Saturday Miscellany

First, in the matter of the measles outbreak. The outbreak has been widely reported, along with the notion that the fault lies with HHS Secretary Kennedy.

Kevin Bass ran the numbers:

[Some people] often claim that measles is making a comeback because of "antivaxers". So I plotted measles cases as a ten-year rolling average using CDC data. And I found that measles is actually not making a comeback. These "doctors" and "experts" are simply lying to everyone.

What a shock.

Second, hedge fund tycoon Bill Ackman expressed the government’s fiscal problems succinctly:

Our government has operated like a trust fund kid that never had to earn a dollar, doesn’t understand the value of money, and therefore wastes trillions of other peoples’ money until someday the trust fund goes dry. @DOGE operates like a fiduciary where every dollar matters, working on behalf of American taxpayers to do what’s best for the country. Thank you DOGE.

Third, the great state of Maine has recently been in the news, thanks to its inept governor. In a meeting with POTUS and other governors, she declared that she was going to defy the executive order about trangendered athletics.

That’s not all, folks.

Writing on Zero Hedge Tyler Durden explains that Maine’s schoolchildren have had their educational opportunities reduced because the state has let in so many illegal migrants.

Maine’s public schools are seeing their worst test scores in 30 years, with student performance in reading and math ranking among the lowest in the nation.

According to the latest data from the National Center for Education Statistics, only 33% of fourth graders are proficient in math, while just 26% meet reading standards. Older students fare even worse, with only 25% proficient in math and 26% in reading, placing Maine 38th nationwide.

The decline comes as schools prioritize the children of illegal migrants, a group welcomed by the state’s politicians and employers, according to Brietbart.

The Democrat-led state has embraced sanctuary policies, contributing to a surge of mostly illegal migrants, according to the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). Over the past decade, the number of students with limited English proficiency has skyrocketed.

In Portland, 70% of new enrollees require special language instruction before tackling other subjects. Schools are diverting funds to hire multilingual staff, with classrooms now accommodating speakers of 57 different languages.

It goes beyond virtue signalling. Sacrificing your children’s education on the alter of wokery is frankly unforgivable.

Fourth, you might be surprised to discover that Republicans are far more supportive of Israel than are Democrats.

The New York Post reports the results of a recent Gallup poll:

More than half of Democrats are anti-Israel, according to a shocking new poll.

Only 33% of Dems surveyed by Gallup said they had a favorable view of Israel, while a whopping 60% said they viewed the Jewish State unfavorably and 4% had no opinion.

It’s the first time ever that a Gallup survey showed a majority of members of a main US political party had a negative opinion of the Jewish state, with the question being asked since 1989.

By comparison, 83% of Republicans said they had a favorable view of Israel, and just 13% unfavorable, with 4% not offering an opinion, the poll found.

Fifth, it’s the feelgood story of the day. It shows the cost of virtue signalling. The Daily Mail reports on some leftist theatre managers in great Britain who invited a group of migrants to a free show. Then the ungrateful migrants chose not to leave the venue. It has been three months.

Left-wing theatre managers who invited 200 migrants to a free show will abandon the building and face bankruptcy as refugees still refuse to leave after three months and spark a wave of sex-related violence.

It recalls the old line: no good deed goes unpunished.

Sixth, I am hardly alone in suggesting that Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky is in way over his head. The spectacle that took place in the White House yesterday showed what that looks like. It shows the importance of decorum and the problems you create when you dispense with it. 

A journalist who was in the room during the conflagration asked Zelensky this question:

“Why don’t you wear a suit?! You’re in the highest level of this country’s office and you refuse to wear a suit. Do you own a suit?!”

“A lot of Americans have problems with you not respecting this office.”

Seventh, Jordan Schactel offers a succinct summary of Zelensky’s mistakes:

Zelensky errors today: 1) Shows up in costume, not a suit 2) Has n0 awareness about his geopolitical standing 3) Blackmails POTUS w "Russia will be at your doorstep" talk 4) Ambassador emotes in front of press, humiliating delegation 5) No respect, demands more money What a mess.

Eighth,  more than a few denizens of the political left have declared that the fault lies with President Trump. As a rule, they believe that when anything goes wrong the fault lies with Trump.

They have no sense of the simple fact that the president of Ukraine insulted POTUS and the United States. 

Trump offered Zelensky a deal. In exchange for shared rights to Ukraine’s rare earth minerals, he would bring peace to the region.

Zelensky rejected the deal because it does not offer sufficient security guarantees. He had already been told that such guarantees, especially NATO membership, were not going to happen. 

He chose to create a spectacle over nothing. Sometimes we need to reject it when a foreign leader comes along to insult the president. 

Within a few days two left-leaning European leaders, Emmanuel Macron and Keir Starmer met with President Trump, without incident. That ought to be a hint as to who is at fault.

Ninth, from the Journal of Sexual Medicine, the least surprising fact of the day:

 NEW STUDY: "Gender-affirming surgery" is associated with INCREASED risk of mental health issues. Study of 100k+ patients found those with surgery had significantly higher rates of depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation & substance use disorder vs matched controls w/o surgery