There were many reasons that President-elect Donald Trump won in such a resounding victory this week: inflation, the bewildering open border policy, the Afghanistan withdrawal humiliation, the world on fire, etc. But let’s not forget one of the top ones: This was a resounding defeat of wokeism. Voters have rejected wokeism—defined here as an unhealthy obsession with viewing all of life as a struggle between oppressors and oppressed, or, as the woke would put it, being “awake” to the misfortunes of the marginalized. This would still have been true even if Vice President Kamala Harris had won. Throughout her long public career, the vice president has embraced all the woke nostrums. She was particularly adept at describing equity—the government and the private sector treating Americans differently depending on their race—and how it is different from equality. “So, there’s a big difference between equality and equity,” she voices over in a 2020 animated video. “Equitable treatment means we all end up at the same place.” President Joe Biden spoke the word “equity” constantly, but he struggled with it, at times starting to say “equality” before catching himself. And he never described or defined in any way the thinking behind it—probably because he lacked the knowledge. Harris, however, completely abandoned her views during the three months she ran for president, and the media, of course, never held her accountable. This was a tacit admission that she understood how much the country hated the use of race to justify dismantling society or the promotion of the idea that the United States is systemically racist. Voters also happen to disagree with allowing males to use women’s bathrooms and allowing minors to surgically or chemically castrate themselves or remove other healthy body parts. It is, of course, an open question whether Harris’ sudden march to the center on these issues was a political ruse and whether she would have turned around and promoted these policies once elected. But Trump was elected and will now be our 47th president. And we know from his time in office that he is anti-woke in word and in deed. He will take measures against this ideology—as he did in his first term with his ban of so-called diversity, equity, and inclusion trainings in the government workforce and government contractors. And there is so much to do in his second term. An anti-woke agenda would comprise clawing back the cultural institutions that the Left has penetrated and subverted for decades now. This Left long ago abandoned doing things frontally, such as launching bloody revolutions, and has opted instead for infiltration and indoctrination. Of course, as we saw with the 2020 riots instigated by the Marxist-trained founders of Black Lives Matter, this Left will also opportunistically launch street violence when it thinks it can deliver a knockout blow against society. But violent action must be preceded by, and act in tandem with, capturing K-12 school systems, so “educators” can weave Marxist programming into standards and even curricula. It must accompany the complete takeover of the university, where many departments no longer have a single conservative, and the takeover of museums by curators and administrators who are busy “decolonizing” our cultural institutions. So the anti-woke agenda must prioritize doing everything possible to ensure that universities can no longer compel speech, whether it is forcing students or faculty members to express or affirm the falsehood that America is “systemically racist” or to break the rules of grammar by referring to a male as “she” or “they.” Of course, Trump must also reinstitute the ban on DEI in the government force and contractors. Another measure that must be part of the package is taking back control of public museums and restoring them to their original mandate of increasing and diffusing knowledge and away from efforts to become a change agent that seeks to deconstruct society. And because the lifeblood of identity politics, one of the central aspects of wokeism, are the racial categories that the Left has painstakingly created in the past five decades, the new administration would also do well to eliminate these groups from government paperwork. Lastly, if this election has taught us anything, it’s that the Left has captured legacy media, whose bias in this election was unrelenting. There is little the government can do about ABC News, CBS News, etc. as long as they don’t violate their license, but NPR and PBS have violated the public trust with their extreme and biased coverage of this election. They are subsidized by the taxpayer, conservatives and liberals, through the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. It’s high time to yank those subsidies. The defeat of wokeism requires it. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. Originally published by the Washington Examiner The post The Left’s Woke Agenda Died This Week appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Imagine doing something so important that you change the course of history– but no one remembers your name! While some important individuals make the history books, there are many more who are often forgotten. From famous inventors, social leaders, and artists, these incredible people had amazing accomplishments and deserve more recognition. Those who aren't familiar with Margaret Howe Lovatt... Source

The Soviet Union was founded on December 30, 1922, as a socialist community that quickly became governed by the Communist Party. After decades of unrest, the USSR was dissolved 69 years later on December 26, 1991. While the Soviet Union wasn't the safest place to be, the state did have some unique rules and living conditions. Continue reading to learn some odd facts about the USSR. Source

From having their own fragrance to their own footwear, the rise of luxury products for dogs is undeniable. And this month, Louis Vuitton is joining in with the launch of their Men’s Spring-Summer 2025 Pre-Collection.  The collection is said to be a “sartorial ode to the canine community” by Louis Vuitton’s Creative Director, Pharrell Williams. In an Instagram post, Louis Vuitton writes, “Pharrell introduces a new collection dedicated to the cosmopolitan culture of dogs and their walkers — interweaving Louis Vuitton’s icons with an anthropomorphic audacity.” Among the collection’s most notable piece is the $60,000 dog house called the “Kennel Trunk”. According to Louis Vuitton’s website, the Kennel Trunk is “the ultimate luxury item for man’s best friend”. It creates the illusions of a traditional house, with a roof and its own windows. And while the product is all about luxury and sophistication, the brand ensures that the Kennel Trunk is still very much functional. “The door is removable, and the bottom of the trunk can be opened for easy cleaning,” its description read on the Louis Vuitton website. Aside from this, the metallic name card holder on the house can be customized in store. Other dog accessories that are part of Pharell’s newest collection include a $470 dog poop bag holder, a $2,330 flask holder, and a $2,160 dog bowl. Along with the collection, Pharell also launched a pop-up called “Dog LVERS” which “showcases and celebrates the Spring/Summer 2025 pre-collection by inviting fashion enthusiasts and dog lovers alike to explore a masterfully curated selection of Louis Vuitton’s latest casual and formal menswear alongside an exclusive line of accessories for man’s best friend; dogs, all in a pet-friendly atmosphere.” The pop-up also boasts cozy areas for both two-legged and four-legged visitors to relax in!

The technique, discovered by an amateur but now verified by scientists, could play a big part in saving the endangered animals.

The Senate returns to session Tuesday. The new members will be there too. They’ll have a candidate forum Tuesday night, where the men vying for Senate Republican leadership will make their case, and on Wednesday, the GOP senators and senators-elect of the 119th Congress will choose their next leader. It’s an important job. Under Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), power and money have become more and more centralized while the Senate’s regular order has been pushed aside — and along with it, the power of Senate committees and their chairmen to seriously shape policy. Inside the Senate, support can be mercurial ... and how much does ideology play into it anyway? And while the House of Representatives has its essential role in governance, and though its members are generally more raucous and more conservative than their counterparts in the upper chamber, you can expect all that to calm down in the next Congress. When the same party controls both chambers and the presidency, it’s business time — and the House tends to follow the Senate’s lead without all the drama of the last four years. So Senate majority leader? Important role. The candidates are Sens. John Thune (S.D.), John Cornyn (Texas) and Rick Scott (Fla.). That’s two men with moderate, leadership-friendly records and a self-made billionaire known for angering McConnell and generally shaking things up. While the Republican base might have its favorite in that kind of race, the Senate is an entirely different animal. For months, D.C. has called Thune the leader, Cornyn a possibility, and Scott a conservative protest run meant to pull concessions from the eventual leader, but not much backs this up aside from an aggressive, behind-the-scenes campaign by Team Thune to make it seem that way. Granted, Thune and Cornyn fit the mold. Both have long been close to leadership (and less close with conservatives). Cornyn in particular has built a fundraising juggernaut with which he’s generously supported his colleagues (an important thing in an insular popularity contest). While lacking the treasure chest, Thune aggressively campaigned for his fellow Republicans throughout the last election. Scott has largely gone his own way, but over the past couple of years, he has distinguished himself for his willingness to challenge McConnell’s very un-MAGA agenda and also put forward an actual agenda (however unpopular with his colleagues) for Republicans to run on. But it’s a secret vote, so no one actually knows who to hold responsible for what. As retired Sen. Lamar Alexander quipped in his December 2020 farewell address, in 2006, “I wrote 27 thank-you notes for 24 votes when I lost the race by one vote to be the Republican whip.” The secret vote can be important. It allows senators to avoid retribution for opposing the eventual winner. It can also shield them from the influence of one president-elect, Donald J. Trump. While thus far Trump has declined to weigh in on the race, it is well in his interest to have a Senate majority leader he can work with for once. Members of his camp know this, and leaks and barbs are circulating Capitol Hill undermining this or that candidate. For example, a video started shooting between staffers and members this week showing five clips of Thune speaking ill of Trump, followed by a clip from earlier in the week of the senator warning Trump away from trying to influence the election, and ending with a tweet by Donald Trump Jr. attacking both Thune and Cornyn as establishment liberals. Then there’s the Axios piece last week reporting that months prior, Trump dismissed Scott as an unserious contender. Trump spokesmen denied it, but the point is blood is in the water. And if Trump wouldn’t have any impact on the election, why would Thune feel the need to warn him off? If he was comfortable in the big man’s support — or confident it wouldn’t have an impact — he would have invited it. (Though he has been courting the once and future president and, just as with Scott and Cornyn, is in frequent contact with him.) Inside the Senate, support can be mercurial. While Sen. Markwayne Mullin (Okla.) joined Thune’s South Dakota colleague Mike Rounds in their support, Sen. Josh Hawley, a populist conservative from Missouri, announced his support Friday for Cornyn’s bid. Why? Cornyn apparently promised to support Hawley’s mission to get a bill covering federally caused radiation exposure for citizens of all 50 states through the Senate. Earlier this year, others on the fiscal right had offered to expand the bill to cover states including Missouri, but Hawley wanted all 50 states covered. Scott voted against that. The end. And how much does ideology play into it anyway? Cornyn has taken a couple of stands in his life, including for the now-unpopular criminal justice reform. Do conservatives want a strong speaker who doesn’t share their views or one who is more malleable to the current mandate — a mandate Trump clearly earned? In all but two states a Republican senator won, Trump beat their winning tally by tens to hundreds of thousands of votes. Then, Cornyn is courting conservatives you might imagine would otherwise vote for Scott. The day after Trump’s election, he released a statement promising a return to normal order in the Senate, including empowering committees — two things far more important to empowering the legislature than term limits for leadership (though he’s supported these as well). Another point in his favor? He has his own fundraising team and won’t be reliant on the McConnell people in quite the same way Thune would be. Scott is the only one of them to put pen to paper and write out a plan for what the Republican Senate should be fighting for. That courage has been in short supply over the past five years in D.C. But will it make a difference now that Trump is back and his agenda is the agenda? All this and more will be hashed out in behind-the-scenes negotiations this week, though true to fashion, McConnell’s team didn’t want even that to happen. He's getting a lifetime achievement award from the thoroughly anti-MAGA American Enterprise Institute Tuesday night, and Utah Sen. Mike Lee’s candidate forum is disrupting the celebration. It's perfect, really. Blaze News: How Tim Scott plans to capitalize on GOP Senate gains Glenn Beck: ‘A true rebirth of freedom’: Why Glenn Beck is ‘really hopeful’ about Trump's second term Sign up for Bedford’s newsletter Sign up to get Blaze Media senior politics editor Christopher Bedford's newsletter. IN OTHER NEWS Goodbye (for now) I'm absolutely thrilled to report that Sarah Bedford gave birth to a beautiful daughter Saturday morning. While I barely — I mean, barely — missed becoming a midwife, these next four weeks I’ll be tending to a healthy mom and healthy baby girl. God willing, you’ll hear from me again the week of Dec. 9. Until then!

Campaign Closeout! Trump Credited with Drastically Slashing the Price of Kamala Harris Merch

Gemini is Google's most important product right now, with Google baking its genAI chatbot into as many products as it can. The Pixel 9 served as the key piece of hardware to showcase several new Gemini capabilities, including Gemini Live functionality. That's the equivalent of OpenAI's Advanced Voice Mode for ChatGPT, which makes the AI sound like a real human. But Google isn't happy rolling out Gemini to as many Android devices as possible. It's also targeting the iPhone, a potentially lucrative market for Google when it comes to its AI ambitions. Rumors already say that Apple will soon offer chatbot choices to iPhone users by integrating Google Gemini into Apple Intelligence alongside ChatGPT. The latter will get a period of exclusivity since it's Apple's preferred partner for the launch of Apple Intelligence. Whether or not Gemini comes to Apple Intelligence, Google is testing another way to make Gemini available to iPhone users. The company rolled out a standalone Google Gemini app in some test markets, complete with Gemini Live functionality. Continue reading... The post Google’s upcoming Gemini AI app for iPhone was just uncovered appeared first on BGR. Today's Top Deals Best deals: Tech, laptops, TVs, and more sales Today’s deals: Rare Nintendo Switch sale, $729 black Apple Watch Ultra 2, 32% off LG G4 OLED TV, more Today’s deals: $150 off eufy Robot Vacuum Omni C20, $30 Fire TV Stick 4K Max, $99 Beats headphones, more Today’s deals: $30 in Amazon credit, $149 Roomba, $100 Fitbit, $180 Ninja CREAMi Deluxe, more

Paris police said Sunday that 4,000 officers and 1,600 stadium staff will be deployed for a FranceIsrael soccer match to ensure security in and around the stadium and on public transportation a week after violence against Israeli fans in Amsterdam.

Many veterans who've started small businesses tell a similar story: Their military service prepared them mentally for the task, but they were at a disadvantage when it came to the financial part.