News of the Week (December 4th, 2022)

Posted on December 4, 2022 by The Political Hat

 

News of the Week for Dec. 4th, 2022


 

Election 2022

 

Five House Republicans Oppose Kevin McCarthy for Speaker
McCarthy can only lose four votes since the GOP will likely only have a 222-seat majority.

Checking In on the Now-Complete Vote Count in Arizona . . .
Just to make the final update to a series of Corner posts, the state of Arizona has no more ballots left to count, provisional or otherwise. Democratic gubernatorial nominee Katie Hobbs won by 17,116 more votes than Republican Kari Lake.

Tired of Winning, Arizona Republicans Decided to Try Losing Instead
In many cases, the collapse of a system isn’t a choice; throughout history, many empires and dynasties have fallen. In the late Bronze Age, virtually the entire civilized world fell into ruin. In the 5th century, the last remnants of the Western Roman Empire imploded, sparking the millennia-long Middle Ages. In 1453, the last remnant of the Byzantine Empire fell as Constantinople was conquered. The British Empire gradually faded over the 20th century, shifting the Pax Brittanica to today’s Pax Americana.

The US House Was Biased Toward Democrats in 2022: Why Republicans Are Developing a Geography Problem
In the 2012 Presidential Election, Democrat Barack Obama decisively defeated Republican Mitt Romney. Obama won 332 electoral votes and the national Presidential popular vote by nearly 4%. Despite this crushing victory, Obama headed into his second term in office without a majority in the US House. House Republicans lost the popular vote by 1% but still won a 234-201 majority in the chamber. This outcome did not surprise shrewd political observers—Republicans held a considerable structural advantage in the US House throughout the 2010s. In fact, according to FairVote, Republicans would expect to win a 241-194 majority in a tied national House popular vote. This means that by only winning 50% of the vote, Republicans were assured a crushing majority in the US House.

Apparently, No Lawyer Wants to Defend Cochise County’s Refusal to Certify Election Results
The increasing ridiculousness of the stance of the supervisors in Cochise County, Ariz., appears to be another hard lesson of, “Don’t elect lunatics to positions of serious public responsibility”

 

Abortion

Dobbs Decision

 

A Sad Reality
There’s a remarkable op-ed in the Wall Street Journal today by a lawyer who was fired for defending Dobbs on a post-Roe conference call for women at her firm.

 

Gun Rights

 

IL Dems say they’ve got the votes for a gun ban
And they’re not wasting any time ramming it through the legislature. A sweeping gun control bill that would not only ban the sale of so-called assault weapons and require the registration of all legally-owned modern sporting rifles but would block most adults under the age of 21 from accessing their Second Amendment rights could get its first hearing in just a few days, and backers are hoping to get it to Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s desk in January.

 

Hide the Decline

Environment &“Green Energy”

 

Green Gone Wild: Dutch Government Demands ‘Compulsory Purchase’ of 3,000 Farms to Comply With EU Environmental Rules
Seventy-one percent of the earth’s atmosphere is made up of nitrogen, but we’re told that too much of it can be very, very bad. So the Nitrogen Minister of the Netherlands (yes, that’s a real job), Christianne van der Wal, is spearheading a government effort to drastically reduce nitrogen emitted by too much greenery — especially on very productive farms — and especially close to “environmentally sensitive” areas.

Wind Power: U.K. Blown Off Course (Again)
To return to a familiar theme, the reality of intermittency (the wind doesn’t always blow) and the reality that we have yet to develop a scalable technology that can get around that problem means that wind power is an energy resource that is not yet ready for prime time.

Netherlands to close up to 3,000 farms to comply with EU rules
Government tries to cut down on nitrogen pollution in a move set to reignite tensions with farmers who say the industry is unfairly targeted

They really really want you to eat bugs
We constantly joke about how the World Economic Forum and the rest of the transnational elite want you to eat bugs. We probably shouldn’t, because in fact they do want you to eat bugs. They really really do, and they are promoting the idea like mad. They deserve ridicule, of course, but not dismissal.

Europe’s Downward Energy Spiral
The European Union has committed to going “green.” This means they are closing reliable fossil fuel and nuclear plants, and betting on wind and solar to meet their energy needs. Liberals assure us that wind and solar will represent a cost savings. (Which, obviously, is why they need to be subsidized.) Also as part of its “green” agenda, Europeans are moving to replace internal combustion vehicles with electric vehicles, with the electricity to come from wind and solar.

The Origin of the Green New Deal
America’s interest in the Green New Deal (GND) or energy decarbonization has its origins half a century ago with the 1970 founding of Earth Day, and the subsequent 1972 creation of both UNEP, the United Nations Environment Program and the United States EPA, the Environmental Protection Agency.

Swiss look to ban use of electric cars over the winter to save energy
The European Union jumped on the electric vehicle craze well ahead of other parts of the world, particularly after the Paris climate accord. But in typical socialist fashion, they weren’t content with simply encouraging people to switch to EVs. Many European countries almost immediately started making plans to ban gas-powered cars and trucks and make EVs mandatory. Lots of Europeans wanted to get out ahead of the curve and began snapping the newer models up. But then came the start of the war in Ukraine, cutting energy supplies just as Europe was trying to wean itself off of fossil fuels. Now, in a rather embarrassing reversal, Switzerland is considering legislation that would ban people from driving electric vehicles except in urgent conditions over the winter because there simply might not be enough juice on the grid to recharge them.

Extinction activist wants humans to voluntarily die out: ‘Feed ’em, don’t breed ’em’
Voluntary Human Extinction Movement founder said the biosphere will ‘have a chance to recover’ if humanity stops procreating

 

Obamacare

Government in Healthcare

 

Quebec Retailer Simons Tries to Normalize Assisted Suicide in Latest Ad Campaign
“We really felt — after everything we’ve been through in the last two years and everyone’s been through — maybe it would resonate more to do a project that’s less commercially oriented and more focused on inspiration and values that we hold dear.”

The New England Journal of Ideological Medicine
The editors of the New England Journal of Medicine are destroying the publication’s brand by immersing its pages ever more deeply into advocacy for woke ideological agendas.

Justice Minister David Lametti under fire for ‘unbelievable’ comparisons between euthanasia and suicide
Suicide prevention experts are appalled by comments from Canada’s justice minister, Althia Raj writes.

Disabled Canadian Army veteran Paralympian blasts government for offering to EUTHANIZE her when she complained about how long it was taking to install stairlift at her home
Christine Gauthier testified in Canadian Parliament on Thursday. Gauthier, a paraplegic veteran, sought help getting a wheelchair lift at home. A Veterans Affairs staffer instead offered medically assisted suicide, she said.

 

War & Terror

 

Belarus minister who acted as secret go-between with the West ‘WAS killed by Kremlin assassins’ and ‘shaken’ dictator Lukashenko now fears for his life, reports claim
Vladimir Makei ‘passed away suddenly’, Belarusian media reported yesterday. They gave no cause for Makei’s death or any explanation of the circumstances. Several sources claim the 64-year-old was assassinated on orders from Kremlin

Lukashenko told to fire all staff as Foreign Affairs Minister poisoned
Local and Russian news agencies are reporting that Belarus leader Lukashenko has been told to change all his staff following rumours that Makei was poisoned.

NATO commits to future Ukraine membership: “NATO’s door is open”
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg made clear today that Ukraine will “one day” become a member of NATO. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is in Romania with Stoltenberg and other NATO counterparts to drum up support for Ukraine. The renewed call for support is to defeat Russia as it bombards energy infrastructure.

Pentagon: China to Quadruple the Number of Nuclear Warheads by 2035
AP News: “China currently has about 400 nuclear warheads, and that number could grow to 1,500 by 2035.”

Putin’s botched plan to takeover Ukraine in just 10 days and execute Zelensky
Leaked Kremlin documents show Moscow’s initial plan for the invasion of Ukraine, which involved a brutal 10-day siege and the execution of President Volodymyr Zelensky – a plan that failed spectacularly badly

Never-before-seen malware is nuking data in Russia’s courts and mayors’ offices
CryWiper masquerades as ransomware, but its real purpose is to permanently destroy data.

Nuclear submarine ‘buzzed by underwater object travelling faster than speed of sound’
The incredibly encounter – which took place in the late 1990s – has come to light after a scientist on board decided to speak to a YouTube channel and reveal his terrifying experience

Top Indo-Pacific Commander Watching for ‘Potential’ Chinese Aggression Linked to Protests
Admiral John Aquilino, the top U.S. commander in the Indo-Pacific, said that he’s watching closely for potential Chinese military operations intended to distract from China’s recent nationwide protests.

Former transgender Navy SEAL announces de-transition, says he was ‘propagandized’ and pulled into a ‘cult’: ‘Everyone is converting all these kids into transgender’
Former Navy SEAL Chris Beck, who gained national attention for coming out as Kristin Beck in a 2013 interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, announced Thursday that he is de-transitioning back to being a man after realizing that he was “propagandized” and “used badly by a lot of people,” the Daily Caller News Foundation reported.

 

National

 

Gruesome Newsom Watch
As I commented previously, the political figure secretly most disappointed that the GOP red wave didn’t occur in the mid-term is Gavin Newsom. If a red wave had taken out Michigan’s Wretched Witmer, Minnesota’s Tim Walz, Colorado’s Jared Polis, or New York’s Kathy Hochul, Newsom could point to his landslide re-election in California as evidence that he’s the strongest person to run for president in 2024 in place of the decrepit Joe Biden, not to mention Kamala Harris, who Newsom privately despises by all accounts. But with Biden getting a new lease on life, and some early buzz about Witmer and Polis as a possible candidates, Newsom has lost ground as a presumptive front-runner.

UMass-Boston Faculty Says “Enough!”
The woke diversicrats at the University of Massachusetts Boston have issued drafts of a new “mission statement” and “vision statement” for the campus (because why just limit yourself to a mission statement when you can have a vision statement too).

Next up fighting NYC crime wave? Preventing landlords from doing criminal background checks on prospective tenants
They voted themselves in a couple of gems, these New York City folks did. Between actually electing Kathy Hochul to continue her reign of incoherence and incompetence, coupled with their already in-situ fashion plate, empty-suit city chief executive, Big Apple dwellers might as well save time and just beat themselves up.

Biden Transgender DOE Official Charged With Felony for Allegedly Stealing Luggage
Brinton faces five years in prison, a $10,000 fine, or both. He has been on leave for over a month.

Trump’s Reckless Dinner with Kanye Is a Window into a Second Term
Donald Trump’s reckless dinner with Kanye West and Nick Fuentes should be treated as a preview of what to expect were he to be given a second term. That is, what it would be like to have a Trump who is totally left to his own devices, with even fewer reasonable advisers around to try and contain his worst impulses.

Kraft Heinz sued over ‘misleading’ mac and cheese directions
A woman is suing the company for the statement of “ready in 3 1/2 minutes” being “false and misleading.”

Wisconsin School Counselor Sues District after Firing over Objections to Child Gender Transition
A former Wisconsin elementary school counselor who was fired after she spoke out against transgender ideology during a feminist rally last spring is suing the school district claiming district leaders violated her First Amendment and due-process rights.

DEI is destroying academia
I’ve said it before, and I will say it again: academia is trash. As a child of academics, a former academic married to a former academic, and a good friend to many academics I am allowed to say that. It is like members of an ethnic group can joke about each other, right?

Braun to run for Indiana governor, opening Senate seat in 2024
The first-term Republican senator filed paperwork to run to succeed Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb, who is term-limited.

Americans against Race Factoring into Admission, MU Law Poll Finds
A national poll from Marquette Law School published this morning finds that majorities of Democrats, independents, and Republicans would prefer race to be a non-factor in college admissions. This is heartening news as the Supreme Court hears arguments around racial discrimination in higher education. While the Supreme Court is to be obedient to the Constitution, not the public, it is nonetheless a fine thing for the voting public to be in broad agreement on the matter

Elon Musk expects Neuralink’s brain chip to begin human trials in 6 months
Elon Musk said on Wednesday he expects a wireless brain chip developed by his company Neuralink to begin human clinical trials in six months, after the company missed earlier timelines set by him.

Gun Related Homicides of Black Men Climb to Rates Not Seen Since the 1990s
“Since 1990, rates of gun-related homicide have been highest among Black men aged 20 to 24, the analysis said, with 142 fatalities per 100,000 people in this group in 2021—a 74% increase since 2014.”

Documents reveal Democrat pressured IRS, DOJ to target conservative groups
“What’s important about these letters is it makes it very clear that a U.S. senator is attempting to essentially encourage the IRS to investigate his political opponents,” one analyst observed.

Gavin Newsom’s reparations committee will recommend handing out $223,200 per person to all descendants of slaves in California for ‘housing discrimination’ at a cost of $559BN – in nation’s biggest restitution effort ever
A task force was set up in California to make proposals for slavery reparations

‘A Revulsion from Distinctness’
This is more or less the basic premise of the long-standing skepticism of homeschooling — or, for that matter, any viable alternatives to the public-school cartel — on the left.

Hunter Biden laptop bombshell: Twitter invented reason to censor Post’s reporting
That is “f—ed.” Twitter “just freelanced” its baseless decision to censor The Post’s bombshell Hunter Biden laptop scoop in the run up to the 2020 election — with top-level workers at the social media giant agreeing that controversial decision was “f–ked,” damning insider communications released by CEO Elon Musk Friday reveal.

UChicago announces ‘The Problem with Whiteness’ course
The course will examine material through the lens of critical race theory. The course is being offered under the college’s Critical Race and Ethnic Studies program.

The AIDS Crisis and the Same-Sex-Marriage Movement
Why, at this particular point in human history, did the demand arise among gay couples to marry, and why did Western (and even, in a number of cases, non-Western) society embrace it? Michael and Charlie both talked about the big-picture trends in the decoupling of marriage, sex, and children and the decline of the matrimonial ideal. To this I would add one key event that caused same-sex marriage to surface as an issue when it did in the early 1990s: the AIDS crisis.

What Do You Suppose Students Learn in This English Course?
Reading and Writing Gender and Sexuality ENGL 214 CREDITS: 0.5

California state task force will recommend paying blacks $223,200 per person in reparations — $559 billion statewide
A task force set up by a California law “will recommend handing out $223,200 per person to all descendants of slaves in California for ‘housing discrimination’ at a cost” of $559 billion, reports the Daily Mail. That’s more than California’s entire annual budget. The committee was created by the state legislature in a law passed in 2020.

Philadelphia approves “permanent” 10 pm curfew
Every time you asked a Democrat or one of their MSM stenographers about the rising crime rates in America’s cities during the run-up to the midterm elections, you were told that it was a mirage. It’s not really that bad. These are just Republican talking points. New York’s Governor even expressed disbelief as to why anyone would even bring it up. Perhaps someone should point these people to the current situation in the City of Brotherly Love. (A tragically hilarious name given the current circumstances.) If things are going so well, why would the City Council vote to make the 10 pm curfew that was in place for almost everyone under the age of 18 all summer permanent? And yet that’s what happened on Thursday and one of the Democrats who voted in favor of the measure specifically called out the city’s rampant crime rates and the threat crime poses to her own child as the reason.

Short Circuit: A Roundup of Recent Federal Court Decisions
Veterans’ benefits, Robert’s Rules of Order, and Floribama.

Some Professors Can’t Abide the DEI Mania
The diversity, equity, and inclusion mania continues to sweep through American higher education, with fresh offensives launching almost every week. Unscholarly administrators who are full of rage against everything that has made Western civilization so successful are constantly pressuring faculty members to put more “woke” blather into their courses.

 

Economy & Taxes

 

The IRS Is Coming for Cryptocurrency
Crypto cases will top the agency’s criminal-investigation ‘to-do list’ in 2023.

Biden Calls for Congress to Avert Rail Strike
In a statement today, President Biden called on Congress to pass legislation to avert a rail strike. Biden requested that lawmakers “adopt the Tentative Agreement between railroad workers and operators — without any modifications or delay — to avert a potentially crippling national rail shutdown.”

House Votes to Prevent Rail Strike, Add Seven Days Paid Sick Leave
The House of Representatives today voted overwhelmingly to prevent a nationwide freight-rail strike. The vote was 290–137, and it adopted the tentative agreement that unions and railroads negotiated in mid-September under the supervision of the Biden administration with no modifications.

Senate reaches deal to stop rail strike; Biden admin lobbied against sick-leave bill
Looks like the US will avoid a strike by rail workers. It also looks like the Senate deal tossed Joe Biden’s union allies under a bus — with most of the tossing done by the White House.

Fed’s flop: US added 263,000 jobs in November
November’s job growth may not look spectacular, but it’s still higher than stasis. In fact, the level of growth shown seemingly defies Federal Reserve efforts to tamp down inflation. The US economy added 263,000 jobs last month despite rising interest rates and looming recessions in other parts of the Western world

 

International

 

WHO Renames Monkeypox to ‘Mpox’ Because Racism
I have no idea how this solves anything. It’s still a disease that has affected chiefly Africa until this year and men who have sex with other men.

“Many are now referring to the protest to as ‘white paper revolution,’ ‘blank sheet revolution’ or “A4 revolution.'”
The London Times reports, in “China protests: Clashes in Shanghai over Covid lockdowns/Protesters demanded President Xi’s removal.”

‘The dead keep coming’: violence overwhelms Mexico’s morgues
In a dark, windowless room with no air conditioning in southern Mexico, thousands of bones of unidentified people encapsulate the crisis of a forensic system overwhelmed by violent crime.

Qatar says worker deaths for World Cup ‘between 400 and 500’
A top Qatari official involved in the country’s World Cup organization has put the number of worker deaths for the tournament “between 400 and 500” for the first time, a drastically higher number than any other previously offered by Doha.

Strange meteorite that crashed into Earth contains two never-before-seen minerals
TWO minerals that have never before been observed on Earth have been uncovered inside a meteorite.

Iran threatened families of national soccer team if players don’t behave before match against U.S.
It’s make or break time today between the U.S. soccer team versus the Iranian team. If the U.S. ties or loses the match, the team goes home. For soccer fans, it’s a big match. For the rest of us, it’s been interesting to watch what has been going on in Qatar during the 2022 World Cup.

Scientists Revive ‘Zombie Virus’ Frozen for 48,500 Years in Russian Permafrost
The report hit all the science narrative buzzwords: Pandemic, climate change, and greenhouse effect.

EU warns Musk that Twitter faces ban over content moderation -FT
The European Union has threatened Elon Musk’s Twitter with a ban unless the billionaire abides by its strict rules on content moderation, setting up a regulatory battle over the future of the social media platform, the Financial Times reported on Wednesday.

‘Merit-making’ on hold as monks fail drug tests leaving Buddhist temple empty
A Buddhist temple in central Thailand has been left without monks after all its holy men failed drug tests and were defrocked.

Man Celebrating U.S. Soccer Win Shot Dead in His Car by Iranian Police
When the last whistle blew in the World Cup soccer match between Iran and the United States signifying the game was over and the U.S. had come out on top 1-0, a strange thing happened in the streets of Iranian cities.

UK ditches plan to censor legal speech
If you live in the United States, you are likely already aware of the levels the current White House administration has gone to in an effort to censor any speech that is seen as being unfavorable toward Joe Biden or his policies. But it can be easy to lose track of similar efforts at censorship in other countries. The first one that comes to mind is, of course, China, where every aspect of citizens’ private lives is monitored and controlled. But Great Britain recently tried to get in on this action with legislation that would force tech companies and social media platforms to remove “legal but harmful” content from their sites. Fortunately, the outcry against this measure among the public and many members of Parliament was of sufficient volume that the proposal was dropped this week.

Jiang Zemin, who guided China’s economic rise, dies
Jiang Zemin, who led China out of isolation after the army crushed the Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests in 1989 and supported economic reforms that led to a decade of explosive growth, died Wednesday. He was 96.

Cuban dictatorship has spent more on luxury hotels in 2022 than on healthcare or agriculture
While the Cuban people suffer through food and medicine shortages, the Castro dictatorship is spending money on building luxury hotels and resorts for foreign tourists.

Dissident says Cuba regime has unleashed ‘repressive fury’
Trailblazing blogger Yoani Sanchez said Saturday the Cuban regime has hit any sign of discontent with “repressive fury” and warned that a new penal code seeks to stifle independent journalists.

 

Opinion

 

The Morning Briefing: Republicans Might Make House Takeover the Wrong Kind of Interesting
Happy Monday, dear Kruiser Morning Briefing friends. Berwick felt that his bocce ball skills weren’t respected simply because he spent his formative years in a Utah commune.

The GOP’s great Trump reckoning begins at the state party level
There are already recriminations. Whether they will amount to a course change remains unclear.

Guess who’s coming to dinner
The artist formerly known as Kanye West is a deranged anti-Semite. My reference to his mental health issues cuts him some slack, but he spews the anti-Semitism straight. See, for example, Elliot Kaufman’s December Commentary essay “O Ye of Little Faith: The Anti-Semitism of Kanye West.”

Thought for the Day: John Adams on Education
“It should be your care, and mine, to elevate the minds of our children and exalt their courage; to accelerate and animate their industry and activity; to excite in them a habitual contempt of meanness, abhorrence of injustice and inhumanity, and an ambition to excel in every capacity, faculty, and virtue. If we suffer their minds to grovel and creep in infancy, they will grovel all their lives.”

303 Creative Will Affect More Than Wedding Vendors
Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg should be paying close attention

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