GREAT MOMENTS IN MALARKEY: Biden: Releasing 15 Million More Barrels of Oil Reserves Right Before Election ‘Not Politically Motivated at All!’

More malarkey: “Let’s debunk some myths: My administration has not stopped or slowed U.S. oil production.”

Joe Biden, it’s time to meet Joe Biden!

● Biden’s plan to cancel Keystone pipeline signals a rocky start with Canada.

—The Washington Post, January 19th, 2021.

● Success: Biden Gets the High Gas Prices He Promised.

—The Pipeline, June 17th.

● Biden pulls 3 offshore oil lease sales, curbing new drilling this year.

—The Washington Post, May 12th.

● Biden administration won’t appeal judge’s ruling revoking Gulf of Mexico drilling leases.

—The Washington Post, February 28th.

Flashbacks: Why Aren’t Democrats Dancing for Joy About Sky-High Gas Prices?

In the service of reducing carbon emissions, Democrats have long openly worked to raise the price of fossil fuel energy. They have done so by proposing carbon taxes, cap-and-trade schemes, higher leasing fees, and other measures to jack up costs so people burn less of it. This is why Barack Obama said, in answer to a related question about electricity, that his energy plan would make prices “necessarily skyrocket.” This is why Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna praised BP’s CEO less than six months ago for pledging to reduce oil and gas production by 40% by 2030. Reductions in oil production and rising gasoline prices are part of the Democrats’ agenda and the Paris climate agenda.

There’s even more to it than that. Over the past decade, the Democrats’ overt hostility toward fossil fuels has even driven companies in the industry to sideline production, purely for public relations purposes, while prioritizing meaningless, politically correct carbon emissions goals. How can Democrats suddenly feign outrage at their incredible success in influencing the industry?

Is it a mystery why Democrats aren’t doing a sack dance and celebrating the salvation of planet earth?

There’s the small matter of their political survival, of course. It would be unseemly — like doing a jig at an Irish funeral — to celebrate other people’s pain. And it would cost many Democrats who are secretly jubilant about high gas prices their political careers.

Instead, Democrats are pretending to look for a way to “ease consumers’ pain.”

In September of 2019, after CNN’s seven hour “climate change town hall,” Bryan Preston wrote, “Seriously, if you see all of the above — which is just a sample — and vote for any of these people for any office at any level, it’s on you. If you like Venezuela, voting for any of them will bring you a whole lot of Venezuela.”

And as Kate of Small Dead Animals wrote after the CNN horror show, “Don’t make the mistake of thinking they don’t mean it.”

● Aren’t California’s High Gas Prices What The Left Have Wanted?

● NBC, the Washington Post, and the New York Times in lockstep call for higher gas taxes.

● 2008 L.A. Times headline: “The joy of $8 gas.”

● “Under my plan, energy costs will necessarily skyrocket…”

In other words, Obama administration retreads are following the same playbook as the original Obama administration: “We’re going to keep at it to ensure the American people are paying their fair share for gas,” is the perfect Kinsley Gaffe for an Obama administration retread like Biden:  As Steven Chu, Obama’s then-incoming energy secretary, told the Wall Street Journal in the fall of 2008: “Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.”

So despite Biden claiming today that high gas prices are Putin’s fault, is it fair to ask if Biden is on the payroll of Putin? As Walter Russell Mead wrote in 2017:

If Trump were the Manchurian candidate that people keep wanting to believe that he is, here are some of the things he’d be doing:

Limiting fracking as much as he possibly could
Blocking oil and gas pipelines
Opening negotiations for major nuclear arms reductions
Cutting U.S. military spending
Trying to tamp down tensions with Russia’s ally Iran.

“Yep,” Glenn added in late 2019. “You know who did do these things? Obama. You know who supports these things now? Democrats.”

● Biden praises high gas prices as part of ‘incredible transition’ of the US economy away from fossil fuels.

● Team Biden might be purposefully grinding down the middle class.

● The ‘cabal’ that bragged of foisting Joe Biden on us must answer for his failed presidency.

Related: Biden tormented by Republican guerrilla campaign and ‘I did it’ stickers.

Also: 100Pcs I Did That Biden Funny Car Stickers. #Resist #CommissionEarned

DAVID THOMPSON: But What If Your ‘Whole Self’ Is, Frankly, Aggravating?

And back in the world of contrived racial grievance,

Job postings and corporate ‘About Us’ pages often include a statement about the company fostering an environment where employees can bring their ‘whole selves’ to work. But how often do these claims reflect reality?

At risk of being difficult, I have questions about the premise. For one, why on God’s Fragrant Earth would an employer, or indeed their customers, want employees to drag every last piece of their personal baggage into the workplace and then inflict that inexhaustible tedium on everyone else? If, say, I’m buying groceries, I am as a rule friendly towards the person at the checkout. There’s always eye contact, a smile, and a word of appreciation. However, I rarely have the time or inclination to hear about the cashier’s extensive list of ailments or her difficulties finding a babysitter, or a lover, or a suitable shampoo. Nor do I wish to hear her views on politics. It’s not why I’m there. And ditto her.

Read the whole thing. As Christopher Buckley wrote in his satiric “Introducing Yourself to the Waiter” chapter of his 1997 book, Wry Martinis, “One person I know always eats a full meal before going to the restaurant, leaving him free to concentrate on developing a personal relationship with the server.”

SNOWFALLS ARE NOW JUST A THING OF THE PAST:

● Shot: Climate COVID? The Guardian Insists ‘Next Pandemic’ May Come From … ‘Melting Glaciers.’

—Headline, NewsBusters, today.

● Chaser: President ‘has four years to save Earth.’

—Headline, the Grauniad, January 17^th, 2009.

● Hangover: Artists must confront the climate crisis – we must write as if these are the last days.

—Headline, the Grauniad, November 12^th, 2021.

● The D.T.s: ‘Humiliating:’ 2004 Guardian Report Peddling Climate Doom By 2020 Frozen Out.

The eco-extremists at the liberal Guardian should realize by now that the internet is forever. The outlet freaked out over 17 years ago about a frosty future thanks to a ridiculously inaccurate Pentagon prediction.

The Guardian published a report in 2004 sounding the alarm bells over a “secret report, suppressed by US defence chiefs” and obtained by sister newspaper The Observer. Here was the harrowing message, according to The Guardian: “[M]ajor European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas as Britain is plunged into a ‘Siberian’ climate by 2020.”

It’s now 2021, and major European cities are still intact and a Reuters report this year flushes The Guardian’s frets about a little ice age in Britain down the toilet. Reuters trumpeted: “Britain’s climate getting warmer, sunnier and wetter – Met Office.” Travel website Touropia has an updated report headlined, “25 Best Cities to Visit in Europe.” Even the waterway-dominated Venice, Italy is No. 17 on the list. Ouch.

—NewsBusters, December 17th, 2021.

You have to give the Grauniad points for keeping at it, though. And yet, I’m keeping all the lights on; if only to do my part: ‘Promise?’ Illustrated warning of what Washington, DC might look like if climate change isn’t addressed backfires:

(Classical reference in headline.)

OLD AND BUSTED: “Safe, Legal, and Rare.”

The New Hotness? Stacey Abrams Floats Abortion as an Inflation Fix: ‘Having Children Is Why You’re Worried’ about Rising Prices.

THE FBI HAS ANNOUNCED INDICTMENTS OF 22 PRO-LIFE PROTESTERS AND ZERO PREGNANCY CENTER FIREBOMBERS:

A Federalist review of Justice Department press releases in 2022 revealed not a single announcement of the arrest or indictment of a pregnancy center arsonist. It took the FBI 44 days after the Dobbs opinion leaked to even acknowledge it was investigating incidents of violence against pro-life groups. As The Federalist’s Jordan Boyd concluded earlier this month, “the arrest of peaceful pro-lifers but not of violent pro-abortionists confirms Biden’s DOJ does not equally apply the law.”

Asked on Tuesday if “the FBI has made any arrests related to the vandalism, firebombing, etc. of dozens of pregnancy resource centers and churches around the country since the leak of the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson decision?” the FBI refused to comment. The FBI also declined to answer whether any individuals had been indicted, or if the FBI had conducted any raids on potential suspects such as those used to target pro-life activists Mark Houck and Chester Gallagher; the agency directed The Federalist to the DOJ for indictment inquiries. The DOJ did not respond.

Related: Majority see FBI as Biden’s ‘personal Gestapo’ after Trump raid.

FROG MEETS SCORPION: Former New York Times Editor Claims Colleagues Treated Him Like an ‘Incompetent Fascist’ for Running Cotton Op-Ed.

Bennet left the Times on June 7, 2020, just a few days after the publication of the Cotton op-ed, which recommended that the National Guard be deployed to quell the riots that were plaguing American cities at the time. Social-justice minded Times employees led a public revolt over the publication of the op-ed, publicly accusing the paper’s leadership of endangering the lives of black staffers by giving a sitting U.S. senator a platform to air his views.

Nikole Hannah-Jones, who headed the Times’ 1619 Project, led the public backlash against Bennet.

“I’ll probably get in trouble for this, but to not say something would be immoral. As a black woman, as a journalist, I am deeply ashamed that we ran this,” Hannah-Jones tweeted at the time.

While Bennet had affixed an editor’s note to the column in the wake of the backlash, he now says that he wishes he had not.

“My regret is that editor’s note. My mistake there was trying to mollify people,” Bennet said in an interview with Smith’s new publication Semafor. He went on to accuse publisher A. G. Sulzberger of having blown “the opportunity to make clear that the New York Times doesn’t exist just to tell progressives how progressives should view reality. That was a huge mistake and a missed opportunity for him to show real strength.”

“I never apologized for publishing the piece and still don’t,” said Bennet, who also charged Sulzberger with disloyalty.

“When push came to shove at the end, he set me on fire and threw me in the garbage and used my reverence for the institution against me,” he continued. “This is why I was so bewildered for so long after I had what felt like all my colleagues treating me like an incompetent fascist.”

In 1992, New York magazine quoted ‘Pinch’ Sulzberger, then-publisher of the New York Times, as telling a crowd at the Metropolitan Museum that “alienating older white male readers means ‘we’re doing something right.’”

Pinch’s son is extending dad’s rule to older white Timesmen as well.

AMERICA’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD: Kanye Made Honorary Member Of The Squad After Antisemitic Comments.

DANCHENKO WALKS: Leftwing Alexandria, Virginia Jury Once Again Acquits a Guilty-as-Sin Russiagate Figure. “It’s almost as if leftwing juries want to pay off their allies for having attempted to Rig the 2016 election, and for Rigging the 2020 election.First order of business in ’24: The power of removal of politically-affected cases away from Washington, DC to  non-biased jurisdictions to get fair trials. Both prosecutors and defendants should be permitted to remove trials in this way. No more Home Court Advantage for Democrat Criminals.”

HOW IT STARTED:

One hundred years ago this week, Woodrow Wilson took the oath of office, and still, after all this time, Americans cannot make up their minds about him.

Wilson was the great idealist whose first inaugural address lamented the “groans and agony” of the “men and women and children upon whom the dead weight and burden” of industrialization had fallen, who made himself the voice of “the solemn, moving undertone of our life, coming up out of the mines and factories.”

Wilson was also the most disdainful racist to hold the presidency since Andrew Johnson in the 1860s. Wilson’s administration sought to remove black Americans from all but the most menial federal employment. Those who could not be removed were required to work in spaces screened from public view and to use segregated lunchrooms and toilets. When a black newspaper editor led a delegation to Washington to protest the introduction of Southern Jim Crow into the national government, Wilson — a slaveholder’s son — retorted that segregation “was not humiliating, but a benefit” to black people.

Wilson led the United States into the First World War in April 1917, justifying his decision in characteristically idealistic language: “to make the world safe for democracy.” Only five months before, he had won reelection on an antiwar platform: “he kept us out of war.”

Wilson’s detractors accused him of hypocrisy: talking peace while preparing for war. Yet the truth is even worse. Wilson utterly failed to prepare for war. Unlike Franklin Roosevelt, who used the delayed U.S. entry into World War II to mobilize and train, Wilson was caught off guard by the resumption of German submarine warfare. In World War II, the United States would serve as the great arsenal of democracy. In World War I, American troops crossed the Atlantic protected by British warships; American pilots flew French airplanes. Wilson’s chosen commander, John Pershing, refused to learn from the fearful experience of the Allied armies, instead ordering U.S. forces into the terrible battles of 1918 using the tactics that had so horribly failed the French and British in 1915 and 1916. The result: American troops took far heavier casualties to win much poorer results than their British, Canadian, and Australian counterparts did during the decisive 100 days’ campaign of August–November 1918.

—“Mystery Man,” David Frum, Newsweek, March 11th, 2013.

How it’s going:

* * * * * * * * *

Frum offers a case in point. He’s advocating seizing the property of a private American citizen to help win a war the United States is not even an active participant in. It doesn’t seem to have occurred to Frum that the precedent he cites, unjust as it was, occurred while America was actually fighting in World War I. Furthermore, it was only done after Congress had passed the Army Appropriations Act, which gave the president war powers to take over the nation’s transportation systems.

Frum might get many things wrong on policy, but he’s a smart man (not to mention a talented writer); so I think he knows all this. His error is that he’s putting ends before means, which is a serious moral mistake.

The bottom line is Starlink belongs to Elon Musk, not the US government, which has no right to it. Plunder, even when it is “legal,” doesn’t become just when the government does it.

—“Former Bush Speechwriter Says Feds Should Plan to Seize Starlink Form Elon Musk,” Fee.org, today.

Related: ‘Always a new WWII to arouse them:’ Glenn Greenwald takes DC warmongers/neocons like David Frum (AOC!!!) apart in BRUTALLY honest thread.

XI’S GOTTA HAVE IT! China’s armed forces recruiting dozens of British ex military pilots in ‘threat to UK interests.’

China has recruited dozens of former British military pilots to teach the Chinese armed forces how to defeat western warplanes and helicopters in a “threat to UK interests”, officials have revealed.

One official said some 30 mainly ex-fast jet but also some helicopter pilots – lured by annual salaries of around £240,000 – are currently in China training pilots for the People’s Liberation Army, in what a defence analyst described as a stunning breach of security.

A retired senior Royal Air Force officer said: “Wow… that is appalling. What were they thinking?”

Beijing is actively trying to hire many more serving and former military pilots and other specialists from across the RAF, the Royal Navy and the British Army as well as personnel from other western nations, the western official said.

The situation is so grave, the Ministry of Defence’s Defence Intelligence service on Tuesday issued a “threat alert” to warn serving and former military personnel against such approaches.

Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told Sky News’ Kay Burley the recruitment of UK pilots to train Chinese counterparts had been a concern within the Ministry of Defence “for a number of years”.

Meanwhile in the States: US military rated as ‘weak,’ may not be able to win one war, as tensions grow with China, Russia.

CAROL ROTH: Biden’s plan to kill independent and gig work.

DISGRACED FORMER FBI AGENT PETER STRZOK: “9/11 is nothing compared to January 6. And the fact that the FBI and the rest of the government if they are not only on the same sort of war footing that they were on in the weeks and months and years after 9/11, shame on everyone!”

MESSING WITH TEXAS: Biden admin pressured Dem El Paso mayor not to declare state of emergency over city’s migrant crisis.

THE EAST IS…WHITE? XI JINPING IS A CRACKER? Chinese racism and imperialism is really a manifestation of Whiteness, says white Aussie broadcaster.

Stan Grant, a white guy who is a leading commenter on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (Oz’s BBC), believes that China’s hegemonic brutality is — wait for it — a manifestation of Whiteness.

* * * * * * * *

Imperialism is a White Supremacist construct, and therefore to be an imperialist power is to be a white power, even if you are, well, non-white. And say what you will about Grant, he carries this argument to its logical conclusion. Xi’s China might have represented the end of whiteness, he laments, but instead “the Chinese Communist Party itself mirrors whiteness.” How can this be? Well, it has turned out that Xi is a Han nationalist, committed to the idea that “Chinese power is ethnic Han superiority.”

Grant is probably right about this. But instead of this leading him to question his own efforts to put all forms of capitalism, including the Chinese, indeed, arguably all forms of power, into the Procrustean Bed of White Supremacy, Grant doubles down, insisting that Han persecution of non-Han is nothing less white people persecuting non-white people.

One feels as if one has entered a lunatic asylum. The Han are not white, and somehow they are. But in Grant’s world, and in this he is in no sense expressing a fringe view but rather is an emblematic figure of a very wide current of an opinion, whiteness is a synonym for power, full stop. Thus, for Grant, the tragedy of Xi’s China is that it has become what he believes historically its opposed, whiteness, of which, he says, “Xi Xinping is its champion…the continuation of white power in darker skin.”

Whiteness as metaphor, in short. It is this metaphorization of understanding, no is the deepest intellectual, and in some ways, the deepest philosophical ill that afflicts us.

Earlier: “White Supremacy:” Is there anything it can’t do?

ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Veteran Hollywood actress turned activist Susan Sarandon tweets video of trash in Oakland.

Veteran Hollywood actress and political activist Susan Sarandon took to Twitter Monday to share a TikTok video showing a stretch of Oakland lined with homeless encampments and trash. The video, which Sarandon reposted from an account belonging to homelessness activist, Thomas Wolf, is shot from what appears to be a car driving along streets lined with tents, makeshift structures, discarded furniture and piles of trash.

There are no people visible in any of the shots and the only sound in the video is of the car’s engine.

Sarandon’s post has no caption, but the original post reads “This isn’t a shanty town in India. This is Oakland, CA. The crisis of our generation.”

pic.twitter.com/FeI9riVpZ8

— Susan Sarandon (@SusanSarandon) October 17, 2022

Oakland’s last Republican mayor left office in 1977.

WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG? Digital license plates are now legal in California.

New technology is hitting the streets in California that lets motorists use high-tech digital license plates on their vehicles instead of the old-fashioned metal variety.

The Motor Vehicle Digital Number Plates Bill (AB 984), passed earlier this month, allows California vehicle owners to use the digital plates, made exclusively by California company Reviver.

The plates, which resemble tablets. connect to an app that offers registration renewal, vehicle location services and security features — such as reporting a vehicle stolen. They are the same shape and size as traditional license plates, and give users the option to change the plate’s background color by toggling between a light or dark mode. Motorists can also personalize a banner message on the plate.

The bill’s passage follows a successful pilot program in which approximately 10,000 California drivers demoed the new technology.

“Californians are known to be early adopters of emerging innovative technologies. We welcome new opportunities to automate and integrate as many parts of our lives as possible, enabling us to streamline mundane tasks and stay connected. Our cars are no exception,” Reviver co-founder Neville Boston said in a statement.

Besides the obvious risk of hacking, what happens when the iPad bolted to the front of the car is hit from debris in the road, or is backed into by a pickup’s trailer hitch? A bent metal license plate is still readable; a smashed LCD probably won’t be.

Ars Technica notes that digital license plates aren’t the only cutting edge option for California drivers. “A larger unanswered question is whether smart license plates offer enough personal utility to see widespread adoption beyond commercial vehicles and fleets. And if the thought of a $20/month subscription is too much to bear but you don’t want a metal plate like everyone else on the road, California also just legalized using a license plate wrap instead.”

20 MINUTES INTO THE FUTURE:

Related: Biden Thinks You’re An Idiot: It’s Pretty Obvious President Will Blame Coming Economic Ruin On GOP After Midterms.

President Joe Biden thinks you are an idiot.

Based on the president’s comments last week, it is abundantly clear that his team is readying to blame Republicans for any economic ruin after the midterm elections — despite the fact that his economic policies over the past 20 months are behind current skyrocketing costs.

“If Republicans win, inflation’s going to get worse. It’s that simple,” Biden recently said in Los Angeles.

Biden’s declaration came the same day that the Bureau of Labor Statistics consumer price index reported that inflation was hotter than expected in September and rose by 8.2% year-over-year. That is now the twelfth straight month with inflation year-over-year above six percent.

Somehow, Biden wants you to believe that Democrats have a handle on inflation, and the GOP will only add to the worries.

Of course, throughout 2021, America was also experiencing inflation, albeit at a slightly lower rate. For example, in July 2021, the U.S. saw an annualized rate of inflation of 5.4%. The president claimed that the surging costs were due to a roaring economy but that it wouldn’t last long.

“Some folks have raised worries that this could be a sign of persistent inflation,” he added. “But that’s not our view.  Our experts believe and the data shows that most of the price increases we’ve seen are — were expected and expected to be temporary.”

It was not temporary and, in fact, only worsened after those comments.

In December 2021, Biden predicted America was at the peak of inflation. Clearly, that was false.

If there is a GOP majority elected in November, look also for loads of ginned-up non-scandals by the DNC-MSM in their attempt to derail their majority, such as the media’s blanket attack in early 2011 on Sarah Palin for an apolitical lunatic’s shooting of Dem. Gabrielle Giffords (and a George H.W. Bush-appointed judge, who was killed, but received far less ink). Katrina in 2005. Or the non-scandal in 1994 of Newt Gingrich’s book contract. (In contrast to Dem. former speaker Jim Wright, whose book deal was essentially a kickback scheme.)

WAIT, ISN’T IT RE-ELECTION RESULTS IN HER CASE? Stacey Abrams Dodges on Whether She’d Accept Georgia Gubernatorial Election Results.

RIOTS FOR THEE, BUT NOT FOR ME: Cori Bush spent $490,000 on private security despite calls to defund police: Report.

“Squad” member Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) allegedly spent just under $500,000 on private security over the last two years despite public calls to defund the police, according to a new report.

Bush’s campaign paid out over $100,000 for security services during the third quarter of 2022 alone, according to Federal Election Commission records obtained by Fox News. Just over $71,000 went to private security, while the other $30,000 was categorized for other security services. She has spent $490,000 overall.

Despite standing by defunding the police, Bush said it is better to think about the movement as a reallocation of the funds that typically went to police departments into a broader department of public safety. Calls to defund the police unfurled after the death of Minneapolis resident George Floyd, who died two years ago after a police officer knelt on his neck.

“The thing about ‘defund the police’ is we have to tell the entire narrative,” Bush said in an interview on Good Morning America. “People hear ‘defund the police.’ But you know what they’ll say? Say ‘reallocate,’ say ‘divest,’ say ‘move.’ But it’s still the same thing. We can’t get caught up on the word. People spend more time focusing on the word ‘defund’ than they spend on caring and addressing the problem of police in this country.”

Related: Seven Minutes of Democrats Saying Defund The Police:

(Classical reference in headline.)

BURIED LEDE: JOE BIDEN CHANNELS INSTAPUNDIT!

JOE BIDEN 2007: "How are you going to keep it from us being able to be in a position where you can manipulate the machines, manipulate the records? I think we should pass a federal law mandating that the same machines with paper trails be mandatory for every federal election.” pic.twitter.com/FGXyClKYh7

— Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) October 16, 2022

UPDATE (FROM GLENN):

I’ve been pushing paper ballots since 2002.

Flashback, November 2, 2020: Will your ballot be safe? Computer experts sound warnings on America’s voting machines.

Millions of voters going to the polls Tuesday will cast their ballots on machines blasted as unreliable and inaccurate for two decades by computer scientists from Princeton University to Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

Toyed with by white-hat hackers and targeted for scathing reviews from secretaries of state in California and Ohio, Direct Recording Electronic voting systems, or DREs, have startled Illinois voters by flashing the word “Republican” at the top of a ballot and forgotten what day it was in South Carolina. They were questioned in the disappearance of 12,000 votes in Bernalillo County, New Mexico, in 2002 and 18,000 votes in Sarasota County, Florida, in 2006. . . .

All election systems are for the most part black boxes: proprietary software and hardware jealously guarded by the handful of companies selling them. But state reviews and court cases opening up DRE systems of all makes and models for examination have for years flagged problems.

In New Jersey in 2008, Princeton computer scientist Andrew Appel and a five-member team got a rare look under the hood of an AVC Advantage DRE, part of a lawsuit alleging DREs could not reliably count votes

Among the findings: The system sometimes only seemed to record a vote. It sometimes did record a vote but seemed not to. It would take one screwdriver and seven minutes to insert a vote-stealing program. That kind of hack would probably be invisible, Appel concluded.

Plus: Democrats question election results: ‘We just trust the machines, and we shouldn’t.’

Matt Luceen didn’t vote for former President Donald Trump in 2020, but he came to Washington last week to protest President Biden’s inauguration, saying the election was flawed.

Mr. Luceen, a supporter of Sen. Bernard Sanders, said he toted signs that read “COUNT OUR VOTES BY HAND,” and “End the charade.”

“We don’t ever really put the paper into piles and count them by hand anymore,” the 34-year-old computer programmer said. “We just trust the machines, and we shouldn’t because we have documented proof that these machines are vulnerable.”

While Mr. Trump and his supporters have been explosively vocal about their distrust of the election system, discontent runs through a broad swath of voters from across the political spectrum.

In 2016, it was Democrats complaining that the election had been tainted by Russian interference. Two years later, the party complained that Stacey Abrams had been denied the Georgia governorship because of shenanigans with voting rolls.

Ms. Abrams never conceded, and Democrats — who took control of the U.S. House in those 2018 elections — made her cause a rallying cry, vowing to repair elections.

In 2020, it was Mr. Trump sowing complaints early and often.

And remember this? Democratic senators warned of potential ‘vote switching’ by Dominion voting machines prior to 2020 election.

In a December 2019 letter to Dominion Voting Systems, which has been mired in controversy after a human error involving its machines in Antrim County, Michigan, resulted in incorrect counts, Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Ron Wyden, and Amy Klobuchar and congressman Mark Pocan warned about reports of machines “switching votes,” “undisclosed vulnerabilities,” and “improbable” results that “threaten the integrity of our elections.”

“In 2018 alone, ‘voters in South Carolina [were] reporting machines that switched their votes after they’d inputted them, scanners [were] rejecting paper ballots in Missouri, and busted machines [were] causing long lines in Indiana,’” the letter reads. “In addition, researchers recently uncovered previously undisclosed vulnerabilities in “nearly three dozen backend election systems in 10 states.” And, just this year, after the Democratic candidate’s electronic tally showed he received 164 votes out of 55,000 cast in a Pennsylvania state judicial election in 2019, the county’s Republican chairwoman said, “nothing went right on Election Day. Everything went wrong. That’s a problem.”

The letter continued: “These problems threaten the integrity of our elections and demonstrate the importance of election systems that are strong, durable, and not vulnerable to attack.”

Dominion sued Rudy Giuliani, but not these Democrats. But an “unbiased” voting machine company that only sues Republicans has kind of blown its credibility already.

K-12 IMPLOSION UPDATE: Texas Dad Arrested for Speaking Out at School Board Meeting Waits Hours for Hearing, Only to Be Denied Yet Again.

Police arrested [Jeremy Story] on Sept. 17, 2021, on a misdemeanor charge of hindering proceedings by disorderly conduct. The charge dates to the previous Aug. 16, when Story raised concerns about Schools Superintendent Hafedh Azaiez [of the Round Rock Independent School District], who at the time faced allegations of family violence in an application for a protective order (redacted version available here).

According to publicly available footage of the meeting, Amy Weir, then president of the Round Rock Independent School District Board of Trustees, warned Story not to speak about “something other than D1 or D2” on the meeting’s agenda.

Story responded: “I will show you how what I’m about to comment on is related to that.”

Weir twice interrupted Story, saying, “No, I do not want you to demonstrate … ” However, she agreed to let him speak. Yet as soon as Story said, “Our superintendent has a protective order … ,” Weir nodded to Round Rock school district police officers, who escorted Story out of the building.

Story, along with another Texas father, Dustin Clark, argues that Weir was intending to silence him. Weir categorically denied this claim.

Weir told Fox News that “there has never been an attempt to silence Mr. Story.” Following normal procedure, she said, Story wrote on a card indicating what he would say in the meeting, and he wrote that “unlike the board, citizens are not required to speak on items on the agenda,” indicating that “he was planning to speak on a topic not listed for the meeting.”

Story filed a grievance with the school board on Sept. 4, 2021. The board noted it as “filed” on Sept. 16, the day before police arrested Story.

Story referenced a “protective order” to discuss the claims of a woman who identified herself as Azaiez’s girlfriend from September 2018 to December 2020 and then from February to June 2021. In her application for a protective order, the woman claimed that when she told Azaiez that she was pregnant with his child, he demanded that she get an abortion. When she refused, she said, he assaulted her in her home, which put her in danger of miscarrying.

The woman also claimed that she overheard Azaiez “plotting” with Weir about hiding certain things from other school board members.

In a text message chain about the situation included in the application for the protective order, Azaiez wrote: “For the last time I am telling you please get an abortion[;] you don’t know what you are getting yourself into. I will make you pay this[,] you will not make me lose everything … Don’t make me go after you and make you pay the consequences for you and this baby.”

However, another board member, Danielle Weston, countered Feller’s claim, insisting that the board president has authority over its meetings.

Police arrested Story on Sept. 17, 2021, on a misdemeanor charge of hindering proceedings by disorderly conduct. The charge dates to the previous Aug. 16, when Story raised concerns about Schools Superintendent Hafedh Azaiez, who at the time faced allegations of family violence in an application for a protective order (redacted version available here).

It’s PJ Media alum Tyler O’Neil in the Daily Signal, so read the whole thing.

DISPATCHES FROM THE INTERSECTION OF “RIOTS FOR THEE, BUT NOT FOR ME” AND “WITH DNC IN MIND CITY BANS CARRYING URINE, FECES:” Seattle City Council Woman Wants Police Protection After Turds Thrown at Her Condo.

(Classical references in headline.)

IGNORE THE PROBLEM; IT WILL GO AWAY: Leftist columnist freaks out over ad showing actual crime in America.

If you happen to be a baseball fan who has been watching the playoff games recently you may have noticed some intentionally jarring political advertisements popping up between innings. They depict some of the grisly crimes that have been captured on security cameras around the country recently as the ongoing crime crisis continues to spiral out of control. The advertisements ask voters to consider why this is happening and to take this critical issue into account when they vote next month.

One person who definitely noticed the advertisements was Will Bunch, the liberal author and columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer. Having his baseball game interrupted by such “vile right-wing political ads” was clearly more than Mr. Bunch could tolerate, so he took to the pages of his newspaper this weekend to vent his fury at the “shadowy figures” behind the advertising campaign. Apparently, seeing images of terrible things that are actually happening on America’s streets today is an unwarranted disruption to the lives of ordinary Americans or something.

If you live in Philadelphia or thereabouts, the October baseball playoffs have brought almost unbridled joy from a Phillies hot streak, punctuated by an epic bat flip and an inside-the-park home run — and marred only by jarring interruptions from the most shockingly crude and, arguably, racist political ads since Willie Horton hit the small screen in 1988.

Every few innings, the dark, grainy TV spots — with a flood of unsettling images of urban crime and civic unrest, or large migrant caravans streaming toward the U.S. border — broke up the stream of otherwise cheerful spots for iPhones or car insurance. One says “illegal immigration is draining our paychecks, wrecking our schools, ruining our hospitals and threatening your family” — blaming President Biden, and telling Democrats to “stop hurting our children,” against an ominous, empty playground swing. The crime spot blames liberals for a wave of “violence, bloodshed and death” as men with machine guns roam an urban wasteland.

Bunch puts on his detective hat and figures out who is responsible for these advertisements that “marred” the “unbridled joy” of a Phillies game. Do you really need me to tell you who he determined was the culprit? It was the Bad Orange Man, of course! Well… it wasn’t Donald Trump specifically, but the group developing the advertisement, Citizens for Sanity, is the brainchild of what Bunch calls “the very worst, xenophobic remnants of Team Trump.”

Bunch, who caught “Defund the Police” fever in 2020, is angry that the GOP has revived the effective Nixon-era “Law & Order” playbook: Of Course Republicans Should Run against Crime.

Democrats and the media are trying to shame Republicans into giving up one of their strongest issues: being tough on crime. Will Bunch, writing in the Philadelphia Inquirer, says that Republicans are reviving “racist ‘Willie Horton’-style fearmongering” ads from their 1980s playbook. Similar accusations litter the airwaves on CNN and MSNBC. Fretting abounds in the New York Times and Washington Post.

Republicans should ignore this. Bunch has no evidence that the ads are fueling racist incidents or ripping up the social fabric. He objects that the ads are working: A “once seemingly dead-in-the-water Mehmet Oz has revitalized his Republican Senate campaign against Democrat John Fetterman — and suddenly the 2022 midterms are all crime, all the time.”

There’s a good reason for that. Philadelphia’s district attorney, Larry Krasner, ran as a progressive. His own office’s website reports that 49 percent of gun-possession charges and 66 percent of violent offenses were withdrawn or dismissed this year. Over 400 people have been murdered in Philadelphia so far this year; the city is on pace to break homicide records by the end of the year. Carjackings have skyrocketed. The atmosphere of lawlessness reached a crescendo in recent weeks as five teens were shot outside of Roxborough High School, one fatally. And Temple University graduate Everett Beauregard was shot in the back of the head by a complete stranger near Drexel. Pennsylvania’s Democratic Senate candidate John Fetterman endorsed Krasner’s reelection campaign and embraced all of his soft-on-crime policies. George Soros’s political organizations spent nearly $1.7 million to elect Krasner as Philadelphia’s DA.

If Republicans can’t run against this unfolding disaster, then democracy itself is a joke. Berwood Yost, a pollster who directs the Franklin & Marshall College Center for Opinion Research, noted that Krasner is a huge electoral liability for Democrats: “He’s a direct tie to what Republicans would call ‘woke, soft-on-crime views towards the police’ — and those views are just not a popular position anywhere outside of Philadelphia.” Elections are for checking the positions of authority against the populace.

You know it’s an effective ad when YouTube labels the embedded clip “This video is age-restricted and only available on YouTube.” Click here to watch.

THE CORBYNIZATION OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY* CONTINUES APACE: Adam Kinzinger Unravels In Bizarre, Embarrassing Rant After Critic Hits Close to the Mark.

Entrepreneur David Sacks who has been supportive of Republican candidates called out Kinzinger for his profile in which he claimed he was “country first” but then bragged about being a part of “NAFO” a “foreign propaganda organization (NAFO) which was founded by a neonazi. Can things get any crazier?”

What is NAFO? Here’s what the account “Defense of Ukraine” — a Ukrainian government account — says.

So he’s spending his time defending Ukraine on Twitter and accusing people of being Kremlin trolls on behalf of Ukraine? That could be a problem if he’s acting as an agent of Ukraine. And a group Sacks claims was “founded by a neonazi”? What is Adam doing?

Sacks’ tweet caused Kinzinger to lose his mind.

“David, whose last name is Sacks, claims #nafo is a foreign propaganda organization,” Kinzinger said. “Well there SACKS, much better than under the influence of Russian propaganda. Sacks. #NAFOarticle5”

It looked like he hashtagged it to try to sic people on Sacks, attacking him over his name and accusing him of being under the influence of Russia.

Sacks didn’t take it lying down and asked Kinzinger if he had an issue with people with Jewish names.

It’s been quite a month for the future MSNBC or CNN pundit: Adam Kinzinger’s bizarre rantings – Baseballcrank, pro-lifers, and Putin – Oh my!

* And its camp followers.

ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Gisele Fetterman calls for NBC to apologize following ‘shocking’ interview with husband John Fetterman.

Mr Fetterman suffered a stroke in May, shortly before the Pennsylvania Senate primaries. As a result, he uses closed captioning to better communicate, which was employed during a recent sit-down interview with NBC News journalist Dasha Burns.

The interview itself was ultimately overshadowed by an extemporaneous comment from Ms Burns while promoting the appearance on the network. She told viewers that it seemed like Mr Fetterman was unable to follow their small-talk conversation ahead of the interview without the use of the closed captioning assistance.

“During some of those conversations before the closed captioning was rolling it wasn’t clear he could understand what we were saying,” Ms Burns said on NBC while promoting the interview.

The comment sparked a firestorm of fierce reactions, with other journalists claiming Mr Fetterman had no trouble following their conversations and Mr Fetterman’s critics pouncing and arguing it showed the candidate was not up to the task of serving as a US senator.

Ms Fetterman criticised the interview.

“If this happened in a school, if this was a child that was ableist towards another child or a teacher, there would’ve been issues stated. There would have been new training done,” she told The Independent in an exclusive interview. “What is being done at the media after a reporter came out so openly ableist towards a person? I think shocked and appalled, but sadly not surprised. I know there’s still so much to do, but it would be great to see some accountability, to actually see real change.”

Did the “de facto candidate” just compare her stroke-riddled husband to a child?