But The Big Story Is . . .

The longest-lasting Johnstown TV station used to make a habit of pledging its allegiance to far-away Centre County with teases such as this: Nuclear war breaks out in the Middle East, black plague identified in Cambria County, and fire burns Johnstown to the ground. But the big story tonight is the Centre County Grange Fair has opened.

It was both ridiculous and incisive as to their emphasis. Highlighting the absurdly pedestrian over the truly noteworthy fit their corporate geographic directive, silly as that might have been and still be. I will borrow their format to discuss current events.

Joe Biden’s approval rating sits at an all-time low for U.S. presidents at this point in their term, Philadelphia Republic First bank has been taken over by the Federal Insurance Deposit Corporation lest it fail, and a Boeing 767 jet departing New York City lost its emergency slide in mid-flight. But the big story is UCLA is mandating classes on “fat positivity” and requiring this be displayed toward the overly rotund among us.

Video of an unidentified aerial object near New York City’s LaGuardia Airport has been posted on social media with zero official feedback, a penthouse atop a 66-story tower on a Florida key is being offered at $100 million, and Europe’s declining birth rate among the natives makes the prospect of being overrun by migrants all the more real. But the big story is owning a flamethrower is legal across the U.S. except in Maryland. In California a permit is required.

In Baltimore a disgruntled athletic director let go for misuse of school funds has been arrested for using AI in an attempt to frame the principal for making a racist rant, a report notes that public schools having been turned into college-prep only factories instead of also emphasizing trades is a mistake, and California’s new $20 minimum hourly wage for fast-food workers is backfiring in terms of workers being laid off or having their hours reduced. But the big story is U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, no longer missing in action, advised Iranians to examine the effectiveness of their weapons systems and their planning in the aftermath of a less-then-successful missile and drone attack on Israel.

Mainstream media attempting to prop up Clueless Joe are misreporting that crime is falling in the United States, Donald Trump challenges the Clueless One to a debate on the steps of the courthouse in which Trump once again is being persecuted for a non-crime, and even more ships have been attacked in the Red Sea with one suffering damage. But the big story is that the Pittsburgh Pirates, after an unrealistically strong start to the season, on Friday once again slipped into their customary spot at under .500.

George Soros and his various sources have been outed for funding so-called “fellows” to agitate and whip up frenzy among the pro-Hamas demonstrators (perhaps Soros is providing the same small green tents used by the protestors?), Japan’s Yen is in freefall with dire implications for the world economy, and the Federal Aviation Administration is investigating a mid-April incident at New York’s JFK Airport in which a Swiss Air plane narrowly missed colliding with not one, not two, not three, but four other planes that had been cleared to use the same runway. But the big story is Clueless Joe’s regime has abandoned plans to ban menthol cigarettes because the cigarettes are disproportionately popular with black smokers and Joe is becoming disproportionately unpopular among that once secure demographic.