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FEBRUARY 25,  2021

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – OVERNIGHT: 

WHY DID WE NOT THINK OF THIS SOCIAL ADVANCE BEFORE?  I WANT ANSWERS – FROM FOX BUSINESS:    California lawmakers are considering a bill that would penalize department stores for separating children’s toys, clothing and other items by gender.  Under CA AB2826 (19R), introduced by Assemblyman Evan Low, D-Campbell, department stores with 500 or more employees would be subject to a $1,000 fine if they do not “correct a violation of these provisions within 30 days of receiving written notice of the violation.”  Stores would not have to change their products, but the products could not be displayed based on how they have “traditionally been marketed for either girls or for boys.”  Low, who originally introduced the bill last year, said he conceived of the idea from one of his staffers, who claimed her daughter had asked her why an item she supposedly wanted was in the boys’ section.  “This is an issue of children being able to express themselves without bias,” Low told Politico last week.  Yes, I'm sure there'll be a rush among five-year-old girls for toy machine guns, and the boys will certainly go for Senior Prom Barbie.  Am I in the right world?

BULLETIN – FROM REUTERS:   US President Joe Biden on Thursday night and Friday morning directed US military airstrikes in eastern Syria against facilities belonging to what the Pentagon said were Iran-backed militia, in a calibrated response to rocket attacks against US targets in Iraq.  At dawn on Friday, US attacks targeted several areas in Eastern Syria on the Syrian-Iraqi border, Syrian state television reported citing its reporter in Deir al-Zor.  The strikes, which were first reported by Reuters, appeared to be limited in scope, potentially lowering the risk of escalation.  Biden's decision to strike only in Syria and not in Iraq, at least for now, also gives the Iraqi government some breathing room as it carries out its own investigation of a February 15 attack that wounded Americans.  "At President (Joe) Biden’s direction, US military forces earlier this evening conducted airstrikes against infrastructure utilized by Iranian-backed militant groups in eastern Syria," Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said in a statement.  "President Biden will act to protect American and Coalition personnel. At the same time, we have acted in a deliberate manner that aims to de-escalate the overall situation in both eastern Syria and Iraq," Kirby said.  We'll watch this carefully, and will hope the president has a spine that is more Trump and less Obama.  The Iranians must understand that we will vigorously defend our interests and our forces.  If they don't understand it, diplomacy will fail.

February 25, 2021       Permalink

WHOOPS, Y'MEAN THERE ARE RULES?  WHAT KIND OF A COUNTRY IS THIS? – AT 11:23 P.M. ET:  President Biden's ill-timed and economically dicey call for a $15 minimum wage has hit a mine in Congress.  From Fox Business: 

The Senate Parliamentarian said on Thursday night that a federal minimum wage hike to $15 per hour does not fit the criteria to be included in the Democrats’ $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package.
The measure does not fall in line with the requirements to be passed via the fast-track budget reconciliation process, a source familiar with the ruling said.

The reconciliation process will allow Democrats to pass legislation without any Republican support, so long as all members of their own party are on board. Some moderate Democrats, like West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, had expressed reservations about the minimum wage increase.

Typically, budget reconciliation measures must affect spending or revenue.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., applauded the Senate Parliamentarian’s decision, saying that it will reinforce the traditions of the Senate over the long-run.

“Very pleased the Senate Parliamentarian has ruled that a minimum wage increase is an inappropriate policy change in reconciliation,” Graham said in a statement. “This decision reinforces reconciliation cannot be used as a vehicle to pass major legislative change - by either party - on a simple majority vote.”

But progressives are already expressing their displeasure with the decision to remove the provision.

“I strongly disagree with tonight’s decision by the Senate Parliamentarian. The CBO made it absolutely clear that raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour had a substantial budgetary impact and should be allowed under reconciliation," said Sen. Bernie Sander, I-Vt. in a statement.

COMMENT:  We'll see what happens.  There are voices in Congress who want both houses to ignore the judgment of the Senate parliamentarian.  But President Biden is signaling that he respects the Senate rules and will try to find some other way to raise the minimum wage.

The arrogance of the Democrats is astounding.  They control the House by a handful of votes and have only a tie in the Senate, with control only occurring when Vice President Harris breaks that tie.  You'd think they'd want to be more cooperative, but self-delusion is hard to cure.

February 25, 2021       Permalink

FEBRUARY 24,  2021

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – OVERNIGHT:

SAD, ISN'T IT? – FROM DAILY MAIL:   A public school system in New York has introduced a new curriculum to teach that 'all white people play a part in perpetuating systemic racism', and show kindergarten classes videos of black children shot and killed by police, instructing them about the dangers of police brutality.  Buffalo's schools are expected to follow lesson plans devised by Fatima Morrell, the associate superintendent for Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Initiatives.  Morrell's lesson plans, obtained by City Journal, teach pupils and their teachers how to be, in her words, more 'woke.'  The youngest pupils read a series of texts under the heading 'Woke Kindergarten', which are described as being 'digital culturally responsive and sustaining easy reader books'.  The texts help children with their 'learning for liberation' and tell the stories of children 'that we have lost to racist police and state-sanctioned violence.'  Six young people killed by police, including Trayvon Martin, 17; Tamir Rice, 12; and seven-year-old Aiyana Stanley-Jones, are imagined telling their stories on video.   What an awful thing to teach black children.  What will happen to these kids in the real world?  Where will they go with this poison in their brains?

THE CUOMO CRISIS – FROM THE NEW YORK POST:   Gov. Andrew Cuomo is a “criminal sexual predator” who “must immediately resign” over a former aide’s detailed sexual-harassment allegations, a member of Congress from upstate New York said Wednesday.  Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-Glens Falls) also said that “any elected official who does not immediately call for his resignation is complicit in allowing a sexual predator to continue leading the great state of New York.”  Stefanik’s remarks came after Lindsey Boylan, now a Democratic candidate for Manhattan borough president, published an online essay in which she accused Cuomo of kissing her “on my lips” without warning following a 2018 meeting in his Manhattan office.  Cuomo is in big trouble, but the mainstream media doesn't seem to care much.  He may yet survive.

February 24, 2021       Permalink

AND SO IT BEGINS – OVERNIGHT:  Little by little we see the return of the Obama foreign policy dealing with Iran.  An American ally now caves, apparently encouraged by Washington.  From i24: 

Iranian assets worth an estimated $7 billion locked in South Korea will shortly be released following consultations with the United States, after Tehran announced Monday that it has reached a deal with Seoul over how to transfer the funds, reported the Korea Times.

The agreement was reportedly reached during a meeting between Iran’s Central Bank Gov. Abdolnaser Hemmati and South Korean Ambassador to Iran Ryu Jeong-hyun.

For months Tehran has been pressuring Seoul to unblock the assets held in two South Korean banks due to US sanctions. Seoul has been in talks with Washington on ways to release the money without violating the sanctions, including expanding humanitarian trade with the Middle Eastern country, according to the Korea Times.

“Our government has been in talks with Iran about ways to use the frozen assets, and the Iran side has expressed its consent to the proposals we have made,” the foreign ministry said, without providing further details of the proposals.

“The actual unfreezing of the assets will be carried out through consultations with related countries, including the United States,” the ministry said.

Seoul has apparently been finalizing talks with Washington over the last few weeks regarding using some of the frozen assets to pay Iran’s United Nations arrears — to which Tehran acquiesced.
Since the dying days of former President Donald Trump’s administration and the start of his successor US President Joe Biden’s, Iran has attempted to leverage its way out of US sanctions.

Although Tehran has denied that its seizure of a South Korean oil tanker and its crew in early January had anything to do with the frozen assets, this latest news would appear to indicate that its massive gamble may just have paid off.

COMMENT:  And the mullahs know there's a lot more cash out there, and that they will get a pile of it...as long as Barack Obama is pulling the strings.

February 24, 2021        Permalink

LET'S SUPPORT THE GIRLS – AT 10:15 P.M. ET:  This issue has not been given enough attention.  Political correctness is wrecking the dreams of thousands of female athletes across the nation.  And the Biden administration is siding with the wreckers.  Unbelievable.  From Fox: 

Connecticut high school track athlete Alanna Smith told Fox News Wednesday she was "disappointed" after the Biden Justice Department withdrew its support for her lawsuit seeking to prevent transgender athletes from competing in girls’ sports.

The Justice Department had backed Smith's case last year during the Trump administration.
Smith, who is fighting the rule after placing below a transgender runner in a meet, told "Fox News Primetime" that she and other female athletes "have worked really hard to get our stories out there to get people to realize that fairness needs to be restored in our sport and in all other women’s sports."

Smith hopes people will "realize that a lot of biological females have missed out on making it to meets that really matter...and the transgender athletes have taken spots on the podium that belong to biological females.

"We train for so many days a week, so many hours to be able to be the best in our state and the best in our region, and these biological males are just taking it away from us and we really deserve it."
Smith's attorney, Christiana Holcomb of the Alliance Defending Freedom, vowed the case will go ahead and called the DOJ's decision "politically motivated."

"What is even more concerning is this effort took gut legal protection for women is not just isolated to what we see in Connecticut," she said. "Even now, the Biden administration is pushing for the so-called Equality Act, which ignores the physical differences between men and women and threatens women’s privacy, women’s homeless shelters, and yes, even women's sports on a national level for female athletes like Alanna."

"Title IX was designed to ensure that girls like Alanna have a fair and level playing field," Holcomb concluded, "We want to move forward and we want to see women’s sports protected across the country."

COMMENT:   Absolutely right.  The Biden crowd, which is really the Obama crowd, is leading this country into the cold tunnels of the Marxist left.  Naturally, the mainstream press doesn't care.  Even female "journalists" are silent.  And leading "feminists," fearing they'll be left out of the latest trendy thinking, aren't touching the story. 

So sick.

February 24,, 2021       Permalink