A FRIEND COMMENTS: “When one of the implications of this article sink in—QAnon adherents are not especially white, male, conservative, or Republican—we will start to see a concerted downplaying of their significance in the Capitol riots.” How the QAnon Cult Stormed the Capitol.
EMAIL FROM A FRIEND:
Trump showed that the annihilation of the American middle class was not the result of inevitable forces. Technological change and globalization are not weather or the movement of tectonic plates. The economy, and who gets what from whom, is embedded in political choices. Who pays the costs and who reaps the benefits are political choices. Who is crushed by the legal system and who benefits from it, and who is insulated from it, are also political choices. Trump will never be forgiven for showing normal people that their destruction, and the enrichment of other people, who despise everything that they love, believe in, and care about, is a policy decision. Trump showed other choices are possible.
Having seen once how it actually works, we can never unsee it.
That is Trump’s greatest achievement.
Indeed, and it won’t be forgotten.
DON SURBER: The Donald Was Their Final Warning.
BIDEN’S FIRST DAYS IN OFFICE GOING SWIMMINGLY: National Guard Kicked Out Of The Capitol, Forced To Sleep In A Parking Garage.
Earlier, from Glenn at the New York Post: Biden’s militarized inauguration showcased Democrats’ insecurity.
Related: “One does wonder if the decision to piss off both their armies was well advised.”
UPDATE (FROM GLENN): Troll level — ex-Presidential! Trump Offers to Let National Guard Stay at the Trump Hotel D.C. After Parking Garage Outrage.
UPDATE (From Ed): ‘Packed us together like sardines:’ Guard deployed to Capitol struggles to contain Covid.
Leave it Joe to kick off his administration with a super-spreader event.
UPDATE: MSNBC Host Admits: Trump Would’ve Been ‘Crushed’ for Holding ‘Super-Spreader’ Inaugural:
[Stephanie] Ruhle told never-Trumper Steve Schmidt, “It will be a smaller inauguration ceremony, but they’re still having one in person and, let’s be honest, you know if President Trump did this, he would be getting crushed for holding a super-spreader event. We’d all be saying it.”
But they won’t complain about Biden and the National Guard. Evergreen:
(Updated and bumped.)
SPACE CHALLENGES FOR PRESIDENT BIDEN.
CANCEL CULTURE COMES FOR WILL WILKINSON. It’s always wrong, but some might spot an irony here. “And thus a noted doubter of cancel culture has been canceled for a problematic tweet—ironic, but also regrettable.”
Plus:
This affair has produced several hypocrisies. First, if the Niskanen Center “draws the line at statements that are, or can in any way be interpreted as, condoning or promoting violence,” then it would have to fire its president. Taylor has arguably used Twitter in a manner that suggests he condones violence. He rooted for antifa to punch out Mark and Patricia McCloskey, the St. Louis couple who waved their guns at protesters encountered on their private street. “If I were in that march, and these racist lunatics were waiving [sic] guns at me, I’d like to think I’d rush them and beat their brains in,” said Taylor. “And I wouldn’t apologize for it for one goddam [sic] second.”
Unlike Wilkinson’s tweet, there’s little reason to assume this was meant in jest. And unlike Wilkinson, Taylor is the president of the organization and sets the tone for what is permissible. If the boss can tweet an unapologetic call to “beat their brains in,” his employees might very well think that edgy humor is okay. Perhaps that’s why Taylor deleted his statement regarding Wilkinson’s firing—he realized that it impugned him as well. (Neither Taylor nor a spokesperson for the Niskanen Center responded to a request for comment. Wilkinson declined to comment.)
No comment.
WHEN ATTITUDES SHIFT OVERNIGHT: Is ‘first dose first’ the right vaccination strategy?
What a difference a couple of weeks makes. In mid-December, I asked a collection of wise guests on my BBC radio programme How to Vaccinate the World about the importance of second doses. At that stage, Scott Gottlieb, former head of the US Food and Drug Administration, had warned against stockpiling doses just to be sure that second doses were certain to be available, Economists such as Alex Tabarrok of George Mason University had gone further: what if we gave people single doses of a vaccine instead of the recommended pair of doses, and thus reached twice as many people in the short term? . . .
The concept was roundly rejected. “This is an easy one, Tim, because we’ve got to go with the scientific evidence,” said Nick Jackson of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations. “And the scientific evidence is that two doses is going to provide the best protection.”
My other guests agreed, and no wonder: Jackson’s view was firmly in the scientific mainstream three weeks ago. But in the face of a shortage of doses and a rapidly spreading strain of “Super-Covid”, the scientific mainstream appears to have drifted. The UK’s new policy is to prioritise the first dose and to deliver the second one within three months rather than three weeks. Cynics argue that this change is a wearingly familiar display of dishonesty and short-termism, designed to produce flattering figures about the number of people vaccinated. Yet the recommendation comes not from ministers but from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI).
Strikingly, many scientists have given the move their approval. Others remain sceptical and are alarmed both by the shift in policy and by the way it was announced. There are several different issues to untangle here.
More at the link.
WAR ON WESTERN CIVILIZATION: Chaucer to be scrapped as British university ‘decolonises’ curriculum.
THIS IS THE TRIPLE LINDY OF FLIP-FLOPS: Biden Flip Flops on COVID: ‘There’s Nothing We Can Do to Change the Trajectory’ of the Pandemic.
(Classical reference in the headline.)
FLASHBACK: Irish Democracy.
JOHN COCHRANE: Low Interest Rates and Government Debt. “Default is not impossible, just because the US and eurozone print our own currencies. Imagine my scenario and add policy chaos. The US is just getting going on political chaos. Bond markets are demanding 5% or 10%. Are the US Congress and Administration, really going to put interest payments to the Chinese central bank, ‘the rich,’ and ‘Wall Street’ ahead of writing checks to needy Americans? Don’t bet on it. It won’t be a simple default. It will be a complex restructuring, as it always is. T bills may get forcibly rolled over to low-coupon long term debt for example.”
Related: My thoughts: “Right now, yearly deficits are going up, but the debt — essentially the sum of all previous deficits — is skyrocketing. It has done that for a decade, except for a couple of years when it briefly leveled off due to the influence of the Tea Party movement. I’m sorry to say I’ve kind of given up talking about it because nobody seems to care, and I’m afraid the politicians in both parties will kick the can down the road until something really drastic happens. I’m guessing that might happen in the next decade, but although the rule is something that can’t go on forever, won’t, there’s no guarantee as to when it will stop. I feel safe in predicting, though, that it won’t stop due to a sudden infusion of virtue and self-control into our political class.”
TACIT ENDORSEMENT: Biden Press Secretary Jen Psaki FAILS to Condemn Antifa Violence.
INCENTIVES, HOW DO THEY WORK? Aero Precision Moves Out of Tacoma In Response to Gun and Ammo Tax.
PAST PERFORMANCE IS NO GUARANTEE OF FUTURE RESULTS:
Shot: Biden has a plan to fight COVID-19. Here’s what we know.
—C/Net, November 10th.
Chaser:
The president says the first part of his plan is to “get direct financial relief” to those who need it most.
* * * * * * * *
“If we fail to act, there will be a wave of evictions and foreclosures,” he adds. “because there’s nothing we can do to change the trajectory of the pandemic in the next several months.”
—“Biden warns of ‘wave of evictions,’” the BBC, today.
FIRST LOOK: FN 509 Compact Handgun.
WHY NOT TAKE A BREAK FROM THE SERIOUS NEWS FOR A FEW MINUTES? Florida Man Friday: Unforgettable Anti-Mask Bagel Shop Outrage Video.
AMERICA’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD: Biden Tells Freezing Troops Sleeping In Garages To Be Patient Until He Can Get Them Shipped To Iraq.
THE STREISAND EFFECT: Change! “Speaking of Andy Ngo and antifa, by protesting against Powell’s bookstore for carrying his new book, Unmasked: Inside Antifa’s Radical Plan to Destroy Democracy, they managed to jump it to the top of Amazon’s political bestseller list.”
WHY ARE DEMOCRAT-MONOPOLY CITIES SUCH CESSPITS? 699 people died of drug overdoses in San Francisco last year compared to 235 from COVID-19.
San Francisco’s last Republican mayor left office at the beginning of 1964.
GOOD: Arizona Moving Toward Second Amendment Sanctuary Status. “A handful of Arizona Republicans are behind a push to make their state the fifth to keep state resources from assisting in any federal activity they consider contrary to the Second Amendment.”
SPECIAL RELATIONSHIP: US, UK Sign Agreement to Merge Forces for Historic Joint Carrier Deployment.
That was Monday, when Trump was still in office.
This is Thursday: Fury as Joe Biden REMOVES bust of Boris Johnson’s hero Winston Churchill from the Oval Office.
AS ALWAYS, LIFE IMITATES THE EARLIER, FUNNIER EPISODES OF SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE: Chuck Schumer says senators will decide if Trump incited ‘erection’ at US Capitol.
Emily Litella, vindicated at last.
HOWIE CARR: Without Trump to blame, coronavirus turns the corner.
Any bad news now belongs to Dementia Joe. Ergo, no bad news.
Just as “the homeless” disappear whenever a Democrat takes office, along with rising gas prices or drone bombing of “wedding parties” in terrorist states, seldom will be heard a discouraging word about COVID-19 until further notice.
If you doubt that the air is rapidly deflating out of almost a year’s worth of breathless hysteria in the alt-left media, just Google “New COVID-19 cases decline.”
Here’s a small sampling over the last 72 hours:
From CNN: “New Covid-19 cases declined 11% after hitting a peak last week.”
Wall Street Journal: “Newly Reported U.S. Coronavirus Cases Decline Again.”
National Panhandler Radio: “Current, Deadly U.S. Coronavirus Surge Has Peaked.”
At least until the mid-term elections, when the Democrats will be needing to ramp up mail-in voting yet again, because it worked so well in November in the rotten boroughs where voter turnout sometimes exceeded 100%.
That’s why Big COVID is hedging its bets just a bit, allowing such future potential horrors as “mutant strain B.1.1.7” to start warming up in the bullpen — just in case.
This is nothing new. Recall how Big Pharma didn’t announce that the vaccines were ready to go until Nov. 5, when it was too late to benefit Trump.
How much as coronavirus “turned the corner?” Michigan restaurants can officially reopen Feb. 1 with curfew, other COVID safety restrictions. Gov. Whitmer announces indoor dining will be allowed starting next month.
Fortunately though, at least a few are remaining vigilant: ‘We cannot become numb to this’! @redsteeze puts COVID19 deaths on President Joe Biden’s watch into devastating perspective.
MEDIA OUTRAGE AT THIS ABUSE TO FOLLOW IN APPROXIMATELY NEVER: Biden Admonishes Reporter for Questioning Whether Vaccine Goal Is Ambitious Enough: ‘Give Me a Break.’
DIGITAL ASTROTURF: Google-Funded ‘Conservative’ Groups Tell Congress To Leave Google And Big Tech Alone. “The so-called conservative National Taxpayers Union, which led the effort recruiting groups to sign on, is also named on Google’s list of associations that ‘receive the most substantial contributions’ from the California company. Several other signatories, including the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the R Street Institute, and TechFreedom, are also featured on Google’s list of supported organizations.”
DEMOCRACY DIES IN DELETIONS: The Washington Post Memory-Holed Kamala Harris’ Bad Joke About Inmates Begging for Food and Water.
‘RUSH TO FAILURE’ SOUNDS LIKE A GOOD MOTTO FOR BIDEN’S FIRST 100 DAYS: Don’t Rush to Failure on Iran Nuclear Negotiations.
RIP, HAMMERING HANK: Atlanta Braves legend Hank Aaron dies at age 86, daughter says.
IT’S DIFFERENT NOW BECAUSE SHUT UP: So much healing: Suddenly the Betsy Ross flag, which was like a swastika or burning cross, isn’t racist anymore.
JUST THINK OF THE MEDIA AS DEMOCRATIC PARTY OPERATIVES WITH BYLINES, AND IT ALL MAKES SENSE: Media Bootlickers Hurl Themselves at Biden’s Feet.
How bad was it? So bad that even Mediaite and the Politico noticed:
Meanwhile, CNN switches into palace guard mode: Right-wing media holds Biden bash-fest, foreshadowing its next four years of coverage.
And not coincidentally: Trust In The Media Hits An All-Time Low In New Polling.
POLITICS MAKES YOU SAY DUMB THINGS: The Fast Company article on Parler that Stephen posted earlier has some good info but is hilariously biased against Parler and concludes thusly:
On some level, then, this is the internet working as intended: Hate speech will still exist, but after Parler failed to moderate the worst of it, it’s being pushed to the margins.
There is no level on which censoring speech those in power deem “hateful” is the Internet working as it was intended. It stuns me that someone could write this. Then again, maybe it’s just another example of saying the quiet part out loud – this is how the converged establishment intends the Internet to work now.
FLASHBACK: Liberals Versus Political Speech. To be fair, they only want to put people behind bars for political speech they disagree with.
JOE BIDEN: THE NEW GEORGE WALLACE.
What is really at play here with President Biden, as with George Wallace, is identity politics. The original identity politics was slavery. After the abolition of slavery came the next installment of identity politics — segregation. The identity politics of today is the new segregation — identity politics being the son of segregation and the grandson of slavery. It’s all about race, and its practitioners can easily be called racial supremacists.
As I long ago detailed in this space, racism has been the political fuel for the Democratic Party since its inception.
The party was founded by slave owners. It wrote one platform after another supporting slavery. At its first convention after the Civil War, in 1868, with slavery abolished and segregation the new party doctrine, the party’s slogan was:
This is a White Man’s Country, Let White Men Rule.
The point, of course, was to use race to win elections.
Nothing has changed with the Democratic Party. Today’s identity politics is nothing less than the politics of racial supremacy. Race trumps all.
Read the whole thing.
Related: How bad minorities became ‘white.’ Black and Latino Trump voters have been accused of suffering from ‘multiracial whiteness’.
SARAH HOYT’S SHOCKED FACE IS TAKING A WELL-NEEDED REST: Dem Govs Flout Own COVID Restrictions to Attend Biden Inauguration. “Michigan’s Whitmer banned outdoor gatherings of more than 25 people before attending event.”
LEFTIST USEFUL IDIOTS NO LONGER QUITE AS USEFUL: Twitter suspends Antifa accounts with more than 71K followers.
VODKAPUNDIT PRESENTS YOUR DAILY INSANITY WRAP: One Day With Joe Biden and Everything Has Gone to Hell Already.
Insanity Wrap needs to know: What do you do with a billionaire who brags that the guy he voted for is bad for business?
Answer: Seriously. We need to know. Because tar and feathers are just so unfashionable.
Before we get to the sordid details, a quick preview of today’s Wrap.
- A different billionaire — Warren Buffett — gets his first big payout for supporting Biden
- Dems struggle to put their Antifa/BLM genie back in the bottle
- It’s scientific fact that Dr. Fauci has reduced himself to a partisan hack — science!
Bonus Sanity: Soldiers still sleep whenever, wherever.
And so much more at the link, you’d have to be crazy to miss it.
HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Temple counts BLM investment among ‘proudest moments’ of 2020, right alongside Alheizmer’s, HIV breakthroughs.
THE SUSPENSE ISN’T EXACTLY KILLING ANYONE: Facebook sends Trump suspension to its oversight board. “The former president’s account will remain blocked while the board makes its judgment.”
WILL CODE FOR FOOD: Apple and Google execs applaud Biden’s immigration plan.
GEORGE KORDA: A TRUMP PARTY?
THEY DON’T EVEN PRETEND ANYMORE: Media gush: Bidens restore ‘love’ at the White House, ‘we missed that.’
SPEAK UP: Biden Can’t Snuff Out the Truth of America’s Past. “Joe Biden disbanded the 1776 Commission, but he cannot silence its members.”
KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEF: Impeach #NotMyPresident Joe Biden Also Plus #Resist. “I’m no United States Inauguration Day historian, but I can’t off the top of my head remember a new president taking over and thinking that killing jobs was a great way to kick things off and endear himself to his people. Honestly, I’m not sure that a mentally competent Joe Biden would have thought so either.”
Things may get a whole lot worse before suddenly falling apart.
BECAUSE IT WAS MADE A PARIAH BY COMPANIES AND INTEREST GROUPS DOING EXACTLY WHAT THEY ACCUSED PARLER OF DOING: Here’s why Parler is still struggling to come back online.
ARE COLLEGES Covid Superspreaders? “The analysis of 30 large U.S. universities indicated that in 18 of them, a peak in campus infections preceded a peak in the surrounding county by less than 14 days, suggesting infections were translated from the campus to the nearby community. In some cases, the home counties of these large colleges had infection rates much greater than the rest of their state.”
OREGON PREFERENCES PEOPLE OF COLOR FOR COVID VACCINES: I don’t know, I’m just an Okie but isn’t that a violation of the equal protection clause? Hans Bader, who isn’t an Okie but is a Harvard Law guy, says it is.
YEP: A Government Of Politicians, By Politicians And For Politicians.
Nothing says “peaceful transition of power” like barbed wire, barricades and 25,000 troop standing by. . . .
Political Washington puts inordinate taxpayer assets on the line when it is, itself, being protested. There are FBI billboards across the country, at who knows what cost, asking for information about those who went into the Capitol Building on Jan. 6. I do not remember our politicians sending in National Guard troops or spending millions on billboards when American cities, government buildings and people’s businesses were burning all across America last year. But when there is the slightest threat to them, there is no limit to the amount of your money they will not spend to protect themselves.
There are more troops in Washington protecting politicians than we have in war zones across the world, all in an overreaction to a small fraction of marauding knuckleheads who ran amok in the Capitol. These self-absorbed career politicians should get over themselves. I have long supported term limits, and I feel further that no elected official like Schumer, “Plugs” Biden or Pelosi should serve more than one face lift or one hair transplant.
25,000 National Guard troops for an inauguration no one will attend? This is the only personal security detail bigger than the one that looks after Beyonce and Jay-Z. Thank goodness Trump brought so many of our troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan to be able to staff this.
There are folks in burned-out “protest” cities who wish Washington politicians protected them the way they protect themselves. And for Democrats who say fences do not work and we should not have guns, it seems they have a lot of fences and guns around them.
Do tell.
January 21, 2021
In the 1980s, the Democratic Party of Tip O’Neill bore little resemblance to the party that Trump had to confront as his relentless enemy. Back then Democrats were still a party of blue-collar workers (a class that Trump tried to bring into his populist movement). Tip O’Neill was an Irish Catholic ward-heeler from Boston, who represented a working-class base; Nancy Pelosi by contrast speaks for culturally radical San Franciscans in a transformed Democratic Party, which today features LGBTQ demands, anti-white hysteria, Green New Deals, and which fights the gender identity war. Why would anyone think that Trump would not have gotten along with Tip as well as Ronnie did; or that Reagan would have enjoyed a better relationship with the present Democratic Party than Trump has? We are speaking about different forces of opposition to the GOP in two different eras.
Although Reagan faced critics in the leftist media, as someone who briefly served in his administration, let me assure Mr. Lavin that this sniping was nothing like the nonstop, venomous attacks to which Trump was subjected from the moment he declared his candidacy for the presidency. I have no idea how anyone but an absolute saint would not have exploded in the face of such slander; and it was directed not only against the president but also against his wife and young son. Never in my long life have I seen such a feeding frenzy.
Attacks on Trump as another Hitler and calls for assaults on him became commonplace over the last four years; and I strongly suspect that if Reagan has been forced to deal with such adversaries his approval rating and his temper would both have taken a hit. Reagan left office with a 63 percent approval rating, which by 1989 went up to 68 percent. We might ask what that approval rating would have been if the media threw dirt at him incessantly and if his congressional opponents incited riots against him throughout his presidency. Please note these attacks occurred not just because the Donald was intemperate in his language. The Left wanted power, and it was necessary to destroy Trump’s presidency to achieve it.
Finally, I would note that, unlike Reagan, Trump tried to be a transformative president who took his own party kicking and screaming into the populist form that he gave it. Although an honest, dedicated leader, Reagan transformed nothing.
Well, you don’t transform things by handing them over to an establishmentarian like George H.W. Bush.
THE SPACE REVOLUTION CAME IN 2033, WHICH WAS RATHER LATE FOR ME: Humans could move to this floating asteroid belt colony in the next 15 years, astrophysicist says.
IT’S DIFFERENT BECAUSE SHUT UP: The Making of a Molotov Cocktail: Two lawyers, a summer of unrest, and a bottle of Bud Light.
IT’S MEWE, AND I’M ON THERE: Hmmm: New Facebook Competitor Adds 2.5 Million Subscribers — In A Single Week.
THE RETURN OF ETIQUETTE AND DECORUM WE WERE PROMISED? Biden Snipes at Reporter Questioning His Vaccine Plan. “The president did not engage further, [and] got up and left the room as an aide broke up the proceedings by urging reporters out.”
NOT MENTIONED: BLACK LIVES MATTER. 2020 Saw Unprecedented Murder Spike In Major U.S. Cities. Though, shockingly, there’s this from Bill de Blasio: “it’s certainly related to the fact that the criminal justice system is on pause and that’s causing a lot of problems”.
Do tell.
BRONZE AGE CASH: Objects suggest Europeans used standardized money 4,000 years ago.
CHINA PUSHING HARD TO CLOSE MILITARY DRONE GAP WITH U.S.: The Epoch Times’ Eva Fu has an exclusive report, based on a leaked file. Beijing’s military build-up is on all fronts.
JOURNALISM IN THE TRUMP ERA: Slouching Toward Post-Journalism: The New York Times and other elite media outlets have openly embraced advocacy over reporting. Also the Clinton, Bush, Obama, and Biden eras, but it’s getting worse with each iteration.
PUNCHING BACK TWICE AS HARD. The mom suing a Nevada high school for compelled speech in a class based on “intersectionality” is asking for support. According to the complaint, “Plaintiff William Clark’s first graded assignment for the class … required him to reveal his racial, sexual, gender, sexual orientation, disabilities and religious identities” (and later, of course, dealt with his alleged “privilege”). FIRE dealt with a similar situation at the University of Delaware back in 2007. It was bad then and it’s bad now.
TRUMP’S FOUR YEARS REALLY WERE FULL OF ACCOMPLISHMENTS: Issues & Insights takes a look back and compiles an impressive look at Trump’s record. How long before “Miss Me Yet? photos of Trump proliferate?
JUST WHAT YOU NEED FOR HOME DEFENSE: Review: Tippmann Armory Gatling Gun 9 mm.
LIVE IN FIVE FOR OUR VIPS: Live Chat with Kruiser, Preston, VodkaPundit.
ALSO FOR OUR VIPS: Gird Your Loins, Libertarians. The Biden Admin Is Going to Be Keeping an Eye on You. “Former CIA Director John Brennan let the cat out of the bag during an MSNBC appearance Wednesday, saying that the Biden administration is laser-focused on rooting out ‘insurgency movements’ in the U.S., cracking down on pernicious malefactors like (gasp!) libertarians. No, really.”
I BLAME #ORANGEMANBAD AND ANTI-MASK RED-STATERS: China reports more COVID-19 cases in Beijing, Shanghai.
21ST CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: Another Woman Gave Me An Orgasm At A Strip Club Bachelor Party.
HEY, JOE, CAESAR CHAVEZ WAS A VIRULENT FOE OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION: Maybe our 46th chief executive should spend more time reading journalists like The Federalist’s John Daniel Davidson.
QUESTION ASKED: Can Biden Sec State Continue the ‘Tougher Approach’ on China?
President Joe Biden’s incoming secretary of state, Antony Blinken, agrees former President Donald Trump’s administration got communist China right.
During his Jan. 19 Senate confirmation hearing, Blinken told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: “President Trump was right in taking a tougher approach to China. I disagree very much with the way that he went about it in a number of areas, but the basic principle was the right one. And I think that that’s actually helpful to our foreign policy.”
Blinken knows the Chinese Communist Party endangers America and the world.
But can the Biden administration continue “the tougher approach” with Hunter Biden’s China investment scandal lurking in the diplomatic and criminal background?
Read the entire essay.
DNC-MSM CONTINUING TO ENJOY FOUR YEAR SLUMBER: Hey, Remember When Executive Orders Were Controversial? Not Anymore!
I THINK THE EXPERTS HAVE HIT THE NAIL ON THE HEAD HERE: Collaboration Between Government and Big Tech Giving Rise to Totalitarianism, Experts Warn.
THE NEW CIVIL LIBERTIES ALLIANCE, ON WHOSE BOARD I SERVE, argued before the 5th Circuit in Michelle Cochran v. U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. You can listen to the oral argument here.
NEW PRESIDENT, NEW SENATE, NEW ANTITRUST BALLGAME:
U.S. antitrust enforcement may be due for a shot in the arm as Joe Biden takes office, backed by Democratic majorities in both chambers of Congress and led by lawmakers who have vowed to increase funding for competition enforcement and push other reforms.
Even before Democrats retook the Senate with victories in Georgia’s runoff elections on Jan. 5, Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota had been confident Congress would get more aggressive on antitrust enforcement.
Regardless of whether she would continue as ranking Democrat on the Senate antitrust subcommittee in a GOP-controlled chamber or ascend to the chair if her party took over, Klobuchar said in November she would push for reforms she has introduced over the years, including bills making it easier to contest mergers.
“This was never a partisan issue,” Klobuchar said at the time, arguing antitrust concerns, especially about increasing market concentration, are not limited to the major technology companies that are currently facing scrutiny.
The head of the House antitrust subcommittee, Rep. David Cicilline, D-R.I., said in separate remarks around the same time that he would be working on competition legislation in the coming weeks.
Of the various reforms currently circulating, Cicilline said those with the most bipartisan support include calls for more funding for the U.S. Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission, as well as prohibitions against platforms favoring their own products and excluding competitors.
The Trump Administration was more friendly to antitrust than traditional Republican administrations, so this isn’t as big a shift as it might be.
MORE LIKE THIS, PLEASE: Megyn Kelly Cheers Formation Of Legal Group Fighting Critical Race Theory. “Today, President Biden doubled-down on critical race theory in the federal government. In response, I am announcing a new coalition of legal foundations and private attorneys that will wage relentless legal warfare against race theory in America’s institutions. The fight is on.”
ROGER SIMON: An Inauguration in the United States of North Korea.
I tried not to break the pledge of my previous columns to avoid the inaugural, but you couldn’t escape some of the images of the event out of the corner of your eye as you went about your day.
And what I caught glimpses of more than anything else was a massive display of guard troops, not quite what you would see marching through Pyongyang to commemorate Dear Leader’s birthday, but enough to make you wonder what kind of state you were in, democratic or autocratic.
The putative excuse was to avoid violence and a repetition of the occurrences of Jan. 6, but a hundred troops or so would have been more than sufficient to have blocked entry to the Capitol that day, had they been so empowered.
For the inauguration we had twenty to twenty-five thousand troops, an army of greater size than Lincoln employed to prevent the invasion of Washington during the Civil War.
All this with no known threats, at least none reported. (The actual “insurrection” at the Capitol was far less than your average weeknight tussle in Portland for the last six months.)
The attendance estimates at the inaugural were around two thousand, less than many high school basketball games.
What was the purpose then of all this saber rattling on a day that was supposed to be a celebration of the peaceful transfer of power in a democratic republic other than an ominous show of force, a reminder to the unruly masses that “stability” had returned and you had better accept it?
The Uniparty was back or, as they would put it in North Korea, Juche!
At least for the moment, Americans can still mock Fearless Leader:
Related: Comments ‘Turned Off’ On Biden White House YouTube Video.
ZHEY AREN’T WASTING ANY TIME: Just like that … The White House website’s contact form now asks for your pronouns.
FINALLY: At last, America has a gaffe-prone president again.
‘Folks, I can tell you, I’ve known eight presidents, three of them intimately.’ So said then vice-president Joe Biden in 2012. A month earlier, he had assured a crowd in New York that President Barack Obama could, in Teddy Roosevelt’s famous words, ‘speak softly but carry a big stick’ when it came to international relations. ‘I promise you,’ he said. ‘The president has a big stick.’ The crowd started laughing at the double-entendre. Joe wasn’t joking. ‘I promise you,’ he repeated, gravely.
That is just Joe being Joe. The 46th president is someone who quite often has no idea what he is saying. Curiously, everybody seems relieved about that. We’re told Biden’s presidency will mark a ‘return to normalcy’. Really it will mark the triumphant return of the gaffe-prone president.
For decades, Biden’s verbal blundering has been the stuff of legend. His presidential campaign of 1988 died because he plagiarized a Neil Kinnock speech. As a senator, he was called ‘the gaffe machine from Delaware’. Or as the Washington Post once put it: ‘Joe Biden isn’t a gaffe machine. He’s the Lamborghini of gaffes.’
Democratic Party loyalist Robin Williams certainly enjoyed dunking on Biden:
And Biden is so old, so did Johnny Carson during the 1988 campaign season:
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