Pete Buttigieg Hates Your Car, but Mostly He Thinks You’re an Idiot.
America’s eminently mockable Transportation Secretary, Pete Buttigieg, went on national TV on Tuesday to mock Americans who find that electric cars don’t suit their transportation needs.
“Sometimes, when these debates happen,” the failed former mayor of South Bend, Ind. told Fox News, “I feel like it’s the early 2000s and I’m talking to some people who think that we can just have landline phones forever.”
Spoiler: Nobody was saying that in the early 2000s. Even before the iPhone came out in 2007 and changed phones forever, Americans were snapping up Nokias and Blackberries and wondering if we still needed our landlines at all. As early as 2005, 69% of Americans already owned cell phones, which was pretty much the entire adult population. Six percent of households had even given up their landlines.
But back to SecTrans Buttigieg, who insisted, “Let’s be clear, the automotive sector is moving toward EVs and we can’t pretend otherwise.” This is like telling a death row prisoner that he’s moving towards the electric chair and can’t pretend otherwise. The prisoner might not want to make the “transition” to the next life, but the government has set a date for him — just like the Biden administration is trying to transition the entire country to EVs.
Even though Americans have to be bribed, browbeaten, and mandated into buying EVs, Buttigieg insisted that Big Government knows best — even when that Big Government is the one in Beijing. EVs are “the economically smart play,” he said. “We’ve been working to make sure that advantage comes back on American soil.” China has the opportunity to undercut more established players like Tesla precisely because Washington is trying to force a massive EV market into existence.
Tesla is the most successful electric vehicle company in the West, and its stock was sent plunging on Tuesday after reporting its first-ever year-on-year sales decline last quarter. “Tesla’s deliveries for the quarter fell far below even the most bearish of analysts’ expectations,” CNBC reported.
Overall, EV sales growth has slowed since 2022, despite billions spent on incentives and record-high prices for gas-powered cars.
Presidentish Joe Biden can’t even bribe people into building EV charging stations. Biden’s misnamed Inflation Reduction Act — really the Green New Deal in drag — set aside a massive $7.5 billion in your tax dollars for fulfilling Biden’s dream of building 500,000 new charging stations over the next few years. But just seven have been built in two years.
Seven. Even with all those government billions just waiting to be taken.
Maybe that’s because, while EV sales hit a record 1.2 million in the U.S. last year, they still represented just 7.6% of the vehicle market. While EV sales are expected to take maybe 10% of the market in 2024, there are so many locations, needs, and situations where EVs make no sense at all. Virtually mandating that they make up two-thirds or more of all sales by 2032, as the EPA did last month, is a quasi-religious crusade courtesy of the most anti-religious White House in history.
Still, at least we’ll always have Pete Buttigieg’s smug ignorance to mock.
Americans Disapprove Of Biden On Guns—And Most Other Issues.
If you thought Americans strongly disapproved of the way President Joe Biden’s economy is working out, you ought to see what people think of the way he has handled the gun issue.
According to a recent survey by The Economist and YouGov, a full 52% of Americans disapprove of how Biden is handling economic issues. Breaking it down, 91% of Republicans, 55% of Independents and even 11% percent of Democrats aren’t too fond of the strangling consequences of “Bidenomics.” And by age, a majority of Americans over 30 disapprove of Biden’s economic performance.
But believe it or not, even more Americans disapprove of the job Biden has done concerning firearms, which 81% of respondents said was an important issue. In total, 54% of Americans disapprove of how the president is handling the gun issue, compared to 28% who approved. That includes a whopping 88% of Republicans and 52% of Independents who gave the president low marks. Disapproval was also very high by race and age: whites, 61% disapproved; Blacks, 35%, Hispanics, 46%; age 18-29, 43%; 30-44, 57%; 45-64, 57%; and 65-plus, 60%.
Remember?
Today:
Biden Shows Up at Noon — an Hour Late for Event — and Here’s Why People Think He Overslept
Joe Biden hasn’t exactly had a heavy schedule this week. He went to Camp David with Hunter over the weekend so he had yet another vacation.
Then on Monday all he had was the Easter Egg Roll. Not exactly a lot of work or high stress, although Biden managed to create his own problems by slurring and being confused throughout the event. He also told a bizarre story about his grandkids, most of whom are adults jumping in bed with him being his favorite memory of the White House.
On Tuesday, he had nothing at all on his public schedule. But, as I noted, he looked horrible at his healthcare remarks that he had to deliver on Wednesday and lost badly in a fight with the teleprompter.
Turns out there was a backstory.
Biden was late to the event which was supposed to be at 11 a.m. He kept Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and the health care advocates who attended the even waiting for an hour before he bothered to appear. He didn’t show up until around 12 p.m. And when he showed up finally, people noticed that he had CPAP strap marks still very evident on his face.
He supposedly sleeps with a CPAP machine helping him because he has sleep apnea.
But if he’s showing up at that time with the straps still evident on his face, then one has to concluded it’s very likely he overslept. Fox’s Jesse Watters made this point.
"Today, Biden OVERSLEPT and was late to an 11:00 a.m. speech. He didn't show up until an hour later," says @JesseBWatters.
"If you look closely, you can see the CPAP creases on his face … If he has a creasy face at noon, he just got out of bed." 😬 pic.twitter.com/Q0zYp0Zl8D
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) April 4, 2024
“If he has a creasy face at noon, he just got out of bed,” Watters surmised. He wasn’t up late or doing anything the day before, yet he’s still so late this morning?
Seriously, we have someone occupying the Oval Office who is oversleeping and not making an event until noon? Is he actually doing any work at all with a schedule like this? Sounds like former President Donald Trump nicknaming him “Sleepy Joe” is right yet again.
Also, the only other thing on the schedule was that Biden was supposed to have the Daily Briefing at 10 a.m., did he just skip that? Does he actually attend that?
If that’s the case, who is truly making the decisions behind the scenes here if this is going on? And how could anyone possibly vote for the mess that’s going on here? I know we can’t expect them to be straight with us, even though we have a right to it and for sure media isn’t pushing hard enough when he does things like this to ask: what the heck is going on here?
April 4, 2024
April 5, 2024
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Alleged home invasion suspect shot by Bay City resident,
BAY CITY, Mich. – Police say that an alleged home invasion suspect is in serious condition after being shot by a Bay City resident.
Police responded to a shooting in the 200 block of N. Jefferson St. shortly before 5 p.m. on Monday.
Officers found a 33-year-old Bay City man outside of the residence suffering from two gunshot wounds to the torso.
Investigators say the individual that was shot was allegedly armed with a pipe and had broken into the residence.
That is when one of the residents shot the alleged suspect, according to the Bay City Department of Public Safety.
The individual has been hospitalized with serious injuries, but is stable.
Coroner IDs woman shot by Clark County homeowner targeted in scam
A Franklin County woman shot to death outside a Clark County house this week has been identified as Loletha Hall, 61, according to Dr. Kent E. Harshbarger, Montgomery County coroner.
The resident, an 86-year-old Madison Twp. man, had been targeted in a scam, according to the Clark County Sheriff’s Office.
The shooting happened at 11:18 a.m. Monday in the 7000 block of South Charleston-Clifton Road.
Lt. Kristopher Shultz said preliminary investigation revealed the resident had been contacted by telephone by strangers. They told the 86-year-old a relative of his was incarcerated in the Clark County Jail and “a significant amount of money, in cash, was necessary to post bail for this relative,” Shultz said.
The caller provided pertinent information for the case and the posting of bail, “all of which was bogus information,” the lieutenant said.
The caller and the resident, whose identity has not been released, spoke multiple times regarding the situation, Shultz said, “with the resident being hesitant and resistant to complying with the instructions of the caller.”
The investigators said the caller threatened violence toward the 86-year-old man and members of his family.
When Hall went to the man’s house, the resident produced a pistol and shot Hall multiple times.
“The resident then retreated to the interior of his home, secured his firearm, and made contact with the (911) Communication Center,” Shultz said.
Deputies responded as did fire and EMS units from Madison Twp. and Cedarville.
They found the 86-year-old with lacerations to the head and an ear, bleeding profusely. He was transported by ambulance to a local hospital for treatment and later released.
The Franklin County woman was on the ground about 20 feet from her vehicle. After treatment at the scene, Hall was flown to Kettering Health in Kettering, where she died while in surgery.
Shulz said significant evidence has been seized and collected by detectives, with search warrants in process to continue the investigation.
“It was reported that there was an assault on the homeowner here at the residence, it was an elderly male, and that he used a firearm to defend himself in the course of that assault,” Shultz said at the scene Monday.
The incident prompted a message from the Clark County Sheriff’s Office to remind residents, especially older citizens, that no law enforcement agency or court will make contact with anyone to solicit cash for bail or other official functions.
“We encourage all citizens to use extreme caution when being contacted unexpectedly by subjects claiming to be relatives incarcerated in a correctional facility, or claiming to have direct knowledge of relatives incarcerated in a correctional facility,” the sheriff’s release said.
Firearms bans threaten our personal safety
A week before my mom passed away, she taught me how to shoot a firearm. As a long-time firearms instructor, she trained thousands of Coloradans and passed on to me the vital importance of gun safety and self-defense. I followed in my mom’s footsteps and opened Elite Firearms & Training. Every day, I work to carry on her legacy, equipping men and women to protect— from harm.
After a decade of serving as a firearms instructor, I am confounded by efforts in my home state of Colorado to ban the sale of majority of semi-automatic firearms, including many popular handguns and shotguns used for self-defense. This isn’t a fight to keep your AR-15s. Legislators want to pass a “assault weapons” ban bill that will ban the smallest of guns like the Beretta 21a, a .22lr, 7 round handgun that’s smaller than my hand to a more common handgun used for concealed carry like the Springfield Hellcat RDP 9mm.
The current bill defines “assault weapons” generally to include many commonly carried pistols and shotguns that are used for self-defense. Clearly, the drafters of this bill do not understand how firearms operate and are making it as broadly encompassing as possible by including largely cosmetic features that are in common use.
Within the bill, it says that if the firearm has a detachable magazine and a foregrip, threaded barrel, barrel shroud, adjustable stock, pistol grip, and many other ridiculous characteristics, the firearm will be banned. None of these features increase lethality. This legislation undermines our basic rights as Americans, threatening our safety and well-being.
While lawmakers at the State Capitol exploit tragedy to advance their political agenda, they fail to mention the simple and undeniable truth that gun bans fail to reduce crime or keep people safe. Following the Public Safety and Recreational Firearms use Protection Act of 1994, in which certain semi-automatic firearms and magazines were banned, the nonpartisan National Institute of Justice concluded that the moratorium, “failed to reduce the average number of victims per gun murder or multiple gunshot wounds.”
Even worse, we’ve seen that violence is often incentivized by the same gun restrictions that Colorado legislators are attempting to pass. According to researchers, five out of six mass shooters choose “Gun Free Zones” to unleash their terror. Colorado’s homicide by firearm rate has surpassed the national rate for the first time in over forty years, while states who have passed constitutional carry are seeing a decrease. This comes after Colorado lawmakers have already enacted gun control measures such as universal and expanded background checks, magazine capacity limits, safe storage, red flag laws, etc. and the state has even created their own Office of Gun Violence Prevention.
The same trend of higher crime with more restrictive gun laws have been proven repeatedly in other states and politicians refuse to recognize that the firearm violence occurring is overwhelmingly not from legal firearm owners.
Beyond the definitive data and research that proves the ineffectiveness of gun bans, is the troubling truth that legislative action to halt the production or possession of semi-automatic firearms ultimately threaten the safety of law-abiding citizens, and more specifically, women like me.
According to a Harvard study, the United States added 8 million new gun owners between 2019 and 2021 with nearly half (48%) of those new gun owners being women (3.84 million). Violent crime continues to ravage our communities, and women are literally taking up arms and fighting back.
These brazen and alarming attempts to disarm — and endanger — citizens in Colorado should be national news. We know that lawmakers across the country use these outrageous bills as blueprints, changing the state names, and implementing them within their respective jurisdiction because they don’t have the votes to do it nationally.
Last year, it was Washington state that passed sweeping legislation to disarm citizens and destroy gun stores. Today, it’s Colorado. We cannot sit on our hands as our rights and safety are eroded. It’s time to fight back.
Almost 50% of Colorado’s population own firearms, so we’re not outnumbered. However, we will be ignored if we don’t speak up. Additionally, elections have consequences and gun owners must elect men and women who will safeguard our rights and freedoms. It’s critical that we bring balance — and common sense — back to the state.
The pro-gun argument isn’t rhetoric — these are proven facts — and I invite anyone who is in favor of Colorado’s “assault weapons” ban to come spend a day with me on the range so I can show you how this ban will only harm law-abiding citizens.
Ava Flanell is a firearms instructor and resident of Colorado Springs.
Intruder shot and killed by East Side homeowner, police say https://t.co/Q6hhuuqtSU
— San Antonio Express-News (@ExpressNews) March 31, 2024
A homeowner killed a 59-year-old man who broke into a residence on the East Side late Saturday, police said.
Arriving officers found the intruder with multiple gunshot wounds in his abdomen and he was pronounced dead at the scene, according to a preliminary report.
San Antonio police said the man forced entry into the home around 9 p.m. in the 3300 block of Martin Luther King Drive and assaulted the owner, a 27-year-old man.
The younger man told officers he shot his assailant out of fear for his life. No charges are expected, police said.
Chicago: Another Day, Another ‘Ceasefire’ ‘Anti-Violence’ Worker Busted on Gun Charges
The do-gooders in Illinois believe that if you hire enough felons to “interrupt” violence, somehow you’ll make the streets safer. Given that Murder City USA has kept that title for 12 years in a row now, one would think that smarter heads would prevail and the state legislature would vote to stop paying millions of taxpayer dollars to these foolish endeavors.
Yet each year, Gov. J.B. Pritzker signs off on scores of millions paid to these organizations like “CeaseFire” who employ ex-cons who will supposedly stop gang violence. ($110M in 2022 alone!) Ironically, CeaseFire lost one of its recent leaders thanks to an arrest for beating his wife domestic battery.
And while shoveling the money at these groups never stops, neither do the arrests of these paid “anti-violence” workers, often times for gun charges. Take Davon Turner, aged 35 – or in common parlance, “old enough to know better.”
See Davon, a frequent felon in the Land O’ Lincoln’s criminal justice system (or what masquerades as such), walked out of the house that day packing a GLOCK Fo-Tay. He came to the attention of Five-Oh because he and a bunch of his buddies acted like fools while smoking the Devil’s lettuce in a building where not everyone appreciated the smell of skunk.
One thing led to another and cops cuffed him after finding (Surprise!) that GLOCK .40. Of course, when he showed up at the Cook County Jail, he proudly mentioned that he had gainful employment. Indeed, he worked for CeaseFire/FLIP anti-violence programs. Paid for by Illinois taxpayers.
Why if Illinois’ leaders only treated the law-abiding people as kindly as they treated the criminal class (to include illegal aliens) as well. From CWB Chicago:
When I was assigned to my first duty station at Fort Lewis, the 9th Infantry Division had just drawn the – then new, now obsolete for the past 15 years – M16A2 rifle. We all thought we had achieved Nirvana, and when we qualified the percentage of those who qualified Expert, yours truly among them, astonished the command echelons.
We shall soon see what hath been wrought.
The Army Has Finally Fielded Its Next Generation Squad Weapons
The Army has officially fielded its brand-new Next Generation Squad Weapon rifles to its first unit, bringing an end to the service’s decades-long effort to replace its M4 and M16 family of military firearms.
Army Futures Command announced Thursday that soldiers from 1st Battalion, 506th Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division, at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, accepted delivery of the XM7 Next Generation Rifle and XM250 Next Generation Automatic Rifle ahead of training in April.
Produced by firearm maker Sig Sauer, the XM7 is intended to replace the M4 carbine in close combat formations, while the XM250 will replace the M249 Squad Automatic Weapon, or SAW. Both new rifles are chambered in 6.8 mm to provide improved range and lethality against enemy body armor.
The Next Generation Squad Weapon series also includes the XM157 Fire Control smart scope, built by Vortex Optics, which integrates advanced technologies such as a laser range finder, ballistic calculator and digital display overlay into a next-generation rifle optic.
The fielding “is a culmination of a comprehensive and rigorous process of design, testing and feedback, all of which were led by soldiers,” Col. Jason Bohannon, manager of soldier lethality for the Program Executive Office Soldier project, said in a statement. “As a result, the Army is delivering on its promise to deliver to soldiers the highest-quality, most-capable small-caliber weapons and ammunition.”
April 3, 2024
Anti-gun group plagiarizes photos of top female shooters to gaslight the public
Victims never gave permission for use of their photos or personal information.
This is the busiest time of year for professional shooter, wife, mother and Army veteran, Julie Golob. She is hosting classes and training hard for the upcoming competition season, which begins later this month. She did not have much time to devote to a controversy that surfaced last week, when her image and personal information were misappropriated for a social media post by the anti-gun group, 97Percent, as part of its campaign to gaslight the public into falsely believing it is a moderate pro-gun group.
“I did not endorse their message. I gave no permission for the photo. It is unfair to use my image and likeness to give the perception that I support what they are all about. I certainly don’t,” Golob told the Second Amendment Foundation last week. “And the fact it was used for Women’s History Month is insulting.”
A special report published by the Second Amendment Foundation last week revealed how 97Percent uses slick marketing and an aggressive social media campaign to falsely portray itself as a pro-gun organization comprised of gun owners and non-gun owners, while in reality it is nothing more than a run-of-the-mill anti-gun group, not unlike Everytown, Giffords or Brady.
Last Wednesday, ostensibly as part of Women’s History Month, 97Percent posted tweets featuring images and personal information of nine female shooters and/or leaders within the Second Amendment community — six living and three deceased. They included Golob, Rhonda Ezell, Robin Sandoval, Lena Miculek, Kim Rhode and Carrie Lightfoot, as well as Lucille Ball, Mary Edwards Walker and Annie Oakley.
Last Thursday, after Golob responded to the post on Twitter/X and made it clear that she did not give permission to use her likeness or personal information, the group quickly deleted all of its Women’s History Month posts.
97Percent’s executive director, Olivia Troye, said during a recent appearance on ABC’s The View, that her group’s mission is “to bring gun owners into the conversation and to bring them to the table, in order to work on reducing gun deaths happening across the country, while including them in the solutions.”
However, the recent investigation by the Second Amendment Foundation revealed that 97Percent supports bans on “assault weapons,” standard-capacity magazines and bump stocks, and has called for permits to carry, purchase and even possess firearms. It supports mandatory background checks and mandatory storage laws and claims the Second Amendment is “overprotected.”
Troye declined to be interviewed for the previous story, and she did not return emails seeking an explanation for her group’s misuse of the women’s photos and personal information.
Chicago Guns Matter founder Rhonda Ezell pointed out that 97Percent lifted her image right off of her website, without her knowledge or permission.
“When I first saw it, I was shocked,” she told the Second Amendment Foundation. “Why would an anti-gun group post a picture of me? They never asked to use the photo. This doesn’t make sense. At best, this is theft of intellectual property.”
Ezell has since contacted an attorney.
“I didn’t know of 97Percent. I never interacted with them. They are working against our cause,” she said. “I pick my battles, but I did feel it was rude. The picture they took is from a professional photo shoot.”
Both Ezell and Golob are frustrated by 97Percent’s plagiarism and use of false light.
“Lawful gun owners have to be wary of organizations that make certain claims,” Golob said. “We have to be vigilant and speak up, because when something is done wrong to you, the burden of proof and all of the effort is on you.”
Ruling: Millions of NRA Members Exempt From Pistol Brace Ban
The ATF can’t go after NRA members over guns with pistol braces on them.
That’s the outcome of a preliminary injunction issued by a federal judge on Friday. US District Judge Sam A. Lindsay sided with the gun-rights group and enjoined the federal agency from enforcing its rule reclassifying pistol-brace-equipped guns as short barrel rifles (SBRs) under the 1934 National Firearms Act (NFA). The decision keeps any NRA member who owns a braced gun from facing six-figure fines or imprisonment if they didn’t register their gun by last year’s deadline–something most owners didn’t do.
“[C]ompliance with the Final Rule is not discretionary, and the NRA’s members face severe penalties for their failure to comply with the Final Rule,” Judge Lindsay wrote in NRA v. ATF. “Accordingly, both of the final requirements for injunctive relief are satisfied because the threatened injury to the NRA’s members outweighs the threatened harm to the Defendants, and enforcement of the Final Rule under the circumstances will not disserve the public interest.”
The ruling is a concrete, if temporary, win for the NRA. While the group has lost millions of members due to an ongoing corruption scandal, and it’s unclear exactly how many remain, those who’ve stuck with the group will now enjoy protection from the long arm of the ATF. The decision puts NRA members under the same legal umbrella employed for members of the Second Amendment Foundation, Firearms Policy Coalition, and Gun Owners of America through previous rulings.
April 2, 2024
Israeli Air Strike Punches Senior Iranian Revolutionary Guards Commander’s Ticket
On Monday, a senior commander in Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps was deleted from the rolls of the living by an Israeli air strike. The strike hit the Iranian consulate in Damascus, Syria, killing Mohammad Reza Zahedi along with (reportedly) several Iranian diplomats.
An Israeli airstrike launched at the Iranian consulate in Damascus, Syria on Monday has killed Mohammad Reza Zahedi, a senior commander in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps, a Lebanese security source has told Reuters.
In 2010, the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned Zahedi, describing him as playing a key role in Iran’s support of the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
Reuters is reporting that its journalists at the scene in the Syrian capital saw smoke rising from the rubble of a building that was flattened in the airstrike. Israel has not confirmed its involvement.
“We do not comment on reports in the foreign media,” an Israeli military spokesperson told Reuters when asked about the matter.
One has to appreciate the wisdom of Israel not commenting on this at all; in taking out Zahedi, they determined to let a missile do their talking for them, and that would seem to be sufficient to make their point. Zahedi was not in Syria to play tiddlywinks; the Revolutionary Guard Corps commander was known to be a conduit to funnel Iranian weapons to Hezbollah and acted as a liaison between Iran, Hezbollah, and Syria. He was a guy who manifestly deserved to be removed from the game.
The U.S. Treasury said in 2010 that Zahedi “has also acted as a liaison to Hezbollah and Syrian intelligence services and is reportedly charged with guaranteeing weapons shipments to Hezbollah.”
This isn’t the first Iranian commander that Israel has un-alived in recent months.
Israel said in February that it killed a senior Hezbollah commander in a strike carried out in Lebanon.
The Israel Defense Forces had announced at the time that an overnight airstrike targeting a “Hezbollah military structure” in Nabatieh killed Ali Muhammad Aldbas, a senior commander of the Radwan forces. His deputy commander, Ibrahim Issa, and an additional terrorist were killed in the attack, according to the IDF.
It’s important to note that then the U.S. Treasury Department “sanctioned” Zahedi all the way back in 2010, it clearly seems to have had little to no effect on his actions. Israel’s sanction, delivered at several times the speed of sound, would appear to have been much more effective. The Israeli military has time and again proven their skill at making bad terrorists into good terrorists, and since the Oct 7th atrocities, they have picked up the pace.