Author Archive: Stephen Green

JOANNE JACOBS: Why teachers quit: ‘It was the wild West.’ “Another complained that behavior expectations kept changing. Instead of automatic punishments for disrespect, insubordination and violence, teachers were told to ‘have a buddy role.'”

DON’T GET COCKY:

MUCH MORE LIKE THIS, PLEASE:

CHRISTIAN TOTO: Trump Effect? Oscar Ratings Crater in Second Term.

These celebrity galas often feast on anti-Trump lectures, be it those “ICE out” pins or mocking the First Family. The messages may differ, but the target is typically the same.

President Trump.

And, as a result, Hollywood, Inc. watched awards show ratings slump.

Their ratings stabilized somewhat during the Biden years, but with Trump back in office, the ratings decline resumed. Just look at the just-released Oscar numbers.

Also, Hollywood largely stopped making (and awarding) movies people want to see. Trump or no Trump, why tune in to see which movie you never even heard of won Best Picture?

IT WOULD TAKE A HEART OF STONE NOT TO LAUGH:

UM…:

BLUE STATE BLUES: Virginians At More Risk Thanks to Soros-Funded Prosecutors. “At the exact moment Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger and a Democrat-majority legislature are ramming through additional gun control measures restricting the Constitutional rights of law-abiding Virginians, those responsible for putting bad guys who break the law behind bars are instead going easy and putting peaceful Virginians at risk. That includes the risk of getting murdered.”

More details at the link than I would have imagined.

THIS IS A SPECIES OF CORRUPTION:

From the replies: “Yet Chief Justice Roberts backhands the President, whilst doing nothing to stop political activists masquerading as Judges.”

Related:

Moral authority is the judiciary’s real currency, and they’re embarrassing drunken sailors with their reckless spending.

GOODER AND HARDER, NEW YORK: Mamdani’s 15 mph speed limit isn’t about safety, it’s a money grab.

At a time when New Yorkers are already struggling with affordability, the mayor’s proposal risks becoming something else entirely: another automated toll on drivers.

Let’s start with the obvious question critics have already raised: Why would school-zone limits apply 24 hours a day?

Kids aren’t walking to school at midnight.

They aren’t crossing streets at 3 a.m.

Yet drivers could still be ticketed in the middle of the night for exceeding the limit in an empty school zone.

That’s not a safety policy. It turns speed cameras into toll booths.

And the money involved isn’t trivial.

New York City already collects hundreds of millions of dollars each year from speed-camera tickets, according to city reports. Expanding enforcement to thousands of locations means dramatically increasing the number of places where those cameras can issue fines.

One way or another, New Yorkers will be made to pay for Mamdani’s schemes.

ARM THE BRITS:

PAST PERFORMANCE DOES NOT GUARANTEE FUTURE RESULTS…:

…but I wouldn’t bet against Elon, either.

SOCIAL MEDIA — OR AT LEAST X — IS THE PLACE TO GIVE THEM THE ATTENTION THEY DESERVE:

MAKE IRAN ZOROASTRIAN AGAIN: Defiant Iranians celebrate ancient fire festival despite war.

As dusk falls across Iran on Tuesday, bonfires, fireworks and street gatherings take place to mark Chaharshanbeh Suri, an ancient fire festival that has also become a public act of defiance, this year unfolding under war, heavy security and fears of bloodshed.

Iranian authorities have issued stark warnings ahead of Chaharshanbeh Suri, pointing to what they describe as wartime conditions and the risk of unrest.

Nevertheless, Iranians celebrated the festival.

I guess stark warnings don’t mean much right now.

CHANGE?

THE ENEMY WITHIN:

China is a problem. But certain parts of the intel community are a bigger and more immediate problem.

THIS IS CNN: CNN’s Man in Iran Tacitly Admits He Had a ‘Minder’ Who Informed Regime.

CNN had repeatedly insisted that senior international correspondent Fred Pleitgen and the network maintained “full editorial control” about what they reported when the former was in inside Iran. But, in an interview with the U.K.-based newspaper The Guardian, which was less of an interview and more just answering prompts, Pleitgen asserted that he and his cameraman didn’t have a “minder” lurking over them. Yet, when he described who guided him around and what he was allowed to see, it very much sounded like a minder.

“Did you have a minder? Were you taken around by someone?” asked Guardian’s media and power reporter Jeremey Barr. A minder in this case being someone who worked with/for the regime who would shadow or guide a foreign journalist, who would only show them what the regime wanted, or to be a constant reminder the regime was in control over their stay and life.

Pleitgen initially suggest they CNN didn’t have a minder, but they did have “a guy” who showed them around and translated. He began to say the guy “obviously” had some sort of duty before cutting himself off and noting that the regime had asked the guy not to show them certain places.

Read the whole, and remember that this kind of thing is nothing new for the network: How CNN hid the truth about Saddam and betrayed the world.

NIFTY:

Although I’d be surprised if the Pentagon (and Israel, too) hadn’t already figured this one out.

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEFING: I SO Did Not Have ‘Gayatollah’ Khamenei on My Bingo Card. “Please believe me, dear readers, that I desperately want to be more mature about this story because this is a newsletter, after all. Then again, I am the snarky opinion guy around here and you’re all familiar with my observational peculiarities. Please know that my tongue is being figuratively bitten to avoid any fanciful pictures I might want to paint about a mullah bath house that pipes in Adam Lambert music all day.”