WASHINGTON, D.C. (LifeSiteNews) — Heather Idoni, 59, who had a stroke two weeks ago, disclosed to LifeSiteNews that she is a victim of gross medical neglect at the D.C. jail, which has failed to administer essential medication for her heart while falsifying her medical record as she awaits sentencing next week for taking part in a traditional pro-life rescue.
Idoni said she received three stints above her heart for three major arteries. While she was prescribed several medications, some of which she has been given, she has been denied one essential medication prescribed by the doctor to be taken once a day to lower her blood pressure.
“It’s just the metoprolol that I’ve had a difficult time with,” she said. “I haven’t even been given one dose.”
I recently was back in the basement of my parents’ home, digging through old yearbooks and photo albums. My brother nagged me to find the old stereo with the turntable and vinyl records. In an age of modernity, it seems we can’t help but long for the things that have been indeed “crushed,” as recently illustrated by Apple’s new iPad ad.
Last week, Apple faced so much backlash to its new commercial bragging about the destruction of humanity, that the company quickly apologized and admitted it “missed the mark.” Particularly for those of us who are old enough to remember all of the musical, gaming, and artistic icons crushed by the huge hunk of metal’s descent to generate the “thinnest iPad ever,” the ad justified every fear we have of technology overtaking our lives. It also goes to show how out of touch the technocratic elites are with not only the experience of everyday Americans but humanity.
British actor Hugh Grant said it best in his caustic criticism of the ad: “The destruction of the human experience. Courtesy of Silicon Valley.”
While “wide right” and “fake punt” still haunt me from the AFC divisional round, the Kansas City Chiefs are the 2024 Super Bowl Champions. Harrison Butker, the team’s kicker, gave the commencement address at Benedictine College, where he blasted alleged Catholic Joe Biden for being the most pro-abortion president America has ever had.
See, while the media wants us to believe Joe Biden is a “devout” Catholic because those are the talking points given to them by the Biden Admin, Butker is of the belief that a devout Catholic wouldn’t give the sign of the cross at the pro-abortion rally (in front of literally tens of people).
Our own nation is led by a man who proudly proclaims his Catholic faith, but at the same time is delusional enough to make the Sign of The Cross during a pro-abortion rally… Being Catholic alone does not cut it… We need to stop pretending that the church of nice is a winning proposition.
Did you know the average American adult spends between 2.5 and 3 hours a day on social media? Those Death Scroll Sessions (Taylor Swift’s next era, probably) inundate us with thousands of data bits, most of which we forget as quickly as we are exposed, so it’s notable when I think of something I saw online for the tenth time in 48 hours.
Sylvester Stallone, who is more attractive at 77 than he was fifty years ago, if I do say so myself, published a monologue about life getting easier and how hard work has become “strong medicine that tastes horrible going down, but makes you feel better.”
The World Health Assembly – “the decision-making body of the WHO” – convenes in Geneva, Switzerland, from May 27 to June 1 to discuss and presumably vote on final amendments to the International Health Regulations (IHR) and the “WHO Pandemic Agreement.”
It’s imperative that we shed light on their supposed “mission critical for humanity.” The proposed WHO treaty and IHR amendments gravely threaten our rights and freedoms as they stand to:
Change IHR recommendations from “non-binding” to legally binding so that all member countries must comply.
Create requirements for health documents that could be used to restrict access and travel as the WHO sees fit.
Require surveillance of online information and censorship of information deemed “misinformation.”
Coerce extreme lockdown measures, including creating “quarantine of suspect travelers, preferably in facilities away from the point of entry,” aka “quarantine camps” seen during the COVID-19 pandemic in China and elsewhere.
Allow the WHO to declare an emergency at will.
Require member nations to use certain “relevant health products” like vaccines, drugs, etc., while prohibiting others during emergencies.
In medieval Europe, Christians who hated Jews spread the lie that Jews kidnap Christian children, slaughter them, and use their blood to bake matzos for Passover. This lie became known as “the Blood Libel,” probably the greatest libel in history. Over the course of many centuries, Jews were tortured and murdered, often by being burned alive, because of the Blood Libel.
The Blood Libel was particularly odious in light of two facts: it was the Jews who, through their Bible, first outlawed human sacrifice, and one of the first laws in the Hebrew Bible is a ban on consuming blood.
For centuries, Jews had to confront the fact that all around them, throughout Europe, a vast number of people believed an enormous lie about them. Jews have to confront the same thing today. We are now living through the Second Blood Libel: the claim that the Jewish state is committing genocide. But, unlike the first Blood Libel, this libel is not the product of Christians; it is the product of Muslims and the left. The very people against whom the greatest genocide in recorded history—the Holocaust—was directed are now accused of the very same crime.
Attorney specializing in child welfare cases, Michael Discioarro, called out Child Protection Services (CPS) for ignoring “dying children” across the U.S. on Monday while discussing the ongoing treadmill abuse murder trial.
Discioarro appeared on “Cuomo” to discuss the trial involving the death of 6-year-old Corey Micciolo, who prosecutors believed died due to blunt force trauma he suffered from his father forcing him to run on a treadmill, even after falling multiple times. Before bringing on Discioarro, NewsNation host Chris Cuomo explained that his team attempted to get in contact with a CPS official, however, none were willing to respond.
As Cuomo slammed the government agency, he questioned Discioarro on how CPS was allowed to “get a pass on accountability” as Micciolo’s mother reportedly contacted CPS multiple times about the father.
For years, President Joe Biden was flying west to east with the prevailing winds, economically speaking. During Covid, politicians (primarily Democrats) closed down large portions of the economy. When Covid ended, the economy “grew” because that’s what happens when you go from a partially closed economy to an entirely open one.
The truth is that Biden’s economic numbers were never any good. And now that the easy-growth environment of the post-Covid era is well behind us, Biden — and the country — face a terrible economic reckoning.
The specter of stagflation has returned. On April 25th, The Bureau of Economic Analysis announced that GDP only grew by 1.6% in the first quarter of this year, well below expectations.
Consumer spending on goods actually declined in the quarter as ordinary Americans are financially tapped out. The report also showed inflation remains stubbornly high, continuing a recent trend of resurgent inflation running about twice the Federal Reserve’s target rate.
American small businesses are the biggest victims of the stagflationary economy, which is being weighed down by big government policies. This was the most important storyline coming out of this Month’s National Small Business Week.
President Biden is claiming a small business “boom” under his administration. The reality is entrepreneurs grapple with a triple threat: a decelerating economy, soaring inflation, and escalating credit expenses due to his bad policies.
American consumers have a record $1.2 trillion of credit card debt. They are experiencing declining real wages and face a cost-of-living crisis. They can’t afford to keep up their discretionary spending, which small businesses rely on to survive and thrive.
Last week, President Biden said he would withdraw military aid to Israel if it commenced military operations to go into Rafah and go after Hamas. There were many reactions to this announcement because it seemed to perfectly encapsulate the incoherent Israel policy the Biden administration has been developing since Hamas’ brutal attack last October that touched off the war in Gaza.
On one hand, the American people are broadly supportive of Israel and the moral justification for this war. Lest anyone forget, Hamas is still holding American citizens hostage at this very moment. On the other, the hard-left grassroots that are an important part of the Democrat Party’s coalition are radically pro-Palestinian and eager to engage in street violence domestically to prove the point. It’s also worth noting that the hard-left shock troops aren’t just emblematic of the party’s activist heart — their efforts to destabilize colleges and worse are being funded by George Soros, the Tides Foundation, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and those that hold the purse strings for billions of dollars of funding for Democrats and their lefty causes.
The issue is drastically polarizing the Democratic coalition. For instance, normally America’s celebrities are engaged in overt social media campaigning for Democrats six months out from an election. Well, here’s a video of Jewish actor Michael Rapaport, an avowed Trump hater, unendorsing Biden in characteristically profane fashion.
During an episode of “Real Time with Bill Maher,” James Carville, a Democrat and political strategist, expressed his opinion that Speaker Mike Johnson and other “Christian nationalists” are a bigger threat to America than al-Qaeda. In a more recent rant posted on X, Carville urged young people to recognize the potential dire consequences of not voting for Biden in this year’s November election, at least as he sees it:
If Trump, and Roberts, and Alito, and Gorsuch, and Thomas, and Leonard Leo, and the Heritage Foundation — if they get a hold [of power], there will be no government left, there will be no rights left, you will live under theocracy, you’ll end up [with] Christian Nationalism. My advice to tell these young people is to get off your motherf**king a** and go vote because you should vote like your entire future, and the entire future of this United States depends on it because, quite frankly, it does, and that’s not an exaggeration.
Now Zakaria is telling Democrats that it’s time to face the ‘reality’ that Joe Biden is probably going to lose the election in November.
He comes right out and says that he personally doesn’t want Trump to win, but that barring some unforeseen event, Trump is likely to walk away with the win.
A political action committee for a ubiquitous home improvement company is doing some financial renovations in the wake of fraud, according to a new financial filing.
“The PAC has taken action to prevent this from happening in the future by closing that bank account and opening a new account,” said a report to FEC from May 8. “In addition, the PAC is using positive pay through the bank to prevent any future occurrences.”
The $7,500 charge was “fraudulent activity on the bank account and has been reversed,” the report said.
There’s been some chatter over social media that Virginia could be in play for the 2024 presidential election, despite how it’s gone for the Democratic presidential candidate every year since 2008. That being said, it’s only regarded as “Likely Democratic.” But, the campaign for former and potentially future President Donald Trump looks to be hopeful about every state, even and including the bright blue ones. On Monday, RealClearPolitics featured a conversation between reporter Phil Wegmann and co-founder Tom Bevan from Friday, with Wegmann discussing some of those hopes from the Trump campaign as it pertains to New York and New Jersey, specifically when it comes to reactions to antisemitic protests on college campuses.
As Bevan pointed out, especially since President Joe Biden had been in Wisconsin that week and Trump had been in Michigan andWisconsin, it looks like the race could come down to those two states, as well as other key battlegrounds. Polling released before and since then has shown that the race is particularly close and competitive in those two states as well as overall. Trump is leading Biden by +0.6 in Wisconsin and by +0.8 in Michigan, per RCP’s averages.
“It does seem that in this ‘Blue Wall’ of the upper Midwest, Trump’s leading, but not by very, very much. And that’s where they’re gonna spend the majority of their time and effort and money,” Bevan offered, as he also wondered “is that where the Trump folks think this race is going to be decided, in one of those two states,” when speaking to Wegmann about Wisconsin and Michigan.
House Republicans are teeing up a number of pro-law enforcement bills to hit the floor during National Police Week, looking to hammer home their law-and-order platform ahead of the 2024 election.
Lawmakers will vote on a slew of police-related legislation over the coming days, including bills to increase protections for law enforcement officers as well as resolutions denouncing the Biden administration over what Republicans consider to be “soft-on-crime” policies. The law enforcement bills will also include a number of provisions seeking to crack down on the rise of illegal immigration at the southern border, which has become a hot-button topic on Capitol Hill.
Governor JB Pritzker’s administration is shedding more light on plans to close a state prison in Chicago’s south suburbs as early as September, and possibly move another.
Capitol News Illinois reports top officials with the Illinois Department of Corrections on Friday laid out the agency’s plans to close and rebuild two state prisons that are in dire states of disrepair.
Pritzker announced the plan in March, but IDOC officials have been slow to release details. Now, the agency is acknowledging it’s aiming to close the Stateville Correctional Center at the end of summer.
Organized labor is pushing back on the plan. AFSCME Council 31 represents most state prison workers. The union’s Deputy Director Mike Newman cast doubt on the state’s assurances that prison employees would be guaranteed jobs at other facilities.
This is what happens when United States senators try to speak on topics they know absolutely nothing about.
Senator Ben Cardin of Maryland made an absolute fool of himself on X where he tweeted out his support for banning “high-ammo stocks”, whatever that is. Senator Cardin claims that we “owe it” to young people to strip them of their rights? Young people deserve senators that understand the Bill of Rights and at least make a basic attempt to understand the topics that they speak on. Instead we have Senator Ben Cardin.
It’s time to pass mandatory background checks, bans on assault weapons and high-ammo stocks.
We owe it to young people everywhere.
— Senator Ben Cardin (@SenatorCardin) May 12, 2024
Less than two weeks until its scheduled adjournment, state lawmakers and Gov. JB Pritzker appear to be at-odds in budget negotiations.
The Democratic governor is requesting legislative approval of a $52.7 billion budget for the upcoming fiscal year, accompanied with approximately $800 million in tax increases. Those increases, namely extending an expiring cap on losses that corporations can claim on taxes to gain $526 million and increasing the tax on sportsbooks’ revenues from 15% to 35% to collect another $200 million, are meeting resistance in Springfield.
Gov. JB Pritzker speaks at the Hoogland Center for the Fine Arts Thursday, May 2, 2024.
During a May 13 news conference, Pritzker said Democrats and Republicans — often clashing with the governor — were both raising concerns. Mathematically, however, he just needs Democratic backing since the party holds super-majorities in both the House and Senate.
The governor and Democrats have often been in lockstep throughout his first five years in office, yet tweaks to his budget proposals have occurred in prior budget negotiations. Pritzker said at an unrelated event in Chicago that he welcomes changes as long as they keep spending in-check.
“My one principle around this budget is its got to be balanced,” he said. “We’re not going to overspend, we’re not gonna start sweeping dollars from accounts that had been done before I became governor. And we’re not gonna go back to the old practices of, you know, making us a credit unworthy state.”
In preparation for legislative resistance, Deputy Gov. and former local state senator Andy Manar sent out a letter to department heads last week requesting their help in identifying $800 million in collective budget cuts. Their focus, he wrote, should be on items such as “grant programs and other discretionary spending that has increased in recent years.”
Others leading counter efforts to Pritzker’s spending plan include the Sports Betting Alliance, a nationwide advocacy group representing gaming interests such as DraftKings and FanDuel. The alliance claims the new rate will lead to an uptick in illegal offshore sports betting.
Last year, Illinois collected $150 million in tax revenues from sports wagering meaning the increased rate would bring in $350 million to the state’s coffers. Pritzker said the 35% is subject to the sportsbooks themselves and not on those placing bets, a point that he’s had to clarify with lawmakers.
Scheduled adjournment for the spring session is set for May 24, but lawmakers have built a contingent schedule tacking on a week in case negotiations are still ongoing. If negotiations are not wrapped up by the end of the month, a three-fifths vote in both chambers will be necessary. FY25 starts on July 1, 2024.
Jerry Nowicki of Capitol News Illinois contributed to this report.
Contact Patrick M. Keck: 312-549-9340, pkeck@gannett.com, twitter.com/@pkeckreporter.
JEFFERSON CITY — Democrats blocked business in the Missouri Senate overnight, preventing Republicans from sending voters a ballot question that, if approved, would limit future changes to the state constitution.
Republicans brought up the plan shortly before 2:40 p.m. on Monday. Democrats then began holding off action through a talking filibuster, which reached the 15-hour mark at about 5:40 a.m. Tuesday.
Stakes are high: legislators face a 6 p.m. Friday deadline to complete regular business for the year. With the potential ballot question pending before the Senate, the chamber cannot act on any unrelated bills.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott responded to a Sunday article in Daily Mail that detailed the large number of cops ditching California for the pastures of Texas, which might not be greener but are certainly more friendly to law enforcement. Morale is low among peace officers in the Golden State as soft-on-crime woke district attorneys like LA’s George Gascón and Alameda County’s Pamela Price, along with criminal-loving measures like Proposition 47, make them feel undermined and unwelcome.
Thousands of them are getting out of Dodge, the outlet reported:
…the Golden State is hemorrhaging thousands of police every year, with numbers down by more than 5,000 since 2019.
There are now fears that high-crime Californian cities are suffering a brain drain in law enforcement, leaving the public unprotected as criminals run riot.
Ray Bottenfield, a former Santa Monica College Police Captain who retired to Hewitt, Texas, admitted it had become increasingly difficult to retain or recruit officers due to the lack of support from the state.
A fresh poll from The New York Times brought more bad news for President Biden as he struggles to catch up to former President Trump in the key battleground states that will decide November’s election.
The poll found Trump leading in five out of six swing states, with Wisconsin the lone place where Biden is ahead. More concerning for Biden is that the poll found the president is losing support among young voters and Black and Hispanic voters, all of whom are critical to his coalition to win reelection.
While Republicans took a victory lap, Democrats cautioned it was one poll nearly six months out from Election Day. But Biden allies acknowledged the president has work to do if he is to win reelection in November.
“With the usual stipulations about polls six months out, Biden is behind,” said Jim Kessler, co-founder of the left-leaning think tank Third Way. “They need to be in a better place on the border, crime and inflation to win. They have a story to tell on each and further actions they can take, but they need to get cracking.”
Former President Donald Trump’s team blasted the Joe Biden campaign for releasing a Mother’s Day attack ad.
On Sunday, the Biden campaign released an ad attacking the former president by asking the American people to “do the moms in their lives a favor” and vote against Trump come November.
“Happy Mother’s Day. At the Biden campaign, we are asking Americans to do the moms in their lives a favor. Stop Trump,” said the press release.
“Families depend on moms – and moms deserve a President they can depend on to protect their rights, work to lower their costs, and fight for them. Donald Trump wasn’t and isn’t that President, but Joe Biden is,” it added.
BLINKEN: UKRAINE IN A TOUGH SPOT: After traveling covertly overnight by train from Poland, Secretary of State Antony Blinkenarrived in Kyiv this morning for meetings with Ukraine’s president and other senior officials to deliver a message of reassurance as Ukraine is facing serious challenges from an aggressive new Russian offensive that is threatening to overwhelm Ukraine’s defenses in the north.
“While in Ukraine, Secretary Blinken will meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky, Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal, and Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba to discuss battlefield updates, the impact of new U.S. security and economic assistance, long-term security and other commitments,” the State Department said in a statement announcing Blinken’s arrival. “He will emphasize America’s commitment to Ukraine’s sovereignty, territorial integrity, and democracy in the face of Russia’s ongoing aggression.”
In brief remarks before their first meeting, both Blinken and Zelensky admitted Ukraine is now in a tough spot, the result primarily of the six-month delay by the U.S. Congress in approving a $61 billion aid package, a delay that left Ukraine’s artillery and air defense systems greatly depleted.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has traveled to Ukraine to emphasize America’s “enduring support” for the embattled Eastern European nation that has been fighting a war against Russia for more than two years, according to a press statement from a State Department spokesperson.
“Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken arrived in Ukraine today to meet with senior Ukrainian officials and highlight the United States’ enduring support for Ukraine. While in Ukraine, Secretary Blinken will meet with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal, and Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba to discuss battlefield updates, the impact of new U.S. security and economic assistance, long-term security and other commitments, and ongoing work to bolster Ukraine’s economic recovery. He will emphasize America’s commitment to Ukraine’s sovereignty, territorial integrity, and democracy in the face of Russia’s ongoing aggression,” the statement notes.
On Monday’s broadcast of CNN’s “OutFront,” House Armed Services Committee Ranking Member Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA) stated that while Israel can launch a major offensive in Rafah without new American weapons, whether Israel can “adequately deter all of the different entities who want to attack it, Iran, Hezbollah, the Houthis, various other militia groups without that support” is “a much tougher question.”
Smith said, “Prime Minister Netanyahu has put Israel, the U.S., and the entire Middle East in a very difficult place. We do not want to withdraw support from Israel, at least I don’t and the president doesn’t. We saw that when Iran attacked Israel a few weeks ago, if we are not able to help Israel defend itself, this war could spread as Iran and Hezbollah decide to jump into that void. But, at the same time, Prime Minister Netanyahu is pursuing a strategy that is not in the best interests of Israel and not in the best interests of peace. He has no plan for a post-Hamas Gaza. So, the president has been trying every lever we have to change that. But we don’t really have the power to just force them to do something differently, and as I said, completely abandoning them comes with a high amount of risk for peace in the region as well. That’s what President Biden’s trying to navigate.”
I don’t know what to say other than don’t start wars that you can’t win. Of course, rational actors know this, but Hamas isn’t of that mindset. They’re a genocidal terrorist group that spent 17 years building underground tunnel networks to protect their members but intentionally neglected to build bomb shelters for its people in case hostilities broke out. With Hamas, war was their policy from the outset, aimed at destroying Israel.
There are reports that Gaza’s healthcare system could collapse within hours. It’s not surprising, given that Israel now controls most of the region in their months long military operation to destroy Hamas, which will be successful. These people have nowhere to go. The Left will blame Israel, but it’s Hamas’ fault. This entire war and all the suffering it has created is Hamas’ fault. The October 7 attacks were Hamas’ fault. Not agreeing to numerous ceasefire proposals submitted over the past months is Hamas’ fault. They reject peace with Jews. It’s explicitly clear to anyone paying attention. They’re the only party who could end this war right now but won’t. If you don’t want the health care system to collapse, there is one thing Hamas could do: surrender.
The US does not believe Israel can decisively triumph over Hamas in Gaza, Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell has said. The comments come as fighting between the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the Palestinian militant group entered its eighth month last week, with West Jerusalem refusing to walk away from its pledge to destroy Hamas.
“I think in some respects, we are struggling over what the theory of victory is. Sometimes when we listen closely to Israeli leaders, they talked mostly about the idea of some sort of sweeping victory on the battlefield, a total victory,” Campbell said at the NATO Youth Summit in Miami, Florida on Monday. “I don’t think we believe that that is likely or possible,” he said.
He acknowledged the “undeniable tensions” between Washington and West Jerusalem over Israel’s ongoing assault on Rafah, the southernmost city in Gaza which is overcrowded with refugees who fled the northern part of the Palestinian enclave in accordance with the Israeli Army’s evacuation instructions.
