December 16, 2025

WHEN FRAUD IS A FEATURE, NOT A BUG: Issues & Insights (I&I) points to a former investigator in the Minnesota Attorney General’s office as highlighting the underlying truth about how Democrats in the Land of 10,000 Lakes view defrauding public benefit programs.

“We’re not just talking about Democrats ripping off government programs for their personal benefit – examples of which are legion – but the opportunities for fraud built into the programs they create,” I&I notes.

“Take the federal food stamp program, which now goes by the euphemism SNAP and is riddled with fraud. Instead of trying to protect taxpayers, Democrats are actively thwarting a Trump administration effort to eliminate it.

“Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said that ‘We asked for all the states for the first time to turn over their data to the federal government to let the USDA partner with them to root out this fraud, to make sure that those who really need food stamps are getting them, but also to ensure that the American taxpayer is protected.'”

Can you guess how many Democrat-controlled states refused to comply?

 

Posted at 9:46 am by Mark Tapscott

NOTHING TO SEE HERE, MOVE ALONG: More than 60% of security clearance data was ‘not reliable,’ GAO reveals as it urges intel changes.

A newly released U.S. Government Accountability Office report highlights problems with the reliability of data used to oversee the federal government’s personnel security clearance process, raising concerns about oversight of how quickly and effectively clearances are granted.

The report last week found that the Office of the Director of National Intelligence lacks accurate and complete clearance data from dozens of federal agencies, limiting its ability to monitor performance and identify problems in the vetting of employees who must access classified information for their positions.

According to the GAO, over 60% of the clearance data it reviewed was “not reliable” across eight reporting requirements and seven agencies.

Good lord.

Posted at 9:37 am by Stephen Green

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEFING: Let’s Globalize the End of the Leftist Fetish for Murderers. “Evidence abounds that the Democrats are delighted to be in bed with criminals, both of the domestic and illegal alien variety. They’re practically writing campaign ads for Republican candidates. During the last couple of elections, I wanted the Republicans to hammer the Dems on illegal immigration. The economy was easy pickings, too, but I was as close to being a single-issue voter as I ever had been. Now I want them to shout, ‘DEMOCRATS LOVE MURDERERS AND RAPISTS!’ from the hilltops.”

Posted at 9:06 am by Stephen Green

SARAH HOYT’S SHOCKED FACE IS IN COMPLETE REMISSION: FBI to give Congress bombshell memos warning Biden DOJ didn’t have probable cause to raid Trump home.

The memos show the FBI’s Washington field office “does not believe they established probable cause” prior to raiding Trump’s Florida home, according to one source with direct knowledge of the memos about to be turned over to Congress.

It has long been rumored that some FBI agents disagreed with the decision to raid Trump’s home to look for classified documents at the request of the National Archives.

But the soon-to-be released emails will chronicle the specific concerns that DOJ under President Joe Biden had not met the standard for a search warrant, but proceeded anyway, officials said.

Of course they did — that’s how witch hunts work.

Posted at 8:35 am by Stephen Green

ICYMI: Ignoring Islamic Threat, Aussie PM Vows Tougher Gun Laws After Bondi Beach.

Related (from Glenn):

Posted at 8:04 am by Stephen Green

JIMMY LAI UPDATE:

Posted at 8:00 am by Glenn Reynolds

COMMON SENSE COONS: The Delaware senator offers some hard-headed, reality-based advice to his fellow Democrats. Interesting that two Democrats from adjoining states are looming as significant voices of reason in their party.

Obviously, there is much in the Coons analysis with which to disagree, but statements like this could be tremendously encouraging signs of an openness to a genuine policy debate about where the country is headed:

“Democrats need to stop telling Americans how to be and what to feel and believe. Instead, we need to listen. Then we need to solve the problems they’ve shared with us. In the last few years, it’s not just our message that was wrong—it was some of our policies, too.

People didn’t recognize the impacts of the bills we wrote and the votes we took. That’s why Americans don’t believe us when we preach at them from auditorium stages, cable news desks, and social media posts. We have to get back to the values and ideas that draw people to be Democrats to begin with.”

Let’s see where this goes.

Posted at 7:45 am by Mark Tapscott

THEY ARE EVIL AND SHOULD BE DESTROYED:

Related:

Also:

And:

Posted at 7:36 am by Glenn Reynolds

AGREED: ‘Financialization of All the Things’ is Parasitism, not Capitalism.

Friend-of-the-blog Alexandria Brown offered up a recent X/tweet addressing the financialization of, well, everything in business and commerce, and how it should be viewed in relation to the ideal of capitalism. Specifically, Alex wrote: ”Here’s a fun question to which I have not made up my mind even a little bit: is the financialization of All The Things a form of capitalism which is at least tolerable or is it so reductive of human life and endeavors as to be past a limitation on acceptable commercial behavior?”

Those of us who advocate for free markets understand that capitalism also presents an opportunity for bad actors to misbehave within the system. Be it 20th century snake oil salesmen peddling patent medicines, or 21st century Wall Street investment bankers selling pools of subprime mortgages as high-quality securities, there have always been bad actors exploiting the opportunities within a free market.

But just because we conservatives endorse capitalism doesn’t mean we must endorse – or even tolerate – the worst practices that occur therein.

In my opinion, the “financialization-of-all-the-things” is a form of parasitism that does not create wealth, rather it serves to extract the accumulated wealth from entities where wealth has previously been created.

Read the whole thing.

Posted at 7:33 am by Stephen Green

BEYOND PARODY:

Posted at 7:00 am by Glenn Reynolds