Trump Is About To Stress Test Our (shady) Judicial System Or Something

By William Teach March 31, 2023 – 10:30 am

I had planned on ignoring the supposed Trump indictment, because the charges have not been formally released, it’s all based on leaks (shouldn’t the proceedings of a grand jury be secret?), and we all knew that shady Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg would get his charges. As the saying goes, a grand jury can indict a ham sandwich. Once indicted, Bragg actually has to make the case. This piece by Time perfectly encapsulates what’s wrong with this whole thing

Trump Is About to Stress Test the Credibility of Our Judicial System

For the weeks leading up to Donald Trump’s indictment, the former President was constantly throwing misdirection into the ether. He predicted an indictment and arrest in the coming hours, even as his advisers and lawyers conceded they had no evidence that was in the offing. He raised cash on the threat of the prospect of criminal prosecution and plotted with his team about a potential perp walk. Amid it all, the ex-President seemed to miss the severity of history’s judgment should he become the first of his cohort to face a criminal indictment.

Well, late Thursday, that anticipated outcome finally came into relief. The Manhattan District Attorney’s office confirmed that a grand jury had made history, and that the process of negotiating a surrender and booking for the former White House resident had already begun. In the coming days, as the indictment is unsealed and Trump poses for his mugshot, the misdirection is unlikely to abate. And in that comes a distinct risk, one not confined to the American judicial system, the norms of the Presidency itself, or the basics of civility in a pluralistic political world.

With every single utterance, filing, and grievance, Trump and those involved in this case—and potentially others—stand to rewrite the rules of criminal accountability in a high-charged political environment.

First off, no matter what the Democrats think, people are innocent till proven guilty in a court of law. They have protections. Bragg must prove his case. Defendants can do whatever to protect themselves. Those cheering this targeted political attack via prosecution should remember that they could be next.

As the first criminal charges against an ex-President move forward, the combination of head fakes and the legitimate threat to judicial norms should not be taken lightly.

The stratagem has worked plenty for Trump to this point, and it still may, to be clear. At the same time, these proceedings might finally shake the American public of its reflex to follow Trump’s eyeline when it locks on to something blurry in the distance. After all, it seems an indictment is about to be in plain view, even if a lot of Americans aren’t yet ready to believe their eyes. In fact, Trump and his allies are going to work overtime to ensure that his strongest supporters never get there, even if it further diminishes the credibility of the nation’s courts.

Political norms would preclude a soft on crime prosecutor, who lets felons off light if not off, targeting a specific US citizen, even if a former president, because of politics. It’s interesting that so many of the articles on this focus on Trump and getting Trump, rather than the constitutional protections, both in the federal Bill of Rights and the NY Constitution and how Bragg has broken them. Cheering media and Democrats should remember that they opened this box, and it can immediately turn around and bite them right in the ass.

Someone who spent her life in Congress fails to understand Civics 101.

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LOL: UN’s Climate Crisis (scam) Influence Says We Need To Treat It Like COVID Emergency

By William Teach March 31, 2023 – 7:00 am

Sophia Kianni is a hoot. She’s basically a young, attractive “influencer” for the UN climate cult division, and perfect in that she’s a typical climahypocrite. She takes a lot of fossil fueled travel, always seems to have a new outfit (Warmists rage about “fast fashion” being bad for climate and the environment, and, for the latter, they’re aren’t wrong), and lives the high life. Oh, and isn’t an actual climate scientist. And doesn’t look very serious, but, is great at posting what the climate cultists at the UN tell her to. Are we really supposed to listen to a 21 year old?

Youth UN adviser says climate change needs to be treated like COVID-19: ‘An emergency’

A youth United Nations (UN) climate adviser is calling for world leaders to treat global warming with the same mandates used to fight the COVID-19 pandemic.

Sophia Kianni, who is the UN’s youngest adviser, said in a tweet earlier this week that more than 80% of the global population is being “impacted” by climate change and that it warranted an emergency response.

“Remember when we treated COVID-19 like an emergency?” Kianni tweeted Monday evening. “Well it’s time to do the same for climate change, over 80% of the world’s population is being impacted from Climate Change!”

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, governments implemented wide-reaching mandates and economic shutdowns, which led to massive job losses and supply chain problems, in an effort to prevent further spread of the disease. Such shutdowns were heavily criticized for their negative impacts on the global economy and education outcomes.

However, actions taken to defeat the pandemic — such as limiting travel and forcing individuals to stay at home — ultimately curbed carbon emissions and energy consumption, a priority activists have pushed. In 2020, the U.S. emitted 4.6 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide, a staggering 11% year-over-year decline and the lowest level since 1983, according to federal data.

I said all the way back in 2020, many many times, that the climate cult wants the same things. Because they said so. They want government to have that power to restrict your life, to control it. Does Sophia realize that it limit her own life? Or, does she think she’d be exempt?

I suspect that most of the “science” stuff posted to her Twitter, Instagram, and other accounts comes from some UN media cultist.

Read: LOL: UN’s Climate Crisis (scam) Influence Says We Need To Treat It Like COVID Emergency »

Posted in AGW Socialism, Global Warming | 17 Comments | Trackback URL

Gun Grabber Recommends Doing What New Zealand Did

By William Teach March 31, 2023 – 6:45 am

During the 2016 election cycle we heard about the Australian solution, where the nation banned most private ownership of firearms. Of course, somewhere around 70% of citizens did not turn in their guns to this day, and, since there had been no registration beforehand, the government can’t do a damned thing about it

No more ‘thoughts and prayers’ — pass the gun laws America needs

…

I woke up early Tuesday morning and, as I always do, turned on “Morning Joe,” where the first two hours of the show was devoted solely to the shooting at the Covenant School in Nashville on Monday, March 27. Three adults and three children were gunned down by an individual wielding two AR-style guns and a pistol.

As usual, there were obligatory messages from senators and Congress members — including Republicans — on how tragic it was, and how they were holding the families of those killed in their “thoughts and prayers.” Hearing this, I wanted to scream. They should pass a law that no elected official can use those words about a mass shooting, because it is the height of hypocrisy for any politician to offer “thoughts and prayers” to victims’ families when they know they will not support any changes to stop gun violence.

No real mention of the mental illness from the Nashville shooter, or other wackjob shooters.

This has to end. Don’t tell me that gun laws can’t be changed, when New Zealand had a mass shooting in 2019 and the New Zealand government set out to pass strict gun-control legislation — and did so within six months. New Zealand has not had another mass shooting since. Gun violence there is rare.

We can do this. We must do this. It will take courage on the part of our members of Congress but, truth be told, it shouldn’t require much fortitude because many polls show Americans strongly favor commonsense gun safety laws. If it were up to me, we would pass gun safety laws as strict and comprehensive as those in New Zealand. Weapons of war, such as AR-style firearms and multiple-shot magazines, should be barred forever in America.

New Zealand made private ownership of most semi-automatics illegal. They have a gun registry. They track everything. And the government went full authoritarian the following year over COVID.

But I’m going to make it easy for Congress: Break down the changes we need into smaller increments and pass them, one after another, every six months. Start with what should be the easiest and pledge that by Memorial Day, Congress will pass legislation making multiple-capacity magazines — many of which contain 30, 50 or 100 bullets — illegal in this country. We did it in the 1994 law, making it illegal to possess a magazine with more than 10 bullets.

I’m sure criminals will follow this. Now, listen, there are things we could do. I fully support revamping the background check system to weed out the wackjobs who shouldn’t have a firearm. I have no problem with a 7-14 waiting period, where people could be checked, like with the Nashville trans nutter. I even support requiring some training for first time buyers. I got training voluntarily. A proper red flag system which protects Constitutional Rights and heavily penalizes those filing false reports. And others.

Here’s the problem: Australia. New Zealand. Great Britain. This is the end game. If you give the gun grabbers a little bit they want more and more, because ending most private ownership of firearms Is The Goal. The end game. The powers that be do not care if you, the peasant, are left at the mercy of the criminals who would still be armed

Notice during Jamaal Bowman’s unhinged rant at Thomas Massie that there’s an armed officer in the background. He doesn’t want you to have protection.

I’d also highly recommend the article The Nashville shooter and the forever children who refuse to grow up.

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Surprise: AstraZeneca COVID Vax Can Cause Heart Problems For Young Women

By William Teach March 30, 2023 – 3:00 pm

One would have thought this would be bigger news, wouldn’t you? It’s rather important after the last three years. I first ran across it on Yahoo News on the tablet app, which curates. Imagine my surprise when this NY Times article is way, way, way down the page

AstraZeneca’s Covid Vaccine May Have Posed a Higher Heart Risk for Young Women, Study Shows

Young women who received at least one dose of the Covid vaccine made by AstraZeneca might have been more likely to die of a heart problem in the 12 weeks after their vaccination, according to an analysis of immunization and death records in Britain released on Monday.

Those findings carry a big caveat: Britain withdrew AstraZeneca’s vaccine use for young people under 30 in April 2021, citing the risk of rare but dangerous blood clots. By that time, the young women who were immunized would have been mainly health care workers or those who were medically vulnerable, because people at high risk of Covid from their age, health or employment were vaccinated first. So the results of the study may not apply to the general population.

“It could be that the people who are clinically extremely vulnerable are more susceptible to side effects from vaccination,” said Vahé Nafilyan, a senior statistician for Britain’s Office for National Statistics and one of the lead researchers on the study. The results were published on Monday in the journal Nature Communications.

The AstraZeneca vaccine was never authorized for use in the United States. But more than 3 billion doses of the vaccine had been delivered worldwide as of November 2022. It is cleared for use in more than 170 countries, although in recent months, some have relied only on bivalent mRNA vaccines for the latest round of booster shots because of Omicron’s dominance.

Yet another problem with the vaccines. I can certainly understand why they were rushed, as many things were rushed in 2020, since they just didn’t know. But, since they were experimental, the powers that be should have been doing more research and study before allowing any sort of mandates, any calls for vaccine passports (which were implemented), requirements to be vaccinated to go places, and so forth.

The researchers did not find a significantly elevated risk of death in any other subgroup or with the Pfizer-BioNTech mRNA vaccine, which was also widely used in Britain. And the study did not prove that the vaccines caused the deaths.

The benefits of Covid vaccines still vastly outweigh the risks, and the incidence of harmful events after vaccination remains very low, the researchers and other experts emphasized.

In fairness, you sit there and watch commercials for all sorts of medications on TV and the radio/streaming, and half the time it’s about the side effects, right? But, no one was forcing you to take those.

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If All You See…

By William Teach March 30, 2023 – 10:30 am

…is an Evil fossil fueled vehicle, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Moonbattery, with a post on moonbats doubling down after transgender attack.

Read: If All You See… »

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Senate Votes To Stop Biden’s WOTUS Rule

By William Teach March 30, 2023 – 10:30 am

The Waters of The US rule was horrible when it was first proposed during the Obama administration, and it it even worse now. So, good news on this massive Executive Branch over-reach

From the link

U.S. Senators Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) and Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss.) today voted with a majority of Senators to overturn the Biden administration’s Waters of the United States (WOTUS) rule.

The Senate voted 53-43 to approve a Congressional Review Act (CRA) joint resolution of disapproval to stop the new WOTUS rule finalized by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to vastly expand the federal government’s regulatory reach under the Clean Water Act.

“This rule is yet another government overreach from the Biden Administration that threatens to halt progress on necessary infrastructure projects,” Wicker said.  “Landowners and businesses need regulatory certainty, and the President has failed to provide it.  I am glad to stand with my colleagues in this effort to overturn this unlawful regulation.”

“No one needs a puddle on their property to be regulated by the federal government,” Hyde-Smith said.  “This terrible Biden WOTUS rule will affect tens of thousands of small businesses in Mississippi, which would affect how we grow crops or get permits for new projects.  What’s worse is that it would require private individuals to prove water on their land is not under the federal government’s Clean Water Act jurisdiction.  It must be stopped.” (snip)

The U.S. House of Representatives approved its WOTUS CRA on a 227-198 vote earlier this month, with the support of U.S. Representatives Trent Kelly (R-Miss.), Michael Guest (R-Miss.), and Mike Ezell (R-Miss.).

At every turn Leftists like Biden are trying to grow the federal government’s control over pretty much everything. This is a good smackdown.

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Your Fault: Melting Antarctic Will Drastically Slow Down Ocean Flows

By William Teach March 30, 2023 – 7:00 am

So, it’s not actually happening? It’ll just be doom in the future?

Rising Antarctic ice melt will dramatically slow global ocean flows – study

Rapidly melting Antarctic ice is dramatically slowing down the flow of water through the world’s oceans, and could have a disastrous impact on global climate, the marine food chain and even the stability of ice shelves, new research has found.

The “overturning circulation” of the oceans, driven by the movement of denser water towards the sea floor, helps deliver heat, carbon, oxygen and vital nutrients around the globe.

But deep ocean water flows from the Antarctic could decline by 40% by 2050, according to a study published on Wednesday in the journal Nature.

“That’s stunning to see that happen so quickly,” said Alan Mix, a paleoclimatologist at Oregon State University and co-author on the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessments, who was not involved in the study. “It appears to be kicking into gear right now. That’s headline news.”

In reality, this tends to happen during warm periods, which can lead then to cooling periods, it’s just a part of the complex systems on Earth. No reason to drag witchcraft into it. But, do they really know what’s going on? Because I’ve blogged this doomy stuff several times, and we have headlines like

Oh, and

Ocean currents drive climate patterns – so what happens when they speed up?

Yeah, that was March 29, 2023.

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Kentucky Passes Big Law To Protect Kids From Groomers, Women From Gender Confused

By William Teach March 30, 2023 – 6:45 am

This has obviously made the groomers very upset, like those at the Washington Post

Kentucky lawmakers pass major anti-trans law, overriding governor’s veto

Kentucky lawmakers passed a sweeping bill Wednesday that restricts how doctors and schools treat transgender youths, overriding the governor’s veto and forceful objections by state medical associations, education officials and parents with trans children.

The law — which sparked protests inside and outside the Capitol and takes effect this summer — bans access to gender-affirming health care for trans children, restricts which bathrooms and lockers they use, prohibits discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity in schools, and allows teachers to use students’ birth names and pronouns against their wishes.

“We are denying families, their physicians and their therapists their right to make medically informed decisions,” said state Sen. Karen Berg (D). She noted that the bill was introduced just weeks after her own trans son killed himself. “To say this is a bill protecting children is completely disingenuous. And to call this a parents’ right bill is an absolutely despicable affront to me personally.”

No, they are protecting children, minors, from life altering medical procedures for which they do not have the wisdom to make, along with the poor mental health that comes with the whole fad of being “transgender.” If you want to do this as an adult, that’s your choice. Kids should not be dragged into this insanity, should not be goaded and incented into it. Let them be kids. Most of this starts with the adults. It wasn’t that long ago that if an adult treated kids like this they would have been arrested for child abuse. The kids would have been taken from the parent(s).

Remember the whole fad of young women being “bi-curious?” How many acted on it? How many became lesbian? How many got over the fad? It was mostly harmless. Trans have much higher mental disturbances, suicidal thoughts, and suicide. The medical procedures and puberty blockers and stuff cause life altering changes. Their insurance rates are higher for auto, home, and medical.

Schools should not be discussing sexual issues with children, even straight sex issues. It’s not their place.

Further, women should not have to deal with biological men with mental health issues in their safe spaces, ie, locker rooms, bathrooms, showers, and changing rooms.

Brian Wells said his trans daughter Fischer, 13, met with her endocrinologist Tuesday to figure out how they would handle her treatment going forward. Fischer is currently on puberty blocker medication, but once the law goes into effect this summer, it will be illegal for her doctor to continue that treatment.

“We’ve started looking for doctors we can drive to out of state. The closest would be in Cincinnati,” Wells said. “We’ve been talking about whether we need to move. It’s stressful, exhausting.”

That’s child abuse in a sane world. Along those lines, I’d recommend this Federalist article about it not being compassionate to feed mental illness.

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Pure TDS: LA Times Blames Trump For Border Policy With Canada

By William Teach March 29, 2023 – 6:46 pm

Does the LA Times and screed writers Karen Musalo and Audrey Macklin understand who is president now and making the decision? (paywalled LA Times piece here)

Opinion: Now Trump’s cruel border policy is spreading in Canada

At almost 4,000 miles, the United States’ northern border is about twice as long as the U.S.-Mexico border — much of it wild, unmarked and dangerously cold for half the year. And yet, human smuggling and deaths at the U.S.-Canada border have not been a major phenomenon, as they have been down south. Nor has Canada poured billions of dollars into a network of walls, fences, robotic dogs and militarized border patrol. It is also true that historically the number of asylum seekers and migrants seeking entry to Canada has been relatively low.

But the ills of the U.S.-Mexico border seem bound to spread northward, now that Canada reached a deal with the Biden administration to expand a 2004 agreement to repel Canada-bound asylum seekers back to the United States (and vice versa).

And this is Trump’s fault how, exactly? Bush 43 was president in 2004. Biden has expanded it.

As U.S. policies toward asylum seekers grew harsher from 2017 on, the number attempting to enter Canada increased. Instead of appealing to its southern neighbor to do better, Canada is coordinating with the U.S. to pass the buck on the legal obligation to protect refugees, which both countries undertook when they signed the Refugee Convention and Protocol more than 50 years ago. Their current approach foists responsibility onto poorer, less stable countries that are already doing more than their share.

That sounds more like Justin Trudeau’s fault than Trump’s. Oh, and did you notice the 50 years thing?

After Trump’s election, more asylum seekers headed north, and to avoid being sent back, they entered between official ports of entry. Biden’s failure to reverse the worst of Trump’s policies has led increasing numbers of individuals to hope for the chance of protection in Canada. In the past year, about 40,000 have crossed into Canada at an informal border crossing called Roxham Road, in Quebec.

So it was bad for Trump to tell illegals to not come, and his fault they’re going to Canada? Now, let’s say it was Trump continuing Obama’s “cruel” policies (kids in “cages”, anyone?): who would they blame?

Karen Musalo is a law professor and the founding director of the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at UC Law, San Francisco. Audrey Macklin is the director of the Centre for Criminology and Sociolegal Studies at the University of Toronto.

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Climate Cult Is Now Coming After Asthma Inhalers

By William Teach March 29, 2023 – 3:00 pm

Sorry, people with medical issues and breathing problems, you are simply inconvenient for ‘climate change’, and will just have to suck it up

Are inhalers contributing to climate change?

When you think of climate change you might not think about people who suffer from asthma, but many of the inhalers that help people with lung issues breathe can create greenhouse gasses.

St. Luke’s Regional Health System is holding a series of talks on medicine and climate change and the first one, “Climate Smart Asthma Care” is happening on Wednesday and will include some possible alternatives that might reduce the carbon footprint of folks with asthma.

In fairness, many studies show that dry powder inhaler better than pressurised metered dose inhalers, and the dry are supposedly better than pressurised for Hotcoldwetdry. But, not for all, and, regardless, the climate cult doesn’t care about people with asthma, and dry ones are much more expensive.

Meanwhile

Yellen calls climate change ‘existential threat’ after GOP lawmaker labels it ‘Trojan horse’ for spending

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Wednesday pushed back against a GOP congressman who voiced skepticism about the threat of climate change, suggesting the issue was being used by the Biden administration to secure funding and was not a serious concern.

“Can you provide to me, or do you know any research on your own to justify this drastic climate change that we have to do today or the next four or five years this world’s going to come to an end?” Rep Jerry Carl (R-Ala.) asked Yellen at a hearing on the banking system.

When Yellen pointed to an “enormous amount of research” summarized by a United Nations group about the threat of climate change, Carl claimed that the global organization “makes a lot of money off the climate change scenario.”

Perhaps she should be worried about her job, which on the treasury.

‘How do you laugh about death?’: the comedians tackling climate change

When David Perdue applied to be part of a climate comedy program, he felt a little out of his element: “I couldn’t recall one time I’d ever had a conversation with my friends about climate change,” said the Atlanta-based comic. Perdue, who is Black, added, “But I knew it was an issue that was going to affect people who look like me, so I wanted to use comedy to address that.”

Perdue was one of nine comedians who took part in a nine-month fellowship where they learned about climate science and solutions and collaborated on new, climate-related material. The Climate Comedy Cohort produced shorts, toured together, and pitched ideas to television networks. Their work is part of a broader effort to bring some levity to a topic that is increasingly present in everyday life.

For Perdue, that meant bringing race into the conversation about sustainability and clean energy. “[Solar power] is free labor, and the most American thing to do is to use free labor,” he says in one of his sets. “We just have to tell people the sun is Black.”

The cult even has to ruin comedy.

Read: Climate Cult Is Now Coming After Asthma Inhalers »

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