Closing the tabs ...
ZOHRAN MAMDANI: If I ever ran out of money, my family would be able to support me. pic.twitter.com/P1kpH4KJhf
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) July 15, 2025
Ed: Hey, he really is a genuine Marxist. He relies on other people's money. This sounds more like a case of arrested development than leadership, frankly, which might actually make him a true voice of this generation of progressives.
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Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., has been leading the probe into Joe Biden’s cognitive state during his presidency, with Republicans alleging that Biden's occasional use of an “autopen” to sign documents — a practice other presidents have done as well — demonstrated that he wasn’t fully in control or aware of what his administration was doing.
But documents show that some of the letters and subpoena notices Comer has sent out in connection to his investigation have been signed using a digital signature — not written by the congressman himself.
Ed: NBC News apparently has difficulty distinguishing constitutional requirements from the niceties of correspondence, bless their little biased hearts.
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In case you're wondering if they really don't actually know what an e-signature is through Adobe acrobat an NBC news producer just called it "a version of an autopen" https://t.co/vYrJ2woqM0
— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) July 15, 2025
Ed: Next up -- NBC News blows the lid off Docusign!
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Was President Joe Biden aware of who he was pardoning in the final days of his presidency? Or were White House staffers behind the unprecedented string of autopen signings? In recent weeks, evidence has been mounting that the former president may not have been in the loop, which is, to be charitable, problematic.
Luckily for us, the folks at NBC News jumped into action with a story headlined, “Lead investigator into Biden’s use of an autopen signed letters with a digital signature.” In it, reporters Ryan Nobles and Melanie Zanona make an inane equivalence between Rep. James Comer (R-KY) signing PDFs using a digital signature — a completely legal thing to do — and Joe Biden allegedly allowing his staff to issue blanket presidential pardons for thousands of people without knowing the names or crimes of the recipients.
Ed: What's amazing to me is that NBC seems more concerned about the digital signature than the fact that the White House issued pardons without presidential signatures, and in fact without Biden being fully aware of who was getting pardoned. Rather than address that issue, the big news at NBC is that you can use Adobe products to add signatures, which has been the case for a decade or more.
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"I want you to compare presidential autopen pardons, which the chief executive may or may not have known about, to e-signatures in Adobe Acrobat."
— T. Becket Adams (@BecketAdams) July 15, 2025
NBC: You got it, boss!
Ed: The 'boss' here being the Protection Racket Media's narrative labs.
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Prime Minister Mark Carney has acknowledged publicly for the first time that the deal he’s negotiating with U.S. President Donald Trump is almost certain to come with tariffs.
“There is not a lot of evidence right now” that the U.S. is offering tariff-free deals, Carney said in French on Tuesday morning on the way into his office ahead of a meeting with his Cabinet. ...
“America wants our land, our resources, our water, our country,” Carney warned more than once. “These are not idle threats.”
The prime minister has since changed his messaging, and his working relationship with the president is said to be cordial.
Ed: I've decided to take a wait-and-see approach to trade developments. It seems pretty likely that we'll get tariffs into most of our trade agreements, but I suspect it will be around the 10% mark when the dust settles, except with China and some other particularly problematic partners.
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Chuck Schumer gets incredibly annoyed about being asked about Zohran Mamdani and then ends his press conference lol pic.twitter.com/QocO1EZGTL
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) July 15, 2025
Ed: Schumer had better get used to answering these questions. They aren't going away.
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During a six-week stretch this year, House Democrats twice were confronted with impeachment votes — forced by their own rank-and-file members — that had zero chance of passing, given that Republicans control the chamber.
In May, Democratic leaders convinced Rep. Shri Thanedar, D-Mich., to back off his impeachment push at the last minute. But the following month, Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, forced a failed vote to impeach Trump, exposing stark divisions among Democrats and putting the party's vulnerable members in a difficult position ahead of next year's midterm elections.
Before the 119th Congress is over, it’s likely there will be other pushes to impeach Trump, who survived two such efforts during his first term, even as many Democrats grow frustrated by them.
Ed: This is a psycho level of avoidance by Democrats. Trump won the election, and he's also on the right side of almost every issue about which voters care most. Rather than deal with that reality, Democrats keep obsessing over Trump instead, while ignoring what voters actually want.
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“the victim” 🧐 https://t.co/oYsjgrNrjJ pic.twitter.com/EHtMNUHz06
— Peter J. Hasson (@peterjhasson) July 15, 2025
Ed: I know there are differences in the English used in the UK and the US. I just assumed they were limited to the 'u' in color, favor, humor, etc, and in idioms like lorry and petrol. Apparently the British media have a completely different definition of the word "victim" too. Who knew?
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Inflation picked up in June, a potential sign that companies are starting to pass tariff costs on to consumers.
Consumer prices rose 2.7% in June from a year earlier, the Labor Department said Tuesday, faster than May’s increase of 2.4%. That was in line with the expectations of economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal.
Core inflation, which exclude volatile food and energy prices, was 2.9%, also in line with forecasts.
Ed: I saw this earlier today, but there's not much news in these figures. It's still in line with inflation levels over the past year, and still lower than those from most of 2024. It's worth watching, but right now the changes are not terribly significant. If it picks up more, then it might impact Trump's standing with voters, but so far the "trade wars" don't appear to be having much impact at all.
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Upon being read her Miranda rights in the back of a squad car, Sen. Nicole Mitchell (D) states “I know I did something bad.”
— Dustin Grage (@GrageDustin) July 15, 2025
OMG. pic.twitter.com/stDRVRhOPm
Ed: This is a crazy story. John wrote about it in a post about Tim Walz, and Mitch has covered it a couple of times in stories about the Minnesota legislature. Mitchell refused to step down given the narrow split in the Minnesota legislature, and she's still in the state senate while awaiting trial. Stay tuned.
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Its spontaneous nature has shifted into a methodical one, as activists prepare for a longer fight against President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown. Volunteers are stationing themselves outside Home Depots to monitor for ICE activity targeting day laborers, and a citywide strike is planned for next month to protest the raids. Organizers are hosting smaller demonstrations, coordinating know-your-rights workshops and passing out pamphlets to keep community members informed. And some residents who weren’t involved before are getting involved now.
There’s strategy behind the shift. Immigration advocates and some city leaders told The Washington Post it’s crucial to continue finding ways to dissent as the Trump administration continues targeting Los Angeles County’s large immigrant community. Thousands of National Guard troops, which Trump deployed to L.A. in an unprecedented move in June, remain in the area. ICE continues to conduct operations, showing up last week at MacArthur Park in central Los Angeles and at two Southern California cannabis farms.
Ed: It appears that they are also shifting from violence to lawful demonstrations. The arrests and potential prosecutions are having a salutary effect, it seems.
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Girls still cannot go to school in Afghanistan and @CordolaLanny's Afghan students tragically have been in hiding for 4 years.
— John Ondrasik (@johnondrasik) July 15, 2025
Please make your tax-deductible donation at https://t.co/xdFkOsqzTI to help support The Miraculous Love Kids if you are able. Heroes still exist. pic.twitter.com/DTdISkmaTD
Ed: It's been nearly four years since the Kabul bug-out. Utterly heartbreaking to know what was lost.
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