Maricopa County Judge Recuses Himself from Election-Related Case Due to Activist Brother’s Social Media Posts Denigrating Republican Election Lawsuits

Judge

Opposition is increasing to the judges assigned to handle election related lawsuits in Arizona, as their biases are being revealed. After Arizona Senate Majority leader Warren Petersen (R-Mesa) and House Speaker Ben Toma (R-Peoria) requested that Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Tim Ryan recuse himself from their lawsuit challenging the state’s Election Procedures Manual (EPM) because of his progressive activist older brother’s posts on X, Ryan voluntarily recused himself. 

The Arizona State Senate Republican Caucus issued an announcement praising the recusal. “His brother, Tom Ryan, is a liberal attorney who plagues social media with his contempt for the Republican-controlled Arizona Legislature with an incessant number of juvenile posts,” the statement said. “There is no way anyone who has witnessed the antics of Judge Ryan’s brother, which included case-specific criticisms and commentary, can credibly believe that Judge Ryan could give the Legislature a fair trial.”

Read the full story

Retired Lawyer Files Ethics Complaints Against Maricopa County Judges Who Were on the Election Ballot Yet Ruled Against Election Challenges

Retired attorney A.S. Martin, who has closely followed the election illegalities in Arizona, filed bar complaints against 12 Maricopa County Superior Court judges who ruled on election lawsuits in 2020 or 2022 despite being on the ballot themselves for retention elections. Martin said she believes this is a conflict of interest and self-dealing since the judges had an interest in upholding the election due to wanting to retain their seats. Usually, judges easily win retention elections, but this past year was different, since progressives targeted some of them, causing three judges to lose their elections.

Read the full story

Republican Candidates Need Not Apply: Media Tracker’s New Study Shows Just How Politically Biased Google’s Search Results Are

Google has long been accused of suppressing conservative speech, but a new study shows the internet search engine giant is playing favorites with Democrats in the 2024 presidential race.

By typing in just one query, “Presidential campaign websites,” Google returned only Democratic Party candidates — some of whom are not even running in 2024, according to Media Research Center, the media watchdog and parent of conservative news site NewsBusters, which is “committed to exposing and combating liberal media bias.”

Read the full story

Commentary: The Clear and Present AI Danger

Does artificial intelligence threaten to conquer humanity? In recent months, the question has leaped from the pages of science fiction novels to the forefront of media and government attention. It’s unclear, however, how many of the discussants understand the implication of that leap.

In the public mind, the threat either focuses narrowly on the inherent confusion of ever-better deep fakes and its consequences for the job market, or points in directions that would make a great movie: What if AI systems decide that they’re superior to humans, seize control, and put genocidal plans into practice? That latter focus is obviously the more compelling of the two.

Read the full story

Court: Virginia Parents’ Lawsuit Can Continue Against Loudoun Schools over Bias Incident Reporting Form

School buses

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit reversed the dismissal of a lawsuit made by Loudoun County, Virginia, parents against their public school system over a bias reporting system, which they argue could chill their children’s freedom of speech.

The appeals court overturned a lower court decision to dismiss the lawsuit Friday, saying that the case against Loudoun County Public Schools’ based on student’s First Amendment rights could continue in federal court.

Read the full story

Arizona Election Attorney Says Trial Court Judge in Kari Lake’s Case Should Consider Recusing Himself from Hearing Case Again

The Arizona Supreme Court rejected part of the lower two courts’ rulings throwing out Kari Lake’s election contest, remanding it back to Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Peter Thompson for a new trial, but there are concerns Thompson will not provide a fair trial. An election attorney in Phoenix who prefers not to be identified due to fear of retaliation, told The Arizona Sun Times that due to the perception that Thompson might be biased, he should consider recusing himself if he cannot otherwise overcome that perception of bias.

The attorney said, “The courts rarely rule in favor of these Republican election challenges, so the fact that both the Arizona Supreme Court and the Arizona Court of Appeals reversed some of Thompson’s opinion raises a concern that Thompson may have overreached, overstepped, and some may believe that’s a sign of bias. And unless he believes he can overcome that concern with not only assurances of fairness, but actual rulings guaranteeing fairness to Lake including access to ALL requested signature verification discovery, then he should seriously consider recusing himself; otherwise, it may hurt the chances of him providing a fair trial if he doesn’t and it turns out he’s biased. Remember, everyone across the country is watching this case. He should do the right thing either by guaranteeing fairness, or put everyone at ease by removing himself.” 

Read the full story

FBI Keeps Getting Burned by Reliance on Liberal Sources

A dossier alleging Russian collusion funded by a Democrat presidential candidate. A suggestion that school parents were domestic terrorists from a left-leaning school board group. A list suggesting old-fashioned Catholics were extremists from a liberal watchdog on hate speech.

Three triggers for investigation. Three blunders that left America’s premier law enforcement agency reeling with a black eye.

Read the full story

‘Twitter Files Part 4’ Details How Platform Changed Policy Specifically to Ban ‘Trump Alone’

The fourth entry in the ongoing “Twitter Files” series of explosive revelations dropped on Saturday night, with part four in the series focusing on the removal of Donald Trump from the popular social media platform in early 2021. 

The latest thread, published by writer Michael Shellenberger, details the process that “Twitter executives” took as they were “build[ing] the case for a permanent ban” against the former Republican president. 

Read the full story

Twitter Removes Warning Flag on ‘Just the News’ Ballot-Harvesting Story After Direct Appeal to Musk

Elon Musk

Twitter has removed its warning label on a post from the account of Just the News editor-in-chief John Solomon about his story on a whistleblower alleging ballot harvesting in Florida, following Solomon’s direct appeal to the platform’s new owner, Elon Musk.

Solomon made the post Thursday that included a link to his interview with the whistleblower. The label was put on the post Friday, and as of Monday morning, it was no longer there.

Read the full story

Elon Musk Vows to Review Why Just the News Story Was Censored

Twitter owner Elon Musk on Sunday said he would “look into” why a story from Just the News about election ballots was marked as “unsafe” on the social media platform.

“I will look into this. Twitter should be even-handed, favoring neither side,” Musk tweeted early Sunday morning in response to Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton, who posted the Just the News article, “Election ‘misinformation’ policing returns as Twitter flags JTN ballot harvesting report.”

Read the full story

‘Leftist Mindset’: DeSantis Rips Hochul, Crist for Treating Republicans Like ‘Second-Class Citizens’

Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida blasted Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul of New York and Democratic Rep. Charlie Crist of Florida for attacking Republicans during a Saturday night Fox News appearance.

“We’ve got so much support in Florida, and it’s not because people have hate in their hearts,” DeSantis told “Unfiltered” host Dan Bongino. “They are thankful we saved their jobs. Mothers are thankful we kept their kids in school and senior citizens are thankful we provided medication for them, and so I think that he really put his foot in his mouth. But I think people like Hochul and Crist are representative of this leftist mindset and they do believe that the conservative half of the country are effectively second-class citizens.”

Read the full story

Commentary: Our Incredible, Unbelievable Media

Here is what we’re talking about when we talk about the media “Narrative.”

A 10-year-old girl in Ohio was raped and impregnated. According to the doctor who performed the girl’s abortion in nearby Indiana, the girl could not obtain the procedure in her home state because of a law that cuts off abortions after six weeks. The girl, supposedly, was three days too late to have an abortion in the Buckeye State.

It sounds like the perfect story for the post-Roe era, which is why practically every news outlet on the planet picked it up. See! See, Americans! This is what your Christofascist Supreme Court has done! Are you happy now?

Read the full story

Commentary: Why I Stopped Donating to Harvard, My Alma Mater

The statue of John Harvard, seen at Harvard Yard

This year, for the first time since graduation some two decades ago, I did not donate to either of my alma maters. Like many of you, I have become disillusioned with the illiberalism on many college campuses and could no longer support them with an annual gift. While higher education has historically tipped to the political left, the gap has widened in recent decades. Analyzing data on faculty ideological leanings, the American Enterprise Institute reported that “in less than 30 years the ratio of liberal identifying faculty to conservative faculty had more than doubled to 5.” 

At Harvard, where I attended graduate school, the faculty political imbalance is particularly striking. According to a 2021 survey by The Harvard Crimson, the college newspaper, out of 236 faculty replies only 7 people said they are “somewhat” or “very conservative,” while 183 respondents indicated that they are “somewhat” or “very liberal.” A similar problem plagues my undergraduate college, Bowdoin. 

The absence of my meager donations won’t matter to the colleges I attended, each of which has billions of dollars in endowment money. But big alumni donors at some leading universities are using their influence to improve free thought and inquiry on college campuses. 

Read the full story

Wikipedia Moderators Are Debating Removing an Article About Communist Mass Killings for ‘Bias’

Wikipedia moderators are currently considering removing an article titled “mass killings under communist regimes” over concerns of “bias.”

The article was flagged for deletion in September 2021 due to the “neutrality” of the article being disputed in addition to concerns over the “verifiability” of claims made in the article and whether it contained information already available in other areas of Wikipedia, according to a notice posted on the article.

Read the full story

Facebook Employees Actively Censored Conservative Websites, Even in Defiance of Managers

Facebook logo with smartphone showing lock in front

A series of new leaks from Big Tech giant Facebook has revealed even more bias against conservatives from the company’s employees, even to the point of causing internal debates between employees and upper management, according to the New York Post.

The latest leaks come from message board conversations reviewed by the Post, which showed back-and-forth discussions within Facebook about how to deal with conservative news outlets during last year’s race riots by far-left domestic terrorist organizations such as Black Lives Matter and Antifa.

Some employees expressed their desire to completely remove sites such as Breitbart from Facebook’s “News Tab” feature. When one such employee asked a manager about doing so, the manager responded by pointing out that “we saw drops in trust in CNN 2 years ago,” before rhetorically asking “would we take the same approach for them too?”

Read the full story

NPR Will Now Allow Journalists to Take Part in Partisan Activist Demonstrations

National Public Radio this month said its reporters will now be permitted to take part in public partisan demonstrations and activist events of which the news service approves.

In a revision of its internal ethics handbook, the outlet said that its journalists may now participate in “marches, rallies and other public events” from which they were previously barred.

Read the full story

Arizona’s U.S. Senator Mark Kelly Proposes Legislation to Fund Local Mainstream Media

Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) joined U.S. Sens. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) and Ron Wyden (D-OR) to co-sponsor legislation that indirectly funds local media. The Local Journalism Sustainability Act establishes tax credits that give consumers a huge deduction on media subscriptions, subsidizes journalists’ salaries, and funds news outlets by paying for businesses to advertise.

Read the full story

Conservative Sorority Student Banned over TikTok Video Says Louisiana State University Ignored Her Bias Complaint

Emily Hines of Louisiana State University

After her sorority at Louisiana State University kicked her out, Emily Hines says the school ignored her request for the incident to be investigated for possible bias.

Alpha Phi, a Greek Life organization independent of LSU, revoked Hines’ membership in April over her TikTok video that criticized Assistant Secretary for Health Rachel Levine for her transgender identity. The seven-second video featured the Bee Gees’ song “More Than a Woman.”

Despite being told that the organization does not side with political views,” Hines told The College Fix she believes the decision was politically motivated.

Read the full story

REPORT: Biden’s Education Department Has Closer Ties to Critical Race Theory Group Than They Admit

Young girl in pink long sleeve writing

The Biden administration called it an “error” to promote a critical race theory (CRT) activist group’s guide in a Department of Education (DOE) handbook meant for use in over 13,000 public school districts on reopening recommendations and policies, Fox News reported.

The activist group, Abolitionist Teaching Network (ATN) has connections to at least two high-ranking officials in the Biden administration’s DOE, Fox News reported. It is unclear why ATN was mentioned in the April 2021 handbook and who added the link.

The Biden administration DOE backtracked on the promotion and its link to the group in a statement to Fox News Wednesday which said, “The Department does not endorse the recommendations of this group, nor do they reflect our policy positions. It was an error in a lengthy document to include this citation.”

Read the full story

Education Department Civil Rights Nominee Rejects Presumption of Innocence for Accused Students

Catherine Lhamon

The Biden administration’s nominee to lead the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights told a Senate committee Tuesday that a year-old Title IX regulation does not require the presumption of innocence for students accused of sexual misconduct.

The claim drew bafflement from critics of Catherine Lhamon, who held the same job in the Obama administration’s second term.

In response to threats from Lhamon to pull their federal funding, colleges lowered evidentiary standards and enacted policies that treat accusers more favorably than accused students. Courts have been steadily reining in those practices, sometimes citing the pressure from Lhamon’s office as evidence of bias.

Read the full story

Major School District in Virginia Eyes ‘Anti-Racism’ Instead of Questioning Assumptions

Students dancing in classroom

Parents in one of the nation’s largest school districts are being asked about how schools should teach their children about systemic racism, “multiple identities,” and ways to “challenge power and privilege.”

Virginia’s Fairfax County Public Schools sent a survey Thursday to parents and teachers seeking input about the school system’s future “anti-racism” and “anti-bias” policy. 

“One key strategy to achieve educational equity is to analyze and address the beliefs and policies that inform teaching practices along with what is taught in schools,” Schools Superintendent Scott S. Brabrand said in an email message introducing the survey to parents and teachers. 

Read the full story

Virginia Department of Education Leader Accused of Appropriating Government Resources to Speak on Equity at Loudoun County Public Schools

Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) Director of Equity and Community Engagement Leah Dozier Walker will moderate a Loudoun County Public Schools (LCPS) event on equity. Walker also advocates other issues including Black Lives Matter, anti-racism, critical race theory, and social justice. 

Earlier this year, Virginia Inspector General Michael Westfall accused Walker of appropriating government resources to set up her private consulting business. Westfall noted in his report that Walker had accumulated nearly 100 hours of unexplained absences the previous year, as well as offered consulting services that were almost the same as her state duties.

Read the full story

ANALYSIS: DOJ Investigators Involved in Antitrust Probe Don’t Appear to be Scrutinizing Claims of Bias in Google’s Search

by Peter Hasson and Chris White   Department of Justice investigators who are conducting an antitrust probe targeting Google do not appear to be scrutinizing claims that the tech giant manipulates its search function, leaks about the probe and a source familiar with it indicate. Google critics argue that Google Search must be a focus of the investigation, pointing to the company’s sheer dominance in the market: Google consistently accounts for roughly 90% of online information searches, and company employees have expressed a willingness to artificially manipulate search results on the platform. Google did not comment on allegations of search bias, or on the pending antitrust investigation. “We continue to engage with the ongoing investigations led by the Department of Justice and Attorney General Paxton, and we don’t have any updates or comments on speculation,” Google spokeswoman Julie McAlister told the Daily Caller News Foundation. The company’s goal is focusing on the kind of products that serve customers and support businesses, she added. Google’s search feature can potentially skew a major national election toward one candidate over another, according to Robert Epstein, a research psychologist at the American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology. Research he published in 2017 suggests Google’s bias affected the vote in the 2016 election.…

Read the full story

Walz Launches ‘Bias and Discrimination’ Helpline for Reporting Incidents to the State

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz announced Monday that his office has created a “discrimination helpline” amid “rising reports of discrimination from the Asian American community.”

Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan claimed that America has a “distinct pattern” of “increased discrimination during uncertain and trying times, of needing someone to blame.”

“This is unacceptable and, as Minnesotans, we must work to break this cycle,” she added.

Read the full story

Commentary: Democrats Hoist Their Own Petard

Since at least 2016, CNN has mostly ceased being a news agency, but that hasn’t stopped it from being an active participant in #TheResistance. The network is so caught up in the fervor of this movement that many of its guests and regular hosts have been fired, reprimanded, or apologized for threats to the president or general obscene references (e.g., Reza Aslan, the late Anthony Bourdain, Kathy Griffin).

Read the full story

Apple’s Digital Assistant Siri Told Users Israel’s Reuvin Rivlin Was the ‘President of the Zionist Occupation State’

by Chris White   Apple’s voice-controlled assistant told the big tech company’s customers Saturday night that Israel President Reuvin Rivlin is the leader of the Zionist occupation state.” Someone changed Rivlin’s Wikipedia page to describe Israel’s president as the “main child of Israel,” Israel’s i24 News reported Saturday. Apple and Google often rely on Wikipedia to answer customer questions about politicians, historical events, and people who are in the public eye. Rivlin is the 10th president of Israel and was elected in 2014 having previously served as the speaker of the Israeli parliament, the Knesset. Rivlin’s Wikipedia page no longer refers to Israel’s leader as the “president of the Zionist occupation state.” Israel’s enemies frequently refer to the country as the “Zionist occupation state,” a term many Israelis and Jews around the world view as promoting anti-Semitic ideology. “Anti-Zionism is a prejudice against the Jewish movement for self-determination and the right of the Jewish people to a homeland in the State of Israel,” the Anti-Defamation League notes on its website. Twitter users posted tweets explaining what happens when they asked Siri about Rivlin. Got the same response https://t.co/UMM8VwqziA pic.twitter.com/Y7QxicQUeQ — Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) January 19, 2020 Another Twitter user told his followers: “Not doctored, this…

Read the full story

Carol Swain: There Are No Consequences for Liberals When They Deviate From Professionalism

Live from Music Row Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – Leahy was joined in studio by all-star panelist Dr. Carol Swain to discuss her history with Professor Pamela Karlan who recently testified in the impeachment judiciary hearing this week.

Read the full story

Flowchart Tells Non-Minority Students They Could Be ‘Taking Up Space’

A diversity orientation presentation for law students at the University of South Dakota encourages non “minitorized” voices to consider whether or not they are “taking up space” when they contribute to a discussion.  This comes just weeks after the South Dakota Board of Regents announced an investigation into the existence of liberal bias in the diversity offices of state schools.

Read the full story

Researcher: Facebook Algorithm Changes Suppressed Journalism

Facebook’s News Feed algorithm determines what users see on its platform – from funny memes to comments from friends. The company regularly updates this algorithm, which can dramatically change what information people consume.

As the 2020 election approaches, there is much public concern that what was dubbed “Russian meddling” in the 2016 presidential election could happen again. But what’s not getting enough attention is the role Facebook’s algorithm changes play, intentionally or not, in that kind of meddling.

Read the full story

Commentary: Google’s Algorithms Threaten Free and Fair Elections

In the wake of the dumpster fire that was the Mueller hearings this week, Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s reputation was left in ashes, the Democrats are covered in soot, and the Russian collusion fairytale is toast. The Democrats’ impeachment hopes are also dead, whether they choose to believe it or not. But the question of election meddling remains very much a vital topic of discussion, just not in the way Democrats and the leftist corporate media would like.

Read the full story

Commentary: We Need a Higher Education Reformation

by Emina Melonic   American higher education, once the envy of the world, is suffering a crisis of confidence and a loss of purpose. “Once upon a time, universities were institutions dedicated to the pursuit of truth and the transmission of the highest values of our civilization,” writes New Criterion editor and publisher Roger Kimball. “Today, most are dedicated to the destruction of those values. It is past time to call them to account.” What would accountability look like? The distinguished British philosopher Roger Scruton, a conservative through and through, recently proposed a radical solution: “get rid of universities altogether.” Have these men taken leave of their senses? Not at all. Both have been keen observers for decades of the slow-motion catastrophe unfolding in academia. It may be we’ve reached a turning point. Behind most of the problems plaguing education is a noxious identity politics. This is particularly true in the humanities because these subjects easily lend themselves to manipulative interpretation and reshaping by those with an ideological agenda. Take a piece of classical literature, such as Homer’s The Iliad, slap a theory on the text, and bingo, you have just rid yourself of the chore of trying to understand this magnificent piece of dramatic poetry…

Read the full story

Commentary: Manipulating Science in the Data Age

by Robin Burk   Who are you going to believe – my academic paper/editorial/meme or your lying eyes? It’s a pressing question in today’s world of artificial intelligence, machine learning, faked videos, and tendentious scientific claims – and particularly pressing in light of ambitious, far-reaching policy proposals based on data analytics and models. Perhaps you remember Climategate 1.0, when emails from the UK’s East Anglia Climatic Research Unit were hacked (or leaked). Many who read through them saw clear evidence that climate researchers in the United Kingdom and the United States worked to suppress legitimate research results and data that mitigated against their claim of catastrophic human-caused global warming. Among those researchers was Pennsylvania State University climatologist Michael E. Mann, who was accused of having deliberately cherry-picked tree ring data in order to assert a “hockey stick” shaped graph in which global temperature spiked over the last century or so. That cherry-picked data, it was said, served to “hide the decline” in overall global temperatures that others saw using different data sets, leading to this satirical video. What followed were two investigations which sort of, kind of, exonerated the participants of offenses that would otherwise cut off their research funding from government agencies.…

Read the full story

Mike Huckabee Calls For Prosecution Of Politically Biased FBI Agents

by Nick Givas   Former Republican Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee called for the prosecution of politically biased FBI agents, on “Fox & Friends” Monday, and said the agency needs to clean house. “I think, you know, at some point, somebody’s got to take a good Dyson vacuum cleaner to go over to the FBI and just clean out the leadership. Because there’s something wrong at the top,” Huckabee said. “There needs to be, then, accountability for those who are being cleaned out and there’s still some there that shouldn’t be. The rank and file deserve better leadership than this,” he continued, adding: They’re good people in the FBI. They’re good, hard-working people of integrity that are disgusted with what’s happened to their agency that they committed themselves to. And they deserve better leadership. And I’m really hoping that there will be people truly held accountable. Not just fired, but I’m talking about truly held accountable. And some need to be prosecuted for using their positions as a political weapon.   Huckabee had been discussing stories from The New York Times and The Washington Post about the FBI’s inquiry into President Donald Trump’s supposed connection with Russia and said the agency’s actions should scare the public. “What scares…

Read the full story

Harvard Bias Trial to Spotlight Use of Race in College Admissions

A lawsuit challenging the use of race as a factor in U.S. college admissions will go to trial in Boston on Monday, when Harvard University will face accusations that it discriminates against Asian-American applicants. The lawsuit, backed by the Trump administration, could eventually reach the Supreme Court, giving the newly cemented five-member conservative majority a chance to bar the use of affirmative action to help minority applicants get into college. “The case is critically important as it’s really about diversity at colleges all across the country,” said Nicole Gon Ochi, an attorney at Asian Americans Advancing Justice – Los Angeles who supports Harvard in the case. Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA), founded by anti-affirmative action activist Edward Blum, sued Harvard in 2014, contending it illegally engages in “racial balancing” that artificially limits the number of Asian-American students at the Ivy League school. The U.S. Justice Department, which launched a related probe of Harvard after Republican President Donald Trump’s election, has backed the group, saying the Cambridge, Massachusetts, university has not seriously considered alternative, race-neutral approaches to admissions. Conservatives argue that affirmative action, which aims to offset historic patterns of racial discrimination, can hurt white people and Asian-Americans while helping black…

Read the full story

A New Campus Invention for Policing Speech

by Dan E. Way   Colleges are using a new tool with the frightening potential to shut down open dialogue. They go by the benign-sounding name of “bias response teams.”  Bias response teams monitor what students and faculty say. They encourage students to report, often anonymously, comments or behavior that make them feel uncomfortable or threatened, even if the speech or conduct is constitutionally protected. Those who are reported can face referral to student conduct administrators or law enforcement, but records on whether or how often punitive action is meted out are elusive. Indeed, colleges are reluctant to share much of the data collected by them. Campuses have created bias response teams as early as the 1980s, according to an article in the Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice authored in part by UNC-Charlotte professor Ryan Miller. Arizona State University was among the pioneers, said Adam Steinbaugh, director of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education’s (FIRE) Individual Rights Defense Program. By 1996, Ohio State University and others increasingly got on board. And their expansion has been a national issue. Bias response teams operate on at least 231 college campuses in 43 states and the District of Columbia, and the number is growing.…

Read the full story

Analysis: Why NYT’s Latest Attempt To Scare Readers About Global Warming Is A ‘Waste Of Time’

by Michael Bastasch  – The New York Times teamed up with climate scientists to produce a graphic purporting to show an increase in hot days.  – However, it’s not actually showing that, but instead TheNYT’s graphic shows an average based on climate models.  – When compared to the observed temperature record, TheNYT’s graphic doesn’t match up. Another week, another New York Times feature trying to get its readers worried about how much the world could warm in the future. This time TheNYT partnered with the Climate Impact Lab, which is “a group of climate scientists, economists and data analysts from the Rhodium Group, the University of Chicago, Rutgers University and the University of California, Berkeley,” the paper noted. TheNYT and Climate Impact Lab created a graphic that’s supposed to show readers how many more days at or above 90 degrees they could expect today in their home town from when they were born — their data only goes back to 1960, though. The question is: how accurate is TheNYT’s representation of the change in days at of above 90 degrees? Well, at least for U.S. cities, it seems to be misleading. “This is [a] waste of time,” quipped Dr. Ryan Maue, a Cato…

Read the full story

How Censorship by Facebook Reinforces This Writer’s Point on Liberals’ Intolerance

by Mike Gonzalez   Less than a third of the way into his upcoming book on nationalism, Israeli philosopher and scholar Yoram Hazony warns about the growing censorship constricting debate in Western societies when the opinion in question runs counter to the views of politically correct liberalism. Facebook wasted no time in making his case for him. “There is a sense today throughout the Western world that one’s beliefs on controversial matters should no longer be discussed openly,” Hazony writes in “The Virtue of Nationalism,” to be published by Basic Books in September, adding: We are now aware that we must think a second and third time before acting or speaking. … Genuine diversity in the constitutional or religious character of Western nations persists only at mounting costs to those who insist on their freedom. The observation was prescient, and Hazony is now facing these costs. Facebook has blocked ads for Hazony’s book ostensibly because, as an announcement informed him: “Your ad was not approved because your Page has not been authorized to run ads with political content.” According to Facebook’s own definition, however, political content is support for candidates, legislation, ballot questions, etc. Having spent part of a North Carolina…

Read the full story

Republican Rep. Gaetz Threatens Twitter with FEC Complaint Over Twitter Suppression, Claims Twitter May Be Giving Opponent Illegal Advantage

Matt Gaetz

by Peter Hasson and Joe Simonson    – Twitter’s recent algorithm change suppressed, or “shadow-banned,” prominent conservatives, including Republican Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz, a new report found.  – Gaetz is considering filing a Federal Election Commission (FEC) complaint against Twitter, he told The Daily Caller News Foundation.  – Gaetz said his Twitter account’s growth slowed immediately after Twitter’s recent algorithm change. Twitter acknowledged the “inaccurate” search results but said it was unrelated to politics. Rep. Matt Gaetz is considering filing a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) over Twitter’s alleged suppression of his account, the Florida Republican told The Daily Caller News Foundation on Wednesday. Gaetz was one of several prominent conservatives, including members of Congress and the chair of the Republican National Committee, whose accounts Twitter suppressed by making it harder to find in the site’s search function, a Vice News investigation published Wednesday found. “Democrats are not being ‘shadow banned’ in the same way,” the report concluded, noting: “Not a single member of the 78-person Progressive Caucus faces the same situation in Twitter’s search.” Twitter announced in May that the company would rely on “behavior-based signals” to boost the visibility of some accounts and to suppress the visibility of others, as…

Read the full story

Twitter Suspends Conservative Pundit Kathleen McKinley For Opposing Trans In Military, Tying ‘Extreme Muslim Beliefs’ To Honor Killings

Kathleen McKinley

by Peter Hasson   Kathleen McKinley, a conservative blogger and political commentator for a local Fox station in Houston, was surprised Friday to find an email from Twitter announcing her account had been suspended. Twitter listed two tweets that it claimed violated rules against “hateful conduct,” emails that McKinley shared with The Daily Caller News Foundation show. In the first tweet, McKinley stated her opposition to an Obama-era rule allowing transgender troops serving in the military, which she felt the Obama-era “was normalizing a mental disorder (gender dysphoria) (called ‘distress’ now) which has no place in our military. Certainly not our $$ for surgery.” The belief that biological males who believe they’re women shouldn’t be cleared for military service is well within the conservative mainstream. McKinley’s second tweet referred to “extreme Muslim beliefs” — rather than mainstream Muslim beliefs — “that condone honor killings.” That tweet had a specific context: McKinley’s friend Obianuju Ekeocha, an African pro-life activist, was in a Twitter debate about abortion with Bill Prady, a producer on CBS’ “The Big Bang Theory.” At issue was whether pro-lifers should support exemptions for someone who claimed a religious right to abortion. Ekeocha’s answer was no, for the same reason that she…

Read the full story

Facebook Removes Death Threats Toward Republicans After Florida Representative Matt Gaetz Called It Out

Matt Gaetz

by Kyle Perisic   Facebook removed a page Tuesday that posted incitements to violence and implied death threats after a Republican lawmaker called the company out. During a hearing Tuesday with representatives from Facebook, Twitter and Google, Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida asked Facebook’s Head of Global Policy Management Monika Bickert why the social media giant hasn’t removed the page, “Milkshakes against the Republican Party,” for its calls to violence against Republicans. “Do you remember the shooting at the Republican baseball game? One of those should happen every week,” one post read, referring to the attempted assassination of GOP members, which almost killed Rep. Steve Scalise of Alabama. Bickert read the post back to Gaetz at the hearing. Another post called for “crazed shooters” to target Republicans at baseball practices, saying “if you really want to be remembered, that’s how you do it,” before referring to the National Rifle Association as a “terrorist organization.” “Any call to violence violates our terms of service,” Bickert clarified. However, Gaetz claimed Facebook responded to his staff after reporting the page earlier that “it doesn’t go against one of our specific community standards.” Later that day, Facebook removed the page. “I am glad Facebook swiftly removed this offensive…

Read the full story