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From One Fake Left-wing Hysteria to the Next

The decade-old age of fables like Russian collusion, laptop disinformation, or the pangolin/bat cause of COVID is not over; it is just hitting midstream.

For much of April, amid stock downturns, in the classical paranoid style, we were assured by the Wall Street Journal news reporters and the liberal press that Trump had either a) guaranteed an inevitable recession, b) engineered a losing trade war he likely regretted, c) crashed the stock market, d) lost his once majority favorability ratings, e) mostly had a failed first 100 days, or f) all of the above.

Some of us thought these diagnoses and prognoses were absurd. How in mediis rebus, during a radical counterrevolution never quite seen before, could anyone issue such bleak predictions? Would these same observers have said the U.S. was doomed to lose World War II after the bleak first five months of mostly failure in the Pacific, or North Africa, after the utter U.S. army disaster at the Kasserine Pass?

When the Biden administration compiled two consecutive quarters of negative GDP—the supposedly classic definition of a recession—most of these same pundits assured us that the data was meaningless and irrelevant. The same left-wing media throng insisted Biden was in his cognitive prime until hours before he abdicated from the ticket under pressure. They swore to us that Robert Mueller’s “walls were closing in” on Donald Trump, who would legitimately go to jail, buried by 93 lawfare indictments.

As for their polls showing that Trump was all but through after three months in office, almost all of them were not just off in the 2016 presidential race, but again in 2020. And given the chronic temptation to warp polls to create Democratic momentum and fundraising, they rigged their polls yet again in 2024—even when they knew in disgrace that they were ruining their brand. A former Harris campaign official just admitted that internal polls never showed Harris ahead—even as the majority of polls predicted her victory.

So why would anyone believe any of these people? Take the now-defunded Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Its recent NPR/PBS News/Marist poll assured us that 45 percent of the public gave Trump an F for his first 100 days, with only 42 percent expressing approval of his job so far.

But this is the same bunch that also assured us in its final authoritative 2024 election poll, on the very eve before the voting, that Kamala Harris would win the race by 4 points—a lead proverbially “outside the margin of error.” (The next day, she lost the popular vote by 1.5 percent or 2,284,952 votes and the Electoral College by 312-226). The public broadcasting polling partnership was off 5.5 points, perhaps suggesting that it wished to aid the Harris campaign more than either adhering to professional and ethical norms or fearing to lose what little was left of its reputation.

As soon as the Washington Post and the New York Times issued their dismal Trump bias polls, observers quickly pointed out they had, by intent, vastly underpolled those who voted for Trump in 2024. In contrast, the polls with the best 2024 records had Trump’s 100-day approval ratings near even or positive: Rasmussen was 50-49%, and the joint national surveys by Insider Advantage and Trafalgar Group had Trump up at 100 days, 46-44%.

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Trump’s NIH Shuts Down Final Beagle Lab Conducting Painful Experiments — Ending Fauci-Era Cruelty and Bureaucratic Waste

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) — under Director Jay Bhattacharya’s new leadership — has shut down the last remaining in-house beagle experimentation lab, effectively ending the federal government’s most notorious dog testing program.

NIH Director Dr. Jay Bhattacharya confirmed the move during a Fox & Friends Weekend interview, saying, “We got rid of all of the beagle experiments on NIH campus.”

In August 2021, The Gateway Pundit reporter Cassandra Fairbanks reported exclusively on Dr. Fauci’s macabre experiments with beagles in Tunisia.

The White Coat Waste Project, a taxpayer watchdog group, has provided The Gateway Pundit with new examples of Dr. Anthony Fauci facilitating cruel and unnecessary taxpayer-funded experimentation on dogs — this time in Tunisia.

Documents uncovered by the organization found that the National Institutes of Health division, led by Dr. Fauci, shipped part of a $375,800 grant to a lab in Tunisia to infest beagles with parasites.

The grant money funded a study published in 2021 that detailed the horror inflicted upon the unlucky dogs.

One of the tortures that the beagles were subjected to included locking their heads in mesh cages filled with infected sand flies so that the parasite-carrying insects could eat them alive.

Beagles are often used for these tests because of their gentle nature, even toward those who harm them.

There was a photo of the test, which is sure to haunt anyone with a conscience. 

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BATFE: “Show Me The Man, And I’ll Manufacture The Crime”

Guns don’t kill people.  People kill people.  

But people don’t kill people with replica guns, because they are not guns. 

The point appears to be lost on the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATFE), the nation’s top cops for enforcing federal firearms laws. 

It’s nearly illegal, and very difficult, for regular civilians to get machine guns, or anti-tank rocket launchers.  But you can get replicas of either; at most, they’ll have been demilitarized, with things like triggers, bolts and firing pins removed and plugs welded into barrels; at the lower level, they are metal facismiles that are specifically deisgned not to be able to shoot anything, absent some fairly malicious ingenuity.  

Which brings us to the case of Patrick Adamlak – who had a business, selling not firearms, but replicas, including of “RPG’7s” – the Soviet-era “bazooka” famous from “Black Hawk Down” and countless third world wars – and of a “Sten” submachinine gun, a bargain-basement British weapon from World War 2 favored by Resistance groups on the continent.  

This is the story of Patrick “Tate” Adamlak, a US Navy Petty Officer First Class and candiate for Naval Special Warfare (from which we might deduce had had a clean criminal record), and his…gun store?

No.  Replica store.

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Sexual abuse of nuns: one of the Catholic Church’s last taboos

Nuns sexually assaulted by priests are one of the last Catholic taboos, but with reports of abuse rising, it is a scandal that will be difficult for the future pope to ignore.

“In the past, the nuns suffered a lot and couldn’t talk about it to anyone; it was like a secret,” Sister Cristina Schorck told AFP, walking through St Peter’s Square with her parents.

The 41-year-old Brazilian, who works with the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians in Rome, said Pope Francis, who died last month, opened “a first door” for women to speak out.

After an unprecedented summit at the Vatican on clerical sexual violence in 2019, a series of measures were taken, including lifting the pontifical secret on abuse and an obligation for people to report cases to their superiors.

“It’s both still a taboo and something that has progressed” because “it’s never been talked about as much as it is today,” Sister Veronique Margron, President of the Conference of Religious of France, told AFP.

The slow shift in attitudes is exemplified by the case of the influential Slovenian priest and mosaics artist Marko Rupnik, accused by nuns of sexual and psychological violence against them in the early 1990s.

It was only under pressure that Francis lifted the statute of limitations in 2023 to open proceedings against him.

Laura Sgro, the Italian lawyer for five of his accusers, told AFP that nuns should be better protected “both by states and by canon law”, notably by extending the statute of limitations, and said the next pope must act “immediately”.

Victims’ associations say the Vatican has not done enough, particularly by refusing to remove confessional secrecy.

“Things are moving forward step by step,” a senior ecclesiastical official told AFP on condition of anonymity, pointing out that Francis “has denounced all forms of abuse”.

Nuns in black, grey, white, beige or brown habits, in Rome to study, work or accompany pilgrims, come and go every day in St Peter’s Square, far from the media hype surrounding the cardinals.

Among them, Sister Marthe, a nun from Cameroon in her forties, said she wanted the Church to “know how” to respond to “sexual (or) power abuse”.

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Ohio Guard shootings at Kent State 55 years ago fueled protests at Ohio State, across U.S.

On this date 55 years ago, May 4, 1970, Ohio National Guard members fired on student protesters at Kent State University, killing four students and wounding nine others.

The students were protesting the escalation of the Vietnam War into Cambodia. The shootings became a pivotal moment in the anti-Vietnam War movement, highlighting the deep divisions and tensions in the country at the time over U.S. involvement and the loss of lives.

An investigation was conducted into the Kent State shootings by the Ohio National Guard, who were sent to the university and nearby town by Ohio Gov. James Rhodes at the request of town officials in response to violence May 1, 1970, in which downtown businesses were damaged.

Eight guardsmen were later indicted by a federal grand jury for their involvement in the May 4 shootings. But U.S. District Court Judge Frank Battisti dismissed the case in the middle of the trial, claiming the government’s case was so weak the attorneys for the guardsmen didn’t even have to present a defense.

Students at Ohio State, along with many other universities across the country, were deeply affected by the shootings at Kent State and the broader issues surrounding the Vietnam War. Protests at Ohio State intensified immediately after the Kent State shootings, leading to clashes between students and authorities there. The campus saw large demonstrations, sit-ins, and strikes as students expressed their outrage and demanded changes.

These protests were part of a nationwide wave of student activism that sought to address not only the Vietnam War but also issues of civil rights and social justice.

Several days before Kent State, on April 29, 1970, Ohio State students boycotted classes after administrators rejected calls to add Black and women’s studies courses to the university curriculum. Columbus Mayor M.E. “Jack” Sensenbrenner declared a state of emergency and a curfew was put in place on April 30, 1970

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Hillary May Have Unlocked Our Government’s Digital Door

Here’s something most people don’t realize: We didn’t have the type of system-wide, ultra-high-level, utterly catastrophic breaches of the federal government’s network security before a certain server going up in a certain Secretary of State’s bathroom in early 2009. It’s been astonishing to me over the years how nobody seems to have noted this or the timing. Well, it’s about time we did. We’ll do it here. We’ll have a look at how bad it’s been, but first, let’s recall what started it all.

Secretary Hillary Clinton’s server, which former FBI Director James Comey described as having “less security than Gmail,” resulted in a serious and protracted “scandal [which] revolve[d] around questions about classified information, the preservation of government records and the security of her email communication.”

Any one of those issues, whether the utter recklessness with top-level classified information, the outright theft of our public record, or the insanely dangerous vulnerability of it all to our enemies, would have been enough to banish any normal person to the back of beyond. However, being a (D), especially one named Clinton, has its privileges, as we all know all too well.

Let’s remember a fact too few do: Hillary declined a “.gov” email when she took the job at State. She made an affirmative choice not to have a government email at all.

It’s not simply that she had a .gov email and neglected to forward her State-related personal email to honor her obligations (which is allowed, with specific limitations). Oh no. She made a clear choice to simply not have one.

That’s an order of magnitude worse than simply being derelict. It shows consciousness of intent—frankly, criminal intent—to steal, or allow others to steal, our records. Our records. Her job belonged to us, not her.

So, when James Comey, in that infamous July 2016 press conference said there was “no” criminal intent, he was flat-out lying, and he damned well knew it. And anyone with even a passing familiarity with the above knew it and knows it to this day.

So now that we recall how grievous Hillary’s crimes were, what of hacks of important federal systems? Well, according to a May 2015 CNN story, which opens with a big picture of Mrs. Clinton and mentions her server in the first paragraph, the 2014-2015 State Department hack was the “worst ever.” When even CNN makes the connection between the two, that’s pretty bad.

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‘He needs to resign’: Democrats react with quiet shock to damning John Fetterman profile

When Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman was hospitalized for depression in 2023, many on Capitol Hill celebrated it as a moment of courage and a willingness to be open about mental health struggles.

Now, a startling picture of relapse and its associated cost is being associated with him after a deeply sourced profile on Fetterman was published Friday in New York Magazine’s Intelligencer by reporter Ben Terris.

Democrats on Capitol Hill have yet to comment. But the shock from the profile’s reporting was evident across social media and on political talk programs.

“He needs to resign,” The Bulwark’s Jonathan Last, a supporter of the senator who wrote that he “was the first person to suggest that John Fetterman could run for president”, said on The Secret Podcast with co-host Sarah Longwell.

Longwell, who agreed, called the piece’s revelations “career-ending.”

In the piece, Terris quotes extensively from Fetterman’s former chief of staff, Capitol Hill veteran Adam Jentleson. He also relies on statements from current and former employees in the senator’s office who describe a man harrowed by the challenges of his office and struggling to accept the help he may still require to recover fully.

Fetterman, who suffered a stroke during the final months of his 2022 run for Senate, pulled off a much-needed victory for Democrats even after a debate performance made clear that he was still suffering dire auditory processing issues and speech problems.

But his recovery inspired many on the Hill and around the country. While he continues to rely to some extent on auditory transcription devices during conversations, he remains capable of speaking in press gaggles and in interviews.

In private, however, things are reportedly far less encouraging. For the first time, New York Magazine reported that the senator was involved in a serious car wreck in May or June of 2024, one which injured his wife Gisele, after he ignored staffers’ concerns and got behind the wheel, then supposedly fell asleep. A video of him arguing with a commercial airplane pilot over the visibility of his seatbelt resurfaced this weekend after the profile was published.

And there are other interactions between the senator and those around him outlined in New York Magazine’s profile and other sources that are turning heads, including supposedly frequent and heated personal exchanges with his wife, Gisele Fetterman, over Israel’s siege of Gaza and other issues.

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The Pandemic that Never Left

We often speak of COVID-19 in the past tense.  The masks have come off, the Plexiglas dividers are gone, and the nightly case trackers have vanished from our screens.  But the virus, less in its biological form than its cultural and economic residue, never really left.  Its fingerprints are all over how we live, eat, and work.  And the strangest part?  Many of us hardly notice anymore.

Take a walk downtown in any mid-sized American city around 8:30 P.M. on a Tuesday.  You’ll see it.  The restaurants are dark.  The neon signs are dim.  Kitchens that once bustled until midnight now flick off their stoves by nine, if they’re open at all.

Increasingly, diners find locked doors on Tuesdays or Wednesdays, with small placards explaining “New Hours Due to Staffing” or the more typical “Closed Tuesdays.”

It’s tempting to blame labor shortages or inflation.  Both are real.  But behind them lies a broader, quieter shift, a cultural transformation catalyzed by the pandemic and cemented by inertia.  Much of that has eroded the hustle, the grind, the after-hours dining, and lingering conversations over a second glass of wine.

And it’s not just restaurants.  America’s downtowns, once the heartbeat of business and commerce, are hollowing out.

This is not a red-state or blue-state problem.  The virus didn’t ask about party affiliation when it changed how we live.  Both political parties spent, scrambled, and stumbled through the early stages of COVID-19, each spinning its response as leadership while quietly punting the deeper consequences down the road.  In many cities, that road now runs past a series of vacant office towers.

A recent National Bureau of Economic Research study found that office attendance in major urban centers remains down over 40% from pre-pandemic levels.  Remote work, initially a stopgap, became a lifestyle.  Hybrid work is now the norm for many white-collar jobs, and although it offers flexibility, it also delivers a slow bleed to the urban economy.  The companies that once filled 20 floors of a high-rise are now leasing half of one or none.

And cities are paying the price.

Fewer office workers mean fewer lunches bought, fewer dry cleaning runs, fewer happy hours, fewer subway fares, and fewer tax dollars.  Cities like San Francisco and Chicago are staring down budget shortfalls and contemplating service cuts.  Smaller cities with less diversified economies are faring worse.  Once designed around density and foot traffic, downtowns now resemble ghost towns by 6 P.M.

The commercial real estate market is groaning under the weight of it.  Office vacancy rates in the U.S. hit a record 19.6% in late 2023, and the consequences are rippling.  Property taxes from office buildings make up a significant revenue stream for many municipalities.  When those buildings sit empty or depreciate, cities lose income.  That means potholes go unfilled, bus routes are cut, police and fire departments see reduced budgets, and residents feel the decline.

We’re living through a slow-motion crisis that doesn’t make headlines because it doesn’t explode; it seeps.

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Trump orders reopening of Alcatraz prison

President Trump said Sunday that he is ordering the reopening of the Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary, the historic prison offshore from San Francisco that closed more than 60 years ago.

“For too long, America has been plagued by vicious, violent, and repeat Criminal Offenders, the dregs of society, who will never contribute anything other than Misery and Suffering. When we were a more serious Nation, in times past, we did not hesitate to lock up the most dangerous criminals, and keep them far away from anyone they could harm,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

“That’s the way it’s supposed to be. No longer will we tolerate these Serial Offenders who spread filth, bloodshed, and mayhem on our streets. That is why, today, I am directing the Bureau of Prisons, together with the Department of Justice, FBI, and Homeland Security, to reopen a substantially enlarged and rebuilt ALCATRAZ, to house America’s most ruthless and violent Offenders,” he added.

The island, which sits less than 2 miles offshore, was first developed in the mid-19th century, with the original structures including a lighthouse.

Notable figures including Al Capone and George “Machine Gun” Kelly were once held at Alcatraz, which was a federal prison from 1934-63. The National Park Service, which now oversees its facilities, describes the prison as “the federal government’s response to post-Prohibition, post-Depression America.”

“Both the institution and the men confined within its walls reflect our society during this era,” the National Park Service adds on a web page about the prison, which was also known as The Rock and gave that name to a popular Michael Bay action film set on the island.

In his Sunday post, Trump said Alcatraz’s “reopening” is going to “serve as a symbol of Law, Order, and JUSTICE.”

“We will, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!” he added.

The Bureau of Prisons notes on its website that “USP [United States Penitentiary] Alcatraz closed after 29 years of operation” due to soaring costs.

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Columbia Journalism Review editor fired after insisting on ethics, deadlines: report

The Columbia Journalism Review fired Sewell Chan as its executive editor after he insisted on ethics, deadlines, and showing up in the office for work, the longtime journalist alleges. A journalism expert told The College Fix that it seems Chan acted appropriately and within his bounds as the executive editor.

Chan, who recently started a new job at the University of Southern California as a senior fellow in its Annenberg communications school, alleges the school fired him after “three pointed conversations.”

Chan (pictured) is the former editor of the Texas Tribune and also worked for the Los Angeles Times and New York Times.

“One was with a fellow who is passionately devoted to the cause of the Gaza protests at Columbia and had covered the recent detention of a Palestinian graduate for an online publication he had just written about, positively, for CJR,” Chan wrote in a LinkedIn post.

“I told him there was a significant ethical problem with writing for an outlet he had just covered,” Chan wrote.

This description fits CJR Journalism Fellow Meghnad Bose, who wrote an article about the Substack page Drop Site News for Columbia Journalism Review in February.

In late March, Bose wrote an article for Drop Site about Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University graduate and Palestinian activist, arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement on March 8. The article quotes Khalil’s claim that his arrest was a “direct consequence of exercising [his] right to free speech as [he] advocated for a free Palestine and an end to the genocide in Gaza.”

Bose did not respond to two emails sent in the past week that asked about the accuracy of Chan’s statements on what happened.

While Chan declined to comment further to The Fix, a journalism professor at DePauw University said, “it would seem [Chan] has a good point in trying to reel in the apparent conflict of interest for the one fellow.”

“This kind of management would be expected from an executive editor who values the reputation of his outlet,” Professor Jeffrey McCall told The Fix via email. McCall regularly writes about journalism ethics and the media.

“Normally, an executive editor has wide leeway in making personnel and content decisions, and it appears Chan was perhaps having his role undercut,” McCall said.

“Conflict of interest policies are essential to any media organization in that they protect both the readers and the reporters, and provide transparency for news decisions,” he said.

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