French-Israeli woman Mia Schem, one of several dozen hostages abducted and taken into Israel by Hamas terrorists on October 7th and held until she was released in an exchange on November 30th, told Israel’s Channel 12 the wife of the first Hamas terrorist assigned to guard her was far from pleased her husband’s bosses had stuck them with Schem, and “couldn’t stand the fact that I was alone with her husband in a room, she was jealous,” The Messenger reports.

The 21 year-old Schem believes this was actually a good thing though, because “terrorist didn’t touch me for the simple reason that his wife was outside the room. If we were alone, there’s a big chance something would have happened.” Later on in her nearly two-month long ordeal Schem was moved to a different house occupied by three Hamas goons. Again she says she was able to avoid sexual violence – and death – this time simply by cooking for the jihadis. “I asked them if they were hungry. I sent one of them to the market, I asked him to bring several ingredients and I made them a traditional dish. I assessed the situation. It was either cook them food – or be killed or raped.”

Maine Republican Party chair Joel Stetkis on Friday told a radio host that he’s going to make lots of noises and statements about Secretary of State Shenna Bellows’ ruling that fat former President Trump is ineligible to run again in the state due to that January 6th thing, Spectrum News reports.

“This political activism by Shenna Bellows, it’s not going to stand. At the party, since yesterday, we’ve been working on an appeal to the Maine Superior Court and we’re also reserving the right to return to a caucus system where Shenna Bellows will have absolutely no say in who Mainers choose for the Republican nominee for president,” said Stekis, adding that he’s raising money for MAGA state Senate and House candidates who promise to fire Bellows, as Maine is one of just a few states in which the Secretary position is appointed by the legislature. “The thing we’re working on over the next 10 months is winning that Legislature, having more Republicans in the Legislature than Democrats, and never having to have somebody like Shenna Bellows in a position of power to make these decisions to override the rights of the people.” Stekis did not add that Trump attempted to override the rights of the people by trying to remain in power after losing a free and fair election.

The Southern Baptist Convention and other defendants have reached a confidential settlement with four plaintiffs led by a man who claimed one of its former leaders, retired far-right Texas Judge Paul Pressler, had sexually abused him for decades beginning in 1977 when the man was a 14 year-old member of a youth group led by Pressler, the Texas Tribune reports on a case that exposed the complicity of Pressler’s law partner Jared Woodfill, a Houston-area extremist anti-LGBTQ MAGA activist currently running for a seat in the state House and then its Speakership.

The original plaintiff, Duane Rollins, filed the lawsuit against the SBC, Pressler, Woodfill, and other leaders in 2017 after spending decades in and out of prison and suffering from drug and alcohol addiction as a result of the trauma he endured. The three other plaintiffs later joined the lawsuit, but they were not the only ones to come forward with accusations against Pressler, a former Vice President of the SBC who was instrumental in making homophobia an important part of the “faith.” In his public career as a Texas state Representative and state appeals court judge, Pressler was also President George HW Bush’s nominee for Office of Government Ethics chief in 1989 until he withdrew due to – wait for it – ethics issues. Weasel-faced Texas Senator Ted Cruz was of course among scores of Lone Star State politicians who lobbied heavily for Pressler’s endorsement in GOP primaries over the last several decades. Cruz said he’s known Pressler since he was a teenager.

Taking a cue from rival Nikki Haley’s refusal to be honest about the true cause of the Civil War, heels-wearing Florida Governor Ron DeSantis on Thursday tried to score some points with the MAGA Republican base by ripping into Dem Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan’s decision to remove a Confederate monument from a city park early that morning, the Washington Examiner reports.

“I’m opposed to taking down statues. The idea that we’re going to just erase history is wrong. You’ve seen it now where they tried to take down Thomas Jefferson. They tried to take down George Washington off schools,” said DeSantis to the crowd in Iowa at an event for his increasingly doomed presidential campaign, of course not specifying who they fuck “they” is or where and when “they tried” to, uh, whatever that sentence-ish string of words about George Washington and schools was supposed to mean. “It just gets so out of hand. So I don’t support taking down statues, particularly if you don’t have legal authority to do it,” DeSantis continued, making it sound like an abuse of power.

It is true that Deegan didn’t seek city council approval to remove the “Tribute to the Women of the Southern Confederacy” statue in Springfield Park. She also didn’t need to, as the crew contracted to take it down were paid not by taxpayers but by anonymous donors and a grant from an area philanthropic organization called the Jesse Ball DuPont Fund. Florida state Senate Republicans responded to the statue’s removal Thursday by proposing a bill “prohibiting certain acts concerning historical monuments and memorials, providing civil penalties for officials who engage in certain actions, providing for suspension or removal of such officials in certain circumstances, etc,” for which Deegan would’ve been fined $1,000 for her order removing the pro-slavery statue.

Republican Ohio Governor Mike DeWine vetoed a bill passed by both GOP-controlled state legislative chambers that would ban gender-affirming care for children under the age of 18, a move that puts him at odds with a culture war issue Republicans need to stress in 2024 because they have no popular policies on which to run.

According to the Ohio Capital Journal, DeWine announced his decision Friday, saying that he consulted with five children’s hospitals in the state as well as psychologists and families with trans youth.  “Ultimately, I believe this is about protecting human life,” he said adding, “These are gut-wrenching decisions that should be made by parents and should be informed by teams of doctors who are advising them. These are parents who have watched their children suffer for years, and have real concerns their children would not survive without it… Families are basing their decisions on the best medical advice they can get.”

Per Politico’s Kyle Cheney, a federal appeals court rule that former President and violence abettor Donald Trump can face civil lawsuits brought by the law enforcement officers who defended Congress against the Republican-led domestic terrorists who attacked the Capitol on January 6th.

I normally don’t pay much attention to Donald Trump’s posts on Truth Social, his ripoff of the now failing former-Twitter platform, but Friday morning’s flurry of more than 39 posts–most reposting polls he likes–in a 43-minute period is likely panic-driven given various states continue to consider excluding him from the ballot because of his support for the January 6th Republican-led insurrection to overturn the results of the 2020 election.  While there are no original stubby thumb-punched missives with his usual veiled threats to people in Maine and Colorado, the rapidity of the reposts demonstrates his insecurity as he proceeds with his morning bathroom rituals of social media posting and flushing classified documents.  Here’s hoping he keeps the fan on when he leaves his “office.”

A federal court denied a motion by the company formerly known as Twitter to block a new state law that requires social media companies to publicly post their content moderation policies, a move challenged by Elon Musk who considers users to be chattel subject to his whims.

According to the San Jose Mercury News, AB 587 was signed into law by Democratic California Governor Gavin Newsom in July 2022 and immediately came in the crosshairs of Musk, who considers any government regulation to be too much because he’s rich.  Musk claimed the law was meant to put government pressure on social media companies to due it censorship bidding, though he never really explained how publishing moderation guidelines as part of the company’s Terms of Service would accomplish this.

“Y’know I watched that yesterday, and I made a small statement on social media last night. I just, I’ve come to the conclusion that this is the new Covid for 2024.  In 2020, they had us locked down.  We couldn’t get out and vote.  We could do all this absentee voting.  Everything was built around fear.  So now the new fear and what the Democrat [sic] Party is trying to do here is, is to tear Trump down and say he’s unqualified to run for this office, Jerry Carl, Republican Alabama Congressman, says disregarding the fact that the Constitution disqualifies Trump, not Democrats.  “That is not their job to determine that.  It’s we the voters.”

Well, no, Jerry.  No one will die from Trump’s disqualification.  (More may die at the hands of insane MAGA cult members, however.) The Constitution explicitly lays out qualifications for people who can run for President, and one of those qualifications is never having violated his previously sworn oath of office.  Trump did that, so he is therefore disqualified.  And just a reminder:  In 2020, Trump was president during the lockdowns and he was the one promoting fear of virtually everything, saying “only [he could] save us.”  Democrats were working to expand access to ballots for eligible voters while the GOP filed scores of lawsuits around the country to prevent people from voting and later, having their votes counted.

Through early Friday morning (local time) into midday, the Kremlin commenced its most massive air attack on Ukraine since the earliest days of Russia’s invasion, hitting targets around the country with missiles, drones and aircraft, CNN reports.

At least 18 were killed and dozens injured, with more still reported missing, as 158 drones and missiles, including hypersonic Kinzhal missiles, cruise missiles and Shahed drones hit Kyiv and locations around the country not currently occupied by Russian forces.  Ukrainian Prime Minster Denys Shmyhal said more than 20 explosions were recorded in Kharkiv, with one missile striking a hospital.

Tim Ballard, the Mormon “anti”-sex-trafficking activist who inspired the Jim Caviezel-helmed QAnon fan-favorite film Sound of Freedom before he pretty much turned out to be a sex-trafficker himself, on Thursday told his sexual assault accusers he will not issue a full response to the apparently “petty” accusations against him until each of the plaintiffs in a civil complaint publicly identify themselves and their allegations “with proper context,” Fox 13 in Salt Lake City reports.

Four of the six accusers have already done so, which raises the question of how badly this bluff is going to be called for the would-be Republican US Senate candidate if and when they do.

Aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket, the seventh (acknowledged) mission of the Pentagon’s X-37B, an uncrewed satellite that resembles a miniature space shuttle without windows.  According to CNN, the X-37B will continue to conduct tests, but at a higher orbital distance thanks to the power of the Falcon Heavy.

Known as an Orbital Test Vehicle, the X-37B has been the subject of much speculation and conspiracy theories.  First launched into orbit in 2010, the reusable autonomous vehicle stayed in orbit for over two years on one mission.  Conspiracy theorists believe the craft is a space bomber that can release deadly kinetic missiles that can destroy entire cities or that it is a floating spy platform keeping an eye on the Chinese space station.

Here’s the scene:  In New Hampshire, the questioner literally tells Republican presidential candidate and professional equivocator Nikki Haley that he’s giving her a softball question to “redeem” herself from her “forgetting slavery” flub at a New Hampshire town hall Wednesday night… and Haley flubs the response.

The question:  Would you accept the VP slot on a Trump-led ticket?  The answer, as we (except a certain former South Carolina governor) all know the answer should be an immediate, “No, I have said he is unfit for office and I would not serve in another Trump administration.”  But Haley doesn’t come close to that.  (And this is one of those times when the CNN edit in the middle doesn’t allow us to truly appreciate the great lengths to which Nikki Haley will talk to get out of answering a direct question.)

Well it happened once again with it the MAGAverse is screaming in horror over democracy working to reject the horrible sickness they’ve infected it with for the past seven going on eight years.

“So much for being considered innocent before found guilty by a jury. Last I checked nobody has been even charged with the crime of insurrection, let alone tried, convicted and sentenced” – Top comment on Fox News’s article. It’s almost like none of the fanboys ever heard of Couy Griffin.

“America has a liberal problem, a female liberal problem to be exact” – Top comment on Gateway Pundit’s article. We wish to express our deepest sympathies for that guy’s Fleshlight.

“We need to take the gloves off and fight with brass knuckles like the Democrat’s do. Red states need to take biden off the ballots for corruption and treason. The democrats are trying to start a civil war again. And we need to take it seriously and start fighting just as hard and dirty as they do or else we are screwed” – Top comment on TownHall’s article. Let us know how that goes.

“‘Trump has never been charged with sedition or participating in an insurrection.’ There’s also that nasty little fact that there wasn’t an insurrection, unless you count every similar incident as an insurrection. In which case, the US suffers them as often as car dealers have sales” – Top comment on an Instapundit post. Maybe like two examples of “similar incidents” would help. Or even just one.

“These SecStates should be impeached. They won’t be, but they should” – Top comment on PJ Media’s article. There’s something perversely admirable about this admission of impotence.

Apparently, China gets great wifi:  According to US intelligence officials, the Chinese spy balloon that floated over parts of Canada and the United States in the first months of 2023 connected to a US-based internet provider to exchange data and get instructions from its controllers, NBC News reports.

Yep, the Chinese balloon, flying 60,000 feet above the ground, was apparently able to use cell phone systems to dial into the home base and use high-burst signals to send and receive data.  But US intelligence agencies monitored the signals coming from the various balloons, and NBC News reports that the Biden Administration got a FISA warrant to monitor any commercial communications it sent over traditional methods.

“We have four years of history with Donald Trump,” bobblehead host Jason Chaffetz asserts.  “He never tried any of these shenanigans,” to which albino celery stalk Laura Ingraham responds, “Bingo! Who’s the autocrat now?  Where’s the autocratic behavior coming from?  I would submit it’s coming from the Left, which is refusing to allow people to make basic decisions about their lives,” before reciting a list of grievances from 2021 lockdown protocols but conveniently forgetting abortion.

But Chaffetz’s effort to un-history Donald Trump’s history is MAGAdmirable:  insisting Barack Obama was ineligible to be on the ballot, leading chants calling for the extrajudicial incarceration of his opponent in 2016, AND (allegedly) leading a criminal attempt to subvert the Constitution and install himself for a illegal second term in 2020.  But yeah, no shenanigans, just outright insurrection.

Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows on Thursday ruled fat former President Trump ineligible to run in 2024 under the proscriptions of Article 3 of the 14th Amendment. “Trump’s occasional requests that rioters be peaceful and support law enforcement do not immunize his actions. A brief call to obey the law does not erase conduct over the course of months,” Bellows wrote.

Large headed Trump spokesman Steven Cheung responded in a typically angry statement, saying “The Maine Secretary of State is a former ACLU attorney, a virulent leftist and a hyper-partisan Biden-supporting Democrat who has decided to interfere in the presidential election on behalf of Crooked Joe Biden. We are witnessing, in real-time, the attempted theft of an election and the disenfranchisement of the American voter. Democrats in blue states are recklessly and un-Constitutionally suspending the civil rights of the American voters by attempting to summarily remove President Trump’s name from the ballot. Make no mistake, these partisan election interference efforts are a hostile assault on American democracy. Biden and the Democrats simply do not trust the American voter in a free and fair election and are now relying on the force of government institutions to protect their grip on power. State courts in Michigan and Minnesota have rejected these bad-faith, bogus 14th Amendment ballot challenges, as have federal courts in New Hampshire, Arizona, Florida, Rhode Island, West Virginia, along with ten other federal jurisdictions.”

“We know both the Constitution and the American people are on our side in this fight. President Trump’s dominating campaign has a commanding lead in the polls that has dramatically expanded as Crooked Joe Biden’s presidency continues to fail. We will quickly file a legal objection in state court to prevent this atrocious decision in Maine from taking effect, and President Trump will never stop fighting to Make America Great Again,” Cheung’s giant cranium continued angrily.

Dordt University, an evangelical Christian college with 1,500 students in Sioux Center, Iowa, announced it was canceling a town hall with Republican presidential candidate and multi-venue defendant Donald Trump because Trump insisted on hosting a rally at the campus and didn’t want to take questions from students, KCAU ABC-9 in Sioux City reports.

In a statement, the university said it would no longer host the event at a campus location that holds around 900 people because the Trump campaign did not want him taking questions and instead preferred his normal vocal diarrhea.  The university said it would continue hosting forums for the other GOP candidates who committed to the format.

“These events are intended to be educational in nature, including questions directly from Dordt students to the candidates. The Trump campaign started the process of lining up a campaign stop but desired a rally format,” a statement from the school read.  “Dordt understood that President Trump’s visit would not be publicized until the format was finalized after the new year. Ultimately, the vision of the Trump campaign and Dordt were incongruent, and the event will not take place at the university.”

What could go wrong with a handheld battery-powered device that spins sharp blades rapidly to make smoothies in a society that demands immediate satisfaction?  Well, unshockingly, a lot, which is why BlendJet is recalling nearly five million units of their portable blender for defects that can cause a fire and fling the sharp blades, the Associated Press reports.  The company is recalling 4.8 million BlendJet 2 Portable Blenders after more than 300 incidents that have led to burns, cuts and other injuries to users.

Saying the court needed more minority representation, five justices on the Louisiana Supreme Court asked the state legislature to redrawn the judicial districts to get more equitable representation on the panel, KDSU NBC-6 New Orleans reports.  The Louisiana Supreme Court sits seven justices elected in district elections.  Currently, the court has five Republicans, one Democrat and one independent, with the letter being submitted to legislative leaders by the Dem and four Republicans.

Stating that they hoped redrawing the districts to include a new minority-majority district would end a four-and-a-half-year federal lawsuit seeking to improve representation in the state, where non-white citizens make up 40% of the population. “The current election districts have not been updated in more than 25 years. We feel the time to act relative to these issues is now. In this regard, a redistricting proposal has been prepared that has the support of a majority of the Supreme Court, and which addresses the issues described above,” the five justices said in their letter.  “It creates a second majority minority (voting age population) election district, allowing that seat to be filled in the Fall of 2024.”