RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://pjmedia.com/john-stossel/2024/05/01/make-government-work-n4928660

President Joe Biden says, “I know how to make government work!”You’d think he’d know. He’s worked in government for 51 years. But the truth is, no one can make government work. 

Biden hasn’t.

Look at the chaos at the border, our military’s botched withdrawal from Afghanistan, the rising cost of living, our unsustainable record-high debt …

In my new video, economist Ed Stringham argues that no government can ever work well, because “even the best person can’t implement change. … The massive bureaucracy gets bigger and slower.”

I learned that as a consumer reporter watching bureaucrats regulate business. Their rules usually made life worse for consumers.

Yet politicians want government to do more!

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/nypd-begins-entering-columbia-campus-moving-toward-barricaded-anti-israel-protesters/

Hundreds of New York City police officers equipped with riot gear took dozens of anti-Israel protesters into custody Tuesday evening after Columbia University called in the police to end the pro-Palestinian occupation of a campus building.

Columbia protesters occupied Hamilton Hall early Tuesday morning and blocked the entrances to claim the area as their own. Protesters were seen smashing windows and barricading themselves inside the building, one day after the university began suspending students for refusing to leave a pro-Palestinian encampment on campus.

The New York Police Department received a letter from Columbia president Minouche Shafik authorizing officers to move onto campus, marking the second time the university administration had done so. The NYPD closed off streets around Columbia while moving toward the barricaded campus location. Officers then entered Hamilton Hall through a second-floor window and began pulling people out of the building, according to Columbia radio station WKCR-FM.

Columbia’s property, including Hamilton Hall, was cleared of all pro-Palestinian protesters by around 11 p.m. Tuesday, less than two hours after the law-enforcement raid began.

Large numbers of protesters could be seen getting arrested, zip-tied, and escorted onto buses. Over 100 protesters were arrested at Columbia and the City College of New York, which saw a similar situation developing. Most of the arrests were made at Columbia, according to law enforcement.

The police department denied using tear gas when clashing with protesters; flash-bang grenades and other “distraction devices” were used instead, according to an NYPD spokesperson.

“The decision to reach out to the NYPD was in response to the actions of the protesters, not the cause they are championing,” university spokesman Ben Chang said in a statement. “We have made it clear that the life of campus cannot be endlessly interrupted by protesters who violate the rules and the law.”

The building occupation was believed to have been led by people not affiliated with the university, Chang added.

In addition to clearing out all encampments, Shafik asked city police to maintain a presence on campus for at least two more weeks.

“In light of the activities that occurred after the events of April 17-18, 2024, we further request that you retain a presence on campus through at least May 17, 2024 to maintain order and ensure encampments are not reestablished,” Shafik wrote in the letter to NYPD deputy commissioner Michael Gerber. The school’s commencement is scheduled for May 15

https://www.frontpagemag.com/beware-of-the-deadly-progressive-touch/

Recently, viral videos have highlighted the furor—and narcissism—of progressive elites when they rarely face the consequences of their own actions.

The most hilarious video was the defiant DA of New York’s Monroe County, dripping with elite condescension. She felt she had the right to go 20 mph over the speed limit, ignore a patrol car signaling her to pull over, and then in her garage dress down police officers for daring to treat her like she was a mere citizen.

Another was the Emory professor screaming (“I am a professor!”) when handcuffed and hauled off her campus by Georgia law enforcement. She exited whining to cameras that she had only “lightly” hit a policeman on the head (“I impulsively hit him on the head very lightly to get his attention and they grabbed me.”). And then there was the Bakersfield fiery leftist who bragged to the City Council about murdering them in their homes, only to flicker and weep in court when facing felony indictments.

Progressive hothouse plants assume their supposed moral superiority exempts them from living by the rules in the manner of others. But sometimes it is not just the police who anger them, but the very Frankensteinian monsters they created who do not cooperate with their degreed and elected enablers.

In California, an epidemic of crime, from theft to assault, has struck liberal politicians in the last few months, including most recently Adam Schiff, the leftwing mayors of San Jose—Matt Mahon—and Los Angeles—Karen Bass, and even the unhinged district attorney of Oakland Pamela Price. Critical legal theory, no-bail, and defund the police apparently offer no protection.

Sen. Chuck Schumer thought it a neat trick in 2020 to assemble a pro-abortion throng outside the Supreme Court doors, and threaten Justices Kavanagh and Gorsuch by name. He grandstanded that they would not know what would soon “hit” them as they reaped the “whirlwind”. Now a pro-Hamas whirlwind hit his own home, in the fashion leftists not long also did with impunity to Supreme Court Justices’ homes—then to the sudden silence of the otherwise loud Schumer.

https://issuesinsights.com/2024/05/01/barely-a-month-old-californias-20-hr-fast-food-minimum-wage-is-already-an-economic-disaster/

California Democrats who pushed through the state’s punitive new minimum wage must be feeling mighty proud about now. Not only are fast-food joints closing or replacing low-end employees with overseas workers and robots, now the law is costing the very people it was supposed to help while decimating consumers’ wallets. Well done!

The $20-an-hour wage floor foisted on California’s fast-food restaurants, dubbed with the innocent-sounding moniker Assembly Bill 257, was signed into law last fall. It didn’t take long to become a disaster.

Hoover Institution senior fellow and economist Lee Ohanian showed just how quickly bad policies can wreck an economy. And the damage was done even before the law officially went into effect a month ago today.

“Between last fall and January,” Ohanian wrote, “California fast-food restaurants cut about 9,500 jobs, representing a 1.3% change from September 2023.” By comparison, overall employment in California during that period fell just 0.2%.

Those who are losing their jobs in this new higher-wage environment are those most easily replaced, with the lowest productivity — which usually means minority youths with minimal education and little or no work skills. In short, the most vulnerable among us.

“This includes losses at Pizza Hut and Round Table Pizza which are in the process of firing nearly 1,300 delivery drivers. El Pollo Loco and Jack in the Box announced that they will speed up the use of robotics, including robots that make salsa and cook fried foods,” Ohanian added.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/campus-protests-mob-rule-columbia-palestine-israel-fe9be21d?mod=opinion_lead_pos1

The anti-Israel—and often antisemitic—protests sweeping college campuses these days are an old story with a new cause. That story is the increasing resort by America’s political left to protests in the streets as a form of intimidation and rule by the mob. When Americans on the political right do this, it’s called a threat to democracy.

For readers of a certain age, today’s protests at Columbia and other campuses echo 1968 and opposition to the Vietnam war. The kids even took over the same building at Columbia, Hamilton Hall. But the mass-protest method has become the political default for progressives when they lose the policy debate in Congress, the White House, the courts, or other institutions. They keep going to the barricades because it often gets them what they want.

The clearest example was the post-George Floyd riots of 2020. The left used that murder to trigger, and then condone, riots in numerous cities against what they claimed was widespread police abuse. Looting and vandalism were justified as social-justice rage.

Fearful of these protests, Democratic mayors and city councils around the country slashed police funding, eliminated cash bail, and stopped enforcing many crimes. Vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris tweeted support for a bail fund for protesters who were arrested in Minnesota. The Democratic convention in 2020 failed to condemn the rioting.