Rockefeller & education
Rockefeller & education
On Thursday, a new poll released by the Napoleon Institute confirms what most of us have long suspected. Results showed that 76 percent of bureaucrats who voted for Kamala Harris in November said they would “do what [they] thought was best,” in regards to following legal orders from President Trump. Of those polled, 16 percent said they would follow orders, and nine percent said they were unsure. Of the federal employees who voted for Trump, 80 percent said they would follow orders even if they disagreed with them, 18 percent said they would not, and just two percent said they were unsure. https://dailycaller.com/2025/04/24/democrat-voting-federal-bureaucrats-trump-orders-poll/
The question asked in the poll of federal employees was framed like this: "Imagine that you were the head of a federal government agency," and "President Trump gave you an order that was legal but you believed was bad policy." "Would you follow the President's order or do what you thought was best?" Over half, 56 percent, said that they would embrace their own political agendas and either "strongly resist" or "somewhat resist" Trump's America First agenda, with 16 percent saying they would “neither support nor resist." The poll surveyed 500 bureaucrats “living in the National Capitol Region and earning at least $75,000 annually," with a margin of error of four percent. //
Founder of the Napoleon Institute, pollster Scott Rasmussen, had this to say about the survey results.
"Our research confirms that the Administrative State is not composed of thoughtful, nonpartisan experts who are making neutral decisions for voters. The deep partisan divide within the federal bureaucracy and the shifting public opinion present significant challenges for the current administration. However, the silver lining is that with such high levels of chaos in this bureaucratic 'civil war', there may be an opening for the common sense voice of the American people to rise above the political noise and once again become the shaping force of the nation's dialogue."
State attorney generals just have no particularized interest. They’re like anybody else in the United States. Tariffs are very complicated. Judges don’t have any basis for deciding whether they’re good or bad for the economy. That can be decided by legislatures if they decide to take over the issue or by elected executives, but not by appointed judges.
Host Greta Van Susteren asked Dershowitz if a state could successfully sue on behalf of its "devastated agriculture sector," to which he answered, "I don't think so," adding:
I think you’d have to have the farmers bringing the lawsuit, not the attorney general of the state. But even farmers would have a difficult time demonstrating that they were directly impacted in a way that was illegal by the tariffs.
When you have tariffs, some people are helped, some people are hurt. That’s the nature of the economy. There are winners, and there are losers. Trump ran for office promising that he would use tariffs, and he was elected. So I just don’t think there is standing to challenge this by virtually anybody.
But if anybody would have standing, it would be a particular person who may have been subject to the tariff who would otherwise be able to sell his product cheaper than he could sell it now. But this is such a stretch that I think they’re going to be laughed at. //
Finally, yes — tariffs used as a bargaining chip can be effective. Also, yes: The longer tariff (trade) wars continue, the worse they become. Why? Because long-term trade wars lead to inflation, without exception.
Holtec International @holtecintl
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This marks another major step forward in our effort to return Palisades to service later this year—bringing 800 megawatts of safe, reliable baseload power back to the grid and supporting hundreds of high-paying, highly skilled American jobs. It further underscores the critical role nuclear plays in meeting our domestic energy needs, strengthening U.S. energy security, and reaffirming America’s position as the global energy leader.
8:12 AM · Apr 23, 2025. //
MINorthWoods
5 hours ago
Sort of old news for Michigan at least. Bi-partisan support including Whitmer and others.
From 12/23
"State lawmakers and Michigan officials have generally been supportive of the restart. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has vouched her approval of the restoration of the plan and Michigan lawmakers set aside $150 million for reopening the plant in the 2024 state budget so long as the effort also gains some federal support."
Cafeblue32
5 hours ago edited
They'll blink because China needs to sell their cheap crap in order to make money to secure more IMF loans to keep building real estate no one is buying. Their entire economy is a Ponzi scheme of investors. While our economy consists of about 14% construction, China is over a third at about 34%. They currently have more vacant housing in China than they have people. But no one can afford to buy them anyway. China sells cheap junk, shows income, takes out huge loans, skims from top to bottom, builds shoddy construction with what's left and the whole thing repeats.
China's collapse in inevitable because of this. No one globally wants to buy their weapons because they're already outdated or cheaply made and substandard to US or European models. They really don't produce enough food to export and they consume more oil than they produce. It would do us well to become as independent from China as we possible can get, because as goes China, so goes most of the economies of the dependent west.
How the west ever allowed itself to go from seeing commie threats under every rock in the 1960s to going into business with them and becoming dependent them just ten years later is something scientists should be studying as a wonder in human psychology.
anon-b24t Cafeblue32
4 hours ago
The answer is: Corrupt politicians and excessively greedy corporatists.
So much for “the shot heard ‘round the world.”
The nation recently celebrated a quarter-millennium since the first battles of the American Revolution, fought at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775. But, as a recent Wall Street Journal column noted, you wouldn’t know it from talking to most Americans. The anniversary of events celebrated by Ralph Waldo Emerson’s 1837 “Concord Hymn” passed largely unnoted and unnoticed, “the shot heard ‘round the world” turning into a quiet squib barely detected, save perhaps for the towns in Massachusetts where the events occurred.
The nation’s impending semiquincentennial — a fancy term for our 250th birthday, which we will celebrate next July — provides an excellent time for Americans to rediscover our nation’s history. In an ideal scenario, the more our fellow citizens recognize the sacrifices that our forebearers made to establish, as Lincoln noted, “a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal,” the more we might cherish, value, and nurture those freedoms today.
Tough’s article explicitly mentions). But this isn’t widely accepted because nothing about the problem or solution seems appropriately scientific.
Of course, one way for ADHD boosters to navigate through the contradictions implicit in the bad science and the proposed rectification is to take a clearly defined idea and blur it by turning it into a spectrum.
Just like gender, autism, or sexual orientation, ADHD is yet another spectrum of symptoms: //
While this definition is certainly more “flexible,” it’s also perfectly useless. ADHD is now the equivalent of a mood that changes from day to day and place to place. This in turn makes it impossible to refute. If one wants to argue against the reality of ADHD, defenders can simply point to an indefinite “continuum” that encompasses multiple definitions of the presumed disorder. The goal of all this is to create a rhetorical loophole that allows ADHD believers to continue prescribing and taking drugs in the belief that the disorder is a real thing, not a cynical fabrication of unscrupulous pharmaceutical companies.
The Catholic Charities Bureau was created by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Superior in Wisconsin to serve the poor and needy. In furtherance of this mission, Catholic Charities provides a number of important social services. These services are open to any Wisconsinite in need, regardless of his religious background. One might think Wisconsin would want to incentivize such open-ended acts of charity by granting Catholic Charities the same benefits made available to other religious organizations. Alas, that is not the case.
Instead, the Wisconsin Supreme Court disregarded the undeniably religious purpose behind the creation of Catholic Charities and ruled that serving the poor and needy is not “typical” religious activity. Setting aside the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s blissful ignorance of both the role religion plays in charitable activity and the dictates of Catholic Social Teaching, such a ruling creates a narrow set of state-approved religious activities that limits religious activity to the likes of “observance of liturgical rituals,” “evangelical outreach,” “pastoral counseling,” “performance … of church ceremonies,” and “education in … doctrine.”
The court’s ruling unilaterally declares that any activity that is unorthodox or resembles secular activities cannot be motivated by a religious purpose. This means that church-run food pantries or community projects cannot be religious activities under Wisconsin’s limited understanding of religion.
The Becket Fund, which represents Catholic Charities at the Supreme Court, has rightfully argued that the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s decision “violates the principle of church autonomy,” “entangles church and state,” and “discriminates among religions.” While a ruling in favor of Catholic Charities on these grounds would be a win for religious liberty, it would only be a Band-Aid on a bullet hole.
Without a definition of religion, courts are forced to guess at what activities mandate protection from government interference. //
However, the definition the court should adopt is that which best reflects the original meaning and is adaptable to a changing religious landscape: namely, religion means a system of beliefs and practices derived from duties to a sacred authority, which is prior to and beyond human relations and receives allegiance and worship.
This definition recognizes that religion is not merely the product of internal contemplation but also features externally compelled duties. Such an understanding was commonplace among the founders and reflects the original meaning of religion as used in the Religion Clauses. However, this definition also provides flexibility by recognizing protections for religions with external governing authorities — such as the Great Spirit common to American Indian religions — that operate similarly to God in the Abrahamic faiths but may not be covered by an exclusively theistic definition.
Moreover, supporting a single definition respects the painfully obvious truth that the Religion Clauses of the First Amendment are complementary provisions working together to defend a preexisting sphere of authority against government capture. Similarly, this definition recognizes something that courts have so desperately tried to deny for decades: The Religion Clauses are not antagonistic to religion or even indifferent; they exist for the benefit of religion.
Citizens’ natural right to religious liberty is one of the foundational principles of American law, so much so that, according to the Supreme Court, a “religious people” enshrined in the First Amendment a guaranteed freedom to worship as one wills. A “religious people” are not a people indifferent or antagonistic to religion. Rather, they are a people who believe the dictates of religion impose superior obligations to those imposed by the state.
Next year marks the 250th anniversary of America’s Declaration of Independence — the semiquincentennial. Unfortunately, instead of a yearlong birthday party and a celebration of American history, the stage is being set for 2026 to be a year of neurotic self-loathing.
The U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission (also called America 250) was created to provide national coordination for next year’s commemorative events. Ostensibly, each state and territory has also appointed its own independent committee to plan more local contributions to the festivities. In reality, a minimum of 14 states have adopted programming recommendations from a single non-profit called the American Association for State and Local History (AASLH).
The motivation driving the AASLH’s recommendations is neither celebratory nor constructive. John Dichtl, the president and CEO of the AASLH, recorded a Zoom presentation in 2021 in which he explicitly outlined their goals. He describes 2026 as a “once in a generation opportunity to critically engage with our nation’s history,” and a chance to “foster critical awareness of our faults, past and present, and the changes we need to make now to move toward justice.”
Now it's interesting, and maybe Orrick is hoping nobody will learn this, but Title 23 U.S.C. § 158 established that the federal government could lawfully withhold highway funds from states that did not comply with a uniform minimum age for alcohol consumption that was set by the feds at age 21. This came about in an effort to combat drunk driving and was enacted by Congress in 1984 as a way of ensuring compliance. It is a federal statute. Title 23, Section 158 says:
The Secretary shall withhold 10 per centum of the amount required to be apportioned to any State under each of sections 104(b)(1), 104(b)(3), and 104(b)(4) [1] of this title on the first day of each fiscal year after the second fiscal year beginning after September 30, 1985, in which the purchase or public possession in such State of any alcoholic beverage by a person who is less than twenty-one years of age is lawful.
At least one state did not comply and took the matter to the Supreme Court in 1987 with South Dakota v. Dole. South Dakota lost ... //
Held: Even if Congress, in view of the Twenty-first Amendment, might lack the power to impose directly a national minimum drinking age (a question not decided here), § 158's indirect encouragement of state action to obtain uniformity in the States' drinking ages is a valid use of the spending power.
(a) Incident to the spending power, Congress may attach conditions on the receipt of federal funds. However, exercise of the power is subject to certain restrictions, including that it must be in pursuit of "the general welfare." Section 158 is consistent with such restriction //
Watt
33 minutes ago
Background documents:
The court order: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.444175/gov.uscourts.cand.444175.111.0_1.pdf
To the point: Sorry, this post is messed up in several respects, including as follows:
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The federal courts, including the Supreme Court, review cases and controversies (Art. III), not "general trends".
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South Dakota v Dole is presented superficially here. First, the case addressed a federal statute that itself placed a condition on further federal finding to the states. The present situation involves an EO that threatens to cut off federal funding. That's different enough such that South Dakota wouldn't apply.
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Second, South Dakota presumed that the statute would define the conditions. Here, the EO threatens to cut off funding after the fact.
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Third, South Dakota set forth factors for when a statute can constitutionally place conditions on federal funding. One of these is that the conditions not be coercive. Arguably, the EO is "coercive."
Although I'm not sure whether case law after South Dakota has has covered this permutation, it would seem that the condition placed on funding should relate to the goal of the funding. In South Dakota, the funding was for interstate highway construction. The condition for full funding was that the state statutes had to set their drinking are at 21 (to help reduce drunk driving). So, could Congress constitutionally enact a statute that withheld all federal funding from a jurisdiction not compliant with immigration law? Or perhaps just all federal law enforcement-related funding?
In any event, South Dakota doesn't support the EO at issue.
mopani Watt
3 minutes ago
Excellent summary review; I agree.
However, the present state of affairs is intolerable. Since Congress did not specify enforcement mechanism to cover this eventuality, I think this is the right way to start down the path. If Congress decides the solution decided by the Courts and precedent is satisfactory, then it was a useful exercise. If Congress (and by extension, their constituents) does not like the precedent, then they have reason to amend the law, and data on which to base the change.
This is the sort of discussion that I wish Trump would engage in, explaining the theory, method, and desired end result. It would win loyalty from supporters, might convert detractors, and would help defuse some animosity (maybe?).
CheeseState
27 minutes ago
The precedence is in regards to a Law passed by Congress and not an EO by a single person (POTUS). So the principle may be the same but there is a difference between Congress tying the two together and POTUS tying Congressionally approved funds to an EO he created. //
mopani CheeseState
16 minutes ago edited
I think you are right in part, but the nuance is that Trump's EO is about enforcing existing law.
Even if Congress didn't write this enforcement action into explicit law, do we want to agree that the precedent is set that any law without explicit enforcement penalties are unenforceable? I'm of two minds about that; generally, I would say, yes, let the elected officials debate and write penalties into the laws they write.
On the other hand, do all the existing laws suddenly become unenforceable because they didn't have explicit penalties written in? What about all the creative resistance mechanisms that opponents of laws always find?
I think we have to give the Executive flexibility to enforce laws passed by Congress to deal with ingenious disobedience, and we need the courts to debate the methods to come to a consensus and create precedent. It takes time, and that's good even if it gets frustrating.
The whole process is analogous to the Scientific Method:
- Thesis
- Anti-thesis
- Synthesis
- Consensus
Sometimes it takes decades to get all four steps hammered out because it takes decades to build a Large Hadron Collider to test the first two.
The legal process is similar, but usually takes less than a decade. It should be slow. We don't want government running at warp 9.
That Maher didn't fire bomb the bridge of friendship that he has with Larry David is respectful, and if David gets upset because Maher shrugged it off, that's good for this part of the story.
Godwins Law ... short for Godwin's law of Nazi analogies,[1] is an Internet adage asserting: "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one."[2]
With one of the best sitcom writers of our time, lazily trying to criticize somebody for just meeting and having dinner with somebody who is in no way, shape, or form comparable to Adolf Hitler, sorry.
Possibly being taken down a notch in this way, it will make this a point that stands out in the annals of internet history.
I know this may be a bit risky because it may force those who just compare anything they dislike to Hitler to possibly actually think about creative criticism, but I'm pretty sure society as a whole would benefit from that.
I hope.
Political-Paige
3 hours ago edited
Roberts and the majority of the Court have ignored their first obligation: to adhere to the Constitution, in favor of an obligation they created out of whole cloth: to protect at all costs inferior court judges by abrogating any semblance of judicial restraint.
Every time they duck the elephant in the room by pretending these ruling are well-intentioned misinterpretations of the Constitution, rather than the blunt usurpation of Article II power by a rogue and adversarial branch, they further degrade what's left of our checks & balances. They are a constitutional wrecking ball.
Their intentional misinterpretation of the unlawful actions of lower courts has upended 250 years of constitutional stability. The other two branches either rein them in by reminding that that enforcement is the prerogative of the Executive alone, or the Republic is nothing more than a dictatorship of unelected thugs.
The Constitutional crisis is already here. //
COUltraMAGA
3 hours ago
The only court co-equal with the executive branch is US Supreme Court.
That’s it.
All other courts have been created by the legislative powers of congress and can be curtailed, thinned, or eliminate by congress.
It’s time for Johnson and Thune to get heads cracking and draft reconciliation bills that require simple majorities to chain up or whittle down these idiots.
It’s Russia-gate and Impeachment-gate part 2.0 this time around. And I’m sick of it.
Insurrection Barbie
@DefiyantlyFree
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🧵🧵This thread shows how $4 Trillion in Federal Funds Were Funneled Through Leftist NGOs to Enrich Activists, Mobilize Voters, and Power Anti-Trump Protests—With Receipts
This is maybe the most important thread I have ever done. It explains how the two biggest pieces of legislation from the Biden administration filled the coffers of all of these activist groups that have been engaging in the Trump 2.0 resistance. From GOTV efforts, to Anti-Tesla protests to the legal battles against Trump.
The Center for American Progress (CAP), founded by Clinton ally John Podesta, is more than a think tank—it’s the strategic command center for the modern Left. Under Biden, CAP helped orchestrate the biggest activist cash grab in U.S. history: $4 TRILLION.
12:45 PM · Apr 24, 2025
Insurrection Barbie
@DefiyantlyFree
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Replying to @DefiyantlyFree
Let’s be clear: these aren’t apolitical charities.
•Indivisible was built to oppose Trump.
•Sunrise led sit-ins to demand Biden go further left.
•Faith in Action and EDF advocate openly for progressive legislation.
And they’re all funded by your tax dollars—thanks to Podesta’s CAP and their policy-to-grant pipeline. This is government-funded activism, hidden behind a green mask.
12:45 PM · Apr 24, 2025
Insurrection Barbie
@DefiyantlyFree
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Replying to @DefiyantlyFree
This is what they mean by “saving democracy”:
•Billions to leftist orgs
•Massive GOTV ops under federal cover
•Protest movements
subsidized by taxpayers
•Power concentrated in NGOs that answer to no one
12:45 PM · Apr 24, 2025
When you install a fresh, clean copy of Windows – say, if you're switching to the LTSC edition – Ninite is here to kickstart provisioning the new OS.
Ninite is a very simple, but very clever, tool that automates the process of installing a user-configured suite of apps and runtimes onto Windows. Not only will it help you get up and running as quickly and easily as possible, but if you keep the tiny custom installer, you can re-run it later and it will update everything it originally installed to the latest version. //
If you're also missing some important device drivers, Snappy Driver Installer Origin can help you there, as we have described previously. With LTSC there's much less need for O&O AppBuster but O&O ShutUp10++ makes it trivially easy to turn off most Microsoft telemetry.
The folder, typically c:\inetpub, reappeared on Windows systems in April as part of Microsoft's mitigation for CVE-2025-21204, an exploitable elevation-of-privileges flaw within Windows Process Activation. Rather than patching code directly, Redmond simply pre-created the folder to block a symlink attack path. //
For at least one security researcher, in this case Kevin Beaumont, the fix also presented an opportunity to hunt for more vulnerabilities. After poking around, he discovered that the workaround introduced a new flaw of its own, triggered using the mklink command with the /j parameter.
It's a simple enough function. According to Microsoft's documentation, mklink "creates a directory or file symbolic or hard link." And with the /j flag, it creates a directory junction - a type of filesystem redirect.
Beaumont demonstrated this by running: "mklink /j c:\inetpub c:\windows\system32\notepad.exe." This turned the c:\inetpub folder - precreated in Microsoft's April 2025 update to block symlink abuse - into a redirect to a system executable. When Windows Update tried to interact with the folder, it hit the wrong target, errored out, and rolled everything back.
"So you just go without security updates," he noted.
Trump issued the order on March 25, 2025, and Ward Clark gave us an overview of what's in it:
The EO discusses the integrity of voter registration:
Within 30 days of the date of this order, the Election Assistance Commission shall take appropriate action to require, in its national mail voter registration form issued under 52 U.S.C. 20508:
(A) documentary proof of United States citizenship, consistent with 52 U.S.C. 20508(b)(3); and
(B) a State or local official to record on the form the type of document that the applicant presented as documentary proof of United States citizenship, including the date of the document’s issuance, the date of the document’s expiration (if any), the office that issued the document, and any unique identification number associated with the document as required by the criteria in 52 U.S.C. 21083(a)(5)(A), while taking appropriate measures to ensure information security.
And, there is a section strong-arming the states into strictly abiding by federal election laws:
The Election Assistance Commission shall, pursuant to 52 U.S.C. 21003(b)(3)and 21142(c) and consistent with applicable law, take all appropriate action to cease providing Federal funds to States that do not comply with the Federal laws set forth in 52 U.S.C. 21145, including the requirement in 52 U.S.C. 20505(a)(1) that States accept and use the national mail voter registration form issued pursuant to 52 U.S.C. 20508(a)(1), including any requirement for documentary proof of United States citizenship adopted pursuant to section 2(a)(ii) of this order. //
On Thursday, Kollar-Kotelly issued a 120-page memorandum opinion in support of her order granting the plaintiffs in the LULAC and League cases a preliminary injunction, prohibiting the administration from giving effect to section 2(a) of the order (requiring proof of citizenship in the national mail voter registration form). //
anon-15qo
15 minutes ago
Article II, Sec. 3, ...he [president] shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed,...
Article I, Sec. 4, of the Constitution gives states the responsibility of overseeing federal elections.
Amdt. 15, Sec.1, The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude–
Amdt. 19, The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.
Amdt. 24, sec. 1, The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax.
Amdt. 26, sec. 1, The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.
When Elon Musk bought Twitter, those of us who have spent years being censored, suppressed, and shadow-banned were hopeful that maybe things would finally change. And even when he brought on the Community Notes program, we thought, 'Ok, this is users holding one another accountable. This is better than Twitter Lefties nuking us because they could.'
But then we started seeing people abuse Community Notes ... and it's so much worse than we realized. //
Using multiple accounts to sabotage posts on X. Sadly, it sounds like new Twitter is a lot like the old Twitter, they're just sneakier.
So let me get this straight. If parents don't want their child enrolled in a curriculum that teaches them about sexuality and transgenderism, the burden should be on them to homeschool? All those taxes they pay to fund the public school system should just be voided? They get no say whatsoever?
Returning to the core issue, why is it this important for public schools to talk about topics that violate the religious principles of some parents? Does LGBTQ ideology really trump religious liberty? It doesn't, but Jackson thinks it does, and that's a scary proposition. Imagine a court with a few more justices in her mold, and where that would leave the country.
Consider what else her ridiculous argument could apply to. A hospital denying care based on race? That would be fine, according to Jackson, because the patient could just provide themselves with care. Of course, we all know she would never agree with that because this isn't about logical consistency. It's about partisanship and propping up a specific worldview. Remember, this is the same woman who made her "Broadway debut" in an LGBTQ play. //
Matt Whitlock @mattdizwhitlock
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Justice Kavanaugh with the most important point of the day:
“They’re not asking you to change what’s taught in the classroom. They’re only seeking to be able to walk-out so their children aren't exposed to things that are contrary to their own beliefs.”
2:13 PM · Apr 22, 2025 //
As I said before, I'd argue this stuff shouldn't be in schools in the first place, but that's not even the issue here. Yet, Jackson still wants to trample on the rights of parents and spit on religious liberty. So is her motivation stupidity or worse? I'll let you be the judge of that.
Dr. Allan Josephson worked for nearly 15 years as chief of the University of Louisville's Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychology, when he made a “mistake” that would cost him—he dared to speak up about so-called transgender surgeries and the harm they inflict upon young people.
For that terrible crime, he was demoted and eventually fired.
Revenge is best served cold, however, and now the university has agreed to a tasty $1.6 million settlement in the case.