The Democrats bet everything on the former U.S. ambassador to the EU blowing up the impeachment against Donald Trump, bringing about the ultimate downfall of the former president. After changing versions several times, his statement turned out to be essentially irrelevant. Perhaps my statements the night before last, when I came out of the nightclub with my shirt open, and howling and sweating, were more relevant to Trump’s political future than Sondland’s statement. In the aftermath, all that blew up was the head of more than one Democratic leader who was already dreaming of Trump’s forced withdrawal. Since the day he made official his intention to return to the White House, the Democrats have been scared to death. All the efforts, all the media and political machinery of the Government and the Democratic party is devoted to making Trump unable to compete with Biden. Good luck with that, guys. The West needs America to be great again, assertive, influential, and relevant. Now Sondland, whom Trump fired after his impeachment testimony, has returned to the limelight with an interesting op-ed on Fox News, titled very differently than what you’d expect from someone who believes his former boss should be convicted as a felon, “President Trump fired me and I’m still voting for him.” (READ MORE from Itxu Diaz: Spring Is the Season of Love) The most amusing thing about this story, aside from Mr. Sondland’s personal situation and reasons for rushing to work with Trump again, is that the point he makes in his article is unassailable. It is not replete with impressions, or coarse words, or feelings or emotions, which are the kinds of things the left employs to attack Trump. It is full of facts, which is something that terrifies Democrats. You show the postmodern left a fact and they run away with their hands on their heads and screaming in fear. Sondland says Biden is neither physically nor mentally prepared to continue four more years at the helm of the United States. And it’s true. And anyone who wants to deny it in public will have to put up with their audience laughing in their face. Sondland says this election is a battle between free market democracy and socialism. And it is true. And it is the gravest issue. And that is why it will be a key election in the history of the United States. I remember when in Spain the president of the Community of Madrid launched her campaign slogan: “now we have to choose between communism or freedom.” Freedom won. Sondland says Trump is the only candidate strong enough to lead the country at this delicate moment in history. And it’s true. Sondland says that with what’s happening in Ukraine, in Israel, on the U.S. border, and with the country under the greatest terrorist threat since 9/11, “we need Trump’s relentless energy speed.” And it’s true. The whole world will be focused on America in the next election, but the West, the free world that today is threatened by the treasonous and liberticidal follies of the left, will not only be keenly focused, but will probably also be on its knees and praying. The West needs America to be great again, assertive, influential, and relevant. Furthermore, in his article he suggests that he testified reluctantly while others testified cheerfully, and hints that the motive of those who have accused Trump the most is actually personal revenge. I abhor the spiteful. And I abhor those who devote their strength to harassing a former colleague or boss with whom they failed to get along. The most flattering then, the most accusatory today. Traitors with whom you should not even go to collect a winning lottery ticket. (READ MORE: The Polite European Right Missed the Point) You can think what you want about Gordon Sondland. But his repositioning of Trump, whether self-serving or not, is perhaps the most credible defense ever made of the former president. And not just because it comes from someone who was fired by him, but mostly, I insist, because his position is replete with incontrovertible facts, which place the voter before a very simple question: do you want this (free markets, strength, and prosperity) or the other (socialism, irrelevance, and misery)? The post Gordon Sondland Returns to the Right Side of History appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

The truth about battery-powered devices (EVs) is finally being emitted. One of these truths — styled a “hurdle for EV adoption” — is the plummeting resale value of these devices. The possibility is that the automakers will demand that EVs be forced on people … by forcing vehicles that aren’t devices off the road. How much — and how fast? How about more than 30 percent in just one year? That’s about five times as much loss in over 12 months as you’d typically lose (about 10 percent) if you bought a vehicle rather than a device. It’s a loss that is actually fast — as opposed to how long it takes to charge a device. (READ MORE from Eric Peters: Complicit Car Media Heralds ‘Revolutionary’ New Electric Vehicle) This latter accounts, in part, for the plummeting value of devices vs. vehicles. The word has gotten out about the time-cost of devices, including the truth about the lie that you don’t have to wait for the device to charge when you plug it in at home. Of course you do. EV apologists pretend it’s not waiting because you’re waiting at home — or because you’re sleeping while the device is charging. But there’s no getting around the waiting — which will become clear if you need to use the car before it’s done charging. But the real killer is that devices are dependent upon batteries that inevitably lose their capacity to retain a charge — at which point the device’s value plummets because it doesn’t work anymore and the cost to make it work again (i.e., a new battery) is too high relative to the value of the device itself. It’s easy to understand how this works. Everyone who owns a phone or even a laptop already knows how it works. After a few years, the device stops working — unless you keep it plugged in (which means you’re stuck wherever your electrical outlet is located) because the device’s battery has gotten old and won’t hold charge anymore. By the time this happens, the device itself is already an old device. Electronic devices age much faster than mechanical things, which also don’t need to be the latest things and routinely work for decades and so continue to have value for decades. Most people want to have the latest device — or at least, not an old one that’s lacking all the latest features or that won’t work with the latest updates. So when their old device won’t hold a charge anymore and they find out that it will cost them 50 percent of the rapidly plummeting remaining value of their device to get a new battery, what do most people do? They throw the old device away. That is easy enough to do — financially — with a small battery powered device such as a phone or even a laptop because the cost of a new device isn’t prohibitive. But it is effectively impossible — financially — for most people who own a large and very expensive device such as an electric vehicle to replace the thing’s battery because most people haven’t got the $15,000-plus it costs to buy a new battery, which they can’t (realistically, most of them) pay for in cash and can’t (also realistically) finance because they’d be putting that $15k on a credit card, at probably double-digit interest, compounded monthly. So they walk away from the device, which they probably leased (most devices are leased rather than bought because of the high cost of a new device) and leave the dealer that leased it holding the bag. Now the dealer has to eat the cost of the loss, which he can’t recover because most people don’t want a used device, even if it has a new battery. Because it’s still an old device and it will inevitably need a new battery and when it does, by that time, it will be an even older device and probably have lost 70 percent of its original value. These losses have consequences — including for the cost of leasing a new device, which has become high in proportion to the plummeting residual value of the device by the end of the lease term. It is the projected residual value — i.e., the remaining value of the vehicle after “x” number of years — that is the primary factor affecting how much a lease costs. A device that loses 30-plus percent of its value-when-new after as little as one year is going to cost a commensurately higher amount each month to lease than it would cost to make monthly payments on a vehicle that only loses about 10 percent of its value each year. It will also still be worth something by the time you pay it off — in the event you decided to buy. “Tumbling resale values aggravate buyers’ worries that an EV isn’t worth the price or the potential headaches, says USA Today.” They already worry about EVs’ high prices, charging, lack of choice, and driving range. Now, they fear when it comes time to sell the vehicle, they’re not going to get much back.” That’s not a “fear.” It’s a fact. A related fact is that vertical depreciation negates the device’s supposed “savings” in not having to spend money on gas — and oil/filter changes. Not surprisingly, people are eschewing devices in favor of vehicles. This is reflected in double digit declines in the number of devices being bought (and leased). Which has triggered a walking back of the “commitments” made by a number of vehicle manufacturers to make more devices because they’re beginning to realize they can’t force people to buy these devices. (READ MORE: The Car That Pulls Itself Over) Which brings up an alarming possibility that is likely to become a certainty after the pending election, if the Orange Man doesn’t win. And perhaps even if he does. The possibility is that the automakers will demand that EVs be forced on people — not just forced onto the “market” — by forcing vehicles that aren’t devices off the road (and not just out of the showroom). There are a number of ways this could be done, including a massive “carbon tax” on vehicles that aren’t devices — or on the fuel that vehicles need. That is just a matter of the how. The why is self-evident. Having poltroonishly (and short-term greedily) bought into the government pushing devices into production for a “market” that doesn’t want these devices, the manufacturers (car companies) are now hemorrhaging billions on devices and that bleeding has got to be staunched. The most obvious way to staunch it is to leave people no alternative but to buy the devices they’re pushing. The post Another Hurdle for the Electric Vehicle appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

Joe Biden continues to be a terrible father. For all his senile doddering, the real problem with him isn’t his age, it’s that he lacks virtue. He has been willing to sacrifice anyone to obtain and keep power and the most disgusting sacrifices he has made have been his own children. The worst part? Both Hunter and Ashley Biden have cried for help, but Democrats and the media crave power, so they facilitate the abuse of these adult children by covering for Joe Biden. Joe Biden has kept his son fueled up with drugs and underaged prostitutes in his own quest for money and power. Bad dads cause countless cultural woes. Addiction, abandonment, abuse, and adultery are familial crimes rooted in self-gratification. Often, these things combine to create a toxic environment for children and the problems become intergenerational. The genetic proclivities to narcissism, psychopathy, and addiction create an unstable milieu the children suffer trauma. These victims, insecure and fragile and with the same genetic weaknesses, cope with their anxiety and fear in various ways and often end up addicts themselves seeking solace through drugs, alcohol, people, work, exercise — something, anything, to escape the emotional pain. Self-centered and fractured, with no one to sooth them, they become emotionally stuck. They are perpetual children in search of parental figures who love them unconditionally. They become frustrated when they find no adequate human or substance surrogate. They suffer endlessly unless they find recovery and God. (WATCH Melissa Mackenzie: The Spectacle Ep. 118: Conservatives Win European Elections, Shocking Leftist Elites) And so it is with the Biden family. Joe Biden, more criminal kingpin than pater, abandoned his children at the moment they lost their mother for his own narcissistic ambitions and then confabulated a story to narrate his debauched life when the truth is more ruthlessly terrible: his wife and child died, he left his remaining children when they needed him most, had an affair with the married wife of one of his campaign operatives, married her, and together, they crafted a lifetime of lies using and abusing the surviving Biden children as props, and in Ashley’s case, personal plaything, and later, as money mules for the criminal Biden organization. The play-pretend lid can only stay on this pressure-cooker situation for so long. Often, adult children of narcissists must reckon with their own pain well into their adulthood. If it is still unsafe to face the truth, sometimes the truth is revealed inadvertently. There is a psychological theory for this: leakage. Leakage is when someone’s words may convey one idea but his facial expressions or body language, or in particularly overt cases, actions, reveal the true intent or feelings. A person crying while saying nothing is wrong or balling his fists and claiming to not be angry are examples of leakage. And then there’s the Biden children. Ashley Biden “left” her diary to be discovered. Oopsie. And Hunter Biden “lost” his laptop during a bender. Oopsie again. These are monumentally huge psychological tells. This is leakage on a tsunami scale. Desperate to be heard, both Hunter and Ashley left their personal testimonies to their pain where someone, anyone, could find them. The tales of woe and self-incrimination (and Hunter Biden is a criminal), but more importantly, parental incrimination, are so damning it seems impossible that neither of these adult children of Joe Biden didn’t go back and search and reclaim their property in haste. But they didn’t. Why? One can imagine many reasons but the fact is that they did leave this evidence to be discovered. Both the diary and laptop are corroborated and verified evidence that were abandoned in public places. The sins of the father are revealed in both of these catalogs of catastrophe. From Ashley’s musings about inappropriate showers with her father to Hunter’s images with hookers, guns, and blow, these embarrassing vignettes are humiliating confessions; secrets to be guarded at all costs. But sometimes the self won’t survive unless the truth is known. So now the truth is out there and what has happened? The children have continued to be abused but not by the media that is exposing it. No. The abusers continue to be Joe and Jill Biden and, like the family members who cover for the pedophile favored son, the Democrats and mainstream media who aid and abet the abusers. The media portrayal of Joe Biden as a good father is risible. The fact that he’s cast as the victim of his son’s drug abuse and addiction is laughable. This father, knowing that his son is a strung out addict, continued to use him to conduct his corrupt influence-buying business dealings. He uses his daughter Ashley as a human prop. New evidence of corruption just broke. John Solomon reports that the FBI knew since 2016 that Hunter Biden, on behalf of his father, was setting up a side business in Lichenstein with the founder of Burisma: The FBI learned as far back as 2016 that Hunter Biden and his partners had plotted to set up a new venture in tax-friendly Liechtenstein that would be capitalized by a whopping $120 million investment from the controversial owner of the Ukrainian energy firm Burisma Holdings, according to documents obtained by Just the News that have been kept from the American public for eight years. The mega-deal was not referenced inside Hunter Biden’s now infamous laptop or during the 2019 impeachment proceedings involving Ukraine, but was instead chronicled in a trove of 3.39 million documents the FBI seized from Hunter Biden and his business partners during an investigation of securities fraud nearly a decade ago. The cache of documents was recently turned over by former Hunter Biden business partner Devon Archer to the House Oversight Committee as part of its impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden’s conduct. Hunter Biden has been an addict for a long time. Joe Biden has kept his son fueled up with drugs and underaged prostitutes in his own quest for money and power. These are not the actions of a loving father. Joe Biden has used the Feds to go after and prosecute those who found and then sold the diary. The FBI and intelligence community covered for the Hunter laptop to help Joe Biden’s election chances. Nancy Pelosi had been briefed about the laptop a year before the last election. (WATCH: The Spectacle Ep. 117: David Catron: Why Tim Scott Should be Trump’s VP) But the mainstream media and Democrats refuse to examine the contents of these revelations. They refuse to acknowledge the pain of these adult children. To look and really see is to find a bad father. Good fathers create a cultural legacy and build civilization. Bad fathers cause intergenerational pain and destroy civilization. Joe Biden is a bad father. The post Bad Father Biden and His Kids’ Cries for Help appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

This plot seems too diabolical to be true, but true it is. Late in the day of January 7, 2021, unknown operatives within the D.C. establishment made the conscious decision to have Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick “murdered.” Two of them relayed the news of the Sicknick murder to the New York Times. Reporters Zolan Kanno-Youngs and Tracey Tulley described these operatives as “law enforcement officials.” Babbitt was, in fact, one of four protestors to die that day, three as a result of police action. In the unrevised version from January 8, 2021, the reporters told Times readers that “pro-Trump rioters … struck [Sicknick] in the head with a fire extinguisher.” For authenticity’s sake they added this chilling detail: “With a bloody gash in his head, Mr. Sicknick was rushed to the hospital and placed on life support.” To secure Sicknick’s status as a martyr to the cause of democracy, the operatives saw to it that Sicknick’s cremated remains were laid in honor in the Capitol Rotunda. The previous last American to be so honored was Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and, before her, civil rights hero John Lewis. Sicknick’s remains were then buried with full honors at Arlington National Cemetery. He had served six years in the Air National Guard. In analyzing a given event, it is sometimes hard to distinguish conspiracy from incompetence. In this case, incompetence led to conspiracy. At 2:44 p.m. on January 6, a panicky Capitol Police officer, Lt. Michael Byrd, ignored all standard police protocol and fatally shot 35-year-old Ashli Babbitt, a 14-year Air Force veteran. This shooting was part of no one’s plan. (READ MORE from Jack Cashill: First, They Came for the J6ers) Byrd was positioned on the far side of the heavily barricaded doors leading to the House lobby. On the exposed side stood three Capitol Police officers. A few minutes before the shooting, Babbit had walked by herself down the long, narrow corridor leading to the lobby doors. Following her was citizen journalist Tayler Hansen who recorded her movements. Hansen offered the officers some water, while Babbitt joked with them. These were her people. She had spent most of her military career in police work. Within a minute or two, a trailing crowd of roughly thirty people quickly filled up the hallway behind Babbitt. In that crowd was Zachary Alam, thirty, a repeat offender with no social media ties to Donald Trump or MAGA. Alam moved to the front of the crowd, reached between the officers, and began punching the glass panels while yelling, “F*** the blue.” Appalled by Alam’s behavior, Ashli’s police training kicked in. “Call f***ing back-up!” she shouted at the feckless officers as they stood in place with their backs to the doors, doing nothing. “She was basically yelling at these officers telling them to do their jobs,” said Hansen. For more than a minute after the first window was cracked, protestors argued with the officers but did not touch them or threaten them. Nor did they smash any more windows. In a subsequent press release the Department of Justice (DOJ) observed, “Eventually, the three USCP officers positioned outside the doors were forced to evacuate.” The video does not bear this out at all. The officers were not in any imminent danger. As soon as the officers pulled away, Alam grabbed a helmet from a protestor and broke out all the glass from the transom on far the right side. “Ashli was actively trying to disarm these people,” said Hansen, “trying to calm them down through this entire kind of confrontation with these police officers.” After yelling for Alam to stop, Ashli took matters into her own hands, literally. A southpaw, she yanked at Alam’s backpack with her right hand. As he spun around, she slugged him square in the face with her left fist. His glasses flew off on impact. Fleeing the madness, Ashli hopped with some assistance into the window frame now fully free of glass. Only a person as small as she could have managed that feat. Just seven seconds after she slugged Alam, said Hansen, “Michael Leroy Byrd ended up issuing the kill shot with no verbal warning.” Complicating matters for the operatives was that the shot had been recorded by John Earle Sullivan, a black provocateur with BLM roots. Sensing a payday for his footage, Sullivan had his agent contact CNN on January 6 and enter into a one-week agreement for use of the critical forty-four seconds. CNN paid him $35,000. This video undermined the Democrat narrative. Babbitt was, in fact, one of four protestors to die that day, three as a result of police action, but her death was the most visible. The shooting of a petite, attractive, unarmed young Air Force veteran made it difficult to sell the saga of heroic police officers fending off a rabid mob, especially since all the dead were J6ers, and none of the police was seriously injured. Sara Carpenter, one of ten women I profile in my new book, Ashli: The Untold Story of the Women of January 6, shed unwitting light on the plot to “murder” Sicknick. A medically retired NYPD officer, Carpenter was driving back to New York after her day at the Capitol when she called an old friend who lived in Maryland. When Carpenter mentioned where she had been that day, her friend started screaming at her, “You killed somebody,” the “you” referring to the protestors. “You killed a Capitol Police officer with a fire extinguisher.” The friend’s husband had once been a Capitol Police officer. Carpenter presumed he had inside information.“It sent me reeling,” she told me. Fortunately for the operatives, the 42-year-old Sicknick just happened to die on January 7 from a stroke. They then wedded Sicknick’s real death to the fire extinguisher rumor and commissioned the aforementioned “law enforcement officials” to sell this cruel fiction to the New York Times. It appeared under the shocking headline, “He Dreamed of Being a Police Officer, Then Was Killed by a Pro-Trump Mob.” Independent journalist Glenn Greenwald made a screen shot of the Times account before it could be revised. “This horrifying story about a pro-Trump mob beating a police officer to death was repeated over and over, by multiple journalists on television, in print, and on social media,” said Greenwald. He called this counterfeit murder “the single most-emphasized and known story of the event.” It cowed the entire GOP into silence. The D.C. medical examiner’s office performed Sicknick’s autopsy on January 8. To preserve his fictional murder as fact, the medical examiner sat on the autopsy report for more than 100 days and might never have released it were it not for pressure from a Judicial Watch lawsuit. This suit also forced the medical examiner to reveal the true cause of Sicknick’s death, specifically two strokes at the base of his brain stem caused by a clot. Sicknick died a “natural death” on January 7. There was no fire extinguisher. No bloody gash. No rush to the hospital. Sicknick, a reported Trump supporter, did not deserve this ghoulish exploitation. (READ MORE: Why Republicans Should Make January 6 Their Issue) There is considerable debate as to whether January 6 was a trap or even an inside job. Beyond debate is the fact that someone had Brian Sicknick murdered. His reported “death by fire extinguisher” was no accident. Congress needs to find out pronto who ordered the hit. Jack Cashill’s new book, Ashli: The Untold Story of the Women of January 6, is now available for purchase. The post Who Had Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick ‘Murdered’? appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

In the Jewish calendar, this is the week in which the holiday of Shavuot is celebrated. It is called in the ancient prayerbook the Time of the Giving of Our Torah, and the Torah reading on that day is of the Exodus text in which the Ten Commandments are given on Sinai. Israel is upholding the most fundamental of human rights and acting on the most fundamental of societal imperatives. The laws and the ideas in the Torah have spread their influence far and wide. Its sensibility of humans as being created in the image of God inspires freedom-loving people everywhere. At the top of one of the two tablets was the prohibition on murder. And some simple attention to what the protection of human life means would clean up a great deal of the chaos in our world. (READ MORE from Shmuel Klatzkin: As John Adams Knew, We Must Hold To Received Traditions) Blood is protected. It is the fundamental protection given to humans. Without life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness are meaningless abstractions. Taking of life is a sin of the first magnitude, if only because, unlike sins most other sins against our fellows, we cannot restore the victim to wholeness in any way at all. The blood of others is like our own. “Do not stand by the blood of your fellow,” Leviticus directs, these terse words meaning not only that threats to the lives of others must be our concern but that standing, that is, inaction, is not an acceptable response. In the in-depth discussions that the comprise much of the Talmud, this imperative is taken up and fleshed out in terms of practical law. It rules that in the case of someone pursuing another with murder or rape in mind, “it is a mitzva (that is, an imperative) to get the jump on them to kill them.” The meaning is that it is not only an option but rather it is necessary to take pre-emptive action. The preference of biblical law is not to sit back and let murder happen and then prosecute the matter in court, but to stop it from happening altogether. Of course, the law specifies that the minimum of force necessary to accomplish the task should be used, but the task must be accomplished even if it requires nothing less than deadly force. This idea is present in the Biblical phrase “his blood is on his head.” This means that the murderer has removed from himself the protection God has granted all humans, and there is no guilt in taking his. The Talmud is telling us that the moment that protection is removed is the moment the person has committed himself to the act of murder. God does not require the murder to happen but prefers that it does not happen. Therefore, we do not give murderers a tactical advantage of always getting the jump. Their intentions made clear, we must act to do what they will not — not allow murder to happen. There is an interesting point that is implicit in the Talmud’s language on this point. The Hebrew says, translated literally, one must “get up earlier to kill him” [that is, the would-be murderer] when it could well have said “get up earlier and kill him.” This word choice is significant, as it teaches us the idea of deterrence. When it becomes known that people will be ready to use deadly force as necessary in defense of life, it becomes less necessary to use it. This is deterrence. When murder and mayhem are not resisted, when they are not vigorously anticipated and deterred, they will fill up the absence of will. Nature abhors a vacuum, especially the natural murderer that looks for the chinks in the armor of civilization. Rousseauian romanticism about human nature has led to dreamers to erect their utopias on piles of human bones. They turn to violence inevitably as the struggle to be civilized is an internal one and must be fought and won each day. Without the covenant passed on to us by those who preceded, we would never exit from barbarity and chaos. We preserve the legacy of insight, inspiration, and law that are passed to us from those whose humanity is just like ours and who cared enough to turn away from selfishness to live a life devoted to a larger self, one that includes us and our own posterity. (READ MORE: Biden Distracts Americans. Turns on Israel With New Ceasefire Proposal) Foremost of the imperatives that they passed down is the one to construct a society in which life is valued and in which you use whatever deterrent is necessary to make that value govern. This includes having to override the choices of those who choose to murder and rape, even if they don’t like it. Even if a lot of others also don’t like the idea and squawk about it in the UN. Israel is upholding the most fundamental of human rights and acting on the most fundamental of societal imperatives. Its magnificent and bold hostage rescue pre-empted the murderous intent of Hamas; their military pre-empted those who would kill to stop the rescue and to stop the saving of lives. Yet the Administration is remarkably uncomfortable with this victory of life and deterrence of murder and rapine. Under Biden and Obama, we have forgotten the necessity to pre-empt and to deter. The result has been a world in chaos. The policy towards Israel has shown a lack of clear purpose, unnecessarily confusing gaseous wishful thinking with the hard urgent choices that response to the cold-blooded ideological murderers requires. By failing to pre-empt, by handicapping Israel’s response to the would-be exterminators, Biden and his Obamanik crew have encouraged the murderers and prolonged the war and spilled far more blood than was ever necessary. But that is what Obama did in his pathetic response to ISIS and to Assad and his poison gas. That is what Biden did in his humiliating and unnecessary skedaddle from Afghanistan, forcing Americans to behave as if we had been routed. That is what they both continue to do by the spineless appeasement of the Iranian mullahs. In failing to act, in thinking that only good intentions and fine dreams are required, they have failed in their duty and in their own aims. This whole bloody mess was unnecessary. There is an example of four years of a presidency in which precious little bloodshed took place and in which the stock of the exterminationists went bust. It can be done. We have the evidence. If our current leaders can’t make better choices, let’s make better choices ourselves. The post The Bible: Kill Before They Kill appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

In 1985, David Blum, a 29 year-old writer bestowed the sobriquet Brat Pack on a group of rising young actors with a now infamous  New York Magazine cover article. The piece which was originally intended to be a profile of then-emerging star Emilio Estevez  (The Breakfast Club) expanded into a broader commentary about Hollywood’s new box office golden boys after the writer spent an evening at the Los Angeles Hard Rock Cafe with Estevez, Rob Lowe, and Judd Nelson, two of his co-stars from the ensemble film,  St. Elmo’s Fire  (1985).  Blum thought that he had found a linguistically clever way to illustrate the transition from the Rat Pack of the 1960s, which included Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, and Sammy Davis Jr., to his evening companions along with other eighties stars such as Tom Cruise, Sean Penn, Timothy Hutton, Andrew McCarthy, and Matt Dillon. The Brat Pack category would later be expanded to include the actresses who appeared in The Breakfast Club (1985), St. Elmo’s Fire, and Pretty in Pink  (1986), among them Demi Moore, Ally Sheedy, and Molly Ringwald. And while most of us do not have public forums for exorcizing our demons, we can relate to McCarthy’s quest for catharsis. While Blum correctly calculated the catchiness of the Brat Pack term, the actors saw the branding as a mixed blessing. While they appreciated their newfound fame, they resented the pejorative term “brat” and the article’s connotation that they were entitled young people who had not paid their dues and did not take the acting profession seriously. Moreover, they were concerned about being typecast and losing out on future roles. Their agents and managers at the time shared these concerns and consequently tried to downplay the “Brat Pack” concept in their clients’ media interviews, and they also imposed some limits on how often the Brat Packers appeared together in public. (READ MORE from Leonora Cravotta: Hit Man Is Destined To Become a Hit) Forty years later, the Brat Pack and their movies have metamorphosed into a cultural touch point for the Generation X’ers and Young Boomers who came of age in the 1980s. The Brat Pack label has also lost its professional sting with time. After all, everyone who was in the Brat Pack or “adjacent” to it is either already over sixty or approaching that milestone. Yet Andrew McCarthy, the fourth male lead in St. Elmo’s Fire and a guy who was not in the New York Magazine article photograph, released a new documentary (Brats) now airing on Hulu in which he talks about the professional  challenges he experienced as a result of this classification. The documentary includes interviews with his former co-stars along with those who worked behind the scenes on Brat Pack productions. New York-based McCarthy was likely not at the Hard Rock the night of the cover photo because he may have been back in New York. Or maybe, he wasn’t that tight with the other LA based actors. One of the three actors (Estevez, Lowe, Nelson) reportedly said of McCarthy to Blum, “He plays all his roles with too much of the same intensity. I don’t think he’ll make it.” Perhaps it was this comment that no one in the media seems to remember that has haunted McCarthy. Nevertheless, the talented actor has worked consistently in front of and behind the camera over the past four decades. He has also built a reputation as a travel writer. McCarthy has leaned into the Brat moniker before, most recently in his 2021 book Brat: An ‘80’s Story, where he discusses his struggles navigating a Hollywood career and his personal life while dealing with self-confidence issues and substance abuse problems.  McCarthy, now 61, was 59 when he decided to create a documentary about the significance of the Brat Pack. How has the label effected the Brat Pack members’ careers and their personal lives? What is their perception of the role of the Brat Pack on the entertainment industry and the broader cultural landscape? What makes Brats so interesting is that since McCarthy’s former co-stars are geographically dispersed, he needed to travel to interview them.  So he took to the road to meet with Emilio Estevez, Ally Sheedy, Demi Moore, and Rob Lowe along with Brat Pack adjacent actors like Jon Cryer, Timothy Hutton, and Lea Thompson. We literally observe him picking up the phone to call former co-stars that he hasn’t spoken with in over thirty years, a humbling experience to say the least. He also interviewed Pretty and Pink Director Howard Deutch, journalist Malcom Gladwell, and other film industry personnel. Interestingly enough, most of the people he contacted said yes, with the exception of Molly Ringwald who wanted to focus on the future and Judd Nelson who made public statements about the fact that he hadn’t spoken to McCarthy in over thirty-five years, an action which shows more about Nelson’s needs than McCarthy’s. The interviews with Demi Moore and Rob Lowe are particularly compelling in that these two “bigger names” saw value in the documentary not just as a project but also as an affirmation of the contribution that the talent pool known as the Brat Pack made to the 1980’s popular culture zeitgeist. Moore was warm but firm with McCarthy when she agreed with him that forty years ago he took things too seriously but admitted that they all did because they were young. She also expressed gratitude  to Joel Schumacher, the director of  St. Elmo’s Fire, for keeping her in the film despite her problems with substance abuse. “He really stuck his neck out for me, it’s not like I had any box office draw….. They paid to have a companion, a sober companion with me 24/7 during the whole shooting. They could have easily just found someone else.” Lowe also expressed gratitude for not only his movie career but also for having had the opportunity to play a role in the changing face of the film industry. “We were so lucky to be in the right place at the right time as the movie business was beginning the transition to where it landed and still exists — which is movies made almost exclusively for 18- to 20-year-olds, every summer movie that’s out is geared towards that audience. It wasn’t always like that. We were there at that time that it began.”  The documentary also includes a  tête-à-tête between McCarthy and David Blum where the writer essentially stated that he was just trying to make a name for himself and that he wasn’t trying to ruin anyone’s career. He also conveyed to McCarthy that the very fact that are still talking about the Brat Pack forty years later is indicative that he helped their careers. In an interview with Vulture  about Brats Blum additionally took issue with  the documentary not discussing the career successes of the Brat Packers. (READ MORE: The Fall Guy Honors Stunt People, Traditional Values) While there are moments in the film where McCarthy sounds like he is whining about a lost opportunity or a slight that seems insignificant to the viewers, on the whole Brats is very watchable. The unpolished rawness of the interviews along with the grainy eighties footage gives the production a friendly accessibility. The viewers feel like they know Andrew McCarthy and we do know him. After all, we have been watching his movies for forty years. And for those of us who came of age in the 1980’s, it is helpful to see him look in the rear view mirror because it enables us to look back as well. And right now, Hollywood 1980’s throw-backs are everywhere with reboots of Ghostbusters,  The Fall Guy. and the soon to be released Beverly Hill Cop. I highly recommend Brats as a nostalgic, introspective conversation between a group of sixty something actors looking back on their twenty-something selves. It is also the story of one man, Andrew McCarthy, and his journey to find peace with himself. And while most of us do not have public forums for exorcizing our demons, we can relate to McCarthy’s quest for catharsis. The post Brats: A Deliberation on Labels and Fame appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

from HopeGirl:  TRUTH LIVES on at https://sgtreport.tv/

by Peter Schiff, Schiff Gold: The longstanding US-Saudi petrodollar agreement is unraveling, with Riyadh inching towards diversified currency deals including the yuan. Our guest commentator sheds light on the history and present challenge to the petrodollar, and what this means for US dollar decline. The following article was originally published by the Mises Institute. The opinions expressed […]

Baseball legend Willie Mays, often considered the greatest center fielder of all time, has passed away. He was 93. “It is with great sadness that we announce that San Francisco Giants Legend and Hall of Famer Willie Mays passed away peacefully this afternoon at the age of 93,” the San Francisco Giants announced. It is with great sadness that we announce that San Francisco Giants Legend and Hall of Famer Willie Mays passed away peacefully this afternoon at the age of 93. pic.twitter.com/Qk4NySCFZQ — SFGiants (@SFGiants) June 19, 2024 “My father has passed away peacefully and among loved ones,” Michael Mays said, according to ESPN. “I want to thank you all from the bottom of my broken heart for the unwavering love you have shown him over the years. You have been his life’s blood,” he added. “24-time All-Star, 12-time Gold Glover, 2-time MVP, World Series champion, Hall of Famer. MLB Network mourns the passing of one of our game’s most iconic figures, Willie Mays,” MLB Network wrote. WATCH: 24-time All-Star, 12-time Gold Glover, 2-time MVP, World Series champion, Hall of Famer. MLB Network mourns the passing of one of our game’s most iconic figures, Willie Mays. pic.twitter.com/gQLCnbm2lN — MLB Network (@MLBNetwork) June 19, 2024 Per ESPN: The “Say Hey Kid” left an indelible mark on the sport, with his name a constant throughout baseball’s hallowed record book and his defensive prowess — epitomized by “The Catch” in Game 1 of the 1954 World Series — second to none. All told, in a career that spanned 20-plus years (1951-73) — most of them with his beloved Giants — he made 24 All-Star teams, won two NL MVP awards and had 12 Gold Gloves. He ranks sixth all time in home runs (660), seventh in runs scored (2,068), 12th in RBIs (1,909) and 13th in hits (3,293). “Today we have lost a true legend”, said Giants Chairman Greg Johnson in a statement. “In the pantheon of baseball greats, Willie Mays’ combination of tremendous talent, keen intellect, showmanship, and boundless joy set him apart. A 24-time All-Star, the Say Hey Kid is the ultimate Forever Giant. “He had a profound influence not only on the game of baseball, but on the fabric of America. He was an inspiration and a hero who will be forever remembered and deeply missed.” WATCH: Simply iconic Willie Mays made The Catch OTD in 1954. #Postseason pic.twitter.com/MUTfw7qkyr — MLB Vault (@MLBVault) September 29, 2020 From the New York Post: He was traded to the Mets in May 1972 at the age of 41 and finished his career in Flushing, retiring following the Mets’ seven-game loss to the Athletics in the 1973 World Series. The Mets, fulfilling a promise made to Mays by then owner Joan Whitney Payson, retired his No. 24 — which had been worn by Rickey Henderson and Robinson Cano, among others — at a ceremony in August 2022. The Giants had retired his number 50 years earlier and Mays became the 15th player in major league history to have his number retired by multiple teams. Despite a lasting image of a sadly diminished Mays falling down in center field while trying to track a fly ball at the Oakland Coliseum in Game 2 of that World Series, he left baseball as a two-time NL MVP and the author of 3,283 hits and 660 home runs, twice hitting as many as 50 in a season. At his retirement his was the third-highest home run total in major league history, behind only Babe Ruth (714) and Hank Aaron, his contemporary who would go on to hit 755 home runs. The winner of 12 consecutive Gold Gloves, Mays, who popularized the basket catch and was renowned for running out from under his cap as he flew around the base paths, was named to a record-tying 24 NL All-Star teams — there were two All-Star games each season from 1960-62 — joining Aaron and Stan Musial. “They invented the All-Star Game for Willie Mays,” said Ted Williams. WATCH:

I keep saying each week and each day that Joe Biden just had his worst moment yet. Each one is true. Until the next day comes and there’s something worse. I’ll prove it to you…. Here’s what Joe Biden just did today: Holy shit! This dude is GONE! pic.twitter.com/M6lxnHW3bE — Brenden Dilley (@WarlordDilley) June 18, 2024 Wow, that’s bad! But is the clip real? Is it edited? After all, that was posted by Brenden Dilley of the Dilley Meme Team. Surely it’s fake, right? Nope: The President just short circuited. No, this is not a joke and yes, this video is 100% real. Joe Biden is mentally unfit for office. It’s incredible/insane that some Democrats are still pretending that this is totally normal.pic.twitter.com/mpyYAmrK7B — Robby Starbuck (@robbystarbuck) June 18, 2024 And one more here: Joe Biden’s brain breaks mid sentence everyday and The White House will keep blaming “deepfakes” Just beyond sad at this point pic.twitter.com/bwCec9wTBL — Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) June 18, 2024 Full video player here if this is easier: Joe Biden’s brain breaks mid sentence everyday and The White House will keep blaming “deepfakes” Just beyond sad at this point pic.twitter.com/bwCec9wTBL — Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) June 18, 2024 Folks, that’s what we call a “short circuit”…. He’s shot! Here’s a summary of his top hits from last week: Did Joe Biden Just “Head-Butt” The Pope? Joe Biden’s very bad week continues…. From Freeze Ups, to Wandering Off, to Falling Asleep, to Word Salads, to Angry Outbursts, it’s been a very bad week for The Resident. But he may have just topped them all….by head-butting the Pope! You can watch for yourself and see what you think. Was it a head-butt? Was it just very close rubbing? Just the tip? Or perhaps Joe was about to topple over and the Pope’s dome held him up? Take a look for yourself as Collin Rugg reports: NEW: President Joe Biden goes in for an intimate forehead to forehead with the Pope at the G7 summit in Italy. Pope Francis appeared to look uncomfortable with the gesture. According to insiders at the G7, Biden’s performance is the “worst” it has ever been, noting that he is “losing focus.” Biden was also seen wandering off at the summit and saluting the Italian Prime Minister as he shuffled around. NEW: President Joe Biden goes in for an intimate forehead to forehead with the Pope at the G7 summit in Italy. Pope Francis appeared to look uncomfortable with the gesture. According to insiders at the G7, Biden’s performance is the “worst” it has ever been, noting that he… pic.twitter.com/o94JTQo8WH — Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) June 14, 2024 Backup video here if needed: Joe Biden rubs his forehead on Pope Francis during the G7 Summit in Italy with the Pope appearing to look uncomfortable. pic.twitter.com/M1QyktsjkR — Oli London (@OliLondonTV) June 14, 2024 The New York Post calls it a “forehead-to-forehead hug”: Heads up, Your Holiness! President Biden embraced a surprised-looking Pope Francis with an intimate forehead-to-forehead hug on Friday during the second day of the G7 summit in Italy. The 87-year-old pontiff had been wheeled into a room of world leaders to take part in a discussion of issues surrounding artificial intelligence, energy and the Africa-Mediterranean region. He is the first pope ever to attend a G7 gathering. Other leaders joining the discussion included Argentina President Javier Milei, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. The 81-year-old Biden, America’s second Roman Catholic president, was scheduled to meet privately with Francis later Friday. A senior administration official told reporters the president and pope were likely to discuss the situation in Ukraine, the Israel-Hamas war, and AI and climate change. As usual, the Dilley Meme Team did not disappoint as they mocked the encounter. Watch here: Biden got a bit too close with the pope -Dilley Meme Team pic.twitter.com/GpNzH6SxSZ — drefanzor memes (@drefanzor) June 14, 2024 And in case you missed it, here’s a recap of Joe’s Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day: Joe Biden Gets Lost At G7 — One Of His Worst! I seem to be saying this a lot yesterday…. “One of Joe Biden’s worst”. But it’s true. The rate at which he is deteriorating already was fast, but recently it seems to be accelerating….and the bad news for Joe is that he didn’t have much margin left to give up! So allow me to show you today’s installment of “One of Joe Biden’s Worst!”…. It comes from the G7 summit where the G7 “Elites” seemed to take a cue from Apple’s WWDC conference and conduct a bunch of ridiculous and unnecessary stunts….in both cases, parachuting! Collin Rugg reports: JUST IN: President Biden appears to start wandering off at the G7 summit and has to be handled back in. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni was seen grabbing Biden to bring him back to the group. This wasn’t the only awkward encounter between the two. Biden was caught on camera saluting Meloni before shuffling away. Clown show. Take a look: JUST IN: President Biden appears to start wandering off at the G7 summit and has to be handled back in. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni was seen grabbing Biden to bring him back to the group. This wasn’t the only awkward encounter between the two. Biden was caught on… pic.twitter.com/xf8NizIVgH — Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) June 13, 2024 Backup video here if needed: NEW: Biden lost his compass again at the G7 summit. pic.twitter.com/lKQu1oXUoh — Megatron (@Megatron_ron) June 13, 2024 But the comments on Twitter are the absolute best part….. Biden missed the show and is still waiting for the jumper: BREAKING: Biden missed the show at the G7 and is still waiting for the jumper. HAHAHAHA pic.twitter.com/DzqLQvlzHZ — Lord Bebo (@MyLordBebo) June 13, 2024 Very appropriate because isn’t one of his (weird) tagline phrases “Don’t jump!” Now I get it! Joe Mannarino says he thinks Biden saw a child in the distance: I’m not sure if Biden saw a child in the distance or what happened, but he just wandered off for no reason. Giorgia Meloni, being the typical Italian caring woman, goes and helps the old demented man get his bearings and points him in the right direction. If this were an… pic.twitter.com/PtjZsN7xlU — Joey Mannarino (@JoeyMannarinoUS) June 13, 2024 Yes, it totally looks like it! How sad when our President has to be escorted back into the group like a toddler that ran away from the daycare pack. And of course we know the other similarity Joe Biden has with toddlers: Did Biden Just Take Another DUMP In His Pants? It's been a really bad week for joe Biden.... Here's a quick recap in case you missed any of these: Joe Biden FREEZES Again! Joe Biden often looks frozen... Slow.... But what I'm about to show you is perhaps his worse yet. While the whole crowd is awkwardly but vibrantly dancing (cringe!) Joe Biden just stands there mouth agape like his batteries are below that 5% mark and he's doing all he can to conserve power for just a little longer! We've all been there... Your phone battery goes below 20% and suddenly goes from the nice green color to the yellow on the battery bar. You pretend like you don't see it. This is fine! But then it ticks below 10% and below 5% and suddenly the yellow has turned to red. Now you're panicking.... Not a charger in sight. Or perhaps you have a charger and no outlet. Either way, you're screwed. At this point, all you can do is start shutting things down. You shut off the WiFi and shut off the Bluetooth.... You turn the screen brightness down to as low as it will go. You kill all open aps. And when you do all of that, my friends, this is the visual representation of what you get: This is the guy that said you aren’t black unless you vote for him. ? pic.twitter.com/NoQ4WHVnmC — Alex Rosen (@iFightForKids) June 11, 2024 Backup video here: Joe Biden emergency low battery! pic.twitter.com/YZDwvV2XjI — DailyNoah.com (@DailyNoahNews) June 11, 2024 Of course he was at least still moving slightly.... Which makes is weird but still not as weird as these three: Why Did Al Roker, Maxine Waters and Shaq All FREEZE On Live TV? Back to Joe Biden.... Fox News had more details: President Biden appeared to freeze during a Juneteenth celebration at the White House on Monday. Biden, 81, was filmed standing still as stone while those around him, including Vice President Kamala Harris, clapped and danced to a concert featuring gospel singer Kirk Franklin. Video shows Biden staring blankly and not moving an inch for about 30 seconds before Philonise Floyd — the brother of George Floyd, whose murder triggered nationwide riots in 2020 — noticed the president and put his arm around him. Biden then smiles as Floyd leans in to say something, and they bump fists after exchanging a few words. Republicans, who have sought to make the president's advanced age an issue in the 2024 election, were quick to deride the president. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. "Why isn't Biden moving?" the Republican National Committee's rapid response account questioned on X. "Lights are on but no one's home," former President Trump's campaign posted. It's been a rough couple of days for Joe Biden.... Did you see this from just yesterday? Are they doing all they can to set up a 25th Amendment challenge? Joe Biden Suffers Most Confused Moment Yet Trying To Get Offstage... Joe Biden just suffered his most confused moment yet while trying to get offstage... I know, I know, that's a very high bar, but I believe this is the worst I have ever seen. He does that confused walk where he turns right, turns left, then shuffles off in one direction with his hands oddly out in front of him, gets to the end of the stage, pauses, turns around, and then starts turning in circles like one of those robot vacuum cleaners that gets stuck in a corner and doesn't know where to go next. Take a look: https://x.com/theflateartherr/status/1800057741173825546?s=46&t=fQPc05aE4Kkb738_xetJBg Some people are convinced it is Jim Carrey playing him in costume.... I can't say for sure. But I can't say it's not either. Tim Pool calls them Cornholio Hands and that is so perfect: Cornholio hands, wtf https://t.co/Oom3VcPyqp — Tim Pool (@Timcast) June 10, 2024 Here's a backup of the video in case you need it. Watch here: He’s doing it again… pic.twitter.com/JBJ3q6hBzL — Matt Gaetz (@mattgaetz) June 10, 2024 Best of call though is President Trump mocking Biden and doing his own impression of him. It's so spot on! Watch here: Trump mocks Biden getting lost on stage. This man is hilarious pic.twitter.com/7rn40rWodq — Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) April 27, 2023 Now back to the whole question about Jim Carrey. Honestly....it's not as crazy as you might think. Check this out: Is Jim Carrey Playing Joe Biden In A "Mask"? Is "The Mask" playing Joe Biden and wearing a Mask? I've waited quite awhile to cover this....years even. But the speculation has certainly been out there. I'm not even saying I'm convinced he is, but I will say this -- I want you to watch this video below IN FULL before you judge. Because this is pretty wild. About halfway through I started to realize this was almost beyond any level of "coincidence" explaining things away. Watch for yourself: https://twitter.com/ronin19217435/status/1747326157236711457?s=46&t=fQPc05aE4Kkb738_xetJBg Backup here if needed: Is Jim Carrey playing Joe Biden in a Mask? Don't judge before you watch this: pic.twitter.com/PIxGdgvWze — DailyNoah.com (@DailyNoahNews) January 18, 2024 It WOULD explain the earlobes problem: Jim Carey also has connected ear lobes@burrylurkin pic.twitter.com/UAp2EzuGRR — Lief Magnus (@LiefMagnus) January 17, 2024 And if. you don't know what that is, look here: How did Joe Biden have free earlobes back then, but has attached earlobes now? pic.twitter.com/EO6VATTBb5 — Old School Republicans (@OldSchoolRepubs) January 11, 2024 The old Joe Biden never had the creepy smile he does now. You know, this one: Have you ever seen them together? you know who else likes to paint Jim. pic.twitter.com/WBPKkmEKcS — SONS OF GOD (@ObeyYaweh) January 17, 2024 And if you think all of this is crazy, then you just don't know your facts. And you most certainly have not seen this: Former CIA Chief of Disguise — “I Briefed Bush Sr. In A Mask And He Couldn’t Tell!” If they could do that in the 1990s, what do you think they can do today? More here: There’s a few. This is one rabbit hole, that I never wanted to go down, until I saw this … pic.twitter.com/uTv42nTMqr — BlueChecksMatter (@CheckThatBlue) January 16, 2024 And now let's recount all the other "weird" things we've witnessed over these last 3 years with Joe Biden's face: The Actor Playing Joe Biden Just Revealed His Mask? Yes, we're going there.... No, I have never ascribed to the theory that all these people are dead, executed at GITMO, and actors and body doubles are playing them. I haven't seen the evidence for that. But I HAVE seen some evidence that very sophisticated masks do exist and I just saw some major new evidence about the Biden mask tonight. So I'm sharing with you. And you can make your own decision after you see this.... Judge for yourself! A new video is going absolutely viral after the Biden mask seems to be exposed. Take a look for yourself: https://twitter.com/laurie_to/status/1646661494824681474 And check out that thumb too! Do you know any thumbs that look like this? More here: Ive never bought into the mask conspiracy as theres no way to know if its true plus it just sounds crazy but after seeing how real these masks look Im an agnostic now. That just doesn’t look right where Biden is itching his neck. What say you? pic.twitter.com/u2r9uaZYdI — Lion of Judah (@LibertyMutual8) April 14, 2023 The most complex military campaign in history? https://twitter.com/FletcherJersey/status/1646615781093044224 Who is under there? Here it is, who is under Biden’s deep fake mask pic.twitter.com/Y41TN8zaNG — Mr. Nobody (@greencostco) April 13, 2023 Some literally believe it is Jim Carrey: I've been trying to tell y'all that Jim Carrey is acting in for Joe Biden right now .. Y'all remember the movie The Mask? pic.twitter.com/o5nl51LQUF — ALL SPORTS ARE RIGGED 2023 (@FormerNFLFan789) April 13, 2023 Now to everyone who thinks this is too crazy, I respectfully suggest you simply don't know what you're talking about. Have you seen this? If they can do it with Eli Manning on the football field, what do you think they can do with a sedentary Joe Biden? Oh, and is this the reason Joe always "calls a lid" by 9am? Do they need to limit the exposure of time in the mask? Suddenly starts to make a lot of sense, right? Just read this and try and tell me it's not possible.....I dare ya! Are Multiple Actors In Fake Masks "Playing" Joe Biden? Ok look, I'll say right off the bat I don' know for sure what's going on with Biden. And I'm not one of these people who thinks he was executed at GITMO 5 years ago and is now replaced by a clone. Not going there. But...being played by an actor? Or by multiple actors? Not far-fetched if you ask me. Especially considering how different he often looks. More on that farther down in this article. But right now I want to show you something that will probably blow your mind if you didn't realize just how good they've gotten with fake face masks. No, I don't mean COVID face masks. I mean, an entirely fake face put on somebody. I saw this clip on ESPN recently of Eli Manning (who is 41) who went "undercover" to Penn State to try and walk on as a college freshman. You know, about 18 years old. And guess what? After the fake face was put on, nobody recognized him! And here's the other part...they did a full day of football tryouts....running around, sweating, moving, hitting, the full deal.  And the fake face stayed on. So is it really that hard to believe Joe Biden is being played by an actor made to "look" like Joe Biden? Think about how often they never let him leave his basement, now why would they want to keep him out of public view so much? First, because he's a walking gaffe machine. But second, you probably wouldn't want to have to put on the fake Biden face too often, would you? I bet not. So keep him out of public view as much as possible before you have to run out the actor? I don't folks, I'm not 100% convinced either way, but here's what I do know after watching this ESPN bit: they have the technology and it's not even that hard. Go ahead and watch this, it's pretty incredible. Watch till the end when he rips the fake face off in front of the whole team and they are stunned. Enjoy: Here's some more footage: And since we're on the topic, here is Julie Green saying "Biden will soon be unmasked". Hmmmm..... Watch here on Rumble: Now let's take a minute to explore all the different "Bidens" and how they all look so wildly different. FAKE ACTOR? Can You Spot The Real Joe Biden? Is this the same man in all 4 photos? Let's dig in to a very serious question, shall we? What is going on with Joe Biden? That's a very open-ended question that could take hours to unpack, but let's just talk about his looks and mannerisms. Is this the same guy from a few years ago? I wonder. And so do many of you because I get your emails and videos. On that note, a big "thank you" very much to my friend Mark who sent me this video. It's a comparison of Joe Biden in 2006 vs. now. The differences are stunning! Of course you have the shocking mental decline but you also have a man who sounds a lot more like a Republican back in 2006. Watch this and then keep reading for a deep dive into just how many different "Bidens" there seem to be! Is this the same man? Even Sean Hannity is talking about it! But first, watch this from Rumble: Now let's dig in deeper... I'm not making any conclusions here, I'm simply reporting. I report, you decide. Anyone else think Joe Biden looks a little...."different"....than he used to? Of course we all look different as we continue to age. Reminds me of one of my favorite Mitch Hedberg jokes: But let's get serious for a moment. Because seriously, Joe Biden does NOT look much like the guy from 10-15 years ago. My friend Daniel just posted this video and I had to share it with you: https://twitter.com/dnajlion7/status/1377340773763411968 If you're having trouble seeing that, you can watch it here on Rumble: Wanna take it one more level deeper? Many people are saying the last photo in that video sure does look like Jim Carey pretending to be Joe Biden. What do you think: But it's not just "conspiracy theorists" on the Internet asking questions. Sean Hannity is even starting to question it. Watch this recent segment where he asks "What happened to Joe?" Are there two Joes? Watch Sean here on Rumble: What do you think? Leave a comment below. Want to dive in even deeper? Let's look at an even older clip of Joe Biden and you tell me if this is the same guy currently pretending to be President..... Watch: "How are you gonna keep it from us being able to be in a position where you can manipulate the machines, manipulate the records?... I think we should pass a federal law mandating that the same machines with paper trails be mandatory for every federal election" -Joe Biden, 2007 pic.twitter.com/0fWOVRHXFX — Fleccas (@fleccas) December 15, 2020 And since Twitter will no doubt be taking that post down very soon, don't worry I saved a backup! From Rumble: Beyond the incredible admission, people are rightly pointing out that the Biden of today does not look or sound much like the Biden of 13 years ago. Take a look for yourself: https://twitter.com/Hobocrow1/status/1338960601066872832 And here: Not the same guy!! pic.twitter.com/cy1fQC7nyR — Koen (@Koen_84) December 15, 2020 What do you think? They sure do look different to me! And while we're on the topic of Biden's admissions (perhaps from a guilty soul?) let's revisit this: BIDEN ADMITS TO VOTER FRAUD! @JoeBiden brags about having the “most extensive VOTER FRAUD organization” in history WATCH pic.twitter.com/ft7u07kUX0 — Kayleigh McEnany (@kayleighmcenany) October 24, 2020 Even a liar tells the truth sometimes! Mostly when his cognitive ability has declined so much he can no longer keep all the lies straight. What do YOU think? Zoom in: From Fake Biden we move to Fake Whitehouse? Biden Caught AGAIN Posting From Fake Oval Office Set! Is He Not In The White House? It happened again folks. Joe Biden posting videos and messages from an obviously FAKE White House set. We've covered this before here: Biden Caught AGAIN Using a Fake White House Set! And here: Biden Mocked for Using Fake White House Set with Digital Windows, Rose Garden But it just happened again and it's getting REALLY weird. This all begs the simple question: if you have access to the REAL White House, why do you need to create a Fake set somewhere else? But let's back up a minute and address the so-called "Fact Checkers". Or as I like to call them, the Ministry of Propaganda. Because they don't truly "fact check" jack shit. Their sole job is to try and sway a story and confuse the public from what is obvious truth. Exhibit A? We'll let's go right to a "Fact Check" on the whole Fake White House story from back in October when this first broke. Back in October, WeLoveTrump was one of the first in the Media to jump on the story of the Fake White House set. Before it was common news, we posted here at WeLoveTrump that the window behind Joe Biden looked very odd...almost cartoonish in coloration. Very shortly after that post it was being widely reported that it was indeed a Fake Set of the White House. In fact, here is one of the photos which was a total BOMBSHELL when it was first released.  It very clearly shows the Fake Set: Nothing is real with these people, it’s all smoke and mirrors. But we’re supposed to entrust them with all of our personal health decisions? pic.twitter.com/9N5FPYm7pI — Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) September 29, 2021 And this: If you go to Facebook to this very day, this is what you see when you load that photo. "MISSING CONTEXT". Hilarious folks.... It's a picture and we can all determine the context with our own two eyes! But the Ministry of Propaganda has to TELL YOU what you can think... They have to TELL YOU what your eyes are seeing... So sad. Here's another one: Oh what do you know...more "Missing Context". Friends, let me key you in on a little truth... I'll translate this for you from Facebook-speak to Plain-English Truth. Ready? Missing Context = this is actually 100% true and even we can't BS enough to label it false so we're going to find some minor detail or idea we make up and claim that due to something that has 0.01% impact on the story it is "Missing Context". Hope that helps. But it's not just FakeBook and their propaganda... Let's now go to Reuters who published this "fact check" back in October: Any rational human-being reading that report would conclude it must be fake news! See (says Normie Poindexter)....See!  I told you it was fake news that Biden was on a fake White House set! Except....keep reading. Let's just skip down to the END of the article where they admit (1) he WAS in fact on a film set, and (2) it wasn't in the White House at all, it was in the Eisenhower Building! Look: Compare that first section with the last section... Even within their own article they are caught lying! And yet these bastards hold themselves out as Fact-Checkers. GIVE ME A BREAK! I've had massive dumps in a toilet that hold more truth that your garbage fact checks. But I digress... Let's get back to the story and advance the ball because the Fake Set was just used again! Here is the new photo released by the White House which they claim is a photo of his call with Ukrainian President Zelensky: I spoke with Ukrainian President Zelenskyy to discuss our coordinated diplomatic efforts and reaffirm our support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. We will respond decisively — along with our Allies and partners — if Russia further invades Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/hRaUIxyxCd — President Biden (@POTUS) January 28, 2022 Yes, note that is the official Twitter account. Notice anything weird? It's those weird cartoonish colorized windows again! And what do we see outside them? TREES WITH LEAVES! Of course, I don't need to tell you that it's winter in D.C. and no trees have green leaves on them right now. But just in case, here are two photos from live feeds of the White House taken today and yesterday: Right, no leaves. Winter time. Why in the world would you need to build a FAKE OVAL OFFICE set? The obvious answer is because you don't have access to the genuine article. Make of that what you will. Follow up question: why do they KEEP doing it? My theory is when they did it the first time, they never thought they would get caught. We were one of the first to notice and start asking questions, so we take pride in being on the front end of this story. After they were caught, I think they had two choices:  (1) lie about it and claim it didn't happen, or (2) embrace it and keep doing it and pretend like it was intentional. They clearly went with Choice #2. Even Newsweek was brought in to carry water for the second option. Check out this load of propaganda they published trying to explain why they just HAD to create a Fake Oval Office: Why was a fake Oval Office built? The event space is being used for White House events that are being broadcast. The area is bigger than the actual Oval Office, and provides an area for journalists. Martha Kumar, director of the White House Transition Project explained that this room in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building is being used more regularly due to it being more accessible. Previously, the room known as Room 450 was used for such media events. "You have to slug your way up flights of stairs because the small elevators would hold only a limited number of people," Kimar explained to the Washington Examiner. "That means you often had to walk. White House staff, as well as presidents, would have to make their way there, too, though they had the luxury of an elevator. With its easy access, the South Court site was welcomed by all." While former White House events director Josh King explained that the use of the new area is down to "PoliOptics." "Every week in Washington has an element of theater and stagecraft, one side or another working to take full advantage of visual storytelling," King told the newspaper. "Presidents can fly on Air Force One across the country—or even around the world—for a photo worthy to print on the top of the fold of U.S. newspapers." King said that the South Court Auditorium is usually a "generic, stadium-style meeting room with four or five rows of seats; space in the back of the room for cameras sitting on tripods; a small buffer area in front of the stage for still photographers to capture the key moment; and handy backstage doors for easy ingress and egress by the principals." LOL, ok thanks Newsweek. Got it...they just had to create a Fake Set because the other one had too many stairs! How long did it take to come up with that line of BS and how many people sat around a table spitballing ideas until you decided that was the best one to run with? Maybe I'm being too tough. Maybe it's true! I'll turn it over to you....what do YOU think? WATCH: A Glimpse Into Biden's Fake White House Set Why does he even have this thing? Many theories abound, but there can only really be a handful of logical reasons why someone would need a fake staged set to mimic the real thing... Stephen Miller claims that it is a set built around the use of a teleprompter. I too think that it has something to do with Biden's reported cognitive decline, but I am not sure if the teleprompter is the exact reason. Let's take a look, and let us know what you think the deal is behind this creepy staged set: I’m never speechless but this is insane! Can you imagine if Trump had a little stage set built for him to mimic the White House?President Trump worked in the real White House took hard questions & didn’t use sticky notes! Shame on the media for keeping it silent. @Thatdoll86 pic.twitter.com/NyHL3vOSIk — Sara (@skb_sara) April 1, 2022 The reason Biden uses this bizarre virtual set for televised meetings—and not an actual room like East Room, Cabinet, Oval, Roosevelt, Sit Room, etc.—is because it allows him to read a script directly from a face-on monitor (& w/out teleprompter glass that can be seen on camera). https://t.co/Uc4Ly9kL7T — Stephen Miller (@StephenM) October 6, 2021 The New York Post comments: Twitter erupted after Biden was spotted sitting in front of the digital projection window on Wednesday as he held a meeting with business leaders and CEOs on the need to raise the debt ceiling. Some ridiculed Biden for using a “literal game show set” as president, while others accused him of deliberately trying to deceive Americans into thinking he was in the White House.   Biden, 79, uses 'cheat sheets' to answer press questions on his 'unscripted' call for Putin to be ousted in Russia No one has yet provided a good explanation as to why the Biden administration has a stage set of the White House in a studio across the street from the real WH — Gordon (@StopTheCoup2020) March 29, 2022 https://twitter.com/DBark46107258/status/1509627433296674832 Fox News states: The video set, which was constructed across from the White House in the South Court Auditorium in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, is used by Biden for video conferences and events broadcast online. Featuring professional monitors and lighting.