BOTTOM STORY OF THE DAY: Kathy Griffin Begs Fans To Come To Her Comedy Shows – Admits Tickets Are ‘Not Selling Well.’

Griffin, who infamously posed with the simulated severed head of the then-President Donald Trump in a 2017 photoshoot, recently took to social media to post a video in which she begged people to buy ticket to her shows.

“I’m gonna be honest with you guys. I had another voice surgery two days ago, so my voice is sounding better, I think. And yet, I have COVID and I’m heartbroken because I’m getting divorced,” Griffin began. “It’s all about the tour, man. Just freaking get me to opening night in Des Moines. And Omaha is not selling well. First of all, there’s not enough people there.”

“I need comedy fans to come out and see me in Kansas City,” she continued. “Come on! I need sell-outs. I’ve been through hell. I’ve been through so much crap since my last tour. I actually just have to laugh at it. I just have to laugh. So please…”

“I just have to laugh.” As a comedienne, shouldn’t her focus be on making her audiences laugh?

MATT TAIBBI: “UK Files” Exclusive, Part 2: The Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) Told the IRS It Was A Charity. Documents Say Otherwise. “In reality, the CCDH was and is a pioneering effort in a new form of “non-governmental” pressure group that hides its ties to major-party politics as it pushes for the removal of ‘hate’ speech, often the critics of mainstream politicians.”

CORN, POPPED: Did Obama Just Get Trump Off the Hook? “Just when you thought 2024 couldn’t possibly get any weirder — yes, I know it’s still only January — a secret Barack Obama memo could prove the undoing of special counsel Jack Smith’s case against Donald Trump.”

CRIME HAS GOTTEN SO BAD IN BLUE CITY THAT COMPANIES ARE NOW PAYING FOR SECURITY ESCORTS TO PROTECT EMPLOYEES:

Businesses in downtown Oakland are hiring private security for employees and asking employees to stay inside as crime in the city worsens, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

Blue Shield, a health care provider that moved its headquarters to Oakland in 2019, is offering employees security guards and ride-hail services due to the rise in crime in Oakland, according to the Chronicle. Kaiser Permanente, a healthcare giant, is asking employees to stay in their buildings, according to the Chronicle.

“In response to the current crime environment affecting all businesses and the entire community of Oakland, as well as other communities across the country, we continue to provide guidance to keep employees as safe as possible,” Kaiser spokespeople said in a statement, according to the Chronicle.

Private security escorts — they’re not just for Detroit anymore!

NO MAN, NO PROBLEM: Ron Hart: Democrats Got Their Political Playbook From Lenin. “When you have bad policies and cannot sustain your authority based on quantifiable results, you do what Democrats have done these last few years: you weaponize the government against your enemies. It is not a novel construct.”

Plus: “Lenin was famously placed in a glass coffin and publicly exhibited for years after his death. This is the same game plan the Democrats have in store for Biden’s second term.” Heh. It would be funnier if it weren’t basically true.

IT’S SATIRE NOW:

California Becomes First State To Ban Heterosexual Marriage https://t.co/vPHyY9twmp pic.twitter.com/IvUZl4VFA8

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) January 30, 2024

MATT TAIBBI ON 2024: Note to Readers: “The Fix is In.”

THIS SEEMS LIKELY: The Fed will cut rates fewer times and start them later than market hopes, according to CNBC Fed Survey. “Just 9% see the Federal Reserve cutting rates in March. Fifty percent see a cut in May and only in June is there a majority of 70% predicting that rates go down. Futures markets, meanwhile, place a 37% probability on a March cut and around an 84% chance in May. And while futures markets have priced in between five and six rate reductions this year, survey respondents, on average, see just a bit more than three.”

CLOTHING STAPLES: Fruit of the Loom Men’s Eversoft Cotton Stay Tucked Crew T-Shirt. #CommissionEarned

HER NEW LOW FOR NOW: Karine Jean-Pierre Hits a New Low.

CHANGE (IT BACK): GM To Reintroduce PHEVs In North America. “Let me be clear, GM remains committed to eliminating tailpipe emissions from our light-duty vehicles by 2035, but in the interim, deploying plug-in technology in strategic segments will deliver some of the environmental benefits of EVs as the nation continues to build its charging infrastructure.”

The charging infrastructure will improve — throwing enough tax dollars at a problem always solves it, they keep telling me — but EVs will still have weaknesses and limitations that hybrids don’t.

WHOM THE GODS WOULD DESTROY THEY FIRST MAKE INSANE: Penn faculty ‘die-in’ blocks building entrance in ‘solidarity with civilians in Gaza.’

HMM: Trump’s Lawyer Walks Back Conflict-of-Interest Accusation in Carroll Case.

THE END OF HIGHER EDUCATION: Princeton adds trigger warnings to library docs to ‘protect researchers from accidentally viewing harmful and offensive materials.’

SHOULD COLLEGES PAY PROPERTY TAXES? You hate to wish taxes on anyone. But the more that a college gets into activities that compete with traditionally taxpaying entities (like running hotels or other businesses) the more likely it is that legislatures will decide the answer is “yes.”

COMPUTING IN SPACE: It turns out NASA’s Mars helicopter was much more revolutionary than we knew.

“The processor on Ingenuity is 100 times more powerful than everything JPL has sent into deep space, combined,” Tzanetos said. This means that if you add up all of the computing power that has flown on NASA’s big missions beyond Earth orbit, from Voyager to Juno to Cassini to the James Webb Space Telescope, the tiny chip on Ingenuity packs more than 100 times the performance.

A similar philosophy went into other components, such as the rechargeable batteries on board. These are similar to the lithium batteries sold in power tools at hardware stores. Lithium hates temperature cycles, and on the surface of Mars, they would be put through a hellish cycle of temperatures from -130° Fahrenheit (-90° C) to 70° (20° C).

The miracle of Ingenuity is that all of these commercially bought, off-the-shelf components worked. Radiation didn’t fry the Qualcomm computer. The brutal thermal cycles didn’t destroy the battery’s storage capacity. Likewise, the avionics, sensors, and cameras all survived despite not being procured with spaceflight-rated mandates.

“This is a massive victory for engineers,” Tzanetos said.

Indeed it is. While NASA’s most critical missions, where failure is not an option, will likely still use space-rated hardware, Ingenuity’s success opens a new pathway for most science missions. They can be cheaper, lighter, and higher-performing in every way. This is almost unimaginably liberating for mission planners.

Exciting, too.

DON SURBER: Trump’s next Cabinet: Senators need not bother to apply.

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEFING: The UN Is a Great Starting Point for Adding to the Terror Watch List. “One of the main reasons that pro-UN American officials give for remaining part of the organization is that it does a lot of good humanitarian work, which is occasionally true. UNRWA, however, is one of those alleged humanitarian agencies run by the UN, and now it’s complicit in one of the most heinous terrorist attacks in history.”

NOPE:

This is not very sustainablehttps://t.co/aJBSKRqaq2

— wretchardthecat (@wretchardthecat) January 31, 2024

MARK SIMON: Yes, Taiwan will fight. “Eight years ago, if asked whether the Taiwanese people would fight should the Chinese Communist Party decide to invade, I would have hesitated with a response. Coming off President Ma’s eight years in office there was no sense of urgency in Taiwan as they had yet to witness the worst of Xi Jinping inside China, the persecution of Hong Kong, or more happily, the success President Tsai has reaped in leading the people to a recovery of their Taiwanese identity. Eight years may not seem like a long time, and in fairness to past leaders there was already a shift underway in building the identity of the Taiwan people as separate from China. But 2016, maybe even earlier, was then. This is now. Taiwan fights.”

JEOPARDY BLOWS THE GREAT DEPRESSION:

In an episode of Jeopardy last week, one of the categories was “One-Term Presidents.”

Here was the “answer:”

Britannica: He “was blaming the depression on events abroad & predicting” his foe’s win” would only intensify the disaster”; it didn’t.

The question that Jeopardy was looking for was “Who was Herbert Hoover?

The Jeopardy fact checkers were arguably wrong.

Read the whole thing

Flashback: FDR’s policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate.

EVERYTHING IS GOING SWIMMINGLY: The Real-Estate Downturn Comes for America’s Premier Office Towers.

Owners of the most elite buildings escaped this fate for a while by convincing the market they had created a new class of office tower—one that surpassed the traditional Class A building at the top of the pecking order.

These landlords persuaded blue-chip tenants that reluctant workers would return if only their offices sparkled with lush roof decks, fully loaded gyms and food prepared by Michelin-starred chefs. Owners invested heavily in these properties, which were usually new developments with the best locations, views, air quality and modern designs.

But that strategy is losing steam as more companies have accepted the reality of hybrid work schedules and, for the most part, have given up on compelling workers to be in five days a week.

“The ship has sailed on full return to the office for most companies,” said Rob Sadow, chief executive of Scoop Technologies, a software firm that developed an index that tracks workplace strategies. “They’re not going to go from three days a week to five days a week by making their space nicer.”

That is one reason why few office developers are considering new ground breakings.

Good news for the remaining renters, bad news for contractors and their employees.

Plus: “Rents at the highest-end buildings have been falling, while the rate of leasing has been slowing.”

That means they haven’t found the bottom yet.

ILHAN OMAR, D-MOGADISHU. Calls Grow For Ilhan Omar To Be Expelled From Congress After She Says She’s Advocating For Her Homeland Of Somalia.

GOODER AND HARDER, DC: Trump official and father-of-three is in critical condition after being shot during carjacking rampage while picking up his wife in Democrat-run DC: Suspect fled before being cornered and killed by cops.

OUR CORRUPT “JUSTICE” SYSTEM: YGTBFKM: 11 Years in Prison for This?

Some protests are more protected than others.

For instance, you can trash a city, burn down blocks of it, including a police precinct, occupy government buildings, trap innocents behind closed doors as you consider taking ransoms, and everything’s cool. You might be able to sue the city and get millions if the police try to stop you. At the very least, you can get all the right politicians and the entire public health establishment to applaud your bravery and commitment to racial justice.

But if you sing gospel songs outside an abortion clinic? Prepare to go to jail for up to 11 years.

The system of justice isn’t being weaponized. Not at all.

There must be an accounting, and the individuals involved must pay a sufficient price to discourage similar misconduct in the future.