Tag Archives: The New York Times

Statistics Can Say Anything You Want Them To!

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On Sunday, John Hinderaker posted an article at Power Line Blog that illustrates how numbers can be twisted to mislead people. The numbers in question have to do with the declining birth rate in America.

The article reports:

The New York Times has probably put out more significant misinformation than any other  news outlet over the last 40 years. Being scrupulously fair, I admit that the National Enquirer may have propounded even more fake stories than the Times, but the Enquirer’s misinformation is generally insignificant–three-headed calves, cabbages that look like Jesus, and the like–while the Times’ lies are important, like the Russia collusion hoax.

Here is a nice example of how the Times misleads its readers–although again, to be entirely fair, it is possible that Times reporters are so bad at  math that the error was accidental. The story was Women in Their 20s May Not Be Having Babies, But by 45 Most Probably Will. The point of the story was to reassure readers: concerns about demographic decline are misplaced. This chart was the centerpiece of the story:

That chart looks good. It implies that women are simply having children later in life.

The article includes the following chart which tells the real story:

It isn’t really a surprise that a woman who has her first child at 40 is not likely to have as many children as a woman who has her first child at 25. Times have changed. Back in the 1960’s, I had a friend who had her first child at 26. The doctors considered her an ‘older mother.’

The article concludes:

Yes, women over 40 are having more children, and God bless ’em for it. But that increase obviously can’t make up for the decreasing births among women in their childbearing prime. The United States is suffering demographic decline, and it is, or should be, a serious concern.

I think most readers of the New York Times are below average in basic mathematical skills, like most Times reporters and editors. This is unfortunate in an era when data is ubiquitous and statistics are all around us. If you don’t have at least an elementary understanding of statistics, you can’t be an informed voter. And I am afraid that leaves out most of the Times readership.

Having children is a long-term responsibility. Unfortunately, I believe that many of the children raised in the past 30 years or so are not interested in taking on that responsibility.

Good News From The Medical Field

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On Monday, Hot Air posted an article about some of the recent developments in dealing with cancer.

The article quotes a New York Times article:

A drug nearing regulatory approval, daraxonrasib, is the first to substantially extend the lives of patients with pancreatic cancer. It works by targeting a cellular protein that fuels not just nearly all pancreatic tumors, but also many lung and colon cancers. Those three are the leading causes of cancer deaths.

Now, some scientists predict that the approach could wind up being the most significant advance in cancer treatment in 15 years, since the arrival of immunotherapy…

The drug that opened the floodgates, daraxonrasib, has been fast-tracked for review by the Food and Drug Administration and could win approval later this year. Until then, the agency has signed off on a plan by Revolution Medicines, the small Silicon Valley company developing the drug, to offer early access to some patients.

The pills, three taken daily, are not a cure — eventually, daraxonrasib stops working. Many patients do not respond. And it has side effects that can be harsh, including rash, diarrhea, fatigue, nausea and raw, split fingertips.

Until now, however, patients with pancreatic cancer have typically been offered grueling chemotherapy that does little to extend their lives.

The article also mentions positive developments in breast cancer and prostate cancer research.

The article concludes:

All of these developments are good news for future patients diagnosed with these cancers and could lead to additional breakthroughs as other companies race to find similar drugs they can bring to market. None of this happens overnight of course but with advances in AI we can expect it to happen much more frequently in the coming years. In ten years time, the cumulative change in treatments and survival rates could be pretty dramatic compared to where we are now.

This is really good news!

This Is One Weird Cease-Fire

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On Tuesday, Breitbart posted an article about U.S. attacks on Iranian missile sites and mine-laying boats in the Strait of Hormuz.

The article reports:

Fresh strikes on southern Iran were launched by U.S. military forces early Tuesday morning targeting Iranian missile sites and vessels attempting to lay anti-shipping mines in the contested Strait of Hormuz.

The targeted strikes were done “to protect our troops from threats posed by Iranian forces,” but the military was “using restraint during the ongoing ceasefire,” Capt. Tim Hawkins, the spokesman for the U.S. military’s Central Command, said in a statement as reported by AP.

Following the strikes, the BBC reports U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said a deal was still possible and pointed to talks on Tuesday between Iran’s top negotiator and foreign minister and Qatar’s prime minister.

The article concludes:

Capt Hawkins said the U.S. strikes targeted an area near Bandar Abbas, a southern port city and the site of one of Iran’s largest naval bases, that sits on the Strait of Hormuz, according to the New York Times.

Iranian state media had earlier reported local officials in Bandar Abbas were investigating after explosions were heard.

As I have previously stated, I don’t think this war ends without a total defeat of Iran. A total defeat could bring regime change, although that is not a guarantee, but a total defeat could end the threat. We will have to find a way to stop Iran from re-arming and re-developing its nuclear capabilities. World War II ended because Germany and Japan were thoroughly defeated. I don’t think the war with Iran ends any other way. A total defeat is the only way to bring peace to the region. It should also be considered that there are countries that do not want peace in the Middle East–it is to their advantage to promote unrest in the region.

Finding And Plugging The Leaks

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On Thursday, Just the News posted an article about the investigation into possible leaks of classified information by Democrats or their staffs on the Senate Intelligence Committee.

The article reports:

The NSA made the referral last summer concerning reports, including one in The New York Times, earlier that year during Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard’s confirmation process that quoted information from an intercept of two Hezbollah terrorist figures who claimed Gabbard, during a 2017 trip to Syria, had met with the “big guy.”

The Times suggested the reference was taken by some to mean Gabbard had met with a top Hezbollah terrorist leader, a claim she adamantly denied.

NSA concluded the leak accurately contained information from one of its intercepts but that Gabbard had not in fact met with Hezbollah leaders.

…Over the last 15 months, that crackdown has led to major indictments by the Justice Department of figures ranging from former National Security Advisor John Bolton to a former Army employee accused last month of leaking to a journalist.

The Senate Intelligence Committee has been the focus of past major leaks probes, including a case in 2018 that eventually led its former security chief James Wolfe to plead guilty to lying to the FBI about his leaks of nonpublic information to a reporter.

Unfortunately, there are people in our government agencies that truly believe it’s okay to do anything as long as it damages President Trump. That idea forms the basis for many of the bogus claims against the President that frequently show up on Fake News.

It we are going to move forward as a country, we need to stop playing silly games and learn to support each other.

The Warning In The Vote

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On Wednesday, The Federalist posted an article about the results of the Indiana primary elections. Five of the seven state senators who opposed the redistricting of the state lost in their primary elections. One election was too close to call, and one of the senators who opposed redistricting won his election. The voters supported the candidates President Trump endorsed–not the establishment Republicans. This should be a lesson to all of the Republicans in the Senate–listen to the people–pass the SAVE Act.

The Federalist reports:

Indiana conservatives just sent a message to RINOs everywhere: FAFO. These voters are mad as hell and they’re not going to vote for spineless Republicans anymore.

Hopefully GOP senators performing in the failure theater production of “debating” the SAVE America Act heard Indiana’s message loud and clear.

Most of the Republican Indiana state Senate candidates endorsed by President Donald Trump won primary races Tuesday against incumbents who voted with Democrats to stop a congressional redistricting bill. As of late Tuesday evening, The New York Times election results showed challengers picked up at least five of the seven state Senate seats targeted by Trump and allied conservatives groups. Republican primary voters rejected politicians standing on “fairness” principles while Democrats employ every weapon in their political arsenal to wrest back control of the U.S. House. 

Indiana Sen. Jim Banks helped drive the campaign to oust the incumbents who helped kill a mid-decade redrawing of the red state’s congressional maps. The redistricting plan, urged by Trump, would have given Republicans two additional seats in a House of Representatives with a razor-thin GOP majority.

“Everyone in Indiana politics should have learned an important lesson today: President Trump is the single most popular Republican among Hoosier voters,” Banks said in a statement. “Indiana is a conservative state, and we deserve conservatives in our State Senate who have a pulse on Republican voters.” 

Ideally, the makeup of the Congressional delegation from each state should reflect the makeup of the voters in that state. Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be the case. As much as I don’t like the Republicans redistricting to gain U.S. House seats, I don’t like what the Democrats have done with U.S. House districts in the past either. Why do the six New England states have no Republicans in the U.S. House? That is unfair. Until the Democrats stop creating districts in odd shapes to get Democrats elected, I am unwilling to condemn the Republicans for doing the same thing.

Policy Changes Before An Election?

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It’s amazing what politicians will do to get elected. On Saturday, Hot Air posted an article with one example.

The article reports:

Kathy Hochul is up for reelection this year, and has a big, big problem: for all the talk about an “affordability” agenda, every single policy the Democrats like to push increases costs, reduces quality of life, and drives people out of Blue states.

And one of the worst problems she faces is skyrocketing energy bills, and the prospect that those prices will rise even more and faster in the next few years as climate deadlines rapidly approach.

The article quotes The New York Times:

Gov. Kathy Hochul on Friday moved to alter and delay the implementation of New York State’s landmark 2019 climate law, which calls for gradually decreasing greenhouse gas emissions by certain deadlines.

Those proposed adjustments include delaying issuing the regulations for enforcing the law — already two years late — until 2030 and amending how certain emissions are measured.

“We need more time,” Ms. Hochul wrote in an editorial that was published on Friday morning in The Empire Report, a news site that covers state politics. “So much has radically changed since the Climate Act was enacted, necessitating common-sense adjustments.”

The proposal, anticipated by lawmakers in Albany, comes late in the budget negotiation process. Although Ms. Hochul has considerable leverage to push for her agenda during this time, members of the Legislature will need to approve the final budget, which would include changes to the climate law.

The article notes:

There is not a serious person alive who didn’t understand that imposing huge costs for not meeting impossible climate goals would raise costs for consumers. You had to have had a lobotomy or be a liberal to not predict this.

Passing the climate law in 2019 was perfect for liberal politicians; it helped funnel money in great quantities to political allies for years, and the worst of the price increases was put into the seemingly distant future. But that “distant” future is not so distant now, and Hochul sees political trouble if she doesn’t relieve the artificial price pressure the law has created.

The article concludes:

As always, the Democrats warn about a fake crisis, promise the moon, spend tons of money, make things infinitely worse, and then say they will fix the problem.

Hey, folks, I have a better plan: get rid of these idiots and elect some Republicans. They aren’t perfect, but you get a lot fewer butterfly bridges, fraudulent programs, insane green energy laws, and as a bonus, we won’t put boys in girls’ locker rooms.

Give it a try. You may like it.

The Governor’s election in New York State is going to be fun to watch!

Yes, Children Can Learn To Read And Do Math

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On Monday, The New York Times posted an article about the significant improvement in schools in Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi in recent years. I have written about this before when it was reported in Mississippi (article here), but at that time, only Mississippi had made the necessary changes to go from ranked 49th to 21st.

The New York Times reports:

  • Louisiana ranks No. 1 in the country in recovery from pandemic losses in reading, while Alabama ranks No. 1 in math recovery.

  • The state with the lowest chronic absenteeism in schools is Alabama, according to a tracker with data from 40 states.

  • Once an educational laughingstock, Mississippi now ranks ninth in the country in fourth-grade reading levels — and after adjusting for demographics such as poverty and race, Mississippi ranks No. 1, while Louisiana ranks No. 2, according to calculations by the Urban Institute. Using the same demographic adjustment, Mississippi also ranks No. 1 in America in both fourth-grade and eighth-grade math.

  • Black fourth graders in Mississippi are on average better readers than those in Massachusetts, which is often thought to have the best public school system in the country (and one that spends twice as much per pupil).

Could it be that when we introduced politics into education, education suffered?

The article concludes:

We liberals need to wake up to the reality that we are being outperformed on education, opportunity and racial equity — supposedly our issues. As recently as 2019, blue states had better average test scores than red states, after adjusting for demographics; now, red states are mostly ahead. We used to say that education was the civil rights issue of the 21st century, and if so, we should be ashamed that by that metric, Mississippi Republicans are ahead of California Democrats. If we care about kids, we must be relentlessly empirical, and that must mean a willingness to learn from red states.

Kane said something you don’t expect to hear from a Harvard professor: “I hope that there are lots of governors that are looking at Mississippi and saying, ‘Look, I want us to be next.’”

Please follow the link to read the entire article. It seems that the ideas that many of us grew up with still work!

Taking Action In Minnesota

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On Tuesday, Hot Air reported that subpoenas were served on Monday to at least five Democratic officials in Minnesota as part of of the investigation into the response to the federal government crackdown on illegal immigrants in that state.

The article quotes a New York Times report:

Federal prosecutors issued subpoenas on Tuesday to at least five Democratic officials in Minnesota, ramping up the Justice Department’s investigation into their response to the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration crackdown in the state, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The subpoenas sought documents from Gov. Tim Walz, Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis and Mayor Kaohly Her of St. Paul related to their policies on immigration enforcement efforts in the state. Two Minnesota prosecutors, Keith Ellison, the state attorney general, and Mary Moriarty, the Hennepin County attorney, were also sent similar subpoenas…

While the subpoenas did not cite a specific criminal statute, the inquiry as a whole was said to center on whether elected officials in Minnesota had conspired to impede the thousands of federal agents who have been in the state since last month looking for undocumented immigrants. But the investigation is likely to run up against stiff pushback for examining political speech and conduct that is traditionally protected by the First Amendment.

Free speech is protected by the First Amendment. The right to worship is also protected by the U.S. Constitution.

The article concludes:

The polling on Walz’s attacks on ICE must have been pretty bad because he’s really done a 180 in the past week. Instead of repeating that the state was at war with federal agents he’s now, for the second time, calling for calm. Walz is acting like an arsonist who suddenly decides to make friends with the fire department to help his image. If you want calm, governor, stop throwing rhetorical bombs at the feds and making demands you have no right to make. And you could make a call to Mayor Frey and ask him to dial it back a bit as well.

I have always heard the expression, “Minnesota nice.” I am not sure it applies right now although I suspect that a lot of the people who are making trouble are not actually residents of the state.

Were They Making Wishes Or Predictions?

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On January 3rd, Stephen Moore posted an article at Hot Air about the predictions by the so-called economic gurus about the economy in 2025.

The article reports:

Well, Donald Trump has done it again!

He stumped the chumps. The “chumps” in this case were the “blue-chip” academic and financial economists whose consensus forecast this time last year was of high inflation and low economic growth. Wrong on both counts.

As you’ve probably heard, the GDP growth for Q3 came in at a red-hot 4.3%, following 3.5% for the second quarter. Some 90% of professional economists got it wrong — all underestimating the strength of the Trump economy. QED: These weren’t random errors. These were “hate Trump” errors.

They also predicted inflation of above 3% for 2025. It’s going to come in at closer to 2.7%, with the last two months trending down to the Fed inflation target of 2%.

Starting in the second quarter, GDP has been nearly twice as high as predicted.

To quote the inimitable special agent Maxwell Smart, “Missed it by that much.”

This isn’t the first time the whiz kids whiffed on the Trump economy. These are the same Keynesian economists who warned at the start of Trump’s first term that we would see a stock market crash. The stock market is today at record highs on all three indices. Paul Krugman, who won a Nobel Prize in economics and wrote regularly for The New York Times for years, famously feared a second Great Depression if Trump policies took hold.

The danger in putting a businessman in the White House was that if he succeeded, he would make all of the politicians look useless. How long have Americans put up with wasteful spending and fraud from a government that was constantly demanding more of the taxpayers’ money? On a side note, who wrote the grants for the daycare centers in Minnesota, who approved them, and who signed the checks? Would that fraud have been discovered and dealt with under another administration?

The article concludes:

If these blue-chippers had any integrity, they’d admit that they don’t know what they are talking about and send back their Ivy League PhDs.

Fat chance that will ever happen. Instead these prophets of doom will continue to give the entire economics profession a black eye. No wonder it is known as “the dismal science.”

Elections Have Consequences

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I have always enjoyed visiting New York City. I went to school there. My husband worked in a recording studio there when I met him. One of my daughters went to school there and lived there for a few years afterward. I loved visiting her–we walked everywhere and shopped till we dropped. I suspect that a lot of the things I loved about the city are about to change.

The New York Times has the full transcript of Mayor Mamdani’s speech. It includes:

Together, New York, we’re going to freeze the… [rent!] Together, New York, we’re going to make buses fast and… [free!] Together, New York, we’re going to deliver universal… [child care!]

If he can get these changes through the city council, these actions will have consequences. One of the consequences of his election is already occurring.

On November 3rd, The New York Post reported:

As Wall Street faces the prospect of left-wing firebrand Zohran Mamdani becoming the city’s next mayor, a fast-growing business hub down south is beckoning.

Dallas — whose grab bag of major business moguls has included Ross Perot, Mark Cuban and Jerry Jones — has more recently become a major draw for big financial firms that were born and raised in the Big Apple.

Goldman Sachs is building an 800,000-square-foot, $500 million campus in Dallas. It’s set to open in 2028 and consolidate over 5,000 employees. Last year, the mega bank hired Robert Kaplan, the former president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, as its vice chairman.

On November 5th, The University of Texas at Arlington reported:

A new financial powerhouse could soon emerge in the heart of Texas. The Texas Stock Exchange (TXSE), based in Dallas, has received approval from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to operate as a national exchange—positioning it to compete with the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq. Backed by more than $160 million from major investment firms like BlackRock and Citadel Securities, TXSE plans to begin listing stocks by late 2026.

To explain what this means for businesses, investors and the Texas economy, The University of Texas at Arlington’s Sriram Villupuram, associate professor of finance, shares his insight. Villupuram, whose research focuses on corporate finance and capital markets, discusses how TXSE could reshape the financial landscape and the challenges it may face.

What exactly is the Texas Stock Exchange, and how does it differ from the New York Stock Exchange or Nasdaq?

Villupuram: The Texas Stock Exchange is a national securities exchange like the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and Nasdaq, and will compete with those exchanges. Both the NYSE and the Nasdaq have stringent listing requirements for prospective companies to list on their exchanges. In contrast, the Texas Stock Exchange is expected to facilitate the listing of relatively smaller companies.

Please follow the links to read the above two articles. I think the New York City residents who voted for Mamdani are in for a rude awakening.

Remembering Some Not-So-Recent History

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There has been a lot of noise lately about the fact that Jimmy Kimmel was not on the air for a few days. There are still a few stations that have chosen not to air his late-night show. Considering the ratings of the show, I do wonder how long he will remain on the air. However, there has also been a lot said about the ‘tyranny’ of the Trump administration in wanting his show to go away. Hollywood has been very vocal about protecting their right to free speech. However, they have not been consistent.

On Wednesday, Jack Cashill posted an article at Substack reminding us of some of Hollywood’s not-so-recent history.

The article reports:

Those of us who know even a little recent history can only snicker at the CNN headline, “Jennifer Aniston, Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks join 400 artists to back Jimmy Kimmel against ‘government threats.’” To “back” here meant signing an ACLU letter. Such bravery!

The letter reads, “We the people must never accept government threats to our freedom of speech. Efforts by leaders to pressure artists, journalists, and companies with retaliation for their speech strike at the heart of what it means to live in a free country.”

Although I agree with the sentiment, I am astonished anew at Hollywood’s selective outrage. They sat in silence these past four years while the Biden administration used every lever of power to silence critics on the internet, even to the point of imprisonment. Those offenses they could pretend not to notice, not so the hunt through the Hollywood Hills in 2012 for filmmaker Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, a hunt that the media gleefully joined.

Just three days after the September 11, 2012, disaster in Benghazi, the New York Times Ian Lovett reported that the feds were inquiring into whether Nakoula “had been the person who uploaded the video to YouTube.” The video was actually a 14-minute trailer for a proposed film titled, “The Innocence of Muslims.”

Nakoula was eventually arrested on September 15, just four days after the Benghazi attack, and held him in secret without charge or without access to an attorney.

The article notes:

Nakoula was vulnerable. He was on parole for his involvement in a check-kiting scheme. Even more worrisome, he had quietly cooperated with the feds and fingered the scheme’s ringleader.

Less than 48 hours after Secretary of State Clinton first alluded to Nakoula’s video, someone in the Obama administration had unsealed the indictment and exposed Nakoula to retaliation. “Why did the government release the deal?” Nakoula asked me when I first spoke to him after his release from prison. “Why did they put my life in danger?”

They put his life in danger because they knew they could get away with it. With Nakoula silenced, they could perpetuate the lie that the attack on the consulate in Benghazi was not a result of the administration’s disastrous policies but of a spontaneous protest inspired by Nakoula’s “hateful” film trailer.

No one’s life was endangered by taking Jimmy Kimmel off the air for a few days. Spare me your outrage when you kept quiet while an American citizen’s civil rights were totally violated to protect a false narrative created by the Obama administration. That also happened on January 6th, 2021, but the truth on that has not totally been revealed. Stay tuned.

What Is Journalistic Responsibility?

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Just for the record, I don’t consider myself a journalist. I am a blogger. My goal is to point out stories that the mainstream media might not have carried and to shine light on shenanigans in the press and elsewhere.

Recently,  The New York Times posted a very misleading article about children starving in Gaza. Anyone who has investigated this claim understands that Hamas holds food hostage (as well as people). The humanitarian aid that comes into Gaza is sold at exorbitant prices to raise money to buy weapons. That is documented in various places. That is why Israel has taken to doing food drops–in an effort to get food directly to the people. There was a picture included in The New York Times article of a child who was obviously suffering from malnutrition. It turns out that the child shown has a genetic health problem that is causing the malnutrition.

On Monday, Hot Air reported:

The New York Times ran a photo on its front page that was a visual lie. 

The point of that lie was to back the claims made in their article that Israel was intentionally starving Gazan children, but apparently, there were no photos available that would back the claims made in their story. 

No doubt they believed the story that their reporters were feeding them, not that any reporter who was not a Hamas toady would dare set foot in Gaza–but in the circular logic of the Times they assumed that nothing printed in their paper could be false.

We know that they knew the photo was false because there are internal Times emails that show they did. In fact, the editors had rejected a different photo because they knew that printing a photo of a child suffering from a genetic disease did not back their story, and demanded it be replaced.

…Uh, maybe they would use a photo like that because there IS a dearth of photos of otherwise healthy children dying of starvation. Did they consider that?

Of course not.

We already know that The New York Times employs a reporter who openly expresses his admiration for Hitler and defends him against accusations of bias. Nazis can be fair, too, you know. His work is published in the Times, so it must be true.

As I said, I am not a journalist, but it seems to me that even if they had only put a note on the picture that said ‘file footage’ at least that would have been partially honest. When are they going to post the video of the hostage being forced to dig his own grave?

Are We Willing To Go Back To The Nineteenth Century?

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On Tuesday, Hot Air posted an article about several decisions by various international courts. The combined affect of these decisions is to make fossil fuels illegal. Hang on to your gas stove!

The article reports:

It’s a piece in The New York Times–for him, it was the international version with a different headline–that argues that several decisions by various international courts amount to outlawing the extraction and use of fossil fuels.

It’s hard to argue with their conclusion because I am not an international lawyer, but let’s assume that the claim is true, as it appears to be on its face.

Rulings by the International Court of Justice, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, and the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea all suggest that the climate harms resulting from the burning of fossil fuels violate international law.

The New York Times article states:

The I.C.J.’s unanimous opinion reinforced these conclusions and broadened their reach, stating that countries must protect citizens from the “urgent and existential threat” of climate change. When a country fails to curb greenhouse gas emissions — whether by producing or consuming fossil fuels, approving new exploration to find them or subsidizing the industry — it may be held liable for “an internationally wrongful act,” the court’s 15 judges said.

This makes it much harder for any government or company to say that rules don’t apply to them or they don’t have to act. Read together, these three landmark legal rulings leave no doubt that continuing fossil fuel production and use, let alone expanding it, violates the law. It is a cease-and-desist notice to fossil fuel producers.

This isn’t the dumbest thing I have ever heard, but it’s close.

Never forget:

On March 30, 2016, I posted the following (here):

Have doubts? Then listen to the words of former United Nations climate official Ottmar Edenhofer:

“One has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy. This has almost nothing to do with the environmental policy anymore, with problems such as deforestation or the ozone hole,” said Edenhofer, who co-chaired the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change working group on Mitigation of Climate Change from 2008 to 2015.

So what is the goal of environmental policy?

“We redistribute de facto the world’s wealth by climate policy,” said Edenhofer.

Whenever you see someone claiming global governance and talking about climate change, consider the above quote.

Meanwhile, follow the link above to read the entire article at Hot Air.

Closing The Barn Door After The Horse Ran Away

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On Saturday, The New York Times posted an article about an amendment to a federal spending bill put forth by Representative Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, Democrat of Washington.

The article reports:

Representative Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, Democrat of Washington, was sitting through an Appropriations Committee meeting on Tuesday, staring up at the oil paintings of the past chairs of the powerful panel.

One, in particular, she found deeply unsettling.

“It’s concerning to sit there under a large portrait of Kay Granger,” Ms. Perez said, referring to the former Republican congresswoman from Texas who had suffered from mental decline for years when a conservative news outlet in her state found her, at the age of 81, living in an assisted living facility that included a memory care unit while she still held office.

The portrait served as a glaring reminder to Ms. Perez, the 37-year-old auto shop owner and second-term congresswoman who is a co-chair of the center-leaning Blue Dog Coalition, that she has served in Congress alongside aging colleagues, some of whom suffer from mental decline that renders them unable to perform large portions of their jobs.

The article notes:

So last month, Ms. Perez offered an amendment to a federal spending bill that aimed to create basic guidelines in Congress to ensure that members were able to do their jobs “unimpeded by significant irreversible cognitive impairment.”

Her amendment was unanimously rejected, which Ms. Perez chalked up to the fact that it prompted an “uncomfortable conversation” and that Congress does not like to make new rules for itself.

“It’s not a solution that’s been widely discussed,” she conceded.

But Ms. Perez does not plan to drop the issue, which she said is a major concern for voters. In a poll of the 230,000 people who subscribe to her newsletter, more than 90 percent who responded supported the proposal, she said, noting that she represents a district that President Trump won three times.

I have to admit that my first cynical thought upon reading this was ‘which Republicans is she trying to get rid of?’ Mitch McConnell comes to mind in the Senate, but I am not aware of any Republicans in the House that are struggling with cognitive decline. Recently, however, I was aware of a President with that problem.

Our Founding Fathers envisioned a Congress where citizens would come to Washington and serve one or two terms and then go home and live under the laws they passed. It was not meant to be a place inhabited by people who are no longer capable of doing the job required.

The Story Keeps Changing

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I thought former President Biden said he approved all of the pardons that were signed by autopen. Now he is saying something different.

On Monday, Breitbart reported:

Former President Joe Biden admitted to the New York Times that he did not individually sign off on each of the pardons issued via his autopen signature to batches of criminals at the end of his term, though he reportedly delineated criteria to staff.

…Per the outlet, Biden approved standards to give out categorical pardons to criminals in his final months in office, but staff ultimately ran a final list of names that supposedly met the criteria through the autopen, though it had been revised after Biden delineated the requirements:

Mr. Biden did not individually approve each name for the categorical pardons that applied to large numbers of people, he and aides confirmed. Rather, after extensive discussion of different possible criteria, he signed off on the standards he wanted to be used to determine which convicts would qualify for a reduction in sentence.

Even after Mr. Biden made that decision, one former aide said, the Bureau of Prisons kept providing additional information about specific inmates, resulting in small changes to the list. Rather than ask Mr. Biden to keep signing revised versions, his staff waited and then ran the final version through the autopen, which they saw as a routine procedure, the aide said.

Citing emails reviewed among the Biden team, the Times noted that then-White House staff secretary Stefanie Feldman was in charge of the autopen.

The article concludes:

In one instance, on January 19, the day before Biden left office, emails show that Zients personally gave his own sign-off on a last-minute draft summary minutes after receiving an email seeking its approval, according to the Times.

“…Mr. Zients hit ‘reply all’ and wrote, ‘I approve the use of the autopen for the execution of all of the following pardons,’” according to the email.

The major revelations come as questions continue to mount about Biden’s cognitive acuity during his presidency, as well as the legitimacy of the pardons signed via autopen.

Is this even legal?

The Consequences Of Being Generous With Someone Else’s Money

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On Friday, Hot Air posted an article about a new minimum wage in Los Angeles.

The article reports:

Los Angeles is hosting the 2028 Summer Olympics. The games were awarded to the city back in 2017 and since then it is preparing for the arrival of tens of thousands of visitors. They city was already struggling a bit because of the deadly wildfires which destroyed significant portions of two neighborhoods in January. The quote below is from The New York Times:

No one is suggesting that the Games be postponed or canceled in response to the fires. But there is rising concern that an already difficult endeavor for both Los Angeles, the main host city, and LA2028, the private committee in charge of raising most of the money and running the Games, has become staggeringly complicated.

Mike Bonin, a former City Council member who voted in support of the Olympics when the effort came before the Los Angeles governing body for approval in 2017, said the wildfires posed a “nightmare scenario.”

“It calls into question the city’s ability to deliver the Olympics,” he said in an interview. “This is cause for elected officials to ask themselves the question: Is this something we can handle?”

But there is another wrench in the works concerning hotel workers and the new minimum wage.

NBC Los Angeles reports:

The Los Angeles City Council gave final approval Friday to an ordinance that will increase the minimum wage for Los Angeles hotel and airport workers…

The vote authorized updates to the city’s Living Wage and Hotel Workers Minimum Wage ordinances, which regulate the minimum wage for such workers. Hotel and airport employees would receive $22.50 an hour starting in July under the amendments, followed by an annual $2.50 increase over three years…

Workers are expected to earn $25 an hour beginning July 2026, $27.50 an hour in July 2027 and $30 an hour in July 2028, as well as receive a new $8.35 per hour healthcare payment, which will begin July 2026.

How many hotels will be able to stay in business without serious increases in the price of rooms with the new minimum wage?

The article at Hot Air notes:

And that brings us back to the 2028 Olympics. In a last ditch effort to warn the city against this, a group of hotels have threatened to pull out of an agreement to provide discounted rooms for the Olympics.

…The city obviously can’t expect hotels to stick to rates negotiated when labor costs were half of what they will now be by 2028. If Bass approves this, she’s effectively asking the hotels to lose money on one of the biggest events in the city’s recent history.

…Presumably other hotels are now doing the math and could decide to back out of the deal. Will this lead to new negotiations for higher room rates? That seems like the most likely outcome but you never really know what might happen in LA.

That is not a reasonable minimum wage if you want hotels to stay in business.

When The Rule Of Law Fails

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On Friday, The Gateway Pundit posted an article about President Trump’s policy of relocating African farmers who are being threatened and who are losing their farms to violence to America.

The article reports:

In a move that’s stirring the pot in global diplomacy—but receiving high praise from conservatives, nationalists, and realists alike—President Donald Trump’s administration is officially moving forward with plans to resettle increasingly racially persecuted white South Africans, specifically Afrikaners, in the United States.

The first group of refugees is expected to arrive in the United States any day now, The New York Times reports, citing several leaked government memos.

While the globalist media squawks, conservatives across the U.S. and Europe are hailing the move as a long-overdue response to the violent racial persecution of an ethnic minority left to fend for itself in a crumbling, post-apartheid South Africa. The victims? White farmers—the very backbone of South Africa’s food supply, many of whom trace their ancestry back to Dutch and French settlers.

“These people are being systematically targeted,” President Trump said, slamming the South African government’s land expropriation without compensation policies. “They’re not just being pushed off their land—they’re being erased from the future of their country.”

The land in South Africa is largely owned by the descendants of the Dutch and French settlers. They have not always treated the black Africans well. I get that. However, in the past few years, black Africans have been killing the owners of farms and their families and simply stealing their farms. The laws support the taking of an individual’s land without compensation under the guise of “public interest.” Somehow the “public interest” seems only to apply to taking farms away from white farmers. Needless to say, the white farmers are ready to leave the country and begin again.

The article notes:

But here’s what the mainstream press won’t tell you: interest in Trump’s offer has exploded. The U.S. Embassy in Pretoria confirmed it’s received a list of nearly 70,000 white South Africans expressing interest in the program. That list, passed along by the South African Chamber of Commerce in the U.S., doesn’t even include formal applications—just desperate families searching for hope.

This is a true humanitarian effort.

Much Ado About Nothing

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The mainstream media is so desperate to destroy President Trump’s second term, they really don’t care how many lies they have to tell to do it. Obviously, one of the major liars is The New York Times.

On Monday, The Western Journal posted an article about The New York Times’ latest attack on President Trump.

The article at The Western Journal reports:

The New York Times, along with multiple other outlets, chastised President Donald Trump for allegedly breaking the Vatican’s dress code for Pope Francis’s funeral on Saturday.

The featured image of their story was cropped in such a way as to suggest that Trump was the only leader in a blue suit at the event.

The Times’ chief fashion critic, Vanessa Friedman, wrote that President Emmanuel Macron of France, Prime Minister Keir Starmer of Great Britain, and Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni of Italy all wore black.

This is the picture The New York Times ran:

This is the picture of the entire group:

I see a number of blue suits in the crowd.

More Lies From The Mainstream Media

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Reading the headline on a recent article in The New York Times is not only misleading, it’s inaccurate.

On Monday, The Federalist reported:

The New York Times continues to cover up government corruption, on April 11 hitting FBI Director Kash Patel for suspending analyst Brian Auten nearly a decade after Auten helped Democrats frame Donald Trump as a Russian asset. The NYT headline reads, “F.B.I. Suspends Employee on Patel’s So-Called Enemies List,” not something accurate such as “FBI Suspends Employee Who Illegally Abused Government Power To Protect Democrat Presidential Candidates.”

Predictably, other corporate media outlets took the same corrupt angle, notably an April 12 NBC article by “Fusion Ken” Dilanian and Alexandra Marquez.

Actually, that is not what actually happened. Evidently Brian Auten pushed the use of the Steel dossier as a justification for surveillance of the Trump campaign despite being aware that the dossier was verified. The spying and inappropriate behavior by the Justice Department that surrounded the Trump campaign, Trump transition team, and Trump administration makes Watergate look like child’s play. Those responsible for the illegal surveillance need to be held accountable.

The article concludes:

Yet the same NYT that helped the FBI and other intelligence agencies lie to Americans about Spygate, Biden corruption, and numerous other items of public importance clownishly claims in its April 11 article that “The reasons for the suspension [of Brian Auten] remain unclear.” It further alleges Auten’s suspension is political retaliation rather than the potential beginnings of bringing justice to those who dangerously sought to turn the United States into an intelligence dictatorship.

The reporter bylining this article, Adam Goldman, is a Times national security reporter who “has been a journalist for more than two decades.” He cannot not know all of this background or he wouldn’t have this job, and he still wrote a ridiculously idiotic story claiming Auten’s firing is only explainable by political retribution.

This means Goldman is a paid shill for the world’s worst people, not a reporter of any kind. He’s not just a hack; he has no morals at all. New York Times, delenda est.

Hopefully the firing of Auten is only the beginning of holding people accountable for their misdeeds.

When Common Sense Takes A Vacation

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On Friday, The Gateway Pundit posted an article about the fake news posted by The New York Times about Elon Musk receiving a security briefing on top secret war plans. He did not  receive such a briefing. First of all, Elon Musk is seriously involved in America’s space program (some might argue that he is America’s space program). What kind of clearances might he have because of that involvement? I realize that classified information should be given out on a ‘need to know’ basis, and there might not be a case for Elon Musk to know about China policy, but I do believe this is much ado about nothing.

The article reports:

The deep state was has been in full meltdown since Thursday night’s leaked report by the New York Times that DOGE chief Elon Musk would be visiting the Pentagon on Friday for an alleged briefing on top secret U.S. war plans for communist China.

Notice it was a leaked report. Who leaked it? We can guess why–anything to make the Trump administration look bad. The person who leaked it needs to face consequences. That is how you stop the leaks.

The article notes:

Trump addressed the controversy with reporters in the Oval Office midday Friday with Hegseth by his side, saying he would not authorize such a briefing for Musk given his business ties with China. The purpose of the Oval Office meeting with Hegseth was to announce the selection of Boeing to build the military’s new Next Generation Air Dominance fighter jet, the F-47.

The article includes the following quote by President Trump:

““Elon Musk will be briefed by the Pentagon about the USA’s top secret plans against China should there be a War,” according to the Failing New York Times, one of the worst and most purposely inaccurate newspapers anywhere in the World. Their FAKE concept for this story is that because Elon does some business in China, that he is very conflicted and would immediately go to top Chinese officials and “spill the beans.” RATINGS CHALLENGED FAKE NEWS CNN immediately picked up on this absolutely ridiculous and false story, which is probably libelous, and went heavy with it. Fortunately, nobody was watching! Maggot Hagerman, the really dumb “scammer” who constantly writes about me for the Times, using anonymous, made up (nonexistent!) sources, and who I haven’t spoken to in ages, is a big part of the Scam. She lead the Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax, only to realize that she was duped and got it wrong. She owes me a totally discredited Pulitzer Prize for her bad reporting. The Fake News is the ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE…And Elon is NOT BEING BRIEFED ON ANYTHING CHINA BY THE DEPARTMENT OF WAR!!!”

How many Americans still believe the fake story? That is the scary part.

Making Room For People Who Tell The Truth

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On February 3rd, The New York Post posted an article about changes being made in the Pentagon office space designated for news organizations.

The article reports:

The Trump administration has ordered four left-leaning news organizations including the New York Times and NBC News to vacate their dedicated office space at the Pentagon, making room for new media outlets such as The Post and the right-leaning Breitbart News and One America News.

The decision was announced late Friday in a Department of Defense memo issued by spokesman John Ullyot, who wrote that the Times, NBC News, NPR and Politico must relinquish their Pentagon office space by Feb. 14.

According to Ullyot, the move is part of a new annual media rotation program designed to allow access by “a new outlet from the same medium that has not had the unique opportunity to report as a resident member of the Pentagon press corps.”

As part of this reshuffle, The Post will replace the Times as a print outlet, OAN will take NBC News’ spot as a cable network, Breitbart News will assume NPR’s role as a radio outlet and HuffPost, owned by BuzzFeed, will take Politico’s space.

The reaction is predictable:

She urged the Pentagon to expand media office space to ensure equal access for all news organizations.

Other affected outlets voiced similar concerns.

Politico’s senior managing editor Anita Kumar called the decision “troubling,” while an NBC News spokesman expressed disappointment over losing a broadcasting booth that had been in use for decades.

Where were the complaints when the organizations now given space didn’t have space?

The article concludes:

The reshuffling of Pentagon media access marks another chapter in the Trump administration’s strained relationship with the press.

With accusations of press favoritism and concerns over media transparency mounting, the decision is likely to fuel further debate over the role of independent journalism in government reporting.

If the reporting of the news organizations that lost their space had been accurate, they would still have their space.

Protecting The Pocketbook Of The American Taxpayer

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On Saturday, Zero Hedge posted an article about Elon Musk’s efforts to cut government spending. David A. Lebryk, the acting Secretary of the Treasury has retired after refusing Elon Musk access to Treasury Department records.

The article reports:

David A. Lebryk, a decades-long Treasury official who President Trump named as acting secretary upon taking office last week, announced his retirement in a Friday email to colleagues. According to the report, Lebryk had a dispute with Musk surrogates over access to the US government’s payment system used to disburse trillions of dollars every year.

[Imagine Musk and team uncover decades of improper payments and shady dealings?]

The Musk surrogates are affiliated with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), and have been asking since the election for access to the system, according to the report. The requests were reiterated after Trump’s inauguration.

After Trump pick Scott Bessent was confirmed as Treasury Secretary on Monday, Lebryk ceased to be acting agency head.

The payment system in question is run by a handful of career officials within the Bureau of the Fiscal Service – which controls the flow of more than $6 trillion annually to households, businesses, and other entities nationwide – and includes Social Security, Medicare, federal salaries, payments to government contractors, tax refunds, grant recipients, and more.

…Unfortunately for the career bureaucrats, Trump signed an executive order instructing all agencies to ensure DOGE has “full and prompt access to all unclassified agency records, software systems, and IT systems,” which appear to include the Treasury payment systems.

Musk has previously slammed rising national debt as an existential threat to the country, while DOGE has already made progress in rooting out bullshit programs established by Democrat administrations.

On Saturday, The New York Times reported:

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent gave representatives of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency full access to the federal payment system late on Friday, according to three people familiar with the change, handing Elon Musk and the team he is leading a powerful tool to monitor and potentially limit government spending.

The new authority follows a standoff this week with a top Treasury official who had resisted allowing Mr. Musk’s lieutenants into the department’s payment system, which sends out money on behalf of the entire federal government. The official, a career civil servant named David Lebryk, was put on leave and then suddenly retired on Friday after the dispute, according to people familiar with his exit.

This is what America voted for.

Why Some Awards Mean Nothing

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The New York Times and The Washington Post won Pulitzer Prizes for their great reporting of RussiaGate. When the story was proved to be false, they got to keep their awards. I wonder if after Liz Cheney is tried for destroying evidence and other crimes committed during her time on the January 6th Committee if she will get to keep her award.

On Thursday, The Epoch Times reported:

President Joe Biden has awarded 20 individuals the Presidential Citizens Medal, including two leaders of the disbanded Jan. 6 congressional panel—former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.)—for “exemplary deeds of service for their country or their fellow citizens.”

The Presidential Citizens Medal, created by President Richard Nixon in 1969, is the country’s second-highest civilian honor after the Presidential Medal of Freedom. It is awarded to those who “performed exemplary deeds of service for their country or their fellow citizens.”

“President Biden believes these Americans are bonded by their common decency and commitment to serving others,” the White House wrote in a statement. “The country is better because of their dedication and sacrifice.”

Considering the current mental state of President Biden, I wonder who actually made this decision. It certainly does nothing to further the idea of a rule of law that applies equally to everyone, and thus will further divide the country. That may actually be the goal.

For all of President Biden’s claims that he is engaging in a peaceful transition of power, his actions tell a very different story. When I examine the President’s actions since the November election, I see a man doing everything he can to put roadblocks in front of the incoming administration. The pettiness of this man and the people behind him never ceases to amaze me.

It’s Not Really Harmless

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On Friday, Hot Air posted an article about the dangers of recreational use of marijuana.

The article reports:

There are now 24 states, plus the District of Columbia, that have legalized recreational marijuana. This change in attitude toward the drug was originally driven by a push to make it legal for medicinal purposes, i.e. for cancer patients and other people struggling with nausea. But over time this morphed into the kind of broader legalization we have today.

But as many have noted, the drug being sold today is not like the stuff some were smoking in the 1970s or 1980s. Today’s cannabis products are often many times more potent and along with that has come a host of problems that are only starting to be recognized by many doctors, everything from addiction to psychosis. As with any drug, the people who use it most frequently are the ones most likely to experience problems.

…In the worst cases, heavy users experience exactly the kind of symptoms that cannabis is generally thought to alleviate, i.e. nausea, vomiting and pain. This is known as cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome and it can even lead to death in extreme cases.

The article quotes The New York Times:

“Not everyone who smokes cigarettes develops lung cancer, and not everyone who has lung cancer smoked cigarettes,” said Dr. Deepak Cyril D’Souza, a professor at Yale School of Medicine and a staff psychiatrist at VA Connecticut Healthcare Systems. “But we now know, after denying it for many, many decades, that the association between the two is very important. The same is true for cannabis and psychosis.”…

A study in 11 sites across Europe found that people who regularly consumed marijuana with at least 10 percent THC were nearly five times as likely to develop a psychotic disorder as those who never used it. A study in Ontario found that the risk of developing one was 11 times as high for teenage users compared with nonusers.

The article concludes:

Weed is not always harmless and it can be addictive. It’s probably especially bad for younger people whose brains are still maturing. Does that mean it should be illegal? Not necessarily. Alcohol kills a lot of people every year but prohibition didn’t work. Nevertheless, anyone who is using potent cannabis everyday is setting themselves up for problems. Hacking your own chemistry to feel good is always subject to a law of diminishing returns. Sorry if I sound like a 1980s after-school special but I’ve been pretty consistent on this since I was 16 myself. Don’t do drugs, kids.

Using any mind-altering substance while you are young and your brain is still developing is not smart.

Caught!

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On September 18th, Hot Air posted an article about the Hezbollah pagers that exploded yesterday. There were some very interesting people who had those pagers.

The article quotes The New York Times:

Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon, Mojtaba Amini, lost one eye and severely injured his other eye when a pager he was carrying exploded in a simultaneous wave of blasts targeting wireless electronic devices, according to two members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps briefed on the attack.

The Guards members, who had knowledge of the attacks and spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly, said Mr. Amini’s injuries were more serious than Iran initially reported and that he would be medevacked to Tehran for treatment.

Hossein Soleimani, the editor in chief of Mashregh, the main Revolutionary Guards news website, confirmed the extent of Mr. Amini’s injuries in a post on X. “Unfortunately the injuries sustained by Iran’s ambassador were extremely severe and in his eyes,” Mr. Soleimani wrote.

Why was Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon carrying a Hezbollah pager?

John Hinderaker at Power Line reported on the news that on Thursday handheld radios were exploding.

The article at Power Line notes:

Apparently fires have broken out in seemingly random buildings, and loudspeakers are telling people to take the batteries out of their phones. I haven’t seen any reports, however, of exploding cell phones.

The usual suspects are up in arms over yesterday’s pager attack:

The United Nations Security Council will convene an emergency meeting on Friday afternoon to discuss Israel’s wave of attacks in Lebanon, according to Slovenia, which holds the Council’s rotating presidency this month.

How many emergency meetings have they held over Hezbollah’s rocket bombardment of Israel, which has gone on for months?

The United Nations’ human rights chief, Volker Türk, has criticized the pager attack as a violation of international law and called for those behind it to be held to account.

So, does sending thousands of rockets into Israel violate international law? What does the U.N. propose to do about it?

Nothing, of course. Hence the need for Israel to defend itself.

That is the current state of the United Nations.