This is a very good thing.  A New York State Supreme Court has blocked the unilateral state-wide mask mandate of Governor Kathy Hochul and state Health Commissioner Basset.  The legal reasoning is very important.   NY Supreme Court Ruling HERE.

The authority of the New York governor and health commissioner, provided by the declaration of a state emergency, has expired.  With that expiration any/all mandates from the office are invalid; all requirements for public health -such as the mask mandate- MUST come from the legislative body.

According to the ruling, Judge Thomas Rademaker said that neither the governor nor the state health commissioner had the authority to enact the mandate without the state legislature, since the governor no longer has emergency powers. [full pdf here]

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There is really only one question that matters at the heart of the U.S. position toward Ukraine and NATO.  It was asked halfway through the press conference with Jennifer Psaki today.

“Considering that NATO allies have not held up their own agreement to spend 2 percent of their own GDP on their military preparedness … if Europeans are not willing to expend their own blood and treasure on their own self-defense why should Americans be expected to do so?” 

Spoiler Alert… The White House could not answer the question.  Jen Psaki hemmed, hawed, and attempted to use verbal linguistics to assemble previously over-used soundbites, but she could not -and did not- answer that question.  WATCH:

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‘Nuf said.

The honest answer would be…  We, in the Biden and Obama administration, are doing all this stuff in Ukraine, for Ukraine and under the auspices of protecting Ukraine, because a whole bunch of us from both political parties in/around the DC beltway – along with our families – receive massive amounts of personal financial wealth from the DC money laundering operation of foreign aid money in/around Ukraine.

That’s the real answer, and the reason Psaki cannot reconcile the easiest question publicly.   The NATO members also know that American politicians enrich themselves and their families through the laundry of foreign aid to their own bank accounts.

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For those who think the conflict is not being orchestrated by the Obama-Biden administration, consider this.  European countries and our NATO allies are not as worried about Russia entering Ukraine.

The people closest to the situation including France and Germany, are not asking for the U.S. to get involved.  Indeed, you can make the argument based on their public statements, that European NATO countries are not that concerned.  Even Chuck Todd (NBC) sees this.

It is the Obama-Biden foreign policy team that is creating anxiety over the potential for Russia to enter Ukraine, not our NATO allies. If we end up in a conflict in Ukraine, it will be because the professional political class in Washington DC want us to be in a conflict in Ukraine, not the American people.

Russian President Vladimir Putin can easily see this dynamic.

(Via ABC) – The State Department ordered diplomats’ families Sunday afternoon to depart the U.S. embassy in Kyiv, Ukraine, amid heightened fears of a Russian attack on the country.  The embassy has also authorized non-emergency employees to depart, according to an internal cable obtained by ABC News.

In an updated travel advisory issued later Sunday, the State Department confirmed the drawdown and urged U.S. citizens in Ukraine to consider departing the country now using commercial flights.

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The professional political leftists are starting to rebrand themselves as having fallen victim to the “bureaucracy of COVID”, and according to those high-minded people who think very highly of themselves, we are supposed to embrace this new enlightenment from the same people who were demanding our acquiescence to their dictates.

This example of “THE AWAKENING” from an uber-progressive, Ms. Bari Weiss, on a television show, is supposed to be something I am told to appreciate.  WATCH:

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I/We are expected to appreciate the same people who demanded our acquiescence to every policy that was created by their ridiculous fear, simply because they now admit ‘oops, my bad‘?   Sorry, not happening.

For two years they shoved their intolerant fingers in our faces, destroyed lives and livelihoods, made ridiculous demands in order to sustain their own fear, threatened our children, destroyed the economy, used COVID as an excuse to destroy families and steal an election, attempted to force us to kneel at the altar of their mask wearing and never-ending vaccine crap… and we’re just supposed to what, forgive them?

Fat chance.  That sound you heard was millions of us locking the door, turning around to face them, and now the reckoning is about to begin.

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For those of you who have prepared it is wise to remember the advice that always accompanies the final stages of preparation.  Once you are prepared, shut up, zip it, run silent and run deep.

The reason is simple comrades, when the “voluntary rationing” phase concludes, those who have prepared are quickly cast as ‘hoarders” and targeted by those who created the desperation.  It has always been thus.

DC Mayor and COVID Compliance Minister, Muriel Bowser, asks residents in/around her region to enter a phase of voluntary rationing.  What comes after the voluntary phase is the part many have been studiously preparing to avoid.

In the bigger picture… I find it rather revealing that only when leftist policies are followed to their natural conclusion do you see officials in the leftist economic system they created, a system not coincidentally always based on the outcome of scarcity, asking people not to engage in economic activity.

Chasing socialism always creates an outcome where the expressed intent from government is NOT to buy stuff, rationing.  Socialism, or leftism in its modern form, always creates scarcity; it is the diametrically opposite outcome of a free capitalistic society.

Ukraine is a hot mess and has been ever since the Obama administration stuck their fingers into the internal affairs of the country.  In recent days, the DC administrative state and their corporate stenographers in media have been promoting a position that the U.S. needs to go to war with Russia in defense of Ukraine.

Fox News host Tucker Carlson asks why.  Why does the DC beltway and the crew behind Joe Biden want to create a war with Russia over a nation state that really doesn’t impact U.S. interests?  WATCH:

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Earlier today a federal judge enjoined the Supreme Court decision against a federal mandate for private companies and expanded a nationwide injunction against the federal mandate for federal employees and contractors.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A U.S. judge in Texas issued a nationwide injunction on Friday barring the federal government from enforcing President Joe Biden’s requirement that federal workers without qualifying medical or religious exemptions be vaccinated for COVID-19.

Judge Jeffrey Brown, who was appointed to the District Court for the Southern District of Texas by then-President Donald Trump, ruled that opponents of Biden’s vaccination mandate for federal employees were likely to succeed at trial and blocked the government from enforcing the requirement.

Biden announced in September that more than 3.5 million federal workers were required to undergo vaccination, with no option to get regularly tested instead, unless they secured approved medical or religious exemptions. The requirement kicked in this past November, and White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Friday that 98% of federal workers are vaccinated.

“We are confident in our legal authority here,” she added.

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The U.S. Dept of Labor has released the unemployment claim data [DATA HERE], and the results show claims of 286,000 last week: an increase of 55,000 from prior week and the third consecutive week of increased claims.

As we have continued to point out from data, in part due to the vaccine mandate, and in part due to the underlying economic issues created by the Biden administration, the working class economy has bifurcated and cleaved.   The trendline is negative.

Ask yourself, where are these current claimants going to gain future jobs when the inflationary pressure is contracting consumer demand?

WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits rose to the highest level in three months as the fast-spreading omicron variant disrupted the job market.

Jobless claims rose for the third straight week — by 55,000 to 286,000, highest since mid-October, the Labor Department reported Thursday. The four-week average of claims, which smooths out weekly volatility, rose by 20,000 to 231,000, highest since late November.

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Proctor and Gamble makes a variety of familiar products under various brand names.  As we noted last October, we were awaiting details on a predictable next wave of retail price increases for products in the chemical and household cleaner segment.

Today, P&G announced an average price increase to retailers of 8% on their laundry products (Tide, Gain, etc.) effective with the next fulfillment of supplier purchase orders.  On the liquid detergents, that’s an average increase well over $1 per bottle…. YIKES.

(VIA CNN Business) – It’s going to cost you more to wash your clothes. Procter & Gamble (PG) said Wednesday that it was raising prices by an average of about 8% on retail customers next month for its Tide and Gain laundry detergents, Downy fabric softener and Bounce dryer sheets.

[…] “Transportation and labor markets remain tight. Availability of materials remain stretched,” P&G CEO Jon Moeller said on an analyst call Wednesday. “In some categories and in some markets, inflationary pressures are broad-based with little sign of near-term relief.” P&G makes many of the most recognizable brands in US homes, such as Gillette, Charmin, Bounty, Pampers and Crest.

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When Joe Biden took to the microphones in October to announce, “a series of public and private commitments to move more goods faster, and strengthen the resiliency of our supply chains, by moving towards 24/7 operations at the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach,” the supply chain objective was to increase the productivity of the ports.  However, data released for November [SEE HERE] and now December, show exactly the opposite.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg visited both ports recently.  Both ports, along with Oakland, also made the arriving ships remain further offshore than when the October announcement was made.  They are hiding the ships.

For some unknown reason the Port of Los Angeles (POLA) has delayed reporting of December; but the Port of Long Beach (POLB) just released their data {LINK}.  What the statistics show is that less cargo is being handled now, than it was when the 24/7 port operations announcement was made:

The purpose of telling the ships to await their port time in a queue farther offshore is transparent.  The Biden administration wants to give the illusion they eliminated the bottleneck of container ships.   Out of sight is out of mind.

Operation ‘Hide the Ships’ allows the administration to make claims about port efficiencies and increased productivity that are abjectly false.  The data from the two months after the announcement shows less container offloading and onloading happened in November and December than happened in the prior month of October when the new initiatives were announced.

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