Dec 08

Today’s News 8th December 2023

  • The "Why" Is Now Obvious
    The “Why” Is Now Obvious

    Authored by Albin Sadar via American Greatness,

    The release of more video and cell phone tapes from January 6 by new House Speaker Mike Johnson shows further evidence of a setup by the Feds that their so-called insurrection was staged.

    All sides will acknowledge the fact that then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi refused to have extra security on January 6.

    However, there is a bigger question that no one, Left, Right or Center, seems to be asking:

    Why?

    Why wouldn’t Pelosi want to be sure that “Democracy was secure” so that Vice President Mike Pence could certify the Electoral College vote? Making sure that the Capitol was safe and sound would mean that Joe Biden’s presidency would be assured. After all, the election of 2020 was “the most secure in American history,” so why wouldn’t you want that obvious fact certified and rubber-stamped by Congress?

    The only obvious answer to why Pelosi wanted to guarantee a riotous breach of the Capitol was what she knew would be the actual results of the Electoral College vote if the process were allowed to run its course. Senators Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley, among others, had previously made noise about challenging election results in several swing states. And despite what many have debated, there was tangible potential for Pence to delay the certification for a couple of weeks to look into the evidence of significant vote-tampering and fraud.

    How do we know that the vice president had the authority to stop the certification? Well, because the ability for the position of vice president to do just that was changed by a vote of Congress relatively recently after the events of January 6. Why would you change something that did not need to be changed?

    So, at the time, Pelosi knew that a halt in the proceedings would lead to an investigation. And an investigation would lead to those questions being covered, albeit reluctantly, by the entire mainstream media. What actually transpired over the three additional days of counting in the 2020 Election would be exposed. And the narrative of the most secure election in American history would crumble in front of the eyes of everybody in this country and across the globe.

    To this day, then, as the new Speaker takes a serious look at the events of January 6 and as America and the world itself can see exposed in the recently-released video evidence, we must address what happened that particular day – specifically, the reason that the crowds of tens of thousands had gathered. The patriots in Washington, D.C. showed up to highlight one very important message: “Stop the Steal.”

    Pelosi’s action – as well as inaction – diverted attention from that message; she refocused our sights on the word “insurrection” in order to keep President Donald Trump from returning to the White House as a result of the true, states’ election totals of 2020. And the Left continues nonstop that charade in order to keep Trump from the White House in 2024.

    With each passing day, it is becoming increasingly apparent that the two biggest blemishes recently on America as a great and free nation are the stolen presidential election of 2020, and the subsequent incarceration of those patriots who exercised their guaranteed First Amendment right to free speech to contest it. The election tampering advanced the Left’s directive of “fundamental transformation” of the country, which included imprisonment without bail or trial of those with whom the tyrannical administration disagreed.

    So, what next?

    Unless the country itself can see that the narrative presented by the Left regarding January 6, 2021, was a smoke screen for the real insurrection of November 3, 2020, America will need to brace itself for a repeat performance of that nefarious action on November 5, 2024.

    *  *  *

    Albin Sadar is author of Obvious: Seeing the Evil That’s in Plain Sight and Doing Something About It, as well as the children’s book collection, Hamster Holmes: Box of Mysteries.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 23:40

  • What Are The Best Selling Video Game Franchises In The US?
    What Are The Best Selling Video Game Franchises In The US?

    Fortnite, Minecraft, Call of Duty, Super Mario or Grand Theft Auto: Even many non-gamers recognize at least some of these highly successful titles and franchises, be it by name or their cultural impact.

    As Statista’s Florian Zandt details below, when viewed through an economic lens, there are two game series that have dominated the sales charts in the United States for the past decade.

    The first and overall leader in terms of total entries in the top 10 selling games in the U.S. between 2013 and 2022 according to market analysts at NPD Group is Call of Duty. The franchise has been present among the top sellers with 11 individual games since 2013, snagging the top spot every single year apart from two instances.

    Infographic: What Are The Best Selling Video Game Franchises In the U.S.? | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    In 2018, Red Dead Redemption 2 trumped Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, while Grand Theft Auto V rushed to the top in 2013, followed by Call of Duty: Ghosts.

    It’s worth noting that while Call of Duty turned out to be a cash cow for its parent company, this success can’t overshadow that Activision Blizzard, which is now owned by Microsoft, was at the center of several scandals surrounding alleged toxic workplace culture and sexual harassment over the past years.

    The second and third spots are indicative of U.S. Americans’ love for all things sports.

    The American Football simulation Madden was represented in the top 10 every single year, while Take-Two’s NBA 2K series dropped out of the ranking of the best-selling games in the U.S. starting with NBA 2K21.

    Grand Theft Auto V remains a singularity in this ranking, though. While most other games managed to enter the top 10 with new franchise installments, Rockstar Games achieved this feat for five years with a single game.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 23:20

  • Arizona Sheriff: Illegal Immigrants Being Handed $5,000 Visa Gift Cards, Cell Phones, And Plane Tickets
    Arizona Sheriff: Illegal Immigrants Being Handed $5,000 Visa Gift Cards, Cell Phones, And Plane Tickets

    Authored by Matthew Lysiak via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Immigrants who illegally cross the border into Arizona are being handed $5,000 in good-as-cash gift cards, along with cell phones and costly plane tickets, all of which are being paid for by the American taxpayer, according to Arizona Sheriff Mark Lamb.

    Mr. Lamb, sheriff of Pinal County, Arizona, told The Epoch Times that he had been informed of the lucrative hand-out through his close sources working at the United States border.

    “I was absolutely in shock when these agents came forward,” said Mr. Lamb. “I had known we handed out free cell phones and plane tickets, but to give out $5,000 Visa gift cards to people who break our laws and come into our country illegally when the average American is struggling to pay their bills is just tough to swallow.”

    “People need to know the truth and let their representative lawmakers hear about it. This needs to end,” added Mr. Lamb.

    Mr. Lamb, who in April became the first Republican to announce his candidacy to challenge Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) for the United States Senate, says that the high-end gift cards, in addition to the plane tickets and cell phones, are paid through American tax dollars funneled from government agencies.

    “We know they’ve been giving illegal immigrants money for a long time,” said Mr. Lamb, who worked in the position of sheriff of Pinal County for seven years. “The government can make the claim that they aren’t directly paying for it, because each dollar first goes from the government to a non-government institution like a charity before it is used to pay for the illegals.”

    “They are just moving the money around, but it all comes from the same place,” he added.

    The Epoch Times reached out to a representative from Customs and Border Protection (CBP), who was not immediately available for comment.

    Surge in Crossings

    In recent years the nation has seen a large surge in illegal border crossings.

    In October, CBP reported the highest number of illegal immigrant encounters for any October on record, with 240,988 encounters at the southern border. The agency also reported that 13 of the arrests it made during the month were of people on the FBI terror watchlist (12 from the southern border and one from the northern border). It is expected that the fiscal year total for 2023 will exceed 2.4 million, surpassing 2022’s record of 2.3 million, once the figures are finalized.

    In Arizona, a record high of 17,500 illegal immigrants were arrested for unlawfully entering the southeast region of the state from Mexico between Nov. 24 and Nov. 30—up from approximately 15,650 the previous week.

    On Monday, the number of illegal immigrants crossing the border into Arizona had grown so large that the federal government shut down a port of entry in Lukeville, Arizona to pull those federal customs officers to manage the crisis.

    In Tucson, Arizona, the surge has spiraled so far that there is no longer room to hold new arrivals, according to an email obtained by the Washington Examiner.

    “As you are aware, Tucson Sector is experiencing an unprecedented surge of illegal entries in our [area of responsibility],” Tucson, Arizona, leadership wrote in an email to agents this afternoon, according to the Washington Examiner on Nov. 27. “This morning we had more than 5,000 people in custody—far more than our holding capacity.”

    As the chaos at the border continues to spiral into an unmanageable crisis, the government needs to prioritize the growing number of struggling American families, according to Mr. Lamb.

    “We got Christmas coming up,” said Mr. Lamb. “Families are finding it difficult to keep lights on and find a way to buy their kids a few presents for under the tree, and now the American taxpayer has to watch as their hard-earned money is being taken from them and handed to people who have broken the law?”

    “It is infuriating. I know a lot of hard-working Americans who could use that money,” he added.

    Mr. Lamb says in his role as sheriff—where he is tasked with enforcing existing law—his hands are tied. However, securing the border has become one of the main platforms, and reasons, for his current run for Senate.

    The race to represent the GOP in the upcoming Senate race continues to be tight. Currently, Mr. Lamb is polling second in the GOP primary behind former television anchor and gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, according to a Noble Predictive Insights poll conducted between Oct. 25 and Oct. 31.

    However, if he does go on to represent the people of Arizona in the Senate, Mr. Lamb says he will do “whatever it takes” to close the border and end the taxpayer-funded gifts being handed to those who come into the country illegally.

    “The border is our greatest national security threat,” said Mr. Lamb. “I’m the guy who has the experience and knows how to finally do what it takes to secure it.”

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 23:00

  • The CIA Sure Looks Busy
    The CIA Sure Looks Busy

    The rise of generative AI applications like ChatGPT, Midjourney or Bard already leads to increased demand in the world’s data center network due to its sometimes hefty requirements for the underlying large language models.

    This computing demand will only increase in the upcoming years, necessitating the building of new data centers and expanding the capacities of existing ones.

    As Statista’s Florian Zandt shows in the following chart, based on 2022 data collected by commercial real estate company Cushman & Wakefield, the race between the global superpowers China and the United States also extends to data centers.

    Infographic: Which Regions Have the Biggest Data Centers? | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    The highest concentration of data center power capacity in the world can be found in Northern Virginia, particularly the counties of Loudoun and Prince William.

    According to an interview with the vice chairman of real estate service provider CBRE, Rob Faktorow, with radio broadcaster WTOP in 2022, the main reasons are tax incentives, superior connectivity and infrastructure well suited to the resource needs of big server farms.

    “It is true Northern Virginia is the data center capital of the world, the largest market in the world, by three times,” said Faktorow.

    “It encompasses almost 50% of the data centers in the United States.”

    We couldn’t help but notice that both those Northern Virginia counties border The CIA’s ‘Langley’ HQ in Fairfax County…

    Coming in second is Beijing with a capacity of 1,800 megawatts, followed by London (1,000 megawatts) and Singapore (876 megawatts).

    While the Greater Tokyo area only ranks fifth for current capacity, the island nation is on an accelerationist path in terms of future projects, especially compared to its competitors in the Asia-Pacific region. According to Cushman & Wakefield, Beijing’s capacity will likely increase by around 300 megawatts in the next three to five years, owed partly to investors shifting funds due to rising U.S.-China tensions. The traditionally Western-aligned Japan might see its data power capacity double to almost 2,000 megawatts in the same period, in part due to pledges by big players like TSMC and Nvidia to build chip fabrication plants and establish a network of, as Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang put it, “AI factories” across the country.

    Another relevant aspect in evaluating the growth potential of data centers in a specific region is their vacancy rate.

    As CBRE notes, capacity vacancy in Singapore stood at less than one percent in Q1 of 2023. Northern Virginia had a vacancy rate of about two percent, and Tokyo stood at 11.2 percent.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 22:40

  • Japan's First-Ever Conviction For Illegal Organ Trafficking Shines Light On Forced Organ Harvesting
    Japan’s First-Ever Conviction For Illegal Organ Trafficking Shines Light On Forced Organ Harvesting

    Authored by Bin Zhao and Sean Tseng via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    In a landmark ruling, a Japanese court has convicted a non-profit executive of facilitating illegal overseas organ transplants for Japanese citizens.

    Doctors carrying organs for transplant surgery at a hospital in Henan Province, China, on Aug. 16, 2012. (Screenshot/Sohu.com)

    On Nov. 28, the Tokyo District Court sentenced 63-year-old Hiromichi Kikuchi, chairman of the Association for Patients of Intractable Diseases, a non-profit organization. Kikuchi received an eight-month prison term and a fine of 1 million yen (around $6,800) for arranging organ transplants abroad for two Japanese citizens without government approval. His organization, which has been working with transplant patients for over fifteen years, is now under scrutiny.

    The case, the first of its kind in Japan, has prompted widespread media coverage and heightened concerns over illegal organ transplants.

    Mr. Kikuchi’s conviction shows Japan’s efforts to crack down on organ trafficking and forced organ harvesting. The transplants that led to his arrest took place in Belarus in 2022. However, the case has drawn attention to the grim reality of forced organ harvesting in China, as Mr. Kikuchi admitted that the vast majority of the transplants he has orchestrated since 2007 involved organs from China.

    This verdict has sparked intense public debate in Japan, where organ harvesting is already a hotly contested topic because of widespread ethical reservations about the source of organs for transplant.

    Forced Organ Harvesting

    For years, investigations and reports have highlighted the practice of forced organ harvesting in China’s major hospitals, with substantial evidence supporting the claims.

    On June 25, 2022, The Epoch Times Japanese edition published an exclusive interview with Ushio Sugawara, a former member of Japan’s largest “Yakuza” crime syndicate, Yamaguchi-gumi.

    Mr. Sugawara, who left the underworld in 2015 to become an economic commentator, recalled an incident from 2007. At that time, he was involved in a liver transplant for a friend’s brother, arranged through an intermediary, and costing about $220,000. The liver transplant took place at Beijing’s Armed Police General Hospital.

    After arriving in China, Mr. Sugawara visited his friend’s brother at the hospital the day before the scheduled surgery.

    He described seeing the donor, a 21-year-old Falun Gong practitioner labeled a “terrorist” and sentenced to death, unconscious and medicated, with bandages on his hands and feet. The hospital staff explained that the severing of tendons in the donor’s hands and feet was to prevent escape and ensure the quality of the organs.

    The transplant ultimately failed, resulting in the deaths of both the recipient and the donor.

    After the report on forced organ harvesting practices by The Epoch Times Japan, several prominent Japanese media outlets, including Yomiuri Shimbun, Japan’s largest newspaper, launched investigations into Japanese intermediaries in overseas organ transplants and found evidence against the Association for Patients of Intractable Diseases and Mr. Kikuchi.

    The non-profit, according to its website, has been connecting Japanese patients with overseas hospitals, primarily in China, for organ transplants since 2003.

    This timeline coincides with when Chinese hospitals began aggressively marketing organ transplants to foreign nationals.

    Canadian human rights lawyer David Matas and the late David Kilgour, a former Canadian cabinet minister, have long investigated the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) organ transplant practices. Their 2006 report, which was expanded into the book “Bloody Harvest,” raised suspicions that the CCP was illicitly harvesting organs and particularly targeting Falun Gong practitioners.

    In 2016, Mr. Matas, together with Kilgour and London-based investigative journalist Ethan Gutmann, published “Bloody Harvest/The Slaughter: An Update.” The 680-page report estimated that China was conducting 60,000 to 100,000 transplant surgeries annually.

    ‘Organ Extractions for Profit’

    On Oct. 10, the Tokyo District Court conducted its first hearing in the widely-publicized Kikuchi case. The defendant was charged with brokering organ transplant operations without government permission for two patients, in violation of Japan’s organ transplant law.

    Presiding Judge Baba Yoshiro said Mr. Kikuchi recruited patients for overseas organ transplants and expedited organ transplant surgeries within a matter of a few months. Japan’s organ transplant law outlaws the sale of human organs and profiting through intermediaries.

    In a startling admission, Mr. Kikuchi revealed that over the past two decades, his organization had facilitated about 170 transplants, with 90 percent of patients receiving transplants in Chinese hospitals. He highlighted the cost-effectiveness of the operations, noting that prices in China were significantly lower than in the United States. Following the COVID-19 pandemic and ensuing travel restrictions, Mr. Kikuchi shifted his focus to Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

    Mr. Kikuchi also outlined the costs involved: 20 million yen (approximately $136,000) for a kidney, 30 million yen (around $204,000) for a liver, 30–40 million yen ($204,000–$272,000) for a heart, and 40–50 million yen ($272,000–$340,000) for lungs. These figures included surgery, travel, and intermediary fees.

    On Nov. 28, the court handed down its final verdict: Mr. Kikuchi was sentenced to eight months in prison and fined 1 million yen (about $6,778).

    The decision was widely discussed online, with some Japanese netizens expressing outrage: “This group’s inhumane acts, forcibly extracting organs from young individuals in China, are utterly deplorable,” read one post.

    Another post criticized the leniency of the sentence: “Kikuchi is essentially an accomplice to murder; this punishment is insufficient.”

    Initially, Mr. Kikuchi had maintained his innocence, claiming his actions “saved hundreds of lives.” However, Hiroaki Maruyama, a representative for the Stop Medical Genocide (SMG) Network, vehemently disagreed with this perspective.

    In an interview with The Epoch Times, Mr. Maruyama said the “Chinese hospitals’ organ extractions from living persons for profit” contrasted with the principles of medical ethics.  Mr. Kikuchi, by engaging in these activities, not only abetted them but also implicated many Japanese patients unaware of the truth, he said.

    Mr. Maruyama emphasized that Mr. Kikuchi’s arrest and conviction, along with the media coverage surrounding it, shed light on a network of illegal intermediaries tied to the global organ black market, particularly CCP’s large-scale forced organ harvesting.

    These revelations represent just the surface of a much darker reality, he stressed. He called for legislation preventing Japanese citizens from seeking organ transplants in countries like China, which are known for human rights violations.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 22:20

  • Illinois Bill Would Require Blood Donors To Disclose COVID Vaccination Status
    Illinois Bill Would Require Blood Donors To Disclose COVID Vaccination Status

    Authored by Megan Redshaw via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    New legislation in Illinois would allow individuals receiving blood donations to know whether they’re receiving blood from an individual vaccinated with a COVID-19 vaccine or another messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine.

    (hxdbzxy/Shutterstock)

    Bill HB4243, introduced on Nov. 29 by Illinois state Rep. Jed Davis, amends the Illinois Clinical Laboratory and Blood Bank Act and would require blood banks to test donated blood for evidence of COVID-19 vaccines and other mRNA components, including lipid nanoparticles and spike protein—and requires a blood donor to disclose during each donor screening process whether they have received a COVID-19 vaccine or any other mRNA vaccine during their lifetime.

    Additionally, the bill imposes labeling requirements for blood or blood components that test positive for evidence of a COVID-19 vaccine or other mRNA vaccine component or were obtained from a donor who received a COVID-19 vaccine or other mRNA vaccine.

    “A constituent approached me concerned about her son’s upcoming surgery. What if he needed a blood transfusion with the long-term impacts concerning mRNA vaccines unknown? As a parent myself, her concern and corresponding question feel warranted,” Mr. Davis told The Epoch Times in an email.

    “This conversation was the catalyst for my bill delineating blood donations and mRNA vaccines. We disclose medical information all the time with providers, so why not our vaccine history? It’s an easy ask, and I’m proud to sponsor this bill.”

    Once a bill is introduced in Illinois, it is read and referred to the Rules Committee and will then be assigned to a substantive committee. For elected officials like Mr. Davis, he believes that part of his job is to translate the concerns or ideas of constituents into legislation when applicable—and that every bill, including HB4243, originated from someone walking through his office door. “Without hesitation, helping people is such a blessing and honor,” he said.

    Concerned about blood transfusions from people vaccinated against COVID-19, a Republican lawmaker in Montana introduced a bill earlier this year that would have made it a misdemeanor offense for anyone who received a COVID-19 vaccine to donate tissue or blood. However, the bill was tabled quickly in a 19 to 1 vote.

    Unlike the bill introduced in Montana, HB4243 does not criminalize individuals who donate blood if they’ve received a COVID-19 vaccine. It merely allows people receiving blood products to know whether the blood they’re receiving came from a vaccinated individual and requires blood blanks to add this information to product labels so that patients can make informed decisions.

    According to the Red Cross, there is no waiting period for those who received a COVID-19 vaccine—as long as they are symptom-free and feel well at the time of donation. If an individual doesn’t know which vaccine they received, they must wait two weeks to donate blood.

    The Association for the Advancement of Blood & Biotherapies, America’s Blood Centers, and the American Red Cross do not believe COVID-19 vaccines pose a risk to patients receiving blood transfusions.

    In a joint statement issued on Jan. 26, the three organizations said there is no “scientific evidence that demonstrates adverse outcomes from the transfusions of blood products collected from vaccinated donors and, therefore, no medical reason to distinguish or separate blood donations from individuals who have received a COVID-19 vaccination.”

    The statement further reads that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), on multiple occasions, has confirmed that there is no evidence to support concerns about the safety of blood donated by vaccinated individuals. However, the FDA has not provided data showing it is safe to receive blood donated from vaccinated individuals, and many studies have found mRNA from COVID-19 vaccines circulating in the blood or plasma of recently vaccinated individuals.

    A 2022 study published in Biomedicines found synthetic mRNA in Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine persists in the blood of vaccinated individuals for at least two weeks post-vaccination.

    A January study published in the Journal of Pathology, Microbiology, and Immunology found full-length or traces of SARS-CoV-2 spike mRNA vaccine sequences from both Pfizer and Moderna in the blood of some vaccinated individuals up to 28 days after COVID-19 vaccination.

    “We expect that vaccine mRNA detected in plasma is contained within LNPs [lipid nanoparticles] and that the LNPs in plasma have been slowly released from the injection site either directly to the blood or through the lymph system,” the authors wrote.

    In a January study in Circulation, researchers found persistently elevated circulating levels of full-length spike protein in the blood of adolescents and young adults who developed myocarditis following COVID-19 vaccination.

    A 2022 study in Clinical Infectious Diseases found circulating S1 antigens from the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein in the plasma of participants vaccinated with Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine. Antigens are the weakened or inactive parts of a particular organism—in this case, the spike protein—that triggers an immune response within the body. Researchers also confirmed that the detected S1 antigens resulted from vaccination and not natural infection.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 21:40

  • House Votes To Overturn Biden's EV Mandate
    House Votes To Overturn Biden’s EV Mandate

    Authored by Joseph Lord via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    The House of Representatives on Dec. 6 voted to pass a bill that will block a proposed rule by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to effectively mandate that most cars produced in the United States be fully electric by 2032.

    The U.S. Capitol building in Washington on Nov. 13, 2023. (Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times) 

    The bill, H.R. 4468, dubbed the Choice in Automobile Retail Sales Act of 2023, passed the House by a 221–197 vote. That included total GOP support; Democrats, meanwhile, sought to have the bill sent back to committee.

    The bill would block an EPA rule that would require roughly 68 percent of cars manufactured in the United States be fully electric by 2032. The rule has won the support of President Joe Biden’s administration.

    Republicans have rallied against the proposed standards, which they say are unrealistic and threaten to undermine consumer freedom—as well as to increase U.S. dependence on China.

    Around 90 percent of the rare earth minerals used to create electric vehicles (EVs) are sourced from the top U.S. adversary.

    The broad support among Republicans for blocking the rule was on full display in November, when over 200 House and Senate Republicans signed onto a letter to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) urging opposition to the rule (pdf).

    “While we are supportive of the free market producing electric vehicles to satisfy a market need, this misguided EPA mandate would have an immediate, detrimental impact on the choices and affordability of cars, trucks, and SUVs available to our constituents,” the Republican signatories said. “It also increases America’s dependence on China.”

    Specifically, those who signed the letter pushed for the inclusion of a reversal of the EV standards to be included in the final draft of 2024 government funding.

    “Not only would the EPA’s proposed regulation hurt America’s national security, but it would severely limit consumer choice for affordable vehicles that fit the needs of the average American,” they wrote. “At a time of inflation, high interest rates, and rising costs, the last thing Americans need is to find both new and used vehicles unaffordable because of an EPA mandate.”

    The National Automobile Dealers Association has also criticized the EPA rule, which they called “too far, too fast.”

    In a Dec. 5 press conference the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich.) and other House Republicans spoke in support of the measure to overturn the rule prior to its vote on the floor.

    “This standard … is unattainable, it’s unaffordable, and in fact it’s unrealistic,” Mr. Walberg said.

    Rep. Lisa McClain (R-Mich.) agreed, saying that the notion that most vehicles should be fully electric by 2032 is “ridiculous.”

    She said, “If we force automakers to do this, they will bleed money, which will mean layoffs for employees of families who are already struggling under this administration, and manufacturing will move outside of the United States.

    “That is not good for our taxpayers.”

    Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), another enthusiastic supporter of the proposal, raised a series of concerns about the potential effects of a mandate.

    Specifically, he pointed to the instability of the U.S. electric grid, which is currently unable to support a large-scale move toward EVs.

    As proof of this, he pointed to a case in California a few years ago when Gov. Gavin Newsom asked Californians not to charge their EVs between 4 p.m. and 8 p.m. due to strains on the electric grid.

    “What do you do when you’re stuck? What do you do when your wife is pregnant in the hospital?” Mr. Roy said. “These questions are existential threats to the well being of American families.”

    Despite its passage by the House, the legislation seems unlikely to pass muster in the Senate, where Democrats hold the majority.

    And even if it did pass the Senate, President Biden has promised to veto the bill.

    The White House has defended the rule, saying it’s “projected to save Americans $12,000 over the lifetime of a new light-duty vehicle by accelerating adoption of technologies that reduce fuel and maintenance costs alongside pollution.”

    However, Republicans are unusually united behind the effort to overturn the rule, and this issue could become a key point of negotiations over spending next year.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 21:20

  • Hunter Biden Indicted On Multiple Felony Tax Charges Including 'Office Expense' Deductions For 'Over-The-Hill Strippers'
    Hunter Biden Indicted On Multiple Felony Tax Charges Including ‘Office Expense’ Deductions For ‘Over-The-Hill Strippers’

    On the same day as House Republicans formalize the impeachment inquiry of President Joe Biden, the special counsel investigating Hunter Biden charged the president’s son late Thursday on nine counts stemming from his failure to pay his federal taxes on time on millions in income from foreign businesses.

    A grand jury in the Central District of California (yes California!) charged Mr. Biden with three counts each of evasion of a tax assessment, failure to file and pay taxes, and filing a false or fraudulent tax return, according to the 56-page indictment (see below).

    The situation is more serious now as the charges include three felony tax offenses and six misdemeanors.

    “At times relevant to this Indictment, the Defendant served on the board of a Ukrainian industrial conglomerate and a Chinese private equity fund. He negotiated and executed contracts and agreements for business and legal services that paid millions of dollars of compensation to him and/or his domestic corporations, Owasco, PC and Owasco, LLC,” the indictment reads.

    “The Defendant engaged in a four-year scheme to not pay at least $1.4 million in self-assessed federal taxes he owed for tax years 2016 through 2019, from in or about January 2017 through in or about October 15, 2020, and to evade the assessment of taxes for tax year 2018 when he filed false returns in or about February 2020,” the indictment adds.

    As TechnoFog details on his Substack, the indictment is exacting and detailed, discussing Hunter’s various business entities, the millions he received from foreign nationals and/or foreign business entities (such as those in China, Romania, and Ukraine), as well as the income and support Hunter has received from his entertainment lawyer, who happens to have paid “over $1.2 million to third parties for [Hunter’s] benefit” in 2020.

    It also makes the case – a case known to the public for this last year or so – that Hunter willingly engaged in this tax scheme. The indictment is replete with examples: he did not report his Burisma income in 2014; he was informed by accountants that he owed taxes; his ex-wife told him that his tax returns were not filed; and there are multiple times where he is discussing his outstanding tax obligations in various communications.

    Despite all this, Hunter’s spent like a man who thought he operated under a different set of rules.

    He had $1,664,004 in “ATM/Cash Withdrawals”, spent $683,212 in payments to “various women” (a new euphemism for hookers, apparently) and $188,960 on “adult entertainment”.

    Ironically, Hunter’s own words from his memoir, for which he was paid a handsome sum, are coming back to haunt him. As his tax-avoidance scheme went on, he surrounded himself with, and paid for the company of:

    thieves, junkies, petty dealers, over-the-hill strippers, con artists, and assorted hangers-on, who then invited their friends and associates and most recent hookups. They latched on to me and didn’t let go, all with my approval. I never slept. There was no clock. Day bled into night and night into day.

    The indictment also details the “office expenses” or other deductions he used to lessen his tax burden, which included a $1,500 Venmo payment to an exotic dancer; $11,500 paid to an escort for two nights; and a $30,000 payment for his daughter’s law school tuition; $1,248 to fly an exotic dancer from Los Angeles to New York.

    As you can read below, the indictment has many other juicy details regarding Hunter’s “deductions”.

    This is the second indictment against him this year – the first of which related to alleged gun possession and false statements.

    He has pleaded not guilty in the gun charges case.

    As a reminder, the previous indictment culminated in a plea deal, which ultimately fell apart amid whistleblower allegations that Biden-appointed officials had worked to stifle the case.

    Don Jr offered his perspective on the matter…

    The case was assigned to Judge Mark Scarsi, who was appointed by former President Donald Trump.

    Well, all those 87,000 new IRS agents was money well-spent right?

    Instead of going after the ‘billionaires’, they are clearly just trying to keep the poor-but-talented painters of America down.

    Thanks Joe!

    ….and that’s how Gavin Newsom becomes the Democratic Party nominee.

    *  *  *

    Read the full docket below:

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 21:01

  • Starlink Completes "Successful" Military Test Deep In Arctic  
    Starlink Completes “Successful” Military Test Deep In Arctic  

    The one thing progressive corporate media and the radical left in the White House cannot stand is Elon Musk deepening his ties with the Department of Defense from rocket launches to providing the military with high-speed internet beamed from low-Earth orbit. 

    According to Bloomberg, Musk’s satellite internet service called “Starlink” successfully completed a nine-month pilot test in the harsh, snowy environment in the Arctic.

    Brian Beal, principal engineer with the Air Force Research Laboratory’s Integrated Capabilities Directorate, stated that StarLink was a “reliable and high-performance communications system in the Arctic, including on-the-move applications.” 

    Beal said the test ended in June and evaluated Starlink’s usefulness for high-speed internet in remote areas that can be set up in minutes.

    “We tested in some very high winds and very cold temperatures,” he said, adding, “That all went smoothly though. Once we got the terminals mounted securely to withstand high winds, they worked great with no issues.”

    Musk has seen months of success with Starlink. The Pentagon granted Starlink a contract to support Ukraine in June and, in late September, awarded Starlink an additional $70 million contract for the Starshield project. 

    Reports indicate Starlink is preparing for an IPO in 2024. Musk recently announced, “Excited to announce that @SpaceX @Starlink has achieved breakeven cash flow!” 

    In September, Tesla blogger Sawyer Merritt posted a graph on X showing Starlink’s onboarding of new customers has been parabolic since June 2022. The service now has more than 2 million users worldwide. 

    Meanwhile, SpaceX currently has a $175 billion valuation. It has delivered 80% of all Earth’s payload mass to orbit this year. 

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    Even Jeff Bezos hired Musk for rocket launches as his space company, Blue Origin, has been hit with ‘frustrating delays’ including a rocket engine explosion during a routine test earlier this year. 

    Democrats are furious with Musk’s success and have attempted to weaponize federal agencies to hinder the latest Starship launch. 

    Musk is becoming the ‘uncancellable billionaire.’ 

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 20:40

  • FDA Approved, Controversial Lab-Grown Meat Becomes A Reality
    FDA Approved, Controversial Lab-Grown Meat Becomes A Reality

    Authored by Patricia Tolson via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    In an effort to protect its farming industry, its economy, and the health of its citizens, Italy recently became the first country to officially ban cultivated meat.

    (Illustration by The Epoch Times, Shutterstock, Freepik)

    Cultivated meat, also known as lab-grown meat, is created in a lab through a five-step process in which stem cells from an animal are replicated and grown in a series of bioreactors before being blended with additives to create a more realistic texture. The meat cells are then drained in a centrifuge, formed, and packaged for distribution, according to consulting firm McKinsey & Company.

    In a Nov. 16 Facebook post, Italian Minister of Agriculture Francesco Lollobrigida said, “In defense of health, of the Italian production system, of thousands of jobs, of our culture and tradition, with the law approved today, Italy is the first nation in the world to be safe from the social and economic risks of synthetic food,” according to an English translation.

    The bill passed the Italian Senate by a measure of 159–53 and was supported by the country’s agricultural groups, which worked to protect Italy’s $10.1 billion meat-processing industry.

    Cultivated chicken is made in tanks at Eat Just in Alameda, Calif., on July 27, 2023. Cell-cultivated or lab-grown meat is made by feeding nutrients to animal cells in stainless steel tanks. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

    Efforts in the United States to block lab-grown meat, or to ensure that consumers know what they’re buying, include a 2018 law in Missouri that prohibits plant-based and lab-grown food from being labeled as “meat.”

    “​​This act also prohibits misrepresenting a product as meat that is not derived from harvested production livestock or poultry,” the law states.

    On Nov. 13, Florida state Rep. Tyler Sirois filed a bill that aims to prohibit the “manufacturing, sale, holding, or distribution of cultivated meat” in the state.

    “Farming and cattle are incredibly important industries to Florida,” the Republican legislator told Politico. “So I think this is a very relevant discussion for our state to have.”

    Should the bill, HB 435, become law, restaurants and stores in violation could be fined up to $5,000, and manufacturers, processors, packers, or distributors who misrepresent or mislabel the food could be fined up to $10,000 per violation.

    Wilton Simpson, commissioner of the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, is fully on board with Mr. Sirois’s effort.

    “Without this legislation, untested, potentially unsafe, and nearly unregulated laboratory-produced meat could be made available in Florida,” Mr. Simpson said in a statement to The Epoch Times.

    “One of my top responsibilities is ensuring the safety and wholesomeness of our food supply and protecting Florida’s consumers, and this proposal does just that.”

    On Nov. 22, the measure moved to the Agriculture, Conservation, and Resiliency Subcommittee.

    Wilson Castro restocks the shelves in the meat department at the Presidente Supermarket in Miami on April 13, 2020. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

    Cultivated Meat Market

    So far, only two countries—the United States and Singapore—have approved cultivated meat for human consumption.

    Research and Markets predicts that the global lab-grown meat market will reach nearly $2 billion by 2035. It lists 16 cultivated meat companies, five of which are based in the United States, three in Israel, two in the Netherlands, two in Singapore, and one each in China, India, the UK, and Switzerland.

    “In 2025, the nuggets segment is expected to account for the largest share of the lab-grown meat market,” Research and Markets states in its January analysis.

    “The large market share of this segment is attributed to the increasing adoption of on-the-go lifestyles, the growing demand for snacking products, and the increasing demand for frozen products.”

    However, lab-grown burger patties are projected to register the highest compound annual growth rate from 2025 through 2035, according to the company.

    Chef Zach Tyndall brushes sauce on a piece of Good Meat’s cultivated chicken as it’s grilled at the Eat Just office in Alameda, Calif., on July 27, 2023. In June, the U.S. Department of Agriculture authorized two California-based companies, Upside Foods and Good Meat, to sell chicken grown from cells in a lab. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

    In November 2022, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that it had “completed its first pre-market consultation for a human food made from cultured animal cells.”

    On June 21, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) granted its first-ever approval to produce cell-cultured meat to two companies in the United States, Good Meat and Upside Food.

    Good Meat—the cultivated meat brand of the food technology company Eat Just, Inc.—has manufacturing facilities in the United States and Singapore.

    According to the company, the USDA approval allows for its first lab-grown chicken product to be produced and sold in the United States. Four months earlier, the company had received its “No Questions” letter from the FDA, which meant it passed a food safety review.

    “Our first product is cultivated chicken that is prepared and served in multiple formats and was approved for sale in Singapore in 2020 and the United States in 2023,” the company states on its website.

    “We’re also working on other types of meat, including cultivated beef using cells from California pasture-raised cattle and Wagyu from the Toriyama farm in Japan.”

    Washington-based restaurant China Chilcano added a dish using Good Meat cultivated chicken to its menu in July.

    Major investors in Good Meat are UBS O’Connor, a hedge fund management firm within UBS Asset Management, and the venture capital firms of Graphene Ventures and Singapore-based K3 Ventures.

    Bill Gates has been a major investor in Upside Foods since its launch in 2017.

    Bill Gates speaks at an event called “Transforming Food Systems in the face of Climate Change” during the United Nations’ Climate Change Conference in Dubai on Dec. 1, 2023. (Christophe Viseux/COP28 via Getty Images)

    Upside Foods said its USDA approval clears the company to produce and sell its cultivated chicken. The company says it takes about three weeks to produce its chicken filet product.

    “Not to get bogged down in semantics, but we can’t overstate this: We’re making meat!” the company states on its website. 

    “Cultivated meat is a brand-new product category, so we understand that there’s a lot of confusion out there about what it is and what it isn’t. For one thing, cultivated meat is not vegan or vegetarian.”

    According to the company, its cell-cultivated chicken is made up of “more than 99 percent chicken cells.”

    The FDA approved Upside Foods to make its products in November 2022, based on a self-assessment by Upside of its processes and risk management practices.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 20:20

  • Moody's Told Staff In China To Work From Home Ahead Of Downgrade To Country's Credit Outlook
    Moody’s Told Staff In China To Work From Home Ahead Of Downgrade To Country’s Credit Outlook

    It’s not just the US that retaliates against credit agency downgrades: China – which is almost as authoritarian as the US but at least does not pretend to be some beacon of democracy or virtue – does too, only in China’s case Moody’s, which on Tuesday downgraded the outlook for China’s A1 long-term local and foreign-currency issuer rating to negative from stable, had a pretty good idea what would happen after its action became public and advised staff in China to work from home ahead of its cut to the outlook for the country’s sovereign credit rating.

    According to the FT, some Moody’s department heads in the country told associates on Friday that non-administrative staff in Beijing and Shanghai should not go into the office this week, they said.

    “They didn’t give us the reason . . . but everyone knows why,” said one China-based Moody’s employee, referring to the request to work from home. “We are afraid of government inspections.”

    The staff member said Moody’s also advised analysts in Hong Kong to temporarily avoid travel to the Chinese mainland ahead of the cut; he also said working from home might prevent Chinese authorities from questioning many employees in one place if they decided to raid the agency but added that such a raid was still considered to be unlikely.

    The move by the US rating agency highlights the unease of many foreign companies doing business in the world’s second-largest economy, where some have suffered police raids, exit bans for staff and arrests amid tensions between China and the US and its allies. Similar forceful responses are heaped upon companies that operate in the US as well, only the ruling regime’s fascist tactics are somewhat more subtle, which is why the White House has weaponized the DOJ to do anything and everything Biden’s handlers want it to do.

    A Moody’s spokesperson said: “Our commitment to maintaining the confidentiality and integrity of the ratings process is paramount and therefore, we cannot comment on internal discussions, if any, related to specific credit ratings or issuers.”

    In the past year, Chinese authorities have raided the offices of several US-based consultancies and detained local employees of due diligence group Mintz over what Beijing said were national security concerns.

    “We’ve seen crackdowns on due diligence companies and other firms, but those have been motivated by issues beyond just negative commentary,” said Michael Hirson, a China analyst at 22V Research in New York.

    “I would be surprised if Moody’s rating action, which is based on just an argument about the outlook, generates anything remotely like an overt crackdown on the company,” Hirson said. “But clearly how the authorities handle this will be a test that investors and the business community are watching.”

    Naturally, Moody’s latest rating action has already triggered a spate of criticism from Chinese officials and on social media. In a statement on Wednesday, the National Development and Reform Commission, an economic planning body, accused the rating agency of “bias and misunderstanding of China’s economic outlook”.

    A popular WeChat social media account operated by state broadcaster China Central Television on Wednesday dismissed Moody’s concerns about a slower growth outlook and soaring government debt, claiming that Chinese authorities had “always been working on annual projects, looking at five-year plans while thinking about the long term”.

    “A misjudgement by [Moody’s] will not cause too much harm for the Chinese economy,” said the post. “It may cause the company to lose its credibility.”

    Another Moody’s staff member said some of the points raised by Chinese authorities made sense and that the agency was concerned about regulatory risks following the rating action.

    “The Chinese authorities can make trouble for you if they want to,” the person said.

    It is unclear if fears of retaliation were behind the apparent leak of the news: according to Reuters, hours before the Tuesday downgrade, speculation that such a move was imminent was circulating on Chinese social media platform WeChat.

    “It is said that Moody’s will downgrade China’s sovereign credit rating, and an announcement will be made in the afternoon,” according to one WeChat post in Chinese translated by Reuters, in a chat group with several hundred people.

    Ratings leaks are quite common but can be difficult to pin down since they can come from different sources, said Alexander Michaelides, professor of finance at Imperial College London, who has researched and published academic papers on the systematic leakage ahead of official sovereign debt rating announcements.

    “It is quite common, but it is difficult to show that it has happened. And it happens in many countries around the world – even in countries with very high institutional quality,” Michaelides said.

    * * *

    Despite concerns, the rating agency on Wednesday also lowered its outlook for Hong Kong, Macau and 18 Chinese state-owned and private companies, including tech groups Tencent and Alibaba, from stable to negative.

    In a statement, the rating agency said the rating action was “primarily” driven by the change in outlook for China’s government credit ratings and reflected increased risks “related to structurally and persistently lower medium-term economic growth”.

     

     

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 20:00

  • Biden Funding Woke Theater Arts Groups Under Counterterrorism Grants
    Biden Funding Woke Theater Arts Groups Under Counterterrorism Grants

    Authored by James Varney via RealClear Wire,

    Founded in 2020 in the aftermath of the George Floyd protests, the Black Legacy Project describes itself as “a musical celebration of black history to advance racial solidarity, equity and belonging.” It brings together artists of all backgrounds “to record present day interpretations of songs central to the Black American experience and compose originals relevant to the pressing calls for change of our time.”

    A similar arts group, Nu Art Education Inc., an offshoot of the NorCal School for the Arts, says it is “following the theory of change that utilizing theater arts” can be “a tool to teach and practice conflict resolution in the classroom.”

    While both outfits share a mission of using the arts to inspire social change, they have something else in common: counterterrorism. Or rather, both have received taxpayer grants through the Department of Homeland Security’s “Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention” (TVTP) program. Together, the two groups have received more than $1.4 million since the Biden administration doubled the program’s annual budget, to some $20 million per year.

    Grants to arts cooperatives and educational initiatives strike some as odd for a department charged with protecting the United States — including its southern border, now viewed by many as virtually open to illegal migrants. Against that backdrop, FBI Director Christopher Wray recently warned Congress of the heightened threat of terror in the U.S. at a time of wars raging on two continents with America involved on the sidelines.

    On Tuesday, Wray told the Senate Judiciary Committee the “threat matrix” is “blinking red lights everywhere.”

    “The threat level has gone to a whole other level since Oct. 7,” he said.

    Given such concerns, Andrew Arthur of the Center for Immigration Studies, a critic of Biden policies, said the DHS grants are misplaced. “It’s kind of hard to see how all that is going to help stop terrorism,” he told RealClearInvestigations.

    DHS declined to discuss the TVTP program, or answer questions about how competitive the grant process is or who makes final decisions on where the money will go.

    The program has its roots in the Obama administration under the concept of “countering violent extremism” and has drawn criticism ever since from both left and right – albeit for different reasons. During the Trump administration, the leftist Brennan Center for Justice faulted the “anti-Muslim and xenophobic rhetoric and policies” in such programs, which “also target refugees, asylum seekers, and Black Lives Matter activists.”

    The Brennan Center said “the reality is that these programs, which are based on junk science, have proven to be ineffective, discriminatory and divisive.”

    That was then. Now, having doubled the program’s budget, the Biden administration is using the money to advance parts of its agenda not directly related to terrorism. Increasingly the DHS grants, like much larger ones at other departments, are part of the administration’s “whole of government” effort to promote “diversity, equity and inclusion” and quash what it considers misinformation.

    While proclaiming that that the grants are designed for “local communities across the country to develop targeted violence and terrorism prevention programming in their communities,” the Department of Homeland Security also stresses its focus on DEI.

    “Ensuring equity is a key priority of the TVTP Grant Program and 41 percent of this year’s grant recipients are devoted to underserved populations, compared to 25 percent last year,” the DHS website says, noting grants have gone to historically black colleges and universities, seven “Minority Serving Institutions (MSI),” a Native American group and another serving the LGBTQIA+ community.

    The program uses keywords to note favored characteristics of approved grants. Ones used often include “raising societal awareness,” “bystander training,” and what advocates call “media literacy.”

    “Media literacy involves the critical evaluation of media messages, as well as their authors and audiences, and it includes the ability to differentiate between original, evidence-based reporting and commentary or propaganda,” said Seth Ashley, a communications professor at Boise State University, which has received nearly $400,000.

    But such anodyne-sounding definitions come at a time when censorship by government in tandem with news outlets and social media has stirred controversy and court challenges. Experts have sprouted in the fields of “misinformation” or “disinformation,” and their power to control what is published and shared on various tech platforms has grown.

    One of the recipients of DHS funding for media literacy is the University of Rhode Island, which received $700,000 in TVTP grants in 2022. The money has helped pay for “Courageous Rhode Island” initiatives that involve online seminars and work with K-12 schools.

    In one of Courageous R.I.’s starter seminars, URI professors Renee Hobbs and Pam Steager discuss warning signs for media consumers. The flags include sources that “attract audience attention by finding and promoting unexplained phenomena or coincidence that seems at odds with official narratives.”

    In another, the professors warn of “contrarian ‘experts’ [that] increase visibility and status by exploiting journalistic norms of balance and neutrality to present a controversy that counters widely-accepted beliefs.”

    The COVID-19 pandemic is often used as a case study in media literacy. Ashley co-authored an op-ed in the Idaho Capital Sun in 2021 warning of COVID “disinformation.” But the co-authors offered no concrete examples of what would earn that classification, and many of the doubts health officials and Big Tech worked diligently to erase then – on masks, lockdowns, the origin of the virus – have been vindicated by subsequent reporting and revelations.

    “Doing your own research is fine, but it’s no substitute for the meticulous work of experts who are doing their best to learn everything they can about Covid-19 and are updating us when their knowledge grows and as situations change,” Ashley wrote.

    Asked by RealClearInvestigations about the sort of collaboration between government actors and Big Tech companies exposed in the “Twitter Files” and other revelations, Ashley replied, “I don’t think recent events have changed the need to be vigilant about where or how we get information, but I do think the digital age has made that more difficult than ever.”

    Some conservative critics see in the nebulous language of media literacy a clear agenda against outlets that could counter the message of Washington Democrats. They see the government using taxpayer money to get around First Amendment protections by paying third party groups to censor views it doesn’t approve.

    “They are very careful in the words they use, and you rarely see them offer concrete examples of ‘misinformation,’” said Dan Schneider, vice president of the conservative Media Research Center. “But what the project is trying to do is get into the schools and divert people from conservative outlets and direct them to liberal outlets.”

    Schneider has looked closely at the work being done in Rhode Island, as well as by other media watchdogs such as NewsGuard.

    One of Courageous R.I.’s goals is combating “fear and hate that leads to violence,” but one participant in the group’s online workshops said that is a tenuous thesis. Nicole Solas, a Rhode Island parent who became a prominent critic of what she regarded as a leftward drift in public education there, took some Courageous R.I. courses online and clashed with Hobbs. Like critics at the Brennan Center, Solas said she saw no proof that “words in media cause people to commit violent acts,” and she said it was clear Courageous R.I. had conservative news in its crosshairs.

    “They themselves are media – they write blogs,” Solas said. “They are promoting their own propaganda by saying someone or something else is propaganda so it’s not a real ‘conversation.’”

    Hobbs disputed that characterization, insisting “listening” is a key component of the “Courageous Conversations” that Courageous R.I. seeks.

    The “media literacy” advanced by TVTP grants also warns against outlets that do not perform “public interest journalism.” Ashley defines that as “journalism that aims to serve citizens by addressing issues of social importance and holding powerful actors accountable. It can be produced by anyone but usually comes from organizations with the resources and expertise necessary to gather and synthesize large amounts of information.”

    Using preferred groups to set such parameters has been a hallmark of government grants like TVTP since the Obama administration, according to several people familiar with the process. The grants are not confined to DHS – the State Department, FEMA, the EPA, and other branches have similar programs – and critics agree the overall goal of such policies is to corral speech into preferred spaces and proscribe it from countering preferred narratives.

    “They are using targeted funding to promote a buy-in to toeing the government line,” said Brian Cavanaugh, a former White House national security staffer in the Trump and Biden administrations who is now a senior vice president of American Global Strategies. “And here these have nothing to do with DHS’s core mission.”

    Some of the grants appear to go to traditional organizations engaged in fighting terrorist threats. But most of the $70 million in grants issued since 2020 – $60 million of which flowed since Biden took office – reflect the administration’s approach to DEI initiatives more than any clear attempt to tackle potential threats, according to Mike Howell, director of the Oversight Program at the conservative Heritage Foundation. Howell said he has tracked federal “countering violent extremism” measures for almost a decade.

    “This goes back to Obama where we saw the government shower these credentialed liberal outfits with a crap-ton of money,” he said. “Trump redirected it a bit, but not enough to kill it in its roots, so now it has cropped back up and gone full-woke under Biden.”

    These include $878,000 to Michigan State University social workers who are running a project with the Drama Club on Rikers Island; nearly $1 million on esports (electronic sports or gaming); more than $500,000 to the Sexual Minority Youth Assistance League; and three grants to Columbia University Teachers’ College totaling more than $2.3 million, including classwork “to slow the manifestation of domestic radicalization and extremism that contributed to the Jan. 6 insurrection on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol.”

    “The project will involve researching, developing and presenting stories,” one Teachers’ College grant says. “It also will include curating and co-creating educator stories of adapting to challenging situations, supporting the storytelling of educators who bring unifying narratives from their local communities, and leading the sharing of these stories.”

    Teachers’ College officials did not respond to RCI’s request for comment.

    In earlier iterations, much of the grant money would fund pet congressional projects, budget log-rolling that helped keep it popular on a bipartisan basis. But under Biden, Howell said, the grants have been folded into the “whole of society” philosophy that animates the administration’s efforts.

    “These grants fund the left but it’s not harmless – they use these grants to predicate their own initiatives,” he said. “What they are doing is outsourcing research to groups they like, who reach the conclusions they want, and then the administration claims it is ‘acting on the belief of experts.’ This growth and maturation of outsourcing is one of the less noticed trends that got us into the mess we’re in now.”

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 19:40

  • "If People Think Things Are Bad Now…" Tucker And Alex Jones Talk Deplatforming, Depopulation, & The NWO
    “If People Think Things Are Bad Now…” Tucker And Alex Jones Talk Deplatforming, Depopulation, & The NWO

    In a deep-dive on everything from ‘deplatforming’ to ‘depopulation’, Tucker Carlson sat down with Alex Jones.

    Elon Musk said it best…

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    Dubbed “the most censored man in the world”, Jones began by discussing his (correct) prediction about 9/11.

    As Tucker points out, “the 9/11 thing, you called it in public.”

    But Jones says his most accurate prediction was around a decade ago when he read the “Rockefeller Foundation Operation Lockstep report,” which he says:

    “described using a virus to bring in world government, a world medical ID, which they would then build a social credit score off of…

    …that they would make people wear masks for fear, shut down sporting events and things like that… and basically phase in this new tyranny.“

    These warnings, among other things, were the reason, Carlson argues, why Jones was so widely deplatformed.

    “Fundamentally, Alex Jones is right about a lot of things. And in fact, that’s why they don’t like him.”

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    Deplatforming

    “To this day, nobody has been more aggressively censored, I don’t think, than you… I read about it, and I felt that it was a major moment in the history of American media. I don’t think anybody defended you when that happened. Anybody, with any kind of audience,”

    To which Jones replied:

    “When Tim Cook admitted that he met on the weekend in August of 2017 with the other big tech heads, and they made the decision to “curate” like it’s a museum – and take me off, it was hundreds of platforms. It wasn’t just the big ones. Everything from LinkedIn, to our bank accounts being taken away, to everything ensuing over the next week and that month. And I knew I was a test case.”

    “It was the questioning the school shooting thing that came later. They kind of dredged that up from my past, blew that up after I’d been deplatformed, and said I’d been deplatformed for that.

    “Once they deplatformed me, it made the show in ways only get bigger… So then they panicked and said ‘okay, let’s look at his record and create more of a reason,’ so they took things out of context from 5-6 years before, blew em up as a current thing out of context, and deceptively reported on what I said to create a strawman argument to then facilitate the reason.”

    The discussion turns to the current state of America with Jones laying the blame for the growing division of the nation by race squarely at the feet of China.

    “The CCP, along with the SPLC and ADL, see America’s weakness and they are literally coming in and saying ‘white people are inherently bad because of the color of their skin…

    …and then they organize all them into race-based groups under the Democratic party flag to attack who is left… which tends to be more conservative.”

    Jones warns however that “they are panicking” because “more and more blacks and hispanics are voting Republican,” which, he explains is why the open border policy is being allowed.

    “They are bringing in all these totally disenfranchised people from around the world… putting them in camps where they indoctrinated into a subdued political under-class… that’s then going to be turned loose on America.”

    This is why Democrats are giving illegal immigrants drivers licenses, the right to vote in some cities, allowing them to become police officers “so they are importing a new enforcemen t class against the American people.”

    The new class will allow them to bring home a New World Order.

    NWO

    Jones and Carlson also discussed the New World Order after Carlson noted that White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre is an idiot.

    “That’s it,” Jones replied. “We’re in a beautiful ball. It’s prom night. Everybody’s dressed great. There’s wonderful food, big delicious punch bowl, and then they say ‘what can we do?’ – well, just have Brian Stelter take a dump right in that. And then he’s there, laughing at you – they’re all there laughing at you, to make you feel small. To make you question reality – why is everything so ugly?“

    Jones then explained that the elites demonize rural Americans in order to blame them for the ills of society.

    “The reason you’re doing bad is not blackrock and the WEF and Bill Gates. It’s all those evil people in the countryside. They’re all white supremacists, terrorists and racists. Let’s go get ’em! Cause the last group they don’t control is rural people that are self-sufficient. And so I get going to the countryside, protecting your children. That’s the holy grail. The problem is, you gotta have one foot in each – you gotta go back and fight in the city for the infrastructure, for the government.”

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    “You gotta give people hope, while also building a backup operation of farming and ranching and self-sufficiency,” Jones continues.

    “So that’s why the WEF and the UN are coming in in Ireland and in areas of Asia, and in the Netherlands, and saying ‘by 2030, 80% of your cows gotta be dead,’ and they just banned like 30% this year in the Netherlands.”

    “They’re all WEF globalist alumni that the big banks, on record, brag – they’ve ‘penetrated the cabinets,’ to quote Klaus Schwab, they’ve put their operatives in to cut off our energy, demoralize us, release the hardened criminals, put the political activists in prison, continue to cut off the resources, to make an angrier world…

    Klaus Schwab says, ‘we’re gonna make the world collapse, we’re gonna have everybody turn against each other, we’re going to blame the political classes that we own and control, and then when we’re done we’ll bring in our new solution. But first thing they have to demolish the cultures of societies that we had before, with the fentanyl, with the open borders, with the demoralization, and then they bring in their next phase, which is a high-tech cashless society. Robot drone-controlled nightmare. More than half of the US in their official UN maps, that they’ve had for more than 25 years, show half the US off-limits to humans.

    All cars will have to have GPS, everyone by law will have to have a cell phone at all times…

    And that’s the admitted global UN standardized plan, where you don’t leave your house without a cell phone.”

    “So if people think things are bad now,” Jones continued, “the straight-jacket, the ball-and-chain is going on, and it’s all being militarily run. Our military is great men and women, but at the top, our military has been globalist Ukraine, New World Order people for at least 30-40 years.”

    Jones also says that the NWO is pushing for:

    • 15-minute cities

    • Central bank digital currencies

    • All of these systems that track and trace everything you do with the social credit scores

    • The plan for the 99% is 250 square-foot coffin-apartments

    • 5G bathing you

    • Literally eating bug protein

    Depopulation

    The New World Order discussion leads Jones on to discuss the controversial topic of depopulation that seems at the end of every globalist policy delivered from on high.

    “The Globalists have gone from testing-phase to fully operational now,” he warns, noting that “they say – read their writings – we are going to have a post-industrial world by 2030… and we will start the depopulation of 90% of the people by 2045.”

    That, Jones explains is the official WEF/UN/Club of Rome plan.

    A stunned Carlson asked “what do you mean ‘depopulation’?”

    Jones replies: “they want to bring the world population down to 500 million.”

    “We are told ‘do not have children, because it is bad for the earth’,” and points out that Elon Musk is a hero for pointing out that we need to have kids to save the world, “otherwise, society collapses.”

    Carlson takes a moment to reflect on what he has heard and says poignantly, “I feel a little bit innervated and downbeat just hearing your dot-connecting… what’s that like to live with?”

    Brian Stelter Prank

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    2024 election, WW3

    The two also discussed the upcoming US election next year. According to Jones, both Biden and Trump are ‘liabilities’ for the deep state, so the plan is :

    “They have a right winger, they’ll claim, assassinate Biden, and they’ll have a left-winger assassinate Trump…

    …That then gets the country even in more of a fight against each other, and then they put in Gavin Newsom and, you know, somebody like Mike Pence or who knows. But I really think the next 13 months is the most critical time – not just in American history, but world history,” Jones continued.

    Biden “doesn’t know who he is.”

    Alex Jones says sources in the White House have told him that Biden “wanders around naked” and is on a constant cocktail of amphetamines and benzos.  

    Tucker says he knows someone who witnessed Biden taking amphetamines in 2020.

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    “Because if they can bring down America, they’re going to bring down the world. Then you’ve got the escalation,” he warns.

    “Remember a year ago, Biden said, you can’t give F-16s and Abrams tanks and cruise missiles to the Ukrainians, that’s WW3. Now they’re doing it. So as Russia wins that war as Col. McGregor documented a few months ago with you, NATO is escalating. Well, that leads right to nuclear war.“

    “Since when do Democrats love war?” Jones asked.

    “Since when did Democrats love the intelligence agencies. They love them now. And so really, the Democrats, just like the Republican party is the beachhead for sanity and populism – it’s not perfect, but it’s a beachhead. The Democrat party is totally turned over to evil.”

    Finally, Jones says he doesn’t expect Elon Musk to reinstate him on X:

    “I understand that if he did that, the ADL and others would really be able to shut down Twitter”

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    Watch the full interview below:

    • 2:46 Alex Jones predictions
    • 15:07 Deplatforming
    • 21:59 Dividing us on race
    • 25:37 The border
    • 28:09 Austin
    • 32:12 New World Order
    • 42:09 Brian Stelter demon video
    • 50:57 Depopulation
    • 1:07:51 Food
    • 1:13:51 Whiskey
    • 1:16:22 Presidential election

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    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 19:20

  • San Francisco Facing Deadliest Year Ever For Overdoses
    San Francisco Facing Deadliest Year Ever For Overdoses

    Authored by Eric Lundrum via American Greatness,

    The far-left city of San Francisco is set to have its deadliest year on record in terms of drug overdoses, further emphasizing the coastal city’s struggles with rising crime, homelessness, and drug abuse.

    According to the Washington Free Beacon, the California city recorded 692 accidental overdose deaths from January to October of 2023, as reported by the San Francisco Office of the Chief Medical Examiner last month.

    By the end of the year, that total is expected to top 800, surpassing the previous record of 720 deaths in 2020.

    The primary cause of overdose deaths in the city is fentanyl, which was responsible for 83% of drug-related deaths in the first 10 months of 2023.

    Methamphetamine and cocaine were responsible for 51% and 46% of drug overdose deaths, respectively, in the same time period. To a lesser extent, some who overdoses have also used medicinal opioids and heroin.

    The drug problem is just one of many crises facing San Francisco, many of which are driven by the city’s soft-on-crime approach.

    Many prominent companies, from restaurants to retailers, have shut down locations in the city due to concerns of robbery, vandalism, and violence against employees which largely go unpunished. Many of the stores that have remained in the city have resorted to locking down their merchandise, including putting them behind locked glass cases, and even chaining doors shut to prevent shoplifting.

    In September, San Francisco recorded a record-high office vacancy rate of 34%. In another survey of 74 restaurants throughout the city, just 3% reported that they did not suffer from any vandalism in that same month.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 19:00

  • "Why No Advertiser Boycott?" Musk Nails Disney's Iger After Facebook Child Sexual Abuse Bombshell
    “Why No Advertiser Boycott?” Musk Nails Disney’s Iger After Facebook Child Sexual Abuse Bombshell

    Elon Musk took another shot at Disney CEO Bob Iger Thursday, after the state of New Mexico sued Meta for allegedly enabling child sexual abuse and trafficking – yet Disney and other woke advertisers, who paused advertising on X in a kneejerk reaction to claims of antisemitism – apparently have no problem when it comes to the sexual exploitation of minors.

    “Why no advertiser boycott, Bob Eiger? [sic]” Musk posted on X. “You are endorsing this material!”

    “He should be fired immediately,” Musk continued in a response to a question over why Disney hasn’t canned Bob.

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    In response, people have been revisiting reports that Disney was offering snorkeling trips to Jeffrey Epstein’s “Little Saint James” island.

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    The fact check on this is beyond hilarious… with Snopes suggesting that it’s false because ” the claim is based on the incorrect assumption that snorkeling in the waters around a private island is the same as physically standing on that island,” and “Second, the trip advertised is not one that is, or was, led by Disney. It was, instead, what is known as a “Port Adventure.” These are activities recommended by Disney that can be found, for extra cost, when  docked at various ports of call on Disney Cruises.”

    In short, Disney only recommended the trip to Epstein’s pedo island, and it doesn’t count if it’s just snorkeling.

    Meta Sued

    On Tuesday, New Mexico sued Meta for “knowingly” exposing children to ‘sexual exploitation and mental health harm.’

    In a Tuesday court filing, New Mexico’s Attorney General’s (NMAG) Office revealed that it had conducted an undercover investigation, creating fake accounts of minors which were then used to fish for offending content, according to a press release reported by the Daily Caller.

    “Meta and its CEO tell the public that Meta’s social media platforms are safe and good for kids,” reads the lawsuit. “The reality is far different. Meta knowingly exposes children to the twin dangers of sexual exploitation and mental health harm. Meta’s conduct has turned New Mexico children who are on its platforms into victims. Meta’s motive for doing so is profit.”

    And crickets from Disney…

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsTo recap the spat, Disney and other advertisers signaled maximum virtue in response to Musk’s endorsement of a post on X which clumsily attempted to explain that Jews who support woke ideology, which includes anti-occupation rhetoric, are reaping what they’ve sewn in regards to the Hamas attack on Gaza and the ensuing pro-Palestinian protests. Musk later apologized, but it was just the ‘antisemitism’ needed for establishment advertisers to leave the platform amid broader concerns over ‘hate speech.’

    Iger went on the NYT Dealbook Summit on Nov. 29, where he explained that “By him taking the position that he took in quite a public manner, we just felt that the association with that position, and with Elon Musk, and X, was not necessarily a positive one for us and we decided we would pull our advertising.”

    To which Musk infamously said hours later, “Go… Fuck… Yourself…” calling out Iger by name. 

    Days later, Musk called Disney the “world’s biggest example of go woke, go broke.”

    Fast forward to today…

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    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 18:45

  • Federal Tax Filers Beware: Underpayment Penalty Has More Than Doubled
    Federal Tax Filers Beware: Underpayment Penalty Has More Than Doubled

    One of the Internal Revenue Service’s fangs has quietly grown much sharper, as the interest rate charged on the underpayment of federal income taxes has soared from 3% to 8% in less than two years. If you’re not sure if you’re hitting the right pace, it’s time to double-check your situation to make sure you don’t throw any more money into Uncle Sam’s rathole than you must. 

    While many taxpayers focus on the annual April deadline, the federal income tax actually works on a “pay as you go” basis, in which the government demands recurring bites out of your income, with those bites rising and and falling in proportion to what you’re earning over the course of the tax year. If the math comes out wrong enough when you file, the IRS will penalize you by demanding you pay interest on money you were supposed to have forked out earlier.   

    Gig employees, the self-employed, people with big bonuses and those with substantial investment income are among those at higher risk of an underpayment penalty surprise (Photo by Andrea Piacquadio)

    In August, the IRS announced that the interest penalty charged against underpayments was rising to 8% for the calendar quarter that started Oct. 1. The rate isn’t set on a bureaucrat’s whim — per the Internal Revenue Code, it’s calculated each quarter by adding 3% to the “federal short-term rate.” Thus, the higher rate is a reflection of the surge in interest rates. As recently as the first quarter of 2022 — when the Fed’s zero interest rate policy was still in place — the rate was just 3%.  For the first three quarters of 2023, it was 7%.  

    Most people whose income is almost entirely derived from regular employment satisfy the pay-as-you-go system through the income tax that employers withhold from each paycheck. Assuming they’ve filled out their IRS W-4 forms correctly, those workers typically don’t run afoul of underpayment penalties. However, regular employees who receive big bonuses or equity compensation might find the regular withholding formula doesn’t cough up enough money to please the IRS. If you want to play with the numbers on your own, you might check out the IRS’s online Tax Withholding Estimator — though ZeroHedge sure isn’t guaranteeing its accuracy. 

    For many people, avoiding underpayment penalties requires making quarterly estimated tax payments directly to the IRS, or significantly adjusting their employee withholding. That’s true of anyone with significant income from anything other than regular employment, including the self-employed, gig economy workers, and people with substantial investment income from things like interest, dividends and capital gains. Note: The 2023 surge in yields on money market funds and some bank accounts may cause a surprise underpayment penalty for those who’d grown accustomed to earning near-zero on their cash. 

    Using the IRS safe harbor can help free you from worrying about an underpayment penalty (Photo by Andrea Piacquadio)

    Federal tax rules provide for a “safe harbor” that generally guarantees you from facing underpayment penalties on personal tax returns. You won’t have to pay the penalty if your withholding and/or timely estimated taxes add up to at least 90% of your 2023 tax bill or 100% of what you owed in 2022. However, if your adjusted gross income is more than $150,000 (or $75,000 for married couples filing separately), the safe harbor linked with your 2022 tax bill rises from 100% to 110%.  

    The IRS is notorious for complicating taxes at every turn, and estimated tax is no exception. Here, the IRS assigns four due dates that don’t come every three months. Instead, payments are due April 15, June 15, September 15 and January 15. (This year, the payment for the fourth quarter instead is due Jan. 16, 2024.) There are several methods for making payments, including mail or through on online portal. 

    In fiscal 2022, the IRS hit individual taxpayers for more than $1.8 billion in underpayment penalties — a number that’s likely to soar alongside the rising penalty interest rate. Here’s hoping ZeroHedge readers aren’t victims of the Feds’ upcoming feeding frenzy. 

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 18:40

  • California Attorney General Accused Of Misleading Voters On Transgender Issue With 'Biased' Ballot Info
    California Attorney General Accused Of Misleading Voters On Transgender Issue With ‘Biased’ Ballot Info

    Authored by Brad Jones via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    California Attorney General Rob Bonta speaks during a news conference in San Francisco on Nov. 15, 2021. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

    A coalition of parental rights and child advocacy groups have accused California Attorney General Rob Bonta of attempting to mislead voters over a ballot initiative title and summary they say is skewed in favor of his political stance on “gender affirmation.”

    The ballot initiative would require schools to notify parents if their child changes his or her gender identity, protect the integrity of girls’ sports by prohibiting boys who claim to be girls from competing in them, and ban the use of puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgery on minors.

    However, the state attorney general wrote the ballot initiative title as “Restricts Rights of Transgender Youth,” and the summary is “overtly biased,” “completely absurd,” and “wrong,” said Jonathan Zachreson, spokesman of Protect Kids California, the coalition of parental rights groups that launched the initiative.

    “It’s so bad it’s laughable,” he said. “Our initiative protects kids. It doesn’t restrict rights.”

    The coalition opposes any kind of medical intervention, including “chemical sterilization” and “genital mutilation” to treat gender dysphoria that could affect the future reproductive health of children, he said.

    In late August, the coalition launched three separate initiatives, which have since been consolidated into a single initiative known as the “Protect Kids of California Act of 2024.”

    The coalition received the ballot title and summary on Nov. 29 and now has less than 180 days to collect the 546,651 qualified signatures needed for the statewide initiative to be placed on the Nov. 5, 2024, general election ballot.

    The ballot summary from the attorney general’s office reads:

    • Requires public and private schools and colleges to: restrict gender-segregated facilities like bathrooms to persons assigned that gender at birth; prohibit transgender female students (grades 7+) from participating in female sports. Repeals law allowing students to participate in activities and use facilities consistent with their gender identity.
    • Requires schools to notify parents whenever a student under 18 asks to be treated as a gender differing from school records without exception for student safety.
    • Prohibits gender-affirming health care for transgender patients under 18, even if parents consent or treatment is medically recommended.

    It continues: “Summary of estimate by Legislative Analyst and Director of Finance of fiscal impact on state and, local governments: Potentially minor savings in state and local health care costs of up to millions of dollars annually from no longer paying for prohibited services for individuals under the age of 18. These savings could be affected by many other impacts, such as individuals seeking treatment later in life. Minor administrative and workload costs to schools, colleges, and universities, up to several millions of dollars initially. Potential, but unknown, cost pressures to state and local governments related to federal fiscal penalties if the measure results in federally funded schools, colleges, universities, or health care providers being deemed out of compliance with federal law.”

    Summary ‘Confusing’

    The attorney general’s assertion that the ballot initiative aims to “prohibit transgender female students (grades 7+) from participating in female sports” is “tricky” and “confusing,” while the wording submitted by Protect Kids California clearly defines what male and female mean based on biology, Mr. Zachreson said.

    Erin Friday, an attorney and western U.S. regional leader for Our Duty, a group that opposes social, medical, and surgical interventions on minors, told The Epoch Times the ballot title and summary were predictable.

    The attorney general, she said, has already shown his “disdain for parental rights,” most recently with his lawsuit against Chino Valley Unified School District’s parental notification policy regarding gender transitions at school.

    “We knew that Bonta would do everything in his power to undermine the initiative to mislead the voters,” she said. “We are disgusted, but not surprised.”

    The lawsuit against Chino Valley “is designed to permit schools to continue the unconstitutional practice of deceiving parents when their students are experiencing gender dysphoria,” she said.

    Erin Friday gathers with “Our Duty” supporters at the California state capital building in Sacramento, Calif., on Aug. 28, 2023. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

    Both California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Mr. Bonta have pushed for too much state control over parental authority, Ms. Friday said.

    While the summary states the initiative would “prohibit transgender female students” from participating in female sports, it doesn’t define what ‘transgender female’ means, deliberately misleading voters unfamiliar with the nomenclature of gender ideology to think it means “girls who believe they are boys” when actually it means physical males, she said.

    In addition, the language of “gender-affirming health care” refers to a model that means any child, of any age, regardless of mental health issues, ability to consent, or “absurdity of gender identity” must be affirmed and be given any intervention they request, she said. However, not all professionals agree with this model.

    The summary also underestimates the potential cost-savings to taxpayers by “tens of millions” of dollars, because children who undergo sex-change interventions face the “grim and predictable future” of becoming life-long medical patients with a host of side effects, including increased occurrences of cancer, osteoporosis, atrophy of sex organs, heart issues, and other life-altering, perpetual ailments, she said.

    Detransitioners, including Layla Jane and Chloe Cole who had double mastectomies as minors—at 13 and 15 respectively—have talked about their ongoing discomfort from the surgeries, she said.

    The Attorney General’s press office stated via email in response to a request for comment that the Attorney General’s Office is responsible for issuing official titles and summaries “describing the chief purpose and points of every proposed initiative submitted in compliance with procedural requirements,” but did not respond to questions about the alleged bias and ambiguity in the title and summary including, “What defines a ‘transgender female?’”

    “We take this responsibility seriously,” the press office stated. “However, we cannot comment on any particular initiative,” the press office stated.

    Workers process California ballots at a Los Angeles Registrar site at the Los Angeles Fair Grounds in Pomona, Calif., on Aug. 31, 2021. (John Fredricks/The Epoch Times)

    Bigger Picture Unfolds

    Before almost every election in California, the wording of ballot measure titles, summaries, text, and rebuttals is enough to leave even the most politically astute voters feeling confused—even duped, according to two former state legislators.

    Lawsuits over allegedly twisted ballot titles and summaries are nothing new to California, and the controversy is well-documented in news reports by several media outlets.

    Former Assemblyman Kevin Kiley (R-Rocklin), now a congressman, and former state Sen. Melissa Melendez (R-Lake Elsinore) told The Epoch Times preceding the 2020 election that state ballot measure texts and summaries are so skewed, many voters have no idea what they are truly voting for or against come election time.

    The problem, they said, is that in California, the authority and responsibility to write fair and impartial ballot titles and summaries rests with the attorney general—a partisan political office—who crafts the wording in a way that leads voters in his or her desired direction.

    Mr. Kiley called the practice “terrible” and said it amounts to “election fraud,” because it manipulates the language “in a way that likely changes the whole outcome of the vote.”

    “It’s time we finally protect the integrity of our elections by putting a neutral nonpartisan official in charge of writing the ballot language,” Mr. Kiley said in August 2020.

    Mr. Kiley and Ms. Melendez said at the time they wanted to avoid further lawsuits and hand over the authority for wording ballot measure titles and summaries to the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO), and they even proposed legislation, Assembly Constitutional Amendment 7, or ACA 7, to do just that. However, the proposed amendment was killed in committee and never put to a vote.

    In 2020, several lawsuits were filed against then Attorney General Xavier Becerra or his wording of ballot titles and summaries, but his office denied they were biased.

    “The elections code is very clear. … It says you have to give a true and impartial statement on the purpose of the measure, and it’s not supposed to be used as an argument or to create prejudice for or against a measure,” Ms. Melendez said.

    On Nov. 4, 2014, California voters passed Proposition 47, a referendum that proponents touted as the Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Act, and opponents such as the California Police Chiefs Association called the ballot title and summary misleading.

    At the time, voters were told Prop. 47 was intended to keep nonviolent criminals out of state prison by downgrading some crimes from felonies to misdemeanors, thus saving money on housing inmates. The saved money would then go into a fund to support schools as well as rehabilitation programs, including providing offenders with counseling, therapy, housing, and job opportunities.

    Critics, including a county supervisor who originally supported the measure, say the law has instead resulted in an increase in shoplifting and property theft crimes in the state.

    Potential Lawsuit

    Mr. Zachreson told The Epoch Times it’s not worth suing over the misleading ballot title and summary and risk a potential drawn-out court battle that could prevent the initiative from being on the 2024 ballot.

    If there is a court battle, it will come after the state prints the ballot title and summary in its official voter guide, he said.

    Meanwhile, the “biased” language could backfire on Mr. Bonta, he said.

    “It’s so wrong and absurd that in some ways, I don’t know if it even does the other side a favor, because it’s going get more people to turn their heads and look at what we’re actually trying to accomplish,” Mr. Zachreson said.

    The state law that puts the attorney general in charge of ballot titles and summaries is a “direct conflict of interest,” he said. “It should be nonpartisan, impartial, and I think the Legislative Analyst’s Office is a good starting point.”

    A Worldwide Stop the War Against Children Rally to protest the sexualization of children, secret gender transitions of minors, and pornographic books at schools, and other issues in Sacramento, Calif., on Oct. 21, 2023. (Courtesy of Julius Giles)

    Politics and Polls

    A Rasmussen poll published in June, found that 71 percent of American adults believe there are only two genders, and the majority “support laws against transgender treatment for minors.”

    Another Rasmussen survey in December 2021 showed 68 percent of Americans don’t believe schools and teachers should be allowed to counsel students on their sexual and gender identities without parental knowledge or consent, and that only 19 percent believe schools should be allowed to engage in such counseling without parental consent.

    “Voters are in such strong support, we know that we can win, so the hardest part is just to get on the ballot,” Mr. Zachreson said. “That’s where we’re at now and we feel we can do it.”

    But because most Democratic politicians in California are “vehemently against” the tenets of the ballot initiative, and Democrats hold a super majority in the state, “there is no way that we’re going to be able to persuade the legislature,” he said.

    And, although litigation has worked to some extent to fight against gender ideology in schools, he said the ballot initiative is a more direct route to democracy.

    Even if the state loses its legal battle against Chino Valley and the district is allowed to enforce its parental notification policy, parental rights groups would still have to convince nearly 1,000 other school districts to adopt similar policies, whereas a successful ballot measure would make parental notification policies a statewide law, he said.

    The Petition

    Protect Kids California has set a goal of 850,000 signatures to make sure it has ample qualified signatures to make the 2024 ballot, Mr. Zachreson said.

    The 546,651 qualified signatures needed are based on five percent of the number of voters in the last gubernatorial election.

    “We’ll also do our own signature verification to minimize any issues there,” he said.

    Mr. Zachreson said petition forms for the ballot initiative will soon be available for download from the Protect Kids California website.

    Former collegiate swimmer Riley Gaines, a National Collegiate Athletic Association record setter who testified before Congress in support of Title IX on Dec. 5, urged more than 300 people at a California Family Council event in Costa Mesa, Calif., on Nov. 30 to support all aspects of the ballot initiative.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 18:20

  • Visualizing Portfolio Return Expectations, By Country
    Visualizing Portfolio Return Expectations, By Country

    How do investors’ return expectations differ from those of advisors? How does this expectation gap shift across countries?

    Despite 2022 being the worst year for stock markets in over a decade, investors around the world appear confident about the long-term performance of their portfolios. These convictions point towards resilience across global economies, driven by strong labor markets and moderating inflation.

    While advisors are optimistic, their expectations are more conservative overall.

    In the following graphic, Visual Capitalist’s Dorothy Neufeld shows the return expectation gap by country between investors and financial professionals in 2023, based on data from Natixis.

    Expectation Gap by Country

    Below, we show the return expectation gap by country, based on a survey of 8,550 investors and 2,700 financial professionals:

    Investors in the U.S. have the highest long-term annual return expectations, at 15.6%. The U.S. also has the highest expectations gap across countries, with investors’ expectations more than double that of advisors.

    Likely influencing investor convictions are the outsized returns seen in the last decade, led by big tech. This year is no exception, as a handful of tech giants are seeing soaring returns, lifting the overall market.

    From a broader perspective, the S&P 500 has returned 11.5% on average annually since 1928.

    Following next in line were investors in Chile and Mexico with return expectations of 15.1% and 14.7%, respectively. Unlike many global markets, the MSCI Chile Index posted double-digit returns in 2022.

    Global financial hub, Singapore, has the lowest expectations gap across countries.

    Investors in the UK and Europe, have the most moderate return expectations overall. Confidence has been weighed down by geopolitical tensions, high interest rates, and dismal economic data.

    Return Expectations Across Asset Classes

    What are the expected returns for different asset classes over the next decade?

    A separate report by Vanguard used a quantitative model to forecast returns through to 2033. For U.S. equities, it projects 4.1-6.1% in annualized returns. Global equities are forecast to have 6.4-8.4% returns, outperforming U.S. stocks over the next decade.

    Bonds, meanwhile, are forecast to see 3.6-4.6% annualized returns for the U.S. aggregate market, while U.S. Treasuries are projected to average 3.3-4.3% annually.

    While it’s impossible to predict the future, we can see a clear expectation gap not only between countries, but between advisors, clients, and other models. Factors such as inflation, interest rates, and the ability for countries to weather economic headwinds will likely have a significant influence on future portfolio returns.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 18:00

  • Trump Witness Says He Valued Mar-a-Lago At More Than $1 Billion
    Trump Witness Says He Valued Mar-a-Lago At More Than $1 Billion

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

    A Florida real estate agent this week testified in former President Donald Trump’s civil fraud trial in New York that his Mar-a-Lago property is worth at least $1 billion.

    Former President Donald Trump arrives at Trump Tower the day after FBI agents raided his Mar-a-Lago Palm Beach home, in New York City on Aug. 9, 2022. (David ‘Dee’ Delgado/Reuters)

    Lawrence Moens, who was called as a witness by the defense, testified that the Florida property could be sold as a home, saying he would value it at over $1 billion as of 2021.

    “It’s something breathtaking. It’s something amazing to see,” he said of Mar-a-Lago, adding that he had valued it at over $1.2 billion in 2021. He also told the court that President Trump’s company had actually undervalued Mar-a-Lago by about half.

    Mr. Moens’s valuation assumes that Mar-a-Lago is a personal residence, a premise that a judge already has rejected in the ongoing civil fraud trial.

    “I work very hard to sell rich people property in Palm Beach,” testified Mr. Moens. “I’m on the front lines every day of selling properties, and I have a pretty good handle on what’s happening in the market.”

    Spanning 17 acres with waterfront on two sides, the Trump estate and social club is his home, a place where the former president and current Republican 2024 front-runner has conducted high-profile meetings while in and out of office, and the spot where federal special counsel Jack Smith alleges he improperly stashed classified documents, which President Trump denies.

    Mar-a-Lago also is a key element of the current New York civil case. State Attorney General Letitia James’ lawsuit claims that the ex-president and his company deceived lenders and others by giving them financial statements that greatly overstated the values of some of his prime assets, including Mar-a-Lago.

    Testifying for Trump’s defense, a Florida real estate attorney said the property could be sold as a home, notwithstanding decades-old legal documents in which Trump said he intended to forswear its use as anything but a club. Then a Palm Beach luxury real estate broker testified that he’d value the historic estate at over $1 billion as of 2021.

    Judge Arthur Engoron, in a pretrial ruling declaring that Trump and his company engaged in fraud, found that he exaggerated Mar-a-Lago’s worth by as much as 2,300 percent, compared to the Palm Beach County tax appraiser’s valuations. They ranged from $18 million to $28 million.

    However, some real estate professionals who aren’t involved in the case expressed concern about the judge’s ruling several months ago, suggesting that he made an error by relying solely on the tax appraiser’s valuations.

    Some Palm Beach luxury real estate agents have told The Associated Press that the property would sell for $300 million to $600 million, and possibly $1 billion or more if it sparked a bidding war among uber-wealthy contenders.

    During a short cross-examination Tuesday, state attorney Kevin Wallace asked whether he was a member of the Mar-a-Lago club. “I am,” Mr. Moens said, saying that he joined in 1995 or 1996. “I don’t go too often. I don’t like clubs,” he added.

    “You’re not running a process that is re-creatable … is that fair?” Mr. Wallace asked about his valuations of Mar-a-Lago. “That’s fair,” Mr. Moens said.

    In a pre-trial deposition over the summer, Mr. Moens had said that he “could dream up anyone from Elon Musk to Bill Gates and everyone in between” to purchase Mar-a-Lago. “Kings, emperors, heads of state.” “If they want the best house in the country, that would be one of the top two or three that would be available if they were for sale,” he added.

    “I wish he’d let me sell it, but it’s not for sale,” he said.

    Another defense witness, Miami-based real estate attorney John Shubin, also testified that “there is absolutely no prohibition on the use of Mar-a-Lago as a single-family residence.”

    He noted that the property is simultaneously a club and President Trump’s residence. Mr. Shubin also pointed to a 1993 agreement between the former president and the city that said Mar-a-Lago would revert to private residential use if the club were “abandoned.”

    This week, President Trump confirmed that he’ll return to the witness stand on Monday in the New York case.

    “I will be testifying Monday in this shameful, NO JURY ALLOWED ‘TRIAL,’” he wrote Tuesday in a Truth Social post. Court was not in session Wednesday, and his son, Eric Trump, won’t be testifying.

    “I told my wonderful son, Eric, not to testify tomorrow at the RIGGED TRIAL … Eric has already testified, PERFECTLY,” President Trump wrote Tuesday. “So there is no reason to waste any more of this Crooked Court’s time on having him say the same thing, over and over again.”

    The Associated Press contributed to this report.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 12/07/2023 – 17:40

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