Category: zerohedge

Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Summit News,

The threat posed by Iran-backed Hezbollah sleeper cells embedded in major American cities has once again come to the fore following the killing of Iran’s Quds Force General Qasem Soleimani.

Following last night’s assassination of the Iranian military leader, authorities in both New York and Los Angeles announced that they were ramping up security in readiness for possible revenge attacks on U.S. soil.

This is because Iran is known to have placed Hezbollah terrorist sleeper cells throughout not just Europe but the United States too.

Last year, the the criminal prosecution and conviction in New York of the Hezbollah operative Ali Kourani revealed that the terror outfit has already plotted to attack U.S. interests inside the country and is ready to activate if it considers the existence of either Hezbollah or Iran to be at stake.

Following the arrest of Kourani and another Hezbollah operative named Samer el-Debek, the U.S. intelligence community reversed its belief that Hezbollah was unlikely to attempt attacks within the U.S.

“It’s our assessment that Hezbollah is determined to give itself a potential homeland option as a critical component of its terrorism playbook,” said National Counterterrorism Center Director Nicholas Rasmussen.

Authorities in major U.S. cities are monitoring developments and ramping up security in preparation for any potential Iranian-backed terror attacks following the killing of Iran’s Quds Force General Qasem Soleimani.#WWIII https://t.co/Mtf1HPQrmp

— Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) January 3, 2020

“We in the intelligence community do in fact see continued activity on behalf of Hezbollah here inside the homeland,” he added.

Hezbollah has never directly attacked the U.S. homeland, but Kourani, working for the Hezbollah-controlled Islamic Jihad Organization, was confirmed to have been conducting surveillance of FBI and U.S. Secret Service offices, as well as a U.S. Army armory and John F. Kennedy International Airport, all in New York City.

“While living in the United States, Kourani served as an operative of Hezbollah in order to help the foreign terrorist organization prepare for potential future attacks against the United States,” said U.S. Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Demers.

In casing both JFK and Toronto’s Pearson International Airport, “Kourani told the FBI that he provided Hezbollah with details about security procedures, the uniforms worn by security officers, and whether the officers were armed. His surveillance, Kourani told the FBI, focused on exit points, security checkpoints, camera locations, baggage claim procedures, and what questions airport screeners asked passengers,” reported ForeignPolicy.com.

With the world now waiting for Iran’s response to Soleimani’s killing, we can only hope that it doesn’t come in the form of a massive Hezbollah-backed terror attack targeting a major American city.

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Nobody knows where they are coming from, or why they are there.

Back on Christmas we wrote about large, non-governmental drones flying in mysterious patterns in Colorado. Since then, sightings have only increased, despite there being no explanation as to why.

Local sheriff’s departments in regions of Nebraska and Colorado have been “bombarded” with reports of large drones with “blinking lights and wingspans of up to 6 feet” flying over rural towns and open fields, according to MSN News. The drones have even prompted a federal investigation – yet no one has been able to explain them. 

Missy Blackman, who saw three drones hovering over her farm outside Palisade, Neb said: “It’s creepy. I have a lot of questions of why and what are they, and nobody seems to have any answers.”

Sheriff James Brueggeman of Perkins County, Neb. saw the drones on patrol one night. He commented: “In terms of aircraft flying at night and not being identified, this is a first for me personally.”

He said he has heard rumblings of people wanting to shoot down a drone, but has urged residents to contact law enforcement instead. 

Brueggeman said: “I think it’s kind of a joke, but you have to remember the part of the country we live in. People here don’t like their privacy to be invaded.”

Dawn George, who lives near Wray, Colo. said: “They’re high enough where you couldn’t shoot one anyway, but they’re low enough that they’re a nuisance.” She says her dogs bark at the drones when they fly over. 

The drones are attracting attention at the same time the FAA proposed new regulations that would require most drones to be identifiable. A spokesman for the FAA, Ian Gregor, said the timing of the rule was coincidental, but also that the agency had opened an investigation into the “mystery” drone sightings. 

Gregor said: “Multiple F.A.A. divisions and government agencies are investigating these reports.”

Meanwhile, the drones have been the talk of rural Colorado and Nebraska. Sighting are increasing and so are the inquiries of witnesses and those in the area. Some have suggested simple answers, like a mapping operation or land survey, but many ask why those tasks would be undertaken at night. 

Senator Cory Gardner, Republican of Colorado said he would “closely monitor the situation.”

But regulations around drones are still fuzzy:

Unmanned drones, which have exploded into popular usage in recent years and can be used for everything from mapping to photography to farming, can be difficult to track. Operators of all but the smallest drones have been required to register with the federal government since 2015, but there is no straightforward, legal way for state and local officials to identify the owner of a particular drone or to track that drone’s location.

Reggie Govan, a former chief counsel to the F.A.A. who now teaches at the University of Pennsylvania Law School said: “Like in many other areas of drone regulation, the statutory and regulatory framework is lagging the technology. It’s just that simple.”

Govan says the government has tracking tools to figure out where the drones are coming from, but the vast distance they fly over could make it difficult. Limits in drone detection have allowed rogue operators to approach the White House without raising alarms and even deploy homemade bombs in a Pennsylvania neighborhood, in one case. 

Michael Yowell, a sheriff’s captain in Lincoln County, Colo said: “Most people are very reasonable, and they say it could be somebody mapping or doing topography. But you can’t rule out what you don’t know.”

The sightings started in Northeast Colorado in mid December and have grown more widespread since then. Almost all sightings have occurred between sunset and 10PM, but they have occasionally been spotted during daylight hours. One witness said she looked at them through binoculars and saw no markings, just plain silver and white coloring. Captain Yowell tried to photograph the drones but couldn’t get a clear picture. 

Yowell said: “We want to know, at around 10 o’clock, when we start to lose visuals of these, which direction are they homing? Which way are they heading? We hope that’s how we can contact somebody on the ground.”

Residents like Dawn George are worried they may never get answers: “All the sudden, it’s just going to stop and we’re not going to have answers. And that’s very unsettling to a lot of people. It’s the fear of the unknown.”

Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk,

According to new IRS documents for 2017 and 2018, people are fleeing Illinois in record numbers.

New IRS data confirms Record Number of Illinoisans Leave State as Tax Base Continues to Shrink.

The IRS has just released new domestic migration data for both 2017 and 2018 and it shows Illinoisans left the state in record numbers. In both years, Illinois lost more people and more taxable income than in any past year reported by the IRS.

The IRS data complements the new Census Bureau data that shows near-record out-migration of Illinoisans in 2019.

Grim Numbers

• Illinois lost more than 130,000 tax filers and their dependents in 2017 and another 88,000 in 2018. Illinois’ 2018 loss was the third worst in the country, with only California and New York losing more residents, 153,000 and 160,000, respectively.

• Illinois lost $6.8 billion in Adjusted Gross Incomes to net out-migration in 2017 and $5.6 billion in 2018. Illinois’ 2018 loss was the third worst in the country, with only California and New York losing more AGI, $8.0 billion and $9.6 billion, respectively.

• The three biggest gainers nationally in 2018 of residents and their incomes were Florida, Arizona and Texas. Florida was the biggest winner by far, gaining a net 115,000 people and $16 billion in AGI. Arizona gained 65,000 people and $3.5 billion in AGI. Texas gained 77,000 people and $3.4 billion in AGI.

• When measured on per capita basis, only New York lost more AGI than Illinois in 2018. Illinois lost $435 in AGI per person while New York lost $484 per person.

• The biggest per capita winners of AGI were Nevada, up $766 per person, Florida, up $762 per person, and Idaho, up $646 per person.

• Illinois’ neighbors suffered far smaller AGI losses than Illinois in 2018, ranging from a loss of $145 per person in Iowa to just $52 per person in Missouri.

Third Biggest Loser

• Domestic in-migrants to Illinois earned far less than the Illinois residents who left the state. The average AGI of those who left in 2018 was approximately $85,000, while those who entered the state had incomes of just $66,000.

• The wealth gap between residents leaving and coming to Illinois has more than tripled since 2000. In 2000, those moving into Illinois earned on average $5,000 less than those leaving Illinois. In 2018, the gap is now nearly $19,000.

Net Loser to 43 States

​

• Illinois was a net loser of people to 43 states in 2018, while it netted gains from just six states. The total gain from those six states, however, was trivial – just 667 net residents. In contrast, Illinois netted losses of 88,664 people to the other 43 states.

• Illinois’ biggest resident losses weren’t just to Florida and Texas, two of the nation’s biggest in-migration winners. Indiana and Wisconsin were the second and fourth largest net winners of Illinois’ residents.

• All of Illinois’ neighbors netted gains vs. Illinois. Indiana gained nearly 26,000 Illinois residents but gave up just 15,000 of its own. That left Indiana with a net gain of nearly 11,000 residents vis-a-vis Illinois. Wisconsin ended up with a net gain of more than 7,000 residents vs. Illinois. Kentucky, Iowa, Michigan and Missouri all netted gains of 1,200 to 2,900 residents vs. the Prairie State.

Any way the data is sliced, Illinois is chronically losing its population and its tax base. It is a national outlier along with New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. For full information on Illinois’ demographic and out-migration losses, see Wirepoints: Out-migration.

The outflow is particularly alarming given the state’s pension shortfall, which is already the highest in the nation. As the state’s population and tax base continue to shrink, the risk of insolvency for the state continues to rise.

And more tax hikes will only exacerbate the situation – Illinoisans already face the highest total tax burden in the nation, according to Kiplinger and Wallethub.

Illinois’ legislature shows no signs of pursuing the spending and pension reforms needed to make Illinois competitive again. Until that changes, expect the Illinois exodus to only get worse.

Thanks for Wirepoints for the discussion.

Escape Illinois: Get The Hell Out Now, We Are

On October 5, I announced Escape Illinois: Get The Hell Out Now, We Are

We are moving to Southern Utah this year. Going house hunting in February (will rent for a year) and we will sell this one rather than trying to rent it.

Property taxes are too much of a killer to keep it (as in ~$15,000 a year on a ~$400K home).

Yikes. Had enough.

Whether he is eating ice cream or not, Trump appears to be on a rampage to recreate the end of The Godfather.

Less than 24 hours after a US drone shockingly killed the top Iranian military leader, Qasem Soleimani, resulting in equity markets groaning around the globe in fear over Iranian reprisals (and potentially, World War III), the US has gone for round two with Reuters and various other social media sources reporting that US air strikes targeting Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units umbrella grouping of Iran-backed Shi’ite militias near camp Taji north of Baghdad, have killed six people and critically wounded three, an Iraqi army source said late on Friday.

Iraqi official media has also confirm that two vehicles were targeted north of Baghdad, carrying commanders of the pro-Iran militias in the PMUs.

Iraqi officials media now confirm that two vehicles were targeted north of Baghdad, carrying commanders of the pro-Iran militias in the PMUs. #iraq #QassemSuleimani

— Hassan Hassan (@hxhassan) January 3, 2020

Two of the three vehicles making up a militia convoy were found burned, a Reuters source said, as well as six burned corpses.

Asaib Ahl al-Haq media outlet releases photos shows the aftermath airstrikes on Hashd al-Shaabi vehicles near Taji.#Iraq pic.twitter.com/MO1yqnttjF

— Baxtiyar Goran (@BaxtiyarGoran) January 3, 2020

The strikes reportedly took place at 1:12 am local time.

Hezbollah’s Mayadeen confirms that an airstrike hit a moving target in Taji northern Iraqi capital of Baghdad.
—
Mayadeen was first media outlet that confirmed the death of Soleimani and Muhandis last night.#Iraq https://t.co/cwebUoxlzA https://t.co/j5R73kZpyv

— Baxtiyar Goran (@BaxtiyarGoran) January 3, 2020

According to unconfirmed reports, a US MQ-9 Reaper drone targeted a convoy carrying several high ranking officials of PMU (Hashd al-Shaabi) in Taji, North of Baghdad. The casualties are said to be mostly among members of the IRGC-backed Asaib Ahl al-Haq. It is not known whether Qais al-Khazali is dead or alive.

#BREAKING: #USAF‘s MQ-9 Reaper drone targeted a convoy carrying several high ranking officials of #PMU (Hashd al-Shaabi) in #Taji, North of #Baghdad. Casualties are mostly among members of #IRGC backed Asaib Ahl al-Haq. It is not known whether Qais al-Khazali is dead or alive! pic.twitter.com/CGGebcLn0M

— Babak Taghvaee (@BabakTaghvaee) January 3, 2020

Separate reports claim that Shibl al-Zaidi, a commander of Kataib Imam Ali brigades, an Iranian-backed militia and the PMU’s 40th Brigade, is among those the six who were killed in the strike.

Not confirmed yet, but it is reported Shibl al-Zaydi, secretary general of #IRGC backed Kata’ib al-Imam Ali (#PMU‘s 40th Brigade) is among whom are targeted by the #USAF in this airstrike at #Taji, North of #Baghdad tonight! pic.twitter.com/SteN0vg5iB

— Babak Taghvaee (@BabakTaghvaee) January 3, 2020

Al-Zaidi was close (see on left) to Soleimani & Abu Mahdi al-Mohandis, both killed 24hrs ago.

That said there are conflicting reports, with some noting that a Twitter account allegedly belonging to al-Zaidi tweeted that he is alive after the attack.

The twitter account, who we presume is run by al-Zaydi, tweeted this out saying they aren’t dead: https://t.co/6Mh24mgjOO

— Strategic Sentinel (@StratSentinel) January 3, 2020

Additionally, Hamad al-Jazairi, the deputy leader of Saraya al-Khorasani, was also reprotedly among those killed tonight.

In separate, unconfirmed reports, yet another airstrike is said to have targeted a convoy in Iraq’s Nineveh governorate.

Claims of another strike targeting a convoy in Nineveh Governorate https://t.co/04l5lrOggM

— David A. Daoud (@DavidADaoud) January 3, 2020

And so, with the US laying death and carnage from the sky across Iraq, reactions have ranged from the sarcastic and laconic…

Oh, I thought last night’s peace-loving strike was supposed to prevent additional warfare https://t.co/Z2S3WQaz7L

— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) January 3, 2020

I guess the de-escalation of last night’s air strike wasn’t enough to fully de-escalate and stop war, so today the US has ordered another airstrike at a top Iraqi militia commander to further de-escalate and stop even more war.

— Chris Hayes (@chrislhayes) January 3, 2020

… to the objectively concerned, with some wondering how much further is Iraq going to let US operate freely in country before they decide to kick their assets out? These airstrikes really make the Iraqi government look weak like they can’t deal with their problems by themselves, which may or may not be true, but the point stands.”

How much further is #Iraq going to let US operate freely in country before they decide to kick their assets out? These airstrikes really make the Iraqi government look weak like they can’t deal with their problems by themselves, which may or may not be true, but the point stands.

— Strategic Sentinel (@StratSentinel) January 3, 2020

Of course, the other point is when and how will Iran respond, as it is now clear that if Tehran does nothing it will only embolden the US to pick off its top generals one at a time, while any substantial escalation could ignite a regional war with even more dire consequences.

Authored by Kyle Smith via NationalReview.com,

Former national security adviser Ben Rhodes, the architect of the Iran nuclear deal, purposely structured the JCPOA as a treaty that was not a treaty because he and his boss, President Obama, had no intention whatsoever of doing with the JCPOA what the Constitution mandates for all treaties, which is to obtain the approval of two-thirds of the Senate.

Rhodes and Obama simply rammed through what was in effect a treaty without seeking the approval of even one Senator.

Yet here is Rhodes after the strike that killed Qasem Soleimani, the commander of the secretive Iranian Quds force that sows mischief (and kills Americans, and ordered the attack on the U.S. embassy in Baghdad) outside Iran’s borders.

Congress has to assert itself and determine exactly what our Iran policy is. Did we mean to do this? Do we have any plan for what comes next? What is the legal basis for all this?

— Ben Rhodes (@brhodes) January 3, 2020

Rhodes’s tweet is incomprehensible unless one or both of the following two conditions applies:

1) Rhodes is very, very stupid;

2) Rhodes thinks one set of laws and principles applies to presidents he likes and another set applies to presidents he doesn’t like.

Congress gets to “assert itself” in the Trump Administration’s foreign policy? When Rhodes was in charge of President Obama’s foreign policy (a documentary showed him bossing around Secretary of State John Kerry), he not only didn’t solicit Congress’s opinion on Iran policy but took extraordinary action purposely to cut the Senate out of a matter of which it should have had oversight.

Moreover, as David French at The Dispatch points out this morning, the strike that killed Soleimani actually was authorized under the Constitution because (as Rhodes may or may not remember) Congress did approve of U.S. military actions in Iraq. Those actions were re-authorized by the Obama Administration.

Iranian-backed militias attacked U.S. troops lawfully present in a combat zone under valid legal authorities. Moreover, America’s military response isn’t limited to immediate self-defense or tit for tat. It can act to remove the threat. That threat includes enemy commanders. /4

— David French (@DavidAFrench) January 3, 2020

Whether the Soleimani hit was a good idea is worth debating, but President Trump did have the proper authority to order it.

US freight railroads have long been used as a barometer of the country’s economic health, continue to show declines in traffic, suggesting the industrial recession could persist into 2020. 

The Association of American Railroads (AAR) published a new report that shows US weekly rail traffic for the week ending December 21 was down 10.5% to 507,589 carloads and intermodal units compared with the same week last year.

Total carloads for the week were 245,048 carloads, down 11.5% compared with the same week in 2018, while weekly intermodal volume was down 9.5% to 262,541 containers and trailers. 

The AAR tracks ten carload commodity groups on a weekly basis — with Petroleum and Petroleum Products and Other segments showed marginal growth over the week as all other segments including Chemicals; Coal; Farm Products excl. Grain, and Food; Forest Products, Grain, Metallic Ores and Metals; Motor Vehicles and Parts; and Nonmetallic Minerals registered declines. 

For the first 51 weeks of 2019, US rail traffic across all segments was 12,780,814 carloads, down 4.8% from the same period last year; and 13,550,432 intermodal units, down 5.1% from last year. Total rail traffic in the first 51 weeks was 26,331,246 carloads and intermodal units, a 5.9% drop over last year.

Canadian and Mexican railroads also reported traffic declines for the week and in the first 51 weeks as both countries are teetering if not already in a recession. 

North American rail volume for the week was down 9.2% to 350,256 carloads over the same week last year, and 348,566 intermodal units, down 8.2 % over the previous year. Total combined weekly rail traffic in North America was 698,822 carloads and intermodal units, down 8.7%. 

North American rail volume for the first 51 weeks of 2019 was 35,963,299 carloads and intermodal units, down 3.9% compared with 2018.

In a separate report, AAR described how 400,000 railcars currently sit in storage amid slumping rail demand. 

But it’s not just rail traffic that is tumbling, class-8 truck orders collapsed last month, all of this is a symptom of an industrial recession that shows no signs of abating into 2020.

Authored by Lawrence Sellin via WIONews.com,

According to the latest news reports, a US airstrike at Baghdad International Airport killed the commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Quds Force unit, General Qasem Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, deputy head of the Iran-backed Iraqi Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF), a Shia paramilitary force made up of former militias with close ties to Iran.

The US Department of Defence says Soleimani and his Quds Force was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of Americans and coalition service members and the wounding of thousands more. The Pentagon also blamed Soleimani and the PMF for orchestrating assaults on coalition bases in Iraq in recent months, including the December 27 attack that culminated in the deaths of additional American and Iraqi personnel.

Just days ago, PMF supporters and members attempted to storm the US Embassy in Baghdad in protest of American airstrikes against PMF bases and personnel in Iraq and Syria in retaliation for the December 27 PMF attack.

Subsequent to the PMF assault on the US Embassy, US Secretary of Defence Mark Esper warned that the US “Will take preemptive action” if an imminent attack is detected.

The US airstrike that killed Soleimani and al-Muhandis has been described by an American official as “target of opportunity.” Indeed. Suleimani and his co-conspirator al-Muhandis were, quite literally, caught at the scene of the crime.

As noted by Vox’s Daniel Byman, because Iran’s conventional forces are weak, Tehran often works through militias, terrorist groups, and other proxies to advance its interests abroad. The IRGC, with the Quds Force in the lead, is the key Iranian liaison with the Lebanese Hezbollah, the strongest paramilitary organisation in Lebanon and one that has attacked Israel and the US at Iran’s behest. The Quds Force also works with Palestinian terrorist groups like Hamas and Islamic Jihad, among other nefarious organisations in other countries.

Soleimani can, therefore, be considered responsible for the deaths and injuring of tens of thousands. No one should shed a tear for his demise and, in fact, many Iraqis and Iranians are reportedly celebrating.

In his first official reaction to the strike that killed Suleimani, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei vows “harsh revenge awaits the criminals.”

Undoubtedly, attacks on US forces and facilities in Iraq should be expected. Tehran has spent years building up extensive networks among militia groups and politicians in Iraq. One indication of that was Iran’s ability to rapidly mobilise local proxies to violently demonstrate at the US Embassy in Baghdad, creating a grave security risk to personnel there. It eventually led to the airstrike that killed Soleimani and PMF leader al-Muhandis, the apparent organisers of the attack on the embassy.

The effect on Iraqi politicians may be significant, many of whom by necessity or by choice, have close ties to Iran. Pressure may grow to oust US forces from the country, which could undermine efforts against the Islamic State as well as other US objectives in the region.

The killing of Soleimani and the targeting of pro-Iranian figures in Iraq like al-Muhandis will rachet up the already dangerous tension between the US and Iran.

By ordering the airstrike on Soleimani and al-Muhandis, President Donald Trump demonstrated decisive action against America’s enemies, but the eventual outcome, whether the United States emerges stronger, whether war can be avoided and bloodshed limited, will depend on Trump’s ability and those of his administration to remain steadfast, formulate a long-term strategy and work closely with allies.

Carlos Ghosn, the ousted Nissan boss and now an international fugitive, fled Japan to Lebanon on Monday via two transport jets.

Bloomberg has uncovered that the Turkish charter operator of the jets has also been responsible for ferrying gold around the world for the Venezuelan government. 

MNG Airlines, a unit of MNG Holding Co., a conglomerate with hotel, finance and transportation services, used cargo aircraft to ship gold from Venezuela to Istanbul.

Chartering jets provides clients with “a cloak of privacy. Planes are often owned by one group yet operated and managed by a specialty company. Still, tail number and registrations can be tracked, partially piercing their secrecy,” Bloomberg noted.

Michael Burton, an attorney practicing international trade law, said after the Ghosn drama, MNG’s name is on everyone’s radar. 

MNG states that clients can transport whatever they want in the aircraft, as long as it’s not illegal. The company said it had filed a criminal complaint on the unlawful transportation of Ghosn. 

“Similarly to a car rental agency, MNG Jet is renting out planes, and does not bear any responsibility for what the passengers do with them,” the company told Bloomberg in an email response. “According to the international aviation code, it is not MNG Jet’s role, responsibility and rights to enquire about the reasons behind the travels or to check the content of the luggage transported by the passengers in the planes.”

On Thursday, right around the same time the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) released an international warrant against Ghosn, Turkey arrested seven people in connection to the smuggling of the former executive. 

One MNG employee, who was arrested by Turkish authorities, “admitted to falsifying flight records” in the transportation of Ghosn. He also “confirmed that he acted in his individual capacity, without the knowledge or the authorization of the management of MNG Jet,” the company said in a statement.

We reported one year ago, unrelated to MNG, that a private Boeing 777 registered to Russia’s Nordwind airline ferried 20 tons of gold from Venezuela to Russia. 

Then in February 2019, another report surfaced of 8 tons of gold from Venezuela’s Central Bank was shipped abroad via a mysterious cargo plane. 

Venezuelan opposition lawmakers said the looting of the gold by the Maduro regime is illegal and warned that Maduro likely intends to sell the gold abroad: 

At least 8 tons of gold were removed from the Venezuelan central bank’s vaults last week, an opposition legislator and three government sources told Reuters, in the latest sign of President Nicolas Maduro’s desperation to raise hard currency amid tightening sanctions.

The gold was removed in government vehicles between Wednesday and Friday last week when there were no regular security guards present at the bank, Legislator Angel Alvarado and the three government sources said.

“They plan to sell it abroad illegally,” Alvarado said in an interview. The central bank did not respond to requests for comment. Alvarado and the government sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, did not say where the central bank was sending the gold. They said the operation took place while central bank head Calixto Ortega was abroad on a trip. In 2018, 23 tons of mined gold were transported from Venezuela to Istanbul by plane, according to sources and Turkish government data.

A Wall Street Journal investigation uncovered how an African gold Refinery–launched by a Belgian in Uganda–is behind the operation to secretly help Maduro get the country’s gold to the market.

The gold landed in Entebbe, Uganda, and then went to the African Gold Refinery (AGR) before it was exported onward, according to the WSJ. 

Ghosn’s great escape via several charter planes from Japan to Lebanon sheds light on the global aircraft charter industry, where it appears, according to Bloomberg and other past reports, Venezuela has been using mysterious charter planes to shift its gold across the world as it relies on illegal gold exploited from African jungles — then sold abroad — as a key source of revenue for survival. 

Authored by Matthew Vadum via The Epoch Times,

An Oregon court that granted the first individual legal recognition for his “non-binary” sex designation has rescinded the status and restored the sex on his birth certificate to “male.”

In a dramatic repudiation of the transgenderism movement and the industry that supports it, the request for the change came from James Shupe, an icon of transgender activism, who denounced the movement and the idea that one can change one’s sex as a fraud.

“I’m saying my experience should very much serve as a cautionary tale, to everyone, from males like me with sexual paraphilias and false beliefs about being women, to the lawyers, doctors, judges, therapists, and lawmakers that allowed this whole sordid tale to happen,” Shupe told The Epoch Times via email.

Paraphilias, according to WebMD, are “abnormal sexual behaviors or impulses characterized by intense sexual fantasies and urges that keep coming back.”

News of Shupe’s restored male sex status broke in a Dec. 31 interview with Tyler O’Neil of PJMedia.

“The charade of not being male, the legal fiction, it’s over,” Shupe said.

“The lies behind my fictitious sex changes, something I shamefully participated in, first to female, and then to non-binary, have been forever exposed. A truthful accounting of events has replaced the deceit that allowed me to become America’s first legally non-binary person.

“The legal record has now been corrected and LGBT advocates are no longer able to use my historic non-binary court order to advance their toxic agenda.

“I am and have always been male. That is my biological truth, the only thing capable of grounding me to reality.”

Born in the nation’s capital in 1963, Shupe, who served in the U.S. Army from 1982 to 2000, has been married to his wife, Sandy, for three decades. He began identifying as a transgender woman in 2013 after experiencing harassment in the military because others thought of him as homosexual. He subjected himself to hormone treatment that had unpleasant, dangerous side effects, and legally changed his first name to Jamie and his sex to female. He didn’t undergo sex-reassignment surgery.

A few years later, he changed his legal sex again.

On June 10, 2016, Multnomah County, Oregon, Circuit Court Judge Amy Holmes Hehn signed an order declaring that Shupe’s sex “is hereby changed from female to non-binary.”

Shupe was celebrated by the LGBT movement and hailed as a courageous trailblazer by the mainstream media, but changing his legal sex and trying to live as a non-binary person didn’t solve his problems, he said.

“The gender transitions were supposed to fix my mental health problems, but I kept getting worse instead. The high-powered marijuana made me psychotic. I started hearing booming noises and having visions of being some Indian woman,” he told PJMedia.

“I started believing I was some kind of chosen one who was picked to restore the third gender to North America, that’s what I thought the visions were telling me.”

Shupe said he latched onto the transgender identity as he tried to deal with psychological problems that should have been dealt with more conventionally.

“I ended up in the psych ward three times because of hormones. I had blood clots in my eyes because my estrogen levels were 2,585 instead of 200, low bone density, problems controlling my bladder, and emotional instability,” he said.

“Blood tests indicated I was dropping into kidney disease territory … for about 18 months, I had chronic dermatology issues and skin reactions to estrogen patches, I passed out on the kitchen floor from Spironolactone [a diruretic drug].”

Shupe decided to legally become male again.

Gay-rights public interest law firm Lambda Legal dropped him as a client, and Shupe changed his political perspective. Although he had supported transgender individuals serving in the armed forces, he came to embrace President Donald Trump’s policy that service members live according to their sex at birth.

Multnomah County, Oregon, Circuit Court Judge Patricia L. McGuire signed a “General Judgment Regarding Change of Name and Sex” on Dec. 19, 2019, changing his sex to male and his name to James Clifford Shupe.

“Despite six years of hormonal treatments, my sex was immutable, and I remained the same biological male I was at the time of my birth. In hindsight, my sex change to non-binary was a psychologically harmful legal fiction, and I desire to reclaim my male birth sex,” Shupe told PJMedia.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) says he was briefed on the plan to target Iran’s No. 2 Qassem Soleimani earlier this week, and that he advised President Trump to cripple Iran’s economy by taking out the country’s oil refineries.

“I was briefed about the potential operation when I was down in Florida,” said Graham during a Friday interview on Fox & Friends, adding “If I were the president, I would put on the table targets in Iran, not Iraq and Syria. Economic targets that would crush the economy.”

Notably, Graham appears to be the only member of Congress briefed on the military action while he was with Trump at Mar-a-Lago for a round of golf.

Graham was asked “You say, the next stop is their oil fields, right?”

To which he responded: “Well, what I’m trying to do is create deterrents,” adding “What are they thinking about in Tehran right now? Revenge. What are they thinking about inside Iraq? All of these Shiite militias are going to have three days of mourning. What kind of command and control do they have regarding Tehran? Who makes the decisions to strike, and what kind of strikes are they contemplating? How would you stop retaliation to deterrents? What’s the one thing that the regime can’t afford to lose? The ability to refine oil. So what President Trump has done is up the ante as high as you can up it. He’s killed the most consequential military leader in Iran.”

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