Well of course they’re looting — it's California

/


Your child won’t be reading about this in his state indoctrination class

/

Glenn Reynolds, Instapundit

WEIRD TO SEE THIS IN A MAINSTREAM OUTLET: Challenging Modern Climate Narratives: Forgotten 1937 Aerial Photos Expose Antarctic Anomaly. “A study using a whaler’s forgotten aerial photos from 1937 shows East Antarctica’s ice has been stable and even grown, despite some early signs of weakening. . . . Using hundreds of old aerial photographs dating back to 1937, combined with modern computer technology, researchers have tracked the evolution of glaciers in East Antarctica. This area, which spans approximately 2,000 kilometers of coastline, contains as much ice as the entire Greenland Ice Sheet. By comparing the historical aerial photos with modern satellite data, researchers determined the glaciers’ movement and changes in size, revealing that the ice has not only remained stable but also grown slightly over the last 85 years, partly due to increased snowfall. . . . Compared to modern data, the ice flow speeds are unchanged. While some glaciers have thinned over shorter intermediate periods of 10-20 years, they have remained stable or grown slightly in the long term, indicating a system in balance.”

And this is kind neat:

Hidden From the Nazis

Most of the images used in the study were captured during a 1937 expedition organized and paid for by Norwegian whaler Lars Christensen. The mission aimed to produce the first maps of this part of East Antarctica, but the maps were never published due to the German invasion of Norway. Since then, the images have been stored at the Norwegian Polar Institute in Tromsø and forgotten.

When the researchers from the University of Copenhagen read about the expedition, they realized that valuable images were likely hidden in an archive in Norway. They traveled to Tromsø and reviewed all 2200 images taken during the expedition. They supplemented the Norwegian aerial images with images of the same glaciers from Australian surveys conducted between 1950 and 1974.

“By comparing the historical aerial photos with modern satellite data, we have gained critical knowledge about glaciers that we would not otherwise have had. I think it’s fantastic that these old images can be used to generated new research results almost 100 years after they were taken,” says Assistant Professor Anders Bjørk from the University of Copenhagen, who leads the group working with the historical images.

If we can only prop him up until January, we'll be spared Kampallawalla Ding Dong (Updated and bumped)

/

He clearly won’t remember being there, but Ol’ Dependables has gone to Italy — with his entire expanded family, thanks to us taxpayers — for the G7 summit. His handlers have already announced that he’ll be going to bed early and so will have to skip the G& Leaders dinner, but that’s probably a good thing; what little respect and credibility the US still has, if any, wouldn’t survive the sight of Joe planting his face into his soup bowl.

UPDATE: Oh, dear; even after the airport debacle, they let him continue to expose himself to the public eye. He’s safely in bed now, but they should have tucked him in as soon as he set his cushioned sneakers on the tarmac.

Well, at least she had the decency to cackle madly after delivering the line

/

love from mother teresa

This public servant estimates her worth as between $6.75 - $15 million.

Harris owns multiple real estate properties in California, including a home in Brentwood, Los Angeles; a condominium in Oakland, California; and a townhouse in Washington, D.C. According to Zillow, the three homes are estimated to have an $8 million combined value.

Including investments, cash, and real estate, Harris is estimated to have between $11.75 million and $16.29 million in assets.

Eyes wide shut

/

A poll taken last week of Jewish voters showed that they still vastly prefer Biden to Trump, 61% to 23% (with another 10% saying they’ll vote “for someone else”.

And my guess is that, regardless of who they choose for President, an even larger percentage will vote to return their Democrat senators and congressmen to office, because it can’t happen here.

But …

Masked anti-Israel protesters take over NYC subway car, tell ‘Zionists’ to raise their hands: ‘This is your chance to get out.’

Masked anti-Israel protesters took over a New York City subway car on Monday and demanded to know if there were any “Zionists” on the train — then warned them: ‘This is your chance to get out.”

The sickening moment came after protesters rallied in Union Square Park in Manhattan and held up a banner that read “Long live October 7.”

One antisemitic demonstrator at the event yelled that he wished “Hitler was still here” to “wipe out” the Jews.

And it’s a good thing we don’t have any Somalians in this country:

No Somalians nor, thanks to Biden’s secured border, any other muslim terrorists.

NBC News: 8 suspected terrorists with possible ISIS ties arrested in New York, L.A. and Philadelphia, sources say

Eight men from Tajikistan with potential ties to ISIS out of central Asia were arrested over the weekend in New York, Philadelphia and Los Angeles, three people familiar with the matter told NBC News on Tuesday.

The suspects had been on the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force radar and were arrested by personnel with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, better known as ICE, the sources say.

All eight men crossed through the southern border into the United States and their criminal backgrounds checks came back clean at the time they crossed the border, according to two officials familiar with the matter.

At least two of the men crossed the border in the spring of 2023 and one of those men used the CBP One app, created by the Biden administration to allow migrants to book appointments to claim asylum, those officials say. 

The FBI’s Joint Terrorism Taskforce has been aware of a potential terror threat originating in central Europe and began monitoring these men as part of that investigation, three sources say. 

A senior U.S. official says the FBI was monitoring the group for several months and kept close tabs on their activities. 

While they have not been charged with a terror connection or plot yet, the FBI alerted ICE they should be arrested because of potential ties to ISIS and they were arrested on immigration charges, two sources say. They are currently detained and are facing removal proceedings before an immigration judge, and they could later face terrorism related charges, two sources say. 

“Over the last few days, ICE agents arrested several non-citizens pursuant to immigration authorities," the Department of Homeland Security and FBI said in a joint statement on Tuesday. "The actions were carried out in close coordination with the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Forces. The individuals arrested are detained in ICE custody pending removal proceedings.”

Two people familiar with the matter say the same intelligence that led to the surveillance and arrests of these eight men led to the arrest in April of an Uzbek man in Baltimore with an alleged ISIS connection. 

This article was originally published on NBCNews.com

Well, of course he was — it's California, Jake

/

don’t shoot!

77-year-old Oakland homeowner arrested for murder after shooting crowbar-wielding burglar

According to the report, three criminals drove a stolen car up to his home armed with a crowbar and a replica firearm [with the intention, no doubt, of inquiring whether he’d like to buy some Girl Scout cookies — Ed]. The elderly man shot one of the criminals and held his gun on the remaining two until police arrived.

The cops then arrested the homeowner and are holding him on suspicion of murder.

Silly old man, he should just hire guards, as 78-year-old (!) Goldie Hawn in now doing.

Goldie Hawn says 'LA is terrible' after becoming victim to multiple home break-ins in 4-month span

Hollywood's bright lights are fading fast for Goldie Hawn, and she's ready to get the heck out of Dodge.

The actress, 78, admitted her home in Los Angeles was "robbed once" recently while she was out to dinner for a few hours with Kurt Russell, her partner of over 40 years.

"What if we couldn't live in LA, where would we live? We both decided, I think it's Palm Desert. … It's so safe," Hawn reminisced about her dream location to plant new roots while appearing on the SiriusXM podcast "Let's Talk Off Camera with Kelly Ripa." 

"It's just 'cause L.A. is terrible. I mean, we were robbed once."

The Academy Award-winning actress explained that she and Russell were "gone two hours and 20 minutes" before returning home to a seemingly normal situation. 

"We came back and went in the house. I went up to the stairs and I walked into my closet. I just lost it," Hawn said. "They had broken in from the balcony to our bedroom, our closets."

Hawn added, "And they completely knocked down my door, which is a safe door, so they're very, very sophisticated, and they got a lot of my goodies, if you know what I mean."

Despite the traumatic event, the "First Wives Club" star attempted to put the incident in the past and was convinced the robbery was just a one-off.

"So, I'm thinking, 'Oh, my God, so the chances are, I guess that's it,'" she said. "It's gotta be. The odds are that's not gonna happen again."

Four months later, Hawn was alone at home with just her dog when she heard a startling noise in another room. 

"I hear this big thump upstairs — and I was alone; Kurt wasn't there — and I went, 'What the hell was that?'" she said. 

"It was just like, was that a sonic boom? Did somebody jump somewhere? And as it turned out, the next day, we discovered that they were trying to get in my bedroom while I was in the house."

"That's terrifying," Ripa said before Hawn responded, "I couldn't believe it. What is happening here?"

Ripa asked if she had any further protection in place following the break-ins. 

"I've had a guard, especially when I'm alone now," Hawn said. "I'm never without a guard. We have a nice relationship with our guard."

What self-proclaimed compassionate liberals refuse to acknowledge is that when they free criminals to go about their business, it’s the poor who are left defenseless; Goldie can hire guards or move to Palm Springs to escape, but the peasants have no such options.

So, not much different than much of the rest of the country

/

Chicago Doubles Education Spending, Tragedy Ensues.

Stephen Green, PJMedia

Illinois Policy just issued a report showing that while CPS has doubled spending per student since 2012, grades are down by 60-80%, depending on the subject. "Just 1-in-4 CPS students can read or perform math at grade level," the report says. "The percent of students enrolling in college after high school graduation is decreasing. And for those who do enroll, another study found many are struggling to finish college in four years – just 30% get their bachelor’s in four years compared to 47% nationally."

≥≥≥

  • In 2023, 26% of students in grades 3 through 8 across all of CPS could read at grade level and about 18% could do math proficiently. For 11th grade CPS students, only 22% could read at grade level and 19% do math proficiently.

  • CPS’ failure to engage students shows in the chronic absenteeism rate. Chronic absenteeism has skyrocketed. 

  • According to ISBE data, 86.3% of teachers in CPS were rated as proficient or excellent in 2023, down from 91.4% in 2019. Yet many students in CPS are struggling to reach proficiency in core subjects.

There's much more at the link, all of it tragic. An entire generation of Chicago students is failing — and being failed by their schools and, let's be brutally honest, by their families. 

If you're thinking that CPS must be seriously underfunded to achieve such dismal results, you must have been living in a cave for the last 40 or 50 years. CPS will spend a jaw-dropping $29,028 per student this year. My family lives in a lovely exurb of Colorado Springs and our district spends roughly one-third of what CPS does — $10,214 per student — and we get much better results. It isn't about the money. It rarely is.

≥≥≥≥

Let me tell you the dirty little secret about K-12 education spending. The teachers' union and/or your local government constantly play the same game. First, they like to boast that the district spends X number of dollars per student. With the very next breath, they'll complain that X number of dollars isn't enough. For next year, they'll need X+Y, where Y is equal to whatever they think they can squeeze out of you, the taxpayer.

Lather, rinse, repeat because the year after next, they'll demand X+Y+Y.

"It's for the children," they'll remind you.

But it isn't. Absolutely nothing like $29,028 goes to educating each student. While there's been an explosion in pricey education administration, the number of dollars that actually reach the classroom — books, supplies, furniture, teachers' salaries, etc — is more or less stagnant. Public education is no longer about educating students. It's about shoving ever-increasing amounts of taxpayer money into administrators' gaping maws. 

Green writes, “An entire generation of Chicago students is failing — and being failed by their schools and, let's be brutally honest, by their families” — I’d say, especially families; if parents don’t value education, don’t keep their kids off the street at midnight, and let them skip half the school year, then the failure of those children is preordained. The Jews in New York’s lower east side in the early 1900s and the Asians of today saw education as their children’s path out of poverty, and it worked, and still works, for the most part. Of course, if the schools those children are sent to are hellholes of rioting students and “participation trophy” standards (New York State Democrats have just eliminated Regents exams and will no longer issue diplomas marking achievement, just, essentially, certificates of attendance), then insisting that one’s children attend them is useless. Enter, charter schools.