Author Archive: Ed Driscoll
June 17, 2023
TRUNALIMUNUMAPRZURE! Babbling Biden tells Connecticut crowd ‘God save the queen, man’ at end of baffling speech where he joked about being 110 and said ‘don’t make me a dog-faced lying pony soldier.’
And he’s been watching too many crime dramas:
Biden: “Down in Philadelphia and New York, areas I know well, like up here, you’d see a truck pull up, pull to the curb and selling weapons, selling guns, selling AR-15s.”
— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) June 16, 2023
Related:
Tucker Carlson tongue-in-cheek just last night:
"If Joe Biden ever developed some profound physical or medical problem that was obvious to everyone, the media would say something. This is not North Korea. We don't have State Media here… It's not like they would cover it up!" pic.twitter.com/xHXZnYXg0l
— Danny De Urbina (@dannydeurbina) June 16, 2023
On Wednesday at a hearing for the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, Representative Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) blasted a far-left witness for her inability to cite even a single medical study that proved her bogus claim of transgender surgeries benefiting minors.
The Lone Star State Representative spoke with Yale School of Medicine assistant professor Meredith McNamara about a proposal to withdraw funding from hospitals that provide any gender-transitioning treatments to minors. The far-left university staff member found a problem with the idea and was at the hearing to speak against such a move.
And this is how it went:
This is a radical new movement that is performing permanent physiological changes to children with no evidence of any benefits. pic.twitter.com/BV9at1G7At
— Rep. Dan Crenshaw (@RepDanCrenshaw) June 14, 2023
QUESTION ASKED: Photos: Anybody buying that ‘Pride’ merchandise at Target?
Those are fully stocked store shelves of this merchandise, as if no one had touched them for weeks. Nobody wanted a Pride chew toy for their pet, nobody wanted Pride children’s wear, or transgender-themed children’s toys (I had to look up what Kidd Kenn was in the blue and pink box on the last in the sequence — a rap star), nobody wanted a Pride baking kit, nobody wanted LGBTQ+-themed liquor, or LGBTQ+ cups to put them in. Notice that the liquor is already on sale. Nobody wanted rainbow kid boots.
That’s shelf space that could have been used for merchandise that people wanted to buy, and in retail, efficient use of shelf space for things that sell is the name of the game. They pay people to determine those things. These items at Target Kearny Mesa were all displayed prominently at the front of the store, no back of the store decision for them. You’ve heard of “dead-naming”? Well, this was “dead-spacing.”
Why is California such a homophobic state?
CHARLES COOKE: Let the Beatles Be.
“Have you heard about the new Beatles record?” a friend texted me yesterday. I had. And despite my unparalleled enthusiasm for the group, I felt obliged to record without hesitation that I hate it already.
Per the Wall Street Journal, the “new” song “features AI-assisted vocals from the late Beatle John Lennon.” To achieve this, the film director Peter Jackson and his team digitized a demo tape that was recorded by Lennon in 1978, and then used artificial intelligence to extricate — and improve upon — the parts that the producers wanted to keep. From there, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr took over, adding the instruments and vocal harmonies that the original sketch lacked. Conceptually, the process was similar to what McCartney, Starr, and George Harrison did back in 1995, when they converted two forgotten Lennon demos into two fleshed-out songs (“‘Real Love’” and “‘Free As A Bird’”) and released them under the band’s name as part of the Anthology project. Apparently, “Let It Be” remains a suggestion.
Paul McCartney has described the project as “the last Beatles record.” It is no such thing. Whatever McCartney did or did not do during the recording process, the result cannot possibly be “the last Beatles record,” because the result is not a record by the Beatles. The Beatles existed as a recording group between 1962 and 1970, after which they broke up and stayed broken up. In 1980, one of the band’s members, Lennon, was murdered in New York City. In 2001, another member, Harrison, died of cancer. As of today, only two of the Beatles — that’s just half of the group — are still alive. As was true in 1995, and as will be true in 2045, too, there can be no “more” Beatles records because there is no more Beatles. It is an impossibility.
I have no problem with AI being used to demix a recording. Peter Jackson’s team did a brilliant job demixing Revolver, where the Beatles had multiple instruments on the primitive four-track recording technology that was available to them in 1966, into clean individual tracks. But Giles Martin had the original 1966 mixes to compare his remixes to. However, Revolver was a commercial release; in contrast, McCartney is working with John Lennon’s demo cassette. A demo recording is a way for an artist to explore his ideas for a song, and/or to give to his backing musicians to learn a song’s riff or chord progression. On a demo, often he’s not singing with as much effort as he would give a polished recording designed for wide commercial release.
Of the two Lennon demos that were reworked by the then-three surviving Beatles in 1994, Ian MacDonald wrote in his 2007 book, Revolution in the Head: The Beatles’ Records and the Sixties:
Nothing better could have been done with Lennon’s demo by anyone else, and as a soundtrack for Geoff Wonfor’s adroitly nostalgia-exploiting video it works well enough. Ultimately, though, this is a dreary song, produced in a period of its writer’s life when he was too content to care, or notice, whether his expression was banal or unfocused. ‘Free As A Bird’ stands no comparison with The Beatles’ Sixties music.
* * * * * * * *
Essentially as tired as ‘Free As A Bird’ (it was varispeeded up about a tone to somewhere between D sharp and E to give it some zip), ‘Real Love’ appears to have had less time lavished on it and makes little impression. Unimpressed with the quality of these two ‘reunion’ tracks, Harrison declined to have anything to do with Lennon’s third demo, which consequently remains in its original state and was not included on Anthology 3, as originally planned.
Apparently, Harrison did some initial work on the third song, which has been flown into the multi-tracks McCartney recently completed, along with the cleaned-up Lennon vocal. I hope I’m wrong, but I’m expecting similar results to 1994’s efforts. I wonder if McCartney, who will soon turn 81, has also used AI to turn back time on his own vocals, which over the past decade have become quite hoarse sounding.
HE’S TOO POPULAR; WE’LL HAVE TO ELIMINATE HIM: Woke Marvel Eliminates The Punisher Due To “Problematic” Conservative Fan Base. But not before a Maoist struggle session:
This month, though, Marvel officially declared the Punisher persona non grata, eliminating the character as readers know him. Did he go out in a blaze of glory? No, in typical woke fashion Frank Castle is captured by progressive heroes, chained up and forced to go through a struggle session in which he is admonished as a murderer and a terrorist. Marvel even brings the Punisher’s wife back from the dead, only so that she can divorce him and take his money and property, and then inform him that his lifelong crusade against the criminal underworld was all for nothing.
The character then “dies” from apparent suicide but the story is left open to his return, just not as the gun-toting hero people know and love.
Marvel writers, including original Punisher creator Gerry Conway, specifically cite the popularity of the character among conservatives as the reason for his virtual elimination. As Newsweek noted, the Punisher was “problematic” for Marvel because conservatives liked him too much. He represents the every-man: He has no superpowers, he’s not a billionaire like Batman, but he still fights evil with an immovable will and a lot of guns.
Well, we can’t have that.
MOVE ALONG, NOTHING TO SEE HERE: Covid’s Patient Zero Was… One of the Chinese Lab Workers Playing With Covid, Say… Chinese Government Officials.
JERRY, JUST REMEMBER. IT’S NOT A LIE IF YOU BELIEVE IT: Biden White House to Screen Disney’s Fake News Film ‘Flamin’ Hot.’
The Mexican immigrant turned Frito-Lay executive also knows our hunger for rags-to-riches stories.
[Richard] Montañez claimed he invented the infamous Flamin’ Hot Cheeto that revolutionized the snacking industry. Now, Hulu and Disney+ are sharing the screen adaptation of that narrative, dubbed appropriately enough “Flamin’ Hot.”
There’s just one problem. It appears Montañez made the crucial part of the story up from whole cloth.
The Los Angeles Times did a thorough investigation into who created the Flamin’ Hot chip, and it determined it wasn’t Montañez.
The article’s blunt headline on the matter speaks volumes.
The man who didn’t invent Flamin’ Hot Cheetos
The details are even more damning.
Montañez didn’t invent Flamin’ Hot Cheetos, according to interviews with more than a dozen former Frito-Lay employees, the archival record and Frito-Lay itself.
Frito-Lay, which would love to support his story for marketing purposes, categorically denied his involvement with a diplomatic caveat.
“That doesn’t mean we don’t celebrate Richard,” the statement continued, “but the facts do not support the urban legend.”
It’s Fake News, the movie, yet it snagged the attention of a political team that has turned lying into an art form.
The Biden White House.
The Bidens will host a screening of “Flamin’ Hot” on the White House’s South Lawn. They’ll watch the movie alongside the film’s cast and crew, including director and progressive activist Eva Longoria and “Latino community leaders.”
Game respects game, when Mr. Malarkey himself meets Montañez.
But why is the Biden administration so misogynistic?
HOW IT STARTED:
No, Los Angeles is and should remain a Sanctuary City and the LAPD should not be burdened with the federal government’s responsibility to enforce immigration law. I do not support an ICE presence in local and state correctional facilities, nor do I support ICE transfers, absent a judicial warrant.
—“Karen Bass on how she will reach Latino voters,” Calo News, November 1st, 2022.
How it’s going: Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass calls Texas migrant bussing ‘despicable.’
—AP, Thursday.
And: Los Angeles City Council pushes for probe into Texas bussing of migrants to city.
—Fox News, Friday.
Earlier: Sanctuary Cities Seethe as Illegal Immigrants Actually Arrive.
The surest sign that public policies are simply virtue signals is when the messages don’t cost anything. The easiest way to tell when that signal starts to fail is to watch politicians flounder as the costs start to rise and voters demand relief.
It was free—and meaningless—for progressive churches to post banners calling themselves “nuclear free zones” during the Reagan era. Their dwindling congregations loved it. It was free, after George Floyd‘s murder, to post woke catechism signs on your front lawn, proclaiming “In this house, we believe: Black Lives Matter, women’s rights are human rights, no human is illegal” and so on. Maybe the neighbors gave you high-fives. And for years it has been free for deep-blue cities to proclaim themselves “sanctuaries” for illegal immigrants. That’s changing now that voters want some sanctuary for themselves.
Changes like this happen when voters realize the old virtue signals actually entail serious costs—and that they will have to pay them. That is exactly what’s happening in New York City and Washington D.C. now that Texas governor Greg Abbott is sending those cities a few busloads of illegal immigrants from his state.
These progressive bastions were silent when the Biden administration flew planeloads of illegal immigrants to suburban airports in the middle of the night. TV coverage was prohibited, and the arrivals were secretly dispersed. Abbott’s buses, by contrast, arrive downtown greeted by local TV crews. Now you can hear the politicians screech.
Why, it’s as if: Democrats Discover Only The Federal Government Can Solve The Border Crisis.
DISPATCHES FROM WEIMAR AMERICA: Fox News Workers Were in for a Shock When They Logged Into Their Employee Portals.
Matt Walsh can and does rub people wrong, even on the Right, but this thread is something else. From sources at Fox News, Walsh obtained what appears to be forced participation and support of extreme LGBT groups. These documents were allegedly shown when Fox staffers logged into their employee portals. Some of the reading material suggestions for Pride Month contained graphic sex, which obviously might be off-putting to some. As Walsh noted, Fox Corp. activated an artificial intelligence program to monitor employees’ commitment to diversity, equality, and inclusion (DEI) activities. Just read the thread of what’s allegedly going on over there: [Warning: some graphic content]:
Or as America’s Newspaper of Record reports: Satan Asks LGBTQ Community To Please Tone It Down A Bit.
KAROL MARKOWICZ: Impeach Becerra for saying masking 2-year-olds was fine.
In fact, while masking children was particularly egregious, there’s no evidence that having anyone mask, at any time, saved any lives.
A scientific review published in February by the respected Cochrane Library, “the leading database for systematic reviews in health care,” compared a variety of studies on masking to fight not only COVID-19 but a range of flu-like and respiratory illnesses.
The conclusion: Masks — yes, even N95s — provided “little to no difference” in contracting these viruses.
There are people still walking around masked and, worse, masking their children, who simply don’t know they were led to believe a lie.
To watch the HHS secretary and a far-left congressman continue to push a damaging health policy we all know didn’t work, even today, should be a wake-up call to everyone.
It’s the middle of 2023. The pandemic is in the rearview.
You don’t want to be reading about COVID. I don’t want to be writing about COVID.
But there’s no other way to interpret these comments than that those in power have not learned any lessons.
And they haven’t: For Biden White House, COVID, Masks Will Never Go Away.
June 16, 2023
June 15, 2023
MARK JUDGE: ‘America’s Front Porch:’ When Georgetown was Great.
Things began to change in Georgetown during the 1990s and beyond. “In the 2000’s if I recall correctly,” Julie Wilson told me, “companies were lured away to Virginia with financial incentives that diminished lunch business for the restaurants. I would bet my life that most small business owners did not own their buildings and suffered the rent increases that were occurring. The prosperity earned by those who helped create a vibrant scene, who stuck their necks out and took the risks, were usurped by the greed of landlords who saw bigger profit margins. Hence the arrival of big, brand named stores found in any mall in the USA. Many of them are adios now.”
What the landlords didn’t kill the pandemic hysterics did, undermining businesses in Georgetown and boarding up storefronts. Wilson recently paid a visit to Georgetown for the first time in years: “During my recent tour of Georgetown, I observed boarded up storefronts on every block, some left vacant for years. Does this appear business-friendly, prosperous and productive?” It does not.
Read the whole thing.
IT’S COME TO THIS: “Hate is dangerous, including against bicyclists” says op-ed in the San Fran Chronicle.
“Let’s have the bicyclists pay for bike lanes,” another commenter proposed (ignoring the fact that bicyclists do pay taxes and car-related fees and taxes do not cover the cost of maintaining public roads even though cars and trucks cause the great majority of road damage).
“Cyclists need to be more mindful,” tut-tutted another.
“I’ve witnessed bicyclists doing insanely dangerous things,” said yet another. “S.F. has one of the densest car populations in the country.
Riding bikes and scooters has got to be very risky.”In all these comments, the implicit or explicit suggestion is that the bicyclist was basically at fault for riding on the street in the first place.
I’ve seen this knee-jerk reaction dozens of times: The bicyclist brought this on themselves, heedlessly and recklessly persisting in riding. Or this comment: “I question how one can value their life while literally putting themselves in voluntary danger. (San Francisco is among the) top 5 most dangerous cities to ride in. I’m so confused on how cyclists are on here accusing drivers for deliberately trying to kill them, then hop right back on the bike. If I thought someone was out to kill me, I would not continue to put myself in that position.”
A “ghost bike” memorial placed at the scene of Boyes’ death was vandalized — twice. Who does that? Someone emboldened to physically enact their hatred of bicyclists.
Just as those who tolerate or encourage racist, sexist and homophobic or transphobic comments on social media contribute to emboldening the people who attack and menace particular groups, people who parrot stereotypical comments about cyclists on social media subtly encourage those who would harm them — tearing down a memorial, close-passing a mother with a child on her bike or aggressively edging their car into a bike lane to menace and squeeze a bicyclist.
It was not until several years ago, when in my 70s I took up an electric bike as my primary form of transportation, that I began to realize how pervasive the hatred of bicyclists is among car drivers. At first, I thought it must be my inexperience that explained drivers cutting me off by turning directly into my path, honking impatiently and close-swerving around me when I slowed or moved out into the lane due to an obstacle ahead of me. They couldn’t know (or didn’t care) that I was being extra cautious to avoid being “doored” by someone parked alongside the bike lane in which I was riding. As I rode more, I saw drivers regularly do these things to other bicyclists, including everyone from kids to expert riders like Boyes.
Obligatory:
GOODER AND HARDER, CALIFORNIA: State Senator Tells Parents to Flee His Own State Amid Bill That Would Take Kids Away From Non-’Affirming’ Parents.
A California state senator told a gathered crowd of parents at the California Senate Judicial Committee to flee the state on June 13 during a hearing on a bill which would put parents who don’t affirm their child’s “gender transition” in danger of child abuse charges.
Sen. Scott Wilk, R-Santa Clarita, is one of the two lone Republicans on California’s Senate Judiciary Committee, and he has served in the California Legislature for 11 years. He was also the lone voice warning against language in AB 957, which a Democratic senator had amended on June 5 to rewrite the California Family Code to list “gender affirmation” alongside a child’s need for “health, safety, and welfare.”
I’m now in year 11 in the state legislature, and all the time we’re proposing policies to protect children. After 11 years, I’ve come to the conclusion that we need to start protecting parents.
That’s just not happening.
I’ve been here and witnessed a full frontal assault on charter schools, taking away parents’ choice in how their children are going to be educated to the detriment particularly of children of color.
In recent years, we have put government bureaucrats between parents, children, and doctors when it comes to medical care—and now we have [AB 957] where if a parent does not support the ideology of the government, [children are] going to be taken away from the home…
Wilk then targeted the statements of Democratic committee members who promised that AB 957 would only “give the judge more information.”
Don’t miss the video’s punchline:
TUCKER CARLSON: Wannabe Dictator.
Ep. 4 Wannabe Dictator pic.twitter.com/MDcs5g0gxB
— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) June 15, 2023
CURIOUSLY, THE DESANTIS CAMPAIGN ISN’T THE ONE CALLING HIM A GROOMER. Mediaite: DeSantis War Room Posts Bizarre Video Suggesting Biden Is a Groomer: ‘Keep Your Hands Off Our Kids.’
Keep your hands off our kids. pic.twitter.com/X7WqniRLO4
— DeSantis War Room 🐊 (@DeSantisWarRoom) June 15, 2023
It’s nothing but video of Bad Touch Biden in action. But as Jim Treacher likes to say:
SOMEBODY NEEDS A VISIT TO ROOM 101*: 86-year-old returns George Orwell’s “1984” to library 65 years late, saying it needs to be read “more than ever.”
* Not to be confused with Room 102:
HOW IT STARTED: New gaffe: Obama hails America’s historic building of ‘the Intercontinental Railroad.’
—The Los Angeles Times, September 23rd, 2011.
How it’s going:
BIDEN: "We have plans to build a railroad from the Pacific all the way across the Indian Ocean…
I'm going off-script. I'm gonna get in trouble." pic.twitter.com/M6GHT0dS8y
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) June 15, 2023
Related: Biden Wants to Build an 8,000-Mile Ocean Train and I Say Let’s Do This! “On today’s installment of ‘What the Hell Did Biden Actually Just Say?’ we have the alleged president of the most powerful country in the world announcing his plan to build, and I quote, ’a railroad from the Pacific all the way across the Indian Ocean.’”
AMERICA’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD: Marlboro Adds Puberty Blockers To Cigarettes To Make Them Legal For Kids.
NO ENEMIES TO THE LEFT: Target Received Bomb Threats From the ‘LGBTQ+ Community.’ The Media Told a Different Story.
QUESTION ASKED AND ANSWERED: What Happened to Modern Movies? Clifton Duncan interviews Will Jordan aka The Critical Drinker (Video).