Posts Tagged ‘Not The Bee’

LinkSwarm For March 21, 2025

Friday, March 21st, 2025

More DOGE revelations, more leftwing violence, more pervert school teachers arrested, Baltimore builds a ghost city, astronauts get rescued, DVDs rot, and a bunch of fierce togers with a gentle mom.

It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

  • Hamas-linked CAIR was given over $7,200,000 in taxpayer money, and that money is unaccounted for.

    Muslim charity with links to Hamas was awarded more than $7.2 million in taxpayer cash, which has now disappeared, according to a watchdog group.

    An “immediate investigation” needs to be launched into The Council on American-Islamic Relations’ (CAIR) California chapter’s use of funds, according to the watchdog, who sent a complaint to the Department of Justice Thursday.

    According to the Intelligent Advocacy Network (IAN), a California-based, non-partisan advocacy group, the money was given to the chapter to help re-settle impoverished immigrants in California between 2022 and 2024.

    In what appears to be a sleight of hand, the money – $7,217,968.44 — was sent to CAIR-Greater Los Angeles and not to CAIR-CA, which was the only group eligible to receive it, according to the complaint.

    The Greater Los Angeles chapter of the Muslim organization, which is not a registered non-profit and not eligible to handle charitable donations, received the entire pot of money according to the complaint, viewed by The Post.

    I think we all know where that money went: Leftwing pockets and murdering Jews.

  • Trump Signs Executive Order Dismantling Department of Education.”

    President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday shuttering the Department of Education, fulfilling a long-standing conservative wish to do away with the agency.

    Trump’s order directs Education Secretary Linda McMahon to take the “necessary steps” to close the $268 billion agency and transfer its authority back to the states. The order does not immediately shutter the agency, and it will require programs and services to continue uninterrupted.

    “Everybody knows it’s right,” Trump said moments before signing the order, which he said was 45 years in the making. “We have to get our children educated.”

    The long-expected executive order will likely face significant legal challenges over whether Trump has the authority to dismantle the agency. Fully closing down the Department of Education will require congressional approval.

    Since the days of President Ronald Reagan, Republicans have sought to eliminate the Department of Education, created in 1979 under former President Jimmy Carter, for its role in promoting left-wing ideology and encroaching on state authority. The Education Department’s responsibilities primarily consist of allocating grant money, administering student loans, and enforcing federal civil rights laws

    Trump has long promised to terminate the agency and empower states to run their own education systems without federal interference. Shuttering the Education Department was a bullet point on the 2024 GOP platform.

    National Review seems to think Trump’s plan is more flawed than the previous Republican Presidential attempts to shutter the Department of Education by not doing a goddamn thing…

  • Republican Congresswoman Harriet Hageman explains exactly what the Department of Education does with your money.

    The Department of Education has a budget of about $280 billion dollars per year. Less than 25% goes to educating our students.

    It goes to a bureaucracy. It goes to a consultant. And that consultant then donates money back to the Democrats. And then it goes to a different consultant. And then it goes to an NGO. It is money laundering and money churning at its absolute best.

    It appears that the entire point of both the Biden and Obama Administrations was to turn the entirety of the federal government into a giant graft machine for the radical left.

  • “Paxton Opinion States District Courts Cannot Order Sex Changes on Government ID.” State district courts can no longer direct state agencies to change a person’s sex on government documents.”
  • “Trump Administration Pauses $175 Million in Funding to UPenn over Refusal to Bar Men from Women’s Sports.” Defunding will continue until sanity improves.
  • Victor Davis Hanson: The left knew they were lying to us.

    For years, the left has advanced utter untruths for cheap partisan purposes that it knew at the time were all false. And now when caught, they just shrug and say they were lying all along.

    Once it was known that the first COVID-19 case originated in or near a Chinese communist virology lab engineering gain-in-function deadly viruses—with help from Western agencies—the left went into full persecution mode.

    They damned as incompetent, racist, and conspiratorial any who dared follow logic and evidence to point out that the Chinese government and its military were both culpable for the virus and lying.

    A million Americans died of COVID. Millions more suffered long-term injuries. Still, the left-wing media and Biden administration demonized any who dared speak the truth about a lab origin of the deadly virus.

    The lies were designed to protect the guilty who had helped fund the virus’s origins, such as Doctors Anthony Fauci and Francis Collins.

    The Biden government also tried to use the lab theory to ridicule a supposedly pro-Trump “conspiracy.”

    Western corporate interests deeply invested in China did not want their partner held responsible for veritably killing and maiming hundreds of millions worldwide.

    Almost as soon as Joe Biden was inaugurated, the left knew that he was physically and mentally unable to serve as president.

    Indeed, that was the point.

    Biden’s role was designed as a waxen figurine for hard-left agendas that, without the “old Joe Biden from Scranton” pseudo-moderate veneer, could never have been advanced.

    His handlers operated a nightmare administration: the destruction of deterrence abroad, two theater wars, 12 million illegal aliens, a weaponized justice system, hyperinflation, and $7 trillion more in debt.

    By 2017, the public knew three truths about the so-called Christopher Steele dossier.

    One, it was completely fallacious—fabricated by a has-been, ex-British spy Christopher Steele. He childishly had cobbled together lurid sex stories, James Bond spy fictions, and Russian-fed disinformation to destroy the Trump candidacy and later presidency.

    Two, it was paid for by the Hillary Clinton campaign. She hid her checks behind the Democratic National Committee, the Perkins Coie law firm, and Fusion GSP paywalls.

    Three, the FBI under James Comey hired Steele as an informant. It helped disseminate his concocted files and was also instrumental in trying to subvert the Trump campaign and later administration.

    No sane person ever believed that Hunter Biden’s laptop was the work of “Russian disinformation.” Its contents a year before the 2020 election were verified by the FBI, but it kept mum about its confirmation.

    The pornographic pictures, the evidence of prostitution and drug use, the electronic communications implicating Joe Biden in his family’s illicit shake-down operation of foreign governments—all were never challenged by anyone who was associated with the laptop’s contents.

    Yet future Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, along with former interim CIA Director Mike Morrell, sought to fabricate a colossal lie to arm their candidate, Joe Biden, with plausible denial in the last presidential debate before the 2020 election.

    They rounded up a rogue’s gallery of 51 now utterly discredited former intelligence authorities to lie to the nation that the laptop was likely fake.

    All knew the FBI had verified the laptop. But they also knew that their titles would empower their lies that the Russians likely invented the laptop to aid the sinister Trump.

  • Fort Worth Teacher Arrested for Online Solicitation of a Minor. Christopher Rhodes was placed on leave from Young Men’s Leadership Academy during the investigation.”
  • Austin Elementary Teacher Jailed for Possessing ‘Large Quantity’ of Child Sex Abuse Material. Carl Innmon taught sign language at Baranoff Elementary School in Austin ISD.”
  • The question of whether federal judges can review alien deportation orders under the Alien Enemy Act has already been decided in Ludecke v. Watkins. “The Alien Enemy Act precludes judicial review of the removal order.” Pp. 163-166. (Hat tip: Grim’s Hall.)
  • Sanity: ” New York’s Highest Court Blocks NYC Law Allowing Noncitizens to Vote. ‘Instead, it is plain from the language and restrictions contained in Article II that “citizen” is not meant as a floor, but as a condition of voter eligibility.'”
  • You may not have heard in another packed news week, but once again Recep Tayyip Erdogan is doing Erdogan things in Turkey.

    Ekrem Imamoglu, Istanbul’s mayor and a high-profile member of the opposition to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, was arrested along with dozens of others Wednesday, state-run media reported, in what critics said was a significant escalation of the government’s crackdown on dissent.
    Get concise answers to your questions. Try Ask The Post AI.

    The chief public prosecutor’s office ordered the arrest of about 100 people Wednesday, saying Imamoglu and others faced allegations including membership in criminal organization, bribery, aggravated fraud and unlawful acquisition of personal data. More than 80 people had been detained so far, according to local media reports.

    Imamoglu, a popular politician and member of the opposition Republican People’s Party, or CHP, became mayor of Turkey’s largest city in 2019 and won reelection last year in high-profile races where he defeated candidates from Erdogan’s ruling party. He was expected to be selected as the CHP’s candidate for president in the party’s primary elections scheduled for this weekend. The mayorship of Istanbul is seen as a political stepping stone: Erdogan once held the role.

    Over two decades in power, Erdogan has tightened his control over state institutions and deepened restrictions on speech and expression, including within the judiciary, bringing charges against and imprisoning opponents. He has also exerted widespread control over the media, universities and other institutions.

  • Lefties suffering from Musk Derangement Syndrome are attacking Tesla centers.

    US Attorney General Pam Bondi released a statement overnight, calling the “violent attacks” on Tesla showrooms, service centers, Supercharger networks, and vehicles “nothing short of domestic terrorism.”

    “The swarm of violent attacks on Tesla property is nothing short of domestic terrorism. The Department of Justice has already charged several perpetrators with that in mind, including in cases that involve charges with five-year mandatory minimum sentences,” Bondi stated in a press release.

    She continued: “We will continue investigations that impose severe consequences on those involved in these attacks, including those operating behind the scenes to coordinate and fund these crimes.”

    The latest domestic terrorism attack on Tesla occurred at a service center in Las Vegas early Tuesday morning.

  • And of course a Soros-funded NGO is paying for the campaign of terror.

    ver the next few days you’re going to see an organized progressional protest effort at Tesla stores put together by a group called Indivisible.

    George Soros foundation has given Indivisible nearly $8 million dollars for their “activism”.

    They’re calling these “Tesla takedown” events and they’re doing it in the midst of a domestic terror spree targeting Tesla and Tesla owners. They have these planned across the entire country. These images are just six examples.

    How can this not be seen as encouraging more violence and terrorism? I personally think that any violence occurring near locations they’ve chosen should result in Soros, his foundation, Indivisible and their founders being held criminally accountable as co-conspirators.

    The indivisible founders are Ezra Levin and his wife Leah Greenberg. They became “resistance” figures during Trump’s first term and their work is celebrated by elected Democrats. So yeah, it’s clear to me that the Democrats and their typical thugs are organizing this insanity.

    There’s reportedly even a form protest leaders can fill out to receive “reimbursement” payments for their protests.

  • “So the way you fight Nazis in 2025 is paint swastikas on Jewish people’s cars.”
  • Naturally, the Daily Show audience cheered at the news.
  • Meanwhile, Musk’s SpaceX Dragon crew compartment was busy returning stranded astronauts to earth, a path I’m assuming the Biden Administration didn’t pursue because there was no way to rake off leftwing graft from the rescue mission…
  • Plus Trump says they’ll get overtime, even if has pay it out of his own pocket:

    (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)

  • People called up North Carolina Republican Sen. Thom Tillis’ office to express polite disagreement with his policies. Ha, just kidding! They threatened to kill him and his family.
  • “Two Texas Universities Investigated by U.S. Department of Education for ‘Race-Exclusionary Practices.'” That would be Rice University and North Texas University.
  • Trump releases the JFK files and they raise more questions.
  • New York Times is now saying that lab leak theory is now plausible, after years of attacking anyone who mentioned it as “conspiracy theorists.” And yes, Not The Bee used the Hot Dog Guy meme.

  • “Federal Prosecutors Secure Convictions for 2022 Human Smuggling Event that Killed 53.”

    Federal prosecutors announced the convictions of two of the human smugglers responsible for the horrific 2022 mass casualty event wherein 53 people were killed and 11 injured after being locked into a tractor-trailer and left in the Texas heat.

    The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) described the tragedy as the single deadliest human smuggling case in U.S. history at the time. Four men, all Mexican nationals, were charged in connection with the crime: 30-year-old Riley Covarrubias-Ponce, 28-year-old Felipe Orduna-Torres, 37-year-old Luis Rivera-Leal, and 53-year-old Armando Gonzales-Ortega.

    Fast forward, and the DOJ confirmed in a press statement that Orduna-Torres and Gonzalez-Ortega were convicted for their roles in the alien smuggling conspiracy that led to the deaths.

  • In Mexico: There’s a big difference between “screwing up” and accidentally killing three of your fellow guardsman in a negligent discharge. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Speaking of negligent discharges, Brandon Herrera did not appreciate Sig Saur’s media team trying to gaslight people over the P320’s well-documented issues .
  • Japan’s “evaporated people,” who completely abandon their previous life, family and friends to move to slums anonymously. Some similarities with American homeless or China’s “lie flat” movement, but I get the impression a big difference is that evaporated people are primarily motivated by shame of failure.
  • Baltimore offers tax incentives to inner harbor development project, only to create a ghost city.
  • Kotaku gets a defamation lawsuit by former Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick. Some people are calling it “Gawker 2.0.”
  • Another day, another indicted rap mogul.

    A music bigwig who helped launch Nipsey Hussle’s career and was lauded as rap’s “godfather” has been accused of running a “Mafia-like” criminal enterprise involving murder, human trafficking, robbery and extortion on the streets of Los Angeles.

    Eugene Henley Jr. — known as “Big U” in the entertainment world — was one of 18 members of the Rollin’ 60s Neighborhood Crips street gang charged in a sprawling federal racketeering complaint, the US Attorney’s Office said Wednesday.

    Henley has “maintained the image of an entertainment industry entrepreneur running a music label and of somebody who gives back to the community here in Los Angeles,” US Attorney Joseph T. McNally said while announcing the indictment.

    (Hat tip: Dwight.)

  • Carl Erik Rinsch, the guy who $55 million from Netflix to make an SF miniseries and instead bought stocks and Dogecoin has finally been indicted.
  • Amazon driver goes ballistic, cussing out woman’s doorbell camera for “buying all this shit.” Turns out the woman is in a wheelchair. Pink slip ensues.
  • New Yorker art critic Jackson Arn fired for “making ‘inappropriate overtures’ at some of the party guests and appeared to be drunk.” I hold no water for Arn (a lefty who used to write for The Nation) or Conde Naste (Teen Vogue), but “getting drunk and making a pass” at a holiday party used to be a forgivable sin in corporate American, but the woke religion of social justice is incapable of offering forgiveness or redemption. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Looks like I’m one of the authors that Meta ripped off to train their AI on without permission.
  • Warner Brothers DVD bit rot is a real problem.
  • A simplified description of how your brain actually operates. I wouldn’t take it as gospel, but I’m regretting that I never actually read Marvin Minsky’s The Society of Mind
  • Rick Beato interviews Hans Zimmer. “The job is not to listen to the director telling you what the music is he wants, because if if he knows what music he wants, then he can do it himself. My job is to sort of listen to him tell me the story and then do the thing that he can’t even imagine.”
  • “Federal Judge Orders Astronauts Be Returned To Space Station.”
  • “Democrats Say Fire At Tesla Facility Likely Caused By Climate Change.”
  • “Single Woman Constantly Stressed With No Man Around To Tell Her To Relax.”
  • Pack of tigers has Golden mom:

    (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)

  • I’m between jobs again. Feel free to hit the tip jar if you’re so inclined.





    LinkSwarm For November 22, 2024

    Friday, November 22nd, 2024

    The Trump witchunt trial is suspended, PA Democrats give up the steal, the ruble collapses, a real estate developer is busted for bribery, thrash metal TDS, and an unexpected voice of sanity and reason from…Cenk Uygur?

    It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

  • New York Judge Indefinitely Postpones Trump Hush-Money Sentencing, Will Consider Dismissing Case.” Why, it’s almost as if the entire farcical trial was a witch hunt from the beginning.

    Judge Juan Merchan indefinitely postponed the sentencing hearing in President-elect Donald Trump’s New York criminal case, which had been planned for next week, in light of Trump’s election.

    Merchan is giving Trump’s legal team more than a week to file its motion asking for a dismissal under the argument that his return to office provides him a new host of immunity-related defenses.

    Trump’s lawyers will be required to file by December 2, after which Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg will have until December 9 to respond.

    Snip.

    While Trump could face up to four years in prison, the more likely sentence in the case — should it move forward — would be probation, which could include some combination of a fine or community service, as the former and future president is a first-time offender.

    “Just as a sitting President is completely immune from any criminal process, so too is President Trump as President-elect,” Trump’s lawyers wrote in a letter filed Tuesday.

    Trump’s team had requested a December 20 deadline to file.

    Bragg, for his part, has argued in favor of freezing the case for the entirety of Trump’s term in office, and then revisiting the sentencing at the end of Trump’s tenure.

    But Trump attorneys Todd Blanche and Emil Bove have argued dismissal of the case “is necessary under the Constitution and federal law to facilitate the orderly transition of Executive power — and in the interests of justice — following President Trump’s victory in the Electoral College and the popular vote in the 2024 Presidential election.”

  • Democrat Bob Casey realizes he won’t be able to cheat his way to victory and concedes after the Pennsylvania Supreme Court reiterates that no, you’re not allowed to illegally count the ballots we’ve already declared illegal.
  • The Harris campaign spent $12 million doing polling on her strengths and weaknesses. I’m going to guess that the amount Trump spent on polling his strengths and weakness was “zero.”
  • Matt Gaetz withdraws from consideration as Trump’s Attorney General, and former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi is the new nominee.
  • Heh:

    (Hat tip: Instapundit.)

  • Musician turns Democrat freakouts into epic thrash metal:

  • Are we running out of gunpowder? (Hat tip: KR Training.)
  • To paraphrase Instapundit, we’ve entered some sort of hellworld where Cenk Uygur is a voice of moderation and reason, calling out far left pollster Allan Lichtman for blowing his election call, whereupon Lichtman shrieks that Uygur is committing “blasphemy” against him. Everyone and their dog has posted this, but I’m linking to the Asmongold clip because his seems to be the shortest.
  • Ukraine hit a military manufacturing facility 1,279 km from the Ukrainian border in a drone strike.
  • The Russian ruble hit a two year low against the dollar.
  • Trump intends to squeeze Iran.

    US President-elect Donald Trump’s administration is preparing to reinstate its “maximum pressure” strategy against Iran, targeting Tehran’s economic stability and its ability to support militant proxies and nuclear development, The Financial Times reported on Saturday, citing sources close to the transition team.

    The sources revealed that the administration plans to impose stricter sanctions, particularly on Iran’s oil exports, which serve as a critical revenue source.

    The anticipated sanctions could drastically reduce Iranian oil exports, which currently exceed 1.5 million barrels per day, up from a low of 400,000 barrels per day in 2020. Experts suggest that these measures would severely impact Iran’s economy. Bob McNally, an energy consultant and former US presidential adviser, indicated that reducing exports to a fraction of current levels would leave Iran in a far worse economic position than during Trump’s first term.

  • The Danish Navy is following a Chinese ship suspected of severing communication cables in the Baltic Sea.
  • In a followup to yesterday’s story, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has ordered state entities to divest from investments in Communist China. “One investment group specifically highlighted in Abbott’s letter is the University of Texas/Texas A&M Investment Management Company (UTIMCO), which manages billions of dollars in assets for both university systems. UTIMCO has come under scrutiny after a Texas Scorecard investigation revealed its investments in more than 50 Chinese companies.”
  • Laken Riley’s illegal alien murderer convicted and sentenced to life without parole. Oh, and he had previously enjoyed a taxpayer-funded stay at the Roosevelt Hotel and a flight to Georgia. Thanks, Joe Biden.
  • El Salvador’s gang prison doesn’t play around. A whole lot of this would (rightfully) be considered cruel and unusual punishment, but we should veer more in this direction rather than putting illegal alien rapists up in hotels…
  • Michael Johnston, the mayor of Denver, “is “suggesting the use of force against ICE agents who are carrying out the lawful actions of the U.S. government.”
  • “Dallas Developer Pleads Guilty to Bribing City Council Members.”

    Sherman Roberts, who led the City Wide Community Development Corporation, was indicted four years ago for a bribery scheme involving former Mayor Pro Tem Dwaine Caraway and former City Council Member Carolyn Davis for their support of loans and low-income housing tax credits for his apartment projects.

    He now faces up to five years in prison and is expected to be sentenced in March.

    Roberts paid Davis several thousand dollars in cash, and promised future payments after her council tenure ended, in return for Davis’ support of his projects — Serenity Place, Runyon Springs, and Patriot’s Crossing — according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Texas.

    Roberts was a Democratic Party donor, but in fairly piddling amounts for a real estate developer…

  • Middle School Principal Arrested for Possession of Child Pornography…Chad Dwight Barrett, a 56-year-old principal at Hardin Junior High School in Liberty, was arrested on November 14 following a police investigation that found he sent a student an inappropriate video.”
  • “Incoming Lawmaker Files Legislation to Allow Death Penalty for Sex Crimes Against Children.” Would need to see the details, but clearly scumbags raping small children deserve to die…
  • Repeat criminal told sheriff it would take “his tank and his helicopter” to get him out of his house, but in the end all it took was a needle.
  • Southern Poverty Law Center tries to dox Not The Bee staffers over #WrongThink.
  • Advanced Auto Parts closes all of it’s California stores. Thanks, Gavin Newsom.
  • Carmakers stopped making affordable cars in order to underwrite their move into electric cars. Result: They can’t sell cars and their overflow lots are full.
  • The DOJ wants Google to sell off Chrome. Well, that would be a start in addressing their monopoly position in Internet searches, but would hardly be sufficient. They should also have to spin off YouTube. And because consumers were directly harmed by their monopoly, they should be required to add 2GB of storage a year for every Gmail user for 20 years, he said self-interestedly. (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • The time of the turning: “Sold-out NYC crowd ERUPTS, chants USA as President Trump attends UFC 309 with Elon Musk, RFK Jr, Speaker Johnson.”
  • Austin governance at its usualist: “CapMetro puts dozens of electric buses in storage amid manufacturer’s financial collapse. (Previously.) (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Shocking news from the world of science: Weed isn’t good for you. “According to their findings, exposure to cannabis was associated with a range of cancers – breast, pancreatic, liver, thyroid, testicular and lymphoma – that also develop quickly and are more aggressive.”
  • Sweden’s Gender Equality Minister Paulina Brandberg is deeply afraid of…bananas.
  • Service for a hypercar costs more than the purchase price of a non-hyper car.
  • Thomas E. Kurtz, creator of BASIC, RIP. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Enjoy the Honest Trailer for Megalopolis, with bonus Teen Girl Squad reference.
  • Interesting video on attempts to replicate flickering firelight using electric bulbs. (This is what I currently use for the Halloween season, and it’s adequate for my needs.)
  • The TDS doctor is in.
  • “Trump Worried Everyone Will Quit Before He Can Tell Them ‘You’re Fired.'”
  • “Fattest, Sickest Country On Earth Concerned New Health Secretary Might Do Something Different.”
  • “After Illegal Immigrant Found Guilty Of Murder, Dems Sentence Him To Flying Coach.”
  • “Sunny Hostin Forced To Read Legal Notice Acknowledging Nothing Said On ‘The View’ In Its Entire History Has Ever Been Remotely True.”
  • “Before DOGE Cuts Funding, NIH Working Feverishly To Complete Study On The Effects Of Giving Meth To Jetpack-Wearing Hamsters.”
  • That’s a happy puppy.

  • LinkSwarm For July 19, 2024

    Friday, July 19th, 2024

    The assassination attempt against President Donald Trump was less than a week ago and a ton of news has come down the pike since. Biden replacement rumors fly hot and heavy, Trump secures renomination, Windows machines across the globe are down thanks to CrowdStrike, a League of Assholes rises in Africa, Chuy’s gets sold, and we say goodbye to a comedy legend. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

  • Rumors are flying fast that Biden is going to quit the race this weekend. This may just be a bluff from the anti-Biden faction for Biden’s handlers to force him out.
  • The fact that Biden was diagnosed with Flu Manchu has helped fuel rumors he’ll quit for “medical reasons.”
  • But his handlers are claiming rumors of a Biden withdrawal are fake news and that he’ll be back campaigning next week. (Hat tip: Director Blue.)
  • Biden’s campaign chief Jen O’Malley Dillon says he’s not leaving the race.
  • A zoom call with prominent Democrats evidently didn’t reassure them.

    The 81-year-old president repeatedly lost his train of thought on the call and was dismissive of the Democrats’ concerns about his 2024 re-election campaign following his train-wreck debate performance last month, Puck reported Wednesday, citing multiple sources…

    ‘The call was even worse than the debate. He was rambling; he’d start an answer then lose his train of thought, then would just say “whatever.” He really couldn’t complete an answer. I lost a ton of respect for him,’ one person on the call said.

    ‘The president was rambling, dismissive of concerns, unable or unprepared to present a campaign strategy,’ added a second source, who is a member of Congress.

  • Pushing Biden out won’t solve the fundamental problem of the unpopularity of his administration’s leftist ideas.

    Joe Biden’s escalating dementia and the long media-political conspiracy to hide his senility from the public are the least of the Democrats’ current problems.

    Biden’s track record as president may be more concerning than his cognitive decline. He has literally destroyed the U.S. border, deliberately allowing the entry of more than 10 million illegal aliens. His callous handlers’ agenda was to import abjectly poor constituencies in need of vast government services without regard for the current struggles of a battered American middle class and poor.

    The widespread poverty of a vast new cohort of illegal immigrants could serve as indictments of a “racist,” “unequal,” and “unfair” America—as if the residents of East Palestine, Ohio or inner-city Chicago had anything to do with the centuries-long corruption and oppression of Mexico and Latin America that daily drives thousands of their own poorest citizens northwards to a society founded on very different ideas than those of their homelands.

    Note that the left, neither in Mexico nor in America, never asks why millions of these impoverished people prefer to break into a supposedly racist America. Much less do they even distinguish those principles and values that once made America prosperous, free, and secure from their antitheses that have sadly made much of Latin America mostly poor, without freedom, and insecure.

    Biden inherited near-zero real interest rates and inflation at 1.4 percent. Almost immediately, in nihilistic fashion, Biden did to a sound economy what he had done to a secure border. So, he recklessly printed money at a time of spiraling, quarantine-ending demand and supply chain disruption. Middle-class wages never caught up with Biden’s inflation, as prices for key staples are nearly 30 percent higher than when he took office.

    The cost of servicing the ballooning national debt at high interest is now nearly $1 trillion per year. The world abroad is aflame, lit by Biden’s inexplicable withdrawal from Kabul, his mixed signals to Vladimir Putin on the eve of his invasion of Ukraine, his deliberate alienation of Israel, his appeasement of Iran and China, and his cuts in the defense budget, coupled with his woke war on mythical “racists” in the military.

    Energy prices soared, even as Biden’s green agenda proved unworkable and prompted draining the strategic petroleum reserve and begging foreign oil despots before key elections. The “unifier” Biden by design needlessly alienated nearly half the country, and in his debate, he reiterated why Trump supporters do not deserve his concern. And more ominously and recently, Biden grossly told hundreds of his donors that “it’s time to put Trump in a bullseye”—just days before the attempt on Trump’s life.

    The greatest absurdity of the Biden White House is the gaslighting talk of Biden’s “achievements.” Biden’s actions over the last four years are not offsets for his senility that warrant his continuance in office, but again, sadly, they serve as force multipliers, furthering claims of his dementia and for his removal.

    (Hat tip: Sarah Hoyt at Instapundit.)

  • Donald Trump officially accepts Republican nomination for President.
  • Donald Trump, elder statesman.

    I’ve been saying for a month or so now that I’m really impressed with the way that Trump has been conducting himself in this campaign. Yes, I was a fan before, but he’s really been hitting all the right notes this year, especially given the pressure of the the Democrats’ un-American lawfare assault on him.

    The Donald J. Trump who took the stage in Milwaukee last night was a reflective, determined elder statesman and it was glorious. This is what my ultra mega super MAGA friend Kevin wrote about it:

    Trump took to the stage with a bandage covering the wound left by the would-be assassin’s bullet. He kicked off his mesmerizing speech by thanking the GOP for the nomination and promising to stand for all Americans, stating: “We rise together or we fall apart.”

    Trump’s speech was unlike any of his others. It lacked the bombast and sarcasm of earlier speeches, which I find entertaining. Instead, it focused on unity.

    Trump’s sotto voce, conversational tone was perfect, and a counter to the angry maniac that the commies in the mainstream media like to portray him as. He was the adult in the room at a time when the Republic desperately needs that. His recounting of the assassination attempt provided yet another deeply emotional moment at this convention.

    I’ve only briefly glimpsed some of the MSM hacks’ response to the speech, and it’s mostly been awful and not reality-based. They’re desperate and losing and their opinion doesn’t matter.

    The man who accepted the Republican nomination last night is the man who this country needs to right the wrongs of the Biden administration’s wrecking ball reign of error.

    (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)

  • Borepatch sees a preference cascade for Trump that may have the effect of minimizing cheating. “It’s one thing to stuff ballot boxes when you think that everyone on your side is on board and your guy is going to win – and any potential investigation will be done in the most slipshod manner. It’s quite a different thing when you wonder just how many of the guys on your side are actually going to go through with this, and if the other guy wins will you be facing 20 years in Club Fed.”
  • Senator Bob Menendez Convicted in Corruption Trial.

    New York jury convicted Senator Bob Menendez (D., N.J.) on 16 felony charges on Tuesday, including obstruction of justice, acting as a foreign agent, bribery, extortion and honest services wire fraud.

    Over the course of a two-month trial, prosecutors accused the three-term senator and his wife, Nadine Arslanian Menendez, of accepting bribes — including hundreds of thousands of dollars, gold bars, and a Mercedes-Benz convertible — from three New Jersey businessmen in exchange for help with a number of legal issues. Menendez was also accused of accepting bribes to work as a foreign agent on behalf of Qatar and Egypt while he served as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

    Shortly after the verdict was handed down on Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) urged Menendez to “do what is right for his constituents, the Senate, and our country, and resign.”

    You know it’s been a pretty news-packed week when the conviction of a Democratic senator on bribery charges is this far down the LinkSwarm…

  • It seems that Kamala Harris has just as tepid support among black women as Biden.

    Kamala Harris has the same approval rating among Black women as President Biden, according to a new poll, which must come as a blow to the Vice President as Biden’s electoral fortunes falter.

    And it comes as a surprise, as Black women have been pivotal for securing Harris her spot on the ticket.

    The poll, conducted by Split Ticket between July 12 and 14, asked Black voters in battleground states of Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin about their opinions on Harris, as well as Biden and Donald Trump.

    According to the poll, if the 2024 election was a toss up between Joe Biden and Donald Trump, 76 percent of Black voters would vote for Biden, compared to 17 percent for Trump. The gender split was 72 per cent of male voters and 79 percent of females backing Biden.

    In contrast, 12 percent of Black women and 23 percent of Black men said they would vote Trump.

    But if the election were a toss up between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, the results were virtually the same, with an equal proportion of voters opting for Harris over Trump, and a split of 79 percent of Black women and 73 percent of Black men preferring the Vice President.

  • You know who else doesn’t want to vote for Democrats any more? Young male voters.

    A years-long collapse in support for Democrats among young Gen Z “Zoomer” males accelerated to a dizzying speed during the Presidentish Joe Biden administration — and that’s before Donald Trump’s display of sheer damn manliness in the moments after Saturday’s assassination attempt.

    The collapse began in 2016, the same year Donald Trump was elected to his first term in office — and, looking back, it seems almost inevitable. That was the year the American Left went from merely unhinged to flying off the rails like Doc Brown and Clara Clayton at the very end of “Back to the Future Part III.”

    Daniel Cox — aka The Liberal Patriot — wrote Monday, “A mounting number of polls suggest that young voters are shedding their Democratic attachments” and that “the way young people relate to the two major political parties is undergoing a momentous change.”

    A recent Pew study found that “young Americans are evenly divided between the parties: 47 percent lean towards or identify as Republicans and 46 percent identify as Democrats.”

    Look at these other numbers from Gallup. They’re unsustainable for the so-called Party of Youth.

    Gallup has conducted this party ID/lean poll since 1998, so presumably, they know a thing or two about it.

    “Biden is a big reason why,” Cox concluded, but there’s much more to it than that.

  • Ukrainian drones destroy electronics factory in Kursk oblast.
  • Federal appeals court blocks all of Biden student debt relief plan. “The St. Louis-based 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals granted a request, by seven Republican-led states to put on hold parts of the U.S. Department of Education’s debt relief plan that had not already been blocked by a lower-court judge.” Good. I don’t see how the Constitution allows the President to simply declare billions of dollars of subsidies to favored classes of individuals absent congressional approval. (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)
  • Remember CrowdStrike, the company that helped wipe Hillary’s equipment? An update to their security product Falcon is blue-screening Windows machines across the world today. “The U.S. Emergency Alerts System said 911 lines in multiple states were down.”
  • Biden can’t remember the name of his own Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and calls him “The Black Man.” We all know this would be career-ending for a Republican, yet it’s just another expected “senior moment” for Slow Joe…
  • Here’s some news I missed a while back: China expelled a bunch of defense chiefs from the Communist Party in a “corruption crackdown.” “The moves against Li Shangfu and his predecessor, Wei Fenghe, follow a series of shake-ups at the top of the world’s largest military — Li was ousted from the role last year after disappearing without explanation.” Actual corruption, or simply suspicion of disloyalty to Xi?

  • Barry Diller has lost $9 million propping up The Daily Beast. I know a lot of political publications lose money, but I’m pretty sure you could prop up a leftist website for less than 1/10th that…
  • Welcome to Africa’s League of Assholes. “The military regimes of Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso marked their divorce from the rest of West Africa Saturday as they signed a treaty setting up a confederation between them….All three have expelled anti-jihadi French troops and turned instead toward what they call their ‘sincere partners’ — Russia, Turkey and Iran.” More.
  • Microsoft lays off its entire DEI team.
  • Followup: After being exposed, John Deere is also axing its DEI campaigns.
  • “Alderon Games revealed that it had observed a nearly 100% failure rate of [Intel] Raptor Lake processors in its own testing.” Intel’s patch for these 13th and 14th gen chips is to underclock them, but no root cause has been found.
  • Speaking of semiconductors, UT is sucking up $840 million of DARPA subsidies for research.
  • “Dallas Jailed 14 Illegal Alien Suspects for Child Sex Crimes in a Single Month.” Thanks, Joe Biden…
  • “Newly selected Austin City Manager T.C. Broadnax has presented his proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2025 that totals $5.9 billion — a record for the city.” You can look at the entire 1,162 page document here. Of course there’s plenty of line items for “equity” and “homeless.” That’s where some of the graft is…
  • Speaking of free-spending Austin ways: “Austin City Council Members Propose Creating a Municipal Bank.” Because obviously homelessness and toy trains don’t offer quite enough opportunities for leftwing activists to skim off graft.
  • Turns out slimy NeverTrumper Max Boot was married to a foreign spy:

    For legal reasons, I supposed I should describe Sue Mi Terry as an “alleged” foreign spy.

    Terry and her husband Max Boot, a Washington Post national security columnist, put up their tony Upper West Side apartment as collateral for her $500,000 personal recognizance bond as a condition of her release before trial.

    The six-room, $1.8 million turn-of-the-century home features lavish wood paneling, built-in bookcase, stained glass windows and airy 10-foot ceilings, according to its StreetEasy listing.

    The taste for such luxury is what allegedly drove Terry — a native of Seoul who formerly worked as a CIA analyst before becoming a prominent policy expert linked to several think tanks — to disclose US secret to South Korean spies, Manhattan federal prosecutors said.

    Terry traded her access to information from top US officials, including US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, in exchange for luxury goodies such as a $3,450 Louis Vuitton handbag and a $2,845 Dolce & Gabbana coat, prosecutors said.

    Heh:

    (Hat tip: Ed Driscoll at Instapundit.) (Previously.)

  • “Hundreds Of Failing Water Systems In California Need Funding For New Infrastructure.” Because of course they do.
  • “Democratic Socialists Of America Withdraws Endorsement Of AOC.” Because she’s just not anti-Israel enough. Which has jack all to do with democracy or socialism. This is just another sign that victimhood identity politics has eaten the far left whole.
  • Uncle Sam is looking for 155mm air defense system.

    The US Army is seeking a wheeled, self-propelled 155mm cannon-based air defense system capable of firing cheaper hypervelocity rounds.

    A cost-effective alternative to current capabilities based on surface-to-air missiles is being sought, particularly in expeditionary scenarios against the rising threat of cruise missiles.

    Projectiles fired by the Multi-Domain Artillery Cannon (MDAC) will be guided by offboard sensors, eliminating the cost of onboard sensors in current rounds.

    “Current air and missile defense munitions require onboard guidance and targeting components that drive high munition procurement costs,” a service request for information explains.

    “In contrast, the MDAC seeks to significantly reduce munition costs and enhance expeditionary utility by developing a 155mm artillery cannon-based air defense system capable of firing Hypervelocity projectiles, integrated into a wheeled platform.”

    Additionally, the system will be linked with an external Command and Control Battle Manager and the Integrated Air and Missile Defense Battle Command System.

    A prototype contract award is expected in the third quarter of 2025, with deliveries by the last quarter of fiscal 2027 and demonstration in fiscal 2028.

    This is another case of “everything old is new again,” as Germany’s 88mm and 128mm flak cannons were generally considered very effective anti-aircraft weapons in World War II, and I bet 155mm is more than capable of putting a hurt on drones.

  • Ukrainian sniper takes record for world’s longest sniper shot, using a 12.7x114mm cartridge at 4,155 yards. (Hat tip: Reader John Zoch.)
  • If you have AT&T, hackers have probably stolen your phone records.
  • Local TexMex chain Chuy’s is being bought by Darden Restaurants for $605 million. I didn’t know they actually had more than 100 locations. The food is good, but here in Austin they’ve been in the “no one goes there anymore, they’re too crowded” category for a while. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Generation Kill author Evan Wright RIP. That was a very solid book following a Marine recon unit into Iraq in 2003, and is well worth reading if you haven’t already.
  • Comedy legend Bob Newhart, RIP. I’m sure everyone and their dog will be posting the justly famous Newhart finale, but we’re going to kick it old school with a selection from his comedy albums.

  • Lou Dobbs, RIP.
  • Brits visit an HEB+. They’re astounded at the size and blown away by Blue Bell. They’re also amazed that a plain, fresh-baked tortilla can taste so good…
  • Fiberglass rebar?
  • For some reason, the camera focus on the alien romance scenes really crack me up in this episode of Let’s Game It Out.
  • “Democrats Order Flags To Be Flown At Half-Staff As Trump Still Alive.”
  • “Secret Service Director Assures Nation She Wasn’t Trying To Get Trump Killed, She’s Just Extremely Incompetent.”
  • “Democrats Warn That Democracy Will Cease If One Of The Two Major Political Parties That Have Existed For 170 Years Wins In November.”
  • “Democrat Leaders Make Tough Decision To Place Biden On Hospice Following COVID Diagnosis.”
  • West Virginia Republican Governor and senate candidate Jim Justice brings his dog Babydog up on stage at the RNC:

  • I’m still between jobs, so hit the tip jar if you’re so inclined.