Just Humming Along

Nature 1 Minute

Humming birds are amazing birds and one of my absolute favorites!

Hummingbirds are the only birds that can fly in different directions. They can hover forward, backward, sideways, in mid-air, and even upside-down! They can also fly in the rain and shake their heads off to remove drops of water. What is incredible though is that they can shake their heads as fast as 132 times per second and rotate up to 202 degrees. And they can do all of this while flying!

Hummingbirds have a very fast metabolism, which is nearly 100 times faster than that of an elephant.

They eat nectars and insects such as ants, gnats, mosquitoes, and wasps the entire day just to survive. These hummers can feed every 10 to 15 minutes and scout between 1,000 and 2,000 flowers every day for food.

Don’t judge them by their size as hummingbirds have speed and stamina. They have been clocked in direct flights at about 30 mph and in courtship dives at 45 mph. In addition, their heart can beat up to 1,200 times per minute when flying and 225 times at rest. And their wings? Well, they can flap to as fast as 70 times per second on a regular flight and 200 times when diving.

Once a hummer has found a food source, it will return yearly. We generally begin to see ours in mid-April (depending on the warmth) and they depart in September. Our neighbor once told us that the hummers would fly to his windows in the spring and “say hello” and that’s when he knew it was time to get his feeders out. (Although hummers have no sense of smell, bears do and in early spring the sweet smell of the sugar water attracts bears, so we take our feeders in every evening.)

We found that in the mornings, the hummers will indeed fly at the window to “announce” they are up and to signal they are ready for breakfast…LOL

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Published by pat frederick

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133 thoughts on “Just Humming Along”

  1. Good morning y’all! Still need to clean my feeders and make some nectar for them. Got my roof vent installed yesterday and my body is paying for it today! The attic is cramped and getting out on the roof sucked. Wore a safety harness, but got sealant all over everything. Will have to clean it up when I pressure wash the roof next weekend. Anyhow, took a sick day today to deal with being sore and to tie in the elctrical outlet for the range hood.

    Liked by 3 people

        1. us too…
          a friend from the borough office i worked at, swore you had to cook it and so forth…
          we never did…and we get dozens of hummers every year…

          Liked by 1 person

  2. Morning All!
    wow! I overslept…but then I was awakened in the early morning by a noise–and hubby was sleeping too soundly to wake him…so i lay there fretting about it for a couple of hours…lol…
    being it’s spring, i thought bear or raccoons were destroying the deck, but i don’t see anything so far…

    Liked by 2 people

  4. so maybe the moving on tweet was the deal is gonna be hashed out so i’m moving on to the next thing?

    FTA
    Twitter is in discussions to sell itself to Elon Musk and could finalize a deal as soon as this week, people familiar with the matter said, a dramatic turn of events just 10 days after the billionaire unveiled his bid for the social-media company. The two sides met Sunday to discuss Mr. Musk’s proposal and were making progress, though still had issues to hash out, the people said. There are no guarantee they will reach a deal.

    https://citizenfreepress.com/breaking/twitter-could-finalize-deal-with-elon-musk-this-week-wsj/

    Liked by 2 people

        1. I saw a Tweet about that within the last couple of days…..not sure I can find it now. Sorry about the source – first one that popped up.

          EXCERPT: “In a tweet on Friday, the Tesla CEO admitted that he asked Gates if he was short-selling shares of the electric carmaker. When investors short a stock, they are betting that the price of the asset will fall.

          “I heard from multiple people at TED that Gates still had half billion short against Tesla, which is why I asked him, so it’s not exactly top secret,” Musk said in the tweet.

          He was responding to a Twitter user’s question on whether a screengrab of a supposed text conversation between the two billionaires was real.

          The Tesla chief’s response was: “Yeah, but I didn’t leak it to NYT. They must have got it through friends of friends.”

          https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/23/elon-musk-tweets-that-he-confronted-bill-gates-about-shorting-tesla.html

          Liked by 1 person

          1. thanks Filly…
            I am incredibly dense on the stock market…how do you “own” shorts if you’re betting the stock will fall?
            do you place an order with a brokerage firm that says if tesla falls to (made up number) $50 a share buy half a billion of them?

            Liked by 1 person

            2. PR just posted this: “JUST IN – Twitter said the platform is on track to reach deal with Elon Musk as soon as today, Bloomberg reports.

              Reuters reports that Twitter is poised to accept Musk’s offer to purchase the company.

              Twitter shares jump as deal talks enter “final stretch”.

              @disclosetv

              Liked by 1 person

  6. wow…whatever this woman is smoking is too strong for her brain…she’s “demanding” a $30/hour MINIMUM WAGE…and she’s running for office…
    FTA
    A Democratic socialist candidate for Congress in Washington State is proposing a $30 minimum wage, saying that the current push for a $15 minimum wage is an “antiquated demand.”

    Rebecca Parson, who’s running for Congress in Washington’s 6th district, tweeted on April 21 that the minimum wage should be increased to $30.

    “$15 minimum wage is an antiquated demand. It should be $30 per hour,” Parson tweeted.

    Parson added that “$30 is the floor,” and called on people to reflect on why they “punch down on poor people” while praying to “Saint Elon.”

    “1 adult supporting 1 kid needs $30 an hour across the country. Rural, urban, suburban: $30 is the floor. As you say your nightly prayers to Saint Elon while you fall asleep tonight, reflect on why you punch down on poor people instead of up at your heavenly billionaire,” she added.

    https://www.foxnews.com/politics/washington-state-democratic-socialist-candidate-30-minimum-wage

    Liked by 2 people

      1. right???
        $30 an hour to make HAMBURGERS at mcd’s…does she know how that will drive prices and inflation up?
        freaking clueless
        minimum wage is not supposed to be a living wage–it’s supposed to be a STARTING wage–to compel people to better their education or experience and MOVE UP…not be satisfied at the bottom. teenagers, people who want a second job, retired people…
        a person who scoops ice cream should not be making $62,000 a year!

        Liked by 1 person

  7. just noticed the red envelope on the table and I remembered something that happened on Saturday.
    Every year, the day after Thanksgiving I mail out my Christmas cards–been doing this for as long as i can remember. Talking to my mom that weekend, she informed me my cousin had moved…oh well, i thought. the post office will forward the card to her new address.
    It did not.
    Saturday, 5 MONTHS AFTER i mailed it, it was returned to me…unable to forward.
    for the love of pete…

    Liked by 1 person

  9. Liked by 1 person

  11. You know I love Hummers but they were supplanted by the Orioles the last few years. Since my Oriole feeder is broken beyond repair……maybe I’ll go back to concentrating on the Hummers…..or maybe not. Just not feeling it this year.

    Besides their amazing flying abilities, I like their spunk – they are fierce!!!! I’ve talked before about the Hummers when I was working as an editor from home. I had the feeder hanging right outside my window and they would fly up to the screen and hover, darting back and forth, just chattering away at me, hoping to scold me away.

    Liked by 1 person

    2. last summer, we had dozens visiting at the same time…we have 4 feeders.
      I took the one feeder off the hook and held it by the hook. the hummers scolded me briefly, but when i stood still enough they landed on the feeder just fine.
      then i held the feeder in my palm…and i got them to sit on my fingers cupping the feeder—they are sooo light…

      Liked by 1 person

  12. EXCERPT: “Breakdowns of voter demographics by pollsters, while not definitive, also indicate trouble ahead for the political class, with Le Pen appearing to have beaten Macron decisively in the battle for the working-class vote and either defeating or just barely falling short of him among Millennials aged 25 to 34 — a demographic often derided as insufferably “woke” in other Western European countries and the U.S.

    Interestingly, Le Pen may have edged out Macron among voters aged 50 to 59 as well — a segment of Generation X which made many of the same sacrifices as baby boomers but did not reap the same financial rewards, and today face persistent pressure from “fiscal conservatives” who want their state retirement age to be raised.

    The affluent and the oldest generations already enjoying the fruits of retirement, perhaps unsurprisingly, seem to have voted decisively for Macron, as have Generation Z voters aged 18 to 24 — although these “zoomers” are seemingly more open to Le Pen than their grandparents, with roughly four in ten estimated to have backed her.

    18-24-year-olds also appear to have skipped voting in the largest numbers of any age cohort, with Le Monde putting abstentions at 41 per cent.”

    https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2022/04/25/sea-change-le-pen-wins-big-among-working-class-big-share-millennial-vote/

    Liked by 1 person

  13. we officially caught our first carpenter bee of the year.
    we bought these traps late last summer, and they were expensive. but they work like the nuts!
    it’s a small glass jar under a wooden box. there are holes drilled at an upwards angle that the carpenter bees fly into but cannot seem to figure out how to get back out. then they drop into the glass jar below.
    the instructions say to leave a dead bee in there and that scent attracts more…

    Like

  14. Entire article @ BB: “A dog in Cornelius, North Carolina, set out on an important mission at Robbins Park on Tuesday when some ducklings found themselves in a tight spot. Charlie is a flat coat retriever who loves accomplishing tasks for his master, Queen City News reported Wednesday.

    “He’ll do anything you ask him to do. He’ll deliver newspapers when he walks by somebody’s house. Or he’ll carry flowers to somebody if you ask him to do it,” explained his owner, Jorge Serrano. Flat-coated retrievers were described as tireless, trainable lake hunters who specialized in retrieving downed waterfowl, according to the American Kennel Club’s (AKC) website.

    “Flat-Coats were once Britain’s most popular retriever, before being overtaken by Labs and Goldens, and was once called the ‘Gamekeeper’s Dog’ because of its widespread use on the sprawling estates of the English gentry,” the club said. Video footage from last year showed the breed being presented to judges: [Video removed due to copywrite]

    Meanwhile, Serrano said Charlie was always ready to help, but what he rescued from a storm drain at the park got him a lot of attention. Neighbors watched as several ducklings fell into a drainage hole at the center of the pond and Serrano knew exactly who to ask for assistance.

    “I just thought, Charlie’s a pretty good guy. Maybe he could go through the pipe and get them,” he commented. Charlie immediately went into the drain and brought each duckling out one at a time while neighbors reunited them with their mother.

    “It makes me really proud. I’d like to take credit for training him but really, he’s just a smart guy that wants to please. And he’d do it for anybody,” noted Serrano.

    The following day, the hard-working Charlie went back to the scene and looked in the drain, checking for any stragglers. In addition, the AKC characterized the flat-coated retriever as cheerful, optimistic, and good-humored.”

    Liked by 1 person

  15. Entire article @ DC: “Twitter is reportedly closing in on a deal to sell itself to Tesla CEO Elon Musk after weeks of publicly battling Musk over his initial offer.

    An agreement could be reached as soon as Monday as the board negotiates with Musk over his $46.5 billion offer to buy the social media platform, The New York Times (NYT) reported, citing unnamed sources. The board reportedly met Sunday to discuss the offer. The deal could possibly fall through, the NYT reported.

    The social media platform has been unable to nab a ‘go-shop’ provision in its potential agreement with Musk that would allow Twitter to solicit other offers even after the deal is signed, Reuters reported, citing unnamed sources. Twitter, however, could still accept a different offer so long as they pay Musk a break-up fee, Reuters reported. Twitter shares jumped 4.5% in pre-market trading Monday, according to Reuters.

    Musk originally offered $43 billion to buy Twitter but recently announced he secured $46.5 billion to pay for his offer, totaling $54.20 per share, according to Securities and Exchanges (SEC) filings released on April 20. Musk would finance the offer with the help of several banks who will provide him with debt to finance the deal, the SEC filings revealed. Musk would provide his own $21 billion in cash while receiving an additional $26 billion in debt from Morgan Stanley, Bank of America and Barclays, The Wall Street Journal reported.

    Twitter’s board has pushed back against the bid from Musk, adopting a “poison pill” which is a shareholder rights plan limiting a single shareholder from purchasing too many shares and forcing the company into a sale. Musk responded to the measure by tweeting that should the “Twitter board take[s] actions contrary to shareholder interests, they would be breaching their fiduciary duty.”

    “The liability they would thereby assume would be titanic in scale,” Musk said.”

    Liked by 1 person

  16. Entire article @ DC: “Florida police released the bodycam footage from a wedding where multiple guests fell ill after eating cannabis-infused food.

    The video shows Seminole County sheriff’s deputies questioning guests and the groom after several guests were transported to the hospital after ingesting cannabis-infused food at the wedding in Springs Clubhouse, Longwood, Florida in February. At least one person is being taken away on a stretcher by emergency service personnel as the video opens.

    The sheriffs then tell the catering company to stop packing away their equipment and to take several containers back inside the property. “We all have been affected somehow … by what was put in the food,” someone tells the officers.

    “We’re trying to figure out who put it in the food, whether it was a guest or the catering company,” the officer responds before someone points them in the direction of the bride and groom. Before he talks to them, the officer tells the guest, “I would not drive in your condition,” and instructs them to hire a rideshare service.

    “Apparently, supposedly, your food had cannabis inside of it when your guests ate it. Did you guys authorize that?” the officer asks two people who are reportedly the bride and groom. “I have no idea,” one man responds, who may be the groom, according to the Daily Beast.

    “I just need a yes or no… did you guys authorize it for the catering company? To have cannabis placed in the food?” The officer asked. The alleged groom then suggests that people at the wedding had their own edibles.

    All of the guests’ faces are blurred in the video except for the bride, Danya Glenny, who can be seen smiling throughout the interrogation. Glenny and the caterer, Joycelyn Bryant, were subsequently charged with tampering, culpable negligence and delivery of marijuana after law enforcement found Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) in lasagna and bread served at the wedding.”

    Liked by 1 person

  17. Entire article @ DC – Victor Davis Hanson: “America these last 14 months resembles a dystopia. It is becoming partly the world of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, and partly the poet Homer’s land of the Lotus-Eaters. Nothing seems to be working. And no one in control seems to care. The once secure border of 2020 vanished. Two million people have crossed the southern border illegally in the last 12 months. Millions more are on the way. The Biden administration unilaterally and simply destroyed existing immigration law.

    What followed was surreal. The administration claimed COVID was again on the horizon. So it justified forcing American citizens to keep wearing masks in public buildings and transportation. But at the same time, it waived all such requirements for illegal entrants. Citizens who obeyed our laws had to mask up; foreign nationals who broke them did not need to take such precautions.

    Biden blasted mounted border guards who used long reins to steady their horses as near-criminals. When investigations cleared them of wrongdoing, he went mute. This administration apparently sees its own American law enforcement at the border as criminals, and non-Americans who break our laws as their moral superiors.

    Biden then concocted the perfect recipe for bringing back the inflation of the 1970s. Print more money. Run up multitrillion-dollar annual deficits. Borrow trillions on top of a $30 trillion national debt. Send generous checks to workers for staying home. Shrug at historic disruptions of the supply chain. When reminded that his deliberate policies are the classic roads to inflation, Biden went fetal and ignored the warnings. Or he lashed out and blamed anyone and anything for his own suicidal agendas.

    First, we heard inflation was transitory. Then it was a mere concern of the elite. Then it was only a matter of exercise equipment being in short supply. Then it was solely because of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Then, somehow, it was also the result of former President Donald Trump. Then it was an organic phenomenon that presidents had little power to stop.

    America was energy independent until the arrival of the Biden administration. On the orders of his Green New Deal masters, Biden immediately began canceling federal oil and gas leases. He stopped new pipelines. He jawboned against the private financing of fossil-fuel production.

    Biden was hellbent on his way to fulfilling his campaign promises of eliminating the use of natural gas and oil on his watch. Then prices soared and the public grew irate. In response, still more incoherence followed. The administration would not reverse its destructive energy policies. But as it floundered in desperation, Biden begged American enemies Iran, Russia and Venezuela to pump more oil on our behalf. In vain, it beseeched Saudi Arabia to produce more of the hated icky stuff that we had in abundance but would not fully produce ourselves. Biden tapped the strategic petroleum reserve. Yet the existential peril was not war or natural catastrophe but Biden himself and his far more dangerous policies.

    Abroad, we looked at the relatively manageable situation in Afghanistan and simply fled. The terrorist Taliban quickly took over and restored its medieval rule. The administration abandoned a $1 billion embassy and dumped a $300 million refitted airbase at Bagram. Over $70 billion in military supplies and weapons were left for Taliban terrorists. Thousands of refugees were airlifted, may not have been properly vetted, and were transported into the United States. Meanwhile, hundreds of known translators and helpers of the U.S. military were left behind.

    As public outrage grew, in typical Biden fashion, he blamed the Afghanistan debacle on his generals. Then he blamed Trump. Then he denied that he had ever claimed the war was going well. In the end, the public was told the humiliating flight was a near-perfect logistical evacuation, as if America should be proud of being better at running away than it is at fighting.

    What explains an America that suddenly no longer works? First, all of these problems are self-induced. They did not exist until Biden birthed them for ideological or political reasons. Apparently, his administration wanted a changing, more favorable electorate and demography at any cost. Perhaps Biden was privately happy that cash-short commuters had to burn less gasoline. Maybe the more he printed money, the more he would be rewarded politically.

    Second, Biden has no solutions to these self-created problems because of the ideological restraints the Left has imposed on him. The administration fears the anger of the hard left more than the furor of the American people. So it will not change, preferring to be politically correct and a failure than to be ideologically incorrect and successful.

    Third, when people object, this administration answers either by blaming others for its self-created mess or by seeking distractions. Now it is faulting gun owners for the crime wave it fostered, supposed “white supremacists” for the racial tensions it fanned, and Putin, whom it appeased.

    The common denominator? Biden knows that he inherited a stable, prosperous America and has nearly ruined it. And he knows the American people know that too.”

    Liked by 1 person

  18. From NBC News:

    EXCERPT: “CAMBRIDGE, Neb. — Wind-driven wildfires sweeping through parts of Nebraska killed a retired fire chief and injured at least 15 firefighters, authorities said Sunday. The man who died Friday night was a retired Cambridge fire chief who was working with firefighters as a spotter in Red Willow County in the southwestern corner of the state. That fire had burned more than 78 square miles (202 square kilometers) in Red Willow, Furnas and Frontier counties by Sunday afternoon.

    The Nebraska Emergency Management Agency said firefighters were still working to contain that large fire Sunday, and officials didn’t have an estimate of how much of it had been contained. Alyssa Sanders, with NEMA, said 66-year-old John P. Trumble, of Arapahoe, was overcome by smoke and fire after his vehicle left the road Friday because of poor visibility from smoke and dust. His body was found early Saturday.

    At least 15 firefighters have been injured battling the blazes, including five who were hurt in the fire that killed Trumble, but a spokeswoman said the state agency didn’t have details about their injuries.”

    https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/nebraska-wildfires-kill-ex-fire-chief-hurt-15-firefighters-rcna25785

    Pic from Wildfire Today: “A retired fire chief died in a Nebraska fire that has burned 41,155 acres in the southwest part of the state. The Road 702 Fire is west of the towns of Cambridge and Wilsonville and has crossed both US 34 and State highway 89. About 1,500 acres of the blaze is in Kansas.”

    Liked by 1 person

        1. Talked to her a few minutes ago – it’s all good – she didn’t even see any smoke! She is at the Capitol building in Lincoln – she took a busload of 3rd graders and was getting ready to go get them and take them to lunch. Fun, fun! LOL – she loves it!

          Liked by 1 person

  19. NYC claims about 70 teachers used fake vax cards to keep their jobs and is putting them on leave WITHOUT pay. the teachers union vows to fight the DOE about it…snicker, snicker
    FTA
    “Fraudulent vaccination cards are not only illegal, they also undermine the best line of protection our schools have against COVID-19 – universal adult vaccination. We immediately moved to put these employees – fewer than 100 – on leave without pay,” a DOE spokesman said, according to PIX11 News.

    The teachers union told the DOE to rescind its accusations and is prepared to legally challenge the DOE’s action.

    https://www.dailywire.com/news/nyc-accuses-dozens-of-teachers-of-showing-fake-vax-cards-teachers-union-fights-back

    Liked by 1 person

    1. TBH, I’m kind of surprised – I would have thought the Union would be on-board with required jabs…..they were all spouting off about it and “keeping our teachers safe,” after all!!!!

      Liked by 1 person

    1. Hi kea!
      once i see one here, I will wear y bright reds, yellow or purple shirts outside when i sit on the swing…they get right in your face…LOL

      Liked by 1 person

  22. LOL

    Trump says Prince Harry is “whipped” by Meghan Markle

    “I’ve been a very good predictor, I’ve predicted almost everything, it will end, and it will end bad,”

    Liked by 1 person

  24. EXCERPT: “President Joe Biden’s plan to compensate the families of 9/11 victims suing the Taliban could be a windfall for a Democrat-aligned law firm that employed Hunter Biden.

    Joe Biden in February announced an executive order that awards $3.5 billion in assets seized from Afghanistan’s central bank to a group of families of 9/11 victims who sued the Taliban. The law firms representing the families could make tens of millions of dollars in legal fees. One of the firms is Boies Schiller Flexner, where Hunter Biden served for several years as counsel. The firm’s three founders contributed a combined $174,000 to Joe Biden’s presidential campaign and the Biden Victory Fund, according to campaign finance records.

    Several factions—American military veterans, the families of other 9/11 victims, human rights groups, and Republican lawmakers—have blasted the executive order. They say Biden improperly bypassed the U.S. Victims of State Sponsored Terrorism Fund, which Congress created to compensate all terrorism victims. Instead, critics say Biden’s plan will compensate a few select families with high-powered lawyers. More than 400 veterans and military families this month called on Biden to reverse the executive order and distribute the Afghan money through the Victims Fund.

    Critics of the executive order have focused on the role of Lee Wolosky, a lawyer for the 9/11 families who recently served as White House counsel on Afghanistan issues. Wolosky, a partner at the firm Jenner & Block, in February signed a court brief urging a federal judge to lift a hold on the $3.5 billion payment to the 9/11 families. Two Boies Schiller Flexner partners, Stuart Singer and David Barrett, also signed the brief as co-counsel for the families. Wolosky was a partner at Boies Schiller Flexner until 2020.

    Rep. Jim Jordan (R., Ohio) said the Biden connections to both Wolosky and Boies Schiller Flexner raise concerns about the executive order.

    “The conflicts of interest here show how Democrats are all connected in the ‘Swamp,'” Jordan, the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, told the Washington Free Beacon. Jordan has asked the White House for records about Wolosky, saying the lawyer’s stint in the administration creates the “perception of impropriety.”

    Hunter Biden served as a consultant for Boies Schiller Flexner from 2011 to 2017. He brought the firm one of its most controversial clients, the Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings. Biden served on the board of the scandal-plagued company while his father led the Obama administration’s anti-corruption efforts in Ukraine.”

    https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/hunters-law-firm-could-cash-out-on-bidens-controversial-order/

    Liked by 1 person

  25. Entire article @ FB: “A “coalition of Wisconsin residents” that has been running TV attack ads against Sen. Ron Johnson (R.) is a front for a massive dark money group based in Washington, D.C., according to corporate registration records.

    Opportunity Wisconsin said it has pumped at least $4 million into negative Johnson ads—including one on Friday blasting him for benefiting from a tax cut he helped pass—making it the most prevalent anti-Johnson group on the state’s airwaves. On its website, Opportunity Wisconsin bills itself as a “coalition of Wisconsin residents fighting for an economy that works for all Wisconsinites, not just the wealthy few” and touts a steering committee composed of state-level progressive activists.

    But Opportunity Wisconsin doesn’t actually exist on paper. The name is a business alias for the North Fund, which is more than 600 miles away in Washington, D.C. The North Fund filed to conduct business under the name “Opportunity Wisconsin” in January 2020, according to D.C. corporate records. Opportunity Wisconsin did not respond to a request for comment.

    The North Fund’s prominence in the competitive Wisconsin race shows the Democratic Party’s increasing reliance on dark money groups, even as Democratic candidates claim those groups invite corruption and give the wealthy and corporations outsized influence over elections. Democrat-aligned dark money groups significantly outspent Republican-aligned groups during the 2020 elections, according to an analysis by the New York Times.

    Unlike super PACs and other campaign committees, the North Fund isn’t required to disclose its donors. The North Fund is managed by Arabella Advisors, a progressive, for-profit consulting firm that has “funneled hundreds of millions of dollars through a daisy chain of groups supporting Democrats and progressive causes,” the New York Times reported last year.

    President Joe Biden vowed to crack down on dark money spending during his campaign, while raking in more than five times as much anonymous funding as President Donald Trump in 2020. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) claimed that dark money TV spending amounted to “voter suppression” and argued that “dark money has been an obstacle to progress for America’s working families” in a speech last year.

    Johnson’s campaign spokesman Jake Wilkins slammed the group as a “poorly built front for dark, liberal Democrat money” and claimed it has been “running ads misleading Wisconsin voters about Ron Johnson’s personal finances and his successful record on tax reform.”

    Wisconsin lieutenant governor Mandela Barnes, the frontrunner in the state’s Democratic Senate primary, has repeatedly decried anonymous political spending, saying in February that “dark money has no place in democracy.”

    The primary also includes hedge fund billionaire heir Alex Lasry and Wisconsin treasurer Sarah Godlewski. The winner will face Republican incumbent Johnson in what is expected to be one of the most competitive Senate races of the election cycle.”

    Liked by 1 person

  26. EXCERPT: “Less than a decade ago, my high school hosted a naturalization ceremony. Each time a new citizen, donned in red, white, and blue apparel, approached the stage to receive his certificate of citizenship, the rowdy crowd of hundreds of teenagers—myself among them—broke into irreverent but welcoming and patriotic chants of “USA! USA!”

    Those days are long gone. National pride fell to an all-time low in 2020, with just 20 percent of American adults ages 18 to 29 saying they were “extremely proud” to be an American, according to a Gallup poll. And though the coronavirus pandemic and protests following the death of George Floyd factored into that number, the poll marked the sixth consecutive year of decline in patriotism.

    The right blames this trend on progressivism and, more recently, critical race theory. But is CRT really to blame for this drastic shift in anti-American sentiment? Jonathan Butcher offers a guidebook on the subject in Splintered: Critical Race Theory and the Progressive War on Truth.
    ———————–
    Butcher proposes ways to thwart critical pedagogy in the classroom. While Butcher rejects bills to ban the 1619 Project and other readings, he calls for state lawmakers to propose legislation to uphold First Amendment rights to assemble and speak freely. Teachers should not force students to admit privilege, adhere to a set of principles with which they disagree, or attend Black Lives Matter protests for a grade.

    A model curriculum to counter critical pedagogy includes lessons on American civics. Such standards would prepare students to answer questions like those included in the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ test: What rights are protected in the first 10 amendments? What document claimed American colonies were free from British rule? Most Americans today cannot answer these basic questions, according to several studies Butcher cites.

    Students should learn about America’s failure to live up to its ideals, from slavery to Jim Crow laws to Japanese internment, Butcher says. But they should also know these failures don’t reveal fault lines in our founding principles. Rather, they show shortcomings of some individuals’ own morality.
    ————————-
    Splintered proposes an off-ramp to progressive movements working to derail the American experiment. It offers a renewed sense of hope and pride in American principles and institutions. It’s enough to make you want to chant, “USA! USA!”

    https://freebeacon.com/culture/the-plot-to-undermine-americas-institutions/

    Liked by 1 person

  27. EXCERPT: “With Democrats in a bind as midterms approach, the worst of them have turned to sleazy tin-pot-dictator measures to disqualify popular Republicans from the ballot itself, knowing they can’t win otherwise.

    They’ve already put Georgia’s popular Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene in the dock (See Andrea Widburg’s thoughts on that here). Now it turns out they were also active in Arizona, seeking to prevent Reps. Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar, as well as Republican state rep. Mark Finchem, who is running for secretary of state, in charge of counting elections, from putting their names on the ballot. In their case, though, a state judge called bee ess and shut the whole kabuki down.

    According to Newsweek:

    ‘A judge in Arizona rejected an effort to prevent GOP Representatives Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar from 2022 midterm election ballots on Friday, asserting that the “plaintiffs have no private right of action” to disqualify the Republicans over their actions related to the January 6, 2021, attack against the U.S. Capitol.

    A lawsuit was filed against Biggs, Gosar and GOP state Representative Mark Finchem, contending that the three Arizona Republicans should not be allowed to appear on the ballot — alleging they are not permitted to hold office due to their participation in an “insurrection.” Many Democrats and some Republicans have called the attack by former President Donald Trump’s supporters against the U.S. Capitol an “insurrection.’

    He didn’t want to waste time on this crap. And his legal reasoning, that “plaintiffs have no private right of action” to disqualify others from running, was as clear as day. After all, if they did have such a right, anyone could shut down other candidates over whatever spurious concern bothered them or whatever unproven crime they could cook up, and then no one could run at all. That would be some fine democracy for us, wouldn’t it?

    Seeking to disqualify candidates is hardly new. Barack Obama got his political start using this technique, invalidating signatures of rivals in 1996 to knock them off the ballot, leaving himself as the only viable candidate as he won his first statehouse seat in Illinois. What is new, however, is that instead of signatures, leftist operatives are employing vague charges of “insurrection” and “January 6” in a new and desperate effort to halt the coming red wave, which is exactly what Venezuela’s tropical Marxist dictators, Hugo Chávez and his successor, Nicolás Maduro, once did. They too howled about “insurrection” and “unrest” to knock their rivals off the ballots. It worked great for them — and the result is “Venezuela,” where no one has any meaningful vote at all. I wrote about that here.
    ———————
    That’s what this is ultimately about: whether or not a voter can choose whom he wants to vote for. The voters love Biggs and Gosar. Democrats who are trying to shut them down are ultimately trying to shut down their voters, which is very much within the Chavista playbook. One hopes the crisp legal reasoning of this Arizona judge rings out to the other trial on this that is going on in Georgia.”

    https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2022/04/arizona_state_judge_shuts_down_leftist_junk_lawsuit_to_disqualify_reps_andy_biggs_and_paul_gosar_from_the_ballot.html

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    1. if he makes certain changes–removing some of the anonymity–a lot will leave–they feel safe now trolling and being mean behind screen names and aliases…

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    1. there’s so much crap he could buy…LOL

      I remember not too long ago, when some organization said with all his $$ he could end world hunger (was it the who?) and he offered $6BILLION if they presented him with a plan and details on where the $$ would go…they did not respond.

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              3. This March 10 article says 7 but I heard someone on Fox say, more than once, it is 8 so….another recent baby, I guess.

                EXCERPT: “Elon Musk’s brood just keeps growing.

                The Tesla mogul and his on-again, off-again partner, Grimes, secretly welcomed their second child together, a baby girl named Exa Dark Sideræl, via surrogate in December 2021.

                The unusually named tot, who goes by Y, joins Musk’s six other children: Griffin, Xavier, Kai, Saxon, Damian and X.

                Meet the billionaire businessman’s kids and their mothers below.”

                https://pagesix.com/article/elon-musk-children/

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              6. OMG! His first child died!

                “After marrying in January 2000, Musk and Canadian author Justine Wilson welcomed son Nevada Alexander Musk in 2002. Nevada died of sudden infant death syndrome, or SIDS, at only 10 weeks.

                After losing their firstborn, Musk and Wilson turned to IVF to grow their family. She gave birth to twin sons Griffin and Xavier Musk in April 2004. The boys are now 17.

                Kai, Saxon and Damian Musk:

                The former couple also used IVF to welcome triplet sons Kai, Saxon and Damian in January 2006. The trio are now 16.

                Musk and Wilson divorced in 2008 and share custody of their five sons.

                After two marriages to “Westworld” star Talulah Riley and a brief relationship with actress Amber Heard, Musk started dating singer Grimes in May 2018. She gave birth to their son, X AE A-XII, in May 2020. X is now 1.

                X was originally named X Æ A-12, but “Æ” and “12” violated California law for not being part of the English alphabet, forcing his parents to change his name.

                Page Six exclusively reported in September 2021 that Musk and Grimes had broken up.

                Exa Dark Sideræl Musk
                Grimes revealed in March 2022 that she and the SpaceX founder had welcomed his first daughter, Exa Dark Sideræl Musk, via surrogate in December 2021. She was given the nickname Y after their other child being named X.”

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      2. The problem is making sure all of that $$$ doesn’t get stolen along the way, and that requires honest and decent organizations to distribute it. That’s another HUGE elephant in the room on this issue.

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