Aug 09

Today’s News 9th August 2024

  • Chinese Rocket 'Breaks Apart' In Space, Unleashing 'Significantly Hazardous' Debris Cloud 
    Chinese Rocket ‘Breaks Apart’ In Space, Unleashing ‘Significantly Hazardous’ Debris Cloud 

    The Chinese Long March 6A rocket, launched from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in north China on Tuesday, carrying 18 Qianfan (“Thousand Sails”) satellites to low Earth orbit (LEO), has broken up in space.

    On Thursday afternoon, US Space Command announced on X that the “Long March 6A rocket launched on Aug. 6, 2024” has broken up in LEO, “resulting in over 300 pieces of trackable debris in low-Earth orbit.” 

    Space Command has “observed no immediate threats and continues to conduct routine conjunction assessments to support the safety and sustainability of the space domain.”

    Earlier, UK Space Command wrote on X that “the break-up of the Long March 6A rocket body” has created a “debris cloud” in LEO and is still analyzing the situation to “determine implications” for satellite constellations operating in LEO.

    Space News said the Qianfan satellites are part of a new “planned mega constellation of more than 14,000 low Earth orbit (LEO) communications satellites,” adding, “the mission appears to have created a string of debris along its orbital path.” 

    Slingshot Aerospace, a space-tracking and data analytics firm, published data on the debris cloud on X, indicating the “space debris that poses a significant hazard to LEO constellations below 800 km altitude.”

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    Swiss firm S2a Systems posted some of the first images of the debris cloud. 

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    So when comes the uncontrolled reentry of the rocket body? China has a history of this…

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/09/2024 – 02:45

  • Bulgaria Bans LGBT Propaganda In Schools
    Bulgaria Bans LGBT Propaganda In Schools

    Authored by Grzegorz Adamczyk via Remix News,

    The Bulgarian parliament has passed an amendment to the preschool and school education law, which bans the “promotion of ideas and views related to non-traditional sexual orientation.”

    The amendment was adopted with 135 deputies voting in favor, 57 against, and 8 abstentions.

    The new regulations stem from a survey conducted in schools about the attitudes of students aged 14 to 18 towards LGBT issues.

    The draft amendment was quickly passed on Wednesday after being introduced in the national parliament.

    Under the new law, Bulgarian preschools and schools face a total ban on promoting “in any way ideas and views related to non-traditional sexual orientation or defining a gender identity different from biological sex.”

    Members of the nationalist Vazrazhdane party, the leftist BSP, the Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms, the There Is Such a People party, and part of the center-right GERB party supported the amendment.

    The entire center coalition, We Continue the Change – Democratic Bulgaria, opposed it.

    Supporters of the coalition organized a protest outside the parliament on Wednesday evening, arguing that the amendment would hinder efforts to combat bullying of young lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and transgender individuals in schools.

    In 2023, the Bulgarian Supreme Court ruled that “changing sex” through judicial proceedings is not permissible under the current legal framework, emphasizing that “gender is recognized at birth and defines a person until death.”

    Meanwhile, in another European country, Georgia’s parliament approved in the first reading a package of laws banning LGBT propaganda proposed by the ruling Georgian Dream party.

    The second and third readings are scheduled for the autumn parliamentary session, just before the elections set for Oct. 26.

    Read more here…

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 08/09/2024 – 02:00

  • 2024 Echoes '1984'
    2024 Echoes ‘1984’

    Authored by Victor Joecks via American Greatness,

    The book “1984” is supposed to be a warning. Today’s leftists are using it as an instruction manual…

    George Orwell’s classic novel is set in a dystopian world where Big Brother controls the population through information control and surveillance. See if any of this sounds familiar.

    “Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them.”

    During her career, especially when running for president in 2020, Kamala Harris took a number of radical positions. She praised efforts to defund the police. She once insinuated that Immigration and Customs Enforcement was comparable to the KKK and suggested the agency should be rebuilt “from scratch.” She wanted to decriminalize border crossings. She co-sponsored the Green New Deal. She supported a mandatory gun buyback program, eliminating private insurance and reparations. She was in favor of banning fracking and plastic straws.

    Those policies play great in San Francisco, but not in battleground states. Not to worry. She’s flip-flopped on at least five major policy positions since becoming the presumptive nominee.

    Instead of exposing this duplicity, the national mainstream media is participating in it.

    “Harris is calibrating her policy pitch for going to battle with Trump,” the Associated Press wrote about her reversals.

    “If the Party could thrust its hand into the past and say of this or that event, it never happened — that, surely, was more terrifying than mere torture and death.”

    The attempted assassination of Donald Trump happened just over three weeks ago. The iconic photo of a bloodied Trump defiantly standing and pumping his fist went viral. Outside of conservative sites and social media accounts, it’s barely been seen since. The national media has largely moved on, eager to fluff up Harris.

    Less than two weeks ago, pro-Hamas rioters stormed Washington, D.C., to protest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaking to Congress. They tore down U.S. flags outside of Union Station and raised Palestinian flags. They burned an American flag, vandalized monuments and assaulted park police. Charges against some of the few people arrested have already been dropped.

    An easy prediction: You’ll hear less about these two stories than Trump’s out-of-context “bloodbath” remark and Jan. 6. It’s like events that would make Trump look heroic and hurt the left never happened.

    “Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten …”

    You can see this happening in real time. Last week, I googled “Trump rally.” The top result was “Kamala Harris rally in Atlanta.” The same thing happened to Elon Musk and many others.

    Recently, Meta AI refused to acknowledge that Trump was almost assassinated. Meta is the parent company of Facebook. It inaccurately labeled a fist-pumping photo of a bloodied Trump as “altered.” When people used Google to search for information on Trump’s attempted assassination, its auto-fill wouldn’t even suggest his name.

    Both companies claim they weren’t trying to rig search results. Those excuses would be more believable if almost all mistakes like these didn’t go in the same direction.

    “Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end, we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it.”

    Illegal aliens are merely undocumented migrants. Men who claim to be women are women. People voting for Donald Trump are a threat to democracy. Ramming scissors into the skull of an 8-month-old preborn baby and sucking her brains out is health care. Israel is the oppressor for defending itself against genocidal terrorists. Diversity requires ideological conformity.

    2024 looks a lot like “1984,” but you get to help write the ending. Choose wisely.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 23:25

  • Every Second American Buys Food Online
    Every Second American Buys Food Online

    According to Statista’s Consumer Insights, more than half of Americans have ordered groceries online for delivery in the past 12 months before the survey was carried out between July 2023 and June 2024. 53 percent said they had ordered items to their house in this way.

    Infographic: Every Second American Buys Food Online | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    The most popular category of food ordered online for delivery was one fitting this rather lazy method of shopping: snacks and candy at 24 percent.

    However, all categories of groceries ordered online for delivery were very close together. The healthier fruits and vegetables category follows close behind at 23 percent, ahead of frozen food and rice & pasta, both at 22 percent. A similar number of Americans had ordered breakfast cereal, meats & sausages as well as dairy and bread.

    The survey also showed that Walmart was the most popular store to order groceries from online, followed by Amazon, Costco and Instacart.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 23:00

  • The 1948 Irgun Re-Born?
    The 1948 Irgun Re-Born?

    Submitted by Alastair Crooke,

    The signposts are there for all to read: The West — in deliberately overlooking such explicit markers — cannot then complain, or escape, the ensuing consequences.  

    No, the ‘tin ear’ is not some new western derangement — a unique mass collapse of sanity — that we are living through. It is something worse: a return to a dogmatic, authoritarian version of truth which dissident physicist Eric Weinstein complains has (in the West) also destroyed true science — ignoring and silencing its most important dissident voices, whilst amply rewarding Science’s frauds.

    Consider: Prime Minister Netanyahu addressed the US Congress on 24 July saying, in an unrelieved Manichaean mode, that the West is facing an “axis of evil” (Iran and allies), which the US must join in destroying. It was a call to participate in civilisational war.

    His invitation was celebrated with 58 standing ovations from US legislators.

    Netanyahu returned home to a disaster in the Druze community on the Golan. Missile fragments had struck, killing and wounding many children playing football (the exact circumstances are still not clear). Western rationality however is perfectly capable to deduce firstly that Majdal Shams lies in Occupied Syria; secondly, that the Druze community there remains overwhelmingly Syrian (rejecting Israeli citizenship) and largely pro-Syrian. And that they are neither Jews nor Israelis. The West seemingly cannot however, adduce the further very obvious conclusion: Why on earth would Hizbullah intentionally attack a Syrian community on Syrian land that largely is sympathetic to the Resistance?

    They wouldn’t. Yet these obvious facts are completely ignored by a rationality that, as Weinstein suggests, actively prefers fraud to truth. Spokesman Kirby said Hizbullah had attacked children in northern Israel. 

    Israel’s Defence minister repeatedly says:

    “We don’t want war”. Western leaders parrot the same meme: No-one wants war. ‘We are fully confident that Israel’s response will be constrained and limited to military targets’. The White House: “In our view, there is no reason for some dramatic escalation in southern Lebanon and there is still time and space for diplomacy”.

    So what then occurs?  Two major assassinations: one in Beirut and the other in Tehran (i.e. to a guest on Iranian sovereign territory).  Western leaders express their ‘concern’.  The Hamas target in Tehran, Ismail Haniyeh, as the Qatari PM noted, was the key Gaza hostage negotiator.  

    This too will be overlooked, though Netanyahu’s intent to weave together Hamas, Hizbullah and Iran into a single ‘axis of evil’ cloth – thus speaking to his Join-Session of Congress thesis – must be evident even to a blinkered Washington.

    Recall the new ‘equation’ that followed the assassination of a senior IRGC official in the Iranian Consulate in April 2024: Henceforth Iran will respond directly — and directly from Iran. Washington says it does not want war with Iran, yet the latter explicitly was what Netanyahu advocated. Did the legislators miss his point?

    For nearly ten months, Israel has been unable to stabilize the situation along the northern border and allow for the return of displaced Israelis to their homes. Even if the Beirut strike doesn’t lead to wider war, restoring a negotiated stability on the Lebanese border is now beyond reach – as is too, a Gaza hostage deal. “How can mediation succeed when one party assassinates the negotiator on the other side”, Qatari PM al-Thani ruefully observed.

    So too ‘overlooked’ in the West, will be that which happened in Israel on the same day the assassinations later took place: Right-wing vigilantes descended from their settlements, storming two military IDF bases. The anarchic scenes of mass break-ins, fomented by several members of the ruling coalition, some of whom took part in the forcible entries, sparked angry condemnation from Defence Minister Gallant. 

    The invasions were supported by one minister and several Knesset members seeking to free reservists that are suspected of aggravated abuse and forcible sodomy against a Palestinian detainee. According to a security source, the injured detainee was taken to a hospital with severe injuries, including to an intimate body part which left him unable to walk.  

    “The spectacle of military police officers coming to arrest our best heroes at Sde Teiman is nothing less than shameful”, said Ben Gvir, whose ministry controls the Israel Police and Israel Prison Service, said of the storming of the IDF post. 

    Yet the wider picture as related by Yossi Melman is:

    “What is happening on the part of the nationalistic messianic Right with the backing, winking or silence of ministers and MKs of the Right is a “putsch”.  The youth coming down from the hills of the ‘State of Judah’ to act with the same violent methods – used against the Palestinians – (but now) are being used against the state of Israel.  MK Limor Son Har-Malech (Otzma Yehudit) said: “The people of Israel will fight against enemies from outside and enemies who try to destroy us at home” [those such as the Advocate General seeking to investigate the torture being practiced Sde Teiman]. The concept of the knife in the back and the betrayal at home echoes the voices in Germany after WWII”.

    Again, overlooked but not in the news: The situation at Sde Teiman was widely-known and said to be “more horrific than anything we’ve heard about Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo”.  A UN report has detailed how Palestinians arbitrarily detained faced torture and mistreatment. The vigilantes from the settlements nevertheless described those committing the anal rape as “heroes” — and cast the IDF investigators as fifth columnists.  Reports suggest that the perpetrators at Sde Teiman enjoy high level protection. 

    This account of systematic torture followed earlier revelations that the Israeli army had marked tens of thousands of Gazans as suspects for assassination, using an AI targeting system, called Lavender, with little human oversight and a permissive policy for casualties.

    In the same vein, Right-wing Cabinet ministers celebrated the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on social media Wednesday morning, as: “This is the right way to purge the world of this filth”, Heritage Minister Amichay Eliyahu, a member of National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir’s far-right Otzma Yehudit party, tweeted:

    “No more imaginary ‘peace’/surrender agreements, no more mercy for these dead men walking. The iron fist that will strike them is the one that will bring quiet and a modicum of comfort, and strengthen our ability to live in peace with those who seek peace. Haniyeh’s death makes the world a slightly better place”.

    What then is this ‘truth’ that the West ignores and silences reality, whilst amplifying its narrative frauds? It is that the Israel which they presume to understand is now something very different. And that it has an epistemology at odds with mechanistic rationalism.

    An eschatological Right-wing cult now holds the majority in cabinet — and wields a vigilante militia ready to attack the military establishment, and the Israeli state. No one was arrested for the attack and take-over of the two bases. They do not dare.

    Moshe “Bogie” Ya’alon, former Chief of Staff of the IDF, who also served as Israel’s Defence Minister, had this to say in a video interview on the forces taking over in Israel:

    “When you talk about Smotrich and Ben Gvir: They have a Rabbi. His name is Dov Lior. He is the Rabbi of the Jewish Underground, who intended to blow up the Dome of the Rock – and before that the buses in Jerusalem. Why? In order to hurry up the ‘Last War’. Do you [not] hear them talking in terms of the Last War; or of Smotrich’s concept of ‘subjugation’?  Read the article he published in Shiloh in 2017. First of all, this concept rests on Jewish supremacy: Mein Kampf in reverse”.

    “My hair stands on end when I say that – as he said it. I learned and grew up in the house of Holocaust survivors and ‘never again’. It is Mein Kampf in reverse: Jewish supremacy: and therefore [Smotrich] says: “My wife won’t go into a room with an Arab”.  It is anchored in ideology. And then actually what he aspires to – as soon as possible – is to go to a big war. A war of Gog and Magog. How do you start the flames?  A massacre like the [1994] Cave of the Patriarchs?  Baruch Goldstein is a student of this Rabbi. Ben Gvir has hung up Goldstein’s picture [in his house]”. 

    “This is what goes into the decision-making process in the Israeli government”.  

    Rabbi Dov Lior has been described by Netanyahu as the “élite unit that leads Israel”, because of his influence and control over the settler forces. The 1948 Irgun, drawing heavily on the Mizrahim, is being reborn?

    Isn’t it time that the western ruling structures raised their eyes from their reverie, and read the runes that manifest all around them?  Some serious players don’t think as you westerners do; they seek Gog and Magog (the prophecy that “the children of Israel” will be victorious in the battle of Armageddon). That is what you risk.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 22:35

  • Yet Another Cargo Theft From A Refrigerated 18 Wheeler In Philadelphia
    Yet Another Cargo Theft From A Refrigerated 18 Wheeler In Philadelphia

    Cargo thefts are becoming a trend in Philadelphia…and it doesn’t look like the swearing in of new Mayor Cherelle Parker – who is supposed to be far tougher on crime than her predecessor Jim Kenney – is deterring them. 

    This time around thieves made off with “large cartons of tuna from a refrigerated truck” in South Philadelphia, according to 6ABC. 

    The crime took place at about 3:30am on Thursday near Pattison Ave. when the truck was parked on the roadway. The report said that “multiple male suspects got away in two vehicles – a white sedan and a SUV.”

    Back in April, thieves made off with more than $12,000 in pork from a Northeast Philadelphia truck. That crime marked the 37th cargo theft in the area for the year, and it was months ago. 

    The thieves made off with 56 cases of pork at the time. 

    As ABC noted in April, the location where the pork was stolen is a popular overnight stop for truckers en route to morning warehouse deliveries. However, it’s also become a hotspot for theft, with recent incidents on March 14 involving stolen bourbon and meat while drivers were asleep.

    Captain Jack Ryan of the Philadelphia Police Dept. commented: “They are asleep in a lot of cases. The refrigerated trucks make a lot of noise.”

    And, recall last year thieves also stole 2 million dimes worth $200,000 from a truck parked at a Philadelphia Walmart. The truck had $750,000 in dimes in it altogether. Many were found strewn about in a Walmart parking lot where the trailer was parked. 

    The dimes had been picked up at the Philadelphia Mint, but the driver of the truck went home to sleep before planning to drive the next day to Florida. 

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 22:10

  • Nevada Agrees To Purge 90K Ineligible Voters From Election Rolls
    Nevada Agrees To Purge 90K Ineligible Voters From Election Rolls

    Authored by Luis Cornelio via HeadlineUSA.com,

    Nevada has agreed to purge over 90,000 ineligible voters from its rolls following a legal battle with the Republican National Committee and the Trump campaign, according to a press statement from the Nevada GOP. 

    The purge will focus on Clark County, which includes Las Vegas, and will remove individuals no longer active under state law, the Wednesday statement alleged,

    RNC Chair Michael Whatley praised the decision as a significant step for voter security. 

    “Election integrity starts with clean voter rolls, and that’s why we’ve brought litigation in key states to compel outcomes just like this,” he tweeted.

    The Nevada GOP’s Executive Board also expressed satisfaction with the voter roll cleanup in a press statement. 

    “We are incredibly pleased with the recent voter roll clean-up in Clark County. Our team has worked tirelessly to ensure a fair and free election this November,” the board stated.

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    The party vowed to achieve similar victories across the state’s 16 counties ahead of the 2024 presidential election, where President Donald Trump is expected to face Kamala Harris, the embattled and unpopular vice president.

    The push for clean voter rolls began in April 2024, shortly after former RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel’s resignation. In June, U.S. District Court Judge Cristina Silva dismissed the lawsuit, claiming the state had insufficient time to address the issues raised. 

    According to Nevada-based News 4, Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar, a Democrat, began the cleanup after sending postcards to over 150,000 voters whose mail was returned as “undeliverable” during the 2023 primaries.

    The voters who did not respond by Aug. 6 were moved to inactive status and will not receive automatic ballots until they update their registration, the outlet reported. 

    It isn’t immediately clear whether Aguilar’s actions came after the GOP’s requests. Headline USA has reached out to the RNC for clarification.

    Nevada is considered a pivotal state for both Trump and Harris in 2024. Trump narrowly lost the state in 2016 and 2020 to Democrats Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, respectively. Redfield & Wilton Strategies poll shows both candidates tied at 40%.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 21:45

  • US CENTCOM Confirms F-22 Raptors Land In Middle East For "Force Posturing" Against Iran
    US CENTCOM Confirms F-22 Raptors Land In Middle East For “Force Posturing” Against Iran

    Update:

    United States Central Command confirmed on X that an unspecified number of F-22 Raptor stealth fighter jets have arrived in its ‘area of responsibility’—which includes over 4 million square miles and 21 countries in the Middle East, Central and South Asia, and Northeast Africa.

    “U.S. Air Force F-22 Raptors arrived in the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility Aug. 8 as part of U.S. force posture changes in the region to mitigate the possibility of regional escalation by Iran or its proxies,” US CENTCOM said. 

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    We reported earlier that as many as 12 F-22s arrived in the Middle East today (see the reporting below)… 

    Unconfirmed, but some X users that identified as “OSINT”—or open-source intelligence—pointed out some of stealth fighters landed at the Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar. 

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    Some geopolitical observers anticipate retaliation by Iran (or Iranian proxy groups), possibly including a direct assault on Israel. This suggests the Middle East is on the brink of a broader conflict that could escalate into a regional war. 

    In recent days, the Biden administration has been working through diplomatic channels, utilizing its Middle East allies to convince Tehran to reconsider its retaliation strike against Israel. They’ve warned Tehran that a massive missile and drone strike on Israel could spark regional conflict, Politico said, citing two senior US officials earlier this week. 

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    While initial assessments had expected a retaliation strike earlier this week, Al Arabiya has reported any retaliation may now be postponed. However, we’ve noted…

    In another development, Israeli journalist Hananya Naftali reported Wednesday, “Twelve American F-22 Raptors head to the Middle East, ready to counter any Iranian threat against Israel.”

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    On Tuesday, YouTube CobraEmergency filmed twelve F-22s that landed at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk, England. 

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    By Thursday morning, X users that identified as “OSINT”—or open-source intelligence—pointed out that these stealth fighter jets were headed towards the Middle East. 

    “It was previously believed that they would be Deployed to Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, but this approach direction suggests that it may be an Airbase that’s further West, like Muwaffaq Salti in Jordan,” OSINTdefender wrote on X. 

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    Meanwhile, the USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier is positioned in the Gulf of Oman. 

    The US has more than 50,000 troops stationed across the Middle East.

    Earlier this week, Jared Cohen, President of Global Affairs and Co-Head of the Goldman Sachs Global Institute, noted in a conversation with another colleague, “We don’t know the timing of a potential Iranian retaliation, and it’s impossible to predict the scale with certainty. But a direct Iranian-led assault against Israel looks increasingly likely, and Israelis and their partners are preparing.”

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 21:20

  • National Guard Disputes Walz's Military Bio; CNN Calls Out 'Absolutely False' Claim Over Deployment
    National Guard Disputes Walz’s Military Bio; CNN Calls Out ‘Absolutely False’ Claim Over Deployment

    The Minnesota National Guard has disputed Governor Tim Walz’s military biography, saying that his claims of retiring at the rank of command sergeant major is untrue.

    Minnesota National Guard spox Army Lieutenant Colonel Kristen Augé told Just the News that Walz, Kamala Harris’ vice presidential running mate, was demoted and did not retire as a command sergeant major as he has claimed for years – including on his official gubernatorial biography – as he failed to complete a 750-hour course in the Army’s Sergeants Major Academy, a mandatory course for E-9s, the Army’s highest enlisted rank.

    While Walz temporarily held the title of command sergeant major he “retired as a master sergeant in 2005 for benefit purposes because he did not complete additional coursework at the U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy,” Army Lt. Col. Kristen Augé, the Minnesota National Guard’s State Public Affairs Officer, told Just the News.

    The statement reignited a controversy that began during his 2018 election for governor in which National Guardsman claimed on social media and in a paid ad that Walz declined to deploy to Iraq for combat duty in 2005 and forfeited his title of command sergeant major. Walz chose to run for Congress that year. -Just the News

    The governor’s biography, however, says that “Command Sergeant Major Walz” retired from the Minnesota National Guard in 2005. At the time he was serving as one of the highest ranking members of the 1-125th Field Artillery Battalion.

    “He retired as a master sergeant in 2005 for benefit purposes because he did not complete additional coursework at the U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy,” said Augé.

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    That said, an unnamed Guard spokesperson told Task & Purpose, in direct contradiction to Augé, that Walz’s demotion was a technicality.

    “Soldiers who do not finish the course revert back to their prior rank,” they told the outlet. “This is what we refer to as an administrative reduction and not punitive in nature.”

    The outlet also claims that the Guard ‘confirmed’ that Walz was properly promoted and served in the E-9 role, and “retired as” an E-9, despite the later reduction.

    That said, Task & Purpose also framed the entire stolen valor controversy as “The ‘Swift Boating’ of Tim Walz” – as if his on-record lies about ‘weapon of war, that I carried in war’ (he never saw war), are the same as disputed allegations over John Kerry’s (D) Vietnam war record.

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    On Wednesday we noted that Walz straight up lied about having been deployed in a combat zone.

    The lies were so egregious that even CNN acknowledged they were less than ideal.

    “Walz did make a comment speaking to a group, he’s done it a couple of times, where he has used language that has suggested that he carried weapons in a fighting situation,” said CNN correspondent Tom Foreman in a fact check. “As you know, with your contact with the military, I know from coming from a military family, there is a difference between being in a combat area, being involved at a time of war and actually being in a position where people are shooting at you. There is no evidence that at any time Governor Walz was in a position of being shot at, and some of his language could easily be seen to suggest that he was.”

    “So that is absolutely false when he said that about gun rights out there. The campaign has essentially come forward to say, ‘Look, he had a long career, he would never want to purposely mislead people about this.’ It’s what campaigns tend to say,” Foreman continued.

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    Meanwhile, in a 2006 press release issued by his campaign, Walz is described as a “veteran of Operation Enduring Freedom,” the US military operation in Afghanistan. As modernity.news notes, some have charged that this is misleading given that Walz was stationed in Italy at the time, with his battalion providing base security in Europe.

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    Walz has also come under fire from the men he served with, who they described in a 2019 letter as ‘Traitorous, fraudulent and shameful.’

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    Meanwhile, the Free Beacon reports that Walz knew his National Guard battalion was being eyed for a likely redeployment to Iraq when he decided to retire.

    “As Command Sergeant Major, I have a responsibility not only to ready my battalion for Iraq, but also to serve if called on,” Walz said in a campaign statement on March 20, 2005. Just three days prior, the National Guard Public Affairs Office announced that at least part of his battalion could be shipped overseas to the Middle East in the next two years.

    Walz left the National Guard that May. Two months later, his battalion was put on notice that they would be deploying to Iraq.

    When questioned about all of it, Walz decided to duck, cover, and run from a journalist before an explanation could be ‘deployed.’ 

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    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 21:01

  • Neuroscientists Blame Racism For Black Women Aging Faster
    Neuroscientists Blame Racism For Black Women Aging Faster

    Authored by Micaiah Bilger via The College Fix,

    Stress on the body caused by racism may cut African American women’s lives short, according to a recent study by neuroscientists at Harvard and Emory universities.

    Their research, published in the journal JAMA Network Open in June, found a connection between “higher self-reported racial discrimination” and “DNA methylation age acceleration” among black women.

    “Racism steals time from people’s lives – possibly because of the space it occupies in the mind,” lead researchers Negar Fani and Nathaniel Harnett wrote in an article this week at The Conversation.

    Fani is a professor at Emory and Harnett at Harvard, both in the areas of psychiatry and neuroscience. Both also receive funding from the National Institutes of Health, according to the article.

    “Aging is a natural process. However, stress can speed up the biological clock, making people more vulnerable to aging-related diseases, from cardiovascular disease to diabetes and dementia,” they wrote.

    In their study of 90 black women in the U.S., they found that those who reported being “more frequently exposed to racism showed stronger connections in brain networks involved with rumination and vigilance,” Fani and Harnett wrote.

    “We found that this, in turn, was connected to accelerated biological aging.”

    The scholars wrote:

    Racial discrimination is a ubiquitous stressor that often goes unnoticed. It might look like a doctor questioning a Black patient’s pain level and not prescribing pain medication, or a teacher calling a Black child a “thug.” It is a constant stressor faced by Black people starting at an early age.

    Rumination – reliving and analyzing an event on a loop – and vigilance, meaning being watchful for future threats, are possible coping responses to these stressors. But rumination and vigilance take energy, and this increased energy expenditure has a biological cost.

    Their study found changes in two different parts of the brain that were caused by stress linked to racial discrimination.

    “These brain changes, in turn, were linked to accelerated cellular aging measured by an epigenetic ‘clock,’” they wrote.

    According to their findings, these “higher clock values indicate that someone’s biological age is greater than their chronological age. In other words, the space that racist experiences occupy in people’s minds has a cost, which can shorten the lifespan.”

    Fani and Harnett said they plan to conduct more research on aging and racism in the future. Among other things, they said they want to explore “how different types of racial discrimination and coping styles influence brain and body responses.”

    As to the purpose of their research, Fani and Harnett said a greater understanding of the issue can lead to better therapeutic and prevention measures, including “programs that target implicit bias in physicians and teachers.”

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 20:55

  • US Hints At Regime Change In Tehran If Israel Is Attacked
    US Hints At Regime Change In Tehran If Israel Is Attacked

    The US is preparing to play Air Force for Israel’s skies as it deploys a dozen F-22 stealth raptor jets to the Middle East region. This change in ‘force posture’ was not debated in Congress (nor is it even really being debated on the mainstream networks), despite that clearly US service members could soon find themselves in the middle of a war between Iran and Israel.

    The White House has issued a fresh warning to Tehran on Thursday as it is said to still be gearing up for a strike on Israel in retaliation for the July 31st killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh at a residence in Tehran. The new warning from Washington includes both negative economic consequences and threats of destabilizing actions directed against the newly elected government of Masoud Pezeshkian.

    The attack on Tehran’s embassy compound in Damascus, Syria, on April 1, marked an unprecedented escalation. AFP/Getty Images

    “The United States has sent clear messaging to Iran that the risk of a major escalation if they do a significant retaliatory attack against Israel is extremely high,” a US admin official told The Wall Street Journal.

    The official further said that Tehran has been put on notice over “a serious risk of consequences for Iran’s economy and the stability of its newly elected government if it goes down that path.”

    Is this a threat of regime change? To the ears of Iranian officials, it will sure sound like it given the country on its eastern border and the country on its western border were both regime-changed by Washington.

    Currently, the consensus among US national security officials is that Hezbollah is likely to play a much bigger and coordinated role in any potential Iranian ballistic missile and drone attack on Israel:

    Officials also don’t know for sure whether Hezbollah plans to attack at the same time in a coordinated offensive with Iran or separately. Hezbollah has a large arsenal of missiles that can reach Israel and the concern is that the group and Iran might attack at the same time to try to overwhelm Israel’s missile defenses. 

    “Last time we got more of a heads up, and this time people are making their best guesses,” said a third U.S. official. 

    But while the US mainstream media narrative remains that it is exclusively Iran and its regional allies that are the regional ‘aggressors’ against Israel and the US, the fact remains that it is Israel which has attacked close Tehran ally Syria literally hundreds of times over the past years.

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    And more recently, Israel attacked the Iranian embassy in Damascus (the aftermath which is pictured above). Nation-states did not attack each other’s embassies even during World Wars I and II, and the strike on the diplomatic complex was unprecedented in history as an intentional act prior to Israel’s April 1st operation in the Syrian capital.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 20:30

  • "Progress" – NIH Brags About Using Tax Dollars To Fund More Research By Black Scholars
    “Progress” – NIH Brags About Using Tax Dollars To Fund More Research By Black Scholars

    Authored by Micaiah Bilger via The College Fix,

    Even as diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts draw increased scrutiny at the state level, a federal government agency is bragging about promoting DEI – and using Americans’ hard-earned tax dollars to do it.

    “Progress” is how National Institutes of Health diversity officer Marie Bernard recently described the agency’s work to fund more research by black scholars.

    But the massive amount of time and money the NIH is dedicating to DEI in higher education is anything but “progress” when the color of a person’s skin or their “gender identity” is weighed more heavily than their merit.

    Meanwhile, professionals are expressing concerns about DEI efforts leading to a lower caliber of students and recent graduates, including future doctors and military leaders.

    The NIH has been working since 2011 to close up what an agency-commissioned report described as a “gap” in funding to black researchers, Bernard wrote in a recent blog post on the NIH website.

    “Over the last 13 years since the release of the Ginther report, NIH has initiated numerous initiatives to foster diverse perspectives in science,” including a Diversity Program Consortium and institute-wide trainings “to foster diverse perspectives in science,” she wrote.

    Her own role as the chief officer for scientific workforce diversity also was created as a result of the report, Bernard wrote.

    While “gaps remain in funding rates by race and ethnicity for research project grants,” Bernard said the NIH is “encouraged by the overall trends.”

    But Bernard denied that the NIH is funding projects “based on demographic characteristics,” writing:

    “Clearly, to benefit from the full range of talent available within the United States and foster creativity and innovation in science, we need as broad a range of voices as possible. … NIH, of course, does not fund based on demographic characteristics, and those data are not available to reviewers during their deliberations. However, we will continue looking at the data retrospectively to determine whether we are achieving equity and evaluating our programs and policies to be assured that there are no barriers to everyone being at the table.”

    In the same article, however, she mentioned the NIH Faculty Institutional Recruitment for Sustainable Transformation initiative, which “target[s] early career faculty who have an interest and commitment to [diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility].”

    That initiative awarded more than $64 million to four universities earlier this year for the purpose of recruiting more “diverse” faculty. And it’s the third round of awards – meaning that is just a fraction of the total funding.

    For those wondering why identity politics and DEI have become such a big focus in higher education, consider the old adage “follow the money.”

    With the federal government continuing to pour hundreds of millions of dollars into such projects, it is little wonder these controversial ideas are getting so much attention.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 20:05

  • Value Of US Housing Hits Record $50 Trillion, Up 7% In Past Year, Just In Time For Fed Rate Cuts
    Value Of US Housing Hits Record $50 Trillion, Up 7% In Past Year, Just In Time For Fed Rate Cuts

    The Fed’s rate hikes were supposed to slow down the economy and, thanks to soaring interest rates, lower prices and make housing more affordable. That did not happen, and instead housing is now the least affordable it has been in US history.

    And while an entire generation of potential buyers will be forced to rent indefinitely, the flip side is that anyone who has been lucky enough to buy a house, is celebrating on a day real-estate brokerage Redfin reports that the total value of U.S homes gained $3.1 trillion over the past 12 months to reach a record $49.6 trillion.

    In percentage terms, the total value of the US housing market grew 6.6% year over year, laughing in the face of a Fed chair who kept on hiking rates in hopes of lowering prices. Zooming out further, the total value of U.S. homes has more than doubled in the past decade, climbing nearly 120% from $22.7 trillion in June 2014.

    “The value of America’s housing market will likely cross the $50 trillion threshold in the next 12 months as there are not enough homes being listed to push prices down,” said Redfin Economics Research Lead Chen Zhao. “Mortgage rates have started falling, but many potential sellers and buyers are waiting to make a move, meaning we are likely to continue seeing a pattern where prices slowly tick up. That’s great news for the millions of American homeowners who see their equity rising, but first-time buyers are going to keep finding it tough to find an affordable home.”

    That, of course, is an understatement: what Zhao meant is that for millions of Americans, the dream of owning a home is now gone for ever, because if they couldn’t afford to buy a house during the most aggressive rate hike cycle since Volcker, the coming rate cuts will certainly not make it easier.

    The number of metros where the total value of homes topped $1 trillion grew to eight—doubling from four a year ago—with Anaheim, CA, Chicago, Phoenix and Washington, DC, joining New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Boston in the trillion-dollar club. San Diego and Seattle look like they will join them in the next 12 months if home values keep increasing at a similar pace.

    It’s worth noting that while San Francisco’s aggregate home value is roughly $700 billion, when combined with neighbors Oakland, CA, and San Jose, CA, the combined Bay Area housing market is worth nearly $2.5 trillion. Likewise, the combined Dallas ($734 million) and Fort Worth, TX ($294 million) metro area also surpasses the $1 trillion mark.

    Rural home values outpaced those in urban areas and the suburbs, jumping 7% year over year to $7.8 trillion. The total value of homes in urban areas rose 6% to $10.3 trillion, while the value of homes in the suburbs cracked the $30 trillion mark for the first time, increasing 6.8% to $30.1 trillion.

    There are around 57 million homes in the suburbs, compared to 22 million in urban areas and 21 million in rural areas.

    Thirteen major metros posted double-digit percentage gains in total property value over the last year, led by relatively-affordable New Jersey metros within commuting distance of New York, where property is more expensive. The value of properties in New Brunswick, NJ rose 13.3% to $582.6 billion, while Newark, NJ climbed 13.2% to $406.2 billion. Anaheim, CA (up 12.1% to $1.1 trillion), Charleston, SC (up 11.8% to $188.9 billion) and New Haven, CT (up 11.8% to $91 billion) rounded out the five metros with the highest gains.

    Cape Coral, FL was the only metro to record a fall in total home value, dropping 1.6% to $204.2 billion. Sun Belt metros—especially those in Texas—grew slower than those in other regions, with New Orleans (up 0.8% to $128.2 billion), Austin, TX (up 1.9% to $392.8 billion), North Port, FL (up 2.1% to $251.8 billion) and Fort Worth, TX (up 2.3% to $293.7 billion) rounding out the bottom five metros.

    Broken down by age group, the total value of homes owned by millennials rose 21.5% year over year to $8.6 trillion in the first quarter of 2024—the most recent period for which generational data is available—nearly four times as fast as any other generation.

    The increase is partly due to the overall growth in home prices, but also because millennials are now the largest generation by population and have reached an age and financial position where they make up a larger share of the homebuying market. Around two-thirds of the mortgages taken out in 2023 were issued to homebuyers under the age of 45.

    Meanwhile, the total value of homes owned by the Silent Generation fell for the fifth straight quarter, dropping 1.6% to $4.6 trillion. The value of homes owned by baby boomers increased 6.1% to $19 trillion, while Gen X home values rose 5.9% to $13.6 trillion.

    Finally, Asians once again made the best decisions, and after falling in 2022-2023, the total value of homes in neighborhoods that are majority Asian bounced back over the past 12 months, rising 9% to $1.4 trillion. The increased value is being caused by price growth in West Coast cities—where many Asian neighborhoods are located.  In comparison, majority white neighborhoods experienced a 6.6% increase in value to $39.4 trillion, while majority Black neighborhoods saw a 5.4% increase in value to $1.4 trillion. The value of homes in majority Hispanic neighborhoods increased 6.4% to $2 trillion.

    More in the full report available here.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 19:40

  • How Chinese Traders & Miners Got Around China's Crypto Ban
    How Chinese Traders & Miners Got Around China’s Crypto Ban

    Authored by Yohan Yun via CoinTelegraph.com,

    Chinese investors are finding innovative ways to tap into the digital assets markets and participate in some of the year’s most profitable trends despite Beijing’s ban on cryptocurrency trading.

    The government has banned crypto amid a blaze of publicity numerous times, including a 2013 ban on banks dealing in crypto, a 2017 ban on initial coin offerings and exchanges, followed by a trading and mining ban in 2021.

    Despite this, accessing cryptocurrencies in the mainland isn’t that difficult, pseudonymous investor Lowell tells Magazine.

    Lowell is a recent university graduate who describes herself as a full-time cryptocurrency trader. She had the option to pursue a career in her field of study but says that a “normal” job cannot match the profits she can make with crypto.

    China’s cryptocurrency bans aren’t always crystal clear or effective. Though crypto trading and businesses are prohibited, there are channels for investors to partake in the global market.

    Local traders say they buy and sell their cryptocurrencies to other investors via peer-to-peer trading on centralized exchanges like OKX and Binance. While China’s Great Firewall prohibits access, savvy users with VPNs can access the websites and apps they need.

    Investors also seek lucrative opportunities in borderless DeFi, like using bots or hiring students to farm airdrops which has become a quasi-industry for some.

    Crypto isn’t totally illegal in China

    As it happens, crypto tokens are not themselves illegal in China, Robin Hui Huang, a law professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong tells Magazine. Exchanging them also falls into a gray area.

    “People can hold cryptos in China. They can also exchange cryptos for other properties, but such exchanges are not protected by law, that is, if the other party breaches the contract, no legal protection is available.”

    While the law does not protect these transactions, it also does not ban them. Therefore, private individuals can exchange cryptocurrencies for other properties if they mutually agree to do so and fulfill their commitments, Huang adds.

    Rumors of China’s crypto ban reversal. (Mike Novogratz)

    Outside the mainland, rumors are circulating, fueled by key opinion leaders in the cryptocurrency community including Galaxy Digital’s billionaire founder Mike Novogratz, suggest that Beijing may be contemplating a reversal of its crypto ban. 

    However, experts tell Magazine that the likelihood of this rumor being true is quite low.

    They point to recent developments concerning China’s central bank digital currency, the digital yuan, which were highlighted during the Third Plenum of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, chaired by President Xi Jinping.

    China mining ban fails to ban mining

    Although China’s Bitcoin mining ban was widely reported by pretty much every major media outlet in 2021, it has conspicuously failed to prevent mining in the country.

    According to Bitcoin ESG researcher Daniel Batten, that’s because the ban was misreported as being harsher than it actually was. He argues that closer analysis of the wording of the ban suggests the legislation actually prohibited the establishment of new mines and merely contained a “statement of intent” that mining should be gradually eliminated due to electricity use, climate targets and the association with money laundering.

    Precise figures aren’t that easy to come by, and many appear to be out of date, but most estimates suggest China still accounts for at least a fifth of the global hashrate.

    According to the University of Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance, and World Population Review figures, China accounts for around 21.1% of the total, while CryptoQuant founder Ki Young Ju released a chart in July showing Chinese mining pools account for 54% of the global hashrate. Not all miners in a pool are located in China, he noted, but added “Some mining farms might still be operating covertly in China, with authorities possibly concealing data.”

    CryptoQuant data suggest Chinese mining pools are in control of more than half of the global hashrate. (Ki Young Ju)

    VPNs and trading apps make crypto available in China

    Crypto users in China are aware of the trading bans of course, they just find creative ways to get around them without attracting the attention of authorities. 

    “Most crypto traders in China, we don’t talk about these things because we know that China is like that,” Lowell says.

    Today, P2P trading channels are available on social media or crypto exchanges enabling users to buy crypto with the Chinese yuan via bank transfers, WeChat Pay or Alipay — two of the nation’s top payment rails.

    OKX and Binance are two of the most popular in Lowell’s network, though she personally prefers the former. As you can see in the picture below, Binance offers yuan P2P sales in the China region. The two exchanges did not respond to Magazine’s request for comment.

    Users have the option to select the Chinese yuan currency and the Chinese region in Binance’s P2P market. (Binance)

    “I can access these two apps. I use an iPhone and I can download these two apps on the Hong Kong store or other country stores,” says Lowell, adding that the apps are not available on Apple’s mainland App Store.

    Access to apps in China is governed by a more restrictive internet environment compared to what users outside the country experience. This system, known as the “Great Firewall,” blocks access to popular domains like Google and Facebook, among many others.
    Magazine requested a source in mainland China to test access to cryptocurrency exchanges. The test confirmed that users cannot access Binance and OKX websites without using VPNs. The mobile applications for these exchanges are accessible without VPNs.

    Some projects like MakerDAO prohibit users from accessing the protocol with VPNs, but that’s mainly out of fear of getting sued by US regulators rather than Chinese ones.

    VPN searches in China over time. (Google Trends)

    Wayne Zhao was formerly the CEO of Beijing-based analytics firm TokenInsight, who relocated to Singapore to start his DeFi project BitU. He says that using a VPN is almost second nature to mainland internet users. 

    “VPN is common sense for people if you want to visit Google or YouTube,” Zhao says. The same applies to DeFi platforms.

    For platforms, providing users P2P access is a “gray area” that risks regulators coming down on the overseas exchanges and their executives, Joshua Chu, co-chair of the Hong Kong Web3 association tells Magazine.

    “That could lead to a lot of legal costs even if they don’t always lead to prosecution, especially once they enter China,” says Chu, pointing to the recent detention of a Binance executive in Nigeria as an example.

    Airdrop farming in China

    Chinese crypto trades are restricted to P2P options, but that’s not the only way to get a hold of tokens.

    Lowell has profited handsomely from airdrops, including $50,000 from Ethena’s ENA campaign and $40,000 from StarkNet.

    According to at least three local sources, airdrop farming in China has scaled up to an industrial level.

    Similar to how Bitcoin mining was once accessible to private individuals using laptops in their bedrooms, but eventually grew into a profitable enterprise with businesses investing in professional equipment and filling warehouses, airdrop farmers are now investing in advanced technology and equipment to maximize their profitability.

    China once led the industry in crypto value received before the 2021 ban. (Chainalysis)

    Zhao attributes the rise of airdrops to the move-to-earn era during the pandemic, popularized by StepN, a Solana-based project that rewards users with its GST tokens for moving.

    “When people started to find out that you can actually earn money with your cell phone, it’s quite natural to think that you can do it with hundreds of cell phones at the same time, Zhao tells Magazine. 

    Airdrop farmers automate transactions with bots on up-and-coming protocols believed to be planning a future airdrop, or even manually log them with multiple devices.

    Protocols are aware of users deploying bots to automate transactions to farm their airdrops, and take measures to limit them.

    But airdrop farmers are taking creative routes to bypass the blockers. Some Chinese airdrop farmers even hire students to conduct transactions to replicate organic onchain behaviors.

    “My friend earned a lot more than me in airdrops because they hired some college students to do transactions for them,” Lowell says.

    “I had about 30 or 40 accounts but they have like 200 accounts,” she says.

    Crypto traders and businesses still exist, but there’s always a risk

    Crypto businesses can receive closure notices at any given moment and they have no legal grounds to resist. (Tim Mossholder/Unsplash)

    Any crypto business in China always carries the risk of sudden shutdown notices.

    “It happened before with a very good friend of mine,” Zhao says.

    “They just got a notice that said, ‘Sorry guys, you cannot do this anymore. You have to shut it down,’ and that was it. A few days later, they shut it down.”

    P2P traders face risks as there is no trusted intermediary. 

    They are buying cryptocurrencies directly from strangers, often without knowledge of the assets’ origins. This poses the risk of unknowingly participating in money laundering or being deemed guilty by association with other illegal activities.

    Due to such risks, Lowell says she prefers dealing with personal acquaintances, though this option is limited.

    “When I’m selling to my friends, I know they won’t do some illegal things and I won’t be arrested,” she says.

    “So I’m willing to sell my USDT to people I know but they may not always have that much money so I also need to use exchanges.”

    CBDC plans put paid to crypto ban reversal rumors

    Winston Ma, an adjunct law professor at New York University, tells Magazine that it is unlikely that Beijing will reverse its crypto ban as it wants to go all in on a CBDC.

    In July, Beijing held its third plenary session, a meeting of senior Communist Party officials. The meeting resolved to promote RMB internationally with a particular focus on the digital yuan, state-backed media Xinhua News Agency reported.

    China considers its CBDC as the sole legal digital tender, rendering all other digital currencies, including Bitcoin, illegal for use as payment.

    China’s retail digital yuan is in its pilot phase and it’s among the most advanced in major economies. (Atlantic Council)

    “You can expect the central bank to now move at full speed because it’s coming from the Central Committee. You cannot get more authoritative than that,” Ma says.

    Ma says the renewed momentum for China’s CBDC points to the “complete opposite” direction of a crypto ban reversal.

    “You can expect the central bank to now move at full speed because it’s coming from the Central Committee. You cannot get more authoritative than that,” Ma says.

    Ma says the renewed momentum for China’s CBDC points to the “complete opposite” direction of a crypto ban reversal.

    Local traders have all they need

    Zhao of BitU believes that while trading continues, the demand for crypto in China is low at present, and points to the trading performance of Hong Kong’s newly launched crypto exchange-traded funds (ETFs).

    Chinese nationals are banned from accessing the ETFs unless they have a temporary or permanent residency permit.

    “We all saw what happened to the Hong Kong ETF. The trading volume, it sucks,” Zhao says.

    “The reason is that most of the people in mainland China or Hong Kong who are willing to buy Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies have already done it.”

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 19:15

  • Israel Attacks Airbase In Central Syria Known To House Russian Troops
    Israel Attacks Airbase In Central Syria Known To House Russian Troops

    Following late night explosions being reported in the central Syrian region of Homs, state media SANA has subsequently confirmed that an Israeli airstrike has wounded at least four soldiers and caused “material losses” at the Shayrat Airbase.

    The Israeli attack came from the direction of northern Lebanon. It has become common for Israeli jets to use undefended Lebanese airspace from which to attack targets inside Syria. Images showing a series of large explosions have circulated on social media.

    Unverified social media image said to show Thursday night attack in central Syria.

    Shayrat Airbase has long been well-known also as a base of Russian troop operations over several years. It remains unknown if Russians were present at the base when it was struck late Thursday night. Some Israeli sources have said ammo storage depots were hit, or else ‘Iranian assets’ were targeted – as is the usual refrain after such operations.

    The airfield is the same base bombed by then President Trump in April of 2017:

    The US launched 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles from its warships in the eastern Mediterranean early Friday, taking aim at the Syrian airbase it believes houses the aircraft that carried out the attack.

    But it’s not just Syria that uses the Shayrat airfield – Russia, its key ally, has forces based there too.

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

    Elsewhere in Syria, pro-Damascus Arab tribes in the east are seeking to drive out American occupying forces in the vicinity of Syria’s oil and gas sites.

    Turkish media reported at least nine separate clashes between Syrian Arab militants and US-backed Kurdish groups. “A warplane belonging to the international coalition led by the US made a low flight above the Deir ez-Zor countryside,” Anadolu Agency said. One regional report has said the Syrian national army is involved in the fighting:

    Syrian army troops shelled positions of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) on Thursday, responding to attacks from the Kurdish militia on its territory in the countryside of the eastern governorate of Deir Ezzor. 

    The Syrian Arab Army (SAA) shelled SDF positions in Al-Busayrah city and the towns of Al-Sabha, Bariha, Jadid Bakara, and Al-Dahla in Deir Ezzor’s eastern countryside, Al Mayadeen reported on Thursday. 

    The SDF’s media center announced on August 8 that its militants targeted the Syrian army and allied forces in the Al-Zubari and Sa’lu villages of the Deir Ezzor countryside with artillery and mortar shells. 

    Beirut-based The Cradle additionally reports that “A coalition of Syrian Arab tribes, dubbed the Army of Tribes, seized several towns from the SDF in the countryside of eastern Syria’s Deir Ezzor governorate on 7 August.”

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

    In the evening hours of Thursday there have been unconfirmed reports of a fresh attack against American forces located at the Rumalyn Landing Zone in Northeastern Syria.

    All of this is happening against the backdrop of continued fierce fighting between Hezbollah and Israel in southern Lebanon, a situation which threatens to escalate further…

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

    Very likely, the Syria situation will continue to unravel rapidly in the event of a major clash between Israel and Iran (and its proxies). Some 1,000 US troops (and likely many more contractors) continue to occupy northeast Syria, and we could be witnessing the beginning of the end of the Pentagon’s occupation of sovereign Syrian territory.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 18:50

  • Why Did Kamala Snub The Obvious VP Choice In Josh Shapiro
    Why Did Kamala Snub The Obvious VP Choice In Josh Shapiro

    Submitted by QTR’s Fringe Finance

    It was just a couple of days ago that I wrote an article labeling Kamala Harris “The Next Worst Thing” to Joe Biden, and suggesting that her ascent to the top of the Democratic Party was another tried and true product of a guarantee I call “politicians always make the worst decisions possible.”

    My theory was given a serious shot in the arm this week when Kamala Harris announced Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her vice-presidential candidate.

    As somebody who thinks the country would implode into itself like a dying star if Harris won the election, I was extraordinarily relieved to see her pick.

    I was all but certain that Harris was going to pick Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro as her running mate. Everything about the pick made sense: he was racially her foil, he was younger, a well-spoken candidate, he was viewed as more of a moderate, he has great support in the extraordinarily crucial swinging state of Pennsylvania, and he could help the Democratic Party claw back some of the Jewish vote that they’ve (deservedly) lost over the last year while their far left fringe, including ‘the squad’, has all but openly supported Hamas.

    The Shapiro pick made so much sense and, in my opinion, guaranteed the election for Harris so much, that I thought it would even break through the dumb-ass-politician-blood-brain barrier and be the inevitable selection.

    But instead, nope! We get Tim Walz. The party who claims to hate old milquetoast white men, instead selected an even further left old milquetoast white man. What a time to be alive!

    Without going into the worst points about Walz, not the least of which is he oversaw the destruction of his own state during the George Floyd riots of 2020, the pick is so conservative strategically, it just might fail. It reminds me of when Hillary Clinton picked Tim Kaine as her running mate.

    It was as if, all of a sudden, millions of voices cried out in terror…

    Tim Walz is a pick that you make when you are far ahead in the polls and literally have nothing to worry about. He’s an NFL prevent defense that should only be run when you are multiple touchdowns ahead and the clock has less than 20 seconds on it.

    Walz is a declaration that the Democrats do not think they, in any way, need to be aggressive in order to earn your vote…as if Kamala Harris not holding a press conference since becoming the presidential nominee hasn’t told you that already.

    I also have an unfounded and unproven theory on how Walz became Harris’s running mate.

    If you remember, on Friday, Philadelphia mayor Cherelle Parker, or a staffer of hers, accidentally tweeted out a pre-made and clearly pre-planned congratulatory message on Josh Shapiro being picked as Kamala’s vice president. The pre-planned nature of it made it clear that the leak was a legitimate accident and the pick was likely legitimate.

    On the 2nd, PBS reported on the leak:

    Everybody, including myself, braced for what I thought would be the inevitable this week: Josh Shapiro would become Kamala Harris’s running mate.

    But then there were scattered reports this weekend that Harris was still doing some last-minute vetting. On the 3rd, the next day, this article hit the wires:

    Now we know, at some point, assuming the Shapiro pick was legitimate, Harris changed her mind. Could it have possibly been that after the leak on Friday, members of the progressive base and Democratic voters lashed out at Harris for picking a Jewish running mate?

    After all, there were widespread reports last week of whitewashing Josh Shapiro’s Wikipedia page and attempts to try and cover up his past support for Israel.

    In Walz, did the Democratic Party choose to abandon its Jewish base and side with activists and supporters of Palestine?

    One way to make that statement would be to pick the man who oversaw the looting and riots of 2020, that’s for sure.

    Either way, the sugar high of Harris becoming the nominee is going to soon start to run out, and it’s difficult for me to see how the Democratic base is going to get any sort of additional dopamine hit from her vice-presidential selection.

    In fact, I think this pick will force the onus to be aggressive to shift back to Harris and the momentum back to the Trump campaign. Everybody knows there was a fair amount of second-guessing regarding Trump’s vice-presidential pick. Shapiro likely could have given Vance a run for his money in attracting moderates and debating. But Walz is just the opposite: my guess is that to people in the center, Vance now looks more like the moderate and, in general, the candidate who has their sh*t together the most.

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    I like that the Trump campaign isn’t giving in to having a debate on ABC. I don’t think anybody on either side of the aisle thinks that Trump is afraid to debate Kamala Harris, no matter how many times she repeats it. The Democratic Party got absolutely everything they wanted for the first debate with Joe Biden: they got their favorite network, they got their favorite anchors, and they got rules, including microphone control and no audience, that obviously favored President Biden. And they still got their ass kicked. Now, like an NBA playoff series, the Trump campaign is owed a match on their home territory.

    As many said this week, if Harris can’t handle a debate on Fox News, how in God’s name is she going to negotiate with world leaders like Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping?

    I said it earlier this year and I will say it again: the Eagles and Doug Pederson won the Super Bowl against Tom Brady and the New England Patriots by being aggressive.

    The Democratic Party right now is the Tom Brady dynasty New England Patriots. They deflate the balls before the game, you wouldn’t be surprised to find out they cheat, and they have an incredible winning record over the last 10 years. This move by the Harris campaign is taking a victory lap way too soon, and if Trump dials up his aggressiveness from this point forward, including directly addressing Walz’s record repeatedly on immigration, law and order, and socialism in general, the Republicans can take the momentum back quicker than I would’ve ever guessed they would have had a chance to.

    And if you’re Kamala Harris, news flash: you are out of cheap gimmicks to attract attention. It’s time to debate, it’s time to hold press conferences, and it’s time to see how excited all-important independent voters get when she is put to explaining the substance behind her policy positions.

    Now read:

    QTR’s Disclaimer: Please read my full legal disclaimer on my About page here. This post represents my opinions only. In addition, please understand I am an idiot and often get things wrong and lose money. I may own or transact in any names mentioned in this piece at any time without warning. Contributor posts and aggregated posts have been hand selected by me, have not been fact checked and are the opinions of their authors. They are either submitted to QTR by their author, reprinted under a Creative Commons license with my best effort to uphold what the license asks, or with the permission of the author. This is not a recommendation to buy or sell any stocks or securities, just my opinions. I often lose money on positions I trade/invest in. I may add any name mentioned in this article and sell any name mentioned in this piece at any time, without further warning. None of this is a solicitation to buy or sell securities. I may or may not own names I write about and are watching. Sometimes I’m bullish without owning things, sometimes I’m bearish and do own things. Just assume my positions could be exactly the opposite of what you think they are just in case. All positions can change immediately as soon as I publish this, with or without notice and at any point I can be long, short or neutral on any position. You are on your own. Do not make decisions based on my blog. I exist on the fringe. The publisher does not guarantee the accuracy or completeness of the information provided in this page. These are not the opinions of any of my employers, partners, or associates. I did my best to be honest about my disclosures but can’t guarantee I am right; I write these posts after a couple beers sometimes. I edit after my posts are published because I’m impatient and lazy, so if you see a typo, check back in a half hour. Also, I just straight up get shit wrong a lot. I mention it twice because it’s that important.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 18:25

  • 50 Years On… The Bait-And-Switch Behind Post-Watergate "Reforms"
    50 Years On… The Bait-And-Switch Behind Post-Watergate “Reforms”

    Authored by Stephen Anderson via The Mises Institute,

    Today is the fiftieth anniversary of the resignation of President Richard Nixon, who later was pardoned of all Watergate crimes by President Gerald Ford. The Watergate break-in occurred at the Democratic National Committee headquarters office in June 1972 at the Watergate building in Washington, DC, during a presidential election year. The Nixon Administration exerted great effort to conceal its involvement in the break-in. The United States Department of Justice and press reporters (Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward) found five people involved in the break-in received thousands of dollars of hush money from the Committee to Reelect the President, which was the fundraising organization of President Nixon’s reelection campaign.

    Many of Nixon’s administration staff were convicted of federal crimes, leading to their being sentenced to federal prison from the Watergate scandal. President Nixon used presidential powers to obstruct the Watergate investigation which pundits claim led to greater public cynicism and distrust of the federal government. The response of Washington’s political elites, naturally, was to further expand centralized power.

    Members of Congress claimed that Watergate evils came from the misuse of presidential campaign donations used in the break-in cover-up. One “solution” to solve these election finance evils and rein in presidential power excesses was to expand federal power through legislation into federal election finances.

    One post-Watergate legacy was the passage of new federal election finance laws and the creation of a new agency to enforce, finance, record, and regulate them. This law was passed by Congress in 1974, creating the Federal Election Commission (FEC). One FEC function is to dole out federal taxpayer money to congressional, senatorial, and presidential election campaigns, which incentivizes federal election control.

    These new laws required candidates, political parties, and political action committees that were raising and spending money in federal elections to file periodic campaign finance reports subject to FEC audit and enforcement. When a campaign chose to receive federal tax dollars for their federal election campaign, one requirement was accepting campaign contribution limits from nonfederal sources and hold to campaign spending limits.

    Mises Institute executive editor Ryan McMaken, in a Mises Wire article in October 2016 entitled “Decentralize the Elections,” described the history of states administering elections for federal offices and the methodical takeover of elections by the federal government over time. Presidential candidates began receiving federal funds for their campaigns from the 1971 campaign finance law, and funds distribution expanded in 1974.

    The stated intent of federal taxpayer financing for presidential campaigns was to level the candidates’ playing field and remove the major party nominees’ need to seek political contributions during the general election. Taxpayer funding and the increased campaign fundraising demand included Congressional candidates. Expanded federal funding allowed more presidential candidates to run and extended the campaign season, with increased fundraising pressures on each candidate. Major party nominees spend much of their time today raising campaign cash for their parties, despite the fact that the alleged reason for government campaign funding was to eliminate the need for such fundraising.

    The federal government’s campaign-funding intervention resulted in a presidential candidate’s campaign depending on federal taxpayer dollars to function. This long-term federal intervention has led to higher campaign costs with candidates chasing money.

    The FEC board is composed of six members, with three affiliations each from the Democratic Party and the Republican Party. Each member is nominated by the president and confirmed by a Senate majority for staggered six-year terms. A presidential campaign contributor can be nominated by the president to the FEC board as a favor for past sizable campaign contributions.

    The board needs four sitting members for a quorum to conduct agency business. FEC board functionality in the twenty-first century is partisan with each side pointing fingers at each other on alleged federal campaign financial wrongdoing. Sometimes the board only had three sitting members, so a quorum was not attained, and agency decisions halted. Some members remained after completing their six-year term when no nominee was confirmed to replace them.

    For all the lessons supposedly learned from the Watergate scandal, the only real lesson is that so-called reform in Washington is little more than bait-and-switch. While Congress passed a number of post-Watergate laws that supposedly reined in what progressives were calling Nixon’s so-called imperial presidency along with its phantom campaign funding, the power of the executive branch has grown exponentially in the past five decades, and campaign spending has grown with it.

    No doubt, the usual suspects in the media will be praising the Watergate reforms and claim that Congress rescued the nation from Richard Nixon’s lawlessness and set the country on the right path again. The truth is that whatever executive power Nixon abused probably would seem trivial when compared to what happens regularly today in the White House.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 17:40

  • Hezbollah-Aligned Newspaper Urges Rockets On Tel Aviv
    Hezbollah-Aligned Newspaper Urges Rockets On Tel Aviv

    Israel has informed Washington that if Hezbollah harms more civilians in a retaliation campaign for the assassination of its top military commander Fuad Shukr last week, Israel’s military will have no choice but to launch a disproportionate response.

    “In the internal discussions with the U.S., Israel stressed that the cost of another Hezbollah mishap would be heavy and that Hezbollah would pay a disproportionate price if it harmed civilians as part of its retaliation,” a senior Israeli official told Axios.

    Getty Images

    The report continues, “Two Israeli officials said that in recent days Israel told the U.S. via several military channels that it is concerned Hezbollah could hit civilian population centers if it tries to target military bases in central Israel.”

    Last month 12 children were killed in the occupied Golan Heights town of Majdal Shams during a Hezbollah rocket attack. Israeli officials believe the rocket was intended to hit a nearby IDF military base, while Hezbollah leadership has claimed an errant Israeli anti-air missile struck the soccer field where civilians died.

    Meanwhile, Hezbollah has since the killing of Shukr in Beirut declared that its strikes will hit targets deeper inside Israel.

    On Tuesday, the Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar – widely seen as sympathetic to Hezbollah – wrote that Hezbollah could decide to hit Tel Aviv, which would mark a new major escalation, likely leading to all-out war.

    “If Hezbollah can choose targets, it is possible that it will target Tel Aviv and civilians might be harmed on the margins. The effective thing will be to hit a significant center of the organization that made the decision about the assassination and took part in it,” the Al-Akhbar op-ed said. This too has been seen as a severe warning conveyed indirectly via Lebanese media.

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    Axios cites Israeli officials who “interpreted the article as saying the target for Hezbollah’s response could be the IDF headquarters in the center of Tel Aviv or the Mossad headquarters and other key intelligence bases in northern Tel Aviv.” They conclude: “The bases are all close to civilian neighborhoods and if a rocket were to miss them, it would likely harm civilians.”

    In a fresh speech, Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah stated, “The fact that Israel is waiting for the response for a week is part of the punishment because it is also a psychological war that influences morale.” At the same time, Iran is expected to launch an attack on Israel following the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh which occurred in Tehran. But nothing has happened and some observers believe that Iran’s leadership is being talked down amid a global diplomatic press.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 17:20

  • LA County To Extend Guaranteed-Income Plan To 2,000 Foster Dependents
    LA County To Extend Guaranteed-Income Plan To 2,000 Foster Dependents

    Via City News Service,

    The Board of Supervisors voted Aug. 6 to expand its “Breathe” guaranteed-income program to provide financial stipends to more than 2,000 non-minor dependents in the foster care system.

    Holly Mitchell, a member of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, speaks to the media in Los Angeles on April 1, 2021. (Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images)

    In addition to the stipends, the foster dependents will also have access to career and education counseling, financial empowerment training, housing and other programs as recommended by the Department of Consumer and Business Affairs’ Center for Financial Empowerment.

    The Breathe guaranteed income program began as a pilot project in March 2022, providing monthly $1,000 payments to 1,000 in-need residents.

    Last year, the board agreed to expand the program to include 200 former foster care youth adjusting to life outside the system.

    “While Breathe’s initial expansion supports 200 former foster youth, the continued support of transitioning foster youth can provide essential financial stability during such a critical and pivotal time in their lives where data has demonstrated the risks youth exiting care face, including homelessness to justice system involvement,” according to a motion by Supervisor Holly Mitchell.

    According to the motion, funding to expand the program is available through the state’s Flexible Family Support funding. The FFS funding requires that recipients use the money for specific purposes, defined as “extracurricular and enrichment activities that are designed to enhance the foster child or non-minor dependant’s skills, abilities, self-esteem, relationships, and overall well-being and healing.’’

    Noting that L.A. County is home to the largest population of youth living in foster care, Mitchell on Tuesday called guaranteed income a “powerful and effective way to truly disrupt poverty.’’

    Supervisor Lindsey Horvath also spoke out in favor of the idea, saying foster youth often have the worst outcomes when transitioning out of the system, including homelessness, dropping out of schools, poor health and poverty.

    “By offering financial support combined with career and education counseling, financial literacy, housing and benefit access support, we‘ll begin to provide stable transition out of care,’’ Horvath said.

    The expansion will provide support to two groups of people in the foster system between ages 18 and 21:

    — The first group will be 1,000 people aged 18 and 19, providing them $500 monthly stipends for 18 months, along with access to career and education counseling, financial empowerment training, and other supportive services.

    — The second group will be 1,000 individuals between ages 19 and 21 who are likely to age out of foster care during the 18-month program, providing them with $1,500 quarterly stipends, with the final payment provided in the quarter in which the person turns 21. They would also be provided access to counseling and other supportive services.

    To enact the expansion, the board approved through the motion a $4 million increase to a contract with Strength Based Community Change— the program administrator– which will also evaluate the program’s impact and how recipients are using the funds.

    It also backed a roughly $15 million expansion in the contract with MoCaFi, which distributes the debit cards used in the program and also distributes the stipends to those cards, to cover the costs of the payments.

    Tyler Durden
    Thu, 08/08/2024 – 17:00

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