Howdy All, a few Interesting Items for your information. Enjoy –
In this issue:
1. RGB
2. Pebble
3. Wuhan Flu
4. PA Supremes
5. CRT
6. Jake
1. RGB. SCOTUS Justice “The Notorious RGB” Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away from cancer a little over a week ago igniting yet another firestorm of anti-Trump commentary. She was brilliant and would have made a heck of a politician from an NE state. Sadly, she was a judge who misused and abused her position to push feminist and leftist issues in her 27 years on the SCOTUS. It took a week for President Trump to nominate Amy Coney Barrett to replace her. Barrett was famous for being attacked by Senators Feinstein and Durbin three years in her confirmation hearings for being too Catholic (a religious test for public office, imagine that). Expect similar assault during the shortened confirmation hearings. This time around, the left has gone after her children, two of whom are adopted from Haiti (remember that the rumored handle on Chief Justice Roberts are irregularities in his adoption) and one of whom is a handicapper. For their part, Senate Republicans immediately got on board, including our three Problem Children, Senators Collins, who is in a tough fight for reelection in Maine, Lisa Murkowski who often defaults to her Orange Man Bad worldview, and Mitt Romney who literally hates Trump but will be tarred and feathered if he votes against confirmation. The ladies initially say they don’t want a vote until after the election, though Lisa has waffled a bit on that position as the days passed. Both McConnell and Graham believe the Republicans already have the votes to confirm. Expect a vote before or immediately after the election. For her part, Ginsburg got too cute. Rather than resigning during the last year or two of O’Bama’s WH infestation, she wanted to be replaced by the first female US President, the never elected Hillary Clinton. She reportedly left a deathbed request (unverified) requesting she not be replaced until a new president is elected in November, once again, attempting to legislate from the Bench.
2. Pebble. The proposed Pebble Mine project in SW AK that has been the subject of virulent leftist opposition for the last three decades made a bit of news last week, with President Trump, Alaska US Senator Dan Sullivan, and an enterprising reporter all participating. President Trump tweeted two weeks ago that there would be no politics involved in the Pebble Mine review process. He promised to do what is right Alaska and our great country. Trump has been under some pressure from both Don Jr. and Tucker Carlson to shut down the permitting process and make sure the process did not proceed. Suzanne Downing’s Must Read Alaska ran a 3-part series on the Pebble Mine by Sandy Szwarc over the last couple weeks making a case for the mine being both a positive economic driver in Alaska and its positive impact on local residents. Part 1 made the case that the mine is a rare earth mine in addition to a copper and gold mine. Part 2 reviewed the reality of life in the region for those without commercial fishing permits. The final Part 3 reviewed a permitting process that favors the opposition. This is the most in-depth analysis of the issue I have read in 20 years up here and is well worth your time to follow the links. At its bottom line, Pebble is one of the US responses to the Chinese Communist Party’s attempt to corner the market on rare earth minerals / metals, ironically most used in high tech devices like, say renewable energy generation and batteries for electric vehicles. Opposition to this mine ends up putting China in charge of our high-tech industries. With that being said, we also have a campaign for US Senate going on up here, with incumbent Dan Sullivan running against a very well-funded “independent” former orthopedic surgeon named Al Gross. Gross is fully backed by the usual suspects on the political left and has been inundating Alaska airways in radio and TV ads for at least the last couple of months. As part of his campaign, Gross is schwacking away at Sullivan for Sullivan’s failure to come out against Pebble. Last week, Sullivan did. It took the CEO of the Pebble Partnership running his mouth in a meeting about his political clout to so-called investors to get that done. A few enterprising greens got themselves a meeting with the Pebble Partnership posing as investors and did the Project Veritas routine recording the conversation. They released the audio a week or so ago and the fecal matter hit the rotating machinery. The CEO, Tom Collier resigned. Sadly, Sullivan formally came out against the mine, much to the distress of resource development people here in the state who spent much of the last week beating his campaign to a pulp, and the unbridled glee of the political left in the state. This is not the first time Sullivan has done something like this, choosing to respond poorly to the Billy Bush Trump tape NBC released as a kill shot in 2016. At that time, he rescinded his endorsement of Trump because of women. He was also chewed out by supporters for weeks afterwards. Overall, Sullivan has been a particularly good, reliable US Senator. What he can do to stop a commercial mine on state land remains to be seen. All he really has to do is to allow the process to complete itself, which is after all, what we have the process for. Personally? I think Pebble gets built. And we will know about approval shortly after the election.
3. Wuhan Flu. As the Whuan Flu pandemic winds down and election day approaches, only have a couple stories this week.
- First story is the Deep Staters at the FDA are diddling the ability of companies developing vaccines to deal with the virus to get them quickly to the general public. The FDA is expected to ask manufacturers of the vaccine who are requesting emergency authorizations (quicker than normal approval) to follow participants in late-stage clinical trials for at least two months on average starting after they receive the second vaccine shot. This will add a minimum of two months to the approval process. There are other demands that make the emergency approval process nearly as cumbersome as a full approval process. And the media is on top of this, noting that any pressure by the WH or HHS on the FDA is little more than election year politics. Add to this democrat active questioning the safety of the new vaccines, playing into the fears of the anti-vax crowd. The news was leaked to the WP before the WH was notified of the proposed new requirements.
- In similar news, Trump got himself into an argument with the head of the CDC who told a Senate Committee that masks were better at protecting against the virus than a potential vaccine, something that President Trump vehemently disagreed with shortly afterwards.
- Final story comes out of Nashville, where a series of e-mails from the Mayor’s office released to the general public show that the number of Wuhan Flu cases were so low that the mayor’s office and the Metro Health Department decided to keep the results secret so as to keep his lockdown of bars and restaurants in place. And yes, the mayor is a democrat. The mayor knew about the low number of cases in bars and restaurants and shut them down anyway, keeping the actual data from the general public. The mayor claimed to be falsely accused.
4. PA Supremes. Five elected democrats on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court had themselves quite a week as they figured out how to kick the Green Party off the state ballot in a 5 -2 ruling that found the original nominating documents were missing candidate affidavits. As such, the initial qualification of the Green Party for November was invalid. This helps Biden and his democrats. They topped that ruling a few days later when they ruled by another 5 – 2 majority that ballots could still be counted if they were received up to 3 days after Election Day regardless of a postmark or other proof of mailing is illegible. These democrats explained that disqualifying a ballot without a postmark would “… disenfranchise a voter based upon the absence or illegibility of a USPS postmark that is beyond the control of a voter once she places her ballot in the USPS delivery system.” Note that this apparently only applies to idiot female voters rather than idiot male ones. This essentially rewrites election law in PA, allowing ballot harvesting and destruction so as to ensure democrats have sufficient votes to win the state, and gives them three solid days after Election Day to manufacture them, which is apparently all they think they need to steal the election in PA. Mark Levin was irate, demanding that the PA legislature convene and set the rules for selecting electors, something specifically reserved to state legislatures by Article II of the US Constitution. Article II does not mention any state court play in this at all.
5. CRT. Evie Magazine ran a piece a week ago entitled Critical Race Theory (CRT) Root Of Our Current Unrest, And They’re Teaching It In Schools. Before they dive into the Frankfurt School, the author asks if the rest of us have noticed how often questions that may lead to uncovering uncomfortable truths are quickly deemed as “conspiracy theories” by media. This is an effective tactic of censorship, essentially weaponizing ridicule. In the past, conspiracy theories had some element of the supernatural. Today, the conspiracy theory label is used to shut down inquiry and silence dissent. Public ridicule has been weaponized as a form of social control, essentially political correctness in action. The Frankfurt School slanders opponents of Critical Race Theory as pushing the conspiracy theory of Cultural Marxism. The Frankfurt School’s 12-point plan to subvert Western civilization includes the following:
- Creation of racism offenses
- Continual changes to create confusion
- Teaching of sex and deviant sexuality to children
- Undermining of schools and teacher’s authority
- Huge immigration to destroy identity
- Promotion of excessive drinking
- Emptying of churches
- Unreliable legal system with a bias against victims of crime
- Dependency on the state or state benefits
- Control and dumbing down of media
- Encouraging the breakdown of the family
The question for the reader is which one of these is NOT playing out in our culture today? Before CRT, we had a right to defend our property. Not so anymore. And this sort of worldview is being promulgated in academia, education at all levels, especially in occupations that never have to actually do or fix anything. Solution? Quit subsidizing it at the federal and state levels. A related story comes out of BLM, which last week removed it’s What We Believe page on its web site, the page that included all the anti-male, anti-family objectives of these self-described Marxists. As with any self-described Marxist organization, the money raised by BLM is now showing up in other places. One $200,000 tranche was used to purchase a house, which moderately surprises me as I thought it all ended up in the DNC and Biden campaign coffers.
6. Jake. Last story comes out of Omaha, where a bar owner who shot a looter in May and was initially cleared of all charges was indicted in September after a mob showed up at the home of the prosecutor. The prosecutor complied with mob demands for justice, indicted the bar owner who committed suicide a couple weeks ago much to the delight of at least one democrat legislator. Jake Gardner, owner of the Hive bar in Omaha was a former Marine who suffered Traumatic Brain Injury while on active duty. The attempted looting took place on the third night of the Floyd riots in May. The looter had been engaged in vandalism earlier in the evening. The County Attorney concluded that Gardner acted in self-defense. The visit by the mob triggered a special prosecutor who obtained an indictment. A basic lesson here is that mob justice is not justice at all.
More later –
– AG
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