Ace of Spades Pet Thread

—Misanthropic Humanitarian

My bad, I forgot to keep track of who submitted today's opening picture. If you are here in the comments take a bow! Thanks for the submission.

In the meantime, welcome to the almost world famous Ace of Spades. Relax and spend a little time in the world of animals.

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Imagine the stories this dog could tell if this dog could talk. H/T Hank Curmudgeon

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Flight of the Bumblebee dachshund.

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Various lessons learned from dogs. Yes, they do live for the moment.

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We've all heard let sleeping dogs lie. I'm not sure about cats. Quite the cat.

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From Northern Lurker. Could this girl replace Tanya and/or Yoko........

Meet The PetMorons

Hello ~

This is the story of Bilbo Baggins, my sister's cat.

SMALL MIRACLES AND THE ART OF SAVING ONE ANIMAL
P.S. LOVE the petmoron pictures!!

Lurker and pet lover,
Michele

A wonderful story! Thanks for sharing Michele.

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This is our 60 gallon reef tank. Everything that you see in there is alive and growing. The good news is that almost all of the live coral in the reef trade today is aqua-cultured. Typically you purchase most corals as small aqua-cultured “frags”. You glue your frag in place on a rock in your tank and then grown it out. Taking a tiny piece of coral and growing it out to something substantial is very fun and rewarding. It can take several years to grow a frag out to a decent sized coral. I guess it’s really just very expensive gardening in the end. I will admit that the picture was taken through a filter to reduce the heavy blue light that the camera has trouble digesting. But on the whole, the colors are accurate. Love your site. Thanks for what you do. - Andrew of SC

Awesome hobby and beautiful to boot. You must be a very patient. Thanks for sharing with us.

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This is Gracie. She is one lucky pup. Someone found her staving by the side of the road near Los Barriles, Baja Sur, Mexico and brought her to the vet up on the highway. The vet thinks she is about 7 months old. When my wife stays in Mexico, she is a foster pet caregiver. This time however, she decided to keep Gracie instead of giving her back to the vet. This dog is really smart and now bilingual as she responds to commands in both English and Spanish.
Gracie has all her shots and travel papers so she’s ready to come to California when my wife returns. Thanks for the Pet thread. I look forward to it every week. - George

Thank you for your support George and thank you for sharing Gracie's photo and story with us. She sounds like a very smart and sweet dog.

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This is Darbie a wonderful Irish Setter. Unfortunately, she left us this past Thursday. She was the ultimate couch potato and snuggler. Hopefully she is begging for C-O-O-K-I-E-S in doggy heaven. -Misanthropic Humanitarian

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Horde, the In-Box has been pretty light the past couple of weeks. Why not submit your pet's photo? Does your pet want to be a PetMoron? I bet he or she does.

It also helps to say send your items to petmorons at the gmail thingy.

Have a great week!!!

Close it up

Saturday Gardening Thread [KT]

—Open Blogger

Hello, gardeners and garden admirers! Today we try to say goodbye to winter and welcome spring. Lots of bright colors today. A few veggies and such, and some gardening tips.

I really like the photo above. It reminds me that the bees of Notre Dame Cathedral survived the blaze. Our photo is from crisis du jour. He calls it "Touchdown":

I'm a longtime lurker at Ace. I post rarely (once per year, +/-) but read daily, including your gardening thread when I have opportunity ... which is infrequently because I work most Saturdays. Even so, thanks for your efforts in making the Gardening posts! They're a good break from the weekday focus on politics and culture.

I didn't realize until today that you publish reader-submitted photos. I don't have a garden - and my thumb is not green at all - but I do have a camera and a Flickr page. Over the years I've posted more than 100 flower photos at Flickr, mostly closeup shots using my 'macro' lens. I often have no idea what it is I'm shooting; I just point the camera at something that looks pretty and press the button.

This is an example of what a macro lens can do. "Spring Smile":

There are some other great photographers in The Horde, too. Don in Kansas has some new photos up. And some other interesting posts.

Welcoming Azaleas

ALH sent in a photo of some welcoming plants. White is a good choice against that dark brick:

Hi, this is the front flower bed at my house. We planted these azaleas about 4 years ago. They are finally big enough to put on quite a show!

I think Jane D'oh's azaleas have been delighting visitors for more than four years. We are glad that the deer haven't eaten them.

A closer view of one of them.

Overwintering Tips

From S. Lynn, in one of the less-frigid parts of Idaho:

Planted carrots and garlic last fall. They are growing like gang-busters with the warmer weather. The lettuce was reseeded from last year. Ducks and chicks love it.

About those carrots:

I planted then in the fall. Were about an inch high at the first snow. Covered them with hay. I love to experiment.

There's more:

My herb garden survived the winter. I covered it with plastic sheeting to help guard against snow, wind and freezing temps..

I guess you could say her daffodils, tulips and hyaciths (which "smell heavenly") overwintered, too.

From my cousin in Utah who keeps the geraniums in her basement over winter:

The geraniums are almost ready to go back out as soon as the weather gets a little warmer. They have had a wonderful winter some of them are ready to bloom and their leaves are huge! They loved the cold winter downstairs.

A friend who had tried to keep geraniums over the winter and had given up asked how she did it.

I trim them when I bring them in because the summer leaves die quite quickly. Some of the growth just needs to be taken off. I do Miracle Grow a few times over the winter and water them ever 3 weeks. Right now before going out, they need more water.

You probably give up when they look quite ugly, but they seem to recover. I think trimming them down might be the key. Some of mine only looked like stalks after their fall trimming.

When you take them back out, they go through a bit of a shock and might look a bit sad for a couple of weeks, but they get better. They are by a west window in my unfinished basement, not heated.

Little trip to Switzerland and Italy

Since we last visited our Swiss doggie friend, Rocky, he has played in the snow some.

He has visited mountain communities.

His human parents went to Rome.

And took a photo of this old olive tree. Fitting for Easter Week, I think.

Now, back home in Rocky's garden, it is spring. I guess they call Bleeding Hearts (Dicentras) "Tears of the Heart". Might be more fitting. What do you think?

Also note that they seem to have garden cow statuettes in place of garden gnomes in Switzerland. In honor of the Swiss love of cows, Here is a bovine playing fetch.

Have a great Easter weekend. Try to spend a little time outdoors if you can.

We have some great photos that we didn't get to today. But we will take more. If you would like to send information and/or photos for the Saturday Gardening Thread, the address is:

ktinthegarden
at g mail dot com

Include your nic unless you want to remain a lurker.

Close it up

The New Futurism [KT]

—Open Blogger

Happy Easter Saturday! Today, as we remember not to trust too much in the Arm of Flesh, perhaps we should also consider not trusting too much in the inventions of the Arm of Flesh.

Last week we discussed surrealism. This artistic and philosophical movement got going between the World Wars. Futurism, as art, started before World War I, extending from 1909 to 1944. Note on representative pieces at the link.

From the Tate Museum:

Futurism was launched by the Italian poet Filippo Tommaso Marinetti in 1909. On 20 February he published his Manifesto of Futurism on the front page of the Paris newspaper Le Figaro.

Among modernist movements futurism was exceptionally vehement in its denunciation of the past. This was because in Italy the weight of past culture was felt as particularly oppressive. In the Manifesto, Marinetti asserted that 'we will free Italy from her innumerable museums which cover her like countless cemeteries'. What the futurists proposed instead was an art that celebrated the modern world of industry and technology:

We declare...a new beauty, the beauty of speed. A racing motor car...is more beautiful than the Victory of Samothrace. (A celebrated ancient Greek sculpture in the Louvre museum in Paris.)

Sort of reminds me of the architecture historian who thinks the fire at Notre Dame was liberating because the building was overburdened with meaning. Along with the librarian who wants to eliminate book collections because they, you know, help explain culture.

Wired called the Italian futurists "techno-utopians". Maybe there are some of those today, too.

Saturday Morning Coffee Break

—Misanthropic Humanitarian

It's the weekend! Woot-Woot!!! Caffeine and a look at things that didn't get too much attention here at the AoSHQ this past week.

EMT 4/20/19

—krakatoa

If this actually gets published at the appointed time, it will be an EMT miracle.

Overnight Open Thread (04-19-2019)

—CBD

One of my main conclusions from them #MuellerReport so far is that the vast majority of *reporting* on Trump and Russia was extremely accurate.

"Based on what we have seen to date, going forward on impeachment is not worthwhile at this point. Very frankly, there is an election in 18 months and the American people will make a judgement..."

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The frantic shifting of the goalposts and flat-out hallucinatory ramblings of the left-wing media was a delightful beginning to the Passover/Easter weekend. Enjoy their tears, their rage, their impotence (wait...that's not what I meant!), and most of all the reality that while they will posture and bluster and rant and rave, they have been rocked back on their heels. And isn't that nice!
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Thank God we are winning the War On Drugs^TM
Alabama Cops Raided Their House, Seized Their Cash, and Ruined Their Lives Over $50 of Marijuana
Civil Forfeiture is a tremendous evil that is being perpetrated by the out-of-control law enforcement establishment on the American people, and it has to end.
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Don Burgett of the 101st Airborne Vet talks about the M1 Garand

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A musical interlude, in no particular order, with no particular theme. Just a few songs off the top of my head that I enjoy.

Ramble On
Here Comes The Sun
The Weight
Wabash Cannonball

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It's more than one year old, and is of course ignored by our betters in the rabid anti-gun media. But it is full of those pesky things called facts, and is worth a read.
Schools are safer than they were in the 90s, and school shootings are not more common than they used to be, researchers say
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I have no idea why this resulted in a suspension....

I wasn't even trying to get bounced!
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©2021 by AceCorp LLC. All Rights Reserved. Do not taunt proprietor with Makita, DeWalt or Milwaukee products. Shelves are non-weight-bearing and are for decoration only. Dehydrating room is closed. Platinum members to the right, all others please use rear entrance. Please wash girth-measuring calipers after use. Send all unwanted Browning Hi Powers to: cbd dot aoshq at gmail dot com

Close it up

Good Friday Night Open Thread

—Ace of Spades

Happy weekend, and happy Easter!

Earnings and Economic Data May Indicate That Fears of a Slowdown Were Overblown

—Ace of Spades

Unexpectedly!

According to Refinitiv, 74% of the companies reporting so far have beaten expectations. Based on forecasts and actual reports, earnings for the S&P 500 as a whole are expected to decline 1.7%, the first negative quarter in three years. Some forecasters had projected an earnings decline of 4% or more.

...

The equivalent of the economy's first-quarter report card will be released Friday, with the first reading of GDP. The outlook for first-quarter growth has suddenly shifted upward, after a series of better data releases later in the quarter.

CNBC/Moody’s Analytics Rapid Update survey shows economists’ median forecast is now tracking at 2.4%, way above the 1% expected earlier in the quarter, when severe winter weather and the government shutdown were stifling the economy.

Mark Levin: Let Me Explain Why Prosecutors Bring Cases to a Court, not Op-Ed Essays to the Public, In Words So Simple That Even Jake Tapper and Joe Scarborough Can Understand Them

—Ace of Spades

Dude goes off.

Worth the watch. It's 6:25 long.

Also worth watching: Carl Benjamin, aka Sargon of Akkad, dressing down the press as "smear merchants" at press conference.

He's running on the UKIP line to be a European Minister of Parliament. Obviously, he's not going to win that, and I don't know if the UK will even have MEP's after the summer. (Assuming they don't just cancel Brexit.)

So this is really just a publicity stunt.

But he takes the opportunity to tell the media they're failures that no one trusts any longer. Check out his one minute (or so) rant.

Leftwing Partisan Propaganda Media: "Collusion? Never Heard of It."

—Ace of Spades

Chuck Ross sums up the CNN/MSNBC/NYT/WP/MSM message of the day: "COLLUSION IS A MEANINGLESS TERM BUT ALSO THERE WAS COLLUSION"

Let's take a look:

Ohhhh: New York Times Reports That It's Very Possible the Entire Steele Dossier Was Itself Kremlin Disinformation

—Ace of Spades

Didn't they dismiss this possibility for two and a half years and also smear anyone who noticed the entire basis of this conspiracy theory that Trump was a Kremlin asset actually came from Kremlin assets?!

Oh right, they did do exactly that.

And now, as Pitch Meeting Guy would say:

Whoops.

Whoopsie!

Now the dossier, financed by Hillary Clinton's campaign and compiled by a former British intelligence agent, Christopher Steele, is likely to face new, possibly harsh scrutiny from multiple inquiries.

Republicans in Congress have vowed to investigate. The Justice Department's inspector general is considering whether the Federal Bureau of Investigation improperly relied on the dossier in applying to the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court for a warrant to eavesdrop on Carter Page, a Trump adviser. The inspector general wants to know what the F.B.I. learned about Mr. Steele's sources and whether it disclosed any doubts about their veracity to the court.

The Times spends a few paragraphs alibiing the Clinton campaign and Steele (and themselves) by explaining all the ways in which this dossier could have been completely wrong, and yet innocently so.

Only after those alibis do they venture another guess:

Another possibility -- one that Mr. Steele has not ruled out -- could be Russian disinformation. That would mean that in addition to carrying out an effective attack on the Clinton campaign, Russian spymasters hedged their bets and placed a few land mines under Mr. Trump’s presidency as well.

Oleg D. Kalugin, a former K.G.B. general who now lives outside Washington, saw that as plausible. "Russia has huge experience in spreading false information," he said.

Mr. Steele declined to comment for this article.

Of course, The Daily Caller reported on that possibility weeks ago, when the media was still dismissing the possibility as a conspiracy theory which couldn't possibly be true because it disagreed with their own preferred conspiracy theory.

No Matter How Cynical I Get I Can't Keep Up Update: MikeN brings up a possibility I didn't think of -- what if this new claim is itself a cover story?

173 Ace, don't fall for this. This is being leaked by the same people who were leaking against Trump before. The purpose is to try and protect the fact the dossier was written not by Russians, but by the people who wanted to spy on Trump.

Well, actually... right. Certainly they were paid to deliver a product with specified dimensions and, whaddayaknow, their paid Kremlin-asset "sources" just happened to tell them stories that fit their design.

So yes, this is at least mostly true. But is there a chance that they colluded with Putin to interfere with an election?

I'd say yes-- they just might have been spreading Russian disinformation knowingly. With both sets of partners in the conspiracy getting the political results they wanted.

New York Times Issues Series of Embarrassing Corrections About Basic Christian Beliefs

—Ace of Spades

Even I know most of this stuff and I only went to Sunday school about three times.

As for the saints-sacraments -- I also guessed that they might be relics or statues.

Based on this French language tweet:

But 1, that's partly because I was translating from the French "saints sacraments" and didn't know if those words had a special meaning when paired (they do -- it's just not on WordReference.com!), and 2, I also said I did not know what this term meant, but was guessing at its meaning, not reporting, authoritatively, what it meant, and 3, I corrected and added the right information in about 20 minutes when two readers told me what it meant.

BTW: I also forgot that "saint" actually means "holy" in French, and just took it to have the meaning we associate it with in English, that is, a person elevated to sainthood.

This bit of forgetting led me down a crooked path of mistranslation.

Mark Hemingway points out the New York Time's very provincial ignorance:

Just in time for Easter, The New York Times has been forced to run yet another correction that speaks to the paper’s profound ignorance regarding the basic beliefs of Christianity.

In a Thursday report on the fire at Notre Dame, The Times highlighted the actions of Father Jean-Marc Fournier, the Paris Fire Department chaplain who exposed himself to certain danger in order to recover the cathedral’s treasured relics.

"I had two priorities: to save the crown of thorns and a statue of Jesus," the Grey Lady quoted him. The story was full of gripping details about the scramble to preserve this statue. "As the chaplain began removing a statue of Jesus, he said, his colleagues were fighting the fire from the cathedral's towers," the paper reported. "With the statue in hand, Father Fournier, alone in the nave, gave a benediction to the cathedral, he said."

There’s one small problem here. There’s no statue of Jesus inside Notre Dame. What Father Fournier was referring to was the Blessed Sacrament, communion bread that, according to Catholic doctrine, contains the real presence of Jesus Christ.

Sure enough, The New York Times later appended this correction to the story: "An earlier version of this article misidentified one of two objects recovered from Notre-Dame by the Rev. Jean-Marc Fournier. It was the Blessed Sacrament, not a statue of Jesus."

They did what I did, I think: They tried to translate the French term used here, "saints sacraments," and they guessed it referred to some kind of relic or statue, as I did, though they added this bizarre specificity that it was definitely a statue and furthermore a statue of that most famous saint, St. Jesus.

Okay, so: Are the New York Times' French translation resources no better than my own?

In fact, they seem worse, because I never had any confidence in my guess. The New York Times reports -- as if it's a verified fact! -- that saints sacraments refers to a statue of Jesus.

By the way: Here's a hint that that couldn't possibly be right:

Saints sacraments."

Does the New York Times not know that the French plural is just like the English plural -- you add an -s, 98% of the time?

And, though some singular words end in -s (as they also sometimes do in English), you can tell that this is indeed a plural because the adjective, sacrament, is also pluralized to agree with the noun?

Seriously? There is no possible way that someone with even the most basic acquaintance with French could think that saints sacraments referred to A statue (singular) of Jesus.

Wait, I mean Saint Jesus.

How could the newspaper possibly confuse these two things? The most logical explanation is that Father Fournier referred to the “body of Christ,” and the reporter took his words literally and not seriously. It doesn’t appear to be a translation error; the reporter who wrote the story, Elian Peltier, appears to be fluent in French and tweets in the language regularly.

Yeah, I'm going to guess "No" on this. To repeat, I myself found a French news source reporting that le couronne d'epines et les saints-sacrements s'ont sauvee', or words to that effect, and I guessed (because the crown of thorns is itself a relic) that the saints-sacraments might be other relics.

I'm going to guess that this idiot saw the same reference and made the same religiously-ignorant guess that I did -- but stated it as a fact, and a correct translation.

Okay, so I don't want to steal everything from Mark Hemingway. So I'll just tell you that if you click the link to see the Times' previous Body of Christ-related corrections, you'll find out that the New York Times thinks that Christians believe that Jesus is buried in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre -- which seems to me to be another wild-assed, Bart-Simpson-Book-Report-style guess based on context.

Also, they think that Easter is the day Christ was resurrected... into Heaven.

And they think the crook'd staff a bishop carries is a "crow's ear," rather than a crosier or crozier.

I mean, it just goes on and on.

Professor Henry Jones Jr. is baffled at the ignorance of the curators of the supposed holy repository of all the facts that need knowing.

Is there a single Christian employed at the New York Times?

If not -- that's awfully strange, isn't it? Perhaps it's time to open an EEOC investigation into this Hate Group.

By the way: Here's the priest the New York Times is quoting-- the chaplain of the French fire brigade who was brought with them into the cathedral to rescue objects of inestimable value.

He does say that his second goal was to save "Jesus," but then follows that with "present en les saints-sacrements" -- taken together, "Jesus, present in the saints-sacrements."

Not "present in a statue."

Also: plural.

And also, not just "Saving Jesus." Saving Jesus, present in the holy hosts.

Here's how another French source put it:

Le père Fournier se fixe deux objectifs : d’abord, « sauver la couronne d’épines et les reliques de la passion », puis « sauver Jésus » en récupérant le Saint-Sacrement, c’est-à-dire les hosties consacrées.

"Father Fournier set himself upon two objectives, first, "saving the crown of thorns and the relics of the Passion," then "saving Jesus," in recovering the Saint-Sacrement, which is to say the consecrated hosts."

Here's the thing: the French word for statue is, get this, "statue," and I find it strange that in no quotation from this guy does he ever mention the word "statue" but repeatedly specifies Jesus as present in the saints-sacrements.

But the New York Times and its Pulitzer winning reporters and editorials just guess that saint-sacraments means "statue."

Bonus: Real Headline from the AP. This is real. This is not The Onion or the Babylon Bee.

Tourist mecca Notre Dame also revered as place of worship

Really.

Thanks to Dr. Spank.

Kim Foxx's Top Ethics Officer and Conviction Integrity Officer Resign in Wake of Corrupt Smollett Whitewash

—Ace of Spades

The article doesn't say they resigned in protest of that corrupt swindle-- but it's hard to avoid that conclusion.

Two officials have resigned from their positions in the office of Cook County, Illinois, State’s Attorney Kim Foxx in the wake of her decision to drop charges against disgraced "Empire" actor Jussie Smollett.

April Perry, Foxx's chief ethics officer, and Conviction Integrity Director Mark Rotert have both tendered their resignations and will serve their last days on the job in May.

...

Perry, Cook County's first ethics officer, initially encouraged Foxx to recuse herself from the Smollett case after learning that she had spoken about the case to members of the actor's family

Of course, she did not recuse herself. She merely told the public that she was recusing herself, while retaining authority over the case (and meddling in it).

She would later explain that she recused herself "colloquially," which is not a thing that actually exists.

Chris Buskirk: William Barr Was Right and the Media and Ruling Class Were Wrong About Everything. It's Time for Them to Admit It.

—Ace of Spades

Nice.

Read the whole thing.

Chris Buskirk of American Greatness, writing at the New York Times:

For nearly four years, members of America’s ruling class, especially those in the media, the academy and government, have operated on one central, unquestioned assumption: orange man bad. This stifling orthodoxy led to a blind, counterfactual faith in the theory that Mr. Trump had somehow colluded with "the Russians" (never well defined) to win the election. Again, the specific charges were always amorphous -- plastic enough to change as needed. That's hardly surprising: That's the way conspiracy theories always work. The Russian collusion hoax was in fact nothing more than a massively multiplayer coping mechanism for people who couldn't accept the results of the 2016 election.

But why is it not enough to simply acknowledge that you dislike Mr. Trump and disagree with his policies? What psychological purpose does adding the fiction of a conspiracy serve?

The French philosopher and literary critic Rene' Girard held that such scapegoating and ritual sacrifice is an essential part of group identity and solidarity. That seems to apply here. Mr. Trump ran against American elites and their insular culture. Their response was to load onto him all of the sins they see in American society and attempt to sacrifice him to appease their gods.

Mr. Girard asked a question that is pertinent today: "Why is our own participation in scapegoating so difficult to perceive and the participation of others so easy? To us, our fears and prejudices never appear as such because they determine our vision of people we despise, we fear, and against whom we discriminate."

But the ritual sacrifice of Donald Trump didn't work -- at least not in the sense of removing him from office. It certainly did have the effect of catalyzing and uniting his opponents. Still, one of the many ironies here is that the Trump-hating media has handed him an incredibly powerful weapon for the 2020 campaign, one that may ensure his re-election.

Again, the operating principle was that of the zealot: Believe the narrative regardless of the lack of evidence, squint to see justifications where there are none and then in an intoxicated frenzy of moral superiority use any weapon at hand to destroy your enemy.

He also briefly talks about the NeverTrumpers, always eager to be Useful Idiots for their true political allies, the upper class left.

Speaking of, let's check in with another NeverTrump Collusion Truther, deftly mutating his conspiracy theory to avoid previous refutations:

Deranged: McClatchy Comes Up With New Fake News to Rescue Its Old Fake News

—Ace of Spades

Months ago, McClatchy, citing anonymous sources (of course), claimed that Michael Cohen actually was in Prague -- they claimed that his cell phone hand pinged a tower in Prague.

Now, the Mueller report says (again) that Michael Cohen was never in Prague. Never. Nev-er.

Neh-heh, veh-her.

But don't worry: McClatchy has an answer to that.

Sure, they now say, maybe Michael Cohen was not in Prague -- but what about his treasonous phone itself?

From McClatchy:

"The Mueller report states Mr. Cohen was not in Prague. It makes no statement on whether the investigation ever had evidence that Mr. Cohen's phone pinged in or near Prague, as McClatchy reported," said Kristin Roberts, McClatchy's East Region Editor.

McClatchy's Dec. 2018 reporting was based on information from five individuals with foreign intelligence connections, who all requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information shared and concerns about sources and methods. Each obtained their information independently from each other. McClatchy stands by the reporting.

You idiots need to stop printing up every bit of bullshit one of Fusion GPS' paid sources/shills sticks in front of you.

Mid-MorningCrack-of-Noon Open Thread

—CBD

The Sacrament of the Last Supper
Salvador Dali

(By request...Kallisto)

The Morning Rant

—OregonMuse

"I remember, a month or two before the 2016 election, that I did something I don't normally do: I actually went to the main page of the CNN website, and I was shocked. The page contained links to 6 of their main 'news' articles, all of them relentlessly negative toward Trump, and a couple of them virulently so. That's when I first realized that something had gone very, very wrong. There wasn't even a pretense of objectivity. So I was reminded of this yesterday when the Mueller report was released and there on CNN was this huge desk on the set (must've cost them a fortune) and behind it, there was a human centipede, 8 or 9 commentators, all relentlessly bashing Trump, eating and regurgitating each other's crap talking points. Again I was amazed, just like 2016, that any pretense of objectivity was gone. but now I guess that's just naivete on my part. The journalism standards have changed from 'you can run anything that you can corroborate with verified sources' to 'you can run anything that bashes Trump.' And then they get offended when Trump calls them the enemy of the people. I know because I hear them complaining about it when they're handing out journalisming awards to each other. Which I suppose they have to do, to shield themselves from the truth that most normal Americans hold them in the same regard as infomercials or used-car salesman. The guy who comes on Me-TV in the afternoon and promises you big money from suing some company if you've contracted mesothelioma is more reputable. Saul Goodman > Brian Stelter. Goodman actually works for a living. Stelter is just a pasty lump of dough."

"We're Going To Need A Bigger Desk"

So the Mueller Report Was Released Yesterday...

Keeping the Faith:

You Know, the Bee Has Really Been Wielding A Sharp Knife Lately:

'Everything Is Bad And The World Is Ending And You Shouldn't Have Kids,' Says Party Of Progresshttps://t.co/jLNMF3c9Jp

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) April 16, 2019

Unforgivable Sin Now Thought To Be Whitenesshttps://t.co/Lnjs7UrHfV

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) April 17, 2019

Weird: Everyone Who Attended Bernie Sanders' Town Hall Has Reported Their Wallet Missinghttps://t.co/xpD7noyM0s

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) April 17, 2019

Snopes Rates Babylon Bee World's Most Accurate News Sourcehttps://t.co/LbnWL0HzEx

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) April 18, 2019

(I just an e-mail from Ben Roethlisberger that said "THAT LAST ONE IS FUNNY BECAUSE THE SNOPES IDIOTS ACTUALLY 'FACT-CHECKED' THE BABYLON BEE BECAUSE THEY DIDN'T REALIZE IT WAS A SATIRE SITE."

Vintage Beauty:

For the Ettes:

click for bigger mike

Wednesday's celebs: Christina Hendricks in her younger days and Jon Hamm, wearing one of his Mad Men suits.

Friday Shoe Pr0n:

Today's Edition Of The Morning Rant Is Brought To You By Bread and Wine:

Close it up

The Morning Report - 4/19/19

—J.J. Sefton

Good morning kids. A blessed Good Friday and ziessen Pesach to one and all. The top story is of course the release of the redacted Mueller Report cum two-year deception as well as the reaction from all quarters. The Democrat-Left-Media complex is in total freakout mode as they a) refuse to believe this President is not guilty in any way, shape or form, b) are convinced that AG William Barr is covering up his guilt and c) thanks to Mueller and his pro-Clinton team's feckless and reckless punting on the obstruction angle, as well as verbiage that not only continues to unfairly smear the President's character but more horribly upends centuries of legal tradition by putting the onus on him to prove he's not a reprobate criminal as opposed to them proving beyond any reasonable doubt that he is. That is utterly inexcusable, but what did you expect from Robert Mueller? He was, is and always will be an agent of the Deep State Leftist cabal and as such, dragged this whole thing out for more than two years in the vain attempt to find something, anything, with which to destroy the Presidency of Donald Trump, either by removing him from office or essentially kneecapping his agenda.

The latter is what happened and for sure it affected the outcome of the midterm elections in the GOP losing the House. But circling back, the GOP-e at best was diffident or averse to Trump because it, too, is part and parcel of the anti-American globalist enterprise. I find it extremely hard to believe that turds like Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell did not know from the get-go that this entire collusion story was a complete crock. Hell, John McStains himself sent an aide to go fetch the fraudulent Steele dossier from the Brits and then was instrumental in disseminating it back here in DC. They knew. They all knew - Democrat and Republican alike. But still they persisted.

Back here in the real world, the President has been "exonerated." But I put that in quotes because that word implies that Robert Mueller and company were legitimate, impartial arbiters of justice who have nobly executed a fair and just process when the cold, hard truth is that this process was completely illegitimate from the start; they were put there to hang this President if they could, on whatever flimsy excuse they could find or manufacture. And even after ruining the lives of Michael Flynn and Paul Manafort they came up with nothing. Mueller turns my stomach as much as Clinton, Obama, Brennan, Clapper, Comey, McCabe, Priestap, Steele, Halper, Mifsud, Strzok, Page, Ohr, Ohr, Rosenstein and all the other smug, elitist traitors who very nearly pulled off the overthrow of a President and really, by extension, the will of the American people in electing him. And before it gets lost in the sauce, none of this would have happened had Jeff Sessionszzzz not recused himself and then appointed Rosenpenis, who turned around and appointed Mueller with no specific boundaries and carte blanche to do anything he wanted. If there is any justice in this world, all of the aforementioned would be behind bars at Leavenworth for the rest of their lives, or have a date with the hangman for what they tried to do. And what is still going on now in the House of Representatives with such morally bankrupt frauds as Nadler and Schiff.

All things considered, you have to marvel at Donald Trump. The entirety of a feral, criminal bureaucracy and politicians along with a complicit mass propaganda machine was hurled at him non-stop for a period of nearly four years going back to the summer of 2015 when he announced his candidacy, and yet he not only survived, but he thrived. Part of it was because the base and now a growing number of people outside of that base see that he has either kept his word or has done everything within his power to advance the agenda despite the opposition, even from within his own camp. And even despite losing the House (or perhaps as a result of it), the Democrats are in an open internecine war that has exposed who they are and what they believe for all the world to see... and it's not pretty. More on that later.

So notwithstanding my rage against Mueller, semantics aside, the President has been exonerated, but the Dem-Media-Complex will now use Mueller's "insinuendos" on obstruction as well as the mythical crimes not mentioned in the report to advance to yet more persecutions and smearing of him, his allies and supporters among the American people. Bring it on. The more they attack the more Trump fights back twice as hard and the more support he garners. I don't have the links handy but there is polling indicating that a growing number of people across all age and demographic categories are in agreement that this entire thing was indeed a witch hunt to get Trump. And if the Left collectively continues to fuck the innards out of that chicken, 2020 is going to get ugly for them, no matter who they put up to run.

Then there's the media. Tucker Carlson calls their reaction the single most embarrassing thing to happen to the White House press corps in American history, Great One Mark Levin rightly says that their attacks on Trump are really attacks on the American people and R.S. McCain edits his erudition and examination of the embarrassment of American journalism to just three words - "Orange Man Bad!" Switch to any channel or grab any paper and you'll find plenty of cringe-worthy embarrassment to go around, but the icing on the cake has got to be Brian "Commander McBragg" Williams, who was all set to dispatch Trump lawyer Jay Sekulow.

Williams: "My first question, I'm afraid, is going to verge on plain English. Where did the attorney general get off with that characterization this morning, including four mentions that there was no collusion? What document was he reading, compared to the one we're left with?"

Sekulow: "Well, page two of the document says, 'The investigation did not establish that members of the Trump campaign coordinated with the Russian government in its election of interference activities.' So it's right from the document itself."

Earlier, Williams had the temerity to refer to the attorney general as "Bagdhad Bill Barr." This from a confirmed liar and fabulist. Brian, you're not a journalist despite being paid millions of dollars to portray one on television. I have some advice for you. Stop talking. Forever.

On to the rest of the news starting with Amnesty and Immigration, and as the migrant hordes continue to jump the border the administration is trying its best to stem the flow as well as the massive fraud being perpetrated in the name of asylum. A previously deported illegal is charged with raping and sex-trafficking a teenager, Rancida Tliban calls for hunger strikes to end ICE, and a two-part series on the health hazard coming across the border.

Dem Scandal Sheet: Two potential huge scandals involving a billion in dark money cash finding its way into Democrat coffers and the looming UkraineGate scandal that could hit the BIdens. In the Joo-Hate subsection, our Rancida feels more Palestinian in Congress than anywhere else (is that a Michael Kors suicide belt or are you happy to see me?), and an exposed Islamist politician responds to the charges.

Civil War 2.0: Seattle sick-o punches a priest when he spots his crucifix.

General Politics: Conrad Black rips into Bernardo Sandersnista, while Tom Styrene is itching to impeach Steny Hoyer is not so sure about that (he knows its a loser before 2020), the openly gay ambassador to Germany Richard Grennell rips Mayor Buttplug for his attacks on VP Pence, "Jello-Brain" Gillibrand hires actual former Soviet propagandists, "Blotto" Beto hates America so much, he wants to rule it, and a look at this electoral college sabotage in the states and how to deal with it.

First Amendment and Fake News Fakery: Aside from the psychotic reaction to the Mueller thing, the press did not appreciate Edelweiss being played at the news conference, Chicago press ignoring black crimes, and shockingly Time names Trump, Bolsonaro and Guaido to their top 100 list.

Guns: The judge who threw out the California magazine ban suddenly reverses himself after getting a talking to by Xavier Becerra. Disgusting.

Abortion: NC governor vetoes anti-infanticide bill.

Foreign Desk: IDF general warning about a Hezbollah invasion from the Galilee, Citgo court ruling could have repercussions for Venezuela, a look at the disaster of the Globalist mass migration plot and Notre Dame is latest of three great conflagrations and what it could mean going forward.

DEE-fense: US Intel community is 99.99% leftist (and see the Ledeen piece about the entirety of the CIA, FBI and DoJ as a nest of foreign spies [as if foreign foes need to infiltrate those places given our homegrown commies]).

We-All-Slam-For-I-Slam: Girl who complained about her madrassa teacher harassing her gets incinerated for her troubles. Paging Bro-Fo Omar to pick up the courtesy jerry can...

Domestic Affairs: Leftist DC housing policy turns out as well as you'd think, and metro areas are depopulating faster and faster. Gee, why is that do you think?

Crime and Punishment: USCG scores big drug haul off the Central and South American coasts and SCOTUS to decide on another violent felony law.

Healthcare: Senator Bill Cassidy as a better health plan (meh, I prefer free markets but let's see what he's got), and "Blotto" is a big fat hypocrite.

Education: Minneapolis public schools dish up the pro-Bro-Fo propaganda to the kiddies while bashing OrangeManBad, Austin schools infect young brains with the tranny psychosis, high school students do the Nuremberg Law 2 Electric Boogaloo, and Florida governor DeSantis with some good news in the sunshine state.

Red Greens: Hack sportswriter delves into nihilism and ludditism.

Hither and Yon: Christian Toto on new Christian movie Breakthrough, on the passing of noted man of G-d James V. Schall, and the Progressive scapegoating of a noted British contemporary scholar.

Anyway, links from around the world, across the nation and up your street. Have a better one and remain blessed.

NOTE: The opinions expressed in some links may or may not reflect my own. I include them because of their relevance to the discussion of a particular issue.

THE MUELLER DECEPTION, SPYGATE, DEEP STATE, CONGRESSIONAL COUP
• Trump Declined to Assert Executive Privilege to Prevent Any Part of Mueller Report, AG Barr Says
• Reactions: Trump Takes Victory Lap, Dems and Media Fuming
• Good Roger Simon: Democrats Continue to Destroy Themselves Over Mueller Report
• Mueller's Despicable Parthian Shot
• Mueller Passed the Prosecutorial Buck, Preferring to Slime Trump On Obstruction Rather Than Indict
• Truth and Hand Washing in the Mueller Report
• Kellyanne Conway Goes Scorched Earth in Press Conference
• James Clapper: Mueller Report "Devastating," "Road Map" for Impeachment, And...
• ...Piece of Shit Traitor: If Active Collusion Wasn't Proven, I Think We Have "A Case of Passive Collusion"
• Will Congress Honor Mueller Redactions? "We Have an Obligation to Share the Truth," Dem Rep Himes Says (that would be illegal and dangerous, dolt - jjs)
• "Nuke 'em" Swallowswell: "AG Barr Must Resign... Sign Our Petition"
• Greenfield: Bill the DNC the $32 Million for the Mueller Report
• Ledeen: Real Spies - Could Foreign Spies Have Penetrated the CIA, FBI, and DoJ?
• Goodwin: Release of Mueller Report Finally Sets Trump - and America - Free

  FIRST AMENDMENT, CENSORSHIP, FAKE NEWS, BIG TECH BROTHER
  

• Tu-Ca: Mueller Report "Single Most Humiliating Thing" to Happen to White House Press Corps in US History
  
• Levin: The Media's Attacks on Trump "Are Really Aimed at You"
  
• R.S. McCain: "Orange Man Bad!"
  
• The Mainstream Media Are Not Handling the Zero Collusion Conclusion Well
  
• Brian Williams Asks Trump Lawyer Where Mueller Report Says "No Collusion"... Lawyer Reads From Second Page
  
• Press Left Terrified After White House Band Plays "Edelweiss" Ahead of Press Conference
  
• Outbreak of Color Blindness Strikes Chicago Reporters
  
• Anti-Socialists Make the Time 100: Trump, Venezuela's Guaido, and Brazil's Bolsonaro

  BORDER WALL, MIGRANT INVASION, AMNESTY, IMMIGRATION, BORDER SECURITY
  

• Border Patrol Identifies Massive Fraud: Thousands of Fake Famiiies
  
• No Free Ride for Asylum Seekers Who Enter US Illegally
  
• Police Say Previously Deported Illegal Alien Raped, Sex Trafficked Teen Girl
  
• Rancida Tliban Calls for Hunger Strikes to "Shut Down ICE" (I look forward to Bobby Sands-like GAINZZ! - jjs)
  
• Contagion Invasion Part 1: What Ever Happened to the Principle of Protecting Our Borders Against Dangerous Diseases?
  
• Contagion Invasion Part 2: The Untold Public Health Endemic at Our Borders and Beyond

  DEMOCRAT-LEFTIST SCANDALS, CRIMES, CHUTZ-POCRISY, MESHUGAS
  

• Report: Liberal Dark Money Umbrella Facilitated $1.6 Billion in Recent Years
  
• From Russiagate to Ukrainegate (the bubbling under Biden & Son scandal - jjs)

  OFFICIALLY-SANCTIONED DEMOCRAT PARTY ANTI-SEMITISM
  

• Rancida Tliban Says She "Feels More Palestinian In the Halls of Congress" Than She Does Anywhere Else (feels, like with Joe Biden? - jjs)
  
• Islamist Politician Responds to Frontpage Mag Article Alleging Terror Ties

  CIVILWAR 2.0
  

• Seattle Man Punches Priest After Asking, "How's Trump?"

  POLITICS
  

• Black: The Lies, Cliches, and Hypocrisy of Bernie Sanders
  
• Hoyer: Trying to Impeach Trump "Is Not Worthwhile at This Point" (waiting until after he's reelected - jjs)
  
• "Styrene" Steyer's Itching, Scratching Need to Impeach
  
• "Hate Hoax": Richard Grenell Shames Mayor Buttplug For Attacking Pence
  
• "Jello-Brain" Gillibrand Teams Up With Former Soviet Propaganda Outfit
  
• Robert Francis "Blotto" O'Rourke Hates America... But Wants to Be President Anyway
  
• How to Defeat the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact

  SECOND AMENDMENT
  

• Billingsley: Bush League Judge Junks Second Amendment

  ABORTION
  

• Democrat North Carolina Governor Vetoes Newborn Abortion Survivor Protections

  NOTRE DAME FIRE AFTERMATH
  

• Three Fires, Three Skylines

  FOREIGN AFFAIRS, INTERNATIONAL
  

• IDF General Warns That Hezbollah Plans For Invasion of Sea of Galilee
  
• US Court Ruling On Citgo Could Have Major Repercussions For Venezuela's Leadership
  
• Democratic Self-Government or Mass Migration?

  DEFENSE, MILITARY, SECURITY AFFAIRS
  

• US Intelligence Institutionally Politicized Toward Democrats

  ISLAM, TERRORISM, SHARIA, DHIMMITUDE
  

• Bangladeshi Teen Allegedly Sexually Harassed By Her Headmaster Gets Burned To Death After Reporting It

  DOMESTIC AFFAIRS, THE BUREAUCRACY, WASTE, FRAUD, CORRUPTION
  

• DC Progressive Housing Program Causing Chaos in Upscale Liberal Apartment Complex
  
• Glitter, Without Growth: New Census Bureau Estimates Indicate Major Metro Areas Beginning to Shrink

  CRIME & PUNISHMENT (NON-DOSTOYEVSKY)
  

• US Coast Guard Seizes 8 Tons of Drugs in International Waters
  
• SCOTUS Looks to Knock Down Yet Another Vague Violent Felony Law

  HEALTHCARE
  

• Bill Cassidy Designing Republican Federalist Healthcare Plan (that would be zero government involvement, but I'll bite - jjs)
  
• How Robert Francis "Blotto" O'Rourke Sabotaged Obamacare

  EDUCATION, INDOCTRINATION
  

• Minneapolis Public School Has Kids Color Pictures of "Bro-Fo" Omar; They Haven't Been So Kind About Trump
  
• Austin, Texas "School Climate Survey" Tells Students "Gender Is How a Person Feels"
  
• High School Students Assigned to Tabulate "Privilege" based on Race, Gender, Sexuality, Religion
  
• With 3 Weeks Left in Session, DeSantis Calls on FL Lawmakers to Act on 3 School-Choice Expansion Plans

  RED-GREENS, CLIMATE CHANGE HOAX, LYSENKOISM
  

• Sports Writer Jeff Pearlman Compares Having More Than 2 Kids to Tossing Garbage Into the Ocean

  CULTURE WARS, HITHER & YON
  

• Toto: Breakthrough Marks New Era in Faith-Based Films
  
• The Ideological Roots of Modern Socialists
  
• Who Will Convert Us? The Life of James V. Schall, S.J.
  
• Progressive Religion and the Ritual Scapegoating of Sir Roger Scruton

Thursday Overnight Open Thread (4/18/19)

—Misanthropic Humanitarian

Quote I

Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under. H.L. Mencken

Quote II

“We had clear lines between ‘this is alive’ and ‘this is dead,’” “How do we now think about this middle category of ‘partly alive’? We didn’t think it could exist.” Nita A. Farahany, a bioethicist and law professor at Duke University

Quote III

"Like similar state and local laws that have been used to prosecute cake artist Jack Phillips and florist Barronelle Stutzman, this federal law would force Americans to participate in events and speak messages that violate their core beliefs. Tolerance and respect for good-faith differences of opinion are essential in a diverse society like ours." Greg Baylor, Director of the Center for Religious Schools

***

This is a rerun from last night. Someone goofed up last night. We won't mention any names will we Mis. Hum.?

As us 29 year olds approach Medicare and Social Security eligibility, we must pay attention to the little details.

Long-time readers may recall our series of interviews with attorney Kent Brown about his lawsuit against the Fed's "because Social Security officials claim that folks must forfeit their Social Security benefits if they withdraw from (or choose not to enroll in) Medicare."

[ed: Original and follow-up posts are here and here]

One would think that since neither of these are in any way legislatively connected, this would be a non-issue.

One would think that, but one would be incorrect:

"Is there something in the original Medicare legislation that dictated this? Surprisingly, the answer is no ... Nothing in the Social Security or Medicare statutes state that one must take Medicare in order to receive Social Security payments (or vice versa)"

So how did this come about?

Two words: Washington, DC.

***

So the little Canadian pussy needs our help? Trudeau wants to crack down on immigrants.

There’s no wall or checkpoint or regular guard at the end of Roxham Road, just a footpath to the border. In recent years, this trail has been the busiest unauthorized crossing into Canada, a well-known back door for tens of thousands of people seeking asylum in a country that projects itself as a haven for refugees.

Canada has largely tolerated their arrival. But with an increasingly close election on the horizon, the Liberal government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau - a global figure of welcome for refugees - is signaling plans to crack down. And they're asking the United States to help.

***

Reason #117 why I voted for Donald J. Trump.

***

Just about everybody enjoys a spectacular photo. And today's narcissists want to be in that photo. And in the meantime are caught up in a destructive behavior.

A recent report found that 259 people died between 2011 and 2017 while stepping in front of the camera in often dangerous destinations. Our writer went deep on the psychology of selfies to figure out what's behind our obsession with capturing extreme risk-taking.

It began as retribution for a lost bet: in 2014, Gigi Wu, an experienced hiker from Taiwan, posed atop a snow-covered mountain, clad only in a bikini. The stunt resulted in a series of undeniably gorgeous photos. So Wu, a model and adventure sports personality, kept at it for the next four years, photographing herself on the summits of more than 100 of Asia’s most impressive peaks, always in a bikini. The images are at once absurd and beautiful, a juxtaposition Wu told Taiwan TV that she adored.

***

If I were young, adventurous and not allergic to hay I would move here.

FOR OVER A YEAR, THE Channel Islands community of Sark has been importing their milk from elsewhere. According to the BBC, the community is currently looking for someone to put an end to this nonsense and bring dairy production—and a herd of cows—back to the island.

Sark is three miles long and a mile-and-a-half wide, free of cars and streetlights. Around 500 people live on the island, surrounded by a rocky cliff-lined coast accessible by ferry and boat, under a sky dark enough for the stars to twinkle at night. Sark’s last dairy farmer, Christopher Nightingale, shut his operation down in 2017 due to rising costs and a lack of land stability: The island is still led by a seigneur, or feudal lord (currently, Christopher Beaumont). While feudalism formally ended on the island in 2008, old habits die hard. Farmers on Sark must still lease their land on a short-term basis, which makes it difficult to plan a sustainable business.

***

Vaxxers vs. Anti-Vaxxers

Five unnamed mothers in New York City filed a lawsuit Monday, April 15, seeking to block the city's mandatory vaccination order in areas hit by a massive measles outbreak that has raged since last October.

City health officials announced the order earlier this month as they declared a public health emergency over the outbreak, which has sickened 329 people so far—mostly children. According to the city's order, all unvaccinated people in affected ZIP codes must receive the Measles, Mumps, and Rubella (MMR) vaccine, prove immunity, or have a valid medical exemption. Violators could face a fine of $1,000.

***

***

Who needs a semi-automatic firearm? Congress critter Eric Swallows (D-CA) question is answered.

***

As ever, The ONT is always looking out for you. Why you shouldn't mix booze and pot.

“Beer before liquor, never been sicker”—by now (and probably from personal experience) we all know this rule to be true. But when it comes to alcohol and weed, where’s our helpful rhyme?

As Vice writes, every person copes with alcohol and cannabis differently, so while you may be fine mixing both substances, your friend may be tripping balls in the very same room. While the subject of cannabis and alcohol’s combined effect is largely under-researched, there are a few things worth knowing before diving under the influence.

***

No mention how much this virtue signaling is going to cost you.

Adidas has introduced a new sneaker that it’s calling the first of its kind. Named the Futurecraft.Loop, it’s a performance running shoe that can be 100% ground up and melted back into raw materials for a brand-new shoe—without any waste.

The sneaker is part of Adidas’s attempt to address the grave environmental threat posed by plastic, which increasingly clogs landfills and suffuses our oceans. At a presentation in New York today to reveal the shoe, Eric Liedtke, an executive board member in charge of global brands at Adidas, noted that every piece of plastic ever made is still around. “We need to innovate our way out of this mess,” he said.

***

What's been happening in Cheese Head land?

***

Hey Congress lady, you first. If memory serves me correctly it only took Bobby Sands about 63 days to assume room temperature.

Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., urged people to join with her in a hunger strike in an attempt to shut down U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), The Washington Free Beacon is reporting.

Her comments came during a fundraiser in Detroit last weekend for the Michigan Coalition for Human Rights, the Free Beacon reported. She said Congress is unwilling to abolish ICE.

***

The ONT Musical Interlude

Died on this day, 18 Apr 2013
Storm Thorgerson, whose album cover artwork includes Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of The Moon died aged 69. A childhood friend of the founding members of the band, he became their designer-in-chief. His credits also include albums by Led Zeppelin, Peter Gabriel and Muse. In 2003, Thorgerson suffered a stroke, from which he recovered. He was later diagnosed with an undisclosed form of cancer, which he battled for several years. via thisdayinmusic.com

&&&

***

The GOP = The Stupid Party

***

Feel Good Story of The Day and Genius Award Winner all wrapped up in one story.

Moments later the mostly naked man left the scene of his attempted burglary bleeding, embarrassed, still pretty much naked. 5’6, 300-pound Antonio Mosely had charged the old woman without realizing that she was holding a metal baseball bat, or knowing that she was a pretty good softball player in her day. But oh did Clarese Gainey know how to handle that bat. She swung, connected, and drove off the offensive lineman-sized attacker.

No surprise what state is involved.

***

Who needs sweet talk & negligees? Not our Genius Award Winners.

An Arizona couple is charged with luring a day laborer to their Phoenix home and forcing the man to have sex at gunpoint with the female suspect, an assault that the male suspect described as a “sexual fantasy scenario,” according to a criminal complaint.

According to investigators, the victim was picked up last Monday outside a Home Depot by Brenda Acuna-Aguero, 39, who said that she needed help moving items at her home.

The victim told cops that when he reached the residence, Acuna-Aguero “began to talk sexual to him” and said it “was her fantasy to have sex with a laborer and that she wanted to have sex with him.”

When the man declined to have sex, Acuna-Aguero’s husband Jorge Murrieta-Valenzuela, 45, entered the room carrying a rifle. Murrieta-Valenzuela, cops charge, placed the firearm against the victim’s chest and told him “that he was going to have sex with his wife or he would shoot him.”

***

Trying to keep the memory of his comrades alive. Tonight's Feel Good Story of The Day!

The image of the Marine veteran crawling across the Boston Marathon finish line quickly became one of the most memorable — and talked about — moments of this year’s race.

Micah Herndon, 31, of Tallmadge, Ohio, may not have been prepared for the attention he received when he crossed the finish line on his hands and knees, determined to complete the race in honor of his fallen comrades.

***

Tonight's ONT has been brought to you by the Sixth Commandment.

Notice: Posted with permission by the Ace Media Empire and AceCorp, LLC. This product may or may not cause side effects and obstruction of justice.

Close it up

Babylon Bee Goofs on CNN Cutlists

—Ace of Spades

Faith tested is faith strengthened.

ATLANTA, GA--Anchors at CNN headquarters have made a bold statement of unwavering faith after the Mueller Report revealed no actual evidence that Trump colluded with Russia. "We believe in collusion with all our hearts and will never let the world's teachings get in the way of that," said Jim Acosta while mumbling mantras quietly in a room misty with burning incense.

"If God allowed this report to be written in the manner that it was, He did so to test our unshakable faith in what we know to be true," said Anderson Cooper.

"We believe in the one true Russian collusion, the one that was spoken into truth and made real far before any evidence was brought before this dark world," added Natalie Allen.

They then recited the Collusion Catechism, but you'll have to click over for that.

Oh -- and who will CNN be criminally blackmailing (threat to dox + demand that one give up a right one has, such as free speech) the maker of this gif?

They've blackmailed a guy before; are they going to commit blackmail again?

Caution, CNN: You'd better read the blackmail and extortion laws of the state your next victim lives in closely. Threatening to release information that someone wants to keep private, but promising to not release that if they do something they are not legally required to do, or not do something they are legally entitled to do (such as post memes on the internet), does in fact satisfy the elements of blackmail and/or extortion in many states.

Pro-tip: It's generally good to avoid sentences that include the elements 1) I will reveal this thing about you that you do not want revealed and 2) unless you do this thing for me, or stop doing this thing I don't want you to do.

Sometimes prosecutors take a look at sentences like that and find the grammar to be criminal.

Now that Trump is unchained, who knows what investigations his DOJ might undertake?

And speaking of journalists engaging in dubious behavior when they feel that someone isn't properly Respectin' Their Authoritah:

Andrew C. McCarthy: Robert Mueller Violated Prosecutorial Standards By Smearing Trump Without the Evidence For an Actual Criminal Charge

—Ace of Spades

Dirty cop.

In his report, Mueller didn't resolve the [obstruction] issue. If he had been satisfied that there was no obstruction crime, he said, he would have so found. He claimed he wasn't satisfied. Yet he was also not convinced that there was sufficient proof to charge. Therefore, he made no decision, leaving it to Attorney General William Barr to find that there was no obstruction.

This is unbecoming behavior for a prosecutor and an outrageous shifting of the burden of proof: The constitutional right of every American to force the government to prove a crime has been committed, rather than to have to prove his or her own innocence.

This is exactly why prosecutors should never speak publicly about the evidence uncovered in an investigation of someone who isn't charged. The obligation of the prosecutor is to render a judgment about whether there is enough proof to charge a crime. If there is, the prosecutor indicts; if there is not, the prosecutor remains silent.

If special counsel Mueller believed there was an obstruction offense, he should have had the courage of his convictions and recommended charging the president. Since he wasn't convinced there was enough evidence to charge, he should have said he wasn't recommending charges. Period.

Anything else was -- and is -- a smear. Worse than that, it flouts the Constitution.

The Federalist's Margot Cleveland agrees:

After two years and spending an estimated $35 million, Robert Mueller issued a 448-page report that ignored the governing special counsel regulations. Those regulations required Mueller, at the conclusion of the special counsel's work, to "provide the Attorney General with a confidential report explaining the prosecution or declination decisions reached by the Special Counsel."

Yet, instead of issuing the mandated closing documentation, Mueller explained that his team "determined not to make a traditional prosecutorial judgment" of whether "to initiate or decline a prosecution."

Attorney General William Barr spoke during today's press conference of Mueller's failure to perform this regulatorily required duty. When asked why he and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein felt it necessary "to take it to the next step to conclude there was no crime," Barr retorted:

The very prosecutorial function and all our powers as prosecutors, including the power to convene grand juries and compulsory process that’s involved there, is for one purpose and one purpose only. It’s to determine yes or no, was alleged conduct criminal or not criminal. That is our responsibility and that’s why we have the tools we have. And we don’t go through this process just to collect information and throw it out to the public. We collect this information. We use that compulsory process for the purpose of making that decision. And because the special counsel did not make that decision, we felt the department had to. That was a decision by me and the deputy attorney general. Yes.

Yet Mueller wrote that if Trump had proven that he clearly was innocent, then Mueller would have declared him such.

The burden lies on Trump? And at the "clear and convincing evidence" standard of evidence?

The "clear" standard is a high standard of evidence, a midpoint (or so) between the civil courts' preponderance of the evidence standard and the criminal courts' requirement of the state to prove every element of its case (including intent) beyond a reasonable doubt.

And this burden, we're now told, did not lie with the state but with with the accused.

It's not just that Trump must prove his innocence by the lesser preponderance-of-the-evidence standard -- he must prove his innocence by the clear evidence standard.

That's one step shy of saying that Trump must prove his innocence beyond a reasonable doubt.

Why stop at the "clear and convincing" level? Why not shoot the moon, Andrew Weissman?

And because Trump did not meet this made-up standard of providing the prosecutor "clear" evidence of his innocence, Mueller hits him with a "talking indictment" and smears him.

Media Running Around Giving Itself Participation Trophies, For Some Reason

—Ace of Spades

BTW, Bret Baier is actually going to permit Mollie Hemingway on the panel tonight. I imagine that's because he's brought in two other guests to argue that No Seriously There Was Obstruction and Stuff, even though a prosecutor with unlimited resources couldn't establish evidence of it, and even though members on his own team could not agree that there was obstruction.

Hilarious: Tucker Carlson Pronounces Beto O'Rourke's Campaign for President "Dead;" Mocks Media's Infatuation With Him

—Ace of Spades

Video below the fold; it's the opening segment.

He mentions the very-rich trust fund Irish WASP's refusal to donate more than 1/3 of one percent to charity, and his claim that essentially his whole life counts as charity.

From The Federalist:

Last night, The Washington Post reported that Beto O'Rourke released his tax returns for the past ten years. Of course, the feel-good, inevitably government-expanding presidential contender should probably have been more hesitant to release his returns because it doesn’t take much sleuthing to figure out from them that the O'Rourkes made $370,412 in 2017 while giving a measly $1,166 of that income to charity. As The Post noted, this makes Beto's charitable giving less than one-third of 1 percent of his household income.

Man Who Brought Lighters, Butane, and Gasoline into St. Patrick's Cathedral Arrested; He's a "Philosophy Teacher" Who Had Just Booked a Flight to Rome

—Ace of Spades

Here's what we knew as of last night: A "New Jersey Man" arrested with filled gas cans inside St. Patrick's cathedral in NYC. When police stopped him, he claimed his minivan ran out of fuel.

I don't see any plausible reason given for bringing gasoline into a church.

"As the man was turned, police say gasoline spilled out onto the floor. Security then notified nearby police who questioned the man outside the church and took him into custody.

"Police say the man was carrying over four gallons of gas, two bottles of lighter fluid and two butane lighters."

Now he's been arrested for attempted arson -- and he'd been arrested at another church earlier in the week, after refusing to leave at closing time.

A 37-year-old man who was arrested Wednesday after entering St. Patrick's Cathedral carrying two cans of gasoline, lighter fluid and butane lighters had also been arrested at a New Jersey cathedral this week and had booked a flight to Rome, the New York Police Department said.

Marc Lamparello, a college teacher, has been charged with attempted arson, reckless endangerment and trespassing, according to police.

"There doesn't appear to be any connection to any terrorist group or any terrorist-related intent here," said John Miller, the New York Police Department's deputy commissioner of intelligence and counterterrorism.

...

Miller said surveillance camera footage showed Lamparello circling St. Patrick's several times in a minivan Wednesday well over an hour before he parked outside the cathedral on Fifth Avenue, walked around the area, returned to his vehicle, and retrieved the gasoline and lighter fluid. When he entered the church, he was confronted by a security officer, who notified counterterrorism officers standing outside.

Lamparello told the officers his car was out of gas and headed in a direction away from where he was parked, Miller said. Officers found his vehicle and determined it was not out of gas, Miller said.

Mb>Before going to St. Patrick's on Wednesday, Lamparello booked a $2,800 ticket on a 5:20 p.m. Thursday flight to Italy, according to Miller.

On Monday, he had been arrested at the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark, New Jersey, after he refused to leave at closing time, Miller said.

Monday is of course when Notre Dame was burning -- and assuming the church's closing time was in the late afternoon or evening, he would have been attempting to remain in a church after seeing Notre Dame burn all afternoon.

Had he been inspired?

Was he up to something there, too?

And what was he planning to do in Rome, a city famous for cathedrals?

Why did he buy a ticket last-minute, when it's so expensive? And was it only a ticket, singular, as the article says -- a one-way trip?

I'm going to take a guess that his philosophical inquiries focus mainly on the areas of atheism and anti-clericalism. (Update: Actually, that might not be a good bet; I'm not sure if he is anti-catholic or anti-religious. He might just be a depressed incel loon.)

Update: The Heavy says that the NYDN reports the ticket to Italy was indeed a one-way ticket.

Note the lighters are even more incriminating that normal lighters -- those are grill lighters. The long tube helps keep your hands safe when you ignite a potent flame.

Why was he carrying those lighters? What was he planning to grill?

You don't light cigarettes with those.

The Heavy says that police are looking at him as a possibly emotionally-disturbed individual.

In August, he wrote about his own appearance, “I’m going through a phase. After not giving a shit about my appearance for 20 years, I’ve swung in the opposite direction. Now, I’m very vain and appearance-obsessed. I’ve lost 70 pounds, 25 more to go. Thinking about doing other stuff, too. Learned a lot about what makes people beautiful in the process, though, and thought I could share my knowledge on here to help people. I’m hoping that, in time, I settle down somewhere in the middle, conscientious of my appearance, in shape, stylish, but without a dozen plastic surgeries.”

He also wrote about struggling on a dating app, "Honestly, I'm getting murdered on Tinder. It’s a total self-esteem killer. I'm a pretty in-shape guy, and I'm going for in-shape women who are a little attractive, and have a few nice features. Not models, but just generically attractive women. I've "swiped right" on 500+ women. So far, not a single match. Depressing. I think I should probably give up on dating for the time being, and focus really hard on school and work and saving up as much as I can for plastic surgery. Based on the consults I've had with my plastic surgeon, I'm confident I can go from a 4/10 to a 7.2–7.3/10. That’s what I'll focus on now."

This may be terrorism. It might also be an attempted act of destruction without any real political terroristic motive, a "Nova" type of explosive, senseless destruction before hoping for the cowardly euthanasia of suicide by cop.

I guess I should also say "It's possible he had no bad motives," though I do not believe that for a moment.

("Nova" is a term I've heard used to describe depressed/emotionally disturbed men who do something terrible on their path to suicide, like kill their whole family.)

CNN in "Meltdown" Trying to Spin Report to Save Their Own Reputations

—Ace of Spades

Embarrassing.

CNN hack and Gender Flexible Eggbody Chris Cillizza got butthurt when someone said CNN was in meltdown:

Meanwhile, if you can believe this, ridiculous joke and corporate tool Brian "Butterball Powerbottom" Stelter was earlier shrieking at people that no "partisans" should speculate about the report.

Annnnnd... simultaneously, on his own network, a panel of eight ludicrous partisans were speculating about the report.

Meanwhile, AG Barr is getting a little edgy with his redactions:

Media is, Get This, Embarrassing Itself over Conspiracy Theories

—Ace of Spades

Trust all agents of the state.

Except Robert Barr. He's a traitor and a RUSSIAN AGENT.

"What do you say to people on both sides of the aisle, who are concerned that you are trying to protect the president," [a reporter] asked.

"It just seems there's a lot of effort to go out of your way to acknowledge how this was difficult for him," quoting the portion of the remarks where Barr said, Trump "faced an unprecedented situation."

"Well, is there another precedent for it," replied Barr.

"No, but it's unusual that..." replied the reporter.

"Okay, so unprecedented is an accurate description, isn't it," said Barr.

Yes sir, indeed it is.

MSNBC Perma-Guest Neal Kaytal declares that no one ever says "collusion" because it's not a real crime, saying that Trump is the only person who uses that word -- precisely because it's not a crime he could be charged with.

Is it true that no lawyer uses the term "collusion"?

Well, Neal Kaytal is a lawyer.
He used the word a lot when that allegation was in play.

Now that it's rubbished, he claims "no one ever even talked about collusion, except Trump."

Super-Spy Christopher Steele Refuses to Cooperate With Inspector General

—Ace of Spades

Nothing to hide.

Even Politico notes the irony of a guy who used to pass documents to the DOJ every few weeks now claiming that Sacred Honor forbids him from cooperating with the DOJ.

Steele declined the inspector general’s request on the grounds that it would be improper for him to take part "in an internal Justice Department investigation as a foreign national and former British intelligence agent," Politico reported Wednesday.

The explanation is somewhat ironic given that Steele, a former MI6 officer, provided his anti-Trump research to the FBI as well as to Bruce Ohr, a Justice Department official.

Meanwhile, word is that IG Horowitz is in fact investigating Steele -- and whether he really was a Super-Spy, after all.

As you read this, bear in mind that the FIFA investigation is the only thing cited to establish what a world-beater of an intelligence operator this guy is.

In 2010, Steele delivered information to the bureau's Eurasian Organized Crime squad about corruption within the international soccer league FIFA, with links to Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin, that led to the ouster of longtime FIFA president Sepp Blatter and the indictment of several FIFA officials.

The inspector general's office has concluded that Steele inflated his worth to the bureau in that case, and did little more than introduce agents to a journalist who had obtained hacked documents, according to two people who were interviewed and briefed on the matter. For the FBI to have formalized its relationship with Steele -- paying him an undisclosed amount beginning in 2013 -- as a result of his FIFA role may therefore have been bad judgment, the inspector genera'’s team has intimated. Horowitz's probe also appears set to cast doubt on the veracity of the information Steele provided about Page that the FBI included in its application for a FISA warrant.

Trump to Give Press Conference on Mueller Report Shortly
Barr's Press Conference: No Collusion, No Obstruction

—Ace of Spades

Trump's upcoming presser will be livestreamed here.

Barr's presser (which already happened, at 9:45) below the fold.

Mid-Morning Open Thread

—CBD

Monkeys As Judges Of Art
Gabriel von Max

[This has absolutely nothing to do with the coming media frenzy over the Mueller Report. I would never suggest that our noble 4th Estate are, in the main, a bunch of slobbering monkeys who fling poo and chatter nonsense. I have far too much respect for them.]

The Morning Report - 4/18/19

—J.J. Sefton

Good morning kids. Thursday and breaking late last night a man has been arrested trying to enter New York City's St. Patrick's Cathedral with two cans of gasoline, lighter fluid and lighters. We've been trying to reach Shepherd Smith and Neil Cavuto to get their expert analysis, but we've been told they're under an I-95 overpass near the Meadowlands, servicing the local chapter of Vermin Supreme. All seriousness aside, the code 10 whack-a-doo in question is identified as one Marc Lamparello, 37, a Jersey resident and a grad student at CUNY seeking a PhD in philosophy. Perfect! Meh, given the political landscape here in New York, this guy could be a future mayor or governor... if he doesn't flame out along the way.

We now return to our regularly scheduled meshugas, where the big story for today is the long anticipated release of the Mueller Report, which as we all know is the aftermath of the world's longest running smear campaign against a sitting president in an effort to stall and coverup the revelation that the Clinton/Obama/Deep State perpetrators of the aforementioned are the actual colluders, traitors and criminals worthy of a long drop from a short rope. The "report" such as it is will of course find Trump guilty of zero crimes but, as it is authored by a few dozen Democrat/Hillary loyalists led by shyster-cum-Roland Freisler Andrew Weissman, every page will no doubt be jam-packed with "insinuendos," smears and other swipes at the President's character that will be the fodder for the Democrat-Media-Complex to fill every minute of airtime and every column inch every day until November of 2020. And since anti-Trump co-conspirator Mueller conveniently omitted any statements clearing the president of obstruction of justice, that will also sustain the attack on him going forward. But how can you obstruct justice for crimes that were never committed? Oops, I forgot; the Lavrenty Beria codicil. Silly me.

Of course, adding fuel to the fire is a press conference that has been called by AG Wiliam Barr that will precede the release of the report, with former deputy AG Rod Rosenpenis in attendance. The Left is going positively ape over this and ever since Barr's four-page summary that essentially exonerated Trump, they've thrown every accusation at him for covering up Trump's crimes that are sure to be in the unreduced report that has been denied them. Forget the fact that had there been any, Mueller would've gone to the press immediately. And, much as I loathe Rosenpenis, recall in July of last year, that late Friday press conference where 12 Russians were indicted for hacking where he declared:

...There is no allegation in the indictment that any American was a knowing participant in the alleged unlawful activity or knew they were communicating with Russian intelligence officers. There is no allegation in the indictment that the charged conduct altered the vote count or changed the outcome of the 2016 election...

That was July of 2018. And yet Mueller persisted for another 8 months, after knowing full well probably on the day he was given the assignment that there was zero evidence that Trump was guilty of anything. But of course, he had his job to do like a good little Fifth Columnist. Meanwhile, Christopher Steele, the author of the tripe that was used as a pretext to dupe (or not) the FISA courts to give a rogue DoJ and FBI the wiretaps to spy on the campaign and then the nascent presidency of Trump, is refusing to meet with the department's IG. I wonder if there'll be a 3AM raid on his house where he too can be dragged away handcuffed in his tidy whiteys in front of the TV cameras like Paul Manafort. Meh, who am I kidding? Two Americas, yo. And on that note, Great One Mark Levin takes us on a trip down memory lane where we relive the real collusion between the Clintons and the Chinese during the 1996 campaign. Funny how none of that ever gets spoken of in the media.

To the border we go where the migrant invasion crisis continues. And it plus our non-immigration system in general tops the Ipsos poll for Republican voters as their top issue. Meanwhile, Ben Carson and HUD come in from nowhere to announce they are going to crackdown on illegal aliens abusing the public housing system. Bravo, and let this spread to every agency that illegal aliens leech off of, as well as enforcing the laws strictly and with harsh penalties of knowing employers of same. And as a DHS panel calls for more action (I thought you guys at DHS provide the action), Yuma, Arizona is declaring a state of emergency. Also, send the dreamy DREAMers to live in Bernie's six plush dachas and one of Obama's sparks of humanity is charged with murdering the father of 10.

Dem Scandal Sheet: Kim Foxx fixxed Jussie Galore's case after recusing herself, the UAW bribery scandal deepens with implications for unions fighting right-to-work legislation, and T.J. "B.J." Cox is indeed a goniffing Democrat weasel (BIRM).

In Democrat Joo-Hatred, Rancida Tliban hosts terror-affiliated Joo-haters on Capitol Hill, Nancy Palsi insists the Democrat Party has no taint of anti-Semitism, right after meeting with rabid anti-Semite Jeremy Corbyn, and perhaps there is a distancing of some Dems from "Bro-Fo" Omar. Legit revulsion or political expediency? You make the call.

In general politics, Dems think Florida is key to beat Trump in '20, Dems hate "dark money" except when they get it, Jim Messina not high on Bernie's chances, Bernie and Blotto are cheap bastards and hypocrites, Bernie attacks legit redskin for attacking Fauxca-Has-Been, a look at entrepreneurship, the electoral college and reparations, Spengler on the Democrat klown kar, and a victim of socialism has some choice words for those pimping it today.

First Amendment and Fake News Fakery: He may look like a mincing milquetoast but Butthead Buttplug will demand you bake that cake and Schiff-for-Brains is the pinup girl in every city room.

Guns: Gun grabbers gunning for pro-gun Nevada sheriffs.

Abortion: OB-GYN challenges the storyline of Unplanned and don't believe the phony polling about American approval of Roe v Wade.

Notre Dame Fire Aftermath: The priest who rescued the crown of thorns and other relics is some guy, jihadi savages ululate and masturbate over the conflagration, let the rebuilding begin and yes, whether it was terrorism or not, what happened serves to underscore the mass desecration of churches all over France.

Foreign Desk: Trump hoping to create a commie-free hemisphere ("charity" begins here at home too, Mr. President), the administration turns the screws tighter on Venezuela, reports indicate the NorKs are testing a new weapon, more Brexit analysis including an American angle vis a vis independent trade deals with the US and their fate in Congress, the latter directs all maps and other paraphernalia to officially indicate the Golan Heights as part of Israel, Canuck conservatives score big win in Alberta, and the Chi-Coms are a threat to freedom everywhere.

Military Affairs: What's this? F-35s and naval assets being deployed to the Gulf region.

We-All-Slam-For-I-Slam: Some court just threw out years of rulings from military judges against the USS Cole terrorists, and Instagram cuts off IRGC officials. How can we get their cool swag now?

The Economy: California is leading the way... in the highest gas prices in the nation, and where are the GOP YIMBYs?

Crime and Punishment: Kamala-Toe regrets being hard on parents of juvies, that 5-year-old boy thrown from a balcony at the Mall of America is in critical condition, and a NY parole board frees terrorist Judith Clark. Disgusting, but hey, it's Democrat-controlled New York.

Education: North Carolina public schools announce May Day off for the commies to hold a #Red-for-Ed protest, Middlebury College censors conservative lecture on totalitarianism (hey, they obviously are experts in the subject), and what the hell happened to the University of Tulsa? That's a rhetorical question.

Red Greens: Chiquita Khruschev AOC releases an insane, even for her, agitprop cartoon video pimping the Green Leap Backwards to children, and a look at radical environmentalism and something known as "transhumanism," which involves immortality, and the conflict between the two.

Feminazism: Dennis Prager on the heavy price of femme rage.

Hither and Yon: "You gotta fight. For your right..." to choke the chicken? Christian Toto on two anti-Fox propaganda flicks, a rave for the play Hadestown, on the Left's need to rewrite history and the great Victor Davis Hanson with a high level view on where things are heading.

Anyway, links from around the world, across the nation and up your street. Have a better one and remain blessed.

NOTE: The opinions expressed in some links may or may not reflect my own. I include them because of their relevance to the discussion of a particular issue.

BREAKING, DEVELOPING

• Man Arrested After Trying to Enter NYC's St. Patrick's Cathedral With 2 Gasoline Cans

  THE MUELLER DECEPTION, SPYGATE, DEEP STATE, CONGRESSIONAL COUP
  

• Dems Furious Barr Will Hold Press Conference Before Report Is Sent to Congress
  
• Mueller Report: Dems Bash Barr to Keep Hype Alive
  
• What To Expect From Democrats When Mueller's Report Drops Today
  
• Ahead of Mueller Report, Corey Lewandowski Feels Vindicated
  
• Christopher Steele Refusing to Meet With DoJ IG Scrutinizing Ex-Spy's Dossier (3AM raid with TV crews - jjs)
  
• Levin: Remember Clinton's 1990s Reelection? Real "Evidence [of Collusion] Was Everywhere"

  BORDER WALL, MIGRANT INVASION, AMNESTY, IMMIGRATION, BORDER SECURITY
  

• Ipsos Poll: GOP Voters Say Immigration "Most Important Problem" in US
  
• HUD Plans Crackdown On Illegals Taking Advantage of Public Housing System
  
• DHS Panel Calls for Urgent Action to Address the Border Crisis
  
• Yuma, Arizona Mayor Declares "State of Emergency" Over Migrant Influx at Border
  
• The Case for Busing Border Detainees to Burlington, Vermont
  
• Illegal Alien Animal Released by Obama's DHS Charged with Killing Father of 10

  DEMOCRAT-LEFTIST SCANDALS, CRIMES, CHUTZ-POCRISY, MESHUGAS
  

• Unearthed Texts Show Kim Foxx Meddled in Jussie Smollett Case Despite "Recusal"
  
• UAW Chrysler Bribery Scandal Hits Chattanooga
  
• T.J. "B.J." Cox Campaign Spent Over $12,000 on Catering During Shutdown

  OFFICIALLY-SANCTIONED DEMOCRAT PARTY ANTI-SEMITISM
  

• Rancida Tliban Hosts Another Extreme Anti-Israel, Terror-Affiliated Creep On Capitol Hill
  
• Nancy Pelosi Claims Democrat Party Has "No Taint" Of Anti-Semitism... Right After Meeting With Rabid Joo-Hating MP Jeremy Corbyn
  
• Two Dems Turn Down "Bro-Fo" Omar's Money

  POLITICS
  

• Battleground Florida: Dems, Progressive Groups Work to Turn Critical Swing State against Trump for 2020
  
• Report: Democrats Who Complain About "Dark Money" Groups Should Note Huge One On Their Side
  
• "Jello-Brain" Gillibrand Campaign Struggling to Raise Cash Due to Backlash Over Franken Resignation
  
• Bernie Can't Beat Trump in 2020 Says Obama Campaign Manager (knives out for the alta-cocker commie - jjs)
  
• Sandersnista and Blotto Beto Give Almost Nothing to Charity
  
• Greenfield: Raise Taxes on Everyone Richer Than Me
  
• Bernie Sanders Attacks Actual Cherokee Author for Criticizing Fauxca-has-Been Warren's False Cherokee Claim (so proud to live, so proud to lie - jjs)
  
• If Entrepreneurs "Didn't Build That," Who Did?
  
• How the Electoral College Squelches Faction
  
• Reparations and the Weaponization of Slavery
  
• Spengler: "Reservoir Dems" Prepare for a Trump 2020 Landslide
  
• Hey Democrats, Here's the Price I Paid For Your Socialist Dream

  FIRST AMENDMENT, CENSORSHIP, FAKE NEWS, BIG TECH BROTHER
  

• Mayor Buttplug Will Make You Bake the Cake
  
• Adam Schiff-for-Brains: The Media's Pin-Up Doll

  SECOND AMENDMENT
  

• National Gun Control Group Takes Aim at Second Amendment-Supporting Nevada Sheriffs

  ABORTION
  

• OB-GYN Contests Depiction of 13-Week-Old Unborn Baby "Fighting For Its Life" In Unplanned Film (from the Mengele School of Pediatrics - jjs)
  
• Abortion and Polling Propaganda

  NOTRE DAME FIRE, AFTERMATH
  

• Hero Priest Who Saved Notre Dame Relics Comforted Victims At Bataclan, Survived Taliban Attack
  
• Jihadists Celebrate Devastating Notre Dame Cathedral Fire
  
• The Resurrection of Notre Dame Cathedral Begins
  
• The Politics of Notre Dame
  
• Jihad Against Churches

  FOREIGN AFFAIRS, INTERNATIONAL
  

• Trump Strengthens Efforts To Uproot Communism In Latin America (here too, please, Mr. President - jjs)
  
• US Tightens Pressure on Cuba Amid Crackdown on Maduro in Venezuela
  
• Report: NorKs Test New Weapon
  
• Brexit Revolution Exploding
  
• Congress Directs Trump Admin to Alter Federal Info to Recognize Israeli Control of Golan Heights
  
• Canadian Conservatives Win Historic Election in Alberta
  
• China vs. A Liberal World Order

  DEFENSE, MILITARY, SECURITY AFFAIRS
  

• Trouble Brewing? US Deploys F-35s to UAE, Naval Assets to Red Sea, Persian Gulf

  ISLAM, TERRORISM, SHARIA, DHIMMITUDE
  

• Court Throws Out Years of Rulings from Military Judge in USS Cole Trial
  
• Top IRGC Officials Lose Instagram Accounts After Terror Designation

  THE ECONOMY, STUPID
  

• At $4.016 a Gallon, California Has Nation's Highest Average Gas Price
  
• Where Are All the Republican YIMBYs?

  CRIME & PUNISHMENT (NON-DOSTOYEVSKY)
  

• Kamala-Toe Harris Regrets Parents Arrested Over Her 2011 Truancy Law
  
• 5-Year-Old Boy Thrown From Third-Floor Balcony At Mall of America Fighting to Recover
  
• If Cuomo's Parole Board Can Free Terrorist Judith Clark, It'll Free Anyone

  EDUCATION, INDOCTRINATION
  

• North Carolina Public Schools to Cancel Classes May 1st Due to #Red-for-Ed May Day Teachers Protest
  
• Middlebury College Cancels Conservative Philosopher's Lecture on Totalitarianism (ironic, nein? - jjs)
  
• Storm Clouds Over Tulsa: Inside the Academic Destruction of a Proud Private University

  RED-GREENS, CLIMATE CHANGE HOAX, LYSENKOISM
  

• Chiquita Khruschev AOC Previews Green New Deal: Oil Workers Replace Pipelines with Mangroves, Indigenous People Heal the Land
  
• Chiquita Khruschev AOC's Message From the Future
  
• Radical Environmentalism and Transhumanism: Symptoms of the Same Disease

  FEMINAZISM, TRANSGENDER PSYCHOSIS, HOMOSEXUALIZATION, WAR ON MASCULINITY/NORMALCY
  

• Prager: They Heavy Price of Feminist Rage

  CULTURE WARS, HITHER & YON
  

• Man Sues Parents For Trashing His Porn Collection (out of a Beastie Boys' lyric - jjs)
  
• Toto: Hollywood Declares War on Ailes, Fox News?
  
• Hadestown On Broadway Re-Envisions An Ancient Story of Love, Loss, and Distrust
  
• Politicians, Fearful and Ashamed of Truth, Rewrite History!
  
• V.D. Hanson: Things That Can't Go on Forever Simply Don't

Wednesday Overnight Open Thread (4/17/19)

—Misanthropic Humanitarian

Quote I

"Despite repeated claims that CAIR is a benign, mainstream civil-rights advocacy group, the truth remains that CAIR has a long history of financing terrorist groups like Hamas, Hezbollah and al Qaeda. Since 9/11, 15 CAIR leaders have been criminally convicted or implicated in terrorism investigations—including one convicted for violating sanctions of Iraq and another for financing al Qaeda and the Taliban." Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry (R.)

Quote II

“I don’t think I know a single judge who has allowed religion to interfere with their jobs. “I think if you start the day on your knees, you approach your job differently from when you start thinking that someone anointed you to impose your will on others.”Justice Clarence Thomas

Quote III

America is a land that bans books, has political prisoners and condemns people to a form of internal exile where they cannot have a job or maintain a normal life. Ten years ago, if someone said Americans would lose their jobs because they liked something on social media, only the aluminum foil hat types would have believed it. Such things were considered impossible just a decade ago. In the 1980’s, these were the sorts of things that happened in the Soviet Union, which was why communism was considered evil. The Z Blog

***

Interesting times we live in.

A female high school student has been expelled from her school after she kneed a boy in the groin while he was blocking her from leaving the girls bathroom. The boy, along with 6 other male students, entered the girls’ restroom at North Pole High School in Alaska to protest a selfie taken in a boy’s bathroom by a student transitioning from female to male.

The male students intended to do the same in the girl’s bathroom, that was occupied by the girl. The student expelled and the transgender student were not connected in any way, but the female student who was blocked from leaving felt threatened, which is why she used self-defense.

***

Older men at the range.

***

Why should I donate money to charity when I donate myself to politics? So asked Robert Francis O'Rourke.

Mrs. Mis. Hum. calls him a "dick". That's pretty strong coming from her.

***

As us 29 year olds approach Medicare and Social Security eligibility, we must pay attention to the little details.

Long-time readers may recall our series of interviews with attorney Kent Brown about his lawsuit against the Fed's "because Social Security officials claim that folks must forfeit their Social Security benefits if they withdraw from (or choose not to enroll in) Medicare."

[ed: Original and follow-up posts are here and here]

One would think that since neither of these are in any way legislatively connected, this would be a non-issue.

One would think that, but one would be incorrect:

"Is there something in the original Medicare legislation that dictated this? Surprisingly, the answer is no ... Nothing in the Social Security or Medicare statutes state that one must take Medicare in order to receive Social Security payments (or vice versa)"

So how did this come about?

Two words: Washington, DC.

***

Swimming in pudding. J/K Rolling in grits.

The World Grits Festival in South Carolina featured an eating contest for the traditional breakfast food in addition to a "Rolling in the Grits" contest.

The festival, held in St. George, featured Tom McCoskey capturing his seventh consecutive title in the grits eating contest, besting competitors including his own sister.

***

Tonight's geography lesson..........

***

My father and I didn't always get along. But as I hit the awkward age of 13 or 14, not a boy, not a man, there was one thing that we enjoyed together on Saturday nights. AWA Wrestling. Boy am I glad I didn't know this then.

What is professional wrestling? Without a well-written story, it’s just two adults fighting each other in scanty clothing. With a great story though, wrestling is nothing short of magnificent. It’s an art just like music, movies or any other television show. Wrestlers are actors who have diverse personalities and play the part extremely well.

There is so much going on behind the scenes, much more than just a few moves, a finish, and a winner to each match. One of the first things people learn is that everything that plays out on camera in wrestling is predetermined with storylines being composed like a play written for a large audience.

Have you ever gone to the theaters in anticipation of a movie and been completely disappointed because it was not written well? The same could be said for a wrestling match.

***

Tonight's doping scandal. NFL? No. NBA? No. MLB? No. Hope you're sitting down. Bridge. Yes, bridge the card game.

When a top athlete is caught using performance-enhancing drugs in an elite competition, like the Olympics, it's big news. But humans will make a competition out of anything, and even the most obscure tests of skill and talent have their cheaters. Even the card game bridge.

Early 2019 delighted the world with news of the world's #1 Bridge player, Geir Helgemo, being suspended after getting caught doping. Of course, if you read a little deeper, you'll see that Helgemo was using two drugs to increase his testosterone, which increases your Bridge skills in ... no way whatsoever? Maybe his strategy involved intimidating other players with his sudden influx of chest hair?

***

They aren't even good liars.

It turns out that trusting the word of a con artist might not always be the best choice.

Following Lori Loughlin and husband Mossimo Giannulli's decision to plead not guilty to the charges facing them in connection to the college admissions scandal on Monday, a source close to the 54-year-old actress tells ET that she feels like those who orchestrated the scheme misled her about the severity of her involvement.

"[Lori and her husband] claim they were under the impression they might be breaking rules, but not laws," the source says. "They feel they were manipulated by those involved and are planning that as part of their defense."

***

Not only does this guy have a horseshoe stuck up his ass. He also has a steel rod through his skull.

Construction Worker Miraculously Survives Getting An Iron Rod Through His Skull

21-year-old Sanjay Bahe was doing routine repair work one second and had an iron rod impaling his head the next.

***

The FCC is looking for naughty people.

With ever more streaming options and set-top boxes than any one person could ever possibly need, it’s certainly much more convenient to cut the cord than ever before. But if you’re looking to cut corners with the devices you’re using for those services, you may want to reconsider.

The Federal Communications Commission last week issued an enforcement advisory to remind consumers and distributors about its policies around unauthorized set-top boxes and streaming devices—namely, don’t even think about it.

***

The ONT Musical Interlude

Born on this day: April 17th 1934 - Don Kirshner
American music publisher, talent manager, and songwriter Don Kirshner who helped launch the careers of Neil Diamond, Bobby Darin, Carole King, Neil Sedaka and The Archies. Kirshner was hired by the producers of The Monkees to provide hit-worthy songs to accompany the television program and also served as a music consultant for almost two dozen TV series between 1966 and 1977. He died on January 17, 2011. via thisdayinmusic.com

Not mentioned is that he basically bank rolled the band Kansas.

On this day: April 17th, 1987 - Carlton Barrett
Reggae drummer and percussion player Carlton Barrett of The Wailers was shot dead outside his house in Kingston, Jamaica. Joined Bob Marley and The Wailers in 1970, wrote the Marley song 'War'. Barrett was the originator of the one-drop rhythm, a percussive drumming style. via thisdayinmusic.com

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I'm envious that he could build the car of his dreams. His long range planning on the other hand makes him tonight's Genius Award Winner 1st Runner-up

Super cars have captured speed enthusiasts since they were first introduced. These mountains of metal and horsepower are works of art in their own rights. I mean, when was the last time you saw an ugly super car? These speed machines capture our imagination with their beauty and raw power. They are meant for two things, to go fast and looks amazing. So when Ken Imhoff first saw the Lamborghini Countach in the movie Cannonball Run, he found himself falling in love with the legendary car. This started on him on a journey that culminated 17 years later when he unveiled what he had kept under wraps for so long. What he made with his own two hands is so amazing that I almost couldn’t speak. You seriously won’t want to miss this.

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Cursing and shouting at students. Genius Award Winner.

A substitute teacher in Kentucky has been arrested for allegedly endangering middle school students by teaching while drunk. Yes, forget drinking and driving, now it’s drinking and teaching. This according to 32-year-old Brook Ellen West, who I want to say was having a very harsh morning.

West was arrested on charges of public intoxication and endangering the welfare of a minor. Scott County Sheriff’s deputies stated she confessed to the incident after questioning and told authorities that she had a total of four shots of vodka while teaching a class at Royal Springs Middle School in Georgetown.

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If this is true, I'll never have to pay for electricity again.Tonight's Feel Good Story of The Day.

Researchers have developed a first-of-its-kind device that can generate electricity from falling snow.

The inexpensive device, which was developed by UCLA scientists, is small, thin, and flexible like a sheet of plastic.

“The device can work in remote areas because it provides its own power and does not need batteries,” said senior author Richard Kaner. “It’s a very clever device – a weather station that can tell you how much snow is falling, the direction the snow is falling, and the direction and speed of the wind.”

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Tonight's ONT has been brought to you by Self-Help Books.

Notice: Posted with permission by the Ace Media Empire and AceCorp, LLC. The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Ace, his Media Empire or his red-headed step child AceCorp, LLC.

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