LinkSwarm for February 12, 2021

February 12th, 2021

Greetings, and welcome to a Friday LinkSwarm! Bad weather and bad driving are themes, as the ice storm mentioned yesterday already slammed Texas hard. I was without power for over 10 hours last night and this morning, and every tree is heavy with frost.



  • Hit black ice at 95/They said I’m lucky to be alive…

  • Seriously, try to avoid driving on ice if it’s even remotely possible:

  • Bad news for law-abiding Austinites: Police Chief Brian Manley is retiring after 30 years on the force. I’m sure the City Council is eager to replace him with some social justice warrior approved tool. On the other hand, if he wants to run for mayor…
  • How crazy leftwing do you have to be for the French to call you lunatics?

    The threat is said to be existential. It fuels secessionism. Gnaws at national unity. Abets Islamism. Attacks France’s intellectual and cultural heritage.

    The threat? “Certain social science theories entirely imported from the United States,’’ said President Emmanuel Macron.

    French politicians, high-profile intellectuals and journalists are warning that progressive American ideas — specifically on race, gender, post-colonialism — are undermining their society. “There’s a battle to wage against an intellectual matrix from American universities,’’ warned Mr. Macron’s education minister.

    Emboldened by these comments, prominent intellectuals have banded together against what they regard as contamination by the out-of-control woke leftism of American campuses and its attendant cancel culture.

    You can ding France (and French intellectuals) for a lot of sins, but “insufficient appreciation of western civilization and culture” is not one of them.

  • The bloom was off the Andrew Cuomo rose for anyone who had eyes to see last year, but now even the Democratic Media Complex is is being forced to admit what a giant pile of manure he is:

    America’s worst governor probably never thought he would miss America’s most obnoxious president.

    But that is the situation that New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo likely finds himself in now that Donald Trump is no longer around to take all the heat for mismanaging the coronavirus pandemic. Indeed, now that the man who commanded nearly every minute of the media’s attention has shuffled off to Florida following his defeat in the 2020 presidential election, Cuomo is at long last experiencing widespread criticism and scrutiny in the press for his grossly incompetent handling of the COVID-19 outbreak in the Empire State.

    The New York Times, for example, took the governor to task after he announced that indoor dining in the state can resume as soon as Feb. 14, arguing that the flip-flop makes no sense based on the available data and his past diktats. “Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York said on Friday that New York City could reopen indoor dining on Feb. 14,” the newspaper notes. “But by nearly every measure, the coronavirus outbreak in the city is worse than it was when he announced a ban on indoor dining in December.”

    The New York Times adds, “As the governor spoke on Friday, citing the ‘current trajectory’ of cases as his reasoning for reopening, average per-capita case counts in New York City were 64% higher than when he announced the ban in December.” The paper even published an article titled “N.Y.C.’s Covid Metrics Are Dire. Cuomo Is Reopening Restaurants Anyway,” laying into the governor for his about-face on indoor dining.

    Elsewhere, Cuomo is weathering blistering criticism over news reports that his administration dramatically undercounted the number of deaths connected to his order last year forcing infectious coronavirus patients into long-term care facilities. Criticism so bad, in fact, that the governor actually declined an invitation to appear on CNN, which has done more than any news network to boost his image amid the pandemic.

    The bad press, by the way, appears to be having an adverse effect on the governor, whose increasingly frenetic decrees suggest a man who is spiraling. Recall that Cuomo claimed recently that the effort to vaccinate restaurant workers was a “cheap, insincere discussion.” Now, he has expanded vaccine eligibility in New York to include — you guessed it — restaurant workers. It’s almost as if he has no idea what he is doing.

    Then, there is the sudden bout of unflattering news reports regarding the growing number of high-level resignations by New York health officials, including nine top state executives who have stepped down since last summer. Cuomo is also suffering embarrassing news coverage for his recent statement in response to the reports that his administration undercounted nursing home deaths: “But who cares? … Died in a hospital. Died in a nursing home. They died.” Add to it all the fact that the governor is catching heat for saying that he doesn’t trust health experts, and it seems clear we are witnessing the end of the love affair between the news media and the man who won an Emmy recently for his supposedly savvy COVID-19 management.

    It is good that the news industry as a whole is finally scrutinizing the Cuomo administration for its ineptitude, but where was this critical look last year? It’s not as if Cuomo flipped a switch. He didn’t become an incompetent, callous, flailing bureaucrat overnight. This is who he is. This is how he has behaved for the entirety of the pandemic. Many newsrooms either did not notice or did not care. After all, there was a bad man in the White House.

    The Cuomo who is getting badly beaten up today in the press is the same Cuomo who in April 2020 said glibly of out-of-work, anti-lockdown protesters that if they want to provide for themselves and their families, they should “take a job as an essential worker.”

    This is the same man who targeted the state’s Jewish communities over social distancing violations, all while giving a free pass to the thousands of anti-police demonstrators and other political activists who clogged New York’s streets last year, gathering cheek to cheek in both protest and celebration. At a press conference in October of last year, Cuomo even dredged up a 14-year-old photo showing Jewish mourners gathered to mark the death of Rabbi Moses Teitelbaum, claiming falsely that it was proof of those people’s refusal to follow his COVID-19 restrictions.

    This is the same man whose administration flip-flopped constantly on the timeline for when COVID-19-positive front-line workers should return to work.

    This is the same man who, during a press conference in September, attempted to absolve himself of responsibility for his state’s deadly mismanagement of the coronavirus by claiming, “Donald Trump caused the COVID outbreak in New York. That is a fact. It’s a fact that he admitted and the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] admitted and [Dr. Anthony Fauci] admitted.” No one “admitted” any such thing.

    Cuomo actually wrote an entire book praising his response to the pandemic. He even hawked a stupid poster boasting of New York’s alleged victory over the outbreak. The poster, which bears more captions than a Herblock cartoon, is careful to highlight infection increases in Arizona, Texas, and Florida. Because nothing says responsible, caring leadership quite like cheering case increases in fellow states, which, by the way, likely got the virus from New York.

    Yet, amid all of these missteps, many in the press claimed last year that New York’s governor led one of the best, if not the best, coronavirus responses in the country. The way certain journalists and commentators told it, Cuomo’s wisdom and steady hand safely guided the state through one of the most dangerous and deadly episodes in its history.

  • “Cuomo aide admits they hid nursing home data so feds wouldn’t find out.” I strongly suspect that falsifying data reported to the federal government for federal grant programs is a felony…
  • Speaking of coronavirus, previous timelines had pegged “Patient Zero” as being infected in November of 2019, but new evidence suggests the first cases showed up October 2019. (Hat tip: Director Blue.)
  • “Let them have their Impeachment 2: Electric Boogaloo. It won’t result in a conviction. It won’t affect Donald Trump’s standing with his supporters or his detractors. But it will delay the Senate from action on Joe Xiden’s initial legislative goals and confirmation of His Fraudulency’s nominees.”
  • More on the same subject:

    Democrats may end up paying a higher political price than they anticipate. The trial won’t only delay Mr. Biden’s program. It will tarnish his image as a “unifier” eager to work across party lines. That identity will be much harder to sustain after Democratic senators vote in lockstep to convict Mr. Trump and push through a mammoth Covid relief bill without any Republican votes.

    I see they misspelled “trillions in pork graft for politically connected cronies” as “Covid relief.” (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)

  • “14 State Attorney Generals Tell Biden They’re Reviewing Legal Options Regarding Keystone XL.”
  • Texas intermediate crude is now up above pre-coronavirus drop levels.
  • The Social Justice Warrior Thunderdome at The New York Times has reached the point where you get fired for using the N-word in the process of talking about the N-word.
  • Related: “New York Times Has Used the N-Word 6,481 Times.”
  • Teen Vogue publisher Conde Nast can’t pay its rent. Oh no! Where else will teenage girls be encouraged to try anal sex?
  • More on the great ammo shortage:

    During a media presentation at Virtual SHOT Show 2021, Winchester said that if they stopped taking orders for .22 LR right now, it would take 2 years to fill all the back-orders. In December, the Vista family of companies, which comprises Federal, CCI, Speer, and Remington, announced they had a $1 billion backlog in orders. In the first 3 months of the COVID-19 lockdown, Winchester experienced a 17-percent surge in orders, which hasn’t tapered off.

  • Superbowl ratings show it was the leas watched since 2006. How is that wokeness working out for you, NFL? (Hat tip: The Other McCain.)
  • How painfully ignorant of literature do you have to be to not recognize the tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow soliloquy from Macbeth? Evidently Andrea Mitchell ignorant…
  • Rancher believes Biden wants to hurt border security to undo President Trump’s legacy. True, but incomplete. The entire Democratic Party sees every illegal alien as a potential Democrat voter.
  • Heh:

  • Most shocking update:

    Got to admit, 140 MPH is hauling ass. One problem with Most Shocking is that they would intone “…with speeds hitting 90 miles and hour!” and I wanted to ask “Dude, have you never driven on a Texas highway before? That’s pretty much the prevailing speed…”

  • Bruce Springsteen arrested for DWI. I’m pretty sure he makes enough to hire an Uber. Or a full-time chauffeur.
    

  • This one was is from up in Milwaukee:

  • Just no:

  • Shipping container homes are not all they’re cracked up to be.
  • “Today’s Youth Simply Don’t Have The Work Ethic To Build The Gulags Needed For Their Communist Ideals.”
  • “Jill Biden Decorates Migrant Cages With Valentine’s Day Message Hearts.”
  • “I’m not a cat.”

  • Dribble:

    • By the way, the current forecast is for it to hit 1°F here on Monday, which would only be 3 degrees above the coldest temperature ever recorded in Austin…

    

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    Posted in Austin, Border Control, Crime, Democrats, Global Warming, Guns, Media Watch, Social Justice Warriors, Texas, video | 4 Comments »

    Se7°en

    February 11th, 2021

    Here’s the seven day forecast:

    Take a look at the temperature on Monday: 7°F. Not 37, not 27, but 7°F. That wouldn’t be the coldest Austin day on record, but it would be the coldest this century and the coldest since it hit 4°F in 1989.

    For those who haven’t been in Austin during a winter storm before, the entire city shuts down. Nobody knows how to drive on snow or ice, nobody has any tire chains, and the roads become a very expensive game bumper cars. Untrimmed, ice-covered tree limbs snap and take out power lines.

    So be forewarned! You probably want to stock up on necessities at the store before the really cold weather hits Sunday and Monday. Wrap any exterior pipes. Get your pets and plants in. Make sure emergency devices like flashlights have good batteries. Consider getting a jump starter for your car, if you don’t already have one (far more convenient than jumper cables; I’ve had good luck with this one).

    And above all:

    Now, with the thinnest of justifications, here’s David Bowie’s “The Heart’s Filthy Lesson.”

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    Posted in Austin, Texas, video | 10 Comments »

    Immodest Proposal: Tax The Homeless

    February 10th, 2021

    Remember how Governor Greg Abbott said he was going to clear homeless camps out from under bridges and highway overpasses in Austin? TxDOT was supposed to enforce that edict for state highway underpasses, but I can tell you that every time I drive under the McNeil/183 underpass, that’s not being done.

    If highway underpasses are indeed state property, then I have an immodest proposal for solving the problem: The state of Texas should pass a law taxing homeless camping under state highway overpasses.

    After all, subsidize something (like the Austin City Council has done for homelessness) and you get more of it. Tax it, and you get less of it.

    Want to pitch a tent under a state overpass? Fine. then you can pay $10 a night for the privilege. That’s still cheaper than renting an apartment, but no longer free, and it helps to offset the considerable expense of cleaning up those homeless camps. But contrast, designated homeless areas like Camp RATT in East Austin would remain free, theoretically providing incentives for the homeless to take up legal residence elsewhere.

    Gov. Abott has once again been warning Austin that if they don’t reinstate the camping ban, he’ll take action:

    All well and good, but we’ve heard this before, and the problem continues to get worse:

    Something certainly needs to be done about the situation. Issuing press releases and throwing more money at the problem to be siphoned into the pockets of leftwing activists isn’t going to solve the problem.

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    Posted in Austin, Crime, Texas | 10 Comments »

    Biden’s CIA Pick Runs Think Tank Filthy With Chinese Money

    February 9th, 2021

    Well, this seems like a huge conflict of interest:

    William J. Burns, who is President Joe Biden’s nominee for director of the CIA, is president of a think tank that has received up to $2 million from a Chinese businessman as well as from a think tank with close ties to the Chinese Communist Party.

    As president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Burns also invited nearly a dozen congressional staffers to attend a junket to China, where they met with a communist party operative and a president of a Chinese front group.

    Burns, who was paid $540,580 last year as president of Carnegie, will appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee for a confirmation hearing likely to be held this month. He has been president of Carnegie since March 2015.

    During Burns’ tenure at Carnegie, a businessman named Zhang Yichen joined the think tank’s board of trustees.

    “We are very fortunate to have Zhang Yichen on our board,” Burns, a former deputy secretary of state, said in a statement in October 2016. “I look forward to working with him to make Carnegie an even finer institution.”

    Zhang, the CEO of CITIC Consulting, a China-based investment firm, donated between $500,000 and $999,999 to Carnegie from July 1, 2017, through June 30, 2018, according to Carnegie’s website. He gave between $250,000 and $549,999 in the 2020 fiscal year, according to Carnegie’s 2020 annual report.

    Zhang is a member of two organizations linked to the Chinese Communist Party, according to his biography at CITIC Capital: the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and the Center for China and Globalization.

    Can you imagine any Cold War president nominating a CIA director who worked for a think tank that took Soviet money? “Sure, Hubert J. Kissup’s Detente Institute took money from the Young Communist League, but you should confirm him because he’s a swell guy!”

    Notice how quickly our garbage elites went from “Ivanaka Trump sells clothing in Russia! This is a huge conflict of interest!” to “CIA director bringing in a half million dollars in Communist Chinese money at his last gig? Nothing to see here! Move along, pleb!”

    President Trump’s list of his administration’s accomplishments cites numerous instances of confronting and reigning-in communist China. However, Democratic Party grandees seem far more concerned with sucking up to, appeasing, and profiting off China than confronting it. From Hunter Biden’s documented payoffs from China to universities taking money from China to Hollywood studios bowing to censorship pressure to attempting to repress any mention of the possibility that the Wuhan cornavirus escaped from a Chinese lab to getting a case of the vapors over mentioning Flu Manchu as the “China Virus” to a sitting Democratic congressman literally banging a communist spy, our garbage Democratic ruling class is in bed with communist China both literally and figuratively.

    The Burns nomination should be rejected on the basis of his Chinese ties alone.

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    Posted in Communism, Democrats, Foreign Policy | 1 Comment »

    George Shultz, RIP

    February 8th, 2021

    George Shultz, who served as Secretary of State for Ronald Reagan for six years, died yesterday at age 100.

    Reagan assumed the presidency at a time when the existence of the Soviet Union and its domination of eastern Europe was regarded as an immutable fact of world politics. Taking office after Alexander Haig, Shultz helped implement Reagan’s vision of containing and rolling back communism across the globe. From supporting Solidarity in Poland, to backing anticommunist rebels in Reagan Doctrine countries like Afghanistan and Nicaragua, to the liberation of Grenada, to deploying intermediate nuclear missiles in Europe, to a hundred other policies, the Reagan Administration pressed Soviet communism in ways that would eventually force not only the liberation of Eastern Europe, but the demise of the Soviet Union itself. Shultz would play a key role in keeping American allies onboard with the program, and eventually in negotiations with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev that would lead to the end of the Cold War.

    Compared to Haig, Shultz was a low-key, drama-free professional who skillfully kept a wide variety of western governments broadly aligned with American goals, and for that he deserves credit. That he was wrong about much outside the Cold War (the gold standard, carbon taxes, and Brexit, to name but three) should not take away from his central achievement. With James A. Baker III, Secretary of State under Bush 41 (who largely followed the policies laid down under Reagan), Shultz presided over the most successful period of post-World War II diplomacy in American history, and his achievements were far more lasting than those under flashier Secretaries of State like Henry Kissinger or Colin Powell.

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    Posted in Communism, Foreign Policy | No Comments »

    Mike Lindell’s Absolute Truth Documentary on 2020 Presidential Election Fraud

    February 7th, 2021

    I kept meaning to put up this 2020 Presidential election fraud documentary by Mike Lindell (the MyPillow CEO), but YouTube keeps taking it down, so here’s a BitChute version:

    I haven’t watched all of it it yet, but it’s more proof that there’s a lot of evidence out that there the 2002 Presidential election was rigged, and that very powerful people in the Democratic Media Complex want to keep you from examining the evidence for yourself. And I wanted to put up a copy that I don’t think is going to disappear…

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    Posted in Crime, Elections, Media Watch, video | 4 Comments »

    Supreme Court Strikes Down California’s Church Service Ban

    February 6th, 2021

    Evidently Americans do continue to enjoy some modest minimum of freedom of religion, as the Supreme Court just struck down California’s ban on indoor church services:

    Late Friday evening, the Supreme Court, in South Bay United Pentecostal Church v. Newsom, issued emergency relief suspending California’s broad ban on indoor religious services. The Court ruled that California was “enjoined from enforcing the . . . prohibition on indoor worship services . . . pending disposition of the petition for a writ of certiorari.” The order is limited: Relief was “denied with respect to the [25%] percentage capacity limitations” and denied with respect to the prohibition on singing and chanting during indoor services,” although the Court left the door open to hear any “new evidence . . . that the State is not applying the percentage capacity limitations or the prohibition on singing and chanting in a generally applicable manner.” This lifts some of the most stringent restrictions on religious services in the country. Justices Thomas, Gorsuch, and Alito wanted to grant broader relief on these fronts; Justices Barrett and Kavanaugh thought the evidentiary record was too unclear.

    The Court was yet again divided on these issues, but not entirely along the same lines as in prior cases. Chief Justice Roberts, who dissented when the Court ruled against Andrew Cuomo’s restrictions in November, reiterated his view that courts should defer to elected officials and public-health experts, but thought that California had gone too far this time: “The State’s present determination — that the maximum number of adherents who can safely worship in the most cavernous cathedral is zero — appears to reflect not expertise or discretion, but instead insufficient appreciation or consideration of the interests at stake.” Justice Gorsuch argued that California was overgeneralizing the risks of religious services:

    California . . . insists that religious worship is so different that it demands especially onerous regulation. The State offers essentially four reasons why: It says that religious exercises involve (1) large numbers of people mixing from different households; (2) in close physical proximity; (3) for extended periods; (4) with singing . . . California errs to the extent it suggests its four factors are always present in worship, or always absent from the other secular activities its regulations allow. Nor has California sought to explain why it cannot address its legitimate concerns with rules short of a total ban . . .

    On further inspection, the singing ban may not be what it first appears. It seems California’s powerful entertainment industry has won an exemption. So, once more, we appear to have a State playing favorites during a pandemic, expending considerable effort to protect lucrative industries (casinos in Nevada; movie studios in California) while denying similar largesse to its faithful. . . . Even if a full congregation singing hymns is too risky, California does not explain why even a single masked cantor cannot lead worship behind a mask and a plexiglass shield. Or why even a lone muezzin may not sing the call to prayer from a remote location inside a mosque as worshippers file in.

    Gorsuch concluded:

    [California’s] “temporary” ban on indoor worship has been in place since August 2020, and applied routinely since March. California no longer asks its movie studios, malls, and manicurists to wait. And one could be forgiven for doubting its asserted timeline. Government actors have been moving the goalposts on pandemic-related sacrifices for months, adopting new benchmarks that always seem to put restoration of liberty just around the corner. As this crisis enters its second year — and hovers over a second Lent, a second Passover, and a second Ramadan — it is too late for the State to defend extreme measures with claims of temporary exigency, if it ever could. Drafting narrowly tailored regulations can be difficult. But if Hollywood may host a studio audience or film a singing competition while not a single soul may enter California’s churches, synagogues, and mosques, something has gone seriously awry.

    The three liberal justices dissented, asserting that the opinions of unelected experts should trump enumerated constitutional rights.

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    Posted in Supreme Court | 2 Comments »

    LinkSwarm for February 5, 2020

    February 5th, 2021

    Greetings, and welcome to another Friday LinkSwarm! The Biden Administration is moving full speed ahead hard left:

  • Kurt Schlichter: The Matrix has you:

    There’s nothing more tiresome than hackneyed references to The Matrix, except for the constant propaganda we’re hosed down with by the Establishment and its media lackeys about how everything is groovy in our totally free, free enterprise paradise of freedom and happiness and more freedom. Some of us have been woke for a while, having realized the undeniable truth that the system is rigged for the benefit of a garbage ruling class, whose sole accomplishment is to perpetuate a paradigm in which they maintain power and prestige by controlling institutions they didn’t create or build. Instead, they are cultural trust fund babies, the equivalent of third generation Kennedy brats with substance issues who got into power by getting into the right schools and modeling the right SJW attitudes. These oligarch overseers rely on us to toil in their figurative fields while they sit on their figurative porches, sipping locally-sourced figurative mint juleps.

    I say burn it all down and rebuild America into what it is supposed to be, that is, what they tell us it is when they lie to us.

    I’m not alone. We’re primed for some conservative anarchy. The normals’ resistance cannot be quelled; the revolution will be Telegrammed. Everyone’s gobbling up red pills, the one medication our incompetent Establishment is fully capable of distributing efficiently and effectively. You drop one and you see the Matrix. You see the lie. You see that it’s all rigged.

    Snip.

    I mentioned GameStop and these ladies not only knew what it was, but they cheered the armchair day trader anarchists. And they booed the hedge funders.

    Rich Orange County Republicans booed the hedge funders.

    And they booed Liz Cheney and Mitt Romney, with one exception, Nikki! Haley too. The ones who had heard of the Bulwark booed it as well, so there were like three of those.

    Populists in pearls, fully red pilled and woke as hell. They saw how the Establishment has been lying to them. They realized that they were never really members of the ruling caste despite their sweet rides and bank accounts. They were allowed its material trappings, but they were excluded from the real power, the power to govern themselves.

    They have more in common with the Keystone pipeline worker John Kerry wants to go make solar panels – which seems unrealistic, since his Chi Com collaborators make them all – than with the rich and truly powerful elite.

    People are getting woke – the red pill is socio-political anti-Ambien because it keeps you from falling back asleep and not seeing that everything is rigged.

    They see how the ruling caste allows you this little band of autonomy, and how you are allowed some leeway to improve your material life, but the instant you try to assert power that threatens the status quo, the Matrix kicks in and its immune system reacts to snuff you out.

    That was the revelation of the GameStop Revolution. You’re allowed to put your money into Wall Street and they might let you take some pennies out, but if you try to go big and play at the same level as the anointed, oh no. You don’t get to. The system shuts you down – literally. You can’t buy the hot stock. Does that apply to the hedge fund guys? You think they can’t play after you’ve been sidelined? Come on. It’s blatant market manipulation, but Wall Street owns the Asterisk Administration – Treasury Secretary & Lord High Protector of the Masters of the Universe Janet Yellin took nearly a million bucks to “speak” to the lever-pullers behind the RobinHood app – and the Administration owns the SEC, and do you think it will investigate the hedge funders who changed the rules? No, but look for FBI SWAT teams to be hitting the basements where the Reddit rebels live. That is, right after they bust more conservative meme guys for illegal memes.

    Read the whole thing.

  • Are Democrats trying to infect the military with Social Justice?

    Now, in perhaps the most chilling move yet from the new administration, the newly minted Defense Secretary [Lloyd Austin] plans to direct a military-wide stand down, reportedly to address “extremism” within the ranks.

    Austin wants all military units to take an operational pause to discuss extremism as he works to grasp the full scope of the issue and better address the longstanding problem, John Kirby, the Pentagon’s chief spokesman, told reporters Wednesday. The pauses are expected to occur within the next 60 days, but Austin has yet to determine how the stand downs are to be completed, Kirby said.

    “The intent is to reinforce the [Pentagon’s] policies and values with respect to this sort of behavior and to have a dialogue with the men and women of the force and to get their views on what they are seeing at their level,” Kirby said. “He wants commands to take the necessary time to … speak with troops about the scope of this problem. It’s a two-way conversation.”

    Austin spoke frankly with the acting service secretaries and uniformed service chiefs about his concerns about extremism in the military, including white supremacism, said Kirby, who attended the meeting. The new defense secretary, who is the first Black leader of the Defense Department, wants the service leaders to better grasp how pervasive the issue is within their formations and work with leaders to stamp it out, Kirby said.

    We have gone in a few short months from President Donald Trump preventing “critical race theory” dogma from being imposed on federal employees to the possibility that the armed services will have to apologize for their privilege.

  • Will fake moderate Biden get pushback for his hard left turn?

    it seems that Biden is intent on provoking just such a pushback by his record number of early and often radical executive orders — a tactic candidate Biden condemned.

    On almost every issue — open borders, blanket amnesties, canceling the Keystone XL pipeline, promoting the Green New Deal, and hard-left appointees — Biden is touting positions that likely do not earn 50 percent public support.

    When Biden made a Faustian bargain with his party’s hard-left wing of Bernie Sanders, Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to win the election, he took on the commitment to absorb some of their agenda and to appoint their ideologues.

    But he also soon became either unwilling or unable to stand up to them.

    Now they — and the country — are in a revolutionary frenzy. The San Francisco Board of Education has voted to rename more than 40 schools honoring the nation’s best — Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln — largely on racist grounds that they are dead, mostly white males.

    Statues continue to fall. Names change.

    The iconic dates, origins and nature of America itself continue to be attacked to meet leftist demands. And still, it is not enough for the new McCarthyites.

    Social media are banning tens of thousands. Silicon Valley and Wall Street monopolies go after smaller upstart opponents.

    A wrong word destroys a lifelong career. Formerly sane pundits now call for curtailing the First Amendment. Thousands of federal troops blanket a now-militarized Washington, D.C.

    If Trump’s pushback tried to return to traditions ignored during the Obama years, Biden’s reset promises to become far more radical than Obama’s entire eight years.

    (Hat tip: Director Blue.)

  • Looking at Slow Joe The Unpopular’s approval rating sure as hell doesn’t look like a mandate for radical change:

    Biden has not been above water a single time in the Approval Index rating. This index is the difference between how many likely voters strongly approve and how many strongly disapprove. Total approval has hit 50% once so far…

    This result is astonishing when you think about it. President Biden has the full weight of nearly every corporate media outlet, tech company, and cultural institution behind him. They have been drooling all over themselves to convince us this is a return to unifying normalcy. After all, his favorite ice cream is chocolate chip, and his two German Shepherds just love their new digs. So normal. So unifying.

    (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)

  • Florida Governor Ron DeSantis declares war on Big Tech:

    While other Republican legislators complain and pontificate about Twitter, Facebook and Google’s interference in our elections and censoring of conservative voices, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has declared war on the tech giants.

    DeSantis is proposing legislation that asks the Florida state legislature to impose stiff fines – up to $100,000 per day – on tech companies that “deplatform” political candidates running for office in his state. Candidates like, for instance, Donald Trump.

    Calling the tech giants “enforcers of preferred narratives” whose interests are “not in the public interest,” DeSantis, a Republican, wants to “ensure the protection of the people and their rights.” His proposed bill would allow individuals and the Florida attorney general to sue firms that violate newly established safeguards against privacy violations and censorship.

    DeSantis also suggested that other activities, such as colluding to ban people or companies from payment platforms or from cloud services, could also be outlawed.

    Presuming that the popular governor can get his measure passed by the Republican-controlled state legislature, it could become a template for the other 23 GOP-led states. It could, in effect, be the beginning of a revolt against the unacceptable dominance and manipulation of our nation’s discourse by Big Tech.

    It’s a start.

    (Hat tip: Real Clear Politics.)

  • The Trump comeback begins:

    Here’s my game plan for how Trump can make Trump and America great again.

    First, Trump must become the kingmaker of the GOP. The Trump Army is 74 million strong. The Republican Party belongs to Trump. He should remake the party in his image.

    In some ways, his defeat was empowering. As president, Trump couldn’t get rid of RINOS and never-Trumpers, because he needed their votes. But from the outside, he can remake the party, elect allies and end the careers of the GOP traitors who stabbed him in the back. Are you listening, Rep. Liz Cheney?

    Trump should recruit, endorse and campaign for Trump Republicans in each GOP primary where they’re running against RINOS, never-Trumpers and backstabbers. Seventy-four million Trump voters will vote for his chosen candidates in GOP primaries. By 2022, the GOP will be 100% remade in Trump’s image.

    Secondly, Trump should spend the next four years fixing voter fraud at the state level. Trump should recruit his billionaire buddies to put up hundreds of millions to attack this problem. Trump’s goal should be to reform election law in just the handful of states that cost him the election: Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin, Nevada and Arizona.

    If Trump spends his time, money and focus on reforming election laws in those six states, the GOP will be back in business in 2022 and 2024.

    Thirdly, Trump needs to raise billions from his billionaire backers to build TMN: Trump Media Network. That should include a national cable TV network; a national talk radio network; a new version of Drudge Report (called Trump Report); and conservative versions of Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube. Conservatives will never again have to depend on the mainstream media or Silicon Valley to broadcast their news and opinions.

    Only Trump has the money, brand and fundraising ability to change the media and social media landscape like this. And think of the amazing bonus: Not only will 74 million Trump voters have permanent places to communicate but if we all move away from mainstream media and social media, they will collapse. Trump will cripple his enemies and put many of them out of business.

    However, I’m not a fan of Root and others idea of Trump running for the House.

  • Bryan Proffitt, “the Vice President of North Carolina’s largest teachers’ association is a self-avowed Marxist activist linked to Liberation Road – a ‘revolutionary socialist‘ group that follows the teachings of Karl Marx and Mao Zedong.” Sounds like a good reason to put your children in a private school. (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • There’s now a website to fight critical race training in education. You might want to bookmark that site. (Hat tip: Kemberlee Kaye.)
  • The Biden Administration hates private space ventures and pulled permission from Elon Musk’s SpaceX to fly. Punishment for Musk supporting the GameStop squeeze? Either way, it’s blow to American space capabilities and a boon for Chinese domination of space. (Hat tip: Borepatch.)
  • Speaking of which: Chicom rocket goes boom.
  • “Joe Biden put me out of business by suspending new oil and gas leases and drilling permits. I am a petroleum geologist and generate drilling prospects in the Rocky Mountains on federal lands. I worked six years to get a prospect ready to drill and Biden just illegally broke the terms of the lease, killing the deal.” (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • “Police dismantle world’s ‘most dangerous’ criminal hacking network.”

    International law enforcement agencies said on Wednesday they had dismantled a criminal hacking scheme used to steal billions of dollars from businesses and private citizens worldwide.

    Police in six European countries, as well as Canada and the United States, completed a joint operation to take control of Internet servers used to run and control a malware network known as “Emotet,” authorities said in a statement.

    “Emotet is currently seen as the most dangerous malware globally,” Germany’s BKA federal police agency said in a statement. “The smashing of the Emotet infrastructure is a significant blow against international organised Internet crime.”

  • “Cornyn, Crenshaw, Cruz Lead Fundraising in Final Quarter of 2020.”
  • Blackpool, UK, is preparing to seize land to make into a Chariots of the Gods theme park.

  • “Number of Texans with at least one vaccine dose surpasses number of confirmed COVID-19 cases.” Faster, please. (Hat tip: Texas Governor Greg Abbott.)
  • CEO: “We tried paying everyone the same salary. It failed.”
  • Good news! Gay Patriot blog relaunched. (Hat tip: Instapundit.) Also see this Twitter account, which may look familiar…
  • Once again social justice warriors fail to cancel Chris Pratt.

  • 21st century headlines: “Scientists have now taught spinach to send emails warning of landmines.”

  • “Snopes Rates AOC’s Account Of Capitol Attack As ‘Factually Inaccurate But Morally True.'”

  • “AOC Recalls How She Barely Survived Terrorists Seizing Nakatomi Plaza.”
  • “Hey Strongbear, do you like techno?”
  • What it was like to see Star Wars in 1977.
  • Heh:

  • Funny dog tweet:

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    Posted in Crime, Democrats, Foreign Policy, Military, Republicans, Social Justice Warriors, Texas, unions | No Comments »

    Followup: Austin City Council Votes To Purchase Wilco Homeless Hotel

    February 4th, 2021

    Today (not yesterday as the Statesman had reported), the Austin City Council voted to purchase the Candlewood Suites Hotel at 10811 Pecan Park Boulevard over the strenuous opposition of local reasidents. The vote was 10-1, with only Mackenzie Kelly voting against.

    Condolences to area residents who are sure to see crime and disorder skyrocket. Here’s hoping Williamson County sues to stop the purchase.

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    Posted in Austin, Texas | 1 Comment »

    Reinstatement of Austin Camping Ban Makes May 1 Ballot

    February 4th, 2021

    A tiny bit of good news in a sea of gloom: The petition to restore the camping ban has been garnered enough signatures to be placed on the May 1 ballot:

    A group’s petition to reinstate Austin’s camping ban will appear on the May ballot after the city clerk certified enough signatures.

    The Office of the City Clerk confirmed Thursday the petition submitted by Save Austin Now met the minimum requirement of 20,000 verified signatures to put it before voters. This is the second time Save Austin Now has attempted to bring this issue to the ballot, the first time they gathered signatures during the summer of 2020, the city’s analysis indicated the group did not gather enough valid signatures to do so.

    A city spokesperson told KXAN that the City Council will now have to decide whether to adopt the ordinance changes as written in the petition, or call an election for May 1. The council has until Feb. 12 to make this decision, and there is expected to be a special meeting to discuss these issues on Feb. 9.

    Up to this point, Save Austin Now has identified as an educational nonprofit and is led by Matt Mackowiak (the chair of the Republican Party for Travis County) and Cleo Petricek, who has been vocal about her opposition to the city’s recent policies related to homelessness. The Save Austin Now website notes its leadership includes Austin Police Association President Ken Casaday, president of UT safety group SafeHorns Joell McNew, and former Austin City Council Member Ora Houston. Now that this measure will be going before voters, Save Austin Now will have to register as a Political Action Committee with the city to handle activities for the election.

    It’s good that they finally got enough signatures to exceed the threshold of fraud.

    An Austin City Council who respected common sense and the will of citizens would go ahead and reinstate the camping ban, so that will never happen. Instead expect a vicious campaign from Mayor Steve Adler, Austin City Councilman Greg Casar and the other advocates of the Homeless Industrial Complex to smear those backing reinstatement of the ban as “white supremacists” (the reflexive go-to smear for the hard left in 2021) and wanting homeless people to die.

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    Posted in Austin, Texas | 3 Comments »

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