Month: July 2024

Authored by Pepe Escobar via The Cradle,

Sanaa is eagerly engaging with Moscow in a bid to expand its astounding military gains into both the economic and diplomatic realms. While trade with Russia may be integral to blunting the effects of the siege of Yemen, Sanaa also views membership in the BRICS as a ‘golden opportunity’ to establish lasting Persian Gulf security.

Yemen’s stellar strategic maneuvering in defense of Palestine from its dramatically ascendant role in West Asia’s Axis of Resistance is acquiring the contours of an epic odyssey – eagerly scrutinized by the Global Majority.  

As if the unprecedented humiliation of the US Navy in the Bab al-Mandab and the Red Sea was not enough, Ansarallah targeted an Israeli ship with a Hatem-2 hypersonic missile, a remarkable advancement in indigenous technological development.

These prodigious strategic-military advances displayed by Ansarallah at the same time revived the always simmering, unfinished war and blockade launched against Yemen in 2015 by Saudi Arabia and the UAE with the usual US and UK backing.

Riyadh abhors the Yemeni resistance like the plague. Instead of Sanaa, Yemen’s recognized capital city, it supports an anti-Ansarallah’ government’ sitting in Aden, sort of recognized by the ‘rules-based international order.’ In truth, though, that government actually sits in a luxury Riyadh hotel.

Ansarallah has tried hard to negotiate a prisoner exchange involving captured Saudi pilots traded for jailed Hamas members in Saudi Arabia. Riyadh has not only refused but threatened that bank transfers to and from Yemen would be blocked, and Sanaa’s international airport and sea ports would be shut down.

Ansarallah’s response was stark: if Yemeni banking is blocked, the Saudi Arabian banking system would be destroyed. If Sanaa airport is targeted, the same would happen to Saudi airports.

So, the war that never ended is suddenly and ominously back on track. Ansarallah would have no problem targeting Saudi Arabia’s oil production as retaliation to a full blockade – considering its proven capability with brand-new missiles and naval drones. The consequences for global oil markets would be catastrophic.  

Two delegations come to Moscow…

Yemen represents the classic case of a fierce resistance actor in the context of the emerging multipolar, multi-nodal world. So that begs the question of where multipolar/multi-nodal champion Russia stands when it comes to Yemen’s fight.  

Which brings us to the fascinating case of two Yemeni delegations that recently visited Moscow.

One of them, led by a senior Ansarallah official, met in Moscow with the Russian President’s Special Envoy to the Middle East (West Asia) and Africa, Mikhail Bogdanov.

They discussed not only the ongoing Gaza genocide but also what Ansarallah describes as “the American–British aggression on Yemen,” a reference to ongoing western naval operations in the Red Sea that have – unsuccessfully – sought for months to thwart Yemeni ops against Israel-bound and Israel-associated shipping vessels. A retaliatory siege, if you will.

The Yemenis reassured the Russians that their maritime operations “do not pose a threat to international navigation or target anyone, but rather support the Palestinian people and respond to the American and British airstrikes on Yemen.” Ansarallah praised Russia’s understanding and expressed gratitude for: 

Russia’s position against the American–British aggression on Yemen and their support for the humanitarian and political process in our country. We also reviewed the outcomes of the de-escalation efforts between Yemen and the aggressor countries and highlighted the necessity of reaching a comprehensive solution that ensures Yemen’s unity and sovereignty.

All of the above concerns what could be described as the Yemeni political process delegation. In Oman, while waiting to collect their Russian visas, they crossed paths with another Yemeni group: let’s call it the geoeconomics delegation.

This delegation was led by Dr Fouad al-Ghaffari, special advisor to Yemeni Prime Minister Dr Abdulaziz Saleh bin Habtoor’s National Salvation Government in Sanaa.

Habtoor is a leading Yemeni intellectual and the author of the remarkable Undeterred: Yemen in the Face of Decisive Storm, which highlights key details of the war launched in 2015 “by a hostile coalition of 17 countries,” fully supported by the US and the EU, and complete with air, sea, and land blockades.

The prime minister explains the economic war, as the Yemeni Central Bank was transferred to Aden; the biological war, which led to a horrendous break out of cholera across the nation; and how the Arab League was bought and paid for all the way. He stresses how “this is the first war in History in which all the rich Arab countries stand together under the cloak of the most powerful imperialist country in an unsacred coalition against the poorest country in the Arabian Peninsula.”  

That war is far from over. Yemen is suffering badly. The specter of a large famine has not disappeared. So, the focus of Dr Ghaffari’s delegation clearly had to be humanitarian and centered on food security.  

He tells The Cradle what Yemen expects to receive from Russia’s Ministry of Agriculture: 

We have food to export and import from Russia. We should have a shipping line between Russia and Yemen at Hodeidah port. Last month, another Yemeni delegation was in China. There were good contacts, and they are now developing an agreement. Here, I came as an adviser to the Prime Minister, and parallel to the Russian presidency of BRICS, I came to highlight the importance of developing an agriculture connection – and food security connection – between us and Russia. We need Russian expertise on all this. We have special products in Yemen that we want to export – and now we are fighting a boycott by the US and the west. We want Russian products instead of products coming from Europe.

Ghaffari adds, “Some Russian products do come to Yemen – but they don’t come directly. They come from Gulf countries or African countries. But not as Russian products. In Yemen, there are no Russian products. Now, after 96 years of Russia–Yemen relations, Yemen is defining itself as a good player in our region. It’s a time for BRICS to unite – and to fight back against the US model.”

Yemen’s BRICS drive

Dr Ghaffari further explains what, in effect, breaks down as the possible geoeconomic integration of Yemen: 

We had good signs from official contacts, and the Prime Minister in Yemen welcomes that. The objective is to close a deal with Moscow. We have a vision. We want to explain this vision of how to bring the North and South of Yemen together into one railway. This brings us back to 15 years ago when Russian Railways had a project. We bring oil, gas, [and] agriculture investment to seaports. Maybe Yemen could do that by itself in 50 years, but with good help, we can do it in one or two years.

He says a long discussion was also held in Moscow on Yemen’s desire to apply for BRICS membership – and the pitfalls involved:

We have been working close to BRICS for 10 years in Yemen, because we believe in this vision, if we have a chance to become a member. I am the only adviser to the Prime Minister for BRICS advancement. We want to work with BRICS. We now have a golden opportunity.

The prime minister’s office in Sanaa has sent letters to the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs expressing its desire to join BRICS. If these contacts develop, Moscow could certainly invite Sanaa to participate as an observer in the BRICS summit in Kazan in October. 

But does the recent BRICS membership of Saudia Arabia and the UAE create an instant obstacle in Yemen’s pathway to joining the multipolar powerhouse?

Ghaffari doesn’t seem to think so, linking Yemen’s BRICS drive to establishing “security in the Gulf. The Emirates and Saudis are now in BRICS. BRICS could take all of us together.”

So Dr Ghaffari’s delegation visited Russia with several objectives: to study the opportunity of establishing a joint agricultural company, to discuss import and export opportunities and shipping methods, to discuss cooperation within the BRICS strategy for economic partnership in agriculture, to learn about the Russian experience in boycotting western products; to introduce the specificity of Yemeni products, especially coffee, honey, and cotton into the Russian market, and to discuss the construction of one of the Yemeni dams.

Add to this a key diplomatic objective: to discuss the possibility of a Yemeni representative attending the upcoming BRICS summit. “We stand with Russia. Russia should have a complete picture of what happens in Yemen. If Yemen is not at the summit, something would be missing in the region.”

Moscow, Beijing, and Tehran would certainly agree. But then hardcore geopolitical reality calls. The Russian Federation, forced to protect an extremely delicate geopolitical balance between Iran and Saudi Arabia inside BRICS, may still be far from solving the Yemen riddle.

By Charlie Zhu and Helen Sun, Bloomberg Markets Live reporters and strategists

Three things we learned last week:

1. Chinese regulators intensified efforts to tighten their control over financial markets. The People’s Bank of China effectively narrowed its interest rate corridor, placing a much higher floor on the costs banks pay to borrow overnight from each other.

For longer-term bond yields, local branches of the National Financial Regulatory Administration asked some rural lenders to shorten the average duration of their bond holdings, joining the PBOC’s recent efforts to prevent yields from falling further.

For stocks, the securities watchdog took some of its most extreme measures yet to restrict short selling and quantitative trading strategies, providing a boost to some of the key indexes.

While recent policies have their respective rationale, they could come at long-term or macro economic costs, according to Nomura Holdings Inc. Measures to control the yield curve might mitigate financial risks, but weak domestic demand need lower interest rates to stimulate borrowings, economists at Nomura wrote in a report last week.

China’s financial industry has already been reeling from slower growth and regulatory crackdowns. Ping An Bank Co. is relocating more than 100 staff based in Shanghai to its Shenzhen home base to cut costs, while PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP is cutting staff across its China operations amid an exodus of corporate clients.

2. Domestic demand remains week despite efforts to stimulate consumption. The consumer price growth hovered near zero for a fifth month, with the statistics bureau attributing it to promotions for the annual “618” shopping festival.

“The deteriorating labor market will limit the potential for any quick and sustained recovery in consumption and hence inflation,” economists led by Zhou Yingke at Barclays Plc wrote in a report.

Meanwhile, credit expansion also missed estimates. Exports in June jumped more than expected, highlighting the importance of external demand in underpinning China’s economy. Together with weak imports, the country registered a record trade surplus.

3. Baidu’s tests of unmanned auto driving have reminded people the future has arrived. China’s Internet search leader is investing in generative AI and autonomous driving to diversify its business. With Beijing supporting robotaxis in ride hailing and car rental fleets, Baidu’s shares in Hong Kong posted the biggest weekly gain in more than one-and-a-half years.

Authored by Debra Heine via American Greatness,

Dr. Robert Redfield, the former director of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said Thursday that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) pushed a false “safe and effective” COVID vaccine narrative by underreporting adverse events. The mRNA shots “never should have been mandated,” Redfield told the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on Thursday.

The Democrat-controlled Senate oversight hearing entitled “Risky Research: Oversight of U.S. Taxpayer Funded High-Risk Virus Research,” included witnesses  Dr. Gerald Parker, Dr. Carrie Wolinetz, Dr. Kevin Esvelt, and Redfield.

Former President Trump’s CDC director accused the Biden government of suppressing data about vaccine injuries in an effort to prevent vaccine hesitancy.

“There was not appropriate transparency from the beginning about the potential side effects of these vaccines, and I do think there were inappropriate decisions by some to try to underreport any side effects because they argued that would make the public less likely to get vaccinated” Redfield testified.

Redfield said the biggest mistake of all was the Biden regime’s decision to mandate the mRNA products.

“They never should have been mandated,” he said. “It should have been open to personal choice. They don’t prevent infection, they do have side effects.”

A growing number of doctors and scientists now say that the cost to society and the cost to the individual taking the COVID injection far outweighed any of the proposed benefits.

Senator Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) pointed out that Biden regime officials like Dr.  Peter Marks, head of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, continue to deny that the injections are dangerous.

“They’re saying they [vaccine side effects] are rare and they’re mild,” Johnson said.

“The FDA should release all of the safety data they have,” Redfield replied. “I was very disappointed to hear that they’re planning to hold on to that [safety data] until 2026,” he continued. “That really creates a sense of a total lack of trust in our public health agencies toward vaccination. It’s counterproductive,” he added.

Johnson lamented that he has been unable to get Rep. Gary Peters (D-Wis.), the chairman of the the Senate Homeland Security Committee, to issue any subpoenas to the relevant health agencies to obtain the safety data.

“I would suggest you do that,” the Republican told Peters.

Johnson was poised to spearhead investigations into COVID vaccine malfeasance himself as Chair of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations starting in 2023, but Republicans did not gain the majority in the 2022 midterm elections.

The Wisconsin senator said there’s “a lot more” being covered up than the COVID origin story.

“There are many aspects of our miserably failed response to COVID that needs to be uncovered, not the least of which, the sabotage of early treatment,” Johnson said. “The public has a right to know.”

Authored by Richard Truesdell and Keith Lehmann via American Greatness,

Tying Donald Trump to Project 2025 is the latest desperation tactic from Democrats. But it’s likely to backfire. It might actually create a new generation of Conservatives in the process.

Last year, the Heritage Foundation published the Mandate for Leadership as assembled by a consortium of people and think tanks called Project 2025. It is a compilation of long-standing recommended Conservative policies for the next Republican administration. The Project 2025 group claims the document is “the Conservative movement’s unified effort to be ready for the next Conservative administration to govern at noon, January 20, 2025.”

It absolutely petrifies progressive Democrats.

Looking at a portion of the 900+ page compendium, we note that it contains policy suggestions that have been embedded within the Conservative platform for over sixty years. We also note that proclamations from right-leaning think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation are routinely attacked from the left as being “radical” in nature and “out of touch” with ordinary Americans. This is nothing new. The left and progressives, especially, see this as the latest bogeyman to motivate the base as the Biden candidacy spins out of control.

What is new here is the odd tactical decision of the Biden-Harris campaign to demonize the Heritage Foundation and tie the organization’s work to Donald Trump, who has nothing to do with Heritage and had no participation with Project 2025. It’s quite doubtful Trump even knew about Project 2025 until the Biden-Harris campaign decided it would characterize it as “Donald Trump’s Project 2025 Agenda” as “something every American should be scared of.”

When we first saw references to Project 2025 appear, we knew that it was not organic. When all the usual suspects—MSDNC, CNN, the New York Times, the Washington Post, Axios, Politico, NPR, Media Matters for America, and dozens of those image memes flooding your timeline on Facebook—we knew it was no accident. As we like to say, there are no coincidences in partisan politics.

Calling this “Donald Trump’s Project 2025 agenda” is yet another droplet in the endless ocean of lies from the Biden administration and its leftwing enablers. Here is another example of the obvious disinformation coming from the left (hit the link to see how remarkably unhinged these people are).

While some of the points are true (i.e., ending the Department of Education, using public funding for private religious schools, increasing Arctic oil drilling), over 90 percent of these claims are outright lies, many of which are not even mentioned in the document. Project 2025 responded to this with an enumerated list of 30 “myths vs. facts.”

This attack on Project 2025 and the attempt to connect their agenda to Trump seem to have a very strange appeal to ignorant Biden-Harris voters. Previously, hardly anyone, even among Republican and Conservative political junkies, had even heard of the Heritage Foundation, a relatively low-key, center-right institution that has never been considered a radical fringe organization. A vast majority of Americans are now hearing about Heritage for the first time.

What might actually emerge is a broader awareness of the Heritage Foundation and its Conservative work among citizens who would not have otherwise found out if the Biden-Harris campaign had not made such a huge stink. The curiosity of voters will drive them to check out Project 2025, in which they will find five primary policy pillars intended to restore the Constitution as the country’s primary governing guide. We have distilled the five massively detailed policy proposals as follows:

First, and arguably most important, “The president must enforce the Constitution and laws as written, rather than proclaiming new ‘law’ unilaterally. Legislatures make the laws in a republic, not executives.” (With the SCOTUS controlled by its current Conservative majority, this is downright scary to far-left progressives.)

Second, “We must rediscover and adhere to the Founder’s wise division of war powers, whereby Congress, the most representative and deliberative branch, decides whether to go to war; and the executive…decides how to carry it out once begun.” Our multi-generational experimentation in presidentially initiated wars demonstrates that “we depart from our Constitutional design at our peril.” Over the vast majority of our history, especially in the 20th century, it was a Congressional Declaration of War that had the United States enter World War Two, not a Presidential Declaration of War.

Third, the president and the State Department must “stop skirting the Constitution’s treaty-making requirements and stop enforcing ‘agreements’ which haven’t been ratified by the Senate as the Constitution requires, as if they were proper treaties.” Republicans as well as Democrats are guilty of this. Is it any wonder that no new wars were started during the four years of the first Trump administration?

Fourth, “The Senate has been extraordinarily lax in fulfilling its constitutional obligation to confirm presidential appointees.” This results in unconfirmed, “acting” officials carrying out executive-branch responsibilities for months or years without Senate approval. Not to hold Democrats totally to blame here, the Senate ceded its war-making powers to the Executive Branch, starting with George W. Bush and continuing through the Obama and Biden administrations. Our growing involvement in the Ukraine conflict serves no real United States policy agenda other than to keep deep state warmongers like Victoria Nuland happy under Republican as well as Democrat administrations.

Fifth, the Justice Department must “respect the constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech rather than try to police speech.” Oh my God, where do we start here? The encroachment on the First Amendment started under Bush with the Patriot Act in the aftermath of 9/11 and has accelerated since then, especially under Obama and Biden. Biden’s Department of Justice especially has used deep state violations of its police powers against ordinary citizens, like many of the J6 demonstrators as well as journalists who neglect to toe the administration’s line.

Each of these five points is a cap, not an expansion, of presidential power. The Biden-Harris campaign making such an effort to characterize Project 2025 as enabling a presidential power grab is a classic case of projection.

Tying Trump to Heritage is a losing proposition, indicative of a campaign in desperation to change the subject from their complete and total meltdown in the wake of Biden’s catastrophic performance in the first debate and his subsequent interview with former Bill Clinton operative, George Stephanopoulos. It will backfire as expected and could lead to a broadening of acceptance toward Conservative principles among the American population.

Keep up the good work, Democrats!

***

Richard Truesdell is a former consumer electronics retail executive and automotive travel photojournalist. In the last 25 years, he has visited more than 35 countries on six continents. A former high school history teacher with a BA in Political Science from Waynesburg University, he is a lifelong Conservative moderate who has turned his thoughts and keyboard to political commentary and popular culture. A cross-section of his writings can be found here.

Keith Lehmann is a retired consumer electronics industry executive who has written extensively on technology, transportation, and international travel. Living in Southern California for over fifty years, he has first-hand exposure to societal and cultural happenings of the left and submits decidedly realism-based, Conservative viewpoints, much of which can be found on his Substack.

A high school diploma not only represents the development of essential knowledge and skills but is also a critical step toward personal and professional growth.

This graphic, via Visual Capitalist’s Bruno Venditti, shows the percentage of public school students who graduate with a regular high school diploma in each U.S. state. Data is sourced from the U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, for the school year 2021–22.

West Virginia Has the Highest Graduation Rate

The U.S. average high school graduation rate was 87% in the school year 2021–22.

West Virginia has the highest graduation rate, with 91% of its students graduating. Meanwhile, the District of Columbia has the lowest graduation rate, with 76%.

State	Percentage
West Virginia	91
Tennessee	90
Wisconsin	90
Kentucky	90
Massachusetts	90
Iowa	90
Missouri	90
Texas	90
Virginia	89
Kansas	89
Connecticut	89
Mississippi	89
New Hampshire	88
Delaware	88
Utah	88
Alabama	88
Arkansas	88
Indiana	88
Florida	87
Illinois	87
Pennsylvania	87
Nebraska	87
California	87
New York	87
North Carolina	86
Maryland	86
Ohio	86
Maine	86
Hawaii	86
Montana	86
New Jersey	85
North Dakota	85
Georgia	84
South Carolina	84
Minnesota	84
Washington	84
Rhode Island	83
Louisiana	83
Vermont	83
Colorado	82
Wyoming	82
Nevada	82
Oregon	81
Michigan	81
Idaho	80
Alaska	78
Arizona	77
District of Columbia	76
New Mexico	Not available
Oklahoma	Not available

Given that West Virginia typically struggles in rankings like this, this top placement might be surprising to some. This high graduation rate is part of a concerted effort by the state to increase its graduation rate.

In 2011, West Virginia’s graduation rate sat at 72% (which would put them dead last by today’s standards). How did the state see such a significant improvement? A data-driven early warning system was put in place to target individuals when they are at most risk of dropping out and using interventions to keep them on pace to graduate.

Alabama, also an early adopter of this system, saw a steep improvement in their graduation rate over the past decade and a half.

If you enjoy posts like these, check out Mapped: Personal Finance Requirements by State, which visualizes where high school students are required to take a personal finance course.

Authored by Luis Carnelio via HeadlineUSA.com,

The scandal-plagued Biden campaign has pulled all its ads against former President Donald Trump after he was nearly killed by a shooter on Saturday. 

Joe Biden is “pausing all outbound communications and working to pull down our television ads as quickly as possible,” a campaign official told The Wall Street Journal on Sunday morning. 

The ads would have likely labeled Trump as an existential threat ahead of the 2024 election. 

Biden’s anti-Trump claims have rightfully led critics to question whether this heavily partisan rhetoric has incited violence against Trump.

This rhetoric often conflates Trump with dictators, including Adolf Hitler, and suggests he would end “Democracy” if elected. 

Just on Friday, Biden appeared at a campaign rally in Michigan, where he labeled Trump a “threat to this nation.” 

Several conservatives quickly called out the past anti-Trump rhetoric that could have fueled violence against the former president. 

Cartoonist Scott Adams on Twitter wrote, “The Biden campaign is pausing its ad campaign that was obviously designed to get Trump assassinated.  The Fine People Hoax probably just killed one spectator, injured another, and almost ended Trump. This is all on Biden.”

Kyle Mann, the Babylon Bee’s editor-in-chief, added, “When you call your political opponent Hitler for 4 years, don’t act surprised when you inspire your followers to try to kill him.” 

Outkick founder Clay Travis echoed Mann’s remarks, writing, “I am f**king furious beyond words. F**k every left wing media member who has been calling him Hitler for the past eight years. This is on them. They made this happen.” Travis’s post has reached nearly 5 million views.

Director James Wood wrote, “We were two inches away from a civil war today. It is not a prospect I relish, but one that is to be feared if Democrats don’t stop with their absurd vile Hitler analogies and their assassination glee.” 

We were two inches away from a civil war today. It is not a prospect I relish, but one that is to be feared if Democrats don’t stop with their absurd vile Hitler analogies and their assassination glee. pic.twitter.com/NYxJllujNC

— James Woods (@RealJamesWoods) July 14, 2024

Comedian and host Dave Smith similar said, “How the f**k can you say he’s literally Hitler and Democracy is on the line but we wish him a speedy recovery and political violence is never acceptable?”

The Daily Wire posted a video compilation of several legacy media outlets comparing Trump to Hitler.

A retrospective of how the Leftist media continuously compared Trump to Hitler: pic.twitter.com/MQcdTexgkC

— Daily Wire (@realDailyWire) July 14, 2024

Other critics were equally vocal in their responses.

Every Democrat and media outlet tonight is like “Thank God Hitler is okay and wishing Hitler a speedy recovery.”

— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) July 14, 2024

A shocking and tragic day for the nation — and an amazing, heroic response from President Trump.

You cannot repeatedly and endlessly label a major party candidate and former president Actual Hitler, a full-scale threat to democracy, without radically increasing the danger of…

— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) July 14, 2024

God bless President Trump and our secret service. I haven’t ever been angrier. This is what calling him Hitler for eight years caused. pic.twitter.com/5kVJmU8itY

— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) July 13, 2024

If Trump were as bad as Biden and other Democrats say he is — if he were a tyrant on par with Hitler himself — then why would they be grateful to hear he’s safe and doing well? Either their characterizations of Trump are false or their sympathy is. https://t.co/WlR1WABtG2

— Seth Dillon (@SethDillon) July 14, 2024

Hey @JeffBezos your paper @washingtonpost compared Trump to Hitler a few months ago. Maybe focus on that instead of bullshit platitudes. Thanks, bud. https://t.co/nnZOhfT5Rz pic.twitter.com/nHqLr7mF2X

— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) July 14, 2024

 

The COVID-19 pandemic erased nearly two decades of life expectancy gains in America. Meanwhile, U.S. health spending per capita is at the highest level in the world.

In the graphic below, Visual Capitalist’s Marcus Lu visualizes life expectancy and per capita healthcare costs across several wealthy nations.

Figures were compiled by Peterson-KFF, and are as of 2022.

America Spends a Lot on Healthcare, For Little Gain

As Peterson–KFF bluntly notes, “the U.S. has the lowest life expectancy amongst large, wealthy countries” while their per capita healthcare cost has moved past $12,500 as of 2022

In fact the U.S. is an outlier for both healthcare costs (+$4,600 from next-highest Germany), and in life expectancy (-3.2 years from Germany).

Note: Health spend is measured in PPP-adjusted 2022 U.S. dollars.

From the 12 developed countries in the analysis, the average healthcare per capita cost is at $6,700 with a life expectancy of 82.2 years. Americans spend nearly double the amount while living 5 years less on average. Peterson-KFF also notes that in 1980, the U.S. had similar health spends and life expectancies as all its peers. Trends have since diverged.

Of course, both health care spending and life expectancies are influenced by a variety of socioeconomic factors. For example, the UK has the lowest costs ($5,500) amongst its European peers in the group, thanks in part to its National Health Service.

At the same time, Japan has one of the highest life expectancies in the world (84 years) while its per capita health costs come in at $5,300. Their low red meat intake and high fish consumption are partially credited with maintaining good health in the population.

Via Middle East Eye

The assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump on Saturday has provoked an outpouring of condemnation, even from opponents of the Republican frontrunner. In the Middle East, national leaders largely joined in. 

“I followed up the treacherous attack on former president and presidential nominee Donald Trump with concern, and I reiterate Egypt’s condemnation of the incident,” wrote Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi on his Facebook page. He expressed hope for the “completion of the American election campaigns in a peaceful and healthy atmosphere, free of any manifestations of terrorism, violence, or hatred“.

The attack was also condemned by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who said he hoped those behind it would be brought to justice “in order not to cast a shadow on the US elections and global stability“, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he and his wife would pray for Trump’s “safety and speedy recovery”.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who has not enjoyed cordial relations with Trump in past, also condemned the attempted assassination, saying in a statement that he “reaffirm[s] the positions of the State of Palestine, which has always rejected violence, terrorism, and extremism, regardless of its source”.

Not everyone, however, was so supportive or magnanimous. The Telegram and X accounts for Sabereen News, an outlet affiliated with the Iran-backed “resistance” groups in Iraq, on Sunday posted a picture of a bleeding Trump with the caption: “Today terror has entered their fortified palaces.”

One of Trump’s last significant acts while in office was ordering the assassination of Qassem Soleimani, former head of Iran’s Al-Quds Force.

The 2020 attack in Baghdad, hailed by Trump as a “flawless precision strike”, also killed Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, a senior Iraq government official and head of the irregular Popular Mobilisation Forces.

Iranian journalist and former diplomat Amir Mousawi also implied the attack was “divine” retribution for the killing of Muhandis and Soleimani, tweeting “soul for a soul and an eye for an eye” and suggesting Netanyahu would be next.

Others pointed out the irony of Israeli officials’ condemnation of the Trump attack just a day after their own attempted assassination of a senior Hamas leader in Gaza:

Consecutive tweets by the Israeli Foreign Minister. You cannot make this shit up… pic.twitter.com/cE7vX2b9Qc

— David Andress (@ProfDaveAndress) July 14, 2024

And as night follows day, numerous social media users also attempted to link the assassination to a range of Middle Eastern factions, with some in the US and Israel claiming the shooter was a supporter of Hamas, some blaming the Israeli Mossad intelligence agency, and some Turkish users saying he was a supporter of the militant Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK.

While Trump’s arch-nemesis Iran has yet to comment on the shooting, a number of Trump supporters tried to link the Islamic Republic to the shooting by citing a statement by an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander last year in which he said they “hope we can kill Trump, [former Secretary of State Mike] Pompeo, [former US general Kenneth] McKenzie and the military commanders who gave the order” to kill Soleimani.

So far however, despite speculation and conspiracy theories, the motivation of the shooter has yet to be determined.

* * *

Meanwhile…

In China just hours after the assassination attempt on Donald Trump. pic.twitter.com/obIai00NBI

— Middle East Observer (@byz_observer) July 14, 2024

Ever wondered where your dollar stretches the least in the U.S.?

States vary significantly when it comes to cost of living, which takes into account expected expenses for essentials like housing, food, and transportation.

In this graphic, Visual Capitalist’s Kayla Zhu maps out the top 10 U.S. states with the highest annual cost of living in 2024. The cost of living figures are based on data calculated by Forbes Advisor.

Calculating Cost of Living

To calculate the cost of living in each state, Forbes Advisor calculated annual expenses for housing, healthcare, taxes, food, and transportation.

Their data sources include C2ER, KFF, MIT Living Wage Calculator, and the U.S. Census Bureau. You can read more about their methodology here.

Hawaii is the State with the Highest Cost of Living

The sunny state of Hawaii is the most expensive state to live in, with an average annual cost of living of $55,491.

Despite having the highest cost of living ($55,491), Hawaii also has the lowest annual average salary ($61,420) among these 10 states.

This leaves residents with an annual disposable income of $5,929–the lowest out of all 50 states.

Some factors that contribute to Hawaii’s high cost of living are its high housing costs due to housing shortages and high income taxes.

Coastal Life Isn’t Cheap

Life on either coast isn’t cheap, either.

All four West Coast states make the top 10 list, while Northeastern states like New York, Massachusetts, and New Jersey also make an appearance. New York City is consistently ranked as one of the most expensive cities in the world to live in.

About 40% of the U.S. population lives on the coast, but the coast only accounts for less than 10% of the country’s land mass.

Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack,

Former President and impending Republican Nominee Donald Trump survived an assassination attempt at an outdoor rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday days before his party’s national convention after suddenly turning his head at the last second and thus miraculously dodging a bullet that only ended up grazing his ear. The shooter was killed by the Secret Service, but an eyewitness told the media that he warned the police about a man crawling on the roof a few minutes earlier, though no action was taken.

This security lapse is suspicious and prompts speculation that at least one member of the Secret Service might have purposely waited until after the shooter took his shot before neutralizing him, whether out of sympathy for his cause or perhaps because they were in on some sort of plot.

About the shooter, he’s been identified as Thomas Matthew Crooks, a registered Republican. It remains unclear at the time of writing what his online history was and whether there’s more to his party affiliation than meets the eye.

At the very least, there’s no doubt that the Democrats’ and their allied “Never Trumpers’” hatemongering played a role in radicalizing the suspect.

Had he succeeded in assassinating Trump, then the US would have certainly plunged into socio-political disaster, which it literally missed by less than an inch. Many expect that powerful Democrat donors might soon force Biden to drop out of the race, thus leading to the party selecting their nominee outside of the notionally democratic primary process.

Their Republican counterparts would have done the same on their side of the aisle, especially since Trump hadn’t yet announced his Vice-Presidential pick by the time of his attempted assassination. Both parties would therefore have likely chosen nominees that didn’t complete their respective primary processes, thus blatantly disenfranchising Americans even more than they already are in reality. In theory, the elections could be delayed to re-run the primaries, but Congress might not agree to it.

Even if they did, the aforementioned hyperlinked article reminded readers that the 20th Amendment mandates the end of the President and Vice-President’s four-year terms at noon on 20 January, thus leading to (replacement) President Harris being forced to step down before a new one is elected. Her Vice-Presidential replacement could only be speculated upon in that scenario since the 25th Amendment stipulates that they’d have to be confirmed by a majority vote of both Houses of Congress.

Whether or not the elections would be delayed, the US would continue to be ruled by the “governing oligarchy” that Axios reported late last month is the real power behind Biden. This analysis here that was coincidentally published earlier that same day noted that “The country is being ruled by a shadowy network of transnational and domestic elites that are united by their radical liberal-globalist ideology.” This group simply exploits Biden as their placeholder to publicly legitimize all of their decisions.

They’d remain in power if the Democrats keep the White House or if a “Republican In Name Only” (RINO) replaced Trump had he been assassinated. The former President promised supporters that he’d make good on his former pledge to “drain the swamp” if he’s re-elected, and while precedent suggests that he might once again fail, there’s still a chance that he might partially succeed. At the very least, his return could create the conditions for some replacements, who might be conservative-nationalists.

This insight sheds light on those forces who’d be pleased had he been assassinated, namely the liberal–globalist clique that secretly controls American policy, and they’d also have been delighted that Trump wouldn’t get the opportunity to end their latest “forever war” in Ukraine like he sought to do. His potential Republican successor could try to follow in his planned footsteps, but they also might not be interested in doing so if they’re a RINO, hence why taking Trump out could have been a game-changer.  

On the home front, there’s no doubt that “shitlibs” would have plastered pictures of Trump’s blown-out brains all over social media and their cities in order to incite his supporters to violence, and some of them would have predictably obliged after being endlessly provoked with such images. The ruling liberal-globalists have wanted to radicalize MAGA members for a while already in order to further discredit their movement and create a compelling pretext for cracking down more forcefully upon them all.

It also can’t be ruled out that some of these newly radicalized supporters of his might have carried out “retributive violence” by targeting Democrat officials from the federal level on down to the local one if they blamed them for his assassination. Infamous anti-Trump celebrities and influencers could also have been caught up in this bloody campaign, which might have led to martial law in parts of the country like Trump should have imposed during the Democrats’ spree of urban terrorism in summer 2020.

America’s socio-political fabric could therefore have very easily been torn to shreds had Trump not suddenly turned his head at the last minute and thus miraculously averted this worst-case scenario by less than an inch. There’s no guarantee that this won’t happen again, however, which is why it’s imperative that Trump immediately announce his Vice-Presidential pick and ideally choose someone who the ruling liberal-globalist elite is also afraid of in order to reduce the chances of him being killed.

Regardless of whatever happens, America just got a reality check about how close it is to descending into chaos, which shows how much it’s changed for the worse since 2016. Partisan radicalization and elite scheming have always been around, but they reached an unprecedented level after Trump became the Republican Nominee back then. He’s an imperfect candidate with a lot of personal flaws, but his re-election is the last chance to save America from itself if he succeeds in implementing his lofty plans.