Month: June 2021

President Joe Biden speaks following a bipartisan meeting with U.S. senators about the proposed framework for the infrastructure bill at the White House in Washington, D.C., June 24, 2021. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters) On Thursday, hours after agreeing to framework for an infrastructure bill with a bipartisan group of senators, President Biden said: “If this [bipartisan deal]
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Bill Maher took big tech to the woodshed over censorship of the COVID-19 Wuhan lab leak theory that was suppressed on social media. The “Real Time” host also lambasted the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday night’s episode. Maher called out Google and Facebook by name for censorship
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Maryland authorities arrested two men on criminal charges after the pair offered to drive a group of women home from a beach club. Police say that the suspects reportedly followed the unnamed women home, set a vehicle on their property ablaze, and shot at the residence at least six times. What are the details? Authorities
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Former TikTok employees have disclosed that the popular social media platform is largely controlled by its Chinese parent company. TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, supplies the Chinese government with endless American user data since Chinese law requires its organizations to “support, assist, and cooperate with the state intelligence work.” TikTok’s privacy policy allows the platform to
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I’ve been writing about Colorado cakemaker Jack Phillips’ fight against cultural authoritarians for a long time. This past March, I noted that Phillips would probably be badgered into the grave. And this week, Denver District Judge A. Bruce Jones again found that the state could compel speech, claiming that Phillips had acted unlawfully when refusing
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India Walton poses as she campaigns to replace four-term Mayor Byron Brown in Buffalo, N.Y., December 15, 2020. (Lindsay DeDario/Reuters) Media outlets are insistent that capitalism is unpopular, and that a clear majority of Americans, especially young people, prefer socialism over capitalism. A quick look at the headlines from major newspapers reveals stories that start
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The World Health Organization said on Friday that fully vaccinated people should continue social distancing, including the wearing of masks, in order to stop community transmission of the delta variant of the coronavirus. The delta variant was first identified in India, where the coronavirus pandemic continues to grow and devastate the population. It has since
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Supreme Court Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg (Joshua Roberts/Reuters) 1996—By a vote of 7 to 1 (with Justice Thomas recused), the Supreme Court rules that Virginia’s maintenance of the Virginia Military Institute as an all-male institution violates the Equal Protection Clause. Justice Ginsburg’s majority opinion (for six justices) invents a new standard for assessing the
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Two inexorable energy trends are underway in California: soaring electricity prices and ever-worsening reliability—and both trends bode ill for the state’s low- and middle-income consumers. Last week, the state’s grid operator, the California Independent System Operator, issued a “flex alert” that asked the state’s consumers to reduce their power use “to reduce stress on the grid and avoid power
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It was straight out of Hollywood.  Countless comparisons were made in the Donald Trump era between the 45th president and Phineas Taylor “P.T.” Barnum. With the showman standard-bearer summarily ejected from the center ring, John Cox, perennial candidate and current aspirant governor, sought to fill the void. Literally.  He brought in the bear. Overshadowed by
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A video channel dedicated to highlighting human rights violations in China has been blocked by YouTube. Atajurt Kazakh Human Rights channel is run by Serikzhan Bilash, a Xinjiang-born activist who has been arrested for his pro-freedom activism several times. Government advisors warned him against using the word “genocide” to describe the abuses in Xinjiang. “They’re just
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A.F. Branco coffee table book “Keep America Laughing (at the left)” ORDER HERE Donations/Tips accepted and appreciated – $1.00 –  $5.00 –  $25.00 – $50.00 – $100 –  it all helps to fund this website and keep the cartoons coming. Also Venmo @AFBranco – THANK YOU! Women’s sports are in danger of being destroyed by allowing biological males to compete
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Vice President Kamala Harris delivers remarks before boarding Air Force Two at El Paso International Airport in El Paso, Texas, June 25, 2021. (Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters) The vice president finally dropped by El Paso this morning for a four-hour tour, after months of resisting such a visit. She might have been able to shrug off Republican
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A bioethicist activist based in Toronto, Canada, scolded people for “gendering animals,” and many on social media erupted with ridicule and disbelief. “Gendering animals serves to normalise bioessentialist conceptions of gender,” Florence Ashley tweeted on Thursday. Gendering animals serves to normalise bioessentialist conceptions of gender. When we gender animals, we forget that… https://t.co/Mvl0xdGMRI — Instructor
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