Mimosa, Bloody Mary, nice flute of champagne — or maybe a favorite tipple in your coffee. Make yourself one and join me at our own Algonquin Round Table, the spirit of Dorothy Parker abides.

Happy Sunday, dear friends! I see you’ve all survived Super Bowl Sunday and Fat Tuesday. Are you willing to share some romantic tidbits from how you spent Valentine’s Day? Come on, dears, dish! The champagne is cold, the delicious brunch is warm and no matter how the Left is out to destroy our Republic, I have faith in tried-and-true Americans to stand athwart the dangerous idiocy and say STOP! So pass the smoked salmon, lift your glasses and let’s get to it. Kanpai!

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Escape from California continues apace

The feudal state ruled by Governor Hairgel is number one in things like worst place to open or run a business. A 101-year-old fixture in Sonoma County has announced their future departure.

Sonoma County’s last and only apple processing plant in Sebastopol is leaving town.

The 101-year-old company, Manzana, on Tuesday announced its plans to move its entire California operation in 2025 to the state of Washington, where most organic apples are produced, the company said in a news release.

The article top-loads the column with all manner of excuses, from getting closer to their raw materials to needing to upgrade their equipment … but if you get down past paragraph 10 you find a few things that have become common reasons for fleeing. One is the hinted-at reasons why the company cannot expand in their current location (the Greens power in CA means anything industrial is to be throttled) and this:

the cost of living and housing in Sonoma County has skyrocketed over the last few decades significantly impacting ongoing efforts to recruit a stable labor pool who can afford to live and work here.

Well, DUH. Having thriving middle, working, entrepreneurial classes gives the Sacramento ruling class hives. Such people may get uppity when a new tax or regulation is foisted on them.

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Including Indigenous Woo-Woo in Science(tm)!

Because you know, the mythology from stone-aged cultures needs to be right there in your kid’s high school/college chemistry class.

there is often a lack of wider acceptance, application, and policy protections of Indigenous knowledge transmission in more local settings, including opposition by some scientists. We argue that Indigenous knowledge can complement and enhance science teachings, benefitting (sic) students and society in a time of considerable global challenges.

Yet these are the same people who would stand up and shriek if any student dared let a Bible slip out of their backpack in the classroom.

And don’t think this is confined to this insulting paper, the woke FDA and CDC are right there to incorporate this woo-woo as a legit resource in research and data analysis.

The document is a proposed revision of scientific integrity guidelines for the Department of Health and Human Services, which encompasses the FDA, CDC, and the National Institutes of Health. Going forward, agency staff should employ “multiple forms of evidence, such as Indigenous Knowledge,” when analyzing data, the document states.

We are in the best of hands, eh?

I really don’t start day drinking on Sunday early enough. Be a dear and fill my flute.

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We hate Illinois Texas Nazis

For the 2d time this week, anti-Israel protestors have come to my house early in the morning, waking up the neighbors & harassing my family.

None expressed concern about Hamas’ Oct 7 murder of over 1200 or mass rapes of women & children.

I’m proud to stand with Israel. pic.twitter.com/beSJdzQYyJ

— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) February 17, 2024

Dear Ted, turn your sprinklers on. Or let loose the hounds. Of course, these are my publicly acceptable suggestions. I’ve got several more, but it’s Sunday and I don’t want to curdle the fresh cream on the table. Dears, any further suggestions on how Ted can pest-control these Nazi-insects are welcome in the comments

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The Left’s destruction of a high-trust society

Between the United States and Russia, one country just arbitrarily seized the assets of an oligarch opposed to the regime, and is trying to jail him

The other country is Russia

— Will Chamberlain (@willchamberlain) February 16, 2024

Unless you are laboring under stage-4 TDS, then Kafkaesque judicial farces like what happened in NY and what that corrupt sack-of-horse-apples, Fani Willis, is trying to pull in Georgia should worry the ever-loving daylights out of you. The US doesn’t just run on the Constitution, it runs on the basic decency of its citizens. We have been a high-trust society for a couple hundred years — based on Judeo-Christian morality, we defaulted to trusting in our shared values and the institutions we built. This resulted in high compliance with law and taxes coupled with the faith that if we needed the court system to intervene in protecting our rights, we could trust it living up to its mission as humanly possible. I worked within that system for 22 years and I’m alarmed and ashamed of the transmogrification of Justice into a political spoils machine where the Ruling Class uses the courts to reward its allies and kneecap its enemies.

This trust will not be restored any time soon. And longer if we don’t clean out vermin infesting it.

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Your Sunday palate cleanser

For your listening pleasure — this doesn’t always make the oldies playlist but it was one of my faves from the 70s.

There’s some hope for overcoming the dearth of real music today as, if youtube is any indication, there are a lot of young people discovering the oldies and reacting with delight and wistfulness.

More please.

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Your Sunday smile

Batman pivots from fighting criminals to helping children …

Christian Bale Breaks Ground on 16-Year Passion Project: 12 New Homes for Foster Children

The Oscar winner turned up at a construction site that will host a one-of-a-kind village in California designed with a singular goal in mind: to keep siblings in foster care together under the same roof.

The scene that surrounded him before noon today in the Antelope Valley north of Los Angeles was 16 years in the making, offering Bale another reason to beam as he was joined by wife Sibi, a group of elected officials and tight-knit supporters to break ground on an ambitious project that will feature 12 homes, two studio apartments (for transitional housing) and a 7,000-square-foot community center. The blueprints reflect a village community that will operate with a singular goal: to keep siblings in the foster care system together and under the same roof.

Bale is not just the celebrity face of the operation, he’s knee-deep in the trenches as the co-founder of Together California, the organization steering the development under the leadership of executive director Tim McCormick and Bale’s co-founder and longtime friend, UCLA’s Dr. Eric Esrailian.

Bravo, Christian.

Sometimes, even celebrities can surprise you in the best ways.

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Whoa! Where has the time gone? Do pack a doggy bag or two — snacks for later! — and go enjoy your friends and family this afternoon. See you next Sunday. Cheers!

featured image, original graphic by Darleen Click