Facebook's algorithm bans a passage from the Declaration of Independence

Remember earlier this month when Facebook's algorithm banned a passage from the Declaration of Independence? Jim Goad looks into it at Taki's Magazine.

On July 2, Facebook’s indefatigable legions of Hate Robots censored a post as “hate speech” because it dared to contain a passage from the Declaration of Independence:

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

The three words everyone zeroed in on were “merciless Indian savages.” The only thing inaccurate in the term “merciless Indian savages” is the word “Indian,” but facts don’t matter in an era where moral outrage is forever on the warpath.



According to Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker:

Contra leftist anthropologists who celebrate the noble savage, quantitative body-counts—such as the proportion of prehistoric skeletons with axemarks and embedded arrowheads or the proportion of men in a contemporary foraging tribe who die at the hands of other men—suggest that pre-state societies were far more violent than our own.

Read more here.

You are for monogamy? You must be a homophobe!

At The College Fix, Greg Piper brings us a report on

Students criticize hiring of theoretical physicist because he defends monogamy.

They want ‘safe spaces’ from him.



Aron Wall was not a fan of the 2015 Supreme Court decision that took marriage policy away from the states and federalized same-sex marriage.

The postdoctoral researcher at the University of California-Santa Barbara, who studies “quantum gravity and black hole thermodynamics,” wrote a lengthy blog post three years ago on “the implications of gay marriage for the culture” in light of the ruling.

Citing both his Christian beliefs and the history of homosexual relations across cultures, Wall questioned whether American gay couples would adopt “the norms and practices of heterosexual married couples” in light of research that half of such couples are not monogamous with each other.

His main argument was the value of monogamy:

Like anyone else, what gay people need is to turn to Christ and learn to live in freedom from the harmful fleshly desires which are indeed part of the human condition for everyone. But if they cannot accept this, it is far better that they should live in a committed exclusive relationship, than that they should live the notoriously promiscuous, reckless, and obscene lifestyle characteristic of the cultural venues of the gay community. (Note: I do not identify all gay individuals or couples as being members of this “gay community”; those are different things.)

Without even linking his blog post, The Cambridge News reduced Wall’s thoughtful and nuanced argument to his “promiscuous, reckless and obscene” line and implied it referred to all gay people and couples. It called his views “homophobic.”

Now that the researcher (left) has been hired by Cambridge University’s math department, student activists are claiming the presence of a Christian with typical beliefs on sexuality threatens them.

Wall might not make it to his start date in January, given this rhetoric that his views violate the university’s diversity and inclusion statement:

Cambridge University Student Union’s (CUSU) LGBT+ campaign president Alistair Hyde … questioned whether the department’s hiring process was ‘careful or thorough enough.’

Read more here.

Keep it up, Democrats!

In American Greatness, Christopher Roach takes a look at the Democratic Party since about 1968 and then writes,

The Democratic Party that nominated Hillary Clinton had an already left-leaning establishment, but it was a hybrid of managerial-class leftism that also endorsed global free trade, “humanitarian” wars, and the tech economy. Like the Bolshevik street fighters who morphed into the Soviet Union’s staid nomenklatura class, the left under Obama was in charge not only of the state, but of the major institutions of culture, like the media, universities, and cutting-edge businesses.

...The Democratic Party’s leadership and activists were united, however, in ditching its old identity as a party of the “working man.” Instead, it became a party for the elites and of the dependent. After all, the unions were now smaller and mostly in the hands of government employees, not industrial workers, who began trending Republican as early as 1972, giving Richard Nixon his victory under the banner of “law and order” and the “silent majority.”

Just as Democrats have taken their voters for granted—presenting octogenarians like Dianne Feinstein and Nancy Pelosi as the proper spokesman for their black, brown, gay, and poor voters—working-class Republicans weren’t exactly thrilled by cuts in the capital gains tax cut, nor the stagnant wages that had prevailed since the 1970s. That is, they were Republican more for social issues than economic, even though the party rarely delivered on any issues other than the economic. Even so, the Democrats’ increasing emphasis on multiculturalism, gay rights, and open borders Left them cold.

Trump won by appealing to this group’s interests and concerns (and idiomatic modes of expression) directly, realizing that working-class whites were the heart of the swing vote, not the mythical “economically conservative, socially liberal” cohort of Republican strategists’ fantasies. This quasi-libertarian group is numerically insignificant and already bolted for the Democrats under Obama or by now have revealed the cloven hoof by explicitly opposing Trump, even as he undertook conservative policies.

Trump won by appealing to this group’s interests and concerns (and idiomatic modes of expression) directly, realizing that working-class whites were the heart of the swing vote, not the mythical “economically conservative, socially liberal” cohort of Republican strategists’ fantasies. This quasi-libertarian group is numerically insignificant and already bolted for the Democrats under Obama or by now have revealed the cloven hoof by explicitly opposing Trump, even as he undertook conservative policies.

Purity Tests and Failure
The Democratic Party’s embrace of its left wing has done Donald Trump and the Republican Party a great service. Obama, after all, won in 2008 and 2012 by pretending to be a moderate, deploying unifying rhetoric, and providing social services, including affordable healthcare, to the middle class. Only after his 2012 win did he revert to his Hyde Park socialist background, taking sides on contentious issues like the Trayvon Martin shooting and the anti-police riots in Ferguson. In his second term, he finally decided to push for gun control and the normalization of transgenders in schools and the military. Most importantly, he made it clear that he would do nothing to stop the demographic re-engineering of America and its electorate by stopping immigration, instead, he de facto legalized the-so-called Dreamers through executive order.

As the continuity candidate, Clinton lost. The voters found a voice and a choice in Trump. Instead of going back to the drawing board—as Democrats did with Bill Clinton and his Democratic Leadership Council candidacy in 1992—they have instead shown they think the party simply needs to shout their message more loudly and with greater purity.

Midterms are usually a good time for voters to express their unease with a single party in power, but voter support for Trump has proven remarkably durable. Indeed, even after June’s “month of the border kids,” Trump is hanging strong at nearly 48 percent approval. Outside of a few K Street and think-tank cranks, the NeverTrump phenomenon has dissipated, as traditional Republicans have seen the importance of issues like Supreme Court nominations, solid moves on taxes and regulations, as well as surprising agility by Trump on matters of foreign policy.

Perhaps the most important thing has been the boomerang effect of Democratic attacks on Trump; because people interested in politics belong in some sense to a team, these attacks have encouraged certain Republicans, otherwise uneasy with President Trump, to defend him reflexively—particularly when the attacks are made in an unhinged way.

It may seem quaint, but there are people who think the president and the people who elected him are due a certain degree of deference and respect. Perhaps the Democrats will have to lose a few elections in a row to rethink their strategy. In the meantime, thanks.

Read more here.

Benefiting big agribusinesses at the expense of family farms.

Whowrites better editorials than Investors Business Daily? Their latest is about cheese.

A Mountain Of Surplus Cheese, Brought To You By The Federal Government
Subsidies: According to the federal government, almost 1.4 billion pounds of surplus cheese now sit in refrigerated warehouses around the country. Yet dairy production is climbing. What gives?

X
The amount of surplus cheese is growing fast — up 6% in just the past year.

According to news accounts, the reason is that dairy production is climbing, while dairy consumption is falling. Data from the Department of Agriculture show that between 2008 and 2017, milk production in the U.S. climbed 13%.

Over those same years, however, consumption has sagged — with per capita milk consumption down 14%, USDA data show.

The surplus milk gets stored as cheese. If formed into one giant wheel, the current 1.39-billion-pound cheese surplus would be about as big as the U.S. Capitol Building.

Two years ago, the Obama administration effectively bailed out the industry, when it bought up $20 million worth — 11 million pounds — of cheese, which it then used for food assistance programs. But the stockpile has grown 16% since then.

If all this sounds odd, it is.

In what other industry would you find producers continuing to ramp up production while demand slides, and then stuffing the growing pile of surplus into warehouses, hoping the federal government will buy some of it?

What makes the dairy industry different is decades of government efforts to "support" dairy farmers with various subsidy schemes. The 2014 farm bill did away with old federal price support programs, but replaced them with heavily subsidized insurance that essentially guarantees margins for those who sign up. This year, the dairy industry successfully lobbied Congress to expand this subsidy program.

Distorting the Market
By interfering with pricing signals, the effect of these subsidies has been to encourage production, almost regardless of market demand. It's a problem not just with the dairy industry, but with other agricultural products on the receiving end of government largesse.

Each year, in fact, taxpayers fork over more than $20 billion to subsidize corn, soybeans, wheat, cotton, rice, dairy and a few other commodities. Critics of these subsidies say that not only do these programs distort the market, but they tend to benefit big agribusinesses at the expense of family farms.

The 2014 bill was supposed to include provisions to prevent dairy overproduction, but clearly it hasn't worked as intended.

Dairy farmers say they need these programs to survive. We doubt that. Like every other industry, they'd learn to adapt to market changes.

In the meantime, ask yourself this question: Why should taxpayers hand over their hard-earned money to protect other people's jobs in a declining industry?

Judge Kavanaugh, Diversity, Elect legislators who will stop the administrative state from trying to rule over us, Pedophiles want to be included in the LGBT community.

Andrew spends the first half of the show talking about Judge Kavanaugh. Jenna Ellis is a guest and she approves of the pick, as does Andrew.

Andrew does "d" for diversity as this week's entry in the Leftese dictionary. Diverse people must not be diverse in their thoughts, beliefs, or opinions. In Leftese, that's what diversity means, being the same!

Andrew's next guest is Matthew Peterson from the Claremont Institute. Judge Kavanaugh has opined that unelected administrative bodies ruling over us is not in the Constitution! Peterson explains that the administrative state has more and more usurped power that should be the prerogative of the legislative branch. They are difficult to fire, so they are not being controlled by the executive. Congress is not doing a good job of controlling them, as we see in the Obama DOJ and FBI scandals.

The progressive era, when Woodrow Wilson was president, said the Constitution was outdated. "We need people who are rational experts who we can put in charge and they are going to make things go smoothly. Over the last century that expert class has been put into place to rule over us and objectively solve our problems! We need to elect legislators who understand the problem, and hold these agencies accountable!

Pedophiles want to be included in the LGBT community. They are rebranding themselves as MATS, minor attracted persons! So now it would be LGBTM. Andrew says the M would stand for monsters. It is not your identity. It is a compulsion, something you want to do.

Women's suffrage

Gail Heriot writes at Instapundit,

ON THIS DAY IN 1890, WYOMING BECAME A STATE: There’s an interesting backstory here: The Wyoming Territory’s constitution had been the first to guarantee women the right to vote. But when Wyoming initially applied for statehood, this created controversy. Fearing that women in long-established states would be emboldened by Wyoming’s example, some Members of Congress initially insisted that Wyoming withdraw women’s right to vote. But the Wyoming legislature stood its ground and cabled back to Congressional leaders, “We will remain out of the Union one hundred years rather than come in without the women.”

Congress eventually relented, and before the turn of the century, there were four women’s suffrage states–Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, and Idaho.

Some of Judge Kavanaugh's opinions

In Reason, Jonathan Adler takes some time to review some of Judge Kavanaugh's opinions. Read more here.

All have been rescued in Thailand!

The Guardian reports,

Hooyah!
All twelve members of a boy’s football team and their coach have been rescued, after being trapped in a cave in Thailand for 18 days. The Thai Navy Seals, who have been running the operation, confirmed that all 13 were out. “We are not sure if this is a miracle, a science or what”, the Seals said on their Facebook page.
Three navy seals and a doctor, who had been with the boys, emerged safely from the cave several hours later. The four boys and their coach rescued on Tuesday have been airlifted to hospital to join their eight teammates rescued on Sunday and Monday.

Read more here.

We meet Judge Kavanaugh and his family

Trump: "The Supreme Court is entrusted with the safeguarding of the crown jewel of our republic, the Constitution!"

Kavanaugh: "A judge must be independent and interpret the law, not make the law! I teach at Harvard that the Constitution's separation of powers protects individual liberties. ...I am part of the vibrant Catholic community in the DC area. Kavanaugh is proud that most of his law clerks have been women (what is wrong with male law clerks?), and he serves meals to the homeless via Catholic Charities. He coaches girl's basketball, and the girls call him Coach K! His wife is from Abilene, Texas (where I went to college). His first date with his wife, Ashley, was on 9-10-2001. He has run the Boston Marathon twice.

Shannon Breen says that Rand Paul may have problems supporting Kavanaugh. I didn't understand what Rand's concern is.

Sean Hannity plays tape of Clarence Thomas's famous "high tech lynching" by the US Senate during hearings on his nomination, before he served this nation as one of the most distinguished Supreme Court Justices in our history. Now the Democrats will try again to tarnish the name of the newest justice.

Sean had a great lineup of guests, including Judge Jeanine Pirro and Andrew McCarthy, but Sean just could not stop sermonizing, so neither of them were heard from in tonight's program.

Keep people healthier, for longer!

In New Atlas, Michael Irving brings us news of

How hardy volcanic microbes helped track down an anti-aging "superhero" protein.

Hardy microbes that make their home in volcanic pools may hold the key to a new anti-aging drug(Credit: fyletto/Depositphotos)
A team of scientists, looking to figure out how hardy little creatures known as archaea thrive in boiling, volcanic pools of sulfuric acid like they were hot tubs, may have uncovered the key to an anti-aging drug. By manipulating a so-called "super hero" protein common to both archaea and humans, the researchers found a way to "trick" cells into acting younger by keeping the DNA repairing process running much longer than usual.

In previous studies, the researchers examined how archaea have managed to survive in such harsh conditions for billions of years. Eventually they determined that a protein called ssB1 was responsible by helping the organisms repair damage to their DNA. The team says the real eureka moment came when they discovered that we humans have our own versions of this protein, hSSB1.

"In normal cells, ssB1 is like a guardian angel that is looking after the genetic code and, if there is any damage, we see it rush in to repair that damage," says Derek Richard, co-author of the study. "But, as we age, we lose parts of our genetic code, and that is the foundation for diseases such as cancer and Alzheimer's. When we found that ssB1 was helping the archaea to repair its damaged DNA, we realized we might have stumbled across the basis for a new cellular treatment for humans, to control our aging pathway and keep people healthier, for longer."

The researchers examined how hSSB1 functions in humans, and discovered it works through a pathway that seems to control aging. The team found that as we get older our bodies down-regulate hSSB1 and related proteins, which slows down the DNA repair process, leading to a whole range of health problems.

"The big link between cancer and aging is DNA repair," says Ken O'Byrne, co-author of the study. "As we age, our target protein starts to function differently and allows our genome to be damaged and this damage can cause cancer."

Go here to read more and watch a video.

Brett Kavanaugh is Trump's pick

Trump's pick for the Supreme Court is Brett Kavanaugh. All Glenn Reynolds has to say is,

IT’S BRETT KAVANAUGH. With a narrow majority, Trump goes for a safe pick. Of course, he’ll still be Hitler. Because whoever the nominee was, he or she was going to be Hitler.

Trump to release classified JFK assassination documents tomorrow

Dick Morris says that tomorrow President Trump is going to release all the classified information on the JFK assassination. JFK's Vice President, LBJ, was the target of two Senate investigations prior to the assassination. One was about bribery, with LBJ's buddy Bobby Baker handing out the bribes to senators. The second: Johnson had a monopoly on the radio and t.v. market in the Austin, Texas area and he worked with the FCC to protect that monopoly. Those two investigations were coming to fruition right at the time JFK went to Dallas. JFK's assistant, Evelyn Lincoln, told LBJ's biographer, Robert Caro, that JFK had planned to drop Johnson from the ticket. Was Johnson involved in the assassination? Morris says there is some evidence that he was!

Johnson had close contacts with the mob in New Orleans and Dallas and with the police departments in those areas. Jack Ruby, who killed Oswald, was also heavily involved with the mob.

The Deep State did not like JFK. The Warren Commission was heavily influenced by the Deep State.

Morris video here.

Ted Cruz's f-bomb-dropping opponent

In Texas, Senator Ted Cruz has an energetic, f-bomb-dropping Democrat running hard against him. Politico has a very long article about Democrat Beto O'Rourke.

...he intends to keep up the relentless campaigning. Among other initiatives, O’Rourke is planning a monthlong road trip across the state during the August recess. Cruz will be stuck in Washington because Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell canceled his chamber’s recess. It’s the sort of lucky break O’Rourke will need a lot of in the months ahead.

Read more here.

"We know where you live!"

You are what you do! Andrew shows a video of fat thugs following 76-year-old Senator McConnell out of a restaurant in Kentucky, calling him "turtlehead" and saying, "We know where you live!"

Andrew is troubled by the fact that the Episcopal church denomination wants to eliminate gender when referring to God. The problem is that the Word of God uses gender when referring to God! Who knows best, the Bible or the Episcopal Church?

Leftist harassment continues

Ace of Spades has a rundown on the latest rude behaviors of Leftists.

Mitch McConnell chased from Kentucky restaurant by "protesters." From CNN:

One man can be heard calling the senator "turtle head" and repeatedly saying "we know where you live" as the senator and two dining companions climb into their parked vehicle.

In a recent Washington Post regarding the topic of harassment Trump officials receive in public, Presidential Counsel Kellyanne Conway recalled how a man harassed her while she was shopping in a supermarket for her family. Kellyanne, a mother of four, was shopping when an angry man sneered, “You ought to be ashamed of yourself! Go look in the mirror!”

Without missing a beat, Kellyanne replied, “Mirrors are in aisle nine — I’ll go get one now.”

“What am I gonna do?” Kellyanne tells the Post, “Fall apart in the canned vegetable aisle?”

Stephen Miller was harassed by a bartender at a sushi takeout joint, who followed the Trump aide into the street, giving him the finger and cursing him.

Miller threw out the $80 of sushi he'd just bought -- probably suspecting it had been adulterated by this hateful crew.

Also, they're posting "Wanted" posters of his face around his residence, which certainly seems like a method to encourage a crazy to shoot at him.

In a definite escalation of this new "confrontation" culture, a man harassed Steve Bannon at an independent bookstore. The bookstore's manager told the "protester" to stop it; he didn't, so the bookstore manager called the cops on him.

Perfectly reasonable -- someone was being disruptive in his store, so he called a cop.

The left doesn't see it this way -- they see this small businessman as viciously thwarting a fellow leftist's Right to Harass and Stalk People. So Hillary Clinton campaign advisor Phillipe Reines actually tweeted out the bookstore's address and phone number, with the obvious suggestion that the left now turn to harassing the bookstore owner for refusing to allow his bookstore for purposes of leftist harassment.

Four more Thai boys rescued; Four more plus their coach yet to be saved

Sundance reports at The Conservative Treehouse,

Four more Thai schoolboys have been rescued from the underwater cave complex in Northern Thailand during the second mission. This brings the total rescued to eight so far with four remaining and one adult; their soccer coach.

Read more here.

Check your pre-packed vegetable trays!

David Morris reports at Fortune,

Two hundred twelve people have been infected with an intestinal parasite in four upper Midwest states after reportedly eating pre-packed vegetable trays under the Del Monte Fresh Produce brand, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The trays were purchased at various retailers including Kwik Trip or Kwik Star convenience stores.

The outbreak was first tracked by the CDC in mid-June, and is most severe in Wisconsin. As many as 54 cases have also been reported in Minnesota, along with a handful in Iowa and Michigan. Seven victims have been hospitalized, according to the CDC.

Read more here.

Homeopathy vs. Allopathy

Patricia Rattray explains in her soon-to-be-published book, Medical Policing: A Modern Day Witch Hunt,

Homeopathy is a specific medicine that is the polar opposite of allopathic medicine. Allopathic drugs use chemicals, many of which are poisons, which are antagonistic to the body’s symptoms and force suppression of the symptoms. Allopathy means “allo” or against “pathology” or illness. Homeopathy uses minuscule amounts or nanoparticles of substances, that in the gross form produce the same symptoms that the body is experiencing, thus the name “similar illness.” For some reason not clearly understood (except for often dramatic effects), this stimulates the body to heal its disease state. To date five Nobel laureates in science have come out in favor of homeopathy.

The hit job on Jim Jordan

@Brenda06135 lives in Ohio and has been doing research on the hit job on Jim Jordan. Read it here, and keep Congressman Jordan in your prayers.

How healthy are we?

I am reading a yet-to-be-published book by Patricia Rattray. It is entitled, Medical Policing: A Modern Day Witch Hunt. From Chapter Six, Health and Medicine:

...The U.S. ranks 30th in life expectancy, below every other economically developed country. In healthy life expectancy, meaning free of chronic illness, the US ranks 20th among industrialized nations. The United States has a higher infant mortality rate than any of the other 27 wealthy countries. A baby born in the U.S. is nearly three times as likely to die during the first year of life as one born in Finland or Japan.“

...Forty-five percent of Americans now suffer from some form of chronic illness: asthma, diabetes, thyroid problems, high blood pressure, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer's, Multiple Sclerosis, Crohn’s, and IBS to name a few.

...One in two men and one in three women in the US will get cancer in their lifetime.

Diabetes is now epidemic, asthma is now epidemic, thyroid disease is now epidemic.

One in every six children in the US has a developmental disability, such as autism, attention deficit disorder or cerebral palsy.

Autism is up 200 to 400 percent country-wide and up 2000 percent in California, where a quarter of all pesticides used in the US are applied.

...One in six adult Americans are on psychiatric drugs.

One in thirteen American children are on a psychiatric drug.

“The Cato Institute of Washington, D.C., reports that … in the U.S. about 83 million people suffer insomnia, 70 million people have severe headaches, 32 million have arthritis, 23 million have allergies, and 16 million have bad backs. Organically and chemically generated toxins can trigger many of these health problems. Also, on this list of environmentally triggered diseases are cancer, multiple
sclerosis, heart disease, asthma, joint deterioration, gastrointestinal illness and premature aging. Experts in the field indicate that as many as 25% of our population will become chemically sensitive during their lifetimes.”
Cato Institute (citation)

More to come as I read further.

They are starting back up again!

Kindness

Look at the kindness from this little child who has no hands or fingers. Obviously, no one has taught that child that he or she is a victim yet!

Humanity. pic.twitter.com/7mI3DwrByX

— Ali A. Rizvi (@aliamjadrizvi) July 5, 2018

Ignorant, though opinionated!

Although President Trump will not be announcing who is his Supreme Court pick until tomorrow night, Campus Reform decided to pretend like he had already announced his pick, and went to New York City to ask people what they thought of the pick.

Bragging about caving to Commies!

Susan Crabtree writes at The Washington Free Beacon

The mother of one of four young American men killed by the Castro regime in 1996 is decrying new details of the secret shuttle diplomacy that preceded the Obama administration's rapprochement with Cuba, which a top Obama official revealed this week.

Read her article here.

Feminism and the American family

How has feminism affected the American family? Not well, according to Mona Charen at The New York Post.

Most women want and need upright, well-adjusted, dependable men to serve as co-anchors of healthy and happy families. The feminist movement was deeply misguided to take aim at marriage. Far from oppressing women, it offers a safe foundation for a full life.

Read more here.

What led to the #WalkAway movement?

Clarice Feldman, at American Thinker, does her usual fine job of surveying lots of articles. This time the subject is an overview of what the Democratic Party has been doing which has led to the #WalkAway movement.
Read it here.

Rescue efforts in Thailand

In The Daily Wire, Emily Zanotti brings us up to date on the rescue efforts in Thailand.

...Four boys — described by rescuers as the "weakest" of the group — emerged from the caves in the care of elite Thai Navy SEAL divers Sunday morning, and were immediately rushed into ambulances and taken to local hospitals. Each of the other eight boys, and their coach, have been assigned a "buddy team" of two elite divers who will guide them on an "hours-long" trek out of the caves.

Read more here and pray for them!

Oh, so that's what those aprons are for!

Conceal carry wins again! pic.twitter.com/FW7tnLn2HK

— Oliver McGee PhD MBA (@OliverMcGee) July 7, 2018

Read the story here.

Trying to sell meth in a courtroom

I can understand being impatient waiting for the judge to show up, but a courtroom might not be the best place to try to sell meth! Heather Oney reports in Kentucky.com,

Three people are behind bars after one woman allegedly tried to sell methamphetamine in a Magoffin County courtroom.

Telby Fields, 24, of Mount Olive, Kentucky, was in court on Monday, July 2, for a scheduled court date in an earlier 2018 case in which she was charged with third-degree terroristic threatening. While sitting in the back waiting for the judge to appear, Fields reportedly asked at least three other people waiting in the courtroom if they would be interested in buying methamphetamine from her.

A security officer overheard the transactions and told Magoffin County Sheriff Department Detective Neil Adams.

The three were in a car with Indiana license plates, though the plates did not match the car, Sheriff Montgomery told the Independent. Law enforcement found approximately 35 grams of methamphetamine, scales, hundreds of plastic bags, and a BB gun that looked like a real pistol in the car.

Go here to see photos of her two lovely male companions and read the rest of the story here.

Socialism in America, Social Media censorship, FBI in a rush to stop Trump's election

Another excellent show by Tucker Carlson last night.

Carter Page is a guest. He is the man FBI agents Strzok and Page defamed in their corrupt attempt to stop Trump.

Do we have a labor shortage? No, says Steven Camarota of the Center for Immigration Studies.

Socialism is popular with Millennials. Wages are low and they can't afford to buy a house.

San Francisco, one of America's most beautiful cities, is now coated in human waste and discarded syringes.

Revenge porn is the posting online of naked pictures without the consent of the naked. The New York legislature wanted to ban it, but Google came in at the last minute and demanded lots of changes in the bill, which then was defeated. Is Google giving funds to politicians?

Iranian harassment of US ships

"We are in bad times, with much worse to come."

At American Greatness, Victor Davis Hanson writes under this headline: History's Bad Ideas are an Inspiration to Progressives.

...progressives see the court as an arm of the progressive movement that can enact social justice otherwise impossible either through referenda or their elected representatives. They see it as their own private domain (better even than the social fiat power of the armed forces) and essential to checking the ignorance of the irredeemables and deplorables.

...The nihilistic idea of nullification helped spark the Civil War. The few times the lethal gambit was repeated—we all remember George Wallace in 1963 standing in the door of the University of Alabama, defying federally ordered integration—it was usually smashed, given its ultimate logic was the replacement of America by the Founders’ nightmare of weak, feuding, and warring antithetical sovereign nations.

...In fact, the Left has resurrected an entire host of once discredited ideas from the nation’s past that reveal the new illiberal progressive ethos and remind us why those practices were odious in the first place. A new drive to limit free speech is underway, not just on campuses but also on social media. The effort is almost entirely progressive-driven and based on the assumption that what people sometimes say and think does not contribute to a progressive narrative, especially when it is more logical and persuasive than the efforts of the censors.

Nullification has indeed resulted in an emasculation of immigration law and helped redefine even criminal illegal aliens as victims of unfair federal intrusions rather than perpetrators of often violent crime.

Safe spaces empower the entire identity politics movement and bully anyone who sees a naked racist emperor arrayed in progressive robes.

Barring entry to a customer, or forcing her to leave the premises intimidates opponents and sends a message: obey or don’t eat, gas up, or stay overnight. For a time, such discrimination worked in the South and elsewhere in ostracizing opponents and reformers, and for the present moment it apparently is seen as valuable in bullying Trump supporters into retreating into the shadows and finding underground safe establishments.

To survive and spread, exalted righteousness always excuses tawdry methods, given the supposed ignorance and gullibility of the unenlightened.

Short-term expediency is well worth the goal of regaining power. Any smell from low tactics later can be perfumed away—once power is back in the correct hands.

...We are in bad times, with much worse to come.

Read more here.

John Solomon on FBI efforts to impugn Trump

John Solomon reports at The Hill,

irrefutable proof exists that agents sought to create pressure to get “derogatory” information and a “pretext” to interview people close to a future president they didn’t like.

Clear evidence also exists that an investigation into still-unproven collusion between a foreign power and a U.S. presidential candidate was driven less by secret information from Moscow and more by politically tainted media leaks.

And that means the dots between expressions of political bias and official actions just got a little more connected.

Read more here.

The vicious Left goes after Congressman Jordan

Jim Jordan is my favorite Congressman. He has been incredible, along with my other favorite Congressman, Devin Nunes, in trying to learn the truth about the corruption in the Obama FBI, DOJ, and intelligence agencies. This interview with Brett Baier is heart-wrenching. Please pray for Congressman Jordan and his family. There is nothing the Left will not do to try to destroy someone who gets in their way.

“full of harsh facts”

The Babylon Bee reports,

NEW YORK, NY—In a late-night show interview Wednesday, Senator Bernie Sanders politely asked the nation to please stop mailing him books on basic economics, revealing that he’s been “absolutely flooded” with works on the most rudimentary concepts of supply and demand.

Sanders made the request after receiving yet another daily shipment of books from well-meaning Americans who simply assumed that he has never read a book on the subject in his life.

“I’ve got 1,200 copies of Human Action, 1,500 copies of Basic Economics, and 4,700 copies of Economics in One Lesson,” the angered senator said. “I’m drowning here.” Sanders also showed the late-night host a small mountain of children’s books on the subject of economics from the easy-to-read Tuttle Twins series, sent to him from Americans who assumed he had somehow missed classroom discussions on the value of a dollar and supply and demand while in elementary school.

Sanders further confirmed he still hasn’t read a single one of the books, stating that they look like they’re “full of harsh facts” and that he prefers a more emotion-based approach to economics. He added that he’s “a little peeved” that our nation has so many choices for books on basic economics on the market. “Do we really need that many?”

At publishing time, Sanders had arrived to one of his other houses and began screaming at the sky in anger upon discovering fifty-eight more books on basic economics had been mailed there.

$507 billion dollar trade deficit with China, Pray for the trapped soccer team and coach in Thailand

We have a $507 billion dollar trade deficit with China?

A former Thai navy seal died during the operation to save The soccer team and coach in Thailand who are trapped in a cave. There is an oxygen problem. The 9 boys are 11-16 and their coach is 25. Diving experts from around the world are volunteering their expertise.

The world's smallest dog has been cloned 49 times.

All five panelists work out every morning.

Democrat Marie Harf is a huge improvement over Juan Williams and Richard Fowler as a panelist, but she is still a Democrat!

Are we approaching the Third American Revolution?

Michael believes we are approaching the third American Revolution. The first one was in 1776. It was based on natural rights: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The second was the Civil War which was fought because slvaery was keeping people from enjoying those natural rights enumerated in the Constitution. The third revolution is going to be fought over the issue of abortion. Michael explains why Roe v. Wade is such a bad law.

The second part of the program featured filmaker Hawk Jenson and Sung Ho, who escaped North Korea and came to the State of the Union and held up his crutches. Remember? Victims of Communism is the website that tells about the documentary films Jensson is producing and directing. Michael interviewed Sung Ho in another episode (I presume it would be episode 178, which I have not seen).

Michael opened the mailbag of viewers' questions. One asked him who he wants Trump to name for the Supreme Court vacancy. His answer? Amy Coney Barrett! "Optics matter!" "She is the most rock-ribbed!"

Michael makes this statement: The Catholic belief is if you don't have sexual differences (male and female), you don't have marriage. Also, if you are not open to having children, you can't get married in the Catholic Church.

The "Cult"

At National Review, Mona Charen takes a look at "People of Praise," the so-called cult of which Amy Coney Barrett is a member.

...Founded in 1971 as part of the lay Catholic ministries movement, People of Praise provides spiritual community, support for those in need, prayer and counseling, and guidance for successful marriages, among other things. More than 1,000 couples have completed their Marriage in Christ program that instills habits of prayer and — this is shocking — conversation to improve relationships.
The first thing you see on the People of Praise website is a Louisiana picnic attended by a notably inter-racial group. One might have thought that such membership groups are far too rare — especially in the current climate. As Dorothy Anderson, an older African-American woman, put it, “In almost all of his speeches, Martin Luther King spoke about blacks and whites living together in unity. I didn’t think I’d live long enough to see it, but I saw it last Thursday night at the barbecue.”

People of Praise is ecumenical, with Lutheran, Methodist, Anglican, and other Christian members in addition to the Catholics. It contains both Democrats and Republicans, rich and poor. Like churches, they send missions to needy communities in the United States. More than 100 members have helped to build and renovate homes, run summer camps for thousands of kids, and found schools.

As for Barrett herself, it seems that she lives her faith. She and her husband have seven children including one with special needs and two adopted from Haiti. Her former colleagues on the Notre Dame law-school faculty, many of whom have disagreements with Barrett, unanimously endorsed her nomination to the Circuit Court, describing her as “brilliant” and also “generous” and “warm.” They wrote: “She possesses in abundance all of the other qualities that shape extraordinary jurists: discipline, intellect, wisdom, impeccable temperament, and above all, fundamental decency and humanity.”

If Barrett is a glazed-eyed cultist, she’s done an incredible job of hiding it. She fooled her fellow clerks on the Supreme Court when she worked for Justice Antonin Scalia. Dozens of clerks, including some who worked for Justices Ginsburg and Breyer, endorsed her previous nomination, calling her a “woman of remarkable intellect and character.” She fooled her students, hundreds of whom signed an endorsement reading in part “Our religious, cultural, and political views span a wide spectrum. Despite the many and genuine differences among us, we are united in our conviction that Professor Barrett would make an exceptional federal judge.” And she fooled all of the Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee along with three Democrats, who voted to approve her nomination.

The words “people of praise” raise hackles among secularists. Considering their charitable work and trans-racial, trans-class appeal, they deserve at least the benefit of the doubt. And that Barrett is reportedly a member is the best testimonial of all.

Read more here.

213,000 jobs added in June

Sundance brings us the latest jobs report.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics presents the latest snapshot of jobs and employment. According to the BLS data, behind the 213,000 jobs added, the most significant gains all center around growth in durable goods, manufacturing, transportation/distribution and the ancillary business services directly connected to the blue collar sector.

In addition, April was revised up from +159,000 to +175,000, and the change for May was revised up from +223,000 to +244,000. With these revisions, employment gains in April and May combined were 37,000 more than previously reported.

Right now all of the trade jobs, and transportation (truck drivers etc) attached to the trade jobs, are at capacity. Every raw material producer, miner, logger, and/or fabrication job professional: pipe-fitter, brick-layer, mason, welder, engineer, journeyman or apprentice therein; can make buckets of money with virtually unlimited work hours and overtime for those who can work with their hands and tools.

This is the MAGA economy; knowing how to use a pair of metal snips is WAY more valuable than a degree in gender studies. Teach a Starbucks barista how to drive a fork-lift or operate a machinist lathe and they can increase their wages exponentially.

Read more here.

Consistent?

hat tip Bookworm

Progress?

hat tip Bookworm

Happens every time!

credit Bookworm

Gowdy's take on Adam Schiff and Peter Strzok

The dogma lives loudly within her!

Putting the lie to their identity politics! The Dems are freaking out about the possibility that Trump will appoint an extremely well-qualified woman named Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court. Leo Terrell is absolutely terrified about the fact that Amy Coney Barrett believes in God! I had never heard Carrie Severino before, but I was very impressed with what she had to say in this segment. She stayed composed with a beautiful smile, while Terrell grumbled and complained and played the victim.

"that realm we know only dimly but tell ourselves, in our error, that we know well."

At American Digest, Gerard Vanderleun writes

the Politics of life are easy. It’s the Poetics of life that are tough.

...Politics is the great game of our globe. It is now and always has been the only blood sport played well by both warriors and wimps.

...All of that is hard and difficult and, more often than not, splits parties, factions, families and friends right down to the living bone. It is played in real time and with live ammunition. But none of it is mysterious. In the end, it involves only the process of politics and, while the rules may be at times obscure, they can still be described and codified.

Not so the changes in the darkest realm of our lives; that realm we know only dimly but tell ourselves, in our error, that we know well. This is the realm of the human heart; a place where change comes more slowly than wisdom accrues and rolls below our conscious minds like a deep, underground river into which we have drilled, through the bedrock of our lives, the wells of love and the wells of hate.

Read the whole thing here.

Now that is a catch!

Oh. My. Goodness.@KeonDDBroxton pic.twitter.com/goOoQ0mUqM

— Milwaukee Brewers (@Brewers) July 4, 2018

Kimberley and Donald Jr.

Ann Althouse wrote that she had a negative reaction to a story in The Daily Mail about Kimberley Guilfoyle dating Donald Trump Jr. Why? Because his divorce is not final after being separated from wife Vanessa in March? A commenter at the Althouse blog named Rehajm wrote,

They’re both high profile. There’s no discretion. NYTWaPo will out them and then it looks like they are sneaking around and looking guilty. Out and proud is the best option.

Another commenter says If he is the dumpee ok to date quickly. I find it funny that Guilfoyle is 49, Jr is 40 and step-mom Melania is 48.

Another commenter says

Maybe she is getting a bit of revenge for Gavin Newsome fooling around on her.

Twitter Tidbits

Educating Liberals tweeted,

President Trump just said he would donate $1,000,000 to the charity of Elizabeth Warren’s choice if she took a DNA test that proved she had Indian heritage.

This man is a savage! 😂

A day late on this blog, but couldn't pass it up!

Credit: Patrick Cross for PJ Media

China's state-driven economic aggression

Trump's goal: Free, Fair, Reciprocal and Balanced Trade! Peter Navarro explains, In that world we would have zero tariffs, zero non-tariff barriers, zero subsidies to industry, zero currency manipulation and undervaluation, etc. The U.S. sends a half trillion dollars off shore every year in the form of a trade deficit.

Navarro explains China's economic aggression, state-driven economy. He has a chart that shows over 50 ways that China engages in acts and policies of advancing their own economic dominance.

Organ printing

Avery Thompson reports in Popular Mechanics,

One biotech company has taken the first steps toward printing functional human organs for transplants.

...one of the more promising technologies is bioprinting: using 3D printing technology to build a new organ cell by cell.

This technology is still in its infancy, but a handful of companies are trying to bring organ printing into hospitals. One of those companies is BIOLIFE4D, which has taken the first step toward that goal by printing a patch of human cardiac tissue.

...While a two-dimensional patch of cardiac tissue is nowhere near a functional human heart, it does meet some of those conditions. The cardiac patch is fully functional human tissue with diverse cell types, and it can actually be implanted into the body to repair a patient’s malfunctioning heart.

BIOLIFE4D hopes that this type of cardiac patch could be used to treat victims of heart attacks and heart disease by replacing the affected heart tissue with brand new tissue. If they’re right, this tech could go a long way toward helping some of the millions of people who suffer from those conditions.

And while an effective treatment for cardiac patients sounds pretty good, BIOLIFE4D isn’t stopping until they make a full human heart. The next step for the company is to print a three-dimensional structure, and then achieve their next goal: a mini-heart, with the same structure and function of a full-sized one. From there, the company hopes to scale up their product and start implanting them in the people who need them.

Read more here.

More winning!

Fox Business reports,

Germany’s chancellor said Thursday she’s willing to back lower tariffs on U.S. auto imports as a potential European Union (EU) concession to the Trump administration – just one day after CEOs of Germany’s biggest carmakers reportedly voiced support for eliminating such tariffs entirely.

...The EU tariff rate on all U.S. car imports is 10% while the U.S. tariff on imported European cars is 2.5%.

...Last week, President Trump threatened to impose a 20% tariff on imports of all vehicles assembled in the EU, though he is reportedly willing to scrap those plans if the EU reduces its levies. The potential tariff would hit Germany particularly hard as cars are one of their key exports: manufacturers in the country exported more than 4.3 million vehicles in 2017.

Read more here.

Climate Extremism

In City Journal, Joel Kotkin does his usual job of detailing whatever subject he writes about. Today's subject is California's Climate Extremism.

The Resistance wins one

John Roberts reports at Fox News that Scott Pruitt has resigned his position as EPA Director.

...In his resignation letter to Trump, Pruitt said: "It is extremely difficult for me to cease serving you in this role first because I count it a blessing to be serving you in any capacity, but also, because of the transformative work that is occurring.

"However, the unrelenting attacks on me personally [and] my family, are unprecedented and have taken a sizable toll on all of us," Pruitt added.

...While in his job, Pruitt worked relentlessly to dismantle Obama-era environmental regulations. But, despite boasts of slashing red tape and promoting job creation, Pruitt had a mixed record of producing real-world results. Many of the EPA regulations Pruitt scrapped or delayed had not yet taken effect, and the tens of thousands of lost coal mining jobs the president pledged to bring back never materialized.

Read more here.

Let it go?

Meghan McCardle writes in the Washington Post about the

...biggest problem with Roe: It has given the most religious developed country in the world one of the world’s most permissive abortion laws. This is not some peculiar quirk of the American political psyche. The abortion law is out of step with what the majority of the population wants, and given the seriousness of what’s involved, it is Roe, more than any other opinion, that is driving both the radicalization and the judicialization of American politics, as pro-lifers fight like caged tigers to amend the law through the only avenue left open to them.

...Somewhat paradoxically, the way to make abortion less contentious is to throw the matter back to the states so that people can argue about it. Debating the difficult decisions regarding gestational age and circumstances would force people to confront the hard questions that abortion entails, which tends to have a moderating effect on extreme opinions.

Read more here.

Promising voters even more of what they didn’t want

Victor Davis Hanson writes at National Review,

...In 2009, Obama seemed to usher in a progressive revolution for a generation.

Democrats controlled the House. They had a supermajority in the Senate. Obama had a chance to ensure a liberal majority on the Supreme Court for years.

Democrats had gained on Republicans at the state and local levels. The media, universities, professional sports, Hollywood, and popular culture were all solidly left-wing.

A Republican had not won 51 percent of the popular vote in a presidential election since George H.W. Bush’s 1988 defeat of Democrat Michael Dukakis. Before 2016, Republicans had lost the popular vote in five of the previous six presidential elections.

And then visions of a generation of progressive grandeur abruptly vanished.

Obama left behind a polarized nation. Democrats lost both the House and the Senate. During Obama’s tenure, Democrats lost more than 1,000 seats at the state level.

Presumptive winner Hillary Clinton blew the 2016 presidential election.

Foolishly, Clinton tried to ensure a landslide victory by wasting precious campaign time in unwinnable red states such as Arizona and Georgia. Meanwhile, she too often neglected winnable purple states such as Florida, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, all of which Obama had won in 2008 and 2012. Clinton apparently forgot that the Electoral College, not the popular vote, elects a president.

...Abroad, Trump did what no other Republican president would have dared, bombing ISIS into submission, canceling the Iran deal, seeking to denuclearize North Korea, pulling out of the Paris climate accord, and moving the U.S. embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

The U.S. economy took off with new tax cuts and deregulation. Radical improvement in unemployment, economic growth, and oil and natural-gas production created new consumer and business confidence.

Worse still, much of the loss of progressive power was at least partly self-inflicted.

Former Democratic Senate majority leader Harry Reid foolishly dropped the number of votes needed to overcome a filibuster for executive appointments and most judicial nominations in 2013. That blunder ensured Republicans the chance to remake the Supreme Court when they took over the Senate in 2014.

Obama chose not to try to win over his opposition, but to alienate it by veering hard left in his second term. Hillary Clinton foolishly got herself into a number of personal scandals that embarrassed her party and helped lead to her defeat.

In reaction to the sudden loss of political power, Democrats would have been wise to run to the center, as did Bill Clinton, who all but ended the era of the Reagan Republicans.

They could have dropped their obsession with identity politics and instead attempted to win over blue-collar voters with more inclusive class appeals rather than racial appeals.

Instead, Democrats have endlessly replayed the 2016 election. In Groundhog Day fashion, Hillary Clinton repeatedly offered tired excuses for her loss.

To progressives, Trump became not an opponent to be beaten with a better agenda, but an evil to be destroyed. Moderate Democrats were written off as dense; left-wing fringe elements were praised as clever.

Voters in 2016 bristled at redistribution, open borders, bigger government, and higher taxes, but progressives are now promising those voters even more of what they didn’t want.

Read more here.

Happy Birthday To Me!

Guest post
by Suzann Darnall

Tomorrow is my 60th birthday. A pretty good milestone for some folks. But, still in my middling years according to my family tree. I come from a fairly long-lived group of people. For us, 80s, 90s, and 100s are (and have been) quite common. When someone has passed in their 60s or 70s, my family said, “Oh, they were so young”. Thus, I figure I am probably good for another 35 to 40 years at minimum. And, if not, at least I will have lived my life like it was still “prime time” and not “end of days”!

I am continually dismayed by people around me who choose to be old. I am not talking about their age in years, but their age in behavior. I know there are things that change as we age and things we can sometimes no longer do. But, to crawl into a premature grave is ridiculous! While I cannot do everything I used to do or I have to alter how I do things, I still DO things! I still enjoy life, family, hobbies, and look for the good in every day. In short, I choose happiness.

My husband and I started a new tradition with the beginning of 2018. At night, as we do our scripture reading and say our bedtime prayer, we also share what was our “Happy for Today”. I record them in my iPad notebook and we will print it out at year’s end to put into a journal binder. It is just one or two sentences. He relates his and I relate mine. Sometimes it is a big thing, but oft times it is just a small happening that lifted us up. Occasionally we have a similar or even the same “happy”, but it is just as likely to be completely different. The important thing is that at the end of each day we look for at least one bright spot in even those days which are more problematic. To end the day with positivity makes it easier to fall asleep at times.

I believe we need to choose happiness, count blessings, and celebrate each birthday. I mean, not acknowledging birthdays does not stop the aging process. Hair is still gonna thin and gray. Skin is still gonna get spots and wrinkles. Bones and joints are still ache. Muscles are still gonna weaken. So, instead of ignoring the passing years, why not at least get the cake, ice cream, and gifts! Also, I never, ever lie about my age. I figure if I am truthful, I will get one of two reactions: 1) people will be kind to me ‘cause they feel sorry for me and think, “Oh, no wonder she looks like crap, she is sooo old”. Or, 2) They will look at me and think, “Wow! She looks amazing for her age” and still be nice to me as they pay me compliments. Either way, they will treat me good.

I am blessed to have a husband who feels much as I do and we go around not acting our age together. This does not mean we do inappropriate activities or dangerous stunts, it just means we live life kinda like we always have. Maybe just being a tad more careful about heat, sun, hydration, dangers, and such. We may walk a little slower, rest a little more often, and sometimes skip the really hard parts, but we get out and about. Enjoying life, family, and each other.

We pay attention to our grooming and wardrobe. We try to eat healthier. We try to exercise regularly. I try to avoid frumpy. No house-dresses and terry-cloth slippers in public. He tries to not look like a Florida tourist. Oh come on, you know what I mean. The old man wearing bermuda shorts, straw mini-brim fedora, black socks, and sandals.

For my birthday weekend celebration we have a variety of ideas. Rodeo. Watching, not participating. Family lunch party. Maybe a date night dinner at Texas Roadhouse. We like to sit at the bar, despite the fact that we don’t drink alcohol. Shopping for new fish for my aquarium. Not sure what will end up being the top picks. Although the family lunch is set in stone!

Anyway, I am looking forward to turning 60. Plan to have my cake and ice cream, or whatever sugar-free dessert option my family brings as a surprise. Plan to open my gifts. Plan to count my many blessings. And, to once again not lie about my age. Life is good. Birthdays are great. The cessation of birthdays is not such a good thing. I feel like denying the advance of time might make the Lord think I do not treasure each hour, day, month, and year. I never want Him or anyone to think that I am not appreciating every moment I have here on this earth. So, bring on the gray hair and saggy skin, just so long as my lust for life remains undiminished! I may have to grow OLDER, but I do not have to get OLD.

Live, laugh, and love. Kiss your beloved. Hug your children. Pet the dogs. Snuggle the cats. Feed the fish. Groom the horses. Water the plants. Smell the roses. Savor your food. Find the small treasures of life around you. There are more than we know just waiting in each room of our home and each second of our life. Miracles abound. Just open heart and mind to the possibilities. I have to go now. My birthday celebrating awaits!!!
Suzann blogs at Wooly Mammoth.com

Do we dare allow reason to trump anger?

Ben Shapiro writes at National Review,

We must stop allowing anger to be its own justification.
We’re living in the era of “authenticity.”

Once upon a time, human beings strove not to be authentic — at least not in public. Self-control was predicated on the idea that our most authentic selves had to be overcome by reason and civility. Sure, you hated Bob from accounting — but you were a better person because you never said so, and you treated Bob decently whenever you saw him. The book of Proverbs suggested, “Fools give vent to their rage, but the wise bring calm in the end.” Ecclesiastes recommended, “Do not be quickly provoked in your spirit, for anger resides in the lap of fools.” And Aristotle suggested that anger, while useful, should only be channeled in service of reason.

Thanks to the ubiquity of social media, however, those who withhold their true emotions are now seen as inauthentic. Reason must never trump anger — allowing reason to trump anger is a sign of insincerity.

The same holds true of new Democratic stars like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a democratic socialist who has been hailed as the avatar of the new Leftism, or Bernie Sanders, who channeled the supposed rage of the youth, or Donald Trump, the man who captured the anger of conservatives. Overt displays of fury act as predicates to trust: We know we can trust people who can’t control themselves, or who won’t control themselves. They’re not lying to us.

...Our addiction to anger must stop. Anger may be authentic, but there’s no reason to trust angry people to wield power responsibly.

Read more here.

JJ Sefton's Morning Report

Here is JJ Sefton's Morning Report from Ace of Spades. Be sure to click on some of his links for some good Thursday reading material.

Good morning kids. Looks like somewhat of a slow news day, and with July 4th on a Wednesday combined with summer hours and you get essentially a five-day weekend. Not so for the crack staff of the Morning Report as we have aggravated/aggregated some links for your edification. Let us commence.

First up, the big story continues to be the President's search for the next justice to take the seat vacated by the ankling of Antony Kennedy. VP Pence has evidently confabbed with the short-listers and the Left are doing whatever they can to blockade, obstruct and prevent the seat from being filled, especially by a potential Neil Gorsuch or, please G-d, an Antonin Scalia originalist/strict constructionist. They know that the things they can never enact via the ballot box can only be rammed down our throats by the unelected Deep State bureaucracy as diktats. Since 99.999% of the time they'd be considered unconstitutional in a sane and just world, a judiciary packed with socialists will always ignore and/or twist the law and carve it into granite forever.

I won't say it's ballgame, but look what having the one-vote majority of Neil Gorsuch did to them last week. One or perhaps two, outside shot at three, more like-minded justices on the court between now and January 2025 (please G-d) would enable the most significant shift in the political/legislative trajectory in 100 years. The only other way to effectively retrieve the usurped power of the post Marbury v Madison judiciary is if some case comes before them that they would somehow rule against precedent (and to denude themselves of their own power [highly unlikely even with nine Scalia's]) or of a Constitutional Amendment, as suggested by Mark Levin, that would give a majority of states legislatures the right to overturn a Roe v Wade or Kelo, and thus have the final say. It would be nice to actually not wait on pins and needles every June for nine flawed human beings to decide the fate of 320 million of the rest of us. Stay tuned.

Meanwhile, as leaders from Cuck Schemer and Maxine "Roger" Waters to future leader Alexandria Occasionally-Cortez and celebrities like Tubby Riefenstahl Sarah Silverfish continue to spew out the most insane, hate-filled rhetoric, expect the insanity and violence to ramp up. Yesterday some schmuck decided that climbing up the outside of the Statue of Liberty on the Fourth of July was just the thing to do - shut down a national monument and piss off thousands of people. Meanwhile, an incredibly detestable lout decided to steal a kid's MAGA hat and then throw his drink at him. Decorum prohibits me from describing the retribution that should be visited upon this bastard. But when a highly vocal minority decides to demonize people for not giving in to their demands, surrendering their beliefs and cheerfully sticking their necks into a noose, this is the result. And worse as we have seen in the case of Steve Scalise. As Dennis Prager says, when they think we're Nazis, then we can expect more of this.

In Spygate news, traitorous crook Peter Strzok tells us, via his lawyer, that he's going to ignore a Congressional subpoena. Okay, let's see if he can ignore handcuffs, leg irons and a stint in a jail where his new "colleagues" know just how to treat someone in law enforcement. MR favorite Daniel Greenfield has another fine outing going beyond the political to examine the sleaze factor in the corrosion of ethics within our intel and LE communities that led to all of this.

On the political front, a former wrestler on the OU team where Jim Jordan was once an assistant coach is claiming that Jordan knew about the sex scandal that was going on and did nothing. I hope this is a lie and/or nothingburger since as I said yesterday, Jordan really is one of the few good guys. Call me crazy but I smell Paul Ryno in there somewhere. I question the timing of this and given Jordan's open criticism of GOP House leadership, it would not surprise me.

To immigration where a clear majority of Americans want strong border security, somehow 20,000 DACAns are still going through the process of invading the country despite the program's clear illegality while 14,000 did it the right way yesterday and were sworn in as legal citizens. While it's commendable, all things considered, the last thing we need are more immigrants. I think we need a moratorium on all immigration for a period of at least 20 years so that those who are already here can assimilate. Meh. Considering the state of our schools, media and culture, they'll be hating us in no time flat. Weird how with all the anti-American agitprop pumped out on a daily basis (evidently CNN International is a big thing around the word) hundreds thousands risk their lives to come here. And in related news, an enraging piece about how Obama opened the doors of citizenship to thugs, scum and murderous anti-American terrorists.

Internationally, as unrest builds within Iran, the President is set to meet with what Caroline Glick describes as a considerably weakened Vladimir Putin. This is because Syria has become a military and political quagmire for the ex KGB thug, and the real player there is Iran whose military and Hezbollah proxies are getting the shawarma kicked out them. Taiwan is pressuring US Airlines about the mainland's one China policy and a student leader of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protest (they let this guy live?!) is pissing off the right people at that country's front group, the Confucius Institute, for a 30th anniversary memorial (can't believe that's next year already). Interesting, and alarming, piece about China's influence south of our border, especially in context to the raging commie that just got elected there and finally PDT has a chance to really help the Brexit cause via a trade deal the Brits can't refuse.

Going around the horn, as Tom Steyer seeks to flip the Colorado legislature, Rhode Island is going ahead with its lawsuit to wipe out our petroleum industry, which would destroy our economy and line the pockets of trial lawyers. Considering how a judge in California of all places essentially threw out the case brought against Exxon, I can't see how this insanity goes much further. In any case, tort reform we much. And Al Gore cites summertime as proof of global warming.

In Pennsylvania, a school district is refusing to allow parents to see the propaganda film promoting homo perversion that their kids are forced to see, Talcum X, the faux bro, sez the Fourth of July is a lie, San Francisco has become a Socialist paradise (read "open sewer") and this #WalkAway thing could be a thing and that would be a huge thing indeed. "Kanye" hear us now?

“About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful."

At American Digest Gerard brings us a speech by Calvin Coolidge on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Because it is by Coolidge, it is short and very much on point!

Patriotic?

At Instapundit, Glenn Reynolds writes,

Well, when one party is explicitly unpatriotic, patriotism becomes a political statement.

He links to the latest Gallup poll.

The Latest on Tommy Robinson

America

hat tip Oregon Muse

Independence Day at the Daily Wire

I have been looking forward to this podcast from the Daily Wire. The four guys from the Daily Wire, Ben Shapiro, Andrew Klavan, Michael Knowles and Jeremy Boreing, are all terrific human beings. It is such a treat to learn from each of them. And today's podcast includes Jordan Peterson, who joins them at the 1:20 mark. There is a summary of the discussion here, but here are my notes on points that interested me.

Ben: The Declaration of Independence was an act of great bravery! A document enshrining slavery? Ridiculous! It was a call to freedom that had gone unfulfilled.

Andrew: The existence of evil proves God's commitment to freedom!

Andrew: Watching westerns as a child shaped his concept of America. Individual liberty meant individual responsibility (Gary Cooper in High Noon).

Ben: When was the last time you saw a patriotic movie? Do they even make them any more?

Ben: You are an immigrant to America? Assimilate! Jeremy: Why did you make the choice to leave the country you came here from? Ben: His grandparents left everything behind when they immigrated to America. There was no social safety net (welfare). They came here with nothing and no guarantee they would get anything.

Jeremy and Andrew: America is a creed. Jeremy: The Left believes America is a place, not a creed. By fortune and conquest. Jeremy: The Left wants us to take away the idea of gratitude and replace it with the idea of covetousness.

Andrew says he is an imperialist: we should sell our ideas!

Ben: Every one of the founding fathers believed in balancing the pursuit of happiness with virtue.

Ben: The only way the conservative movement survives in the long run is if libertarians realize conservatives are right about culture and conservatives realize libertarians are right about government!

Ben: Too many religious leaders have decided that religion has nothing to say about the major issues in politics.

Jeremy: The Left does not find wisdom in the past. They don't look back. Millennials know very little about anything that happened before them. Ben: We were born on third base and we think we hit a triple! Millennials have cell phones connected wirelessly to the internet and think they are advanced! They are technologically advanced, but not in terms of what they know of foundational principles.

John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God! Ben: what gives our life meaning is words. Our country is based on words. Human existence is based on words. The Left says no, you're based on material, on things. All the shortcomings in your life are based on material privilege.

At this point Jordan Peterson joins the group. He picks up on the discussion about words. The Egyptians thought the world was created as a consequence of the use of language. The Mesopotamians and the Egyptians were also interested in the ability to pay attention. Attention precedes reason. Attention is also dependent on the structure of your values.

Jordan talks about the ancient Hebrews constantly being walloped by God. They had no victimization culture, so they asked themselves, "What did we do?"

Jeremy: What are the words that brought us here? (On Canada Day and Independence Day)

Jordan says, responsibility! He talks about the malevolence and suffering we experience. How to contend against that? Responsibility! Without becoming bitter, vengeful and cynical, adopt as much responsibility as you can.

At the 1:33:35 mark Andrew asks Jordan, "Where do you direct people's faith? Is there something other than space and time on which this world is supported? Jordan answers, "Whatever is at the top of the hierarchy of values is in some sense de facto God. Andrew asks, "Doesn't there have to be something above the hierarchy of values to which those values tend? Jordan answers, "I think you could say, yes. The highest value in the hierarchy isn't exactly a value, it is the process by which values are generated."

Jeremy points out that the West is premised on the idea of one God, monotheism.

Jordan talks about brains and specialization. The right hemisphere is specialized to deal with chaos and your left hemisphere is specialized to deal with order.

He also talks about the sovereignty of the individual, a western concept that is catching on worldwide.

Ben finally speaks! "There is something dangerous about our values. To do the right thing, to act responsibly in the world."

Jordan ends by saying maybe there is something the Left and the Right can agree on: Big is bad! As it stands now, the right doesn't like big government and the left doesn't like big corporations.

"Much needed sunlight!"

Nunes: "Even though we are the legislative branch of government we are having to do the work that should have been done by the media!

Looking for a hero? Nunes is the man!

“with firm Reliance on the Protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.”

In American Thinker, Scott S. Powell writes,

The Diary of Nathaniel Snowden recounts the testimony of an eyewitness observer, who by chance encountered George Washington alone on his knees praying loudly in the snowy woods of Valley Forge. Snowden’s account of Washington’s prayer at that dark hour of the revolutionary struggle depicts him as beseeching “God’s deliverance of aid for the cause of the country, humanity and the world.” Indeed, Washington placed everything on the line for the cause as did the 56 signatories of the Declaration of Independence, citing in the last sentence of that document that “with firm Reliance on the Protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.”

...America now faces the greatest scandal of abuse of power in its history. And while times have changed in that regard, principles have not. May this July 4th be a special time, hopefully a turning point, for Americans to demand the prosecution of corruption in government and also to renew their appreciation of accountable and limited government.

Read more here.

Banned by Facebook?

Judi McLeod reports at Canada Free Press,

On the Eve of July 4th, 2018 the arrogant, insanely anti-American FACEBOOK has banned the pro-America music video of beloved American patriot Lloyd Marcus.

Supreme Irony

9-11 coverup and other crazy stories

Congressman Louie Gohmert is a guest. He has been told by people in the intelligence community that he is being watched and listened to by deep state operatives. It was a very short interview, with Tucker interrupting Gohmert a couple of times.

Charlie LeDuff is an author who has spent a lot of time at the US Mexico border. Tucker says we have spent $800 billion to secure the border since 9-11, but LeDuff says the border is overrun with illegals. He shows a video of a coyote using a jet ski to try to drop two women on the American shore. The Coyote yells at LeDuff, "You are costing me money!" LeDuff himself came across the border in 2000 walking three days across the desert. Now you can rent an innertube for five bucks to cross the Rio Grande.

Kathy Owens lost her husband on 9-11. She and her attorney are guests on the program. Mueller was head of the FBI on 9-11. Kathy believes Mueller has covered up by not releasing classified documents regarding 9-11. The documents would reveal the Saudi role in aiding and abetting the hijackers and our government's coverup.

What are we directing our attention to? What the media tells us, or are we beginning to write our own narrative?

Andrew shamelessly supports a babe for the Supreme Court vacancy. He is for Amy Coney Barrett, and so am I!

Are the American people beginning to write their own narrative? Directing their attention to the things that really matter, no matter what the press says. Are we seeing only what the press wants us to see? The media are all on one side. They expect to be able to set the agenda of what we direct our attention to. It is the trick used by magicians. They show us crying babies at the border because they want the border open. They back it up with hysterical rhetoric.

Andrew cites new laws in Denmark requiring assimilation in which children are separated from the families for a minimum of 25 hours a week to teach the children Danish values. Even Germany's Merkel has agreed to build camps on Germany's borders.

The Left resorts immediately to rhetoric. Trump stands up to them and he survives!

Christian Toto is a movie critic. He is Andrew's guest. If stars like Deniro insult us, we can respond by not seeing their movies. There are lots of ways we can entertain ourselves, and that should scare Hollywood.

Who benefits?

"...the sick Nazi comparison works both ways: It elevates political opponents into homicidal criminals who deserve extreme punishment, while reducing real historical monsters into little more than petty partisan zealots."

Victor Davis Hanson writes about critics of Donald Trump. One was

Laura Bush, who recently compared the temporary detention of children — after their parents had been apprehended for breaking U.S. immigration law — to the forced internment of tens of thousands of U.S. citizens of Japanese descent. Mrs. Bush has apparently forgotten that the warped comparison to the Japanese interment was used as a slur against her husband during the Abu Ghraib mess and also after the announcement of the administration’s forced renditions of terrorist suspects to foreign countries. In her hierarchy of crimes, is temporarily housing children separately from their law-breaking parents a greater crime than enhanced interrogations, the “collateral damage” that accrues from drone strikes, or the use of the interrogation methods in foreign countries on suspects sent there by the U.S. government?

VDH never forgets!

Harry Truman claimed that his Republican opponent in the 1948 election, Thomas Dewey, was a “front man” for fascists. In 1964, California governor Pat Brown suggested that the Republican presidential candidate Barry Goldwater had “the stench of fascism.” Brown added, “All we need to hear was ‘Heil Hitler.’” After 1980, leftists used the Nazi slur frequently against Ronald Reagan.

“Nazi!” was also a familiar favorite of the Left during the George W. Bush administration, widely employed across the progressive spectrum. Folk singer Linda Ronstadt, dramatist Harold Pinter, cartoonist Ted Rall, and financier George Soros all tied George W. Bush either to Nazism in general or to Adolf Hitler in particular.

Mainstream Democratic politicians — including former vice president Al Gore and the late senators Robert Byrd (D., W.Va.) and John Glenn (D., Ohio) — took delight in slurring George W. Bush or his supporters as Nazis or brown shirts.

The target of the Nazi smear, to avoid even the appearance of affinity with an odious monster and his regime, supposedly will offer psychological penance or policy concessions in hopes that his critics will curb their hysteria. If George W. Bush is Hitler, or Stephen Miller is Joseph Goebbels, or a German-accented Trump is sending Mexican nationals to Auschwitz-like death camps, then what is the patriotic thing for an American to do about them? One answer might be to take out Trump-Hitler, or take up arms to stop his Nazi takeover of the U.S., or force the target of such slurs to submit to reeducation to cleanse and reset his mind in a properly correct fashion.

Perhaps such logic is one reason we simultaneously see both the rise of Nazi slurs and the hyperbolic talk of killing a conservative president. Assassination chic also did not begin with Donald Trump, although David Crosby, Johnny Depp, Kamala Harris, Madonna, Rosie O’Donnell, Snoop Dogg, Kathy Griffin, and the Free Shakespeare in the Park troupe have by now exhausted the methods by which to rhetorically liquidate Trump (incineration, shooting by pistol, death by elevator, explosives, jumping off a cliff, shooting by automatic weapon, beheading, and stabbing by a mob).

...the sick Nazi comparison work both ways: It elevates political opponents into homicidal criminals who deserve extreme punishment, while reducing real historical monsters into little more than petty partisan zealots.

Read more here.