(SOME) HILL GOPERS THROW DOWN SPENDING GAUNTLET: Conservatives in the Senate and House are challenging fellow Republicans and Democrats to pass a “clean” congressional resolution (CR) that keeps the government funded through the end of the year.

It’s a VIP issue because any CR that comes up during the “lame duck” session after the election but before the 118th Congress convenes will provide opportunities for the White House, Congressional Democrats and opportunistic Republicans to boost spending and insert new policy directives.

A SHAREHOLDER SUIT THAT COULD GET VERY INTERESTING: National Center for Public Policy Research (NCPPR) owns stock in Starbucks. Folks at NCPPR think Starbucks is decreasing the value of that investment by promulgating a host corporate programs that discriminate on the basis of race.

“The policies—all of which are advertised on the coffee giant’s website—include $1.5 billion set aside for ‘diverse suppliers’ and a compensation scheme that ties executive pay to ‘BIPOC representation’ at the company, for which Starbucks has set numerical targets. The corporation also runs a ‘Leadership Accelerator Program’ that is available only to minority employees, as well as a program that reserves 15 percent of Starbucks’s advertising budget for minority-owned media companies,” according to The Washington Free Beacon’s Aaron Silbarium.

The reason this could get really interesting is NCPPR also owns stock in McDonald’s and JP Morgan, and the conservative nonprofit has already warned them about their woke programs. Keep an eye on this one.

SOCIALISM, JEWISH ‘HIGH HOLIDAYS’ DON’T MIX: Jews worldwide will begin as the sun sets September 25 celebrating the most important holidays on their calendars, with the celebrations bookended by Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur.

Given the generally leftward tilt of many American Jews, it is easy to miss the fundamental contradictions between socialism and the Jewish faith. Jeff Dunetz of The Lid notes that:

“During the High Holidays, Jews are working toward becoming better people via personal introspection and the sacred texts provided by our maker. Socialism directs people to become better people via serving the government.”

That’s just the most obvious contradiction, Dunetz offers much more in an essay from which Jews and Gentiles alike would greatly benefit.

THE TRUTH ABOUT FETTERMAN’S CRIMINAL AIDES: Pennsylvania Democratic Senate candidate John Fetterman has claimed the two aides he hired after they were released from prison due to murder sentences were actually innocent. Hans Bader has the facts.

THE NEW YORK TIMES: This is “what happens when bias meets financial illiteracy and gross [journalistic] incompetence,” according to the editors at the Washington Free Beacon. The “this” is the comparison of the formerly trustworthy newspaper of record’s treatment of a liberal billionaire and a conservative billionaire, both of whom did the same thing with their former companies.

DID BEARS REALLY EVOLVE INTO WHALES? Believe it or not, the idea that whales represent the end result of a long evolutionary process that started on the land is pretty much current orthodoxy. But maybe it shouldn’t be if this episode on HillFaith of “Long Story Short” is accurate.

AND THEN THERE’S THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION: People on the Left, be they in government or in the academic, think tank or corporate worlds, just cannot abide dissent from their orthodoxy.

Witness Brookings’ latest release, a tool to “combat misinformation” being disseminated by podcasts, as reported by Issues & Insights. The Left never  figured out how to suppress conservative Talk Radio, but they are steadily destroying dissent on the vastly more influential Internet and now they are targeting podcasts.

The Totalitarian Temptation is irresistible to these people.

HAVE YOU HEARD WHAT BIDEN’S DOJ IS DOING TO EAGLE FORUM? This story isn’t getting the coverage it should. The DOJ has issued a subpoena to the Alabama chapter of Eagle Forum for, according to The Lid’s Jeff Dunetz, “any draft legislation, proposed legislation, or model legislation” and including “any social media postings.”

But wait, I thought all Americans, including each and every member of the Alabama chapter of the conservative activist group founded in the early years of the conservative movement by Phyllis Schlafly, is guaranteed by the Constitution’s First Amendment the right to speak his or her mind on political issues, to assemble with like-minded Americans on behalf of such views, and to petition the government for change?

To say a “housecleaning” is needed throughout DOJ doesn’t even begin to do justice (pun intended) to the stench of rotting respect for the Constitution in that department.

WATCHDOG TO PROBE IRS TAX CHEATERS: Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) says the Treasury Inspector-General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) agreed to do another investigation of how the IRS deals with its employees who are late paying their taxes or don’t pay at all.

BIBLE BELT STATES RANKED LOW ON RELIGIOUS FREEDOM INDEX: Seven states of the Bible Belt — Georgia (39) South Carolina (38), North Carolina and Virginia (30), Arkansas and Louisiana (27) and Texas (25) — ranked in the bottom 50 of the first-ever Religious Liberty in the States Index, as reported on HillFaith.

On the other hand, four of the top 12 states that are ranked among the most protective of religious freedom are Bible Belt states, including Mississippi at first overall, Florida in fourth, Tennessee in seventh and Alabama in 12th.

Can you guess who’s at the bottom?

REMEMBER THAT HUGE TAX RETURN LEAK TO PRO PUBLICA? One who does remember is Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), and he had the temerity Monday to ask why Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen, the IRS and the Department of Justice (DOJ) haven’t said word one about the leak or hack.

Curiously, when The Epoch Times conveyed Grassley’s inquiry to the respective spokesmen, they either ignored the question or punted to the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA). The TIGTA spokesman said he couldn’t say anything either.

BELIEVE YOUR ENEMY WHEN HE SAYS HE’S GOING TO KILL YOU: The Iranian fanatics took the wraps off a new drone they claim is designed specifically to kill — who else? — Jews, especially those living in Haifa and Tel Aviv. Reminds of Hitler’s “New Yorker” ICBM prototype.

This is further evidence of the colossal strategic mistake by President Barack Obama in not doing everything possible to support the Iranian Green Movement in 2009. The country was primed for a revolution but Obama effectively sided with Mullahs.

JUST IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: Stacey Lennox describes in detail how and why Republicans must give Democrats large doses of their own rancid political medicine in order to have any hope of restoring regular order in Congress. I would only add that if the GOP doesn’t, it’s future viability as an effective tool for saving the republic will be all but gone.

WHY DO THEY SO HATE TRUMP: I think I know why and I explain it in some detail in a comparison of OrangeManBad and The Gipper. BTW, if you haven’t become a VIP member at PJ Media, now would be a great time to do so. Be sure and tell them I sent you, too!

SHOULDN’T BE A SURPRISE BUT IT IS: Millions of Americans still visit Mt. Rushmore these days despite the unceasing suppression of the American spirit, principles and history, according to The Epoch Times’ Allan Stein.

GOOGLE, IBM BACK OFF RACE-DRIVEN FELLOWSHIPS: They still require recipient colleges to award their generous graduate fellowships to diverse fields of recipients, but reporting by The Washington Free Beacon appears to have moved Google and IBM to drop their previous requirement that half of those awarded go to minorities.

FDA THUMBS NOSE AT FOIA REQUEST FOR COVID SAFETY DATA: Epoch Times’ Zachary Steiber filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for the results of a specialized data mining procedure regarding COVID vaccination safety:

“The Epoch Times asked the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in July for all analyses performed by the agency for the COVID-19 vaccines using a method called Empirical Bayesian data mining, which involves comparing the adverse events recorded after a specific COVID-19 vaccine with those recorded after vaccination with non-COVID-19 vaccines.

“According to operating procedures laid out by the agency and its partner in January 2021 and February 2022, the FDA would perform data mining ‘at least biweekly’ to identify adverse events ‘reported more frequently than expected following vaccination with COVID-19 vaccines.’ The agency would perform the mining on data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS).

“In a recent response, the FDA records office told The Epoch Times that it would not provide any of the analyses, even in redacted form. The agency cited an exemption to the Freedom of Information Act that lets the government withhold inter-agency and intra-agency memorandums and letters ‘that would not be available by law to a party other than an agency in litigation with the agency.’

Translation: So sue us.

SOMEBODY SHOULD TELL BIDEN HE’S PRESIDENT, NOT TRUMP: To listen to Democrats in recent weeks, according to The Lid’s Ari Kaufman, one might think Donald Trump never left the Oval Office.

UPDATE (FROM GLENN): Dems want the midterms to be a referendum on Trump, not bungling Biden — and the media are compliant.

RESPECT FOR MARRIAGE ACT HAS NONE FOR 1ST AMENDMENT: Senators Kevin Cramer of North Dakota and James Lankford of Oklahoma, plus multiple civil liberties advocates who specialize in freedom of speech and religion issues, say Schumer’s same-sex marriage vehicle is jam-packed with destructiveness.

‘WE MUST FIGHT BACK ON THIS:’ Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) tells the Washington Stand that he doubts 10 of his GOP colleagues will support Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s (D-NY) same-sex marriage bill when it hits the Senate floor later this month. Without those 10 GOP votes, the already House-passed Respect for Marriage Act will fail.

PODESTA APPOINTMENT BOOSTS CHINA: President Joe Biden’s appointment of veteran Democratic campaign operative John Podesta to oversee hundreds of billions in federal environmental funding puts a long-time China advocate in the White House, according to The Washington Free Beacon’s Collin Anderson.

YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK: The Biden administration is shelling out nearly $4 million to put “Harm Reduction Kiosks” in rural Kentucky as vending machine distribution centers for drugs (no, not the kind your doc prescribes).

WILL FORMER FBI AGENT ACCEPT GRASSLEY CHALLENGE? Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) in a floor speech Wednesday challenged former FBI agent Timothy Thibault to come in for a recorded, on-the-record interview.

Grassley has a few questions for the recently retired Thibault regarding his role or non-role in the FBI’s investigation or coverup of the Hunter Biden laptop and related issues regarding the Biden family’s dealings with shadowy overseas business and government interests in Ukraine, China and elsewhere.

DOBBS DIDN’T REPEAL ABORTION CULTURE: The Washington Stand’s Mary Szoch looks at women in sports and the reaction to the Dobbs decision. It’s clearly going to take much more than one Supreme Court decision to reverse 5o years of Roe damage.

BIG WIN FOR RELIGIOUS FREEDOM: An Obama federal district court appointee comes down hard on woke New York child and family services ideologues.