The Washington Post is melting down and the reason might surprise you. Actually, no it won’t. Just kidding. The Washington Post is melting down because it leaned hard into the Year Zero cultural revolution that’s completely transformed almost every elite institution in the past several years and the newspaper is now bleeding money.  People are no longer buying what they’re selling. What’s happening at the Post is a microcosm of a much larger and more significant phenomenon. More on that later.  First, let’s review what’s happened at the Post this week. Publisher and CEO William Lewis announced Sunday that the newspaper would remove Executive Editor Sally Buzbee, hired in 2021 from The Associated Press.  Buzbee is being replaced by former Wall Street Journal Editor-in-Chief Matt Murray, who will remain in an interim capacity through the 2024 election cycle, according to Fox News. Buzbee decided during her tenure that The Washington Post wasn’t nearly left wing enough and chose to limit the publication’s appeal to the same demographic as NPR’s. The result was that the newspaper found a way to lose $77 million last year amid collapsing readership numbers. NPR gets taxpayer dollars (rather shamefully, in my mind); the Post doesn’t. So, the higher-ups looked at the Post’s dwindling readership and catastrophic financial losses and decided enough was enough. “We are going to turn this thing around, but let’s not sugarcoat it. It needs turning around,” the Post quoted Lewis as saying. “We are losing large amounts of money. Your audience has halved in recent years. People are not reading your stuff. Right. I can’t sugarcoat it anymore.” The people who run The Washington Post seem to understand that there is a crisis—losing lots and lots of money being the prime indicator. The question is, do they understand what the real source of that problem is? The response to Buzbee’s removal dropped hints about the deeper, underlying issue with the Post and other institutions that decided to replicate the culture and power structure of American higher education. The Post’s issues aren’t just the result of changing social media algorithms or mundane difficulties finding revenue streams. Instead, they come from the fact that the newspaper chose to prioritize DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) over everything else and to empower a militant clique of employees who seem to think that promoting their agenda is a privilege that doesn’t have to adjust to reality. According to Vanity Fair, after the announcement of the Buzbee ouster one reporter complained that “we now have four white men running three newsrooms.” The Post will reportedly be subdivided into three newsrooms. One for news, one for opinion, and one for “service and social media journalism,” which I imagine will be the loony bin. Vanity Fair reported that the Post had a meeting Monday about the shakeup and it went about how you would expect, with employees obsessing over diversity initiatives rather than the journalistic merit of the new editors. The New York Times had more, worth quoting at length: During the meeting on Monday, the executives were grilled by reporters at the Post on the lack of diversity in the hires replacing Ms. Buzbee — Mr. Murray, Mr. [Robert] Winnett and Mr. [David] Shipley are white men. According to a recording obtained by The New York Times, one of The Washington Post’s star political reporters, Ashley Parker, asked how the newspaper had arrived at its decision, adding that one skeptical interpretation might be that Mr. Lewis was simply hiring his associates to help run the Post. … “When you were here before, you talked very movingly about how you care about diversity—and people talk about diversity—but then when push comes to shove, they say, ‘Well, I looked around and I couldn’t find anyone,’” Ms. Parker said. In response, Mr. Murray said that diversity would be a “constant commitment” at the Post, adding that he had “the most diverse masthead that the Journal had ever had” during his years as the top editor at The Wall Street Journal. It’s clear that the DEI today, tomorrow, and forever folks aren’t going to let go, nor will they accept a direction that doesn’t entirely align with their narrow political ideology. New statement from The Washington Post Guild, expressing concern over Ms. Buzbee's abrupt exit: pic.twitter.com/R9LpokVeIy— Ben Mullin (@BenMullin) June 3, 2024 The people who foisted left-wing dogma into every corner of The Washington Post’s newsroom aren’t used to not getting their way. The question is: Will the new management be able to make a genuine pivot? It’s doubtful. It appears that those in charge of The Washington Post—whether Buzbee or the new bosses—are unwilling to fundamentally challenge the central tenets of DEI. At no point are they willing or able to say, “My commitment is to running the best, most effective newsroom regardless of the race, gender, or background of our reporters and editors.” Instead, we get a quasi-religious kowtowing to the “constant commitment” to diversity. Maybe that will change in the coming days, but the early returns aren’t great. As independent writer Wesley Yang noted in a post on X, several other massive media companies have been given this choice in the past: Go woke or go broke. They chose to go broke. It is a major inflection point a decade into the Great Awokening in media. Vice and Buzzfeed went bankrupt rather than attempt what WaPo's new editor is attempting because the cost of pushing back internally was always perceived as greater to them as individuals than going along… pic.twitter.com/VZeceLEsy3— Wesley Yang (@wesyang) June 4, 2024 This may seem surprising, but from an individual perspective, this has often been the “right” decision. It’s far easier to jump ship from one failing newspaper or corporation and hop on to another as long as one maintains commitment to the overarching left-wing faith. That’s how the game has been played. Rebuking or even wavering in commitment to DEI has been a one-way ticket to never working in an elite, “mainstream” institution ever again. It’s better to fail or demonstrate outright incompetence than to question orthodoxy and risk excommunication. Welcome to life in the USSR. This is in many ways the heart of the problem, not just for The Washington Post but for our country and even Western civilization more broadly. In the interlocking world of elite institutions, where even the gap between what is governmental and what is private has become blurry, ideological gatekeepers determine who is promoted and who is denied employment, who is worthy of praise or destruction. The Washington Post has acted as one of the more prominent gatekeepers. But it isn’t 2020 anymore. Although most elite institutions remain as compromised as ever, the “racial reckoning” and DEI revolution have created a serious and determined “populist” backlash. Huge numbers of Americans, even ones who have generally found themselves on the Left, are tired of the nonsense. They are tired of being fed a constant diet of left-wing agitprop and refuse to live by lies. The prophets of DEI made huge profits, but now a critical mass of Americans are on to the scam. This doesn’t mean the revolutionary fever has entirely broken, or that everything will now return to normal. Far from it. We will continue dealing with the profound and terrible consequences of what this ideology has done to our society for a long time to come. What it does mean is that the power of DEI gatekeepers has waned. The revolution has literally been eating itself, as similar movements have in the past. And now there is a serious counterrevolution—both legal and political—to reduce their poisonous influence on our society. Christopher Rufo, the conservative activist and commentator who has perhaps done more to produce this turnaround than anyone else, described this moment succinctly. BLM in shambles. Washington Post losing a fortune. Ibram Kendi down bad. It's not 2020 anymore—and not a moment too soon.— Christopher F. Rufo ?? (@realchrisrufo) June 4, 2024 The post Leftist Media Gatekeepers’ Power Wanes as Washington Post Melts Down appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The Georgia Court of Appeals officially put the racketeering case against former President Donald Trump’s case on hold. The appeals court ordered Judge Scott McAfee to pause all proceedings pending its coming ruling on the defendants’ bid to disqualify Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis from the case. McAfee previously allowed Willis to stay on the case despite finding “a significant appearance of impropriety” in her romantic relationship with special prosecutor Nathan Wade, who defendants allege she financially benefited from appointing. The appeals court agreed to take up the matter in May. It will hear oral arguments on Oct. 4. NEW: Georgia Court of Appeals pauses Trump's case pending its decision on the Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis disqualification appeal. pic.twitter.com/0Qgs3XUdS2— Katelynn Richardson (@katesrichardson) June 5, 2024 As a condition of allowing Willis to remain on the case, McAfee required Wade to step down. His ruling found “reasonable questions” about whether the pair testified truthfully about the timing of their relationship, which they claimed began after Wade was appointed. Defendants argued in their appeal that disqualifying Wade was “is insufficient to cure the appearance of impropriety the Court has determined exists.” Wade paid for expenses on multiple vacations he and Willis took together, bank statements revealed. Both claimed during a hearing on the defense’s motion that Willis reimbursed him using cash stored in her house. Wade pointed to cash reimbursements as a reason he had only one receipt for a flight demonstrating she paid for any aspect of their travel together, which they said was “roughly divided equally.” Willis paid Wade more than the state’s top racketeering expert John Floyd, awarding Wade a $250 per hour contract while Floyd was earning $200 an hour, the Daily Caller News Foundation previously reported. The original motion to disqualify Willis was filed by co-defendant Michael Roman in January. Originally published by the Daily Caller News Foundation. The post Appeals Court Pauses Trump’s Georgia Case Until Decision On Fani Willis appeared first on The Daily Signal.

When the elected Democrat district attorney of Manhattan and his 12 (likely Democrat) Manhattan jurors convicted Donald Trump on artificially inflated felony counts of business accounting, you could count on leftist journalists to try to make it the Most Historic Event Ever. We’re not even sure it won’t all be reversed on appeal. But “historic” is their word of choice … when they like the result. In 1999, when Bill Clinton was impeached for lying under oath about sex with an intern named Monica Lewinsky, Geraldo Rivera was furious on the “Today” show: “It was a spiteful action, an action that they performed absolutely in violation of the framers’ intent. It was a legislative coup d’etat.” Impeaching Trump twice was never a “coup” to NBC News. But the worst part of that spectacle was leftist activists like Rivera trying to speak for the framers of the Constitution. He was implying it wasn’t just a revolting result but revolting in the eyes of James Madison and the rest. The Left reveres nothing about the Founders, routinely denouncing them as a racist, sexist, capitalist patriarchy. This regrettable citation of the Founding Fathers happened again with the Trump trial, and again in this case, the American revolutionaries were placed on the side of the Democrats. George Stephanopoulos began his commentary on “This Week” with the second president: “In 1774, John Adams said representative government and trial by jury are the heart and lungs of liberty. Two hundred and fifty years later, the heart and lungs of liberty are facing what may be the ultimate stress test.” It’s John Adams vs. Trump. The front page of the June 3 New York Times was topped with an editorial—labeled “News Analysis”—from its White House correspondent Peter Baker. He picked Patrick Henry as the Trump opponent. “The revolutionary hero Patrick Henry knew this day would come,” Baker began. Henry “feared that eventually a criminal might occupy the presidency and use his powers to thwart anyone who sought to hold him accountable.” In Henry’s words, “Away with your president, we will have a king.” Never mind that historians pointed out Henry was inveighing against the Constitution before it was ratified. Baker channeled the Democrat line: “The notion that 34 felonies is not automatically disqualifying and a convicted criminal can be a viable candidate for commander in chief upends two and a half centuries of assumptions about American democracy.” Inside the paper, the headline over Baker’s essay was “If a Felon Becomes President, Can Anyone Limit His Power?” The text box underlined the theme again: “Revival of a long-ago fear that a U.S. leader could try to be a king.” All that followed was the argument ad infinitum that Trump’s second term would result in “unfettered abuses of authority.” What Baker and Stephanopoulos refused to understand was that this rhetoric of a president abusing authority can also be applied to President Joe Biden. On CNN, Scott Jennings mocked Rep. Jake Auchincloss, D-Mass., on how Biden ruthlessly ignored the courts and the Congress in offering $165 billion in student loan “forgiveness” to win younger voters. “You’re a member of Congress,” Jennings told Auchincloss. “Does it not offend you that the president of the United States is usurping your authority?” The eventual answer was no. The Democrats and their media enablers use “history” to establish how there is a “right side,” and that is their leftist agenda. Undercutting democratic norms and coequal branches of government is admirable when the ends justify the means. The Founding Fathers are just yellowed paper puppets in their relentless power games. COPYRIGHT 2024 CREATORS.COM We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post Beware When Leftist Journalists Use Founders to Attack Trump appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Analysis: Vast Majority of Abortions Done for Birth Control

Oh, Happy, Waste of Time Day: NJ Businesses Can Now Be State 'LGBTQ+ Certified'

On Wednesday morning, the “big three” of ABC, CBS, and NBC continued to surprisingly give full segment to the Hunter Biden trial, but this left the overall tally at 37 minutes (37:11) versus the 71 minutes (70:43) at this point in the Trump trial. On the substance, they all casually brought up Hunter Biden’s “controversial” laptop despite years of either denying its existence or brushing it aside. ABC’s Good Morning America again had senior national correspondent Terry Moran provide helpings of pathetic sympathy for these supposedly downtrodden Bidens: “Because Hunter Biden is the President’s son, this case is seen as political by many, but for the Biden family, who so many American families have been caught up in the world with drug abuse and guns, this is personal and painful.”     Like the CBS and NBC would, Moran brought up Hunter’s relationship with his late brother Beau’s widow Hallie, but ignored how that caused his first marriage to fall apart to Kathleen Buhle. After giving space to the defense’s claim Hunter was too cogent in the same time period to have been on cocaine, Moran finally brought up the laptop (click “expand”): MORAN: During testimony the jurors saw these angry text messages between Hunter and Hallie Biden after she found Hunter’s gun and threw it in a trash can. Hunter texting, “Did you take that from me? You’re being totally irresponsible and unhinged.” Hallie responding, “I just want you safe, that was not safe.” Prosecutors are using a portrait of Hunter Biden the crack addict using images and text messages obtained from his laptop including a video where he is using a Tom mark holding a crack pipe. As well as passages from his memoir. BIDEN: I used my superpower finding crack anytime, anywhere. MORAN: Defense lawyers say that they plan to call members of the Biden family who can present eyewitness testimony and paint a different picture of that troubled time in Hunter’s life. NBC Capitol Hill correspondent Ryan Nobles said on Today that Wednesday “could be another difficult day for the Biden family in the courtroom as Hunter Biden’s ex-wife is expected to be called to the witness stand.” Nobles also reported excerpts of the audiobook for Hunter’s memoir were played in court to outline “his painful battle with addiction” as well as Hunter Biden’s lawyer Abbe Lowell countering by “listing off all the things Biden was involved in at the time, arguing that it doesn’t look like, ‘someone who was smoking crack every 20 minutes.’” Nobles named the laptop as evidence, but called it “controversial”. To his credit, he was the only network correspondent to inform viewers about a deranged outburst from Hunter’s current wife (click “expand”): The prosecution also introducing as evidence the controversial laptop Hunter left at a repair shop in Delaware. It is filled with texts and Whatsapp messages as well as pictures that prosecutors used to demonstrate the defendant’s pattern of addiction. Hunter’s painful past will continue to be a theme throughout the trial. Expected on the witness stand Wednesday, Kathleen Buhle, Hunter’s ex-wife, who will detail how his addictions impacted their family life. And Hallie Biden, the widow of Hunter’s late brother Beau, with whom he had a romantic relationship. And as an example of just how tense things are here in Wilmington, yesterday Hunter’s current wife Melissa Cohen Biden confronting a Trump aide who was in the courtroom. She asked what he was doing here, and accusing him of being a Nazi.  CBS Mornings continued its more muted and straightforward approach that, in other words, was the opposite of ABC’s Moran. “Hunter Biden’s ex-wife could testify this morning at the criminal trial of the President’s son, accused of lying about his drug use when he bought a gun in 2018. Jurors yesterday heard the defendant himself describe his past addiction,” co-host Nate Burleson began. Correspondent Scott MacFarlane relayed that prosecutors used “Hunter Biden’s own voice” as “a key part of evidence” to show he wasn’t anywhere close to clean when he allegedly bought the gun at the center of the trial. MacFarlane, however, brought up the laptop by calling it “the infamous laptop that Hunter Biden left at a Delaware repair shop in 2019” and was “introduced into evidence” with an “FBI agent testif[ying] it contained messages detailing Biden’s drug addiction.” Many thanks to NewsBusters intern Mary Clare Waldron for assistance in compiling the transcripts. To see the relevant June 5 transcripts, click here (for ABC), here (for CBS), and here (for NBC).

After spending almost four years claiming there was nothing he could do about securing the U.S.-Mexico border (which echoed his claim about lowering inflation), President Biden finally issued an executive order to supposedly secure it. The purported effectiveness of the orders remained to be seen, but the liberal ladies of ABC’s The View spent the first part of their Wednesday show touting the move while simultaneously whining about Biden being “forced” into doing it by Republicans. Near the top of the segment, staunchly racist and anti-Semitic co-host Sunny Hostin (the descendant of slave owners) tried to suggest Biden’s move proved that Democrats – the party of sanctuary cities and amnesty – was not weak on border security: I think we should all remember Obama was called the (…) deporter-in-chief and deported more undocumented people than ever before and Biden was his vice president. So, the notion somehow that Democrats are so light on immigration is just actually a misnomer, it's not true. And I think he's doing the right thing. She admitted it was just a political decision during an election year, “but at least he's doing something.” Faux-conservative co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin quoted Senator John Fetterman (D-PA) in proclaiming that “it's not xenophobic to care about border security.” She added that “the left flank of the party” got it “wrong” when they made it their position that “you're bigoted and racist if you think there needs to be some level of border security.” “He's got five months to prove that he can help solve this process and I would say this: Joe Biden can't live in fear of his left wing or he's going to lose,” she stated.     Co-host Joy Behar, who recently admitted that she self-censors her criticism of Biden to help him get elected, spun Biden’s limitations on asylum claims from the left as eventually returning and claimed former President Trump wanted to put people in “camps”: What Trump said he would do is he would basically he would round them up and put them in detention camps. Total different. It's a little different. One is an extreme way to deal with this issue and one is somewhat humanitarian and it'll be changed eventually, rechanged and people able to come in here legally again. But if you put Donald Trump in there, he's going to put people in, like, these sort of camps. Pretend-moderate co-host Sara Haines also admitted Biden’s executive order was wholly intended to stop the bleeding in the polls but insisted “this is a Band-Aid like that he's been forced to do” by Republicans. She also blamed Trump for the increase in border crossings during the Biden presidency, despite Biden letting Title 42 expire. Moderator Whoopi Goldberg took on the role of parroting one of the more intellectually lazy arguments of the far-left wing of the Democratic Party: claiming red states sending illegal immigrants to the so-called sanctuary cities that were telling them to come was somehow human “trafficking”: GOLDBERG: So, here's my question. So, people arrive in a country. HOSTIN: Yes. GOLDBERG: They are then put on buses and sent to other cities and towns. Isn't that trafficking? BEHAR: They send them to sanctuary cities. GOLDBERG: Isn’t that trafficking? Last year, The View was all for “tracking” illegals out of their city. Haines demanded that they be “resettled elsewhere” in America because it’s “a massive country.” Goldberg obviously didn’t care about American sovereignty because she previously demanded other countries come into America and control our border security and immigration system. The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read: ABC’s The View June 5, 2024 11:05:01 a.m. Eastern (…) SUNNY HOSTIN: I think we should all remember Obama was called the ex—the WHOOPI GOLDBERG: Deporter-in-chief. HOSTIN: I was going to say exporter. Deporter-in-chief and deported more undocumented people than ever before and Biden was his vice president. So, the notion somehow that Democrats are so light on immigration is just actually a misnomer, it's not true. And I think he's doing the right thing. He's doing it, yes, because it's a political threat. It's five months before an election but at least he's doing something. [Applause] JOY BEHAR: What is he doing? Tell us what he’s doing. ALYSSA FARAH GRIFFIN: Well, he's using an executive action to basically limit the number of asylum seekers that can come in. But I'm basically just frustrated with how this debate has gone in the country and I think there’s responsibility on both sides. John Fetterman who I feel like is one of those people who is a straight shooter said, very wisely, ‘it's not xenophobic to care about border security.’ Every nation on Earth deals with this issue. I remember being in a meeting with then-Chancellor Angela Merkel saying, ‘we’re dealing with the Syrian Refugee Crisis, we’re dealing with a border crisis.’ So, I think what Democrats got wrong early in this – and especially the left flank of the party – is to basically say you're bigoted and racist if you think there needs to be some level of border security. What Republicans got wrong is that they got the best border package in decades and they blocked it because Donald Trump. It is a crisis. It ranks as the top issue for voters. And I think a lot of folks think it's a border state issue, doesn't affect us. So, New York City, this was interesting. Hotel prices have gone up because 15 percent of hotels are housing migrants in New York City. So, there are real impacts that we have. He's got five months to prove that he can help solve this process and I would say this: Joe Biden can't live in fear of his left wing or he's going to lose. BEHAR: So, Biden is saying when you reach a certain number like over 2,500, is it? HOSTIN: It’s 2,500. BEHAR: Then that's the end of asylum? HOSTIN: Yes, because – BEHAR: What Trump said he would do is he would basically he would round them up and put them in detention camps. Total different. It's a little different. One is an extreme way to deal with this issue and one is somewhat humanitarian and it'll be changed eventually, rechanged and people able to come in here legally again. But if you put Donald Trump in there, he's going to put people in, like, these sort of camps. FARAH GRIFFIN: He's talking about people who are already here, the DACA population. BEHAR: He wants to send them back too. Right? SARA HAINES: The problem with the executive order – which I feel like his has was forced because he didn't have the vote and that border bill was designed by a very conservative Republican Senator James Lankford, the one they blocked. The problem with this executive order in making Biden do that, is it doesn't include a lot of the more comprehensive parts that that bill does, which is quick -- they have antiquated systems down there. They don't have enough help, not enough judge, social workers, al the things. HOSTIN: Path to citizenship. HAINES: That bill included so much more. So, this is a Band-Aid like that he's been forced to do. And so, some people are calling it political but I'll take what Sunny said, something needs to be done because if we've watched this happen for decades and decades and decades and now it's exploded as people started, like, seeing the numbers come in – because it did get really after Donald Trump and that 42 -- FARAH GRIFFIN: Title 42. HAINES: Title 42 expired the numbers have gotten too great. But it would be really nice if they could just do their jobs. Because now you have nine senators I think it is, a group of Senate Republicans vowing to oppose legislation and Biden nominees in the wake of Trump's conviction. So, now you've got time and they're just saying I'm not going to do my job. GOLDBERG: So, here's my question. So, people arrive in a country. HOSTIN: Yes. GOLDBERG: They are then put on buses and sent to other cities and towns. Isn't that trafficking? BEHAR: They send them to sanctuary cities. GOLDBERG: Isn’t that trafficking? HOSTIN: In a way. They're processing them first. GOLDBERG: Are they, though? HOSTIN: This is supposed to be the land of the free and we’re supposed to be welcoming people. And so, they process them. But right now there are about 3,700 crossings a day over the last three weeks. And so, they want them to be about 2,500. So now, even if you have an asylum claim that's valid, you will not be heard and you have a five-year minimum ban for returning. GOLDBERG: So, you come across and you get here and they take you and they send you someplace else. They don't send money. The other states don't say, and here's some money to help you with the thing. HOSTIN: No. GOLDBERG: It feels like trafficking and feels like we only have 30 seconds so talk fast. FARAH GRIFFIN: The Biden administration has put in a policy of taking lateral flights where they relocate migrants to where there may be more places with economic opportunities and so on. But, I  mean, it just underscores how bad the crisis is. GOLDBERG: This blanket sending people wherever. HOSTIN: States aren’t necessarily helping, like Texas. GOLDBERG: Yes. Yeah.

There are seven conditions that must be met for a color revolution to successfully topple a government, and it all must revolve around a national election. The timing couldn’t be more ripe as America heads into one of the most tumultuous and important elections we’ve seen in our lifetime. Not only that, but according to Glenn Beck, we currently meet all seven conditions. The first condition is a “semi-autocratic regime.” “We’re not a fully autocratic regime, and that’s not what you need. You need a semi-autocratic regime,” Glenn explains. The second condition is an “unpopular incumbent.” As Joe Biden’s disastrous polls reflect, we can definitely check that one off on the list. The checklist goes on, with number three being a “united and organized opposition” and number four “an ability to quickly drive home the point that voting results were falsified," which then begets number five: “media to inform people about the falsified vote.” Number six is the “opposition capable of mobilizing thousands of demonstrators,” and last but not least, number seven is “divisions among the regime's coercive forces,” which are military and police. “They’ve got a fully united opposition, they’re prepared to drive home the point that the election was illegitimate. Hillary Clinton has been saying that just about every week since 2016,” Glenn says. “Listen to the media; they’re already planting the seeds again,” he adds. “It’s never been more biased.” Want more from Glenn Beck?To enjoy more of Glenn’s masterful storytelling, thought-provoking analysis, and uncanny ability to make sense of the chaos, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

The lower appeals court is expected to rule on Fani Willis’s disqualification by March 2025.

The bill was blocked by Republicans in the Senate’s Wednesday procedural vote. It can be brought up again at a later date.