May 6, 2024 — Lloyd Billingsley

Take a Look Around You Boy

Featured image “The song of the sixties is over,” noted Peter Collier back in 2018, “but the melody lingers on.” Consider, for example, Barry’s McGuire’s “Eve of Destruction” from 1965. The “Eastern world” was exploding, and if “the button is pushed” there would be no one to save, so “take a look around you boy, it’s bound to scare you, boy.” That invites a look around America in 2024. China and Russia »
May 6, 2024 — Steven Hayward

The Daily Chart: Bidenflation Compared

Featured imageFrom our friends at the Committee to Unleash Prosperity, some measures of the magnitude and persistence of inflation under President Biden and previous presidents. But remember, Joe told us that “Milton Friedman isn’t running the show any more.” Someone forgot to tell this to inflation. Chaser—Slow Joe might not want to count on a rate cut from the Fed just yet: »
May 6, 2024 — Steven Hayward

Prepare for Mass Hysteria and Exile!

Featured imageEvery four years we hear Alec Baldwin, Babs Streisand, Michael Moore and other flaky leftists say they will leave the country if a Republican wins the presidency, and one of these days they may actually mean it, though I doubt it. I recall my mentor Stan Evans joking that “I voted for George W. Bush because Alec Baldwin said he’d leave the country. Which just goes to show that pragmatism »
May 6, 2024 — Steven Hayward

Consequences for Columbia

Featured imageThirteen federal judges have written to Columbia University to announce that, absent major changes, they won’t hire any Columbia graduates—from the law school or the undergraduate college. Here’s the letter: More of this, please. »
May 6, 2024 — Scott Johnson

To whom it may concern

Featured imagePrime Minister Netanyahu gave a speech at Yad Vashem at the start of Holocaust Remembrance Day events in Jerusalem yesterday evening. Israel Hayom observes that “[t]he speech took an unusual turn when he shifted language since Netanyahu normally does not use this forum to speak in English.” This is what he had to say to whom it may concern in the English-speaking world: Eighty years ago in the Holocaust the »
May 6, 2024 — Scott Johnson

Karl versus Cotton

Featured imageSenator Tom Cotton appeared for an interview by ABC’s Jonathan Karl on This Week yesterday (transcript here). I missed it. You missed it. We all missed it. The interview proceeded in the form of cross-examination. Karl sought to put words in Cotton’s mouth or elicit his agreement to the axioms planted in his leading questions. He wants his colleagues to know he’s working hard on behalf of the Democrats. Addressing »
May 5, 2024 — John Hinderaker

Who Is Paying For the Protests? [Updated]

Featured imageThe anti-Semitic and anti-American protests that have engulfed college campuses are among the most disgraceful events of our recent history. A lot of people want to know, who is paying for, supporting and coordinating these outrages? Politico has been looking into that question: President Joe Biden has been dogged for months by pro-Palestinian protesters calling him “Genocide Joe” — but some of the groups behind the demonstrations receive financial backing »
May 5, 2024 — John Hinderaker

Al Gore, Statesman?

Featured imageUntil I saw Lloyd Billingsley’s post, I hadn’t realized that Joe Biden awarded Al Gore, among others, the Presidential Medal of Freedom. The White House’s press release is here. This year’s recipients were the usual mixed bag, but I want to focus specifically on Gore. This is what Gore’s citation says: Al Gore is a former Vice President, United States Senator, and member of the House of Representatives. After winning »
May 5, 2024 — Scott Johnson

Students for Justice in Palestine: Whodat?

Featured imageThe Middle East Forum’s Dexter Van Zile visited Gaza Solidarity Encampments in Boston/Cambridge at Emerson College, MIT, and Harvard (he didn’t make it into Harvard Yard). MEF has posted his report “Students for Justice in Palestine Grooming American Students for Intifada: A First Person Account.” Who are these people? What do they want? What do they have to say? Who funds them? It’s an enterprising report. I am sorry to »
May 4, 2024 — Lloyd Billingsley

Campus Jihadists Real Target Is America

Featured imageThe surge of pro-Hamas “protesters” on American campuses has some pundits puzzled. On the other hand, past events help explain the dynamics in play. On August 3, 1981, some 13,000 members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO), walked off their jobs. “They are in violation of the law,” said President Ronald Reagan, “and if they do not report for work within 48 hours, they have forfeited their jobs »
May 4, 2024 — Steven Hayward

Columbia’s Disgrace

Featured imageIt is tempting to quip that Columbia University has succeeded splendidly in bring ‘Colombia’ to its campus. But that is an injustice to Colombia, which has largely rooted out its corruption, unlike Columbia University. In any case, I got to reflecting on how perceptive leftists understood the previous iteration of the meltdown at Columbia University back in 1968. Not long after the police cleared out the campus back then, Columbia »
May 5, 2024 — Steven Hayward

Bonus Podcast: Three Whisky After Hours, on How to Think About the Anti-Semitism Awareness Act

Featured imageThere was a lot of listener and reader interest in our too brief comments on the Anti-Semitism Awareness Act in our last episode, and we realized this issue deserved keeping the whisky bar open after the usual 2 am closing time to extend our treatment of the issue, yielding this short special episode. To recap: Lucretia thinks it is a stupid idea (hence, “Don’t murder a man who is committing »
May 5, 2024 — John Hinderaker

Trump +10?

Featured imageIf Democrats aren’t pushing the panic button, they should be. Rasmussen’s latest has Trump ahead of Biden by ten points: Despite being on trial in New York City, former President Donald Trump has widened his lead over President Joe Biden during the past month. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that, in a three-way contest between Biden, Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., 46% of Likely »
May 5, 2024 — Scott Johnson

Biden sits on ammo for Israel

Featured imageBased on two official Israeli sources, Barak Ravid reports at Axios that the Biden administration put a hold on a shipment of American ammunition to Israel. The Biden team of course opposes Israel’s long-delayed operation to clear the last Hamas redoubt in Rafah. Ravid adds this: Last Wednesday U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Israel and had a “tough” conversation with Netanyahu regarding a possible Israeli operation in Rafah, »
May 5, 2024 — Scott Johnson

Sunday morning coming down

Featured imageJohn Pizzarelli and Jessica Molaskey celebrated the centennial anniversary (on April 28) of the birth of Blossom Dearie on yesterday’s Radio Deluxe show (posted here). With her girlish voice, I thought the first time I heard her, some creative genius must have come up with that stage name. But no, Margrethe Blossom Dearie was her real name. I was introduced to her late in life courtesy of Pete Lee’s Bop »
May 4, 2024 — John Hinderaker

Trump: Still Too Hot to Handle

Featured imagePresident Trump is running this ad in Georgia, reportedly targeted to specific geographies within that state. Its message is powerful and, if you are a Democrat, nuclear: Trump’s Super PAC is running this ad in rural Georgia counties targeting Black men. pic.twitter.com/mcRMkGsqLN — Alex Thompson (@AlexThomp) May 3, 2024 Google reportedly censored the ad. Instead of the ad playing, there was a notice that it was “removed for a policy »
May 4, 2024 — Lloyd Billingsley

Biden Picks the Winners

Featured imageJoe Biden’s 19 recipients for the Presidential Medal of Freedom include “Nancy D’Alesandro Pelosi,” and as the Delaware Democrat explains: Nancy Pelosi served as the 52nd Speaker of the House and has represented San Francisco in Congress for more than 36 years. A staunch defender of democracy, she has shaped legislative agendas and Democratic priorities for decades. As Joshua Muravchik noted in “Pelosi’s Favorite Stalinist,” Pelosi once “took to the »