Incompetent Elected Officials

The Gabbard Files

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

The big news in last ten days—I mean other than the allegation that Donald Trump wrote a raunchy birthday card (maybe) to Jeffrey Epstein once—was a newly declassified report released by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard that fingers former DNI James Clapper, former CIA Director John Brennan and former FBI Director James Comey among others in the Obama Administration, and later in the Trump Administration, as having deliberately “manipulated and withheld” key intelligence from the public in order to advance the hoax that there was Russian interference in the 2016 election with the collusion of Donald Trump.

Gabbard said she would provide all related documents to the Justice Department “to deliver the accountability that President [Donald] Trump, his family, and the American people deserve…No matter how powerful, every person involved in this conspiracy must be investigated and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, to ensure nothing like this ever happens again.” She said she was releasing information that showed a “treasonous conspiracy in 2016” by top Obama administration officials, including Obama.

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Unethical Quote of the Month: NPR’s CEO Katherine Maher

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

“As far as the accusations that we’re biased, I’d stand up and say, ‘Please show me a story that concerns you.’”

The infuriatingly dishonest, smug and biased Katherine Maher, head of NPR, on CNN yesterday.

Social media and others, like Senator John Kennedy and Instapundit, are going wild picking obvious examples. Hell, I have a lot of them; here’s one you may have forgotten (I had).

If Congress doesn’t finally strip public funding from NPR and PBS, there is no reason to trust those people to do anything. The Democrats love them because they are permanent propaganda mouthpieces for their party, but what’s the Republicans’ excuse?

Into the “It Isn’t What It Is” Hall of Fame Goes L.A. Mayor Karen Bass

/ Jack Marshall / 4 Comments

Video has “surfaced”—where do these surfaced videos go to, before they surface?—of Los Angeles’s incompetent, smug, ridiculous mayor Karen Bass answering a question about her city’s ICE riots by replying that “they never happened.” See?

The response on social media has been swift and terrible…

I just don’t understand.

How do politicians like Bass keep getting away with this? Democrats during the Biden Administration set new records for “It isn’t what it is” gaslighting. The border was secure. Inflation wasn’t really excessive. Men who declared themselves women while keeping all their junk were…POOF!…women. Joe Biden was “sharp as a tack.” War is Peace. Oops, sorry, that last one was Big Brother. How does Bass and her party live with themselves? How can they look themselves in the mirror? Why do Democrats tolerate it?

Have they no sense of decency, at long last? Have they left no sense of decency?

Apparently not, or they would be hiding their heads under paper bags.

[Of course, it helps that virtually no Axis news sources have reported on the video. But we know that journalists have no sense of decency…]

One More Bit of Evidence That The Government Is Too Incompetent To Be Trusted With So Much Power And Money

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

 The Transportation Security Administration has started to phase out its rule requiring travelers to take off their shoes before going through airport security.  The New York Times writes that “the agency has not officially announced this change and did not confirm the new policy” but it “appears to be taking effect at airports across the country.” Caleb Harmon-Marshall, a former TSA officer, first reported the soft launch of this policy via his travel newsletter. It appears to be happening first at major airports, then trickling down to all of them.

The requirement was one of the best examples of what Ethics Alarms calls The Barn Door Fallacy: a rare or preventable incident occurs attracting lots of media attention, and lawmakers or regulators react hysterically with draconian measures that are expensive, obtrusive, ineffective and unnecessary to ensure that what had never happened before won’t happen again.

Richard Reid (above) is an incompetent British terrorist who tried to bring down a passenger plane in 2001 by igniting a plastique bomb in his shoe. (The fuse was wet, and he couldn’t get it to light.) This coming being so soon after the September 11 bombings and everyone being freaked out over the failure of airport security that allowed that tragedy, the TSA decided to make all commercial airline passengers remove their shoes and have them x-rayed forever. Morons. (My mother observed that we should regard ourselves as lucky that a female terrorist hadn’t tied to set off a bomb in her brassiere.) And it has taken 24 years for someone in charge to decide, “You know, this is kind of stupid.”

“Why now?” Harmon-Marshall asked in his newsletter. “I think it’s politics, not security. A handful of lawmakers have recently ramped up criticism of the TSA, with some even floating the idea of dismantling the agency altogether. From complaints about long lines to inconsistent screening experiences, the pressure has been mounting. And this shoe change? It feels like a direct response to that pressure.”

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A Perfect Example of a “Trump Lie”

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

On both MSNBC and CNN today, a big deal was made over the fact that President Trump said that “no other country” confers automatic citizenship on those born within its borders. They were both sneering so hard that I bet they needed a lip massage afterwards, “Of course, 33 nations have birthright citizenship,” said one, with the other making a similar statement.

No question about it, they are right and Trump was wrong. What he meant, however, was “No nations anywhere but the Americas have birthright citizenship, and we are the only major power in the world that does.” Or, “Almost no nations that know what the fuck they are doing have birthright citizenship.” Presidents shouldn’t be that careless, but Trump is, he refuses to change, he’s not going to, and nobody should pretend that they are shocked when he does.

Here’s the list, as represented in the chart above: Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Gambia, Grenada, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, Jamaica, Lesotho, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago, Tuvalu, United States, Uruguay, and Venezuela.

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From the Res Ipsa Loquitur Files….[Updated]

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

That’s one of the anti-Musk “exhibits” displayed by Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-NM). Yes, she’s an Incompetent Elected Official. (I can’t wait for her to scream “Those budget figured don’t add up!”) Yes, she’s an embarrassment. Yes, she’s an idiot. [Special thanks to long, LONG-time commenter Neil Dorr, who informed me who the math genius was.]

Before I proceed, HIT IT, L’il Abner and Marryin’ Sam!

Rueful observations…

1 And they wonder why American trust in our government institutions is falling…

2. If Democrats can’t find a legitimate poll to justify their positions, they just make one up. That is proof right there…

3. Even if that chart were not completely incompetent, dishonest and absurd, how is a poll on what DOGE is doing and has done relevant to anything? All it shows is that the public’s inattentive and gullible consumption of partisan propaganda from news organizations causes it to believe one thing or another. A poll has no bearing on whether a government program or action is wise, effective or necessary.

4. Consider how many government employees had to be lazy, ignorant or stupid (or all three) for that chart to get into the hearing and on TV. We begin with the Congresswoman, of course, then all of her staff and the drones who made the chart.

5. As usual, this is one more indictment of the public school system.

6. The Democrats are doing their damnedest to snatch away the GOP’s longtime title as “The Stupid Party.”

7. The social media wags are having a ball with this one. Example: “I agree with that poll 110%!”

8. Democracy Dies in Cretinism.

Open Forum, “I Wasn’t Going To Have One But Then My Head Exploded” Edition….

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

We just had an open forum a few days ago, so I was going to skip the Friday Forum. Then I read this, my head exploded, I already was struggling because I didn’t sleep at all last night, so I need some time to mop up and repack my head:

The Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against Minnesota Wednesday for its laws that provide free and reduced tuition rates to illegal aliens. The laws, a DOJ press release contends, unconstitutionally discriminate against out-of-state U.S. citizens, who are not afforded the same privileges at Minnesota’s public colleges and universities….According to the lawsuit [“…which names Gov. Tim Walz, Attorney General Keith Ellison and the Minnesota Office of Higher Education as defendants”], federal law prohibits states from providing illegal aliens with any post secondary education benefit that is denied to U.S. citizens….The lawsuit explains how a 2013 state law allows illegal aliens who establish residency in Minnesota to benefit from reduced, in-state tuition rates….Additionally, the DFL-controlled Minnesota Legislature established in 2023 a free tuition program for students whose families make less than $80,000 annually. Illegal aliens are eligible for the program. The lawsuit asks the U.S. District Court to declare the laws unconstitutional and prohibit their enforcement.

“We are reviewing the lawsuit and will vigorously defend the state’s prerogative to offer affordable tuition to both citizen and non-citizen state residents,” a spokesperson for the attorney general’s office said.”

KABOOM!

A few rueful points, and then you write about whatever you want…

  • Why are we just hearing about this now, when the knuckleheaded governor of Minnesota was running from August 2024 to November to be a heartbeat from the Presidency? Why didn’t Trump confront Harris with that insanity? Why did no one in the news media, Axis or not, report on it?
  • These laws are the equivalents of “Welcome, illegal immigrants!” invitations to break the law, with Minnesota being a “sanctuary state.” Minnesota citizens are that stupid, or in the alternative, that clown car crazy? How did they get that way? Can they be treated? 
  • What logic can possibly justify this?
  • Note that the Minnesota AG is still obfuscating, not having the honesty of integrity to call a metaphorical spade a spade. “Non-citizen state residents”! The state lies, cheats and steals under Walz, but this is what the Democratic Party now stands for. No wonder he thinks he has a shot at the Presidential nomination in 2028.

Back to brain clean-up…

Lest We Forget: This Was the Most Unethical and Indefensible Partisan Act of 2025 So Far

/ Jack Marshall / 4 Comments

The Democratic Party seems hellbent on self-destruction, but the Axis media burying, under-reporting and generally spinning its worse transgressions may slow the process a bit. This week, there was a scantly reported act by the party that cannot be defended—-if you have a defense to propose, please send it in—but it came in a week so saturated with consequential news both ethical and otherwise that I’ll wager most Americans missed it.

Senate Democrats refused to participate in the first Congressional hearing regarding the cover-up of former President Joe Biden’s mental decline while in the White House, the question of whether his “autopen executive orders” and appointments were valid, and the potential Constitutional breaches these represent. Senators Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Peter Welch (D-Vt.) attended the first Senate Judiciary Committee meeting on the topic this week. Then almost immediately Durbin, the ranking Democratic member, walked out in protest with Welch behind him, with a lame and cynical whataboutist call for the committee to investigate President Donald Trump’s deployment of the National Guard to respond to illegal immigration enforcement rioting in Los Angeles. (The courts took care of that one, Dick, despite the attempts of your party’s captive judiciary.)

Then Durbin blathered, “The Republican majority on this committee has not held a single oversight hearing despite numerous critical challenges facing the nation that are under our jurisdiction.” Desperately, he cited the assassination of a state lawmaker in Minnesota, now pretty authoritatively proven to be the act of a lone wacko, and last week’s handcuffing of Sen. Alex Padilla at a DHS press conference, when the grandstanding jerk was properly treated according to Secret Service protocols. “Apparently, armchair diagnosing former President Biden is more important than the issues of grave concern, which I have mentioned,” Durbin said.

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Incompetent Elected Official of the Month: Minnesota State Rep. Kaohly Her

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

And, may I add, what an idiot!

It’s bad enough that she has a name that automatically thrusts us into an Abbott and Costello routine [“Who?” “Her!” “Who’s Her?” “She’s Her!” “Of course she’s a her, but who is she?” “Her!”], but the fact that she also appears to have no compunction about lying, rationalizing law-breaking and making a fool out of herself along anyone silly enough to support her makes Her one more example of what’s wrong with Minnesota, the Democratic Party, and the advocates for illegal immigration.

During a debate on the Minnesota House floor that touched on illegal immigration, Her announced that she entered the United States as a child illegally. “I am illegal in this country. My parents are illegal here in this country,” she said.

Oh! That’s interesting: that means that she can’t hold elected office legally, that she shouldn’t be on a ballot, and that she can’t even vote in elections, much less on bills. The fourth-term lawmaker’s confession “ignited a firestorm in right-wing media,” The Minnesota Informer writes. I guess Democrats and progressives don’t care if an elected official isn’t holding office legally as long as she votes their way, just those racist conservatives who are sticklers for details like citizenship. One of her Republican colleagues in the House, Rep. Walter Hudson, called for Her to be investigated. What a meanie! A state rep admits that she’s in the state illegally, and this Fascist wants to have her kicked out of the legislature. Xenophobe!

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More Thoughts and Observations on the LA Pro-Illegal Immigration Riots

/ Jack Marshall / 20 Comments

1. This morning, while CNN and MSNBC were raging about the riots, Fox News had an extended feature about how to make faux cocktails using coffee. Gee, it would be nice to have a responsible, trustworthy broadcast news network that was both unbiased and that didn’t assume that is viewers dropped out of junior high school.

2. I am surprised that so few readers have commented on this morning’s introductory post. Was everyone at church? “Is anybody there? Does anybody care?”

3. Here’s the comment on Facebook by an old friend, a retired journalist, and, of course, a Trump Derangement sufferer:

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