CHANGE: MTG Ousted From the House Freedom Caucus. “Depending on which source you access, Greene was given the gate for her support of Kevin McCarthy or for the issue with Boebert, during which Greene allegedly called Boebert a ‘little b***h’ on the House floor. Greene was irked that instead of supporting her original articles of impeachment against Biden, Boebert had filed her own, which made use of some procedural resources Greene had not accessed.”

CHANGE (IT BACK): Why the Marines Are Ditching Tanks and Howitzers to Prepare for America’s Next Big War. “The U.S. Marine Corps is undergoing its biggest reorganization in decades, slimming down and chopping weapon systems, such as tanks and howitzers, in an effort to become quicker, more agile, and more lethal, while specializing in operating in island chains and coastal areas. It’s all built on the service’s belief that the next war will resemble World War II far more than Iraq or Afghanistan.”

FIGHT THE GLEICHSCHALTUNG: The Latest Company to Lose Billions After Anti-Woke Backlash Won’t Shock You.

BIDENESQUE: NY Times Busts Eric Adams After Taking Closer Look at Fallen Officer Photo Story He Frequently Tells.

KEVIN DOWNEY JR: 25 Holiday Mass Shootings: 25 Killed, 161 Injured, 0 MAGA Hats Recovered.

CHRISTOPHER RUFO: Oregon’s Castration Machine.

The gender surgery program at Oregon Health & Science University, a public teaching hospital in downtown Portland, provides a productive tableau for analysis. The program is led by Blair Peters, a self-described “queer surgeon” who sports neon-pink hair, uses “he/they” pronouns, and specializes in vaginoplasty (the creation of an artificial vagina), phalloplasty (the creation of an artificial penis), and “non-binary” surgeries, which nullify the genitals altogether. Peters and his colleagues have pioneered the use of a vaginoplasty robot, which helps efficiently castrate male patients and turn their flesh into a “neo-vagina.”

Business is booming. According to Peters, OHSU’s gender surgery clinic has “the highest volume on the West Coast,” and his robot-assisted vaginoplasty program can accommodate two patients per day. His colleague Jens Berli, who specializes in phalloplasty, boasts a 12- to-18-month waiting list for a consultation and an additional three- to six-month waiting list for a surgical appointment.

This openness marks a revolution in manners and morals. In the past, transgender theorists acknowledged that their surgical transformations were disturbing and anti-normative. “I find a deep affinity between myself as a transsexual woman and the monster in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein,” wrote the male-to-female transgender theorist Susan Stryker in 1994. “I will say this as bluntly as I know how: I am a transsexual, and therefore I am a monster.”

Such views no longer prevail. Today’s transgender medical providers conceal the barbarity of their practices in euphemisms. They are not postmodern Dr. Frankensteins but providers of “life-saving, gender-affirming care.” The model patient is no longer the middle-aged autogynephile but the troubled teenager, sold a new identity, mediated through technology, that promises to resolve deep-seated sexual anxieties—and advance the political cause of transgender activists.

Read the whole thing.

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEFING: Pinkos, Stinkos, and Puerto Ricos: Damn it Feels Good to Be a Gangsta. “I spent the weekend at a Bud-Light-free celebration of American Independence in the great state of Michigan. I spoke to many patriotic revelers, while eating walleye, about the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) plan to enslave us in 6.5 years. NO ONE knew what I was talking about.”

Kevin Downey Jr is filling in for Kruiser today.

HMM: SpaceX Starlink satellites had to make 25,000 collision-avoidance maneuvers in just 6 months — and it will only get worse. “Data compiled by Lewis shows that, in the first half of 2021, Starlink satellites conducted 2,219 collision-avoidance maneuvers. The number grew to 3,333 in the following six-month period ending in December 2021 and then doubled to 6,873 between December 2021 and June 2022. In the second half of 2022, SpaceX had to alter the paths of its satellites 13,612 times to avoid potential collisions. In the latest report to the FCC, the company declared 25,299 collision-avoidance maneuvers over the past six months, with every satellite having been made to move an average of 12 times. “

SOD OFF, SWAMPY: WEF Partner Aimed to ‘End’ ‘Private Car Ownership’ to Save the Planet.

BIDEN’S ’70S SHOW: Bond Market Faces Reckoning From Inflation Boomerang.

Inflation can be thought of as a play in three acts. The 1970s are considered an imperfect analogy for today, but it in fact captures much of the essence of inflationary episodes.

In that period, we had the initial burst of inflation due to overly loose fiscal and monetary policy in the late 1960s. Then there were rate rises and a recession leading to a fall inflation, and a premature belief the worst was over. This was followed by a resurgence in CPI in the mid-1970s, ultimately requiring the Volcker rate sledgehammer to pacify it.

Today, however, that time period could be considerably compressed – with inflation beginning to rise again in as little as six months.

Much more at the link.

I’d add that there’s more inflationary pressure built into Biden’s “infrastructure” spending that hasn’t really kicked in yet. Worse, much of that will prove to be malinvestment that destroys the productivity gains the economy needs to catch up to Washington’s obscene money growth.

IT’S HIS SPECIALTY, REALLY: Gavin Newsom Says Something So Mind-numbingly Stupid, Only a Leftist Could Believe It.

IS KAMALA HARRIS GETTING THE SPIRO AGNEW TREATMENT?

NEW: The White House is now claiming the cocaine was found "in a much more secure place … near the Situation Room" and next to "where, for example, the vice president's vehicle is parked." pic.twitter.com/N17r8YJyVV

— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) July 6, 2023

INSTAPUNDIT: STILL 100% HUMAN! Liberal media company’s AI-generated articles enrage, embarrass staffers : ‘F—ing dogs–t.’ “It’s WILDLY inaccurate. Just complete dogs–t. Even straight up plagiarizing Forbes’ list would have been preferable, because at least then the numbers would have been right.”

OK, GROOMER: Guess What Teachers Union Groomers Are Assigning as Summer Reading.

ROBERT BRYCE: The Energy Transition Isn’t.

The numbers from the just-released Statistical Review of World Energy show, once again, that despite rapid growth in wind and solar, those two forms of energy are not even keeping pace with the growth in hydrocarbons. That’s true both globally and in the U.S.
…
In 2004, hydrocarbons provided 86% of global primary energy. The balance came from hydro, nuclear, and biomass. By 2022, hydrocarbons’ share of global primary energy had dropped by four percentage points, to 82%, wind and solar made up 5%, and the balance came from hydro, nuclear, and biomass. But in absolute terms, hydrocarbon consumption grew by 110 exajoules, (EJ), while wind and solar grew by just 32 EJ. Thus, the growth in hydrocarbon use over that time frame was 3.4 times faster than what was seen in wind and solar.

And here’s the key point: hydrocarbons are prevailing despite staggering amounts of spending on wind and solar. According to a January report by Bloomberg New Energy Finance, some $6.7 trillion was spent on alt-energy globally between 2004 and 2022, with the vast majority of that, some $4.8 trillion spent on renewables. And the vast majority of that $4.8 trillion — about $4.1 trillion — was spent on wind and solar.

Yes, but all the right people got their cut of the $4.1 trillion.

MEANWHILE, OVER AT VODKAPUNDIT: I Just Figured Out How to Fix Disney.

YOU CAN CHECK OUT ANY TIME YOU LIKE…: Threads profile can only be deleted by deleting Instagram account, Meta says. “Threads, Meta’s Twitter rival, is drawing users at an astounding pace, amassing 10 million signups in just seven hours, according to co-founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg. But the highly-anticipated new service, which requires an Instagram account for onboarding, features an intriguing stipulation: Deleting a Threads account requires deleting the linked Instagram account.”

KRUISER: NY Times Continues to Report on a Joe Biden Who Doesn’t Exist. “The alternative reality accounts of who Joe Biden is that I’ve read since 2020 have been like nothing I’ve ever seen, even during the eight years that these people were swooning over His High Holiness, the Lightbringer Barack Obama.”

THAT’S A BIG HAUL: Trump Raises $35 Million In Second-Quarter Fundraising.

RICHARD FERNANDEZ: The New Information World Order.

Meta has decided to launch its own social media app in a direct challenge to Twitter. The WSJ writes: “Let the battle begin. Facebook parent Meta Platforms on Wednesday announced the launch of Threads, a stand-alone microblogging app that takes direct aim at Twitter as user unrest in that platform has grown since Elon Musk took the company over in October.”

The rise of social media as a news source and opinion shaper is eating away at the influence of traditional media platforms. Fewer people, mostly oldsters, still watch TV. Already, “almost half of Americans use social media as a news source, according to the Pew Research Center.” With the 2024 elections right around the corner, Musk’s acquisition of Twitter cannot go unanswered.

But the phenomenon is larger than just confirming the increasing importance of social media for news. Many separate pieces are moving toward what might be called a new information system that will have far more potential impact than the old tube. Social media, AI and even crypto are converging in as yet poorly understood ways to comprise an emerging environment.

All the players are still trying to build silos though, which do no favors to the free flow of information that the internet originally promoted.

SCHOOL CHOICE: Pa. Gov. Shapiro says he will scrap school vouchers in end-run on Senate Republicans. “The Democrat issued a statement Wednesday acknowledging that talks had deadlocked over a $100 million voucher program, which he had supported and which state Senate Republicans passed as part of their budget proposal last week. Pennsylvania House Democratic leaders oppose vouchers and had refused to act on the Senate’s bill.”

GET WOKE…: Wealth Shifted to Red States as Blue States Bled Money.

The Promise and Pitfalls of an “Israel Model” for Ukraine.

Arming a state rather than allying with it formally can be an effective way to promote defense and deterrence without running the risks of binding treaty commitments. But a deeper understanding of the transformation of the US-Israel relationship over the last half-century suggests that there are likely to be both pros and cons to applying the Israel model in Ukraine. If policymakers do pursue this path, history suggests pitfalls of which they should be aware.

The most obvious benefit of building an Israel-style relationship with Ukraine is that it is one of the most efficient ways to strengthen Ukrainian deterrence and enable that country to defend itself. Indeed, in some ways, the United States has already spent the last 18 months building such a relationship with Ukraine. In the case of Israel, the United States has committed to maintain the country’s “qualitative military edge” to compensate for a quantitative disadvantage. To offset this numerical superiority, Israel relies on advanced technologies, much of which it acquires through foreign military sales and aid from the United States. The ways in which the United States is currently supporting Ukraine — including providing top-of-the-line weapons — are remarkably similar. Though they will not single-handedly enable Ukraine to win a war, Western systems such as Stinger missiles or Leopard tanks have been essential in helping Ukraine to damage and repel larger and better-equipped Russian forces. Committing to maintain Ukraine’s qualitative edge over the longer-term would largely be a recognition and formalization of existing practice.

NATO doesn’t import wars or even border disputes, which is why countries like Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova have had their participation limited to the Partnership for Peace program. Assuming Ukraine still exists after this current war, something like the “Israel model” makes sense.

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEFING: Defund Rich Anti-Capitalist Hippies—Ben & Jerry’s Episode. “The thing about the ’60s hippies is that most of them embrace capitalism. They just aren’t allowed to admit it. Give them free rein in cities like Ann Arbor or Santa Monica and they are making BANK. And by ‘free rein,’ I don’t mean no government interference; I mean favorable government interference to the right people. Lefties really take care of their own.”

HUNTER’S OR SOMEONE ELSE’S, OF COURSE THEY KNOW WHOSE IT IS:

"A senior law-enforcement official told CBS News the substance was found “in a storage facility in a cubby routinely used by White House staff & guests to store cell phones."

Umm…I know where that is. As such, the WH knows full well whose it is.https://t.co/VTrEu8qHov

— cdrsalamander (@cdrsalamander) July 5, 2023