‘IS THIS A JOKE?’ How a Classic Star Trek: TNG Episode Broke the Rules of the Franchise. “The episode’s final scene hinges on a surprise cameo from a future TV sitcom legend: Cheers’ Kelsey Grammer as the Bozeman’s captain, Bateson. Grammer’s casting as a captain who has seemingly been stuck in this loop for at least 90 years is one of Frakes’ favorite stories from the production. ‘This was pre-Frasier,’ Frakes says. ‘Before he had his spinoff, he was just a member of the [Cheers] ensemble. And they shot that show right around the corner from us, because we were on the same lot. And Kelsey, he was a Trekker. A huge Star Trek fan. And he asked to be on the show, like a number of actors that were fans, like Whoopi Goldberg did. That’s how I understood it. It was just one day of shooting and I had no idea. But it was fun to  shoot.’ ‘Fun’ is a word both fans of ‘Cause and Effect’ and its creators throw around often when discussing this landmark episode of the series, which, after three decades, still remains an outstanding and popular installment of the franchise, which currently clocks in at over 800 episodes.”

CALIFORNIA TURNED INTO EAST GERMANY SO SLOWLY, I HARDLY EVEN NOTICED: San Jose now turning its guns on First Amendment. “I don’t know if the San Jose city government is officially the most authoritarian body in the country, but they’re definitely making a run for first place. The California city is already taking aim at legal gun owners through its ordinances requiring them to purchase insurance and pay an annual fee for exercising their right to keep and bear arms, and now the city council appears poised to approve a new ordinance targeting the First Amendment as well.”

KETANJI BROWN JACKSON CAN’T DEFINE WHAT A WOMAN IS: “I’m Not A Biologist.”

SEN. BLACKBURN: “Can you provide a definition of the word ‘woman’?”

JACKSON: “No, I can’t.”

BLACKBURN: “You can’t?”

JACKSON: “I’m not a biologist.”

“Certainly ironic to have a full day of encomia to Jackson being the first black woman nominated for the job, capped by Jackson saying she doesn’t know what a woman is,” Dan McLaughlin tweets.

Though to be fair, not everybody watches Dr. Phil: Matt Walsh Explains Human Biology to Confused Trans Activists (Video): “Walsh clashed with trans activists on a recent episode of the Dr. Phil show in a heated debate over gender identity that climaxed at the fundamentals of gender identity and what it means to be a woman.”

Earlier: “Ketanji Brown Jackson told [Ted Cruz] she has ‘never studied critical race theory,’ but she has cited the founder of critical race theory, Derrick Bell, and endorsed its core concepts, including white privilege and intersectionality, in her speeches. She is lying.”

GOODER AND HARDER: Los Angeles becomes 1st in US to reach $6 gas average.

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

K-12 IMPLOSION UPDATE: Watch What Happens When a Mother at a School Board Meeting Tries to Read Explicit Content Served Up to Students.

TWITTER: THAT’S A BANNING. Ron DeSantis recognizes Emma Weyant as winner of NCAA swimming championship, not biological male Lia Thomas.

THE BLIND LEADING THE BLIND! NYC Mayor Eric Adams turns to Chicago’s Lori Lightfoot for ideas on how to tackle subway crime and gun violence… even as violent crime surges 34% in the Windy City.

That’s really not fair. Nobody knows how to clean up a city like Lightfoot:

JUDGE JACKSON EXPLAINS HER SENTENCING PROCESS FOR CHILD PORNOGRAPHY OFFENDERS: “The argument that we should be more lenient on child pornographers because modern technology makes it easier to distribute child porn is….not great.”

More: Hawley Presses Jackson on Three-Month Sentence in Child-Porn Case.

“You say this does not signal a heinous or egregious child pornography offense. Help me understand that. What word would you use if it’s not heinous or egregious?” [Sen. Josh Hawley (R., Mo.)] asked Judge Jackson.

“It is heinous. It is egregious,” she responded. But she said, “it’s not just about how much time a person spends in prison. It’s about understanding the harm of this behavior,” and noted other restraints that sex offenders have to abide by, including registration requirements and computer bans.

She also defended her broader sentencing record. “If you were to look at the greater body” of her sentences, and those of other judges, she said, ”you would see a very similar exercise of attempting to do what it is that judges do – attempting to take into account all of the relevant factors and do justice individually in each case.”

Mr. Hawley then retorted: “I am questioning your discretion and your judgment. … I’m not questioning you as a person. I’m not questioning your excellence as a judge.” He added: “I’m questioning how you used your discretion in these cases.”

Naturally, the Onion smears Hawley for having raised this issue: Josh Hawley Slams Ketanji Brown Jackson For Letting Pedophiles Like Himself Walk Free.

As Treacher likes to say:

Related:

Ketanji Brown Jackson says Critical Race Theory “doesn’t come up in the work that I do as a judge.”

Senator @tedcruz then reads a quote from her saying that Critical Race Theory is part of her work as judge. pic.twitter.com/MKtNjGeZw6

— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) March 22, 2022

YOUR TERMS ARE ACCEPTABLE: Stormy Daniels: I’ll go to prison before paying Trump a penny of the $293,000 he won.

I’VE SEEN THE LOCKDOWNS AND THE DAMAGE DONE: Alcohol Killed More Under-65 Americans Than COVID in 2020.

Flashback: Johns Hopkins Analysis: ‘Lockdowns Should be Rejected Out of Hand.’

TOP BUZZFEED EDITORS QUIT AS CEO ‘PRESSURED TO CLOSE ENTIRE NEWS DIVISION:’

Investors at BuzzFeed are reportedly pressuring CEO Jonah Peretti to close down its entire money-losing news operation as senior journalists announced their resignations on Tuesday.

Mark Schoffs, the editor in chief of BuzzFeed News, and two of his top deputies quit in the latest sign of turmoil at the cash-strapped company.

Schoofs informed staffers at the online publication that he would be stepping down on Tuesday, according to The Information.

Tom Namako, Schoofs’ deputy news editor, and Ariel Kaminer, the executive editor of investigations, also announced that they planned on leaving their posts, according to the report.

Journalists working for the site have been told that more job cuts are in the offing, The Information reported.

Related: Should You Learn To Code? Find out if there’s been an article written telling you specifically to code or not.

—BuzzFeed News, February 10th, 2014.

TWITTER SUSPENDS THE BABYLON BEE FOR TELLING THE TRUTH:

The Babylon Bee has been accused of “punching down” with their satire of Levine, but Levine is one of the most powerful health officials in the country. Similar criticisms have been lodged against those speaking out against collegiate swimmer Lia Thomas, a trans woman who has been winning against biological females. Yet Lia Thomas has the power of an entire mainstream media complex on her side and Levine has the backing of the most powerful man on earth.

Twitter suspended the Babylon Bee under their policy against “violence and harassment on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability or serious disease.” They also banned right-wing commentator Charlie Kirk (and it aggrieves me to defend him) over another factual tweet concerning Levine.

Neither the Bee nor Kirk threatened violence against Levine or committed harassment. Twitter suspended the Bee simply because it disagrees with their joke and was encouraged to do so by a left-wing base increasingly hostile to anyone who presents an argument they disapprove of.

Meanwhile, at America’s Newspaper of Record itself: Taliban Spokesman Finally Banned From Twitter After Sharing Babylon Bee Headline.

HEADLINES FROM DAYS ENDING IN “Y:” 1619 Project Founder Nikole Hannah-Jones Finds Something New to Call Racist.

It all started on Monday night when Hannah-Jones tweeted (and later deleted): “Tipping is a legacy of slavery and if it’s not optional then it shouldn’t be a tip but simply included in the bill. Have you ever stopped to think why we tip, like why tipping is a practice in the US and almost nowhere else?”

Well, no, actually, I haven’t. There are all sorts of customs and cultural habits that have their roots in long-forgotten beliefs and practices. But Hannah-Jones’ claim that “tipping is a legacy of slavery” strains credulity. Did slave owners tip their slaves?

After getting some pushback for her nonsense, Hannah-Jones hastened to assure the world that she was a big tipper: “Are y’all reading what I am writing or nah? I said I tip. I tip well. I tip almost always. But I object to the idea that I am obligated to tip no matter how I am treated. Nope. And you can’t get more offended at me than employers that pay less-than-minimum wage.” As the firestorm continued, she grew weary of the topic, concluding with: “I’ve said what I have to say about this. I have been utterly disrespected at restaurants. Ignored. Rudeness. Nope.”

But it wasn’t just because Hannah-Jones has unfortunately stumbled upon racist restaurants where she was “utterly disrespected” that she is against tipping. It is also because she is a Marxist. During the controversy her initial tipping tweet created, she asked Touré, who had rejected the idea that one should tip based on the quality of service: “What do you think is the purpose of tipping, Toure? Why does it exist?” Another Twitter user answered: “to transfer labor costs from the business to the consumer.” To that, Hannah-Jones replied: “Bingo.”

Earlier: “Tipping is racist. That’s the argument being forwarded by some liberal activists and politicians as a way of stigmatizing laws that exempt certain professions, mainly restaurant workers, from the federal minimum wage. However, there is little historical evidence for the argument.”

Why would that stop Hannah-Jones now?

UPDATE: Right on cue, the “botched joke” defense:

Flashback: “Ah, well. Let’s just chalk it all up to nuance. Lefties want a free reign to speak in absurdities, but also want us to go along with their calling verbal mulligans when their absurdities become punchlines.”

(Updated and bumped.)

LEE SMITH: Ukraine Is the Ruling Class’s Latest Propaganda Ploy.

It would be useful to have insight into Putin’s thinking, especially now with a massive land war in the middle of Europe giving rise to a powerful anti-American bloc led by Russia and China. But don’t count on America’s national-security establishment to provide that insight. For they squandered their credibility with Russiagate. From former officials like ex-Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul and retired spy chiefs like James Clapper and John Brennan to Biden deputies like National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and the Pentagon’s top strategist, Colin Kahl, and the entire Democratic Party and its media apparatus, the lies of America’s political class left the republic vulnerable to destructive forces.

Why did they lie? Policymakers, spy chiefs, and military officials rightly deceive foreign powers to protect and advance the US national interest. But these men and women lied to the American people about the president they elected. Then they lied about everything. Public US institutions and private industries have spent the last six years mustering their formidable powers to break the US working and middle classes. Why? Because lying is part of the logic of war, and America’s oligarchy is at war with the American people.

Earlier: Here Comes the Limited Hangout. America’s Nixonian press corps takes a page from the Watergate playbook to try and cover up its active role in the criminal Russiagate hoax.

Related: 2022 has become the preventing World War 3 election.

JIM TREACHER: Wake Me When a Republican Accuses Ketanji Brown Jackson of Rape. Until then, it’s all fair game.

OKAY, GROOMERS: California Disney Employees Stage Walk-Out over Florida’s Parental-Rights Bill.

Related: Groomer Teachers Are Absolutely Determined to Talk About Their Sexual Fetishes With Your Children.

‘CREDIBLY ACCUSED:’ The Left Takes the GOP’s Bait.

For simply protesting his innocence, Kavanaugh was besmirched as the “personification of white, male privilege.” His anger over this career-ending allegation was reframed as the self-entitled rage reserved for “privileged white men who are furious about being finally held to account” or “trauma for white men unaccustomed to trauma.” The substance of the claim against him was for many immaterial. His torment was a karmic comeuppance due to those who share his accidents of birth.

This history lesson is necessary, in part, because the left is busily reminding the nation that they subordinated any universally agreed-upon understanding of justice to their pursuit of a political scalp. Republicans have only invoked the mistreatment of their nominees to establish a favorable contrast. Their strategy is to observe as much decorum as possible to showcase the impropriety of their opponents. Republicans are fortunate that progressives in political media seem happy to oblige.

Meanwhile, a Politico headline screams, “How the GOP’s dirtiest slur got a new life.”

OKAY, GROOMER: Portland Children’s Hospital Gives Kids Tips on ‘Tucking’ and Sex Shops.

GREAT MOMENTS IN HYGIENE THEATER:

Shot: San Clemente city officials fill skatepark with 37 tons of sand to prevent skaters from using it.

—KUSI TV, April 20th, 2020.

Chaser: A California city filled a skate park with 37 tons of sand to deter skateboarders, but dirt bikers decided it was their turf.

Connor Ericsson, 25, posted videos on his Instagram page this week, showing him and his friends zipping through the sand on their bikes, then helping skateboarders shovel out the sand “so they could do some social shredding.”

“I think it’s a big joke, these kids are cooped up inside their house and just want to go out and have some fun,” Ericsson told KUSI News.

—Business Insider, April 23rd, 2020.

OUR SOURCE WAS THE NEW YORK TIMES: ‘Priceless!’ NY Times asked Candace Owens where she got her ideas about Ukraine (then it got awkward for the NYT).

OK, that's pretty funny. https://t.co/JcVTUxmnC2

— Mark Hemingway (@Heminator) March 21, 2022

(Classical reference in headline.)

OKAY, GROOMERS: Austin, Texas Elementary Schoolers Told To Keep Pride Week ‘Community Circles’ ‘Confidential.’

BOMB CANADA — THE CASE FOR WAR: What the Canadian Pacific Shutdown Could Mean for the U.S.

Over the weekend, Canadian Pacific Railway (CP) began to shut down its operations because of a labor dispute. Headquartered in Calgary, CP is one of the largest freight railroads in North America, with over 12,000 miles of track.

Around 3,000 engineers, conductors, and yard workers stopped working on Sunday, according to FreightWaves. They’re represented by the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference (TCRC), and the union said the main points of disagreement were wages, benefits, working conditions, and pensions — in other words, just about everything.

Each side is blaming the other for the shutdown. The TCRC emphasized that this shutdown is a lockout, not a strike, because it was initiated by Canadian Pacific, not by the union. CP contradicted TCRC’s claim, saying that the union was the one that walked away from negotiations.

Whoever started it, the result is the same: Canadian Pacific’s normal rail operations will not be resuming until a deal is worked out. That has consequences for the United States.

Despite its name, CP has significant U.S. operations. In addition to its denser network in western Canada, CP serves North Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, New York, and Pennsylvania.

Fortunately though, Pete Buttigieg finally has nautical-based supply lines sorted out, to help reduce any issues caused by the CP strike. Or not:

(Classical reference in headline.)

CHANGE: Kentucky Senate overrides [Democrat Andy] Beshear’s veto to end COVID State of Emergency.

YES, INFLATION IS HARD, BUT ELITES THINK WE DON’T KNOW HOW TO NAVIGATE IT:

Yes, [economics professor and Bloomberg contributor Teresa] Ghilarducci actually suggests selling your car and relying on public transportation to get everywhere. Like all elites, her default is that all of us poor, unwashed masses live in urban settings (she probably thinks we all live in slums).

Of course, the whole sell-your-car-and-take-the-bus strategy doesn’t do a thing for people who live in rural and many suburban areas, but that doesn’t matter. Nevertheless, it’s a slightly less stupid idea than Pete Buttigieg’s flippant “just buy an EV” plan.

My favorite quote when she suggests selling your car is the part where she declares, “Now may even be the time to sell your car. It certainly isn’t the time to buy a new or used one.” In other words, it’s a bad time for you to buy a car, but maybe you can convince some sucker to buy yours.

And then there’s the whole “eat lentils” thing. Actually, when you go into detail, Ghilarducci goes straight to the old lefty trope of going vegetarian.

“Meat prices have increased about 14% from February 2021 and will go up even more,” she writes. “Though your palate may not be used to it, tasty meat substitutes include vegetables (where prices are up a little over 4%, or lentils and beans, which are up about 9%). Plan to cut out the middle creature and consume plants directly. It’s a more efficient, healthier and cheaper way to get calories.”

In other words, do without, peasant. At least she didn’t try to talk us into eating bugs.

And about buying in bulk? Ghilarducci repeats the old saw about how you don’t really save that much by buying in bulk unless you “try to do it with a friend, so you can split some of the costs and ensure everything gets eaten or used.”

I picture most readers thinking, Don’t tell me how to shop! After all, buying some things in bulk can be a hedge against having to pay more for those things sooner rather than later as prices continue to rise.

And then there’s the bizarre paragraph about pet chemotherapy.

In a 2018 Forbes article, Ghilarducci defended AOC’s socialist worldview by writing that she “may not be too far left,” so no wonder she’s now writing articles straight out of the Carter era to justify Biden’s runaway inflation.

RIOTS FOR THEE, BUT NOT FOR ME: The View Throws Tantrum After Josh Hawley Questions Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Judicial Record.

UPDATE: ‘So, You Don’t Know:’ ABC Reporter Lays Trap For Josh Hawley, He Snares Her Instead.

(Classical reference in headline.)