Posts on Saturday, February 11, 2023

New York — The New York City suburbs nearly cost Gov. Kathy Hochul her job. Now, far from treading with caution, she’s pushing a proposal that may be radioactive in the bedroom communities that dot the region: A plan to mandate more housing in those suburban counties, some of the nation’s largest and wealthiest. Hochul wants to give the state bold new authority to override local zoning laws in cases where municipalities resist the measure, which she hopes will help address a housing shortage that’s made New York one of the least affordable places in the country.

For two years, the Leftist establishment prolonged and exacerbated the Hunter Biden laptop news with repeated, multipronged efforts to deny its authenticity and cover it up. Leftist ideologues were in full and enthusiastic payback mode Saturday when it came to light that a Donald Trump aide had turned over to investigators a laptop containing classified documents. #TrumpLaptop immediately began trending on Twitter, and Leftists gleefully started throwing everything that patriots have said about Hunter Biden’s laptop over the last two years back at those who have maintained that the endless investigations of Trump amount to nothing more than a hyper-partisan witch hunt. But as usual,

Leaders in multiple states and cities are embracing efforts to bar police from pulling drivers over for certain less-severe traffic violations, a move that some experts believe endangers public safety. Lawmakers in Washington state are pushing a plan that would forbid police traffic stops conducted to address some lower-level traffic lawbreaking, and Oregon has already established a similar policy, while San Francisco is considering a city-wide plan of this kind after Los Angeles and Minneapolis instituted their own. Such restrictions could effectively impede enforcement against more serious offenses and put innocent civilians at risk, according to experts who spoke to the Daily Caller News Foundation.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre took a dig at former President Trump on Friday, brazenly taunting him with open contempt during a press briefing where she bid farewell to the departing Communications Director Kate Bedingfield. (Video) Friday morning, the White House announced in a statement that Bedingfield would be exiting stage left. The administration fawningly lauded her for her work and then announced that she will be replaced by Ben LaBolt. Jean-Pierre made a point at the White House press briefing on Friday to give Bedingfield a “bittersweet” sendoff while sharing with reporters a nickname that Trump inadvertently bestowed upon her. She also crowed over LaBolt’s status

A new government report reveals that the total amount of American soil owned by Chinese investors is nearly twice as large as the entirety of New York City. As the New York Post reports, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) revealed in last month’s report on foreign-held land that Chinese buyers currently own at least 384,235 of American land. By contrast, the full expanse of New York City covers just 193,700 acres. Even Bill Gates’ total land ownership is dwarfed by China’s, with just 270,000 acres. Of all the foreign-owned farmland in the U.S., China owns roughly 0.9 percent, or about $1.2 billion worth of land, according to the USDA report.

Exclusive: Unearthed documents from early in the JonBenet Ramsey murder investigation show DNA evidence recovered under her fingernails and clothes was not a match for members of the family and others close to the case just weeks after the crime. But police for years continued to float the possibility that her parents were under "an umbrella of suspicion" in the gruesome slaying, a new book on late Colorado investigator Lou Smit, who worked the case, argues in its opening pages. "Lou and JonBenet: A Legendary Lawman’s Quest to Solve a Child Beauty Queen’s Murder," by John W. Anderson, a former

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Saturday that an "unidentified object" had been shot down over Canadian airspace on his orders. "I ordered the take down of an unidentified object that violated Canadian airspace. @NORADCommand shot down the object over the Yukon. Canadian and U.S. aircraft were scrambled, and a U.S. F-22 successfully fired at the object," Trudeau said on Twitter. Trudeau said that he spoke with US President Joe Biden on Saturday and that Canadian forces will lead the object recovery operation. Canadian Defense Minister Anita Anand tweeted Saturday that she had discussed the incident with US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin "and reaffirmed that we'll always defend our sovereignty together."

A short time ago North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) announced it had “positively identified” another “high-altitude airborne object” over norther Canada. Just minutes later, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced it had been shot down in cooperation with the United States. “Military aircraft are currently operating from Alaska and Canada in support of North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) activities,” read a statement put out on Saturday afternoon. “NORAD confirms that we have positively identified a high-altitude airborne object over Northern Canada.” “While we cannot discuss specifics related to these activities at this time, please note that NORAD conducts

It’s easy to mock the progressive mindset–for example, those people who scream about the need for full vaxxed status, yet after getting their fourth booster, come down with COVID. That said, there are times when it’s not funny at all. On Monday, February 6th, Jen Angel, the owner of a cupcake store in Oakland, was robbed. But things got much worse. "On Monday, Angel was sitting inside her car behind a bank on Webster Street in Oakland when a thief broke into the car and grabbed her purse. The robber darted into a getaway vehicle that was waiting nearby, police said. 'The victim exited their vehicle and attempted to retrieve

ChatGPT has become a global obsession in recent weeks, with experts warning its eerily human replies will put white-collar jobs at risk in years to come. But questions are being asked about whether the $10billion artificial intelligence has a woke bias. This week, several observers noted that the chatbot spits out answers which seem to indicate a distinctly liberal viewpoint. Elon Musk described it as ‘concerning’ when the program suggested it would prefer to detonate a nuclear weapon, killing millions, rather than use a racial slur.

Kamala Harris really, really likes electric school buses. In fact, they seem to be the only thing that excites her more than talking about Venn diagrams. For years now, the vice president has given public speeches extolling the wonders of the completely unremarkable vehicles. It doesn’t matter that public buses in general are often an inefficient waste of taxpayer money, nor does it matter that spending hours a day commuting on buses constitutes a waste of human productivity. Harris loves those big long things, and she wants you to know it. Besides, did you know that you can charge your phone on them? (Tweet/Video)

President Joe Biden struggles with sit-down interviews. On Friday, the White House pulled the executive gaffe machine out of the traditional pre-Super Bowl sit-down with the network airing the game — which, this year, is Fox News. Biden aides had attempted to circumvent the primary network by scheduling an interview with Fox Soul, a small streaming platform aimed at black Americans owned by the same parent company as Fox News.(snip)wrote White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre in a morning tweet. “We’ve been informed that Fox Corp has asked for the interview to be cancelled.”

Everything is always a conspiracy theory, until it’s not.(snip) David McIntosh the president of the Club for Growth lobbying group that represents the interests of U.S. multinationals and Wall Street finance players, has organized another “donor retreat” session; where ‘donor retreat’ is the assembly of the Republican big club operatives who manipulate and control the Republican big club candidates, aka the establishment. The multinationals, led by CfG, are assembling to coordinate plans with, Nikki Haley, Tim Scott, Mike Pence, Glenn Youngkin and Mike Pompeo.

Former President Donald Trump has slammed mega pop star Rihanna ahead of her Super Bowl halftime performance, describing her as having “no talent” and saying she would be nowhere without her stylist. His attack comes after Rihanna threw the first verbal punch back in 2019, calling Trump “mentally ill” in a Vogue interview. The following year, she spray-painted the words “F*** Trump” on a car at an art show. On Friday, President Trump returned the favor in a Truth Social post. “Without her ‘Stylist’ she’d be NOTHING. Bad everything, and NO TALENT!” he wrote.

Russia's federal media watchdog tasks its spooks with protecting Vladimir Putin from memes that portray him as a 'bald dwarf', 'a crab', or 'a Hitler wannabe'. That is according to reports on a leak out of Roskomnadzor, the main agency behind online censorship in Moscow that is responsible for blocking material about the on-going invasion of Ukraine and any disparaging posts about the Russian president. Analysis of the leaks found that the agency compiles reports on all 'negative publications', and sends them 'upstairs' to the Kremlin and Russia's security services to brief them on all of the despot's critics via an internal messaging system.

The apology had the funny smell of IRS tax-exempt chief Lois Lerner's initial "apology" to the public, prompted by a planted question in 2013, for illegally targeting Tea Party groups for delay and scrutiny. Jes' a lil' ol' customer service problem, ya know. Everything's fixed. According to the National Catholic Register: The FBI says it is retracting a leaked document published on the internet Feb. 8 that appears to reveal that the bureau’s Richmond division launched an investigation into “radical traditionalist” Catholics and their possible ties to “the far-right white nationalist movement.”

Asked about his philosophy in life, movie star Harrison Ford said this week that he was "raised a Democrat" and "my moral purpose was being a Democrat." (Snip) Back in 2020, he suggested, "I think it's come to the point where we gotta start talking politics. But we gotta talk about it in a positive way. We gotta regain the middle ground. We're in these ideological enclaves. But the truth is in the middle. Progress is made in the middle." That same year, Ford called Donald Trump a "son of a b----."

Sen. John Fetterman (D-What?) was finally released from George Washington University Hospital in Washington, D.C., on Friday, after going in on Wednesday because he was “feeling lightheaded.” That’s some serious lightheadedness to require three days in a hospital bed, but as is always the case with Fetterman, whatever is really going on is shrouded in a fog of denial and deception. Fetterman is reportedly in fine fettle now, and according to CNN, will head back to the Senate on Monday. That’s great, but will he understand anything that is being said there? After all, it was just on Thursday that Fetterman was revealed as having

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is on the cusp of making a final decision on a 2024 presidential run. (snip)On Monday, David McIntosh, the president of the conservative Club for Growth, told reporters that the group had invited DeSantis to its annual donor retreat and was hoping to feature him as a keynote speaker. DeSantis wasn’t the only 2024 prospect to land an invite to the gathering. The Club also extended invitations to former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, former Vice President Mike Pence, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) and Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.). Trump was notably left off that list.

It goes without saying that voter fraud is nothing new. Think Tammany Hall and Chicago’s “city bosses,” including Cook County in the 1960 presidential election. Or read “Means of Ascent,” Robert Caro’s masterful account of “landslide” Lyndon’s shenanigans at the ballot box during his 1948 Senate run-off in Texas. And who can forget (except the media) the more recent FBI investigation into the corrupt “community organization” ACORN that resulted in the arrests of eight workers in St. Louis for a host of election law violations? Pretending voter fraud doesn’t exist is political strategy, not reality. That’s why partisans screaming the loudest at so-called “election deniers”

The House of Representatives on February 2 passed a bill — H. Con. Res. 9 — opposing the "implementation of socialist policies" and "denouncing socialism in all its forms." More than a hundred Democrats joined Republicans in a 327-86 vote on the bill, fittingly sponsored by Maria Salazar (R-Fla.), daughter of exiles from Fidel Castro's Cuba. Fittingly, too, the bill quoted President James Madison, the father of the Constitution, who wrote that the United States "was founded on the belief in the sanctity of the individual, to which the collectivistic system of socialism in all of its forms is fundamentally and necessarily opposed."

Hunter Biden’s legal team has been at the center of news coverage this month after it appeared to confirm the authenticity of his laptop in a letter (only to try to backtrack 24 hours later). It was a curious and gratuitous move for Biden and his counsel Abbe Lowell as they called for criminal investigations into his critics, suggested lawsuits against media, and even argued that the tax-exempt status of some groups be rescinded by the IRS. Now, however, the team is moving in a far more precarious direction. They seem to be adopting the strategy of Steve Bannon that resulted in his conviction for contempt of Congress.

“The Democratic Party [is] the bedfellow of international communism.” Those words from Sen. Joe McCarthy captured the gist of the Red Scare and the use of blacklists and personal attacks to silence critics. The Democrats this week appear to have taken up the same cudgel in labeling opponents and critics Russian sympathizers and fellow travelers in opposing government involvement in a massive censorship system. The Red Scare is back and it is going blue. I testified this week in Congress on the Twitter Files and how they suggest what I have called “censorship by surrogate” or proxy. The files show dozens of FBI and government employees actively seeking the censorship

Victoria White was abused by Capitol Police in one of the most violent and disturbing police beatings on an innocent political protester in modern American history. The police beat Victoria in the face with their fists and batons over 40 times after she was pushed into the Capitol Tunnel they were guarding. After her beating the police dragged Victoria through the US Capitol. Arrested her and then let her go in the freezing night with no shoes, phone or coat. This week Victoria is on trial in Washington DC – not the police thugs who viciously beat her face.

With the Super Bowl tomorrow and my grade school knowledge of Roman numerals unable to calculate which number this one will be, my thoughts have turned, not to the Super Bowl yet to come, but to a Super Bowl of football past. It was a time when there was less hype; less self-promotion, and less on-field braggadocio. It was also a time of more patriotism; more happiness and more fun. It was the time when Walter Payton played in Super Bowl XX. In Chicago, there were always Cub fans and Sox fans, and though never those twain would meet

Former White House strategic communications director and “The View” co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin was forced to choke down a good-sized helping of crow after she blatantly lied about Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, now the top target of the Democrat smear machine. On Thursday’s edition of the popular ABC daytime gabfest where Farah Griffin is still settling into her role as the house conservative in the nest of shrieking leftist harpies, she accused DeSantis of “erasing history” over a controversial AP black history course that veers into queer theory and other key tenets of “woke” left ideology.

Many years ago, during the ancient times of the early part of this century, I provided individual psychotherapy to several adolescents. Although some stood out, one in particular, a thirteen-year-old, will remain in my mind forever. Every week, dressed in her school uniform, she discussed the issues of family life. Her parents lived apart. What made this memorable was her lamenting the fact that her parents never married, sharing with me her humiliation when other children discussed their parents' anniversaries or honeymoons. The sanctity of marriage has been losing its luster since the late 1960s

WASHINGTON — Emails released Friday by the National Archives reveal references to President Biden’s lawyers handing over boxes of documents in Boston — confirming a little-known detail in the chronology of Biden’s classified documents scandal. “Please ensure that the boxes in your office in Boston remain secure in a locked space and are not accessed by anyone,” National Archives official Gary Stern wrote on Nov. 7 to Biden attorneys Patrick Moore and Bob Bauer. The email was sent five days after Biden’s lawyers say they discovered classified documents at Biden’s post-vice presidency office at the Penn Biden Center in Washington.

The Secret Service has been accused of a 'cover-up' over its alleged involvement in a police investigation when Hunter Biden's lover dumped his gun in a trash can near a school in 2018. Judicial Watch, a justice watchdog nonprofit, announced on Friday that it received 487 pages of Secret Service (USSS) records over the incident, and says the documents cast further doubt over the agency's claims that it was not involved. Hunter's lover and brother's widow, Hallie Biden, left his .38 handgun at the top of a trash can at Jansens supermarket in Wilmington, Delaware in October 2018, sparking a police probe.

Newly elected Sen. John Fetterman has described his severe hearing disability as causing him to hear the voice of the teacher from the "Peanuts" cartoon when listening to people speak, the New York Times reported. Fetterman suffered a stroke in May 2022 while campaigning for Pennsylvania's open Senate seat, causing him to have cognitive issues, including a problem with auditory processing. The senator, who is in the hospital after experiencing lightheadedness Wednesday, has also struggled to adjust to life in the Senate, given the challenges of recovering from his stroke and the need for technological tools

House Republicans are pushing to bar any person or business associated with the Chinese Communist Party from purchasing agricultural land in the United States, an effort gaining traction on the Hill as lawmakers look to retaliate against China over its spy-balloon incursion. Reps. Dan Newhouse (R., Wash.) and Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R., Wash.), alongside more than 40 cosponsors, last week proposed legislation that would prohibit any purchase of public or private agricultural real estate in the United States and its territories by "nonresident aliens, foreign businesses, or any agent, trustee, or fiduciary associated with the Government of the People's Republic of China."

Former vice president Mike Pence was subpoenaed as part of a special counsel investigation into former president Donald Trump's actions leading to the events of Jan. 6, 2021. On that day, Trump-supporters protested the Electoral College certification of then-candidate Joe Biden. The subpoena was issued by special counsel Jack Smith, who was tasked by U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland in November 2022 to investigate the classified documents seized by the FBI from the former president's residence in Florida.

President Joe Biden hosted the National Governors Association Winter Meeting in the East Room of the White House Friday, and he couldn’t resist the temptation to toss out one of his trademark not-off-the-cuff quips. “Every time I hear ‘the President of the United States,’ I look around and say, ‘Where the hell is he?’” Biden said. The line apparently failed, as very few in the room laughed and some looked confused or concerned. Watch: Very funny, Joe. Actually, it’s not that funny, and although he’s made similar jests in the past, it points to a larger problem: many don’t believe the President is really in charge—including seemingly himself.

On Friday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Deadline: White House,” Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT) stated that he believes the object downed over Alaska “was unlikely to have been a threat of any kind, even of intelligence gathering,” and was probably something benign and “they just said, given what we just all went through for a week, better to just take this thing down.” He also stated that there was a risk to civilian aircraft from the object and that is a reason for the object being taken down. Himes said, “I don’t know a lot. The briefing was pretty summary, my understanding, there have been some briefings in D.C. for various committee

HO-LEE-SMOKES It seems like years ago, but was only last October that a respected NBC journalist was driven from the scene by outraged mobs with pitchforks for questioning a certain Democratic senate candidate’s…well…health and mental acuity. Even the candidate’s delightful and feisty South American wife went after the poor girl. …An NBC News interview with Fetterman back in October caused a stir when a reporter asked him questions about his stroke experience. Reporter Dasha Burns explained on air that “Fetterman’s campaign required closed captioning technology for this interview to essentially read our questions as we asked them,” and noted that, “in small talk before the interview without captioning

The Biden administration has played Fox News all week on whether or not Joe Biden would do the traditional Super Bowl interview with the network this Sunday. The White House went around Fox News on Thursday and made arrangements for a softball interview with two personalities with Fox Soul, a little known digital broadcast and streaming service. That deal was initially shot down by Fox Corp., prompting a White House statement on Friday. Hours later Fox Corp. relented, announcing that Fox Soul would be interviewing Biden