Democratic lawmakers and officials around the country are so desperate to disarm law-abiding Americans, they are now going after some toy guns.

With the backing of the March for Our Lives Foundation and the eponymous gun-grabber activist group of former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), Democratic Rep. Kevin Mullin (Calif.) introduced legislation last week targeting certain air guns.

‘They are literally coming for your Red Ryder.’

Federal law currently defines the term “firearm” as “(A) any weapon (including a starter gun) which will or is designed to or may readily be converted to expel a projectile by the action of an explosive; (B) the frame or receiver of any such weapon; (C) any firearm muffler or firearm silencer; or (D) any destructive device.”

Whereas a firearm utilizes burning gunpowder to launch projectiles, air guns — as the name suggests — use compressed gas to send projectiles down the barrel.

Although air guns are categorically not firearms, Mullin’s bill would classify them as such if they launch .177 pellets, .22 caliber pellets, and .25 caliber pellets at an initial velocity of at least 800 feet, 500 feet, and 450 feet per second, respectively. Any air gun firing a metallic pellet above .25 caliber would also be designated as a firearm.

RELATED: The FBI’s new active-shooter report has a surprise

Michele Eve Sandberg/Corbis/Getty Images

If enacted, this bill would require that air gun purchasers undergo a background check.

The legislation would also require that the attorney general “publish … guidance to assist manufacturers of lethal air guns in becoming federal firearms licensees, including assistance with the application process and on compliance with requirements for licensees, including serialization and record keeping requirements” within a year of enactment.

Mullin said that he introduced his so-called “Garrett’s Law” after Garrett Edwards — a constituent who, though barred from possessing a firearm, committed suicide using an air gun.

Ann Edwards said in a statement that her deceased son experienced “late onset psychosis” and was “able to access a lethal airgun through Amazon.”

‘The attempted Australia-ification of the US continues.’

Since one mentally compromised constituent abused his freedom, Mullin evidently wants to restrict that freedom for all Americans.

“If a weapon is powerful enough to kill, it should be subject to the same commonsense safety standards as any other gun,” stated Mullin. “It makes no sense that someone prohibited by law from purchasing a firearm can still walk into a store or go online and legally obtain an airgun capable of killing. This bill closes that gap and, hopefully, helps prevent another family from facing this kind of unimaginable loss.”

“Lethal weapons should be treated like lethal weapons,” said March for Our Lives Foundation co-founder Jaclyn Corin.

Daisy, the over-century-old American company behind the famous Red Ryder lever-action BB gun, noted on X that Mullin’s bill would impact toy air guns like the Daisy 880.

“Their goal is to eventually include all airguns,” said the company. “If passed it will treat airguns guns producing ‘high velocity’ as firearms.”

“It bears watching very closely,” added the company.

Utah Sen. Mike Lee (R) blasted Mullin’s legislative initiative, stating, “The gun control lobby targeting BB and pellet guns is fundamentally unserious.”

“Putting dangerous criminals behind bars and keeping them there is the #1 way to reduce violent crime, but leftists have convinced themselves that law-abiding gun owners are villains,” added Lee.

“If you want to know how far gun-grabbers will go, they are now trying to reclassify BB guns as ‘firearms,'” tweeted Young Americans for Liberty. “They are literally coming for your Red Ryder.”

The National Association for Gun Rights suggested that this kind of legislation was a long time in coming.

“The attempted Australia-ification of the US continues,” said the association. “Giffords and David Hogg’s former gun control group are backing a bill to regulate air guns the same as firearms. This isn’t a shock. We’ve said for years they’ll never stop at firearms.”

“They constantly point to places like the UK, Germany, and Australia as the model we should follow. Places that regulate knives with a point and make you register airsoft guns with the government,” added the association.

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​Airgun, Democrat, Firearm, March for our lives, Second amendment, Mike lee, Politics 

A Mexican national remains in custody in Northern Michigan after he was identified as the suspect in a sexual assault on Mackinac Island earlier this month.

Mackinac Island is a picturesque tourist destination located in Lake Huron between the Upper and Lower Peninsulas of Michigan. Some say going to Mackinac Island is almost like taking a “step back in time” with its breathtaking views, Victorian architecture, and strict prohibition of motor vehicles.

MIPD described Jaimez in the press release as ‘a 30-year-old male from Mexico.’

According to a press release from the Mackinac Island Police Department, a woman was walking alone on Main Street, just east of Hoban Street, around 2:15 a.m. on September 16. At that point, a man forced her to the ground, sexually assaulted her, and then fled the scene on foot.

The woman was taken to the Mackinac Island Medical Center for treatment, the press release said.

Later that day, Carlos Adrian Fernandez De Lara Jaimez was identified as the suspect. Jaimez was arrested and booked into Mackinac County Jail in St. Ignace in the Upper Peninsula.

He is identified in his county booking photo as “Carlos Fernandez,” though court records list Jaimez as his last name. A deputy confirmed to Blaze News that he remains in custody as of Monday afternoon.

RELATED: Long-serving mayor of idyllic Michigan island has just been re-elected — for the 50th time

Blaze News

MIPD described Jaimez in the press release as “a 30-year-old male from Mexico.” The county deputy could not confirm Jaimez’s legal status but did note that surrendering his passport was one of the conditions of Jaimez’s bond.

Jaimez has been charged with second-degree criminal sexual conduct with personal injury, a felony. He was arraigned on September 18, when Judge Beth Gibson assessed him a $100,000 cash or surety bond, court records show.

Jaimez had a probable cause conference on Monday, though court records listed only “miscellaneous action” under the event description. He has a preliminary examination hearing scheduled for next Monday.

Jaimez’s attorney and the Department of Homeland Security did not respond to requests for comment from Blaze News.

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​Mexico, Michigan, Mackinac island, Crime, Politics 

After more than a decade of jokes, false promises, and disappointments, Apple’s Siri is finally worth the hype. The latest version brings a bunch of new capabilities to iPhone, thanks to Apple Intelligence. Here’s what it can do and how you can enable it on your device — if you meet the requirements.

The new Siri isn’t just marketing fluff or corporate spin. It’s real. I’ve used it for more than a week, and I’ve come away impressed. Granted, Siri isn’t perfect. It makes mistakes, just like any other AI chatbot from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google. But compared to the old Siri that sometimes struggled with basic facts, the new version is light-years ahead. It’s even good enough to replace some interactions you might have with bots from the competition.

This is a huge leap forward.

The new Siri is included with iOS 27 on supported devices. The catch, though, is that it’s not enabled by default. In fact, if you want to use the new Siri, you’ll have to sign up and spend time on a digital waiting list.

I signed up during the public beta, and I only had to wait about 10 minutes. Now that iOS 27 is out for everyone, though, wait times can stretch out to several days to several weeks. So for those interested in the new Siri, you’ll want to sign up as soon as possible.

Getting on the list is simple. Open the Settings app, tap “Siri,” then select “Try Siri AI (Beta),” and you’re in the queue. That’s it.

Old Siri (Left), New Siri (Right)/Apple

Once approved, the Siri Settings page will have a new interface with new voice options that are fully customizable to build the ideal-sounding digital assistant for fielding questions and queries.

You’ll also find a new Siri app on your home screen. It functions similarly to other AI chatbot apps that you may have used in the past. There’s an option to type questions to Siri or review past conversations for reference or posterity.

Finally, you can access Siri by writing queries in Spotlight (the search bar that pops out when you swipe down from the middle of Home Screen) or using voice commands by holding the power button on the side. You can even ask Siri about something on your screen, it will analyze the data, and give you more information in real time.

Perhaps the most impressive part, though, is that Siri is actually useful now. It knows facts, draws on current events, and understands complex data, all powered by Apple Foundation Models, which are essentially custom Google Gemini models with revised training data running on Apple Silicon.

Confusing, I know.

Of course, none of Siri’s new capabilities are all that new for Android users who have had Gemini for the last couple of years, but on iPhone, this is a huge leap forward for a previously addled Siri. There’s also something Siri can do that no other chatbot can — maintain your privacy.

RELATED: You can finally get all those blobby shapes off your iPhone. Here’s how.

martin-dm/Getty Images

The new Siri combines local data processing with Private Cloud Compute, a system that anonymizes queries by removing customer metadata and IP address information to mask users’ identities. The entire process is complex, but ultimately, all queries that can’t be conducted on-device are encrypted and sent to a Private Cloud Compute.

They’re used only to complete a specific task as requested by the user, and then they are promptly deleted from the system. Queries aren’t gathered and saved as training data, and Apple claims that no one — not even an Apple employee — can access them.

Here’s the bad news for anyone interested in trying out the new Siri on iPhone. The new models require cutting-edge hardware. That means you need an iPhone 15 Pro or iPhone 15 Pro Max and up, an iPad mini with an A17 Pro chip and up, an iPad with an M1 series chip and up, or a Mac with an Apple Silicon M1 chip and up.

Even more devices can download the latest iOS 27 update, but only a select few can use Apple Intelligence and the new Siri to its fullest extent.

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​Ai chatbot, Artificial intelligence, Tech, Apple, Siri 

The editors of New York Magazine decided that the person best suited for its debut “men’s style” issue is a transgender-identifying actor.

The magazine’s photographer “kibitzed” with some of the “most stylish” men at the Russian and Turkish Baths in New York City, but many online were not impressed.

‘The Spirit of the Age wants us to know it is mocking and scorning us.’

“When even 15-year-olds are ‘hype’ about Ralph and Armani’s got a brand-new designer — it feels like the right moment to dedicate an entire issue to the subject,” read a post from the magazine on Monday.

While the other covers featured biological men, one cover was dedicated to Ellen Page, who now identifies as Elliot Page after undergoing transgender surgery.

Much of the response online expressed bewilderment at the choice.

“Where is the man here? I see a mentally ill, testosterone injected woman that had her breast surgically removed,” said one account.

“Fueling Elliot Page’s gender dysphoria is not helping her or others. She needs to abandon Hollywood before it destroys what’s left of her. Or, y’all do it for them,” said another critic.

“I feel like this is sabotage or something,” said another user. “Everyone knows that most people are so sick of trans crap being centered and don’t relate to it. And it’s icky to a lot of normal people even. And her face looks like she is scared or like a prisoner. Not flattering.”

“Way to just alienate more of the audience of men’s style. This poor woman’s body is destroyed because she’s traumatized. Just sad,” replied one detractor.

BlazeTV host Steve Deace responded to the discordant cover in comments to Blaze News.

“Publications like the New Yorker are not for us, but for the opposing culture that occupies this land mass along side of us,” he said. “And putting Ellen Page on its ‘men’s styles’ issue is a clear declaration of that, but also a declaration of war.”

RELATED: Tuberville mocked for warning about pilots with ‘deranged fetish’ — then he brings the receipts

“The Spirit of the Age wants us to know it is mocking and scorning us,” Deace added. “Except it’s really doing something much riskier — shaking its fist at an all-powerful God.”

Page is best known for her female role in “Juno” and most recently in a male role in Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey.”

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​Ellen page, Gender dysphoria, Transgender agenda, Masculinity, Politics, New york magazine 

A recent article from the New York Times alleges that President Donald Trump is cracking down on free speech in the aftermath of the Charlie Kirk assassination — but BlazeTV host Pat Gray says that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Instead of defending free speech, Gray says the Times is excusing the left “as they revel in violence.”

“They had some thoughtful insight into Charlie Kirk’s assassination just a few days after the anniversary of his assassination. And you know, they’ve got all of these reporters who side with all the murderers in our society now,” he says.

“They did the same thing with Mangione and the murder of the CEO from the health insurance company,” he adds.

Gray went on to explain that no one is stopping them from celebrating “the murder of anybody they want.”

However, he says, “It just shows what kind of people we’re dealing with here. It shows that the left has no respect for human life.”

And in a recent poll, it’s revealed that nearly a whopping 60% of Democrats are neutral on President Trump getting assassinated in order for him to leave office.

“Twenty-three percent of Democrats say that would be very positive. Nine percent say somewhat positive,” executive producer Keith Malinak says.

“So you’ve got 32% saying it would be very or somewhat positive,” Gray says.

“Fifty-seven percent either positive or they’re fine with it,” Malinak adds.

“The New York Times wants to make this a freedom of speech thing. … That’s not the issue here. The issue is these people are insane. They’re psychotic. The left has literally gone nuts,” Gray says.

“Violently, frighteningly nuts,” he adds.

Want more from Pat Gray?

To enjoy more of Pat’s biting analysis and signature wit as he restores common sense to a senseless world, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​New york times, Donald trump, Assassination, Charlie kirk, Free speech, Leftists, Blazetv show 

An FBI website was hacked by Pokémon enthusiasts.

This is not a joke.

‘Thank you for your attention to this matter.’

The hack that allegedly took place may have flown under the radar if not for the group leaving a public calling card to show the government agency had been compromised.

At the same time, an adjoining message showed a frightening display of access.

The hackers call themselves ShinyHunters, referencing the active pursuit in Pokémon games of rare Pokémon creatures. Their adopted symbol is a golden Poké Ball, used to capture such Pokémon.

ShinyHunters then circulated a message online taking credit for the hack, which reportedly contained personal information on 5,000 FBI agents.

“We have compromised the FBI. We hold very sensitive data on almost ALL FBI Agents and individuals who filed an application with the FBI for a job,” the message said, according to the Associated Press.

The claims were corroborated by 404 Media, which said the hacker group contacted the company to show the obtained information.

The FBI website in question was the agency’s job website — apply.fbijobs.gov — which found its own information replaced with the image of a Pokémon named Umbreon; the “Shiny” portion of the hacker group’s name likely refers to the rare type of Pokémon in the video game’s universe.

“This site has been seized by ShinyHunters,” the group wrote, akin to what the FBI puts on a website that has been taken down by the government.

The message added, “All FBI data was compromised including [personally identifiable information and protected health information] on incumbent and former FBI employees and all applicant information. We have a lot more than we claim here.”

“Thank you for your attention to this matter,” the message concluded.

Not only did the revealing hack compromise government employee data (addresses, phone numbers, spouse name), it allegedly revealed the FBI’s own hacking team too.

RELATED: Terror threat strikes Missouri archdiocese ahead of pre-sainthood Mass for Fulton Sheen

Matias J. Ocner/Miami Herald/Tribune News Service/Getty Images

The FBI’s Remote Operations Unit, which is known to be made up of the agency’s own decoders, had personal addresses, phone numbers, and in some cases spouses’ phone numbers exposed, 404 Media further reported. The website said it fact-checked the allegedly hacked info by cross-referencing other breached data to show, for example, one person had worked for the Secret Service.

“We hacked the FBI. We hold data on all FBI employees and applicants,” a representative for the hackers told the outlet.

On the other hand, the FBI has sent out a public statement indicating it is “aware of a cyber-criminal enterprise group claiming a compromise of the FBIJobs.gov portal.”

The FBI managed to pull down the targeted subdomain, marking it for “scheduled maintenance.” Meanwhile, the agency said the “point of breach” was undetermined, and it was “actively and aggressively investigating this matter and working closely with those third-party providers that support FBIJobs.gov to mitigate any and all risk.”

RELATED: DOJ claims ICE agent made up wild ‘broom’ attack story after shooting — but lawyer says he’s being used as a ‘political pawn’

Mark Boster/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images

404 Media asked ShinyHunters if it planned on extorting the FBI, to which it said, “What we plan to do is not something I’d call extortion, maybe coercion.”

The group then claimed its efforts are “not finically motivated” and that the FBI has made “false allegations” against it by claiming the group exaggerates what it has gained access to.

The group wants those allegations taken down.

404 Media said the initial hacked data was verified by cross-referencing it with open source intelligence records and also by contrasting it with other previously compromised data.

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​Hackers, Fbi, Government, Tech 

A shooting inside the parking garage at the Orange County (Florida) Courthouse on Wednesday stopped court operations for several hours while deputies investigated the attempted murder of a woman in the garage, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office said.

Later in the day, deputies captured the “known suspect” — 26-year-old Kenneth Jerome Logan Jr., officials said.

‘Why are you doing this to me?’

Logan was arrested on the following charges:

Attempted first-degree murder with a firearmAggravated battery with firearm (two counts)Armed burglary of conveyance with firearmBurglary of conveyance with assault/battery Robbery with a firearm Aggravated stalkingFalse imprisonment (with a weapon) Battery

Florida Today reported Friday that Logan was denied bond; he remained behind bars Monday, jail records indicated.

According to the Orlando Sentinel, Logan and the victim are married.

The victim told investigators she was at the downtown Orlando courthouse Wednesday to seek an injunction against Logan, the Sentinel said, citing records. No details about the injunction were available, the Sentinel added.

The victim parked her car in the garage and then went to the courthouse, deputies told the Sentinel.

When she returned, she entered the vehicle — and then noticed the seat had been moved and that something was in the back seat, the Sentinel said, citing Logan’s arrest affidavit.

With that, she ran out and saw Logan exit the car and point a handgun at her, the paper added.

He fired at her twice as she tried to run away, grabbed her dropped cell phone, caught up with her, struck her in the head with the gun, and held her as he tried to reload the weapon, the Sentinel reported.

The sheriff’s office said the woman wasn’t injured in the shooting.

But as he tried to reload, she was able to escape toward an elevator, and Logan ran off, the Sentinel reported, citing the affidavit. He also threw something inside her vehicle before running away, WOFL-TV reported.

During the incident, Logan repeatedly asked the victim, “Why are you doing this to me?” the paper noted.

RELATED: Male accused of shooting wife amid argument — then running ill-advised errand while taking her to hospital

Deputies had responded to the courthouse garage around 11:30 a.m. after reports of shots fired at the Orange Avenue facility, the Sentinel reported, adding that the lockdown was lifted in the afternoon while deputies continued searching for Logan.

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​Florida, Arrest, Shooting, Orlando, Orange county sheriff’s office, Husband and wife, Crime 

Even in these days of hotter summers and disappearing traditions, a few fall rituals remain reassuringly predictable: back-to-school sales, postseason baseball, and the annual uproar over an offensive Halloween costume.

This year, it was Target’s turn.

For generations, poverty among rural Southern whites had been treated not simply as an economic condition but as evidence of something wrong with the people themselves.

A screenshot circulating on social media showed a child model wearing a “circus clown” getup from the retailer’s Hyde and EEK house brand. Critics said the face mask, miniature top hat, and gloves — not to mention the child’s pose — evoked blackface and 19th-century minstrelsy. Target quickly pulled it.

The Rev. Jamal Bryant, the Georgia pastor who spent the previous year leading a boycott of Target over its retreat from DEI initiatives, called it “a profoundly harmful symbol of racism.” Target followed with a corporate apology: “As a company, we know we got this wrong, and we are deeply sorry. The costume is offensive and should never have been part of our assortment.”

The resemblance to Jim Crow-era imagery was vague enough to give Target the benefit of the doubt. The individual elements of the costume have lost enough of their original meaning that a designer could plausibly assemble them without recognizing that they once belonged to a caricature of a particular people.

But the cultural memory of minstrelsy remains strong enough that once the connection was pointed out, the resemblance was clear enough to make pulling it the right call.

We retain a similar sensitivity to the old caricatures of most ethnic groups, even when the stereotypes themselves have receded from everyday life. But there is one old American caricature that has become so detached from the people it once mocked that most of us no longer recognize it as an ethnic caricature at all.

Hillbilly Highway

Walk into almost any big-box store or scroll online retailers this month, and you will find it: the frayed overalls, the missing front tooth, the corncob pipe, and a jug of moonshine. A quick Google search shows that “trailer park,” “redneck,” and “hillbilly” costumes abound. You can even dress as Joe Dirt, Ricky from “Trailer Park Boys,” or Joe Exotic from “Tiger King.”

No corporate statement has ever called such costumes “especially hurtful.” No brand has ever pulled any one of them and promised to look closely at how it happened. It’s simply a costume built on the presumed backwardness, dirtiness, and moral degeneracy of the people once called “hillbillies,” sold with little awareness of the history behind the stereotype.

That history includes a largely forgotten mass migration — and the prejudice and discrimination that followed it. At roughly the same time that millions of black Southerners were heading north and west in the Great Migration, another vast movement was under way. Historian Max Fraser estimates that as many as 8 million whites left the Southern countryside for the factory towns and cities of the industrial Midwest, along what became known as the “Hillbilly Highway.”

And that was only part of a much larger exodus. Historian James Gregory estimates that nearly 20 million white Southerners left the South over the course of the 20th century, compared with close to 8 million black Southerners. Yet while the Great Migration became a familiar part of the American historical narrative, the parallel movement of white Southerners largely faded from national memory.

Southern man

My own family were part of that migration, moving from Western Kentucky to Gary, Indiana, in the 1950s. They weren’t hillbillies, technically — Western Kentucky sits roughly 300 miles from Appalachia — but that distinction meant little once they got north. To the people already there, a Southern accent did all the sorting a map wouldn’t.

That the migration was remarkably successful seems hardly to have mattered. Chad Berry’s oral histories of the Southern whites who migrated to Midwestern mill and factory towns found that most achieved the economic stability they had sought, even as their new neighbors continued to stereotype them as violent, drunken, lazy, unclean, and sexually dissolute.

Richard Dorson captured the prejudice in “Land of the Millrats,” his study of the industrial communities around Gary. Driving through nearby Whiting with a local man named Ed, Dorson was told why trailers carried a particular stigma: “This is a Southern white area. Hillbillies live in the trailers. So there’s prejudice attached to trailers, ’cause that was the first housing available to Southern whites in the community. So trailer equals hillbilly.”

The prejudice could have more tangible consequences. Historian Anthony Harkins found that job listings announcing “No Southerners need apply” and restaurants refusing to serve “hillbillies” were not uncommon in Northern cities receiving Appalachian migrants.

RELATED: How My Hometown Got Eugenicized

Gabriel Gigliotti

White trash

But the contempt those migrants encountered in the North had much older roots. For generations, poverty among rural Southern whites had been treated not simply as an economic condition but as evidence of something wrong with the people themselves.

In her book “White Trash,” historian Nancy Isenberg traces that tradition from colonial descriptions of the poor as “waste people” through the antebellum contempt for the supposed moral failings of “poor white trash” and into eugenic theories that treated poverty and “feeble-mindedness” as hereditary defects.

Appalachian journalist James Branscome made this case explicitly more than 50 years ago, in a 1971 manifesto called “Annihilating the Hillbillly.” By portraying Appalachians as backward, ignorant, and responsible for their own poverty, he argued, coal operators, government agencies, and the national media diverted attention from the economic arrangements that had enriched outsiders while leaving much of the region poor.

The hillbilly, in other words, provided a convenient explanation for poverty: The problem was the people. And when millions of those people left the rural South, found industrial work, and built more prosperous lives elsewhere, the stereotype followed them anyway.

Yokels only

Today the hillbilly survives mostly as a seemingly harmless comic trope. The caricature migrated from comic strips like “Snuffy Smith” and “Li’l Abner” to television’s “Hee Haw” and “The Beverly Hillbillies.” More recently it was “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo” and “Duck Dynasty.” Cletus and Brandine Spuckler are still turning up on new episodes of “The Simpsons,” more than 30 years after Springfield introduced its “slack-jawed yokel.”

It might be harder to laugh if we still connected those characters to the people the caricature once described.

The history isn’t particularly ancient. In 1958, Time quoted sociologists describing poor Southern whites as “vicious” and more difficult to assimilate than other minority groups. A Wayne University survey of Detroit residents published in 1952 found “poor Southern whites; hill-billies” the second-most frequently named group when residents were asked which people were “not good to have in the city.” Twenty-one percent named them, compared with 13% who named black residents; only “criminals and gangsters,” at 26%, ranked higher.

These were the people who left Eastern Kentucky and West Virginia for the mills of Gary and East Chicago and the auto plants of Detroit. They didn’t bring backwardness north with them. They brought labor. Many found the economic security they had gone looking for and became part of the working class that built the industrial Midwest.

Eventually, they also became less visible. Their children and grandchildren lost the accents, left the trailer parks, moved into the middle class, and blended into the rest of America. The people disappeared into the country while the character remained behind.

That is the history the Halloween costume no longer evokes.

None of this requires another corporate apology. But corporate sensitivity reveals something in what it notices — and what it doesn’t. Some old caricatures still carry a social cost. Others remain fair game.

I don’t know what my own family heard when they migrated more than 300 miles north to Gary. They’re gone now, and they didn’t leave that part written down. That’s part of the point. The costume survived. Their story didn’t.

​Blackface and minstrelsy, Comic hillbilly trope, Halloween costume, Hillbilly highway, Offensive halloween costume, Southern migration, White trash stereotype, Appalachian migrants, Great migration, Halloween, History, White trash, Trailer park, Southerners, Books, Memoirs, Culture 

Over the weekend, ESPN got to see exactly how things would play out if it aired completely partisan right-wing commentary.

Unfortunately, host Pat McAfee was the unwilling victim of an experiment that came out of a viral online post.

‘What a f**king sellout.’

Saturday’s game between the University of Tennessee Volunteers and the Texas Longhorns got a ton of fanfare. Whether it was McAfee doling out $1 million to a college student, “Jackass” star Johnny Knoxville trying to hand a referee $20, or the sitting president attending the game, the stakes were high between the two powerhouse schools.

About an hour before kickoff though, a post attributing a quote to McAfee made the rounds, resulting in the former NFL punter getting death threats.

“Pat McAfee picks President Donald Trump to win the Texas vs. Tennessee matchup on College GameDay,” a post from X account @ShaneTuttleNCAA read.

“I only root for one team, and that team is TEAM USA,” the post claimed McAfee said. Attached was a photo of McAfee with President Trump as his prediction for the winner of the game.

Although the picture was altered and the X account labels itself as “satire,” plenty of viewers took the post seriously and went on a rampage against the ESPN host.

“What a f**king sellout,” one reader said.

“Nobody likes ESPN commentators sharing political opinions,” another wrote.

On Sunday, McAfee revealed screenshots of more alleged egregious responses:

“Yea he really does need to get kirked,” one user apparently wrote in response, likely referring to the assassination of political commentator Charlie Kirk.

That account has seemingly been deleted.

Another X user apparently called McAfee a “worthless piece of s**t,” prompting the host to wonder if enough people had seen that the original fabricated post had been hit with a community note from X.

RELATED: Peyton Manning’s nephew learns what the liberal media is all about — and it may change him forever

“All of these folks that were very excited to believe this DEFINITELY got a follow up about this being fake right?” McAfee asked openly.

“If it gets Community Noted much later on, is X forcing it back into folks [sic] feeds?” he continued. “I’m sure they all know it’s not real. The community note probably cleared it all up for the 1,000,000+ folks that saw this,” McAfee added.

X does notify users of a community note being added to a post if a user interacts with it by commenting, liking, or sharing, but not if a user simply sees it.

McAfee also called out the user who posted the image by name, while also singling out OutKick writer Jon Root for an article written the week prior.

McAfee said Root was “completely lying” about what he said, thereby “dropping” McAfee “into something with potential real life repercussions.”

The article in question cited McAfee’s comments during a military flyover, where he said, “We certainly appreciate the hell out of the American military. And if you’re not the United States of America and you hear that sound, your ass better run.”

According to OutKick, a previous version of the story “indicated Pat McAfee may have been referring to illegal immigration but in fact he seems to be referring to America’s military against its enemies.”

RELATED: Pat McAfee refused to fold, and ESPN paid up. There’s a lesson there for young men.

To his credit, Root chimed in on McAfee’s post and condemned any threats made against the former NFL player and apologized.

“I apologize for taking that statement last week about the National Guard as a illegal immigration joke. I corrected it in the thread soon after posting, but probably should have just deleted it,” Root wrote.

As for McAfee, he attempted to make light of the disturbing comments made about him. “That’s fun,” he wrote. “That’s the good stuff.”

McAfee concluded, “And if I do get ‘kirked,’ please know that I love my kin and I love ball. Now … Let’s have a phenomenal NFL Sunday.”

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​Football, Ncaa, Pat mcafee, Charlie kirk, Donald trump, Sports, Espn 

Millions know him as Clavicular, the controversial influencer who helped popularize “looksmaxxing” — an online subculture obsessed with maximizing physical attractiveness by any means necessary.

But as BlazeTV hosts Stu Burguiere and Dave Landau explain, the story surrounding the internet celebrity has become far more disturbing than viral videos about jawlines and self-improvement.

“We’re in this weird society where people can be massively famous, and you’ve never heard of them,” Stu says. “That’s kind of where I am with Clavicular until I did some deep research today preparing for this show.”

“He is a ‘looksmaxxing’ influencer,” he adds.

“This is a man who chiseled his face with a hammer,” Dave comments, explaining that it’s called “bone smashing.”

“The point of this is basically hitting yourself literally in the face with a hammer. Breaking the bones slightly, causing fractures, and then the bone was supposed to grow back to make you look more handsome,” Stu says.

“By the way, you should know this, this does not at all seem to be accurate about how the human body works,” he adds.

“It’s causing a lot of issues for a lot of people,” Dave agrees.

Clavicular has also been charged with allegedly raping a teenage girl, who claims that he lured her to his family’s $3 million Cape Cod mansion before exploiting her months later.

“He films everything that he does,” Dave comments. “Did he happen to turn off his backpack camera when this happened?”

“Well, apparently not,” Stu says, “when he was giving an underage girl alcohol and apparently injecting her face with some sort of serum.”

But those aren’t the only legal troubles Clavicular has faced. In February 2026, he was reportedly booted from a “fashion bash” and “attacked on a night out in New York,” before being arrested in March 2026 on a battery warrant.

The influencer was also charged with a misdemeanor after a viral video revealed an alligator being shot “repeatedly.”

“I know PETA won’t agree with me,” Dave says, “but they’re nasty lizard creatures, and I think they’re what’s remaining of the dinosaurs, and we don’t need them.”

Want more from Stu and Dave?

To enjoy more of Stu and Dave’s lethal blend of wit, humor, and insightful commentary subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Clavicular, Dave landau, Stu burguiere, Bone smashing, Looksmaxxing, Allegations, Blazetv show 

Fans called New York Giants quarterback Jameis Winston everything from crazy to a troll on Sunday, and they really couldn’t figure out what he was trying to say.

Winston is known for being incredibly eloquent with his thoughts, but this time, he wasn’t sharing his own words, and his comments seemingly went right over everyone’s head.

‘It’s us doing, being doers, not speakers.’

Before the Week 3 game against the Tennessee Titans, droves of fans were already reacting to yet another head-scratching interview from the Giants’ new starting quarterback, something they’ve already become accustomed to.

CBS reporter AJ Ross was the one tasked with asking Winston about his game prep and his ability to carry the team as he stepped in for injured QB Jaxson Dart; but there is no way she expected the answer Winston gave.

“One thing that I do is forgetting those that is behind and reaching forward to what’s ahead,” Winston replied.

Fans were confused. The video was seen over 5 million times, but almost no one understood what the QB was trying to say.

One post called Winston’s words “utter incoherence,” while another said he was saying “insane things.”

No, Winston wasn’t trying and failing to sound “eloquent,” as another fan put it. He was actually quoting Scripture.

Winston was relaying the message of Philippians 3:13, about Paul the apostle admitting he has not yet achieved perfection.

RELATED: NFL fines player for ‘beer’ chug celebration — but what happened right after proves the league’s hypocrisy

Not everyone was pessimistic about Winston’s pregame words though. Popular podcast “Bussin’ with the Boys” labeled the Alabama native a “poet,” while sports website OutKick called him a “national treasure.”

Podcaster Keith Malinak was one of the few who understood the message, relaying the passage to more readers.

Winston’s unrelenting positivity has a way of resulting in some of the most entertaining — as well as some of the most confusing — interview segments, and he can often catch reporters off guard.

For example, when a CBS reporter asked him about how the weather might affect the game, Winston didn’t give the most clear response.

“The circumstances, conditions, and facts, they don’t matter,” the 32-year-old replied. “It’s us doing, being doers, not speakers.”

With answers like that, it’s not hard to see why fans have a difficult time determining when Winston is delivering biblical quotes or his own personal wisdom.

RELATED: ‘You’re like the most genuine dude’: Comic Bert Kreischer gives hilarious, loving speech to Jameis Winston during Super Bowl

Elsa/Getty Images

Following the 12-7 win over the Titans, Winston began his postgame interview by telling reporters he was “elated” to see his team close out the game.

“Praise God,” Winston added.

Consistent questions followed about whether he feels replaceable, but Winston continuously made it clear to reporters how grateful he is to be in his position.

The truth is, most analysts are not confident in Winston’s capabilities as a starting quarterback. With no touchdowns and just 229 passing yards in his first two games, criticisms have come quickly and in abundance.

As ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith stated, there is a certain expectation of an eventual big mistake when Winston is in the game.

“Jameis Winston is more entertaining and more interesting in the pregame chatter about football than he is once he’s behind center. That’s the reality of the situation,” he said.

The Giants play the Arizona Cardinals in Week 4 in what should be another winnable game. The Giants have many such games before the end of the calendar year.

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​New york giants, Football, Nfl, Jameis winston, Bible, Scripture, Sports 

The U.S. Catholic bishops have formed a task force on artificial intelligence, with Bishop Oscar Cantú of San Jose as its chairman. The September 16 announcement followed a meeting between the bishops’ Administrative Committee and representatives of technology companies.

Cantú told Religion News Service that about seven technology experts from four companies spoke with roughly 30 bishops for two and a half hours. He said the discussion took place under Chatham House rules, which allowed the participants to speak candidly but limits what he can disclose about who said what.

John Paul II described technology as an ally of work that can become an enemy.

Afterward, more than a dozen bishops went to Capitol Hill and met with members of Congress. The bishops’ conference says they urged lawmakers to adopt AI safeguards and legislation to protect children online.

Cantú described the task force’s work to RNS: continue talking with AI developers, advocate for legislation, teach bishops and dioceses how the technology works, and report to the Vatican’s AI commission. He gave no timetable for that work.

What the bishops have already asked for

Pope Leo XIV’s May encyclical, “Magnifica humanitas,” prompted the bishops’ response. Blaze’s Joseph MacKinnon covered its warnings, including the pope’s concerns about automated killings and the extraction of personal data. The new story is what U.S. bishops will do with those principles.

They aren’t starting from zero. In a 2025 letter to congressional leaders, the bishops asked for human oversight of employment decisions and weapons systems, protections for children online, and public accountability for government AI use. They also warned about the water and power demands of data centers. The task force can press those positions with lawmakers while examining how the Church uses AI in its own institutions.

RELATED: DEI is trying to take over AI. These universities are leading the charge.

Alexey Yaremenko/Getty Images

The letter gives the task force something to measure itself against. It says AI should supplement human work and judgment. In education, health care and public services, the bishops warn that automated decisions can carry biases into consequential choices. What human oversight means in each setting still needs spelling out.

Is it appropriate for the job?

Economist E.F. Schumacher helped popularize the idea of appropriate technology in his 1973 book “Small Is Beautiful.” A later U.S. Office of Technology Assessment report described it as fitting the scale and complexity of a tool to the job, while considering the needs and resources of the people who will use it.

The bishops have not used that label for their AI work, but it gives their call for human oversight a practical edge. Take hiring, which their 2025 letter specifically addresses. An AI system might help sort applications. If a manager cannot explain why it rejected a qualified applicant, however, putting that manager’s name on the decision does not make the process accountable. The task force could spell out what a human reviewer must be able to see, correct, and explain.

Catholic teaching has its own language for this concern. In his 1981 encyclical “Laborem exercens,” John Paul II described technology as an ally of work that can become an enemy when it strips workers of responsibility or replaces them.

That is now the question that the Catholic Church and all humanity are wrestling with. AI is here and unlikely to go away. How do we direct it into being a pro-human technology and not one that is ultimately destructive?

​Tech, Humanity, Ai, Catholic church, Congress 

Popular support for homosexual “marriage” is plummeting — and liberals are beginning to panic.

James Kirchick, a gay liberal contributor to the Atlantic, suggested on Friday’s episode of “Real Time with Bill Maher” that this waning popularity is in response to years of LGBT extremism.

‘Gay men purchasing babies didn’t help.’

A lesbian bar in Massachusetts recently made headlines after it became a target of local LGBT leftist hatred after operators announced on Aug. 31 that they were waiving the establishment’s mask requirement just one night a week.

Maher highlighted the LGBT attacks on Greenfield’s Last Ditch lesbian bar as yet another example of leftist intolerance. Kirchick said the story also illustrated the “growing divide between gay and lesbian people, and queer people.”

“To be gay or lesbian is a sexual orientation. That’s it,” continued Kirchick. “To be ‘queer’ is to embrace a whole political orientation. There are straight people who identify as queer. It’s about deconstructing gender, which is how you get in that [bar] story a lesbian who uses ‘he/him’ pronouns.”

The Atlantic writer provided an example of the political and conformist nature of those in the “queer” camp, referencing California Democratic state Sen. Scott Wiener’s apparent excommunication over his lukewarm support for Israel.

When he tried to join the Trans March in June, Wiener — a radical homosexual activist who previously claimed that “the word groomer is categorically an anti-LGBTQ hate word,” advanced a law that made California a sanctuary state for child sex-change mutilations, and advocated for exempting some adults who had sex with minors from automatically registering as sex offenders — was told, “You stopped being queer the moment you started supporting Israel,” reported the San Francisco Chronicle.

RELATED: ‘There is no mama’: How a viral video accidentally exposed the true cost of gay adoption

PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP/Getty Images

“There was a poll done two years ago, and it was a poll of the LGBT community — who identifies as what within the LGBT community,” Kirchick told Maher. “About 15% identify as lesbians. About 21% identify as gay. Fifty-six percent identify as bisexual. … 0.5% of LGBT people identify as queer.”

Kirchick unironically asked, “Why are we allowing this 0.5% of the community to speak for all of us?”

“All this queer, trans extremism is having a real impact,” he continued. “I mean, support for gay marriage has started going down.”

According to a Gallup poll conducted in May, support for homosexual “marriage” is down six percentage points from the peak in 2022 and 2023.

The percentage of U.S. adults who said that same-sex “marriages” should be valid rose from 27% in 1996 to 71% in 2022, where it remained for another year. In 2024, however, the percentage dropped to 69%, and it has been declining in the years since.

The percentage of U.S. adults who say that gay or lesbian relations are morally acceptable has similarly begun to decline, dropping from 71% in 2022 to 62% this year.

The decline has largely been driven by changing attitudes among Republicans. Whereas 55% of Republicans said that they favored homosexual “marriage” in 2021 and 2022, the number is now 37%.

The liberal writer speculated that this decline in support is a “backlash to this queer extremism. And as a gay man, it’s something I really worry about, frankly.”

Katy Faust, founder and president of children’s advocacy group Them Before Us, said in response to Kirchick’s observation, “Queer definitely poisoned the well. But gay men purchasing babies didn’t help.”

Kirchick is hardly the only liberal concerned about declining support for homosexual “marriage.”

Andrew Sullivan, an LGBT activist who has written for the New York Times, wrote in a July blog post, “On all questions gay and trans, the Dems are now entirely controlled by trans and ‘queer’ extremists.”

Referencing the recent Gallup data, Sullivan added, “As someone who played a part in bringing those Republicans and moderates around to gay marriage, it’s distressing to see what the queer overreach has done — especially in red states.”

Last month, Log Cabin Republicans dropped the “T” from its LGBT advocacy, recognizing the reputational damage that trans-radicals have done to the cause of their fellow non-straight activists.

Ross Hemminger, the president of the Log Cabin Republicans, argued that support for homosexual “marriage” is waning because many voters’ “view of the gay community is based on today’s radical transgender activists with their unnecessary and discomfiting focus on America’s youth.”

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​Homosexual, Lgbt, Marriage, Scott wiener, Bill maher, Extremism, Politics