Month: March 2024

Authored by John Mac Ghlionn via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

In “All the Rebel Women: The Rise of the Fourth Wave of Feminism,“ the author, Kira Cochrane, suggested that this particular wave of feminism ”isn’t about making everyone around the table feel comfortable.”

“It’s about being disruptive, challenging, and changing the terms of the debate,” Ms. Cochrane said.

What debate is she referencing? One that largely revolves around men. More specifically, how toxic they have become. Not surprisingly, many men (and women) haven’t taken too kindly to this particular narrative. Young men are especially repulsed, and so they should be.

Last year, a report titled “The State of American Men 2023: From Confusion and Crisis to Hope” found that more than half of young males believe that men have it harder today than women. The report further unveiled significant levels of contempt for modern-day feminism, especially among male members of Generation Z. Yes, some in the “wokest” generation in the history of mankind are actively rejecting a core ingredient of wokeness. And who can blame them? Feminism, in its most current form, specializes in the demonization of masculinity. It regularly equates men with trash.

Some feminists would have us believe that men, especially straight, white men, are a danger to society, one that must be addressed and, in some cases, attacked.

Common sense (remember when it was a little more common?) tells us that if you keep bashing, berating, and belittling an entire group of individuals—or, in this case, half the country’s population—a response is inevitable.

A recent survey out of King’s College London clearly demonstrates this fact. On both sides of the Atlantic, it seems, millions of Gen Z men have had enough of feminist-friendly narratives.

Interestingly, however, the survey revealed that older males, when compared to younger generations, have a greater inclination toward progressive and feminist perspectives. In short, Gen Z males are more inclined than older baby boomers to believe that feminism has had a negative impact on broader society. In the UK, for example, one out of every four males aged 16 to 29 believes that being a man is more challenging than being a woman.

This data sharply contrast with the prevailing perception of men today in comparison to their “pale, stale, and male” predecessors. The research indicates that the general public tends to assume that it would be the oldest group of men who believe that women have already achieved sufficient equality. However, this assumption is clearly incorrect. Approximately 20 percent of Gen Z males believe that being a man will be significantly more difficult than being a woman in the next two decades, echoing the sentiments of young men in the United States. In contrast, this sentiment drops to only 9 percent for males older than the age of 60.

As the survey points out, when considering the age group of 16 to 29, 46 percent of women in this category believe that feminism has had a more beneficial impact on society than harm. This percentage is 10 points higher than the proportion of young men who share the same perspective (36 percent). Moreover, the survey notes that “among this age group, one in six (16%) men say feminism has done more harm than good, compared with one in 11 (9%) women.”

What is going on here? Why are so many Gen Z males—again, on both sides of the pond—rejecting feminist-friendly ideologies?

According to the academics responsible for the surprising survey, it may have something to do with the rise of Andrew Tate, a controversial, American British influencer who, in recent times, has become popular. A fifth of the Gen Z men surveyed hold a favorable view of Mr. Tate, who has a huge following in both the UK and the United States.

On a recent episode of “Real Time With Bill Maher,” social psychologist Jean Twenge discussed Mr. Tate, suggesting that his influence has had—and continues to have—an impact on young men. In particular, Ms. Twenge suggested that Mr. Tate’s influence has contributed to Gen Z males’ rejection of left-wing politics.

However, CNN’s Van Jones was quick to push back, arguing that this particular form of rejection has less to do with the pull of Mr. Tate and considerably more to do with the push of the left; to be more specific, the left’s effort, be it conscious or otherwise, to push young men away. Mr. Maher agreed with Mr. Jones, saying that just being a man today is considered “a little suspect.”

It’s important to note that being a man, in both the UK and the United States, was considered “a little suspect” long before Mr. Tate shot to fame. Sure, he was the most Googled man in the world in 2022, but prior to this, most people were not familiar with his philosophies and overall mindset. Even The Guardian, no fan of Mr. Tate, conceded that he should be viewed as a “symptom” of a much broader problem.

Commenting on the abovementioned survey, professor Rosie Campbell, director of the Global Institute for Women’s Leadership at King’s College London, said:

“This data shows it’s not just young men’s attitudes that stand out. For example, young women are much more likely than any other group to think ‘toxic masculinity’ is a helpful term, and are most pessimistic about the prospect of future progress on gender equality.”

Let that percolate for a minute: Young women are “most pessimistic” about the future of gender equality and consider “toxic masculinity”—a truly heinous term—to be helpful.

From Birmingham, Alabama, to Birmingham, England, name one thing men are allowed to do that women are not. If you find yourself scratching your head, struggling to think of an answer, that’s because there’s nothing to name. Gender equality already exists, but young women, many of whom are blinded by illogical ideologies, can’t separate the facts from fictitious narratives.

Moreover, the term “toxic masculinity,” which was around a long time before Mr. Tate took the world by storm, is in no way constructive. On the contrary, it only serves to demonize an inescapable part of being a man. There was a time, not that long ago, when being a man and exhibiting masculine traits was something worth celebrating. However, in both the UK and the United States, those days appear to be long gone. To compound matters, the ideological divide between Gen Z men and women is fast becoming a gaping chasm.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or ZeroHedge.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) confirmed on Tuesday another rare strike conducted deep into Lebanese territory. The strikes targeted “a military compound used by Hezbollah’s aerial unit” in the Baalbek District which is in the northeast of the country.

This marks the deepest Israeli strike inside Lebanon since the war began in the wake of the Oct.7 Hamas terror attack, at more than 110km from Israel’s border.

The extent of casualties or damage remains unclear, but it follows a similar February strike on the Bekaa Valley some 100km from the Israeli border, which killed at least two people. There are growing fears that if such strikes become more regular, it will signify a bigger regional war could be opening up.

Hezbollah has lobbed several missiles against northern Israeli communities as well as the IDF base atop Mount Meron over the past days. The Mount Meron surveillance base is about 8km from the Lebanese border and has come under repeat attack over several months.

In the overnight and early morning hours there were also large-scale strikes against areas of eastern Syria. While Israel frequently attacks Syria, some Syrian government-affiliated sources laid blame on the United States. According to regional outlet The Cradle: 

Airstrikes targeted a number of areas in Syria’s eastern city of Deir Ezzor and its countryside on 26 March, resulting in numerous deaths and injuries. “At 1:49 AM, American aircraft carried out several simultaneous air strikes targeting a number of areas in the governorate and its countryside,” Syria’s government-affiliated National Defense Forces (NDF) said, according to Sputnik.

The strikes targeted the Salhiya area in Al-Bukamal near the Iraqi border and residential areas in the Al-Mayadin and Al-Qusour areas in Deir Ezzor. 

But Israeli media has identified the IDF air force as behind the eastern Syria attack, reportedly targeting ‘pro-Iran’ assets. According to details in The Times of Israel:

The Israeli Air Force carried out airstrikes in the predawn hours of Tuesday morning in eastern Syria, targeting Iranian assets and operatives involved in a recent plot to smuggle advanced arms to West Bank terrorists, The Times of Israel has learned.

More than 15 people were reportedly killed in the strikes in the Deir Ezzor and al-Bukamal areas, close to Syria’s border with Iraq.

The strikes targeted assets belonging to Iran’s Unit 4000, the Special Operations Division of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps’ Intelligence Organization, and the special operations unit of the IRGC’s Quds Force in Syria, known as Unit 18840, according to Israeli defense sources.

Various international reports have cited different casualty figures, but what is clear is that there were a series of large airstrikes. Iranian media said a Revolutionary Guard member was killed in Syria overnight.

Below: Israeli strikes in northeast Lebanon…

غارة عنيفة على بوداي في #بعلبك pic.twitter.com/FM7WQptCze

— kataeb.org (@kataeb_Ar) March 26, 2024

According to The Associated Press, civilians were among the dead, including women, children, and a World Health Organization (WHO) official: 

Dama Post, a pro-government media outlet in Syria, said the strikes targeted the provincial capital of Deir el-Zour that carries the same name, and the towns of Mayadeen and Boukamal. It said 20 people, including women and children, were among the dead.

The World Health Organization said one of its team members, engineer Emad Shehab, was killed in one of the strikes that hit his building. It said Shehab, 42, served as a WHO focal point for water, sanitation, and hygiene in the province since 2022.

Iran-linked insurgent attacks against US bases in Iraq and Syria have mostly quieted down of late, compared to their frequency and weekly occurrence last year in the wake of Oct.7.

In the meantime, any potential scenario where Israel were to move ground troops into southern Lebanon would likely spark a bigger war with Hezbollah, which could engulf all of Lebanon.

Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

After a New York court reduced former President Donald Trump’s bond to appeal his civil fraud case, several legal analysts weighed in on the decision.

On Monday, a state appeals court agreed to hold off collection of the former president’s more than $454 million civil fraud judgment if he puts up $175 million within 10 days. If he does, it will stop the clock on collection and prevent the state from seizing the presumptive Republican presidential nominee’s assets while he appeals.

Greg Germain, a law professor at Syracuse University in New York, said that President Trump may have a strong case to challenge Judge Arthur Engoron’s ruling in February that he must pay $455 million in his civil fraud case.

“I think the $175 million reduction … shows that the appellate division has serious concerns about the validity of Judge Engoron’s decision,” Mr. Germain told Newsweek.

While he believes the judgment was “seriously flawed,” the professor said that President Trump will have a difficult time overturning the judge’s “findings that his financial statement was grossly overstated.”

“The standard for the appeals court to review factual findings is ‘clearly erroneous,’ which means that there was no evidence in the record to support the judge’s findings. Engoron was very careful to cite to the record for his factual findings, which were very solid,” Mr. Germain said.

But the judge, he added, “made no attempt to determine what portion of the profit was solely due to the financial statement as opposed to other factors” before handing down his ruling.

The former president “has some strong legal arguments to make on appeal,” Mr. Germain added. “Unfortunately for him, I think he’s so focused on denying that he did anything wrong that the strong legal arguments may be lost in his unwinnable arguments on the facts.”

The former president has said he did nothing wrong, adding that he actually undervalued his net worth when communicating with banks and insurers at the center of the civil fraud lawsuit. He said that the case is politically motivated, and that both the New York attorney general and Judge Engoron are biased against him.

Meanwhile, a constitutional scholar said that the bond for an appeal should be been reduced to basically nothing.

“The Court of Appeals may have felt that they can’t prejudge the evidence, and so to reduce the bond further would have been heavy-handed,” George Washington University professor Jonathan Turley told Fox News on Monday. “I actually think they could have reduced this bond to virtually nothing, because the amount set by [Judge Arthur] Engoron was absurd.”

In a post on social media, Mr. Turley wrote that the New York appellate court may “restore a degree of objectivity and restraint missing on the trial level,” referring to the Engoron decision. “Both Engoron and [New York Attorney General Letitia] James would have gained greater credibility if they recognized the obvious unreasonableness of the original demand,” he continued.

A former federal prosecutor now in private practice said that “judgments of this size are rare,” referring to the penalties imposed against President Trump. “What makes this one unusual is someone who is subject to an enormous amount of money and has to come up with it himself,” Joshua Naftalis said.

President Trump hailed the ruling and said he would post a bond, securities, or cash to cover the $175 million sum in the civil case. Ms. James’s office, meanwhile, noted that the judgment still stands, even if collection is paused.

Previously, the former president’s lawyers pleaded for a state appeals court to halt collection, claiming it was “a practical impossibility” to get an underwriter to sign off on a bond for such a large sum, which grows daily because of interest. The Trump attorneys had earlier proposed a $100 million bond, but an appellate judge had said no late last month.

Monday’s ruling came from a five-judge panel in the state’s intermediate appeals court, called the Appellate Division, where President Trump is fighting to overturn Judge Engoron’s Feb. 16 decision. Trump attorneys Alina Habba and Christopher Kise characterized Monday’s ruling as a key first step.

“We won,” Ms. Habba told Fox News on Monday. “You know, no … we didn’t win. You know when we’ll win? When we get this all reversed, which is what’s gonna happen.”

The Trump attorney added that she was “so proud” of the appeals court’s decision because it gave her “a little bit of faith” in the U.S. justice system.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

The Taiwanese armed forces on Tuesday conducted highly provocative anti-aircraft defense exercises in the face of Chinese military “intrusions” which have been occurring on a weekly basis. 

Importantly, the drills centered on deploying and operating US-made Patriot missiles and anti-aircraft artillery systems provided by Washington. 

A military statement said the drills are a response to “incursions by Chinese Communist Party aircraft and ships into the sea and airspace around Taiwan” and added that “the air force will continue to increase the intensity of drills.”

“The aim was to verify the command and control of joint air defense operations among the three branches of the military,” the armed forces described.

Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen has meanwhile ramped up defense spending, and attended a ceremony Tuesday for the handover of two domestically made warships at Suao port.

“Over the past few years, we have steadily implemented defense autonomy with Taiwan-made warships being named, launched, and commissioned one after another at an increasingly rapid pace,” Tsai announced at the event.

“These achievements repeatedly demonstrate Taiwan’s capacity for domestic shipbuilding and proves our determination to safeguard our democracy and freedom,” she added.

In the United States, lawmakers are taking steps to prepare for a potential future invasion by China’s military of the self-ruled island backed by the US.

“Fears of possible conflict across the Taiwan Strait are spurring state-level legislation aimed to identify and mitigate the potential local impact of hostilities,” Politico reported last weekend.

“Since the beginning of the year, lawmakers in Arizona, Nebraska and Illinois have introduced versions of the Pacific Conflict Stress Test Act — bills that impose checklists of potential local vulnerabilities in supply chains and infrastructure security if Beijing eventually uses force to ‘reunify’ with Taiwan,” the report said.

#Taiwan, M109A7 155 mm tracked self-propelled howitzers on the move and Patriot battery stations being set up. pic.twitter.com/KaovVd6m3X

— Globe Sentinel (@GlobeSentinels) March 18, 2024

The Chinese government, for its part, has long maintained that it desires the island to be reunited through peaceful, political means; however, at the same time frequent PLA military drills have projected the threat of force in regional waters.

Authored by Frank Miele via RealClear Politics,

I’m sure everyone has heard enough about President Biden’s recent State of the Union address, certainly enough to know that the mainstream media thought it was admirable of Biden to scream at the top of his lungs that Republicans are detestable worms.

You also probably heard enough from the media to be certain that Sen. Katie Britt, who delivered the response to Biden, is a lying, detestable Republican worm. But as humorist Will Rogers noted, if all you know is what you read in the newspapers (or in updated form, what you see on cable news), then you are woefully misinformed.

Take the media’s coverage of Biden’s extemporaneous remarks about the murder of Laken Riley that were prompted by a challenge from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.

First of all, Biden got Riley’s name wrong, twice calling her “Lincoln” Riley. That was embarrassing and drew attention to the cognitive issues Biden has exhibited throughout his first term. But somehow, the mainstream media glossed over that and quickly focused on an entirely manufactured “news” story that seemed intended to reassure Democrats that Biden wasn’t channeling Trump’s border rhetoric.

As everyone knows by now, Biden referred to the man arrested for Riley’s murder as an “illegal,” which angered members of the radical left “Squad,” who insisted that Jose Antonio Ibarra should properly be referred to as “undocumented.” This was just a silly moment of political correctness, as both words mean the same thing: Ibarra had no immigration documents because he was in the country illegally.

Yet the mainstream media went to great trouble to explain that Biden “regretted” using the word illegal. Chances are most of the Democrat-leaning reporters who cover the White House sympathized with the Squad and were happy to see Biden essentially apologizing for the word he used to describe the alleged murderer.

Much more importantly, the media’s attention on the linguistic sideshow meant that virtually no news outlet covered Biden’s truly offensive reference to Laken Riley’s murder in the State of the Union. Here’s exactly what he said.

BIDEN: Lincoln – Lincoln  Riley, an innocent young woman who was killed.

GREENE: By an illegal!

BIDEN: By an illegal. That’s right. But how many of thousands of people are being killed by legals?

Do you see what he did there in that last line? He minimizes and devalues the murder of Riley by suggesting that her life is not important when compared to the “many… thousands” of murders committed by legal immigrants or other Americans. This is the latest, albeit incredibly awkward, manifestation of a Democratic Party talking point: The immigrants commit fewer crimes than native-born Americans. The social science on this is sketchy, and in any event, it begs the question of how many more violent crime victims exist because of the Democrats’ lenient criminal justice “reforms.”

Leaving that aside, Biden’s rejoinder was offensive for another reason. We simply don’t dismiss the brutal murder of one person by proclaiming that it is statistically irrelevant. Each precious human life has untold value to God, as it should to presidents, and Laken Riley, a vibrant nursing student beloved by her family and friends, would still be alive if Biden and his political party had not made it easy for Ibarra to be in the country illegally.

It was another story about the human toll of illegal immigration that caused outrage in the media about Britt’s response to the State of the Union.

If you were to listen to the talking heads, Britt’s speech was the worst act of political suicide since Alexander Hamilton agreed to a duel with Aaron Burr. It was certainly one in a long line of responses that brought humiliation on a well-intended speaker. Britt’s performance was cringeworthy as she tried to emote rather than orate her response, and she was effectively reduced to a caricature in a brilliant performance by Scarlett Johansson on “Saturday Night Live.”

If the media hacks had simply gone after Britt because of her awkward delivery of a speech that reads fine on paper, they would have met no opposition from me. But with their usual overreach and partisan slant, the finest minds in journalism instead attacked Britt for what they called her “misleading” anecdote of sexual abuse suffered by women who depend on the Mexican cartels to get them across the border.

The story itself is quite short:

“When I first took office… I traveled to the Del Rio sector of Texas, where I spoke to a woman who shared her story with me. She had been sex trafficked by the cartels starting at age 12. She told me not just that she was raped every day, but how many times a day she was raped. The cartels put her on a mattress in a shoebox of a room, and they sent men through that door, over and over again, for hours and hours on end. We wouldn’t be OK with this happening in a third-world country. This is the United States of America, and it’s past time we start acting like it.”

When the media discovered the identity of the victim who spoke to Britt, they claimed that Britt had tried to make it seem like President Biden’s policies were responsible for the woman’s abuse. But if any reporter could pass a simple reading comprehension test, he or she would see that Britt talked to a full-grown woman who revealed what had happened to her when she was 12. Since Britt talked to her sometime after her own election in 2023, and assuming that the woman was of the bare minimum adult age of 18, that would mean her abuse would have occurred no later than 2017, four years before Joe Biden took office.

In other words, there was no attempt by Britt to blame Biden for this woman’s plight. Instead, she was hoping to elicit heart-felt sympathy from her audience for the plight of young women who fall victim to sex trafficking as they make their way to the U.S. border.

Who could disagree with her? Only Democrats and media personalities who hate Republicans and Donald Trump. The fact that Trump was supposedly eyeing Britt as a potential vice presidential pick probably made her an irresistible target.

Now, to be clear, there was one implicit error in the story Britt told. The abuse that Britt recounted actually took place in Mexico, and Britt’s reference to a “third-world country” suggests she didn’t know that. If so, that’s on her. It should have been obvious that most, but not all, of the sex trafficking of women making their way north from Colombia takes place before they arrive in the United States. But that is no reason to try to deflect attention away from the truth of what Britt was saying about the dangers facing women who are enticed north by Biden’s open-border policy.

Instead of condemning the cartels, however, the legacy media went after Britt. When she responded by explaining that her anecdote was accurate, and that the timeline proved she never intended to claim Biden was responsible for the woman’s rapes, the media was ready with its all-purpose continuation of the smear. As NBC reported it, “Sen. Katie Britt attempts to clean up her misleading State of the Union response.” But it wasn’t misleading at all, and she wasn’t attempting to “clean up” anything; she was attempting to educate the Fake News Media. An impossible task.

So, if you want to know what the State of the Union is, you don’t have to look any further than the double standard the media used in reporting the speeches by Biden and Britt. As we enter the 2024 election season, we citizens must pledge to look beyond the biased headlines and treat the national media with the distrust they have richly earned. Remember, if all you know is what you read in the newspapers or saw on cable news, you are being played for a fool. Get the facts for yourself, and then make up your own mind.

US oil prices have recently jumped above the $80 a barrel mark – the highest level since late 2023, sending worrying signals to the Federal Reserve and overly anxious White House. 

The surge in WTI has pushed wholesales gasoline prices up…

And worse, pump prices are set to accelerate even higher in the coming months to an average of $4 a gallon, which would be the highest level since the summer of 2022, according to Bloomberg, citing new data from AAA Automobile Club. 

A combination of issues is pressuring futures and pump prices higher, including the transition to summer-grade gasoline and strained domestic refineries, as well as concerns about shrinking global crude product supplies while Ukraine attacks Russian refineries. 

As we explained in the note titled “Dominoes Falling As Biden Admin Deals With Twin Energy Crisis In Russia, Middle East,” traders have been spooked by refinery outages across Russia due to Ukranian drone attacks. In the Middle East, traders are increasingly worried that Iran-backed Houthis could be several steps away from targeting Saudi refineries.

And now it should make a whole lot of sense why the Biden administration pleaded with Ukrainians to stop drone attacks, along with the White House pushing Vice President Kamala Harris out on ABC News on Sunday to warn Israel publicly not to launch a counteroffensive against Hamas in Rafah – because increased chaos on that side of the world would stoke higher crude prices – and bad timing for the administration, just ahead of the US presidential election in November. 

Devin Gladden, a spokesperson for AAA, which tracks gasoline prices, warned higher pump prices will force the working poor to make “lifestyle changes and be a focus in November’s presidential election.” Higher pump prices will also make Americans realize how much Bidenomics has failed. 

Higher pump prices will also complicate the Fed’s fight against the inflation monster and likely delay rate cuts this summer, which would undoubtedly upset markets. 

This comes as the administration is trying to refill the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserves after releasing a record amount to control last year’s summertime gasoline price surge. 

Since the administration is busy refilling reserves, it has exhausted some of its war chest to control price spikes this spring and summer. 

“If pump prices keep rising, SPR refills will stop automatically. While one cannot rule out another SPR release, the real sleeper risk is the Biden administration would revive threats to restrain US gasoline and diesel exports, especially if a storm disrupted refining capacity. The market, policy, and geopolitical implications of restricting product exports would dwarf those of the LNG pause. Supersize it and add fries,” Scott Modell, CEO at Rapidan Energy Advisors, wrote in a statement. 

Authored by Adam Andrzejewski via OpenTheBooks substack,

“The Squad’ is a group of ultra-left wing Congressional socialists which has been the toast of so-called “progressives” for the last several years.

Its members might promise a worker’s paradise, in which government “withers away,” in the words of Vladimir Lenin, but for now they are only too happy to direct government largesse to the folks back home.

In fact, The Squad members have earmarked $224 million and many absurd pet projects since 2023. 

Download the full database of The Squad’s 2023 and 2024 earmarks here.

Our figures include the earmarks in the most recent $1.2 trillion spending bill from last week.

It’s a stunning display of logrolling – deep inside the status quo – they say they hate as a tool of capitalist oppression.

The Squad maxed out their pork in 2023 and 2024. Their 215 earmarked projects cost the rest of us (overwhelmingly non-socialist) U.S. taxpayers $224.1 million. Every dime was borrowed against our national debt.

New York’s Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), AKA, “AOC,” who last week did not know that “RICO” names a crime, is The Squad’s most prominent voice. She is celebrated as a “socialist superstar” by the Democratic Socialists of America.

Representative Ocasio-Cortez earmarked $1.2 million for a new building for the International Muslim Women’s Empowerment Project. Its founder teaches a “hijab grab” self-defense move involving a “kick to the groin.”

And then there’s the $500,000 for the Billion Oyster project in her district. Rich people eat oysters. However, the law prohibits anyone from either fishing or eating oysters in the Hudson River. So, this is only an engineering project for eco-marginalized people in Queens.

Other Squad members are Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), Cori Bush (D-MO), Greg Casar (D-TX), Summer Lee (D-PA), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), and Rashida Tlaib (D-MI).

The Squad Practices Race-based Earmarking

Squad members shoveled some pretty stinky stuff into spending bills. It appears race-based legislating is OK if a progressive does it:

• $850,000 to create jobs for the Black community near George Floyd Square, whose death in 2020 “added to the stress faced by the community and increased the need for support and stability in housing and commerce.” Patron: Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.

• $1.7 million to help the Environmental Leaders of Color build a “green tech park.” The group’s goal is to “assist marginalized communities in preparing for climate change’s adverse effects … so that they can thrive like healthy plants in their natural ecosystem.” Patron: Congressman Jamaal Bowman.

• $1 million for the Immigrant Opportunity Center expansion. It’s run by CAPI USA, a nonprofit that “guides refugees and immigrants in their journey toward self-determination and social equality.” Patron: Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.

• $1.35 million to New Immigrant Community Empowerment, a nonprofit that advocates for citizenship for all illegal immigrants. Patron: Congresswoman Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez ($500,000). The group received another $850,000 this year from Rep. Grace Meng (D-NY).

• $1.5 million to build special grocery stores and education facilities for Black farmers in the community of St. Louis. Patron: Congresswoman Cori Bush.

• $1 million for the San Antonio College Empowerment Center, which runs an Undocumented Student Support Program to help immigrants enroll in the school. Patron: Congressman Greg Casar.

The Squad’s Green Earmarks

Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez introduced her Green New Deal, in 2019. It’s the focus of 21 earmarks to build green infrastructure, move away from fossil fuels, and involve minority communities in climate policy. She and her colleagues find ways to get us to pay for their policy preference, such as:

• $1 million to build “a network of intergenerational, trauma-informed waterfront green spaces.” The project already received $792,000 in 2022 earmark funding. Patron: Congresswoman Ayanna Presley

• $466,000 to improve the energy efficiency of a St. Louis homeless shelter. Patron: Congresswoman Cori Bush.

• $4 million to build an “industrial green beltway” in Dearborn, Michigan. Patron: Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib.

• $500,000 from Ocasio-Cortez will build an oyster reef to “address longstanding environmental justice inequities facing underrepresented communities in Queens.” Oyster habitats in New York have been damaged by pollution and harvesting them for food is illegal.

• $850,000 to repair a bridge that “connects minority environmental justice communities” in Pennsylvania. Patron: Congresswoman Summer Lee.

• $2 million for Everett, Mass. to build a park for “low-income BIPOC residents” to “stay cool during increasingly hot summers.” (“BIPOC” is an acronym for “Black, indigenous and other people of color.”) Patron: Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley.

Stopping Insane Earmarks. Or Not.

In 2024, when it got too insane, Republican members of the House finally got serious and cut a few of the whacky earmarks.

For example, Rep. Pressley’s earmark to build affordable housing for LGBTQ seniors did not make it into the final House bill.

However, in the second minibus bill, Pressley was able to add back $850,000 for LGBTQ “The Pryde” senior housing by moving the earmark to the U.S. Senate. Pressley called Republicans homophobic for attempting to eliminate her LGBTQ earmarks.

Background

From time immemorial, politicians of every stripe have used their positions to benefit those who sent them to D.C., while sticking taxpayers with the tab.

Congresspeople all play together in the sandbox, promising not to rat each other out for some strikingly goofy – or downright weird – local spending. Things got so out of hand 15 years ago, that a bi-partisan coalition led by former U.S. Senator Dr. Tom Coburn (R-OK) and President Barack Obama actually banned earmarking for ten years.

It didn’t last.

Regardless of what you may have heard about GOP hate for former U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), three years ago, the House Republican caucus, in a secret vote, joined Speaker Pelosi and the Democrats to reinstate earmarks.

That moment of fiscal fealty was replaced by the naked need for pork, and in the instance, a new alliance with the Speaker.

And so, we have more tabs to face than a diet soda aisle at a big Costco.

In 2024, the so-called “minibus measures” contained 8,051 earmarks totaling $15.7 BILLION TAXPAYER DOLLARS. In 2023, the year-end omnibus was stuffed with 7,510 earmarks worth just over $16 BILLION TAXPAYER DOLLARS.

Congress must disclose earmarks online. However, it posts them in hard-to-review PDF files. (Our team at OpenTheBooks.com converts those files into Excel spreadsheets to more effectively parse what they are hiding.)

When Congress knows what it is doing is wrong, it always makes it a bit harder to find.

In all too many ways, earmarks – from both Democrats and Republicans — are no exception.

Next week – “The Freedom Caucus Decides It Is Free to Earmark”

State Farm will not renew approximately 72,000 property and commercial apartment policies, of which approximately 30,000 will be for ‘homeowner, rental, rental, residential community and business owner insurance,’ and the remainder of which are for commercial apartment policies, the Sacramento Bee reports.

Last May the company announced that it would stop accepting applications for property and business properties due to higher construction costs, growing risks from wildfires and other catastrophic events, and challenges related to how it insures its own business.

Last week, the company cited those challenges in an announcement, along with “the limitations of working within decades-old insurance regulations.”

California says it’s fixing the issues, with Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara announcing upcoming regulatory changes that his office says “will improve conditions for the overall market.”

According to spokesman Michael Stoller, State Farm’s decision “raises serious questions about its financial situation — questions the company must answer to regulators.”

The action was taken by State Farm General Insurance Company, which sells homeowners insurance in California. The company acknowledged the department’s proposed changes and vowed to continue to work with the agency to “establish an environment in which insurance rates are better aligned with risk.”

In December, the department approved a 20% average rate hike for the company’s homeowner insurance policies. -Sacramento Bee

The insurer says it will begin canceling policies in July for homeowners, and August for commercial properties, which will occur on a rolling basis over the next year. 

The move comes two years after AIG pulled out of the Golden State over wildfire risk.

Authored by Victor Davis Hanson,

Joe Biden reportedly is weirdly asking the Ukrainians not to strike Russian oil facilities, despite the military utility of such attacks.

Why?

Not because he fears a wider war since he sent no such request in the prior two years of fighting.

Apparently, it is the same reason why on the eve of the 2022 midterm elections, Biden began draining the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (down to 360,000 million barrels, from a high of 631,000 at his inauguration) to get cheaper gas prices right before the voting.

Biden further campaigned in 2020 blasting Saudi Arabia as a “pariah” nation. But by early 2022, he was courting the Saudis, the Venezuelans, the Iranians, and by default the Russians to pump more oil.

The message?

In non-election years, Biden & Co. blast fossil fuels as doomed and dirty. In election years they beg others to pump the icky goo to surfeit.

So at least until November 2024, expect surreal petroleum-fueled restraint as Iranian surrogates freely hit more U.S. targets.

Venezuela without worry will threaten its neighbors.

“Pariah” Saudis for a while longer stay our new old “strategic” partner.

The “murderer” Putin’s oil is off-limits.

Secondly, the “ultra-MAGA” and “semi-fascist” Trump becomes “broke Don” who is foreclosed upon and who planned an “insurrection” and “civil war” on January 6, after “praising” racists in Charlottesville, and damning dead GIs as “suckers”.

Thirdly, Biden will give lots of free stuff to win votes.

So despite a $35 trillion national debt, expect massive new student loan debt cancellations and amnesties before November.

After 10 million illegal entries, anticipate sudden tough but otherwise empty Biden gibberish, about “securing the border.”

There will be louder cries for Israel to stand down and essentially resuscitate Hamas.

So here again are the Biden’s talking points in 2024:

• Gloat that Trump is broke and a crook and headed to jail—at least according to legal geniuses like Alvin Bragg, E. Jean Carroll, Letitia James, Jack Smith, and Fani Willis.

• Blame Trump for all the things Biden did that wrecked the country in 2021-4.

• Hand out amnesties, pardons, free stuff, and windfalls to the electorate in “you get it now, they pay later” fashion.

• Assure wavering blacks, Latinos, and Jews that Trump is a racist and an anti-Semite.

• Do not mention soaring food and gas prices, a destroyed border and a stampede of illegal aliens, high interest rates and mortgages, an epidemic of homelessness and violent crime, and the world turned upside down in Ukraine, the Middle East, the Red Sea, the Philippines, Haiti, and Taiwan.

• Claim a “feisty” and “supercharged” Joe is “raring to go” and “can’t wait” to hit the campaign trail to “take on” Trump because he has never been more “in charge,” more “dynamic”, and more “cocky”.

Oil prices dipped lower today, consolidating just off five-month highs.

“WTI crude oil and Brent crude oil front month futures trade steady after both climbing 1.6% on Monday as Ukrainian drones hit another Russian oil refinery, adding to the list of casualties of Russian refining infrastructure, which according to (Goldman Sachs) has knocked out an estimated 900,000 barrels per day of refining capacity,” Saxo Bank noted.

Expectations were for a third weekly crude draw in a row and an eighth weekly decline in gasoline stocks…

API

• Crude +9.34mm (-1.2mm exp) – biggest build in six weeks

• Cushing +2.39mm

• Gasoline -4.437mm (-1.7mm exp) – 8th straight weekly draw

• Distillates +531k (+100k exp)

Against expectations of a small draw, API reported a surprise significantly large crude build and stocks at the Cushing Hub rose notably. Gasoline stocks fell for the 8th week in a row..

Source: Bloomberg

WTI was hovering around $81.50 ahead of the API print and legged lower on the surprise crude build…

And finally, as gasoline stocks decline, wholesale gasoline prices imply pump prices are going much higher…

Source: Bloomberg

Not a good sign for Powell or Biden…