Commentary: The Hysterical Style in American Politics

White Silence

The post-Joe McCarthy era and the candidacy of Barry Goldwater once prompted liberal political scientist Richard Hofstadter to chronicle a supposedly long-standing right-wing “paranoid style” of conspiracy-fed extremism.

But far more common, especially in the 21st century, has been a left-wing, hysterical style of inventing scandals and manipulating perceived tensions for political advantage.

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Music Spotlight: Ashley Anne

Occasionally, you meet an artist, and you know they were born with a gift. At age 17, Ashley Anne wrote/released her first single, “Dear Dolly,” a song that she penned entirely on her own.

And while Dolly Parton is arguably the most popular country star on the planet, most people of Anne’s peer group only know “Jolene” and probably don’t realize that Parton wrote “I Will Always Love You” and may not have ever heard Whitney Houston’s version of it.

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Poll: Only 22 Percent of Likely Voters Confident Biden Is Innocent of Corruption Allegations

Joe Biden

One-third of Americans say that President Joe Biden is guilty of corruption and should be impeached, including some Democrats, according to a new poll.

The Center Square Voter’s Voice Poll found that 34% of likely voters say “Joe Biden is guilty of corruption and should be impeached.” An additional 35% said it’s not clear if the president did anything wrong but that a Republican-led House investigation into the president should continue.

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Uvalde School Shooting Response Had ‘No Urgency,’ Plagued with ‘Cascading Failures’: DOJ Report

The mass shooting that killed 19 students and two teachers at Robb Elementary in Uvalde, Texas, could have been stopped sooner if it were not for significant law enforcement failures, according to a scathing Justice Department report released Thursday.

Police had “cascading failures” in their response to the shooting on May 24, 2022, according to a nearly 600-page federal report, which slams first responders for a lack of leadership and demonstrating “no urgency” in creating a command post, among other things, per The Associated Press.

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Commentary: DEI Destroys Excellence, Military Cohesion at Service Academies

Military

Applicants who self-identified as a member of a race the Academy wished to privilege—at the time I was on the Admissions Board it was African American, Hispanic, and Native American—were briefed separately to the committee not by a white member but by a minority Navy lieutenant. Briefings (a minute and forty seconds per applicant, no more) ran through a number of factors quite quickly and offered a recommendation that we had been told was appropriate: “qualified” for USNA if grades A/B for white applicants (but not minorities, who needed only C grades), 600 score in each part of the SAT for white applicants (but about 550 for minorities who come to USNA without remediation), and Whole Person Multiple (points given for grades/tests, school leadership positions, and sports) of at least 55,000 for whites, no bottom for minorities.

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Ranked Choice Voting Disenfranchises Minorities, Though Favored by Left, Study Finds

Voting Booths

Ranked choice voting, in which voters rank candidates on a ballot rather than choose one, may harm black and Native American voters disproportionately, according to a new study by a Princeton University professor. 

Minority candidates also may be undercut by ranked choice voting, said Nolan McCarty, a professor of politics and public affairs at Princeton’s School of Public and International Affairs and vice dean for academic assessment.

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Feds Conceal Details About Anti-Ivermectin Campaign in Response to Doctors’ Reinstated Lawsuit

Ivermectin

The Food and Drug Administration wants to continue its selective promotion of off-label drug use: good for COVID-19 vaccines, bad for alternatives to those vaccines. It just doesn’t want the public to see its full reasoning for the latter.

The FDA and the Department of Health and Human Services filed a renewed motion to dismiss a lawsuit by doctors claiming  the agencies have a practice of demonizing ivermectin by conflating its human and animal doses and using “command” language, such as “stop it,” to discourage using the anti-parasite drug against COVID.

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Supreme Court Declines to Hear Case Regarding Transgender Bathroom Policies in Schools

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court refused to intervene in a case that could have potentially set a nationwide precedent on the question of transgender bathroom policies in school districts.

As ABC News reports, the case in question stems from an Indiana public school district, the Metropolitan School District of Martinsville, which is located about 30 miles southwest of Indianapolis. Most recently, the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a previous order determining that biological females can use the male restroom, and vice-versa. A similar ruling was made by the federal appeals court in Richmond, Virginia, while the appeals court in Atlanta ruled against such policies.

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Alleged Foreign Agent Law Violations Loom over Hunter Biden as House Prepares to Depose Him

The U.S. law firm that did work for Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings was encouraged by the Justice Department to register as a foreign agent for the same type of work that Hunter Biden did for the company while he was a board member. Burisma was not registered as a foreign agent at the time.

Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP (Cravath) as part of its representation of Burisma and its founder, litigation partner John Buretta met with State Department officials and sent a letter directly to the U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine, according to Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) filings submitted earlier this month.

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