The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

How Trump Ruined the Media’s Weekend

Posted on | June 22, 2025 | Comments Off on How Trump Ruined the Media’s Weekend

Oh, sure, it was a bad Saturday for the Ayatollah, but try to imagine what it was like for the news media. Suppose you’re the lead national security reporter for the Washington Post or the New York Times. It’s a Saturday in June, so maybe you’re out at the beach for the weekend, having a nice seafood dinner with friends at some beachside bistro on the Maryland shore. You’re probably on your third glass of wine when, shortly before 8 p.m., your phone explodes with messages from your editors.

“HOLY FUCKING SHIT! THAT SON OF A BITCH!”

Which is how reporters talk, by the way, especially when they find out on a Saturday night that they’ve got barely an hour to write the lead for a front-page story in the Sunday paper, and the only information they’ve got is a Truth Social message from Donald Trump. Bwa-hahahahaha!

A lot of reporters had their weekends ruined this way. The front-page story in the Metro edition of the Washington Post carries three bylines (Dan Lamothe, Evan Hill and Warren Stroebel), and down at the end, it gives credit to two other writers, Natalie Allison and Alex Horton, as having “contributed to this report.” Meanwhile, of course, the news desk was scrambling to remake the layout of the front page, and clearing space for the “jump” on page A11, as everybody in the newsroom — skeleton staff on a Saturday night — was scrambling to deal with this story.

It didn’t end there, however. After rushing to get a story in the early Metro edition (the one delivered to the suburbs), then they immediately turned around to do an update for the late city edition. Shortly after Trump’s Truth Social message, the White House put out the word that there would be a 10 p.m. press conference.

“HOLY FUCKING SHIT! THAT SON OF A BITCH!”

Which is how reporters talk, when they find out they’re going to have to write up a second version of their front-page story — including quotes from the press conference — with just minutes to spare before the presses roll for the late edition. Great weekend at the beach, eh?

OK, so after filing your first version of the story, you might have 30 or 45 minutes before Trump’s press conference, time enough to write up a quote or two from your “intelligence community” sources. And then — as the final weekend-wrecking insult from the president you loathe with ever fiber of your being — at the end of his White House press conference, Trump announces that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Air Force General Dan Caine will hold a Pentagon press conference at 8 a.m. Sunday.

“HOLY FUCKING SHIT! THAT SON OF A BITCH!”

Which is how reporters talk, when they realize that after a night spent scrambling to write a front-page story, they’re going to have to get up early Sunday and head down to the Pentagon for a press conference by that smug Fox News bastard Pete Hegseth. It’s absolutely . . . perfect.



 

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What the Heck Is Wrong With Florida?

Posted on | June 21, 2025 | Comments Off on What the Heck Is Wrong With Florida?

Anthony Reznick was 11 when he was killed

Sometimes you encounter a story that makes you so angry that words cannot express the intensity of your rage, and such is the case with Florida’s new “super speeder” law. Here’s the short version:

Gov. Ron DeSantis just signed a new measure creating extra criminal penalties for extreme speeding, marking the state’s latest move to improve road safety and deter reckless driving.
The legislation (HB 351) targets so-called “super speeders,” establishing criminal consequences for motorists who exceed the posted speed limit by 50 miles per hour or more, or who drive at 100 mph or more in a manner that threatens others or interferes with vehicle operation.
First-time violators may face up to 30 days in jail, a $500 fine, or both. Repeat offenders could receive up to 90 days in jail, a $1,000 fine, or both. If a second violation occurs within five years, the offender’s driver’s license could be revoked for up to a year.
Any driver caught exceeding the speed limit by more than 50 mph must appear before a Judge under a mandatory court appearance provision.
The measure, carried by independent Hollywood Sen. Jason Pizzo and Republican Reps. Danny Alvarez of Hillsborough County and Susan Plasencia of Orlando, passed unanimously in the Senate. . . .
While Pizzo had initially proposed a stricter version of the bill (SB 1782) that would have imposed longer jail terms, he accepted the House’s comparatively lighter version. Passing the measure on the Senate floor April 24, he jokingly referred to HB 351 as the “less good House bill.”
The legislation, he said, was partly inspired by the 2022 death of 11-year-old Anthony Reznick in Sunny Isles Beach. Reznick was struck and killed in a crosswalk by Samentha Toussaint, a driver with more than two dozen prior traffic citations and a suspended license. She was traveling roughly 85 mph in a residential zone without headlights and had no insurance.
Despite the circumstances, Toussaint was not criminally charged. A Judge suspended her license for eight years and ordered community service and fines.

[ insert shouted obscenities here ]


Before getting into the legal discussion, permit me first to share some anecdotes. When I was 17, a police officer told me, “You could’ve got yourself killed” and, smart-ass that I was (and still am, honestly), my reply was, “Yeah, but I didn’t.” No need to go into the details of that vehicular offense, but there was a serious point behind my arrogant sarcasm: There is a difference between a hypothetical danger and an actual event, which ought to be considered in traffic enforcement.

When I reflect on my driving history, I have to admit that those guardian angels — sent to protect me, by the prayers of my late Grandma Kirby, and subsequently by my dear wife — deserve tremendous credit for my survival, especially during my years on the campaign trail.

Remember that? The day after Christmas 2011, I flew into Iowa for the 2012 Republican caucus campaign, with reservations for an economy rental car, but the lady at the counter explained that the Rick Perry campaign staff had arrived earlier and taken every car on their lot, except one — a black Mustang convertible which, under the terms of the agreement, they were obliged to give me at the same rate as the economy car I’d reserved. The best eight days of my life ensued, and not just because Rick Santorum won the caucuses. One morning, I found myself “aggregating headlines while naked” from the Radisson Quad City Plaza in Davenport, on the east side of the state. There was a 3:30 Rick Perry event scheduled in Pella that day, and I calculated a 1 p.m. departure for a drive of approximately 150 miles. Knowing that I couldn’t drive more than 10 mph over the speed limit on the interstate, the key to my calculations was to max it out on the final 25-mile stretch from Exit 173 — down Highway T22 South through Killduff, hang a right on Highway F62 toward Galesburg, then a left onto Highway T14. Let me tell you folks, I took some of those curves at tire-squealing speed, and don’t even ask how fast I drove the straightaways on those country roads.

You think I’m joking and, from a strictly legal standpoint, I’m prepared to plead that this is just satire, rather than a confession of crime, because they’ve got no other evidence and the statute of limitation has probably expired, but I’ll leave that to Bert the Samoan Lawyer.

My point is that nobody was killed or injured as a result of my record-setting pace on those Iowa backroads. The basis of traffic laws is the hypothetical risk of an accident, but between my skill as a driver, the excellent handling of that Mustang, and the overtime labor of those guardian angels, there was no actual risk and therefore, no accident. Sure, there are nerds who can point to statistics about the correlation between excessive speed and vehicular accidents, but (a) correlation is not causation and (b) who gets to define “excessive”? Yes, I saw the sign cautioning me that 25 mph was the, uh, recommended speed for that tight curve, but if in fact I made it through safely at 50 mph, who’s wrong — me or the sign? But I’ve digressed long enough . . .

The funniest guy I ever knew, Scott Swanson, was killed in a traffic accident while a student at West Georgia College (now West Georgia University). It was a profoundly stupid accident, caused by his friend’s drunk driving, and the friend was sentenced to what’s called “five do 10” (a 10-year sentence, with five years suspended, if the convict has no further offenses after being released from the penitentiary). Trust me, the judge didn’t want to sentence an otherwise harmless college kid to five years in prison, but he felt that anything less would be an injustice. I forget what the exact charge was — negligent manslaughter or whatever — but most states have some similar law, like vehicular homicide:

Vehicular homicide, also known as vehicular manslaughter . . . is a criminal offense that occurs when a person’s negligent or illegal operation of a vehicle results in the death of another person. It’s generally considered a form of involuntary manslaughter, where the intent to kill is not required.

Hence my question: What the heck is wrong with Florida?

Don’t they have a vehicular homicide statute in the Sunshine State, and if not, why not? Instead of increasing the penalties on mere speeding — which, as I have pointed out at some length, is just a hypothetical risk — why doesn’t Florida law punish actually causing death as a felony?

This situation is insane. Toussaint was 32 years old at the time she ran over Anthony Reznik in February 2021:

Records show Toussaint has past citations for speeding through a school zone in Pembroke Pines, and for “following too closely behind a vehicle.” There are several infractions in South Florida courts ranging from careless driving to not having proof of insurance.
In Miami-Dade County alone, Toussaint has a laundry list of moving violations through the years, including seven separate citations for driving on a suspended license — infractions that date back to at least 2007.
Records show Toussaint still owes big fines for some of those past driving citations.

She had been a known public menace for 15 years, basically, and by the time she finally killed someone — running a red light on a residential street at 85 mph — you might think the courts would consider this something more than a mere traffic violation. The appropriate legislative response to this egregious situation would be to fix whatever loophole exists in Florida law that fails to punish vehicular homicide as a felony, particularly in cases with aggravating circumstances such as a prior record of driving on a suspended license, etc. Ramping up penalties on “super speeders” isn’t the right answer because there are plenty of “no harm, no foul” speeding cases that don’t deserve harsh punishment. Not saying that I’ve ever topped 115 mph on any country backroads, because I haven’t waived my right to remain silent, but if nobody was actually harmed by me driving fast, why should it be treated as a crime?

Some people are just born to drive, and I’ve got that hillbilly moonshiner chromosome somewhere in my DNA. which explains why I’m still alive. (Also, thank you, guardian angels.) On the other hand, some people are born to ride the bus, and should never be allowed to drive at all.

You can make your own judgments about Ms. Toussaint.



 

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NY Times on the Left’s Skrmetti Bungle: ‘Somebody Set Up Us the Bomb’

Posted on | June 21, 2025 | Comments Off on NY Times on the Left’s Skrmetti Bungle: ‘Somebody Set Up Us the Bomb’

Chase (née Kate) Strangio is not actually a man

The Left will sometimes admit to tactical mistakes, e.g., “Maybe it was a bad idea to pretend Joe Biden was ‘sharp as a tack’ and fit for another four years.” On rare occasions, the Left will even acknowledge errors of strategy, e.g., when Bill Clinton went out of his way during the 1992 campaign to prove he was “tough on crime,” thus to avoid a repeat of the 1988 Mike Dukakis debacle. What is impossible for the Left is to admit the ugly truth — their ideas are wrong and their policies are bad.

So the case of U.S. v. Skrmetti made it all the way to the Supreme Court, where ACLU lawyer Kate “Chase” Strangio made history as the first transgender lawyer to argue a case before the Supreme Court. Then the verdict came down and guess what? It’s an utter disaster.

The New York Times is Boohoo Whinin’ and Cryin’ That Unrealistic Extremists in the ACLU Brought the Tennessee Trans Case to the Supreme Court and Lost Bigly

That’s the Ace of Spades headline and he gives it a thorough fisking, so that all I have to do is pile on the snark. Let’s pause just a minute, however, to explain why the case is called U.S. v. Skrmetti. This is quite relevant to the current state of Democratic Party politics. Jonathan Skrmetti is a Harvard-educated lawyer who in 2022 was appointed Attorney General for Tennessee. In 2023, Tennessee passed a law “prohibiting surgical procedures and hormone therapies for transgender minors with a diagnosis of gender dysphoria”:

Upon passage of the law, the Biden Department of Justice sought an injunction in the US District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee to prevent the law from going into effect on July 1, 2023.
The District Court granted a preliminary injunction . . .
[A lawsuit] was brought by three transgender teens and their families as well as a Tennessee doctor who treats youth with gender dysphoria. The Biden administration joined the plaintiffs under a law which allows the federal government to join in private suits which allege violations of the Equal Protection Clause. . . .
The District Court’s ruling was appealed to the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. . . .
By a 2–1 vote in September 2023, the Sixth Circuit panel reversed the district court’s preliminary injunction . . .
On November 6, 2023, the United States [i.e., the Biden administration] petitioned the Supreme Court to hear this case on appeal. The Supreme Court granted certiorari on June 24, 2024.

So while Joe was sleeping on the beach or eating ice cream, the people who were actually running the White House decided to push this case all the way to the Supreme Court. The “nut graf” of that NY Times story:

On Wednesday, the Supreme Court delivered a new, crushing blow, upholding Tennessee’s ban in a 6-to-3 decision. In allowing Tennessee to outlaw blockers and hormones, the court not only shielded similar laws on the books in some two dozen states. It effectively closed the door on extending new constitutional protections to trans people.

Despite their belief that they are on “the right side of history,” the Left lost this case so decisively that it will likely be decades before they could even hope to undo the self-inflicted damage to their cause.

It could have been so easily avoided. If it were just a group of plaintiffs (Jane Doe, et al.) suing the state, would they have appealed it all the way to the Supreme Court? Perhaps, but it was the Biden administration that made that call, which is why the case is U.S. v. Skrmetti.

And now that it’s blown up in their faces, the Left is trying to obscure the truth — their ideas are wrong and their policies are bad — by pointing to tactical errors and, also, blaming Trump:

For other trans activists and their allies, Skrmetti is the culmination of a powerful Trump-era backlash against the entire progressive project of expanded rights and consciousness around gender identity, artfully stoked by right-wing politicians and abetted by biased media coverage. “I didn’t pick this fight around trans rights,” Anthony Romero, the A.C.L.U.’s executive director, told me in an interview not long before the decision. “The right-wing conservatives of the MAGA G.O.P. have made this one of their cause célèbre issues as a way to kind of scapegoat individuals, as a way to score cheap political points.” . . .
Along the road to Skrmetti, some believe, the L.G.B.T.Q. movement drove itself toward a cliff — and took the Democratic Party with it, chaining the Biden administration to one of the most divisive issues in American politics at a moment of shifting medical consensus and fierce polarization. . . . Strangio and other advocates for trans rights have cast Skrmetti as the case they had to bring. It may also have set their movement back a generation.

Translation: “Somebody set up us the bomb.”

But my repetition of old jokes is not nearly as enlightening as Ace’s brutal fisking of the New York Times story, so go read that.



 

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In The Mailbox: 06.20.25 (Evening Edition)

Posted on | June 21, 2025 | Comments Off on In The Mailbox: 06.20.25 (Evening Edition)

— compiled by Wombat-socho

You know what day it is.
Usual weekend deadlines for the usual weekend posts.
Ceterum autem censeo Silicon Valley et Hamas delendam sunt.

If only there was some clue.

OVER THE TRANSOM
357 Magnum: Don’t Bring a Knife to a Gunfight
EBL: “Heat Wave” Lawsuit, Gavin Newsom: It’s Good To Be Governor, Happy Summer, MAGA Message To Iran, and Is CNN going to get rid of its high priced “talent”?
Twitchy: LA Mayor Has a Fit Over JD Vance’s Trolling Of Senator Whats-his-name, Donks Are Losing Their Minds Over The 2030 Census & Here’s Why, and Psychos Defending Iran Need To Check Out This List Of 20 Actual Iranian Laws
Louder With Crowder: After Kathy Hochul pledges $50 million in taxpayer-funded funds to illegal immigrants, one of them tries to murder a lawyer, Alleged “worship” team performs profanity laced LGBTQ song to a church full of children, Karoline Leavitt offers blunt response to mentally ill Jasmine Crockett, and Woke Chicago mayor freaks out on residents concerned about street takeover
Vox Popoli: No Victory Without Nukes, US Democracy Isn’t Real, Winning, and Based Quantum Wardogs
According To Hoyt: That Seventies Cover has a Blurb Now! The Trip, the Stickers and– ArGH, Faces In the Crowd, and Iran So Far Away
Monster Hunter Nation: Explaining the rules of the Political Blame Game
Gab: The Real Battle Is Here At Home – Not In The Middle East

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
Adam Piggott: The Solution to Modernism is to Get Off the Internet
American Conservative: The Neocons Are Working Hard to Co-Opt MAGA, The Surprising Campaign of Zohran Mamdani, and Will Trump Betray America First?
American Greatness: U.S. Senator from California Forcibly Removed from DHS Immigration Press Conference, Feds Crush Violent Antifa Uprising Outside Portland ICE Facilty, Gov. Hochul Says ‘New York Is Providing $50 million to Cover Legal Services’ For Illegal Aliens, ‘No Kings’ Protests Prove Dems Only Hate ‘Tyranny’ When Not in White House, and In ‘Big Win’ For Trump, Appeals Court Says President is Allowed to Keep Control of National Guard Troops in L.A.
American Thinker: Destroying Iran’s Nuclear Capability – Once Again, Israel, Thank You, To Defeat Drug Cartels, Corrupt Bankers Must Be Jailed, Slave Labor Won’t Save America, No Kings, No Pins, No Clue, and Immigration Riots and America’s Fascist Party
Animal Magnetism: Vacation Totty I, II, III, IV, and Animal’s Red Thursday News
BattleSwarm: Iran – Don’t Fear Regime Change, USAID – Guilty Plea For A Half-Billion In Fraud, Paxton Investigates 33 Instances Of Illegal Alien Voting Fraud, Idiot Peace Activists Get Asses Kicked In Egypt, and LinkSwarm For June 20
Behind The Black: Two lunar orbiters spot the crash site of Ispace’s Resilience lander, New nova spotted and now visible to the naked eye, The source of a Martian glacial canyon 750 miles long, Chinese pseudo-company Landspace completes static fire test of 1st stage of its Zhuque-3 reusable rocket, and Why should anyone listen to people who behave like infantile toddlers?
Cafe Hayek: Bad Economic History Fuels Bad Present-Day Economic Policies, also, No Logic to the “Liberation Day” Tariffs
CDR Salamander: Fullbore Friday
Chicago Boyz: The Long Awaited Fix, Liberals, Conservatives, and Happiness, Unintended Consequences, Brian Wilson, and Langston Hughes, George Orwell, and the Tea Party
Da Tech Guy: Israel’s and Iran’s Tactics are Both Consistent With Their War Aims
Don Surber: Help Democrats the Rand Paul way
First Street Journal: Midnight Oil Blogging, President Trump is winning on immigration, and World War III Watch
Gates Of Vienna: Culture-Enriching Rape on the Banks of the Adige, “Wir schaffen das” — NOT, The Islamization of Italian Schools, Solidarity For Gaza in Palestine-Sur-Seine, and Burn, Baby, Burn!
The Geller Report: London Synagogue Attacked, Destroyed, Torah Scrolls Desecrated, Sanctuary Smashed to Pieces, Terror-Tied CAIR Funding Jew-Hating Jihadi Zohran Mamdani’s Bid for NYC Mayor, Israeli Air Force SUCCESSFULLY Struck the Iranian Nuclear Reactor in Arak, Iran, Iran Strikes Major Hospital in Israel, Central Israel Buildings in Missile Attack, and Jew-Hating Jihadi Zohran Mamdani Calls for Global Jihad, Says ‘Globalize the Intifada’ is Expression of “Palestinian” Rights
Hollywood In Toto: Danny Boyle Bends the Knee to Woke Mob, Sean Penn Says – I’d Meet with Castro, Chavez…But Not Trump, The ONE Way Spaceballs 2 Can Crush Expectations, Pathetic Colbert Trots Out ‘Very Fine People’ Attack Against Trump, and Why 28 Years Later Is Unlike Most Sequels
The Lid: White Leftists Try to March for ‘Palestine’ in Egypt… Get Beaten, Arrested, Deported for their Trouble, One Million Illegal Aliens have Self-Deported Since Trump’s Election, and Despite Left-Wing Tears, Trump Orders Expansion of Deportation Raids in Blue Cities
Legal Insurrection: FBI Watching Hezbollah Sleeper Cells in U.S. as Trump Weighs Iran Strike, Vice President Vance Travels to Los Angeles in Support of Marines and ICE, Trump Gets To Keep California National Guard, Appeals Court Rules, DOJ Suing Kentucky Over In-State College Tuition Rates for Illegal Immigrants, and Temple University Facing Budget Shortfall of $60 Million
Matt Taibbi: The Great Disappearing Trans Freakout
Outkick: Dölly Crüe: Did Anyone See Mötley Crüe Teaming Up With Dolly Parton Coming? Rafael Devers Says He Felt Disrespected By Boston Red Sox, Left-Wing Sportswriters Get Their Way As Dodgers Donate Against Enforcing Immigration Laws, Shocker – Caitlin Clark Leads The WNBA In All-Star Votes By A Wide Margin, and Sophie Cunningham Clearly Inspired Pacers’ Game Six Win With Her Pregame Fashion Choice
Power Line: No MAGA Schism On Iran, Joe Biden’s DOJ at Work, Thoughts from the ammo line, and Pardon me?
Shark Tank: Record Legislative Funding Request For “Negligent” DCF Died Without Committee Hearing
Shot In The Dark: Snap Back To Reality, Too Good To Fact-Check, Fine Line, Fed Up, and Soooo Close
The Political Hat: Happy Flag Day 2025, False Consciousness & Repressive Tolerance, and Quick Takes – Towards Cyborg Catgirls: The Cyborg Catgirl Future; Brain-Computer Interfaces; Self-Healing Synthetic Muscle
This Ain’t Hell: Valor Friday, “PJ” Herbert Sentenced in Stolen Valor Case, Pentagon Pizza Theory, Former Coastie Arrested for Trump Threat, and Army Misuse of Enlisted BAS Fees
Transterrestrial Musings: The Marchers, El Segundo, I’m No Munitions Expert, But, and On The Road Again
Victory Girls: Ilhan Omar Calls America the Worst—While Living Her Best Life, Dear San Bernardino Sheriff — You Are NOT Helping, and “Lack Of Seriousness” – Gov. Wes Moore On Donald Trump
Watts Up With That: The Lethal Fog of Clean-Air Hypocrisy, UN Calls for “Climate Misinformation” to be Criminalised, The LA Riots Aren’t Gavin Newsom’s Biggest Defeat—That’d Be the EV Mandate, and Three Years To Save The World!
The Federalist: Neocons Use Accusations Of ‘Appeasement’ To Morally Blackmail People Into Supporting Forever Wars, Obama Judge Escalates Attack On Executive Authority With Injunction Allowing Foreign Students At Harvard, Mass Migration Destroys The West Like Crowd Controls Destroy The Mona Lisa, Tariffs Aren’t Raising Prices, CNN Admits After 5 Articles Insisting Tariffs Were Raising Prices, and How Clarkson’s Farm Debunks Globalist Lies About England And Mass Migration
Mark Steyn: Dignity of Labour – Picket Lines and Coal Mines in Harlan County USA, Too Plebeian, Minnesota Not So Nice, Good Cop Bad Cop, and Happy Father’s Day!

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In The Mailbox: 06.20.25 (Morning Edition)

Posted on | June 20, 2025 | Comments Off on In The Mailbox: 06.20.25 (Morning Edition)

— compiled by Wombat-socho

I stole Cobb’s shtick to vent about some stuff.
The Summer Based Books Sale is on! Free books! 99 cent books! All written by people that don’t hate you!
Silicon Valley et Hamas delenda sunt.

OVER THE TRANSOM
EBL: How The Mossad Tricked Iran’s Top Generals To Their Deaths, I’m A Honky Tonk Girl, Robert Johnson, Emma Canning, and Bluesky Bans Vice President Vance
Twitchy: “Conservative” Pining For The Days The GOP Were Losers Does Not Go Over Well, Catherine Herridge Drops Bombshell Showing Media KNEW China Interfered In 2020 Elections, and Mark Cuban’s Big Reveal About Kamala’s Campaign Is A DOOZY
Louder With Crowder: JD Vance needs only one Bluesky post on the trans agenda to get himself suspended from the platform, Zoomer congressman admits the Democrat agenda on illegals out loud, Democrat thought leader Jasmine Crockett goes off on Trump supporters, claims YOU’RE the “mentally ill” ones, Woman’s drunken airplane meltdown ends in handcuffs, the footage is bonkers, and TikToker goes on unhinged rants that Americans live on “stolen land”
Vox Popoli: So Tiresome, also, Mailvox: Sad Cope
Ammo.com: Gun Ownership By State
JIm McCoy: The Lightning War – Rising Storm

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
CDR Salamander: What’s The Shelf Life Of Intel Reports?
Don Surber: Cowardly British press

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Radical Vegan Transgender Cult Update: Federal Weapons Charge Indictment

Posted on | June 20, 2025 | Comments Off on Radical Vegan Transgender Cult Update: Federal Weapons Charge Indictment

Jack Lasota, a/k/a “Ziz”

Wednesday press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office:

Today, a federal grand jury returned an indictment, charging Jack Amadeus LaSota, 34, of Fairbanks, Alaska — aka Andrea Phelps; Ann Grimes; Anne Grimes; Canaris; Julia LaSota; Ziz — with being a fugitive from justice in possession of firearms and ammunition.
Kelly O. Hayes, U.S. Attorney for the District of Maryland, announced the indictment with Acting Special Agent in Charge Amanda M. Koldjeski, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) – Baltimore Field Office.
According to the indictment, LaSota possessed several firearms, including a GM6 Lynx .50 caliber rifle, a black HS Produkt, model Hellcat, 9x19mm handgun, and hundreds of rounds of ammunition. At the time, LaSota was knowingly a fugitive from justice and therefore was not permitted by law to possess a firearm or ammunition.
If convicted, LaSota faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison. . . .
U.S. Attorney Hayes commended the FBI, the Allegany County State’s Attorney’s Office, and the Allegany County Sheriff’s Office for their work in the investigation. Ms. Hayes also thanked Assistant U.S. Attorney Jared M. Beim who is prosecuting the federal case.

Via Andy Ngo, who reminds us of the background:

[LaSota] remained a fugitive until being caught in western rural Maryland in February amid a manhunt of the Trantifa terror cult’s members.
Since then, he has been in custody after being denied bail, along with two fellow Zizian members, Michelle “Jamie” Zajko and Daniel Blank. In Maryland, LaSota faces local charges of trespass and firearm offenses.
He has an open criminal case in Pennsylvania related to the obstruction of an investigation of a double homicide in 2023 and a 2019 riot-related case in California.
Currently, three other Zizian members are in custody in California for two murders. Another member, Seattle woman Teresa Youngblut, is in custody in New Hampshire over the homicide of a U.S. Border Patrol agent in January.

By the way, with the cult leader and two of his accomplices in custody, I’d sort of backed off coverage of the Zizians and, in the process, missed out on two excellent accounts of the cult: “The Delirious, Violent, Impossible True Story of the Zizians” (Evan Ratliff, Wired, February 21) and “‘Show her the body’: Alleged kill orders, cult behavior inside the Bay Area Zizians” (Katie Dowd and Andrew Chamings, SFGate, February 26). Both of those stories are worth reading because they mention Alice Monday, who was Michelle Zajko’s girlfriend from 2018 to 2022. Zajko and Monday at one point lived together in Vermont, but Zajko claims Lasota ordered her to murder Monday who, apparently, fled the country and is now living in Chile. Also, our friends at Kiwi Farms have a complete text of Michelle Zajko’s “Open Letter” (which I’d partially quoted in April), in case you wanted to get the paranoid delusion straight from the kook.

Like I keep telling y’all, Crazy People Are Dangerous.

PREVIOUSLY:



 

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In The Mailbox: 06.19.25 (Abbreviated Juneteenth Edition)

Posted on | June 20, 2025 | Comments Off on In The Mailbox: 06.19.25 (Abbreviated Juneteenth Edition)

— compiled by Wombat-socho

The older I get, the harder the drive to and from Las Vegas gets.
It’s here! The Summer 2025 Based Book Sale!
Because I missed it yesterday: the man who could have been Duke of London introduces Iron Maiden
Silicon Valley et Hamas delenda sunt.

Truth hurts, eh Teach?

OVER THE TRANSOM
357 Magnum: Concealed Carry License Holder Stops Crime Spree
EBL: Why destroying Iran’s nuclear program is so important, Anne Burrell, RIP, “This Was Their Finest Hour…”, Cleaner, and Waterloo
Twitchy: Nashville Mayor Doesn’t Think Doxxing ICE Agents Puts Them In Any Danger, On Juneteeth, Democratic Socialists Claim Their Cause Is Inseparable From Black Liberation, and Florida AG Proposes New “Alligator Alcatraz” For Illegals
Louder With Crowder: Elder millennial emo rocker announces Christians and Trump supporters are BANNED from his shows, NY Governor pledges $50 million in taxpayer-funded legal services for ILLEGAL immigrants, Remember the man whose 175-year-old farm was being seized for affordable housing? The Trump Admin is coming to his defense, Chuck Schumer gets asked about Joe Biden’s cognitive decline cover-up, responds with bizarre claim about Americans, and Whoopi Goldberg Claims Being Black In America Is The Same As Living In Iran
Vox Popoli: The Science is Settled, Iran Has Nukes, There is No “We”, Kemosabe, The War Drums Get Louder, and Why the USA is Under Pressure
Stoic Observations: Transhumanist AI Fiction
Gab: The Next Chapter For The American Right
Toni Airaksinen: Hawaii Surgeon Calls For Zionists To Be “Deleted” Off Earth
Cedar Sanderson: A Glimpse of Heaven

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
CDR Salamander: We Have a CNO
Dana Loesch: What’s The Point Of Complaining About Juneteenth?
Don Surber: Shouldn’t it be World War 6 or 7 by now?
Matt Taibbi: Optimism, The Last Taboo, also, Activism Uncensored – Protests, Riots, & The Army Parade

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YUGE Win for Trump: Illegal Immigrant Population Has Dropped by 1 Million!

Posted on | June 19, 2025 | 2 Comments

Remember how in 2012, during a Republican primary debate, Mitt Romney was mocked for saying he was in favor of “self-deportation”? The audience actually laughed, as Romney explained that it would not be necessary to “round people up,” but rather that enforcement of the E-Verify system for employment would cause illegal aliens to leave the country voluntarily. Liberals treated this idea as if it were some kind of joke, but Romney’s point — that if the U.S. ever got serious about enforcing our immigration laws, this would encourage illegals to leave — has now been vindicated. Steven Camarota and Karen Zeigler of the Center for Immigration Studies report:

Our analysis of the Bureau of Labor Statistics household survey, officially called the Current Population Survey (CPS), shows a large decline in the foreign-born or immigrant population (legal and illegal) between January and May of this year. The decline was caused by a falloff in the number of non-citizens from Latin America who arrived in 1980 or later, a population that overlaps significantly with illegal immigrants. We preliminarily estimate that the number of illegal immigrants has fallen by one million since the start of the year, perhaps due to their leaving in response to President Trump’s election and stepped-up enforcement efforts. . . .

• Based on the CPS, published figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that the number of foreign-born individuals in the labor force declined by 601,000 from January to May 2025.
• Our analysis of the raw data shows the total foreign-born population, both in and out of the labor force, declined 957,000 from January to May 2025. This is one of the largest declines over a 4-month period in the foreign-born in the last three decades, but it is not unprecedented.
• The decline was entirely among non-citizens. The number of naturalized U.S. citizens in the data did not fall from January to May of this year.
• In particular, non-citizens from Latin America who indicated they arrived in the United States in 1980 or later show a 1.07 million decrease from January to May of this year and a 1.45 million falloff since December 2024.
• It is well-established that the post-1980 Latin American non-citizen population overlaps significantly with the illegal immigrant population.
Our preliminary estimate is that there are 14.8 million illegal immigrants in the country in May 2025, one million fewer than we estimated in January of this year. . . .

You can read the whole thing. Let’s extrapolate a bit from this analysis. If the number of illegal immigrants decreased by one million in about five months, that’s an average decline of 200,000 every month — roughly 2.4 million per year. So if the current trend could be continued, by the time the 2028 election rolls around, the number of illegals in the United States will be less than it was when Joe Biden took office in 2021.

Keep in mind that the average population of a Congressional district is about 760,000, so that for every 2.3 million illegal immigrants you deport, you’re taking away three House seats (and three Electoral College votes) from states that have large illegal populations. The Top 10 of these include five “blue” states: California (2.6 million illegal aliens), New Jersey (490,000),Illinois (420,000), New York (410,000) and Washington (340,000), as well as two “red” states — Texas (2.1 million) and Florida (590,000) — and the “swing” states of North Carolina (360,000), Georgia (340,000) and Arizona (290,000). Thus, if strict enforcement could reduce the illegal alien population by 7 million by the time the 2030 Census arrives, the chances of Democrats winning the Electoral College (or a House majority) in the 2032 election would almost certainly be diminished — and perhaps by a significant margin.

Democrats know this, of course, which is why they’re pulling all kinds of stunts to try to stop Trump from enforcing the law.

Hey, did I mention the Democratic Party is going broke?

Good times, my friends — good times!



 

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