“Self-awareness isn’t one of the modern GOP’s strong suits, as House Republicans proved again this week. If the party is still confused as to why voters didn’t trust them in greater numbers, it might consider that it isn’t trustworthy.
Leader Kevin McCarthy in September unveiled to great fanfare the party’s Commitment to America, which vowed that Republicans would “curb wasteful government spending” that feeds inflation and the national debt. Hundreds of Republican candidates stormed their districts, waving Commitment pocket cards and pronouncing on fiscal discipline and oversight.
Then came Wednesday’s first testof whether this was all hot air, and it turns out a fleet of dirigibles wouldn’t have held the gas. California Rep. Tom McClintock moved to repeal the recent party rule allowing earmarks. The caucus routed his motion, voting it down 158-52. Commitment to America? More like Commitment to Spoils…”
Here’s the juice: While earmarks don’t necessarily put money directly into a Congressman’s pocket, they do contribute substantially to an individuals odds of reelection. Though it’s clear the vast majority of these civic-minded, dedicated public servants don’t leave Congress as millionaires by chance.
Now, here’s The Gouge!
First up on the last Gouge of the week, another far wiser and infinitely more Conservative McCarthy, that being Andy, recounts…
“It wasn’t an elaborate, multilayered plot. It wasn’t democracy hanging by a thread. It was a mob run amok, a riot. It was dangerous for those on the scene, and it was notorious because it happened at the Capitol instead of, say, on the streets of Minneapolis. But it was a spontaneous, chaotic, nearly pointless tantrum that had no chance of achieving even the nebulous, short-term aim of preventing Congress from counting state-certified electoral votes, much less of overthrowing America’s constitutional order.
Oh, and to hear prosecutors tell the story of January 6, Donald Trump had precious little to do with the whole thing.
These are the only logical conclusions to draw from the verdicts returned Tuesday afternoon by a jury in deep blue Washington, D.C. The panel acquitted three of the five Oath Keeper defendants whom the Justice Department overheatedly charged with seditious conspiracy — the crime of agreeing to levy war against the United States, or to forcibly oppose its authority. The jury did return seditious-conspiracy convictions against the Oath Keepers’ national leader, Stewart Rhodes, and his confidant, Kelly Meggs, who headed up the loose-knit organization’s Florida chapter. Yet jurors acquitted Rhodes on a charge of conspiracy to disrupt the January 6 joint session of Congress — the objective that, according to prosecutors, drove the seditious conspiracy.
On the other hand, all five defendants — Rhodes and Meggs, along with Kenneth Harrelson, Jessica Watkins, and Thomas Caldwell — were convicted of what should have been the main charge in the case: the actual obstruction of a congressional proceeding. Like the superfluous seditious-conspiracy charges, obstruction carries a potential penalty of 20 years’ imprisonment; by itself, it would have provided more-than-adequate punishment for the defendants’ actions. Unlike conspiracy, actual obstruction need not entail a plan, much less a serpentine scheme to destroy our republic. Again, it was a better fit for what happened at the Capitol on January 6, which was chaos.
The verdicts seem irrational, but that is because the prosecution was irrational…”
If this kangaroo court prove one thing it’s that for all Trump’s faults, which are numerous, inciting insurrection wasn’t among them.
Next, though this latest offering from the Journal‘s Holman Jenkins is well worth your time…
Zero-Covid and Xi Jinping’s Deal With the Devil
China’s lockdown strategy was aimed at helping a new Mao consolidate power.
…it was this snippet somewhat unrelated to the headers which got our attention:
“I doubt Mr. Xi drinks deeply of the mentality of the Western media, whose zero-Covid delusions amounted to indulgence in the prerogative of the harlot through the ages. Western politicians weren’t asking what made the most sense for society, but what made the most sense for themselves at a specific moment, in terms of career preservation.
President Trump extended his social-distancing guidance in March 2020 based on polls that showed the public, however unrealistically, wanted and expected to be spared the virus altogether…“
Those who fail to grasp almost all our completely counterproductive response to the genetically-altered coronavirus which was either loosed or slipped loose from a government lab in Wuhan, China was based on politics rather than science hasn’t been paying attention.
Since we’re on the subject of the completely counterproductive, courtesy of NRO, Christian Schneider details how…
“Years from now, students of American history will be taught of the era when college students were kept from living near one another because of the color of their skin. When separate graduation ceremonies were held for students of color because of a group’s unease with the commingling of the races. When students were kept out of colleges because of their ethnicity. And when governors openly questioned the learning abilities of schoolchildren of color.
The history books covering this era, however, won’t be talking about the Jim Crow South or George Wallace’s 1963 declaration urging “segregation now, segregation forever.” They will, instead, be referring to the last five years, in which colleges have begun separating students by race out of concern that it might damage the “mental health” of non-white students if they are forced to interact with white students.
What was once discarded as an embarrassing remnant of the Jim Crow era has now become de rigueur on college campuses, returning in the form of “affinity groups,” racially separate housing arrangements, and segregated theatrical performances…”
Consider the view expressed in this tweet from Libs of Tik-Tok video forwarded by the lovely Shannon:
If you’re hanging out with black people and want to invite a white person you need to make sure to get permission because not everyone feels comfortable with white people and their shenanigans pic.twitter.com/GnundAdfGl
(2). NRO reports the WHO will be renaming monkeypox as “mpox” moving forward due to fears the original name could be misconstrued as insensitive and racist. Two thoughts immediately come to mind: (i). This move is certain to have as little effect on racism as the Washington Bullets becoming the Wizards impacted gun violence and the Redskins renaming benefited American Indians; and, (ii). Can it be mere coincidence the name monkeypox only became insensitive or racist when the disease escaped the confines of Third World Africa and spread almost exclusively amongst First World gay men?!?
(4). In a related item from FOX, the U.S. Naval Academy has confirmed it denied all requests for religious exemptions from the WuFlu vaccine, while at the same time refuting claims unvaccinated midshipmen were denied their diplomas. So much ado over a group of young people who didn’t need it not wanting to receive something that didn’t work.
SORKIN: Sam, help me with this. On Nov. 7, you tweeted, and then deleted a tweet, that said: “FTX has enough to cover all client holdings, we don’t invest client assets, even treasuries. We have been processing all withdrawals and will continue to be.” You then deleted that tweet and literally just moments ago, you told me that it was on Nov. 7 that things took a turn.
BANKMAN-FRIED: Yep.
SORKIN: Were you telling the truth?
BANKMAN-FRIED: Things were changing fast.
Yeah, I’m just going to mark that one down as a “No, I was not telling the truth.”“
And second:
“I think Mary Katharine Ham has a good argument that, “The media is more hostile to [Elon] Musk for spending his own money than to SBF for losing a couple billion in people’s life savings.”“
(6). We don’t know which is worse, 46* claiming all these union workers are ignorant as hell…
…or the bobblehead nodding behind him!
(7). The more things change…
…the more they remain the same:
Doocy: “Kevin McCarthy says that he invited president Biden down to the border. How does the president RSVP? We know the president has never been down to the border.”
Progressives: they lie but once…and that continually!
Which brings us, appropriately enough, to The Lighter Side:
Finally, we’ll call it a week with this sage suggestion from Ed Hickey:
As almost every husband learns early on in every marriage, you can be wrong even when you’re right.
Magoo
Video of the Day
Though we had a link to it in our last edition, this Tucker exposé of Apple’s complicity in the ChiCom’s crackdown on peaceful protests is deserving of another look.
Tales of The Darkside
Hey, what could go wrong?!?
On the Dimmer Side
Listen to the INCREDIBLE circular logic of an illegal alien advocating for “rights” which don’t exist.
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