There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true. —Soren Kierkegaard. "…truth is true even if nobody believes it, and falsehood is false even if everybody believes it. That is why truth does not yield to opinion, fashion, numbers, office, or sincerity–it is simply true and that is the end of it" – Os Guinness, Time for Truth, pg.39. “He that takes truth for his guide, and duty for his end, may safely trust to God’s providence to lead him aright.” – Blaise Pascal. "There is but one straight course, and that is to seek truth and pursue it steadily" – George Washington letter to Edmund Randolph — 1795. We live in a “post-truth” world. According to the dictionary, “post-truth” means, “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.” Simply put, we now live in a culture that seems to value experience and emotion more than truth. Truth will never go away no matter how hard one might wish. Going beyond the MSM idealogical opinion/bias and their low information tabloid reality show news with a distractional superficial focus on entertainment, sensationalism, emotionalism and activist reporting – this blogs goal is to, in some small way, put a plug in the broken dam of truth and save as many as possible from the consequences—temporal and eternal. "The further a society drifts from truth, the more it will hate those who speak it." – George Orwell “There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.” ― Soren Kierkegaard
And Joseph said unto his brethren, I die: and God will surely visit you, and bring you out of this land unto the land which he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. (Genesis 50:24)
Joseph had been an incarnate providence to his brethren. All our Josephs die, and a thousand comforts die with them. Egypt was never the same to Israel after Joseph was dead, nor can the world again be to some of us what it was when our beloved ones were alive.
But see how the pain of that sad death was alleviated! They had a promise that the living God would visit them. A visit from Jehovah! What a favor! What a consolation! What a heaven below! O Lord, visit us this day; though indeed we are not worthy that Thou shouldest come under our roof.
But more was promised: the Lord would bring them out. They would find in Egypt a cold welcome when Joseph was dead; nay, it would become to them a house of bondage. But it was not to be so forever; they would come out of it by a divine deliverance and march to the land of promise. We shall not weep here forever. We shall be called home to the gloryland to join our dear ones. Wherefore, “comfort one another with these words.”
One of John Ortberg’s popular books is titled “If you Want to Walk on Water, you have to get out of the Boat“. Although the title alludes to when Peter tried to walk on water (and succeeded, albeit briefly; (Matthew 14:22-33) this quote also applies to the apostles, just after Jesus ascended to heaven.
As Jesus “was taken up before their very eyes“, the apostles “were looking intently up into the sky” (Acts 1:9-10). Just before this, Jesus told them “you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” (v8) Yet after Jesus ascends apostles just stand there. How often do we do the same? God’s instructions are clear to us, but we just can’t seem to get going.
I can imagine the apostles were worried when Jesus left them. How would they survive without Him? They left their homes, jobs, and everything else behind to follow Him. And now He was leaving? But this is no excuse, and their lack of action prompts two angels to appear to them, who say “Why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.” (v11)
The angels gave them the reason not to worry: Just as Jesus had been taken away, He will return. Luke’s gospel tells us how the apostles responded to the angels: “They worshiped [Jesus] and returned to Jerusalem with great joy.” (Luke 24:52) Their confidence was restored by God’s promise, which is trustworthy and true. And this confidence prompted them into action!
The question for us today is: Am I standing around, staring up at the sky? Or am I actively living out Jesus’ command to be witnesses to the ends of the Earth?
What’s holding you back from being an active witness? If you want to witness, you have to start witnessing! If your spiritual life lately has felt more like stargazing than navigating, it may be time to re-read the book of Acts and be inspired by the lives of some of the earliest Christian servants. I assure you that you are more ready than you realize, “for the Holy Spirit will teach you at that time what you should say.” (Luke 12:12)
Many people today believe that Satan is a myth, while some Christians have gone to the opposite extreme, attributing all kinds of experiences to the devil. Today, R.C. Sproul examines the Bible’s teaching about Satan.
The US, Russia, and Iran butt heads in Syria and Iraq In a significant development last month, US military convoys rolled into Iraq via the Arar crossing with Saudi Arabia. This visible display of foreign force movements saw a portion of the convoy making its way to the Ain al-Assad base in western Iraq, while the rest headed toward the US occupation base of Al-Tanf in Syria.
College students launching first US robotic moon rover – before NASA Carnegie Mellon University students are planning to send America’s first robotic lunar rover to the moon ahead of NASA. Developed over the course of three years by students, faculty, and alumni at Pennsylvania’s Carnegie Mellon University, the Iris rover is scheduled to be transported to the moon by NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services program.
India on the moon! Chandrayaan-3 becomes 1st probe to land near lunar south pole India has joined the moon-landing club. The Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft touched down softly near the moon’s south pole today (Aug. 23), notching a huge milestone for the nation. India is now the fourth country to stick a lunar landing, after the United States, the former Soviet Union and China. The historic touchdown occurred at 8:33 am ET (1233 GMT or 6:03 p.m. India Standard Time), according to the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). “We have achieved soft landing on the moon! India is on the moon!”.
Big solar flare incoming? Intriguing black patch on Sun captured by Perseverance Mars rover Currently rolling across the Red planet, NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover has sent amazing pictures of an intriguing patch on the sun, that is not yet visible from Earth. Using its Mastcam-Z camera system, Perseverance managed to capture the big sunspot moving across the solar disk late last week and over the weekend.
Lawmakers want subpoena power in UFO inquiries Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are looking to expand their investigative power following their July hearing on unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), or UFOs, which they say left more questions than answers. They emphasized the hearing only scratched the surface of existing intelligence on UFOs, partly because former intelligence official David Grusch, their star whistleblower, said he was unable to present classified evidence to substantiate his claims.
Expert warns fake Prigozhin body double may be on board crashed jet Anyone rejoicing that Wagner Boss Yevgeny Prigozhin may have died in a fiery plane crash should hold back on the fireworks as one expert has warned it could have been a body double aboard the plane. The notorious mercenary boss, whose gang of blood thirsty soldiers has been blamed for warcrimes from Ukraine to Mali, is ‘feared’ dead in a plane crash along with 10 people on board.
Rand Paul On Return Of COVID Measures: “These People Have No Shame” “These people are so conflicted,” Paul said, adding “It’s so dishonest to put people like that on the air to promote a product that they make more money from … promote this hysteria. This defies all logic. It defies science, and it defies common sense.” “To see this coming up again, these people have no shame,” Paul continued,
McCarthy Recycles Biden Impeachment Tease To review, the president of Ukrainian energy giant Burisma was allegedly coerced by the Bidens to tune of $10 million – and has 17 recordings of Biden dealings for ‘insurance,’ on top of Hunter Biden’s exorbitant board seat, Donald Trump was impeached for asking Ukraine about it.
Federal Judge Sides With Christian Activist Banned By University For Calling Transgender Student ‘Male’ A federal judge has blocked the University of Wyoming (UW) from censoring a Christian activist who openly called a female-identifying transgender student “male.” In a preliminary injunction issued on Aug. 18, the U.S. District Court in Wyoming sided with Todd Schmidt, an elder at Laramie Faith Community Church, ordering the university to not ban him from tabling on campus while the case proceeds.
Ben Gvir on Arab violence: Some of the murdered are ones who planned murders “Some of those who were murdered are people who themselves went out in order to murder. Two days ago, there was a story of a man whose body arrived with the gloves and the gun that were in his possession; he was run over by a car on the way to a murder,” said Ben Gvir.
North Korea fails in second attempt to launch a rocket North Korea said on Thursday that its second attempt to launch a spy satellite has failed and it will make a third attempt in October, The Associated Press reported, citing North Korea state media. The North’s state news agency, KCNA, said Thursday’s launch ended in a failure because of an error that happened during a three-stage flight of the rocket.
Wagner Decries ‘Murder’ Of Prigozhin Amid Reports Anti-Air Missile Struck Plane …the entire top command of Russian mercenary outfit Wagner Group was aboard the private plane that was downed northwest of Moscow hours ago. Wagner itself is confirming Yvgeny Prigozhin’s death, with Wagner-affiliated Telegram channel Grey Zone calling it a “murder”. “The murder/assassination of Prigozhin will have catastrophic consequences. “The leader of the Wagner Group, a Hero of Russia, a real patriot of his motherland – Yevgeny Prigozhin has died at the hands of traitors of Russia. But even in hell he’ll be the best! Glory to Russia!”
Deep M6.2 earthquake hits Santiago del Estero, Argentina A deep earthquake registered by the USGS as M6.2 hit Argentina at 14:22 UTC on August 23, 2023. The agency is reporting a depth of 568.8 km (353.4 miles). EMSC is reporting M6.2 at a depth of 565 km (351 miles.
Tropical Storm “Harold” hits South Texas, becoming the first 2023 landfall in US Tropical Storm “Harold” — the first tropical cyclone to make landfall in the US for 2023, hit South Texas on Tuesday, August 22, 2023, delivering torrential rains and localized flash floods in areas along the Mexico border. This sudden impact came mere hours after its upgrade from a tropical depression on its trajectory across the Gulf of Mexico.
China’s Hypocrisy on Display at the United Nations The Chinese Communist regime’s shameless pretension that it is concerned about protecting religious holy sites in Jerusalem while destroying the religious holy sites of minorities in its own country is the height of hypocrisy
Liberal Democrat Wants Gang Members To Only Shoot Between Certain Hours Sigh. I have said this before and I’m going to say it again. The Democrats are the party of BAD ideas and the Republicans are the party of NO ideas. In Chicago, which is the modern-day equivalent of the wild, wild, west, another bad idea has arisen. Alderwoman Maria Hadden, is promoting a proposal from a group called the Native Sons “asking” gang members to restrict their shooting to between the hours of 9:00 PM to 9:00 AM.
Disturbing Trend: Maternal Death Rates Have Soared 50% in America Since Vaccine Rollout A “terrible report” by the National Center for Health Statistics, published on the CDC website, came out in the spring of this year, reported world-renowned cardiologist Dr. Peter McCullough. What that report shows is that maternal death rates are increasing in America — and fast.
Google’s AI Bots Tout ‘Benefits’ of Genocide, Slavery, Fascism, Other Evils If you asked a spokesperson from any Fortune 500 Company to list the benefits of genocide or give you the corporation’s take on whether slavery was beneficial, they would most likely either refuse to comment or say “those things are evil; there are no benefits.” However, Google has AI employees, SGE and Bard, who are more than happy to offer arguments in favor of these and other unambiguously wrong acts. If that’s not bad enough, the company’s bots are also willing to weigh in on controversial topics such as who goes to heaven and whether democracy or fascism is a better form of government.
Revisiting New York City in Spring 2020; a deep dive into the data relating to the covid event that was used to scare the world New York City’s spring 2020 mass-casualty event is a global and domestic outlier that warrants closer scrutiny. The events and death toll in America’s largest city were used to scare the country, and the world, and justify the sudden implementation of a response akin to an anticipated bomb attack, rather than a disease outbreak. Dr. Jessica Hockett suggests that time-series data and primary source documents she has been analysing raise serious questions about when, where and if people died.
Iran Unveils Their New ‘Mohajer-10’ Drone They Say Is Capable Of Reaching Israel And Dropping A Deadly Payload On Arch-Enemies The Jews The Biden administration has been busy unfreezing billions of dollars in Iranian assets, and this is one of the many factors as to why the terror state of Iran is not only surviving but thriving. Like the illustration of the attack dog willing to launch itself over the edge of a cliff as it seeks to devour a bird in flight, Iran is a nation fueled solely by hate, and that will prove to be its undoing. But before that day, Iran seeks to do as much damage to the Jews as possible, say hello to Mohajer-10.
Stop demonising farmers and let farmers farm, Australian rural charity says Cut the red tape and the demonisation of farmers under the banner of the so-called “climate crisis” or any other “crisis.” Let Australian farmers farm, Anita Dolan said. And, allow farmers to have input into the consultations with the government bodies and Members of Parliament when deciding what’s best for the land, animals and the environment.
“Speak seldom, but to important subjects, except such as particularly relate to your constituents, and, in the former case, make yourself perfectly master of the subject.” —George Washington (1787)
Fellow Patriots, on this day in 1814, British troops invaded Washington, DC, burning the White House and the Capitol Building. In today’s news, Donald Trump and 18 others are getting mugshots in Georgia for the supposed crime of trying to “steal” the election — the aftermath of which featured rioters “invading” the Capitol. —Mark Alexander
One candidate stood out, another exceeded expectations, and all eight of them made the most of Donald Trump’s absence.
Douglas Andrews
“Our country is in decline,” said Florida Governor Ron DeSantis in his opening salvo of last night’s Republican Party presidential debate. But, he said, “This decline is not inevitable; it’s a choice.”
In years past, we’d have expected the other candidates to take issue with that kind of pessimistic broadside and rise up on behalf of the country. But not last night. It’s a sign of the times that there was plenty of agreement on this point among the participants, plenty of agreement that Joe Biden’s presidency has already been an unmitigated disaster.
The first thing we noticed about seven of the eight candidates on stage last night was that all of them seemed to be wearing Trump-blue suits and Trump-red ties. Talk about the elephant (not) in the room. Nikki Haley, thankfully, went with a different look. Regardless, it was probably a win-win for the eight candidates, who got to introduce themselves to the American people, and for Donald Trump, who cited his commanding lead in the polls as his reason for sitting this one out with Tucker Carlson.
Those eight qualifying candidates: North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum, former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, the aforementioned DeSantis, former UN Ambassador and South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, former Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson, former VP Mike Pence, biotech businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, and South Carolina Senator Tim Scott.
We also couldn’t help but notice that Christie, the anti-Trump attack dog and therefore the darling of the Left, got booed during the intros. And deservedly so. The guy seemed to relish turning Ronald Reagan’s Eleventh Commandment — “Thou shalt not speak ill of a fellow Republican” — on its head, and not just toward Trump.
As for the other anti-Trumper, Asa Hutchinson, he also got booed. And by the end of the night, he caused us to wonder: What on earth is this guy doing on stage?
As for grittiness, Governor Burgum won it going away. Just prior to the debate, he completely tore his Achilles tendon playing pick-up basketball. And yet there he was, standing on stage for two hours, answering media questions afterward, and quipping that he’d taken his fellow North Dakotans too literally when they sent him to Milwaukee and told him, “Break a leg.”
Ramaswamy, 38, gave an electrifying albeit pre-packaged intro answer, and it set the tone for the rest of his performance. The guy is whip smart and quick on his feet. “Do you want a super PAC puppet,” he asked, “or do you want a patriot who speaks the truth?”
One point of unanimity among the candidates was American energy, about which all of them agreed that Biden’s war on fossil fuels is killing the American economy. “Drill, frack, burn coal, unleash nuclear,” said Ramaswamy in rapid-fire succession.
If Haley’s chances of being Trump’s VP pick didn’t go out the window with her first answer, in which she blamed the former president for having added $8 trillion to the national debt, they certainly did so when she said, toward the end of the debate, “Trump is the most disliked politician in America,” while warning that the Republicans can’t win the presidency with him on the ticket. No one else staked out that territory last night — not even Christie.
Pence was strong with his opening statement, but his mean-spirited swipe at Ramaswamy — “Now is not the time for on-the-job training; we don’t need to bring in a rookie” — was strangely un-Pence-like. If Pence supporters were looking for a breakout performance, he simply didn’t deliver.
It’s interesting, too, because in terms of speaking time, Pence led all candidates with 12:37. For comparison, Ron DeSantis came in fifth at 10:22. Clearly, what a candidate says is more important than how long he takes to say it.
When the elitists at Fox News turned to the topic of climate change, DeSantis had one of his best moments — and certainly his most commanding one. Co-moderator Bret Baier asked a pre-recorded question from a concerned young person and then tried to get the candidates on record with a show of hands about whether they believe climate change is man-caused. “We’re not children here,” DeSantis shot back immediately — and that was the end of Baier’s show-of-hands stunt.
One of the most jarring moments of the night came when Ramaswamy took a shot at the rest of the candidates on climate change: “I’m the only person on the stage who isn’t bought and paid for,” he said, “so I can say this: The climate change agenda is a hoax, and we need to declare our independence from it.”
In response, Christie bellowed back with a pre-programmed retort: “I’ve had enough of a guy who sounds like Chat GPT.” Christie also took exception to the way Ramaswamy introduced himself as a “skinny guy with a funny last name” because the last guy to use that line was Barack Obama.
When co-moderator Martha McCallum asked about abortion and the electoral toll that the issue has been taking with suburban women, Haley came back with a thoughtful answer and staked out some reasonable policy positions. “I am unapologetically pro-life,” she said, but “we’ve got to stop demonizing this issue.”
DeSantis weighed in, defending his state’s six-week ban on abortion, saying, “I believe in a culture of life,” and, referring to the Democrats’ de facto position of abortion on demand up until the moment of birth, vowing, “We will hold them accountable for their extremism.” This comment — calling out the Democrats’ on-demand abortion extremism — seems to us the way forward, the way to go on offense rather than continuing to play defense.
Pence proposed a 15-week ban, which he said is still “after a baby is able to feel pain.”
Bergum came out against a federal ban on abortion, refreshingly invoking the 10th Amendment and referring the matter to the states, while Scott called out “states like California, New York, and Illinois” that have abortion on demand up until the moment of birth.
Haley then rightly challenged the media to ask Democrats what their abortion threshold is: 38 weeks? 39 weeks? 40 weeks? This, too, we think, is a great way to go on offense. Of course, the media won’t go along, but that doesn’t mean our candidates can’t keep pounding on them for their bias.
Baier: “We are going to take a moment to talk about the elephant *not” in the room.“
It was a telling moment when he then said “You all signed a pledge” and asked the candidates whether they’d still support Trump as their party’s nominee if he was convicted in a court of law. Ramaswamy’s hand shot up immediately. Then Haley and Scott followed, and then Bergum. Then, after looking to his left and his right and then his left again, DeSantis sort of meekly raised his hand. And then Pence, who didn’t need to look. And then, surprisingly, Christie, who later tried to mealy-mouth it back, saying he was wagging his finger rather than raising his hand.
“The conduct is beneath the office of president of the United States,” said Christie, to boos from the audience. To which he responded, “Booing is allowed, but it doesn’t change the truth.”
Hutchinson was the only one of the eight who didn’t raise his hand.
When Scott was asked whether Pence did the right thing on January 6, he didn’t hesitate: “Yes.” Then he pivoted immediately to the Democrats’ weaponization of government, and he said the first thing he’d do is fire Merrick Garland, and the second thing he’d do is fire Christopher Wray.
DeSantis also hit weaponization and eventually got back to the question of Pence and January 6. “Mike did his duty. I’ve got no beef with him.”
In defense of himself, Pence was ready: “I had no right to overturn the election,” he said, “and Kamala Harris will have no right to overturn the election when we beat them in 2024.”
As for Hutchinson, he couldn’t resist: “Donald Trump was morally disqualified from being president again because of what happened on January 6.” Then he did the work of leftist legal scholars and invoked the old 14th Amendment argument meant to keep former Confederate leaders from serving in Congress.
When Baier asked whether the candidates would support an increase of funding to Ukraine, Ramaswamy stood alone in raising his hand. Then he compared securing our southern border to helping Ukraine secure its border, and giving money to Ukraine instead of Maui or the south side of Chicago.
Pence, though, strongly defended our support of Ukraine against Vladimir Putin: “We can do both. … We achieve peace through strength.”
To which Ramaswamy shot back, “Ukraine is not a priority for the United States of America.” Then he invoked Vietnam and Iraq as wars that were mistakes.
Haley then joined in, hitting Ramaswamy hard on his isolationism: “He wants to hand Ukraine to Russia, he wants to let China eat Taiwan, he wants to stop funding Israel. You don’t do that to friends.” This escalated into a shouting match, with Haley calling Ukraine our “first line of defense” and telling Ramaswamy that he’s “choosing a murderer” in Putin. “You have no foreign policy experience,” she yelled, “and it shows.”
DeSantis jumped back in, rightly reminding his colleagues that the first duty of an American president is to protect our border. He then said he’d secure the southern border and declare war on the cartels, and that he’d use the American military to do it.
“If we just spend $10 billion, we could finish the wall,” said Scott.
MacCallum asked DeSantis about using lethal force against the cartels, and he responded immediately. “Would I use force? Would I treat them as foreign terrorist organizations? You bet I would.”
Pence, meanwhile, spoke of his record in defending the southern border and how the economic pressure the Trump administration applied was successful in getting Mexico to do its job.
The talk then shifted to education. “The nation’s report card,” said Baier, “was the weakest ever for American schoolchildren, exposing chronic absenteeism, deep declines for reading and math.”
Said DeSantis, who has pledged to eliminate the Department of Education, “We need education in this country, not indoctrination.” And he talked about American civics, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. “As president,” he said, “I’m going to lead an effort to increase civic understanding and knowledge of our Constitution. We cannot be graduating students that don’t have any foundation in what it means to be an American.”
But it was Ramaswamy who weighed in with one of the best responses of the night, calling a two-parent household “the ultimate privilege,” calling education “the civil rights issue of our time,” and calling the nuclear family “the greatest form of governance known to mankind.”
Haley added, “Let’s put vocational education back into our schools,” and suggested that we teach our young people “to build things again.”
Baier then teed up the candidates’ closing comments with the following: “Twenty years ago, 70% of American adults said they were extremely proud to be an American. That number has now plummeted to just 39%. In his pitch to get to the Oval Office, President Reagan called America the shining city on a hill, a beacon of hope and optimism.”
Perhaps Pence said it best: “Joe Biden was weakened American at home and abroad … but I know we can bring it back. We proved during the Trump Pence years that you can turn this country around faster than you can imagine. … God is not done with America yet. … The best days for the greatest nation on earth are yet to come.”
As for the election choice, former RNC Chair Reince Priebus afterwards noted, “Every one of these candidates is better than Joe Biden.” Or, we might add, whoever replaces him on the Democrat ticket.
Ultimately, that’s what the 2024 election is all about, and every Republican candidate would do well to focus on that instead of hitting each other.
PopCon #10: Is ‘Rich Men North of Richmond’ Right Wing?Oliver Anthony has captured the nation, with his original song “Rich Men North of Richmond” breaking music chart records and amassing tens of millions of views on social media in only days. Some say his song captures the frustration most Americans are feeling but don’t fully know how to verbalize, while others say it’s a slight against minorities and filled with right-wing conspiracies. Is “Rich Men North of Richmond” right wing?
Donald Trump sat down with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson with the full intent of upstaging the GOP debate.
Nate Jackson
Literally five minutes before the GOP presidential debate began on Fox News at 9 p.m. last night, Tucker Carlson dropped his 46-minute pre-taped interview with Donald Trump, who skipped the debate, on the platform formerly known as Twitter. Carlson was fired by Fox earlier this year and Trump simply didn’t want to debate. Was there any doubt that the whole point was for both men to upstage their rivals?
To be sure, it worked — at least in terms of diverting a lot of attention away from the debate stage. We don’t trust Twitter’s X’s metrics for several reasons, but as we went to press this morning, Tucker’s Trump interview had already surpassed 190 million views.
Today, Trump will be in Georgia for his mugshot for what he twice told Carlson was another “bulls**t” indictment. Could he have had a better week?
The former president explained his decision to skip the debate as being driven entirely by the polls. As much as he loves talking about the issues, he said, why bother going? He’d just “get harassed by people that shouldn’t even be running for president” when he’s leading the polls by 50 and 60 points, or, this time he added, even 70 points in one poll. He then mocked and belittled a few of his competitors by name or sophomoric nickname.
Trump clearly made the most savvy play he could make by not attending the debate and instead getting to talk almost totally uninterrupted for 45 minutes about a wide variety of issues. And we do mean almost totally uninterrupted, given that Tucker asked only a handful of questions and mostly just listened as Trump opined on whatever came to his mind, some of which was very funny.
Judging by X (Twitter) reactions, it seems that the most talked about part of the interview was the roughly two minutes predominantly dedicated to the 2019 death of Jeffrey Epstein. It began when Carlson accused former Attorney General Bill Barr of lying about Epstein’s death in his book before asking what Trump thought of Epstein’s death. Trump tried to redirect the conversation to how “Barr didn’t do an investigation on the election fraud, either,” but Tucker wouldn’t have it, steering back to Epstein.
Despite our humorous title, the point of this article isn’t to settle that mystery, though it has been the butt of countless memes of ours over the years. But we will say this: Trump was right to simply note that Epstein “knew a lot on a lot of people” in Washington. In fact, that’s putting it mildly.
Anyway, Trump also talked about Russia and Ukraine, North Korea, China, and our own southern border — all areas where he was undoubtedly stronger as president than Joe Biden. Trump railed against the bureaucracy, especially regarding heavy-handed regulation in the name of saving the environment.
That led to one of the funniest moments for Trump, as he joked about electric cars: “The happiest moment for somebody in an electric car is the first 10 minutes. The unhappiest part is the next hour because you’re petrified that you won’t be able to find another charger.” Of course, Biden wants to mandate charging anxiety for all of us, which isn’t funny at all.
Speaking of laughing and Joe Biden, Trump brutally roasted the president. “I think he’s worse mentally than he is physically, and physically, he’s not exactly a triathlete or any kind of an athlete,” Trump joked in response to Tucker asking if Biden would even make it until November 2024. “You look at him, he can’t walk to the helicopter. He walks — he can’t lift his feet out of the grass, you know, it’s only two inches at the White House, right? It’s not a lot. But you watch him and it looks like he’s walking on toothpicks.”
“We have a president that can’t put two sentences together,” Trump added. “He can’t speak, can’t walk, can’t talk. I don’t think he’s going to make it to the gate.” Neither do we.
More importantly, though, Biden is “the most corrupt president we’ve ever had, and he also has the distinction of being the most incompetent,” Trump added. “He is in many ways the Manchurian candidate.”
On another serious note, Carlson asked about whether Trump ever fears for his life and whether he thinks we’re headed for another civil war. Trump called his Democrat opponents “sick” and “savage animals,” but he declined to say more about death threats. But because they so grossly overreach and exaggerate about January 6, Trump has always been inclined to go overboard the other direction, downplaying the violence by regularly insisting that “we said ‘peacefully and patriotically’ march” to the Capitol. He said of the J6 crowd, “There’s tremendous passion and there’s tremendous love.”
There’s a middle ground of reality regarding January 6 that the most vehement partisans on both sides ignore. Most Americans don’t, and it’s evidently going to play a prominent role in the 2024 election.
In any case, “There is a level of passion that I’ve never seen,” Trump ultimately concluded regarding the idea of civil war. “There is a level of hatred that I’ve never seen. And that’s probably a bad combination.”
It most certainly is, and Trump Derangement Syndrome explains a good bit of it.
Georgia mugshots, head of Wagner mercenary group in plane crash, antifa thugs ordered to pay Ngo, and more.
Thomas Gallatin & Jordan Candler
Cross-Examination
Trump, et al. get GA mugshots: Today, former President Donald Trump will turn himself into the Fulton County authorities to be booked, photographed for a mug shot, and arraigned. In doing so, Trump will join his fellow “co-conspirators” who have been either already booked or soon will be in this blatantly politically motivated charade and mockery of the American justice system. Indeed, Trump’s lawyers are included in the specious charges for daring to do what lawyers do — advise their clients — which exposes this sham for what it is: a vindictive plot against a candidate the Left loathes. The remaining question is, will Trump smile for his mug shot?
Biden’s Venezuela election integrity demand: Evidently, measures to ensure election integrity matter to the Biden administration only when it comes to foreign countries. Case in point, Venezuela’s authoritarian socialist leader President Nicolas Maduro, who has been in power since 2013, is soon expected to announce his run for reelection next year. After Venezuela descended into becoming a socialist authoritarian state, the U.S. raised sanctions against the South American nation, targeting its top export, oil. The Biden administration is now floating sanctions relief in a bid to get Maduro to hold a free and fair election. As Adrienne Watson, a spokeswoman for Biden’s National Security Advisor, stated, “Should Venezuela take concrete actions toward restoring democracy, leading to free and fair elections, we are prepared to provide corresponding sanctions relief.”
Prigozhin dead? On Wednesday, a plane crashed outside of Moscow, Russia, killing all who were on board. According to the flight manifest, Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner mercenary group, was on that flight. Earlier this year, Prigozhin led a short-lived mutiny against the Russian military leadership after months of him publicly voicing his displeasure with the Kremlin. The mutiny inexplicably ended after a deal was brokered by Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Prigozhin. After that deal, many speculated that Prigozhin’s days were numbered given Putin’s history of knocking off potential rivals. Well, it now appears that speculation was warranted, assuming Prigozhin was actually on the doomed flight. Putin and Prigozhin’s longtime friendship combined with Prigozhin’s strange decision to end his mutiny when he had the upper hand causes one to wonder.
Antifa thugs ordered to pay Ngo: Investigative journalist Andy Ngo, who was attacked and severely beaten by a mob of antifa activists in 2019 while he was covering protests in Portland, Oregon, finally got at least a little semblance of justice. While a jury failed to rule in Ngo’s favor in a civil trial against two other antifa members, a circuit court judge ruled that three other antifa defendants who failed to show for court summons now owe Ngo $300,000. Ngo responded, “She gave the full amount that she could, the full amount that I requested in my lawsuit.” He added: “That’s quite telling. It’s such a different outcome from the jury verdict.” However, given who these antifa thugs are, Ngo is under no delusion that he will see any money from them. “This is part of the reason why you don’t see victims of Antifa suing them,” he explained. “A lot of them are losers with no assets.” Ngo pointed to the root of the problem: “So, they escape accountability in the criminal-justice system because they carry out criminal activities in jurisdictions where there are [progressive] district attorneys like [Portland’s] Mike Schmidt. And civilly, they also escape justice because the resources that it takes to go through this legal process are immense.”
Renewed restrictions on offshore drilling: The Biden administration leaned even harder into the anti-fossil fuel agenda, as the Interior Department on Tuesday rolled out its new offshore drilling regulations that will make future oil development and production that much more difficult and costly. Under the guise of ensuring greater worker safety, the new regulations are a return to the Obama-era regulations for the industry that the Trump administration rolled back, but are now even more stringent. For example, the new rule introduces a third-party requirement for permit applications that will significantly hamper the process with unnecessary red tape. American Petroleum Institute (API) Vice President Holly Hopkins charged that “this rule continues the rampant politicization of the rulemaking process and represents another policy swing from administration to administration, resulting in a policy that fails to meaningfully improve the safety of workers or protect the environment.”
Follow the money: Speaking of regulations, Democrat Senator Sheldon Whitehouse has introduced several pieces of legislation pushing the climate change agenda that present a potential conflict of interest. Whitehouse’s wife, Sandra, just happens to serve as an advisor for a startup green company, Running Tide Technology, that could end up benefiting financially from the legislation that the Rhode Island senator is pushing. Making matters worse, Whitehouse was the one who raised ethics concerns over Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’s wife Ginni Thomas working for a consulting company. Whitehouse called for “significant ethics reform at the Supreme Court.” Meanwhile, Whitehouse’s wife works for Running Tide, which lobbied Congress to “mandate” more government spending on carbon capture and retrieval technology from the ocean, the business that Running Tide just happens to be engaged in.
Headlines
Hunter Biden traveled to at least 13 countries with VP dad (Fox News)
FDA taps new Human Foods Program head after baby formula crisis (Roll Call)
New York Times slammed by the Left over Ann Coulter byline; critics recall she once fantasized about bombing their offices (Mediaite)
New York Times confirms St. Louis gender clinic whistleblower’s claim that adolescents were rushed into “affirming” care (National Review)
South Carolina Supreme Court rules state’s “heartbeat” abortion law constitutional (Daily Signal)
Court rules against Dr. Jordan Peterson, upholds regulatory group’s requirement that he undergo “re-education” for expressing his opinions online (Blaze Media)
Mortgage demand hits lowest level in nearly three decades (Washington Examiner)
Policy: Biden’s incoherent energy policy continues (Daily Signal)
Satire: Leader of failed Russian uprising dead after accidental ingestion of surface-to-air missile (Babylon Bee)
These hypocrites’ “fix” to the growing police shortage they created is making the problem worse.
Emmy Griffin
The consequences have kept on coming down the pike after Democrats raised the clarion cry to “defund the police” and local politicians actually listened.
A whole town’s police force resigned in Minnesota, where no one wants to be a police officer. It’s thankless and stressful and definitely not a job you go into for the money and cushy perks. It also now has the stigma attached to it — starting in 2015 and onward to the 2020 death of George Floyd — that cops are racist.
It’s not just Minnesota that is hurting for more law enforcement. Many cities (particularly blue cities) are seeing a shortage of willing recruits. It’s a problem that is steadily getting worse.
Some states are seeking a creative solution to this hiring bottleneck.
Illinois, which has the added bonus of being a “sanctuary state,” is taking measures to get its overflow of migrants out of the shelters and into paying jobs. Democrat Governor J.B. Pritzker just signed a bill that may even allow some illegal migrants to become law enforcement officers. Seems like a bad precedent to have law-breaking noncitizens arresting citizens in our “land of the free.”
The Chinese could set up a secret police station with impunity under this law.
Here is the exact language from the bill:
…provides that an individual who is not a citizen but is legally authorized to work in the United States under federal law is authorized to apply for the position of police officer, subject to all requirements and limitations, other than citizenship, to which other applicants are subject.
Newsweek, of course, slapped a fact-check on the people reporting on this insane new law, saying that it clearly only applies to illegals who have permits to work in the U.S. The question on any sane person’s mind is: How does that stipulation make it better?
Illinois is not alone. California also has a similar law in effect. Migrants who are protected from deportation because of work approvals or DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) can sign up to join the boys in blue.
Meanwhile, as cities like Chicago and Los Angeles are going to hell in a handbasket, lawmakers who led the cry against police are showing the country what a bunch of elitist hypocrites they are.
House “Squad” members Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), and Cori Bush (D-MO) — some of the loudest proponents of the “defund the police” movement post-George Floyd — have spent a combined $1.2 million on personal security.
Bush in particular has earned the crown of hypocrisy in this particular arena. Back in 2021, she had spent a total of $70,000 on personal security, citing threats to her life. Since then, her total is now up to $730,000.
Some of that campaign money — yes, their personal security is paid for through campaign funds — was given to her husband to the tune of $75,000. He was not licensed as a security guard, and she has a Federal Election Commission complaint as a result.
What we at The Patriot Post have articulated from the beginning of this disgraceful push to eradicate law enforcement is that hobbling the police force is hurting the most vulnerable communities (often those of color) that rely on the police to keep law and order in their neighborhoods.
What we are seeing in big states like California and big cities like Chicago is a Wild West-like free-for-all of thievery and lawlessness. Chicago recently asked gangs not to shoot during school hours, but during the night is fine.
Their cities are dying. Yet the Democrats won’t own up to their terrible policies. Instead, they redirect the blame toward the GOP and try to make it sound like “defund the police” was the Republicans’ idea.
Nothing is ever their fault. And nothing is going to change if we keep voting clowns like these into positions of power.
YouTube, Facebook, and even X all expand their censorship efforts.
Thomas Gallatin
Google-owned YouTube recently announced that it is expanding its COVID-specific censorship practices to now include all “medical misinformation.” According to the new guidelines, only medical information that comports with what is currently approved by local health authorities or the World Health Organization will be deemed appropriate to post.
That which runs counter to the accepted narrative will be subject to censorship and removal according to three broadly and ill-defined categorizations of “medical misinformation.” Those categories of supposed “misinformation” are as follows: prevention misinformation, treatment misinformation, and denial misinformation.
YouTube’s new policy implicitly advises self-censorship, as it states: “Don’t post content on YouTube if it contains any of the [above information].”
We’re old enough to remember the compromised history of the WHO during the coronavirus pandemic and the misinformation the UN organization was guilty of pushing — as were the CDC and Dr. Anthony “The Science” Fauci himself. That included misinformation such as that the COVID vaccines prevented infection or the spread of COVID and that the Wuhan lab leak was a quack conspiracy theory. One would have thought this would have caused YouTube to back off its medical information suppression efforts. Of course, that would only be the case if those running YouTube were actually concerned about maintaining a platform where truth can be discovered and error exposed; a platform that believes in free speech.
However, as investigative journalist Michael Shellenberger observed, “YouTube isn’t a social media platform, it’s a propaganda platform.” Exactly.
But Google isn’t the only Big Tech company ramping up content censorship. Meta-owned Facebook is still outsourcing its censorship policing to “neutral” “fact-checking” organizations in an effort to claim Facebook itself is not engaged in any efforts to suppress content. Well, as we’ve noted ad nauseam, these “fact-checking” outfits are anything but neutral; rather, they are almost all leftist organizations that Meta is funding to suppress conservative content on Facebook.
One such “fact-checking” outfit is the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT), hired by Meta to the tune of $740,000 a year. RMIT is responsible for blocking and deplatforming a number of Australian journalists — of course, all in the name of preventing “misinformation” or for some other dubious reason.
Elon Musk recently weighed in by calling for transparency: “Facebook is manipulating the public almost everywhere on Earth. That is why they won’t open source their algorithm.”
Speaking of Musk, for his buyout of Twitter, now known as X, the billionaire entrepreneur repeatedly expressed his desire to ensure the social media platform would serve as a beacon for free speech. Unfortunately, it appears that beacon isn’t shining so brightly lately.
Musk recently touted what amounts to a “fairer” censorship. Concerned over advertisement dollars, Musk is apparently seeking to assuage the concerns of advertisers who don’t want to be associated with “problematic” posts, and so he therefore is willing to engage in censorship of certain subjects or terms — it’s just that he will also censor leftists. He announced that the term “cis” would be banned from the platform, as he declared it to be considered a slur. He’s pretty much right about that.
Even so, Musk will compromise with the Left by enforcing its “preferred pronouns” rules in exchange for censoring certain words conservatives may find offensive. But conservatives aren’t asking for censorship of anyone. We care about the fundamental principle of freedom of speech on a public platform.
The fact of the matter is, Big Tech censorship will only get worse, as upholding the narrative matters more than contending for the truth.
Would any lives had been saved if we’d been greener, sooner?
Jack DeVine
It happened again, this time on a scale not seen in a century. On the Hawaiian island of Maui, a wildfire fanned by hurricane-force winds incinerated the historic town of Lahaina and killed more than a hundred people. The death toll is still climbing.
The Maui scenario was not very different from those in recent California fire seasons or the wildfires in Canada that have raged all summer long. And they are conceptually similar to other severe weather events — hurricanes, tornadoes, etc. — that occur with worrisome frequency.
The consequences of such events are all too similar — devastation that will take decades to heal. The reaction from politicians and media is just as predictable: “There it is again, climate change, plain as day, getting worse all the time. We know the cause and we know how to fix it. Stop using fossil fuels, now!”
But hold on: Is there any reason to believe that even a single life would have been saved in Maui by more subsidies for electric vehicles, pricier climate change legislation, more global gallivanting by John Kerry, more windmills and solar panels, or any of the other green lobby’s insistent demands?
The answer is no. Our massively expensive green energy initiatives do nothing to clean up the earth’s atmosphere; at best they reduce the rate (and possibly, by not much) of future global warming ostensibly caused by mankind’s use of fossil fuels.
Critics of columns like this one continue to either misunderstand or misrepresent the fundamental, scientifically solid reality of climate change. Everyone knows that the earth’s climate has been changing, in many ways, for its entire lifetime. Our problem is that there’s not much we can do about it.
So, in view of the repeated, horrific consequences of extreme weather events (regardless of cause) like the Maui fire, maybe it’s time to rethink the problem. Should we not alter our priorities and place our primary emphasis on protecting people and property rather than pursuing potentially futile efforts to fix the climate?
The circumstances surrounding the Maui fire are already well understood. The fire probably started from high-voltage power lines; the fuel source was untended grasses that have replaced farmlands in high tourist areas; those grasses were tinder-dry and very inflammable due to the cyclic drought conditions common in Hawaii (and Canada and the western U.S.); high winds caused it to spread rapidly; and for reasons yet unknown, Maui’s public warning system was never activated.
Those factors are well understood; they can be mitigated with expenditures that are minuscule compared to the hundreds of billions spent or committed in U.S. climate control initiatives.
Step back and take in the big picture. Today’s taxpayers are spending fortunes to stave off a global warming crisis decades in the future, with little certainty that those expenditures will ever deliver tangible benefit; and at the same time we are counting on current processes and funding to prevent — or when needed to mitigate — environmental and human catastrophes such as the Maui fire.
That’s not working. Priorities matter, and ours need to change.
That change won’t happen under a Biden administration already far too invested in the religion of climate change and quite pleased with its initiatives; it advises proudly that in-place legislation (including the conveniently but inaccurately named Inflation Reduction Act) constitutes “the largest investment in clean energy and climate action ever.” The projected cost is $500 billion in the next decade, and the administration would like to go further.
Even if well intended, single-minded fixation on global warming is itself as harmful as the future problems we are trying to avoid. The unavoidable consequence of precipitous reduction in fossil fuel use is higher cost and decreased availability of electricity — which in turn causes reduced life expectancies and adverse health effects for billions in the lower economic strata worldwide.
That’s not an argument for indefinite reliance on fossil fuels. But it is an argument for careful, methodical, and cost-beneficial reduction of fossil fuels, augmented by a combination of renewables and a healthy new supply of nuclear energy.
The nuclear hill is a steep one to climb, primarily because we have let our nuclear design and construction capability atrophy for decades. The problem ahead — which, by bad planning, will collide with the government-dictated tenfold expansion of electric vehicles — is that the U.S. nuclear fleet is aging collectively, and many plants will retire from service when they are needed most. Our government has bet the house on fixing climate change, while treating nuclear energy — our most effective tool in combatting climate change — as an afterthought. It should be the centerpiece.
None of this is easy. Our nation’s energy and environmental policy must take into account the full range of societal, scientific, and economic factors, and find a way to balance both current and future needs — one more arena demanding open-minded, apolitical leadership.
Go off to school this year determined to make a difference — but look for those opportunities right next to you.
Laura Hollis
This is the time of year when millions of young Americans are heading off to college, including my own daughter. In the spirit of maternal love and concern, I wanted to offer a bit of wisdom to them, based on my observations and personal experience.
No. 1: Actually, don’t try to change the world.
The college-bound youth of this country (and others) hear constantly that they are the “best and the brightest.” They are often launched into adulthood carrying the weight of all society’s ills, having been told that it’s their charge to “solve” perennial problems like poverty, hunger and war, which have existed since humankind crawled out of caves. (Not to mention the relatively more recent matters that our neurotic elites have decided are crises, like overpopulation, “climate change,” “the patriarchy” and “white supremacy.”)
The delegation of these responsibilities is apparently supposed to be inspiring, despite the fact that teenagers and 20-somethings typically have inadequate education, experience or judgment to resolve anything as widespread, varied and hotly disputed as these issues are.
Unfortunately, I think the whole “best and brightest” spiel has contributed both to the explosion of depression and anxiety and the rise of strident intolerance we have witnessed on college campuses across the country for some years now. To paraphrase poet William Butler Yeats and songstress Joni Mitchell, the best of our young people are overwhelmed when they think about those unwieldy responsibilities, and the worst are full of passion without mercy.
Better than committing to “change the world” is the decision to make good decisions in one’s own circumstances.
And in that vein …
No. 2: You do have some control over the “culture” on campus.
Every new school year brings headlines about the culture of substance use (and abuse) and “hooking up” — the latter of which is, regrettably, often fueled by the former. Here — unlike world peace — a student’s individual decisions can have dramatic impact. It’s quite simple, in fact — don’t drink to excess, don’t use illegal drugs, don’t take others’ prescription meds (a source of many tragic fentanyl overdoses) and don’t treat sex like recreation. You keep yourself out of danger — and you never know how many people you can influence by making better choices.
No. 3: It’s not about the grades; it’s about knowledge.
There is so much pressure to cheat — an impulse that is now exacerbated by the omnipresence of the internet and artificial intelligence.
Ultimately, however, this is counterproductive. Success in life is about knowledge and character, not grades. If you scoff at this, ask yourself: Would you rather be operated on by a surgeon, represented by a lawyer or flown by a pilot who got A’s by cheating, or B’s by doing his or her own work?
No. 4: Character starts early.
Cheating also sets a bad precedent, and being under pressure is no excuse. If you didn’t do the work, take your lumps. If you cut corners in small things, you’ll be inclined to do so when even more is on the line. Character is established in everyday decisions.
No. 5: How clean is your own environment?
Some years ago, I was told by a student that my generation was responsible for the polluted environment. I said to him, “Fair enough. But what does your dorm or apartment look like? Your car?”
His expression told me plenty.
Don’t be a hypocrite. Concern for the environment starts at home.
No. 6: Be humble — you may be wrong.
This is advice that is just as applicable to older folks as to college students, but it’s a good attitude to adopt early on in life. It is wise to consider whether you have all the information before exploding with the righteous indignation that accompanies inflated belief in one’s elevated moral status. If advocates of the prevailing narrative about which you are so certain are shutting down dissent, objection, contrary opinions, arguments and even research, you are probably operating in relative ignorance. That’s bad. Ignorance and arrogance together are much worse.
No. 7: Diversity is about more than external characteristics.
The inclination to include others and make them feel appreciated and valued is worthwhile. Make sure it includes not only those who don’t look like you, but those who think differently. Encourage conversation and debate. You might learn something. (See No. 6 above.)
No. 8: Appreciate people for things other than their politics.
There is so much more to human interaction and relationships than who people vote for (yet further proof that government has grown too ubiquitous in our lives). Find other things you have in common with those around you: a love of movies, books, music, food, puppies, sunsets, travel, whatever. Be interested in others’ nonpolitical interests. A great conversationalist asks open-ended questions and then listens sincerely; learn how to become one. Your life will improve immeasurably.
No. 9: Love works more miracles than power.
It’s easy to talk about caring for humanity. But real love values others enough to engage them in reasoned discussion. Persuasion creates commitment; brute force creates resentment. Enough said.
So, dear young people, do go off to school this year determined to make a difference — but look for those opportunities right next to you. In doing so, you will have more impact than you ever thought possible.
Editor’s Note: Mark Alexander is out this week in consultation with legal counsel about a litigation strategy to hold social media giants accountable and end their systemic “redlining” suppression of Patriot Post content. To understand how perilous the Big Tech suppression of free speech has become to the future of American Liberty, he covers that threat comprehensively in an updated column, “The Systemic ‘Redlining’ of Free Speech — Violating Foundational Civil Rights.” (Currently, our traffic from Facebook, where we have more than 750,000 active followers, has been suppressed to just 5% of our previous content reach.)
If you’d like to receive Alexander’s Column by email every Wednesday, update your subscription here.
Editor’s Note: Each week we receive hundreds of comments and correspondences — and we read every one of them. Click here for a few thought-provoking comments about specific articles. The views expressed therein don’t necessarily reflect those of The Patriot Post.
Former Homicide Detective on the Reality of Crime in Chicago — Jim Sherlock discusses what led him to become a Chicago police officer and eventually a homicide detective, as well as the state of crime in the city and what has led to its explosion.
The COVID Lie That Started It All — The mainstream media pushed the WHO’s false claim of higher COVID death rates that helped stoke fears over the novel virus.
“Our democracy is in peril. The reality is we have people in the state of Tennessee, a Republican Party, who are much more interested in turning our democracy into their mobocracy for mob rules.” —Tennessee State Representative Justin Pearson (D), who led an “insurrection” on the floor of the Tennessee legislature
Hot Air
“There is no rational discussion of our energy future which is not also about climate change, and there’s no serious discussion about climate change which is not also about energy.” —Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm
Belly Laughs of the Day
“I am grateful to have a president and a vice president who are fighting tooth and nail for the freedoms that we hold near and dear to our hearts.” —Madison, Wisconsin Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway
“I would suggest that anybody who thinks that this country is in decline — come to cities! Because Democratic mayors all across the nation are creating great places where people want to be.” —Satya Rhodes-Conway
Grand Delusions
“You just gotta keep going out there making sure that people connect the good things that are going on with the president, because they’re happening because of his policies.” —DNC Chair Jaime Harrison
“The reality of the economic recovery that we’re living through is pretty dramatic. The fastest and best economic recovery of any place in the world.” —Senator Tina Smith (D-MN)
The BIG Lie
“President Biden was very warmly received there [Hawaii]. And I think also that the president has a unique capacity to connect with people and express empathy for what they’ve been going through.” —Tina Smith
For the Record
“In the Jewish community, death of a loved one is followed by shiva, a seven-day period of mourning. … The first rule of visiting a shiva house: Don’t talk about your own experiences with death or pain. It’s gauche and irrelevant and trivializing. Yet this is Biden’s first move.” —Ben Shapiro
“Empathy is the quality of putting yourself in the place of others. But Biden isn’t an empath. He’s someone who believes that everyone else’s pain is merely a reflection of his own.” —Ben Shapiro
Political Futures
“People in the DeSantis campaign see the day of the first Trump indictment as the day their momentum stopped. It’s an insane situation. You’re running for public office. Your opponent is indicted. And the indictment hurts you, and helps him.” —Byron York
“Aspirants to the nation’s highest office should be asking themselves why they want it. Do they want to be someone? Or do they want to do something? The American people are looking for a leader whose motivation is the mission of country, its operation, and the quality of life of American citizens. They are looking for a leader dedicated to fixing and improving our country and not someone who really, deep down, is trying to solve some kind of personal need for fame and recognition.” —Star Parker
A Blind Squirrel Finds a Nut
“We owe those [Kabul Airport] Gold Star families everything. We owe them transparency, we owe them honesty, we owe them accountability if appropriate. We owe them the truth about what happened to their loved ones.” —Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley, finally getting something right
Although he was derided by the other GOP candidates for skipping out on the first debate, Trump’s decision to appear with Tucker Carlson was a fateful one. His has become the most-watched interview in history, with nearing 200 million views. The other GOP candidates have thus faded into political irrelevancy. Meanwhile…the Democrats are set to arrest and mug shot Trump today in Georgia. What’s happening in America? Which Way, America? Watch today’s Liberty Report:
With federal agency whistleblower reports claiming that a resurgence of COVID mandates, lockdowns, and edicts is very near, Dr. Peter Breggin, a well-respected physiatrist and author, told The Sentinel Report that outrage over lockdown tyranny must overcome pandemic terror.
With little more than a year until the 2024 elections, the reappearance of some COVID-era protocols has sparked concerns that more widespread measures may be ordered in the months ahead.
This week, Morris Brown College announced on Instagram that “effective immediately,” several COVID-19 protocols, including a campus-wide mask mandate, had been enacted for at least 14 days despit there having been no confirmed COVID-19 cases on campus recently. The measure, the college says, is instead “due to reports of positive cases among students” at other Atlanta-area schools.
CNN reported that at least one expert has said the protocols may be needed soon for people with diabetes, cancer, chronic liver, kidney or lung disease, organ or stem cell transplants, HIV or other immunocompromising conditions, a history of heart disease or stroke, dementia or mental health issues. The COVID-19 protocols included: Social distancing
Bans on “large gatherings” Isolation and quarantines in accordance […]
The recent upturn in COVID-19 cases in some regions has spurred a handful of entities around the country to reinstate mask mandates, reigniting the debate over what place masking requirements have in an era of living with the coronavirus.
Mandatory mask mandates and enforced lockdowns were so well accepted by the majority of the American population that some of these things appear to be coming back right now. Major Hollywood studios, Big Pharma health conglomerates, colleges and universities are beginning to require people start masking up again. Over on InfoWars, they are claiming they have ‘inside information’ that the Biden administration is planning on bringing back full COVID restrictions in September. Will that happen? I don’t know. But a better question would be to ask if such a thing were possible, and the answer to that is a resounding yes.
“There is a conspiracy of her prophets in the midst thereof, like a roaring lion ravening the prey; they have devoured souls; they have taken the treasure and precious things; they have made her many widows in the midst thereof.” Ezekiel 22:25 (KJB)
I know one thing for sure, and have been saying it for many months now. The people who brought you the gain-of-function COVID virus, the lockdowns, and who damaged our national economy are absolutely not done and we are in the middle of Phase 2 of this great reset. On that there can be no question or debate because it’s right before your very eyes. The Biden administration would love to see mask mandates come back, and indeed as this article shows, it looks like it has already started. Remember when Joe Biden changed his 2020 campaign slogan from ‘No Malarky’ to ‘Build Back Better’? Do you know where he got that? From his handlers at the United Nations. That’s the level this things is operating on.
Mask mandates reemerge amid upturn in COVID-19 cases
FROM THE HILL: Earlier this week, Hollywood movie studio Lionsgate asked its employees to wear masks on certain floors of its facilities in Santa Monica in response to a few staff members testing positive for COVID-19.
Kaiser Permanente began to require staff, patients and visitors to wear masks at its facility in Santa Rosa, Calif., this week in response to a spike in cases. Upstate Medical University in New York announced a similar decision last week for two of its hospitals. Schools like Rutgers University in New Jersey and Morris Brown College in Georgia have issued mask mandates for their respective campuses, with the Atlanta-based school reinstating masks as a two-week precautionary measure.
Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R) spoke out against the news from Morris Brown College, writing on Twitter, “Americans have had enough COVID hysteria. WE WILL NOT COMPLY!”
Nationally, hospitalizations due to SARS-CoV-2 have been rising the past few weeks. Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), however, shows that hospital admission rates are still considered low in 97 percent of the U.S. According to Marcus Plescia, chief medical officer for the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO), the necessity of mask mandates will come down to a case-by-case, adding that publicly available data should inform these decisions.
“I think the new approach is we want to make that information available to the public and give people some warning that there may be some increases in disease activity,” said Plescia. “And then people decide for themselves sort of how they want to react and what kind of precautions they want to take.”
Mask-wearing became highly politicized over the course of the pandemic, with opinions on whether businesses, schools and government agencies had the authority to make such requirements divided largely along partisan lines.
The Supreme Court ruled in 2022 that the White House did not have the authority to enforce a vaccine-or-mask mandate on companies with 100 or more employees, though individual businesses can uphold their own policies on the matter.
The court alsoruled last year that the TSA could impose mask mandates on planes, trains and other forms of transport, leaving mask requirements as an option for the federal agency. READ MORE
The first Republican presidential primary debate hosted by Fox News on Wednesday featured no questions on election integrity, despite polls showing the issue is important to conservatives.
Many sociologists now speak about the arrival of the post-Christian era in both America and the West in general. Way back in 1976, Newsweek Magazine spoke of “the year of the evangelical.” But church attendance is down in America. Young people abandon any semblance of their childhood faith as soon as they set foot in a university. This is a great concern in our churches. The Wall Street Journal recently published an analysis of national sentiment over the past 25 years on:
· Religion: 62% in 1998 vs 39% today.
· Having kids: 59% in 1998 vs 30% today.
· Community involvement: 47% in 1998 vs 27% today.
· Patriotism: 70% in 1998 vs 38% today.[1]
· The number of weddings: 40% lower in 2000 than in 1970
Star Parker, a black Christian intellectual gives similar figures and sees the sign of a “nation committing suicide.”[2]
While 20th century unbelief was atheistic, religiosity is now everywhere, as astrology and occultism flourish in mainstream culture.[3] Such an abandon of personal biblical faith has some obvious causes. Many universities, for instance, have become centers of Marxist training and/or Critical Race Theory, both of which are based on a godless post-modernism, generally called Wokism. George Floyd’s death affected major institutions—from federal agencies to Fortune 100 companies. Encouraged by the Department of Justice and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, such organizations hastily pledged themselves to the new flag of Wokism. They gave multi-millions to groups like Black Lives Matter and promoted a revised version of morality preached through DEI—“diversity, equity, and inclusion.” Wokism’s leaders insist that America is fundamentally racist and they demand “antiracist discrimination” (a technical term used to discriminate against people identified as racist) to produce “racial equity.” This semi-religious ideology abhors “systemic racism,” “white supremacy,” “white privilege,” and “antiracism.” Racism in America today is, to a very significant degree, a manufactured problem, crafted by woke Leftists in order to overthrow the American way of life. Most major cities, many major companies, the educational system and the government’s policymaking apparatus all bow down together before the god of Wokism.
Most contenders in the Republican presidential primary field firmly rejected the party’s rising isolationist tide during the debate on Wednesday, with nearly every GOP candidate saying they support continued military aid to Ukraine in its defense against Russia.
“Focus on the signal, not the noise,” is a phrase that might as well have been coined by Steve Bannon given how frequently he and his acolytes make use of it. At this stage in the game, it should be the mantra of the MAGA movement writ large; for the hour is already late, there is a mountain of work left to do to haul President Trump over the finish line: navigating a corrupt, weaponized justice system; dealing with rigged election procedures; combatting both soft and overt censorship by mainstream networks and social media – and that is just the tip of the iceberg.
Which is why – given the enormity of the collective hole we have dug ourselves in – the idea of a normal politics-as-usual primary season was ridiculous from the start. The 2020 presidential election was undeniably the most unfair election in modern history – it necessarily produced an illegitimate outcome. That Ron DeSantis, Mike Pence, Chris Christie (and the rest) are behaving as if all of that does not matter, or that somehow the problems that got us in this dire situation as a country would miraculously vanish if Trump were removed from the picture is the ultimate indictment of their credentials. The other candidates are not serious contenders for the presidency for the simple purpose that they do not seriously care about America’s interests: if they realized the gravity of the crisis, they would have immediately stepped aside and thrown whatever miniscule political capital they harness upon the 45th President, knowing that he alone has a shot at achieving the near-insurmountable feat of winning the presidency.
In short, the primary process – personified above all by Ron DeSantis and his pitiful excuse for a campaign – is a colossal distraction and timewaster from where our focus needs to be.
Poll after poll has Trump with leads of 30, 40, 50+ points above his nearest competitor.
Even in the absolutely most competitive primary states, like Iowa, Trump’s lead is well over the 20-point mark, the largest such lead for that state’s Republican caucus in over two decades. Trump won this battle before the first shot was ever fired because grassroots voters can viscerally intuit just how high the stakes are this time around; that for America, 2024 is truly the make-or-break moment.
The candidates who did appear on the debate stage in Milwaukee last evening presented an image of betrayal to the American people. That the first debate was on Fox News, the network responsible for prematurely and recklessly calling Arizona for Biden in 2020, added a poetic touch to the general feeling of impotence surrounding the whole spectacle.
Perhaps even more poetic was who Trump instead chose to spend the evening with: Tucker Carlson, the most famous talk show host in America before he was sent to the slaughterhouse earlier this year by the powers-that-be at Fox in a sacrificial offering to the woke deities. Both Trump and Carlson are unified in being corporate media pariahs – maybe the only person more detested by the Murdoch’s than Donald Trump is Tucker Carlson; the fact that the two combined their influences against their shared enemy in Fox, which is now bloodletting viewership seemingly by the day now, is a powerful signal to the forces in this country that otherwise hope to shut down Donald Trump, and the populist furor both he and Carlson represent, for good.
Those who tuned into Wednesday night’s debate received a depressing look into the GOP’s past – and what lies in its future without Trump: timid, boring, and ineffectual “leaders.” The frontrunner’s absence was keenly felt in the lack of energy, vigor, and vision on the stage.
Vivek Ramaswamy was the only spark of life.
The candidates smothered viewers with platitudes about new leadership, stopping Putin, liberal tax and spend policies, and how bad Biden is – something all Republicans already agree on. It could have been a debate from 2012. Fox beclowned itself with a segment on climate change, and dedicated just a few minutes to the issue of the day: the persecution of the opposition leader, Donald Trump.
On that question, the only candidate to defend Trump was Ramaswamy.
DeSantis and Tim Scott dodged with abstractions about “the weaponization of justice,” all without mentioning public enemy number one. DeSantis refused to say whether Mike Pence was correct to certify Biden’s bogus victory. Instead, DeSantis said Biden loves that Republicans are still talking about January 6th, and it’s time to move on. The political prisoners languishing in the D.C. gulag would like a word.
On Ukraine, Vivek was, again, the only candidate to unequivocally state that America must not prioritize the European backwater over its own people.
DeSantis continued to muddy waters on this key foreign policy issue. Across the board, the bogus tough guy persona fell apart, and DeSantis showed himself to be serpentine, weak and equivocating. When the issue of supporting Trump as the nominee came up, DeSantis scanned the stage and then half-heartedly raised his hand, only after seeing Ramaswamy had done so.
DeSantis, after weeks and weeks of crashing and burning, desperately needed to make a recovery. But he was an afterthought.
No one bothered attacking him. He didn’t attack anyone either, only briefly jabbing at Trump on COVID, although he was too timid to use Trump’s name. He grabbed a hold of the words “American decline” and never let go.
[ZH: “August 23 2023 in Milwaukee, Wis., is the day that the DeSantis for President campaign died,” senior Trump adviser Chris LaCivita said. “You can’t win a debate by making a cameo appearance.”]
Pence and Scott took turns gushing with hokey optimism about an America that no longer exists.
The insincerity and fundamental lack of seriousness of the whole spectacle was overpowering – between Nikki Haley’s girlboss routine, Tim Scott’s Martin Luther King impression, and DeSantis’ fake bravado.
We’ve heard a lot about “Trumpism after Trump.” The GOP without Trump looks a lot like the GOP before him. Coming on the very same day that Rudy Giuliani had his mugshot taken, and just a day before Trump is expected to endure the same humiliation with his arraignment in Georgia, the debate could not have been a more out of touch spectacle.
Meanwhile, Trump’s decision to ditch the debate and Fox News for Tucker Carlson on X (formerly known as Twitter) proved to be an act of political genius.
As of this publication, Tucker Carlson’s interview garnered more than 150 million views within hours of being posted.This already ranks the Trump interview as the most watched television interview in history, breaking the record set by Carlson and Andrew Tate from earlier this summer.
This fact alone shows Trump’s pulse is on the cultural trajectory of this country in ways that cannot be replicated by the other candidates. Indeed, despite the unfortunate news of this latest arraignment, Trump’s poll numbers are higher than ever: his margins over his nearest opponents now are upwards of 50 percentage points or higher, making his famous prophecy from earlier this month – that he would only need “one more indictment” to win the 2024 election true. Indeed, even the legacy media seems to be coming around to this conclusion: both CNN and Time Magazine ran pieces over the last week gearing their readers for the possibility – perhaps inevitability – of another Trump administration.
Trump is the protagonist of this evil chapter of American history.
His inconsequential challengers, lacking the talent to become forces in history themselves, fancy themselves above the “drama” of history, when the truth is they are pursuing a station destiny has closed off to them. They play off their inertness and aversion to “drama” as a virtue.
But Trump’s war with the Deep State, which now threatens to destroy the very foundations of the republic, is inextricably woven with the nation and its fate. It is the main event, as even his enemies must acknowledge. Should the worst-case scenario happen and his mugshot be taken, hardly anyone will remember the sideshow in Milwaukee.
U.S. — According to several polls, millions and millions of Americans skipped watching last night’s Republican debate, leading most commentators to declare those people the undisputed winners of the debate.
“The millions of people who decided to watch something else, or maybe go to bed, instead of watching these 8 candidates debate each other for 2 excruciating hours are the true geniuses here,” said Fox News anchor Bret Baier. “Why didn’t I think of that? Why do I attend these things year after year? What am I doing with my life?”
The respected anchor then dismissed himself to go outside and weep bitterly.
According to the losers who actually watched, Republicans argued for over two hours over who was the best candidate to send billions to Ukraine, keep abortion legal, and pretend to believe in global warming. “That’s two hours of my life… just gone…” said one Fox News viewer from Fargo ND. “I should’ve watched reruns of Friends, or stuck my face in a bee’s nest. What was I thinking?”
At publishing time, officials from Ukraine had expressed disagreement with American commentators, instead declaring the winner to be Mike Pence.
It is super important to know your stuff when it comes to debating ultra-MAGA Republicans about guns.
Elon Musk has confirmed X’s plans to sue NGOs funded by US financier George Soros over their alleged attempt to crack down on free speech. What’s the lawsuit about? Who is Mr. Soros? And how has his name come to feature so prominently in many of the most politically disruptive events of the first decades of the 21st century? Sputnik explains.
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