It’s Wednesday, June 28th, 2023…but before we begin, following up on Monday’s opening detailing how Critical Race Theory and DEI indoctrination replacing reading, writing and arithmetic have resulted in illiterate students who cannot solve simple math problems, The Washington Free Beacon records…
“…A National Assessment of Educational Progress report published Wednesday found that math and reading scores among U.S. 13-year-olds are at their lowest levels in decades. Cardona responded to those findings by praising “positive results” in student achievement, arguing that the “historic investments and resources” provided by President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan would “reverse the damage.” In school districts across the country, however, a large portion of those funds did not go to more tutoring or new school materials. Instead, they funded bonuses for teachers and administrators.
In North Carolina, for example, the Wake County Public School System from March 2020 to April 2023 spent 78.5 percent of its total pandemic relief funding on salaries and employee benefits, according to the district. Chicago Public Schools—a district where union teachers repeatedly refused to return to the classroom during COVID—similarly spent77 percent of its pandemic money on staff bonuses, salaries, and benefits. In Tennessee, meanwhile, the state’s comptroller found that a district funneled nearly $28,000 to one administrator alone. And in Nebraska, Lincoln Public Schools attempted to use COVID relief dollars to issue across-the-board teacher bonuses, but the state’s Department of Education said no.
The use of so-called emergency COVID funds to pay for five-figure staff bonuses reflects the stark divide between Republicans and Democrats on education policy. Democrats generally balk at school choice, shooting down taxpayer funding for charter schools in favor of additional public school spending. For Republicans, that spending is already at an all-time high with little to show for it and showcases the need to pursue alternative options rather than funneling more money to powerful teachers’ unions working to pay out their members.
“It turns out the hundreds of billions in taxpayer money that was ‘direly needed to safely reopen schools and improve infrastructure‘ was a lie,” Nicki Neily, founder and president of parental rights group Parents Defending Education, said in response to districts’ using federal COVID funds to pay for staff bonuses. “The same teachers’ unions that kept schools closed are now misusing the taxpayers’ money to smooth things over with their growingly dissatisfied members through bonuses and raises. What a slap in the face to families.”
The Department of Education did not return a request for comment…”
Meanwhile, we learn American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten had outgoing CDC director Rochelle Walensky’s personal cell number:
What are the chances any of us would have access to the personal cell number of the Director of the Centers for Disease Control? Unless, of course, like Weingarten, we were one of the biggest financial contributors to Democratic candidates. Anyone not understanding why the Biden clown car and its public health bureaucrats went willingly along with keeping schools closed for so long despite “the science” clearly confirming classrooms presented little if any danger should now grasp the connection. Wake up and smell the real collusion, America!!!
Now, here’s The Gouge!
First up, in full and with limited editorializing, NRO‘s Charlie Cooke proffers a plethora of…
Give it up, guys. Only Donald Trump can prevail against Joe Biden.
Why? In 2016, when Trump won the White House, he obtained just 46.1 percent of the vote. Had his opponent not been so historically unpopular — and had the Green Party not siphoned off votes from the Democrats in a handful of key states — Trump would have lost. In 2020, when he lost reelection, Trump received 46.8 percent of the vote — lower than Mitt Romney’s number in 2012. Trump received 7 million fewer votes than Joe Biden, who barely campaigned. In the midterm elections of 2018 and 2022, Trump proved politically toxic with the independent voters who decide American elections. Since then, he has grown even more unpalatable. All told, it would make more sense to say that Trump is the only candidate who cannot prevail against Joe Biden than that he is the only candidate who can. Trump’s approval rating is in the low 30s, and 60 percent of Americans wish he weren’t running for president again. It would be a peculiar form of “populism” that considered these facts to be recommendations.
Screw you. You can’t win without MAGA, and MAGA will only vote for Donald Trump. You have to pick him.
Actually, the opposite seems to be true. This argument was made in Georgia, where the incumbent Republican governor, Brian Kemp, was primaried by David Perdue at the behest of Donald Trump and his acolytes. Perdue lost the primary by 50 points; Kemp went on to win the general by eight. Especially in general elections, the Only MAGA voters just don’t seem to matter that much. Sure, some of the movement’s more monomaniacal members will stay home if Donald Trump is not on the ballot. But the loss of those voters will be more than offset by the considerable number of non-MAGA voters who are happy to return to the fold. As we have observed in the political fallout from Trump’s two indictments, what is good for Trump among the most committed Republican voters is, in fact, toxic for him among the electorate at large. To put it bluntly, alienating MAGA voters may be mandatory if a Republican candidate is to win the White House in 2024.
Why are you thumbing your nose at the base?
I don’t really know what that means. I’m not a politician, I’m a voter. And, as a voter, I have just as much right to argue for or against a candidate as anyone else. I am not obliged to acquiesce to bad arguments simply because they are made by people who are sensitive or unusually loud. And whom are you referring to as the “base”? A party’s base consists of voters who show up every cycle no matter who the nominee is. You’re threatening to stay home if it’s not your guy? Then you’re not the base.
But we can’t go back to the loser-filled Republican Party of old!
Which Republican Party was that, exactly? The one that won five out of six presidential elections between 1968 and 1992? The one that won the White House in 2000 and 2004? The one that controlled the House for most of the period between 1994 and 2018? The one that did so well in the elections of 2014 that it was tantalizingly close to being able to amend the Constitution on its own?
There have, indeed, been some problems with the way that the modern Republican Party has chosen to use the power it has garnered — although these criticisms are usually overstated — but it is not at all clear why Donald Trump is regarded as the answer. For a start, one has to win elections to wield power, and Trump is proving a serious obstacle to that aim. And, besides, the victories that Trump did win and that his champions are touting relied heavily on the very institutions and figures (the Federalist Society, Paul Ryan, the American Enterprise Institute) that are supposed to have fallen out of favor. Moreover, with the exception of the imposition of tariffs, Trump did not actually do most of the unorthodox things that he promised he would. He did not reform the bureaucracy. He did not champion an industrial policy. He did not try to procure funds for his border wall until the GOP had lost control of the House of Representatives. And, when the choice was between listening to the entrenched public-health establishment and listening to the people he claimed to represent, he chose the establishment every time. What, exactly, did he do to earn his place in the vanguard?
If we don’t choose Trump, we are allowing the Deep State to choose our candidate.
On its own terms, this doesn’t make much sense, does it? Practically speaking, there is no difference between the insistence that, because Donald Trump was indicted, he ipso facto must not be the Republican nominee and the insistence that, because Donald Trump was indicted, he ipso facto must be the nominee. Both arguments take an external event and use it as a dispositive case for nomination. You just like one of those cases but not the other.
All right, but the indictment makes a strong case for Trump, doesn’t it?
Do you hear yourself? The fact that Donald Trump was indicted makes a strong case for his being the Republican nominee for president in 2024? Why?
Because they’re scared of him.
Who are “they”? The people who took control of the House of Representatives in 2018 because Donald Trump was so unpopular? The people who won the presidency in 2020 because Donald Trump was so unpopular? The people who won the Senate in 2022 because Donald Trump and his preferred candidates were so unpopular? The people who spend their days dreaming of another Donald Trump nomination in 2024? Those people? The Democrats have been extremely open about the fact that they want Trump as the nominee. They spent tens of millions of dollars promoting Trump-backed candidates in the 2022 primaries, betting those candidates would lose. It worked out for them.
But the Deep State! They’re trying to get rid of him because he’s such a threat to them.
A threat? Trump is nothing of the sort. On the contrary: He’s the sort of ill-disciplined fool on whom the permanent bureaucracy likes to feast. Leave aside that Trump can’t be a threat to anyone if he can’t win a general election. Nothing in the man’s first-term record suggests that he will be able to reform the federal bureaucracy from within. Trump was federally indicted because, at every stage in the proceedings, he made profoundly stupid decisions. He took information to which he was not entitled. He refused to give that information back, even though by doing so he would have avoided a prosecution. He ignored the advice of lawyers who knew how to work the system. And by admitting — on audiotape, no less — that he knew a document was secret and knew that an ex-president lacked authority to declassify it, he undermined the only defense that was available to him. In doing each of these things, he accomplished precisely nothing and made his situation worse.
Did Trump “drain the swamp” last time? Why not? Because he doesn’t know how anything works, and he doesn’t care. Of all the people in the United States — politicians and nonpoliticians alike — Donald Trump is perhaps the least qualified to reform Washington, D.C. He doesn’t grasp detail. He sees neither the threats nor the opportunities. He is fatally susceptible to flattery. He has a short attention span.
He can’t do it. We know this, because we’ve watched him work since 2015.
Why are you abandoning him in his hour of need?
Come now, this isn’t medieval England. It’s America. Trump is a servant, a vessel, a hireling. When some of us balked at voting for him in the past, we were told to ignore the man’s faults because he was just the tool of a larger cause we should join. When did that change?
The correct role of his employers — the voters — is not to help or to hinder him as a person, but to use him or discard him in order to advance a set of political aims. Even if one were willing to overlook that he violated his oath of office last time he was entrusted with power — and I’m not — he is simply not able to fulfill the role for which he is running. I want a president who can maintain an originalist majority on the Supreme Court, rein in the bureaucracy, balance the budget, deal smartly with China, advance school choice, protect unborn life, ensure that the Bill of Rights remains intact, and promulgate a hopeful conception of America that is capable of vanquishing the ignorant nihilism of the 1619 Project and its followers. Trump is not that guy, and he never will be.
So you prefer Joe Biden?
That’s not the choice, is it? Trump isn’t the Republican nominee, and he doesn’t have to be the Republican nominee. Hell, he’s not even the incumbent. The question at present is not whether we prefer the Republican nominee or the Democratic nominee, but which candidate for the Republican nomination we wish to elevate. I can see a certain campaign-strategy logic to the Trump camp’s decision to pretend that he is inevitable, but as a free citizen, I am in no way obliged to submit to it.
So you think that the Democrats and the media will be nicer to another candidate than they were to Trump?
No, I don’t. But I do think it matters how that other candidate responds to that inevitable onslaught. Yes, Mitt Romney was too nice, but that doesn’t mean anything goes. That Republicans have learned to fight back with more edge is, I agree, a good thing. I do not agree that this makes the case for flat-out, all-caps insanity. The press can’t accuse any of the other candidates of being under indictment — because they’re not. They can’t accuse any of the other candidates of having paid off a porn star — because they didn’t. They can’t accuse any of the other candidates of having tried to stage a coup — because they didn’t do that either. It is the worst of non sequiturs to propose that because Romney lost to the most talented politician in a generation, the Republican Party must continue to indulge the preposterous antics of a septuagenarian lunatic. There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than Mitt Romney and Donald Trump. Some of them are running for president this year.
Given the headwinds, it’s important to make smart decisions. A lot of Democrats still believe that Al Gore and Hillary Clinton got cheated out of the presidency and that only unfair racist appeals stopped Michael Dukakis from taking his rightful place as the president. You know what Democrats didn’t do? Nominate those people again. They went out and found people they thought would do a better job of handling what Republicans threw at them. That’s how they got the White House back three times.
So you hate me then?
No, and it’s extremely weird that this would be your conclusion from what is nothing more than a political disagreement. You like Donald Trump. I don’t. If you can’t tolerate that, I’d propose you leave your computer and go outside.
And no, we don’t hate Donald Trump, we’re just sick to death of the man and everything about him. We’re sick to death of his voice, his mannerisms, his self-centered narcissism and situational loyalty, his second-grade vocabulary and constant use of superlatives, his juvenile name-calling and ridiculous boasts. Okay, we hate the fact he cost Republicans the Senate in 2020 and 2022, but we don’t hate Trump. And Heaven forbid he wins the Republican nomination; But if he does, we’ll still hold our nose, stifle our gag reflex and cast our ballot for him.
Biden, Obama and Hillary…we’re real close to hate; But not The Donald; For him we reserve an abiding distaste and overriding repugnance.
Since we mentioned the most corrupt individual ever to occupy the Oval Office, as Brittany Bernstein reports, a…
“…The gun charge centered on the younger Biden’s acknowledgment in his recent autobiography that he was using crack nearly every 15 minutes around the time he purchased a handgun in 2018, despite claiming on a federal background check that he was not using illicit drugs. The two IRS agents told the committee they pushed for felony charges against Hunter Biden in the tax probe and that Delaware U.S. attorney David Weiss wanted to bring charges against Hunter in the District of Columbia and Southern California last year but was denied by DOJ officials both times.
Brett Tolman, executive director of Right on Crime and former U.S. attorney for the District of Utah, told National Review that the misdemeanor charges against Hunter Biden are “not consistent with any historical practice.” The DOJ, he explained, is run by attorney-general memos. The Holder memo says federal prosecutors “should ordinarily” charge the most serious readily provable offense though decisions “must always be made in the context of ‘an individualized assessment of the extent to which particular charges fit the specific circumstances of the case, are consistent with the purpose of the Federal criminal code and maximize the impact of Federal resources on crime.’” And, “in all cases, the charges should fairly represent the defendant’s criminal conduct, and due consideration should be given to the defendant’s substantial assistance in an investigation or prosecution.”
The culture of the DOJ is about “charging as many felonies as you can and getting as long a sentence as you can,” Tolman said. “And everybody else that’s been crushed by the Department of Justice or the criminal-justice system in this country has experienced that.” “When I was U.S. attorney, I think I authorized maybe one or two diversions and they’re oftentimes cases where you don’t have victims. They’re also not part of any sort of top priority [at] DOJ,” he said.
But by contrast, gun possession cases have been a “top priority of DOJ for a very long time” under Project Safe Neighborhoods. During his time as assistant U.S. attorney, the average sentence for gun possession cases was five years. He recalled sending one person to prison for 3.5 years just for possessing ammo without a gun. “There’s just hundreds of thousands of these that are people serving long, lengthy prison sentences for a simple possession case,” he said.
He noted that the allegations stemming from Hunter Biden’s laptop should have made the case “one of the biggest, highest priority cases” the DOJ would ever see. “But everything about this case is wrong. Everything about it in terms of the scope of the investigation, the length of time it took to investigate this. If you’re going to take that length of time, there is no way the only charges that you’re coming up with are two tax misdemeanors, a felony possession of firearm diversion and no jail time,” he said.
…Former director of national intelligence John Ratcliffe suggested the judge in the Biden case shouldn’t accept the plea.
“As you know, judges are required to look at all of the defendant’s conduct. And in this case, you start with some of that conduct being on videotape and showing felony possession of a firearm while using a controlled substance, that’s a felony that carries a maximum penalty of ten years,” Ratcliffe said on Fox News…”
Brittany went on to record the mindless mutterings of former senator Claire McCaskill, the MSDNC talking head who truly puts the a*shole in analyst,
“MSNBC analyst Claire McCaskill said on the network that conservative should “back off” of the Biden family.
The former Democratic senator questioned why Republicans have been critical of the younger Biden’s plea deal. “I don’t know what America they live in and I don’t know how they sleep at night. Alcoholism and addiction are probably the most pervasive diseases in America. I don’t know of one family that hasn’t been touched by the pain of these diseases. And it’s particularly painful when you have someone you love unconditionally that is suffering from these diseases,” she said, adding that the president has “shown a wonderful role model to the country about unconditional love.”
“What do these jerks in the House want Joe Biden to do? For now, refuse to speak to him, so he doesn’t love him publicly? Do they not understand this disease and how it works?” she asked. “And by the way, everybody needs to back off Joe Biden about this. He loves his son. Back off! It is okay for him to love his son and there’s nothing wrong with it,” McCaskill said. “They have no evidence of any kind of wrongdoing by Joe Biden. And it infuriates me that they’re using this heartbreak against Joe Biden in this way. It’s just not right.””
It’s almost as if Progressives are would like you to believe the evidence of presidential interference in a DOJ investigation and demonstrable corruption of the Biden criminal cartel don’t exist. See the way it works? Focus on the “disease” in this hand and ignore the rampant corruption in the other.
BTW, the only “disease” Hunter has is dissolute degeneracy, a condition which is evidently genetic in nature.
Here’s the juice: It would be well within Joe’s presidential powers and prerogatives to pardon Hunter were he ultimately convicted. Problem is, Joe doesn’t know what might come out at trial, and thus can’t afford for one to take place. Frankly, Hunter would do well to disappear for a while, not bringing any more attention on himself until after the election. And under no circumstances should he ever occupy the same cell as Jeffrey Epstein, who, by the way, we’ll never believe killed himself, no matter what any government investigation concludes.
Were Progressives to have their way, how long do you think it would be before doctors faced fines and jail time were they unwilling to conduct such insane inspections?!?
(4). And if you’re curious as to what’s behind the push for the genital mutilation of minors, as with everything else, just follow the money, as this tweet forwarded by Nick confirms:
NEW – Global “sex reassignment surgery” market revenue is poised to garner $3.2 billion by 2032 with a growth rate (CAGR) of 20.4% from 2023 to 2032 — Acumen Research pic.twitter.com/Qse0o2ApBB
(7). In a related item, how is forcing a state to redraw its congressional districts to favor Black voters not itself an act of racism? And who benefits from Black-majority voting districts other than Progressive politicians and those eager to receive the taxpayer-funded benefits they so freely bestow?!?
“A Rhode Island state senator was arrested last week after allegedly vandalizing a car that had a “Biden sucks” bumper sticker, claiming he was “dared” to do it by the victim. Sen. Joshua Miller, 69, was shown in surveillance footage keying a car at the Garden City Center in Cranston, Rhode Island, last Thursday, according to police. The unidentified son of the man who owns the car told police he heard a scratching noise when walking back to his SUV and saw Miller with keys in hand. After asking Miller if he keyed the vehicle, he said Miller denied it and walked away.
When police encountered Miller about two hours later, he denied vandalizing the vehicle and let the police look at his keys to check for paint transfer, according to body camera video obtained by Fox News. Miller told police that he thought the victim recognized him and was one of the “gun nuts” who he claims are stalking him for sponsoring anti-gun legislation. He also accused the victim of making threats toward him. “He was blocking my way, saying that I scratched his car, I didn’t scratch his car,” Miller said. “I’m a state senator, I think he recognized me. I think he’s one of the gun nuts.”
Miller is also seen name-dropping police Col. Michael Winquist in the video, telling police to call him as he was aware of the threats against Miller from “gun nuts.” The Cranston Police Department disputed his claim in a press release posted to social media. “Mr. Miller never reported any threats to Colonel Winquist or any member of the Cranston Police Department,” the statement reads. “Nobody is above the law, including those who make and enforce the laws,” Winquist added in the release. “The officers who handled this investigation did so with fairness, integrity, and without preferential treatment.”
…The press release says the victim noticed Miller’s “Re-elect Senator John Miller” bumper sticker on his car, leading to him search the state senator’s name on the internet and realizing that Miller was the man he had just encountered. The officers initially released Miller until they could get access to security footage, but once they viewed it, they said it corroborated the witness’s account.
Police later arrived at Miller’s house and questioned him about the footage. In another body cam footage video, Miller is seen admitting to being the vandal, claiming again that he was threatened and the victim “dared him” to key his car. “What’s the reason to key the car, though, that’s the question?” a police officer asks in the footage.”Because he was daring me to, basically,” Miller responded…”
Four related thoughts immediately come to mind: (i) The only nut in this little drama is Joshua Miller; (ii) Being this is Rhode Island, there’s no chance a Democrat gets convicted, let alone punished; (iii) The idiots in the Ocean State will probably send him to Washington; and, (iv) You’ll note Miller never disputed the accuracy of the bumper sticker’s message.
THAT he surely does!
Magoo
P.S. On an administrative note, tomorrow we’ll be heading north for our 50th high school reunion, so it’s likely we’ll be radio silent until next Wednesday, possibly Friday. So ’til then…
Video of the Day
John Stossel and Bjorn Lomborg discuss ways to change the world without wasting trillions trying to control the earth’s climate.
Tales of The Darkside
Candace Owens addresses the glaring inconsistency presented by the reality of Asian success in America.
In Case You Were Wondering
Yes, the subject matter of this video is a bit dark, but it answers questions inquiring minds might be mulling over.
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