Supreme Court Justice Breyer Likely Retiring, Likely To Be Replaced With Another Hardcore Liberal

Justice Stephen Breyer is reportedly mad that it was leaked, because he wasn’t ready to announce his retirement till summer, but, now it’s out there

Sen. Lindsey Graham says Democrats will likely be able to replace Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer without any Republican support: ‘Elections have consequences’

Following reports that liberal Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer will retire at the end of this term, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said Democrats would likely be able to confirm his replacement without any Republican support, noting that “elections have consequences.”

“Justice Breyer has always shown great respect for the institution and his colleagues, and I wish him well in the next phase of his life,” said Graham in a statement, adding that he appreciates Breyer’s service while describing him as “a scholar and a gentleman.”

President Joe Biden on the campaign trail pledged to nominate the first-ever Black woman to the nation’s highest court. Potential candidates for the job include DC Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, California state Supreme Court Justice Leondra Kruger, and South Carolina federal district judge J. Michelle Childs.

Graham noted that it’s possible for Biden’s nominee to be confirmed without the need for any Republican votes. Vice President Kamala Harris can cast a tiebreaking vote, granting Senate Democrats narrow control of the evenly-divided upper chamber.

Well, yeah. Expect all 50 Democrats to cast a “yea” vote for whomever Brandon nominates, with Kamala casting the 51st vote. And, you might get some of the GOP squishes, like Collins and Murkowski, to flip. But, what if Biden nominates Kamala and she can’t cast that vote?

White House confirms that Biden will pick Black woman for Supreme Court seat

“The president has stated, and reiterated, his commitment to nominating a Black woman to the Supreme Court and certainly stands by that,” Psaki said, declining to give any further details. That woman, however, will not be Vice President Kamala Harris, despite some speculation that he would nominate her to the high court, thus paving the way to choose a new vice president ahead of the 2024 presidential election.

“The president has every intention, as he said before, of running for reelection, and running for reelection with Vice President Harris on the ticket as his partner,” Psaki said during the briefing.

So, that’s not happening. I just have to wonder, how will that black woman picked feel over being picked solely for her skin color and sex, rather than her legal pedigree? Well, that’s her problem. Regardless of who he picks, it’s not going to change much. It’ll be switching out one leftist for another leftist. Axios analyzed the Justices, and Sotomayor is, unshockingly, the furthest to the left, at -3.959 (that’s from the middle, with Republican leaning in the + column). Breyer scores -1.901, with Kagan at -1.508. So, no difference.

The GOP probably won’t put up a big fight, there’s no point. It won’t be a circus like when a Republican nominates anyone. But, they should spend as much time as possible highlighting just how out of step the person is from the American public.

Read: Supreme Court Justice Breyer Likely Retiring, Likely To Be Replaced With Another Hardcore Liberal »

Who Wants To Guess Where Biden’s “Free” At-Home COVID Tests Were Made?

You’re smart. You can probably tell from just reading the headline (via Twitchy)

If he really got 81 million votes, that’s a lot of stupid, gullible Americans.

Read: Who Wants To Guess Where Biden’s “Free” At-Home COVID Tests Were Made? »

If All You See…

…is horrible concrete used to create a Rich Person pool, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Blazing Cat Fur, with a post on an Ontario leader wanting COVID passports for liquor and cannabis stores.

Read: If All You See… »

Daily Laugh: Brandon’s Leading NATO Against Russian Aggression

It’s like the Credentialed Media lives in an alternate reality, when we can all see what Joe has done

Budowsky: President Biden leads NATO against Russian aggression

President Biden is acting as leader of the free world, combatting Russian aggression against Ukraine. Working closely with political and military leaders of the NATO alliance, and mobilizing economic and military deterrents to avoid another European war, Biden has hit his stride seeking to construct a multifaceted and multinational policy that, to his credit, has a reasonable chance of success.

Every president grows on the job. President Kennedy screwed up on the Bay of Pigs, took responsibility, and became the leader who saved the world during the Cuban missile crisis and began his great work for nuclear arms control. It is high praise, not criticism, that I see signs that Biden is growing on the job.

Joe has been in the federal government since 1973, first as a Senator, then as Vice President. He didn’t learn anything? He’s also the guy who enticed Russia to get frisky, because he is weak. He blew it with Afghanistan, and even the far left UK Guardian had to be honest

The president’s suggestion that a “minor incursion” by Russia might split Nato over how to respond sent the White House into frantic damage limitation mode.

The weak response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea has emboldened Putin. He has massed almost 130,000 heavily armed troops on the border of Ukraine, instituted covert action, amassed an arsenal of propaganda and psychological warfare against Ukraine (and NATO), and is testing the limits of how aggressively he can attack Ukraine without provoking a powerful and effective response from NATO.

Wasn’t Joe VP during that time?

Biden is right to organize major sanctions, and take preparatory steps to protect European economies on energy and related matters if and when sanctions are imposed. Biden is right to put thousands of American troops on alert and work with NATO nations to provide limited but critically important super-trained troops to help Ukraine defend Ukraine. Biden and NATO are right to mobilize substantial military aid to Ukraine and to use air and naval power to provide intelligence and offshore protection to Ukraine.

You mean like all those sanctions President Trump put on Russia? How he wanted to sanction NORD, the pipeline to Europe from Russia, and Joe doesn’t?

My hope in the coming days is that Biden host a Zoom meeting with living former presidents including Clinton, George W. Bush, Obama and Carter to brief them and seek their ideas based on their experience. This would send a powerful message to Putin and America of bipartisan unity.

Oh, good, let’s involve one of the squishiest presidents, Carter, and Joe’s former boss, who showed weakness and watched Russia go into Crimea (among other bad errors by Obama) and did nothing. But, no Trump, under whom Russia was not frisky.

I would suggest Biden organize a presentation to the United Nations Security Council and present evidence similar to what Kennedy did during the Cuban missile crisis — and explore a vote in the General Assembly to mobilize not just European but worldwide support for Ukraine for Ukrainians — opposing a new Russian colonialism today.

It’s a little too late, especially since Russia has a veto on the Security Council. The time to be tough was from the start of Joe’s term, not pretending to be now. It’s like calling an alarm company when you watch a criminal breaking into your business.

Read: Daily Laugh: Brandon’s Leading NATO Against Russian Aggression »

Warmists Now Want OSHA To Safeguard Us From Climate Crisis (scam)

This would be the same OSHA that overstepped it’s bounds with it’s vaccine mandate (as demanded by Brandon, to be sure), and has now given up on the rule

How Can OSHA Better Protect Workers from Climate Change?

A major culprit is the lack of a federal occupational heat safety standard. Unlike other workplace hazards with their own specific and enforceable rules, such as laddersnoise, and cotton dust, unhealthy levels of heat are loosely regulated by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) under a vague part of federal law called the General Duty Clause.

That clause states

The General Duty Clause from the OSHA Act of 1970 requires that, in addition to compliance with hazard-specific standards, all employers provide a work environment “free from recognized hazards that are causing or are likely to cause death or serious physical harm.” Workplace violence is a recognized hazard within the healthcare industry and as such, employers have the responsibility via the Act to abate the hazard. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) relies on the General Duty Clause for enforcement authority.

A slight increase in the global temperature is not a hazard or likely to cause death or serious physical harm

That could soon change. After many years of advocacy by labor, faith, health, environmental, and other leaders, the Biden administration announced last September that OSHA would begin working on a federal heat injury and illness prevention standard. The public comment period for the first stage of rulemaking ends today. A clear, detailed, legally enforceable set of heat-related requirements for employers would help protect workers from restaurants in the Pacific Northwest, to construction sites in Texas, to warehouses in Maine, to farm fields in Florida.

And will increase the cost of doing business, which will increase the cost to the consumers as it’s passed on, all for a scam. But, the real intent is to give the federal government even more control over private businesses.

Here is the TL;DR version of the public comments NRDC submitted to OSHA today about proposed heat standards. ADD LINK TO PDF

  • Heat affects the workforce with everything from missed wages, to debilitating injuries, to premature death.
  • We don’t have the full picture of how heat harms U.S. workers because of chronic underreporting across federal and state health data systems. OSHA can and should use multiple data sources to better understand the scope and scale of heat-related harms to workers—but still consider those estimates as conservative.
  • The current situation will worsen as the United States gets hotter, so heat standards must protect workers from current heat hazards and the future effects of climate change.
  • Heat hurts outdoor and indoor workers across every major industry, so OSHA’s heat safety standard needs to protect all workers—not just those at the hottest outdoor worksites.

They forgot to add the link to the PDF, but, regardless, this is all about prognostication of doom for the future, to take control now. Which should receive quite a few lawsuits if passed.

Workers themselves must be involved in developing and finalizing a heat standard. They’re the ones suffering nose bleeds during heat waves, sneaking sips of water lest they be fired, and  collapsing in the heat. They should have a voice in creating the solutions that will work best for them.

Who immediately thought “this is about empowering unions, and creating more unions”?

We recognize that OSHA is chronically underfunded and understaffed, not to mention more than a little busy with COVID-19. That’s part of why NRDC supports the Build Back Better Act, which includes a $700 million investment in OSHA’s ability to uphold its core duty to U.S. workers. But workers simply can’t wait for years for better heat stress protections. We urge OSHA to urgently develop and enforce a strong standard that recognizes occupational heat harms for what they are: preventable.

That whopping 1.5F increase in global temperatures since 1850, which most people won’t notice, is super doomy, right?

Read: Warmists Now Want OSHA To Safeguard Us From Climate Crisis (scam) »

Democrats Search For New Messaging With Lots Of People Being Done With COVID

Will they search for a new way to push Government control of citizens? The NY Times is Very Concerned

With Some Voters ‘Ready to Move On,’ Democrats Search for New Message on Virus

When the coronavirus pandemic first swept Pennsylvania, Gov. Tom Wolf closed stores and schools and ordered millions of citizens to stay home. Even four months into the crisis in 2020, all but “life-sustaining” businesses in much of the state were locked down.

Today, the virus is ravaging Pennsylvania again, like much of the country, with hospitalization numbers nearing or exceeding those during the worst months of the pandemic.

Yet Wolf, a Democrat whose party desperately wants to keep control of his seat in the midterm elections, has no intention of returning to the strict measures of two years ago. There are no plans for mask mandates or more virtual schooling. Pennsylvanians, the governor said, crave a return to normalcy.

Look at New Jersey, a deep blue state: there are no mask mandates, and the governor, who was just re-elected, barely, has no intention of re-instituting a state wide mask mandate. Gov. Cooper here in North Carolina was not quite as bad as many of his Democratic Party comrades, but, also has zero intention of putting in a mask mandate.

Around the country, Democratic elected officials who in the pandemic’s early phase shut down cities and states more aggressively than most Republicans did — and saw their popularity soar — are using a different playbook today. Despite the deadly wave fueled by the omicron variant, Democratic officials are largely skipping mask mandates and are fighting to keep schools open, sometimes in opposition to health care workers and their traditional allies in teachers’ unions.

Who did their popularity soar with? Hardcore progressives? They’re seeing that voters are done, that kids need to be in school. That people will blow off masking, because the science says that anything less than an N95 will only help about 10%.

The shift reflects a potential change in the nature of the threat now that millions of Americans are vaccinated and omicron appears to be causing less serious disease. But it is also a political pivot. Democrats are keenly aware that Americans — including even some of the party’s loyal liberal voters — have changed their attitudes about the virus and that it could be perilous to let Republicans brand the Democrats the party of lockdowns and mandates.

Locking the barn door after the peasants have already left.

“You’ll see more Democratic elected officials say that this is our forever now and we can’t live our lives sitting rocking in a corner,” said Brian Stryker, a partner at the polling firm ALG Research, whose work on Virginia’s elections last year indicated that school closures hurt Democrats. “We’ve just got to live with this virus.”

Which is what a lot of Republicans have been saying the whole time. A lot of us said “be careful, wash your hands, keep your distance”, and even “get the vaccine”, ones like me, but, don’t overdo it.

Today Biden’s overall approval, which has fallen into dangerous territory for any party in a midterm election year, is being kept down in part because of disappointment over his performance on coronavirus. Fewer than half of Americans approved of his handling of the pandemic in a CBS News/YouGov survey last week, down from 66% who approved in July.

In a lot of polls that approval is much lower, yet, Biden is still pushing for vaccine mandates. And sending N95s and test kits? Won’t really make a difference.

Now that vaccines have been proven effective, Americans have lower tolerance for restrictions, strategists and elected officials said. While schools are largely open in the United States, many families are still dealing with the fallout of two years of classroom disruptions, including loss of learning, mental health problems and millions of parents who were driven out of the workforce.

Problems not really seen much in Republican run states. But, see, this is all about the 2022 midterms, and protecting Democrats. Democrats want to pivot to seem more reasonable

“They will pay the price in the next election,” said Lou Barletta, a Republican candidate for governor in Pennsylvania who blames Democrats, rather than the virus, for damage to businesses and loss of learning. “Nobody’s going to forget businesses who couldn’t open again or people who lost their jobs. That doesn’t get erased from memory. Not to mention a year’s education was stolen away from our children.”

And you can bet they’ll pivot right back to their Progressivism (nice Fascism) right after the mid-terms.

Read: Democrats Search For New Messaging With Lots Of People Being Done With COVID »

Anyone Seeing Lots Of 500 Type Errors?

Let me know if you are seeing lots of downtime errors, usually some type of 500 type, in which you see “Cloudfare” in the middle.

I’m getting hit by a lot, and I mean a lot, of bots hitting the blog, particularly the admin login page and one other backend. Like the tune of over 49K a day, so, I’ve implemented a few plugins to try and limit this. They won’t get in, my password is too long and too random, and I stopped allowing registration years ago because of this.

But, I’ve seen a couple Cloudfares myself. I might have to turn it off.

For those using WordPress, check out Blackhole and Wordfence, which are the two others I’ve implemented. Had to add Yost SEO to update a file required by Blackhole. Might have to implement WPS Hide Login.

Thanks!

Read: Anyone Seeing Lots Of 500 Type Errors? »

Good News: Biden To Make Mobile Homes More Green, Price Them Out Of Purchase For Low Income Americans

Is this what the climate cultists mean by ‘climate change’ affecting low income people the most?

After decades, Biden plans to make mobile homes greener. But it’s sparked a fierce debate.

…..Spurred by a court order, the Biden administration is proposing long-awaited updates to energy-efficiency standards for manufactured homes that it projects will save mobile-home owners thousands of dollars and prevent millions of tons of greenhouse gas emissions from entering the atmosphere in the coming decades. But the new standards, due in May, have also sparked a fierce debate about costs, equity and the future of manufactured housing.

The changes that the Biden administration has put forward include updates to insulation and windows, as well as heating and cooling systems.

Some say the Energy Department’s plan goes too far. “We believe in the importance of energy efficiency,” said Lesli Gooch, CEO of the Manufactured Housing Institute, a trade organization. “We just don’t think that this proposal is going to have the desired impact. And in fact, it’s going to have a negative impact on the supply of affordable, manufactured housing.”

“To us, the primary metric needs to be the upfront cost of the home,” added Mark Weiss, president of the Manufactured Housing Association for Regulatory Reform, another industry trade association. “Our concern is that these new requirements are going to make them substantially more costly.”

Most who purchase manufactured homes aren’t doing it as a 2nd place down at the beach which they use on the weekends (lots trailer parks at the NC shore like this): it’s a cost thing. Make them more expensive and they can no longer afford

Others argue that energy savings and better quality homes with higher resale values would cover any extra costs. They would like to see the Energy Department set even stricter standards.

That means zero if they cannot afford them up-front. Certainly, it is good to weatherize them better, but, this type of high-cost regulation does not help. Of course, it’s easy for a rich guy like Biden, who figured out how his sons can make him a lot of cash from Ukraine and China, selling shady artwork, etc, all while living in nice, big, rich homes.

Read: Good News: Biden To Make Mobile Homes More Green, Price Them Out Of Purchase For Low Income Americans »

If All You See…

…is an area that will soon be flooded by rising seas, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is The Daley Gator, with a post on the Left’s obsession with releasing violent people.

Read: If All You See… »

Who’s Up For An Omicron Offshoot?

This one is super stealthy

New Omicron Offshoot BA.2 Arrives In U.S. After Spreading In U.K., Denmark, India

Just as the Omicron wave may have broken across the U.S. comes word of another version of the more transmissible variant, dubbed BA.2. It’s been nicknamed by some “stealth Omicron” because it seems to evade identification better than its predecessor.

While other new variants that seemed worrisome — like Mu or Lambda — have had little impact, and details remain sketchy, early indications are that BA.2 seems to be spreading even in countries where the original Omicron lineage, BA.1, is dominant.

In Denmark, a country whose Covid policies are often contrasted with the U.S., BA.2 now accounts for nearly half of the test samples sequenced. In the final week of December, according to data from Statens Serum Institut under the auspices of the Danish Ministry of Health, the subvariant accounted for 20% of all Covid cases in Denmark. By the second week of January, its share had risen to about 45% of the total.

An initial analysis instances of BA.2 in the country “shows no differences in hospitalisations,” according to SSI. It’s also unclear how effective the current vaccines are against the subvariant.

The map at the article shows that BA.2 is hitting the U.S. as a medium, on a scale of meh, medium, and big. Has anyone heard of this before?

BA.2 “has been designated a variant under investigation” by the UK Health Security Agency. The new version of Omicron was first detected in the UK on December 6, 2021, per a HSA report. To date, there have been 426 confirmed cases, with the greatest concentration centered around London.

426. That’s what they’re getting worked up about? Britain is in the big category on the map. Is this something important, or a way to continue sowing fear to control the population?

One anonymous Biden administration official, however, told the Washington Post on Monday that “there is concern about the omicron BA.2 variant.” Because of the increase in cases overseas, the person said the U.S. is gearing up and “paying close attention to the BA.2 variant.”

I’m leaning towards fear.

New York judge strikes down state mask mandate

A New York judge struck down the state’s mask mandate on Monday, one week before it was due to expire, ruling the governor overstepped her authority in imposing a rule that needed to have been passed by the state legislature.

Judge Thomas Rademaker of New York State Supreme Court on Long Island found that the state legislature last year curbed any governor’s ability to issue decrees, such as a mask mandate, amid a declared state of emergency.

Governor Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, vowed to fight back, saying in a statement, “We strongly disagree with this ruling, and we are pursuing every option to reverse this immediately.”

“My responsibility as Governor is to protect New Yorkers throughout this public health crisis, and these measures help prevent the spread of COVID-19 and save lives,” Hochul said.

She can yammer about her responsibility, but, she must follow the law. Period.

Read: Who’s Up For An Omicron Offshoot? »

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