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Clip of the day:
The Biden Pivot
Democrats are growing increasingly frustrated over Joe Biden’s deliberate pivot back to the middle ahead of a reeleciton announcement. Cracks in the coalition of the moderate and progressive bases of the Democratic Party became evident in the past few days over crime and immigration.
Crime: Joe Biden backed a Republican initiative to strike down Washington D.C.’s progressive crime bill that ignores criminals as crime continues to rise.
Immigration: Joe Biden is considering a return to the Trump tactic of detaining migrant families who eneter the US illigally instead of releasing them into the states with a court date.
Why this matters: Democrats in congress and the senate are becoming increasinly vocal over what they are calling betrayal. “Callous and inhumane", "disgusted and disappointed", and “we haven’t resolved anything” were just some of the quotes from Democrats that Axios listed.
Budget Showdown
Democrats and Republicans are barreling towards a debt ceiling showdown later this year with neither side giving an inch. Here’s the latest:
The Biden Plan: President Biden will propose a plan tomorrow that his adminsitration claims will cut the federal budget deficits by $2 trillion over the next 10 years by raising taxes on corporations and high income individuals. The plan includes taxes on unrealized gains and stock buybacks.
The Republican Plan: The Republican plan to be released next month won’t raise taxes or touch Social Security and Medicare, the nation’s two largest entitlement programs. The plan will center around foreign aide cuts, housing cuts, work requirements for food stamp and Medicaid beneficiaries, and eliminating the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at the Pentagon.
Dominion vs Fox News
Court filings released in the $1.6 billion defamation case against Fox News reveal some of the biggest personalities and executives at Fox disliked Trump and knew the election was not stolen. These are texts or emails sent in the days following the 2020 election.
Carlson: “We are very, very close to being able to ignore Trump most nights. I truly can’t wait. … I hate him passionately.”
Murdoch: “The election was not stolen.”
Stirewalt: “What I see us doing is losing the silent majority of viewers as we chase the nuts off a cliff.”
Sammon: “In my 22 years affiliated with Fox, this is the closest thing I’ve seen to an existential crisis — at least journalistically.”
Columbia Ditches SAT
Columbia Univeristy annoucned last week it is ditiching the SAT as a prerequisit for application in order to evaluate students on a more holistic basis.
The National Review has the best take:
The self-evident value of standardized testing is not something that National Review should have to rise to speak in defense of (but then we could say the same about much else these days). And why? Because testing is the great equalizer. This is not mere supposition; clinical studies have shown that standardized testing does exactly what you expected it would: It identifies intellectually gifted children from all strata of society, but even more crucially allows talented children from disadvantaged backgrounds (whether economic or minority) to shine in a way their local educational opportunities (or a chaotic home life) might never have permitted. It forms the essence of what any just conception of America as a so-called meritocracy was supposed to be about: You might have gone to Phillips Exeter Academy and had the best SAT tutors available to you — but this kid over here living above his parents’ corner store and studying when he doesn’t have to mind the shop? He took it once and scored a 1590.
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The rest of the news:
UPDATE: Senator's TikTok whistleblower alleges data abuses - Axios
I pretended to be a 14-year-old boy on TikTok — what I saw terrified me - NY Post
US intel community warns of 'complex' threats from China, Russia, North Korea - Fox News
Washington teeters on the brink of a Cold War over Social Security - Politico
Attacks on power grid raise alarm among top officials - Axios
House plots bipartisan deal on Trump and Biden family finances - Axios
BlackRock says the Federal Reserve could hike interest rates to a peak of 6% - CNBC
Private payrolls rose by 242,000 in February, better than expected, ADP says - CNBC
Kerry: China tensions hurting climate talks - Axios
Ridiculous: Covid backlash hobbles public health and future pandemic response - Washington Post (paywall)
Biden FCC nominee withdraws after a bruising lobbying battle - Washington Post (paywall)
Tweets that caught my eye:
Market snapshot:
Everywhere I look... in my city, county, state and the White House and Senate... it confirms a final conclusion that has been percolating for years... that liberal Democrats... people with left-leaning views... are people that by their nature are unfit to control the levers and switches of government. They are unfit for the primary reason that their thinking apparatus is too myopic, subject to distraction and influence from emotional reaction... ending up causing them to make sub-optimized decisions and choices... mistakes that end up with lots of negative unintended consequences... and the accumulation of those are a death to society by a thousand cuts.
But they tend to get academic credentials and become career politicians or work in government or government support jobs and retire early with a comfortable pension and then run for office. And so we have a situation where the least capable of people end up with political power as politicians and government officials.
And voters, because we have grown used to a certain profile, we keep electing them and rejecting those that have a different profile... one that is actually from a more capable person.
I don't know how we fix this with the voters so duped.
Knowing all the supper capable business owners and leaders that I do... those that could never become successful without high, high capability for making great decisions and choices... the low quality of our government officials has been very telling and disturbing to me. But again, they keep getting elected as they play a part that make voters comfortable.
There is a saying that people tend to get the government they deserve. Maybe we deserve Biden and the current Democrats... the cast of clowns we elected to do their routine clown show.
Re: Erick’s commentary on natural immunity today.
Earlier this morning on NPR, an immunologist stated during an interview that himself and his colleagues are reluctant to use that phrasing. Instead, they describe it as “infection-acquired immunity.”
Subtle, yes. But yet another classic example of the left’s tactic of changing the language to suit their narrative