The Patriot Post® · Friday: Below the Fold

By Douglas Andrews, Thomas Gallatin, & Jordan Candler ·
https://patriotpost.us/articles/106499-friday-below-the-fold-2024-05-03

Cross-Examination

  • Biden and his fellow BSers: Joe Biden continued to cement his sorry legacy yesterday when he finally got around to saying something about the smelly Jew-hating leftists who have overtaken so many of our, ahem, elite universities and in so doing are damaging the Democrats’ brand — if that’s still possible. “We are not an authoritarian nation where we silence people or squash dissent,” said The Decrepit One from the safety of the White House. “The American people are heard. In fact, peaceful protest is in the best tradition of how Americans respond to consequential issues. But neither are we a lawless country. We’re a civil society and order must prevail.” Order, eh? Like the order that should’ve kept his Red Guards from defiling with Hamas paraphernalia the famous statue of George Washington at his namesake university just a few blocks away? Hey, who needs the National Guard anyway? Certainly not a president desperate to undo the stunning 55-point swing of voters under 30 away from him and toward Donald Trump. Demonstrating that he can ladle BS twice in a single day, Biden also powered through some prepared remarks on our National Day of Prayer. “This year,” he read, “my prayer for our Nation is that we keep faith that our best days are ahead of us and continue to believe in honesty, decency, dignity, and respect.” You first, Mr. President. But Biden wasn’t the only incompetent boob doing damage control. Karine “The Binder” Jean-Pierre was dusting off and trotting out that long-ago-debunked Charlottesville lie as she was fending off questions about leftist anti-Semitism at yesterday’s press briefing: “Let’s not forget in 2017,” she said. “He was very clear what we saw — the anti-Semitic vile that we saw in Charlottesville — on the streets of Charlottesville.” That this administration continues to peddle such a bald-faced lie speaks volumes about its degree of desperation. It’ll say anything because it knows that its low-information voters will believe anything.

  • Pelosi to get Presidential Medal of Freedom: When Barack Obama “won” his Nobel Peace Prize in 2009 just 11 days before he took office, he hadn’t done a thing to earn it, and it rightly became a running joke. So we’ll say this about the White House ceremony tomorrow at which Joe Biden will give the nation’s highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, to Nancy Pelosi and 18 fellow recipients: At least San Fran Nan earned it. At least she presided over the speakership and wielded that gavel with an iron fist. And at least she kept her fellow Democrats in line for all those ruinous House votes. As The Washington Post reminds us: “The congresswoman from California led House Democrats for two decades and became the first woman elected House Speaker, a position she stepped away from in 2023. Pelosi continues to serve in Congress, where she’s represented a San Francisco-area district for more than 30 years.” Other unworthy honorees include Global Warmist Al Gore, Biden Kingmaker James Clyburn, and Vietnam Fabulist John Kerry. All of this leads us to wonder whether it won’t be long before the Presidential Medal of Freedom is looked upon with the same sort of derision as the Nobel Peace Prize.

  • ObamaCare for Dreamers: Healthcare is not a right in America because asserting so effectively condones a right to slavery — someone must provide your healthcare — a notion the U.S. officially dispelled over 150 years ago. Yet that hasn’t stopped Democrat politicians, those original defenders of slavery, from conflating the freedom of Americans to seek healthcare with a right to receive healthcare. However, since the disastrous passage of ObamaCare, the Democrats have successively sought to expand this usurpation of Americans’ freedom by playing up the false notion of a “right to healthcare.” On Thursday, the Biden administration announced it was pushing the Liberty-infringing ObamaCare even further, expanding it to include noncitizens. Now, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients, also known as Dreamers, will be eligible to enroll in ObamaCare. Biden’s Domestic Policy Council Director Neera Tanden explained, “This final rule also reflects the president’s belief that health care is a right not a privilege for all Americans, that it should extend to DACA recipients just like the rest of us.” This move is an effort to make it even harder to get rid of DACA, as the U.S. Supreme Court will likely weigh in on its legality. By tying in ObamaCare, which only survived SCOTUS thanks to Chief Justice John Roberts dubiously turning it into a tax law, the Biden administration is banking on protecting DACA from elimination.

  • Now they tell us: 13 vulnerable House Dems join GOP to condemn Biden: It’s funny, not funny, the lengths to which members of Congress will go to hang onto power. When they see an election looming, and they see that red career-dissipation light a-flashing, they tend to resort to all manner of truth-telling at the expense of their own party. A case in point came this week, as The Daily Caller tells us: “A slate of House Democrats in mostly competitive districts have signed their names onto a resolution that explicitly condemns the Biden administration’s immigration agenda. Thirteen House Democrats joined with Republicans in backing H. Res. 1112, a resolution that denounces President Joe Biden’s and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’ immigration policies. The resolution passed the House chamber on Wednesday by a vote of 223-191, highlighting the growing bipartisan concern over the border crisis.” The language of the admittedly toothless resolution didn’t mince words: “Whereas President Joe Biden and Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas have created the worst border security crisis in the Nation’s history,” the resolution reads. “Whereas President Biden, beginning on day one of his administration, systematically dismantled effective border security measures and interior immigration enforcement.” Hey, who can disagree with that assessment? Certainly not a Democrat up for reelection in a narrowly divided district.

  • Iranian college offers free tuition to anti-Semitic protesters: Impressed with the anti-Israel protesters rabble-rousing on university campuses across the U.S., Shiraz University in Iran has an offer for these anti-Semitic students — free tuition. The head of the Iranian university, Mohammad Moazzeni, recently said, “Students and even professors who have been expelled or threatened with expulsion can continue their studies at Shiraz University, and I think that other universities in Shiraz, as well as Fars province, are also prepared [to provide the conditions].” A professor at the University of Tehran, Foad Izadi, was excited by the anti-Israel protests and expressed similar sentiments, calling protesters “our people.” He added, “And if tensions between America and Iran rise tomorrow or the day after, these are the people who will have to take to the streets to support Iran.” He also claimed, “Our Hezbollah-style groups in America are much larger than what we have in Lebanon.”

  • California’s EV-only future imposes big grid cost: A recently released study from the University of California, Berkeley has concluded that it would cost upwards of $20 billion for California to upgrade its electrical grid to meet its goal of an all-electric vehicle future by 2045. This study only focused on the state’s mass adaptation of EVs and the resulting increased demand on the grid. It did not take into consideration California’s other electrification rules aimed at making all household appliances electric as well. In other words, this study just focused on the grid cost for EVs in every driveway. Currently, only residents in Hawaii pay more for their electric bill than Californians, but that will likely change with the Golden State’s push for an all-electric future. Is it any wonder people are fleeing the state?

  • NJ Nissan workers decertify the UAW: Just over a week ago, the president of the United Auto Workers, Shawn Fain, was celebrating a unionization victory at the Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The Leftmedia treated it as big news and a potential bellwether of unionization spreading across the Deep South. However, up in Somerset, New Jersey, workers at the Nissan facility were preparing to cast their vote in response to a petition to decertify from the UAW. That vote happened last week and the result wasn’t even close, as 37 of the facility’s 60 employees voted to leave the union with just 17 votes to remain. While the scale of the loss isn’t nearly as large as the UAW’s win in Chattanooga, it does represent a continuing losing trend for unions across the country. Last year alone, unions lost 110 decertification elections to 65 wins. In an effort to stop the union bleeding, the Biden administration has sought to eliminate the secret ballot in decertification elections, a move that gives union bosses the names of workers who oppose them.

  • That’s the Spirit: Ole Miss students drown out filthy leftist rabble: Let’s end another Bidenesque week of “America Held Hostage” with some good ol’ American Spirit, shall we? Nearly all of the campus tumult in the past two weeks has taken place north of the Mason-Dixon Line. But that doesn’t mean that the southern campus of the University of Mississippi was safe from the Soros-funded, Jew-hating, pro-Hamas hooligans who’ve been running roughshod over our nation’s institutions of lower learning. Sure enough, there they were, a handful of protesters carrying large Palestinian flags and shouting anti-Israel and pro-Hamas ditties. And sure enough, a group of far more decent and patriotic students launched a counterprotest, complete with a high-volume singing of our national anthem. “I am aware of today’s scheduled protest on the campus of Ole Miss,” said Republican Governor Tate Reeves. “Mississippi law enforcement is also aware. And they are prepared,” he added. “Campus police, City, County, and State assets are being deployed and coordinated. We will offer a unified response with one mission: Peaceful protests are allowed and protected — no matter how outrageous those protesters’ views may seem to some of us. But unlawful behavior will not be tolerated. It will be dealt with accordingly. Law and order will be maintained!” Let that be a lesson to ‘em.

Headlines

  • U.S. job growth totaled 175,000 in April, much less than expected, while unemployment rose to 3.9% (CNBC)

  • House passes confusing bill to penalize anti-Semitism and it might destroy the First Amendment (Not the Bee)

  • Biden again pledges gun control in second term and calls idea “tree of liberty is watered with the blood of patriots and tyrants” a “bunch of crap” (TTAG)

  • DOJ official Kristen Clarke comes clean after falsely testifying to Senate that she had never been arrested (NY Post)

  • Biden admin funneled $1.3 million to Taliban, audit finds (Washington Free Beacon)

  • Congress’s free Netflix plan: Members want to extend a monthly pandemic subsidy for broadband (WSJ)

  • Arizona governor signs bill repealing state’s 1864 abortion law (Daily Wire)

  • Georgia governor signs bill mandating jailers check immigration status of inmates (Daily Wire)

  • Border agent on horseback falsely accused of whipping migrants in Texas now awarded for his service (NY Post)

  • U.S. bird flu outbreak spreads to chickens, cattle, raises concerns over human infections (Reuters)

  • Hamas leader reportedly protecting himself with multiple Israeli hostages (Sky News)

  • Humor: Immigration crisis ended as frat boys deployed to guard southern border (Babylon Bee)

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