Cross-Examination

• Macy’s parade meets pro-Hamas protesters: Clearly, the pro-Hamas crowd hasn’t read Dale Carnegie. Otherwise, they’d realize that they aren’t going to win friends and influence people by disrupting the most iconic of American events: the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City. But perhaps their intent is merely to alienate and intimidate people. As the New York Post reports: “Pro-Palestinian protesters were spotted handing out ‘Killed by Israel’ fliers as chaos erupted at the end of the [parade] on Thursday. A handful of people could be seen dishing out the posters to parade-goers as hundreds of protesters stormed the end of the annual family spectacular in Midtown Manhattan.” According to National Review, one large sign read, “Genocide Then Genocide Now,” “Free Palestine,” and “Land Back,” while the rabble chanted clever ditties such as: “Not another nickel, not another dime. No more money for Israel’s crimes.” The protest was, of course, an attempt to regain control of a narrative that has largely eluded Hamas since it launched a barbaric attack on Israel 51 days ago. Alas, more than 30 protesters were arrested, four were charged, and, we’d venture to guess, zero attendees of the parade had their minds changed by the mobbish disruption of the holiday gala that Macy’s first staged in 1924 and that NBC began televising in 1953.

• Holland’s “far-right” Wilders wins: From last Sunday’s stunning victory in Argentina by pro-Trump nationalist Javier Milei to Wednesday’s big win in the Netherlands by longtime anti-immigration candidate Geert Wilders, people are fed up with leftist policies including unchecked immigration. As the leftists at CNN lament: “The Netherlands woke up Thursday to an unexpected victory for Dutch anti-EU far-right populist Geert Wilders and his Freedom Party (PVV) — a forecast win that has triggered shockwaves in the Netherlands and could have reverberations across Europe and beyond. The provisional outcome … showed the PVV had won 37 seats and will be the largest party in the House of Representatives.” The Heritage Foundation’s Nile Gardiner put it in context: “The Dutch people are saying they’ve had enough of this and the huge cultural changes which have come in as a result. … I think the Geert Wilders effect is going to spread across much of Europe, and I think his electoral victory is a massive game-changer.” Indeed, nationalist candidates in Sweden, Italy, and Spain have also scored victories recently, and in Ireland, as Sky News reports, more than 400 police officers clashed with enraged crowds over a stabbing near a primary school “which left a five-year-old schoolgirl in critical condition and a female teacher in her 30s in a very serious condition.” Authorities are refusing to release any information about the suspect who’s in custody, but the Irish appear to have drawn educated conclusions about his background.

• Buttigieg “buddy” gets 30 years for child porn: Patrick Wojahn, the former mayor of College Park, Maryland, was sentenced to 30 years behind bars after he pleaded guilty to possessing and distributing child pornography. Joe Biden’s Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Wojahn, both of whom are homosexuals, met at a U.S. Conference of Mayors in Washington, DC, back in 2015, when Buttigieg was still mayor of South Bend, Indiana. Evidently, they really hit it off, as Wojahn described it: “[Buttigieg] was assigned to be my buddy. I now serve in a leadership role as vice chair of city livability and bicycling in part due to his mentorship.” Wojahn, a longtime Democrat who has donated to the national party, has visited the White House multiple times since Biden took office. He resigned as mayor this past March after his pedophilia came to light.

• Good news: saving babies’ lives: A recently released study published by the Institute of Labor Economics found that since the U.S. Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, the lives of more than 30,000 babies have been saved. “Our primary analysis indicates that in the first six months of 2023, births rose by an average of 2.3 percent in states enforcing total abortion bans compared to a control group of states where abortion rights remained protected, amounting to approximately 32,000 additional annual births resulting from abortion bans,” the researchers observed. This result is thanks to 14 conservative states having enacted limits and outright bans on abortion, which then saw “a 100% decrease [in abortions] during the study period.” The states seeing the biggest decline in abortions include Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Tennessee, Texas, and Wisconsin.

• PETA gets roasted: With an ill-advised meme, PETA sought to shame Americans for enjoying turkey on Thanksgiving. PETA’s meme posted on X featured a cartoon image of turkeys sitting around a table with a headless roasted human on a platter. The meme was captioned, “We’re lucky turkeys would never do this to us — you don’t have to do it to them, either.” Well, thanks to X’s community notes feature where readers can add context, PETA’s misinformation play was hilariously corrected, pronto. As the community note observed: “Turkeys are not vegetarians. Turkeys eat mice, lizards, frogs, and just about anything they can fit in their mouth. If turkeys were larger or had the technological means to farm and eat humans, their current diet reveals they likely would.” Seems the real turkeys here are PETA’s mindless gobblers.

• Biden keeps sinking: If panic hasn’t set in yet at the Biden White House, then we’re not sure what will trigger it. Last month, in what may have come as a surprise to some, polls indicated that Donald Trump had overtaken Joe Biden in four of five battleground states in a potential head-to-head matchup. Those polls indicated that Biden had lost voters more than Trump had gained them. That is evidently changing now with the most recent polls. Biden is now falling further behind Trump and, to make matters worse for Biden, Trump’s average voter share in national polling is now rising. In other words, swing voters are swinging toward Trump, and this includes a surprise NBC News poll that found voters under 35 years of age now favor Trump over Biden 46% to 42%. What is clear is that Biden is in a downward spiral; what’s not clear is whether the old man can pull out of it. The question is: Are a majority of Americans simply done with the bumbling Biden?

• An apparent anti-Arab hate crime in Vermont: In what was clearly a targeted attack, three men in their 20s and of Palestinian descent were shot early Saturday evening in Burlington, Vermont. Two of the men were wearing the traditional keffiyeh headscarf that former PLO boss Yasser Arafat used to wear and that has since come to symbolize Palestinian rights. As CBS News reports: “The three men were in Burlington visiting the home of one of the victim’s relatives for Thanksgiving … when an armed white man confronted them and, without speaking, allegedly discharged at least four rounds. … Two of the victims were shot in the torso while the third man was shot in his lower extremities, police said.” Two of them were listed in stable condition, while the third victim “sustained much more serious injuries.” Soon thereafter, police arrested a man who happens to be white. Joe Biden was briefed on the incident, as was Vermont socialist Senator Bernie Sanders, who condemned it as “shocking and deeply upsetting.” Biden and his handlers, meanwhile, have thus far remained curiously silent rather than trying to score cheap points with the Arab-American community.

Headlines

• Derek Chauvin seriously injured in prison stabbing (New York Post)

• Israel and Hamas look open to extending truce on its final day, with one more hostage swap planned (AP) | Family members: Hostages ate poorly, slept on benches, waited up to two hours for bathroom (Breitbart)

• “Disappointed” Biden apologized after showing skepticism about Hamas death toll claims (Washington Examiner)

• The FBI released journal info from a “white shooter” within 48 hours of the crime and the media raced to report the attack “may have been racially motivated.” Funny how that works. (Not the Bee)

• Lawmakers are ditching Congress at a record pace (Axios)

• Elizabeth Warren acknowledges the ripple effects of ObamaCare’s consequences (Fox News)

• New York retailers lost $4.4 billion due to organized shoplifting rings in 2022 (New York Post)

• Lack of “affirmation” is child abuse: New Biden rule applies transgender standard to foster care (Daily Signal)

• Catholic all-girls college will admit men who identify as “trans” (Daily Signal)

• Menstrual product company launches “Tampons for Men” (National Review)

• New York City enacts law barring discrimination based on weight (PM)

• Progressives advocated pandemic school closures. Now they’re covering their tracks. (National Review)

• Black Friday shoppers spent a record $9.8 billion in U.S. online sales, up 7.5% from last year (CNBC)

• Humor: Musk to put Cybertruck’s bulletproof armor to ultimate test with trip through downtown Chicago (Babylon Bee)

For more editors’ choice headlines, click here.