LinkSwarm for December 24, 2021

December 24th, 2021

Merry Christmas Eve, everyone! For some reason, corrupt scumbags seem to be a theme of this LinkSwarm.

  • This week marks the 30th anniversary of the dissolution of the Soviet Union, an evil empire who’s passing made the world a better place. Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher, Pope John Paul II and even George H. W. Bush all had key roles in bringing the Cold War to a successful close.
  • Biden’s vaccine mandates go before the Supreme Court. There’s a good chance they lose there on federalism grounds, even as the Supremes have avoided overturning state vaccine mandates. (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • Tom Cotton has a modest proposal: “Recall, Remove & Replace Every Last Soros Prosecutor.”

    Last year, our nation experienced the largest increase in murder in American history and the largest number of drug overdose deaths ever recorded. This carnage continues today and is not distributed equally. Instead, it is concentrated in cities and localities where radical, left-wing, George Soros progressives have captured state and district attorney offices. These legal arsonists condemn our rule of law as “systemically racist” and have not simply abused prosecutorial discretion, they have embraced prosecutorial nullification. As a result, a contagion of crime has infected virtually every neighborhood under their charge.

    Soros prosecutors refuse to enforce laws against shoplifting, drug trafficking, and entire categories of felonies and misdemeanors. In Chicago, Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx allows theft under $1,000 to go unpunished. In Manhattan, District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. refuses to enforce laws against prostitution. In Baltimore, State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby has unilaterally declared the war on drugs “over” and is refusing to criminally charge drug users in the middle of the worst drug crisis in American history. For a time, Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascon even stopped enforcing laws against disturbing the peace, resisting arrest, and making criminal threats.

    All of these cities have paid a terrible price for these insane policies. Last year, the number of homicides in Chicago rose by 56%, and more than 1,000 Cook County residents have been murdered in 2021. In New York City, murder increased 47% and shootings soared 97%. In 2020, the murder rate in Baltimore was higher than El Salvador’s or Guatemala’s — nations from which citizens often attempt to claim asylum purely based on gang violence and murder—and this year murder in Baltimore is on track to be even higher. Murder in Los Angeles rose 36% last year and is on track to rise another 17% this year.

    Soon after taking office in Boston, Suffolk County District Attorney Rachel Rollins published a list of 15 crimes that she would refuse to prosecute except under special circumstances. Among the charges on her “do not prosecute” list was drug trafficking, malicious destruction of property, trespassing, driving with a revoked license, and resisting arrest. Rollins also declared that she was “going to battle” against the U.S. attorney in Massachusetts and has slandered Boston police officers as “murderers” before accusing the department of “white fragility.”

    Unsurprisingly, Boston’s violent crime rate surged shortly after Rollins took over, as the number of murders in Boston skyrocketed by 38% in 2020. As Rollins implemented leniency for drug trafficking, opioid overdose deaths increased by 32% in Suffolk County. As a reward for her ineptitude and extremism, President Biden nominated her to run the U.S. Attorney’s office in Massachusetts, the very office she had gone “to battle” against only months before. Every Democrat in the Senate voted to confirm her.

    Another Soros prosecutor, Philadelphia’s District Attorney Larry Krasner, came to office after suing the Philadelphia Police Department 75 times as a private citizen. He began his tenure by purging dozens of veteran prosecutors in his office and then slashed his jurisdiction’s prison population by over 30%. In most cases, Krasner also refuses to seek bail for accused criminals and has maintained a highly antagonistic relationship with the police, once accusing the Fraternal Order of Police lodge president of being “with the Proud Boys.”

    The number of homicides in Philadelphia has increased every year that Krasner has been DA. Last year, the murder rate rose 40% and this year it reached an all-time high.

    In San Francisco, the voters elected the son of two cop-killing terrorists as their district attorney. Chesa Boudin (pictured) has since unleashed chaos on the streets of a once-great city and inaugurated what the San Francisco mayor labelled the “reign of criminals.” San Francisco’s homelessness crisis has spiraled out of control, smash-and-grab looters are such a menace that the city had to close its downtown during Black Friday, and shoplifters have closed down retailers throughout the city. Since Boudin took over, car theft has increased by 27%, murder by 29%, arson by 36%, and burglary soared 38%.

    The liberal mayor of San Francisco, as if struck by amnesia of her own tenure and complicity in the crime wave, recently emerged to condemn her city’s appalling rise in crime. Speaker Nancy Pelosi also condemned the disorder and “attitude of lawlessness” in her city. However, in one of the great examples of “see no evil, hear no evil,” Speaker Pelosi pretended to be baffled by what could have caused the crime wave. The answer is obvious: Liberal extremists like Nancy Pelosi and Chesa Boudin caused this crisis.

    Conclusion: “The Republican Party must then join with independents and common-sense Democrats to wage an unrelenting war on crime. That war must begin with a campaign to recall, remove, and replace every last Soros prosecutor. Throw the bums out.”

  • Even CNN is wondering if Biden’s senile.
  • One rule for you, another for them. “California Dems Sip Champagne, Violate State Mask Mandate While Celebrating Successful Gerrymander.”
  • “According to data from Nielsen/MRI Fusion, Fox News is watched by more Democrats than CNN and by more Independents than both MSNBC and CNN.” Average network news viewers want truth, not a force-fed Narrative at odds with reality. (Hat tip: Instapundit.)
  • More on why Build Back Better sucked:

  • Two defund the police state Democratic congresscritters carjacked. “In late December, two Democratic politicians were carjacked just hours apart in Philadelphia and Chicago. Ironically, both women – Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon and Illinois State Senator Kimberly Lightford – supported slashing police budgets and other reform measures, which many Republicans have blamed as the cause of the rapid increase in crime.” It would take a heart of stone not to laugh…
  • So you want to move to a red state.

    In the now three and a half years since I have decamped with my family from Los Angeles to Nashville—some have called us “early adopters”—I have spent considerable time on phone, email and texts with old friends and acquaintances in New York and California who are asking me what it’s like. Am I happy? Should they move? What’s best—Florida, Tennessee, Texas or someplace else?

    Although answering the question “should they move?” for someone else is rather like answering for them should they marry or divorce—it’s too big a decision and really none of your business—that doesn’t stop me from almost universally saying yes.

    I do this because I have been in L.A. and NY lately and know them to have turned into the ghosts of their former selves—basically hellholes.

    I haven’t been to Chicago for a few years, but it seems to be, if anything, worse. And when I was in L.A., covering the late, lamented Larry Elder campaign, I didn’t even want to go to San Francisco. That was a Golden Gate Bridge too far.

    It’s not just the pervasive homelessness and the escalating Clockwork Orange-like ultra-violence, the actual souls of the cities that I knew very well—born in NY and lived decades in LA—seem to have vanished.

    Who wants to sing “New York, New York” or “I Love L.A.” anymore? And can you imagine leaving your heart in San Francisco? What has happened is a true American tragedy—and it’s not just because of COVID, although that helped. The cancer has been growing for a long time.

    It could be said you should stay to help resuscitate these cities although I would argue you do more for them by leaving, making those governing the cities—universally Democrats, as everybody knows—and even more those dopey enough to have voted for that governance, wake up.

    But even in red states, the culture war continues…

  • Hundred of holiday flights have been cancelled due to “staffing shortages.” How’s that vaccine mandate working out for you, Biden voters?
  • Santa Clara County Sheriff Laurie Smith, infamous for refusing to approve concealed carry permits, is indicted on multiple misconduct charges:

    Sheriff Smith is being indicted for:

    • Count 1: Illegally issuing concealed carry weapon permits (CCW) to VIP’s
    • Count 2: Failing to properly investigate whether non-VIP’s should receive CCW permits
    • Count 3: Keeping non-VIP CCW applications pending indefinitely
    • Count 4: Illegally accepting suite tickets, food, and drinks at Sharks game
    • Count 5: Failing to report Sharks game gifts on financial documents
    • Count 6: Committing perjury by failing to disclose Sharks game gifts
    • Count 7: Failing to cooperate with internal affairs investigation surrounding treatment of Andrew Hogan

    (Hat tip: Dwight.)

  • How bad did New York Corrections screw up for the courts to free someone on 8th Amendment grounds? This bad. Holy crap!

  • Play stupid games, win pink slip prizes: “New York Times fires editor accused of leaving profane voicemails for gun group.” (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Speaking of the New York Times, here’s a video on how Times reporter Ian Urbina ripped off the royalties for over 2,000 songs from 462 different artists. Bonus: Noam Chomsky!
  • “Florida Sheriff Cheers Homeowner Who Shot a Broad Daylight Home Invader.”
  • Short Twitter thread about the fiendship between Alice Cooper and Groucho Marx.
  • Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s book The Real Anthony Fauci: Bill Gates, Big Pharma, and the Global War on Democracy and Public Health now tops the Amazon non-fiction bestseller list. I haven’t read it, and usual Robert F. Kennedy Jr. caveats apply, but this is the book we have now, and I suspect regular BattleSwarm readers may find some of the same topics covered here within its pages.
  • The Grand Tour lads speak admiringly about how the French are ungovernable.
  • YouTube: You liked that one video on fixing door hinges? Here, have hundreds more!
  • The best of the Internet for 2021.
  • “New York Restaurant Adds Voting Booth So They Can Allow People In Without ID.”
  • “San Francisco To Require Proof Of Vaccination To Poop On The Sidewalk.”
  • If you’re bummed out from all these scumbags, here’s a palate cleansing Christmas puppy:

    • Merry Christmas everyone!

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    Posted in Budget, Communism, Crime, Democrats, Elections, Media Watch, Social Justice Warriors, Supreme Court, Waste and Fraud | 1 Comment »

    What 12th Man?

    December 23rd, 2021

    Texas A&M’s football team has withdrawn from the Gator Bowl following a bout of Flu Manchu.

    News broke on Tuesday that A&M’s football team had not practiced since last Saturday as a number of athletes had tested positive prior to the Aggies hitting the practice field on Sunday and then again during the next two days. The team was supposed to be released to go home on Tuesday until Dec. 26 when players were to make their way to Jacksonville for final bowl preparations. People both within the program and the highest levels of the administration were pessimistic as early as Tuesday night due to practical considerations arising from numbers via NCAA protocols that the game would take place.

    The Aggies were already down quite a few players going into bowl game workouts last week given their status due to injuries and opt outs even before news of possible problems with COVID tests had emerged. There are as many as ten upperclassmen who are draft eligible who could or already have opted out of the game. In addition, two more (Zach Calzada and Dreyden Norwood) have entered the NCAA transfer portal since the regular season ended. Finally, by our count, there are as many as 12 players who are done for the season and won’t play in the game due to injury. Those items push the Aggies down towards approximately 60 scholarship players being available for the game including just one quarterback in Haynes King (who missed most of the season himself due to a broken ankle and has just returned to workouts).

    Wait, 60 players? That’s seven more than an NFL roster. You need 11 players each side, for a total of 22. (And prior to 1941, the same players played both offense and defense.) You’ve got enough to play, even if a few players have to learn new positions in a hurry. It’s the postseason, the only postseason your team gets this year, and you’re wimping out.

    Also note: “Scholarship” players. Whatever happened to the much-vaunted “12th Man” tradition at A&M, about to turn a century old? One of the features of the 12th Man was a willingness to play walk-ons. A bet dozens (if not hundreds) of ex-high school football playing Aggies would be happy to volunteer to join the football team in their hour of need. And I bet the NCAA would approve it.

    But no, we can’t have that. Better to cancel it because someone might get an ouchie.

    Evidently the Aggies of 2021 just aren’t made of the stern stuff of the Aggies of 1922. Or even 1983.

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    Posted in Texas | 6 Comments »

    Brokeback Boondoggle Busted

    December 22nd, 2021

    By now you’ve heard that Sen. Joe Manchin has killed Biden’s pork-laden Build Back Better bill because Biden Administration staffers screwed around with him too much.

    “They figured surely to God we can move one person. We surely can badger and beat one person up. Surely we can get enough protesters to make that person uncomfortable enough that they’ll just say, ‘OK I’ll vote for anything,'” Manchin continued. “Well, guess what? I’m from West Virginia. I’m not from where they’re from and they can just beat the living crap out of people and think they’ll be submissive, period.”

    We all owe Manchin our thanks for this, since Build Back Better was a giant pit of pork, waste, and leftwing pandering.

    • Spends nearly $5 trillion more on a path to big-government socialism over 10 years
    • Gives tax breaks for the wealthy political donor class in mostly Democrat-run states at the expense of other Americans
    • Imposes new mandatory programs that create dependency on government and cycles of poverty
    • Expands existing inefficient welfare programs
    • Adds $24,000 in debt on every American taxpayer, increases each taxpayer’s national debt burden to $111,000
    • Wastes billions of dollars on unreliable “green energy” boondoggles
    • Empowers new IRS agents to spy on Americans’ bank accounts
    • Raises childcare costs for families by more than twice
    • Adds more marriage penalties to the tax code, especially
    hurting married, small-business owners
    • Imposes new taxes on tobacco and nicotine
    • Limits how much you can save for retirement
    • Wastes even more money on failed ObamaCare programs
    • Provides healthcare subsidies for wealthy Americans who don’t need assistance
    • Increases taxes on petroleum that will further increase the price of gasoline
    • Raises taxes on business that will lower wages, increase prices, and reduce return on investment

    And that’s just the topline.

    Of course, the things that made Build Back Better such an odious dumpster fire are what made it holy to Democratic Party grandees and the hard left, who are fuming that they have nothing to show for negotiations, and imploring Biden to somehow “get tough” with Manchin, as though a President can have a Senator arrested and put on a rack for disobeying his will.

    Democrats are also worried that it will result in an electoral disaster in 2022. With Slow Joe’s horrendous first year, including record inflation and record Flu Manchu deaths from a virus he said he was going to eradicate, they were always going to have a disasterous midterm, but now they have a handy scapegoat.

    Lots of Democrats have said that Manchin should be ejected from the party for his apostasy. Manchin says make his day.

    One of the many reasons the bill died is that a coalition of conservative interest groups banded together to make it happen.

    Twenty groups have helped lead the “Save America” Coalition, including Americans for Prosperity, American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), Americans for Tax Reform, Center for Renewing America, Committee to Unleash Prosperity, Freedom Works, Heritage Action, Texas Public Policy Foundation, Goldwater Institute, Independent Women’s Forum and Job Creators Network.

    [America First Policy Institute head Brooke] Rollins said she first realized while working as president and CEO of the Texas Public Policy Foundation, an Austin-based free-market think tank, that if conservative groups put differences aside and worked together for a common cause they could make a powerful change.

    The very first call the coalition held, Rollins remembers saying, “If we do this right and if we put all the egos aside and we don’t worry about who gets the credit, it’s a new day for our entire movement.”

    Knowing what was at stake and what the other side was capable of — Democrats are estimated to have spent between $50 to 100 million building public support for the bill — Rollins told the group it was “time to really come together.”

    The coalition did polling nearly everyday with Scott Rasmussen to find the “weak underbelly of the bill,” Moore said, and joined together to run millions of dollars worth of advertising to “pound the airwaves” in West Virginia and Arizona where the two senators who were most likely to oppose the bill — Manchin and Senator Kyrsten Sinema (D., Ariz.) — are from.

    Althouse thinks it’s all theater. “Whatever they say publicly I will test against the hypothesis that making it all about Manchin is political theater, designed to concentrate the blame where it will not hurt other Democrats, moderate Democrats, while they gain the opportunity to edit the excessively left-wing material out of the bill.”

    On the surface this makes a lot of sense, as the Corrupt Wing letting the Insane Wing get so far out in front of their skis that Manchin is the only one who gets blamed when their insane ambitions get chopped down to size. On the other hand, little about the Biden Administration suggests Machiavellian geniuses steering the ship of state through subtle stratagems, and their manifest failures are far more likely to pink-slip remaining moderate Democrats in 2022 rather than dethroning the hard left.

    The competing theory is that Democrats know they’re going to be wiped out in 2022, and all of them (even most of the so-called “moderates”) are hellbent on shoving radical change down America’s throat because they’re never going to get the chance again.

    And that’s why they’re so furious with Manchin. He’s not only keeping their snouts out of that giant trough of taxpayer money, he’s keeping them from rigging the game and insuring they never get a chance to again, because they’ll be out of office and out of power.

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    Posted in Budget, Democrats, ObamaCare, Waste and Fraud, Welfare State | No Comments »

    Ron DeSantis Unloads on Critical Race Theory

    December 21st, 2021

    Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis doesn’t mince words in announcing legislation to outlaw Critical Race Theory in schools:

    One of the first tasks of opposing a poisonous ideology is to actually speak clearly about what it is, why it’s bad, and how it works, and DeSantis does all three in announcing the STOP Woke Act, which would allow parents to sue schools that try to impose Critical Race Theory, including calling out such CRT-speak markers as “white supremacy” and “equity.”

    At first glance, if enacted, the lawsuit provision suggests that the DeSantis bill would have more teeth than the Texas anti-CRT bill Governor Greg Abbott signed earlier this year. Since Florida has Republican majorities in both houses, I would expect it to pass.

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    Posted in Republicans, Social Justice Warriors, video | 9 Comments »

    Which Topic Should I Do A Big Roundup Post On Next?

    December 20th, 2021

    I have some time off this week and next, so what big roundup post should I tackle?

    Supersurvey

    Not a polling choice: A roundup of evidence that a lot of The Holy Covid Narrative is wrong, including that Joe Rogan interview with Dr. Peter McCullough. I’m working on that, but it may take me a few days.

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    Posted in Austin, Texas, Uncategorized | 6 Comments »

    No Exit

    December 19th, 2021

    Yeah, another Louis Rossmann video, this one about the news that several Broadway shows are cancelling due to “breakthrough” Flu Manchu cases among their cast. This is despite all cast, crew and audience being required to be vaccinated. “It scares me is because it means that we do not have a path back to normal life.”

    Maybe you won’t watch all 25 minutes of this, but it’s worth watching the first six minutes to see how ordinary Americans who were sympathetic to early coronavirus restrictions have lost all patience with endless Covid Theater.

    “‘If it even saves one life’ is unsustainable for society.”

    Rational people have already abandoned lunatic Flu Manchu restrictions, and it’s long been obvious that the vaccinated can spread the disease, but hard left Democratic Party elites continue to insist that lockdowns and mandates are the way to go, and that their unwavering insistence on these measures is a marker of their moral superiority over those that oppose them.

    At this point, Flu Manchu virtue-signaling is a self-reinforcing loop. Democratic Party elites and their leftwing transnational allies see coercive measures as an invaluable tool for The Great Reset*, and time and time again they’ve proven that rules are for the little people, and that any restrictions imposed on ordinary Americans can be safely ignored by the nomenklatura. So too rank-and-file Democratic Party activists (at least the ones not actively burning down small businesses) seem to have embraced Covid Theater as one of the defining virtue signals of their lives. They have too much ego and self-love at stake to admit that their own sacrifices were all for nothing, and that those Bible-clinging Trump voters were right and they were wrong about living normal lives.

    Now that it’s been proven time and time again that the fully vaccinated spread Mao Tse Lung, there’s no exit for them from the Flu Manchu Fearmongering Treadmill, no logical place where they can finally declare “enough!”

    Expect Covid Theater lunacy to continue until the people pushing it are removed from power.

    (Eighteen and a half minutes in, Rossmann also talks about Thomas Sowell’s Discrimination and Disparities and the cost of being wrong. I haven’t read that particular Sowell, but he’s always worth reading.)

    *Do I believe every part of The Great Reset/New World Order conspiracy theory? No. But there’s something there, some powerful, unspoken, anti-democratic agenda that explains why so many elites pursue so many coercive measures long after they’ve obviously become both unpopular and counter-productive given their ostensible goals.

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    Posted in Democrats, Social Justice Warriors, video | No Comments »

    Texas and Florida Added More Than Half The Nation’s New Jobs In November

    December 18th, 2021

    You may have heard that the America added an anemic 210,000 jobs in November, which was (as has become standard in the Biden era) much less than “experts” predicted.

    The news wasn’t great, but Texas did well:

    Employment in Texas has reached nearly 13 million non-agricultural jobs, eclipsing the pre-pandemic high set in February of 2020.

    From October, the unemployment rate dropped 0.2 percent with the addition of 75,100 jobs. Since November of last year, 698,700 jobs have been added to the rolls.

    “By reaching nearly 13 million jobs last month, Texas has surpassed our pre-pandemic employment levels — a remarkable achievement and testament to our welcoming business climate and strong workforce,” Governor Greg Abbott said in a release.

    According to the Texas Workforce Commission (TWC), Amarillo continues to post the lowest unemployment rate in the state at 3.1 percent. Austin-Round Rock follows closely behind at 3.2 percent.

    Also crowing about adding jobs: Florida governor Ron DeSantis, whose state added 50,000 jobs:

    75,100 + 50,000 = 125,100. So just shy 60% of jobs added in November came from two states known for low taxes, light regulation and general economic freedom.

    (If you dig further into the statistics, the lesson is a bit less clear cut, with California (45,700), New Jersey (25,800) and New York (23,600) ranking 3-5 for most jobs added.)

    According to census data, Texas and California have a combined population of 50,683,692, while the U.S. has a census-estimated population of 328,239,523. (Both those numbers have undoubtedly gone up a bit since census data was released in July.) Which means that two states with less than 1/6th the total population of the U.S. accounted for more than 60% of job growth.

    Why, it’s almost as if red states run by Republican governors are better at creating jobs than blue states run by Democratic governors…

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    Posted in Austin, Economics, Texas | 2 Comments »

    LinkSwarm for December 17, 2021

    December 17th, 2021

    Another mandate injunction, Democrats continue their popularity freefall, China seals more dirty deals, and Turkey melts down. It’s another Friday LinkSwarm!

  • Federal judge halts healthcare employee vaccine mandate in Texas.

    A federal judge in Texas has issued a preliminary injunction, stopping a new rule from the Biden administration requiring healthcare workers to receive the COVID vaccine as the case moves through the courts.

    The injunction came from the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas in Amarillo. The case was filed by Attorney General Ken Paxton on behalf of the State of Texas against Xavier Becerra, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services secretary.

    The injunction was sought against a federal rule that would have required employers that receive Medicaid and Medicare funds—namely hospitals and other healthcare providers—to require their employees to receive a COVID vaccine as a condition of employment.

    Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk ordered that the federal government provide notice to all Medicaid and Medicare providers in Texas that the mandate “will not be implemented or enforced.”

    “Healthcare facilities covered by the [Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services] Mandate have a tremendous reliance interest in Medicare and Medicaid funds. Therefore, Defendants unconstitutionally use Congress’s spending powers to ‘commandeer a State’s . . . administrative apparatus for federal purposes’ by conditioning Medicare and Medicaid funds on state surveyor compliance with the mandate,” wrote Kacsmaryk. “As a result, not only would the CMS Mandate prohibit Plaintiffs from enforcing its duly enacted COVID-19 vaccination regulations, but it would likely force Plaintiffs to administer a federal mandate that has a dubious statutory basis.”

    “It is a ‘gun to the head’ and an unconstitutional use of Congress’s spending powers to compel Plaintiffs through ‘financial inducement’ to forgo exercising their police powers to enforce a federal statute.”

  • Crime, inflation, wokeness and that old Biden magic continue to work their charm on the American electorate.

    Democrat support from independent voters has fallen near the crucial 40% line, while almost half of all independent voters tell Gallup that they’re leaning Republican.

    “If you’re a Democrat and you’re not terrified,” says The Dispatch’s Avi Woolf, “you should be.”

    Well, I’m neither a Democrat nor terrified, but I am conservative and — at least for now — quite giddy.

    Gallup recently updated its long-term party affiliation poll, which asks American voters one or two simple questions:

    In politics, as of today, do you consider yourself a Republican, a Democrat or an independent?
    (If they ID as independents) As of today, do you lean more to the Democratic Party or the Republican Party?

    Currently, 31% say they’re Republicans, up slightly from the usual mid-20s to 30%. 41% told Gallup that they’re independent voters, in line with the average swing. Only 27% self-ID as Democrats, which is down from the more typical 29-32%.

    As recently as May, Democrats were at 32% and the GOP at a dismal 25%.

    But that’s before Presidentish Joe Biden had had a chance to do much other than send out FREE! MONEY! (handouts that helped cause our present inflation) and smile for the glowing press coverage. Since then, important parts of his agenda have taken hold and the malign incompetence of his cabinet has been fully revealed.

    Apparently, Americans don’t think much of either.

    But it’s the second question that should have Washington Democrats changing their shorts.

    Indies, asked whether they lean towards the Democrats or the GOP, broke for the GOP 47% to 41%.

    At this time in Barack Obama’s first term, the breakdown was a much more Dem-friendly 25R/41I/32D. And the Indy swing was exactly reversed, 41R/47D.

    Yet the Democrats still lost a whopping 63 seats in the House and seven more in the Senate in the following midterm election.

    Obama enjoyed immensely more personal popularity than Biden does — I know, I don’t get it, either — but couldn’t stop a GOP tsunami when his agenda proved unpopular.

    Biden has both an unpopular agenda and a high unfavorable rating draped around his neck like a lead life preserver. And now voters are leaving his party in droves.

    (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)

  • Democratic problems apply down-ballot as well: “If the elections for Congress were held today, 48% of likely U.S. voters would vote for the Republican candidate, while 39% would vote for the Democrat.” (Hat tip: Instapundit.)
  • The woke are coming for all that sweet, sweet Medicare money.

    Buried in the Department of Health and Human Services’s fiscal planning for next year is a proposal to establish bonuses for physicians who “create and implement an anti-racism plan.”

    “The plan should include a clinic-wide review of existing tools and policies, such as value statements or clinical practice guidelines, to ensure that they include and are aligned with a commitment to anti-racism and an understanding of race as a political and social construct, not a physiological one,” the HHS writes . “The plan should also identify ways in which issues and gaps identified in the review can be addressed and should include target goals and milestones for addressing prioritized issues and gaps. This may also include an assessment and drafting of an organization’s plan to prevent and address racism and/or improve language access and accessibility to ensure services are accessible and understandable for those seeking care.”

    I’m sure this will go over great with Medicare patients. “Mam, I can’t check on your osteoporosis until you check your privilege!” (Hat tip: Mickey Kaus.)

  • Speaking of Biden screwing up health care: “Biden’s big bill cuts hospital funds for poor in red states, shifts money to Obamacare.”
  • After Democrats abandoned trying to pass Biden’s giant leftwing “Build Back Better” porkfest this year, is the bill actually dead forever? South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham thinks so.

    The South Carolina Republican said that the Congressional Budget Office score, which found the $1.75 trillion bill would add $3 trillion to the deficit, is what led to its demise.

    ‘I think Build Back Better is dead forever and let me tell you why: Because Joe Manchin has said he’s not going to vote for a bill that will add to the deficit,’ he said on Fox News’ Hannity Wednesday night.

    ‘Well, if you do away with the budget gimmicks, Build Back Better, according to the CBO [Congressional Budget Office] adds $3 trillion to the deficit.’

  • Speaking of Manchin, he finally snapped at a Democratic Media Complex flunkie trying to badger him into supporting it.

    ‘This is b******t. You’re b******t,’ the West Virginia senator yelled at Arthur Delaney, a reporter for HuffPost Politics, who asked him about reports that the child tax credit has become a major sticking point in his talks with the White House.

    ‘I’m done, I’m done,’ Manchin fumed as the questions continued.

    ‘Guys, I’m not negotiating with any of you all. You can ask all the questions you want. Guys, let me go,’ he told the press as he walked through the basement of the Capitol, muttering ‘God almighty’ as he walked away.

  • Democrats are wailing about the “end of Democracy” because they’re about to lose power:

    What is behind recent pessimistic appraisals of democracy’s future, from Hillary Clinton, Adam Schiff, Brian Williams, and other elite intellectuals, media personalities, and politicians on the left? Some are warning about its possible erosion in 2024. Others predict democracy’s downturn as early 2022, with scary scenarios of “autocracy” and former President Donald Trump “coups.”

    To answer that question, understand first what is not behind these shrill forecasts.

    They are not worried about 2 million foreign nationals crashing the border in a single year, without vaccinations during a pandemic. Yet it seems insurrectionary for a government simply to nullify its own immigration laws.

    They are not worried that some 800,000 foreign nationals, some residing illegally, will now vote in New York City elections.

    They are not worried that there are formal efforts underway to dismantle the U.S. Constitution by junking the 233-year-old Electoral College or the preeminence of the states in establishing ballot laws in national elections.

    They are not worried that we are witnessing an unprecedented left-wing effort to scrap the 180-year-old filibuster, the 150-year-old nine-person Supreme Court, and the 60-year tradition of 50 states, for naked political advantage.

    They are not worried that the Senate this year put on trial an impeached ex-president and private citizen, without the chief justice in attendance, without a special prosecutor or witnesses, and without a formal commission report of presidential high crimes and misdemeanors.

    They are not worried that the FBI, Justice Department, CIA, Hillary Clinton, and members of the Obama Administration systematically sought to use U.S. government agencies to sabotage a presidential campaign, transition, and presidency, via the use of a foreign national and ex-spy Christopher Steele and his coterie of discredited Russian sources.

    They are not worried that the Pentagon suddenly has lost the majority support of the American people. Top current and retired officers have flagrantly violated the chain-of-command, the Uniform Code of Military Justice, and without data or evidence have announced a hunt in the ranks for anyone suspected of “white rage” or “white supremacy.”

    They are not worried that in 2020, a record 64% of the electorate did not cast their ballots on Election Day.

    Nor are they worried that the usual rejection rate in most states of non-Election Day ballots plunged—even as an unprecedented 101 million ballots were cast by mail or early voting.

    And they are certainly not worried that partisan billionaires of Silicon Valley poured well over $400 million into selected precincts in swing states to “help” public agencies conduct the election.

    What then is behind this new left-wing hysteria about the supposed looming end of democracy?

    It is quite simple. The left expects to lose power over the next two years—both because of the way it gained and used it, and because of its radical, top-down agendas that never had any public support.

    After gaining control of both houses of Congress and the presidency – with an obsequious media and the support of Wall Street, Silicon Valley, higher education, popular culture, entertainment and professional sports – the left has managed in just 11 months to alienate a majority of voters.

    The nation has been wracked by unprecedented crime and nonenforcement of the borders. Leftist district attorneys either won’t indict criminals; they let them out of jails or both.

    Illegal immigration and inflation are soaring. Deliberate cuts in gas and oil production helped spike fuel prices.

    All this bad news is on top of the Afghanistan disaster, worsening racial relations, and an enfeebled president.

    Democrats are running 10 points behind the Republicans in generic polls, with the midterms less than a year away.

    President Joe Biden’s negatives run between 50% and 57%—in Trump’s own former underwater territory.

    Less than a third of the country wants Biden to run for reelection. In many head-to-head polls, Trump now defeats Biden.

    In other words, leftist elites are terrified that democracy will work too robustly.

    After the Russian collusion hoax, two impeachments, the Hunter Biden laptop stories, the staged melodramas of the Kavanaugh hearings, the Jussie Smollett con, the Covington kids smear, and the Rittenhouse trial race frenzy, the people are not just worn out by leftist hysterias, but they also weary of how the left gains power and administers it.

    (Hat tip: Director Blue.)

  • Hey, remember all the way back to two weeks ago when I said that Turkey’s collapsing currency was something we should keep an eye on? Well, guess what? “Turkey Halts All Stock Trading As Currency Disintegrates, Central Bank Powerless To Halt Collapse.” ZeroHedge suggests that the collapse is engineered to disguise how much graft Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his cronies have stolen from the country.
  • Registered Republicans now outnumber registered Democrats in Florida for the first time ever. Take a bow, Scott Presler, who has worked tirelessly to register Republicans to vote:

    He’s not the driver here, but he certainly helped.

  • Nothing to look at here, just a sex and drugs scandal involving FBI employees.
  • Sometimes things are exactly what they appear to be. “Documents link Huawei to China’s surveillance programs.”

    The Chinese tech giant Huawei Technologies has long brushed off questions about its role in China’s state surveillance, saying it just sells general-purpose networking gear.

    A review by The Washington Post of more than 100 Huawei PowerPoint presentations, many marked “confidential,” suggests that the company has had a broader role in tracking China’s populace than it has acknowledged.

    These marketing presentations, posted to a public-facing Huawei website before the company removed them late last year, show Huawei pitching how its technologies can help government authorities identify individuals by voice, monitor political individuals of interest, manage ideological reeducation and labor schedules for prisoners, and help retailers track shoppers using facial recognition.

    Insert shocked face here.

  • Apple climbs further into bed with Communist China.

    Citing both interviews and direct access to internal Apple documents about repeated visits by Cook to China in the mid-2010s, the report describes a $275 billion deal whereby Apple committed to investing heavily in technology infrastructure and training in the country.

    The non-binding five-year deal was signed by Cook during a 2016 visit, and it was made partially to mitigate or prevent regulatory action by the Chinese government that would have had significant negative effects on Apple’s operations and business in the country.

    The Information details the nature of the Chinese government priorities included in the 1,250-word deal:

    They included a pledge to help Chinese manufacturers develop “the most advanced manufacturing technologies” and “support the training of high-quality Chinese talents.”

    In addition, Apple promised to use more components from Chinese suppliers in its devices, sign deals with Chinese software firms, collaborate on technology with Chinese universities and directly invest in Chinese tech companies… Apple promised to invest “many billions of dollars more” than what the company was already spending annually in China. Some of that money would go toward building new retail stores, research and development centers and renewable energy projects, the agreement said.

  • “Disgrace: Biden abandoned over 60,000 Afghan interpreters, support personnel — along with 14,000 Americans.”
  • “Trump’s Social Media Platform Gets $1 Billion Investment Boost, Dems Get Nervous.” It will be interesting to see how quickly TRUTH Social can get off the ground.
  • Are Texas National Guardsmen getting screwed out of their pay?
  • Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. “Texas man sentenced to nearly 4 years in prison for attacking US Marshal during Portland Antifa riot.”
  • Play stupid games, win stupid prizes Philadelphia pizza joint edition.
  • In yesterday’s post, I forgot to link to these Log4J memes. Enjoy!
  • Why New York City lags the rest of the nation in unemployment. Thank lockdowns, shutdowns, and insane government. “The economy is not a light switch. The supply chain is not a light switch.” The money quote “New York City is just not that amazing!”
  • Popular Mexican singer Vincente Fernandez died, and the woke couldn’t wait to crap on his grave:

  • In a blow to election integrity, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals says that the Attorney General lacks authority to prosecute election fraud cases.
  • Democrats: Don’t you dare call us communists! Also Democrats: “Sen. Richard Blumenthal Helps Conn. Communist Party Celebrate 102nd Anniversary of CPUSA.”
  • Things that make you go “Hmmmm”:

  • True, dat.

  • Life imitates an episode of Justified:

  • Did you know that an Israeli airstrike hit a Syrian port last week? Did you see anything about that in the news? Seems like the sort of thing the media would cover before they decided that a bunch of lunatics shouting at J.K. Rowling is more important.
  • Texas House Speaker Dade Phalen attends fundraiser for quorum-busting Democrats in the Rio Grande Valley (including State Reps. Terry Canales, Sergio Munoz Jr., Oscar Longoria, Armando Martinez, and Bobby Guerra, and State Sen. Chuy Hinojosa) while skipping a Republican event a mile away. Remind me again why Phalen is speaker?
  • “Pasadena Mechanic Sues City Over Parking Space Regulation Prohibiting His Business from Operating.”
  • There’s nothing this Austin City Council can’t seem to ruin, including the Trail of Lights.
  • “Man these allergies are killing me,” December edition. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • I think they should use this scene in Super Troopers III: “Two Massachusetts State Police troopers have been suspended without pay for turning a hallway at the state police academy into a makeshift ‘Slip ‘N Slide’ game.” (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Speaking of science experiments: What happens when you hit a gong with a baseball traveling at Mach 1.5? And you know there’s super-slow motion involved…
  • Whoa:

  • Terry Gilliam fired from directing West End production of Into The Woods for daring to recommend Dave Chapelle’s new comedy special on his own Facebook page.
  • “Sex and the City writer Candace Bushnell, 60, admits she regrets choosing a career over having children as she is now ‘truly alone.'”
  • “Biden Warns Russia That If They Invade Ukraine, America Will Evacuate Haphazardly And Leave $86 Billion In Weapons Behind.”
  • “Hillary Clinton Reportedly Considering Losing Again In 2024.”
  • “Bob Dole Switches To Democrat Party.”
  • Skillz:

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    Posted in Austin, Budget, Communism, Crime, Democrats, Economics, Elections, Foreign Policy, Media Watch, ObamaCare, Regulation, Republicans, Social Justice Warriors, Texas, video, Waste and Fraud, Welfare State | 1 Comment »

    Log4J and Internet Castles Made of Sand

    December 16th, 2021

    If you work outside of a tech company, chances are you’ve spent this week primarily concerned with getting ready for Christmas. If you work inside a tech company, there’s a significant chance your company spent much of this week patching a critical vulnerability in an open source Java logging library called Log4J.

    Here’s a non-technical explanation of the problem:

    It’s a vulnerability that was discovered in a piece of free, open source software called log4j. This software is used by thousands of websites and applications, to perform mundane functions most people don’t think about, such as logging information for use by that website’s developers, for debugging and other purposes.

    Every web application needs functionality like this, and as a result, the use of log4j is ubiquitous worldwide. Unfortunately, it turns out log4j has a previously undiscovered security vulnerability where data sent to it through that website — if it contains a special sequence of characters — results in log4j automatically fetching additional software from an external website and running it. If a cyberattacker exploits this, they can make the server that is running log4j run any software they want — including software that can completely take over that server. This is known as a Remote Code Execution (RCE) attack.

    To use a technical phrase, this is Really Bad.

    The net result is that, left unaddressed, cyberattackers right now can completely take over thousands of websites and online applications, allowing them to steal money, data, and access. The security community has been completely focused on this vulnerability for the past two days, and updating servers running log4j as quickly as possible to protect against this vulnerability.

    The good news is that mitigations are relatively easy to implement. The bad news is that left unmitigated, the vulnerability is extremely easy to exploit. iCloud, Minecraft, Baidu, and many other sites have been confirmed to be vulnerable so far, and you’ll likely hear more about many other sites being vulnerable in the coming days.

    And those companies are just the tip of the iceberg. LAMP stacks (Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP) are used as the technological underpinnings for a wide variety of web applications of all sizes. (It’s not universal, as NGINX has taken over as a market leader from Apache, and there are still a few all-Microsoft houses that use IIS, and neither of them have the vulnerability.)

    Open Source has been a revolutionary invention because it provides rapid development by armies of distributed developers, and Linus’s Law states that “with enough eyes, all bugs are shallow.” But there are tens of thousands of Open Source components out there running critical infrastructure that haven’t had nearly as many eyes on the code as the Linux kernel. It’s simply the nature of the beast. XKCD had a cartoon for this occasion:

    Internet applications gain usefulness from widespread adoption and the number of other components they tie into and support. You know what creates new vulnerabilities? A larger user base and the number of other components they tie into and support, which creates more attack surfaces for malicious actors to exploit.

    The flaw isn’t the fault of Random Guy in Nebraska, the fault is the company adopting software that they can’t possibly test for all the use-cases they’re going to use it for. Surprise! Just about every high tech company in the world is in the same boat. Pretty much everyone uses a wide panoply of open source tools for their Internet applications, and no one can test all the permutations of how each component might be put to use.

    You can’t eliminate the risk, you can only minimize and mitigate it. You can use containerization strategies (Docker, Kubernetes, Container D, etc.) to minimize attack surfaces and limit contagion. You can run all your code through security scanning tools on your CI/CD platform of choice. You can do constant testing and keep rolling backups of everything to limit risk and speed recovery. (You can also train your employees not to click on random email links without verifying the sender is who they say they are, and not to give any any account information or passwords over the phone, and train them enough so that the lessons stick, even though phising and human engineering weren’t factors in the Log4J vulnerability.)

    But there still a good chance that the platform you’re using today is different than the platform you’ll be using ten years from now, and you’ll have to go through the same learning lessons discovering new vulnerabilities for the new platform all over again.

    Castles made of sand all fall into the sea eventually…

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    Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments »

    Cuomo Casho Nomo

    December 15th, 2021

    Few political falls have been so swift and complete as that of former New York Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo. In 2020, Cuomo was being talked up as an emergency replacement for Sundown Joe Biden on the presidential ticket despite having forced Flu Manchu patients into nursing homes, resulting in tens of thousands of unnecessary deaths, and signed a $5.1 million book deal to talk up the awesomeness of all his lockdowns and granny killing.

    Here at the burnt-end of 2021, Andrew Cuomo is not only disgraced and out of office over sexual abuse allegations, his brother Fredo has been purged from CNN, ostensibly over his own sex abuse scandal. Now ex-Governor Cuomo has been ordered to turn that sweet $5.1 million over to New York State.

    Former New York governor Andrew Cuomo has been ordered by the state’s ethics board to forfeit $5.1 million in profits next month from the memoir he published over the pandemic.

    In a near unanimous decision, a twelve to one vote, the New York Joint Commission on Public Ethics passed a resolution demanding that Cuomo return his earnings from the book, “American Crisis: Leadership Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic.” This comes a month after the panel rescinded its prior approval giving the now disgraced governor permission to keep the book side hustle while he was still serving as governor of New York, confronting multiple scandals simultaneously.

    Over the summer and into the fall, the New York attorney general’s office launched a probe into Cuomo’s alleged abuse of state resources, including staff members, to draft and promote his book. During that criminal investigation, Attorney General Letitia James subpoenaed the ethics panel for information related to the book deal. The JCOPE then reversed its approval for Cuomo’s to collect income from the book deal, paving the road for fines to be potentially imposed or profits to be recalled.

    According to the resolution, created by Republican commissioner David McNamara, the former governor “lacked the legal authority to engage in outside activity and receive compensation in regard to the book” since the panel rescinded its approval.

    While I had no intention of making this Louis Rossmann Week, he has such a wonderful plate of profane schadenfreude over this turn of evens that I’m embedding it here.

    How unpopular is Cuomo? Even former Gambino Family underboss Sammy “The Bull” Gravano said Cuomo’s granny-killing was beyond the pale. “I don’t give a f— who tells me to do that, whether it’s [former President] Trump, the president, the vice president, you, him, I would never do it…And I’m a badass. I’d never do it.”

    How bad do you have to suck to have a guy involved in 19 murders to think you’re scum?

    (And did you know that Gravano has his own YouTube channel and a podcast? His videos even have sponsors! Only in America…)

    Speaking of organized crime figures, Cuomo has clearly pissed off somebody deep in the Democratic Party power structure. I am very far indeed from the center of the New York Democratic Party, but there’s obviously something weird going on there. Having Letitia James take out Cuomo, only to drop out of the race to be his successor suggests someone beyond the public players made that call. Add that to the perfect table-run required to get Biden the nomination in 2020, the continued screwing of the Bernie Brigades, and the inexplicable rise of Pete Buttigieg, and it becomes very obvious that people very far indeed from the public figureheads of the Democratic Party are calling the shots from the shadows.

    Not that Cuomo didn’t have it coming. He did. He’s a scummy asshole. But he was just as big a scummy asshole in 2020, and the Democratic Machine pulled out all the stops propping him up as some sort of messianic paragon of COVID-fighting virtue. Now the same people have done a 180° and plunged the knives into him.

    The question is why.

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    Posted in Crime, Democrats, Waste and Fraud | 4 Comments »

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