- Reviving ISIS: A US Weapon Against The Resistance Axis
Reviving ISIS: A US Weapon Against The Resistance Axis
Is it a coincidence that the world’s foremost terror organization is being revived just as the US struggles under a multi-front assault on its hegemony in West Asia? More curiously, both ISIS and Washington’s targets are exactly the same…
Iraqi security sources are warning of an ISIS revival in the country, which coincides all too neatly with the spike in Iraqi resistance operations against US bases in Iraq and Syria, and with widening regional instability caused by Israel’s military assault on Gaza.
More than six years after declaring victory over the terrorist organization, Iraqi intelligence reports now indicate that thousands of ISIS fighters are emerging unscathed, under the protection of US forces in two regions of western Iraq.
The missing piece of the puzzle
According to intelligence reports reviewed by The Cradle, at its height, ISIS consisted of more than 35,000 fighters in Iraq – 25,000 of these were killed, while more than 10,000 simply “disappeared.”
As an officer of one Iraqi intelligence agency recounts to The Cradle:
“Hundreds of ISIS fighters fled to Turkey and Syria at the end of 2017. After the appointment of Abdullah Qardash as the leader of ISIS in 2019, following the death of Caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the new Caliph began to restructure the organization, and ordered his followers to return to Iraq. The organization exploited the long border with Syria, the security disturbances, and the diversity of forces on both sides of the border to infiltrate the Iraqi territory again.”
Imprisoned ISIS officials admit that infiltrating that border is not an easy task, because of the strict control imposed by the Iraqi Border Guards and the use of modern technologies, such as thermal cameras.
It therefore became necessary for the terror group to identify intermediaries capable of breaking through or bypassing these fortifications to transport its fighters across borders.
An Iraqi security source, insisting on anonymity, tells The Cradle that the US plays a vital role in enabling these border violations:
“[There are] several incidents that confirm the American assistance in securing the crossing route for ISIS members – mainly, by shelling Iraqi units on the border, especially the Popular Mobilization Units (PMUs), to create gaps that allow ISIS fighters to cross the border.”
The Iraqi security source adds that there are confirmed reports of US Chinook helicopters transporting fighters from eastern Syria to the Anbar desert in western Iraq and Jebel Hamreen, in the country’s east.
Munir Adib, a researcher specializing in Islamist movements, extremist organizations, and international terrorism, confirms the possibility of the return of ISIS after the organization’s “dozens of attacks in Syria and Iraq in the past few weeks,” which led to the death of tens of civilians and soldiers.
According to Adib, “the international community’s preoccupation with the Gaza and Russia-Ukraine wars gave ISIS an opportunity to reorganize its ranks, while continuing to receive internal and external logistical support.”
Manufacturing and harboring terrorism
Houran Valley is the largest of its kind in Iraq, extending 369 kilometers from the Iraqi-Saudi border to the Euphrates River near the city of Haditha in Anbar Governorate. Its topography is marked by soaring cliffs ranging in height between 150 to 200 meters, and includes the hills surrounding the valley and the sub-valleys that extend into its surroundings.
The valley was and still is one of the most dangerous security environments in the state. Terrorist groups use it as a safe haven because of its desert terrain, and distance from congested urban areas. The valley and its environs have witnessed numerous security incidents, most notably in December 2013, when ISIS killed the commander of the Iraqi army’s Seventh Division, his assistant, the director of intelligence in Anbar Governorate, eight officers, and thirteen soldiers.
Iraqi MP Hassan Salem has called for launching a military operation to clear Houran Valley of terrorist fighters. He confirmed to The Cradle that “there are thousands of ISIS members in the valley receiving training in private camps, under American protection,” noting that US forces have “transferred to this area hundreds of ISIS members of different nationalities.”
US foreign policy, of course, is rife with historical evidence of the creation of proxy armed militias in West Asia and Latin America, often utilizing these organizations to overthrow governments in target countries. We know Washington has no aversion to allying with Islamist extremists largely because of its direct involvement with arming and financing the Afghan Mujahideen, from which the Taliban and Al Qaeda emerged.
An early US-ISIS connection exists quite clearly: the terrorist group’s founding and second rank leaders were among the inmates of Camp Bucca prison in southern Iraq, an internment facility run by the US military. The roster of high-value terrorists captured, then set free by the Americans is quite extraordinary: ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, his successor Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi, Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, Abu Muslim al-Turkmani, Haji Bakr, Abu Abdulrahman al-Bilawi, Abu Ayman al-Iraqi, among others.
Camp Bucca, known for abuses against its detainees, brought together extremist elements, slow-boiled this combustive formula for six years (2003-2009), then let the now well-networked extremists go free.
The religious officials of ISIS even say they used their time at the prison to obtain vows from prisoners to join the terrorist group after their release.
US intelligence also protected the terrorist organization indirectly, by allowing ISIS convoys to move between the cities that were under its control. Other forms of protection, according to Iraqi security experts, include refusing to implement death sentences issued by Iraqi courts against detained ISIS members, and establishing safe havens for the organization’s members in western and eastern Iraq.
ISIS: US foot soldiers in the regional war
In a speech on 5 January, Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah warned that the US was supporting an ISIS revival in the region.
The Cradle obtained security information monitoring the new activity of extremists in Lebanon, communications between these elements and their counterparts in Iraq and Syria, and suspicious money transfer activities among them.
Lebanese Army Intelligence also recently arrested a group of Lebanese and Syrians who were preparing to carry out security operations.
Importantly, this surge in terror activities comes at a time when the Lebanese resistance is engaged in a security and military battle with Israel, which may expand at any moment into open war. It is also notable that renewed ISIS activity is concentrated in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Iran; that is, in the countries that support the Palestinian resistance politically, militarily, and logistically.
On 4 January, ISIS officially claimed responsibility for two bombings in the Iranian city of Kerman that targeted memorial processions on the anniversary of the assassination of Quds Force Commander Qassem Soleimani by US forces. The dual explosions killed around 90 people and injured dozens, in an unprecedented attack targeting the biggest US-Israeli adversary in West Asia – just one day after Tel Aviv killed top Hamas leader Saleh al-Arouri in Beirut.
Before that, on 5 October 2023, ISIS drone-attacked an officers graduation ceremony at the Military College in the Syrian city of Homs, killing about 100 people. These attacks, and others in Iraq, Syria, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Africa, indicate that fresh blood, money, and weapons are being pumped into the ISIS organization’s arteries again.
A high-ranking PMU officer, who asked to remain unnamed, tells The Cradle that US forces are preventing Iraqi forces from approaching Houran Valley by attacking any security forces approaching the area. “This happened when American aircraft targeted units of the PMU that were attacking ISIS in the region,” he reveals, citing intelligence reports confirming the presence of dozens of ISIS members and other extremist organizations in the valley, where they receive training and equipment from US forces.
Security sources in the Anbar Operations Command confirm this information:
“Noticeable activity by the organization had been recorded a few weeks ago in the west of the country. Near the Rutba desert, ISIS fighters were spotted digging underground hideouts. Information indicates that the organization is in the process of carrying out terrorist operations in many locations,” they tell The Cradle.
Concurrently, ISIS is expanding its operations in the east of Iraq, within the geographical triangle that includes eastern Salah al-Din Governorate, north-eastern Diyala, and southern Kirkuk, particularly in the geographically challenging Makhoul, Hamrin, Ghurra, Wadi al-Shay, and Zaghitoun areas.
It should be noted that US forces are deployed in Iraq under the umbrella of the International Coalition to Combat ISIS. Last week, four years after the Iraqi parliament first voted to expel foreign forces, Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammad Shia al-Sudani weighed in on the “destabilizing” impact of US troops and demanded a “quick and orderly” exit of those combat units.
Washington not only countered by saying it has “no plans” to withdraw from Iraq, but announced on 14 January that it would be sending an additional 1,500 troops to Iraq and Syria illegally, and without the consent of either nation.
One irony here is that ISIS appears to regain momentum each and every time Baghdad raises the issue of US military withdrawal from Iraq.
It can also no longer be seen as a coincidence that the terror group is now re-assembling its forces to target Washington and Tel Aviv’s most capable regional foes – the Axis of Resistance – just when the US and Israel are struggling to handle a region-wide, multi-front assault from the Axis.
The extraordinary synergies between the Americans and the world’s foremost terror group can no longer be ignored: their targets are one and the same, and ISIS is only now entering the fray, just as Washington begins to lose its hold on West Asia.
* * *
The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ZeroHedge.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 23:40 - EVs In Chicago Are No Match For Polar Vortex
EVs In Chicago Are No Match For Polar Vortex
Average temperatures across the Chicago metro area plunged below zero this week.
Resulting in a double whammy for electric vehicle owners: paralyzed charging networks and battery degradation because of the cold blast.
“This is crazy. This is a disaster.”
Electric Vehicle owners find out the hard way what it means to go electric during Chicago’s harsh winter.
Can’t imagine why the EV market isn’t taking off.pic.twitter.com/1jRbsFX5L8
— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) January 17, 2024
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One woman complained she was stranded because one charging station “was all broken.”
POV: Owning an EV in Chicago… pic.twitter.com/420Q1X2tq1
— Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) January 19, 2024
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“When it’s cold like this, cars aren’t functioning well, chargers aren’t functioning well, and people don’t function so well either,” Javed Spencer, an Uber driver, told The New York Times. He said he’s worried about being stranded again with his Chevy Bolt.
For years, the Davos elites have pitched to the masses about a ‘green’ new world of EVs and how nothing could go wrong. But these elites are not fortune tellers and are sometimes very wrong in their predictions, as EVs are no match for a polar vortex.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 23:20 - Digital Kill Switches: How Tyrannical Governments Stifle Political Dissent
Digital Kill Switches: How Tyrannical Governments Stifle Political Dissent
Authored by John and Nisha Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,
“No president from either party should have the sole power to shut down or take control of the internet or any other of our communication channels during an emergency.”
– Senator Rand Paul
What’s to stop the U.S. government from throwing the kill switch and shutting down phone and internet communications in a time of so-called crisis?
After all, it’s happening all over the world.
Communications kill switches have become tyrannical tools of domination and oppression to stifle political dissent, shut down resistance, forestall election losses, reinforce military coups, and keep the populace isolated, disconnected and in the dark, literally and figuratively.
As the Guardian reports, “From Ukraine to Myanmar, government-run internet outages are picking up pace around the world. In 2021, there were 182 shutdowns in 34 countries… Countries across Africa and Asia have turned to shutdowns in a bid to control behaviour, while India, largely in the conflict-ridden region of Jammu and Kashmir, plunged into digital darkness more times than any other last year… Civil unrest in Ethiopia and Kazakhstan has triggered internet shutdowns as governments try to prevent political mobilisation and stop news about military suppression from emerging.”
In an internet-connected age, killing the internet is tantamount to bringing everything—communications, commerce, travel, the power grid—to a standstill.
Tyrants and would-be tyrants rely on this “cloak of darkness” to advance their agendas.
In Myanmar, for example, the internet shutdown came on the day a newly elected government was to have been sworn in. That’s when the military staged a digital coup and seized power. Under cover of a communications blackout that cut off the populace from the outside world and each other, the junta “carried out nightly raids, smashing down doors to drag out high-profile politicians, activists and celebrities.”
These government-imposed communications shutdowns serve to not only isolate, terrorize and control the populace, but also underscore the citizenry’s lack of freedom in the face of the government’s limitless power.
Yet as University of California Irvine law professor David Kaye explains, these kill switches are no longer exclusive to despotic regimes. They have “migrated into a toolbox for governments that actually do have the rule of law.”
This is what digital authoritarianism looks like in a technological age.
Digital authoritarianism, as the Center for Strategic and International Studies cautions, involves the use of information technology to surveil, repress, and manipulate the populace, endangering human rights and civil liberties, and co-opting and corrupting the foundational principles of democratic and open societies, “including freedom of movement, the right to speak freely and express political dissent, and the right to personal privacy, online and off.”
For those who insist that it can’t happen here, it can and it has.
In 2005, cell service was disabled in four major New York tunnels, reportedly to avert potential bomb detonations via cell phone.
In 2009, those attending President Obama’s inauguration had their cell signals blocked—again, same rationale.
And in 2011, San Francisco commuters had their cell phone signals shut down, this time, to thwart any possible protests over a police shooting of a homeless man.
With shutdowns becoming harder to detect, who’s to say it’s not still happening?
Although an internet kill switch is broadly understood to be a complete internet shutdown, it can also include a broad range of restrictions such as content blocking, throttling, filtering, complete shutdowns, and cable cutting.
As Global Risk Intel explains:
“Content blocking is a relatively moderate method that blocks access to a list of selected websites or applications. When users access these sites and apps, they receive notifications that the server could not be found or that access was denied by the network administrator. A more subtle method is throttling. Authorities decrease the bandwidth to slow down the speed at which specific websites can be accessed. A slow internet connection discourages users to connect to certain websites and does not arouse immediate suspicion. Users may assume that connection service is slow but may not conclude that this circumstance was authorized by the government. Filtering is another tool to censor targeted content and erases specific messages and terms that the government does not approve of.”
How often do most people, experiencing server errors and slow internet speeds, chalk it up to poor service? Who would suspect the government of being behind server errors and slow internet speeds?
Then again, this is the same government that has subjected us to all manner of encroachments on our freedoms (lockdowns, mandates, restrictions, contact tracing programs, heightened surveillance, censorship, overcriminalization, shadow banning, etc.) in order to fight the COVID-19 pandemic, preserve the integrity of elections, and combat disinformation.
These tactics have become the tools of domination and oppression in an internet-dependent age.
It really doesn’t matter what the justifications are for such lockdowns. No matter the rationale, the end result is the same: an expansion of government power in direct proportion to the government’s oppression of the citizenry.
According to Global Risk Intel, there are many motives behind such restrictions:
“For instance, the kill switch serves to censor content and constrain the spread of news. This particularly concerns news reports that cover police brutality, human rights abuses, or educational information. Governments may also utilize the kill switch to prevent government-critical protestors from communicating through message applications like WhatsApp, Facebook, or Twitter and organizing mass demonstrations. Therefore, internet restrictions can provide a way of regulating the flow of information and hindering dissent. Governments reason that internet limitations help stop the spread of fake news and strengthen national security and public safety in times of unrest.”
In this age of manufactured crises, emergency powers and technofascism, the government already has the know-how, the technology and the authority.
Now all it needs is the “right” crisis to flip the kill switch.
This particular kill switch can be traced back to the Communications Act of 1934. Signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, the Act empowers the president to suspend wireless radio and phone services “if he deems it necessary in the interest of national security or defense” during a time of “war or a threat of war, or a state of public peril or disaster or other national emergency, or in order to preserve the neutrality of the United States.”
In the event of a national crisis, the president has a veritable arsenal of emergency powers that override the Constitution and can be activated at a moment’s notice. These range from imposing martial law and suspending habeas corpus to shutting down all forms of communications, restricting travel and implementing a communications kill switch.
That national emergency can take any form, can be manipulated for any purpose and can be used to justify any end goal—all on the say so of the president.
The seeds of this ongoing madness were sown several decades ago when George W. Bush stealthily issued two presidential directives that granted the president the power to unilaterally declare a national emergency, which is loosely defined as “any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions.“
Comprising the country’s Continuity of Government (COG) plan, these directives (National Security Presidential Directive 51 and Homeland Security Presidential Directive 20), which do not need congressional approval, provide a skeletal outline of the actions the president will take in the event of a “national emergency.”
Just what sort of actions the president will take once he declares a national emergency can barely be discerned from the barebones directives. However, one thing is clear: in the event of a perceived national emergency, the COG directives give unchecked executive, legislative and judicial power to the president.
The country would then be subjected to martial law by default, and the Constitution and the Bill of Rights would be suspended.
The internet kill switch is just one piece of the government’s blueprint for locking down the nation and instituting martial law.
There may be many more secret powers that presidents may institute in times of so-called crisis without oversight from Congress, the courts, or the public. These powers do not expire at the end of a president’s term. They remain on the books, just waiting to be used or abused by the next political demagogue.
Given the government’s penchant for weaponizing one national crisis after another in order to expand its powers and justify all manner of government tyranny in the so-called name of national security, it’s only a matter of time before this particular emergency power to shut down the internet is activated.
Then again, an all-out communications blackout is just a more extreme version of the technocensorship that we’ve already been experiencing at the hands of the government and its corporate allies.
Packaged as an effort to control the spread of speculative or false information in the name of national security, restricting access to social media has become a popular means of internet censorship.
In fact, these tactics are at the heart of several critical cases before the U.S. Supreme Court over who gets to control, regulate or remove what content is shared on the internet: the individual, corporate censors or the police state.
Nothing good can come from techno-censorship.
As Glenn Greenwald writes for The Intercept:
“The glaring fallacy that always lies at the heart of pro-censorship sentiments is the gullible, delusional belief that censorship powers will be deployed only to suppress views one dislikes, but never one’s own views… Facebook is not some benevolent, kind, compassionate parent or a subversive, radical actor who is going to police our discourse in order to protect the weak and marginalized or serve as a noble check on mischief by the powerful. They are almost always going to do exactly the opposite: protect the powerful from those who seek to undermine elite institutions and reject their orthodoxies. Tech giants, like all corporations, are required by law to have one overriding objective: maximizing shareholder value. They are always going to use their power to appease those they perceive wield the greatest political and economic power.“
As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, these censors are laying the groundwork to preempt any “dangerous” ideas that might challenge the power elite’s stranglehold over our lives.
Whatever powers you allow the government and its corporate operatives to claim now, whatever the reason might be, will at some point in the future be abused and used against you by tyrants of your own making.
By the time you add AI technologies, social credit systems, and wall-to-wall surveillance into the mix, you don’t even have to be a critic of the government to get snared in the web of digital censorship.
Eventually, as George Orwell predicted, telling the truth will become a revolutionary act.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 23:00 - Judge Orders Wind Farm Dismantled In Win For Tribal Sovereignty
Judge Orders Wind Farm Dismantled In Win For Tribal Sovereignty
Authored by Bonner Russell Cohen Via RealClear Wire,
Capping a legal battle that had raged for over a decade, a federal judge in late December handed the Osage Nation a major victory by ordering wind farm developers to dismantle dozens of turbines they had erected on tribal land in northeastern Oklahoma.
By ordering the scuttling of 84 turbines spread over 8,400 acres of land, along with the removal of underground lines, overhead transmission lines, and meteorological towers, U.S. Court of International Trade Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves essentially ruled that the renewable energy project, known as Osage Wind, should never have been constructed in the first place because the developers – Osage Wind LLC, Enel Kansas LLC, and Enel Green Power North America – did not have the required lease from the Osage Minerals Council.
“The developers failed to acquire a mining lease during or after construction, as well as after issuance of the 10th Court of Appeals’ decision hold that a mining lease was required,” Choe-Groves ruled, according to Tulsa World (Dec. 22).
“On the record before the Court, it is clear that Defendants are actively avoiding the leasing requirement,” Choe-Groves said. “Permitting such behavior would create the prospect for further interference with the Osage Mineral Council’s authority by Defendants or others wishing to develop the minerals lease.
“The Court concludes that Defendants’ past and present refusal to obtain a lease constitutes interference with the sovereignty of the Osage Nation and is sufficient to constitute irreparable injury.”
The reference to minerals is key to understanding the case. Wind turbines not only soar into the air from the surface of the land. Their construction also requires the subsurface smashing of rocks and other excavation necessary to ground the turbines. The Osage Nation and its Minerals Council have claimed for years that this subsurface excavation activity constitutes mining and is covered by the tribe’s mineral rights. And for that the developers needed a lease from the Osage Mining Council which they never sought. The developers began leasing the surface rights in 2013 but never bothered to acquire the subsurface mineral rights. In the end, that was their undoing.
“A Win for Indian Country”
Still, the long, and expensive, court battle took its toll on the ultimately victorious Osage Nation.
“I hope no other tribe has to do what we had to do,” Osage Minerals Council Chairman Everett Walker to Tulsa World in an interview. “This is a win not only for the Osage Minerals Council; this is a win for Indian Country.”
“There are a lot of smaller tribes that couldn’t have battled this long, but that’s why we’re Osages,” Walker added. “We’re here, and this is our homeland, and we are going to protect it at all costs.”
The battle between the Osage Nation and the wind-farm developers got underway in 2011 and has lasted through the Obama, Trump, and Biden administrations. Throughout the litigation, the Interior Department, which administers the tribe’s mineral rights, has supported the Osages’ claims. Even the Biden administration, whose political appointees at Interior have enthusiastically greenlighted wind and solar projects on federal land, stuck with the tribe on the question of mineral rights.
While seeing 84 giant wind turbines disappear will be a bitter pill to swallow for Biden climate crusaders at Interior, they appear to have concluded that this was the wrong fight under the wrong circumstances.
Bonner Russell Cohen, Ph. D., is a senior policy analyst with CFACT.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 22:20 - Global Warming? North America Snow Coverage Hits "Decadal Highs"
Global Warming? North America Snow Coverage Hits “Decadal Highs”
Americans suffer from climate catastrophe fatigue after leftist corporate media outlets push endless climate doom headlines that seemingly never come true. Another round of climate doom headlines came this week at the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland. Many elites attending the event who spoke and or commented on the sidelines sound like broken records. They warn of imminent doom that never comes.
While the rest of us who don’t have private jets and gas-guzzling motorcades live in reality, the Lower 48 has been battered by a multi-week polar vortex blast of cold air that has made life absolutely painful. On top of freezing temperatures, snowstorms have hit many parts of the US.
“Talk about a turnaround or reversal of fortunes! North American #snow cover goes from record low to decadal highs in just a couple of weeks, thanks to the vagaries and whims of the #PolarVortex,” Judah Cohen, Director of Seasonal Forecasting at Verisk’s Atmospheric and Environmental Research, wrote in an X post.
And take a look at the snow coverage map.
Before the polar vortex split, corporate media outlets unleashed a flurry of headlines blabbering about global warming.
Next week’s forecast shows warmer air for the Lower 48, which means corporate media will be blasting headlines about global warming (again).
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 22:00 - Rufo: "The Only Hope For A Diverse Nation Is…"
Rufo: “The Only Hope For A Diverse Nation Is…”
Authored by Christopher Rufo via City-Journal.org,
A New Civil Rights Agenda
The only hope for a diverse nation is a regime of colorblind equality…
This year’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Day was marked by contentious debate about the state of civil rights law in America.
On the left, as always, the failure to achieve equal outcomes along racial lines requires greater state intervention.
On the right, a different critique has gained traction, most notably in Christopher Caldwell’s Age of Entitlement and Richard Hanania’s The Origins of Woke, books arguing that American civil rights law has metastasized into a “second Constitution” that has led inexorably to left-wing racialism as the nation’s new orthodoxy.
This critique has merit.
The modern civil rights regime has assumed unprecedented power to reshape public and private life, regulating not only instances of outright discrimination but also the minutiae of thought, behavior, speech, and association. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 appealed to the noble principle of equality, but over time the legal structure that it helped establish has metamorphized into an intrusive “diversity and inclusion” bureaucracy that discriminates against supposed “oppressor” groups—namely whites and Asians—and imposes left-wing ideology.
The question is what to do about it.
Libertarians have long argued that the Civil Rights Act compromises core freedoms of speech and association to such a degree that only repealing the law can restore them.
Another faction argues that the solution to minoritarian identity politics is majoritarian identity politics—that is, if the legal regime has become a racial spoils system, then Americans of European descent must develop “white racial consciousness” and fight for their share.
Both these approaches are misguided.
Some conservatives seem to have forgotten that the Civil Rights Act was a response to state-sanctioned racial injustice in the United States and that, at its best, the civil rights movement appealed to the ideals of the Declaration of Independence and the language of the Fourteenth Amendment. The libertarian proposal for abolishing the Civil Rights Act, like most libertarian proposals, is unfeasible. The white identity proposal, which I have previously criticized, is a recipe for permanent racial division, more akin to “prison gang politics” than republican virtue.
Happily, another avenue is open to us: reform.
The ideological capture of the Civil Rights Act is neither fixed nor inevitable. Rather than argue for its abolition, Americans concerned about the excesses of the DEI bureaucracy should appeal to higher principles and demand that our civil rights law conform to the standard of colorblind equality. The answer to left-wing racialism is not right-wing racialism—it is the equal treatment of individuals under law, according to their talents and virtues, rather than their ancestry and anatomy. This policy does not require radical innovations. Embracing the philosophy of the American Founding—with its emphasis on natural rights and liberties—will suffice.
What would this new civil rights agenda look like in practice?
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First, reformers should outlaw affirmative action and racial preferences of any kind. Both policies are euphemisms for racial discrimination. The next president should rescind Lyndon Johnson’s 1965 Executive Order 11246, which established “affirmative action” and marked the initial deviation from the standard of colorblind equality. Congress should strengthen this principle by amending the language of the Civil Rights Act to make indisputably clear that the law will not permit state-sanctioned discrimination toward any racial group, whether in the minority or the majority.
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Second, reformers must eliminate the “disparate impact” provisions in the Civil Rights Act of 1991 and overturn Griggs v. Duke Power Co., both of which have entrenched the doctrine that disparate group outcomes are de facto evidence of racial discrimination. This is a preposterous standard: a system of equal rights necessarily means unequal outcomes, as different groups have different preferences, talents, and capacities. Under a just system, the criterion for assessing biased treatment would not be disparate outcomes but specific, concrete discrimination, driven by animus. Much as libel law requires actual malice, anti-discrimination law should require proof that an individual or institution sought to discriminate. The change in standard would have an immediate effect, reducing the number of frivolous lawsuits and changing the incentives that have driven institutions toward racialist ideology as a defensive strategy.
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Third, legislators should abolish the DEI bureaucracies in all American institutions, which openly discriminate against disfavored racial groups, impose ideological orthodoxies on American citizens, and restrict freedoms of speech and association. In addition, federal legislators should radically reduce the size of the federal departments of civil rights enforcement. Bureaucracies are designed to discover—or, if the supply is low, fabricate—whatever transgression they are tasked with eliminating. While a large civil rights enforcement apparatus may have been necessary to enforce non-discrimination law in the past, it is no longer necessary. Americans are a tolerant, cooperative people; a “night watchman” civil rights state and a competent courts system would be sufficient to resolve disputes and ensure compliance with the law.
The goal of these reforms is finally to realize a regime of full colorblind equality. The principle, first promised by the Declaration and supported today by a large majority of Americans, would mean that the state would treat all Americans equally, regardless of ancestry, and leave as much discretion as possible to individuals to determine their own futures, without the government imposing or requiring racial favoritism of any kind. Rather than pit ourselves against one another, we should aspire to a higher standard that subordinates racial faction to a broader national identity.
Americans do not have to accept the bigotries of the past or the present. In a vast and diverse country, colorblind equality is the only way forward.
* * *
Christopher F. Rufo is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, a contributing editor of City Journal, and the author of America’s Cultural Revolution.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 21:40 -
- Florida On Alert For Falling Iguanas Ahead Of Weekend Polar Blast
Florida On Alert For Falling Iguanas Ahead Of Weekend Polar Blast
As Florida faces freezing temperatures this weekend, residents should be cautious for iguanas from trees falling from trees.
“*FALLING IGUANAS* possible this weekend in Southwest Florida as the coldest air of the season moves in Sunday morning,” WINKNews meteorologist Matt Devitt posted on social media platform X.
Devitt pointed out, “We have a pretty sizable iguana population from Sanibel to Cape Coral to Naples. Locally, lows will dip into the 40s, wind chills in the 30s by sunrise.”
*FALLING IGUANAS* possible this weekend in Southwest Florida as the coldest air of the season moves in Sunday morning. We have a pretty sizable iguana population from Sanibel to Cape Coral to Naples. Locally, lows will dip into the 40s, wind chills in the 30s by sunrise. 🥶🦎… pic.twitter.com/PSzk4JZuvN
— Matt Devitt (@MattDevittWX) January 18, 2024
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In the past, the National Weather Service has issued unofficial “falling iguana” advisories for Floridians.
“Iguanas are cold-blooded. They slow down or become immobile when temps drop into the 40s. They may fall from trees, but they are not dead,” the weather service said.The northern parts of Florida are under freeze-watches and warnings into Saturday.
Brr!
The good news: global warming returns next week.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 21:20 - Most Young Voters Want Abortion Limits, Say Legal Rights Begin In Womb: Poll
Most Young Voters Want Abortion Limits, Say Legal Rights Begin In Womb: Poll
Authored by Samantha Flom via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
A majority of Gen Z and millennial voters say legal rights should begin in the womb and that abortion should only be an option under certain circumstances, according to a new poll.
Pro-life leaders Kristan Hawkins (C) and Penny Nance (R) celebrate the overturning of Roe v. Wade in Washington on June 24, 2022. (Courtesy of Students for Life of America) The Students for Life Action/YouGov poll released on Jan. 16 found that 54 percent of voters ages 18 to 42 believe human rights should begin in the womb, compared with 32 percent who said they should begin after birth.
Additionally, 65 percent of voters said they supported at least some limits on abortion—the same percentage as last year. However, 75 percent supported restrictions at or before viability, up 10 percent from 2023.
By contrast, 25 percent of respondents expressed support for unlimited abortion through all nine months of pregnancy—including 9 percent who would allow the death of a baby born alive in a botched abortion.
“Changing hearts and minds on the human rights issue of abortion means being specific,” said Kristan Hawkins, president of Students for Life of America (SFLA) and the Demetree Institute for Pro-Life Advancement.
“In light of ballot initiatives, misinformation on protections in place for women’s lives, and radical abortion policies pushed by those who don’t care about what happens to mothers and their preborn children, we wanted to explore just what the Youth Vote—Gen Z and millennials—are thinking. Far from being lock-step for abortion, many are open to conversation and willing to consider pro-life policies.”
One key finding of the poll was that the vast majority of Gen Z and millennial voters want to see more legislative support for mothers, newborns, and families. Measures like paid family leave for new parents, child tax credits, childcare subsidies, support services and programs, and laws to keep the health care costs of pregnancy affordable all received overwhelming support, with just 5 percent of respondents rejecting all of the options presented.
“Reaching the key voting bloc that is the Youth Vote doesn’t mean running away from the issue of abortion. It means talking specifically about how to protect life in law and in service and about plans to help women survive their exposure to an abortion industry that profits from death,” Ms. Hawkins said.
“The Youth Vote, like most Americans, rejects the late-term abortion extremism seen in numerous state ballot initiatives, Biden administration regulation, and Pelosi-pushed policies.”
Abortion on the Ballot
With the 2024 election just months away, initiatives to legislate abortion at the ballot box have cropped up in states around the country.
In November, abortion proponents in several states will look to replicate the recent success of Ohio’s Issue 1, a citizen-led ballot initiative that cemented a right to abortion in the state’s constitution.
Pro-life advocates, however, have criticized such efforts as deceitful attempts to confuse voters. Measures like Issue 1, they say, are deliberately crafted with vague language to trick voters into allowing loopholes for late-term abortions.
With its latest survey, Students for Life sought to determine the impacts of abortion-related misinformation on young voters, finding that only 14 percent were aware that all 50 states currently allow abortion in circumstances where the mother’s life is at risk. One-third (35 percent) said they believed most states had such protections in place, and nearly half (49 percent) said they believed that was true of “only some or a few” states. Another 2 percent said they believed women’s lives were not legally protected at all.
Additionally, 64 percent of voters said they were more concerned than ever about women’s lives being at risk due to unplanned pregnancies, with 58 percent attributing their heightened concern to media reports.
Most voters (57 percent) also said they want required reporting of abortion data to track complications from abortion and other statistics. Currently, no such requirement exists at the national level.
Political Perspectives
Gen Z and Millennial voters are on track to make up a majority of the American electorate by 2028, according to the Brookings Institution. And the survey shows that most of them—55 percent—rank abortion among their top three political issues.
Moreover, 40 percent said they prefer candidates who support abortion limits, with 16 percent preferring those who fight “strongly in favor of abortion restriction.”
Yet in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v. Wade, the largely pro-life Republican Party has openly struggled to connect with voters on abortion, unable to articulate a stance that most party members can support.
Some candidates, fearing political suicide, have opted to avoid the issue completely. But Ms. Hawkins contended that the survey’s results show it would benefit the GOP to adopt a clear position.
“On the human rights issue of our day—abortion—the fine print matters,” she said. “Those urging GOP politicians to ignore this vital issue are making a mistake and should take a look at these findings to develop concrete plans and policies.
“The humanity of the preborn matters to many people, and support for the practical policies that help young families builds good will with young voters,” she added. “A swing in the pro-life/pro-family Youth Vote voter participation rate can become a game changer in this election.”
The Students for Life Action/YouGov survey was conducted in early January and has a margin of error of 3.52 percentage points.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 21:00 - Houthis Declare Safe Passage For All Russian, Chinese Ships In Red Sea
Houthis Declare Safe Passage For All Russian, Chinese Ships In Red Sea
In a remarkable development, and at a moment European retailers and factories are beginning to bear the brunt of the global shipping chaos and soaring Red Sea transit risk, the Houthis have declared safe passage for Russia and China.
A senior Houthi official, Mohammed al-Bukhaiti, mentioned these US rivals by name in an interview with the Russian outlet Izvestia on Friday. “As for all other countries, including Russia and China, their shipping in the region is not threatened,” he said, stipulating this will remain as long as they are not linked to Israel or its supporters.
Getty Images “Moreover, we are ready to ensure the safe passage of their ships in the Red Sea, because free navigation plays a significant role for our country,” he added, but then underscored that attacks on ships will continue if they are “in any way connected with Israel.”
The spokesman went on to blame the Red Sea crisis on Israel’s (and its backers) refusal to reverse course in Gaza, given its aerial and ground campaign as continued. “Ansar Allah [the group’s formal name] does not pursue the goal of capturing or sinking this or that sea vessel,” he claimed. “Our goal is to raise the economic costs for [Israel] in order to stop the carnage in Gaza.”
Some of the vessels which have come under attack thus far actually have connection to dozens of countries, but ships with Russian or Chinese ownership, or deep ties, have yet to be attacked.
Another Houthi official told Reuters separately that the group doesn’t seek to expand its campaign, after a fragile peace took effect with Saudi Arabia and the EUA concerning the Yemeni civil war:
Yemen’s Houthis have said they do not intend to expand their attacks on shipping in and around the Red Sea, beyond their stated aims of blockading Israel and retaliating against the US and Britain for airstrikes.
In an interview with Reuters, spokesperson Mohammed Abdulsalam, who is also the chief Houthi negotiator in peace talks over Yemen’s decade-old civil war, said the group had no plans to target its longstanding foes Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
“We do not want the escalation to expand. This is not our demand. We imposed rules of engagement in which not a single drop of blood was shed or major material losses,” said Abdulsalam. “It represented pressure on Israel only, it did not represent pressure on any country in the world.”
The US-UK coalition patrolling the Red Sea has at this point launched four rounds of airstrikes against Houthi positions, but this appears to have only deepened Houthi resolve.
As for Russia and China, they’ve been foremost among Washington’s powerful rivals to criticize Israel’s mass bombing of the Gaza Strip. They both have close ties with Iran, as well as with Assad’s Syria, and China is busy inking multi-billion dollar infrastructure and energy deals with Iraq. Of course, these ‘defiant’ countries are under US sanctions as well.
Meanwhile, cue “Putin is behind Red Sea attacks” narrative…
‘No one is immune’
‘Many geo-political experts are saying that Putin is behind all of this, with China and Iran’
Dr Roger Gewolb says that all countries would be affected by Houthi attacks in the Red Sea, and that Russia could be responsible for starting the attacks. pic.twitter.com/F8XGxrCW68
— GB News (@GBNEWS) January 13, 2024
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
In December, Russian President Vladimir Putin assured to the Palestinian Authority’s Mahmoud Abbas that “Russia will continue to supply the Gaza Strip with essential goods, including medicines and medical equipment.” But overall, Moscow has been relatively quiet when it comes to the Red Sea crisis, but has condemned the ‘escalation’ of US coalition ships launching missiles on Yemen. Moscow and Beijing remain fiercely critical of the soaring Palestinian civilian death toll, and tensions with Israel’s government have persisted.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 20:40 - DEI Destroys Excellence, Military Cohesion At Service Academies
DEI Destroys Excellence, Military Cohesion At Service Academies
Authored by Bruce Fleming via RealClear Wire,
Applicants who self-identified as a member of a race the Academy wished to privilege—at the time I was on the Admissions Board it was African American, Hispanic, and Native American—were briefed separately to the committee not by a white member but by a minority Navy lieutenant. Briefings (a minute and forty seconds per applicant, no more) ran through a number of factors quite quickly and offered a recommendation that we had been told was appropriate: “qualified” for USNA if grades A/B for white applicants (but not minorities, who needed only C grades), 600 score in each part of the SAT for white applicants (but about 550 for minorities who come to USNA without remediation), and Whole Person Multiple (points given for grades/tests, school leadership positions, and sports) of at least 55,000 for whites, no bottom for minorities.
This is aside from the fact that 20 percent of the class could be sent to the remedial, taxpayer-supported prep school for a year, also with no minimum for scores. Other possible recommendations included a year at a civilian prep school that the Naval Academy Foundation pays for, where they also do a thirteenth year (the profile for this was white lacrosse players, not black football players), and USNA “pool,” a sort of wait list for nonrecruited whites, who typically weren’t tracked to NAPS or Foundation schools. The athletic department offered its list of recruits that were invariably deemed “qualified” no matter how low in scores, because many if not most to go to NAPS and only a few to USNA directly.
Race in America is a complex question that we have no silver bullet for. We’d like to see everybody playing happily in the academic sandbox together, as well as elsewhere in society at large. However, in academic institutions with limited places, we have a problem—especially at an institution touted for academic rigor and that taxpayers fund for one specific job. Blacks, on average, consistently score lower than whites (who score lower than Asians) on standardized tests. The choices are simple. If you want students who look a certain way but tend to score lower than others, you accept the lower scores and stop talking about your standards. Or you go with the class that can meet these standards and stop talking about the way they look. The Naval Academy tries to square the circle by both bragging about its standards and letting in half the class to lower standards. No wonder they were furious that I pointed this out. All educational institutions have this problem to some degree; the academies are just worse than others. And in 2023, the Supreme Court said we’re legal in doing so, whereas all others are not.
I’ve had some brilliant black students over three decades, and quite a few really nice ones. I’ve taught classes at both ends of our ability spectrum—our honors classes and our remedial precollege English classes, which are almost all filled with black and Hispanic students, most of whom have just come from the remedial, taxpayer-funded thirteenth grade at the prep school. I usually love them as people, and the warmth I show them usually melts the ice when they heard they got Professor Fleming, the one who “hates the football team.” I don’t hate the football team. I just don’t think we should be recruiting them to play Division I, which takes up slots better all-around qualified candidates (like your kids?) could have filled. But they got the offer, and here they are, so I’m going to give it my all, and hope to inspire them to do the same.
Some of the African American kids are the most disappointed of all. One brilliant young woman from New York City announced in my office some years ago, “I should have gone to Howard.”
“Why?” I said.
“Because I am so tired of being stereotyped as black,” she said. “In New York nobody is anything. But here they want me to join the gospel choir. I can’t sing. And I hate this channeling of the black kids so the administration looks good.”
“Yeah,” I said. “It’s a problem. But don’t give up. Just be you.”
“Hmmm,” she said. “Hard at this place.”
“Tell me about it,” I said.
In 2021, the Academy issued a Diversity and Inclusion Strategic Plan whose lead picture has a black male midshipman standing as Brigade Commander in front of a phalanx of white males. A former military instructor in the History Department and USNA graduate J.A. Cauthen, in an article entitled “The US Naval Academy is Adrift” objects—and it’s hard to disagree with him that this plan “will erode the competency of future officers and imperil our national security.”
He quotes the plan as saying that the Naval Academy “will develop a diversity and inclusion checklist and schedule to inventory and assess all academic classes and training events,” something I saw beginning as I was being forced out of the classroom. It will “partner with Academic Departments in conducting comprehensive curriculum review prioritizing the inclusion of marginalized scholarship and hidden histories within midshipmen education.” And he asks a question relevant to my situation: “What will be the fate of those who will not comply, given their belief in, and right to, academic freedom?”
I can answer that question already. Academic freedom doesn’t exist at Annapolis. And those who do not repeat the party line unquestioningly, such as (um, yes) your humble correspondent, will be relentlessly pursued and fired. Cauthen goes on with his quote: The Naval Academy “will develop a confidential process for reporting bias incidents”—for what it calls “nonpunitive informational purposes” to “identify areas for potential additional training.” My experience suggests that “nonpunitive” is bunkum. Indeed, Cauthen points out that all of this comes with the whip hand of the UCMJ and quotes Article 917 as saying that
“Any person subject to this chapter who uses provoking or reproachful words or gestures toward any others person subject to this chapter shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.”
All this comes with something called the DPE Program, Diversity Peer Educator Program, including a confidential system to report “bias incidents.” I’ve seen it all before with sexual assault training. And he asks: “will a DEI agenda propagating woke ideology prepare future leaders to wage and win wars against our enemies? Those who believe so are either blind or worse.” But of course, the service academies have long since moved on from preparing leaders to wage and win wars. Now they’re about enforcing by military rather than constitutionally permitted means (even against civilians) the obsessions of a certain sector of society.
Over the course of my decades teaching literature, I’ve had to answer these questions:
What’s the point of reading (say) Shakespeare? Or Toni Morrison? Is the point different for future officers than for anybody else? If so, how? I don’t think the point is to check the box through reading works by someone of a certain skin color or sexual orientation. There has to be a higher purpose. But teaching everything according to categories of race, gender, and sexual orientation is what has supplanted sexual assault training as topic A at Annapolis: hiring and teaching courses in gay, Latino/a, and African American literature focused on the experiences of recent immigrants to the exclusion of almost everything else, usually to emphasize how tough they had it. For example, two out of three upper-level senior seminars English majors could choose from in Spring 2023 were “The Queering of the Renaissance” and “Queer Communities in Film and Literature.” We have courses in post-colonial studies, African American studies, and Native American Studies, and a “diversity” requirement. I guess we’re really with the Zeitgeist!
Recent hiring emphasizes minority racial and sexual-orientation groups. And now the faculty get relentless “training” in DEI with newly hired administrators to enforce the rules—Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. In our English Department, there is now a faculty committee to vet faculty syllabi to ensure that an acceptable number of works about and by nonwhite authors are taught. It’s all intensely political, and usually with an edge of resentment: our kind didn’t get or don’t have as much as your kind! In fact, these kinds of resentment studies have nothing to do with being a good officer. Having a sense of what separates people, sure. How about what unites them? And if you as an officer see yourself as radically different from people with a different skin color––and groups of your subordinates with different skin colors as lacking a common goal––military cohesion is torn asunder. This is military suicide, shooting ourselves not merely in the foot but in the head. How about we emphasize commonality and deal with difference as it comes up rather than assuming it? It’s insulting to say “I see that you have a different skin color, so I can tell you we have little in common”—aside from destructive of military cohesion.
Bruce Fleming has taught at the U.S. Naval Academy since 1987.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 20:20 - Obama DOJ Wants To Jail Peter Navarro For 6 Months For Same Thing Eric Holder Got Away With
Obama DOJ Wants To Jail Peter Navarro For 6 Months For Same Thing Eric Holder Got Away With
Former Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro – the only guy who openly stood up to Anthony Fauci’s authoritarian lockdown ‘science’ – is facing six months in jail and a $200,000 fine if the Biden DOJ gets its way, after Navarro defied a subpoena from the House Jan. 6 select committee.
Navarro was arrested at a DC airport in June of 2022 on two misdemeanor contempt of Congress charges for doing exactly what Obama AG Eric Holder did (with zero consequences), and more recently, Hunter Biden – ignore a Congressional subpoena when he told the Jan. 6 committee to pound sand.
“The Defendant chose allegiance to former President Donald Trump over the rule of law,” said Assistant U.S. Attorney Elizabeth Aloi in a 20-page sentencing memo submitted Thursday night, Politico reports.
He will be sentenced by a federal judge next week after being convicted in September of said charges, after Aloi said that he “thumbed his nose at Congressional authority” and would likely do so again if it meant serving the “political interests of his allies and patrons.”
The prosecutor said Navarro summarily refused to aid the Jan. 6 committee’s investigation into the causes of the violent assault at the Capitol — including efforts by Trump to subvert the 2020 election and derail the transfer of power. Navarro worked with allies in Congress on a strategy to help slow Congress’ counting of electoral votes via a strategy that he and fellow Trump ally Steve Bannon dubbed “The Green Bay Sweep.”
The Jan. 6 committee subpoenaed Navarro to discuss those efforts, but he quickly told them that his testimony was barred by executive privilege, and he declined to participate in their probe. -Politico
Navarro was held in contempt in April 2022, after which the DOJ obtained a grand jury indictment for refusing to provide documents and testimony. According to prosecutors, Navarro knew that Trump had never actually asserted executive privilege to bar him from testifying, and that such an assertion would not preclude him from testifying about at least some of the subjects demanded by the committee.
“At no time did the Defendant provide the Committee with any evidence supporting his assertion that the former President had invoked executive privilege over the information the Committee’s subpoena sought from the Defendant, or otherwise challenge the Committee’s authority or composition,” wrote Aloi. “The Court was left with only the Defendant’s fan fiction version of what the Defendant wished or hoped the former President might have wanted but left unsaid.“
Eric Who?
Obama Attorney General Eric Holder famously also defied a congressional subpoena, and was held in contempt for concealing documents related to the “fast & furious” scandal, which was tied to the death of an estimated 150 Mexican civilians – while Navarro is refusing to answer House Democrats’ questions surrounding the 2020 election and the January 6th riot.
Where’s the ‘equity’ in that?
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 20:00 - Economic Results Of California Banning Gas Vehicles
Economic Results Of California Banning Gas Vehicles
Authored by Anne Johnson via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
As a result of California Governor Gavin Newsom’s executive order, gas-powered vehicles will be banned by 2035. This refers to new vehicles and existing gas-powered cars and trucks that will be allowed on California roads for the moment.
Other states are following California. But with electric vehicles (EVs) comes an investment. What are the economic ramifications of banning gas-powered vehicles? Can California afford it? Can America afford it?
(Shutterstock) California Banns New Gas-Powered Vehicles 2035
Gov. Newsom’s executive order was announced in 2020 and was followed by the California Air Resources Board’s approval in August 2022. Automakers and car dealers will be restricted to selling only cars, SUVs, and pickup trucks that generate zero tailpipe emissions by 2035.
To prepare for this, California’s Advanced Clean Cars II rule requires 35 percent of new cars and light trucks to have zero emissions by 2026. Sixty-eight percent must reach that goal by 2030.
Power Grids and Demand
There are ramifications to the gas-powered ban. One of these is the need to upgrade the power grid.
In the past, California residents have been plagued with planned rolling blackouts. Some of these were designed to cut the risk of wildfires. In high-risk areas, electric utilities are often preemptively shut off during windstorms, but many blackouts resulted from the strain on the power grid. Residents were asked to conserve energy.
California has experienced more outages in the last five years than any other state except Texas. On average, a California blackout lasted roughly 10 hours, with the longest lasting two and a half days.
Electric vehicles are dependent on the grid. If the power goes out, so does the car.
Cost of Upgrading California Power Grid
Preventative fire measures aside, California’s power grid will need to be upgraded to handle the increase in EV usage.
In 2021, analytics firm Kevala conducted a study for the California Public Advocates Office. Kevala found that without load management of other mitigation measures, system-level peak load would increase as much as 56 percent between 2025 and 2035.
This increase would mainly be due to EVs. Kevala estimated that upgrading the grid would cost $50 billion.
However, the California Public Advocates Office created a different number using a different model. They estimated the usage based on the addresses of all vehicles in California to predict where EV increased usage would likely occur. They then modeled the expected charging load.
The Public Advocates Office estimated the figure was $15–20 billion. But as a caveat, they said, “No single study or pair of studies, particularly this early in the electrification process, can definitively answer such a complex question as what the costs of distribution grid upgrades will be.”
The bottom line is that billions of dollars will need to be invested to upgrade the power grid to handle the additional strain of EVs.
Lack of Charging Stations
In 2022, at 14.3 million, California had more registered automobiles than any state nationwide. The overall number of registered motor vehicles was nearly 31.4 million. California also has the most new car sales. In 2022, new car sales amounted to $1,667,831 worth of vehicles.
With those million-plus potential EV sales, the need for charging stations will soar. Currently, there are approximately 51,000 public charging stations across the nation. As of March 2023, California has the most, with 14,040.
A report by the California Energy Commission shows that California needs 1.2 million electric vehicle chargers by 2030. This doesn’t take into the account the additional 157,000 chargers needed by 2030 for medium, heavy-duty and electric buses.
There are three types of chargers, and their cost ranges from $1,500 to $20,000. But that’s just for the equipment. There’s also the installation cost.
Regardless of which type of equipment is chosen, the installation can cost $100,000 to $200,000. These high-voltage items must have specialized electricians and laborers to install them.
Splitting the difference with $150,000 per charger, it would take roughly $180 billion to build the 1.2 million chargers needed to accommodate the 2035 mandate.
Banning Gas-Powered Vehicles Tax Revenue
With electric vehicles comes a decrease in gas consumption. Fuel taxes are a significant contributor to state transportation funds. It contributes 40 percent of funding. The majority of funding could disappear in the coming decades.
To replace lost revenue, many states have added fees to EV owners. California charges $100 annually for a zero-emissions vehicle. As of January 2021, this fee was indexed to the Consumer Price Index.
Economic Hardship on Middle and Lower Classes
The average EV costs $66,000. The Inflation Reduction Act EV tax credit of $7,500 can be written off when filing income taxes, but the consumer must still make the initial downpayment and finance. This could give them a hefty car payment, which not many may be able to afford.
In California, low-income individuals could be eligible for $9,500 in grants or rebates. If you take both discounts, it comes to a $49,000 vehicle. That’s still a big-ticket item for most middle to low-income Californians.
The high cost is because batteries are more expensive than internal combustion engines—a lithium battery for an EV costs between $5,000 and $20,000. And batteries are easy to damage and difficult to repair.
States Banning Gas Vehicles
But California isn’t the only state with this on its agenda. Nine states have also announced a restriction on new gas-powered vehicle sales. These states are:
- Connecticut
- Massachusetts
- Maryland
- New Jersey
- New York
- Oregon
- Rhode Island
- Washington
These states eight states are following the Advance Clean Cars II.
In 2022, the ninth state, Vermont, lawmakers required zero-emissions by 2030.
California and EV Economics
California is currently facing a $68 billion dollar deficit. Its debt for 2022 was $145.03 billion. That compares to the 2000 debt of $57.17.
Chris Hoene, head of the California Budget and Policy Center, blamed climate change for the state’s shortfall. This was because the state’s fires interfered with cash.
The goal with California is to reduce emissions to help prevent these climate issues.
However, the cost of converting the most populated state to EVs may not be feasible. Billions of dollars must be invested to upgrade the power grid and build chargers.
Manufacturers will need to drastically reduce prices to make it possible for middle America to afford EVs.
The Epoch Times copyright © 2024. The views and opinions expressed are those of the authors. They are meant for general informational purposes only and should not be construed or interpreted as a recommendation or solicitation. The Epoch Times does not provide investment, tax, legal, financial planning, estate planning, or any other personal finance advice. The Epoch Times holds no liability for the accuracy or timeliness of the information provided.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 19:40 - New DNC Pipe-Bomb Video Can "Utterly Demolish The Jan6 Narrative": Darren Beattie
New DNC Pipe-Bomb Video Can “Utterly Demolish The Jan6 Narrative”: Darren Beattie
“If the Republicans step up, if the speaker steps up, if the relevant congressional figures step up, this is the chance to utterly demolish the January 6th narrative that the regime is using to weaponize the national security state against the American people, and to take Trump off the ballot.”
Having acquitted himself extremely well (and calmly) during the ZeroHedge Debate on January 6th, Darren Beattie brandished his considerable tome of facts to discuss with Tucker Carlson the impact of newly-released footage surrounding the pipe-bomb incidents of January 6th (well 5th).
Carlson begins by quite appropriately pointing out the fact that the FBI’s ongoing efforts to apprehend those involved (or not) in the Capitol riot contrasts greatly with their apparent inability to identify the person responsible for the pipe bombs:
“The FBI wants you to know that if you were there, you can’t hide,” highlighting the extensive use of surveillance technology in these efforts.
Except if you hide in plain sight…
Beattie’s analysis of the discovery of the DNC pipe bomb, published on Jan. 18 by Revolver.news raises questions about the authorities’ response to the bomb at the DNC.
The video shows a man (circled in red in the photo below) – now identified by congressional investigators as an undercover US Capitol Police officer – approached an SUV owned by the Metropolitan Police Department just after 1:05 p.m. on Jan. 6.
Then he walked to an adjacent dark SUV belonging to the Secret Service and spoke to someone in the driver’s seat, Revolver reported.
The vehicle was parked in a driveway of the DNC building at the intersection of Canal Street Southeast and South Capitol Street Southeast in Washington D.C.
But, as Beattie points out, their response is described as “utterly unconcerned.”
“What the individual in the backpack is doing is alerting the Metro PD and the Secret Service of the fact that there is a pipe bomb just feet away,” underlining the lack of urgency in their actions.
As Joseph Hanneman details, the undercover officer walked off camera back toward the park bench and the bomb at 1:06:34 p.m., the video shows.
Two occupants of the MPD vehicle exited the SUV at 1:07:25, and a third emerged 35 seconds later.
The driver went back into the vehicle to retrieve a COVID mask.
The first indication on Capitol Police radio dispatch that the DNC bomb had been discovered came at 1:07 p.m., according to audio files obtained by The Epoch Times.
“987-Adam, I’m going to declare a 10-100 at the DNC as well,” an officer broadcast on the OPS2 radio channel. “Similar device as was found at the RNC as well. Advising the units on scene what’s going on.”
At 1:09 p.m., the security camera pivoted and zoomed in on the bench, indicating that the U.S. Capitol Police Command Center was aware of the bomb.
In fact, it took more than two minutes for the Secret Service detail protecting Vice President-elect Kamala Harris to visibly react to the presence of the bomb.
Ms. Harris was inside the DNC building at the time the bomb was discovered.
A group of children were allowed to walk near the bench where the bomb sat after the undercover officer discovered the device, Revolver reported.
Children walk past the Democratic National Committee and a pipe bomb (location marked with a circle) found minutes earlier by a Capitol Police undercover officer. (U.S. Capitol Police/Graphic by The Epoch Times)
In the nearly seven minutes after the undercover officer approached the Secret Service detail, the streets were not closed, the sidewalks were not cordoned off, and pedestrians were allowed to walk right past the bomb location, security video shows.
Agents walked back and forth on the driveway and sidewalk near the bomb, and one officer walked close enough to snap a photo of the device before waving at the other officers.
The FBI later determined the bomb was planted the night of Jan. 5, along with a similar device left in an alley near the Republican National Committee, which is where the conversation between Carlson and Beattie goes next.
Beattie mentions that the bomb was found by a pedestrian, Karlyn Younger, in a back alley with a timer set to go off at 1 p.m., coinciding with the certification of the electoral vote, raising questions about the intent and timing of the bomb placements:
“We’re told that the RNC bomb was sitting behind a trash can in a back alley, undiscovered for over 16 hours, and yet was randomly stumbled on.”
Beattie then discusses the characteristics of the bombs, noting that they were not designed for remote detonation, suggesting they were not intended to explode but rather serve as a diversion.
He also questions how the discoverers of the bombs could be so accurately timed, noting:
“The person who planted the bombs presumably would have had to count or just simply be the luckiest person alive.”
In conclusion, Beattie and Carlson discuss the political implications of the January 6th narrative and the lack of thorough investigation into the pipe bombs.
As we started with at the top of this note, Beattie emphasizes the importance of challenging the official narrative, particularly in the context of the upcoming 2024 election.
Watch the abridged discussion below:
It seems likely that government officials were involved in planting pipe bombs in Washington, DC three years ago, as part of an effort to keep Donald Trump from running for president again. Darren Beattie has details. pic.twitter.com/jsM5jCDeBd
— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) January 18, 2024
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Watch the full interview here at TCN…
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 19:20 - Biden Won’t Be Removed For Corruption In Ukraine But New Allegations Can Still Have An Impact
Biden Won’t Be Removed For Corruption In Ukraine But New Allegations Can Still Have An Impact
The Republicans could make support for more Ukrainian aid conditional on a joint investigation into these claims and thus doom any deal and/or the Biden Administration or the Zelensky regime could leak evidence if the other doesn’t do their bidding given their blackmail of one another due to these joint crimes.
Former Ukrainian MP Andrey Derkach dropped a bunch of bombshells about Biden’s corrupt dealings in Ukraine in a recent interview with Italian-American journalist Simona Mangiante. The takeaways can be read here, but they basically boil down to bribes and money laundering, among other crimes. While they might boost the Republicans’ impeachment efforts in the House where the opposition has a slim majority, their lack of a two-thirds majority in the Senate means that he won’t be removed from office.
Even so, these new allegations can still have an important impact on events, one that might be much more significant than his superficial impeachment by the House. Proceedings at that level have become politicized as proven by the Democrats’ witch hunt against Trump, which isn’t to say that the Republicans are carrying out their own against Biden, but just to emphasize that impeachment by the House has no tangible significance. At most, it’ll strengthen both parties’ efforts to get out the vote in November.
Where the actual importance of these latest allegations lies is in the larger context of the Ukrainian Conflict, which began to wind down late last year following the failure of Kiev’s counteroffensive and the consequent dwindling of Western aid. The Republicans already made their agreement on any more such deals contingent on robust border security reforms, but they might now also include the additional condition of a comprehensive joint investigation with Ukraine into Derkach’s bombshells about Biden.
If the opposition makes such a proposal, then there’s no way that the Democrats would agree, thus capsizing the possibility of any compromise on this issue until next year after November’s elections, which could shake up the congressional dynamics and potentially lead to Biden’s ouster as well. Furthermore, Zelensky’s regime can’t be counted on to assist any theoretical joint investigation in good faith since leading figures are also implicated in this corruption per Derkach’s revelations.
That particular point adds a curious twist to this scandal since it suggests that they might also be able to blackmail the Biden Administration, which provides a new layer of understanding to why the incumbent and his team have been so gung-ho about perpetuating NATO’s proxy war on Russia through Ukraine. Zelensky knows that any outcome short of the maximalist victory that he fantasizes about would kill his political career so he has self-interested reasons in wanting to turn this into a so-called “forever war”.
The US’ objective national interests aren’t served by depleting even more of its stockpiles and therefore reducing its ability to flexibly respond to foreign crises as they arise, or rather might even be provoked by America or its partners, hence why it’s become popular to talk about freezing the conflict. Former NATO Supreme Commander Admiral James Stavridis’ Korean-like “land-for-peace” armistice proposal last year could be a starting point but only if the West agrees to Russia’s security guarantee requests in Ukraine.
They’ve been reluctant to do so, however, hence why no progress has been made on this. One reason behind the US’ recalcitrance might not just be that it’s concerned about “losing face” upon reaching a pragmatic series of mutual compromises with Russia, but that Zelensky is blackmailing the Biden Administration that he’ll spill the beans if they dare to pursue this policy. Given his prior “godlike” status in the Western media, any corroboration of Derkach’s claims might be widely believed by Westerners.
They know that Zelensky isn’t a so-called “Russian agent” and have convinced themselves that he’s a “democratic freedom fighter” so it would be very damning to the incumbent Democrats’ reputation if he engaged in a “limited hangout” by sharing some relevant information. He of course wouldn’t implicate himself or his most loyal allies, but he could take down a couple less politically reliable officials in that event (perhaps as part of a purge) while possibly dooming Biden’s re-election and flipping the Senate.
Republican control of the White House and Congress coupled with what many regard as the right-leaning Supreme Court could lead to the Democrats’ worst nightmare of their opponents reversing most of Biden’s policies. Meanwhile, Zelensky’s worst nightmare is that Biden bows to the popular sentiment among Americans to scale back their country’s participation in this proxy war and coerce him to resume peace talks with Russia, so each can therefore keep the other in check through this mutual blackmail.
The legitimacy of both the Biden Administration and Zelensky’s regime is therefore dependent on each of them staying silent about their corruption scheme, but one or the other could at least in theory reveal some details about this if they begin to distrust the other or want to get rid of them. For instance, the Biden Administration could leak some information about Zelensky’s corruption to pro-Democrat media to pressure him into resuming peace talks or to pave the way for a “government of national unity”.
That proposal was pushed by a member of the influential Atlantic Council think tank last month in an article for Politico and could credibly be interpreted as a signal that the Biden Administration is beginning to get fed up with Zelensky. As for the Ukrainian leader, it was already explained that he might be the first to leak certain details about this scheme if he feels that the Democrats’ support for this proxy war is faltering, which could be one of his “nuclear options” in that case alongside a major false flag.
Circling back to Derkach’s latest corruption allegations, their impact in terms of the Ukrainian Conflict is much more important than the possibility of them aiding the Republicans’ efforts to impeach Biden in the House since they can’t remove him due to a dearth of support in the Senate. The Republicans could make support for more Ukrainian aid conditional on a joint investigation into these claims and/or the Biden Administration or the Zelensky regime could leak evidence if the other doesn’t do their bidding.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 19:00 - National Self-Reliance Is On The Rise: China & The US
National Self-Reliance Is On The Rise: China & The US
Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,
Balancing globalized trade and capital flows with domestic self-reliance and control of credit and capital is a positive development for everyone.
This week’s focus is on self-reliance, a topic of increasing relevance than is more complex that it may seem.
The flip side of the decline of hyper-globalization is the rise of national self-reliance. We can see this dynamic expanding in real time across the globe, particularly in China and the U.S.: though still bound by trillions of dollars / RMB in investment and trade, the two nations are seeking to balance their dependency on the other by increasing their self-reliance with their own resources and technologies.
This reduction of a potent source of instability (dependency) in favor of national self-reliance is a positive development. Just as household self-reliance doesn’t mean self-sufficiency (something I explain in Self-Reliance in the 21st Century), national self-reliance doesn’t mean self-sufficiency: trade and diplomatic ties with other nations are beneficial, but it doesn’t serve anyone’s interests to be so beholden to other nations that blackmail become a temptation.
But withdrawing from the world has risks, too. The ideal is a dynamic balance between national interests and global ties that benefit everyone, that is, ties that nurture cooperation and global stability.
In other words, national self-reliance is not a substitute for global engagement and cooperation, it is a stabilizing force that enables beneficial global ties. Dependencies are sources of instability and risk, as each side is under pressure to preserve whatever is viewed as essential, and this tends to increase the risk of rash decisions and actions.
The ideal global arrangement is a transparent flow of ideas and information that enables every participant to adapt to changing conditions. From this perspective, the risk isn’t that China seeks to become less dependent on Western technology, i.e. becoming more self-reliant; the risk is China blocking the flow of ideas from outside sources with the Great Firewall. (My sources report no U.S. news sites are available in China except a handful of anti-establishment sites.)
In the long sweep of its history, China has opened to the world and prospered, and then closed itself off and stagnated. A century after the glories of Admiral Zheng He’s massive fleet reaching the shores of Africa in the early 1400s, China banned all oceangoing vessels and suppressed maritime trade sought by other nations.
That outside ideas are viewed as potential threats to the domestic status quo is a common feature of history. Many national elites have tried to block ideas and information while seeking to attract technologies and capital, as these benefit not just the domestic economy but the elites’ personal wealth and their power base.
Capital and technology are tricky, however. Capital flowing into a developing nation can be beneficial, but it can also overwhelm and exploit the domestic economy, leading to the neo-colonialization of the nation’s productive assets. Capital flowing out of a nation with excess savings can be a positive source of investment opportunities, but this draining of capital can also hollow out the economy, especially if it is accompanied by a parallel loss of human capital leaving for better opportunities elsewhere.
Cheap credit looks attractive to credit-starved nations, but it comes with a terrible cost as the debt levels quickly rise to unsustainable levels and both borrowers and lenders are forced to absorb losses and retrench. China is receiving a 21st century education in these dynamics via the Belt and Road Initiative, which has been dialed back as loans sour and asset transfers ignite fears of neo-colonialism from the East.
Technology that’s borrowed ends up stagnating unless the entire system that enabled the development of that technology is also imported. The key feature of that technology-engine isn’t money, though that is one ingredient; the most important feature is the free flow of ideas and information, unencumbered by elite / political interference.
Balancing domestic self-reliance and global trade and capital / information flows is not easy. Closing the door to outside ideas, capital and information tends to lead to stagnation, while opening the floodgates with no constraints tends to lead to destabilizing dependencies, credit bubbles, exploitation and neo-colonialism.
National self-reliance has spawned an entire vocabulary. In China, President Xi Jinping has called for a “whole-nation approach” to increase domestic production of technology. In the U.S. the vocabulary includes reshoring, onshoring, friend-shoring and strategic alliances.
Hyper-globalization wreaked havoc on many levels in many places. Balancing globalized trade and capital flows with domestic self-reliance and control of credit and capital is a positive development for everyone. A more balanced global economy offers the potential for continued global cooperation and engagement and domestic development for every nation that pursues the dynamic stability of both self-reliance and global engagement.
Gordon Long and I discuss trade and supply chains in depth in our podcast on Self Reliance (45 min).
* * *
I began my study of China over 50 years ago when I earned a degree in Philosophy at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, where I was a student of two widely admired professors of Chinese philosophy, Chang Chung-yuan and Cheng Chung-Ying. It seems to me that Chinese philosophy–Confucianism, neo-Confucianism, Legalism (Mencius et al), Chan Buddhism, Taoism and in the 20th century, China’s version of Marxism–remain foundations beneath the great flux of China’s often tumultuous history. In this sense, Chinese philosophy is perhaps the ideal path to understanding the history and culture of China.
I haven’t maintained a list of the many books I’ve read on China; I’ve listed a few below that I recall. Please note that I am not an expert or a scholar, I am merely an informed observer.
1587, A Year of No Significance: The Ming Dynasty in Decline
Creativity and Taoism: A Study of Chinese Philosophy, Art and Poetry
The Long March: The True History of Communist China’s Founding Myth
The Man Who Loved China (Joseph Needham)
Daily Life in China on the Eve of the Mongol Invasion, 1250-1276 (Southern Song Dynasty)
Red Roulette: An Insider’s Story of Wealth, Power, Corruption, and Vengeance in Today’s China
The Golden Peaches of Samarkand: A Study of Tang Exotics
Foreign Devils on the Silk Road
The Great Wall and the Empty Fortress: China’s Search for Security (Andrew J. Nathan)
The Good Women of China: Hidden Voices (Xinren Xue)
Here are a few books which illuminate the complexities of the flow of trade, ideas and capital from the Bronze Age to the present:
Global Crisis: War, Climate Change and Catastrophe in the Seventeenth Century
The Great Wave: Price Revolutions and the Rhythm of History
The Loss of El Dorado: A Colonial History
The Great Transformation: The Political and Economic Origins of Our Time
Civilization and Capitalism, 15th-18th Century, Vol. 1: The Structure of Everyday Life (Fernand Braudel)
Civilization and Capitalism, 15th-18th Century, Vol. 2: The Wheels of Commerce
Civilization and Capitalism, 15th-18th Century, Vol. 3: The Perspective of the World
* * *
My new book is now available at a 10% discount ($8.95 ebook, $18 print): Self-Reliance in the 21st Century. Read the first chapter for free (PDF)
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 18:20 - Majority Of Biden's $136 Billion Student Loan Forgiveness Scheme Going To "Public Servants"
Majority Of Biden’s $136 Billion Student Loan Forgiveness Scheme Going To “Public Servants”
President Joe Biden is heaping another $5 billion onto a $136 billion pile of taxpayer-funded student loan debt forgiveness, as one of his signature 2024 (vote buying) schemes heading into the 2024 election.
Not only has moral hazard been reduced to an academic concept, shouldn’t taxpayer funds be used to bail out poverty-stricken Americans before people with college degrees who signed their names to a contract for non-dischargeable debt? We digress.
Around 74,000 student loan borrowers will now see debt canceled as a result of administrative changes enacted by the US Department of Education in the latest round of relief – including borrowers enrolled in the government’s income-driven repayment and public service loan forgiveness programs, Bloomberg reports.
Each program requires at least a decade of payment or service to be eligible for relief. Mismanaged federal student-loan plans have left some borrowers without promised relief after making payments for as long as 25 years. -Bloomberg
“My administration is able to deliver relief to these borrowers – and millions more – because of fixes we made to broken student loan programs that were preventing borrowers from getting relief they were entitled to under the law,” Biden said in a Friday statement written by other people.
Of those receiving taxpayer-funded assistance, roughly 60% are taxpayer-funded “public servants” – so the snake continues to eat its tail. So, buying votes with voters’ money.
The article states that 43,900 of those getting debt relief are “public servants.” That means (I presume) government workers. So nearly 60% of the 74,000 people whose loans will now be paid off via deficit financing work for government, not private sector. https://t.co/wuNgAU0lyl
— Judy Shelton (@judyshel) January 19, 2024
Biden’s bailout comes as civil rights groups, labor unions, and borrowers’ advocates have pressured his administration to expand the scope of his earlier $400 billion initiative that was struck down by the Supreme Court.
The second bite at the apple is much narrower than the original plan which would have forgiven up to $20,000 in student loans for around 40 million Americans.
Nearly 70 groups, including the AFL-CIO and NAACP, asked Education Secretary Miguel Cardona in a letter Thursday to hold another session in the rulemaking process and to include targeted relief for borrowers who have experienced hardship.
The goal is to allow more young people, people of color and low-income borrowers to be eligible for relief. -Bloomberg
According to the report, Biden’s support has weakened among black, hispanic, and young voters – demographics which have been historically critical for Democrats.
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Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 18:00 - FBI, CISA Warn Of Risks Posed By Chinese-Made Drones
FBI, CISA Warn Of Risks Posed By Chinese-Made Drones
Authored by Frank Fang via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
A new DJI Mavic Zoom drone flies during a product launch event at the Brooklyn Navy Yard in New York City on Aug. 23, 2018. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images) The FBI and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) issued a new memo and report on Wednesday, warning U.S. owners and operators of critical infrastructures not to use Chinese-manufactured unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) due to security risks.
“Our nation’s critical infrastructure sectors, such as energy, chemical and communications, are increasingly relying on UAS for various missions that ultimately reduce operating costs and improve staff safety,” said David Mussington, executive assistant director for CISA’s Infrastructure Security, in a memo that accompanied the report, titled “Cybersecurity Guidance: Chinese-Manufactured UAS.”
“However, the use of Chinese-manufactured UAS risks exposing sensitive information that jeopardizes U.S. national security, economic security, and public health and safety.”
Mr. Mussington added that “urgent attention” must be paid to “China’s aggressive cyber operations to steal intellectual property and sensitive data from organizations.”
Chinese-made drones have long been a concern in the United States, particularly those made by China-based Da Jiang Innovations (DJI), the world’s largest manufacturer of commercial drones. In December 2020, the Commerce Department added DJI to its export control list for being complicit in the Chinese regime’s human rights abuses. Two years later, the Pentagon added DJI to its list of “Chinese military companies.”
The report does not mention DJI or other Chinese UAS manufacturers by name.
Chinese Laws
However, it highlights the risks associated with using Chinese-made drones by pointing to different Chinese laws, including the National Intelligence Law that went into effect in 2017, which compels Chinese companies to hand over data collected within China and elsewhere to Beijing’s intelligence agencies.
“The 2021 Data Security Law expands the PRC’s access to and control of companies and data within China and imposes strict penalties on China-based businesses for non-compliance,” the report says, referring to China’s official name, the People’s Republic of China.
“The 2021 Cyber Vulnerability Reporting Law requires Chinese-based companies to disclose cyber vulnerabilities found in their systems or software to PRC authorities prior to any public disclosure or sharing overseas,” the report adds.
“This may provide PRC authorities the opportunity to exploit system flaws before cyber vulnerabilities are publicly known.”
The report points out three major vulnerabilities that Chinese-made drones can exploit: data transfer and collection, patching and firmware updates, and a broader surface for data collection. Drones controlled by smartphones and other internet-of-things devices could allow foreign intelligence gathering on U.S. critical infrastructure.
Sensitive imagery, surveying data, and facility layouts are some of the vulnerable data that “allow foreign adversaries like the PRC access to previously inaccessible intelligence,” according to the report.
“Without mitigations in place, the widespread deployment of Chinese-manufactured UAS in our nation’s key sectors is a national security concern, and it carries the risk of unauthorized access to systems and data,” said Bryan Vorndran, assistant director of the FBI’s Cyber Division, in a statement.
The memo encourages owners and operators of U.S. critical infrastructures to buy drones that are “secure-by-design,” including those made by U.S. companies. The report provides several cybersecurity recommendations.
Responses
Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), chairwoman of the House Republican Conference, and Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.), chairman of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), issued a joint statement in response to the report.
“The new Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency report makes clear that Communist Chinese drones present a legitimate national security risk to our critical infrastructure and must be banned from the U.S.,” the two lawmakers stated.
“The CCP has subsidized drone companies such as DJI and Autel in order to destroy American competition and spy on America’s critical infrastructure sites. We must ban CCP-backed spy drones from America and work to bolster the U.S. drone industry,” they added.
Last November, a bipartisan group of 11 House lawmakers, including Mr. Gallagher and Ms. Stefanik, sent a letter to the Biden administration, calling for an investigation into Chinese drone maker Autel Robotics, citing national security concerns. The group said the firm is openly affiliated with the Chinese military and “poses a direct threat to U.S. national security as local law enforcement and state and local governments are purchasing and operating Autel drones.”
Mr. Gallagher and Ms. Stefanik also introduced the Countering CCP Drones Act (H.R.2864) last April to prevent DJI technologies from operating on U.S. communication infrastructure.
Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, advised people interested in purchasing Chinese-made drones to read the security report.
“For years, I’ve been concerned about the security risks associated with drones, including those made in the PRC. This memo represents a good first step to studying that, and I hope anyone considering purchasing a Chinese drone reads it carefully,” Mr. Warner wrote in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 17:40 - Fani Fingered: Jilted Wife In Trump-Georgia Fiasco Drops Bank Statements Revealing Lavish Vacations
Fani Fingered: Jilted Wife In Trump-Georgia Fiasco Drops Bank Statements Revealing Lavish Vacations
Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.
The jilted wife of DA Fani Willis’ alleged lover and outside counsel Nathan Wade dropped receipts in a Friday court filing, revealing that Wade purchased plane tickets in Willis’ name, with alleged travel to places such as Napa Valley, California, Florida and the Caribbean, according to the Daily Caller.
According to records filed in the Wade divorce, Wade bought tickets for he and Fani to travel on both Norwegian and Royal Caribbean cruise lines.
According to the report, Wade made two payments to Royal Caribbean cruise lines in the same day in the amount of $1,387 and $1,284, on Oct. 4, 2022.
As the Caller further notes;
Wade filed to divorce his wife on Nov. 2, 2021, the day after his contract with the District Attorney began. His wife alleged in prior filings that he did not disclose his earnings from the county to her but continued to draw from her bank account.
Wade’s firm has been paid nearly $654,000 from the Fulton County District Attorney’s office since 2022, county data shows.
BTW, Delta Comfort+ is booked under fare code W (“SVC: W”) pic.twitter.com/QKG1H2pGrO
— Chad West (@Chad_WestReal) January 19, 2024
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The Friday filing was made in response to Willis’s attempt to quash a subpoena for her to testify in the divorce proceedings – with Willis accusing Joycelyn Wade Thursday of seeking to “harass and embarrass” her to obstruct the Trump case.
Wade’s wife hit back Friday, calling Willis’ arguments “disingenuous,” and said that the evidence is clear “Ms. Willis was an intended travel partner” for several trips.
As recently as May 2023, her office paid the attorney considered Georgia’s top racketeering expert, John Floyd, only $200/hour, while Wade — who reportedly has little to no experience prosecuting RICO cases — was earning $250/hour, per billing statements obtained by the DCNF.
— Katelynn Richardson (@katesrichardson) January 16, 2024
“It is regrettable that Ms. Willis has filed such an inflammatory Motion, which has left Defendant with no other choice than to respond forcefully and with supporting evidence in a case that is very personal in nature,” reads the filing.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 17:20 - Scuttling 'Chevron' Precedent Will Put Ship Of State Back On A Constitutional Course
Scuttling ‘Chevron’ Precedent Will Put Ship Of State Back On A Constitutional Course
Authored by Mark Chenoweth via RealClearPolitics.com,
Like North Atlantic squalls pounding away at the New England shoreline, judicial deference doctrines have eroded the civil liberties ordinary Americans enjoy. No one can hold back the tide, but the Supreme Court has the opportunity to stop the erosion of civil liberties in a marquee case it will hear this week. My organization, the New Civil Liberties Alliance, is proud to represent the fishermen plaintiffs in this case, Relentless v. Department of Commerce.
Relentless poses a constitutional challenge to Chevron deference. Chevron is a court-made legal doctrine from 1984 requiring judges to defer to an agency’s reasonable interpretation of an ambiguity in a statutory provision it administers. It falsely treats ambiguity – and even statutory silence – as implicit delegations of rulemaking power from Congress to agencies.
At first, Chevron supporters thought that by empowering agencies the doctrine would rein in judicial activism.
In time though, constitutionalists have come to recognize that Chevron enables the administrative state to arrogate power to itself while flouting due process guarantees that protect all Americans.
This case provides one stark example.
For some 30 years federal fisheries agencies have randomly placed observers aboard commercial fishing vessels to log the crew’s activities and ensure compliance with catch quotas.
Placing observers is expensive.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration concedes that the cost runs at least $700 per day, per observer. That’s multiple thousands of dollars over the course of the typical fishing voyage, in a business where profit margins are tight.
The government bore the cost until 2020 when, concerned that congressional appropriations no longer sufficed to cover the cost of the program, NOAA crafted a new rule that charged the cost to fishermen instead.
NCLA’s clients operate commercial fishing vessels. We challenged the 2020 rule, arguing that federal law does not authorize NOAA to mandate industry-funded observers. The agency countered by citing an allegedly “ambiguous” provision of the 1976 Magnuson-Stevens Act, which it interpreted to allow burden-sharing. The agency demanded Chevron deference to its strained interpretation, and a federal trial court in Rhode Island duly obliged. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit affirmed.
These courts did not decide that NOAA’s interpretation of the statute was better than our clients’ interpretation; instead, they merely held that NOAA’s interpretation was “reasonable” – even if our clients’ interpretation was better. Now before the Supreme Court, we argue this judicial deference accorded under Chevron is unconstitutional in at least two respects.
First, deference doctrines allow bureaucrats to hijack the judicial power that Article III of the Constitution properly vests in the federal judiciary.
Construing the law is the essential and exclusive role of the courts. The defining characteristic of this task is independent judgment, and judges are duty-bound to provide litigants their own views on a statute’s meaning, not just to assess the agency’s reasonableness.
For its part, an executive branch agency, like anyone else, cannot be trusted to render judgment in its own case. The agency has a policy agenda and is subject to the president’s political influence. Regulators will invariably interpret (or, as in this case, seek out) “ambiguous” provisions to benefit their power-expanding agendas. That no man can be the judge of his own case is an ancient principle of justice so basic that it should not need restating. But as we have seen, the administrative state imperils first principles.
Here, NOAA has salvaged its preferred regulatory program in the face of lapsing congressional appropriations by discovering latent authority to pass costs on to fishermen in a 40-year-old statute.
The Founding Fathers anticipated this problem. Hamilton explains in Federalist 78 that the separation of powers reflects a division among will, force, and judgment. Without the independent judgment of the judiciary, the people have no defense against the force of the executive, particularly where it has been conjoined with fictitiously delegated legislative will. For this reason, myriad provisions in the Constitution protect judicial independence. Most notably, judges are appointed for life, cannot serve simultaneously in other branches of government, and cannot have their pay cut by Congress. But all those parchment protections are for naught if judges defer to an agency’s legal interpretation instead of providing their own judgment.
The second reason Chevron is unconstitutional is that it violates due process of law principles.
Due process requires that disputes be resolved with neutral rules in a neutral forum by impartial judges. But Chevron makes a mockery of neutrality. It requires a judge to pre-commit to resolve legal ambiguity in favor of one party – and the most powerful party at that – the federal government. Put differently, Chevron systematically injects pro-government bias into legal proceedings; it puts a Leviathan-sized thumb on the scales of justice.
Separation of powers disputes are not esoteric. They pose the question fundamental to any republic – who decides? Nor are these issues arcane for our clients, commercial fishermen who will be forced to pay government agents for performing government functions on their boats, when Congress has never legislated that.
If NOAA can get away with snatching unlawful administrative power to force fishermen to pay for its regulatory regime, then with apologies to Billy Joel there will be no (Rhode) Island left for Rhode Islanders like my clients. The Court must scuttle Chevron and chart a new course, before it wrecks the F/V Relentless and takes the rule of law down with it.
Tyler Durden
Fri, 01/19/2024 – 17:00
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