Shannon Brandt, 41, struck and killed [18-year-old Cayler Ellingson] with his Ford Explorer SUV early Sunday in an alley. His mother said Ellingson called and asked her if she knew Brandt (she did). The boy called again a short time later and said that “‘he’ or ‘they’ were chasing him.” The mother could no longer reach him after that. Court documents said, “Brandt admitted to striking the pedestrian with his car because he had a political argument with the pedestrian and believed the pedestrian was calling people “to come get him.” He claimed the teen was part of an unspecified Republican “extremist group.” Brandt was released on bond. — dailysignal.com He was a MAGA Republican, a threat to the country like Joe Biden said. So I crushed him with my truck. To make America safe for democracy. Read more →
EppsNet Archive: Politics
Talk to Them on iPhones as They’re Dying
It became evident very early on that science didn’t speak with one voice on the subject. . . . The idea that our leaders are just following the science, following the algorithms, following the experts, and we’re not even going to look into the faces of people who are losing their jobs because we shut the economy down? We’re going to let our grandparents die in isolation and talk to them on iPhones as they’re dying? It’s obscene. — James Hankins Read more →
It’s a Short List
I keep a list. Whenever someone in Washington does something admirable, something not for political advantage but for the country, I write that person’s name on the list. It’s a short list. — James Hankins Read more →
We Are Led by Idiots
It’s hard to contemplate American public life in the 21st century and not arrive at the unhappy conclusion that we are led by idiots. The political class has lately produced an impressive string of debacles: the Afghanistan pullout, urban crime waves, easily foreseen inflation, mayhem at the southern border, a self-generated energy crisis, a pandemic response that wrought little good and vast ruin. Then there are the perennial national embarrassments: a mind-bogglingly expensive welfare state that doesn’t work, public schools that make kids dumber, universities that nurture destructive grievances and noxious ideologies, and a news media nobody trusts. — Barton Swaim Read more →
I Heard the News Today, Oh Boy
I’m getting a little tired of presidents of the United States repeating things that could only be spoken by an idiot or a liar, and then trying to intimidate people out of contradicting them. The latest (though of course not the most egregious) offender is one Joseph R. Biden, who told the country today that he can raise corporate income taxes without imposing any additional tax burden on anyone who earns less than $400,000 a year. Because in the United States of America, nobody with an income under $400,000 owns any stocks or mutual funds. And if you disagree, he’ll stare you in the face and repeat himself. — Steven Landsburg Joe Manchin has also taken up the banner on this. I don’t know enough about Manchin to say whether he’s economically illiterate or a liar or both. (I don’t think Biden is an idiot, though he’s obviously cognitively dysfunctional.)… Read more →
5 Reasons We’re Not Helped by More Gun Laws
The most common statistical sleight of hand when it comes to showing charts of gun murder rates per capita by country, with the United States always in the lead, is that these charts, somewhere in the fine print, and sometimes not at all, note that they’re only charting so-called “developed” countries, meaning that the U.S. is being compared to countries like Japan and France, but that Latin American countries and African countries, among others, are left out. So — 50+ people shot to death in a Nigerian church? Doesn’t count because Nigeria is not a “developed” country. And so on. (The other thing you have to pay attention to is whether a chart is showing gun murders or gun deaths. The U.S. has a very high suicide rate compared to most other countries — more than 60 percent of our gun deaths are suicides — so rolling the suicides in… Read more →
Trump’s Second Term
Donald Trump is having a pretty good second term for someone who wasn’t elected. Several favorable Supreme Court rulings while Biden continues to mess things up at home and abroad as predicted . . . Read more →
Mayor Pete’s Definition of Insanity
Pete Buttigieg Calls ‘Door’ Solution To Mass Shootings ‘Definition Of Insanity’ — huffpost.com Mayor Pete’s timing was not ideal as a few days later, a man aggressively trying to enter an Alabama elementary school was shot and killed by police. He couldn’t get in because the doors were locked. It seems like any serious solution to school shootings would have to include multiple steps, one being hardening the physical security at the school. Does Mayor Pete lock the doors of his home? Does he lock the doors of his car if he doesn’t want anyone getting into it? But locking the doors of a school is the “definition of insanity”? Read more →
Focusing on the Stuff That’s Important
This should drive down inflation and cause the market to rebound. https://t.co/c2XR6hM5p6 — Paul Epps (@paulepps) June 13, 2022 Read more →
The Jack Del Rio Dust-Up
Washington Commanders fine defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio $100,000 for his comments about Jan. 6 — usatoday.com Del Rio referred to Jan. 6, 2021, as a “dust-up” rather than the preferred-by-many term “insurrection.” In a statement released by the team, coach Ron Rivera said, among other things: pic.twitter.com/86bJREVDsq — Washington Commanders (@Commanders) June 10, 2022 “This morning I met with coach Del Rio to express how disappointed I am in his comments on Wednesday. His comments do not reflect the organization’s views and are extremely hurtful to our great community here . . .” What a great place to work! You’re not allowed to have a thought and say it out loud without having it pre-approved by “the organization.” I’m also surprised that even the most dysfunctional crybabies find the use of the term “dust-up” hurtful, let alone “extremely hurtful.” Maybe it’s just me . . . I don’t think… Read more →
Electric Car Maker to Vote Republican?
I have to agree with the characterization . . . there are a lot of Democrats who’d rather see you dead if you’re not as loving as they are. In the past I voted Democrat, because they were (mostly) the kindness party. But they have become the party of division & hate, so I can no longer support them and will vote Republican. Now, watch their dirty tricks campaign against me unfold … ? — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 18, 2022 Read more →
Who is to Blame for Buffalo?
From Kevin D. Williamson: Before the blood was even dry in Buffalo, Democrats were asking the most important question: “How can we well-heeled white progressives most effectively use the murders of all these black people to our personal and political advantage?” The murderer in Buffalo didn’t kill anybody you’ve ever heard of, and so the first thing to do if you want to exploit the deaths of all these people — and that is what Democrats intend to do — is to connect the crime to some famous name or prominent institution. It doesn’t matter if there isn’t any actual connection: Just assert it, and that’s good enough for the newspapers and the cable-news cretins and the impotent rage-monkeys on Twitter. The usual suspects: social-media platforms, Tucker Carlson, Donald Trump, the Republican Party, Fox News, the National Rifle Association, etc. The shooter was actually well known in advance as a… Read more →
Like His Voters
Audit finds half of Joe Biden's Twitter followers are fake https://t.co/HcJjpi1D8W pic.twitter.com/p3dEeOdV6q — New York Post (@nypost) May 17, 2022 Read more →
It’s Time to Ban Things That Are Already Banned
My 4-year-old just FaceTimed to ask what I’m doing to “help the people in Buffalo” and “why did the bad man do this?” Absolutely gutting. This cannot be his normal. It’s time to BAN ASSAULT WEAPONS. #EndGunViolence — Rep. Eric Swalwell (@RepSwalwell) May 16, 2022 “Assault weapons” are already banned in New York. New York has every gun law you could possibly want, including a “red flag” law. Do you have a more serious suggestion than “It’s time to ban things that are already banned”? BTW, the replies to this dubious tweet are hilarious. A couple examples: In the middle of enjoying her after-dinner all-natural watermelon fruit bar popsicle, my 5-year-old leaned back in her chair, looked me dead in the eye and asked, “What will we ever do to escape this inflationary spiral in which this country currently finds itself.” I’m shook AF. — Will Stafford (@WillStaffordLSU) May 17,… Read more →
This Would Have Never Happened to Donald Trump
I don’t have any regard for Trevor Noah but if Biden’s lost Trevor Noah, he’s lost America. It doesn’t seem real. Noah is right though. If a Middle Eastern country didn’t take a call from Donald Trump, who knows what Trump would do? Start bombing mosques in descending order of holiness? You don’t know. So you answer the call. Preferably on the first ring. Read more →
There Is No Country Like America
From an interview with Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears: There is no country like America. There is not. Not one. . . . I mean, I’m the one who got off the plane and here I am, here in the former capital of the Confederacy for goodness sake. I am second in command. Second in command. I’m a black woman. I am not first-generation American. I am still the immigrant. As I said, I’m a black woman, immigrant, and what else can you say to me that would say, well, “racism, racism, racism”? How do you explain me? I’m not an outlier. I’m not a one-off. The opportunities are here. Are we denying that there have been problems, that there has been slavery, that there has been racism, or that there has been segregation, and redlining, and blue codes, and all this stuff? No, we’re not denying any of that.… Read more →
Let’s Go Brandon
I have a shirt that looks similar to the one in the photo. The shirt is a conversation starter and the conversation often goes like this: “I don’t like your shirt.” “Mmmm, I don’t really like yours either.” “Ha ha, you know what I mean.” “I think I do and I have to say that it concerns me like a whole lot of nothing at all.” Read more →
Never Retract, Never Apologize
I know you’ve never heard of Ilya Shapiro so first let me tell you that he is on administrative leave from Georgetown University Law Center while the school decides whether to retain him as executive director and senior lecturer for the school’s Center for the Constitution. The rest you can glean from this excerpt from a recent essay by Bari Weiss: I’ve been thinking a lot over the past few days about a tweet by a Georgetown professor. Look at this chorus of entitled white men justifying a serial rapist’s arrogated entitlement. All of them deserve miserable deaths while feminists laugh as they take their last gasps. Bonus: we castrate their corpses and feed them to swine? Yes. That tweet was written in 2018 by Georgetown professor Carol Christine Fair about Republican senators who supported Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court. Fair also writes a blog called Tenacious Hellpussy,… Read more →
And That’s the Truth: Sidney Poitier
[And That’s the Truth is a feature by our guest blogger, Sojourner Truth — PE] God he was a handsome man. I seen that he died. He was described as a “legendary actor and civil rights activist.” Black folks got to get over the notion that all they problems are caused by other people. Nobody likes Jews but Jews done very well for theyselves. We had a Jewish man, Bernie Sanders, run for president two times and I never once heard him even mention that he was Jewish or that you was a Jew-hater if you disagreed with him. A black person run for some office, everything about race. You can’t disagree on the merits, you can only disagree because you a racist. I would like to hear someone explain Asian success to me in the context of white supremacy. America has always treated Asians very badly . . .… Read more →
This Day in History: January 6
On Jan. 6, 2021, a group of unarmed citizens frustrated by their inability to date Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez walked into a building. Read more →