Looks like Kirk didn’t survive the assassination.
“It’s worth to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment” – Charlie Kirk
Tag: JustTheFacts
Charlie Kirk Shot in Utah
Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Points USA, white christian nationalist, election and COVID conspiracy theorist, right wing grifter, and professional Butthead impersonator, has been shot in the neck at Utah Valley University.
“I’ve never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure.” – Clarence Darrow (paraphrased)
The First Week
I had intended to start this blog on January 20th, the day of the inauguration. Unfortunately, the SSL certificate kept refusing to install properly, which blocked me from getting things set up until now. So I’ve decided to a first week recap instead, focusing on what has actually happened, rather than proposals. I am not interested (for now) in what people are exhorting the administration to do, but what they actually do.
This all comes on the heels of Los Angeles burning in all directions – some of the worst fires the state’s ever seen. The Palisades fire has destroyed a lot of Malibu and most of Pacific Palisades, as well as outskirts of Santa Monica. The Eaton fire basically erased Altadena from the map and is burning in the San Gabriels at the moment. The Castaic fire which was threatening Santa Clarita and Castaic Junction is getting contained, but not without getting perilously close to a lot of homes.
So, the past few weeks have been a bit of a lot.
A short list of executive actions in the first week of Trump’s second term. This is not all of them, but the primary ones of interest:
- Declaring a National Emergency at the Southern Border of the United States
- This executive order indicates deployment of “as many units or members of the Armed Forces, including the Ready Reserve and the National Guard, as the Secretary of Defense determines to be appropriate to support the activities of the Secretary of Homeland Security in obtaining complete operational control of the southern border of the United States.”
- Realigning the United States Refugee Admissions Program
- This order has effectively halted all refugee admissions into the United States for the time being, including individuals who had previously been accepted but had yet to arrive in the United States. This includes military translators and advisors from countries such as Afghanistan. Others affected include refugees fleeing Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela.
- Reinstating the Remain in Mexico policy
- This was not a new executive order but reactivation of one from his first term, wherein individuals attempting to enter the United States from Mexico must remain there until they are officially accepted as either residents or refugees. Coupled with the previous executive order, that time may be never.
- Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship
- This order attempts to rescind or redefine the nature of “birthright citizenship” as established in the constitution. Department of Justice lawyers have attempted to argue this week that citizenship is only granted to children born in the United States if one of their parents is already a citizen or lawful permanent resident.
- If upheld, this would in effect create large numbers of stateless individuals, as certain countries do not regard children born abroad to be citizens, even if one or more of their parents are citizens of that country.
- In a Seattle courtroom, these lawyers also argued that Native Americans are not citizens of the United States, because their primary allegiance is to their tribe, rather than the United States. U.S. District Judge John C. Coughenour has placed a 14-day hold on this executive order, and gave the DoJ lawyers a dressing down when they suggested Native Americans were “subject to the laws of the United States” but then asserted they were not “subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.”
- I.E. they argued Natives were not citizens, but were still beholden to United States law. The judge was not having any of that.
- This order will no doubt face other legal challenges on the basis of the 14th amendment.
- Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government
- This order prohibits any member of the Executive Branch and associated agencies from recognizing someone’s gender may differ from their biological sex, or assisting in documentation to that effect. This has also paused all new intersex/agender passport applications, per Acting Secretary of State Marco Rubio
- The order also indicates one’s sex is determined by their sex at conception. At conception, a zygote has no sex. It is a mass of cells.
There are other directives, executive orders, and proclamations I haven’t listed, of course. Muzzling the NIH, CDC, and other federal health agencies unless they run every public statement past the Executive Branch, for instance. The halt of federal funding for all medical trials being run by higher institutions of learning – and federal funding for certain other sciences as well. Pulling all federal funding for the World Health Organization. Trying to use Schedule F to reclassify federal employees, though unions are fighting that in court. The “anti-DEI” initiatives across all federal agencies, even NASA.
Interestingly, while he fired a shit ton of women in advisory positions, he seemed to leave most of the men in their jobs. Surely this is a coincidence.
There’s almost too much to catalog in this one week, but that – as told by Stephen Miller – was literally part of their plan. To overwhelm resistance with a firehose of action.
More to come as days unfold.