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Big Pharma giant Pfizer confirmed on Wednesday that it will settle more than 10,000 lawsuits over allegations that the company failed to warn people about possible cancer risks caused by their Zantac product.
Zantac is the company’s once-popular anti-heartburn medication featured in a multitude of television commercials, many of which featured an animated fireman character.
But in 2020, the Food and Drug Administration warned that Zantac and its generic version, called ranitidine, should be pulled from the shelves after a cancer-causing substance called NDMA was discovered as a contaminant linked to the medication.
Now, the company has agreed to settle the thousands of cases filed in state courts all across the nation over the substance, according to Bloomberg News.
Terms of the Pfizer settlements have not been disclosed.
“Pfizer has explored and will continue to explore opportunistic settlements of certain cases if appropriate, and has settled certain cases,” the company said in a statement.
Pfizer and other companies began developing the generic version of ranitidine in 1997 once Glaxo’s patent for the ingredient expired, according to the New York Post.
“The company has not sold a Zantac product in more than 15 years and did so only for a limited period of time,” the statement from Pfizer added.
After the FDA made its recommendation to pull the product, thousands of lawsuits were filed against pharmaceutical companies such as Pfizer, GSK, Sanofi and Boehringer Ingelheim.
Sanofi already settled about 4,000 lawsuits last month.
Bloomberg reported that Sanofi will pay $100 million in its settlement, marking an average of $25,000 for each plaintiff.
But Sanofi still faces more than 20,000 lawsuits in the state of Delaware.
Indeed, there are up to 70,000 cases in Delaware courts against Sanofi and the other Big Pharma companies.
“Sanofi is settling these cases, not because we believe the claims have any merit, but rather to avoid the expense and ongoing distraction of the litigation,” the company said in a statement.
Like Sanofi, GSK has settled some of the suits leveled against the firm.
According to the Daily Mail, NDMA is a common byproduct of many industrial processes, including the making of rocket fuel.
“NDMA is a ‘‘forever chemical,’ meaning that it doesn’t degrade, or break down, naturally in our bodies and is believed to cause DNA damage,” the outlet reported.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Pfizer to Settle 10K Lawsuits Over Drug Linked to Cancer, Costing Company Millions appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Having been a university professor, I’ve been to a lot of commencement ceremonies.
With our campus in a poor, semi-rural area, it was especially moving to see students who were not only the first in their family to get a college degree, but the first to have even graduated from high school.
Sometimes it was boring, but it never got old. It was routine for me, but for some graduates and their families, it was an event of a lifetime.
Which makes what happened with the speaker at The Ohio State University’s recent spring commencement especially grievous.
You see, Chris Pan thought it was all about only him. Perhaps he hoped to promote himself as a professional speaker or guru.
Worse, Pan wrote his speech while high on the psychedelic drug ayahuasca, according to The Columbus Dispatch. He reportedly said he also sought help from ChatGPT and other artificial intelligence.
It showed.
Beginning the university’s commencement address, Pan — an OSU graduate and Harvard MBA who worked for PepsiCo and Facebook before launching a jewelry business — noted the usual things about hard work, late-night studying, achievement and such.
He led students in applauding the support of their families in their accomplishments.
I’ve heard all this before — many times. It’s standard commencement fare, but meaningful for those graduating and their loved ones.
But then the crowd at Ohio State — and the rest of us via X — heard things that were novel.
No, not novel. Bizarre. And completely inappropriate.
The worst commencement address in the history of commencement addresses.
Chris Pan, 05/05/24 | The Ohio State University pic.twitter.com/UlX16R4yuZ
— Kevin McMahon (@Kevin__McMahon) May 7, 2024
Pan called on the crowd to stand and join with him in a song, complete with prepared lyrics projected on a screen.
And hand motions. Lots of hand motions. And breathing exercises — got to have breathing exercises at graduation.
Having, he said, properly gotten everyone in the right state of mind, Pan then gave the old parable about blind men perceiving different aspects of an elephant (trunk as a snake, side as a wall, tail as rope).
No problem with that to make a point.
Then Pan said (and imagine the uproar if he did this in a Christian context) “My goal today is to share new perspectives that will lead you to financial, emotional and spiritual freedom.”
He then talked about money and government policies. In promoting Bitcoin, he called on university President Walter Carter to be his assistant, and did a magic trick, changing quarters into Bitcoin.
Ba-da-BOOM.
Pan explained his self-therapy on emotional health through singing, and talked of spiritual aspects of making one’s soul grow.
As music began to play, he led the crowd in a meditation session/TED talk about a person they might admire and how one can change one’s life.
He then told the crowd he would make a free bracelet from his company available to each of them “as an apology for listening to me talk about Bitcoin,”) the Dispatch reported.
Pan finally moved to what might be considered a traditional commencement speech, with admonitions on learning forgiveness, compassion, resilience and tolerance.
He hearkened back to the elephant parable to talk about how tolerance allows people to hold multiple perspectives, especially in gatherings among those of different cultures, and how inner peace results in world peace.
Usual commencement topics.
But then, back to the music (Pan drank from a coffee cup with the price tag still on it), more on breathing, and an encouragement to learn from others with different perspectives.
Overall, Pan provided some appropriate statements about perspective and harmony.
Despite Pan’s talents and creativity, there are some ways of presenting material that don’t fit at something like commencement. Especially if they come from being high and from using artificial intelligence.
Earlier versions of his speech posted online talked of the current conflict in the Middle East and called for him to remove his shirt. Thankfully, he did neither.
And perhaps Pan’s motive for his little production was contained in his statement that he would be willing to be your teaching assistant for life.
Followed, of course, by a slide of his contact information and website.
Meaning, it seems like Pan’s little show was really about him.
And of it, Kevin McMahon of Townhall posted on X: “The worst commencement address in the history of commencement addresses.”
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Ohio State Graduates Suffer Through ‘The Worst Commencement Address in the History of Commencement Addresses’ appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Most people have at least a vague notion of the virtue of self-sacrifice.
But considering how few people in the developed world face life-or-death situations on a daily basis, how many of us could truly embody that virtue if it came down to it?
How many people would be able to put aside their self-preservation instinct and give up their own life for the people they love?
One North Carolina father, when presented with this situation, was able to rise to that calling, sacrificing his own life when his children fell into a river.
According to local news outlet WGHP, Benny Bowers Jr., a native of Surrey County, North Carolina, was out fishing with his children on April 28 when three of his four sons fell into the Yadkin River.
WGHP reported that, although the family called 911 immediately, the strength of the current forced Bowers to make that fateful, split-second decision.
He jumped in, rescuing his struggling children, but Bowers himself never resurfaced.
Rescue crews quickly came on the scene, The Charlotte Observer noting that they searched the entire day with no success, suspending the search once it grew too dark.
They ended up finding his body around 11 a.m. on April 29, near the juncture of the Yadkin River and the Ararat River in Siloam, where he originally vanished.
Tragic as the loss of this loving father was, Bowers’ children had only glowing praise for the heroic actions of their father, who wen by the name Benji, according to the Observer.
His 10-year-old son, Benny Bowers III, told WGHP “He was a brave man. And if you wanted him to help, he would be there for you.”
Bowers’ sister, Angela Stewart, told WGHP about how much her brother loved the Lord, and Bowers’ son called his father “the greatest dad I could ever have, and he’s a hero. A real-life hero.”
Friends and family shared their own tributes on Facebook, with Bowers’ cousin, Jason Johnson, writing, “I’ve been thinking about all the things I could say about Benji Bowers. If I could put it all in one word it would be Love. To know him was to love him. Always the jokester. The life of the party. God, Family, friends and fishing were what matters most.”
And Bowers truly lived up to the praise of his son, his sister and his cousin.
While too many Christians in the secular culture of the West see their commitment to the Lord as more of a social thing, Bowers clearly took his commitment to God seriously, up to and including sacrificing himself for the sake of his children.
In doing so, Bowers personified the words of Christ, who said in John’s Gospel that “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.”
Every child deserves a father like Bowers, who was devoted to God first, and then put his family before everything else.
Benny Bowers Jr. was, as his son said, a real-life hero, animated by the words of Christ and his love for the Lord.
Bowers had that “greater love,” to “lay down his life” for his children. If America had more fathers like him, maybe that would be enough to turn the nihilistic, atheistic culture of the West back to God.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post ‘A Real-Life Hero’: Father Sacrifices His Life to Save Three Children appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
The House on Tuesday passed a bill designed to ensure that any new energy efficiency standards promulgated by the U.S. Department of Energy be based on available technology and economic reality, according to a media release from the bill’s sponsor.
Rep. Debbie Lesko’s office said that the bill passed with bi-partisan support.
“I am saddened that we would need such a bill,” Lesko said in the release. “However, as we have experienced under this administration, the Department of Energy has unleashed an avalanche of new regulations for household products, including stoves, dishwashers, washing machines, showers, toilets, water heaters, air conditioners, heat pumps, and furnaces.
“No government bureaucrat should EVER scheme to take away Americans’ appliances in the name of a radical environmental agenda, yet that is exactly what we have seen under the Biden Administration,” she added (emphasis original).
Republican Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington spoke in support of the bill from the House floor, calling the “rush to green agenda” by the Biden administration “out of touch” with the priorities of everyday Americans.
The Biden administration is waging war on American energy, and this war is making its way into Americans’ homes.
The administration is doubling down on unaffordable appliance mandates—which is why we’re leading on H.R. 6921. Watch: pic.twitter.com/Y8oYpDZNJe
— CathyMcMorrisRodgers (@cathymcmorris) May 7, 2024
The intent of the bill is to tweak the way in which the DOE creates new regulations or modifies or revokes existing ones as they apply to consumer products like household appliances, but specifically excludes vehicles, according to a summary of the bill on the official congressional website.
According to a summary of the bill, if enacted, it would grant the DOE the authority to “grant a petition to revoke or amend energy conservation standards if it finds that the standards (1) result in additional costs to consumers, (2) do not result in significant conservation of energy or water, (3) are not technologically feasible, and (4) result in a product (e.g., gas stoves) not being commercially available in the United States to all consumers.”
It also would require all new or modified regulations to be ” technologically feasible and economically justified,” according to the summary.
The website listed 10 cosponsors of the bill, all of whom are Republicans.
Interested readers can read the bill in its entirety below.
H. R. 6192 by The Western Journal on Scribd
According to the U.S. House Clerk’s Office, 205 Republicans voted to pass the bill along with seven Democrats. All 195 votes against the bill were from Democrats.
Of those listed as “Not Voting” on the bill, 11 were Democrats and 12 were Republicans.
The bill faces an uncertain future in the Senate, although passage seems unlikely given the Senate’s refusal to take up similar bills in the past, such as Lesko’s Save Our Gas Stoves Act, passed by the House in 2023.
According to an analysis by the Congressional Budget Office, the bill would require no significant additional federal government spending.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post House Passes Bill That Forces Biden Administration to Keep Its ‘Hands Off Our Home Appliances’ appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Former President Donald Trump could break a 52-year GOP losing streak by winning the blue state of Minnesota, campaign officials said at a Republican National Committee retreat, citing internal polls.
Pollster Tony Fabrizio and senior advisers Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita told attendees at the private donor event Saturday that they’re optimistic the 45th president could flip both Minnesota and Virginia, NBC News reported.
President Joe Biden won Minnesota by 7 percentage points in 2020, according to the outlet. The state has not voted for a Republican presidential candidate since Richard Nixon’s re-election campaign in 1972.
According to internal polls, Trump leads Biden by three points — 49 percent to 46 percent — in a head-to-head matchup in the North Star State.
In a six-way Minnesota contest with four independent candidates, including Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump and Biden are tied at 40 percent each.
When Kennedy is taken out of the equation, Trump leads Biden by five points, at 46 percent to 41 percent.
Trump camp poll memo: Blue states MN & VA are in play
MN: Trump & Biden are tied 40-40%
Sans RFK Jr: Trump +5
Head to head: Trump + 3VA: Biden up 40-37%
Sans RFK: Biden +1
H2H: Biden +4 pic.twitter.com/rZYw5twBpQ— Marc Caputo (@MarcACaputo) May 7, 2024
Overall, Trump campaign polls show the former president outperforming Biden in swing states.
“Fabrizio’s numbers, posted on a slide shared with NBC News, showed Trump ahead of President Joe Biden by small margins in the key swing states from 2020 — including Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona and Georgia,” the outlet reported.
LaCivita said the Biden campaign’s suggestion that he could flip Florida and North Carolina — states Trump won in 2020 — is empty bluster, while the 45th president has a realistic shot at flipping some blue states.
“I think that the Biden campaign is deliberately playing a faux game by talking about [how] they’re going to expand the map in Florida and North Carolina,” LaCivita told NBC News. “But we have a real, real opportunity in expanding the map in Virginia and Minnesota.”
Biden campaign spokeswoman Lauren Hitt scoffed at the very notion.
“While we have 150 offices open with hundreds of staff across the key battlegrounds, the RNC is closing offices and hemorrhaging money on legal fees,” Hitt said.
“Joe Biden has hit every battleground at least once, while Trump’s in the courtroom or on the golf course. We’ll see how that translates in November.”
While polls are temporary snapshots in time that can and do change, they paint an encouraging picture for Trump, who has been campaigning hard despite fighting sham lawsuits.
In contrast, his doddering Democratic rival is hardly campaigning, in a repeat of his lethargic 2020 efforts.
New: Swing State Polls with @thehill
AZ: 48% Trump, 44% Biden
GA: 47% Trump, 44% Biden
MI: 45% Trump, 44% Biden
NV: 45% Trump, 44% Biden
NC: 47% Trump, 42% Biden
PA: 47% Trump, 45% Biden
WI: 47% Trump, 45% Bidenhttps://t.co/tt6RQ0rGGP pic.twitter.com/c1xsuqa3Po— Emerson College Polling (@EmersonPolling) April 30, 2024
No matter what the polls say, it’s clear the United States is buckling under the weight of Biden’s disastrous presidency.
Americans are struggling with punishing inflation, terrifying crime and daily border invasions that are destabilizing the nation. Things cannot continue as they are.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Trump Leads Biden in State that Republicans Haven’t Won at Presidential Level Since 1972 appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
CNN’s Jake Tapper called out President Joe Biden’s ever-changing position on the issue of abortion.
In an interview that aired Sunday with Biden campaign co-chair Mitch Landrieu, Tapper questioned whether Biden’s shifting stance on abortion over his political career will be harmful to his campaign.
Tapper characterized Biden’s position on abortion as “all over the map” and asked whether it undermines support from him from pro-choice advocates.
“Do you think his own long, complicated history on this issue — do you think it muddies his message, and undermines the contrast with Donald Trump?” Tapper asked.
Landrieu at first criticized how Trump has handled the abortion issue, but then explained how Biden’s pro-choice stance is stronger than ever.
“Since his presidency, he has been very strong in his support of a very simple notion: that he trusts women to make decisions about their reproductive health,” Landrieu said.
To Tapper’s point, Biden’s position on abortion has been inconsistent throughout his career.
In 1974, then freshman Senator Biden said that he didn’t like the Supreme Court’s decision on abortion.
“I think it went too far. I don’t think that a woman has the sole right to say what should happen to her body,” the Washingtonian reported in 1974.
In 2006, Biden called himself “the odd man out” in the Democratic Paty on the abortion issue, according to CNN.
“I do not view abortion as a choice and a right. I think it’s always a tragedy, and I think that it should be rare and safe, and I think we should be focusing on how to limit the number of abortions.’ Biden said.
Just this year, Biden said that he’s “never been supportive of, you know, ‘It’s my body, I can do what I want with it,” the New Yorker reported.
Yet, since his inauguration in 2021, Biden has been anything but a sideline spectator on the issue.
In July 2022, just a few weeks after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Biden signed an executive order aimed at protecting access to abortion services.
CNN reported that the “executive order attempts to safeguard access to medication abortion and emergency contraception, protect patient privacy, launch public education efforts as well as bolster the security of and the legal options available to those seeking and providing abortion services.”
In June 2023, Biden denounced abortion restrictions in Republican-governed states, arguing that the states were depriving women of “basic health care,” according to the New York Times.
“In his 50+ years in politics … Biden has been all over the map on abortion,” says CNN’s Jake Tapper.
— “In ’74, he said Roe v. Wade went too far, and that a woman should not have ‘the sole right to say what should happen to her body.'”
— “In 2006, he said, ‘I do not view… pic.twitter.com/uad5XSziwI
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) May 5, 2024
Just this year, in his State of the Union address, Biden said, “if you, the American people, send me a Congress that supports the right to choose, I promise you I will restore Roe v. Wade as the law of the land again,” Huffpost reported.
It seems like Biden’s position on abortion corresponds to that of his base. Instead of having an independent opinion based on what he believes, he’s believing what he thinks will get him elected.
Tapper is right to bring up Biden’s tepidity on the issue. There is perhaps no issue that Biden has flipped back and forth over in his career more than abortion.
What Biden represents is an opinion that is often held on the left, particularly among left-leaning legal scholars: the idea that codified laws are living, constantly evolving instruments.
It’s in stark contrast to the position taken by the mainstream right, who take an originalist perspective on laws. They argue, according to the National Constitution Center, that laws should be interpreted with the understanding of those who wrote them, not those who are reading them.
The idea of the left is that the U.S. Constitution should change over time to accommodate how society’s view on key issues changes. This all happens without any sort of formal amendment process, and is instead implemented by enlightened members of the judiciary.
As many people are aware, the Constitution makes no mention of abortion in its text. Rather, the theory of the “living constitution” was utilized by the Supreme Court to permit them to bring the Constitution into the modern age.
David Strauss, a professor of law at the University of Chicago Law School, defined a living constitution as “one that evolves, changes over time, and adapts to new circumstances, without being formally amended.”
This idea that the Constitution can change over time and adapt to new circumstances has been the foundation of Supreme Court decisions that have written rights into the Constitution based on what the Court wants it to say.
This philosophy is concerning, to say the least.
For the left and “living constitutionalists,” no constitutional right is safe. To them, the government is the arbiter of what rights should and should not be guaranteed.
To them, the law is subject to their will. If a provision of the law is disharmonious with their will, they will simply change it.
The core issue with that philosophy is, at the end of the day, the letter of the law means nothing more than what judges think it ought to mean, irrespective of what it says.
That’s why overturning Roe v. Wade was the correct jurisprudential decision, even if it was not popular. Nothing in the Constitution guarantees anyone the right to have an abortion.
The Constitution was founded on the principle that there are some rights so sacred, so worth protecting, that citizens can only be deprived of them when afforded due process.
And no right is greater than that of the right to life. Unlike the left, many on the right believe that rights come from God, not government, and that they cannot be changed just because some judges feel like they should.
That’s why conservatives have so consistently opposed abortion. Sure, you can deprive someone of life with due process. But how can you give a baby in the womb due process?
The left and right can, and do, disagree on many issues. From immigration and taxes to welfare and energy, all of these debates have their place.
But when it comes to abortion, and the deprivation of the right to life, this is something that we really should all be able to agree on. After all, if we don’t protect the right to life of innocent children, what is worth protecting?
Does any other issue matter if we can kill our most vulnerable citizens?
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Watch: CNN Host Calls Out Joe Biden for ‘Being All Over the Map” on Abortion appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
The Rev. Billy Graham, famed evangelist and minister to presidents, is set to receive a great accolade next week as a 7-foot-tall statue will be dedicated in his honor at the U.S. Capitol, according to reports.
The state of North Carolina approved a measure back in 2015 to replace its statue of former Gov. Charles Aycock in the Capitol’s Statuary Hall with one dedicated to Graham, who was born in the city of Charlotte in the Tar Heel State. But the plans have been stalled for years, The Charlotte Observer reported last year.
Graham died in 2018.
The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association told Fox News on Monday that the long-awaited statue will finally be placed in the Capitol.
“It’s a rare honor,” the organization said.
The outlet reported the statue will be unveiled on the morning of May 16.
The commanding sculpture was created by North Carolina artist Chas Fagan and portrays Graham gesturing toward an open Bible, according to Fox News.
The bronze was cast at Carolina Bronze Sculpture, a foundry in Seagrove, North Carolina, while the base was made of Salisbury granite cut from a quarry in Rowan County.
The base of the statue contains Bible verses to “highlight Graham’s lifelong commitment to sharing the Gospel,” the association said.
They include John 3:16 (“God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life”) and John 14:6 (“Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one goes to the Father except through me'”), Fox News reported.
The Rev. Franklin Graham celebrated the statue being raised in his famous father’s honor.
“This isn’t just a statue of my father — it represents the One that he surrendered his life to and the message that he preached for more than 80 years, that God loves us and He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to save us from our sins,” he told Fox News via email.
“What I appreciate most is that this is an opportunity for everyone in future generations who sees the statue to be reminded of God’s love, grace and forgiveness,” Graham continued.
“This is a great honor and my father would be humbled and grateful,” he added. “At the same time, he would not want the attention on himself but on God’s Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.”
Billy Graham, who died at 99 years of age, dedicated some 80 years of his life to his ministry and preached the Gospel to more than 215 million people across six continents — the most ever reached by a single Christian minister.
He also counseled 12 sitting U.S. presidents, starting with Harry Truman, as well as many world leaders.
“The legacy of Rev. Billy Graham is based on his simple message of forgiveness based on John 3:16,” Republican North Carolina Sen. Ted Budd told Fox News.
“He was the first private citizen from North Carolina to lie in honor in the United States Capitol and his likeness should stand in the U.S. Capitol forever,” Budd said.
Graham has received several honors from the federal government.
In 1996, he and his wife, Ruth, received a Congressional Gold Medal.
When he died in 2018, he became one of only four private citizens to be laid in state at the Capitol.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Billy Graham to Be Permanently Commemorated in US Capitol in ‘Rare Honor’ appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
As our country barrels heedlessly towards the uttermost bounds of depravity, even the country’s hallowed national monuments are no longer safe from those promoting this degeneracy.
From Joe Biden inviting transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney to speak with him at the White House to inviting other transgender influencers who took off their shirts on the White House lawn, the Biden administration has ensured that nation’s capital would become a hotbed of this increasing degeneracy.
And now, members of the infamous show “RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars” have disgraced the Washington Mall and the Lincoln Memorial by promoting the show and parading themselves in patriotic-themed, provocative outfits across these national landmarks.
Per The Hill, eight alumni of “Drag Race” took to the Washington Mall on Monday to both promote the ninth-season of the show and pose for pictures.
One of the drag queens, Angeria Paris VanMichaels, told The Hill, “It feels like progress. … In this moment, I feel very proud of my country and just the fact that we’re able to do stuff like this now. It kind of shows how far we are coming as a country — slowly but surely, we get there.”
More specifically, in addition to promoting the show, the drag queens were there to persuade people to vote in the upcoming election — for Biden, that is.
As The Hill noted, the LGBT community was instrumental in clinching Biden’s victory back in 2020.
Local news station WUSA-TV also reported on the drag queen’s underlying intentions regarding their little display, noting drag queen Shannel posted a video to Instagram encouraging people to vote, with the caption “Let your voice be heard VOTE.VOTE.VOTE.”
WARNING: The following video contains images that may be offensive to some readers.
Now, was the drag queens’ little publicity stunt directly sponsored by the Biden administration?
It appeared not. Though these drag queens would most likely be full-throated Biden supporters, the impetus for the whole endeavor seemed to come from the makers of the show and not the White House.
However, The Hill reported, the drag queens met with White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre at a “popular gay bar” following their jaunt about Washington.
Is this any surprise?
After all, career liberal Nancy Pelosi once gladly appeared on this execrable show, and Biden invited a “non-binary” drag queen who publicly advocated for defunding the police to the White House to witness him signing the “Respect for Marriage” Act in 2022, WPDE-TV reported at the time.
Biden has devoted almost his entire presidency to prompting far-left causes that would have made our forebears recoil in disgust.
Imagine what Abraham Lincoln would have said had he seen these drag queens parading around the nation’s Capitol, within sight of his own monument.
Even a mere ten years ago, such a display would have been unthinkable to any sitting president, Democrat or Republican.
Only 20 or so years ago, committed liberals like Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton publicly opposed gay marriage.
How, in such a short span of time, did men dressing like female strippers at our most important national monuments become something many people would consider “normal”?
This display from these drag queens, then, was more than an off-putting publicity stunt for a depraved reality show.
It was a sobering, and disturbing, representation of the moral decline of our nation.
What a difference a couple of decades can make.
A terrible, disheartening, difference, but a difference nonetheless.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Sign of the Times: Drag Queens Take Over National Mall, Create Spectacle at Lincoln Memorial and White House appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
A state judge in New York has shot down a pro-abortion ballot measure just ahead of the November election, dealing a blow to Democrats who hoped to use the initiative as a top campaign issue this fall.
A judge in Livingston County ruled on Tuesday that Democratic legislators did not follow the constitutionally required steps to place the measure on the ballot, according to the New York Post.
State Supreme Court Justice Daniel Doyle found that they approved the measure before obtaining a legal opinion from state Attorney General Letitia James’ office, the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle reported.
New York already has some of the strongest protections for abortion and abortionists in the country, yet Democrats in the Empire State have been trying to make abortion a central issue in this year’s election with absurd claims that it is endangered in a deep-blue state that is fully controlled by Democrats.
The Democratic Party hopes to use the initiative to boost voter turnout.
“Our decades-long fight to protect equality and reproductive freedom will not be thrown off track by one extremist judge and I look forward to casting my ballot for the Equal Rights Amendment in November,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said in a statement.
Critics of the ballot measure said the language is an attack on parental rights because it would make it illegal to deny a minor’s request for an abortion — or other “health” services, such as “transgender” procedures.
The measure would ask New York voters if they support adding language to the state constitution saying that people cannot be denied rights based on their “ethnicity, national origin, age, and disability” or “sex, including sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive healthcare and autonomy.”
Detractors said that not only would parents be prohibited from having a say in abortions for their children, but the measure also would force schools to adopt the “transgender” agenda.
“Schools would be required to permit biological males to compete on girls’ sports teams if voters approve this amendment,” the Coalition to Protect Kids said in a statement last month, according to the Post.
Critics blasted the measure as “the Parent Replacement Act,” with the Coalition to Protect Kids saying it “opens the floodgates” for government interference in families.
“This ballot initiative is written so broadly and so poorly that it could cause irreparable harm to children and families,” said Greg Garvey, New York executive director of the coalition.
Opponents — including Republican Assemblywoman Marjorie Byrnes of Livingston County — went to court to prevent the measure from being placed on the ballot.
Byrnes told the Post she was pleased with the judge’s decision to block the measure.
“While the state is controlled by one party, our constitution and our laws must be honored. I am pleased with Justice Doyle’s decision which upholds the plain meaning and integrity of the constitution of our state,” she said.
A recent poll found that a supermajority of American voters oppose abortions after the third month of pregnancy, but the New York ballot measure would go against that sentiment by approving unrestricted abortion.
New York state law currently guarantees a right to abortion up to 24 weeks — or six months — and also protects abortion until birth if the fetus is unviable or if the mother’s life is endangered by the pregnancy.
Shockingly, the law includes “mental health” as a reason for abortion up until birth.
Naturally, Democrats plan to appeal the judge’s ruling, so this measure might yet end up on the ballot.
But it all just goes to show how Democrats use abortion as a political wedge even when the “right” they claim to be worried about isn’t in danger in the least bit.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Judge Hands NY Democrats Massive Loss, Axes Abortion Rights Measure appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
A public health emergency has been declared in Long Beach, California, due to a tuberculosis outbreak.
A declaration from Dr. Anissa Davis, Long Beach’s health officer, said one person has died and nine people have been hospitalized, according to Live Science.
Fourteen people with active TB had been identified as of April 29. All cases have been linked to a single-room-occupancy hotel. Officials are not naming the hotel in what they said was an effort to protect patients’ privacy.
“People who were staying at the hotel at the time or could have otherwise been exposed have been or will be contacted by the Health Department,” a Health Department statement said.
“Why this city has declared a public health emergency”
Lack of medical screening for immigrants – they’re bringing in a wave of diseases we eradicated decades ago.
— Beersaint (@USMC_Razorback) May 6, 2024
“Through the course of this investigation, staff have identified approximately 170 people who have likely been exposed to TB,” the statement said.
The emergency declaration, which was issued Thursday, is expected to be ratified by the Long Beach City Council on Tuesday, according to Newsweek.
The declaration allows the Health Department to take expanded intervention efforts.
I believe the name of the hotel SHOULD BE DISCLOSED in the interest of traveler safety. OR does this mean the hotel is used to house illegal aliens invading our border? Long Beach declares public health emergency after deadly tuberculosis outbreak https://t.co/jTe7fpuR2R
— Judy Holiday (@msjudyholiday) May 3, 2024
TB has been rising in California. California’s 2023 cases were 15 percent higher than its TB caseload in 2022, according to the Los Angeles Times. That is the highest year-over-year increase since 1989, according to the state Department of Public Health.
Live Science said that the microbe that causes tuberculosis can be dormant in a person, without any symptoms. Between 5 percent and 10 percent of the people with the bacteria develop TB.
OFFICIAL STATEMENT
Click here.
— City of Long Beach (@LongBeachCity) May 2, 2024
“The outbreak is currently isolated to a distinct population,” the Health Department statement said.
“The population at risk in this outbreak has significant barriers to care, including homelessness and housing insecurity, mental illness, substance use and serious medical comorbidities,” it said.
Tuberculosis passes from person to person through airborne particles, although it usually takes extensive exposure to a person who has active TB and spreads most easily in poorly ventilated environments.
Do you know the symptoms of #TB disease?
CDC’s new “Questions and Answers About TB” booklet has helpful info on how to diagnose and treat tuberculosis disease, and is now available in English, Spanish, Tagalog, and Vietnamese: https://t.co/nLCpacw9cm. pic.twitter.com/Q4ROhwUKMu
— CDC (@CDCgov) September 27, 2021
“You can catch tuberculosis if someone is coughing or sneezing or in close contact, the bacteria from those particles gets into the air and anybody nearby will breathe that in — and that’s how they pick it up, and that’s how they catch it,” Dr. Janette Nesheiwat of New York City said, according to Fox News.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post State Declares Public Health Emergency After Tuberculosis Outbreak: 1 Dead, 14 Infections Confirmed – 170 Likely Exposed appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Donald Trump’s presidential campaign released an ad Monday putting university leaders on notice that if he is re-elected his administration will not tolerate anti-Semitism on campuses.
The online ad, which dropped on Holocaust Remembrance Day, included clips from a speech Trump made as president in 2017 condemning anti-Semitism and remarks he made last fall to the Republican Jewish Coalition following the Hamas Oct. 7 attacks.
“We’ve seen anti-Semitism on university campuses, in the public square, and in threats against Jewish citizens. This is my pledge to you, we will confront anti-Semitism. We will stamp out prejudice,” Trump said. “We will condemn hatred. We will bear witness, and we will act.”
“When I get back into office, I will put every single university and college president on notice. The American taxpayer will not subsidize the creation of terrorist sympathizers on American soil,” the 45th president promised.
He concluded, “I will defend our friend and ally the state of Israel like nobody has ever defended it before. I will always stand with the Jewish people.”
Joe Biden has still refused to condemn the pro-Hamas mobs occupying college campuses across America.
President Trump took historic action to combat anti-Semitism and stamp out prejudice—and he will always stand with the Jewish people.#HolocaustRemembranceDay pic.twitter.com/woxT0sJHZl
— Team Trump (Text TRUMP to 88022) (@TeamTrump) May 6, 2024
Last week as protests were occurring on many campuses around the country from Columbia University in New York to the University of California, Los Angeles, Trump said at a campaign rally in Wisconsin, “To every college president I say remove the encampments immediately, vanquish the radicals, and take back our campuses for all of the normal students who want a safe place from which to learn.”
President Trump calls out college presidents amid nationwide campus protests:
“To every college president I say remove the encampments immediately, vanquish the radicals, and take back our campuses for all of the normal students who want a safe place from which to learn.” pic.twitter.com/LEPUTOR2BU
— Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) May 1, 2024
The beginning of Trump’s ad included news clips that highlight President Joe Biden’s failure to forcefully respond to the protests.
On April 22, Biden repeated a reporter’s question back to her regarding the protests, saying he does condemn “anti-Semitic protests” but added, “I also condemn those that don’t know what’s going on with the Palestinians.”
The White House had released a similar on-the-one-hand, on-the-other-hand statement the day before.
Last week, Biden addressed the campus protests more directly saying, “There’s the right to protest, but not the right to chaos.”
He noted that destroying property and shutting down campuses is against the law.
The president then employed his practice of saying he’s against anti-Semitism directed toward Jewish students, as well as “Islamophobia” and “discrimination against Arab Americans or Palestinian Americans.”
BIDEN: “There should be no place on any campus, no place in America, for antisemitism or threats of violence against Jewish students. There is no place for hate speech or violence of any kind, whether it’s antisemitism, Islamophobia, or discrimination against Arab Americans or… pic.twitter.com/I6T8cK0RHc
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) May 2, 2024
The campus protests have primarily been anti-Israel, anti-Jewish in nature.
Last month, 27 Republican senators — including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, Katie Britt of Alabama, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Ted Cruz of Texas, Tom Cotton of Arkansas, John Kennedy of Louisiana and Marco Rubio of Florida — sent a letter to Education Secretary Miguel Cardona and Attorney General Merrick Garland urging them to use their authority to “restore order and protect Jewish students” on college campuses.
They noted multiple federal laws have been violated by the protesters, including those against discrimination and espousing support for terrorism.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Trump Drops Ad Putting University Presidents ‘On Notice,’ Pledges to Deal with Pro-Palestinian Protests appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
ABC News president Kim Godwin has tendered her resignation in a move that surprised a number of mainstream media insiders.
There will undoubtedly be some who are sad to see the first black woman to lead a broadcast television news division leave the position — but former President Donald Trump is apparently not among them.
Nor are most of her former staff, according to CNN.
Trump posted to Truth Social just over an hour after The Wall Street Journal broke the story on Godwin’s departure.
“Happy to report that Kim Godwin, Head of ABC, has resigned,” Trump wrote. “Could it be the unfair reporting on EVERYTHING TRUMP? In any event, GOOD RIDDANCE!” (emphasis original).
“Hopefully somebody else will be able to control George Slopadopolous and the rest of the Fake News Thugs over at ABC? Best wishes Kim!” he added.
The former president’s hypothesis notwithstanding, Godwin was known to be a controversial figure at ABC. CNN remarked that the “embattled” Godwin’s “polarizing leadership led to plummeting employee morale,” according to unnamed staffers.
CNN also reported that her departure — or at least its timing — came as something of a surprise. Her Sunday evening memo to staff announcing what the outlet referred to as her “abrupt” resignation was said to have “rocked” the newsroom.
Last week, CNN reported that Debra OConnell, who had been put over Godwin and the news division by parent company Disney in February, was “conducting a review of her performance and had voiced dissatisfaction in private conversations with the state of affairs” at ABC News.
More than 24 staffers and “others close to the network” — who requested anonymity because they had not been authorized to speak with CNN — said Godwin had had a crushing effect on morale in the organization she led.
“Godwin, staffers told CNN, made several profound errors, including employing a hands-off approach to managing, not developing a strategic vision for the newsroom, eliminating the heads of the talent-relations division and appointing an inner-circle that alienated staffers, among a stream of other complaints,” the outlet reported.
In addition, Axios reported that it had heard from other unnamed sources that “the main sentiment felt by staff was that Godwin was more focused on promoting herself as a leader rather than invest time with ABC News’ staff and show teams.”
Godwin’s resignation was apparently effective immediately, as OConnell said she will take charge of the newsroom “for the time being,” according to The Associated Press.
For her part, Godwin claimed to have made the decision on her own to part ways not only with ABC News, but with the entire industry.
“I have decided to retire from broadcast journalism,” the 60-year-old Godwin said in an email to the ABC News staff, according to CNN.
“I have been fortunate and blessed enough to have done almost every job there is in this business,” she added. “But after considerable reflection, I’m certain it’s the right one for me as I look to the future and prioritize what’s most important for me and my family.”
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post ABC News President Suddenly Quits Amid Internal Backlash – Trump Celebrates appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
When hearing about the woes of blue states, names like California and New York immediately come to mind, but we may need to add a new name to the list of places Democratic officials are ruining: Illinois.
The Daily Caller reported on Thursday that new data indicates the state our 16th president, Abraham Lincoln, once called home is in a downward spiral.
While California is still leading the nation with the worst unemployment rate in the country at 5.3 percent, Illionois is not far behind in fifth with 4.8 percent.
The comparisons don’t stop there. With the 8th highest tax burden and high crime rates, many Illinoisans are opting to simply leave the state for greener pastures — as Californians have been doing.
Bryce Hill, director of fiscal and economic research at the Illinois Policy Institute, told the Daily Caller News Foundation, “The Census Bureau has reported that residents are leaving the state en masse to the tune of hundreds of thousands every single year, so much so that the state’s population has actually been declining for the past 10 years.”
As of July 2023, Illinois population was 12,549,689. That number was down 32,826 from 2022. Census data showed this fall has been steady, as the population as of April 1, 2020, was 12,813,469.
Heartland Institute Senior Fellow S.T. Karnick cited a few reasons for this decline. “Opinion polls cite high taxes as the top reason people want to leave Illinois, with crime and safety second. Illinois has the fourth-most regulations among the 50 states, which raises prices and kills jobs.”
Violent crime in Chicago went up 18 percent in 2023 compared to ten years prior, with arrests dropping 33 percent over the same time.
Central to Illinois problems is its ballooning pension cost. The state pension debt currently sits at $142.3 billion. Since the 2000 fiscal year, inflation adjusted spending for pensions has gone up 584 percent.
Illinois adopted a new constitution in 1970. Article XIII, Section 5 states pension benefits cannot be “diminished or impaired.” Couple this with Senate Bill 95 in 1989, which created a 3 percent compounding benefit increase for retired Illinoisans in the pension system, and you’ve found the root of the problem.
Hill highlighted the damage in declining population and the pension problem saying, “Migrants take over $10 billion worth of income with them out of state when we lose people due to domestic migration,” but included that the pension is draining the budget and “taking up large sources of revenue.”
Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker attempted to take an optimistic view in his State of the State address in February. “We’ve also grown Illinois’ economy to over $1 trillion. … We attracted billions of dollars in new business investments and created tens of thousands of new jobs.”
Illinois GDP grew 2.3 percent year-over-year in the fourth quarter of 2023. This is lower than the national total of 3.4 percent in the same quarter. Numerous businesses have announced downsizing plans in recent years.
While something is clearly amiss, it is amazing how one-size-fits-all the solution is to the catastrophe that plagues blue states.
Firstly, violent crime, and all crime must be dealt with. Declining arrests and increasing crime rates make Illinoisans feel unsafe. Blue state policies invoking leniency on crime must end in Illinois.
Ballooning pensions must cease as it creates a burden on the taxpayer. Illinois has become pro-government and anti-business. Government employees retire to an out-of-control pension fund while the taxpayer foots the bill causing job loss.
Why take your business to Illinois when your taxes are going towards paying a bloated government that can’t even keep you safe?
Pritzker admitted in his SOTS address that Illinois is also being burdened by an influx of illegal immigrants. This will certainly burden the taxpayer further.
If your keeping count, that’s three basic solutions to keep Illinois from becoming another one of the left’s progressive utopias.
Illinoisans need law and order, tax cuts, and a secure border.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Race to the Bottom: The State Competing with California to be the ‘Left’s Progressive Utopia’ appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
After numerous different walks to Marine One ended with President Joe Biden blundering through questions, the White House is taking extra steps to ensure it won’t happen again.
Aides now assist the president whenever he walks to his helicopter as a way to shield him from the onslaught of hungry reporters.
It makes sense when the head of state randomly snaps back at journalists trying to do their jobs — not a good look.
Additionally, measures have to be taken to cover his frail state as he’s fallen numerous times, especially while attempting to board Air Force One and other aircraft.
But with new changes, there are always speed bumps.
In a recent, awkward walk to Marine One, a Biden aide initially began the walk on the president’s left, giving reporters direct access to the president.
Crooked Joe Biden (surrounded by his handlers) ignores questions as he shuffles off to Delaware for another long weekend of rest.
He has spent 460 days — 38% of his presidency — on vacation. pic.twitter.com/DA8STIxYwI
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) May 4, 2024
It appeared about halfway through the walk that she realized her mistake, shifting to the right side and ensuring journalists wouldn’t be able to throw questions at Biden without going through her.
While it’s subtle, it’s obviously intentional.
There’s no other reason for the aide to shift from left to right besides attempting to shield the commander-in-chief from getting into verbal tussles with journalists.
It’s quite sad that the president of the United States has to be escorted by an aide, not for security, but because he can’t manage on his own.
I’d be utterly devastated if I dedicated my career to working my way up in the political world to end up the babysitter for a senile president whose biggest enemy is stairs.
For God’s sake, if he can’t even get to a helicopter without being escorted, imagine what goes on behind closed doors.
What are the chances he’s even in charge of his own administration?
President Biden is not the strong figure we need in the Oval Office: He’s a weak old man who can’t even stand at the head of his family proudly.
We don’t need a man with one foot in the grave who has to be led around like a toddler for four more years.
Vote him out.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Biden’s Handler Seems to Remember Something Important Halfway to Marine One, Cameras Catch the Subtle Change appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
“And the rocket’s red glare, the bomb bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there, O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave, O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?”
When Francis Scott Key penned these words in 1814, over a dozen British warships were launching mortars and rockets in the mouth of the Baltimore Harbor.
Although no mortars or rockets were fired in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, last Tuesday, there were some familiar sounds of battle: the beat of a snare drum, the bellicose shouting of belligerents, and the whizz of not rockets but rocks and water bottles.
But Key surely would have smiled had he been present to see the small cadre of men enduring profanity, spittle, and abuse in order to keep the star-spangled banner from touching the ground.
After screaming, left-wing, pro-Hamas protesters tore down the American flag in the quadrangle at University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, raising a Palestinian flag in its stead, Chancellor Lee Roberts and several police officers restored the flag to its rightful place.
Almost immediately, foamy-mouthed protesters tried to tear it down again.
Young men of the Pi Kappa Phi fraternity rushed forward to keep their nation’s flag from touching dirt and to keep their animalistic fellow students at bay until more police could arrive.
Pi Kappa Phi brother Guillermo Estrada said, “We stood for an hour defending the flag so many fight to protect.”
His compatriot Dan Stompel said, “They’re going to have to tear me off this flag by my dead body,” according to Fox News.
He added, “[N]ice, normal, strong boys protecting America’s flag. There’s nothing more patriotic, nothing more genuine, nothing more inspiring than that.”
(Thread) Today was a sad yet empowering day at Chapel Hill. When I walked to class, I saw the Palestinian flag raised on our quad flag pole, and was immediately upset at the act that these “protestors” had made. I cannot say I am fully educated on the Israel/Palestine conflict pic.twitter.com/tZrZEOSu8a
— Guillermo Estrada (@estradguillermo) April 30, 2024
Though perhaps not so fraught as the War of 1812’s Battle of Baltimore, the episode at Chapel Hill is nonetheless indicative of a fundamental truth that secular American society has, for decades, been trying to suppress: Men must be men, for the good of the nation, for the good of families, for the good of civilization.
The feminist myth of “toxic masculinity” has cowed and emasculated generations of men, with catastrophic effects on Western civilization.
Fatherlessness has proliferated over the years; divorce is now commonplace. Young men grow up without a father to show them how to be a man; young women grow up without a father to show them how a man ought to love and respect them.
“Daddy issues” have almost become the punchline to a sick societal joke, hookup culture and pornography. Of the few men who don’t openly embrace degeneracy, many live in fear of being trampled by fascist feminism’s stormtroopers in stilettos, becoming bitter and self-centered in their isolation.
“Male loneliness” is at its peak, with men terrified of being labeled a “threat” for trying to build friendships with women and almost equally afraid of being labeled “gay” for developing brotherly bonds with other men.
Marriage and birth rates are declining; crime and lawlessness are spiking.
Not all of this societal cancer is due to feminism, of course, but to a whole host of “isms” besides.
Agnosticism, atheism, casualism, egoism, feminism, hedonism, indifferentism, liberalism and libertarianism, Marxism, materialism, narcissism, nihilism, pessimism, progressivism, and relativism have all joined forces to browbeat into simpering submission the first vanguard and final bulwark against civilizational decay: men.
For centuries, men have served as the engines of civilization, its architects and its builders. The chief roles that men have fulfilled throughout history are as provider and protector.
The very first man, Adam, was commanded by God Himself, “In pain you shall eat [the ground’s yield] all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread …” (Genesis 3:17-19).
It is the role of men to provide, to toil and labor, to give of themselves for the sake of their families first, and then their communities and nations.
When men provide, as they ought, they allow their wives to nourish and raise their children, they allow their children to live in relative comfort, and they allow their communities and nations to benefit from the fruits of that labor: Those children will themselves grow up to be mothers and fathers, they will grow up to be nurturers and providers, they will grow up to be doctors and lawyers and teachers and architects and coal miners and butchers and farmers — and the whole of the nation will benefit from the fruits of even one man’s labor.
Men are called also to be protectors. As German author and World War I veteran Ernst Jünger wisely noted, “Long periods of peace and quiet favor certain optical illusions. Among them is the assumption that the invulnerability of the home is founded upon the constitution and safeguarded by it. In reality, it rests upon the father of the family who, accompanied by his sons, appears with the ax on the threshold of his dwelling.”
When things go bump in the night, it is the role of the man to crawl out of bed, equipped with a flashlight and armed with a shotgun, a baseball bat, an ax, or some such, and go investigate.
When criminals brandish their weapons and begin to pillage and rape, it is the role of men to stand between the criminal and the vulnerable of society, women and children.
When war threatens peace, it is the role of the man to pick up a sword or a rifle and march forth to meet the enemy. When the mob is incited to riot, it is the role of the man to stand on his doorstep to ensure his wife and children and home are kept safe.
These dual responsibilities — provider and protector — have been maligned and ignored, smeared as “toxic masculinity,” as a form of misogyny, as some kind of “inequality.”
But the simple fact is that it is necessary that men fulfill these responsibilities, or else civilization will collapse.
The young men at Chapel Hill recognized this reality. Inspired by patriotism and a love of the good and the beautiful, they did not hesitate to protect their flag.
As lawlessness and animosity embed their roots ever deeper into secular American society, it is increasingly, urgently crucial that men reclaim their responsibilities as providers and protectors.
If order is to be restored to society, it must be at the hands of men, as providers and protectors.
These dual responsibilities — provider and protector — find their perfect union in the person of Christ. Through His earthly ministry, of course, Christ fulfilled the role of provider, feeding starving souls.
But in His passion and death, He united the roles of provider and protector. Through His suffering, by the sweat (and blood) of His brow, Christ provided us with forgiveness of our sins and entrance into eternal life.
He gave His life to protect us from death, the wages of sin (Romans 6:23), so that we might have eternal life. The blood of Christ is the ultimate image of both provider and protector.
If civilization is to continue, if America is to be kept from the precipice of social collapse, men must look to Christ as their inspiration.
Another World War I veteran, the author J.R.R. Tolkien, once wrote to his son of the inspiration which Christ should be for all men: “There you will find romance, glory, honor, fidelity, and the true way of all your loves on earth, and more than that: Death. By the divine paradox, that which ends life, and demands the surrender of all, and yet by the taste — or foretaste — of which alone can what you seek in your earthly relationships (love, faithfulness, joy) be maintained, or take on that complexion of reality, of eternal endurance, which every man’s heart desires.”
In an age of apathy and indifference, of degeneracy and perversion, of sterility and lifelessness, of joylessness and passionlessness, may all men look to Christ and be inspired to romance, glory, honor, fidelity, and, if demanded of them for the sake of virtue, death.
This article appeared originally on The Washington Stand.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post The Battle of Chapel Hill: Men Are America’s Final Bulwark Against Civilizational Decay appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
A Border Patrol agent who was hung out to dry by the Biden administration for months on false charges of whipping illegal immigrants at the southern border has now received a Border Patrol achievement award.
In September 2021, images circulated of Border Patrol agents on horseback trying to round up illegal immigrants from Haiti. The images were initially interpreted by some as showing an agent whipping the illegal immigrants.
The incident was denounced by President Joe Biden, who promised to punish the agents responsible.
However, a subsequent investigation revealed that the horses’ reins were the objects that, at the angle some images were taken, appeared to be whips. Despite that, the agents under investigation were found to have used “unnecessary” force, with one agent found to have maneuvered his horse “unsafely” and used “denigrating and inappropriate language,” according to the New York Post. Biden has never apologized to the agents.
The agent was among the many members of Customs and Border Patrol to receive an award, according to the Post.
The agent’s name has never been released, but the Post said a source it did not name at the Department of Homeland Security confirmed that the agent was among those awarded.
“I find it hilarious and ridiculous that almost three years later, a Border Patrol agent who was accused of being racist and so vilified by this Biden administration now wins an achievement award for his efforts in preventing smuggling, before he gets a public apology,” the Post quoted its DHS source it did not name as saying.
The agent was initially taken off the border and banned from working with illegal immigrants.
Instead, he was assigned to intelligence work to combat human smuggling. His work in that area led to his award, the DHS source said.
He eventually was permitted to return to working along the border and allowed to interact with illegal immigrants, according to the DHS source.
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas was among those vilifying the agents.
However, in a 2022 report, the Heritage Foundation noted that even as agents were being condemned for what they did not do, evidence had emerged that the outcry against them was wrong.
“We got some communications that were sent to Mayorkas right before he went up and gave that really heated speech at the White House,” said Mike Howell, Director of Heritage’s Oversight Project.
Howell said the Heritage Foundation sued to get the documents that told what went on behind the scenes.
“One such communication that we found was an email from his top press staffer, a woman by the name of Marsha Espinosa. She had forwarded to Mayorkas an article. In this article was a comment from the photographer that was there, the one source that was neither border patrol or a Haitian, illegal alien. The photographer said there was no whipping, ‘I saw no whipping,’” Howell said.
“Marsha Espinosa highlighted this part for Secretary Mayorkas, and Mayorkas went up and gave his press conference and did not make use of this information that would’ve cleared the border patrol agents in light of this public outcry and these false accusations being levied at them from media, Democrat congressmen, and even the president of the United States,” he said.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Border Agent Biden Falsely Accused of Whipping Migrants Is Given a Major Award: Report appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
While some say that Americans are more polarized than ever, there are certainly still points that the country is relatively united on.
One such topic is a distrust of our news media.
A poll released Wednesday conducted by the American Press Institute and The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that over half of Americans (53 percent) are extremely or very concerned about news organizations reporting inaccurate information during the election.
Another 30 percent of U.S. adults said it is an issue they are somewhat concerned about.
And as to having actual confidence in the information, the number is even worse.
“Most Americans follow news about presidential (77%) and local and state elections (64%) at least somewhat closely, and more report frequently receiving news about elections from nation (50%) or local (39%) than other sources such as friends or family (21%) or individuals on social media,” the poll reported.
And yet, only 14 percent of respondents “express a great deal of confidence in election-related information they receive from national sources and only 11% say the same about local media,” the poll reported.
Fourteen percent? More Americans admit they believe in astrology.
“Misinformation” was a major talking point during both the 2016 and 2020 elections as each side accused the other of reporting false information.
The biggest was in 2016 when then-presidential candidate Donald Trump was reported to be colluding with Russia, a story that was ultimately shown to be baseless, yet spurred an investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller that dogged much of Trump’s presidency.
This coming election cycle will face unique problems that previous ones have not as artificial intelligence technology has expanded since 2020.
Americans have worries over how AI can be negatively harnessed to spread misinformation as 42 percent say of respondents said they were extremely or very concerned.
Other issues, such as whether news organizations will report unverified information or that news will be biased worried 47 percent and 44 percent, respectively.
It’s hard to blame Americans for their distrust of the established media.
Whether it’s news organizations intentionally ignoring or downplaying the story of Hunter Biden’s laptop or liberal news sources constantly covering for President Joe Biden’s blunders, there’s a whole list of reasons to be skeptical of the establishment media.
But while media is as untrustworthy as ever it’s also as abundant as ever.
It is no longer the 1960s when all that most Americans had to choose from were major networks and newspapers.
Conservative media outlets — like The Western Journal — aren’t hard to find.
Before the election cycle is a perfect time to begin vetting different sources and finding which you trust and which ones don’t care about integrity.
While it’s impossible to find a source of news without a bias, as long as you know what that bias is you avoid falling into an echo chamber.
The news is important but it’s just as important that it is true.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Looking to Unify America? Vast Majority of Americans Distrust News Media on Every Level – Report appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Some Americans are merely disgusted by the idea of lab-grown meats, but many others are actually alarmed at the prospect of eating synthetic foods.
One state is now taking the lead by banning lab-grown meat from even being sold inside its borders.
Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis has signed a bill that actually outlaws the sale of lab-grown meat in Florida making the Sunshine State the first to enact such a law.
DeSantis signed Senate Bill 1084 into law on May 1 during a visit to Wauchula, Florida.
Speaking at the Hardee County Cattleman’s Arena in Wauchula, DeSantis said that Florida stands with agriculture.
“In the State of Florida, we’ve put down the marker very clearly: We stand with agriculture,” DeSantis said, according to WTVT-TV. “We stand with the cattle ranchers. We stand with our farmers. Because we understand it’s important for the backbone of the state, it’s important for the culture, it’s important for our heritage.”
The new law makes several alterations to rules from the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services that now prohibits the manufacture, sale, holding or distribution of “cultivated meat” in Florida.
Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services Commissioner Wilton Simpson also celebrated the signing of SB 1084.
“Florida is making a tremendous step in the right direction by signing first-in-the-nation legislation banning lab-grown meat,” Simpson exclaimed. “Lab-grown meat is a disgraceful attempt to undermine our proud traditions and prosperity and is in direct opposition to authentic agriculture.”
“We must protect our incredible farmers and the integrity of American agriculture. Lab-grown meat is a disgraceful attempt to undermine our proud traditions and prosperity and is in direct opposition to authentic agriculture,” Simpson added, according to KXAN-TV.
One company that sells lab-created meat products said they were “disappointed” at the news and insisted, “We’re not going anywhere.”
“In a state that purportedly prides itself on being a land of freedom and individual liberty, its government is now telling consumers what meat they can or cannot purchase,” Good Meat said in an X post.
“The law is a setback for everyone: Floridians who deserve the right to eat whatever safe and approved meat they want; Florida’s technology sector, innovators and entrepreneurs; and all those working to stop the worst impacts of climate change,” the company added.
Some nutritionists have also sounded the alarm over products developed in labs over claims they lack essential nutrients.
Still, Florida is not the first jurisdiction to reject lab-grown meat products. In Europe, Italy has also turned against the products by banning lab-grown meats as a “health threat.”
Regardless, several large meat producers have begun investing large sums of money into the development of lab-grown food products.
And despite the wide-spread disgust many feel towards the whole idea of synthetic meat, many elites — including Bill Gates — are pushing world leaders to reduce animal-based food production and replace it with artificial products such as lab-grown meats.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post GOP Governor Declares War on Lab-Grown Meat, Signs Law Making Distribution, Sale, Manufacture Illegal appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Joe Biden’s economy is having a serious negative impact all across the country and as prices on everything we need skyrocket, the dream of owning a home is slipping away.
A new study, for instance, finds that it is now cheaper to rent than it is to buy a home in the country’s 50 largest metro areas. And this is putting serious pressure on home builders and sales.
It is more cost effective to rent a place to live than to own a home, Bankrate said in a report it published at the end of April.
While the cost of rent soared over the last few years, the cost of buying and owning a home has not only caught up to that rise in rent but has eclipsed it as mortgage rates have begun rising and low home inventory have created higher prices, the report adds.
The personal finance resources company notes that owning a home now costs nearly 37 percent more than renting.
It was already so bad last year that Americans had to earn a record high annual income to be able to afford a home, as The Western Journal reported in October, but in the last year that problem has worsened.
Despite all this, 78 percent of Americans still feel that owning their own home is an integral part of the American dream, and they would like to be homeowners.
But a large number, 56 percent, also told the company that their income prevents them from fulfilling that dream, while 42 percent said home prices are too high.
Bankrate’s analysis found that in 50 metros, a mortgage for a median-priced home worth just over $400,000 costs $2,703 a month whereas rent only costs $1,979. That is a huge 36.6 percent difference.
Even worse, in 21 of those metro areas, the cost of a monthly mortgage is 50 percent higher than renting.
“Purchasing a home is a long-term commitment. Home price appreciation has slowed considerably and costs have risen dramatically since the days of 3 percent mortgage rates, so it’s going to take more time to break even on a purchase compared to renting.,” said Zillow chief economist Skylar Olsen.
It seems unlikely any of the elites at the World Economic Forum will shed a tear for the destruction of wealth this trend represents. For many families, a home is the largest investment they will make. Additionally, having the realistic potential of owning real property like a home is a cornerstone of a free society. It’s almost certain the WEF will be quite happy that Americans can’t afford the luxuries of investments and property.
That organization recently posted a video containing its “8 predictions for 2030” in which it noted that one of its top goals is to make sure the lowly common man will “own nothing” and will “be happy” about it.
The elites want to tear down the American dream, of course. The lofty ideas of ownership and controlling one’s own destiny is an impediment to their power grabbing and their authoritarian desires to rule over us all.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
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At least 30 sailors and Marines were injured off the Atlantic coast of Jacksonville, Florida, Wednesday when two landing hovercrafts collided.
Landing Craft Air Cushions, or LCACs, from both the multipurpose amphibious assault ship USS Wasp and the transport dock vessel USS New York crashed into each other, according to a Navy announcement.
Sailors assigned to the Wasp Amphibious Ready Group and and Marines assigned to the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit were conducting a training exercise when the incident occurred, according to the report.
The Western Journal reached out to the U.S. Navy for an update on the incident.
Cmdr. Lara Bollinger, a Navy public information officer, said that “[b]oth LCACs involved remained afloat after the incident, and have since returned to their respective ships.”
Bollinger added that the collision “remains under investigation” and noted that the Navy will provide more information when it is available.
She said that all 30 injured personnel received medical care. “Most injuries were considered minor, and those personnel returned to full duty,” she added.
Five of the 30 servicemembers reportedly required advanced medical care and were airlifted to Savannah Memorial University Medical Center in Southern Georgia, with most having been released.
30 U.S. Navy Sailors from the USS Wasp (LHD-1) and USS New York (LPD-21) as well as Marines with the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit were Injured on Wednesday, following an Incident off the Coast of Jacksonville, Florida which involved the Collision of 2 Landing Craft Air Cushions… pic.twitter.com/IttWXbOsI9
— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) May 3, 2024
Bollinger said that “[o]f the five Sailors who were medically evacuated, one remains under medical care at a hospital in Savannah, Georgia. The others were treated and released to return to duty.”
“Our primary focus is on our Sailor’s health and well-being,” she added.
The vessels are currently at sea as part of the Wasp Amphibious Ready Group / Marine Expeditionary Unit 24 composite training unit exercise.
The Landing Craft, Air Cushion (LCAC) is a high-speed, over-the-beach, amphibious landing hovercraft that is built to carry a payload of up to 75 tons, according to a Navy website.
They are used to transport the weapons systems, equipment, cargo and personnel from ship to shore and across the beach.
LCAC can carry even heavy equipment such as M-1 tanks at high speeds, which provides significant benefits, the Navy site reported.
“Air cushion technology allows this vehicle to reach more than 70 percent of the world’s coastline, while only about 15 percent of that coastline is accessible by conventional landing craft.”
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
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For $90,000 a year, parents of some elite school students expected more than hate.
A report in The Wall Street Journal says some parents are calling for tuition refunds and rethinking future enrollments.
“They are not getting the education they expected and paid for,” Zev Gewurz, a Boston real-estate lawyer whose daughter is a senior at New York City’s Barnard College. Barnard was founded as a women’s college adjacent to Columbia University. The cost of attendance at Barnard tops $90,000
Gewurz said Barnard gave an “inadequate response” to hate speech.
“I try to tell her that this is not her fault, and that she is living in a moment in history and needs to keep her head high,” he told the Journal.
Debra Lynn Eden, whose daughter is a junior at Princeton, complained, “It’s all a giant distraction to the students who are trying to complete their studies in a high-stress environment.”
Christopher Rim, founder and CEO of Command Education, which helps students complete applications, said parents of Columbia and University of California – Los Angeles students are calling for refunds.
“Physically blocking their child from attending class or a lecture hall is 100 percent not what they signed up for,” he said. “They are beyond upset at what’s going on.”
“I’ve had so many parents emailing, calling, asking me what they can do,” Rim told the London Times.
“There’s been protests, encampments and physical violence that has interrupted their education and they’re not happy. Fees at these sorts of schools are phenomenally high; parents want to feel like they are getting what they pay for and right now they don’t,” he said.
The lack of a commencement also galls parents.
Lana Shami’s daughter will graduate from the University of Southern California without a ceremony due to protests.
“There will be no celebration at the university where we paid an exorbitant amount of tuition for the past four years. It’s a huge letdown,” Shami said.
“This is not the experience that my freshman daughter should be having, that any of the students of any year should be having,” Amy Gallatin, whose daughter attends Barnard, said, according to Fox News.
Gallatin said her daughter took a final exam Tuesday as protests were raging.
“My daughter is also frustrated [and] understandably so,” she said. “She had a final exam yesterday at 6 o’clock that she was taking from her dorm only to have the protesters on the street banging and clanging and chanting.”
Hearing chants interpreted as seeking the death of Jews was “a very unsettling experience,” Gallatin said, and “walking through all of those people is a scary thing.”
CNN reported that one Jewish high school senior, whose name was not used, ditched Barnard due to the protests.
The student chose Brandeis University in Massachusetts, in part due to its A rating from an Anti-Defamation League list of colleges that ranked their support for Jewish students.
“Barnard was my top choice. I was so dead set on going,” the student said. “But after seeing what is happening on campuses, I feel so glad I am going to Brandeis. I feel really happy and safe knowing they got an A.”
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
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A top Biden administration Justice Department official was not truthful during her Senate confirmation process in 2021 when she said she had never been arrested for an alleged violent crime.
Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division Kristen Clarke has served in her position since May 2021.
However, according to news reports, she had an arrest record that was not disclosed when she was narrowly confirmed by the Senate, which led to calls for her resignation.
Clarke’s past became an issue earlier this week when The Daily Signal reported Tuesday she had previously been arrested and accused of slicing her former husband’s finger to the bone with a knife.
The Signal unearthed a text message exchange involving Clark’s former husband, who was candid about the incident.
“I was seeing another woman,” Reginald Avery texted in a May 2021 exchange with Tom Jones of the American Accountability Foundation, which shared it in a post on social media platform X. (Warning: The text exchange contains language that some may find offensive.)
“She was angry,” Avery added of the 2006 incident at their Maryland home that led to his then-wife’s arrest, the Signal reported. “Attacked me with a knife. I instinctively grabbed it. As I said earlier, I’m not blameless.”
“That’s the story,” he concluded. “That’s what happened. She went to jail.”
After reading the reporting, Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah was among scores of people who called on Clarke to resign for not disclosing the arrest.
Kristen Clarke is in charge of enforcing civil rights laws.
She enforces those laws aggressively against anyone who sneezes near an abortion clinic.
And not at all against those who vandalize churches.
She lied under oath during her confirmation proceedings, and should resign. https://t.co/5tHpaG4a2W
— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) May 1, 2024
She lied under oath to mask her arrest for committing a violent crime, yet she zealously prosecutes peaceful pro-life protesters.
— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) May 1, 2024
Clarke acknowledged Wednesday that she was not truthful about being arrested during her marriage and said she had been a victim of domestic violence.
“Nearly 2 decades ago, I was subjected to years-long abuse and domestic violence at the hands of my ex-husband,” Clarke said in a statement to CNN.
Clarke added:
“This was a terrorizing and traumatizing period that I have sought to put behind me to promote my personal health, healing and well-being. The physical and emotional scars, the emotional abuse and exploitation, and the lying are things that no woman or mother should ever have to endure.”
Clark concluded that because of an expungement of her record, she did not feel it was necessary to reveal the incident when she was up for a top job at the DOJ.
“When given the option to speak about such traumatic incidents in my life, I have chosen not to,” she said. “I didn’t believe during my confirmation process and I don’t believe now that I was obligated to share a fully expunged matter from my past.”
When Clarke was nominated for her current role, she filled out a questionnaire from Lee in which she was asked numerous questions about her past.
One question read, “Since becoming a legal adult, have you ever been arrested for or accused of committing a violent crime against any person?”
On the form, which is available on the Senate Judiciary Committee website, Clarke answered, “No.”
Clarke celebrated in a DOJ statement in January when six pro-life activists were convicted of felonies when they peacefully blockaded the entrance to a Tennesse abortion clinic while singing hymns.
“These defendants are being held accountable for unlawfully obstructing access to reproductive health services,” Clarke said in a statement when it was announced the defendants would each face up to a decade behind bars.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Top Biden DOJ Official in Hot Water After Failing to Disclose Past Arrest During Senate Confirmation appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Prosecutors from Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office on Thursday urged Judge Juan Merchan to slap former President Donald Trump with four contempt charges for comments Trump made about his trial on charges of falsifying business records.
Under a gag order issued by Merchan, Trump is barred from talking about the witnesses and jurors in the trial. Merchan fined Trump $9,000 earlier this week for violations of the order and mused about whether jail would need to be the answer to stop the violations.
On Thursday, a hearing took place concerning four other comments for which the prosecution wants Trump punished, according to CBS.
Two of the comments concerned Michael Cohen, who was Trump’s lawyer at the time of the 2016 payments to porn star Stormy Daniels and will be a witness. One comment concerned former National Enquirer publisher David Pecker, who testified last week. The fourth comment prosecutors cited was a remark about the jurors.
Prosecutor Christopher Conroy said Trump violated the order in commenting that Pecker was “very nice.”
“The defendant knows what he’s doing. He talks about the witness, says nice things, does it in front of cameras,” Conroy said. “The [question] he answered was about the witness who was testifying. It was deliberate and it was calculated.”
Attorney Todd Blanche, who was representing Trump, said the remark was a “very fair and neutral answer” to a question.
“When you have President Trump saying something completely neutral about the witness, that’s not a violation,” Blanche said. Merchan said he was “not terribly concerned” about the comment.
Blanche said Cohen has been “inviting and almost daring President Trump to respond to everything he has been saying” through “personal attacks, mocking him for being on trial and comments about his candidacy.
“This is not a man that needs protection from the gag order,” Blanche said.
Blanche also responded to a comment from Trump that the jury was “95% Democrats.”
The dig “absolutely, positively” did not violate the order because no single juror was cited, Blanche argued.
Merchan did not issue an order on Thursday.
As he left court, Trump vented his frustration with the trial.
“We’re seeing all of the crime that’s going on outside, and to be sitting in this courtroom is just ridiculous. It is election interference at the highest level that’s never been done before in our country. And I shouldn’t be campaigning right now,” Trump said, according to Fox News.
“He has me under an unconstitutional gag order. Nobody’s ever had that before. And we don’t like it, and it’s not fair. Other people are allowed to do whatever they want to us, and I’m not allowed as … the Republican Party nominee, and the one who’s leading Biden by a lot, I’m not allowed to talk,” Trump said,
“There’s never been an abuse like this before, this conflicted judge should get out of this case, he should not be having this case. He gives us nothing. It’s such a rigged court. So I’m not allowed to testify. Because of an unconstitutional gag order. We’re appealing the gag order,” Trump said, according to NBC.
Earlier, Trump shared his anger on Truth Social.
WE CANNOT LET THIS RADICAL LEFT, CORRUPT AND HIGHLY CONFLICTED NEW YORK DEMOCRAT JUDGE INTERFERE WITH THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION OF 2024 — THE MOST IMPORTANT ELECTION IN THE HISTORY OF OUR COUNTRY. THE USA IS TRULY A NATION IN DECLINE! REMOVE THE UNCONSTITUTIONAL GAG ORDER,” Trump posted.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
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ABC News senior meteorologist Rob Marciano has been fired by the network, more than a year after he was banned from reporting inside the “Good Morning America” studio.
The ban came after Marciano allegedly made his colleagues on the set feel uncomfortable — leaving him to report from outside of the show’s New York City headquarters.
Dylan Byers of Puck News reported on Tuesday afternoon that Marciano had been axed by the network.
“Multiple staffers had made complaints about Marciano’s behavior over the years and he was at least temporarily barred from main GMA set in NYC,” Byers wrote.
SCOOP @PuckNews: Rob Marciano, the ABC News & Good Morning America meteorologist, has been fired from the network, per sources familiar. Multiple staffers had made complaints about Marciano’s behavior over the years and he was at least temporarily barred from main GMA set in NYC.
— Dylan Byers (@DylanByers) April 30, 2024
ABC News did not issue a public comment on the firing of the veteran weatherman. There were rumblings previously that Marciano displayed a temper that led to his ban from the “GMA” studio, according to Page Six.
He still worked inside the studio during weather reports for “World News Tonight” and last appeared on the network this past weekend.
Page Six reported in March that Marciano’s ban came as he was going through a divorce from his wife.
“He was found to have done something,” a person described as an ABC News insider told the outlet.
The person did not disclose what Marciano was alleged to have done, other than to call it “improper.”
“…[But] he was punished for it, and they still haven’t let him return,” the person said.
Another person close to the production of the show claimed Marciano was working through anger management issues when an incident with a female colleague escalated.
“There were times when [Marciano] was very cranky and angry,” the person claimed.
“He made people feel uncomfortable,” the source added. “There was a period where there were some issues, a number of alarming events.”
Marciano was reportedly supposed to serve out a short ban from the studio, but “GMA” executive producer Simone Swink reportedly declined to have him back.
The EP of the show reportedly likes a distraction-free environment.
Marciano confirmed to People magazine in July 2022 that he and his wife Eryn were divorcing after marrying in 2010.
“The last couple of years have been very difficult,” he said in a statement to the outlet. “I didn’t want this and tried to save the marriage, but we are sadly divorcing. My focus now is on my kids.”
Marciano joined ABC News in 2010.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post ABC Fires Veteran Meteorologist Who Had Been Banned from Studio appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
We’ve all heard the tales of marital woe caused by a “third wheel.” An old flame. A nosy in-law. A so-called “work spouse.” God forbid, an affair with another person.
One anonymous writer for an Australian feminist outlet has declared that an unusual “third wheel” has entered her nuptials, however. He’s bald, entertaining, half a world away and beloved by millions. Yet, he’s “ruining my marriage,” the anonymous author said.
She speaks, of course, about Joe Rogan.
In a month that produced plenty of evidence that those on the left refuse to even tolerate those not on the same page as them, much less take their arguments seriously — a theme that was played out violently on campuses across America over the war in Israel, especially at Columbia University — one of the wackier manifestations of this phenomenon came from Down Under.
On April 8, an anonymous writer published a screed on MamaMia, an online feminist outlet that describes itself as a center of “independent women’s journalism.”
This includes hard-hitting articles like “Influencers are bringing back ‘Day on a Plate.’ And it’s more toxic than ever,” in which YouTubers and TikTokkers are slammed for sharing their healthy meal plans, with the author arguing they come in under the recommended calorie intake for a day.
Also, “Calling someone your ‘girlfriend’ is officially cancelled.” It’s a thinkpiece about how Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift, among other celebrities, refer to each other if they’re dating but not married. Spoiler alert: It’s “juvenile” to use those words, and “the structure of our relationships has changed significantly over time, but our vocabulary hasn’t sufficiently extended to be inclusive of these new unions.”
This is funny enough in its own peculiarly sad way, but the cake-taker is the anonymous spouse who declared, last month, “Joe Rogan is ruining my marriage.”
The scribe began with Princess Diana of Wales’ quote, during an interview, that, “There were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded.” She was referring, of course, to the then-title-free Camilla Parker-Bowles — now Queen Camilla — who then-Prince Charles was having an affair with.
Our anonymous agonized spouse said she identifies with Princess Diana, “though the ‘third’ in my marriage is an annoying male American voice who has somehow managed to insert himself into my relationship.
“Joe Rogan, often touted as the world’s most popular podcast host, can be heard in our kitchen, bathroom, or backyard on loud speaker morning, noon and night,” she wrote. “And like the uninvited guest he is (by me anyway) he’s causing tension in my home.”
Yes, reality is now officially making satire obsolete. The Babylon Bee has nothing on this.
Now, the author admitted that both her husband and her differ politically, but had “settled into a companionable acceptance” of these differences.
“Very loosely I am more liberal and he is more conservative. There were arguments (usually around national elections) but it didn’t really interfere with our relationship,” she said.
“But since Rogan has appeared on the scene I feel like my husband’s taken a trip to right-wing-crazy-town. He’s developed a deep distrust of science and government. He stopped taking the COVID boosters early on and is skeptical about vaccinations generally. He once tried to explain to me why aliens probably built the pyramids,” she claimed in the article.
“And while I do believe in taking a critical approach to life, relentless conspiracy theories are exhausting and can leave you feeling like you’ve landed in la la land.”
The woman then brought up things she said Rogan has posited that are false, including furries demanding kitty litter in school bathrooms. However, how she would know this is beyond me, because this is what she admits in the very next paragraph:
“My husband will argue that I can’t criticize Rogan because I don’t listen to him, which is true. But what I can do is observe his influence on my husband, and this is what I see.” [Emphasis ours.]
Oh! Rogan is apparently on in her house day and night, so much so that his voice is inescapable … but she hasn’t listened to him? She just knows because now her husband is talking about things like wokeness gone amok, and we can’t have that.
According to her, the husband has gotten some wacky ideas via the “third wheel,” noting, “It appears that for Rogan and those who follow him, the political is personal. My husband will often get angry about what he calls ‘woke’ activists and how ‘they’ are going too far. When he says the word ‘feminist’ he reduces it to a dirty word.” [Emphasis again ours.]
In this paragraph, we can see exactly why Rogan irritates so many on the left, and it’s not because he gives marching orders to brainless, spineless men whose political views would otherwise be moldable by — thank ye heavens! — sensible women like our author, but who are now being warped by some podcaster.
Note the bolded phrase: “The personal is political.” It has a history, so much so that the Encyclopedia Britannica — among many other sources — has an entry on it. Spoiler alert: It didn’t originate with the right, but with radical feminists instead.
“The personal is political, political slogan expressing a common belief among feminists that the personal experiences of women are rooted in their political situation and gender inequality,” the Encyclopedia Britannica noted.
“Although the origin of the phrase ‘the personal is political’ is uncertain, it became popular following the publication in 1970 of an essay of the same name by American feminist Carol Hanisch, who argued that many personal experiences (particularly those of women) can be traced to one’s location within a system of power relationships.”
There’s no particular need for feminists to spout this phrase anymore, at least for themselves. In this arena of the culture war, they have assumed they’ve attained victory. “Toxic masculinity” and “gender roles” are phrases tossed around by liberals with the same contempt that this woman’s husband allegedly uses when he talks about “wokeness” and “feminism.” “Believe all women” isn’t just a phrase that sprouted from the #MeToo movement, it’s now become an inviolable cultural maxim in the West and similar cultures.
When men wake up and realize this is all rubbish forced upon them by a leftist monoculture, it’s blamed on that goshdarned “toxic masculinity” — in this case, embodied in the personage of Joe Rogan, a podcaster who is apparently ruining marriages.
“I know my husband is not a bigot. If a child asked him to use a certain pronoun, he absolutely would without a fuss. He has empathy. What has this harlot Rogan done to my kind, loving husband?” the writer asked.
It’s truly amazing that this woman — apparently more than willing to vocalize her opinions to her husband — is suddenly repulsed when he gets some of his own. But he couldn’t have come up with this himself, right? Blame the dude with the show on Spotify … which, admittedly, she’s never really listened to.
Before the author hit send on this, she surely must have read it again to see if she had cogently expressed her arguments. So lacking in self-awareness is this woman, apparently, that, at no point during this rereading, did it occur to her that she was telling one side of a problematic relationship, and a telling one at that.
To this writer’s husband, I imagine there’s a “third wheel,” too: the cudgel of political correctness she wields whenever he criticizes “wokeness.” Heaven forfend he ever doesn’t use the pronoun the hypothetical child asked him to, or then he’d really get a whack with it — probably in divorce court, from the sound of things.
Joe Rogan is not the one who made the political personal in this dysfunctional relationship. Instead, it’s the fact that this woman has apparently blindly swallowed whatever pap that was fed to her by progressive feminists who have succeeded in making their personal grievances political and react with unmerciful venom whenever their status quo is challenged.
This would all be quite silly — if there weren’t enough people who probably nodded along with this witless, self-deluded woman, and not given her condemnation of the “third wheel” in her marriage the mockery it so clearly deserved.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Writer on Feminist Website Says Her Marriage Is Being ‘Ruined’ by ‘Third Wheel’: Joe Rogan appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Ahmad Massoud, a prominent figure in the anti-Taliban resistance movement, the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan, and son of the revered Afghan leader Ahmad Shah Massoud, delivered a stark message to the United States: Terrorism is on the rise, and America could experience a series of attacks at any moment as it’s a prime target of radical extremists.
Massoud delivered the dire warning, which has been echoed by others who are familiar with the Middle East for several years, in an exclusive interview with the U.K.’s Daily Mail.
“An attack on U.S. or European soil is very much possible now. It is not about a matter of if, it’s a matter of when,” Massoud told the Daily Mail.
His late father, heralded as the “Lion of Panjshir,” was assassinated by Al Qaeda just two days before 9/11.
Taking up the mantle of his late father, Massoud has become well known for his relentless efforts to combat radical Islam and Taliban’s resurgence in Afghanistan.
In his memoir “In the Name of My Father,” which was released Tuesday, Massoud reportedly emphasized that the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan in August 2021 created a dangerous vacuum.
This vacuum, he warned, is now being exploited by extremist elements, increasing the likelihood of terrorist attacks not only in America, but also in Europe.
In fact, Massoud suggested Biden’s withdrawal was the final nail in the coffin.
The United States Armed Forces concluded their departure from Afghanistan on August 30, 2021, ending a two-decade-long conflict that cost American taxpayers over $2 trillion.
This withdrawal followed the February 2020 agreement between the Trump administration and the Taliban in Doha, Qatar, which imposed combat restrictions on both the U.S. and the Taliban and secured the withdrawal of all NATO forces from Afghanistan in exchange for the Taliban’s pledges to counter terrorism.
Significantly, the deal set the stage for the collapse of the Afghan National Security Forces.
This was precipitated further by the Biden administration’s decision in April 2021 to withdraw all U.S. troops from Afghanistan by September 2021 without maintaining any residual force, thereby weakening the ANSF’s capabilities against the ongoing Taliban insurgency.
This series of events culminated in the Taliban’s swift capture of Kabul on August 15, 2021.
In his memoir, Massoud chronicled his lifelong struggle for freedom in Afghanistan and issued a solemn warning to world leaders: Ignore the plight of Afghanistan at your own peril.
Massoud is not the only one to sound the alarm about America’s national security pitfalls.
Recent pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel protests on college campuses across the United States have resurfaced a prophetic warning from United Arab Emirates Foreign Minister Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan from 2017.
“There will come a day that we will see far more radical extremists and terrorists coming out of Europe because of lack of decision making, trying to be politically correct, or assuming that they know the Middle East, and they know Islam, and they know the others,” bin Zayed said. “And I’m sorry, but that’s pure ignorance.”
I told you so https://t.co/Vqg3B8WOdO
— عبدالله بن زايد (@ABZayed) April 28, 2024
Meanwhile, Massoud called on President Biden to reassess U.S. policy towards Afghanistan and cautioned him that the failure to do so could have dire consequences for the United States’ regional and global security.
“The political situation is helping the Taliban massively,” Massoud told the Daily Mail, “from Ukraine to the war on Gaza and, and many other things happening around the globe.”
He added, “It helps the fatigue (from the West) when they are busy elsewhere. There is a numbness in the West. They are forgetting about what’s happening in Afghanistan.”
Yet, despite facing formidable odds, Massoud remains undeterred in his quest to resist the Taliban’s rule and restore peace to his nation.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Red Alert: Anti-Taliban Leader Flips Script on Biden – Issues Chilling Warning appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
What do conservative Americans see in viewing the protests on college campuses currently? As one of them, I see the look of ignorance and failure.
I also see the real possibility that, one day soon, one of these protests will result in lives lost. You can’t view the escalation of intensity without smelling the scent of growing violence in the air.
Nor can you watch the following video shared on X by N.D. Wilson, whose son and his friend held the door against an angry mob made up of pro-Hamas students, and not fear for the safety of the two young men. The two locked arms to help protect Jewish students who were trying to protect Hamilton Hall. Wilson stated, “Proud of my son for holding the door as long as he did, and of his friend whom the mob peeled off. Infuriated at #NYPD and @Columbia campus security who ignored his calls about vandalism and assault.”
Proud of my son for holding the door as long as he did, and of his friend whom the mob peeled off. Infuriated at #NYPD and @Columbia campus security who ignored his calls about vandalism and assault. https://t.co/fFbfASTG0f
— N.D. Wilson (@ndwilsonmutters) April 30, 2024
That boy is also the grandson of Pastor Doug Wilson, who leads Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho. If you recall, Pastor Wilson recently appeared on “The Tucker Carlson Encounter” to discuss the attack on Christianity by the left. The example he has set obviously translated well to his grandson.
N.D. Wilson shared further about the his son’s and his friends’ moxy, “Another part of my son’s evening, trying to stop a psycho building takeover. Protestors got onto campus by climbing through dorm windows and then set their sights on taking over this building. My son and his friend are students. Most of the mob did not appear to be.”
WARNING: The following video contains vulgar language some readers may find offensive.
Another part of my son’s evening, trying to stop a psycho building takeover. Protestors got onto campus by climbing through dorm windows and then set their sights on taking over this building. My son and his friend are students. Most of the mob did not appear to be. https://t.co/dTCgvQkxRk
— N.D. Wilson (@ndwilsonmutters) April 30, 2024
What is striking in the video but hardly surprising is the lack of how long these boys had to endure being at the center of this threatening situation. Columbia University is allowing these protests to continue, and when the house comes crashing down, they will be responsible as a party to these non-peaceful protests.
Neither boy should have had to navigate this moment without the help of staff or authorities. As of today, Columbia continues to pacify these pro-Hamas students, unlike many others who have cleared the encampments that have called for the annihilation of Israel.
According to NBC News, the students are going to great lengths to intimidate and destroy. It is insanity, for their ignorance is fanning the flame that seems to have nothing to do with the situation of origin and everything to do with mob mentality.
As Biden encouraged Hamas to agree to his latest ceasefire proposal offered up Monday, he couldn’t send a weaker message to pro-Hamas advocates across college campuses. According to USA Today, the U.S. worked with Egypt and Qatar to broker that deal between Israel and Hamas. And although it would “reportedly involve a six-week cease-fire in exchange for the release of 40 militant-held hostages and hundreds of Palestinian prisoners,” it would also establish precedent to negotiate with terrorists.
That is like lighting a match underneath these pro-Hamas protesters to do whatever they want to get their way. That could very well be the impetus to getting several Jewish students, or any other students standing in the way like this Wilson boy, killed.
Just as the anti-Israel mob was enraged that someone was standing in their way at Columbia University, so is Hamas with Gaza, Israel, and the Jewish people. A temporary ceasefire, if agreed to, will only allow Hamas to regroup and hit back harder while guards are down.
Plus, as former President Trump said, per the Washington Times, “The terrorist organization cannot be trusted to return hostages, who he said are likely dead.” It doesn’t matter how generous the deal is Biden places in front of them. That actually just makes everything worse.
A note needs to be taken from Pastor Wilson’s grandson and his friend. Both weren’t only extremely brave, but they demonstrated what should be done when terrorists descend. Stand tall and don’t waiver in what is right. He obviously is well-versed in history, with a stellar example in Jesus Christ.
Look how quickly the protests at University of Texas-Austin came and went. The leadership of the state translated all the way onto that campus — just as it did at the University of Florida. Before you knew it, it was over. That is how it is done. It isn’t being generous. It is being quick, decisive, and resolute.
The ignorance and failure running around on these campuses reflects that which is coming from the top. And the act of appeasing Hamas will result in many more getting killed, including students. It’s coming.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Watch: Famous Pastor’s Grandson Stares Down Columbia Mob, Refuses to Let Them Continue Their Mission of Destruction appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Former soccer star Megan Rapinoe appears to not have learned her lesson whatsoever, advocating for transgender athletes to compete in women’s sporting events even though she lost to a team of teenage boys a few years ago.
On Tuesday, Rapinoe signed a letter along with numerous other athletes that called for the NCAA to ensure men claiming to be women would be able to compete against women.
“We, the undersigned, call upon the NCAA, a governing body meant to serve athletes and our wellbeing, to ensure that the lifesaving power of sport is accessible to all athletes who compete in championship and emerging sports at and for NCAA-member institutions – including transgender athletes,” the letter’s opening paragraph reads.
It goes on to say banning men from women’s sports would “severely [limit] the capacity of your member institutions to protect and support their athletes.”
The letter largely relies on emotional appeal while making broad, bogus claims such as that “studies used to justify the exclusion of transgender athletes are methodologically flawed and misinterpreted to further discrimination.”
“We call on you to be on the right side of history and affirm that sport is truly for us all. Do not ban transgender women from NCAA women’s sports,” the letter concludes.
Taking part in such an act is nothing new for Rapinoe, a lesbian LGBT activist who has generated headlines with her left-wing political posturing.
In March, she called out Christian U.S. soccer player Korbin Albert for sharing social media posts that said homosexuality and “feeling transgender” were immoral.
But as always, while Rapinoe and her fellow leftists wish to create a world where everyone is equal and nothing is set in stone, the reality is far from that.
In 2017, while she was still on the U.S. Women’s National Team, they faced the FC Dallas under-15 boys team to prepare for a friendly match against Russia, as CBS Sports reported at the time.
They lost.
While it was far from a shutout, losing 5-2 to a team of boys who can’t even drive a car yet shows just how big of a difference sex plays in physical ability.
Imagine the score if these boys were men. That’s a reality that could come about as more and more male athletes claiming to be women are allowed into women’s sports.
It will only ruin the ability of women to compete.
It’s shameful that as Rapinoe leaves the sport, she advocates for changes that will make it harder for other women to succeed.
As swimmer and women’s sports activist Riley Gaines wrote on X, “Megan Rapinoe, in typical virtue-signaling fashion, is pulling up the ladder behind her.”
“No one would know who Megan Rapinoe is [if] it weren’t for women’s sports lol,” she said.
Megan Rapinoe, in typical virtue-signaling fashion, is pulling up the ladder behind her.
No one would know who Megan Rapinoe is it weren’t for women’s sports lol https://t.co/SuNsTENbwr
— Riley Gaines (@Riley_Gaines_) April 25, 2024
Perhaps more women in sports — and the organizations that govern them — should reject Rapinoe and her woke nonsense.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Megan Rapinoe Demands Trans Athletes Be Allowed to Compete Against Women – Remember When Her Team Faced Teenage Boys? appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
As a neophyte graduate student in history in the late 1990s, I once asked a veteran professor how he managed to focus on grad school during the campus protests of the Vietnam Era. “Easy,” he replied. “You went to the library.”
In other words, the protesters might take themselves seriously, but that does not oblige you to do the same. Without wishing them harm, in fact, you might even quietly chuckle when they receive what looks like a mild comeuppance.
At Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, on Thursday, a Georgia state trooper took down a protester with a linebacker-style form tackle that drew high praise on social media.
A 13-second clip posted to social media platform X showed the tackle once, and then again in slower motion.
Photojournalist Billy Heath III of Fox 5 Atlanta called it “one of the first takedowns of many” on the day.
PROTESTER TACKLED BY TROOPER: Video captured at the Pro-Palestine protest at Emory in Atlanta shows the moment a protester is tackled by a Georgia State Patrol trooper. This was one of the first takedowns of many, several protesters were arrested today on the campus. @FOX5Atlanta pic.twitter.com/N96Ny9yqSr
— Billy Heath III (@BillyHeathFOX5) April 25, 2024
Some X users joked that the trooper must have had a background in organized football.
Definitely played HS football, lol!
— Arithia (@Arithia3) April 26, 2024
Wow , he must have played for Alabama
— Tom (@Syloustr) April 26, 2024
That brief clip, of course, provided no context. The trooper might have had a good reason for tackling the protester. Or, the trooper might have tackled the wrong person. Anything is possible, which makes speculation pointless in this particular instance.
In a broader sense, however, the trooper and his fellow officers had plenty of good reasons for being on campus.
Thanks to a video report from Fox 5’s Eric Perry, we do have some much-needed context for the tackle.
“It was something never seen on the campus of Emory University Thursday as pro-Palestinian protesters and those against the Atlanta training facility went head-to-head with law enforcement,” Perry’s report began.
Thus, the protesters at Emory also included antifa miscreants from Atlanta’s “Stop Cop City” movement.
For further context, Michael Doudna of WSB-TV posted a video of a “peaceful” antifa protest outside Emory’s theology school.
As they crowded around law enforcement officers, pushing them against the building, the protesters maintained a chant that equated the Atlanta Police Department (APD) and the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) with the Ku Klux Klan (KKK).
“A-P-D, K-K-K, I-D-F, they’re all the same!” the protesters chanted again and again.
Protestors here at Emory are pushing in on officers near the theology school. Things are starting to escalate here. pic.twitter.com/olCbWIntZg
— Michael Doudna (@MichaelDoudna) April 26, 2024
Perry’s report also showed Emory faculty and staff being led away in handcuffs after cosplaying as activists.
According to representatives of the university, the protest did not originate with members of the Emory community. Thus, university officials called on both Atlanta Police and Georgia State Patrol to help quell the disturbances.
All of this, of course, followed a pattern of ugly recent incidents at campus protests across the country.
In other words, one need not know the identity of the tackling trooper, or the tackled protester, or the reason for the specific tackle, to understand the broader context.
Violent and narcissistic leftist protesters have caused no end of trouble. But police, if given the chance, can handle them.
In the meantime, no one has an obligation to take those narcissists as seriously as they take themselves.
As for university students who must navigate the campus chaos, take a cue from my former professor. Ignore the protesters. Go to the library.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Watch: Georgia State Trooper Puts NFL Pros to Shame with Ruthless Tackle on Anti-Israel Protester appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Joe Biden alone has already caused the price of everyday staples to soar, but there are other pressures also forcing an increased burden to fall on all Americans.
Thanks to those external pressures, this month, yet another staple food item has soared to prices that won’t come down any time soon.
Coffee is absolutely essential for millions, and many Americans claim they can’t get their day in gear if they don’t have a jolting cup of Joe, and they don’t mean Biden.
But there will soon be more financial pain going forward with your morning cup. Get ready to see your coffee prices given a jolt as supply problems, hoarding, and contract defaults are tearing through the coffee producing industry worldwide causing prices to soar. This is only adding to the skyrocketing costs of breakfast, which is at its highest point since 1979 as it is. And experts say those higher prices won’t go away any time soon, if ever.
The cost of robusta coffee beans soared more than 30 percent early in April and 50 percent now as a heat wave has settled in over Vietnam in one of the world’s top coffee growing regions, according to Bloomberg.
The price jump for robusta has also put pressure on arabica coffee, causing arabica futures to rise more than 3 percent, surpassing the $2-per pound mark for the first time since December, the outlet added.
“Weather conditions are not encouraging,” representatives of London-based importer DRWakefield said this week. “There are still concerns over a possible water shortage for irrigation, which may hurt the output of the next season.”
About 40 percent of the world’s coffee supply is made up of robusta beans whereas the arabica bean is the source of around 60 percent, according to Nespresso.
Analysts also say that some of the rise in prices of these two beans is due to buyers letting their stocks dwindle over past price hikes, but who are now panic buying for fear that crops will dry up on them.
In a more recent follow-up report, Bloomberg added that analysts and sellers are saying they have no idea if the prices will come down.
“We can’t tell when prices will peak,” said Tran Thi Lan Anh, deputy director of Vietnamese export company Vinh Hiep Co.
“We don’t have water for our farms,” said Vietnamese coffee bean farmer Nguyen The Hue. “If the drought persists, we won’t have lots of new beans to sell in the new season.”
The pressure is in full swing. Already, farmers and producers have reneged on coffee contracts as growers have been unable to fulfill contracts for upwards to 200,000 tons of beans, or about 13 percent of the expected harvest.
These failures will soon cause prices of coffee to skyrocket for consumers, Bloomberg warns.
Add this pressure to the rising prices already seen in most other food staples and it all adds up to a huge burden on Americans.
The price of eggs have been fluctuating wildly, for instance, after millions of laying hens had to be destroyed due to infections with the deadly bird flu. Millions of chickens have had to be destroyed this year thanks to the disease.
Bird flu is a growing threat to the American food supply outside of the poultry industry, too.
Farmers and ranchers are also worried because the bird flu has jumped to cattle and dairy herds, threatening dairy and meat producers.
H5N1 bird flu found at 4 more dairy farms, including 2 in Michigan, 1 in Texas and 1 in New Mexico, taking the total to 28 pic.twitter.com/SfzHQMIkYS
— BNO News (@BNOFeed) April 12, 2024
These pressures, along with the grueling effects of Bidenflation and Bidenomics, are causing Americans to put more of their income to just daily survival than they have had to for decades.
And it’s only going to get worse, especially if Biden is reelected in November.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Another Grocery Staple Surging to Record High – The Days of Cheap Breakfasts Are Gone appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
The leftist legislators in California have done it again, making things more difficult for the very low-income people they claimed to be helping, this time with a law that is throwing thousands of minimum wage earners out of their jobs.
As Ronald Reagan used to say, the scariest words in the English language are “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help,” and California has once again proven that quip to be a hardbound truth.
Economics has always been a concept that liberals cannot understand. Deep-blue California’s recent passing of Assembly Bill 1228, forcing certain — but not all — fast-food restaurants to wildly raise their minimum wage by up to $4 an hour all at once, is having the unintended consequence of costing people their jobs, not enriching their lives.
As CNBC noted, the state has more than 500,000 fast-food workers, but now many of them are under threat of losing their jobs.
This month, the left coast state’s new $20-per-hour minimum wage took effect on the fast-food industry. Business owners have responded by putting in more electronic ordering devices and firing costly human employees.
The new wage hike comes on the tail of the disastrous COVID shutdowns that devastated the restaurant industry, causing profit margins to plummet. Just as restaurants in California were starting to regain their footing, the left-wing legislature weighed them down with this new wage law.
The warning by Burger King franchise owner Harsh Ghai is on target: Ghai said that the costly new wage law has forced him to put in place a plan to add electronic ordering kiosks at his 140 locations within two months, Business Insider reported.
Ghai even pointed out that prices for customers at fast-food places have gone up between eight and 10 percent in the past year, when prices usually only go up by about three percent a year. And this new wage law will make that problem worse.
“The majority of that is going to get absorbed in the inflation of our food costs,” he said of the higher costs the state is imposing on restaurants. “So we’re not even compensating for most of the labor costs that we’re going to be experiencing with this legislation.”
Ghai added that the higher prices — already in effect before the higher staffing costs began hitting business owners — are driving customers away. So, instead of raising prices further, the easiest way is to cut the number of employees.
The businessman added that he has revisited plans to roll out electronic, self-ordering kiosks over a 10-year period across his 140 locations and will now add them in a matter of months.
“[W]e are just going ahead and installing the kiosks in every single restaurant in response to the legislation to be able to balance some of these labor costs that are hitting us,” he said.
“We can’t move fast enough on this,” Ghai told Business Insider.
“We’ve done the financial analysis and it makes more sense for us to spend the capital expenditure on the technology, and obviously when you’re buying large amounts of the hardware, you obviously get it for a cheaper price as well,” he added.
“So it’s making more sense for us to just roll that across the business in its entirety,” he said.
Other restaurant chains have responded by firing hundreds of employees. A large number of pizza chains in California immediately fired their delivery drivers earlier this year after the law passed, including Pizza Hut and Southern California Pizza Co. stores in the state.
Many restaurants have even simply closed down rather than face barely scraping, by thanks to the higher costs imposed on them.
Still other restaurants are looking at plans to try locations that have no dining area and no cashiers at all. Chick-fil-A, for instance, is testing its “grab and go” locations where customers order exclusively online or via an app and pick up their order at a drive-through at a location with no cashiers and no eat-in area.
California’s left-wing legislature is causing every fast-food customer to dish out more for their food. But it is also costing tens of thousands of people their jobs. The legislature’s actions are having the exact opposite effect of what they intended.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Liberal Utopia: New California Law Could Terminate Up to 500,000 Jobs appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
There’s no question LeBron James is the biggest name in NBA play today.
He’s regularly compared with Chicago Bulls legend Michael Jordan as one of the greatest of all time. His basketball career has made him a billionaire.
But after the Los Angeles Lakers’ playoff loss in Denver on Monday night, he showed he’s one of the biggest crybabies in the league, too.
In his postgame news conference, as ESPN reported, James griped about a foul call that was overturned during the game and implicitly questioned the integrity of the officials in charge of reviewing calls on the court.
“I don’t understand what’s going on in the replay center, to be honest,” he said.
“What the f*** do we have a replay center if it’s gonna go … It doesn’t make sense to me,” the NBA star said.
According to ESPN, James added, “It’s f***ing stupid,” as he got up and left the room.
WARNING: The following video contains (edited) language that might offend some viewers — especially viewers who expect adult men to act and speak like adult men even when their team loses a ball game.
“I don’t understand what’s going on in the replay center, to be honest… It makes no sense to me… Then I just saw what happened with the Sixers/Knicks game too, what are we doing?” – LeBron James pic.twitter.com/7OWLmuf8jn
— Spectrum SportsNet (@SpectrumSN) April 23, 2024
James has made news for public complaints about officiating before, but his behavior after the Nuggets’ Jamal Murray dropped a thrilling, buzzer-beating bucket to seal Denver’s win Monday bordered on bizarre.
He not only complained during his postgame news conference, but he also pursued a referee immediately after the game, arrogantly demanding an explanation for why he didn’t get a call when he thought he was fouled earlier in the game.
“Why didn’t you call that s***?” James said, according to the LegendZ account on X.
Check that out here:
See “WARNING” above.
LEAKED Video Of LeBron James Chasing A Ref After No Call:
“Why didn’t you call that sh*t? It was right in front of you” pic.twitter.com/zMCLVRRRGm
— LegendZ (@legendz_nba) April 23, 2024
It’s a moot question at this point whether James was correct in either of his complaints. Anyone who has played sports or watched them only casually understands that bad calls are as much a part of a game as great athletes. Referees are human — just like coaches, fans and even billionaire hulking giants who cry wolf about “racism” while raking in money from Chinese slavery.
Mistakes happen. Adults understand that, even if they get frustrated by it.
But adults also understand that a game needs to be won over all obstacles — and adults like James, who is pushing 40 after spending two decades playing professionally, are paid ridiculous sums of money to not only understand it but to overcome it.
Instead, James, a lightning rod for criticism under the best of circumstances, violated one of the cardinal rules of sports and sportsmanship that many children learn from their first coaches — “Don’t blame the refs.”
It was particularly egregious in James’ case on Monday since, as ESPN reported, his team at one point had a 20-point lead in the contest. An NBA playoff team that squanders a 20-point lead doesn’t deserve to win. It doesn’t deserve so much as a tie.
And the star of that team has no business blaming a loss on a call or two from officials on the floor — indulging in a vulgar temper tantrum that only tarnished his image and embarrassed the game.
No matter how big his name is.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post LeBron James Chases Down Ref After Crushing Playoff Loss, Has Vulgar Tantrum During Press Conference appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Skin color, which vies with sexuality for distinction as the most tedious subject in America, has once again made headlines.
Stephen Jackson, who won the 2002-03 NBA championship with the San Antonio Spurs and who happens to be black, illustrated the modern mind’s toxic obsession with race when he denigrated black journalist Gayle King, co-host of “CBS Mornings,” for using the first-person plural pronoun “we” when referring to fans who rooted for the Iowa Hawkeyes women’s basketball team and superstar guard Caitlin Clark, who happens to be white.
“I don’t consider her black media,” Jackson said of King in a short video posted to Instagram on Saturday.
The former NBA champion cited the veteran journalist’s conduct during an interview with South Carolina Gamecocks head coach Dawn Staley, who also happens to be black.
On April 7, the Gamecocks completed an undefeated season with an 87-75 win over Iowa in the NCAA championship game.
Clark, who helped elevate the popularity of women’s basketball, finished her career as the NCAA Division I all-time scoring leader. On April 15, the Indiana Fever selected Clark with the 1st overall pick in the WNBA draft.
Jackson who played 17 NBA seasons with eight different teams, had nothing negative to say about Clark.
He did, however, betray the ugly tribalism at the root of “race” consciousness when he criticized King for not behaving as he thought a black journalist should behave.
Race, of course, has no meaning outside of human tribalism. As a biological factor, skin color matters as much as eye color or hair color — that is to say, not at all.
Nor is this a new argument. In fact, lawyers for the plaintiff made this same anti-segregation argument — in vain, as it turned out — during the infamous 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson case before the U.S. Supreme Court.
But this does not satisfy people who cling to tribalism and will not let it go.
“Y’all give her all these passes because she f*** with — she’s Oprah[‘s] friend. I don’t give a f*** whose friend she is. That don’t do nothing for nobody,” Jackson said of King.
In her interview with Staley, King said, “We were all cheering for Iowa, of course, and Caitlin Clark,” according to the New York Post.
Jackson took issue with a statement so offensive to tribalists.
“But you cannot demean Dawn Staley like that. You talkin’ to her about winning the championship, about going undefeated. And you have the nerve to get on there and say, ‘Well, we was rootin’ for Caitlin Clark, and you broke everybody hearts,'” Jackson said on Instagram.
He assumed that King, because of her darker complexion, should speak for others with a dark complexion.
“Who is ‘we’? Who is ‘we’? All the black people I know was rootin’ for Dawn Staley,” Jackson said.
Again, the former NBA champion did not attack Clark personally. But he did take issue with King celebrating Clark at what he regarded as Staley’s expense.
“We all fans of Caitlin Clark. But the way you put it? That s*** was trash,” he said.
“You just demeaned [Staley] and made it about Caitlin Clark. That’s trash — super-trash,” he later added.
Readers may view Jackson’s full comments in the video below.
WARNING: The following video contains vulgar language some readers may find offensive.
King, of course, did nothing wrong.
Nor did Staley, whose undefeated South Carolina team deserves all the accolades it gets.
Nor did Clark, whose playing style and scoring prowess attracted many thousands of new fans.
Only Jackson, who cannot let go of the shopworn tribalism we call “race,” came out of this looking boorish.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Watch: NBA Champ Goes on Race Rant, Says Journalist Isn’t ‘Black Media’ After Praising Caitlin Clark appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
As the Biden administration accelerates their strategy of promoting abortion as their go-to issue ahead of the November elections, a new poll confirmed the results of numerous previous polls, showing that a supermajority of American voters oppose abortion after the third month of pregnancy — a view that is not in line with the Democratic Party’s public position of unrestricted abortion.
On Wednesday, Rasmussen Reports released the results of a poll revealing that 66 percent of American voters are opposed to late-term abortions beyond 12 weeks. These latest numbers are largely similar to polling results from the last 20 years, which show anywhere from 55 to 71 percent of Americans opposing second trimester abortions and 70 to 86 percent opposing third trimester abortions.
Notably, Democratic lawmakers in recent years have consistently refused to say if they would place any limits on abortion, even up to the moment of birth.
The current Democratic Party platform makes no reference to placing any limits on the procedure, going so far as to say that the party would work to overturn any and all pro-life protections enacted by duly elected state lawmakers, as well as any federal protections: “Democrats oppose and will fight to overturn federal and state laws that create barriers to reproductive health and rights.”
The platform goes on to state that Democrats would force taxpayers to pay for abortions by “repeal[ing] the Hyde Amendment,” a position that is opposed by 60 percent of Americans.
The platform further declares that Democrats will sweep away all state pro-life protections by “codify[ing] the right to reproductive freedom” in federal law, which the party has already attempted to do with the “Women’s Health Protection Act.”
Despite the Democratic Party’s unwillingness to show any moderation on abortion, Republicans in recent months have struggled to find their footing on how to message on the issue and have often not taken advantage of the contrast between public opinion on late-term abortion and the Democratic position.
Former Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel has urged GOPers to point out the Democrats’ extremism in recent months. “We are the pro-life, pro-woman, pro-family party, and we can win on abortion,” she said. “But that means putting Democrats on the defense and forcing them to own their own extreme positions.”
National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Sen. Steve Daines voiced similar sentiments, pushing candidates to “not run away from the issue.”
In comments to The Washington Stand, Director of Family Research Council Action Matt Carpenter contended that the Democratic Party is engaging in a money-centric strategy to overcome the discrepancy between their abortion extremism and public opinion.
“Across the nation, pro-abortion groups are pushing for ballot measures which would amend state constitutions to allow abortion through all stages of pregnancy, on the taxpayer dime,” he observed. “Liberal dark money groups are pouring campaign cash into these efforts, and Democrat political operatives are licking their chops at the thought of a super-charged pro-abortion turnout at the polls. Forgetting for a moment that poll after poll shows voters are concerned mostly about the cost-of-living crisis, rising crime, and the daily invasion at the southern border, the reality is voters are not supportive of second and third trimester abortions.”
Nonetheless, Carpenter went on to acknowledge that pro-life Republicans face challenges in educating voters on abortion ahead of November.
“While the pro-abortion side relies on a phalanx of pundits repeating their euphemisms, the pro-life movement has their work cut out for them to educate voters as to the extreme nature of these measures, which would prevent states from protecting unborn children from abortion in the second and third trimesters,” Carpenter said.
Mary Szoch, director of the Center for Human Dignity at Family Research Council, also acknowledged the challenges in the current political climate but encouraged GOP candidates to be unafraid of making plain the Democratic Party’s position on abortion.
“The tragedy of only 66 percent of voters opposing late-term abortion points to the prevalence of the culture of death,” Szoch told The Washington Stand. “It demonstrates that our culture has become one that values people based on what they can do or accomplish as opposed to the fact that each person is a son or daughter of God. We have a lot of work to do building a culture of life.”
Szoch concluded, “That said — 66 percent of voters is a majority of Americans who agree that killing an unborn child after viability is a grave evil. Political candidates should recognize that speaking the truth about the Democratic Party’s views on life — their desire for abortion through (and even infanticide after) birth — is out of step with the American people.”
This article appeared originally on The Washington Stand.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Poll: Supermajority of American Voters Oppose Abortion Past 12 Weeks appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
The International Monetary Fund last week ripped the Biden administration’s out of control spending, calling it “out of line with what is needed for long-term fiscal stability.”
According to the New York Post, the IMF, an international organization aimed at fighting financial crises across the globe, warned that ever-growing national debt in the U.S. poses a long-term risk to the global economy.
“Something will have to give,” the IMF cautioned in foreword of the World Economic Forecast published on Tuesday.
“The exceptional recent performance of the United States is certainly impressive and a major driver of global growth,” the IMF said. “But it reflects strong demand factors as well, including a fiscal stance that is out of line with long-term fiscal sustainability.”
Unfortunately, the Biden administration has shown no intention of slowing down its spending.
Last month, the administration proposed a massive, $7.3 trillion budget for fiscal year 2025, the New York Post reported.
The Office of Management and Budget reported that the national debt would surge to $45.1 trillion by 2034 under the budget plan, according to the Post.
The IMF’s warning comes as the U.S. national debt is approaching $35 trillion, with the total rising by about $1 trillion every 100 days.
The cost the national debt is imposing on a yearly basis has also risen, as the U.S.’s debt interest payments topped $1 trillion in October, according to Business Insider.
What’s more, U.S. debt-to-GDP ratio, which measures debt as a proportion of GDP, is climbing to concerning heights. According to a report by the World Population Review, the U.S. has the ninth-highest debt-to-GDP ratio in the world at 129 percent. According to the site, a debt-to-GDP ratio of 77 percent or lower encourages domestic economic growth.
In classic Biden fashion, the White House is blaming the problem on former President Donald Trump.
“The Trump tax cuts added $2 trillion to the debt with unpaid giveaways skewed to the wealthy and big corporations, and now Congressional Republicans are proposing another $5.5 trillion in tax cuts skewed to the rich, while raising taxes on millions of middle-class families,” White House spokesman Michael Kikukawa told the Post.
And Biden’s solution to the problem? More taxes.
Biden’s budget plan proposed includes hiking the corporate tax rate to 28 percent, while raising the minimum corporate tax rate from 15 percent to 21 percent, according to the Post.
He also proposed a minimum 25 percent tax on billionaires, “defined as those with a net worth of $100 million or greater,” according to the Post.
This comes as Biden is trying to force through $7.4 billion in student-loan debt cancellation.
Biden is attempting to use a different legal justification than the cancellation plan he tried to push forward last year, which was struck down by the Supreme Court as an overstep of his authority under Article II of the Constitution.
The new round of student debt cancellation is estimated to cost taxpayers $84 billion over the next 10 years.
Biden’s actions have done anything but put the U.S. on a trajectory for economic prosperity. As the IMF noted, while we have experienced growth, the careless spending will serve to deter the nation’s long-term future.
And Americans agree that the economic situation is dire. Only 28 percent of Americans currently view our economic conditions as excellent or good, according to a Pew poll from January. Meanwhile, prices continue to rise, with inflation being 3.5 percent from March 2023 to March 2024, a higher rate than was anticipated.
What the Biden administration needs to do is decrease its spending and pull money out the economy, so that inflation can be curtailed.
But instead of decreasing government spending, Biden is hell-bent on making American taxpayers bear the burden of his progressive policies.
Inevitably, raising wealth and corporate taxes will be detrimental to growth. Increasing tax rates will cause corporations to invest elsewhere and strike a blow to the American economy.
In this instance, the government needs to do less, not more. We need to decrease government spending, not increase it.
And while his comments were aimed for a different time, Ronald Reagan’s assessment of the issues plaguing the U.S. in his 1981 inaugural address are the same issues we face today. “In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”
And, as the IMF put it, something will have to give.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post ‘Something Will Have to Give’: IMF Issues Dire Warning to Biden Administration appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Riding high after a wave of Clark-mania that accompanied the NCAA women’s basketball tournament, Caitlin Clark has signed a megabucks shoe contract with Nike.
The eight-year deal will be worth up to $28 million, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing sources it did not name. The Journal summed it up as the “most lucrative and attractive shoe deal in women’s basketball—and yet another record for her collection.”
The endorsement deal dwarfs the controversial contract Clark signed with the WNBA team the Indiana Fever, which will pay her over $330,000 over four years.
Nike had Clark under contract in a deal that expired at the end of the season, but as she was climbing the pinnacle of achievement in an unrivaled spotlight, in the shadows there was some hard bargaining taking place.
The Journal report said that on Feb. 15, after Clark poured in 49 points, her agents were raising the stakes with Nike, Adidas, Under Armour and Puma.
Country star Tim McGraw dons Caitlin Clark’s Indiana Fever jersey at concert in Indianapolis https://t.co/eIullFWi3p
— Fox News (@FoxNews) April 21, 2024
Their proposal: Nothing under $3 million a year.
“Some of the brand reps were shocked by the number. It was a huge sum for a women’s basketball player, few of whom ever receive deals worth more than six figures,” the Journal reported.
Amid the bargaining, some shoe company executives were conditioning deals on Clark staying in college another year on the grounds that as a college phenomenon, she was more attractive to consumers than as a professional, the Journal reported.
Clark is set to graduate May 14, according to CNN. However, she has an extra year of college ball eligibility under an NCAA COVID exemptions, according to The Sporting News.
But Clark changed the conversation as she soared to new levels of achievement – and ratings.
“She played herself into a position where it wasn’t even contingent on staying in college,” a source told the Journal. “People just wanted her.”
Not Puma. It dropped out.
Adidas had its turn.
“While some athletes let their agents ask the questions or wade through details, this was one more area where Clark, an honors student in marketing at Iowa’s business school, liked to have the ball in her hands. Adidas executives were surprised by how engaged, curious and well-prepared she was on the call,” the Journal wrote.
The offer clanged on the rim: $6 million for four years.
Under Armour offered $16 million over four years along with a signature shoe. Close, but not enough.
Nike started with $3.5 million per year. The deal would last through the next three Olympic Games. But it took one more piece — a signature shoe – to close the deal, the Journal reported.
Diana Taurisi, the WNBA’s all-time leading scorer, said all the hype has been fun, but it is in the past.
The Women’s NBA season begins next month, and Clark is expected to see playing time right off the bat, according to USA Today, but the game she’ll be playing could be much different from her college competitions.
“You look superhuman playing against some 18-year-olds, but you’re going to come play with some grown women that have been playing professional basketball for a long time,” Taurasi told sports columnist Jay Mariotti for a Substack post.
“There’s a period of grace that you have to give rookies when they get to the league. We’ve had some of the greats to ever play basketball, and it takes two or three years to get used to a different game (against) the best players in the world. As long as everyone has expectations that are realistic, they should be fine,” she said.
But WNBA analyst Rebecca Lobo said judging Clark by anyone else’s norms sells her short.
“There’s no comparison that I can find on the women’s side, and I’ve been in this league since the very beginning,” she said.
“We haven’t seen a player drive ticket sales like this. We haven’t seen a player drive ratings like this. Look at the ratings, the last four or five games she played. I’ve never seen anything to this degree, and to me, what’s special is that she’s staying in the Midwest and going to Indiana. It’s such a perfect fit,” she said.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Caitlin Clark Lands Historic Nike Shoe Deal Worth Millions Just Before Her Rookie Season Kicks Off appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
New York City’s storefronts aren’t as alluring as they once were. The brutal statistics coming out are bad (but wholly predictable) news.
As of 2024, 11.2 percent of the city’s storefronts are sitting vacant. This is up from 6 percent in 2019. That doesn’t seem like a huge number, but that 5.2 percentage point increase translates to an 86% percent increase from 2019 to 2024. That is a massive jump.
Manhattan Councilmember and Democrat Gale Brewer said these vacancies, “are creating havoc because there is homeless, garbage and the business next door hurts.”
What’s the cause of this trend? During a New York City Council Committee on Small Business meeting on Wednesday, Calvin Brown, deputy commissioner for neighborhood development, stated the problem was due to “archaic zoning barriers.”
New York Mayor Eric Adams has advocated for changing current zoning regulations. Adams’ initiative, the “City of Yes” aims to do just that.
According to the New York City Planning Department website, “City of Yes for Economic Opportunity would remove outdated limitations on businesses and ensure that local retail streets and commercial centers across the city can remain lively places that sustain our neighborhoods.”
But are zoning restrictions really the problem that’s led to so many vacancies?
The New York Post reports shoplifting cost retailers in the state $4.4 billion in 2022. Thefts have gone up 64 percent between June 2019 and June 2023. City retail thefts are up more than 6.5 percent as of April 2024 compared to April 2023.
New York City Councilmember for Queens and Republican Vickie Paladino put it frankly. “We’ve got kids coming in on bicycles and just ransacking a store.” She continued, saying, “We can’t sugarcoat the fact that there’s rampant crime in the city that is preventing people from opening small businesses in areas that used to be nice places to go to.”
Bronx Councilmember Oswald Feliz, chair of the Committee on Small Business and a Democrat mentioned how close to home the issue was for him. “There’s a Walgreens one minute away from where I live that’s closing down due to retail theft.” Going further he stated, “Anytime I speak to a small business that is literally the very first issue they bring to us.”
Paladino mentioned theft has gotten so bad that even mundane items are locked away. “I went in to buy a tube of toothpaste. It, of course, was locked up as everything is now. But the store manager is keeping one tube of toothpaste behind the lock. It’s insanity.”
The proposed antidote to vacancies isn’t exactly stellar. Brewer is in favor of taxing landlords, suggesting owners of large retail buildings leave their properties vacant until chain stores move in.
To summarize, vacancies, whether they be because of zoning regulations or rampant theft are on the rise.
These vacancies create problems with homelessness and garbage piling up, and according to Brewer the solution is a tax?
Without the government addressing homelessness, garbage, and crime, landlords won’t be able to lease to chain stores or anyone else for that matter.
Don’t forget New York’s current tax system is among the worst. The Tax Foundation’s 2024 State Business Tax Climate Index found that New York ranked 49th out of 50 in 2024 for how well its tax system is structured.
None of this had to happen. New York City didn’t have to shut down peoples businesses, storefronts, and lives because of COVID. New York City didn’t have to go soft on crime and bail. New York City didn’t even have to tax its richest citizens into fleeing the city which in turn helped reduce the city’s coffers. But New York City voters elected a government that did just that. And now they’re enjoying the fruits of their collective electoral labor.
New Yorkers have played a stupid game, and as the old saying goes, “play stupid games, win stupid prizes.” And what prizes could be stupider than crime-ridden neighborhoods, locked up toothpaste, and piles of garbage?
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Blue-State Paradise: Vacant NYC Storefronts ‘Creating Havoc,’ Nearly Double Since Pandemic appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Like reading a news story about a person getting scurvy, hearing about a modern metropolis getting beset by rat-borne illnesses almost seems like getting thrown back in time to the Dark Ages.
But, no, this time it was not a problem afflicting an impoverished medieval village, but rather one of the largest cities in the entire developed world: New York City.
While the city has been allocating resources toward prosecuting former President Donald Trump for the crime of winning the 2016 election, it has descended further and further into a state of squalor.
As reported Wednesday by CBS News, not only have rats in New York become ubiquitous in the worst way possible, but levels of rat-related sicknesses have reached their highest annual rate last year.
The New York City Health Department has been warning the populace of the increasing cases of a disease spread by contact with rat urine.
According to the department, leptospirosis is caused by bacteria in infected animals’ urine. It usually causes flu-like symptoms (aches, chills, stomach trouble) but, if left untreated, can cause kidney failure, liver failure or meningitis.
CBS News reported that Mayor Eric Adams and city health officials have been working on methods of containing the disease and the disgusting rats, including sterilizing the animals (since rat poison has been outlawed) and encouraging citizens to use gloves when handling garbage or food waste.
Still, seeing as a single rat pair could breed 15,000 descendants in one year and the city’s garbage containment plan is expected to take at least two-and-a-half years, suffice to say New Yorkers’ rat-related woes are far from over.
The reason this trashcan is so important is because diseases linked to RAT URINE (leptospirosis) are spreading in the filth that was once a great American city. There aren’t enough trashcans in the world to solve the problems that sanctuary cities have brought to America. https://t.co/qQyOD5JXBi
— Amy (Doc) CHAI, MD 4Congress CT-3 (@docchai2022) April 19, 2024
If only funds to help deal with this issue were not allocated somewhere else.
Such as the civil fraud case and criminal “hush money” prosecution against Trump.
According to NewsNation, the latter trial, which got underway this week, could cost New York City up to $2 million, with $50,000 spent on security measures alone (assuming the trial lasts a minimum of six weeks).
A six-week trial in Donald Trump’s hush money case could cost New York City as much as $2 million, one legal analyst estimates. The city could spend about $50,000 per day on safety precautions.
More: https://t.co/z3jBIoyaCd #MorningInAmerica pic.twitter.com/FkkwnpUL8l
— NewsNation (@NewsNation) April 16, 2024
Taking a former president to court requires security, road closures and many other disruptions, not to mention the mountains of cash required to maintain those precautions.
While this legal circus has gone on much longer than necessary, average New Yorkers have been living with a pest problem straight out of the Dark Ages.
City and state Democratic leaders instead have prioritized a political witch hunt against the Republican Party’s presumptive presidential nominee.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post While NYC Dumps Resources Into ‘Getting’ Trump, Rat-Borne Disease Explodes Amid Squalid City Conditions appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
More often than not, surveys tend to quantify what impressions have already conveyed. And when it comes to quantifying faith, those impressions might suggest few apparent reasons to hope for good news.
Nonetheless, a new “State of the Bible 2024” survey by the American Bible Society did reveal at least one piece of hopeful news: Amid an otherwise depressing set of revelations, 15 percent of respondents reported an increase in their personal Bible use from 2023 to 2024.
The Jerusalem Post called this a “resilient, albeit small, group of individuals deepening their engagement with scripture.”
Small and resilient, yes, but 15 percent represents a strong minority within a larger-yet-dwindling minority of adults who reported any meaningful Bible engagement at all.
For instance, the “State of the Bible USA 2024” survey revealed that, apart from church services, only 38 percent of American adults “engage with the Bible” as often as three or four times per year outside of church. That number marked a slight decrease from 40 percent in 2023.
Worse yet, as recently as 2011, 50 percent of respondents reported that same frequency of Bible engagement.
The most obvious explanation for that decline lies in generational priorities. As Americans born during the first half of the 20th century have passed away, their beliefs have died with them.
And if the loss of the World War II generation did not already fill us with melancholy, then the realization that Gen-Z values have begun to replace those older beliefs might make us despondent.
Indeed, the survey rated only 11 percent of Gen-Z adults as “Scripture Engaged,” based on a new Spiritual Vitality Gauge that uses nine important questions to assess respondents’ spiritual health.
Furthermore, as measured by the Scripture Vitality Gauge, the number of Americans categorized as spiritually “Ailing” rose from 21 percent to 28 percent since last year.
The decline in Bible engagement also has regional dimensions with partly historical explanations.
For instance, of all the survey’s Bible-engaged respondents, nearly twice as many hailed from the American South as from the Northeast or Midwest.
That makes sense in light of the Protestant influence in Southern history. By contrast, Northern cities in the 19th century experienced multiple waves of mass immigration from predominantly Catholic countries or regions, such as Ireland, Italy and Eastern Europe.
Catholicism, of course, offers its own kind of spiritual vitality. Historically, however, it has not encouraged believers to engage with the Bible in the same way that Protestantism has.
In light of all this, what should we make of Americans’ spiritual health in 2024?
To begin, we might borrow a phrase from prominent Canadian psychologist and political conservative Jordan Peterson.
In a 2022 appearance on “The Joe Rogan Experience” podcast, Peterson beautifully described Christ’s Passion and Resurrection.
“You look far enough into the abyss, you see the light,” Peterson said.
Readers may view a clip of those comments in the YouTube video below. Peterson began talking about the gospels around the 6:25 mark and continued for more than three minutes.
Seeing the light after staring into the abyss seems an apt description of one possible reaction to the spiritual-health survey.
Yes, things look bad, especially for Gen-Z.
On the other hand, in addition to the 15 percent who reported increased Bible engagement, another 53 percent said they wished they could read the Bible more often than they did.
That result would appear to confirm another impression derived from the recent experience of simply living in the world.
In short, as Gen Z’s woke values win cultural ascendancy, exasperated Americans know they can find an antidote in Biblical truth.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Hope: Polling Shows 1 Bright Spot for Christianity in America appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
In the years after the Nazis took power in 1933, they instituted hundreds of laws and policies at the national, state and local levels to systematically remove Jews from German society. Bans were placed on Jews working as doctors and lawyers and in other professions, and quotas were set, limiting Jews in schools and universities.
By 1935 Nazi-institutionalized anti-Semitism had stripped Jews of their German citizenship and barred them from municipal hospitals, legal practice, the military and even World War I memorials, effectively excommunicating them from civic life and laying the groundwork for the Nazis’ future escalation to even more severe anti-Semitic persecution, according to the Holocaust Memorial Museum.
It’s tempting to look back at the dark days of 1930s Germany under the Nazis as a distant chapter in history when ignorance and racism fueled by hateful rhetoric were allowed to contaminate an entire society and national leadership. We want to believe that could never happen again in modern times.
But a video shared by Campaign Against Antisemitism from a pro-Palestinian march in London reveals a scene that could have been right out of the 1930s.
In the video taken during the protest in central London, an officer can be seen blocking the path of Gideon Falter, a Jewish man wearing a kippah, a religious head covering, asking him to stay in place while the protesters march, according to the BBC.
“You are quite openly Jewish. This is a pro-Palestinian march. I am not accusing you of anything, but I am worried about the reaction to your presence.”
Enough is enough. It is time for a major change.
On Saturday 27th April — the next anti-Israel march — we are asking you,… pic.twitter.com/lfJr7UZnif
— Campaign Against Antisemitism (@antisemitism) April 18, 2024
Falter, who is the chief executive of Campaign Against Antisemitism said he was simply walking around London after synagogue, according to the BBC.
“I don’t want to stay here, I want to leave,” Falter replied, after being blocked by the officer.
“In that case sir, when the crowd is gone, I will happily escort you out,” the officer responded.
When Falter tried to move past the police officer, the officer blocked his path, preventing him from leaving.
“I don’t want anybody antagonizing anybody …” the officer said as Falter protested, saying, “I just want to walk across …”
“At the moment sir, you are quite openly Jewish,” the officer responded. “This is a pro-Palestinian march. I am not accusing you of anything, but I am worried about the reaction to your presence,” the officer said.
Later in the video, another police officer attempted to defuse the situation, explaining to Falter that they were just trying to protect him.
“Do you have any idea what it’s like being a Jew in London at the moment?” Falter asked the officer.
Falter went on to explain that every Saturday, as protest routes change unpredictably through neighborhoods, being visibly Jewish means having to cross and face down “huge groups of people” in an “intimidating” atmosphere.
He said they were told repeatedly that Jews were safe in the city, “and yet,” he said, “here I find myself in this bubble. This guy has just been shouting at me and shoving me because I want to cross the road.”
Later in the video, another police officer can be seen telling Falter, “There’s a unit of people here now. You will be escorted out of this area so you can go about your business, go where you want freely, or if you choose to remain here, because you are causing a breach of peace, with all these other people, you will be arrested.”
“If I remain here, you will arrest me?” Falter asks incredulously.
“Your presence here is antagonizing a large group of people that we can’t deal with all of them if they attack you … because your presence is antagonizing them,” the officer responds.
The video also shows some people shouting “Scum” at the Jewish man. Another protester shouted “Nazi,” while yet another brazenly confronted him in front of officers, telling him, “I’m watching your movement … that’s right. We’re all going to watch your movements and record you. The police ain’t gonna help you in this scenario.”
“After months of being gaslit by the [Metropolitan Police], it’s not safe for Jews to be walking in the presence of these protests. And was there anything so crazy about what we were trying to do? Just walking around our home city on a Saturday?” Falter said in the accompanying video narrative.
“‘Is this something that we are willing to accept? That now the police have to keep Jews away? We mustn’t accept it,” he said.
“It has been six months now,” Falter said in the accompanying narrative, “six months, where every single weekend, we have to witness the streets of London awash with people, many of whom seem to have no problem at all declaring their full-throated support for Hamas, waving around anti-Semitic placards, calling for jihad, showing swastikas, waving anti-Semitic flags. It’s enough. Enough,” he said.
The police have since apologized for the officer’s choice of words, stating, “Being Jewish is not a provocation. Jewish Londoners must be able to feel safe in this city,” according to the BBC, but the incident is a clear example of a growing sentiment.
We are watching an eerie flashback of the 1930s playing right before our eyes.
And the U.S. is not far behind.
Chants of “From the river to the sea” have been heard on almost every city street and college campus, even in New York — a city that holds the largest population of Jewish people outside of Israel.
Domestic Terrorism: Today in NYC
Outside of Wall St. Today – An organized Pro HAMAS Rally takes off In New York City
– Protesters called for the Death of America and The Death Of Israe while a Nationwide protest shut down traffic, highways and bridges across the US.
This… pic.twitter.com/oxUwkNFLJO
— Asher Press (@AsherPress) April 16, 2024
The 1930s did not begin with gas chambers and concentration camps, but with the pervasive mindset that one’s religious identity alone is a provocation worthy of exclusion from society.
It doesn’t feel like we have learned anything from that dark time in history.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Watch: UK Police Threaten to Arrest an ‘Openly Jewish Man’ for Walking Near Palestinian Protest appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
One day after Senate Democrats squashed the House Republican effort to remove Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas from office, GOP Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky held Mayorkas’ feet to the fire during a Senate hearing, making him squirm in his seat.
On Wednesday, Democratic senators shut down the impeachment proceedings initiated last week by the Republican-controlled House over Mayorkas’ handling of immigration and border security.
On Thursday, during a Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing, Paul masterfully laid bare the utter disregard for the law Mayorkas has shown in his time as homeland security secretary in a systematic and deliberate line of questioning without accusing or raising his voice.
The senator first asked Mayorkas what the criteria for paroling someone from detention was.
Mayorkas replied that the parole process, according to the law, involved “individualized determinations with respect to significant public benefit or an urgent humanitarian reason.”
“So for what reason was the alleged killer of Laken Riley, Jose Ibarra, paroled and allowed to come into this country?” Paul shot back.
Paul was, of course, referring to the high-profile case of a Georgia college student who was allegedly killed by an illegal immigrant.
Mayorkas refused to answer based on the fact the case is currently being prosecuted.
“You’re refusing to give any specifics about Jose Ibarra?” the senator said. “Well, I have the documentation, and the document says that the parole, the subject, the person accused of killing Laken Riley, was paroled due to detention capacity — it was full.
“So is detention capacity statutorily allowed to be used as a reasoning for parole?”
Mayorkas acknowledged that people were paroled because of a lack of beds for those encountered at the border, causing Paul to quickly retort, “You might have more beds if they remained in Mexico.”
The senator noted that the Biden administration had reversed “92 executive orders of the Trump administration which allowed them to apparently have people remain in Mexico, allowed them to have, you know, probably 90 percent less parolees than you have.”
“When you come to us and say, ‘Oh gosh, if we only had more legislation, we could do it,’ why don’t you bring back the executive orders of Donald Trump that seemed to be working? You immediately got rid of them for political purposes. The border is a disaster. Why don’t you bring back the 92 executive orders that you reversed?” he demanded.
The fiery exchange escalated as Paul listed other recent crimes allegedly perpetrated by illegal immigrants, including the killings of a Washington state trooper and a Michigan woman.
“I think a lot of people in America are going to be appalled, you know, that you refuse to answer the questions,” he said.
When asked about Ibarra’s unlawful entry, Mayorkas deflected again, saying that criminal perpetrators “need to be held accountable for their crimes.”
“Well, that’s not much consolation if you wait until after he’s murdered somebody,” Paul retorted.
The senator then went on to explain to Mayorkas the major flaws in how the Department of Homeland Security screens and processes migrants who are paroled into the United States — the most crucial of which is that DHS relies heavily on the “honor system,” i.e., just taking migrants at their word for their name and background information.
Paul pointed out that when migrants arrive at the border and claim to be from a country such as Venezuela, DHS has no real way to verify that is their true identity or country of origin because “most domestic crimes in Venezuela probably are not in any kind of international database.”
“So if you waltz into the country through your generous parole programs and say, ‘I’m John Smith from Venezuela,’ you have no way of ascertaining that,” he said. “You still let them go. So you say, ‘Well we’re going to make sure that they’re not a violent criminal.’ You have no way.”
What’s even worse, Paul pointed out that when DHS does collect biometric data such as fingerprints from paroled migrants, since their identities were not properly vetted initially, the agency is essentially just issuing them a new official identity in the United States.
“You look in some databases, maybe they’re not in the database, but you have no way of even knowing that that’s their name. Then you give them biometrics … you give them fingerprints, now they have a new name and fingerprints, they essentially have been given a new identity by your agency,” he said.
Today, I confronted Mayorkas over the damage inflicted upon America and the families who have tragically lost loved ones due to the abject failure of the Biden administration’s border policies. https://t.co/q2ejsC69NV
— Rand Paul (@RandPaul) April 18, 2024
Hearing the senator speak, I had the feeling that if a person from another country, completely unaware of our laws, saw the process, he or she would be convinced that the DHS was hoping for an attack on American soil.
To pretend to “vet” people by taking their word for who they are after they have just broken your laws by entering your country illegally is already ludicrous.
But then Mayorkas’ department takes it a step further by collecting fingerprints without first properly vetting migrants’ stated identities, effectively issuing them new official identities in the U.S. based on unverified information.
As Paul bluntly put it, the agency is just “giving a new identity” to these migrants.
It’s no wonder 90 percent of migrants are now turning themselves in to U.S. authorities instead of trying to escape them, according to Bloomberg.
It’s like the Biden administration has put up a sign: If you’re looking for a new start to get away from your criminal past, come to America. We’ll give you a new identity and a ticket to a city of your choice so that you can start all over again.
“I’m just so sickened and sad by the families of lost loved ones from this,” Paul said in conclusion. “I don’t see real remorse. I don’t see you willing to answer the questions. I mean, if it were me, I would be so upset by this, I would be doing everything possible to make sure another Jose Ibarra doesn’t get in.”
He concluded by saying, “All I can express is disappointment and bewilderment that the Democrats let you get away with it.”
Senator, you are not alone.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Watch: Rand Paul Holds Mayorkas’ Feet to the Fire Regarding Laken Riley’s Suspected Killer, Swats Down Excuses appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
The cost of gasoline has skyrocketed under President Joe Biden, but he has been utterly unmindful of the burden he is putting on the American people because of his concerted war against oil, a war he proudly announced he would initiate if he won the White House.
Indeed, the war on the American energy industry is just one of the many ideological promises hurting America he made during his 2020 campaign that he has kept while in office.
As Americans suffer through Bidenomics, giving us one of the worst economies in decades, the cost of everything we need for our daily lives has soared. Gasoline has been a particular burden throughout Biden’s four years and prices have skyrocketed roughly 14 percent just over the last few months, ABC News reported.
Of the last three presidents, gas has been most expensive during Biden’s term. Forbes reported that the average price per gallon during Trump’s term was $2.57 a gallon. Obama’s was $3.12 in his first term and $2.95 in his second. By comparison, Biden’s average thus far was $3.60 as of early March.
But the price per gallon for gas is just one of the many problems Joe Biden has created for Americans with his war on the U.S. oil industry.
Biden has taken at least 200 actions to restrict or otherwise harm American energy independence since taking office, according to Just the News.
The actions were detailed in a report by the Institute for Energy Research that found that Biden has made it much harder for American companies to produce oil and gas products.
“President Biden and Democrats have a plan for American energy: make it harder to produce and more expensive to purchase,” the report said. “Since Mr. Biden took office, his administration and its allies have taken over 200 actions deliberately designed to make it harder to produce energy here in America.”
The study noted three of the more far-reaching attacks Biden has conducted on the U.S. oil and gas industry.
One of the very first things he did when he took office, for instance, was to shut down the Keystone XL pipeline, an action that eliminated thousands of American jobs. And he took that move even as he supported a pipeline being built in Russia.
He also declared that every acre of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge would be off-limits to oil and natural gas leasing activities. This took a huge field of energy resources off the table just as prices started to soar when he took office.
The third destructive move he made early in his presidency was to revoke Trump’s executive order that decreased burdensome regulations on the American energy sector.
But these three disastrous moves were far from the only ones he implemented when he entered the White House.
He also issued a series of moratoriums on new gas and oil leases on public lands, imposed a suite of onerous new regulations on the industry, and forced companies to take him to court to honor the leases they already had. And he is also threatening to slam the gasoline industry with an additional $110 billion in taxes on oil, natural gas and coal.
All of this has sent the cost of producing domestic energy soaring.
Then there has been his draining of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve , an act that has actually put our national security at risk.
“President Biden had the chance to top up the SPR when prices were still low during the pandemic, but anti-oil-and-gas ideologues within the administration couldn’t bear to do anything that would help out producers when demand was low,” said Kathleen Sgamma, president of Western Energy Alliance.
Not only that, she added, Biden then drained it “for political reasons and it’s long overdue to fill the SPR back up. Like many other politically driven decisions from this administration that distort energy markets, the government will have to spend more taxpayer money than if it had rational energy policies.”
These attacks on our energy independence make us more dependent on our enemies abroad, including Russia, Saudi Arabia and other anti-American oil-producing states. And it puts our national security at risk more than ever.
Trump had the right policy by cutting burdensome regulations, lowering taxes and inviting U.S. energy companies to explore for and drill for more oil and natural gas, thereby making us an energy-independent nation — and even a net exporter of oil — and putting us on our own two feet to ensure our national security.
Remember this when you are voting in November. A vote for Joe Biden is a vote to drive up our costs, tear down our energy industry and put us at the mercy of our enemies.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Revealed: Biden Has Taken 200 Actions to Increase Gas Prices – We Highlight Top 3 appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
At some point in the last five years, we stopped merely studying history’s darkest moments and began experiencing them.
For instance, in an 11-second viral clip posted Wednesday to the social media platform X, a woman identified as Loyola Marymount University graduate student Grace Obi-Azuike effectively re-enacted a scene from Nazi Germany when she spewed venomous anti-Jewish hatred and, significantly, incurred no apparent rebuke from the younger people around her who attended an event featuring Israel Defense Forces members.
“Get the f*** out of here, all you ugly-a** little Jewish people in this b****,” the California law student appeared to say in a clip shared by the StopAntisemitism X account.
Obi-Azuike made the comment while seated and signaling in the direction of people who did not appear on camera.
Her insidious remark drew a look of astonishment but also an open-mouthed smile from an androgynous-looking person seated to her left. The male-looking person to her right wore the cloth mask of the COVID cult. His reaction, therefore — perhaps thankfully — remains a mystery.
But some attendees clapped or otherwise voiced approval.
“Oooooh, hooooo, yeah,” an unidentified female voice said.
At that point, an older, suit-wearing man walked over to Obi-Azuike and stood to her left. The camera did not capture what happened next, but he did not appear pleased as he rubbed his chin.
Readers may view the clip below:
WARNING: The following video and post contain vulgar language and racism.
Loyola University Law School – Grace Obi-Azuike appears to be caught yelling “Get the f*ck out of here all you ugly ass little Jewish people in this b*itch”.
Shockingly, she was Loyola’s Anti Racism Center Fellow for 2022-2023.
Grace Obi-Azuike graduates in a few weeks. pic.twitter.com/Bpaxo05gxg
— StopAntisemitism (@StopAntisemites) April 17, 2024
According to the Los Angeles school’s Jewish Law Students Association, the Adolf Hitler-like outburst occurred as part of a calculated effort by multiple law students to disrupt an event that featured firsthand accounts from Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.
On Instagram, JLSA reported that “a few attendees left trembling as they made their way to their vehicles.”
As one would expect in this age of woke narcissism, the Loyola Law School boasts its own Anti-Racism Center.
The StopAntisemitism post referred to Obi-Azuike as a 2022-2023 fellow at the center — and the humor-focused, real-news site Not the Bee did likewise based on her now-deleted LinkedIn page.
Her intellectual profile certainly fits that of an anti-racist narcissist.
For instance, Obi-Azuike also belonged to the California ChangeLawyers organization.
“Our scholars and fellows are law students and recent law grads who are BIPOC, First Generation, LGBTQ+ and others whose lived experiences and identities are underrepresented in the halls of power,” the group’s scholar and fellow directory proclaimed.
As of Thursday afternoon, Obi-Azuike still appeared on the directory page. The following note appeared on her scholar profile:
“Our community has informed us of an incident that occurred earlier this week at Loyola Law School involving one of our scholarship recipients.
“ChangeLawyers exists to build a more inclusive multiracial democracy that protects and respects the humanity of all people — including our Jewish, Black, Muslim, and Women-identified communities. Any words or actions that denigrate the humanity of others flies in the face of our values. We do not condone racism or hate speech in any form, spoken or posted online.
“To all our community members: You Belong. ChangeLawyers will always be a place of compassion, empathy, and understanding.”
Obi-Azuike also appeared among the California Association of Black Lawyers‘ 2024 law student scholarship recipients.
On Feb. 2, LMU recognized Obi-Azuike among 11 graduate finalists who each received $5,000 to support research “focused on areas of diversity, equity, inclusion, and anti-racism.”
She also has served as president of the LLS Black Law Students Association. In that role, with a paean to the Juneteenth holiday, she provided a glimpse into the mind of a young narcissist.
“We comprise the generation of individuals that have the strongest ability to dismantle and end racism throughout this country,” Obi-Azuike wrote.
Predictably, she also insisted on the need to “understand the intersection between law and systemic racism.”
In other words, like many young victims of woke education and culture, Obi-Azuike sees the world primarily through skin color — and she obviously felt empowered to count herself with the “generation” that could “dismantle and end racism.”
Oh, how our schools have failed to encourage humility in such self-important crusaders.
Nonetheless, though unfortunate to have come of age in an era that validates narcissism, Obi-Azuike is no victim here.
For one thing, she reminds us that anti-racism amounts to nothing more than institutionally approved racism.
More importantly, her ugly outburst called to mind a 1998 book by historian Christopher R. Browning.
In “Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland,” Browning explained how a group of “average middle-aged Germans” transformed into executioners during the Holocaust.
In short, it did not take much for those initially reluctant killers to become eager instruments of mass murder.
Above all, it took an atmosphere in which officials encouraged such phrases as “you ugly-a** little Jewish people.”
Not long ago, we could study the past and wonder how things could have ever turned so dark. Now, however, we wonder no more.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Law College ‘Anti-Racism’ Fellow Caught on Camera Piling Vicious Hatred on ‘Ugly…Little Jewish People’ appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
The price tag of President Joe Biden’s student loan amnesty just keeps growing — and it’s not the neediest who are getting the money, either.
According to the New York Post, a new study by the University of Pennsylvania estimates that a new round of student loan cancellation programs raises the amount that taxpayers are stuck holding to $559 billion total, including $84 billion under new provisions announced last week.
The kicker? The newest provisions under the Saving on a Valuable Education, or SAVE, plan will benefit those in higher tax brackets the most.
The income-driven plan was introduced last summer, but new loan cancellations for 277,000 borrowers were announced last week.
“Today’s announcement shows — once again — that the Biden-Harris Administration is not letting up its efforts to give hardworking Americans some breathing room,” Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said in a statement, the Post reported.
“As long as there are people with overwhelming student loan debt competing with basic needs such as food and healthcare, we will remain relentless in our pursuit to bring relief to millions across the country.”
Cardona was doing the usual media rounds promoting how the plan was going to help the most vulnerable student loan recipients:
.@SecCardona breaks down who qualifies for President Biden’s new student debt relief plan.#GMA3 pic.twitter.com/BB3PVT76K4
— GMA3: What You Need To Know (@ABCGMA3) April 9, 2024
However, the University of Pennsylvania’s Penn Wharton Budget Model found that the new round of cancellations wasn’t exactly going to help those who were struggling to put food on the table — unless their diet consisted of three square meals of foie gras and Wagyu steak.
“President Biden recently announced five main provisions to provide student loan debt relief. Some of provisions are already mostly covered by President Biden’s SAVE plan introduced in 2023. Some provisions, however, are more incremental to the SAVE plan, including one provision — the forgiveness of longer-term debt — that expands eligibility to higher-income households,” read a Thursday media release of the study’s key takeaways.
“We estimate that the New Plans will cost $84 billion in addition to the $475 billion that we estimated for President Biden’s SAVE plan, for a total cost of about $559 billion across both plans.
“While the New Plans, like the SAVE plan, contain provisions to relieve debt based on individual or household income, the New Plans will also relieve some longer-term student debt for about 750,000 households making over $312,000 in average household income,” it continued.
“The main reason for this high average household income is that the SAVE plan already provides long-term debt relief to households with lower incomes.”
Of the five major components of the new plans announced on April 8, two in particular stick out as driving the relief up the income ladder.
First is the threshold for waiving accrued and capitalized interest on the loans: “Up to $20,000 in accrued and capitalized interest will be waived for borrowers with current balances above the initial balance upon entering repayment, regardless of borrower’s income,” the Wharton media release read.
“Single borrowers making less than $120,000 or couples making less than $240,000 a year will qualify for a total waiver of all current balances above the initial balance if they are enrolled in any IDR plan. Automatic relief will be applied, and so no application is needed.”
Second is the elimination of undergraduate student debt for those who have been paying it for over 20 years or gradate debt for 25 years.
“If student loan repayments started on or before July 1, 2005, all debt will be eliminated for borrowers with undergraduate loans only. (For borrowers with any graduate debt, this date is pushed back to July 1, 2000). No enrollment in IDR plans will be needed to receive the relief, but currently it’s unclear if any other application will be required from the borrowers,” the news release said.
The total cost of all the five measures is a touch over $84 billion, added to the estimated $475 billion Biden’s unilateral student loan relief has already put taxpayers on the hook for.
However, in this case, Biden is providing relief to households who are less than $100,000 away from that magical $400,000 number that he says makes you one of the wealthy that he plans to tax to pay for his spending sprees — you know, those who need to start paying their “fair share.”
To say this is ridiculous is an understatement — until, of course, you realize that 2024 is an election year and Biden’s poll numbers haven’t looked hot since the beginning of the race, despite the fact that Democrat DAs and the Department of Justice have been on a quest to tie up the presumptive Republican nominee in court until November.
As House Budget Committee chairman Rep. Jodey Arrington, a Texas Republican, noted, this wasn’t just unconstitutional, it was a “quest to buy votes.”
“In reality, his plan will shift the responsibility of paying for loans owed by high-income earners who freely incurred them onto the backs of all taxpayers, many of whom do not even have a college degree,” Arrington said via a statement.
“[Biden’s] administration is dead set on circumventing the Supreme Court, defying Congress, and saddling our country with more debt.”
And unlike he says, it’s not taking from the rich to give to the poor. It’s taking from those who didn’t take college loans or paid them off and giving relief to wealthy people who did and haven’t.
Is this what student debt relief should look like? It is when one is down badly in the polls and is grasping at straws to get suburban voters in swing states. That’s hardly good policy — but as cynical strategizing, it’s not half bad.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Biden’s Student Debt Cancellation Has Taxpayers Paying Over $550 Billion, Benefits Wealthier Families appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
The quarterback considered by many to be the best player in the NFL is steering clear of partisan messaging in the wake of a shooting at a parade celebrating his team’s 2024 Super Bowl victory.
Patrick Mahomes of the Kansas City Chiefs has rebuffed calls to advocate for gun control, according to a Time magazine profile of the two-time NFL MVP published Tuesday.
“I continue to educate myself,” Mahomes told Time. “I don’t want to make a quick response to something that takes a lot of education to really learn and make a swaying comment based off that.”
“But I know we have to find a solution of some way to make this stuff stop,” he added.
The shooting at the Chiefs’ Super Bowl parade in February left one dead and 22 wounded.
On the day of the tragedy, Mahomes posted on X that he was “praying for Kansas City.”
Time reported that Mahomes and his wife Brittany also visited victims in the hospital and donated $50,000 to a fund to “aid the victims and first responders and support violence-prevention organizations.”
Mahomes took a similarly hands-off stance in the Time interview when it came to the 2024 presidential election.
“I don’t want to pressure anyone to vote for a certain president,” he said, instead urging Americans to make their own informed decision.
“I want people to use their voice, whoever they believe in. I want them to do the research.”
The three-time Super Bowl champion also addressed the longevity of his NFL career, expressing some doubt that he would play as long as all-time legend Tom Brady did.
Mahomes pointed to his desire to spend time with his family as a potential obstacle to a 20-year career.
“If I played until Tom [Brady]’s age, my daughter would be 19, 20 years old,” he said.
Patrick Mahomes talks retirement:
“I’ve looked, if I played until Tom Brady’s age, my daughter would be 19, 20 years old, I would love to play that long. At the same time, I want to be there for my daughter. if I can do that, I’ll continue to play. But if I feel like it’s taking… pic.twitter.com/Ni1kjVRIyG
— BBQ Chiefs (@BBQChiefs) April 16, 2024
“I would love to play that long. … At the same time, I want to be there for my daughter. If I can do that, I’ll continue to play. But if I feel like it’s taking away from my family time, that’s when I’ll know it’s time to go.”
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Patrick Mahomes Refuses to Call for Gun Control After Kansas City Shooting – ‘I Continue to Educate Myself’ appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
A video of one of the pro-Palestinian protesters who shut down the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco and I-880 in Oakland on Monday is going viral.
A clip shared by the official X account of the California Highway Patrol showed one agitator screaming in apparent pain as officers cut a piece of concrete reinforcement he had held onto in order to make his removal more difficult.
The video shows the CHP officers ordering the man to simply let go of the rebar, which he refused to do.
It was not immediately clear if the man was on the Golden Gate Bridge or was part of a blockage of the Bay Area’s Interstate 880.
“Let go of the rebar,” one officer off-camera told the man.
Another officer pleaded repeatedly for the man to simply “let go” as he screamed in agony.
“Ohh! Ahh,” the man shouted. “They’re twisting [my hand] for no reason. … Stop! …. Stop squeezing my hand and twisting it!”
While refusing to let go of the metal, the protester shouted, “You’re hurting me!”
Tactics utilized by unlawful protesters this morning on I-880 and the Golden Gate Bridge. This is unlawful and will not be tolerated. Arrests were made and the CHP is recommending charges. Thank you to our law enforcement partners for their assistance. pic.twitter.com/Nn4fdqD08m
— CHP Headquarters (@CHP_HQ) April 16, 2024
The man was asked if he needed medical assistance after he was handcuffed.
CHP officials said of the incidents on the roadways and the Golden Gate Bridge closure, “This is unlawful and will not be tolerated. Arrests were made and the CHP is recommending charges.”
The agency also made it clear in a statement posted on Facebook that officers made every effort to clear the protesters and free traffic as quickly as possible.
The man was one of around 40 anti-Israel protesters who were arrested after they shut down the iconic bridge and highway, KNTV reported. Twenty-six people were detained for their actions on the bridge.
Per KTVU, the protesters used a technique called “the sleeping dragon.”
On the bridge, “protesters used their cars, with chains concealed with pipes, to connect themselves to each other,” which took police over four hours to clear. While on the I-880, some of the protesters attached themselves to large barrels filled with concrete, which took seven hours to clear.
KNTV spoke to a number of the protesters who said they shut down the highway and bridge in order to compel the federal government to stop offering military aid to Israel.
Those behind the blockages are facing conspiracy charges.
Some of the protesters will also be charged with false imprisonment for trapping commuters on the bridge from about 7:30 a.m. local time until well into the afternoon.
Their actions occurred just two days after Iran launched hundreds of missiles and suicide drones at the Jewish state on Saturday.
Israel has been fighting the Islamic terror group Hamas in an all-out war since last October when militants based in Gaza murdered at least 1,200 of its citizens and took over 200 hostages.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Pro-Palestinian Agitator Screams in Pain as Police Remove Device He Attached to Himself on Highway appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
For its nearly universal control over the news-industrial complex, the left has failed to penetrate the one and only media format dominated by conservatives: talk radio.
Despite repeated liberal incursions into the medium, from Mario Cuomo to Tom Daschle to Air America, the left cannot make a showing. Now, it has launched a series of deceptive websites and bought up talk radio outlets — apparently in hopes that, where persuasion failed, cold hard cash may prevail.
Enter George Soros — and his bank account.
“Over the last two years, Soros Fund Management, the firm founded by the billionaire investor and now controlled by the Open Society Foundations, has become an increasingly key player in the oldest electronic mass media: radio,” Semafor reported.
Two months ago, the business arm of the Soros empire bought out Audacy, giving it control of more than 230 radio stations and innumerable podcasts. The fund is now openly discussing taking over Cumulus Media, which owned and operated 403 radio stations across 85 markets in the United States last year, according to its website.
Soros facilitated the buy-out of 18 Univision radio stations by a consortium of former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, known as The Latino Media Network, for $60 million in cash. When Vice Media faced bankruptcy in 2019, Soros provided part of the $250 million in debt relief that kept it afloat.
“Soros specifically funneled at least $131,111,250 between 2016 and 2020 into 253 journalism and activist media groups worldwide to spread his radical leftist ideas on abortion, Marxist economics, anti-Americanism, defunding the police, environmental extremism and LGBT fanaticism,” reported the Media Research Center in a three-part exposé.
Some $103 million of the $131 million went directly to media outlets, including $2 million to Wikipedia — which, despite its dependably left-leaning bias, poses as an impartial encyclopedia.
Donor-driven deception seems to be a recurring theme for the Soros media takeover, as numerous beneficiaries disguise left-wing political advocacy in the form of “local news” websites.
Among the practitioners of this art is Tara McGowan, a Democratic political operative who worked for the 2012 Obama-Biden re-election campaign and for the 2016 Hillary Clinton campaign’s primary super PAC, Priorities USA Action. (To give you a flavor, a 2012 Priorities USA ad falsely charged Utah Republican Mitt Romney with causing a woman to die of cancer.)
After Clinton’s loss to Donald Trump, McGowan got concerned, writing in a 2019 memo that the “Democratic Party, long reliant on television and radio, is losing the media war.” To fill the gap, she created Courier Newsroom, owned by another McGowan organization, Good Information Inc. Courier’s media outlets use apolitical news stories with local content to deliver Democratic diatribes.
“The goal was to get persuadable voters engaged with unassuming content, then feed them political persuasion content, using underwriters who would pay Courier to come up with the content,” a former Courier employee revealed.
George Soros is one of those underwriters. So, too, is Planned Parenthood. The nation’s leading abortion franchise gave McGowan’s faux news media empire a quarter of a million dollars in the 2021-2022 fiscal year alone. Yet McGowan did not disclose either contributor, which one investigator noted “cannot be traced through public records until years after the fact.”
Courier also has another revolving door with the Biden administration: McGowan has visited the Biden White House 20 times, according to a review of White House visitor logs carried out by Fox News. One visit produced an exclusive interview with Biden — but the rest seem to have influenced Courier’s journalism in other ways.
McGowan met with Patrick Stevenson, Biden’s senior advisor for digital strategy, raising questions about whether McGowan coordinated its media activities with the administration. (That would be old hat. A 2016 email from Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign manager outlined a strategy of illegal “coordination of some ads with Priorities” USA.)
The left followed the same blueprint in the 2022 midterm elections. Last time, the misleading media strategy worked through The American Independent, the grotesquely misnamed company then led by Media Matters founder David Brock. The group, now branding itself “TAI News,” hosts “local” websites in the battleground states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Montana, where incumbent Democratic Sen. Jon Tester faces a difficult re-election race. “It’s been widely reported that where local news outlets shut down, dis- and misinformation grows,” said Jessica McCreight, then TAI’s executive editor, in 2022. “To combat this challenge, The American Independent has expanded to bring readers local, fact-based news and information on topics and issues that impact their communities.”
TAI used McGowan’s model of writing local news to sell its political product. For instance, the Pennsylvania Independent’s story “Pennsylvania is home to the world’s mushroom capital” sits alongside headlines slamming alleged GOP “health care cuts” and touting Biden’s “clean energy investments in Pennsylvania farms.” Yet the state websites carry dizzyingly repetitive content for an operation purportedly dedicated to local news.
Each site carries the same national news stories, usually as the lead. Very little original local content takes place: As of this writing, the Wisconsin website has the same story, with the same graphic, side-by-side as the lead story in both the Politics and Economy sections.
TAI News also shares McGowan’s troubles with the truth and ties to partisan hacks. TAI’s current president, Joe Conason, wrote a baseless 1992 article claiming that President George H.W. Bush had an affair with longtime aide Jennifer Fitzgerald and a 2003 book titled “Big Lies: The Right-Wing Propaganda Machine and How It Distorts the Truth.”
TAI’s former president, Matt Fuehrmeyer, had been a senior aide at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
Ownership and management of media matters. Look at Fox News since Rupert Murdoch stepped back from day-to-day affairs, leaving its direction to his children. As part of its 2022 Pride Month coverage, Fox News Channel carried a news story celebrating a child’s gender transition.
Last April, FNC fired its top-rated host, Tucker Carlson, days after he delivered a revival-themed address to The Heritage Foundation. While Fox News still has outstanding hosts and guests, its retreat from social issues mirrors the views of management.
This seeming minutiae impacts citizens’ ability to make a difference for Christ in the public square. Since information fuels and directs action, intelligence is a vital asset of spiritual warfare. The world’s greatest calamity occurred when our first parents acted on erroneous information (Genesis 3:5).
On the other hand, God asks rhetorically whether His people know of His power to cast aside kingdoms that violate His laws by asking in Isaiah 40:21, “Do you not know? Do you not hear? Has it not been told you from the beginning?”
The anti-life crowd believes it can hide its venomous viewpoint in objective-looking news sites. If you do not know the bias and ownership of your “local” media site, why not read — and promote — news outlets like this one that share your Christian worldview? We will never sell out to shadowy leftist billionaires. We have already been bought with a price (I Corinthians 7:23).
This article appeared originally on The Washington Stand.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post The Left’s Plan to Sabotage Talk Radio and Local News appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
President Joe Biden was caught Monday with a sheet of instructions as he met in the Oval Office Monday with Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’a Al-Sudani.
The latest in a long string of episodes in which Biden is instructed where to stand and what to say led to him being dubbed “commander-in-cheat” by the New York Post.
The Post report said Biden turned to his script often to check on what he was supposed to say concerning the attack on Israel by Iran, as well as to pause so an interpreter could translate his words.
Biden cheat sheet for Iraq PM meeting caught on camera — including instructions to ‘pause’ https://t.co/WJ950tZRiO pic.twitter.com/ix4qwll3PX
— New York Post (@nypost) April 15, 2024
“As you know, Iran launched an unprecedented aerial attack against Israel, and we mounted an unprecedented military effort to defend Israel. Together with our partners, we defeated that attack,” Biden said, according to the White House.
“We’re also committed to the security of our personnel and partners in the region, including Iraq. The partnership between Iraq and the United States is critical. We’ve seen over the last decade as our troops have served side by side to help defeat ISIS, and we’ve seen this in our Strategic Framework Agreement as well,” Biden said.
Joe Biden checks his watch again. This time with the Prime Minister of Iraq. pic.twitter.com/IjiefoiCUW
— The American Girl (@TheAmericanGrl) April 15, 2024
But members of the Republican Study Committee were not happy that the meeting was held at all, according to Fox News.
“As members of the Republican Study Committee, we write to express our deep concern with your decision to host Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani to the White House and your overall Iraqi policy,” the letter from Republican Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina and Republican Study Committee Chair Kevin Hern of Oklahoma said.
“Despite hundreds of billions of dollars spent in Iraq over two decades and countless lost American treasure, Iraq is now solidly in Iran’s hands,” the letter said.
Two questions Biden should have asked Iran’s puppet in Baghdad:
“So why did you let Iran use your airspace, and why did you try to deny our use of our bases in Iraq to defend Israel?”
“Why don’t you use your U.S. trained ISOF units to target Iran’s Iraqi militias firing at… pic.twitter.com/Bno7Xkp2lf
— Michael P Pregent (@MPPregent) April 15, 2024
“This is evident across Iraq’s institutions and within Prime Minster Sudani’s own government, which includes two U.S.-designated terrorist groups,” the letter continued, adding, “On Saturday Iranian-backed militias in Iraq joined Iran in directly attacking Israel.”
“In essence, the U.S. has effectively overseen China, Russia and Iran dominate Iraq, despite our overwhelming financial and human commitment to Iraq’s latest chapter,” the letter said.
Biden has been roundly mocked for his use of cheat sheets, including one in November that included pictures of the reporters he was told by his staff to call upon.
Q cards with pre-selected reporters and the answers to their questions. It was plain as day.
— Rob Allen (@RobMAllen1971) November 16, 2023
In November, he publicly apologized for forgetting the name of a CBS reporter he had been instructed to have lob him a question.
Last April, Biden was caught with a notecard bearing the name of Los Angeles Times journalist Courtney Subramanian under “Question #1,” along with a pre-written question, according to the Post.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Camera Catches Biden’s Cheat Sheet for Meeting with Iraq PM, Shows Embarrassing Directions to Guide Him appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
In the aftermath of Iran’s attack on Israel Saturday night, President Joe Biden said he will meet with allies on Sunday to consider what to do.
Biden said he will meet with G7 nations to craft a unified response, according to Reuters.
Biden said that during a call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, “I told him that Israel demonstrated a remarkable capacity to defend against and defeat even unprecedented attacks — sending a clear message to its foes that they cannot effectively threaten the security of Israel.”
“Tomorrow, I will convene my fellow G7 leaders to coordinate a united diplomatic response to Iran’s brazen attack,” he said. The G7 includes Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Great Britain.
On Saturday, Israel said Iran sent 170 drones, more than 30 cruise missiles and more than 120 ballistic missiles towards Israel, according to the Independent. Almost all of the weapons were intercepted before they reached Israel.
On Sunday, John Kirby, a spokesman for the National Security Council, avoiding escalation is uppermost in Biden’s mind.
“Every decision, every discussion that he’s had is all designed to not let this become a broad regional war, and that’s where his head still is,” Kirby said on Fox News, The New York Times reported.
Israel’s War Cabinet is meeting Sunday afternoon to craft Israel’s response.
Some experts said they do not believe Iran wants escalation.
“Iran’s government appears to have concluded that the Damascus strike was a strategic inflection point, where failure to retaliate would carry more downsides than benefits,” Ali Vaez, the Iran director of the International Crisis Group, said.
“But in doing so, the shadow war it has been waging with Israel for years now threatens to turn into a very real and very damaging conflict,” one that could drag in the United States, he added.
Sanam Vakil, director of the Middle East and North Africa program at Chatham House, said Iran “made a choice to call Israel’s bluff, and they felt they needed to do so, because they see the last six months as a persistent effort to set them back across the region.”
“I think Tehran saw a need to draw this red line and make it clear to Israel that Iran does have red lines and would not continue to tolerate the slow degradation of its position,” she said.
The Times reported that Israel was considering a retaliatory strike last night, but the strike was called off after damage from the Iranian attack proved minimal.
Iran’s drone strikes show us President Biden’s approach with Iran and the Middle East is backwards. Now as we risk entering WWIII, the U.S. must stand by Israel’s commitment to democracy. The president must stand firm, and stop coddling Iran immediately.
— Rep. Nancy Mace (@RepNancyMace) April 13, 2024
In a post on X, Republican Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina urged a strong American response.
“Iran’s drone strikes show us President Biden’s approach with Iran and the Middle East is backwards. Now as we risk entering WWIII, the U.S. must stand by Israel’s commitment to democracy. The president must stand firm, and stop coddling Iran immediately,” she posted.
We stand with the people of Israel against this brazen and callous attack. Iran hates democracy, Freedom, and basic human rights — making them an enemy of Israel and the United States. I expect the Biden Administration to stand up for these shared principles and hold Iran…
— Kristi Noem (@KristiNoem) April 13, 2024
South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, who has been mentioned as a possible running mate for Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump, urged action.
“We stand with the people of Israel against this brazen and callous attack. Iran hates democracy, Freedom, and basic human rights — making them an enemy of Israel and the United States. I expect the Biden Administration to stand up for these shared principles and hold Iran accountable,” she posted.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post US Calls to Convene G7 for a United Response Against Iran appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
After drastically depleting the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve to buy votes during the midterm election, President Joe Biden’s Department of Energy has announced it will not purchase up to 3 million barrels of oil from a site in Louisiana in August and September, as originally intended.
“Keeping the taxpayer’s interest at the forefront, we will not award for the Bayou Choctaw SPR site in August and September and will continue to solicit available capacity as market conditions allow,” a department spokesperson said according to S&P Global.
“As always, we monitor market dynamics to remain nimble and innovative in our successful replenishment approach to protect this critical national security asset.”
Reportedly, the current oil prices are scaring away the DOE from purchasing, as current oil barrel prices are around $85 — above the $79 a barrel it’s aiming for.
Oil has gradually risen in price over the past few weeks, jumping a considerable 10 percent in the last month alone and 20 percent since mid-December, according to The New York Times.
Of course, oil and gas are far from the only thing rising under the Biden administration.
Inflation in general continues to miss the targeted goal, seeing considerable jumps monthly.
Nonetheless, regardless of rising prices in oil, the record-low levels can’t help but draw concern.
The SPR was originally signed into law by President Gerald Ford in 1975 following a massive oil crisis that followed the 1973-74 oil embargo.
The reserve was intended to function as an emergency source of fuel for the nation in times of crisis, ensuring essential functions such as our country’s military wouldn’t be ruined by a shortage.
Today, it doesn’t seem that same understanding is seen.
The four underground storage facilities for the SPR, located along the Gulf of Mexico, currently have an “authorized capacity” of 714 million barrels, according to the Department of Energy.
The most ever held for the SPR was close to 727 million barrels in 2009, according to Reuters. (Evidently they had a higher capacity at one time.)
In 2022, the Biden administration announced plans to sell 180 million barrels “in an attempt to lower gasoline prices after Russia invaded Ukraine,” Reuters reported.
Biden’s sale that year was in addition to 38 million barrels that Congress had ordered sold, a practice lawmakers came up with to fund government programs, according to the outlet.
Those sales drained the SPR to its lowest level in about 40 years. It now stands at 363.6 million barrels, according to Reuters. That’s just over half of where it should be in the best of times — and these certainly are not the best of times.
There’s a good reason that the SPR was created and with the levels it sits at now, it’s unlikely to be able to fulfill that purpose.
Incidentally, Biden’s predecessor recognized the importance of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and tried to replenish it, according to the National Review.
“When former president Donald Trump attempted to fill the SPR to the brim when oil prices were at a rock-bottom price of $24 a barrel, congressional Democrats blocked the purchase, claiming it would be an oil-industry bailout,” the outlet reported.
Oil is an essential part of everyday life, whether green energy advocates want to admit it or not.
When a crisis comes, the country will need sources of energy like oil to keep the military and economy properly functioning. Otherwise, things could get much worse.
But rather than existing for times of emergency or crisis, President Joe Biden decided to throw away what had been accrued for a handful of extra votes in 2022.
The saddest part is that Biden is doubly responsible for the issue at hand, being responsible for both the low levels of the SPR and the high prices of oil.
Rather than playing both sides to always come out on top, it seems the president is playing both sides to always lose.
Perhaps if earlier in his administration, Biden had permitted more drilling on federal land, we wouldn’t be in this situation.
Unfortunately, the commander in chief has constantly foiled any attempts to drill on federal land.
It’s almost like he’s intentionally forcing gas prices to climb.
Every solution that has been right in front of him he’s denied, constantly instead appealing to environmental extremists within his party.
Oil excavation is not pretty, but it’s necessary — fighting against it will only hurt the nation.
Biden and his climate freaks need to suck it up and do what’s best for the nation, even if it breaks their vapid little hearts.
Not refilling the SPR, even if it costs a pretty penny, could cost the nation far more.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post With Strategic Petroleum Reserve at Historic Lows, Biden Cancels Replenishment Order appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
President Biden is facing an uphill battle for a second term in the White House.
But this latest news is probably going to send his campaign into a panic.
A report by the Daily Caller shows that Democratic voter registrations have dropped in Nevada, North Carolina and Pennsylvania — three hotly contested states in the 2020 election.
While Democrats still hold a voter registration advantage over Republicans in all three states, the gaps have shrunk significantly.
According to Pennsylvania state election data and reported by the Daily Caller, Democrats have lost 336,269 registered voters in the state since Nov. 3, 2020. Democrats still hold a nearly 400,000 voter registration advantage over Republicans, though this a sharp decline from the 685,818 lead Democrats held going into the last presidential election.
In North Carolina, Democrats saw a decrease of 212,084 voters from December 2020 to April 2024. Democrats now only outnumber Republicans by 170,943 voters, a decrease of over 200,000 voters since 2020.
The numbers in Nevada were less staggering, with Democrats losing only 27,757 voters since December 2020. The Democratic majority in registrations over Republicans has shrunk from 96,875 in 2020, to 55,116 today.
All in all, Democrats have lost 576,110 voters in the three states combined.
According to CNN, Fewer than 200,000 combined votes decided the winner in these states in 2020. Biden won Pennsylvania by a little under 81,660 votes, and Nevada by 33,596. Former president Trump won the Tar Heel state by 74,483 votes.
Biden will need a massive turnout in each of three states if he wants any shot at victory.
The latest RealClearPolitics polling averages show Trump holding a 4.0-point lead in North Carolina, and a 3.2-point lead in Nevada. Biden is currently edging out Trump in Pennsylvania by 0.1 points.
However, while these figures are surely not what the Biden campaign wants to hear, Republican strategist Scott Jennings is cautioning people to “not over read” the data, according to the Daily Caller.
“But certainly Biden has a real problem on his hands among many segments and you can clearly see that in these results,” Jennings added. “The trick, of course, is that once people are registered, then you have to turn them out.”
A recent analysis performed by the Pew Research Center showed that the nation is basically split when it comes to overall voter registration, with 49 percent of voters registered as Democrats compared to 48 percent who are registered as Republicans.
While Jennings is right to caution Republican optimism, recent history has shown that swings in voter registrations can be very beneficial for Republicans.
Take Florida, for example. According to the Florida Division of Elections, from 2018 to 2022, Democrats only lost 47,727 registered voters. They also lost the voter registration advantage they held over Republicans.
Despite the modest gains, Republicans swept the floor in the 2022 gubernatorial election, with incumbent governor Ron DeSantis defeating Democratic challenger Charlie Crist by 1,507,897 votes, or 19.4 percent.
The shift really had to do with the man on the ballot. DeSantis’ actions during the pandemic and refusal to cower in the face of wokeness turned him into one of the most popular governors in the country.
If Trump wants to capitalize on these shifts away from the Democrats, he needs to make this election about the other man on the ballot.
While Trump does not have the surging popularity DeSantis had in 2022, he is running against a widely unpopular incumbent. According to RealClearPolitics, Biden’s latest approval rating average currently sits at 40.6 percent.
Gallup reported in February that Biden’s approval rating for his third year in office was a mere 39.8 percent, the second lowest approval for a president’s third year in the Gallup polling era. Only Jimmy Carter’s 37.4 percent was worse than Biden’s.
Carter went on to be destroyed in the 1980 general election by Ronald Reagan, suffering one of the worst defeats in presidential election history.
If Trump wants to replicate the outcome of the 1980 election, he has to make the focus of the campaign about Biden’s presidency.
Every speech, every event, every rally needs to be about how Biden has failed to deliver on anything he promised in 2020, and emphasize that Americans are worse off under Biden than they were under Trump.
And it’s not a difficult argument to make: Americans are paying more across the board for goods and services, housing and gas now than they were under Trump. Biden has made life more difficult for Americans, not better.
If Trump can stick to these points, he should have no problem winning over these ex-Democrats in November.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post In 2020 Biden Won 2 Key States by 115K, Now He’s Lost Over 364K Voters in Same States appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Who could have imagined it: Eating a concoction of chemicals made to imitate real meat appears to be actually quite bad for you.
A new study postulates that eating vegan meats can have major negative effects on an individual’s health, such as increasing the risk of diabetes.
As the Daily Mail reported, those who consumed notable amounts of fake meat brands like Impossible Burgers and Beyond Meat over eight weeks recorded higher blood sugar levels than those who consumed natural meats.
This increase in blood sugar levels could put plant-meat eaters at a higher risk of heart disease and diabetes in the future.
The 89 Singaporean study participants were chosen because they started out with a high risk of diabetes
The two-month study saw no noticeable changes in participants’ cholesterol, but did see considerable changes in the sodium levels for the group.
Meat-eaters reportedly had lower sodium levels than those who consumed fake meat products.
Most previous studies that found health benefits in the vegan diet looked at those who consumed natural foods. Researchers who conducted this trial specifically wanted to look at the consumption of highly processed vegan alternatives.
“A whole-foods, plant-based eating pattern generally includes legumes, whole grains, fruits, vegetables, and nuts, and is high in fiber,” the study noted. “All of these elements have been found to be protective against diabetes.”
The ultra-processed plant-based meat diet study did not show those same benefits, the researchers concluded.
“A plant-based meat [analog] diet did not show widespread cardiometabolic health benefits compared with omnivorous diets over 8 weeks,” the study concluded. “The composition of [plant-based meat analogs] may need to be considered in future trials.”
In other words, the report implied that fake-meat manufacturers need to go back to the drawing board and create something healthier.
While the study undoubtedly is helpful to anyone trying to persuade a friend or loved one away from faux meats, it’s hard to say this wasn’t already clear.
A quick read-through of the nutrition facts on one of these products should quickly dissuade anyone interested in considering the products.
Of course, when big names of the establishment like Bill Gates push for the sheep of the world to flock toward these alternatives, it’s unlikely that these will be going away.
A pretty good way of determining whether a food is healthy for you is to simply ask yourself one question — Did God make it?
If it was made by the divine hands of the Creator to provide sustenance to His children, it should be pretty good for you in moderation.
If it was thrown together in a lab using different chemicals, it’s probably not going to be very healthy.
While the study is not definitive, it’s a good sign to confirm what any functioning member of society already knows.
Avoid ultra-processed plant-based alternatives.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post New Study Shows How Unhealthy Fake Vegan Meat Truly Is – Stick with the Real Thing appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
A hard-hitting sports commentator is changing the focus from touchdowns to God’s judgment.
Stephen A. Smith reacted to the death of NFL Hall of Famer O.J. Simpson on Thursday.
Smith expressed his belief that Simpson was falsely acquitted in his 1995 murder trial.
“Most people believe that he committed those murders,” Smith said of the case, speaking on ESPN’s “First Take.”
Stephen A. Smith on O.J. Simpson: “Most people believe that he committed those murders. I know that if I was on the jury, he would have been under the damn jail. I know that much. I believed he was guilty.” pic.twitter.com/gaJFk2JmET
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) April 11, 2024
“I know that if I was on the jury, he would have been under the damn jail. I know that much.”
“I believe he was guilty.”
In spite of Simpson’s hotly debated acquittal, Smith suggested that the former running back would be held accountable in the afterlife.
“The Lord will deal with him.”
Smith did clarify that his belief in Simpson’s guilt wasn’t a certainty, according to OutKick.
“I believe he was guilty, but I don’t know. I’m talking about based on the evidence that was placed before us during the trial overseen by Judge Lance Ito.
“This is what we saw on national television, and by most accounts, you found yourself believing he was guilty as hell.”
Simpson’s family revealed that he had died of cancer on Thursday, according to Fox News.
Simpson was accused of murdering his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, as well as a friend of hers, Ron Goldman, in the 1996 trial, according to The Washington Post.
The former Buffalo Bills star did experience legal troubles after his shock acquittal — with judges and juries returning verdicts against him.
Simpson served nine years in the Nevada prison system on charges of armed robbery and kidnapping, having been released in 2017.
The families of the two victims were awarded $33.5 million in a civil judgment against Simpson, according to Fox Business.
California attorney David Cook is continuing attempts to collect on the hefty judgment in the wake of Simpson’s death.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Watch: Stephen A. Smith Torches OJ Simpson Live on Air After News of His Death – ‘The Lord will Deal with Him’ appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
With dramatic stories of self-defense appearing in our news feeds almost every day, you have to wonder how gun-control advocates have still pontificated about the evils of gun ownership with a straight face.
True, a few bad actors have used guns to hurt, terrorize and kill the innocent.
But how many of those bad actors have been — or could have been — apprehended, if one of those citizens had also been armed?
An incident reported Wednesday by EastIdahoNews.com showed how a potentially lethal situation became an example of heroism, thanks to an 85-year-old woman armed with a handgun.
According to EastIdahoNews.com, Christine Jenneiahn was sleeping at home during the wee hours of March 13, when a man officials identified Derek Ephriam Condon, 39, broke into her house around 2 a.m.
The report, released by Bingham County prosecuting attorney Ryan Jolley and shared by the Bingham County Sheriff’s office on Facebook, noted that Jenneiahn’s disabled adult son, David, was sleeping downstairs when the invasion happened.
Condon went to Jenneiahn’s upstairs bedroom, and awakened her while pointing a flashlight and a pistol at her head.
Based on the blood police found on her bed and her pillow, they believe Condon hit her in the head, though Jenneiahn doesn’t quite remember when or how it happened.
Clearly, though, Jenneiahn was in grave danger, and Condon was ready and willing to kill to get what he wanted.
And what was it that he wanted?
According to Jolley’s report, Condon took Jenneiahn to the living room and handcuffed her to a chair, demanding to know where she kept her valuables and pointing a pistol to her head when she said she didn’t have much.
Then, as the New York Post explained, she told Condon she had two safes downstairs, without disclosing that her son was sleeping in a downstairs bedroom.
When Condon discovered that, however, he was enraged.
Returning to the living room, Condon threatened to kill her for failing to tell him about her son, in addition to issuing multiple other threats.
‘Heroic’ mom, 85, fatally shoots masked intruder while handcuffed to chair protecting disabled son during gunfight https://t.co/IBzd73rk1W pic.twitter.com/qTAZTVLrHN
— New York Post (@nypost) April 11, 2024
However, what Condon did not count on was the remarkable resilience of this otherwise frail old woman.
Despite suffering multiple injuries at Condon’s hands, while Condon was rummaging through the house, Jenneiahn dragged herself and the chair back to her bedroom, where she retrieved the .357 Magnum revolver she kept under her pillow.
From there, she dragged herself and the chair back to the living room, where she hid the gun in a nearby couch.
When Condon returned, Jolley’s report explained, Jenneiahn decided it was “now or never.” She drew her gun and “engaged Condon, striking him with both her shots.”
Condon then emptied his 9mm pistol at her, striking her abdomen, leg, arm and chest, before stumbling to the kitchen, where he died from his gunshot wounds to the chest.
Jenneiahn then collapsed, unable to call 911 for about 10 hours, until her son brought her a phone in the morning. The police finally arrived at the scene around noon.
After investigating the scene, the police and Jolley concluded that this “case presents an easy analysis of self-defense and justifiable homicide. It also presents one of the most heroic acts of self-preservation I have heard of.”
Jolley was full of praise for Jenneiahn, crediting her “grit, determination, and will to live” for saving her life that night.
The Bingham County Sheriff’s Office, in sharing Jolley’s report in a Facebook post, likewise praised Jenneiahn’s incredible bravery and tenacity, saying that the department was releasing the facts of the case to explain that “that there was a victim involved that displayed heroism, fortitude, and a will to live that we’d be remiss not to share.”
Clearly, this story would have ended much more tragically had Jenneiahn not been armed in some way.
Moreover, Jenneiahn displayed a courage and resilience in protecting herself and her disabled son that would have been impressive for someone half her age, let alone for a woman approaching 90.
As has been demonstrated time and time again, guns have been the great equalizer in these kinds of situations, especially for those lacking in physical strength.
A frail old woman like Jenneiahn wouldn’t have stood a chance had she not owned a gun and had the presence of mind (not to mention the force of will) to drag herself and her chair to the bedroom where she kept the weapon.
The strict gun-controlling measures advocated by liberal lawmakers hinder the ability of law-abiding citizens to defend themselves against thugs like Condon. Such measures would have ensured the deaths of Jenneiahn and her son in an incident like this.
It’s nothing short of baffling that our liberal elites have long been (presumably) aware of stories like this and yet they still advocate for gun control measures.
But gun control was never really about protecting law-abiding citizens, now, was it?
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post 85-Year-Old Woman Pulls Out Hidden Revolver When Armed Robber Least Expects It appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
As the Biden administration continues to fail countless Americans by allowing millions of illegals to pour across our southern border, more state governments have begun to pick up the slack, following the lead of Texas.
Republican Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds signed a bill on Wednesday that strengthens state law enforcement’s ability to mitigate the migrant crisis.
S.B. 2340 functions much in the same way as a similar law in Texas, making it illegal to enter the state of Iowa if an individual has previously been deported or barred from entering the state.
The piece of legislation gives peace officers considerable power that they did not have before to handle the hoards of illegals.
Gov. Reynolds celebrated when signing the bill, speaking strongly on its importance in the face of a failing presidential administration.
“The Biden Administration has failed to enforce our nation’s immigration laws, putting the protection and safety of Iowans at risk,” she stated in a news release. “Those who come into our country illegally have broken the law, yet Biden refuses to deport them.”
Today, we give Iowa law enforcement the power to do what Joe Biden won’t: deport illegal criminals to protect our state. pic.twitter.com/GaQwdprekb
— Kim Reynolds (@KimReynoldsIA) April 10, 2024
“This bill gives Iowa law enforcement the power to do what he is unwilling to do: enforce immigration laws already on the books.”
The law will begin to take effect on July 1 and will make the crime a felony offense if the previous removal order against an individual was related to misdemeanor convictions for drug-related charges, a crime against another person or a felony conviction.
Of course, while the bill will undoubtedly take significant strides to create a safer Iowa, left-leaning groups have already begun to whine about a state attempting to keep law and order.
A local immigration rights group named Iowa Migrant Movement for Justice lamented about not being able to illegally enter the state and siphon away resources from American citizens.
“We know that we all belong here, Iowa is home, and we will stand together as workers, families and allies to defend each other,” the group claimed in a statement translated by CNN.
The ACLU couldn’t help but dissent as well, with executive director of the Iowa ACLU Mark Stringer releasing a statement, making wild claims of racism for enforcing the southern border.
“This legislation encourages and facilitates racial profiling and stereotyping. It undermines — not promotes — public safety and the rule of law,” he said. “It will consume already strapped state court and law enforcement resources.”
Nonetheless, despite the dissent from more liberal voices, the bill will undoubtedly have major positive effects in handling illegal immigration in Iowa.
Perhaps if the Biden administration took proper steps to ensure the southern border was secure, states wouldn’t have to take such major action as the Hawkeye State has.
Unfortunately, the world we live in has a spineless president, unable to do what is necessary for American safety.
Hopefully, that will change this November.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Another State Joins Texas, Authorizes State and Local Cops to Soon Begin Arresting Illegal Immigrants appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
How incompetent does the leadership of a national political party have to be to schedule its nominating committee after the deadlines of two states to confirm the party’s nominee to be included on the ballot?
That’s a good question — and one the Democratic National Committee is apparently well-placed to answer.
Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen sent a letter Tuesday to the Alabama Democratic Party and the DNC to inform both groups that the party must, under state law, confirm its presidential and vice presidential candidates by Aug. 15 to be eligible to appear on the state’s ballots in November.
The only problem with that is that Democratic National Convention isn’t scheduled to begin until Aug. 19. Whoops.
Of course, everyone knows that the incumbent, President Joe Biden, will be the Democrats’ nominee again this year, despite some conspiracy theories to the contrary. But that’s not the same as the DNC confirming those nominees to the state.
Letter to AL Democratic Party 4.9.24 by The Western Journal on Scribd
Biden faces a similar problem in Ohio, as The Western Journal reported Monday.
In case you were wondering, the Republican National Convention is scheduled for July 15-18 in Milwaukee, well before the deadlines in both Alabama and Ohio.
Neither state is likely to be competitive, it should be noted. Combined, the two states represent 26 electoral votes that Biden may not even have a shot at, but he probably didn’t have much of a shot at them anyway.
Former President Donald Trump won Ohio by better than 8 points in each of the last two presidential elections, and he demolished his Democratic opponents in Alabama by more than 25 points in both 2016 and 2020.
Still, this isn’t a good look for Team Biden.
So far, the Democrats’ response to the issue has been simple: Rather than replace the people responsible for their terrible planning, they’re simply denying that there’s a problem.
“We’re monitoring the situation in Ohio and we’re confident that Joe Biden will be on the ballot in all 50 states,” a Biden campaign spokesperson told ABC News last week.
After the news about Alabama broke, a Biden campaign spokesperson — perhaps the same one — made a similar statement to Fox News, but actually amped up the denial.
“Joe Biden will be on the ballot in all 50 states,” the unnamed spokesperson said. “State officials have the ability to grant provisional ballot access certification prior to the conclusion of presidential nominating conventions.”
Some state officials may have that ability, but not those in Alabama.
“Under Alabama law, there are no ‘provisional certifications’ for candidates,” the Alabama secretary of state’s office told CNN. “All candidates must comply with current Alabama law to gain ballot access.”
So, back to my original question: How incompetent does the leadership of a national political party have to be to schedule its nominating committee after the deadlines of two states to confirm the party’s nominee to be included on the ballot?
Sit back and grab the popcorn. It looks like we’re about to find out.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Biden Now at Risk of Being Left Off Two State Election Ballots – 26 Electoral College Votes at Stake appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Norfolk Southern Railway has agreed to pay residents in and around East Palestine, Ohio, more than $600 million after one of the company’s trains derailed resulting in an environmental catastrophe.
The Feb. 3, 2023, derailment caused fires that burned for days and emitted chemicals, such as hydrogen chloride and phosgene, into the air and ground.
Residents were ordered to leave the area by Republican Governor Mike DeWine, and a year later the long-term effects of the pollution remain unknown.
Images of the disaster captivated the country:
According to a company news release published on Tuesday morning, Norfolk Southern will pay those affected by the disaster as part of a settlement that is a repose to a class-action lawsuit.
“Norfolk Southern Corporation announced Tuesday that it has reached a $600 million agreement in principle to resolve a consolidated class action lawsuit relating to the East Palestine derailment,” the company said.
Norfolk Southern added, “If approved by the court, the agreement will resolve all class action claims within a 20-mile radius from the derailment and, for those residents who choose to participate, personal injury claims within a 10-mile radius from the derailment.”
The company claimed in its news release that offering to settle was an effort to “to make it right for the people of East Palestine and the surrounding communities.”
Norfolk Southern admitted the calamity had affected drinking water, home values and the health and well-being of those in and around East Palestine.
The company said in addition to the cash settlement, it would continue to help people in the area have access to clean water and would help them prop up the local economy.
“Individuals and businesses will be able to use compensation from the settlement in any manner they see fit to address potential adverse impacts from the derailment,” the company said.
Norfolk Southern added, “This could include healthcare needs and medical monitoring, property restoration and diminution, and compensation for any net business loss.
“In addition, individuals within 10-miles of the derailment may, at their discretion, choose to receive additional compensation for any past, current, or future personal injury from the derailment.”
The company added that it had already invested a sum well in excess of $100 million into the region.
Norfolk Southern also denied it was culpable for the derailment as part of the settlement noting, “This agreement does not include or constitute any admission of liability, wrongdoing, or fault.”
The company said it hopes a federal court will accept the settlement by the end of the month.
People who had been part of the lawsuit could be compensated by the end of the year, pending approval by the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio.
The derailment devastated wildlife and was blamed on improper braking safety and maintenance practices, Bloomberg reported.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
The post Norfolk Southern Announces Massive Settlement for Those Within a 20-Mile Radius of East Palestine appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
Norfolk Southern Announces Massive Settlement for Those Within a 20-Mile Radius of East Palestine | The Gateway Pundit | by Johnathan Jones, The Western Journal
Norfolk Southern denied it was culpable for the catastrophic derailment in a company news release announcing the settlement.
Vaunce News 