They destroyed the system. Bankrupted it. And it's someone else's fault?-----DPS sickouts a symptom of Lansing's ill behavior

DPS sickouts a symptom of Lansing's ill behavior
"We're tired.
Tired of the political machinations some Lansing lawmakers indulge in while Detroit children's futures remain in peril and Detroit Public Schools teachers fear they'll lose their too-meager paychecks.
Tired of the lack of urgency exhibited by nearly everyone involved in the so-called fix for DPS, which we can't help but read as widespread lack of concern for Detroit kids' futures.
...What questions, you ask?
Lawmakers are, ostensibly, concerned that the spendthrift district will squander its state-granted $715 million, a notion that fits comfortably into the stereotype of Detroiters' profligacy (and let's get real, by "Detroiters," what's meant is "African Americans") but neatly overlooks the reality of DPS:
The district has spent the better part of this century under state control.
It's still under state control, with former U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Steven Rhodes the latest in a succession of leaders who have failed to fix the district's financial — much less academic — problems.
Those problems, you'll note, have grown worse...."
Always someone else who done them wrong.....

Cruz: 'Behind The Donald Trump Mask Is Hillary Clinton' | Daily Wire

Cruz: 'Behind The Donald Trump Mask Is Hillary Clinton' | Daily Wire:

"They agree with each other on issue after issue after issue. They’re both big government New York liberals. They’re both Washington insiders. Hillary has made millions selling power and influence in Washington, and Trump has made billions buying politicians like Hillary Clinton," said Cruz of the two front-runners.

Saying that Americans are tired of “bipartisan corruption” encapsulated by Trump and Clinton, Cruz pointed to his “positive, forward-looking, and optimistic campaign.”

In 6 Months Since Budget Deal: Debt Up More Than $1 Trillion

In 6 Months Since Budget Deal: Debt Up More Than $1 Trillion:
"In the six months that have passed since then-retiring House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell cut a budget deal with President Barack Obama that suspended the legal limit on the federal debt until March 15, 2017, the federal debt has increased by more than $1 trillion.
The Senate passed “The Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015” with a vote held in the early morning hours of Friday, Oct. 30. Obama signed it on Monday, Nov. 2.
At the close business on Oct. 30, 2015, the total federal debt was $18,152,981,685,747.52.
By the close of business on April 28, 2016—the latest date for which the Treasury has published the number--the total federal debt was $19,186,207,744,589.55.
That is an increase of $1,033,226,058,842.03..."

The cliff?-----Puerto Rico’s Debt Crisis Deepens as Government Misses Payment

Puerto Rico’s Debt Crisis Deepens as Government Misses Payment - WSJ:
"Puerto Rico’s debt crisis moved into a more perilous phase for residents, lawmakers and bondholders Monday after the Government Development Bank failed to repay almost $400 million.
The missed principal payment, the largest so far by the island, is widely viewed on Wall Street as foreshadowing additional defaults this summer, when more than $2 billion in bills are due.
Together with the spread of the Zika virus, the risk of cascading defaults is putting new urgency on bipartisan negotiations in Washington over legislation granting the U.S. territory new powers to restructure more than $70 billion in debt...."

Lunch video-----British Airways - Building the 787-9 Dreamliner

Noon-toon

BREAKING: Tenn. Defies LGBT Bullies, Makes MASSIVE Move to Protect Christians

BREAKING: Tenn. Defies LGBT Bullies, Makes MASSIVE Move to Protect Christians:

"Another state has taken a brave stand against the forces of LGBT political correctness: This week, Tennessee signed into law a major religious freedom act that allows therapists to refuse clients if their lifestyle and life goals violate their “sincerely held belief(s).”"

Lying Hillary. Lying media-----One Year of Silence on Hillary Clinton Uranium Deal

One Year of Silence on Hillary Clinton Uranium Deal - Breitbart:
"For more than a year, the mainstream media has failed to ask Hillary Clinton some very basic questions about a series of extremely troubling deals.
Why?
Last Spring, my book Clinton Cash was released and it initially set off a media maelstrom.
...The Times went on to note that the book was hardly a hysterical attack on the Clintons, but rather, “mainly in the voice of a neutral journalist” who “meticulously documents his sources, including tax records and government documents.”
Things got worse for the Clintons a few days later when two New York Times Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporters, Jo Becker and Mike McIntire, took two of the most explosive chapters in the book and did their own digging.
What they found confirmed what I had reported.
They ran a 3,000-word, front-page article in the paper confirming that:
–Bill and Hillary Clinton had helped a Canadian financier named Frank Giustra and a small Canadian company obtain a lucrative uranium mining concession from the dictator in Kazakhstan;

• The same Canadian company, renamed Uranium One, bought uranium concessions in the United States;
• The Russian government came calling and sought to buy that Canadian company for a price that would mean big profits for the Canadian investors;

• For the Russians to buy that Canadian company, it would require the approval of the Obama administration, including Hillary’s State Department, because uranium is a strategically important commodity;
• Nine shareholders in Uranium One just happened to provide more than $145 million in donations to the Clinton Foundation in the run-up to State Department approval;
• Some of the donations, including those from the Chairman of Uranium One, Ian Teler, were kept secret, even though the Clintons promised to disclose all donations;
• Hillary’s State Department approved the deal;
• The Russian government now owns 20 percent of U.S. uranium assets.

In short, here was what you might call a radioactive scandal.
It included secret donations, the Russian government, foreign financiers, more than $145 million, and Bill and Hillary Clinton. 
And this was just two chapters of the book.
And yet, one year later, Hillary Clinton has never once been asked about this controversial uranium deal by the national media.
...It is remarkable that in the year following the release of Clinton Cash and a 3,000-word article on the front page of the New York Times confirming these facts, that no one in the media (save Mr. McElveen) has been interested in asking Hillary Clinton about this troubling uranium deal."

Your tax dollars at "work".-----Hey ‘white people’: you have a ‘way of life problem,’ and Mizzou Faculty Council has videos telling you how to shape up

Blog: Hey ‘white people’: you have a ‘way of life problem,’ and Mizzou Faculty Council has videos telling you how to shape up:
Hey ‘white people’: you have a ‘way of life problem,’ and Mizzou Faculty Council has videos telling you how to shape up

By Thomas Lifson

Does the University of Missouri have a death wish?  
In the wake of capitulating to race grievance demonstrators, Mizzou is already experiencing a decline in applications so severe that it is closing four dorms and a drop in donations that is causing a financial crisis.  Although the faculty no longer includes Melissa “I need some muscle” Click, apparently race-obsessed leftists still occupy positions of power.

The university’s Faculty Council Committee on Race Relations is digging an even deeper hole for the school.  Carly Hoilman of TheBlaze reports:

The University of Missouri’s Faculty Council Committee on Race Relations released a video series this week that aims to educate students and faculty about racism on campus, Mizzou’s student newspaper, the Maneater, reported.

Committee member Craig Roberts, a Mizzou plant sciences professor, said that the target audience of these videos will be white faculty, the lessons will be applicable for the while community as a whole.

The committee apparently is aiming not at overt expressions of racism, but rather:

Mak[ing] Mizzou a “safe and welcoming place for everyone” by developing “tools and strategies to assist the faculty” in understanding and and working to correct “misunderstandings about race and ethnicity.”

The committee has released five videos. In the first video, Roberts regretfully notes that around 1,500 of Mizzou’s two thousand full-time faculty members are white. He calls racism “a way of life problem” for the school’s community.

Check out one of the videos for yourself:

Glenn Reynolds, the Instapundit, hits the nail on the head:

So they really haven’t learned their lesson yet.

There is only one way they will ever learn.  Mizzou depends on the GOP-dominated state legislature for its funding.  
The legislature has the power to defund entire departments, and tenure does not protect professors whose departments are closed.  
Academia has been out of control for generations now, alienated from the society that sustains it, insisting on its privileges and entitlements.  
Nothing would do more to “encourage the others” (in Napoleon’s famous words) than defunding entire departments."

Good guys vs Bad guys-----Know Thy Enemy: a Classier Take on Class Warfare

Know Thy Enemy: a Classier Take on Class Warfare - Texas Millennial Institute:
"In case you didn’t know it, the ultra-rich are widely vilified—particularly within movements such as Occupy Wall Street and the political campaign of Bernie Sanders, which has captured the hearts of many a burgeoning millennial.
...So, let’s explore that claim, which points to some nuances of wealth, and try to determine whether it is true.
Is wealth predicated upon adverse exploitation?
For dictators, slave-owners, shysters, and others of their ilk, the answer is certainly “yes.”
It is important to note, however, that there are essentially two ways a person can make money. 
Herein lies the nuance.

• You can either create a product or provide a service that people are voluntarily willing to exchange money for, creating trade-based value; 
• or you can employ coercive, unjust means to make a profit—wherein money ceases to reflect the creation of value, but rather the plundering thereof."

Some rich people deserve our scorn, but most of them do not.
Placing all rich people in one category blinds us to the crucial distinction inherent in how money can be made. 
The only people who deserve to be vilified for their money are the ones who acquired their money unjustly—whether through cronyism, fraud, rent-seeking, or predation.⁠2
...Steve Conover, who created the above graphic, writes:
“Focusing on the right enemy would present a target-rich environment that includes anyone (of any income level) who is cheating to win,

• any business or union (of any size) with its snout in the public trough, 
• any politician filling that trough and feeding those snouts for reciprocal gain, 
• and any group using the political system (at any level) to maintain its monopoly, or its winning ‘edge’ against less-well-connected competitors.⁠

“Among ‘the rich’ are many entertainment superstars, artists, CEOs, inventors, and entrepreneurs who got where they are because they produced things that entertain us, make us more productive, save us money, or save us time.
Can we really say with a straight face that all of them are villains because of their huge incomes?..."

TapWires - Cruz Out Maneuvers Enraged Fmr Gov Jan Brewer - In Her Own State - Secures Delegate Landslide

TapWires - Cruz Out Maneuvers Enraged Fmr Gov Jan Brewer - In Her Own State - Secures Delegate Landslide:

"Apoplectic – the single word to describe the reaction of former AZ Governor Jan Brewer when she found out that the team Cruz had out maneuvered her in her own state and nailed down an impressive landslidey of delegates to the GOP National Convention in Cleveland beginning July 18th.  Naturally the defeated Trump supporters joined former Governor Brewer in crying foul but - the rules were the same for everyone and Cruz bested them, not with sleight of hand but with a common sense approach that relied on simple math."

Unions. Liberals.-----Detroit teachers sickout closes most schools today

Detroit teachers sickout closes most schools today - Crain's Detroit Business:

"A mass sickout has forced the Detroit Public Schools district to close 94 of its 97 schools.
The move by the Detroit Federation of Teachers was announced Sunday, a day after the district's transition manager said the district will have no money to continue paying teachers this summer without further funding from the state.
...The district's state-appointed transition manager Steven Rhodes said 45,628 of approximately 46,000 students were forced to miss classes Monday as 1,562 teachers called in sick.
Detroit's schools are expected to be out of cash starting July 1.
The state earlier gave the district $48.7 million in emergency funding to keep it open through June 30 as the Legislature considers a $720 million restructuring plan.
...Teacher strikes are illegal under Michigan law. 
Sick-outs earlier this year caused tens of thousands of students to miss class."

AM Fruitcake

History for May 3

History for May 3 - On-This-Day.com:
Niccolo Machiavelli 1469 - Italian philosopher/writer, Golda Meir (Golda Mabovitch, Golda Meyerson) 1898 - Fourth Prime Minister of the State of Israel, Bing Crosby 1903 - Singer, according to Bing Crosby his birthday is May 2nd, his birthday is actually May 3 


Sugar Ray Robinson (Walker Smith Jr.) 1921 - Boxer, James Brown (James Joseph Brown, Jr.) 1928 - Singer, Frankie Valli 1934 - Musician (The Four Seasons) 


1921 - West Virginia imposed the first state sales tax.


1937 - Margaret Mitchell won a Pulitzer Prize for "Gone With The Wind."


1944 - Dr. Robert Woodward and Dr. William Doering produced the first synthetic quinine at Harvard University.


1952 - The first airplane landed at the geographic North Pole.


1971 - James Earl Ray, Martin Luther King's assassin, was caught in a jailbreak attempt.


1992 - Five days of rioting and looting ended in Los Angeles, CA. The riots, that killed 53 people, began after the acquittal of police officers in the beating of Rodney King.


1999 - Mark Manes, at age 22, was arrested for supplying a gun to Eric Harris and Dylan Kleibold, who later killed 13 people at Columbine High School in Colorado.


2000 - The trial of two Libyans accused of killing 270 people in the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 (over Lockerbie) opened.

Cruz: Both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton ‘Think Planned Parenthood Is Wonderful’ | TheBlaze.com

Cruz: Both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton ‘Think Planned Parenthood Is Wonderful’ | TheBlaze.com:

"In an interview on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” which aired Sunday, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz suggested that Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump and Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton are more alike that many have suggested.

When discussing his recent decision to appoint former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina as his running mate, the candidate explained his hope that a Cruz-Fiorina ticket would provide a clear alternative for conservative voters."

NYPD Using 'Nuisance Abatement' Law To Force Small Businesses To Install Cameras, Agree To Warrantless Searches

NYPD Using 'Nuisance Abatement' Law To Force Small Businesses To Install Cameras, Agree To Warrantless Searches | Techdirt:

"...Under the guise of policing "nuisance businesses," certain precincts are targeting minority-owned businesses -- usually small bodegas, laundromats, etc. -- with abatement actions that force owners to either lose their source of income or capitulate to the NYPD's overreaching demands.
One business owner was hit with a "nuisance abatement" action -- one which could lead to his laundromat being closed for at least 30 days -- after undercover officers twice sold stolen goods to store customers. 

Sung Cho's laundromat had nothing to do with either sale, other than being open for business when the sales were made. 

Despite Cho's lack of culpability in the selling of stolen goods, the NYPD portrayed his business as a "facilitator" of illegal activity and hit his store with a restraining order.

As Ryley reports, the nuisance abatement program is prone to abuse, what with its one-sided court process (NYPD files complaint and asks for restraining orders without notifying the business owner or allowing them to challenge the orders) and very loose definition of "facilitation." 

While the statute does provide that business owners must be given a chance to challenge an order within three business days of being presented with it, the NYPD routinely serves orders on Thursday or Friday, forcing businesses to close over the weekend, normally their busiest sales days..."

Watch the Final Moments of These Incompetent ISIS Fighters

Watch the Final Moments of These Incompetent ISIS Fighters | The Daily Sheeple
When ISIS first swept across the Middle East, they seemed like an unstoppable juggernaut. 
They really lived up to their propaganda.
Every town and city they came across swiftly fell under their draconian rule, as bumbling Iraqi soldiers failed to contain them, and the overwhelmed Syrian military failed to send them packing.
These days however, ISIS seems to be in disarray.
They’re short on cash and short on supplies. And as this video shows, they’re also short on competent fighters.
Vice News recently obtained headcam footage that a Peshmerga soldier had picked off of a dead ISIS fighter.
This is the current state of ISIS.
Their fighters are scared, poorly trained, and utterly incompetent.

Confederate Monument to be Removed from University of Louisville After 120 Years | TheBlaze.com

Confederate Monument to be Removed from University of Louisville After 120 Years | TheBlaze.com:

"After years of debates, the University of Louisville in Kentucky made the decision Friday to remove a Confederate monument from the spot it has held near campus since 1895.

The stone monument, which had been erected to honor the Kentucky soldiers who fought and died for the Confederacy during the Civil War, subsequently will be moved to a different location, according to the Associated Press. Capping the monument stood a statue of a Confederate soldier, as well."

We are erasing our history.
We are doomed to repeat it.

No, slavery didn’t build America

No, slavery didn’t build America. | Intellectual Takeout:
"It’s a popular narrative, but history doesn’t support it.
...Southerners also relied on connections in the North for imported goods.
The South became, economically if not formally, a kind of colonial dependency of the North.”
That isn’t the description of strength that one would think would come from a region employing the “peculiar institution” that America supposedly was built upon.
Instead, it would appear that a region dependent upon enslaving others ended up enslaving itself to a free North.
...In 1860 the North had over 110,000 manufacturing establishments, the South just 18,000.
The North produced 94 percent of the country’s iron, 97 percent of is coal and – not incidentally – 97 percent of its firearms.
It contained 22,000 miles of railroad to the South’s 8,500.
The North outperformed the South agriculturally as well.
Northerners held 75 percent of the country’s farm acreage, produced 60 percent of its livestock, 67 percent of its corn, and 81 percent of its wheat.
All in all, they held 75 percent of the nation’s total wealth.”
That final statistic combined with the North’s victory in the Civil War should be sufficient to dispel the idea that America was built on slavery. 
Keep in mind, too, that not all of the wealth in the South was generated by slaves. 
Free men in the South also worked their own fields and industries.
The truth is, America was primarily built on the industry of free people.
Slavery was a terrible thing that went against the founding ideals of the country.
Nonetheless, we do not need to create false narratives to know it was wrong and to have sympathy for both those who lived through it and for those who carried the scars forward.
Indeed, it does damage to one’s cause to push a false narrative that cannot stand up under scrutiny and calls in to question any other statements one makes as well as the agenda for making them."

'Safe place' set aside for those upset at campus talk on transgenderism's threat to liberty

'Safe place' set aside for those upset at campus talk on transgenderism's threat to liberty - The College Fix
Matt Walsh appearance prompts need for safe space
This Thursday, members of the UC Santa Barbara Young Americans for Liberty are slated to host popular conservative writer Matt Walsh for a talk titled “An Encroachment on Liberty: How the Left Exploits Transgender Laws.”
Students offended by the topic, instead of simply not attending the speech, have gone a step further — and organized a “safe place” for the same time as the talk.
“Recently, the transgender community in Isla Vista [where UCSB is located] has been the target of hateful, abusive, and belittling statements and gatherings,” organizers state in announcing their counter event on Facebook.
“In response and as a sign of solidarity, there will be a free meal at St. Michael’s [Episcopal] University Church.
This Cinco de Mayo-themed meal will be a safe place for all who identify with or support the transgender community,” the announcement states.
...Organizers of the upcoming talk have indicated it promises to be something of an academic discussion not on the choice of transgenderism per se, but rather on how it is affecting our entire nation — an interesting legal and societal topic worthy of consideration by all stripes.
Said organizers: “[I]n the last couple years we have seen *the state* force businesses and citizens to, e.g., create “gender neutral” restrooms, or to pay for sex reassignment surgery, or to not ‘misgender’ someone on pain of a fee of $250,000, etc..."

Lunch video-----White People are paying Reparations!

Lunch video-----Hillary Clinton A Career Criminal

Noon-toon

Cruz Offers ‘Common Sense’ Response to Caitlyn Jenner’s Critiques Regarding Transgender Bathroom Laws | Video | TheBlaze.com

Cruz Offers ‘Common Sense’ Response to Caitlyn Jenner’s Critiques Regarding Transgender Bathroom Laws | Video | TheBlaze.com:

"Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz appeared on CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday, where host Jake Tapper asked him to respond to transgender celebrity Caitlyn Jenner’s critique that his objections to transgender people being allowed to use whichever bathroom they want is unfounded."

Seattle Citizens’ Trash Now Safe From Unwarranted Government Snooping

Seattle Citizens’ Trash Now Safe From Unwarranted Government Snooping - Hit & Run : Reason.com:
"A judge has ruled that snooping trash collectors in Seattle cannot simply go through garbage bins without any sort of warrant to determine whether its citizens are putting food in the wrong place.
It's a win for the property-rights-focused lawyers of the Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF).
The Foundation brought suit last year on behalf of a Seattle citizen over a law that mandated that no more than 10 percent of a resident's "regular" trash bin contain food waste. 
The food was supposed to go into the yard waste bin so that it could be composted.
Rather than simply asking residents to do this, the city decided to make it a law and mandate fines. The fines were minor—$1 per container violation—but nevertheless enforcement required permitting the guys picking up trash to snoop through containers to look for compliance..."

Obama Unveils New Gun Control Plan, Including ‘Smart Gun’ Requirements and More

Obama Unveils New Gun Control Plan, Including ‘Smart Gun’ Requirements and More | TheBlaze.com
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama announced new steps Friday to help curb gun violence, including by identifying the requirements that “smart guns” would have to meet for law enforcement agencies to buy and use them as well as sharing mental health records with the federal background check system.
Smart guns use various technologies to prevent an accidental shooting or help track down a missing gun.
“These common-sense steps are not going to prevent every tragedy, but what if they prevented even one?” Obama wrote in a Facebook post. “We should be doing everything we can to save lives and spare families the pain and unimaginable loss too many Americans have endured.”
As Obama unveiled a plan last January to expand federal background checks for gun purchases, he directed the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security and Justice to conduct or sponsor research into smart-gun technology.
Obama also instructed the agencies to regularly review the availability of such technology and to promote its use..."

This Childless Author Thinks All Women Deserve Maternity Leave

This Childless Author Thinks All Women Deserve Maternity Leave  - Us Weekly
Childless author Meghann Foye has come under fire.
The reason: She believes that maternity leave is, in her words, a “time and space for self-reflection.”
...“After 10 years of working in a job where I was always on deadline, I couldn’t help but feel envious when parents on staff left the office at 6 p.m. to tend to their children, where it was assumed co-workers without kids would stay behind to pick up the slack,” wrote Foye.
That’s when the 38-year-old dreamed up the term “Meternity,” which she describes as “a sabbatical-like break that allows women and, to a lesser degree, men to shift their focus to the part of their lives that doesn’t revolve around their jobs.”
The New Jersey-based writer also feels that parents have an advantage in the work place..."

ICE Director Says 'Sanctuary' Policies Put Agents At Risk | The Daily Caller

ICE Director Says 'Sanctuary' Policies Put Agents At Risk | The Daily Caller:

"Immigration and Customs Enforcement director Sarah Saldana acknowledged on Thursday that “sanctuary city” polices put federal immigration officers at risk, but she declined to support measures that would force local law enforcement agencies to scrap them.

“Does the sanctuary city program put your field personnel at more risk than they would be otherwise?” South Carolina Rep. Mick Mulvaney asked the Obama appointee during a contentious House Oversight Committee hearing."

Steyn on Big Climate and its ever more naked hostility to free speech and intellectual inquiry.

A Se'nnight of Steyn, April 25-May 1 :: SteynOnline:
This week The New Criterion posted Ben Weingarten's in-depth interview with Steyn on Big Climate and its ever more naked hostility to free speech and intellectual inquiry. 
Here's their exchange on the similarities between the Islamic supremacists and the climate mullahs:

If you enjoyed that, you can watch the full Steyn/Weingarten interview here.

AM Fruitcake