KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEF: Humorless Democrat Marxists Are Terrified of the Babylon Bee. “America was a different place when I first went on the road doing stand-up. It seemed like everyone wanted to laugh back then. I would do gigs in big cities and medium-sized towns all over the country and they would all be packed. There was no political divide when it came to comedy. I kid you not, Republicans and Democrats would sit in the same audiences and laugh at the same things.”

ABOUT THAT PERMANENT DEMOCRATIC MAJORITY… As Democrats go hard left, Hispanics head to the center.

In a recent New York Magazine interview, Democratic pollster David Shor weighed in on his party’s performance in the 2020 election. Based on the interview, it appears that Democrats continue to interpret 2022 in the context of demographics, race and class and less about voters’ belief systems and positions on issues.

Give him credit: Shor does recognize that white liberal elites are pushing the party to the left and alienating certain voter groups, including Hispanics.

“We’ve ended up in a situation where white liberals are more left wing than Black and Hispanic Democrats on pretty much every issue: taxes, health care, policing, and even on racial issues or various measures of ‘racial resentment,’” he told the magazine. “So as white liberals increasingly define the party’s image and messaging, that’s going to turn off nonwhite conservative Democrats and push them against us.”

They’re not leaving the Democratic party — the Democratic party is leaving them.

JOE BIDEN’S RETURN TO CLEAN GOVERNMENT: The DOJ Is Investigating Hunter Biden, But ‘The Big Guy’ Nominated TWO DOJ Lawyers With Hunter Ties.

NICE: Attack Damages Iran’s Nuclear Centrifuge Manufacturing Facility. “The attack was said to have been carried out by a small drone against a manufacturing center used in the production of centrifuges.”

BRYAN PRESTON: A Terrible Day for the Republic: Biden and His Top General Strike at America’s Foundations. “Gen. Milley, America’s top soldier, gets within inches of trashing the United States Constitution, which he swore an oath to defend with his life.”

OH: Planned Parenthood sex-ed flyer telling 11-year-olds they could have sex, as long as the partner isn’t older than 13, distributed in WA public school.

SAY ANYTHING: Did Joe Biden Threaten American Gun Owners with F-15s and Nuclear Weapons?

“DO IT TO JULIA. NOT ME!”: First Capitol Rioter To Be Sentenced Receives Probation After Condemning Fellow Rioters In Court.

TODAY AT 3:30PM EASTERN: ‘Five O’Clock Somewhere’ Live Chat with Kruiser, Preston, VodkaPundit.

Cold drinks, hot takes.

GOOD GOVERNMENT (FOR A CHANGE): The DeSantis doctrine.

‘Maybe the best way to understand Ron DeSantis — who came out of nowhere for a lot of Americans outside Florida — is to know that he was a longtime Rush Limbaugh listener,’ says David Reaboi, a political communications consultant who lives in Miami Beach. ‘It’s not surprising that the governor has been on the leading edge of things conservatives care about, like Big Tech censorship, the trans issue or critical race theory. Conservatives really get a sense that DeSantis is “one of us”, because he is.’

Kristi Noem, the governor of South Dakota, thought she would retain the base’s loyalty after she refused to implement a mask mandate. But that goodwill vanished when she vetoed a bill banning biological men from competing in women’s sports. DeSantis signed a similar bill in Florida, then took on Big Tech, the Chinese Communist party and the cruise lines that wanted to require vaccine passports for passengers.

DeSantis’s critics claim his legislative victories are merely performative and will get struck down by courts. Others worry he is seeking state solutions to federal problems. DeSantis insists that he won’t sign ‘symbolic’ measures because there would be ‘no point’. When I asked him about potential lawsuits in response to his bill fining Big Tech for deplatforming political candidates, he had a coherent legal defense ready.

John Cardillo believes DeSantis is a ‘brilliant’ policymaker who understands how to use the law to his advantage.

He fights, to coin a phrase.

THAT’S NOT FUNNY: Facebook’s New Announcement on Satire Doesn’t Bode Well for the Babylon Bee. “Facebook will clarify the “satire exception” to its ‘Hate Speech’ rules, but the platform’s language suggests it may target The Babylon Bee.”

NOTHING TO SEE HERE, MOVE ALONG: Microsoft Exemption From Antitrust Bill Followed Company Donation to Top Democrat.

WHISTLEBLOWER: Georgia Conducted Secret Investigation of Tainted Ballots; Pressured Monitor To Recant Affidavit.

Cleanest. Election. Ever.

DON’T TRUST CHINA. CHINA IS ASSHOLE: They Relied on Chinese Vaccines. Now They’re Battling Outbreaks.

VODKAPUNDIT PRESENTS YOUR DAILY INSANITY WRAP: China Lied About COVID Again: Outbreak Might Have Begun Months Earlier.

Plus:

• Child neglect is a progressive, antiracist value
• How to tell if you’re the bad guy with this one easy test
• Donald Trump orders Taco Bell

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

GOOD: Iowa Teacher Loses Her Mind Because She Can’t Teach CRT Anymore.

ENRICHING OUR DESTROYERS: Iranian official says US agrees to lift Trump-era oil sanctions. “An Iranian official said on Wednesday the United States plans to lift all sanctions on Iran’s oil and shipping industries and delist some members of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s inner circle as part of efforts to restore the landmark nuclear agreement.”

EXCLUSIVE: Army Finally Defines ‘Extremism’ When It Comes to Screening Out ‘Hate Group’ Members. “Social justice content is leaking its way into the military through some mechanism. Now, the Army Recruitment Command uses subjective and easy-to-politicize criteria to identify potential ‘extremists’ who wish to enlist.”

LIES, DAMNED LIES, AND JEN PSAKI: White House Rewrites History With Claim That Republicans, Not Democrats, Tried To Defund The Police.

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

Matt Margolis: Was Meghan McCain Really That Blind About Joe Biden’s Abortion Radicalism? “How could she not have known how Biden would govern? Especially when he adopted his radical positions on abortion before taking office.”

Bryan Preston: Why These Two Races – Not the Ones You Probably Think – Are the Most Important in Texas in 2022. “As I’ve been saying and writing since inauguration, as the Biden administration uses executive orders to push its far-left agenda outside of Congress, it will be up to states to put up resistance.”

Yours Truly: We’re Leaving Afghanistan… Then What? “We’re leaving Afghanistan,” I recently asked an Air Force officer in a position to know these things, “So then what?”

EUROSCLEROSIS: Bosch’s New Fab And The State of European Semiconductors. “Back in the 1990s, Europe was competitive with American and Japanese semiconductor companies, with fabs built in the UK, Ireland, France, Germany, the Netherlands and even Italy. Today, of those countries, only Ireland (Intel) and Germany have any 300mm fabs at all, despite having a highly educated workforce and modern technological infrastructure. (Russia evidently has one as well, owned by Crocus Nano Electronics (about which I know next to nothing), also running 65nm, that started production in 2015.) Europe’s semiconductor industry has been passed not only by Taiwan and South Korea, but also by China.”

HE ISN’T EVEN A GOOD ACTOR: Tamir Rice’s Mom Tells Shaun King He Is ‘a White Man Acting Black.’

THAT’S NICE, BUT I’M STILL WAITING FOR THE BETA SERVICE TO GO LIVE HERE ON TOP OF MONUMENT HILL: SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet service expects global coverage this fall.

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEF: We Can’t Let the Psycho Marxist Democrats Win the Critical Race Theory Fight. “I’m one of those freaks who thinks that parents should have some say in what their children learn and how they grow up. That puts me at odds with almost every public school union teacher in the United States.”

THAT ’70S SHOW: Burrito Economics: Why Chipotle’s Wage Hikes Are Not Good News.

Even if the labor shortage is artificial, won’t the working class still benefit? The current workers certainly profit somewhat, but not for long if their rising wages are washed away by inflation. Price hikes are not restricted to burritos—prices across the economy are rising at the highest rates in over a decade.

The Federal Reserve contends that current inflation is “transitory.” If that bears out, then the economy will soon cool down. Supply chains will normalize, pandemic savings will be spent, and public benefits will expire in time for a wave of low-skilled workers to flood back into the slowing economy and stop wage growth in its tracks.

Alternatively, If the Fed is wrong and Deutsche Bank’s dire prediction of 1970s-style inflation holds true, then inflation will completely wipe out the gains of low-skilled workers into the foreseeable future. And once the sense of security brought by decades of low inflation disappears, the momentum of the new inflation expectations may carry it much further into the future than the pandemic recovery.

The picture gets even worse for low-wage workers who were enticed out of the labor market by generous benefits. They will have lost a year or more of work in which they may have been able to rise out of an entry-level job. Labor force experience is a significant factor in pay rates, and resume gaps make it tougher to find future work.

“We’re from the government and we’re here to help,” the wise man once warned us.