Saturday Miscellany

First, was the great debate rigged? After all, it was conducted by Democratic Party partisans, at a network whose manager of news operations is a personal friend of Kamala, and where one of the two so-called journalists was a sorority sister of Kamala.

Now, Mark Penn, whose words have more credence since he is anything but a MAGA Republican, offers this, via Collin Rugg:

JUST IN: Former top Clinton adviser calls for an internal probe of ABC for rigging the debate against Trump. Former adviser to Bill & Hillary Clinton Mark Penn says ABC needs to launch an investigation to search for an effort of "rigging the outcome" of the debate. "I actually think they should do a full internal investigation, hire an outside law firm. I don't know how much of this was planned in advance," Penn said to @jsolomonReports. "I don't know what they told the Harris campaign." "I think the day after, suspicion here is really quite high, and I think a review of all their internal texts and emails really should be done by an independent party to find out to what extent they were planning on, in effect, you know, fact-checking just one candidate and in effect, rigging the outcome of this debate." "I think the situation demands nothing less than that."

Second, on the other side, the simple fact that Kamala could not answer the first question that David Muir asked her, namely, whether the nation was better off now than it was four years ago.

Third, everyone has noticed that Donald Trump was angry throughout the debate. No one seems to have noticed that Kamala was monumentally rude. She was making faces when Trump spoke. It was designed to get him riled up, but in truth it showed a very serious lack of decorum. It was theatrical and offensive. As several people have noticed, you do not negotiate with world leaders by making faces to insult them.

This does not mean that Trump knew how to deal with it. He did not.

Then again, the last time Kamala was sent to negotiate a foreign policy, in Munich, with the Russian army massing on the border of Ukraine, she failed miserably. Three days after Munich the Russian army entered Ukraine.

Fourth, meanwhile the mayor of Springfield, Ohio has denied that people in his city are eating cats and dogs. And yet, a woman in Canton, Ohio, nearly two hundred miles from Springfield, was filmed eating a cat, with fur on her lips.

In the meantime, I have been somewhat surprised that, what with all the talk about eating cats-- which does happen in some cultures-- no one has remarked that there is another word for cats, a word that has a more risque connotation. Naturally, I will spare you the mention of the specific word, because it would sorely offend the local feminists, but I am sure you can guess what it is.

Fifth, pets aside, the influx of Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio has produced a spike in automobile accidents.

The New York Post reports:

Forget about the ducks and geese allegedly disappearing from public parks. In this beleaguered city, residents say the biggest problem, by far, is that wild-driving Haitian migrants — unfamiliar with US road laws — are turning the streets into combat zones.

And the result can be deadly. The family of Springfield grandma Kathy Heaton experienced this firsthand on Dec. 1 — a day after her 71st birthday — when a Haitian migrant ran her down while she was collecting her garbage cans.

And the driver got off scot-free.

Sixth, we were assured, by none other than David Muir, that violent crime has been decreasing under the Biden presidency.

It is not true. The New York Post reports on the most recent numbers, from the government:

Violent crime has increased under the Harris-Biden administration, according to data from the Department of Justice published Friday — belying ABC News debate moderator David Muir’s correction of Donald Trump during his showdown with Kamala Harris Tuesday night.

The DOJ’s survey from the Bureau of Justice statistics is self-reported instances of violent crime over the last six months — meaning that it includes crimes that may not have been reported to police.

The annual National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) showed total instances of reported violent crime — including rape, robbery and aggravated assault — is up from 5.6 per 1,000 in 2020 to 8.7 per 1,000 in 2023.

The highest recent rate of violent crime was in 2022, when the survey tracked 9.8 instances per 1,000 people over the age of 12.

The rate of rape increased from 1.2 per 1,000 in 2020 to 1.7 in 2023, while robbery went from 1.6 per 1,000 in 2020 to 2.6 per 1,000 in 2023, and aggravated assault rose from 2.9 per 1,000 in 2020 to 4.5 per 1,000 in 2023.

It looks like we need to fact check the fact checkers.

Seventh, DefiantLs Twitter account offers this high concept summary of the current presidential election:

I read this somewhere and couldn't be more true If Trump was going to destroy America, he would have done it in his first term. If Kamala Harris was going to help America, she would have done at least something these past 3.5 years.

Eighth, at one crucial moment in the debate Donald Trump declared that Kamala was in favor of sex change operations for illegal migrants.

The left nearly went berserk. It was such a stupid idea that everyone assumed that he was making it up. Funny thing, he was not making it up. She approved of the policy in a questionnaire offered by the ACLU in 2019.

Nellie Bowles reports for the Free Press:

One interesting turn is that some of the wackiest progressive policies, policies that Kamala Harris heartily endorsed in a more exciting era, now come across as crazy and bizarre to even ask about. When Trump said that Kamala Harris “wants to do transgender operations on illegal aliens that are in prison,” he was saying something that is quite literally true (here’s the CNN story on that exact position of hers). But it sounds crazy. And Kamala reacted as if it was crazy (“What is he talking about?” she said, smiling toward the audience). 

Trans aliens became a meme with BuzzFeed’s headline: “Donald Trump Might Have Said One Of The Most Baffling Things Of His Career In The Debate, And The Internet Is Having A Field Day.” But. . . but. . . she did support that! No, the media says now; no, she did not. Here’s the stately New Yorker with their political analysis of the debate: “His line about how the Vice-President ‘wants to do transgender operations on illegal aliens that are in prison’ was pretty memorable, too. What the hell was he talking about?” We have all been normal moderates all this time, silly goose. What are you even talking about? <Hides the incarcerated and medically transitioned illegal aliens under the bed>

So, serious media outlets were fooled, for not accepting how radical sister Kamala really is. And for not fact checking.

Ninth, extra credit for Gov. Tim Walz for having coined the Freudian slip of the week. It does not require interpretation. He said:

As a young prostitutor, Kamala Harris talked about going in that courtroom for the first time….

Tenth, nuclear energy might very well be our future. The problem is, our academic institutions are not producing anywhere near enough nuclear engineers to do the job.

The Wall Street Journal reports:

Demand for nuclear energy is rising fast. Whether there are enough new recruits to keep the industry humming is another question.

Between 2012 and 2022, the number of students graduating with bachelor’s degrees in nuclear engineering in the U.S. fell by 25%, according to the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education, with the class of 2022 seeing only 454 students graduate with a degree in the field. 

At the same time, the nuclear industry is facing a maturing workforce, with 17% of workers in the industry over the age of 55 and 60% aged between 30 and 54, according to the 2024 U.S. Energy and Employment report. The report also highlighted that 23% of workers were aged under 30, compared with 29% for other energy workers. 

Eleventh, some people are not at all disturbed by the fact that the moderators at the presidential debate did not fact check Kamala Harris.

To which, Joe Concha has replied, with a list of the lies that Harris was trafficking.

Harris said Trump supports Project 2025 (he denounced it)

Harris said Trump wants a national abortion ban (he doesn't)

Harris said Trump wants to ban IVF (quite the opposite) 

Harris claimed Trump warned of a bloodbath if not elected (talking about the auto industry and EV mandates) 

Biden-Harris inherited a bad economy (GDP 4.1%, Inflation 1.4% in Jan 2021 as economy was recovering from the pandemic)

Harris said in 2020 she supports fracking (no transcript of her saying that)

Harris said she'll never take away your guns (she's on video in 2020 advocating a gun confiscation program)

She said there's no American soldiers in war zones (we had troops killed in the Red Sea by Iranian proxies this year).

She said the Trump tax cuts only helped the wealthy (not true). 

She repeated the Charlottesville very fine people hoax (debunked by Snopes and others)