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Archive for 2022
June 9, 2022
NEW CIVILITY WATCH:
FAST TIMES AT BEN BRADLEE HIGH: The Washington Post’s week from Hell.
The paper known for its slogan “Democracy Dies in Darkness” should perhaps be more concerned about its own well-being after the disastrous week it had.
The Washington Post, the once-revered news organization that famously exposed the Watergate scandal leading to a president’s resignation, is still highly respected in the Beltway but has lost its way in recent years among most Americans. From declaring the coronavirus lab-leak theory was a “debunked” “conspiracy” to quickly rejecting the Hunter Biden laptop scandal in the final weeks of the 2020 presidential election, the Post of today is simply not the same as the Post of the Nixon era.
But the events that occurred over the past week may be some of the worst that have plagued the Washington Post in its 144-year history.
Speaking of which: Things at the Washington Post are great.Thanks for asking!
It certainly looks apparent that despite the suspension of Weigel over a simple retweet, Sonmez is trying to provoke a disciplinary action from her superiors at the Post, which she can then use as evidence of retaliation for her lawsuit in her appeal.
The public appearance is that the inmates are running the Jeffrey Preston Bezos Asylum and that the Post has a completely upside-down idea of what constitutes an ethical lapse. A single retweet, swiftly retracted, is worth a month-long suspension. However calling out colleges on a public timeline, siccing online mobs on them, leaking internal emails and refusing to comply with workplace directives are allowed to continue. Something stinks at the Washington Post and for once it’s not Dave Weigel.
And the hits just keep on coming! WaPo’s Felicia Sonmez torches ‘White’ colleagues for ‘downplaying’ workplace drama with ‘synchronized tweets.’
Washington Post reporter Felicia Sonmez continued her scorched-earth tweeting about her colleagues on Thursday, this time taking aim at ‘White,” “star” reporters who expressed solidarity with the paper as the viral infighting has dominated conversation in the media industry.
On Thursday, Sonmez took a flamethrower to fellow staffers in another lengthy series of tweets, attacking those who had posted recent, strikingly similar messages of support for their paper.
“I don’t know who the colleagues anonymously disparaging me in media reports are. But I do know that the reporters who issued synchronized tweets this week downplaying the Post’s workplace issues have a few things in common with each other,” Sonmez wrote during a lengthy Twitter thread.
“They are all white – They are among the highest-paid employees in the newsroom, making double and even triple what some other National desk reporters are making, particularly journalists of color – They are among the ‘stars’ who ‘get away with murder’ on social media,” Sonmez tweeted. “Of course the Washington Post is a great workplace. It is a great workplace *for them.* The system is working *for them.* What about for everyone else? The General Assignment team? The Morning Mix team? The newsletter researchers?”
Sonmez insisted there have been “long-standing issues” within the Post that have not been addressed and that will only continue, even if the media will move on from “trivializing” them as a “Twitter spat.”
Nothing like calling your employer crypto-racists. So how is all of the drama of the gifted children being received outside the writers’ bullpen?
NEWS YOU CAN USE IN THE BIDEN ECONOMY: Expert tips for growing food in all four seasons.
VIA A FRIEND:
Nailed it.
Thousands of voters have recently left the Democratic Party in Western Colorado — some as part of a grassroots effort to defeat Republican Congresswoman Lauren Boebert in her upcoming primary election.
Among them is Steven Hallenborg of Montrose.
“Well, I’m a lifelong Democrat, and now I’m unaffiliated,” he said. Because he changed his affiliation, he now can vote against Boebert in the June 28 Republican primary.
For the last few years, Colorado’s “open primary” system has allowed unaffiliated voters to participate in either party’s primary elections. That means voters like Hallenborg can weigh in on Boebert’s primary run — without actually joining the Republican Party.
“It’s very unfortunate what’s going on in this state. So, I mean, she has to go,” Hallenborg said in an interview at a Democratic event. Voters who oppose Boebert have one other option, Republican state Sen. Don Coram, in the June 28 primary.
Open primaries are a joke and wide-open for abuse.
YOU’RE GONNA NEED A MUCH BIGGER BLOG: Here’s the economic data Biden doesn’t want you to see.
MYTHS, BUSTED: Little evidence testosterone treatment increases the risk of cardiovascular events, most in-depth analysis suggests. “Prescribing of testosterone for hypogonadism is increasing globally, but conflicting messages about its safety may have led to many patients not receiving the treatment. Ongoing studies should help to determine the longer-term safety of testosterone, but in the meantime, our results provide much-needed reassurance about its short-to-medium term safety. Our findings could have important implications for the treatment of men with hypogonadism worldwide.”
A TALE OF TWO PRESIDENTS: What DECADE does he think it is?! Biden goes on bizarre rant about biracial couples and you know even Jimmy Kimmel had to cringe a little (watch). Biden babbles to Kimmel, “Turn on the TV, look at the ads. When’s the last time you saw biracial couples on TV? When’s the last time you saw the way, I mean, people are selling products, they do ads and sell products. And they sell products when people, they appeal to people.”
Flashback:
Bush was driven to the Waco airstrip in an unmarked vehicle, with only a tiny Secret Service contingent. As Bush described the scene for reporters afterward: “They pulled up in a plain-looking vehicle with tinted windows. I slipped on a baseball cap, pulled ‘er down — as did Condi. We looked like a normal couple,” he said, referring to National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.
—“Surprise! Bush Pops in for Dinner in Baghdad,” The Orlando Sentinel, November 27th, 2003.
DAMMIT, AND I JUST ORDERED A BUNCH OF UPSIDE-DOWN COMPASSES: New research suggests Earth’s magnetic polarity isn’t reversing.
BOB MCMANUS: After Boudin ouster, New York lefties face their own ‘Bay’ of Reckoning.
San Francisco voters just gave George Soros-style law enforcement a swift kick where it hurts. Here’s hoping New York Democrats were paying attention.
And here’s especially hoping Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg took note of the defenestration of Frisco DA Chesa Boudin in a recall election Tuesday.
The lesson being that you cannot have law without enforcement — not in any meaningful sense. Plus that sooner or later even voters in hard-left precincts like San Francisco get a belly full.
Full of crime-ridden, vagrant-infested streets. Of random, often lethal violence. Of slow-motion looting by “shoplifters.” Of public spaces turned into permanent, open-air shooting galleries and lunatic asylums.
Occasionally voters do something about all that — which, in Boudin’s case, was to kick him to the curb. Three cheers for the City by the Bay.
Boudin’s problem, and San Francisco’s, was his true-believer embrace of the Soros Doctrine — that when local prosecutors disengage, criminals come to their senses and begin to behave themselves. It’s nonsense on stilts, of course, yet lefties lap it up.
Yeah, why do you think that is?
COVERING THE IMPORTANT STORIES: Progressive Writer Doggedly Tracks Down Creator of Biden ‘I Did That’ Gas Pump Stickers.
These stickers have proliferated across the country and across sales platforms. You can find them for sale on Amazon, at eBay, and Etsy, as well as other outlets, usually with a gross available for under $10. The messaging has been effective enough that Republicans have been inspired to hold voter registration efforts at gas stations. Now, in the face of this grassroots political commentary, the press has once again snapped into action.
At Business Insider, writer Nina Burleigh decided that there was a need to track down the originator of this organic campaign against Joe Biden. (As a sign of where Burleigh’s allegiances rest, she is infamous for proclaiming she would have serviced President Bill Clinton with oral sex because of his pro-abortion stance.)
* * * * * * * *
Nina attempted to pin things down via some early social posts about the stickers, then began contacting numerous retail outlets with questions and probes, but came up empty. Then her intrepid sleuthing paid off – when the creator actually contacted her. Robert “Bobby” Naklicki, president and CEO of Redneck Nation called Burleigh directly with the announcement that he was the original source of the dastardly decals.
According to Naklicki, he produced the very first “I Did That” stickers in May 2021, the same month gas prices hit $3 a gallon. “Our brain trust did that,” he told me. Once his team came up with the idea, they began printing the stickers in Florida by the thousands.
* * * * * * * *
If Burleigh was of the mind that outing Naklicki will bring an end to this craze, or at the least bring him and his company enough pressure to curtail their campaign, she is mistaken. As has been proven repeatedly in the Biden era, those on the right have a deft hand with this type of organic messaging. When a NASCAR reporter attempted to deflect from fans cursing out the president, the “Let’s Go Brandon” phrase instantly swept the country for months.
In a similar fashion, as the Biden administration attempted to get a rebuke of messaging on Republicans by unleashing the “Ultra-MAGA” tagline, those on the right embraced it instantly. It became a mocking intonation for many, and the impact the White House may have hoped for was never realized.
In fact, Naklicki’s company made a move on that term – they pounced, if you will. “We trademarked ultramaga.com right away.,” he said, calling it “the new ‘deplorables.’”
Heh, indeed. As Glenn Greenwald wrote in April, “Your Top Priority is The Emotional Comfort of the Most Powerful Elites, Which You Fulfill by Never Criticizing Them.” Burleigh thought she was going to be next mighty leftist doxxer; it’s good to see someone declare himself uncancellable. (And Redneck Nation is a great brand name, given the craziness of 21st century America.)
Related: Biden tormented by Republican guerrilla campaign and ‘I did it’ stickers.
Also: 100Pcs I Did That Biden Funny Car Stickers. #Resist #CommissionEarned
Flashback: US journalist [Nina Burleigh] loses in libel action against Telegraph over Melania Trump apology.
BRANDON GETS RESULTS! Biden ‘Jokes’ About Sending Political Opponents to Jail. The FBI Actually Does It the Very Next Morning. “Last night on Jimmy Kimmel’s show, Biden promised to throw his political opponents in jail. This morning, Biden’s FBI arrested a GOP candidate for governor in Michigan.”
COME SEE THE VIOLENCE INHERENT IN THE LEFTISM: A Disturbing Poll in the Aftermath of the Attempted Assassination of Brett Kavanaugh.
A MESSAGE FROM MARK JUDGE TO INSTAPUNDIT READERS:
In 2018, after the DNC and its opposition research goons tried to destroy me during the Brett Kavanaugh nomination, the readers of Instapundit graciously offered me support, both financial and spiritual, to survive while I worked on a book about my battle against the New American Stasi.
That manuscript is now being edited by the good folks at Bombardier Books for a fall release. The research, writing and re-writing was a lot of work, but the result, I hope, will stun and edify you and tell the truth. Unlike Michael Avenatti, I do not spend other people’s money on planes and sports cars, and the book effort has left me a bit drained, and not just emotionally. (Not a lot of folks were offering me jobs in 2018.) I’d like to make one last appeal to Instapundit readers to help us make it through the last few weeks of editing. This project would not have been possible without you, and ever dime went to and goes to the basics of survival while I did this work. (You’ll love the title.) I have a GoFundMe page, but for those who don’t want to use it, I also have a UPS address: 3220 N St. NW #175 Washington, D.C. 20007. God Bless you guys.
Mark’s currently waiting tables to make ends meet, so he can use the help. I donated just now. (Bumped.)
YEP:
Politics and virtue signaling are the oddest pairing. In truth they're almost hypergolic.https://t.co/wvkN5OdVms
— wretchardthecat (@wretchardthecat) June 9, 2022
HE UNDERESTIMATED HIS ABILITY TO F*** THINGS UP: Biden’s base abandoning him: Youth, women, minorities, and unions.
A bit more on the poll Glenn linked to earlier this morning:
In new polling provided exclusively to Secrets, he is losing support among younger voters, suburbanites, women, minorities (especially Hispanics), and union members.
And the reason is simple: They think the country is headed in the wrong direction, and by a country mile.
Two polls from Zogby Analytics lay out the problems facing Biden. In one sizing up the economy, just 27% believe the country is headed in the right direction, down from 51% just a year ago.
To be fair, a year ago Biden’s policies hadn’t really started kicking in.
KEVIN DOWNEY JR: LeBron James Is a Hypocritical, Racist Crybaby. Here Are the Receipts. “LeBron James, arguably the G.O.A.T of the National Basketball Association (NBA) who has somehow managed to become a billionaire despite living in a nation seething with ‘racism’ (just ask him he’ll talk about it for days) isn’t saying much about the savage beating death of 17-year-old Ethan Liming, which took place in the parking lot of LeBron’s ‘I Promise’ school in Akron, Ohio.”
STAY COOL THIS SUMMER: Dickies Men’s Relaxed-Fit Multi-Pocket Shorts.#CommissionEarned
WE MIGHT SOON BE LOOKING BACK FONDLY AT THE MALAISE YEARS: There’s No Stopping a Recessionary Reckoning. “If there was only one causal factor nudging the economy into recession, it might be a mild, brief recession. But with all five conditions in confluence, this recession will be unlike any other.”