Conflicting economic signals, more Democrat fraud uncovered, more criminal illegal aliens deported, Ukraine sinks more Russian ships and ignites more Russian oil refineries, more Winning, more media companies still try to cling to woke (but Victoria’s Secret wises up), and videos that will break your brain. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!
Personally, it’s been an eventful week. I opened an IRA to move money into from a 401K so I can move some of it to my checking, but it always takes longer than they promise. And my dog managed to catch a skunk, who seemed to spray directly into his mouth from the way he was frothing. So I bought some carpet stuff to get the second-hand Eue de Skunk out of my carpets. (From the description of other people whose dogs have been skunked, I don’t think he got much of a dose except in his mouth and on his head, so I suspect I haven’t had it as bad as some people.)
The closely watched employment report from the Labor Department on Friday painted an upbeat picture of the jobs market. The economy added 93,000 more jobs in March and April than previously estimated and the unemployment rate held at 4.3% for a third consecutive month.
But: “Tech job cuts surge, hitting a nearly two-year high. Big Tech in May announced the most job cuts in almost two years — more than 38,000 in total, according to new data from Challenger, Gray & Christmas. The tech sector has announced 123,653 cuts in 2026, a 65% increase over the same period last year.” So the economy is doing great! Except for the part of it that could hire me…
Russ Vought at OMB has just overhauled $1 TRILLION in federal grants by adding: Strict E-Verify requirements, English-language rules, and political appointee oversight to ensure taxpayer dollars go to American citizens first.
Vought’s new proposal replaces automatic payouts with “pay for performance” standards. Grants can now be terminated for waste, fraud, underperformance, or pushing anti-American priorities like DEI, gender ideology, or Green New Scam programs.
No more blank checks and fraud complaints go STRAIGHT to inspectors general and U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro within 10 days.
Sounds like a great start, but the fact that the federal government is handing out $1 trillion in grants seems like a problem in and of itself…
Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin says he has made several criminal referrals after uncovering a major political enrichment scandal that routed billions in Biden-era green energy grants to Democrat cronies. “It’s about self-dealing,” Zeldin tells Just the News.
Zeldin said he has canceled or stopped about $29 billion in EPA grants – including one for $2 billion to a nonprofit tied to longtime Georgia Democrat election activist and failed gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams – after unmasking a series of pass-through groups used to route taxpayer monies to the politically connected.
“As you look through all of these pass-through entities, you’re seeing so many connections to former Obama and Biden administration officials and Democratic donors, people who were former Cabinet members, other high-ranking administration officials,” he said during a wide-ranging interview Monday on the John Solomon Reports podcast.
Zeldin: “Blatant waste and abuse.”
Zeldin said he has referred several of the transactions to the EPA inspector general, the agency’s chief watchdog, and the Justice Department for possible prosecution or further investigation. “Those referrals have been made,” he said.
Zeldin said some of the allegations have their roots in legislation like the Inflation Reduction Act, when Congress and the White House were all in Democrat hands. “They included all of this funding in this so-called Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund. And then they would work with these different agencies of the Biden administration to get it out to their unqualified friends. The whole thing just feels criminal,” he said. “[…] This is clearly something that falls into the category of blatant waste and abuse.”
Zeldin has repeatedly singled out the Biden administration’s $2 billion grant to Power Forward Communities, a nonprofit tied to the former Democratic gubernatorial candidate Abrams. The funds were awarded in 2024 to finance “residential decarbonization,” which was an effort to replace gas furnaces and other appliances with electric ones.
Abrams reportedly “played a pivotal role” in establishing the group, according to Fox News.
The award came under scrutiny after it was revealed Power Forward Communities had reported only $100 the year before the award. The Trump administration’s EPA announced in February 2025 it was taking measures to get the money back as part of an overall effort to claw back funding rushed out the door in the final days of the Biden administration.
There doesn’t seem to be a single federal agency the Democrat Party didn’t treat as a giant bag of graft.
“SCOTUS Allows Alabama Congressional Map Likely to Net GOP House Seat. Alabama’s 2nd Congressional District, currently represented by Democratic Rep. Shomari Figures, is now widely viewed as a likely Republican pickup.”
The Supreme Court ruled 6–3 on Tuesday night that Alabama may use a congressional map drawn in 2023 for this year’s elections, reversing a lower federal court’s decision that the plan unlawfully diluted the voting power of black residents.
This ruling reduces the number of majority-black congressional districts in the state from two to one and is widely expected to give Republicans one additional House seat in the upcoming midterm elections.
“Superseding Indictment Alleges SPLC Funded ‘Ku Klux Klan garments’ and ‘Cross-Burning Events.’ Asserts wide-ranging wire and bank fraud ‘to disguise the true nature, source, ownership, and control of the fraudulently obtained donated money the SPLC paid’ to extremist group members SPLC supposedly was fighting.”
From the Introduction to the Superseding Indictment:
The Southern Poverty Law Center’s (“SPLC”) stated mission included the dismantling of white supremacy and confronting hate across the country. However, unbeknownst to donors, some of their donated money was being used to fund the leaders and organizers of racist groups, including the Ku Klux Klan, the Aryan Nations, and the National Alliance. The SPLC’s paid informants (“field sources”) engaged in the active promotion of racist groups at the same time that the SPLC was denouncing the same groups on its website. The SPLC also had a field source who was a member of the online leadership chat group that planned the 2017 “Unite the Right” event in Charlottesville, Virginia. That field source made racist postings under the supervision of the SPLC and helped coordinate transportation to the event for several attendees. In order to covertly pay its field sources, the SPLC opened bank accounts connected to a series of fictitious entities. The covert nature of the accounts allowed the SPLC to disguise the true nature, source, ownership, and control of the fraudulently obtained donated money the SPLC paid the field sources. In order to keep the scheme going, the SPLC made a series of false statements related to the operation of the accounts.
The Superseding Indictment summarizes the structure of SPLC’s alleged fraudulent operation:
10. Starting in the 1980s, the SPLC began operating a covert network of individuals who were either associated with violent extremist organizations or who had infiltrated such organizations at the SPLC’s direction. These individuals were referred to by some high-level employees within the SPLC as the “field sources” or the “Fs.” Upon entering into an agreement with an F, the SPLC assigned each F a unique number. The SPLC assigned these numbers in chronological order. The SPLC then paid the Fs with donor money.
11. Between in or about 2010 through in or about 2023, the SPLC secretly funneled approximately $4.1 million dollars in tax-exempt donor funds to a series of fictitious accounts described hereinafter. The general purpose of these fictious accounts was to pay Fs who were either leading or affiliated with multiple violent extremist organizations. Fs used the money donors gave to the SPLC to, among other things:
a. Attend extremist group rallies across the country;
b. Host extremist group rallies throughout the country;
c. Grow existing chapters of extremist groups;
d. Create new chapters of extremist groups;
e. Recruit new individuals into extremist groups;
f. Make donations to extremist group leaders;
g. Purchase materials for cross burnings;
h. Purchase materials to make Ku Klux Klan robes and hoods;
1. Create racist paraphernalia that extremist groups sold at rallies;
J. Publish extremist literature used in the recruiting of more members; and
k. Pay everyday living expenses, which allowed the Fs to focus on their extremistgroups rather than seeking other employment.
12. Certain SPLC employees knew that Fs used donors’ money to actively recruit new members and grow their violent extremist organizations.
There allegedly were fictitious entities set up to conceal what SPLC was doing:
15. To secretly funnel donors’ money to the Fs, employees at the SPLC, including a person who would become the SPLC’s Chief Financial Officer (“Employee-I”) and the person who would become Director of the SPLC’s Intelligence Project (“Employee-2”) among others, opened and/or modified a series of bank accounts at Bank-I and Bank-2 in the name of various fictitious entities, including the following:
a. Center Investigative Agency (“CIA”);
b. Fox Photography;
c. North West Technologies (“North West Tech”);
d. Tech Writers Group (“Tech Writers”);
e. Rare Books Warehouse (“Rare Books”);
f. Imagery Ink;
g. J&J Electronics;
h. Kelly ‘s Marine; and
1. Turner Personnel
16. These fictitious entities were never incorporated, had no bonafide employees, and conducted no legitimate business.
More at the link. But it certainly sounds like they were breaking a whole host of laws, including deceptive trade practices, and possibly tax fraud.
“Multiple Drone Strikes on ST-68 Radars, Pantsir SAM System and Big Logistics Hub.” There have been a lot of reports about how Ukrainian attacks are wrecking logistics well back of the front lines, and I should probably do a separate post on that when I have the time.
“Mala Tokmachka. Here, Ukrainians completely broke Russian forces who have now spent a historically long time trying to capture a tiny village.” “These repetitive assaults have been producing mounting casualties for more than four years now.” “The battle for the tiny Mala Tokmachka has turned into the longest battle in history, even exceeding the Siege of the major town of Leningrad in the Second World War, which lasted eight hundred and seventy-two days and was an important turning point and a win for the Soviets.”
“Latest ICE roundup nabs pedophiles, violent criminals. Under the Trump administration, DHS has sought to implement the president’s mass deportation agenda to remove as many as 22 million illegal aliens from the U.S.”
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) on Monday unveiled the latest alien criminals in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody, which included pedophiles and persons convicted of violent crimes.
Snip.
Topping the list was Carlos Sanchez-Benitez of El Salvador, who was convicted for second-degree vehicular manslaughter.
Lauro Javier Miron-Tapia of Mexico was convicted for lewd acts with a minor child under 14 years old.
Daniel Alexis Casasola-Rivera of Mexico was convicted for a lewd act with a child under 14 years old.
Nun Hawi Tuam of Myanmar was convicted for aggravated sexual battery.
Franklin William Orellana-Maya of Honduras was convicted for sexual assault.
Yermy Hernandez-Castro of Honduras was convicted for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
Geovanny Gonzalez-Gonzalez of Nicaragua was convicted for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, battery by strangulation.
Ivan Jayasi of Mexico was convicted for aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon.
Mario Zendejas-Gomez of Mexico was convicted for fourth-degree assault, obstructing law enforcement, and no contact order violation.
Miguel Sosa of Cuba was convicted for cocaine trafficking.
Oriol Mora-Arroyo of Mexico was convicted for attempted trafficking of a schedule II-controlled substance and carrying a concealed gun.
Juan Flores-Archaga of Honduras was convicted for third-degree burglary: illegal entry with intent to commit a crime.
Jhonathan Perla-Bonilla of Honduras was convicted for strongarm robbery and burglary of occupied conveyance.
Alexei Marti-Martinez of Cuba was convicted for grand theft.
Pedro Wladimir Contreras-Perez of Ecuador was convicted for larceny and licensing violation.
All of the UK seems furious over the death of Henry Nowak from stab wounds in police custody after his attacker accused his victim of being racist. “Police handcuffed Nowak, who had been stabbed by Sikh immigrant Vickrum Digwa, believing the Sikh man’s claim that Nowak had made a racist remark. Nowak told police he had been stabbed and couldn’t breathe, but officers simply left him on the ground as he lost consciousness and died.” So just like George Floyd, except Nowak was a real victim rather than a career criminal high on fentanyl.
The House Judiciary Committee said that it has uncovered new funding links between the Biden administration and left-wing groups that oppose the Israeli government, as well as groups with ties to terrorist organizations
A May 29 committee memorandum, which JNS obtained exclusively and which was addressed to committee members from the Republican-led committee staff, addresses “new information about the Biden-Harris administration helping to fund protests against the Netanyahu government.”
It alleges that U.S.-based organizations, including the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and the Tides Network, “provided over $5 million to groups that funded radical anti-Israel protests in the U.S. and Israel, and supported multiple terrorist-linked NGOs.”
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), chairman of the committee, told JNS that the funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development, the State Department and other federal agencies raised questions about the misuse of federal dollars.
“You’re taking taxpayer money, you’re supposed to be doing good work,” the congressman said. “Why in the heck is it going to groups that are pro-Hamas?”
“Our government is sending American tax dollars to NGOs that are undermining our ally—our best ally—the State of Israel,” he told JNS. “That’s not how it’s supposed to work.”
The memo provides new details, after the committee released the initial findings of its investigation in 2025.
It describes a web of financial connections, in which the Biden administration “provided grant funds to groups that contributed directly and indirectly to the judicial reform protests that sought to undermine the Israeli government.”
“Documents suggest that the Jewish Communal Fund, and its grantees, Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors and PEF Israel Endowment Funds, may have violated their tax-exempt status by funding groups engaged in radical anti-government campaigns in Israel,” the memo says.
“Another U.S. government grantee, Abraham Initiatives, similarly led anti-government protests in Israel and, according to a 2023 audit, the organization failed to comply with anti-terrorism procedures in a USAID-funded program,” per the memo.
Between 2016 and 2022, the Tides Network received $30 million from USAID, while Abraham Initiatives received about $2.05 million in government funds between 2018 and 2021.
Some of the money that the Biden administration provided to these groups was intended for projects unrelated to Israel.
In the case of Tides, the $30 million went to “a civil development program in regions of Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Pacific.”
The report argues that money intended for one project freed these organizations to fund activism in Israel to oppose the judicial reform efforts of the Netanyahu government.
“Money is fungible,” Jordan told JNS. “It’s tough to track exactly, but it looks like some of this money was also then being run through one or two NGOs, winding up on college campuses to promote all the crazy antisemitic, anti-Israel stuff on campuses.”
“Even worse yet, it looks like some of it maybe even funded organizations that had links to terrorism,” he said.
In one example, Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors (RPA) “received millions of dollars in grants from the Biden-Harris Administration’s USAID, State Department and Department of Defense,” the committee memo says.
RPA then donated $557,000 to its “affiliate and partner,” the Rockefeller Brothers Fund (RBF), per the memo.
RBF, in turn, has “donated $190,000 to Defense for Children International Palestine, an Israel-designated terrorist organization with ties to the U.S.-designated terrorist organization, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine,” according to the memo.
RBF has also made donations to Jewish Voice for Peace, one of the main organizers of anti-Israel demonstrations in the United States, and to Alliance for Global Justice, a U.S.-based non-profit that the committee alleges has provided funding to the Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network.
The Biden administration designated Samidoun as a front for the PFLP in 2024.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani unveiled his administration’s new housing initiative on Tuesday to considerable fanfare. The plan, titled “Block by Block,” aims to build 200,000 new affordable housing units and preserve or stabilize another 200,000 over the next decade.
The administration’s website describes “Block by Block” as “a sweeping blueprint to tackle New York City’s deepening housing crisis with the urgency and scale the moment demands. Spanning the full breadth of housing policy, from new construction to tenant protections to public housing, homeownership and worker protections, the plan lays out a comprehensive strategy to make New York City more affordable for working people.”
The reality is that this plan would significantly expand the power and protections afforded to renters, fulfilling a promise Mamdani made repeatedly on the campaign trail.
It would also impose steep penalties on landlords who allow their buildings to fall into disrepair and, in some cases, even transfer ownership of neglected properties.
The mayor smiled broadly as he announced his administration’s astounding plan to seize and redistribute properties owned by neglectful landlords — a proposal taken right out of the Marxist playbook.
“Through our new citywide campaign, Fix the City, we will focus on the worst landlords in New York City,” the mayor said, to much applause. “When necessary we will take aggressive legal action to remove negligent owners and property managers.”
He continued, “And for buildings that have suffered chronic neglect, we will work to transfer ownership to responsible stewards – stewards that include community land trusts, nonprofits or even the tenants themselves.”
If you’re wondering how low the administration might actually set the bar for “neglect,” and what new regulations and/or coercive tax measures it may impose on current property owners to achieve its goals, you’re not alone.
And how much of this “neglected” property belongs to his political enemies?
173 House Democrats vote against resolution honoring police amid rising attacks
House Democrats split over a resolution backing law enforcement as assaults on officers surged last year.
Just 29 House Democrats on Wednesday voted for a GOP-authored measure paying tribute to the “extraordinary sacrifice” law enforcement officers make and criticizing the defund the police movement for jeopardizing public safety.
Meanwhile, 173 Democrats voted with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., against the resolution, while every GOP lawmaker present supported it.
7News confirmed that a man accused of sexually assaulting a woman in the stairwell of an Arlington parking garage is in the country illegally.
U.S. Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Lauren Bis told 7News Reporter Nick Minock that Cristobal Liobardo Vasquez-Sanchez is from El Salvador and had prior charges for rape, sexual assault, property damage, drug possession, and larceny.
Sounds like a good candidate for deportation back to El Salvador’s notoriously fun gang prison.
Speaking of tattooed Democrat lunatics, “Dem congressional candidate charged with terrorist threats after pulling gun on government officials.” “Kirill Basin, 40, allegedly threatened two Maui County workers during the terrifying incident at around 9:30 a.m. on Friday before fleeing the building in Wailuku, Civil Beat reported. The longshot candidate for Hawaii’s 2nd Congressional District was arrested at his home around 12:30 p.m. on a terrorist threatening in the first degree charge.”
Talafreakco.exe: “I’ve never seen a politician memorize his lines like James Talarico and it’s creepy as heck.”
This guy thinks God is non-binary and loves abortion and transing the kids in the name of Jesus, but this right here is the creepy cherry on top of the leftwing cake:
There’s being a robot, and then there’s … this. Do you think Talarico plugs himself into his charging unit at night, or does someone do it for him?
And the cherry on top is you know that he’s absolutely lying about those random “I’m not a Democrat” voters coming up to him…
Disgraced Ex-California Dem Rep. Eric Swalwell is so sleazy that he’s even involved in secondhand sleaze: “Rep. Jimmy Gomez’s mystery makeout IDed as Eric Swalwell’s chief of staff.”
The mystery woman Rep. Jimmy Gomez admitted to making “mistakes” with is his best buddy Eric Swalwell’s former chief of staff, The Post can reveal.
The married California Democrat had an 11-month-old child at home when he was caught in a moment of passion with Swalwell’s minxy congressional aide Yardena Wolf three years ago.
Gomez, the founder of the Dads Caucus in Congress, confessed Tuesday in a statement that he cheated on his wife after The Post’s reporting on the encounter with Wolf, which kicked off a House Ethics Committee investigation, yielding fresh tips on his conduct.
Wolf, at the time 29, and Gomez, then 48, were spotted having an intimate moment against a car outside a party at Swalwell’s home north of the Capitol in the summer of 2023 — about two years into her tenure as Swalwell’s top staffer.
There’s also this: “[Wolf] co-founded an AI fundraising company with Swalwell in 2024.” That’s evidently Findraiser.AI. “Findraiser uses AI to search your donor database so you don’t have to.” Creating a tag for it now so I’ll have it ready when the inevitable scandal hits… (Hat tip: Dwight, in comments.)
A rebuke for the media types who accuse Republican voters of mindlessly doing Trump’s bidding: “Zach Lahn, who went viral for confronting Obama in 2009, beat Trump’s pick for Iowa governor.”
Lahn took down multiple established GOP politicians, including Randy Feenstra, who had the coveted Trump endorsement. Lahn had an endorsement from TPUSA and MAHA Action, but was not expected to win. He also won the coveted … Steak ‘n Shake endorsement?
Lahn strongly promoted the message of “Iowa First,” with a focus on agricultural pesticides, health, and Chinese influence. He also rejected outside funding (the internet is noting in particular that he rejected funding from AIPAC).
I wouldn’t necessarily count AIPAC backing as pro or con, save for the fact that they’ve backed some real squishy moderate Republicans lately (Dan Crenshaw and Tony Gonzales come to mind).
This is bad news: A confirmed case of New World Screwworm in south Texas.
U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins says a single confirmed case of New World screwworm is contained, as state and federal officials move quickly to quarantine the area.
During a Thursday press call, Rollins reported that the single screwworm case was confirmed in a three-week-old beef calf on Wednesday in La Pryor, south of Uvalde. The U.S. Department of Agriculture immediately created a unified incident command team with the Texas Animal Health Commission and deployed the USDA Animal and Plant Health and Inspection Service to the area.
A 20-kilometer control zone was established around the detection site, and an expedited, targeted release of 4 million sterile New World screwworm flies a week is planned for the immediate area.
Texas State Veterinarian Dr. Lewis Dinges told the press that his staff have reported that the infested calf is improving and they have not found any other infested animals on the premises. There has also been no recent movement of animals onto or off the premises.
Dinges encouraged Texans to monitor their animals as often as possible and keep a close eye on any open wounds.
A quarantine has been issued on all warm-blooded animals within the control zone.
“Animals will still be able to move,” said Dinges. “We just need to make sure that they are moving safely and not moving the screwworm with it.”
It’s a nasty, nasty critter, and extreme measures are justified in keeping it from spreading.
The departure triggered immediate criticism of New Jersey’s tax and regulatory environment. Michele Siekerka, president and CEO of the New Jersey Business and Industry Association, called the announcement “not surprising, but it is no less sad.” Siekerka pointed to New Jersey’s 11.5% corporate tax rate — the highest in the nation, confirmed by the Tax Foundation’s 2026 state comparison — and noted that the number of Fortune 500 companies headquartered in New Jersey has declined from 22 in 2018 to 15 in 2025.
“These are the results of decades of anti-business policies in the state,” Siekerka said. “These are not accidents, nor are they coincidences.”
Assemblyman John Azzariti, a Republican representing the 39th District, was more pointed: “Texas didn’t win Samsung by accident. They won because they have spent years creating an environment where businesses want to invest, grow and create jobs. Meanwhile, New Jersey continues to raise costs, add regulations and send the message that employers are little more than a revenue source for government.”
Azzariti cited a pattern: in addition to Samsung, Mercedes-Benz USA, Honeywell, Hertz, and Sealed Air have all departed the state.
Speaking of relocating to Texas: “ExxonMobil Receives Shareholder Approval for Texas Move . The approval comes after Attorney General Paxton filed a lawsuit against a shareholder advisory firm that attempted to discourage the move.”
“Murder charge dropped for Arkansas sheriff nominee who killed teen daughter’s rapist.” No jury in the world…well, at least outside California and London. “The case against Aaron Spencer was dismissed by a judge on Thursday afternoon after law enforcement lost a dash camera memory card that may have captured the fatal October 2024 shooting of 67-year-old Michael Fosler.” (Hat tip: Dwight.)
Two Republicans and two Democrats in the Senate and House of Representatives are co-sponsoring proposed legislation designed to protect the Fourth Amendment’s bar of warrantless government searches and seizures of private citizens’ email content.
“The Fourth Amendment is clear: the government must get a warrant before searching an individual’s private property, including written communications. As today’s world has grown increasingly digital, that principle should apply just as strongly to an email inbox as it does to a desk drawer or file cabinet,” Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio) said in a jointly issued June 2 statement.
“That’s exactly why I’m proud to cosponsor the Email Privacy Act — to ensure our freedoms carry into the digital world and that all communications are protected as the Founders intended. Congress must pass this commonsense legislation, so Americans’ rights are fully respected in the 21st century,” Davidson added.
Under current statutes, law enforcement authorities such as the Department of Justice (DOJ) are able to acquire email content that is at least 180 days old, thanks to the now-outdated storage capacity limits in force when Congress passed the Electronic Communications Privacy Act in 1986 and in subsequent amendments….
Joining the Ohio Republican in the House in co-sponsoring the Email Privacy Act are Rep. Suzan Delbene (D-Wash.), Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah), and Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.).
Usually when the Evil Party and the Stupid Party get together to pass a bill, it’s both Evil and Stupid, but this sound like the rare case where they’re working on something that’s actually needed.
Heh:
🚨 LMAO!! President Trump just dropped this absolute GEM: He's filling the newly improved Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool with leftist tears
“Things From Another World — the cult-favorite comic and collectibles chain owned by Dark Horse Comics — is shutting down all of its stores after 46 years in business.” Unmentioned in the article is that Dark Horse was bought by Swedish gaming company Embracer Group in 2022, and they’re busy Borging Dark Horse with a bunch of other media companies for an anticipated spinoff called “Fellowship Entertainment” with a bunch of Lord of the Rings licensed companies.
Should we seriously consider the possibility that Claude, or any large language model, might be conscious? And if it has feelings, is it capable of receiving moral instruction?
No. Absolutely not. Generative AI is harmful enough when we understand it as a conventional technology, but if we confuse fluency at generating text with consciousness or moral agency, we’re at risk of assigning responsibility to entirely the wrong parties whenever anyone uses a chatbot.
Ted (who is a very smart cookie) then goes into great detail why they’re not conscious.
Rick Beato on the Fender disaster. “If you were to go to any music store, Guitar Center, and pull a Fender Strat off the shelf and go play it at a gig, well, I wouldn’t recommend it, because the chances of it playing well are extremely low. That’s why there are so many other companies like Sire, PRS, Charvel, tons of companies that make Strat style guitars that are far better than normal Fenders that you buy at your local Guitar Center.”
The Iran war remains on pause, more of that Democrat voting fraud that never happens, more California, more felonious illegal alien scumbags, a corrupt Democrat resigns before she can be kicked out, Virginia’s radical Dem redistricting ploy gets court-blocked, black rain in Russia, and some auction artifacts for the Golden Anniversary of punk rock.
It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!
Also, I’ve trimmed the blogroll of a few (mostly gun) blogs that haven’t posted for a few years, and added According to Hoyt, partially for the tasty meme roundups.
JUST IN: Iran just pulled a thirty-year-old empty supertanker out of retirement and began towing it toward Kharg Island. She is moving so slowly that a voyage that should take a day and a half is taking four days.
Her name is NASHA. IMO 9079107. Built 1996. A two-million-barrel very large crude carrier that has been anchored empty off Kharg for years. TankerTrackers confirmed her reactivation yesterday. Gulf News, Iran International, and Fox News all picked it up within hours.
The reason she is moving at all is that Iran is running out of places to put the oil.
Kharg Island handles roughly ninety percent of Iran’s crude exports. Its onshore tanks had about thirteen million barrels of spare capacity when the US blockade began on April 13. Net inflow since has been running at one million to one point one million barrels per day because exports have collapsed to single digits of vessels while upstream production continues. The math is mechanical. Roughly twelve days of spare capacity. The calendar says that window closes this week.
NASHA is not a strategy. NASHA is what you do when you have run out of strategy.
A two-million-barrel floating storage vessel buys Iran approximately forty-eight hours of continued upstream production. After that, either the wells get shut in or the crude goes somewhere else. The parallel options being pursued, ship-to-ship transfers in the Riau Archipelago, AIS-dark transits, sanctioned VLCCs returning home through the blockade line, are not enough. Lloyd’s List Intelligence has tracked roughly twenty-six Iran-linked vessels evading since April 13. That cannot absorb a million barrels a day.
The wells will shut in. The question is which wells, for how long, and whether they come back.
Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall announced the arrest on Wednesday of two Lowndes County residents on charges related to the unlawful use of absentee ballots in the August 2025 Ft. Deposit municipal election.
Jacqulyn Boone, 51, and Steven Thigpen, 49, were each charged with unlawful use of absentee ballots, a Class C felony under Alabama law. Boone previously served as mayor of Ft. Deposit, and Thigpen was a candidate for the Ft. Deposit City Council. Both were declared winners in the August 2025 election.
Good news: “Democrat Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick Resigns from Congress Ahead of Potential Expulsion.”
Representative Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick (D., Fla.) announced her resignation from Congress on Tuesday after Republicans threatened to hold a vote to remove her from her seat over allegations that she misused federal disaster relief money, among other misconduct.
She was also indicted by a grand jury last year on charges of stealing federal disaster funds.
Snip.
Ahead of her resignation, Representative Greg Steube (R., Fla.) threatened to file a motion to expel her from Congress, which would have set up a vote on her ouster for later this week. Her announcement also came moments before a House Ethics Committee hearing was set to begin, in which the committee was expected to recommend sanctions against her for a number of ethics violations involving financial misconduct.
The panel previously found the congresswoman guilty on multiple counts of failing to comply with Federal Election Commission regulations and uphold the Code of Ethics for Government Service. It found “clear and convincing evidence” that she misused $5 million in federal disaster relief money that was improperly paid to her family’s healthcare company, in order to boost her 2021 campaign.
But on Tuesday, House Ethics Chairman Michael Guest said that her resignation meant the committee had lost its jurisdiction and would no longer consider sanctions against her.
“How Gavin Newsom Subsidized the Migrant Invasion. The California governor has spent nearly $1 billion on nonprofits that want, among other things, to dismantle the border, “abolish ICE,” and help immigrants ‘living with HIV.'”
In this City Journal investigation, we have traced the money and can reveal that Governor Gavin Newsom has granted approximately $1 billion to an army of nonprofits that has encouraged unchecked numbers of migrants to enter the country, fought deportation orders in the courts, and led street protests against ICE. These groups often operate under the guise of “humanitarianism” or “immigration justice,” but many, as we have uncovered, are in fact left-wing activist groups that use propaganda, lawfare, and street protests to transform America’s demographics and build political power for California Democrats—all on the public dime.
This is the story of how Gavin Newsom subsidized the illegal invasion and turned a wave of desperate people into pawns in his political game.
California was ground zero for the Biden-era migrant wave. The state saw an enormous number of people cross its border, including more than 400,000 illegal immigrants between 2021 and 2023 alone. Under Newsom’s leadership, the nation’s largest “sanctuary” state granted hundreds of millions of dollars to nonprofits that have encouraged the flow of humanity across the border, variously providing migrants with transportation, shelter, social services, and legal protection.
The expenditures have been enormous. According to our review of state funding records, since Newsom took office, California has granted massive contracts for migrant-related services: more than $250 million to Catholic Charities; $85 million to Jewish Family Services; $12 million to Centro Legal de la Raza; $23 million to the Immigration Institute of the Bay Area; and more.
Many nonprofits benefiting from these funds are shockingly radical. Al Otro Lado, a nonprofit that has been awarded more than $2 million from California since Newsom took office, helps migrants enter the United States—hence the group’s name, “to the other side.” On social media, Al Otro Lado touts its efforts to provide “freedom of movement” to migrants. In addition to providing legal guidance, the group deploys volunteers to “remote migration routes to leave water, food, and essential supplies.”
According to its own materials, Al Otro Lado is anti-borders and openly hostile to the American nation. In one Instagram video, the group’s litigating attorney Diego Teixeira clumsily summarized the view: “I honestly just believe that there’s no reason for why we should have borders.” In another video, the group shows off books from its library, such as Undoing Border Imperialism, that “remind us that the U.S. is [sh*t].” The organization, which did not respond to our comment request, is currently suing the Trump administration to prohibit the government from turning away certain migrants at the border.
Other groups focus on ideological subpopulations. Oasis Legal Services, another taxpayer-funded group, has worked on helping “queer and trans immigrants navigate immigration relief and benefits.” In a recent report, the group boasted that “the odds of winning an asylum case go up to 99% for clients when they are represented by an Oasis team member.” (The group denies that it encourages the entry of immigrants.)
Adam Ryan Chang, Oasis’s executive director, believes that “homosexual audacity” is his “superpower,” and he has framed his work with the nonprofit as part of a broader left-wing campaign of “liberating” the “LGBTQ+ community.” In a recent annual report, the group highlighted its work of apparently representing migrants with a sexually transmitted disease. In 2024, the report said, “one in six of new clients is living with HIV and the rest are all at significant risk of contracting HIV.” In 2025, the proportion increased to one in five.
In response to a request for comment, Chang said people “living with HIV are not barred from entering the United States on that basis.”
For Oasis, the public health implications are apparently not a cause for concern; it is all part of reducing “stigma” and ensuring that “immigration justice” prevails.
Bad news: Virginia voters approved the Democrats’ radical redistricting proposal.
Democrats spent $70 million on this referendum.
Almost every penny came from out of state.
They broke laws.
They wrote a deceitful ballot measure.
They ran tv spots for two months, nonstop.
They brought in Obama.
They brought in Hollywood.
We had grassroots.
That’s really it.
They only beat us by 70k votes.
In an April election.
Here’s the most ironic part … what do you notice?
All that money, all that effort, and all they did was prove our 6/5 map is accurate.
Almost exactly.
But: “Virginia Judge Rules VA Gerrymandering Vote Unconstitutional.” “From the Tazewell Circuit Court, the Judge reaffirmed all prior rulings, declared the referendum as unconstitutional and the amendment process of HB 1384 as unconstitutional. He entered injunctive relief and specifically enjoyed the certification of the election. He denied a motion to stay pending appeal. A final order will be entered once drafted.” (Hat tip: Director Blue.)
“Tuapse Port Burns Heavily After Multiple Drone Strikes: Russians in Panic.” Tuapse gets getting hammered hard by Ukraine.
I think now this is having a big effect not just on Russian fuel exports but on the city of Tuapse itself. Twitter and online Telegram sources reporting toxic clouds black coatings from oil on houses cars and animals because of rainfall with oil in here. Some Telegram posts are saying residents are advised not to go outside.
More:
Here’s a statement shared by Russian online which I’ll read out. “City of Tapsa no longer exists. It’s been destroyed. In fact, the land there is poisoned. The water is poisoned. The air is poisoned. Black rain is falling there right now like water in Hiroshima mixed with oil salt. It’s killing vegetation, insects, and birds. The human consequences are also predictable. Residents in the city and surrounding areas are ordered not to leave their homes and not to open windows at all. I suggest we realize this. There’s an oil slick up to seven kilometers deep in the sea. That is the harbor and the entire coastline are dead. What can I say? Since 2022, we’ve been told very pompously. Do you want Chernobyl and Kiev? Well, now Chernobyl is in Tuapse.
The moral of the story: Don’t launch illegal wars of territorial aggression.
Reminder: LA Mayor Karen Bass is an actual communist.
I am going to keep repeating this until people understand this.
Karen Bass was not only a Castro operative and Communist, but she got elevated to Vice Chair of National Endowment for Democracy, which is the center of soft power operations in the US government. She is not a "DEI… https://t.co/Kh7wMQvwgZ
— DataRepublican (small r) (@DataRepublican) July 7, 2025
Karen Bass was not only a Castro operative and Communist, but she got elevated to Vice Chair of National Endowment for Democracy, which is the center of soft power operations in the US government. She is not a “DEI mayor.” She is extremely powerful at the global stage.
She was actively involved in shaping foreign policy with the Obama administration, especially Africa. Her Ghana visit during the LA wildfires wasn’t a vacation, it was part of a Biden delegate to greet Ghana’s new President.
She was considered HUD Secretary for the Biden administration. Instead, she nominated the person who would become the actual HHS Secretary – California Attorney General Xavier Becerra.
Now, let me ask you. If a literal Castro operative gets elevated to this stage, what does this imply about the rest of the United States government?
The Wall Street Journal reported that the Justice Department’s antitrust division has opened a criminal probe into major meatpackers.
The report follows President Trump’s push for an investigation into meatpackers as supermarket beef prices remain near record highs.
Criminal antitrust cases are typically brought for alleged price-fixing, collusion, or bid-rigging. While the DoJ previously disclosed an investigation into beef companies after Trump called for action, it had not provided details on whether it was criminal.
In early November, Trump publicly stated, “I have asked the DOJ to immediately begin an investigation into the Meat Packing Companies who are driving up the price of Beef through illicit collusion, price fixing, and price manipulation.”
“We will always protect our American ranchers, and they are being blamed for what is being done by majority foreign-owned meat packers, who artificially inflate prices and jeopardize the security of our nation’s food supply,” Trump continued.
Sneaky local elections creeping up on May 2 in Texas. Check to see if your school board is having an election. (Not to be confused with the primary runoff elections, which are coming May 26.)
The decades long discriminatory tension between the financial sector and the firearm industry underwent a positive shift with a final rule published on April 10 by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). This landmark effort in a long fought battle, which NRA-ILA has reported on extensively, codifies the removal of “reputation risk” as a basis of adverse action under oversight programs that apply to FDIC-supervised financial institutions.
Ultimately, this final rule eliminates reputation risk as a means of injecting politics into banking regulation by prohibiting examiners from using this subjective assessment to pressure or penalize banks. It also prohibits regulators from pushing banks to close accounts or deny services based on their ill-conceived aversion to the lawful firearms and ammunition industries, which are vital to supporting our constitutional rights.
This rule helps to mitigate unjustified biases against these business sectors left over from the Obama-Biden Administration and importantly helps to prevent future efforts in the same vein. In 2013, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), in coordination with regulators such as the FDIC, began pressuring banks to cut ties and services to industries they considered to be “high risk,” which under the anti-gun Obama-Biden administration unsurprisingly included firearm and ammunition-related business.
The program, billed Operation Choke Point (OCP), encouraged broad financial “de-risking” and led to banks freezing or terminating services to lawful businesses based on “reputation risk,” instead of any proven misconduct or illegality. Guidance documents provided to banks at the time specifically listed firearm and ammunition sales as high-risk activity, although they are some of the most highly regulated industries in the country.
OCP’s circular reasoning held that even law-abiding businesses could generate ill-will among banking customers, merely because of the controversial nature of those businesses’ products or services. Thus, to prevent some customers from canceling their banking relationships out of protest or disgust that businesses they didn’t like were also being served, banks were supposed to sever ties with those businesses. Meanwhile, the administration did all it could to stoke this same ill-will by portraying these “suspect” industries in a relentlessly negative light.
In 2017, President Trump officially ended Operation Choke Point, with the DOJ issuing a missive characterizing it as a “misguided initiative” and conceding that “law abiding businesses should not be targeted simply for operating in an industry that a particular administration might not favor.” And while it was noted that the initiative would not be undertaken again, there was still work to be done to strengthen protections for the industry and prevent similar back-door discriminatory efforts in the future. Among these, for example, are various attempts to surveille firearm and ammunition-related purchases through credit card companies, supposedly to flag “suspicious” purchases to regulators.
Last year, in acknowledging the continued threats of financial discrimination, President Trump took more decisive steps by issuing an Executive Order, Guaranteeing Fair Banking for All Americans, emphasizing that lawful individuals and businesses should not be denied access to financial services due to ideological bias. The order also called for greater oversight and accountability to prevent discriminatory debanking practices.
“Illegal Alien Freed by Biden Admin Accused of Sledgehammer Killing in Houston. Josue Abraham Chirino-Leonice was released at the border in 2023.”
“ICE Houston Arrests 277 Criminal Illegal Aliens in Two Weeks, Including Murderers and Child Predators. Among those arrested were 17 convicted child sex offenders, six murderers, and a Salvadoran MS-13 member sentenced to 228 years in her home country before the Biden administration released her into the United States in 2024.”
“Michael and Susan Dell Become UT-Austin’s First Billion-Dollar Donors.” “The university announced Tuesday that the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation had pledged $750 million towards the construction of a medical research facility as part of the expansion of the Medical School that was already named after Dell.”
Bonhams has an auction for 50 Years of Punk Rock, just in case you want to pay £1,000 for a CBGB’s poster you could have ripped off a lightpost for free back in 1978.
Also, Heritage Auctions is having a Star Wars auction on May the 4th, because of course they are. Despite how badly the Kathleen Kennedy era has damaged the franchise, a 5 foot Millennium Falcon model would still be a very cool thing to have…
The left-wing Southern Poverty Law Center, which is now facing federal charges related to financial crimes, allegedly paid more than $270,000 to an informant who was a member of the leadership group that planned the 2017 “Unite the Right” event in Charlottesville, Va., according to federal prosecutors.
Acting U.S. Attorney Todd Blanche announced charges against the group on Tuesday, alleging it had defrauded donors by using their money to secretly pay informants inside extremist organizations. The group spent more than $3 million between 2014 and 2023 to informants involved with groups like the Ku Klux Klan and the National Socialist Party of America.
One “field source” for the SPLC “was a member of the online leadership chat group that planned the 2017 ‘Unite the Right’ event in Charlottesville, Virginia, and attended the event at the direction of the S.P.L.C,” according to prosecutors. The antisemitic rally had hundreds of participants and saw a protester drive his car into a group of counterprotesters, killing one woman and leaving at least 19 others injured. The rally was held amid controversy over the removal of Confederate monuments, which local governments opted to take down in the wake of the Charleston church shooting. In 2015, a white supremacist shot and killed nine people at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church.
The “Unite the Right” rally led to a national debate over Confederate imagery and white supremacy. President Trump came under fire in the wake of the rally for saying, “you also had people that were very fine people, on both sides.” Later in the press conference, Trump added: “I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists, because they should be condemned totally – but you had many people in that group other than neo-Nazis and white nationalists, okay?”
Snip.
The SPLC informant, whose salary from the group was paid out between 2015 and 2023, “made racist postings under the supervision of the S.P.L.C. and helped coordinate transportation to the event for several attendees,” prosecutors said.
Prosecutors say SPLC paid another informant with a neo-Nazi group more than $1 million over the course of nine years. In 2014, that informant stole 25 boxes of documents from an unidentified violent extremist group — documents that SPLC later used to create a report about the group.
Blanche says the SPLC was “doing the exact opposite of what it told its donors it was doing — not dismantling extremism, but funding it.” He also accused the group of “manufacturing racism to justify its existence.”
The SPLC’s revenue increased by roughly $80 million in the wake of the rally, from $51 million in October 2016 to $133 million in October 2017, according to Fox News.
Now, the group faces charges of wire fraud, false statements to a bank, and conspiracy to commit money laundering.
You run into some definitional problems here. The actual indictment lists one of SPLC’s money recipients “F-30” as someone who lead “the National Socialist Party of America.” (Some online have identified F-30 as one Paul Mullet, the very first Internet search hit is his SPLC page which states “Paul Mullet is a neo-Nazi and Christian Identity adherent with a long history of theft. He has been involved with the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan and the Aryan Nations and formed the American National Socialist Party in 2010.”) Is someone who is a member of a “National Socialist Party” really a “neo” Nazi, or just a plain old Nazi? Are they “neo” because they’re not members of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party?
Also: “F-unknown was the Imperial Wizard of the United Klans of America.” Imperial Wizard is pretty much the highest rank in the Klan.
Another: “F-unknown was a member of the Klu Klux Klan and married to an Exalted Cyclops of the Klu Klus Klan.”
If you’re funding the people at the very top of a hate group, you’re not paying “informants,” you’re subsidizing the hate group.
Going through the indictment, it looks like SPLC was the actual funding source behind:
American Nazis
The Klu Klux Klan
Charlottesville (I originally guessed George Soros, and since Soros funds SPLC, I’m going to count that as a win.)
A whole bunch of tiny groups nobody would ever have heard if SPLC hadn’t put a spotlight on them.
Many have noted that the demand for hate crimes greatly exceeds the supply, so SPLC had to secretly subsidize it. So the entire “The American Right are neo-Nazis” idea was not just a lie, it was an entire subsidized edifice of lies.
Hopefully these indictments results not just in convictions, but actual jail time.
Meanwhile, what are all those angry leftists who based their identity on “punching Nazis” going to do now that it’s been revealed that their side were the ones funding the Nazis all along?
Back before Mark Robinson became North Carolina’s Lieutenant Governor, he attracted notice as an ordinary citizen fighting against gun grabbing legislation:
And after being elected Lt. Governor, here he is fighting about the media’s “insurrection” bullshit on January 6, and slamming a newspaper for depicting him, a black man, as a member of the Klu Klux Klan.
That’s how you do it.
And here’s Robinson talking about his own rise from being a blue collar worker to Lt. Governor:
I’m not a huge fan of Cornyn, whose turned into bit of a squish, but I’m not even remotely buying that a guy who was born in 1952, and who went to school at Trinity University and St. Mary’s Law, got anywhere near the Klan, which was already a joke by the 1970s. Even assuming Cornyn was An Evil Racist (he’s not), unlike West Virginia in the early 1940s, the Klan was not on any ambitious politician or lawyer’s plans by the 1970s, and the only people joining by then were strictly white trash rural losers.
Moreover, we’re given to understand that these names were culled from email membership lists, which suggest that Cornyn joined, when, 1995 or so? When he was already on the Texas Supreme Court? Because joining a bunch of white trash losers was totally more important than avoiding scandals and winning elections.
To begin with, the Ku Klux Klan is pathetically small compared to the overall white male population of the South and Midwest. Membership estimates range from 3,000 to 5,000. The likelihood that four separate members of the Klan could find their way into the ranks of the Senate are astronomically low, even if you assume that your average Klansman is coherent enough to manage it (spoilers: they aren’t).
Or to put another way, you’d have to believe that a Klansman is roughly 10,000 times more likely to become a senator than the average American. Or, put even another way, there are supposedly twice as many Klansmen as Princeton grads in the Senate. Now that’s an alumni network.
But even a cursory look at the lives and voting records of the accused should have clued people in. One, for example, voted for Martin Luther King Jr. Day to become a national holiday, a proposal that a sizeable minority actually opposed back in 1983. Why would a Klansman go out of his way to vote for a holiday that promotes racial harmony, instead of joining the 90 Congressmen who voted against it?
Another of the accused senators is Catholic. While the Klan’s anti-black activities are much more rampant and widespread, they are also virulently anti-Catholic.
Oh, and did I mention one of the accused mayors is openly gay? I don’t think that’s the kind of “flaming crosses” the Klan has in mind.
As Ayn Rand once noted: “The Ku Klux Klan is not a Republican issue or problem; its members, traditionally, are Democrats; for the Republicans to repudiate their vote would be like repudiating the vote of Tammany Hall, which is not theirs to repudiate.” As far as the historical record shows, Sen. Robert Byrd (Democrat, West Virginia) is the only U.S. Senator elected after World War II to have been a member of the Klan.
Even the most base liberal propagandist should be ashamed to spread such pathetically laughable bullshit…
By the standards of signing up the previously uninsured, “Obamacare may be headed for an epic failure.”
Health and Human Services secretary Kathleen Sebelius resigns, leaving behind a legacy of incompetence and deception. “Rarely has any single public official done more to undermine the public’s confidence in the ability of government to function than Kathleen Sebelius.”
Jay Carney is so use to lying, he can’t even resist PhotoShopping his own house. Badly. (Or maybe The Washingtonian is simply desperate to glamorize all Democrats profiled they won’t let little things like “competence” stand in the way…)
The ideological slap-fight between radical lesbian feminists and tranny activists. “But all crazies are not created equal and, as crazy as the radical man-hating lesbians may be, they at least have valid science on their side in saying that ‘female’ is a biological category — genetically determined, rather than being a ‘social construct.'”
Vermonters just aren’t sure they want eyeball-bleeding tax rates just to satisfy the left-wing fantasy of single-payer health care.
Round Rock incumbent City Councilman Carlos Salinas appears to be benefiting from his position in a way that violates both city and state codes. How nice to pass a city-funded, interest-free loan for a building to a crony, then lease the same building back at below-market rates…
Well, this is disturbing: Kobe Bryant dispensing actual wisdom: “If we’ve progressed as a society, then you don’t jump to somebody’s defense just because they’re African-American. You sit and you listen to the facts just like you would in any other situation, right?” (From a New Yorker piece behind a paywall.) And naturally a firestorm erupted…
Speaking of the NBA: How two brothers owning a failing ABA franchise managed to earn a cool$1 billion from the NBA. The advantages of foresight,,,
