Posts Tagged ‘Israel’

LinkSwarm For March 15, 2024

Friday, March 15th, 2024

Happy Ides of March! You might want to avoid knife-wielding Romans today. Trump trial news, lots of Russo-Ukrainian War news, transexual madness starts to recede, and more Disney missteps. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

  • Biden’s proposed budget is going to lower the deficit by $3 trillion. By which he means it will grow by $16 trillion.

    Following yesterday’s release of Biden’s $7.3 trillion budget, the Biden administration bragged about lowering the deficit by $3 trillion over the next decade – an average of 0.8% of GDP over that period.

    This would consist of roughly $2.6 trillion over 10 years in additional spending programs, offset by around $4.8 trillion in tax increases over the same period. Most of the tax and spending proposals have been included in prior budget proposals from the White House, according to Goldman’s Alec Phillips, however there are several new items.

    The budget would increase the corporate alternative minimum tax on book income from 15% to 21%, raising $137 billion over the next decade. It also limits a corporation’s ability to deduct employee pay exceeding $1mm/year, raising $272 billion over 10 years. The largest proposed tax increases include; raising the corporate minimum tax from 21% to 28%, as well as a series of tax increases on high-income earners, including new Medicare taxes, and a new 25% minimum tax on incomes over $100 million, raising $500 billion over the next decade.

    Of course, it has zero chance of passing under the current Congress – but that’s not the point.

    As one DC strategist wrote in a morning email noted by CNBC’s Brian Sullivan, the budget deficit will still grow by another $16 trillion over the next decade – and that’s with aforementioned tax hikes.

    Without them, the deficit grows to $19 trillion.

    In short, talk of ‘$3 trillion saved’ is total bullshit in the grand scheme of things, given how much the national debt will grow in the best case scenario.

  • “Georgia Judge Strikes Down Six Counts in Trump Election-Interference Indictment.”

    The judge overseeing the Georgia election-fraud case struck down six counts in the indictment on Wednesday finding that the language in the counts didn’t provide “sufficient detail” for former president Donald Trump and more than a dozen other co-defendants “to prepare their defenses intelligently.”

    The counts that Fulton County Superior Court judge Scott McAfee struck down all involved allegations that some of the defendants in the case solicited various Georgia elected officials to violate their oaths of office and to unlawfully appoint pro-Trump presidential electors.

    The six counts struck down by McAfee on Wednesday involved Trump, his former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, and lawyers Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman, Ray Smith and Bob Cheeley. The defendants were accused in the various counts of soliciting elected members of the Georgia house and senate and Georgia secretary of state Brad Raffensperger to violate their oaths “to unlawfully appoint presidential electors.” Trump and Meadows also requested that Raffensperger “unlawfully decertify” the 2020 presidential election, according to two of the counts that McAfee struck down on Wednesday.

  • Fani Willis ruling: She can stay on the case despite her numerous ethical lapses and bias, but her boytoy Nathan Wade has to go, so he’s stepping down.
  • “Judge Sets Trial Date for Hunter Biden’s Federal Gun Case.” “U.S. district judge Maryellen Noreika ruled the trial will start on June 3 at a status conference with Hunter Biden’s attorneys and special counsel David Weiss’s team of prosecutors.”
  • Kursk and Belgorod Invaded by Freedom for Russia Legion with Tanks.” It looks like several more villages have been invested this time, with some artillery backing (and unconfirmed reports of Bradleys). (Previously.)
  • Ryazan Oil Refinery Hit By Multiple Ukrainian Drones.”
  • And another one. “Kaluga Oil Facility Hit By Drones.” I know a lot of previous Ukraine drone strikes on oil facilities hit storage tanks. It can be hard to tell with the quality of videos, but in both of these videos, it appears that these recent strikes are hitting either the cracking or fractional distillation towers, which are much higher value targets and more difficult to replace.
  • Russia bags one (possibly two) Patriot batteries.
  • Have I already talked about how stupid Biden’s idea to build a floating pier for Hamas is?

    The Biden admin knows that US military personnel will not be safe in Gaza, but millions of dollars will be spent to build a pier to send aid that the Gazans don’t even want and that someone in the admin hopes will become a “commercial facility.”

    That’s what they think “American leadership” looks like.

    Apart from wasting taxpayer money, this is building infrastructure that, unless Israel finishes off Hamas, will fall into the hands of terrorists.

    Also, it will take 60 days to build (at least), by which time Israel should have finished pounding Hamas into a thin paste. It’s stupid piled on top of stupid.

  • Biden Department Of Justice Declares War On Voter ID And Other Election Security Laws.” Of course they have. There’s no way to drag Biden’s ambulatory corpse over the finish line without cheating.
  • Progress: “U.K. National Health Service to Stop Prescribing Puberty Blockers to Kids.”
  • Bling bishop’ Lamor Whitehead convicted of fraud, attempted extortion and lying to the FBI.” Not noted in the piece is that under his full name, Lamor Whitehead-Miller, he ran for Borough President of Brooklyn as a Democrat…and came in dead last. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • New Canadian law wants to hand down life sentences for #WrongThink.
  • The F-35 is now certified for nuclear weapons. (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • UT brings back the SAT. It was stupid to dump it.
  • Female Swimmers Sue NCAA over Male Competition.” Discovery of who’s pushing transexism on American institutions should be enlightening…
  • I haven’t paid much attention to Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s independent presidential run because I doubt it’s going to be on enough state ballots to even play a spoiler role. But the idea that he’s thinking of picking NFL quarterback Aaron Rodgers as his running mate seems extra stupid. Yes, he’s won a Super Bowl and is a four-time MVP, is 40 years old (and thus constitutionally eligible to serve, but what the hell does an NFL quarterback know about running the country? Also, since Rodgers is under contract to the Jets, won’t having to play NFL football preclude him from actively running as VP pick?
  • Crazy white boy Shuan King is now a Muslim.

    (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)

  • Weird crime news of the week: “2 men charged with blowing up woman’s home, planning to use large python to eat her daughter.”
  • Captain Marvel 3, Ant Man 4, Eternals 2 All Cancelled.” Second time to break this out this week:

  • Related: Just about all of the $71 billion Disney spent to acquire Fox was essentially wasted. They got into a bidding war, and then “they don’t use the catalog that Fox has that they were given.”
  • The Texas town of Palestine is suing Union Pacific over a contract dispute. The catch: The contract was signed in 1872.
  • Charges are dropped in “Hotel California” lyrics case.

    In the middle of trial, New York prosecutors abruptly dropped their case Wednesday against three collectibles experts who had been accused of scheming to hang onto and peddle the pages, which Eagles co-founder Don Henley maintained were stolen, private artifacts of the band’s creative process.

    In explaining the stunning turnabout, prosecutors agreed that defense lawyers had essentially been blindsided by 6,000 pages of communications involving Henley and his attorneys and associates. Prosecutors and the defense got the material only in the past few days, after Henley and his lawyers apparently made a late-in-the-game decision to waive their attorney-client privilege shielding legal discussions.

    In waving attorney-client privilege, it looks like Henley made himself a prisoner of his own device…

  • An end to drywall?
  • How the famous tracking shot in Wings was done.
  • I’ve seen this one before, but it’s still funny:

    (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)

  • Bill Ackerman Shocked To Find Antisemitism On The Left

    Saturday, March 2nd, 2024

    Some people figure things out slower than others. Such is the case with formerly lefty billionaire hedge-fund manager Bill Ackerman, who is simply shocked to find out that Harvard has unquestionably embraced antisemitism and diversity in the name of DEI.

    Here’s Dave Rubin excerpting Ackerman’s interview with Lex Friedman:

  • “The governance structure [of Harvard] is a disaster.”
  • “October 7th is the event that woke me up. Thirty student organizations came out with a public letter on October 8th, literally the morning after, this letter was created, and said Israel is solely responsible for Hamas’s violent acts.”
  • “Again, Israel had not even mounted a defense at this point, and there were still terrorists running around in the southern part of Israel.”
  • “And I’m, like, what is going on, you know? WTF, right? And that’s when I went up on campus and I started talking to the faculty, and that’s where I started hearing about ‘Actually, Bill, it’s it’s this DEI ideology.'”
  • “They started talking to me about this oppressor/oppressed framework, which is effectively taught at on campus, and represents the backdrop for many of the courses that are offered.”
  • “You know, I’m a pretty aware person, but I was completely unaware.” If you were “completely unaware,” then no, you’re not a “pretty aware person.” The malignancy of social justice has been know for at least a decade, and the hard left’s love for Muslim terrorists manifested itself at least as far back as the 1980s, when campus lefties loved the PLO almost as much as the commie Sandinistas. My guess is that by “a pretty aware person” you mean “you read the New York Times and watched a nightly MSM news broadcast, and stayed safely inside your real estate/hedge fund bubble, and never realized just how much your news sources were lying to you.” And all those PLO- and Sandinista-loving lefties now have their hands on control levers of the Democratic Party.
  • “They’re like ‘Look, Israel is deemed an oppressor and the Palestinians are deemed the oppressed, and you take the side of the the oppressed. And any acts of the oppressed to dislodge the oppressor, regardless of how vile or barbaric, are OK.”
  • “This is a super dangerous ideology.”
  • “DEI comes out of a kind of a Marxist, socialist backdrop way to look at the world.”
  • “Unfortunately it’s advancing racism as opposed to fighting it.”
  • As Dave Rubin notes:

    Yes, his conversion is welcome, but again, conservatives (and even just anyone paying attention) has know what poison DEI/Critical Race Theory/Social Justice is for a decade. The #BlackLivesMatter/#Antifa riots didn’t make him think something just might be wrong with victimhood identity politics?

    Bill Ackerman needs to go back and look at what else the left-leaning MSM has lied to him, about (including inflation, China, crime statistics, the Russian collusion hoax and and Donald Trump).

    He has a lot of reading to do…

    LinkSwarm for February 16, 2024

    Friday, February 16th, 2024

    More Biden corruption evidence, a would-be mass shooter turns out to be a pro-Palestinian Bernie Sis, a parent beats the snot out of a would-be child kidnapper, a top sniper dies, Disney gets sued, and Venus is feeling Zoove. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

  • Another “Try to contain your shock” headline: “Joe Biden’s Classified Docs Provide More Evidence Hunter’s Pay-To-Play Was A Family Affair.”

    The special counsel report on Joe Biden’s unauthorized removal and disclosure of classified documents exposed much more than our president’s mental deficits and the breadth of his irresponsible handling of top-secret and classified information. The report revealed a close nexus between Hunter Biden’s influence peddling and his father’s responsibilities and access to intel during the elder’s term as vice president.

    On Thursday, Special Counsel Robert Hur released the results of his investigation into the president stemming from the discovery of top-secret and classified documents at Biden’s D.C.-based Penn Biden Center, his private Delaware home, and the University of Delaware. While the specific details in the recovered documents remain unknown, the nearly 400-page report provided an extensive enough summary of the materials to confirm an overlap in the timing and topics of Joe Biden’s vice presidency and Hunter Biden’s “business” enterprises.
    Ukraine Overlap

    Appendix A of the report provided a table summary of the documents recovered. Many of the top-secret and classified documents concerned Ukraine during the time frame when Hunter Biden acted as an intermediary between Burisma’s owner, Mykola Zlochevsky, and the vice president. Recall that Hunter’s business partner, Devon Archer, told the House Oversight Committee that in early March 2014, he met Zlochevsky while in Moscow. And soon after, he and Hunter Biden joined Burisma’s board, receiving $83,000 per month.

    The following month, Hunter Biden sent Archer an email dated April 13, 2014 — one week before Joe Biden would travel to Ukraine and meet then-Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk. Referring to “my guys upcoming travels,” Hunter then elaborated on “22 points about Ukraine’s political situation, with detailed information about the upcoming election and predicting an escalation of Russia’s ‘destabilization campaign, which could lead to a full-scale takeover of the eastern region, most critically Donetsk,’” according to the New York Post.

    Among the material recovered from President Biden’s unauthorized storage locales were several top-secret and otherwise classified or confidential documents discussing Ukraine. One undated document discussed issues related to Russian aggression toward Ukraine. Another, dated Sept. 17, 2014, consisted of a “Memorandum for the Vice President from staff members, with subject ‘U.S. Energy Assistance to Ukraine.’” Also dated Sept. 17, 2014, was an “event memo” from a vice-presidential national security staffer, titled, “Lunch with Ukrainian President Poroshenko,” which was scheduled for the following day.

    The overlap between Joe Biden’s Ukraine-related work and Hunter Biden’s Burisma profiteering became more pronounced in 2015. On Dec. 2, 2015, the lobbying firm Blue Star Group, which Hunter Biden had arranged to work with Burisma, wrote to Burisma that it had “participated in a conference call today with senior Obama Administration officials ahead of U.S. Vice President Joe Biden’s trip to Ukraine next week.” The memorandum provided a summary of the conference call, telling Burisma that “Michael Carpenter, Vice President Biden’s Special Advisor for Europe and Russia, and Dr. Colin Kahl, the Vice President’s National Security Advisor, presented the agenda for the trip and answered questions about current U.S. policy toward Ukraine.”

    Two days after receiving this memorandum, Burisma executives Zlochevsky and Vadym Pozharskyi, on Dec. 4, 2015, pushed Hunter Biden to call his father. The Burisma executives, according to Archer, expressed concern over the pressure they were under from Ukrainian investigators.

    And there’s more, though very little that will be surprising to BattleSwarm readers. (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)

  • “Joe Biden Met with Chinese Energy Firm Chairman around the Time of $3M Payment to Hunter’s Business Partner.” Of course he did.

    Joe Biden met with the chairman of the Chinese energy firm CEFC shortly after Hunter Biden’s business associate Rob Walker received a $3 million payment from the firm as part of a joint venture the pair were then trying to develop, according to a newly released transcript of Walker’s closed-door congressional testimony.

    Walker testified before the House Oversight and Judiciary Committees on January 26 about his role in Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings with Chinese energy conglomerate CEFC.

    Walker received roughly $3 million from CEFC in March 2017 through its State Energy HK account, bank records show. He recalled a meeting between Joe Biden and CEFC officials in spring 2017, around the time of the State Energy HK payment.

    “Did Joe Biden ever attend any location or meeting or place where CEFC officials were also there?” a staffer asked Walker, according to a transcript of the interview released Tuesday morning.

    “Yes,” Walker replied. He recalled the meeting took place in Washington, D.C., and Joe Biden, who had just left office as vice president, stopped by for lunch.

    “I don’t know the exact — it was 20- probably -17 at some point, but I don’t know exactly when,” Walker said.

    The meeting took place at a Four Seasons hotel in a private room. CEFC Chairman Ye Jianming and other associates were present at the meeting.

    “I don’t know if Zang was there, but I believe that Ye was there. I’m certain of it,” Walker testified.

    He did not know who the other CEFC associates were at the meeting. Walker firmly recalled Jianming and his translator, Hunter Biden, business associate James Gilliar, and Joe Biden attending the meeting.

  • Inflation higher than expected. Unexpectedly!
  • Well, what do you know? “Mail-In Ballot Fraud Study Finds Trump ‘Almost Certainly’ Won In 2020.”

    A new study examining the likely impact that fraudulent mail-in ballots had in the 2020 election concludes that the outcome would “almost certainly” have been different without the massive expansion of voting by mail.

    The Heartland Institute study tried to gauge the probable impact that fraudulent mail-in ballots cast for both then-candidate Joe Biden and his opponent, President Donald Trump, would have had on the overall 2020 election results.

    The study was based on data obtained from a Heartland/Rasmussen survey in December that revealed that roughly one in five mail-in voters admitted to potentially fraudulent actions in the presidential election.

    After the researchers carried out additional analyses of the data, they concluded that mail-in ballot fraud “significantly” impacted the 2020 presidential election.

    They also found that, absent the huge expansion of mail-in ballots during the pandemic, which was often done without legislative approval, President Trump would most likely have won.

    “Had the 2020 election been conducted like every national election has been over the past two centuries, wherein the vast majority of voters cast ballots in-person rather than by mail, Donald Trump would have almost certainly been re-elected,” the report’s authors wrote.

    Not news to those of us who watched returns into the wee hours, only to wake up to The Steal the next morning.

  • House Republicans finally impeach DHS Secretary Mayorkas for intentionally failing to secure the border.
  • Is there any doubt that Fani Willis lied her ass off?
  • Ukraine bags another Russian ship. “Ukrainian Magura V5 Marine Drones have sunk the Ropucha-class landing ship Cesar Kunikov near Alupka in Crimea in the Black Sea.”
  • Russia also had 59 planes and helicopters stolen.
  • Putin says he prefers Biden to Trump in the White House because he’s more predictable. I’m sure he does. Notice that both his Ukraine invasions occurred during Democratic presidential administrations.
  • Austin’s commie congressman Greg Casar wants to federalize Texas power grid.
  • Pervert tries to kidnap kid in a CVS, instantly receives beatdown from parent.
  • Another week, another teacher busted for child porn, this one in Klein ISD.
  • The woman who tried to shoot up Lakewood Church in Houston was a Bernie Sis who had “Free Palestine” written on her AR-15. “[Genesse I.] Moreno had a violent, extensive criminal history stretching back to 2005, according to court records reviewed by Townhall. She was previously arrested for assaulting a public servant, assault causing bodily injury, forgery, theft for stealing cosmetics from a store, evading police, and unlawfully carrying a weapon, among a slew of charges on Moreno’s decades-old rap sheet.”
  • “Soros network gave paid fellowship to head of anti-Israel center propping up terrorism.” Try to contain your shock.
  • Man swatted 47 times.

    Alan Winston Filion, 17, is suspected of targeting hundreds of high schools, mosques, historically Black churches, US senators and even the US Supreme Court with swatting attacks that placed thousands of people in the crosshairs of heavily armed police response teams.

    Prosecutors say the 6ft 3in teenager advertised his services under the pseudonym Torswats on the encrypted messaging app Telegram, charging as little as $40 to get someone’s gas shut off, $50 for a “major police response”, and $75 for a “bomb threat/mass shooting threat”.

    Mr Filion would then post chilling audio of the 911 calls on Telegram as a proof of purchase, according to court documents.

    Among the hundreds of “swats” that Torswats allegedly claimed credit for were multiple hoax callouts at the home of Patrick S. Tomlinson, a Milwaukee-based science fiction author who says he has been swatted dozens of times in the past four years as part of a targeted harassment campaign by a group of “sociopathic” stalkers.

    You’d think after five or six times, the guy would put up a sign in his front yard alerting police to the problem. (Hat tip: Dwight.)

  • Ohio cops go full T.J. Hooker.
  • “Court Orders Netherlands To Halt F-35 Parts For Israel As EU Says “Too Many People” Are Dying.” Excuse me? Does the Netherlands let their court interfere in foreign policy decisions and defense contracts based on events beyond their borders?
  • Army cancels FARA helicopter program, makes other cuts in major aviation shakeup.”

    The US Army is cancelling its next generation Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft (FARA) program, service officials announced today, taking a potential multi-billion-dollar contract off the table and throwing the service’s long-term aviation plans into doubt.

    In addition, the Army plans to end production on the UH-60 V Black Hawk in fiscal 2025, due to “significant cost growth,” keep General Electric’s Improved Turbine Engine Program (ITEP) in the development phase instead of moving it into production, and phase the Shadow and Raven unmanned aerial systems out of the fleet, the service added.

    All told, it reflects a massive shift in the Army’s aviation strategy and upends years of planning. There is also an ironic sense of history repeating: the decision to end FARA comes two decades to the month after the Army ended its plans to procure the RAH-66 Comanche and nearly 16 years after it terminated work on the ARH-70A Arapaho, both aircraft designed to replace the Kiowa — the same helicopter FARA was supposed to, finally, replace.

    The reason for ending FARA, Army leaders told a small group of reporters ahead of the announcement, is a reflection of what war looks like in the modern era.

    “We absolutely are paying attention [to world events] and adjusting, because we could go to war tonight, this weekend,” head of Army Futures Command Gen. James Rainey told reporters at the Pentagon on Thursday.

    “We are learning from the battlefield — especially Ukraine — that aerial reconnaissance has fundamentally changed,” Army Chief Gen. Randy George said in a press release. “Sensors and weapons mounted on a variety of unmanned systems and in space are more ubiquitous, further reaching and more inexpensive than ever before.”

    Many commenters here feared the Pentagon wasn’t taking the drone threat seriously. Maybe they are…

  • The Marine Corps’ all-time deadliest sniper, Chuck Mawhinney, has died at age 75.

    From 1968 to 1969, Mawhinney — still only a teenager — was credited with 103 confirmed kills.

    An additional 216 kills were listed as “probable” since the enemies’ bodies were risky to verify in the active war zone.

    Mawhinney had confirmed kills over 1,000 yards, with the average kill shot for snipers during the Vietnam War taken at a distance of 300 to 800 yards.

    He received a Bronze Star with Combat Valor, Navy Achievement Medal, Navy Commendation Medal with Combat Valor, and two Purple Hearts.

    Having more confirmed kills than Carlos Hathcock is pretty impressive. (Hat tip: Dwight.)

  • “Rockwall County Sues to Undo $833 Million MUD Approved by Lone Voter With Criminal Record.” Perhaps the Texas legislature should create a MUD election review board, as these shenanigans have been going on for a while.
  • Disney sued over illegal, racist casting quotas.
  • The CW Network (which evidently still exists) just launched a 12 channel free streaming platform. Including, evidently, a Mystery Science Theater 3000 channel.
  • Someone misread an astronomy chart. Result? Venus now has a mini-moon named Zoove. (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)
  • “Judge Orders Trump To Pay Whatever Amount It Takes To Bankrupt Campaign.”
  • Donkey + screaming rubber chicken = happy donkey.
  • Hit the tip jar if you’re so inclined.





    LinkSwarm For February 9, 2024

    Friday, February 9th, 2024

    The Senate’s bad border deal goes down badly, Big Brother is (still) watching you, Netanyahu tells everyone calling for a Gaza ceasefire to stick it in their murder tunnels, more Democrats arrested for (or convicted of) fraud, and a tiny bit of Disney news. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

  • Republicans took one look at the abomination of a “bipartisan” border deal and declared it dead on arrival.

    In a key vote on Wednesday, Senate Republicans moved to block the long-anticipated bipartisan border deal, which ties border-security provisions to aid for both Israel and Ukraine.

    The bill was blocked in a 49 to 50 procedural vote, with only four Republicans joining Democrats in backing the legislation. The bill needed 60 votes to advance.

    This setback comes after months of negotiations between Senate Republicans and Democrats on a measure President Joe Biden strongly requested. While the GOP wants more resources allocated toward the southern border, House Republicans and former president Donald Trump have made it clear they don’t want the legislation tied to foreign aid.

    Hours after the bill’s details were revealed Sunday night, House GOP leaders rejected the package and declared it “DEAD on arrival in the House.”

    Trump, who has made the border crisis a central issue of his 2024 presidential campaign, also weighed in on the border deal earlier this week. “Don’t be STUPID!!! We need a separate Border and Immigration Bill. It should not be tied to foreign aid in any way, shape, or form!” Trump posted on Truth Social.

    Before the Senate voted on the matter, Biden blamed Trump for Republicans’ fierce opposition to the bill.

    “Now, all indications are this bill won’t even move forward to the Senate floor,” Biden said Tuesday. “Why? A simple reason: Donald Trump.”

    Hey Biden, I’m already going to vote for Trump. You don’t need to keep giving me new reasons.

    The $118 billion Senate proposal includes about $60 billion in Ukraine funding, $14 billion in Israel aid, and $20 billion in border-security improvements, among various other items listed in the legislative package.

    Senators James Lankford of Oklahoma, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine, and Mitt Romney of Utah were the only Republicans to vote in favor of the bill on Wednesday.

    Lankford should be ashamed to be in such company.

  • Texas isn’t taking the Biden Administrations abrogation of the rule of law lying down. “Texas Attorney General’s Legal Challenge to Biden Administration’s ‘Asylum Rule’ Will Proceed. A federal judge ruled Texas raised a plausible claim that the federal government is violating the Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution.”

    The Texas Office of the Attorney General (OAG) announced a procedural victory in one of its many ongoing lawsuits against the federal government this week, after a federal district judge ruled against a motion by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to dismiss a legal challenge to its “asylum rule,” saying Texas had a plausible constitutional challenge.

    According to the OAG, the federal government violated the Appointments Clause in the U.S. Constitution when the DHS granted power to review asylum cases to immigration officers — a power uniquely held under federal statute by immigration judges.

    “This case offers a rare opportunity to litigate the application of the Appointments Clause of the Constitution, which states that Congress may only vest the power to appoint “inferior Officers… in the President alone, the Courts of Law, or the Heads of Departments,” the OAG wrote in a press statement regarding the case.

    The office explained that by using asylum officers to perform jobs Congress assigned to judges when said officers were not appointed in the same manner, DHS violated the Constitution.

    The OAG also argues that asylum officers are granting more noncitizens asylum than otherwise would be entitled to it. This is causing surges at the border and population increases that are in turn increasing the state’s costs relating to the increases, the state says.

    “It is tremendously important for Texas and for our Constitutional order that this case is allowed to move forward,” Attorney General Ken Paxton said regarding the case. “The Biden Administration must not be permitted to ignore Congress and violate the Constitution. We take every opportunity to hold Biden accountable for his unlawful overreach.”

  • Know who else isn’t wild about Biden’s open borders? Border Patrol agents.

    Rank-and-file Border Patrol agents have slammed the Senate’s $118B Senate funding bill that would guarantee 1.5 million illegal migrants entry to the United States, while sending the majority of funds to Ukraine ($60B+) and Israel ($14.1B).

    Snip.

    “Now that I’ve seen more of it, they can respectfully go fuck themselves. The more I’m seeing the more it just puts what they’ve been doing in writing. You want to shut this down, it’s real easy. Team up [the Department of Defense] with DHS and let us enforce like we were supposed to,” one agent told the Caller, adding “I feel like we are the only nation in the world that is this dumb about the border. Maybe it’s because we haven’t.”

    Oh, and “Aliens from noncontiguous countries shall not be included in the sum of aliens encountered.” Did America’s enemies write this thing?

  • Ted Cruz had his own border security bill that wasn’t considered.

    Cruz went on to say he knew [the Biden border bill] “had zero chance of passage” and that the entire purpose of the bill was to give “political camouflage to Democrats running in November.”

    “Joe Biden can secure the border any day he wants,” Cruz said. “He doesn’t want to.”

    The Secure the Border Act, which passed in the lower chamber as as House Resolution (H.R.) 2, was introduced to the Senate by Cruz in September of 2023, a fact he highlighted Wednesday, saying to “give me Ukraine aid and H.R. 2 and I’ll vote for that.”

    H.R. 2 would have continued construction of the border wall, reinstated the “remain in Mexico” policy, and added border patrol agents and technology for both the southern and northern borders.

    “Democrats do not want to secure the border; they want this invasion,” Cruz continued. “The Americans who are dying as a result, they’re [Democrats] willing to look the other way.”

  • “Matt Taibbi Warns ‘Financial Big Brother Is Watching You.'”

    A few weeks ago, Ohio congressman and Judiciary Committee chairman Jim Jordan’s office released a letter to Noah Bishoff, the former director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, or FinCEN, an arm of the Treasury Department. Jordan’s team was asking Bishoff for answers about why FinCEN had “distributed slides, prepared by a financial institution,” detailing how other private companies might use MCC transaction codes to “detect customers whose transactions may reflect ‘potential active shooters.’”

    The slide suggested the “financial company” was sorting for terms like “Trump” and “MAGA,” and watching for purchases of small arms and sporting goods, or purchases in places like pawn shops or Cabela’s, to identify financial threats.

    Jordan’s letter to Bishoff went on:

    According to this analysis, FinCEN warned financial institutions of “extremism” indicators that include “transportation charges, such as bus tickets, rental cars, or plane tickets, for travel to areas with no apparent purpose,” or “the purchase of books (including religious texts) and subscriptions to other media containing extremist views.”

    During the Twitter Files, we searched for snapshots of the company’s denylist algorithms, i.e. whatever rules the platform was using to deamplify or remove users. We knew they had them, because they were alluded to often in documents (a report on the denylist is_Russian, which included Jill Stein and Julian Assange, was one example).

    However, we never found anything like the snapshot Jordan’s team just published:

    The highlighted portion shows how algorithmic analysis works in financial surveillance.

    First compile a list of naughty behaviors, in the form of MCC codes for guns, sporting goods, and pawn shops.

    Then, create rules: $2,500 worth of transactions in the forbidden codes, or a number showing that more than 50% of the customer’s transactions are the wrong kind, might trigger a response.

    The Committee wasn’t able to specify what the responses were in this instance, but from previous experience covering anti-money-laundering (AML) techniques at banks like HSBC, a good guess would be generation of something like Suspcious Activity Reports, which can lead to a customer being debanked.

    If Facebook, Twitter, and Google have already shown a tendency toward wide-scale monitoring of speech and the use of subtle levers to apply pressure on attitudes, financial companies can use records of transactions to penetrate individual behaviors far more deeply. Especially if enhanced by AI, a financial history can give almost any institution an immediate, unpleasantly accurate outline of anyone’s life, habits, and secrets. Worse, they can couple that picture with a powerful disciplinary lever, in the form of the threat of closed accounts or reduced access to payment services or credit. Jordan’s slide is a picture of the birth of the political credit score.

    Tiabbi says worse revelations are to come…

  • “Netanyahu Rejects Hamas Cease-Fire Demands, Vows to Fight until ‘Absolute Victory.'”

    Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected Hamas cease-fire demands on Wednesday, vowing to fight on until “absolute victory.”

    Netanyahu made the comments shortly after meeting with Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who arrived in the region Tuesday night after meeting with leaders of Qatar and Egypt in the most serious diplomatic push of the war to secure a cease-fire agreement. Through these diplomatic channels, Hamas presented Israel with a proposal for a three-stage cease-fire that would last for 135 days and culminate in the end of the war.

    “Surrendering to Hamas’s delusional demands that we heard now not only won’t lead to freeing the captives, it will just invite another massacre.”

    Indeed.

  • The Special Counsel’s report on Biden’s mishandling paints a picture of Biden’s mental decline we all know is true but which the media refuses to report.

    President Biden couldn’t even remember when he was vice president or when his son Beau had died, leading special counsel Robert Hur to conclude that he could not bring charges for mishandling of classified documents, because a jury would see the president “as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”

    In a report, Robert Hur concluded that Biden “willfully retained and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen.” But he declined to issue any charges, in part because Biden’s poor recollection would make him hard to convict.

  • If you want to see Fani Willis taken down only the way Ace of Spades can, then I direct your attention to “CashApp Cougar Fani Willis: Okay, Fine, So I Used Taxpayer Money to Hire a Human Meat-Mallet to Pound My Snizz Into Thin Tender Strips Like Veal Scallopini.” (Hat tip: Reader Tig if Brue.)
  • No less than 70 current and former employees of the New York City Housing Authority just caught federal charges for over $2 million in bribes. We call that “A good start.”
  • “ICE Operation Nabs a Dozen Illegal Aliens Convicted of Crimes Against Children.”
  • Radical, Soros-backed leftist Travis County DA has a primary opponent in Jeremy Sylestine.
  • “Former Houston Mayor Turner’s Senior Aide Sentenced Over Bribes Related to City Permits.”
  • Democratic Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut admits that his favorite Americans aren’t Americans.
  • Open borders in the UK means giant lines for NHS dentists.
  • In order to push green graft, the Biden Administration has designated Martha’s Vineyard as “low income” so they can get EV subsidies.
  • The Austin City Council will vote on creating a giant slush fund for left-wing activists. Of course they’re calling it an “Environmental Investment Plan”…
  • Kentucky tranny gets no jail time for molesting a baby.
  • Pakistan had an election and both sides claim they won.
  • Is China exporting deflation to the world?
  • In China, 30 million WeChat accounts are shut down in a single day.
  • Did a “SIM swapping crew” steal $400 million from FTX the same day it declared bankruptcy? That timing seems…suspicious.
  • Members of the Austin American-Statesman took one look at the vast wave of layoffs hitting newsrooms across the country and decided “Now is the perfect time to go on strike!” (Note: Elon Musk should buy the name, fire everyone, and build a national quality newspaper from scratch.)
  • YouTube threatens Louis Rossmann and FUTO for violating the terms of service for the APIs they’re not using.
  • Microsoft Edge is stealing Chrome tabs.
  • Dell demands all workers (no matter how far away) return to the office. Those who don’t will be “placed on a ‘career limiting’ fully remote contract. In my experience, working for Dell is itself career limiting
  • Man shoots home invader…with a musket.

  • Disney is evidently moving all hand animation to other countries. “I feel like this is punishment for the Burbank studio for delivering a terrible movie [Wish].” More.
  • Disney makes $1.5 billion investment in Fortnite creator Epic Games. Fremium games are a very tricky space, and Fortnite has been around since 2017. There’s a strong possibility that Disney has bought high here.
  • Mojo Nixon, RIP.
  • Budget drag race community comes together to help fan with terminal brain tumor who’s also the happiest guy they know. “Don’t feel bad for me. Everyone’s terminal.”
  • Former Houston Texas receiver Andre Johnson finally assumes his rightful place in the NFL Hall of Fame.
  • Who do you think treats dogs better: Palestinians or Israelis?

    (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)

  • Hit the tip jar if you’re so inclined.





    LinkSwarm For February 2, 2024

    Friday, February 2nd, 2024

    Let’s get this out of the way:

    Tons of Fani Willis’ crooked shenanigans come to light, Ukraine bags another warship, all those things they said the vaccine wouldn’t do it’s doing, and an anger management therapist who was very poor at his job. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

  • If you were wondering why Fulton County DA (and Trump prosecutor) Fani WIllis was so eager to bump uglies with married lover Nathan Wade, it turns out that his business partners bankrolled her campaign, and she gave them lucrative contracts.

    Business partners of District Attorney Fani Willis’ alleged lover Nathan Wade, whom she appointed to work on the case against former President Donald Trump, made donations to her campaign before receiving lucrative contracts from her office.

    Terrence Bradley, Wade’s former partner, and Christopher Campbell, his current partner, have collectively contributed more than $5,000 to Willis’ campaign, contribution disclosure reports show. Moreover, both men have each raked in tens of thousands of dollars from contracts with the district attorney’s office, according to county records.

    Campbell is a partner at Wade & Campbell Firm, where he works with Wade. Bradley formerly worked with Wade at Wade, Bradley & Campbell Firm, and also represented Wade in his divorce case until Sept. 2022.

    The donations add another wrinkle to Willis’ already-scrutinized relationship with Wade.

    Willis was accused in a motion earlier this month by Trump co-defendant Michael Roman of benefiting from the “lucrative” contract she awarded Wade when he took her on vacations using money earned from the position. Wade filed to divorce his wife on Nov. 2, 2021, the day after his contract with the district attorney’s office began, and has earned nearly $700,000 from the Fulton County District Attorney’s office since his appointment.

    Quid Pro, meet Quo. (Hat tip: Instapundit.)

  • More Willis shenanigans: “DA Fani Willis fired a whistleblower who informed her about the intentional misuse of federal funds and there’s audio of their conversation.”

  • If you’re having trouble keeping track of all Fani Willis’ lawbreaking, here’s a timeline.
  • Old and Busted: “If you don’t vote for me, you ain’t black!” The new hotness: Black voters just aren’t into Biden.

    Resident Biden appears to be in serious trouble with black voters ahead of the 2024 election, and black lawmakers and organizers are starting to panic.

    “What I’m hearing in my district is how ‘Bidenomics’ hasn’t really hit them in the pocket,” New York representative Jamaal Bowman told National Review earlier this week on the steps of the U.S. Capitol. “I need him in the barbershops. I need him on the basketball courts. I need him talking to the hip-hop community. I need him talking to the sports and athletics community to really get at what is troubling black men.”

    Polling suggests Bowman is right to be concerned. Just 50 percent of black adults said they approve of Biden in a national AP-NORC poll last month — a 36-point drop from July 2021. An October Siena College/New York Times poll found that 22 percent of black voters surveyed in six competitive presidential battlegrounds say they will vote for Trump over Biden in 2024, a stunning polling shift from a reliably Democratic coalition that helped Biden win the White House in 2020. That same survey found Trump’s numbers were even higher among black men.

    In the 40 years he’s spent in political activism, National Black Farmers Association president John Boyd Jr. says the Biden administration has done worse than any other administration in his lifetime in opening its doors to black voters. That lack of outreach, Boyd warns, may come back to bite him in November.

    Wait, black people like jobs and safe neighborhoods and dislike inflation and illegal aliens sucking up welfare benefits? Who knew?

  • “U.N. Agency for Palestinians Discloses Involvement of Employees in October 7 Attack.”

    The U.N.’s agency for Palestinians said that it fired several employees after receiving information from Israel showing that they had taken part in the October 7 terrorist attacks. The State Department indicated that twelve U.N. employees allegedly took part in the attacks and announced that it had temporarily paused funding for the agency while it reviews the situation.

    The U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) delivers aid to Palestinians across Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon. The U.S. is UNRWA’s largest donor, providing $343 million of its budget in 2022.

    In a statement Friday morning, UNRWA commissioner general Philippe Lazzarini disclosed that Israel had presented his agency with evidence of its employees’ involvement in Hamas’s massacre of Israelis.

    “To protect the Agency’s ability to deliver humanitarian assistance, I have taken the decision to immediately terminate the contracts of these staff members and launch an investigation in order to establish the truth without delay. Any UNRWA employee who was involved in acts of terror will be held accountable, including through criminal prosecution,” he said.

    Sure they will. The question is why the United States ever funded UNRWA, since the funds seem to go straight into rockets and murder tunnels to kill Israeli civilians with?

    The Trump administration cut off all funding to UNRWA in 2018, saying that the U.S. shoulders a disproportionate share of its budget. Blinken resumed funding to UNRWA three years later, pledging that the U.S. would seek reforms to the organization.

    Oh. That’s why…

  • They continue to play games with the job numbers.
  • It’s not just Fani Willis. “DOJ Opens Criminal Probe into Cori Bush for Allegedly Funneling Campaign Funds to Husband.”
  • Austin news via Libs of Ticktock:

    (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)

  • Ohio senate overrides the Governor’s veto of bill banning child genital mutilation and males playing female sports. Good.
  • Japan is not having America’s woke nonsense.
  • UPS is laying off 12,000 workers. You know, because of how strong that Biden economy is…
  • Mail is screwed up in Missouri City, Texas (southwest of Houston) because a new sorting machine didn’t fit in the building.
  • You know all those crazy “fringe” “conspiracy theories” about the Flu Manchu vaccine? Yeah, about that.

    We found the number of myocarditis reports in VAERS after COVID-19 vaccination in 2021 was 223 times higher than the average of all vaccines combined for the past 30 years. This represented a 2500% increase in the absolute number of reports in the first year of the campaign when comparing historical values prior to 2021.

  • Ukraine bags another Russian warship, in this case the Tarantul-class corvette Ivanovets.
  • “Starbucks Employee Opposed to Unionization Sues to Declare National Labor Relations Board Unconstitutional.” “The National Labor Relations Board should not be a union boss-friendly kangaroo court run by powerful bureaucrats who exercise unaccountable power in violation of the Constitution.” This is another post-Chevron lawsuit that has the potential to completely dismantle the administrative state.
  • Language on Texas 2021’s Proposition 2 declared illegal.

    Proposition 2 allowed counties to create transportation reinvestment zones (TRZs), a power they did not previously have. According to the Texas Department of Transportation, a TRZ is a kind of tax increment financing district where a “zone is created, a base year is established, and the incremental increase in property tax revenue collected inside the zone is used to finance a project in the zone.”

    The proposition did not include language about the use of increased ad valorem taxes to pay bonds or notes issued by the county in the TRZ district. A similar measure in 2011 that included such language was voted down.

  • “Anger management therapist loses his temper and murders a homeless man.” To be fair, the transient did try to fark with his dogs…
  • Woman with Master’s degree finds out that her trade school husband has quadrupling her salary with no debt.

  • Disney losses lawsuit against Ron DeSantis over Reedy Improvement District.
  • Media site called The Messenger blew through $50 million and closed down in less than a year. No, I never heard of it either…
  • George Carlin’s estate sues makers of AI Carlin.
  • “Texas Finds Loophole With New ‘Super Ouchy Pokey Wire.'”
  • “Tragic Report Reveals Thousands of Journalists Still Have Not Been Laid Off.”
  • I think he likes to swim…

    (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)

  • Did Israel Just Declare Victory Over Hamas?

    Monday, January 8th, 2024

    Three months in, reporting on the Israel-Hamas War has been notably poor, focused on playing up Israel-inflicted casualties and hyping the possibility of a wider two-front war with Hezbollah rather than concrete information on whether Israel is achieving military objectives or not.

    So it would be easy to miss this announcement that “IDF says it has completed the ‘dismantling of Hamas’ military framework.'”

    The Israel Defense Forces claimed on Sunday that it has “completed the dismantling of Hamas’ military framework” in the northern Gaza Strip, hitting hundreds of targets and taking out key leaders of the terrorist group.

    In an assessment of the first three months of the war between Israel and Hamas, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, an IDF spokesperson, said Israeli forces have met their goals through airstrikes, ground operations and intelligence gathering in the primary objective of eliminating Hamas.

    The Israel Defense Forces claimed on Sunday that it has “completed the dismantling of Hamas’ military framework” in the northern Gaza Strip, hitting hundreds of targets and taking out key leaders of the terrorist group.

    In an assessment of the first three months of the war between Israel and Hamas, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, an IDF spokesperson, said Israeli forces have met their goals through airstrikes, ground operations and intelligence gathering in the primary objective of eliminating Hamas.

    Among the Hamas commanders eliminated was Ahmad Randor, Hagari said, showing what he said was a photograph of Randor sitting with his command echelon in a bunker 40 meters, or about 131 feet, underground.

    “We have completed the dismantling of Hamas’ military framework in the northern Gaza Strip and will continue to deepen the achievement, strengthening the barrier and the defense components along the security fence,” Hagari said.

    More:

    The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) announced on January 6 that it “dismantled” the 12 Hamas battalions in the northern Gaza Strip. IDF officials added that they have dismantled Hamas’ “military framework” in the northern Gaza Strip. An Israeli Army Radio defense correspondent reported on January 6 that Israeli forces no longer permanently operate in the entire area of the northern strip and have moved to the border with Israel. IDF spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said on January 6 that the IDF would focus on the central and southern parts of the Gaza Strip and strengthen defenses along the Israel-Gaza Strip border fence. These announcements are consistent with the IDF stating that it would establish a security buffer zone in the northern Gaza Strip in the third phase of its operations. This third phase also involved Israeli forces conducting raids against Hamas compounds, destroying tunnels, killing remaining fighters, seizing intelligence and military equipment. CTP-ISW assessed on December 22 that, in Hamas’ Northern Strip Brigade and Gaza City Brigade, three battalions are combat ineffective, eight are degraded, and one is combat effective.

    ISW goes on to warn that Hamas has not been completely destroyed and will likely reconstitute itself. But that’s pretty much standard operating procedures for transnational jihadist terror organizations.

    No one questioned the IDF’s ability to ability to dismantle Hamas. Israel has one of the most modern, disciplined, technically savvy and motivated armed forces in the world. (Having enemies who literally call for the complete extermination of the Jewish race is a powerful motivator.) Hamas, on the other hand, is a terrorist organization whose main skills seem to be raping and murdering civilians and building tunnels. The only question was whether the the feckless, Iran-dealing Biden Administration and it’s Obama foreign policy retreads would be able to pressure Israel into halting before the job was done. That appears not to be the case.

    Another sign that IDF has succeeded is the distinct lack of apparent Hamas activity in Gaza.

    Today’s Livemap snapshot shows one rocket strike into Israel and one dead Al Jazerra journalist in Gaza. There’s precious little sign of any organized, robust Hamas military resistance left in Gaza.

    Nor are there any signs of Hezbollah “opening up a second front.”

    Though Hezbollah evidently launched rockets at an Israeli base this weekend, right now they’re only firing off the occasional mortar. Rockets and mortar attacks like this are just common terrorist pinpricks, and do not constitute anything like a “second front.” Meanwhile, Israeli planes are hitting Hezbollah positions with impunity.

    What constitutes victory for the Israeli government? It took fourteen years after the end of Operation Cast Lead for Hamas to reconstitute itself. Assuming the Shia fundamentalist government remains in power in Iran (which in turn depends on how badly American Democratic Administrations want to prop it up), then maybe we can look forward to a similar period of relative peace on Israel’s southern front.

    And presumably Israel won’t be caught asleep at the switch again the next time Hamas stages a big attack.

    LinkSwarm For January 5, 2024

    Friday, January 5th, 2024

    Happy New Year, everyone! The Biden Recession bites deeper, Israel dirtnaps a top terrorist, Harvard’s chief plagiarist finally steps down, and the crypto CEO who wasn’t there. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

    

  • Once again, the new job numbers are horrible.

    The monthly nonfarm payrolls (from the Establishment Survey) may have been weak at 216K but the far more accurate Household Survey showed that the number of Employed workers actually collapsed by an unprecedented 683K, the biggest drop since the US economy was shutdown by covid!

    Even scarier, while the monthly grind higher in the payrolls number (pulled from the far less accurate Establishment Survey) means that US jobs hit a record high every month with bizarre consistency and in December this was certainly the case, the total nonfarm employment number rose to an all time high 157.232 million, the abovementioned collapse in US Employment (per Household survey) meant that there were only 161.183 million employed people in the US, the lowest since June, with the now traditional divergence between these two surveys glaringly obvious.

  • Israel takes out senior Hamas leader in Beirut.

    A senior Hamas leader was killed Tuesday in a drone strike in Beirut, Lebanon, during a meeting between Palestinian factions at a Hamas office.

    Saleh al-Arouri, deputy chairman of Hamas’s political bureau and commander of the terror group’s military wing in the West Bank, and at least five others died from the explosion, which occurred near Hezbollah’s headquarters in Beirut, Lebanese state media reported. Several more were injured. Following the blast, Hamas blamed Israel for the “Zionist raid” amid its ongoing war with the Jewish state. Israel has not claimed responsibility for the strike.

    Many Israeli officials declined to comment. However, Israeli finance minister Bezalel Smotrich posted a statement on X shortly after the attack: “Surely your enemies will perish, O Israel.”

    In November, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu indicated he ordered the nation’s Mossad spy agency to eliminate Hamas leaders around the world after the militant group’s coordinated October 7 attack. Netanyahu’s office also declined to comment about the explosion.

    Al-Arouri, whom Hamas described as “one of the architects” of the terror attack on Israel, had close ties with Yahwa Sinwar, the group’s leader in Gaza. Al-Arouri is the most senior Hamas leader to have been killed since the war began in early October.

  • Supreme Court to take up Trump’s Colorado ballot case.
  • A good chunk of the Epstein files have finally been released. Some revelations: Bill Clinton “likes them young” and Donald Trump didn’t have sex with at least one girl who was asked under oath about it.
  • Harvard President Claudine Gay finally does the right thing and resigns in wake of burgeoning plagiarism scandal.
  • A three act farce: Act 1: “Ohio governor Mike DeWine (R.) on Friday vetoed a bill that would have banned both transgender procedures for minors and trans student-athlete participation in school sports in the state.” Act 2: Turns out DeWine has taken taken over $40,000 in donations from pro-child-genital-mutilation hospitals. Act 3: “Republican Ohio governor Mike DeWine issued an “emergency” executive order Friday banning child gender-transition surgeries after receiving intense backlash last week for vetoing a bill with a broader but similar mandate.” Ohio’s Republican legislature can and should override DeWine’s foolish veto.
  • “President of Illinois NAACP suspended after saying migrants are ‘savages who are ‘raping people, breaking into homes.'” Speaking the truth is now crime
  • Border Protection Officer Charged with Human Smuggling. Emanuel Celedon is also charged with bribery and drug trafficking.”
  • Robert F. Kennedy, jr. qualifies for the presidential ballot in Utah.

    Last month, American Values 2024, a super PAC supporting the third-party candidate, announced a plan to spend nearly $15 million to get Kennedy on the ballot in ten states: Arizona, California, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Nevada, New York and Texas. All are important to winning the 2024 race.

    I don’t see RFK Jr. doing even as well in Utah as Egg McMuffin did in 2016, and of the other states, only Arizona, Colorado, Michigan and Nevada might have any effect on the election, all four of which went (however fraudulently) for Biden in 2020.

  • Harris County Criminal Court Judge Arrested for Domestic Violence on New Year’s Eve. Harris County Judge Frank Aguilar is alleged to have assaulted and impeded the breathing of a female victim.” Aguilar is, of course, a Democrat.
  • “Louisiana sporting goods employees fired for chasing shoplifter who stole gun.” Get bent, Academy. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Crypto hedge fund CEO may not have actually existed. That’s some mighty fine vetting there, investors…
  • Ricky Gervais has a great idea: He and Dave Chappelle should co-host the Oscars. That would indeed be a smash ratings success, and I would watch the Oscars for the first time this century.
  • New commie gaming regulations lop $80 billion off Chinese video game company values.
  • TGIFriday’s just closed 36 locations in 12 states, including four in Texas. Thanks, Joe Biden.
  • Plus for Sephora “Body Butter”: Smoother skin. Minus: Attracts Spiders.
  • Mythbuster‘s Adam Savage keeps buying replica torturer baby masks from Terry Gilliam’s Brazil. Also, he watched it once a day, every day, for six months while working at a movie theater. Which explains a lot.
  • “Texas Agrees To Two-State Solution With Austin.”

    This is the only way for us to live in peace,” said Texas Governor Greg Abbot. “The citizens of Austin have been at war with the people of Texas for many years now, and to end the bloodshed for future generations, we are willing to recognize Austin as its own separate and sovereign land.”

    The resolution brought much-needed relief to the war-torn area, where battle lines had been drawn along the border of Austin. “The weirdo hipsters of Austin can stand down now,” said Texas Senator Ted Cruz in a statement acknowledging the resolution. “The people of Austin can now stop patrolling the perimeter of the city in armored tanks and go back to driving electric vehicles, painting strange murals nobody understands, and hating everything the United States stands for.”

  • “Detroit Pistons relegated to the WNBA.”
  • Bluehost is dog slow today, so I should wrap this up.

    Hit the tip jar if you’re so inclined.





    LinkSwarm For December 29, 2023

    Friday, December 29th, 2023

    Congratulations, you’ve made it to the end of 2023! Iranian proxies get pounded, NGO’s help destroy the border, Democrats keep trying to remove Trump from the ballot, and thieves get a taste of their own medicine. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

  • Not only is the Obama/Biden administration undermining American sovereignty and the rule of law by allowing a massive influx of illegal aliens, but a wide variety of NGOs, some “none political,” are also involved.

    A network of NGOs, or non-governmental organizations, seems to be playing a powerful role in coordinating the large-scale invasion of illegals at the US southern border.

    The new website Muckraker revealed a treasure trove of “mass migration blueprints,” handed out by NGOs across South and Central America to illegals with details about their route to the US.

    “The collapse of the US southern border is the result of a carefully planned and deliberately executed industrial mass migration program,” Muckraker said.

    MAP #1 – Distributed by Doctors Without Borders (Médicos Sin Fronteras in Spanish).

    They seem to be taking that “Without Borders” part way too literally.

    What’s becoming increasingly evident is that a network of NGOs funded partly by the US taxpayer but by other countries and corporations are covertly facilitating the invasion of illegals at the US southern border, as well as distributing them across the US into progressive metro areas.

    According to an August report by progressive left-leaning media watchdog organization Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting, President Biden’s Department of Homeland Security allocated $363 million to NGOs to assist illegal aliens once in the US.

    Texas Governor Greg Abbott released a press release one year ago detailing how “NGOs may be engaged in unlawfully orchestrating other border crossings through activities on both sides of the border, including in sectors other than El Paso.”

    Once across the border, NGOs are also helping migrants with transportation across the US, such as providing seats on commercial airlines.

    Also “Catholic Community Services of Southern Arizona Inc.”

  • U.S. Launches Air Strikes in Iraq in Response to Hezbollah Attack on Military Base.” Mess with the bull…
  • Speaking of attacks on Iranian proxies, Israel hit Syria again.
  • “Americans back Biden impeachment probe by 12 point margin and six in ten believe he was involved in Hunter’s shady deals.”
  • Trump is back on the ballot in Colorado
  • …but off it in Maine.
  • 2024 budget deficit on track to be the worst since Flu Manchu. (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • And speaking of Flu Manchu, here’s another fraud case. “A Georgia attorney and former City of Atlanta police officer has been convicted of fraudulently obtaining over $7 million in loans under the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP). According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, 62-year-old Shelitha Robertson from Atlanta conspired to submit PPP loan applications on behalf of four businesses she owned.”
  • The Real Story: “Philadelphia trans activist charged with rape of not one, but two minors.” The Newsweek Story: “Trans Activist Kendall Stephens’ Arrest Sparks MAGA Uproar.” Evidently the left feels that only MAGA Republicans should be upset at the rape of minors…
  • San Francisco’s 911 emergency.

    The first is answering 911 calls.

    According to the Department of Emergency Management, San Francisco’s 911 call dispatchers answered just 72 percent of calls within 15 seconds in October, the latest month available. That’s the lowest share of any month in the last six years, and well short of the department’s goal to answer 95 percent of calls in 15 seconds or fewer.

    Staffing is not up to the levels required, which is causing people to burn out, due to mandatory overtime. The bureaucratic hiring practice moves at a glacial pace, and so they can’t hire people to cover retirement and people just quitting due to burn out. They did raise pay some, but there is no indication if that is enough. I guess only time will tell.

    The second problem that San Francisco has, in relation to 911 calls, is getting officers to the scene of a “Priority A” incident.

    The slowdown in responses has contributed to broader delays San Franciscans face when trying to get help during emergency situations. The city’s typical response time to “Priority A” incidents — defined as the most urgent and serious events, like assaults-in-progress — is slower than it’s been at any point in the last eight years, increasing from about 6.5 minutes in January 2016 to nearly nine minutes this November.

    Now this is the media, so there is no mention of any “defund the police” initiatives in San Francisco over the past few years.

  • “Since President Trump’s win in 2016, black support for him has more than tripled, now exceeding 20 percent in some surveys.” Including Mark Fisher, co-founder of a Black Lives Matter group in Rhode Island
  • “Two large Pizza Hut operators in California are laying off all their delivery drivers ahead of a new state law that raises the minimum wage for fast-food workers to $20 an hour, Business Insider reports.” Good work, Democrats!
  • Thieves try to rob a check-cashing place and a woman steals their getaway car.
  • Store owner in Germany called a racist for trying to prevent Muslim illegal aliens from stealing from him.

    Grocery store manager Gatzke told Bild that the thieves who steal huge bags full of items are usually migrants, with around a third of them being Tunisian.

    During one incident at the Edeka supermarket in Regensburg, a man stole €140 euros worth of goods, while the manager has also tried to stop thieves stealing groceries worth €300 euros.

    “In the bag were spirits: vodka and liqueurs again. They are Muslims — did they want to resell the alcohol?” asked Gatzke.

    “What do you need 10 sea bream and so many shrimp for? Nobody steals that because they’re hungry,” he added.

    Gatzke noted that the culprits even steal shopping bags worth up to €2.50 euros.

    However, he was denounced as a “racist” for complaining about the mass looting and subsequently criticized by Ferat Koçak, a member of the Berlin House of Representatives for The Left party.

    Siding with the criminals, Koçak suggested that the migrants were “entitled” to steal because the government wasn’t giving them enough free money in welfare payments.

  • Some interesting artillery usage data, via reader Kirk”

  • Democrat majority in Oregon bans half the Republican Senate delegation from running for reelection.”
  • Nothing says “Republican” quite like having Democrats do fundraising for you. “Dade Phelan Fundraiser Hosted by Liberals. Former House Speaker Joe Straus and former Democrat nominee for lieutenant governor Leticia Van de Putte are among those raising cash for Phelan.”
  • Ken Paxton announced a $700 million settlement with Google.

    Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced a $700 million settlement with Google over anticompetitive practices.

    According to the settlement, Google must pay $630 million in restitution—minus costs and fees—to consumers who made purchases on the Google Play Store between August 2016 and September 2023 and were harmed by Google’s anticompetitive practices.

    Paxton secured the settlement alongside attorneys general from all 49 other states as well as the District of Columbia, and the territories of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

  • One childhood, furnished in early MST3K.

    would like to share the happiest Christmas memory of my childhood with you, an experience that shaped the young adult and the man I would become as much as any book or teacher ever would. I was accidentally given an inestimable gift – one which unwittingly dared me to grow intellectually and culturally so that I could be properly worthy of it, and which has since comforted me through endless long subsequent years of disappointment, heartache, personal growth, and triumph. And there’s no better time to write about it than during a season of joy. So if you will graciously permit me, on this Christmas Eve 2023 I’d like to take you back to the “not-too-distant future.”

    On Christmas Eve 1991, my father suggested we should watch a cassette of an obscure TV show his friend at work had taped off a then-obscure cable channel called Comedy Central a few days before. “A guy and some robots make fun of bad movies” was how he described the premise. Since my dad and I had been talking back to films from the safety of our family-room couch for years already while watching B-movie schlock like USA Up All Night, it was at least something to do. (11-year-olds do not otherwise have a long list of entertainment options.)

    Although my dad couldn’t possibly have intended it, what happened next altered the course of my life, and profoundly for the better: I was exposed to Mystery Science Theater 3000 (MST3K for short) for the first time. And “exposed” is the right word; the experience was as instantly catalyzing a moment for me as a rapid chemical reaction. It was the Christmas episode from a few days earlier, and the show was mocking something called Santa Claus Conquers the Martians.

    “I’ll never forget how comforted MST3K made me feel from that exact moment onward, comforted that there were people out there who had my sense of humor – only they were vastly more funny than me.”

    God bless us, each and every one…

  • North Carolina has a law that allows people to do practically whatever they want to the official state marsupial.” Which would be the possum. And it only applies five days a year. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • C-SPAN acquired by PornHub.
  • The Detroit Pistons tied a record for futility by losing 28 straight games. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • “Colorado Bans Trump From Running Over Concerns Usual Election Rigging System Could Fail.”
  • Hit the tip jar if you’re so inclined.





    LinkSwarm For December 22, 2023

    Friday, December 22nd, 2023

    The Colorado Supreme Court goes full TDS, IDF blows more Hamas tunnels, more unconstitutional gun laws are struck down, and news about two different Francises. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

  • The big news this week is that the Colorado Supreme Court got way, way, way out over their skis by kicking Donald Trump off the 2024 ballot despite him not being convicted of any crimes.

    The Colorado supreme court on Tuesday ruled that former president Donald Trump is ineligible to appear on the state’s ballot in the 2024 presidential election.

    In a 4–3 ruling, the court held that Trump’s presence on the ballot “would be a wrongful act under the Election Code,” arguing that the former president is disqualified from holding the presidency under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.

  • Even the Washington Post said the decision was wrong. (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • “The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) destroyed a vast network on underground tunnels inside Gaza City this week that belonged to top Hamas terrorist officials. Yahalom Unit Combat Engineering Forces discovered Hamas’ “Elite Quarter” on Wednesday, including “a large network of strategic underground tunnels which connect hideouts, and bureaus belonging to Hamas’ senior military and political leadership,” the IDF said in a statement.”

    It blew up real good:

  • Oklahoma bans DEI requirements at public colleges and universities, requires cuts to ‘non-critical personnel.’ Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt announced the mandate Wednesday, citing a need to spend more money on preparing young Oklahomans for the workforce, and less on ‘six-figure salaries to DEI staff.'” Faster, please. (Hat tip: Instapundit.)
  • “Federal judge blocks California gun control law against firearms in public places.”

    On Wednesday, a federal judge blocked a California law that would have banned the carrying of firearms in many public places, calling the legislation “sweeping, repugnant to the Second Amendment, and openly defiant of the Supreme Court.”

    According to Fox News, US District Judge Cormac Carney granted a preliminary injunction blocking the law, adding that it removes people’s ability to defend themselves and their families.

    The law was signed into law in September by Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom and was scheduled to go into effect on Jan. 1. The legislation banned people from carrying concealed firearms in places such as public parks, playgrounds, and religious institutions, regardless if they have a concealed weapon carry permit or not.

    Chuck Michel, president of the California Rifle and Pistol Association, which sued to block the law, said in a statement, “California progressive politicians refuse to accept the Supreme Court’s mandate from the Bruen case and are trying every creative ploy they can imagine to get around it. The Court saw through the State’s gambit.”

    He added that if that law had gone into effect, permit holders “wouldn’t be able to drive across town without passing through a prohibited area and breaking the law.”

  • Speaking of lawsuits: “Virginia Supreme Court Backs Teacher Fired For Not Using Student’s Preferred Pronouns.” Let the lawsuits fly. (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)
  • “Dem Staffer Busted for Having Gay Sex in Senate Hearing Room.” There’s more of that decorum and restoration of norms we keep hearing about… (Hat tip: Sarah Hoyt at Instapundit.)
  • Harvard President Claudine Gay’s plagiarism scandal is even worse than previously thought.

    Gay has been credibly accused of more than 40 acts of plagiarism during her tenure at Harvard – which the university secretly investigated, threatened journalists over, and ultimately concluded was no big deal – clearing her of breaching Harvard’s “standards for research misconduct.”

    The Times, looking at just five examples of Gay’s plagiarism, wrote: “her papers sometimes lift passages verbatim from other scholars and at other times make minor adjustments, like changing the word “adage” to “popular saying” or “Black male children” to “young black athletes.””

    One rule for the elite, another for you…

  • “Investigators Beginning To Suspect Claudine Gay’s Novel ‘Larry Potter And The Sorcerer’s Rock’ May Have Been Plagiarized.”
  • Fat Leonard is back in custody.

    Returning convicted defense contractor Leonard “Fat Leonard” Francis to U.S. custody as part of the Venezuelan prisoner swap on Wednesday is the latest twist in a decade-long salacious saga and bribery scheme that swept up dozens of American Navy officers.

    One of the biggest bribery investigations in U.S. military history led to the conviction and sentencing of nearly two dozen Navy officials, defense contractors and others on various fraud and corruption charges. And it was punctuated by Francis’ daring escape last year, when he fled from house arrest at his San Diego home to South America.

    An enigmatic figure who was 6-foot-3 and weighed 350 pounds at one time, Francis owned and operated his family’s ship servicing business, Singapore-based Glenn Defense Marine Asia Ltd. or GDMA, which supplied food, water and fuel to vessels. The Malaysian defense contractor was a key contact for U.S. Navy ships at ports across Asia for more than two decades. During that time he wooed naval officers with Kobe beef, expensive cigars, concert tickets and wild sex parties at luxury hotels from Thailand to the Philippines.

    In exchange, the officers, including the first active-duty admiral to be convicted of a federal crime, concealed the scheme in which Francis would overcharge for supplying ships or charge for fake services at ports he controlled in Southeast Asia. The officers passed him classified information and even went so far as redirecting military vessels to ports that were lucrative for his Singapore-based ship servicing company.

    In a federal sting, Francis was lured to San Diego on false pretenses and arrested at a hotel in September 2013. He pleaded guilty in 2015, admitting that he had offered more than $500,000 in cash bribes to Navy officials, defense contractors and others. Prosecutors say he bilked the Navy out of at least $35 million. As part of his plea deal, he cooperated with the investigation leading to the Navy convictions. He faced up to 25 years in prison.

    While awaiting sentencing, Francis was hospitalized and treated for renal cancer and other medical issues. After leaving the hospital, he was allowed to stay out of jail at a rental home, on house arrest with a GPS ankle monitor and security guards.

  • Far left Austin Democrat (and now U.S. Representative) Greg Casar
    is now singing a different tune on police patrols.

    An Austin, Texas Democrat politician is demanding police step up their patrols in his neighborhood despite previously voting to defund them.

    Yes, in the latest example of ‘Do as I say not as I do,’ Representative Greg Casar now says that he wants more police for at least the next week. It’s unclear why the Congressman wanted the extra police.

    The Austin Police Retired Officers Association however did not hold back and called out the Congressman’s sudden change of tone.

    “We want everyone in Austin to feel safe, but this seems to us as the height of hypocrisy from the congressman. Maybe he should hire private security like his fellow squad members do. Sure seems like he wants the police in his neighborhood just not yours,” the ROA tweeted out.

    Snip. “In 2020, Casar couldn’t hold back how happy he was when he helped the Austin City Council reduce the Austin Police Department’s budget by over $100 million.” (Previously.)

  • Delta, American Airlines fly illegal immigrants from Biden’s Arizona processing centers into domestic US on late night flights.”
  • Elizabeth Warren wants to enact an unconstitutional wealth tax.
  • “Taco stand owner spends $4k per WEEK in private security to protect his business (it’s more than his rent).” This is in D.C. And the cost for that gets passed on to everyone buying a taco…
  • Good: A fat Christmas duck roasting in your oven. Bad: A fat duck roasting in your engine right after takeoff. “Do you need an emergency vehicle?” “We need everything you have.” This was two days ago.
  • Military history YouTuber Mark Felton goes to visit Vatican City, and accidentally ends up getting an audience with the Pope.
  • Toshiba was delisted from the Tokyo Stock Exchange after 74 years and is being taken private.
  • Been a little lite on dog content for the last few LinkSwarms. so he’s a Ryan George skit about dogs and Christmas:

  • Hit the tip jar if you’re so inclined.





    Biggest Losers From Houthi Attacks? Not Israel And America

    Wednesday, December 20th, 2023

    It’s hard to report on Houthi rebels telling U.S. armed forces to “bring it on” and keep a straight face. It’s like Steve Urkel declaring he’s going to kick Mike Tyson’s ass, or Bambi vs. Godzilla.

    I mean, their video features a Northrup F-5, a plane introduced to service in 1964 and last manufactured in 1987. It would be very, very unlikely to defeat an F-15, much less an F-35, which would probably splash it from 50 miles away with an AIM-120 and be back in time for breakfast.

    I’m a bottomless well of Skiffy pop culture references.

    And the rest of their air force (or what little of it survives after Saudi air strikes) is old (and probably ill-maintained) Soviet crap of the type that got smoked by F-15s during Desert Storm more than 30 years ago.

    Beyond that, the Houthis probably only have the shitty drones Iran sells to Russia, and the even shittier rockets they give to Hamas, and neither of those will get the job done, either.

    So: Yeah.

    So instead of the laughable idea of direct Houthi-U.S. military confrontation, let’s turn to Peter Zeihan (yeah, him again) to talk about who the biggest losers are in the Houthi attacks on Red Sea shipping. (Hint: It’s not the U.S., or Israel.)

  • “Militants in Yemen are launching a combination of low-grade ballistic missiles and drones at commercial shipping in the Red Sea. And that’s led the 10 major shipping companies of the world to basically suspend operations in that area, and either tell their ships to wait [until] the threat passes, or simply sail around the Red Sea completely, which means going all the way around Africa for the Asia-Europe run.”
  • “Here we have basically a bunch of drug-adled militants, some of the world’s least competent ones, operating from some of the world’s least valuable land in Yemen, probably at the instigation of the Iranians who are their primary supporter, because this is a little conflict that is a needle in the side of Saudi Arabia cost them very little.”
  • “This is is not a formal shutting down of trade, this is more of a heavy annoyance.”
  • It’s not the danger of being sunk deterring traffic, it’s the dangerous of losing insurance for going into a zone of conflict.
  • Who’s hurt worst by all this? First, China. “Roughly 30% of all global containerized traffic [goes through Suez], and the biggest single chunk of that is Chinese exports to the European Union…it increases the sailing distance by 1/3rd to 2/3rds, and that means you need 1/3rd to 2/3rd more container ships to maintain the same flows. So we’re going to see a lot of pinches in the supply chains for finished goods.”
  • “In an environment where consumption is basically seized up in China and all they have left are exports, it’s also going to make it a little bit easier for the Europeans to put trade sanctions on the Chinese for product dumping.”
  • The Saudis might find it a bit more difficult to ship crude to Europe, but there are some ways around that.
  • Then there’s Russia: “Because of a lack of infrastructure, Russian crude had to be exported through the same port points on the Black and Baltic Sea, but it had to be then shipped through the Mediterranean through Suez through the Red Sea across the Arabian Sea to India, southeast Asia and China.”
  • “Well, that is barely an economically viable route now, which is one of the reasons why the Russians are typically selling their crude at a $20 to a $30 a barrel discount. But if Suez is closed, then they can no longer send these small tankers through it, and these small tankers don’t have the reach to go all the way around Africa.” I find the last assertion dubious, as they are surely ports in Africa they can resupply and refuel at, especially since I don’t think any countries in Africa have signed up for sanctions against Russia.
  • “So you’re looking at something like 1.5 to 2 million barrels a day of Russian crude that might finally actually be stranded if this isn’t solved pretty quickly now.”
  • Russian insurance update: “You have some Russian players, some Indian players, and some Chinese players who have started started to offer indemnification insurance. So we might get this really colorful situation where the real shipping companies stop using Suez and the Red Sea, but these shadow companies that have never had to pay out start using it and then we get to find out what happens if an Iranian-backed militant Force hits a Chinese Indian or Russian ship.” Good times, good time…
  • I also have to wonder if there are mercenaries Ukraine could hire to carry out letters of marquis and reprisal on Russian ships…