Biden's Emergency Bill, Mixed Messages, Biden & Bibi

Gary Bauer

by Gary Bauer: Biden's Emergency Bill
President Biden's COVID relief bill – a massive $1.9 trillion emergency spending bill – is expected to come up for a vote in the House of Representatives this week. It's not difficult to justify additional resources to help struggling small businesses, families, and unemployed workers.

But there is a lot in the bill that is impossible to defend. For example:

• Why are Democrats attempting to stuff a massive minimum wage hike into this "emergency" bill? While some workers would benefit, many others (about 1.4 million others) could lose their jobs. But some Democrats apparently don't care about those jobs.
• There's $1 billion in payments to "socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers," which appears to be some sort of race-based set-aside.
• There's nearly half a billion dollars in funding for art museums.
• There's tens of millions for Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers.
• There's $100 million for an underground rail system in San Jose, California, that is not scheduled to be completed until 2030. How is that an emergency?
• $670 billion would not be spent until 2022 or later, including $140 billion that is allocated for 2024.

> And keep in mind that there's still $1 trillion in unspent funds from emergency spending bills passed last year!

Mixed Messages
The Biden Administration is sending insane and illogical messages when it comes to immigration policy. Late last week, Canada and the United States announced that border crossings would remain closed for at least another month. There are also ongoing negotiations to further tighten travel restrictions.

At the same time, Biden is doing everything he can to open up the southern border, including bringing in tens of thousands of migrants and resettling them deeper into the American heartland to await a court hearing two or three years from now.

How does that make any sense at all in the middle of a pandemic?

We don't have adequate testing, and Texas is struggling to get back on its feet after the recent shock of artic weather knocked out power and water to millions of residents.

In fact, the Democrat mayor of Del Rio, Texas, is begging the Biden Administration to stop flooding his city with illegal aliens. And other Democrat politicians are warning that Biden's immigration policies are too extreme.

This is just another example of how we have moved from America First policies to a radical America Last agenda.

Biden's Model
There's every indication that Joe Biden is modeling his administration on the radicals who run places like Minneapolis, New York City and San Francisco. Well, what's happening in those places? The nutty left is definitely hitting some bumps in the road.

In Minneapolis, progressive politicians led the charge to defund their police department last year. It hasn't worked out so well. Crime has skyrocketed, and 90% of residents no longer feel safe. Now Minneapolis is spending more than $6 million to recruit new police officers.

In New York City, Trump derangement syndrome is so out of control that Mayor Bill de Blasio tried to shut down two Central Park ice skating rinks (and put hundreds of people of out of work) because they happen to be managed by the Trump Organization. After a backlash from outraged parents and a Harlem youth ice hockey program, city officials backed down.

Speaking of outraged parents, the entire school board of Oakley, California, resigned Friday after they were caught mocking and threatening frustrated parents during what they thought was a private Zoom call.

What is the significance of Oakley? Well, the school board was comprised of the kind of people Biden is catering to when he refuses to reopen the schools.

We have previously reported on the absurd decision of the San Francisco School Board to rename schools named after George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. The city's liberal mayor is so frustrated with the woke school board for wasting time and money that she's suing to get the schools reopened.

I am pleased to report that the backlash – even in liberal San Francisco – was so great that the school board has backed down. The renaming committee meetings have been canceled and the board will focus exclusively on reopening San Francisco's schools.

Unfortunately, one of the first things that Joe Biden did was to disband the 1776 Commission, which was created to explain why the "woke" version of American history is a complete lie.

Biden & Bibi
After nearly a month in office, President Biden finally got around to calling Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. While the two leaders had positive things to say afterwards, the terse statement from the prime minister's office suggests it was not a pleasant call. The statement reads:

"Israel remains committed to preventing Iran from getting nuclear weapons and its position on the nuclear agreement has not changed. Israel believes that going back to the old agreement will pave Iran's path to a nuclear arsenal. Israel is in close contact with the United States on this matter."

As I noted in Friday's report, Iran has done nothing to justify any sanctions relief. In fact, Iranian backed militias attacked a U.S. base in Iraq last Monday. Nine people were injured, and one contractor was killed.

Yet according to one Washington Post columnist, "Nobody in the Biden administration will acknowledge the likelihood that an Iranian-backed militia just attacked U.S. troops once again."

In a related development, the Biden Administration is also vowing to restore funding to the Palestinians, even as the Palestinian Authority continues to subsidize terrorism against innocent Israelis.

Delusional Disney Disney has slapped an offensive content warning on the Muppet Show. Yes, Kermit and Miss Piggy are officially politically incorrect.

Disney wants to make sure that some pajama boy sitting in his basement with a few Twitter followers doesn't launch a boycott. But the media conglomerate wasn't so upset that it was willing to give up any extra revenue that the show might generate as Disney's new streaming service takes on Netflix.

And while Disney is worried about a Muppet with a sombrero, it's not worried about doing business with the communist Chinese.

Senator Tom Cotton slammed Disney's double standards, tweeting, "Disney is concerned that 'The Muppet Show' is offensive. But filming where China runs concentration camps for Uighurs? Disney is okay with that."

This is another sad example of corporate America's embrace of the left while selling out to the Chinese communists. It's like uber "woke" LeBron James blasting America but refusing to stand up for human rights in Hong Kong when the NBA's bottom line is at risk.
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Gary Bauer (@GaryLBauer)  is a conservative family values advocate and serves as president of American Values and chairman of the Campaign for Working Families

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