From my friends at Townhall:
Monthly Archives: April 2023
Laws Have Consequences
On Tuesday, Stephen Moore posted an article at Townhall about the current employment situation in America.
The article notes:
A policy question these days that has befuddled federal lawmakers is why so many millions of people have not returned to the workplace in the post-COVID-19 era. The labor force participation rate among employable adults is near a record low today. There are at least 2 million to 4 million employable adults who could and should be working but aren’t.
Very few people with even minimal skills can credibly say they can’t find a job. Employers report some 10 million job openings. Small business owners say their biggest problem is finding competent workers. There are many explanations for why so many people aren’t working — fear of COVID-19, the skills mismatch, more people taking early retirement, and so on. But a major factor is that the federal government is back to doing what it did in the 1970s and 1980s. The welfare state today is paying people not to work — even a single hour.
That problem went away in the 1990s after many states, such as Wisconsin and Michigan, began reforming their welfare systems with work requirements. Then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) and the Republican Congress in 1996 passed a historic bipartisan welfare reform bill that President Bill Clinton signed into law.
The article reports on the results of the passage of that law:
Few laws in the last half-century have had such stunning success. Here is a quick summary of the impact, as reported by Brookings Institution welfare expert Ron Haskins:
No. 1: Caseloads declined by 60%, and the number of welfare recipients fell to its lowest level since 1969.
No. 2: Between 60% and 70% of those leaving welfare got a job.
No. 3: The child poverty rate fell every year between 1994 and 2000 because parents were working.
No. 4: The federal government saved more than $50 billion (almost $100 billion in today’s dollars).
During the Covid pandemic, the work requirements were removed.
The article concludes:
America is a rich nation, and we should absolutely have a safety net so that those who fall on tough times, lose a job or become disabled — and that happens to almost all of us at some point in our lives — do not go hungry or homeless or suffer from deprivation.
But welfare is supposed to be temporary and a hand-up, not a handout. The goal of welfare was to end poverty, not perpetuate it.
House Ways and Means Committee Chair Jason Smith (R-MO) said that restoring work for welfare requirements is “a top priority” of his panel. It should be a top priority for our country. Let’s make work, not welfare, pay.
Let’s put the work requirement back into welfare.
First Our Gas Stoves, Now Our Light Bulbs
Somehow I don’t believe that our Founding Fathers even intended to have the government tell us what kind of stoves we could cook on or what kind of light bulbs we could use. They never dreamed that Americans would tolerate the amount of government overreach we currently tolerate.
On Tuesday, The Washington Examiner reported:
Is there any better way of showing how out of touch you’ve become with your own country than turning the screw on average citizens who are already struggling to afford to feed their families by forcing them to buy … expensive lightbulbs?
This is the Biden administration’s latest act of environmentalist genius: ban incandescent lightbulbs and force people to use only LED bulbs.
The Department of Energy finalized these plans back in April 2022, and full enforcement will begin on Aug. 1, 2023. From that date onward, you’ll be using LED lightbulbs whether you want to or not and whether you can afford them or not; LED bulbs are up to three times more expensive than other soon-to-be-illegal options.
Last year, the Department of Energy, headed by Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, celebrated this legislative agenda with every green buzzword imaginable.
The article notes the savings claimed by the Biden administration:
“Once these light bulb rules are in place, DOE expects consumers to save nearly $3 billion per year on their utility bills,” the Department of Energy said . “In addition to delivering significant cost savings for households, schools, and businesses, these energy efficiency actions also advance President Biden’s climate goals. Over the next 30 years, the rules are projected to cut carbon emissions by 222 million metric tons — an amount equivalent to the emissions generated by 28 million homes in one year.”
But the article fails to mention:
With more than 140 million customers in the electric utility industry, the collective $3 billion of so-called savings amounts to … $21.43 per customer, per year.
…Banning bulbs is just one part of 100 other acts of government overreach that will (supposedly) save families $100 every year. Excuse me if I don’t shriek with gratitude as President Joe Biden “saves” us a few dollars every year while he continues to fuel inflation, which has caused energy prices alone to skyrocket by almost 40% since his first day in office.
This talk of “savings” comes straight from the same deceitful logic used by Biden when he claimed to have lowered inflation. Instead, inflation was going up, but not as quickly. That’s like declaring yourself a firefighting hero after setting your neighbor’s house on fire because the flames aren’t spreading as fast as before.
But the cherry on this particular cake? Those who will suffer most are those who always suffer most: poorer people already brought to their knees by Biden’s economic agenda.
Hold on to your wallets, I suspect that this is only the beginning.
All The Speeches In The World Won’t Make Up For Bad Policies
On Monday, The Conservative Review posted an article about manufacturing in America.
The article reports:
U.S. manufacturing reached its lowest point since the start of the pandemic, according to a report released just as President Joe Biden embarked on a tour of U.S. factories to tout his promise to boost the industry.
On Monday, the Institute for Supply Management’s manufacturing index reached its lowest point, 46.3, since May 2020, Reuters reported. Excluding the pandemic recession, the index, known as PMI (Purchasing Managers’ Index), was at its lowest point since 2009.
PMI is a tool for identifying economic trends in the manufacturing and service sectors based on business conditions at hundreds of major companies. A PMI below 50 indicates decline.
The article concludes:
The Biden administration has made its taxpayer-funded push to build a “clean energy economy” a central part of its plan to boost U.S. manufacturing. But critics have questioned the billions of dollars invested in green energy companies, which have enriched left-wing billionaire megadonors to the Democratic Party along with Chinese manufacturers that source materials for the firms.
The two things that the Trump administration did to bring manufacturing back to America were to lower the tax rate on corporations and to supply dependable and relatively inexpensive energy. President Biden has undone both of those policies. It should also be noted that the minerals needed to create green energy at imported–the Biden administration has blocked the mining of these minerals in America. Even if America were able to switch over to green energy, green energy is not as reliable as fossil fuel and right now it is considerably more expensive. Spain and Germany both attempted to convert to green energy and had to return to fossil fuel to avoid bankrupting their countries. If we continue down the road the Biden administration is taking us down, President Biden will eventually bankrupt America.
A Get-Out-The-Popcorn Moment
On Sunday, The Daily Wire posted an article with an interesting twist of the indictment of President Trump.
The article reports:
Leaked details about Donald Trump‘s indictment are grounds for criminal charges, a top official from the former president’s administration said on Sunday.
John Ratcliffe, a former U.S. congressman and federal prosecutor who served as Trump’s final director of national intelligence, reacted to reports that Trump faces around 30 counts related to business fraud as part of the investigation led by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
“The only felony of which we can be certain to come out of this Alvin Bragg prosecution in New York is the felony committed either by DA Bragg himself or someone on the grand jury that he’s using for this perversion of our justice system,” Ratcliffe told “Sunday Morning Futures” anchor Maria Bartiromo.
“The accused, Donald Trump, and his lawyers, don’t know what’s in this sealed indictment. But for the past, what? Seventy-two hours, the American public has been discussing supposedly 30 or 34 felony counts,” he added. “Leaking grand jury information is a felony. And so the only people capable of that would be Alvin Bragg’s team or members of the grand jury itself.”
…Ratcliffe isn’t the only person saying there could have been criminal leaks. Harvard Law professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz shared a similar view during an appearance on OANN, noting that such a violation of New York penal law could warrant up to five years behind bars.
Are we about to see another situation where Lady Justice takes her blindfold off? At what point do Americans wake up to the fact that the principle of ‘equal justice under the law’ supposedly guaranteed by our Constitution has been thrown under the bus?
This Is Not Good News For The American Economy
Remember when America was energy independent and gas was less than $2 at the pump? Those days are long gone, and if the Biden administration and OPEC have anything to say about it, we will never see them again.
On Monday, CNSNews reported the following:
Saudi Arabia and half a dozen other members of OPEC+ announced on Sunday that they plan to cut up to a combined 1.15 million barrels of oil a day from May until the end of 2023, calling the decision a “precautionary measure” aimed at ensuring market stability.
The unexpected move comes six months after a decision to cut production by two million barrels a day, also through the end of 2023, sparked a serious diplomatic spat between the Biden administration and the kingdom.
…“We don’t think cuts are advisable at this moment given market uncertainty – and we’ve made that clear,” Reuters quoted a U.S. National Security Council spokesperson as saying in response to Sunday’s announcements.
The announcements by the various oil producers made clear that the new cuts were additional to those announced last October, when OPEC+ agreed on a reduction by two million barrels a day until the end of 2023.
That decision, shortly before the U.S. midterm elections, came despite Washington’s appeals for OPEC+ to increase supply. The administration responded bitterly, portraying the move as one that would hurt U.S. interests and benefit Russia’s war in Ukraine.
President Biden warned of “consequences” and White House and State Department officials said the administration would consult with Congress after the midterms and look to “recalibrate” the 70-plus year relationship with Saudi Arabia.
President Biden needs to realize that no one is listening to him. He has undermined the power of America on the world stage to the point where no one cares what he says. The only real way to avoid the economic crisis that this production cut will create is to resume ALL American drilling immediately. Those involved in the extreme environmental movement need to realize that if they crash the American economy, their movement will lose a lot of support and economic clout. America needs to be energy independent for national security purposes and for geopolitical purposes. If we do not turn the Biden administration’s energy policies around quickly, we are in danger of failing as a nation.
This Isn’t A New Strategy
The deep state has been around for a while. I just finished reading The Last Days of Marilyn Monroe by Donald H. Wolfe. I was genuinely shocked by some of the behavior of J. Edgar Hoover, John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Frank Sinatra, and a lot of other people. J. Edgar Hoover consistently broke laws in his surveillance of American citizens and was never held accountable. The activities of some of our leading political figures of the 40’s, 50’s, and 60’s were routinely kept hidden from the public with the cooperation of the media. There really isn’t anything new under the sun.
As shocking as the indictment of President Trump is, that is a political trick that has been done before in a presidential campaign.
On Monday, The Federalist reminded us:
But in evaluating whether Bragg’s charges against Trump are politically motivated, it’s worth remembering that Trump is the second major GOP presidential candidate in less than a decade that has been indicted by a local Democratic district attorney. And in that case, involving former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, the prosecution was redolent of corruption and naked attempts to harm Perry’s national political ambitions.
In 2014, Perry was indicted on two felony charges. The first charge was abuse of official capacity, and the second was coercion of a public servant. Perry’s crime was using the veto power granted to him in the Texas Constitution.
What happened was this: Travis County District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg, a Democrat, was convicted of drunk driving and incarcerated. Working from the Travis County DA’s office, Lehmberg managed the state public integrity unit, a legal office responsible for rooting out public corruption. After she refused to resign her position following a fair bit of criticism over the fact that a person in charge of rooting out public corruption should not be known for being convicted of a crime, Perry threatened to veto the public integrity unit’s $7.5 million budget and eventually did veto the budget.
So the Travis County DA’s office, the very same office where Lehmberg worked, convened a grand jury and indicted Perry. It wasn’t difficult; aside from the old saying that prosecutors could get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich, Travis County is where “the People’s Republic of Austin” is located. It’s a notoriously liberal enclave where it is easy to find a jury politically hostile to Perry, who was an otherwise popular three-term GOP governor.
The outcome was predictable:
As for the charges against Perry, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals eventually dismissed the charges against Perry in a 6-2 ruling. The abuse of official capacity charge was dismissed on the grounds that it violated the separation of powers in the state constitution. It was always the case that Perry had wide latitude and authority to issue a veto in this instance. “The governor’s power to exercise a veto may not be circumscribed by the Legislature, by the courts, or by district attorneys,” noted the ruling by Judge Sharon Keller of the Court of Criminal Appeals.
The second charge, coercion of a public official, was dismissed on the grounds that it was a violation of the First Amendment to say the governor could not threaten to lawfully wield power on the grounds he was intimidating other public officials.
Unless they are stopped, the Democrat party will continue with using the court system to interfere in elections.
From my friends at Townhall:
The Government Giveth And The Government Taketh Away
On Friday, The Epoch Times reported the following:
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) announced Friday that it would propose rules that would make it more difficult for a number of new electric vehicles (EVs) to qualify for tax breaks, according to a news release.
Starting April 18, the IRS will enforce a domestic sourcing requirement for minerals and components used in EV batteries, the agency said. Analysts say that a number of new EVs won’t qualify for a clean vehicle tax credit of $7,500 that was implemented under the Inflation Reduction Act that was passed last year.
…To qualify under the new rules, the IRS said that an EV must have a battery capacity of at least 7 kilowatt hours, have a gross vehicle weight of fewer than 14,000 pounds, be “made by a qualified manufacturer,” and those vehicles have to go through a final assembly in North America. The vehicle also has to be new and the seller has to report “your name and taxpayer identification number to the IRS for you to be eligible to claim the credit,” the release said.
It also said there are price and income caps, including $55,000 for sedans as well as $80,000 for trucks, vans, and SUVs. A list of EV manufacturers was placed on the IRS website.
The article concludes:
John Bozzella, president and CEO of the Alliance for Automotive Innovation, told the outlet that he believes only few of the 90 or so electric vehicles that are on sale in the United States will be eligible for the tax credit starting next month.
“Some EVs will certainly qualify for a partial credit. Given the constraints of the legislation, Treasury’s done as well as it could to produce rules that meet the statute and reflect the current market,” he warned to Reuters.
How many of us can afford to pay upwards of $55,000 for a vehicle? What is behind this push for electric vehicles and the gradual phasing out of gasoline-powered vehicles? The automobile is a major part of American life.
According to House Grail:
In 2017, the average US household owned 1.88 cars. The average US household consisted of 2.54 people which means the average American owns 0.74 cars, although this includes children that would have been too young to drive.
If approximately 75% of the population are old enough to drive, then the driving population owns 0.99 of a car each, on average.
What would be the impact of ending the sale of cars with gasoline engines and replacing them with cars the average American cannot afford? The impact would be the loss of individual freedom. Trips to the grocery store to pick up one or two items would be a thing of the past. Trips would have to be carefully planned. How often would families be able to get together? The family is the building block of our society, what happens when family dinners on holidays are no longer possible?
The push for electric cars is a sham. It is a reach for further government control and less freedom for Americans. Putting cars out of the financial reach of average Americans is not a good idea.
Considering Some State Laws, This Actually Makes Sense
On Sunday, The Daily Wire reported the following:
NBA officials and the National Basketball Players Association reached a new tentative labor agreement over the weekend that no longer penalizes athletes for using marijuana and removes the substance from the league’s drug testing program.
Both parties reached the new seven-year Collective Bargaining Agreement early Saturday morning, which still needs players and team governors to ratify the deal before becoming official.
Recreational use of marijuana is legal in twenty-one states, and medical marijuana is legal in many others. To prohibit athletes from using something that may be legal in their home states makes no sense. I disagree with the legalization of recreational marijuana, but banning the use of a substance that is legal in many states makes no sense.
The article notes:
Aside from changing its position on marijuana use, The Athletic details other negotiations in the tentative agreement, which include allowing NBA players to promote and/or invest in betting and cannabis companies, sign non-gambling endorsement deals with sports betting companies and invest in teams in NBA and WNBA teams via an NBPA-selected private equity firm — among other terms.
According to the outlet, the reversal would go into effect this summer through the 2029–30 season if both parties do not opt out by the end of the 2028–29 season.
The article concludes:
“The Band-Aid has been ripped off in the sports world,” Durant said. “It’s kind of an undercover thing that players use cannabis and use it throughout when they’re actively playing.”
Former NBA players, including Hall of Famers Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Allen Iverson, have also been open about their cannabis use, according to Insider.
NBC Sports reported the National Football League reduced potential penalties for marijuana three years ago in a similar deal but did not completely exclude testing for the substance as more states started to legalize cannabis for recreational use — creating a conflict between the league and the law.
It will be interesting to see if this decision impacts the quality of play in the NBA. I do suspect that marijuana might be useful in dealing with the kind of pain that professional athletes deal with. Masking that pain might result in better athletic performance, but it also might result in further damage to whatever is causing the pain. Again, it will be interesting to see what impact this decision has on the National Basketball League during the upcoming season.
Does Anyone Actually Believe That The United Nations Is A Positive Force For World Peace?
On Sunday, Hot Air reported that due to the normal rotation of leadership, Vladimir Putin has now become the president of the United Nations Security Council.
The article reports:
The United Nations Security Council rotates new members in as the president of the council on a monthly basis. This month it was Russia’s turn, making Vladimir Putin the president. While this was no doubt an annoyance to most of the NATO allies in the UN, it was particularly bothersome to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenski. Last night he took his complaints to the press, describing the move as “absurd and destructive.” He pointed out that a five-month-old child had been killed by a Russian missile strike only the day before. His Foreign Minister joined him in protesting the situation, calling it “a slap in the face to the international community.” But the position is almost entirely ceremonial and it’s unlikely that Putin will be showing up for any meetings in the near future.
The article also notes:
Look at the current membership of the United Nations Human Rights Council. Some of the most autocratic nations guilty of massive human rights abuses are seated there, including China and the United Arab Emirates. (And Russia, of course.) Other examples abound throughout the entirety of the UN.
But how likely is it that Vladimir Putin will actually show up to gavel a meeting into session? Keep in mind that the International Criminal Court recently issued an arrest warrant for Putin over war crimes committed in Ukraine. The court isn’t technically part of the UN, falling under the Assembly of State Parties, but it runs pretty much in parallel. Wouldn’t the other members of the council feel obligated to slap some handcuffs on Putin if he showed up?
That would make for an interesting wrinkle in this story. If anyone had the audacity to actually arrest him, Russia would almost certainly retaliate, potentially expanding the conflict to dangerous levels. Then again, Putin may be counting on everyone being aware of that possibility. While it seems unlikely, he might just show up to prove a point.
Let’s kick the United Nations out of New York City and turn the building into affordable housing!
Bias?
On Friday, Newsbusters posted an article about the mainstream media reporting on the indictment of President Trump.
The article reports:
Shhh! Nothing to see here! The Big Three (ABC, CBS, NBC) networks continue to bury the Hunter Biden probe and the growing scandals surrounding the Biden family’s corruption, including the House Oversight Committee’s revelations that Hunter, the President’s brother Jim and Hallie Biden (widow of son Beau) received payments from a Chinese energy firm — something President Joe Biden firmly denied.
However, their voracious appetite for covering the various investigations (Stormy Daniels, Mara Lago documents, January 6th) surrounding former President Donald Trump remains unsatiated.
Beginning with the House Oversight Committee’s breaking of the Hallie Biden news through the evening of Trump’s indictment, MRC analysts tracked the glaring double-standard.
Over 14 days (March 16-March 30) ABC, NBC, CBS filled their evening, morning and Sunday roundtable shows with over 272 minutes (4 hours, 32 minutes, 56 seconds) of Trump investigation coverage compared to ZERO seconds spent on Biden family corruption stories. On average, network audiences saw almost 20 minutes per day of Trump investigation stories.
Please follow the link above to the article. It gives a few examples of news stories that broke recently about the Biden family corruption and how much media attention has been paid to those stories. It is aggravating that the information on Hunter Biden’s laptop showing drug use, prostitution, and emails indicating corruption is out in the public and no one has yet been held accountable, but President Trump has had his house raided and has been indicted. If most Americans watch the mainstream media, they are not aware of any of the questions of corruption surrounding the Biden family. I wonder if we will ever return to equal justice under the law.
Don’t Celebrate Too Soon
On Friday, Breitbart reported that a “Not Above the Law” event is planned for Boston on Friday. Actually, I think the rally should be named “Only some people are not above the law.” As I am sure everyone is aware, Bill Clinton paid more than $800,000 to Paula Jones. President Trump allegedly paid $180,000 to Stormy Daniels. If nothing else, that illustrates who had better negotiators.
The article reports:
The Scourge Of Fentanyl
On Friday, The U.K. Daily Mail reported that Joanne Marian Segovia, 64, the executive director of the San Jose Police Officers’ Association, has been charged with attempting to unlawfully import valeryl fentanyl, a synthetic opioid.
The article reports:
Starting in 2015, Segovia had at least 61 drug shipments mailed to her San Jose home from India, Hong Kong, Hungary and Singapore with manifests that listed their contents as ‘wedding party favors,’ ‘gift makeup,’ ‘chocolate and sweets’ and ‘food supplement,’ according to a federal criminal complaint unsealed Tuesday.
In at least once instance she is accused of using her work computer and address and the police union’s UPS account to ship the drugs within the U.S.
Tom Saggau, a spokesperson for the police union in San Jose, said Segovia has worked for the union since 2003, planning funerals for officers who die in the line of duty, being the liaison between the department and the officers’ families and organizing office festivities and fundraisers.
He said that federal officials informed the union last Friday that Segovia was under investigation and that no one else at the union was involved or knew about Segovia’s alleged acts.
The revelation shocked her colleagues, Saggau said.
‘We didn’t have any reason to suspect her,’ he said, adding that the union’s board of directors has pledged to fully support the federal investigation.
Federal prosecutors said that in 2019, U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers intercepted a parcel being sent to her home address that contained $5,000 worth of Tramadol, a synthetic opioid, and sent her a letter telling her they were seizing the pills.
The next year, the CBP again intercepted a shipment of Tramadol valued at $700 and sent her a seizure letter, court records showed.
But federal officials didn’t start investigating Segovia until last year when investigators found her name and home address on the cellphone of a suspected drug dealer who is part of a network that ships controlled substances made in India to the San Francisco Bay Area, according to the complaint.
The article concludes:
Fentanyl has now infected almost every major city in America, turning once-thriving streets in New York, Los Angeles and Philadelphia into wastelands.
Scenes of zombified addicts shooting up or smoking the drug in front of children increasingly becoming a part of everyday life.
Many people who die of overdoses do not know they are taking fentanyl and the drug has partially been blamed for America’s sharp decline in life-expectancy.
Experts have described the drop in life expectancy from 78.8 in 2019 to 76.4 in 2021 as ‘dramatic’ and ‘substantial’.
Officials in Washington state have said that they’ve run out of space in morgues and crematoriums as the drug tears through local communities.
We need harsh penalties for drug dealers and treatment programs for addicts. However, the problem with treatment programs is that they don’t work unless the person is willing to let go of their drug habit.
Posted by Act for America on Twitter:
Preparing Our Military?
On March 23, Judicial Watch released the following Press Release:
(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today it received 167 pages of records from the U.S. Department of Defense which show the U.S. Air Force Academy (USAFA) has made race and gender instruction a top priority in the training of cadets.
The records include recommendations that the USAFA considers “Behavioral Science 362, ‘Class, Race, Gender, and Sexuality’ as a core class,” that all curriculum be reviewed for “D&I” (diversity and inclusion) topics, and that all cadets and staff be educated in “specific D&I concepts and skills in order to decrease incidents of microaggressions, unconscious bias, etc.”
Judicial Watch obtained the records in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit on behalf of Stand Together Against Racism and Radicalism in the Services, Inc. (STARRS) against the U.S. Department of Defense for Air Force Academy records regarding “systemic racism,” as well as records of critical race theory at the Academy (Stand Together Against Racism and Radicalism in the Services, Inc. v U.S. Department of Defense (No. 1:22-cv–02894)).
In the introduction to the September 21, 2020, “U.S. Air Force Academy Internal Racial Disparity Review,” Superintendent Lt. General Jay Silveria writes:
Systemic racism exists in our society. Identity groups, whether based on race, ethnicity, age, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or disability, have all experienced less-than-equal treatment in our nation, both historically and persisting in the present day. Ongoing events across our nation and around the world are a stark reminder that racism and social injustice continue to afflict our society. We must acknowledge that at USAFA we are not immune to these issues. What happens outside our gates also happens across our installation, and throughout the Cadet Wing. We would be naive to think otherwise, and negligent to ignore the impact of racism and injustice on our cadets, our permanent party and their families and our entire USAFA community.
Our military superiority relies on an incredibly diverse force of innovative individuals who must work cohesively as a team. There is no place in our words or actions for discrimination or racial bias of any kind, nor can we allow these behaviors to persist in the culture of our institution. A disregard for dignity and respect is corrosive to mission success, and will not be tolerated. To address these issues we must each, and as a cohesive team, look inward to continually examine ourselves and our institution for the prevalence of racism, discrimination, and injustice.
To that end, I directed what I hope will be an enduring, lasting effort to promote racial understanding and diversity in the context of leadership. These actions included the establishment of a Critical Conversations Working Group (CCWG), led by the Center for Character Development (CCLD), to facilitate recurring USAFA-wide critical conversations for cadets and permanent party. In addition, my Director of Staff and the Director of Equal Opportunity co-chaired an internal assessment and review for biases within our policies, processes, practices, curriculum, and artifacts. The objective of the assessment was to identify racial disparities unique to USAFA.
The Press Release concludes with other examples:
Two sets of records obtained by Judicial Watch in November 2021 related to the teaching of critical race theory in Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS), Maryland’s largest school system, included a training course with information about a book titled “Antiracist Baby” that introduces the youngest readers to “the concept and power of antiracism,” and says it’s the “perfect gift” for “ages baby to age 3.”
Records from Loudoun County, VA, obtained in October 2021 revealed a coordinated effort to advance critical race theory initiatives in Loudoun County public schools despite widespread public opposition.
A training document provided to Judicial Watch in October 2021 by a whistleblower in the Westerly School District of Rhode Island, details how its schools are using teachers to push critical race theory in classrooms. The training course was assembled by the left-leaning Highlander Institute and cites quotes from Bettina Love, from whom the Biden administration distanced itself publicly after her statements equating “whiteness” to oppression.
Records produced in June 2021 by Wellesley Public Schools in Massachusetts confirmed the use of “affinity spaces” that divide students and staff based on race as a priority and objective of the school district’s “diversity, equity and inclusion” plan. The school district also admitted that between September 1, 2020, and May 17, 2021, it created “five distinct” segregated spaces.
Heavily redacted records obtained by Judicial watch in May 2021from Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) in Maryland included documents related to their $454,000 “Anti-racist system audit” and critical race theory classes. Students were taught that the phrase “Make America Great Again” was an example of “covert white supremacy.”
Please follow the link to read the entire Press Release. Children are not born racist; they are not born oppressors or oppressed. Those concepts are learned, and if those concepts are not taught correctly, they present a serious obstacle to unity in America.
Going To Jail For A Sense Of Humor
Yesterday Fox News reported that Douglass Mackey, 33, of West Palm Beach, Florida, known as “Ricky Vaughn” on Twitter has been convicted of conspiring to deprive individuals of their right to vote in the 2016 presidential election. If he had actually done that, I guess the conviction would be valid, but that is not what was going on.
The article reports:
Mackey, who was arrested in January 2021, could face up to 10 years in prison. His sentencing is set for Aug. 16.
His lawyer, Andrew Frisch, said in an email that the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan will have multiple reasons to choose from to vacate the conviction.
“We are optimistic about our chances on appeal,” Frisch said.
U.S. Attorney Breon Peace said in a release that the jury rejected Mackey’s cynical attempt to use the First Amendment free speech protections to shield himself from criminal liability for a voter suppression scheme.
It wasn’t a voter suppression scheme–it was a joke!
The article notes:
The government alleged that from September 2016 to November 2016, Mackey conspired with several other internet influencers to spread fraudulent messages to Clinton supporters.
Prosecutors told jurors during the trial that Mackey urged supporters of then-Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton to “vote” via text message or social media, knowing that those endorsements were not legally valid votes.
…Using social media pitches, one image encouraging phony votes utilized a font similar to one used by the Clinton campaign in authentic ads, prosecutors said. Others tried to mimic Clinton’s ads in other ways, they added.
By Election Day in 2016, at least 4,900 unique telephone numbers texted “Hillary” or something similar to a text number that was spread by multiple deceptive campaign images tweeted by Mackey and co-conspirators, prosecutors said.
This says more about the voters than it does anything else. Common sense should tell a voter that this is not real. It is frightening to me that so many voters are so clueless about how to vote and would believe what he posted.