DON'T ASK! I DON'T HAVE A CRYSTAL BALL...

The Republican House Caucus is in disarray.

Once again, eight so-called conservative Republicans joined the radical progressive communist democrats to oust the Speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy, over poorly articulated grievances. To be sure, a deal with the devil. 

These are the same eight individuals who killed one of the most conservative spending bills ever offered in Congress., one that contained significant spending cuts and necessary border security.

The proposed bill had little or no chance of passing into law as it was designed to be used as leverage against Senate Republicans to force a more palatable bill. Faced with a potential government shutdown, McCarthy played his only card, a clean continuing resolution that omitted border security and Ukraine spending.

Now passed into law, the egregious eight joined with the progressive communist democrats to successfully oust McCarthy and kill the most ambitious spending cuts in history.

Here are the House Republicans who voted to oust McCarthy:

• Andy Biggs of Arizona
• Ken Buck of Colorado
• Tim Burchett of Tennessee
• Eli Crane of Arizona
• Matt Gaetz of Florida
• Bob Good of Virginia
• Nancy Mace of South Carolina
• Matt Rosendale of Montana

Bottom line...

I am unsure of the consequences of what Matt Gaetz and his band of malcontents have wrought. But it looks like the Republicans have, once again, snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

It remains to be seen what the next Speaker will do with the ongoing investigations and the impeachment of Joe Biden and other high-ranking officials.  Any failure to achieve control over our borders, significant spending cuts, and procedural reforms is now on the shoulders of the egotistic eight.

We are so screwed 

-- Steve

WHY CALIFORNIA IS LOST

Last night, after hearing that California Governor Gavin Newsom promoted color and sexual orientation over competence by nominating a pro-abortion, black, female, lesbian, communist, labor activist to fill the unexpired term of deceased Senator Dianne Feinstein. I started wondering if California, as well as the rest of the nation, was doomed.

Who are those willing to push back?

Not the elitists, for they are insulated from the consequences of their absurd or corrupt actions by their wealth, position, power, and politics. They are at the top and will do everything in their power to stay at the top.

Not the poor, for they are the recipients of the state’s benevolence and entitlements. There are few incentives to change the way of life they have come to expect and, in the case of illegal aliens, may be vastly superior to the life they may have left behind.

How about the middle-class traditionalists?

And therein lies the problem. The bifurcated middle-class swing vote refuses to take action because they appear to be coping with life’s necessities and are still relatively comfortable – believing that tomorrow will be much like life today. They are propping up and perpetuating corruption and tyranny by not pushing back or allowing the system to fail.

Consider the political inertia of the middle class.

My political science instructor, a leftist of the first order, claimed that the liberals needed to target the middle class, which serves as the backbone of our nation and represents its core values, stability, progress, and future aspirations.

However, in recent years, we have witnessed the inertia of the middle class, trapping America in a cycle of stagnation and decay.

Despite working hard and having relatively stable jobs, many families find it challenging to make significant financial progress due to stagnant wages in the face of rising inflation-driven living costs.

Their assets, property, and savings are dwindling rapidly as they are burdened with debt, primarily through prolonged repayment periods on student loans, mortgages, and credit card debt. Rising healthcare and education costs are increasingly significant for the middle class, leading to additional financial strain.

And it’s getting worse as technological advancements in artificial intelligence and automation transform the job market, increasing job insecurity, especially for mid-skilled workers. 

Is there an answer?

As far as I can tell, unless there is a “black swan” event to motivate the middle class, we will continue to drift downward through layers of mediocrity until we reach tyrannical authoritarianism. At that time, our nation will be lost.

Ask yourself, is it bad enough yet?

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

WHY GAVIN NEWSOM SHOULD NOT BE PRESIDENT

As expected, California's progressive communist democrat Governor Gavin Newsom chose color, sex, and ideology over competence in nominating a replacement for deceased Senator Dianne Feinstein.

CHECKING ALL THE BOXES...

The only box not checked: Laphonza Romanique Butler is not a lawyer!

OOPS! Butler is not even a California resident -- she lives and is registered to vote in Maryland. So much for being represented by a fellow resident of, you know, California.

How corrupt?

Former president of SEIU Local 2015 and current president of EMILY's List, a pro-abortion political action committee dedicated to electing pro-abortion democrats to office.

For those that don't know, EMILY is an acronym standing for  "Early Money Is Like Yeast." As the group's founder further commented, like yeast, it makes the dough rise."

Now we know what Gavin Newsom is all about kissing progressive communist democrat ass!

We are so screwed.

Steve

GAVIN NEWSOM: WANTING TO FUCK OVER AMERICA

 

THE CLINTON FOUNDATION: BUILD BACK BETTER

There was never any doubt in my cynical mind that the Clinton Foundation was a personal enrichment scheme, a convenient vehicle to launder foreign money bribes, and a place to park Clinton operatives between government appointments and political campaigns.

One of the most widely publicized controversies related to the Clinton Foundation involved donations made by foreign governments and individuals while Hillary Clinton was serving as Secretary of State during the Obama administration, raising significant concerns about potential conflicts of interest, suggesting that these donations influenced U.S. foreign policy decisions or the actions of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), which approved the Uranium One deal.

For those with short memories, the 2010 Uranium One deal involved the sale of Uranium One, a Canadian mining company with uranium interests in the United States, to Rosatom, the Russian state nuclear energy corporation. The deal required approval from several U.S. government agencies, including the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), because it involved the transfer of control over uranium mining operations in the U.S. to a foreign entity, Rosatom. It was revealed that some individuals associated with Uranium One, including its chairman, had donated heavily to the Clinton Foundation. Donations were said to total $145 million.

Of course, no action was taken against the Clintons since Obama’s Department of Justice and FBI were heavily compromised. Ever wonder why those 30,000+ emails were destroyed if they only contained "personal" information and Chelsea's wedding plans?

So, I am unsurprised that the Clinton Foundation is dipping its beak in the billions of untraceable government dollars flowing to Ukraine with no oversight or accountability.

Clinton Global Initiative plans to announce the launch of the CGI Ukraine Action Network, as well as numerous financial pledges, to support nonprofits working in the country. The Clinton Global Initiative Ukraine Action Network is the result of a collaboration between Hillary Clinton and Olena Zelenska, first lady of Ukraine, that began last year. The new organization, which will be formally announced Tuesday, is designed to mobilize existing CGI partners, as well as new leaders from around the world, to create and finance new commitments for Ukrainians, according to CGI. <Source: Associated Press>

It's funny how the same names keep appearing…

The Wall Street Journal article specifically looked at “foreign individuals and their foundations and companies” who “were large donors to the Clinton Foundation” while Clinton was secretary of state from Jan. 21, 2009 to Feb. 1, 2013. In the case of Ukraine, the amount given appeared so high because of one donor — Victor Pinchuk, a former Ukrainian parliamentarian and businessman whose father-in-law is a former president of Ukraine. “Between 2009 and 2013, including when Mrs. Clinton was secretary of state, the Clinton Foundation received at least $8.6 million from the Victor Pinchuk Foundation, according to that foundation, which is based in Kiev, Ukraine,” the Journal reported. “It was created by Mr. Pinchuk, whose fortune stems from a pipe-making company. He served two terms as an elected member of the Ukrainian Parliament and is a proponent of closer ties between Ukraine and the European Union.” The newspaper also said that, in 2008, “Mr. Pinchuk made a five-year, $29 million commitment to the Clinton Global Initiative, a wing of the foundation that coordinates charitable projects and funding for them but doesn’t handle the money. The pledge was to fund a program to train future Ukrainian leaders and professionals ‘to modernize Ukraine,’ according to the Clinton Foundation. Several alumni are current members of the Ukrainian Parliament. Actual donations so far amount to only $1.8 million, a Pinchuk foundation spokesman said, citing the impact of the 2008 financial crisis.” <Source>

Victor Pinchuk?

Ex-Obama lawyer Craig charged in Mueller spin-off probe for lying about Ukraine work Greg Craig, who served as former President Barack Obama’s top White House lawyer, was charged on Thursday with lying about work he performed in 2012 for Ukraine in a case that grew out of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation. Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, the New York law firm that produced the report, agreed in January to turn over the $4.6 million it was paid and retroactively register as a foreign agent, as part of a settlement with the Justice Department. Skadden produced the 187-page report at the behest of Paul Manafort, the former chairman of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign who is currently serving a 7 1/2-year prison sentence for lobbying violations and financial crimes. According to the indictment, Craig covered up aspects of his work in order to avoid registering as a foreign agent under FARA, a rarely enforced law that was enacted in 1938 to counter Nazi propaganda. Had Craig complied with the law, he would have been forced to reveal that funding for the report largely came from Viktor Pinchuk, a Ukrainian billionaire. Pinchuk paid the firm $4 million for its work, according to Skadden filings made as part of its settlement. The Ukrainian government only paid Skadden $12,000 - an amount so low that it aroused suspicion in Ukrainian media. <Source>

Corruption is corruption and cuts both ways…

Mueller Investigating Ukrainian’s $150,000 Payment for a Trump Appearance Investigators subpoenaed the Trump Organization this year for an array of records about business with foreign nationals. In response, the company handed over documents about a $150,000 donation that the Ukrainian billionaire, Victor Pinchuk, made in September 2015 to the Donald J. Trump Foundation in exchange for a 20-minute appearance by Mr. Trump that month through a video link to a conference in Kiev. Michael D. Cohen, the president’s personal lawyer whose office and hotel room were raided on Monday in an apparently unrelated case, solicited the donation. The contribution from Mr. Pinchuk, who has sought closer ties for Ukraine to the West, was the largest the foundation received in 2015 from anyone besides Mr. Trump himself. <Source>

Bottom line…

Historically, corruption in Ukraine has been pervasive and deeply rooted in all sectors of society, including government, law enforcement, judiciary, and business. The idea they would change their national culture now that unaudited funds are flowing freely into the country is unbelievable.

I can’t help but wonder how much money is being siphoned out of Ukrainian foreign aid since nobody in the media is even curious about where the money is going.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

CAN WE TRUST THE GOP THIS TIME?

Once again, the G.O.P. caves…

In the House … The Republican-dominated House of Representatives (221-212) could not control their own caucus and passed (335-91) a temporary 45-day funding plan to avoid a government shutdown with the assistance of Democrats. 209 Democrats and 126 Republicans voted yes, while 90 Republicans voted no, with only 1 Democrat, Mike Quigley (D-IL), voting no over a lack of Ukraine aid. Like most bills presented at the last minute, there was insufficient time to read and understand the bill thoroughly – even though legislators had months to work out an acceptable deal. The G.O.P. caved to the progressive communist democrats and refused to hold the line, even if it meant a government shutdown. The House bill passed was a “clean” extension of the current year’s funding priorities, which were set by the Democrat-held Congress last year. The alternative bill, proposed by conservative MAGA (Make America Great Again) Republicans, which would have restored a measure of fiscal sanity to the budgeting process, was resisted by both the progressive communist democrats and the establishment Republicans whose power and electoral future relies on pork-barrel spending. The conservative MAGA Republicans in the G.O.P. demanded procedural changes, spending cuts, and immigration enforcement that would have produced meaningful reforms of the broken immigration system, legislative processes, and desperately needed spending cuts.  In the Senate… H.R. 5860, The Continuing Appropriations Act, Passed the Senate (88-9).

Communist Democrat caught red-handed breaking the law to delay the vote, will Justice prevail?

Communist Representative Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) was caught on video as he pulled a fire alarm in the Cannon House Office Building in an attempt to delay a vote on the Republican funding bill.

This is a prosecutable crime.

Since a House proceeding was in progress, one wonders if Bowman will be charged with 18 U.S.C. § 1512(c)(2), “(c)Whoever corruptly— (2) otherwise obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding, or attempts to do so, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.

This was the same “obstructing an official proceeding” charge used against the January 6 defendants in the United States Capitol riot.

The bullshit excuse given...

Bowman’s office said it was an accident, and the congressman told reporters later Saturday: “I was trying to get to a door. I thought the alarm would open the door, and I pulled the fire alarm to open the door by accident.”

Un--fricken-believable!

Bottom line…

The bad news is that some Republicans are Democrats, but no Democrats are Republicans.

It was disgusting to see the Senate Democrats, notably Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Senate President Pro Tem Patty Murray (D-WA), take a victory lap as they celebrate their victory over crucial commonsense legislative reform.

The progressive communist democrats won this round. Will the G.O.P. win the next? Or, will the football be snatched away at the last moment?

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

CALIFORNIA CORRUPTION: BEWARE OF GAVIN NEWSOM

There is no doubt that the cadre of Obama’s progressive communist democrats must find a replacement for Joe Biden, the cognitively impaired, corrupt, psychopathic liar who now serves as the President of the United States.

The most likely candidate is another psychopath, California’s smarmy Governor Gavin Newsom, who presides over a single-party progressive communist democrat state that is technically insolvent and in severe decline.

Enough!

Newsom is battling against California citizens and business groups attempting to limit the out-of-control spending of California’s Democrat-dominated government by asking the California Supreme Court to remove a tax measure from the 2024 ballot. The initiative, offered as a state constitutional amendment, is supported by enough qualified signatures to qualify for the ballot.

If the measure, labeled by its sponsors as the “Taxpayer Protection and Government Accountability Act,” is approved by the voters, it would reduce legislative authority to raise revenue by increasing state taxes.

The Taxpayer Protection Act would restore a series of voter-approved ballot measures that gave taxpayers, not politicians, more say over when and how new tax revenue is raised.

Over the past decade, the California courts, many of which are presided over by activist progressive communist democrat judges, have created massive loopholes and confusion in long-established tax law and policy.

The Taxpayer Protection Act attempts to close many loopholes and provides new safeguards to increase accountability and transparency over how politicians spend California’s tax dollars.”

Some of the measure’s key provisions include:

• Require all new taxes passed by the Legislature to be approved by voters
• Restore two-thirds voter approval for all new local special tax increases
• Clearly define what is a tax or fee
• Require truthful descriptions of new tax proposals
• Hold politicians accountable by requiring them to clearly identify how revenue will be spent before any tax or fee is enacted.

For those who want to read the Taxpayer Protection and Government Accountability Act, it is available on the California Legislative Analyst’s Office website as A.G. File No. 2021-042.

You can’t have that level of accountability…

Gavin Newsom and his fellow progressive communist democrats are rushing to the California Supreme Court to remove the “Taxpayer Protection and Government Accountability Act” from the ballot by claiming it “violates the Constitution by attempting to completely restructure our system of government.”

“It is “unlike any measure that has ever gone before the voters with respect to the sweeping changes it would make to California’s fundamental governmental structure, the foundational powers of its branches, and the government’s ability to provide the essential government functions required by a functioning state.”

It would ‘eliminate much of the executive branch’s administrative and regulatory power’ and would repeal taxing authority that the Legislature has held throughout California’s history. As a result, the measure amounts to a ‘revision” of the California Constitution, a far-reaching change that cannot be done by initiative, and would require two-thirds legislative approval before being submitted to the voters.”

“The time needed to seek voter approval would eviscerate government’s ability to respond quickly to emergencies, like the 2009 global financial crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic, or the Northridge earthquake.”  “In doing so, the Measure would in many cases impair the government’s ability to perform its essential functions.” 

Remember those emergency powers?

The one’s in effect during the shutdown of California, when elitist Governor Newsom dined at a posh restaurant with lobbyists -- without the required mask, and tried to lie his way out of it.

The one that cost the taxpayers between $32 billion and $125 billion in fraudulent California’s unemployment insurance program claims. Money which went to murderers, people on death row, deceased individuals, and organized crime members in China and Russia.

What happened to Julie Su, California’s Secretary of Labor who oversaw the program? She was rewarded by the progressive communist democrats and was nominated as President Biden’s pick to become his first Secretary of Labor.

Bottom line…

Newsom's first hurdle is to find an acceptable replacement for deceased California Senator Dianne Feinstein. Will he choose color over competence, communism over constitutional allegiance? 

If Gavin Newsom enters the election… avoid being Californicated.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

IS THE BIDEN IMPEACHMENT INQUIRY THE FINAL PHASE OF THE MOST EXTENSIVE COVERUP IN HISTORY?

After watching a portion of the beginning of President Joe Biden’s pre-impeachment inquiry, I have come to some inescapable conclusions.

1. Even if Joe Biden is found guilty of selling influence to foreign powers and possibly the sale of classified information, he is unlikely to be fully prosecuted under the law. First, and most importantly, because too many influential individuals on both sides of the aisle are guilty of the same behavior and risk mutually assured destruction should the feckless Republicans proceed against the Democrats. Second, President Biden’s mental incapacity, including his ability to distinguish between truth and fiction, and physical frailness precludes an adequate trial defense. Moreover, influential, top-level players in the intelligence and law enforcement agencies, including the CIA, NSA, DOJ, and FBI, are likely to subvert any investigation that would reveal their complicity in criminal behavior and unconstitutional denial of American citizen’s inalienable and constitutionally protected rights.

2. Likewise, the corporatized media and tech oligarchs have been incentivized to censor information unfavorable to the regime and to cancel dissident voices.

   Corporate media like CNN, MSNBC, NBC, CBS, and ABC, which were once eager to amplify Democrats’ sham impeachments of former President Donald Trump, did the bidding of the Biden administration on Thursday when they refused to air footage of Republicans’ impeachment hearing. <Source>

3. It is unlikely that former President Obama, on whose watch Vice President Biden and Hillary Clinton performed nefarious acts, will be held responsible as both parties pander to minorities. Truth be told, Obama, the communist commander-in-chief, is grossly responsible for one of the saddest periods in U.S. History, only preempted by major wars, starting with the Civil War.

4. I also note that the Ranking Committee Member Jamie Raskin (D-MD) is a well-credentialed Harvard-trained lawyer and a constitutional law professor. And, in my opinion, Jamie “the red” Raskin is a hypocrite, fraud, liar, and radical progressive communist democrat whose behavior as part of the anti-Trump movement was unconscionable. He should be precluded from this panel based on prior bad acts and lies.

Setting the stage…

I believe the stage has been set at the United States House Committee on Oversight and Accountability’s first hearing, “The Basis for an Impeachment Inquiry of President Joseph R. Biden, Jr.”

Consider the testimony of well-regarded Jonathan Turley, Shapiro Chair for Public Interest Law at the George Washington University Law School…

It is important to emphasize what this hearing is not. It is not a hearing on articles of impeachment. The House has launched an impeachment inquiry, and I am appearing to discuss the history and purpose of such inquiries.

I have previously stated that, while I believe that an impeachment inquiry is warranted, I do not believe that the evidence currently meets the standard of a high crime and misdemeanor needed for an article of impeachment. The purpose of my testimony today is to discuss how past inquiries pursued evidence of potentially impeachable conduct.

My testimony also reflects the fact that I do believe that, after months of investigation, the House has passed the threshold for an inquiry into whether President Joe Biden was directly involved or benefited from the corrupt practices of his son, Hunter, and others.

Since my testimony focuses on the historical and legal aspects of this inquiry, I will leave much of the discussion of the evidence to my fellow witnesses and to the Committee members themselves.

However, I believe that the record has developed to the point that the House needs to answer troubling questions surrounding the President. As discussed below, polls indicate that most of the country shares those concerns while expressing doubts over the Biden Administration investigating potential criminal conduct. <Source: Turley Statement>

The fact that President Biden ignored federal immigration laws and voluntarily instructed other administration officials to allow a hoard of illegal aliens into this country, in violation of our nation's sovereignty, is enough to stand alone as an impeachable offense that has materially damaged our nation. This is a matter that was adjudicated by the Supreme Court, whose ruling he ignored. Simply put, he did not "faithfully execute the Office of President." 

The fact that Biden used Executive Orders to usurp the law-making duties of Congress and refused to enforce existing laws should be the first article of impeachment.  We are over the threshold of impeachment.

Testimony of forensic accountant Bruce G. Dubinsky, CPA…

The critical question facing the American people today is whether behind the smokescreen clouding the Biden family and associates’ businesses was there, or is there a fire? And if there was or is a fire, how big is that fire?

Why were members of the Biden family and close business associates receiving millions of dollars of payments from foreign entities and individuals? What services, if any, were being provided? What was the substance of the alleged services being provided? Was the money being paid a fair amount commensurate with those services? Were political favors being traded and disguised as services? These are the questions that, as a forensic accountant, I routinely am tasked to answer when I am hired to investigate allegations of fraud and corruption.

There is a great deal of evidence that has been collected to date by this Committee and others, trying to answer these questions. However, much more information is still needed in order to be able to answer these questions and make a final determination as to whether or not the Biden family and its associates’ businesses were involved in any improper or illicit activities, and whether those activities, if any, were connected to President Joe Biden or then Vice President Biden.

In my experience, fraudsters purposefully create a labyrinth of Limited Liability Companies (LLC’s) to create an opaque network of entities that are then used to hide improper conduct. In many instances, these complex business arrangements are typically centered around conducting illicit activities and involve moving money around the globe in a manner designed to avoid detection of the underlying illegal activity, as well as the movement of the money tied to that illegal activity. <Source: Dubinsky Statement>

Bottom line…

Let us remember that impeachment is a political process and has nothing to do with a criminal code that did not exist at the time the Constitution was written. It is enough to reach the threshold by violating the public's trust and materially damaging the nation.

Grab some popcorn as both sides grandstand and maneuver for political advantage. Just don’t expect those in power to be entirely held accountable for their actions. Least of all, Barack Obama, who might tell you all he knows is what’s in the newspaper.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

JUDICIAL TYRANNY OR JUSTICE?

Once again, a suspect legal case is lodged against former President Trump to manipulate a presidential election by eliminating the Republican frontrunner.

The charge is a civil, not criminal, business fraud case based on false financial statements and unsubstantiated valuations. It was not brought by the financial institutions and others who did business with the Trump Organization, all of whose debts were claimed to be satisfactorily settled.

No, the charge was brought by politicians, progressive communist democrats, to be specific. One of which was the Attorney General of the State of New York, Leticia James, who openly campaigned on prosecuting and jailing former President Trump.

Of course, there was no trial, no jury – even though a jury was likely to be hostile to Donald Trump after years of overwhelmingly negative media coverage.

The Judge, Arthur Engoron, put forth a summary judgment of guilt, which opens the way to severe and costly penalties unless the case is immediately appealed. One critical portion of the ruling places the Trump Organization under the control of a court-appointed “receiver” who could rummage through years of documents looking for “smoking gun” evidence and disrespecting Trump’s legal rights.

The Judge’s ruling responded to Trump’s “summary judgment” request to dismiss the matter. The court case starts next week.

The law …

Executive Law § 63(12) provides, as here pertinent, as follows: Whenever any person shall engage in repeated fraudulent or illegal acts or otherwise demonstrate persistent fraud or illegality in the carrying on, conducting or transaction of business, the attorney general may apply, in the name of the people of the state of New York, to the supreme court of the state of New York, on notice of five days, for an order enjoining the continuance of such business activity or of any fraudulent or illegal acts, directing restitution and damages and, in an appropriate case, cancelling any certificate filed under and by virtue of the provisions of section four hundred forty of the former penal law or section one hundred thirty of the general business law, and the court may award the relief applied for or so much thereof as it may deem proper. The word “fraud” or “fraudulent” as used herein shall include any device, scheme or artifice to defraud and any deception, misrepresentation, concealment, suppression, false pretense, false promise or unconscionable contractual provisions. The term “persistent fraud” or “illegality” as used herein shall include continuance or carrying on of any fraudulent or illegal act or conduct. The term “repeated” as used herein shall include repetition of any separate and distinct fraudulent or illegal act, or conduct which affects more than one person. PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, BY LETITIA JAMES, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK vs. TRUMP, DONALD J. ET AL (Page 3 of 35)

The Judge’s order…

ORDERED that defendants’ motion for summary judgment is denied; and it is further [OCS: Lawyers were anctioned for presenting frivolous motions. Especially their argument that a “worthless” disclaimer absolves an individual from complying with the requirements of presenting honest information to financial institutions.] ORDERED that plaintiffs motion for sanctions is granted in part, to the extent of sanctioning Michael Madaio, Esq. (Habba Madaio & Associates, LLP), Clifford S. Robert, Esq. (Robert & Robert PLLC), Michael Farina Esq. (Robert & Robert PLLC), Christopher M. Kise, Esq., (admitted pro hac vice) (Continental PLLC), and Armen Morian (Morian Law PLLC) in the amount of $7,500 each, to be paid to the Lawyer’s Fund for Client Protection of the State of New York no later than 30 days from the date of this Decision and Order; and it is further [OCS: Everybody is liable.] ORDERED that plaintiffs motion for partial summary judgment on its first cause of action is granted in part, to the extent of finding defendants Donald J. Trump, Donald Trump, Jr., Eric Trump, Allen Weisselberg, Jeffrey McConney, the DJT Revocable Trust, the Trump Organization Inc, the Trump Organization LLC, DJT Holdings LLC, DJT Holdings Managing Member LLC, Trump Endeavor 12 LLC, 401 North Wabash Venture LLC, Trump Old Post Office LLC, 40 Wall Street LLC, and Seven Springs LLC to be liable as a matter of law for persistent violations of Executive Law§ 63(12); and it is further [OCS: New York business licenses canceled.] ORDERED that any certificates filed under and by virtue of GBL § 130 by any of the entity defendants or by any other entity controlled or beneficially owned by Donald J. Trump, Donald Trump, Jr., Eric Trump, Allen Weisselberg, and Jeffrey McConney are canceled; and it is further [OCS: Appointment of a receiver to dissolve all of the above businesses.] ORDERED that within 10 days of the date of this order, the parties are directed to recommend the names of no more than three potential independent receivers to manage the dissolution of the canceled LLCs; and it is further [OCS: Court monitor to remain to prevent further fraud.] ORDERED that the Hon. Barbara S. Jones (ret.) shall continue to serve as an independent monitor of the Trump Organization until further Court order; and it is further [OCS: Judgement to be entered.] ORDERED that the Clerk shall enter judgment accordingly. PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, BY LETITIA JAMES, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK vs. TRUMP, DONALD J. ET AL (Page 35 of 35)

Full disclosure…

Trump admits to having a first-page disclaimer, essentially saying that the document being presented is “worthless” for the purposes of performing due diligence.

The judge’s response…

“However, defendants' reliance on these "worthless" disclaimers is worthless. The clause does not use the words "worthless" or "useless" or "ignore" or "disregard" or any similar words. It does not say, "the values herein are what I think the properties will be worth in ten or more years." Indeed, the quoted language uses the word "current" no less than five times, and the word "future" zero times.

“Additionally, as discussed supra, a defendant may not rely on a disclaimer for misrepresentation of facts peculiarly within the defendant's knowledge.”

“Thus, the "worthless clause" does not say what defendants say it says, does not rise to the level of an enforceable disclaimer, and cannot be used to insulate fraud as to facts peculiarly within defendants' knowledge, even vis-a-vis sophisticated recipients.”  (Page 13-14 of 35)

The Judge is not infallible and is operating on government-supplied estimates...

The Judge cited a Palm Beach Assessor valuation for Mar-a-Lago that ranged from $18 million to $28 million between 2011 and 2021, with industry sources saying it fails to take into consideration the fair market value of this unique 20-acre property.

"Notwithstanding, the SFCs' [Statements of Financial Condition] values do not reflect these land use restrictions. Donald Trump's SFCs for 201 1-2021 value Mar-a-Lago at between $426,529,614 million and $612,110,496, an overvaluation of at least 2,300%, compared to the assessor's appraisal. NYSCEF Doc. Nos. 769-779." (Page  26 of 35)

According to real estate experts, this property is wildly undervalued. Their valuations range from $300 million to $500 million for this unique property and its attached golf course. The property spans the entire Island, hence its name -- sea to lake, Mar-a-Lago. By comparison, Rush Limbaugh's 2.5-acre Palm Beach compound sold for $155 million earlier this year. At question is how much land use restrictions devalue the property valuation. 

Trump’s response…

“As my lead in the polls over Joe Biden continues to skyrocket, these Corrupt and Highly Political Prosecutors and Judges are getting more and more desperate and dangerous.

We are rapidly becoming a Communist Country, and my Civil Rights have been taken away from me.

The New York State Attorney General went before a Highly Politicized Democrat Judge, who refused allowing the case to go to the Commercial Division, where it belonged, to simply rule, despite all of the evidence to the contrary, that I committed fraud, which is both ridiculous and untrue.

As an example, this Democrat Operative valued Mar-a-Lago, the most spectacular and valuable property in Palm Beach, Florida, to be worth as low as $18 Million, when in actuality, it could be worth almost ioo times that amount. He hated everything about me at a level that I have never seen before, even beyond the hatred of that displayed by Letitia James. There was no trial and no jury for the supposed "wrongdoing" OF FULLY PAYING BACK SOPHISTICATED WALL STREET BANKS IN FULL, WITH INTEREST, WITH NO DEFAULTS, AND WITH NO VICTIMS.

These Banks were represented by the largest, most sophisticated Law Firms in the Country.

This is Democrat Political Lawfare, and a Witch Hunt at a level never seen before. It is an attempt to badly injure the opposing Party's Leading, by far, Political Candidate. Nothing like this has ever happened in our Country before. My Civil Rights have been violated, and some Appellate Court, whether Federal or State, must reverse this horrible, un-American decision. If they can do this to me, they can do this to YOU!” <Trump via Truth Social>

Bottom line…

I do not doubt that Donald Trump inflated the value of his assets, sometimes laughingly so. Likewise, there is no doubt in my mind that all of the counterparties to Trump transactions were sophisticated individuals and entities who relied on their own due diligence and appraisals before entering into deals.

I do not question the Judge’s honesty, motivation, or ruling; if mistakes were made, they should be brought up on appeal or during the actual trial.

What I question is the timing of this action and why it was brought after years and years of business practices, which seemed to be a feature of most New York real estate and business deals.

Therefore, I must conclude that the timing of this action was political and advanced by political players such as Leticia James—a deliberate attempt to interfere with the 2024 presidential election.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

SECOND GOP DEBATE: BORING AND NOT WORTH YOUR TIME

Once again, Republican National Committee Chair Rona Romney McDaniel produced a clown show.

For its part, the Fox moderators were abysmal and failed to control the debate.

Fox News Media’s Stuart Varney, a pretentious-sounding milquetoast that should be reading stock quotes, Fox's  Dana Perino, with her heavy eyeliner and forgettable personality, alongside UNIVISION’s Ilia Calderón, a heavily-accented Columbia news anchor who seemingly pandered to Latinos, were abysmal.

Probably best summarized by Perino's disrespectful game show question asking the candidates to use the pad on the podium to write down their choice on who should drop out of the race, given that none of them would get the nomination over Donald Trump unless the field was thinned. Which one of you, tonight, should be voted off the island? DeSantis took a leadership role and shut down Perino's garbage. 

Ron DeSantis was the clear winner. Vivek Ramaswamy was a smarmy prat. 

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

SURVEYS OF EXPERTS ARE NOT SCIENCE. NOR SHOULD THEY BE USED FOR CRITICAL PUBLIC POLICIES

Frank Harary, a prominent mathematician, once suggested the law that any field that had the word “science” in its name was guaranteed thereby not to be a science, citing examples: Military Science, Library Science, Political Science, Homemaking Science, Social Science, and Computer Science.

The trouble with surveys and polls…

1. Polls and surveys, no matter how carefully crafted, have so many confounding variables as to be nearly useless in promoting public policies. Adding statistical analysis with artificially created decimal points does not give them certifiable or reproducible credibility.

2. If you survey academics who, by the academic selection and promotion process, are likely to be Marxists, socialists, and communists favoring centrally-planned governance and authoritarian regulation, you will likely see progressive communist rhetoric in the findings and conclusions.

 Let us consider a recently released survey…

Experts Say Federal Agency or Global Organization Should Govern AI, New Survey Co-sponsored by Two University Institutes Finds A new survey co-sponsored by two Syracuse University institutes finds that a majority of computer science experts at top U.S research universities want to see the creation of a new federal agency or global organization to govern artificial intelligence (AI). [OCS: This is the type of progressive communist democrat bullpucky you might expect from academic researchers. As for being “experts,” we have seen instances where well-educated, well-credentialed, and well-experienced researchers were profoundly wrong and were subsequently found to have been influenced by the politics of funding rather than performing independent research.] Generation Lab conducted the survey for Axios in partnership with Syracuse University’s Institute for Democracy, Journalism and Citizenship (IDJC) and the Autonomous Systems Policy Institute (ASPI). [OCS: Axios is a demonstrably progressive publication with a significant left-leaning bias. According to their website, “The Syracuse University Institute for Democracy, Journalism and Citizenship (IDJC) in Washington, D.C., engages in nonpartisan research, teaching, and public dialogue aimed at strengthening trust in news media, governance, and society.” We have seen that the media has little or no credibility for their bald-faced lies, censorship, and cancellation of equally well-educated, well-credentialed, and well-experienced  dissenting voices.] The Axios-Generation Lab-Syracuse University AI Experts Survey of computer science professors found that 37% favored a new “Department of AI” to regulate AI, while 22% thought a global organization or treaty was the best option. These findings compared with 16% of respondents who said Congress was the best entity to regulate AI, while 4% said the responsibility falls on the White House and 3% mentioned the private sector. About 14% of respondents said AI cannot be regulated, while 3% said AI should not be regulated. [OCS: As proven over the past decade, governments, non-governmental organizations, foundations, and institutes cannot be trusted to regulate anything that can be corrupted and weaponized by political action, especially by progressive communist democrats.] Margaret Talev, Kramer Director of the IDJC, says the survey offered a different and important perspective on the expanding conversation about the uses and proliferation of AI. [OCS: There is nothing different or important about progressives suggesting that the government regulate a critical new technology to “protect the people” from the fear deliberately created by progressive media propagandists promoting a communist democrat agenda.] “While larger general-population surveys can provide broad insights into most Americans’ hopes, fears and understanding of AI, this new survey offers an in-depth look at how computer science professors with significant subject-matter expertise are thinking about the same issues,” says Talev, who is also an Axios senior contributor. [OCS: Most Americans are ignorant about AI, its limitations, its dangers, and the real danger of allowing the government to regulate a technology that can create propaganda – including fake news, photos, and sound bites. What they know comes from a mainly progressive media that lies with impunity.] “This survey provides valuable information about the current state of AI because it is based on the views of those who are closely involved in the development of AI techniques and systems. We are glad to be part of this effort, which also informs our own initiatives, including our plan to launch the Academic Alliance on AI Policy next month in Washington, D.C.,” adds Hamid Ekbia, director of the ASPI. Some other key survey findings: About 62% predict AI will increase racial, gender and economic disparities. [OCS: Classic Marxist/Communist rhetoric.] Respondents also predict that customer service; art, design or content creation; and administrative and support services are most likely to experience job losses due to AI over the next five years. [ OCS: AI produces realistic results based on its training – it cannot produce creative solutions, cannot generate consensus, and can generate detectible work. It can “hallucinate” and produce profoundly wrong results.] No single person is highly trusted to deal with AI issues; President Biden ranked higher than individual tech CEOs. [OCS: Tell me a funny story about a cognitively impaired individual who lies frequently and cannot speak coherently, even with a teleprompter. How President Biden could even be considered as being trusted speaks to the progressive communist democrat bias of this survey.] The Axios-Generation Lab-Syracuse University AI Experts Survey was conducted July 15 – Aug. 6. Results are based on interviews with 213 computer science professors from 65 of the top 100 computer science programs in America, as defined by SCImago Institutions Rankings. Experts from Syracuse University were among those surveyed. [OCS: Look closely at how the institutions are chosen based on published work – much of it banal and originating from professors funded by government and foundation grants and featuring the work of doctoral candidates or post-doc researchers.  <Source> Most professors teaching advanced courses are far from subject matter experts.] A listing of the participating institutions and additional details about the methodology may be found on the Generation Lab website. <Source>

The weasel words…

Generation Lab Expert Opinion Methodology Generation Lab conducts studies to capture expert perspectives from scholars on a variety of critical issues. Our proprietary non-opt-in scholars frame, the largest commercially available one yet, is built from a database of every college and university in the United States in order to conduct high-volume, customizable studies on various expert populations. To build our frame, we first ordered the list of every college and university in the United States based on their admission rate from most selective to least selective. The admissions rate was used as a proxy to prioritize universities with more dedicated resources to research. We obtain this compilation of universities and the relevant appended data from the Department of Education College Scorecard, which includes all active Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) institutions. We eliminate schools that are dedicated to arts, trades, and specialized programs. Then we go through the list and obtain contact and details on every scholar within each school, including but not limited to: their title, their department, their area of focus within the department. We utilize a variety of proprietary methods to find the contacts and details about the scholars. [OCS: Teaching a subject does not qualify you as an expert. Many academic research experts have no teaching responsibilities.] Because we are obtaining a scholar’s information from their institution directly, all the information contained in our frame is fully validated, including the contact information of each scholar. We further confirm this information through screening in our questionnaires. Depending on the study design, we may employ a stratified random method of sampling by leveraging a wealth of data available on published scholarship. Studies are deployed and sent out to the scholars who satisfy the qualifications of our intended study. Scholars are provided with details about the study, its sponsors, and information about the Generation Lab. An honorarium is given to the sampled respondents who complete each study.  <Source> [OCS: Most AI “experts practice in non-academic entities, rarely publish proprietary data, and whose informed opinion may be quite different from an academician with a more theoretical and political viewpoint.]

Bottom line…

The funniest finding was:

The intrigue: No one individual is highly trusted to deal with AI issues.

President Biden took the top spot, with 9% of respondents — slightly higher than Sundar Pichai, Elon Musk or Sam Altman. Mark Zuckerberg and Donald Trump drew 2% and 1%, respectively.

[OCS: I wonder which 19 morons out of the 213 respondents chose Biden?]

The only AI “expert” among the group is Sam Altman, the full-time CEO of OpenAI (developer of ChatGPT), which was “initially funded by Altman, Greg Brockman, Elon Musk, Jessica Livingston, Peter Thiel, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services, Infosys, and YC Research – all seeking competitive advantages of AI outside the government sphere.

Where are you going to find an honest global regulator? The United Nations?

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

THE GOVERNMENT IS AFRAID TO TAKE THIS ONE EASY STEP TOWARD IMMIGRATION REFORM

The federal government demands private and public entities to perform extensive research and file lengthy and complex environmental impact reports, so why are they afraid to survey the number of illegal aliens? Yes, that is the legal description of interlopers in the United States.

They are afraid! Afraid of the answer and the ordinary citizen’s response when they find out that the 12 million illegal aliens officially acknowledged are more than 25 million and a significant portion of the population. They fear your reaction when you see how much of your paycheck directly supports illegal aliens and indirectly the federal, state, and local bureaucracies servicing their needs.

And they are afraid of the very first step in the process: self-report your presence in the United States with location and contact information by a specific date or risk deportation, including the entire family. That is, if their country of origin will even accept their return.

Who is responsible?

Primarily the progressive communist democrats who are employing the Cloward-Piven strategy of overwhelming our social services to bring about a systemic collapse of the capitalist system and to implement an authoritarian communist system as a replacement. Including their Republican enablers.

Buyer’s remorse?

Amazingly, cities that bragged about being open, welcoming, and inclusive are now getting pushback pressure from their residents.

And, since when are we paying our military backup resources to act as clerks to facilitate unconstitutional and criminal activities?

New Deployment Increases National Guard Personnel to 2,050 Working with Asylum Seekers 250 National Guard Personnel will be Assigned to Full-Time Case Management Services Builds on $50 Million State Investment to Aid Asylum Seekers and Migrants File Paperwork, Attain Legal Work Status and Exit Taxpayer-Funded Shelter Governor Kathy Hochul today deployed an additional 150 members of the New York National Guard to support the ongoing response to the asylum seeker and migrant crisis. Because of this new deployment, the state will be able to assign 250 National Guard personnel the full-time responsibilities of case management professionals. This deployment, along with the $50million state investment in case management thus far, will help asylum seekers and migrants file the appropriate paperwork to attain legal work status and exit taxpayer-funded shelters. “It is critical that we help secure work authorization for asylum seekers and migrants in New York,” Governor Hochul said. “We need to ensure individuals can navigate the paperwork necessary to get them established here so they can work and start making their American Dream a reality. Our National Guard members play a huge role in assisting in the process and we are grateful for their service.” [OCS: Translation: By all means, fuck over legal, law-abiding, low-income New Yorkers, primarily minorities, for people who should not be in the United States and bring with them poverty, illiteracy, few skills, disease, and crime. Call me an uncaring racist; I don’t give a fuck!] Governor Hochul announced the deployment of an additional 150 New York National Guard personnel and assets to asylum seeker sites in New York City. This deployment builds on the 1,900 National Guard personnel who are currently providing logistical and operational support to asylum seekers statewide. New York National Guard personnel are currently staffing 51 hotels and two New York City Humanitarian Emergency Response and Relief Centers. [OCS: I can understand the Guard backing up our military, serving in natural and man-made disasters, and aiding law enforcement activities – but running hotels for illegal aliens? Sorry, no!] In addition to the New York National Guard, Governor Hochul has directed other state resources to help Venezuelans and other asylum seekers and migrants submit the appropriate paperwork to speedily receive legal work status. Working in partnership with federal and city officials, New York is in the midst of a “Month of Action” where more than 50 personnel from the federal Department of Homeland Security are in New York working to process work authorization paperwork. This builds on an additional $20 million allocated to local nonprofits, $20 million allocated to help New York City with a casework surge through NYC Health + Hospitals, as well as $10 million for migrant legal services allocated in the FY24 Budget. [OCS: Shouldn’t they be looking for terrorists slipping over our border or spies jetting in from other countries to form sleeper cells.] Earlier this month, White House officials announced certain individuals from Venezuela, who have continuously resided in the United States on or before July 31, 2023, will be eligible to apply for Temporary Protected Status. This announcement followed more than a year of advocacy from Governor Hochul and a broad coalition of New Yorkers working to secure work authorization for asylum seekers and migrants, allowing them to exit the shelter system and begin living independently. <Source>

I find it ironic that we are taking in individuals from Venezuela -- a formerly wealthy country destroyed by communist scumbags.

Why isn’t the Governor of New York indicted for aiding and abetting illegal aliens as they violate immigration law? These can’t be legitimate asylum seekers as they pass through non-violent countries to arrive at our border.

“Over 116,000 migrants have arrived in NYC since the spring, when border states began busing migrants to blue “sanctuary cities” which have committed to providing shelter and social services to all individuals regardless of immigration status. At a recent town hall meeting in Manhattan, Adams said New York City is receiving 10,000 migrants per month. ‘This issue will destroy New York City,’ Adams said” <Source>

Imagine what it’s like in a border city!

Bottom line…

Where is the federal government’s response to the drug cartels killing more Americans than died in foreign combat?

Why are we not holding Mexico responsible for the violence and drugs?

Who in the progressive communist democrat party is being paid off?

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

TODAY'S RANT

The budget is bullshit, Kabuki theater on both sides of the aisle.

Correct me if I am wrong, but doesn’t October 1st, the beginning of the new federal fiscal year when Congress must enact either a continuing resolution (CR) or regular appropriations to fund the government’s activities, come at the same time each year? With sufficient time for Congress to create and debate a budget? So, one might ask, does Congress wait until the last moment that threatens a faux government shutdown where only public-facing services are curtailed and all government employees receive retroactive pay?

Could it be to force unpalatable items to be accepted without public debate or approval? Like an additional $300 million in Ukraine aid stuffed into the Defense Authorization Act?

And, what’s up with the GOP declaring war on itself and allowing a few grandstanding members like Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Green to hold the party hostage unless their personal demands are met?

Where is the outrage over a TWO TRILLION DOLLAR ANNUAL BUDGET DEFICIT? (In 2022, the U.S. government had a budget deficit of 1.36 trillion U.S. dollars. This is compared to 2000 when the government had a budget surplus of 0.24 trillion U.S. dollars.) Of course, much of the accounting is smoke and mirrors – with “off the books” accounting hiding the truth.

The “Gold Standard” defense of dishonest democrats: racism.

Here is Senator Bob Menendez, caught with gold bars and wads of unexplained cash stuffed in clothing hanging in his closet. When indicted on three counts of corruption, including conspiracy to commit extortion under color of official right, a charge reserved for public officials who take bribes in return for official acts, as well as using his position on the foreign affairs committee to transmit classified information to Egypt, his first line of defense is typical. RACISM!

“For years, forces behind the scenes have repeatedly attempted to silence my voice and dig my political grave. Since this investigation was leaked nearly a year ago, there has been an active smear campaign of anonymous sources and innuendos to create an air of impropriety where none exists.

[OCS: Pretty hard to explain away gold bars and wads of cash stuffed in clothing. Where did he get $500,000 in cash? ]

“The excesses of these prosecutors is apparent. They have misrepresented the normal work of a Congressional office. On top of that, not content with making false claims against me, they have attacked my wife for the longstanding friendships she had before she and I even met.

“Those behind this campaign simply cannot accept that a first-generation Latino American from humble beginnings could rise to be a U.S. Senator and serve with honor and distinction. Even worse, they see me as an obstacle in the way of their broader political goals.

“I have been falsely accused before because I refused to back down to the powers that be and the people of New Jersey were able to see through the smoke and mirrors and recognize I was innocent. I have worked every day to repay their trust by fighting to create jobs, strengthen public safety, update infrastructure, and reduce costs for New Jersey families. I have also stood steadfast against dictators around the globe – whether they be in Iran, Cuba, Turkey, or elsewhere – fighting against the forces of appeasement and standing with those who stand for freedom and democracy.  I remain focused on continuing this important work and will not be distracted by baseless allegations.

“They wrote these charges as they wanted; the facts are not as presented. Prosecutors did that the last time and look what a trial demonstrates. People should remember that before accepting the prosecutor’s version.

“To my supporters, friends and the community at large, I ask that you recall the other times the prosecutors got it wrong and that you reserve judgment. I am confident that this matter will be successfully resolved once all of the facts are presented and my fellow New Jerseyans will see this for what it is.”

One wonders what he did to piss off the Democrats, or is he a sacrificial distraction from the ongoing Biden scandal and a corrupt DOJ/FBI?

CNN, the Communist News Network, hosts academics who proclaim that the U.S. Constitution threatens democracy.

What else would you expect from the progressive communist democrat propagandists? There should be no doubt that the U.S. Constitution is a bulwark against the type of authoritarian tyranny we now see as America is knowingly driven into a police state by Democrats. What started as limitations on the federal government’s power to enumerated functions, with checks and balances to protect civil rights, has morphed into a tool granting centralized national government power not even contemplated by the Founding Fathers. The progressive communists own academia and the media, so why wouldn’t they combine forces to pursue their toxic agenda? So much for trusting progressive “intellectuals” and “experts.” 

A new year, a new subsidy…

The progressives apparently want to extend the luxury of app-based grocery and restaurant delivery to California's poor, primarily illegal aliens. For specific segments of the population, senior citizens, people with disabilities, and individuals facing transportation issues, the delivery of groceries is a godsend. However, like most federal programs without monitoring, it is likely to be misused by a segment of the poor that owns the other necessities of life like 60” flat screen monitors, $1,000 smartphones, and $400 sneakers.

From Uber’s latest press release…

With prices of goods on the rise and access to fresh and healthy foods crucial for households, our team has been hard at work building new tools to help you save time and money. Whether you’re needing to quickly find groceries within a budget or are looking for a bottle of bubbly under $20, we’re here to take the stress out of shopping for you.

Today, we’re excited to share updates you’ll see in the Uber Eats app later this year or in 2024 that will help you Get (almost) Anything, faster and easier than ever before, without breaking the bank.

SNAP/EBT

We know that online food delivery can have a meaningful impact in reducing barriers to fresh groceries, especially for the most vulnerable–including people living in food deserts, seniors, and those facing disabilities or transportation barriers. Helping to improve access to quality food is incredibly important to our work at Uber and we’re proud to use Uber’s technology and extensive local delivery networks to offer SNAP recipients the ability to use their benefits to access fresh groceries conveniently from our app in 2024.

Healthcare Benefit Payments

We are working with Managed Medicaid and Medicare Advantage plans to support benefits that help members stay healthy, like accepting FSA Cards, Flex Cards, and relevant waiver payments on Uber. Select payment methods will be ready in 2024. This is yet another way we are simplifying how people can access healthy foods and connect with their local grocers in new ways. <Source>

Federally known as SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program provides monthly food benefits to individuals and families with low incomes and provides economic benefits to communities. CalFresh is the largest food program in California and provides an essential hunger safety net. CalFresh is federally mandated and, in California, is state-supervised and county-operated.

I wonder what line item in the federal budget will reimburse Uber Eats for the fees it charges when one of its drivers does a grocery run in the name of the “most vulnerable” illegal aliens.

Bill Gates Bullshit...

Speaking before  the New York Times "Climate Forward" event, Gates remarkably said, “Are we the science people or are we the idiots?” “Which one do we want to be?”

Considering the event's sponsor, one might suggest the answer is neither. They are not science people, nor are they idiots. What they are is malevolently evil individuals pursuing a destructive progressive communist agenda. 

Recognizing that America is waking up to the elite bullshit and the pendulum of commonsense is returning toward the middle, Gates further observed, “If you try to do climate brute force, you will get people who say, ‘I like climate but I don’t want to bear that cost and reduce my standard of living.” “Without innovation, it’s unlikely, particularly in middle-income countries, that the brute force approach will be successful.” But that's the reality under the Obama and Biden Administrations, where Executive Orders on environmental issues became de facto laws, was all about brute force.

Gates' ego was on full display as he commented, “I’m the person who is doing the most on climate in terms of the innovation and how we can square multiple goals.” “There’s very limited money for causes to reduce inequity in the world. And no temperate country is going to become uninhabitable.” Huh! I thought the goal was to reduce the global temperature, not deal with global inequities -- but then again, elite liberals like Gates show their true elitist colors when they open their mouths.

Gates is immune from the consequences of his destructive actions. He apparently is willing to stand by and cheer as America's energy-dependent economy is being destroyed for something that may never happen in a million years.

I don't care how intelligent Gates may be or how fast he can master the basics of a complex subject, he is still an elite communist democrat.

Bottom line...

Everywhere I look, I see corruption. Lots of questions, with few answers from either side of the aisle. 

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

ANOTHER LOOK AT POLITICAL CORRUPTION

While everybody is distracted by the corruption of Senator Bob Menendez (D-NJ), whose haul included actual gold bars and wads of cash stuffed in pockets, I was wondering about how many people consider the corruption inherent in the progressive communist democrat party whose proceeds drive both politicians and the political process? Including a cohort of Republican enablers.

How many developers, consultants, and non-governmental agencies feed off the homeless scam?

Yes, it is a scam, especially considering that the vast majority of homeless are hardcore drug addicts who prefer to live in an environment of minimal personal responsibility, easy access to drugs and paraphernalia, and the minimal consequences for low-level crimes like retail theft promoted by progressive politicians and prosecutors. I acknowledge that there is a number of mentally ill individuals in the mix, especially those dumped from other venues – including hospitals.

Is this a misguided liberal attempt to virtue signal their compassion, or something more malevolent? Look at the streets of major democrat-governed cities; how can this filth and lawlessness be allowed to impact law-abiding citizens and taxpayers? How did the uber-liberal cities of San Francisco and Santa Monica in California become cesspools? Could it be due to the Harvard-trained lawyers and progressive communist activists who are personally insulated from the consequences of their actions? It can’t be the money as billions of dollars wash through a corrupt system, promptly siphoned off to benefit politically connected players.

How did this massive disconnect from reality come about? 

How many people have noticed the culture shift over the past five years, beginning with an invasion force level horde of illegal aliens and combined with legislatures closing penal facilities, decriminalizing felonies, prosecutors claiming discretion not to prosecute, and activists judges demanding that hardcore criminals be dumped into our communities to relieve racial disparities and overcrowded facilities. Heaven forbid they acknowledge reality,  prosecute criminals of all backgrounds, and build additional facilities to handle the overflow.

Why are we releasing drug dealers selling life-ending heroin, crack cocaine, methamphetamine, and deadly fentanyl? Could the profits be filtering up to those who make and prosecute the laws? These problems are not unsolvable. 

Perhaps the answer is mandatory treatment and supplying users with one of the three maintenance drugs that help treat addiction: Suboxone, Vivitrol, and Methadone – perhaps for the rest of their lives, like one treats diabetes, high blood pressure, or other ailments, along with creating work programs to clean up our cities and treating drug gangs as domestic terrorists.

Bottom line… 

Our cities are becoming increasingly unsafe due to progressive communist democrats and their corrupt political agenda.

Where are our leaders who will stand up for our inalienable rights and have the moral courage to help those who can’t help themselves? They might be in the GOP as they certainly are not in the Democrat Party. Most likely, they are ordinary people in our communities that may rise to the occasion.

You almost have to admire Bob Menendez for his astonishing old-school corruption with no multiple bank accounts and no-purpose limited liability corporations.

This type of influence-peddling corruption is well understood, as is the more sophisticated influence-peddling of the Biden crime family.

What is insidious is the hidden corruption in everyday government programs that are bleeding us dry, collapsing social safety nets, and contributing to increasing chaos.

It’s time for an intervention – the upcoming 2024 election.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

A RARE POLITICAL WIN FOR ALL CALIFORNIANS

A rare win against the progressive communist democrats in California…

The San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) is an association of local San Diego County governments that serves as the metropolitan planning organization for the County of San Diego and believes your money is their money.

San Diego County’s SANDAG was forced to vote to remove the Mileage Tax from the San Diego county’s regional transportation plan! The board, which consists of mayors, councilmembers, and County Supervisors, voted to remove a contentious “Regional Road User Charge,” AKA the “mileage tax,” from SANDAG’s 2025 Regional Plan. The original plan proposed a 4- to 6-cent-per-mile tax that would cost the average driver $900 per year on top of registration, license, sky-high gas taxes – and possibly an electric vehicle surcharge to compensate for the lack of fossil fuel tax revenues. An equivalent of an 80-cent-per-gallon hike in now outrageous gas tax! The proposed tax was to assist in funding The mileage tax, originally proposed to fund a $162.5 billion railway expansion that included a transit connection to San Diego International Airport, a fix for fragile rail tracks along Del Mar bluffs, and kickstart a 200-mile commuter rail system. All apparently to advance the progressive communist agenda to curtail the ownership and use of private vehicles stemming from the uber-progress Governor Jerry Brown and his appointment of Adriana Gianturco as the director of the California Department of Transportation in 1976. Unlike his father, Pat Brown, who was a proponent of large infrastructure projects to keep California golden, his son Jerry was little more than a hippie/Jesuit Democrat wingnut. The joke is that drivers would be gouged just to drive on poorly maintained freeways already paid for and maintained with the original gas and sales taxes! Of course, the politicians have diverted those funds elsewhere and replaced them with moldering IOUs. However, the biggest joke on taxpayers remains California’s multi-billion High-Speed Rail project to planning, design, build, and operate the first high-speed rail in the nation, sold on the progressive promise to connect the mega-regions of the state, contribute to economic development and a cleaner environment, create jobs, and preserve agricultural and protected lands—a political boondoggle benefiting developers, consultants, contractors, and unions. Ridership estimates and cost recovery are a joke, and the project appears to be little more than a money-losing, highly subsidized transit system to move illegal aliens from the hinterlands to employment centers.

The unspoken surveillance state danger…

Implementing a per-mile gas tax would require a surveillance device in your vehicle that could be used for everything, from setting your insurance rates, monitoring and punishing driving infractions, tracking your location, and even reporting on your personal communications via the car’s built-in communications systems. The proposed system uses a smartphone app for its connectivity and possibly data collection points as ubiquitous as roadside license plate readers.

Bottom line…

We live in a police state, and it’s getting worse.

Vote the progressive communist democrats out of office.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

ELECT A DEMOCRAT: DESTROY AMERICA’S ECONOMY

If you doubt that progressive communist democrats will say or do anything to destroy America, its military, economy, culture, and people, consider what a second Biden term would look like under an administration effectively run by communist-in-chief Barack Obama’s fellow travelers.

Biden to Target Industrial Pollution in a 2nd Term, if He Gets One

If the president wins re-election, his climate team is likely to try to cut greenhouse gases from steel, cement and other hard-to-clean-up manufacturing.

If President Biden wins a second term, his climate policies would take aim at steel and cement plants, factories and oil refineries — heavily polluting industries that have never before had to rein in their heat-trapping greenhouse gases.

[OCS: The progressive communist democrats are targeting industries that fuel our economy and are responsible for almost all of our public infrastructure. This in an effort to control the uncontrollable -- the relentless, chaotic activities of a constantly changing nature.]

New controls on industrial facilities, which his advisers have begun to map out and described in recent interviews, could combine with actions taken on power plants and vehicles during his first term to help meet the president’s goal of eliminating fossil fuel pollution by 2050, analysts said. Industrialized nations must hit that target if the world has any hope to avoid the most catastrophic impacts from climate change, according to scientists.

[OCS: The is no doubt that progressive communist democrats want to limit the voluntary mobility of Americans, destroy the rural housing market, and force people into dense, easily monitored and controllable  housing units much like those found in the old Soviet Union. Consider the insanity of electric vehicles with the added burden wind and solar power on an increasingly unreliable electric grid .]

Still, the urgency of global warming requires action, Mr. Larsen said. “Most other problems in America aren’t going to be 10 times worse in 10 years if we don’t do something right now,” he said. “Climate’s not like that. If this year has shown us anything, with the extreme weather and fires, it’s that it won’t just stay at this level — it’s going to break all the records we’ve just broken.” <Source>

[OCS: John Larsen, a partner at the leftist Rhodium Group, a self-proclaimed nonpartisan energy research firm, cannot answer even the basic questions about climate change. Scientists do not fully understand the climate system. They can’t directly measure man’s climate signal amid the noise of climate’s inherent variability. They cannot explain how there is an optimum temperature that would be suitable for latitudes from the equator to the polar regions. It’s a scam – a hoax designed to accrete political power and loot treasuries.]

Bottom line…

Consider the unions, the communist Judas goats leading their members to the slaughter, like the union leader of the Turkeys pointing out all of the free food available – and never mentioning the existence of Thanksgiving.

Consider the GOP, at war with themselves while the progressive communist democrats march us all into the gulag.

Consider how screwed we are.

-- Steve

WHEN CELEBRITIES TALK POLITICS AND DEMONSTRATE THEY ARE LIBERAL ASSHOLES...

I  may be outraged when a multimillionaire celebrity pervert tells me, “It shouldn’t be so great here in America.”

Speaking on the Joe Rogan podcast, Comedian Louis C. K. spouted the progressive communist democrat immigration nonsense you expect from someone who is insulated from the consequences of his actions. 

• “Like when liberals try to say -- it's like the dumbest position they get into, it’s like ‘we can’t keep letting them in here, gotta keep them out, but we really like them, and it’s great that they’re brown,’ and ‘sorry.’” “Then the right takes over, and they sound racist and the left takes over, and they sound stupid.’”

• “My feeling is they should open it, the border, let everybody pour in, and then the answer which is ‘well then there will be all these problems.’ Yes, there should be. It shouldn’t be so great here, is what I’m saying, in America.”

• “You’re not supposed to be happy, and you’re not supposed to be safe, I think that that’s the problem is that people expect that-- you’re not happy when you’re safe, you’re not happy when you’re secure.”

• “It’s a weird thing to sequester a certain group of people and try to keep upping their lifespan and their lifestyle and just keep trying to increase that for ‘this’ group of people,” as others suffer in poorer conditions.

• “There’s something wrong with that, that’s not a system that’s working, and it forces people to do cruel things to other people,” he said. “There’s a lot of people that die, so Americans can be safe.”

• “It’s not a good way to live in a gated community. If you let folks pour in, like any other wave it will kinda slosh, and then you’ll all just-- things will be different.” “I don’t know, like-- what will really happen? A bunch of people-will they just come with knives and start killing everybody? I don’t think so, I don’t know what will happen, it’s just weird to me.”

The great fallacy of Louis' thinking is that he wants America to support the world, instead of helping the world to increase their own standards of living, mainly by ousting their corrupt leadership that is stealing the fruits of their citizen's labor. He lived in Mexico, one of the most corrupt countries in the world -- and you can bet he did not live the life of an ordinary Mexican.

Remember, this man was excoriated by his fellow liberals and nearly had his career destroyed by the hysterical #MeToo movement... 

Louis CK accused by five women of sexual misconduct in new report Five women came forward to the New York Times, including two female comics who say CK masturbated in front of them, following rumors of his misconduct Louis CK responds to sexual misconduct allegations: ‘These stories are true’ Five women have accused Louis CK of sexually inappropriate behavior, including masturbating in front of two female comics, according to a report by the New York Times. Coming in the wake of years of rumors that have dogged the influential comedian, Dana Min Goodman and Julia Wolov told the Times that in 2002, CK invited them to his hotel room for a nightcap and shocked them by asking if he could take out his penis. As the two women laughed, thinking it was a joke, he proceeded to take off all his clothes and masturbate. Three other women told the Times that CK masturbated in their presence, over the phone, or that he asked if he could. Louis CK’s publicist, Lewis Kay, told the New York Times the comedian would not respond to the allegations. “Louis is not going to answer any questions,” Kay wrote in an email. CK is one of the most revered figures in contemporary comedy. The Emmy-winning creator of the FX series Louie consistently sells out huge concerts and has cultivated a reputation as an auteur. The network HBO dropped the comedian’s shows from its on-demand service on Thursday night. The report came as CK prepared to premiere a new movie, I Love You, Daddy, about a television writer whose 17-year-old daughter is seduced by an older movie producer who is rumored to be a pedophile. On Thursday, his new film’s production company canceled its New York premiere, which was scheduled for that evening, and CK canceled an appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. The comedy world has convulsed with rumors about CK’s sexual misconduct for years. In 2015, Gawker linked CK to rumors about a comedian who exposed himself to fellow performers at the Aspen and Just For Laughs comedy festivals. Jen Kirkman seemed to refer to CK on a comedy podcast when she described “a known perv” who is “lauded as a genius”. (Last month, Kirkman clarified that CK had never harassed her.) <Source>

The scandal Louis millions in lost revenue, but he had plenty left over to purchase expensive real estate in “safe areas” and live a life of his own making.

Even the corrupt liar Joe Biden returned a $2,800 donation made to his presidential campaign by Louis C.K., noting that the disgraced comedian admitted in 2017 to sexually harassing a number of women over the course of his career.

Bottom line...

 But that’s the beauty of free speech.

We are free to make our own determinations of the source's credibility, the “truth” of the issue, how we feel about a particular person or subject, and what action we will take.

Consider the ancient wisdom of Proverbs 17:28, “Even a fool is thought wise if he keeps silent, and discerning if he holds his tongue.” Or, more colloquially, “Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt.”

In my opinion, Louis C.K. is either a liberal asshole, a liberal asshole seeking attention on a media platform, or both. 

And opinions are like assholes; everyone has one.

Isn't it nice when the progressive communist democrats virtue signal their thoughts?

We are so screwed by censorship and cancellation. 

-- Steve

 

UNDERSTAND YOUR ENEMY, AND RESIST!

Look around; the signs of America’s decay are everywhere. Mostly in areas governed by progressive communist democrats who place political power over people. Exclaiming we must destroy society first before we can "build back better."

Suppose you want to understand the destruction of America from within by the progressive communist democrats. In that case, this is the one book you must read, understand, and motivate yourself to take action -- before our country becomes just another failed third-world state like Mexico, a nation with abundant natural resources, a willing workforce, and a malignant communist government.

From Chapter One… America is unraveling. Our founding and history are under assault. Our families and faiths are being degraded. Individualism has been substituted for groupism. Color blindness is now racist. Capitalism and prosperity are being devoured by economic socialism and climate-change fanaticism. Classrooms have become indoctrination mills for racism, segregation, bigotry, and sexual perversion, and teachers’ unions are hostile to parental involvement in critical decisions about the health and welfare of their children. In America, free speech and academic freedom are shrinking, and the police state is growing—as is monitoring and spying on citizens. The government is banning and regulating more and more household products, from incandescent lightbulbs to dishwashers, while creating shortages and driving up costs of others. Crime is out of control on our streets, public transportation, and schools, while police budgets are slashed and many prosecutors and judges coddle violent criminals. Our borders are wide open to millions of foreigners who seek entry into the country, as drug and criminal cartels ship killer drugs into our country by the tons and brutalize migrants by using them as indentured servants and sex slaves. And the list goes on. [OCS: Tell me this is not all true, one-hundred percent accurate, and a condemnation of the Democratic Party and their Republican enablers.] Chapter One:     The Democrat Party & Authoritarianism Chapter Two:     Anti-Black Racism & Anti-Semitism Chapter Three:  Anti-White Racism & Anti-Semitism Chapter Four:    Language Control & Thought Control Chapter Five:     War on the American Citizen Chapter Six:       War on the Nuclear Family Chapter Seven:  War on the Constitution Chapter Eight:   Stalin Would Be Proud

About The Author Mark R. Levin, nationally syndicated talk radio host, host of LevinTV, chairman of Landmark Legal Foundation, and the host of the Fox News show Life, Liberty, & Levin, is the author of seven consecutive #1 New York Times bestsellers: Liberty and Tyranny, Ameritopia, The Liberty Amendments, Plunder and Deceit, Rediscovering Americanism, Unfreedom of the Press, and American Marxism. Liberty and Tyranny spent three months at #1 and sold more than 1.5 million copies. His books Men in Black and Rescuing Sprite were also New York Times bestsellers. Levin is an inductee of the National Radio Hall of Fame and was a top adviser to several members of President Ronald Reagan’s cabinet. He holds a BA from Temple University and a JD from Temple University Law School. Title:                       The Democrat Party Hates America Author:                   Mark R. Levin Publisher ‏: ‎             Simon & Schuster Threshold Editions  Publication date ‏: ‎ September 19, 2023 Language ‏:             ‎ English Print length ‏: ‎         400 pages ISBN-10‏: ‎                 150118315X ISBN-13:                  9781501183157 Hardcover ISBN-10‏ : ‎ 150118315X Hardcover ISBN-13‏ : ‎ 978-1501183157 AMAZON-ID:   ASIN B0C7RJMJ8S

Bottom line…

There is very little time to reverse course, to excise this metastasizing malignancy before it consumes you, me, and America.

I am not saying that voting Republican will solve all problems immediately. Still, it will halt the progressive communist democrats before they can complete the task of destroying America from within.

For those Democrats who may have a shred of decency left, look around and ask is this what you want for your children or yourself in the near future?

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

THE SAUDIS ARE PLAYING BIDEN AND HIS CADRE OF OBAMACONS

President Obama bows to Saudi King Abdullah during the G-20 summit…

There is little or no doubt that President Obama sold out America to Iran… and now President Joe Biden is preparing to sell America to the Saudis.

• In what universe can we trust the duplicitous Saudis, especially after September 11, 2001?

• In what universe can we allow the Saudis access to nuclear technology, even using climate change and the Saudi reserves of fossil fuel as justification?

• The Saudis have always feared that the corrupt House of Saud might be overthrown and will do anything to preserve their absolute power.

• Using a “peace with Israel” stratagem is ironic since any agreement might protect Saudi Arabia from Israel should they overtly or covertly support an attack against Israel.

Danger and Deception…

Biden Aides and Saudis Explore Defense Treaty Modeled After Asian Pacts Despite U.S. fatigue over Middle East wars, the White House sees a security agreement resembling those with Japan or South Korea as an incentive for Saudi Arabia to normalize relations with Israel. The United States is discussing terms of a mutual defense treaty with Saudi Arabia that would resemble military pacts with Japan and South Korea, according to American officials. The move is at the center of President Biden’s high-stakes diplomacy to get the kingdom to normalize relations with Israel. [OCS: The Biden Administration hates the idea that President Trump negotiated the Abraham Accords, a bilateral agreement for Arab–Israeli normalization that was signed between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain on September 15, 2020. The progressive communist democrats want a similar agreement to tout in the 2024 election.] Under such an agreement, the United States and Saudi Arabia would generally pledge to provide military support if the other country is attacked in the region or on Saudi territory. The discussions to model the terms after the treaties in East Asia, considered among the strongest the United States has outside of its European pacts, have not been previously reported. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, regards a mutual defense agreement with the United States as the most important element in his talks with the Biden administration about Israel, current and former U.S. officials said. Saudi officials say a strong defense agreement would help deter potential assaults by Iran or its armed partners even as the two regional rivals re-establish diplomatic ties. [OCS: Of course, Mohammed bin Salman wants the United States to protect his totalitarian regime, especially at no cost to the Kingdom.] Prince Mohammed is also asking the Biden administration to help his country develop a civilian nuclear program, which some U.S. officials fear could be cover for a nuclear weapons program to counter Iran. [OCS: Sounds like the same bullshit the Iranians fed former President Obama.] Any treaty with Saudi Arabia that is similar to the American pacts with East Asian allies is sure to draw strong objections in Congress. Some senior U.S. lawmakers, including top Democrats, see the Saudi government and Prince Mohammed as unreliable partners who care little about U.S. interests or human rights. [OCS: By Congress, they mean the United States Senate – and we all know that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnel and several establishment Republicans will most always jump the aisle to join the progressive communist democrats in pushing their anti-America agenda.] An agreement would also raise questions about whether Mr. Biden is getting the United States more militarily entwined with the Middle East. And such a treaty would also contradict the Biden administration’s stated goal of reorienting American military resources and fighting capabilities away from the area and toward deterring China specifically in the Asia-Pacific region. The U.S. military has bases and troops in both Japan and South Korea, but American officials say there are currently no serious discussions about having a large contingent of American troops in Saudi Arabia under any new defense agreement. The Pentagon has just under 2,700 American troops in the kingdom, according to a letter the White House sent to Congress in June. [OCS: 2,700 troops in Saudi Arabia? Why? What are they protecting? Can’t be our diplomats who are protected by the DSS (Diplomatic Security Service).] But U.S. officials have said a diplomatic pact would be an important symbolic defusing of Arab-Israeli tensions and could also have geopolitical significance for the United States. Bringing Saudi Arabia closer to the United States, they argue, could pull the kingdom farther from China’s orbit and blunt Beijing’s efforts to expand its influence in the Middle East. [OCS: Symbolic? At what cost to America for nothing more than a photo-op?] The United States and South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea, signed a security treaty with similar language in 1953, when the Korean War halted under an armistice. [OCS: In Korea, we had skin in the game. With Saudi Arabia, nothing comes to mind.] <Source>

Bottom line…

We cannot trust the Saudis or the progressive communist democrats in the Obama/Biden Administration.

Now consider Obama and Biden deliberately destroyed America’s energy independence. Something stinks, and it is the progressive communist democrats.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

DEMOCRATS IGNORE CRIME CONTROL, PURSUE GUN CONTROL WITH BULLSHIT STUDY

Another bullshit “research study” dropped like pigeon poop on the heads of law-abiding individuals…

Once again, we find “research” driving a social narrative skewed to the beliefs of the progressive research funders and benefitting the progressive communist democrats.

Who bought a gun during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States?: Associations with QAnon beliefs, right-wing political attitudes, intimate partner violence, antisocial behavior, suicidality, and mental health and substance use problems Abstract There was a large spike in gun purchases and gun violence during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. We used an online U.S. national survey (N = 1036) to examine the characteristics of people who purchased a gun between March 2020 and October 2021 (n = 103) and compared them to non-gun owners (n = 763) and people who own a gun but did not purchase a gun during the COVID-19 pandemic (n = 170). [OCS: The sample sizes are inadequate to draw valid statistical inferences.] Compared to non-gun owners, pandemic gun buyers were younger and more likely to be male, White race, and to affiliate with the Republican party. [OCS: Notice the overt politicization, which mirrors the narrative of the progressive communist democrats.] Compared to non-gun owners and pre-pandemic gun owners, pandemic gun buyers exhibited extreme elevations on a constellation of political (QAnon beliefs, pro-gun attitudes, Christian Nationalism, approval of former President Donald Trump, anti-vax beliefs, COVID-19 skepticism; mean Cohen’s d = 1.15), behavioral (intimate partner violence, antisocial behavior; mean d = 1.38), mental health (suicidality, depression, anxiety, substance use; mean d = 1.21), and personality (desire for power, belief in a dangerous world, low agreeableness, low conscientiousness; mean d = 0.95) characteristics. In contrast, pre-pandemic gun owners only endorsed more pro-gun attitudes (d = 0.67), lower approval of President Joe Biden (d = -0.41) and were more likely to be male and affiliate with the Republican party relative to non-gun owners. [OCS: A statistical hit job! Especially considering the widespread fear of a killer pandemic and increased stress caused by lockdowns, forced long-term intimate contact with family members, disruptions in normal daily activities and exercise, and increased financial pressures. Did the study authors consider age-related impacts or extreme financial pressures on increased suicidal ideation?] Pandemic gun buyers represent an extreme group in terms of political and psychological characteristics including several risk-factors for violence and self-harm. [OCS: One wonders if any cohort included members of radical progressive extremists like Antifa or Black Lives Matter, both of which were associated with violent behaviors?] Introduction The early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic introduced tremendous uncertainty and stress into people’s lives around the world that included major disruptions to social and economic life, in addition to the health risks associated with contracting a potentially life-threatening infectious disease. In the United States, the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic was also a period of social and political upheaval driven by the impact of heightened divisions among Americans. This upheaval included resistance to public health guidelines and government restrictions to curtail the spread of COVID-19, protests against police brutality that became the largest mass movement in U.S. history, controversies around the 2020 presidential election results (aka the Big Lie conspiracy theory of voter fraud), and the Insurrection of January 6th, 2021 when Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol in a failed attempt to stop Congress from certifying the electoral college votes of the 2020 Presidential election. [OCS: There is no doubt, even with retrospection, that our public health officials were lying and spreading propaganda. That our election integrity had been compromised. And that communist-in-chief Barack Obama and his cadre of fellow travelers were the proximate cause of increasing racial division in the United States. January 6 was a riot, not an insurrection – believing a small, unarmed, motley group of individuals, embedded federal officers, and Antifa members could take over the government is ludicrous.] Amidst this turmoil, there was a dramatic increase in domestic gun sales. The estimated 7 million federal background check applications in the early part of the pandemic (March to July 2020) surpassed the rates recorded during other high gun-buying periods in recent history, including the months following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the election of Barack Obama in 2008, and the Sandy Hook school shooting in 2012. From March to July 2020, national surveys estimated that 6% of adults bought guns, 34% of whom were new gun owners, for an estimated 6 million first time gun buyers. [OCS: The “dramatic increase in domestic gun sales” was driven by progressive communist democrats' street-level shock troops, anti-police rhetoric, and their general failure to protect citizens from criminals and domestic terrorists like Antifa and BLM.] <Original Study DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0290770>

I see bullshit flowing freely…

The “Pretense of Knowledge”

In his Nobel Prize lecture, Friedrich von Hayek criticized the arrogance of economists and other social scientists who believed their knowledge was so excellent that they could make numerical predictions with accuracy comparable to the physical sciences.

"The recognition of the insuperable limits to his knowledge ought indeed to teach the student of society a lesson of humility which should guard him against becoming an accomplice in men’s fatal striving to control society – a striving which makes him not only a tyrant over his fellows, but which may well make him the destroyer of a civilization which no brain has designed but which has grown from the free efforts of millions of individuals." <Source>

Confounding variables.

Confounding variables are extraneous factors in a research study that can distort or obscure the genuine relationship between the independent and dependent variables, making it challenging to determine whether the independent or confounding variable causes changes in the dependent variable.

Correlation versus causation.

Just because two variables are statistically related or tend to occur together does not necessarily mean that one causes the other. An underlying third variable or other confounding factors may influence both variables, creating an apparent correlation.

Issues with online surveys.

Online surveys are a popular research tool for collecting data due to their convenience and cost. However, it’s essential to exercise great caution when interpreting the results of online surveys because they come with significant validity concerns relating to inadequate question design, age bias with respondents skewing to a younger, internet-savvy base, selection bias created by voluntary participation, lack of appropriate controls, and other issues affecting a study’s conclusions. 

Statistically valid sample sizes.

The size of a statistically valid sample depends on several factors, including the population size, desired level of confidence, margin of error, and the variability of the data. Small sample sizes are unlikely to yield valid insights when mapped onto a significantly larger, demographically diverse population. Unless, of course, you are trying to advance a political narrative and the actual research is secondary.

The press release from the University of Michigan…

Mental health problems, political extremism found in many who bought firearms during COVID pandemic Survey raises concern about high risk for suicide and violence toward others People who bought firearms during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic have much higher rates of recent suicidal thoughts, self-harm behaviors and intimate partner violence, compared with other firearm owners and people who do not own firearms, a new study suggests. Pandemic gun buyers were also much more likely than the other groups to hold extreme beliefs, ranging from anti-vaccination views to support for QAnon conspiracy theories, according to the new findings published in the journal PLOS One. The survey was completed by 1,036 adults living in the United States in October 2021. While not nationally representative, recruitment for the survey was designed to approximate the U.S. adult population in terms of the distribution of age, sex, race and Hispanic ethnicity with participants drawn from 47 states and Washington, D.C. The findings suggest that pandemic firearm buyers have special characteristics that deserve attention to prevent harm to themselves or others, say the researchers, who are from the University of Michigan, the University of South Florida, the University of Nebraska at Omaha and Michigan State University. <Source>

Bottom line…

This is precisely the type of bullshit research used by progressive communist democrat legislators to pursue public policies that criminalize lawful behavior by law-abiding citizens.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

ARE YOU ENJOYING THE DEMOCRAT CRIME WAVE?

Have you noticed that certain areas, notably areas governed by progressive communist democrats, appear to be experiencing an upsurge in crime?

And that our progressive communist democrat politicians, at the behest of billionaire and millionaire donors who are well-insulated from the consequences of their actions, are restricting or eliminating criminal prosecutions and passing legislation that incentivizes criminal activity.

Likewise, judges, driven by their progressive ideology, demand that hardened criminals be released back into our communities and that illegal alien criminals be treated differently than ordinary citizens.

What we are facing…

Los Angeles County deputy shot and killed after being 'ambushed' in his patrol car

Neither a suspect nor a motive has been identified. Sheriff Robert Luna said it appeared the deputy was killed because “he was in uniform."

A Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy was "ambushed" and killed in his patrol car by an unknown person Saturday. Authorities suspect the deputy was targeted simply because "he was in uniform."

Deputy Ryan Clinkunbroomer, 30, was found unconscious in his car at 6 p.m. Saturday, Sheriff Robert Luna told reporters at a late-night news conference. The bystander called 911, and Clinkunbroomer was taken to the hospital with a gunshot wound. He did not survive.

Authorities have not identified a suspect. Luna said that no theory had been eliminated for the shooter's motive but that it appeared the deputy was targeted because "he was in uniform."

"He was just driving down the street, and for no apparent reason — and we’re still looking into the specific reasons — somebody decided to shoot and murder him," Luna said.

Clinkunbroomer had just left the Palmdale station, and his car was found nearby at the intersection of Sierra Highway and Avenue Q. Law enforcement officials familiar with the investigation said Sunday that a video clip that shows a car pulling alongside the patrol car before it speeds away is a focus in the investigation. <Source>

UPDATE: (9/18) The alleged suspect is now in custody and his mother indicates that he is a paranoid schitzophenic who may have been off his meds and that she had requested help from deputies previously. The suspect is also said to have attempted suicide on at least two occasions. Another example where it is the individual, and not the weapon, responsible for a despicable act. The failure to deal with the mentally ill population falls squarely on the politicians and judiciary.

Footage shows teen driver appear to deliberately hit and kill retired police chief Andreas Probst

A retired California police chief appeared to be deliberately mowed down and killed while riding his bike in Las Vegas by a laughing teenage driver whose pal can be heard saying “Yeah, hit his ass,” video of the incident shows.

Andreas Probst, 64, was killed after he was deliberately struck while out for a morning bike ride around 6 a.m. on Aug. 14, according to Las Vegas police.

The unidentified 17-year-old driver of the Hyundai was arrested by police soon afterward, The Las Vegas Review-Journal reported.

The teen has since been charged with murder, after police discovered a video posted to social media that allegedly showed him deliberately hitting the man.

This weekend, the shocking footage went viral online, showing the driver asking his pals “ready?” as the passenger films, laughing.

“Yeah, hit his ass,” he tells the driver before plowing into the retiree. <Source>

Illegal immigrant charged with murder released by New York police because of paperwork delay: Reports

An illegal immigrant charged with stabbing a man to death in New York was previously released by police because of a paperwork delay despite being accused of a separate stabbing in another state, according to multiple reports.

Carlos Corrales-Ramirez, a 20-year-old Honduran national, was arrested and arraigned this week in a Rensselaer County, New York court for the fatal stabbing of 28-year-old Jario J. Hernandez-Sanchez, 28, of Troy, New York on September 2.

However, a report by The National Desk said that Corrales-Ramirez was previously arrested by border patrol agents near Champlain, New York in March before being turned over to New York State Police when border patrol saw there was an active warrant for his arrest in Laurel, Maryland for a non-fatal stabbing.

He then spent three months in the Clinton County Jail waiting for Maryland to approve his extradition — which never came — before a county judge finally ordered his release in June.

According to the report, Maryland failed to obtain a governor's warrant for the extradition in that three-month time frame, leading Clinton County Judge William Favreau to approve an extension of his hold from 30 days to 90 days because Maryland had not responded to the extradition request. <Source>

Why?

OBJECTIVE: To create fear and chaos throughout the land.

GOAL: To condition the population to demand more protection and accept harsher authoritarian measures without protest or pushback.

What's next?

Look for the progressive communist democrats to employ their Antifa and Black Lives Matter street shock troops as we grow closer to the 2024 election.

Look for illegal alien gang activity to ramp up as illegal aliens flood the border before a new administration.

Bottom line…

We are so screwed if we don't curtail progressive communist democrats with an unassailable majority in 2024.

-- Steve

IS THIS THE END OF ONE CITIZEN SPEAKING?

I am continuing to experience issues with my blog hosting platform provider…

1. They have denied access to an RPC (remote procedure call) server they have supported for years. When questioned, they claim they do not support third-party software, even though the issue is on their end and has been accessible in the past few weeks.

2. They suggest the use of their internal editor to compose blog content. This demands online access, and given the intermittently unstable nature of the platform, this appears to be a sub-optimal solution. Likewise, there are issues with uploading graphics and having graphics display properly.

3. Their RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feed, which connects blog content with my email provider, has suddenly failed, making it impossible to send content to my email list automatically.

4. Their customer service announcements are simply platitudes like “we are working on it” and lack specificity regarding the issue and a resolution time frame.

Considerations…

The hosting company started as a well-respected platform hosting many Fortune 500 companies. However, it has been sold several times. It is now controlled by a hosting company offering several competing services, itself owned by a private equity firm, probably seeking a restructuring and integration with its other entities.

If you try to create an account, you are greeted with a disturbing message which portends changes afoot.

Bottom line…

After sixteen years and many thousands of posts, I must ask myself, “Is this the end of One Citizen Speaking, or maybe this the start of a new beginning?

Is this a case of "sunk costs" where I am attempting to save previous content?

Do I want to invest the time, effort, and money to transition some of my content to another blog platform, or discontinue the effort and move on to something else?

This is the way of the world, where formerly great companies have fallen prey to cost-cutting money manipulators who treat companies and brands as pieces on a Monopoly board.

It is also a cautionary tale to those who rely on long-term service providers in these mutable times.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

 

IT'S NOT ABOUT THE CHILDREN: IT'S ABOUT MONEY AND DEMOCRATS

Once again, we find the execrable communist radical, Rhonda “Randi” Weingarten, the President of the American Federation of Teachers, pursuing her union’s agenda to force the government to curtail or eliminate the twin evils of “parental rights” and “school choice.”

In an interview with Northeastern University’s Burnes Center for Social Change senior fellow Seth D. Harris, Weingarten noted, “I was kind of gobsmacked when I was talking to Southern Poverty Law Center, and they showed me the same words: ‘choice,’ ‘parental rights’ and attempts to divide parents versus teachers, and at that point, it was white parents versus other parents. But it’s the same kind of words..”

Setting aside the blatant dishonesty and racial grifting of the Southern Poverty Law Center, Weingarten’s attempt to racialize and stigmatize the issue of parental rights and school choice is abominable.

Weingarten conflates actions taken by a genuinely evil union with their relatively innocent membership, many of whom are bullied into union membership and have little or nothing to say about the union’s almost exclusive political support of progressive communist democrats. It has never been about parents versus teachers, as most parents respect individual teachers and are grateful for their efforts.

The idea that the school owns your children and their decisions supersede parental rights is just another communist opportunity to destroy the nuclear family and to pursue a fundamental tenet of communism where children are wards of the state.

At least as recounted 13 years ago by Jason Riley, writing in the Wall Street Journal, history points out the dismal failure of a unionized educational system.

“Just 2,000 of the nation's 20,000 high schools produce almost half of all high-school dropouts. But nearly half of all black high-school students wind up in one of these "dropout factories." The prospects for black males who don't graduate are not good, quite aside from lower lifetime earnings. The sadder reality is that 60% of all black male high-school dropouts in their mid-30s have prison records.” <Source>

And it doesn’t seem to have changed much over the years. The teachers’ unions still fight testing teaching competency and subject matter knowledge and have lowered the bar on standardized teaching scores to hide the failure of a heavily unionized school system to educate, rather than indoctrinate, children.

Ignoring the obvious…

1. Education is the great equalizer, a pathway to success that knows no bounds.

2. School choice encourages healthy competition among educational institutions. When schools know that parents are presented with alternative educational choices, they are motivated to improve the quality of their teaching efforts.

3. Parents are encouraged to find schools that align with their children’s unique abilities, learning needs, and aspirations.

4. Minority families with the means to escape failing schools and seek out more effective institutions are narrowing the racial or ethnic disparities that are often exploited for political and funding purposes.

Bottom line…

School choice is not a one-size-fits-all solution, but it undeniably offers numerous benefits for minority students and their families.

Parental rights are inalienable, not granted or governed by government fiat.

Weingarten’s efforts to label anyone who disagrees with her union’s communist agenda as an extremist or, as the government claimed, domestic terrorists, are abominable. 

Our children are our most precious resource and the future of our society; to let communist perverts like “Randi” Weingarten control their destiny is beyond morally reprehensible; it is criminal.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

 

 

 

 

 

 

WILLARD MITT ROMNEY: A LOSER WHO FAILED TO ENGAGE

Now that Mitt Romney has announced his intention not to seek reelection as Utah’s Junior United States senator, not that he could have won his race, perhaps it is time to consider all he has done to America.

There is no doubt in my mind that Romney, the feckless, gutless, double-dealing hypocrite, is the single individual, other than John McCain, most responsible for the damage the progressive communist democrats have wreaked on the United States, primarily because of his failure to defeat Barack Obama in 2012.

While Romney identified as a “conservative Republican,” his actions betrayed him more as a moderate Democrat, willing to jump across the aisle and advance a progressive communist democrat agenda in the Democrat-majority state of Massachusetts.

A duplicitous chameleon who adopted a “red” color when pushing Massachusetts’s “Romneycare,” based on the failed “Hillarycare” proposal, and the precursor to Barack Obama’s “Obamacare.” Passed with a dishonest sleight-of-hand financing trick authored by Massachusetts Senator Ted “Killer” Kennedy.

Had it not been for Romney’s elitist, above-it-all, gentlemanly tone and his failure to fight back against the presidential candidacy of John McCain in 2008, we would see the election of Barack Obama – an out-an-out America-hating communist who went on to divide America along racial lines.

In 2012, Romney’s second presidential campaign, he, again, failed miserably to defeat incumbent President Barack Obama, who was fundamentally transforming America into a European-style socialist society as he pushed toward perpetual political power on behalf of the progressive communist democrats.

Bottom line…

Here is a man who had it all. He was from a wealthy family, deeply grounded in religion, well-educated with a Harvard MBA and a Harvard law degree, and well-experienced as a business turnaround specialist – but he lacked the intestinal fortitude to overcome obstacles and fight his opposition.

The reason I am pissed is: one, he gave us four more years of Obama’s communist leadership and a deeply entrenched communist bureaucracy;  two, his position as an “establishment” Republican and his failure to fight encroaching communism while a Senator; and three, here is a man I supported as a turning point to help restore sanity to a wounded federal government.

Listening to the progressive communist democrats praise Romney makes me want to throw up.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

.

THE NFL IS VIRTUE-SIGNALING AGAIN…

What do all these teams have in common?

Arizona Cardinals Atlanta Falcons Baltimore Ravens Buffalo Bills Carolina Panthers Chicago Bears Cincinnati Bengals Cleveland Browns Dallas Cowboys Denver Broncos Detroit Lions Green Bay Packers Houston Texans Indianapolis Colts Jacksonville Jaguars Kansas City Chiefs

Las Vegas Raiders Los Angeles Chargers Los Angeles Rams Miami Dolphins Minnesota Vikings New England Patriots New Orleans Saints New York Giants New York Jets Philadelphia Eagles Pittsburgh Steelers San Francisco 49ers Seattle Seahawks Tampa Bay Buccaneers Tennessee Titans Washington Commanders

They are all so politically correct when it comes to money, not so much in real life!

Bottom line…

Do as we say, don’t do as we do!

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

APOLOGIES TO ALL

My well-respected pioneering blog hosting provider, TypePad, has been experiencing numerous intermittent connectivity, graphics, and publishing problems that are impacting my blog. 

I am currently researching a method to transition content to a new provider.

Sorry, but that's the price we pay for dependency on systems hosted by others. A lesson well worth considering if your life or livelihood depends on a third-party provider.

-- Steve

WHITE HOUSE COUNSEL WARNS THE MEDIA ABOUT DISINFORMATION

Once again, the progressive communist democrats are playing “rope-a-dope,” hanging on the ropes and drawing non-injurious punches from the GOP.

How is it prudent and proper for the White House Counsel, Stuart Frank Delery, a Yale Law School graduate, to actively advance false narratives and deny factual allegations linked to the Biden corruption scandal? One picture says it all.

One might assume that the White House Counsel knows the U.S. Constitution and the federal statutes…

MEMO TO EDITORIAL LEADERSHIP AT U.S. NEWS MEDIA ORGANIZATIONS From:     Ian Sams, Special Assistant to the President and Senior Advisor and Spokesman for White House Counsel’s Office Date:      September 12, 2023 Re: It’s Time For The Media To Do More To Scrutinize House Republicans’ Demonstrably False Claims That They’re Basing Impeachment Stunt On After nearly 9 months of investigating, House Republicans haven’t been able to turn up any evidence of the President doing anything wrong. But House Republicans led by Marjorie Taylor Greene are nonetheless opening a baseless impeachment inquiry of President Biden – despite many House Republicans openly admitting there is no evidence on which to support it. Impeachment is grave, rare, and historic. The Constitution requires “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.” [OCS: This is a series of bald-faced lies from a self-described “communications professional and strategist.” One, there is sufficient documentary and sworn testimony evidence that serves as a legal “probable cause” to support an impeachment inquiry. The hard evidence is contained in SARs (Suspicious Activity Reports” filed by various financial institutions, the banking records relating to multiple LLCs, which appear to have no legitimate purpose other than to receive and distribute funds in a money-laundering scheme, the recorded confession of Joe Biden bragging openly about a “quid pro quo” deal involving Ukraine, the obstruction of justice, and acting as an unregistered foreign agent.  Two, using the impeachment precedents established by then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Impeachment Manager Adam Schiff, there is more than enough hard evidence to justify the inquiry. And three, like the usual progressive communist democrat tactic, they start the story in the middle – ignoring the recently disclosed evidence produced by legitimate congressional inquiries. The quotes from various Republicans are either self-serving as they are in heavily Democrat districts or currying favor with the administration for pre-election handouts.] But House Republicans are publicly stating they have uncovered none of these things: Republican Rep. Ken Buck (Colorado) said that “the time for impeachment is the time when there’s evidence linking President Biden, if there’s evidence linking President Biden to a high crime or misdemeanor” but that the evidence “doesn’t exist right now.” He has also said “I don’t think that evidence has been presented” connecting President Biden to wrongdoing and that “I’m not convinced that that evidence exists.” Republican Rep. Dave Joyce (Ohio) told Forbes he is “not seeing facts or evidence” that would merit an impeachment inquiry. Republican Rep. Dusty Johnson (South Dakota) told CNN that “there is a constitutional and legal test that you have to meet with evidence” when it comes to impeachment and that he has “not seen that evidence.” Republican Rep. Don Bacon (Nebraska) said, “I think before we move on to [an] impeachment inquiry, we should … there should be a direct link to the president in some evidence. We should have some clear evidence of a high crime or misdemeanor, not just assuming there may be one. I think we need to have more concrete evidence to go down that path.” Republican Rep. French Hill (Arkansas) told CBS that House Republicans have not “even remotely completed their work on the kind of detailed investigations and quality work” needed to proceed to an impeachment. Republican Rep. Mike Lawler (New York) said, “With respect to impeachment, we’re not there yet.” Republican Rep. Chuck Edwards (North Carolina) said in a House hearing, “I’ve heard over and over that President Biden has not been implicated or proven for any wrongdoing here, and I acknowledge that.” A Republican lawmaker told CNN, “There’s no evidence that Joe Biden got money […] There’s just no evidence of that. And they can’t impeach without that evidence. And I don’t think the evidence exists.” A senior House Republican aide told Politico, “We haven’t proven the case for impeachment yet. How can you start impeachment? We haven’t done what you need to do to start impeachment.” Page 2 But reporting that solely focuses on process rather than substance is woefully inadequate when it comes to something as historically grave as impeachment. [OCS: Funny, the Trump impeachment was all about process over substance.] It’s time for the media to ramp up its scrutiny of House Republicans for opening an impeachment inquiry based on lies. When even House Republican members are admitting that there is simply no evidence that Joe Biden did anything wrong, much less impeachable, that should set off alarm bells for news organizations. [OCS: Is this an illegal attempt to interfere in a presidential election by asking the media to do what the government is constitutionally prohibited from doing? Who is the arbiter of truth? Certainly not Joe Biden, a pathological liar with no filter, nor any government spokespersons who lie to the public regularly. Alarm bells – is this an implied threat to the corporatized progressive communist propagandists in the media?] For years, Republicans in Congress have tried to muddy the waters by attracting media coverage of their allegations, and as they choose to move forward with impeachment, it is the responsibility of the independent press to treat their claims with the appropriate scrutiny. Covering impeachment as a process story – Republicans say X, but the White House says Y – is a disservice to the American public who relies on the independent press to hold those in power accountable. [OCS: A classic case of projection – accusing the Republicans of doing what the Democrats unjustifiably did to former President Trump. There is no independent media, the bulk of which is partisan and progressive. As for holding those in power accountable, that is a sick joke on the American people.] And in the modern media environment, where every day liars and hucksters peddle disinformation and lies everywhere from Facebook to Fox, process stories that fail to unpack the illegitimacy of the claims on which House Republicans are basing all their actions only serve to generate confusion, put false premises in people’s feeds, and obscure the truth. [OCS: Over the past decade, the most significant source of undeniable disinformation has been the Obama and Biden Administrations.] House Republican leaders should be held accountable for the fact that they are lurching toward impeachment over allegations that are not only unfounded but, in virtually all cases, have been actively disproven – including by witnesses and documents in their own investigations, as well as years-old congressional probes and even the former President’s first impeachment inquiry. As you begin to cover the House GOP’s impeachment push more intensely, enclosed you will find a 14-page appendix that comprehensively addresses the 7 key lies House Republicans are suggesting they are basing an impeachment on. We hope this document helps provide you with factual information useful in your reporting on their unprecedented, unfounded claims underlying an impeachment inquiry without any evidence of wrongdoing. [OCS: Finish big with a big lie. It is the sworn constitutional duty of every Representative to investigate government corruption and hold those responsible accountable. This document does not contain facts, only a self-serving narrative.] <Source>

Who is this lying putz?

His resume says it all… 

• Special Assistant to the President & Senior Advisor and Spokesman for White House Counsel’s Office -- Lead White House spokesman for oversight and investigations
• U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Deputy Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs (COVID Response)
• Kamala Harris For The People, National Press Secretary
• Hillary for America, Regional Communications Director
• Democratic National Committee, Regional Press Secretary

Bottom line…

The progressive communist democrats are unafraid of a Biden impeachment, and it is unlikely the Senate will convict given the specter of a hapless, incoherent, and incompetent Kamala Harris assuming the presidency. They are afraid of the GOP being able to legitimately use their subpoena power on everybody in the Obama (it occurred on his watch) and Biden administrations. And, as we saw with the subpoenas handed to Trump’s associates, defying a congressional subpoena can lead to substantial jail time.

Even worse, the heads of agencies like the CIA, NSA, FBI, DOJ, and the State Department are not immune to being subpoenaed: one, because it is a legitimate purpose, and two, certain members of Congress have the necessary security clearances to review classified materials. Remember how House Intelligence chair Adam Schiff abused the secrecy process by holding classified hearings in a SCIF (Sensitive Compartmentalized Information Facility)?

Now, if only the House GOP members had the cojones to do the right thing for America and Americans.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve 

THE SIGNAL HAS BEEN SENT

Yes, the signal that former progressive communist democrat President Barack Obama and his cadre of anti-America acolytes are fully in charge of the White House.

How else can you explain the aberrant behavior of President Joe Biden on 9/11, a day of infamy when we were attacked by Saudi-supported terrorists in an event rivaling the scurrilous Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941?

There Biden stands, not in New York City, at the Pentagon, or at the Philadelphia site where Americans died— but in Alaska, a state far removed from now sacred sites.

Handing over billions to “Death to America” Iran, an enemy Islamic terrorist state that has killed Americans and thanking the Saudis, of all countries, on this date for their $20 billion contribution to Biden’s global infrastructure initiative targeted at global warming and wealth redistribution. And telling a lie that he was at the New York attack site the next day. No, he was on the floor of the Senate giving a speech televised by CSPAN.

You can’t blame Biden himself as he barely made it through his preplanned speech before being shuffled off by his handlers.

This is all on his Obama-directed handlers. A middle finger to America and all Americans.

Let’s not forget that the intelligence agencies, our federal law enforcement agencies, and the State Department were all tightly controlled by the Obama administration and ultimately responsible for the poisoning of our government institutions, domestic spying, and criminal interference with a presidential election. These agencies weren’t protecting Hillary Clinton or Joe Biden, they were and are protecting Barack Obama. And, that was when the Obamacons weren’t stirring up racial animosity to divide Americans.

Classic misdirection! 

The excuse given by the White House Press Office was that, after 22 years, presidents stopped going to Hawaii to memorialize Pearl Harbor. Totally bullshit considering the distance and logistics moving between Washington and Hawaii and the distance between Washington and New York. 

Meanwhile, the professional liars in the White House Press office are loudly proclaiming that the money being released is not a ransom, but a routine prisoner swap. Of course, the liars refuse to name the high-value prisoners being released by the Biden Administration.

Iran crapping on America and celebrating 9/11…

Ayatollah Khamenei Marks $6 Billion 9/11 with Speech Celebrating America’s Demise

Iranian dictator Ayatollah Ali Khamenei celebrated the demise of “the arrogant power of America” in a speech in Tehran on Monday, the 22nd anniversary of the September 11 attacks on the U.S. homeland by radical Muslim terrorists.

Khamenei’s remarks, in which he celebrated that America “has weakened and will become weaker,” preceded a report by the Associated Press claiming on Monday that leftist American President Joe Biden agreed to waive sanctions on third-party countries to allow the transfer of $6 billion in frozen funds to Iran out of banks in South Korea – a further concession as part of a prisoner swap first reported in early August.

The initial reports on the deal suggested that the Iranian terrorist state would release five Americans in exchange for a “handful” of Iranian convicts in America and $6 billion, but the Americans in question have only been released out of the country’s notorious Evin prison into house arrest and are reportedly not free at press time. The reports, citing the Iranian mission to the United Nations, claimed the money would travel from South Korean banks to Qatar. The concessions reported on Monday are reportedly meant to facilitate that transfer by not punishing banks aiding the transfer for violating existing sanctions. <Source>

Let us not forget that it was pro-Islam President Obama that bypassed the Senate to conger up a deal that would allow Iran to become a nuclear power. The deal bypassing prudent enforceable inspections and placing no restrictions on the development of intercontinental ballistic missiles that could strike America and her allies. At the same time, denigrating and disparaging Israel, America’s only true ally in the region. 

Bottom line…

There was no compelling interest in giving $6 billion dollars to a state sponsor of terrorism or incentivizing the false detention of American citizens. 

The progressive communist democrats cannot be trusted with the safety and security of the United States and represent a clear and present danger to democracy as they continue to ignore the U.S. Constitution and the Rule of Law with their police-state tactics. 

We are so screwed if we do not elect an overwhelming GOP majority in 2024 — one that can overcome the “Republicans in Name Only” who jump the aisle to vote with the progressive communist democrats.

These are not the Democrats of my parent’s generation, America-loving, socially liberal well-meaning individuals, these are straight up communists, media propagandists, and their useful idiots.

— Steve

 

 

 

REMEMBERING 9/11…

It has been 21 years since the 9/11/2001 cowardly sneak attack on America by terrorists  -- an event that killed thousands and forever changed the lives of thousands of more individuals.

As we solemnly remember those 2,977 innocent Americans and others who lost their lives simply because they went to work that fateful day or boarded a plane destined to enter history, let us reflect on how the world has changed.

George W. Bush responded to the attack with overwhelming force, not against Afghanistan and the Taliban, who harbored Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda, but against Saddam Hussein and Iraq—operating under the specious theory we needed to overthrow a Middle East dictatorship and democratize a country with a history of totalitarianism. The thinking was that we could use this success to demonstrate to others in the region that they should follow U.S. dictates or suffer a similar fate. A failed attempt at nation-building that drained our treasury and mired us in other regional conflicts.

New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, the take-charge leader that led New York's recovery efforts, has since devolved into a rather pathetic figure, seemingly intoxicated, hair-dye running down his face, as he spins wild conspiracy theories that go beyond the actual evidence of election tampering.

Former President Obama and the top people in his administration who were mostly anti-America, anti-white, anti-Semitic, anti-Israel, and pro-Islam, are still deeply embedded in the leadership and bureaucracy of our nation.

All of the military men, continue their pompously strutting but are generally satisfied with their participation in a twenty-year debacle that ended up with America's first unconditional surrender of a country -- resulting in a Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, and Americans leaving Americans behind enemy lines as they withdraw in disgrace.

As for al Qaeda, the terrorist group led by Osama bin Laden, and the Taliban who provided the resources, unfortunately, a mentally-incapacitated President Biden and the anti-America Obamacons who pull his strings, have re-armed and empowered our enemy.

Let us remember that the Democrats allowed the massive immigration of Islamic individuals into our nation, including those Muslims that serve openly in Congress. Like the despicable un-Americans like corrupt Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), both anti-white, anti-Semitic, and anti-Israel.  Do not forget Keith X, Keith Ellison (D-MN), whose association with Louis Farrakhan and the militant black Nation of Islam is rarely mentioned.

Perhaps the real lesson to be learned today is that we must defend the United States from its enemies, both foreign and domestic, hitting them with overwhelming force without regard for collateral damage, and leaving with the promise of returning if necessary--not rebuilding that which we destroyed.

Recognizing that it is futile to attempt to take a confederation of regional authoritarian tribal powers and transform them into a somewhat democratic national state that would be respected and protected by their own army and national police force. You cannot take a medieval region into modernity if they lack a sense of nationalism, the critical civic institutions, deep educational resources, and the necessary industrialization to create a self-sustaining economy. You cannot impose any government or law which does not comport with Islam, the Quran, and the various writings of The Prophet.

As we remember the collapsing Twin Towers with people jumping to their deaths rather than being burned alive, those at the Pentagon, and Danny Lewin and the other brave passengers who crashed their aircraft into a Pennsylvania field rather than the White House, perhaps we should re-dedicate ourselves to protecting and defending our Constitution and restoring faith in our civic institutions by dealing with political corruption and the inroads of communism.

Let us honor the sacrifices of those who died and the many still suffering by restoring American exceptionalism and our national honor.

Let us not forget, the tragedy and terrorism of 9/11 are not over but have been empowered by those who rather protect their self-interests rather than our exceptional nation. Our enemies are still here in America and growing stronger each day. 

Once again, we are reminded that there are hundreds of millions of individuals whose religion commands them to enslave or kill anyone, not of their intolerant religion…

Bottom line …

Let us remember that it was Democrats that birthed Islamo-Fascism in Iran (Carter), allowed North Korea to go nuclear, and China to improve their missile guidance technology (Clinton), stabilized the Iranian economy and the production of ballistic missiles capable of reaching the U.S., and set Iran on a course to develop nuclear weapons (Obama). At the same time, Hillary Clinton and Eric Holder were approving the sale of uranium to Russia.

Unless Islam is reformed, it represents a clear and present danger to America and the non-Muslim world. Do not let the far-left Democrat liberals in our government convince you otherwise. Unless we circumvent political corruption, our country will fall from within and be conquered by dollars, not bullets. 

We need to elect leaders and keep our eyes open and focused on those who pretend they are friends of the United States, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and Turkey come immediately to mind. There are no moderate Muslims – and if there are, they are ineffective in controlling the crazies among them.

We need to understand that our Constitution is not a suicide pact – and that we can take decisive action against religious threats as if they were any other enemy initiative.

“Vigilance and Peace Through Strength” are concepts that are not well understood by the Democrat party and its far-left liberal Marxist infiltrators.

DUE TO PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN, THE ENEMY IS BACK AND STRONGER THAN BEFORE--ARMED WITH U.S. MILITARY GEAR! 

We are so screwed.

Be well, be safe, and take care of yourself and your family first.

-- steve 

SUFFERING FROM PROGRESSIVE COMMUNIST DEMOCRAT DEPRESSION

In recent years, we've witnessed a growing trend of political depression sweeping across our nation.

It's not just a feeling of disillusionment with our current political system; it's a pervasive sense of hopelessness, frustration, and disengagement.

While it's perfectly normal to feel disheartened by the state of politics, succumbing to political depression can be dangerous.

Political depression is not a new phenomenon, but it has become increasingly more pronounced in recent years with the battles between the progressive communist democrats and anyone standing in the way of their tyrannical power grab.

The most shocking example of a sustained political attack can be found in the often egregious and unfounded persecution of former president Donald Trump, his associates in and out of the administration, and those innocents that participated in the January 6 freedom rally and were caught up in the mob and apparently following the orders of the Capitol police.

Several factors are contributing to the rise of an apprehensive or apathetic populace…

1. Polarization: Extreme political polarization between the progressive communist democrats, the disaffected independents, establishment Republicans, and conservative members of the GOP, has made it difficult to find common ground, leading many to feel alienated from the political process.

2. Misinformation: The spread of misinformation and fake news has eroded trust in the corporatized media and partisan institutions, making it challenging to discern fact from fiction.

3. Disillusionment: The failure of posturing political leaders to address pressing health and economic issues, coupled with empty promises, has left many individuals feeling dissatisfied, disillusioned, and depressed.

4. Extremism: Political depression can drive some individuals further towards extreme ideologies and actions as they seek an outlet for their frustration, making them more susceptible to social division, as people retreat into social media echo chambers where their views are reinforced. Forgetting that the world reflected in the social media does not often comport with reality.

Bottom line…

Political depression is a real and growing concern, but it's essential to recognize that the root cause is the fundamental transformation of America as promised by the Communist-in-Chief, former president Barack Obama and his cadre of radical acolytes, that are determined to destroy America from within. Followed by the hollow presidency of Joe Biden who is being stage-managed by Obama’s acolytes.

It’s now up to you to redress this sad state of affairs in 2024 before we are well and truly screwed.

— Steve

PROGRESSIVES SUSPEND SECOND AMENDMENT WITH A STROKE OF THE PEN

Deja vu, all over again…

Once again, we find a progressive communist democrat suspending the Constitution’s Second Amendment with the stroke of a pen, pretending they have supra-constitutional authority based on a bogus “public health emergency.”

Suspending your inalienable right to self defense…

New Mexico governor issues order suspending the right to carry firearms in public across Albuquerque SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham on Friday issued an emergency order suspending the right to carry firearms in public across Albuquerque and the surrounding county for at least 30 days in response to a spate of gun violence. The Democratic governor said she expects legal challenges but was compelled to act because of recent shootings, including the death of an 11-year-old boy outside a minor league baseball stadium this week. Lujan Grisham said state police would be responsible for enforcing what amount to civil violations. Albuquerque police Chief Harold Medina said he won’t enforce it, and Bernalillo County Sheriff John Allen said he’s uneasy about it because it raises too many questions about constitutional rights. The firearms suspension, classified as an emergency public health order, applies to open and concealed carry in most public places, from city sidewalks to urban recreational parks. The restriction is tied to a threshold for violent crime rates currently only met by the metropolitan Albuquerque. Police and licensed security guards are exempt from the temporary ban.  <Source>

Considering everything can be considered to impact “public health,” this amounts to granting unchecked and unlimited power to an authoritarian government.

The real problem is crime control, not gun control…

If you haven’t noticed, the progressive communist democrats are pandering to one of their core constituencies, the minorities that commit a disproportionate number of crimes in proportion to their representation in the general population. Or as former Attorney General Eric Holder might say, a disproportionate or disparate impact! 

It is the progressive communist democrats who are behind lawlessness with their defund the police policies, treating police errors in apprehending resisting suspects as crimes, and attempting to disarm law-abiding citizens — thus, creating a larger pool of victims for the crazies, criminals, and terrorists who do not respect nor follow any law.

Progressive craziness…

Some progressive communist democrats have openly declared that looting is permissible if the looter “needs” the stolen item. As if looters need expensive electronics or other luxury items. Others claim this is a form of “reparations.” They refuse to say, “Stealing is wrong and will not be tolerated.”

Here in California, looting and shoplifting is a misdemeanor if the merchandise stolen is less than $950 — per occurrence. Well-meaning employees are fired if they attempt to stop a crime in progress. Stores are shutting down rather than suffer continuing losses. And, if the perpetrator makes it to court, it is likely that the George Soros-backed prosecutor will dismiss the case, plea bargain the charges down, ask for a “diversion” program, or simply refuse to prosecute. And this is for both major and minor crimes.

On the national scene, this is being repeated by the DOJ which is overlooking Hunter Biden’s many local, state, and federal crimes that would see ordinary individuals being prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Or, in the case of the January 6 participants, treated as political prisoners with egregiously outrageous sentences. 

Bottom line…

We are experiencing conditions like those found in a banana republic where the progressive communist democrats are making it up as they go along, ignoring historical precedent to punish their enemies. 

This cannot be tolerated by law-abiding citizens in a constitutional republic. This must be redressed in the 2024 election with an overwhelming majority that nullifies the democrats acting as Republicans in the GOP — people like Mitt Romney, Lindsey Graham, Susan Collins, and a number of others who routinely jump the aisle after stabbing the GOP in the back on close votes. Not that many in the GOP have the cojones to push back against tyrannical progressive communist democrats.

We are so screwed.

— Steve

 

PROGRESSIVE COMMUNIST DEMOCRATS OUT OF CONTROL

Justice delayed is Justice denied. ~ William Gladstone 

It is now time for the judiciary to discipline its own and to redress a two-tiered justice system that is rapidly destroying the U.S. Constitution and the Rule of Law.

It appears we cannot rely on our elected representatives, many of whom are enthralled by the progressive communist democrats or possibly being blackmailed and coerced by our intelligence and law enforcement agencies — threatened with the disclosure of personal foibles or prosecution for real or imagined crimes.

How out of control?

Georgia special grand jury recommended charges against 39 people, including Sen. Lindsey Graham

uThe special grand jury that investigated efforts by Donald Trump and others to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results recommended indictments against twice as many people as the 19 ultimately charged by prosecutors, leaving South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham among those not indicted.

The grand jurors’ report released Friday showed they recommended racketeering charges against 39 people, including Graham, former U.S. Sens. Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue of Georgia and former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn. Charging recommendations against others included false statements and writings, influencing witnesses and criminal solicitation to commit election fraud.

Released at the request of the special grand jury, the report provides insight into one of the most expansive investigations into Trump, who is also facing two federal indictments along with unrelated state charges in New York City. While critics have accused Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis of launching an unwieldy, overly broad investigation, the report suggests she used her discretion to streamline the case. <Source>

This is pure, unadulterated communism! The Democrats are projecting their very actions onto their opposition, criminalizing free speech and political activities over which the Court has no jurisdiction. Jurisdiction over political matters lies with Congress. 

Outrage!

It appears that the Biden Administration is considering implementing a policy to contain illegal immigrants in Texas, full well knowing that if Texas flips from a red state to a blue state, the GOP will never be able to win another Presidential election, in which case the progressive communist democrats will reverse their position on eliminating the electoral college. That an to eliminate the pressure from whiny blue state governors who are reaping the malignant rewards of their sanctuary cities.

Since when do American politicians vote for policies that advance the interests of foreign nationals, in this case foreign nationals who have entered the United States illegally, over American citizens?

It’s all about the communist Cloward-Piven strategy of overwhelming our social welfare systems to bring about chaos and the collapse of the capitalist system — to be replaced with a centralized authoritarian communist government.

Bottom line… 

Make the Democrats prove their case or be charged with interfering with a presidential election. Where are all of the Republican attorneys general or prosecutors?

We are so screwed when we see our beloved nation being overrun by illegal aliens and our laws subverted by communists within our government.

When are the Republicans going to find their balls? Maybe they should look in Hillary,k Clinton’s pocket or ask Nancy Pelosi to return them? Don’t bother asking Mitch McConnell or Lindsey Graham.

I say again, we are so screwed.

— Steve

THEY’RE SCARED OF TRUMP

Trump’s unpredictability, more than his anger at his enemies, scares the bejesus out of those who owe their livelihood and freedom from prosecution to the progressive communist democrats…

George Soros's foundation is worried that former President Donald Trump will win the 2024 election and undermine globalist "unity," while warning of supposed harms coming from a potential "MAGA-style Republican victory" more generally.

The Open Society Foundations (OSF), which Mr. Soros' 37-year-old son, Alex Soros now leads, is "adapting" so that it's able to respond to whatever political scenario emerges after the dust settles from next year's presidential election in America.

"We are adapting OSF to be able to respond to whatever scenarios might emerge, on both sides of the Atlantic," George Soros' son wrote in a recent op-ed for Politico headlined "No Soros retreat from Europe." <Source>

Compared to any progressive communist democrats, Trump seems to be the infinitely greater choice for America.

 

However, I am waiting for him to stop attacking Ron DeSantis and airing his petty grievances and start telling me how he plans to win the general election against Biden, Newsom, or an “as yet to be announced” candidate. Until then, ho hum. 

On the computer scene, still recovering and reloading my system, removing or minimizing Microsoft’s boot on my neck. I do not plan to reload Chrome as my alternative browser due to Google’s new invasive tracking and ad platform. 

On the legal front, police-state indictments are flying and disproportionate sentencing is obviously a warning from the progressive communist democrats to their opposition. It looks like they want to repeat the old playbook, locking down voters to force them to vote by mail. Definitely an environment conducive to voting fraud.

 

We are so screwed.

 

— Steve

WE LIVE IN SCARY TIMES

There is no doubt in my mind that the progressive communist democrats, their media propagandists, and the government-coerced tech oligarchs are all becoming a clear and present danger to America.

We saw what Amazon did to the free speech platform Parler, while hosting competitor Twitter — whose radical, subversive, and obscene content was far worse than the content carried by Parler.

Moreover, Twitter silenced those legitimate credentialed medical voices discussing medical information we now know to be true or the legitimacy of Hunter Biden’s laptop which we now know was not a Russian disinformation operation. We also know that our government was complicit in censoring accurate information and canceling dissident voices.

So I ask, Why would you allow such an organization to maintain your medical records, provide healthcare, or, in this case, control your life-dependent drug supply?

Bottom Line…

Isn’t it about time we stopped handing the progressive communist democrats a loaded gun to be used on behalf of an increasingly authoritarian and tyrannical government?

We are so screwed.

— Steve

BILL GATES, AMERICA'S HOME-GROWN GEORGE SOROS

Someone is crazy, and it isn’t me…

I cannot believe that billionaire Bill Gates, reputed to be a brilliant individual, would let his Seattle, Washington, liberal roots cloud his judgment and overpower both his intellect and common sense.

Consider the facts as we currently understand them…

1. Global warming is a construct concocted by globalists to gain and maintain political power.

2. Man cannot directly measure his impact on global climate amid the natural variability of climate and the nature of long climate cycles.

3. No optimum temperature exists, given the temperance variation between the equator and the polar regions. The raw data has been corrupted by nonsensical statistical manipulation and has become unreliable. The best data is relatively short-term satellite data which remains uncoupled by artificial manipulation.

4. No force on Earth can overcome the natural drivers of climate change: the Sun’s energy output in all spectral bands, cosmic rays and cloud formation, the Earth’s position relative to the Sun, the Earth’s precessional and rotational dynamics, plate tectonics and vulcanology, the deep ocean currents, the internal dynamics of the Earth, and the most significant greenhouse gas of all” water vapor.

5. The Earth has been hotter and colder, with more carbon dioxide and less carbon dioxide. The only reason the globalists are fixated on carbon dioxide and methane is that they are carbon-based as are fossil fuels which, if controlled, are the key to controlling economies. 

6. Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant but an essential ingredient of life – necessary for plants and trees to produce life-sustaining oxygen.

Yet we find Bill Gates proposing to cut down living, healthy trees and burying the remains underground to lock up their carbon content.

This is sheer madness if not downright stupidity—with even the tree-hugging environmentalists decrying deforestation.

Did Gates fail junior high school science, where we learned living trees absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and give us oxygen in return?

If you think I am kidding, consider this from MIT, one of the most prestigious schools of science and engineering…

CLIMATE CHANGE AND ENERGY A stealth effort to bury wood for carbon removal has just raised millions Kodama has raised more than $6 million from Bill Gates’ climate fund and other investors, as it pursues new ways to reduce wildfire risks and lock away carbon in harvested trees. A California startup is pursuing a novel, if simple, plan for ensuring that dead trees keep carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere for thousands of years: burying their remains underground. Kodama Systems, a forest management company based in the Sierra Nevada foothills town of Sonora, has been operating in stealth mode since it was founded last summer. But MIT Technology Review can now report the company has raised around $6.6 million from Bill Gates’s climate fund Breakthrough Energy Ventures, as well as Congruent Ventures and other investors. In addition, the payments company Stripe will reveal on Thursday that it’s provided a $250,000 research grant to the company and its research partner, the Yale Carbon Containment Lab, as part of a broader carbon removal announcement. That grant will support a pilot effort to bury waste biomass harvested from California forests in the Nevada desert and study how well it prevents the release of greenhouse gases that drive climate change. A handful of research groups and startups have begun exploring the potential to lock up the carbon in wood, by burying or otherwise storing tree remains in ways that slow down decomposition. Trees are naturally efficient at sucking down vast amounts of carbon dioxide from the air, but they release the carbon again when they die and rot on the ground. Sequestering trees underground could prevent this. If biomass burial works as well as hoped, it may provide a relatively cheap and easy way to pull down some share of the billions of tons of greenhouse gas that studies find may need to be removed to keep global temperatures in check in the coming decades. <Source>

It appears money talks, and bullshit follows.

Bottom line…

Bill Gates has nothing to lose. He is well-insulated from the consequences of his madness as he jets around the world, telling others how to live their lives.

I  don’t give a crap how brilliant Gates might be or how quick he absorbs information from his funding-biased scientist sources; he appears to have become a dangerous progressive communist democrat loon – an abortion-loving de-growther and a proponent of untested vaccines and artificial meat.

To even suggest that you might be willing to consider destroying over 70 million acres of trees and burying the remains to fight global warming is a mark of insanity that requires urgent medical intervention.

We are so screwed when rule-making politicians are willing to parrot Gates’ fever dream in return for the proverbial thirty pieces of silver in campaign funding. Or, is Bill Gates being coerced by the deep state?

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

THE BATTLE FOR MY SYSTEM CONTINUES

My computer has now had its operating system restored, software applications reloaded and tested, and everything is functional. Yet, I am majorly unhappy.

It appears that the latest versions of Windows 10 and Windows 11 “force” you into adopting Microsoft’s invasive infrastructure that goes beyond its routine telemetry surveillance system. Specifically, the newer installation demands that you create or login to a Microsoft account. The option to create a non-, or should I say less-invasive, “local account” has disappeared from the initial setup screen.

Mysteriously, your settings – including any stored passwords are automatically transferred from an unknown location in the cloud to its Edge Browser to the newly installed system. You find yourself connected to the company’s OneDrive cloud storage ecosystem, which is backing up your data in the background – including sensitive information. You suddenly find OneDrive incorporated into file paths, which can complicate file manipulation issues. Funny how my “free” teaser of 5 gigabytes of storage was filled with crap I would not typically save.

You are also plagued with the installation of Teams, the company’s collaboration effort, which must be removed manually from the startup folder.

You can no longer select which Office applications are installed locally; everything is loaded and taking up valuable space for programs you want by programs you will never use.

PrtScr (PrintScreen) functionality has changed as it now links to Microsoft's own program which inhibits my workflow.

I am pissed!

I have spent a significant amount of time and effort reloading my system and getting it functional. And I am about to flush it all away and reload my system again. This time, bypassing much of Microsoft’s nonsense by forcing the creation of a local account. The workaround is to turn off Wi-Fi at the first create login screen and hit the backspace option on the screen. This will force the creation of a local account, and you can load the operating system, reestablish your Wi-Fi connection to download the numerous updates, tweak various options, remove worthless cruft applications that are automatically installed, and then reinstall your applications programs.

Is it worth it? You bet!

There are a number of petty annoyances which you must work through, not to mention tweaking the settings of your application programs to reestablish your workflow.

Bottom line…

The tech tyrants are winning and it is only a matter of time until they force their  sick “woke” agenda down your throat— demanding you support the progressive communist democrats and their evil agenda.

Remember, all the big cloud service, Microsoft, Google, and Amazon are all dependent on the government and employ former politicians and former NSA, CIA, and FBI agents in their security departments. 

Our freedom is rapidly eroding and few politicians support a digital bill of rights with strong sanctions against company executives who are all willing to use the company’s money to pay those “record” fines to the government rather than face personal consequences including prison time.

We must recapture the House, Senate, and Presidency with an unassailable majority mandate.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

LABOR DAY 2023: A REMINDER THAT THE COMMUNISTS ARE DESTROYING OUR COMPANIES, OUR GOVERNMENT, AND OUR NATION

Labor Day, the first Monday in September, was a creation of the labor movement and was dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers.

Initially, it was designed as a yearly nationwide tribute to the contributions workers have made to the prosperity and well-being of our country. To mark a long struggle for safety and worker's rights.

Unfortunately, due to the infiltration of the labor movement by organized crime, Marxists, socialists, and communists – much of the true meaning of this day has been lost. And it has become just another holiday for the nation.

We are seeing the creation of unionized government bureaucracies that do not function under the same rules as the majority of the private sector—holding entire sectors of the government hostage. Holding politicians hostage in return for campaign funds and voter support. A self-sustaining critical mass of government workers who can ask the government to vote them higher wages, more extensive benefits, less work, or suffer the consequences. The public be damned.

In the private sector, we see a similar story. Pushed on by ever-rising wages, health and welfare benefits, outrageous retirement plans, and outrageous work rules, the competitive nature of American industry has been dramatically affected, and much of our industrial base has been outsourced abroad.

Labor leaders are often thuggish characters more about amassing personal and political power by supporting politicians and their parties with their member's dues – regardless of the political position of the members themselves. Like politicians, they lack that smoothness when they lie to the public or their membership. While big business has its share of shady characters and egregious behaviors, so does America's labor and political movement. Both have become big business for power players.

Therefore, while I might salute individual workers on this holiday, I say that big labor and its unions are growing cancer on the body politic – and must be abolished before they rot our nation into a socialist shell of a third-world country.

History is replete with examples of the Marxist and Communist domination of labor … and it would be naive to think that it is any different today.

So raise a glass to the decent, hard-working Americans who actually do the necessary work – with quiet ability, confidence, and competence – while saying, at the very same time, screw the corrupt unions which are dragging our nation into a polarized world of socialism or worse.

Bottom line... -- Steve

THE HIDDEN DANGERS OF SUNK COSTS

As I continue the time-consuming and arduous task of rebuilding my computer from scratch, the life lessons are endless…

One of the most pressing and annoying problems I faced during the system recovery was whether or not to keep programs and data files accumulated over the years. The two major mental issues I encountered could be summed up by JIC, just in case, and sunk costs. Of the two, the JIC issues were the most troublesome.

The nightmare of JIC…

Should I keep that article that may still be useful in the unspecified future? Will I ever need that invoice or digitized receipt? What to do about documents that have medical, legal, or financial implications? There are no easy answers. However, an attitude adjustment might be required before you are officially designated as a hoarder..

Medical records – most physicians will not read, or even quickly scan, that stack of documents you have provided. They will perform current tests, for which they are paid, and may consider some of your anecdotal history if you have an unusual case. I decided to archive my detailed medical history on an external drive, possibly to be read and summarized by an AI-powered assistant sometime in the future.

Financial and legal records – Unless they provide proof of ownership for legal, tax, or insurance purposes, back them up to two safe places and leave them off your system. The best guideline for record retention comes from the IRS and can be found here.

The agony of sunk costs, the psychological impact of not letting go

To grasp the psychological danger of sunk costs, you must first realize that sunk costs are the expenses or investments you have already made and cannot be recovered. While it may seem rational to consider these costs when making decisions, clinging to them can lead to a life of clutter and craziness. Somewhat like that semi-valuable antique, you have never found time to sell in the past ten years.

Generally, sunk costs should not influence future decisions.

My problem was fixating on multi-thousand-dollar software packages that still worked but were outdated. Undoubtedly, I had spent a significant amount of money and time mastering a difficult learning curve. And, who knows if I might want to “do something” in the future? They went in the recycle bin as I hadn’t done anything but transfer them from computer to computer for at least five years. Being older seemed to make the decision easier. I also dumped a number of old software installation CDs, some diskettes, and my favorites, DC-2120 backup tapes for which there are no compatible drives.

Bottom line…

JIC and sunk costs are a natural part of life, but they can also be dangerous distractions if we allow them to cloud our judgment and clutter our lives. I am convinced that we can lead more fulfilling and successful lives by recognizing, considering, and avoiding the hidden dangers of JIC issues and sunk costs.

After my computer-induced attitude adjustment, I think I am prepared to clean off my desk, clean out my closets, and reduce the cruft in my life. Now, if Microsoft, Adobe, and others did something similar, the world would be a better place.

As for politics, same shit, different day.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

A SYSTEM CRASH OPENED MY EYES

For those who believe that every problem sows the seeds of opportunity, you may be right...

For the last three days, my eyes have been opened as I struggled with first trying to restore a backup that had passed a validity check and then using the nuclear option of rebuilding my system from the bare metal.

Some of the things I learned along the way...

(1)  Backup software, even professional-grade software, can be dodgy in ways that are not apparent until you face a data disaster. In this case, the validation feature prominently displayed in the center of the screen is misleading. It may mean that your data file is valid, but the disk file system is corrupted, so you cannot restore the entire system. Likewise, critical hidden files may not be captured. Luckily, I use other software to protect my data files, not the installed programs.

(2)  Then there is Microsoft... putting more cruft in their installations, which pack unwanted and unnecessary features into their bloated programs -- and then force you to adopt their work process even though you must re-tool your own workflow. And, of course, they are trying to force you into the cloud -- where they hold the keys to the kingdom and can unilaterally scan your data without your permission—using a pay-as-you-go money-spinning scheme to generate outlandish profits on some products that have seen better days—forcing you to use a Microsoft account to download third-party software.  Even with a new installation from Microsoft's latest software release -- expect to spend hours updating and tweaking settings.

(3)  Even my blog provider gave me some grief. I use third-party blogging software to post entries and needed the vendor's server address. They told me, straight up, that they don't support third-party software and to use their inferior software offering -- telling me that it may have some new features. Of course, this was lousy customer service and pure bullshit from a company whose aging platform has seen numerous issues—time to reconsider our 17-year relationship.

(4)  You can do everything right and still get screwed by the fickle finger of fate wielded by Father Time.

Bottom line...

It's great to have a fallback position of simply walking away from the bullshit.

It appears that we are in deep doo-doo -- a full-on communist rebellion and a police state enforcing the nonsense that would have our ancestors running our tarred and feathered politicians out of town on a rail.

We are screwed.

-- Steve

STILL STRUGGLING

M$ SCREEN OF DEATH

Another day, another update…

Today’s hiatus from politics is brought to you courtesy of Microsoft and their infamously crappy update process which scrambled a portion of their equally dodgy Windows 10 operating system.

I use backup and recovery software and perform a nightly backup, saving critical legal or financial files to another location when created.

So, when this minor annoyance struck, I attempted to repair the system but couldn’t get the system to do anything after logon but display a black screen with a flashing system tray at the bottom.

I tried an alternate account login and booting into safe mode, but no joy was found in either effort.

I booted my system from a bootable removable drive with recovery software and set about backing up the damaged system in situ for further investigation. This is an extremely time-consuming process.

After the hours-long process, it is my intention to copy some selected directories to an external drive before restoring yesterday’s validated backup. Then, on to restoring select data files to bring the system current to today — and soldier on after another backup. 

UPDATE: Validated backups indicating corrupt index — new plan required.

In the meantime, I will do some further research on Vivek Ramaswamy, who I believe is an opportunistic poseur kissing Donald Trump’s ass for a position in his Administration if he should win. Otherwise, boost his own name brand which he will use to monetize his ventures. In my opinion, he appears to be an inexperienced man not to be trusted with our nation’s affairs.

Bottom line…

M$hit happens and we are so screwed.

— Steve

DO THE DEMOCRATS HAVE THE HONESTY TO GO FULL COMMIE?

We are faced with the clear and present danger of communism in the form of a Trojan Horse, the modern Democrat Party…

Long infiltrated by hardcore communists, agitators, and activists, the Democrats control most of our government, institutions, and infrastructure. They have weaponized the government against the people and destroyed our sovereignty with open borders. They have wrecked our economy and produced another generation of ill-educated, mush-minded, useful idiots in their K-college indoctrination programs. 

So why won’t the Democrats elect an out-and-out communist like Bernie Sanders instead of a closeted one like Barack Obama?

Almost…

Undoubtedly, Bernie Sanders remains a prominent figure within the Democratic Party and played a significant role in influencing the progressive communist democrat platform and policy discussions, particularly in the 2016 presidential primaries. Sanders was the front-running candidate, laid low by Hillary Clinton and the DNC.

Likewise, there is little doubt that Hillary Clinton and her cadre of Communist Clintonistas conspired with the Democratic National Committee (DNC) to steal the presidential nomination from Bernie Sanders in the 2016 Democratic primary season. Much of the evidence revealed in the release of allegedly hacked DNC emails demonstrated DNC bias against Sanders. Although the DNC claimed that Russia hacked the emails, the FBI was prevented from thoroughly investigating the alleged email server breach by the DNC and stonewalled the investigation of the mysterious murder of DNC Staffer Seth Rich, who favored Sanders and had access to the emails. Rich was said to be the victim of a robbery – where nothing was taken. Except his laptop kept mysteriously appearing and disappearing. Moreover, the head of the DNC, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, had her own laptop scandal involving foreign nationals with access to the Democrat’s IT systems.

Again?

On the Trail: Why Bernie Sanders is back in NH on Saturday

Longtime progressive champion Sen. Bernie Sanders returns to the New Hampshire on Saturday, a trip that’s sure to generate plenty of political buzz ahead of next year’s presidential primaries.

Sanders will deliver a speech entitled “The Agenda America Needs” at Saint Anselm College’s New Hampshire Institute of Politics that a release from the populist independent senator highlighted will “lay out a concrete agenda which speaks to the needs of a long-neglected working class.”

“I have always believed that good public policy is good politics,” the two-time runner-up for the Democratic presidential nomination said in a statement promoting the address. “The American people are increasingly disgusted at the growing levels of income and wealth inequality in our country and the rampant corporate greed we are seeing.”

Sanders, who won the 2016 and 2020 Democratic presidential primaries in the longtime first-in-the-nation primary state, will deliver his speech at the Institute, which has been a must-stop for White House hopefuls for over two decades.

And his latest trip to New Hampshire is sparking speculation. <Source>

There is no doubt that the grandfatherly-like communist Bernie Sanders resonates with a younger, college-indoctrinated crowd and represents a clear threat to the corrupt cognitively impaired Joe Biden and interloper California Governor Gavin “Gruesome” Newsom, who is waiting for Biden to stumble and die. Nobody in the progressive communist democrat party believes the unlikeable and incoherent Vice President Kamala “Haughty” Harris is a viable candidate for any office.

Colorado’s "Che " Guevara…

Colorado Dems Go Full Commie, Choose Open Marxist Who Calls for Cultural Revolution for State House Seat Just in case you have any lingering doubt about what the Democrats plan to inflict upon America, consider the case of Tim Hernández, whom Colorado party apparatchiks have just selected to fill a vacant state House seat in the Denver area. The charming Hernández is an open and proud Marxist, frequently rails against “Whiteness,” and has called for a “FORCEFUL Cultural Revolution.” He is also a schoolteacher, busy raising up new cadres of Bolsheviks to bring about the revolution he desires. Every Marxist revolution in history has been accompanied by appalling bloodlust; if Hernández ever gets what he wants, Coloradans can’t say they didn’t see it coming. Fox News reported Monday that Hernández was “selected as a state representative for the Denver area on Saturday by a committee of Democrats tasked with filling the vacant seat after its incumbent, Serena Gonzales-Gutierrez, was elected to the Denver City Council.” Before that, Comrade Hernández indoctrinated children under the unsuspecting noses of their parents, working at Aurora West Preparatory Academy in the Aurora Public Schools District. He kept this job despite hanging signs in his classroom reading “Black Lives Matter” and “Dismantle White systems.” Or maybe he kept the job because he was so flamboyantly and unapologetically leftist in a heavily leftist area. Hernández made where he stood abundantly clear when he ranted at a protest about how to bring about the Marxist revolution that apparently everyone present wanted: “We like to compete who knows Marx better, who knows these things better, who’s a Leninist. Listen, all right, I’ll give you a real take on this s—t. Kids don’t care.” He meant that talking Marxism was less important that acting to bring the revolution about: Yes, it’s important to know theory. But you have to do some practices, you have to get out into the streets. You have to get into your workplace. You have to go to your families. If we are just sitting, talking in an ideological circle, our kids are still going to schools that are underfunded where they are investing more in their failure than in their success. Your [communist] theory will not save you. The revolution…will happen in the hood. It will not be led by who understand Lenin best, it will not be led by the deepest Marxists. The people will lead the revolution….And I say all of this because I’m a teacher. Yeah, that’s the scary part. Fox notes that he has “signaled that he was including lessons on communist theory in his classroom.” He recommends that children “be shown the movie ‘A Bug’s Life’ followed by a lesson on ‘proletariat revolution,’ meaning a social revolution in which the working class attempts to overthrow the bourgeoisie.” He boasted at one far-left rally: I tell my students the truth.” Tim Hernández in the Colorado State House is a veritable poster child for the maladies of our age. Communist regimes the world over have terrorized and murdered their own people and driven their economies off a cliff. There has never been one anywhere that made life better for those who had the misfortune to have to endure it. The Colorado Democrats, if they had any modicum of good sense left, would have expelled Tim Hernández from the party, not given him a state House seat. However, it’s all out in the open now that they have done so. You want Marxist revolution? You want to be a slave of the all-powerful, all-encompassing, rabidly violent and conscienceless state? Register as a Democrat. <Source>

Bottom line…

Why you should reject communism beyond national security…

1. Preserving Freedom, Liberty, and Individual Rights: American values emphasize individual freedom and liberty, emphasizing the protection of individual rights, such as freedom of speech, religion, and the press

2. Equality, Justice, and The Rule of Law: American values include the principles of equality and justice for all, deeply rooted in the rule of law.

3. Democracy, Representation, with Checks and Balances: The United States is founded on the principles of democracy and representative government with a system of checks and balances to prevent any one branch of government from becoming too powerful.

4. National Unity with Inclusivity and Diversity: American values celebrate inclusivity and diversity, promoting national unity by supporting leaders who seek common ground and work toward the betterment of the nation rather than divisive interests.

5. Innovation and Progress: American values encourage innovation and progress that helps the United States advance the country's prosperity  and maintain its role as a global leader 

This is not the story that the progressive communist democrats and their media propagandists tell as they create classes of victims and set them against each other to create their revolution. Promising to address their individual grievances in return for political power, which, historically, turns into corrupt authoritarian dictatorships.

Ask yourself why Bernie Sanders just endorsed a corrupt dysfunctional Biden for the Presidency of the United States. 

They Democrats appear to be winning, so get off your ass and fight back by registering more Republicans and seeing they vote.

Otherwise, we are so screwed.

-- Steve

WAS THE FBI PROTECTING OBAMA AND NOT HILLARY CLINTON OR JOE BIDEN?

It is now plausible that the FBI, NSA, and CIA were protecting former President Obama’s nefarious activities when they declined to prosecute Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden for the use of pseudonymous e-mail addresses that violated national defense and government policies -- and may have revealed government corruption and complicity.

National Archives acknowledges 5,400 Biden pseudonym emails, faces lawsuit for their release The National Archives and Records Administration acknowledged possessing potentially up to 5,400 emails connected to then-Vice President Joe Biden's pseudonym accounts that he used to forward government information and discuss business with his son, Hunter Biden, and others, and on Monday the Southeastern Legal Foundation filed a lawsuit to compel the agency to turn over the emails. The non-profit constitutional legal group that filed the lawsuit said the archives confirmed that Biden used the pseudonyms of Robin Ware, Robert L. Peters, and JRB Ware during his time in the Obama administration. The archives' admissions confirm years of reporting from Just the News about Biden's use of a personal email as vice president and the pseudonym accounts he used. The legal foundation first filed a Freedom of Information Act request to the archives for Biden's emails in 2021 on behalf of Just the News editor-in-chief John Solomon. The legal foundation renewed its initial request last year with a second FOIA request, but the archives "has failed to produce a single one of these emails," the group said. Monday's lawsuit turns up the pressure on the archives to release the documents. "All too often, public officials abuse their power by using it for their personal or political benefit. When they do, many seek to hide it," Southeastern Legal Foundation general counsel Kimberly Hermann said. "The only way to preserve governmental integrity is for NARA to release Biden’s nearly 5,400 emails to SLF and thus the public. The American public deserves to know what is in them." <Source>

Bottom line…

Someday, someone is going to unravel the media-created myth of Barack Obama.

Until then, we are so screwed.

-- Steve

IT IS MY CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT TO AVOID SELF-HARM OR NOT COMMIT SUICIDE

As an American citizen and a member of a high-risk group, I refuse to accept any mandate, advice, or suggestion from a demonstrably corrupt Administration headed by a cognitively impaired individual whose Administration is being run by ideological and incompetent holdovers from the scandal-ridden Obama Administration.

An Administration whose top medical officials working for the leading medical agencies lied about almost everything, including the origin, spread, treatment, and outcomes related to the COVID-19 virus – including the fact that it was developed with U.S.-funded technology in our enemy’s laboratory with ties to hostile military bioweapons research.

Just in time to assist the progressive communist democrats in stealing the 2024 election by demanding mail-in balloting to avoid the spread of the new COVID variant, which seems to mutate at the speed of politics.

Biden Suggests He Will Mandate a COVID Booster for All Americans This Fall Here we go again— the Biden Administration has plans to roll out a new COVID-19 vaccine this fall, requiring Americans to get another jab. Despite declaring earlier this year that COVID is no longer a threat, President Joe Biden said his administration will "likely" recommend that all Americans receive the updated booster, including children.  [OCS: Face it! It is not Biden speaking as he merely reads the words of an anonymous Obama acolyte.] Over the weekend, the president told reporters that he plans to ask Congress for additional funds to develop a new vaccine, adding that he may force everyone to take it whether they previously received the initial vaccine. "Yes, I can," Biden said. "I signed off this morning on a proposal we have to present to Congress a request for additional funding for a new vaccine that is necessary, that works." The new vaccines, developed by Pfizer, Moderna, and Novavax, have been re-designed to target the dominant XBB variants that magically popped up just in time for the general election. The jab is expected to be rolled out sometime in mid-September. [OCS: Will these "more of the same" vaccines be tested by the FDA for efficacy and effectiveness, or receive rubber-stamped "emergency approvals" under an agreement that holds the government and vaccine manufacturers immune from adverse consequences?] Additionally, a TSA whistleblower allegedly reported that mandates would return in October. CNN also pushed the Left's Covid hysteria, citing so-called "experts" who say to "dust off those N95 masks and place them snugly over your nose and mouth to protect yourself from a recent uptick of the virus."<Source>

The government is now urging (wink-wink) the major platform operators to ramp up their efforts to combat disinformation, especially health-related disinformation…

Once again, the government is urging the conventional and social media to reassert their role as watchdogs against “conspiracy theories” ahead of the 2024 presidential election. However, what they can’t deny is that the major conspiracy theories involving the progressive communist democrats not only have been proven to be accurate but even worse than first imagined.

Operating on the specious basis that hostile foreign actors are attempting to spread disinformation to disrupt our nation, government agencies are gearing up to “protect” America and Americans by becoming the arbiters of the “truth,” much as they have become the arbiters of what is “science,” “gender,” and social justice.

Pushback – rediscovering the First Amendment right to free speech…

U.S. is barred from combating disinformation on social media. Here's what it means The government's ability to fight disinformation online has suffered a legal setback that experts say will have a chilling effect on communications between federal agencies and social media companies. [OCS: Are those the same so-called “experts” who manipulated the system for personal and political profit and blatantly lied to the American people – possibly resulting in thousands of American deaths?] A Tuesday ruling by a federal district judge in Louisiana could have far-reaching consequences for the government's ability to work with Facebook and other social media giants to address false and misleading claims about COVID, vaccines, voting, and other issues that could undermine public health and erode confidence in election results. District Court Judge Terry Doughty, who was appointed by President Donald Trump, issued a preliminary injunction on Tuesday that bars several federal departments and agencies from various interactions with social media companies. On Wednesday, the Justice Department filed a notice that it will appeal the injunction with the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans. The government also expects to ask the court to stay the district judge's decision, meaning it would not go into effect while the appeal is heard. What does the judge's ruling say? Doughty issued a temporary injunction blocking agencies including the departments of Justice, Health and Human Services, and State, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the FBI and many individual government officials from doing things like notifying platforms about specific posts that may be against their own rules or asking for information about content moderation efforts. The injunction bans interactions such as "meeting with social-media companies for the purpose of urging, encouraging, pressuring, or inducing in any manner the removal, deletion, suppression, or reduction of content containing protected free speech posted on social-media platforms". It also blocks federal agencies from flagging specific posts that contain protected free speech, encouraging social media companies to change their guidelines regarding such posts, or asking the companies to "be on the lookout" for such postings. What else is in the injunction? The ruling also prevents federal officials from working with third parties including the Election Integrity Partnership, the Virality Project, and the Stanford Internet Observatory — three academic research groups that track the spread of online information. Republicans have accused the Biden administration of attempting to outsource its alleged efforts to stifle speech to outside organizations and academics. [OCS: Are these the same third-party non-profit groups who purport to be non-partisan while funding and promoting programs that almost always seem to benefit the progressive communist democrats? Like operating a voter registration drive but concentrating those efforts in highly concentrated or marginal Democrat districts? Or by falsely labeling something as “disinformation” to give the government “plausible deniability?” Or by providing an ignition point that can be used to justify a congressional hearing or government “investigation?”]  MacCarthy says the judge's tone was "a little bit over the top" and "apocalyptic," but the free speech issues involved in the case are real. "I know it's a matter of the paranoia of the conservative groups that they're being victimized by shadowy agents and the government," he says. "But these are not one-sided partisan issues here. These are issues that everyone should be concerned about." [OCS: Funny, MacCarthy is Mark MacCarthy, a tech policy expert and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a progressive communist democrat think tank associated with the Obama/Clinton Russia hoax and the Steele dossier.  What does the Biden administration say about this? The Justice Department is reviewing the injunction and will evaluate its options in the case, a White House official told NPR. "This administration has promoted responsible actions to protect public health, safety, and security when confronted by challenges like a deadly pandemic and foreign attacks on our elections," the official said in a statement. "Our consistent view remains that social media platforms have a critical responsibility to take account of the effects their platforms are having on the American people, but make independent choices about the information they present." [OCS: This is a big lie! Almost everything in the Obama/Biden Administration was either ideologically or financially corrupt and was the product of morally and legally bankrupt ideologues.] <Source> <The Ruling>

The truth emerges...

Biden Admin Admits Vaccine Error: No Evidence Behind Recommendations｜Facts Matter

After a 7 month long legal battle, the Biden administration conceded that there is no scientific evidence to support an apparent recommendation to receive as many as six COVID-19 booster shots per year.

It took government watchdog Functional Government Initiative (FGI) eight months and a lawsuit for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to confirm that there was no scientific or academic basis supporting Secretary Xavier Becerra’s prescription for COVID-19 vaccine booster shots every two months. HHS ignored FGI’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for months until taken to court, and now says there are no documents or communications explaining the origin of the Secretary’s public health pronouncement.

Considering the many concerns that surrounded and still surround COVID vaccine efficacy and safety, such confusion and unsubstantiated public health pronouncements raise serious questions about the administration’s approach to pandemic policy. The lack of supporting records for the Secretary’s controversial recommendation also raises more questions on whether federal officials are committed to grounding major public health recommendations in hard science and empirical evidence – even if they run counter to the Biden administration’s policy agenda.

“The lack of a single record supporting Secretary Becerra’s bold public health recommendation for six COVID boosters a year is a startling development. It is tremendously irresponsible for the government’s chief health official to fire off tweets recommending frequent injections of a new vaccine booster apparently based on no academic or scientific support.

How can the public be assured that the agency is ‘following the science’ on other important public health matters when it demonstrates such clear disregard for basic scientific integrity standards on an issue as important as COVID vaccine shots? Pandemics and vaccines are matters of life and death. Americans should be able to trust their leaders are not playing politics with their health.” <Source>

Remember the operative progressive communist democrat dictum about using fear and a crisis as an opportunity for political gains…

Bottom line…

Never Again!

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

IF TRUMP IS THE GOP NOMINEE, THE ONE REASON I WOULD VOTE FOR HIM

Take almost any topic and examine the progressive communist democrat policies that created or exacerbated the problem.

Why? You may ask.

What happened to instinct, historical precedent, and commonsense that may have prevented adverse outcomes?

Why are people ignoring the insanity of doing the same thing and expecting something different – doubling, tripling, or quadrupling down on stupid? Pumping additional funds into a manifestly corrupt system to be siphoned off before they even reached their intended recipients.

Is muscle memory, ignorance, or wishful thinking driving citizens to make poor political choices? Or is their estrangement from religion or a cause outside of themselves that motivates their need for belonging, even if the result is self-harm?

Are they acting upon limited information or information manipulated by the progressive communist democrats and their media propagandists who censor information adverse to their agenda or cancel dissident voices from the outlets they control?

Do they have strong emotions? Susceptible to social and peer pressure? Do they manifest cognitive biases such as believing that which confirms their present opinions, makes them comfortable, and immune from the uneasy feeling of cognitive dissonance?

Are they protecting their self-esteem and refusing to admit their previous knowledge, attitudes, opinions, and behaviors are suspect or manifestly wrong?

Do they not understand the consequences of their actions, refusing to believe in aggregating and cascading events, like an avalanche, after it gains mass and momentum?

Or does greed override humanity?

Or are they just lazy, believing tomorrow will be much the same as today?

Whatever the reason, most people respond to pain and act only when the pain becomes intolerable.

Have we reached that point, or will it take a cataclysmic event, like a World War, to reset their behavior?

An example of progressive communist democrat idiocy and corruption...

Instead of dealing with crime control...

City Of Chicago Files Suit Against Automakers Kia And Hyundai

Mayor Brandon Johnson announced today that the City has filed a civil lawsuit against Kia America, Inc., Kia Corporation, Hyundai Motor America, and Hyundai Motor Company for their failure to include industry-standard engine immobilizers in multiple models of their vehicles, resulting in a steep rise in vehicle thefts, reckless driving, property damage, and a wide array of related violent crimes in Chicago.

The complaint, which was filed in the Circuit Court of Cook County, alleges that Kia and Hyundai failed to equip their U.S. cars, sold between 2011 and 2022, with vital anti-theft technology, which almost all other car manufacturers made a standard feature over a decade ago and which Kia and Hyundai include in their vehicles sold outside of the country. The Complaint alleges that Kia and Hyundai deceptively assured consumers that these vehicles possessed “advanced” safety features, despite knowing about this critical defect and its consequences.

[OCS: I was unaware of any legal requirement to build vehicle security features into every model. I even remember when I had to install my own alarm system -- coincidently made by Representative Daryl Issa's company and featured Issa's voice instructing would-be thieves to "stand back!" Safety features are not synonymous with security features.]

“The impact of car theft on Chicago residents can be deeply destabilizing, particularly for low- to middle-income workers who have fewer options for getting to work and taking care of their families,” said Mayor Brandon Johnson. “The failure of Kia and Hyundai to install basic auto-theft prevention technology in these models is sheer negligence, and as a result, a citywide and nationwide crime spree around automobile theft has been unfolding right before our eyes.”

[OCS: They don't say that Chicago's poor and drug-addled residents are preying on their neighbors in a city where criminals are treated as victims rather than perpetrators. Rather than cracking down on auto theft or going after those chop shops selling parts or loading the cars onto containers for export, the city is turning a blind eye to crime, much of which appears to be organized.] 

Since videos posted on social media exposed this defect, thefts of Kia and Hyundai vehicles in Chicago surged from about 500 in the first half of 2022 to more than 8,350 during the second half of the year. Thefts of Kia and Hyundai vehicles continue to comprise more than half of all vehicles stolen in Chicago in 2023. 

[OCS:  Is there any surprise that a thief will target a theft that provides the least risk and resistance? So, what's the city's excuse for the remainder of non-Kia and Hyundai car thefts?]

Because these vehicles are entry-level models, Kia’s and Hyundai’s failure to include engine immobilizers disproportionately impacts low-income Chicago residents. Moreover, offenders have used stolen Kia and Hyundai vehicles to commit other crimes, including reckless driving, armed robbery, and murder.

[OCS: Playing the race card? Criminals have always used stolen cars when committing other crimes; they may be evil, but most are not stupid.]

Kia and Hyundai have failed to remedy their misconduct, refusing to provide sufficient steering wheel locks requested by the City and even taking advantage of the crisis by charging consumers for security kits. <Source: City of Chicago>

[OCS: In the automotive world, you get what you pay for. Is a vehicle manufacturer now being required to upgrade features in their low-end vehicles to features found in their higher-priced vehicles? If this is such a significant issue, where is the NHTSA (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) that sets "federal vehicle regulations specifying design, construction, performance, and durability requirements for motor vehicles and regulated automobile safety-related components, systems, and design features?"

Strong locks do not deter determined criminals. There are always workarounds, or thieves would not steal high-end Mercedes and Cadillacs. Of course, thieves prefer popular cars that are easily stolen or whose parts may be worth more than what they could get for the entire vehicle.] 

Bottom line…

The progressive communist democrats have created a system that favors their agenda, using fear and free incentives to create the economic and societal volatility from which they profit. But why is the American citizen buying into such a corrupt system without pushback?

Can things change?

Will things change?

Or is what we need a disruptor – not a politically correct establishment representative like John McCain, Mitt Romney, or Lindsey Graham – politicians willing to jump the aisle to gain the approval of the progressive communist democrats and their media propagandists? At the same time, acting as useful idiot shills for anti-American forces.

I prefer a resolute, well-reasoned, and experienced candidate like Ron DeSantis. Still, at this point, we need a cunning, vengeful ass-kicker who has withstood the onslaught of the progressive communist democrats for years and remains standing. Donald J. Trump in 2024 may give us our last chance to save the nation from communism.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

ANOTHER CORRUPT BIDEN ADMINISTRATION BREACH OF SECURITY AND COMMON SENSE

There should be no doubt that we cannot trust our government under the iron-fisted rule of the progressive communist democrats to protect America and its citizens.

Who in their right mind would demand that defense contractors hire non-citizens, even for janitorial duties?

Yet we find the corrupt Obama/Biden Administration demanding that we weaken our defenses again to favor those illegal aliens breaching our borders. 

Every two hours or so, a satellite that SpaceX built for the Department of Defense circles Earth. The exact purpose of the satellite isn’t clear: The project is confidential.

That satellite is part of Starshield, a business SpaceX unveiled publicly last week through which it will build and launch satellites that cater to the national security needs of government clients. SpaceX didn’t say much about what those satellites will do, but people familiar with the project told The Information their capabilities will include climate change research, missile tracking and surveillance. SpaceX was awarded $2.2 billion and $2.8 billion in federal contracts in 2021 and 2022, respectively, the majority of which came from NASA. <Source>

Even NASA has requirements…

Information for Non U.S. Citizens:

Other than extremely rare exceptions, you must be a U.S. citizen in order to work for NASA as a civil service employee. <Source>

SpaceX sued by corrupt Biden Administration’s Department of Justice for hiring U.S. Citizens…

Justice Department Sues SpaceX for Discriminating Against Asylees and Refugees in Hiring Asylees and Refugees With Relevant Information Should Contact the Justice Department The Justice Department filed a lawsuit today against Space Exploration Technologies Corporation (SpaceX) for discriminating against asylees and refugees in hiring. The lawsuit alleges that, from at least September 2018 to May 2022, SpaceX routinely discouraged asylees and refugees from applying and refused to hire or consider them, because of their citizenship status, in violation of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). In job postings and public statements over several years, SpaceX wrongly claimed that under federal regulations known as “export control laws,” SpaceX could hire only U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents, sometimes referred to as “green card holders.” SpaceX recruits and hires for a variety of positions, including welders, cooks, crane operators, baristas and dishwashers, as well as information technology specialists, software engineers, business analysts, rocket engineers and marketing professionals. The jobs at issue in the lawsuit are not limited to those that require advanced degrees. Asylees and refugees are migrants to the United States who have fled persecution. To obtain their status, they undergo thorough vetting by the United States government. Under the INA, employers cannot discriminate against them in hiring, unless a law, regulation, executive order or government contract requires the employer to do so. In this instance, no law, regulation, executive order or government contract required or permitted SpaceX to engage in the widespread discrimination against asylees or refugees that the department’s investigation found, as explained in the complaint. [OCS: This is a lie. As we have seen, the United States Government has a backlog in vetting legitimate citizens for security clearances. It is not adequately vetting asylees, many of whom have no official identification, and their nation of origin does not have adequate databases for criminals and terrorists. Likewise, we have seen numerous foreign spies inserted in government and critical infrastructure programs.] Because SpaceX works with certain goods, software, technology and technical data (referred to here as export-controlled items), SpaceX must comply with export control laws and regulations, including the International Traffic in Arms Regulations and the Export Administration Regulations. Under these regulations, asylees, refugees, lawful permanent residents, U.S. citizens and U.S. nationals working at U.S. companies can access export-controlled items without authorization from the U.S. government. Therefore, these laws do not require SpaceX to treat asylees and refugees differently than U.S. citizens or green card holders. [OCS: ABSOLUTE BULLSHIT! THIS COUNTRY IS RUN FOR ITS CITIZENS, NOT THE CITIZENS OF EL SALVADOR!. PRETTY SOON THE DOJ WILL DEMAND TECHNOLOGY SHARING WITH CHINA.] Find more information here on how employers can avoid discrimination when complying with export control requirements. <Source> <DOJ Complaint>

Under Trump: fighting Chinese espionage…

INFORMATION ABOUT THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE'S CHINA INITIATIVE About 80 percent of all economic espionage prosecutions brought by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) allege conduct that would benefit the Chinese state, and there is at least some nexus to China in around 60 percent of all trade secret theft cases. The Department of Justice’s China Initiative reflects the strategic priority of countering Chinese national security threats and reinforces the President’s overall national security strategy. The Initiative was launched against the background of previous findings by the Administration concerning China’s practices. In March 2018, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative announced the results of an investigation of China’s trade practices under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974. It concluded, among other things, that a combination of China’s practices are unreasonable, including its outbound investment policies and sponsorship of unauthorized computer intrusions, and that “[a] range of tools may be appropriate to address these serious matters.” In June 2018, the White House Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy issued a report on “How China’s Economic Aggression Threatens the Technologies and Intellectual Property of the United States and the World,” documenting “the two major strategies and various acts, policies, and practices Chinese industrial policy uses in seeking to acquire the intellectual property and technologies of the world and to capture the emerging high- technology industries that will drive future economic growth.” In addition to identifying and prosecuting those engaged in trade secret theft, hacking, and economic espionage, the Initiative focuses on protecting our critical infrastructure against external threats through foreign direct investment and supply chain compromises, as well as combatting covert efforts to influence the American public and policymakers without proper transparency. [OCS: Like unregistered foreign agents like the influence-peddling Biden Crime Family?] The China Initiative is led by the Department’s National Security Division (NSD), which is responsible for countering nation-state threats to the United States. <Source: DOJ>

Under China-compromised Biden, spies welcome…

DOJ shuts down China-focused anti-espionage program The China Initiative is being cast aside largely because of perceptions that it unfairly painted Chinese Americans and U.S. residents of Chinese origin as disloyal. The Biden administration is shutting down a Justice Department program that focused on countering Chinese espionage, following stumbles in a series of criminal cases and accusations that it amounted to racial profiling. Officials said Wednesday that the three-year-old effort, known as the China Initiative, was being cast aside largely because of perceptions that it unfairly painted Chinese Americans and U.S. residents of Chinese origin as disloyal. “By grouping cases under the China Initiative rubric, we helped give rise to a harmful perception that the department applies a lower standard to investigate and prosecute criminal conduct related to that country or that we in some way view people with racial, ethnic or familial ties to China differently,” Assistant Attorney General for National Security Matthew Olsen said in remarks prepared for delivery at George Mason University in Virginia. However, Justice’s top national security official insisted that the decision amounted to a reframing and recalibration — not an abandonment — of a muscular law enforcement response to the national security threat posed by the People’s Republic of China. Olsen said that abandoning the organizational framework of the China Initiative should not be seen as minimizing what the Justice Department still views as determined and nefarious efforts by the Chinese government to acquire high-tech secrets by illegal means and to intimidate dissidents and critics abroad. “The Department of Justice is going to continue to aggressively combat threats posed by the PRC government using investigations, prosecutions, the full range of tools at our disposal. I think our actions will speak for themselves,” he said. [OCS: Notice how the DOJ never investigated the Democrat Biden crime family’s connections to China? Nor did they investigate GOP Senator Mitch McConnell' or his wife despite significant connections with China? Former Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the initiative on Nov. 1 2018, just a few days before former President Donald Trump ousted him. DOJ headquarters encouraged U.S. attorneys around the country to invest time and resources in building cases against espionage conducted for the Chinese government. Some of the initiative’s most high-profile and troubled cases have involved criminal charges against professors and researchers working in the U.S. over accusations that they illegally hid their involvement in Chinese government scientific development programs known as “Thousand Talents” or by similar names. The cases have typically involved allegations that the targets lied or omitted information on disclosure forms accompanying grant applications. Some such cases have led to convictions and guilty pleas. Last December, a jury found the former chair of Harvard’s Chemistry Department, Charles Lieber, guilty of making false statements to federal officials as well as filing false tax returns. <Source>

Bottom line...

Once again, we cannot trust our government to do the right thing regarding national defense.

I was not aware that non-citizens and illegal aliens were a protected class.

Like the bogus actions against Trump, the DOJ targets Elon Musk because he is not censoring and canceling on X/Twitter.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

A SAD DAY FOR AMERICA

A jumped-up progressive communist democrat, Fulton County (Georgia) District Attorney Fani T. Willis appears to have knowingly violated the constitutional rights of former President Donald J. Trump by criminalizing normal and customary political activities over which she has no authority to act.

This is Donald Trump's historic mugshot, the first ever taken of a former U.S. president, that was released after he was booked into the Fulton County Jail in Atlanta, Georgia, on specious politically motivated allegations. 

President Trump is facing 13 felony counts in connection with Fani T. Willis’s investigation into Trump and his allies’ alleged efforts to lawfully challenge the results of the 2020 election in Georgia. Those charges include conspiracy to commit forgery, filing false documents, Solicitation of Violation of Oath by Public Officer, and violating the Georgia Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act. Trump is one of 19 defendants charged in the case, which includes those who provided lawful legal counsel to Trump. 

Bottom line...

What can I say other than to hope the GOP captures the House, Senate, and Presidency to prosecute a conspiracy between progressive communist democrats to violate 18 U.S. Code § 595 - Interference by administrative employees of Federal, State, or Territorial Government?

Whoever, being a person employed in any administrative position by the United States, or by any department or agency thereof, or by the District of Columbia or any agency or instrumentality thereof, or by any State, Territory, or Possession of the United States, or any political subdivision, municipality, or agency thereof, or agency of such political subdivision or municipality (including any corporation owned or controlled by any State, Territory, or Possession of the United States or by any such political subdivision, municipality, or agency), in connection with any activity which is financed in whole or in part by loans or grants made by the United States, or any department or agency thereof, uses his official authority for the purpose of interfering with, or affecting, the nomination or the election of any candidate for the office of President, Vice President, Presidential elector, Member of the Senate, Member of the House of Representatives, Delegate from the District of Columbia, or Resident Commissioner, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both.

(June 25, 1948, Ch. 645, 62 Stat. 720; Pub. L. 91–405, title II, § 204(d)(6), Sept. 22, 1970, 84 Stat. 853; Pub. L. 103–322, title XXXIII, § 330016(1)(H), (L), Sept. 13, 1994, 108 Stat. 2147.)  <Source> 

These are the same progressive communist democrats who knowingly put forth false and misleading allegations against Donald Trump in several hoaxes, all used to interfere with a presidential election or undermine a duly elected federal official. 

There is no progressive communist democrat who can legitimately point to actions taken by Donald Trump and fail to note that President Biden took the same actions before he assumed the Presidency.

There is no doubt that the government is riddled with communists and their useful idiots and that they are actively attempting to destroy the United States from within.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

Trump was also fingerprinted...

GOP DEBATE ONE: CAN VIVEK RAMASWAMY BE TRUSTED?

Ho hum...

There was no clear winner in the first Republican Presidential Primary Debate hosted by Fox News live from the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Ron DeSantis did not stand out, and Vivek Ramaswamy came across as animated, self-important, snarky, smarmy, and spouting platitudes -- clearly out of his depth. Mike Pence was uncharacteristically frisky but to no avail.

Fox needlessly injected Trump into the mix to the delight of Chris Christie, who was roundly booed, and Asa Hutchinson.  Moderators Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum were undistinguished and almost lost control of the candidates occasionally. 

Biggest surprise...

There was no concerted attack on the second to the frontrunner, Ron DeSantis.

Best line...

In response to Ramaswamy, "Let me just address a question that is on everybody’s mind at home tonight. Who the heck is this skinny guy with a funny last name?  An obese Chris Christy responded, "The last person in one of these debates who stood in the middle of the stage and said, ‘What’s a skinny guy with an odd last name doing up here?’ was Barack Obama, and I’m afraid we’re dealing with the same type of amateur.” 

Vivek Ramaswamy was the most animated, so let's look at his negatives ...

1. Absolutely no experience in elective political matters.

2. Government is not a “business” enterprise and cannot be managed as a business enterprise. Unlike that of a corporate officer, the President's power is checked by Congress and the Judiciary and held to task by a hostile media with deep allegiance to the opposition, the progressive communist democrats.

3. While intelligent, well-educated, and well-spoken, Ramaswamy appears to be another billionaire buying into a lucrative political sinecure.

4. Ramaswamy might not be running for the Presidency, but he is increasing his name recognition for a future run or auditioning for a cabinet position.

5. Ramaswamy looks like another Obama-style Manchurian candidate.

6. Ramaswamy may be positioned as an “outsider,” but he is well-connected with both the Democrat and GOP establishment.

7. Ramaswamy appears to be a Trump ally and may serve as a stalking horse for Trump to clear out the pesky opposition.

8. Ramaswamy has already upset the foreign policy applecart.

Vivek Ramaswamy Paid to Have His Soros Fellowship and Covid-Era Role Scrubbed from Wikipedia Page

Longshot presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy has accused his prospective Republican rivals of parroting him, but Ramaswamy himself has made an intentional effort to conceal his own biography, even paying a Wikipedia editor to remove potentially politically damaging details about his past from his page.

Ramaswamy’s Wikipedia page includes the warning, “this article has multiple issues,” with a note that it “contains paid contributions” and “may require cleanup to comply with Wikipedia’s content policies, particularly neutral point of view.”

The source of these concerns are changes made by an editor with the screen name “Jhofferman,” who has disclosed that he was paid by Ramaswamy to make alterations to the page.

According to the article’s version history, the editor removed lines about Ramaswamy’s receipt of a Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans in 2011. Paul Soros was the older brother of billionaire funder of leftist causes George Soros, who was the biggest individual political donor in the United States during the 2022 election cycle.

Also removed from the page on February 9, 2023 was Ramaswamy’s role on the state of Ohio’s Covid-19 Response Team. The editor recorded that Ramaswamy’s Covid-era work was removed from the article by the candidate’s own explicit request, while his Soros fellowship was deemed “extraneous material” by the editor.

Ramaswamy announced his candidacy for the White House a little less than two weeks after the changes to his page were made. <Source>

About that Soros Fellowship…

Ramaswamy was already millionaire when he accepted Soros award he said he needed to pay for law school

Ramaswamy reported $2.2M income during same year he accepted Soros scholarship.

Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy was already a millionaire by the time he accepted the Soros scholarship he previously said he needed in order to pay for law school.

Ramaswamy defended himself last month for accepting a $90,000 award from the Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans, which was founded by Daisy and Paul Soros, the late older brother of liberal billionaire financier George Soros. <Source>

Fingers in the Covid payout pie?

Moderna loses bid to shift liability in COVID-19 vaccine patent case

Warminster Township, Pennsylvania-based Arbutus and Genevant — a joint venture between Arbutus and Roivant Sciences Ltd — sued Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Moderna for patent infringement last year, seeking royalties from Moderna's multi-billion-dollar COVID vaccines.  <Source>

In 2014, Ramaswamy founded the biotechnology firm Roivant Sciences; the "Roi" in the company's name refers to return on investment. The company was incorporated in Bermuda, a tax haven, and received almost $100 million in start-up capital from QVT and other investors, including RA Capital Management, Visium Asset Management, and the hedge fund managers D. E. Shaw & Co. and Falcon Edge Capital. Roivant's strategy was to purchase patents from larger pharmaceutical companies for drugs that had not yet been successfully developed, and then bring them to the market. <Source>

A foreign affairs disaster in the making?

Ramaswamy: Cut Off Aid to Israel After 2028

The 38-year-old biotech entrepreneur and self-proclaimed political "outsider," has raised eyebrows for his shifting positions on U.S. military aid to Israel, which he now says he wants to cut off in 2028.

He supports ending the military funding once the current package passed by Congress expires in 2028, arguing that the aid will be unnecessary after he successfully negotiates new peace treaties between Israel and its Arab neighbors during the first year of his presidency.

"If we’re successful, the true mark of success for the U.S., and for Israel, will be to get to a 2028 where Israel is so strongly standing on its own two feet, integrated into the economic and security infrastructure of the rest of the Middle East, that it will not require and be dependent on that same level of historical aid or commitment from the U.S.," Ramaswamy told the Free Beacon on Saturday.

Ramaswamy describes his Middle East plan as "Abraham Accords 2.0," an expansion of the historic Trump-era deals cementing relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco.

He said he would broker expanded agreements between Israel and Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, and Indonesia, and believes he "can deliver that in my first year in office."

"Why is that important? That integrates Israel into the economic and security infrastructure of the rest of the Middle East, in a way that hasn’t happened because Israel has been wrongfully held hostage over a complex historical Palestine question, from being able to integrate itself," he said. "Because Israel was isolated, that required years of the U.S. having to stand for our democratic ally, including in the form of military aid to Israel." <Source>

Ramaswamy breaks from GOP orthodoxy on foreign policy, sparks pushback ahead of first debate

In his remarks at Erick Erickson's "Gathering" in Atlanta, Georgia, last week, Ramaswamy said he would discourage China from invading Taiwan only until the U.S. achieves semiconductor independence. The U.S., through legislation such as the CHIPS Act, is working to bolster its chip-making technology as a national security measure. <

Ramaswamy said he would let Russian President Vladimir Putin keep parts of Ukraine under Moscow's control in exchange for severed ties with China, telling ABC News that "the China-Russia military alliance is the single greatest military threat to the United States" and it's imperative that it be dismantled -- a take he views as a bipartisan, "pro-American policy."

"I will ensure that I'm not a wartime president by actually de-escalating. Make sure that we're in a position to pull apart that alliance, do a deal that yes, Vladimir Putin would do because he comes out of it rationally ahead of where he is now. But we come out even further ahead of where we are," he said, breaking from the opinions of Senate Republicans such as Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

Ramaswamy, who said he would prioritize a trip to Moscow in his first year in office, said he would make a "hard commitment" that NATO should never admit Ukraine, provided that Putin exit Russia's military partnership with China. <Source>

Over in Tuckerland...

 In a pre-taped interview with Tucker Carlson released on Twitter/X ... Ho Hum -- different day, same old shit. Trump's summary: Everyone but him is irrelevant.

The most controversial issue was the hint of the assassination of the indisputable front-runner in the Republican race. “They are savage animals. They are people that are sick. Really sick. You have great people in the Democrat Party, great people that are Democrats. But I’ve seen what they do; I’ve seen the lengths that they go to.”

As far as responding to his legal troubles, "Bullshit, it’s all bullshit.”

Bottom line…

I don’t trust Ramaswamy. Period!  Would I vote for him if he were the GOP nominee facing Biden or, more likely, California Governor Gavin Newsom? You bet. The key to holding a president in check is ensuring we have an unassailable majority in Congress and electing more conservative judges.

Let historians relitigate the elections as we clean up the swamp. That is, if we can get through the upcoming Covid emergency that demands everybody vote by mail.

The debate was a waste of time with no new information or real news value.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

HOW DOES DONALD TRUMP PLAN TO BEAT BIDEN OR WHOEVER REPLACES BIDEN?

• How does siphoning off Trump donor campaign contributions for legal costs, when the donors were donating to fund campaign advertising and activities, win the general election?

• Does the free media attention, with a progressive communist democrat narrative, boost the name recognition of someone who already has near 100% name recognition?

• How does talking endlessly about Trump convey the GOP position or demonstrate the evilness of progressive communist democrats? 

• How many Americans are tuning out of the endless Trump repetition of his grievances?

Which matters more?

• Defending Donald Trump from Democrat legal attacks or winning our nation back from a corrupt Obama/Biden Administration?

• Continuing to pay exorbitant inflated amounts for food, fuel, and lodging?

Bottom line...

The problem, as I see it, is the vast majority of Americans remain clueless, believing the political climate tomorrow is going to be much the same as today.

Dithering while their Constitution and the rule of law are negotiated away by liberal elite academicians and their useful idiots -- with many people trying to fit bizarre behavior into normalcy so they can understand and live with the consequences.

Time to wake up.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

CUBA: THE DEVIL'S DIGITAL CURRENCY WORKSHOP

As our Federal Reserve rushes to implement its freedom-killing digital currency, we have a real-time example of the havoc that will ensue in Communist Cuba, a favorite of progressive communist democrats.

As Cuba takes leap towards 'cashless' economy, entrepreneurs brace for impact

HAVANA (Reuters) - When Cuba in early August announced it was taking a major step towards electronic banking and a "cashless" society, the offices of fledgling small businesses across the communist-run country were left scrambling to figure out how to respond.

Most alarming to many budding entrepreneurs was a new 5,000 peso ($20) daily cap on cash withdrawals for businesses, one of several measures the government said were aimed at forcing Cubans to do their transactions electronically, via transfer, online payment and bank cards.

Even before the new restrictions, Cuban entrepreneurs faced what might seem insurmountable hurtles anywhere else: spotty electricity and internet, widespread fuel shortages, and no practical way to legally exchange large amounts of local currency into the dollars needed to import merchandise from abroad.

Just three days after the rules were put in place, Hernandez [Yulieta Hernandez, founder and manager of Pilares Construction] said, more bad news rolled in: Many of her suppliers, once amenable to electronic transfers, were now only accepting cash, for fear of losing access to the paper money they needed to operate - the opposite of what the law intended.

That has put businesses like Pilares Construction in a bind: The company needs cash to operate but is prohibited from extracting it in sufficient quantity from its local accounts.

"Right now the effect ... is like paralysis," Hernandez said, adding that many business owners were already freezing investments. "People are waiting to see ... if a solution is found for the problems (the rules) have created."

Cuban officials have said the new banking measures are necessary for transparency, to assure transactions are recorded and taxes are paid. <Source>

A few considerations…

This is a freedom-limiting move that an authoritarian government can exploit to track, control, reward, or punish its citizens. Unlike cash, each electronic transmission is diminished by fees until the value is entirely consumed by the “system.” Now consider the dangers of a single point of failure where the loss of electricity or communications cripples the entire system. Now imagine a kill switch that can hold the country hostage to outrageous political demands. It is worthwhile to note that one of the first acts in Castro’s revolution was to disarm the citizens of Cuba.

Dangers of Nationalized Digital Currency.

1. Centralized Control: The primary concern associated with a nationalized digital currency is the control granted to governments and central banks operated under a central authority raising credible questions about individual financial privacy and government overreach. Relying on a central authority for the issuance and regulation of a digital currency introduces the risk of governmental abuse or mismanagement, especially if the government decides to devalue or restrict the use of the digital currency in the event of economic or political instability.

2. Loss of Financial Privacy: Digital currency enables the government to monitor and track every financial transaction its citizens make. While the government argues this could help combat tax evasion and illegal activities, it raises concerns about mass surveillance and the erosion of personal financial privacy. Digital currencies lack the anonymity associated with physical money. Every digital transaction leaves a trace in the ledger, potentially revealing sensitive financial information. This lack of anonymity could lead to unintended consequences, such as identity theft or personal data breaches. Considering the number of leaks involving financial data coming from the government, privacy for the opposition is dead.

3. Digital Equity: The progressive communist democrats go on and on about those unable to obtain valid identification for voter-id or the unbanked population, who may not have access to the internet or digital devices when needed, especially in rural areas. Thus, a digital system would exacerbate existing economic inequalities and result in marginalized populations being further marginalized as they are unable to participate fully in the digital economy. (Alinsky’s Rule #4 -- Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules.)

4. Cybersecurity Vulnerabilities: As we have recently seen, digital currencies are prime targets for cyberattacks and are lucrative targets for hackers and malignant state actors with catastrophic consequences, leading to the loss of funds, sensitive financial data, and state secrets.

5. Monetary Policy Challenges: Nationalized digital currencies can complicate a country's monetary policy as central banks use interest rates and money supply adjustments to stabilize the economy. The central bank's ability to influence the money supply is compromised with digital currencies, leading to additional economic instability.

6. International Relations: The use of a national digital currency would impact international relations as other countries refuse to adopt or use digital currency from another nation, leading to sovereignty issues, national pride, diplomatic tensions, and trade disputes.

7. Technological Dependence: The successful implementation and operation of a digital currency system rely heavily on advanced technology infrastructure where technical glitches, outages, or system failures could disrupt the entire financial ecosystem, potentially leaving citizens without access to their funds or the ability to purchase necessary food, medicine, and critical supplies.

8. Inadequate Regulation and Corrupt Oversight: Who can be trusted to regulate the system? As we have seen in the Obama/Biden Administration, every institution headed by a political appointee appears to have been politically or financially corrupted – with abuse of power becoming more commonplace. Without comprehensive and effective regulations, digital currencies are subject to political manipulation, fraud, scams, and illegal activities, posing risks to consumers and the broader financial system.

And there are other concerns.

Bottom line…

Digital currencies are best left to communist countries, which will be funding their own revolutionary implosion.

We are so screwed.

-- Steve

BILLIONAIRE BULLIES

There is no doubt in my mind that certain billionaires, through their financial contributions to foundations, political campaigns, and lobbying activities, wield disproportionate influence over public policy where they may use their wealth to push for policies that align with their personal or corporate interests – often leading to policies that benefit them at the expense of the broader public.

I used to admire Michael Bloomberg as an entrepreneur who created a fortune reporting bond data to financial firms worldwide. It made him ridiculously wealthy, politically powerful, and, unfortunately, delusional. Somehow, he appears to have convinced himself that his intelligence, education, and wealth have confirmed his wisdom, moral superiority, and the right to impose his views on others. Usurping our inalienable rights and constitutional guarantees to live a life of our own devising and free from unwanted and unjustified government molestation.

It is one thing for money to magnify the reach of his voice, for that’s what free speech is all about, but it is quite another to use his wealth in a coercive manner to bring about public policies with detrimental and life-changing effects.

Besides his business accomplishments, my awareness of Michael Bloomberg was heightened by his attempt to curtail the Constitution’s Second Amendment, more colloquially known as “gun control.”

I considered this to be his first act of hubris. It is a fact, not a supposition, that criminals, crazies, and terrorists do not respect the law nor adhere to its provisions. These types will always use whatever is at hand to intimidate, murder, or maim their victims. Likewise, disarming a law-abiding populace would deprive them of their God-given right to self-defense. And the firearms to respond to mortal danger when no other means are available. A force multiplier that allows a 120-pound individual to protect themselves against a 220-pound brute or multiple assailants.

Perhaps Bloomberg fails to realize two fundamental facts: one, first responders, e.g., the police, cannot be everywhere they are needed or when they are required; and two, the police have no legal duty to protect individuals unless they are in police custody.

Likewise, Bloomberg seems blind to the slaughter in Democrat-governed cities, adversely impacting gun deaths and injuries. Why is he addressing gun control and not crime control? Why does he not note the disparate racial impact of inner-city crime?

Chicago Democrat Asks Gang Members to Refrain From Shootouts Between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m.

A crime-ridden, lawless Democratic city is being asked to limit shooting their guns in the streets to nighttime.

Chicago Democratic alderwoman Maria Hadden asked gang members to refrain from shootouts between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. to reduce the risk to people "not involved in high-risk activities."

An email from Rogers Park-based Native Sons, known as "The People's Ordinance," said making a deal with dangerous gang members will help keep the liberal city safe from accidental killings. <Source>

[OCS: How effing stupid is this progressive communist democrat, the first Black, queer woman elected to Chicago City Council?]

Now I find that Bloomberg is extending his wealth and influence to damage our way of life. To implement public policies that would bring about a radical change in our freedoms and standard of living…

These 14 American Cities Have A ‘Target’ Of Banning Meat, Dairy, And Private Vehicles By 2030

Fourteen major American cities are part of a globalist climate organization known as the “C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group,” which has an “ambitious target” by the year 2030 of “0 kg [of] meat consumption,” “0 kg [of] dairy consumption,” “3 new clothing items per person per year,” “0 private vehicles” owned, and “1 short-haul return flight (less than 1500 km) every 3 years per person.”

C40’s dystopian goals can be found in its “The Future of Urban Consumption in a 1.5°C World” report, which was published in 2019 and reportedly reemphasized in 2023. The organization is headed and largely funded by Democrat billionaire Michael Bloomberg.

Nearly 100 cities across the world make up the organization, and its American members include Austin, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York City, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Portland, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and Seattle. <Source>

[OCS: All of the U.S. mayors involved are progressive communist democrats, and two of the major funders are Michael Bloomberg and George Soros, along with progressive foundations and virtue signaling companies. Note that most prominent non-corporate organizations are tax-exempt organizations deciding how to tax you to advance their agenda.]

Again, Bloomberg, intelligent as he is, does not realize a simple fact. NO public policy can alter the overwhelming forces of nature — in our lifetimes or the next hundred lifetimes. Overcoming the natural forces of the Sun’s energy output in all spectral bands, cosmic rays and cloud formation, the Earth’s position relative to the Sun, the Earth’s precessional and rotational dynamics, plate tectonics and vulcanology, the deep ocean currents, the internal dynamics of the Earth, and the most significant greenhouse gas of all” water vapor.

Is Bloomberg so blind as to ignore that science has been corrupted by politics and government funding of selective research, with few dollars spent on replication studies to affirm or falsify scientific findings? Does he not realize that no optimum temperature can optimize the ecosphere across all latitudes, from the equator to the poles?

Bottom line…

I don’t mind Bloomberg having his say any more than the debunked Malthusians had their opinions regarding population growth and human existence.

I wish that the subject would be debated openly and honestly, with proponents and opponents adhering to the scientific method, with science being divorced from supporting nonsensical and costly public policies that do little other than advance a perpetual authoritarian political elite with self-righteous members like Michael Bloomberg.

I, for one, am tired of academics, politicians, and other elites treating the American people as small children, unable to handle the truth or incapable of devising solutions to infrastructure problems. For example, we know our electrical grid infrastructure is decrepit and decaying. We can see that grid owners and operators defer capital expenditures to boost Wall Street performance. How many Americans know, or care, that most of those crucial large power transformers are custom-built in Communist China or elsewhere in Asia?

We are being screwed by billionaires whose opinions are meaningless in view of nature’s normal variability. They are either ignorant or evil – my bet is on evil.

— Steve