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This is the kind of thing that ‘progressives’ just don’t understand

Many people have made fun of Helen Gym Flaherty’s huge promises, including this poor site, with even the Editorial Board of the very liberal Philadelphia Inquirer calling her out:

Gym should be honest about her big spending agenda before voters go to the polls on May 16. Philadelphia does not have unlimited funds. Under Mayor Jim Kenney, the city’s budget increased 50% to $6 billion with little to show for the spending spree.

The city tried to tax and spend its way to prosperity in the 1970s and ‘80s and nearly went bankrupt. Despite 25 years of fiscal sanity before Kenney was elected, Philadelphia remains one of the most heavily taxed cities in the country. The city’s tax burden continues to contribute to its slow job growth, which, in turn, is linked to its high poverty rate.

Sometimes it’s the little stories which illustrate the problem:

Philadelphia pool closures leave neighborhoods without a vital community resource: ‘Why our pool?’

Across the area pools have been closing down due to lifeguard shortages and ongoing renovations. No one is certain when, or if, some pools will open again.

by Allison Beck | Monday, May 15, 2023 | 5:00 AM EDT

On a March afternoon, Lakia Toney recalled the sounds of kids laughing and splashing in the clear blue water during a summer afternoon. Neighbors of all ages joined in on the fun at 12th and Cambria Recreation Center.

She smiled at the memory of her North Philadelphia community enjoying the safety of the city-run pool, and one another’s company.

“(T)he safety of the city-run pool”? Perhaps the author, Allison Beck, forgot about, or never heard of, the city having to close the pool at the McVeigh Recreation Center last year due to “unruly behavior,”, violence, and vandalism.

Patrons of 17 Philadelphia pools are dealing with a similar story. Between lifeguard shortages and renovations, no one is certain when, or if, the pools will open again. The area pools that open often do so later in the season, with their gates closing after as little as six weeks.

Just 50 of 72 city pools could open in 2023, and many of them for only a portion of the summer.

Parks and Recreation has been recruiting lifeguards through high schools, community groups, and employment organizations. They are hiring Philadelphians who do not yet know how to swim and offering free training and certification ahead of the summer. Pay was recently raised to $16 per hour, with a $1,000 end-of-season bonus if guards submitted their applications by April 15.

Just how desperate do they have to be to find lifeguards if the city has to first train people who don’t even know how to swim?

Toney said the background checks and drug testing needed for lifeguards are a big barrier for some neighborhood youths. All candidates are required to submit to background checks and must pass a drug screening if they are over 18, according to Andrew Alter, a spokesperson for Parks and Recreation.

“When there are opportunities like this where they could be making a great income or helping out the community, helping out themselves, they’re not able to,” Toney said. “They can’t be a part of that because they’re involved in things that they’re not supposed to be doing and it’s hindering them from actually helping themselves and others.”

Heaven forfend! You mean that city employees who would be responsible for rescuing swimmers in distress, and be able to perform CPR, would be expected to be clean and sober, expected to not use drugs?

The ‘progressives’ seem to think that our social problems are caused by government not doing enough, and Mrs Flaherty has been frequently mocked for saying that part of the solution is to have more public libraries open, for longer hours, I guess so the gang-bangers and wannabes could sit in there are read Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie books.

If, of course, they could read at all. Mrs Flaherty has bragged how she saved the Edward T Steel Elementary School from ‘going charter,’ but the school is ranked 1,205th out of 1,607 Pennsylvania elementary schools, 1% of students scored at or above the proficient level for their grade in math, and 8% scored at or above that level in reading.

But, like lifeguards, there is a shortage of librarians, and a shortage of money to pay for more of them and keep libraries open longer. Mayor Jim Kenney, if not as hard-left ‘progressive’ as Mrs Flaherty, would have loved to keep the libraries open longer, and the City Council would have appropriated money for it, if the city had the money!

Note that even the Editorial Board of the Inky stated that Philadelphians were very highly taxed, and that has contributed to slower job growth and economic opportunities.

I will admit it: while I’d like to see the City of Brotherly Love saved from the looming disaster of progressivism, there’s a little part of me which wouldn’t be all that upset if Mrs Flaherty won, because then Philadelphians, Pennsylvanians, and the whole nation would be able to see what an utter failure progressive policies would be. Coupled up with the police-hating defense lawyer who is the city’s District Attorney, and adding to that a police department crippled by inept leadership and a huge shortage of officers, Philly would become the disaster area of the eastern seaboard, and perhaps, just perhaps, teach the well-to-do liberals who have been voting for Democrats for so long that being soft-on-crime and supporting the bad behavior that makes and keeps people poor harms our society and our country.

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What about the right to a speedy trial?

The escape of Nasir Grant, 24, and Ameen Hurst, 18, from Philadelphia’s Industrial Correctional Center last Sunday has caused both concern and amusement in the City of Brotherly Love, concern that two dangerous men, especially Mr Hurst, charged with four homicides, were on the loose, and amusement that the seriously understaffed jail didn’t even know that the two men had bolted for three shifts.

Xianni Stallings booking photo, via Steve Keeley on Twitter. Click to enlarge.

Just a few days later, 21-year-old Xianni Stallings, who had been “released from jail earlier this year after charges connected to a stabbing she was accused of participating in fell apart due to a lack of evidence,” decided that she wanted to go back behind bars for allegedly helping Mr Hurst escape, and the expression on her face in her latest booking photo clearly shows an, “Oh, what the f(ornicate) have I done?” look.

Mr Grant, who was not facing charges that would have kept him locked up for the rest of his miserable life, was recaptured by federal marshals after just four days on the lam. He didn’t even ‘lam’ very far, as he was picked up in North Philly.

And now a second person has been charged with helping Messrs Grant and Hurst escape:

Suspect in fatal beating at Pat’s Steaks allegedly helped inmates escape prison

Jose Alberto Flores-Huerta is expected to be charged with crimes including conspiracy and escape, police said.

by Chris Palmer | Friday, May 12, 2023 | 5:38 PM EDT

José Alberto Flores-Huerta, via Metro Philadelphia. Click to enlarge.

A 35-year-old man jailed on murder charges is expected to face new charges for serving as a lookout for the two men who escaped from a Philadelphia jail this week, authorities said Friday.Jose Alberto Flores-Huerta — incarcerated for allegedly participating in a fatal beating outside Pat’s King of Steaks in 2021 — is expected to be charged with crimes including conspiracy and escape, the Police Department said in a statement.

Police declined to provide additional details about Flores-Huerta’s alleged role in the breakout. He is the second person in two days to be accused of helping Nasir Grant, 24, and Ameen Hurst, 18, break out of the Philadelphia Industrial Correctional Center on Sunday. The pair sneaked out through a hole in a chain-link fence, police said.

The announcement of the impending charges came just hours after Grant was captured in North Philadelphia on Thursday night by U.S. Marshals while disguised in women’s clothing. Grant was arraigned on a new count of escape Friday morning, and bail was set at $10 million.

There’s more at the original, and at least from the story, and the charges he faces, it would seem that Mr Flores-Huerta isn’t necessarily a great guy. But a few paragraphs further down, I found this:

Flores-Huerta, of South Philadelphia, has been jailed since 2021, when he was charged with taking part in the fatal beating of Isidro Cortes outside Pat’s Steaks in South Philadelphia. Authorities said Flores-Huerta and several other men also assaulted Cortes’ father and another man during the brawl, which followed a CONCACAF Champions League soccer game in Chester between the Philadelphia Union and Club América, a team from Mexico City.

At a preliminary hearing last year, Flores-Huerta’s lawyer contended that two other men — who have not been caught — were primarily responsible for striking Isidro Cortes. But a judge was not persuaded, and she ordered Flores-Huerta held for trial on counts including murder, conspiracy, and aggravated assault. He was denied bail, and a trial is scheduled for the fall.

Why, exactly, is Mr Flores-Huerta scheduled for trial two years after he was arrested? What about his right to a reasonably speedy trial? Did the prosecution, which apparently presented enough evidence that the judge ordered the suspect held without bail, delay proceedings, of was it the defense? What if, after he is finally tried, Mr Flores-Huerta is acquitted? If that is the case, he will have spent two years behind bars for a crime he didn’t commit!

This is one of the travesties which has occurred in this country as a result of the COVID-19 panicdemic: the judicial system pretty much ground to a halt, and prisoners all across the United States were held in legal limbo, and some of them in jail, because trials were so greatly delayed, and it seems as though nobody cared.

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‘Progressives’ against common sense and reality

The Nation is a far-left, “progressive” opinion journal with a long history, and when you see an article from The Nation, you already know: it’s going to be almost Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez crazy:

How Women’s Swimming Got So Transphobic

Almost no other sport is as hostile to trans athletes—and that’s because its culture created the perfect conditions for transphobia to take root.

By Frankie de la Cretaz | Friday, May 12, 2023 | 5:00 AM EDT

When Lia Thomas first entered the women’s NCAA swimming scene in 2021, her presence was immediately felt. National media outlets became obsessed with her. She got the kind of attention rarely given to swimming athletes outside of the Olympics.

Non-subscribers get just three articles per month before the paywall descends. To read this article without paywall issues, you can also find it here.

Thomas was good, but she wasn’t the next Simone Biles of her field. So what explained such a frenzy? Simple: Thomas was a transgender woman having success in the women’s division.

Will Thomas, who competed all through high school and his first three years at the University of Pennsylvania, as the 6’3″ tall male he was, did not have much success in the men’s division. He won a couple of events, but was ranked 554th in the nation, 200 meter freestyle, all divisions, 65th in the 500 freestyle and 32nd in the 1650 freestyle.

Yet, when he decided that he was really a woman, which coincided with the shutdowns due to the COVID-19 panicdemic, he had a full season off before joining Penn’s women’s swim team and calling himself “Lia.” Mr Thomas did more than just “hav(e) success in the women’s division”; he dominated.

From December 7, 2021, to February 22, 2022, CNN spent nearly 15 minutes criticizing Thomas’s participation in the women’s division but less than two minutes discussing the dozens of anti-trans sports bills being introduced across the country. Meanwhile, from December 3, 2021, through January 12, 2022, Fox News aired 32 segments that attacked Thomas, according to Media Matters for America. That pace didn’t slow down for months. “That level of coverage of women’s swimming, specifically, has not come close to being matched in the year after the end of [Thomas’s] swimming career,” says Ari Drennen, the LGBTQ program director at Media Matters. “They like to say that this is coming from a place of caring about women’s sports, but it’s hard not to notice that they don’t really cover women’s sports unless trans women are competing in them.”

Well, one thing is certainly true: Mr Thomas did generate far more coverage competing on the women’s team as a woman than was common. But let’s tell the truth here: men’s swimming races don’t generate that much coverage, either.

Women’s sports? Yeah, there’s coverage on ESPN and its related networks . . . of figure skating, volleyball (especially beach volleyball), and gymnastics, sports where we get to see mostly white women in top shape in skimpy outfits. There is some coverage of women’s basketball, which features mostly black women in top shape, though the uniforms are not as skimpy or tight-fitting.

But it’s also true that Mr Thomas’ participation drove the coverage of women’s swimming, because he was a fully-developed man male beating up on girls beating women in sports.

Frankie de la Cretaz, from her Tweet saying that she is “Summer ready.”

So, who is Frankie de la Cretaz, the author of The Nation article? Her biography page on the Hatchette Book Group lists her as Frankie, but the underlying url shows that, at some point, she was calling herself Britni. I found nothing which indicates that she is a transgender woman, but her biographies, through several sources, including Twitter and The Nation,, all use “they/their/them” pronouns. Her only two articles listed in her The Nation biography are on transgender issues. She is, to put it plainly, a special pleader. As The First Street Journal does not go along with the pronoun silliness, I shall refer to her using the feminine forms, though I am not certain that such are correct.

The intensity of the critical media coverage helped fuel an equally intense backlash against Thomas. Sixteen of her University of Pennsylvania teammates signed a letter midway through the season saying that she had an unfair advantage. That letter was organized by former Olympic swimmer Nancy Hogshead-Makar, who, along with fellow Olympic swimmer Donna de Varona, is a founding member of the Women’s Sport Policy Working Group, which has been leading the movement to ban trans women and girls from competing in the women’s division in sports across the board. (The Human Rights Campaign has called the WSPWG “a hate group.”) And World Aquatics, the international federation that governs the sport of swimming, released a new transgender participation policy in July 2022 that essentially bans trans women from competing by creating incredibly restrictive requirements for their inclusion. (As I have written previously, there is no real evidence that trans athletes have an inherent advantage over their cisgender counterparts.)

This is utter rubbish. Mr Thomas certainly had an inherent advantage over the real women against whom he competed. He was bigger, taller, stronger, and had more endurance than the women against whom he was racing. We have previously noted his times in the Zippy Invitational.

I have noted Mr Thomas and his swimming records, competing against biological women, proving that “trans women” are very different from real women. On Sunday, December 5, 2021, Mr Thomas, won the 1,650 yard freestyle with a time of 15:59:71; the second-place finisher was his teammate Anna Sofia Kalandaze, who touched at 16:37:44 in the Zippy Invitational Event in Akron, Ohio. The difference between Mr Thomas’ and Miss Kalandaze’s times is 37.73 seconds, nearly the length of the pool.

Competitive swimming at the collegiate level involves races which are often won by fractions of a second. A victory of 37.73 seconds is extraordinary.

In the 500-yard freestyle final, Mr Thomas again defeated his teammate, Miss Kalandaze, who finished second, 4:34.06 to 4:48.99, a 14.93 second margin; Miss Kalandaze defeated the seventh-place finisher by 7.42 seconds, just half of the time she was behind Mr Thomas.

Mr Thomas time would have finished 15th in the men’s final, ahead of ten other male swimmers. The last place male swimmer in the 500 yard freestyle, Luke Scoboria of Bloomsburg University, finished at 4:42.78, 7.21 seconds ahead of Miss Kalandaze’s second-place time. His year of taking testosterone suppressants — Mr Thomas had not undergone ‘sex reassignment surgery’ by the time of the NCAA championships — have obviously not done what the NCAA believe it would. Mr Thomas ranking in the 500 freestyle, 65th, went to number one in the women’s category.

When it came to the NCAA championships, Mr Thomas went ahead and won one title, and then, apparently, backed off in his other races, so as not to increase the political backlash. No, I can’t prove that’s what he did, but it seems pretty blatantly obvious. Riley Gaines Barker, who tied for fifth with Mr Thomas in the 200-yard NCAA women’s championships, and was one of the few who had the ovaries to speak out, reported that Mr Thomas was an intact male in the women’s locker room at those championships.

Human beings have known about sex, and the differences between males and females for as long as we have any evidence of human social structure and thinking. Every bird, every reptile, and every mammal can tell the difference between males and females of their own species, and, from my anecdotal observations, it appears that dogs and cats can tell human males and females apart.

The ‘transgender’ advocates have been mounting a full-court press on this stuff. In just Friday’s Philadelphia Inquirer’s website home page are the stories Trans and queer-led groups are protesting the Marriott for hosting Moms for Liberty conference this summer, The Pennridge board has passed a bathroom policy that advocates say discriminates against transgender students, and Central Bucks orders removal of ‘Gender Queer,’ ‘This Book is Gay’ from school library shelves. As a cycling fan, my feed has Cycling race director agonizes over UCI’s transgender participation policy: ‘This could kill the sport’, and Cycling team parts ways with Olympian Inga Thompson after call to protest UCI’s transgender athlete policy.

Miss de la Cretaz’s article went a lot longer than I have quoted, but most of the remainder of it isn’t some sort of pseudo-scientific claim that there are no real advantages in sports to males claiming to be female over real women, but political arguments, that swimming has been an almost exclusively white sport, and that opposition to Mr Thomas’ claim that he’s a real woman is actually white supremacy.

Mr Thomas is white. And several of the women on Penn’s women’s swim team are Asian rather than white. But no, I don’t expect much in the way of rationality from someone like Miss de la Cretaz.

In the end, it boils down to one simple question: can people actually change their sex? The notion that sex is somehow “assigned” at birth is silly; sex is recognized at birth, but the actual determination of sex occurs at conception, by whether the sperm cell fertilizing the egg carries the X or the Y chromosome. This has been known scientifically for a hundred years now.

We know of no process by which a person whose body was developed with XY chromosomes can be transitioned into someone having XX chromosomes, or vice versa. Some with ‘gender dysphoria’ want to allow children to take puberty blockers, to prevent them from developing into adult males when they believe they are girls, or adult females if they think that they are really boys. But that doesn’t transform them into the opposite sex; it simply leaves them as underdeveloped as children.

Someone as focused on ‘transgender’ issues as Miss de la Cretaz cannot possibly have missed the horror stories of Jaron Bloshinsky, more commonly known by the fake name Jazz Jennings, and his attempts to surgically transition in adulthood after being on puberty blockers since he was young. The dedicated author cannot possibly be unaware that medical and surgical treatments do not really turn male bodies into female ones, or female bodies into male ones, but, at best, a simulacrum of what the victims want to be.

I can understand that the ‘transgendered,’ the delusional people who really, really, really believe that they were born into the wrong body — and hey, I think that I should have been born into Bo Jackson’s body! — believe that there is some way, perhaps just over the horizon, but close and eventually attainable in which they can really become the members of the sex that they want to be, but the percentage of people really suffering from gender dysphoria is very, very low. What I don’t understand is the number of normal people who support this silliness.

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Killadelphia: How do you define a “mass shooting?”

On May 7th, Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Helen Ubiñas suggested that our definition of what constitutes a “mass shooting” needs to be changed.

The Inquirer defines a mass shooting as one that occurs in public and kills three or more people.

The FBI classifies mass shootings as four or more deaths in a single incident.

Meanwhile, Congress has used the definition of three or more, and the Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit that tracks mass shootings, defines them as any incident in which four or more people are injured or killed, a classification also used by some national media outlets. (I often wonder why any shooting with more than one victim isn’t considered a mass shooting, but that may be a column for another day.)

Well, this isn’t a mass shooting under the Inquirer’s definition, bit I’m pretty sure that, if it was, there’d be a mass shooting in Philly almost every day of the year.

Quadruple shooting in East Germantown kills 17-year-old boy, wounds 2 other teens and a 7-year-old

Three people were injured and one was killed in the shooting.

by Jason Laughlin and Beatrice Forman | Thursday, May 11, 2023 |7:49 PM EDT

A shooting in East Germantown killed one teenager and injured three other youths, including a 7-year-old child, on Thursday night, the Philadelphia Police Department said.

Police said they received a report of the shooting on the 5900 block of North 21st Street shortly before 6 p.m. A 17-year-old boy who was shot in the face was transported to Einstein Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.

The other three victims — ages 7, 15, and 16 — were also transported there, where police said they are all in stable condition.

The 7-year-old was shot once in the upper thigh. The 15-year-old boy was shot twice in the head and twice in the back. The 16-year-old boy was also shot once, in the right shoulder.

NBC Channel 10 stated that the 7-year-old was not part of the group, but struck by a stray bullet.

That’s all the Inquirer had, one boy killed, and three others, at least two of whom were male, wounded.

In the meantime, Philly Crime Update tweeted, at 7:59 PM EDT, “🚨TRIPLE SHOOTING at 4800 Tackawanna St. possibly a 4th victim at Einstein stand by”.

The 4800 block of Tackawanna Street, in the Frankford section of Philadelphia, is a mix of older rowhomes and some housing project looking multi-family buildings. The 5900 block of North 21st Street consists of older rowhomes, some of which have been updated and flipped.

Now why aren’t these mass shootings? They aren’t not mass killings, but seven, and possibly eight, people were shot, and I have to wonder: how many of the victims were deliberately targeted? According to the Philadelphia Shootings Victims Dashboard, there have been 603 shootings in the City of Brotherly Love through May 8th, 118 of them fatal. May 8th was the 128th day of the year, and if fewer people have been killed this year than last, that’s still 4.71 people shot per day in Philly.

At least the way I would count it, that’s a mass shooting every day, but let’s tell the truth here: since the vast majority of the victims are black, and the vast majority of the shooters are also black, it’s way, way, way too politically incorrect to call that carnage a mass shooting.

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Khader Adnan has gone to his eternal reward

Khader Adnan was a long-time Palestinian Arab activist, and at one point a spokesman for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Arrested many times, Mr Adnan’s weapon of choice in detention was the hunger strike. His first hunger strike, ten days long, occurred in 2000, when he was locked up not by the Israelis, but the Palestinian National Authority. In 2011, he began another hunger strike, one which lasted 66 days. In 2015, he undertook a 56-day hunger strike, which resulted in Israel releasing him.

In spite of the agreement to end his first hunger strike (see above), Adnan was arrested again on 8 July 2014, at the beginning of the 2014 Israel–Gaza conflict, and has been held in detention ever since, beginning his second hunger strike on 5 May 2015. The government of Israel was seemingly determined to break Adnan’s hunger strike using force-feeding techniques similar to those used by the USA in its Guantanamo Bay prison camp. Israeli Minister of Public Security Gilad Erdan was quoted as saying “Security prisoners are interested in turning hunger strikes into a new kind of suicide attack that would threaten the State of Israel. We cannot allow anyone to threaten us and we will not allow prisoners to die in our prisons.” However, the Israeli Medical Society and various human rights groups were deploring this planned course of action by Israel, with the Medical Society issuing orders to Israeli doctors to not participate in any planned forced feedings except under certain limited circumstances not applicable to Adnan at this point in time.

Palestinian Khader Adnan, center, is greeted by Palestinians after his release from an Israeli prison in the West Bank village of Arrabeh near Jenin on July 12, 2015. Photo by Majdi Mohammed/AP, via CNN. Click to enlarge.

Adnan was again detained without charge in 2015 and again started a hunger strike on 4 May that lasted 56 days until Israel agreed to release him in July. He was arrested again in 2017 and again immediately began a hunger strike that lasted 58 days. Arrested once more in 2021 after being detained at an Israeli checkpoint, and he again went on hunger strike in protest, this strike lasting 25 days.

You can see how Mr Adnan was greeted by the Palestinians after his release. He was never going to be anything other that a pain in the ass for Israel.

Well, he was arrested again on February 5, 2023, and began another hunger strike, which would be his last: he died on May 2nd, after 87 days. Some in the Israeli media are upset about that:

Khader Adnan’s death in prison: A preventable crisis – opinion

A number of democratic countries permit force-feeding to rescue the life of a fasting prisoner. Israel could have saved Khader Adnan’s life.

By Shimon Glick | Thursday, May 11, 2023 | 1:01 AM Jerusalem Time

Following a series of security events which we recently faced, it is incumbent upon us to do some serious examination, without the involvement of political considerations. The events began with the death of a hunger-striking prisoner, Khader Adnan, and then deteriorated in an almost predictable manner. But with some different behavior on our part, much of the crisis could have been avoided.

Why was the death of Adnan not prevented by force-feeding him when his health deteriorated seriously? The answer is that the Israel Medical Association accepts the position of the World Medical Association that it is forbidden to force-feed a hunger-striking protesting prisoner.

Such a step is regarded as a violation of the autonomy of the prisoner. But it is important to be aware that this view is far from a unanimous international consensus and from Israeli court decisions.

Dr Glick, a professor emeritus of the Faculty of Health Sciences at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, continues to note the history and precedence of force-feeding a hunger-striking prisoner in Israel.

Let us think how much of what’s been occurring recently we would have been spared if we would have saved the life of Adnan, in the spirit of Jewish culture and without violating ethical norms.

While I hesitate to go all-out “Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?“, none of the references I have found have stated that Israel ever broke one of Mr Adnan’s hunger strikes via force-feeding, but he did win some concessions in his various attempts. I have to ask: did the Israelis finally say to themselves, “if he wishes to kill himself, let him”? Israel is a liberal democracy, the only one in the Middle East, and Dr Glick expresses that.

But Mr Adnan found a weapon he could apparently tolerate, better than most, and used it to his political advantage. By not force-feeding him, by letting him starve himself to death, Israel rid itself of a turbulent problem.

Dr Glick is wrong: force-feeding Mr Adnan, if they had “saved the life of Adnan,” the Palestinians would still hate the Israelis, and Hamas and their ilk would have continued to occasionally shoot rockets into Israel proper, and launch the occasional terror attack. The Arabs were given to violence and terror against Jews migrating to the Levant even when they were few in number, well before the re-establishment of Israel, well before World War II and the shoah, really for the entire 20th century.

Mr Adnan has gone to his eternal reward, and Israelis will not miss him.

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Killadelphia: Campaign canvassers for Helen Gym Flaherty prove the futility of gun control laws

As we noted on Tuesday, two ‘progressive’ campaign canvassers in Philadelphia, both carrying concealed weapons, got into a shootout on Monday. The Philadelphia Inquirer had more on the story late on Tuesday:

Family mourns loss of canvasser, as gun violence intersects with a common campaign practice

The shooting, which remained under investigation, underscored the relevance of the most important issue in the election: the city’s ongoing gun violence crisis.

by Jesse Bunch, Sean Collins Walsh, and Ellie Rushing | Tuesday, May 9, 2023 | 9:41 PM EDT

Eddie Brokenbough was struggling to make ends meet.

The 46-year-old, whom relatives described as a dedicated father of 10, experienced difficulties finding a good-paying job because, like many Philadelphians, he had a criminal record.

To supplement his income as a construction flagger, Brokenbough sometimes worked as a political canvasser, knocking on doors for organizations trying to get out the vote.

On Monday, Brokenbough was fatally shot while canvassing for the progressive group One PA by another canvasser from the same organization after the two men had an altercation.

The previous Inquirer story reported that Staff Inspector Ernest Ransom, the head of the Police Department’s homicide unit, said that the two men “had always had a beef” with each other, though what that “beef” was about has not been reported.

The shooting also underscored the relevance of the most important issue in the election: the city’s ongoing gun violence crisis. Both men involved were armed, police said, and the shooter, 22, told investigators he was acting in self-defense.

The unnamed 22-year-old shooter, with whom Mr Brokenbough apparently had an ongoing dispute, was licensed to carry a concealed weapon, and claimed that he only fired in self-defense after Mr Brokenbough drew his weapon first.

Deputy Police Commissioner Frank Vanore stated that all of the interviews have been submitted to the Philadelphia District Attorney’s office, and that office said the incident was still under investigation. Thus far, no charges have been filed, and the shooter has been released. He had a permit to carry, so there is no gun charge against him.

But next comes the real beef — pun most definitely intended — of the story:

One PA said guns are not permitted in its offices or during canvassing, and it has temporarily suspended its canvassing efforts.

Brokenbough was prohibited from legally carrying a firearm because of an earlier conviction on charges of aggravated assault and illegal gun possession, after he shot a man in the arm for speaking to his girlfriend in 2012, according to court records.

He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 11 ½ to 23 months in prison, plus five years’ probation. His conviction prohibits him from possessing a gun.

So, what happened? Mr Brokenbaugh, a previously convicted criminal with an illegal gun conviction in the past, was legally barred from owning a firearm, but did so anyway. One PA, a ‘progressive’ organization, prohibits its employees and contract canvassers, yet both of the campaign workers were carrying firearms. In a setting in which neither man, at least before they ran into each other, should have had any need to be armed, and one of which was committing a felony by carrying a weapon, both were.

Mr Brokenbough knew that he was breaking the law, and chose to do so anyway. The unnamed 22-year-old, who wasn’t breaking the law, was still violating the rules of the organization which hired him.

So, if both the convicted felon, and the law-abiding citizen, were violating the rules, why would anyone believe that passing more gun control laws would stop anyone who wanted to own and carry a firearm? And remember: these weren’t evil reich-wing Republicans here, but men working for a hard-left, socialist organization, canvassing for Helen Gym Flaherty!

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“Progressive” campaign workers, both packing heat, get into a shootout in Philly Nope, they weren't evil, reich-wing Republicans.

Screen capture from OnePA website, taken at 10:20 AM EDT on May 9, 2023. Click to enlarge.

When people tell you who they are, believe them!

What does OnePA support? They support depriving property owners of their rights by opposing eviction for non-payment of rent. They are, simply put, socialists and a group opposed to law enforcement. And naturally, they support Helen Gym Flaherty!

A Philly campaign worker for a progressive political group fatally shot another canvasser in East Germantown, police say

Both men were canvassing for the city’s upcoming primary election on behalf of OnePA. Police said it was not immediately clear what sparked the shooting.

by Sean Collins Walsh, Chris Palmer, and Ellie Rushing | Monday, May 8, 2023 | 9:44 PM EDT

A 46-year-old man was fatally shot on Monday afternoon in East Germantown while canvassing for the city’s upcoming mayoral primary, police said, in an incident that stemmed from a dispute with a 22-year-old man, who was also canvassing on behalf of OnePA, a progressive-leaning political group.

It was not immediately clear what prompted the 22-year-old to shoot the older man, and police declined to identify either of them.

The tragedy on the campaign trail came one week before high-stakes mayoral and City Council elections that have been defined by debates about public-safety issues amid the city’s ongoing gun violence crisis.

OnePA Executive Director Steve Paul said members of the group were “heartbroken, and our condolences and sympathy are with their family.”

At this point in the article, an advertisement appears, something that stops a lot of readers.

“Today, a One PA team member tragically lost their life,” Paul said in a statement. “We are mourning this senseless loss and continuing to gather the facts and investigate what happened.”

Paul previously worked in the Council office of Helen Gym, who is now a mayoral candidate running in the May 16 primary with the backing of OnePA and other progressive organizations. The group is also canvassing on behalf of Council candidates Seth Oberman-Anderson, Rue Landau, Amanda McIllmurray, Isaiah Thomas, and Erika Almirón.

So, it took Inquirer reporters Sean Collins Walsh, Chris Palmer, and Ellie Rushing six paragraphs to let readers know that the canvassers were canvassing for Helen Gym Flaherty. If a reader’s only news source was the Inky — mine isn’t — wouldn’t he wonder for whom OnePA was canvassing? I sure hope his attention span was long enough to get past the first advertisement!

The 22-year-old — who was in legal possession of his handgun — remained on the scene afterward the shooting and was taken to the homicide unit to be questioned by detectives, according to Chief Inspector Scott Small. The 22-year-old’s car was also still on the street after the crime, Small said, and OnePA pamphlets could be seen in its passenger seat.

Deputy Commissioner Frank Vanore said the victim and the man accused of shooting him knew each other and began arguing after they “happened upon each other” on the 2000 block of Church Lane[1]At or near the intersection with Lambert Street, near the Church Lane Food Market, a bodega. around 4 p.m. Vanore was not certain what the argument was about, but said detectives were investigating the possibility that it related to an existing dispute.

Staff Inspector Ernest Ransom, the head of the Police Department’s homicide unit, said that the two men “had always had a beef,” and that when they crossed paths on the street, the 46-year-old pulled out a gun — which was not registered to him — and the 22-year-old then pulled his firearm, shooting the older man once in the armpit.

The shooter claimed that he was acting in self-defense, but the important part to note is that both men were packing heat, one of them illegally, while canvassing, in broad daylight, for Mrs Flaherty. No wonder the guy carrying illegally was part of OnePA, ’cause he certainly seems to support the voting ‘rights’ of felons.

The candidate, of course, prefers sending “non-police mental health mobile crisis units” to reduce the city’s “gun violence” crisis, but perhaps there were no social workers in the canvassing crews.

Mrs Flaherty expressed sorrow, but made it clear that the shooter and his victim were not part of her official campaign.

In a statement issued Monday night, Gym said she was “devastated to hear about the tragic death of a canvasser today.”

“My thoughts are with the family of the victim, the One PA community, and everyone impacted by this irrevocable loss,” Gym said. “Though the canvasser was not part of our campaign, this loss is deeply felt by all of us.”

If Mrs Flaherty, who promises to “Get illegal guns off our streets,” and to “Provide interventions to stop those in the path of violence,” had anything to say about people canvassing for her carrying guns, the Inquirer never mentioned it.

References

References
↑1 At or near the intersection with Lambert Street, near the Church Lane Food Market, a bodega.
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Helping without helping

I guess that I was wrong . . . sort of.

I had said, on Twitter, that The Philadelphia Inquirer would not publish the photos of two escaped criminals, one of whom was accused of murder, even though the other media in the City of Brotherly Love did. After all, publishing their mugshots might help in apprehending them, and, of course, since the suspects are both black, publishing their photos would be raaaacist. Much of the professional media in the city have criticized Fox29’s Steve Keeley for his crime coverage, for that very reason. Cherri Gregg of WHYY, the Philadelphia affiliate of National Public Radio, wrote:

I rarely speak badly of news outlets — BUT Steve Keeley FOX 29’s coverage of crime — definitely makes me cringe. Crime coverage can be very harmful and scares people.

I have been working with my fellow Board Members at Law & Justice Journalism Project to train journalists to do better. Our crime coverage must be community centered — otherwise it can be harmful, sensationalized and disproportionate to what is really happening. AND who gets harmed?? Black and brown people… Black communities and Black men.

Shockingly enough, the Inquirer did cover the story, and I am amused:

Two men, including one charged with 4 murders, escaped from a Philly jail, police say

The escape happened around 8 p.m. Sunday night but was not made public until Monday evening.

by Samantha Melamed | Monday, May 8, 2023 | 8:48 PM EDT

Two men escaped from the Philadelphia Industrial Correctional Center on Sunday at 8:30 p.m., but their absence was not noticed until Monday afternoon, Prisons Commissioner Blanche Carney said at a news conference Monday evening.

One, Ameen Hurst, 18, was charged with four homicides, including the killing of Rodney Hargrove, who had just been released from a Philadelphia jail when he was gunned down on prison grounds in 2021.

The other, 24-year-old Nasir Grant, faces drug and gun charges.

“The goal right now is to make sure these two individuals are apprehended and brought back into custody,” Carney said, adding that both U.S. Marshals and the Philadelphia Police have joined that effort.

Deputy Commissioner Frank Vanore of the Philadelphia Police Department described Hurst as “a very dangerous individual,” and said, “We are looking for the public’s help to get him back.”

I’m sorry, but this is just rolling on the floor funny. The jail, the Philadelphia Police, and U.S. Marshalls are all seeking these suspects, one of whom is described as extremely dangerous, and the “anti-racist news organization” that the Inquirer promised to be published a picture which showed enough to the suspects for readers to tell that they are both black, but not detailed enough to help readers really identify them if they passed them on the streets.

You can click on the screen captured image I took from the Inky’s article to enlarge it, but even full-sized, the photos won’t really help. At least as of the writing of this article, at 8:53 AM EDT on Tuesday, May 9th, the newspaper has not included photos large enough to readers to be able to identify the escapees.

The escape occurred less than a week after the correctional officers’ union, Local 159 of AFSCME District Council 33, entered a vote of no confidence in Carney’s leadership. They said she had failed to adequately respond to a staffing crisis that has risen to more than 800 vacancies, or 40% short of a full complement.

The prisons have been subject to a monitor appointed by a federal judge since last year, in response to a class-action lawsuit alleging inhumane and unconstitutional prison conditions.

I’ll admit it: I can’t imagine why anyone would want to be a prison guard. But, when I consider that the city’s Police Department is over 500 officers understaffed, and non-uniformed city staffing is also under authorized strength, perhaps, just perhaps, it’s time to entartain the possibility that the City of Philadelphia is a crappy place to work, period.

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I’ve said it before: today’s left are pro-choice on exactly one thing! Now Joe Biden wants to regulate your dishwasher

Remember the commercial in which mom washes the dishes before putting them in the dishwasher, and the little girl asks, “So what does the dishwasher do?”

Now, I will admit it: we clean the dishes before they go in what we call the dishrinser, because I’ve installed a couple of dishwashers in my lifetime, and considering the dishwasher drain lines, and the fact that I would have to be the one to clean them or change them if they got clogged, that simply seems the best way to avoid disaster. And now Joe Biden wants to make things worse!

Now Biden is going after your DISHWASHERS: Appliances would have 27% less power and 34% less water in new White House crackdown to fight climate change

  • New rules will force dishwashers to meet harsh water and energy efficiency targets

  • It marks the latest chapter in Biden’s war on appliances that his administration claims will save Americans money

  • The DoE quietly slipped out the rule changes ahead of Cinco de Mayo festivities on Friday

by James Franey | Monday, May 8, 2023 | 1:10 PM EDT | Updated: 3:45 PM EDT

Joe Biden will face fresh accusations of meddling in the lives of American households after his administration announced a green crackdown on dishwashers.

His Department of Energy quietly released tighter rules for the home appliances on Friday afternoon as millions of people across the country prepared to celebrate Cinco de Mayo. . . . .

The rules, which form part of the administration’s climate change agenda, would slash water use by more than one-third and cut energy use limits by 27% for dishwashers in the U.S.

Any changes would only apply to new models on sale once the new rules have officially come into effect, expected to be 2027.

The new rules would force manufacturers to limit dishwashers to using 3.2 gallons of water per cycle, far below the current federal limit of 5 gallons.

There’s more at the original.

Now what would all of that do? If you have to cut the amount of water used, then you have to be using something else to clean the dishes, which has to mean better detergents and higher-pressure pumps. Reducing the amount of water used means less water in which to suspend solids cleaned from the dishes, which means an increase in clogged drain lines. This could be a bonanza for plumbers!

And if energy use limits are to be decreased by 27%, how are engineers going to get more pressure out of the pumps?

Of course, water isn’t actually saved by this, because water isn’t lost. Using more water simply means that more grey water goes into the sewer, to be cleaned at the water treatment plant, or into the septic tank, where it is filtered out through the drain field and returned to the soil. Some may evaporate into the atmosphere, where it is eventually returned to the ground as rain or snow.

This also means an increase in the price of new dishwashers, because all of the new engineering has to be paid for, but the activists have never cared about the costs to consumers.