The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) told congressional staffers that the agency’s Disinformation Governance Board lacks a charter and has yet to hold its first meeting.
The board has come under scrutiny, with members of Congress fearing that it could infringe on the rights of American citizens.
Conservatives, including Republican lawmakers, are also concerned with DHS’ pick to lead the board, Nina Jankowicz, who has spread misinformation herself.
One congressional staffer described the board as “half-baked,” adding that DHS seemed to have gotten “ahead of themselves when they mentioned this in the secretary’s testimony.”
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) told congressional staffers Friday that its Disinformation Governance Board had yet to hold its first meeting, according to two congressional staffers familiar with the discussion, who spoke with the Daily Caller News Foundation.
One congressional staffer told the DCNF that the board appeared “half-baked” and said DHS seemed to have gotten “ahead of themselves when they mentioned it in the secretary’s testimony.” DHS also admitted the board lacks a charter during Friday’s call, the two congressional staffers told the DCNF.
The congressional staffers elected to speak on background, with one telling us they don’t want to compromise their ability to work with DHS, and the other telling us their office only confirms details of this nature on background.
The board is new under the Biden administration, according to the aforementioned staffer who said DHS doesn’t “really have direction for this board.” The staffer also said Nina Jankowicz, the head of the board, kept referring to the board as “visionary,” adding that it appeared that there’s “no concrete structure to it yet.”
Jankowicz has recently come under scrutiny for having a history of promoting misinformation, such as discrediting the Hunter Biden laptop story
The staffer said they requested a copy of the charter and that DHS agreed to share it when it’s ready. The board is also looking to add two co-chairs to work under Jankowicz, according to the staffer.
The other staffer told the DCNF that they were told the board hasn’t met yet and hasn’t approved a charter.
DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told lawmakers on April 27 that the agency had formed the board to tackle misinformation and disinformation targeting minority communities.
Cat’s out of the bag: here’s what I’ve been up to the past two months, and why I’ve been a bit quiet on here.
Mayorkas said Sunday that Jankowicz is “eminently qualified,” adding that the board will only monitor foreign misinformation and disinformation and not American citizens.
On Friday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said that the board is “a continuation of work that began at the Department of Homeland Security in 2020, under former President Trump,” adding, “For anyone who’s critical of it, I didn’t hear them being critical of the work under the former president, which is interesting to note contextually.”
A DHS spokesperson didn’t address whether the board was newly formed or what was discussed on the call, telling the DCNF that DHS agencies have long worked to tackle “disinformation.”
DHS has been working for years to address disinformation, the spokesperson said, pledging DHS’ commitment to upholding “Americans’ freedom of speech, civil rights, civil liberties, and privacy.”
The board doesn’t have any operational authority or capability, the spokesperson added.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-05-04 14:51:322022-05-04 14:51:32‘Half-Baked’: DHS Admitted Some Stunning Details About Its ‘Disinformation’ Board To Congress
Do you feel your paycheck isn’t going as far as it used to?
That when you go to the grocery store, you’ve noticed your bill is higher, but there are fewer and fewer items in your cart with every trip? (Perhaps you’ve even taken items out while waiting in line at the checkout counter.)
And that when you pull into the gas station, you decide more often that maybe you can stretch it before you need a full tank?
You’re not crazy. 62 percent of Americans think their family’s income is falling behind, and 83 percent of voters say they’re experiencing hardship due to increased prices.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, real wages are down 2.6 percent in the last year.
On top of that, inflation is costing the average American household $430 per month — essentially an additional tax of $5,200 this year
Here are Americans for Prosperity‘s solutions to the ongoing problem of we the people paying our federal, state and local governments more and getting less.
But there’s a better way. We can reimagine how to make life more affordable for everyday Americans.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-05-04 13:51:372022-05-04 13:51:37The True Cost of Government ‘Pay More, Get Less’
The Epoch Times provides below a wonderful overview of the movie “2000 Mules” by Dinesh D’Souza. Both The Epoch Times and D’Souza have investigated and followed the many aspects, conflicting arguments, waves of evidence, people directly involved, and more…associated with the very sophisticated, multi-dimensional interference of the last national election in November of 2020. Without a doubt the compilation of evidence substantiates the reason for the initial Joint Public Arizona Legislative Hearing in Phoenix on November 30, 2020. Arizona State Rep. Mark Finchem and Arizona State Senator Sonny Borrelli co-chaired the day-long hearing, and testimony along with cyber-evidence presented by Mayor Rudy Giuliani and a team of professionals. Epoch Times, One America News, and seven other fair and balanced news organizations provided national coverage for the ten hour hearing. I was privileged to coordinate all aspects leading up to the legislative hearing, and then thereafter. This hearing launched investigations and hearings in 16 other states.
Arguments were made as to why many public officials did not support such a hearing or even an investigation. Most disturbing was the fact that when preliminary evidence was presented to various officials – obtained from both the public legislative hearing, as well as private briefings from President Trump, Vice President Pence and Mayor Giuliani, elected officials did not take every possible and legal step to obtain answers for citizens who already were very disturbed by preliminary evidence showing our national election was attacked and severely compromised. Evidence of fraudulent ballots had already been presented, but many elected officials were too timid to examine this charge. Much, much work was accomplished to bring an election forensic audit into life; which, finally, was accomplished as the nation now knows. Throughout the forensic evaluation led by a Florida based team of cyber-security professionals, Mr. Doug Logan and his firm “the Ninjas,” many elected officials either kept far away from the proceedings or publicly trashed the evaluation even before any findings could be formally produced and presented.
Since the forensic evaluation’s completion, an additional Joint Public Arizona Legislative Hearing was held in Pima County, Arizona to review still further evidence of ballot fraud, collusion to undermine an election, and demonstrate further that crimes had been committed throwing into question the legitimacy of the national election of 2020. Properly gathered and secured, evidence was handed to the Arizona Attorney General for inclusion into an already begun formal criminal investigation on matters associated with ballot fraud, manipulation, election machinery compromise, tabulation, and other factors leading to the premise that our nation experienced a very sophisticated election coup. The Arizona Attorney General submitted a Preliminary Report of Findings confirming that serious election irregularities leading to the hypothesis that election fraud did occur in Arizona on November 3, 2020. Why several elected and public officials have not been charged is still a question, with a preliminary answer that the investigation is still on-going. Regardless…the Arizona Attorney General did find more than sufficient evidence to demonstrate that the two Joint Public Legislative Hearings were justified, and findings from said hearings along with additional evidence submitted and testimony given under oath, showed very grave consequences developed in the last national election, and immediate and serious steps must be taken to ensure such diabolical actions are not repeated.
The movie by D’Souza “2000 Mules” is still another profound and legitimate set of steps revealing the absolute disgrace and sophisticated operation that occurred to remove a President of the United States rather then allowing the People of America that privilege as given to us by our founders. Dinesh D’Souza presents clear and convincing evidence by which each American should ponder most seriously, most soberly who is seeking an office this coming November. Not simply be swayed by political ads or brochures, not taken in merely by a candidate’s presence or speech style, but what evidence is there in the candidate’s life and actions that he/she shall truly protect and defend our constitutional rights, our individual freedoms, and not merely talk-the-talk! The movie “2000 Mules” is profound, and Dinesh D’Souza is to be complimented for taking on an investigation many in public office to this day refuse to address, other than to mock and ridicule, and through willful ignorance pretend nothing irregular occurred in the November 2020 election.
Thank you, Dinesh, for accomplishing what many in elected and high appointed office refuse to accomplish… their job!
Of Mules and Donkeys
Commentary
Today, I release a new documentary film called “2000 Mules.”
The film releases in 300 theaters on May 2 and May 4, and there’s an in-home virtual premiere on May 7. After that, it will be available for digital download, but only on two uncancellable platforms: the Rumble-owned platform Locals and the Salem Media platform SalemNow. I’ve made six documentaries, but in an age of censorship, you have to create a novel way of distributing them.
Here I want to talk about mules and donkeys. Strictly speaking, of course, a mule is a cross between a horse and a donkey. A few months after I came to the United States as an exchange student from India, my host parent in Arizona took me to the Grand Canyon.
“We can try to walk down,” they told me, “or we can ride a mule.”
We chose to walk, but on the way down we saw mules carrying tourists and sure-footedly making their way down the treacherous pathways to the bottom of the canyon.
The term mule is now commonly used in drug trafficking and sex trafficking. The mule is the middleman, the guy who makes the transport. My friend Catherine Engelbrecht, who runs the election intelligence organization True the Vote, borrowed this term to apply it to the paid political operatives who engage in ballot trafficking. Mules are professional deliverymen and women who are hired by left-wing organizations to deliver fraudulent and illegal ballots to mail-in dropboxes.
Now let’s turn to the evidence in the movie that was assembled by True the Vote. The organization purchased 10 trillion pings of cellphone data. Basically, they bought the data covering all cellphone movements in key urban areas of the five swing states in which the 2020 election was decided. True the Vote then ran a search algorithm seeking to ferret out mules who picked up stashes of ballots from left-wing organizations embedded in those cities and then made delivery drops of those ballots to 10 or more drop boxes.
The point of this high bar was to avoid false positives and only capture the most industrious mules. After all, there might be some reason why a person might stop by a local activist organization and then go to, say, two drop boxes. Perhaps he dropped off his ballot at the first and then had to tie his shoelace, causing him to stop at the second. But can anyone think of a rational reason for someone to go to 10 mail-in drop boxes? The only conceivable reason is to dump illegal ballots.
Since each of our cellphones has a distinct ID, True the Vote has the cellphone IDs of more than 2,000 mules hired by left-wing organizations to do ballot trafficking in Atlanta, Phoenix, Detroit, Milwaukee, and the greater Philadelphia area. These mules alone generated approximately 400,000 illegal ballots. When you break down the fraud state by state, you see that it was more than enough fraud to tip the balance in the presidential election. Trump should have won, not Biden.
The geotracking evidence is corroborated by video evidence, and I’m talking about the official surveillance video taken by the states themselves. True the Vote obtained more than 4 million minutes of video, and the movie shows mule after mule after mule stuffing illegal ballots into the drop boxes.
Typically, this occurred in the middle of the night. In many cases, you can see the mules stuffing in multiple ballots. Some mules wear gloves, so as not to leave fingerprints. Mules typically take photos of the ballots going into the boxes, evidently to confirm that they’re performing the work so that they can get paid.
All of this is flatly illegal. To understand this, we must make an important distinction between vote harvesting—legal in some states—and paid ballot harvesting—illegal in all states. In Georgia, for example, it’s legal to give your absentee ballot to a family member or caregiver to drop off. In no state, however, can money change hands, whether it’s money paid to a voter or money paid to a mule or other type of delivery man.
Who’s deploying the mules? I believe the answer is the donkeys. By donkeys, I obviously mean the Democrats—the party of the donkey. Donkeys are the recognized experts at election fraud. They’ve been doing it since the 19th century. In the Tammany Hall days, for instance, Democrats would greet immigrants coming right off the boat, ask them to sign ballots that the Democrats would later fill out on their behalf, and give them in exchange a bottle of alcohol or a reference for someplace where they might find work.
This fraud operation was ramped up in the 2020 election, largely because of the changes in the rules instituted under the pretext of COVID-19. Suddenly, mail-in ballots were dispatched by the tens of millions. Suddenly, mail-in drop boxes proliferated, especially in the major donkey strongholds. No wonder the fraudsters saw their opportunity to escalate their operations—and they did.
Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
Those who care about norms, decorum, civility, institutions, and rule of law must hold the leaker and any co-conspirators fully accountable for this egregious breach.
By: Mollie Hemingway, The Federalist, May 3, 2022;
The Supreme Court is poised to relinquish its nearly 50-year stranglehold on abortion law and return the debate over whether states may protect unborn human life to the American people and their elected representatives, according to a draft opinion that was leaked to Politico reporters. If the draft opinion authored by Associate Justice Samuel Alito stands, it would be a momentous course correction for the court.
Roe v. Wade, the radical decision that took the abortion debate away from the American people, has myriad legal, scientific, and constitutional critics. Even abortion supporters complained about its weaknesses, as Alito mentions in his draft opinion. Roe was issued in 1973, shortly after the end of the Warren Court, known for pushing through radical changes through the power of a majority of justices rather than on the basis of the Constitution.
“[W]ielding nothing but ‘raw judicial power,’ the Court usurped the power to address a question of profound moral and social importance that the Constitution unequivocally leaves for the people,” Alito wrote in the draft opinion.
A previous attempt to salvage the court’s abortion edicts, Planned Parenthood v. Casey, was supposed to keep the court from having to hear so many controversial abortion cases from the states. Instead, the court has been inundated with challenges to its complicated abortion jurisprudence. And states have gotten better at fine-tuning their challenges.
Few legal observers felt confident in Roe v. Wade’s ability to survive yet another state challenge, such as the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case before the court this term. That case deals with a Mississippi law that protects the lives of those unborn children who have reached the age of 15 weeks gestation. The vast majority of countries in the world limit abortion at a similar point in pregnancy.
The draft opinion, which runs 67 pages, is being described as a “tour de force” by those who have read it. It carefully works through all arguments for retaining Roe, and favorably addresses arguments made by other justices who as of February had joined the majority.
“The reported draft opinion is thoughtful, scholarly, and thorough. It does the work that the majority in Roe and Casey refused to do, looking to the Constitution itself to determine whether it includes a right to an abortion. The opinion concludes it does not,” writes Carrie Severino, president of the Judicial Crisis Network and my co-author for our national best-seller “Justice on Trial: The Kavanaugh Confirmation and the Future of the Supreme Court.”
She adds, “Justice Alito’s opinion does not mince words about Roe and its progeny. He describes Roe as ‘an abuse of judicial authority’ and as being ‘on a collision course with the Constitution from the day it was decided.’”
The Shameful Leak
While Alito’s draft opinion is being welcomed and celebrated by pro-lifers, and strongly objected to by abortion supporters, the way it became public is a horrific scandal.
Someone leaked the draft, almost certainly to pressure the justices to change their views. Alito’s draft opinion from February would go to the concurring justices for feedback, commentary, and fine-tuning. It would also go to justices on the other side of the issue for their knowledge as they write their dissents.
It is unclear who leaked it, but it is considered a grave problem to have done so. Such leaks violate the trust shared by justices. The Supreme Court is viewed more as a family, and the betrayal from the leaker threatens the whole institution.
Still, many on the left celebrated the leak. “Seriously, shout out to whoever the hero was within the Supreme Court who said ‘f-ck it! Let’s burn this place down,” wrote Ian Millhiser, an activist with Vox.
Brian Fallon, the former Hillary Clinton campaign spokesman who became the leader of a dark money group behind the fight against the nomination of Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh, issued a pretty clear call for intimidation of the court: “Is a brave clerk taking this unpredecented [sic] step of leaking a draft opinion to warn the country what’s coming in a last-ditch Hail Mary attempt to see if the public response might cause the Court to reconsider?”
“All Democrats need to show the same urgency as the clerk who apparently risked his or her career to sound this alarm. Those on the inside know best how broken the institution is. We should listen,” he added.
Crowds comprised of many staffers from abortion groups gathered at the Supreme Court immediately after the leak. “Chants of ‘fascist scum have got to go,’ interspersed with the names of the conservative justices,” noted one reporter. Signs included, “F-CK SCOTUS,” and “Sam Alito Retire B-tch.”
The Supreme Court was attacked by a crazed mob in the aftermath of the Kavanaugh confirmation. Hundreds of raucous protesters tried to break down the 13-ton bronze doors. They scaled the building and its statues and threw tomatoes and water bottles at the cars of justices who had attended his swearing-in. The mob even went after Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Elena Kagan.
Mobs had also rioted in Senate buildings in the leadup to Kavanaugh’s confirmation. They had disrupted the official constitutional proceedings associated with his nomination and review.
When a riot broke out at the massive post-election protests around the U.S. Capitol, the entire Democrat and media complex said it was an insurrection that had been egged on by Trump and other critics of the 2020 election.
Even after the attacks on the Supreme Court, Sen. Chuck Schumer went in March 2020 to the steps of the Supreme Court and specifically threatened Justices Neil Gorsuch and Kavanaugh. Referring to an abortion case, he said, “I want to tell you, Gorsuch, I want to tell you, Kavanaugh, you have released the whirlwind and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.” Even liberal activists were appalled.
The attacks on the court have continued through this term. In recent years, Democrats have openly called for court-packing as an intimidation tactic to get the court to rule the way Democrats desire. Justice Clarence Thomas has been pressured to follow an invented recusal standard for having a wife with conservative political views. Justice Gorsuch was the victim of a made-up story leaked to NPR. Justice Breyer was forced to retire when his decision to step down was leaked as part of a high-pressure campaign.
EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. All rights reserved.
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While Americans are suffering due to the Biden administration’s incompetent policies, which have fueled higher gas prices, food prices, and threaten to suck the nation into a European war, the president was yucking it up at their expense on Saturday night.
“Since you’ve come into office, things are really looking up. Gas is up, rent is up, food is up! Everything!”
Daily Show host Trevor Noah, who calls himself a comedian, was the host of the White House Correspondents Dinner on Saturday night. At one point, he made an inflation joke that caused Biden to guffaw.
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Tech giants are shutting us down. You know this. Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Adsense, Pinterest permanently banned us. Facebook, Google search et al have shadow-banned, suspended and deleted us from your news feeds. They are disappearing us. But we are here.
Subscribe to Geller Report newsletter here— it’s free and it’s essential NOW when informed decision making and opinion is essential to America’s survival. Share our posts on your social channels and with your email contacts. Fight the great fight.
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Condemning, turning in family members is employed by Nazis, Stalinist, Communists — vicious totalitarians. The Democrats mean to get our children when they are young and groom them in the style of Hitler Youth.
The book provides students a step-by-step process on how to address racism in their home and within themselves.
A public elementary school in Washington, DC, gave children as young as 4 a lesson on “anti-racism” that asked them to identify racist members of their family.
According to a Nov. 30 letter from Janney Elementary School Principal Danielle Singh, students in Pre-K through 3rd grade participated in an “Anti-Racism Fight Club” presentation by speaker Doyin Richards.
“As part of this work, each student has a fist book to help continue the dialogue at school and home,” Singh’s letter stated, linking to Richards’ presentation. “We recognize that any time we engage topics such as race and equity, we may experience a variety of emotions. This is a normal part of the learning and growing process. As a school community we want to continue the dialogue with our students and understand this is just the beginning.”
Richards’ “Anti-Racism Fight Club Fistbook for Kids” explains that “white people are a part of a society that benefits them in almost every instance,” and that “it’s as if white people walk around with an invisible force field because they hold all of the power in America.”
“If you are a white person, white privilege is something you were born with and it simply means that your life is not more difficult due to the color of your skin,” the “Fistbook for Kids” explains. “Put differently, it’s not your fault for having white privilege, but it is your fault if you choose to ignore it.”
The “Fistbook for Kids” says anti-racism “isn’t a spectator sport” but requires “being loud, uncomfortable, confrontational and visible to ensure change is made.”
A series of questions in the book asks children, “Where do you see racism in yourself? This requires true soul-searching. Be real with yourself, don’t feel guilt/shame and own it. It’s the first step in becoming an anti-racist.”
Quick note: We cannot do this without your support. Fact. Our work is made possible by you and only you. We receive no grants, government handouts, or major funding.
Tech giants are shutting us down. You know this. Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Adsense, Pinterest permanently banned us. Facebook, Google search et al have shadow-banned, suspended and deleted us from your news feeds. They are disappearing us. But we are here.
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Trying to guess what the economy and the financial markets will do occupies an entire industry. And, within that industry of financial services, opinions vary greatly. That makes the job of prediction even more difficult because so many bright people have such diametrically different points of view. Which set of views is correct?
Having come from that industry, and maintaining a keen interest in the economy, we have shared our opinions with you, the readers of The Prickly Pear. Matters of personal finance should be of interest to all of us, especially when going into difficult times.
We have suggested in a series of articles, that many negative trends have been forming and that 2022 would be a “risk-off” year. Among these are: monetary and fiscal tightening, a flattening or inversion of the yield curve, serious inflation, an oil price shock, a food price shock, China is going back into lockdown making supply chains worse, a seriously overvalued stock and real estate markets, a vicious bear market in bonds, a complete breakdown of law and order at the Southern border and in dozens of major cities, overall excessive debt, a war that likely is just the opening battle in a broader conflict, an unwinding of the Bretton-Woods era monetary arrangements, dreadful political leadership, and environmental extremism that paralyzes rational policy responses. Whew!
The Democrat’s response to the inflation they have unleashed is to raise taxes! Either you get skewered with high inflation (a hidden regressive tax) or you get skewered with a direct tax on whatever income your can earn. Screwing the public seems to be the best Democrats can give us in policy options.
These are all important trends, each of which standing alone, would spell trouble. Rarely have we seen quite so many problems link arms and confront us at the same time. For that and other reasons, we suggested that the classic 60-40 approach taken by most money managers would not work, as both stock and bonds would be declining at the same time.
These fundamental macro events and now being joined by technical deterioration within the stock market, such as busted long-term trend lines and the penetration of long-term moving averages. Margin debt appears to have peaked out, internal divergences have formed, and price momentum is turning negative. Defensive areas of the market are now outperforming growth. Historically speaking, these are not good signs.
In short, the “wealth effect” of an ever-rising market may have gone into reverse gear.
We suggested that 2022 would be a difficult year for investors and the economy which would justify investors taking serious steps to de-risk their portfolios.
A recent headline in Market Watch was that stocks have had the worst opening for the year since 1939. It gives us little comfort to report that most of our predictions seem to be playing out. We mention them not to brag but only to catch your attention and ask you to enter these on the credit side of the ledger, to balance out the eventual errors that we will surely commit.
We have been correct to warn you of a “risk-off” year. Did you take action to reduce risk?
But if we did not get your attention before, we hope we have the credibility to have it now.
Things are getting worse. You need to have a discussion with your financial advisor if you have not already done so.
There are tangible signs the economy is weakening, even beyond the surprisingly weak GDP numbers for the first quarter. This is coming even earlier than we expected.
Demand for home mortgages is falling.
Consumer sentiment is growing sour.
Industrial production is slumping and the demand for trucking is slipping.
Some stock market indices such as the broad Russell 2000 and the NASDAQ Composite have fallen somewhat below the necessary level to label the market “bearish.”
The damage to stocks is more than the averages suggest. Something close to 45% of all stocks on the NASDAQ are down more than 50%. ARKK, the techno-laden ETF run by the now-famous Cathy Wood is down 70%. Darlings of the lockdown like Peleton and Zoom have also lost about 70%.
Are we starting a round of competitive currency devaluations and beggar-thy-neighbor policies like the 1930s?
In summary, a number of markets are in trouble, the economy is in trouble, and real estate looks frothy and vulnerable.
The FED runs a high risk of policy error, which is jamming up interest rates with the economy already weakening. That potentially could make things worse. To flip flop again, and reverse course, would signal they are not serious about inflation. The FED has painted itself into a corner and there is no painless way out.
There are certainly some positive things going on, that is for sure. Elon Musk buying Twitter is one. But the preponderance of data and market action suggests that recession is now a higher probability than before.
The one silver lining in all this is that most people will rightly blame the Democrats for wild inflation in food and fuel and, the wreckage in their 401ks. A feckless foreign policy encouraged Russia and likely China to take advantage of our weakness. Biden, supposedly an experienced operator in the US Senate for years, seems incapable of compromising with reasonable opposition.
Actually, he seems incapable of uttering a coherent sentence. Behind him of course, is the cackling and vacuous Kamala Harris, the woman of color and imbecility.
We could be moving into a political leadership vacuum.
Aggravating the problem, they both peddle the lie that opponents to their socialist and racist initiatives are “white nationalists” that is a security threat to the very existence of the Republic. And now, we have the Department of Homeland Security forming a board to oversee “truth”. It is straight out of Orwell and scary as hell.
With this twisted view of reality, political compromise to address the many problems we face is likely impossible. After all, you can’t negotiate with terrorists like Republicans, can you? And, why would Republicans in their right mind wish to deal with people who have labeled them white supremacists? Well, there is the one lady from Wyoming…
Only after a thorough drubbing of Democrats in the mid-term elections, is political consensus likely. But the election will likely be too late to reverse many of these trends from wreaking damage to household and corporate net worth.
As we have stated previously. We will be very lucky to dodge a recession and bear market. Don’t leave your financial planning to luck alone.
TAKE ACTION
America is now aware of the Department of Homeland Security’s new ‘Disinformation Governance Board’. DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas called disinformation a “threat” that needs to be addressed with federal law enforcement power. (Is it coincidental that Elon Musk will shortly take Twitter private and re-establish a free speech platform in America?)
This new DHS office is the Biden Speech Police and represents an existential threat to our First Amendment and our Republic. Please click the adjacent red TAKE ACTION link for the resources to inform your Senators and Representatives about this unconstitutional and tyrannical assault on American Free Speech and our fierce rejection of it.
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Editors’ Note: Some readers may find it offensive to see the criticism of Donald Trump. We think Trump did many good things and we admire his courage. However, he and the Republican leadership did abandon one of the key elements of conservative Republicanism, fiscal prudence. Yes, he was bullied by the medical establishment, but the lockdown was both a catastrophic health and economic mistake, and The Prickly Pear said so at the time. Sending out direct stimulus checks to the public with money printed out of thin air was a terrible precedent and simply makes citizens even more comfortable becoming wards of the state and completely disrupted labor markets. And even before that, Republicans had long before abandoned their charge of being fiscally prudent and a champion of sound money. The last time we had a balanced budget was under Clinton when Gingrich was Speaker of the House. Under Republican leaders, we talked a good game but never delivered. Under Bush, the nation continued to sink slowly into the quicksand of fiscal excess, but we do keep sinking. To be sure, Obama and Biden have made things much worse, but if we are ever to reverse the trajectory towards national bankruptcy, Republicans need to stand up for financial rectitude by the government. Hopefully, the midterm elections will bring to Washington new U.S. Representatives and Senators willing to curtail debt financing, rampant money printing, and excessive federal spending.
Well, here’s another shocker. This Commerce Department report showed that real disposable personal income in March came in at -19.9% versus March 2021.
That staggering shrinkage, of course, is still another testimony to the old saw about “what goes around, comes around.” That is, last March real disposable incomes soared by nearly 29% owing to the massive Biden stimulus payments. But since then inflation has blasted skyward, even as Washington has run out of nerve on the fiscal stimulus front.
Y/Y Change In Real Disposable Income,February 2020 to March 2022
What this reminds us, of course, is that we are not in an ordinary business cycle. Washington simply went berserk on the fiscal and monetary front in response to the economic dislocations caused by Trump’s foolish backing of Covid lockdowns. These massive stimmy eruptions, in turn, have created unprecedented turmoil and fluctuations in the quarterly flows of income and spending.
And, yes, the Donald owns the Lockdown madness of 2020, which caused GDP to plunge at a 37% annual rate during the April-June quarter of that year. After all, no one said he had to listen to the likes of statist bureaucrats such as Dr. Fauci and the Scarf Lady, but he was simply too uninformed, lazy, and timid to send them packing.
In any event, there has never in American history been an explosion of transfer payment-free stuff like what occurred on the Donald’s watch during 2020 and Q1 2021. And, yes, you can saddle him with a good share of the blame even for Biden’s $1.9 billion spending palooza in March 2021. That’s because it was centered on completing the second $2,000 per person stimmy check that the Donald had loudly brayed for during the 2020 election campaign.
As shown below, the annualized run rate of total government transfer payments (including the state and local portion of welfare and Medicaid) had been about $3 trillion, but after February 2020 it soared into a wholly different zip code. Thus, compared to the $3.15 trillion rate of February 2020, the huge surges of transfer payments occurred as follows:
April 2020: $6.49 trillion, up 106%;
January 2021: $5.65 trillion, up 79%;
March 2021: $8.05 trillion, up 155%.
Alas, even Washington’s outbreaks of fiscal madness eventually come to an end. Consequently, the run rate of transfer payments reported this morning for March 2022 was just $3.86 trillion, a figure -$4.19 trillionand 52% below that of March 2021.
Needless to say, neither the American economy nor economists’ models are built to handle fluctuations of such gigantic magnitudes. Accordingly, the American economy is now flying blind into a direction that includes soaring inflation and an abrupt reversal of the massive monetary and fiscal stimulus that drastically distorted economic activity during the past two years.
Total Government Transfer Payments At Annualized Rates, January 2019 to March 2022
For the moment, the collapse of stimmies and transfer payments has not appreciably slowed down the every-ready spending bunny of the household sector. During March, spending rose by 1.1% from February and was up by 9.1% from prior year.
But that only happened because households took their savings rates back to 6.2% of disposable income—the lowest level since December 2013, and barely half of the 10%-12% rates that prevailed prior to the turn of the century.
Stated differently, the temporary bulge in the calculated savings rate which occurred during April 2020 to March 2021 was a pure artifact of Washington’s fiscal madness: Free stuff was being shoved into household bank accounts faster than even America’s spendthrift families could dispose of it.
But for all practical purposes that is now ancient history. The household sector is already back to its paycheck-to-paycheck modus operandi, meaning that when the next round of layoffs hit the scene, it will pass directly through to reduced consumption spending.
Personal Savings Rate, December 2013 to March 2022
For want of doubt, it is illuminating to look at the absolute level of personal savings (at annualized rates) and the incredible fluctuations that have roiled the data owing to the stimmies. These data make clear that the allegedly “strong” current levels of household spending are being fueled on a one-time basis by the take-down of savings.
To wit, the run rate of personal savings was about $1.19 trillion per annum in December 2019, reflecting the modest 7-8% savings rate which prevailed during the post 2008-2009 recovery. But that figure soared to $6.39 trillionand $5.76 trillionduring April 2020 and March 2021, respectively, when Congress blasted the household sector with free stuff from the end of a fiscal fire-hose.
The obvious message of the chart, however, is that this aberration is now over and done. During March 2022, in fact, the savings level plummeted to $1.15 trillion (annualized). That was actually below its pre-Covid trend rate, and a staggering -$4.61 trillion or 80% below its level of March 2021.
In a word, household spending and GDP numbers have been immensely flattered in recent months by an unprecedented drawdown of the bloated savings levels which were generated by the stimulus checks. But that particular trick can be accomplished only once, and the descending yellow bars in the chart below make clear that it is playing out with a vengeance.
Personal Savings Level, 2019-2022
In fact, the exhaustion of the savings drawdown combined with surging inflation is already showing up in the true measure of household spending—-real PCE (personal consumption expenditures).
Notwithstanding the 9.1%rate of Y/Y nominal PCE gain (purple line) reported this morning for March, the Y/Y gain in real terms (black line) was just 2.3%.That compares to 7.3%, 9.3% and 25.4% in November, June, and April of 2021, respectively.
In short, with the savings drawdown dwindling and inflation racing well above wage and salary gains, real PCE is being powerfully pulled toward the flat-line. That’s because what amounted to the equivalent of a watermelon passing through a Boa Constrictor has now basically exited the beast.
Y/Y Change In Nominal and Real PCE, March 2021 to March 2022
Indeed, today’s report even put the kibosh on the claim that robust growth of wages and salaries will keep the household sector fueled with fulsome spending power. As it happened, in fact, March’s 11.7% Y/Y gain in aggregate wage and salary incomes ballyhooed on bubblevision this AM was not exactly what it was cracked up to be.
That’s because when you strip away the inflation, the Y/Y figure shrinks to a pretty pedestrian 3.1%. Also, when you look at the trend since last April, when the nominal and inflation-adjusted figures rose by 15.3% and 11.2%, respectively, there is really not much to argue about.
To wit, while the Y/Y growth rate of nominal wages and salaries is down a modest 24%, the growth rate of real wage and salary income has plummeted by 72%. Yet it is fairly certain that aggregate employment and wage growth will continue to slow, even as inflation accelerates—meaning that the growth rate of inflation-adjusted household incomes will continue to shrink.
Y/Y Change In Nominal And Inflation-Adjusted Wage And Salary Income Disbursements, April 2021 to March 2022
Finally, the March figure for the Fed’s favorite inflation measuring stick—the PCE deflator—had two clear implications: First, that the inflation rate is accelerating, and second, that the Fed will be in no position to ease up on its anti-inflation stance at any time soon.
The chart below shows that the Fed is hopelessly behind the inflation curve and that its long-held “lowflation” theory was a complete crock, supported by a temporary but aberrant low in the inflation rate for durable and nondurable goods.
Accordingly, the two data banks below summarize the Y/Y inflation rates for the three major components of the PCE deflator, as well as the overall index. The difference between the two periods is night and day, and as depicted by the chart it is getting worse.
Y/Y Deflator Change As Of Q4 2019:
PCE Services: +2.2%;
PCE Durables: -1.5%:
PCE Nondurables: +0.4%;
Total PCE Deflator: +1.5%;
Y/Y Deflator Change As Of Q1 2022:
PCE Services: +4.6%;
PCE Durables:+10.9%;
PCE Nondurables:+8.8%;
Total PCE Deflator:+6.3%
Given the fact that services inflation, which has always been well above the Fed’s target, has now doubled from 2.2% to 4.5% and that the forces driving both durables (global supply chain disruptions) and nondurables (global commodity surges) are continuing to intensify, the bottom line index figure of 6.3%posted for March has nowhere to go except up, and substantially so.
Thus, the question remains. Under an impending scenario in which the PCE deflator is rising toward 10% is it conceivable that the Fed can ease up on monetary restraint—especially during an election season in which the GOP will be in full-throated anti-inflation war cries?
Y/Y Change In PCE Deflator And Its Major Components, Q4 2019-Q1 2022
We think the answer to the above question is negative, and that means the impending hit to the insanely over-valued stock market will be biblical.
That’s because interest rates are going to rise far above current expectations before the Fed finally succeeds in staunching the inflationary tide and sending the economy into the drink; and also because the superficial “growth” canards that have justified out of this world PEs in the tech sector, and especially among the FANGMAN, are already starting to unravel.
All along our argument has been that the likes of Amazon, Google, and the rest will soon be coming up against the iron law of GDP growth. That is, their high growth rates of the last decade are not sustainable because they were due to one-time economic shifts, such as the movement of advertising dollars from legacy to digital media and the shift of retail distribution from bricks and mortar stores to eCommerce.
Moreover, the huge economic disruption caused by the Covid Lockdowns actually accelerated these shifts, bringing the day of completion, and therefore GDP-based growth, significantly forward in time.
This week’s Q1 earnings reports among the tech giants have validated those themes in spades. For instance, Amazon’s revenues increased just 7% during the first quarter, compared with 44% expansion in the year-ago period. This marks the slowest rate for any quarter since the dot-com bust in 2001 and the second straight period of single-digit growth for the eCommerce giant.
Moreover, Amazon said it projects revenue during the current quarter of $116 billion to $121 billion, missing the $125.5 billion average analyst estimates. This means that the second-quarter revenue growth could dip even further, to between 3% and 7% from a year earlier.
To be sure, Amazon still has the largest share of online commerce, about 39%, according to Insider Intelligence. But the business intelligence firm also says that growth in the segment has flat-lined recently and predicts that annual growth in Prime subscriptions in the U.S., once nearly 20%, will slow to 2% by 2025.
As it was, Amazon actually posted a net loss of $3.8 billion during the first quarter, and, more importantly, negative free cash flow of $18.6 billion. So it is only a matter of time before its remaining $1.242 trillion of market cap (after today’s bloodbath) tumbles back to earth.
Nor is Amazon alone. A broad swath of companies across industries is experiencing an online-shopping slump. In March, online spending in the U.S. was down 3.3% from a year earlier, the first such decline since 2013, according to MasterCard SpendingPulse.
Likewise, Google’s ad revenues slowed sharply from 34% last March to just 22% for the LTM period ending in March 2022, while Facebook’s ad revenue slowed to just 6.1%. That was weakest expansion in the company’s 10-year history.
Again, the digital giants have already absorbed upwards of two-thirds of ad revenue, meaning that sometime not too far down the road, revenue growth will bend to the 2% +/- level of the overall advertising industry. At that point, the $2.1 trillion of combined Facebook and Google market cap is not likely to withstand low single digit revenue and earnings growth.
So, yes, today’s report told the bubblevision crowd that consumer spending in March came in at 9.1% over prior year and that therefore all was well.
America is now aware of the Department of Homeland Security’s new ‘Disinformation Governance Board’. DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas called disinformation a “threat” that needs to be addressed with federal law enforcement power. (Is it coincidental that Elon Musk will shortly take Twitter private and re-establish a free speech platform in America?)
This new DHS office is the Biden Speech Police and represents an existential threat to our First Amendment and our Republic. Please click the adjacent red TAKE ACTION link for the resources to inform your Senators and Representatives about this unconstitutional and tyrannical assault on American Free Speech and our fierce rejection of it.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00ThePricklyPear.orghttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngThePricklyPear.org2022-05-04 03:55:002022-05-04 03:55:00Real Personal Income Down 20% from One Year Ago
President Joe Biden’s pick to represent the United States on a council that promotes free trade in Asia has a long history of cozying up to the Chinese Communist Party. He’s also a top Biden donor.
Biden tapped Dominic Ng, the chairman of East West Bank, to represent the United States on the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation’s Business Advisory Council, a group of business leaders that advises governments on issues in the Asia-Pacific region. Ng, who has led the East-West Bank since 1992, contributed $100,000 to the Biden Victory Fund and $35,500 to the Democratic National Committee in October 2020, according to campaign finance disclosures.
Ng’s appointment means the United States will be represented by a consistent defender of some of Beijing’s most controversial policies. The role could also provide a boost for Ng’s bank, which lends heavily to businesses in Asia. Ng has endorsed China’s infrastructure program, the Belt and Road Initiative, and criticized the United States for refusing to join the program. He has sided with Beijing on other hot-button issues such as the origins of the coronavirus. Ng also criticized two Biden-backed bills to make the United States more competitive with China.
Ng is the latest Biden ally to land a prestigious administration appointment. Biden tapped his longtime friend, Chris Dodd, to serve as special envoy for the Summit of the Americas, a triennial meeting of government and business leaders from the Western hemisphere. Dodd signed an ethics agreement for the position, the Washington Free Beacon reported, because his lobbying firm represents several countries taking part in the summit. Biden also appointed his friend and campaign supporter Joe Kiani to serve on the Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. Kiani has given $1 million to Biden’s family charity and bundled $1 million in donations for Biden’s campaign.
Ng served as chairman of the Committee of 100, a group of Chinese-American business and government leaders that one Hong Kong columnist has called “a pro-Beijing group, concerned almost exclusively with the interests aligned with those of the Chinese Communist Party.”
America is now aware of the Department of Homeland Security’s new ‘Disinformation Governance Board’. DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas called disinformation a “threat” that needs to be addressed with federal law enforcement power. (Is it coincidental that Elon Musk will shortly take Twitter private and re-establish a free speech platform in America?)
This new DHS office is the Biden Speech Police and represents an existential threat to our First Amendment and our Republic. Please click the adjacent red TAKE ACTION link for the resources to inform your Senators and Representatives about this unconstitutional and tyrannical assault on American Free Speech and our fierce rejection of it.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00ThePricklyPear.orghttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngThePricklyPear.org2022-05-04 03:50:002022-05-04 03:50:00Meet the CCP-Loving Biden Donor Responsible for US Economic Interests in Asia
Here’s a story about Hypocrisy and Duplicity: I lawfully received a copy of Joe Biden’s 40 year old daughter’s diary. In it, she alleged horrible things about her father, then a candidate for president of the United States. I didn’t publish the diary or any story about it.
Nevertheless, for a year a cowardly federal prosecutor in New York named Robert Sobelman secretly stole my emails, spied on my media company, and appears to have lied to federal judges to obtain secret covert spying orders.
He then appears to have lied again to federal judges to get a search warrant to invade my home and seize my First Amendment-protected reporter’s notes and source information.
Yesterday, Politico’s Josh Gerstein received a stolen copy of a draft U.S. Supreme Court opinion overturning Roe v. Wade and published it — and yet he sleeps well in his own bed tonight, with no fear of being rousted at 6AM by short, loud, thuggish FBI agents as I was, and handcuffed.
It is right that he not fear prosecution. It is wrong that we must.
Welcome to America in 2022.
No morning search warrant raids at Politico’s office. No Josh Gerstein in handcuffs, as with Project Veritas pic.twitter.com/hX08yZI475
If Project Veritas “broke” the Supremes story—not Politico—all their offices would have already been raided, journos would be in custody, all phones & computers would be seized by FBI.
Instead, Politico’s reporter is doing interviews, and it’s hailed as “the story of a lifetime”
Will they raid the homes of Politico journalists or is that only reserved for #projectveritas? Maybe they’ll collect more than 220,000 emails related to this incident through secret surveillance as well. https://t.co/PpMaVy6RJt
The American people want to know why rules apply differently to Project Veritas journalists.
Do we live in a country with equal justice under the law?
Without accountability from the DOJ, your freedom is an illusion.
RELATED TWEET:
What if it turns out Sotomayor leaked this? Or one of her clerks did with her permission? Then we have a chance for a two-fer: Get rid of Sotomayor, and get rid of Roe. There could be a big bright upside to this! #Scotus#abortion
Despite a low turnout (28% abstention), French President Emmanuel Macron was re-elected on April 24, 2022, beating second-round competitor Marine Le Pen by a margin of 58.6% to 41.4 %. Macron’s victory was the first re-election [without prior cohabitation] of a French president in two decades. In 2017, the dark horse Macron won a major victory over Marine Le Pen.
During his first term, Macron reduced unemployment, well questioned for his competent handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. and was praised for his diplomatic efforts in the current crisis of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. He met Russian President Putin in Moscow and was in constant telephone contact with Ukrainian President Zelensky. French voters appear to support efforts by the NATO alliance to arm Ukraine to repel unprovoked attacks on a sovereign nation aspiring to EU membership. Macron is the current rotating president of the European Union.
Le Pen had tried to airbrush her “extremist” positions and distance herself from her anti-Semitic father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, founder of the National Front. She changed the name of her custom party to Rassemblement National (NR). Le Pen, like populists Eric Zemmour on the far right and Jean-Luc Mélenchon on the far left, have agreed to step down as commander of NATO’s joint force. The outgoing president accused Le Pen of promoting a disguised Frexit and maintaining a close alliance with Putin’s Russia. The NR owes more than 9 million euros to a Russian-Hungarian bank. We’ll ask our Parisian colleague what she thinks of the claim by some British and American media that Le Pen actually won a victory while losing.
Macron has another “campaign” ahead, as he seeks a majority for the La République En Marche party in the June legislative elections. The trio of populist contenders, Le Pen and Zemmour on the far right and Jean-Luc Mélenchon on the far left, will try to take control of the National Assembly and thwart Macron’s second term agenda.
Macron now has the politically daunting task of appealing to a wide range of French regional voters who are likely to support populist agendas.
In this context, we held our seventh in a series of discussions with an American expat in Paris, contributor to New English Review , which provides English-language media resumes for Tribune Juive . We explore the implications of the French presidential election, the populist stance on the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, Israel’s need to turn a blind eye to Russia in Syria, Russia’s gas blackmail, and even more…
Jerry Gordon: I’m Jerry Gordon, editor of The New English Review . And here we are with Nidra Poller reporting an interesting development with the second round of the French presidential elections. Nidra, what were the preliminary results of the second round?
Nidra Poller: The results reported tonight are approximately: Macron 58%, Le Pen 42%. That might change slightly when the final results come in for major cities.
Jerry Gordon: How does this compare to the 2017 election?
Nidra Poller: The difference was greater. It’s basically because Marine Le Pen, after losing miserably in 2017, did some sort of political Botox. She smoothed over her real agenda, her real intentions, and walked around with a big smile. By the end of the campaign, she was selling herself as “the mother of the nation.” This blunted the previous backlash that the far right should not be allowed to win. But, as you know, what I mean is that it would have been better if the commentators had shown it populist and explained populism. In any case, I am proud that France did not elect a populist. That’s the first thing. I wasn’t particularly impressed with Macron before, but he’s the president now, and that’s where I live, and I want him to succeed.
Interestingly, the losers did not give decent Democratic kudos. Well, I call them losers. Marine Le Pen lost to Macron. She phoned, as it should, to congratulate him. And then gave a speech that was a short version of his campaign, with insults and accusations, and blaming this and that, they didn’t treat her well, they won’t treat the French right, and so on. And then the candidates who didn’t even make it to the second round also had to put their face in front of us. Jean-Luc Mélenchon, whose bright new idea is that he should be elected Prime Minister, (I will explain later), and Zemmour, who says he will unite the right. It was really very sad. They just rehearsed…mumbling…just rehearsed their campaign pitches.
When candidates lose, they claim to love the country and the people. It’s sad to see them making a speech, basically saying that what the French want is what they had proposed. But the French have just voted, right? If people didn’t vote for them, stayed home saying how wonderful they are, the fact is they didn’t vote for them. You know, that’s the focus of my thinking right now: what we’re going through now is an uphill battle between democracy and tyranny. This is being played out in Ukraine with horrific brutality and suffering. And that is played out in our democracies, with elections and, sometimes, this refusal to accept the verdict. I have a lot of hope. I believe that the courage of Ukrainians in the defense of democracy will play an important role in strengthening democracy in what we called the free world. So, as I said,
But the idea that any intelligent and serious person can vote for Marine Le Pen, while the tyrant of tyrants is on the run in Europe, and we are witnessing unprecedented violence since the end of the Second World War. This violence has global repercussions. The idea that you could put a thoughtless, incompetent person, who walks around saying, “I’ve changed. I changed”… It looks like an alcoholic! “I’ve changed, I won’t do that again.” You cannot have a person without stature as President of France! France is very important in Europe. You know better than anyone that France is the strongest military power in Europe.
Jerry Gordon: Yes.
Nidra Poller: With Britain, right?
Jerry Gordon: Yes.
Nidra Poller: At a time when suddenly we know we have to defend ourselves, we can’t have… I mean, it would have been a terrible disaster for Europe if she had been elected. And I hope that Americans will wake up and pay tribute to us, as Europeans, for this choice.
Jerry Gordon: I have to tell you that if you read the American press as the second round approached, it was: Oh, please, dire consequences, inflation will rise, NATO and the problems in Ukraine. And this result just confirms what you just talked about. This is, of course, a reaction against a rather reprehensible type of populism.
Nidra Poller: Yes. And when you have a country as powerful as the United States that elects an incompetent populist president who has no sense of international relations… When Marine Le Pen spoke of international relations, it was laughable… if not tragic . It’s time people got serious. You cannot elect incompetent people on a whim. So, as I said, this is a lesson for the free world. And I think that’s a relief. I didn’t have time to read the New York Times article you sent me, “Marine Le Pen Has Already Wo”. … Isn’t this a magnificent victory? When losers say they’ve won. Well, I’m glad they lost, because their sense of reality isn’t very strong.
Jerry Gordon: What was curious to me was that the author of that New York Times article was Rachel Donadio, a Parisian contributor to The Atlantic and former Rome bureau chief and European culture correspondent for the New York Times .
Nidra Poller: What strikes me when I read about French politics in the American or Anglophone press is the lack of precise information given there. Sometimes, when I submitted articles to the American media, they said that there were too many details, the readers could not find their way. But if you don’t give specific details, there’s no way to figure out what’s at play here. What are we trying to do in our monthly conversation , right ?
Jerry Gordon: Does this send another message to people similar to Marine Le Pen who had become Putin’s ally in the EU? And I’m talking about Victor Orban, who has just been re-elected in Hungary.
Nidra Poller: Yes. As you see with their previous statements… In the past, when people lied, it was not easy to find proof of what they said. Today they lie, and two seconds later the video appears and the truth is out. Marine Le Pen was tripping over herself to say the invasion was terrible, and she doesn’t approve. But she had previously printed campaign posters showing herself shaking hands with Putin. So she had to throw them away. But everyone knows.
Jerry Gordon: Do the French people, domestic concerns notwithstanding, be it inflation or some other excuse, support Macron’s position on the defense of Ukraine?
Nidra Poller: Yes, and they do it the French way. For example, the idea that the French can talk to everyone, and that it was good that Macron could talk to Putin. And they appreciate his refusal to use the term “genocide”. This pleases the French. But another point we will keep an eye on is that the legislative elections are approaching in June. And my prediction is that Macron’s party will get the majority. Tonight, the sore losers immediately put on their combat gear and took an aggressive stance: “Well, he won the election, but we’re going to give it to him, because we’ll win the parliamentary election.” I do not think so. Then, as the president says, he will have to consider all votes against him, right and left. This is what is expected of a president. Bad losers rack their brains saying how much they love France, and love the French. But when it comes to defending Europe against Putin’s aggression, we realize that these are empty words. Because they wouldn’t dare stand up to a dictator attacking us. What he does in Ukraine, he would do anywhere else. And, deep down, they won’t resist.
Jerry Gordon: Where does that place Mr. Zemmour, whom some in the American press had said was the wind behind Marine Le Pen’s sails?
Nidra Poller: Yes and no. He acted so badly that she got to do that Botox. At first he said she couldn’t win. It inspired her to prove she could. This way he made her look good. On the other hand, if you do the arithmetic, you might figure out that he stopped her from winning. After the first round, they did polls to see where his voters would go in the second. They went massively to Marine Le Pen. So, if they agree with Marine Le Pen, why didn’t they vote for her in the first round? She would have had a much better result. Fortunately, they didn’t. This evening, there were the three grumpy ones, Marine Le Pen, Jean-Luc Mélenchon and Zemmour. They did not have the dignity to say that Macron won, he is our President, we will continue to express our positions, but he is our President and we want him to succeed. Zemmour gave a speech, he looked dejected and he said he was going to unite the right. It’s funny.
Jerry Gordon: Nidra, you wrote an incisive article – and I mean incisive in a positive sense – for Tribune Juive , dealing effectively with the whole problem of populism. What was the reaction of those who read it in France?
Nidra Poller: I have to talk to my editor to find out how people react to what I write, because TJ is not a site that attracts dozens and dozens of comments. Which is good, because most of the time they are not very enlightened and often they are quite cruel. Only one person has posted a reaction to this text. She ignored all the arguments I had given to show that populism is no more for the people than communism is for the sharing of wealth. She just made the same populist arguments: Macron is for the elite; ordinary people are ignored. And they’re fed up with it all. She said she was going to vote for Marine Le Pen because of my article. I hope, by the end of the year, to publish a collection of these chronicles that I write for Tribune Juive , because there is another dimension when you read them one after the other and see how they are linked. That’s what I did in the early 2000s. And maybe I’ll try to do an English version of those essays. In the column to which you refer, I said that they are populists and false nationalists. Populists never keep what they promise. Why do people believe them? They never deliver what they promise. They cling to a big social problem that no one can solve: immigration, drug trafficking, violence against women, and… What else…
Jerry Gordon: Inflation?
Nidra Poller: Yes, the cost of living. And Islamic jihad in all its ramifications. Populists click on really problematic things that no one can fix. Their line is this: you elected one government after another and none of them solved these problems. I will do it. In fact, they have no experience to be judged. You remember: “We are going to build this wall and Mexico will pay for it. What they offer is a pie in the sky. I am proud and relieved that French voters did not get caught. If Putin’s Russia had not invaded Ukraine, the dangers we face would have remained theoretical. Russia has been getting a pass for 20 years. But the danger has now materialized, and it is obvious that we must have good leadership and responsible citizens. We don’t play on social media. Its a question of life or death.
Jerry Gordon: Nidra, did the Franco-Jewish organization support Macron.
Nidra Poller: No. That’s not what happened.
Jerry Gordon: None?
Nidra Poller: No. It was very controversial. Leaders of several organizations issued a warning: “Do not vote for the extremists, Zemmour, Le Pen or Mélenchon. For many Jews, people I respect, it was the unacceptable mixture of religion and politics. French Jews vote as French citizens. They shouldn’t be told how to vote.
Jerry Gordon: Okay.
Nidra Poller: But I see this warning as similar to what I wrote in the Tribune Juive article you referred to. I find it appropriate that Jewish leaders speak out and educate Jews about the dangers of populism. And don’t forget, Marine Le Pen seriously intended, if elected, to ban kosher slaughter.
Jerry Gordon: Right.
Nidra Poller: I have to leave you now, because I’m going to listen to Emmanuel Macron’s speech at the Champ de Mars.
Jerry Gordon: And I want to thank you for your comments on what seemed like a resounding victory for President Macron.
Nidra Poller: Well, Marine Le Pen thinks it was a resounding victory for herself, but it was a resounding victory for democracy. And, as I said in that article you mentioned, now everything remains to be done.
Jerry Gordon: So if I had to have a lead for this discussion, is it Macron’s victory over populism?
Nidra Poller: I think it’s the victory of French voters against populism. Now Macron has to pull through. He’s very smart, he knows it’s not a resounding victory for him. It is a victory against the danger of electing an incompetent and dishonest person to the presidency of France in one of the most dangerous periods of modern times. People on the right are going to be angry when he does things to please voters on the left and vice versa. But that’s what he must do, rule. So we’ll follow it from there.
Jerry Gordon: Nidra, following Macron’s victory, the French Jewish community organization CRIF applauded the result, but expressed concerns about the populist minority vote. What does this tell us about the fact that divisions in France are a threat to democracy?
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-05-04 00:52:032022-05-04 00:52:03French voters re-elect President Macron and reject populists
Republican Louisiana Rep. Mike Johnson will introduce legislation Tuesday that would defund the Department of Homeland Security’s new “Disinformation Governance Board,” which is set to be led by Nina Jankowicz.
The Daily Caller first obtained the legislation spearheaded by Johnson, which has 50 cosponsors. The bill would completely bar federal funding for the DHS’ “Disinformation Governance Board,” something Johnson said the Republicans will do if President Joe Biden does not get rid of the board.
“The Biden Administration’s decision to stand up a ‘Ministry of Truth,’ is dystopian in design, almost certainly unconstitutional, and clearly doomed from the start,” Johnson told the Daily Caller before introducing the legislation. “The government has no role whatsoever in determining what constitutes truth or acceptable speech. President Biden should dissolve this board immediately and entirely. If he won’t then Republicans will.”
Jankowicz attempted to discredit the Hunter Biden laptop story in the past and is now in charge of the DHS disinformation board. Republican Sen. Ron Johnson sent a letter April 27 to DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, saying Jankowicz is a “beacon of misinformation online” and mentioned that she has published multiple tweets “furthering the false media narrative” about the Hunter Biden laptop.
Both The Washington Post and The New York Times noted the authenticity of Hunter Biden’s laptop in March 2022, more than a year after the Daily Caller News Foundation (DCNF) first verified it on Oct. 29, 2020. The DCNF obtained a full copy of Hunter Biden’s alleged laptop from former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani in 2020 and had the emails forensically verified as real.
Just days before the DCNF verified the authenticity of the laptop, Jankowicz tweeted about the laptop, saying it “is a Russian influence op.”
During the second presidential debate, Jankowicz sent out a tweet which said that Biden cited “50 former natsec officials and 5 former CIA heads that believe the laptop is a Russian influence op.”
In a tweet from December 2017, Jankowicz also claimed the Steele dossier, which has been totally discredited, was funded by Republicans. Christopher Steele, the dossier’s author, was never funded by Republicans. The Washington Post reported in October 2017 that Marc E. Elias, a lawyer for the Clinton campaign and DNC, and his law firm, Perkins Coie, hired Fusion GPS last April to investigate Donald Trump — something Jankowicz failed to mention.
Jankowicz is currently a fellow at the Wilson Center. On her website, she calls herself an “internationally-recognized expert on disinformation and democratization.”
President Joe Biden’s decision to reverse a series of Trump administration energy policies have harmed American consumers amid the Ukraine crisis, former Interior Secretary David Bernhardt said.
Bernhardt, who led the Department of Interior (DOI) between 2019-2021, said Biden’s energy policies reflect activism rather than a coherent strategy to ensure low prices and sufficient supply for Americans. Fossil fuel industry groups and Republican lawmakers have repeatedly blamed the Biden administration for rising energy prices slamming consumers in recent weeks.
The average price of gasoline ticked up to $4.19 a gallon on Monday, remaining near its all-time high of more than $4.30 per gallon set in April, according to Energy Information Administration data.
“As a candidate, President Biden was very, very clear that he had a different energy vision than the vision of energy independence — even energy dominance — that Trump had,” Bernhardt told the Daily Caller News Foundation in an interview.
“President Biden campaigned with a very different vision,” he continued. “His vision, I think to say fairly, would be a vision of climate activism over energy independence or energy dominance.”
Bernhardt added that Interior Secretary Deb Haaland has filled the DOI with “some of the most activist folks that could have possibly been chosen.” He said the agency is largely crafting energy policies based upon Biden’s directives.
Shortly after taking office in January 2021, Biden issued a series of climate-related executive orders, canceling the Keystone XL pipeline permit and issuing a moratorium on new federal oil and gas leasing, following up on a campaign promise to “get rid of fossil fuels.” The Biden administration has yet to hold an onshore lease sale even after a federal court ruled the moratorium was illegal.
Haaland revoked a dozen key Trump administration energy policies in compliance with Biden’s executive orders in an April 2021 secretarial order. The DOI’s “American Energy Independence,” “Supporting and Improving the Federal Onshore Oil and Gas Leasing Program and Federal Solid Mineral Leasing Program” and “Executive Committee for Expedited Permitting” were among the policies reversed.
“I’m hopeful that these steps will help make clear that we, as a Department, have a mandate to act,” Haaland said at the time.
But Bernhardt pointed to both the lack of drilling and decline in applications for permit to drill (APD) issued by the Biden administration.
“If you look at the number of APDs issued in December 2020 and then compare that to December of 2021, you will see a nearly 80% reduction in APDs issued even though over 4,000 APD requests,” Bernhardt told the DCNF. “And if you look at the length of time it currently takes to do the processing of APDs and let’s say you looked at it between fiscal year 20 and fiscal year 21, you will see a lengthening.”
The U.S. increased domestic oil production during the Trump administration from 8.9 million barrels of oil per day to nearly 13 million barrels of oil per day between 2016-2019, according to Energy Information Administration data. The nation became a net exporter of total energy in 2019 — factoring in oil, coal and natural gas trade — for the first time in nearly eight decades.
The U.S., though, is projected to return to net oil importer status under the Biden administration in 2022. Production has decreased since November to about 11.3 million barrels a day.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-05-03 13:51:142022-05-03 13:51:14Biden Revoked Trump’s ‘Energy Dominance’ Agenda. Now It’s Coming Back To Haunt Him
Sunday on CNN’s State of the Union, Secretary of Homeland Security and open-borders fanatic Alejandro Mayorkas claimed that the newly-launched “Disinformation Governance Board” would not infringe on free speech or monitor Americans.
Asked about criticisms that the Board is Orwellian, Mayorkas proceeded to gaslight CNN’s few remaining viewers:
“It’s clear, I mean, those criticisms are precisely the opposite of what this small working group within the Department of Homeland Security will do. And I think we probably could have done a better job of communicating what it does and does not do.”
They could have started by not calling it the Orwellian-sounding “Disinformation Governance Board.”
“So, what it does, it works to ensure that the way in which we address threats, the connectivity between threats and acts of violence are addressed without infringing on free speech, protecting civil rights and civil liberties, the right of privacy,” Mayorkas continued. “And the board, this working group, internal working group, will draw from best practices and communicate those best practices to the operators because the board does not have operational authority.”
Draw from and communicate best practices? That word salad is absolutely meaningless.
Asked if American citizens will be monitored, Mayorkas said, “No, no, the board does not have any operational capability. What it will do is gather together best practices in addressing the threat of disinformation from foreign state adversaries, from the cartels and disseminate those best practices to the operators that have been executing and addressing this threat for years.”
Translation: the Disinformation Governance Board absolutely will monitor Americans and infringe on free speech.
“The United States remains in a heightened threat environment fueled by several factors, including an online environment filled with false or misleading narratives and conspiracy theories, and other forms of mis- dis- and mal-information (MDM) introduced and/or amplified by foreign and domestic threat actors. These threat actors seek to exacerbate societal friction to sow discord and undermine public trust in government institutions to encourage unrest, which could potentially inspire acts of violence. […] The primary terrorism-related threat to the United States continues to stem from lone offenders or small cells of individuals who are motivated by a range of foreign and/or domestic grievances often cultivated through the consumption of certain online content. […] For example, there is widespread online proliferation of false or misleading narratives regarding unsubstantiated widespread election fraud and COVID-19. Grievances associated with these themes inspired violent extremist attacks during 2021.”
In a press statement regarding this same issue, Mayorkas said: “Since January 2021, DHS has … increased efforts to identify and evaluate MDM, including false or misleading narratives and conspiracy theories spread on social media and other online platforms, that endorse violence.”
Early exposures to pornographic images and verbiage are amongst the very best ways to facilitate lifelong sexual, emotional, educational, social, and mental health problems. Here’s how pornographically-sexualized children can become dysfunctional, suicidal, and homicidal:
Bisexual violence is greatly promoted via pornography in which the human body is objectified as a source of entertainment for adult pleasure. Children used for such entertainment and/or exposed to it live, on the screen, in printed images, and text are cast into a world in which they are lost and cannot escape. For instance, here’s an example of a story by a 10-year-old boy, sexually abused since age 3, that he wrote for school, reflecting his horrifying worldview of “Terror Island,” where we find in accompanying maps he drew such prominent features as “Mountains of Horror,” “Desert of Death,” “Lake of Doom,” and “Bottomless Lake”: “the lava burst into the air…. Only a few people and me lived. It was kind of scary seeing all the corpses everywhere.” In the true worldview of sexualized children, such features are frighteningly real to them as they are horrors, terrors, death, and doom inescapably surrounding them. In this case, the family consisted of professional parents living in a suburban home in which unrelated sexual predators repeatedly victimized children while the parents were home.
Children exposed to pornography are likely to flounder all of their lives and never fully recover from their emotional problems emanating from pornography abuse. Many become depressed, anxious, tense, angry, withdrawn, suicidal, and harm themselves through self-mutilations. Some become homicidal, as their anger intensifies over the years. Some become arsonists, sadists, or sexually- aggressive, especially to females. As marriage partners, they may delight in withholding sex and/or inflicting pain during sex, even to the point of drawing blood.
Children and teens preoccupied with pornographic images in their minds do not focus or concentrate on their studies. They may make sketches in class of the images in their heads. They are distractible, irritable, and often unteachable. Their grades may plummet, as they are too afraid, too embarrassed, or too ashamed and guilt-ridden to confront their experiences openly. They retreat into silence about their terrors. Their predators are ever-looming terrorists.
Socially, children abused with pornography are likely to function at the extremes of anti-social behaviors – loners or youths constantly needing others around them. The loners can become homicidal or fiercely entombed in themselves. The attention-seekers may have early pregnancies, multiple early sexual partners, extreme trust/mistrust issues, deep insecurities, and drug addictions.
In terms of mental health problems, children sexualized via pornography are at least as sexually-abused as children who are molested. Violence inherent in pornography becomes normalized in the course of human development, and sexualized children can present without conscience or compassion. Contrarily, some sexualized youths rise to the heights of humanity’s best, through life-long struggles to overcome their early childhood traumas.
Often, sexualized children make terrible spouses, especially men whose ideals of womanhood can never be met by women practicing natural sex; for pornography is unnatural, unhealthy sexuality – not loving monogamous intimacy intended for a lifetime. Rather, it is the objectification of the female body and dehumanization of women as sexual toys, to be used and discarded at will.
In the case of males, they may never have a healthy relationship with a woman. On his honeymoon night, a successful professional man, exposed to pornography from his youth, pled to his bride, “Do we have to have sex?” and continued to complain about sex for decades thereafter, as no woman could ever match his pornographic sexual fantasies.
Can children suffering pornography abuse overcome the terrors of their childhoods? Thank goodness! Can a society that permits children to be pornographically-abused overcome these crimes? Let’s pray we fully and immediately repent our societal sins against children.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-05-03 13:51:122022-05-03 13:51:12PORNOGRAPHICALLY-ABUSED CHILDREN: The Negative Effects of Grooming Children in Public Schools
According to U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data, more than 1 million excess deaths — that is, deaths in excess of the historical average — have been recorded since the COVID-19 pandemic began two years ago, and this cannot be explained by COVID-19. Deaths from heart disease, high blood pressure, dementia and many other illnesses rose during that time
Across the world, death rates have also risen in tandem with COVID shot administration, with the most-jabbed areas surpassing the least-jabbed in terms of excess mortality and COVID-related deaths
According to Walgreens data, during the week of April 19 through 25, 2022, 13% of unvaccinated persons tested positive for COVID. Of those who received two doses five months or more ago, 23.1% tested positive, and of those who received a third dose five months or more ago, the positive rate was 26.3%. So, after the first booster shot (the third dose), people are at greatest risk of testing positive for COVID
U.K. government data show the all-cause mortality rate is between 100% and 300% greater among people who got their first COVID shot 21 days or more ago. The risk for all-cause death is also significantly elevated among those who got their second dose at least six months ago, and mildly elevated among those who got their third dose less than 21 days ago. As of January 2022, all who got one or more doses at least 21 days ago were dying at significantly elevated rates
Other data also show that COVID mortality rates are far higher in areas with high vaccination rates, and risk-benefit analyses reveal the jabs do more harm than good in most age groups
According to U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data,1 more than 1 million excess deaths — that is, deaths in excess of the historical average — have been recorded since the COVID-19 pandemic began two years ago, and this cannot be explained by COVID-19.
Deaths from heart disease, high blood pressure, dementia and many other illnesses rose during that time.2 “We’ve never seen anything like it,” Robert Anderson, CDC’s head of mortality statistics, told The Washington Post in mid-February 2022.3
According to University of Warwick researchers, “the scale of excess non-COVID deaths is large enough for it to be seen as its own pandemic.”4 A number of explanations have been offered, including the fact that lockdowns and other COVID restrictions discouraged or prevented people from seeking care. But another, less discussed factor may also be at play.
Across the world, death rates have risen in tandem with COVID shot administration, with the most-jabbed areas surpassing the least-jabbed in terms of excess mortality and COVID-related deaths. This flies in the face of official claims that the shots prevent severe COVID infection and lower your risk of death, be it from COVID or all causes.5
Boosted? You’re Now at Highest Risk of COVID
Ever since the announcement that the COVID “vaccines” would be using novel mRNA gene transfer technology, I and many others have warned that this appears to be a very bad idea.
Numerous potential mechanisms for harm have been identified and detailed in previous articles, and we’re now seeing some of our worst fears come to bear. “Fully vaccinated” individuals are both more likely to be infected with SARS-CoV-2 and more likely to die, whether from COVID or some other cause.
As reported by investigative journalist Jeffrey Jaxen in the April 22, 2022, Highwire video above, data from Walgreens’ COVID-19 tracker6 reveal that COVID-jabbed individuals are testing positive for COVID at higher rates than the unjabbed. What’s more, people who got their last shot five months or more ago have the highest risk.
As you can see in the screenshot below, during the week of April 19 through 25, 2022, 13% of unvaccinated tested positive for COVID (with Omicron being the predominant variant). (The data reviewed by Jaxen are from the week of April 10 through 16.)
Of those who received two doses five months or more ago, 23.1% tested positive, and of those who received a third dose five months or more ago, the positive rate was 26.3%. So, after the first booster shot (the third dose), people are at greatest risk of testing positive for COVID.
A deeper dive into the data7 reveals that two doses appear to have been protective for a short while, but after five months, it becomes net harmful. The group faring worst of all is the 12 to 17 cohort, where no one with one dose tested positive, but after the second dose, cases suddenly appear, and get higher still after five months. After the third dose, positive cases drop a bit, but then shoot up higher than ever after five months.8
Deaths by Vaccination Status in the UK
Data sets from the U.K. government reveal an equally disturbing trend. The raw data from the Office for National Statistics9 is difficult to interpret, so Jaxen had data analysts create a bar graph to better illustrate what the data actually tell us. A screenshot from Jaxen’s report is below.
Bars going upward are a good thing, as it indicates the risk for all-cause mortality based on vaccination status is either normal or reduced. Bars that dip below zero percent are indicative of increased all-cause mortality, based on vaccination status.
As you can see, the all-cause mortality rate is between 100% and 300% greater among people who got their first dose 21 days or more ago. The risk for all-cause death is also significantly elevated among those who got their second dose at least six months ago, and mildly elevated among those who got their third dose less than 21 days ago. As of January 2022, all who got one or more doses at least 21 days ago were dying at significantly elevated rates.
Everywhere we look, we find trends showing the COVID shots are resulting in higher death rates. Above is an animated illustration10 from Our World In Data, first showing the vaccination rates of South America, North America, Europe and Africa, from mid-December 2020 through the third week of April 2022, followed by the cumulative confirmed COVID deaths per million in those countries during that same timeframe.
Africa has had a consistently low vaccination rate throughout, while North America, Europe and South America all have had rapidly rising vaccination rates. Africa has also had a consistently low COVID mortality rate, although a slight rise began around September 2021. Still, it’s nowhere near the COVID death rates of North America, South America and Europe, all of which saw dramatic increases.
Here’s another one,11 also sourced from Our World In Data, first showing the excess death rate in the U.S. (the cumulative number of deaths from all causes compared to projections based on previous years), between January 26, 2020, and January 30, 2022, followed by an illustration of the tandem rise of vaccine doses administered and the excess mortality rate. It clearly shows that as vaccination rates rose, so did the excess mortality rate.
Risk-Benefit Analysis Condemns the COVID Jabs
At this point, we also have the benefit of more than one risk-benefit analysis, and all show that, with very few exceptions, the COVID jabs do more harm than good. For example, a risk-benefit analysis12 by Stephanie Seneff, Ph.D., and independent researcher Kathy Dopp, published in mid-February 2022, concluded that the COVID jab is deadlier than COVID-19 itself for anyone under the age of 80.
They looked at publicly available official data from the U.S. and U.K. for all age groups, and compared all-cause mortality to the risk of dying from COVID-19. “All age groups under 50 years old are at greater risk of fatality after receiving a COVID-19 inoculation than an unvaccinated person is at risk of a COVID-19 death,” Seneff and Dopp concluded. And for younger adults and children, there’s no benefit, only risk.
“This analysis is conservative,” the authors note, “because it ignores the fact that inoculation-induced adverse events such as thrombosis, myocarditis, Bell’s palsy, and other vaccine-induced injuries can lead to shortened life span.
When one takes into consideration the fact that there is approximately a 90% decrease in risk of COVID-19 death if early treatment is provided to all symptomatic high-risk persons, one can only conclude that mandates of COVID-19 inoculations are ill-advised.
Considering the emergence of antibody-resistant variants like Delta and Omicron, for most age groups COVID-19 vaccine inoculations result in higher death rates than COVID-19 does for the unvaccinated.”
The analysis is also conservative in the sense that it only considers COVID jab fatalities that occur within one month of injection. As demonstrated by the U.K. data above, the risk of all-cause death is nearly 300% greater for those who got a second dose at least six months ago.
Teens Are at Dramatic Risk of Death From the Jabs
Similarly, an analysis13 of data in the U.S. Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) by researchers Spiro Pantazatos and Herve Seligmann suggests that in those under age 18, the shots only increase the risk of death from COVID, and there’s no point at which the shot can prevent a single COVID death, no matter how many are vaccinated.
If you’re under 18, you’re a whopping 51 times more likely to die from the jab than you are to die from COVID if not vaccinated. In the 18 to 29 age range, the shot will kill 16 for every person it saves from dying from COVID, and in the 30 to 39 age range, the expected number of vaccine fatalities to prevent a single COVID death is 15.
Only when you get into the 60 and older categories do the risks between the jab and COVID infection even out. In the 60 to 69 age group, the shot will kill one person for every person it saves from dying of COVID, so it’s a tossup as to whether it might be worth it for any given person.
How Many Are We Willing to Sacrifice?
We also have a risk-benefit analysis by researchers in Germany and The Netherlands. The analysis was initially published June 24, 2021, in the journal Vaccines.14 The paper caused an uproar among the editorial board, with some of them resigning in protest.15 In the end, the journal simply retracted it — a strategy that appears to have become norm.
After a thorough re-review, the paper was republished in the August 2021 issue of Science, Public Health Policy and the Law.16 The analysis found that, “very likely for three deaths prevented by vaccination we will have to accept that about two people die as a consequence of these vaccinations,” the authors wrote in a Letter to the Editor17 of Clinical and Translational Discovery. Defending their work, they went on to note that:18
“The database we based our analysis on was a large naturalistic study of the BioNTech vaccine in Israel. This was the only study at the time that allowed for a direct estimation of an absolute risk reduction (ARR) in mortality.
Admittedly, the ARR estimate was only available for a short observation period of 4 weeks after the first vaccine dose, a point raised by critics. One might have wanted a longer observation period to bring out the benefit of vaccinations more clearly, and our estimate of a number needed to vaccinate (NNV) of 16 000 to prevent one death might have been overly conservative.
The recently published 6-month interim report of the BioNTech-regulatory clinical trial now covers a period long enough to let us look at this risk benefit ratio once again. In Table S4 of this publication, 14 deaths are reported in the placebo group (n = 21 921) and 15 in the vaccination group (n = 21 926).
Among them, two deaths in the placebo-group were attributed to COVID-19, and one in the vaccination group was attributed to COVID-19 pneumonia. This leads to an ARR = 4.56 × 10–5, and conversely to an NNV = 1/ARR = 21 916 to prevent one death by COVID-19. This shows that our original estimate was not so far off the mark.
The most recent safety report of the German Paul Ehrlich Institute (PEI) that covers all reported side effects since the vaccination campaign began (27 December 2020 until 30 November 202119 … reports 0.02 deaths per 1000 BioNTech vaccinations or 2 per 100 000 vaccinations.
We had gleaned four mortality cases per 100 000 vaccinations (all vaccines) from the Dutch pharmacovigilance database LAREB. Using the data of Thomas et al., a liberal NNV = 20 000, we can calculate that by 100 000 vaccinations we save five lives.
Using the PEI pharmacovigilance report for the same product, we see that these 100 000 vaccinations are associated with two deaths, while using the LAREB database back in June 2021, they were associated with four deaths across all vaccines and are associated with two deaths in the most recent reports concerning the BioNTech vaccine … In other words, as we vaccinate 100 000 persons, we might save five lives but risk two to four deaths.”
The risk-benefit ratio may be even worse than that, though, as these calculations do not take into account the fact that passive pharmacovigilance data “are notorious for underestimating casualties and side effects,” the authors note, or the fact that severe side effects such as myocarditis are affecting young males at a staggering rate, which can reduce lifespan in the longer term.
We Do Not Have a Functioning Pharmacovigilance System
In an August 2021 editorial, editor-in-chief of Science, Public Health Policy and the Law, James Lyons-Weiler, Ph.D., wrote:20
“There are two messages from those who hold appointed offices or other influential positions in Public Health on long-term vaccine safety.
The first message is that long-term randomized double-blinded placebo-controlled clinical trials are not necessary for the long-term study of vaccine safety because we have ‘pharmacovigilance’; i.e. long- term post-market safety surveillance that is supported by widely accessible, passive vaccine adverse events tracking systems.
The second message is that any use of those very same vaccine adverse events tracking systems that leads to the inference or conclusion that vaccines might cause serious adverse events or death is unsupported by such systems …
When those seeking support for public health initiatives, such as a new vaccination program, offer evidence that long-term vaccine safety studies are well in hand due to the possibility of detecting adverse events that happened following vaccination, they are either:
(a) unaware that the vaccine adverse events tracking systems upon which they are basing their confidence about society’s ability to detect and track vaccine adverse events are alleged to be unable to be used to infer causal links between health outcomes and vaccination exposure, or:
(b) participating in a disinformation campaign to end scrutiny over the absence of properly controlled long-term randomized clinical trials to assess long- term vaccine safety. Neither of these is sufficient empirical basis for the knowledge claim of long- term safety …
There must be room for disagreement in science; otherwise, science does not exist. It is sad to bear witness to the fact that science has degenerated into a war against unwanted and inconvenient results, conclusions and interpretations via the process of post-publication retraction for issues other than fraud, grave error in execution, and plagiarism.
The weaponization of the process of retraction of scientific studies is well underway, and it induces a bias that could be called “retraction bias”, or, in the case in which a few persons haunt journals in search of studies that cast doubt on their commercial products, a ‘ghouling bias,’ which leads to biased systematic reviews and warped meta-analyses.”
In his editorial, Lyons-Weiler specifically criticized the Vaccine journal for its retraction of the risk-benefit analysis cited above, and mocked the editorial board members who quit in protest, noting that “Rage-quitting is not science.”
“The resigning editorial board members’ knowledge claim is that no deaths have occurred due to the vaccination program. As helpful as that claim might be to a prescribed narrative, it is not based on empirical evidence, and it is, therefore, unwarranted,” Lyons-Weiler wrote.21
“From a Popperian view of science, one can see the fatal flaw in the editorial board members’ knowledge claim: if, as they insist, passive vaccine adverse events tracking systems cannot test the hypothesis of causality, then how can editorial board members, resigning or otherwise, know that the events were NOT caused by the vaccine? …
It is logical to conclude that since passive vaccine adverse event tracking systems do not lend themselves well to testing hypotheses of causality, they do not provide the opportunity to design and conduct sufficiently critical tests of causality, and therefore a replacement system is needed … one that is suitable to detect risk.”
While we may indeed need better pharmacovigilance, there’s really no doubt at this point that the COVID jabs are ill-advised for most people. I believe that in the years to come, people will look back at this time and vow to never repeat it. In the meantime, all we can do is look at and assess the data we do have, and make decisions accordingly.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-05-03 13:51:112022-05-03 13:51:11VIDEO: Why the Boosted Are Now at Highest Risk of COVID
BREAKING: Peter Thiel and other conservative/libertarian investors announce plans to buy Disney after kerfuffle over Florida Parental Rights in Education law.
“This woke sh*t has gone way too far,” he told reporters. “If Elon can buy Twitter, then dammit, we can buy Disney.”
Peter Thiel has been described by the Washington Post as, “The 54-year-old, whose contrarian and right-wing political views have made him one of the most controversial figures to emerge from Silicon Valley, will focus his time on helping pro-Trump candidates win in November’s midterm elections, according to a person familiar with his thinking who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.”
Listen to Peter Thiel’s remarks at the 2016 Republican National Convention:
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-05-03 12:51:292022-05-03 12:51:29Will Peter Thiel and other Conservative and Libertarian investors buy Disney?
Jeff Crouere is the host of, “Ringside Politics,” which airs weekdays on WGSO 990-AM in New Orleans. He is a political columnist, the author of America’s Last Chance and provides regular commentaries on the Jeff Crouere YouTube channel and on www.JeffCrouere.net.
TOPIC: GOP Grassroots demand bold action.
ADAM A MILLSAP
Adam A. Millsap is a Senior Fellow for economic opportunity issues at Stand Together. Adam writes about state and local policy, urban development, population trends, and labor markets. His writings have appeared in national outlets such as USA Today, US News and World Report, Real Clear Policy, and The Hill, as well as regional outlets such as the Detroit Free Press, Las Vegas Sun, Cincinnati Enquirer, and Orange County Register, among others. Adam is the author of Dayton: The Rise, Decline, and Transition of an Industrial City.
TOPIC: Europe Needs Natural Gas And America Could Help
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-05-03 12:51:282022-05-03 12:51:28PODCAST: GOP Grassroots demand bold action and Europe needs natural gas America could help
A new scientific research paper published in TheGazette of Medical Sciences on April 21, 2022 showed an alarming, unprecedented spike in reported cases of a previously extremely rare gynecological condition called membranous dysmenorrhea, or “decidual cast shedding” (DCS).
This trend began in 2021, as Covid vaccines were being widely distributed to the U.S. population, according to the paper.
The uterus disorder DCS occurs when the entire lining of the uterus sheds and exits the body in one piece, say scientists. They say the process can be extremely painful.
Prior to Covid, there were fewer than 40 cases of the uterus disorder reported in the medical literature over the previous 109 years, according to researchers.
The authors of the paper conducted the MyCycleStorySM study in which 292 women reported having a DCS uterus disorder event over 7.5 months in 2021.
Three of the study’s co-authors, Dr. Brian Hooker, Dr. Sue Peters and Ms. Heather Ray, are part of the Children’s Health Defense (CHD) science and research team.
The study was designed after an extraordinary number of women began sharing their experiences of menstrual irregularities on various social media platforms following the wide-spread distribution of the COVID vaccinations, resulting in a survey with over 150,000 participants that suggested a remarkable increase in menstrual irregularities starting in 2021.
MyCycleStorySM was created and conducted by thirteen scientists and physicians to follow up on previous reports and to gather more extensive data on the unusual increase in menstrual issues after the Covid vaccines were introduced into the population.
The MyCycleStorySM study collected detailed data from 6,049 survey participants between May 16 – December 31, 2021, all of whom described having abnormal menstrual symptoms.
In addition to the survey data, the study authors looked at Google metadata during 2021 and found that there was a 2,000% increase in the search terms “decidual cast” and “decidual cast covid vaccine” during the first two quarters of 2021.
A bill in Congress would create new ‘domestic terrorism’ units within the Department of Homeland Security, Department of Justice, and FBI tasked with spying on Americans considered terrorist threats. Considered by whom? By a fraudulent rogue regime?
H.R. 350 would give federal agencies the power to classify as ‘domestic terrorism’ whatever bureaucrats consider a ‘hate crime.’
A bill in Congress would create new domestic terrorism units within the Department of Homeland Security, Department of Justice, and FBI tasked with spying on Americans considered terrorist threats, then investigating and prosecuting them.
H.R. 350, also known as the Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act (DTPA) of 2022, is making its way through the House Judiciary Committee. It would give federal law enforcement agencies the power to classify as “domestic terrorism” whatever the federal government considers a “hate crime.” One of the new “domestic terrorism” agencies the bill would create would focus on “domestic terrorism matters that may also be hate crime incidents.”
These new “domestic terrorism” agencies would also “ensure that such programs include training and resources to assist…law enforcement agencies in understanding, detecting, deterring, and investigating acts of domestic terrorism and White supremacist and neo-Nazi infiltration of law enforcement and corrections agencies.”
Of course, many of those in power consider the Constitution and patriotism to be acts of “white supremacy.” That is openly stated by purveyors of the 1619 Project and its effective champions in the federal bureaucracy.
According to critical race theory, anyone born with pale skin is a potential “white supremacist” by means of his or her inborn “white privilege.” That means this bill could ultimately give federal agents the power to charge local law enforcement officers who love the Constitution with the “domestic terrorist” crime of “white supremacy.” This use of racial division to transfer local police power to federal agencies is already underway.
The Biden administration has also already proven itself willing to apply the extremist label of “domestic terrorists” to parents who publicly disagree with critical race theory at local school board meetings. This bill is exactly in step with that view of dissent as not only merely criminal, but an act of domestic terrorism. So is the Biden White House’s new “Disinformation Governance Board,” which also classifies dissent as a concern for federal law enforcement.
Indeed, H.R. 3350 would also set up a potential federal purge of U.S. law enforcement and military units. It sets up a federal “task force” “to analyze and combat White supremacist and neo-Nazi infiltration of the uniformed services and Federal law enforcement agencies.”
No reasonable person opposes legitimate policing of actual terrorist activities. The problem with the DTPA is that it is being set up for use as a political weapon against conservatives, Republicans, concerned parents, and anyone else who opposes the ruling class.
That is clear also from reading press releases from the bill’s sponsors. In a 2021 press release, main bill sponsor Rep. Brad Schneider, D-Illinois, attempted to indict Donald Trump supporters as domestic terrorists and presented the DTPA as a tool to suppress them: “Unlike after 9/11, the threat that reared its ugly head on January 6th is from domestic terror groups and extremists, often racially-motivated violent individuals.”
Judiciary Chairman Rep. Jerry Nadler also pushed the false idea that the 2021 Capitol riot was a domestic terrorist attack, as opposed to a riot: “In the wake of the domestic terrorist attack on our Capitol two weeks ago, it is painfully clear that the current approach to addressing the real and persistent threat posed by white nationalism and similar ideologies is not working.”
These politicians are not hiding their intentions. They are openly using disinformation and deception to brand anyone who dares question their activities as “domestic terrorists,” “white supremacists,” and “white nationalists.”
The act was first introduced in 2017, long before the events on Jan. 6, 2021. Past iterations have included a “findings” section that lists violent incidents the authors attribute to “white supremacists,” “white nationalists,” and “far-right-wing extremists.”
The 2020 version referenced a 2017 shooting in Canada and a 2019 shooting in New Zealand. It’s unclear why international cases were included in a bill that promotes the idea of a rise in U.S. domestic terrorism. Additionally, the 2020 shooting by Kyle Rittenhouse that a jury concluded was justified self-defense was added to the bill as an example of right-wing extremism.
Absent from the earlier bill version’s findings, however, were mass shootings and attacks by apparent left-wing extremists. No mention was made of the 2016 Pulse Nightclub massacre of 49 people by a Muslim domestic terrorist or the 2017 mass shooting of four white men by Muslim extremist Kori Ali Muhammed, nor the violent attacks across the country by Antifa in 2020.
The findings section was stripped out of the current 2021-2022 version of the bill, but it’s a good indicator of its underlying purpose. So are the events of the past several years, as the label “domestic terrorism” has been applied increasingly more often to Democrats’ domestic political opponents.
Perhaps the most notable of such examples is the January 6, 2021 riot at the Capitol. Leftist media and politicians continue to promote the false narrative that the riot was a planned and organized “insurrection,” a terrorist act during which multiple people, including police officers, were killed. They are keeping these lies alive in the minds of vulnerable Americans, providing a springboard for things like unusually harsh prosecutions and detainment, the partisan and possibly illegal January 6 commission, and legislation like H.R. 350.
The false premise of January 6 protesters being domestic terrorists has resulted in the justification of solitary confinement. It has also led to biased judges passing excessive sentences for misdemeanors. Giving federal law enforcement agencies more tools to brand certain groups of Americans as terrorists will likely lead to more such abuses…….read the rest.
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https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-05-03 12:51:262022-05-03 12:51:26DYSTOPIAN AMERICA: Bill Would Allow Feds To Purge U.S. Military And Local Police Using Charges Of Thought Crimes
