Month: September 2024

Two and a half years after Bloomberg Opinion published advice for those earning under $300k on how to weather the Biden-Harris inflation storm—suggesting, among other things, swapping beef for “tasty meat substitutes” like lentils—we revisit whether labor economist Teresa Ghilarducci’s tips have truly shielded consumers from the fallout of failed Bidenomics.

The short answer is no. 

Let’s revisit the March 19, 2022 op-ed titled “Inflation Stings Most If You Earn Less Than $300K. Here’s How to Deal,” which Bloomberg Opinion’s X account reposted the article.

Inflation stings most if you earn less than $300K. Here’s how to deal:

➡️ Take the bus
➡️ Don’t buy in bulk
➡️ Try lentils instead of meat
➡️ Nobody said this would be fun https://t.co/HGJEoXL5ZZ

— Bloomberg Opinion (@opinion) March 19, 2022

The X post was heavily ratioed, with some users saying… 

pic.twitter.com/4Y6XXNv3QG

— The Right To Bear Memes (@grandoldmemes) March 19, 2022

pic.twitter.com/5wgHFi1e6X

— Adam Singer (@AdamSinger) March 19, 2022

The author is clearly an elitist that lives in the city. Rural Americans don’t have the option to take the bus or cut down on driving.

— Beth Baumann (@eb454) March 20, 2022

And, by the way, elites can be very wrong about their predictions… 

Using the Amazon price tracker website camelcamelcamel, prices for a 12-pack of 14.5-ounce canned lentil soup produced by Amy’s Soup sold for around $30 when the op-ed was published. Several months later, prices jumped to $50, indicating prices were elastic as demand likely soared due to cash-strapped consumers. Since the start of 2023, data from the tracking website show prices bounced between the $40s to $50s, even as high as $65. 

Meanwhile, the food inflation theme is still hot. 

Orange juice contracts in New York are hyperinflating to record highs. 

Wholesale egg prices via the Urner Barry Egg Index EBP are nearing record highs once again. 

Let’s not even get started with USDA retail beef prices per pound. 

But don’t worry—as the VP Harris team states, communist price controls will be the cure against evil supermarket chains that price gouge customers.

The higher price of breakfast food and just food in general is an alarming sign for low- and middle-income consumers. 

Last week’s Dollar General stock price crash, fueled by warnings of a “financially constrained” core customer, is merely a warning sign the economy is trending in the wrong direction. 

Authored by Huey Freeman via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

More than half the world’s population is deficient in micronutrients such as vitamins and minerals, according to a new study.

According to the results, published in Lancet Global Health journal, 99.3 percent of the global population is missing at least one important nutrient.

The study collected data from 31 countries to estimate micronutrient consumption in 185 countries.

“Our study is a big step forward,” Chris Free, research professor at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, UC Santa Barbara, and co-lead author, said. “Not only because it is the first to estimate inadequate micronutrient intakes for 34 age-sex groups in nearly every country, but also because it makes these methods and results easily accessible to researchers and practitioners.”

Deficiencies in micronutrients harm health and can lead to various preventable health conditions, the researchers say.

“Iron deficiency is the most common cause of anaemia, leading to impaired cognition and adverse pregnancy outcomes. Vitamin A deficiency is the leading cause of preventable blindness globally, affecting mostly children and pregnant women,” the authors wrote in their study.

“These results are alarming,” Ty Beal, lead author of the study, said in a press release. “These gaps compromise health outcomes and limit human potential on a global scale.”

The researchers said the new study is the first to provide global estimates of inadequate consumption of 15 micronutrients critical to human health.

“These results can be used by public health practitioners to target populations in need of intervention,” the researchers added.

Seven Common Deficiencies

The researchers identified seven common micronutrients that people are deficient in, namely iodine, vitamin E, calcium, iron, riboflavin (vitamin B2), folate, and vitamin C.

Vitamin E, iodine, and vitamin C are also common deficiencies in the United States, the authors wrote.

More than half the children in the world younger than 5 years old are deficient in vitamin A, iron, or zinc.

Each micronutrient deficiency has unique consequences, with multiple deficiencies potentially lowering quality of life and lifespan. The study revealed several global deficiency rates:

Iodine (68 percent): Vital for cognitive development in infants. Iodine plays an essential role for pregnant and breastfeeding women. Common sources of iodine are iodized salt, seaweed, and seafood.

Vitamin E (67 percent): Deficiency can cause muscle weakness and impaired coordination. Nuts, seeds, and vegetable oils are common sources of vitamin E.

Calcium (66 percent): Deficiencies can cause weak and brittle bones. Dairy and fish are common sources of calcium.

Iron (65 percent): Deficiencies can cause anemia, affecting cognition and pregnancy outcomes. Red meat and eggs are common sources of iron.

Riboflavin (55 percent): Deficiencies can cause non-specific symptoms like eye sensitivity and neurological symptoms like seizures and migraines. Eggs, meat, and dairy are main sources of riboflavin.

Folate (54 percent): Folate is needed early in pregnancy to reduce the risk of stillbirths and severe birth defects of the brain and spinal cord. Nuts and leafy greens are main sources of folate.

Vitamin C (53 percent): Deficiencies can cause gum bleeding and poor wound healing. Peppers, tomatoes, and citrus fruits are common sources of vitamin C.

Other less common deficiencies include inadequate vitamin A and zinc. Vitamin A deficiencies can cause blindness and zinc helps prevent infectious disease.

The researchers found that females consistently showed higher deficiency rates for iodine, iron, and the mineral selenium.  Males, however, were more deficient in magnesium, vitamin B6, zinc, vitamin C, vitamin A, thiamin (vitamin B1), and niacin (vitamin B3).

Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A federal appeals court has granted X Corp.’s request to block part of a California state law that requires social media platforms to disclose their content moderation and anti-hate speech policies.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued an order on Sept. 4 that grants X Corp.’s request for a preliminary injunction and reverses a district court’s ruling against the Elon Musk-owned social media company in a legal challenge to California’s Assembly Bill (AB) 587.

The court said the bill’s content-moderation provisions are not narrowly tailored to serve California’s purported goal of requiring social media companies to be transparent about their content-related practices, and may amount to unconstitutionally compelled speech.

“The panel held that X Corp. was likely to succeed on the merits of its claim that the Content Category Report provisions facially violate the First Amendment,” the appeals court judges wrote in their opinion.

AB 587 requires large social media companies to post their terms of service and to submit periodic reports to the California Attorney General’s office about their content-moderation practices and policies.

A key provision of the bill requires a semiannual report detailing how the platforms define six categories of content: hate speech or racism; extremism or radicalization; disinformation and misinformation; harassment; foreign political interference; and controlled substance distribution.

X Corp. argued in its lawsuit, which named California Attorney General Robert Bonta as defendant, that the law intends to pressure social media companies to censor content that the government deems objectionable and improperly compels speech in violation of the First Amendment.

“The legislative record is crystal clear that one of the main purposes of AB 587—if not the main purpose—is to pressure social media companies to eliminate or minimize content that the government has deemed objectionable,” X Corp. attorneys argued in their complaint.

In December 2023, a district court handed X Corp. a loss, denying the company’s request for a preliminary injunction. U.S. District Judge William Shubb found that the Content Category Report provisions aren’t “unjustified or unduly burdensome within the context of First Amendment law.”

Shubb acknowledged in his order that compliance with the provisions may carry a significant burden on social media companies, but he concluded that the periodic reports that include the mandated content policy and practice disclosures are merely factual and “uncontroversial.”

“The mere fact that the reports may be ‘tied in some way to a controversial issue’ does not make the reports themselves controversial,” the judge wrote in his eight-page opinion.

The district court judge determined that X Corp. was unlikely to succeed on the merits of its First Amendment claim and that the bill’s provisions are reasonably related to the state’s interest in transparency.

X Corp. appealed, leading to the Sept. 4 ruling, holding that the Content Category Report provisions likely compel noncommercial speech and probably fail the strict scrutiny standard because they are not narrowly tailored to serve the state’s transparency interest.

In reversing the lower court’s decision to deny X Corp.’s request for a preliminary injunction, the 9th Circuit instructed the district court to issue one in line with the panel’s opinion. In addition, the lower court must determine if the Content Category Report provisions can be separated from the rest of AB 587 and, if so, to determine whether any other challenged provisions should also be blocked.

A spokesperson for the California Attorney General’s office told The Epoch Times in an emailed statement that it’s reviewing the opinion and “will respond appropriately in court.”

The legal battle between X Corp. and the state of California over AB 587 is part of a broader trend where social media platforms and industry groups have pushed back against laws around content moderation on First Amendment grounds.

Recently, the 9th Circuit appeals court issued a ruling that upheld the data privacy-related provisions of California’s online child safety laws, while striking down those that required social media platforms to assess and mitigate risks of harmful content. The appeals court found that the blocked provisions likely violate free speech rights.

Authored by Jonathan Lesser via RealClearEnergy,

Like the Jeopardy! game show, green energy subsidies have been Congress’ answer to every energy policy question. The first OPEC oil embargo of 1973-74 catalyzed decades of energy policy, including the formation of the Department of Energy. Wind, solar, and hydropower subsidies began in earnest with the Public Utilities Regulatory Policy Act of 1978. Similarly, subsidies for corn-based ethanol were enacted as part of the National Energy Conservation Policy Act of 1978. Both were designed to reduce the country’s dependence on Middle East oil.

The PURPA subsidies set off a race by independent developers to construct small generating plants whose output electric utilities were required to purchase at administratively set prices. In some cases, the subsidies were independent of how much electricity the plants actually produced, creating the moniker “PURPA machines,” because their real purpose was to extract subsidies; producing electricity was secondary.

The Energy Policy Act of 1992 modified those subsidies, creating a “temporary” production tax credit for wind power and certain types of biomass generation. Congress also enacted an Investment Tax Credit, initially for solar energy, but later extended to all renewables, which could choose between the ITC and the PTC. Although the PTC was supposed to expire in 1999, it has been repeatedly extended and expanded, most recently in the Inflation Reduction Act. The PTC now includes all zero-emissions generation, including new nuclear plants. Under the IRA, the ITC has been increased, with qualifying green energy investments able to claim a credit of as much as 60% of their construction cost.

Moreover, the IRA extends the PTC and ITC until greenhouse gas emissions from electric generation fall to just 25% of their 2005 levels, after which they will be decreased gradually. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the expected date for reaching that goal is 2048.

The IRA also provides subsidies for “green” hydrogen, that is, hydrogen produced from emissions-free electricity, battery storage facilities, and facilities that capture carbon and bury it underground.

Ethanol subsidies have similarly been extended and increased, with the government now subsidizing various types of biofuels and numerous states enacting clean fuel standards, which, like renewable portfolio standards, require increasing percentages of transportation fuels to be biofuels.

Congress has not been the only institution shoveling subsidies to green energy. Many states have provided their own subsidies, especially the mid-Atlantic states that are forcing ratepayers to purchase electricity from offshore wind projects at prices many times higher than the market. States have also enacted renewable portfolio standards forcing electric utilities to increasing percentages of electricity from renewable sources that would otherwise never be built.

This subsidy smorgasbord is supposed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by promoting new clean energy technologies. It’s also supposed to accelerate economic growth by creating new “green” industries and high-paying jobs.

There is little evidence for the former. U.S. energy-related greenhouse gas emissions have decreased by almost 20% from 2005 levels primarily because natural gas has supplanted coal as the primary fuel for generating electricity. Between 2005 and 2023, electricity generation from natural gas was six times greater than generation from wind and solar combined. In 2023 alone, electricity generated using natural gas was three times greater than wind and solar generation.

Moreover, growth in subsidized wind and solar generation has distorted wholesale electric markets, begetting the need for subsidies to ensure existing nuclear plants continue operating, lest their owners shutter them and eliminate thousands of high-paying jobs. Enacting subsidies required to offset the distortions caused by other subsidies is surely one definition of economic insanity.

As for spurring new industries and economic growth, today, the U.S. solar manufacturing industry is moribund, with almost 90% of the solar panels installed in this country now produced in China. All but one of the offshore wind projects under construction or slated to be built are owned by European companies that their respective governments control.

The economic costs of these subsidies are borne by taxpayers, who must finance the additional deficit spending; electric ratepayers who, despite claims that renewable energy resources are less costly than traditional generating resources, have seen their electric rates soar; and drivers, who pay more for gasoline and diesel fuel as refineries have closed or been modified to produce subsidized biofuels.

Those higher costs for electricity and transportation fuels raise the costs of producing and distributing almost everything else, which ripples through the entire economy, reducing economic growth and destroying jobs.

As for green energy subsidies spurring the development of new, lower-cost clean technologies, there is nothing new about wind and solar generation that receives the lion’s share of subsidies. After almost half a century, neither are cost-competitive, especially when the additional costs of addressing their inherent intermittency are included—costs that others must pay. And new technologies, such as direct air capture of carbon, will only be commercially viable if the U.S. imposes carbon taxes of several hundred dollars per ton, which few politicians will be willing to do.

The overwhelming majority of green energy subsidies reward politically powerful constituencies and businesses whose primary purpose is not to build better energy mousetraps but to build only ones that qualify for the largest subsidies.

The government could instead target subsidies solely on true research and development efforts of new clean energy technologies, such as advanced and small modular nuclear reactors.

With the country deeply in debt, wasting hundreds of billions of dollars on subsidies for green energy, as the Inflation Reduction Act calls for, is an idea whose time is long past. Green energy Jeopardy! may be a lucrative game for the lucky recipients, but eventually everyone loses.

Jonathan Lesser is a senior fellow with the National Center for Energy Analytics and the president of Continental Economics.

In a move that we can’t help but think looks suspiciously like war prep, two Chinese state-owned shipbuilders announced Monday plans to merge, according to a new report from Nikkei Asia.

The report says up front the merger could “help them better serve the military”. Key details, such as pricing, asset handling, employee treatment, and protections for dissenting shareholders, have yet to be revealed.

The Nikkei report says that in nearly identical filings to the Shanghai Stock Exchange on Monday night, China CSSC Holdings and China Shipbuilding Industry (CSICL) announced they had signed an agreement to merge.

On Monday, CSSC Holdings’ shares closed at 34.90 yuan, and CSICL’s at 4.98 yuan. The merger would involve CSSC Holdings absorbing CSICL through a stock swap.

Based on current prices, CSSC Holdings’ market cap is 156.08 billion yuan ($22 billion), while CSICL’s is 113.55 billion yuan. The companies aim to “further focus on major state strategy.”

“Promoting equipment for a strong military” was also mentioned as a priority in the filings, according to the report. 

The report says that the two companies are part of China State Shipbuilding Corp. (CSSC), a central state-owned conglomerate overseen by the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC).

SASAC has recently increased pressure on listed arms of central companies to enhance market value by improving governance, raising disclosure standards, conducting share buybacks, and increasing dividends. If the merger boosts efficiency and profitability, it aligns with government policy goals.

CSSC has a complex history, dating back to a 1950 government organization for shipbuilding, which was reorganized in the 1970s and later split into “North Ship” and “South Ship” entities in 1999.

These merged in 2019 to form the current CSSC, but CSSC Holdings and CSICL, from the original north and south entities, remained separate listed companies with overlapping businesses….until now.

Authored by J.B. Shurk via American Thinker,

Negotiation is the art of getting an opponent to advocate for your position.  You want one thousand dollars for an old car.  You ask for two.  The buyer works you down to one, and you shake on the “deal.” 

Parents employ similar skills.  A toddler who is unhappy about being put in the stroller might be given a choice: we can either go to the park or take a nap.  Cries often disappear when the alternative to play is less fun.  Of course, children quickly learn this game, too.  Some will double-down on crying until mom throws up her hands and offers to renegotiate: and we can stop for ice cream on the way!  Teenagers realize that either-or offers invite workarounds.  “Do your homework or you’re grounded” succeeds as a negotiating position only if Junior can’t climb out the window after dark.  

From an early age, we grasp that successful negotiations take advantage of (1) asymmetric information and (2) asymmetric authority.  Individuals who know more than their opponents and who are capable of restricting the range of available outcomes to any dispute are likely to get what they want.

Governments use such asymmetries to maintain control.  By knowing more than the public and by exercising complete authority over what is permissible, their bargaining power far exceeds that of the lowly citizen.  In the United States, the Department of Justice maintains an almost perfect conviction rate.  Is that because prosecutors pursue only the guilty?  Or is it because lone defendants are up against federal law enforcement agencies with huge bureaucratic workforces and immense investigatory resources?  When the “United States of America” is a party to any case, the underdog sits on the other side.

Governments also relish playing parent.  Before their deaths, Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi, and Hugo Chávez embraced the role of father to their respective nations.  Kim Jong Un, Vladimir Putin, and Xi Jinping assume that role today.  Even in so-called “democratic” countries, it is common to treat the heads of government as family patriarchs (or the matriarch, as was the case with the late Queen Elizabeth II).  Right now in America, the Democrat Party is doing its best to brand vice presidential nominee Tim Walz, “America’s Dad.”  Dictatorships, monarchies, and constitutional republics, it seems, all love to turn their rulers into daddy and mommy figures.

Why wouldn’t they?  There is a great deal of perceived authority and omniscience ascribed to parents.  Who else could get away with answering, “Why should I do that?” with this one-two punch: because I’m your mother, and I said so.  That’s the kind of power that governments adore.  How come we have to change our doctors and embrace socialized medicine?  Barack: because I said so.  Why can’t we talk about mail-in-ballot fraud and stolen elections?  Pelosi’s J6 committee: because we said so.  Why can’t we exercise free speech and engage in vigorous debate?  Disinformation Governance Board: because we said so.  Why can’t we enforce existing immigration law and secure America’s borders?  D.C.’s Uniparty and corporate paymasters: because we said so.  Why should we elect an unlikable and incompetent politician just because she’s a woman?  Hillary and Kamala: because we said so.  No wonder governments use a combination of regulatory sticks and welfare carrots to punish and reward their children.  Nobody dares to question Daddy Government when he scowls across the kitchen table and threatens to throw the misbehaving public over his lap!

Does this seem absurd?  I certainly think so!  I find it bizarre that so many adults are comfortable with others telling them what they can and cannot do.  I don’t need Facebook and Google to censor words because they might be “scary.”  I don’t need the Department of Homeland Security to “save me” from foreign points of view.  I don’t need self-described “public health experts” to filter knowledge based upon an article’s likelihood to “harm” my thoughts.  I don’t need some bureaucratic “parent” questioning my reasoning skills or decisions.  Adulthood requires some semblance of personal responsibility and a willingness to utilize the organ resting between one’s ears.  Human equality requires the exact same things.  It is no surprise, then, that governments of all stripes work so hard to infantilize their citizens.  When Daddy Government “knows best,” obedient children behave.  No civic or political equality survives government paternalism.

As a negotiating strategy, however, government paternalism is highly effective.  Should a citizen question why we must rush into war, the NSA, CIA, or Pentagon can simply say, “That’s classified.”  If anyone asks why we must take an experimental “vaccine” with unproven effectiveness, the CDC and FDA can answer, “We’re working at the speed of science.”  If someone wonders why it’s okay for the government to ban certain political viewpoints, public censors can explain, “We’re experts in disinformation.”  Like any good negotiator, the more that government actors depend upon (1) secret knowledge and (2) special authority, the easier it is for them to get what they want.  Daddy Government is such a good negotiator that he can get peaceniks to cheer for war, medical doctors to wear six useless paper masks, and free speech enthusiasts to warn against the dangers of unregulated speech!

How does Daddy Government negotiate so well?  He’s a “nudger” really.  He always has been.  He asks, “Don’t you care about freedom and the American flag?”  And answers, “If so, you’ll agree to fight and die overseas.”  He will never suggest, however, that you fight and die for freedom right here!  He tells us every problem has a government solution.  Too much interstate crime?  That’s why we need the FBI!  Too much economic uncertainty?  That’s why we need the Federal Reserve!  Too many evil regimes plotting our demise?  That’s why we need the CIA!  Too many domestic enemies in our midst?  That’s why we need the NSA to spy on everything we say! 

Daddy Government succeeds when his children are conditioned to root for bigger and more intrusive government.  After all, negotiation is the art of getting an adversary to convince you that your opinion is right!  When more government is the only answer to any perceived problem, who wins the negotiation?  Daddy Government!  That’s why he’s a master negotiator!

When we speak about a “Great Awakening” happening in America and throughout the West, what we are talking about is a growing public recognition among citizens that their governments have long been “negotiating” in bad faith.  Censorship is not free speech.  Mandatory vaccination is not healthcare.  Energy cartels, fiat currencies, central banks, overseas slave labor, and heavily regulated domestic economies do not constitute free markets.  Endless war does not produce endless peace.  Governments that have long “nudged” us into believing such lies are being broadly exposed.  You take thirty years of a relatively open Internet, combine it with enlightened public conversations that transcend national boundaries, add a handful of technologies that provide workarounds to mass surveillance, mix in a few revelations from the likes of Julian Assange and Edward Snowden, and what do you get?  You get a large number of citizens who realize that they are in an abusive relationship with their government. 

Americans who once believed that tyranny could not happen here now know better.  Western Europeans who believed that totalitarianism had been beaten know better, too.  This change in social consciousness is why governments have swapped their “nudge patrols” for authoritarian armies that push and shove.  Government coercion and violence are on the rise because Westerners see through the rigged “negotiations” of their fake “democracies.”  It’s why Germany disenfranchises conservatives, France arrests the CEOs of free speech platforms, Brazil bans Elon Musk’s X, the UK treats “anti-Establishment rhetoric” as a crime, and the United States persecutes J6 political prisoners.  

Daddy Government is afraid because his “children” are done negotiating.

It looks like we’re doing September surprises now…

The DOJ has accused several conservative influencers of unwittingly working for a Kremlin-funded media outlet.

A federal indictment unsealed on Wednesday alleges that a Tennessee-based media company, later identified as Tenet Media, received nearly $10 million from employees of Russian state-backed media company, Russia Today (RT), as part of “a scheme to create and distribute content to U.S. audiences with hidden Russian government messaging.”

The DOJ claims that RT and two of its employees – Kostiantyn “Kostya” Kalashnikov and Elena “Lena” Afanasyeva – worked to funnel money to Tenet Media as part of a series of “covert projects” aimed at shaping narratives within Western audiences.

The indictment specifically notes that the influencers – including Tim Pool, Benny Johnson, Dave Rubin and Lauren Southern – had no idea they were taking Russian money, and were deceived. They were told by Tenet founder Lauren Chen – who allegedly knew the true source of the funds – that the money was from a wealthy private investor named “Eduard Grigoriann.”

The influencers named appear to have been deceived about funding sources by Lauren Chen, founder Tenet. Secondly, Lauren Chen, the alleged Russian agent receiving millions for propaganda (allegedly) has actively been discouraging votes for Trump and dividing the Right. Read the… pic.twitter.com/2JmVk2iml3

— Ashley St. Clair (@stclairashley) September 4, 2024

At least one of the influencers asked for a profile on Grigoriann before signing a contract – and was given a fabricated one-page profile.

This was apparently sufficient, as two of the commentators (believed to be Tim Pool and Benny Johnson) signed contracts which paid Pool $100,000 per podcast, while Johnson was paid $400,000 per month plus a $100,000 signing bonus for “four weekly videos.”

They let her off. Mostly likely, she entered some off the books deal, to protect a federal asset who Tenet media aggressively promoted, and for access to all her devices. Plus they were able to monitor her under FISA and no doubt did a few hops off that.

— Cernovich (@Cernovich) September 4, 2024

While Pool and Johnson have issued statements (below), it’s been pointed out that Lauren Chen has recently been trying to divide Donald Trump’s base…

Interestingly enough, in recent weeks, Lauren has been telling her followers to boycott Trump. It’s entirely unclear if she was doing so at the direction of the Russian government. Nonetheless, worth noting. pic.twitter.com/o9mLFw7gMH

— Jordan Schachtel @ dossier.today (@JordanSchachtel) September 4, 2024

Lauren Chen catching a break? Sounds like the typical leftist double standard in play! Trust the liberals to protect their own when the rest of us would be toast!

— The Scoop (@TheScoopUS) September 4, 2024

This is likely backdrop to Garland’s “Russia, Russia, Russia.” To notes: 1) No one serious believes Russia backs Trump; 2) What I want to know is whether anything Russia paid for is FALSE. As I said: https://t.co/tRcXbg3Pjs https://t.co/RgZwaAWK5V

— Margot Cleveland (@ProfMJCleveland) September 4, 2024

In a Wednesday statement on X, Pool says that should the allegations prove true, “I as well as the other personalities and commentators were deceived and are victims,” and ends by telling haters to “eat my irish ass.”

My statement regarding allegations and the DOJ Indictment

Should these allegations prove true, I as well as the other personalities and commentators were deceived and are victims. I cannot speak for anyone else at the company as to what they do or to what they are instructed…

— Tim Pool (@Timcast) September 4, 2024

Johnson says “Our lawyers negotiated a standard, arms length deal, which was later terminated,” adding “We are disturbed by the allegations in today’s indictment, which make clear that myself and other influencers were victims in this alleged scheme.”

A statement on the leaked DOJ indictment today:

A year ago, a media startup pitched my company to provide content as an independent contractor. Our lawyers negotiated a standard, arms length deal, which was later terminated. We are disturbed by the allegations in today’s…

— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) September 4, 2024

We’re sure the timing of this, two months before the election, was a total coincidence. How long has the DOJ been sitting on this? Why did it drop a day after we learned that a Chinese spy was working for NY Gov. Kathy Hochul, or that Poole was going to sue Kamala Harris for defamation?

So @Timcast announces he will be suing Kamala and her campaign for defamation and within 24 hrs the DOJ launches an assault calling him a paid Russian asset.

Nothing to see here. Move along.

— Spitfire (@DogRightGirl) September 4, 2024

And of course, the NeverTrumpers like Rick Wilson are giddy with joy…

Obviously we should be flushing out any foreign influence operation but let’s not pretend this is a problem exclusive to the right

— Auron MacIntyre (@AuronMacintyre) September 4, 2024

Hezbollah on Wednesday unleashed its largest volley of rockets on northern Israel since late August. At around noon local time, nearly 50 rocket sirens sounded throughout settlements and towns in northern Israel as around 65 missiles rained down.

The settlement of Kiryat Shmona was hit, according to Israeli media, resulting in fires in surrounding fields – which has been a common feature of the conflict with Hezbollah. The settlements of Malchia, Ramot Naftali, and Beit Hillel were also targeted, but it remains unclear how many projectiles made it through.

An Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) statement indicted that anti-air systems were able to intercept many rockets while failing to shoot down others.

Before Wednesday’s attack, Hezbollah’s daily rocket fire had significantly dropped and was at a bit of a lull. The IDF had last month launched a large-scale ‘preemptive attack’ on Lebanon, and Israeli officials attribute this action to quieting the ferocity of Hezbollah attacks in the week after.

The Jerusalem Post explains of the recent daily stats as follows:

The military did not explain why it missed certain rockets, though given the context, the sudden large volume after a relatively quiet period may have partially taken the air defense apparatus by surprise.

Prior to August 25, Hezbollah had at times launched 100 or even 200 rockets in a day against Israel’s North and frequently was launching dozens per day.

In that sense, it was clear on Wednesday that Hezbollah had re-crossed a threshold of challenging Israel with more rocket attacks after a period of time in which it had seemed deterred by the August 25 IDF preemptive strike.

Still, the Israeli August preemptive strikes are having their intended effect of serving as a major warning to the whole of the Lebanese government and people.

Israel has since Oct.7 held the threat over the populating of “bombing Lebanon back to the stone age” – as Israeli officials have often repeated – should Hezbollah keep escalating its attacks which have left some 80,000 Israelis evacuated from their homes.

On Sunday the head of the Christian political party Lebanese Forces (LF), Samir Geagea, charged Hezbollah with “confiscating the Lebanese people’s decision on war and peace, as if there were no state”. He has accused the Shia paramilitary group of endangering the whole nation against the will of the Lebanese people.

Geagea described that the tit-for-tat conflict on the southern border is “a war that the Lebanese people reject, but has been imposed on them.”

“It is a war that the Lebanese people do not want and over which the government has had no say. This war does not serve Lebanon, it has brought nothing to Gaza, nor alleviated its suffering one iota,” he added.

Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack,

The Democrats have all of a sudden zeroed in on Green Party leader Jill Stein in the latest sign that they’re getting desperate.

Most polls had previously claimed that Kamala was leading Trump, but cynics suspected that this was all part of the party’s coronation of their new candidate after Biden dropped out. The truth is now coming out after even pro-Democrat Newsweek felt compelled to headline a recent article about how “Kamala Harris’ Lead Over Trump Being ‘Steadily Cut’—Poll” so as to retain some credibility.

Three factors have worked against her faux lead and inevitably exposed it as fraudulent:

1. Americans haven’t forgotten how Trump miraculously survived an assassination attempt this summer;

2. influential former Democrats RFK and Tulsi Gabbard endorsed him; and

3. Kamala’s CNN interview was disastrous.

The first even inspired lifelong Democrat Mark Zuckerberg to praise Trump as a “badass”; RFK and Tulsi command a lot of sway among dissident Leftists; and Americans remembered how inept Kamala is.

The confluence of these aforesaid factors is responsible for the Democrats attacking Stein all of a sudden despite having hitherto held off on doing so out of fear that it would give her free publicity. Trump’s real lead (i.e. not the manipulated polling put out by Democrat cut-outs) might already be “too big to rig” or is rapidly approaching that level. Stein might also once again siphon votes from disgruntled Leftists and thus lead to him winning back the presidency, which is the Democrats’ worst nightmare.

They’ve proven themselves unable to effectively counteract the three factors working against Kamala’s faux lead so their backup plan is to attack Stein like AOC and DNC spokesman Matt Corridoni began doing earlier this week. The first claimed that she’s “not serious”, “not authentic”, and “just predatory” in the sense that she could take enough votes from the Democrats to make a difference, while the latter defamed her as “a useful idiot for Russia” whose “spoiler candidacy” can help Trump win.

Neither would have crossed the Rubicon, let alone at the same time and not to mention given their influential roles in the party, had they not thought (or perhaps been told by the party elite) that the expected benefits outweigh the predictable detriments. They’re giving her free publicity, which could further amplify her ideas among dissident Leftists and thus lead to her siphoning off more votes from the Democrats, but with the goal in mind of ultimately scaring some of her supporters away too.

The fact of the matter though is that those who support Stein are already aware of these two information warfare narratives against her but don’t care since they see their vote for her as a form of protest against the Democrats and the US’ political system more broadly. They’re therefore not going to be scared away like AOC and Corridoni expect, but those two might have an ulterior motive in mind in going on the attack, or at least those who might have told them to do that could have such intentions.

It was explained late last month in this analysis here about why “The Justice Department’s Crackdown On Russian Media’s American Affiliates Is Frightening” that efforts are underway to concoct another Russiagate conspiracy theory for discrediting Trump’s potential victory and sabotaging his next term. To that end, the FBI raided the homes of Scott Ritter and Dimitri Simes, and unnamed administration sources told the New York Times that more people might soon be raided on this pretext too.

The abovementioned analysis concluded that “[Trump’s] actual lead might result in a victory that’s ‘too big to rig’ if it stays on track, hence the need to preemptively manufacture a backup plan”, which could be complemented by the Democrats’ attacks Stein in order to more compellingly concoct their narrative. It should be mentioned that these attacks followed her announcing that she’d attend a rally in support of the Uhuru 3, whose Russiagate-like case readers can learn more about from one of them here.

The narrative threads have yet to be explicitly connected, but one scenario is that the FBI’s latest raids and the Democrats’ sudden attacks against Stein are meant to lend false credence to another Russiagate conspiracy theory for discrediting Trump’s “too big to rig” lead in the event that he wins. The FBI raids can’t do this on their own, nor the Democrats’ attacks against Stein, hence the need to pair them together and perhaps include another forthcoming but as-yet unknown element into this mix.

After all, it was already explained how the Democrats’ attacks against Stein will only give her free publicity and risk more dissident Leftists defecting from their party to hers, but this interpretation reconceptualizes everything by enabling the Democrats to then blame it all on Russia. Her public support for the Uhuru 3 coupled with the latest attacks against her and the FBI’s raids could combine to make a remixed Russiagate scenario more believable to a greater segment of the population than the first one.

If Trump’s lead is “too big to rig” like was argued throughout this analysis might already be the case or rapidly approaching that level, then the Democrats’ fallback plan could be to craft this narrative as a last-ditch effort to influence some electors into not voting for him, or at least till everything is “investigated”. Stein is going to carry some percentage of the vote like she always does whenever she runs, and if Trump’s lead is “too big to rig”, then there’s logic in attributing her “spoiler vote” to “Russian influence”.  

To be clear, Stein and all other third-party candidates have the right to run for president, and this shouldn’t be discredited. That said, sour Democrats are known to resort to the dirtiest tricks to smear their opponents instead of taking their electoral losses in a sportsmanlike manner. Blaming Trump’s potential return to office on “Russian-backed Stein” and relying on “evidence” obtained from the FBI’s raids of Russian media’s American affiliates, the Uhuru 3 case, and whatever else is therefore possible.

It remains to be seen whether these threads are explicitly connected by that party or not, and there’s always a chance that their elite might decide not to go through with this for whatever reason, but it’s still plausible enough to be taken seriously and that’s why all Americans should be on alert. As Election Day nears and Trump’s lead over Kamala grows, or hers over him slips as some Mainstream Media outlets might frame it so as to retain some credibility, the Democrats will become more desperate than ever.

Two years after his ouster, CNN host Brian Stelter announced he’s returning to the network… but he’s different this time…

“I am thrilled to share that I am returning as the lead author of CNN’s Reliable Sources newsletter, the digest I founded in 2015,” Stelter wrote in a “surprise” message to “Reliable Sources” readers on Tuesday.

“I’m returning to CNN in a brand new role as Chief Media Analyst, which means I’ll be appearing on air, developing digital content, and helming this newsletter.”

Stelter said his return to CNN, which officially starts Sept. 9, won’t be the same as his previous stint at the network, insisting “because I am different.”

As Fox News reports, Stelter was fired by CNN in 2022 by his then-boss Chris Licht, who at the time was “determined to tamp down spectacle” and tasked by his own bosses at parent company Warner Bros. Discovery to restore CNN’s journalistic credibility by shedding its left-wing partisanship.

In addition to re-hiring Stelter, new CEO Mark Thompson also promoted Jim Acosta to a weekday anchor role and elevated Laura Coats and Abby Phillips into primetime.

“I’m very happy to welcome Brian back to CNN in this new role,” Thompson said in a statement.

“Brian is one of the best global experts in media commentary, and as the founder of the Reliable Sources newsletter, he is the perfect choice to lead Reliable Sources into its next chapter.”

As a reminder, as host of “Reliable Sources,” Stelter hyped Russiagate, fawned over Andrew Cuomo’s coronavirus response, and in Oct. 2020 called the Hunter Biden laptop story a “manufactured scandal” peddled by the “right-wing media machine.”

He even called disgraced anti-Trump lawyer Michael Avenatti a “serious” presidential contender going into the 2020 election cycle.

But, hey, he says he’s “different” this time… so there’s noting to worry about.

…and I experienced the news more like an everyday consumer. In doing so, I learned a whole lot about the attention economy and the information ecosystem. So this time around will be different, because I am different.

— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) September 3, 2024