[Babylon Bee] PHILADELPHIA, PA‐Speaking to a packed 30-seat arena, Bill Clinton remarked on Jeffrey Epstein's recent passing, saying that Epstein's cause of death "really depends on what your definition of 'suicide' is."
"Did Epstein commit suicide?" asked an attendee at the event.
A wide-eyed Clinton shrugged his shoulders. "I mean, it really depends on what your definition of suicide is, heh."
An awkward silence ensued. Bill turned to look at Hillary for support, but she just glared at him and ran her finger across her throat, a metaphor that means "death."
He went on, "Heh, I mean, well, we've got to define terms here, alright? If you mean, 'Did he hang himself without any outside assistance?' then I'd say that does not fall under the definition of what may or may not have occurred."
Hillary held up a pair of finger guns to her husband's head in a threatening fashion, another metaphor that means "death." A repeat of their "marriage vows"
Bill gulped. "But, well, heh, if you mean did he hang himself and then shoot himself three times in the back of the head just to be sure? Then yeah, I'd say he committed suicide."
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/02/2019 00:00 ||
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#1
Apparently he (Bill) choked Monica a number of times.
[Townhall] After much procrastination and evasion, this week Britain's Parliament finally relented to the request of Prime Minister Boris Johnson for a general election. For the first time since 1923, Britain will have an election in chilly December. And yet, for Boris, this would appear to be springtime for his political prospects. Why? His Conservative Party is heavily favored to capture a solid majority, confirming Johnson's premiership and almost inevitably approving his renegotiated deal with the EU over Brexit. In short, by the end of 2019, it would appear highly likely that Boris will have solidified his grip on his party, on Parliament, and on a newly independent United Kingdom. That sounds a lot like total victory, from Boris's perspective.
Why am I so sanguine about Boris's chances? Because for months the British political establishment and the media have heaped contempt on poor Boris. They have pilloried him, whittled away at his majority in Parliament by encouraging defections and rebellion, and questioned his decency, integrity, and even his sanity. Boris has been given the Trump treatment, in other words, and yet he's still standing ‐ unbowed, undaunted, and ready for more. Boris has proven his mettle in extraordinary fashion, and that makes it likely that he can endure ‐ nay, prosper ‐ in the midst of a tough general election campaign. After all, he's used to incoming fire.
Even more tellingly, despite all the slings and arrows that have come Boris's way, his party is soaring in the polls. The latest snapshots of voter sentiment in anticipation of the upcoming general election put the Conservatives ahead by 16, 13, 17, 14, 8, and 15 points, respectively. Can circumstances change before December 12th? Absolutely. But what fresh assault on Boris and the Tories can be contrived, when the opposition has already thrown everything at them but the kitchen sink? Stay tuned on that front.
Given the bright prospects now contemplated by Boris Johnson and the Conservatives in the U.K., it seems reasonable to ask the obvious question: why is the political right thriving in Britain at the same time that a similarly conservative, populist, nationalist leader in the U.S. is struggling? Why is Boris almost certain to win re-election, while most polls in this country show Trump losing to electoral lightweights like Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren, and Bernie Sanders?
The answer lies in a key difference between U.S. and British politics.
...and possibly in differences between British and American pollsters...
In the United States, the two-party system, while manifestly unpopular, has proved surprisingly durable.
This suggests that, like democracy itself, the two-party system is the worst way to do things except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time...
In the U.K., on the other hand, eight parties captured seats in the last Parliamentary election, and this time approximately ten parties have a legitimate shot at doing so. Moreover, as recently as 2015 the two main British parties captured only two-thirds of the vote. In 2019, the average of current polling shows the Conservatives capturing about 36% of the vote and Labour about 25 percent. In other words, 40 percent of the public is either undecided or plans to vote for another party. In the U.S., polling averages show less than 10 percent of the electorate uncommitted to either of the two main parties.
...The lesson for Trump is a straightforward one, but one not easily acted upon. Trump is, to be frank, an unpopular figure, and an unpopular president,
...in certain circles, yes. But so was Obama, not to mention George W. Bush. Wikipedia collected the historical record on Electoral College and popular vote counts here.
in a country where it is hard to win an election if you gain less than 50 percent of the votes. That's bad news.
It does depend on how many of the votes came from legitimate voters— certain districts are notorious for having more votes than voters, among other issues.
To win re-election, therefore, Trump must do one of three things: he must improve his own popularity (very difficult, given the media's undisguised loathing), he must drive up his opponent's negatives (somewhat more achievable, given the poor quality of the Democratic field and the vast resources available to the GOP), or he must divide and fragment the opposition, making it possible to win in 2020 with less than 50 percent of the vote.
#1
I don't see how his "reputation" among people who won't vote for him anyway is a problem. And when kangacoup implodes it will be all about who the dems run. I think their "white knight" is that assh*le who plays Captain America in the Marvel comic book movies.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
11/02/2019 7:16 Comments ||
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"Dear Couch"
[National Review] The Democratic primary campaign started in January, but it already feels as if it began in the late Jurassic period, and the first votes are still three months away.
Primaries are a lot like Christmas: The shopping season begins way before, and things rarely live up to expectations. (I mean this in the secular sense. I’m not talking about celebrating the birth of Jesus; I’m talking about pretending to be psyched about new socks or, say, Joe Biden.)
I still like Christmas, but I’m happy to play the Grinch with the primaries. We should get rid of them. If I could, I’d sneak into the Whovilles of Iowa and New Hampshire and steal the voting machines, ballots, and bad coffee.
In the past, my Grinchiness was mostly reserved for the "first in the nation" Iowa and New Hampshire votes. Why should these two states have so much power? Two generations of political consultants have made their careers by knowing how to fill hotel rooms in Des Moines and whose palms to grease in Nashua. Scour the Federalist Papers and the Constitution and you’ll find no mention of primaries, never mind the Hawkeye and Granite State Hegemony. And yet, if you win in either or both, you’re statistically likely to become your party’s nominee.
The Iowa caucuses are a particular affront. If it weren’t for them, there’d be no ethanol subsidies, which are bad for your car, the economy, and the environment. If such things bother you, Iowa and New Hampshire are also very white places, and I don’t mean in the "white Christmas" sense.
But the proposed remedies ‐ rotating the primary states every four years, nuking Iowa from orbit, etc. ‐ don’t really fix the underlying problem. We shouldn’t have primaries at all ‐ and that goes for Senate and House primaries, too.
#5
By my figuring Trump has three years coming for the 3 years the Dems stole from him. Add another 4--8 years for punitive damages. We donn need no stinkin election. We just need to keep on keepin on.
h/t Instapundit
[Spectator] Nancy Pelosi proclaimed Thursday that the party-line impeachment vote in the House of Representatives was about protecting "democracy." Madame Speaker was actually close to speaking the truth for once, because what the impeachment circus is about is protecting Democrats, particularly the Obama administration officials who sought to sabotage President Trump both during the 2016 election campaign and after Trump won. The vote Thursday ‐ 232 to 196, with all but two Democrats in favor and all Republicans voting "no" ‐ followed several days of secret testimony in deranged California Rep. Adam Schiff’s House Intelligence Committee, conducted prior to any authorizing vote on the House floor. Now that Democrats have formally voted to climb aboard the "Ukrainegate" impeachment train, however, Pelosi and her party have signed a sort of suicide pact. They must destroy the president in a desperate effort to prevent Americans from learning what Obama, the Democratic Party, and "deep state" bureaucrats did to Trump.
It was perhaps symbolic that this House vote happened on Halloween, inspiring the president to remark on Twitter: "The Greatest Witch Hunt In American History!"
[The Hill via Right Scoop] Most Democrats like Juan Williams are sticking to their guns about Pelosi’s impeachment process, but Geraldo sounds more like a Republican as he rips Pelosi’s impeachment process as "grotesquely unfair and divisive":
THE HILL ‐ "It’s grotesquely unfair and divisive. Even The New York Times got it right. Fractured House, bitter vote. This is absolutely the way this went down yesterday," Rivera said on "Fox & Friends."
"The Speaker of the House, the Democrats, have crafted an impeachment which is inherently divisive and made it so very unfair as to enrage Republicans and other fair-minded people," he continued. "You cannot have a process wherein the Speaker, running the event, gets to say the other side what witnesses they can call, and has veto power over those witnesses and over any kind of subpoenas."
"It is so deeply and fundamentally unfair," Rivera later added. "I predict it will lead to the kind of Tea Party uprising we saw in 2009 and 2010. It will divide this country along partisan lines in a way we have heretofore never seen. And I do not believe it will result in justice."
[The Hill] Former Vice President Joe Biden's handlers, they let him out of his private airplane yesterday to do a rare campaign rally in Fort Dodge, Iowa.
I suffered through most of it so that you wouldn't have to, and I really have to tell you how shocking it is. It’s literally like being transported back to the year 1999. The rhetoric and policy proposals are exactly the same; the only difference is he says something along the lines of how this election is, quote "a battle for the soul of this nation."
The rally just completely lacked the self-awareness and the reflection for any person who wants to hold the oval office in the year 2020. Biden remarked on terrible things in American life, as if he has had no role whatsoever in crafting the policies that lead to these terrible things in the first place. Take this lamentation on the state of the middle class.
Further on, he says quote, "I'm determined to give the middle class a real shot in this country. If we ever lose that, we begin to lose the soul of the country. It’s about who we are.
I mean, who wants to tell him folks?
How exactly did the middle class get into trouble? It is absolutely stunning that one of the politicians most responsible for our current plight has the gall to express concern for those he took a direct role in hurting. Biden is, of course, behind the 2005 effort to strip bankruptcy protections for millions of Americans. Protections they probably could have used when the bottom fell out of the economy in 2008.
You would really think from Biden's statement that he did not serve and play a central role in an administration that oversaw the greatest wiping out of middle-class wealth in generations.
Under the Obama/Biden administration median household income cratered and then barely recovered to 2007 levels by the end of 2016. That barely scratches the surface of just how bad things got. In terms of wealth, median total wealth for Americans in 2016 was 34% what it was in 2007. And when Obama left office, the average wealth of the bottom 40% of Americans was minus $8,900. Throughout all this time the everyday costs of life went up, which means in a nutshell, you got epically screwed
It is difficult to overstate the miserable and hollow state that Obama and Biden left this country in. The extremely modest gains made over the course of the Trump administration are a band-aid on the gaping wounds that neoliberals inflicted upon us beginning in the late 90's and 2000's with NAFTA, permanent normal trade relations with Cina, and allowing China to enter to the World Trade Organization.
[BabylonBee] U.S.—Presidential candidate Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke has announced he is dropping out of the presidential race so that he can spend more time taking guns away from his family. “I’ve been so focused on grabbing the guns of strangers,” O’Rourke told the press, “that I’ve neglected taking away the guns of those closest to me.”
The news was especially upsetting for the millions of AR-15 owners who had just been waiting for a politician to come and free them of their scary burden. “I guess I’m stuck with these,” said gun owner Rex Wells, standing in front of his arsenal of semi-automatic rifles.
Having dropped out of the race, O’Rourke wasted no time in turning his attention to his family, immediately confiscating his children’s super soakers. He then invited himself on his uncle’s hunting trip, though his uncle seemed very wary of that. O’Rourke also asked his nephew Tommy where he kept his Nerf dart guns; Tommy claimed he lost them all in a “tragic boating accident.”
[Ricochet - Jon Gabriel] Robert Francis "Beto" O'Rourke began his presidential run with a Vanity Fair cover photo taken by Annie Leibovitz. It proved to be the high-water mark of his campaign.
Since then, Beto's campaign has been a comedy of errors. A Kerouac-style vision quest driving aimlessly around the country that he journaled on his web diary. Instagramming a gross dental appointment. Leaping on tables, windmilling his arms, and shouting about the promise of hope to help change what is possible for the future of hopeful promises. "Skateboarding to be the Leader Of The Free World™!"
Gassing on about vagaries made him a media darling when he was up against Texas Sen. Ted Cruz. But on the big stage he seemed, and still seems, shocked that the parade marched on without him. From weak debates to stump flubs to utter policy cluelessness, some white male billionaires just can't catch a break. and those Furry pics...
When Beto got desperate, he started speaking the quiet part out loud. "Hell yes, we're going to take your AR-15!" he shouted from the debate stage, hawking a T-shirt with the quote minutes later. Red-state Democrats rushed to the cameras insisting they disagreed with the former congressman.
He promised to tax churches that disagree with his LGBTQ weathervane at any given moment. "There can be no reward, no benefit, no tax break for anyone or any institution, any organization in America, that denies the full human rights and the full civil rights of every single one of us," Beto said.
That would cancel the First and Second amendments; next he might suggest quartering troops in our homes. Alas, with his departure, Beto's forced march through the Bill of Rights has ended in defeat. As it should
Hopefully, his supporters can console themselves with one of the other 162 candidates running for the Democrat nomination.
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/02/2019 00:00 ||
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[SOFREP] Why did American commanders choose Delta Force over SEAL Team 6 to conduct the operation that killed the leader of ISIS?
Many are bound to speculate that the SEAL option was quietly put aside because of the never-ending drama emanating from the Naval Special Warfare (NSW). And the problems in the SEAL community aren’t restricted in the "White" SEAL teams ‐ "White" teams are the acknowledged SEAL teams that aren’t part of the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC).
The Naval Special Warfare Development Group (DEVGRU), also known as SEAL Team 6, has had its fair share of issues ‐ issues that came in to the forefront in the immediate aftermath of the last high-profile operation of the Global War on Terror (GWOT).
Operation Neptune Spear, the raid to kill or capture Usama Bin Laden, was conducted by DEVGRU’s Red Squadron. Soon after UBL was dead, an account of the raid appeared in the form of a book written by Mark Bissonnette (he wrote it under the pen name of Mark Owen). Soon thereafter, the "Shooter’s" (Robert O’Neil) account emerged and brought an additional wave of bad publicity on DEVGRU and the NSW community.
And then reports about DEVGRU’s alleged war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan emerged. Couple the above with the recent high profile cases in the NSW community, for example, Chief Gallagher’s war crimes trial, drug issues in SEAL Team 10, SEAL Team 7’s Alpha Platoon withdrawal from Iraq ‐ which was made public by SOCOM on Twitter, highlighting the utter lack of confidence in the SEAL community to discipline its own, and it’s only reasonable to assume that American commander shunned away from the ST6 option because of the inability of the unit and the SEAL community to avoid embarrassing incidents.
A plausible, and even desirable, reason for many in the SOF community. But that wasn’t why Delta was chosen for the operation.
Ever since America has been engaged in two simultaneous conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, JSOC has decided to divide the pie between its two Direct Action Special Mission Units (SMU). DEVGRU got Afghanistan, Delta got Iraq. This, of course, doesn’t mean that there hasn’t been a transfusion of elements from the two units between the two Areas of Responsibility (AOR). But Delta has had the lead in Iraq (and Syria) since March 2003.
Another reason why Delta was chosen for the operation is directly related to the above: battlefield familiarity. Delta shooters have been fighting ISIS alongside their Kurdish and Iraqi allies for close to five years. After multiple combat rotations in the theater, they have gained an invaluable understanding of how the terrorist organization functions and its operational and tactical peculiarities. That doesn’t mean that DEVGRU wouldn’t be able to pull this mission off ‐ SMUs are designed, after all, to be ready for any contingency anywhere in the world. But rather it delineates the relationships that Delta has been nurturing in the region and the great work it has been doing. A work that began in late 2015.
Under the guise of the Expeditionary Targeting Force (ETF), JSOC elements redeployed in Iraq in the closing months of 2015. The ETF was autonomous, comprising of shooters from Delta, Rangers, aviation support from the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (160th SOAR), a military intelligence detachment, and an assortment of enablers. Its goal was simple ‐ take the fight to ISIS; give them no rest, no quarter.
Drawing from the McChrystal playbook, which devastated Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) during the Iraqi insurgency, the ETF and its Kurdish allies began a surgical campaign that has since resulted in the killing (direct or indirectly) of approximately 25,000 ISIS fighters.
Operation Kayla Mueller was commanded by JSOC’s departing deputy commander Major General John W. Brennan Jr.
Posted by: Besoeker ||
11/02/2019 06:09 ||
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#1
I think it's a "spread the wealth around" thing.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
11/02/2019 6:47 Comments ||
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#5
Simple field reality. The Unit has cultivated extensive intel links with locals, may even be running assets within the camp. They know the terrain, the people. It wasn't as in and out as a raid in relatively safer Abbotabad.
#6
I had not thought of #3 (but that's why we hired g(r)om). Posting that possibility to butcher paper and office wall this afternoon for further monitoring and comment.
[Intellectual Takeout] Most kids’ shows today are pretty much twaddle.
However, in moments of exhaustion and weakness, I let my boys watch the occasional age-appropriate movie or TV show. But I usually find myself having some ’splainin to do with them afterwards.
That’s because, more often than not, they have just watched something in which the female lead is the smart and capable hero, and the male lead is the bumbling idiot who must be rescued by his female companion. For the sake of their self-esteem, I find myself having to clarify that what they are witnessing is a systematic effort to denigrate men for the sake of exalting women, all in the name of "equity".
In a recent article, Bishop Robert Barron of PBS fame has referred to this effort as the "Homer Simpsonization of men":
"Don’t get me wrong: I’m a big fan of The Simpsons and laugh at Homer’s antics as much as the next guy. But the father of the Simpson family is stupid, boorish, drunk most of the time, irresponsible, comically incompetent, and childish. In the cartoon world, he is echoed, of course, by Family Guy’s Peter Griffin, who is similarly buffoonish. In both cases, the wives‐Marge in The Simpsons and Lois in Family Guy‐have the brains, the competence, and the moral responsibility. And in The Simpsons, Homer is imitated by his son Bart, who is sneaky, stupid, and unmotivated, and Marge by daughter Lisa, who is hyper-smart, uber-competent, and morally alert."
You will notice this same prototype in many of today’s family sitcoms where the female lead is usually fit and gorgeous while the male lead is an unintelligent and sometimes unattractive Neanderthal. As Barron points out, you’ll also notice it in most of the recent movies:
"And I wonder whether you’ve noticed a character that can be found in practically every movie made today? I call her the ’all-conquering female.’ Almost without exception, she is underestimated by men and then proves herself more intelligent, cleverer, more courageous, and more skilled than any man. Whether we’re talking about a romantic comedy, an office-drama, or an adventure movie, the all-conquering female will almost inevitably show up. And she has to show her worth in a domineering way, that is to say, over and against the men. For her to appear strong, they have to appear weak. For a particularly good case in point, watch the most recent Star Wars film."
We shouldn't overestimate the impact of this entertainment-industry campaign on behalf of the "all-conquering female"; there are still plenty of men out there who are full of self-esteem and are very successful.
But as one of our articles last week showed, there are also increasing numbers of men who are checking out of society. One-sixth of men between the ages of 25 and 34 have stopped looking for work all together. Women are outpacing men in both college attendance and graduation. Suicide rates for middle-age men continue to rise. And fathers are now absent from one-third of American homes. There are undoubtedly many factors behind these phenomena, but it can’t help that movies and televisions today are constantly feeding men the message that they are stupid, and that society doesn’t really expect much from them.
In his conclusion, Barron points out that some modern correction of previously deficient portrayals of women was probably in order. "But," he writes, "what is problematic now is the Nietzschean quality of the reaction, by which I mean, the insistence that female power has to be asserted over and against males, that there is an either/or, zero-sum conflict between men and women."
Indeed. Can’t our society build up one gender without taking down another?
#2
I actually consider myself a sort of knight for women's rights. I believe I can forgive (most) women for their trespasses because men have simply been assholes to them and forced them to adapt to that. I find men themselves to blame for driving the woman to extreme hatred mixed with angst and self-loathing. The idiot masses have louder louts and leches than decent, gallant men and the worst of us that crave attention, quite often get it.
This 'men are inferior' doctrine. Who sets it in motion ? Who are the writers, the producers, the enablers of this stupid creed ? Is it not 'involuntary celibates' in thick glasses and designer wear, trying to impress women to get in their pants ? Or manipulative men invested in the empowerment of the most whimsical section of society - the fairer sex ? Invested so as to one day reap the reward of an easily beguiled, vain leadership of frustrated divorcees and spinsters.
Men control the feminist brigade, the lgbtNation, and any other mass indoctrination agenda that is actuated through hollywood, the MSM or lobbies. I think if they were to be exposed - the Bloombergs and Soros and all the beltway-bums behind the Hillarys and Warrens, that would be a gallant thing to do, and it would also take some steam out of this idiocy.
Men and women need to love each other as much as they love themselves, that's the natural order of things. Trying to suppress nature with nurture has never worked.
#4
Well, I don't feel inferior to Miley Cyrus, Meggie Moo and other "womyn." My bank account is pathetic compared to theirs, but that's not a worry to me.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
11/02/2019 7:12 Comments ||
Top||
#12
[seriously] I'm realizing that there is now a completely parallel cultural-entertainment universe available to young men (and others) who gave no patience for, or interest in, the Hollywood and Woke Culture Shitshow.
Someone who accepts that boys have lots of testosterone, that they are rough at times but also want to be valorous, i.e. willing to fight to uphold concepts like honor or "respect": if you still believe in this conception of maleness and refuse to deny nature, then you can still find an array of delightful, interesting, sometimes even highly instructive videos, podcasts, essays and e-books across the web.
Peterson, Rogan, SouthPark, American Thinker-Federalist-Quillette-CityJournal, and on and on.
And of course, the 'burg.
The resistance to the Shitshow is thriving, and has many legions.
#14
A very respected friend recently observed that Men are very like America in that it is not only safe but de rigeur to heap every type of vile abuse on both. That is until some mouthy whiner needs some heavy lifting.
#15
"Respectable" prejudices today:
1. Anti-Americanism
2. Anti-Catholicism
3. Hatred of (living) straight white males
4. Hatred of (no longer living) white male cultural, political, military and religious heroes.
#16
Lately, they've become blatant ads for political dogma though. And they're destroying franchises.
The Terminator was a favorite of mine, ruined recently by the new flick. It's like the Culiacan familia funded a bunch of dykes to make a terminator movie and they roped in Arnie just to humiliate the stupid bastard on a road trip.
Then there's the Batgirl, Supergirl shit I haven't seen but I can tell what they'll be like.
#17
Saga of ancient Mary Sues, or Yesterday's News...
Two valiant maids went a-viking --
"By Odin, we're gonna go hiking!" --
But found the sweet flower
Of chivalry sour,
And marches not much to their liking.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Townhall] After much procrastination and evasion, this week Britain's Parliament finally relented to the request of Prime Minister Boris Johnson for a general election. For the first time since 1923, Britain will have an election in chilly December. And yet, for Boris, this would appear to be springtime for his political prospects. Why? His Conservative Party is heavily favored to capture a solid majority, confirming Johnson's premiership and almost inevitably approving his renegotiated deal with the EU over Brexit. In short, by the end of 2019, it would appear highly likely that Boris will have solidified his grip on his party, on Parliament, and on a newly independent United Kingdom. That sounds a lot like total victory, from Boris's perspective.
...The lesson for Trump is a straightforward one, but one not easily acted upon. Trump is, to be frank, an unpopular figure, and an unpopular president,
[The Hill via Right Scoop] Most Democrats like Juan Williams are sticking to their guns about Pelosi’s impeachment process, but Geraldo sounds more like a Republican as he rips Pelosi’s impeachment process as "grotesquely unfair and divisive":
[BabylonBee] U.S.—Presidential candidate Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke has announced he is dropping out of the presidential race so that he can spend more time taking guns away from his family. “I’ve been so focused on grabbing the guns of strangers,” O’Rourke told the press, “that I’ve neglected taking away the guns of those closest to me.”
[Ricochet - Jon Gabriel] Robert Francis "Beto" O'Rourke began his presidential run with a Vanity Fair cover photo taken by Annie Leibovitz. It proved to be the high-water mark of his campaign.
