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Whitmer said, “Any insult from the Trump campaign is laughable when you think about his years in office and who he fought for. He fought for himself. He’s laid out nothing in terms of a vision for America. He’s feeding into people’s anxieties and anger. That’s what he’s always does. He has never done anything that makes someone’s life a little better.”
She added, “In fact, his time in office we have record job loss. We saw so many deaths from COVID because it was, he put out misinformation, denied that it was even a problem. I mean, this is a guy who he calls other people name, but offers nothing of value to the American people when it comes to a vision or a plan to make people’s lives better. That contrast is stark.
What you will see this week in Chicago is a bunch of happy warriors who understand the middle class, understand how we pull more people into the middle class and make sure every one of us can have the path of prosperity and live the American dream and take care of our families.”
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Almost 14,000 people in Britain have applied for payments from the government for disabilities they claim were caused by Covid-19 vaccines, The Telegraph has reported.
Only 175 people, or less than 2% of those seeking compensation, have so far received a one-off money transfer of £120,000 ($155,300), the paper said in an article on Saturday.
Data obtained by The Telegraph through Freedom of Information requests indicates that those who were eventually reimbursed suffered from conditions such as stroke, heart attack, dangerous blood clots, inflammation of the spinal cord, excessive swelling of the vaccinated limb, and facial paralysis.
Around 97% of the satisfied applications were related to the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine, developed by Oxford University and British-Swedish company AstraZeneca, and the rest to the US-made vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna, it said.
The outlet noted that the UK government continued to recommend the AstraZeneca vaccine, despite its use being halted in Germany, Italy, France, and other European countries by March 2021, amid reports of a growing number of blood clotting cases.
Thousands of people have been refused payment due to the government’s medical assessors arguing that there is no concrete proof that their health problems are a result of the vaccines, the report read.
Hundreds of others were turned down due to being “not disabled enough,” it added. Under the rules of the Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme (VDPS), an applicant has to be at least 60% disabled to qualify.
A spokesman for AstraZeneca told The Telegraph that its vaccine “has continuously been shown to have an acceptable safety profile and regulators around the world consistently state that the benefits of vaccination outweigh the risks of extremely rare potential side effects.”
As for the health complications caused by the vaccine, the spokesman said, “our sympathy goes out to anyone who has lost loved ones or reported health problems.”
In May, AstraZeneca, which officially admitted that its vaccines could cause blood clots in certain cases, began the withdrawal of its product worldwide, saying that newer vaccines adapted to the latest coronavirus variants were more effective.
Around 16,000 people have sought payments since the introduction of the VDPS in 1979, with most of the claims related to Covid-19 vaccines. The growing workload resulted in an increase of the staff responsible for handling applications from four people to 80 last year. “We continually review our processes to further develop the way in which we manage claims, and to provide a better service for claimants,” a National Health Service spokesperson said.
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https://www.rt.com/news/602752-uk-coronavirus-vaccine-astrazeneca/
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The Las Vegas police union is warning the Las Vegas Raiders and the NFL that if new requirements for officers to supply the league with biometric data are implemented, they will cease providing security details for games.
The NFL has recently mandated that all gameday staffers—including contractors and non-employees—supply biometric data, including an image of their face, via an approved app before being allowed clearance to enter the stadium.
However, the police union representing Las Vegas police officers is warning officials that its members will not comply with the new security requirements. If they are forced to do so, they won’t work Raiders home games at Allegiant Stadium.
At issue is the league’s close relationship with numerous anti-police organizations. Members of the police are afraid that the data will end up in the hands of these woke, left-wing organizations, which will then turn around and use the data as a weapon against police officers.
Las Vegas Police Protective Association President Steve Grammas recently sent out a video to members stating that he is not on board with handing his data over to the NFL to end up in the hands of “people that you don’t know.”
“I’m sure if you’re like me, you don’t want to have biometric data in the hands of people that you don’t know,” Grammas says in the video posted by TMZ.
In an interview with the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Grammas added that he does not want officer data to end up in the hands of “anti-cop” people who could “target and harass officers just for doing their job.”
Grammas has suggested that police officers be excluded from the NFL’s new security protocols and be issued identifying wristbands instead.
But. so far, the NFL does not seem disposed to alter its plan.
“The credentialing system will enhance security at our stadiums,” NFL Director of Communications Tim Schlittner said in a statement, “and we look forward to working with all stakeholders to address any questions or concerns raised.”
Grammas concluded that if the full policy is implemented, his officers will no longer work at Allegiant Stadium for Raiders games.
The NFL has worked with numerous organizations critical of the police, including those championed by former NFL quarterback turned social justice warrior Colin Kaepernick.
The league has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to anti-cop organizations, including the Vera Institute of Justice, the Oregon Justice Resource Center, and the Community Justice Exchange, all of which support defunding and abolishing the police.
The NFL even allowed 1990s rapper Dr. Dre to include anti-cop lyrics in his halftime show at the Super Bowl 2022.
It seems likely that this could become an issue for other police departments that provide security at NFL stadiums across the country. However, as of this writing, it is unknown if any other departments or unions representing them are considering a boycott.
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More people will leave Sweden than arrive in 2024, a major turnaround for the country, which was once the most enthusiastic adopter of mass migration in Europe, and which experienced all the social unrest that seems to inevitably come with it.
The Swedish government has hailed its new anti-mass migration policies, as migrants start leaving the country in larger numbers, meaning it now has net emigration for the first time in over 50 years. The government’s Migration Minister, Maria Malmer Stenergard, has announced that “Sweden has stopped being an asylum immigration country” on the back of the latest figures.
This change is, in part, due to considerably fewer asylum seekers coming to Sweden this year and more migrants leaving Sweden. In a remarkable development unthinkable only a couple of years ago, a thousand more Iraqis left than arrived in 2023, over a thousand more Somalis left than arrived, and 500 more Syrians left than arrived.
The number of people leaving Sweden has increased by 60 per cent.
According to a Ministry of Justice statement based on Migration Agency data, Sweden will receive the lowest number of asylum seekers in 2024 of any year since 1997. Illustrating just how far these have fallen, there were 85,000 asylum applications in 2016, and just 5,600 so far in 2024, with new applications already running 27 per cent lower this year than in 2023, which itself had represented a record low year.
While these figures are relatively small and only represent baby steps towards the greater goal, which Minister Stenergard discussed, net migration being minus 5,700 in 2024 and being driven by former migrants departing is consequential for the country of just ten million people.
This change is not down to wider European trends, either, which makes Sweden’s achievement even more impressive. The government’s data pack makes clear that overall asylum seekers in the European Union remain very high, but “in Sweden, the decline continues from an already historically low level,” demonstrating Sweden has succeeded in the new government’s mission to make the country less attractive to mass migration.
Indeed, in 2015, Sweden took 13 per cent of all asylum seekers in the EU. In 2024, it is predicted to take just one percent.
Sweden got a new government in 2022, led by the Moderate Party—the national equivalent to Britain’s liberal centre-right globalist Conservative party—with coalition partners the socially conservative Christian Democrats, and the classically liberal Liberals party. The coalition is propped up by the right-populist Sweden Democrats, which, at times, were the lone voice on limiting migration during Sweden’s open borders years. Between their influence on the government and the much-changed Moderates, the Swedish state has taken a radically new course on immigration.
The Swedish government says that it has implemented “stricter asylum legislation” through combating what it calls the “shadow society”—the black market that allows illegal migrants to thrive—increasing returns and repatriations, cracking down on low-skill migration, revoking more residence permits for those who abuse Sweden’s hospitality, making chain migration harder, and requiring migrants to integrate.
Moderate Party migration minister Maria Malmer Stenergard hailed these policies as having been effective when she presented the latest immigration figures this week, boasting: “The government’s work yields results. The number of asylum applications is heading towards a historically low level, asylum-related residence permits continue to decrease and for the first time in 50 years, Sweden has net emigration.”
“Sweden has stopped being an asylum immigration country”, she reported.
Stenergard said lower levels of migrant arrivals are essential because persistently high arrivals make integration of newcomers into Swedish society difficult, given the tendency to form parallel communities. In other words, the Swedish government’s policy is to end multiculturalism and will require migrants to become culturally Swedish.
Indeed, Sviergesradio reports Stenergard told migrants this week: “If you are in Sweden to stay, you must learn the language, become self-sufficient and respect Swedish values”.
The Swedish upmarket newspaper Dagens Samhalle states the minister stopped short of outright saying that asylum migration had been bad but nevertheless said: “We have unfortunately seen that we have had a high asylum immigration in combination with a very poor integration. And there are many, not least those born abroad, who suffer from alienation. We must, for a long time, have greatly reduced immigration.”
Illustrating just what a journey the now-governing Moderates have been on, DS notes that next week is the 10th anniversary of former Moderate Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt‘s infamous call to the Swedish people to “open their hearts” to the asylum seekers of the world.
These comments came during the 2014 general election campaign, when Reinfeldt told the public that if they voted for him, he would introduce no new programs for Swedish citizens because the cost of taking on so many asylum seekers would be immense. He said then: “I can already say that it will lead to large costs… They are so extensive that it will place further restrictions on what there is room for in public funding. Therefore, we promise next to nothing in this election campaign, there will be no room for that.”
Unsurprisingly, with such a bleak offering to the country, Reinfeldt lost the election, but Sweden’s left-wing Social Democrats under Stefan Löfven won instead. Löfven implemented everything Reinfeldt had spoken of and more during the Europe Migrant Crisis of 2015–2016, causing a demographic change more rapid and more pronounced than any other country in Europe.
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Dozens of people have been killed and many more injured in an Israeli airstrike on a school-turned-shelter in Gaza City, the Palestinian authorities have said.
The attack on the Tabeen school in the central part of the city took place on Saturday morning and was confirmed by both officials in Gaza and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
There are conflicting reports so far about the number of casualties. Al Jazeera said, citing Gaza’s government media office, that more than 100 people have been killed and dozens more injured in the bombing. Not all of the bodies have been recovered so far, it added.
AP provided information from the Gaza Health Ministry’s ambulance and emergency service, which put the death toll at 60, with 47 others wounded. The outlet described the incident as “one of the deadliest strikes” in the ten months of the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian armed group Hamas.
Gaza’s government media office said in a statement that the number of casualties was so high because IDF warplanes “bombed the displaced people [at the school] while they were performing the dawn prayer.”
“We hold the Israeli occupation and the American administration fully responsible for this massacre,” the statement read. The strike “comes within the framework of the crime of genocide and ethnic cleansing against our Palestinian people,” it added.
Palestinian journalists said the facility was hit by at least three bombs. Some people were reportedly trapped in the building, which caught fire after the attack. Emergency workers are unable to extinguish the blaze and rescue them, as Israel cut off the water supply to the area, according to their reports.
The Israeli military claimed on X (formerly Twitter) that it targeted the school because it had been used as a headquarters by Hamas, from which the group “planned and promoted terrorist operations against the IDF forces and the citizens of the State of Israel.”
“Hamas systematically violates international law and operates from civilian shelters, using the population as a human shield,” the IDF said.
According to UN data, 477 out of 564 schools in Gaza, almost all of which were turned into shelters for refugees during the conflict, have been directly hit or damaged as of July 6.
Israel began its military operation in Gaza in response to a cross-border incursion by Hamas last October, in which around 1,200 people were killed and 250 were taken hostage. More than 39,600 people have been killed so far and over 91,700 others have been wounded in Israel’s airstrikes and ground offensive in the Palestinian enclave, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
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https://www.rt.com/news/602409-gaza-school-airstrike-israel/
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Washington will send Kiev another $125 million worth of missiles and ammunition, the Pentagon announced as fierce fighting continued in Russia’s Kursk Region.
The US Department of Defense noted on Friday that this was the 63rd batch of aid provided to Ukraine since August 2021 – six months prior to the launch of Russia’s military operation.
To help Kiev meet “critical security and defense needs,” the US will send Stinger anti-aircraft missiles; ammunition for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS); rounds for 155mm and 105mm artillery; Javelin, AT-4 and TOW anti-tank missiles; small-arms ammunition; and demolitions ordnance, the Pentagon said in a statement.
The package also included multi-mission radars, Humvee ambulances, spare parts, services, training and transportation.
Washington’s previous batch of military aid, worth $1.7 billion, was sent at the end of July. According to the Pentagon’s own numbers, the US has sent more than $56.2 billion in military aid to Ukraine since President Joe Biden took office in January 2021.
Earlier this week, Ukraine sent several battalions worth of troops into Russia’s Kursk Region. Moscow has accused the invaders of indiscriminately targeting civilians with artillery, small arms and drone strikes. On Friday, Ukrainian drones targeted the Kursk Nuclear Power Plant in Kurchatov, briefly cutting power supplies to the town.
“We don’t feel like this is escalatory in any way,” Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh told reporters on Thursday, when asked about US military aid to Kiev.
According to Singh, everything Ukraine does is legitimate self-defense from the Russian “invasion,” while Russia can always de-escalate by withdrawing.
The Ukrainian leadership has said the primary goal of the Kursk operation was to induce “fear” in the hearts of the Russian people. One of the units involved in the operation, according to Ukrainian media, is named ‘Nachtigall’ after the notorious Nazi auxiliary from WWII commanded by Roman Shukhevych.
At least five civilians have been killed and 21 wounded – including six children – by the Ukrainian attacks, according to Russian authorities. The defense ministry in Moscow said that the invaders have lost almost 1,000 troops and over 100 armored vehicles as of Friday.
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https://www.rt.com/news/602400-pentagon-ukraine-military-aid/
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The British government is eyeing a crackdown social media, while a member of the public has been arrested for “inaccurate social media” post, and a Covid-era government spy team monitoring the public for “disinformation” has been brought back.
The United Kingdom has experienced days of civil unrest including protest, riots, and confrontations between ethnic groups since the mass-stabbing of young children last week. Hundreds have been arrested for real-life acts of violence and incitement, including a cop-bashing middle-aged gay couple on their way home from the bingo, counter-protester “Asian males” who assaulted Union Jack-wearing men, and a Labour politician who called for his political enemies to have their throats cut at a ‘peace’ rally.
Since the early days of this unrest the government has gone hard on social media, warning both users and platform owners that severe consequences would follow for the disinformation the government said is causing the unrest. Now the time has come to deliver on those threats, it seems, and in comments made at the headquarters of London’s Metropolitan Police at Scotland Yard Friday morning Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer announced he was minded to crack down on the internet.
He said, reports The Guardian: “we’re going to have to look more broadly at social media after this disorder… this is not a law-free zone. And I think that’s clear from the prosecutions and sentencing.” Sir Keir boasted there would be “sentencing for online behaviour” in courts today, and reiterated “whether you’re directly involved or whether you’re remotely involved, you’re culpable, and you will be put before the courts”.
Critics say the government’s new slogan “think before your post” is a little too Orwellian for comfort, but some have already been caught up in that net. Cheshire Police boasted on Thursday evening they had arrested a woman “in connection with inaccurate social media post”, stating “a woman in relation to social media post containing inaccurate information about the identity of the attacker in the Southport murders.”
The leader of civil liberties campaign group Big Brother Watch, Silkie Carlo, expressed alarm at this language from the Police, stating their press release was “so badly written” — generously overlooking the possibility it was meant to be deliberately vague. Offering her interpretation of the law, Carlo claimed that it is not, in fact, an offence to accidentally post inaccurate information on social media unless it was intentional stirring of racial hatred or knowingly publishing false information intending to cause non-trivial harm.
“These are serious allegations and shouldn’t be trivialised, nor the law misrepresented, for short term political goals” said the anti-government overreach activist, reflecting on the vague police statement: “I assume the intention is to scare people [and] prompt more caution in social posting”.
Meanwhile, a Coronavirus-era shadowy government unit that Carlo’s Big Brother Watch campaigned against at the time appears to have been resurrected by the Starmer government this week. The Counter Disinformation Unit (CDU) is coming back, now given a fresh identity as the National Security Online Information Team (NSOIT) is pivoting from snooping on anti-lockdown activists — including Members of Parliament — to protest content, instead, reports The Daily Telegraph.
The paper states the observation unit is already embedded within social media companies as a “trusted flagger”, meaning it can bring content the government doesn’t want live to the attention of their moderation teams directly. The online content the unit is going after falls short of criminal activity but nevertheless is considered unwelcome, the report stated.
In all, the British government is working up to going to war with social media companies, and probably in particular Elon Musk’s Twitter / X, given his strident views on freedom of speech and the importance of having a public square for ideas to be challenged. Musk has been openly goading Sir Keir for days, something which Member of Parliament Nigel Farage has characterised as the billionaire getting the first punch in, before the legislative hammer falls, as in Venezuela.
Speaking to TalkTV on Thursday, Mr Farage said: “What I think is really interesting is the war of words that Elon Musk has launched against Starmer. You can almost tell that’s a pre-emptive strike.
“He senses that the Labour government, regulators… that things are going to get more difficult. But you know what? Governments that try and ban things, government that try and suppress things, all they do is create new avenues for people to go. And I honestly think that to control the internet, to control that debate, it’s almost impossible.”
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President Donald Trump is rolling out a new catch-all attack on his Democratic opponents: “We’re going to bring back all our commonsense things,’ he said in an online fund-raising ad.
He also used the phrase in his Wednesday press conference at Mar-a-Lago, saying:
People want safety. They want security. They want respect all around the world for our country. They don’t want this horrible culture that is developing — a culture of no commonsense. It’s really a culture of no common sense, and it’s not what anyone wants.
He explained:
We want to have a safe country. We want to have a strong military. We want low interest rates, and we want to be able to have the American dream. We want to be able to have our youth be able to buy homes, housing, get good jobs, and we’re really just at the opposite right now. So it’s so sad to see … [Harris has] been the worst border czar in history … [and] 20 million people came over the border during the Biden-Harris administration … Now you have people dying financially because they can’t buy bacon, they can’t buy food, they can’t buy groceries, they can’t do anything, and they’re living horribly in our country right now.
…
She picked a radical left man [Gov. Tim Walz as running mate]. He has positions that are … not even possible to believe that they exist. Heavy into the transgender world … He doesn’t want to have borders. He doesn’t want to have walls. He doesn’t want to have any form of safety for our country. He doesn’t mind people coming in from prisons — and neither does she.
The “culture of no common sense” may help Trump and JD Vance combine their criticism of Harris’ economic and border policies into a pocketbook pitch aimed at voters who are worried about migration’s wide-ranging damage to their living standards and the nation’s economy.
Vance told Fox News on August 6:
Border czar Kamala Harris has handwritten an invitation to every illegal alien and terrorist across the world … When I talk to Americans, one of the biggest concerns I hear is, ‘Why are housing costs so high?’ I’ll give you two reasons, Sean. Number one, there are 20 million illegal aliens who shouldn’t be here and who are competing with Americans for scarce homes. Number two, Kamala Harris has supported higher interest rates, which makes mortgages totally unaffordable for most people. So these policies make ordinary people suffer … she’s putting the interests of illegal aliens above Americans citizens.
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https://www.breitbart.com/2024-election/2024/08/09/trump-slams-democrat-culture-of-no-common-sense/
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Paramount Global will reportedly cut is workforce by 15 percent in another round of layoffs amid the entertainment industry’s uncertain future.
The reported cuts will aim to trim Paramount’s spending by $500 million in 2025, with a primary focus on marketing, communications, legal, and technology. Paramount Global co-CEO Chris McCarthy announced the changes during a Q2 earnings call on Thursday.
“These actions will take place in the coming weeks and will largely be completed by the end of the year,” McCarthy said. “As you can imagine, these are difficult decisions to make. We’ve incredibly talented people at Paramount and these actions are not a reflection of their contributions. Rather, they are necessary to transform our organization for the future next, transforming streaming.”
The announcement comes after co-CEOs Brian Robbins and George Cheeks unveiled a plan back in June to cut expenditures by $500 million. Per TheWrap:
With the hefty savings goal, CFO Naveen Chopra added that reductions in cost “go beyond head count” and “won’t all happen necessarily at the same point in time.” “We’ve made most of the $500 million savings that you’ll see in the near term is head-count-related, but we do think that there are opportunities to significantly reduce costs in other areas as well,” Chopra said on the earnings call.
Earlier this week, Paramount Global let go of its ownership of the ComicBook and PopCulture brands as Nashville-based Savage Ventures acquired both companies. Both companies were acquired in 2018 and employ a combined staff of over 40 staffers.
The entertainment industry suffered a heavy shakedown this week after Warner Bros. Discovery announced its stock took an $11.2 billion dive after “company reported disappointing second quarter earnings on Wednesday that missed expectations on both the top and bottom lines,” per Yahoo Finance.
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The new leftist Labour Party government in Britain announced plans to slash winter energy benefits for around 10 million pensioners while preparing massive tax hikes to fund soaring spending driven largely by mass migration.
In her first major address to Parliament on Monday, Chancellor Rachel Reeves — the head of the Treasury Department — confirmed the high-tax, high spending agenda of the new Labour government.
Reeves claimed that she “did not want to have to do this” but asserted that the previous Conservative government of Rishi Sunak had left a £22 billion “black hole” in Britain’s finances, the Daily Mail reports.
This deficit was exacerbated by illegal immigration and the asylum system, the overspend on which rose to £6.4 billion this year alone. The chancellor also pointed to more spending on the National Health Service (NHS), funding for the war in Ukraine, and highway and road maintenance.
To meet the spending costs, Reeves said that the government would scrap energy bill support this winter for potentially up to 10 million pensioners.
She said that all those who do not receive pension credit will have their support cut, despite the ongoing energy crisis in the country. Reeves claimed this would save the government around £1.4 billion this year and a further £1.5 billion next year.
“This is not a decision I wanted to make, nor is it the one I expected to make – but these are the necessary and urgent decisions that I must make,” Reeves told the Commons.
While the government decided to scrap money for elderly people to heat their homes and despite concerns over fuelling inflation, Reeves committed to a 22 per cent pay rise for junior doctors to end the longstanding labour dispute.
Despite the country suffering under the highest tax burden since the Second World War, Reeves also suggested that billions more in taxes would need to be raised when she unveils her Budget at the end of October, with death taxes and capital gains likely being targets to fill the £16.4 billion gap left after the budget cuts announced Monday.
A Value Added Tax (VAT) will also be imposed on private school fees starting at the beginning of next year, however, anyone who is paying advance fees will be caught up in the scheme starting this week.
Reeves said: “When I arrived in the Treasury, on the very first day I was alerted by officials that this was not how much the previous government expected to spend this year – it wasn’t even close.
“This level of overspend is not sustainable. Left unchecked, it is a risk to economic stability and, unlike the party opposite, I will never take risks with our country’s economic stability.
“So, it therefore falls to us to take the difficult decisions now to make further in-year savings. The scale of the situation we are dealing with means incredibly tough choices.”
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Former President Donald Trump’s July 13 rally in Butler, Pennsylvania — where he survived an assassination attempt — was the first time the Secret Service sent a counter-sniper to a Trump event to protect the 45th president, the agency admitted.
“It was the first time Secret Service counter-snipers were deployed to support the former president’s detail,” Secret Service acting director Ronald Rowe revealed during a Friday press briefing.
“With respect to why they were there in Butler, listen, we evaluate our threat landscape every day, we calibrate based on that threat, we evaluated a threat stream that we have, and we put our Secret Service counter-sniper personnel out there,” Rowe continued.
“And looking back, it was very fortunate that we did,” the Secret Service acting director added. “But the former president [and Trump’s running mate Sen. JD Vance (R-OH)] will have counter-sniper coverage moving forward.”
Notably, one of the counter-snipers fatally shot would-be presidential assassin Thomas Matthew Crooks after he opened fire on Trump, shooting the 45th president in the ear and killing former Pennsylvania fire chief Corey Comperatore, as well as wounding other rallygoers.
Rowe, however, couldn’t explain why none of the counter-snipers were posted on the nearby building from which the 20-year-old tried to assassinate President Trump.
“This was a Secret Service failure,” he said. “That roof line should have been covered.”
As Breitbart News reported, top officials within the Secret Service have denied requests to increase the security for President Trump over the past two years, according to several sources.
In the past, President Trump’s security detail had been covered by state and local counter-sniper teams,” according to a report by New York Post.
During Trump’s July 13 rally, a member of a local counter-sniper team “texted the Secret Service counter-sniper team leader about a suspicious person,” and sent him two photos of Crooks, Rowe said during Friday’s press briefing.
Rowe also noted that one member of President Trump’s security detail was on the phone with the Secret Service’s Pittsburgh field office, asking, “Hey, what do you know about this?” moments before Crooks fired at Trump.
“Right in the middle of that phone conversation, the shots begin firing,” Rowe said.
A viral video that one the July 13 rally attendees filmed shows an individual running across a roof — the same roof from which Crooks shot President Trump — minutes before the tragedy unfolded.
“We should have had better protection for the protectee,” Rowe admitted. “We should have had better coverage on that roof line. We should have had at least some other set of eyes from the Secret Service point of view, covering that.”
On Monday night, an anonymous Secret Service counter-sniper warned that the agency “SHOULD expect another assassination attempt” in an email to the agency’s Uniformed Division, a source confirmed to New York Post.
Meanwhile, a Secret Service whistleblower recently told Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) that Rowe “personally directed significant cuts to CSD,” which included reducing the division’s manpower by 20 percent.
After a reporter mentioned the whistleblower’s claim that Rowe “personally directed cuts to the Counter Surveillance Division, which led to the threat assessments team failing to perform its duties,” the acting director replied, “What I can tell you is that the Counter Surveillance Division, they do a fantastic job.”
“I know that there’s been allegations that I personally cut or that I denied that request,” Rowe added. “I did not.”
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Over 30 people were killed in a terrorist attack on Lido Beach in Somalia’s capital, Mogadishu on Friday, local media report, citing law enforcement. The seaside spot frequented by locals was targeted by four gunmen shooting indiscriminately and a suicide bomber who detonated an explosive device.
The attack took place late Friday when the beach was packed with people. A witness who spoke to AP said he saw an attacker wearing an explosive vest seconds before the man “blew himself up next to the Beach View Hotel.” Another witness said the shooting started soon after the blast. Videos posted by witnesses on X (formerly Twitter) show bodies lying on the beach in the dark, and people running to escape the carnage.
According to police spokesman Abdifatah Adan Hassan, security forces were able to kill all the attackers and detain their suspected driver, who attempted to flee the site in a car packed with explosives. One soldier was killed during the standoff with the gunmen.
As a result of the tragedy, at least 32 civilians died and 63 others were wounded, some of them critically, according to Hassan.
Al-Qaeda-linked Al-Shabaab militants claimed responsibility for the attack through an affiliated radio station.
The Somali government condemned the attack and held an emergency meeting attended by President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and top security officials late Friday. At the meeting, the president urged the security agencies to develop advanced strategies to protect civilians against further terrorist attacks.
This is not the first time Lido Beach has been targeted by Al-Shabaab. The militant group was driven out of Mogadishu in 2011 by an African Union peacekeeping force, but still controls some areas in the southern and central regions of the country. It often conducts bombing and gun attacks on civilians and military infrastructure.
Friday’s tragedy is the deadliest attack since October 2022, when Al-Shabaab carried out twin car bombings in Mogadishu, killing more than 100 people and injuring 300.
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https://www.rt.com/africa/602087-somali-beach-terror-attack/
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New research produced by British scholars has claimed that vaccination with any of the Covid-19 shots actually lowered the incidence of heart attacks and strokes and therefore outweighed the risks of adverse effects.
Researchers from the universities of Cambridge, Bristol and Edinburgh were able to analyze millions of anonymized health records of adults in England, provided by the National Health Service (NHS) and dated from December 2020 to January 2022. By that point, over 90% of the UK population over the age of 12 had received at least one dose of the jab.
“We studied [Covid]-19 vaccines and cardiovascular disease in 45.7 million adults in England and found a similar or lower incidence of common cardiovascular diseases, such as heart attacks and strokes, following each vaccination than before or without vaccination,” said Dr. Samatha Ip of Cambridge, the lead author of the study.
Ip and 16 other researchers based their conclusions on the linked data from general practices, hospital admissions and death records, in a secure environment provided by the NHS. They were looking at the incidence of cardiovascular events before or without vaccination compared to after.
According to their findings, published this week in the journal Nature Communications, the incidence of heart attacks and strokes dropped by almost 10% in the 13-24 weeks after the first dose of the jab. This went to 27% lower after the second dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine, and 20% lower after the second Pfizer shot.
“This England-wide study offers patients reassurance of the cardiovascular safety of first, second and booster doses of [Covid]-19 vaccines,” said William Whiteley, associate director at the BHF Data Science Centre and professor at the University of Edinburgh.
The benefits of second and booster doses, added Whiteley, “outweigh the very rare cardiovascular complications.”
Previous studies have found a rise in myocarditis and pericarditis after the mRNA-based shots – such as those from Pfizer/BioNtech and Moderna – and vaccine-induced thrombotic thrombocytopenia (blood clotting) following adenovirus-based vaccines such as the AstraZeneca one.
While this study confirmed those findings, it did not identify any new cardiovascular conditions and “offers further reassurance that the benefits of vaccination outweigh the risk,” the authors said.
The vaccination program, said Ip, “has been shown to provide protection against severe [Covid]-19 and saved millions of lives worldwide.”
The study used a technique called Cox regression to estimate adjusted hazard ratios and corresponding 95% confidence intervals in time intervals since vaccination, adjusted for a wide range of comorbidities, age, sex, and prior Covid-19 infections.
Critics of the vaccination mandates embraced by many countries – including the UK – have argued that the shots had not been tested for safety, failed to prevent transmission of the virus, and potentially pose greater risks to otherwise healthy people than the virus itself.
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https://www.rt.com/news/602072-nhs-covid-vaccine-safety-study/
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Paris has once again surrendered to foreign occupiers. Except this time, the occupiers are not an armed encampment; they’re hungry athletes fed up with the vegan diet Olympic organizers tried to make them eat.
Olympic organizers were forced to order 4,000 pounds of meat and eggs quickly after athletes decried the fake meat and non-dairy options, the Daily Mail reports.
From the beginning, officials sought to make this year’s Games the most eco-friendly and green in Olympic history. However, lost somewhere in the social designers’ “grand design” was the fact that, while fake meat is fine in the faculty cafeterias of Harvard and Oxford, elite human machines do not run on fake meat.
While organizers initially sought to downplay the woke meal plans’ impact and assured that all would be well, eventually, they had to concede defeat.
“As far as food is concerned, we had to make a few changes, and we had to adapt, which is quite normal,” Paris 2024 chief executive Etienne Thobois told reporters.
“We have 700kg of eggs and a tonne of meat have been the increases we have provided to meet the needs of athletes.”
Is having to rush order over 4,000 pounds of a totally different menu item “quite normal?”
Thobois continued, “We have got a full vision in terms of nutrition which is designed to provide the products necessary, including organic food. We have adapted everything, and it is to the satisfaction of all concerned.
‘We have had discussions with the heads of delegation and we have put the athletes at the forefront of our concerns and adapted our services to meet the needs of the athletes.”
The menu is not the only area where major concessions from the Games’ eco-friendly planners are seen. Teams are also now being allowed to bring their own air conditioning. This is in contrast to the previous arrangement, where only teams from highly-funded, wealthy countries had their own AC, and others were forced to rent it.
The problems with nutrition and cooling off have followed the athletes onto the field of play.
Australian swimmer Ariarne Titmus says the conditions contributed significantly to her inability to set a new world record in the 800m freestyle.
“It probably wasn’t the time I thought I was capable of, but living in the Olympic Village makes it hard to perform,” she said on Sunday.
“It’s definitely not made for high performance, so it’s about who can really keep it together in the mind.”
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Four restaurants in Ohio have announced they will not televise the Olympics to their patrons after the “insulting” displays during the opening ceremonies in Paris on Friday.
The restaurants – located in Columbus and Cleveland and owned by restauranteur Bobby George – issued a joint statement on Tuesday announcing their decision to cancel the Games.
The four restaurants are TownHall, REBoL, Green Goat, and Mandrake, according to WKYC.
The post read labeled the drag queen-themed parody of the Last Supper as “insulting to the Christian faith.” In addition, the statement said, “We will not tolerate any form of discrimination or desecration. Therefore, we will not be broadcasting the Olympic games at any of our restaurants.”
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The ban on children being prescribed puberty blockers was upheld as lawful on Monday, rejecting challenges from a pro-transgenderism group.
In a blow to the woke transgender movement, the emergency legislation introduced by former Health Secretary Victoria Atkins in May to prohibit children from being given life-altering drugs designed to stunt puberty was upheld by by Britain’s High Court, the BBC reported.
The decision came after a legal challenge from the progressive campaign group TransActual UK, which argued that the government had wrongfully used emergency powers to enact the ban and that it did not carry out the proper consultations with patient groups before making a decision.
The move from the previous government came in response to the landmark Cass Review, a study into medical interventions for children supposedly suffering from gender dysphoria, which found that there was a lack of evidence of the efficacy of so-called “gender affirming care” such as the prescription of puberty blockers.
The Cass Review came in the wake of the National Health Service (NHS) also banning puberty blockers for children, outside of clinical trials.
Despite large swaths of the Labour Party subscribing to radical transgenderism, the new left-wing government appears intent to maintain the ban on puberty blockers for children.
Recently-installed Health Secretary Wes Streeting said of Monday’s ruling: “Children’s healthcare must be evidence-led… Dr Cass’s review found there was insufficient evidence that puberty blockers are safe and effective for children with gender dysphoria and gender incongruence.
“We must therefore act cautiously and with care when it comes to this vulnerable group of young people.”
The TransActual UK campaign group condemned the ruling and said that it is considering an appeal.
“We are seriously concerned about the safety and welfare of young trans people in the UK. Over the last few years, they have come to view the UK medical establishment as paying lip service to their needs; and all too happy to weaponise their very existence in pursuit of a now discredited culture war,” the group said in a statement.
“To trans young people: you are loved and you are special. What is happening to your healthcare in this country is appalling, and we will keep working until all trans people can access the healthcare they need when they need it,” the group added.
The ruling was hailed by Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling, however, who said: “We seem, at last, to be moving back to treatment for vulnerable youth based on evidence-based medicine, as opposed to the unevidenced [sic] claims of ideological lobby groups.”
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Too hard and too costly. That sums up the reason Air New Zealand has abandoned a goal to cut its carbon emissions by 2030, blaming a range of difficulties Tuesday for the decision.
Delivery delays of fuel-efficient aircraft and the affordability of alternative jet fuels were the two key factors in the surprise move.
The move makes it the first major carrier to back away from such a climate target, the BBC reports.
The airline added it is working on a new short-term target and it remains committed to an industry-wide goal of achieving net zero emissions by 2050 as soon as it can work out a way to fulfill that undertaking.
“In recent months, and more so in the last few weeks, it has also become apparent that potential delays to our fleet renewal plan pose an additional risk to the target’s achievability,” Air New Zealand Chief Executive Officer, Greg Foran, said in the statement announcing the end of the plans.
In 2022, Air New Zealand adopted a 2030 target to cut its emissions by almost 29 percent.
It was much more ambitious than a five percent reduction goal over the same period set by the global aviation industry.
Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF) are a key part of the sector’s strategy to cut emissions but airlines have struggled to purchase enough of it.
“The price of [SAF] is more expensive than traditional fuels, and there is not enough capacity to produce that at scale,” said Ellis Taylor from aviation analytics firm Cirium.
Other airlines listed on the U.N.’s Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi) database as having “removed” their commitment to near-term emissions goals included United Airlines, the German carrier Lufthansa, Britain’s easyJet, LATAM Airlines Chile and Japan Airlines, AP reports.
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Brazilian skateboarder Rayssa Leal won a bronze medal in the street skateboarding event on Sunday. In contrast to the Satanic opening ceremony, she quoted the Bible after her big win.
Leal, a 16-year-old Christian, proudly quoted John 14:6 when she won her bronze medal, the Christian Post reported.
“Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me,'” the verse reads.
Leal also performed the reading in sign language.
At 13, Leal became Brazil’s youngest Olympian during the Games in 2021 when she won a silver medal.
This year, she made an amazing comeback. Her score of 92.88 lifted her from fifth place to third and a bronze medal.
“When I was very young, I dreamed of becoming a skateboard athlete,” Leal said. “And here I am, with a second Olympic medal from the games. Once again, thank God I won a medal. I’m very happy to be here.”
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John Binder 18 Jul 2024
Ford Motor Company will expand production of its profitable gas-powered Super Duty pickup trucks at its Oakville Assembly Complex in Ontario, Canada, which had been meant to become an all-electric plant producing only Electric Vehicles (EVs).
On Thursday, Ford CEO Jim Farley announced that the automaker would be expanding production of its F-Series Super Duty pickups to the Ontario plant with a $3 billion investment. The pickups are also produced in Kentucky and Ohio.
Investments are also expected to be made at Ford’s Michigan plants.
“Super Duty is a vital tool for businesses and people around the world and, even with our Kentucky Truck Plant and Ohio Assembly Plant running flat out, we can’t meet the demand,” Farley said in a statement. “This move benefits our customers and supercharges our Ford Pro commercial business.”
The Oakville Assembly Complex was supposed to produce EVs with a $1.3 billion investment. Production of an electric three-row SUV has since been delayed until 2027.
The news comes as Farley recently said making large EV pickup trucks and SUVs are not going to be profitable for Ford or other automakers because they are far too costly.
“These huge, enormous EVs are never going to make money: The battery is $50,000, even with low-nickel, LFP chemistry. They will never be affordable,” Farley said.
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at [email protected].
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Maybe?
Joe slips on a banana peel strategically placed next to his golf clubs and he breaks a hip, the Secret Service is baffled.
With absolutely nothing to lose the deeply panicked screaming meanies find themselves in the truly liberating position of being able try anything.
Cackles is in for a minute to bat cleanup, but then...
Jill sacrifices herself and comes in off the bench.
Valiantly embracing her duty to save our nation from the impending doom of the inevitable Trump Dictatorship, she sacrifices her comfy retirement and unselfishly puts the future of this country back into the hands of millions of decent Americans by proclaiming...
"You Can Still Vote Biden For America!"
Media monkeys call it the greatest move since sanctuary cities.
"Doctor" Jill is already up to speed.
"She knows what Joe was trying to accomplish to protect our democracy and keep decency on the ballot." They will chant in unison.
"She will be able carry that torch..."
Is it legal?
Is it possible?
Is the good doctor disqualified?
With a few minor changes some others could be plugged in to this scenario as well... Mike, Hunter, Nancy through Paul Jr, Adam, Joy or Joy, Oprah, Rob, Bobby, Babs, Bette etc.
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CNN to Implement Up to Two Minute Delay for Presidential Debate — It’s Normally Seven Seconds
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2024/06/cnn-implement-up-two-minute-delay-presidential-debate/
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Denmark is set to impose a new tax on farmers over greenhouse gases produced by their livestock, Taxation Minister Jeppe Bruus has announced. The toll on cow, pig, and sheep emissions will be implemented starting in 2030, according to the minister.
The new tax is expected to greatly contribute to the country’s goal of reducing emissions by 70% from 1990 levels by the end of the decade, as well as ultimately attaining carbon neutrality, Bruus explained.
“We will take a big step closer in becoming climate neutral in 2045,” the minister stated, praising the measure as a way for Denmark to become “the first country in the world to introduce a real CO2 tax on agriculture.”
Livestock farmers will be taxed 300 kroner ($43) per ton of carbon dioxide equivalent produced by their animals. However, this will initially be subject to an income tax deduction of 60%.
The measure is expected to hit dairy farmers the most, given that an average Danish cow produces around six metric tons (6.6 tons) of CO2 equivalent each year, with pigs and sheep emitting significantly less gas.
The country is a major livestock producer, with its current cattle population at nearly 1.5 million, according to Statistic Denmark. That would net more than $400 million a year in carbon taxes.
The new tax is set to rise even higher, reaching a target of 750 kroner per ton by 2035.
Dairy farming is believed to be a major contributor to human-related greenhouse gas production. According to the UN Environment Program’s estimates, livestock account for some 32% of methane emissions caused by human activity.
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https://www.rt.com/news/600064-denmark-livestock-emissions-tax/
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Over registration is a prevalent factor in fraudulent activity. Especially with registered voters that never vote.
I expect that all of this has been thought of before and our corrupt congress monkeys will never do it, but it would put an end to the voter roll cleanup problems and seems worthy of consideration.
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- Any voter registration that goes unused for more than two years is automatically declared dormant and removed from the rolls.
That voter will be notified by electronic and paper mail that re-registration is necessary for them to participate in any upcoming elections.
If a person votes regularly they will not be affected.
- All voter registration promotion will be discontinued and made illegal.
If a person wants to vote they must make the specific effort to complete the steps necessary on their own with no influence or other incentive.
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Online registration with ID will be quick and easy.
Citizens will be able to register at their driver's license office but any motor-voter automatic registration laws are to be repealed.
Voter registration will be made available at local City Halls, Post Offices and Public Libraries.
Absentee voting with current registration and by specific request will be allowed.
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Remember, even though something is promoted as a good thing there is always another agenda behind it.
"Get Out The Vote" etc. benefits the ones doing the promotion or they would not be doing it.
"The welfare of humanity has always been the alibi of tyrants."
Christine Anderson MEP
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Hearing on the Manhattan District Attorney's Office
https://www.youtube.com/live/jY6liKk1-eU?si=xZ6SqhIT2LItmNXQ
Starts at 1:16:00
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