Posts Tagged ‘Director Blue’

LinkSwarm For January 9, 2026

Friday, January 9th, 2026

Iran teeters, Walz falls, more Russia’s shadow fleet has an epically bad week, more Minnesota Somali fraud fallout, more computer security vulnerabilities, and a policeman transformed into a frog using the power of AI! Plus the Austro-Hungarian and Achaemenid empires. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

Personally, this week has been deeply frustrating, as I’ve been trying to withdraw money from my 401K account to pay my property taxes, a process I began mid-December, and it’s still not done. “Oh, these things take time,’ says 401K company. Then it’s “Oh, we haven’t heard back from your former employers.” Former employer: “Oh, we haven’t received the request from your 401K company.” Then: “Oh, the third party company we hired to handle 401K requests hasn’t received the request.” Now it’s “Oh, they’ve just started working on it, but they’re always slow at the end of the year.” It’s frustrating to have to jump through so many hoops to access my own money.

On to the LinkSwarm!

  • From the outside, it’s hard to tell how serious the chances of protesters are to free their own country, but they’re so fed up with the mullah’s rule that they’re burning mosques.

    Iranian protestors demonstrating against the theocratic regime will face harsh punishment with absolutely zero leniency, Iran’s top judge has warned — as footage emerged Friday of mosques burning on the streets of Tehran amid the ongoing riots.

    Chief Justice Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei, the head of Iran’s judiciary, issued the stark warning after President Trump vowed to back those peacefully demonstrating across the country.

    Signaling a potentially violent crackdown, Ejei vowed the punishment for rioters would “be decisive, maximum and without any legal leniency.”
    Protesters gather as vehicles burn in Tehran, Iran.

    Things in Iran seem to be moving very fast indeed…

  • “Authorities report that Mahmoud Haqiqat, a police station commander in Iranshahr, Iran’s southeastern Sistan and Baluchestan Province, was shot and killed by unknown assailants this week in a drive-by attack. Video circulating online appears to show gunmen firing on Haqiqat’s vehicle before it crashed. Social posts and video descriptions identify him as the former head of the city’s intelligence and allege that he was involved in operations targeting anti-regime Baluch groups in the area.” Add Balochs to Kurds and Lurs as ethnic minorities pissed at the mullah’s government. There’s also a substantial Baloch population in Pakistan, and they don’t like the Pakistani government either. Hell, history records the Balochs rebelling against the Achaemenid Empire three millennia ago…
  • “Blue states created an election trimester for ballots, now Trump conservatives are pushing back.”

    With constant pressure from liberal activists, some states now dispatch mail-in ballots 45 to 60 days before Election Day and allow the counting of such absentee votes as many as three weeks afterward, creating an election trimester that causes vote tallies to wildly fluctuate days after polls close and increasingly erodes Americans’ trust.

    But conservatives are now fighting back, first with an executive order by President Donald Trump requiring all ballots to be counted on election night, followed by a challenge to Mississippi’s counting process that has not reached the U.S. Supreme Court and then the Ohio legislature’s vote to require all its ballots to arrive on election night to be tallied.

    “It’s common sense that ballots should arrive by Election Day,” Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose told Just the News this week after his state became the 35th to require mail-in ballots to arrive by Election Night in order to be counted. Previously, the state had a four-day grace period for ballots to arrive after Election Day.

    “I think that trying to reduce complexity should be our goal in government, and certainly when it comes to the rules for how elections run,” LaRose said in a wide-ranging interview with the John Solomon Reports podcast. “If you were to stop the average person on the street last year and say, what’s the deadline for your ballot to get back to the board of elections, they would not know that it’s four days after. It’s kind of an arbitrary date.”

    The National Conference of State Legislatures reported that many states now mail out ballots as early as 45 days to two months before Election Day and about a dozen states allow them to be counted days later — as long as three weeks afterward in Washington state, 14 days in Illinois, 10 days in Maryland and seven days in California and New York.

  • There’s not a violin small enough. “Minnesota Governor Tim Walz Drops Reelection Bid amid Somali Fraud Scandal.”

    Tim Walz is dropping his bid for a third term as governor of Minnesota amid a national political firestorm sparked by the identification of massive welfare fraud in the state’s Somali community.

    Walz released a statement Monday morning ahead of a late morning press conference announcing his withdrawal from the race.

    “But as I reflected on this moment with my family and my team over the holidays, I came to the conclusion that I can’t give a political campaign my all. Every minute I spend defending my own political interests would be a minute I can’t spend defending the people of Minnesota against the criminals who prey on our generosity and the cynics who prey on our differences,” Walz said. “So I’ve decided to step out of the race and let others worry about the election while I focus on the work.”

    Translation: “I got caught, and I need to see if I can get away from this giant pile of graft as quickly as possible.”

    Walz and fellow Minnesota Democrats have been subjected to withering attacks at the hands of Trump and his allies over the staggering scale of welfare fraud that’s taken place under their noses in recent years. Federal prosecutors announced last month that the cost of the welfare fraud perpetrated against state-run Medicaid services alone could exceed $9 billion, half or more of the $18 billion paid out since 2018.

    A federal probe into the matter has been initiated, and Minnesota officials have until January 9 to provide the administration with more information regarding who is receiving the welfare benefits in the state.

    It’s amazing that anyone can give Gavin Newsom a run for the title of America’s Most Incompetent Governor, but Walz is just that special.

  • A few facts on Somalis in Minnesota:
    • 54% of Somalis are on food stamps
    • 73% on Medicaid
    • 81% on Welfare
    • 78% on Welfare after 10 years

    The perfect Democrat constituency…

  • It’s been going on a while. “Minnesota Inspector General [Carolyn Ham] covered up hundreds of millions in Somali childcare fraud in 2018.”

    You know how the Somali childcare fraud has been a big thing, kind of an open secret in Minnesota for years now?

    Well, not only has this been happening for at least a decade, but, according to this report, the state has known about it for at least that long.

    Check out these receipts from Maze on X detailing a nine-year-old investigation into the fraud at Minnesota’s Child Care Assistance Program — an investigation that went nowhere.

    The Minnesota child care fraud saga is so strange because years ago it was fully investigated, documented, and reported on by a team of state investigators set up to catch and stop child care fraud.

    They spent years gathering evidence including many hours of surveillance footage. In 2018 they compiled a detailed report and delivered it to their boss, the DHS Inspector General.

    Directly from the report: ‘Investigators, as well as the Supervisor and Manager of this unit believe that the overall fraud rate in this program is at least 50% of the $217M paid to child care centers in CY2017.’

    What did the Inspector General do with this information? She refused to meet with her own team, refused to discuss the findings of the report, and then spent $90,000 of taxpayer money to have an outside company write a report saying the fraud isn’t quite as bad as her own team of investigators was claiming.

    Woke is a heckuva drug, isn’t it?

    So is corruption, scamming, and Democratic politics in general.

  • “Growing List Of Democratic Billionaire Kings & Queens Funnel Millions Into Terror-Tied Nonprofits.”

    Former Wall Street Journal reporter Asra Nomani, now at Fox News, is investigating the left-wing, billionaire-funded dark money networks in the nonprofit world and offering much-needed coverage for mainstream Americans on how these NGOs influence protest movements, unleash riots, and conduct sophisticated political pressure campaigns.

    Snip.

    Key details from the report:

    • MacKenzie Scott disclosed sending at least $5 million in a new round of donations to the Solidaire Network, on top of a $10 million gift in 2021 via her philanthropy vehicle, Yield Giving.
    • Solidaire funds a network of radical anti-Israel activist groups, including Students for Justice in Palestine and American Muslims for Palestine, both of which are under House and Senate investigation for alleged coordination with Hamas-linked activities.
    • Other Solidaire-backed groups include the Palestinian Youth Movement and the US Palestinian Community Network, which publicly justified Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.
    • Scott’s grants are unrestricted, allowing recipients to spend funds freely. Solidaire used this flexibility to finance campaigns promoting “Palestinian liberation,” campus protests, and direct-action activism, including efforts to block U.S. military logistics supporting Israel.
    • Funding was often routed through fiscal sponsors such as WESPAC Foundation and Tides Foundation, structures that have drawn scrutiny from Republican lawmakers investigating possible links to extremist groups.
    • Scott’s cumulative charitable giving has reached roughly $26 billion since 2019, surpassing the lifetime donations of George Soros, and placing her at the center of growing political controversy over billionaire-funded activist networks.

  • Doug Ross provides more leftwing funding network graphics.

  • Somalia’s UN Ambassador, Implicated in a Medicare Scandal, May Have Acquired American Citizenship Under False Pretenses.”

    The Somali ambassador to the United Nations, Abukar Dahir Osman, who is tied to a daycare company in Ohio under investigation in Washington, might have acquired an American citizenship fraudulently, according to a source in Somaliland.

    Ambassador Osman, who currently serves as the rotating president of the UN Security Council, first entered America in the mid-1980s and again in 1989. He claimed to be a refugee of a minority in Somaliland persecuted by the Somali regime at the time, a Somaliland ambassador at large who tweets under the name of Haggoogane, tells the Sun via text.

    Haggoogane, whose real name is Mustafa Osman but is unrelated to the ambassador, says that the current Somali UN ambassador was far from a refugee fearing extermination by the Somali regime. Instead, he tells the Sun, the UN ambassador was part of that regime in the late 1980s. “His job was to identify anyone the regime saw as a threat,” Haggoogane says.

    Between 1960 and 1991 the government of Somalia killed hundreds of thousands of ethnic Isaaq and others in Somaliland, which declared independence of Mogadishu in 1991.

    Following Israel’s recognition of Somaliland last month, the Israeli foreign minister, Gideon Sa’ar, visited its capital, Hargeisa, on Tuesday, and met with President Abdirahman Mohamed Abdullahi. After Israel became the first UN member to recognize Somaliland’s independence, Mr. Osman, the Somali UN ambassador, convened an “emergency session” of the security council.

    At Washington on Tuesday, the deputy secretary at the Department of Health and Human Service, Jim O’Neill, confirmed a rumor regarding the Somali ambassador, which has long been whispered in UN corridors.

    “I can confirm public speculation that Ambassador Abukar Dahir Osman, Permanent Representative of Somalia to the UN and President of the Security Council, is in fact associated with Progressive Health Care Services, a home health agency in Cincinnati,” Mr. O’Neill wrote on X. “HHS has previously taken action against Progressive in response to a conviction for Medicaid fraud. More to come.”

  • US seizes Russian-flagged tanker, intercepts ‘dark fleet’ ship in Venezuela sanctions crackdown.”

    The United States seized a Russian-flagged oil tanker in the North Atlantic this week while also intercepting a separate stateless “dark fleet” vessel tied to Venezuelan oil exports, US officials said, marking a significant escalation in Washington’s enforcement campaign against sanctioned energy shipments.

    According to US officials, the Russian-flagged tanker Marinera, previously known as Bella-1, was seized on Wednesday near Iceland after being tracked for more than two weeks across the Atlantic, reports Reuters. The operation occurred as Russian military assets, including a submarine, were operating in the general area, though officials said there were no signs of confrontation.

    In a post on X, US European Command said the tanker was seized for violating US sanctions. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth responded, writing, “The blockade of sanctioned and illicit Venezuelan oil remains in FULL EFFECT — anywhere in the world.”

    Two US officials said the operation was carried out by the US Coast Guard with support from the US military. The Coast Guard declined to comment. Russian officials have not issued a response, though Russian state media outlet RT published an image showing a helicopter hovering near the ship.

    The Marinera had previously evaded US enforcement efforts in the Caribbean and refused boarding attempts. After those encounters, it re-registered under a Russian flag and changed its name, officials said. Sources indicated the vessel may now be heading toward British territorial waters, though its final destination has not been confirmed. The UK Ministry of Defence declined to comment.

    Separately, US Southern Command confirmed that the Coast Guard intercepted another tanker, the Panama-flagged M/T Sophia, in Latin American waters early Wednesday. The vessel was described as a “stateless, sanctioned dark fleet motor tanker” linked to Venezuelan oil shipments.

  • “Prosecutor Calls Newsom ‘King Of Fraud‘ For Oversight Failures.”

    U.S. First Assistant Attorney Bill Essayli Thursday called California Gov. Gavin Newsom “the king of fraud,” accusing him of a lack of oversight on spending to address homelessness.

    Essayli made the comments on the “Fox and Friends” telecast, during which he discussed the federal fraud charges that were filed in October against real estate executives Steven Taylor and Cody Holmes for allegedly misusing grant money meant for homeless housing.

    Holmes, 31, of Beverly Hills was charged with mail fraud charge that was allegedly linked to millions of dollars in grant money that the state paid Shangri-La Industries to purchase, build and operate homeless housing in Thousand Oaks, just north of Los Angeles. Holmes was Shangri-La’s chief financial officer.

    Taylor, 44, of Brentwood, was charged with seven counts of bank fraud, one count of aggravated identity theft and one count of money laundering.

    Essayli Thursday said the charges are the “tip of the iceberg” in an investigation he launched with a task force in April. He said more charges would be coming, probably later this month.

    The state spent $24 billion in the last five years to address homelessness and can’t account for where the money went, Essayli said on “Fox and Friends.”

  • California Democrats: “Hey, let’s institute a wealth tax on billionaires!” California billionaires: “See ya!

    A ballot measure that could tax the wealthiest people in California may reportedly push billionaires Larry Page and Peter Thiel to leave the state, while other wealthy residents have condemned the idea, whose supporters claim could generate up to $100 billion—though the measure has yet to be considered by state officials or voters.

    • Thiel, who cofounded PayPal and Palantir, and Google cofounder Page have held discussions to reduce their ties to California by the end of the year because of the billionaire tax proposal, The New York Times reported, citing people familiar with their thinking.
    • Thiel operates the investment firm Thiel Capital and may open an office for the company in another state, with plans to spend more time outside of California, while Page has filed documents to incorporate three limited liability companies in Florida, according to the Times.
    • Bill Ackman weighed in, calling California “on a path to self-destruction,” adding, “Hollywood is already toast and now the most productive entrepreneurs will leave, taking their tax revenues and job creation elsewhere.”
    • Billionaire Chamath Palihapitiya wrote on X the proposed ballot measure would result in an “exodus of the state’s most talented entrepreneurs” who would opt to “build their companies in less regressive states,” and argued the middle class would be the worst hit by the tax.

    Dear Fleeing Billionaires: Welcome to Texas! Please be sure to discard any liberal ideas you brought with you in the nearest trash receptacle…

  • “Ukrainian Drones Hit Usman Oil Depot in Lipetsk & Ball Bearing Factory in Penza.”
  • Major train crash on key route used to feed Putin’s war machine with North Korean military equipment…A freight train hauling 35 wagons spectacularly derailed in Russia’s remote Amur region on the Transbaikal Railway – a strategic line linked to the famed Trans-Siberian route.”
  • Ukraine also hit the Oryol power plant.
  • Ukraine also hit Russian shadow fleet tanker Elbus in the Black Sea off the coast of Turkey. It’s been a bad week all around for Russia’s shadow fleet…
  • France and UK bomb Islamic State targets in Syria. This isn’t the first time France has bombed Islamic State terrorists, as they also participated in Operation Chammal in 2014, back when the would-be caliphate was much closer to the extremely short zenith of its limited powers.
  • Minnesota woman tries to run over ICE agent, immediately enters find out phase.

    Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers fatally shot a woman during an operation in Minneapolis Wednesday.

    As videos of the incident went viral, the Department of Homeland Security justified the shooting on self-defense grounds, calling the slain woman a “violent rioter” who “weaponized her vehicle” by driving towards federal agents.

    Today, ICE officers in Minneapolis were conducting targeted operations when rioters began blocking ICE officers and one of these violent rioters weaponized her vehicle, attempting to run over our law enforcement officers in an attempt to kill them—an act of domestic terrorism. An ICE officer, fearing for his life, the lives of his fellow law enforcement and the safety of the public, fired defensive shots,” said DHS assistant secretary Tricia McLaughlin.

    “The alleged perpetrator was hit and is deceased. The ICE officers who were hurt are expected to make full recoveries. This is the direct consequence of constant attacks and demonization of our officers by sanctuary politicians who fuel and encourage rampant assaults on our law enforcement.”

  • She wasn’t the only idiot dirtnapped trying to run over ICE agents. A Tren de Aragua scumbag tried the same trick, and met the same fate, in Portland. Naturally, the usual leftist idiots there rioted.

    Yesterday, Border Patrol officers had to shoot a dangerous criminal gang member in self-defense after he committed a vehicular assault on them to evade arrest. Leftists in the sanctuary city of Portland, Ore., promptly turned out to protest his shooting — and apparently to try to accomplish his deadly intention against federal officers.

    In case you still have any illusions that the Democratic Party is not essentially a criminal organization, just look at the fury and violence the last few days in blue cities over the shootings of individuals who deliberately tried to seriously injure or kill Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) or Border Patrol officers. Renee Good in Minnesota and the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua member in Oregon were both violently and dangerously ramming their vehicles into officers at the time they were shot. That makes them leftist heroes and martyrs, it seems.

    The American left is trying to do a repeat of the summer of love and mostly peaceful protests in 2020. They want to burn down what is still standing after their previous riots. With Democrat politicians and media lying to fuel violence and their followers cheering for murder, how can we avoid the conclusion that the Democratic Party is acting like a terror organization?

    (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)

  • “U.S. Department of Homeland Security Suspends Funds for Immigration Work of Catholic Charities RGV. The charity is accused of grant violations and incomplete recordkeeping.”

    The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has suspended the funding for Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley (CCRGV) pending an investigation into whether or not the charity is complying with federal grant requirements.

    According to CCRGV, the charity learned of the suspension in late November 2025. It claims that it is “committed to compliance with federal grant requirements and will work expeditiously with DHS to resolve the matter.”

    The charity stated that all of its funding was used to care for people brought to CCRGV by U.S. Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) — individuals who were “released by CBP with a document that gave them permission to travel to their points of destination with instructions on where to follow up with their immigration proceedings.”

    CCRGV runs the Humanitarian Respite Center in McAllen, a place that offers food and shelter to immigrants who are awaiting court hearings.

    According to reporting by Fox News, CCRGV was suspended after a DHS investigation revealed what the outlet called “major grant violations.”

    The suspension follows “months of warnings and data reviews that auditors say uncovered sweeping inaccuracies, large gaps in migrant records, and significant billing outside federally allowed timeframes,” Fox News reported.

    The investigators also reportedly found 248 instances in which CCRGV billed the federal government for services to immigrants outside of the 45-day window allowed by federal rules.

  • “North America Leads Largest LNG Export Surge Since 2022.”

    Surging liquefied natural gas exports from new North American export plants likely pushed global LNG shipments in 2025 by the most since 2022, Kpler data showed on Tuesday.

    The annual rise in 2025 would be the steepest increase in global LNG exports since 2022, when shipments grew by 4.5% compared to 2021, the data showed.

    North America was the key supplier of new LNG volumes, as Canada’s first-ever export facility, LNG Canada, started shipments in the middle of 2025, and Plaquemines LNG in Louisiana launched operations and ramped up shipments throughout the year.

    Thanks to rising capacity and volumes, the U.S. is set to become the first LNG exporter in the world to have passed in 2025 the threshold of 100 million tons of LNG exports in one year.

    Additional LNG supply is poised to hit the market between 2026 and 2030 as more U.S. export plants come online and Qatar begins shipments from its huge capacity expansion of the North Field export facilities.

    The U.S. is set to export 14.9 billion cubic feet per day of LNG in 2025, up by 25% from 2024, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) said in its latest Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO) for December. With new projects ramping up, the EIA expects U.S. LNG exports to jump to an average of 16.3 billion cubic feet per day in 2026.

  • “Trump blocks chips deal over national security, China-related concerns.”

    President Donald Trump on Friday blocked the Delaware firm HieFo Corporation from acquiring assets in New Jersey-based aerospace and defense specialist Emcore for $3 million, citing national security and China-related concerns.

    The president claimed HieFo was “controlled by a citizen of the People’s Republic of China,” and that there was evidence to believe HieFo, through the merger, may “take action that threatens to impair the national security of the United States.”

    “The Transaction is hereby prohibited,” Trump said and ordered HieFo to “divest all interests and rights in the Emcore assets, wherever located,” within 180 days.

    Snip. “HieFo purchased Emcore’s chips business and indium-phosphide wafer-fabrication operations for $2.92 million.” Indium-Phosphide is a pretty exotic wafer material used in optics and photonics chips.

  • Leprino Foods, the world’s largest mozzarella producer and a vital supplier to major pizza chains like Domino’s, Pizza Hut, and Papa John’s, moved its operations from California to Texas. “For over a century, the Lemoore plant in California’s Central Valley served as a cornerstone of the dairy industry, but the company is now shifting billions of dollars and hundreds of jobs into a new $870 million facility in Lubbock, Texas.”
  • Progress! “Corporation for Public Broadcasting votes itself out of existence. The private agency, which has distributed federal funding to PBS, NPR and hundreds of local television and radio stations across the country for more than a half-century, saw its appropriations from Congress eliminated this past summer.” They promised Big Bird and delivered leftwing propaganda.
  • NYC Bus Fares Raised To $3 Despite Mamdani’s Promise To Make It Free.” Commies breaking promises?

  • Borepatch: The 2025 most dangerous software exploits list.

    I get an incredible sense of deja vu all over again looking at Mitre’s list of top 25 exploits for 2025.

    The top 4 are all very, very old. I myself demonstrated #4 when I taught a computer security class (with corporate IT Security present) back in 1994. That’s three decades ago.

    And what’s with numbers 11 and 14? One of the classic papers on software security is Smashing The Stack For Fun And Profit – from 1996.

    Numbers 3, 6, and 22 are web server vulnerabilities that are over 20 years old, and I’ve posted about them before.

    17, 19, and 21 have been known since before I was in this industry. Call it the 1980s, although it’s likely older.

    Number 2 is literally the Little Bobby Tables exploit…

  • “Cops Forced to Explain Why AI Generated Police Report Claimed Officer Transformed Into Frog.” (Hat tip: Commenter CayleyGraph2015.)
  • Ubisoft studio unionizes. Company lays them all off.
  • Sony PlayStation 5 boot keys have been leaked online, making it much easier to jailbreak systems.
  • Critical Drinker is cautiously optimistic about Avengers: Doomsday.
  • A new Peter Gabriel album is in the works.
  • Why the Austro-Hungarian army sucked in World War I.
  • Did ancient Roman soldiers carry a multi-tool?
  • Philly weirdo steals 100 skeletons from graveyard. That’s taking your Halloween LARPing too far…
  • “I don’t know if you know this, but all the presidents in South America, they’re free. You can just go take them.”
  • “Tim Walz Retiring To Spend More Time In Prison‬.”
  • “Trump Has Delta Force Operators Tell Maduro ‘You’re Fired.'”
  • “Trump To Choose Next Venezuelan President In Inaugural Season Of ‘El Aprendiz.'”
  • Trump Leads SEAL Team To Capture Rogue Dictator Gavin Newsom.”
  • “Aides Tell Disappointed Trump That Maduro And Mamdani Are Different People.”
  • “Democrats Once Again Threaten Civil War To Stop Republicans From Taking Away Their Slave Laborers.”
  • “Democrats Confused Why Venezuelans Cheering Downfall Of Nice, Warm Collectivism.”
  • “Anthropologists Discover Uncontacted Tribe In Remote Area Of IKEA.”
  • I’m still between jobs. Feel free to hit the tip jar if you’re so inclined.





    LinkSwarm For November 21, 2025

    Friday, November 21st, 2025

    Democrat attempts to link Trump to Jeffrey Epstein backfire big-time, more illegal alien felons get deported, more Democrats committing fraud, more DOGE-discovered spending insanity, Letterman inducts Zevon, and the weirdest White House love-in ever.

    It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

  • The Trump Administration is planning to completely deconstruct SNAP.

    U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Secretary Brooke Rollins has said the department will “completely deconstruct” the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in an effort to remove fraud and corruption from the program.

    The USDA told Newsweek: “Secretary Rollins wants to ensure the fraud, waste, and incessant abuse of SNAP ends. Rates of fraud were only previously assumed, and President Trump is doing something about it. Using standard recertification processes for households is a part of that work. As well as ongoing analysis of state data, further regulatory work, and improved collaboration with states.”

    SNAP supports about 42 million low-income Americans nationwide by helping them cover the costs of groceries each month.

    The program came into the spotlight during the recent government shutdown—the longest in U.S. history—when many did not receive their benefits as scheduled in November.

    Rollins’ comment also comes amid the government’s announcement of two major changes to the program: Work requirement provisions brought in by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act could see millions removed from the program, and recipients could be required to reapply for the benefits so that those no longer deemed eligible can be removed from the program.

    In an interview with Fox Business’ Larry Kudlow on Tuesday, Rollins said early data already showed that “186,000 dead people are receiving SNAP benefits,” while another 500,000 people are receiving the benefits in more than one state.

    USDA data indicates that more than 226,000 fraudulent benefit claims and 691,000 fraudulent transactions received approval in the first quarter of 2025, Fox Business reported.

    Fraudulent transactions refer to when SNAP-receiving households do not authorize claims because of card cloning or various kinds of electronic theft.

    These fraudulent claims and transactions cost the government more than $102 million in the first quarter of fiscal year 2025, higher than the $69.4 million figure in the previous quarter and $31.9 million during the same period last year, the USDA data shows.

    As a result of these issues, Rollins said the department had made “hundreds of arrests” in regard to fraudulent claims for SNAP benefits.

    She also said the recent crackdown on SNAP benefit fraud and eligibility was “an unintended consequence of the Democrats shutting the government down for 43 days,” adding that it “shined this very bright light on one of their pet programs and now has given us a platform to completely deconstruct the program.”

    Sounds like a whole lot of fraudsters are going to get snapped off SNAP, thanks to the #SchumerShutdown.

    Welcome to Unintended Consequences Theater. I’m your host, Leonard Pinth-Garnell…

  • “The U.S. economy roared ahead in September 2025, shattering expectations with the creation of 119,000 jobs — more than double what economists predicted.” I can hardly wait for all this job creation to get to me…
  • Jeffrey Epstein was texting sitting members of Congress, Democrat non-voting delegate Stacy Plaskett specifically, and directing the questioning during a congressional investigation of Donald Trump.” Doesn’t exactly seem like Trump and Epstein were best buddies, does it?
  • “Leading fundraising group for Democrats solicited Epstein years after he pleaded guilty in Florida.”

    Desperate to tie President Donald Trump to disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, Democrats are ignoring their own ties shown in newly published documents to the deceased registered sex offender.

    One email in the more than 20,000 documents obtained from the Epstein estate and released publicly by the House Oversight Committee shows that a consulting firm working for now-House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, shortly after he was first elected to Congress in 2012, solicited Epstein for a donation. This came long after Trump barred Epstein from his Florida estate in 2007, when he said he cut ties with the financier.

    “Dear Jeffrey – We are thrilled to announce that we are working with Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, one of the rising stars in the New York Congressional delegation,” a team at Dynamic SRG, a political fundraising and public affairs firm, wrote to Epstein in a May 2013 email.

    “Sometimes referred to as ‘Brooklyn’s Barack’, he is a staunch supporter of President Obama and a progressive voice for the people of New York City,” the firm said, touting Jeffries in the email. Jeffries’ name is listed on Dynamic SRG in a database of “selected current and former clients.”

    Nowadays people refer to Jeffries as “TEMU Obama.”

    The email came roughly five years after Epstein became a registered sex offender in Florida and pleaded guilty to state prostitution crimes related to his alleged involvement with underage girls. He avoided federal charges through striking the controversial deal and served only 13 months in state prison.

    The Democrats love money a whole lot more than they hate sex offenders.

  • Top 20 Insanities DOGE revealed in 2025.”

    #4 – $254 million in unemployment benefits for toddlers under five. If your preschooler is filing claims, we may have bigger issues than fraud.

    #3 – The DOD built an HR IT system that ran 780% over budget at a casual $280 million.

    Somewhere, a contracting executive is laughing on his yacht that just docked in the Greek islands.

    #2 – HUD “misplaced” $1.9 billion. Misplaced! As if money that could pave a small state just slipped behind the couch cushions.

    #1 – And the grand champion: $516 billion spent on 1,264 expired, defunct, fossilized government programs. Half a trillion dollars shoveled into the graveyard of bureaucracy. No wonder the Uniparty attacked DOGE so fervently.

  • “Democratic Florida Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick accused of stealing $5M in FEMA funds.”

    Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (D-Fla.) was hit with a federal indictment Wednesday, accusing her of stealing $5 million in Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) funds to support her 2021 congressional campaign.

    Cherfilus-McCormick, who has been under investigation by the House Ethics Committee since December 2023, was indicted by a federal grand jury in Miami and faces up to 53 years in prison if convicted.

    Snip.

    The Justice Department alleges that Cherfilus-McCormick, 46, and several co-defendants, including her brother, Edwin Cherfilus, 51, “conspired to steal” an overpayment of $5 million in FEMA funds their family health care company received in July 2021 as part of a COVID-19 vaccination staffing contract.

    The defendants allegedly routed the funds “through multiple accounts to disguise its source” and used “a substantial portion of the misappropriated funds … as candidate contributions” to Cherfilus-McCormick’s 2021 congressional campaign.

    Cherfilus-McCormick and another co-defendant, Nadege Leblanc, 46, further schemed to utilize “straw donors” to contribute the stolen money to the Florida Democrat’s campaign, according to prosecutors.

    The congresswoman and her tax preparer, David K. Spencer, 41, are also charged with conspiring to file a false federal tax return for allegedly falsely marking political spending and other personal expenses as business deductions — and inflating Cherfilus-McCormick’s charitable contributions to ease her tax obligations.

    (Hat tip: Dwight.)

  • Pedophiles and murderers among this week’s ‘worst of the worst’ ICE arrests.”

    As Democrats continue to demonize and vilify the nation’s law enforcement officers, the Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers keep protecting communities from violent criminal illegal immigrants. Once again, DHS and ICE collaborated to remove some of the “worst of the worst” illegally residing in the United States.

    While Democrats, and their accomplices in the legacy media, regularly promote narratives denigrating illegal immigration enforcement operations, the fact is, as DHS has regularly highlighted, “70% of ICE arrests are of illegal aliens convicted or charged with a crime in the U.S.” And while Democrats insist on prioritizing the safety of the criminal class over the welfare of the innocent, DHS and ICE continue to protect Americans from bad people.

    These bad people include illegal immigrants convicted of manslaughter, murder, and lewd acts with minors. DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin commented on these violent people when speaking to the Washington Examiner.

    Snip.

    Andres Mendoza-Salomon is an illegal immigrant who was living in the U.S. Previously, he was convicted of “lewd act with a child under 14, contact with a minor – sexual intent, harmful matter to seduce minor, and indecent exposure in Ventura, California,” according to DHS. These are disgusting actions by a dangerous individual. The local community is better with him after ICE’s involvement. But you won’t see Mendoza-Salomon’s picture on legacy media news reports.

    Snip.

    Oscar Arturo Sanchez-Mondragon was also arrested by ICE on Monday. He is an illegal immigrant from Mexico who was convicted of “manslaughter in the second degree and tampering with physical evidence in Boone County, Kentucky,” according to DHS. He was free to roam within the U.S. and put innocent lives in danger. ICE ensured that he would no longer be a threat to any community.

    ICE arrested an illegal immigrant from El Salvador with a particularly violent history, as well. Miguel Antonio Urias-Argueta had a rap sheet that featured convictions for “criminal possession of a weapon, criminal use of a firearm, attempted assault, and attempted murder in Nassau County, New York,” DHS reported. He’s the kind of illegal immigrant who presents a distinct danger to those around him, based on his criminal record. ICE ensured he would no longer be a threat and arrested him. Unfortunately, once again, no Democrats or members of the media will mention ICE’s arrest of Urias-Argueta, or that communities are safer because of their enforcement operations.

    The agency’s other arrests on Monday included an illegal immigrant from Mexico who caused the “death of another by driving a vehicle while under the influence of alcohol in Sparks, Nevada,” DHS said. Higinio Rodriguez-Ramirez is in the country illegally, also from Mexico, and was convicted of “burglary of a habitation in Johnson County, Texas,” according to DHS.

  • Another day, another scheme to exploit illegal aliens.

    A wealthy Plymouth, Michigan couple has landed in federal court, accused of hiring more than 200 undocumented immigrants to work at their national plumbing business over the years, and housing many of them in run-down motels and houses — all while they raked in $74 million in revenue, according to a new court filing in New York.

    That’s where Moises and Raquel Orduna-Rios are facing federal charges, including money laundering, following a five-year investigation that started with federal agents spotting one of the couple’s company vans outside a motel in Amherst, New York. The agents also encountered — and arrested — a small group of undocumented immigrants, who explained the van belonged to their ‘boss,’ court records show.

    This operation took place in Michigan, Ohio, North Carolina, and New York where the charges are being filed.

    That boss was 36-year-old Moises Orduna-Rios, president of Michigan-based Orduna Plumbing Inc., which also has operations in New York, North Carolina and Ohio. He was arrested on Tuesday, Nov. 18, after years of being monitored by federal agents who kept close tabs on his company vans, financial transactions, communications and his illegal workers who made $800-$1,500 per week, and in some cases had their living expenses covered.

  • “Legislation To Fast-Track Removal of Criminal Aliens Heads to US House Floor. The bill would address loopholes enabling the abuse of asylum protections and make the removal of convicted violent criminal aliens mandatory.”

    U.S. Rep. Brandon Gill’s Expedited Removal of Criminal Aliens Act passed through a review by the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday and now moves to the House floor for further action.

    The Texas Republican’s legislation, H.R.5713, would strengthen President Trump’s border security plan by allowing law enforcement to remove violent criminal aliens quickly.

    “For far too long, Democrat leaders have allowed illegal aliens to get away with unspeakable crimes on our soil, turning a blind eye to the suffering American families who call this land home,” said Gill. “It’s time to empower our brave men and women in law enforcement to get foreign bad actors out of our country quickly, before they have a chance to cause more pain.”

    The proposed legislation would stop abuses of protections meant for asylum seekers. The bill would also give law enforcement stronger removal authority over violent criminal aliens, making “detention and expedited removal of gang members, terrorists, and individuals convicted of violent crimes or crimes against vulnerable groups” mandatory.

    Currently, removal proceedings can take years of litigation and lengthy appeals, even after a foreign national has been convicted of a serious crime that warrants removal from the United States. The new legislation would fast-track the removal process for criminal illegal aliens.

    Speaking about the bill in a post on X, Gill said it “gives law enforcement the authority to swiftly remove violent criminal aliens and protect American communities.”

    Similar proposed legislation by U.S. Rep. Troy Nehls (R–Richmond) cleared a House Judiciary Committee review on Tuesday. Nehl’s bill, H.R. 4711, the Rapid Expulsion of Migrant Offenders who Violate and Evade (REMOVE) Act, would require removal proceedings to conclude within 15 days.

    “The Biden Administration let millions upon millions of illegal aliens into our country who wreaked havoc on our communities and drained public resources,” said Nehls.

  • “Under Trump Administration, State Dept Has Revoked 80,000 Non-immigrant Visas In 2025.”
  • El Paso federal judge strikes down Texas redistricting.

    The new Texas congressional map passed by the Legislature this summer, intended to gain five seats for Republicans, constitutes a racial gerrymander according to an El Paso federal court, which enjoined the state from enforcing it for the 2026 midterms.

    The long-awaited ruling came on Tuesday after a couple of weeks of anxious speculation from both sides; the filing period for the midterms began on November 8 and ends on December 8.

    “The public perception of this case is that it’s about politics. To be sure, politics played a role in drawing the 2025 Map. But it was much more than just politics. Substantial evidence shows that Texas racially gerrymandered the 2025 Map,” Judge Jeffrey Brown of the El Paso court’s three-judge panel wrote.

    “For the reasons explained below, the Court PRELIMINARILY ENJOINS the State from using the 2025 Map. The Court ORDERS that the 2026 congressional election in Texas shall proceed under the map that the Texas Legislature enacted in 2021.”

  • But: “U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Jerry Smith issued a scathing dissent Wednesday against the federal judicial panel ruling that blocked Texas’ new congressional map from going into effect for 2026, calling it ‘the most outrageous conduct by a judge that [he has] ever encountered in a case in which [he has] been involved.'”
  • Novokuybyshevsk oil refinery hit by drones.
  • Ryazan oil refinery hit again.”
  • Attack ship on fire off the belt of Orion Oil tanker on fire off the coast of Vladivostok.
  • Paul Warburg says the decline of Ural crude prices from $55 to $36 a barrel has been disasterous for Russia’s economy, even before the effects of Ukraine’s oil industry strikes are taken into account.
  • Novomichurinsk Power Station in Ryazan Hit By Drones.”
  • “Lured to Russia With the Promise of Work, Many African Nationals Unknowingly Sign Contracts To Fight in Ukraine.”

    On November 7, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister, Andriy Sybiha released a statement on X stating that at least 1,436 citizens from 36 African countries have been duped into participating in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

    Hailing from impoverished circumstances in their home countries in Africa, many young men look at Russia as an accessible country to secure economic opportunity. Some arrive to study in Russian universities. Others scour for employment that will allow them to work without documents, but mostly all are convinced that signing a contract in Russian will award them a comfortable salary that can be used to support their families back home. Signing a contract, Mr. Sybiha warns, is equivalent to signing a death sentence.

    According to reports in the LA Times, recruits are promised a monthly pay ranging between $2,500 to $3,500, nearly ten times the average in a country like Cameroon. But when these men go missing or are killed, Russian authorities hardly share any information with the bereaved families, including the bodies of the fallen or their earnings.

  • Ukraine plans to buy up to 100 Rafale warplanes and air defense systems from France.”

    Ukraine on Monday signed a letter of intent to buy up to 100 Rafale warplanes, drones, air defense systems and other key equipment from France over the next 10 years, as part of efforts to strengthen the country’s long-term security.

    Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who signed the document with French President Emmanuel Macron, called it “a historic deal” at a joint news conference at the Elysée presidential palace. The letter is a preliminary commitment of Ukraine stating its interest in buying a series of French defense equipment.

    Snip.

    The Rafale is France’s most advanced fighter jet, a high-tech, delta-winged, multi-role warplane known for its maneuverability and efficiency. It has been deployed in the country’s foreign military operations including in the Middle East and Africa, and comes at a cost estimated at over $100 million per aircraft.

    “Preliminary commitment” is a long way from “fighters in the air.”

  • “Federal Grand Jury Adds Terrorism Indictments Over July 4 ‘Antifa’ Attack on Texas ICE Facility.”

    A federal grand jury indicted nine alleged “North Texas Antifa Cell operatives” last week on charges including rioting, providing material support to terrorists, and attempted murder in connection with the July 4 attack on the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Alvarado.

    Seven additional individuals were also charged with providing material support.

    “This is the first indictment in the country against a group of violent Antifa cell members,” Acting U.S. Attorney Nancy E. Larson stated. “The charges the Grand Jury has leveled against these defendants, including material support for terrorists, address the vicious attack perpetrated by an anti-ICE, anti-law enforcement, anti-government, anarchist group.”

    More:

    Yesterday’s twelve-count indictment charges Cameron Arnold, a/k/a Autumn Hill, Zachary Evetts, Benjamin Song, Savanna Batten, Bradford Morris, a/k/a Meagan Morris, Maricela Rueda, Elizabeth Soto, Ines Soto, and Daniel Rolando Sanchez-Estrada with multiple offenses for their roles related to the Prairieland attack.

    Snip.

    The nine individuals indicted yesterday are charged with the following offenses:

    • Riot, with the intent to commit an act of violence, involving conduct such as shooting and throwing fireworks and explosives, slashing tires on a government vehicle, spraying graffiti on property and vehicles, destroying a closed circuit camera, shooting at officers, and dressing in black bloc.

      Defendants charged: Cameron Arnold, Zachary Evetts, Benjamin Song, Savanna Batten, Bradford Morris, Maricela Rueda, Elizabeth Soto, Ines Soto

    • Providing Material Support to Terrorists, including property, services, training, communications equipment, weapons, explosives, personnel (including themselves), and transportation.

      Defendants charged: Arnold, Evetts, Song, Batten, Morris, Rueda, E. Soto, and I. Soto

    • Conspiracy to Use and Carry an Explosive, and Using and Carrying an Explosive, during a riot.

      Defendants charged: Arnold, Evetts, Song, Batten, Morris, Rueda, E. Soto, and I. Soto

    • Attempted Murder of Officers and Employees of the United States, involving the unlawful attempt to kill with malice aforethought Correctional Officers-1 and 2, and an Alvarado Police Officer.

      Defendants charged: Song, Arnold, Evetts, Morris, and Rueda

    • Discharging a Firearm During, and in Relation to, and in Furtherance of a Crime of Violence, i.e., the attempted murder of two correctional officers and an Alvarado Police Officer.

      Defendants charged: Song, Arnold, Evetts, Morris, and Rueda

    • Corruptly Concealing a Document or Record, by transporting a box containing numerous Antifa materials, such as insurrection planning, anti-law enforcement, anti-government, and anti-immigration enforcement documents and propaganda from Sanchez Estrada’s residence to a location in Denton, Texas, intending to conceal the box’s contents and impair its availability for use in a federal grand jury and federal criminal proceeding.

      Defendant charged: Daniel Rolando Sanchez Estrada

    • Conspiracy to Conceal Documents and other objects that would implicate Maricela Rueda in the riot and shooting at the Prairieland facility.

      Defendants charged: Sanchez Estrada and Maricela Rueda

    If convicted, Song, Arnold, Evetts, Morris, and Rueda each face a minimum penalty of ten years in federal prison and a maximum penalty of life imprisonment. Batten, Elizabeth Soto, and Ines Soto each face a sentence ranging from a minimum of ten years up to fifty years in federal prison. Sanchez Estrada faces up to 20 years in federal prison on each count.

  • Japan says that it will defend Taiwan if China tries to invade.

    China remains infuriated by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s statement last week that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan would threaten Japan‘s “survival” and would thus justify military engagement to defend Taiwan.

    This is an entirely logical assertion by the new prime minister. A Chinese conquest of Taiwan would result in Beijing’s dominance of trade flows in the western Pacific and its militarily encirclement of Japan’s southern outlying islands. Beijing would be able to leverage this military power to demand political concessions that fundamentally diminished Japan’s democratic sovereignty. In turn, the United States should be grateful to Takaichi. Her leadership here stands in stark contrast to that of other regional leaders such as South Korea’s Lee Jae Myung.

    It is partly due to this broadcasting of support for the U.S. that Beijing’s fury with Takaichi remains incandescent.

    If China doesn’t want to fight Japan, maybe they should refrain from invading Taiwan.

  • Never underestimate President Trump’s ability to do the unexpected. Commie New York City mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani met with Trump in the White House…and it turned into something of a love-in:

    While his hard-left fellow-travelers now denounce Mamdani for meeting with Trump?

  • No matter who is running things, Palestinians seem to love terrorism more than life. “Palestinian Authority Paid Terrorists $214M This Year, Major Increase From 2024.” (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • Giant pile of waste mysteriously appears in the English countryside. I’m not saying it’s necessarily unassimiliated Muslim immigrants doing it (I’m sure the UK has plenty of English litterbugs), I’m just suggesting that’s the way I would bet…
  • Houston mayor defends police coordination with ICE.

    After long denying that Houston had been cooperating with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Mayor John Whitmire has now admitted that the Houston Police Department has been cooperating with the federal agency, though he noted that it was the bare minimum.

    The comments came at a conference hosted by former Kemah Mayor Bill King. During an interview with Whitmire, King mentioned a New York Times profile written last month.

    In that article, Whitmire essentially said that, unlike the mayors of other big cities, such as Chicago or Los Angeles—where leaders constantly challenge Trump and his policies, especially on immigration—he prefers to keep a lower profile and focus on his job as mayor. Whitmire noted, “I don’t respond to Trump — that could be counterproductive. Do I have personal views? Sure, and they’re strong, but why do you want to challenge him?”

    On Saturday, Whitmire highlighted this position yet again, stating a certain level of cooperation with the administration was crucial to keeping Houston from becoming a military zone. “I’m not going to say that we’re not cooperating with ICE, because that’s frankly not true,” he said. He continued by pointing out that, even if he tried to get ICE out of Houston’s public spaces, the result would likely be 500 more officers from the Trump administration in response.

    Not to mention that it’s a matter of obeying federal law.

  • Stephen A. Smith interviews Ted Cruz. Cruz even challenges him to a game of basketball…
  • Sarah Hoyt thinks talk of an inevitable “civil war” are overblown.

    This is why I don’t get spooked at things like ante-fa. Because I was spooked, then I poked around and saw that they only operated in areas where the authorities were on their side. And even then, they couldn’t spread thinner than 3 cities or so at a time. This tells you it’s no groundswell movement. Heck, it’s not even as big as the fairly manufactured unrest of the 70s. Because of the way that the news and media worked back then, the people on the street seemed to feel more sympathy for the 70s bs than anyone does now. (No. I don’t know if that was true or the fact that the media and news of the time lent themselves to manipulating the history of the period, as well.)

    Or the reason I didn’t lose all hope in people over the Covidiocy. Yeah, I know. It sure did seem like everyone was onboard. Only we drove if not quite coast to coast close enough, which allowed us to see how widely the nonsense was ignored, and how p*ssed people were on it. After all, it’s very easy to think everyone is onboard with it when places like Twitter and Facebook were censoring any posts questioning it. (At the order of the administration — bah. What DDR bullsh*t.)

    This is the reason I know the groyper bs isn’t taking hold pretty much anywhere except with the extremely online showing how extremely online they are and edgy. And bots. And foreigners. And foreign bots. Because the general attitudes on the street haven’t changed.

    The only people I see talking about “groypers” and Nick Fuentes are either leftwing media, leftwing activists, or gadfly figures headed toward the exit gates from conservatism like Tucker Carlson or Candace Owens.

  • “JD Vance Convicted Of Threatening To Kill JD Vance.” “67-year-old James Donald Vance Jr. is also convicted of threatening President Donald Trump and one of Trump’s children.”
  • Speaking of nomengangers, Texas Democrat Representative Jasmine Crockett accused EPA head Lee Zeldin of taking money from Jeffrey Epstein. It was a different Jeffrey Epstein.
  • Speaking of crazy women, “Ex-GOP aide paid fetish artist to mutilate her, claimed it was an anti-Trump attack.”

    Natalie Greene, 26, was arrested Wednesday and charged with masterminding the violent bogus ambush at Egg Harbor Township Nature Reserve on the night of July 23, the US Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey announced.

    Prosecutors said the accused fraudster claimed three gun-wielding men approached her and a friend on the trail around 10:36 p.m. before threatening to shoot her and striking her in the head.

    An actual Republican hate crime hoax! That leaves the Hate Crime Hoax tally at (counts) I think 20 Democrats to 1 Republican, but I might be multi-counting Jussie Smollett coverage in various LinkSwarms…

  • “21 Alleged Arlington Gang Members Arrested on Violent Crime, Drug Charges.”

    Federal Department of Justice (DOJ) officials announced charges against 21 alleged members of a violent criminal street gang known as “Kiccdoe” in Arlington.

    The group has been charged with racketeering, murder, drug trafficking, and gun crimes, Acting U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas Nancy Larson announced in a press release last week.

    As of Friday, November 7, all 21 were in custody.

    The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Arlington Police Department began investigating “Kiccdoe” in April 2024 after one of its members was shot and killed on a high school campus in Arlington. After the murder, several retaliatory shootings between “Kiccdoe” members and other Arlington gang members allegedly took place.

    “Kiccdoe” began on the east side of Arlington. Its members use words and symbols such as “kiccdoe,” “KDN” for Kiccdoe Nation, “6,” or “600,” including on their clothes, to demonstrate their association with the gang, court documents stated.

    Members also allegedly produced and distributed songs and videos about their gang activities and crimes.

    Yes, that’s a super-smart way to avoid being caught. What could possibly go wrong? The Feds never would have had to work the tax evasion angle if Al Capone had put out a rap video bragging about his illegal booze empire.

    In order to join or remain in good standing in the gang, its members would have to commit violent acts referred to as “stripes,” the court documents stated. The federal complaint alleged that these crimes included murders, robberies, assaults with dangerous weapons, sales of illegal drugs, and continuing threats of violence.

    The violent offenses took place from early 2022 through this year, the DOJ said.

    The alleged gang members range in age from 18 to 22, and many are charged with more than one offense.

    For example, Isaiah Wiley of Dallas is charged with conspiracy to commit murder, assault with a dangerous weapon in aid of racketeering, conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance, and possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime.

  • Despite promising job numbers, the Biden Recession is still with us: “Nearly a third of U.S. job postings don’t result in an actual hire, creating a ‘ghost job economy‘ with millions of roles that never materialize.”
  • David Letterman inducts Warren Zevon into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. A well-deserved honor.
  • Asmongold looks into the Ubisoft situation and compares woke online games “journalists” to the Sirens of Greek myth, lying about the quality of their games and luring them onto the rocks of unprofitability…
  • Jay Leno asks: Which is the better investment: A 1967 Lamborghini Miura, a 1993 Dodge Viper, or a 2013 Bugatti Veyron? The results may surprise you.
  • The story of how the Grumman LLV became America’s ubiquitous mail delivery vehicle.
  • The McRib is back. It’s the guy in the suit reviewing it, and you may or may not like his schtick…
  • “In Devastating Blow, Newly Released Emails Reveal Trump Not Well-Liked By Pedophile.”
  • “To Save Time, ICE Begins Mass Arrests Of Everyone At Soccer Fields.”
  • “Five Guys Now Offering 50-Year Burger Financing.”
  • “Starving African Children Raise Money To Feed Ariana Grande.”
  • “Shocking Study Reveals Someone Still Making Avatar Movies.”
  • “Troubling New Survey Shows 90 Percent Of Graduating High School Seniors Don’t Know The Airspeed Velocity Of An Unladen Swallow.”
  • “Scholars Now Believe Number Of The Beast Is Actually 67.
  • Good boy!

    (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)

  • I’m still between jobs. Feel free to hit the tip jar if you’re so inclined.





    LinkSwarm For November 14, 2025

    Friday, November 14th, 2025

    Happy Anti-Communism Week everyone! (In addition, of course, to May 1st being one of two Victims of Communism Day.) The #SchumerShutdown ends with a whimper, a whole lot of SNAP fraud has been uncovered, more Democrats committing fraud, Chip Roy wants a complete immigration halt, Ukraine hits a bunch more Russian oil refineries, some semiconductor shenanigans, another company leaves Delaware for Texas, some tech companies in trouble, an interesting new pistol design, and a novel theory on “AI-related layoffs.”

    It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

    As a side note, the mosquitos have been brutal the last few days. Possibly because it’s been a very warm (though largely dry) November, and the bats have already migrated south.

  • Our short, mild national nightmare is officially over.

    President Donald Trump on Wednesday night signed a continuing resolution at the White House that ends the record-breaking 42-day federal government shutdown.

    The Senate passed the resolution on Monday and the House passed it earlier Wednesday evening. The resolution will keep the entire government funded through Jan. 30, and extends funding for military construction, Veterans Affairs, the Department of Agriculture, and Congress beyond that, through Sept. 30.

    Trump slammed Democrats for causing the shutdown by refusing to go along with a clean continuing resolution for over a month, and urged voters to remember the party responsible for causing the six-week-long chaos during next year’s midterms.

    “Republicans never wanted a shutdown and voted 15 times for a clean continuation of funding,” Trump said. “The Democrats shutdown has inflicted massive harm … So I just want to tell the American people, you should not forget this when we come up to midterms and other things. Don’t forget what they’ve done to our country.”

    The resolution gives backpay to many federal workers and reinstates employees who were fired during the shutdown, but does not include an extension of Affordable Care Act subsidies despite it having been a key Democratic demand in the shutdown. The subsidies are set to expire at the end of the year.

  • And what did Chuck Schumer get for shutting down large portions of the federal government for more than a month? Two things: “Jack” and “Squat.”

    I hear that if you call Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s office, the hold music is Cheap Trick’s “Surrender.”

    Last Tuesday night, Democrats were jubilant, convinced they had just inflicted the first of many consequential defeats upon their detested foes, President Trump and the Republican Party. And now here we are, six days later, and Democrats are once again disappointed, infuriated, and at each other’s throats.

    For the past 41 days, Republicans have had 53 senators willing to reopen the government, joined by Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, and “independent” Angus King of Maine, who caucuses with the Democrats. But it requires 60 votes to cut off debate and bring the legislation to the floor for a vote, and thus to reopen the government, Republicans needed at least four more Democrats to change their mind.

    Last night, five additional Democratic senators agreed to vote to reopen the government — and in the eyes of their fellow Democrats, effectively surrendered. Tim Kaine of Virginia, Dick Durbin of Illinois, Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire, Jacky Rosen of Nevada, and Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire shifted their positions.

    Those eight agreed to reopen the federal government at current funding levels through January 30, and in exchange, all they needed was a pledge from Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota to hold a vote on legislation to extend the Obamacare exchange premium subsidies by the second week of December.

    There are one or two other deal-sweeteners in there for Kaine, notably an attempt to reverse more than 4,000 federal layoffs the Trump administration announced in the shutdown, and language to prevent future layoffs through January 30.

    Snip.

    Republicans just got the government reopened in exchange for a promise of a vote — not even promise of passage! — and rehiring government workers who were on the job on September 30. That’s a very small price to pay, and Republicans didn’t have to get rid of the filibuster, the ultimate short-term gain, long-term loss for Republicans in the Senate.

  • 500K Double Dippers, 5K Dead People Found on SNAP in 29 States.”

    Across three-fifths of the United States, the Trump administration has found half a million people receiving SNAP benefits twice over and 5,000 dead people receiving them. In deep blue states, the fraud is probably much worse.

    It is important to clarify that 20+ states out of the 50 did not comply with the federal government’s request for information on SNAP beneficiaries, likely because they are trying to hide how many illegal aliens are illicitly receiving food stamps. So the horrifying numbers revealed by U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins on Laura Ingraham’s Fox News show, The Ingraham Angle, are actually incomplete, and will probably be much higher if the administration can make radical Democrat states provide the necessary data.

    Snip.

    The secretary continued to list off food stamp recipient statistics: “80% [are] able-bodied Americans, meaning they can work, they don’t have small children at home, they’re not taking care of an elderly parent. They can work, and they choose not to work, of course, because they’re getting significant benefits from the taxpayer.”

    We need to restore shame to able-bodied adults living on the public dole.
    (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)

  • Texas Republican congressman Chip Roy wants a complete immigration freeze until the system is fixed.

    A Texas congressman is proposing a “freeze” on all immigration until the federal government fixes the country’s broken system.

    U.S. Rep. Chip Roy (R–TX) said Wednesday he is introducing a bill called the “Pause Act” that will freeze all immigration until Congress achieves certain objectives, including reforming chain migration and birthright citizenship and ending H-1B visas.

    He said the nation’s record-high foreign-born population is creating “a cultural problem about who we are as Americans.”

    Roy, who is in a four-way race to be the Republican nominee for Texas attorney general in 2026, explained his proposal on The Benny Show.

    In addition to the immigration freeze and related reforms, Roy called for revisiting Plyler v. Doe, a case originating in Texas that resulted in a 1982 U.S. Supreme Court decision requiring states to fund the education of illegal alien children.

    Roy also said his bill would require vetting people for their adherence to Sharia law.

    “Why are we importing any human being that is adherent to Sharia law, which is totally contrary to the Constitution, and our values, and Western civilization?” Roy asked host Benny Johnson.

    “In Texas, we’ve been dealing with the brunt of the illegal immigration influence. But now we’re seeing, I think, the ramifications of the H-1B system and how it has been abused, in addition to chain migration and diversity visas, which we’ve been trying to fix for a long time, and we’ve been unable to do so,” said Roy.

    Mostly agree with this, though there would probably have to be a way for individual exceptions to be made (say, a foreign Christian under a death threat from jihadists, or a Russian or Chinese defector, or a foreign NBA draft choice). But it should be so narrow as to require the personal approval of DHS Director Kristi Noem…

  • There are Somalis in Minnesota who wouldn’t vote for far leftist Somali Omar Fateh because he was from a different Somali clan, and they want members of the rival clan kicked out of the country…
  • Ukrainian drones hit the Saratov oil refinery for the fourth time since August.
  • They also hit the Orsk oil refinery, some 1600km from the Kharkiv.
  • Ukrainian drones also attacked the Russian Taneko oil refinery in Nizhnekamsk.
  • They also hit multiple targets in Novorossiysk, including both the oil terminal and the S-300/400 system defending it. Also, there’s no way I can donate €100 right now, but I really want one of those “This Is Fine” patches…
  • They also hit two oil depots and a fuel train in Crimea.
  • “Nearly 7,000 transport companies in Russia on verge of bankruptcy.
  • Glorious footage of a Ukrainian Mi-8 door gunner taking out a Shahed drone with a minigun:

  • “Top 20 Outrages of Norm Eisen’s War on America.”

    Orchestrating Over 180 Anti-Trump Lawsuits Through CREW: As co-founder of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), Eisen led hundreds of ethics complaints and lawsuits against the Trump administration, often perceived as partisan harassment that politicizes oversight and strains constitutional separation of powers.

    Snip.

    Involvement in USAID Funding Scandal: Accused of ties to $17M misappropriation via family-linked NGO, raising corruption concerns in foreign aid.

    Plenty more at the link.

  • (Heavy sigh) Look, I’ve been avoid the whole stupid Tucker Carlson thing because he hasn’t been a particularly important part of the mediascape for a while, and plenty of other people were already dog-piling him. Yet, this week he seemed to turn up some pretty interesting information on would-be Trump assassin Thomas Crooks. Namely that he was a pro-Trump supporter…until he radically changed his tune in early 2020.

    On July 19, 2019 Crooks writes: “Ilhan Omar and others are invaders and should honestly be killed and their dead bodies sent back.”

    On July 20, 2018, Crooks writes: “If youre saying trump is a bad president you arent a patriot as trump is the literal definition of Patriotism”

    Seven hours after that comment, Crooks writes: “I hope a quick painful death to all the deplorable immigrants and anti-trump congresswoman who dont deserve anything this countru [sic] has given them”

    Later that evening he wrote: “Everyone of the Trump hat-ing democrats deserve to have their heads chopped of and put on steaks for the world to see what happens when you fuck with America”

    These types of comments continued for months, “and became increasingly violent.”

    “If any of the democratic candidates win. They wont be in there for long. Because unlike the dems we have guns and lots of them”

    He also quoted Mao – writing “The only real political power comes from the barrel of a gun.”

    The Change:

    In early 2020 as the pandemic shifted into the headlines, crooks “radically” changed – writing of “trumps stupidity.”

    He then began to mock the idea of the deep state – writing that “The deep state is simply made up of anybody who dis-agrees with the right wing. Conversation over.”

    In Feb. 2020, Crooks called out Trump supporters as “brainwashed,” and a “cult.”

    Later that day, Crooks called Trump a racist.

    And in April 2020 when the COVID panic was in full swing, Crooks became pro-lockdown, writing “It seems that you people don’t understand that sometimes Public safety comes before your Personnel rights.”

    He then wrote: “…going to a chinese new years party in america isn’t putting you at risk for corona virus because believe it or not viruses don’t spread through race like Tucker Carlson probably told you.”

    In May of 2020, Crooks called Republican concerns over voter fraud “ignorant.”

    He then wrote a comment that sounded like a “digital manifesto,” Carlson reports.

    “they only way to fight the gov is with terror-ism style attacks, sneak a bomb into an essential building a set it off before anyone sees you, track down any important people/politicians/military leaders etc and try to asasinate them. Any sort of head fight is suicide and even ambush/surprise attacks likely aren’t going to end well.”

    Sounds like another “known wolf,” doesn’t it? And the assertion that “there’s no deep state” (combined with what else we know about the assassination) makes you go “Hmmm.”

  • “Obamacare’s Effect on Health Insurance Costs: It Makes Everyone Else Poor.'”

    Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) is pushing back on the idea that the Affordable Care Act (ACA), known as Obamacare, has made health insurance costs more affordable, saying, “Obamacare makes everyone else poor.”

    Lee shared a graphic, first posted by President Trump on Truth social, showing how major health insurance company stocks have performed since the ACA was enacted in 2010 to November 2025.

    The seven major health insurance companies depicted on the graph show gains of anywhere from 414% to 1177% in their stock prices between March 2010 and November 2025.

    Lee called out the insurance providers, noting that they’re “making money hand over fist” but not because they are providing “new & innovative ways of making Americans healthier.”

    Instead, Lee says, these health insurance companies are prospering due to the bureaucratic barriers that prevent new competition and from massive subsidies from the federal government.

  • The Saudis are getting ready to purchase 48 F-35s.
  • “California Governor Gavin Newsom’s Former Chief of Staff Indicted on Public Corruption Charges.

    California Governor Gavin Newsom’s former chief of staff Dana Williamson was arrested Wednesday in an FBI corruption probe and charged with multiple counts of bank and wire fraud.

    Federal authorities accused Williamson, 53, of participating in a scheme to funnel campaign money from former federal Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra into a personal account. Sean McCluskie, Becerra’s former chief of staff, was named as a co-conspirator.

    “This is a crucial step in an ongoing political corruption investigation that began more than three years ago,” U.S. Attorney Eric Grant said in a statement. “As it always has, the U.S. Attorney’s Office will continue to work tirelessly with our law enforcement partners to protect the people of California from political corruption.”

    Williamson and McCluskie stole $225,000 between February 2022 and September 2024 from Becerra’s dormant state campaign fund, the federal indictment says. The Department of Justice investigation into the matter began three years ago, under former President Joe Biden’s administration, FBI Sacramento Special Agent in Charge Sid Patel said.

    “The news today of formal accusations of impropriety by a long-serving trusted advisor are a gut punch,” Becerra told local outlet KCRA 3.

    Williamson was hit with 23 charges, including conspiracy to commit fraud, conspiracy to defraud the United States and obstruct justice, subscribing to false tax returns, and making false statements, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.

    Democratic political consultants are so money-hungry they’ll rake graft off other Democrats. Big fleas have little fleas…

  • Man, it sure seems like a lot of prominent Democratic politicians are committing mortgage fraud. ‘Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) was hit with a federal criminal referral for alleged mortgage and tax fraud related to his purchase of a $1.2 million home in Washington, DC, that he claimed as a primary residence.” As Dwight notes: “You may remember Eric Swalwell for such hits as ‘banging a Chinese spy‘” and “threatening to use nuclear weapons against gun owners.”
  • Stephen Green wonders how the hell we let China buy a trailer park next door to a stealth bomber base.

    So a Chinese fraudster connected to Communist intelligence services wandered in from Canada and bought a trailer park next door to a stealth bomber base in Missouri.

    This is not the opening line of a surreal joke.

    Whiteman Air Force Base is home to our tiny fleet of B-2 bombers, and yet an RV park just a mile away “is one of several properties near U.S. military interests acquired by a web of shell companies, which are ultimately owned by a couple who live in Canada and belong to organizations controlled by disgraced Chinese tycoon and self-described former CCP intelligence ‘affiliate,’ Miles Guo,” according to a bombshell Daily Caller report.

    Someone in the federal government needs to get this fixed. Get a warrant to toss the entire trailer park to see what spectrum warfare equipment they might be using, then seize the place under eminent domain for national security reasons.

  • “Kansas AG charges small town mayor with illegally voting as a non-citizen day after winning second term.”

    ‘We now have tools, thanks to the current White House, that we haven’t had in over 10 years,’ said Kansas Secretary of State Scott Schwab, ‘that we can check through the SAVE program, to find out if folks end up on our voter rolls. And they could be a legal resident, but they’re not a citizen. We want to make sure that gets clarified.’

    Deport him.

  • Least you think I’m never critical of President Trump, I want to note that his trial balloon for 50 year mortgages is a really bad idea. It’s not a way to build wealth, and the only party getting rich off that deal is the banks. Financially, you’d be better off living in a van for a few years until you can afford a real mortgage.
  • This certainly has a whiff of scandal: “Houston ISD Sues Texas Attorney General to Block Release of Emails with California PR Firm. The district wants to keep communications with a PR firm from becoming public.”

    Houston Independent School District (ISD) filed a lawsuit against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton to block the release of emails between the district and Los Angeles public relations firm Bryson Gillette.

    Bryson Gillette is former Obama aide Bill Burton’s public relations firm run by Democratic operatives. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki was a senior adviser there.

    Bryson Gillette was involved with the district’s rebranding in May. Houston ISD’s Chief of Public Affairs and Communications Alex Elizondo told an advisory committee that the district had a brand identity that “isn’t inviting or super compelling.”

    A Houston ISD spokesperson said the rebrand came at no additional cost to the district and coincided with the rollout of new district and campus website designs scheduled for August.

    According to the suit, ABC13 News requested one month of emails between Houston ISD and Bryson Gillette on May 8, which the district received on May 9. On May 21, the district asked Paxton to withhold documents and submitted the required materials to the Office of the Attorney General (OAG) asserting attorney-client privilege.

    The OAG issued a ruling on August 12, ordering Houston ISD to release the records and stating that attorney-client privilege did not apply.

    Houston ISD filed a lawsuit in Travis County on September 11, looking to block the emails from release.

    Makes you wonder what they’re hiding, doesn’t it?

  • Federal judge threatens to sanction California for ‘misleading’ him in ‘gender secrecy’ case. State claimed lawsuit over muzzling teachers, hiding students gender identity from parents was moot because it removed FAQ page with challenged policies, but they secretly popped up again in required teacher training.”

    California Gov. Gavin Newsom has repeatedly slurred a federal judge by name, echoing President Trump’s history of diatribes against judges even before the current Democrat started copying the former Democrat’s social media style and insulting nicknames.

    The perceived contender for the 2028 Democratic nomination for president may cluck his tongue again when he sees the latest order from U.S. District Judge Roger Benitez in a lawsuit against The Golden State’s alleged mandate on school districts to hide from parents their children’s asserted gender identity at odds with sex.

    The President George W. Bush nominee ordered state Attorney General Rob Bonta and the California Department of Education to “show cause” on why they should not be sanctioned for “misleading” Benitez so he would remove them from the suit by teachers who allege their school district muzzled them and parents of “gender incongruent children.”

    The state defendants’ motions to dismiss and opposition to the plaintiffs’ motion for summary judgment claimed that CDE had “withdrawn and conclusively replaced” an FAQ page that contained the challenged policies, which they claimed was the “only basis” for being named defendants and thus made the case moot, Benitez wrote.

    “However, evidence demonstrates that the CDE may have merely moved the challenged content of the FAQ page to a new, required ‘PRISM’ training module,” as documented by the plaintiffs’ lawyers at the Thomas More Society, the judge said, ordering state defendants to explain their behavior Nov. 17 in court.

    “From day one, officials from the local school district all the way to the governor’s mansion have tried to deflect responsibility” but “have now been caught not only lying to California taxpayers but attempting to mislead the Court to escape accountability,” TMS Executive Vice President Peter Breen said in a statement.

  • “The special election for Texas Senate District 9 will continue into a runoff with two candidates: Republican Leigh Wambsganss and Democrat Taylor Rehmet.”

    Based on early voting and some voting day results, no candidate secured over 50 percent of the votes cast, so the two highest vote recipients will move on to the runoff election, the date of which remains to be set by Gov. Greg Abbott.

    The North Texas Senate seat was vacated when former state Sen. Kelly Hancock (R-North Richland Hills) resigned and was appointed by Abbott to fill the vacancy as the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts.

    Snip.

    Wambsganss was endorsed early on in the race by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who has vocally opposed expansion of casino gambling in Texas. She has also received support from Texans United for a Conservative Majority (TUCM), which opposes gambling expansion as well. Texans for Lawsuit Reform, a group not frequently on the same side of an electoral battle as TUCM, has also supported Wambsganss.

  • Leave it to Sargon of Akkad to point out the obvious: Female prison guards shouldn’t guard male prisoners. And vice versa.
  • “Substrate’s claims about revolutionary ASML-beating chipmaking technology scrutinized.” That’s because they’re bunk.

    The Substrate startup has been doing the rounds in the news lately, thanks to its proposition of making chips using particle accelerators and X-rays instead of conventional EUV lithography, claiming it can eventually have angstrom-sized features at only $10,000 per wafer—in U.S. fabs, no less.

    Oooo, where to begin? IBM tried experimenting with x-ray lithography in the 1980s and 90s, and found the rays were too energetic to use because they damaged wafers.

    And technically, semiconductor equipment manufacturing already has particle accelerators: they’re called ion implanters and they’re used for gate dopants. Axcelis (formerly Eaton Semiconductor) and Applied Materials (both companies I worked for in the 1990s) make good money selling them, and there are a whole bunch of limits-of-physics reasons why you can’t use them for lithography. (Historical trivia: Applied Materials used to have their own in-house designed ion implanters, but their current offerings trace back to a competitor named Varian they bought in 2011.)

    Those are bold claims, and an article by Fox Chapel Research (FCR) is seriously questioning whether they pay off.

    The write-up is the first of two parts, and takes aim at not just the seemingly outlandish technological claims, but also at the track record of the venture’s founders, as well as the overall messaging on Substrate’s website. The start-up is backed by various investment funds, namely but not only Founders Fund, of whom Peter Thiel is part of.

    The report says the founders are James and Oliver Proud, who reportedly have no experience in the semiconductor industry, nor do any of the investor funds. James’ latest venture was apparently the Sense sleep tracker, a product that had its inception on Kickstarter to the tune of $2.5m, but didn’t materialize until funding rounds raised over $50m. After release, the tracker was found to be borderline useless by reviewers and drew many comparisons to a scam.

    Yeah, that reeks of a scam. Avoid. (See also: “China’s Semiconductor Industry: Shell Games All The Way Down.”)

  • “Wendy’s Is Closing Roughly 300 Restaurants This Year and Next.”

  • ClowfishTV floats an interesting theory: A lot of those “AI-related” layoffs are just companies using that as an excuse to purge the woke from the ranks.

  • Coinbase Leaves Delaware For “Greener Pastures” In Texas As Exodus Continues.”

    For more than half a century, Delaware stood as America’s corporate capital, renowned for its business-friendly laws, respected Chancery Court, and consistent legal rulings. But in recent years, leftist activist lawmakers and politicized judges have undermined that very foundation, sparking an exodus of major companies seeking stability and fairness to more welcoming states like Texas and Nevada.

    On Wednesday morning, Coinbase joined the growing exodus, announcing on its website and in a Wall Street Journal op-ed by Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal that it is moving its state of incorporation from Delaware to Texas.

    “For decades, Delaware was known for predictable court outcomes, respect for the judgment of corporate boards, and speedy resolutions,” Grewal wrote in the op-ed.

    However, he pointed out that recent inconsistent Chancery Court rulings and reliance on ad hoc legislative fixes do not create a sustainable business environment.

    “Our decision to leave is about ensuring more predictable opportunities for the company, our shareholders, our customers and the new on-chain ecosystem we’re building,” he noted, adding, “Texas offers efficiency and predictability, in part thanks to recent corporate-law reforms that enhance governance flexibility and legal predictability.”

    Grewal concluded, “Delaware wasn’t always the go-to choice for companies. At one point it was New Jersey, and before that New York. We’ve reached another inflection point in corporate law. The more states that can credibly attract companies, the better—and we’d like to see Delaware step up to stay in the mix. But as for Coinbase, you can find us in Texas….”

    The exodus list from Delaware increases:

    • Tesla: Moved to Texas.
    • SpaceX: Moved to Texas.
    • Trump Media & Technology: Moved to Florida.
    • Dropbox: Moved to Nevada.
    • TripAdvisor: Moved to Nevada.
    • Roblox: Moved to Nevada.
    • Pershing Square: Moved to Nevada.
    • The Trade Desk: Moved to Nevada.
    • AMC Networks: Moved to Nevada.
    • Madison Square Garden Sports: Moved to Nevada.
    • Fidelity National Financial: Voted to move to Nevada.

    So was a Delaware judge letting Elon Musk know how much he hated him for supporting Trump worth it?

  • Texas Governor Abbott officially files for a fourth term, and is endorsed by President Trump.
  • Incumbent state rep Tom Craddick (R-Midland) has filed for re-election to his 30th term.
  • San Francisco train driver falls asleep while driving. Brown alert ensues. It’s a greatfentanylmystery how this could happen…
  • “Brazil carves through Amazon rainforest for new highway to ferry global climate conference elites.”

  • “750-meter-long Chinese bridge partially collapses just weeks after opening.” From a landslide, but I’m betting the usual Chinesium/tofu drugs construction quality didn’t help…
  • Google is investing $40 billion in Texas AI data centers.

    At its Midlothian Data Center, alongside a number of state officials, Google announced a $40 billion data center infrastructure investment in Texas.

    Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and its parent company Alphabet, said that the investment will go toward the construction of three data center campuses located in Armstrong and Haskell counties.

    Armstrong County is southeast of Amarillo. Haskell County is north of Abilene. Both counties have a whole lot of nothing there.

    “They say that everything is bigger in Texas – and that certainly applies to the golden opportunity with AI,” Pichai stated.

    “This investment will create thousands of jobs, provide skills training to college students and electrical apprentices, and accelerate energy affordability initiatives throughout Texas.”

    Gov. Greg Abbott said the new Google AI data center announcement is “a Texas-sized investment in the future of our great state.” U.S. Sens. John Cornyn (R-TX) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) were also in attendance, along with Congressman Jake Ellzey (R-TX-06) and a number of other local officials.

    “Google’s $40 billion investment makes Texas Google’s largest investment in any state in the country and supports energy efficiency and workforce development in our state,” Abbott added. “We must ensure that America remains at the forefront of the AI revolution, and Texas is the place where that can happen.”

    Google has already officially broken ground on two other data centers in the state: one in Midlothian in 2019, and the other in Red Oak in 2023. The technology company has since announced further investments into data and cloud infrastructure to the tune of $2.7 billion.

    This most recent announcement of a $40 billion investment will focus on building out infrastructure to support the three new data centers. Some of that investment includes building up new and existing energy storage facilities, advanced water use operations, and partnering with universities to offer technology training and education.

    My reservations about Google’s AI notwithstanding, that will offer a bunch of real jobs for real Texans…assuming the AI bubble doesn’t burst before they get built.

  • Remember when Adobe’s new terms and conditions demanded you give them unlimited rights to anything you created with their tools, forever? Well, now their stock is in the toilet, you can’t own any of their software, only rent it, and there’s a big class action lawsuit against them.
  • Speaking of tech firms in trouble, video game maker Ubisoft (makers of Prince of Persia and Assassin’s Creed games) has not only postponed an earnings report, they’ve suspended stock trading. I can’t recall a single instance where that was a good sign. The last time we mentioned Ubisoft, they were pissing off Japanese gamers for including a black samurai in one of their games…
  • Ian McCollum looks at the new Rideout Arsenal Dragon, a low-bore-axis, lever-delayed pistol. It’s funky looking and has some interesting features, including complete non-tool disassembly. However, the price point would make it way too expensive to consider even if I had a job, he experiences several firing malfunctions testing it (though it is a prototype), and I fear the tiny little tabs it uses may not hold up under heavy use. Still a pretty interesting design.
  • Hasan Piker arrested in China over meme. Sadly, they let him go before he could get to experience more of the communism he professes to love…
  • Disney+ wants to flood you with AI slop.
  • Critical Drinker on the Production Hell of Groundhog Day.
  • “With Cheney Dead, Iraq Finally Admits They Had WMDs All Along.”
  • “Democrats Agree To End Shutdown In Exchange For 15% Off Coupon To Cracker Barrel.”
  • “Congress Prepares To Pivot From Doing Nothing Because Of The Shutdown To Doing Nothing Because They’re Congress.”
  • Dave Ramsey In Critical Condition After Learning Of 50-Year Mortgage.”
  • “Latest Tucker Guest Bigfoot Reveals How Mind-Controlling Chemtrails Are Sprayed Over The Flat Earth By The Jews.”
  • Stampede!

    (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)

  • I’m still between jobs. Feel free to hit the tip jar if you’re so inclined.





    The Stupidest Example Of Musk Derangement Syndrome Yet

    Thursday, March 13th, 2025

    Having utterly and spectacularly failed at preventing Donald Trump’s second term, the loony leftists in the Democratic Party are gradually shedding their Trump Derangement Syndrome for other targets upon which to demonstrably and irrationally vent their spleen. Vance Derangement Syndrome raged for a while, but it seems that the left has settled on Musk Derangement Syndrome as the best way to demonstrate their ludicrous, self-defeating behavior. So much so that Doug Ross compiled a list of Top 20 Violent Anti-Musk Protests: The Unhinged Left’s Greatest Hits.

    This instance of Musk Derangement Syndrome (or MDS) isn’t on that list, and isn’t as violent as the incidents on that list, but is somehow even more sad and pathetic. Some supergenius has wired a projector to his car to project disparaging remarks on random cybertrucks. “When the creators find a Cybertruck, they tailgate it and project the messages on the back tailgate panel, using it as a makeshift canvas.”

    Why yes, driving around looking for random Cybertrucks to tailgate sounds like a supersmart use of your time.

    Here’s an example of the witty, sophisticated bon mots they’re projecting.

    Why yes, that’s the problem, you simply didn’t call people who disagree with your politics Nazis hard enough. Doubling down on that will surely make your agenda of child mutilation, trannies in women’s sports, open borders and wasting taxpayer money to secretly fund the far left super popular.

    Indeed, other than performative asshatery and perhaps rear-ending someone, it’s hard to figure out what this high tech but low thought japery is supposed to accomplish. Do they actually believe that the richest man in the world will be intimidated by their low-wattage light show? Indeed, what do any of the miscreants committing vandalism and arson against Tesla cars and infrastructure think they’ll accomplish? Make him worth only $300 billion rather than $301 billion? Is the performative seal-clapping applause of their fellow radicals worth the risk of time in jail? Do they think setting businesses on fire is the surefire way to win the hearts and minds of the American voters who so roundly rejected them in 2024?

    It’s a puzzler…

    Election Fraud Update for November 16, 2020

    Monday, November 16th, 2020

    Evidence continues to pile up that Democrats stole four states through brazen election fraud in a small number of urban counties. Here’s my attempt to wrangle this fire hose of information into some coherent form:

  • Rudy Giuliani says that 650,000 Votes Were Counted Unlawfully In Philadelphia And Pittsburgh:

    A few days earlier, Giuliani said that the Trump campaign may have sufficient evidence to change the election results in the state of Pennsylvania.

    He told Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo on Sunday that lawsuits being filed by Trump’s reelection campaign might show that as many as 900,000 invalid ballots were cast in the battleground state.

    According to an unofficial vote count from the Pennsylvania Department of State, Biden has received 3.35 million votes to Trump’s 3.31 million votes. Percentage-wise, Biden has 49.7 percent, compared to Trump’s 49.1 percent.

    “I think we have enough to change Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania election was a disaster,” Giuliani said, responding to a question from the host about whether the evidence is enough to change the fate of the presidential election.

    “We have people that observed people being pushed out of the polling place. We have people who were suggested to vote the other way and shown how to do it. I’m giving you the big picture,” he said.

    While mail-in ballots were being counted, GOP Pittsburgh observers were “kept out of the room or kept away from the room” for a period of 24 hours, Giuliani alleged.

    “Even though we went to court and we were allowed to move six feet closer, the Democrat machine people moved the counting place six feet further away. This is documented on videotape. There are upwards of 50 witnesses,” he continued.

  • Analysis of Pennsylvania data shows clear evidence of election fraud:

    You’ll notice that after the 11/4/20 23:00Z cutoff time, only swings of Biden votes (in multiples of 6,000 at a time) seem to have been received.

    Statistically, these changes make no sense. They’re not just improbable, they appear to be impossible.

    It looks to me like bundles of around 6,000 votes were used to slowly overcome any Trump lead. The correlation is uncanny.

  • More on the same theme.
  • Chuck DeVore says that irregularities justify recounts:

    “If the local elections officials in the city of Philadelphia are so confident that they have enough valid votes to beat President Donald Trump, and assign the 20 electoral college votes of Pennsylvania to Vice President Joe Biden. If they were that confident, why are they resisting an authorized court order to allow for people to observe the ballot as they’re supposed to legally be able to do?” DeVore responded to a question from correspondent Jan Jekielek.

    Snip.

    “By the way, this is a common thing throughout the entire country, that you’re supposed to have people from both sides observing the physical process of counting the votes to make sure that it’s done honestly and legally,” DeVore added, “it really potentially puts into doubt the results that came out of Philadelphia.”

    DeVore pointed out that only a few months ago, the U.S. Department of Justice indicted a Philadelphia election official on charges of bribery and election tampering.

    “When you have a race or a state like Pennsylvania, where you have this unprecedentedly large number of mail-in ballots that have been requested, then the question becomes what sort of safeguards are we using to ensure that the votes are valid and have been legally cast?” DeVore spoke about the integrity of the mail-in ballots.

    DeVore went on to say that one of the safeguards—the requirement to have a matching signature on the outside of the envelope—was obliterated in Pennsylvania.

  • Judicial Watch in October: “Pennsylvania Counties Admit They Gave Incorrect Voter Roll Information to Federal Government – Disclose Conflicting Numbers of Inactive Voters to Court.”
  • The statistical anomalies of those fraudulent Biden ballots in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Georgia and Wisconsin.
  • Massive Voter Fraud In Wisconsin?”

    There were 3,684,726 registered voters in Wisconsin going into Election day. The total votes recorded in Wisconsin were 3,240,549. That would give Wisconsin a turnout of 88%. [UPDATE: The current vote total is 3,297,420, which would yield a turnout of over 89%. However, Wisconsin permits same-day registration, so the number of such registrations would bring that percentage down somewhat.] According to Ballotpedia, no American state in the period 2002-2018 has ever achieved a turnout rate of 80% or higher. [UPDATE: These are turnout numbers expressed as percentage of eligible voters, not registered voters, so the percentages are not directly comparable.] For purposes of comparison, in 2016 Wisconsin had a 67 percent turnout rate. [UPDATE: Wisconsin tabulates turnout as a percentage of the estimated voting-age population, so these numbers would be lower than the percentages of registered voters.] If you are credulous, you can believe that 21% more Wisconsinites voted this year, compared with the red-hot election of four years ago, and 248,000 more Wisconsinites turned out to vote for the charismatic Joe Biden this year than voted for Hillary Clinton four years ago. I think those numbers are almost certainly false, the result of ballot manipulation.

  • Michigan Election Fraud: Evidence of Wolverine State Chicanery During America’s 2020 Presidential Election.”

    On Election Night when America went to bed, President Trump had a commanding lead in virtually every swing state, as well as Virginia, which no one expected him to win.

    However, when America woke up the next day, we found that he’d lost these leads, largely on the basis of mail-in ballots found in the middle of the night and out from under the watchful eye of legal election monitors.

    What’s more, these massive caches of votes – almost all of which were for former Vice President Biden – came via large dumps primarily from the five aforementioned cities in states predominantly run by Democratic governors.

    When one looks at the statistical likelihood of the reported turnout, the numbers are so improbable they’re more at home in a one-party state like Saddam Hussein’s Iraq or North Korea.

    What’s more, Biden’s victory does not square with the results of the Republican Party nationally: Republicans won 28 of 29 competitive House seats and Democrats were unable to flip a single state legislature. Joe Biden secured a scant three of the so-called “Bellwether Districts” that almost always choose the winner, one of which was in Delaware. Judicial Watch found 353 counties in 29 different states who had higher than 100 percent turnout.

    Anecdotally, swing states tend to follow Florida in terms of swinging left or right. This is particularly true in Michigan, which has voted in lockstep with Florida since 1968. Nearly three dozen states had counting machines connected to the Internet during the election, which is inherently insecure. Joe Biden’s lead among mail-in ballots was massive in two states — Michigan and Pennsylvania — while it was in the single digits in most states.

    Snip.

    Michigan might take the dubious honor of having the most corrupt elections in America in 2020. As of November 9, the FBI has opened up two investigations into voter fraud in the state. Affidavits have been filed alleging a scheme to backdate mail-in ballots. It is the land of massive vote dumps that go 100 percent for Joe Biden (which the controlled media has attempted to retcon as a “glitch” or “clerical error”), of thousands of dead people voting, of United States Postal Service officials coercing postal employees into backdating the postmark on ballots. And, of course, remember that this is the state that was shut down by executive fiat by Gretchen Whitmer, who eventually had her executive overreach invalidated by the state Supreme Court.

    A single computer “glitch” awarded 6,000 votes to Biden and the Democrats that were supposed to go to President Trump and other Republican candidates. With 47 Michigan counties using this software, similar glitches might yield a discrepancy of hundreds of thousands of ballots — or even more. Perhaps this “glitch” was one of the more innocuous ones. Another glitch returned a Republican incumbent to office after he “lost” to his Democratic challenger.

    We use “glitch” in quotes because these types of things seem to be a running pattern in the state and appear to always benefit the Democrat candidate. One other, and far more important, example of this was the “glitch” that awarded 138,000-plus votes to Joe Biden. It was one of these monolithic vote dumps we keep talking about.

    Over 138,000 votes tabulated and not a single one of them went for the President (or, for that matter, Jo Jorgensen or Howie Hawkins or Kanye West), a statistical impossibility. It was later corrected when hordes of Internet denizens found the vote dump and wondered how it was possible, even under the basic laws of statistics.

    This is hardly the only example of “mistakes” benefitting Biden or suspicious reported totals in the State of Michigan. Take, for example, Antrim County, where President Trump beat Hillary Clinton by 30 points in 2016 but had now swung back to Biden by 29 points. County officials vowed to investigate what they called “skewed” results.

    Even prior to the 2020 election back in October, city officials in Muskegon found that there were registration irregularities.

    A suit has been filed in the state of Michigan based on a sworn affidavit from a Michigan poll worker — not an observer. Among other things, this suit alleges that poll workers processed ballots with missing signatures, coached voters on who to vote for (Joe Biden), and were instructed to backdate ballots.

    How deep is the rabbit hole of “computer error” in Michigan? Sidney Powell, counsel for one General Michael Flynn, appeared on Lou Dobbs’ Fox Business News program and explained that she believes that programs like HAMMER or SCORECARD were used to change as much as 3 percent of the result. While this is merely speculation at this point, it is worth noting that Steve Bannon also floated this possibility on his show, War Room.

  • “Administrative policies in Wisconsin election put tens of thousands of votes in question. From allowing clerks to fix spoiled ballots to permitting voters to escape ID rules, Wisconsin election officials have taken actions that were not authorized by legislature.”

    Records reviewed by Just the News show that an executive branch agency called the Wisconsin Elections Commission:

    1. permits local county election clerks to cure spoiled ballots by filling in missing addresses for witnesses even though state law invalidates any ballot without a witness address.
    2. exempted as many as 200,000 citizens from voter ID rules in 2020 by allowing them to claim the COVID-19 pandemic caused them to be “indefinitely confined.”
    3. failed this year to purge 130,000 names from outdated voter rolls as required by law.

    (Hat tip: John Solomon.)

  • “Great Lakes Justice Center Files Election Crimes Lawsuit.”

    The Great Lakes Justice Law Center is filing a new election crimes lawsuit in Wayne County Circuit Court. The Lansing area law firm is representing two Detroit area residents in the action. The suit charges Wayne County elections officials knowingly allowed and supported illegal activities surrounding the Tuesday general election. The suit in Wayne County Circuit Court is asking for an entirely new election to be staged for the county.

    Lead attorney David Kallman says numerous witnesses are filing swarm affidavits under oath supporting the claims in the lawsuit. The suit spells out a number of alleged election crimes. Many of them surround the use of absentee or mail-in ballots.
    They include:

    -Validating ballots the name showing on the ballot did not appear in the official voter database.
    -Election workers were ordered to not verify voters’ signatures on absentee ballots, to backdate absentee ballots, and to process invalid ballots.
    -The suit claims election workers processed ballots that appeared after the election deadline and falsely reported those ballots had been received prior to the election evening deadline.
    -And the suit claims many of the invalid ballots won’t be hard to pinpoint, saying election workers in Wayne County altered already illegal ballots by inserting a birthdate of 1/1/1900.

    Attorney Kallman says the lawsuit asks the Circuit court to immediately void the uncertified election results in Wayne County and order a new and fully monitored election at the earliest possible date. “This type of widespread fraud in the counting and processing of voter ballots cannot be allowed to stand. Michigan citizens are entitled to know that their elections are conducted in a fair and legal manner and that every legal vote is properly counted. Such rampant fraud cannot be undone. We ask the Court to enjoin the certification of this fraudulent election, void the election, and order a new vote in Wayne County.”

    

  • Sharyl Attkisson has more details on the lawsuit:

    Defendants systematically processed and counted ballots from voters whose name failed to appear in either the Qualified Voter File (QVF) or in the supplemental sheets. When a voter’s name could not be found, the election worker assigned the ballot to a random name already in the QVF to a person who had not voted. Defendants instructed election workers to not verify signatures on absentee ballots, to backdate absentee ballots, and to process such ballots regardless of their validity. After election officials announced the last absentee ballots had been received, another batch of unsecured and unsealed ballots, without envelopes, arrived in trays at the TCF Center. There were tens of thousands of these absentee ballots, and apparently every ballot was counted and attributed only to Democratic candidates. Defendants instructed election workers to process ballots that appeared after the election deadline and to falsely report that those ballots had been received prior to November 3, 2020 deadline.

    Defendants systematically used false information to process ballots, such as using incorrect or false birthdays. Many times, the election workers inserted new names into the QVF after the election and recorded these new voters as having a birthdate of 1/1/1900.

    On a daily basis leading up to the election, City of Detroit election workers and employees coached voters to vote for Joe Biden and the Democrat party. These workers and employees encouraged voters to do a straight Democrat ballot. These election workers and employees went over to the voting booths with voters in order to watch them vote and coach them for whom to vote.

    Unsecured ballots arrived at the TCF Center loading garage, not in sealed ballot boxes, without any chain of custody, and without envelopes.

    Defendant election officials and workers refused to record challenges to their processes and removed challengers from the site if they politely voiced a challenge. After poll challengers started discovering the fraud taking place at the TCF Center, Defendant election officials and workers locked credentialed challengers out of the counting room so they could not observe the process, during which time tens of thousands of ballots were processed.

    Defendant election officials and workers allowed ballots to be duplicated by hand without allowing poll challengers to check if the duplication was accurate. In fact, election officials and workers repeatedly obstructed poll challengers from observing. Defendants permitted thousands of ballots to be filled out by hand and duplicated on site without oversight from poll challengers.

  • Unfortunately, Wayne County circuit judge Timothy Kenny refused to issue an injunction. Great Lakes Justice Center is appealing.
  • President Trump’s plans to defeat the cheats:

    Democrats are stealing the election in Michigan and Pennsylvania. This bothered the heck out of many people because it seems as if nothing can be done to stop them. In Michigan, people born before the Civil War voted. In Philadelphia, Democrats ignored a court order to let Republicans observe the voting. Those are just two of the many irregularities.

    Republican Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, told NBC his state’s Supreme Court “went rogue and decided to violate the U.S. Constitution, ignore Pennsylvania law, and just rewrite the law themselves.

    “In Pennsylvania, unfortunately, it’s been a little bit complicated by a Pennsylvania Supreme Court that went rogue and decided to violate the U.S. constitution, ignore Pennsylvania law, and just rewrite the law themselves.

    “They have no authority to do that. And they extended the period of time over which ballots can arrive beyond the deadline. That’s outrageous, frankly.”

    Some people are banking on state legislatures overturning election. Perhaps they can.

    Forget recounts. The same people who counted the votes the first time will count them again.

    Biden declared victory on Saturday night.

    Big mistake.

    Democrats took the bait. Now President Trump can go to the Supreme Court and have the elections in Michigan and Pennsylvania declared invalid. Without those Electoral College votes, Biden fails to reach 270 and the election gets thrown into the House.

    Other states also may be invalidated. The Supreme Court will decide, and I believe President Trump has 5 votes and Chief Justice John McCain Roberts has only 4.

    Ignoring a federal judge’s order is never a good idea when you are stealing an election.

  • Georgia:

    

  • “Why Does Biden Have So Many More Votes Than Democrat Senators In Swing States?”

    In Michigan, for example, there was a difference of just 7,131 votes between Trump and GOP candidate John James, yet the difference between Joe Biden and Democratic candidate Gary Peters was a staggering 69,093.

    In Georgia, there was an 818 vote difference between Trump and the GOP Senator, vs. a 95,000 difference between Biden and the Democratic candidate for Senator.

  • Trump lawyer Sydney Powell says thy’re getting ready to overturn the results in several states. Whether that’s true or lawyerspeak framing I leave up to you to decide.
  • MIT’s Dr. Shiva Ayyadurai conducts an in-depth statistical analysis of election anomalies and

    I haven’t watched all of it yet. Dr. Ayyadurai says that the Secretary of State of Massachusetts got Twitter to kick him off the platform for 21 days until he was able to get a judge to issue an injunction over election fraud allegations.

  • A thread about Dominion and Smartmatic:

  • Haven’t analyzed this statement to see if it’s true, but it wouldn’t shock me:

  • “Woman Who Voted For Trump In Texas Shocked To Find She Also ‘Voted’ Via Mail-In-Ballot In California.”
  • “5 Historical Trends That Show It’s Utterly Shocking If Trump Lost In 2020.” (Hat tip: Stephen Green at Instapundit.)
  • “Local Man Wouldn’t Have Believed There Was Election Fraud Except Media, Big Tech Keep Insisting That There Wasn’t“:

    Yeah, I think Trump lost fair and square,” he said last Wednesday. “He just got beat by the Biden campaign — that’s all there is to it.”

    But then something happened that changed his mind: Facebook, Twitter, Google, Fox News, CNN, and more giant corporations keep screaming at him via notifications, messages, and broadcasts that there was no election fraud. Now, he’s starting to think maybe there is something fishy going on.

    “You know what, screw it,” he said as another notification popped up on his Facebook feed telling him how safe and secure the elections are. “I’m all-in on the conspiracy theories. If the shadiest, slimiest people in the world really, really want me to believe the election wasn’t stolen, then I’m going full-on Alex Jones, baby. Woooo!!!”

  • Truth:

  • “Pennsylvania Invites World-Renowned Election Auditor Hilaaniti Clintraja To Count The Votes.”
  • I’m sure there’s lots of election fraud new I missed (there are only so many hours in the day), so feel free to share it in the comments.