a day after armed robbery suspect Daunte Wright was shot by police, the name of the police officer who pulled the trigger was publicly released. A short time later, her address was leaked. Now her home is surrounded by concrete barricades, metal fencing, and armed police guards, in hopes of preventing the violent mob from burning it to the ground. This is generally how things have played out for all of the high-profile police shootings in recent memory. All except one.

It was announced yesterday by the DOJ that the officer who shot Ashli Babbitt, one of the pro-Trump rioters at the Capitol on January 6th, will not be charged in her death.

We don’t know who the shooter was. It looks like we’ll never know. And he won’t be charged with anything.

They couldn’t get away with this if Babbitt were Black. We’d have riots in the streets every day until the information was released and until the shooter was charged.

Note I corrected some errors in the original text in this next quoted bit.

[Four Three] months later, and we know absolutely nothing about the federal officer who shot an unarmed woman in the Capitol. It took one day to find out who shot Daunte Wright and where she lives. But more than [120 100] days after Babbitt’s killing, and we know as much about the shooter as we did the moment after he pulled the trigger.

I hope Babbitt’s family sues for this information and for retribution for their grievances.

Oddly, we have had no additional riots over this event, despite it being three months ago and we still don’t know anything.

President Joe Biden (D-USA) was right. This would have been handled completely differently if Babbitt was a Person of Color.

If You Still Had Doubts About CNN, This Should End Them

CNN Twists the Facts on Race, Shootings, and BLM – PJ Media

More in the same undercover series by Project Veritas.

“I was trying to do some research on the Asian hate, like the people [who] are getting attacked and whatnot. A bunch of black men have been attacking Asians,” Chester says in the latest Project Veritas video. “I’m like ‘What are you doing? Like, we [CNN] are trying to help BLM.'”

“The optics of that are not good,” the CNN director admits. He says these “little things… are enough to set back movements, because the far Left will start to latch on and create stories like ‘criminalizing an entire people,’ you know, just easier headlines that way, I guess.”

Chester later explains that he meant to say “the far Right” when he said “the far Left.”

This really is propaganda. There’s no other word for it. It’s not news.

“You can shape an entire people’s perception about anything [depending] on how you do it,” he says.

Sick.

This May Be the Only Way She’s Not Reelected

Trump Celebrates After Sen. Murkowski Indicates She May Not Run Again - 'Great News' (lifezette.com)

The headline exaggerates a little, though.

President Donald Trump is in celebration mode right now after Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) said that she has not decided if she will run again for reelection.

To me, there’s quite a bit of difference between “indicates she may not” and “hasn’t decided yet”.

It would be something to be excited about. It’s almost certain that any other Senator from Alaska would be a more reliably conservative vote. A Democrat has almost no chance of being elected there, and Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) is very much a moderate Republican.

This Is Textbook Media Bias and Gaslighting

Drew Holden lays it all out here. Read the whole thing. I’ll copy of a couple of the more egregious examples, but there are many more.

Drew Holden’s thread on media’s brazenly biased coverage of Trump and Biden on Afghanistan may be his ‘most damning’ yet [screenshots] – twitchy.com

Read the whole thing. Really. If you’re not appalled, then you’re deranged.

This Is the Very Definition of “Gaslighting”

Nadler: ‘We’re Not Packing The Court. We’re Unpacking It.’ | The Daily Wire

On Thursday, defending the plan he has sponsored to pack the Supreme Court with additional justices so that the Democrats have control over the Court, Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-NY) insisted, “Some people say we’re packing the Court. We’re not packing the Court; we’re unpacking it.”

The Democrats must change the rules anytime they lose. Their end goal is to change the rules enough so that they never lose again.

Court packing is a stupid idea, though.

Look, I’m not saying there’s something magical about the number 9 and that we must have 9 Supreme Court justices. I’m sure we can make just about any relatively low number work. It used to be 7 up until about 100 years ago.

But packing the court for political reasons is doomed to failure and will only result in escalation. So, the Democrats add four more Justices in 2021. Then the Republicans take back Congress & The White House in 2024, so they respond by adding four more Justices in 2025. Where does it end?

I’m really hoping saner heads prevail on this one, but sanity is not in great supply in Washington, D.C. right now.

I Can’t Argue With This

In fact, I find it thoroughly disgusting that Dan Rather is treated with respect by anyone at all.

Which Brand of Conservatism Will Win in 2022?

Donald Trump Plans Endorsement in Wyoming Primary Against 'Crazy Liz Cheney' (breitbart.com)

Clearly, President Donald Trump (R-USA)  is planning on being a major force in the 2022 elections. It will be interesting to see how his preferred candidates fair in both the primaries and the general elections.

President Donald Trump said Wednesday he would make an endorsement in the Republican primary against Rep. Liz Cheney, warning too many Republican challengers would allow her to win reelection.

“So many people are looking to run against Crazy Liz Cheney — but we only want one,” Trump outlined in a statement to reporters.

I can’t wait to see how this turns out. Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY-AL) has clearly out-lived her usefulness to the party.

Idiocy in Government

You’re complaining that not enough people are taking the vaccine. You’re complaining about people not having confidence in the vaccine. And then 6 people out of 6 million get blood clots, so what do you do? You shut it down.

Effect?

BREAKING: Biden Admin’s Decision To Pause J&J Vaccine Causes Confidence In Vaccine To Plummet | The Daily Wire

Morons.

“Among those who started the survey before the announcement about the Johnson & Johnson vaccine pause, about half (52%) considered the shot ‘very safe’ or ‘somewhat safe’ – twice the number who believed it ‘very unsafe’ or ‘somewhat unsafe’,” the poll said. “After the announcement was made, these figures had converged – just 37% called the vaccine safe, and 39% feeling it unsafe.”

The poll also said that the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine has suffered reputational damage after experiencing setbacks in Europe. The vaccine has not been approved for use in the U.S.

Most of the country can’t or won’t bother to do the math. They assume you did and “paused” the vaccine for valid reasons.

Morons.

It’s a Shame We Won’t Be Continuing These Policies, Then

US Sanctions Pushed Iran to Brink of Bankruptcy - Washington Free Beacon

I’d like to go much farther than just “the brink”.

Iran burned through nearly all of its cash reserves in the final years of the Trump administration as harsh economic sanctions crippled the country’s economy and brought the hardline regime to the brink of financial collapse, according to findings published by the International Monetary Fund.

The Islamic Republic had $122.5 billion on hand in 2018 and just $4 billion by 2020, when the former administration’s "maximum pressure" campaign on Tehran was at its height, according to the IMF’s 2021 Middle East and Central Asia report, which tracks the region’s economies. Iran burned through $118.5 billion in two years, nearly depleting its cash reserves. The country’s coffers are forecast to grow by several billions in the coming years as the Biden administration moves to unwind sanctions as part of an effort to reenter the 2015 nuclear deal.

Regime change must be our goal in Iran. The Ayatollahs must be removed as a political force. Economic sanctions are the best way to do that. We were soooooo close.

And now it looks like our new President will just destroy years of hard work.

“Number 2” Is What I Think Of When I Think Of Her Work In Iran, so It Fits.

Senate confirms Wendy Sherman for No. 2 post at State Department - Al Monitor: The Pulse of the Middle East (al-monitor.com)

Sherman was the lead negotiator for the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. The debate over her nomination mostly focused on the agreement, which the Biden administration is currently seeking to reenter.

Yeah, she’s definitely a “number 2” person. The entire Iran deal was a “number 2”, as I’ve mentioned before.

Brett Favre on Woke Politics in Sports

As a player, I couldn’t stand Favre. QB for the hated Packers and all that.

As a person, I’ve come to really respect him. He definitely seems as if he has not let fame and fortune affect him. He seems like he’s the same guy he’d be if he’d never played in the NFL, just a whole lot wealthier.

I am not sure I would be as grounded if I’d had his life experiences. So I find that impressive.

NFL Legend Brett Favre Slams Woke Sports Leagues: 'It's A Shame' (thefederalist.com)

“I think both sides, for the most part, want to see it just remain about the sport, not about politics,” Favre said. “At least that’s my interpretation. I know when I turn on a game, I want to watch the game. I want to watch the players play and teams win and lose and come from behind. I want to watch all the important parts of the game, not what’s going on outside the game. I think the general fan feels the same way.”

My mom and I used to talk about “preachy” shows on TV, and how much they drove us crazy. Even if they were preaching what we believed. I don’t tune in to M*A*S*H or Friends, or whatever to be lectured on the issues of the day. I tune in to be distracted from them, to be entertained. It’s the same with sports. If I can’t use sports as an escape, there’s no point in watching.

Favre gets that. I wish more players did.

I Often Disagree With Nate Silver on Process and His Conclusions, but the Dude Knows Math

Wow, Donald Trump and Nate Silver Agree On Something... and It's Huge – PJ Media

It is huge. What is it? It’s that we should not stop giving out the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. The numbers don’t support such a move.

Explanation here:

“Say there’s a 1 in 100 chance someone acquires COVID because of a delayed vaccine (maybe conservative in the US where spread is still quite high) and a 1 in 150 chance they die from it. That’s a 1 in 15,000 chance vs. 1 blood clot death in 7,000,000 doses so far,” Silver explained.

“We also have to consider that the person who gets COVID because of a delayed vaccine will pass her case along to an average of 1 other person…. So the death rate is actually twice as high as I indicated above,” he added.

In other words, a pause for the J&J vaccine is almost certainly going to do more harm than good.

That’s just stupid, as Silver makes clear:

“It’s going to create more vaccine hesitancy,” Silver tweeted. “These people don’t understand cost-benefit analysis. They keep making mistakes by orders of magnitude.”

“He Was Doing a Great Job”, But We Fired Him Anyway

The Death Of Due Process: Supporting A Constitutional Right Now Gets You Fired | The Daily Wire

Brooklyn Center City Manager Curt Boganey was fired on Monday, just hours after he suggested the police officer who fatally shot Daunte Wright in Minneapolis should receive due process before being fired.

After firing Boganey, the Brooklyn Center city council expressed fears that Boganey’s comments about due process might cause the city to further descend into violence.

If his comments about supporting a Constitutional right causes your city to descend into violence, you need to do some better messaging with your citizenry.

“He was doing a great job. I respect him dearly,” [Council Member Kris Lawrence-Anderson] said. “I didn’t want repercussions at a personal level.”

He was doing a great job, but they fired him anyway. Not for poor behavior. Not for incitement to violence. But for speaking out in favor of a Constitutional Right.

If this is wrong, I don’t want to be right.

Riots? What Riots?

Google shadowbans news about Minnesota violence in its search results for "riots today" (reclaimthenet.org)

If you can’t trust your search engine, who can you trust?

News about the two nights of violence that erupted in Minnesota following the police shooting of Daunte Wright has been almost totally purged from the Google Search news tab results for the term “riots today.”

With the exception of a single news story from Fox News, which is buried below the fold four results down, the results are dominated by news stories about the less relevant January 6 storming of the US Capitol and riots in Montreal following COVID-19 curfews.

Huh. Interesting. What about other search engines?

Searching for the same “riots today” term in the privacy-focused search engine DuckDuckGo does display unfiltered news stories about the Minnesota violence in its news tab results with eight of the top 10 results covering the unrest in Minnesota.

Imagine that.

Interestingly, the Google Search news tab results for “protests today” are dominated by coverage of the unrest in Minnesota with six of the top 10 results covering the story. The shadowban is only triggered when the searcher characterizes the recent events in Minnesota as “riots.”

Ah. So they’re “protests”, not “riots”. I would love to see how their algorithm made that choice and to see if it had any outside help in its decision making process.

He May Use This in 2022, but Most Of It Won’t Be For an Election That Year

Florida Gov. DeSantis Rakes In Huge Fundraising Haul For 2022 - The Political Insider

PACs don’t have to raise funds for a specific election. He can use this for his reelection campaign in Florida in 2022, or for a bigger election in 2024.

Apparently Speaking About Eastern Orthodoxy Is No Longer Allowed by Facebook

Facebook swings the banhammer and hits a monk.

Facebook bans Orthodox Christian monk, Abbot Tryphon (reclaimthenet.org)

Facebook has banned the page of an Orthodox Christian monk based in the Pacific Northwest, cutting him off from his nearly 40,000 followers without prior warning.

In a blog post entitled, “Dark Forces,” Abbot Tryphon of All-Merciful Saviour Monastery on Vashon Island, Washington, explains his mission in life and on the internet, and his situation now that the trend of, as he said, the truth being blocked online by dark forces has affected him as well.

I’ve read a little bit. The worst (it appears) that you can say about Tryphon is that he may be a bit of a kook. So what? He’d probably say I’m a bit of a kook. He might have harsher words for me than that. And I probably deserve them. Being eccentric doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t be allowed a voice.

As for Facebook, the abbot said his goal was to share encouragement and equip his followers on this social network with the tools to cope with what he describes as “the age of nihilism.”

Abbot Tryphon describes the internet as something that, while it does plenty of harm, also presents a very useful way for Christians, including Orthodox ones, to communicate and spread their message.

Ahh. See, he probably said some bad things about Big Tech. Big Tech protects its own.

16 April, 2021

75,000,000 Voters Say Otherwise

Flake Attacks Trump And His Voters - Says He 'Plays Well To The Base, But It's A Shrinking Base' (lifezette.com)

“I think there are a number of Republicans, a lot of Republicans who want the get back there,” Flake said. “John was right, what went on in Mar-a-Lago, it plays well to the base, but it’s a shrinking base. If we want to be successful in future elections, then we have to do more what John Boehner is talking about. We’ve got to appeal to a broader electorate. That shouldn’t be hard to figure out, but that is what we have to do.”

If it’s more of Club for Growth Republicans like John Boehner count me out.

Twice.

CNN, Goebbels Would Be So Proud of You

PART 1: CNN Director ADMITS Network Engaged in ‘Propaganda’ to Remove Trump from Presidency … ‘Our Focus Was to Get Trump Out of Office’ … ‘I Came to CNN Because I Wanted to Be a Part of That’ | Project Veritas

CNN_Web_Thumbnail_-_Part_1__2_

“Look what we did, we [CNN] got Trump out. I am 100% going to say it, and I 100% believe that if it wasn't for CNN, I don't know that Trump would have got voted out…I came to CNN because I wanted to be a part of that,” Chester revealed.

and

“[Trump’s] hand was shaking or whatever, I think. We brought in so many medical people to tell a story that was all speculation -- that he was neurologically damaged, and he was losing it. He's unfit to -- you know, whatever. We were creating a story there that we didn't know anything about. That's what -- I think that’s propaganda,” Chester said.

There’s lots more including video at the link. I was trying to link to O’Keefe’s Tweet about it, but surprisingly his account has been suspended.

Leftist media protects its own.

#ThisIsCNN

But Twitter Won’t Let You Talk About It

BLM Of NYC Calls For ‘Independent Investigation’ Of BLM Co-Founder After $3.2 Million Home-Buying Binge | The Daily Wire

The head of New York City’s Black Lives Matter (BLM) chapter is calling for an investigation into Patrisse Cullors, a co-founder of BLM, following her purchase of four homes worth millions of dollars.

Hawk Newsome, who leads Black Lives Matter Greater New York City, called for “an independent investigation” into Cullors’ finances and the operations of the national Black Lives Matter group.

Well, that sounds kind of newsworthy. Exactly the kind of thing I might expect to see breaking on Twitter.

Oh, yeah, there’s that little problem.

April 16, 1963

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. pens his famous “Letter from Birmingham Jail”.

MartinLutherKingBirminghamJ

Oh Gee, I Can’t Imagine This Being Abused

Users can now appeal to Facebook's Oversight Board to delete content – Neowin

Facebook has announced that, starting today, users of either Facebook or Instagram can now appeal to the company's Oversight Board if reported content is left up on the platforms. In October of last year, Facebook had announced that the board was ready to start reviewing cases, but it was limited to appealing content that was removed, if the user disagreed with that decision. Now, if a user reports content and Facebook decides it doesn't go against its Community Standards, the user can request an additional review.

When requesting further reviews by the Oversight Board, users can select a number of reasons for the appeal. For example, they may believe the content goes against the Community Standards, but they may also consider that the Community Standards aren't where they should be, which could potentially prompt Facebook to rework its policies.

We need less Thought Police, not more. This just gets worse and worse day by day. Practically hour by hour.

Good Thing MLB Moved the All-Star Game, Huh?

List: Georgia among 'easiest' states to vote in, better than Delaware and New York | Washington Examiner

A new nonpartisan evaluation of 2022 election laws has named Georgia as one of the easiest states to vote early in, a repudiation of attacks from baseball, corporate America, and others that criticized new state reforms under pressure from liberals, including President Joe Biden.

While critics have called recent reforms in the state “racist” and an effort to limit minority voting, the Center for Election Innovation and Research found that Georgia is among the 36 states with the easiest rules.

D’oh!

YouTube Strikes Again—Are You Sensing a Theme?

YouTube bans Sebastian Gorka's channel for repeated violations of 'presidential election integrity policy' | Washington Examiner

"In accordance with our long standing strikes system, we terminated the channel America First with Sebastian Gorka, for repeated violations of our presidential election integrity policy," Ivy Choi, a YouTube spokesperson, told the Washington Examiner on Sunday. "As we’ve publicly shared, our presidential election integrity policy prohibits content uploaded after last year’s safe harbor deadline that alleges widespread fraud or errors changed the outcome of the 2020 U.S. presidential election. Any channel that violates this policy will receive a strike and channels that receive three strikes in the same 90-day period are permanently removed from YouTube, as in the case of America First with Sebastian Gorka."

If you were confident in your opinions, you wouldn’t be bothered by the voicing of others. Silencing dissent is not a way to encourage people to believe what you have to say.

People Need To Give Nikki Haley a Break For Not Being In Lockstep With Trump

She’s a good team player and conservatives could do far worse than her as the nominee.

She’s still a team player:

When You’ve Lost Nate Silver, It’s Time To Hang It Up

Nate Silver Accuses Dr. Fauci of Gaslighting on COVID Transmission – PJ Media

Fauci needs to just shut up and go away.

The Firemen in Fahrenheit 451 Would Be So Proud

Another online retailer, Bookshop.org, bans Ryan T. Anderson's "When Harry Became Sally" (reclaimthenet.org)

Another retailer has banned a book critiquing aspects of transgender ideology. The book-burning started in February, when Amazon silently removed all traces of the book from its ecommerce platform.

Bookshop.org, a bookselling online shop, has banned “When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Movement,” because of multiple complaints.

Don’t allow people to read books on current events and current culture. They might learn something different than what you want them to learn.

YouTube Is on a Censorship Spree

YouTube suspends Indian news outlet that covered workers' protests over lockdowns (reclaimthenet.org)

YouTube has banned the channel of Millat Times, an Indian news website, for posting a video showing workers protesting lockdown in the state of Maharashtra. YouTube said that the video violated its COVID-19 misinformation policy.

On April 9, Millat Times uploaded a video titled “People Continue Protest Against Lockdown, Gherai CM’s House.” The post showed clips of people protesting the newly enforced lockdown in Maharashtra outside the state’s Chief Minister’s residence.

I don’t see how showing protests can possibly be a violation of a misinformation policy. But then, I don’t think they should have a misinformation policy unless they take an extremely narrow view of what constitutes misinformation that must be censored.

Hint: they don’t.

The New York Times Is Complicit in the Border Crisis Cover-Up

As the founder of RealClearPolitics makes “real clear”.

There’s a Word for This

‘Twitch’ Live Streaming Platform Creates Snitch Service To Police Off-Platform Thought and Conduct (legalinsurrection.com)

“we’ve created a dedicated email address where anyone can report egregious, off-service misconduct in the categories above committed by a member of the Twitch community,” the company noted in an April 7th blog post.

If I were “a member of the Twitch community”, I would destroy my account this instant.

There’s a word for this. And it isn’t “anti-fascist”.

I’ll Just Let You Speculate on Why

Twitter censors criticism of BLM founder's $1.4 million home purchase (reclaimthenet.org)

Twitter has censored those posting tweets criticizing Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Khan-Cullors for purchasing a home worth over $1.4 million.

Cullors’ purchase of the property was covered by various outlets, including dirt.com[.]

Hmm. Well, that seems newsworthy. Why can’t I post that?

Multiple Twitter users who posted the article from dirt.com showed Reclaim The Net evidence that their accounts had been locked for posting the article. Twitter said it was due to posting “private information.”

She’s a public figure. We comment on purchases by public figures all the time. It’s never before been considered “private information” to my knowledge.

But the issue here is not the expensive house or what she chooses to do with her income. The issue is Twitter’s censorship of the criticism. Like any other public figure, Cullors will continue being the subject of public scrutiny and commentary and Twitter censoring articles that criticize Cullors under the premise of photos of the home being shown, is only fueling censorship accusations against Twitter.

Well said.

Leave. Twitter. Now.

This. Is. CNN.

Note the chyron at the bottom. This is real. Not Photoshop. CNN actually thinks it’s important that Fox News hosts have not posted selfies of themselves getting vaccinated.

Really.

Trump Proven Right—Again. but You’re Probably Not Allowed to Talk About It on Twitter or Facebook

Trump Vindicated as Judge Rules Michigan Secretary of State Violated Election Laws – PJ Media

A judge in Michigan has vindicated President Trump by ruling that Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, broke state law when she unilaterally changed election rules concerning absentee balloting in the 2020 election. This ruling legitimizes a key claim made by the Trump legal team in its challenges to the 2020 election.

A major change imposed by Benson was loosening the signature verification requirement for absentee ballots. Michigan Court of Claims Chief Judge Christopher Murray ruled that this change violated Michigan Administrative Procedures Act.

So, what’s the end result of this? There were 3.1 million votes cast by absentee ballot in 2020. A significant number of them were probably invalid. I won’t say fraudulent. We can speculate that the loosened restrictions allowed for more fraud potential and therefore it’s more likely that fraud occurred. But we don’t really have any hard evidence on how much fraud there was. Nor are we likely to find any, because it’s just very hard to prove after the fact.

But we can say “invalid”. The loosened restrictions allowed many ballots to be counted that normally would not be. Biden led widely in absentee ballots, so any significant reduction in the legal count of absentees likely would have turned the state election to Trump.

In fact, I think it’s fair to say that based upon this ruling, that without the loosened restrictions, Trump would have almost certainly won the state. I am not saying the election will be overturned, or even that it should be. I don’t believe either of those are the case at this point. This is one of the many problems with voter fraud. If you can ever prove it, it takes so long to do, that it’s almost certainly too late by then.

I’m really curious, though. Twitter and Facebook have blocked almost any discussion regarding voting issues in the 2020 election. I assume that they still are doing so, and now you’ll not be allowed to talk about a legal win for Trump in court.

He Can Still Change His Mind, But This Makes It Harder

Joe Manchin has written an op-ed in the Wapo saying he will uphold the filibuster – The New Neo

Politicians often say one thing and then do another, but if you take the trouble to write an Op-Ed in a major newspaper like The Washington Post, and then you change your mind, you know you’re going to be in trouble back home.

So, this is encouraging news if you like the filibuster the way it is. And will no doubt cause much teeth-gnashing on the side of the aisle that is (currently) against it.

One thing that will be interesting to see is if the Republicans ever regain control of the Senate and White House, whether or not all those people currently screaming “Jim Crow” about the filibuster will become once again its biggest supporters. I can’t wait to see that.

15 April, 2021

I Think This Is Wrong

It’s in poor taste. But it’s not evil. I suppose that’s a step up for our President.

White House says Biden not planning to attend Prince Philip's funeral | Washington Examiner

The Week in Pictures

I’d fallen quite a bit behind in my blogging. Hence several TWiP posts over the last week or so. I’m almost caught up though. This is from last Saturday. Next Saturday I should post one more and that will be the current one.

Via Power Line Blog:

 

YouTube Is Going After Everyone Now

YouTube demonetizes gun review channel Justin Opinion (reclaimthenet.org)

Justin Opinion, a YouTube channel that reviews guns and related gear, has been told that it’s no longer eligible to monetize its videos because YouTube has deemed them to be “harmful content.”

The channel has been posting to YouTube since 2012 and during that time, it has racked up more than 23 million total views and gained over 84,000 subscribers.

I imagine that was fairly lucrative.

Well, we can’t have that. Not in 2021. YouTube won’t let anyone make any money off guns by using their service.

“From where I sit, it seems extremely arbitrary,” the channel’s host Justin said. “There was no information given that was of any use to me. I have always tried to comply with policies and to the best of my, of my knowledge, I do comply with their policies of YouTube and, but they say ‘harmful content’ is, is the reason.”

Justin added that because his channel is small, there’s nobody he can talk to at YouTube.

“‘We’ve made this arbitrary and vague ruling that drastically affects you, good luck with that,'” Justin said. “So, that is the, that is the hatred that is, that is the YouTube organization towards its ‘partners.'”

I just love Biden’s America, don’t you?

They Come For Everyone Eventually

Progressive news outlet Status Coup is at risk due to YouTube's heavy-handed censorship policies (reclaimthenet.org)

Once again YouTube has taken to making lives of independent creators and media who choose it as their distribution platform quite difficult, by removing content and threatening further restrictive action.

This time the policy of non-transparent removals hit Jordan Chariton, a progressive journalist, and an outlet he helped co-found, Status Coup.

YouTube must control the narrative. And part of that means that only “reliable sources” that agree with the narrative are allowed to post about it. If you’re a small shop, you can’t even post even if you agree.

Well, Who Didn’t See This Coming?

Biden creating Supreme Court reform commission, incl. expanding size | American Military News

President Joe Biden signed an executive order on Friday to create a commission of 36 legal experts to conduct a 180-day study on Supreme Court reform, including expanding the court’s size.

They can’t handle it that there’s a single piece of the government that they don’t control. This will destroy the value of the Supreme Court if it goes through. It will turn the Court into an overtly political body.

You could argue that it’s been turning itself into that over the last couple of decades and you might have a point, but I think for the most part the Justices have tried to resist that, particularly the ones on the right. That will end of Biden gets to pack the Court.

Another tipping point in the fall of America.

David Limbaugh on His Brother

I’m not going to excerpt even a tiny bit. Go there. Read the whole thing. David is a great man. I’ve interacted with him quite a bit over the years. He even sent me a gift of an autographed copy of his book on Obama.

Goodbye to My Brother, Rush Limbaugh – PJ Media

The Joe Rogan Experience—Now With Fewer Episodes!

Spotify has now censored 42 episodes of The Joe Rogan Experience (reclaimthenet.org)

Well, that makes a lot of sense. I can’t wait to see how they back this up.

Spotify declined to offer any explanation as to why it was removing certain episodes. The platform did not even respond to the enquiries and complaints’ from the show’s fans either.

Oh. Well, I guess I’ll have to wait, after all.

Eh. Who needs Freedom of Speech anyway?

If Opinions on Medicine From Medical Experts Violates Your Community Guidelines, You Have a Problem

YouTube censors DeSantis COVID-19 roundtable challenging lockdown consensus – TheBlaze

YouTube has removed a video of a public health roundtable hosted by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) with a panel of scientists and researchers who challenged the effectiveness of COVID-19 lockdowns and masks, claiming the discussion violated its Community Guidelines.

The roundtable, which took place at the state Capitol on March 18 and was streamed and posted to YouTube by WTSP-TV, featured former Trump White House coronavirus adviser Dr. Scott Atlas, epidemiologist Professor Sunetra Gupta, and researchers Dr. Jay Bhattacharya and Dr. Martin Kulldorff.

The scientists and researchers discussed how public policy measures adopted during the pandemic to mitigate spread of the virus, including quarantining healthy people, shutting businesses down, and mandating mask-wearing, were inspired in part by fear rather than by scientific evidence.

They only want you to hear one side of the story. And they have the power to make sure that’s what happens. Welcome to the USSA.

Biden’s America, folks.

#IToldYouSo

More From Indiana AG Todd Rokita

Excerpted in it’s entirety from DailyWire.com since this is from a public official.

I’m Launching An Investigation Into Big Tech Censorship. Here’s Why. | The Daily Wire

Big Tech’s well-documented censorship of conservative voices should concern every liberty-loving American.

That’s why I’m taking action to hold these online platforms accountable.

As Indiana’s Attorney General, I’m launching investigations into Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google and Twitter to examine ways in which their behavior potentially has harmed consumers in our state.

One of my express duties as Attorney General is to protect consumers from harm caused by deceptive, unfair, or abusive business practices. In a free society, few assets are more important to citizens than access to information and the opportunity to express political viewpoints in meaningful forums.

In the Declaration of Independence, our nation’s founders proclaimed their grievances against the King of England based on the principle that government derives its “just powers” from the “consent of the governed.”

In modern times, social media platforms have become the foremost outlets through which average citizens express either their consent or objection to government policies.

These methods give citizens not only the chance to speak, but a chance to be heard — and a chance to rally behind elected officeholders and other public figures who represent their values.

We all can agree that government is constitutionally prohibited from suppressing political speech — that’s First Amendment 101 — while businesses have rights to regulate the kinds of speech they accommodate on their properties.

But digital behemoths such as Facebook, Twitter and others are unique. They have monopolistic power to control much of the nation’s information access and political dialogue. We therefore must sound an alarm when they use this power in a discriminatory way to suppress certain political views.

Everyone knows there are appropriate limits to free speech. No one has the right to threaten the safety of others or incite violence or spread defamatory lies. But that’s not the kind of censorship that concerns liberty-loving people.

Beyond the infamous banning of former President Donald Trump from Twitter, that platform went so far as blocking the spread of a New York Post story that exposed details of Hunter Biden’s Ukrainian dealings.

Simultaneously, Twitter had no problem spreading stories giving credibility to such hoaxes as Trump’s supposed collusion with Russia. Twitter even allowed China’s U.S. embassy to tweet propaganda justifying the mistreatment of Muslim minority women — only removing that tweet in response to intense public pressure (and a day after it permanently banned President Trump).

Clearly, Twitter has a particular bent against conservatives.

As I launch our investigations, I will explore all possible remedies that I can undertake as Indiana’s Attorney General to stop Big Tech’s violations of liberty.

In addition, I will support the enactment of laws by our state legislature and the U.S. Congress that safeguard citizens’ ability to freely access information online and express their views on social media.

The mega-billionaires who run Big Tech have plenty of means to protect their own prerogatives. I am more concerned about everyday Americans who have just as much right to the blessings of liberty as these rich and powerful magnates.

The corporate giants who control the digital universe must offer more than empty rhetoric to protect free speech. The ability to engage in open debate — across ideological and partisan divides — lies at the heart of America’s promise. This moment calls for us to defend the real-life process of liberty in action.

What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

YouTube CEO calls for global coalitions to address content that's "legal but could be harmful" (reclaimthenet.org)

During an appearance at the World Economic Forum Global Technology Governance Summit 2021, an event where more than 40 governments and 150 companies meet to ensure “the responsible design and deployment of emerging technologies,” YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki expressed her support for tech platforms moderating content that’s “technically legal but could be harmful” and praised global coalitions that help Big Tech coordinate and automate their censorship efforts.

Straight up fascism. There is no other word for this.

I Don't Think Pence Can Be President in the Post-Trump Era, but 2016 Showed That We Should Never Say Never

Pence Combining Conservative And MAGA Forces, With Trump’s Blessing, Many Speculate About 2024 (lifezette.com)

Former Vice President Mike Pence is seeking to combine traditional conservatism with former President Donald Trump’s Make America Great Again agenda by launching a new political advocacy group.

This, combined with a new book deal, has left some wondering if this is Pence positioning himself for a 2024 presidential bid.

I think he should definitely consider running, and that he should do more than consider it if he thinks he can win. I think he would be a formidable general election candidate. I’m not sure he can win the primary. And the anti-religious Left would go ballistic, telling us that we’ll have an apocalyptical conservative theocracy.

We’re about 18 months from the beginning of the 2024 campaigns. It will be interesting to see how it all falls out. I think that the GOP has an incredibly strong bench and Pence is definitely part of it. I’m not sure the Democrats can say the same. They might be in a rough spot if Biden can manage to survive four years of being President and yet elects not to run again in 2024.

Welcome to Biden’s America

I may have to stop posting about the Border Crisis. I don’t know how much more of this I can take. I’m physically ill.

April 15, 2019

Fire at one of the most well known landmarks in the Western Hemisphere.

2019-04-15T184813Z_970173393_RC160D915270_RTRMADP_3_FRANCE-NOTREDAME

Notre Dame de Paris.

Heh.

This Is Incredibly Arrogant On the Part Of Facebook

Facebook will not notify the 500 million users affected by the latest data breach – Neowin

This part I understand.

Facebook has now confirmed that the company will not notify half a billion users who were affected by the leak. In a statement to Reuters, a Facebook spokesperson noted that the social media giant was not confident "it had full visibility on which users would need to be notified".

The law requires companies to notify their users if they’ve been affected by a breach, but only if they can actually be notified. This was a phone number breach, and it might be nearly impossible for Facebook to call 500 million people. Even if they could find an automated way to do it, the costs would be mind-boggling.

But the rest of the statement from Facebook shows why this company needs to be destroyed. Not broken up into pieces, but dismantled completely.

Furthermore, the Facebook spokesperson said that the data is out and there is nothing that users can do now.

Yes, that’s true of all breaches. Imagine it Citibank said the same thing. “Yeah, these credit card numbers have all been leaked, but no point in notifying anyone. The data is out there. Nothing we can do about it now.”

Pretty sure our collective minds would explode. But that’s exactly what Facebook is saying.

And it doesn’t get much better from there.

Moreover, on Tuesday, Facebook's Product Management Director Mike Clark wrote an article about the whole ordeal. In the article, Clark tried to downplay the breach by noting that it happened in 2019 and that the issue has since been fixed. Furthermore, he also said that "scraping data using features meant to help people violates our terms"

It happened over a year ago and the issue that allowed it to happen has been fixed. Great. I’m sure that’s very comforting to the 500 million people to know that Facebook won’t let this happen again.

It’s just as comforting to know that the data breach violated their terms of service. You know. I’m appalled at that. How dare hackers violate Facebook’s TOS? I can’t believe that didn’t stop them.

Seriously? That’s the argument you’re making?

Chew them up. Spit out the bones.

Another Reason This Is a Crisis

Abbott says there are allegations of children being sexually assaulted at federal migrant facility | Just The News

Sadly, this is not surprising. When you cram this many people into such a small place, and many of them are unaccompanied minors, this is going to happen.

[Governor Greg Abbot (R-TX)] said on Wednesday "the Texas Health and Human Services Commission and the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services separately received tips that allege child abuse and neglect" at the facility located at the Freeman Coliseum. The Lone Star State Republican pinned the blame on President Biden's policies.

Biden needs to fix this. Yesterday.

Abbott is immediately directing authorities in his state to commence an investigation. He said that he is "directing the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Texas Rangers to immediately begin investigating these allegations."

And he should.

14 April, 2021

I’ve Lost Count. How Many “Trump Was Right” Posts Does This Make?

Huh. Imagine that. Trump said something. Liberal media laughed at it. A few months later it turns out to be true. Really the history of the last four years, and of the China Virus Crisis in particular.

Another take here:

Media Dismissed Trump's April Vaccine Goal, Now Announced by Biden (breitbart.com)

It’s Satire, But Not Really

Democrats Warn That If HR 1 Isn’t Passed, Republicans Could Win Some Elections | The Babylon Bee

That is in fact the point of HR 1, to ensure a Democrat majority for as long as possible.

I won’t quote the article, because someone will decide that I think it’s true and not satirical, but you really should go read it.

A Victory For Those Of Us In Indiana

Indiana AG Launches Investigation Into 5 Big Tech Companies For ‘Censoring Conservative Content’ | The Daily Wire

Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita announced Wednesday he has launched an investigation into five Big Tech companies for allegedly censoring conservative content.

The statement from Rokita’s office said that the investigation centered around whether the companies “have potentially harmed Indiana consumers through business practices that are abusive, deceptive and/or unfair.”

This is how we beat Big Tech.

“In a free society, few assets are more important to consumers than access to information and the opportunity to express political viewpoints in meaningful forums,” Rokita said. “It is potentially harmful and unfair for these companies to manipulate content in ways they do not publicly discuss or that consumers do not fully understand.”

I can’t argue with that.

Wow, I already had tags for all five of the companies. Imagine that.

This May Be The ONE Thing That Biden Does Right In His Time In Office

Biden Not Considering Boycotting Beijing Olympics, Despite China Issues, After Supporting MLB Boycott | The Daily Wire

I know some conservatives think that we should do this, but I’ll stick to my principles. I’ve said for most of my life that President Jimmy Carter’s (D-USA) pulling out of the Moscow Games in 1980 was incredibly stupid.

I’m not going to change my mind on that just because a new Democrat is in the White House.

The Biden administration said Tuesday evening that their position on the upcoming 2022 Olympics in Beijing “has not changed” and that they have not discussed any boycotts.

The State Department issued a statement saying it was not considering a boycott after spokesman Ned Price suggested earlier in the day that one was possible in response to China’s human rights abuses.

The only victims of a boycott would be the American athletes who have trained their entire lives for this moment. China won’t suffer by us not being there. In fact, they’ll likely pick up a lot more medals. And they won’t have to deal with the American press nearly as much. It’s a total win for them and a total loss for us.

No, no, no, a thousand times no.

Two More Cages For The Kids

Feds Open Two More Unaccompanied Migrant Child Detention Centers in West Texas (breitbart.com)

Preident Joe Biden (D-USA) needs to take care of this. He needs to take care of it now. If he can’t, he needs to resign.

I’m trying to think of something worse than this that has happened in my lifetime, where Presidential action or inaction made it possible.

The only thing I can come up with is the Vietnam War. LBJ and Nixon could have and should have done more much sooner to fix the problems there. They didn’t.

This is the only thing that I can think of that compares, and it could quickly get worse than Vietnam was ever even rumored to be.

Continuing a recent trend, Health and Human Services (HHS) announced the opening of two more Emergency Intake Sites (EIS) to hold unaccompanied children out of Customs and Border Protection custody.

The move mirrors recent announcements by HHS to address the surge in unaccompanied child migrants (UACs) at the southern border.

New EIS facilities will be located at two existing sites in Dimmit and Pecos Counties, Texas. The sites add capacity to receive another 2,440 minors from Border Patrol facilities. The first UACs began arriving April 5.

Ugh. Stop the ride. I want to get off.

You voted for this.

#IToldYouSo

Joe, You’re The One Who Needs To “Smarten Up”

Biden tells Georgia to ‘smarten up’ to avoid losing business over new election law | Fox News

"There's another side to it too. When they in fact move out of Georgia, people who need help most, people who are making hourly wages, sometimes get hurt the most," Biden said.

He said he supports however businesses decide to protest the law. "I think it's a very tough decision for a corporation to make or group to make, I respect them when they make that judgment, I support whatever judgment they make.  The best way to deal with this is for Georgia and other states to smarten up. Stop it, stop it," he said.

Actually, the best way to deal with it would be to stop lying about it, Joe.

As I documented here and here.

Presented Without Comment

The Commonalities Between the Rise of the Nazis and the Tactics of the American Left Cannot be Ignored - American Thinker

[T]he Nazis perfected the art of indoctrinating the citizenry through propaganda and “fake news.”  Joseph Goebbels, Nazi minister of propaganda, is credited with saying: “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.” and “Think of the press as a great keyboard on which government can play.”

They Are TRYING To Destroy The Economy

Antony Blinken: No Travel Until World Vaccinated - Victory Girls Blog

Secretary of State Antony Blinken gave remarks to the press on April 5, 2021 regarding the Biden Regime’s response to Covid-19. In the remarks he said that until the world is vaccinated, we cannot fully open our economy or travel again.

I work in a field closely related to the travel industry, so this hits home with me. I’d like to not have my job destroyed by the government. I think that’s something most of can agree upon.

Right now it looks like they are actively trying to make that happen though.

#IToldYouSo

That’s Because Deep Down (And Actually Not All That “Deep”), They Admire The Soviet Union

EXCLUSIVE: ‘Just Like The Communists’: Pastor Who Kicked Police Out Of Church Has Choice Words For Lockdown Tyrants | The Daily Caller

He was shocked to see the officials act as if the church was like “their own home.” (RELATED: Police Raid Home Of Woman Who Built COVID-19 Tracking Software For Government)

After telling the officials to leave, the pastor grabbed his phone and began recording the incident. The now-viral video shows him repeatedly yelling “out!” for several minutes until the officers finally walk away.

“I grew up in Poland under the boot of the Soviets, behind the Iron Curtain,” Pawlowski said. “What I see right now, I see everything escalating and moving to the new level. They’re acting just like the Communists were acting when I was growing up when the pastors and the priests were arrested, and some were murdered. Many were tortured.”

“That’s why I say what I say,” he continued. “Because I see a repetition of history.”

Chess great Garry Kasparov has said many of the same things.

Trump Was Right—Again

More Vindication for Trump as Biden Admin Considers Resuming Border Wall Construction – PJ Media

In what might be the most stunning admission that there’s a crisis at the southern border of the United States, the Biden administration is considering resuming border wall construction.

According to a report from the Washington Times, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told department employees that while Biden had cut off funding for border wall construction, there’s still “room to make decisions” to finish some “gaps in the wall.”

“There are different projects that the chief of the Border Patrol has presented and the acting commissioner of CBP presented to me,” Mayorkas said. “The president has communicated quite clearly his decision that the emergency that triggered the devotion of DOD funds to the construction of the border wall is ended. But that leaves room to make decisions as the administration, as part of the administration, in particular areas of the wall that need renovation, particular projects that need to be finished.”

This is a little Democrat waffle-speak. They can’t come right out and say that President Donald Trump (R-USA) was right and that we need the wall. They have to couch it in euphemisms like “finish some gaps in the wall”, making it sound like they’re just going to do a little patching, not building.

But building is what they will be doing, and it’s because we need the wall.

Pretty Sure This Is A Major HIPAA Violation

NY's vaccine pass is plagued with privacy failures as anyone can access someone else's health records (reclaimthenet.org)

And Excelsior Pass has poor security in place, allowing anyone to check a person’s eligibility and access their Covid-related health records through the app simply by entering their name, date of birth and ZIP code.

After this, more “relatively easily obtained information” is required to verify identity, The Dossier writes. “Even if you get some questions wrong, it appears that you can go back in and answer an unlimited amount of times until you get the right combination,” said the report.

And after reading the article, I’m not even sure that’s the worst bit.

Find Out If You’re A Victim Of The Facebook Data Breach

Have I Been Pwned adds search for leaked Facebook phone numbers (bleepingcomputer.com)

Last weekend, a threat actor released a data leak containing information for 533 million Facebook users. This information includes phone numbers and Facebook IDs for almost all exposed accounts and other optional information such as a member's name, gender, relationship status, location, occupation, date of birth, and email address.

This data was initially collected in 2019 and sold privately at the time. Over time, the data was traded and sold between different threat actors for lower and lower prices until it was eventually released for free on the hacker forum this weekend.

When it was released, the data was added to the Have I Been Pwned data breach notification service so that users can look up whether their emails were in the Facebook data leak.

I checked. I haven’t. I checked my wife’s email & phone. She hasn’t either, but has been a victim of 14 (!) other data breaches. *sigh*

I’m Sure That This Is All Trump’s Fault

DATA: Joe Biden is Detaining 18,000 Minors. Trump's Peak Number Was Just 2,600. (thenationalpulse.com)

A March 10th report from The Washington Post explains how “more than 8,500 migrant teens and children who crossed the border without their parents are being housed in Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)” and “nearly 3,500 more are stuck at Border Patrol stations waiting for beds in those shelters to open up.”

These numbers constitute “the highest figure ever, according to internal data reviewed by The Washington Post.

In contrast, under the Trump administration, the largest number of unaccompanied minors being detained was roughly 2,600[.]

If someone tries to tell you that there’s no border crisis, or if there is, that it’s President Donald Trump’s (R-USA) fault, tell them that they’re full of it.

And it’s going to get worse before it gets better.

This is Biden’s America.

#IToldYouSo

What The Democrats Want For Everyone

New York’s Fiscal Suicide | International Liberty (wordpress.com)

The state of New York is an economic disaster area.

  • New York is ranked #50 in the Economic Freedom of North America.
  • New York is ranked #48 in the State Business Tax Climate Index.
  • New York is ranked #50 in the Freedom in the 50 States.
  • New York is next-to-last in measures of inbound migration.
  • New York is ranked #50 in the State Soft Tyranny Index.

The good news is that New York’s politicians seem to be aware of these rankings and are taking steps to change policy.

The bad news is that they apparently want to be in last place in every index, so they’re looking at a giant tax increase.

The end result of this is that even more producers will continue to leave the state, and they will take their jobs and tax revenue with them.This will increase the number of people in the state who are dependent upon government, while reducing the amount of money available for these people.

Everybody loses!

California is much the same way. And these are liberals’ dream states.

Read the whole thing, but prepare to be physically ill.

We Can’t Promote Religious Freedom—We’re Americans!

Joe Biden Dismantles Trump Commission That Promoted Religious Freedom Worldwide | LifeNews.com

Last week, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken ended the Commission on Unalienable Rights, a panel established by President Donald Trump to advocate for religious freedom across the world, The Christian Post reports.

During the press conference, Blinken criticized the Trump administration for prioritizing some rights, such as religious freedom, more heavily than others. He also announced plans to make abortion a priority for the Department of State, a complete reversal from his predecessor Mike Pompeo’s commitment to human rights for all, born and unborn.

Well, I understand how Democrats, who are beholden to the Abortion Industry, couldn’t have that last bit, but saying that prioritizing religious freedom is a problem, is a horrific thing to do.

If we can’t help people worship how they wish and not be persecuted for it, then we should just exit the world stage completely.