Posse Incitatus

Uneven Justice is a Cancer Upon the Land

We hear a lot about justice these days: racial, economic and environmental, for example. Usually, the focus is on skin color, because identity politics is an obsession of the left and their media lapdogs.

But just as race is not the true wedge that splits apart our society -- class, wealth and the special privilege of connections (i.e., who you know) are far more divisive factors -- race does not play as big a role as it is purported to in the administration of justice. These days, political ideology takes the cake.

A quick word about the race obsession vis a vis justice, and then I'll move on to my main point: There is no question that in the past -- let's say 40-plus years ago -- there were many instances of minorities being unjustly treated by juries, police, judges and other officials, simply because of skin color. How many times has the "To Kill a Mockingbird" scenario played out, where an all-white jury reached an unfair verdict with regard to a person involved in a crime -- unjustly exonerating a white or convicting a black?

But those days are long gone. Despite the media's simple-minded distortions, and analyses by lawyers and justice organizations that overwhelmingly consider race as the determining factor on whether justice is being served, many variables are usually in play.

First and foremost would be a defendant's past record in terms of arrests, convictions and overall comportment. Harsh treatment for a seemingly minor crime might be because the defendant has a lengthy track record and shows no signs of trying to reform himself. This will piss off the lefties, but in many cases, black men shot dead by police would still be alive if they had not resisted arrest or threatened the officer with a weapon. (Of course there are instances where the officer is clearly guilty of egregious behavior and deserves to be convicted, but these are rare.)

Income level is also a major factor -- those who can afford the best lawyers, be they black, white or any other race -- usually receive more lenient treatment. Public defenders are often overworked and underpaid. They are never anywhere near as effective as the $700-an-hour big shots from white shoe law firms. 

But let's turn to an ongoing injustice that grows worse with each passing year. In recent years, we have witnessed an unprecedented degree of selective prosecution of political enemies. In short, an attempted criminalization of political differences, wielded primarily by Democrats in power and carried out by the massive federal law enforcement and taxation bureaucracy -- i.e., the Department of Justice, FBI, CIA, Homeland Security and others, including the ruthless IRS.

If they don't raid your home pre-dawn with a panoply of heavily armed special agents, and then ransack your belongings, they just might bankrupt you with tax audits, fines and legal harassment.

Paul Manafort, Roger Stone and now Rudy Giuliani have been victims of the over-the-top raid by SWAT-like operatives -- something that ought to be used on big-time drug dealers or prison escapees, not political hacks who did what all hacks do but unfortunately were targeted for reprisals.

And then there were a number of bit players or folks who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time who paid a heavy price in the obscene Russian Collusion hoax that chewed up three years and cemented the American media's position as solidly mendacious and partisan. Gen. Mike Flynn had to sell his home to pay his legal bills. Carter Page, Rick Gates, and George Papadopoulos were among numerous people nailed on trumped up charges.

Moving forward several months to the Jan. 6 unrest at the U.S. Capitol, dozens of those who trespassed are being harassed by the FBI, and some have been locked up steadily for going on four months without being released on bond. The FBI has pulled out all stops to hound these people across the nation. There are reports that several inmates involved in the Capitol trespassing were brutally beaten by guards at Washington, D.C.'s city jail. It is doubtful we'll ever get to the bottom of this; ditto for public revelation of the Capitol Police officer's identity who fatally shot Ashli Babbit that fateful day.

Meanwhile, going back nearly a year, authorities from cities and counties up to the FBI and Justice Department have given the kid gloves treatment to hundreds of Antifa and Black Lives Matter anarchists who have looted and burned buildings, shot fireworks at police officers, taken over city blocks, assaulted Trump supporters, and in some cases even committed murder. Despicably, Vice President Kamala Harris organized a fund to bail out leftist perpetrators arrested for committing some of these crimes.

And of course, all of this comes within the context of big-time criminals and miscreants committing offenses for which most of us would be sent to prison for decades. Hillary Clinton, Hunter Biden, Rep. Eric Swalwell, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page and others got away with serious offenses. Untold numbers of deep state hacks feloniously revealed classified information to the New York Times and Washington Post during the Trump administration. Three directors of major agencies, James Comey (FBI), John Brennan (CIA), and James Clapper (NSA) clearly perjured themselves on numerous occasions involving congressional testimony. The list goes on.

One of the hallmarks of justice is consistency. Consistent standards, application and punishment. Consistency is nowhere to be found, and may be gone for good in our thoroughly corrupt government. It may be too late to repair the grievous damage.

Leftist Control Freaks Cannot Let Go of the Reins

Many people have warned that heavy-handed state and local governments, once they had implemented lockdowns and strict rules about masks and social distancing, would be loathe to relax those restrictions once the pandemic subsided.

Turns out, they were right. The State of Oregon has gone on record as stating it wants to make mask requirements in public places a permanent law. Why? Supposedly, the rationale is that widespread mask wearing and social distancing not only reduced spread of Coronavirus; it also inhibited the flu from afflicting millions of people. Ergo, why not keep those restrictions in place, the utopian central planners reasoned.

Michael Wood, administrator of Oregon's Department of Occupational Safety and Health, said the move is necessary to address a technicality in state law that requires a “permanent” rule to keep current restrictions from expiring. Sounds like bureaucratize to me. 

Something similar is going on here in Michigan. A couple weeks ago, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed a Certificate of Need for Extension of Emergency Rules, authorizing that return-to-workplace precautions be extended to Oct. 14.

Then, State Administrative Manager Shannon Matsumoto of the Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration (MIOSHA) filed paperwork indicating the state's desired outcome is "a permanent standard in place to protect Michigan workers after the emergency rules expire."

Matsumoto wrote that the MIOSHA COVID-19 permanent rules would continue the requirements of the emergency rules, adding, "the rationale for changing the rules is that the current emergency rules will expire."

Michigan's massive Department of Labor and Economic Opportunity (LEO) houses MIOSHA. LEO's spokesman, Jason Moon, gave a predictably weaselly comment: "We all are hopeful that by the time the permanent rules would go into effect, they will no longer be necessary and could be withdrawn." Fat chance.

The Centers for Disease Control reports that the 2020-2021 flu season was one of the mildest in many years. Granted, masks, social distancing and lockdowns undoubtedly contributed to this. But does this mean we should accede to greater government controls over our lives and our freedom? Hell no! 

We could eliminate thousands of auto fatalities annually if highway speed limits were 20-30 mph, and passing was not allowed. We could prevent the incidences of cirrhosis of the liver, domestic violence, bar brawls and drunk driving fatalities if alcohol were banned (been there, done that). Cracking down harshly on fast food and junk food would undoubtedly reduce the occurrence of diabetes, heart disease and obesity. And so on and so forth.

Hate to do it, but I'm going to have to regurgitate a hackneyed expression that's often used in exaggerated, drama queen fashion, but in this case is spot-on: This is a slippery slope. Government has already begun to demonize red meat (cow flatulence, the environmental footprint of corporate agriculture), single family housing, gasoline-powered vehicles, innocuous children's books like those of Dr. Seuss, and other aspects of our everyday lives.

You can bet your last dollar that Uncle Sam will try to make mask wearing and social distancing the "new normal" (ugh -- that's another overused term). I am happy to report that there does seem to be a lot of initial pushback, and we'll see where this leads.

Liberals up on their high horse can only be haughty for so long if the resistance is so fierce and persistent, it throws a monkey wrench into their plans and causes them, not others, to be objects of demonization. Widespread noncompliance (i.e., by tens of millions of people), could place this latest leftist overreach firmly in the realm of Prohibition. Let's hope so.

Systemic Bullshit, Existential Pushback: Reimagining Leftist Buzzwords

The propaganda machine has cranked up the "systemic racism" lie to full volume -- 24/7 brainwashing and repetition (Joseph Goebbels style) in the left's push to fundamentally vitiate the United States of America.

I dare say you wouldn't be able to watch more than 60 seconds of MSNBC or CNN without that cursed word "systemic" being uttered by one of the many inane parrots of the Fourth Estate. Sadly, millions of weak-minded sheep fall in line, ignorant that they may be complicit in ushering in a future totalitarian police state.

It's happening before our very eyes, yet we are hard-pressed to stop it. This reminds me of what my father used to say about the great Green Bay Packers teams of the 1960s, coached by the legendary Vince Lombardi. In those days, passing was infrequent, and running formations more rudimentary. It's been decades since the position names "halfback" and "fullback" were in common use; "tailback" is today's term for the players whose primary responsibility is taking handoffs and running with the ball.

So in that context, Green Bay ran the ball a lot. And they did so very effectively, since they had a powerful offensive line and star running backs like Paul Hornung, Jim Taylor and Donny Anderson.

What did my dad tell me? That defenses knew what the predictable Green Bay offense would do. It was as if they were inside the huddle and could hear Bart Starr call out the play. Even so, they STILL could not stop the Pack from steamrolling their defenders and grabbing large chunks of real estate each time they ran the ball.

How's that for frustration? You know what the other team will do, you know how to best defend it, and you do your damnedest to stop them, yet you fail, time and time again.

In some respects, the juggernaut we face today is like those Green Bay offenses of old. Combine the corrupt deep state, Demagogue - er, DEMOCRAT Party, Big Tech, garbage media, woke corporations, universities, leftist foundations and all manner of freelance, solo act virtue signalers, and it's a hell of a Marxist shit-storm. At times it may seem hopeless. But it isn't. I continue to see encouraging signs that make me believe lovers of liberty and limited government won't be like those hapless defenders opposing the green and gold gridiron heroes of Lambeau Field all those years ago.

First of all, ratings are way down for pro sports, due in large part to the leagues' insistence on foisting PC and woke garbage onto the public.

Last fall's World Series set a 20-year record low for average TV viewership. Just 9.78 million tuned in, compared to 13.91 million in 2019 and down from a peak of 25.47 million in 2004. Granted, the decline is due in part to the fact Major League Baseball's fan base is largely an older crowd, and a considerable number of them have passed away since 2004. But there's no question many fans are fed up with being lectured to by sanctimonious millionaires. 

The NBA has been the most egregious of the pro sports leagues as far as aggressive, obnoxious virtue signaling. Black Lives Matter has been emblazoned on players' jerseys and basketball courts, along with the usual pontificating over the P.A. system and players taking a knee during the national anthem. News flash: TV ratings for the 2020 NBA Finals were a whopping 70 percent lower than in 2019.

People will continue walking away from companies and entertainers who thrust garbage down their throats. The Oscars and Golden Globe Awards both have had record low ratings in recent years. Movie theaters have been hammered by the pandemic, and I suspect many of them will never re-open as millions of fans decide not to spend money to see movies involving cast members, directors and producers who regularly dump on America and push socialist, hard-left agendas.

There is also growing resistance to mask mandates and lockdowns. Despite Michigan's worsening incidence of COVID-19, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has declined to impose more strict lockdowns, which the Centers for Disease Control and Biden administration urged. She's seen her poll numbers declining, and knows the public has had it with lockdowns.

A video of a mother of young children complaining bitterly at a Gwinnett School Board meeting in suburban Atlanta has gone viral. She calls out the so-called "experts" for advocating policies at odds with the facts and common sense -- i.e., requiring kids to continue learning virtually and children as young as 2 or 3 to wear masks all day. Children are less likely to catch and spread Coronavirus, and if they do get it, their symptoms are usually mild. Despite this, draconian policies prevail. People are FED UP!

In California, Chicago and other areas, obstinate teachers' unions are refusing to go back to the classroom, leaving parents stuck with the unsustainable and failed model of virtual learning. Some parents have turned to parochial and charter schoools; others are home schooling. The Wall Street Journal reports that California public schools have suffered a drop in enrollment of 160,000 since the pandemic began. Additionally, Republicans in more than a dozen states have responded to parental frustration with school closures by introducing legislation to expand education choice.

Georgia, Florida, Michigan and many other states are in the process of adopting legislation to prevent election fraud, retain oversight as Uncle Sam seeks to take it away, and ensure transparency in elections. These efforts are in response to the Democrats' disastrous HR1, which would federalize elections, allowing banana republic tactics like ballot harvesting, weeks of loosely regulated mail-in ballots, and the elimination of voter ID requirements. 

Oh, and while we're talking about elections, let's not forget that Arizona is conducting an audit of the state's 2020 presidential election. Predictably, the vermin of the left are mocking it, but their credibility is so low that whatever criticisms and cynicism they have must be taken with a pound of salt.

Meanwhile, certain Republican politicians have surprised me with their powerful rebuttals to the left-wing steamroller coming from Washington, D.C.  Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has been outstanding in shining a light on the cockroaches, pushing back ferociously and effectively. Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie grew soft for a few years and dialed down the combativeness he demonstrated in winning the Garden State's gubernatorial race in 2009 and 2013. But in recent weeks, he has locked horns with some of the Sunday talk show hosts and blasted the national Democrats' far-left agenda. His is a strong voice that we need going forward.

And then there are the solid conservative commentators who have pulled no punches in exposing the hypocritical and sanctimonious woke, the leftists, statists and arrogant P.C. virtue signalers. These include Tucker Carlson, Dan Bongino, Jesse Waters, Newt Gingrich, Leo Terrell, Mark Levin, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Tammy Bruce, Candace Owens, Sean Spicer, Michael Savage and many more.

In summary, the coordinated propaganda and indoctrination trying to chew up and spit out conservatives while shredding the constitution is alienating millions of voters (even some who voted for Biden simply because they hated Trump) and meeting with formidable resistance. We are witnessing the equivalent of a brutal, 12-round heavyweight boxing match that will go on for quite a while longer. This thing is FAR from over.

The War on Police Continues

This blog has pointed out numerous times that the vast majority of police officers are good people. They are selfless individuals who put their lives on the line and perform stressful, dangerous work -- essential work -- on behalf of their fellow citizens while receiving modest compensation, frequent criticism and endless second guessing.

Heather MacDonald of the Manhattan Institute, author of "The War on Cops," notes that in 2019, there were 235 blacks shot and killed by police. In many cases, they were armed and resisted arrest. Compare this with the approximately 7,400 black homicide victims that year. Just the other day on the west side of Chicago, an innocent 7-year-old black girl was riddled with bullets and died in her father's car at a McDonald's drive-through. Did LeBron James, Rashida Tlaib or any of the smug university professors who love to spout off have anything to say about that? The fact is, Black-on-black crime happens regularly in our violent cities, but the demagogues marching in the streets don't care about that. It doesn't fit their narrative.

Consider the big picture: Every year, police make about 20 million traffic stops. I do not know what percent of those involve African Americans, but even if it were only 2 million, it's obvious that shootings of black drivers resulting in fatalities are a minuscule statistic.

Yet for several years, going back at least to Ferguson, Missouri in the summer of 2014, Black Lives Matter, charlatans like Al Sharpton, the Democrat Party and their garbage media appendage have ramrodded a load of crap down our throats: The false notion that most police are racist, and there's a covert effort (even a mission) of police officers to want to gun down blacks in cold blood. It's all a part of the fiction of so-called "systemic racism." (Why is it so many arrogant people who are full of themselves keep using that annoying word "systemic"? Do they actually think it makes them sound intelligent?)

Sometimes, false narratives persist despite overwhelming evidence they are B.S. Case in point: The "hands up, don't shoot" mantra of Ferguson. In the case that sparked Ferguson's demonstrations and riots, Michael Brown had tried to steal an officer's gun while resisting arrest -- after he held up a convenience store. 

Of late, we've had a 13-year-old Hispanic boy shot dead in Chicago when he was out at 2 a.m. with a 21-year-old shooting at passing cars, wouldn't drop his gun when chased by a police officer down an alley, and according to the officer appeared to be aiming the gun at him. In Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, a Minneapolis suburb, Daunte Wright was shot dead by an officer who said she thought she had grabbed her taser, but actually grabbed her pistol and pulled the trigger.

On Tuesday, just hours before the conviction of Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin in the death of George Floyd, a police officer in Columbus, Ohio shot a 16-year-old girl dead when the girl tried to attack another teen girl with a knife. It's really mayhem out there.

Amidst all of the rising tension and social media vitriol, the insufferable LeBron James tweeted out a picture of the officer who shot Ma'khia Bryant with the words, "You're next." He either had qualms about it, or received ferocious blowback (or possibly both), because he ended up taking down the tweet.

Meanwhile, leftists were sending out outrageous and reprehensible tweets that perpetuated the false narrative of evil, racist police enjoying their chosen M.O. of engaging in the wholesale slaughter of blacks. Filmmaker and anti-police activist Bree Newsome was ridiculed on social media after arguing that officers should not get involved in knife fights between teenagers because young people have fought with knives for “eons.”

“Teenagers have been having fights including fights involving knives for eons," tweeted Newsome. “We do not need police to address these situations by showing up to the scene & using a weapon against one of the teenagers.”

This is appalling. So let me see if I'm hearing her right: Blacks can go ahead and slash and possibly kill each other. But police have no business intervening. That's just blacks being blacks. Does this clueless woman have any idea how horrendous her "reasoning" is, and how much she disparages her fellow African Americans with her warped perspective? I doubt it.

The ubiquitous and far-left Valerie Jarrett, one of Barry Obama's sycophants who keeps turning up like a bad penny, tweeted, "A Black teenage girl named Ma’Khia Bryant was killed because a police officer immediately decided to shoot her multiple times in order to break up a knife fight. Demand accountability.  Fight for justice."

Nothing new here. Same old anti-police agitprop. It started under Obama, but is continuing under Sleepy Joe Biden. Universities are fully onboard with the B.S. narrative and endless indoctrination. They join BLM, the ACLU, NAACP, garbage media, Big Tech, Hollywood and blowhard pro athletes, along with the usual scum like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.

Our country is really in a bad way. I shudder to think of the riots and unrest to come if things are not dialed down. But I have zero faith that the shameless, expedient and ruthless cretins who make up the Biden administration and its despicable allies have any intention of dialing things down.

They don't give a rat's ass about black people. But they sure as hell love increasing their own power, fame and wealth while derisively mocking and demonizing their political enemies.  Oh, well. Whatever floats your boat. If the country burns down, so be it.

A Shoutout to Detroit Police Chief James Craig

Detroit has had a lot of inept and corrupt leaders over the years.

Fortunately, Mayor Mike Duggan, first elected in 2013, has been far more honest and competent than his predecessors going back four decades. Shortly after Duggan took office, then Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr appointed James Craig as Chief of Police. Craig is a Detroit native and has also worked for police departments in Los Angeles, Cincinnati, and Portland, Oregon.

Chief Craig has been a no-nonsense leader, dramatically reducing the low employee morale that plagued Detroit's police department for decades. He has made efforts to curb juvenile crime rates, and has presided over a less dramatic rise in pandemic-related crime than has occurred in many other big cities. Riots in Detroit were also minimal compared to those in hotspots like Portland, Seattle, and Minneapolis. Just as important, Chief Craig absolutely will not bow to the leftist mobs of Twitter, the garbage media or the woke organizations that think full-time virtue signaling is their Raison d'être.

Matter of fact, it was like music to my ears this week when the chief ripped two execrable politicians a new one:  Maxine Waters and Rashida Tlaib. Both are demagogues, but Waters has far more years of demagoguery under her belt. 

Over the weekend, Waters traveled to greater Minneapolis to pour some gasoline onto the fires of racial tension and civic unrest just days before a verdict was expected in the Derek Chauvin trial. (The verdict came at about 5 p.m. EST today, but I am just not in the mood to comment. Maybe in a few days.)

Chief Craig was with the Los Angeles Police Department in 1992 when the acquittal of four police officers in the Rodney King incident sparked six days of violent riots and anarchy that resulted in 63 deaths and over 2,300 injuries. He remembers the abhorrent Waters pouring gasoline on the fire at that time, and stated that she hasn't changed over three decades.

He also slammed the vile demagogue Rashida Tlaib, an utter embarrassment to Detroit and Michigan, for her "disgusting and reckless" tweet that claimed the death of Daunte Wright was intentional, not an accident. Brooklyn Center Police Officer Kim Potter, who faces a second degree manslaughter charge, stated she thought she had reached for her taser but accidentally grabbed her pistol and shot Wright.

Tlaib tweeted that the shooting "wasn’t an accident" and that policing in the United States was "inherently and intentionally racist." She added, "Daunte Wright was met with aggression & violence. I am done with those who condone government funded murder. No more policing, incarceration, and militarization. It can’t be reformed."

Tlaib is dumb as a rock, that's for sure. Just think if she went back to live in Detroit, but the Detroit Police Department were disbanded. Somehow I don't think she's smart enough to contemplate that.

One other thing I love about James Craig, before I sign off: He has stated that more citizens should be armed -- that this is a key way to reduce crime. The leftists and race baiters just about have an aneurysm when they hear a black man speaking like this. It clashes violently with their warped, distorted ideology. The Marxists like to pontificate about breaking a few eggs to make an omelet. Myself, I like giving kudos to common sense blacks who push back against the Democrats' malignant agenda. They must know that the vicious Dems will ostracize and target them with brutal vitriol.

Chief James Craig is what's sorely needed in this woke age of delusional groupthink. He has the cajones to confront the fascist left. We need a hell of a lot more of this kind of courage and determination. Because without it, this nation is going down the tubes.

Union Takes it On the Chin

Amidst all of the gloom and doom expressed by conservatives during this torrent of socialist and hard-left activism by Marionette Biden and his puppeteers, there are a few silver linings.

One is that millions of parents are wising up to the self-serving, obstinate teachers' unions and deciding to send their children to private schools or home school them. And pushback against the teachers' unions is increasing in intensity, not just from the pissed off parents, but even from other Democrats. Chicago's Marxist Mayor Lori Lightfoot has tangled on numerous occasions with the Chicago Teachers Union, trying her level best to force them back into the classroom.

In recent years, several states, including New Jersey, Rhode Island, Wisconsin and Vermont, have had some success reining in out-of-control pensions and healthcare costs for public sector unions. And private sector union membership continues to decline as these unions become an anachronism and albatross in a nimble, highly competitive global market where technology has shredded old paradigms, and companies have no qualms about off-shoring production to escape union blackmail.

Most recently, workers at an Amazon fulfillment center in Bessemer, Alabama voted down a proposal to unionize by a stunning 71-29 percent. The Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, despite its aggressive hard-sell, scare tactics about what could happen without union representation, and cheap shots against Amazon, got its butt kicked.

The fact is that Amazon, like another frequently demonized giant, Walmart, pays pretty handsome wages to all of its employees -- including people who only have high school educations. Benefits are part of the compensation, too. These employees are not stupid. They know when they've got a good thing going on, and they are loathe to shell out their hard-earned money for union dues.

It's a combination of a couple of things. They know that we live in a global economy, and the competition is stiff. Trying to strong-arm your employer for more money and better benefits 1) Is being an ingrate; 2) Just might convince the company to pull up stakes and move on to a more hospitable country; and 3) Harms goodwill and reduces the chances of future salary increases.

The days of extreme exploitation, dirt wages and dangerous working conditions are many decades behind us. But the unions, in using scare tactics and demonizing management, are employing the same strategy as drama queen, alarmist Democrat demagogues, and are quickly finding that they're becoming as useless as Blockbuster Video.

A Raw Power Grab

The Democrats are totalitarian in nature -- utterly power hungry, and basically fanatical when it comes to wielding power to ruthlessly crush their opposition. Their newly announced legislation to pack the U.S. Supreme Court comes as no surprise, and it is a harsh wake-up call to those who cherish liberty and loathe tyranny and totalitarianism. The legislation jumps the gun on the presidential commission appointed to study the matter, a body that is supposedly bipartisan but in actuality tilted toward the leftists.

This blog has warned for years that, left unchecked, today's radical Democrat Party will do its level best to turn the United States into Venezuela North. Even before the 2020 election results and the marionette Sleepy Joe Biden doing the progressives' bidding, the signs were everywhere.

From the indoctrination and groupthink of universities, to the disparaging of religion and traditional values, to the trashing of the constitution and demonization of the Founding Fathers, to ham-handed identity politics, to Big Tech censorship, to stoking the racial fires, to celebration of anarchists and violent rioters, to delegitimizing and hating the police... the Democrats have shown their true colors time and time again.

Some Republicans, such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, are on to them and pushing back hard. Good. We need a lot more of that. The fact that many Republican legislatures are passing laws to regulate and monitor elections and ensure transparency is a step in the right direction. The Democrats' attempt to federalize elections, HR1, is blatantly unconstitutional and nothing more than a way to loosen oversight and accountability so as to grease the skids for voter fraud and eventual Democrat one-party rule.

Within this scenario is the unseemly influencing of elections with cash and a propaganda press that has received little or no attention. Billionaire progressives like Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg are throwing their money and influence around to help Democrats.

Zuckerberg spent $300 million on "safe voting initiatives" in the 2020 election, showering money on local elections officials in blue cities to open up a pandora's box of infiltration by liberal activists and Democrat operatives. Ballot harvesting and other tactics were used to, shall we say, "finesse" the results.

For several years, Bezos has underwritten the Washington Post, a shrill and shameless Democrat propaganda rag that spent 24/7 bashing Donald Trump and his administration, and repeatedly gives kid gloves treatment to Sleepy Joe and his band of Obama retreads.

This pompous publication has the gall to act righteous with its sanctimonious motto, "Democracy dies in darkness." Never mind that the paper's publisher and editors -- not to mention its legions of devoted readers -- are too ignorant to know that the United States is a constitutional republic, not a democracy. The sticking point is that the paper's motto implies it is striving for transparency, which is far from the truth. One of my major criticisms of the Post and New York Times is their over reliance on anonymous sources for many of the stories they run that bash conservative legislation, ideas and people.

Any idiot knows you can't trust anonymous sources. In a few cases, they may be legitimate and telling the truth, but don't want to get fired, prosecuted or ostracized for divulging sensitive information. But in the majority of cases, the so-called anonymous sources are hacks with an ax to grind, a score to settle. They manufacture harmful slander to tar their enemies, and these two large, established newspapers gleefully run with it, like a kid who gets free run of the candy store. I strongly suspect that some reporters are so unscrupulous, they simply make up sources and information. Believe me, fiction writing has been an all-too common affliction involving members of the Fourth Estate. (See Janet Cooke, Stephen Glass, Jayson Blair, et al.)

But enough on the WaPost & NY Times digression. Pushback against the banana republic election designs of the Democrats is one positive sign. Another is that several states are adopting or preparing to pass legislation to A) Combat Big Tech; and B) hold rioters accountable, thus superseding lawless progressive mayors and city councils -- let's not forget that municipalities are adjuncts of state governments. Additionally, many red states have pushed back hard against Dr. Anthony Fauci and the federal / medical tyrants who have used Coronavirus and "science" as they know it to exert control over people's lives and livelihoods, devastating millions of families.

As usual, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is leading the way. The Sunshine State adopted HB1, an anti-riot act that DeSantis promised to sign into law. Additionally, the Transparency in Technology Act would protect free speech and force tech platforms to disclose what data they have on Floridians to those users and delete that information if requested. The law would also ask companies not to sell the data and would create legal avenues to sue for noncompliance.

As I mentioned the other day, thousands of other Republicans need to show some spine, to "grow a pair," as the vernacular goes, and fight fire with fire. If the Supreme Court does end up getting four left-wing justices, it will in effect become a rubber stamp for whatever totalitarian legislation the Democrat megalomaniacs want to pass. It's all over.

Know this: The Democrats are on a mission: Remove checks and balances on the centralization of government power, shred the First and Second Amendments, and snuff out the Republicans and conservatives for good. Should they succeed, they will disenfranchise well over 100 million people. It will be a horrendous Pyrrhic victory the likes of which we've never seen.

The hour is late; the stakes are enormous. To quote Todd Beamer, that hero of nearly 20 years ago, "Let's roll."

Black Liars Matter

For more than a year, I have witnessed an increasing number of homeowners with Black Lives Matter signs in their front yards, bumper stickers on their cars, and sometimes signs in the window.

Many politicians have paid obeisance to this organization, and corporations are increasingly virtue signaling by donating millions of dollars to BLM. In the extreme world of political correctness, some people have actually been fired for uttering the true statement, "All lives matter."

As I've mentioned dozens of times in this blog, millions of Americans are ignorant and uninformed. Often, it's not because they're stupid; it's just that they have other priorities besides studying history and keeping up on the issues. They're busy with jobs, families and other priorities. And/or, they may be gullible and believe the propaganda spewed out 24/7 by CNN, MSNBC, PBS, ABC/NBC/CBS, WaPost, NY Times, et al. (Fact for the unaware: The New York Times tried to cover up the Holocaust, and in the early 1930s, its Moscow Bureau Chief, Walter Duranty, was an apologist for genocidal Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin. Its credibility hasn't improved much since then.)

So let's grant that millions of people have good intentions in their hearts, but are just missing that healthy skepticism and jaundiced eye that can serve each of us well. I'm prepared to give the benefit of the doubt, but my patience is wearing thin. After all, it doesn't take a whole lot of research to learn that BLM is a Marxist organization, and is also anti-family, anti-Christian and anti-Semitic.

And while the vast majority of its adherents are not criminals and would not engage in felonious behavior, some of them are and have. Riots, looting, assaults, even murders. Ironically, it often seems there are far more white people than blacks at BLM rallies. Many of these are the spoiled-rotten, coddled leftists who were indoctrinated at K-12 schools and universities; people who do not appreciate our nation's greatness and are utterly ignorant of the horrors visited upon humanity by the socialist and communist forms of government they advocate. The irascible Michael Savage calls them "Red Diaper Doper Babies."

BLM brought in about $90 million in donations in 2020. With support from multi-millionaire athletes, musicians, actors, politicians and corporate CEOs, BLM resembles socialism and communism in that there are a few filthy rich people at the top, and millions of dupes, lemmings and useful idiots blindly following along. Those at the top have a "do as I say, not as I do" mindset.

This has been obvious for years, and just recently was brought into clearer focus. We've learned that one of the co-founders of BLM, Patrisse Khan-Cullors, spent over $3 million purchasing four high-end homes. The New York Post reports that she also eyed properties at an exclusive resort in the Bahamas, where the price tags range between $5 and $20 million. Nice work if you can get it!

What's it going to take for people to wake up and realize that many in this organization are frauds? And even if they weren't, they are advocating lifestyles, policies and an orientation that would put a dagger into the black community.

The breakdown of the family structure -- i.e., a 70 percent birth rate to single mothers, and too many children being raised without fathers -- is one of the most serious issues harming blacks today. It is at the root of so many African Americans ending up on the wrong side of the law, having trouble with drugs and alcohol, being unemployed, belonging to a gang, and in many cases ending up incarcerated or dying at a young age.

So please enlighten me: Just HOW are opposing traditional religious faith, tearing down the family structure and advocating for what has long been a fraudulent and genocidal form of authoritarian government, going to help black people? I'm waiting.

Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics

All politicians lie. That's a given. Some lie more than others, and some lie with more subtlety and skill than others. A few, like Sleepy Joe Biden, beclown themselves with ludicrous, brazen lies that are easily refutable.

We saw it a few days ago when Biden made a statement about Georgia closing its polls down at 5 p.m., thus prohibiting working people from voting. Big-time lie. He has also been mendacious regarding the border meltdown that his idiotic policies precipitated. His blaming the Trump administration for the current humanitarian crisis is appalling.

Ditto for Sleepy Joe's gall in claiming credit for the Coronavirus vaccines, which Trump's administration helped bring to market much sooner than anyone though possible through the Operation Warp Speed initiative.

More recently, The Big Guy has spouted the B.S. we've heard from the gun control movement for literally decades. In the wake of two mass shootings in March , Ol' Joe and his merry band of Democrat statists are proposing .... wait for it....YOU GUESSED IT! More gun control!

In other words, more useless virtue signaling that won't stop bad guys from obtaining guns and using them to commit crimes, won't reduce gun injuries or deaths, but will make things harder on law abiding citizens.

One of Biden's executive orders cracks down on so-called "ghost guns," the plans for which are available on the Internet, and production of which can take place on a private individual's 3-D printer. Biden also is cracking down on pistol braces, which have become to the left almost as much a bogeyman as the infamous AR-15. But neither of these figure much beyond a blip on the radar screen when it comes to homicide statistics. It's sort of like the left's obsession with so-called "assault rifles" (in actuality, semi-automatic rifles) when the vast majority of firearm homicides involve handguns.

During a news conference announcing his executive orders, Sleepy Joe repeated the common lie that guns can be purchased at a gun show without undergoing a background check. John Lott, one of the world's foremost experts on gun issues, refutes that lie. He's pointed out that the vast majority of sellers at gun show are federally licensed gun dealers. By definition, they are required to conduct background checks. But don't expect the garbage media to call out China Joe on his blatant lie.

And think about it: How stupid does one have to be to believe that criminals purchase their firearms at gun shows or in gun shops? Mostly, they buy them on the black market or steal them. Duh!

During a recent interview with talk show host Mark Levin, Lott mentioned surveys of felons convicted of gun crimes. Asked how they obtained their firearms, fewer than 1 percent said they bought their guns legally.

Lott's column, "Biden's Many False Claims on Gun Violence," does an excellent job of shining a spotlight on Sleepy Joe's stupid and ludicrous lies.

In announcing the steps he's taking, the Big Guy blew out of proportion gun violence, calling it an "epidemic." (In reality, gun crimes are disproportionately in small geographic areas and tend to affect urban populations -- especially individuals involved in illegal activities.) He totally ignored the defund the police movement and coddling of criminals by leftist prosecutors supported by the likes of George Soros and other leftist vermin.

Biden also promised that there is more to come. More what, lies and disingenuous bullshit? I can hardly wait.

The Impressive Ron DeSantis

The Posse has long lamented Republicans' weakness when it comes to messaging and pushing back against the 24/7 misinformation foisted on America by Democrats, the garbage media, Big Tech and Hollywood.

Donald Trump himself, despite having myriad significant achievements he should have talked up last fall, did a poor job of touting his record. Too often, he get sucked into useless controversies with nobodies. (Remember that absurd Twitter tiff he engaged in having to do with beauty pageants?)

If I had been giving Trump advice, I would have emphasized that he needed to stick to the talking points on his greatest accomplishments, and he needed to keep pounding on them, day and night, relentlessly, in the weeks and months leading up to the election.

Consider his track record: The 2017 tax cuts for businesses and individuals, including a substantial cut in the corporate tax rate (from 28 to 21 percent) that brought many jobs back to the United States and spurred dozens of companies to give bonuses to their employees; getting tough with China in areas including trade and intellectual property theft; building hundreds of miles of border wall and controlling illegal immigration; brokering peace among Israel and several Arab nations; rebuilding the military; destroying ISIS; lowering black and Hispanic unemployment rates to their lowest levels ever (until the pandemic struck). The list goes on.

While Trump was not afraid to push back against the garbage media ("fake news media" is too weak a descriptor), his schtick got old. He needed to focus much more on his achievements, and keep on repeating them, rather than expending time and energy bashing the media.

By comparison, let's take a look at Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, starting with his extraordinary background. Born in Florida in 1978, he attended Yale University, where he was captain of the varsity baseball team. He later earned his law degree at Harvard University. He served as a U.S. Navy JAG, including doing a stint in Iraq, and received several commendations including the Bronze Star Medal. Additionally, he served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney. All of this, and he's only 42 years old.

Just as impressive is DeSantis' aggressive way of taking on the frequently inaccurate and unfair jackals of the media. He calls them out as smear merchants and liars. Recently, he has hammered the hacks at CBS' increasingly sensationalistic "60 Minutes" for a wretched hit piece they did on him that alleged "pay for play" in the State of Florida's decision to award a COVID vaccination contract to the Publix grocery store chain.

Hack reporter Sharyn Alfonsi confronted the governor at a news conference, alleging that because Publix gave his campaign a $100,000 contribution, he gave an exclusive vaccination contract for Palm Beach County to the supermarket chain in return. On its face that's an absurd claim, because pretty much every politician alive who accepts campaign contributions has advocated laws or regulations that helped his benefactors.

But it didn't take long for the "60 Minutes" story to fall apart. It soon became clear that the show's producers had selectively edited the governor's comments, removing key parts of his explanation as to what really happened. Additionally, the report contained numerous factual errors. The governor's office has laid them out in this press release.

"60 Minutes" has issued several clarifications, but in the process has doubled down on its mistakes, refusing to show any humility, accountability or regret. There's that left-wing hubris again. The harsh criticism of the network is coming not just from Republicans and conservatives, but even from several Democrats in Florida, including the Director of Emergency Management, Jared Moskowitz.

This isn't the first time DeSantis has taken on the vicious left. He has done so on other issues, including opposing the teachers' unions when he advocated school choice in the 2018 election, and opposing gun control measures espoused by several Florida legislators.

In fact, DeSantis' support of school choice earned him the votes of about 100,000 black women (18 percent of the number of black women who voted in 2018, according to the Wall Street Journal), even though DeSantis' opponent was a black man, Andrew Gillum. DeSantis won the election by only 40,000 votes.

Last year, Florida was one of the last states to declare a lockdown, and one of the first ones to lift it. While other states' economies suffered grievous damage, Florida's economy escaped largely unscathed because DeSantis kept it mostly open for business. For this he was demonized by the media idiots, who refused to acknowledge that the states with the worst COVID outbreaks and devastated economies were deep blue states.

DeSantis' fiery, passionate defense of conservative causes, his fearless attitude toward the vermin of the left, his stellar professional background, leadership skills and personal charisma make him a solid contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024.

If the Republican Party expects to save this nation from the totalitarian, statist Democrat radicals  and the wrecking ball of Sleepy Joe Biden's policies. thousands of Republican politicians need to grow a pair. NOW. Looking for a role model? Look no further than Ron DeSantis.