Archive for 2019

PORTLAND MAYOR RESPONDS TO TED CRUZ, TED CRUZ smacks him down. “You have a pattern of withdrawing police protection to further your political agenda.”

OPEN THREAD: I’d say “just do it,” but I’m not that happy with Nike right now.

VIRGINIA CLOWN SHOW UPDATE: Charlottesville, Virginia will no longer celebrate Thomas Jefferson’s birthday.

If you remember, Joe Biden officially launched his campaign for president with a video in which he perpetuated the #CharlottesvilleHoax — the often repeated lie that President Trump had called neo-Nazis who had rallied in Charlottesville, Virginia, “fine people.” The unedited video clearly shows the president denouncing them: “I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and white nationalists because they should be condemned totally,” he says.

The two sides to which he was referring were those who wanted all symbols of the Confederacy taken down and those who wanted to preserve them as historical items. And he asked a good question: where does it stop? Do we erase Thomas Jefferson and George Washington from history because they were slave owners?

As Kate of Small Dead Animals likes to say, “Visit The Washington Monument While You Still Can.”

ALIENS. IT’S ABOUT THE ALIENS. Er, what’s the big secret that forced Mike Pence to cancel an event today? “And no, you’re not allowed to know what that thing is. Even though it was sufficiently urgent that the vice president of the United States had to cancel an event and return not just to Washington but to the White House. He’s on the job — which, one would think, rules out some personal or medical issue in the Pence family. Pence’s spokesman insists there’s no cause for alarm. And no, you can’t know what’s up. Sorry.”

Like I said, the aliens.

NEW SOCIALIST “IT GIRL” CONTINUES TO PAY DIVIDENDS: Maybe it’s make-believe: the vanity of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s border war.

Who else manages to radiate such beauty while signaling so much virtue? And why shouldn’t she wear a fabulous little red number to match her lips as she visits the so-called ‘concentration camps’ on the Mexican border? She’s empowering women; she has to look good. And when she is isn’t sharing skincare tips, AOC is on the front line of social justice, fighting tyranny one tweet at a time. Maybe she’s born with it, maybe it’s make-believe.

In case you’ve missed it, AOC has been in Texas, with her Latinx congress-sisters, visiting a detention facility for holding illegal immigrants. She was, you’ll be amazed to learn, horrified at the ‘systemic’ or ‘systematic’ – these words are interchangeable for AOC – cruelty of the place.

‘Now I’ve seen the inside of these facilities,’ she tweeted. ‘It’s not just the kids. It’s everyone. People drinking out of toilets, officers laughing in front of members Congress.’

Laughing? In front of members of Congress? These Border Patrol underlings ought to know their place.*

Or as Mike LaChance of Legal Insurrection notes:

It’s safe to assume how AOC would answer that. Speaking of which, her “border war” is merely another front in what Kevin Williamson dubbed “Sandy’s War” back in February when her obsession was something called the Green Nude Eel: “Like Fromm’s medieval burghers, they live in a time of uncertainty and status anxiety, and so they seek big, important things to which to attach themselves: big crowds on social media, big crises in politics. Which is to say, the passionate and fanatical denunciation of ‘climate deniers’ or billionaires or Mike Pence’s wife is only the Instagram photo of the braised beef cheeks at Hunky Dory in political disguise: consumption that literally could not be more conspicuous.”

* The pseudonymous Cockburn of the London Spectator is obviously being sarcastic, but one of AOC’s Congressional cohorts isn’t: ‘We’re going to shut them down’! Rep. Frederica Wilson (D-Stetson) says people who mock members of Congress online ‘should be prosecuted’ (video).

Wait until she discovers that pesky First Amendment.

Related: Hispanic Pastors Who Saw Same Detention Center Say Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Lying.

BRYAN PRESTON: Austin Goes from Harmlessly Weird to Dangerously Stupid by Legalizing Camping on City Streets.

Austin has long been the weird, liberal capital of Texas. The rest of Texas just sort of shrugs and puts up with it. Austin is quirky. Austin is odd. Austin lives in its own little world. Austin is also home to some of the best live music joints anywhere and you have to work pretty hard to find a bad restaurant in the city, so it’s not without its charms. The joke about Austin is that it’s nice because it’s so close to Texas (its the capital, a deep blue dot surrounded by a vast red sea). Austin is like that oddball cousin we all have. He’s there. He picks his nose and argues with light posts. But he’s nice and basically no threat to anyone, so whaddyagonnado?

Well, Texas’ weird cousin just became a threat to itself and others.

On June 20, the Austin city council passed what has to be one of the dumbest, most nonsensical ordinances since the city’s last idiotic, nonsensical ordinance (they pass a lot of ‘em, bless their hearts).

The city council made it perfectly legal to camp out on the city’s public spaces and sidewalks, under bridges and overpasses and, well, everywhere all over town – except, notably, parks and Austin City Hall.

That’s right. The city council exempted themselves from seeing homeless campouts — let’s call them Adlervilles, after the esteemed Mayor Steve Adler — on their own front porch. Mayor Adler and his cohort deemed city hall camping out of bounds. But you, owner of the local cookie store or overtaxed home, will get to see and step over and around all manner of things right out in your yard 24-7 now.

Read the whole thing, which is great piece of writing about a dangerously irresponsible decision by Austin’s city council.