(Michael Barnes, Liberty Headlines) Social justice ideology celebrates anyone who claims an aggrieved status against traditional America and Western Civilization. But famed sports journalist Jason Whitlock isn’t playing along.
Whitlock, who is black, bravely embraced two cancel-culture non-negotiables on Tuesday: God and country.
“At age 53, those two words define me,” he wrote.
The impetus for Whitlock’s autobiographical column was to explain his recent departure from FOX Sports and his new role with the ascending sports media company Outkick the Coverage — which was founded by Clay Travis, author of “Republicans Buy Sneakers Too: How the Left is Ruining Sports with Politics.”
Whitlock opened his column with a tribute to his late grandmother, Lovi Kennedy, who he said “planted the seed of Christianity inside my soul.”
“I’m a Christian American,” Whitlock professed.
“I’m an imperfect sinner who moves in faith, rejects fear and prefers to be defined as a follower of Jesus Christ above all else. My race, gender, sexuality and political point of view are all irrelevant in comparison to my personal relationship with God,” he wrote.
Whitlock, a one-time ESPN host, further analyzed the sickened state of mainstream sports journalism.
“Major corporations, the lifeblood of the mainstream media, operate in fear of algorithms that act as social-media lynch mobs,” he said.
“The punishment for failing to stick to the secular values promoted through social media is career execution by lethal algorithm.”
He noted that social media companies, and by extension their press employees, prioritize race, gender, sexuality and political ideology over God and country, and that there’s no place for either him or those who think like him at mainstream media organizations.
Whitlock cited the recent attacks on New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees for daring to say he supported standing for the American flag — a situation that appears to have subsided only after Brees and his wife released repeated humiliating apologies.
“I can’t do it. I can’t participate in the character assassination of anyone based on such an innocuous comment,” Whitlock said.
“Irrational fear is threatening our existence,” he continued. “It is my belief that partnering with Clay and making Outkick the most fearless media force in America will help heal the wounds dividing us.”
‘The supply of available rental units continues to accumulate…’
The Manhattan skyline (Wikimedia Commons)
(Michael Barnes, Liberty Headlines) It’s often said that people vote with their feet. And true to form, New York City’s real estate market is showing signs of a mass exodus in the wake of the poorly handled Wuhan virus crisis and Black Lives Matter-related riots.
According to the consulting firm MillerSamuel Inc., new rental leases in Manhattan fell by 62 percent last month, marking the worst May in 10 years.
May also saw the largest year-over-year increase in new listings in nearly four years, with the number of apartments listed for rent in Manhattan jumping 34 percent, to 7,420.
All told, there were more empty apartments in Manhattan last month than at any time since MillerSamuel began collecting market data in 2006.
“The supply of available rental units continues to accumulate,” real estate service provider UrbanDigs warned in a separate report, indicating that June may be worse.
In a borough with 1.63 million pre-COVID residents, only 377 new leases were signed in Manhattan in the first week of June, a decrease of 67 percent from June 2019.
In many ways, the city’s leadership is responsible for the dramatic downturn.
New York City became the epicenter for the Wuhan virus in the United States after city officials encouraged residents to attend mass Chinese Lunar New Year gatherings in February after hundreds of people had already died.
New York City’s health commissioner, Dr. Oxiris Barbot, said it was important to attend the events to combat racism.
“While it is understandable that people feel anxious, that is no way shape or form [sic] an excuse for them to use that as an opportunity to spread misinformation, to spread racist ideas because that is currently the greatest risk to New Yorkers,” said Barbot on Feb. 9.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio implemented harsh social distancing policies once the spread of the virus was out of control. He also selectively enforced them, notably against churches and Jewish worshippers.
De Blasio openly shifted his social distancing position when it came to mass demonstrations and rioting over the past two weeks. He’s even backed rioters and looters over police, according to the NYPD.
Cautious residents appear to be taking notice and leaving for greener pastures.
‘I don’t think anyone would say that it’s not the appropriate time to move the statue of Josephus to a more appropriate location…’
A statue of pro-slavery Josephus Daniels is removed from Raleigh’s Nash Square / IMAGE: The News and Observer via YouTube
(Michael Barnes, Liberty Headlines) A statue of Josephus Daniels was quietly taken down early Tuesday morning without desecration, violence or media-fueled mob anarchy.
Rather than being toppled and trashed, the statue of one of North Carolina’s most influential racists was carefully removed from its perch in Raleigh’s Nash Square, a downtown park in the state’s capital city.
It was wrapped in a blue tarp to protect against scratches and chips and placed on a flatbed trailer to be transported and re-erected at a less public location.
The removal was not a Black Lives Matter spectacle. In fact, there was no pressure from activists or the liberal Raleigh city council, according to news reports. Instead, the removal was sanctioned by the Daniels family and assisted by city officials—and potentially paid for with taxpayer funds.
Many might be wondering, why now? And why the double standard?
“The time is right,” Frank Daniels III said in an interview with The State.
“I don’t think anyone would say that it’s not the appropriate time to move the statue of Josephus to a more appropriate location,” the wealthy former newsman said of his great-grandfather.
But for all the Democratic endorsements, political donations—including support for disgraced former North Carolina senator and presidential candidate John Edwards—and progressive posturing of the modern Daniels family, only now do they think the statue of the family’s patriarch is a problem.
The Daniels family appears to have changed this week, but history didn’t.
The family’s deep media ties and Democratic Party roots may well be the reason they have been given a pass at a time when similar statues are being desecrated across the South. The special treatment is especially stark given the shocking legacy of Josephus Daniels.
Born in 1862, Josephus Daniels was the editor and publisher of the News and Observer newspaper from the post-Civil War Reconstruction period until his death in 1948.
The News and Observer was North Carolina’s largest paper, and Daniels was a prominent Democratic figure who served as secretary of the Navy under President Woodrow Wilson (another noted racist and progressive who has been spared current mob excesses).
Daniels was also a close friend and supporter of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who had been Daniels’s top Navy aide during World War I.
Daniels believed that “the greatest folly and crime” in U.S. history was giving “Negroes” the right to vote.
He flooded the News and Observer with harsh news reports, ruthless editorials, incendiary letters and front-page cartoons so racist that the paper and the Daniels family would be immediately destroyed in today’s social-media-driven “cancel culture.”
According to historians, Daniels was terrified that Southern blacks would gain political power, so he used his newspaper to conjure fears of what was described as the horrors of “Negro rule.”
The evil propaganda helped fuel widespread hatred of black Americans, and historians credit Daniels with fomenting lynch mobs as well as the violent overthrow of a duly elected local government in Wilmington, North Carolina in 1898.
Why did Daniels target Wilmington? Because residents elected a mixed-race mayor.
A heavily armed mob of 2,000 “Red Shirts,” a terrorist faction of the Democratic Party, set fire to black-owned businesses and the city’s newspaper. According to historian David Zuccino, the Red Shirts ravaged Wilmington, “terrorizing women and children and shooting at least 60 black men dead in the streets.”
Ultimately, the city’s elected officials were forced to resign at gunpoint.
Josephus Daniels is the only name mentioned as the cause of the “insurrection” in a 2006 Wilmington Race Riot Commission report. The report concluded that brutal event was the only successful armed coup d’état in American history.
Upon the release of the commission report, the News and Observer issued a weak statement of regret, offering “an apology for the acts of someone [Daniels] we continue to salute in a different context … and for the misdeeds of the paper as an institution.”
In 1900, Daniels used his influence to help pass Jim Crow legislation that broadly disenfranchised most blacks for decades, including excluding them from North Carolina’s political system.
Daniels was a virulent segregationist and a powerful supporter of the Klu Klux Klan, though he never claimed to be a member. He was a leading progressive of his time who helped initiate education reforms, women’s suffrage and the prohibition of alcohol.
There’s no mystery or debate about who Josephus Daniels was. But despite his legacy, the Daniels family and the 8-foot-tall statue of its most prominent member has been treated with kid gloves.
Moreover, the Daniels family is fabulously wealthy thanks to Josephus Daniels.
In 1995, the family sold the News and Observer to The McClatchy Company for $373 million. It had owned a controlling interest in the paper for 101 years.
On Tuesday, Frank Daniels Jr. issued a statement about his grandfather and the removal of the statue that stood in Nash Square for 34 years in commemoration of his legacy. The statement did not explain his family’s abrupt about-face, nor was he asked about it.
It did, however, fall short of an apology.
Daniels Jr. touted his family’s progressive activism and Democratic Party bona fides as proof that they are on the right side of history, eerily similar to Josephus Daniels.
“In the 75 years since his death, The N&O and our family have been a progressive voice for equality for all North Carolinians, and we recognize this statue undermines those efforts,” he said.
‘The world is upside down and not one of us on this phone call would have predicted that the world will be as it is today. And it is five months from now until November…’
Debbie Dingell / IMAGE: MSNBC via YouTube
(Joshua Paladino, Liberty Headlines) Rep. Debbie Dingell, D-Mich., said Democrats should not be overly optimistic about Joe Biden’s lead in presidential election polls.
“Some people say, ‘Oh, look at the numbers,'” said Dingell, who called herself “Debbie Downer” while talking about the statistics. “I don’t believe these numbers.”
Biden leads President Donald Trump in the general election polling average by 8.1 percent, according to RealClearPolitics.
He leads Trump by 7.3 percent in Michigan. Trump beat former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton by fewer than 11,00 votes in Michigan’s 2016 presidential contest.
Dingell cautioned Democrats against trusting the polls during a Michigan Women for Biden online event on Monday.
She said there is too much uncertainty about what will happen in the months leading up to the election to be confident about Biden’s victory.
“And look at what’s happened in five months. The world is upside down and not one of us on this phone call would have predicted that the world will be as it is today. And it is five months from now until November.”
Dingell said she offered the same advice to Democrats in 2016, but they did not heed it.
“Four years ago, many of you on this phone call thought that I was nuts,” Dingell said. “I was in enough communities and heard enough people talking that I was very worried about the outcome of that election.”
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, who is eyeing Biden’s VP slot, also cautioned Biden’s female supporters from becoming too confident.
“We can do this,” Whitmer said. “And I believe we are going to be successful but we cannot for one second let our guard down. We cannot for one second make an assumption that Michigan is going to go with Joe Biden.”
She said polls that show “double-digit leads” can be dangerous for Biden’s supporters.
“We don’t want people to get complacent or for people to think showing up in Michigan doesn’t matter,” she said. “I know Joe Biden gets it. I know he’ll be here.”
‘If we put our hands on the criminal, we are going to jail…’
Cyrus Vance Jr. / IMAGE: John Jay College via Youtube
(Claire Russel, Liberty Headlines) The New York Police Department has removed officers from the Manhattan district attorney’s office following city prosecutors’ decision not to press charges against violent rioters.
The decision to leave the DA office came just hours after Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. announced his office would not be pursuing charges against the protesters who looted businesses and attacked NYPD officers.
Now, the officers originally assigned to Vance’s office will help with crowd control elsewhere in the city, according to the New York Times.
New York City Police Commissioner Dermot Shea denied that the move was directly related to Vance’s announcement, but it’s been clear for weeks that tensions are high between city officials and the NYPD.
Last week, city prosecutors came out in support of legislation that would forbid police officers from using choke-holds. The unions representing NYPD officers immediately slammed the legislation as an attempt to “vilify” officers who are just trying to do their jobs.
“If we put our hands on the criminal, we are going to jail,” Pat Lynch, president of the Police Benevolent Association, said of the legislation. “I am not being dramatic. That’s how bad it is. No one has read the bills.”
The decision not to prosecute protesters is just the latest example of the city trying to undermine its law enforcement, said Edward Mullins, president of the Sergeants Benevolent Association.
More than 400 NYPD officers have been injured by protesters over the past few weeks, according to NBC New York, but the city doesn’t seem to care, he explained.
“It is a dereliction of duty to their oath of office,” Mullins said in a statement. “More important than undercutting the work of the NYPD, it is undercutting public safety.”
Shea, however, argued that city prosecutors and police officers aren’t at odds.
“Are we always in lock step? No,” he told the Times. “We’re human beings and from different agencies.”
“Honestly, we feel alone out there,” Mullins said. “You go out and spend 17 hours on this day, and then you check your phone, and you have certain members of Congress, the governor, the mayor, and they’re saying that we’re not doing a good job.”
‘This continues to be one of the most striking examples of unequal treatment of a church in the land use context that we have seen in the past 20 years…’
New Harvest Christian Fellowship, which occupies a prominent spot across the street in downtown Salinas, Ca., planned to expand into this fabric store./IMAGE: KSBW Action News 8 via Youtube
(Joshua Paladino, Liberty Headlines) Salinas, California has successfully blocked a Christian church from opening in a downtown building after a federal judge ruled that the church would hamper the city’s goal of creating a “street of fun.”
In the lawsuit, the Pacific Justice Institute said that the Salinas City Council’s “vibrancy plan” uses zoning rules to label downtown churches as “blight.”
PJI said Salinas’s zoning laws violate the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, which prohibits governments from imposing substantial burdens on religious exercise, PJI reported.
Judge Susan Van Keulen, who sits on the District Court for the Northern District of California, said the city government has a compelling interest in preventing the church from operating downtown since it does not attract tourists or residents.
PJI said the Salinas City Council is not following its own vibrancy plans, since it allows a post office and a nursing home to open downtown.
“Salinas deems churches as less deserving of equal treatment under the law than the live children’s theatre, two cinemas, and event center that share the City’s downtown corridor with New Harvest Fellowship,” said Kevin Snider, PJI’s Chief Counsel who is the lead attorney in this case.
New Harvest Christian Fellowship has shared the Gospel in downtown Salinas for 25 years, and the church outgrew its downtown rental space a few years ago.
The church told Salinas in 2017 that it planned to buy a new building that is across the street from its current location. The church bought the building in 2018.
The Salinas government said New Harvest Christian Fellowship must have church services on the second floor and that the first floor must be dedicated retail space so that the city can pocket the tax revenue.
Next-door venues use their first-floor space for entertainment purposes.
“This continues to be one of the most striking examples of unequal treatment of a church in the land use context that we have seen in the past 20 years,” said Brad Dacus, president of PJI. “We have appealed this case to the Ninth Circuit, and we are optimistic that a different result will be reached upon review by a higher court.”
‘When criminal aliens are released to the streets instead of being transferred to ICE custody, as in this case, it is a great injustice to the victims…’
Kittitas County law enforcement / IMAGE: KING 5 via YouTube
(Joshua Paladino, Liberty Headlines) The Kittitas County Sheriff’s Department in Washington state arrested an illegal alien with a criminal record, charged him with crimes including murder, and then released him without notifying Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
ICE joined the Kittitas County officials in the search for Jorge Omar Alcantara–Gonzalez, 41, on May 28 after learning that he was involved in the disappearance of a local hunter, 41-year-old Ian Eckles of Kent.
Local authorities found and arrested Alcantara-Gonzalez on June 14 and charged him with murder, burglary, theft and other crimes that are connected to the disappearance of Eckes, who went missing in mid-May, ICE reported.
ICE requested custody of Alcantara-Gonzalez, or at least notification of his release, from the Kittitas County Jail, but the jail released him without notice.
Local law enforcement and immigration officers have encountered Alcantara-Gonzalez on multiple occasions in past years.
The Washington State Patrol arrested him in Dec. 26, 2017 for driving under the influence. The King County Jail released him on Dec. 27 before ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations could lodge a detainer for his arrest.
The Lewis County Sheriff’s arrested him about one year later, on Dec. 17, 2018, for failure to comply with the state, presumably related to King County’s drunk driving charges.
ICE requested custody of Alcantara-Gonzalez on Dec. 18, but the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office transferred him to King County’s custody the next day.
King County placed him in the Regional Justice Center of Washington.
ICE asked RJC to transfer the illegal alien to its custody on Dec. 20, 2018. The jail released him without notifying ICE.
Four days later, the Seattle Police Department arrested Alcantara-Gonzalez and charged him with stealing a vehicle.
The Seattle Police Department arrested him again in March 2019 for failure to comply.
The King County jail released him again, in defiance of another ICE immigration detainer.
Authorities finally convicted Alcantara-Gonzalez of vehicle prowling and drunk driving in May and June of 2019.
After serving a short amount of time in prison, the jail released him without notifying ICE.
Customs and Border Protection has deported Alcantara-Gonzalez three times, in 2003, 2009 and 2013.
“When criminal aliens are released to the streets instead of being transferred to ICE custody, as in this case, it is a great injustice to the victims, their family, and the community at large,” said Michael Melendez, acting field office director for ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations in Seattle.
Man brutally mobbed after argument with teenagers who cut in line at a convenience store…
(Ben Sellers, Liberty Headlines) When the Black Lives Matter movement’s first wave crested during the latter years of the Obama presidency, many of the same familiar elements were present.
One of the most outrageous and alarming elements was the so-called knock-out game, in which a mob—typically African–American teenage boys—would film an unprovoked attack in which they sucker-punched a defenseless victim at random.
If a surveillance video first reported on by KTRK Houston is any indication, those attacks may be coming back.
The video shows a man leaving a convenience store in Spring, Texas, carrying several bags of groceries, who is initially approached by four black males.
Within seconds, they surround him and back him up against a car, where he falls to the pavement. They continue to punch and slap him as several bystanders look on. Some then appear to join in the assault, including a man exiting the store who kicks the victim in the head.
According to KTRK, the victim said the assailant who kicked him in the face also said, ‘Black lives matter” followed by an expletive.
Thomas M Gilliland, a senior deputy with the Harris County Sheriff’s Office, told Liberty Headlines the following in an email:
On Sunday, June 14, 2020, a 24-year-old male was in the line purchasing items at the Exxon Gas mart at 7134 Oakwood Glen, Spring, Texas. He male told deputies a group of 5 to 6 male juveniles attempted to cut in line ahead of him. A verbal argument ensued with juveniles. They then exited and walked towards a black colored vehicle. The complainant also exited and walked towards his vehicle. The juveniles then confronted him and began to strike and kick him. They then fled in an unknown direction in a the sedan. The male suffered a swollen lip and a small laceration over his eye. He refused EMS treatment.
Gilliland asked that anyone with additional information contact HCSO Assault Investigators at 713-274-9100.
Although the police report indicates that the attack was not entirely unprovoked, the brazenness and violence with which it was conducted is telling of the escalating tensions in race relations, ostensibly spurred by the police killing of George Floyd.
Other shocking videos surfacing this week have shown the conflicts involving left-wing activist groups clashing with right-wing counter-protesters and even with reporters.
Some of the past knock-out game attacks—which first drew national attention around 2013 and continued into 2014—targeted particularly vulnerable victims, such as the elderly.
With law-enforcement in many major cities and other predominantly blue areas hamstrung over accusations of police brutality, the recent race-riots evoked the same feeling of lawlessness and chaos as those that occurred in the aftermath of Michael Brown’s 2014 shooting and other precipitating events.
The climate of racial division previously culminated in the deadly tragedy in Charlottesville, Virginia, where right-wing groups, including some from white-supremacist organizations, were confronted by Antifa demonstrators wielding improvised projectiles and flame-throwers.
In the melee, left-wing activist Heather Heyer lost her life after 20-year-old James Alex Fields Jr. drove his car into a crowd that was blocking the road at the city’s popular pedestrian mall.
‘Maybe he’s not telling the truth. He’s been known not to tell the truth, a lot…’
(Claire Russel, Liberty Headlines) Almost immediately after his name appeared in the Justice Department’s lawsuit against former national security adviser John Bolton, Assistant Attorney General Jody Hunt announced his resignation.
NEW: Jody Hunt, the head of DOJ’s Civil Division, announced to employees this evening that he’s stepping down, effective July 3. I reviewed the email to Civil Division staff, which doesn’t say why he’s leaving now, just that he’d advised Trump today of his decision.
Hunt, who was confirmed as head of the DOJ’s Civil Division in August 2018, announced in an email to his employees that he’d step aside on July 3.
He has helped the Trump administration fend off a litany of legal challenges and was part of the DOJ’s recent lawsuit against Bolton. The suit alleges that Bolton breached his nondisclosure agreements by disclosing classified material in his upcoming memoir.
The Civil Division office essentially serves as the government’s law firm, according to the DOJ’s website.
It “represents the United States and its agencies, Members of Congress, Cabinet Officers, and other federal employees in tens of thousands of cases. In total, the Civil Division litigates matters on behalf of over 100 different federal agencies.”
Hunt’s decision to step down from this office is being seen by some as an attempt to steer clear of the Trump administration, especially if rumors of Bolton’s accusations prove true:
Now three senior DOJ officials quitting in the last week, deep into an election year. They can all see the writing on the wall. https://t.co/6slyLicvmS
“Maybe he’s not telling the truth,” Trump said Monday when asked about the memoir. “He’s been known not to tell the truth, a lot.”
Prior to taking the position, Hunt was chief of staff for former Attorney General Jeff Sessions. However, Sessions split acrimoniously with the president over his decision to recuse himself from the Mueller investigation into Russian collusion, thereby turning it over to the less-than-reliable Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.
Sessions is currently in a race in Alabama to regain his old Senate seat from his Democrat successor, Doug Jones, although he faces an intra-party challenge from former Auburn football coach Tommy Tuberville, to whom Trump has thrown his support.
Warning: Video contains extreme profanity and flashes of rear nudity.
(Ben Sellers, Liberty Headlines) In yet another harrowing scene from the tiny, independent nation formerly known as CHAZ, in the heart of downtown Seattle, a local Fox News reporter broadcasting from the front lines of the conflict zone was verbally and physically assaulted by anarchist rioters.
Brandi Kruse, a reporter for Q13, posted the raw video on Facebook showing the events from Monday night.
“I want you to see this. I hope you will watch every minute so you can feel the fear we felt. So you can hear my tears at the end,” she wrote.
“Our crew was targeted, stalked, harassed, and assaulted,” she continued. “The level of vitriol from one member of the mob, who claimed she was a ‘social worker,’ was like nothing I’ve ever experienced.”
Earlier this week, CHAZ’s warlord council, believed to be led by former rapper Raz Simone, declared that the former Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone would be re-acronymned as the “CHOP.”
However, the leaders of the breakaway community, comprising six blocks in Seattle’s East Police Precinct, were reportedly having trouble coming up with a word that corresponded with the “O.”
The name is an homage to the self-governed Paris Commune of the French Revolution, which relied on the guillotine to dispense bloody justice against the deposed aristocracy.
Seattle’s Democrat officials, including Mayor Jenny Durkan and Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee, have declared that there is nothing whatsoever out of the ordinary in the new arrangement.
They have rebuffed offers from President Donald Trump to dispatch federal peacekeeping envoys to liberate the region, with Durkan saying she anticipated it being a “summer of love” in the lead-up to the November presidential election.
Police were forced to abandon the precinct amid race riots, ostensibly over the death of Minneapolis resident George Floyd. They have since been forbidden from using tear gas, pepper spray or other chemical agents.
“When elected leaders call this type of behavior ‘peaceful,’ not only is it a lie, but it’s deeply offensive to those who have been subjected to it,” Kruse wrote. “I hope this video is spread widely. Seattle needs to do better.”
