Because Bill Barr has decided to interject himself into 2024, we should recall what an absolute DISASTER he was as Trump’s Attorney-General. This tweet from Julie Kelly does so succinctly:

Coverup of Biden family crime racket, slow walking of prosecution of Russiagate perps (dare I say seditious conspiracy?), failure to use federal power to stop 2020 riots, green light of Whitmer fednapping hoax, and no probe into 2020 election fraud falls to one man: AG Bill Barr

— Julie Kelly (@julie_kelly2) May 10, 2023

Two things that I believe Trump needs to address.

Barr is just one of a series of disastrous personnel decisions … is one. I would like some acknowledgment that there were major mistakes made in staffing the administration AND some assurance that it would not happen in a second term.

The other is COVID. Again, I would like some acknowledgment that there were major mistakes made in handling COVID … i.e., giving Fauci and Birx the keys to the car … AND some assurance that it would not happen in a second term.

 

The post Bill Barr … Swamp Creature Extraordinaire appeared first on Granite Grok.

Planned Parenthood Peeps like to crow about how little abortion services account for the greater good these clinics allegedly provide. Was it three percent?

It was. I remember asking a similar question when Planned Parenthood lost a court case and stopped applying for Title X funding for abortions (sorry, women’s health care services). To get money for family planning, they had to separate that from abortions, but abortions were so much more than 3% of their business it would (likely) cost more to do the separating than the family planning reimbursements were worth.

They never said it. They just stopped trying because Planned Parenthood doesn’t do a lot of family planning; they are in the family prevention business. Dr. Leana Wen let that dead cat out of the bag back in 2019 when she publicly admitted, as part of her brief tenure running that operation, that abortion was their core business because it was.

She was too honest, so they had to abort her “occupationally,” but not before she confirmed what everyone knew. These clinics end babies’ lives, and that’s how they make money. If that were not the case returning the question of abortion to the states would not have resulted in hundreds (perhaps thousands) of abortion clinics (doing business as women’s health centers) closing their doors.

There’s no other explanation.

There is no shortage of women, and the Abortion-Left culture war has been adding to their numbers. Something with which Planned Parenthood is helping. They are making more “women” that will need prostate cancer screenings – referred by “women’s health care clinics” that care about the health of “women” and not just making money by performing abortions – because the new women won’t need that service.

And clinics keep closing, which is odd, and not just despite the more “women” math. The COVID-19 vaccines had a significant impact on reproductive freedom. Abortificents doing business as flu vaccines will do that. It was so bad I once jested that Planned Parenthood should sue Pfizer.

 

One of the if not early, then alarming reports to surface after the Jabbernauts began the ‘needle-in-every-arm’ crusade was a rise in miscarriages. Pregnant women were losing babies almost as fast as if they’d taken that horse medicine (Misoprostol) feminists ranted about after SCOTUS un-penumbra’d Roe. v. Wade.

 

It’s a public health crisis. I’m surprised we’ve not heard more about it.

 

 

The post If Abortion is Such a Small Percentage of “Women’s Health Care™” Why Are Clinics Still Going Out of Business? appeared first on Granite Grok.

To all those who are sending in memes, thank you!  Keep them coming please, as it helps me gather weaponry to fight the Left.  Please do share this post, and if you share an individual meme, consider mentioning you saw it on the Grok!

Speaking of, from this week, Monday Memes and Meme Overflow.  Also don’t forget both complementary parts of my Survival Sunday feature: PREP edition and SITREP edition.

 

*** Warning, a few possibly off-color ones, in case tender eyes are about ***

 

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

PSA – PSA – PSA – PSA – PSA

 

Don’t have time – just a meme dump today.

 

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Reihan Salam: The Issue of Crime Made Me a Conservative

 

 

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They don’t reproduce, they recruit.  And internationally.  LGBTQ is a religion, a missionary religion.

 

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This kind of push across all media – seen at the time – was one reason I started to have my doubts about The Jab.  When the push-push-push to get this into every arm was this intense, I had to wonder something was suspect about it.  It was only then, my “paranoid antennae” vibrating, that I really started to look into it.

 

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Pick of the Post:

Two are the winner.

 

 

 

From what I’ve seen the Left is absolutely apoplectic over that townhall meeting.

 

>>>>>=====<<<<<

 

Palate Cleansers:

 

 

I guarantee two things:

1. Someone has a sense of humor that I like

2. Someone else is offended

—

—

 

The post Friday Meme Overflow-Overflow appeared first on Granite Grok.

April showers bring May flowers, but for a little while, at least this year, it looked like April showers brought May showers. We got a break from the cold and the rain this past week; the same week, NOAA updated its precipitation data.

April was above average again.

It’s not the most exciting news unless you get it and need to get it. The Climate Cult is at war with your way of life. The enviro-fascist movement and its political agitators drive policy on a handful of oft-repeated lies. The temperature is the big one. Everything orbits around the theory that a few degrees of warming will be cataclysmic. That’s nonsense. Rubbish. Absurd. We’re living despite the lie as I type this. It is so not true they had to stop calling it warming. It’s climate change. And the climate changes morning to night, every day, week, month, season, and throughout the years. That’s not on you.

Another Climate Cult (methane impaired) sacred cow has two parts – too much rain (flooding) or not enough rain (drought). We always have too much or too little. It’s never baby bear. The climate can’t be just right (even though these last few days in New England fit the bill). So, we have to talk about it. People need to know or be reminded.

Example

Rainfall in April and early May gave the Cult media an excuse to roll out the narratives on flooding and blame CO2, which means you. There was a flood of headlines about it. But if the recent absence of daily showers (doing business as lovely weather for the next few days) persists, they will flip the coin and work the drought narrative.

As I’ve noted previously, and at least a few times this year, the annual drought festival narrative is coming. When it does, no one will remember the extra precipitation we keep getting in April. And that matters because it counts.

 

April Precipitation NH 1895-2023

 

Looking back, you can compare total annual precipitation against historical averages and the planned outrage required to advance dangerous partisan political agendas like Net-Zero. Looking at the past 128 years, there’s no evidence that the lifestyle they want you to sacrifice is relevant to precipitation in April.

This is the average annual precipitation in New Hampshire from May to April from 1895-2023.

 

Annual NH precipitation May to April 1895-2023

 

Where’s the drought? 1964-1968 when we were where? Heading into what the experts would predict as a new ice age. 1940-43. 1909-1915. 1979-1981.2001-2003. But New Hampshire has been above the 100-year mean more often than not.

It must be an infrastructure problem that Dems in Dover will address with a new utility that taxpayers can fund. So, ignore the drought talk when that comes up. Otherwise, there is a significant risk of flooding when we’re not on the odd-even water restrictions as our lakes and rivers dry up.

Here are 12 months, Aug to July, when it’s as warm and dry as you’d think we could get.

 

Annual NH precipitation Aug to July 1895-2022

 

Not much to see is there, but if you listen to the screeching climate harpies, it’s the end of the world, rain or shine.

It’s not.

 

The post It Rained a Lot in April … for the 7th Year in a Row appeared first on Granite Grok.

Physical paper money solves some of the privacy and security issues inherent in central bank digital currencies (CBDCs). But a lot of people seem to have forgotten that government-issued paper fiat is the parent of a CBDC, and it won’t solve the more fundamental problem – whether physical or digital, fiat currency isn’t real money.

What Is CBDC?

Digital currencies are virtual banknotes or coins held in a digital wallet on your computer or smartphone. The difference between a central bank (government) digital currency and peer-to-peer electronic cash such as bitcoin is that the value of the digital currency is backed and controlled by the government, just like traditional paper fiat currency. In fact, a Federal Reserve-issued CBDC would just be a dollar in another form.

But the specter of a CBDC raises new concerns relating to financial privacy and the potential for government control.

At the root of the move toward CBDC is what some call “the war on cash.” For years, governments have looked for ways to eliminate physical cash because it is hard to control. I can put it under my mattress and nobody has to even know I have it. And if you and I do a cash transaction, no record exists. That’s a problem for government officials who would like to tax our transactions, or possibly prohibit them altogether.

Enter CBDCs.

Government-issued digital currencies are sold on the promise of providing a safe, convenient, and more secure alternative to physical cash. We’re also told they will help “stop dangerous criminals” who like the intractability of cash. But there is a darker side – the promise of control. CBDC creates the potential for the government to track and even micromanage consumer spending.

Imagine if there was no cash. It would be impossible to hide even the smallest transaction from the government’s eyes. Something as simple as your morning trip to get a coffee wouldn’t be a secret from government officials. As Bloomberg put it in an article published when China launched a digital yuan pilot program in 2020, digital currency “offers China’s authorities a degree of control never possible with physical money.”

The government could even “turn off” an individual’s ability to make purchases. Bloomberg described just how much control a digital currency could give Chinese officials.

The PBOC has also indicated that it could put limits on the sizes of some transactions, or even require an appointment to make large ones. Some observers wonder whether payments could be linked to the emerging social-credit system, wherein citizens with exemplary behavior are ‘whitelisted’ for privileges, while those with criminal and other infractions find themselves left out. ‘China’s goal is not to make payments more convenient but to replace cash, so it can keep closer tabs on people than it already does,’ argues Aaron Brown, a crypto investor who writes for Bloomberg Opinion.”

Economist Thorsten Polleit outlined the potential for Big Brother-like government control with the advent of a digital euro in an article published by the Mises Wire. As he put it, “the path to becoming a surveillance state regime will accelerate considerably” if and when a digital currency is issued.

You can see why governments are keen on implementing CBDC as quickly as possible.

Is Paper Money the Solution?

As the push to implement CBDC intensifies, opponents are lobbying for policies to preserve the right to use cash, primarily in the form of the US Dollar (USD). This makes sense on the surface. If people have the option to use physical currency, they can simply avoid a CBDC and the inherent control it would provide government actors.

But in the clamor to minimize the impact of CBDC, many have lost sight of the inherent problems with paper fiat money.

As George Mason put it, “The laws making paper currency a legal tender have produced great and numerous evils.”

Thomas Jefferson went further, declaring that “paper is poverty, it is only the ghost of money and not money itself.”

A CBDC would certainly give government more control than it has today, but don’t forget that the government’s monopoly on money, and the Federal Reserve’s ability to create it out of thin air, gives it plenty of control to begin with.

In fact, the Fed is the engine that drives the biggest government in history.

The problem with fiat money – paper or digital –  is the Fed can just fire up the proverbial printing press and make more when the government wants to pay for something. That means there is virtually no restraint on government spending already – and on government power. But when the government just creates trillions of dollars out of thin air, it also erodes away the purchasing power. That makes you poorer.

As Thomas Jefferson warned, “We are to be ruined now by the deluge of bank paper.”

Paper currency is the parent of a CBDC. Central bank digital currency is the same old dollar in a new form with the same problem as paper. Instead of printing new dollars, the Fed can create new digital dollars with a keystroke. Instead of a deluge of paper, we will get a deluge of electronic digits.

In fact, the economy has already moved mostly in that direction with the advent of credit cards and electronic payment systems.

Granted, CBDCs create new worries about privacy and control, but that is not a reason to suddenly embrace the USD as the solution to all of our problems.

But that’s what a lot of people seem to be doing. They’re telling us we have to protect and promote the fiat US Dollar in order to fight a CBDC because government digital currency is so bad. As one opponent of government digital currency put it, “I used to be really critical of Federal Reserve notes. … Compared to CBDC, U.S. Federal Reserve note cash will be wonderful. We will miss it when it is gone.” [Emphasis added]

Note he “used to be” really critical of the USD. Apparently, he’s not anymore because CBDC is so much worse. This mentality drives people away from opposing the original evil that led us here in the first place.

It’s important to remember that Federal Reserve notes were always an evil. CBDC is all of that evil plus some. But that doesn’t make the original evil good or something that should be preserved.

John Adams compared government overreach to cancer.

“The nature of the encroachment upon the American constitution is such, as to grow every day more and more encroaching. Like a cancer, it eats faster and faster every hour.”

What do you do to cancer?

You remove it.

And when cancer metastasizes, you don’t just remove the metastasis; you remove it and the original tumor. No sane person would embrace the original cancer just because the metastasis is worse.

The Path Forward

Relying on fiat paper money might alleviate some of the problems of a CBDC, but it doesn’t strike the root of the problem. The government might not be able to track every purchase if you use paper money, but it will still devalue your dollar every single day – and expand its own power while doing so.

We need currency competition.

That means finding sound money alternatives to federal government-produced and controlled fiat money.

This could come in the form of gold, silver, or non-government cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin. It could even involve ways of transacting business we haven’t even thought of yet. But we need money that is not subject to Federal Reserve and government control and manipulation.

Supporting one form of government money over another is not a long-term solution, nor will it ever push the needle forward for the Constitution and liberty.

 

 

 

Mike Maharrey | The Tenth Amendment Center

The post Central Bank Digital Currency: Paper Money isn’t the Solution appeared first on Granite Grok.

If you want an example of Democrats being Democrats, the Vermont legislature has one. They are in the process of rewarding themselves (without any public input) for successfully ignoring constituents’ concerns.

Related: Are Vermont Socialists Not Yet Ready To Accept the Price They Must Pay for Socialism?

Elected Democrats don’t feel a responsibility to represent the interests of voters. Once in office, their job is to tell them what they need even when it is not what they want.

The much-hated heat standard bill is a good example. It passed despite significant objections from the peasants. Their governor, who is effectively a cuckold to the Dem majority legislature, listened long enough to veto the bill to no avail. The State Senate has already overridden what is now expected to pass through the lower chamber like sh!t through a goose [which it has – the house has overridden the Veto].

The people didn’t want it, but elected Democrats knew better, and for that, they want to reward themselves with a fast-tracked hike in pay and benefits (S.39).

 

The Vermont House Government Operations Committee yesterday voted 8-4 to send to the House floor a hefty pay raise, adjournment pay, and state employee-level health care benefits for the Legislature.

 

The Legislature currently makes $811/week in session, which is easily 800.00 dollars too much. That rate will rise incrementally to $1,210/week by 2027. The people who know better will also be eligible for health care benefits, $242.00/week in adjournment (out of session) pay. More mileage pay, lodging, meals allowance, childcare expenses, and a slew of other bennies, including raises for leadership, professional development per-diems, and a death benefit for their survivors that amounts to pay they would have received for the session in which they ceased to be.

Measure that greed against its fiscally irresponsible tone-deafness, the crappy economy, inflation, higher energy prices, and additional cost burdens from new legislation (like the heat standard). Everything costs more, thanks to Democrats, so their legislative majority response is typical of their party. You will give us more so we can afford to offset the financial burden of our policies.

The government first, the people last.

New Hampshire Democrats have a similar impulse, but paying for a professional legislature has not come up (that I can recall) in ten or twelve years. Members of our House and Senate get $100.00 a year plus mileage, a legislative license plate, and a drawer at the state house. No benefits unless near-total impunity for exceeding the speed limit to do the people’s business counts.

The House Speaker and Senate President get an office and a few dollars more, but not much. It is a genuine people’s Legislature.

This benefits taxpayers. Short of rising in the ranks to pursue a paid gig at the federal level, there’s not a lot of incentive to do it, do it for long, or abuse it (some still find a way).

Yes, our Legislature has the odd long-term seat warmer, but it is not for pay or benefits. There are none. And it will only stay that way if we can keep Dems out of the majority and something that passes for a Republican warming the governor’s chair. The side effects of this form of government to date have been low crime, high standard of living, low poverty, high quality of life, better health outcomes, lower total tax burden, and a slew of other things that Vermont used to enjoy before the hippies flipped the government.

Vermont has been going downhill ever since, but at least the professional politicians will be doing better, assuming they have the stones to override what should be a quick veto from the governor on the raise and benefits package when this makes it to his desk.

And they do because it’s all about them and not about you.

 

 

The post Tone-Deaf Democrats Advance Bloated Raise and Benefit Package for Themselves appeared first on Granite Grok.

I anxiously waited for the nine o’clock hour on Wednesday morning for the long-awaited review of the House Oversight Committee’s work for the last four months. We have been getting daily updates from Representative James Comer, teasing us about the plethora of information they have uncovered from banks and whistleblowers. Maybe we have become numb to these promises, having listened to Adam Schiff for nearly five years that he had information linking President Trump to the Russians. Schiff had nothing, but his false promises got him scheduled on the Sunday talk shows for five years. Schiff was using a ploy for self-promotion. Comer, and his committee, put their chips on the table today. They laid the groundwork for the methods used by Biden representatives to receive money from China and Romania and disperse it to as many as ten members of the Biden family. What we are seeing is a complicated scheme that is becoming unraveled like a cheap sweater.

As I watched the press conference, I was scanning the live feed of CNN and MSNBC. CNN was covering a preview of a Donald Trump Townhall Meeting in New Hampshire. MSNBC was discussing the NBA Playoffs. They chose not to cover this press conference implicating the sitting President of the United States for a level of corruption we may have never seen. It is criminal that these news networks censor the information they supply to their viewers. Viewers of these two networks are oblivious that the head of an international crime family is sitting in the Oval Office. Over $10 Million flowed into the Biden bank accounts from China and Romania since he was Vice President. The funds from Russia and Ukraine are still to be analyzed.

The work of the House Oversight Committee is one of three significant events occurring in the country that deserve full media attention. The other that is getting little coverage by MSM is the chaos at our Border as we approach the end of Title 42 on Thursday. Joe Biden went on the record yesterday saying the situation will be chaotic for some time. The Administration has no plans to stop the flow of illegal immigrants. Their only priority is to process them efficiently and let them into our country. The only story they are covering is the impending default on the debt ceiling. The President and Karine Jean-Pierre are flooding the media with anti-MAGA colloquials and outright lies about the plan presented by Republicans and passed by the House. They are denigrating all Republicans and spreading fears about the massive cuts in essential services. Biden is pulling numbers out of the air. Biden claims that Police Forces will be cut, 100,000 teachers will lose their jobs, and Social Security Checks will be reduced-lies-all lies.

Biden is playing divisive politics which is what he promised not to do when on the campaign trail. Either he does not know what is in the Republican Bill, doesn’t understand it, or doesn’t care about the lies he heaps on America. It doesn’t matter because he has the media in his pocket like the Chinese have him, and if he can keep distracting America, he may get away with Grand Larceny. Biden will play along with the media on the default and keep feeding them erroneous information. It is a perfect screen to hide his illegal operation. This will work until the Justice Department decides to press charges. With Garland at the helm, that will probably never happen.

The post Biden Family Corruption Exposed, MSM Not Interested appeared first on Granite Grok.

A provision in the Secure the Border Act (HR 2) scheduled for a vote on the United States House of Representatives floor this week provides for a big step toward the US government going to war in Mexico.

Section 123 of the 213-page-long bill states that “Not later than 60 days after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Homeland Security, in coordination with the Secretary of State, shall submit to the appropriate congressional committees a report on whether a Mexican drug cartel described in paragraph (2) meets the ten criteria for designation as a foreign terrorist organization.” That referenced paragraph two then proceeds to list by name 11 “Mexican drug cartels.”

Should the report called for in the bill conclude that some or all of the listed groups are foreign terrorist organizations, the US will have taken a big step toward launching a war against up to 11 new organizations folded into the targets list of the US government’s global war on terror.

In an April 10 article, I discussed the push by some Republican US House members and presidential candidates for war in Mexico. Expect Democratic politicians to be on board the war train too.

Notably, a US war promoted to the American people as against drug cartels in Mexico may turn into a broader war — one against the nation of Mexico as well. Mexico President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has made it clear that he opposes US military action being taken in Mexico in the name of fighting drug cartels. “We are not going to permit any foreign government to intervene in our territory, much less that a government’s armed forces intervene,” declared López Obrador in a March press conference.

 

Copyright © 2023 by RonPaul Institute. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit and a live link are given.

The post House ‘Border Security’ Bill Provides for a Big Step Toward War in Mexico appeared first on Granite Grok.

As I said here, I finally went there with that question above with the Grandson’s teacher refusing to give me a straight answer. After two and a half years of dogging my School District over their all but complete capitulation to the gender dysphoria movement that has swept our education system…

Sidenote: one that has even caused a backlash now named “LGB without T” because of its militancy in attacking it even with a merest variance to what they want. It has caused the LGB folks to want to dissociate itself from them. Thus, I call it Trans-Authoritarianism and as you know, I’ve been posting about what they (and their enablers) have and continue to do for years.

…with their Policy JBAB to the point of suing them,  I wanted to know what my District would do when asked. If you read my previous email, you know that his teacher refused to tell me, obfuscating her answer relative to my direct question.  I also ended that post with this:

Right after that, and I suspected that it would be, I found out that this email thread was being monitored by “the Administration”.

Here is that email:

—— Original Message ——
From “Danielle Bolduc” <dbolduc@sau73.org>
To “Skip” <skip@granitegrok.com>; <redacted>@sau73.org>
Date 5/3/2023 3:02:52 PM
Subject <redacted>

Hi Skip:

I have been following your emails with Mrs. Anderson concerning <redacted>. In your latest email you ask, “Is he identifying as other than male in your class?” The simple answer to that particular question is no.

Please feel free to reach out to me with any questions or concerns.

Take care,
Danielle Bolduc

Danielle DiSisto Bolduc, EdD
Principal
Gilford Elementary School 76 Belknap Mountain Road
Gilford, NH  03249
603 524-1661
dbolduc@sau73.org
~Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.

Like I said, a simple question needed only a simple answer. Instead of deflection, I should have received that answer the first time I asked “that question”. I am glad, not over being monitored, but that I got that straight answer.

But it leaves another question – WHY didn’t I get that from the get-go?  So I did have questions. Since TMEW and I had a meeting already scheduled last week about one of the Grandson’s F.A.S. issues (a congenital issue of his F.A.S. diagnosis – low muscle tone. In this case, – but this was concerned with swallowing problems that we’ve been dealing with since his birth), and she was there, she and I scheduled a meeting for this past Monday for a face to face.

We did have a bit of a tussle (albeit, polite) still, over “that question”.

More on that later.

 

 

 

The post “What Is The Transgender Status of My Legal Son?” Part 2 appeared first on Granite Grok.

In light of the recent controversy within the New Hampshire liberty community surrounding drag queens, sexuality, children, violence, tolerance, and parental rights, I feel compelled to weigh in on the issue. By way of background, a liberty-adjacent individual who was planning to speak at the upcoming Porcfest made a violent threat against anyone who reads to children while dressed in drag during the festival. 

The post How Should We Deal With Drag Queens & Children? appeared first on The Liberty Block.

The government, in this case, the Federal Government, has shown it is so proficient at controlling functions. One just has to look at how we managed the COVID Pandemic or the Afghanistan withdrawal. How about how well we are dealing with the condition of our rail system or turning our once mighty military into a WOKE social experiment? How about how we took a flourishing economy two years ago into a high-inflation and low-output machine? We have also seen how well the government handles our debt ceiling and the Biden Crime Family. With this horrific management track record, it is no wonder they want to get into our garages and homes to manage our day-to-day lives.

As we are well aware, this President and his WOKE Administration are hell-bent on removing us from the internal combustion vehicles that we have driven and enjoyed for decades. They are adamant about forcing us into much more expensive electric vehicles By 2035. It does not matter whether EVs are affordable or not. Most Americans are against being forced into an EV by the government. The government should not be in a position to dictate to Americans and eliminate our freedom of choice. This President shows daily that he believes the government knows better than the people. This is whether the decisions on education, their child’s gender, the car they drive, or whether their home is powered by gas, natural or propane, or electricity.

The President is extending his reach into our homes with the latest round of household appliances the government wants to control. To date, the Administration has placed controls on air conditioners, residential gas furnaces, light bulbs, refrigerators, freezers, and most recently, gas ranges and washing machines. Very little remains within our homes that the government can try to micro-manage. Today, the Biden Administration added dishwashers to the list. The size of the kitchen sink may be our last stand!

We are allowing this to happen. We have put people into office more intent on assuaging environmentalists than on solving the immediate issues facing every American. We have a Border crisis about to explode with the end of Title 42 on Thursday. We have a Fentanyl epidemic that is poisoning 100,000 young Americans yearly. We have an economy that is stalled by inflation, pending recession, and a workforce unwilling to work. We have a crime situation growing in the cities and suburbs as gangs from Mexico branch out into America. We have a corruption story emerging involving our President and his family that involves millions of dollars from foreign adversaries. These events impact America and our future, and this Administration wants to focus on our dishwasher’s rinse cycle.

We need to replace these feckless representatives of both parties, but in the meantime, we have to hold our elected representatives accountable to representing us and not controlling us. Get out of our garage, kitchen, and laundry room and get to solving the matters we are paying you to solve.

The post Hey Joe, Get Out Of Our Garage And House appeared first on Granite Grok.

Sun-King Sununu tries to be on both sides of the issue. I suppose it’s his version of Bill Clinton’s “triangulation” tactics. For example, Sun-King supports banning late-term abortions, as long as the ban is voluntary … which OBVIOUSLY means the ban is not really a ban.

It would be “big government” … bad, bad, bad … to prohibit corporations from grooming … but it is somehow not “big government” to ban conversion therapy. It is up to each school district to decide whether students wear masks … local control! Local control! Local control! … but opining that every school district MUST allow biological males to compete in female school sports is somehow not inconsistent with “local control.” ETC. ETC. ETC.

It looks like Sun-King’s talking out of both sides of the royal mouth has gotten to be too much for even one of his (formerly?) loudest cheerleaders:

 

 

The post Has Mikey-G Finally Had It With The Sun-King? appeared first on Granite Grok.

Still rolling through the videos that Chau Kelley supplied of the hearing – THANKS, CHAU! The PERFECT angle for getting the testimonies of those for and against NH Governor Chris Sununu’s nominee for a Superior Court Judgeship, Anne Edwards.

For those of you outside of NH, the Executive Council is another check against the Executive power of the Governor and all nominations put forth by the Government. The EC will hold a hearing on each nomination and either vote it up or down.

[Part I] [Part II]

Here is Tranche #3.

NH Supreme Court Chief Justice Gordon MacDonald:

 

Supporter #4:

 

Supporter #5:

 

Supporter #6:

 

Supporter #7:

 

Supporter MacDonald:

 

The post NH Executive Council Hearing: Anne Edwards Nomination for Superior Court Judge Part 3 appeared first on Granite Grok.

Lizzie Cheney … who was overwhelmingly FIRED by the voters of Wyoming … is promoting a new NeverTrump ad. Lizzie, your Daddy is still a war criminal who LIED, repeatedly to instigate a completely unnecessary war in Iraq that caused inestimable human suffering. But the good news is that Daddy Dick and the Bushies and the rest of the neo-con faux-Republican grifters like YOU no longer run the GOP. Go away, Lizzie. Go far, far, far away. NOBODY … except your choir of NeverTrump grifter-sycophants … cares what you have to say.

 

 

The post Hey Lizzie … Your Daddy Is Still A War Criminal And You’re Don Quixote appeared first on Granite Grok.

Forewarned is forearmed.  Thus, this is intended to be a compilation of articles, with my commentary, to try and get like-minded people to grasp what’s coming.  Even merely being aware of events in the world will make you better prepared than the hordes of sheeple.  Note that these compilations are catch-as-catch can, and presented as is.  I make no guarantee of accuracy or complete coverage of the world.

Please follow both me, Nitzakhon, on Gab… as well as my blog host Granite Grok and also on Telegram Tommy Robinson Official plus his Urban Scoop site.  And don’t forget posts sometimes get cloned on American Reveille as well, which is a good site to check out in general.

For prep materials, please see:

Survival Sunday – PREP Edition – Granite Grok

 

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Top of the fold:

Revealed: the US is averaging one chemical accident every two days | US news | The Guardian

Statistically impossible IMHO.  Unless done by design.

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News From Zimbabwe, U.S.A. : The Other McCain

Prescient.

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The Latest Trans Label Will Leave You SPEECHLESS | The Black Sphere with Kevin Jackson | TheBlackSphere.net

I used to use the argument against transgenderism as follows:

If I suddenly decided I was really, say, a paraplegic in an able body, and wanted surgery to snip my spinal cord and become so in reality, virtually all of society would pivot on me to see to it that I got heavy therapy and the help I clearly needed.  The same holds true for getting an “addadicktome” or a “lopadickoffme”.

Apparently that argument’s usefulness has ended.

 

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The Death of Accountability

 

 

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Deep State / Coming Tyranny / WEF / Globalists (broad):

FDA Commissioner Dr. Robert Califf says “regulation” is needed to target “misinformation” (reclaimthenet.org)

In other words, we don’t like you talking and exchanging information freely.

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What climate emergency?

Remember, the earth is an incredibly complex system.  That it all boils down to one thing – CO2 – that happens to be the one thing that politicians can leverage for control is ludicrous.

 

 

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What does human meat taste like? Scientists reveal the unique flavour of our FLESH | Daily Mail Online

Insects.  Cannibalism.  Legitimizing child sex.  At what point can we say this is not just garden-variety evil, but actually demonic?  Related:

This is sick and evil beyond belief – but it’s happening right now, all over the place

 

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Protecting Children:

BREAKING: 27 Colorado Dems vote AGAINST making indecent exposure to minors a felony | The Post Millennial | thepostmillennial.com

Understand your enemy.

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Special Report: Boston Children’s Hospital Gender Clinic (massresistance.org)

It has become a multi-billion dollar business. These procedures often cause permanent disfiguration, mutilation, castration, and lifelong medical and mental health problems. It is all experimental.

Remember when Barackus said that surgeons might just do procedures for the money?

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Idaho parents grill library official over obscene children’s books (massresistance.org)

Video.  Disgusting how the librarian defends it.

 

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National Security (specifically):

Signs that Biden remains on China’s payroll – Flopping Aces

One has to wonder what China has on The Potato, and others, to keep them in their place.

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China And Russia Strike Deal In Push For Arctic Power

Oh, this isn’t good.

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Key Gunpowder Factory Mysteriously Exploded, US Production of the Chemical Now Totally Offline (westernjournal.com)

Critical!

 

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On The Jab (and Covid)

The Big Fail ⋆ Brownstone Institute

If vaccinations were doing what they were promised to do, then countries in which higher proportions of the population became vaccinated would be countries in which relatively fewer people died from the virus. But there is no evidence that such a thing happened.

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U.S. and UK Secretly Agreed to Hide Vaccine Reactions • Children’s Health Defense (childrenshealthdefense.org)

Concerns build on concerns.

 

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Inflation:

Surprise: NY Times Says Inflation Is Still Going Fast

“Transitory”.

 

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Robert Kennedy Jr. | Hotboxin’ with Mike Tyson

 

 

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Enemedia:

Nothing specific, though Trump utterly eviscerated CNN.  And the Left knows it.  But this just hit:

 

 

If Trump said he liked sunny days the enemedia would say TRUMP HATES GARDENERS BECAUSE THEY NEED RAIN.  Vile scum.

 

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Pro-life:

India Kills 22 Million Girl Babies in Sex-Selection Abortions, Where are the Feminists? – LifeNews.com

Steven Mosher, president of the Population Research Institute, told the Church Militant that their research estimates about 550,000 girls are killed in sex-selection abortions every year in India.

“It is a human tragedy of enormous proportions that will haunt India for generations,” said Mosher, a social scientist.

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30,000 Doctors Say: Killing an Unborn Child Not Necessary to Save a Mother’s Life – LifeNews.com

Finally, Dr. Michael Chupp, chief executive officer of CMDA pointed out that “ACOG leadership’s advocacy of elective abortion is out of step with the 85% of OB/GYN’s who do not perform abortions.   Their extreme advocacy for elective abortion through birth does not represent the majority opinion of either ACOG membership, or the majority opinion of all the rest of the obstetricians and gynecologists in this country.”

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Know your Leftist / Globalist & Islamic enemy:

Colorado teachers union adopts anti-capitalist resolution | Just The News

Long march.  Just about there.

 

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Immigration / Migration:

US Lawmaker: 700,000 to 1 Million Illegals Gather at US Border with Mexico to Storm Country After Title 42 Ends (VIDEO) | The Gateway Pundit | by Jim Hoft

Electing a new voting population.

How the Left Wins Elections by Transforming Nations – Daniel Greenfield / Sultan Knish articles

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Invasion Inbound

What happens when these invaders are transferred to Los Angeles, Chicago and New York city? Or to middle America as Bush, Clinton and Obama are organizing? Is this the beginning of the American Spring?

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New Footage Shows El Paso Engulfed In ‘Mass Migration Dumpster Fire’ As State Of Emergency Declared

“Under control”…  Related:

WAYNE ROOT: Title 42 Ends in Days. Get Ready to Witness “The Fall of Saigon.” | The Gateway Pundit | by Assistant Editor

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Watch The Other Hand – The Potential for One Million Illegal Alien Migrants Expected to Swarm the U.S. Southern Border, May 11th With Biden Ending Title 42 – The Last Refuge (theconservativetreehouse.com)

Immigration is THE issue.

 

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Economy at large:

Et tu, Argentina?

Argentina starts to drop the dollar too.

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Biden’s America: Foreclosures And Repossessions Spike, But, Hey, Finally Getting Americans Out Of Sudan

Failure.

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Bernie Sanders Openly Calls For Wealth Confiscation, ‘Billionaires Shouldn’t Exist’ (thefederalistpapers.org)

Brings to mind this Bill Whittle classic:

 

EAT THE RICH!

 

 

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Bayou Renaissance Man: Gradually and then suddenly

Most people – and most countries – that end up in financial trouble spend a long time on the “gradually” part . . . and are surprised when it accelerates to “suddenly”.  Nevertheless, I believe that’s the stage we’re in right now;  the accelerating decline from “gradually” to “suddenly” in the economy – the world’s, and our own nation’s.

Speaking of suddenly:

Establishment Economists Are Finally Realizing It’s Time To Pay The Piper | ZeroHedge

For the average concerned citizen out there, this narrative change matters because it’s a signal that things are about to get much worse. When the establishment itself is openly acknowledging that gravity exists and that we are falling instead of flying, it’s time to get ready and take cover. They never admit the truth unless the worst case scenario is right around the corner.

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Political War

Is Bud Light The Battle of Midway in The Culture War? – Flopping Aces

Breitbart: Politics is downstream from culture.

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“A full-blown Color Revolution-style attack on the US Supreme Court as an institution is now in its early stages” (legalinsurrection.com)

So maybe what we are witnessing is more than a color revolution against the Supreme Court. We’re witnessing a color revolution on the edge of a hot war on the conservative Justices.

Given Antifa et al, it’s pushing towards a hot war with the entire Left.

 

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US Stability (broad catch-all):

Masked Murder Manifesto › American Greatness (amgreatness.com)

When the system protects the corrupt and outright evil, societal destruction is inevitable.  On that:

Millions in PPP Loans Received by Companies Tied to Paul Pelosi Forgiven (welovetrump.com)

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The danger of big cities: How can I put it any more strongly?

Get out!

 

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World Stability (broad catch-all):

US helping to ‘kill Russians’ – Moscow — RT Russia & Former Soviet Union

Words are getting more pointed.  Related:

 

 

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Tom Renz’s Terrifying Warning of World War III (independentsentinel.com)

Attorney Tom Renz of Renz Law has been a fighter for the people in the vaccine injustices of the past three years. He warns that people must be prepared for the possibility of World War III. It’s alarming and credible.

 

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Dr Richard Lindzen exposes climate change as a politicised power play motivated by malice and profit

 

 

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Specific to energy:

Irony: German Bundestag Admits Conversion To Heat Pump Systems For Its Own Buildings Not Possible! – Watts Up With That?

Eat the bugs and shiver in the dark, plebes.

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Bayou Renaissance Man: Natural gas and electric compressors – a marriage made in freezing hell?

Government regulation.  Taking a system that worked, and ruining it.

 

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‘Dark Future’ Decoded: What’s NEXT in Our Dystopian NIGHTMARE

 

 

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Big Tech in general:

 

https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/136/836/505/original/7af22a12ed2f3cc6.mp4

 

Some look at this in wonder.  Me, in terror.  Related:

Groundbreaking AI system reads minds and produces text without implants (newatlas.com)

I can see where this could be of use.  But the potential for misuse…

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The “Location Off” switch on your phone is a lie. – Gabriel Sieben

The only way to be sure is to turn your phone off and wrap it in shielding.

 

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Catch-all miscellaneous:

New theory explains why aliens have never contacted humans (nypost.com)

So what does this set up?  A big reveal coming?

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Concluding thoughts if I’m moved to comment:

Slowly, then suddenly.  I think we’re juuuust about at the suddenly part.  Things are converging:

Converging Downturns – Granite Grok

 

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Palate cleansers:

 

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Please check out my MEME collection.  Here’s the last one.

 

The post Survival Sunday – Thursday SITREP Edition appeared first on Granite Grok.

President Trump was in New Hampshire last night for what he claimed “Could be the beginning of a New & Vibrant CNN, with no more Fake News, or it could turn into a disaster for all, including me. Let’s see what happens.” Well?

What do you think happened?

I listened to Jeff Kuhner this morning on the way to work, and he’s convinced Trump knocked it out of the park. He went so far as to suggest Trump may have secured his nomination. I have doubts about that, not just because he was polling so well before the event even started, but I do think that it is his to lose, regardless of the concerns about how he will invigorate the Left in 2024 and the potential down-ticket consequences. I’m not dismissing those concerns but leaning too heavily on them feels like an excuse to avoid (perhaps) the only (true) political disrupter to come along in many of our lifetimes.

I also believe they exist regardless of the nominee. The Dems will not change their path to victory strategy and risk losing the White House no matter who primary voters pick.

True Dat!

Trump is or was everything activists claimed we needed in Washington, and when he won, he was that guy. What he did is what it must look like no matter who you send to DC. You need Marjorie Taylor Greens, Matt Gaetz'(es), and Donald Trumps. Those folks are Davids facing a Goliath with police powers, a weaponized bureaucracy, and a partisan media wind machine at their backs. One well-placed stone will not get the job done.

Scrappy is only the beginning of the change we need.

Every day is a battle in a war the opposition is better prepared to win. Trump needs to be Trump, and the polling – unless the pollsters are skewing the numbers as some sort of electoral head fake – tell us he is the general of choice to retake The Hill. But he needs to earn it, and Ron DeSantis isn’t going to make it easy, nor should he.

Much like a trial, reasonable doubt makes all the difference. Trump’s scrappy nature and the Left’s war on him (hint: because they fear him) leave dozens of opportunities for challengers like DeSantis—and not just on creating reasonable doubt about The Donald’s electability in a general election. Gov. DeSantis is doing something Trump cannot. He is a sitting executive, advancing actual legislation and signing laws that demonstrate action on Republican priorities.

The real question (assuming DeSantis formally announces, which he will) is if he can cover the nearly 28-36-point lead Trump has in the early polls. And is DeSantis that guy? He’s excellent with a legislature that shares his priorities. He’s grown the brand and the strength of the Florida GOP and earned national praise, but what’s he like when nearly everyone is out to get him, including the Republicans in his new backyard?

He is currently in a political world where you can say you’ll never back down in part because you rarely or perhaps ever need to – unless you consider the recent 6-week abortion ban DeSantis didn’t ask for but signed when his legislature handed it to him. Outside noise is easy to leverage or ignore in his current political womb. What happens when the 6-week ban becomes an issue the Left brings to bear the way they used the Boggs decision to stifle the 2022 Red Wave?

It’s a different game when you can’t wake up with an idea and sign it into law before you go to bed that night. It’s trench warfare 24/7/365 for even an inch. I’m not saying he can’t do it or take it, but we know the opponent, and we don’t know as much about DeSantis in that environment.

Whatever you may think of Trump, we know he can handle that adversity from inside and out. It may be why he agreed to do the CNN Townhall. Yes, he said they made him an offer he could not refuse, but Donald Trump lives to be in that position. He thrives on it. To borrow from the DeSantis campaign, he never backs down from it, walks into it, and comes out nonplussed. Ron will do it, he has to, and he’ll be fine on TV. He knows his way around a debate stage, thinks fast on his feet, and can articulate Republican priorities with conviction, but that’s not the same as the meat grinder inside the Beltway.

Yes, Trump’s got negatives. Some folks think giving CNN a few more eyeballs is one of them, but it pissed Dems off so much that I think a few swore they’d move to Canada.

Did you watch it? What are your thoughts either way? And no, I’m not – at this moment – endorsing Trump or DeSantis, so let us, not waste time assuming I have.

 

 

The post Did You Watch the CNN Trump Town Hall? What Do You Think? appeared first on Granite Grok.

From time to time, I find myself watching an occasional program on the main so-called public broadcasting TV channel in our area, WGBH, based in Boston. While some of their programming is very entertaining, such as, for example, many of the Masterpiece Theatre dramas, I recently tuned in to an episode of one of their so-called journalistic series, Frontline.

Last night, Frontline ran for 2 hours, essentially broadcasting a hit piece on Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and his wife, Ginnie. While it was not particularly surprising to see a hit piece against conservatives on public broadcasting, I was struck by their listing of financial contributors to its operation, and more particularly, the prominent mention of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (“CPB”) as one of its financial angels.

This was not the first time I noticed that CPB appeared to be funding programming on WGBH and presumably other so-called public broadcasting stations. So, it got me thinking about the CPB and I became curious to learn more about it.

A simple web search indicated that the CPB receives a substantial portion, or perhaps, most of its funding from me and my fellow taxpayers. Since around 1968.

In the current fiscal year, the CPB received nearly $500 Million in taxpayer funding for its activities. And for next year, it has requested in excess of half a Billion dollars from the taxpayers. I am not making this up.

The taxpayer subsidies to the CPB are, of course, in addition to the funding public broadcasting stations receive from various and sundry foundations (mostly oriented toward the political left) and from their incessant grubbing for contributions from the public at almost every turn.

However, if the programming on so-called public broadcasting stations is good, it should be able to compete in the marketplace with privately-owned broadcasting outlets, by selling advertising, without the necessity of taxpayer funding. Or if public broadcasting does not want to clutter their offerings with advertising, they can adopt the subscription model and attract viewers who are willing to pay personally for the programming, much like people who pay to have access to HBO and other premium channels.

But the overriding question is: is it a proper role of our government to spend taxpayer funds to pick winners and losers in the marketplace for television viewers.

So, when you write your check for your federal taxes, know that a substantial portion of your money is going to support the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. And if this disturbs you, contact your federal senators and representatives (Ha, Ha!!) and ask them to de-fund the CPB and make it stand on its own two feet. And you might want to ask potential or actual presidential candidates whether they would support de-funding CPB.

The post Corporation for Public Broadcasting – Funder for WGBH’s Democrat Hit Pieces appeared first on Granite Grok.

In New Hampshire, judges are nominated by the Governor and confirmed by the Executive Council. The mandatory retirement age for a judge is 70 years old. This year, Supreme Court Justice Hicks will reach mandatory retirement, and the process of replacing him will begin.

Please Submit Group communications or Press Releases to editor@granitegrok.com.
Submission is not a guarantee of publication – Publication is not an endorsement.

In light of some of Governor Sununu’s past nominations, there is reason to be concerned, and the eventual replacement could have lasting effects on NH law for years to come, particularly in regard to civil liberties.

Currently, Assistant Attorney General Anne Edwards has been nominated, but not yet confirmed as a Superior Court judge. Anne Edwards was one of the main enforcers of the absurd, unscientific, and damaging Covid-era mandates and RebuildNH opposes her confirmation as a judge. Someone with such a disregard for basic civil liberties should not serve as a judge.

The post Upcoming Judicial Appointments appeared first on Granite Grok.

Last week the House passed legislation increasing the debt ceiling. The bill was supported by all but four Republicans. For some Republicans, this was the first time they had ever voted for a debt ceiling increase.

Perhaps the reason they did so this time was because the legislation also promised to reduce federal spending by $4.5 trillion over the next decade. Most of those spending reductions are achieved by rolling back Fiscal Year spending to 2022 levels and then limiting increases in spending to one percent for the next ten years. The bill also returns unspent COVID relief money to the US Treasury and eliminates President Biden’s student loan forgiveness programs.

Perhaps the most significant part of the bill is the REINS Act. This legislation requires congressional approval of any new federal regulation that will have an impact of more than $100 million, will have significant harmful impact on the economy, or will increase consumer prices. Even though the bill increases spending and debt, there are reasons a supporter of limited government might vote for it.

However even in the unlikely event that this bill is passed in the Senate and signed into law by President Biden, it is unlikely that the one percent spending cap would remain in force for the full ten years. Historically, spending caps imposed as part of a balanced budget or debt ceiling deal do not last for more than one or two Congressional terms. This is because every spending program is “protected” by members of Congress whose constituents and/or donors benefit from the program. This process already occurred with this bill before it was even voted on, as Speaker McCarthy had to remove provisions limiting ethanol subsidies to appease several farm state Republicans.

Surely lobbyists for the military industrial complex are already plotting to use hysteria over China, Putin, Iran, or one of the US’s many other designed enemies to justify greater than one percent increase in military spending.

The only reason the US government is able to run up such huge deficits without experiencing a complete economic meltdown is the dollar’s world reserve currency status. But the growing de-dollarization movement-fueled by the US government’s fiscal recklessness and hyper-interventionist foreign policy should be a wake-up call to Congress.

Sadly, few in DC seem to be paying attention.

The government’s fiscal situation will soon worsen, as both the Social Security and Medicare trust funds will likely be bankrupt within the next decade, forcing Congress to find an additional $116 trillion to fully fund them.

The looming economic crisis is a symptom of our moral and philosophic crisis. Too many Americans have bought into the lie that government can and should provide them with economic and physical safety while promoting “global democracy” abroad. Therefore, the most important step in the liberty movement now is convincing more people to apply the same moral code to theft and murder committed by government as they apply to those same crimes by private citizens. The government, at the very least, should be held to the same moral codes as the people it governs.

Ensuring that government follows the same nonaggression principle as law-abiding citizens is the key to a society of freedom, peace, and prosperity.

Copyright © 2023 by RonPaul Institute. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit and a live link are given.
Please donate to the Ron Paul Institute.

The post Congress Ignores Real Debt Ceiling Drama appeared first on Granite Grok.

In the name of God the Merciful, the Compassionate

I, Hasan, the son of Akbar, resident of the village of Saraab, being of sound mind and resolute belief in Muhammad, praise be upon him (PBUH) and the 12 Imams, the Pure Ones, declare this here as my last and final will and testament.

I have found it my sacred duty to answer the call and volunteer as a suicide martyr for any mission that our Olama (religious leaders) assign to this humble servant. I have given the matter great thought and have consulted extensively with our village Agha (the mullah). Agha, with patience and understanding, allowed me to ask many questions and replied to all my inquiries. In order to assist other brothers who may have similar questions as they contemplate offering themselves in the service of our infallible faith, I hereby report the essence of my conversation with Agha.

Me. Agha, I offer Your Person my infinite gratitude for giving me a private audience before I head for Tehran and enlist in the Martyrs Brigade. I humbly request that you accept this sum as an insignificant offering, representing my entire worldly possession, as a token of my gratitude for your console and time. It is the payment I received for selling my donkey – my soul-worldly possession of any value. I gave my hoe, shovel, and pick to my elderly parents so that, with the help of my two sisters, they can work our allotted plot and manage to survive. I have only taken enough money from the sale of the donkey to pay for the bus fare to Tehran…

Mullah. (Quickly tucks the notes under his cloak) and says no need, no need for this, my son. The fact that you are volunteering proves that you place no value on this fistful of dust, this worthless world, and you are aiming for eternal life in Allah’s paradise. If you insist, I’ll accept your offering and will pray for your pure soul.

Me. Thank you Agha for your kindness. I am particularly grateful to you to allow me to unburden myself, unreservedly, of many questions and be ready to wing my way to the next world with absolute certitude regarding our sacred faith. To do so demands that I ask my questions without any reservation and Your Person have allowed me to do so. I am eternally grateful to you Agha…

Mullah. Yes, yes, yes. Please go ahead.

Me. I am committed to embarking on my mission and nothing is going to prevent me from so doing. Yet, over the years, listening to the ulama, your own sermons, and what I have learned from the Quran, the Hadith (sayings of the Prophet), and the Sunna (the examples set by Muhammad) have made me think. Most troubling of all has been the whispering of an evil man, my tent-mate in the army from which I was recently discharged. This man never said his five times a-day obligatory prayer, he never consulted the Quran or even did not observe the fast. To the contrary, at every opportunity he raised questions about our infallible faith that caused me great anguish…

Mullah. Go ahead, son. Get to the point. Realize that I am a busy man and I can only spend so much time with any one person. But, since you are a very special believer and you are on your way to offering yourself in the service of our sacred faith, I will take the time and make every effort to relieve your anguish.

Me. Thank you, Your Person, I will try and organize my thoughts. Yet, you will pardon me if I end up jumping all over the map from one topic to the next as they pop up in my head…

Mullah. Go ahead, go ahead. Time is of the essence.

Me. My motive for volunteering is pure. It is my duty to give the life that Allah has given me for his faith. I am also interested in the promised paradise. I understand that by offering my life I will be admitted into a paradise of indescribable magnificence where rivers of milk and honey course through the endless place, choicest fruits of all kinds adorn the trees and all imaginable nice things are for the residents…

Mullah. Yes, yes, yes. I know all about these. Get to the point.

Me. Well, Your Person, I am truly ashamed to ask troubling questions, most of which have been implanted in my mind by this evil tent-mate. For instance, I am confused about the promised paradise and the reward for a martyr – I mean the promised 72 virgins…

Mullah. Yes, yes, go on. What about it?

Me. I hope you forgive me. But, with your permission, I will try and lump my questions about the 72 virgins. Would I be married to all 72 of them? I know that we are allowed four wives on earth and as many seeghe (temporary wives) as we wish or we can afford. In this accursed earth, not only I couldn’t afford one virgin for my wife, even a widow declined my parents’ proposal to marry me. Furthermore, I couldn’t even afford to have one seeghe. So, you understand that I am a healthy 26-year-old man and I find this promise most alluring to me…

Mullah. Yes, I understand. So what is the problem?

Me. Well, as I said, will all 72 of them be my wives? Would I be able to divorce one or all of them? Can I punish them if they misbehave, like women are wont to do? Having the same 72 virgins forever is a long long time. Could I get rid of them and get some new ones? Would I be able to choose my virgins from a lineup or will they be assigned to me, whether I like them or not? You see, Your Person, I hate to confess this. I have a hankering for a special kind of woman – the blue-eye-blonds, the infidel European and Americans. Would they be in heaven, would Allah make exceptions for them since they are so beautiful? Allah can make exceptions, the scripture says, “He does as he wills and ordains as he wishes.” The type of women I am talking about I have seen in a couple of movies are the ones who get my juices bubbling, pardon me for my impertinences Agha . I don’t care much for scrawny shriveled women like the ones in this village. See what I mean?

Mullah. Son, all these questions are irrelevant. Why do you think it is called paradise? It is just that, paradise. It means that you get your heart’s desire since you have earned admission to it.

Me. Thank you, thank you, Your Person. I knew that you would answer my questions satisfactorily. Now, the older of my sisters is 24 and not married. There is no suitor in sight and chances are that she will go to her grave virgin. She was seriously thinking about volunteering for the Martyr Brigade and going with me to Tehran. We talked about it and I told her about the 72 virgins that I will be getting. That was a mistake, I believe. She asked what she would get for her sacrifice. I had to wreck my brain to come up with an answer. I didn’t think that she would get 72 men. Because, Allah forbid and I do beg your forgiveness for what I am about to say next. If a woman serves 72 men that would be like a brothel, right, Your Person? That just doesn’t seem right and it is not very practical for one woman to satisfy the lust of 72 men. I told her that she would probably be one of the 72 virgins that another man would get since given the shortage of men in this village and our poverty she is likely to go to the grave virgin anyway. She became furious and almost slapped me in the face.

Mullah. Yes. That’s women for you. They are so feeble and emotional. And at the slightest thing they get provoked and become completely irrational— best not to engage them in any serious discourse. They are childlike, even when they are old. For this reason, Allah has ordained in the Quran that men are rulers over women. Women are not equal to men. Women need wise and strong rulers to keep them in line. Otherwise, the whole world would be ruined. Besides, what if women don’t like what they get? The scripture says that a woman’s testimony in the court of law is worth half of that of a man’s, no prophet of Allah has been a woman, no Imams has been a woman, no Ayatollah, not even a mullah has ever been a woman. They just have to know their rank and their place and be grateful to men who care for them, support them and feed them.

Me. Excuse my impertinence Your Person, but my mother is a woman and she is by far more rational, calmer, and wiser than my father. How could that be if women are by design inferior, emotional, and childlike and need men to manage them?

Mullah. Son, you are showing signs of wavering in your faith. These are not my sayings; they are the scripture, the very words of Allah himself. Tonight say extra prayers and repent. I, for my part, shall pray for you so that you do not succumb to the whisperings of the accursed Satan.

Me. Thank you, thank you a thousand times Your Person. But the trouble is with my brain. It keeps raising all kinds of questions. For instance, this tent-mate of mine once asked me, “Why Imam Jafar is called ‘the Truthful?’ Was it because the other eleven Imams were liars?” See how troubling the question can be. I told him that the other Imams must have practiced ketman (secretiveness) and taqiyya (denying) in instances that could cause trouble. They were not actually liars. They exercised wisdom and practiced what is prescribed in the scripture. Am I correct Your Person?

Mullah. Yes and no. You are correct that the Pure Imams were not liars. Yet, it is not up to you to judge the Pure Imams in any way that impugns their character and life. It is not up to you to justify what the Prophet or the Pure Imams did. They are in a special realm of Allah and they are not subject to the same rules that govern us, the sinful mortals.

Me. Yes, yes Your Person. That answers great many of my questions. Studying the Sunna baffled me about some of the things the Prophet did. In his late fifties, for instance, the Prophet married the nine-year-old daughter of his friend and best disciple. No ordinary man of that advanced age should bed down with a tender child of nine. Right?

Mullah. Son, I see that you are a troubled soul. Your faith is tested…

Me. But Your Person, Allah has given me a brain to think with and I cannot help but think about things. If I do not use my brain, then what good is it? Why Allah gave me brains in the first place if I am not to use it?

Mullah. Yes, Allah has given you brains to use it to serve him, love him and obey him and follow the dictates of the Seal of the Prophets. Yet, there is a price to pay for the gift of the brains. It is, unfortunately, the very instrument that the accursed Satan infiltrates to plant seeds of doubt, lead you astray and destroy your faith. I see pieces of evidence of this in your questioning.

Me. Your Person, I beg you to forgive me. You are right indeed. It is the accursed Satan who takes over me, manipulates my thoughts and enflames me. You have been so kind and indulging that I find it in me to ask a few more questions that really trouble me. And since I am headed for the next world, I want to arrive there with absolute certitude about our holy faith and its teachings…

Mullah. I have other urgent matters to attend to them. Please speak up and let us be done.

Me. Yes, yes. I will get to the point directly, but first I beg your forgiveness for this very question is a shameful one. As you recall, my late cousin Ghasem, blessed with his soul, was killed in a religious mission. Our very own Ayatollah declared him a martyr and the government pays his parents a monthly stipend for it. You, yourself, during his burial, proclaimed him a martyr and assured us all that he was in heaven already…

Mullah. Yes, yes. I thought that you were going to get to the question. I need not be reminded of all these preliminaries. What is the question?

Me. Well, I was a lad when they brought his body to the village for burial. My father and uncle asked me to help with the washing of his body before burial. I noticed that although much of his chest and head were seriously injured, his instrument was fully intact.

Mullah. Yes?

Me. Well, how should I say this? Fine, my question is how my martyred cousin, blessed with his soul, is going to partake from the 72 virgins if his instrument was buried with the rest of his body. I saw it with my own eyes that it was buried. Would they issue him a new instrument in paradise? If he is not issued a new instrument, he would most likely sit around, sigh in frustration, and weep bitterly for eternity. That would be true hell, not paradise.

Mullah. Son, you have not only a questioning mind that the accursed Satan has completely taken over, you have a mind that is fixated on sex. You are in dire trouble and in great need of spiritual rehabilitation.

Me. Yes, Your Person. You are correct as always. But, sex is important to healthy men. Is it not for this reason that the Prophet himself had numerous wives, that Muslims are allowed four wives and many Seeghe? And you, yourself, have four wives and reportedly partake of Seeghe on your biannual journey to the shrine of Imam Reza?

Mullah. Now, you have exceeded my patience with your vulgarity. I demand that you take your filthy self out of my presence at once before I have you lynched for blasphemy.

Postscript

I ran out of the Mullah’s house as if the devil himself was after me and left the village in the dead of night fearing the wrath of the powerful mullah. It may be that Satan has taken over my brain and it is he who is raising these blasphemous questions. But even my donkey has a mind of its own and did not always do what I wanted it to do.

Am I less than a donkey to blindly believe and obey what others say? I did not even scratch the surface of the mounds of questions that I have. Why, for instance, our Mullah can have four wives and comfortable life built on the sweat and blood of us destitute villagers? We have to pay Khums (Tithe, one-fifth) of our meager earnings? We have to give Zakat (religious contributions) and even gladly offer our life when they demand it. They have their paradise here on earth, thanks to the servitude of fools like us while giving us phony promises as compensation in the afterlife. I have changed my mind about joining the Martyrs Brigade, until such time that some religious authority can give satisfactory answers to all my questions.

My Satan-possessed mind advises all young men and women to beware of the mullahs. They are wolves in sheep’s garbs.

 

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