The first case of a more dangerous type of mpox, also known as monkeypox, was found outside of Africa in Sweden on Thursday, a day after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared a global health emergency.

The head of Sweden’s public health agency, Olivia Wigzell, said a person in Sweden had become infected while they were staying in Africa in an area where there is currently a major outbreak of mpox Clade 1, per BBC News. She said the person is being treated in Stockholm and cautioned that this did not necessarily mean there’s a risk to the broader population. The person infected tested positive for Clade 1b, which reportedly a “newer and more serious type,” of the infection, the outlet states.

Director of WHO Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus stated in a press conference on Wednesday that his emergency committee advised him that “the situation constitutes a public emergency of international concern” and he accepted the advice. “The detection and rapid spread of a new clade of mpox” in Africa and its neighboring countries “is very worrying,” he said, adding that “it’s clear a coordinated international response is essential to stop these outbreaks and save lives.”

The WHO said it was communicating with Sweden’s health authorities on “how best to manage the first confirmed case of mpox Clade 1b.”

This Story originally came from humanevents.com

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In the last few weeks, there has undeniably been a significant vibe shift. Kamala Harris, once thought toxic and unelectable, is now favored by many mainstream media and perceptive election “experts,” to say nothing of national polls. Granted, many of those polls are suspicious: the pollsters have already been credibly accused of vastly oversampling Democrats.

Nevertheless, polls undeniably show the race between Vice President Harris and President Trump as tightening. This does not mean that President Trump can’t win; far from it. It simply means he’s facing someone with a pulse, and someone with a pulse is more electable than a corpse. President Trump’s campaign just needs to make the necessary adjustments to exploit Harris’ weaknesses; for instance, the fact that she and her running mate Tim Walz are the most far-left ticket in United States history.

Personally, I think the momentum that Harris has is mainly a honeymoon phase; a sugar rush as Democrats exhale with relief at being able to vote for someone not named Joe Biden, no matter how generic she is. Nevertheless, Harris has predictably tried to claim that she is now the favorite in this race, and the media is repeating the same message in lockstep. However, the public should be skeptical; President Trump and his camp have explicitly stated that most of their efforts against the Harris-Walz ticket will come after the Democratic National Convention. I have no doubt that when that time comes, they will once again seize the mantle of “most electable ticket.”

And they are. While Harris was busy choosing far-left liar and Democratic Governor Tim Walz of Minnesota as her running mate, President Trump has been mercilessly broadening his appeal. His frequent campaign stops in Michigan and North Carolina are sops to the working class, and his choice to conduct one-on-one interviews with some of the most recognizable names among the eighteen to thirty-five-year-old age range shows he’s making a grab for the youth vote. Early signs are encouraging: by appearing with internet sensation Adin Ross earlier this month on August 5th, Trump garnered nearly one hundred million views. Ross painted Trump as one of the pillars of American patriotism in the modern era, and made clear that a win for the former president would save the country. When it comes to appealing to the younger generations, it doesn’t get much better than that.

Similarly, President Trump agreed to appear in an X Space for an interview with Elon Musk, live-streamed on the platform on August 12th. That interview garnered so much interest that the Space crashed, leading to technical difficulties which delayed, but did not stop the proceedings. And once it did start, it was fascinating. Musk asked Trump questions for nearly two hours, with the 45th President describing his assassination attempt, his plans for mass deportation once in office, his plan for Musk in the second Trump administration, and an explanation of why Harris was a carbon copy of President Joe Biden, only worse. By the end of the interview across all platforms that the interview is currently available on, Musk and Trump had garnered nearly 998 million listeners and counting for the largest audience of an X Space in the company’s history.

So yes, President Trump’s energy is unmatched, as is his ability to turn the tide just when the political environment feels most hopeless. The mainstream media and establishment press may have crowned Harris as the woman who can take Trump down, but already, the Trump campaign is proving it has the wind at its back. You don’t get upwards of a billion views on social media through just two interviews without it. However, even if Trump remains the same larger-than-life brawler he’s always been, that’s not enough for him to win. Conservatives need to show up. They need to stop despairing. They need to stop running around like chickens with their heads cut off over every election “expert” who tries to change the narrative. Experts don’t determine the vote; the people do. Even if Trump’s interviews were not rocking the media landscape (which they are), he is at least doing interviews, unlike Harris, who hasn’t done a single sit-down interview since becoming the presumptive Democratic nominee for President. Sooner or later, people will notice that one of these candidates is actually trying to win their vote, and the other is taking that vote for granted.

In short, this is no time to panic; instead, it’s time to shift the vibes again and seize victory.

This Story originally came from humanevents.com

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Columbia University’s president Minouche Shafik has now joined her counterparts at UPenn and Harvard in falling on their collective swords and resigning after massive anti-semitic protests erupted on their campuses following the massacre of 1,200 Israelis in October 2023. Each of these presidents, women who were the first, second, and third women to serve in this role at their respective universities, left their positions because they could not handle the violence, anger, and hatred of the students on their campuses.

Now we are facing the potential election of the first woman president of the United States, and she’s facing these same campus protests writ large across America. Like the women who rose to power at Penn, Columbia, and Harvard, she has little to distinguish herself apart from her identity and the assumption that this identity magically guarantees moral rectitude to her opinions and policy decisions. That assumption flows from the same ideology which drove the campus protests across the US, forcing the resignation of three Ivy League university heads.

The campus occupations, which popped up on campuses from Harvard to UCLA, from Princeton to the University of Washington, had in common an opposition for US foreign policy in Israel, a belief in the concept of settler colonialism, and a faith that being oppressed was the equivalent of being morally good. It was under these conditions that students at Columbia quit going to classes, abandoned their dorms for tents on the quad, and occupied Hamilton Hall. As they sat in their tents, screaming about the occupation of “Palestine,” they refused to allow Jewish students to cross their encampment.

It wasn’t just at Columbia, but across the nation that encampments like this, organized by students and agitators, prevented Jewish students from walking freely through campus. The rhetoric that came from these student agitators was nothing less than extreme. They called for the eradication of the nation of Israel, the murder of Israeli soldiers, and the destruction of the United States. This may sound hyperbolic. It’s not. These were the rallying cries coming from the mouths of the most elite students in the United States, the ones being groomed for future leadership.

Which brings me back to Shafik. Along with UPenn’s Liz Magill and Harvard’s Claudine Gay, Shafik was hauled before Congress to answer for her students last year. All three women were asked if they thought anti-semitism was an acceptable use of free speech on campus. No answer. They were asked what they were doing to make sure that Jewish students could still access the education they had signed up for. No answer. They were asked what they intended to do about these protests going forward — protests which are due to break out on campuses again as soon as students return to campuses. Crickets. It was clear that all of them had let resentments and hate fester and flare up on their respective campuses and had no game plan for how to stop it.

Each one of these presidents had overseen curriculum steeped in Marxist ideology, grievance and oppression studies. Professors would stand among students at the protests and occupations telling the students that these agitations were what they had been taught to do. The professors saw the occupations as practicums where students could put what they’d learned in their queer and gender studies classes to the test. In fighting for the right of terrorists to take up arms and fight their oppressors, the professors intimated, the students were fulfilling the promise of their studies.

In each of these cases, Columbia, Harvard, UPenn, and the other universities that faced the same protest actions, the students stood up against Jewish students as a proxy war against Israel itself. And the presidents not only let it happen, but could not get control over it even when they tried. When Shafik called in the NYPD to clear Hamilton Hall, where the occupiers had barricaded themselves, it was a sign of defeat. If Shafik had control of the campus, she would not have needed the largest police force in the country to come to campus and remove students from an administration building.

And now they are coming for Kamala Harris, the illustrious, identitarian veep. Only a short week ago, Harris was heckled by pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel protesters, like those who has spilled out from college campuses after October 7. Protesters screamed out at her as she stood on stage repeating her stump speech. As they yelled, Harris tried to shame them. “I’m speaking,” she said, hearkening back to her VP debate against Mike Pence in 2020. “I’m speaking” in context means several things, including an attempt to grab control based on her identity factors: black, female. By identitarian logic, the vice president is oppressed, and by the logic of progressive discourse, that means that she gets to speak first, and that what she has to say carries all that much more weight. An event simply in favor of her candidacy was crashed in New York City on Wednesday night where agitators set off smoke bombs and held up signs saying “No Votes for Bombala’s Genocide.” 14 of them were arrested.

The agitators wanted some kind of response, some kind of indication of what Harris’ policy on Israel and Gaza might be if she gets voted into the White House. And they haven’t gotten it. Meanwhile, there are clearly massive anti-Israel events planned for the Democratic National Convention next week. While Kamala is trying to keep the euphoria going, attempting to dance and sing her way into the White House, her base will be out in the street demanding answers. Will she be lenient like Magill? Bend over backwards like Gay? Or call in a bigger force, like Shafik, because she doesn’t know how to handle it on her own?

The far left of Harris’ party hates Israel. They love Palestinians not for their culture or policies–which include anti-LGBTQ and anti-female regulations as in other strict, Muslim countries–but simply because they are “oppressed.” And Harris can’t handle them. Even at her speech, rarefied identity wasn’t enough to keep them in their place. The campus riots will likely start up again. As soon as the college-bound finish their orientations, they’ll be picking up their marching orders and protest signs to join their comrades on the quad.

There is already noise that Harris would like to throw Israel under the bus, to eradicate funding and arms shipments. The same woman that waved the flag of Ukraine in Congress as she promised to send him endless weapons and aid, may think the aid packages and arms sales to Israel go too far. Harris may sympathize with the protesters. She may even think that her best course of action is to ignore them, shame them, as she tried to do in Detroit. But she would also do well to heed the warnings of Shafik, Gay, and Macgill: it doesn’t matter how close your identity is to the top of the oppression hierarchy. If you don’t find a way to quash the protests, your career is going down. Of course, if she doesn’t quash them, her career is likely going down, too.

This Story originally came from humanevents.com

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An Iranian mother was left paralyzed after being shot by police in Iran for allegedly violating the country’s strict hijab regulations.

The incident occurred when police attempted to pull over 31-year-old Arezoo Badri who was driving home with her sister. After she reportedly refused to stop, officers opened fire, ultimately leaving her severely injured. According to sources, police initially aimed at the car’s tires before targeting Badri directly. A bullet struck her lung and severely damaged her spinal cord.

“She is paralyzed from the waist down, and doctors have said it will take months to determine whether she will be permanently paraplegic or not,” a source close to the situation told the BBC.

Colonel Ahmed Amini, the police chief in Noor, stated that under Iranian law, the use of firearms in such circumstances is permitted.

Badri was initially treated at a hospital in Sari for lung surgery before being transferred to Tehran for further care. The bullet was removed after 10 days, and she remains under intensive care. Her family has been allowed brief visits, but strict security measures prohibit them from taking photos or videos.

This incident comes amid heightened enforcement of Iran’s hijab laws. The Iranian law has been in effect since the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Iranian authorities have recently announced increased measures to ensure compliance, including the use of CCTV cameras to identify female drivers not covering their heads and confiscating vehicles carrying passengers who are not wearing hijabs.

The strict enforcement of hijab laws has been a source of global controversy, particularly following the 2022 death of Mahsa Amini, who died after being detained and allegedly beaten by Iran’s morality police for wearing her hijab “improperly.” This incident sparked widespread protests and condemnation both within Iran and internationally.

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Lavrenz is a great-grandmother from Colorado in her mid-70s who owns a bed and breakfast. She was prosecuted for entering the Capitol on January 6, 2021 and praying. Her lawyer, John Pierce, revealed that his client was reportedly hit with the largest misdemeanor fine in American history. On top of that, Lavrenz will be restricted from using the internet for 6 months which will keep her from being able to raise money to help pay the fine or talk about the upcoming 2024 election.

Lavrenz told Posobiec that her being put on trial and prosecuted was “appalling” and said that the American government is “turning so ungodly.”

“My main mission in this whole event is because of God. To restore our country back to its original intent as a Godly nation,” she explained. “And if they can take away my inalienable rights that were given to us by God, to speak freely, to share what I believe, even if it disagrees with them.”

However, she said she was simultaneously “excited” because the government thought that she was the “loudest voice out there for January 6.”

“I think they’re afraid of me.” She quoted Thomas Jefferson, who stated “if we fear the government, that’s tyranny, and I will never bow down to tyranny. But if the government fears us, then that’s liberty.”

“Do you think it’s possible that one of the reasons that they went after you so hard as they did and as they are, is because you’re not afraid of being a proud Christian mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother and doing so publicly inside our capital?” Posobiec asked Lavrenz.

“They knew that I wasn’t afraid, because as a Christian and very strong believer in God, he’s the higher authority in my life, and they can put me in prison, but they can never shut off the freedoms that are in my heart and what God has already put in me, because I love my I love God more than anything, and then my country, and I will stand up and fight for my country, for my children,” Lavrenz replied.

She later said in the show: “Karl Marx said in the mid 1800s his one mission in life was to dethrone God. And when I was in that capital for the 10 minutes … I just saw my three little grandchildren, and I said to myself, I said, I will not let my children or my grandchildren be brought into a country with a Marxist ideology. Not on my watch.”

Watch the full episode below.

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“The Molfar OSINT agency has created its own register of foreign propagandists of the terrorist regime of the Russian Federation,” the agency states on its website. “On this page, the names and private data of propagandists are presented, for each person we have evidence of his or her propaganda activities in favor of Russia.”

The individuals on this list are considered national security threats by the agency, which advocates for their removal from public positions, sanctions, investigations, or even targeted assassinations in some cases.

Senator Vance, who has been outspoken about his views on the Russia-Ukraine conflict, was added to the list due to his past comments. His profile on the list cites comments made in 2022 when Vance stated that he “really doesn’t care what happens to Ukraine,” a remark that has drawn significant criticism from the country.

Vance’s profile also points out that he has called Russian President Vladimir Putin an “evil man,” but notes that he has condemned Ukraine as a “corrupt nation run by oligarchs.” More recently, in 2023, Vance expressed the opinion that “it is in America’s interest to accept that Ukraine will have to cede some territory to Russia.”

Molfar’s list includes 153 individuals labeled as Russian foreign propagandists, among them prominent politicians, journalists, and businessmen. Notable figures on the list include Senator Rand Paul, Representative Thomas Massie, and conservative media personality Tucker Carlson, who previously interviewed Putin.

This Story originally came from humanevents.com

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Nabil Boudi, Khelif’s attorney, told Variety that both figures had been named in the complaint filed with the anti-online hatred center of the Paris Prosecutor’s Office on Friday. Khelif won a gold medal the same day. “[Donald] Trump tweeted, so whether or not he is named in our lawsuit, he will inevitably be looked into as part of the prosecution,” he added.

The “National Center for the Fight Against Online Hatred,” part of the Paris Prosecutor’s Office, confirmed that it had received the complaint and had launched an investigation.

“On Aug. 13, (The National Center for the Fight Against Online Hatred) contacted the OCLCH (Central Office for the Fight Against Crimes Against Humanity and Hate Crimes) to conduct an investigation into the counts of cyber harassment due to gender, public insult because of gender, public incitement to discrimination and public insult because of origin,” the office said.

According to the Daily Mail, possible punishments for cyberbullying offenses in France include prison sentences of between two to five years and fines reaching £39,000. If prosecuted as online hate speech, fines increase to up to £214,000.

The lawsuit was issued against X, which according to French law means that it was filed against “unknown persons.” Boudi said that this ensures the “prosecution has all the latitude to be able to investigate against all people,” including those who may have posted under pseudonyms.

He said that while the complaint mentioned names, “What we’re asking is that the prosecution investigates not only these people but whoever it feels necessary. If the case goes to court, they will stand trial.”

In regards to the lawsuit being leveled at X, Boudi said it was aimed at users on the platform and not the platform itself. “It’s the responsibility of lawmakers to issue sanctions to platforms, not ours.”

Pedro Diaz, Khelif’s coach, told Variety that the controversy that surrounded Khelif being able to compete “incredibly affected her” and “everyone around her.”

“The first time she fought in the Olympics, there was this crazy storm outside of the ring,” he said, adding that “I had never seen anything so disgusting in my life.”

Khelif came into the spotlight after winning a bout against Italy’s Angela Carini in just 46 seconds after the fighter withdrew from the bout. Khelif was disqualified from the 2023 International Boxing Association’s world championships after the sports body said that Khelif as well as another fighter failed gender eligibility testing. The International Olympic Committee said that Khelif had met all criteria to compete on the world stage in Paris.

This Story originally came from humanevents.com

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A diving instructor, identified only as Volodymyr Z, allegedly dove 80 meters to place the explosives that caused four gas leaks in the pipelines, rendering them inoperable, according to The Guardian. The Nord Stream pipelines, which transport gas from Russia to Germany beneath the Baltic Sea, were critically damaged at a time when European countries were seeking to reduce their reliance on Russian energy due to Russia’s war against Ukraine.

The explosion also damaged the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which had not yet become operational as Germany had suspended its certification process when the war began.

The suspect is believed to have lived in Poland. German authorities requested his arrest in June, but he reportedly went into hiding. On Wednesday, Polish authorities confirmed that they had received a European arrest warrant for Volodymyr Z. However, the Polish public prosecutor’s office stated that “Ultimately, Volodymyr Z was not detained, as he left the territory of Poland at the beginning of July this year, crossing the Polish-Ukrainian border.”

There is currently no reported evidence linking Volodymyr Z to the Ukrainian government. Russia had previously accused the US of being behind the explosion, a claim the US has denied. In March 2023, German media reported that a pro-Ukrainian group was responsible for the attack, though the Ukrainian government denied any involvement.

This Story originally came from humanevents.com

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Minnesota Governor Tim Walz is a conflicted individual. Influenced at a young age through a Harvard-sponsored China teaching-tourism program, Walz maintains a lifelong dedication to China fueled by fun experiences in his youth. His early dreams for China’s liberation from communist rule have not worked out, yet he has plodded along through the last 30 years in deference to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in his business and political dealings. In other words, he is the perfect VP pick to produce an America-last, doublethinking, emotionally invested, China-forward agenda.

Already a member of the Army National Guard, Walz sought and was one of the first-ever to receive a year-long WorldTeach job in China in 1989. He felt that “China was coming.” Somehow, the Army National Guard permitted this extended trip to a non-allied country during Walz’ contract, and did not recall him even after the Tiananmen Square massacre in the months leading to Desert Shield.

Walz was bought off with trinkets. He noted of his initial time in China as a school teacher that “they gave me more gifts than I could bring home. It was an excellent experience,” blithely unaware that he was in the process of being groomed and won over. “No matter how long I live, I’ll never be treated that well again,” Walz noted eerily about the overseas stint during a time of historic unrest.

Walz selects tasteful attire for chaperoning school children.

In a critique of the CCP, Walz said at the conclusion of the teaching gig of China that “if they had the proper leadership, there are no limits on what they could accomplish.” A fine hypothesis in 1990, but the fundamental leadership under the CCP has not changed. Accordingly, nothing else about China’s circumstances has meaningfully changed. Yet Walz pressed ahead in doing business with the same adversarial communist government of China.

He soon formed a business in 1994 accompanying school children to see the China of poor “leadership.” The CCP, evidently overlooking Walz’s disapproval, welcomed his business “with a special invitation from the Chinese government.” Remarkably, Walz was able to create this politically fraught venture at the age of 30, with no prior business experience in China, or in general. That the Chinese government “paid a large part of the cost” of these trips suggests strong endorsement and control of the activities.

Walz revealed logical contradictions in explaining his intentions for these student trips. He told the Nebraska Star-Herald in 1993 that he wanted the Chinese people oppressed under communism to “see what’s on the outside” by meeting his American students. But he also advised his students before embarking to “downplay their American-ness” to “avoid stereotypes the Chinese have that every American is rich.” Apparently to Walz, to be American is to be “rich,” and that is a bad thing – even if the goal is for Chinese to witness what America’s about.

One of the trips escorting students doubled as his honeymoon. Fitting; he chose the 5^th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre for his wedding day as “he wanted to have a date he’ll always remember.” Gwen Whipple was either a very understanding bride-to-be, or into it. Walz would go on to co-sponsor Congressional resolutions condemning China’s censorship of events related to Tiananmen Square. Evidently a bloody mass murder event was great enough for his wedding date but terrible enough to censure in contradiction of a big portion of his professional past.

Also: since the CCP has had a long record of censoring any reference to the Tiananmen Square event including imprisoning violators, why would it sponsor and endorse a business led by a man who publicly memorialized the event with his own wedding? This dispensation for Walz can only be explained by special status, dismissal in the court of public opinion as an un-serious person, or both.

Walz is proud of his China ties, citing his experience as credentials for dealing with the CCP. In an extended video shared by Michael Sobolik on X, Walz says of the CCP that “if we’re on the same sheet of music, two of the world’s great super-powers… there’s many collaborative things we can do together.” Walz uses CCP-friendly rhetoric by lumping the US and China together as “two great super-powers.” As well, Walz in this remark has abandoned his rejection of the CCP 35 years ago, and feels that it is possible to be on the “same sheet of music” with the same CCP now.

On an archived page from Walz’ Congressional website from the period of 2007-2019, he noted that he has “many concerns about China’s poor human rights record. China’s brutal suppression of pro-democracy advocates, Falun Gong practitioners, Christians, and other critics of the ruling Communist Party is an affront to basic human decency. Additionally, I strongly believe in the need to establish rule of law, freeing the Chinese people from facing imprisonment based on the whims of party leaders.” This is the place Walz saw fit to bring school girls from 1994 to 2003, allowing them to independently “see what they want to see, do what they want to do and get there on their own bicycles”?

As Minnesota Governor since 2019, Walz lately finds himself begging for Chinese investment. He noted in the same year that his state’s “farmers remain in desperate need of a U.S. trade deal with China,” upon returning empty-handed from a trade mission there. However history shows that the CCP only wants to sell to us, or profit from our land, but not buy from us.

Natalie Winters broke the story on X that in 2019, Governor Walz was a headline speaker at the national convention of the US China Peoples Friendship Association (USCPFA). This event was hosted in Minnesota, likely because of the strong ties Minnesota has with China.

The national USCPFA was established in 1974; the Minnesota chapter, one of the oldest, was incorporated in the same year. China-oriented “friendship associations” have been identified through think tank studies as influence organizations working through the CCP’s United Front to capture foreign elites.

The Minnesota USCPFA spawned a “Minnesota China Friendship Garden Society” in 2005 to pursue the creation of a China Friendship Garden, ultimately funded with $50k of Minnesota taxpayer dollars in 2014 through Minnesota’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund. This is an example of how CCP-linked influence organizations marshal US money to spread pro-CCP messaging.

St. Paul, Minnesota has had a sister-city relationship with Changsha, China since 1988. Sister-city relationships are starting to be recognized by lawmakers as governed by the CCP’s United Front; Indiana recently passed a bill banning sister-city relationships with China, but Governor Walz has yet to do so for Minnesota. In fact, the friendship garden funded with taxpayer money is called the “St.Paul – Changsha China Friendship Garden,” both named after and reinforcing the sister-city agreement.

Representative, and then Governor, Walz could have reflected and subsequently rejected any of these arrangements, as all of the Governors have been warned (and some have since opted) to do. But Governor Walz has not, and so he owns it.

Tim Walz is a truly captured elite, the ideological product of the CCP’s tourism-based charm offensive. He contributed to the system with his own company, which was in turn endorsed and subsidized by the CCP. Walz has given up on his early criticisms of the CCP simply because the CCP did not give up first, and because it’s the easier path. This is the destructive path down which he would let this country slide as VP.
This Story originally came from humanevents.com

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It is appropriate, therefore, that Kamala Harris’ idea-free campaign (literally, there’s no policy page on her website at all) has resorted to invoking the concept of “joy” as their campaign theme. In what should be a record for irony (and gall), Rep. Joe Crowley (D-NY) told The Hill that Harris and her running mate Tim Walz are “the happy warriors that are out there fighting a good cause. … It’s not about personal character destruction or having to tear someone down.” To which we only have two responses:

Firstly, no character destruction? Really? This from the campaign that has resorted to calling its opponents “weird” like the sociopathic Queen Bee Regina George in Mean Girls (someone who their own supporter Megan Thee Stallion openly admires)? This from the campaign that has been doing its damnedest, through the captured media, to paint Trump’s vice-presidential selection J.D. Vance as a closet Nazi (even as actual antisemites flock to the Left)? Yeah. Sure. Whatever.

But secondly, and more importantly, okay, you say they’re happy warriors. Some of us remember when Republicans always used to demand that in their politicians, until 2008 and 2012 came along and that presentation ran into an obvious question: If you’re a happy warrior, then what, exactly, are you happy about?

That’s not a rhetorical question. We genuinely want to know. What, exactly, does Kamala Harris have to be happy about, besides the fact that she gets to run for president without the indignity of a primary? What part of the current administration – in which, you’ll recall, she’s the number two leader – is she happy about? The stock market crashing? Record high border crossings? Inflation getting so consistently bad that experts are now forecasting a recession? A former president being shot because his Secret Service detail acts like the cast of Big Brother? Crime spiking? Anemic job growth? Their own infrastructure projects melting down to the tune of $84 billion? Seriously, Democrats: what possible on-the-ground reality suggests that “joy” is the appropriate response right now?

To be clear, the problem isn’t that this campaign theme is contentless, though it is. Barack Obama won two terms on the back of “hope” and “change,” which had about as much definition as the average Antifa protester’s arms. But the thing about “hope” and “change” is that they at least acknowledge the emotional reality which most voters felt in 2008 and 2012. After all, you don’t need “hope” when things are good, and you don’t want “change” unless the status quo isn’t working. The genius of Obama’s slogans was that, in acknowledging that voters needed hope and change, they allowed the voters’ imaginations to fill in whatever their definition of positive change was when pulling the lever for the Obama campaign. Granted, for most people, that turned out to be something quite different from what Obama had in mind, but by the time he was president, it was too late.

Does “joy” work the same way? Well, again, what do the voters have to be happy about? We know what Kamala’s most partisan supporters have to be happy about – the fact that they get to vote for the cool wine aunt who has #brat vibes and also isn’t being visibly mummified before our eyes unlike their last candidate – but come on, how much pull does that version of happiness have beyond TikTok and Mrs. Frazzled? The problem with “joy” is that it invites every voter who’s sitting at their kitchen table trying to make ends meet and realizing they’re buying less for more money to take one look at Kamala’s gyrating, contentless vibes campaign and wonder, perhaps even woundedly, “what does she have to be happy about? She’s one of the people who got us into this mess.”

Moreover, unlike “hope” and “change,” “joy” is an emotion which inherently favors the status quo. No one who’s happy wants to change anything and harsh their vibe. So, if Kamala’s theme is “joy,” then doesn’t that mean she just wants to keep doing more of the same? Actually, that’s not even a question. We know she wants to keep doing more of the same, not just in terms of policy (where her woke bona fides are obvious), but also in terms of the campaign trail. That is to say, what the theme of “joy” is really about, when you cut through the code, is the fact that Kamala’s team wants nothing to change between now and November. She wants to go on smiling her way through speeches in front of friendly audiences, with as few debates, as few interviews, and as few unscripted moments as she can possibly get away with. And like the overgrown Spring Fling Queen she is, she thinks just snapping “Ugh, why are you so sad” at anyone who dares to ask questions or point out her record is enough to get through the election, when everyone will (presumably) just pull the lever for her in order to keep the vibes going, regardless of whether it will actually improve their own circumstances.

Will it work? If we were talking about an election in peacetime, with a roaring economy and a contented populace, then yeah, it probably would. But that’s not the world we live in. No one, including Kamala Harris’ own voters, has much of anything to be happy about outside of the minor dopamine hit Kamala’s campaign is providing them on social media, which will fade before long. In fact, not only will it fade, but to most Americans who aren’t afflicted with Kamala’s brand of yassified brain rot, it’ll seem shockingly unempathetic. To borrow from Robert De Niro in Joker, the average voter will eventually think, “I’m struggling to feed my family and you’re laughing?”

Well, yes, they are. Because the thing is, the Democrats have nothing else. They can’t offer a plan for how to make people happy; that would require them to be honest about their goals – goals no American actually wants to vote for. They just have to keep grinning like the Joker himself and praying no one notices how hard they’re clenching their teeth or how hard their muscles are straining to maintain the rictus. Fortunately, the GOP is not so afflicted. Which is why the candidate of “joy” is going to learn the same lesson as Joy herself in “Inside Out”: yes, people do come to help because of sadness. And one person in particular is going to help.

His name is Donald J. Trump.
This Story originally came from humanevents.com

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