Quick Hits: Volume CCCXLII

 - When Donald Trump first ran for President 8 years ago, his main appeal was he claimed to eschew "politics as usual." In fact, one of the rallying cries from his staunch supporters was that he would go to Washington, D.C. to "drain the swamp" of corruption, bloated bureaucracy, etc. 

So when bipartisan agreement was reached by the U.S. House of Representatives demanding TikTok  divest from its parent company ByteDance (which is controlled by the Chinese Communist Party who in turn controls the app's algorithm to spy on and spread disinformation to Americans), Trump was not on board. Why? 

A couple of reasons really. First is this legislation isn't supported by a GOP megadonor who has a significant financial stake in ByteDance (rather "swampy" to be bought and paid for by a wealthy donor, no?). The other (and, sadly, more plausible) scenario? Trump's general pettiness, specifically how such legislation, while perhaps beneficial to America, might give an advantage to a Trump enemy.

If you get rid of TikTok, Facebook and Zuckerschmuck will double their business. I don’t want Facebook, who cheated in the last Election, doing better. They are a true Enemy of the People!

At least Mark Zuckerberg can absolve himself from being a stooge for the CCP.  

- I don't know that this year's Minnesota Legislative session could approach the dark lunacy that occurred in 2023, but the prog majority is going to do its part to make it competitive. 

SF 4846 dropped on Monday. Here's its description:

Climate change effects on mental health advisory task force establishment and appropriation. 

For decades now you've had leftists play the role of "Chicken Little" by constantly giving arbitrary timelines of our planet reaching a "point of no return" if we don't address "climate change," and then feel the need to establish another layer of bureaucracy in an effort to mitigate a problem (i.e. Americans convinced we're on the verge of the apocalypse) they essentially created. They do this with economic and social issues as well. 

Not a bad gig, eh? 

- No amount of spin is going to convince enough Americans that President Joe Biden is not a feeble man with a poor memory. Nevertheless, prog politicians (and their media lapdogs) aren't going down without a fight, hence the attempts to undermine the credibility of Special Counsel Robert Hur, who interviewed Biden over his mishandling of classified documents. 

But once the transcript of the Hur's interview with Biden was released recently, leftists and anti-Trumpers were flailing in their attempts to refute the notion that the White House's current occupant was as forgetful as the Special Counsel suggested. 

Ah, but Axios (hardly a conservative rag) pointed out some pretty damning excerpts. 

Over the course of the two-day interview, which took place in the immediate aftermath of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel, Biden repeatedly asked for help remembering certain important dates — and his lawyers frequently stepped in.

• "When did I announce for President [in 2019]?," he asked.
• "If it was 2013 — when did I stop being vice president?"
• "In 2009, am I still vice president?"
• "Trump gets elected in November of 2017?," Biden asked, before someone noted it was November 2016.

Since Biden gave off a vibe in last week's State of the Union address that it will require an ether-soaked rag and a lead pipe to keep him from running for reelection, gaslighting is the only tactic available to leftists and non-Trump Republicans in an effort to drag him to the winner's circle. And the fact it isn't the least bit effective has them downright freaked. 

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