Battle for the Soul of the Nation
This week, President Biden gave what Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson characterized as an "urgent wartime address. Just as FDR rallied Americans to avenge Japan's sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, President called for patriotic Americans to help him defend democracy from the MAGA Republicans who are trying to take the country down an authoritarian path that opposes the regulations, mandates, foreign wars, higher taxes and spending needed to rescue us from the selfishness and individual liberty that ran rampant under Trump."
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre rejected GOP complaints that the President was maligning half the country by pointing out "he quite clearly expressed gratitude for independents and Republicans—like Rep. Cheney—who are supporting his efforts to build an America that is free from dissension. He also tried to head off an armed confrontation by reminding his political opponents that their AR15s were no match for the machine guns and flamethrowers his troops can deploy, the smart bombs and napalm his F-15s can deliver, or the nuclear missiles he can launch with the push of a button. He wants to be merciful. All he requires is obedience."
An appalled Sen. John Kennedy (R-La) said "the President Biden we saw was every inch Joe Biden, the politician. He could have used the time to talk about how he was going to solve the problems of crime, inflation, the learning loss of our children, the Fentanyl coming across the border and killing our teenagers. Instead, he chose to say to the American people, if you don't agree with me you're a bad person."
An energized House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif) called the speech "inspiring and optimistic. He identified the enemies we must defeat. MAGA Republicans are orchestrating a sinister campaign to divide us. As my spiritual adviser Landru says, 'they are not of the body.' Their alien beliefs threaten the well-being of the collective. We must take whatever actions are necessary to ensure the termination of their evil influence."
The day after his speech, Biden was taken aback by a reporter asking "do you consider all Trump supporters to be a threat to the country?" A baffled Biden replied "I don't remember saying that. Who says I said that? It's only Trump voters who refuse to accept the fact that 81 million voters elected me to rule this country. Their patriotic duty as citizens is to obey my authority and do what I ask of them to build a better future without me having to force them to do it."
Jan 6 Committee Wants Gingrich
Inspired by President Biden's call to action against the enemies of our democracy, the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 riot at the Capitol is asking former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga) to voluntarily testify at its hearings.
Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo) explained, "the President's speech reminded us that our work here is far from done. Many of the ringleaders of the MAGA conspiracy against democracy are still at large. The handful of Jan 6 insurrectionists that have been locked up in the DC jail are just the tip of the iceberg. We need to interrogate everyone linked to Trump. We will give each of them an opportunity to confess their crimes and inform on their co-conspirators."
"Contentions that Gingrich and others were merely offering advice on legal steps that could potentially be taken to challenge the reported election results in several states do not excuse siding with the would-be dictator Trump," Cheney argued. "Once state officials have certified the vote count their can be no legal challenge to the outcome. At that point all objections are both moot and treasonous."
Dem Predicts "Blue Wave" Election
CNN analyst Van Jones opined that "coming into Labor Day weekend, you are starting to see the beginnings of what could be a blue wave. The disastrous Afghanistan exit, runaway inflation, the growing ineffectiveness of the covid vaccines, and murder rates not seen since the 1990s are just fading memories. Democrat voters will rally to vote for the Party's traditional values—more abortions, more income redistribution, higher taxes, LGBTQ rights, and clean energy. Don't be surprised when you see a bigger Democrat majority in the House and Senate after the votes are counted in November."
He went on to dismiss complaints about Biden spending 234 out of 589 days (40%) of his time in office on vacation. "The issue isn't how much time you spend on the job, but how much you accomplish," Jones asserted. "Since he took office Biden has issued more executive orders than any other president. He has achieved nearly universal covid vaccination. He's gotten trillions of dollars in spending enacted by Congress. He's dramatically cut back the quantities of fossil fuel emissions. A guy that has done so much for America deserves a rest."
Meanwhile, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that this year's second quarter experienced a 4.1% decline in labor productivity. Output decreased 1.4% while hours worked increased 2.7%. The decline in productivity was the largest since 1948. At the same time, hourly compensation increased by only 5.7% while prices rose by 9.1%--indicating a real loss of purchasing power per hour of labor of 3.4%. Jones brushed these statistics off, saying "Democrat voters don't care about productivity. They just want to get paid. That's what the Party has been doing since the days of FDR. Joe Biden has shoveled more money out to key constituencies than any previous President. Those constituencies will reward Democrats running for Congress by getting out the vote in November."
Gov Says "No Point in Citizens Carrying Guns"
Gov. Kathy Hochul (D-NY) instituted a raft of new gun control regulations including designating Times Square in New York City as a giant gun-free zone. National Rifle Association (NRA) spokeswoman Dana Loesch correctly pointed out that "criminals who depend on guns to commit robberies, rapes, and murders aren't going to obey these restrictions. That's why most mass shootings occur in gun-free zones. A policy that would yield better results is lessening the barriers to citizens arming themselves."
Hochul rejected "the erroneous notion that good guys with guns can stop a bad guy with a gun. If heavily armed and well-trained police forces can't stop these massacres how can a lone civilian carrying a concealed handgun possibly succeed? It's insane to think that they could. Good Samaritan stories are just rare freak occurrences. They are not a foundation for building a safer society. Only complete gun confiscation can do that."
Loesch called Hochul's reasoning "fatally flawed. There's a famous aphorism that says 'when seconds count, the police are only minutes away.' Police can't be everywhere and even if they are on the scene of a mass shooting, as they were in Uvaldi, their protocols can prevent them from taking effective action."
"An armed citizen can defend himself and others," Loesch argued. "A concealed carrier stopped a mass shooter in Indiana's Greenwood Park Mall on July 17. On August 9, a man threatened to shoot into a crowd in West Palm Beach, Florida, but an armed citizen shot him before he could kill anyone. Instead of posting signs alerting criminals to the fact that their intended victims are unarmed, Gov. Hochul should opt for 'constitutional carry' and then post signs saying 'one out of every three citizens in our state is authorized to carry concealed firearms.' Such a policy would do a lot more to reduce gun violence."
AOC Denounces Selfishness
Shocked that people who never went to college don't want to be forced to pay down her college loan debt, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (D-NY) ranted against "the selfishness of the few who oppose the social justice of President Biden's generosity. College graduates are our nation's most precious resource. Making them pay their own way is so unfair."
The Congresswoman has it backwards. Less than half of the adults in the US have college degrees. Of these only 41 million owe money for college loans. Graduates that already paid off their student loans, graduates that never took out a student loan, and those who never went to college will have to pony-up the estimated $600 billion that Biden's "generosity" has bestowed on the smaller fraction of the population who haven't paid off their debt. What's really unfair is that on average, a college graduate is projected to earn a million dollars more over a lifetime than a person who didn't go to college. Biden's college debt forgiveness is a transfer payment benefiting the better-off that largely comes at the expense of the worse-off.
"Not every program has to be for everybody," the Congresswoman asserted. "Our system is a complex package of diverse subsidies and offsetting burdens. It is the capitalistic and individualistic mindsets that confuse the issue. Allowing people to freely choose how they will serve society is inefficient. The only way we can fix that is for everyone to contribute based on their ability and receive benefits based on their needs. Only the government has the breadth of vision to know what is best for all. As the highest ranking member of our government, President Biden is best suited to determine who should receive and who should pay, The only flaw in his cancellation of student debt is that it was limited to only $10,000 or $20,000 per debtor."
DOJ Says "Too Late for a Special Master"
Former President Trump's request to appoint a special master to review the documents taken by the FBI in their raid on his Mar-a-Lago residence was rejected by the US Department of Justice (DOJ) on the grounds that it is now moot.
DOJ attorneys explained that "the whole point of a neutral party serving as a special master is to protect the suspect's attorney-client confidentiality from being exposed to the prosecutors. However, as Attorney General Merrick Garland has admitted, the FBI has already read all the documents—including the privileged communications between Trump and his lawyers. We know everything. There is nothing left for a special master to protect. The only realistic course for Mr. Trump is to confess his guilt and hope we will be merciful."
Candidate Refuses to Debate
Despite his February remark that "voters deserve several debates," Democrat nominee for the U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania John Fetterman is refusing to debate his Republican opponent Dr. Mehmet Oz because "Oz is too disagreeable. All he does is ridicule my politics and my record. He makes no effort to consider how difficult it is to be me."
"For example, Oz is unfairly critical of my role in recommending more murderers serving life sentences be released than any previous chairman of the Board of Pardons," Fetterman complained. "Each of the men I recommended has suffered enough and is fully deserving of the chance to return to their families and start a new life. Only a sadist would object to setting them free."
"Considering that each of these killers' victims received a death penalty, most people would say that the life sentences they received were lenient," Oz countered. "Being soft on crime isn't Mr. Fetterman's only dubious political position. He also wants to do away with voter ID. He says requiring ID is racist because blacks are incapable of getting, holding onto, or presenting a photo ID in order to vote. Well, I think denigrating an entire race as incompetent to achieve a simple task might be racist."
Fetterman called the idea that he might be a racist "absurd. I have tats. I shave my head. I wear a hoody. The brothers know I am on their side. They will vote for me regardless of whether I debate or not."
Though Fetterman is running for the US Senate, in a recent campaign swing through Pennsylvania, President Biden recommended that "voters should elect that big ol' boy to be governor."
In related news, Arizona Secretary of State and Democratic gubernatorial nominee Katie Hobbs has turned down a request to appear in a televised debate with her Republican opponent Kari Lake on PBS, saying "the station and the proposed moderator are too right-wing to afford an unbiased event." She proposed "an alternative format where each candidate would be interviewed separately by a person they trust to be fair. Instead of a contentious back-and-forth verbal brawl, voters would be treated to a calm exposition of unchallenged views and policy proposals. That way each candidate can be seen at their best so voters can make the right choice."
Dem Fights to Keep Dead on Voter Rolls
There are 25,975 deceased people whose names are still on Michigan's voter rolls. Of these, 23,663 had been dead for five years or more, and 17,449 had been dead for at least a decade. Federal law requires these names to be removed. Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson has been refusing to remove them. She has now been sued by the Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF). Benson's motion to dismiss the case was denied by the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan.
"President Biden is the duly elected ruler of our democracy," Benson said. "Only he has the authority to enforce federal laws. If he tells me to remove the names, I'll remove the names. In the absence of such a directive from him I have to assume that he has good reasons for keeping these name on the eligible voter list. Before he was elected president he said he had put together the most extensive and inclusive voter fraud organization in the history of American politics. It's possible that retaining these names on the rolls plays an important role in this organization's work and, seeing how successful it was in 2020, I'm not willing to tamper with it."
In other election interference news, the FBI denied Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's claim that the agency pressured him to censor evidence from Hunter Biden's laptop in the months running up to the November 2020 presidential election. Director Christopher Wray insisted that "everybody knows we would never do such a thing. Mr. Zuckerberg's notion that we did may be an early warning sign of the 'Sudden Death Syndrome' that lately has been killing so many vibrant individuals in the prime of their lives. We recommend a vow of silence as the best prophylactic for warding off such a fate for himself."
Green Energy Conundrums
The political push to force people to buy electric vehicles (EVs) has run into problems. The State of California has decreed that no fossil-fueled vehicles will be allowed to be sold in the state after 2035. About a dozen other states that have linked their vehicle emission rules to the "California Standard" are now legally obligated to follow whatever regulations California adopts.
Left unconsidered in this bold stride toward clean energy is how enough electricity to power the growing number of EVs these rules will mandate. Right now only 1% of the vehicles on the road are EVs. Even with this paltry number the California Government is advising EV owners not to recharge their cars during peak demand periods lest they cause the power grid to fail.
EVs aren't the only threat to the power grid. Homeowners' preference for running their air conditioners at comfortable settings is also posing a danger of grid failure. In Denver, the local provider of electricity has taken control over the thermostats of 22,000 customers who signed up for the Colorado AC Rewards program. These customers receive a $100 credit for enrolling in the program plus a $25 annual bonus for remaining in the program. Due to an "energy emergency" their thermostats could not be turned to a temperature any lower than 78 degrees.
US Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm called "centralized thermostat control an integral measure for preventing climate change. When you think about it, the idea that individuals should be allowed to control their home's thermostat is crazy. We can't allow selfish individuals to consume as much electricity as they're willing to pay for. They don't have the knowledge necessary for making a socially optimal choice. The government needs to dole out the appropriate quantity of electricity to each person based on their value to the social collective. Air conditioning is a luxury, not a necessity. People have a biological evap-cooler we call sweat. If there isn't enough electricity to go around what little there is must be reserved for more important uses like heating and cooling government buildings and the homes of important government officials."
