It’s Friday, September 9th, 2022…but before beginning, we offer two brief thoughts from former SecDef Deputy Assistant Amber Smith on the occasion of the recent letter enumerating 16 thoughts dealing with the chain of command, political pressure, and civilian control of the U.S. military signed by the likes of Ash Carter, Mark Esper, Bob Gates, Chuck Hagel, Jim Mattis, Leon Panetta, Martin Dempsey, Joseph Dunford, and Peter Pace:

“It’s completely hypocritical for these former Defense Secretaries and [Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff] to preach about how important civ-mil relations are while setting the stage for using military leaders and officials to undermine the president. They are getting ready for Trump’s second term.”

“Additionally, those who penned this letter are complicit with the deterioration of trust and the breakdown in the relationship between the military and civilians they speak of. They are essentially raising the alarm for an environment they helped create.”

Talk about trying to shut the barn door after deliberately letting the horse out.  Put another way, they’re trying to cover their tracks.

Now, here’s The Gouge!

First up, if you’ve ever wondered why the U.S. of A. continues to experience a rapidly rising tide of criminal violence and mayhem, NRO‘s Caroline Downey offers a compelling clue, as she records the…

Suspect in Memphis Shooting Spree Previously Served Less Than One Year for Killing

“Police arrested a suspect Wednesday night in a shooting spree across Memphis, Tenn. that left four people dead and at least three others wounded. Ezekiel Dejuan Kelly, 19, was detained around 9 p.m. local time after authorities chased after a stolen car he was driving, which he later crashed, according to Memphis Police Chief Cerelyn “CJ” Davis. The alleged killer had a recidivist record, with multiple felony charges pending against him.

A repeat offender, Kelly was charged with attempted first-degree murder but had it downgraded to aggravated assault in a plea bargain in April 2021, Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland said during a press briefing. He was sentenced to three years in prison but was released eleven months later, Strickland said. An arrest warrant on the charge of first-degree murder was already approved for Kelly on Wednesday before he committed the string of shootings, court records obtained by Memphis ABC affiliate WATN show.

…“I want to assure the public that we’re all going to be working together to try to curb this senseless violence here in Memphis and Shelby County,” Shelby County Sheriff Floyd Bonner said at the press conference.“

Sorry, but from where we sit, hardly anyone in either the city of Memphis or Shelby County seems to be doing much of anything to prevent the repeated depredations of the likes of Ezekiel Kelly and Cleotha Henderson, and damn little when they apprehend them after the fact.

As a local Memphis news reporter put it:

“Memphis is tired right now.” – @MemphoNewsLady 😭 #Memphis pic.twitter.com/Q64jGiirPZ

— Andrew Bartolotta  #powertheGOOD (@andrewjpg) September 8, 2022

Here’s the juice: Until the criminal justice system prioritizes the rights and safety of the innocent over the protection of the criminal class, or Progressive politicians and prosecutors are voted out of office, Americans across the country will continue to be fatigued. 

Case in point, as one Mandela Barnes, a Dimocrat running against incumbent Republican Ron Johnson, continues to advocate cutting Wiconsin’s prison population in half, eliminating cash bail and other progressive criminal justice reforms.  Hey, what could go wrong?  Ask the families of Eliza Fletcher and the multiple victims of Ezekiel Kelly.

Speaking of victims, the Journal‘s Kim Strassel accurately assesses what may well prove the most potent force for the GOP in November:

Amid a teacher strike, Washington’s Sen. Patty Murray is ahead by a mere 3 points.

“…In Washington state, five-term Democratic Sen. Patty Murray may finally have a race on her hands—with a poll this week showing her leading Republican Tiffany Smiley by only 3 points. Education is very much on voters’ minds, especially after Seattle schoolteachers voted this week to go on strike, leaving 50,000 kids and their parents in the lurch. The dispute is over a new contract, though many parents see it as the latest in a series of rolling closures.

Ms. Murray did nothing to diffuse the frustration during a train wreck of a Sunday CNN interview, in which she refused to criticize school shutdowns. “Was it a mistake to keep children home from school so long during the pandemic?” she was asked. Ms. Murray excused the “local school officials” and “our scientific experts,” who she said were trying “to protect their children” from a pandemic “that was killing millions of Americans” (the official U.S. death toll is slightly over one million).

Ms. Smiley responded by highlighting the steep learning losses and releasing her own reform plan, which would expand school choice for low-income families, provide curriculum transparency, and reroute some U.S. Education Department dollars to higher teacher pay. The broader Smiley message is that educators need to get back to teaching “the basics” rather than “divisive” topics—a sentiment that polls show resonates loudly with parents across the political spectrum.

The question: Where’s the rest of the party?…

…The GOP is rightly focused on the economy, but it will need more to keep suburban and swing voters on its side in the face of Democratic scaremongering over abortion and Joe Biden speeches about “semifascist” Republicans. Education is the powerful rejoinder, a reminder that conservative candidates are the ones who have all along been on the side of parents and common sense.

Democrats want to close this disgraceful school chapter, but parents aren’t nearly so willing to move on. They didn’t require last week’s official news that national testing scores have dropped to their lowest level in decades; they’ve been living that education horror. And still are…”

Meanwhile, Best of the Web offers additional data demonstrating the superiority of Republican education policies, as Florida and Arizona lead the way in liberating families from woke bureaucracies.

Next up, again courtesy of the WSJ, Dan Henninger urges America to…

The MAGA attacks raise the issue of using state power to silence opponents.

“It is a big advantage for Joe Biden that no one takes him seriously. He spent Labor Day continuing to express animosity toward “MAGA Republicans,” and one’s instinct is to write this off as Joe rousing his party’s base for the midterm elections. It’s much more than that.

This isn’t just Joe or a blowhard Senate majority leader’s pro forma raking of the other side. No matter how feckless one thinks the occupant of the White House is, an American head of state has extraordinary powers to intimidate, investigate and, if desired, prosecute. The power of this office is incomparable. It is a mistake not to take Mr. Biden’s MAGA speeches seriously, no matter how intemperate.

The day after his dark speech in Philadelphia, Mr. Biden attempted a distinction, saying, “I don’t consider any Trump supporter to be a threat to the country,” and suggesting he was referring only to those who condone political violence. This is disingenuous. He is obviously casting a wide net.

Millions of quite-normal Americans, who wouldn’t be caught dead invading the U.S. Capitol, consider themselves MAGA Republicans, which in broad terms means they align to some degree with Donald Trump’s policies and opinions while he was president. Mr. Biden can’t use this phrase and insist he is talking only about a minority within the Republican party or American conservatism.

The president’s continued assaults on MAGA Republicans should be properly seen as an attempt both to marginalize the opposition and to intimidate it into submission and silence. The implicit threat in Mr. Biden’s thought-out aggression is that the legal and investigative powers of the state may be deployed against disfavored beliefs…”

This meme from Ed Hickey emphasizes the clear and present danger Biden’s words pose to the Constitution:

Or as the great Daniel Francis always says, “If you want to know what the Dimocrats are up to, just observe what they’re accusing the opposition of doing.”

And in the EnvironMental Moment, the Journal‘s Editorial Board reveals…

Gavin Newsom’s Dirty Energy Secret

California’s electricity woes result from man-made climate policies, not from climate change.

“Californians narrowly averted rolling blackouts on Tuesday, but the threat looms all week amid an unpleasant but not unusual heat wave. This ought to be a warning about how the government force-fed green energy transition is endangering grid reliability, but Democrats and the media can’t break out of their climate-change conformity to think clearly, or think at all.

Democrats blame climate change for the state’s week-long warnings to conserve power, but California’s climate hasn’t suddenly changed. Triple-digit temperatures aren’t unprecedented even in early September, despite Gov. Gavin Newsom’s claims. What has drastically changed in recent years is California’s electric generation.

Solar and wind power have rapidly expanded thanks to rich government subsidies along with the state’s renewables mandate. These have made it harder for baseload gas and nuclear generators that run around the clock to make money. Many have shut down, and the result is that the state often lacks sufficient power when the sun goes down.

California’s summer electric generation capacity increased by about 10,700 megawatts (MW) between 2010 and 2020—potentially enough to power eight to 10 million homes. The problem is that gas-fired capacity during this time declined by 4,390 MW and nuclear by 2,150 MW. Solar and wind surged 17,000 MW, but those sources can’t be commanded to run when people need them.

The state must therefore rely on imports from other states in the evenings, especially during heat waves. But these imports are becoming less dependable since California’s neighbors are also losing base-load generators owing to their own renewable buildouts. Arizona lost about half of its summer coal-generating capacity between 2015 and 2020.

During heat waves that span the Southwest like the one this week, California must resort to emergency measures to reduce electricity demand. This includes asking users to turn up their thermostats and providing incentives for industrial businesses to power down. A desalination plant in Carlsbad cut water production by about 20% earlier this week to free up power for homes. Not what the state needs during a drought.

…The grid problems that Californians are enduring will grow and spread as supersized green-energy subsidies and mandates spread their harmful incentives throughput the U.S. economy in coming years. The culprit is the left’s climate policies, not climate change.“

It’s just as this meme from Speed suggests:

For more on the subject we offer a recent clip from Jesse Watters:

Here’s a second shot of the juice, or at least our two cents on the subject.  His slicked-back hair and boyish good looks notwithstanding, Gavin Newsom has something the last three successful Dimocratic presidential candidates largely lacked: an actual record of executive experience.  Neither Obama nor Biden had any at all, and though Bill Clinton twice served as governor of Arkansas, he did little of note while in office outside of preying upon vulnerable women, a proclivity the MSM conveniently left unreported when he ran for President.

Newsom, on the other hand, has a documented history of uninterrupted disaster, one which a capable Republican opponent like Ron DeSantis will use to batter his national political aspirations until it’s patently apparent…

Then there’s this sextet of items specially selected for inquiring Conservative minds:

(1). At least there’s one person in the nation’s capital who recognizes the uncontrolled, swelling flood of illegals into the country constitutes an emergency, even if D.C. mayor Muriel Bowser’s done so for the wrong reasons.

(2). In a related item, one Brianne Nadeau, a member of the Council of the District of Columbia, blamed the governors of Texas and Arizona for the city’s public migrant emergency.  No, Brianne: They just believe in allowing sanctuary cities to put their money where their mouths are.  Or more accurately, the taxpayers’ money.

(3). As Dan McLaughlin notes at NRO, Joe Biden can’t seem to decide what “MAGA Republican” means…which should come as no surprise considering the doddering deviant likely doesn’t know where he is or what day of the week it might be.

(4). The Morning Jolt theorizes why the origin of the Wuhan virus is likely destined to forever remain a secret.  You know, the genetically-engineered virus which originated in Wuhan, China…the city in which the Wuhan Institute of Virology is located…a less-than-secure facility and one of only three in the world conducting gain-of-function research…funded in part by our own Dr. Faux Chi.  Talk about a secret that’s hiding in plain sight.

(5). In an item from The Western Journal forwarded by Jeff Foutch, we learn social media giant Snap admits its blunder gave Democratic campaigns access to Republican voter data.  Funny how all these “honest” mistakes always seem to benefit the same political party.

(6). Even if, as AOC claims, during her early days in the House her Dimocratic colleagues showed, “open hostility, open hostility to my presence, my existence”, perhaps it’s because even Progressives were able to recognize her intellectual capacity…  

…represented an historic low, even by…

…Washington standards.

Which brings us, appropriately enough, to The Lighter Side:

Then there’s these from Ed Hickey…

…the lovely Shannon…

…and Major Jon:

Finally, we take a moment to mark the passing of a graceful, gracious lady who maintained her poise and dignity amidst a maelstrom of change and challenges:

R.I.P., Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor, the only British monarch we’ve ever known, and likely the only one we’ll ever care about.  Though only God himself can truly know a human’s heart, if Billy Graham’s thoughts on Elizabeth II’s faith are accurate, we look forward to someday making her acquaintance.

Magoo

P.S. Hat tip to Balls Cotton for the Queen Elizabeth II graphic. 

P.S.S. Just a reminder we’ll be heading out Sunday the 11th on a week-long trip to the greatest golf club on the planet, so likely won’t be resuming our regularly scheduled programming before Wednesday the 22nd.  So ’til then…

Video of the Day

Tucker sounds a warning Americans of every race, color, creed and religion would do well to heed.

Tales of The Darkside

Here’s the juice: If this 6’8″ a*sclown were running against anyone but a complete clown, this race would already be called for the GOP.

On the Lighter Side

Sorry, but there’s certain questions to which any thinking husband will just say, “Pass”! Our personal favorite is #4.