Biden Keeps Pushing Nonexistent Worker Vaccine Mandate, A Ploy to Keeps States From Filing Lawsuits

Sundance reporting for Conservative Treehouse

Joe Biden did it again today.  A month after the first announcement, the White House occupant claimed again a Dept of Labor rule (via OSHA) is forthcoming, yet no such process appears to be taking place.  This ploy now seems very purposeful, because without an actual policy or regulation visibly in place, state attorneys general cannot file a lawsuit or request an injunction.

As long as Biden keeps threatening a DOL worker vaccination rule sometime in the future, many employers will take action to require worker vaccination.   This seems to be the actual strategy; bolstered by White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki caught off-guard last week when asked about it.

Psaki had no idea how to answer the question about any OSHA activity not taking place (link).  Obviously Psaki didn’t expect the question, but it was also obvious that no background conversation had ever taken place amid the White House communication team.

Perhaps responding to an awakening on that issue, Joe Biden gave a speech today begging people to get vaccinated and again warning that a federal vaccine mandate for all workers was coming:

TRANSCRIPT – […] The Labor Department is going to shortly issue an emergency rule — which I asked for several weeks ago, and they’re going through the process — to require all employees [employers] with more than 100 people, whether they work for the federal government or not — this is within a — in the purview of the Labor Department — to ensure their workers are fully vaccinated or face testing at least once a week.

In total, this Labor Department vaccination requirement will cover 100 million Americans, about two thirds of all the people who work in America.

These requirements work.

[…] And as the Business Roundtable and others told me when I announced the first requirement, that encouraged businesses to feel they could come in and demand the same thing of their employees.  (more)

Biden then went on to praise companies who are doing it on their own.

Others are starting to notice as this article in the Federalist notes:

[…] According to several sources, so far it appears no such mandate has been sent to the White House’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs yet for approval. The White House, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), and the Department of Labor haven’t released any official guidance for the alleged mandate. There is no executive order. There’s nothing but press statements.

Despite what you may have been falsely led to believe by the media fantasy projection machine, press statements have exactly zero legal authority. Read more

X22, Red Pill news, and more-Oct 8th

 

Got a fun weekend ahead, folks!! Here's tonight's news:

Authoritarianism Is the Goal of Progressivism

Your betters think the American taxpayer is nothing more than an ATM for the administrative state and its ruling class. Pay up and shut up, suckers.

by Ned Ryun for American Greatness

I’ve said it before, but I will say it again: authoritarianism is the ultimate end of progressivism. The very foundations of a progressive worldview, built from a warped and twisted view of human nature (that it is somehow ultimately good, rather than deeply flawed), is a belief in the ultimate rightness of an all-powerful administrative state filled with a so-called educated elite. Power must be consolidated into the state. Decisions for the advancement of society should be left to the smartest-of-the-smart elite who, through their great knowledge and moral perfection, will advance human progress to a state of nirvana or utopia here on earth. Only through the state will progress be made. 

But what happens when people begin to question the entire premise of the state? What if people—those dirty little peasants—decide that in a supposed constitutional republic, all power flows from the people who then make their elected officials stewards of the money and power given to them? This, of course, is the antithesis of the administrative state: All power flows from the state, not the people. All knowledge for what is best comes from the so-called educated elite. So what happens when people resist and disagree with the administrative state, its apparatchiks, and its propaganda? The state strikes back. 

Consider this: In 1974, when presumably Joe Biden still had two brain cells to rub together, he told a reporter, “Whether you like it or not . . . us cruddy politicians can take away that First Amendment of yours if we want to.” Given what we have seen over the past months, whether in his coddling of Big Tech, China, the undercutting of our civil liberties, or the ongoing abuses of the FBI and Department of Justice, is there any doubt that Joe still believes this?  Worse, that he thinks he can pull it off? I would say all empirical evidence points in one direction.

Just the other day, the fake moderate Attorney General Merrick Garland let it be known to the world that he would sic the corrupt and rotten FBI on those pesky parents protesting at school boards across the country. The parents’ real crime is apparently wrong-think for assuming they had any say about how their children are educated with their taxpayer dollars. Sit down, you miserable little peasants! How dare you question your betters! And for daring to question anything, parents are being labeled as “domestic terrorists.” 

This is exactly what happens when you question the administrative state: you will either submit or you will be forced to comply. If you do not comply you are viewed as a threat to the state, deemed a terrorist, and then the state will weaponize against you (Exhibit A: Donald J. Trump).

At some point, you would think the people might wake up and say enough is enough. Is this that moment? Is this the moment when the American people stare down the state and say, “Enough!” Because let’s not forget: not all the parents protesting at school board meetings are Republicans or even conservatives. They are Democrats and independents, too. Although they might not be as concerned about critical race theory, they are absolutely infuriated that woke school boards have decided to stop offering advanced classes because such classes are now deemed “racist.”  

In Virginia, we might get an early indicator as to what will happen. Just the other week, Clinton pal, Terry McAuliffe, pronounced in a gubernatorial debate, “Parents shouldn’t have a say in what is taught in the classroom.” That statement in many ways encapsulates everything: The American taxpayer is an ATM for the administrative state and its ruling class, nothing more. Taxes will be paid, on threat of force, to fund the state and its priorities. Anything more than that will not be tolerated. You will not question your “betters” and if you do, you’ll be crushed.

We’re going to get very clear indicators on November 2 as to whether we are going to accelerate into insanity or maybe, just maybe, have some signs of hope that the freeborn American people aren’t done just yet.

Merrick Garland To Middle Americans: You’re The Terrorists

If moms at PTA meetings frighten the political establishment more than actual terrorists, then what does that say about our leaders? 

by Paul Bradford for American Greatness

Are you upset that school officials force your kids to mask outdoors and teach them to hate themselves because of their skin color? You might be a terrorist, according to the Department of Justice. 

Attorney General Merrick Garland this week issued a memo directing his agency to investigate and counter alleged threats to school board officials and teachers. The memo was prompted by spirited protests happening at school board meetings across the country. Parents are fed up with left-leaning bureaucrats and their insidious ideas for kids. It’s no surprise some parents get very passionate about these issues—it’s their own kids they’re trying to protect. 

But school boards and teachers’ unions see the matter very differently. The National School Boards Association last month sent a hyperventilating letter to the Biden Administration claiming its members were in grave danger from parents. The association argued that protests constituted “a form of domestic terrorism and hate crimes.”

Garland agreed and ordered the formation of a task force to go after these terrorist parents. “While spirited debate about policy matters is protected under our Constitution, that protection does not extend to threats of violence or efforts to intimidate individuals based on their views,” Garland wrote. “Threats against public servants are not only illegal, they run counter to our nation’s core values.”

This is a curious take from an administration that effectively endorsed the harassment of senators who refuse to back its legislative agenda. Following a lawmaker into a bathroom and berating her as she uses the toilet is just “part of the process,” while arguing with a school board tyrant at a public forum is essentially terrorism.

Garland’s memo makes it clear that the domestic War on Terror’s entire purpose is to persecute and disenfranchise ordinary Americans who oppose the Left. More than a few commentators warned about this eventuality in the aftermath of January 6, but they were either ignored or dismissed. The skeptics insisted that the federal government would only go after “insurrectionists” or actual terrorists—like those horrible militiamen who plotted to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer. Some conservatives believe there is a domestic terror problem and that the feds should do more to crack down on it. They sincerely believe the media’s narrative about January 6 and how it was somehow a terror attack.

But the Justice Department’s new focus should disabuse skeptics of their trust in the Biden regime. The domestic terror threat is a trumped-up myth to generate support for a war on middle Americans. The political elite sees average Americans as the primary threat and they will marshal all resources against them. The regime no longer even needs to bother finding someone they entrapped in a terror scheme; they’ll just settle for concerned parents as Public Enemy No. 1.

Most readers will know how insane this is simply by who the Justice Department doesn’t go after. The George Floyd riots caused more than $1 billion in property damage and took the lives of at least 30 people. Antifa laid siege to Portland and other cities in the Pacific Northwest for many months and attacked several government buildings. Tens of thousands of poorly vetted Afghans are coming to America and a significant number of them may have ties to Islamic extremism and other dubious associations. A record-breaking murder wave engulfs the entire country. Hundreds of thousands of illegal migrants continue to flood the southern border every month. None of these things can compare to the threat of conservative parents protesting liberal school boards. The reason why is simple: none of these other mentioned groups bother liberals; only their political enemies do.

Instead of hosting hearings on left-wing riots, soaring crime, or the border crisis, the Democratic-led Senate hosted a high-profile hearing with a Facebook whistleblower. That whistleblower’s main pitch was that Congress should make social media giants censor hate speech. Judging by the Senate’s receptive attitude to the whistleblower, Congress considers mean words on Facebook to be a far greater danger than rising crime or an open border. 

It’s a bit discomforting to realize your government thinks you’re a terrorist just because of your political views. And this isn’t hyperbole either. The regime has successfully denied bail for many January 6 protesters because of their political views. One unfortunate demonstrator saw his bail revoked simply because he watched a Mike Lindell video. Mere engagement with right-wing ideas is enough to keep you in jail. Just imagine the precedents they now have to use against defiant parents.

This is an uncomfortable thought, but it is reality and we must face it with courage. It’s better for the globalist American empire to openly hate us than to pretend to represent us. It further reduces the regime’s legitimacy among Middle Americans and only emboldens them to resist its dictates. Parents won’t give up the fight to protect their kids from harmful ideas just because Merrick Garland thinks they’re terrorists. It will just expose our leaders’ absurdity and reinforce why their phony domestic War on Terror should be opposed.

If moms at PTA meetings frighten the political establishment more than actual terrorists, then what does that say about our leaders? 

Hunter Biden sells five art prints for $75K each as NYC show pushed back

 Hunter Biden sells five art prints for $75K each as NYC show pushed back

New York Post

At least five prints of Hunter Biden’s artwork have already been sold for $75,000 each and a team of lawyers is vetting potential patrons who plan to attend his upcoming gallery show in New York City — which has now been delayed until the spring, The Post has learned.

The Georges Berges Gallery sold the prints before the Oct. 1 opening of a “pop-up” presentation in Los Angeles, a source familiar with the matter said Thursday.

It’s unclear who purchased the reproductions — which cost a fraction of the top price of $500,000 for an original piece by President Biden’s scandal-scarred son — or if any more were sold after the LA show opened.

“But most of those allowed to buy works are long-term, private collectors with the gallery, people that Berges knows personally,” the source said.

Meanwhile, a leading ethics expert told The Post that Biden’s recent schmoozing with attendees at his debut exhibition showed that a White House attempt to prevent influence-peddling by keeping buyers anonymous won’t work and should be scrapped in favor of a “Plan B.”

Richard Painter, who was President George W. Bush’s chief ethics lawyer, said the LA opening — where Hunter Biden mingled with about 200 guests — “just illustrates how this veil-of-secrecy idea is not happening.”

“It shows the deal’s not going to be secret,” he said. “I think the White House needs to go to Plan B.”

As for anyone who wants to view Biden’s paintings at Berges’ Manhattan gallery, the source said stringent screening measures have been put in place.

Hunter Biden in front of one of his prints at Milk Studios in Hollywood. 

Instagram

Hunter Biden’s artworks have reportedly been fetched for $75,000 each. 

Instagram

Hunter Biden has a long history of exploiting President Joe Biden’s political influence for money.

WireImage

“It is a whole process to get in to see the Biden show. You have to call the gallery in Soho, and they are vetting people carefully,” the source said.

“They laid down rules that thorough vetting of any collector has to be done by a team of lawyers.”

The source also said that the New York City show, which was supposed to open this month, has been pushed back until the spring, with the LA show continuing through November.

Former chief White House ethics lawyer Richard Painter accuses Hunter Biden of using his art shows for influence-peddling.

University of Minnesota Law Scho

The purpose of the legal vetting, who hired the lawyers and the reason for the delayed opening were all unclear.

Painter, now a professor at the University of Minnesota Law School, noted that “buyers buy artwork to hang on the wall, not put in a closet.”

“They tend to be rich people, and rich people come to their houses and it tends to get around,” he said.

“Everyone’s going to be talking about it and everyone’s going to know.”

Painter said the best way to prevent anyone from gaining leverage over the White House by paying the “crazy prices” for Hunter Biden’s artwork would be to not sell it until after his dad leaves office.

Barring that, Painter said, there should be “full transparency” of the buyers’ identities and President Biden and his appointees should all sign “recusal” pledges “to ensure these people can’t get access to the White House.”

“We did that in the Bush White House,” he said. “If people tried to contact the government who were business partners of the Bushes, we made sure they contacted people who weren’t political appointees.”

On Wednesday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki was pressed by reporters about LA Mayor Eric Garcetti, who is the president’s nominee to be the US ambassador to India, having been in attendance at last week’s opening at Hollywood’s Milk Studios.

The Georges Berges Gallery at 462 West Broadway in Soho is rigorously vetting collectors interested in Hunter Biden’s 2022 gallery show.

Helayne Seidman

“Should we expect to see more people who seek jobs in this administration attending events like this in the future?” asked CBS News Radio reporter Steven Portnoy, who is president of the White House Correspondents’ Association.

Psaki grew flustered as she repeated months-old talking points and in one instance said, “Again, the gallerist has spoken to — we’ve spoken to the specifics of what the gallerist has agreed to and what recommendations were made. I’ve done that several times. I don’t have additional details for it from here. I’d point you to them.”

Neither the Berges Gallery, Hunter Biden’s lawyer, his book publicist nor the White House returned requests for comment Thursday.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki has repeatedly denied any alleged connections of art collectors being involved with the Biden administration.

AP

Why Did Fiona Hill Join the Trump Administration?

Fiona Hill’s recent Foreign Affairs article is flawed, both in its failure to explain why Hill elected to serve as an aide to Trump, whom she clearly reviled, and in its recapitulation of key episodes that took place during the administration.

by Mark Episkopos for The National Interest

Donald Trump’s presidency has spawned a burgeoning industry of tell-all memoirs from former officials and associates, all claiming an insider’s look into his time in office. While this genre tends to deal heavily in workplace intrigue and other forms of salacious gossip, former National Security Council official Fiona Hill’s recent Foreign Affairs article, which is excerpted from her new memoir, There Is Nothing For You Here, offers a more cerebral perspective on the broader political trends accompanying Trump’s tenure as the 45th president of the United States. But it is flawed, both in its failure to explain why Hill elected to serve as an aide to Trump, whom she clearly reviled, and in its recapitulation of key episodes that took place during the administration.

Hill opens with an account of the infamous Helsinki summit between Trump and Russian president Vladimir Putin. Hill, a prominent Russianist who is currently the Robert Bosch senior fellow in the Center on the United States and Europe at Brookings, introduced the summit as largely an attempt by Trump to cover his political flank from allegations “that he had conspired with the Kremlin in its interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election or that the Russians had somehow compromised him…” But this framing doesn’t quite do justice to the foreign policy significance of the summit. Whatever criticisms one might level at its execution, Trump’s Russia policy was grounded in the legitimate, pressing strategic concern that Washington is being cornered into an unwinnable two-front competition with Moscow and Beijing. The Helsinki meeting marked the culmination of the Trump administration’s campaign to staunch the cycle of spiraling hostilities that have come to characterize the bilateral relationship. Trump’s efforts were premised on the underlying belief—largely shared by the Biden administration—that now is the time to retrench and refocus Washington’s resources on containing the rising geopolitical threat emanating from Beijing.

But these points are lost in Hill’s retelling of the Helsinki summit, reduced as it is entirely to Trump’s peccadilloes—his vanity, insecurities about his political legitimacy, and alleged deference to his Russian counterpart. Hill vividly recounts AP reporter Jonathan Lemire’s questioning of Trump at the joint press conference: “Would you now, with the whole world watching, tell President Putin—would you denounce what happened in 2016 and would you warn him to never do it again?”

“Trump balked,” the article continues. The former president could not do what Lemire asked, reasoned Hill, because it would be “tantamount to admitting that Trump had not won the 2016 election.” It is not fully clear if Hill is conveying her own view of the 2016 election—or describing what she believes to be Trump’s state of mind.

But Trump had reasons to balk that had nothing to do with his purported insecurities. Turning the summit into a bilateral cage match over Russia’s interference in the 2016 election would only serve to undermine the strategic reasons for why it was being held in the first place. It would also be eminently unproductive. The Russian side has flatly denied any and all accusations of electoral interference, both publicly and in private discussions with U.S. counterparts—Putin has stuck to his guns on this matter for years, and there was no reason to expect a different outcome in Helsinki. Yet this is exactly the kind of hollow spectacle many observers, including those who demanded that Trump chide and threaten Putin in front of the cameras at Helsinki, wanted to see. They were not interested in, say, substantive cybersecurity agreements to safeguard U.S. infrastructure and the integrity of future elections. For vast swathes of Trump’s detractors, the meeting presented an ideal opportunity to depict the former President as “Putin’s puppet”—a thesis to which Hill appears to subscribe, given the tenor of her first-hand descriptions of Trump.

But Hill goes on to explain that she is interested in charting a different, “arguably more pernicious kind of “Russian connection.” Namely, Hill is concerned with what she sees as a creeping authoritarian convergence between the United States and Russia, a trend reified by the purported parallels between Trump and Putin.

Hill rattles off a list of  “glaringly obvious” similarities between Trump and Putin, which notably includes their shared enemies; among them, “cosmopolitan, liberal elites,” George Soros, and voting rights advocates. It also involves their common efforts to prevent the destruction of displacement of historical symbols—Confederate figures for Trump, Soviet figures for Putin, and so on. It is unclear what these rather superficial comparisons are supposed to prove, beyond the fact that the two men share some basic, generic conservative political instincts that are widely exhibited by politicians and voters from Rotterdam to New Delhi.

Hill then makes her way to more specific points of comparison. She tries to demonstrate, through a series of parallels and historical analogies, that Trump and Putin are cut from the populist, autocratic cloth; that the former has more in common with the latter than he does with prior U.S. Presidents. But in her attempt to derive a common essence between the two men, Hill dilutes the terms “populism,” “nationalism,”  and “autocracy” beyond recognition.

As part of her effort to demonstrate the supposed parallels between Trump and Putin, Hill shoe-horns the Russian leader into a nationalist-populist frame in which he simply does not belong. Consider the bigger picture of Putin’s rule. In all its varied forms from the Tsardom to the Soviet Union, the Russian imperial project has been—and continues to be, under Vladimir Putin—a quest to carve out a multinational, multi-confessional empire straddling large swathes of the Eurasian heartland. Since fully consolidating power in the mid-2000s, Putin has consistently repressed, not stoked, nationalist-populist movements and attitudes in Russia. Far from “fueling nationalist grievances,” Putin has de-emphasized Russian nationhood for the sake of a supranational imperial identity.

Hill doubles down on this popular but fundamentally mistaken assessment of Putin with her discussion of jailed opposition Alexei Navalny. Navalny, writes Hill, is, “like Putin,” a “populist” who “has not been averse to playing on nationalist sentiments to appeal to the same Russian voters who form Putin’s base.” Navalny is, in fact, a “small Russia” nationalist who sees empire as a weakness—a centuries-long burden, built on the backs of ethnic Russians. Navalny even sees some of the Russian Federation’s own administrative regions, including Chechnya, as a liability. A poll conducted by Navalny found that some sixty-seven percent of his supporters—as opposed to only around ten percent of the general population—favor holding a referendum on whether or not the entire North Caucasus should be granted independence. Navalny’s ethnocentric, inward-looking nationalism stands in diametric opposition to Putin’s view of Russia’s imperial identity and destiny as a great power.

Hill observes that Putin “blurs the line between foreign and domestic policy,” mobilizing the Russian populace against perceived internal as well as external enemies. This is accurate but in no way exclusive to Russia or authoritarian regimes. President Joe Biden echoed a similar sentiment in an earlier State Department speech sounding the clarion call for a global battle between democracy and autocracy. “There’s no longer a bright line between foreign and domestic policy,” Biden told U.S. diplomats. According to Biden, it is all part of the same noble struggle being waged against the enemies of democracy—whether foreign or domestic. In the same piece, Hill urged the Biden administration to “integrate their approach to Russia with their efforts to shore up American democracy, tackle inequality and racism, and lead the country out of a period of intense division.” This would seem to suggest that Hill—like Putin and Biden—apparently does not see a strict dividing line between foreign and domestic policy, instead taking the opportunity to offer partisan political advice.

In the closing paragraphs, Hill urges the Biden administration to refrain from mobilizing “Americans around the idea of a common enemy, such as China.” Doing so, fears Hill, will subject Asian-Americans to xenophobia. This is a curious way to end an exposition, the better part of which was spent ginning up a Russian threat so grave that it seemingly brought American democracy to its knees in 2016 and threatens to do so again unless Biden implements sweeping domestic reforms to curb “inequality and racism.” Separately, Hill’s appraisals of Trump and Putin are unconvincing. When combined, they form the basis of a deeply flawed comparison that obfuscates more than it reveals about both men—all in service of a contrived, distinctly partisan thesis.

Deprived of any meaningful basis for substantive parallels, Hill is left with shallow observations of leadership style. Trump “imported Putin’s style of personalist rule,” she writes. Hill accuses Trump of influence-peddling schemes involving family members and private associates, seemingly unfazed by or perhaps unaware of similar accusations against the Bidens and the Clintons. Nor is it anything new for U.S. presidents to circumvent, subvert, or even try to destroy established U.S. institutions in pursuit of their goals. Whether it be the Lincoln administration’s sweeping crackdown on political opponents in the years of the Civil War, Andrew Jackson’s bitter battle against the central bank, or Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s blatant manipulation of the media and abortive effort to pack the Supreme Court, Trump need not look to the Kremlin for lessons on American Caesarism.

The real question is why Hill ever went to work for Trump when she harbored such dyspeptic views of him. Of course, Trump himself did little, if anything, to ensure that he had aides surrounding him who could execute his own vision of improved relations with Russia. Contrary to her memoir’s title, Hill does seem to think that there was something there for her in the Trump administration. But anyone looking for a clear guide to what transpired during it should look elsewhere than Hill’s account.

Gallup: People trust the media about as much as they trust the government

 Gallup: 

People trust the media about as much as they trust the government

Jazz Shaw - Hot Air Oct 07, 2021 11:01 AM ET

Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP

If you think the title of this article is an indicator of some upswell of trust in the media you probably haven’t been watching much mainstream media. (And you’re probably a much happier person than many of us.) Gallup keeps a running record of surveys asking Americans how much faith they have in a variety of large institutions. The news media is one of those, and the 2021 edition of that survey was just released. The results may provide cause for some reflection among those charged with reporting the news to us, because the percentage of people who have either “a great deal” or “a fair amount” of trust in the MSM has hit the second-lowest point ever seen in the history of this survey. Only 36% of survey respondents expressed some level of confidence in the media’s ability to “report the news fully, accurately and fairly.” And the lion’s share of that pitiful amount of trust comes from Democrats, while independents and Republicans aren’t buying what the MSM is selling.

Americans’ trust in the media to report the news fully, accurately and fairly has edged down four percentage points since last year to 36%, making this year’s reading the second lowest in Gallup’s trend.

In all, 7% of U.S. adults say they have “a great deal” and 29% “a fair amount” of trust and confidence in newspapers, television and radio news reporting — which, combined, is four points above the 32% record low in 2016, amid the divisive presidential election campaign between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. In addition, 29% of the public currently registers “not very much” trust and 34% have “none at all.”

These findings, from a Sept. 1-17 poll, are the latest in Gallup’s tracking of the public’s confidence in key U.S. institutions, which began in 1972. Between 1972 and 1976, 68% to 72% of Americans expressed trust in the mass media; yet, by 1997, when the question was next asked, trust had dropped to 53%. Trust in the media, which has averaged 45% since 1997, has not reached the majority level since 2003.

Gallup has been tracking these figures for just shy of fifty years now and we’re living through an era where faith in the mainstream media has simply cratered. As noted above, the only time this figure was lower was during the 2016 election between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. (Is anyone really surprised?) 

It’s also worth noting how enthusiastically (or unenthusiastically) this trust was expressed. Among those expressing trust, just 7% said they had “a great deal” of trust, while 29% said they only had “a fair amount” of trust. That’s something of a reversal from the distrusting crowd. 29% said they had “not very much” trust in the media, while 34% (the largest group measured) said they had “none at all.” In other words, nearly five times as many people were at the bottom of the scale than fell at the top.

The partisan divide was probably equally predictable. A whopping 68% of Democrats said that they trust the media either “a great deal” or “a fair amount.” But of course they would. The vast majority of cable news outlets and the larger newspapers constantly say things Democrats like to hear and spin the news in the most favorable way possible for Joe Biden’s party. It doesn’t matter if it’s true or not. You just have to give the people what they want. By contrast, less than a third of independents (31%) and a confused 11% of Republicans similarly gave the media a thumbs up.

We should probably take a moment to compare these numbers to the trust the public places in the government. That survey came out last month. 39% of Americans place either “a great deal” or “a fair amount” of trust in the federal government to handle both foreign and domestic matters. That’s only a few points away from the score the MSM racked up. So since the media is supposed to be the watchdog of the government on behalf of the people, we’re now at a point where a significant majority of our citizens don’t trust either institution as far as they could throw it. Really makes you feel confident for the future, eh? (On a positive note, a significant majority of the public trusts local government to handle local matters. This falls in line with an established conservative mantra that the best government is the one that is closest to, and thus more accountable to the people it governs.)

So how could the major players in the media regain some of this lost trust? Let’s look at the three factors Gallup asked respondents to use as benchmarks. They wanted to know if people feel that MSM covers the news “fully, accurately, and fairly.” 

“Fully?” When they intentionally suppress stories that don’t fit the narrative or reflect badly on their favored political party and ideology, you’d be hard-pressed to say you’re getting the full news. Particularly when they team up with the social media giants to ensure such news is suppressed. Examples include Hunter Biden’s laptop, Tara Reade, and that study out of Denmark showing that cloth masks were virtually ineffective against the novel coronavirus. There are plenty of others.

“Accurately?” How about the Biden border crisis? To watch the current coverage on CNN you would think the Del Rio debacle was only a momentary blip on the radar and aside from that, everything is just peachy.

“Fairly?” Don’t make me laugh. But just in case anyone in the MSM is actually reading these poll results and honestly having a moment of reflection, these are the areas where you could do better. Much, much, better. And if you really did that and kept it up for a couple of years, you might just see the country going back to trusting you a bit more. Maybe.

The American Ruling Class Reaches Its Inflection Point

by Josh Hammer opinion editor at Newsweek

In a 2010 essay for The American Spectator, the late, great intellectual Angelo Codevilla wrote a rare essay that was, in retrospect, so prescient as to be outright eerie. Titled "America's Ruling Class" and deploying "class"-based phraseology historically more at home in some corners of the political Left than on the postwar political Right, Codevilla set his sights squarely on his eponymous target.

"Today's ruling class, from Boston to San Diego, was formed by an educational system that exposed them to the same ideas and gave them remarkably uniform guidance, as well as tastes and habits," he wrote. "Whether formally in government, out of it, or halfway, America's ruling class speaks the language and has the tastes, habits, and tools of bureaucrats."

Even more eerily prescient was Codevilla's description of what motivates the ruling class. "Our ruling class's agenda is power for itself," he wrote. "While it stakes its claim through intellectual-moral pretense, it holds power by one of the oldest and most prosaic of means: patronage and promises thereof."

Is there a single sober-minded observer of our decrepit politics, in 2021, who does not read these words and immediately recognize that this is what is happening—indeed, what has been happening—in these United States?

Beginning with the 2008 bailouts, a parochial uniparty establishment—geographically and (nominally) politically diverse, but all sculpted by elite K-12 and higher education institutions to hold uniformly "correct" beliefs—deemed it necessary to toss moral hazard into the wind and lavish taxpayer money upon the failing Wall Street titans. As for elites' message to the myriad struggling homeowners whose dreams were shattered by Fannie and Freddie, Clinton-era tropes about the relentless pursuit of "affordable housing" and simple lucre-seeking depravity: Drop dead.

The ruling class only tightened its grip in the ensuing years after the 2008 bailouts and the Dow Jones Industrial Average's 2009 nadir. Corporate profits soon skyrocketed, and the stock market began a prolonged, historically record-breaking ascent. But economic inequality worsened. Elites of both parties further doubled down on "free trade" and extensive economic entangling with a Chinese Communist Party regime hellbent on hollowing out the American industrial heartland and ultimately dedicated to America's national implosion.

Republicans, who by dint of decades-long dripping academia/media disdain for their party and their voter base should have already realized they were now the party of blue-collar America, responded by nominating for the presidency a well-coiffed private equity plutocrat in Mitt Romney. The 2012 GOP presidential nominee was well-intentioned in most respects and admirably hawkish on immigration and national sovereignty matters, but that did not prevent the utterance of Romney's infamous "47 percent" gaffe—a proverbial middle finger to the already ailing American heartland if there ever were one. President Barack Obama, ruling class talisman, cruised to re-election.

The American people, and especially the aggrieved and subjugated "deplorables," responded in 2016 by electing to the presidency a man, in Donald Trump, who spoke their language and vowed to fight for them against the uniparty ruling class regime. The ruling class responded by launching an unprecedented, four-year-long campaign against the president, from deep state malfeasance to galling and gratuitous media coverage to coordinated Big Tech censorship (most egregiously, the quashed New York Post Hunter Biden laptop story) to ubiquitous suppression of conservative and pro-Trump viewpoints in the American academy under the risible guise of "microaggressions" and "safe spaces." Elites to the half of America that voted for a duly elected president of the United States: Drop dead.

The era of COVID-19, a virus with a more than 99 percent recovery rate, has only accentuated and exacerbated this divide. Elites have latched onto Rahm Emanuel's famous line about never letting a "serious crisis go to waste" and used it to seize previously unimagined power at all levels of governance. The purpose of this power, from elected officials such as President Joe Biden to career bureaucrats such as Dr. Anthony Fauci to lowly foot soldiers such as pro-critical race theory teachers' unions, is exactly what Codevilla said it was 11 years ago: "power for itself"—power tout court. In the era of COVID, the "biomedical security state," to borrow the term recently popularized anew by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, is the most convenient means of scratching the ruling class' totalitarian itch and dividing the citizenry into de facto warring tribes.

The silver lining is that on every major issue, from COVID hysteria to critical race theory indoctrination to the Afghanistan withdrawal debacle, the rottenness of the American ruling class has been exposed. The ruling class senses this, and it will respond in the short term by doubling down yet again. But such a tactic is not sustainable. The inflection point, and the time for the deplorables to unite against ruling class tyranny, is right now.

‘Can Men Get Pregnant?’

 ‘Can Men Get Pregnant?’

A colleague recently referenced an absurd article I thought was from our friends at the parody site Babylon Bee. But these days, you can’t assume anything is parody, particularly when it relates to gender.

The article, entitled “Can Men Get Pregnant?,” was posted in Healthline, a niche health and wellbeing journal, under the category of Parenthood>Pregnancy. Yeah, this brand of gender-confused nonsense is finding its way into space that should be reserved for rational conversation.

The author, KC Clements, identifies as a “queer, nonbinary writer based in Brooklyn, NY,” who notes: “Their work deals with queer and trans identity, sex and sexuality, health and wellness from a body positive standpoint, and much more.” Yes, much more.

But hey, it was “Medically reviewed by Valinda Riggins Nwadike, MD,” so it must comport with the science! Right?

I decided to highlight this article because it is an exceptional example of the convoluted, contorted, and contrived gender-denial rhetoric emanating from heterophobic gender deniers now infesting some health information quarters. Recall that recently, even as the number of ChiCom Virus pandemic deaths this year surpassed all deaths in 2020, the CDC was prioritizing the use of inclusive language across its website platform.

The assumptions in this article, as with all such articles, are predicated on the supposition that it is possible to be “transgendered.” Of course, for those of us who actually follow the science, there are in fact only two genders and a male and female will from conception to death, regardless of surgical alterations or personal pronouns. A gender dysphoric individual can call himself or herself whatever he or she wants, but asking society to standardize and comport with his or her gender disorientation is as absurd as the question posed by the referenced Healthline article.

So how does “KC” answer this absurd question? As with all cults, the gender-bender cult redefines standard word meanings and assigns new meanings. Let me hit the highlights.

KC: “Yes, it’s possible for men to become pregnant and give birth to children of their own. In fact, it’s probably a lot more common than you might think. In order to explain, we’ll need to break down some common misconceptions about how we understand the term ‘man.’”

Well, obviously we will have to get over those pesky “misconceptions” that cause heartburn for the gender-challenged.

KC: “Not all people who were assigned male at birth (AMAB) identify as men. Those who do are ‘cisgender’ men. Conversely, some people who were assigned female at birth (AFAB) identify as men. These folks may be ‘transgender’ men or transmasculine people.”

Fortunately, KC links to another of his missives defining “cisgender.” He notes, “The term cisgender was coined by transgender activists in the 90s to create a better way to describe people who aren’t transgender.”

KC: “Many AFAB [female] folks who identify as men or who don’t identify as women have the reproductive organs necessary to carry a child.”

That is because they are women.

KC: “Some people who have a uterus and ovaries, are not on testosterone, and identify as men or as not as women may wish to become pregnant. Unless you’ve taken testosterone, the process of pregnancy is similar to that of a cisgender woman.”

In other words, if you are female, you can bear a child.

KC: “To our knowledge, there has not yet been a case of pregnancy in an AMAB [male] individual.”

Actually, I am certain there has not yet been a pregnant man.

KC concludes: “With our understanding constantly evolving, it’s important to honor the fact that one’s gender doesn’t determine whether they can become pregnant. Many men have had children of their own, and many more will likely do so in the future.”

In this case, that would not be an “understanding constantly evolving” but “devolving.” And I thought we just cleared up the fact that no “AMAB [male] individual” has ever been pregnant.

At one time, the bulk of gender identity issues were limited to adolescent teenagers. Problem is, there are now leftist adolescent teenagers in their 60s.

The fact is, I have compassion for individuals who, due to a variety of gender exemplarity and/or psychological factors beyond their control, often including childhood sexual abuse, are gender dysphoric. But one of the great ironies of “woke” culture is that it has abandoned these individuals in their misery. And that is a particularly grievous abandonment by “woke” churches such as most Episcopal congregations.

Finally, clinical psychologist Jordan Peterson offers this observation about the anti-binary cult attempting to unlink sex and gender, and the consequences for those who question that leftist agenda: “Mark my words: A very large proportion of the insistence on the distinction between gender and sex is undiagnosed (and self serving) narcissism. But by the time this is revealed clinically many medical careers and innocent lives will be destroyed.”

Semper Vigilans Fortis Paratus et Fidelis
Pro Deo et Libertate — 1776