Tag: news

Authored by Andrea Widburg via AmericanThinker.com,

On Saturday, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed a law mandating that convicted criminals can request placement in single-sex prisons based upon the prisoners’ self-defined “gender identity.” There’s strong evidence that letting intact men go to women’s prisons is an invitation for rape. That makes the new law one of the most misogynistic things California’s hard-left government could have done.

For myriad reasons, only the smallest fraction of which has to do with biology, there have always been men and women who feel uncomfortable in their skin and associate more strongly with the opposite sex. That must be a terrible feeling, and these people deserve our pity and should be treated whenever possible with kindness and respect for their suffering.

Nevertheless, just because they feel as if they are the opposite sex does not mean that their delusion must be society’s reality. That hasn’t stopped California, which has joined Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York City, and Massachusetts by passing a law allowing convicted prisoners to pick their “gender identity” when they’re being assigned to the single-sex prisons in California’s corrections system:

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law on Saturday requiring California to house transgender inmates in prisons based on their gender identity – but only if the state does not have “management or security concerns.”

…

The law Newsom signed Saturday says officers must ask inmates privately during the intake process if they identify as transgender, nonbinary or intersex. Those inmates can then request to be placed in a facility that houses either men or women.

The law says the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation cannot deny those requests solely because of inmates’ anatomy, sexual orientation or “a factor present” among other inmates at the facility.

The justification for this new law is that men who identify as women, when placed in all-male prisoners are often raped. In Australia, for example, a man who identified as a woman claims to have been raped over 2,000 times, which is utterly appalling and, I’m sure, not unique. Vulnerable men need to be protected — but a sane society doesn’t protect gender-confused men by putting women at risk.

California’s new law doesn’t require that the men have had mutilating surgery or take hormones because of their body dysmorphia. Instead, the law lets the men decide what gender they are. If I were a man with a choice of a dangerous men’s prison or a more civil women’s prison, and I wasn’t all about being macho, it might seem like a good thing to announce that I’d found my inner woman.

For the women, it’s anything but a good thing.

In England, which has been housing men in women’s prisons for some time now, the program has been disastrous for women:

The United Kingdom Ministry of Justice (MoJ) has revealed that inmates who identify as transgender are responsible for a rate of sexual attacks that is exponentially higher than their proportion of the population of women’s jails and prisons.

In response to a question that former Labour Party General Secretary Baroness McDonagh put before Parliament, the MoJ has acknowledged that, while inmates who identify as transgender make up about one percent of the 3,600 inmates in women’s jails and prisons, they have committed 5.6% of all reported sexual assaults.

Also in England, a man calling himself Karen White ended up in prison after stabbing a neighbor. Despite a history that included sexual assault, exposure, sexually abusing minors, and cruelty to animals, he ended up in a women’s prison, where he promptly sexually assaulted women.

In Illinois, a woman filed a federal lawsuit claiming that a man who identified as a “transgender woman” raped her.

In a moral nation, the prisons must protect those men who compulsively present as women. However, that same societal morality says that women in prison must be protected from being forced to share their quarters with mentally ill, or merely opportunistic, men who still have their external genitalia attached.

Sunday saw huge clashes erupt between the armies of Armenia and Azerbaijan along the already militarized and disputed Nagorno-Karabakh border region. An official state of war in the region has been declared by Yerevan. 

“Early in the morning, around 7 a.m. the Azerbaijani forces launched a large-scale aggression, including missile attacks…” Armenia’s Defense Ministry stated Sunday. Armenia has since reportedly declared martial law and a “total military mobilization” in what looks to be the most serious escalation between the two countries in years. 

Air and artillery attacks from both sides ramped up, with each side blaming the other for the start of hostilities, while international powers urge calm. Crucially, civilians have already been killed on either side by indiscriminate shelling. At least a dozen soldiers on either side have also been reported killed.

Armenia’s high command has ordered all troops throughout the country to muster and report to their bases: “I invite the soldiers appointed in the forces to appear before their military commissions in the regions,” a statement said.

Armenia’s military has released footage of significant tank warfare in progress. The below is said to be Armenian army forces destroying Azerbaijani tanks:

And here’s more from Sunday’s fighting:

The recent conflict hearkens back to 2016, but before that to post-Soviet times. Christian Armenia and Muslim Azerbaijan fought a war at that time in which at least 200 people were killed over Armenian ethnic breakaway Nagorno Karabakh, which declared independence in 1991, despite being internationally recognized as within Azerbaijan territory.

The first war for the territory finished in 1994, but the region has been militarized since, amid sporadic shelling. 

A new footage by Azerbaijan that shows further drone attacks against the Armenian positions pic.twitter.com/pWJJd2JX9z

— Ragıp Soylu (@ragipsoylu) September 27, 2020

Dozens of civilians have already been injured Sunday in the major flare-up of fighting, as CNN reports:

While Armenia said it was responding to missile attacks launched by its neighbor Sunday, Azerbaijan blamed Armenia for the clashes.

In response to the alleged firing of projectiles by Azerbaijan, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan tweeted that his country had “shot down 2 helicopters & 3 UAVs, destroyed 3 tanks.”

Multiple dramatic battlefield videos are circulating on social media confirming the large-scale deployment of tanks, artillery units, and airpower. Multiple Azerbaijani soldiers have been reported killed, but it’s as yet unclear what casualty numbers could be.

Turkey’s role in new fighting is attracting scrutiny. Its foreign ministry blamed Armenia and called for it to halt military operations, however, it hardly appears to be a mere outside or ‘neutral’ observer, given new widespread reports Turkey has transferred ‘Syrian rebel’ units to join the fighting on Azerbaijan’s side.

There’ve been reports over the past week that NATO’s second largest army has been shipping its SNA Syria “rebel” proxies to Azerbaijan for a planned attack on Armenians. Turkey just can’t leave Armenia alone, 100 years after its genocide. https://t.co/cNoEDJxsnQ

— Mark Ames (@MarkAmesExiled) September 27, 2020

These reports of Turkish supplied Syrian mercenaries began days ago, in what regional analysts predicted would be a huge escalation in hostilities in the Caucuses. 

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan late in the day slammed Turkey’s meddling in the conflict. Ankara had called Armenia “an obstacle” to peace after the fresh hostilities broke out. Yerevan has now formally confirmed Turkey is supplying fighters.

Given the number of vital oil and gas infrastructure facilities and pipelines in the region, impact on global markets could be seen as early as Monday.

Clashes erupted between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the volatile Nagorno-Karabakh region, reigniting concern about instability in the South Caucasus, a corridor for pipelines transporting oil and gas to world markets https://t.co/tVxDtV3zZb pic.twitter.com/bmBh5EzLBZ

— Reuters (@Reuters) September 27, 2020

“At least 16 military and several civilians were killed on Sunday in the heaviest clashes between Armenia and Azerbaijan since 2016, reigniting concern about stability in the South Caucasus, a corridor for pipelines carrying oil and gas to world markets,” Reuters reports.

Azerbaijan has also declared an official state of martial law while clashes between the armies are unfolding. 

Meanwhile footage has emerged showing Armenia’s nationwide mustering of its national and reserve forces: 

Video of people across Armenia lining up to mobilize to the front lines as people continue to be drafted and recruited.

#Azerbaijan #Armenia
[Knish] pic.twitter.com/QofZtFh3PB

— Aurora Intel (@AuroraIntel) September 27, 2020

Unverified footage of frontline fighting into the night:

#Armenia
• 16 Armenians have been killed, 100+ injured
• State of emergency, general mobilisation of the population declared #Azerbaijan:
• 7 villages captured from Armenia
• A state of war and curfews have been declared.#AzerbaijanIsNotAlone pic.twitter.com/XwPRDZCGTb

— Islamic Services Intelligence (@WorldOfIsI) September 27, 2020

“Pipelines shipping Caspian oil and natural gas from Azerbaijan to the world pass close to Nagorno-Karabakh,” Reuters reports. “Armenia also warned about security risks in the South Caucasus in July after Azerbaijan threatened to attack Armenia’s nuclear power plant as possible retaliation.”

The fighting is expected to grow fiercer along front lines in the disputed region into the night as the prospect of a full ‘state of war’ is looming between the historic rivals. 

Overnight, China’s National Bureau of Statistics reported that profits at Chinese industrial enterprises remained surprisingly resilient in August, rising 19.1% from a year ago if moderating fractionally from the 19.6% y/y surge in July, as Beijing telegraphs that China’s factories maintained momentum following the pandemic shutdown. Profit margin for industrial companies increased further in August compared to one year ago. By industry, data suggest upstream industries’ profit growth outperformed downstream industries in August.

Here are the main highlights:

• China’s industrial profits grew 19.1% year-over-year in August, moderating marginally from 19.6% in July. In month-over-month non-annualized terms, profits fell 1.6% in August.
• On a year-over-year basis, upstream industries’ profit growth outperformed downstream industries in August. Downstream industries’ profit growth moderated to +16.9% yoy in August (vs. 28.7% yoy in July) while upstream industries’ profit growth accelerated to +31.0% yoy (vs. +4.6% yoy in July). By major industry, profit of general equipment manufacturing rose 37% yoy (vs. 26% yoy in July) and electrical machinery and equipment rose 13.3% yoy (vs. 8.1% yoy in July). Automobile manufacturing profits remained relatively solid and rose 55.9% yoy in August, though moderating from 102.5% yoy in July. The decline in profits of mining sectors narrowed meaningfully to -11.9% yoy in August from -40.6% yoy in July, on the back of rising commodity prices and demand recovery.

In a statement accompanying the data release, the NBS said that the increase was due to factors including the continued recovery of production and demand as well as falling costs and fees for companies. The bureau also pointed to a recovery in mining industry profitability and rapid growth in profits for equipment manufacturers.

However, as usual when it comes to Chinese ‘data’, there were several key question marks in the report – which was quite flattering for Xi Jinping in the ongoing cold war with Trump – that put the validity of the data in question:

• For one, industrial revenue growth remains stagnant, and while total industrial revenue growth accelerated to +4.9% yoy, from +3.3% yoy in July, it was nowhere near the surge in profits. In the absence of top-line growth, the continued surge in profits was entirely contingent on rising margins (total profits divided by revenues), which expanded to 6.9% in August (vs. 6.1% in the same period last year), contributing to the solid growth in total profits. How China is managing such dramatic profit margin expansion without mass layoffs, and in a time when supply chain transformations should be crushing margins remains a great unknown.

Secondly, and casting even further doubt on the data’s credibility, is that the jump in Industrial Profits comes at a time when China’s so-called gate inflation, i.e., Producer Prices, which is critical in determining pricing power for local companies and is thus a key driver for industrial profits, remains solidly negative. In fact, after tracking PPI lower for the past three years, Industrial profits magically surged starting in April, even as producer prices continued to sink. As a result, the current divergence between Industrial Profits and PPI is the widest it has ever been.

This decoupling between the two traditionally closely-correlated data sets suggests three things:

• i) Chinese PPI will jump in the coming months as rising prices are a critical component to validate the jump in both industrial margins and profits, leading to a broader reflationary wave spilling out of China and washing across the rest of the world.
• ii) the spike in Industrial profits has been a one-off outlier, resulting from the recent surge in local credit creation which has seen trillions of dollar in new credit creation since the covid pandemic struck, and once Beijing eases back on the throttle, profits will tumble.

• iii) the Chinese data is (and has been) fake, and remains goalseeked for the political benefit of Xi Jinping who is eager to show that his handling of the covid pandemic has been more successful than that of Trump, resulting in a faster return to economic normalcy. Stripping away the populist veneer however sparks even more questions: as a reminder, back in 2018 we showed a staggering gap between official government industrial profits “data” and micro data in absolute terms: a divergence that could only be explained away with even more Beijing data fraud (see “More Fraud Exposed In Chinese Official Econ Data“).

One final reason why the official Chinese “data” is especially suspect, is that Goldman’s latest China real-time activity tracker showed a sharp drop in industrial activity in the past month, just the opposite of what the official data suggests.

Of course, if China has devolved to once again simply fabricating core economic data, that makes the lives of traders and strategists especially difficult since much hope for a global reflation wave has come from the recent surge in China’s credit impulse which leads 10Y TSY yields with a 12 month lead. Unfortunately, if this impulse fails to affect China’s economy first and foremost, then it will make all bets that yields are set to jump in the next 6 months a very costly mistake.

Authored by David Limbaugh via PJMedia.com,

It’s getting scary out there, people. Everywhere you turn, Trump haters are venting their wrath against Trump supporters, as if supporting President Trump is an unforgivable sin.

They’re projecting and gaslighting – blaming Trump and his supporters for everything they’re doing.

It’s madness, but at long last, they might have awakened the sleeping giant they’re trying to hunt down and destroy.

MSNBC’s Joy Reid tweeted, “Genuine question: what will be the relationship between the majority of Americans, and Trumpists after this long, national nightmare ends — and it will eventually end — do people anticipate simply letting bygones (be) bygones with people who joined the Trump personality cult?”

What bygones? Who’s doing what to whom? What are we Trump supporters doing to you Trump haters, Joy? We are trying to mind our own business and stay safe. Are you and yours?

MSNBC’s Donny Deutsch likened a Trump rally to a Hitler rally from the early ’30s: “Well, basically you had a destruction of the belief in the free press. You had a blurring between the executive branch and the Justice Department. You have creating an other, whether it’s Muslims, whether it’s Mexicans, whether it’s congressmen who weren’t born in this country. And then you have the destruction of free elections. And we’re here.”

This is screaming insanity.

• Trump supporters aren’t censoring people on social media.

• They aren’t threatening their opponents’ civil liberties.

• They aren’t violating the separation of powers, which leftists routinely do, including through their activist courts and lawless executive orders (under former President Barack Obama).

• They’re not demonizing other races, as you maliciously accuse. Quit belching that vicious slander.

• And they are not the ones threatening the integrity of the electoral process.

The left, on the other hand, has promised:

• to stack the Supreme Court;

• add territories to the union to increase its electoral prospects;

• circumvent the Electoral College;

• obliterate the integrity of the voting process through rampant unverifiable mail-in ballots and the elimination of voter ID rules;

• and lower the voting age to 16.

Republicans aren’t the ones threatening to lawlessly invoke impeachment to block Trump’s lawful Supreme Court nominee.

Increasingly deranged, intolerant, hateful, and unhinged actor-turned-artist Jim Carrey said, “Too many Americans support Trump because he appeals to their basest and most primitive urges.”

This is a direct indictment of millions of Trump supporters — many of whom have been your fans. Tell me, Jim: What base and primitive urges do you mean? Our commitment to the Constitution, law and order, equal protection under the law for everyone, liberty, prosperity, and a strong national defense? Protecting the borders to ensure orderly and legal immigration? Are these commitments racist and sexist to you, Jim? If you really believe that, you are obviously blinded into irrationality by your hatred and need of therapy and prayer. Please get the tree trunk out of your own eye. In the meantime, sketch a picture of your own dark heart.

And how about the now-famous Leo Guinan, who publicly bragged that he told his parents neither he nor his children would visit them because they had placed Trump signs in their yard. After receiving blowback for this self-indulgent and heartless act, he publicly apologized.

We have obnoxious leftist “protestors” in St. Petersburg, Florida, taking over peaceful diners’ tables from restaurant to restaurant, ratcheting up the despicable practice they began a few years ago to harass Trump supporters.

And, once again, we have violent leftists rioting in the streets of Louisville, where two policemen were shot trying to keep the peace.

How can things be more surreal? I’ll say it again: The left is projecting its own darkness onto Trump and his supporters. Countless leftists accuse Trump of inciting violence and hate while displaying their own intolerance and hatred and committing violence. Trump is trying to stop the violence, while Democratic governors and mayors are fanning the flames.

Fair-minded Democrats, please don’t fool yourself into rationalizing that these things are happening equally on both sides of the aisle. It simply is not true. And don’t fall into the insidious trap of Trump Derangement Syndrome, which now possesses large swaths of Americans because of the left’s concerted effort to smear Trump and his supporters as racists for political gain.

How many Trump supporters are burning down cities, murdering cops, threatening mayhem if Joe Biden is elected, bullying Biden supporters out of restaurants, accosting people with Biden caps or yard signs, threatening to withhold their children from their Biden-supporting parents, and stirring up racial disharmony throughout the nation? When have Republican lawmakers ever tried to destroy the character of a Democratic president’s Supreme Court nominee?

Yes, Republicans say they’re ready to defend themselves, but I know of none who are threatening to commit violence and mayhem if Trump loses.

I don’t know how people can be so warped as to condemn Trump for allegedly inspiring violence simply because they don’t like him, when they themselves are actually committing violence or enabling those who are. I don’t know how they can rage against Trump as a dictator when he is doing nothing but exercising his lawful authority in office and appointing justices who will uphold the Constitution and rule of law, and when they are openly promising to thwart the Constitution in countless ways if they regain power. Notwithstanding the planted trick question, Trump will not resist the peaceable transition of power, but he might legally contest a stolen election. Meanwhile, prominent Democrats are promising not to accept a Trump victory — just like they never accepted his 2016 victory.

No, Joy Reid, we Trump supporters are not part of a cult, no matter how much Trump haters have convinced themselves otherwise. But we do see him as the last best hope to restore America’s greatness — and that includes liberty, peace, and security for all, not just for those who agree with us, unlike many on your side believe. We are relying on him to lawfully prevent the left’s destruction of the nation, its violence and lawlessness, and its abolition of liberty.

God save the republic.

Days after New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio warned about emerging outbreaks in Queens and Brooklyn, advising the city that they demanded “urgent attention”, the city’s principal’s unions have joined together in calling for a vote of no confidence in the bumbling mayor, and for Hizzoner to cede control of the city’s schools to the state (aka, to de Blasio’s archrival, Gov. Cuomo).

Leaders of the city’s principals unions unanimously passed the vote of no confidence in the mayor. School administrators are calling for the mayor to give up control until the pandemic has been brought to heel via a vaccine, something that’s not expected until next year.

The votes comes just days before NYC schools are set to return to classrooms on a part-time basis.

Groups of restaurant owners are suing the city for threatening their livelihoods with its enduring ban on indoor dining, which is expected to continue possibly through the winter. It’s been reported that 90% of NYC restaurants didn’t pay rent last month.

Anger against de Blasio has been mounting since the mayor allegedly ignored the advice of a group of teachers and administrators who issued recommendations to city hall about how the crisis should be handled.

Among the major issues: the need to hire more teachers to compensate for a shortage for the upcoming school year. When Mayor de Blasio claimed during a press briefing earlier this month that the staffing shortage had only just become clear, many union leaders took it as a slap in the face.

A rebellion against the mayor’s office is also motivated in part by the fact that the administrator’s have political leverage in Albany. After all, the city’s schools have operated under what is called “mayoral control” since 2002, when Mayor Bloomberg convinced state lawmakers to abolish the 32 elected community boards that ran the city’s schools, resulting in a series of patronage-mill fiefdoms. There was also a central Board of Education with two members who were picked by the mayor and five by borough presidents. Unions, or at least their leaders, have some incentive for trying to revert back to the old system, under which they had more power since the mayor didn’t have as much leverage. Most other cities have school boards that control decisions made by the chancellor. NYC doesn’t.

“There are no easy answers…but the failure here has been a failure to anticipate the obvious,” one former NYC principal told WSJ.

Former Deutsche Bank AG traders Cedric Chanu and James Vorley were convicted for manipulating gold and silver prices on Friday after three days of deliberation by a Federal jury in Chicago.

The two were accused of making fake trade orders between 2008 and 2013 to influence the prices of precious metals. Their trial was a week long and was the first of its kind since 2010, according to Bloomberg. 

The convictions come as the result of a crackdown on “spoofing”, placing orders with no intention of executing them, in order to move the price of the underlying product. Spoofing works by fooling the market into thinking there are more bids or offers than are legitimately there. It has been illegal since 2010’s Dodd-Frank act.

Chanu and Vorley were said to have “weaponized” this tactic to mislead other traders, according to prosecutor Brian Young. The traders knew what they were doing, the prosecution argued, with Vorley even writing in a message to Chanu at one point: “This spoofing is annoying me. It’s illegal for a start.”

A co-worker at Deutsche Bank acted as witness during the trial and told the jury that Chanu and Vorley taught him how to manipulate prices by spoofing. The defendants didn’t call any witnesses but instead raised the issue of how difficult it was to try and prove criminal intent for “spoofing” in competitive global markets. 

“If you fake a pass and run the ball, that’s competition, not fraud,” Vorley’s lawyer said. 

Chanu was convicted on seven counts of fraud and Vorley was convicted of three counts. They were found not guilty on charges of conspiracy. The government has said they are going to seek about four or five years of jail for each person. Vorley said he will appeal and that he was trading “well within the law”.

Vorley’s lawyer said: “It was a compromise verdict by a jury that three times declared it was deadlocked, deliberating in the face of a Covid scare. The record is clear there was no fraud. The compromise conviction will not stand.”

Chanu’s attorney said he was “gratified that the jury unanimously acquitted Cedric on the conspiracy and other charges, and we intend to continue the fight as to the remaining charges.”

Via AlMasdarNews.com,

Iran has defied the U.S. threats and sanctions by increasing their oil shipments in the month of September, Reuters reported on Friday, citing details from TankerTrackers.

Details from TankerTrackers and two other unnamed firms revealed that the exports are rising, “although the figures fall into a wide range of between 400,000 bpd and 1.5 million bpd, reflecting the difficulty in tracking the shipments.”

“Exports are way up right now. We are seeing close to 1.5 million bpd in both crude and condensate so far this month,” Samir Madani, co-founder of TankerTrackers, told Reuters.

The TankerTrackers data showed Iran’s oil exports for the month of September are double the numbers from August.

Exports have shrunk from over 2.5 million barrels per day (bpd) since the United States withdrew from a nuclear deal with Iran and reimposed sanctions in 2018. Still, Iran has been working to get around the measures and keep exports flowing.

Data from TankerTrackers and two other firms, who asked not to be named, indicated exports are rising in September, although the figures fall into a wide range of between 400,000 bpd and 1.5 million bpd, reflecting the difficulty in tracking the shipments. — Reuters

“Data from TankerTrackers, which tracks shipments and oil storage, showed almost half of Iranian exports were picked up by foreign vessels via ship-to-ship transfers, making it difficult to determine final destinations,” Reuters added.

TankerTrackers noted further, “These are levels we haven’t seen in a year and a half.”

The rise in oil exports comes at a time of time of increased turmoil between the United States and Iran, as both nations have repeatedly exchanged diplomatic attacks in the international arena.

President Trump has again pointed attention to Joe Biden’s apparent slowness from ageing, or even the possibility of dementia, ahead of Tuesday night’s debate, calling on Biden to agree to take a ‘test’.

In a Sunday morning tweet Trump specifically demanded “a Drug Test of Sleepy Joe Biden prior to, or after, the Debate on Tuesday night” which the president said he would undergo as well. In the past the demands have been focused on mental fitness tests, however.

Trump suggested that given prior instances of the seeming inability of Biden to speak well and coherently in fielding random media questions (especially when there’s no teleprompter), those instances where he speaks articulately must be due to drugs.

I will be strongly demanding a Drug Test of Sleepy Joe Biden prior to, or after, the Debate on Tuesday night. Naturally, I will agree to take one also. His Debate performances have been record setting UNEVEN, to put it mildly. Only drugs could have caused this discrepancy???

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 27, 2020

The president questioned: 

His Debate performances have been record setting UNEVEN, to put it mildly. Only drugs could have caused this discrepancy???

Meanwhile The New York Times on Sunday acknowledged that recent Trump campaign claims of Biden lacking proper mental acuity to lead the nation will be to some degree affirmed or ultimately disproven Tuesday night:

President Trump has framed the first general election debate as a test for his opponent, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.

Yet he has simultaneously set the bar so low for so long that many of his supporters — having watched unflattering, often manipulated clips of Mr. Biden in Trump campaign advertisements or on Fox News — are now expecting the president to mop the floor with an incoherent opponent in something resembling a W.W.E. match.

Democrats — and even some Republicans — believe that is not likely to happen.

The Trump campaign has been seizing on Biden’s series of gaffes and momentary melt-downs in simple presentations of his points, which sometimes appear due to confusion or not really knowing what he’s saying (or reading off a screen):

Joe Biden: “It’s estimated that 200 million people will die, probably by the time I finish this talk.”

That’s nearly 2/3 of the U.S. population. pic.twitter.com/lp23K11K3o

— Trump War Room – Text TRUMP to 88022 (@TrumpWarRoom) September 20, 2020

Broadly, it’s unfortunate that this is where we now are in American politics — essentially having to weigh whether a candidate is mentally present enough to participate in a debate and take the highest office in the land, with the other throwing out accusations of drug use. 

* * *

And there’s always this option…

Drugs should be administered to both candidates in equal doses, live and before opening statements, by someone with expertise – like the road manager of a metal band. https://t.co/vFwLf4jbpc

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) September 27, 2020

Authored by L.Brent Bozell III via The American Mind,

A fact-check solution to a constitutional crisis…

The war between conservatives and Silicon Valley is on. The scions of social media are no longer hiding their disdain for an entire movement. They know the outcome of this high-stakes presidential election could jeopardize their rule over the American people and unmake the oligarchy they’ve built with the rest of the ruling class. If we are to save the republic, we must realize this too—and act.

Tens of millions of individual users who dare question leftist orthodoxy are being targeted and silenced by Big Tech. There are no limits on who they censor, including the President of the United States.

That’s why the Media Research Center is fighting back with the Free Speech Alliance, which includes over 70 groups and The Claremont Institute. We also just released our database effort to document the bias at CensorTrack.org.

One key weapon being deployed to punish conservatives is the so-called “fact check.” It’s being used to censor thousands of conservatives communicating with millions of followers. It’s happened tens of thousands of times, and it’s getting worse. Facebook is one of the worst offenders.

Facebook, with 2.7 billion users, is dramatically skewed to the left in its fact-checking operation. It now has an international “Oversight Committee” dominated by George Soros-funded entities that make a mockery of unbiased review. Citizens wanting to rally in support of reopening the country have been banned because some public gatherings in some states are forbidden. Antifa, however, thrives largely unchecked and unchallenged as it riots in the streets and harasses members of Congress in their homes.

Conservatives have made good-faith attempts to resolve these many conflicts, but to no avail.

Covid-19 has sent social media sites into censorship overdrive. If you disagree with the social media prescription for the virus, you are silenced. Ask the president, or his son, or countless doctors.

Social media censorship is the most direct threat to free speech worldwide coming from the most powerful companies in the history of man. As a consequence, some conservatives are actively supporting the effort to strip from these social media giants the Section 230 protections that they certainly have abused.

Just like newspapers such as The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal, these social media giants need to be held legally accountable for content on their own sites. But 230 protects companies from lawsuits when publishing the content of others. This has given Big Tech firms like Facebook the power to block conservatives from the public conversation while encouraging hate-filled, dishonest speech toward conservatives—all with virtual impunity.

Taking Action

U.S. Senators Roger Wicker (R., MI), Lindsey Graham (R., SC), and Marsha Blackburn (R., TN) have proposed legislation that “would clarify the original intent of the law and increase accountability for content moderation practices.”

Others, including 51 state attorneys general, are exploring antitrust remedies to break the monopolies and allow competition that might embrace free speech.

These are very encouraging steps in the right direction.

But there might be an easier solution to resolve at least part of the problem: let’s fix fact-checking.

Silicon Valley, its allies in the “old” media, and the academy are the ones clamoring for fact-checking, not the public.

There’s no market demand for any corporate fact-checking. None.

This is not to suggest that social media sites shouldn’t be monitored, and restrictions placed on them. But those restrictions should be imposed only where absolutely necessary and legally required in cases of criminal activity, terrorism, and pornography.

That should be the full extent of Big Tech’s direct involvement in the fact-checking process.

Let the public make the call: allow them to opt in to fact-checking.

We offer a simple framework.

1. Create a Social Media Charter: A task force would produce a simple document outlining what can and will be banned by the social media community. Every company will be asked to sign the charter.

2. Demand Equal Fact-Checkers: Each social media company would recruit a set number of official fact-checkers—say, ten. These fact-checkers would run the political gamut and share in valuing true diversity of thought. For every leftist enterprise there would be a conservative alternative. Any existing “fact-checking” operations would need to disclose their true bias. Pure objectivity does not exist.

3. Insist on Transparency: Each fact-checking organization would be required to fill out a Transparency Statement, to include the organization’s official mission statement and describe all other organizational activities, political affiliations, sources of major funding and the qualifications of all staff participating in their operation.

4. Pay Fact-Checkers: As cable companies do with C-SPAN, so too would the social media giants fund these fact-checking organizations as a public service. Fact-checkers would be paid their salaries a year in advance, just as ombudsmen are, to mitigate against any possible interference.

5. Publicize Options: Social media companies would prominently list the names of all fact-checkers and encourage their audiences to read them.

6. Track Actions: Social media companies would agree to maintain a public log of all disciplinary action taken by the companies against users, be they personal or corporate.

7. Impose Biannual Oversight: A blue-ribbon “Oversight Board” would be convened biannually to review these fact-checkers. If the Oversight Board determined a fact-checker’s record to be unacceptable, it could terminate the contract while recruiting a similar replacement.

8. Limit Fact-checks: Fact-checks wouldn’t be used to shut down, suspend, or in any other way discipline users or organizations. They would be attached to stories for the users who opted in. They would provide additional information, not censor by dictate.

This will naturally require tweaking, but the outline ought to provide satisfaction for all parties. Social media sites will become self-policing communities; freedom of speech will be guaranteed, warts and all; conservatives will have the assurance they are no longer being targeted for censorship; and the reasons for legal or legislative action against these social media giants will be minimized, if not negated altogether.

In other words, one piece of the debate just might be resolved by the private sector, for the private sector. And maybe liberals will get back to defending free speech, as they once did.

Some times, people just can’t catch a break.

Such was the case of Argentinian lawmaker Juan Emilio Ameri, who has resigned after getting caught on a live camera pulling down his girlfriend’s top to kiss her newly enhanced breasts.

Ameri sat through parts of a virtual session of congress seemingly unaware that his camera was turned on, but well aware that he was turned on, with a woman sitting on his lap. At one point, he pulled down part of the woman’s shirt and exposed her breast, before kissing it, according to the Post.

Ameri thought he was off camera because his internet had gone down several times and admitted his girlfriend recently had her breasts enhanced.

He said:

 “I saw that my partner came out of the bathroom and I asked how she was, due to the operation. At that moment she sat with me and I kissed her on the breast without realizing that the connection had returned.”

And that was your first mistake, Juan.

He continued:

 “It was a moment of intimacy with my partner that leaked. It was serious, really, I take charge and I am very ashamed. I am very distressed by what is happening.”

“I apologize to the citizens, to my family, to my partner, for all this situation. I want to apologize to my mother, my sisters, my daughters, with whom I have not yet spoken,” he continued.

The session was then interrupted by House president Sergio Massa, who called it a “serious offense” and suspended Ameri for 180 days. Ameri resigned shortly thereafter, stating: “It was serious, really. I take responsibility. I’m very ashamed.”