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Monday, October 19, 2020

Voting Alone

 


Howard Husock explains why he will be voting on Election Day.  In a column at City Journal,  Mr. Husock's column starts off (h/t Stephen Green at Instapundit):

Voting Alone : Why I won’t be casting my ballot early—and why you shouldn’t, either.

Even as the presidential campaign continues, an estimated 6 million Americans in 27 states have already voted. Early voting is now a fact of electoral life. I will not be joining in the habit, however—and I urge you not to do so, either.

Voting early is akin to boxing referees declaring one fighter the winner on points halfway through the bout—not knowing that a knockout punch was on its way. It may be hard to imagine what revelation about the candidates, at this point, would make much of a difference. But history has demonstrated such possibilities. 

Even before the Hunter Biden laptop made its way into the headlines.  The rest of Mr. Husock’s column is here.

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Sunday, October 18, 2020

Steyn on the GOP: “A Useless Political Party”

 


Mark Steyn weighed in on this insane election cycle, censorship in the media, the “useless political party,” and more.  He begins:

If anybody is around to write history in a generation or two, October 14th 2020 will go down as the first day of a new Year Zero. Yesterday, with less than three weeks to go in a national election in a settled democratic society with an ostensibly free press, the woke billionaires of the social media cartel decided to freeze and/or cancel the Twitter/Facebook accounts of the President's press secretary, the Trump campaign, Republican Senate candidates and Republican House members.

So America is now formally a one-party state, at least as far as fair access to media platforms is concerned. 

He ran an image of what looks to me like an old mimeograph machine.

Mark concludes:

What's next? And by "next" I mean Wednesday November 4th. Look for more woke pressure on website registrars and banks and credit card companies to cease doing business with Breitbart and Daily Caller and, well, me:

A couple of years back I used a phrase, not entirely in jest, on one of our Clubland Q&As with reference to the death of the big, messy, sprawling, decentralized internet of the turn of the century that I miss so much since it was replaced by a tyranny of ever more doctrinaire and capricious thought commissars. And I said that one day we'll be disseminating SteynOnline via the last rusting Xerox machine in the woods. Well, the day of the last rusting photocopier in the woods is heading towards us very fast.

Eight years ago conservatives blew $1 billion trying to drag Mitt Romney across the finish line so that he could become president and spend the next four years screwing us over. Imagine what that billion dollars could've done starting an alternative to PayPal or Facebook...

If Lindsey Graham and Martha McSally and the Republican Senate survive on November 3rd, so be it. But those of us who've expended our energies dragging this useless political party across the finish line every two years need to get serious about redeploying our fast depleting resources into fighting on the turf that matters. We are well past the eleventh hour.

Mark’s full column is here.  And I wonder if any in Congress – or on the state and local levels -- are able to move the GOP party back to core conservative values.  President Trump is one man, and he’s been up against both parties in the swamp that is DC.

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Saturday, October 17, 2020

Trump auto rally today in Cleveland

There was a Trump auto rally today in Cleveland, not that you would have known about it if you were checking cleveland.com.  An eyewitness reports that the parade stretched out over more than a mile on westbound I-90.  Fox 8 posted a video. (The video will pop up if you don't have an ad blocker.)

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Panic at the Polls?

 


Alan Bergstein column at American Thinker today is titled “It’s Starting to Look Ugly for Democrats.”  It’s hard to know for sure.  Most of the alternative media sources that I go to are split between predicting a Trump landslide and a Biden landslide.  Jokers in the deck include missing ballots, fake polls, outright voter fraud and ballot harvesting, and ongoing attempts to undermine election deadlines, voter ID requirements, and so on. Anyway, here is Mr. Bergstein’s conclusion:

The foundation of Biden's campaign is cracking.  Something drastic has to be done, now at the finish line, to panic the voters, to short-circuit the voting process, to divert voters' attention, to basically destroy the election and eventually declare the outcome null and void.  How to do this and what to expect in the days ahead?  Nothing's off the table for the radical left.

Look for those vandalous thugs in the armies of the BLM and Antifa, who, in recent years, were in Spring Training, to be called out in the next two weeks to strike fear into the hearts of America.  If polling places were to be vandalized and destroyed prior to November 3, could there not be a demand by the Schumers and Pelosis to call the election null and void due to "the denial of voting opportunities"?  If vehicles toting completed ballots were hijacked, what then of a reliable count?  Do you recall the two Black Panthers in Philadelphia during the 2008 voting process who physically and verbally intimidated voters in front of a polling station to vote in support of Barack Obama?  They were exonerated by Obama's wing man, Eric Holder.  It worked then for the Democrats, and look for more like that to occur by November 3.

The Democrats cannot afford to lose this election. If they do, they have no one else to blame but their leaders.  The effrontery to all of us to put an obviously ailing and incoherent Joe Biden for the top spot and for the V.P., Kamala Harris, who couldn't even carry her own state in the primaries, indicates their lack of judgment.  They are at wit's end and will risk the destruction of the nation to regain power.  They are capable of anything.  And that's scary.  Watch out!

Read the rest here.

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Friday, October 16, 2020

Fauci would like to cancel Thanksgiving

 


Rick Moran at PJ Media reported that “Dr. Fauci Tells American To Bite The Bullet and Sacrifice Thanksgiving":

First, CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield warned that sharing Thanksgiving dinner indoors with a group of loved ones was very, very dangerous. Now, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the Mendacious Midget™, is joining the chorus. In an interview with Norah O’Donnell on CBS News, the media darling said the following about the holiday:

That is unfortunately a risk, when you have people coming from out of town, gathering together in an indoor setting. It is unfortunate, because that’s such a sacred part of American tradition — the family gathering around Thanksgiving. But that is a risk.

Given the fluid and dynamic nature of what’s going on right now in the spread and the uptick of infections, I think people should be very careful and prudent about social gatherings, particularly when members of the family might be at a risk because of their age or their underlying condition… You may have to bite the bullet and sacrifice that social gathering, unless you’re pretty certain that the people that you’re dealing with are not infected.

"Sacrifice that social gathering"?  To quote General Anthony McAuliffe:  “NUTS!”  (Mr. Moran’s full report is here.)

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Enthusiasm gap, ballot fraud, and censorship

 

JD Rucker at NOQ Report weighs in on the final run-up to the election.  He opens with a photo of the Biden-Harris campaign event in Arizona:

Nobody showed up. That’s not hyperbole. There weren’t hundreds or dozens or even a few supporters there. They had literally ZERO fans come out for their first official joint campaign event.

Trump supporters have all the enthusiasm, but Biden supporters have election fraud on their side.  Over the past few weeks, I collected links to reports on voter fraud, ballot irregularities, mis-directed ballot applications, etc. in various states, including Ohio.  As of today, I have collected more than 30 reports. So now back to Mr. Rucker:

There has never been a more important election in any of our lifetimes. Both sides feel this way and are putting everything into helping their ticket win. Conservatives recognize the dangers a Biden-Harris presidency represents, so we’re doing everything we can to spread the truth. Leftists deny their own prosperity before the COVID-19 lockdowns and refuse to see the progress we’ve made in recent months. They’ve allowed their Trump Derangement Syndrome to supersede logic while suppressing their doubts in the efficacy of a Biden-Harris administration. But suppressing doubts does not equate to enthusiasm. That’s why images and videos like these exist, and why nobody in mainstream media is willing to talk about it.

Even knowing the truth, we cannot assume that everyone else knows it. We have to continue to press the issue on packing the courts, Russiagate, Hunter Biden’s crimes in Ukraine, Kamala Harris’ radical progressivism, and Joe Biden’s fading mental acuity. Mainstream media may be a joke to many of us, but their reach is still strong. Big Tech is fighting the truth as well, which is why stories like these must be shared far and wide.

It is incumbent on patriots to keep fighting the good fight for President Trump on behalf of this nation. Everything political is at stake right now. We cannot let the left and mainstream media hide the truth.

Mr. Rucker's full article is here

We are witnessing jaw-dropping censorship on Big Tech media of the Joe/Hunter Biden scandal.  We are also witnessing the lockdowns on Twitter or Facebook accounts including those of the White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany, Sebastian Gorka, and even the Trump campaign.  Pass on these links wherever you can, especially this one to Sundance at Conservative Treehouse.

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Thursday, October 15, 2020

More on today's Revolution

 


Yesterday’s link was to Victor Davis Hanson’s “The Fragments of A Civilization” and a section subtitled “Sleepwalking to the Revolution.”  Today, Ron Lipsman at American Thinker expands on that theme and summarizes what conservative Americans are up against with the Progressive left.  In “The Revolution the US Is Experiencing, and What If It Succeeds?,” he concludes:

Two final thoughts. First, even if by some miracle, the Dems do not take control of the Presidency and both Houses of Congress in January, it is just a matter of time until they do. The flood of illegal immigration and the brainwashing – in school and by the media – continue unabated. It is inevitable that conservative America will be reduced to a voting minority. And then the revolution will be unstoppable.  

On the other hand, perhaps I am underestimating the strength, character and wisdom of the American people. I recall vividly the fear I felt in 1967 and 1968 when American cities were burning, a savage war tore at the very fabric of our society, riots determined the selection of a president, and we seemed on the cusp of revolutionary change. It didn’t happen. The good sense of the American people prevailed as we restored order and proceeded to rely on our traditional beliefs and values to right the ship.  Perhaps we shall again.

Mr. Lipsman’s article is here.  Some of the comments published with the article are perceptive, if rather depressing.

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Wednesday, October 14, 2020

Sleepwalking to the Revolution

 

Destruction, from The Course of Empire by Thomas Cole (1836).  Image via Wikipedia 


The great Victor Davis Hanson published a piece at National Review Online, a site that I don’t generally visit. However, his essay, “The Fragments of A Civilization,” was linked on some of the aggregators, and it is worth a read.  He takes on Hillary, the Russia hoax, the Mueller investigation, the 2020 debates, Joe Biden’s virtual campaign, and more. His essay closes with:

To paraphrase Sophocles, 2020 saw many strange things and nothing stranger than peak Trump derangement syndrome, COVID-19, a self-induced recession, our first national quarantine, and riots, looting, and arson, all mostly unpunished and uncontrolled, in our major cities.

So we are in revolutionary times, even as we snooze about a recent systematic effort, hidden with great effort by our own government, to destroy a prior presidential campaign and transition, and now a presidency.

We are asked to vote for a candidate who will not reveal his position on any major issue of our age, because he feels to do so would enlighten the undeserving electorate and thereby cost him the election. So we continue to sleepwalk toward a revolution whose architects warped our institutions in 2016–2020, and they now plan to alter many of them beyond recognition in 2021.

Translated, that means that they don’t regret what they did in 2016–2019, only that they belatedly got caught for a brief time.

And so by changing the rules after 2020, they are vowing never ever to get caught again.

The full article is here.

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Monday, October 12, 2020

Proclamation on Columbus Day, 2020

 

Image via Liberty Daily


 

Proclamation on Columbus Day, 2020

More than 500 years ago, Christopher Columbus’s intrepid voyage to the New World ushered in a new era of exploration and discovery.  His travels led to European contact with the Americas and, a century later, the first settlements on the shores of the modern day United States.  Today, we celebrate Columbus Day to commemorate the great Italian who opened a new chapter in world history and to appreciate his enduring significance to the Western Hemisphere.

When Christopher Columbus and his crew sailed across the Atlantic Ocean on the Niña, Pinta, and Santa María it marked the beginning of a new era in human history.  For Italian Americans, Christopher Columbus represents one of the first of many immeasurable contributions of Italy to American history.  As a native of Genoa, Columbus inspired early immigrants to carry forth their rich Italian heritage to the New World.  Today, the United States benefits from the warmth and generosity of nearly 17 million Italian Americans, whose love of family and country strengthen the fabric of our Nation.  For our beautiful Italian American communities — and Americans of every background –Columbus remains a legendary figure.

Sadly, in recent years, radical activists have sought to undermine Christopher Columbus’s legacy.  These extremists seek to replace discussion of his vast contributions with talk of failings, his discoveries with atrocities, and his achievements with transgressions.  Rather than learn from our history, this radical ideology and its adherents seek to revise it, deprive it of any splendor, and mark it as inherently sinister.  They seek to squash any dissent from their orthodoxy.  We must not give in to these tactics or consent to such a bleak view of our history.  We must teach future generations about our storied heritage, starting with the protection of monuments to our intrepid heroes like Columbus.  This June, I signed an Executive Order to ensure that any person or group destroying or vandalizing a Federal monument, memorial, or statue is prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

I have also taken steps to ensure that we preserve our Nation’s history and promote patriotic education.  In July, I signed another Executive Order to build and rebuild monuments to iconic American figures in a National Garden of American Heroes.  In September, I announced the creation of the 1776 Commission, which will encourage our educators to teach our children about the miracle of American history and honor our founding.  In addition, last month I signed an Executive Order to root out the teaching of racially divisive concepts from the Federal workplace, many of which are grounded in the same type of revisionist history that is trying to erase Christopher Columbus from our national heritage.  Together, we must safeguard our history and stop this new wave of iconoclasm by standing against those who spread hate and division.

On this Columbus Day, we embrace the same optimism that led Christopher Columbus to discover the New World.  We inherit that optimism, along with the legacy of American heroes who blazed the trails, settled a continent, tamed the wilderness, and built the single-greatest nation the world has ever seen.

In commemoration of Christopher Columbus’s historic voyage, the Congress, by joint resolution of April 30, 1934, modified in 1968 (36 U.S.C. 107), has requested the President proclaim the second Monday of October of each year as “Columbus Day.”

NOW, THEREFORE, I, DONALD J. TRUMP, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim October 12, 2020, as Columbus Day.  I call upon the people of the United States to observe this day with appropriate ceremonies and activities.  I also direct that the flag of the United States be displayed on all public buildings on the appointed day in honor of our diverse history and all who have contributed to shaping this Nation.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this ninth day of October, in the year of our Lord two thousand twenty, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and forty-fifth.

DONALD J. TRUMP

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Sunday, October 11, 2020

The Great Barrington Declaration says to end the lockdown

 

James Arlandson at American Thinker reports:  

Over 18,000 (and growing) medical public health scientists and medical practitioners have signed the Great Barrington Declaration, pleads with the various governments around the world to end the lockdowns and open the economy. As of right now, over 166,000 members of the general public have also signed the petition.

Here are some key points: 

Current lockdown policies are producing devastating effects on short and long-term public health. ...

Keeping these measures in place until a vaccine is available will cause irreparable damage, with the underprivileged disproportionately harmed. ...

Fortunately, our understanding of the virus is growing. We know that vulnerability to death from COVID-19 is more than a thousand-fold higher in the old and infirm than the young. Indeed, for children, COVID-19 is less dangerous than many other harms, including influenza. ...

Those who are not vulnerable should immediately be allowed to resume life as normal ...

Schools and universities should be open for in-person teaching.

Extracurricular activities, such as sports, should be resumed. 

Young low-risk adults should work normally, rather than from home.  

Restaurants and other businesses should open.

Follow the science? Everyone knows why the democrat states continue the lockdown, long past the curve being flattened back in April, which was the original goal.

Read the rest here.

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Saturday, October 10, 2020

Handy summary of Russia Russia Russia

Via Bookwormroom:

click to embiggen or go to the Bookworm link here and scroll down.

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Friday, October 9, 2020

Trump to hold largest virtual rally on Friday, Oct 9

 

President Donald Trump will hold the “largest virtual rally” on Rush Limbaugh’s radio program on Friday, October 9. From Rush Limbaugh’s website:

Number one. How incredible was Vice President Pence last night? He was stand-up-and-cheer outstanding. It was just… it was great.

And number two. I’m thrilled to announce that our commander-in-chief, President Donald Trump, will be right here tomorrow hosting the largest virtual rally in radio history. Be sure to tune in. You don’t want to miss this. It will be special. And I am really looking forward to it.

Now, later today, folks, we’re gonna be posting more details on the Rush Limbaugh website and on the Rush Limbaugh Facebook page. So keep a sharp eye out there. And you know what? There’s gonna be a special in-box set up for you to send your questions for President Trump. So be thinking of things you’d like to ask him today, and then get ready for the largest virtual rally in radio history tomorrow.

Oh — and, folks, thank you again for all of your continued prayers. I am so moved by your support. You know that I know and believe that they work. And I cannot tell you how appreciative my family and I are for all of you. Thank you, again, very much. 

Greater Cleveland area listeners can tune in on Friday at noon to WTAM Radio 1100.

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Thursday, October 8, 2020

A Voter-Fraud Nightmare in November

 

Justin Haskins is, I think, rightfully concerned about the November elections – at all levels.  His column at Townhall ("America Is Headed For A Voter-Fraud Nightmare in November") concludes:

Never before has America’s political class so willingly and eagerly marched the country toward predictable and preventable chaos. Mail-in balloting is, in fact, not a truly secure way of holding an election. Even if large-scale fraud does not occur, the perception will be that it did, and that should have been enough for politicians concerned about voters’ faith in the election process to enact policies that would have encouraged in-person balloting, a much safer route.

Unfortunately, that did not occur, so unless it’s a total blowout on Election Day, it seems inevitable the country is on the road to disaster. When we get there, Americans should know who to blame.

That would be the political class – D’s for aggressively pushing mail-in voting (and attempting to extend the deadline for counting ballots well past Election Day) and R’s for not aggressively pushing back.  Our household will be voting in person on Election Day.  Mr. Haskins's column is here.

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Wednesday, October 7, 2020

COVID-19 and risk

 

Guest post by PatD:

CDC recently updated estimated infection fatality rates for COVID. Here are the updated survival rates by age group:

0-19: 99.997%

20-49: 99.98%

50-69: 99.5% 

70+: 94.6%

Remember also that 94% of the fatalities had other morbidities, such as obesity, diabetes, heart disease and cancer, according to the CDC. 

If you are old like me, or our overweight President, you face a greater risk, but, for most people the chances of dying from COVID-19 are minimal. Yet, we are destroying the lives of children by keeping schools shut down for most of the year. We are destroying countless small businesses for a virus that is less deadly than the flu. We have shut down live sports and entertainment for no good reason.

We all know of people who have died with COVID-19. But we know of far more people who have died from other causes, such as traffic accidents, drowning, murder, cancer, heart disease and so on. The problem is we not balancing out the risk factors.

For example, we lose 37,000 people a year in traffic accidents. From 1899 to 2013, it is estimated 3.6 million people died in traffic accidents. Unlike COVID-19, people will continue to die in traffic accidents for the foreseeable future. If we cut the speed limit to 15 mph and require vehicles to be limited to a top speed of 15 mph, we would just about eliminate those deaths. But society won't do that. The convenience and time savings from much higher speed limits outweigh the risk of dying in a traffic accident.

The treatment the President received was little different from that received by most hospitalized COVID-19 patients. The only difference was that he was given an experimental therapeutic that is not yet approved for general use. Our healthcare system has learned a lot since March and the death rates are dropping as better therapies are used to treat patients. 

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VP Debate tonight

 

Stephen Green, a/k/a Vodkapundit will drunkblog the Vice Presidential debate tonight, so you don’t have to watch. 

It should be lots of fun drunkblogging the three of them butting heads, and so I do hope you’ll tune in for it on the PJM homepage at about 8:45 p.m. Eastern on Wednesday.

That’s PJ Media's homepage here.



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Tuesday, October 6, 2020

Trump sign in California

Overnight someone erected a massive Trump sign on the hills along the 405 Freeway in the Sepulveda Pas.  According to local media “the sign supporting President Trump faced northbound lanes near Getty Center Drive. The white lettering appears to be around 10 feet tall and mimics the style of the landmark Hollywood sign.”

Here's 27 seconds of fun via Conservative Treehouse:


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Monday, October 5, 2020

Democrat Projection

 

I first came across Caroline Glick ‘s columns at The Jerusalem Post. Over the weekend, Instapundit linked to her post at her own website.  It’s an excellent essay, and it concludes:

And this brings us to Democrat projection. Since the impeachment hearings last January, Democrat lawmakers and aligned media have been pushing the claim that Trump will refuse to accept the election results if he loses. Just as Trump is repeatedly asked whether he condemns white supremacists, he and his campaign advisors have been asked repeatedly by reporters whether he intends to concede if the results of the election are not in his favor. At Tuesday’s debate, Wallace continued the practice. He asked the candidates to pledge to accept the election results.

Biden quickly agreed. Trump refused to play the sucker’s game.

The President noted that the Democrats still haven’t accepted the results of the 2016 elections and tried to oust him from power through false allegations of collusion with Russia that Clinton invented while working with Russia. He also pointed out the ease with which mail-in votes can be, and allegedly already are being falsified by Democrats.

It is impossible to know how the election will pan out or when, if ever, the true results will be known. What is clear however is that if you want to understand who the Democrats are and what they are doing, all you need to do is look at what they are accusing Trump and his colleagues of being and of doing.

Read the rest here.

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Sunday, October 4, 2020

WalkAway March -- in DC !!!

 

Brandon Straka organized another WalkAway march in DC yesterday.  Impressive turnout – and in DC!  (video approx. 34 seconds)

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Friday, October 2, 2020

Mark your calendars

 


Important dates from our friends at Buckeye Firearms:

October 5: Voter Registration Deadline in Ohio

October 31: Absentee / Mail-In Voting Ballot Deadlines

November 3: Election Day


For what it is worth, our household plans to vote in person on Election Day. If you are concerned about safety, make plans to go with family, neighbors, and friends.
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Dr. Ronny Jackson on President & Mrs. Trump

Via PJ Media:

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Thursday, October 1, 2020

The Mask Empire

On Frontpage, Jack Kerwick reports on The Mask Empire:

Specifically, we spoke about the rise of Mask Empire.

I tried explaining that world renowned scientists—as opposed to career bureaucrats like Anthony Fauci—have demonstrated repeatedly that masks, particularly the kinds of cloth and surgical masks that have become a daily feature of the general public, are ineffective in preventing people from getting infected with COVID-19.  Masks can even be dangerous, both vis-à-vis COVID, as well as with respect to the exacerbation of other health issues.

In fact, even some of these bureaucrats have, at one time, conceded the truth of the science behind COVID and masks.

. . .

Anthony Fauci himself remarked in March, on the eve of the peak of The Virus:

“There’s no reason to be walking around with a mask.  When you’re in the middle of an outbreak wearing a mask might make people feel a little bit better, and it might even block a droplet, but it’s not providing the perfect protection people think that it is.”

. . .

Face masks can pose health risks.

. . .

The bottom line is this:

The science, as the left likes to say, is settled.  Masks, particularly of the kind that are in vogue among the public, are theater.  For the elites that mandate their use, they are a means to augment their power and exert control over the masses.    

Read all about it here.  And right on cue over at cleveland.com, we have today’s headline:

Gov. Mike DeWine says Ohioans will wear masks for years, after new study finds just 1.5% of state had coronavirus antibodies in July

Insane.  Read the report here, if you can stand to.   

Contact Gov. Mike DeWine: (614) 644-4357 or by email  https://governor.ohio.gov/wps/portal/gov/governor/contact

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Wednesday, September 30, 2020

Joe Biden’s sign falls down

 


Headline at PJ Media:

Who Could Blame It: Biden 'Build Back Better' Sign 
Commits Suicide During Rare Campaign Appearance

Almost buried amidst all the post-debate commentary was one short video of Joe Biden making a speech earlier today in Cleveland.  As if to serve as a metaphor, his “Build Back Better” sign fell off the lectern. The big drop happens at :27 or so. (The video is not coming up in any searches, so click here and scroll down. 

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Tuesday, September 29, 2020

Air Force One flies into Hopkins

Seen overhead at 3:23pm


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Drunk blogging tonight's debate

 


Most of us will be watching this evening's debate on TV or on livestream . . . assuming the debate actually takes place.  Good news, though.  You don't have to watch it, since Mr. Vodkapundit will be live drunkblogging it.  Here's his announcement from PJ Media:

Programming note:  Come back to the PJ Media homepage tonight at about 8:45pm Eastern/5:45pm Pacific for the Official VodkaPundit Debate Drunkblog.

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Monday, September 28, 2020

Verifying signatures on absentee ballots: a win in Ohio

 

Andrew J. Tobias reports at cleveland.com:

A group of voting-rights activists has suffered a legal defeat
in their attempt to challenge Ohio's system of verifying signatures
on absentee ballot applications.

A federal judge has ruled Ohio’s system of verifying signatures on absentee ballot applications is not burdensome enough to be struck down as illegal, rejecting arguments made by a coalition of voting-rights groups that sued the state.

U.S. District Judge Michael Watson wrote that while Ohio’s signature-matching requirements impose a “moderate" burden on voters, they have other options to cast a ballot if their vote is improperly rejected, including casting a provisional ballot on Election Day. He agreed with Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose that the state has a legitimate interest in promoting an orderly and secure election, justifying that burden.

. . .

Watson’s ruling is technically just an early loss for the voting-rights groups, which could continue to seek a trial or appeal to a higher court. But it makes it significantly less likely their case will succeed, especially given that the election is only 37 days away.

Read the full report here.

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Sunday, September 27, 2020

Precedents in SCOTUS nominations

 


Instapundit has the goods (click to embiggen if necessary):

DON’T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY: But the important thing to Alyssa Milano is that someone is paying attention to Alyssa Milano.

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Friday, September 25, 2020

Pamela Geller: Big Tech censorship and the Election

 

At American Thinker, Pamela Geller comments on Allum Bokhari’s new book on Big Tech censorship.  It’s worse than we thought.  Ms. Geller begins:

Allum Bokhari, the senior technology correspondent at Breitbart News, has performed an extraordinarily valuable service by giving us his new book #Deleted: Big Tech’s Battle to Erase the Trump Movement and Steal the Election

. . .

In #Deleted, Allum Bokhari tells the whole shocking story. For those who don’t realize the implications of what is going on, he includes a Prologue entitled “The Typewriter That Talked Back” that is as amusing as it is disturbing, and that makes abundantly clear even to the most technically challenged among us what is really happening to our foremost and most important freedom, right under our noses. Bokhari paints a vivid picture of a 1968 in which a typewriter refuses to type, typing instead its own message: “We regret to inform you that your last letter violated our terms of service (Rule 32: Abusive & Offensive Content). We have suspended access to your typewriter for 24 hours.” Newsstands remove from sale magazines that third-party “fact-checkers” have deemed to be “fake news.” The Post Office returns your mail because you told a joke in a letter that a censor found offensive.

It’s all funny until you realize that all this is exactly what email providers and big tech censors are doing to Americans today, every day on the Internet. In the pre-Internet world of 1968, it would have been preposterous. Americans would not have accepted it. But it has all happened gradually, as we gave away our freedom by clicking our agreement to dense and unreadable Terms of Service that turned over our right to say what we believe to shadowy, anonymous guardians of acceptable opinion. Most Americans today are only dimly aware, at best, that it is happening at all, and those that are approach it with grim resignation. After all, what are you going to do? Start your own Facebook?

Having been one of the early targets of social media censorship on Facebook, YouTube et al, I have for many years advocated for anti-trust action against these bullying behemoths. Bokhari makes an airtight case in #Deleted for why such action is necessary.

Read the full column here.  And it’s scary to think that even if millions of Facebook users cancelled their accounts, nothing would change.

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Thursday, September 24, 2020

Today’s meme on next week's debate

The Trump - Biden debate is scheduled for next Tuesday, Sept. 29 in Cleveland.  Will it actually take place? Meme via Patriot Post:

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Tuesday, September 22, 2020

Boos for Gov. DeWine

 

Paula Bolyard at PJ Media reports on the Trump rally in Dayton and his introduction of Gov. Mike DeWine:

President Trump, as is customary at these events, introduced Republican Gov. Mike DeWine at his rally in Dayton, Ohio, on Monday—only to have the audience loudly boo the governor, who had imposed a statewide masking order in July that has been wildly unpopular with the president’s base.

“We’re joined today by a real good friend of mine, somebody that’s been with me from the beginning and I’ve been with him from the beginning, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine,” the president began. “Where’s Mike?” he asked, to a spattering of applause. Trump looked around, seemingly unable to spot DeWine in the crowd—and then the boos began. “What’s that all about?” he quipped, looking a bit confused. “He’s opening up,” Trump said, trying to defend the governor. “He’s a good man.”

The rest of the report is here.  President Trump describes Gov. DeWine as “a good man”?  The Ohio Governor who keeps moving the goalposts on mask mandates and onerous regulations that hamper opening up businesses?  Gov. DeWine seems to have been enjoying his role as a petty tyrant.  Not good.

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Rent-a-mobs: Update by Michelle Malkin


Sunrise logo (yes, the outfit has its own logo) via Wikipedia

Michelle Malkin is now blogging at UNZ.com.  In her column today, “Sunrise Movement: the Riotous Left's Pot-Banging Brats,” Ms. Malkin names names and puts the endless rioting and violence in context. She begins:

Wake up. The “community organizers” of the left are in full wildebeest mode. Now is not the time for bending down, rolling over or playing nice. From now until Election Day (and likely until the end of the year), you can expect screaming banshees carrying identical, preprinted signs to turn up in the middle of the night at the private homes of elected politicians, Donald Trump campaign and administration officials, law enforcement officers, judges and conservative leaders.

This is not conjecture. A nationwide agitation force milked the dead body of George Floyd to create the current anarchotyranny. Now, in keeping with her dying wish, the mob will use the fresh corpse of Ruth Bader Ginsburg to try to bully Republicans into submission over President Donald Trump’s rightful Supreme Court nomination. The ultimate goal: obstruction and delegitimization of Trump’s reelection.

On cue, a bunch of demonstrators all in matching yellow-and-black T-shirts from the Sunrise Movement turned out in front of South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham’s house in Washington, D.C., this weekend, banging pots, pans and buckets. The disrupters also blasted airhorns, pointed strobe lights at the windows and crashed cymbals to punctuate their collective fit over Ginsburg’s passing. Not a single one was arrested for disturbing the peace.

One organizer shrieked at Graham (who was not at home at the time): “You are an old white man desperately clinging to power that you can’t hold onto much longer because we’re coming for it. And in the meantime, you are not filling that Supreme Court seat. Not on our watch. The people will decide who fills that seat. No justice, no sleep!”

Another threatened: “Anyone who is seeing this can do the same thing to your representative, can do the same thing learning about how to hold them accountable. Make sure they know if they do some evil (expletives), they know there will be consequences for it.”

Shrieker Number One concluded: “We will vote, we will organize, we will strike, and we will keep showing up in your goddamned driveway at the crack of dawn to let you know that WE ARE WIDE AWAKE!”

Who is the Sunrise Movement? It’s as organic as Spam and as genuine as AstroTurf. This full-time rent-a-mob is an adjunct of the Sierra Club (annual budget: $100 million; top donors: Michael Bloomberg, George Soros). The Sierra Club provided five-figure initial seed grants to Sunrise’s educational arm, as well as Beltway office space. Other original funders of Sunrise: The Rockefeller Foundation and Wallace Global Fund (which has also contributed to the George Soros-subsidized Tides CenterColor of Change cancel culture guerilla warriors, and far-left legal policy groups Alliance for Justice and the Brennan Center for Justice).

The Sunrise Movement’s co-founder, Evan Weber, is a former Occupy Wall Street organizer. Two others, Sara Blazevic and Varshini Prakash, are Green New Deal zealots and Bernie Sanders activists who teamed with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to push the Democrats even further left. Prakash serves as an advisory board member of Climate Power 2020 along with Soros-funded Center for American Progress head John Podesta, former Obama administration environmental czar Carol Browner, former Obama administration science czar John Holdren, former Obama administration Secretary of State John Kerry, former Obama administration EPA head Gina McCarthy, and former Obama administration U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power.

Ms. Malkin's full column is here. And guess what?  Here's from the Sunrise Movement's website:

Sunrise is a movement to stop climate change and create millions of good jobs in the process. We currently have 8 hubs in Ohio looking for volunteers including: Athens, Canton, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus, Kent, Oberlin and Youngstown. See website for contact information for each hub.

It sounds so benign.

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