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I appeared on Silvio Canto Jr's talk show from Dallas yesterday.  It's here.

MARCH 9,  2021

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – OVERNIGHT:

A PASSING TO NOTE – FROM FOX:    Roger Mudd, the longtime political correspondent and anchor for NBC and CBS who once stumped Sen. Edward Kennedy by simply asking why he wanted to be president, has died. He was 93.  CBS News says Mudd died Tuesday of complications of kidney failure at his home in McLean, Virginia.  During more than 30 years on network television, starting with CBS in 1961, Mudd covered Congress, elections and political conventions and was a frequent anchor and contributor to various specials. His career coincided with the flowering of television news, the pre-cable, pre-Internet days when the big three networks and their powerhouse ranks of reporters were the main source of news for millions of Americans.  Besides work at CBS and NBC, he did stints on PBS’s "MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour" and the History Channel.  When he joined Robert MacNeil and Jim Lehrer’s show in 1987, Mudd told The Associated Press: "I think they regard news and information and fact and opinion with a reverence and respect that really is admirable."  A reporter of the old school, probably not employable today.  He doesn't check off one of the required diversity boxes,

A ONCE-GREAT POLITICAL PARTY – FROM FOX:   The entire Nevada Democratic Party staff quit after a left-wing slate of candidates picked up seats in the party's leadership.  The party's executive director, Alana Mounce, sent an email to Judith Whitmer, who won a spot as the party's chair on Saturday, notifying Whitmer that she and other staff members were resigning.  That included the party's operations director, research director, communications director, and finance director, The Intercept reported Monday.  Whitmer had run as part of the "The NV Dems Progressive Slate," in opposition to the "The Progressive Unity Slate," run by the Democratic Party.  "We weren’t really surprised, in that we were prepared for it," Whitmer told the Intercept. "But what hit us by surprise and was sort of shocking is that for a slate that claimed that they were all about unity, and kept this false narrative of division going on throughout the entire campaign — in fact they kept intensifying that — that’s what was surprising about it, was the willingness to just walk away, instead of working with us."  Many of those who won are formal members of the Democratic Socialists of America.  They have become the real Democratic Party. 

March 9, 2021       Permalink

THE QUESTION CONTINUES TO GROW – OVERNIGHT:  Who is in charge at the White House?  Do we believe the propaganda ministry or our own lyin' eyes?  It is perfectly clear that the president is in poor shape, and getting worse by the day.  He mumbles, he forgets, he's sometimes incoherent.  We've pointed out that a number of his appointments at the sub-Cabinet level, where the daily decisions are really made, are from the far left of the Democratic Party.  Is it the Biden administration?  Or the Obama administration?  Or is Bernie Sanders the key man?

Meanwhile, Kamala Harris isn't missing a beat.  The ambition oozes.  From Fox: 

Vice President Kamala Harris had another call with a foreign leader Tuesday, independent of President Biden.

Harris spoke with the prime minister of Norway, Erna Solberg, where Harris "affirmed her commitment to deepening the strong alliance between Norway and the United States."

" The Vice President thanked the Prime Minister for Norway’s close security partnership with the United States and generous contributions to development and health security efforts around the world," according to a readout of the call.

Harris previously took calls alone with French President Emanuel Macron and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as well as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, shortly after the president put in a call to the French and Canadian leaders himself.

Less than two months into the new administration, Harris’ frequent solo calls with world leaders signal that she’ll engage deeply even in foreign policy, though her experience has been almost entirely in the domestic realm. Leaders around the world could view the vice president as Biden’s heir-apparent and be eager to build a relationship.

"She will be seen by everyone as a potential president in waiting," one European ambassador told Politico in February. "Much more than in previous presidencies."

She also participated in the first bilateral meeting of the new administration, between the U.S. and Canada, an opportunity not afforded to Biden during his time in Harris' job.

COMMENT:  What many are saying privately, and increasingly hinting at in public, is that Biden isn't long for the Oval Office.  If his decline continues, even his press secretary will not be able to hide it. 

As for Kamala Harris, I wonder if she carries a stethoscope.  Remember, she ran for president last year and had to drop out of the Democratic primaries before a single primary vote was cast, because her poll standings were so low.  She usually performs below expectations.  If she becomes president quickly, the American people might be slow to give her much support.

March 9, 2021       Permalink

MARCH 8,  2021

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – OVERNIGHT:

REMEMBER THE WONDERUL TEACHERS THAT WE HAD?  WHERE DID THEY GO? – FROM FOX:   UTLA (Los Angeles) teachers have been warned not to post vacation pictures on social media as the union continues to seek a safe return to in-person instruction amid the coronavirus pandemic, according to a report Monday.  The teachers were urged to keep spring break pictures off social media because it could hurt the union's argument that it's currently unsafe to return to the classroom, according to a screenshot that appeared to be from a roughly 5,700-member Facebook group titled, "UTLA FB GROUP- Members Only."  "Friendly reminder: If you are planning any trips for Spring Break, please keep that off of Social Media. It is hard to argue that it is unsafe for in-person instruction, if parents and the public see vacation photos and international travel," a post from the group read, according to FOX 11 of Los Angeles reporter Bill Melugin.  By the way, what is Spring Break breaking from?  They aren't even in school.  A far cry from the professionalism we saw among teachers in the days of our own youth.  What these kids are missing!

THE NEXT STEP – FROM THE NEW YORK POST:  Republicans in the state Assembly on Monday drafted a resolution to impeach Gov. Cuomo amid mounting allegations of inappropriate behavior with younger women and the scandal over nursing home deaths from COVID-19.  The resolution will be formally introduced on Tuesday, a spokesman for Assembly Minority Leader Will Barclay (R-Syracuse) said.
During a news conference earlier in the day, Barclay said, “We’re going to introduce this resolution because we believe the time has come.”  “There’s been one bombshell after another,” Barclay said.  “I don’t think I’ve used the term bombshell, especially this weekend, anytime more in my life.”  Barclay’s comments came after two more women — former aides Ana Liss and Karen Hinton — on Saturday brought the number of Cuomo’s accusers to five.  Hinton, the wife of lobbyist and former Cuomo administration official Howard Glaser, claims Cuomo twice pulled her into an “intimate embrace” in 2000, when he was the US housing secretary under then-President Bill Clinton.  A short time after the GOP announcement, a group of 20 Democratic assemblywomen — including some of the chamber’s most powerful members — signaled they would oppose impeachment proceedings before the conclusion of a pending probe of the allegations against Cuomo.  I suspect this GOP action is designed to put Democrats on the record as opposing impeachment.  A useful tool at election time. 

March 8, 2021       Permalink 

IRAN CHEATS ITS WAY TO POWER – FROM 11:45 P.M. ET:  This is the kind of story that's truly important, and yet gets far less attention than Meghan gossiping about the Queen.  A sad day for our priorities.  From Times of Israel: 

The International Atomic Energy Agency reportedly told its member states Monday that Iran has started enriching uranium with a third cascade, or cluster, of advanced IR-2m centrifuges at its underground plant at Natanz, in a further breach of the 2015 nuclear deal.

Reuters news agency quoted the UN atomic watchdog as saying in a new report.

UF6 is uranium hexafluoride, a compound that can be fed into centrifuges to produce nuclear fuel.

“The fourth cascade of 174 IR-2m centrifuges was installed but had yet to be fed with natural UF6; installation of a fifth cascade of IR-2m centrifuges was ongoing; and installation of a sixth cascade of IR-2m centrifuges had yet to begin,” the IAEA report said, according to Reuters.

Since the US left the nuclear deal in 2018 under Donald Trump, Iran has walked away from the pact’s limitations on its stockpile of uranium and has begun enriching up to 20 percent, a technical step away from weapons-grade levels.

It is also spinning advanced centrifuges barred by the deal, which saw Iran limit its program in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions.

Iran’s conservative-dominated parliament last month ordered the government to start limiting some inspections by the IAEA, after which the head of the agency, Rafael Grossi, hammered out a temporary technical deal with Tehran.

They confirmed that Iran will continue to allow access to UN inspectors to its nuclear sites — but will for three months bar inspections of other, non-nuclear sites.

According to a report last month, IAEA inspectors last summer found uranium particles at two Iranian nuclear sites that Iran tried to block access to.

Iranian authorities had stonewalled the inspectors from reaching the sites for seven months before the inspection, and Iranian officials have failed to explain the presence of the uranium, Reuters reported, citing diplomats familiar with the UN agency’s work.

COMMENT:  The most tragic part is that Iran now has a government in Washington run by the masters of appeasement from the Obama era.  They see Iran as our potential partner in the Middle East, and would like to move us away from Israel and the moderate Arab states.  They're descendants of the kind of diplomats of the 1930s symbolized by Neville Chamberlain and his umbrella. 

Biden, apparently influenced by others, has appointed a disturbing number of Tehran sympathizers to national-security posts in his administration.

And the mainstream press really doesn't care.

March 8, 2021       Permalink