The Brew: Inspiring Touchdowns, Government Shutdowns, and the Case of the Missing Congresswoman
Happy Monday and welcome to Christmas Eve Eve!
We have also turned the corner past the darkest day of the year, with each new day until June bringing increasing light.
Government Averts Shutdown
Remember all the angst and drama Thursday and Friday about a potential government shutdown? It was just noise. On Saturday, hours after the midnight deadline passed, Joe Biden signed a continuing resolution that keeps federal funding levels the same until March 14, and offers $110 billion in disaster relief plus $10 billion in relief for farmers. The shutdown was averted, and the the original 1,547-page, pork-laden, incoming-administration-sabotaging boondoggle of a CR was tossed into the recycle bin of history.
Despite the fact that he’s technically not president, Donald Trump was the major player in the deal while Joe Biden was a ghost. It seems Trump is calling the shots while Biden is just plain shot.
One amusing storyline of the shutdown saga was how Democrats kept calling Elon Musk “President Musk” because of his role in knocking down the original disastrous bill. They insist the billionaire X owner is the true boss, not Trump, while ignoring the Wall Street Journal story reporting that Joe Biden’s been a few reindeer short of a sleigh and not in charge since day one.
The CR battle also featured some wretched gaslighting. When the bloated CR fell, Democrats raced before the cameras and onto social media to accuse the Republicans of killing $190 million in pediatric cancer research funding. What the Dems failed to mention is the Republican-led House of Representatives passed a stand-alone bill in March allocating the pediatric cancer funding, but Sen. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and the Democrats have sat on it all year.
Victory: Biden Backs Off Effort to Keep Schools from Protecting Female Sports
Biden’s Department of Education has dropped an effort to rewrite Title IX and punish schools that moved to protect female athletes from being forced to compete against and share locker rooms with biological males.
The rule, first proposed in April 2023, would have forced individual states to allow participation in single-sex sports by gender identity rather than biological sex.
The Department of Education says two factors contributed to the decision: the testimony given against the rule during the comment period and lawsuits from multiple states challenging it.
Earlier this year, Biden wanted the Supreme Court to approve an emergency request to enforce his trans-pushing, Title IX-wrecking rule. As Fox News reports, “The request would have permitted biological men in women’s bathrooms, locker rooms and dorms in 10 states where there are state-level and local-level rules in place to prevent it.”
The High Court ruled 5-4 against granting the emergency request.
Meanwhile, the Daily Caller reports the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services gave $850,000 of your tax dollars over the past two years to a LGBTQI+ organization to “facilitate training for military families that pushes parents to affirm their child’s self-selected gender identity.” According to the HHS grant, the group’s efforts are focused on Fort Bragg (currently known as Fort Liberty) in Fayetteville, NC.
What’s worse: the drones plaguing our military bases or the groomers?
Republican Congresswoman Missing from DC for Months Founding Living in Memory Care Home
Above we referenced the bombshell WSJ report that the White House hid Joe Biden’s mental incapacities since the day he entered office. Sadly, we have to say both sides of the aisle have been playing hide-and-seek with their suffering seniors.
Republican Congresswoman Kay Granger, 81, who has been AWOL from Washington for months, has been found by the Dallas Express living in a memory care facility in Texas. The newspaper reports that Granger moved into the facility after being found wandering “lost and confused” in her neighborhood. She has not appeared for a Congressional vote since July. Her local congressional office is shut down. And while her term ends in less than two weeks, it is clear her constituents have been without representation in Congress for half a year.
The current 118th Congress has the highest average age since 1789 (when Nancy Pelosi’s first term began. Okay, I kid.). The median age has risen dramatically since the 1980s. Remember how Nikki Haley got slammed last year for calling the Senate “the most privileged nursing home in the country”?
While we, of course, pray for Rep. Granger and her family, it is unacceptable for representatives to continue serving when they are incapable of doing the jobs taxpayers elected them to do.
If the 2024 election showed us anything, it’s that voters aren’t playing around anymore. Not with Deep Staters, game-players, or public servants who stay in office beyond their ability to serve.
Sick: SNL< Audience Cheers Accused Murderer Luigi Mangione
You don’t expect audiences at a comedy show to be pillars of decorum, but this one is utter depravity.
During Saturday Night Live’s “Weekend Update,” the audience burst into cheers, shouts, and shrieks at the mention of cold-blooded accused killer Luigi Mangione.
Watch: They’re not laughing at a joke. They’re not cheering a skit. They are hailing him.
SNL Weekend Update mentions CEO kiIIer Luigi Mangione and the crowd applauds & cheers pic.twitter.com/Hn6k2kTBp2
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) December 22, 2024
Even “Weekend Update” anchor Colin Jost was taken aback and awkwardly chided the audience, “You’re wooing for Justice, right?” Even he didn’t seem to believe it.
It’s not just a comedy crowd embracing the accused killer in a bit of dark humor. An Emerson College poll< released last week showed a stunning 41% of voters between the ages of 18 and 29 found the actions for which Mangione is currently facing trial “acceptable.”
And we’re supposed to think guns are the problem when some young person decides violence is the answer for their grievance?
College Football Playoffs, Plus a Big Score for a Political Son
This weekend marked the first of the new college football playoff system. How’d it go? I’m the wrong person to ask. I’ve got family members from two of the schools that got whipped, Clemson and Tennessee.
Boo birds can say expanding the playoffs to 12 was a mistake, as all four games were blowouts. And traditionalists can still grumble about the growing insignificance of the historic bowl games, like the Rose Bowl, Orange Bowl and Cotton Bowl. I say give it a couple years to see if the new format works.
Meanwhile, Friday night was a big one at the Gasparilla Bowl between the Florida Gators and Tulane Green Wave, especially if you’re a fan of the movie Rudy – because the game saw a real-life Rudy. (Well, technically another real-life Rudy. But you get the point.)
In the fourth quarter, the Gators scored on a five-yard run by a freshman running back. Although the outcome of the game was already decided, the player was mobbed by his teammates as if he’d just boosted them to win the national championship.
Why? Because that redshirted freshman was no star prospect. He was a walk-on, and kind of a pipsqueak compared to his giant-sized teammates. He didn’t even have an athletic scholarship. And there he was, in a bowl game, scoring his first college touchdown.
The name on the back of the uniform was familiar, though: Rubio. As in Anthony Rubio, son of Florida Senator and soon-to-be-Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
What’s more, when ESPN cornered Anthony after the game, his first order of business was to give praise to God.
https://twitter.com/ItsJesseSimmons/status/1870262268522549254
Papa Rubio was understandably proud –particularly of his son’s response, and his teammates’ reactions. “Happy my son scored,” Rubio said. “But what I am truly proud of is the joy from his teammates and that he gave all the glory to God.”
https://twitter.com/marcorubio/status/1870355512396546386
Along The Stream…
The Stream‘s Gayle McQueary shares some wise insights in “The Duty of American Citizens in the Age of Elon Musk: Holding Congress Accountable.”
Meanwhile, Stream contributor Joseph Mattera details “Seven Way to Release Purpose in People.”
Al Perrotta is The Stream’s Washington bureau chief, coauthor with John Zmirak of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Immigration, and coauthor of the counterterrorism memoir Hostile Intent: Protecting Yourself Against Terrorism.