Posts on Monday, October 20, 2025
Ben Domenech has a very interesting take on Vice President Vance in an essay on The Transom.
>>[T]he truth is: They hate him because they view him as a traitor to their class, after they welcomed him with open arms.<< He recounts the rapturous response Hillbilly Elegy received upon publication and the instant celebrity conferred upon Vance, in so small part because it satisfied a need of “people on the center left trying to make some sense of (or offer some dismissive explanation for) the Trump phenomenon.”
Former Biden White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre unleashed on the Democratic Party in an excerpt from her new memoir, explaining why she decided to become an independent after years as a party flack.
In the excerpt, Jean-Pierre detailed the phone call in which then-President Joe Biden told the White House team that he was dropping out of the race, Newsweek reported.
"Biden seemed to be totally at peace with his decision, but I was stunned, my feelings a blur. I was angry and sad. I was enraged and heartbroken that this man had given more than 50 years of his life to serving the American people,
Actor John Cusack delivered a fiery message to President Donald Trump during a CNN interview Saturday at Chicago's "No Kings" rally, telling the president to "go to hell" over the deployment of Border Patrol and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents to his beloved hometown.
Speaking at one of over 2,600 coordinated demonstrations taking place across the United States and internationally, Cusack criticized what he characterized as Trump's use of "masked goons" conducting immigration enforcement operations in Chicago.
The High Fidelity star's comments have circulated widely on social media as part of a broader wave of organized opposition to the Trump administration's policies
The Trump administration says it is cancelling student debt for millions of borrowers — a pivot from its previous moves to block some loan forgiveness plans.
In an agreement with the American Federation of Teachers, the White House will again start processing student loan forgiveness for eligible borrowers in two income-driven repayment plans – Income-Contingent Repayment and Pay as You Earn – until they expire.
President Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill” is slated to phase out those two programs by July 1, 2028. They have over 2.5 million enrollees total, a higher ed expert estimated.
Health officials said that three cases of a rare strain of mpox, or monkeypox, were confirmed in California and that they are investigating whether the virus is spreading locally.
The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health said in a statement on Oct. 17 that it is “investigating the possibility of a local spread of Clade I mpox cases after confirming its second case in an adult with no recent travel to regions where this virus is typically found,” adding that the person was hospitalized and is now at home and recovering.
Los Angeles County Health Officer Dr. Muntu Davis said in a statement that officials have “concerns about possible local spread
Indicted former FBI Director James Comey is seeking to have his criminal case dismissed on the grounds that he is the victim of selective prosecution because of President Trump’s disdain for him. Comey’s defense team filed a motion to dismiss Tuesday, arguing that the Trump administration’s false statements case is an unconstitutional abuse of power by the Trump administration.
“Ample objective evidence—much of which comes directly from government officials’ own public statements and admissions—establishes that the government’s animus toward Mr. Comey led directly to this vindictive and selective prosecution,” Comey’s attorneys said in court papers.
“The proper remedy for the government’s constitutional violations is a dismissal with prejudice.
Some Democrats skeptical about their leadership’s hard-line stance against reopening the federal government privately acknowledge that they fear getting “hammered” by their liberal base if they vote for a Republican funding bill.
Grassroots Democrats frustrated with the Trump administration have been demanding a fight, and on Saturday millions showed up at “No Kings” demonstrations across the country to protest the president’s government.In that context, Democrats know they will get hit hard by a number of voices on the left if they do not get something for opening the government.
The “No Kings” protesters are not satisfied with the concept of persuading people to adopt their political views; instead, they want to kill their opposition and then celebrate the death the way they lauded Charlie Kirk’s murder. It sounds like a harsh accusation until you read the signs protesters made and carried during Saturday’s “No Kings” events.
Many were straight calls for murder, and others were so vile that they call into question the sanity of anyone comfortable carrying such words — like the woman with the sloppy cardboard sign scrawled with a marker: “Which one heals faster? (A) Trump’s ear (B) Erika’s heart,” referring to Charlie Kirk’s widow.
An appeals court just ruled that President Donald Trump can deploy National Guard troops to violence-plagued Portland, Oregon.
The Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Portland has been under near-constant siege for months, as Antifa, Trantifa, and other radical leftists violently harass and even assault agents and federal property. Trump wanted to send in military backup, and this time, the legal decision went his way.Forbes reported Monday: “A federal appeals court ruled Monday that President Donald Trump can send troops to Portland, Oregon, while litigation over their deployment moves forward, overturning a lower court that blocked Trump from his latest effort to use the military in Democratic-leaning cities.”
A widespread outage affecting Amazon Web Services (AWS) caused significant disruptions to numerous popular websites and services on Monday, showcasing the global reliance on cloud infrastructure. Although the outage seems to be fixed as the day begins on the East Coast, lingering outages continue to be reported.CNBC reports that in the early hours of Monday morning, Amazon Web Services, a dominant player in the cloud infrastructure market, reported a major outage that impacted countless websites and services worldwide.
President Donald Trump’s administration has some very bad news for all those anti-ICE defenders and protestors after the announcement that the Department of Homeland Security has arrested a whopping 480,000 illegal criminal aliens over the last nine months.During a press conference on Monday, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem credited President Trump’s leadership with the removal of hundreds of thousands of illegal criminal aliens that were just roaming the streets in America under former President Joe Biden’s presidency.“Today marks nine months since President Trump has been in office and since he began his work to restore American safety for families who live here,” Noem said.
The Democrats have been trying to blame President Donald Trump and the Republicans for the government shutdown.
The Dems were hoping that the "No Kings" protests would provide them with some ballast for their fight against Trump. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) was hoping that he would appease the radical leftist base so he could hold onto his seat.
The problem with that? The ridiculous "No Kings" exercise is now over, and we still have no kings. All this did was expose how the Democrats were focused on something that isn't real, versus the real issue of opening the government and doing something for the American people.
This is going to be the question for the next who knows how long.
Not 'will Zelensky ever talk Trump into giving him the big guns'...nope.
Not 'will there ever be an agreement Hamas wasn't already planning to break when they agreed'...nope.
Not 'does anyone give a rip about anything the WNBA does or its players'...nope.
NOPE
The unanswerable question on everyone's minds is 'how long can new CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss continue to cruelly torture the news division staff at the network before they collapse from the sheer angst and unending mental abuse?'
That's THE question.
Oh, yeah. What honest, devoted progressive
Federal prosecutors signaled that they might seek the removal of the lead defense attorney in James Comey's criminal case on Sunday, citing his possible role in the disclosures Comey made in 2017, shortly after President Donald Trump fired him as FBI director in his first term.
Prosecutors cited the yearslong relationship between Comey and the defense attorney overseeing his case, Patrick Fitzgerald, as a possible conflict of interest — noting in particular whether Fitzgerald might have had any role in the disclosures Comey made during Trump's first term.
Bari Weiss seems to have confused some of the folks at CBS News after being hired as its new editor in chief.
The New York Times reported that Weiss stunned members of senior staff of the show “60 Minutes,” by asking a simple question: “Why does the country think you’re biased?”
The inquiry was met with stunned awkwardness, according to three people who recounted details from the private session in Midtown Manhattan. The staff of “60 Minutes,” the nation’s most-watched news program, view their coverage as firmly nonpartisan and reject criticism from President Trump and his allies who argue that it has a liberal slant.
Last month, the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) announced it had partnered with the Department of the Interior to cut $14 million worth of environmental grants, including $2.5 million for New Mexico.
The Institute of Applied Ecology, based in both Oregon and here in New Mexico, is one of the organizations that had a large swath of its funding cut.
“We work with native plant materials development,” said Katy Silbert, the assistant branch director of the institute’s southwestern branch. “Which means that we are collecting seeds from the wild to then grow those plants and put them back on the landscape.”
Far-left President of Colombia Gustavo Petro accused President Donald Trump of being “rude and ignorant” to Colombia after Trump called him an “illegal drug dealer” on Sunday.In a Truth Social post on Sunday, President Trump accused Petro of being an “illegal drug leader strongly encouraging the massive production of drugs” in Colombia and denounced that Petro’s administration has done nothing to stop drug trafficking despite the United States’ large scale payments and subsidies. As a result, President Trump announced that he would suspend all U.S. payments and subsidies to Colombia.
National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett predicted Monday that the ongoing government shutdown is “likely to end sometime this week” but warned the Trump administration may impose “stronger measures” if the funding impasse continues.Speaking on CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” Hassett suggested Democrats were waiting to vote to reopen the government until after this weekend’s nationwide “No Kings” protests against President Donald Trump. White House economic advisor Hassett says shutdown could end this week
The comments came as the federal government enters the third week of the shutdown, which has continued with no clear end in sight amid a partisan fight in the Senate over federal funding priorities.
Hamas, in short, has decided to eliminate any Palestinian opposed to terrorism and supportive of coexistence with Israel.
Hamas's actions also demonstrate that the terror group is determined to exploit the current ceasefire to reassert its control over the Gaza Strip.
The silence, or apathy, of the international community, including so-called pro-Palestinian groups and individuals, towards Hamas's crimes only encourages the terror group to proceed with its crackdown on its own people. The silence of the world, in addition, sends a message to the Palestinians that they should refrain from rising against Hamas and other terror groups in the Gaza Strip.
The Party of 'Inclusion' Just Told Winsome
Earle-Sears to Go Back Where She Didn't
Come From replies
Earle-Sears to Go Back Where She Didn't
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Can you imagine letting your hate consume you so much that you would shout something racist at a politician you don’t agree with — and potentially embarrass your son at his football game? That didn’t bother Scott Pogorelc. At the James Madison University football game on Saturday, Pogorelc shouted at Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears (R-Va.), who is the GOP nominee in Virginia’s race for governor, to “Go back to Haiti” and called her a “traitor.” And someone caught the racist dolt on camera. Classy, amirite? For the record, Earle-Sears was born in Jamaica, not Haiti, and she’s an American citizen.
Mike Johnson on ‘Selfish’ Democrat
Shutdown: Democrats Will Get 12th Opportunity
to Open Government replies
Shutdown: Democrats Will Get 12th Opportunity
to Open Government replies
Democrats will get their 12th opportunity to open the government on Monday, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) said during a press conference on the 20th day of the Democrat shutdown.
Johnson called out Democrats for shutting down the government over what he described as a “totally clean, non-partisan continued resolution.”
Noting the Democrats’ lack of shame over the hardships inflicted upon affected Americans, he continued:
This is a political stunt, and it’s the first time it’s been done, and it is the most costly, most selfish, most dangerous political stunt in the history of the United States Congress,
Newark, NJ - Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D., N.J.) rallied with Newark mayor and Louis Farrakhan acolyte Ras Baraka (D.) and Chigozie Onyema (D.), a defund the police advocate, on Sunday as her lead in New Jersey’s gubernatorial race shrinks heading into the home stretch. Baraka and Onyema offered rousing endorsements of Sherrill before the three Democrats led volunteers on a door-knocking campaign in New Jersey’s largest city. Onyema, a state assembly candidate, said Sherrill "understands what it means to love," while Baraka urged the crowd to tell "everybody you know up and down the block, at work, in the barber shop, in the beauty parlor" to vote for her.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) quietly signed legislation last month that will shield local utility companies from responsibility for wildfires and pass billions of dollars in costs to consumers and victims.
The Los Angeles Times noted that “fine print” in a 254-page bill known as SB 254 — a massive bill compared to most state legislation — lets Southern California Edison and other utilities charge consumers for wildfire damage that exceeds $21 billion,[snip] The legislation has revived concerns about the fact that Newsom and other politicians in the state have taken large campaign contributions from the utilities.
Virginia Democrat gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger cast her support behind open borders, stating that she wants “to protect every person who might be interested” in coming to the United States.
“I certainly want to protect every person who might be interested in arriving at the United States, claiming asylum, working here, coming as a refugee — whatever the parameters or the need that begins their desire to move to our country,” Spanberger said in a video posted to X by Greg Price. In response to Spanberger’s comments in the video, several people, such as White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, pointed out that Democrats are “committed to
Political violence has waxed and waned throughout U.S. history. Today, there’s a very clear upswing. But is it widely accepted? No. In fact, Americans overwhelmingly oppose using violence to achieve political goals, and mostly blame major political parties as equal threats to use violent tactics for the sake of political power, the latest I&I/TIPP Poll shows.
A representative sample of Americans were asked: “Do you believe that using violence to achieve political goals is ever justified?”
Respondents made clear they didn’t like violence by either party. Overall, only 9% of those taking the poll said violence for political goals was “always justified,”
Not Hamas or Al Qaeda flags. Obviously. The bad kind of flags. The flags of England.
After a rash of incidents of the flags of England being flown in public and police officers being caught on video seizing them or otherwise removing those flying them, the Sussex police have a statement.
“In less fractious times, seeing your flag normally instils feelings of belonging and pride,” Sussex Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) Katy Bourne said. “It is clear, however, that in some places, the appearance of flags is making some communities feel deliberately targeted and intimidated. That may or may not be the intention of those putting the flags up but
"Together, we can tax the rich, heal the sick, house the poor, defund the police & build a socialist New York,” Zohran Mamdani tweeted in 2020. On his current mayoral campaign website, he calls for shifting the city’s tax burden to “richer and whiter neighborhoods.” These aren’t slip-ups or stray remarks. They are at the heart of his campaign for mayor of New York City this November. And if he wins, the fallout won’t just be felt here. It will ripple far beyond the five boroughs, dragging down not only New York but the nation as well. I know a lot of Americans will shrug and say: “Well, New Yorkers
The Hammerstein Ballroom in midtown Manhattan hums with the sound of walkers, canes, and Medicare-approved stability sneakers shuffling on the brocade carpet. Several busloads worth of gray-haired radicals are milling about the historic auditorium. Some have shelled out thousands of dollars to be here for a chance to see their favorite MSNBC personalities denounce Donald Trump in person. Liquor drinks are extra. The exorbitantly priced bar opens at 10:30 a.m. We're going to need it.
"MSNBC Live '25: This Is Who We Are" is the failing left-wing network's second live offering in as many years. Last year's event was largely focused on how to stop Trump from winning the election
Kushner and Witkoff reveal how the Trump
admin plans to disarm Hamas amid faltering
peace deal replies
admin plans to disarm Hamas amid faltering
peace deal replies
President Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and US Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff — the pair largely responsible for Trump’s Israel-Hamas peace deal — provided rare insight into how the administration is trying to disarm the terror group and reestablish secure leadership in war-torn Gaza.
Kushner and Witkoff explained how they brokered the 20-point deal and what the next steps are on the Sunday episode of “60 Minutes” ahead of their trip to Israel on Monday.Kushner warned that they expect Hamas to “try to reconstitute and take back their positions” within the power vacuum.
I’m extremely proud to be British and utterly unapologetic about that pride. Britain taught the world what freedom means. But often these days I look across the pond at the United States and think you guys might be on to something.
I’m not claiming you get everything right, but America still believes that leadership means taking decisions, not dodging them.
It’s that courage to act, even when it’s unpopular, that makes a nation strong. Britain on the other hand is being led by a government that mistakes timidity for wisdomKeir Starmer took office 16 months ago, and Britain has watched him surrender our sovereignty -
In 2022, Gustavo Petro, a former member of the M-19 guerrilla group and all-around nutcase, became Colombia's first left-wing leader since the founding of the country. In three years, his popularity ratings have tanked, he's been involved in scandal after scandal, and his reckless economic policies have stalled the country's growth. Heck, in just the last three or so weeks, he's had his United States visa revoked, become an arm chair "No Kings" rally expert, and accused our country of killing poor little fishermen in the Caribbean Sea — fishermen who just happened to have illegal drugs on board their fancy narco-boats.
New Jersey gubernatorial candidate Jack Ciattarelli was on “Fox News Sunday” with host Shannon Bream to discuss the governor’s race. Fox News polling showed Ciattarelli behind, but he disagreed and said that the polling that was provided was not accurate.
He is running against Democrat candidate Mikie Sherrill, a Congresswoman from New Jersey.
“We have brand new Fox News polling out on your race this week. It is tightening. You are still lagging by four to five points, based on some of the data,” Bream said.
“How do you close this out in the next couple of weeks and change those minds?” Bream asked.
I don't know if you've seen anything about Barack Obama's presidential center. But if you didn't, he posted about it on Saturday. It's been a boondoggle now for some time. It is, in fact, the perfect representation of Barack Obama.
Here's a Newsweek headline on the project: "Behind Schedule, Over Budget, and Mired in Lawsuits."The local community was also unhappy with it or had concerns. One resident called it a "monstrosity," taking away from the beautiful area that once was there. So much for the feelings of the locals. Guess those got lost in the narcissism.
The Ridiculous No Kings Protest
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It’s difficult to think of a more effective way to illustrate the moral and intellectual emptiness of the American left than to have them march around demanding an end to an institution our founding fathers abolished 250 years ago. This is how the official “No Kings” website described what happened on Saturday: “On October 18, more than seven million of us rose up at more than 2,700 events in all 50 states, DC, and cities worldwide to say: America has no kings, and the power belongs to the people.” These folks are a little late to the party.
Like many Americans, I watched with interest as the “No Kings” spectacle unfolded. It was rather like a box of Monty Python's chocolates. I had no idea what I was going to get, but I was pretty sure I wasn't going to like it much. In this, at least, I was not disappointed.
So, what, exactly, did this crunchy frog of a “No Kings” thing accomplish? We haven’t had any kings since the day we declared our independence. And before I had my coffee made this morning, I was deeply concerned, so I checked. Turns out, we still don’t.
The Democrats (and their socialist and Communist allies) mounted “no kings” protests yesterday, just as they did in July. The July protests accomplished absolutely nothing, and yesterday’s will be no different. The New York Times kept up a brave front, headlining “‘No More Trump!’: Protesters Denouncing the President Unite Across the Country.” But in fact, the protests were mostly the occasion for epic trolling.
We could consider this a supplement to yesterday’s Week In Pictures:
SAN ANTONIO, Texas — A San Antonio Church and residents of several northside neighborhoods were left to deal with damages left by “No Kings” related vandals in the aftermath of the protest in the Alamo City. The vandals targeted residential homes, traffic signs, highway overpasses, and one of the city’s largest churches.
At the Community Bible Church (CBC), where weekly attendance is estimated at over 15,000 worshipers, vandals left messages spray-painted on the church grounds and building that read, “Jesus wants TRUMP gone!” and “No King but God”. CBC Pastor Ed Newton posted images of the vandalism and offered commentary in an Instagram social media post on Saturday.
WASHINGTON - The United States announced Sunday another strike against what it called a drug-running boat, this time attacking an alleged Colombian leftist rebel vessel in an apparent expansion of a US military operation off the coasts of South America.
Word of the attack from Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth came as President Donald Trump said the United States is halting financial aid to Colombia and will announce tariffs against it on Monday.
The United States has had warships deployed in the Caribbean off Venezuela since August and has attacked at least six boats it said were running drugs toward the United States, killing at least 27 people so far.