Now, you see? This is why Martha's Vineyard residents were so eager to toss their unexpected unwashed off the island and into an onshore military base (UPDATED)

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“come back when you’ve learned ironing!”

Remember when Ron DeSantis brought the results of Biden’s throwing open the border to national attention by busing 48 unwashed Venezuelans to Martha’s Vineyard? I’m sure the residents there would like to forget it, because, after pouring out of their mansions to “welcome” the new arrivals and pose for the cameras, they called in buses and shipped the poor people to Otis Air Force faster than you can say “hold my martini”. A certain embarrassment followed for about ten minutes and then faded back into oblivion, but DeSantis and, within days, Abbot of Texas, had changed the national dialogue from one of Episcopalian feel-gooders moaning about no one being illegal, and inviting all 6 billion of the world’s poor to our our shores, to one where ordinary people were suddenly noticing that Biden had loosed 23 million people: that’s the population of 3 NYCs; 6 Connecticuts; or 23 S. Dakotas, to roam our country demanding free food, shelter, medical care and education for their fecund families. It was the beginning of the end for Biden and his fellow anti-American co-conspiracists.

But, while American wised up, those notoriously-slow learners, the French, are still in the discovery mode:

That French theater that invited migrants to a show and then they refused to leave? The owners are now abandoning the building.

The Gaîté Lyrique theatre in Paris opened their doors for a free event called "Reinventing the welcome for refugees in France" on December 10. The conference featured leftist academics, who quickly invited a bunch of African refugees to the event, because who else would come to such a thing?

However, when the conference was over, the refugees remained - and they're still there, occupying the theater.

Halfway through January, when that article was published, the migrants had been there for over a month. Now, they've been there for 11 weeks and counting.

And, because this is why we can’t nice things, here’s the latest development:

Left-wing managers of a Paris theatre occupied by hundreds of homeless African migrants are set to abandon the building because of sex-related violence.

They say the crisis at the Gaîté Lyrique - one of the French capital's most historic arts venues - is now ‘so explosive' that retreat by this Friday is their only option.

…

There are now 446 people living inside illegally, most of them claiming they are minors under the age of 18 who deserve permanent housing.

But local officials have insisted that they are adults and that most are known to the authorities and had been sleeping on the streets before entering the theatre.

HAHAHAHHA!

But there may be an easier, softer way of assuaging the heartbreak of liberalism, one that involves neither discomfort nor inconvenience. FWIW’s Indigenous Peoples Land Reclamation correspondent Susie sends along this photo of a Vancouver Island resident’s simple solution:

UPDATE: I inadvertently used an outdated version of the Associated Press Stylebook to describe the French. The AP’s correction is shown below:

I’m guessing that younger Jews are right there with their peers — after all, they watch the same news, and have been indoctrinated in the same schools

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Gallup Shock Poll: 60% of Dems Are Anti-Israel; Over 80% Have Positive View of Mexico and Ukraine

Scott Pinsker, PJ Media:

Oy veh. Not a big fan of the Jewish state: Only 33% of Democrats support it. An eye-opening 60% view Israel unfavorably. (4% had no opinion.)

Yet 45% of Democrats supported the so-called “Palestinian Territories”!

Democrats are also big fans of Mexico and Ukraine: Our Southern neighbor is beloved by 83% of Democrats; 84% favor Ukraine. (Republican support for Mexico was 47%; for Ukraine, 54%.)

These were the results of a new Gallup survey that the New York Post dubbed as “shocking.”

  • Israel received exponentially more support from conservatives: 83% of Republicans backed the Jewish state — a 50-point difference between the two parties!

In Gallup’s own words:

The 50 points separating Republican and Democratic positivity toward Israel shatters the prior record of 30 points measured last year, primarily because of a 14-point drop in Democrats' rating. The current gap is also nearly three times larger than the average 18-point difference that existed between 2001 and 2023. Over this time, Republicans have consistently viewed Israel more favorably than Democrats have.

This year marks the first time any party group has had majority-level unfavorable ratings of Israel, with 60% of Democrats expressing that view. Forty-four percent of independents also have an unfavorable opinion of Israel.

It’s a generational problem in the Democratic Party. Younger voters — those between the ages of 18 and 34 — were the most critical of Israel. As older Democrats die off, the Democratic Party will increasingly define itself as an active enemy of the Jewish Homeland.

This ain’t Joe Biden’s party no mo’. The future belongs to AOC, Rashida Tlaib, and Ilhan Omar.

….

It used to be that supporting the Jewish Homeland was a bipartisan American position.

…. Not anymore.

Joe Biden was probably the last Democrat president we’ll ever have who even gave lip service to supporting Israel. Because that’s not what liberal donors want anymore. 

Nor does it motivate liberal grassroots activists.

In 2020, 67% of Democrats supported Israel. By 2022, it was 63%. In 2024, it was 47%. Today, it’s down to 33%.

In just five years, Democratic support for Israel has been cut in half!

The Democratic Party is now the anti-Jew party. For all its “tsk-tsk” condemnations about hand gestures and/or accusing everyone they don’t like of being a Nazis, they’re now the go-to party for antisemites: If you wanna protest Israel, attack Jews, and make sinister-sounding allegations about “Jewish money and influence,” you’re not welcome in the Republican Party.

But you’ll find plenty of support in today’s Democratic Party.

And that’s bad for the Jews.

Why the rush to complete the job? The state’s almost over the edge already.

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hey y’all, watch this1

California Considering Taking Over Oil Refineries Because It Works So Well in Iran and Venezuela

David Strom, HotAir

“It's not only in the fever dreams of Right-wingers seeing communists behind every bush (hint: it's only every third bush). Apparently, according to the LA Times California's communist-inspired politicians are seriously considering taking over the refining of oil in their state.”

“Russia. China. Venezuela. Iran. More than a dozen countries make gasoline at state-owned refineries. Could California be next on the list?” asked the Los Angeles Times in an article this week. “California policymakers are considering state ownership of one or more oil refineries, one item on a list of options presented by the California Energy Commission to ensure steady gas supplies as oil companies pull back from the refinery business in the state.”

Strom: “I love that lede in the Los Angeles Times so much that I will quote it again:

Russia. China. Venezuela. Iran. More than a dozen countries make gasoline at state-owned refineries.

Could California be next on the list?

California policymakers are considering state ownership of one or more oil refineries, one item on a list of options presented by the California Energy Commission to ensure steady gas supplies as oil companies pull back from the refinery business in the state.

“The state recognizes that they’re on a pathway to more refinery closures,” said Skip York, chief energy strategist at energy consultant Turner Mason & Co. The risk to consumers and the state’s economy, he said, is gasoline supply disappearing faster than consumer demand, resulting in fuel shortages, higher prices and severe logistical challenges.

Gasoline demand is falling in California, albeit slowly, for two reasons: more efficient gasoline engines, and the increasing number of electric vehicles on the road. Gasoline consumption in California peaked in 2005 and fell 15% through 2023, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Electric vehicles, including plug-in hybrids, now represent about 25% of annual new car sales. By state mandate, new sales of gasoline cars and light trucks will be banned starting in model year 2035.

Strom:

Is it any shock that oil refineries are shifting their production or closing down in California? Of course it isn't. California energy policies are designed to destroy the oil industry, up to and including pursuing a policy to bankrupt them through lawsuits. If the market weren't so huge--12% of the US population--I would recommend that the companies all bail out of the market as the insurance companies are doing. 

It is just too risky a place to do business. Proto-communists run the state.

…. California has EV mandates designed to eliminate internal combustion engines, but there is no way that they can do that in any conceivable timeline. Even when the date hits for banning the new sales of ICE cars, the ones on the roads will still be there and people will find ways to get them. The policy will fail, but the policy risk for companies in the market is enormous. Any company that can should and will insulate itself from the policy risks as quickly as possible. 

As predicted (and as anyone else could have, too)

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8 Oval Avenue in Riverside is reported under contract – 8 days.

I wrote about this when it came on last week:

Irony aside, this one probably won't last, and will in fact sell for more than its listing price

22 Oval Avenue, Riverside, $2.850 million. Built in 1928, it sold for $2.110 million in 2013 and has been upgraded since.

And there’s no available inventory in Riverside.

Not the Bee — literally

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Not the Bee, quoting excerpts from the WSJ article

By some measures, the stakes could not be lower. A red envelope that went missing — or was stolen — from the [Amagansett elementary] school's mailroom [in December of 2023] was said to contain a $25 Amazon gift card, a Christmas-season expression of gratitude from a parent to one of the school's occupational therapists.

Yet the missing card has prompted a police report, accusations of foul play and bullying and a disciplinary trial that has generated some 1,400 pages in testimony from more than a dozen witnesses. Passages read like an Agatha Christie mystery, except there is no antique revolver or pearl-handled dagger.

Not the Bee: “That response alone would be absurd enough, rolling out the court system for a gift card in the amount of a couple of new iPhone chargers off Amazon.

“But the sheer price tag of the endeavor is even more jaw-dropping:”

Meanwhile, based on his published rates, the fees for the arbitrator overseeing the hearing have already exceeded $24,800 — or nearly a thousand-times the value of the missing card — and are sure to rise further.

I get the issue: you don’t want a crook serving as school principal, although, is she is one, she’d be perfectly fit to be a politician, but where are these arbitration costs coming from? I don’t remember what I was paid as an NYSE arbitrator — it might have been just a box lunch, there might have been a small stipend — but this arbitrator must have a relative on the school board.

From debtor, to deadbeat, to the deficit reduction program

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gentlemen, start your bidding

With Patriot Bank breathing down his neck in 2006, James Ferraro unloaded 505 North Street, a/k/a 8 Lindsay Drive to a (dot head, not chicken feather) Indian crook. Iftikar Ahmed for $9,625,000. The unfortunate Iftikar soon found himself in the same awkward, albeit deeper troubled financial waters as Ferraro and departed for his country of origin. Now the g’ummint owns the place, and the U.S. Marshalls Service is offering it for sale at $7,150,00. Here’s the most recent former owner’s story as reported in Greenwich Time in 2018:

Fugitive Greenwich financier to pay $64M for embezzlement

A federal judge ordered a Greenwich fugitive to repay $42 million to Oak Investment Partners he was found to have embezzled, approving as well a $21 million penalty and $1.5 million in interest on the moneys owed.

Iftikar Ahmed has been on the lam since May 2015 in his native India, with the Securities & Exchange Commission having obtained a prior judicial order for a freeze on assets valued at the time at $118 million. The U.S. Attorney’s office for the District of Connecticut had also investigated Ahmed, with his arrest in April 2015 on suspicion of insider trading prompting Oak to examine investment deals Ahmed structured on behalf of the firm.

Oak Investment Partners has offices in Greenwich, Norwalk and Palo Alto, Calif., with the firm investing in technology and energy companies. Oak partners include Ed Glassmeyer, who founded the firm in 1978 with Stewart Greenfield; and Ann Lamont, the spouse of Connecticut gubernatorial candidate Ned Lamont, with the couple living in Greenwich.

Ahmed had been charged with presenting Oak’s partners with investment opportunities in overseas businesses then misrepresenting deal terms, whether with regard to the actual value of the companies or exchange rates and pocketing the difference, and altering documents to hide the subterfuge. Ahmed set up bank accounts in the names of the companies he recommended for investments, according to court documents, then shunted moneys into accounts controlled by him and his spouse Shalini.

Well, Harvard

Ahmed is a graduate of the India Institute of Technology who went on to get an MBA from Harvard Business School and worked for Goldman Sachs Group before joining Oak in 2004.

But wait, there’s still more!

Update from 3 days ago:

Fugitive on the run for 17 years arrested from Croatia

SIALKOT, Feb 18 2025 (APP):A fugitive wanted in dozens of cases including extortion and robbery was arrested from Croatia through Interpol.

According to a police spokesperson, Sialkot police had been looking for Iftikhar Ahmed, wanted in connection with dozens of criminal cases including extortion and robbery. He has been apprehended from Croatia through a coordinated effort involving Interpol. The arrest marks a significant breakthrough in a lengthy investigation, as the individual had been evading authorities for 17 years. A bounty of Rs500,000 (head money) had been announced for his arrest. [Bummer: that’s only around $5,700 in real money — Ed’