Bill Shines Faster Light On Federal Government Spending
'In a free society, you can't have accountability without visibility,' said John Hart, CEO of Open the Books.'In a free society, you can't have accountability without visibility,' said John Hart, CEO of Open the Books.America’s Survival Hinges On Trump Standing Firm On Mass Deportations
Trump has a once-in-a-lifetime chance to deliver on a mandate that will determine whether America exists at all. He should take the chance that was given to him.Democrats hijack Jesse Jackson’s funeral to push their agenda — but Jackson’s son isn’t having it
What was supposed to be a solemn farewell quickly turned political.
Despite a direct request from Rev. Jesse Jackson Jr. asking mourners to leave politics out of the funeral service for his father, several high-profile Democrats used the occasion to deliver pointed political remarks.
“Over the weekend, they decided to hijack the funeral service for Reverend Jesse Jackson to push their radical ideologies. Now you’re probably thinking, well, Jesse Jackson was very, very political. Jesse Jackson was very radical,” BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales comments.
“According to his son, that was the last thing that he wanted. So let’s back up a bit. Several weeks ago, after Jesse Jackson had passed, his son Jesse Jackson Jr. warned people not to bring politics to his funeral service,” she says.
“Do not bring your politics out of respect to Reverend Jesse Jackson and the life that he lived to these homegoing services. Come respectful, and come to say thank you. But these homegoing services are welcome to all: Democrat, Republican, liberal, and conservative, right-wing, left-wing,” his son announced.
“Because his life is broad enough to cover the full spectrum of what it means to be an American. We only ask people to come and be respectful in the context of the extraordinary life that he lived,” he added.
“Seems very clear, a very clear and polite warning from Jesse Jackson Jr. But you guys are going to be shocked to hear, Democrats didn’t care,” Gonzales comments, before playing a clip of former President Barack Obama from the funeral.
“Each day we wake up to some new assault on our democratic institutions. Another setback to the idea of the rule of law. Each day we’re told by those in high office to fear each other and to turn on each other and that some Americans count more than others,” Obama said.
“And that some don’t even count at all. Everywhere we see greed and bigotry being celebrated, and bullying and mockery masquerading as strength. We see science and expertise denigrated while ignorance and dishonesty and cruelty and corruption are reaping untold rewards every single day,” he continued.
But Obama wasn’t the only one.
Kamala Harris also took the stage at Jackson’s funeral to ignore his son’s pleas.
“So let me just say, I predicted a lot about what’s happening right now,” Harris said, laughing.
Former President Joe Biden also joined in — though his contribution was mostly unintelligible.
“I’ve forgotten how much I enjoyed watching these clips, and honestly, I enjoy them much more that he’s not president because it was terrifying when he was president,” Gonzales comments.
However, Jesse Jackson’s son did not enjoy their speeches as much as Gonzales did.
“I listened for several hours of three United States presidents who do not know Jesse Jackson. He maintained a tense relationship with the political order. Not because the presidents were white or black, but the demands of our message,” Jackson said in response.
“The demands of speaking for the least of these, those who were disinherited, the damned, the dispossessed, the disrespected. Demanded not Democratic or Republican solutions, but demanded a consistent prophetic voice,” he added.
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Netflix didn’t lose to Trump. It lost to math.
After months of public back-and-forth, Netflix’s bid for Warner Bros. Discovery is dead. Paramount won. The company on February 26 said it had completed its purchase, and Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr said regulators would approve it “pretty quickly.”
Some observers blamed Netflix’s loss on the Trump administration. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) labeled the Paramount deal a “disaster,” and allies implied that administration officials leaned on Netflix to stand down.
Netflix profits when audiences stay home. Theaters, restaurants, and the broader ecosystem built around going out don’t.
That’s revisionist history. Netflix lost for two reasons: Paramount offered more money, and Republicans have grown far less willing to wave through consolidation by mega-firms that already squeeze consumers and tilt the culture war leftward.
Paramount outbid Netflix
Start with the obvious. Netflix offered a little over $27 per share. Paramount offered $31 per share — roughly $111 billion in total value.
Netflix couldn’t match that price. Paramount could. Netflix walked.
That’s math, not corporate intrigue.
Why Washington had concerns
Money explains why Netflix lost. Politics explains why so few people in Washington felt inclined to rescue it.
Carr said Netflix’s bid raised “a lot of concerns.” President Donald Trump signaled skepticism. So did many congressional Republicans. They saw a company that already dominates streaming trying to turn itself into the dominant media conglomerate — and they saw the costs landing on consumers, creators, and competitors.
Consumers would have taken the hit first. As Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) noted during merger hearings, Netflix’s expansion has marched alongside higher prices. Subscribers pay more, then sit through more ads. The company pushes customers toward “cheaper” tiers that still interrupt programming people already bought access to watch.
Filmmakers would have taken the hit next. Director James Cameron warned that the sale would be “disastrous for the theatrical motion picture business.” Netflix profits when audiences stay home. Theaters, restaurants, and the broader ecosystem built around going out don’t.
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Then comes culture. Paramount’s programming spans the spectrum. Nobody confuses it with a conservative company, but nobody defaults to treating it as a progressive messaging machine either. Its catalog ranges from right-coded “Yellowstone” to newer, openly left-wing “Star Trek” entries, with plenty of mainstream fare between.
Netflix plays a different game. Its board includes former Obama administration official Susan Rice. Critics on the right point to its content tilt, including an Oversight Project analysis that found left-leaning programming outnumbered right-leaning programming by a wide margin. Even Netflix’s CEO recently tried to walk back a 2020-era post supporting Black Lives Matter, a retreat that looked less like conviction than belated damage control.
Monopoly defeated
For years, conservatives answered complaints about corporate media with a libertarian shrug: Let the market decide. That posture collapsed once the market stopped functioning like a market. A handful of firms now gatekeep distribution, advertising, and cultural prestige. Consumer choice matters less when one company controls the pipes.
Netflix seemed to miss that shift. It still spoke like the scrappy upstart that crushed Blockbuster, not like the biggest player trying to swallow a legacy studio and reshape the entire ecosystem on its terms.
Netflix will survive. It will keep producing content, and it will keep pushing its worldview in much of that content. It just won’t do it with control over Warner Bros. Discovery — or over the broader media landscape.
No Matter How The Iran War Ends, We Absolutely Cannot Take Any Refugees
Allowing zero refugees to resettle on American soil should be the absolute minimum requirement for any U.S. military action in the Middle East.Most viral State of the Union moments of ALL time
While the State of the Union address is meant to showcase the presidential agenda, sometimes the moments that live on have little to do with policy. And according to BlazeTV host Liz Wheeler, some of the most memorable come from other politicians stealing the spotlight themselves.
“This one I place in the gold medal position here is Nancy Pelosi ripping up President Trump’s speech,” says Wheeler.
In a clip from Trump’s past State of the Union address, Pelosi stands behind Trump as he takes in the applause from the crowd, ripping up a copy of his address.
“This was not an impromptu action that Nancy Pelosi took. This was not something that she did in the heat of the moment. This was not an unscripted emotional outburst. This was something Nancy Pelosi deliberately planned to do, knowing that it would be broadcast in the background internationally,” Wheeler explains.
“This was her response to President Trump. Nothing of substance, no alternative vision, just ripping him up,” she says, pointing out that the Democrats aren’t the only party to have had a politician throw a tantrum at a State of the Union address.
“When Barack Obama was president and he was attempting to debunk a Republican talking about Obamacare … Representative Joe Wilson, in, I think … the first public heckling of a president during the State of the Union address, shouted from the floor of Congress ‘You lie!’ at Barack Obama in 2009,” Wheeler explains.
Wheeler points out that in the video of Obama being heckled by Wilson, Pelosi’s “jaw actually drops.”
“‘You lie’ wins our silver medal for top moments from past State of the Union addresses. And coming in third, the bronze medal, we have to give to Marco Rubio,” she says.
This bronze medal is in honor of Rubio’s “very first meme.”
“This was back in 2013, so over a decade ago, he gave the Republican rebuttal to President Obama,” Wheeler says.
In his rebuttal, Rubio is clearly thirsty and awkwardly bends down to take a swig from a tiny water bottle.
“And that, of course, that moment eclipsed anything else that the president said or didn’t say,” Wheeler adds.
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