The medium of television has confirmed that nothing transcends like success. After decades of Donald Trump banking his triumphs via TV, it was a mere random and unplanned television moment this week that transformed celebrity into consequence. New technologies appear like puffball mushrooms on a dewy lawn and seem as quickly superseded by others. Our culture has whizzed through Modernism and Post-Modernism and the Machine Age and the Nuclear Age and the Computer Age with a rapidity that could induce whiplash. Yet one legitimate “Age” will persist — the Television Age. The term was used back when tiny screens encased in bulky furniture were watched through an arrangement of cathode-ray tubes and mirrors. Now, of course, there are hand-held little screens and computers that present technical “tele-visions,” and our lives revolve around their images, sounds, entertainment, and information. Nomenclature aside, we live in what will be the Television Age for a long time to come. Television has shaped the news and our perceptions, far beyond the pervasive presence of propaganda and persuasion. From commercials to biased reporting, there is a malignant underbelly to television’s hold on the course of civilization. It is a situation that will be resolved — whether through social and political disruption, or the Unseen Hand of the Market. In the meantime, we can understand our times, and ourselves, better by appreciating the effect of television. That effect is substantial, not superficial; the dispositive consequences of television are found in television’s inherent subliminal power, more than its “coverage” of events and personalities. In 1951, the Senate hearings into organized crime were chaired by Estes Kefauver, who would be Adlai Stevenson’s running mate in the next year’s presidential election. What Milton Berle was to evening TV and the manufacturers’ sales, the Kefauver Hearings were during daytime coverage. Many people bought the new DuMont, Philco, and RCA electronic boxes to follow the crime hearings. As only television can sort and shuffle, however, the most compelling aspect of the hearings was not the accusations and statistics, nor the heated exchanges. It was mobster Frank Costello’s refusal to be shown on TV screens; he was reluctant to have his face and expressions seen by potential millions. So the obliging cameras focused on what they could: his hands. His audio testimony, embellished by the sweaty, nervous, writhing hands of a gangster, decisively “told” viewers about the nature of organized crime in America. Famously, the Nixon–Kennedy debates in 1960 are widely regarded as determining that year’s presidential election, at least as much as Nixon’s late-campaign detour to Alaska or Joe Kennedy’s manipulation of Illinois’s electoral votes. Again, however, it was not the issues nor debating points that carried the day; in fact, Nixon was regarded as the winner among those who listened by radio. Thanks again to television’s silent, probing eye, Kennedy presented as fresh and handsome; Nixon had a five-o’clock shadow and nervously sweated. Worse, cameras caught Nixon during Kennedy’s answers as shiftily glancing at his opponent, glum and uncharitable. This was the effective role of television, despite enlightened discussions of a missile gap or the security of the Island of Formosa. Nixon lost to Kennedy, the first “television president.” In the 1984 election, the Great Communicator, President Ronald Reagan, was not faring well. The economy and foreign affairs initially were not strong elements in the incumbent’s portfolio. Thanks to television, however, the question (and answer) about Reagan’s age turned the tide of the campaign. Reagan had lain in wait for the question and quipped that he “would not exploit, for political purposes, my opponent’s youth and inexperience.” It was neither the logic of the response nor its clever humor that enabled television to alter the course of that election. It was Vice President Walter Mondale’s spontaneous, hearty, and prolonged laughter that defused the issue. A cornerstone of the Mondale campaign’s rationale crumbled as the television moment made the nation even more comfortable with Ronald Reagan — who soon carried 49 of 50 states in the election. We have just witnessed the most important television moment of Donald Trump’s career — and he has had many — and likely of his presidency past and future; perhaps of his ultimate regard by history. Again, it was not merely the coverage of his visit to the re-dedication of the Cathedral of Notre Dame. We may be tempted to think that the TV significance was his spotlighted arrival, or his favored seating — between French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife — and his receiving more deference than America’s current First Lady. Except for television, we might not have been fully aware of world leaders like Prince William and Volodymyr Zelenskyy rushing to Trump’s side, nor the happy embrace of Brigitte Macron and the adoring smiles of Jill Biden. But a televised interaction that matched other unique and important “moments” in recent history occurred when the religious portion of the historical event ended. In the presence of more than 1,500 world leaders, distinguished guests, and anointed workers – and millions of viewers worldwide – the Archbishop of Paris, Laurent Ulrich, rushed to the front row of the congregation. A handshake with his own president, Emmanuel Macron, was perfunctory. But the Archbishop’s smiling, earnest handshake with Donald Trump was notable. The embrace of Timothy Cardinal Dolan would be expected; two New Yorkers greeted each other. But the world noticed the symbolism behind Trump’s reception at Notre Dame — virtually secular and spiritual consecrations. to shake the hand of… Donald Trump. Not his own president and host, Emmanuel Macron. But Donald Trump. Trump, formally not in office, recently was denigrated and even despised by many in the world’s leadership circles; he prominently was in the news as a possible inmate in one or more jail cells; he was a walking caricature in the eyes of many opinion-makers. But with his arrival, at that televised moment, he was the New Trump. There is indeed a new Donald Trump, displayed on television around the world. (RELATED: Trump and the Advent of the Pax Americana) Television presented Richard Nixon with a lesson, but he learned inexpertly. The “New Nixon” (and actually there were several), was the result of political contortions and PR packaging. In Reagan’s moment, TV provided a public reminder of what was reassuring about the man. But the New Trump has changed not at all. He has not changed as Nixon tried to do; he attempted no warm and fuzzy clues to himself. As seen on millions of TV screens, the world has come to see, more and more with favor, reality as Donald Trump sees reality. And it is regarding him differently. If not for television, this Notre Dame moment might have been lost in fervid written accounts of the long ceremony. Its spontaneity was a further affirmation of its significance, consequential even in its seemingly casual nature. The Television Age lives on, and with its assistance, the Trump Era truly commences. Rick Marschall is the author of 75 books including The History of Television (1986) and The Golden Age of Television (1987). He has taught on the subjects of popular culture and television history at New York’s School of Visual Arts; Rutgers University; and the Institute For the Gifted at Bryn Mawr University.  READ MORE from Rick Marschall: The Last of the Bidenocrats My Career as George Santos’ Press Secretary Biden Will Not Be the Nominee The post All Hail the Once and Future President, Donald Trump appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

In a couple of columns that have already run this week, plus the segments of The Spectacle podcast you should have already watched (and if you haven’t, then…seriously?), our regular followers will notice a distinctly optimistic strain in things in and around this space. The Revivalist Era has begun. And everything is going to change. Mostly for the better. But don’t you think for one minute that amid all the positive changes there won’t be resistance. There will be plenty. It won’t look like the unhinged madness that gripped the Left in 2017 when rioters descended on the nation’s capitol for Donald Trump’s January inauguration and did millions of dollars in damage, or when the institutional Left openly declared themselves to be “The Resistance” and threw up a set of barriers to the president’s implementation of his agenda which bordered on treason. Actually, scratch that. The slow-motion coup d’etat that was the Trump–Russia collusion hoax didn’t border on treason, it was treason — and it’s too damned bad nobody was punished accordingly for it. But it’s a little like the 9/11 hijackings. Nothing like that will ever happen again, because if you try to rush the cockpit with box cutters, you won’t be able to get in, and the passengers will get up and rush you — and when they get to you they’ll beat you severely because their assumption is that you’re there to fly the plane into a skyscraper. Or to do something else they won’t survive. Before 9/11, the paradigm was that if somebody hijacked a plane they’d fly it to Havana or something and the State Department would negotiate your release. Probably. At least, the chances were decent you’d make it out of the situation by sitting back and chilling out. That paradigm went away even before 9/11 was over; by the time the passengers of Flight 93 had felt their plane turn around and head for the U.S. Capitol they already knew what was in store, and so they retook the plane and kept it from getting to Washington. Rioters in pink pussy hats will be dealt with a little more harshly this time than they were in 2017, though probably not as harshly as the Jan. 6 protesters were. The “Marc Eliases” attempting to thwart the will of the American public, on the other hand, could have more long-lasting consequences applied to them. Lawfare is a double-edged sword, you know. So what does post-2024 resistance look like? That’s an interesting question. I’m not sure the resisters know yet. But one thing is for sure. 1. The Worship Of Luigi Mangione Shows You Who They Are Mangione, the deranged assassin of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson who was caught this week, appears to be the Left’s version of “Let’s Go Brandon” or Oliver Anthony of “Rich Men North Of Richmond” fame. Those two phenomena were examples of a populist backlash against Joe Biden’s election and governance, and they had some relatively deep meaning behind what was, on the surface, a scowling dissatisfaction with the status quo. The difference is that “Let’s Go Brandon” or Anthony’s video shot in the woods with canine spectators didn’t carry any corpses with them. The anti-Biden populist backlash was so non-violent, in fact, that the Left had to manufacture casualties like Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, who had a stroke the day after emerging from Jan. 6 unscathed. But while Mangione’s motivations for slaughtering Brian Thompson aren’t fully explained by ideology — reading his manifesto and Goodreads book reviews before killing the business executive fills one not with an understanding of his personal philosophy but instead an appreciation for just how violently deranged he is, the reaction to Thompson’s murder has been very much ideological. (RELATED: Luigi Mangione’s Cognitive Dissonance) And dark. Democrats seem to find an orgiastic pleasure in the idea of murdering a corporate CEO. So much so, it seems, that Democrat talking heads are openly supporting Mangione. Here was someone named Briahna Gray, who went on Piers Morgan’s show and proclaimed a lack of empathy for Thompson… I could do an entire 5QT on the most disgusting left-wing reactions to Thompson’s murder. There are far worse ones than this. What’s most striking is how many there are. Thompson is almost like a stand-in for Trump, with his death a fantasy enactment of the unsuccessful Trump assassination attempts this summer. You can be sure that this will continue. We have a staggering number of mentally ill people out there who have made politics the foremost preoccupation of their lives (and I’m not just talking about Jen Rubin and Taylor Lorenz), and those people are wandering around lost over the fact that they lost an election to Hitler. Am I predicting that political violence is going to become the order of the day? I don’t think you’re going to see riots in the cities, no. But don’t be surprised if Brian Thompson is only the first of a sad parade of victims. Let’s not forget the swatting and bomb threats directed at Trump’s cabinet nominees. That’s another preview of what’s likely to come. Stay frosty out there. 2. This Is The Way It didn’t even take him a year. Argentina hasn’t run a surplus in 123 years but they’ve got one now. MILEI: ARGENTINA ENDS DEFICIT FOR THE FIRST TIME IN 123 YEARS “The deficit was the root of all our evils—without it, there’s no debt, no emission, no inflation. Today, we have a sustained fiscal surplus, free of default, for the first time in 123 years. This historic… https://t.co/uszEgPd493 pic.twitter.com/nt5jJGQM1V — Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) December 11, 2024 Look for a free trade agreement between the U.S. and Argentina next year, and don’t be surprised to see Javier Milei’s reforms turn that into the fastest-growing economy in the world by the end of his term. (RELATED: Javier Milei: The Ricky Linderman America Needs) The analogy is to a basketball being held underwater. When that basketball is let go, its velocity shooting into the air is an impressive thing to behold. And Argentina has been held very much below the surface for a very long time. 3. ProPublica’s Aborted Pete Hegseth Smear You’ve probably heard about this, but in case you haven’t, the left-wing hack “news agency” ProPublica, which is both a vanity project for commie billionaires and a jobs program for Democrat propagandists disguised as journalists, planned a hit piece on Pete Hegseth which crashed and burned this week. The meat of this attack was to be that West Point officials were denying Hegseth’s claim that he’d been admitted to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point but opted not to attend. Hegseth was given one of those “we’re doing a hit piece on you and this is our obligatory notification and a chance to comment” messages. He did something smart, which is to post his acceptance letter from West Point on X before ProPublica could run their story, and thus set off an eruption of catcalls and sick burns directed at ProPublica for their failed attempt at a smear. ProPublica editor Jesse Eisinger attempted to deflect the ratio with this… Hegseth has said that he got into West Point but didn’t attend. We asked West Pt public affairs, which told us twice on the record that he hadn’t even applied there. We reached out. Hegseth’s spox gave us his acceptance letter. We didn’t publish a story. That’s journalism. https://t.co/TceZdglkmL — Jesse Eisinger (@eisingerj) December 11, 2024 …but it didn’t help. Why? Because everyone noticed that Eisinger and his gang didn’t bother to cover the real story here, which is why West Point would be lying to ProPublica about Hegseth’s admission. Is this an indication of the Deep State’s attempts to resist a committed reformer at the Pentagon? Why yes, yes it is. But that isn’t of interest to ProPublica, is it? Of course, it isn’t. These people aren’t going to survive the new era which is arriving. They were built for a previous time, and the public has moved on. You can tell only so many lies before nobody’s listening. 4. There Are Still Hostages To The Woke, And Caitlin Clark Is One You’ve probably also heard about this… NEW: Caitlin Clark says she has white privilege in her TIME Athlete of the Year piece, says the WNBA is built on black players. As quoted by TIME, Clark says she earned her success but says she has privilege because she’s white. Clark says she now wants to help elevate… pic.twitter.com/TPKeDRdSGa — Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) December 10, 2024 They’re hammering Clark for the “white privilege” stuff, as you would expect. The Daily Caller’s Andrew Stevens let her have it in a column on Tuesday, for example… If you’re Time, there was nobody else you were gonna be able to pick — Clark was literally the only option. Her performance in 2024 is undeniable. So with that being the case, why the hell is she feeling the need to bow down to wokeness? That’s exactly what she did in her Time piece that came out Tuesday, and just … give me a break, man. Time even described Clark as being “cognizant of the racial underpinnings of her stardom.” I’m going to be more charitable than Stevens was. Here’s the reality of Caitlin Clark’s situation: her well-being and athletic career are in danger whenever she sets foot on the hardwood. We saw that this past season when she single-handedly gave the WNBA a chance at profitability. Rather than recognize her as the Pete Maravich-style savior of the women’s game that she is, combining All-American relatability with a superb technical command of the game, the run-of-the-mill WNBA players’ crowd did everything they could to rough her up in game after game. So much so that midway through her rookie year, observers of the league were openly wondering how long it would be before somebody took out one of her knees. She’s doing the only thing she can do if she wants to make that stop, so she genuflects at the altar of wokeness. There’s a price to be paid for this, of course. A lot of people who were attracted to the women’s game because of Clark will see this prisoner’s confession and turn away, and Clark bending the knee to the woke horde will certainly make her personally less marketable. Because of those things, you can make a very reasonable, if not compelling, argument that she should have stood her ground and not babbled about her “white privilege.” But — and I said this when Drew Brees was made to bend the knee after criticizing NFL players who refused to salute the flag at the national anthem — an elite athlete only really gets to that level upon sacrificing everything else in his or her life to the goal of winning in the game. Caitlin Clark isn’t thinking about the larger implications of bending to the woke mob. She’s thinking about how to get treated like the other players in the WNBA so she isn’t taken out the next time she drives to the basket. Or, less demonstrably, so she isn’t presented as a white supremacist or Trumper among a WNBA fan base that looks mostly like the attendees at a Kamala rally and therefore shut out of the product endorsement game on which female players depend for compensation. You can criticize her for making those calculations. I’m here to tell you most athletes are going to do exactly what she’s doing if they think it will help them just play ball. And if your response is just to ignore the WNBA, then I’m not going to tell you that you’re wrong. 5. This Is Also The Way Daniel Penny’s lawyer says they’re considering a lawsuit against Alvin Bragg, the Soros district attorney in New York who so maliciously and ridiculously wrecked his life for the “crime” of defending subway passengers against a drug-addled lunatic threatening their lives. Daniel Penny defense eyes Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg for potential malicious prosecution lawsuit | Fox News Jordan Neely case was rushed, involved ‘collusion,’ attorney says Days after his acquittal in the chokehold death of Jordan Neely, lawyers for Marine veteran Daniel Penny… pic.twitter.com/ZT6Cvw0Ovt — Owen Gregorian (@OwenGregorian) December 12, 2024 As I said above, lawfare is a double-edged sword. (RELATED:How Democrat Lawfare Launched Trump’s Comeback) And as I’ve said before, if you want to stop these aggressions against ordered liberty, they have to meet with recriminations. It isn’t enough that Penny beat Bragg’s rap for having choked out Jordan Neely on that train; Bragg needs to be taught a lesson and made to be afraid of the consequences of his conduct. So sue him and drag him through all the mud he’s dragged others through. This isn’t revenge. It’s self-defense — civilizational self-defense, to be more specific. You can’t just turn the other cheek in the face of an Alvin Bragg going all out to wreck the norms our society was built on (I’m not just talking about the Penny case here). You have to punish those aggressions. Force — power — is the only thing an Alvin Bragg understands. It has to be used against him. Hopefully, Penny’s lawyer will follow through on that lawsuit. READ MORE from Scott McKay: The Revivalist Era Begins The ‘Civil Rights’ Era Is Over. Good Riddance To It. The Old Game Continues Among the Worst GOP Senators The post Five Quick Things: Now You Find Out Who They Are appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

Unsurprisingly, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich has called it. A professional historian by trade, Gingrich has put out his latest at gingrich360.com, with the headline: “President-Elect Trump: The De Facto President.” Among other things, the former speaker says this: I thought his second term would start on his inauguration on Jan. 20, 2025 … It never occurred to me that President Trump’s fame, energy, and drive — and President Joe Biden’s collapse — would lead to a totally new model. The actuality is that President Trump has become the de facto President. De facto in Latin means “in reality or as a matter of fact.” When French President Emmanuel Macron greeted President Trump with the full honors of state during his recent trip to Paris, it was clear that the mantle of American power had shifted decisively to President Trump. When President Trump met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and President Macron to discuss Ukraine, it was clear where the center of world power resided. The images of President Trump and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni were a powerful contrast to Meloni’s recent meeting with President Biden, in which she had to go find him and lead him back to a group photo. Furthermore, Meloni is a conservative populist. She is solving illegal immigration and creating economic growth, in a manner similar to President Trump. Unsurprisingly, per usual, Gingrich has zeroed in exactly on what is going on in both Washington and the world at large. For reasons the American people are well familiar with — a declining mental state, his lame duck status, serious problems with the elites of his own party, not to mention stories out there that the president is going to have big trouble raising money to establish his own presidential library, it is apparent Joe Biden is president in name only. On the contrary, President-elect Donald Trump is dominating both the national and world stage. Traveling to Paris to commemorate the re-opening of the Notre Dame Cathedral, it was Trump who was sought out by the collection of world leaders who had gathered to honor the Cathedral’s renovation after a severe fire had done considerable damage to the centuries-old landmark. The host of the event, French President Emmanuel Macron, greeted Trump like a long-lost brother-in-arms, smiling broadly at the reunion of the two presidents of their old allied nations. Gingrich took note of this headline from a Politico story: “Biden shrinks from view ahead of Trump’s return to Washington: With 42 days left in office, Biden avoids unscripted moments or press questions.” Among other things Politico notes: Joe Biden is president of the United States for 42 more days. But within the Democratic Party, on Capitol Hill — and even within his own administration — it feels like he left the Oval Office weeks ago. Biden has effectively disappeared from the radar in the wake of Democrats’ bruising electoral loss. Since Nov. 5, he’s largely stuck to prepared remarks, avoided unscripted public appearances or press questions and opted to sit out the raging debate over Donald Trump’s victory, policy conversations in Congress and the Democratic Party’s future. Bad enough as all of that is, there was this from a former Biden White House official: “He’s been so cavalier and selfish about how he approaches the final weeks of the job.” In short, America and the world beyond are simultaneously breathing a sigh of relief that Trump is coming back while treating him as if he already were back as the duly sworn-in president. The one problem for all of this on the horizon is that, in fact, it is still Biden who wields the legal authority of the presidency until Jan. 20. And America’s rivals and adversaries on the world stage are watching. Doubtless calculating what they feel they can get away with in making mischief as long as Biden is legally in charge. Not good. Stay tuned. READ MORE from Jeffrey Lord: The Trump TikTok Post-Election Data The Borking of Pete Hegseth The Biden Corruption The post Newt Gingrich: Trump the De Facto President appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

President-elect Trump has made a series of cabinet nominations, ranging from excellent to questionable. One choice, in particular, is receiving much admiration from some Democrats while some Republicans fear the worst.  Trump’s announcement of Republican Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer as the nominee to serve as secretary of labor is seen as a slight to conservatives and a favor to Teamsters President Sean O’Brien, who spoke at the RNC and lobbied for her to be nominated. Chavez-DeRemer is a one-term congresswoman who lost a close reelection in Oregon’s Democrat-leaning 5th district. The soon-to-be former congresswoman pitches herself as a centrist-leaning Republican with strong ties to union leadership, as her dad was a member of the Teamsters union. In Congress, she was one of just three Republicans to co-sponsor the PRO Act, which would do away with right-to-work laws and halt independent contracting similar to California’s state law. She was also one of only a few Republicans to co-sponsor the Public Service Freedom to Negotiate Act, which, if enacted, would further strengthen public sector unions by mandating collective bargaining among state and local government employers. It’s worth noting that she was not present at a vote when Republicans in Congress sought to spearhead a Biden administration Labor regulation that prevented the right of classification for independent contractors. Even though the union support did not help her win reelection to Congress, it is undoubtedly helping her win over Senate Democrats. Sen. John Fetterman praised the Congresswoman as an “incredibly strong, pro-labor choice.” In addition, liberal Sen. Elizabeth Warren released a statement tentatively supporting Chavez-DeRemer, saying, “It’s a big deal that one of the few Republican lawmakers who has endorsed the PRO Act could lead the Department of Labor. If Chavez-DeRemer commits as labor secretary to strengthen labor unions and promote worker power, she’s a strong candidate for the job.” Furthermore, progressive organizations are warming up to the potential of Lori Chavez DeRemer as secretary of labor. The AFL-CIO, a major labor union that endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for president, applauded her stance on labor matters but cautioned about how she might run the Department of Labor under a Trump administration.  The president of the American Federation of Teachers, Randi Weingarten, a liberal Democrat, posted on X that the nomination of Chavez-DeRemer is “significant” and is encouraged that the incoming Trump administration will “respect collective bargaining and workers’ voices from Teamsters to teachers.” Similarly, the NEA (National Education Association) which regularly gives to Democrats and donated to Democrats this election cycle, raved about Chavez-DeRemer’s congressional votes in favor of public education and unionization. By the same measure that some Democrats are applauding, Republicans are expressing a bit of hesitation. Sen. Bill Cassidy will be chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, where Chavez-DeRemer needs to pass for confirmation, is troubled by her pro-union stances. “I will need to get a better understanding of her support for Democrat legislation in Congress that would strip Louisiana’s ability to be a right-to-work state and if that will be her position going forward,” said Cassidy. Likewise, Sen. Rand Paul, a libertarian-leaning Republican and a sponsor of National Right-to-Work, has stated, “I’m not excited about her opposition to right-to-work,” leaving his vote up in the air.  Other conservatives, such as Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, and Tammy McCutchen, former administrator for Labor’s Wage and Hour division under George W. Bush, have vocally disapproved of her nomination. The Competitive Enterprise Institute is on full attack, denouncing Chavez-DeRemer as “not qualified,” and the National Right to Work Committee is working with Republican senators to block her nomination. President-elect Trump won a mandate to restore the economy and defended the traditionally conservative right-to-work policy position while on the campaign trail. It’s true that the Teamsters members overwhelmingly supported him over Harris, but being pro-worker is not pro-union. Trump needs a labor secretary who will support his pro-business agenda and not undermine it. Lori Chavez-DeRemer either needs to be withdrawn as the secretary of labor nominee or swiftly rejected by every Republican in the Senate. READ MORE:  Americans Need Brendan Carr as FCC Chair to Rein in Big Tech We Live In the Age of Trump Don’t Mistake the Gaetz Nomination for a Misstep The post Lori Chavez-DeRemer Will Not ‘Work’ as Secretary of Labor appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has set out to “Trump-proof” California, but in one sense he’s too late. According to NBC News, 38.3 percent of Californians voted for Trump, by some accounts 40 percent, so as people across the country should know, Newsom’s crusade must involve something else. (RELATED: California Voters Reject ‘California Values’) President-elect Trump has placed entrepreneurs Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy in charge of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), tasked to slim down the bloated government. Californians can easily find state agencies that should be eliminated, such as the Coastal Commission. (RELATED: Restoring the California Dream) The unelected commissioners recently made news by opposing an increase in Musk’s SpaceX launches from Vandenberg Space Force Base in Santa Barbara County. This was due not to environmental concerns but Musk’s participation in the election. Newsom said “I’m with Elon,” but the commissioners, some appointed by the governor, are “friends of mine.” In 2022, the governor’s friends rejected a desalination plant that would have provided arid Orange County with 50 million gallons of fresh water a day. Commissioner Dayna Bochco, president of Steven Bochco Productions explained that “the ocean is under attack from climate change already.” A CCC commissioner since 2011, Bochco was reappointed last year. The Commission overrides scores of elected city and government officials, all fully capable of handling their own affairs, and runs roughshod over property rights. No governor, including Republicans George Deukmejian, Pete Wilson, and Arnold Schwarzenegger, has attempted to eliminate the CCC, hardly the state’s only wasteful body. Before they reach students in the classroom, Californians’ tax dollars must trickle down through multiple layers of bureaucratic sediment. These include the 58 county offices of education, which serve as “support systems for their local school districts and as liaisons for the state.” Like the local districts, the county offices employ superintendents, who absorb huge amounts of taxpayer dollars. According to Transparent California, Los Angeles County Office of Education Superintendent Debra Duardo bags an annual pay package of $508,402, more than the president of the United States and more than double Newsom’s $201,553. Deputy County Superintendent Maria Martinez Poulin pulls down $343,887, and “education officer” Maricela Ramirez is not far behind at $340,458. In the Sacramento County office, Superintendent David Gordon draws a total pay of $447,287 and Deputy Superintendent Masami Herota gets $324,921. This is for services that could easily be performed by the local school districts, whose non-teaching officials are also overpaid. For example, the Ontario-Montclair school district pays Superintendent Phillip Hammond a stunning $743,596, empowered by a “series of opaque perks” that make Hammond the state’s highest-paid administrator. Chief business official Phillip Hillman bags a not-too-shabby $350,619. Bureaucratic bloat is also evident in the state’s tax system. The Franchise Tax Board (FTB), the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration (CDTFA), and the State Board of Equalization (SBE) are all responsible for the collection of taxes in some form. So is California’s Employment Development Department (EDD) “one of the largest tax collection agencies in the nation,” collecting more than $81 billion in payroll taxes in 2018-19 alone. How this revenue is spent is another matter. Under the supervision of Julie Su, California’s Labor and Workforce Development Agency (LWDA) boss, the EDD was responsible for $30 billion in unemployment fraud, with convicts and out-of-state fraudsters alike cashing in. Despite that record, Su was the Biden–Harris administration’s choice for Labor secretary, never confirmed by the Senate but still in power at this writing. If Californians believed that four tax agencies are too many it would be hard to blame them. In a similar style, eliminating the costly county offices of education could help more tax dollars to reach students in the classroom. Over in Washington, the federal Department of Education was a payoff to the teacher unions that supported Jimmy Carter for president in 1976. As the 1983 A Nation at Risk report confirmed, the new department did nothing to improve student achievement. Musk and Ramaswamy have a strong case to eliminate the department, one of many expensive and counterproductive bureaucracies. Nothing of the sort is going on in California, and people across the nation should not be fooled. Newsom’s push to “Trump-proof” California is an effort to reform-proof the state that needs reform the most. Lloyd Billingsley is a policy fellow at the Independent Institute in Oakland, Calif. READ MORE from Lloyd Billingsley: The Golden State Unleashes the Anonymous Snoop Dogs University of California at Planned Parenthood Oh Say Can UC? The post Californians Could Seriously Benefit From DOGE in ‘Trump-Proofed’ California appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

from The Conservative Treehouse: One of the least understood aspects of congressional oversight is the elite group of elected politicians who are charged with congressional oversight over all intelligence activity. This highly important oversight group is called the Intelligence Community “Gang of Eight”. A position within the Gang of Eight comes as a result of […]

by Dr. Joseph Mercola, Mercola: Story at-a-glance Vitamin D deficiency disrupts thymus function and immune tolerance, triggering autoimmune diseases by allowing self-reactive T cells to escape into the bloodstream Vitamin D enhances both innate and adaptive immunity by boosting antimicrobial peptides, suppressing inflammatory responses and promoting regulatory T cells that maintain immune balance Beyond immune […]