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The Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) is officially dead, declares the Office of Legal Counsel in the Department of Justice.  Its announcement is just in time to save girls’ sports from ruination by testosterone-advantaged boys. We are four decades past the moment when ERA went lifeless under its own deadline for ratification.  That is long past any chance at resuscitation, the OLC explained in its detailed legal analysis.“Congress may not revive a proposed amendment after a deadline for its ratification has expired,” the OLC concluded. “Should Congress wish to propose the amendment anew, it may do so through the same procedures...

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DES MOINES, IA—Authorities are warning that a gang of known criminals is currently holding a meeting to debate various plots to steal your money. The criminals are debating exactly how much of your money to steal. Some are suggesting stealing all of your money, while others would just like to steal most of your money. Whatever the case, they all agree on two things: A.) you have money and B.) it must be stolen. "I know!" shouted one of the criminals, an older man with frizzy hair, known throughout the criminal underworld as a seasoned veteran when it comes to...

Dogs don’t bark because they’re brave, they bark because they’re scared. The same can be said for the current House Speaker. Afraid of a revolt among the even more left wing of her party, afraid of a president her party looks increasingly unlikely to defeat in November, afraid of domestic and international American success via an approach that does not comport with her more liberal views and achieved without her consent, Speaker Pelosi has entered the twilight of her political career barking at all she fears. Enacting symbolic measures, absent any import, launching an impeachment, replete with hyperbole and hyper-gesticulation,...

Virginia Democrats flexed their muscle in Richmond this week; passing four gun control bills through the Senate Judiciary Committee. This action had been promised by Gov. Ralph Northam since his Party gained majorities in both houses of the state legislature last November. As with other state governors who believe that the best way to stop criminals from committing murder is to make it more difficult for law abiding citizens to purchase and possess firearms, these measures will do just that – make it harder for law abiding citizens of Virginia to exercise their rights guaranteed by the Second Amendment. Specifically,...

CNN is catching heat from viewers for their questioning of Senator Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.) at the Democratic debate Tuesday night. Just a day earlier, it was reported that Sanders had told fellow presidential candidate, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Ma.), in 2018 that a woman could not win the election, something Sanders has vehemently denied. But despite Sanders’s repeated denials, CNN moderator Abby Phillip went ahead with a line of questioning that made it sound as if there was no doubt Sanders had in fact said it. “So Senator Sanders, I do want to be clear here,” Phillip said, “you’re saying that...

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, pitched the idea of “witness reciprocity” on Tuesday during a meeting with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and other GOP leaders who convened to discuss strategy for the upcoming impeachment trial that will decide if President Trump is removed from office, Fox News has confirmed. The idea would mean if Democrats call a witness, such as Trump’s former National Security Adviser John Bolton, Republicans would in turn be allowed to call a witness. Likely candidates to be subpoenaed by the GOP include former Vice President Joe Biden, his son Hunter Biden, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam...

Tuesday’s Democratic debate clash between Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders may have stemmed from their respective election strategies as next month’s Iowa caucuses draw closer, but it left CNN’s progressive commentator Van Jones shaking his head. “To see those two have that level of vitriol was very dispiriting,” Jones said during a network panel discussion after the debate in Des Moines, Iowa, less than three weeks before the Iowa caucuses. It also left him thinking Democrats were unlikely to defeat President Trump in November, he said.

A key Republican ally of President Trump argued impeachment began long before the Ukraine controversy. Instead, Rep. Jim Jordan, a Republican from Ohio, said the Democratic-led effort, which has resulted in two articles of impeachment, began in the summer of 2016 with the FBI's counterintelligence investigation into members of Trump's 2016 campaign. "It didn't even start with Ukraine. Impeachment started before this guy was president," Jordan said Tuesday on Fox & Friends. "Impeachment started on July 31, 2016, when the FBI opened up an investigation and spied on four American citizens associated with the Trump campaign. And everything they did...

In the video above, Warren can be seen moving toward Sanders. But the Massachusetts senator pulls her hand back when Sanders extends his. During a tense segment of the debate, the two senators were both confronted by questions on whether Sanders told Warren he believed a woman could not win the presidency at a private dinner in 2018. Sanders, who remained a steady constant throughout the early months of the campaign, despite relatively little media attention, has emerged as a frontrunner in the race — just weeks before the Iowa caucuses.

This is a fairly easy CG from The Arkansas Gazette. Try solving it word by word or at least line by line for an added challenge. S OWT’X XGSTU BY WTD HLXXLQ QLKQLJLTXWXSBT BY HLWCXD XGWT JBVLBTL NGB SJ CTWYQWSM XB HL GLQJLRY. —LVVW JXBTL You can find this little fun word game, to combat early dementia and senility in us baby boomers, in several daily publications. The way it works is a letter stands for another letter. For example: AXYDLBAAXR is LONGFELLOW (does not apply to today's cryptogram). Beware, the game is very addictive. If this is your first...

Federal officials on Tuesday blamed Mayor de Blasio for a fatal sex attack on a 92-year-old Queens woman — saying his “sanctuary city” policy kept the accused killer from being held for deportation last year. “It was a deadly choice to release a man on an active ICE detainer back onto the streets after his first arrest included assault and weapon charges, and he now faces new charges, including murder,” said Thomas Decker, New York field-office director of enforcement and removal operations for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement. “New York City’s sanctuary policies continue to threaten the safety of all...

New Jersey shooters David Anderson and Francine Graham had an improvised explosive device inside their U-Haul van that had the reach of five football fields, a weapon that could have been part of larger wave of attacks targeting the Jewish community and law enforcement, officials said Monday. "If it exploded in the right place it could have certainly injured or killed people up to five football fields away," said FBI Newark Special Agent in Charge Gregory Ehrie. Ehrie and others mentioned the homemade bomb along with new details about the investigation into both the shooters and the incidents that led...

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is gloating because President Trump is “impeached for life,” and “there’s nothing the Senate can do that can ever erase that.” Like a prosecutor telling a defendant, “Even if acquitted, you’re indicted for life, and you’ll never shake the disgrace.” So much for the noble principle of innocent until proved guilty. Could this be the same never-hate Pelosi who wore black on ­Dec. 18 as she “solemnly and sadly” called for a vote to impeach the president? What a charade. The Democrats’ goal all along has been to impeach the president and damage his re-election in...

The most widely used antivenom is not effective against the venom of several common snakesHome to more than 60 species of venomous snakes, India bears the world's largest burden of death and disability caused by snakebites. The gold-standard treatment is an antivenom raised against the combined venom of four widespread species that are responsible for most attacks, collectively referred to as the "big four." Although this critical treatment routinely saves lives, a new study published in early December in PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases shows that it comes up short against the venoms of other Indian snakes whose bites can...

Thanks to the confrontation with Iran, the Democratic nomination contest looks more and more like a two-person race between Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders. Both candidates think the issue helps them, and they are probably right. Biden’s foreign-policy experience and relative hawkishness reinforce support from moderate voters, while Sanders’ long record of dovishness helps him among more progressive voters. If it does become a two-way contest, we could be shaping up for a kind of replay of the 2004 Democratic battle between John Kerry and former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean. And that might be good for Mike Bloomberg.

If Jussie Smollett had last year pleaded guilty to some minor charge, done 90 days of community service and paid a substantial fine to reimburse the $130,000 worth of overtime costs rolled up by Chicago police detectives investigating his ludicrous assault claims, he might today be in full rebound mode. Picture it: The tearful, dramatic mea culpa with Robin Roberts. A bold admission — “This is on me” — followed by a deflection of blame to drugs or alcohol or the dark demons of hate we all know are lurking out there, waiting for third-tier television stars to emerge from...

When the Democratic debate started Tuesday night, I was young, carefree, merry. Two hours later, when it ended, I was praying to the Almighty for a swift end to my suffering. I felt like I was 103 years old — or even older, like one of the early patriarchs in the Bible. All the life had been sucked out of my body. This, the seventh debate in seven months, was the dullest major political event in years. And there is no excuse for that, since there were only six candidates on stage and, therefore, a real possibility that the Democrats...

A volcano in southwestern Japan erupted Saturday, the Meteorological Agency said, but there were no immediate reports of injuries. Rocks were thrown about 300 meters from the crater of Mount Shintake on Kuchinoerabu Island in Kagoshima Prefecture following the eruption around 3:05 p.m., the agency said, adding it had not confirmed any pyroclastic flow. No evacuation order was issued. As of the end of last month, 100 people were registered as residents on the island, which is about 36 square kilometers (nearly 14 square miles) in size. It was the first eruption on the island since Feb. 2 last year....

“Preseason is over,” Kauffmann said. “The Democratic race got real tonight, and these candidates started to realize that only one of them is leaving Iowa with a W.” Having only six candidates on stage means: “They have the time to make their points in a way that they haven’t before.” The debate “definitely was more combative than it has been” and part of that was “the moderators really trying to go out of their way to draw confrontation.”