MITTENS WON’T BE MISSED: Utah Sen. Mitt Romney Unsure of Political Future. “Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, the only Senator in history to vote to convict a president of his own party during an impeachment trial, said recently that he is not sure if he will seek reelection to the upper chamber in 2024, possibly sharing the ballot with former President Donald Trump if he runs for president again.”
Author Archive: Ed Driscoll
April 12, 2022
JIM TREACHER: Fauci Says We’re on Our Own Now.
Dr. Anthony Fauci on Sunday appeared to throw in the towel on more government restrictions over COVID-19 — insisting it’s now up to Americans to make their own medical risk assessments.
“This is not going to be eradicated, and it’s not going to be eliminated,” Fauci told ABC’s “This Week.” “And what’s going to happen is that we’re going to see that each individual is going to have to make their calculation of the amount of risk that they want to take.”
Oh, now we get to do that, huh? Better 25 months late than never!
The pandemic is done. Half of Washington tested positive for COVID-19 last week, and nobody cares. Yes, some people are going to get a virus and die. No, that’s nothing new. People need to get back to their miserable lives already.
It’s over. Go Fauci yourself.
But there are still a lot of bureaucrats eager to party like it’s 2020:
● Philadelphia Reinstates Indoor Mask Mandate.
● Biden COVID czar: Sure, we may extend mask mandates on air travel.
Exit question: When will Fauci and liberal leaders apologize for the millions of lives damaged with pointless COVID restrictions?
GOODER AND HARDER, CALIFORNIA: USPS Cancels Mail Delivery in L.A. Neighborhood Amid Crime Spike.
Authorities have indicated they are familiar with the individual responsible for the January attack and have a record of “domestic” incidents with the suspect.
This is a recurring theme in California justice. A disturbed, violent individual severely injures (or worse) an innocent citizen and almost without exception it turns out that individual has a long history of interaction with law enforcement. They’ve simply been dumped back onto the streets by a feckless system that no longer has the teeth to hold and prosecute criminals or protect innocent taxpayers.
This suspension is not simply about one attack. It is a sign of a larger issue. “Defund the Police” initiatives, Prop 47, and a cold-hearted, ruling elite class have all combined to create a chaos that is nearly unbearable in the once great state of California.
Hence the Fresh Start States Welcome Wagon project.
TRANS WOMAN ON WHAT SHE WISHES SHE’D KNOWN BEFORE HAVING SURGERY AT 19: “I’m a little surprised to see this opinion piece appear in the Washington Post. The gist of the piece is that the author had sex reassignment surgery as a 19-year-old and while not exactly regretting that choice outright, does have enough perspective as an adult nearing retirement to say it was a choice made too soon with not enough thought over all that it would mean…There’s definitely a lot of arguing going on in the comments but I’m sure this will go to 11 on Twitter. Will there be calls to fire whichever editor allowed this to be published? It wouldn’t surprise me.”
VDH: The Nihilism of the Left.
The last 14 months have offered one of the rare occasions in recent American history when the hard Left has operated all the levers of federal government. The presidency, the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the permanent bureaucratic state are all in progressive hands. And the result is a disaster that is uniting Americans in their revulsion of elitists whose crazy ideas are tearing apart the fabric of the country.
For understandable reasons, socialists and leftists are usually kept out of the inner circles of the Democratic Party, and especially kept away from control of the country. A now resuscitated Bernie Sanders for most of his political career was an inert outlier. The brief flirtations with old-style hardcore liberals such as George McGovern in 1972 and Mike Dukakis in 1988 imploded the Democratic Party. Their crash-and-burn campaigns were followed by corrective nominees who actually won the presidency: Southern governors Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton.
Such was the nation’s innate distrust of the Left, and in particular the East Coast elite liberal. For nearly half a century between the elections of John F. Kennedy and Barack Obama, it was assumed that no Democratic presidential candidate could win the popular vote unless he had a reassuring Southern accent.
How did the extreme Left manage its rare takeover of the country between 2018 and 2020? Certainly, Obama’s election helped accelerate the woke movement and energized identity politics. One could also argue over the political opportunities in 2020 following the devastation of COVID-19.
In the long term, the medicine of lockdowns and quarantines probably proved more calamitous than the disease, and this crisis mode made doable what had once been unimaginable. State governors such as Gavin Newsom, Gretchen Whitmer, and Andrew Cuomo did not let the pandemic crisis go to waste. It was a rare occasion to leverage agendas that otherwise had no public support in ordinary times.
Read the whole thing.
QUESTION ASKED: 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.”
Flashbacks:
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.”
Exit quote: “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 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.”
Related: Biden tormented by Republican guerrilla campaign and ‘I did it’ stickers.
Also: 100Pcs I Did That Biden Funny Car Stickers. #Resist #CommissionEarned
FORMER COWBOYS EXECUTIVE GIL BRANDT BLASTED FOR INSENSITIVE DWAYNE HASKINS COMMENTS ON RADIO:
Brandt said that Haskins ignored the advice of NFL draft evaluators who told him to remain an extra year at Ohio State, allegedly telling him that he did not have the work ethic.
“It was always something. It was one of those, ‘I’m not offsides, but they keep calling me for offsides,’ ” Brandt said. “It’s a tragic thing. Anytime somebody dies it’s tragic, especially when you’re 24 years old and you’ve got your whole life ahead of you. Maybe if he’d have stayed in school an [extra] year, he wouldn’t do silly things.”
Brandt was known as a pioneering scout under GM Tex Schramm for upward of three decades with the Cowboys.
Brandt, 90, or whoever writes his Twitter account has since issued an apology, but there are many reasons why he’s the main antagonist in Skip Bayless’ first book, God’s Coach.
GOODER AND HARDER, PHILADELPHIA: Philadelphia Reinstates Indoor Mask Mandate.
EVERYTHING WRONG WITH JOURNALISM UNDER ONE ROOF:
The next day saw a discussion with Dispatch editor Jonah Goldberg, who also waved away the Hunter Biden laptop story, which he later stated on Twitter that he did not believe “on it’s face.” Goldberg’s flippant attitude and smug gatekeeping was a perfect example of how so many pundits and thinkers are now more interested in hearing what each other have to say and bathing in self-satisfied pontifications rather than in serving their audiences.
But the ultimate irony is that former President Barack Obama was a special guest, appearing onstage alongside Jeffrey Goldberg. Breitbart reporter Charlie Spiering later summed up his comments on Twitter: “At Atlantic forum, Obama defines ‘disinformation’ as ‘a systematic effort to either promote false information, to suppress true information, for the purpose of political gain, financial gain, enhancing power, suppressing others, targeting those you don’t like.’”
That’s true and it should have been a rare moment of self-introspection for the former president. Among Obama’s own disinformation campaigns were blaming the Benghazi terror attacks on a video and Politifact’s lie of the year that “if you like your plan you can keep your healthcare plan. If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor.” Yet no one from the Atlantic, CNN, or the Dispatch saw the deep irony in appearing alongside Obama at a conference about the dangers of disinformation.
Just think of the media as Democratic Party operatives with bylines, and it all makes sense.
Evergreen:
SNOWFALLS ARE NOW JUST A THING OF THE PAST:
● Shot:
BERLIN (AP) — Temperatures on Earth will shoot past a key danger point unless greenhouse gas emissions fall faster than countries have committed, the world’s top body of climate scientists said Monday, warning of the consequences of inaction but also noting hopeful signs of progress.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change revealed “a litany of broken climate promises” by governments and corporations, accusing them of stoking global warming by clinging to harmful fossil fuels.
“It is a file of shame, cataloguing the empty pledges that put us firmly on track toward an unlivable world,” he said.
—“UN warns Earth ‘firmly on track toward an unlivable world,’” AP, last Monday.
● Chaser:
A leaked draft report from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change paints the starkest picture yet of the accelerating danger caused by human use of coal, oil, and gas. It warns of coming unlivable heat waves, widespread hunger and drought, rising sea levels and extinction. To understand the report’s warnings, William Brangham turns to atmospheric scientist Katharine Hayoe.
Judy Woodruff: A leaked draft report from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change paints the starkest picture yet of the real and accelerating danger caused by humans’ use of coal, oil, and gas.
William Brangham has the latest.
William Brangham: That’s right, Judy.
This is a draft report, so it may still change. And it was obtained by the AFP, the Agence France-Presse., even so, the report says the threat from climate change is real, it’s here, and it’s getting worse.
It lays out a myriad of impacts, unlivable heat waves, widespread hunger and drought, rising sea levels that will force millions from their homes, and the extinction of many species.
For a U.N. agency, the draft language is blunt, saying — quote — “The worst is yet to come, affecting our children’s and grandchildren’s lives much more than our own.”
—“A leaked UN report warns ‘worst is yet to come’ on climate change. Here’s how you can help,” NPR, June 23, 2021.
● Hangover:
In the late 1980s the U.N. was already claiming the world had only a decade to solve global warming or face the consequences.
The San Jose Mercury News reported on June 30, 1989 that a “senior environmental official at the United Nations, Noel Brown, says entire nations could be wiped off the face of the earth by rising sea levels if global warming is not reversed by the year 2000.”
That prediction didn’t come true 15 years ago, and the U.N. is sounding the same alarm today.
—“25 Years Of Predicting The Global Warming ‘Tipping Point,’” Michael Bastach, the Daily Caller, May 4, 2015.
(Classical reference in headline.)
AMERICA’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD: Clarence Thomas Receives Invite To Celebration Of First Black Supreme Court Justice.
KURT SCHLICHTER: Call Groomers ‘Groomers’ Because of Their Grooming and Because It Annoys David French.
It’s a blessing of liberty!
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: HuffPo: Sure looks like Black Lives Matter was a racket, eh? Update: BLM responds.
CHINESE REAL ESTATE DEBACLE: Zhenro Defaults for First Time After Missing Bond Payments.
Zhenro Properties Group Ltd. defaulted for the first time after the debt-laden Chinese developer said it was unable to pay interest on two dollar bonds before a grace period ended Saturday.
The builder, which in February asked holders of about $1 billion of bonds set to mature this year for more time to repay, said in a Hong Kong stock exchange filing Sunday it didn’t pay a combined $20.4 million of interest on two dollar bonds. That has resulted in events of default, according to the company.
Zhenro also said it might not be able to pay a combined $32.6 million of interest due on three other dollar bonds before grace periods end between April 10 and May 14. Failure to meet the obligations would also constitute events of default, the company said. However, the firm said it intends to pay the due interest on all five notes by May 31.
The missed payments are a reminder of the fragility of the Chinese property sector, which is grappling with a cash crunch and sales slump following a government crackdown on excessive leverage. Shares of Chinese developers fell on Monday morning, curtailing a three-week rally that was fueled by optimism policy makers may be preparing steps to support the industry.
Related: China Shadow Banks Snap Up Property to Rescue Own Investments.
China’s shadow banks are emerging as unlikely white knights for embattled property firms by becoming mini-developers themselves.
Trust companies including MinMetals Trust Co. and Zhongrong Trust Co. have bought stakes in at least 10 real estate projects this year, betting that the unfinished homes will eventually yield cash to pay off some of the $280 billion in property-backed funds sold by trusts to investors.
The push by these lenders to get into the real estate business offers some relief for investors and developers in the wake of China’s property collapse that has rattled global markets and led to more than a dozen defaults. The moves free up cash to help real estate firms tackle some of their $3.4 trillion in liabilities.
The shadow banks are doing these deals now, knowing creditors may have limited room to negotiate payments or deals with developers like China Evergrande Group once restructuring plans are announced, according to one trust executive.
“Taking up property projects during an enduring downturn is more about saving themselves,” said Zhu Yiming, a property analyst at China Real Estate Information Corp., referring to the trusts. Rather than await credit improvement, “it’s better for trusts to regain the initiative through getting a controlling stake.”
More: What Doomed China’s Much-Anticipated Property Market Reform Plan?
In Xi’s eyes, the real estate market is the epitome of China’s unsustainable growth model. It supports nearly 25 percent of China’s GDP, a rate higher than both Spain and Ireland before the Eurozone crisis. Since the housing market reform in the late 1990s, Chinese housing prices have grown so fast that a typical apartment in Beijing now costs 25 times the annual wage. Thus, high housing prices add a tremendous burden on Chinese people and suppress their consumption and innovation power.
In addition, the collapse of Evergrande Group, one of China’s biggest real estate developers, showed that the real estate sector might become a ticking time bomb for the Chinese economy. As a result, Xi has made reforming the real estate sector his primary target for the Common Prosperity campaign, declaring that “houses are for living, not for speculation.”
Related flashback to November of 2019: How to Conduct Business with Chinese Companies That See a Dark Future.
April 10, 2022
DANIEL SCHMIDT: Why Anne Applebaum Shot Down My Question.
This wasn’t meant to be a gotcha. Yet Applebaum gave a stupefyingly arrogant (and borderline incoherent) answer: “My problem with Hunter Biden’s laptop,” she said, “is I think [it’s] totally irrelevant. I [mean], it’s not whether it’s disinformation, or I mean, I don’t think the—Hunter Biden’s business relationships have anything to do with who should be president of the United States. So, I didn’t—I don’t find it to be interesting. I mean, that would be my problem with that as a major news story.”
In 2020, two tech giants, Facebook and Twitter, had throttled the Post’s exposé on Hunter’s business dealings, which implicated one of two major-party presidential nominees, and the media had uncritically echoed the false assertion of 50 former ex-spies that this reporting was a Russian information operation. And yet here was Applebaum, nearly two years later at an event dedicated to combatting disinformation, claiming she didn’t find any of this to be “interesting.”
Nonsense. Back when the Hunter Files were a live crisis for the Biden camp, Applebaum published a lengthy essay in The Atlantic that aimed to discredit the reporter who broke the laptop story. So if she doesn’t find the story interesting, why did she—along with the entirety of the corporate media apparatus—dedicate so much time and effort to trying to legitimate censorship of the Post’s reporting?
Past performance is no guarantee of future results: Write 2,400 word essay in 2020, claim to be bored by Hunter’s laptop in 2022.
Related: The ‘cabal’ that bragged of foisting Joe Biden on us must answer for his failed presidency.
XI’S GOTTA HAVE IT! Did Hunter’s China Cash Pay Joe’s Family Bills? Why Does Biden Favor China?
“YOU SHOULD DO THIS IN TEXAS AND REPORT BACK IF YOU CAN:” Adbusters wants you to let the air out of people’s SUV tires, but start by targeting wealthy areas.
Exit quote: “Disabling a person’s car isn’t gentle. You take away their ability to earn a living, shop for groceries, and even to go to the hospital in an emergency. It’s also a good way to get hurt if you’re caught doing it.”
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Pelosi: AOC Wanted to be ‘Queen Bee’ of the Left and It Cost Democrats.
STOP MAKING ELON MUSK SOUND COOL: Elon Musk is the Darth Vader of Twitter.
hen I think of Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, I think of Darth Vader. It’s not that Agrawal himself reminds me of the Star Wars protagonist, grave concerns over Twitter’s handling of free speech notwithstanding. I just can’t help but think of the nervous imperial commander who receives Vader as he arrives to inspect the Death Star II at the opening of Return of the Jedi. “Lord Vader, this is an unexpected pleasure. We are honored by your presence,” the commander says, with a lump in his throat. The Dark Lord of the Sith flatly replies, “You may dispense with the pleasantries, Commander. I’m here to put you back on schedule.”
One wonders if Agrawal has a similar lump in his throat over Elon Musk’s recent appointment to Twitter’s board of directors a day after Musk purchased enough shares — 9.2 percent — to become the social media company’s single largest shareholder.
The move was somewhat of a surprise, given that the billionaire head of Tesla and SpaceX has been a vocal critic of the bird app’s policies on everything from its crackdowns on free speech to its lack of an edit button for tweets already posted. In a carefully worded response, Agrawal characterized Musk as “both a passionate believer and intense critic” and as “exactly when we need on Twitter and in the boardroom, to make us stronger in the long-term.”
Flashback: The destruction of Alderaan was completely justified.