Daily News Roundup - PRICKLY PEAR

Estimated Reading Time: 28 minutes

NOTABLE QUOTES

Matt Kibbe former FreedomWorks president once said: “Sometimes you need to defeat the Republicans before you can defeat the Democrats.”

Sean Moran Breitbart News journalist: After Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) tapped Cornyn to negotiate a deal on gun control, he now promised to move forward on a deal on amnesty. “First guns, now it’s immigration,” Cornyn told Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA). “That’s right, we’re going to do it,” said Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ).

AWR Hawkins Breitbart News journalist: Rep. Matt Gaetz anticipated the financial incentives for red laws, telling Breitbart News Saturday that the Cornyn gun control package uses “federal money to bribe states to enact red flag laws.”

Virginia Kruta contributor to The Daily Wire: President Biden on Tuesday announced: “We’ll get through at least this year. We do need more money. But we don’t just need more money for vaccines for children, eventually. We need more money to plan for the second pandemic. There’s going to be another pandemic. We have to think ahead,. . .”

Sundance contributor to The Last Refuge: With the shortage of infant formula still visible as an example of Biden incompetence, today the White House began selling a proactive strategic communication message in advance of looming food shortages. Yes, you guess it, the advanced position of the Biden administration is that the future U.S. food shortages are Vladimir Putin’s fault.

NY Times: The ruble cemented its unlikely status as the world’s best-performing currency, rising to new multiyear highs this week. Since collapsing in the weeks after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which triggered sweeping international sanctions aimed at crippling the Russian economy, the ruble has come roaring back.

Revolver.news: A politically damaged, barely viable President Biden has surveyed the political landscape, and, incredibly, chosen transsexualism as his field of battle. With inflation soaring, the economy collapsing, shortages ravaging America, a human invasion tsunami pouring over the border, and repeated international humiliations, Biden and his administration flunkies are declaring an all-out war effort to promote transgenderism in every corner of America.

Wayne Allen Root recently interviewed President Trump: Finally, I told Trump that I don’t know if America will exist in 2024. Trump responded with pure honesty, “That’s actually the much bigger question… will the country (exist). There’s been more damage done in the past year and a half… than in the worst 25 years in America’s history (combined).”

Dennis Prager best-selling author and contributor to American Greatness: The war against Western Civilization is a war against distinctions and order. That’s why the Left loathes talk about Judeo-Christian and biblical values. These values represent the divine moral and social distinctions and subsequent order that constitute Western civilization.

John Horvat contributor to The Imaginative Conservative: The only way to stop the shootings is to bring back the father. This does not involve government programs, social monitoring, and financial benefits. The selfless father performs his duties at no cost to the state. Indeed, this devoted father—together with a loving mother—provides society with a balanced young man who will defend society from attacks. Bringing back the father means recreating the culture that allows this Christian father to flourish.

Larry Sand contributor to American Greatness:Ironically, at the same time Congress just gave its okay to raise the minimum age to buy semi-automatic rifles from 18 to 21, Biden and his cronies want to enable preteens – without any parental agreement – to have medical procedures that mutilate various parts of his or her anatomy.

Lindsay Kornick journalist for Fox News writes about the delayed response by the Uvalde police: . . . it was ridiculous to assume that providing “less training and less funding” to officers would result in better policing overall. “And then the people that they’re protecting, [we’re] going to disarm. So the people coming to save them are untrained and unprepared. It’s creating this disastrous situation,” . . .

Steve Kirsch Newsletter: So my mom’s very dear friend called me tonight to tell me that her cancer came back. She was diagnosed over 20 years ago and has been cancer-free. I asked her did you get boosted she said yes, I already knew she was vaccinated. She said don’t start asking me these questions. What does that have to do with anything? They now found cancer all over her uterus and it’s now spreading to her body. You think it’s from the vaccine? She was perfectly fine all these years before getting vaccinated. It makes me so sad she will probably end up dying. I hear these stories all the time of a new cancer or a cancer that was under control suddenly coming back with a vengeance. These aren’t coincidences. While for any individual case it may be difficult to determine a cause, in aggregate we are seeing rates of cancer post vaccine that are unprecedented.

Jesse Kelly host of the Jessie Kelly Show, on 6/21/22, tweeted: We have an FDA doctor on camera saying there’s a five fold increase in myocarditis for 12-17 year olds who are vaccinated. Here’s the President of The United States calling for more taxpayer money to put that “vaccine” in more children. Evil people run this country. Evil.

John Hinderaker attorney & contributor to PowerLine Blog: In Minnesota, a new rule relating to certification of teachers is in process. As I understand it, the rule has proceeded without legislative action and ultimately will come before an administrative law judge who will (I assume) approve it, absent enormous public outcry. The rule provides that you can’t be licensed as a teacher in Minnesota unless you subscribe to neo-Marxist theories of race, gender and so on.

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Root: Video: Wayne Allyn Root Interviews Donald Trump

I just interviewed former President Donald Trump — again. It was our fourth interview in the past few months. I believe you’ll enjoy watching and listening. It’s not your typical formal media interview of a president. It’s more like two old friends talking, without filters, and you get to listen in. You can watch the whole interview on video (link at the bottom of this commentary). But before I get to some key revelations about the interview, I want to share a shocking story that proves our nation is under communist attack. We are experiencing a Soviet-East German-Nazi style of censorship, banning and propaganda never seen in America’s history. I just interviewed the 45th president of the United States. What an honor. Yet the intolerant communist tyrants and bullies of Silicon Valley won’t allow you to watch it. I’m banned for life by Twitter. I’m still on Facebook, but I’m heavily “shadow-banned” — and this Trump interview can’t be seen by anyone. How do I know? There’s not one comment under the video at Facebook. Out of hundreds of millions of people on Facebook every day, not one person chose to comment?

THERE IS HOPE

Peterson: The Way Forward

America is locked into an escalating cycle of political and cultural turmoil. Our cold civil war is heating up and has spilled over into nearly every aspect of life. A momentous commercial-cultural shift is now underway that will force us to reexamine our fundamental assumptions. This shift will soon become the most significant change in America in living memory. The geographic, digital, and financial movement of millions of people and billions of dollars out from under the control of woke states, woke digital technology, and woke corporations and capital has begun. And it is now the duty of all those who wish to stop the decline of our nation to join it. The American cultural and political landscape has been bulldozed and fundamentally reshaped over the last half century. A one-party oligarchy tied to the radical ideology of identity politics controls our major institutions as populist resistance rises. Digital technology continues to reshape human behavior and institutions, causing an escalating war over its control. The views of roughly half the population of America are increasingly suppressed and delegitimized by most major institutions and media outlets. This difference in opinion is not a mere matter of policy preferences. Americans are divided about what men and women, the family, citizenship, and nation-states are and ought to be, as well as when human life begins. Few want to admit the reality of the situation, but Americans are now divided over the building blocks and the purpose of human civilization. Many do not consider what underlies all the factionalism amidst the noise, but this does not change the sordid reality. There is no possibility of reconciling this fundamental opposition unless one side or the other wins. The nature of this conflict is purposely obscured by many of its participants and the rest of our leadership class is often too blind or frightened to describe it. It’s not only hard to come to grips with the depth of our division: it’s difficult for those formed in a very different America to see it. The gap between the experience of older and younger generations of Americans has created dangerously disparate visions of the reality in which we are all operating. But this reality is clear to those of us who have recognized it for what it is all along. And those of us, like myself, who are already “pre-canceled” because we have been in the trenches publicly for years, are not afraid. In the aftermath of the 2020 election, a quiet burst of energy was unleashed across the nation. We stopped asking for permission or seeking anyone’s approval and began to act. It’s over.

THE UNIPARTY LED WAR ON THE SECOND AMENDMENT

Alic: 14 Senate Republicans buck NRA to advance bipartisan gun bill

Fourteen Senate Republicans bucked the National Rifle Association and other Second Amendment advocates on Tuesday to advance bipartisan gun control and school safety legislation. In a 64-34 vote, the Senate voted to begin debate on an ambitious rewrite of the nation’s firearm laws. Although only a simple majority was needed to take the measure up, 14 Republicans led by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell voted in favor. “Our colleagues have put together a common-sense package of popular steps that will help make [mass shooting] incidents less likely, while fully upholding the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens,” said Mr. McConnell, Kentucky Republican. Joining Mr. McConnell in voting for the bill were GOP leadership allies, including Sens. John Cornyn of Texas, Joni Ernst of Iowa, and Todd Young of Indiana. Also supporting the bill were swing-state Republicans, like Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Thom Tillis of North Carolina. Moderate Republicans provided a substantial share of the vote, including Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Mitt Romney of Utah, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. Rounding out the group was retiring Sens. Rob Portman of Ohio, Roy Blunt of Missouri and Richard Burr of North Carolina.

Van Laat: BREAKING: Text of Senate Gun Bill Released, and Your Rights Are Dangling by a Thread

Nearly 10 days after a “framework” agreement on additional federal gun laws was reached by a group of 20 members of the United States Senate, the text of the bill was released by Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) Tuesday night, and the Senate is currently (as of press time) taking a vote on whether or not to begin debate on the bill – even while analysts are still digesting it. For those who don’t want to read for themselves or wait for trusted analysts, Murphy posted a tweet thread asking people to “let [him] tell you what it does.” Pardon us if we’re not going to take Murphy’s word on the bill’s provisions.

According to a cursory reading, here’s what we see that the bill does: . . . The text of the bill can be read here.

Vespa: Do Republicans Even Know What Democrats Did to Them With This Anti-Gun Bill?

Well, it happened. The Republican Party decided to play nice, try to get some good press with a media establishment that hates them, and join the legions of the righteous and blessed by hashing out a gun control bill during a midterm election cycle. Is everyone up there hitting the crack pipe? What are we doing? What the hell is this? We have category five hurricane gusts to our backs heading into November—and the GOP decided to do what it does best: find a new way to blow it. […] Republicans don’t even see the trap here. It’s one that Democrats have suckered them into for years. The Left play to the GOP’s sense of duty, honor, and tradition. […] The contents of the bill are trash. Yes, funding for school security is fine, but not at the cost of red flag law expansion which is arguably unconstitutional. There are no legal guardrails to protect citizens from overreach. Due process is murky. And it’s a massive finger to veterans who will be targeted most by this law. It also includes enhanced background checks for those under the age of 21 purchasing long guns. Under this new process, juvenile records can be accessed and there’s a 10-day period for NICS to complete its review. Again, NICS is only good as the information it’s given. We’ve seen an appalling breakdown in this system because authorities did not follow proper procedures in updating the database with offenses that would have prevented recent mass shooters from purchasing firearms. Oh, and there’s this: . . .

Horvat: Want to Stop Mass Shootings? Bring Back the Father!

Across the country, thousands of confused young men are a potential danger to their communities. Everyone knows they are there and, in some cases, who they might be. They fit a consistent profile that makes them easy to point out. They are self-centered frustrated men with mental-health issues, often from white middle-class backgrounds. They come from broken families and possess limited social skills and self-discipline. These psychopathic young men become the mass shooters that are terrorizing America. Each one is like a ticking time bomb waiting to go off. America now faces the problem of dealing with these explosive young men. The matter calls for urgent action as the number of shooters and shootings grows.There are two main solutions to this problem, only one of which is effective. Employing the Force of Government The first one consists of bringing the full power of the government to bear upon these unfortunate individuals and thus eliminating every possibility of a shooting event before it happens. Everyone must get involved to save these poor young men from themselves before it is too late. This solution calls for . . . […] In almost every single shooter case, this father is missing. The mother cannot assume this role, however heroic she might be. Young men need strong fathers or father figures who will shoulder all these strength-infusing roles to keep them from becoming the weak and cowardly figures who kill innocent and defenseless people. The Father as Monitor, Provider and Protector The father must constantly . . .

TUESDAY PRIMARY RESULTS

Meads: Mike Collins Defeats Trump-Endorsed Vernon Jones In Georgia’s 10th Congressional District GOP Primary Run-Off

As of press time, Collins secured 78.26% of the vote while Jones earned 21.74%, according to Decision Desk HQ, with enough votes reported to project a Collins victory.

Meads: Trump-Endorsed Katie Britt Defeats Formerly-Trump-Endorsed Candidate Mo Brooks In Alabama GOP Senate Run-Off Election

Alabama Senate candidate Katie Britt has defeated Congressman Mo Brooks (R-AL) in the state’s GOP primary run-off election. As of press time, Britt has secured 66.54% of the vote and Brooks has earned 33.46%, according to Decision Desk HQ, with enough votes counted to project a winner.

CNN: 2022 Midterms

See all Alabama, Georgia, and Virginia results.

https://www.cnn.com/election/2022

JANUARY 6 COMMITTEE

King: RNC coordinated fake electors at Trump’s ‘direct request’: Ronna McDaniel

Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel confirmed that former President Donald Trump was involved in lawyer John Eastman‘s fake elector scheme. During a brief excerpt from her deposition played during the Jan. 6 committee hearing Tuesday, McDaniel explained that Trump called her and put her in touch with Eastman, who then engaged with the RNC about the scheme over the following months. “He turned the call over to Mr. Eastman, who then proceeded to talk about the importance of the RNC helping the campaign gather these contingent electors in case any of these legal challenges that were ongoing changed the result of any of the states. I think more, just helping them reach out and assemble them,” she said. “My understanding is the campaign did take the lead, and we just were helping them in that — in that role.”

Tilson: EXCLUSIVE: Police Report Proves Plainclothes Electronic Surveillance Unit Members Were Embedded Among Jan. 6 Protesters

While there is growing speculation that federal agents and Capitol Police were involved in instigating acts of violence during the Jan. 6, 2021 protests and recording responses for the purposes of entrapment, evidence now proves that “plainclothes” members of a special Electronic Surveillance Unit (ESU) were embedded among the protesters for the purposes of conducting video surveillance. Evidence also points to a day of security deficiencies and police provocation for the purpose of entrapment.

U.S. SUPREME COURT

Sullum: SCOTUS Again Upholds Double Prosecution and Punishment for the Same Crime

The federal government prosecuted Merle Denezpi twice for the same crime. It also punished him twice: the first time with 140 days in a federal detention center, the second time with a prison sentence more than 70 times as long. Although that may seem like an obvious violation of the Fifth Amendment’s ban on double jeopardy, the Supreme Court last week ruled that it wasn’t. As the six justices in the majority saw it, that puzzling conclusion was the logical result of the Court’s counterintuitive precedents on this subject. The Fifth Amendment says no person shall “be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb.” But under the Court’s longstanding “dual sovereignty” doctrine, an offense is not “the same” when it is criminalized by two different governments. […] Justice Neil Gorsuch strenuously dissented in that case. “A free society does not allow its government to try the same individual for the same crime until it’s happy with the result,” he wrote. “Unfortunately, the Court today endorses a colossal exception to this ancient rule against double jeopardy.” Gorsuch, joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, dissented again last week. Even the “colossal exception” created by the dual-sovereignty doctrine, he said, is not big enough to encompass the two cases against Denezpi, both of which were pursued by the federal government under federal law. […] Six justices nevertheless approved the second prosecution, tracing the authority for the first conviction to a distinct “sovereign”: the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe. But as Gorsuch notes, . . .

Fox News: Supreme Court rules on religious school tuition assistance

Fox News senior national correspondent Rich Edson reports on Tuesday’s Supreme Court ruling in favor of First Amendment rights for tuition subsidies in schools on ‘Special Report.’

Watch the 2:33 minute report: https://video.foxnews.com/v/6308287566112#sp=show-clips

Kruta: Sotomayor Accuses Conservative Justices Of Attempting To ‘Dismantle’ Separation Of Church And State

Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor accused the conservative members of the court of working to “dismantle the wall of separation between church and state” in a blistering dissent released on Tuesday. The Court announced its 6-3 ruling in the case Carson v. Makin, with the majority holding that the government could not ban taxpayer-funded tuition assistance from being used by citizens for private religious education.

DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE INJUSTICE?

Lindquist: Department of Justice to Spend $1 Million to Create Center for ‘Two-Spirit’ Youth

The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP), a branch of the Department of Justice (DOJ), is actively searching for an organization that will be paid $1 million to implement the agency’s plan to create a National Resource Center for Justice-Involved LGBTQ+ and Two-Spirit Youth.

A listing on the OJJDP website explains that the center will “develop and disseminate resources (e.g., fact sheets, toolkits, online curriculums, webinars, training and guidance manuals, etc.)” and that the program will seek to provide “training and technical assistance to juvenile justice practitioners to assist them in meeting the needs of justice-involved LGBTQ+ and Two-Spirit youth.” It will also “inform justice systems policies, practices, and/or programs.”

FAUCI’S FDA, CDC & NIH: IT’S POLITICAL

(The cat is out of the bag) Sundance: Biden Says White House Needs More Money for Next Pandemic

Earlier today, touting vaccines for babies and children 6 months through 5 years of age, Joe Biden explained they needed more taxpayer money to give to pharmaceutical lobbyists to pay for vaccines and organize the next pandemic.

Hope: Biden Enthuses: ‘We’re the Only Country in the World’ Giving COVID Vaccine to Young Kids

Last Saturday, the Biden Administration gave the green light to the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines for children from 6 months to 5 years old, with CDC Director Rochelle Walensky appearing strangely ecstatic in her announcement video. The Washington Post and its ilk are also super-excited that these vaccines are “finally” approved, a moment that “many parents have anxiously awaited for months.” Then on Tuesday, President Joe Biden and his wife Jill visited a COVID vaccine center Tuesday. Biden declared, “We’re the only country in the world doing this right now.” Which begs the obvious question: why are we the only country dosing our babies with MRNA vaccines? It seems a little strange that we’re serving up our kids as the guinea pigs of the world. I also wonder: Why the excitement, when little kids are at extremely limited risk from the viral disease? From UNICEF: . . . […] Children’s Health Defense says it’s all about the money: But, if the vaccine is added to the pediatric vaccine schedule, and if it’s mandated like other childhood vaccines, it will become an evergreen market representing billions of dollars to the drug companies.

Kirsch: The CDC says “severe reactions” to the COVID vaccines are rare. That’s not what we found.

The CDC has always maintained that severe reactions to the COVID vaccines are rare. Since I officially became a misinformation spreader over a year ago, I’ve never believed that statement because I couldn’t find any reliable data that confirmed it. On Jun 20, 2022, VSRF engaged the services of a professional polling company (Pollfish) to survey 500 people who were selected entirely at random. The implications of what we found in that poll were shocking: At least 2M Americans over 18 were injured by the COVID vaccine such that they are unable to hold a job. The US government has never done any research to determine the extent of the injuries caused by the COVID vaccines. Now we know why. The results of our poll were consistent with an earlier vaccine injury survey by the Israeli government and with the VAERS data which has been “lit up” since January 2021 telling us “the COVID vaccines are the most unsafe vaccines in human history.” Now we have independent confirmation that the safety signals in VAERS were accurate, just like we’ve always said. The numbers in this poll are absolutely shocking and there is no way to spin this as a positive. This article includes the full Pollfish survey reports and individual response data so that anyone can analyze it themselves.

Citizen Free Press; The brainwashing is real…

Parents debate whether to give young children Covid vaccine. One smart and skeptical black father

Watch the 2:54 minute news report: https://citizenfreepress.com/breaking/cbs-interviews-parents-who-are-so-excited-to-vaccinate-their-toddlers/

BIDEN/HARRIS/OBAMA REGIME: TRANSFORMING FOREIGN POLICY

Toameh: Arabs to Biden: Shut Down Iran’s ‘Expansionist Project’

As US President Joe Biden prepares to visit Saudi Arabia and Israel in mid-July, Arabs are sending him a number of messages regarding the need to deal with the threat that Iran’s mullahs pose to their security and stability. The Arabs, especially those living in the Gulf states, continue to express deep concern over the Iranian regime’s ongoing efforts to obtain nuclear weapons. The Arabs also say they are worried about Tehran’s intervention in the internal affairs of some Arab countries, as well as its financial and military aid to terrorist groups such as Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis, and Iraqi militias. Some Arabs are repeating their appeal to the Biden administration to stop the policy of appeasement towards the mullahs and to take into consideration the concerns of Washington’s long-time Arab allies and friends in the Middle East. Ahead of Biden’s visit, the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, in a clear message to the US administration and other Western powers, affirmed that any nuclear agreement or future negotiations with Iran must address the Iranians’ “destabilizing behavior in the region, their support for terrorist militias, and their missile program.”

BIDEN/HARRIS/OBAMA REGIME: TRANSFORMING THE U.S. MILITARY

Olohan: ‘I See The Impact On Our Readiness’: Matt Gaetz Pushes To Reinstate Service Members Dismissed Over The COVID Vaccine

When the House Armed Services Committee marks up the National Defense Authorization Act, Gaetz will introduce an amendment protecting armed service members who refuse to get the COVID vaccine, reinstating members who were dismissed over their refusal at the same rank and grade, and providing back pay and benefits to the members who were dismissed. “I see the impact on our readiness from these mandates,” he said during a Tuesday afternoon phone interview with The Daily Wire. “We are hundreds of pilots short in the Air Force and and we’ve lost a number of pilots as a consequence of these mandates.”

CHINA: AMERICA’S MORTAL ENEMY

Blitzer: Biden administration preparing for ‘wrong kind’ of China conflict in case of Taiwan invasion: book

An article published in a new book from the American Enterprise Institute warns that the Biden administration’s preparations for a possible armed conflict with China could be totally wrong, arguing that a war against Beijing would last far longer than officials may realize. In the think tank’s publication, “Defending Taiwan,” senior fellows Hal Brands and Michael Beckley write that “Washington may be preparing for the wrong kind of war,” while offering suggestions for how they can plan the right way. “The Pentagon and many defense planners appear to be focused on winning a short, localized conflict in the Taiwan Strait. That would mean riding out an opening missile blitz, blunting a Chinese invasion, and thereby forcing Beijing to relent,” Brands and Beckley say in their article, “Getting Ready for a Long War: Why a US-China Fight in the Western Pacific Won’t End Quickly.” They also claim . . .

Martel: China Uses Photo of Biden Bike Fall to Mock U.S. Position on Tariffs

China’s Global Times government propaganda newspaper illustrated an article on Monday about President Joe Biden considering lifting tariffs on Chinese products with a photo of Biden falling off of a bicycle this weekend — an embarrassing image that went unmentioned in the article and had nothing to do with its contents.

BIDEN/HARRIS/OBAMA REGIME: TRANSFORMING AMERICA

Ross: Biden State Department Taps Beijing Bull To Run China Shop

The Biden administration’s pick to advise the State Department on “strategic competition” with Beijing chairs an investment think tank that urged Americans to triple their investments in China. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday selected BlackRock Investment Institute chairman and Obama administration national security adviser Tom Donilon to co-chair the Foreign Affairs Policy Board amid the State Department’s pivot to China. Donilon’s work at BlackRock could pose a conflict of interest for the board, which provides “advice, feedback, and perspectives” to senior State Department officials on foreign policy matters. Under his leadership, the Investment Institute has urged investors to dramatically increase their stakes in Chinese companies. What’s more, BlackRock views “strategic competition” with China as bad for the company’s bottom line.

Citizen Free Press; Trucker issues warning… They’re running out of diesel fuel…

Watch the trucker and Pilot Flying J CEO videos: https://citizenfreepress.com/breaking/trucker-issues-warning-theres-no-fuel/

Harper: Record High Diesel Prices Threaten Domino Effect To Other Goods

Diesel gas prices hit another record high Thursday at $5.79 per gallon, according to AAA. That is a spike from $5.57 a month ago and much higher than the average of $3.22 the same time last year. Diesel gas prices have continued to hit new records this week even as regular gas has leveled out, at least for the last couple of days. Those higher prices are one of several factors raising costs for businesses, costs that are often passed down to consumers. Food prices have soared in recent months. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported a 10.1% increase in the food index in the previous twelve months, “the first increase of 10 percent or more since the period ending March 1981.”

Solomon: ‘Greatly compromised:’ Lawmakers see major security hole after 15 suspected terrorists cross border

Lawmakers in Congress are sounding alarm after 15 illegal migrants with suspected terrorists ties were caught crossing the border in a single month, raising worries that some might eventually reach the stage of launching an attack. “Our national security is greatly compromised, with an open border and simply the unwillingness of the Biden administration to do anything about it, other than just continue to incentivize more and more of it,” Rep. Brian Babin, R-Texas, told Just the News after Customs and Border Protection released May statistics showing the 15 migrants with terrorism flags. Rep, Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., said border agents are increasingly overwhelmed processing the nearly quarter million illegal migrants who are crossing monthly and that means more dangerous players are sneaking across perilously undetected.

Davidson: Border Dispatch, Part II: ‘The Cartel Controls Everything Here Now’

The ongoing border crisis has transformed illegal immigration into an industrial-scale international smuggling black market. […] When Ramon and Veronica and their daughter reached Reynosa, their bus was stopped at a cartel checkpoint and they were asked for a code. (When migrants pay off the cartel they get a code. That’s how the cartel keeps track of who’s paid and who hasn’t.) They hadn’t paid and didn’t have a code, so the cartel kidnapped them and took them to a stash house with a bunch of other families. Ramon says the house had no water, no food, no electricity. They were held there 10 days, until family members back in Nicaragua were able to get together $3,000 (a thousand for each of them) and pay the “cartel tax.” After they paid, they were taken over the river by boat, picked up by Border Patrol, and were released a few days later on humanitarian parole. In this case, they were released on parole through a relatively recent bureaucratic innovation designed to streamline the processing of illegal border-crossers and prevent overcrowding in federal detention centers. They say they were only asked for the address and telephone number of their destination. ICE discharged them with a sheaf of documents that allows them to travel inside the United States — which they’ll need to do, because they were also given a date, 30 days out, to report to an ICE office in central Washington State, where they’re headed. What they don’t have is a court date or work permits.

Hauf: Biden’s Cigarette Crackdown a Boon for Drug Dealers, Experts Warn

A new Biden administration effort to regulate cigarettes will bankroll street gangs and bankrupt U.S. tobacco farmers, experts say. The Food and Drug Administration is preparing this month to require lower nicotine content in all cigarettes—a move critics argue will wreck the $75 billion U.S. tobacco industry amid a global economic crisis and boost a black market as crime spikes nationwide. The news comes weeks after the agency announced its plans to ban menthol cigarettes, which will cost federal and local governments an estimated $6.6 billion in the first year alone. Richard Marianos, a 27-year veteran of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, said these regulations will shift the demand for cigarettes toward unregulated tobacco grown internationally, which is then purchased and sold by drug dealers. “The problem again with this administration is they do not take into consideration a totality of subject matter experts,” Marianos told the Washington Free Beacon. “I’ve never seen this much foolishness in my life.”

THE DEMOCRAT LED WAR ON CHILDREN: TRANNIFYING AMERICA

Revolver.news: The GOP’s “Transgender” Strategy Is Dangerously Off Track

President Biden is signing a sweeping new executive order on Wednesday that aims to protect LGBT youth from a raft of conservative state laws and address barriers they face to health care and housing. The order aims to use the muscle of the federal government to push back on laws in states like Texas and Florida that have restricted access to health care for transgender youth and barred discussion in elementary schools about gender and sexual orientation. The message of the president’s new order is unambiguous: absolutely zero restrictions on bombarding children with morally degenerate sexual and gender propaganda and then permanently mutilating their genitals will be tolerated in Joe Biden’s America. Joe Biden is certainly raising the stakes on transgenderism. The million-dollar question is, will the GOP fold, let the Biden Administration win, and let every school in America become a transgenderism factory forever? Despite what D.C. consultants might tell you, Republicans should accept Biden’s challenge. Until recently, the GOP’s response to the transgender epidemic has been fearful, tepid, and timid. Republicans fear cancellation, they fear backlash from the extreme left, and they fear a replay of the fight over gay marriage from a decade ago. This fear must be banished. […] There is no evidence that anyone is secretly, in their brain, born the opposite sex, let alone one person out of seventy in the general population. And recently, the number of transgenders has skyrocketed. But why? A 2020 report from The London Times on GIDS, the U.K.’s top gender clinic, hints at what is really going on: . . .

Sand: The Feds: Fully on Board the Trans Train

Biden administration doubles down on the transgender fad. Back in March, the Biden administration celebrated the “International Transgender Day of Visibility” by extolling the virtues of the kindly sounding “gender-affirming care.” But this innocuous sounding term can be extraordinarily hazardous to the health of young people – puberty blockers, hormone therapy and “gender affirming” therapies – all irreversible – are part of the program. This bit of insanity was followed by a major rewrite of Title IX in May, which prohibits sex discrimination and harassment in programs receiving federal funds, and now includes discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender. As The Federalist’s Joy Pullman explains, any establishments that accept any federal funding for food, including schools, “must also allow males who claim to be female to access female private spaces, such as showers, bathrooms, and sleeping areas.” These organizations must also follow protocols “such as requiring staff to use inaccurate pronouns to describe transgender people and allowing male staff to dress as women while on the job.” Then on June 15, Biden furthered his descent into the child abuse abyss by signing an executive order that . . .

Gentles: Transgender Activists Manipulate Parents With Suicide Threats

“Do you want a dead daughter or a live son?” This question, which is really a threat, is the central tenet of the campaign selling gender ideology to parents. Parents are often told that they are putting their gender-nonconforming child at risk of suicide if they don’t medically “transition” him or her to appear as the opposite sex or at least treat their child as the sex he or she chooses. The child then internalizes this information and believes that suicide is an inevitable outcome without transition, as opposed to an unhealthy response to internal distress. The pernicious assumption behind this horrific question is that parents do not have the best interest of their children at heart and that the “experts” know better. Nothing could be further from the truth. […] At its horribly rotten core, the culture created by the question “Do you want a dead daughter or a live son?” intentionally drives a painful wedge between parents and children unless parents consent without question to immediate social and medical transition. Parents who would do anything to keep their children safe are shoved aside by arrogant and callous school staff, doctors, and therapists.

A CULTURE IN DECLINE

Prager: What Do ‘Men Give Birth’ and ‘Defund the Police’ Have in Common?

Unless you are brainwashed, you regard the statements “men give birth” and “defund the police” as absurd. Why, then, do leftists (as opposed to liberals and conservatives) say these things and even believe them? I think there are two related explanations. One is that the Left seeks to tear down every normative institution. If men give birth, “man” and “woman” no longer mean anything. “Men give birth” means the end of the male-female distinction, the most basic distinction in the human race. Racial distinctions pale in comparison. So do national distinctions. Marxists support the obliteration of the male-female distinction because the only distinction that matters to Marxists is that of class. The other explanation is . . . […] I came to realize the significance of distinctions when writing my commentary on the first five books of the Bible (“The Rational Bible”). The Bible’s moral order is dependent on distinctions. Among them are: . . . .

McCaffrey: Where It Begins

Destroying the books has always been a key to destroying a culture. We must save our own culture before we save anyone else’s. The bound volume replaced the scroll, as the printing press replaced the scribe. Now the printed volume has been replaced by the digital facsimile. With each stage, something of the past has been lost in order to gain a “better” future. That is the theory. First the art of illumination and hand lettering, never mind the editorial alterations by the copyist, but then paper making and even typography have been forgotten for the most part. […] But what are we losing and what have we lost? Some time ago, as a 50-year-old bookseller with a family to support, and a sense of dignity to maintain, I spent a day dumpster-diving behind a local historical society. I have found that, throughout my life, when push comes to shove, dignity is often the first to go. A homeless man looking for some cash had come in the shop with a grocery bag filled with old 19th-century pamphlets. “Where did these come from?” I asked, already aware of the stamping on the covers. “A dumpster,” was the reply. And he showed me where. And it was filled with them. Jammed. I went into the society and asked what was going on. “Oh,” I was told, “Don’t worry. All of them had been photographically copied. They are saved!” […] Our culture is what we are, not our possessions, but what we know. If that is reduced to what a computer can guess, there is no need for us. […] Books are the caches of our culture. We must, each of us, save our books because the institutions will not do it for us.

THE DEMOCRAT LED WAR ON WOMEN

Gillespie: Michigan’s Gretchen Whitmer refers to women as ‘menstruating people,’ GOP gov hopefuls respond

Whitmer made the comments after being asked a question about a proposed amendment to the Michigan state constitution protecting access to abortion for its citizens should the Supreme Court overturn Roe v. Wade. The proposal’s initiative is being led by a group called Reproductive Freedom For All, and it will only appear on the ballot if a minimum number of petition signatures required by state law are obtained and certified by the board of state canvassers by July 11. […] “Number one: I have the constitutional ability to bring a lawsuit to protect constitutional rights of people of Michigan. So I brought a lawsuit on behalf of all the menstruating people in Michigan — 2.2 million. And another tool I have is to go straight to our state Supreme Court,” she added. […] “Has the left gone insane? I mean really. Menstruating people? Drag queens in every school? This is not normal behavior. Someone needs to check the Democratic Party. It’s starting to seem like COVID was more like mad cow disease,” businesswoman Tudor Dixon told Fox News Digital, including reference to Democratic Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel saying at a recent event that there should be “a drag queen for every school.”

DEMOCRAT PARTY MARXIST PLAYBOOK: WOKE IDENTITY POLITICS

Prager U: Is It Racist to Require Voter ID?

How hard is it for people of different races to get an ID? Is it racist to require an ID to vote? Will Witt is at UCLA asking students what they think.

Watch the 4:14 minute video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEViMMhuk7Q

Hinderaker: ONLY MARXISTS NEED APPLY

In Minnesota, a new rule relating to certification of teachers is in process. As I understand it, the rule has proceeded without legislative action and ultimately will come before an administrative law judge who will (I assume) approve it, absent enormous public outcry. The rule provides that you can’t be licensed as a teacher in Minnesota unless you subscribe to neo-Marxist theories of race, gender and so on. You have to read it to believe it: . . . […] Personally, I wouldn’t allow a “teacher” who “understands” those things within 100 yards of one of my kids. Where does the impetus for this kind of evil come from? Certainly not from parents, students or citizens generally. The extreme left-wingers who orchestrate this kind of revolution without ever having to bring it on for a vote are experts at manipulating bureaucratic processes, always with the complicity of a worthless press.

Weissberg: Manufacturing Social Justice Warriors on an Industrial Scale

For over a half century, American institutions of higher education have been guilty of promoting oikophobia — hatred of one’s own people and, more generally, Western civilization. Instruction initially only occurred in traditional academic disciplines like English and Sociology where youngsters learned about America’s racism, sexism, and multiple other sins. Within a few years, America-bashing had its very own departments, notably Women’s Studies, Black Studies, and other “grievances studies” departments. Remarkably, despite the plain-to-see pernicious impact of this “education,” it continues to thrive and expand. America-hating academics resemble drug addicts unable to achieve highs from the original dose and thus must move on to ever-larger amounts. At some point, alas, this addictive pursuit may prove fatal, and the same may be true in education as our schools continue to demonize America.

The latest installment of this national suicide on-the-installment urge is the burgeoning field of “social justice” as a separate academic major. This is not just sneaking in some criticism of Americas in a traditional history course; nor some freshman orientation lecture to exorcize white privilege. Far worse. This is ROTC for the woke.

CLIMATE EMERGENCY: IT’S POLITICAL

The Center Square Staff: Amid threats of blackouts, Illinois lawmakers call for scrapping ‘Green New Deal’

In the wake of an alert warning of possible rolling blackouts this summer, some Illinois lawmakers want to revise the state’s energy policies. Midcontinent Independent System Operator is warning Illinoisans of possible blackouts and rising energy prices that could cost families as much as $600 more a year.

The announcement was just an advisory and was not the elevated “warning” or “event” stage, but they said the next advisories could require electric utilities to request energy conservation or possible rolling blackouts and power outages. State Rep. Adam Niemerg, R-Teutopolis, said rolling blackouts should not be the norm in this country and something should be done to ensure there will be abundant energy available for Illinoisans. “We need to be back in Springfield. We need to repeal the Green New Deal, we need to bring Ameren to the table,” Niemerg said, “and actually have a productive energy policy moving forward.”

OTHER NEWS

AP: Pa. GOP lawmakers block assault-style gun ban for those under 21

State House Republicans blocked a proposal to prevent those ages 18 to 21 from possessing assault-style rifles on Tuesday by completely changing the bill into a constitutional amendment to allow anyone to carry concealed guns. It was the second week in a row that Republicans in the Judiciary Committee used their majority to defeat Democratic proposals to address the country’s gun violence plague. The bill would have prevented those under age 21 from purchasing, possessing or transporting the types of weapons that have often been used to kill and wound people in the mass shootings that have become an epidemic in the United States. So-called “constitutional carry” has wide support among the Legislature’s Republicans, but a bill to allow it was vetoed by Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf in December.

Solomon: Marjorie Taylor Greene to seek restraining order against Dem staffer who defaced her posters

Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene said Tuesday night she has decided to seek a retraining order against a House Democrat staffer who was captured by Capitol Police on security cameras defacing posters outside her Washington office. Greene told Just the News that she felt like she had no choice but to seek the protective order against Timothy Hysom, the chief of staff to Massachusetts Democrat Rep. Jake Auchincloss, after the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington declined a police request to issue an arrest warrant and charge the staffer.”Nancy Pelosi and Democrat leadership don’t believe in protecting me. So I have no other choice but to do whatever I can do to protect myself and protect my staff,” she said during an interview on the Just the News, Not Noise television show.

Pearce: Audible scores first-look audio deal with Obamas’ production company, Higher Ground

Barack and Michelle Obama’s production company, Higher Ground, has signed an exclusive, multiyear, worldwide first-look deal with Amazon subsidiary Audible, the audio content company announced Tuesday. Audio competitor Spotify recently opted not to extend its 2019 deal with Higher Ground, which produced Spotify shows including “The Michelle Obama Podcast” and “Renegades: Born in the USA,” featuring former President Obama and Bruce Springsteen.

The Center Square Staff: South Dakota Senate removes Attorney General Ravnsborg from office

South Dakota Senate voted Tuesday to sustain two articles of impeachment against Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg and remove him from office, making him the state’s first constitutional officer to be impeached.

The Senate voted 24-9 on count one which involved crimes related to the death of a man he struck with his vehicle in 2020. The vote was 31-2 on the second count which involves malfeasance related to how he represented himself after the incident. The Senate also voted unanimously to bar Ravnsborg from ever holding public office in South Dakota again.

Fox News: Twitter erupts after board endorses Elon Musk’s bid for platform: ‘Cue gnashing of teeth’

Twitter users reacted in shock and awe Tuesday to the news that Twitter’s board of directors endorsed Musk’s offer to buy the social media company. Fox Business reported on Tuesday that Twitter’s board “unanimously recommended” that its shareholders vote to approve Musk’s $44 billion bid to buy the company. A SEC filing from Tuesday revealed the board’s recommendation.

Morrow: Falling Dominoes: Another Sports League Bans Transgender Athletes

Rugby’s international governing body on Monday banned transgender athletes from competing, making it the latest sports body in recent weeks to restrict them from participating. The International Rugby League, which sets the rules for the sport in matches around the world and oversees the Rugby League World Cup, said in a statement that male-to-female rugby players will not be permitted to play in sanctioned women’s matches before further research is conducted. “It is the IRL’s responsibility to balance the individual’s right to participate … against perceived risk to other participants,” the league said.

BOOK REVIEW

Endgame: The Church’s Strategic Move to Save Faith and Family in America, by John Van Epp and J. P. De Gance (276 pages, PGAMA, 2021)

Deavel: “Endgame”: Teaching the Way of the Family

Every bishop, priest, and pastor should read “Endgame” for the sake of the Church and the country. Much evangelization assumes things taught in families that don’t exist. This book shows the way to family—and renewed faith. We talk a great deal about a “crisis of the family” but do not appreciate how much this bulwark of freedom and civilization has fallen. In their new book, Endgame, Protestant pastor and therapist John Van Epp and Catholic non-profit founder J. P. De Gance lay out the dire statistical data. In the U. S., marriage rates have fallen by 61% over the past fifty years. For the last years available, the American Catholic Church has recorded almost three times as many funerals as they have marriages. Divorce rates, premarital sex rates, and cohabitation rates (which actually predict future divorces) for Christians in general are almost as high as the general population. What has happened is a triple decoupling: sex is decoupled from marriage, romantic relationships from marriage, and parenting from marriage. The end result is that 40% of American children arrive without married parents, the vast majority of whom end up with single parents by age twelve. Those children, as decades of empirical research show, are vastly more likely to suffer from physical, emotional, psychological, and economic ills.

The Prickly Pear’s TAKE ACTION focus this year is to help achieve a winning 2024 national and state November 5th election with the removal of the Biden/Obama leftist executive branch disaster, win one U.S. Senate seat, maintain and win strong majorities in all Arizona state offices on the ballot and to insure that unrestricted abortion is not constitutionally embedded in our laws and culture.

Please click the TAKE ACTION link to learn to do’s and don’ts for voting in 2024. Our state and national elections are at great risk from the very aggressive and radical leftist Democrat operatives with documented rigging, mail-in voter fraud and illegals voting across the country (yes, with illegals voting across the country) in the last several election cycles.

Read Part 1 and Part 2 of The Prickly Pear essays entitled How NOT to Vote in the November 5, 2024 Election in Arizona to be well informed of the above issues and to vote in a way to ensure the most likely chance your vote will be counted and counted as you intend.

Please click the following link to learn more.

TAKE ACTION