I HAD BEEN ASSURED THAT SNOWFALLS WERE A THING OF THE PAST: NY and Boston face coldest temperatures since 2019 and up to two feet of snow Tuesday: More than 15MILLION are under wind chill alerts as East Coast temperatures dip 45 below zero.

MATT MARGOLIS: How Biden’s COVID Strategy Failed in One Chart.

SCENES FROM AN ACTUAL INSURRECTION: State and Local Governments Spent $5.6 Million on Lawyers for Illegal Immigrants.

Following a review of local and city governments that partnered with a group that seeks to provide counsel to noncitizens, the Immigration Reform Law Institute found that at least $5.6 million in taxpayer funds from state and local communities was earmarked for these deportation defense programs, which it described as “a conservative estimate [that] does not include numerous other localities that fund their own independent anti-deportation programs.”

“These programs are an insult to every law-abiding American citizen and legal resident,” said Dale L. Wilcox, executive director and general counsel of IRLI, in a statement. “Our laws clearly state that noncitizens charged with civil offenses do not have a right to legal representation. Yet we have radical anti-borders groups starting these programs and sticking unknowing citizens with the bill. It’s outrageous.”

The findings highlight the growing state-level efforts to combat federal immigration enforcement.

It might be fair to ask after this last year: What federal immigration enforcement?

SOMETHING WOKE IN THE AIR: American Airlines: Black Lives Matter Yes, ‘Let’s Go Brandon’ No.

FRAUD, BULLYING, INTIMIDATION: Disgraced FBI No. 2 Andrew McCabe Calls For Feds To Treat ‘Mainstream’ Conservatives Like Domestic Terrorists. “I can tell you from my perspective of spending a lot of time focused on the radicalization of international terrorists and Islamic extremist and extremists of all stripes… is that this group shares many of the same characteristics of those groups that we’ve seen radicalized along entirely different ideological lines.”

EXLUSIVE INTERVIEW: J6 Detainee Describes Mental Torture of Solitary Confinement: ‘I Miss My Mom.’

THE NEW REPUBLIC: The Democrats Are Running Out of Time. “The Democrats enter a new year more or less exactly where they were before Congress shut down for the holidays. Their legislative agenda is completely stalled out, and it’s not clear how the party’s leaders will get it unstuck.”

They have done very little in the last few months beyond very pointedly warring with one another. During that time, the Biden administration briefly threatened to restart student loan payments, before backing down—and kicking the can down the road to the spring, when doing so would be even worse for the party’s dismal midterm prospects. It has more recently made it clear that no further Covid relief in the manner of last year’s American Rescue Plan Act will be forthcoming, despite the fact that parts of the country are effectively shut down due to the insanely infectious omicron variant. This might play into the hands of Republicans, who will have the opportunity to make the case, only somewhat disingenuously, that they did as much on this front as their rivals. Donald Trump would be a fool not to mount such an argument in 2024—though so far his nascent presidential campaign remains resolutely focused on conspiracy theories about vote-counting software, so it’s not a sure thing that he will.

Testing remains patchy and often expensive, effective masks are hard to come by, the administration is sending out half a billion at-home testing kits and modestly expanding the number of federal testing sites, but its response to the pandemic has lately degenerated into inadequacies and frustration—which is particularly bad given that responding to Covid-19 was the centerpiece of Biden’s presidential campaign.

But other than that, how are you enjoying your party’s performance?

VODKAPUNDIT PRESENTS YOUR WEEKLY INSANITY WRAP: Today’s Teens Gotta ‘Fight for Your Right to Total Safety.’

Plus:

• Biden has one word — just one word — for Coloradans who lost their homes to wildfires: Windmills
• Medi-Cal for illegal aliens because at this point why the hell not?
• Pelosi’s worst thing ever (and we’re not talking about whatever is the latest thing she did to her face)

So much more at the link, you’d have to be crazy to miss it.

YOU DON’T NEED TO BE A WEATHER MAN TO KNOW WHICH WAY THE WIND BLOWS: Ed Perlmutter says he won’t seek reelection, upending Colorado’s 2022 political landscape.

“After much thought and consideration, I have decided not to run for reelection,” the Arvada Democrat said in a written statement. “I’ve never shied away from a challenge but it’s time for me to move on and explore other opportunities. There comes a time when you pass the torch to the next generation of leaders.”

Perlmutter, 68, was elected to Congress in 2006. He represents the 7th Congressional District anchored in Jefferson County.

The district was redrawn as part of Colorado’s once-a-decade redistricting process, becoming more competitive and shifting west to include mountain counties including Lake, Chaffee, Park and Fremont.

The new 7th District is forecast to favor Democrats by 7 percentage points. That’s based on an analysis of the results of eight statewide races between 2016 and 2020.

If an incumbent is worried a seven-point advantage might not be enough…

IRAN: When We Strike America, It Will Be With Great Force.

HEY MAN, NICE SHOT: All hail the Ariane 5 rocket, which doubled the Webb telescope’s lifetime.

There were two stunningly good pieces of news about the James Webb Space Telescope this past weekend. One was widely reported—that after an intricate, two-week process, the telescope completed its deployment without any difficulties. The next steps toward science operations are more conventional.

The other piece of news, less well-covered but still important, emerged during a news conference on Saturday. NASA’s Mission Systems Engineer for the Webb telescope, Mike Menzel, said the agency had completed its analysis of how much “extra” fuel remained on board the telescope. Roughly speaking, Menzel said, Webb has enough propellant on board for 20 years of life.

This is twice the conservative pre-launch estimate for Webb’s lifetime of a decade, and it largely comes down to the performance of the European Ariane 5 rocket that launched Webb on a precise trajectory on Christmas Day.

It will be a while yet before Webb reaches L2 and finishes fine-tuning its mirrors, but this is just great news for the once-troubled program.

PJ MEDIA VIP ROUNDUP: Don’t forget that VODKAPUNDIT promo code if you’ve been thinking of joining us.

Athena Thorne: Let The Left Hunt the Great Orange Whale. “Anti-Trump forces can’t see how they’re hurting their own brand. They can’t stop themselves from going full steam ahead with their Jan. 6 agenda. Why?”

Matt Margolis: Sotomayor Was a Terrible Affirmative Action Pick for the Court. “It appears that Harvard law professor Larry Tribe actually warned Barack Obama not to nominate Sotomayor to the Supreme Court back in 2009.”

Yours Truly: The CCP Has Turned Hong Kong Into a Dystopian Nightmare. “You’d think a story like this one is from the early months of 2020 when COVID-19 was still poorly understood. But no. Chen’s tale is a Christmas story.”

PUNCH BACK TWICE AS HARD: Mom, Radio Host, Arrested At School Board Meeting Files Federal Lawsuit: ‘I’m Not Gonna Back Down.’

FROM PANDEMIC TO ENDEMIC: Spanish Prime Minister Wants to Treat COVID like the Flu: ‘We’re Going to Have to Learn to Live With It.’

FACT-CHECKING THE FACT-CHECKERS: AP source who ‘fact checked’ Mass Formation Psychosis theory encouraged ‘behavioral nudging’ people into Covid compliance, quoted Goebbels.

In a Nature article in 2020, Van Bavel posited that “insights from the social and behavioural sciences can be used to help align human behaviour with the recommendations of epidemiologists and public health experts.” What is this if not an attempt to push people to do what they’re told?

The article addresses using fear as a means to control people, in the right doses: “A meta-analysis found that targeting fears can be useful in some situations, but not others: appealing to fear leads people to change their behaviour if they feel capable of dealing with the threat, but leads to defensive reactions when they feel helpless to act. The results suggest that strong fear appeals produce the greatest behaviour change only when people feel a sense of efficacy, whereas strong fear appeals with low-efficacy messages produce the greatest levels of defensive responses.”

Van Bavel deals with how to deal with “optimism bias” in a population, as well as risk perception, emotional responses, and how the “global pandemic may also create opportunities to reduce religious and ethnic prejudice.”

He wrote that “People’s behaviour is influenced by social norms,” but that “Changing behaviours by correcting such misperceptions can be achieved by public messages reinforcing positive (for example, health-promoting) norms.”

Wear the mask, save the world.

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEF: Our Pathetic Puppet President Is Letting Iran Grow Too Bold. “The psychotollah crowd in Iran has been getting a little uppity lately, no doubt emboldened by the fact that the United States of America is currently being presided over by a chief executive whose brain is being run by a cabal comprised of radical leftists who have an infantile worldview.”

EVERYTHING IS GOING SWIMMINGLY: #BareShelvesBiden Trends As Alarming Number Of People Report Empty Stores

MEGAN FOX: The Branch Covidians Are Basically the Same as the Heaven’s Gate Cultists (Except Not as Nice). “They want us to stop celebrating holidays, stop socializing with friends and family, and stop having joyful human relationships, and instead opt for the digitizing of our lives onto machines and serving the government unquestioningly.”

INNOVATION: Farmer Makes His Cows Wear VR Goggles to Increase Milk Production.

WOULD IT BE IMPOLITIE TO ASK WHERE THE MONEY WENT? Feds Blew $100 Billion on Extra Hospital Beds, Got FEWER Hospital Beds.

RIP: This Is Bob Saget’s Last Tweet.

COULD HAVE FOOLED ME: Matt Drudge confirms he still runs Drudge Report.

THE VITAL DISTINCTION BETWEEN ‘FROM’ AND ‘WITH’ IS FINALLY BECOMING OFFICIAL: CDC Director Makes Stunning Admission About COVID Deaths.

ONE CAN HOPE: More COVID-19 School Closures Spell the End of Teachers Unions Empire.

Chicago—where union leaders effectively just voted to strike—is the third largest school district in the country, enrolling more than 340,000 students and spending over $27,000 per student, per year. Just 23% of Chicago public school students can read proficiently. Meanwhile, average Chicago private school tuition is only about $11,000 per student each year.

Detroit Public Schools (reading proficiency rate a staggering 6%) have shuttered in-person classes from at least Jan. 3–5 due to “COVID-19 spread placing employees, students, and families at risk along with excessive staff shortages.” The kicker? The district informed families there would be no in-person nor online learning available: “We simply cannot go online districtwide… because all of our students do not have laptops.”

One has to wonder what the district did with the additional $1.3 billion in federal COVID-19 relief funding it received last year—equivalent to $26,400 per student—according to the Mackinac Center.

In Massachusetts, the head of the state affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers is pushing for a return to remote instruction, wrongly arguing that returning to school for in-person learning “will inevitably make the [COVID-19] crisis much worse.”

According to a school tracker maintained by Burbio, as of early December, just 336 schools were closed. That figure now stands at over 3,200.

It would be much easier to keep believing in public education if our public educators did.

UM: Tesla increases price of Full-Self Driving to $12,000 as demand wanes.