JUST A BUCK, TRY YOUR LUCK:

Newsweek has gotten itself into Paul Krugman’s “The miracle of the 1940s” territory here. (i.e., WWII, in which over 50 million people died), or the Grauniad’s classic headline, “Why Genghis Khan was good for the planet:”

Genghis Khan, in fact, may have been not just the greatest warrior but the greatest eco-warrior of all time, according to a study by the Carnegie Institution’s Department of Global Energy. It has concluded that the 13th-century Mongol leader’s bloody advance, laying waste to vast swaths of territory and wiping out entire civilisations en route, may have scrubbed 700m tonnes of carbon from the atmosphere – roughly the quantity of carbon dioxide generated in a year through global petrol consumption – by allowing previously populated and cultivated land to return to carbon-absorbing forest.

Do Newsweek’s writers carry their iPads and laptops in briefcases that resemble Sonny Bono’s in Airplane 2?

HOW THE LEFT REVERSES ‘ORDO AMORIS:’ There is a traditional Christian doctrine, Ordo Amoris or Ordered Loves, that prioritizes the objects of an individual’s loves. It begins with one’s own family, then one’s neighbors, one’s community, the state, the nation and then those beyond the nation. If you see a parallel in that order with federalism, you’re on target.

But, as Dr. Steve Turley and Rod Martin explore in a well-spent 20 minute video discussion,  the Left has focused a great part of its resources for a century on reversing the traditional Ordo Amoris.

Among the many destructive results they focus on are seen in the growing hate among younger Americans who view this nation as inherently evil from its founding, to say nothing of the insistence that America is obligated to open its borders to all comers and then give them preference over citizens.

MSNBC’S JOHN BRENNAN: ‘Absurd’ To Say Fired Joint Chiefs Head Had Woke Agenda.

On Saturday’s edition of MSNBC’s The Weekend, former CIA Director and current MSNBC analyst John Brennan claimed it was “absurd” to suggest that President Trump fired C.Q. Brown, who Biden had appointed Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, because he had a woke agenda.

Absurd? Really? After the death of George Floyd in 2020, Brown put out a video in which he focused on his own trials and tribulations as an African-American, and concluded by saying that he wanted “to lead and listen to necessary conversations on racism, diversity, and inclusion.”

In 2022, Brown co-signed a Memorandum that began by stating that “diversity and inclusion are an essential part of our society and key to the success of any organization. As such, it is imperative that the composition of our Military Services better reflect our Nation’s highly talented, diverse, and eligible population.”

The Memorandum laid out quotas explicitly reducing the percentage of whites in the Air Force, and ordering the Memorandum’s recipients to “develop a diversity and inclusion plan aimed at achieving these goals no later than 30 September 2022.”

As Obi-Wan would say regarding Brennan’s dissembling, “What I told you was true, from a certain point of view:” John Brennan and the Aging Radicals: “Brennan is the classic illiberal liberal, an aging radical who openly favors in America the repressiveness he once excused in the Soviet Union. Recall that at the height of the Cold War he was rooting for the Reds. He has admitted that in 1976 he voted for Gus Hall, the American Communist Party’s presidential candidate. That radicalism never left Brennan’s system.”

Related: He’s Sweatin’: John Brennan Whines About Being on Kash Patel’s ‘Enemies List’ and It’s Glorious (Watch).

THIS WILL END WELL: Britain’s fire service is too male and too white, a report has claimed.

The report, which was commissioned by the National Fire Chiefs Council (NFCC), found that the fire service was “institutionally racist, misogynistic and homophobic”.

It said firemen in Britain were not “diverse” enough because the service’s proportion of women and ethnic minorities is less than in wider society.

Having been produced by an advisory group focused on improving diversity, equality and inclusion in the fire service, the report found that 9.3 per cent of firemen were women and 5.4 per cent belonged to ethnic minorities as of March 2024.

By contrast, 51 per cent of the total population in England and Wales is female and 18.3 per cent are from ethnic minorities, according to the 2021 census.

The review said: “The common ‘image’ of a firefighter is, for the most part, of a white heterosexual male turning out in a fire engine to fight fires… The diversity of the service needs to be much more reflective of the communities it serves and the wide range of services it delivers.

As Blazing Cat Fur notes, “That worked out great in LA!”

CHICKS DIG BAD BOYS: At the Courthouse With Luigi Mangione’s ‘Fangirls.’

Jeffrey Dahmer got fan mail from women. Why should this guy be any different? Is it really about politics, or just atavistic lust for a killer?

SAFETYISM KILLS:

Watching the meetings and town halls in Los Angeles featuring the nitwits in charge getting yelled at by enraged homeowners as the city burned was enlightening. Again and again, the ridiculous Mayor Karen Bass, an openly communist revolutionary, brought up a persistent theme: the cult of safety.

The term “safetyism” became popularized in The Coddling of the American Mind by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt. It refers to the way modern society is overprotective and overbearing, the ultimate helicopter state, which has led to excessive and even destructive regulations that don’t actually keep you safe, and which in fact may endanger you.

During President Trump’s visit to Pacific Palisades and the round table meeting he held with California’s worst supervillains, Karen Bass repeatedly admonished the angry, devastated Palisades homeowners that “the most important thing is your safety.” The homeowners were angry about the timeline they had been given by L.A. County officials. According to the bureaucrats, it would take 18 months to clear the burned-out lots. Bass insisted they would be able to start rebuilding “immediately.” When pressed on the 18-month clean-up the city was planning, she hedged with, “Well, you know that you will be able to soon. The most important thing is keeping you safe.”

President Trump countered: “Safe? They’re not safe now.”

The “safety” that Bass was fighting for was the mandatory EPA Phase 1 clean-up of their lots. A doctor named Muntu Davis with the L.A. County of Public Health issued an order forcing all homeowners to wait for the EPA to complete their hazardous waste removal before anything else can happen to the destroyed lots. This, as Mayor Bass keeps reminding everyone, is for “your safety.”

God forbid a piece of “highly toxic ash” touches your skin! God forbid a hazardous particle enters your body! Karen Bass is here to keep you safe as you sit in a cramped hotel room with your children and your dog, or on your friend’s couch.

Gooder and harder, Los Angeles:

THE RACIST HOMOPHOBIC TIME TRAVELERS HAVE FINALLY WON: MSNBC Cancels Joy Reid’s Show in Programming Shakeup.

Alex Wagner, married to “former White House nutrition policy advisor and assistant chef Sam Kass…The wedding was attended by then U.S. President Barack Obama and his family,” also lost her show as well: Joy Reid and Alex Wagner Axed From MSNBC Lineup in Major Network Shakeup.

What’s more, Alex Wagner, who has hosted weeknights at 9 p.m. save for a Monday night led by Rachel Maddow, is expected to be named a contributor, according to three people with knowledge of current talks. Wagner, who has been working as a correspondent across the U.S. during the first 100 days of the new Trump presidency while Rachel Maddow anchors each day at 9, is unlikely to return to her weeknight slot, these people indicated. Jen Psaki is expected to take over at least one of the hours, according to one of these people. MSNBC is also in talks with Eugene Daniels of Politico and Melissa Murray, a law professor at New York University who specializes in the regulation of sex, marriage, caregiving and reproductive rights that would have them join the network in unspecified capacities, according to one of these people.

Today’s headlines are a reminder why Comcast keeps Al Sharpton on the payroll:

Of course, perhaps we should sleep on the news for 24 hours:

TESLA CYBERTRUCK VANDALIZED WITH SWASTIKA IN NEW YORK:

As Rupert Darwall told Ben Weingarten in 2018 when discussing his book, Green Tyranny: Exposing the Totalitarian Roots of the Climate Industrial Complex:

If you look at what the Nazis were doing in the 1930s, in their environmental policies, virtually every theme you see in the modern environmental movement, the Nazis were doing. It happens to be historical fact that the Nazis were the first political party in the world to have a wind power program. It also happens to be a fact that they were against meat eating, and they considered…it…terribly wasteful that so much grain went to feed livestock rather than to make bread. It’s also the case that they had the equivalent of fuel economy rules because they had the most expensive gasoline in Europe and so they basically had very few people driving cars…I think actually the most extraordinary thing that I came across was this quote from Adolf Hitler where he told an aide once, “I’m not interested in politics. I’m interested in changing people’s lifestyles.” Well, that could be…That’s extraordinarily contemporary. That is what the modern environmental movement is all about. It’s about changing people’s lifestyles.

Look, I’m all for pointing out the National Socialist roots of the environmental movement, but wanton vandalism is absolutely wrong. Because otherwise, why would anyone at the moment associate Musk with one of the largest and most terrifying bureaucracies in history?

EVERY DAY IS CHRISTMAS:

PANIC AT THE DISCO:

OPEN THREAD: Saturday night’s all right for blogging. Get a little action in.