I CAN’T SAY I’M SURPRISED: Asthma-related ER visits rise in U.S. amid Canadian wildfire smoke.
Archive for 2023
August 28, 2023
IF THEY’D LET HIM BE REELECTED IN 2020 HE’D BE ON THE WAY OUT BY NOW: If you’re waiting for Trump to disappear, be ready to wait past 2028.
INCENTIVIZING RAPE: What do most “trans women” in women’s jails have in common? “When considering the title question, it’s important to point out that we don’t have exact figures for how many gender-bending prisoners have actually been transferred to female facilities. But if you’re talking about Wisconsin, the commonality being observed is that slightly more than half of all prisoners who self-identify as transgender women are behind bars – at least in part – because they were convicted of sex crimes.”
THIS IS THE WAY: Things Don’t Go Well For Climate Activists When They Block Road to Burning Man Festival.
🚨#BREAKING: Nevada Rangers has rammed their truck through climate protesters as they attempted to shut down the Burning Man Arts and Music Festival
📌#Blackrock | #Nevada
⁰Climate activists attempted to halt a significant music and arts festival known as Burning Man, which is… pic.twitter.com/ormnHYIPgy— R A W S A L E R T S (@rawsalerts) August 28, 2023
Or to put it another way:
TRUMP TRIAL SET FOR MARCH IN FEDERAL ELECTION CASE.
This will turn out well.
LIGHTNING DEAL: AWOL VISION LTV-3500 150″ 4K 3D Laser TV, 3500 ANSI Lumen Ultra Short Throw Triple Laser Projector. #CommissionEarned
RACISM, STRAIGHT UP: ‘Black Voices for Trump’ Leader Only Trump GA Co-Defendant Denied Bail.
JOHN KERRY IS A BUFFOON AT BEST, A PITCHMAN FOR EVIL AT WORST: John Kerry jets to Scotland to carp about the climate.
THE SPANISH CIVIL WAR . . . in Ukraine?
Though they don’t brief well to some in industry where cheap is a threat to their business model and they cannot imagine anything that does not have real time video reachback to DC – with the cardboard drones to the modified jet-ski attack drones at sea, the hints for what we need in future wars is right there in Ukraine if people are willing to act on what they see.
Sadly, too many decision makers seem to be listening to the same usual suspects that WaPo’s David Ignatius talks to. Decision makers need to open their aperture and stop taking the words and perspectives from the same people who have been wrong about the Russo-Ukrainian War from D+0.
Imagine if battalions were issued a flat of these cardboard wonders for use as the battalion commander’s discretion? Heck, give it to the Marines for their next exercise in WESTPAC and see what use they can come up with.
The future imperfect is here.
Ignatius is a highly reliable source regarding the conventional wisdom, which is reliably wrong.
I CERTAINLY HOPE SO: Kurt Schlichter: This Political Prosecution Scheme Is Going To Backfire Hard.
LIFE IN THE BLUE ZONES: Boston plans to relocate homeless to island “recovery campus.” If they were doing this in a red city it the press would call it a relocation or concentration camp.
GOODER AND HARDER, NEW YORK: Over half of NY voters say state is headed in wrong direction as 80% demand term limits for governor.
The fed-up respondents gave Gov. Kathy Hochul a dismal 40% approval rating, a big drop from her 50% figure from a survey released just three months ago, according to the independent Unite NY’s Voter Empowerment Index unveiled Sunday.
Other state lawmakers fared even worse with a 27% approval rating, down from their recent 36%.
Overall, 53% of the state’s voters said they don’t like where the state is headed politically, and 40% said they are considering leaving.
Check your blue-state voting habits at the state line, please.
Back in February, Zillow’s housing economists made a bold call that U.S. home prices had bottomed and would proceed to climb 0.5% over the next 12 months.
In the months preceding that call, U.S. home prices as tracked by the Zillow Home Value Index not only began to climb again but also reached a new all-time high. This uptick was propelled by the tailwind generated from tight inventory levels, which proved strong enough to overpower the headwind caused by the mortgage rate shock.
That U.S. house price rebound coincided with Zillow repeatedly revising its home price forecast upward. Its latest revision, Zillow predicts that U.S. home prices will rise 6.5% between July 2023 and July 2024—up from the 6.3% call it made last month.
That’s nice if you’re already a homeowner. Less nice if you’re just starting out and looking to buy your first home.
DUKE GRAD STUDENTS VOTE TO UNIONIZE. I mean, what did management the administration expect? 95% of people on both sides are to the left of Bernie Sanders, and there’s no doubt that every morning the students get another day older and deeper in debt.
MAKE THEM PAY: Expelled grad student wins $3.95 million verdict against Pacific University. That’s good, though it will probably take one more zero on verdicts like this to really get the message across.
HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Ivy League business schools to offer ESG majors and courses in fall, despite controversy.
UNEXPECTEDLY: Experts are witnessing a strange new phenomenon in the demand for electric cars: ‘We call it the ‘Field of Dreams’ moment.’
“The demand is not keeping up with production, which is the opposite story of a year ago,” Cox Automotive executive analyst Michelle Krebs told Grist. “We call it the ‘Field of Dreams’ moment. Automakers are building more, but not enough consumers have come to the field.”
But Krebs also observed that availability isn’t such a bad thing when compared to the wider market.
“A year ago, the average EV price was above the average luxury vehicle price. Today, as inventory and availability build, EV prices are moving closer to the industry average,” Krebs added.
This is one of the possible outcomes (all bad) when Washington tries to pick winners and losers: A big run-up in demand as incentives get some buyers off the fence, followed by market over-saturation.
There are just too many use-cases where EVs make little sense — pickup trucks, for example — and manufacturing incentives and consumer tax credits can’t change that.
DEAL OF THE DAY: MRTLLOA 54/62/68/72 Inch Automatic Open Golf Umbrella. #CommissionEarned
KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEFING: Climate Cult Tyrants Are Still Worse Than COVID Tyrants. “If, like me, you’re skeptical whenever the government says that forcing you to do something will save you money in the long run, you have a clean bill of mental health.”
MAKE THEM PAY: Sixth Circuit Denies Qualified Immunity to School Officials: Court finds parent’s right to comment on their interactions with their child’s coaches or teachers is clearly established. “In this day and age, one need not look (or scroll) far to find speech she deems disrespectful. Many of us might share her sentiment. But that does not mean the disrespectful speech opens one up to government retaliation. The First Amendment muscularly protects most types of speech. For today’s purposes, it is enough to say that those protections encompass a parent’s criticism of the ways in which school employees treat the parent’s child at school.”
What’s disappointing is that we needed a court to make this clear.
A MESSAGE FROM THE RICH MEN NORTH OF RICHMOND:
Dear Oliver Anthony,
It's hard for us too. 😢
Sincerely,
The Rich Men North of Richmond pic.twitter.com/PSXiAJLAux— Remy (@GoRemy) August 25, 2023
BIDENOMICS, IT’S WORKING! Food Stamp Bonanza Sends Grocery Bills Soaring 15%, Study Finds.
In 2022, the Department of Agriculture’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) spending hit a record high of $119 billion, a sixfold increase over the last two decades. In 2019, taxpayers were on the hook for $4.5 billion per month on food stamp benefits. By December 2022, monthly food stamp spending soared to $11 billion.
According to findings from the government watchdog Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA), previewed by Fox News, the administration’s massive expansion of food stamp benefits could be responsible for a 15% spike in grocery store prices.
FGA called Biden’s rush to increase SNAP benefits an “unlawful expansion—which bypassed Congress—will cost taxpayers $250 billion over the next decade and has heavily contributed to soaring grocery prices.”
I love paying for other people’s groceries twice — one with my taxes and again in the form of higher prices.