Today’s News 31st August 2023

• AI Vs. Humans: Which Performs Certain Skills Better?
  AI Vs. Humans: Which Performs Certain Skills Better?

  With ChatGPT’s explosive rise, AI has been making its presence felt for the masses, especially in traditional bastions of human capabilities – reading comprehension, speech recognition and image identification.

  In fact, as Visual Capitalist’s Mark Belan and Pallavi Rao show in the chart below, it’s clear that AI has surpassed human performance in quite a few areas, and looks set to overtake humans elsewhere.

  

  How Performance Gets Tested

  Using data from Contextual AI, we visualize how quickly AI models have started to beat database benchmarks, as well as whether or not they’ve yet reached human levels of skill.

  Each database is devised around a certain skill, like handwriting recognition, language understanding, or reading comprehension, while each percentage score contrasts with the following benchmarks:

  • 0% or “maximally performing baseline”
    This is equal to the best-known performance by AI at the time of dataset creation.

  • 100%
    This mark is equal to human performance on the dataset.

  By creating a scale between these two points, the progress of AI models on each dataset could be tracked. Each point on a line signifies a best result and as the line trends upwards, AI models get closer and closer to matching human performance.

  Below is a table of when AI started matching human performance across all eight skills:

  

  A key observation from the chart is how much progress has been made since 2010. In fact many of these databases—like SQuAD, GLUE, and HellaSwag—didn’t exist before 2015.

  In response to benchmarks being rendered obsolete, some of the newer databases are constantly being updated with new and relevant data points. This is why AI models technically haven’t matched human performance in some areas (grade school math and code generation) yet—though they are well on their way.

  What’s Led to AI Outperforming Humans?

  But what has led to such speedy growth in AI’s abilities in the last few years?

  Thanks to revolutions in computing power, data availability, and better algorithms, AI models are faster, have bigger datasets to learn from, and are optimized for efficiency compared to even a decade ago.

  This is why headlines routinely talk about AI language models matching or beating human performance on standardized tests. In fact, a key problem for AI developers is that their models keep beating benchmark databases devised to test them, but still somehow fail real world tests.

  Since further computing and algorithmic gains are expected in the next few years, this rapid progress is likely to continue. However, the next potential bottleneck to AI’s progress might not be AI itself, but a lack of data for models to train on.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 08/31/2023 – 02:45

• Expanded BRICS Set To De-Dollarize The World, Control Global Energy Supply
  Expanded BRICS Set To De-Dollarize The World, Control Global Energy Supply

  Authored by Darren Taylor via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  “The expansion of BRICS has made it clear that the de-dollarization of the international finance system is inevitable.” 

  This view, from economist William Gumede—who’s also executive chairperson of the Democracy Works Foundation in South Africa—has been echoed around the world since BRICS leaders announced the expansion of the bloc on Aug. 24 at a summit in Johannesburg.  

  

  Current BRICS members are Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

  In January, BRICS—originally established in 2009 to represent the world’s strongest emerging market economies—will add Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to its ranks.  

  Mr. Gumede, one of South Africa’s leading academics and thought-leaders, has been researching the potential impacts of de-dollarization since 2014. 

  He told The Epoch Times the average per capita GDP of the G7 economies was currently six times that of BRICS economies. But, the unexpectedly swift expansion of BRICS would increase the trade bloc’s share of the global economy much faster than earlier predictions. 

  “These forecasts did not take into account that BRICS would expand its membership very quickly. A larger BRICS will mean the world will increasingly use U.S. dollars less,” he said. 

  Mr. Gumede said the bigger BRICS alliance would eventually rival the Group of Seven (G7) large industrial economies of the United States, European Union, United Kingdom, France, Japan, Italy, and Canada, which together are home to 16 percent of the world’s population and account for 62 percent of the global economy. 

  Welcoming the new members in Johannesburg last week, Brazil’s President Lula da Silva said their addition would mean BRICS would represent 46 percent of the global population and 37 percent of the world GDP. 

  The expansion means BRICS now consists of some of the globe’s largest oil producers: Russia, Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Egypt. Nigeria, another major oil exporter, is set to join when the bloc gets even bigger, probably at its next summit in Russia in 2024.  

  “BRICS is going to dominate the world’s energy supply,” said Mr. Gumede. “The strength of the U.S. dollar is also partially based on the currency as underpinning oil trade—the so-called petrodollar—and members of OPEC (Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries) settle their accounts in U.S. dollars.

  “Therefore, enlarging BRICS to also include the oil producers and persuading them to use a new BRICS currency, rather than the U.S. dollar, to settle their accounts, will be a game-changer. It is likely to accelerate the de-dollarization of the world.”

  Jakkie Cilliers, Head of the African Futures and Innovation program at the Institute for Security Studies in Pretoria, attributed the unexpectedly rapid expansion of BRICS, and its moves towards de-dollarization, to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its consequences.  

  “BRICS has seen the West hit Russia with all kinds of financial sanctions, and threaten sanctions against South Africa for supposedly supporting Russia, and as a result it wants to end, or at least ease, its dependence on the dollar,” he told The Epoch Times. 

  “De-dollarization, first mooted by [Russian President Vladimir] Putin, is a potent symbol of a shift away from a Western-led global order towards a new era of more uncertain and fluid multipolar connections. Change is in the air, and the next three decades will see the steady unfolding of this trend.” 

  Mr. Cilliers said BRICS was “cloaking itself in resentment” against the West. 

  “It’s quite easy for Russia and China to take advantage of the ill-feeling that still exists across much of the developing world because of colonialism, imperialism and sanctions by leading Western countries.

  “Never mind the fact that Russia and China show similar imperialistic tendencies,” he commented. 

  He said the Global South was “particularly unhappy” with international finance institutions, and with the U.S. Federal Reserve Bank. 

  “When the Fed hikes interest rates, it sometimes sends smaller economies into turmoil. They’re subjected to shocks for no domestic reason. So they see the dollar as providing the United States with a very powerful weapon to use in its interests,” said Mr. Cilliers. 

  “This is what unites BRICS in its desire to move away from the dollar-backed international financial system.” 

  But, he added, de-dollarization was going to be a slow process. 

  “Trade among BRICS countries is too small to sustain a common currency, and it only makes sense to trade in national currencies if the trade balance between the countries is more or less equal, which it most definitely is not likely to be in the near future,” said Mr. Cilliers. 

  Mr. Gumede pointed to a recent example of Russia selling a lot of oil to India. 

  “They dealt in rupees. But because India exports much less to Russia than it imports, Moscow now sits with rupees it cannot spend or convert, except to buy goods from India.” 

  Mr. Cilliers said China’s renminbi also wasn’t sufficiently convertible and lacked deep capital markets, market transparency, independent central banks and supporting financial institutions of Western banks. 

  He said there were also “perceptions of risk” associated with China’s future. 

  “It is, after all, a repressive autocracy. It’ll battle to maintain stability in the face of slower economic growth. I’d also be very surprised if India supported a common BRICS currency, given its concerns about China as a regional and potential global competitor.” 

  Mr. Gumede added: “The euro, a common currency, is stable because it’s underpinned by stable political regimes in a stable part of the world. Wherever you look in BRICS, there’s instability, like in Russia because of the Ukraine war. What would happen to the BRICS currency if China invades Taiwan?” 

  Mr. Cilliers predicted that rather than a single alternative to the dollar, “new currency blocs” would emerge. 

  “These will be based on bilateral and multilateral trade among the Middle East and China, South America, West Africa and elsewhere. And so we’ll see the power of the dollar slowly wane,” he said. 

  Mr. Cilliers said the most important shift in the power of the greenback would happen once oil and gas prices were no longer set in U.S. dollars. 

  “This is probably the motivation behind the inclusion of Saudi Arabia and the UAE in the expanded BRICS,” he postulated. 

  Mr. Gumede said demand for U.S. dollars would remain high as long as U.S. GDP was close to 25 percent of the global economy.

  He said President Putin—supported by China’s leader Xi Jinping—was pushing so hard for de-dollarization “because it’s key to the economic survival of Russia” following Western sanctions. 

  The West froze $300 billion of Russia’s foreign trade reserves after it invaded Ukraine in February 2022 and its foreign trade transactions, including those with some emerging markets, have been blocked. 

  Seven of Russia’s banks have been excluded from the world’s leading international payment messaging system, SWIFT. The ban means Russian banks cannot do digital cross-border transactions.

  However, Russian banks doing transactions connected to oil and gas are exempt from the SWIFT ban, and this is preventing the Russian economy from collapsing, said Mr. Gumede. 

  Russia is the world’s third-largest oil producer, but its the largest exporter of oil.

  “BRICS countries have been buying oil and gas from Moscow, insulating Russia against isolation by the United States and the EU,” Mr. Gumede explained. 

  For example, Indian imports of Russian oil in May 2023 reached record levels of about 1.95 million barrels per day.

  According to the International Energy Agency, China and India bought 80 percent of Russia’s oil in May 2023, with China buying 2.2 million barrels per day.

  Leslie Maasdorp, Chief Financial Officer of the BRICS financial mechanism, the New Development Bank, told The Epoch Times BRICS countries were prepared to conduct business with one another in domestic currencies. 

  But, he added, they were not yet ready to issue a common currency that could challenge the dollar. 

  “The creation of a global alternative currency to the dollar is a medium-to-long-term ambition, rather than an immediate possibility,” said Maasdorp.

  “Even the Chinese renminbi is very far from becoming a global reserve currency.” 

  Mr. Cilliers said it was also likely that intensifying rivalry between China and India would slow de-dollarization. 

  “India has already said it wants to focus on strengthening its own currency ahead of anything else,” he said.  

  Mr. Cilliers suggested that the expansion of BRICS, now and in the future, should not be seen as an “automatic sign” that developing countries were uniting behind a “simplistic, common vision” of overthrowing the West. 

  “Many people have this view that if Russia and China, in particular, snap their fingers and say, ‘de-dollarize now,’ that other BRICS countries are just going to listen to the master’s voice.

  “Believe me, there is deep resentment within BRICS and within the wider Global South about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the harm it continues to sow in developing countries, causing inflation spikes, for example, and even grain shortages. 

  “Countries’ motivations for wanting to join BRICS differ but what stays the same is that few, if any, Global South nations will exchange one hegemon with another.” 

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 08/31/2023 – 02:00

• We, The Targeted: How Government Weaponizes Surveillance To Silence Its Critics
  We, The Targeted: How Government Weaponizes Surveillance To Silence Its Critics

  Authored by John and Nisha Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

  “Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear.”

  – President Harry S. Truman

  Ever since Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his groundbreaking “I Have a Dream” speech during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on Aug. 28, 1963, the Deep State has been hard at work turning King’s dream into a living nightmare.

  The end result of the government’s efforts over the past 60 years is a country where nothing ever really changes, and everyone lives in fear.

  Race wars are still being stoked by both the Right and the Left; the military-industrial complex is still waging profit-driven wars at taxpayer expense; the oligarchy is still calling the shots in the seats of government power; and the government is still weaponizing surveillance in order to muzzle anti-government sentiment, harass activists, and terrorize Americans into compliance.

  This last point is particularly disturbing.

  Starting in the 1950s, the government relied on COINTELPRO, its domestic intelligence program, to neutralize domestic political dissidents. Those targeted by the FBI under COINTELPRO for its intimidation, surveillance and smear campaigns included: Martin Luther King Jr., Malcom X, the Black Panther Party, John Lennon, Billie Holiday, Emma Goldman, Aretha Franklin, Charlie Chaplin, Ernest Hemingway, Felix Frankfurter, and hundreds more.

  In more recent decades, the powers-that-be have expanded their reach to target anyone who opposes the police state, regardless of their political leanings.

  Advances in technology have enabled the government to deploy a veritable arsenal of surveillance weapons in order to “expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, or otherwise neutralize” perceived threats to the government’s power.

  Surveillance cameras mounted on utility poles, traffic lights, businesses, and homes. License plate readers. Ring doorbells. GPS devices. Dash cameras. Drones. Store security cameras. Geofencing and geotracking. FitBits. Alexa. Internet-connected devices. Geofencing dragnets. Fusion centers. Smart devices. Behavioral threat assessments. Terror watch lists. Facial recognition. Snitch tip lines. Biometric scanners. Pre-crime. DNA databases. Data mining. Precognitive technology. Contact tracing apps.

  What these add up to is a world in which, on any given day, the average person is now monitored, surveilled, spied on and tracked in more than 20 different ways by both government and corporate eyes and ears.

  

  Consider just a small sampling of the ways in which the government is weaponizing its 360 degree surveillance technologies to flag you as a threat to national security, whether or not you’ve done anything wrong.

  Flagging you as a danger based on your feelings. Customs and Border Protection is reportedly using an artificial intelligence surveillance program that can detect “sentiment and emotion” in social media posts in order to identify travelers who may be “a threat to public safety, national security, or lawful trade and travel.”

  Flagging you as a danger based on your phone and movements. Cell phones have become de facto snitches, offering up a steady stream of digital location data on users’ movements and travels. For instance, the FBI was able to use geofence data to identify more than 5,000 mobile devices (and their owners) in a 4-acre area around the Capitol on January 6. This latest surveillance tactic could land you in jail for being in the “wrong place and time.” Police are also using cell-site simulators to carry out mass surveillance of protests without the need for a warrant. Moreover, federal agents can now employ a number of hacking methods in order to gain access to your computer activities and “see” whatever you’re seeing on your monitor. Malicious hacking software can also be used to remotely activate cameras and microphones, offering another means of glimpsing into the personal business of a target.

  Flagging you as a danger based on your DNA. DNA technology in the hands of government officials completes our transition to a Surveillance State. If you have the misfortune to leave your DNA traces anywhere a crime has been committed, you’ve already got a file somewhere in some state or federal database—albeit it may be a file without a name. By accessing your DNA, the government will soon know everything else about you that they don’t already know: your family chart, your ancestry, what you look like, your health history, your inclination to follow orders or chart your own course, etc. After all, a DNA print reveals everything about “who we are, where we come from, and who we will be.” It can also be used to predict the physical appearance of potential suspects. It’s only a matter of time before the police state’s pursuit of criminals expands into genetic profiling and a preemptive hunt for criminals of the future.

  Flagging you as a danger based on your face. Facial recognition software aims to create a society in which every individual who steps out into public is tracked and recorded as they go about their daily business. Coupled with surveillance cameras that blanket the country, facial recognition technology allows the government and its corporate partners to identify and track someone’s movements in real-time. One particularly controversial software program created by Clearview AI has been used by police, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security to collect photos on social media sites for inclusion in a massive facial recognition database. Similarly, biometric software, which relies on one’s unique identifiers (fingerprints, irises, voice prints), is becoming the standard for navigating security lines, as well as bypassing digital locks and gaining access to phones, computers, office buildings, etc. In fact, greater numbers of travelers are opting into programs that rely on their biometrics in order to avoid long waits at airport security. Scientists are also developing lasers that can identify and surveil individuals based on their heartbeats, scent and microbiome.

  Flagging you as a danger based on your behavior. Rapid advances in behavioral surveillance are not only making it possible for individuals to be monitored and tracked based on their patterns of movement or behavior, including gait recognition (the way one walks), but have given rise to whole industries that revolve around predicting one’s behavior based on data and surveillance patterns and are also shaping the behaviors of whole populations. One smart “anti-riot” surveillance system purports to predict mass riots and unauthorized public events by using artificial intelligence to analyze social media, news sources, surveillance video feeds and public transportation data.

  Flagging you as a danger based on your spending and consumer activities. With every smartphone we buy, every GPS device we install, every Twitter, Facebook, and Google account we open, every frequent buyer card we use for purchases—whether at the grocer’s, the yogurt shop, the airlines or the department store—and every credit and debit card we use to pay for our transactions, we’re helping Corporate America build a dossier for its government counterparts on who we know, what we think, how we spend our money, and how we spend our time. Consumer surveillance, by which your activities and data in the physical and online realms are tracked and shared with advertisers, has become a $300 billion industry that routinely harvests your data for profit. Corporations such as Target have not only been tracking and assessing the behavior of their customers, particularly their purchasing patterns, for years, but the retailer has also funded major surveillance in cities across the country and developed behavioral surveillance algorithms that can determine whether someone’s mannerisms might fit the profile of a thief.

  Flagging you as a danger based on your public activities. Private corporations in conjunction with police agencies throughout the country have created a web of surveillance that encompasses all major cities in order to monitor large groups of people seamlessly, as in the case of protests and rallies. They are also engaging in extensive online surveillance, looking for any hints of “large public events, social unrest, gang communications, and criminally predicated individuals.” Defense contractors have been at the forefront of this lucrative market. Fusion centers, $330 million-a-year, information-sharing hubs for federal, state and law enforcement agencies, monitor and report such “suspicious” behavior as people buying pallets of bottled water, photographing government buildings, and applying for a pilot’s license as “suspicious activity.”

  Flagging you as a danger based on your social media activities. Every move you make, especially on social media, is monitored, mined for data, crunched, and tabulated in order to form a picture of who you are, what makes you tick, and how best to control you when and if it becomes necessary to bring you in line. As The Intercept reported, the FBI, CIA, NSA and other government agencies are increasingly investing in and relying on corporate surveillance technologies that can mine constitutionally protected speech on social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram in order to identify potential extremists and predict who might engage in future acts of anti-government behavior. This obsession with social media as a form of surveillance will have some frightening consequences in coming years. As Helen A.S. Popkin, writing for NBC News, observed, “We may very well face a future where algorithms bust people en masse for referencing illegal ‘Game of Thrones’ downloads… the new software has the potential to roll, Terminator-style, targeting every social media user with a shameful confession or questionable sense of humor.”

  Flagging you as a danger based on your social network. Not content to merely spy on individuals through their online activity, government agencies are now using surveillance technology to track one’s social network, the people you might connect with by phone, text message, email or through social message, in order to ferret out possible criminals. An FBI document obtained by Rolling Stone speaks to the ease with which agents are able to access address book data from Facebook’s WhatsApp and Apple’s iMessage services from the accounts of targeted individuals and individuals not under investigation who might have a targeted individual within their network. What this creates is a “guilt by association” society in which we are all as guilty as the most culpable person in our address book.

  Flagging you as a danger based on your car. License plate readers are mass surveillance tools that can photograph over 1,800 license tag numbers per minute, take a picture of every passing license tag number and store the tag number and the date, time, and location of the picture in a searchable database, then share the data with law enforcement, fusion centers and private companies to track the movements of persons in their cars. With tens of thousands of these license plate readers now in operation throughout the country, affixed to overpasses, cop cars and throughout business sectors and residential neighborhoods, it allows police to track vehicles and run the plates through law enforcement databases for abducted children, stolen cars, missing people and wanted fugitives. Of course, the technology is not infallible: there have been numerous incidents in which police have mistakenly relied on license plate data to capture out suspects only to end up detaining innocent people at gunpoint.

  Flagging you as a danger based on your political views. The Church Committee, the Senate task force charged with investigating COINTELPRO abuses in 1975, concluded that the government had carried out “secret surveillance of citizens on the basis of their political beliefs, even when those beliefs posed no threat of violence or illegal acts on behalf of a hostile foreign power.” The report continued: “Groups and individuals have been harassed and disrupted because of their political views and their lifestyles… Intelligence agencies have served the political and personal objectives of presidents and other high officials.” Nothing has changed since then.

  Flagging you as a danger based on your correspondence. Just about every branch of the government—from the Postal Service to the Treasury Department and every agency in between—now has its own surveillance sector, authorized to spy on the American people. For instance, the U.S. Postal Service, which has been photographing the exterior of every piece of paper mail for the past 20 years, is also spying on Americans’ texts, emails and social media posts. Headed up by the Postal Service’s law enforcement division, the Internet Covert Operations Program (iCOP) is reportedly using facial recognition technology, combined with fake online identities, to ferret out potential troublemakers with “inflammatory” posts. The agency claims the online surveillance, which falls outside its conventional job scope of processing and delivering paper mail, is necessary to help postal workers avoid “potentially volatile situations.”

  Now the government wants us to believe that we have nothing to fear from these mass spying programs as long as we’ve done nothing wrong.

  Don’t believe it.

  As Matthew Feeney warns in the New York Times, “In the past, Communists, civil rights leaders, feminists, Quakers, folk singers, war protesters and others have been on the receiving end of law enforcement surveillance. No one knows who the next target will be.”

  The government’s definition of a “bad” guy is extraordinarily broad, and it results in the warrantless surveillance of innocent, law-abiding Americans on a staggering scale.

  Moreover, there is a repressive, suppressive effect to surveillance that not only acts as a potentially small deterrent on crime but serves to monitor and chill lawful First Amendment activity, and that is the whole point.

  Weaponized surveillance is re-engineering a society structured around the aesthetic of fear.

  As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, the police state wants us silent, servile and compliant.

  They definitely do not want us to engage in First Amendment activities that challenge the government’s power, reveal the government’s corruption, expose the government’s lies, and encourage the citizenry to push back against the government’s many injustices.

  And they certainly do not want us to remember that we have rights, let alone attempting to exercise those rights peaceably and lawfully, whether it’s protesting police brutality and racism, challenging COVID-19 mandates, questioning election outcomes, or listening to alternate viewpoints—even conspiratorial ones—in order to form our own opinions about the true nature of government. 

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 23:40

• Money Is The Biggest Point Of Contention In Relationships, New Survey Shows
  Money Is The Biggest Point Of Contention In Relationships, New Survey Shows

  Today in “completely heathy relationship behavior”, it’s being reported that many Millennials and Gen Zers are now doing research on their dates to try and ascertain how much money they make while they’re dating them.

  The revelation comes as part of a Bloomberg wrap up of a Credit Karma study that highlighted the fact that young people in relationships are fighting about money more than any other topics. 

  About 33% of people who responded to the survey said they had ended a relationship over money and more than 40% said they fight about finances on a monthly basis, the report said. 

  Money becomes a point of contention in relationships moreso than spending time together, chores or intimacy, the report says, noting that “red flags” around money including one person expecting the other to pay for everything and reckless spending. 

  

  Brittany Wolff, founder of Wolff Financial in South Carolina says arguments about money aren’t necessarily a bad thing and can lead to both people being more transparent about their financial situations and feelings. She says couples should have a “money date” regularly where they can sit together and talk about their financial goals. 

  Dan Slagle, founding partner of Fyooz Financial Planning, adds that the date should be in a “neutral location” and offers up the perfunctory advice that “Making it fun can help keep conversations light and productive”. 

  Right. And we guess how well you’ve been earning determines exactly how the end of the date goes…

  Meanwhile, 35% of Gen Z and 25% of Millennials said they research the job of the person they are dating to estimate how much money they make, the report says. 

  Brandon Gregg, financial advisor at BBK Wealth Management in Indiana, concluded: “Problems around money are going to happen — it’s a part of life. When they do, make sure that lines of communication are open. Taking the steps to understand each other’s values and communicating regularly early on will lessen the issues.”

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 23:20

• What If Biden Backs Out Of The Race?
  What If Biden Backs Out Of The Race?

  Authored by Charles Lipson via RealClear Wire,

  President Biden has declared he’s running for a second term, but it’s far from certain he actually will. His infirmity and low poll numbers raise serious doubts. His physical decline shows when he walks or climbs the stairs of Air Force One. His cognitive decline shows when he refuses to hold press conferences or answer even the simplest questions, like how he feels about the devastating fires in Maui. His decline in the public’s estimation shows when pollsters ask Americans how they’re doing. Four out of five answer, “Not good. Not good at all.”

  

  Voters also say they don’t want another general election choice like the last one. So many votes in 2020 were negative ones “against the worse candidate,” not in favor of the better one. They don’t want another grudge match between two unpopular candidates.

  Biden’s dismal poll numbers form a somber backdrop for his reelection campaign. That backdrop is even darker now that his health problems are so visible. These mounting problems may not prevent him from running, but they do lessen the chances. True, he keeps saying he is running. But, like all politicians, he may be deceiving the public or himself. The biggest “tell” is that Biden is avoiding the very things active candidates do. He’s not campaigning. He’s not attending a lot of small events with big donors. He’s not running ads. He’s not using the White House’s bully pulpit to address the nation on our challenges and his response to them.

  Still, those signs are not definitive. Biden might be lying low because the Republicans are fighting among themselves. Why get in their way? Better to wait until late autumn to ramp up his campaign.

  He might be unsure if he really is running, uncertain if he is up to the arduous task, physically and mentally.

  Or he might have already decided, privately, that he will not run but is delaying the announcement since it would immediately turn him into a powerless lame duck.

  At this point, it’s impossible to know what he has decided. He might not know himself. But it is well worth considering the implications if Biden limits himself to one term and waits until late fall or early spring to make the announcement.

  The first implication is that a late withdrawal favors some Democratic candidates over others. It favors those with high name recognition, existing campaign operations, and the ability to fund expensive national efforts, either from outside donations or their own pockets. California Gov. Gavin Newsom has already established his campaign-in-waiting and can raise lots of money, especially from big donors in his home state. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker is a billionaire who can fund his own run and has begun setting up a national team. Michigan’s Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, by contrast, would be several steps behind and would need to raise a lot of money quickly to become a viable candidate. So would Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, or others who might step into the wide-open race. One candidate who is already running, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., would stay in the race, trading on his family name rather than his conspiracy-fueled ideas.

  Interestingly, no one in the Biden cabinet seems poised to make a run. That lackluster group is the faceless front of the administrative state. The only name even mentioned is Pete Buttigieg, and that very seldom. The one-time darling of the media has faded from consideration amid his troubled tenure at the Transportation Department. He’s the Beto O’Rourke of this round.

  The second consequence of a Biden withdrawal would be a fight over the future of Kamala Harris. She is the least popular vice president in polling history, and for good reason. Voters think she’s incompetent, inauthentic, and inarticulate, an empty-calorie word salad without any policy achievements. She’s the living embodiment of the “Peter Principle,” where people keep getting promoted until they reach their level of incompetence. She has reached that lofty level, just as Dan Quayle did during George H.W. Bush’s presidency.

  Kamala’s bleak showing in the polls is particularly striking because she took office with enthusiastic support from every legacy media outlet. They loved her, even though ordinary Democratic voters did not. In fact, those voters were so sour on Kamala that she withdrew before the first primary or caucus in 2020. She was polling near zero. She could raise money, at least initially, but she couldn’t raise enthusiasm or votes. She still can’t. With each failure, she tries to reintroduce herself to the public. It hasn’t worked.

  Unfortunately for Democrats, Kamala’s presence as second-in-line poses a thorny problem, whether Biden runs or not. If he runs, she’s an albatross on the ticket because voters are worried Biden might not make it through a full second term. They really, really don’t want to see Harris step into the Oval Office by default.

  If Biden decides not to run, Harris poses a different problem. She is the country’s highest-ranking African-American officeholder in a party built around identity politics and strong turnouts by blacks, especially black women. That dependence on black votes is why Biden picked her in the first place (remember, he promised to pick a black woman), and it’s why he cannot drop her from the ticket. If Biden doesn’t run and Harris sinks to the bottom in an open primary, the result could alienate a vital constituency and depress turnout in that crucial group.

  The third implication concerns Hunter’s legal troubles, which touch on other family members and the patriarch himself. The president could solve the legal peril instantly by pardoning family members who face criminal exposure. Biden’s press secretary rejected the possibility. Asked if Hunter might receive a presidential pardon, Karine Jean-Pierre replied with a single word: “No.”

  The White House knows the uproar – and political damage – a pardon would cause. It would imply guilt, impede a full disclosure of all criminal acts, gut the very notion of unbiased justice, and appear nakedly self-serving.

  The Bidens’ political and legal problems are not merely that family members made a lot of money, but that they made it while Joe Biden was vice president and made it without any visible business skills. Equally important, the money came from foreign businesses in the very countries where he directed U.S. foreign policy, at President Obama’s behest. The family leveraged Biden’s official position for some $20-40 million, funneled through an opaque web of LLCs. They were selling political connections and access, not business expertise. The LLCs were formed when Joe Biden was vice president and had no legitimate business purpose.They were designed to hide to sources and distribution of income.

  The president’s direct involvement in these schemes is still murky. Proving he knew, or worse, aided them, is the goal of Republican House investigations and a possible impeachment inquiry.

  Whether or not any felonies can be proven, such as money laundering or Hunter’s failure to register as a foreign agent, is an open question. Not that the Department of Justice has pursued them vigorously. Quite the contrary. Their lax treatment of the president’s family and suppression of the IRS investigation is a scandal in its own right.

  If President Biden does eventually pardon his family, the ensuing uproar would end his administration’s political life and lead inexorably to an impeachment vote. That’s why the president would be well advised to wait beyond the November election before giving his family a “get out of jail free” card. Even then, it would trash his legacy.

  What about Republicans? What would Biden’s withdrawal mean for them? At this stage, it’s impossible to know. It’s too early to tell if it would hurt or help Trump, either in the primaries or the general election. One possibility is that a new face on the Democratic side would encourage Republicans to pick a new face themselves. But there are still too many unknowns to have any confidence in a prediction.

  One thing we do know is that Biden’s promise to run for a second term does not guarantee he will stay in the race. He could still decide he’s too old, too infirm, or too unpopular to make the arduous uphill climb. And we know one more thing: If Joe Biden does pull out, his decision will send shockwaves across the American political landscape.

  Charles Lipson is the Peter B. Ritzma Professor of Political Science Emeritus at the University of Chicago, where he founded the Program on International Politics, Economics, and Security. He can be reached at charles.lipson@gmail.com.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 23:00

• Russia, North Korea 'Actively Advancing' Arms Deal For Ukraine War: White House
  Russia, North Korea ‘Actively Advancing’ Arms Deal For Ukraine War: White House

  The White House is again accusing Moscow of importing North Korean weapons for use in its military operation in Ukraine, at a moment tensions with Pyongyang are mounting, which has led to tit-for-tat exchanges of nuclear rhetoric.

  White House national security spokesman John Kirby on Wednesday stopped short of saying there’s smoking gun evidence for arms transfers already accomplished, instead strongly suggesting potential sales in the near future. “We urge the DPRK to cease its arms negotiations with Russia and abide by the public commitments that Pyongyang has made to not provide or sell arms to Russia,” Kirby said.

  

  Presidents Putin and Kim Jong Un recently exchanged cordial letters expressing a desire for closer cooperation on multiple fronts, also after North Korea has blasted NATO ‘imperialism’ for causing the Ukraine conflict to erupt. Russia sent a delegation to the north last month, headed by the foreign minister.

  Kirby referenced new intelligence which he said shows both pariah leaders (in the West’s eyes) are “actively advancing” high-level talks for more weapons.

  He further claimed that Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu while in Pyongyang late last month was there “to try to convince Pyongyang to sell artillery ammunition to Russia.” 

  “Following these negotiations, high-level discussions may continue in coming months,” Kirby said, alleging the two sides are negotiating over “significant quantities and multiple types” of weapons to use in Ukraine.

  Washington has over the course of the Ukraine conflict at various points accused North Korea of supplying the Russian military with additional artillery ammo. US intelligence has in the recent past alleged that train shipments between the two countries included covert ammo supplies, but something which has not been proven.

  The two countries actually share a small border. More recently, there have been accusations that Wagner Group, which is now on the outs with Moscow in the wake of the mutiny in June, purchased large quantities of arms and equipment from the Kim Jong-Un government.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 22:40

• 100 Former Clerks Of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas Speak Out
  100 Former Clerks Of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas Speak Out

  Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  More than 100 former clerks for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas signed an open letter defending his independence and integrity amid media reports that suggest he received improper gifts from a Texas billionaire.

  “As his law clerks, we offer this response. Different paths led us to our year with Justice Thomas, and we have followed different paths since. But along the way, we all saw with our own eyes the same thing: His integrity is unimpeachable,” their letter said (pdf).

  

  The 112 individuals who signed the letter include three circuit court judges, including Judge David Stras of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, Judge James Ho of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and Judge Allison Rushing of the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.

  “And these stories are malicious, perpetuating the ugly assumption that the Justice cannot think for himself. They are part of a larger attack on the Court and its legitimacy as an institution,” the letter also stated. “The picture they paint of the Court and the man for whom we worked bears no resemblance to reality.”

  “His independence is unshakable, deeply rooted seven decades ago as that young child who walked through the door of his grandparents’ house for a life forever changed,” they continued.

  The former clerks then described Justice Thomas’ upbringing in Alabama and how he was destined to become a priest before the assassination of former President John F. Kennedy in the 1960s, which made him decide to pursue law instead.

  “He is a man of unwavering principle. He welcomes the lone dissent. He is also a man of great humor and warmth and generosity. Walk the halls, and you’ll hear his laugh. Call, and he answers,” the letter continued. “His grandfather’s sayings become our sayings. His chambers become our chambers—a place fueled by unstoppable curiosity and unreturned library books, all to get every case just right.”

  The letter went on to make reference to Justice Thomas’s upbringing and education, how he was changed by life in the segregated South, and how he had been destined for the priesthood before the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. led him to the law instead.

  Reports from ProPublica, a left-leaning media outlet, have claimed that the Supreme Court justice accepted at least 38 vacations, 26 private jet flights, 12 VIP passes to sporting events, and two resort trips during his time as a justice.

  “While some of the hospitality, such as stays in personal homes, may not have required disclosure, Thomas appears to have violated the law by failing to disclose flights, yacht cruises and expensive sports tickets, according to ethics experts,” the report in August said.

  But the letter, in addressing those reports, asserted that they’re part of a broader series of attacks on the Supreme Court itself.

  “Lately, the stories have questioned his integrity and his ethics for the friends he keeps. They bury the lede. These friends are not parties before him as a Justice of the Court. And these stories are malicious, perpetuating the ugly assumption that the Justice cannot think for himself,” the letter said, according to Fox News, which obtained the document. “They are part of a larger attack on the Court and its legitimacy as an institution. The picture they paint of the Court and the man for whom we worked bears no resemblance to reality.”

  Congressional Democrats have said the reports call into question whether Justice Thomas followed the high court’s ethics rules and have vowed to make changes to the Supreme Court. They have also called on the associate justice, an appointee of former President George H.W. Bush, to recuse himself from certain cases.

  “Justice Thomas has brought shame upon himself and the United States Supreme Court with his acceptance of massive, repeated and undisclosed gifts,” Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, in mid-August. “No government official, elected or unelected, could ethically or legally accept gifts of that scale. He should resign immediately.”

  Other than Mr. Lieu, four other House Democrats have said Justice Thomas should resign from the bench. They include Reps. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), Bill Pascrell (D-N.J), Gerry Connolly (D-Va.), and Hank Johnson (D-Ga.).

  In response to the reports, Justice Thomas has said he “endeavored to follow that counsel throughout my tenure, and have always sought to comply with the disclosure guidelines,” adding that the “guidelines are now being changed, as the committee of the Judicial Conference responsible for financial disclosure for the entire federal judiciary just this past month announced new guidance.”

  “And, it is, of course, my intent to follow this guidance in the future,” he added in a statement.

  Meanwhile, Harlan Crow, whose friendship with Justice Thomas was the subject of the ProPublica reports, issued a comment to The Atlantic earlier this year saying that it “would be absurd to me to talk to Justice Thomas about Supreme Court cases, because that’s not my world.”

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 22:20

• Rare Uprising Against US-Backed Forces In Syria Leaves Many Killed
  Rare Uprising Against US-Backed Forces In Syria Leaves Many Killed

  There’s been a rare armed uprising in a region of Syria currently occupied by American forces, which has resulted in dead and wounded. Regional reports have tallied at least 13 to as many as 25 people, both militants and civilians, have been killed.

  It happened Wednesday in Deir Ezzor province, which for years has had some 1,000 or more US soldiers occupying what is Syria’s only oil and gas rich province. The US has trained and supported Kurkish-led “Syrian Democratic Forces” while also cutting off Damascus and most of the Syrian population from its own resources. 

  

  Al Jazeera reports of the Wednesday violence, “Clashes in eastern Syria between Arab tribal fighters and US-backed Kurdish-led fighters have left several people, including civilians, dead and others wounded, opposition activists and pro-government media have said.”

  It’s being called the worst violence there since 2015, when there were still fierce counter-terror operations against ISIS. 

  According to more details: 

  The clashes first broke out on Monday, a day after the US-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) detained the commander and several members of the Deir Az Zor Military Council, a group that had been allied with the SDF, at a meeting they invited them to in the northeastern city of Hassakeh.

  The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, reported that 10 Arab tribesmen and three SDF fighters were killed in clashes in the villages of Hrejieh and Breeha.

  Additionally there were reports of at least eight civilians, including a child, killed in the village of Hrejieh. 

  Much of the Arab component of the US-backed forces in the region has long been in tension with the area’s Kurdish leadership. The Syrian Kurds dominate the SDF, while the Arabs tend to be made up of remnant “Free Syrian Army” factions. While Washington has long sought to present the SDF as a broad coalition of anti-Assad “opposition” fighters, the reality is that the Kurds and their interests totally dominate.

  🇸🇾 #Syria – #Rojava: Clashes have allegedly broken out between the SDF and tribal groups in Deir ez-Zor after the SDF arrested Deir ez-Zor Military Council (DeZMC) leader Abu Khawla.

  Tribes affiliated with Abu Khawla have since given the SDF a 12-hour ultimatum to release the… pic.twitter.com/3GHbIqHtM2

  — POPULAR FRONT (@PopularFront_) August 29, 2023

  https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

  This has led to fears among the tribes near the Iraq border that the SDF and US will in the end “erase” the eastern region’s “Arab identity.”

  There’s also the possibility that pro-Assad forces are covertly encouraging the Arab tribes to rise up and throw off the American occupation. For years, the Pentagon’s chief enemy in the region has been ‘pro-Iran’ and Shia aligned forces, but if there’s a broader push to overthrow the US occupation from the Arab tribes, Washington’s days occupying Syria are numbered.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 22:00

• Over 1,600 Scientists Sign 'No Climate Emergency' Declaration
  Over 1,600 Scientists Sign ‘No Climate Emergency’ Declaration

  Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

  International scientists have jointly signed a declaration dismissing the existence of a climate crisis and insisting that carbon dioxide is beneficial to Earth, contrary to the popular alarmist narrative.

  

  “There is no climate emergency,” the Global Climate Intelligence Group (CLINTEL) said in its World Climate Declaration (pdf), made public in August. “Climate science should be less political, while climate policies should be more scientific. Scientists should openly address uncertainties and exaggerations in their predictions of global warming, while politicians should dispassionately count the real costs as well as the imagined benefits of their policy measures.”

  A total of 1,609 scientists and professionals from around the world have signed the declaration, including 321 from the United States.

  The coalition pointed out that Earth’s climate has varied as long as it has existed, with the planet experiencing several cold and warm phases. The Little Ice Age only ended as recently as 1850, they said.

  “Therefore, it is no surprise that we now are experiencing a period of warming,” the declaration said.

  Warming is happening “far slower” than predicted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

  “Climate models have many shortcomings and are not remotely plausible as policy tools,” the coalition said, adding that these models “exaggerate the effect of greenhouse gases” and “ignore the fact that enriching the atmosphere with CO2 is beneficial.” For instance, even though climate alarmists characterize CO2 as environmentally-damaging, the coalition pointed out that the gas is “not a pollutant.”

  Carbon dioxide is “essential” to all life on earth and is “favorable” for nature. Extra CO2 results in the growth of global plant biomass while also boosting the yields of crops worldwide.

  CLINTEL also dismissed the narrative of global warming being linked to increased natural disasters like hurricanes, floods, and droughts, stressing that there is “no statistical evidence” to support these claims.

  “There is no climate emergency. Therefore, there is no cause for panic and alarm. We strongly oppose the harmful and unrealistic net-zero CO2 policy proposed for 2050. Go for adaptation instead of mitigation; adaptation works whatever the causes are,” it said.

  “To believe the outcome of a climate model is to believe what the model makers have put in. This is precisely the problem of today’s climate discussion to which climate models are central. Climate science has degenerated into a discussion based on beliefs, not on sound self-critical science. Should not we free ourselves from the naive belief in immature climate models?”

  Climate Models and Sunlight Reflection

  Among the CLINTEL signatories are two Nobel laureates—physicists John Francis Clauser from the United States and Ivan Giaever, a Norwegian-American.

  Mr. Clauser has made a significant addition to climate models to dismiss the narrative of global warming: the visible light reflected by cumulus clouds which, on average, cover half of the earth.

  

  Current climate models vastly underestimate this aspect of cumulus cloud reflection, which plays a key role in regulating the earth’s temperature. Mr. Clauser previously told President Joe Biden that he disagreed with his climate policies.

  In May, Mr. Clauser was elected to the board of directors at the CO2 Coalition, a group focusing on the beneficial contributions of carbon dioxide in the environment.

  “The popular narrative about climate change reflects a dangerous corruption of science that threatens the world’s economy and the well-being of billions of people,” Mr. Clauser said in a May 5 statement.

  “Misguided climate science has metastasized into massive shock-journalistic pseudoscience. In turn, the pseudoscience has become a scapegoat for a wide variety of other unrelated ills.”

  “It has been promoted and extended by similarly misguided business marketing agents, politicians, journalists, government agencies, and environmentalists. In my opinion, there is no real climate crisis.”

  False Doomsday Predictions, a Presidential Issue

  CLINTEL’s declaration against the climate change narrative counters propaganda spread by climate alarmists who have long predicted doomsday scenarios triggered by global warming—none of which have ever come true.

  In 1970, some climate scientists predicted that the earth would move into a new ice age by the 21st century. Pollution expert James Lodge predicted that “air pollution may obliterate the sun and cause a new ice age in the first third of the new century,” according to The Boston Globe.

  

  In May 1982, Mostafa Tolba, then-executive director of the United Nations environmental program, said that if the world did not change course, it would face an “environmental catastrophe which will witness devastation as complete, as irreversible, as any nuclear holocaust” by 2000.

  In June 2008, James Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Sciences, said that within five to 10 years, the Arctic would have no ice left in the summer.

  As climate alarmists continue to spread propaganda about global warming, the topic has become an issue in the 2024 presidential race, with multiple candidates openly dismissing it.

  In a July 13 post on X, Democrat presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said that climate change “is being used to control us through fear.”

  “Freedom and free markets are a much better way to stop pollution. Polluters make themselves rich by making the public pay for the damage they do,” he said.

  During the first 2024 GOP presidential debate, candidate Vivek Ramaswamy called climate change a “hoax.”

  “The reality is, the anti-carbon agenda is the wet blanket on our economy. And so the reality is, more people are dying of bad climate change policies than they are of actual climate change,” he said.

  High Temperatures, Biden’s Appliance Crackdown

  Climate activists have insisted that global warming is responsible for the soaring temperatures across the United States, even claiming that temperatures are hitting record highs.

  In a recent interview with The Epoch Times, John Christy, a climatologist and professor of atmospheric science at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, dismissed the narrative of record high temperatures.

  “Regionally, the West has seen its largest number of hot summer records in the past 100 years, but the Ohio Valley and Upper Midwest are experiencing their fewest,” he said.

  “For the conterminous U.S. as a whole, the last 10 years have produced only an average number of records. The 1930s are still champs.”

  Climate change policies have been used to justify sweeping lifestyle changes across the United States by the Energy Department, like restricting home appliances, and sometimes, even outright banning them.

  In June, the Energy Department proposed rules that would require ceiling fans to become more energy efficient, a development that could lead to manufacturers having to shell out $86.6 million per year in “increased equipment costs.”

  In February, the DOE proposed energy efficiency rules targeting gas stoves that would affect half of all new models of such stoves sold in the United States while making most of the existing ones noncompliant.

  In July, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission proposed a policy that would remove nearly all existing portable gas generators from the market.

  The Biden administration has already implemented a ban on incandescent light bulbs, which came into effect on Aug. 1.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 21:40

• FEMA To Blast All Smartphones , TVs, Radios With Mass Alert Test On October 4
  FEMA To Blast All Smartphones , TVs, Radios With Mass Alert Test On October 4

  On Oct. 4, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will push mass alerts across the nation on every television, smartphone, and radio with a notice that USA Today said would read:

  “This is a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System, issued by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, covering the United States from 14:20 to 14:50 hours ET. This is only a test. No action is required by the public.”

  FEMA’s last test occurred in 2021 during the Covid pandemic. At the time, the emergency agency sent test alerts nationwide, causing all phones, televisions, and radios to blast an annoying sound. 

  Here’s what to expect via a smartphone next month:

  “THIS IS A TEST of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System. No action is needed.”

  

  USA Today said the nationwide test comes “in the wake of the horrific fires on the island of Maui on Aug. 8, when warning sirens that might have alerted people to the danger weren’t deployed, it’s a reminder of what systems are in place should they be needed.”

  Some on social media said the upcoming test will sound like “The Purge.”

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 21:20

• Colorado Controversy Raises Questions Over The Meaning Of The Gadsden Flag
  Colorado Controversy Raises Questions Over The Meaning Of The Gadsden Flag

  Authored by Jonathan Turley,

  The historic Gadsden flag is at the heart of a controversy involving a twelve-year-old boy in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

  The child was removed from the school due to a patch on his backpack featuring the flag.

  The school district defended the action and claimed that, despite its historical symbolism, it is now considered racist and connected to slavery.

  Not only is the flag a historical image originally unconnected to slavery, but the action (in my view) contravenes core free speech protections.

  

  The flag was designed by Christopher Gadsden of South Carolina in 1775 as a symbol of the defiance of colonists to British rule. (Some trace the origins of the flag earlier to a design by Benjamin Franklin). Featuring a timber snake, it affirmed the view of the colonists that they would not be stepped on by overbearing British officials and troops.

  While Gadsden would become a brigadier general in the Continental Army, he gave the flag to Commodore Esek Hopkins who later adopted it as his flag as Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Navy.  For the revolutionaries, it embodied the essence of the war: they were the victims of the British overstepping their authority and treading upon the rights of the colonies.

  The historic image is still cherished by many, including those who see it as a symbol of defiance of individual citizens to overreaching government action.

  That was the view at The Vanguard School in Colorado Springs. A video on the social media platform X, shows the 12-year-old elementary school student being removed from class.

  A staff member explained that the image is now deemed “disruptive to the classroom environment” and that it has “origins with slavery.” The boy’s parent is told that the child must remove the patch before he can return to school.

  The staffer tells the parent to speak with Jeff Yocum, the director of operations at the school.

  Yocum reportedly cited research by a graphic design professor at Iowa State University Paul Bruski, who declared the flag as now a symbol of hate: 

  “Because of its creator’s history and because it is commonly flown alongside ‘Trump 2020’ flags, the Confederate battle flag and other white-supremacist flags, some may now see the Gadsden flag as a symbol of intolerance and hate – or even racism.”

  

  Yocum also reportedly cited a U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ruling involving a Postal worker, which found that while the flag “originated in the Revolutionary War in a non-racial context,” despite its “historic origins and meaning of the symbol, it also has since been sometimes interpreted to convey racially-tinged messages.”

  We previously discussed how the EEOC reinstated a case in 2016 of an employee objecting to another employee wearing a cap with the symbol.

  Clearly, symbols can have different meanings for different people. I disagree with Professor Bruski, but respect his right to raise such objections. The question is whether others respect the right of those with opposing views, including viewing this flag as an important and inspiring symbol of the American Revolution.

  The censorship of the image strikes me as a clear denial of free speech rights for this student. I obviously do not agree with the historical interpretation, but I am far more concerned about the constitutional interpretation of the school district allowing such censorship of images.

  It is an ironic moment for a flag that symbolized the resistance to overbearing government actions and the denial of core rights in the American Revolution.

  *  *  *

  Update: Today the school district reversed its decision and will now allow the student and the flag back into the school:

  From Vanguard’s founding we have proudly supported our Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the ordered liberty that all Americans have enjoyed for almost 250 years.

  The Vanguard School recognizes the historical significance of the Gadsden flag and its place in history.

  This incident is an occasion for us to reaffirm our deep commitment to a classical education in support of these American principles.

  At this time, the Vanguard School Board and the District have informed the student’s family that he may attend school with the Gadsden flag patch visible on his backpack.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 21:00

• Poor Americans Skip Meals, Can't Afford Power Bills, Miss Rent Payments, In Era Of 'Bidenomics'
  Poor Americans Skip Meals, Can’t Afford Power Bills, Miss Rent Payments, In Era Of ‘Bidenomics’

  Amidst the chaos and disinformation being pumped out of the White House and echoed by corporate media cheerleaders, we all remember this headline: 

  

  We all know every politician lies. Some tell half-truths, while others, such as the Biden administration, attempt to convince folks it is daylight while it’s midnight. An increasing number of Americans can see right through the propaganda, hence why Oliver Anthony’s blue-collar anthem “Rich Men North Of Richmond” continues to rank number one on Billboard Hot 100. 

  

  Or that is why President Biden’s approval ratings remain cratered. 

  

  This leaves us with a Bloomberg report citing fintech startup Propel, an app aimed at Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients, that reveals an increasing number of Americans are struggling to pay rent and put food on the table. 

  Among households using the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program’s boosted pandemic benefits, 42% skipped meals in August and 55% ate less because they couldn’t afford food, more than double last year’s share, according to a Wednesday report from Propel Inc., a benefits software developer.

  

  Bloomberg said:

  The data also highlight that households were worse off in August from just a month ago. Since July, an increasing share of low-income households had utilities shut off, couldn’t afford the prior month’s utility bill or couldn’t afford rent. More than two-thirds of those surveyed who were receiving boosted SNAP payments said they had some form of debt.

  Propel’s alarming report is an eye-opener, considering we’ve pointed out that mid/low tier consumers have depleted savings and racked up insurmountable credit card debt to make ends meet in the era of ‘Bidenomics’ inflation. Factor in a cooling labor market (read: Job Openings Crater, Prior Data “Unexpectedly” Revised Sharply Lower). These folks have limited safety nets as social support expires. Just wait until student loan payments kick in in several weeks.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 20:40

• Rise In Crime: Nordstrom Closes Shop In SF, Dollar Store Locks Up Merchandise
  Rise In Crime: Nordstrom Closes Shop In SF, Dollar Store Locks Up Merchandise

  Authored by Bryan Jung via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours)

  

  A nationwide crime wave is forcing many retailers, large and small, to close their doors or lock up their merchandise.

  One example is Nordstrom, which made an announcement in May that it’s closing its flagship store in downtown San Francisco after 35 years in business.

  The location inside Westfield Mall said goodbye to its last customers on Aug. 27, after opening in October 1988.

  The store at the corner of Fifth and Market Streets once occupied five floors and spanned more than 312,000 square feet but is now closing like many other retailers because of a surge in crime and poor sales.

  San Francisco Centre has suffered from a rise in shoplifting, homelessness, and public drug use.

  A Popular 35-Year Store Location Closes Its Doors

  A former shopping staple in downtown San Francisco, the neighborhood’s “unsafe conditions for customers, retailers and employees,” made operations difficult to sustain, a member of the city’s Board of Supervisors, Matt Dorsey, posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.

  The now-empty Nordstrom location has been described by local media outlets as desolated with countless empty displays and mannequins packaged away.

  Other major retailers in the area, including Old Navy Whole Foods, AT&T, Anthropologie, AmazonGo, Office Depot, and Saks Off Fifth Avenue, closed earlier this summer.

  Remaining stores have been forced to lock up their stock to deter shoplifters.

  Nordstrom Rack, across the street from the flagship location, shut down operations in June.

  Even the Westfield Mall announced in June that it would be closing, after operating on Market Street for more than 20 years, local TV news station KRON4 reported.

  The future viability of the San Francisco Centre shopping district is uncertain.

  San Francisco Swamped With Crime And Empty Store Fronts

  In addition to the rampant drug use, homelessness, and crime, the city has lost thousands to remote work after the COVID-19 pandemic, which has decimated vast areas of its commercial neighborhoods.

  Office vacancies in San Francisco reached a record high of 31 percent in May, enough space for 92,000 workers, according to the Daily Mail.

  The loss of office workers is expected to contribute to a budget shortfall of $1.3 billion in five years, while a decline in property tax revenue alone may cost nearly $200 million per year, according to the city’s chief accountant.

  Sales tax revenue for South of Market, or SoMA, where the stores were located, has seen a 25 percent decline from the first quarter of 2019.

  Ms. Breed’s office announced that it was working on changing laws and tax reforms that would bring more businesses to the area.

  IKEA’s opening of a new location at 945 Market Street on Aug. 23 was touted as a sign by Ms. Breed that things weren’t too bad, calling IKEA’s move “a game changer.”

  Mr. Dorsey said that the city will “have some serious issues to work on.”

  “San Francisco has always had ups and downs, but I’m going to tell you we always come back,” he said. “And I’m not going to lose my optimism about my district or my city.”

  Last week, city authorities announced 17 new pop-up shops that will move into empty storefronts in the downtown Financial District in late September, according to ABC7 News in San Francisco.

  Shoplifting Hits Democrat-Run Regions Across the US

  Shoplifting has become a problem for retailers in major metropolitan regions nationwide, with even discount stores being hit.

  On Aug. 24, Dollar Tree Chairman and CEO Rick Dreiling said the discount retailer would start locking up items to prevent growing theft.

  Mr. Dreiling has blamed shrink, an industry term for stolen items and damages, for causing the company to miss its earnings forecasts and cut its outlook in May.

  The retailer’s gross profit margins tumbled to 29.8 percent in the second quarter of 2023 from 32.7 percent in the second quarter of 2022.

  “We are now taking a very defensive approach to shrink,” Mr. Dreiling said, noting that inventory losses had “advanced a little further than what we had anticipated.”

  The spree of store theft has already forced larger stores such as CVS and Target to lock up entire isles of items.

  The CEO also suggested that some items with the highest rates of theft would be removed from stores altogether but wouldn’t specify any in particular.

  Representatives for Dollar Tree and Nordstrom didn’t respond by press time to requests by the Epoch Times for comment.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 20:20

• Half Of Americans Live In States Where Weed Is Legal, Health Officials Push To Ease Restrictions
  Half Of Americans Live In States Where Weed Is Legal, Health Officials Push To Ease Restrictions

  This week in August 2013, the U.S. government cleared the way for the legalization of marijuana in the country, as the Justice Department stated in a press release that it was not going to enforce federal law prohibiting the drug’s use in states that were launching recreational cannabis programs at the time.

  

  Ten years down the line, half of Americans live in states where marijuana is legal and another 80 million have access to medical marijuana.

  As Statista’s Katharina Buchholz notes, this means that almost three quarters of U.S. residents live in a state with some sort of legal weed.

  

  You will find more infographics at Statista

  In 2013, it was Colorado and Washington which were gearing up to legalize marijuana after successful ballot initiatives as part of the November 2012 elections.

  But the federal government’s policy statement was also relevant for another 18 states and the District of Columbia, which at the time had already legalized medical marijuana.

  Data from the Census Bureau shows that between 2012 and 2014, a substantial number of people continued to gain access to medical marijuana as larger states like Massachusetts and Illinois passed measures.

  After that year, shifts to recreational weed legislation dominate the statistic with significant legalizations in California (2016), Michigan (2018), New Jersey (2020) and New York (2021), effectively lowering the number of people under medical marijuana legislation only.

  Despite this, a total of 14 states have passed medical marijuana ballots or legislation after 2015, including Pennsylvania, Ohio, Florida, Utah and most recently Kentucky.

  And today, Bloomberg reports that US health officials are recommending easing restrictions on marijuana, a move that sets the stage for potentially expanding the cannabis market.

  A top official at the Department of Health and Human Services wrote Drug Enforcement Agency Administrator Anne Milgram calling for marijuana to be reclassified as a Schedule III drug under the Controlled Substances Act, according to a letter dated Aug. 29 seen by Bloomberg News.

  With the health department’s recommendation in hand, the DEA must now conduct its own review process before coming to a decision.

  Should the DEA reclassify marijuana, it would mark a critical shift away from its status as a Schedule I substance, which includes drugs with high abuse risk, like heroin, LSD and ecstasy. 

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 20:00

• Naval Aviation Commanders Could Receive Up To $105,000 In Bonus
  Naval Aviation Commanders Could Receive Up To $105,000 In Bonus

  By Diana Correll of NavyTimes

  Active duty commanding officers of aviation units are now eligible for a $105,000 retention bonus for three more years of service.

  

  The deal is a total of $5,000 more than what they were offered the past three fiscal years under the Aviation Command Retention Bonus program, which aims “to retain those officers with the capabilities and command experience in our primary warfighting missions that are critical for the future of our service,” according to a naval administrative message.

  Commanders under this year’s offer will receive $35,000 annually, with their obligation ending after 22 years of cumulative service, the NAVADMIN said.

  Additionally, the Navy is also offering a $35,000 retention bonus for an additional two years of service — an option that wasn’t offered last year. Those officers will receive $17,500 annually, and complete at least 21 years of cumulative service.

  Once the CO tour wraps up, those who agreed to the bonus must serve in a post-command commander tour lasting between 24 and 36 months.

  “The minimum [Aviation Command Retention Bonus] obligation ends after 21 years of commissioned service, the projected rotation date of the assigned [post-command commander[ tour, or 2 years from the contract acceptance date, whichever is later and depending on contract length,” the NAVADMIN said.

  Those eligible to apply must have screened during the Aviation Command Screen Board as the commanding officer of an eligible operational, operational training, or special mission commander command.

  Applications are open until the end of the month.

  In March, the Navy announced reserve officers were eligible for $100,000 through the Training and Administration of the Reserve Aviation Command Retention Bonus program.

  Officers under that program would receive an initial payment of $34,000, followed by two additional annual payments of $33,000 for at least another three years of service that includes a post-command commander tour.

  The Navy emphasized the significance of retention bonuses in its budget request released in March as the service navigates challenges keeping and recruiting new sailors and officers.

  “Retention has … been difficult with a strong national economy, so bonuses and incentives to retain our current naval force [are] a priority,” the budget document said.

  Even so, the Navy surpassed its retention goals for FY22. As of February, the service was ahead of its FY23 monthly retention targets, Navy Times previously reported.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 19:40

• Canada Issues 2SLGBTQI+ "Travel Advisory" For The U.S., Whatever That Means
  Canada Issues 2SLGBTQI+ “Travel Advisory” For The U.S., Whatever That Means

  The genius bureaucrats in Canada have issued either a “LGBTQ2S+” or “2SLGBTQI+” travel advisory for the United States, depending on which news source you pull your information from and which acronym is popular this week. 

  The country has “updated its international travel advisories to warn members of the LGBTQ+ community that they may face discrimination if they travel to some places in the United States,” according to CTV News. 

  The advisory was put into place after at least 18 U.S. states “passed laws that limit or ban certain things relevant to the community, including gender-affirming medical care for minors and teaching about sexual orientation in schools”.

  We don’t get it. So in other words, be careful driving on a highway in Florida, because you can’t pull over and give your minor child a sex change?

  The travel advisory follows the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s warning in May about “threats of violence” against the LGBTQ+ community. There’s been no word on whether or not the Homeland Security warning included the “2S” and “I” portions of Canada’s acronym. 

  

  “Some states have enacted laws and policies” that affect LGBTQ+ travellers, Global Affairs Canada said Tuesday. The warning “doesn’t specify which states, or which of their laws or customs, are of concern,” CTV added.

  “Carefully consider whether you are comfortable visiting a destination where the laws and social customs affecting (LGBTQ+) people differ from those in Canada,” the Canadian government warns. 

  Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland said Tuesday: “Even as we work hard on that government-to-government relationship, every Canadian government, very much including our government, needs to put at the centre of everything we do the interests and the safety of every single Canadian and every single group of Canadians.”

  Recall back in May the NAACP issued a travel advisory for the state of Florida, stating: “Florida is openly hostile toward African Americans, people of color and LGBTQ+ individuals. Before traveling to Florida, please understand that the state of Florida devalues and marginalizes the contributions of, and the challenges faced by African Americans and other communities of color.” 

  In an accompanying statement, the 114-year-old organization said the travel advisory “comes in direct response to Governor Ron DeSantis’ aggressive attempts to erase Black history and to restrict diversity, equity, and inclusion programs in Florida schools.” 

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 19:20

• Pfizer To Restart Production At Damaged North Carolina Facility In Q4
  Pfizer To Restart Production At Damaged North Carolina Facility In Q4

  By Kate Magill of Manufacturing Drive,

  Pfizer plans to restart production at its damaged Rocky Mount, North Carolina manufacturing site by Q4 of this year, the company announced Monday.

  

  The drugmaker reopened the site on Aug. 7 and said efforts to restart production are on track, with several areas of the site now operational, including its Incoming Materials, Chemical and Biological Quality labs, packaging and inspection operations and supply chain and warehouse.

  Pzifer has been scrambling to get production back on track at Rocky Mount after a tornado ripped through the facility last month, causing extensive damage to its warehouse. All 40,000 pallets of packaging supplies and finished goods in the company’s warehouse were damaged.

  The shutdown of the site — which produces nearly 50 types of drugs, including about a quarter of Pfizer’s sterile injectable drugs such as painkillers and anesthesia — sparked worry about shortages across the country. The site produces 8% of U.S. supply of sterile injectable drugs.

  In a move to mitigate future issues, the company is working to release any product that was not impacted and passes inspection to distribution channels. It also secured the use of a temporary warehouse.

  “Pfizer is also working on knowledge and documentation transfers for product manufacturing (tech transfers) to other sterile injectable sites in the network to accelerate the supply of its products,” the company said in its announcement.

  “This includes working with regulatory bodies to ensure compliance and to obtain approvals.”

  As part of its strategy to avoid shortages, earlier this month drugmaker released a list of 12 drugs put on its emergency ordering list, meaning they can only be ordered directly from Pfizer and in capped quantities.

  The company also noted in an earlier update that it is exploring the use of alternative manufacturing sites at other U.S. locations in its network.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 19:00

• Chicago News Crew Robbed At Gunpoint While Reporting On String Of Robberies
  Chicago News Crew Robbed At Gunpoint While Reporting On String Of Robberies

  Today in “too sad to be ironic” news, a Chicago television news crew doing a report on a string of robberies this week wound up getting robbed at gun point themselves by three armed men wearing ski masks. 

  A reporter and photographer for spanish-language station Univision Chicago were filming around 5AM in Chicago’s West Town neighborhood, AP/ABC reported, when three masked men held them at gunpoint and robbed them of their television cameras “and other items”. 

  Luis Godinez, vice president of news at Univision Chicago, commented: “They were approached with guns and robbed. Mainly it was personal items, and they took a camera.”’

  “They’re OK, and we’re working on it together as a team,” he said of his crew.

  The story was specifically on robberies in the West Town community where the robbery took place. The spot was supposed to run on the morning news but footage that was shot was “in the stolen camera” and, as a result, the report never made it to air.

  

  ABC/AP reported that the victims were a 28-year-old man and 42-year-old man and that the armed robbers fled in the vehicles they showed up to the scene in: a gray sedan and black SUV.

  “The offenders then took the victims’ belongings before returning to the vehicles and fleeing,” a police spokesperson told the Washington Post. 

  Astonishingly, this is now the second robbery this month involving a television news crew after a WLS-TV photographer was robbed and assaulted earlier this month while preparing to cover a story on Chicago’s West Side. 

  The corresponding union for the reporters, the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians Local 41, has now issued a warning about growing safety threats to those in the field covering the news. 

  The union’s president said: “Our news photographers and reporters provide a very important public service in keeping our community informed. We are committed to making sure that their safety comes first.” 

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 18:40

• An Important Lesson From Chicago On Confronting The Enemies Of Free Speech
  An Important Lesson From Chicago On Confronting The Enemies Of Free Speech

  Submitted by Mark Glennon of Wirepoints

  The modern left’s assault on free speech is perhaps the most terrifying element of the madness we have succumbed to for the simple reason that democracy is meaningless without it. The assault has been largely successful. Voices that should be heard are muzzled and, more insidiously, countless other voices are frightened into silence.

  We see that suppression routinely. Too often, readers here tell us of being intimidated into silence by the cancel mob, a mob now controlling much of our government. The iron boot of government on one’s throat is no small matter: Fear of the cost of litigating against a government intent on suppressing free speech is particularly intimidating.

  That intimidation must come to an end. Help is often available – a resource you should prize. A number of law firms specializing in free speech are now available, pro bono – free or at reduced cost. And they are winning, thanks to federal courts that still recognize the First Amendment right to free speech.

  A Chicago company’s free speech case is an illustration.

  Townstone Financial is a smallish, Chicago-based home mortgage originator. It marketed itself primarily through a weekly one-hour show on AM 560 called The Townstone Financial Show. They discussed issues of interest to homebuyers and offered advice to listeners and callers, sometimes getting into topics like crime, policing, movies and the like.

  In 2020, the federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) sued Townstone claiming that the company violated a fair lending law by discriminating against African-Americans.

  However, the CFPB never alleged any case of Townstone discriminating on mortgage applications.

  Instead, the CFPB said Townstone discriminated through its marketing in its radio show by “discouraging” applications from Blacks. The CFPB’s evidence was a handful of comments on the show made over a four-year period representing perhaps 10 minutes of air time out of about 10,000 minutes.

  Some of those comments might be regarded as offensive or in bad taste. They referred to a particular Jewel food store at Clark and Division Streets in Chicago as “Jungle Jewel” and included talk of certain Black areas having “hoodlum weekend” and approaching “a real war zone” or as “crazy” and places “to be driven through quickly” while avoiding eye contact.

  But the CFPB did not produce even one example of anybody being discouraged from applying with Townstone. Nor, according to Townstone’s lawyers, has the company ever received any complaint about its show.

  The comments from the show cited by the CFPB were taken out of context and meant little, Townstone believed. For example, the “Jungle Jewel” was commonly called that by people in the area, and referred to as such even by a Black blogger, who called it “a socioeconomic nightmare and a haven for street crazies.”

  As Towntone’s lawyers later argued, if speech like Townstone’s is illegal, what wouldn’t violate the law? “Are creditors permitted to talk about crime at all? Education? Homelessness? Welfare? Poverty? Income distribution? Are they permitted to criticize the Black Lives Matter movement? Support the police? Criticize the Catholic Church about child abuse scandals? Support the BDS movement? Criticize the BDS movement? Support abortion rights? Oppose immigration?”

  The lawsuit threatened to entirely destroy Townstone.

  Its owner decided to fight.

  But how do you fight against the government, which has unlimited resources?

  Enter the Pacific Legal Foundation, a nonprofit with free speech expertise, which represented the company.

  A federal court in Chicago threw out the CFPB’s lawsuit in February. However, the ruling was based mostly on the court’s conclusion that the CFPB had authority only to regulate actual discrimination in lending, not marketing conduct that might be deemed “discouraging.” The court therefore didn’t need to get to the First Amendment defense.

  However, the CFPB has now appealed to the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, so the free speech defense is being raised again, and Townstone is getting still more help. Among the other firms filing amicus — friend of the court — briefs are Hamilton Lincoln Law Institute, America’s Future, Free Speech Coalition, Free Speech Defense and Education Fund, U.S. Constitutional Rights Legal Defense Fund, and Conservative Legal Defense and Education Fund.

  Lawyers from one of those firms, Hamilton Lincoln Law Institute, were guests on our podcast last year discussing legal issues with the University of Illinois’ Diversity, Equity and Inclusion policies and Gov. Pritzker’s gas tax signage law.

  It’s amicus brief in Townstone’s case summarizes it nicely: “Congress has not deputized CFPB as the ‘Tasteful Joke Police,’ nor would the First Amendment permit that delegation…. By conflating candid discussions of crime with the disparagement of African-American communities, CFPB seeks to do just that. Under the First Amendment, it cannot.”

  If you think Townstone’s case or other First Amendment cases you’ve heard about are isolated examples, you are dangerously uninformed.

  The assault on free speech is massive. Much of the government, social media and the press are partners in the Censorship Industrial Complex. That term was coined by Michael Shellenberger, who laid out 56 pages of evidence in congressional testimony last year. The Missouri v Biden case, now on appeal and likely to go to the U.S. Supreme Court, is already blowing the lid off much of the unholy alliance. Read about the massive evidence of record, discussed in the trial court’s Independence Day order.

  And if you think the assault on free speech isn’t ongoing in Illinois, you are again dangerously uninformed. Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul essentially thumbed his nose at the First Amendment when he personally drafted the Illinois law targeting alleged pro-life “misinformation” given out by crisis pregnancy groups near abortion clinics. A federal judge ridiculed it and enjoined its enforcement earlier this month. Chalk up that victory to another of the pro bono law firms available to help on First Amendment issues, the Thomas More Society.

  Gov. JB Pritzker “is gaining a reputation as a hard-left culture warrior who is happy to silence political opponents,” as the Wall Street Journal recently said. “Pritzker apparently thinks that invoking the name Trump is a justification to get away with saying or doing anything. Not under the U.S. Constitution,” wrote the Journal.

  He told CNN, “There ought to be a private right of action for anybody that’s dissuaded or told something that’s false, that’s the important thing.” That would be flagrantly unconstitutional.

  Under the guise of banning book bans, the General assembly passed and Pritzker signed a bill delegating control over what books libraries carry to a group run by an open Marxist. Most recently, they passed an “anti-doxing” law that flies in the face of textbook First Amendment law, as we explained here.

  Illinois Senators Durbin and Duckworth have been among the progressives jawboning tech platforms to do more censorship. And Illinois Congressman Sean Casten introduced a bill to strip courts of the power of judicial review — their power to declare laws invalid as violations of the First Amendment, or anything else.

  Do not stand silent when your right to free speech is suppressed. Know that quality legal firms are often available for free. There are more beyond those I’ve mentioned here.

  The assault on free speech must be defeated at all cost. Do your part.

  Tyler Durden
  Wed, 08/30/2023 – 18:20

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