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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION

50 STATES AND DC, CONGRESS AND THE PRESIDENT

Trumpology The path to the 2024 presidential election will be shaped entirely by how things look for Donald Trump in the wake of the 2022 midterms. By Victor Davis Hanson

https://amgreatness.com/2022/06/01/trumpology/

Donald Trump has signaled he will announce his presidential intentions after the November midterm elections. Yet his record of endorsements is quite mixed. By the sheer numbers of winning primary candidates his stamp of approval is impressive, but in a few of the most important races, not so much. 

The disaster that is the Biden Administration has been a godsend for Trump. Had Biden simply plagiarized the successful Trump agenda, there would have followed no border disaster, no energy crisis, no hyperinflation, and no disastrous flight from Afghanistan. 

Had Biden followed through on his “unity” rhetoric, he could have lorded over Trump’s successful record as his own, while contrasting his Uncle-Joe ecumenicalism with supposed Trump’s polarization. 

Of course, serious people knew from the start that was utterly impossible. A cognitively challenged Biden was a captive of ideologues. Thus, he was bound to pursue an extremist agenda that could only end as it now has—in disaster and record low polls. 

Still, how ironic that the Biden catastrophe revived a Trump candidacy. Biden likely will cause the Democrats to lose Congress. His pick of a dismal Kamala Harris as vice president has likely ensured, for now, fewer viable Democratic presidential candidates in 2024. 

So, will Trump run? 

Unsafe At Any Speed? Electric Cars Keep Catching Fire

https://issuesinsights.com/2022/06/02/unsafe-at-any-speed-electric-cars-keep-catching-fire/

In Vancouver, Canada, in late May, a Tesla Model Y burst into flames while the driver was waiting for a light at an intersection. He had to kick out a window to escape.

Around the same time, a new Tesla burst into flames in Brooklyn, Illinois, and a week before that a Model 3 caught fire in California City, California, while it was parked in a driveway.

In April, a deadly lithium-ion battery fire occurred in a Tesla car crash in Houston.

Last year, a Tesla caught fire while charging overnight in a garage, which the Washington Post described as “one in a string of recent examples showing what can happen when electric cars are left parked in garages to charge overnight” and which promoted electric vehicle (EV) makers to warn “owners not to leave the cars charging unattended in certain circumstances, or sitting fully charged in garages.” (This site keeps tabs on Tesla fires.)

Biden’s Title IX Rewrite Is an Assault on Women’s Rights The administration’s new draft rules redefine the word ‘sex’ to mean ‘gender’ and ‘gender identity.’By Jennifer C. Braceras and Inez Feltscher Stepman

https://www.wsj.com/articles/bidens-title-ix-rewrite-is-an-assault-on-womens-rights-schools-protected-speech-education-harassment-11654114281?mod=opinion_lead_pos6

“Out of a single sentence barring discrimination on the basis of sex, the Biden administration is illegally rewriting federal law to erase women and undermine constitutional liberties. Because the scope of the proposed rules is so vast, and its implementation is being managed by bureaucrats behind the scenes, average Americans may not have noticed. They need to wake up.”

Title IX is a simple anti-discrimination mandate that prohibits federally funded educational institutions from discriminating “on the basis of sex.” Yet, without congressional authorization or other constitutional authority, the Biden administration is writing new Title IX rules to socially engineer every aspect of the educational experience—from student speech and school athletics to high-school locker room use and relationships between adult college students.

These draft rules, leaked to the media in dribs and drabs, have been delayed repeatedly to avoid organized backlash. Behind the scenes, the administration is telling educational institutions that the rules are a fait accompli, demanding enforcement that curtails freedom of speech, due process and women’s rights.

Although Title IX makes no mention of sexual harassment or assault, the Supreme Court has held that a school that tolerates sexual misconduct may be found to have violated Title IX. At the same time, the high court has been clear that most speech (including speech about sex roles) does not rise to the level of unlawful sexual harassment.

Attempted Reagan Assassin John Hinckley Jr. to Be Released, Judge Rules: Arjun Singh

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/attempted-reagan-assassin-john-hinckley-jr-to-be-released-judge-rules/?utm_source=recirc-desktop&utm_

John Hinckley Jr., the man who attempted to assassinate President Ronald Reagan over 41 years ago in 1981, will be fully and unconditionally released from a federal mental-health facility.

At a final hearing on the subject on Wednesday, U.S. Senior District Judge Paul Friedman, a Clinton appointee to the district court for the District of Columbia, said that Hinckley, 67, would be released from the care of Saint Elizabeths Hospital without any preconditions on June 15.

Friedman, who since 2003 has overseen periodic requests from Hinckley for privileges during his confinement, said that “if he hadn’t tried to kill a president, he would have been released unconditionally a long time ago.”

On March 30, 1981, as Reagan was leaving the Hilton Hotel in Washington, D.C., Hinckley drew a .22 caliber revolver and fired at the president as he was entering his limousine. Four of the six explosive rounds he fired struck the president.

Wounded were D.C. police officer Tom Delahanty and U.S. Secret Service agent Timothy McCarthy, who placed himself in the line of fire, while Press Secretary James Brady sustained a gunshot to the head, which resulted in lifelong paralysis. The White House Press Briefing Room is named in his honor.

Biden’s inner Trudeau: On guns, he seems to be operating under the wrong Constitution Jonathan Turley

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/bidens-inner-trudeau-on-guns-he-seems-to-be-operating-under-the-wrong-constitution/ar-AAXXT89

In our increasingly hateful and divisive politics, there are times when our nation seems incapable of coming together for a common purpose. Tragedies — moments of shared national grieving and mutual support — once were the exception. Yet one of the most chilling aspects of the aftermath of the school massacre in Uvalde, Texas, was how the moment of unity was quickly lost to political posturing.

Politicians have long admitted that a crisis is an opportunity not to be missed — the greater the tragedy, the greater the opportunity. After the mass shooting at a Buffalo supermarket, New York’s Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) called for censorship to “silence the voices of hatred and racism.” After the Uvalde massacre, some Democrats renewed calls for everything from court packing to ending the Senate filibuster.

The most immediate response, however, was a call for gun bans. Vice President Kamala Harris got out front of the White House by demanding a ban on AR-15s, the most popular weapon in America. Then President Joe Biden created a stir by suggesting he might seek to ban 9mm weapons.

Such calls are not limited to the United States. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced that his government is introducing legislation to “implement a national freeze on handgun ownership.” He said Canadians would no longer be able “to buy, sell, transfer or import handguns anywhere in Canada,” adding that “there is no reason anyone in Canada should need guns in their everyday lives.”

The difference between the push in the two countries is the existence of the Second Amendment in the United States — a constitutionally mandated “reason” why Americans are allowed to have guns; they don’t have to prove it to the government.

Concha: Pro-Clinton DC Jury Acquitting Sussmann “Another Black Eye For The Justice System”

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2022/05/31/concha_pro-clinton_dc_jury_acquitting_sussmann_another_black_eye_for_the_justice_system.html

JOE CONCHA: Well, Donald Trump got 5.4% of the vote in Washington D.C. in 2020. Right? The fact that this jury was going to be sympathetic and friendly to Hillary Clinton’s campaign lawyer, is not surprising, especially when that jury had Clinton donors on it.

I’m telling you, our faith in institutions just took another big hit as a result of this. This is a whole bowl of wrong.

Very frustrating to see, you have a man who peddled a lie to the FBI — a lie that he was going there as a concerned citizen. Then he turns around and bills the Clinton campaign for that visit to his friend James Baker. What else do you need?

This jury was pre-dispositioned to have a not-guilty verdict. Another black eye for the justice system.

Liz Peek: It’s Biden v. inflation — and Biden’s losing

https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/3507723-its-biden-v-inflation-and-bidens-losing/

President Biden wants Americans to know: Curbing inflation is his top, top, top priority.

He recently penned an op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal with this headline: “My Plan for Fighting Inflation.” The plan didn’t contain much new in the anti-inflation category, but it did contain a red alert, which may have been the point.

The piece prepared the public for an economic slowdown, the likely result of the Federal Reserve’s commitment to reining in its reckless monetary policy. Biden warns that in coming months “growth will look different” and forecasts that job gains will drop from recent monthly totals of 500,000 or so and head lower, to maybe about 150,000.

This will not be “cause for concern,” Biden writes, “it will be a sign that we are successfully moving into the next phase of recovery…”

The last thing Americans were told not to worry about was inflation, so that advisory gives us pause. It was last July – when the Consumer Price Index came in at 0.9 percent, significantly higher than the prior month’s 0.6 percent price increase – that Biden gave an address celebrating the bang-up job he had done in his first six months in office.

He assured us: “Some folks have raised worries that this could be a sign of persistent inflation. But that’s not our view. Our experts believe and the data shows that most of the price increases we’ve seen are — were expected and expected to be temporary.”

TIM BLAIR ON THE LEFT

https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2022/05/they-wont-glow-or-seek-to-know/

“The Left’s complexity fetish infects all social and political realms. To test this, mention nuclear power to one of your bolshie friends and brace for a blizzard of convoluted objections that can claim no more than a nodding acquaintance with logic or fact. After that aural ordeal, eyes glazed and verging on narcolepsy, you won’t dare ask when it became official than men can have babies.”

To no one’s surprise, a D.C. jury acquitted Michael Sussmann By Andrea Widburg

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2022/05/to_no_ones_surprise_a_dc_jury_acquitted_michael_sussmann.html

Most savvy court watchers were completely unsurprised yesterday when a jury in the District of Columbia acquitted Michael Sussmann, a Perkins Coie attorney, who was charged with lying to the FBI on Hillary’s behalf in support of the Russia hoax. After all, juries routinely rule against Republicans and for Democrats in the D.C. district, the judge couldn’t have made his partisanship more clear, and the jury had a good helping of hardcore Hillary supporters. In other words, the fix was in the moment the case was filed. What was more newsworthy than a predictable verdict was the way the case showed just how corrupt the FBI and the district court are.

The news about the verdict is simple:

A Washington, D.C., jury acquitted former Clinton campaign attorney Michael Sussmann of lying to the FBI on Tuesday in the first legal test of special counsel John Durham’s investigation into the origins of the Trump/Russia collusion conspiracy theory.

Sussmann was charged with lying to the FBI during a September 2016 meeting with former FBI general counsel James Baker. Sussmann pleaded not guilty to the charges, arguing that he never lied to the FBI, and even if he did, the lie did not impact the FBI’s operations at all. Sussmann decided last week against testifying in his own defense.

The evidence was clear, though, that Sussmann told the FBI’s general counsel he wasn’t representing anyone when he was, in fact, representing Hillary.

Out of Formula By John Stossel

https://pjmedia.com/columns/john-stossel/2022/06/01/out-of-formula-n1602364

Parents still struggle to find baby formula.

The left and most media (sorry, same thing?) blame “corporate power run amok.” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says, “There might be a need for indictment!”

They blame Abbott Laboratories, because it shut down a Similac plant. The Food and Drug Administration says unsanitary conditions led to deaths of two infants, but Abbott denies that its formula recall had anything to do with those deaths.

In any case, one factory closure doesn’t normally cause massive shortages.

My new video gives the real reason for the formula shortage.

First: bans on imports. There’s plenty of formula on supermarket shelves in Mexico and Europe. Normally, American companies would just buy that and ship it here.

But they can’t, because of several destructive government policies.