Today’s News 7th January 2024

• Obama's Weird New Movie And America's Extreme Vulnerability To Cyber-Attack
  Obama’s Weird New Movie And America’s Extreme Vulnerability To Cyber-Attack

  Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.us

  There has been a lot of buzz lately about a recently released film by Netflix titled ‘Leave The World Behind’ based on a novel by the same name.  The plot revolves around a catastrophic collapse in the US triggered by a cyber attack (and mass drone attack) that shuts down the internet and disrupts the global economy, leading to questions of who might have been behind the sabotage?

  The most interesting aspect of the film is not so much the story (which is lackluster at best), but the fact that Barack Obama was so deeply involved in the making of the film as executive producer and as adviser on the script. This has led many people to suggest the movie is actually predictive programming – Propaganda designed to acclimate the masses to the idea of an event that is planned to happen in the near future.

  Similar concerns were raised back in 2021 when the World Economic Forum oversaw a “war game” called Cyberpolygon, an event meant to simulate a massive cyber attack on the vulnerable functions of the world-wide web. The reason Cyberpolygon raised so many eyebrows was perfectly understandable; the WEF had also hosted another simulation at the end of 2019 called Event 201. The game, which included the CEOs of some of the most powerful health and media corporations in the world along with numerous government officials, “coincidentally” focused on the outbreak of a global coronavirus pandemic, and it was held only a couple of months before the real thing happened.

  In other words, it was as if the globalists at the WEF knew that covid was about to strike.

  While Hollywood interpretations of cyber attacks are usually exaggerated in terms of the true effects, there is a very real and considerable threat associated with such a disaster. So-called “experts” in the tech field often dismiss the wider dangers to the internet itself because they have been indoctrinated into believing that the design of the web has too many redundancies. In other words, they act as if it is invincible.

  This is not really the case. Though data loss can be prevented through cloud storage, the internet as a mechanism can still be shut down or taken down deliberately for long periods of time.

  In the past I have written about a very interesting event that was barely covered by the corporate media called the “Fastly Outage.”  In June of 2021 there was an internet outage that led to large swaths of the web going completely dark, including a number of mainstream news sites, Amazon, eBay, Twitch, Reddit. A host of government websites also went down. All this happened when content delivery network (CDN) company Fastly experienced a “bug.” Although Amazon had its website back online within 20 minutes, the brief outage cost the company over $5.5 million in sales.

  A content delivery network is a geographically distributed network of proxy servers and their data centers. They make up the what is known as the “backbone” of the internet.

  

  Fastly identified and fixed the problem within two hours and continues to claim the outage had nothing to do with a cyber attack. However, a huge vulnerability for the internet (a center of structural support Carl von Clausewitz would’ve called a “schwerpunkt”) was revealed to the public. A sizable portion of the web is dependent on only a handful of CDN companies, including Fastly.

  It is also through collusion with these companies that governments are able to implement an “internet kill switch” in the face of possible civil unrest. A cyber attack would simply remove the government as the arbiter (or act as a false flag scapegoat so the government can avoid blame).  But what would really happen if we lost the internet for a week, or a month or a year? In the US the result would be calamity because our economy has become far too dependent on digitization.

  Around 10% of US GDP is directly tied to online commerce. This doesn’t seem like much, but a loss of that GDP would send the US into immediate and steep recession. Around 17 million jobs in the US are generated by commercial internet enterprises, and around 38% of these workers are employed by small businesses. According to surveys 70% of American workers say they cannot do their jobs effectively without internet access.

  Keep in mind, if the trend of “work from home” during the covid lockdowns had stuck, an even bigger piece of the economy would be dependent on the health of the web.

  The five industries considered most vulnerable to cyber attack are public administration, healthcare and pharmaceuticals, finance and insurance, education and retail. That is to say, these are the industries that are attacked most often. Attacks on vital utilities are usually the favorite set pieces for disasters portrayed in fiction and film, but these are actually far less worrisome. The real danger is the potential for an attack on the internet as a system. All it would take is for a couple CDNs or more to be hit simultaneously to cause vast online blackouts.

  Most important of all are the ways in which international banking and finance utilize online networks to maintain the flow money. Without the web, trade velocity dies immediately and building it back from implosion could take years.

  But who would benefit from such an attack? Certainly, foreign powers might see the crippling of America’s digital infrastructure as a way to severely damage the country without having to fight directly and militarily. However, there are also a number of benefits to the globalists.

  For example, one of the biggest obstacles for the elites during their attempt to institute medical tyranny and the ‘Great Reset’ during covid was the proliferation of factual data that debunked the pandemic narrative. American conservatives represented a serious barrier to their success with tens of millions of gun owning patriots refusing to comply. The harder they pushed, the greater the chance of an armed insurgency.

  Even though the establishment had every single Big Tech conglomerate on their side when it came to mass censorship of contrary information, they still failed to stop the spread of the truth – Covid was nowhere near the threat they hyped it up to be and the public was quickly made aware of this by the alternative media. The elites did not have as much control over the web as they thought they did.

  In the event of a large scale cyberattack, the internet could be shut down completely, leaving only corporate media sources to filter information and control the narrative. The alternative media would be silenced and the public would be left in confusion, desperately searching for answers. Interestingly, this is a core theme of Obama’s ‘Leave The World Behind’ – The idea of a population utterly cut off from reliable information and scrambling to figure out who is attacking them.

  The internet has become an integral pillar of western economies to the point that a majority of people would not know how to live without it should it disappear. This is the disturbing reality we face in the midst of a growing series of geopolitical conflicts and more oppressive governments. It would seem it’s only a matter of time before there’s a major disruption.

  The solution is pretty straightforward – Localization of trade and production is the way to prevent full spectrum collapse, and alternative communication networks such as ham radio networks can prevent information silence. There is no reason why Americans should have to become subservient to the whims of globalism, the interdependent supply chain or digitization; they can and should create their own backup plan. Getting people to realize this and implement basic local measures is where we run into difficulties. Sadly, a lot of first-world citizens assume that the system will always be there for them when they need it, and they don’t actively seek out solutions until disaster is at their doorstep.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 23:20

• Dry January? These Are The Most Popular Cocktails For 2024
  Dry January? These Are The Most Popular Cocktails For 2024

  Dry January might be be required to recover from the excesses of the holidays, but a whole new year beckons with more successes, milestones, and achievements, perhaps requiring more or less libations, depending on the country one is from.

  But what are people craving from their alcohol mixes?

  Visual Capitalist’s Marcus Lu charts out the most popular cocktail drinks in 2024, according to the annual consumer survey from the Bacardi Cocktail Trends Report.

  

  Ranked: Most Popular Cocktails for 2024

  The ever-versatile, but long-enduring Gin & Tonic comes in at first place (28%) for the most popular cocktail drink chosen by Bacardi’s survey respondents.

  Allegedly, the Gin & Tonic traces back to 19th century India, when English soldiers began mixing their daily rations of quinine tonic with gin. Quinine was a common malaria drug up until the early 1900s.

  The modern G&T is coupled with a fistful of ice and makes for a refreshing summer beverage. Its popularity is unparalleled across the Commonwealth, but also finds patrons in Europe, the U.S., Japan, and the Netherlands.

  

  Note: The survey was designed as multiple choice, thus percentages do not sum to 100.

  Another classic summer favorite, the Mojito comes in a close second (27%) by those surveyed. The white rum based cocktail originated in Cuba, though there is much debate on who (or which group) invented it first. Variations include using tequila instead of rum, adding muddled fruit, and switching out lime for lemon juice.

  The Margarita and Bloody Mary tie for fourth place and the unpretentious but clearly popular Whiskey and Coke rounds out the top five.

  Another 19% also love Piña Coladas (and possibly also dancing in the rain), a delicious blended mix of white-rum, cream of coconut, and pineapple juice. This island favorite is the official drink of Puerto Rico, from where it originates.

  Ranked seven to 10, are two more rum-based drinks (the Daiquiri, and the Rum and Coke) and two lemonade mixes with gin and vodka respectively.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 22:45

• Global Security In 2024: 5 Contextual Trends, 10 Possibilities
  Global Security In 2024: 5 Contextual Trends, 10 Possibilities

  Authored by Gregory Copley via The Epoch Times,

  It is more than probable that 2024 will create a confluence of major strategic trends, which could increase the likelihood of formal, kinetic conflict and continued global economic decline…

  

  Each year of the past three decades has seemed like a pivotal year in the evolution of the post-Cold War global strategic architecture, and, indeed, that has been the case. But 2024 promises to provide a number of highly significant watersheds in the progress of that new global framework.

  We should review the major concerns in priority order, in terms of the known probable events and their consequences, bearing in mind that some “uncertain” factors will move into the “certain” column during the year. The interactions from events will, to an extent, develop in accordance with their coincidence with other events. Note that all pivotal events interact with each other; nothing is evolving in isolation.

  What is significant, though, is that there are globally pervasive socio-economic trends that provide an additional contextual layering or background.

  These are the result of the accretion of event trends underway for decades.

  These should be taken as part of the framework for 2024’s geopolitical pivot points. These include the following:

  1. By the early 21st century or even the late 20th century, the exhaustion of the urban-industrial republican reforms began around the late 17th century and created several hundred years of growth, wealth, and the modern form of democracy. The maturity and exhaustion of these societies are now starting to give way to increasingly autocratic governance and lowered national productivity.

  2. The pattern of global population decline, already well underway everywhere except India and Africa (and foreseeable there in the coming decades), is causing a major drop in wealth and population health, and requires the consideration of new economic models geared to declining market sizes and declining technological innovation levels.

  3. A peaking and subsequent decline in the appeal and efficiency of major urban agglomerations is impacting political power centralization.

  4. The overwhelming and deepening decline in prestige—and therefore coercive capability—of literally all major powers in the world has ushered in an era of distrust, a lowered efficacy of military alliances, and a willingness by governments to “go their own way,” increasing the prospect for “unintended consequences,” including unanticipated conflict.

  5. The continued decline, with no reverse at present foreseeable, in the pace of scientific and technological breakthroughs or disruptive events, and a decrease in the volume and efficacy of research and development funding and marketplace trust in “scientific saviors.”

  Against this background, one must consider more immediate consequences that could possibly come to fruition in 2024, such as the following (and their timeline and priority could change as incidents trigger responses):

  Communist China

  The deep, ongoing economic collapse of communist China is leading to strategic consequences at the domestic, regional, and global levels. This could include reactive, high-risk military action by China against other states, particularly Taiwan and Vietnam, in 2024, if Chinese leader Xi Jinping were to retain power. That could result in major escalation and broadening of such conflicts, resulting in the further reduction of the Chinese regime and the removal of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

  Taiwanese military personnel drive a CM-25 armored vehicle across the street during the Han Kuang military exercise, which simulates China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) invading the island in New Taipei City, Taiwan, on July 27, 2022. (Annabelle Chih/Getty Images)

  Alternately, Xi’s removal from power in 2024 could result in a stabilized but greatly chastened and impoverished mainland Chinese society in which the CCP could retain carefully balanced control. It is also possible that an unchecked military action initiated by Xi could then trigger his removal by the Party. The prospect, at the beginning of 2024, was that the growing rift between Xi and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), as well as the growing Party and public confrontation of Xi, may preempt action by Xi.

  US Presidential Election

  The U.S. presidential election of November 2024 will clearly impact U.S. domestic harmony and international actions, as well as the trend path of the power of the U.S. dollar globally. With the probability of a decline in prestige and power projection capability of both the United States and China, the question arises as to which power will attempt to fill the power vacuum during the transitional phase-out or reduction of the Pax Americana phase of the “rules-based world order.”

  Will the United States accelerate or slow the pace of economic vulnerability due to its debt service crisis? And what could trigger a global debt crisis?

  Balance of Power in Middle East, North Africa

  The overflow of the Ethiopian civil war, the Sudanese civil war, and Egypt’s socio-economic crisis into global politics impacting the Red Sea/Suez sea lane is intimately linked with the restructuring of the Middle Eastern and North African (particularly the Horn of Africa) balance of power. This will be accompanied by a stabilization in the Levant through a conclusive outcome to the Gaza war (albeit not with an end to sporadic conflict between Israel and its immediate neighbors).

  Meanwhile, a change of power in Ethiopia could substantially alter the Red Sea/Suez Canal trade route in positive terms. It could lead to a regional accord with Egypt to dramatically transform the region.

  Israel–Hamas War

  The consequences of the Israel–Hamas war as a wider phenomenon, particularly impacting the actions of Turkey and Iran, and subsequently their relationship with Russia, has the potential impact on the Russian-controlled International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) and the rise of India as a stand-alone strategic pretender.

  The Iranian involvement in the Hamas conflict may have brought the Iranian clerical leadership under possibly terminal pressure despite the INSTC alliance, which had promised the clerics security under a Russian blanket.

  Russia–Ukraine War

  A negotiated end to the Ukraine–Russia war, possibly by spring 2024, but certainly by the end of 2024, may lead to the possible scaling back of U.S. dollar-based sanction weapons to recover ground lost to the BRICS-plus (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, plus new members) bloc and others that felt threatened by U.S. unilateralism in sovereignty intervention through the dollar. That may well depend on the outcome of the U.S. presidential election.

  Venezuela–Guyana Dispute

  The impact of the Venezuelan escalation of its conflict with Guyana has the potential to cause the United States to refocus on the Americas, coupled with a potential slowing of the anti-dollar trend among BRICS-plus bloc member states.

  A man walks by a mural campaigning for a referendum asking Venezuelans to consider annexing the Guyana-administered region of Essequibo in Caracas, Venezuela, on Nov. 28, 2023. (Federico Parra/AFP via Getty Images)

  The question is whether this is occurring too late for the United States to take advantage of the possible opportunity, largely because of the mass dollar debt owed by the U.S. government, and because of the U.S. political addiction to the weaponized use of sanctions depending on the use of dollars as a tool to punish adversaries, disregarding the long-term build-up of concerns among U.S. allies and trading partners that the weapon could be used against them.

  Africa

  There is a move toward comprehensive rejection of foreign great power dominance in Africa. That is occurring because of the decline in great power resources and budgets and, in particular, because of the declining prestige and influence of those external powers.

  At the same time, African frustration with imported geopolitical models, including artificial borders, is being matched by the growth, or return, of African philosophical and cultural approaches to governance. All of this, coupled with European and North American governance issues, will interact with the global population movement crisis.

  Green Energy

  There is a slowing down—because of declining prosperity—of trends to end fossil fuel dependence and artificially stimulate pseudo-green technologies while markets move back into a moderating position on energy sources.

  Key Western governmental initiatives to create an artificial market for green and pseudo-green energy technologies for political purposes are now, in 2024, facing increasing societal resistance due to the declining economies and increasing difficulty in sustaining wealth levels, despite governmental initiatives to control the market.

  Technological Developments

  The continued decline in the pace of scientific and technological advancement rates, already mentioned in the contextual trends as being in evidence since the early years of the 21st century, will still see key areas advance incrementally, but with fewer breakthrough technologies occurring, and at a higher cost per incident.

  This is likely to see societies—and armed forces—opting for a mix of practical, older technologies and practices despite governments often attempting to legislate the obsolescence of valid existing technologies.

  In the military sense, the attempts to evolve older weapons systems (such as the U.S. F-15 fighter, the B-52 bomber, the M1 Abrams tank family, 1960s-based hypersonic capabilities, and anti-satellite weapons) are symptomatic of the process.

  Societal Polarization

  The further polarization of many “modern” societies under modern forms of democracy is likely to be evident, particularly in the United States, Canada, Western Europe, Australia, and possibly India. Significantly, none of these societies has legal mechanisms available to overturn such societal polarization and the increasing paralysis and exhaustion of the state apparatus.

  This means that unprecedented catalysts—possibly outside their respective constitutions—must occur for each of these types of societies to change in order to cope with the necessity to create new models and shed old obligations, or else state paralysis and polarization are likely to continue.

  All of these trends are part of the natural cycle of societies. Still, we see them now in the light of modern communications technologies, and we are seeing them harmonizing on a global level. Initial responses have been to attempt to stem the pace of collapse rather than to look at strategies for the emerging era beyond the short-term uncertainties.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 22:10

• The Perfidious Unreality Of The "New Normal"
  The Perfidious Unreality Of The “New Normal”

  Authored by Kit Knightly via Off-Guardian.org,

  So, what’s with all the fake crying?

  Rachel Maddow pretended to cry about “kids in cages”. Matt Hancock pretended to cry about Covid vaccines. Sarah Sidner pretended to cry over covid. Anderson Cooper pretended to cry about Israel, so did John Kirby. Van Jones pretended to cry after Biden “won” the 2020 “election”. Adam Schiff and Adam Kinzinger both pretended to cry about January 6th.

  Don Lemon pretends to cry about pretty much everything.

  They all do it, and they’re all so bad at it.

  And speaking of pretending badly, remember those early photos of people in China lying in the street, straight as planks, supposedly killed by “Covid”?

  

  As if this scary new virus just snuffs you out mid-step to topple backwards flat on the ground in a perfect silent movie pratfall.

  And it’s not just “Covid”.

  During the run-up to the 2020 election “pretending badly” was happening everywhere.

  We were told, over and over again, “It’s going to look like Trump won, but then Biden will win at the last minute because of postal ballots”.

  And gosh darnit – they were right!

  Out of nowhere Joe Biden – ‘Creepy Uncle Joe’ – who in early 2020 was obviously the least popular democratic candidate, and even more obviously going senile – is transmogrified into the most popular presidential candidate

  of ALL TIME…

  …shattering the popular vote records by over 13 million votes.

  Such is the power of bad pretending , when you just don’t give a crap about plausibility or boring details of historical precedent.

  That was, of course, following Biden’s “miracle turnaround” in the primaries, where massive defeats in Iowa and New Hampshire left his campaign “teetering on the abyss”.

  On election night they presented us with badly pretend graphs like this:

  

  They reported that counting the first 99% of the vote took a few hours, and that counting the last 1% in a couple of swing states took two weeks.

  …and told us this was all totally normal and that anyone who said otherwise was an “election denier”.

  On January 6th 2021 they showed you an “insurrection” – a word that used to mean “an armed attempt to seize control of a government by force” but now means “some guy in a Buffalo hat putting his feet on Nancy Pelosi’s desk”.

  Then they told you to be afraid for the fate of a “democracy” which their previously blatant election-rigging had just demonstrated does not exist.

  Bad pretending at its most brazenly ballsy.

  Let’s be honest the airwaves have been saturated with this since at least 2020.

  Remember those lovable doctors and nurses shooting increasingly elaborate music videos during a supposedly deadly pandemic.

  Or doctors saying BLM protesters don’t have to stay home or social distance because “racism is a worse pandemic”.

  Blatantly bad pretending.

  The Israel-Hamas war has already produced similar scenes.

  I mean what is this Busby Berkeley 4K drone footage routine supposed to be telling us?

  Dozens of perfectly synchronized & choreographed women doing yoga poses over posters of supposed hostages as if it’s the most normal thing in the world, when it’s just NOT, is it?

  Who responds to a loved one being taken hostage by calling all their friends and arranging a synchronized yoga session?

  So, what are we looking at? How is this related to the real world?

  And don’t forget “terrorists” on motorized hang-gliders chuntering along at a leisurely pace into some of the most defended airspace on the planet.

  And of course Hamas – operating out of the world’s “largest open-air prison”, with only a couple of hours of electricity a day and limited food and fresh water – but somehow putting together professionally edited high definition music videos of them making improvised weapons.

  …and we’re not supposed to ask “how?” or “why?”

  After the alleged bombing of Al-Ahli Arab hospital, doctors held a press conference surrounded by dead bodies:

  

  So did they bring the bodies to the podium or the podium to the bodies?

  And WHY exactly in either case?

  Is it sensible? Is it respectful? Is it even sanitary?

  Stacking corpses, then running electrical and audio cables over them. In very hot weather, under bright television lights.

  Presumably the mourning families had to wait to collect their dead until after the press conference. Hopefully they didn’t mind.

  I mean you’d be ok with your deceased loved one being used as set-dressing for a presser wouldn’t you?

  All the while, Israel continued carpet bombing a relatively small and very densely populated urban area in the name of “saving hostages” that a) they had made seemingly no effort to recover and b) Could EASILY have been inside one or more of the buildings they are levelling.

  And NO – please – I am not claiming people are not dying. Don’t grab for that easy lazy assumption as a reason to switch off.

  People are dying. People are being murdered. And degraded. And their corpses used as set-dressing for globalist agenda-drives. That’s both the goal and the method.

  But that doesn’t change the fact the narrative rationalization for the killing & for so much else is literal madness.

  And they’re conditioning people not to say it, and eventually not to even see it.

  Look around you – see it while you still can.

  • They kill people while claiming to save lives.

  • They push vaccines while admitting they don’t work

  • They present the physically impossible as an ongoing reality

  • They completely invert the meaning of words and yet claim nothing has changed

  • They attack reason as irrationality and tell you insanity is sense

  • They paint farce as tragedy and real tragedy as “necessary evil”.

  • They laugh, and tell you they are crying.

  • They almost literally report 2+2=5 and call anyone who claims it’s 4 a “five denier”.

  Is this just the symptom of an establishment and media so far removed from normal human experience they no longer understand it well enough to fake it?

  Perhaps. But I think it could be something more.

  Just hear me out…

  I have argued before that a primary goal of the new normal agenda to disrupt each human individual’s relationship with the real world.

  In my piece on the UN’s “Global Digital Compact” I described it thus:

  the final aim of globalist policy [is] control of all aspects of life, achieved by inserting a digital filter between people and reality. Banking, communication, media consumption, shopping. Every interaction you have will be through a digital membrane which can both monitor your exchanges with the world and – if deemed necessary – deny you access to that world.

  By making every purchase remote, every interaction digital, they can effectively disrupt everybody’s ability to interact with reality.

  However, it could be there’s also a more subtle and potentially destructive policy at play – one that attacks people’s ability to understand or even perceive that reality.

  A war on, for want of a better word, realness : the physical laws that govern our world, the emotional responses of human to human, the very existence of rational thought.

  This is the perfidious unreality of the “new normal”: Nurturing and normalising a pervasive persistent state of non-real.

  Why? What is the benefit of cultivating unreality?

  Well, that’s a complicated question with a twisting trail of intertwining potential answers.

  I have written before about the psychopathic individual’s tendency to lie to no purpose, to lie even when the truth would serve their interests better. This is because psychopaths are control addicts, and the ultimate expression of control is to create a fake world and make people live in it.

  This applies to institutions as well as individuals. Perhaps more so. To an authoritarian ruling elite insane narratives serve as both loyalty test and humiliation ritual.

  If they give you something impossible to believe, and you don’t question it, you are demonstrating greater loyalty to the authority above you than to the reality around you.

  The more absurd the lie you believe – or claim to believe – the more loyal you are to the Party. The more you pretzel your own mind at the command of the establishment the lower you sink in obeisance, the more you humiliate yourself.

  The more you humiliate yourself, the more you are no longer your own person.

  Humiliation is the ultimate demonstration of control, and demonstrating control is important to a grasping power structure built on insecurity and forever teetering on the edge of collapse.

  This idea of social control via collective belief predates Covid by decades.

  Take “The magic bullet theory”, an explanation which is no explanation at all. Theoretical physics stretched to near-breaking point.

  It literally has the word “magic” in it.

  And people repeated it, maybe even believed it, rather than deal with the real world in which such an idea was clearly ridiculous.

  Trading in their sanity for the comfort of belonging.

  Telling outrageously nonsensical lies allows you to demonstrate your power over people. But it also allows you to cultivate that power. To prepare soil where useful lies can take root easily.

  Because it’s easiest to lie to people who have no idea what truth means. Because if I can convince you to abandon sense, my narratives are no longer bound by the crushing monotony of causality, linear time or the laws of physics.

  In a world of no reason or rule, everything I tell you becomes inherently believable. In a world where nothing is true, anything could be.

  I can tell you that me taking your money makes us both richer, and you’ll never realise I’m robbing you.

  I can tell you that bars and chains are an expression of freedom, and you’ll never realise you’re my slave.

  In short, they use crazy narratives to erode the idea of objective truth, because if you don’t even know such a thing exists you are a lot easier to control.

  

  This is the perfidious unreality of the “new normal”. It’s not just about deception or fakery or propaganda.

  It’s about breaking your spirit and your mind.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 21:35

• Hezbollah Strikes Israel Intel Base With 60+ Rockets As "Initial Response" To Hamas Leader Assassination
  Hezbollah Strikes Israel Intel Base With 60+ Rockets As “Initial Response” To Hamas Leader Assassination

  Hezbollah on Saturday initiated what it announced as “an initial response” to Israel’s assassination by drone of Hamas deputy chief Saleh al-Arouri, which happened in a south Beirut neighborhood last week.

  The Lebanese paramilitary group backed by Iran unleashed large salvos of missiles that bombarded military bases as well as communities in northern Israel (many of which have long been evacuated), triggering alert sirens among some 90 towns and settlements.

  The Hezbollah statement declared that the assault was “part of the initial response to the crime of assassinating the great leader Sheikh Saleh al-Arouri.”

  

  The Israel Defense Forces in a follow-up statement said some 40 rockets were fired from Lebanon at the Mount Meron area in particular, which contains a crucial IDF base which reportedly has overseen Israeli operations against Syria.

  Hezbollah indicated it launched 62 “various types of missiles” against the Meron air control base as part of Saturday’s retaliatory attacks, however, Israel said there were no casualties in the aftermath.

  Lebanon’s Hezbollah-linked Almayadeen news service has said that the targeting of Meron Base is a first of the conflict, and is of huge significance: 

  Located just 8 kilometers from Lebanon’s southern border, “Meron” Base overlooks the Lebanese towns of Rmeish, Yaroun, and Maroun al-Ras in the central sector. It occupies the summit of Mount Jarmaq in northern occupied Palestine, making it the highest peak within the occupied territories.

  Sitting at an altitude of approximately 1200 meters above sea level, the base sprawls across an area of up to 150,000 square meters, with a substantial portion of the surrounding areas believed to be under its control for military and intelligence purposes.

  According to the Resistance statement released today, “Meron” primarily serves as an aerial surveillance center.

  It is the sole facility responsible for managing and controlling air operations toward Syria, Lebanon, Turkey, and Cyprus, as well as the northern part of the eastern Mediterranean Sea basin. Moreover, this base acts as a central hub for electronic warfare interference in the mentioned directions, staffed by a significant number of elite Israeli officers and soldiers.

  Hezbollah has already since Oct.7 been targeting and degrading Israel’s vast military communications infrastructure along the Lebanese border, often publishing videos of these attacks.

  ⚡️BREAKING

  Hezbollah strikes Israel’s most important military site

  With 62 missiles, Hezbollah pounded the Mount Meron base, which coordinates Israel’s air operations and bombing raids on Syria and Lebanon.

  This strike was the initial response to the assassination of Saleh… pic.twitter.com/kKfEB3s2UK

  — Iran Observer (@IranObserver0) January 6, 2024

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

  It is as yet unknown the degree of damage that Meron base may have suffered, and Israel is likely to keep this under wraps even if the damage is extensive.

  Saturday’s escalation was met with swift reaction from the European Union, which urged restraint:

  EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said on Saturday that it was “imperative” to avoid a regional escalation in the Middle East.

  “It is absolutely necessary to avoid Lebanon being dragged into a regional conflict,” he said, also warning Israel that “nobody will win from a regional conflict”.

  “We are seeing a worrying intensification of exchange of fire across the Blue Line,” he added, referring to the current demarcation line between the two countries, a frontier mapped by the United Nations that marks the line to which Israeli forces withdrew when they left south Lebanon in 2000.

  Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah had vowed to retaliate for the killing of Hamas political deputy head Saleh Arouri in a Friday speech, while also saying he won’t negotiate ceasefire with Israel until it ceases attacking Gaza.

  IDF published clips of its airstrikes on southern Lebanon Saturday:

  חוליית מחבלים, עמדת שיגור, מבנים צבאיים ותשתיות טרור; צה”ל השלים שורת תקיפות בשטח לבנון>> pic.twitter.com/MH0HY5JRR6

  — צבא ההגנה לישראל (@idfonline) January 6, 2024

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  Later in the day Saturday, the IDF said it launched multiple airstrikes on Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon in response, and released footage showing attacks on buildings and rural sites said to include a “terrorist squad, launch site, military buildings and terrorist infrastructure.”

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 21:00

• White House Wasn't Aware For Days That Defense Secretary Austin Was Hospitalized
  White House Wasn’t Aware For Days That Defense Secretary Austin Was Hospitalized

  Earlier throughout the day there were significant rumors that Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin has been in the hospital for days, and no one knew it… surprisingly even at the White House, apparently—and at a moment the US is embroiled in running conflicts and proxy wars from Ukraine to the Middle East.

  This is a worrisome development which has huge implications for the Biden administration and White House competency and issues of transparency. Not only has Austin’s hospitalization now been confirmed, but CNN is reporting late Saturday that President Biden was in the dark almost the whole time: 

  President Joe Biden was not aware for days that Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin was hospitalized, a source familiar with the matter told CNN.

  National security adviser Jake Sullivan ultimately informed Biden late Thursday afternoon, soon after Sullivan himself learned that Austin had been hospitalized, that source said. Austin was admitted to the hospital on New Year’s Day due to complications from an elective surgery.

  The Pentagon announced the hospitalization Friday. Austin issued his first statement Saturday, five days after being admitted to the hospital, saying he could have done a “better job” of notifying the public.

  

  All of this was ultimately confirmed by a statement from the hospitalized Secretary of Defense himself, who said in the early evening Saturday, “I recognize I could have done a better job ensuring the public was appropriately informed. I commit to doing better.”

  Austin continued regarding this growing scandal over transparency: “But this is important to say: this was my medical procedure, and I take full responsibility for my decisions about disclosure,” the statement continued.

  The Defense Secretary was at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and now says he’s “on the mend”. 

  He was hospitalized and thus out of commission… as the head of the Pentagon… for nearly four days.

  NEWS

  CNN has now confirmed that President Biden was not aware that Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin was hospitalized and in intensive care for nearly four days.

  Biden only found out when National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan informed him Thursday afternoon shortly after… pic.twitter.com/S1lJPFYsR0

  — Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) January 7, 2024

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  CNN underscores, “Senior administration officials said they were shocked to learn of Austin’s hospitalization and the delay in informing the White House.”

  The initial procedure which led to complications has been deemed minor, but the situation worsened into a serious medical event based on the undisclosed complication.

  This scandal may have Constitutional implications, given the White House-appointed civilian head of the military was persona non grata and the Commander-in-Chief didn’t so much as know about it…

  An entire industry of reporters investigating Chris Rufo’s college degree but none of them can figure out why the Secretary of Defense was missing in action for four days while the Biden Administration covered it up.

  — Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) January 7, 2024

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  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 20:25

• "The Death Toll Of A Global War": Bret Weinstein And Tucker Discuss COVID Vaccine, WHO's Authoritarian Plans For Humanity
  “The Death Toll Of A Global War”: Bret Weinstein And Tucker Discuss COVID Vaccine, WHO’s Authoritarian Plans For Humanity

  Tucker Carlson sat down with evolutionary biologist Bret Weinstein (brother of Eric Weinstein), where the two dissected the intricate web of narratives surrounding COVID-19, the pharmaceutical industry, and global shifts in governance and public health policy.

  

  According to Weinstein, opposition to the ‘official’ COVID narratives is like taking on Goliath – with competent and courageous experts in various fields being aggressively censored during the pandemic. This led to the formation of a “Dream Team” of dissenters.

  “I call the force that we’re up against Goliath. Goliath made a terrible mistake and made it most egregiously during COVID, which is it took all of the competent people, all of the courageous people, and it shoved them out of the institutions where they were hanging on. And it created in so doing, the Dream Team. It created every player you could possibly want on your team to fight some historic battle against a terrible evil,” he said, suggesting that the Dream Team is uniquely qualified to fight against those who botched the pandemic response with deadly consequences.

  Weinstein also discussed the demonization of alternative treatments such as hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin, and suggested that there have been 17 million deaths from the COVID-19 vaccine.

  “So I’m not a math genius, but one in eight hundred shots times billions is a lot of people…..17 million deaths from the COVID vaccine?” asked Tucker. “Just for perspective. I mean, that’s like the death toll of a global war.”

  To which Weinstein replied: “Yes, absolutely. This is a great tragedy of history. So that proportion. And amazingly there is no way in which it’s over. I mean, we are still apparently recommending these things for healthy children.”

  🚨 “17 million deaths from the COVID vax?”

  Bret Weinstein tells Tucker Carlson: “I saw a credible estimate of something like 17 million deaths globally.” pic.twitter.com/US4Ejypb1f

  — Tucker Carlson Network (@TCNetwork) January 6, 2024

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  Weinstein and Carlson also discussed what they perceive as a global power shift orchestrated through public health policies. They discussed the World Health Organization’s (WHO) proposed pandemic preparedness plan, expressing concerns over potential overreach and infringement on national sovereignty. Weinstein warned of a “turnkey totalitarian planet,” with the WHO positioned to dictate unprecedented controls over nations and their citizens.

  Bret Weinstein Exposes the World Health Organization’s Neo Dark Age Agenda – He is 100% correct on all of it…the best and brightest who were all doing their own things in life in all different areas and levels….found a common cause in trying to preserve Western Democratic… pic.twitter.com/wvAtDrI9bv

  — DavidCWillisUSA (@DavidCWillisUSA) January 6, 2024

  Watch the entire segment on the WHO below…

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

  And subscribers to Tuckercarlson.com can watch the entire one hour interview here.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 19:50

• American Soldiers Are Being Put In Danger For Israel
  American Soldiers Are Being Put In Danger For Israel

  Authored by Brad Pearce via The Libertarian Institute,

  Since the October 7 attacks restarted conflict between Israel and Hamas, U.S. troops have been under fire all over the Middle East. Thus far, most attacks have been deflected with minimal damage, but it is only a matter of time before one gets through and causes a serious loss of life.

  Twenty-two years after the beginning of the Global War on Terror, the government rarely bothers to say what we are doing in the Middle East. There is an implication that by “fighting terrorism” we protect Israel, which is somehow crucial to our national security. In reality, our alliance with Israel harms U.S. national security, as demonstrated by the fact that we have been attacked alongside Israel.

  The War Party has gone from the spurious line of reasoning, “We have to fight them over there so we don’t have to fight them here,” to not really fighting them “over there” but just leaving our troops as sort of reverse hostages to draw fire so that we have a pretense to get drawn into any regional conflict. The continuing U.S. presence across the Middle East is nothing but a depraved exercise in putting American personnel in harm’s way for its own sake.

  

  Though it’s hard to imagine now, until around fifty years ago the United States policy class was skeptical of Israel, and the Middle East was considered a strategic backwater. Perhaps in the 1970s the need for oil and the internal logic of the Cold War justified constructing a policy of trying to split the difference between making Israel a satrap while also maintaining a sphere of influence among the Arab states.

  However, that questionable strategy notwithstanding, the Cold War has been over for decades and the United States is now a net exporter of oil. All that justifies our presence with the American public is the detritus from years of propaganda which has left an unexamined belief that supporting Israel as “the only democracy in the Middle East” serves some sort of moral or strategic purpose.

  One way or another, U.S. troops continue to be spread throughout the Middle East and Israel continues to receive enormous amounts of foreign aid. Though the United States has multiple clients throughout the region, it is Israel with whom there is a “special relationship.” The perception among the Arab public is that there isn’t distance between the policies of the United States and Israel, despite the fact that Israel is nearly impossible to control and many observers see it as a case of “the tail wagging the dog.”

  In pursuit of some rarely defined objective we have troops at over 30 locations in the broader region, according to a map from the American Security Project (and that is only the public or well-documented bases). Us peasants are left guessing where else our rulers are placing our countrymen, but a study by Axios Research found that there were approximately 45,400 known U.S. troops in the Middle East as of October 31, which includes new troops deployed to the region due to the current conflict.

  At this time, the United States is not said to be engaged in any major conflicts in the Middle East. The troops seem to just be on standby to give hostile militant groups convenient targets and serve as tinder for a regional conflagration. And convenient targets they are. A December 11 article from the Associated Press says there have been “at least” 92 attacks on U.S. troops in Syria and Iraq alone since October 7. In response, the United States has launched airstrikes across the region, but they are obviously unable to eliminate the myriad of militant groups who are attacking.

  The Iraqi government has protested the retaliatory airstrikes as a violation of their sovereignty, but of course they remain an occupied country twenty years after the American invasion and don’t have the ability to kick out the United States. In fact, it is Iraq itself that is the most threatened by attacks it has no control over, as the occupying foreign power could turn on them at any time. Alternately, the United States has nothing resembling authorization to be in Syria. Having failed to set up a puppet government in that country, they don’t even have anyone to complain to about coming under attack.

  

  Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) recently forced a vote in the U.S. Senate to withdraw from our undeclared war in Syria, which failed 84-13, meaning 84 Senators want our troops to remain targets. Senator Paul said at the time, “It seems to me, though our 900 troops have no viable mission in Syria, that they’re sitting ducks. They’re a tripwire to a larger war, and without a clear-cut mission, I don’t think they can adequately defend themselves, yet they remain in Syria.”

  It isn’t just Syria, it is the entire Middle East policy. Our political class is leaving American soldiers in the region as sacrificial lambs so there is a pretense to get involved and protect Israel should any major conflict break out. Meanwhile, few serious arguments are made that supporting Israel is good for national security—in fact, Joe Biden went with just saying he is a Zionist, which is to say he supports Israel for ideological reasons completely divorced from American interests. I suppose for the political class admitting that is better than acknowledging the more important truth: supporting Israel harms our national security and US troops in the region serve no purpose but to be easy targets.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 19:15

• St. Louis Mask Mandate Rescinded Less Than 24 Hours After Woke Health Officials Get Trigger Happy
  St. Louis Mask Mandate Rescinded Less Than 24 Hours After Woke Health Officials Get Trigger Happy

  The city of St. Louis reversed course less than 24 hours after reimplementing mask mandates, announcing Friday afternoon that it would no longer require city employees to mask up while working following pushback from hospitals, health experts, and the governor.

  

  “The City of St. Louis has updated its communications with employees surrounding masking,” said a representative from Mayor Tishaura Jones’ office.

  “The City of St. Louis Department of Health strongly recommends masking indoors for all City of St. Louis employees, effective immediately.”

  This came one day after city health director Matifadza Hlatshwayo Davis said that COVID-19, RSV and flu cases in the city justified masking up again.

  On Friday, however, the department updated its original statistics with ‘less alarming’ data regarding RSV trends, according to KSDK.

  “BJC is not seeing a strain on hospital capacity,” BJC Health Care officials told the outlet, adding “We are experiencing a seasonal increase in respiratory illness, which is typical for this time of year.”

  Mercy Hospital described it as a “typical winter.” St. Louis County said they haven’t seen any out-of-the-ordinary strains on the health system.

  “Luckily our influenza has not spiked yet and it is going up, but it’s not nearly what it was last year,” according to Dr. Jim Hinrichs, the interim co-director of the St. Louis County Department of Public Health. “It’s moderate. It’s not alarming.”

  Gov. Mike Parson’s office confirmed to 5 On Your Side it had a conversation with Jones’ office on Friday related to the city’s mask policy shift. -KSDK

  The health department had originally claimed that COVID-19 hospitalizations were up 38% over December, as 278 people were hospitalized with (but not necessarily because of) COVID-19 during the week of Dec. 23. Flu cases rose an alleged 455%.

  Perhaps, as Ian Miller noted on X, the reversal was because of the sudden realisation that masks never made a difference in St.Louis anyway…

  

  …”science”.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 18:05

• "This Is Not A Time For Us To Have A Mentally-Challenged President"
  “This Is Not A Time For Us To Have A Mentally-Challenged President”

  Authored by Mike McDaniel via AmericanThinker.com,

  Joe Biden At Valley Forge: Triumph Of The Shill II

  Well, he did it again. 

  Speaking near Valley Forge, PA, President Joe Biden delivered a follow up to his red-tinged “Triumph of the Shill” speech. The New York Post explains: 

  President Biden kicked off his bid for re-election Friday by deriding former President Donald Trump as a “loser”and calling his bid for a political comeback something out of a “bad fairy tale” Friday — prompting his predecessor to fire back that the 80-year-old is a “true threat to democracy.”

  As one would expect on the anniversary of Democrats/socialists/communists’ (D/s/cs) high holy day, we learned, yet again, how very, very close we came to losing America:

  Valley Forge “tells the story of the pain and the suffering and the true patriotism it took to make America,” Biden, 81, began his first proper 2024 campaign speech.

  “Today, we gather in a new year, some 246 years later, just one day before January 6 — a date forever seared in our memory because it was on that day that we nearly lost America, lost it all.”

  

  Image: Erie Railroad Train Wreck. Wikimedia Commons.org. Public Domain.

  I’m sure China, Iran and our other enemies are paying close attention. They don’t need massive militaries with nuclear weapons to conquer America, only a minor riot by unarmed citizens, provoked by the FBI, that lasts an hour or so.

  Trump’s assault on democracy isn’t just part of his past, it’s what he’s promising for the future. He’s being straightforward. He’s not hiding the ball,” Biden said.

  “His first rally for the 2024 campaign opened with a choir of January 6 insurrectionists singing from prison on a cellphone while images of the January 6 riot playing on the big screen behind him at his rally. Can you believe that? This was like something out of a fairy tale — a bad fairy tale.”

  What were those horrid insurrectionists singing? The Star-Spangled Banner, our national anthem. The horror.

  “Let’s be clear about the 2020 election: Trump exhausted every legal avenue available to him to overturn the outcome — every one. But the legal path just took Trump back to the truth that I’d won the election and he was a loser,” Biden said to hoots and applause.

  Gropin’, sniffin’ Joe forgot to mention not a single court actually heard evidence, which makes for rather a dead end “legal avenue.”

  

  He also forgot to mention Trump quietly, and on time, left office as the Constitution requires. What a pathetic dictator.

  “Well, knowing how his mind works, he had one act left, one desperate act available to him: the violence of January the 6th,” Biden said, “and since that day, more than 1,200 people have been charged for their assault on the Capitol, nearly 900 of them have been convicted or pled guilty.”

  To more cheers, he added, “Collectively to date, they have been sentenced to more than 840 years in prison.”

  Rational Americans might think Biden’s glee in destroying the lives of more than 1000 Americans for what amounts to misdemeanor trespassing–normally a ticketable offense–doesn’t really live up to his endless rhetoric about uniting America.

  “He calls those who oppose him ‘vermin.’ He talks about the blood of Americans being poisoned, echoing the same exact language used in Nazi Germany.  He proudly posted on social media the words that best describe his 2024 campaign, ‘revenge,’ ‘power,’ ‘dictatorship.’  There’s no confusion about who Trump is and what he intends to do,” Biden said.

  “You can’t be pro-insurrectionist and pro-American,” the president added at one point — insisting that unlike Trump “our campaign is about preserving and strengthening our American democracy.”

  “The protection and preservation of American democracy will remain as it has been the central cause of my presidency,” Biden went on before turning his wrath on Trump’s allies in Congress.

  The Bee is the latest victim of plagiarism by a president. pic.twitter.com/sMI5wrJNvI

  — Not the Bee (@Not_the_Bee) January 6, 2024

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  There it is again: “our American democracy,” by which Biden means a tyranny of the majority. 

  The words “constitutional, representative republic,” which is what America is, never escape his lips.

  Biden just finished a very angry speech in which he previewed the center of his re-election campaign.

  Number of times he mentioned…

  Economy: 0️⃣
  Inflation: 0️⃣
  Border security: 0️⃣
  Debt/spending: 0️⃣
  Foreign affairs: 0️⃣
  National security: 0️⃣
  Crime: 0️⃣
  Fentanyl crisis: 0️⃣

  — RNC Research (@RNCResearch) January 5, 2024

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  Donald Trump replied:

  “This is not a time for us to have a mentally challenged president,” the former president said, adding that “the only insurrection is the insurrection that is taking place at our border where he is allowing millions of people from parts unknown to invade our country at a level far worse than even a military invasion.”

  “Biden’s record is an unbroken streak of weakness, incompetence, corruption and failure, other than that he’s doing quite well, isn’t he? That’s a hell of a hell of a list, right? That’s why Crooked Joe is staging his pathetic, fear-mongering campaign event in Pennsylvania today. Did you see him? He was stuttering through the whole thing, he’s going, ‘He’s a threat to Democracy,’” Trump said. 

  Serious ‘Where The F*** Am I?’ vibes here. pic.twitter.com/X6EVhwLFXT

  — m o d e r n i t y (@ModernityNews) January 6, 2024

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  Biden’s remarks are a preview of his second basement campaign, and a continuing act of desperation.

  

  The 2024 campaign will be one for the record books, if America survives to write them.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 17:30

• US Warship Downs Houthi Drone Over Red Sea "In Self-Defense"
  US Warship Downs Houthi Drone Over Red Sea “In Self-Defense”

  US Central Command (CENTCOM) has announced yet another intercept of a launch out of Yemen which had targeted commercial vessels in the Red Sea. 

  CENTCOM described that the Saturday incident saw the USS Laboon guided-missile destroyer down a drone over the Red Sea, after it came near near several commercial ships in international waters.

  

  There were no casualties or damage to ships from the “unmanned aerial vehicle launched from Iranian-backed Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen,” according to the US statement.

  Further, the military statement suggests that US warships may have been targeted by the drone, given it says the USS Laboon shot the inbound drone down “in self-defense”.

  The Biden administration has previously been accused of downplaying that there’s actually been attempted Houthi attacks directly on American warships and naval assets. This would of course be an act of war, and the White House is said to be belatedly drawing up plans to hit back at Houthi launch positions, in an offensive manner (and not just defensive intercepts).

  This hasn’t happened yet, as the US is apparently pursuing a policy of restraint, not wanting a bigger regional war to break out with Iran, which has long backed the Houthis.

  But the contradiction is that Washington has done nothing to impose any kind of limits or conditions on Gaza’s air campaign, which has resulted in unprecedented Palestinian civilian deaths.

  Meanwhile the Pentagon has issued a lot of ‘final warnings’ as Red Sea attacks have persisted weekly & now daily…

  The United States gave the Houthis a “final warning” in the Red Sea, and they responded with a sea drone to attack more ships. https://t.co/E0R25hT0qw

  — FORTUNE (@FortuneMagazine) January 6, 2024

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  The Houthis say their ‘war on Red Sea shipping’ and on Israel itself will continue so long as Israel drops bombs on Gaza civilians. Meanwhile things have only escalated across the region, including Iran-backed militant attacks on US bases in Iraq and Syria. 

  These attacks across Iraq-Syria have led to an escalation in the Pentagon response, which most recently saw a very high-ranking and influential Iraqi militia leader killed. This has enraged the Iraqi government in Baghdad, given the commander, identified as Mushtaq Taleb al-Saidi, had been integrated with national forces, and was considered a key ally.

  Below is a policy note exploring the implications of the growing tit-for-tat in the region, via Peter Tchir’s Academy Securities.

  * * *

  What has Happened:

  • Yesterday [Jan.11], a U.S. drone strike in Baghdad killed Mushtaq Taleb al-Saidi, who was deputy head of operations for the Popular Mobilization Force (PMF), a network of Iran-backed militia groups.
  • Since the war between Israel and Hamas began on October 7^th, there have been over 100 attacks on U.S. and allied forces in Iraq and Syria by Iran-backed militia forces.
  • Iraq’s prime minister, who had the backing of Iran-aligned factions and militias when elected, called the attack “unjustified” and a “dangerous escalation and a violation of Iraq’s sovereignty.”
  • On Tuesday, as reported in our previous SITREP, a suspected Israeli drone attack killed Saleh al-Arouri (Hamas deputy leader) in Beirut.
  • In addition, an Israeli strike on Wednesday night killed a Hezbollah commander in southern Lebanon and Israel has warned of more significant military action if a diplomatic deal is not reached to pull Hezbollah forces away from the Lebanese border.
  • Finally, the U.S., the UK, and other key allies issued “a final warning” to the Houthi rebels this week to cease its attacks on international shipping in the Red Sea or face consequences.

  Why it Matters:

  “First, it’s important to understand that deterrence is the product of three factors: capability, will, and the adversary’s perception of those capabilities and that will. If the first two factors are missing—or inordinately low—or the adversary doesn’t believe that the U.S. has the will to use their capabilities, then deterrence fails. This is the current situation. The proof is in the actions that commercial shipping companies have taken in halting their transit of the Red Sea. We have warships in the region—capability—but if we’re not going to use them to ensure free movement through the Red Sea—will—and the adversary believes that we won’t use them—perception—then we won’t be successful in deterring further aggression on the part of the Houthis and Iran. A strong response to the initial Iranian-backed Houthi attacks could have prevented this situation (i.e., strikes against the Houthi command & control apparatus, launch, storage, and maintenance sites). The solution is that we should stop just shooting down arrows and kill the archers. But the Biden administration has been hesitant to address the source of these attacks over concerns of escalation. Which raises a second point—escalation has already occurred—it was initiated by the Iranians, Houthis, Hamas, Hezbollah, and other Iranian proxy groups.” – General David Deptula

  “General Deptula lays it out nicely. Only comment I’d add is that the U.S. must produce a full array of attack options (both arrows and archers) that will punish Iranian proxies where they currently enjoy sanctuary. That is not an expansion of the current state of affairs; it is appropriate and would meet every legal prescription of proportionality. Not surprisingly, Iran is overreaching. The Iranian leadership, specifically the IRGC leadership, must know with certainty that their only sanctuary is within the borders of Iran.” – General Spider Marks

  “General Deptula’s deterrence formula is how a great power imposes its will on a lesser power through military means. The current U.S. approach is not working, considering the continued attacks on U.S. forces in the region and the disruption of commerce through the Red Sea. The U.S. is failing to deter Iran and its proxy forces, and its deterrence strategy must be reset. The U.S. foreign policy is allowing bad actors to challenge the international order. The U.S. needs to escalate its response in compliance with international law to de-escalate the situation. How quickly and with how much force must be calibrated per General Marks’ salient points of proportionality and self-defense.” – General Robert Walsh

  “While there is always the risk of a miscalculation that leads to escalation, I think that these recent events, while linked to multiple ongoing conflicts (many that predate 7 October), are not necessarily indicative of irreversible momentum toward broader escalation. Each participant (Israel, Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran, Houthis, or the U.S.) can adjust the rheostat as desired. These events could continue to play out as transactional, but limited in scope and scale, and are not indicative that a broader conflict is imminent or inevitable. I would not look at these as fully coordinated events, but rather as transactional. I’m not surprised to see ISIS claim the attacks in Iran which do not follow suit with how Mossad would traditionally strike in Iran proper. While it may seem counterintuitive given the strikes in Gaza, the Israeli government has been relatively surgical in their actions with respect to Iran to minimize casualties/collateral damage.

  A possibly unanticipated outcome is that we may see a policy shift in Iraq. A deliberate strike in Baghdad has drawn the ire of the current regime (not that they haven’t complained during previous strikes) and may be enough for Iraq to consider a reduction (if not an elimination) of the U.S. military presence in Iraq. Lately, there is more being written in the news and opinion pieces about the risk to U.S. forces in Syria and Iraq and questioning the mission. Another factor is whether the U.S. is willing to begin to strike Houthi infrastructure should maritime attacks continue. All that said, I would assess with moderate confidence that none of the nation states are looking to expand the conflict into a direct war and will continue to measure their responses. Where the U.S. is struggling is how to establish deterrence.” – General Robert Ashley

  “The U.S. desires to de-escalate, not escalate, but the challenge is that the same military response can be used to achieve both results. There are plenty of historical examples of U.S. administrations aggressively addressing such threats, resulting in Iran (and others) choosing to back down due to the sudden and high costs that they have incurred. Aggressive action (sinking ships, shooting down aircraft, and killing forces attacking civilian targets) may be our best chance to de-escalate Iran’s actions. It is doubtful that Iran will back down without a serious punch in the nose.” – General Mastin Robeson

  “The bottom line is that escalation will occur by proxies if we don’t change our response and reset our deterrence level. We don’t have the initiative and many allies are not joining our efforts to deter Houthi strikes against shipping. They also see that our policy and posture are not working. The strike in Baghdad is a response that may have unintended consequences. It is possible that the Iraqis can expel or reduce U.S. forces in Iraq which could have a major impact on counterterrorism operations ongoing in Iraq and Syria. If we want an effective deterrent at this point, we will need to increase our response to attacks at a 1-1 level.” – General Frank Kearney

  Please see (link) and attached PDF for full report.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 16:55

• An Explainer Of Jan. 6 And Its Aftermath
  An Explainer Of Jan. 6 And Its Aftermath

  

  Authored by Joseph Hanneman via The Epoch Times,

  It was a day of infamy.

  Worse than Pearl Harbor, 9/11, or even the Civil War, Americans were told.

  A bloody insurrection by a wild, ruthless, armed mob of election deniers.

  A coup d’etat.

  A revolution.

  That first Wednesday in January 2021, however, was none of the above.

  

  Yet Jan. 6 will forever be a prominent part of American history—in ways that few people fully realize.

  It was most certainly a fork in the road.

  Defining and understanding that historic day requires solid information, full context, and a willingness to look beyond the narratives that began before Jan. 6 was even a few hours old.

  Jan. 6 is part of a much larger political and societal movement designed to usher in a “new America,” according to Victor Davis Hanson, an American classicist, military historian, and political commentator at the Hoover Institution.

  “What’s happened in America is not public opinion but institutional control is driving the United States in a direction that was never intended to go, to the degree that they are saying to America, ‘We are morally superior to the old America. This is a new America,’” Mr. Hanson said in an “American Thought Leaders” interview.

  “And that gives us the right to use any means necessary to achieve a morally superior end. You are deplorable, you’re irredeemable, you’re a clinger, you’re a semi-fascist, you’re crazy, you’re ultra-MAGA, and you don’t have the right to object to the means that we’re using.”

  To mark the third anniversary, The Epoch Times offers this guide to Jan. 6 to help the uninitiated and well-versed alike better understand this complex topic.

  

  In an Oct. 28, 2023, interview with Jan Jekielek of ‘American Thought Leaders,” historian Victor Davis Hanson said America is being pulled to places it was never meant to go. (Epoch TV)

  What Was Jan. 6?

  It was a day of rallies and protests held on the National Mall, the Ellipse, and the U.S. Capitol grounds in Washington. The driving force was a widely held belief that the 2020 presidential election was marred by suspicious activity, a lack of security, and alleged widespread fraud with mail-in ballots and electronic voting.

  Massive crowds came to Washington to hear President Donald Trump speak and to put pressure on a joint session of Congress to take seriously the elector challenges expected to be filed by representatives of at least six states under Title 3 U.S. Code § 15.

  Why Does Jan. 6 Matter?

  Jan. 6 and its aftermath has had a broad impact on American society.. The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and the FBI launched an unprecedented use of federal power that—while currently wielded against people right of center—could easily be unleashed against any group.

  The Jan. 6 investigations and prosecutions have raised serious concerns about due process, pretrial detention, jail conditions, equal protection under the law, and—perhaps most significantly—First Amendment guarantees.

  How Big Were the Crowds?

  Estimates are all over the map, from 400,000 to upwards of 3 million at the Ellipse. At the peak of activity at and near the U.S. Capitol between 2 p.m. and 4 p.m., Republican U.S. House investigators estimate crowd size at 250,000. The largest crowds gathered on the west front of Capitol grounds.

  

  Thousands of supporters for President Donald Trump pack the Washington Mall for a rally in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. (Joseph Prezioso/AFP via Getty Images)

  When Did the Trouble Start?

  At 12:53 p.m., more than 20 minutes before President Trump finished speaking at the Ellipse, a fast-growing crowd kicked over metal barricades guarding the Peace Circle and advanced to the northwest sidewalk of the U.S. Capitol.

  Seconds before 12:55 p.m., protesters picked up the bicycle-rack barriers and shoved them into five U.S. Capitol Police officers. Officer Carolyn Edwards was knocked off her feet and her head struck the concrete steps, causing a concussion.

  With that barricade down, the crowd moved quickly to defeat two more police barricades and soon swarmed the west plaza underneath the inauguration stage. By 1 p.m., thousands of protesters began pressing against a hastily assembled line of Capitol Police officers.

  When Did Violence and Rioting Erupt?

  The crowd on the west plaza was amped up and agitated. The conversations along the police line included protesters telling police why they were so angry and questioning why officers would oppose their efforts to get election answers. A few minor skirmishes broke out.

  A protester on the north end of the police line screamed into a megaphone: “You can’t kill us all! We are here to stay! We’re not going anywhere! We want in! We want in!”

  “I’m a combat veteran,” one protester told a police officer.

  “If it’s an unconstitutional order, it is our duty as Americans to disobey those orders. I know you guys have it in your hearts. Do the right thing. Do the right thing. That’s all I’m asking.”

  The true flashpoint came just before 1:06 p.m. when U.S. Capitol Police Deputy Chief Eric Waldow ordered “less than lethal” force be used on the crowd.

  

  Bystanders try to stop the profuse bleeding from the face of Joshua Black, who was shot in the face by Capitol Police on Jan. 6, 2021. (Special to The Epoch Times)

  “I got a crowd fighting with officers, pushing, throwing projectiles,” he broadcast on USCP radio.

  “I have given warnings about chemical munitions. I need the less-than-lethal team positioned above me to identify the agitators and start deploying. Launch, launch, launch!”

  Video shot by a protester with a camera on an elevated stick—obtained by The Epoch Times—doesn’t show fighting or projectiles being thrown in the area where Deputy Chief Waldow stood at 1:06 p.m. and where force was about to be deployed.

  Just before 1:07 p.m., a Capitol Police grenadier shot protester Joshua M. Black, 47, in the left cheek with a projectile. Mr. Black immediately began bleeding profusely. A large blood stain on the concrete remained visible all afternoon.

  Word spread quickly through the crowd that a protester had been shot.

  As bystanders pressed Mr. Black’s wound to stop the bleeding, other protesters began screaming at police.

  The mood and tenor of the crowd changed at that moment.

  When Was the Capitol Breached?

  A yet-to-be-identified man known only by the hashtag #RedOnRedGlasses sailed a long 2-by-4 plank through a window near the Senate Wing Door at about 2:12 p.m.

  Proud Boys defendant Dominic Pezzola used a riot shield to smash the same window.

  In short order, dozens of people were streaming into the Crypt level of the Capitol.

  Were There Deaths and Injuries on Jan. 6?

  Four Trump supporters died at the Capitol on Jan. 6: Benjamin Philips, 50, Kevin Greeson, 55, Ashli Babbitt, 35, and Rosanne Boyland, 34.

  Ms. Babbitt was shot and killed by Capitol Police Lt. Michael Byrd just outside of the House Speaker’s Lobby at 2:44 p.m. Mr. Byrd was subsequently cleared by USCP and the U.S. Department of Justice, but the shooting remains highly controversial. A civil suit against the federal government was lodged on Jan. 5.

  

  Ronald McAbee (in the red cap at center) leans over a prone Rosanne Boyland. Another protester does CPR on the lifeless woman on Jan. 6, 2021. (Special to The Epoch Times)

  Ms. Boyland collapsed at the mouth of the Lower West Terrace tunnel at about 4:22 p.m. and was crushed in a stampede. Police at the tunnel entrance ignored pleas to render medical aid. Metropolitan Police Department Officer Lila Morris inexplicably picked up a wooden walking stick and beat Ms. Boyland in the head and ribs. Ms. Morris faced no discipline for her actions.

  Once Ms. Boyland was pulled inside the Capitol, advanced lifesaving care was started by MPD, U.S. Park Police, and Capitol Police. Efforts continued on two levels of the Capitol. Ms. Boyland was pronounced dead at a hospital at 6:09 p.m.

  Mr. Philips was determined to have suffered a fatal stroke. Security video obtained by The Epoch Times showed Mr. Philips was not struck by police munitions as widely believed. Mr. Greeson suffered a heart attack, although at least one witness claims he was struck in the head by a police projectile before collapsing.

  Some 140 police officers from Capitol Police and MPD suffered injuries on Jan. 6. Some of the injuries were career-ending. An unknown number of protesters were injured, including Dominic Vargo, who was shoved off a stairway ledge by a Capitol Police motorcycle officer just after 2 p.m., and Mark Griffin, whose leg was broken when an MPD officer fired a 40mm crowd control munition at him from point-blank range.

  How Did the FBI and DOJ Respond?

  The decision was quickly made to launch the largest criminal investigation in U.S. history to pursue protesters and rioters. The ramp-up effort was described by top prosecutor Michael Sherwin as a “shock and awe” campaign, borrowing a slogan from the U.S. invasion of Iraq in the Persian Gulf War.

  

  FBI manhunt information is displayed on the side of a bus stop in downtown Washington D.C. on Jan. 13, 2021. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

  The FBI set up a web page with photos of criminal suspects, and eager online sleuths excelled at identifying people and turning them in to the FBI. The DOJ established a “rapid-indictment” unit to level charges against a long list of suspects.

  Protesters found themselves being turned in to the FBI by neighbors, former classmates, and—in some cases—by ex-spouses and children. Arrests have continued unabated for three years, with the total now approaching 1,250.

  How Has the FBI Handled the Arrests of Suspects?

  The FBI’s practice of using SWAT teams to apprehend and arrest Jan. 6 suspects in dozens of cases has brought condemnation from civil rights attorneys and current and former FBI special agents.

  In one case chronicled recently in The Epoch Times, the Westbury family of Lindstrom, Minnesota, faced two SWAT raids, the first involving only misdemeanor charges. The second raid involved up to 60 agents and the use of drones to fly over the property—even into the backyard chicken coop.

  

  Dozens of heavily armed FBI agents conduct a predawn raid on the home of Robert and Rosemarie Westbury in Lindstrom, Minn., on Oct. 4, 2021. (Courtesy of the Westbury Family)

  “For a nonviolent misdemeanor—a nonviolent, non-felony misdemeanor—they came out with 20 to 25 FBI agents fully vested up, AR-15s all pointed right at me like I’m a domestic terrorist,” Jonah Westbury told The Epoch Times.

  Former FBI special agent Stephen Friend said his decision to protest these tactics led to him being suspended without pay and eventually forced him to resign from his “dream job.” He testified before Congress in May 2023 along with special agent Garret O’Boyle and analyst Marcus Allen.

  Are Defendants Mistreated in Jail?

  Defendants have reported many cases of abuse by jail guards and terrible living conditions at the District of Columbia jail, referred to derisively by inmates as the “DC Gulag.” Defense attorney Joseph McBride wrote and submitted an 11-page report to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and Amnesty International. He said he never received a response.

  “January Sixers are regularly being held in solitary confinement for 22 or 23 hours a day in DC-GITMO. Dubbed the Patriot Unit, this previously defunct part of DC-GITMO, was reopened specifically to house January Sixers,” Mr. McBride wrote.

  “To put it mildly, the facility is disgusting. Black mold, brown drinking water, and poor ventilation are but a few of the problems with the facility itself.”

  The U.S. Marshals Service conducted a surprise inspection of the DC facility on Nov. 2, 2021, that led to the removal of some 400 inmates, but the Jan. 6 defendants were not moved. Two days later, four members of Congress demanded access to the jail after being turned away repeatedly by the deputy warden.

  

  U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), with colleagues Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) (left), speaks at a press conference addressing the treatment of the Jan. 6 detainees at the D.C. jail in Washington on Dec. 7, 2021. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)

  Interviews with pretrial detainees on Nov. 4, 2021, led Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) to publish a 28-page report, “Unusually Cruel,” detailing conditions at the facility. Jan. 6 defendants reported being forced to sleep with the lights on and having to carry their mattresses around the jail in the dead of night.

  Others reported physical abuse, including one detainee who said guards dropped him head-first onto the concrete floor.

  Why Wasn’t the National Guard at the Capitol?

  According to former Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund, his pre-Jan. 6 request for the National Guard was squelched because “Pelosi will never go for it,” referring to former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

  Mr. Sund’s comments were spoken at a hearing of the Committee on House Administration’s Subcommittee on Oversight on Sept. 19, 2023. The contention about Ms. Pelosi came from former Senate Sergeant at Arms Michael Stenger, Mr. Sund testified.

  According to former senior Trump aide Kash Patel, President Trump authorized up to 20,000 National Guard troops for use in D.C. and elsewhere on Jan. 6, 2021, but the use of those troops was later rejected by D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and the U.S. Capitol Police. Mr. Patel said former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) misled the public by saying Trump never ordered troops to the Capitol.

  

  Members of the National Guard patrol the area outside of the U.S. Capitol during the impeachment trial of former president Donald Trump at the Capitol in Washington on Feb. 10, 2021. (Jose Luis Magana/AP Photo)

  “She knows the truth—45 [Trump] authorized the National Guard days before Jan. 6, and Pelosi and Bowser rejected it,” Mr. Patel told The Epoch Times in 2022.

  “Cheney knows it’s unconstitutional for any president to ever order the military to deploy domestically. He may only authorize their use; then there must be a request.”

  Mr. Sund detailed his frustrated efforts on Jan. 6 to get authorization to ask for National Guard backup, then having to fight resistance from the Department of Defense. He said the New Jersey State Police arrived at the Capitol to assist faster than the National Guard, which was staged minutes away from the Capitol.

  By the time the National Guard put boots on Capitol grounds on Jan. 6, police had restored order and pushed most of the protesters out.

  What Legal Issues Have Arisen From Jan. 6 Prosecutions?

  In December, 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear a challenge to the DOJ’s use of a white-collar-crime statute to prosecute more than 330 Jan. 6 defendants for “corruptly obstructing an official proceeding,” a felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

  Federal prosecutors claim that the delay of a joint session of Congress to hear elector objections and count Electoral College votes from the presidential election constitutes a crime under 18 U.S. Code Section 1512(c).

  Defense attorneys argue that the statute, enacted as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, was intended only to prosecute corporate fraud in publicly traded companies, not First Amendment political protests. The case of Joseph W. Fischer v. United States is the first Jan. 6 case to make it onto the Supreme Court calendar and could have a major impact on many cases if the high court strikes down the DOJ actions.

  Dozens of other cases from Jan. 6 are in various stages of appeal. These include claims that the DOJ withheld exculpatory evidence from defense teams, resulting in unfair bench and jury trials. Other cases cite the refusal by federal judges to grant zero change of venue requests as evidence that defendants are not facing juries of their peers.

  What Impact Has the Release of the Capitol Security Video Had?

  In 2022, then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) gave exclusive access to more than 40,000 hours of Capitol Police security video to Fox News, The Epoch Times, Just the News, and columnist Julie Kelly.

  The video provided to those media outlets led to some revelations, including an important look at the medical aid provided to Ms. Boyland as she awaited transport via a D.C. Fire and EMS Service ambulance.

  

  Paramedics stop the gurney carrying Rosanne Boyland near the House Wing Door at the U.S. Capitol and move her to the floor to continue CPR on Jan. 6, 2021. (U.S. Capitol Police/Screenshot via The Epoch Times)

  However, the House has not fulfilled about half of the video requests made by The Epoch Times, limiting the media’s ability to fully cover the events of Jan. 6.

  Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has decided to hire a contractor to blur the faces of identifiable persons on the video, setting off a fury of complaints on social media. That decision will prevent media and defendants from using facial recognition software to track suspicious actors and determine the numbers of undercover agents and informants in the crowds that day.

  What’s Next for Jan. 6 Investigations?

  It remains to be seen if GOP House members will successfully press for a new Jan. 6 committee to investigate the myriad issues ignored by the Democrat-controlled House Select Committee in 2022.

  Major unresolved questions include what role undercover police, federal agents, and informants played in the crowds on Jan. 6.

  Court documents filed by Jan. 6 defendant William Pope of Topeka, Kansas, exposed the presence of dozens of undercover Metropolitan Police Department Electronic Surveillance Unit officers on Jan. 6.

  

  Bobby Powell is interviewed in Terra Ceia, Fla., in November 2022 for “The Real Story of Jan. 6 Part 2: The Long Road Home,” a documentary from The Epoch Times. (Paulio Shakespeare/The Epoch Times)

  One of those officers appeared to participate as an agitator, helping protesters over police barricades and urging them to go up to, and into, the Capitol.

  Radio journalist Bobby Powell has spent three years trying to get investigators and journalists to look at a video he shot on the east patio of the Capitol, showing a man who looked like an undercover operative vandalizing a large sheet of glass in a Capitol window. Mr. Powell’s story is told in The Epoch Times’ new documentary: “The Real Story of Jan. 6: The Long Road Home.”

  There will likely also be fallout from alleged perjured testimony given at the first trial of Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and four other defendants that ran from Sept. 27 through Nov. 29, 2022.

  Journalist Steve Baker from Blaze Media says his video investigation showed that an alleged confrontation between Oath Keepers and USCP Officer Harry Dunn never happened because the witness—USCP Special Agent David Lazarus—was nowhere near Mr. Dunn or the Oath Keepers at the time.

  The revelations cast serious doubt on testimony given by Mr. Lazarus and Mr. Dunn in the Oath Keepers trial. One Oath Keepers defense attorney, Brad Geyer, said the development should lead to Oath Keepers guilty verdicts being set aside.

  Perhaps the biggest remaining mystery is the identity of the person who planted pipe bombs at the D.C. headquarters of both the GOP and Democrat parties on Jan. 5, 2021.

  The FBI has increased its reward—it’s now at $500,000—for information leading to an arrest, but has reported little progress over the past three years.

  The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) has refused to release its analysis of the bombs after The Epoch Times filed a Freedom of Information Act request in 2022.

  *  *  *

  The Epoch Times original documentary “The Real Story of January 6 Part 2: The Long Road Home” will be available to full subscribers starting Saturday, Jan. 6, at 8:30 p.m. ET on EpochTV.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 16:22

• JPMorgan: Housing Affordability Could Be Restored Within 3.5 Years, But There's A Catch…
  JPMorgan: Housing Affordability Could Be Restored Within 3.5 Years, But There’s A Catch…

  Authored by Sam Bourgi via CreditNews.com,

  There may be light at the end of the tunnel for Americans struggling to afford a home, but it will take at least three and a half years to get there, according to Joe Seydl, JPMorgan’s senior markets economist.

  

  Why three and a half years?

  According to Seydl, that’s when Americans’ paychecks will catch up to soaring housing costs.

  That translates to an annual income growth of 7%.

  “If you are looking to buy a house in the United States, don’t wait for, or expect, a home price crash,” Seydl wrote in a research report.

  “We don’t foresee one coming (thankfully), nor do we think one is necessary to restore affordability at the national level. We think time and continued robust income growth can cure the problem on their own,” he explained.

  

  There’s just one caveat to Seydl’s analysis: While housing affordability could potentially be restored in 3.5 years nationally, it’ll take longer in major metro areas.

  If you are looking to snap up a house in Miami, Chicago, Houston, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, or New York, the wait may extend to five years.

  While Seydl’s analysis should provide a boost of confidence to Americans struggling to afford their first home, they shouldn’t celebrate just yet.

  Can wage growth be sustained?

  Seydl’s conclusion hinges on “incomes continuing to rise at a robust rate.” But can such growth be sustained?

  According to the Atlanta Fed, wages were growing at 5.2% from September to November—much higher than at any point over the last two decades but down from a peak of 6.7% in mid-2022.

  Meanwhile, inflation still remains well above the target and keeps eating into Americans’ paychecks. In fact, adjusted for inflation, Americans’ wages have shrunk by 5% since pre-Covid.

  Looking ahead to 2024, labor experts aren’t expecting a wage renaissance either, pointing to shrinking annual budgets for payrolls.

  “By all expectations, the mood for [wage growth in] 2024 is radically different than what it was going into 2023,” Aaron Terrazas, Glassdoor’s chief economist, told CNBC.

  According to a recent industry survey by Mercer, American companies are budgeting for a 3.9% increase in wages this year, down from 4.1% in 2023.

  The other factor driving housing affordability

  While higher wages would certainly improve housing affordability, fixing the chronically low supply of real estate may prove to be a much bigger challenge.

  According to the National Association of Realtors (NAR), America is grappling with a “severe housing shortage that’s years in the making.”

  There are so few listings that even one of history’s largest jumps in mortgage rates hasn’t shaken the housing market.

  In fact, as of November, median home prices stood at $409,000—16% higher than before Covid.

  According to NAR, this has affected average or ‘middle-income buyers’ the most.

  “Middle-income buyers face the largest shortage of homes among all income groups, making it even harder for them to build wealth through homeownership,” said Nadia Evangelou, senior economist and director of real estate research at the National Association of Realtors.

  “Even with the current level of listings, the housing affordability and shortage issues wouldn’t be so severe if there were enough homes for all price ranges,” she said.

  According to Redfin data, there were just 3.82 million existing homes for sale in 2023—a 7.3% decline from the previous year and the lowest since 2010.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 16:20

• "Have A Metamucil And Delete Your Account" – Harvard Prof Self-Immolates With Elitist Attack On Chris Rufo
  “Have A Metamucil And Delete Your Account” – Harvard Prof Self-Immolates With Elitist Attack On Chris Rufo

  It would be an understatement to say that academic elites are absolutely seething over the takedown of Harvard president Claudine Gay, whose rise to power was brought to you by the letters DEI, and of course capital P for Plagiarism.

  

  There were two major players involved in her downfall – billionaire investor Bill Ackman, and journalist Chris Rufo.

  Now, establishment tentacles like Business Insider, and the NY Times are going after Ackman’s wife for allegedly plagiarizing part of her dissertation (which, after reading their hit-piece, is maybe a 0.01 on the Gay scale).

  They’re also coming after Rufo, of course – and they aren’t sending their best.

  On Thursday, Harvard Professor of Government and African American Studies, Jennifer Hochschild, implied that Rufo had ‘stolen valor’ by claiming he was a Harvard alum, because he went through Harvard’s extension program as opposed to their graduate program.

  

  “On Rufo: what do integrity police say about his claim to have “master’s degree from Harvard,” which is actually from the open-enrollment Extension School?” Hochschild wrote on X. “Those students are great – I teach them- but they are not the same as what we normally think of as Harvard graduate students.”

  She was immediately smoked by Community Notes:

  

  And then, there’s the replies:

  “You’re a joke. Claudine Gay plagiarized the acknowledgements from one of your papers and now, out of some bizarre desire for revenge, you’re trashing your own university’s continuing education school,” said Rufo, adding “Have a Metamucil and delete your account.”

  You’re a joke. Claudine Gay plagiarized the acknowledgements from one of your papers and now, out of some bizarre desire for revenge, you’re trashing your own university’s continuing education school. Have a Metamucil and delete your account.

  — Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ (@realchrisrufo) January 5, 2024

  “If what the Harvard elite are saying about the extension program is true then I think you and every other graduate has a class action lawsuit on your hands,” one user suggested, adding “They sold you a bill of goods. billed your program as an extension of Harvard, charged you exorbitant fees, and then turned around and said it really wasn’t Harvard.”

  It is a masters degree. If you claim otherwise, then Harvard has engaged in false advertising and is subject to a lawsuit for fraud. Is it your claim that Harvard has engaged in fraudulently advertising?

  — Cernovich (@Cernovich) January 5, 2024

  Hochschild kept digging… posting “Rufo could have proudly and honorably said, “I pulled myself up by bootstraps;to prove it I have master’s degree from Harvard extension school, along with other smart and gutsy students.”Instead he used weasel words to try to attach himself to Ivy status and prestige.Insecurity??”

  Except, Rufo hasn’t attempted to conceal anything…

  Lmao, you just keep proving how far Harvard has fallen. Here is his post. Good for you trashing your students. pic.twitter.com/kshrYLOGYk

  — Nick Joseph (@NickJoseph44) January 6, 2024

  Every word makes sense when viewed through this lense. pic.twitter.com/Qxglih40QG

  — Dr. Ranch Wood (@UVIL1991) January 5, 2024

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

  So a rude, crude, “Harvard extension” guy who didn’t go to Harvard, brought down the Harvard president over the fierce objections of the Harvard board and the Harvard establishment. Well, what does that say about the Harvard establishment?

  — Dinesh D’Souza (@DineshDSouza) January 5, 2024

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

  This is a professor at Harvard. If she has a problem with the way Harvard hands out degrees through its extension school, she could have said so before. Or resigned. Instead, she just reveals herself as the Margaret Dumont of academia. https://t.co/lQAsY0asGZ

  — John Podhoretz (@jpodhoretz) January 6, 2024

  America is in serious need of an academic renaissance. 

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

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 15:45

• FAA Grounds Boeing 737 Max 9 Jets After Exit Door Incident
  FAA Grounds Boeing 737 Max 9 Jets After Exit Door Incident

  Update (1310ET):

  The Federal Aviation Administration announced a temporary grounding for Boeing 737 MAX 9 jets. These jets will need to be inspected before returning to service. This comes after a mid-cabin exit door flew off mid-flight of an Alaska Airlines MAX 9 on Friday evening.

  • FAA ORDERS TEMPORARY GROUNDING OF CERTAIN BOEING 737 MAX 9 JETS
  • FAA: PLANES MUST BE INSPECTED BEFORE THEY CAN RETURN TO FLIGHT
  • FAA REQUIRING INSPECTIONS OF CERTAIN BOEING 737 MAX 9 PLANES

  *    *    * 

  Update (1250ET):

  Sources tell CNBC that United Airlines plans to ground dozens of its Boeing 737 MAX 9 jets for inspections following an incident involving a mid-cabin exit door on an Alaska Airlines MAX 9 jet on Friday evening. This would mean both Alaska Airlines and United Airlines would have both grounded their MAX 9 jet fleets.

  Here’s what X users are saying about the Alaska Airlines incident:

  Another video. Confirms a rear plug door failed in flight. Super rare, brand new @Boeing 737 max 9 failure. Absolutely NOT something a passenger could do. This is a mechanical failure and not something maintenance would be at fault for. https://t.co/xUCpXIYml1

  — Shane Connor 🇺🇲 (@p3d_tesla) January 6, 2024

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

  A big deal: Max was involved in 2 catastrophic crashes in ‘18 & ‘19, causation, trim failure.

  Boeing originally denied fault & was accused of profit over safety.

  Wouldn’t set foot in one.

  Alaska Airlines grounds 737 Max 9 planes after window blow out https://t.co/GyjGQrvPFq

  — Tonksey 🇪🇺 #GTTO #ToryCorruption #Antifa #BLM (@JohnTonks) January 6, 2024

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

  If you wish to do anything right this year, you can permanently BAN every and all MAX 8,9 whatever other number aircraft from your company. The program is a catastrophic failure with proof and you’re daily putting tens of thousands of souls lives at risk. That MIGHT 1/2

  — Now Serving Whatever Number You’re Not 💁🏼‍♀️ (@RuthNicola85) January 6, 2024

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

  *    *    * 

  A brand new Boeing 737 MAX 9, operated by Alaska Airlines, was forced to make an emergency landing at Portland International Airport shortly after takeoff on Friday evening due to its mid-cabin exit door detaching from the aircraft mid-flight. This incident was recorded and shared on social media platform X. 

  

  The Max jet, registered as N704AL, was operating as AS1282 from PDX to Ontario International Airport with more than 170 passengers on board. Data from the aviation tracking website Flightradar24 shows the jet was about ten minutes into the flight, reaching 16,000 feet, with a ground speed of nearly 400 knots when the incident unfolded. 

  

  “During the flight, a sudden decompression occurred once the door detached, leading to an emergency landing. In video footage captured during the incident, the emergency exit can be seen torn off and oxygen masks deployed. There are no reports of serious injuries,” aviation blog Airways Magazine wrote in a note. 

  

  Passengers recorded the shocking moment when the mid-aft door ripped off. 

  BREAKING: Alaska Airlines plane makes emergency landing in Portland, Oregon after window blows out in mid-air.

  Several items, including phones, were sucked out of the plane when it suddenly depressurized. Everyone is safe. pic.twitter.com/BtOB1RU3tn

  — BNO News (@BNONews) January 6, 2024

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

  According to BBC News, Alaska Airlines said 65 of its 737 Max 9 aircraft were suspended after the incident for ‘inspections.’ 

  Boeing said it was briefed on the incident and was “working to gather more information.” 

  The door incident came weeks after Boeing reported 737 Max jets had yet another quality control issue: “A possible loose bolt in the rudder control system.” 

  Max jets have faced several major issues related to different parts and systems. The most notable defect was MCAS (Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System), which led to two separate crashes, killing a combined 346 people.

  Several months ago, fuselage supplier Spirit was found to have improperly drilled holes in the aft pressure bulkhead. 

  We need to revisit internal communications from Boeing employees that pointed out Max jets were “designed by clowns who in turn are supervised by monkeys.” 

  The latest incident of a door detaching mid-flight certainly does not instill confidence in this troubled aircraft. 

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 15:10

• Is 2024 Bitcoin's Big Year?
  Is 2024 Bitcoin’s Big Year?

  Authored by Michael Washburn via The Epoch Times,

  U.S. regulators’ pending approval of the spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF), which could come as soon as next week, and severe criticisms of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for missteps in the prosecution of a Utah-based firm, DEBT Box, and for a general pattern of regulatory overreach, have combined to give the cryptocurrency market unprecedented momentum in 2024, financial and legal expert analysts have told The Epoch Times.

  For Bitcoin, 2024 is off to a strong start. On Tuesday, Jan. 2, riding high on expectations of spot ETF approval, Bitcoin hit $45,000, before dipping modestly to $44,000 today.

  

  The severe risks that regulators associate with Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are real indeed (though most importantly, not unique to bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency), and criminals make wide use of Bitcoin scams to rip off unsophisticated investors, often older people who did not grow up with social media and online trading platforms. The latter problem is so acute that police in U.S. states routinely issue warnings about the dangers of investing in crypto online. Crypto is still a highly volatile asset, and the value of a digital portfolio can disappear virtually overnight.

  The conviction in November of former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried on all the felony charges he faced, after just a few hours of jury deliberations, has also not helped the sector’s image.

  Yet a confluence of factors is still likely to make 2024 the most decisive and transformative year thus far for the cryptocurrency, analysts say. Market players are fed up with SEC Chair Gary Gensler’s war on digital innovation and failure to adhere to legal protocols as he goes about trying to control an industry he has blasted as “rife with fraud, rife with hucksters,” the analysts say.

  The financial markets have taken note of Bitcoin’s performance in the first days of the new year. For much of 2022 and 2023, Bitcoin struggled to emerge from the “crypto winter” and the fallout from the collapse of FTX and other exchanges, and its price vacillated between $20,000 and $30,000.

  Weighing Spot Bitcoin ETFs

  Digital assets are increasingly in vogue at prominent financial institutions. Many of them, such as BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, have gone from a view of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies largely consistent with that of Mr. Gensler, to finding value in digital money and seeking to parlay that value into high returns for investors.

  BlackRock CEO Larry Fink is among those whose view of Bitcoin has undergone a radical shift.

  In October, a former BlackRock managing director said that his former boss, Mr. Fink, and U.S. financial regulators largely agreed on the inevitability of spot Bitcoin ETF adoption, and it was just a question of when.

  Despite the slight dip, much of the market still believes the long-awaited approval is finally at hand, and is bullish. John Deaton, a lawyer who has represented cryptocurrencies platforms in legal battles with the SEC, does not credit such rumors of a regulatory refusal, and sees many factors coming together to make 2024 a huge year.

  “I believe Bitcoin will do well between 2024 and 2025. When you combine the approval of a spot ETF, with the halving in April, along with an election year where you know the Fed will attempt to manipulate the economy, lower interest rates, and buy assets through quantitative easing, it’s a perfect storm for price appreciation,” Mr. Deaton told The Epoch Times.

  “Halving” refers to a process of slashing by 50 percent the payment for mining Bitcoin, to help keep it scarce and retain its value.

  

  As the week came to a close, CoinTelegraph reports that 19b-4 amendments were filed for spot BTC ETF applications from asset managers BlackRock, Valkyrie, Grayscale, Bitwise, Hashdex, ARK 21Shares, Invesco Galaxy, Fidelity, Franklin Templeton, VanEck and WisdomTree. 

  The filings are one of the last stages in the SEC approval process, but S-1 documents must be completed in order for U.S. exchanges to begin listing shares of investment securities with direct exposure to crypto.

  Some experts have speculated that final approval for the spot Bitcoin ETFs will drop before Jan. 10 – the deadline for an offering from ARK Invest and 21Shares. A potential approval could mean greater adoption of crypto in the U.S. and worldwide.

  There’s the first 19b-4 amendment filing! Here we go. https://t.co/dz01aborw7

  — James Seyffart (@JSeyff) January 5, 2024

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

  Meanwhile, in a post on X (formerly Twitter), Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas showed optimism that the SEC would approve a Bitcoin ETF by the start of next week:

  “Yeah it’s basically done. Latest I’m hearing (from multiple sources) that final S-1s are due 8am on Monday as SEC is trying to line everyone up for Jan 11th launch.”

  DEBT Box Fiasco

  The cryptocurrency industry has long had a tense, contentious relationship with SEC Chair Mr. Gensler, who has made no secret of his loathing of cryptocurrency and the firms that mine and trade crypto tokens.

  In an interview with Bloomberg Television last July, Mr. Gensler said, “A lot of investors should be aware it’s not only a highly speculative asset class, it’s also one that they currently should not assume that they’re getting the protections of the securities laws, even though the securities laws apply to many of those tokens.

  “The platforms often are commingling and trading against you and have market makers that are on the other side of your trades … Right now, this is a field rife with fraud, rife with hucksters. There are good faith actors as well, but there are far too many that aren’t,” Mr. Gensler continued.

  As part of his crusade to stamp out such fraud, Mr. Gensler has gone after crypto exchanges of many sizes and profiles, and SEC enforcement has taken a noticeably harsher tone.

  In August 2023, the SEC announced an enforcement action against Digital Licensing Inc., a Draper, Utah-based firm doing business under the name DEBT Box, and 18 of its executives and personnel. The SEC’s complaint charged the company with raising about $50 million, along with unknown amounts of Bitcoin and Ether, with fraudulent claims on social media that investors would make substantial profits investing in tokens generated through crypto mining. According to the complaint, the tokens pitched to investors were the results not of mining but simply of DEBT Box’s ordinary blockchain code.

  

  U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission chairman Gary Gensler testifies during a Senate Banking Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington on Sept. 12, 2023.(Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

  In its zeal to prosecute DEBT Box, the SEC went so far as to make emergency applications for a temporary restraining order and seizure of the firm’s assets, on the grounds that such steps were necessary to stop DEBT Box from transferring investors’ money to offshore accounts.

  But DEBT Box executives vigorously challenged the claims that the SEC put forth to justify seizing the company’s assets, and U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby agreed that the regulator had exceeded its mandate and made materially false claims.

  On Dec. 21, Gurbir Grewal, head of the SEC’s enforcement division, took the highly unusual step of apologizing for his agency’s conduct.

  “I fully appreciate the extraordinary responsibility entrusted to the SEC when enforcing federal securities laws. … I understand that the division fell short of these standards in this case, and I apologize for that shortfall,” Mr. Grewal said.

  The SEC’s PR Nightmare

  The SEC’s admission that it behaved in an arbitrary manner more befitting an authoritarian regime than a financial agency operating under Constitutional strictures affirms what many have long believed about the SEC and its orientation under Mr. Gensler.

  “The SEC only gave a half-hearted apology because they had no choice. The federal judge is considering issuing sanctions against the lawyers at the SEC. That is how bad their behavior and conduct in these crypto cases has become,” Mr. Deaton told The Epoch Times.

  In Mr. Deaton’s view, the severe blowback directed at the SEC’s overreach in this matter is not surprising given the regulators’ failed efforts to prosecute Ripple Labs on the grounds that its crypto token, XRP, was a security, and that Ripple had engaged in the unlicensed sale of a product that fell under the SEC’s purview.

  Though the SEC may not have made material misstatements of fact in seeking to prosecute Ripple, the SEC’s arguments in the case, which Judge Analise Torres found to be invalid in a 34-page ruling issued on July 13, 2023, were so deeply flawed that it was clear the regulator was operating without any grasp of legal nuance or the bounds of its mandate, Mr. Deaton believes.

  “The federal judge in the Ripple case stated that the lawyers at the SEC actually ‘lack faithful allegiance to the law’ and only care about advancing their own self-serving agenda,” Mr. Deaton said.

  Mr. Deaton then called the DEBT Box case an “egregious” instance of overreach where a government agency felt entitled to seize the assets of private citizens without a trial, and without an opportunity to face the accusers and present counter-arguments in court, or any of the other niceties of due process.

  “This was a temporary restraining order where the defendant was not present. It’s an ex parte hearing with the judge, and they intentionally misled the judge to believe that DEBT Box was closing bank accounts and moving money overseas, and if the judge didn’t freeze all the assets, innocent people would lose their funds,” Mr. Deaton said.

  “Based on that, the judge froze the accounts and DEBT Box employees’ payroll checks bounced, which meant people couldn’t pay their mortgages and other bills. What the SEC did was criminal and they should be punished,” he continued.

  

  U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission building in Washington on Nov. 13, 2023. (Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times)

  Chronic Failures

  This is not the first case in which the SEC’s conduct has come in for harsh criticism. Mr. Deaton mentioned the case of Stamford, Connecticut-based Grayscale Investments in this connection, noting that a U.S. appeals court found the SEC to have acted arbitrarily in its zeal to close the firm down.

  The extent of the agency’s wrongdoing in the DEBT Box and other matters does not redound to the SEC’s credit, and the opprobrium now directed at the regulator cuts across partisan lines, he observed.

  No one can claim that a Republican appointee hampered the SEC’s campaign against Ripple, and that the regulator might have fared better in a legal proceeding under the oversight of a Democrat. After all, Judge Torres is anything but a Trump supporter, said Mr. Deaton, who does not expect Mr. Gensler to retain his position as SEC bigwig indefinitely.

  “Judge Torres is a lifelong Democrat appointed by President Obama, and all she did was follow and apply the law. Gary Gensler is a bad faith regulator, and no other SEC chair has lost so much in the court system. Democrats are realizing that he is a political liability,” Mr. Deaton said.

  Broad Acceptance

  Adding further momentum to Bitcoin’s rise, regulators outside the United States increasingly view cryptocurrencies as a hedge against rampant inflation and a means for non-institutional investors—in other words, ordinary citizens—to find some prosperity in tumultuous times.

  Josip Putarek, a crypto analyst at the gaming platform dappGambl, agreed that Bitcoin’s strong start in 2024 is largely a function of U.S. regulators’ imminent spot Bitcoin ETF approval, and suggested that other digital currencies may ride the same wave.

  “All eyes are on Bitcoin right now, and if it performs well, the money inflow to the crypto market may shift to Ethereum and other altcoins,” Mr. Putarek told The Epoch Times.

  “Approval of a spot Bitcoin ETF will drastically change the game, as it will open up inflows to Bitcoin from institutions, thus creating constant buy pressure,” he said.

  Citing the example of gold-based exchange-traded funds, Mr. Putarek suggested the spot Bitcoin ETF’s performance may be comparable.

  “Looking at gold, that ETF has multiplied its market capitalization several times since its launch. In addition, gold, which was in the $400 band in 2004, showed a growth performance of 370% in six years,” he said.

  But an even more important driver may be the rapidity with which various governments are turning to digital currencies.

  Latin America and Hong Kong

  “El Salvador was the first country to officially recognize Bitcoin as a payment unit in 2021, and many other countries will follow in the future. It’s just a matter of time. In my opinion, Argentina and Hong Kong could be among the first countries to join El Salvador in the journey,” Mr. Putarek said.

  Mr. Putarek cited the chronic inflation crippling Argentina’s markets as a reason why its newly elected president, Javier Milei, has adopted forceful pro-crypto rhetoric and drawn comparison to El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele.

  As for Hong Kong, the jurisdiction combines a highly tech-savvy, pro-crypto bent with a determination to adhere to the inter-governmental Financial Action Task Force’s (FATF) international standards aimed at curbing the fraud and scams still associated with crypto, Mr. Putarek said. Hong Kong has updated its Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Ordinance to be compliant with FATF Recommendation 15, requiring firms to follow strict AML and anti-terrorist-financing protocols and operate under a license from the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission. Hong Kong has been a member of the FATF, which targets money laundering and terrorist financing, since 1991.

  In agreement on the direction of Argentina under Mr. Milei is Silvina Moschini, an analyst and the CEO of Unicorns Inc.

  “President-elect Milei demonstrates a noteworthy commitment to financial advancement, particularly in his alignment with crypto foundational values, advocating for minimal state intervention and free markets. This creates a promising landscape for digital assets in Argentina, suggesting a favorable environment for the tokenization of assets and broader financial innovation in the country,” Ms. Moschini told The Epoch Times.

  The appeal of crypto as a hedge in the midst of Argentina’s economic chaos has not diminished, Ms. Moschini believes.

  “Amid the economic challenges in Argentina, characterized by peso devaluation and high inflation, crypto adoption has surged as a practical solution for individuals seeking alternatives to navigate these issues,” she said.

  Ms. Moschini added that she expects the trend to gather force in tandem with the peso’s devaluation.

  People walk past a bank branch decorated with images of old Argentine peso bills, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on Sept. 26, 2018. Argentina’s year on year inflation hit a staggering 142 percent during election week. (Eitan Abramovich/AFP via Getty Images)

  A Complex Environment

  At the moment, the headwinds in the United States and other countries may be favorable to broader adoption of crypto. At the same time, many observers are sober about the persistence of fraud and scams, and the continuing disrepute that they impart to digital asset trading and investing.

  It is important not to read too deeply into El Salvador’s decision to recognize Bitcoin as legal tender. After all, El Salvador is a small country with a set of economic circumstances that hardly apply elsewhere. When compared with traditional, or fiat, currencies, digital money is still at a disadvantage.

  “Crypto lacks the straightforwardness and ease of use that regular currencies bring to the market. Merchants aren’t supporting crypto. Crypto can be volatile, and coupled with its scaling issues, merchants are left with no choice but to deny crypto as a form of payment,” Laura K. Inamedinova, a partner at Dubai-based Illuminati Capital, told The Epoch Times.

  “Recently, we’ve seen payment providers like Mastercard and Visa support different crypto projects like Coinbase, Taurus, Circle, and others, but that’s not as widespread as we might want,” she added.

  In Ms. Inamedinova’s view, raising public awareness about the risks as well as the potential of digital currencies is crucial.

  “There’s still a large stigma around crypto being a scam, which is why educating the public is so important,” she said.

  Here is one more reason why the financial markets are at such a critical juncture, with regulatory approval of the spot Bitcoin ETF expected as early as next week.

  “In a case like this, spot ETFs could work in boosting the credibility of the Web3 space, but that’s not all. Crypto as a financial instrument needs to be simplified for the public,” Ms. Inadmedinova continued.

  The challenges and dangers are real but she views the market with guarded optimism. The Bitcoin halving expected in April, the pending rollout of the spot ETF, and various private initiatives will drive a bull market in 2024 and beyond, she believes.

  The Epoch Times has reached out to the SEC for comment.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 15:10

• Ukraine Again Targets Crimea & Belgorod In Large-Scale Drone & Missile Attacks
  Ukraine Again Targets Crimea & Belgorod In Large-Scale Drone & Missile Attacks

  At a moment the front lines are at a standstill and Ukraine is suffering severe manpower and ammunition supply woes, its military continues high-risk attacks on Russian territory, including two days of missile and drone launches on Crimea. Russia in return has been unleashing even harsher retaliatory strikes in Ukrainian cities, as it warned it would do.

  The Russian military has said Saturday it deflected a fresh missile attack on Crimea, having shot down four inbound Ukrainian missiles overnight. The day prior, Russia downed 36 attack drones over the peninsula, a defense ministry statement also said.

  

  However, Kiev said some of its projectiles made it through the anti-air measures, with Mykola Oleshchuk, the commander of Ukraine’s air force, announcing on social media: “Saki airfield! All targets have been shot!” – in reference to the Russian airbase in western Crimea. Ukraine’s military also said it targeted a command post near Sevastopol.

  Air raid sirens have been sounding in various border regions of Russia stretching back to Thursday:

  Air alerts were heard over the Russian oblasts of Krasnodar and Belgorod, as well as temporarily occupied Crimea, on Jan. 4 as Russia’s aggressive war on Ukraine increasingly hits closer to home in Russia.

  Russia claimed nearly 50 drones were used in the separate attacks, with explosions heard in occupied Crimea and Belgorod, and reports of injuries in Belgorod.

  In the latest direct hit on a residential neighborhood in Belgorod city, two Russian civilians were injured by shelling. Belgorod Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Telegram, “According to preliminary data there are two injured: one man has shrapnel wounds to the forearm, and another has shrapnel wounds to the shin.”

  “Windows were shattered in several apartments and more than 30 vehicles were damaged because of a shell explosion near an apartment building,” according to regional media. “One house suffered roof damage and a car was damaged.”

  Russia has throughout nearly two years of war warned that countries externally supplying weapons to Ukrainian forces would be treated as direct participants in the conflict if their weapons are found to be used against Russia. The US in particular has been the biggest supplier of heavy weaponry, followed by NATO and EU countries.

  

  Moscow has all the while underscored the proxy war nature of the conflict and showdown with NATO, but so far a WW3-style escalation has been narrowly avoided, but this worst case scenario certainly looms large. This especially as President Putin has lately charged that Ukraine is using Western advanced weapons systems to directly target Russian cities and territory.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 14:35

• Trump Drops New Campaign Video Vowing More Transparency On JFK Assassination
  Trump Drops New Campaign Video Vowing More Transparency On JFK Assassination

  Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Modernity.news,

  Donald Trump dropped a new campaign video featuring Bill Clinton meeting with Jeffrey Epstein, while the ad also promised more transparency on uncovering the full story behind the JFK assassination.

  

  The video opens with Ronald Reagan’s ‘thousand years of darkness’ speech where he called on Americans to tell their elected officials that national policy should be based on a shared sense of morality and is soundtracked by Aerosmith’s Dream On.

  It also features Trump’s promise to obtain transparency surrounding the assassination of JFK, featuring footage of Kennedy being shot before highlighting the lyrics, “you got to lose to know how to win.”

  The ad then shows footage of when Trump was ‘arrested’ along with a passage from Sun Tzu’s The Art of War which reads, “If you know the enemy and know yourself you need not fear the results of a hundred battles.”

  Trump just dropped a video featuring Jeffrey Epstein, Clintons’, Obamas, Klaus Schwab, and Bill Gates. 👀 pic.twitter.com/yZrvncYnPx

  — Patrick Webb (@RealPatrickWebb) January 5, 2024

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

  The chorus then drops showing Trump with his supporters before clips showing Bill Clinton meeting with Jeffrey Epstein.

  The lyrics “dream on” are then illustrated with images of Trump’s Republican rivals Nikki Haley, Ron DeSantis, Chris Christie and Mike Pence before showing footage from Trump’s 2016 victory.

  World Economic Forum founder Klaus Schwab, Barack Obama, Bill Gates, George Soros, Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton are also told to “dream on”.

  The song’s ‘scream’ part is then illustrated with the infamous meme of the obese Democrat screaming in anger at response to Trump winning.

  The ad finishes with Trump declaring:

  “As long as the American people hold in their arms deep and devoted love of country then there is nothing this nation cannot achieve – the best is yet to come.”

  Compare Trump’s ad to Biden’s latest effort, which demonizes Trump supporters as extremists.

  *  *  *

  Your support is crucial in helping us defeat mass censorship. Please consider donating via Locals or check out our unique merch. Follow us on X @ModernityNews

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 14:00

• These Were The Top News Stories Of 2023 Based On Google Search Trends
  These Were The Top News Stories Of 2023 Based On Google Search Trends

  In an age of rapid-fire social media updates, memes, and never-ending cat videos, what’s the world still collectively paying attention to?

  Visual Capitalist’s Marcus Lu and Pallavi Rao visualize the the top 10 news stories of 2023 according to Google Search trends.

  

  Hope Amidst Disasters

  In February, southern Turkey and parts of Syria suffered a deadly earthquake which killed more than 50,000 people and left more than a million without a home. Adverse weather conditions and poor infrastructure hampered rescue efforts, worsening the effects of the disaster.

  While rebuilding has since begun, the scale of the project is vast: more than 300,000 buildings collapsed or were damaged beyond repair. Steadily rising inflation in the country, along with a depreciating Turkish lira, has ballooned reconstruction costs.

  

  Meanwhile, an ongoing war in Sudan is being fought between opposing factions within Sudan’s military government. Millions of people are facing food insecurity, and there are widespread reports of war crimes.

  On a more positive note, Google users also looked up Chandrayaan-3, India’s third lunar-exploration mission. In August 2023, India became fourth country to successfully land on the moon.

  Hurricane Season and Violent Events

  Another year gone by, another global temperature record broken. Rising temperatures in the Atlantic Ocean, along with the effect of El Niño, led to plenty of tropical storms in the region, of which the World Meteorological Organization named 20.

  Of them, Hurricane Idalia caused widespread damage in Florida, and Hurricane Lee resulted in prolonged power outages in Maine, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick.

  On the Pacific side, Hurricane Hilary brought torrential rain and flooding to parts of Mexico and the southwestern U.S.

  

  Finally, the Israel-Hamas war has led to more than 15,000 deaths in Palestine and 1,500 fatalities in Israel.

  On December 22nd, the UN Security Council passed a resolution “calling for humanitarian pauses” in the fighting and increased aid to Gaza. An earlier resolution (which called for an immediate ceasefire) failed after being vetoed by the United States.

  Meanwhile, a proposed peace plan by Egypt (which helped architect an earlier six-day temporary ceasefire) has not been well received, though neither the Netanyahu government, nor Hamas has outright rejected it.

  Tyler Durden
  Sat, 01/06/2024 – 13:25

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