Token in waiting

Politico: "‘Not a healthy environment’: Kamala Harris’ office rife with dissent." 

Gosh, I can't believe the California candidate who dropped out before the Iowa caucus would be accused of ineptness.  /sarc

The unserious and dying media

Shot - Fox News: "CNN, MSNBC's ratings collapse due to 'serious credibility problem' covering Biden, experts say."

Chaser - "Journalist" getting in the hard-hitting questions at Joe Biden's latest ice-cream run: "You're not getting any rocky road for infrastructure?"

Hangover - "Jake Tapper’s CNN Fear-Porn Show Lost 75 Percent Of Its Audience Since January." 

Ignore her

Hot Air: "Dan Crenshaw: Gwen Berry should be kicked off the U.S. Olympic team."

Can we not do this?  Look: she made her grand gesture and it's probably the last time we'll ever see her.

It's not funny but it's kinda funny

Look at the sign language translator behind Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot when she's asked about a couple killed execution-style.  At the 50 second mark.  

William Inge and Yogi Bear hardest hit

NY Post: "Joyce Carol Oates slams Brandeis University over ban on ‘picnic,’ other words."

Headline says it all

NY Post: "Kamala Harris doesn’t actually visit border, says nothing of substance, leaves — it was all theater."  

Box checked. 

Butt-hurt over the failure of HR1

Andrew McCarthy: "Biden Lawsuit against Georgia Election Law Illustrates Radicalism of DOJ and Its Civil Rights Chief." - "As our Caroline Downey reports, the Justice Department will today announce that it is suing Georgia over the latter’s election-integrity law. This is ridiculous. The law provides for voting far more extensive than the Constitution’s minimal standards, and well beyond what, about five minutes ago, were state-law norms. The lawsuit is yet another sign, as if we needed one, that the Biden Justice Department is the Obama DOJ 2.0, an activist tool that puts the awesome law-enforcement power of the federal government in the service of woke progressivism."  

It's funny because of the truthiness

Babylon Bee: "Biden Says Latinx Aren't Getting Vaccinated Because Their Giant Sombreros Make It Impossible To Enter Pharmacies."  

Unsurprising and so satisfying

There it is, American media: you're the worst.  The absolute worst: "U.S. Has Lowest Trust of Media In 46 Countries Surveyed, According to Reuters Institute Report."

Remember how after Trump surprised everybody and you guys were going to engage in some introspection?  For example, this New York Times article on November 9th, 2016: "How Did the Media — How Did We — Get This Wrong?"

Mr. Rutenberg had just finished writing about how the media had missed Mr. Trump’s wide appeal, and what that misfire says about journalists’ flawed understanding of major swaths of our country.

You guys were going to have a corn dog at the Iowa State Fair and rub elbows (the suede elbows on your tweed jackets) with the NASCAR fans.  But soon you fell back on your insular, hive-mind, bi-coastal ways and here we are.  Or rather, there you are.  At the bottom.

You earned this, American media.

We have GOT to figure out what’s wrong with these people! Readers and viewers, obviously. This should spark absolutely no introspection for anyone else. https://t.co/5GPOkvbNDv

— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) June 23, 2021

Checking the box

Hot Air: "House Dem: This Harris border visit is a joke, you know."  Yeah, we know. 

Buckhead pulls on to the off-ramp

PJ Media: "Atlanta May Be Headed for a Final Divorce as Communities Nationwide Seek to Redraw the Lines."

Buckhead, a portion of Atlanta, Georgia, is looking to break free from the rest of a city in rapid decline. After decades of increased safety that started ahead of the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, it took one woman and a single summer to ruin it. Not even New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio can beat Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms’ time for running a city into the ground. It took de Blasio two terms. Bottoms has been so spectacular she’s announced she won’t even run for a second one.

The stories of runaway crime are shocking, just violent assaults without a robbery motive.

Free speech, baby

Fox News: "Supreme Court rules school wrong to punish cheerleader for profane Snapchat rant in 8-1 free speech decision."

I'm a bit surprised that Clarence Thomas was the dissenting vote in this case.

Extra - "Stay classy, ACLU."  

As predicted, Kamala fails

Aside from handling the border crisis, Kamala Harris was given the job of moving the "For the People" act through the Senate.  She botched it.  And I'm not saying it was easy but it would have been a moral victory to peel off a single Republican and call it a bipartisan win.  Instead, it's obvious that Kamala backed away from her assignment and did absolutely nothing.

Hot Air had an article this morning about how the Left is noticing that Biden and Harris don't do much:

Did progressives even notice how Biden and Kamala Harris campaigned for their jobs last year? Biden restricted himself to tightly controlled appearances with very few people in attendance, and Harris didn’t get out much more than that. At the time, we assumed this was a political version of Mohammed Ali’s “Rope-a-Dope,” forcing the media to cover Trump rather than Biden. Strategy or not, it succeeded.

Since inauguration, however, Biden has barely changed this strategy — hiding from the media until forced into the open. It took more than two months for Biden to hold his first open press conference, and then didn’t do another until his G-7 trip and summit with Putin last week. He’s back in the White House now and hasn’t popped out to test his shadow since. It’s not that Biden and Harris aren’t using their bully pulpits to lead on the progressive agenda — it’s that they’re not leading at all.

Joe is an old dude.  What's Kamala's excuse, other than her unalloyed ineptness (see: her campaign.)?  She's just so bad at her job.  

This video is wild

Hot Air: "WaPo video: Here's how to understand your whiteness."

I can't fathom the mindset of these self-loathing white women.  It's Racial Stockholm Syndrome.

On the other hand are the American parents who are not insane: "The Backlash against Critical Race Theory Is Real"

Some of these approaches will be more effective — and more appropriate — than others, but, they are all now inevitable. They will not be stopped by academic sophistry. They will not be stopped by epithets and insults. And they certainly will not be stopped by professional pococurantists who simply refuse to believe that anyone could possibly care about the matter at all.

I had to look up pococurantist, too.

Defund NPR and CRT

This morning I was on the road and heard this tripe on NPR: "Understanding The Republican Opposition To Critical Race Theory."  Short summary: we're all a bunch of backward hicks for opposing Critical Race Theory (CRT) and - gosh darn it - we just don't understand it:

SPRUNT: You'll also hear some Republican lawmakers and media outlets say, you know, this theory is unpatriotic. It tells white people that they're racist, you know, just for being white, when, of course, the actual theory itself is about institutions, not individuals.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Right. It's about the systems that are in play and how that has actually created more difficulties for Black and brown people.

Oh, heavens no, we're not attacking white people, just systemic racism.  Ben Shapiro has several videos where he asks the question: "What system?  What institution?"  But there's never an answer.  "Systemic racism" exists as a Schrodinger's Cat of social systems, both existing yet unprovable.

But remember: we're the uneducated rubes in this morality play, duped by those puppet masters at Fox News.

Noah Rothman has an article in Commentary saying the backlash against CRT is real and it's spectacular (excerpt on Instapundit):

The idea that conservatives did anything more than notice this mania is laughable. The legislative efforts on the local level, some of which flirt with violating civic and constitutional propriety, deserve skepticism because this reckoning is entirely organic. Right-wing overreach threatens that emerging consensus. But Republicans should take heart in how Democrats are trying to convince themselves that none of this is real, and no serious person questions the validity of CRT’s sudden ubiquity. They’ll never see it coming.

Americans are a tolerant group and they'll put up with a lot of stuff they don't necessarily agree with.  That is, until you get to their kids.  Then, brother, the gloves are off. 

Also: defund NPR.  Enough is enough.

Virtue signalling is a hell of a drug

Meanwhile, here in the Pioneer Valley, the Amherst-Northampton nexus of white liberals is up to their old tricks: "A price tag on trauma? Amherst weighs Black reparations."

I'm quite sure this effort is going nowhere fast since nobody - from Cori Bush to Ta-Nahesi Coates - has ever been able to articulate a plan for reparations.  Even the aggrieved former professor in the MSN story shrugs his shoulders and suggests they rename an office for him.

Related - Legal Insurrection: "Eleven U.S. Mayors Call For Paying Reparations In Their Cities" - "But have no idea how the money will be paid."  

Headline of the Day

Reason: "U.S. Space Force Finds 30 Kilos of Cocaine While Looking for Sea Turtles."  

Putin wins again

I'm sure Sleepy Joe gave Putin a real tongue-lashing before caving in.  Hot Air: "White House temporarily halts $100 million weapons sale to Ukraine."  

Even if this was planned or simply standard policy, why make this move less than a week after meeting with Putin?  C'mon, man!

He ain't getting any younger

Jim Treacher: "Joe Biden Is Too Old to Be President - We all know it"

Here's your "when you've lost CNN" moment: "CNN’s Jeff Zeleny says he’s never seen a president so protected by his aides as Joe Biden."  That explains why Dementia Joe has had a grand total of (checks notes) one formal press conference.

This was the end result of his blow-up at Kaitlin Collins: "Biden Gets No Pudding Cup Today As Punishment For Taking A Question."  

Leave Sleepy Joe alone!

This tweet is a near-perfect encapsulation of media bias:  

It’s so perfect I can’t stop laughing pic.twitter.com/IfmuwDssw2

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) June 16, 2021

Commenting is back on

Wow, my buddy Roger asked about commenting and, honestly, I wasn't aware it was turned off.  I had an...incident some time ago and I think my caretaker must have turned off comments.

Anyway, have at it.

But good intentions, part 2

Reason: "Study Finds Biden's American Jobs Plan Would Result in Fewer American Jobs - It’s a jobs plan that isn’t about jobs, and an infrastructure plan that isn’t about infrastructure." 

At least we'll have plenty of inflation. 

But good intentions

The Corner summarizes a study comparing the behavior of businesses in California and Texas with regard to minimum wage workers: "Unintended Consequences of a Minimum-Wage Hike."

Interestingly, as the minimum wage crept up in California relative to Texas, stores in the Golden State did not measurably reduce the number of employee hours they paid for. What they did, instead, was to spread those hours around: hire more workers, but have each employee work fewer hours.

What’s the advantage of doing this? Well, as the authors note, “workers have to work at least 20 hours per week on average to be eligible for retirement benefits and work at least 30 hours per week for employer-sponsored health insurance based on the [Affordable Care Act].” They estimate that stores can save roughly a quarter of the cost of the higher wages simply by getting out of contributing to these benefits.

In addition, the reduced hours per employee were more erratic as businesses tried to hold workers below the benefit threshold. 

Full docket

Volokh Conspiracy: "SCOTUS will decide 18 cases in the next two weeks" - "Trump is out of office. Justice Barrett replaced Justice Ginsburg. And there is an actual presidential commission considering Court Packing. And almost every outstanding case will turn right. Red June lies ahead."  

You done messed up, Tom Hanks

Did you think you could escape the Wokeness Apocalypse?  Wrong, Forrest Gump; it's never enough.

Sleepy media for Sleepy Joe

Washington Examiner: "Most of the media will sleep through the Biden years." - "No wonder Pulitzer-Prize-winning investigative journalist Glenn Greenwald calls the legacy media “stenographers for the state.” Press coverage of Biden isn’t just soft. It’s the least critical of any president in the past three decades, according to a study by nonpartisan think tank Pew Research Center."

I can think of a couple reasons for this aside from the media's typical bias.  Tapioca Brains can barely perform his minimal duties before Jill needs to lead him away by the elbow.  It's cruel to criticize a man who doesn't know what's going on half the time.  So the media calls a lid.

Extra - Twitchy: "Joe Biden's presser is just a hot mess."  "120 days," he growled, then fled.

Only ten?

Michael Goodwin: "My Top 10 media lies."  

Je suis Charlie

Reason: "The World Loves Free Speech—Except When They're Offended" - "Americans oppose restrictions, but report feeling less free to speak about political matters."  

Not surprising at all

Ace: "Surprise! The Leftwing Propaganda Media Is Bitterly Clinging To Their "Trump Ordered Tear Gas" Narrative, and Inventing Conspiracy Theories to Explain Away the Authoritative IG Report."  

Extra - Babylon Bee: "CNN Forced To Reset 'Days Since Trump Was Proven Right' Counter To Zero Again." 

She tweeted, unhindered

Hot Air: "Tlaib on Dems' rebuke of Omar: "Freedom of speech doesn't exist for Muslim women in Congress"

It's almost like they don't know what to do if they can't be victims.

Here's the pattern: Omar traffics in anti-semitism, provokes outrage, postures as a victim, walks it back, and is immediately praised by Democratic leadership. No consequences. Wash, rinse, repeat. https://t.co/IGn5RLpKoH

— Noah Pollak (@NoahPollak) June 10, 2021

There shall be many mea culpas

Haha - JK - there shalln't.

Ace: "Finally The Truth Comes Out: No, President Trump Did Not Order the Park Service to Clear Out the "Protesters" With Tear Gas to Do a Photo Op."  

The Ralph Northam standard of absolution

Shot: "The New York Times Helped a Vindictive Teen Destroy a Classmate Who Uttered a Racial Slur When She Was 15."

Chaser: "Leaked text messages show Hunter Biden dropping the N-word in casual conversation with his white lawyer."  

You're not going to move Manchin

Hot Air: "Breakdown: Biden ends talks with Capito over infrastructure".  Here's a take:

My half-baked cloak-and-dagger theory is that Biden tanked the negotiations deliberately, to put more pressure on Manchin at a moment when he’s already under tremendous pressure from the left to figure out a way to pass their agenda along partisan lines. The sooner he shows Manchin that the GOP won’t agree to anything, the sooner Manchin has to decide once and for all if he’s movable on doing things by a simple majority or if this is how it’s going to go for the rest of Biden’s presidency.

Honestly I don't know where people think this magical "pressure" is going to come from.  The dude has made his opinion on both the filibuster and reconciliation crystal-clear in speech and writing.  Repeatedly.

Chuck Schumer can't bring any pressure on Manchin.  The moment he does, Manchin could flip Republican and Chuckie is back to bring minority leader.  Nobody in West Virginia is putting pressure on Manchin to cave to the Democrats.  

The media and Democrats (I repeat myself) can't move Manchin.  He doesn't give a s--t.  

AOC's abuela is still poor

Jim Treacher: "AOC = Abjure Offered Cash"

AOC has yet to make a public statement about any of this, and I doubt any “journalists” will pursue it because they don’t want to embarrass her. What is she supposed to say? Her attempt to leverage her family’s problems for political ends was brilliantly exposed as a cheap stunt, and she can hardly condemn the people who raised a ton of money to help her grandma.

Congratulations to Matt Walsh at the Daily Wire for figuring out how to get AOC to finally shut up: Try to help her.

I've pretty much stopped writing about AOC because - let's face it - she's low-hanging fruit.  She's a deeply dumb person who, nonetheless, keeps shooting off her mouth and inviting ridicule.  When she's backed into a corner, she deploys one of two defenses: 1) you don't understand our culture and 2) I used to be a bartender.  Matt Walsh's trolling perfectly exposed her game.

And, no, the media won't ask her any questions.  Not poor Sandy. 

Nothing outside the State

Red State: "AOC's Family Rejects Generous Matt Walsh Fundraiser to the Tune of $100,000."

It is way more important for AOC to keep her dear abuela as a prop for the narrative that help can only come from the government.

Very revealing, indeed.

Victimhood is currency. https://t.co/tr1oNWlZxp

— PragerU (@prageru) June 5, 2021

Fauci is a fraud

Real Clear Markets: "Believe Your Own Eyes About Fauci E-Mails, Not the Fact Checkers." 

Trolling level: Legend

Daily Caller: "Matt Walsh’s Campaign To Save Ancestral Home Of Rep. Ocasio-Cortez’s Abuela Raises More Than $10,000 In One Hour."

I just checked the GoFundMe page and it's up to almost $92,000.  Dios mio.  

Slowly, so slowly, the light dawns

Twitchy: "‘Purely coincidental’?: Biden admin. changes its tune after lackluster jobs report."

After news that the labor participation rate dropped last month, certain lucid members of the Biden administration are admitting the obvious that paying people to stay home isn't working out. 

Stunning and brave

Federalist: "Biden Promises To Fly Gay Pride Flags ‘Around The World,’ Except Where Homosexuals Are Being Persecuted."  

It really isn't

Twitchy: "New York Times’ Ben Smith finds it ‘really amazing’ how the media mostly looked away from the lab-leak theory."

These no-talent ass clowns never learn.  You'd think the shock of the 2016 election and a breathless year of "Russia! Russia! Russia!" would force these dopes into some introspection.  Instead, they seem to have doubled down on woke.  They found a hero in Anthony Fauci because he was not Trump and mortgaged their credibility:

While the propagandist media is busy fawning over Fauci as some sort of superhuman godlet who was single-handedly battling WuFlu in some kind of one-man cage match against President Trump and the Wuhan coronavirus, these emails reveal a startling truth. They tell the story not just of Fauci’s blatant, politically-motivated lies to the public but also the great lengths the legacy media and Big Tech went to shut down any discussion of the virus’s origins or mask use efficacy. It was not about stopping the spread of “misinformation” but was a calculated political ploy to shut down the truth.  But we knew that.  And now we have proof.

Legal Insurrection’s very own Leslie, in her extensive coverage of the virus, posted reports that COVID-19 may have originated in a Chinese lab in March 2020. Such statements were deemed “misinformation” and banned from YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter.

Oops.

Ben Smith is now the media critic at the New York Times and this happened on his watch:

Last week [July 2020], the Times ran a story about a 30-year-old Texas man who believed COVID-19 was a hoax and contracted the disease at a “COVID party” before dying. Every detail of the story was uncorroborated, which made it exactly the kind of urban legend that moral panics produce. Though it was viral on social media, because it confirmed all the prejudices of the Times’s energized liberal readership, the Times began to edit the story as it was criticized here in National Review and in Wired. The entire tone of the story went from credulous to skeptical, but you wouldn’t have noticed the difference if you hadn’t been paying close attention, because no editor’s notes were appended to it announcing the changes. The Times has begun “stealth editing” its stories in this manner more and more lately, effacing the traditional journalistic ethic that seeks to keep an intact record not just of the news, but of how the reporting of the news evolves.

I've highlighted the very important part to explain how narrative has supplanted fact in the media.  "Amazing," Ben?  Nope, it's the all-too-predictable result of the hive mentality in the Bubble.

Also doomed: the entire Democrat agenda

Big news via Hot Air: "Senate parliamentarian all but quashes new attempt at reconciliation."

Put briefly, the Senate parliamentarian ruled that the Democrats already used their one "get out of filibuster free" card and can't use it again until the next fiscal year.

Looks like Mitch McConnell is back in charge.

Haha, now we know it's doomed

Hot Air: "Biden: I'm putting Kamala Harris in charge of getting voting rights legislation passed through Congress."

The obvious question is: will Kamala make the long journey to the Senate?