Posts Tagged ‘State Department’

LinkSwarm for February 17, 2023

Friday, February 17th, 2023

Bit of a mini-LinkSwarm this time around, as this was a week that I almost caught up on stuff delayed by the ice storm.



  • Bidenomics: “Core CPI Rises 32nd Straight Month, Headline Inflation Hotter Than Expected.”
  • “Biden’s job growth is mostly immigrants working for low wages.” Also this: “The Department of Homeland Security has been issuing an unknown number of two-year work permits to illegal immigrants, which will keep them in the workforce suppressing wages and fanning the flames of discontent amongst Americans unable to find jobs until the next presidential election.” What the hell?
  • Auto repos hit new records.
  • California’s income tax revenues decline by 50%. Tax it, and they will leave. (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • Disinformation Inc: State Department bankrolls group secretly blacklisting conservative media.”

    The Department of State has funded a deep-pocketed “disinformation” tracking group that is secretly blacklisting and trying to defund conservative media, likely costing the news organizations vital advertising dollars, the Washington Examiner can confirm.

    The Global Disinformation Index, a British organization with two affiliated U.S. nonprofit groups, is feeding blacklists to ad companies with the intent of defunding and shutting down websites peddling alleged “disinformation,” the Washington Examiner reported . This same “disinformation” group has received $330,000 from two State Department-backed entities linked to the highest levels of government, raising concerns from First Amendment lawyers and members of Congress.

    “Any outfit like that engaged in censorship shouldn’t have any contact with the government because they’re tainted by association with a group that is doing something fundamentally against American values,” Jeffrey Clark, ex-acting head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division, told the Washington Examiner. “The government or any private entity shouldn’t be involved with this entity that’s engaged in conduct that is either legally questionable or at least morally questionable.”

    GDI compiles a “dynamic exclusion list” that it feeds to corporate entities, such as the Microsoft -owned advertising company Xandr, emails show. Xandr and other companies are, in turn, declining to place ads on websites that GDI flags as peddling disinformation.

    The Washington Examiner revealed on Thursday that it is on this exclusion list. The list includes at least 2,000 websites and has “had a significant impact on the advertising revenue that has gone to those sites,” said GDI’s CEO Clare Melford on a March 2022 podcast.

    GDI has identified that the 10 “riskiest” news outlets for disinformation are the American Spectator, Newsmax, the Federalist, the American Conservative, One America News, the Blaze, the Daily Wire, RealClearPolitics, Reason, and the New York Post.

  • Huge earthquake rocks Syria and Turkey. That was less than a week ago and already it’s pretty much out of the news…
  • Another huge story that the news media has done it’s best to ignore: a toxic derailment in East Palestine, Ohio. The blew it up to prevent a BLEVE and ended up releasing Phosgene gas. That’s carrying your World War I reenactment too far.
  • 90-year California Democratic Senator old Dianne Feinstein to retire after 2024. But…
  • A few hour later she was evidently unaware she had retired. Increasingly, “crazy” or “senile” seem to be the two most common flavors of the Democratic Party…
  • Texas Governor Greg Abbott announces legislative priorities for the current session.
    1. Cutting Property Taxes
    2. End COVID Restrictions
    3. Education Freedom (School Choice)
    4. School Safety
    5. Ending Revolving-door Bail
    6. Doing More to Secure the Border
    7. Addressing the Fentanyl Crisis

    We’ll see if he follows through.

  • Followup: Transient encampment moved away from Headpsace Salon so they can go destroy someone else’s quality of life instead. (Previously.) (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Dumbass reaches for off-duty cop’s gun, with the expected results. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Inside China’s livestreamer girl factories.
  • Updated contact information for the Austin City Council.
  • Not a Babylon Bee headline: “Catalytic converter stolen from Oscar Mayer Wienermobile in Las Vegas.”
  • I chuckled.
  • Biden Taken To Coroner For Annual Physical.
  • Haley? No. Pence? No. Pompeo? No. Sununu? No.

    Sunday, February 12th, 2023

    Now that it’s less than two years before the 2024 Presidential election, a small crop of Republicans whose last names are not “DeSantis” or “Trump” seem to have convinced themselves that they’re viable Republican presidential candidates. These people are either wrong or running for Vice President. The lack of enthusiasm for all four of the would-be candidates is palpable.

  • Former UN Ambassador and South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley. For some reason (photogenic?), NRSC has been using her as one of their email begathon pitch-critters for a while, which probably explains why I’ve been receiving countdown emails (“I’m making a special announcement in 6 days.”) for her-not-even-remotely anticipated run. One struggles in vain to find the significant party faction Haley appeals to. Soft feminist Republican businesswomen? Indian-Americans? Plus: She appointed Tim Scott to the senate. Minuses: Backed Rubio in 2016, and was soft on culture war/social justice issues until about late 2020, and refused to fight transgender bathrooms, very low-hanging fruit for actual conservatives, back when she had a chance as SC Governor. No thank you. Effectively running for Vice President.
  • Former Vice President Mike Pence. Former Vice Presidents (Nixon, Bush41) used to have the inside tract to a White House nod in the Republican Party, but those days are gone. A solid, unexciting Vice President in the Walter Mondale mode for the first 46 months of his term who royally pissed off Trump supporters with his words and deeds in the last two months. Rational or not, Trump supporters now seem actively hostile to a Pence run, and since they were his only potential base of significant support (and only if Trump didn’t run), that’s a real obstacle, despite him checking almost all of the right policy boxes. If he runs (I have my doubts, as he doesn’t seem to have even his own website), he’s effectively running in the John Kasich lane (right down to the “unexciting Midwestern governor” background), which is a one-way ticket to Palookaville. No thank you. The only candidate here that we know isn’t running for Vice President.
  • Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. There was a time when being Secretary of State was a solid stepping stone to The White House. And that time was “the early 1800s,” as Martin van Buren was the last to do it, and only after a stint as Vice President. Which is bad news for Pompeo, arguably the most successful Secretary of State since James Baker. Between the Abraham Accords and keeping the War on Terror coalition together long enough to destroy the nascent caliphate of the Islamic State, Pompeo was a vast improvement over the largely ineffective Rex Tillerson, and worked well with foreign nations and international organizations that were, to put it mildly, not wild about his boss. And he has some other impressive credentials as well. “He graduated first in his class from West Point, and from Harvard Law and was on Harvard Law Review. After six years in the House of Representatives, he became CIA director for Trump, and then secretary of state – the only person ever to hold both jobs.” His short congressional tenure earned him a 97% score from the ACU. For me one of the biggest problems with Pompeo is that, like Haley, I primarily know his post-office career as a guy constantly in my inbox begging for money, and also talking like a career politician that’s already cranking up the baloney factory before properly introducing himself for a run. As Beto O’Rourke found out, three terms in the house is exceptionally thin electoral experience for a Presidential run. Plus his attempt to use “pipehitter” as a catchphrase for some sort of imaginary blue collar credibility was just laughable, as the term conjures drug addicts rather than plumbers. There’s just a bit too much standard issue political phoniness here, and Pompeo strikes me as someone who’s time has already passed. No thank you, but the softest no thank you of these four.
  • New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu. I was only vaguely aware of Sununu The Younger, but his attack on DeSantis for having the balls to fight the poison of social justice instantly rocketed him to the bottom of my list. You would think Romney’s failure would have soured the party on moderate business-oriented governors, but evidently Sununu didn’t get the memo. Likewise, I doubt modern voters are interested in voting for Bush Lite The Next Generation. No thank you. An unwillingness to actual fight for conservative values is automatically disqualifying, and I don’t him bringing anything to the table as a Veep pick.
  • So there you have it. Four people who are not going to be the Republican Presidential Nominee in 2024.

    Bring on the Trump-DeSantis match!

    Colin Powell, RIP

    Monday, October 18th, 2021

    Colin Powell, Secretary of State for George W. Bush, and former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for George H. W. Bush, has died at age 84.

    Powell, a consummate Washington insider, was fairly effective in both roles. As Secretary of State, he was much better at managing relations with American allies and various international institutions than (in increasing order of general competence) John Kerry, Madeline Albright, Warren Christopher, Rex Tillerson, Hillary Clinton or Al Haig, but not among the very best of the modern era (George Schultz, James Baker and Mike Pompeo), and was notably better than successor Condoleezza Rice. He kept the Blair government onboard for Operation Iraq Freedom (at considerable political cost to Blair), effectively used the temporary post-9/11 period of international goodwill, maintained the sanctions regime on Iran, and effectively represented a President who was not loved by the “international community.”

    As Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the Gulf War, he effectively managed inter-service relations and empowered General Norman Schwarzkopf to produce the most overwhelmingly impressive military victory by American forces since World War II.

    Powell does owe a small measure of blame in that American involvement in Iraq turned out to be a long-running, expensive distraction whose ultimate success was only cemented under the Trump Administration, but that was clearly a bipartisan quagmire, as was the long-running, expensive, disaster in Afghanistan, in which the State Department played a very baleful role.

    That he was a squishy Republican who backed Obama in 2008 shouldn’t change the fact that he was fairly adept at at implementing the policies of the Presidential Administrations he worked for, no matter how mistaken some of those policies may appear in hindsight. Powell was almost universally praised for effective and dignified management in successfully filling two different demanding roles.

    He once described himself in an interview with the New York Times in 2007 as a “problem-solver.” He offered this analysis of himself: “He was taught as a soldier to solve problems, So he has views, but he’s not an ideologue. He has passion but he’s not a fanatic. He’s first and foremost a problem-solver.”

    LinkSwarm for June 4, 2021

    Friday, June 4th, 2021

    The pandemic may almost be over, but Mao Tze Lung is still in the news!

  • Katherine Eban at Vanity Fair is shocked, shocked to discover that the Wuhan Coronavirus may have come from a lab!

    On February 19, 2020, The Lancet, among the most respected and influential medical journals in the world, published a statement that roundly rejected the lab-leak hypothesis, effectively casting it as a xenophobic cousin to climate change denialism and anti-vaxxism. Signed by 27 scientists, the statement expressed “solidarity with all scientists and health professionals in China” and asserted: “We stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin.”

    The Lancet statement effectively ended the debate over COVID-19’s origins before it began. To Gilles Demaneuf [a data scientist with the Bank of New Zealand in Auckland], following along from the sidelines, it was as if it had been “nailed to the church doors,” establishing the natural origin theory as orthodoxy. “Everyone had to follow it. Everyone was intimidated. That set the tone.”

    The statement struck Demaneuf as “totally nonscientific.” To him, it seemed to contain no evidence or information. And so he decided to begin his own inquiry in a “proper” way, with no idea of what he would find.

    Demaneuf began searching for patterns in the available data, and it wasn’t long before he spotted one. China’s laboratories were said to be airtight, with safety practices equivalent to those in the U.S. and other developed countries. But Demaneuf soon discovered that there had been four incidents of SARS-related lab breaches since 2004, two occuring at a top laboratory in Beijing. Due to overcrowding there, a live SARS virus that had been improperly deactivated, had been moved to a refrigerator in a corridor. A graduate student then examined it in the electron microscope room and sparked an outbreak.

    Demaneuf published his findings in a Medium post, titled “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: a review of SARS Lab Escapes.” By then, he had begun working with another armchair investigator, Rodolphe de Maistre. A laboratory project director based in Paris who had previously studied and worked in China, de Maistre was busy debunking the notion that the Wuhan Institute of Virology was a “laboratory” at all. In fact, the WIV housed numerous laboratories that worked on coronaviruses. Only one of them has the highest biosafety protocol: BSL-4, in which researchers must wear full-body pressurized suits with independent oxygen. Others are designated BSL-3 and even BSL-2, roughly as secure as an American dentist’s office.

    Read on to see mostly what those of you reading this blog knew last year, albeit with some new details. Such as…

  • It seems that even The State Department tried to block investigation of the lab leak hypothesis:

    A report in Vanity Fair details actions by some members of the U.S. State Department to block efforts to investigate the origins of the coronavirus because the inquiry could open “a can of worms.” An internal memo sent to department heads by Thomas DiNanno, former acting assistant secretary of the State Department’s Bureau of Arms Control, Verification, and Compliance, warned “not to pursue an investigation into the origin of COVID-19.”

    The “can of worms” in question was the extensive funding by the U.S. government into the Wuhan Virology Lab’s “gain-of-function” virus research. It’s unclear whether DiNanno was concerned that an investigation would uncover evidence of a lab leak or the extent to which the U.S. was funding dangerous research.

    Indeed, there’s a lot more going on with this gain-of-function research than has ever been revealed. There appears to be a powerful lobby within the U.S. government that is heavily invested in the dangerous research and is serious about keeping it quiet. Former CDC chairman Robert Redfield received death threats from fellow scientists after telling CNN that he believed COVID-19 had originated in a lab.

    Just whose interests does the federal bureaucracy actually serve? (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)

  • Speaking of which, Dr. Anthony Fauci emails obtained via FOIA show him flip-flopping on a number of topics, including whether Flu Manchu came from a Chinese lab or not.
  • Ron Paul: How Texas killed Flu Manchu:

    The pro-lockdown “experts” were shocked. If a state as big as Texas joined Florida and succeeded in thumbing its nose at “the science” – which told us that for the first time in history healthy people should be forced to stay in their houses and wear oxygen-restricting face masks – then the lockdown narrative would begin falling apart.

    President Biden famously attacked the decision as “Neanderthal thinking.” Texas Democratic Party Chairman Gilberto Hinojosa warned that, with this order, Abbott would “kill Texans.” Incoming CDC Director Rochelle Walensky tearfully told us about her feelings of “impending doom.”

    When the poster child for Covid lockdowns Dr. Fauci was asked several weeks later why cases and deaths continued to evaporate in Texas, he answered simply, “I’m not sure.” That moment may have been a look at the man behind the proverbial curtain, who projected his power so confidently until confronted with reality.

    Now a new study appearing as a National Bureau of Economic Research working paper, highlighted recently in Reason Magazine, has found “no evidence that the reopening affected the rate of new COVID-19 cases in the five-week period following the reopening. …State-level COVID-19 mortality rates were unaffected by the March 10 reopening.”

  • Hunter Biden said he couldn’t remember his baby mama. Turns out she worked for him. And he fired her.
  • Every time Hunter is in the news, the MSM asks Joe Biden about…ice cream. “The record is now rife with individuals associated with foreign governments and intelligence organizations giving millions to Hunter and his uncle as well as luxurious expenses and gifts.”
  • A meme for all seasons:

    

  • Rashard Turner, founder of St. Paul chapter of #BlackLivesMatter learns better:

    That was made clear when they publicly denounced charter schools alongside the teachers union. I was an insider in Black Lives Matter. And I learned the ugly truth. The moratorium on charter schools does not support rebuilding the black family. But it does create barriers to a better education for black children. I resigned from Black Lives Matter after a year and a half. But I didn’t quit working to improve black lives and access to a great education.

  • Congressional Democrats just hit a snag in trying to cram through lots of budget busting bills using reconciliation.

    While the Democrats have high, if not delusional hopes of fundamentally changing every aspect of American life, from federal voting dictates to essentially outlawing sub-contracting, the actual rules of the Senate have stood in their way. The filibuster, which Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema (among others who are laying low) have pledged to not touch, means that Chuck Schumer and his merry band can’t force through things on a simple 50-50 vote.

    The Democrats were given a shot of life a few months ago, though, in the form of a parliamentarian ruling that Schumer claimed greenlit most of his agenda. I expressed skepticism at the time in an article discussing the infrastructure package.

    Chuck Schumer recently claimed the Senate parliamentarian gave him free rein, yet that decision has not been made public, and there’s probably a reason for that.

    Well, it appears my skepticism was warranted. In what is claimed as a “new ruling,” the parliamentarian effectively rips the heart out of the Democrat agenda.

    Reconciliation is a very narrow process, and the Byrd Rule requires that anything included in a reconciliation bill must deal with taxes and budgetary issues. You also have stipulations about deficit offsets that must be taken into account. You can not pass regularly legislative items under the guise of reconciliation.

    Given that, this ruling essentially defeats HR1, the ProAct, and much of what is included in the current “infrastructure” bill. Of course, none of those bills were likely getting support from Manchin anyway, but with reconciliation off the table to get this stuff passed, Schumer is now officially out of options.

    (Hat tip: Director Blue.)

  • Red states continue crushing blue states economically.
  • Inflation is back.

    Corn, soybeans, and wheat have been trading at multiyear highs, with corn having risen from around $3.80 per bushel in January 2020 to approximately $6.75 now. Chicken wings are at all-time record highs. It is getting more expensive to eat.

    Copper prices have risen to an all-time high. Steel, too, recently traded at prices 35 percent above the previous all-time high set in 2008. Perhaps most famously, the price of lumber has nearly quadrupled since the beginning of 2020 and has nearly doubled just since January.

    Naturally, with raw materials prices soaring, prices of manufactured goods are jumping, too. That is especially noticeable in the housing market, where the median price of existing homes rose to $329,100 in March—a whopping 17.2 percent increase from a year earlier.

    The cost of driving is soaring, too. According to J.D. Power, cited in the Wall Street Journal, the average used car price has risen 16.7 percent and new car prices have risen 9.6 percent since January.

  • What I Like About Being White“:

    My answer would’ve been blunt – What I like about being white is I’m free to think anything I like; believe anything politically and not be prejudged by liberals for it. I don’t have people assuming I vote a specific way, for a particular party, simply because of my skin color. That no matter what I believe, I won’t be called a traitor to my race, a sell-out, or some racial slur like “Uncle Tom,” or “Uncle Tim.”

    What I like about being white is I don’t have to suffer the bigotry of leftists demanding I conform to how they insist I must think.

    Hill and pretty much every left-wing pundit, TV personality, reporter, academic, actor, etc., do not extend that same courtesy to, say, any black conservative. Ever.

    In that answer, it would have exposed Hill for what he was trying to do to Rufo, and it shows what the left is now: you are your skin color. If you refuse to conform, if you won’t be what they demand you must be, you are their enemy.

  • Polls show that under Biden, Americans think America is weaker and race relations worse.
  • “BLM activist steps down from school board after allegations he molested up to 62 children.” (Hat tip: Ed Driscoll at Instapundit.)
  • Florida Governor Ron DeSantis does what Texas couldn’t: sign into law a bill preventing men from competing in women’s sports.
  • Gun buybacks increase gun crimes. (Hat tip: 357 Magnum.)
  • Iran’s largest warship mysteriously catches fire and sinks.

  • A new government in Israel?

    Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid announced that he is able to form a new government, in another step towards ousting longtime Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

    Lapid’s coalition is made up of parties from the left and right wings of the political spectrum, many of whom would not normally sit together in the same government. For the first time in Israel’s history, an Arab political party—the Islamic conservative United Arab List—signed on as part of the prospective governing coalition.

    The new government must survive a vote of confidence in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, but the Knesset will not be in session for another twelve days. This means that members of Lapid’s coalition may defect in the meantime, potentially sending Israel to another round of elections.

    Before Democrats start celebrating the fall of their designated bogeyman, the man likely to replace Netanyahu in the new government is Naftali Bennett, who is even harder right than Bibi:

    Yair Lapid and Naftali Bennett have reached an agreement to rotate the prime minister’s position between them as they race to meet a Wednesday midnight deadline to finalize a coalition government to end Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s 12-year rule.

    Under the agreement, Bennett will take the premiership first, but the two are still working on finalizing their ruling coalition, which would include parties from across the political spectrum. The Associated Press reported that as of 6 p.m. Wednesday in Israel, there was still no sign of progress.

  • “New York Times Publishes Photo of Girl Killed by Israelis Who Was Also Killed by Israelis in 2017.”
  • Hollywood types are pouring money into the New York City mayor’s race:

    A-listers including actress Gwyneth Paltrow and director Steven Spielberg have raised the stakes with their backing of candidates. Spielberg and his wife have finally supported activist Maya Wiley, while Paltrow has supported Ray McGuire, a former Citigroup executive, Bloomberg reports.

    The majority of those identified as actors or part of the entertainment industry have opted to join Paltrow in backing McGuire, who has vowed to boost film tax credits, Bloomberg reports. Figures who have donated to McGuire include “Despicable Me” producer Chris Meledandri, filmmaker Spike Lee and comedic actor Steve Martin. McGuire is also the only candidate not accepting public matching funds, Bloomberg notes.

    Other candidates getting attention from Tinseltown include Scott Stringer and former presidential candidate Andrew Yang. Actress Scarlett Johansson has donated to Stringer, while Yang has reportedly received financial backing from actor Michael Douglas.

    Also: “Recent polls, however, show Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams in the lead.”

  • Two-time loser Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke may want to lose running for governor as well.
  • Nice profile of South Carolina Senator Tim Scott. (Hat tip: Instapundit.)
  • The triumph of Thomas Sowell. Review of Jason L. Riley’s new book Maverick: A Biography of Thomas Sowell.
  • Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
  • Speaking of which: Houston homeowner kills would-be burglar. (Hat tip: 357 Magnum.)
  • Florida woman previously rescued naked from a storm drain is rescued from another storm drain in Texas. It’s time to admit you have a D&D LARPing problem… (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • Allen West steps down as Texas Republican Party Chairman in July.
  • Amazon is trying to steal your bandwidth.
  • “Google’s Diversity Chief Removed for Decrying Jews’ ‘Insatiable Appetite for War and Killing.’ No doubt they’ve moved him to their Republican Deplatforming division…
  • Carbonated Jägermeister.
  • “CIA Replaces Waterboarding With 12-Hour Lectures On Intersectional Feminism.”
  • “Bars On Migrant Kids’ Cages To Be Painted Rainbow Colors For Pride Month.”
  • Bilingual:

  • State Department Lead Investigator Says Flu Manchu Escaped From Lab

    Wednesday, March 17th, 2021

    Seems like a whole lot of well-informed people keep thinking the thought that our kowtowing media keeps telling us we’re forbidden to think:

    The US State Department’s former lead investigator who oversaw the COVID-19 task force into the origins of the virus believes SARS-CoV-2 escaped from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and may have been the product of bioweapons research, according to Fox News.

    “The Wuhan Institute of Virology is not the National Institute of Health,” David Asher – now a senior fellow at the Hudson institute – told Fox News in an interview, adding: “It was operating a secret, classified program. In my view, and I’m just one person, my view is it was a biological weapons program.”

    Asher has long been a “follow the money” guy who has worked on some of the most classified intelligence investigations for the State Department and Treasury under both Democratic and Republican administrations. He led the team that uncovered the international nuclear procurement network run by the father of Pakistan’s nuclear program, AQ Khan, and uncovered key parts of North Korea’s secret uranium enrichment. He believes the Chinese Communist Party has been involved in a massive cover-up during the past 14 months. -Fox News

    “And if you believe, as I do, that this might have been a weapons vector gone awry, not deliberately released, but in development and then somehow leaked, this has turned out to be the greatest weapon in history,” Asher told a Hudson Institute panel discussing the origins of the pandemic. “You’ve taken out 15 to 20 percent of global GDP. You’ve killed millions of people. The Chinese population has been barely affected. Their economies roared back to being number one in the entire G20.”

    According to Asher – who interfaced with the Chinese government as the State Department’s lead representative during the 2003 SARS outbreak – the CCP’s behavior surrounding COVID-19 reminds him of criminal investigations he’s overseen.

    “Motive, cover-up, conspiracy, all the hallmarks of guilt are associated with this. And the fact that the initial cluster of victims surrounded the very institute that was doing the highly dangerous, if not dubious research is significant,” he said.

    One wonders who it was that first gave the MSM their marching orders: “Never say ‘China virus!’ Never say that it might have come from the giant viral lab researching coronavirus in the same city it originated in!” The fact that they continue to label this very logical inference a “conspiracy theory” after Trump has left the White House suggests a desperate need to please China among our so-called media elites.

    Terrorist Cartels And The War On Drugs

    Sunday, December 8th, 2019

    Last week President Donald Trump “announced his intentions to designate Mexican cartels as foreign terrorist organizations (FTOs), just weeks after nine American were ambushed and gunned down less than 100 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border by cartel members.” Sarah McConnell at The Texan has details on legislation to enact that proposal:

    After the president said he was considering designating Mexican cartels as FTOs in February, Texas Rep. Chip Roy(TX-R-21) supported by other members of the Texas delegation introduced legislation intended to do just that.

    According to the Department of State, the FTO designation is granted by the Secretary of State in accordance with section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) as a means of helping to fight terrorism by “curtailing support for terrorist activities and pressuring groups to get out of the terrorism business.”

    The Bureau of Counterterrorism within the State Department (CT) monitors foreign organizations known to be connected to terrorist activities, including engaging in, planning, and preparing attacks.

    In addition, the CT carries the responsibility of identifying potential targets for designation based on capability and intent to conduct terrorist activities.

    After the CT identifies a potential FTO designation and demonstrates that the foreign organization in question engages in or is capable of terrorist activity through a detailed record, the Secretary of State in partnership with the Attorney General and Secretary of the Treasury then decides whether or not to grant the designation.

    If the designation is granted, Congress is notified and given one week to review under the terms of the INA.

    The designation officially takes effect when published to the Federal Register provided Congress does not vote to block the designation within the allotted time frame.

    An entity legally fits the criteria for FTO designation under the terms of the INA if it:

  • Is a foreign organization,
  • Engages in terrorist activity as defined in the INA, or
  • Threatens the national security of the United States or U.S. nationals through terrorist activities.
  • In effect, the FTO designation authorizes the Secretary of the Treasury to freeze all assets and block financial transactions conducted by the terrorist organization.

    That’s great and all, but I doubt Mexican drug cartels keep the majority of their funds in the United States. Some, yes, but I bet the bulk are in Mexico, Caribbean tax havens and Switzerland. In addition to those giant piles of cash they keep around for washing cars, buying drugs, exchanging hostages and buying politicians.

    (That photo of a giant pile of cash was taken from accused Chinese-Mexican Sinaloa Cartel druglord Zhenli Ye Gon, was seized in 2007, and has $207 million in U.S. currency alone. It’s been circulating a while, and recent pieces that claim it was seized from someone else or is worth more (I’ve seen $22 billion) are untrustworthy.)

    Additionally, the designation restricts the ability of foreign organizations and their affiliates to travel to the United States and makes it illegal to provide resources to the terrorist organization.

    The designation also has foreign policy implications, as it stigmatizes terrorist organizations, brings awareness to other nations of the dangers of said terrorist organizations, and helps to curb terrorism financing internationally by encouraging other countries to also consider designating organizations as such.

    This will help some, but drug organizations tend to be fairly nimble about moving their money around, and have so much of it that it’s easy to bribe officials up and down the line to make look the other way, an advantage most Islamic terrorist organizations don’t have.

    After announcing his intentions to designate Mexican cartels as FTOs last week, President Trump has been met with resistance from Mexican government officials despite the president’s offers to provide added border security measures and other forms of assistance to the country.

    Citing concerns over U.S. intervention in the country, Mexican Foreign Minister Marcel Ebrard issued a statement following President Trump’s announcement saying, “Mexico will never admit any action that means the violation of its national sovereignty. We will act firmly. The position has already been transmitted to the US as well as our resolution to deal with transnational organized crime. Mutual respect is the basis of cooperation.”

    Mexican President Andrew Manuel Lopez Obrador has also declined aid and other forms of assistance offered by President Trump.

    It’s hard to get more hands-on with Mexican drug cartels when the Mexican government wants you to stay hands-off.

    Can such declarations win the War on Drugs?

    No.

    Human desire for illegal drugs is so strong that even the death penalty hasn’t prevented a thriving illegal drug trade in China, and there was even one in the Soviet Union. A further problem is that large swathes of Mexico’s government is believed by many to be in the pay of various drug cartels. Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman claimed that he had paid a $100 million bribe to then-Mexican president Enrique Pena Nieto, and Guzman also claimed to have bribed a onetime campaign associate of current president Lopez Obrador. And those are just allegations from one trial of one cartel head. Mexico itself has proescuted many more officials for cartel bribery charges. “Would you prefer to take a million dollars from us, or to see your entire family tortured to death in front of you?” is a powerfully persuasive argument to many Mexicans.

    Is there any way to win the war on drugs? As a science fiction writer, I could spin up a scenario where our military and/or mercenaries (think letters of marque and reprisal) simultaneously decapitate all the major cartels by taking out their leaders and lieutenants, while simultaneously seizing control of all the known coca fields, and maybe clandestinely blowing up an illegal Chinese fentanyl factory or ten, and simultaneously legalizing drugs, and offering zero-cost drug fixes in safe surroundings for registered addicts and whisking a certain number off to giant treatment/rehabilitation/internment facilities off in Montana or Idaho or someplace where gangs wouldn’t immediately bribe someone to start dealing to the suddenly isolated addicts, and massive job programs for registered/ex-addicts to clean up America’s cities at below minimum wages while they complete treatment programs while also retraining for better jobs to integrate them back into the community. I can see that cutting illegal drug use by 80% of more while draining all the profit from the cartels, all at a cost of only, oh, about four or five political and/or constitutional impossibilities. It might not work, but it probably wouldn’t fail any worse than the system we have now, especially in the places where Democratic Party mayors already let drug addicts openly shoot up in the street.

    I would also like a pony.

    Short of that, or some technological fix (one injection and the nanoassemblers in a junkie’s bloodstream to produce a heroin rush whenever desired for the rest of his life), or even less probable Social Darwanist solutions (such as John W. Campbell’s proposal to put free barrels of heroin on every street corner; by the evening everyone who couldn’t handle it would be dead and the rest of us could get on with our lives), I don’t see any government policy short of full legalization of all illegal drugs making any significant difference in the problem.

    But as much as I support drug legalization, I suspect I’ll get two ponies before that happens.

    Would declaring the cartels terrorist organizations make a big difference? If it actually lets us take out the cartels, then briefly, and marginally, until new cartels form to fill the vacuum. During that time, Mexico might indeed improve to become a less violent place, possibly only temporarily, or the new cartels might be more circumspect in their violence, or more willing to peacefully carve up business. If, however, it results in a permeant American military presence fighting the cartels, then it would probably make things worse.

    As a persuasion play for the current cartels to knock off the violence and take a lower profile, then it might indeed have some value.

    LinkSwarm for November 8, 2019

    Friday, November 8th, 2019

    Welcome to another Friday LinkSwarm!

  • Trump is derailing the elite’s gravy train:

    Like the garbage French elite of long ago, our American garbage elite of today has learned nothing and forgotten nothing. For four years, it has been focused entirely on deep sixing Donald Trump for his unforgivable crime of demanding that our ruling caste be held accountable for its legacy of failure. Instead of focusing on not being terrible at their job of running America’s institutions, our elitists have decided that the real problem is us Normals being angry about how they are terrible at their job of running America’s institutions. So, let’s imagine that they finally vanquish Trump, though every time they come up against him they end up dragging themselves home like Ned Beatty after a particularly tough canoe trip.

    What happens then?

    What happens then is that it’s back to business as usual, and for decades, business as usual for our garbage elite has not merely been running our institutions badly but pillaging and looting our country for power, prestige and cash.

    The difference is that in the future they will be much more careful to ensure that no one who is not in on the scam will ever again come anywhere near the levers of power. You can already see it – the demands that we defer to the bureaucrats they own, the attacks on the idea of free expression, and the campaign to disarm us. Their objective is no more Trumps, just an endless line of progressive would-be Maduros with the march toward despair occasionally put on pause for a term by some Fredocon Republican who hates us Normals just as much as the Dems, but won’t admit it until after he’s out of office.

  • So #NeverTrumpers are upset because Trump called them scum? Well boo freaking hoo:

    If you were involved in the 2016 election and, at any point, decided that Hillary Clinton was very bad for the nation and that Evan McMullin was a f***ing bug-eating tool and that Donald Trump was not Beelzebub incarnate, then you became the target of abuse. In my personal experience, there are people who I’d considered friends for several years who I would no longer pee on if they were on fire today because of the abuse and scorn the heaped upon people who disagreed with them and the cheap bullying that they engaged in. Trumpkin. Trumptard. Trumpaloo. Trumphumper. And all manner of other cute names.

    Snip.

    For three years these people have degraded, demeaned, and libeled anyone who simply decided that, for all his flaws, Trump was better than any Democrat. No grace was offered to people who had considered them friends and colleagues. No common cause was allowed to be made. They stopped being conservatives and Republicans who simply disliked the candidate and then the president and became active Democrat partisans who simply called themselves something else. Every hoax and bad faith allegation made against the President and his administration, from the Russia bullsh** to defending illegal FISA warrants to the “Muslim ban” to “kids in cages,” was spearheaded by NeverTrumpers flagellating themselves with their principles and yodeling “we’re better than that.”

    In 2020, these people have a choice to make. They can either earn their way back in–Prodigal Son, and all that–or they can stay gone. I don’t care who they vote for because Trump won last time without them and he’s in a much stronger position today than he was in November 2016. But, no matter what path they choose, there should be no forgetting of how these people have acted and what they’ve done. No one should allow them to forget why no one–right or left–wishes to have anything to do with them. No one should ever forget that they are dangerous, timorous and unfaithful allies and should not be allowed to do any more than hold the coats for the rest of us.

  • Full State Department review of Hillary Clinton’s emails show nearly 600 security violations.
  • Former Virginia democratic governor forgives current Virginia democratic governor for wearing blackface. “We’ve moved on,” says former Clinton crony Terry McAuliffe. As Stephen Green says, “it’s easy to move on when your side can’t be held accountable.”
  • President Donald Trump begins process to formally withdraw from the Paris climate accord. I’m not sure this is strictly necessary, as it was never binding on the U.S. because it was never submitted to the senate for ratification. As opposed to being nonbinding on the rest of the world because they’re just lying about following it anyway.
  • Sanctions against Iran really biting into its oil revenues, especially as the U.S. becomes more sophisticated about counter attempts to evade it.

    As recently as mid-2019, Iranian leaders openly boasted of selling its oil to foreign customers despite the 2017 sanctions. At the time of that boast, Iran was getting a million BPD (barrels per day) out to export customers. In contrast, before the sanctions, Iran exported two million BPD. But by July 2019 exports had been reduced to 365,000 BPD and in August it was a record low 160,000 BPD and that did not change much in September. What the Iranians don’t issue press releases about is how well sanction enforcement efforts have been at reducing those illegal exports to record lows.

    (Hat tip: Austin Bay at Instapundit.)

  • The UK is finally having a general election after essentially a year of deadlock. If history is any guide, parties promising to deliver Brexit will win, then not deliver Brexit…
  • “Maryland Officials Drop Sanctuary Policy After Illegal Alien Sex Crimes.”
  • Related: Sanctuary city proposition goes down in flames in Tucson. Funny how not enforcing laws against illegal aliens enjoys crushing defeat when actual voters get a chance to chime in.
  • Meanwhile, the illegal alien debate in the Democratic Party is between the hard left and the loony left. “While the rest of America frets about illegal alien criminals escaping authorities with the eager help of liberal politicians, liberals are more concerned about proving to each other how wonderful and tolerant they are by opening the border and allowing anyone and everyone with a sob story to be welcomed and cared for.” (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • “Comedians Taking Sides In The Woke Wars.”

    A recent string of high-profile comments brought “Cancel Culture” to the fore. Stand-up routines by Dave Chappelle, Bill Burr and Sebastian Maniscalo forced the subject back into the limelight.

    “No Safe Spaces,” a documentary about the Left’s serial attacks on free expression, debuts this weekend at the near-perfect time. Comedian Adam Carolla and syndicated radio star Dennis Prager unite to explore how universities are clamping down on healthy debate, and why that woke sentiment is leaking into society at large.

    “Joker” director Todd Phillips, who previously helmed the “Hangover” series, amplified the cause. He told Vanity Fair he created “Joker” because making comedies is no longer fun.

    “Go try to be funny nowadays with this woke culture,” he says. “There were articles written about why comedies don’t work anymore—I’ll tell you why, because all the f***ing funny guys are like, ‘F*** this s***, because I don’t want to offend you.’

  • Science Fiction tries to erase its past over crimes against Social Justice Warrior orthodoxy. To be fair, the people who handed out the (now being renamed) James Tiptree Award were always far-left radical feminist lunatics. The question is why have the theoretically more sober people behind the John W. Campbell and World Fantasy Awards also given in to this Orwellian, history-erasing lunacy?
  • Is anyone really surprised when a progressive treats institutional charity money as a personal slush fund?

    The former head of the L.A.-based anti-poverty nonprofit Youth Policy Institute improperly used the organization’s funds to pay the property taxes on his house, buy furniture for his home office and make national political donations, the group alleged in court documents filed this week.

    Dixon Slingerland, who was fired as the group’s chief executive in September, spent the nonprofit’s money on an array of unauthorized and personal expenses, including private tutoring for his children, contributions to his wife’s pension, and “lavish” dining, travel and entertainment, according to a Chapter 7 bankruptcy filing lodged by the nonprofit in federal court.

  • “Federal agents raided a Long Island tech firm early Thursday and arrested its top executives amid concerns the company was selling Chinese-made equipment to the U.S. military while claiming it had been manufactured in the United States. According to federal prosecutors, Aventura Technologies of Commack has been running the alleged scheme since 2006, selling equipment with “known cybersecurity vulnerability” to government and other customers.”
  • MSM amnesia:

  • Out-of-state Justice Democrats money props up Texas candidate:

    Texas candidate Jessica Cisneros has been one of the most high profile candidates backed by Justice Democrats, the liberal group seeking to defeat incumbents they perceive as insufficiently progressive. While Cisneros has received praise from freshman Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.), local residents appear more skeptical. She has received just $3,585 of her $190,000 (1.8 percent) in itemized contributions from inside the San Antonio district she hopes to represent.

    Cisneros is primarying Democratic incumbent Henry Cueller for the Texas 28th Congressional District. She does not appear to be former San Antonio Mayor Henry Cisneros’ daughter.

  • “Democrat Elizabeth “Eliz” Markowitz and Republican Gary Gates are headed to a runoff to decide who will fill the unexpired term of State Rep. John Zerwas (R–Richmond)” for Texas House District 28. Gates is a seven time loser, the founding money behind the “Texas Citizens Coalition” (whose mailers I have not seen recently), and was last seen running a dishonest campaign against Wayne Christian for the Railroad Commission. Still, I can only imagine that he’ll be preferable to a Democrat, and even though Markowitz garnered more votes in the election, all the other candidates were Republicans for a Republican-leaning seat, giving Gates a good chance to retain it.
  • Harris County Clerk Diane Trautman tried to illegally transmit voting information over the Internet. (Hat tip: Holly Hansen.)
  • Disruptive Democrats crushed in The Woodlands.
  • Plastikov 3D printed AK. 900 rounds on the front receiver, 550 on the rear – with no signs of damage. 7.62×39 goodness in a 7 dollar PLA receiver.” Not quite a revolution, since he used metal parts for the ejector and rails, and spent a total of $393 for all the parts, but definitely interesting, since the receiver is what the federal government counts as the “gun.” Caveat: 7.62x39mm evidently generates lower firing pressure than 5.56 NATO. But I’m hardly an expert here. Still: interesting. (Hat tip: Sal the Agorist.)
  • Samsung lays off it’s entire Austin design team. I used to work in the building where it was housed, a few jobs ago…
  • Rudy Boesch, decorated Navy SEAL. He was also evidently on some reality TV show.
  • America: Hey Berlin, you want a statue of Ronald Reagan? You know, “tear down this wall” and all of that? Berlin: Nein. America: Too bad.
  • Another day, another fake hate crim—wait, a real one? Oh, against a Catholic Church. In New York City. Now I get it.
  • “Fringe Conspiracy Theorist Believes Epstein Just Killed Himself.”
  • Lee Stranahan On The Clinton State Department Crony Origin Of The Russian Collusion Hoax

    Sunday, October 6th, 2019

    Here’s an interesting thread by Lee Stranahan on how Clinton cronies at the State Department were building the Russian Collusion hoax story back in early 2016, before Fusion GPS hired Steele to assemble the fake dossier.

    So that’s TWO State Department employees being briefed by Steele; Jonathan Winer & Victoria Nuland.

    They both have 🇺🇦 Ukraine connections, as does Steele.

    And there’s one more State Department who is VERY relevant to the whole story…Clinton’s Oxford roommate Strobe Talbott.

    Strobe Talbott is one of the Clinton’s oldest and closest friends.

    He headed the Brookings Instituion for years.

    And is the THIRD State Department official briefed by Steele.
    This is already looking very much like a State Department operation.

    The 🇺🇦 Ukraine connections are everywhere.

    Strobe link to a VERY important connection.

    Back in the 1970s, Strobe married the twin sister of a man who would become a shadowy Clinton operative: Cody Shearer.

    Read that Jonathan Winer op-Ed from earlier in the thread and you’ll that he was shown the little discussed “second dossier” that Cody Shearer assembled.

    Steele gave it to the FBI.

    But it’s totally misnamed. Why?

    Because it came first, as you’ll see soon.

    Snip.

    Cody Shearer was assembling HIS dossier BEFORE STEELE WAS HIRED.

    He was discussing Trump / Russia in MARCH OR APRIL of 2016.

    Other names that play a role in the timeline: DNC operative Alexandra Chalupa, notorious Clinton crony Sidney Blumenthal, George Soros, John McCain and even convicted felony Brett Kimberlin, though those last three names appear to be involved in the Steele story only tangentially. Also, I don’t buy Stranahan’s “Ukraine bad/Russia good” positioning near the end of the thread. But the information about State Department/Clinton crony involvement in assembling the Steele hoax dossier information much earlier than most people know is worth pointing out.

    SecS Rex Exed

    Wednesday, March 14th, 2018

    So Rex Tillerson is is out as Secretary of State and CIA Director Mike Pompeo is in.

    Pompeo will have to be nominated and approved by the Senate before he can take Tillerson’s spot in the government. Republicans can approve anyone they want in the Senate as long as they stick together, and Pompeo was confirmed for his current post in a 66-32 vote.

    “His experience in the military, Congress, and as leader of the CIA have prepared him well for his new role and I urge his swift confirmation,” Trump said in a statement Tuesday, as he wished Tillerson and his family well.

    Vice President Mike Pence backed Trump and urged the Senate to confirm Pompeo, “a man of highest integrity with unquestionable qualifications who will do an outstanding job.”

    There were notable foreign policy improvements under Tillerson (the crushing of the Islamic State, significant reform in Saudi Arabia, the embassy move to Jerusalem, arming Ukraine, pressuring North Korea to the negotiating table, etc.), but most were attributable to either President Trump’s unique style of negotiating, or the fact the idiots in the Obama Administration were no longer in charge.

    I thought I was ambivalent about Tillerson’s exit, until I read this:

    His profound disagreements with the president on policy appeared to be his undoing: Mr. Tillerson wanted to remain part of the Paris climate accord; Mr. Trump decided to leave it. Mr. Tillerson supported the continuation of the Iran nuclear deal; Mr. Trump loathed the deal as “an embarrassment to the United States.” And Mr. Tillerson believed in dialogue to resolve the North Korean nuclear crisis, but Mr. Trump repeatedly threatened military options.

    Indeed, Tillerson’s efforts to save the asinine Iran Deal appear to be his undoing.

    “President Trump has been clear that the Iran deal is terrible policy and has sought ways to hold Iran accountable,” DeSantis told the Free Beacon. “With Mike Pompeo, Trump will have a Secretary of State who sees the threat posed by the JCPOA [Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action] and by Tehran in a similar light as he does.”

    Alrighty then. It’s best Tillerson was shown the door…