Read it.

More than 1,000 people affected by the Palisades Fire gathered Wednesday in front of the charred remains of the historic Pacific Palisades Business Block building.

Speakers at the rally accused California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass of negligence before, during, and after the 2025 firestorm that tore through the coastal community, destroying homes, businesses, and landmarks and displacing thousands of residents.

At the “They Let Us Burn” rally, chants of “fire them all — fire them now” were met with loud cheers from the crowd assembled in the village center, a year after the fires reshaped the neighborhood.

Read it.

Moving company U-Haul has released its annual migration ranking, which continues to show a sustained outflow from high-tax, crime-ridden, Democrat-run states toward lower-tax states where law and order are cherished.

Right off the bat, the report’s authors note that “Florida ranks 2nd for net gain of one-way customers; California last for sixth year in a row.”

Time to leave.

Read it.

Zarai Maza survived a torched vehicle and a horrific car crash after peacefully protesting the Venezuelan regime, an unacceptable act in her home country, where speaking out could cost you your life or those of your family members.

She said she believes that the Venezuelan dictatorship was trying to kill her over her activism.

“They started the persecution against me in 2014, and it lasted until 2017,” Maza said. “They made three assassination attempts against my life, and after the last one, I was in the hospital. I couldn’t remember anything.”

Read it.

The Transportation Security Administration flagged nearly $700 million in cash found in passengers’ luggage departing the Minneapolis airport over the past two years.

Homeland Security officials said the outflow is linked to Somali immigrants and money couriers.

DHS officials are conducting a fraud investigation in Minneapolis, according to Secretary Kristi Noem, but it’s unclear whether the outflow is part of the probe.

Read it.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday signed a presidential memorandum directing the U.S. to withdraw from 66 international organizations that the White House said no longer serve American interests.

The White House said the directive orders all executive departments and agencies to stop participating in and funding 35 non-United Nations organizations and 31 U.N. entities that the administration concluded operate contrary to U.S. national interests, security, economic prosperity, or sovereignty.

The White House said the action follows a review of every international intergovernmental organization, convention, and treaty that the U.S. belongs to, funds, or otherwise supports.

And about fargin time. We waste entirely too much money on this socialist crap.

Read it.

As they do.

NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s newly installed tenant advocate, Cea Weaver – a limousine liberal (socialist), popped out of her apartment in Crown Heights, Brooklyn Wednesday (a historically black neighborhood until people like Weaver priced out longtime residents) – only to start crying and run back inside when reporters asked her about her mother’s $1.6 million home in Nashville, Tennessee.

Read it.

America’s interstate highways, the backbone of its economy and critical infrastructure, are increasingly traversed by an invisible fleet of truck drivers tied to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Through lax enforcement of non-domiciled Commercial Driver’s Licenses (CDLs), Beijing-linked networks are exploiting glaring gaps in U.S. visibility and oversight, placing unvetted operators behind the wheels of 80,000-pound vehicles. This is not merely a safety issue—it represents a deliberate national security vulnerability.

At the center stands the Chinese American Trucker Organization USA Inc. (CATOU), a New York-based nonprofit whose chairwoman, Geng Hang, has held leadership roles in organizations affiliated with the CCP’s United Front Work Department, a known influence and intelligence arm.

Newsbusters.

s The Atlantic magazine trying to send its readers a not so secret message? Although it’s profile of California Governor Gavin Newsom by Helen Lewis on Tuesday, “The Front-Runner,” was generally positive it was also chock full of Gettys as in the oil fortune family of patriarch J. Paul Getty.

In fact the name “Getty” was so important in Newsom’s personal, business, and political background that it appeared a total of 22 times in the article (including the Getty Images attributions of five of the photos used). Although a Republican presidential hopeful so attached to a family whose fortune was based on oil would be savaged for the connection, with Newsom it seems to be okay because of the magic (D) by his name.

Back in power 5 years later, Trump has all but erased the stain of Jan. 6 (Kyle Cheney/Politico)  But it will stick to Biden forever.

5 years ago today (Politico) Whatever happens, everything is/was/will be Trump’s fault.

Senate Democrats Say Rubio Has Had a ‘Full MAGA-Lobotomy’ (NOTUS)  As if Rubio cares what Senate Democrats say.

Court watchers fear Emil Bove’s ‘level of allegiance’ to Trump (Erica Orden/Politico)

Trump’s Venezuela adventure is already a propaganda disaster (Paul Waldman/Public Notice) On his planet.

Trump Blurts Out Dark Truth about Venezuela Plan–and about MAGA Voters (Greg Sargent/New Republic)  Greta Greg Sargent loses his shit.

Greenland could be next — Emboldened by the Venezuelan operation, Trump is seeking a foreign balm for domestic pain (Edward Luce/Financial Times)

Where Trump could strike next (Sean McMinn/Politico) Minnesota, I hope.

Trump May Have Accidentally Pardoned the Jan. 6 Pipe Bomber (Ankush Khardori/Politico)

NPR Faults Trump Labeling Maduro ‘Dictator’ After Years of Smearing Him Same Way

Five years later, these 10 corporations still aren’t funding election deniers (Popular Information)

There Is a Sickness Eating Away at American Democracy (Jamelle Bouie/New York Times)  By ‘American democracy’, of course, the Narrative Media mean ‘Democrat rule’.

Lawmakers battle over how — and whether — Jan. 6 should be remembered (Paul Kane/Washington Post)

More than 2 million Epstein documents still unreleased, officials say (Kelly Kasulis Cho/Washington Post) EPSTEIN! EPSTEIN! EPSTEIN!

DOJ says millions of Epstein files have yet to be released (Kyle Cheney/Politico) EPSTEIN! EPSTEIN! EPSTEIN!

Trump administration sparks midterm vaccine war (Caitlin Owens/Axios)  Because, as we all know, if vaccines aren’t on the government vaccine recommended list, no parents will have their kid receive that vaccination.

“Neocon smear”: MAGA rejects pure isolationism after Maduro capture (Tal Axelrod/Axios) The Narrative Media mind-readers are out in force.

Republican-turned-Democrat George Conway is running for Congress in New York to ‘fight Trumpism’ (Allan Smith/NBC News)  One benefit of Trump—he makes the RINOs show their true colors.

Jan. 6 Never Ended (Jamie Raskin/New York Times) On his planet.

US abandons child exploitation and drug cases to prioritize ICE, Democrats allege (Sam Levin/The Guardian)  As if dealing with one isn’t dealing with the others. These people cannot connect the dots to save their lives.

Dems use Venezuela to hammer affordability issues at home (Politico)  Gas was $2.19 in Plano, Texas, yesterday. That’s the kind of ‘affordability crisis’ I can get behind.

Trump’s Assault on the Environment Has Been Even Worse Than Experts Predicted (Thor Benson/Rolling Stone)  I remember when Rolling Stone wrote about music. Yes, I am that old.

MAGA’s Foundational Lie (Jeffrey Goldberg/The Atlantic)  MAGA is the New Nazi.

Sweeping Minimum-Wage Hikes Take Hold Across the Country (Jared Mitovich/Wall Street Journal)  And yet proglodytes blame the ‘affordability crisis’ on Trump. What do they think makes prices go up?

U.S. allies warn Trump over threats to seize Greenland (Alexander Smith/NBC News)  Trump has made no such threats. He just said he thinks Greenland is important to our national security. The rest is proglodyte fever dreams.

On this Jan. 6, remember the violence of 2020’s BLM riots (Christopher Tremoglie/Washington Examiner)

‘Biggest Mistake’: MAGA Loses It After Hilton Allegedly Cancels ICE Agents’ Reservations (Ben Blanchet/HuffPost)  ‘Loses it’? Say rather ‘wins it’.

January 6th and the Never-Ending Coup (William Kristol/The Bulwark)  William Kristol and the never-ending lies.

January 6, five years on: sustained effort by Trump to rewrite history (Sam Levine/The Guardian) Proglodytes always accuse you of what they are doing—or planning to do.

On January 6, PolitiFact Boasts of Its Activism Against Conservatives on Riot Narratives

Trump Mocks Paid Pro-Maduro Protesters

January 6 Is Five Years Behind Us. The Threat It Exposed Is Not. (Adam Kinzinger)  Democrats feel threatened! *yawn*

History Bends Toward Distortion When Accountability is Denied (Harry Dunn/Meidas+)  And nobody can deny accountability like proglodytes.

Trump Chooses the Path of Hitler, Stalin and Genghis Khan (David Rothkopf/Need to Know) Don’t forget Lenin and Mao, heroes of the Left.

Words & Phrases? — Donald Trump’s pathetic and grammatically flawed attempt to affix … (Jennifer Rubin/The Contrarian)  Jennifer Rubin loses her shit.

The Trump doctrine exposes the US as a mafia state (Jan-Werner Müller/The Guardian)

The Emperor’s New Oil Wealth (Paul Krugman) The vacuum speaks.

Trump triggers a renaissance for grand juries (Josh Gerstein/Politico)

The Military Isn’t MAGA — The Uniform Code of Military Justice should not suppress free speech. (Adam Serwer/The Atlantic)  The UCMJ supresses all sorts of ‘free speech’. That’s one of the rights on which one accepts constraints when one joins the military.

Awkward: Biden Forced To Pay Trump The $25 Million Bounty For Capturing Maduro (Babylon Bee).

Europe and Rest of World Try to Come to Terms With Trump the Imperialist (Steven Erlanger/New York Times)  What worries them is Trump the competent imperialist—Obama and Biden were incompetent imperialists, so nothing to worry about.

Read it.

Harvard University has removed a residential dean after a student-run news outlet resurfaced years of social media posts attacking “whiteness,” condemning police, and defending looting and rioting, prompting renewed scrutiny of ideological bias on elite campuses, the New York Post reported on Wednesday.

Gregory Davis, the former Allston Burr resident dean of Dunster House, was removed from his post effective immediately, according to an email sent to students by Dunster House faculty leadership that was obtained by Fox News Digital.

The decision followed reporting in October by Yard Report, a Harvard student-run outlet, which uncovered posts Davis made on X and Instagram between 2019 and 2024.

Read it.

Larry Page, the Google co-founder and world’s second-richest person, has reportedly left California as momentum builds behind a proposed wealth tax targeting billionaires, The Telegraph reports.

Page has shifted the registrations of several key entities — including his family office and a flying-car venture — from California to Delaware, according to state filings.

Can’t quite make his brain make the shift to Florida or Texas, but he’ll come around.

Time to leave.

Read it.

While today’s ADP report was a solid rebound from the worst monthly report in years (even if it missed expectations due to a sudden plunge in California payrolls), the same could not be said for the JOLTS job opening report that followed less than two hours later, and which was another epic disaster: for the month of November (recall JOLTS lags the payrolls report by a month), the US had only 7.146 million job openings, a huge drop from the 7.670 million in October (which was conveniently revised lower to 7.449 million) and the lowest since September 2024.

Pretty sad when we have to depend on government jobs programs to give us positive employment numbers.

Read it.

Attacks by leftist activists are rising in Germany, with the latest targeting Berlin’s power network and leaving tens of thousands without electricity in freezing winter conditions. The muted response from establishment officials has raised concerns that such violence is being systematically downplayed.

In the year up to November 30th, 2025, the federal government recorded 931 left-wing motivated violent crimes—an increase of approximately 45%. This finding, published in Junge Freiheit on Tuesday, was brought about by a parliamentary question submitted by the right-wing Alternative für Deutschland.

The Berlin power outage, which reports say will end after just over four days on January 7th, is already understood to have resulted in several vulnerable citizens dying. One CDU official even accepted on Saturday that the targeted attack could result in “hundreds to thousands of deaths.”

Read it.

UK PM Keir Starmer and his Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood have announced a new program to tackle the greatest threat to women in the United Kingdom.

English schoolboys.

The new program announced by PM Starmer and Secretary Mahmood will train teachers to “spot early signs of misogyny in boys”. Boys who are flagged for misogyny will be directed to special classes on the dangers of ‘toxic masculinity’ and maleness.

Rather than deal with the real problem, the Starmer government and Home Secretary Mahmood have decided, in the words of the BBC headline, “Schoolboys to be target of UK’s violence against women strategy.” This comes even as the country is reeling after a video showed two Afghan Muslim migrant refugees dragging away a 15-year-old girl into the bushes while she pleads for help and then raping her.

But these are not the ‘schoolboys’ that Starmer and Mahmood are going to war against. So the authorities did their best to cover up the horrifying assault, falsely implying that the two Afghans were local boys and trying to suppress their identities.

“There are cultural differences,” the lawyer for one of the Afghan Muslim rapists argued. “He is not used to a society where women are free and deemed equal to men.”

Read it.

GBNews reports that migrants in France have posted videos on social media, including TikTok, providing step-by-step guidance on how to cross into Britain. The ‘tutorial’ shows individuals attempting to board moving lorries, often hiding behind bushes or trees before running and jumping into the space between the driver’s cabin and the trailer.

Charities say that lorry attempts are mostly undertaken by migrants who cannot afford professional smuggling services via small boats. However, the method carries high risks. In April 2024, a Sudanese man was struck and killed while attempting to board a lorry, and in June 2024, another migrant was crushed by metal bars inside a vehicle.

Tighter security in Calais has made lorry routes less popular, with small boats remaining the main method for crossing the Channel. One video begins with an unsuccessful attempt, where the lorry is moving too fast for the individual to get on. The Arabic caption reads, “The next one will be better.”

Read it.

A major controversy has erupted in France after an Islamist book openly promoting violence against homosexuals, Jews, and Christians was found to be on sale at the French retailer Fnac and can reportedly be purchased with the government-sponsored Culture Pass. The revelations have triggered strong reactions from politicians, who are calling for immediate action.

The book, titled Péchés et Guérison (‘Sins and Healing’) claims to authenticate Islamic hadiths and includes passages that explicitly justify the killing of homosexuals and promote hatred toward Jews and Christians. Excerpts cited by activist Yohan Pawer include statements such as calls to execute homosexuals by stoning them and references to religious violence against non-Muslims.

Read it.

A report from Samnytt provides an unprecedented look inside Sweden’s Migration Agency, highlighting challenges related to staff composition, workplace culture, and internal practices. Sources who have worked at the agency for decades describe a complex environment shaped by linguistic groups, clan affiliations, and internal loyalties.

Currently, a majority of the agency’s approximately 6,000 employees come from non-Swedish backgrounds. Many do not hold Swedish citizenship, and staff often speak their own language within their group. According to a source, “What affects things most is that everyone speaks their own language, so you don’t understand what is being said between groups and colleagues.” This dynamic, combined with longstanding clan networks, has reportedly introduced a Middle Eastern clan mentality into daily operations.

The source described how group loyalties influence decisions on residence permits, work permits, and other administrative matters, sometimes benefiting relatives or clan members. This behavior became so normalized that it happens openly, without any fear of internal consequences. Additionally, chants and songs such as “from the river to the sea” have been heard in the agency’s break room, reflecting political or cultural affiliations among some staff.

Newsbusters.

Yeah,  by people like The Daily Show.

Read it.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has confirmed that Abukar Dahir Osman, Somalia’s permanent representative to the United Nations and the current president of the U.N. Security Council, is associated with an Ohio-based home health care company that the federal government previously took action against following a Medicaid fraud conviction.

My, what a surprise.

Read it.

The Washington Post recently published a detailed investigation showing that childhood vaccination rates across the United States are falling sharply, particularly for measles. Fewer counties now meet the 95 percent coverage level commonly associated with herd immunity, and millions of children attend schools in communities below that threshold.

On the basics, it’s true that routine childhood measles shots are among the most effective measures for keeping that particular infection at bay. But the Post’s analysis fails where it matters most: it cannot explain why trust has collapsed so broadly, so persistently, and so rationally for many ordinary people.

Instead, readers are offered a familiar diagnosis. Distrust of authorities. Political polarization. Misinformation. Backlash against mandates. All of this is curiously detached from responsibility. The article describes the consequences of distrust without confronting its causes.

I know nothing, nothiiiinnnnggg….

Associated Press, a Voice of the Crust.

Federal prosecutors filed charges Monday against Karen Bennett of Stone Mountain, accusing her of one count of making false statements to collect $13,940.

Bennett waived indictment, pleaded not guilty and was released on $10,000 bail after a Monday court appearance.

Lawyers for Bennett did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment Tuesday. In federal court, waiving indictment is often a prelude to a defendant pleading guilty.

Bennett, a Democrat, resigned from the House on Thursday. She was first elected in 2012, representing a district covering parts of DeKalb and Gwinnett counties.

She’s the second Democratic House member to be charged with lying to obtain federal unemployment assistance during the pandemic. Rep. Sharon Henderson, a Covington Democrat, was indicted in December on charges of theft of government funds and making false statements, accused of illegally collecting $17,811 in unemployment benefits. Henderson is free on bail and remains in office. Republican Gov. Brian Kemp has not yet appointed a review commission to determine whether Henderson should be suspended from office after the indictment.

Read it.

Hilton Worldwide Holdings has removed from its system the ?Minneapolis hotel that ?canceled the bookings of Immigration and Customs Enforcement ?agents, the hotel operator said in a post on X on ?Tuesday.

After ICE officers booked rooms using official government emails and rates, ?Hilton canceled their reservations, the Department of Homeland ?Security said in a post on social media platform X on Monday.

“We are taking immediate ?action to remove ?this ?hotel from our systems. Hilton is-and has ?always been-a welcoming place for all,” the statement ?from Hilton said. In a previous statement, the company said the ?hotel ?in question ?is independently owned and operated.

ATQUE: Hilton’s Swift Response to DHS Snub Shows How the Left’s Institutional Power Has Faded

Read it.

A beloved North Carolina science teacher and mother of two was killed in her Raleigh home after a judge released a mentally ill defendant despite prosecutors warning that he should not be free, authorities said.

Zoe Walsh, a longtime science teacher at Ravenscroft School in Raleigh, North Carolina, was assaulted and killed early Jan. 3 after calling 911 to report a man breaking into her home, according to police, reports Newsmax’s Jason Mattera on “Wake Up America” on Tuesday.

“This was a senseless murder. [He] should have been in jail, should have never been let out of jail,” one family member said.

There seems to be something seriously wrong with our judges.

Read it.

Is there something fundamentally wrong with a celebrity being conservative? According to the political left, such a prospect calls for immediate and uncompromising punishment from the woke cult. After all, conservative movie and music stars are rare for a reason – They get blacklisted.

The cancel mob is still around despite numerous political defeats in recent years, and now they want to collect the head of singer Nicki Minaj for their trophy room. Minaj came to the US as a child immigrant from Trinidad to join her legal immigrant parents. The sponsorship status from her family members allows her to reside in the country.

However, because she has not yet received a green card, leftists believe that this is an opportunity to challenge the Trump Administration to “live up to its deportation policies” and remove Minaj from the US. In other words, it’s the classic Alinsky tactic of attempting to make their opponents seem like hypocrites because they won’t apply their principles universally.

Several Change.org petitions to deport Nicki Minaj to her native Trinidad and Tobago have amassed more than 120,000 signatures combined. The most popular petition – garnering over 83,000 signatures – started on July 9, 2025. There are also at least three other petitions created between Dec. 21 and 28, 2025, that coincide with Minaj’s Dec. 21 appearance alongside conservative activist Erika Kirk at Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest, where the rapper praised President Donald Trump’s administration.

Nobody seriously believes that anyone in the Trump administration will pay any attention to these exercises in virtue-signaling—Alinsky never dreamed of somebody like Trump, who doesn’t give a shit what other people think—except perhaps some of the more delusional narcissists on the fringe. Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing….

Big Law walks away from democracy (Marc Elias/Democracy Docket)

Nearly 200 Sue Trump WH Over Immigration Case Freeze

Lawsuit challenges Trump’s authority on immigration pause (Brittany Gibson/Axios)

Transcript: Marjorie Taylor Greene Wrecks Trump in Harsh Maduro Tirade (New Republic)  On their planet.

CNN Tries Having Its Cake and Eating It Too With Latest Stupid Griping Over Trump Economy

Schumer calls out DOJ for not providing unredacted Epstein contacts (Cheyanne M. Daniels/Politico)  EPSTEIN! EPSTEIN! EPSTEIN!

Trump’s Betrayal of Venezuela’s Democracy Movement Is Hard to Overstate (Larry Diamond/The UnPopulist)  But he’ll do his best.

Four questions on what happens next for Trump in Venezuela (Amber Phillips/Washington Post)  Just so you know what the Narrative is going to be.

For Many Jan. 6 Rioters, a Pardon From Trump Wasn’t Enough (New York Times)  Trying to make sure that the cancelled stay cancelled.

The most shameful day in American history (Robert Reich)  Robert Reich loses his shit. (More shameful than the day Bill Clinton did the job on an intern? Strange standards….)

US foes and allies denounce Trump’s ‘crime of aggression’ in Venezuela at UN meeting (David Smith/The Guardian)  As expected.

Trump Cannot Slash NIH Research Funding, Court Rules

Trump’s actions in Venezuela have Latin America on edge (Vox)  Not to mention the Usual Suspects in the Narrative Media.

Michigan teachers weaving lessons on Jan. 6 uprising into history classes (Kim Kozlowski/Associated Press)  To guarantee that kids growing up know that Orange Man Bad. Can’t leave something like that to chance, or risk them thinking for themselves.

From grudging respect to unease: Russia weighs up fall of Maduro (Pjotr Sauer/The Guardian)

Starlink Offers Free Internet in Venezuela After Maduro Arrest

N.Y. Gov. Hochul Says She Lectured Trump on Venezuela  She lives in a world where lecturing Trump has a beneficial effect. Somebody break the news to her that that trick never works. (I’m sure it was just a mandatory virtue-signal.)

WH: Democrats Turn on Maduro Arrest Because Trump Did It  Yeah, pretty much.

Trump’s Retro Imperialism (Jonathan Chait/The Atlantic)

Jack Smith’s Testimony: A Reminder that Donald J. Trump Owns All of It (Mimi Rocah/The Contrarian)

Donald Trump Is Drunk on War (Jeet Heer/The Nation)  I guess that’s why he’s trying to stop wars all over the globe. Good to know.

The straight line between Trump’s Jan. 6 terrorist attack and his attack on Venezuela (Dean Obeidallah/The Dean’s Report)

Network Of Left-Wing Nonprofits Raced To Counter Trump’s Narrative Of Maduro Raid

Oil First, America Last — We’re barely a week into 2026 and Trump has already thrown … (Brian Tyler Cohen) Apparently everything Trump does is either about oil or Epstein.

The Venezuela Invasion Is Going to Backfire. Here’s How (Mehdi Hasan/Zeteo)

At the U.N., Even Allies Condemn U.S. Action in Venezuela (Farnaz Fassihi/New York Times)

Donroe Doctrine: The war for minerals, oil and AI (Axios)

Read it.

I already support it; you don’t have to sell it to me.

Read it.

Now that Mamdani is signing executive orders and staffing up for real he’s showing that he is exactly what he said he was. He really is going to give the 51% of people who voted for him exactly what they were asking for, whether they really knew what that meant or not.

In less than a week into office, Mamdani is showing his true colors, as a true believing socialist who sympathizes with left-wing South American dictators and aims to conduct a socialist experiment on what had been the financial capital of the United States.

Newsbusters.

As you should expect, NPR Morning Edition anchor Steve Inskeep is a cheerleader for his “news” network. On his Substack page came a titled “Public radio may be stronger in 2026.”

Inskeep objected to a recent puff piece on NPR’s CEO by Benjamin Mullin in The New York Times, as it discussed the “terrible blow” of losing taxpayer funding, the system is “far weaker overall.” Inskeep argued his visits to local stations didn’t match that verdict, and insisted that internal ratings reports suggested his show was up a million listeners last spring. But the part about NPR’s bias was ludicrous:

All you need to do is look at what they cover and what they ignore. The bias is obvious.

Read it.

Never did we ever imagine Fox News would run a headline that sounds ZeroHedge-style: “Second front: How a socialist cell in the US mobilized pro-Maduro foot soldiers within 12 hours.”

Yet here we are in 2026. Former Wall Street Journal reporter Asra Nomani, now at Fox News, is investigating the left-wing, billionaire-funded dark money networks in the nonprofit world and offering much-needed coverage for mainstream Americans on how these NGOs influence protest movements, unleash riots, and conduct sophisticated political pressure campaigns (color revolutions).

Coverage on the billionaire Democratic kings and their NGO empires that are in an all-out war against President Trump, his MAGA supporters, and anything America First is becoming mainstream in a very quick way, as the censorship cartel from Europe to the Americas has seen a degradation in their ability to control fake news narratives.

Eugene Volokh.

Today’s New York Times reports on a new study by three economists purporting to show that the Supreme Court’s decisions are increasingly tilted toward the interests of the rich, and suggesting that this may play a role in rising economic inequality.

…

The study, “Ruling for the Rich: The Supreme Court Over Time,” by Andrea Prat, Fiona Scott Morton, and Jacob Spitz, was posted as an NBER working paper, and has not yet been peer-reviewed or (to my knowledge) accepted anywhere for publication. But that did not stop it from getting a the full-article treatment in the NYT.

Having looked at the study, I don’t think it does much of anything to reliably substantiate its claims. It is both conceptually muddled and poorly executed. At most it shows that (surprise!) Republican Supreme Court nominees have become more conservative over time (a point I made to the Times), but that is hardly a revelation.

Of course, to the New York Times (and other Voices of the Crust), anything that ‘favors the rich’, whether deserved or not, whether benefitting the country or not, is to be deplored.

The Financial Times, a Voice of the Crust.

(The Financial Times is the British analog of the Wall Street Journal—if the Wall Street Journal were run by the staff of Mother Jones.)

Venezuela’s government has launched a crackdown in the wake of the US capture of Nicolás Maduro, arresting journalists and deploying paramilitary forces to suppress any show of support for the authoritarian leader’s removal.

The wave of repression comes as Delcy Rodríguez, Maduro’s former deputy and the country’s new leader, moved to consolidate her hold over the oil-rich nation in the wake of the surprise US commando operation, which snatched Maduro from a military base to face trial.

Gun-toting paramilitaries known as colectivos have been deployed to the streets of Caracas under a state of emergency announced on Monday, which forbade Venezuelans from showing support for the US raid. Media unions said 14 journalists and media workers — 11 from foreign outlets — had been detained for hours before being released.

Most of the arrests of journalists took place around the National Assembly building as Rodríguez — whom US President Donald Trump said would lead a government open to Washington’s interests — was formally sworn in as acting president, according to the National Syndicate for Press Workers in Venezuela.

Since US commandos seized Maduro and his politician wife Cilia Flores on Saturday, the remainder of his regime has sought to stifle public celebration.

Thereby proving Trump’s point, and outing American Democrats as anti-democracy statists.

ATQUE: Venezuela detains journalists and seizes communication devices after Maduro’s removal (Sibylla Brodzinsky/The Guardian)

NBC News, a Voice of the Crust.

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting — which helped fund NPR, PBS and many local radio and TV stations — is officially shutting down, months after Congress passed spending cuts that stripped it of more than $1 billion in funding.

CPB’s board of directors voted to dissolve the private, nonprofit corporation after 58 years of service, the organization announced in a news release Monday.

“For more than half a century, CPB existed to ensure that all Americans—regardless of geography, income, or background—had access to trusted news, educational programming, and local storytelling,” said Patricia Harrison, CPB’s president and CEO.

And the Deep State is PISSED.

CNBC, a Voice of the Crust.

The Department of Homeland Security on Monday blasted Hilton Hotels, saying that DHS officers had a reservation abruptly canceled by a Minneapolis hotel because of their work on immigration enforcement.

The price of Hilton shares dipped by around 2% after the criticism by DHS in a social media post.

“NO ROOM AT THE INN!,” DHS said on its X social media account.

“HiltonHotels has launched a coordinated campaign in Minneapolis to REFUSE service to DHS law enforcement,” the tweet said.

“When officers attempted to book rooms using official government emails and rates, Hilton Hotels maliciously CANCELLED their reservations,” DHS said. “This is UNACCEPTABLE. Why is Hilton Hotels siding with murderers and rapists to deliberately undermine and impede DHS law enforcement from their mission to enforce our nation’s immigration laws?”

Apparently shareholdrs don’t want to get in the line of fire between a woke corporation and the Trump troop.

ATQUE: Hilton Hotel Plunges Into PR Crisis Mode After “Coordinated Campaign” To Cancel ICE Agent Bookings

UPDATE: Hilton Says Minnesota Hotel Apologized Over Cancelled DHS Rooms (Hadriana Lowenkron/Bloomberg)

Read it.

A U.S. judge Monday rejected Amazon.com’s bid to dismiss a proposed class-action lawsuit accusing the online retailer ?of price gouging during the COVID-19 pandemic.

‘Price-gouging’ sounds pretty horrible until you realize that it has no definite meaning but is just another of those statist smear-terms (like ‘black market’ or ‘war profiteering’) created for the sole purpose of beating on people who the accuser doesn’t like. ‘Price-gouging’ boils down to ‘you’re charging more for your product than I think is proper’, a verbal finger-wag that has no hint of anything other than disapproval.

Read it.

That the radical Left worldwide would celebrate the inauguration of communist Zohran Mamdani as mayor of New York City was entirely predictable. What is striking, however, is the ostentatious triumphalism displayed at a time when the Trump administration is systematically exposing illegal extraction mechanisms and financial flows step by step.

It is a moment of celebration for the radical Left in the United States. After the defeat in the 2024 presidential election, the inauguration of Zohran Kwame Mamdani—the first Muslim mayor of New York City—marked the resurgence of socialist forces within the Democratic Party.

Naturally, the ever-shrill Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was present, as was leftist know-it-all Bernie Sanders, who administered Mamdani’s oath on the Quran.

Read it.

Brand-new Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson is denying allegations that one of her orders ends arrests of public drug use in the city.

The Seattle Police Officers Guild on Sunday issued a statement stating city leaders issued a directive halting such arrests and instead promoted diversion program recommendations.

Read it.

Trump’s successful “special military operation” in Venezuela has prompted a flurry of reactions from governments across the world.

Venezuela’s strategic Russian and Chinese partners predictably condemned the US’ capture of President Nicolas Maduro while the US’ EU junior partner released a statement that lacked any criticism of the US but also didn’t endorse its actions either.

Therein lies the hypocrisy that was just exposed by the US’ “special military operation” in Venezuela since the EU would have certainly condemned Russia’s hypothetical capture of Zelensky in the harshest language possible.

Their implied excuse for these double standards towards the US’ capture of Maduro is that he’s illegitimate, but Russia now deems Zelensky to be illegitimate too, so third parties’ assessments of other leaders’ legitimacy is ultimately subjective and this leads to the reality that was just exposed.

At the end of the day, Great Powers like the US (which is arguably still a superpower even if it was hitherto in decline till Trump’s return to office) always pursue their perceived interests but cloak them in the language of international law or norms, which is more palatable for the global public.

Welcome to the Real World.sd

The Telegraph (UK).

The hammer-wielding intruder accused of smashing the windows of JD Vance’s house is the transgender child of a Democratic donor.

William DeFoor, 26, was charged on Monday with obstructing official business, criminally damaging or endangering, criminal trespass and vandalism after an overnight break-in at the vice-president’s £1m home in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Police and federal officers swarmed the five-bedroom residence early on Monday morning after a suspect smashed several windows of the Vances’ property with a hammer and tried to break in, according to officials.

DeFoor, who attended a $27,000 (£20,000)-a-year Catholic school now appears to identify as a woman, going by the name Julia, according to the Daily Mail.

ATQUE: Crazy People Are Dangerous: Psycho Vandalizes J.D. Vance’s Ohio Home (The Other McCain)

Key Epstein Deadline Arrives as Attention Turns to Venezuela (Catherine Bouris/The Daily Beast)  Forget Venezula—EPSTEIN! EPSTEIN! EPSTEIN!

Democrats Begin to Call for Trump’s Impeachment Over Venezuela Attack (Amelia Benavides-Colón/NOTUS)

Democrats Begin to Call for Trump’s Impeachment Over Venezuela Attack (Amelia Benavides-Colón/NOTUS) I’m surprised it took them this long.

The Politics of Trump’s Idiotic and Illegal Venezuela War (Dan Pfeiffer/The Message Box)

Secret meetings point to inside job to take down Maduro (Cody Weddle/Telegraph)

Chinese Social Media Explodes: US Invasion Of Venezuela A ‘Template’ For Move On Taiwan I think they might be surprised….

Denmark PM urges Trump to stop threats to take over Greenland (Reuters)  Trump, of course, has made no such threats. The guilty flee where no man pursueth.

What Maduro’s ouster means for Trump’s mass deportation campaign (Washington Post)

A Pardon and a Prosecution in New York Show Trump’s Personal Geopolitics (Jonah E. Bromwich/New York Times)

NPR Sounds Like DNC Radio, Promotes Trump-Trashing Takes on Venezuela

‘The perfect storm’: Trump has left the US less prepared for natural disasters, experts say (Gabrielle Canon/The Guardian)  Because, as we all know, natural disasters are TOTALLY the responsibility of the Federal government—and the Federal taxpayer.

Trump amplifies conspiracies on killing of Minnesota lawmaker (Washington Post)

CNN’s Bash Repeatedly Pushes Talking Point That Venezuela Invasion Is Not ‘America First’  Not that anyone at CNN cares, of course.

Trump’s Move for Regime Change in Venezuela Threatens a New MAGA Rift (New York Times)

A New Trump Game Plan Takes Shape: Strike and Coerce (Wall Street Journal)  Demonstrably more effective than the Democrat game plan of whine and wring hands.

Maduro’s Ouster Plays Right Into Putin’s Hands (M. Gessen/New York Times)

Gunboat Diplomacy Is Back. What Could Go Wrong? (David French/New York Times)  Well, David French could go wrong—and, indeed, is, habitually.

Marjorie Taylor Greene’s requiem for MAGA (Christian Paz/Vox)

Frenzied Trump, 79, Posts Almost 100 Times in an Hour in Late-Night Rampage (Janna Brancolini/The Daily Beast)  Frenzied! Rampage!

Minnesota day care hoax is fueled by MAGA psychosexual weirdness (Amanda Marcotte/Salon)  Amanda Marcotte loses her shit.

Hundreds of judges reject Trump’s mandatory detention policy, with no end in sight (Kyle Cheney/Politico)

Venezuela raid enriches MAGA billionaire (Judd Legum/Popular Information)

If We had a Functional Constitution, We Wouldn’t have an Illegal War (Jennifer Rubin/The Contrarian)  Jennifer Rubin loses her shit.

Trump’s coup in Venezuela didn’t just break the rules – it showed there aren’t any. We’ll all regret that (Nesrine Malik/The Guardian)

This Is What Happens When America Goes Mad (Steven Beschloss/America, America)

The Week Ahead — What is Donald Trump running away from so hard? (Joyce Vance/Civil Discourse …)

Did Trump really invade Venezuela for oil? (Eric Levitz/Vox)

Marjorie Taylor Greene’s Big Breakup (Charles Bethea/New Yorker)

The Danger and Foolishness of Trump’s Foreign Policy (William Kristol/The Bulwark)

Patriots, Take to the Streets — If Washington won’t lead, we must. (Julie Roginsky/Salty Politics …)  After all, ‘the streets’ are where the virtue signals live.

Trump’s ‘American Dominance’ May Leave Us With Nothing (Anne Applebaum/The Atlantic)

MAGA media link Trump’s overthrow of Maduro to 2020 election conspiracy theories (Matt Gertz/Media Matters for America)  There’s that MAGA guy again—and apparently he has media. Who knew?

Read it.

SEIU, the massively powerful and radical health care union, claims that California faces a ‘healthcare collapse’ due to what it calls ‘federal funding cuts’ and only an ’emergency’ 5% tax on the total net worth of anyone with over $1 billion in assets will save the state’s health care.

There are no actual ‘cuts’, what SEIU and much of California’s Democrat machine falsely describes as cuts is actually MediCal (California’s name for Medicaid) getting work requirements for healthy adults and paperwork requirements expected to force illegal aliens off MediCal.

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s efforts to provide free health care to illegal aliens is what actually endangered the state’s health care funding. The only people losing MediCal are the people who shouldn’t have it in the first place. California Democrats are however too beholden to SEIU and its rival the California Nurses Association to graciously accept the much needed reforms.

Read it.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is rushing to block President Trump’s successful operation to arrest Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, labeling it “lawlessness” and a violation of congressional authority—despite Schumer himself and a string of Democrats and their media mouthpieces previously blasting Trump for failing to end the Maduro regime.

With Maduro now in custody and the U.S. overseeing a transition in Venezuela, Democrats have immediately cried foul, with Schumer appearing on ABC’s “This Week” to decry the move as unauthorized nation-building that will cost American lives and dollars.

Schumer declared, “The American people this morning are scratching their heads in wonderment and in fear of what the president has proposed,” adding, “We have learned through years when America tries to do regime change and nation building in this way, the American people pay the price in both blood and in dollars.”

Read it.

NYC Mayor Zorhan Mamdani’s newly appointed tenant advocate called to “seize private property” and called home ownership a “weapon of white supremacy” in several posts on her now-deleted X account.

In another tweet from August 2019, she said “Private property including any kind of ESPECIALLY homeownership is a weapon of white supremacy.”

Ah, the Warm Glow of Socialist Hate.

Read it.

Legacy media have echoed Democrats’ dour talking points in an effort to cast a pall on President Donald Trump’s first year back in office, but a look back at the year 2025 reveals there was significant good news to be had for those willing to see it.

Here are 10 items of good news from 2025.

Read it.

It’s difficult to reconcile the doom mongering over Venezuela becoming the “next Iraq or Afghanistan” when the Venezuelan populace is largely celebrating the capture of Nicolás Maduro. When one recognizes that Maduro stole the Venezuelan elections, that he’s not the true leader of the country and that his communist regime organized a reign of terror against the populace to eliminate political opposition, it’s easy to see why Donald Trump’s black-bag operation is being applauded by the people who actually matter.

Read it.

Move over Nancy Pelosi, there’s a new insider trader, err, investor in town whose portfolio has you beat.

Pelosi’s investment record during her decades in Congress has long drawn criticism, with her portfolio posting a whopping 54% return last year. The California Democrat, who plans to depart at the conclusion of her term in January 2027, recorded a more modest 18% gain in 2025—still a figure that would make some on Wall Street blush.

In 2025, Rep. Tom Suozzi (D- NY) led all Democrats with the strongest portfolio performance, according to data reviewed by The New York Post. The figures come from alternative-data platform Quiver Quantitative, which tracks congressional stock transactions amid heightened public and political fallout from lawmakers’ investment returns.

Suozzi’s portfolio rose 35%, substantially exceeding major market indexes, including the Dow Jones Industrial Average’s 14% gain, the S&P 500’s 17% advance and the Nasdaq Composite’s 21% increase, according to data provided exclusively to The Post by Quiver Quantitative.

“Some members seemed to spend more time managing their portfolios than they did at their day job on Capitol Hill,” Quiver Quantitative CEO Christopher Kardatzke told The Post. “We have seen members making day trades, options trades, and – for the first time ever – meme coin trades.”

Read it.

The demographic landscape of Vienna is shifting rapidly, with a record number of newborns lacking Austrian citizenship despite being born within the country. According to recent data from Statistics Austria, 40.5 percent of babies born in the capital do not have Austrian citizenship — a figure that has doubled from 20 percent just two decades ago.

In several Viennese districts, the statistics are even more striking. In areas such as Favoriten, Ottakring, and Rudolfsheim-Fünfhaus, the share of non-Austrian newborns has surpassed 50 percent. While these children are born on Austrian soil, they are not legally considered citizens, according to data from Heute newspaper.

This data comes at a time when 40.9% of all of Vienna’s population is foreign-born. Over 50 percent have both parents born overseas.

Read it.

Dutch migration researcher and social scientist Ruud Koopmans has described the current rapid naturalizations as a “demographic time bomb” that could lead to 7 million Syrians in Germany within 50 years. Koopmans says that family reunification is the main factor, and with many relatives of these newly naturalized migrants having the right to reunification, it could transform Germany.

he last far-left German government of Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

“One must consider whether refugees should be given access to German citizenship so quickly. If they are German nationals, there is no limit on family migration. Then any possibility of managing these migration flows is gone,“ he said in an interview with Cicero.

“This rapid naturalization can be considered a demographic time bomb in the long run,” he added.

He stated that the so-called “turbo naturalization“ after three years was removed by the current ruling government. The reality is that this option for receiving German citizenship after three years applied to very few people, sometimes numbering less than 10 people in certain German states.

However, standard naturalization is still possible after five years.