UNWINDING WOKE: America’s Classless Act.

America’s lower class is not revolutionary but aspirational, which is why Trump—who uses his fantastic wealth to express notably plebeian tastes for things like Big Macs and gold plating—can seem to millions of more modestly situated voters like “one of them.” In the terms of the American class system, he is—since our class markers have less to do with money and more to do with cultural sensibility.

Vanity Fair contributing editor Fran Liebowitz was being snide when she said that Trump is “a poor person’s idea of a rich person,” but she was also hitting on a foundational element of his appeal. In American terms, Trump is fundamentally aligned with the working poor because he doesn’t look down on them and because, though he has more money than them, he uses it (and regards them) in ways they find appealing. He may have grown up extremely wealthy and moved to Manhattan—but he’s still Donald from Queens. In European terms, Americans voted for Trump in record numbers in 2024 because we have no class.

Unless and until the American Left relearns that lesson, they will remain in the political wilderness. Mr. Trump’s victory represents our desire for a president who sees his job as serving the broad middle class, against the woke on one side and the aristocratic technocracy on the other. Enacting this attitude as a matter of public policy, however, will be much more of a challenge than one might think.

Read the whole thing.

REPORT: Hunter Biden Artworks Worth ‘Millions of Dollars’ Burned Up in LA Fires.

Remember Hunter Biden’s supposed stint as an artist? It was, without doubt, one of the shallowest, most obvious money-laundering efforts undertaken by any member of the Biden family, and that’s really saying something. Hunter’s “art” was reminiscent of what might result from a bomb going off in a paint factory when a truck loaded with bolts of canvas sat parked outside; a talented kindergartner could finger-paint more compelling art than Hunter’s best efforts. But somehow, Hunter’s daubs gained some acclaim in the art community – at least the art community that was willing to help the Biden family to launder bribes – and the paintings sold for, wonder of wonders, a lot of money.

But hey, they sold to anonymous buyers. Give me a break.

Now, the New York Post is breaking the exclusive, heartbreaking story of how Hunter Biden paintings and other artworks worth “millions of dollars” have, according to a source close to the Biden family, reportedly burned up in the ongoing LA-area wildfires.

A trove of nearly 200 artworks by Hunter Biden has been destroyed — one of the casualties of the wildfires ravaging Los Angeles, The Post has learned.

The controversial art had been in storage near the Pacific Palisades home of Hunter’s Hollywood attorney Kevin Morris and is valued at “millions of dollars,” a source close to the Biden family said.

Morris, who loaned the first son nearly $5 million to help pay a tax bill and has been financing a documentary on him, lives in a sprawling five-bedroom, six-bathroom home which is among the few houses still intact in the posh neighborhood, The Post can confirm.

Still though, look on the upside: In the midst of responding to the unspeakable, unending horror in California, Flo from Progressive and Jake from State Farm are about to break the tension with some massive laughs:

LMFAO. Imagine the insurance adjusters face when they file this claim. https://t.co/ZgoDqwunie

— Prison Mitch (@MidnightMitch) January 15, 2025

TEAM BIDEN COMES FULL CIRCLE: How it started: Jim Treacher: Happy Anniversary to Hunter’s Laptop.

Four years ago today, my Twitter account was instantly suspended for posting the following picture:

That’s Hunter Biden. The photo came from the laptop he abandoned at a Delaware repair shop, less than five miles from his father’s house.

Vladimir Putin didn’t take that snapshot. He didn’t plant the laptop. It belonged to Hunter, who then abandoned it and lost legal custody of it because he’s a drug addict.

And yet when I posted that photo in October 2020, just weeks before the election, my Twitter account was instantly locked down.

I don’t mean within minutes, either. The instant I clicked the button to post that, I was locked out of my account.

Here’s the warning I received:

I had been censored. Lil’ ol’ me!

So I removed the tweet, under duress, to restore access to my account.

As it turned out, I was far from the only one. Anybody who shared any part of that news story — and it is a news story — got instantly locked down by Twitter. You couldn’t even share the URL of the original NY Post story. A complete blackout.

The Democrats wanted Trump out of the White House, and they thought this story would interfere with that. So they locked it down.

How it ended: New US ‘oligarchy’ threatens democracy, Biden warns in farewell speech.

Speaking from the Oval Office, the outgoing US President criticised social media bosses who are “giving up on fact checking” and burying Americans in an “avalanche of disinformation and misinformation”.

Mr Biden’s comments will be interpreted as a thinly veiled attack on Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg, the billionaire owners of X and Facebook, who have scrapped fact checkers on their platforms, claiming they hinder free speech.

Channelling President Dwight Eisenhower, Mr Biden warned of the “potential rise of a tech industrial complex” threatening to undermine US democracy.

Mr Eisenhower, a former US army general, spoke in his 1961 farewell address about the rise of a “military-industrial complex”.

Mr Biden said: “Americans are being buried under an avalanche of misinformation and disinformation, enabling the abuse of power. The free press is crumbling. Editors are disappearing. Social media is giving up on fact checking.

“The truth is smothered by lies told for power and for profit. We must hold the social platforms accountable to protect our children, our families, and our very democracy from the abuse of power.”

Biden’s speechwriters have to be trolling us on the way, knowing that Joe is too far gone to remind them there’s no way he can mention disinformation and social media, because everyone will bring up the mass censoring of the New York Post and anyone who mentioned Hunter’s laptop in 2020. Or as Glenn wrote last year in the aforementioned Post: Hunter’s laptop, Wuhan and more: ‘Disinformation’ and ‘conspiracies’ turn out to be true — again and again.

RON BURGUNDY WILL READ ANYTHING THAT IS PUT ON THAT TELEPROMPTER!

Biden spent his entire career crapping all over journalists, the vast majority of whom were members of his own party — and who circled the wagons to keep him in power, long after his mental decline was more than obvious. He doesn’t get to suddenly play the “free press is crumbling” game on his way out the door.

ISRAEL, HAMAS REACH DEAL TO RELEASE HOSTAGES, PAUSE FIGHTING IN GAZA:

Leaders of Israel and the Hamas terrorist organization have agreed to the outlines of a cease-fire that would pause the brutal 15-month military campaign in Gaza launched in response to the October 7 terror attack, according to multiple reports from the Middle East.

The deal, which needs to be ratified by Israel’s cabinet, comes after months of negotiations between the two sides over a multi-phased plan that would include the release of hostages held by Hamas in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.

President Joe Biden announced the deal from the White House on Wednesday, saying it comes after more than “15 months of terror for the hostages, their families, the Israeli people” and “15 months of suffering by the innocent people of Gaza.”

“Media reports a few minutes ago claimed that the deal had been concluded,” Ed Morrissey adds. “Netanyahu’s office says not so fast:”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office says ceasefire deal with Hamas has still not been reached and that the final details were still being sorted out. That comes after multiple mediators had said Israel and Hamas agreed to a ceasefire in Gaza and the release dozens of hostages after more than 15 months of war.

That’s because the terrorists tried to play the Hamas Hokey Pokey again:

The Israeli negotiating team was recently informed that Hamas decided at the last minute to make new demands – this time regarding the Philadelphi corridor, in contrast to the maps that have already been approved by the cabinet and American mediators.

Israel strongly opposed any changes to these maps, the source said.

An informed source told Al-Araby Al-Jadeed that Hamas found a “loophole” in the agreed-upon deal, with Egypt agreeing to amend the deal and “close the loophole” based on Hamas’s demands in the latter stages and in coordination with the Israeli team, as per the Arab media report.

As I wrote earlier, don’t count on this deal holding up until the hostages get released. And even if it holds up through Phase I, don’t be surprised when Hamas reneges and demands a renegotiation at that point, too.

Stay tuned.

UPDATE:

Biden: I got the Israel-Hamas deal done

Netanyahu: Thank you Trump for getting this deal done

Brutal. pic.twitter.com/HqED61euQx

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) January 16, 2025

DISPATCHES FROM THE EDUCATION APOCALYPSE: Joanne Jacobs: Students want A’s for trying hard, B’s for (mostly) showing up.

Psychologist Carol Dweck persuaded teachers and parents to praise Gen Z children for effort, not their abilities, to create a “growth mindset,” Grant writes. “The idea of lauding persistence quickly made its way into viral articles, best-selling books and popular TED talks. It resonated with the Protestant work ethic and reinforced the American dream that with hard work, anyone could achieve success.”

Earlier: The Anxious Generation: Jonathan Haidt on why today’s young people are so anxious.

WELCOME TO THE ERA OF PERSONALITY MEDIA:

Pay-check journalists largely relied on hefty corporate salaries to sate their egos. Who, though, will cough up $7 a month to read Jennifer Rubin? The ultimate irony in all of this is the former corporate media scolds who are vehemently anti-Trump are becoming just like him — hoping to brand their own name for profit in media. That is how Trump made his billions, by emblazoning his name on casinos, hotels and television shows. Now a slew of media personalities are attempting a Trump act of their own: say the most outrageous thing the loudest to draw as many eyeballs to them as possible.

Chuck Todd scored a nice salary off the back of sales from the 30 Rockefeller gift shop. But who is going out of their way to purchase a Chuck Todd T-shirt? For better or worse, this new era of “personality journalism” will likely confirm the worst impulses of corporate media personalities — that they have always been driven by a thirst for celebrity, not truth in broadcasting. As Jennifer Rubin attempts to out-crazy Don Lemon, who attempts to out-crazy Chris Cillizza for a smaller and smaller piece of the pie, chances are their critics will be exonerated.

Speaking of which:

🚨Jen Rubin falsely reports that Pete Hegseth was unable to answer allegations of sex with minors in yesterday’s confirmation hearings.

No such allegations exist or were asked about. This is outright defamation. pic.twitter.com/OR3gL6W6kF

— Bluesky Libs (@BlueskyLibs) January 15, 2025

But what will happen to the biggest showboaters of them all, who still have their legacy corporate brands behind them? Expect Big Changes in the White House Press Room as Trump Will All But Sideline Legacy Media.

MY HOVERCRAFT IS FULL OF EELS: AI tool lets users speak another language without learning a word.

A live translation tool could soon enable people to engage in conversations in real-time despite speaking different languages.

Facebook parent company Meta has launched a tool called Seamless which is able to take spoken or written communication and convert it almost instantly into another language.

The technology is able to work on more than 100 different languages and the Meta engineers behind the technology hope to one day create a real-life version of the talking Babel Fish gadget from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

In the book, the tool enables translation but modern technology has not yet been able to match the fictional capabilities.

I’m sure eventually, we’ll have the full Star Trek universal translator, but getting there is going to be quite a ride:

LOS ANGELES MEGA-FIRE: The Tragic Consequence of Protecting Shrubs Before People:

In 2019, the LA Department of Water and Power (LADWP) began replacing nearly 100-year-old power line poles cutting through Topanga State Park, when the project was halted within days by conservationists outraged that federally endangered Braunton’s milkvetch plants had been trampled during the process.

…But, after an amateur botanist hiking through the park during the work saw the harm done to some of the park’s Braunton’s milkvetch — a flowering shrub with only a few thousand specimens remaining in the wild — and complained, the project was completely halted, Courthouse News Service reported.

Instead of fire-hardening the park, the city — which the state said had undertaken the work without proper permitting — ended up paying $2 million in fines and was ordered by the California Coastal Commission to reverse the whole project and replant the rare herb.

That work saved about 200 Braunton’s milkvetch plants — almost all of which have now likely been torched in the wildfires that consumed Topanga Canyon, along with nearly 24,000 acres (37 square miles) of some of LA’s most sought-after real estate.

The LAWDP had crews and equipment there, and yet the whining of a virtue-signalling “expert” stopped fire prevention.

I am beyond angry now, and there are no words that can adequately express my rage.

Read the whole thing.

UPDATE: John Nolte: Jon Stewart’s Stupid Meltdown Over ‘Conditional’ Federal Wildfire Aid Falls Flat. “A decent person would be thrilled if federal aid came with conditions that forced California Democrats to do what they have so far refused — everything possible to protect the lives and property of its citizens. In his defense, Jon Stewart is a firefighter. No matter the danger to his credibility and integrity, he’s the first on the scene to put fires out for Democrats. Clown.”

TEAM BIDEN GOING OUT WITH A BANG: President Joe Biden removed Cuba from the list of state sponsors of terrorism, according to a White House announcement Tuesday.

The White House said Cuba has not provided aid to a terrorist organization for the last six months and provided no indication that it would sponsor terrorism, according to the announcement. Cuba was previously put on the list by the president-elect Donald Trump’s first administration, saying the regime does “oppress its people” and also supported the National Liberation Army, a U.S.-designated terrorist organization, according to the U.S. Embassy in Cuba on Jan. 11, 2021.

“The United States will continue to support the Cuban people in their desire for a democratic government and respect for human rights, including freedom of religion, expression, and association,” the U.S. Embassy in Cuba said in 2021 announcing the most recent designation. “Until these rights and freedoms are respected, we will continue to hold the regime accountable.”

Earlier: Surprise! Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass is a life-long rabid supporter of communism and the Cuban dictatorship.

SHE IS LARGE; SHE CONTAINS MULTITUDES: Stacey Abrams group to pay largest fine for campaign violations in Georgia history.

A voting rights group founded by Stacey Abrams will pay $300,000 for illegally supporting her 2018 gubernatorial campaign — the largest fine ever assessed for violating Georgia campaign finance laws.

Under a consent order approved by the State Ethics Commission on Wednesday, the New Georgia Project admitted it raised and spent millions of dollars to support Abrams’ unsuccessful campaign without registering as an independent political committee and disclosing its activities, as required by state law. It also supported the campaigns of other Democratic candidates that year, as well as the unsuccessful 2019 Gwinnett County MARTA referendum.

In all, the New Georgia Project and an affiliated group, the New Georgia Project Action Fund, admitted to 16 violations of state campaign finance laws.

It’s a dramatic about-face for a group that for years denied it did anything improper and mocked the investigation as a politically motivated “fishing expedition.” On Wednesday, it admitted to every allegation the commission had leveled against it.

To be fair, her campaign to be governor was merely a stepping stone towards the ultimate prize:

PAM BONDI GLORIOUSLY OUTSMARTED DICK DURBIN:

Despite claiming concern over actions that Donald Trump might take, which Joe Biden himself actually did, Durbin continues to grandstand by pretending to be concerned that Trump is going to violate the Constitution and whether Bondi will say “no” to Trump when he does.

He even brought up the 2020 election as an example, and Bondi blindsided him by pointing out his deception.

“He said to the Georgia secretary of state, find 11,780 votes,” Durbin told her reference

“Do you have the entire context of that call?” Bondi asked. “I feel like it was long — much longer than that, and may have been taken out of context.”

“It was an hour long,” Durbin admitted.

“Right,” Bondi replied.

Bondi’s point pans out because reading the transcript of the call proves that Trump’s words show he was actually arguing that a thorough investigation would reveal evidence of fraudulent votes that altered the outcome of the election, not that he was directly asking Raffensperger to “find” 11,780 votes for him. Trump was emphasizing his belief that the election was marred by irregularities, and he insisted that uncovering these discrepancies would restore the rightful results with his victory in Georgia. The request for “11,780 votes” was a response to the reports of fraudulent activities, not a demand to fabricate votes.

Related:

You’re a little late, Dick https://t.co/FpKCoqJjVJ

— Kurt Schlichter (@KurtSchlichter) January 15, 2025

More: Pam Bondi Helps Dem Sen. Mazie Hirono Make a Fool of Herself at ANOTHER Hearing.

Scott Adams ponders the horror — the horror — of what we’re watching this week:

I have bad news.

Those were their smartest members. https://t.co/Dq3eOtdFdX

— Scott Adams (@ScottAdamsSays) January 15, 2025

ONE MAN’S TERRORIST IS ANOTHER MAN’S FREEDOM FIGHTER: BBC blasted after hiring new boss from Canada who told journalists not to call Hamas ‘terrorists.’

(Classical reference in headline.)

OPEN THREAD: Wherever you go, that’s where you are.

AMERICA’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD IS SEVERELY TEMPTING FATE HERE:

14 HIGHLIGHTS FROM CES 2025 IN AI, ROBOTS, GLASSES, HEALTH AND MORE:

CES went big on humanoid robots, from robots shaking hands and doing dishes to massive agricultural robots from John Deere. These innovations show how personal and industrial tasks can be automated with human-like precision, reducing labor strain and increasing productivity.

My favorites were Realbotix, who unveiled Aria, a life-size AI robot capable of expressing emotions and engaging in conversations. Aria showcases advanced motor technology for fluid movements and modular design, making her suitable for various applications, including personal companionship and travel convenience.

Additionally, Hangzhou Yushu Technology and Unitree presented next-generation robots with improved agility, interaction, and functionality for both industrial and personal use, further blurring the line between humans and machines.

However, while innovation is accelerating, the cost remains a barrier for mainstream adoption. The window cleaning robot was priced at $1,200, the personal companion robot at $175,000, and the all-in-one home robot capable of dishwashing and multitasking was also priced prohibitively high. Even the robot pet feeder came with a premium price tag. Reducing these costs will be essential for wider household adoption of these technologies.

I don’t think Robbie and C3P0, let alone Rachel and Pris from Blade Runner, will be losing much sleep about their competition though, at least this year:

DIVERSITY, EQUITY AND INCLUSION — CITY OF BROTHERLY LOVE STYLE: Internet sleuths tracked down repulsive Eagles fan — and his life at DEI-focused company might be ruined.

A viral and revolting incident in the stands at an NFL playoff game on Sunday has already earned one football fan a lifetime ban from Lincoln Financial Field — and it may cost him even more.

The fan, identified as Ryan Caldwell, was captured on video heckling a female Packers fan — and repeatedly calling her a “dumb c–t” — while her fiancé, Alexander Basara, filmed the entire altercation in the stands during Sunday’s Wild Card game in Philly, an Eagles win over the Packers.

Caldwell has been banned from all future events at Lincoln Financial Field, a source with knowledge of the situation confirmed to The Post, and his employer, BCT Partners — a DEI-focused management consulting firm based in East Brunswick, N.J. — is involved.

“The management at BCT Partners has been made aware of a video circulating involving an employee making offensive remarks outside of the workplace,” the company said in a statement released Monday on X, without naming the employee. “BCT Partners denounces this type of behavior, and we take this matter extremely seriously. As an organization that has always stood for inclusivity, the conduct displayed was completely unacceptable and stands in direct opposition to our company values.

“We have already begun a full investigation as an internal personnel matter to determine what actions will be taken. We sincerely apologize to everyone affected by this behavior and remain committed to fostering a culture of respect for all.”

BCT Partners aims “to harness the power of diversity, insights, and innovation to transform lives, accelerate equity, and create lasting change,” according to its website.

Here’s the aforementioned video. Language alert, needless to say:

What it's like going to Philly just trying to root for your team…

Unprovoked, uncalled for. Packers twitter, help me out and find this guy…. this is not okay

I hate that my fiancé had this happen simply cheering for her team pic.twitter.com/aiHCKzxrSS

— Alexander Basara (@Basaraski) January 13, 2025

And speaking of “language alert,” “Caldwell’s profile, describing him as a business analyst, uses ‘they/them’ pronouns to detail his roles in hospitality management dating back to 2002.”

Jerry Thorton of Barstool Sports writes that he doesn’t “want to see Caldwell lose his job. If you’re going to be against seeing people get canceled for exercising their right to free speech, you have to be consistent. But …”

There might be some jobs you can still do perfectly well after you’ve called some a woman minding her own business “an ugly, dumb, c*nt” for the crime of rooting for the visiting team. But most definitely, hospitality management is not one of them.

I mean, try to picture BCT Partners getting hired to “accelerate equity and create lasting change” with ol’ Ryan still on the payroll. Their sales person meets with the HR manager of some potential client company who has to decide whether to hire them for $100,000 to conduct DEI seminars.

HR manager: “BCT. Say, aren’t you the firm that employs Ryan Caldwell? He’s the one who called that Packers fan a ‘an ugly, dumb c*n,’ isn’t he?”

Sales person: “Excuse me, you mean, ‘Isn’t they the one who called that Packers fan an ugly, dumb c*nt’? That’s exactly the kind of binary cisgender, heteronormative language we’re going to work with you to eliminate from the workplace …”

After all, you don’t want your prospective clients to think the work you do is just a big, expensive grift and you’re really all a bunch of abusive assholes away from the office. That would be bad for business.

But even with Caldwell’s perfect example of how not to stand for inclusivity of Green Bay fans or foster a culture of respect for people wearing the visiting team’s gear, keeping him on the payroll is going to be a tough sell.

Going forward, I wonder if ubiquitous smartphones and social media will be a better deterrent for the worst behavior at Eagles home games than their once-infamous in-stadium judge and jail was.

UPDATE: Eagles fan who hurled vulgar insults at Packers supporters fired from DEI-focused consulting job.

JOEL KOTKIN: The LA fires are the horrifying consequence of Democratic misrule.

Los Angeles authorities’ poor preparation for and lamentable response to the wildfires now devastating the city capture a broader problem – namely, the failure of governance across America’s Democrat-controlled regions. This pattern of incompetence has accelerated the shift of American economic and political power to regions outside the long dominant north-east and West Coast.

The reason for this shift lies in the clear failure of Democrats, writ large in the inferno now consuming large swathes of LA. In states like California, Democratic politicians no longer prioritise such things as public safety and key infrastructure, including roads, ports and, most importantly at the moment, water systems. Indeed, today’s ‘progressives’ generally shy away from things like building dams or maintaining water pressure in the name of protecting the environment. They are far more focussed on climate change and ‘social justice’.

In part, because they know the DNC-MSM has their backs, even during their biggest cock-ups:

As Treacher has said:

But this story might finally be one that’s too big for that approach to stick.

FLAGS AT CAPITOL TO BE AT FULL-STAFF ON TRUMP’S INAUGURATION DAY: Mike Johnson.

A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE:

I already wrote about the role of Karen Bass and Gavin Newsom in this entire mess, and I commend that piece to all those who want to watch me pour accelerant on two careers already on fire. For now, however, I would like to recommend this lengthy and thoughtful piece by Claire Lehmann at Quillette: “Three Hard Truths about California’s Fire Crisis.” Lehmann is Australian and thus writes about the lessons of Los Angeles through the lens of her experience with the catastrophic fires that wracked her hometown of Adelaide in 2020. Readers will find much to agree with, I suspect, but much that also reads like a counsel of despair: Governments need to have the courage to step in, she writes, and privilege the realities of climate change over mere property rights. It reads uncomfortably like the excuse-making for bad government that she denounces elsewhere. I stopped short where Lehmann writes:

The challenge of implementing controlled burns shows how politics fails us regardless of ideology. It doesn’t matter if it is a left-wing or right-wing government, almost all governments fail to provide enough controlled burns.

And this is where she loses me as well as anyone who has paid attention to how American governments operate on the state level. It is a question of competence, yes, but when Lehmann compares Australia to California she is comparing two essentially left-wing governments — like and like — which is no doubt why she throws her hands up in resignation. That is needless defeatism, as the record shows. The proper comparison, rather, would be between California’s fire management and that of its inverse, the red-state bête noir that is Ron DeSantis’s Florida.

The simple truth, as even NPR admitted with disbelief, is that Florida and other southern, Republican-run states — with every bit the same level of dangerous seasonal fire exposure — are light-years ahead of sclerotic California when it comes to fire mitigation. And it is very much a matter of governance, not resignation to fate. Florida and other southern states prove, with their smartly and lightly regulated regimes of controlled burns of brush and deadwood, that you can prevent massive fires with intelligent policy. As Lehmann’s firefighter friend aptly points out in her piece, “politicians never want to admit that nothing we can do will stop the really bad fires once they’re going.” Which is why politicians in more practical (read: Republican) states have figured out that the best way to avoid that situation is to prevent the really bad fires from getting going in the first place. California forgot this, but it can remember it again.

Los Angeles is indubitably fire-prone. But force majeure is not the same as fate. Even my city once rather infamously burned to the ground — mostly because it was made out of wood at the time. Our response was to rebuild it out of less flammable materials such as concrete and steel — now we have no problems whatsoever; Chicago is a metropolis of model governance. Heck, Moscow has burned down so many times throughout its history — most notably in 1812, when it razed itself in response to a flood of obnoxious and unwanted French tourism — that one almost begins to understand why Russians are the way they are. But our American experience has shown us that blaming “climate change” or “acts of God” is a cheap response, an act of avoiding responsibility. If Florida and Georgia can figure this out, then the only thing preventing California from doing so is Californians.

So they never will, in other words: There Is No Bottom for Blue California.

RIOTS FOR THEE, BUT NOT FOR ME:

Roberts did ads for Kamala — a candidate who wouldn’t take a stance on whether theft under $1000 should be a felony. https://t.co/vkDdEBstYM

— Mark Hemingway (@Heminator) January 14, 2025

Related: LA’s lowlifes: The ‘looters, burglars and drug addicts’ arrested during Palisades Fire all share common trait. “Cops charged more than 40 detainees with various offenses including burglary and drug possession since the fires broke out on January 7. Remarkably, none of those arrested were actually living in the evacuation zone and seemingly travelled with the intention of taking advantage of the devastation.”

(Classical reference in headline.)

SKYNET SMILES, ORDERS A CURRY: Indian army to replace pack mules with robotic dogs.

THIS IS CNN: ‘We Gonna Nail This Zachary Young MF**ker:’ CNN Reporter’s Text Read Aloud In Court.

CNN reporter Alex Marquardt took the stand on Monday, marking the sixth day of the network’s Florida defamation trial, brought by U.S. Navy veteran Zachary Young over a report about his efforts to aid in the evacuation of Afghan citizens.

Marquardt stated on the stand that he had pitched a story to the network about desperate Afghans fleeing the Taliban — which resulted in a piece that went to air with claims that Young had “preyed” on the people and “exploited” their desperation to make a quick buck.

* * * * * * * *

Marquardt made Young the face of the story after getting the go-ahead from “top brass” within the network. Young’s attorney, Devin Freedman, shared internal messages from CNN, including one from Marquardt stating, “We gonna nail this Zachary Young mf**ker.”

More here: CNN’s Phil Marquardt Refuses to Apologize for Alleged Defamation, Doubles Down.

ERIC CLAPTON’S MTV UNPLUGGED EPISODE TO BE RELEASED IN THEATERS IN LATE JANUARY WITH BONUS CONTENT.

SCOTT JENNINGS TO JOHN AVLON: Did Dems Promote Unity by Voting $50 Million to Fight Trump’s Deportations?

CNN Panelist Squirms as Scott Jennings Exposes Who’s Really Fueling Division Over LA Wildfires

John Avlon never saw this coming.

AVLON: “I think also in this environment right now, where immediately there’s disinformation flowing through social media networks that cleaves down… pic.twitter.com/Du04KHMbhN

— The Vigilant Fox 🦊 (@VigilantFox) January 14, 2025

Here’s the story that Avalon doesn’t want to discuss, from those nutty MAGA hat wearers at the Politico yesterday: Gavin Newsom and California Democrats reach $50M deal to Trump-proof the state.

Related: Bush-Era Republicans Flourished As Anti-Trumpers — Scott Jennings Took A Different Path. “‘We’re the party that defends Western civilization. We’re the party that generally tries to adhere to common sense. We’re the party that respects cultural norms and values. We respect average everyday people. For as long as I’ve been in politics now, 25 years, that’s been sort of how I view the Republican Party. From that perspective, it’s no trouble at all for me to have proudly worked for George W. Bush, and in this election, and the last two voted for Donald Trump,’ Jennings told the Caller.”