GREAT MOMENTS IN PATRIOTISM: Official Arizona Democrat account promotes ‘F*ck the Fourth’ event.
Author Archive: Ed Driscoll
July 2, 2022
OUT ON A LIMB: Do mask mandates work? Bay Area COVID data from June says no.
June 30, 2022
I THINK ROLLING STONE MAY BE SLIGHTLY OVERREACTING TO THE SUPREME COURT’S EPA RULING:
Libs are mighty upset that the Supreme Court just delivered another conservative victory which would curtail the power of the EPA to just create its own regulations out of thin air, with no congressional approval.
The decision basically takes power away from one of the alphabet agencies and empowers Congress to make actual laws. You know, the end of the world.
At least that’s what the uber-lefties over at Rolling Stone appear to actually believe.
Here’s a real thing they actually tweeted out:
Umm, I think you might be overreacting just a tiny bit.
Wait until the guys at Rolling Stone find out what the founder of Rolling Stone has been up to!
[Jann] Wenner’s Gulfstream II jet seated ten people and featured a dining table, four overstuffed couches, and a foldout bed. It cost $6 million. Wenner loved it so much he put the factory-issued model in his office on Fifth Avenue and dreamed of ways to take his Rolling Stone salon of celebrities and suitors to the air. “Then it became ‘What can we do to fly this thing? Where can we go? How can I take it in the air?’ ” recalled Wenner. “I would just circle over LaGuardia to have lunch.”
* * * * * * * *
[Wenner’s attorney Ben] Needell put the plane under a business subsidiary called Straight Arrow Transportation to write it off as a business expense, but Wenner said it was “90 percent personal.”
—Joe Hagan in the 2016 biography, Sticky Fingers: The Life and Times of Jann Wenner and Rolling Stone Magazine.
I don’t want to hear another word about Glenn Reynolds’ carbon footprint.
AOC SMILES: Dutch farmers protest plan to curb nitrogen pollution.
Thousands of farmers were gathering in a village near the centre of the Netherlands on Wednesday to protest a government plan to curb nitrogen pollution, many travelling by tractor from all corners of the country and snarling traffic.
The protest in Stroe, 70 kilometres east of Amsterdam, follows the introduction last week of targets for reducing pollution by harmful nitrogen compounds in some areas by up to 70% by 2030 – the latest attempt to solve a problem that has plagued the country for years.
Reductions are necessary in emissions of nitrogen oxides from farm animal manure and use of ammonia for fertilisation, the government says. Nitrogen oxides in the atmosphere help form acid rain, while fertiliser washed into lakes can cause algal blooms that kill marine life.
Farmers argue the targets are poorly conceived and unfair. They are expected to lead to a 30% reduction in the number of Dutch livestock, with effects more concentrated in agricultural areas bordering nature preserves.
“These reductions are so severe that those rural communities will be totally devastated economically, and that’s the reason our farmers are going to Stroe today” said Sander van Diepen, a spokesperson for agricultural organization LTO.
As John O’Sullivan tweets, “This is a warning. People have no idea of the sacrifices that will be required of them in lifestyle changes as well as in higher taxes and higher energy prices to meet Net Zero targets. And they won’t like them.“
Flashback to early 2019, when the then-new socialist “It Girl” was in her heyday: “We set a goal to get to net-zero, rather than zero emissions, in 10 years because we aren’t sure that we’ll be able to fully get rid of farting cows and airplanes that fast.”
UPDATE (FROM GLENN): They see Sri Lanka not as a cautionary example but as a goal. Hey, it’s not the politicians and activists who are starving.
MISSED IT BY THAT MUCH: Good Morning America: Ketanji Brown Jackson is the first black Supreme Court justice in history.
Thurgood Marshall and Clarence Thomas would like a word with ABC regarding a tweet that was apparently up for five hours before it was deleted.
RIP: Hells Angels founder Sonny Barger dead: Motorcycle club leader ‘passed peacefully’ from cancer at 83.
Barger wrote six books, including an autobiography titled “Hell’s Angel – The Life and Times of Sonny Barger and the Hell’s Angels Motorcycle Club,” in which he detailed the infamous 1969 Rolling Stones concert at the Altamont Speedway Free Festival in Livermore, California.
The Angels were on hand as security for the Rolling Stones at the counterculture event where Santana, Jefferson Airplane and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young performed. It was designated the “Woodstock West” with the Grateful Dead headlining.
But the concert became so bloody and violent with multiple fights and the stabbing death of concert attendee Meredith Hunter by Hells Angel Alan Passaro that the Dead refused to perform. The entire incident was caught on tape and became the basis for the 1970 documentary”Gimme Shelter.”
Flashback: 53 Years Before the Astroworld Concert Disaster, There Was Altamont.
WHY IS THE LEFT SUCH A CESSPIT OF RACISM? Following Dobbs decision, Savannah College of Art and Design removes sign in front of building named for Justice Clarence Thomas.
GREAT MOMENTS IN GASLIGHTING: Biden: High gas prices to last ‘as long as it takes’ for Ukraine victory.
American drivers will have to endure high gas prices for “as long as it takes” for Ukraine to defeat Russia’s invasion, President Biden told reporters in Spain Thursday.
At the conclusion of this week’s NATO summit in Madrid, the president was asked by New York Times reporter Jim Tankersley about the surging price of oil as a result of Western sanctions on Russia in response to its Feb. 24 assault.
“The war has pushed prices up. [Oil] could go as high as $200 a barrel, some analysts think,” Tankersley said. “How long is it fair to expect American drivers and drivers around the world to pay that premium for this war?”
“As long as it takes,” Biden answered. “Russia cannot, in fact, defeat Ukraine and move beyond Ukraine.
“This is a critical, critical position for the world,” the president went on. “Here we are. Why do we have NATO? I told Putin that, in fact, if we were to move [against Ukraine], we would move to strengthen NATO. We would move to strengthen NATO across the board.”
During his 26-minute presser, Biden also reiterated his administration’s stance that the spike in energy and food prices around the world is primarily the consequence of the Russian invasion, which has constricted wheat deliveries from Ukraine as well as oil and natural gas deliveries to Europe.
Huh. Two weeks ago, Biden was blaming the oil companies, not Putin for high gas prices: Reuters: Biden demands oil companies explain lack of gasoline as prices rise.
U.S. President Joe Biden on Wednesday demanded oil companies explain why they aren’t putting more gasoline on the market, sharply escalating his rhetoric against industry as he faces pressure over rising prices.
Biden wrote to executives from Marathon Petroleum Corp, Valero Energy Corp, and Exxon Mobil Corp and complained they had cut back on oil refining to pad their profits, according to a copy of the letter seen by Reuters.
“At a time of war, refinery profit margins well above normal being passed directly onto American families are not acceptable,” Biden wrote, adding the lack of refining was driving gas prices up faster than oil prices.
“The lack of refining capacity – and resulting unprecedented refinery profit margins – are blunting the impact of the historic actions my Administration has taken to address Vladimir Putin’s Price Hike and are driving up costs for consumers.”
The letter is also being sent to Phillips 66, Chevron Corp, BP and Shell, a White House official, who declined to be identified, told Reuters.
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.
● 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.”
● 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
CHUCK SCHUMER, CHRISTOPHER NOLAN HARDEST HIT: Vermont US Sen. Patrick Leahy breaks hip, to have surgery.
“CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS GIVETH, AND CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS TAKETH AWAY:” SCOTUS rebukes EPA on climate-change regulation, 6-3 — but sides with Biden on immigration.
THE CORBYNIZATION OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY CONTINUES APACE: Elisabeth Epps, candidate for Colorado State House, criticized for old anti-Semitic tweets.
June 29, 2022
GOODER AND HARDER, CALIFORNIA: West Hollywood Defunds Police for ‘Safety Ambassadors.’
LIBS OF TIKTOK: The people who have accused me of inciting violence are now calling for violence.
The Left has relentlessly tried to get me banned from Twitter by calling me a domestic terrorist who’s inciting violence simply because I post about drag queen events that are advertised publicly. Now, the Left—including some of the same individuals who’ve called me a “terrorist”—have been making actual calls to violence with no repercussions.
For about a week straight, I was subjected to a vicious campaign to have my account permanently booted from Twitter. Leftists, especially Ari Drennen from Media Matters and hacks from the SPLC, put out hit piece after hit piece claiming I was “going to get someone killed” for posting about drag queen events for children. All of the events I post are already publicly advertised on social media but they argue that I have subjected those that hold these events to “targeted harassment” by reposting them.
One leftist in particular who was hurling accusations at me was a woman (?) by the name of Alejandra Caraballo, who allegedly works for Harvard and self-identifies as a “Wise Latina.” Alejandra took to Twitter to say, “I don’t know how much clearer I need to be that Libs of TikTok is a stochastic terrorist[…] Twitter needs to put a stop to this before people are killed.
* * * * * * * *
Our “Wise Latina” friend Alejandra resurfaced to voice her opinion about the SCOTUS reversal, saying, “The 6 justices who overturned Roe should never know peace again. It is our civic duty to accost them every time they are in public[…] these justices should never have a peaceful moment in public again.”
It’s a classic example of what James Lindsay calls “The Iron Law of Woke Projection.”
CALIFORNIA’S GREAT AMERICA AMUSEMENT PARK TO CLOSE IN 10 YEARS: “California’s Great America in Santa Clara now has an expiration date. The park operator Cedar Fair announced Monday that it sold the land and ultimately will close the park. The company sold the land for about $310 million to San Francisco-based company Prologis. They also said they’ve signed a deal with the buyer to continue to run the park for ‘up to 11 years’ before finally closing it down at the end of their current lease. In a statement, they said the park should continue to look and feel the same to visitors — at least in the short term. Visitors to the park on Monday were shocked to hear the news. Several employees at the park said they learned the news of the sale on Monday as well.”
THE BANNINGS WILL CONTINUE UNTIL MORALE IMPROVES: Twitter Suspends Jordan Peterson After He Tweets ‘Ellen Page Just Had Her Breasts Removed.’
Twitter suspended famed psychologist Jordan Peterson’s account after he tweeted about a transgender surgery performed on Elliot Page, nee Ellen Page, former Oscar-nominated actress.
Peterson’s daughter Mikhaila tweeted at Elon Musk, “Wow. @jordanbpeterson got a twitter strike. No more twitter until he deletes the tweet. Definitely not a free speech platform at the moment. @elonmusk.”
In the tweet prompting Twitter’s suspension, Peterson wrote, “Remember when pride was a sin? And Ellen Page just had her breasts removed by a criminal physician.”
Twitter wrote that Peterson had violated its rules for “hateful conduct,” apparently because used Page’s given name; Page now goes by Elliott. He also referred to Page as “her,” thus implying Page is a woman.
VOTERS: DO SOMETHING ABOUT INFLATION, GAS PRICES, AND PRODUCT SHORTAGES. Democrats’ response? Going Full Leeeeeroy Jenkins in the Culture War! Wow, They Really Want to Do This? Delusional Democrats Advance ‘Transgender Bill of Rights.’
QUESTION ASKED: Is Dobbs an Electoral Dud?
A majority of voters say the Court’s decisions will not “personally impact” their lives, which is roughly unchanged from May. That helps explain why progressives who insist that this is the moment to “discipline” the Court over its reckless jurisprudence haven’t found their audience. Only 38 percent of respondents back “expanding the Supreme Court” to blunt the influence of its conservative justices—results that are also “largely unchanged from September 2021.”
Meanwhile, Democrats were treated yesterday to the first real-world test of whether the Supreme Court’s decision had enlivened their previously unenthusiastic voting base. The results were ambiguous.
Voters turned out to cast their ballots in primary races in Illinois, New York, Colorado, Oklahoma, and Utah on Tuesday and, as of that evening, turnout “appeared to be typically sluggish” according to the New York Times. All the caveats apply: These states all have early-voting provisions, so many votes had already been cast by primary day, and there were fewer contested primaries on the Democratic side than the GOP’s. That said, however, “unaffiliated voters had returned more early ballots in Republican primaries than Democratic ones, a reversal from 2020 and 2018, election officials said.”
We cannot yet say that Dobbs won’t deliver Democrats from a drubbing at the polls in November. But there’s little indication of that yet. In fact, from what we have seen so far, the Court’s ruling might even be an electoral non-event. If future polls and primary results subsequently confirm that impression—if the overturning of Roe cannot salvage Democratic fortunes—this cake is well and truly baked.
Related: Guess Who Leads in the Generic Ballot After the Dobbs Decision?
Don’t get cocky.
GREAT MOMENTS IN OBJECTIVITY: ABC News’ Jon Karl explains why he tweeted ‘thank you, Cassidy Hutchinson’ (and makes the hackery even worse).
More great moments in objectivity on display here:
AMERICA’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD: Bert And Ernie Both Contract Monkeypox. “‘Hey there, Bert, I don’t know if that bathhouse in Madrid was worth it,’ Ernie was heard saying as muppet CDC bolted the door to their studio apartment shut.”
‘LITIGATION IS LIKELY:’ California Just Doxxed Thousands of Gun Owners. “In a statement given to the Reload, California Rifle and Pistol Association president Chuck Michel said his group ‘is working with several legislators and sheriffs to determine the extent of the damage caused by DOJ’s doxing of law abiding gun owners. Litigation is likely.’”
NEW VIDEO FROM AMERICA’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD: Satan Responds To Roe v. Wade Overturn.
TRUNALIMUNUMAPRZURE! Our Alleged President Has Spoken!
Stacy McCain responds with an old-school Fisking.
NATIONALIZE ALL THE SOCIALISM! Nationalize ‘Big Oil’? Are You Crazy?