May 3, 2024 — John Hinderaker

Now They Tell Us!

Featured image Today the New York Times has a long article about the fact that covid vaccines have been responsible for a limited number of deaths. The article is featured in the paper’s daily email; this is how it begins: Let me start with a disclaimer: The subject of today’s newsletter will make some readers uncomfortable. It makes me a little uncomfortable. It makes the Times uncomfortable because it involves recanting a »
May 3, 2024 — John Hinderaker

The Farce Continues

Featured imageAlvin Bragg’s prosecution of Donald Trump continues in Juan Merchan’s Manhattan courtroom. Today’s testimony was devoted mostly to the “Access Hollywood” tape, in which Trump made an obscene reference to the liberties that celebrities are allowed to take. What that has to do with the “crime” with which he is charged, God only knows. The gist of the prosecution’s case is that Trump tried to prevent bad stories about him, »
May 3, 2024 — Scott Johnson

From the mixed-up files, Gaza Solidarity Camp edition

Featured imageIn the eruption of support for Hamas and hatred of the Jewish people at Columbia University’s Gaza Solidarity Encampment, we have discovered a humorous sidebar. Olivia Reingold originally dredged up lost-and-found entries from the mixed-up files of the encampment and posted them on X. I’m in the lost and found chat for Columbia’s encampment, where a comrade is currently freaking out that their other comrades might steal their Adderall prescription. »
May 3, 2024 — Steven Hayward

The Daily Chart: Was It Everything We Did?

Featured imageJoe Biden is further under water than any modern president at this point in a first term. Here’s the table: It turns out that Biden is relatively stronger than many of his peer leaders: Gee—I wonder why so many leaders are so unpopular right now? (I wonder why the UK’s Rishi Sunak isn’t on this list, since he is heading for an electoral wipeout in just a few months.) Maybe »
May 3, 2024 — Scott Johnson

When it’s better you say nothing at all

Featured imagePresident Biden read a perfunctory statement yesterday addressing “recent events on college campuses.” That’s how the statement referred to the calls for intifada revolution and the occupation of university quads by mobs supporting Hamas. The brief statement ran to fewer than 500 words. It would have been better if it had been zero. This is how it began, according to the White House transcript: Before I head to North Carolina, »
May 3, 2024 — Scott Johnson

Thoughts from the ammo line

Featured imageAmmo Grrrll is not among those CHOOSING “VICTIMHOOD” FOR FUN AND PROFIT. She writes: Let us assume for the moment that a woman who has 20 years of experience as an executive secretary, types 100 wpm, can take shorthand like a tape recorder, and is smart as a whip, discreet, well-groomed, and pleasant to all is also a few pounds north of what is an acceptable weight for a woman »
May 2, 2024 — Scott Johnson

Counterrevolution at Chapel Hill

Featured imageThe gentlemen of Pi Kappa Phi at UNC Chapel Hill have given us a morale booster by protecting the American flag from the kill-the-Jews crowd on campus. They join the Columbia night-shift custodian fighting off the Hamilton Hall Hamasniks in an early bid for man-of-the-year recognition. See the photo below depicting them standing guard. One of the best photos of 2024 so far: Fraternity brothers are pelted by anti-Israel protesters »
May 2, 2024 — John Hinderaker

It Didn’t Start In College

Featured imageMany Americans have been shocked at the spectacle of thousands of college students, along with thousands more non-college students, engaging in kill-the-Jews riots. These people are demonstrating in favor of Hamas, which means in favor of gang rape and mass murder. How could this possibly have happened? I have seen suggestions that left-wing professors have led students astray, and no doubt that is true. We have seen many professors participating »
May 2, 2024 — Lloyd Billingsley

From Munich in 1972 to America in 2024

Featured image  Christopher Scalia recently tweeted side-by-side photos of a masked pro-Hamas protester and a masked terrorist captioned “Manhattan 2024 meets Munich 1972,” a reference some readers might not recognize. On September 5, 1972, at the Olympics in Munich, Palestinian terrorists of the Black September faction forced their way into the quarters of the Israeli team. The terrorists shot dead and castrated weightlifter Yossef Romano, a mutilation not revealed until 2015. The carnage continued »
May 1, 2024 — Steven Hayward

The Campus Appeasement Sweepstakes

Featured imageIt is hard to single out the worst appeaser among the university presidents currently cowering before anti-Semitic mobs on campus, and trying to defuse the situation through negotiations with people who have no interest in negotiating. But I think we have a winner. Yesterday, Carol Folt, president of the University of Southern California, tweeted out this: I had a second meeting today with the same group from the encampment. We »
May 1, 2024 — Steven Hayward

The Daily Chart: Consumers Aren’t Buying Bidenomics

Featured imageFrom our friends at the Committee to Unleash Prosperity, a note about how the main gauge of consumer confidence continues to slip: “Confidence retreated further in April, reaching its lowest level since July 2022 as consumers became less positive about the current labor market situation, and more concerned about future business conditions, job availability, and income,” said Dana M. Peterson, Chief Economist at The Conference Board. »
May 2, 2024 — Lloyd Billingsley

Vaxxing Questions

Featured imageLife must be lived forward, Soren Kierkegaard contended, but can only be understood backwards. That invites a glance at “CDC Found Evidence COVID-19 Vaccines Caused Deaths,” by Zachary Steiber in the May 1 Epoch Times. As the author discovered: CDC employees worked to track down information on reported post-vaccination deaths and learned that myocarditis—or heart inflammation, a confirmed side effect of the vaccines—was listed on death certificates and in autopsies »
May 2, 2024 — John Hinderaker

Trump To Be Fined Again? Then What?

Featured imageJudge Juan Merchan is considering a motion by Alvin Bragg’s office to fine Donald Trump an additional amount for further violations of Merchan’s unconstitutional gag order. Merchan has also threatened to throw Trump in jail. So what did Trump do to merit such a response? The four new alleged violations are quoted here. Trump criticized the Manhattan venue and expressed concern that the jury would be unfair: “That jury was »
May 2, 2024 — Steven Hayward

The Daily Chart: Finding the Rot at Columbia

Featured imageMy pal David Bernstein of Scalia Law School at George Mason University notes the following on Twitter: One thing that hasn’t received enough attention is that major unviersities see themselves today not as American, but as global, institutions. American institutions are strongly opposed to antisemitism and support Israel’s existence. Globally, institutions ranging from the UN to the NGO establishment at best give lip service to antisemitism, and range from tolerant »
May 2, 2024 — Scott Johnson

Rather full of it

Featured imageThe documentary Rather made its appearance yesterday on Netflix. Directed by Frank Marshall, the film premiered last year at the Tribeca Film Festival. It now becomes generally available via the streaming service. I watched the documentary twice in order to comment on it here. As it turns out, Star Tribune media critic Neal Justin fairly describes it and nails its shortcomings in 114 words, but there is more to be »
May 1, 2024 — John Hinderaker

A Sign of the Times

Featured imageEurovision is the annual European (and beyond) popular music contest that has become a giant cultural event. Each country is represented by a single singer or group, and the competition is intense. This year’s contest will begin on Tuesday in Malmo, Sweden. Israel has won the competition four times, most recently in 2018. This year it is represented by a 20-year-old woman named Eden Golan. But the contest will not »
May 1, 2024 — Steven Hayward

Podcast: Classic Format Edition on Victims of Communism Memorial Day

Featured imageToday is May Day, but also the Victims of Communism Memorial Day, and as such today is the prefect day for this classic-hybrid format edition, featuring me in conversation with Elizabeth Spalding, chair of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation. (Elizabeth is also Senior Fellow at the Pepperdine University School of Public Policy and Visiting Fellow at the Van Andel Graduate School of Government at Hillsdale College.) The Foundation has »