It’s Wednesday, November 2nd, 2022…but before we begin, the first few minutes of this clip from Tucker reminded us, no matter the source, one always has to consider the biases behind their viewpoint.
In Carlson’s case, his adamant opposition to any U.S. support for Ukraine in its defense against Putin’s unprovoked invasion leads him to conflate the cause of the EU’s energy shortage with sanctions against Russia rather than the incredibly egregious unforced error of allowing themselves to become dependent upon Russian energy in the first place.
Here’s the juice: Germany’s energy shortage is the result of Angela Merkel’s pointless green energy initiatives just as certainly as America’s dearth of domestic diesel is due directly to Biden’s deliberate disruption of the flow of our nation’s unlimited fossil fuels.
Hence a nation which sits atop the greatest supply of cheap energy on the planet effectively starves amidst plenty.
Yes, you most certainly did; And come Tuesday, here’s hoping America expresses its appreciation for that and everything else you’ve done.
Now, here’s The Gouge!
First up, if Biden’s record-low approval ratings aren’t enough, the Morning Jolt wonders…
“…There is a theory that every group of human beings – organizations, companies, political movements, nations — is either “open” or “closed.” That is, they either have free and open communication — including dissent and assessment of flaws or problems — or they stifle disagreement and internal criticism. Authoritarian regimes, cults, and companies run by tyrannical bosses are closed systems; hopefully, the organizations you belong to have leaders who will listen when someone says, “Hey, we’ve got a problem here.”
Closed systems often appear more stable and stronger in the short-term, but they’re brittle and vulnerable in the long-term. Real problems get downplayed, ignored, or denied; honest assessments and good ideas are never allowed to bubble up from the bottom. Jon Stewart recently lamented that, “The way to understand the American legislative process is that it’s so complex and arcane that nothing is possible. It’s a remarkably inefficient system that’s not agile, and I think it’s why democracy . . . is in some ways on the wane in the world.Ain’t nothing as agile as authoritarian regimes.”
Authoritarian regimes are “agile” in the sense that when the authoritarian orders a change, it is usually quickly carried out. But authoritarian regimes prioritize keeping the authoritarian in power over all other interests — which usually erodes the regime’s ability to address real problems. It is the end of October 2022, and the government of China is still locking workers inside of factories to control the spread of Covid. Vladimir Putin’s regime is “agile” in terms of its ability to send more troops to the front in Ukraine, but not so agile in analyzing the mounting costs and shrinking benefits of invading its neighbor.
In the end, the Democratic Party’s internal politics are a closed system, or at least an insufficiently open one. Leaders don’t like hearing that a candidate that they like is, at minimum, a poor match for the state they’re running in, and likely nowhere near as charming and charismatic as the party’s leaders want to believe. (As anyone who has criticized Donald Trump knows, the Democrats are not the only major political party that suffers from this dynamic.)
The people at the top wanted to believe that Stacey Abrams was a superstar, even a “superhero.” They didn’t want to hear that she was the wrong candidate to run in a GOP-leaning state in a GOP-leaning year. Beyond Warnock’s reelection bid, this year, Georgia elects seven other statewide officials, 14 U.S. House members, all 56 state senators, all 180 state representatives, and numerous candidates for local offices, as well as voting on various ballot measures, etc. If Abrams flops at the top of the ticket, it will have deleterious consequences for Democrats further down the ballot.
Democrats were warned about Abrams’s flaws as a candidate; they just didn’t want to listen.“
In Warnock’s defense, given her girth, Abrams could drag down a Caterpillar D9. Which reminds us: Why doesn’t Stacey avoid wearing green? She keeps getting mistaken…
…for a pool table.
Since we’re on the subject of those who refuse to listen, the Devil…
…should take note of next Tuesday’s results before sending his minions…
…down to Georgia yet again with their inexplicable strategy of vote suppression in the event there’s another Senate run-off.
Next courtesy of The National Interest via Balls Cotton, Steve Cimbala and Lawrence Korb explain why…
“…The problem with Russia’s nuclear warnings is that neither Russia nor any other nuclear weapons state can maintain control over events once the nuclear threshold has been crossed. Russian leaders may imagine that they can unleash a low-yield “tactical” nuclear weapon—compared to “strategic” nuclear weapons deployed on intercontinental launchers—and regain a temporary advantage on the escalation ladder. But the use of a nuclear weapon would not just be a military incident but a political game-changer. The world will hold its breath since the reactions of Ukrainian and NATO political leaders are not necessarily going to be what Putin and his advisers expect.
Nor will Russian political elites and the public necessarily rally around the flag in response to a nuclear weapon fired against Ukrainians. Many Ukrainians have relatives in Russia and vice versa. The people of Russia and Ukraine do not hate one another, only their governments do. Many Russians will react with horror and disgust at nuclear first use in Ukraine and the mass exodus of Russians from their own country will grow larger in number as images of Armageddon dominate the media and social discourse.
Some contend that the Russian military has adopted a rationale for nuclear first use based on the logic of “escalate to de-escalate” if a conflict appears to be going badly for Russia. If so, it would be a mistake for Russia to apply this doctrine to the exigent circumstances in Ukraine. During the Cold War, numerous studies and war games examined the concept of limited nuclear war in Europe with varying sets of assumptions, role players, and outcomes. For the most part, players had considerable difficulty managing the conflict before the fighting escalated to comprehensive attacks between the United States and the Soviet Union.
Less is known about Soviet-era war games but if Russia expects to manage escalation after nuclear first use they are likely to be disappointed. Nuclear escalation control is not like a minuet or a waltz; it resembles more of a mosh pit. Optimism assumes that command and control systems will still work as expected; that leaders and their advisers will keep their heads; that panic and mass migration will not throw European countries into political and social turmoil; and that infrastructure on which states depend for day-to-day functions (manufacturing, transportation, agriculture, fuel, power supplies) will be viable even in the face of mass destruction. There is also the question of whether enlisted personnel in the Russian military, already unhappy about the entire enterprise in Ukraine, will move forward into irradiated wastelands resembling Chernobyl on steroids.
NATO’s political and military unity is now as important as it has ever been. Putin’s nuclear saber-rattling should be taken seriously but it should not divide the United States from its European allies. There is no such thing as a limited nuclear war in Europe and Russia would be foolish to expect that it could contain a nuclear war on Ukrainian territory. Putin should stop imitating Kim Jong-un and revisit the example of Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev with respect to nuclear war and deterrence. Normalizing Armageddon invites misperception, inadvertent escalation, and unthinkable destruction.“
Unfortunately, the authors’ conclusion assumes Putin, like his ChiCom counterpart, will act rationally when threatened with the loss of the absolute power they’ve so ruthlessly accumulated.
“…Back in February, Putin ordered lightly-armed troops to invade much of Ukraine, leaving the country’s infrastructure intact in the seeming belief the war would end in days with a puppet government installed. In destroying Ukraine’s power grid, Putin is signalling, perhaps unintentionally, acceptance that his broadest ambitions will not be realised. Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure is now a target precisely because the country will not become part of Russia’s sphere of influence. The escalation of the bombing is in its own way a quiet admission of defeat.“
Though Mad Vlad doesn’t strike us as someone to go gently into that good night. Besides, you know what they say about cornered animals.
Speaking of animals, Best of the Web offers an update on…
“…on Friday Katherine Eban of Vanity Fair and Jeff Kao of ProPublica reported on the work of Toy Reid, a veteran U.S. diplomat who helped the Senate staff interpret “a notoriously opaque language: the ‘party speak’ practiced by Chinese Communist officials.” Ms. Eban and Mr. Kao report:
As part of his investigation, Reid took an approach that was artful in its simplicity. Working out of the Hart Senate Office Building in Washington, DC, and a family home in Florida, he used a virtual private network, or VPN, to access dispatches archived on the website of the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). These dispatches remain on the internet, but their meaning can’t be unlocked by just anyone.
… in the fall of 2019, the dispatches took a darker turn. They referenced inhumane working conditions and “hidden safety dangers.” On November 12 of that year, a dispatch by party branch members at the [biosafety level-4] laboratory appeared to reference a biosecurity breach.
once you have opened the stored test tubes, it is just as if having opened Pandora’s Box. These viruses come without a shadow and leave without a trace. Although [we have] various preventive and protective measures, it is nevertheless necessary for lab personnel to operate very cautiously to avoid operational errors that give rise to dangers. Every time this has happened, the members of the Zhengdian Lab [BSL4] Party Branch have always run to the frontline, and they have taken real action to mobilize and motivate other research personnel.
Reid studied the words intently. Was this a reference to past accidents? An admission of an ongoing crisis? A general recognition of hazardous practices?Or all of the above? Reading between the lines, Reid concluded, “They are almost saying they know Beijing is about to come down and scream at them.”
Ms. Eban and Mr. Kao continue:
Vanity Fair and ProPublica downloaded more than 500 documents from the WIV website, including party branch dispatches from 2017 to the present. To assess Reid’s interpretation, we sent key documents to experts on [Chinese Communist Party] communications. They told us that the WIV dispatches did indeed signal that the institute faced an acute safety emergency in November 2019; that officials at the highest levels of the Chinese government weighed in; and that urgent action was taken in an effort to address ongoing safety issues. The documents do not make clear who was responsible for the crisis, which laboratory it affected specifically, or what the exact nature of the biosafety emergency was.
What could it have been?“
Nothing to see here, folks…please move along and continue to obey the edicts of the very people…
…who personally profited from their unconstitutional edicts!
Next, a story who’s headline and accompanying photo left us scratching our head, as FOX informs us of a…
“A homeless man in Los Angeles has built a small wooden house with wheels on busy Hollywood Boulevard amid frustrations with the city asking him to take down his tent. The man, who goes by “Q,” told Fox Los Angeles he constructed a house on wheels using wood tossed away from construction sites and help from friends.
He was offered temporary housing from the city but declined, saying he prefers a makeshift home over a temporary stay at a hotel. “It kind of gives me empowerment,” he said. “I don’t think that I’m bothering anyone here.”
The home is propped up by metal carts and batteries with potted plants and a tapestry on the outside. He said he uses a generator placed on the outside of the home for his electrical needs. “I feel good,” Q said. “I feel like I’m, you know, kind of being an example for people that’s in my situation. Letting them know that just because you are living on the streets doesn’t mean that you have to just let go of everything.”
Fox News has reached out to the Los Angeles Police Department and city leaders. Police told Fox Los Angeles they cannot do anything about the situation unless someone is blocking a sidewalk, active driveway or business.
…Q told the news outlet he’s from the Midwest, is an Army veteran and has been in Los Angeles for three months…”
It must be noted FOX failed to confirm Q’s claim to be a veteran, nor did the story highlight the obvious fact his house sits squarely on a sidewalk, LAPD’s recounting of the law notwithstanding. Which confirms the issue isn’t authorities’ inability to act, rather their selective refusal to enforce existing laws.
Here’s a second shot of the juice: As G. Trevor noted, the primary problem with the Pelosi reporting is its lack of details that would have been public knowledge had the man involved been John Q. Citizen rather than the wealthy husband of the Speaker of the House. Consider the fact we still don’t know who the passenger was in Paul’s Porsche that night in Napa. In similar fashion, police have released neither body nor security camera footage from the morning in question. All of which leaves the public to theorize the facts authorities refuse to release, such as James Kunstler’s intriguing take forwarded by Speed.
Four other quick thoughts on the subject: (i) As wealthy as the Pelosis are, we find it more than curious a mentally-ill, homeless drug addicted, illegal alien who lived in a former school bus was able to breach what should have been a high-tech, well-nigh impenetrable security system; (ii) What are the odds the 911 call of an ordinary citizen would have received as prompt a response as Paulie’s?; (iii) We find it hard to believe police accounts stating, as the door was opened, presumably by Pelosi, officers were greeted by the scene of Pelosi and DePape wrestling for control of the hammer, yet failed to intervene prior to the assailant striking his victim in the head; and, (iv) While we wish Paul Pelosi a complete and speedy recovery, if the majority of Americans answered honestly they’d confess they were only disappointed it wasn’t his wife on the receiving end of that hammer.
Moving on, here’s a sextet of specially selected items certain to pique the interest of inquiring Conservative minds:
…to Emily Oster’s suggestion in The Atlantic of blanket amnesty for those who issued the predictably counterproductive policies and edicts in response to the WuFlu, many of whom, as has been proven, profited personally from said policies, including, but not limited to…
(3). Florida gives right-thinking Americans yet another reason to love the Sunshine State, as NRO‘s Ari Blaff informs us the Florida Board of Medicine and state Board of Osteopathic Medicine have approved a plan to ban puberty blockers and sex-reassignment surgery as treatments for transgender minors in the state.
(4). Reading this account in the New York Post forwarded by George Lawlor, one would think the teens involved were upstanding honors students with dazzlingly bright futures ahead of them.
Seriously, and with no disrespect for the deceased whatsoever, a 14-year-old mom who “definitely spent a lot of time with her daughter”…but not so much to prevent her tragic death while riding in a stolen Kia at 0645 on a Monday morning. Perhaps she was on her way to school? Or the 19-year-old young man who was a “hard worker who juggled school and a job”…in between grand theft auto. Again, observations on the reporting, not judgments on the individuals involved.
(5). We’ve never found NASCAR particularly interesting, but when a driver pulls a move that elicits these types of comments from his fellows, it had to be something special:
Bizarrely enough, evidently unwilling to let a good cackle go to waste, this wasn’t the first time the worst Veep in history expressed her love for Venn diagrams:
Finally, we’ll call it a wrap with yet another sordid story straight from the pages of The Crime Blotter, and this just in from the rotten Big Apple:
“At approximately 3:30 p.m. ET, officers responded to a 911 call of an assault in progress at the 96th Street and Broadway-7th Avenue subway station. Police were informed that a 78-year-old male victim on a moving southbound 1 train approaching the station asked an unknown individual on the train playing music via a speaker to lower the volume.
The individual and his companion proceeded to punch the man in the face multiple times. The victim sustained bruising and laceration to his face in the assault and exited the train at the station. The two individuals remained on the subway train and are believed to have gotten off at the 34th Street station…”
Which makes this tweet from Brianna Lyman all the more meaningful:
Apparently @leezeldin and other Republicans are “master manipulators” and are creating a “conspiracy” about crime to scare voters.
Has Gov. Hochul visited a subway recently (without her armed security team)???https://t.co/auY7XHR6BM
One can only imagine the mind of anyone willing to endure a sermon from Al Sharpton.
Magoo
Video of the Day
John Stossel reveals the inconvenient truths about electric vehicles Progressives and their MSM shills continue to obfuscate and ignore.
Tales of The Darkside
The clip from Charlie Kirk offers a perfect example of the CLASSIC tactic Progressive employ when the know they’re losing the debate: argument from authority. BTW, this young WOMAN is the TEXTBOOK definition of an educated idiot who refuses to allow facts to trump her feelings.
On the Lighter Side
This video requires neither explanation nor commentary beyond this…person…is purportedly matriculating at an Ivy League school.
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