A California law banning possession and sale of gun magazines holding more than 10 rounds was blocked by a federal judge who said the law was unconstitutional in a decision released on Friday.

 In a surprise move, Governor Gavin Newsom (D-CA) vetoed a bill that would have allowed judges to consider whether a parent “affirms” a child’s “gender identity” among other factors during custody battles. 

 The Biden administration has again broken records at the border as illegal crossings jumped to new highs in August, according to new statistics released by Customs and Border Protection.

 The 911 call from the aftermath of an F-35 crash in South Carolina last Sunday was released on Friday, revealing more details about the expensive incident that is still under investigation by the U.S. military.

A U.S. federal appeals court has thrown up a big roadblock for special counsel Jack Smith as he continues his investigation into the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol Building two-and-a-half years ago.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled last week that Smith cannot have access to the phone records of Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) because allowing him to obtain the information amounts to a breach of the GOP lawmaker’s immunity under the Constitution’s “speech and debate” clause.

Smith was seeking Perry’s communications with colleagues and Executive Branch officials, Politico reported. However, the clause in question shields members of Congress from being slapped with legal proceedings while they are engaging in their elected official duties.

Russian forces foiled the activity of eight Ukrainian subversive groups in the Kherson direction in the past week, with the enemy losing roughly 445 soldiers, the Russian Defense Ministry said in a report.

Russian forces repelled 28 Ukrainian attacks in the Donetsk direction in the past week, with the enemy suffering 1,455 casualties, Russia’s Defense Ministry said in a report on Saturday.

According to the report, the Battlegroup South used airstrikes, missiles and artillery to repel the attacks near Kleshcheyevka, Avdeyevka and Maryinka in the Donetsk People's Republic.

The owners of a New York City daycare centre where a toddler died and three others were sickened by opioid exposure last week were hiding bags of fentanyl beneath a trap door in the children’s play area, police say.

New York City detectives were executing a search warrant on the Bronx apartment on Thursday when they found the narcotics, including a large quantity of fentanyl and other paraphernalia concealed by plywood and tile flooring. Photos shared by police showed bags full of powder inside the “trap floor” a few steps away from a shelf of children’s toys.

Researchers in Sweden have discovered that large amounts of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, is leaking from unusual depths of the Baltic Sea seabed.

In a recent expedition, researchers at Stockholm University and Linne University detected methane bubbles rising up 370 metres (1,200 feet) from the seabed, a stark contrast to the expected 150-200 metres.

The gas bubbles were found in a 20-square-kilometre (77-square-miles) area off of Sweden’s southeastern coast.

“We know that methane gas can bubble up from shallow seabeds near the Baltic Sea coast, but I’ve never seen such intense bubbles before – and definitely not from such a deep area,” said researcher Christian Stranne, member of the research project, in a statement from Stockholm University.

Stranne explained the oxygen-free conditions in the deep waters of the Baltic Sea could be causing the bubbles to remain more intact, making them rise to the surface more efficiently.

Similar methane leaks could be present in other parts of the Baltic Sea, he said, and the researchers will be carrying out further analysis to understand the cause of high levels of methane release in the area.

The author of letters to social media companies demanding the financial punishment of Russell Brand is a British lawmaker implicated in London’s war on Covid-19 and Ukraine dissenters. Her husband was a commander in the Army’s psy-ops division.

Allegations of sexual impropriety and abuse by comedian and podcaster Russell Brand by the British media prompted YouTube to demonetize the star’s popular channel on September 20. 

The Grayzone can now reveal that YouTube’s financial censorship of Brand is the result of an effort waged by a former British government minister who was responsible for London’s crackdown on dissent during the Covid-19 pandemic. Her husband has also participated in that campaign of state repression as deputy commander of 77th Brigade, the British Army’s psychological warfare division.

YouTube justified its demonetization of Brand on the grounds that he violated its “creator responsibility policy.” This marks the first time a content creator has been financially punished by the company for reasons other than the videos published on the site. A spokesperson has claimed, “if a creator’s off-platform behaviour harms our users, employees or ecosystem, we take action.”

The allegations against Brand date from betwee 2006 and ’13, and have yet to be proven in court. There is no indication the charges are being investigated by law enforcement in Britain or the US, where the offenses allegedly occurred. Brand has vehemently denied accusations of abuse and rape.

A sordid spat burst open this week revealing the absolute lack of principles among the NATO alliance supposedly defending Ukraine against purported Russian aggression. The chief antagonists in the latest row are Poland and the Kiev regime but the angry sparks are liable to explode the whole shaky facade of NATO and European Union support for the Ukrainian regime.

Poland this week said it would halt the supply of weapons to Ukraine. Warsaw declared that its priority was to modernize its armed forces. This is an astounding U-turn by the Polish authorities who up to now have been one of the most gung-ho supporters of the Kiev regime against alleged “Russian aggression”.

The subsequent panic is palpable. Germany has accused Poland of “playing politics” in its solidarity towards Ukraine, while Lithuania and the other Baltic states are clamouring for drastic mediation.

Lithuania’s President Gitanas Nausedá called on Poland and Ukraine to end the row as a matter of urgency. “For the sake of our common and most important goal – the protection of Europe from Russia’s aggressive expansionist policy – the difference between Ukraine and Poland must be resolved as soon as possible.”

President Joe Biden announced on Thursday that Vice President Kamala Harris will lead the new federal office of gun violence prevention after she produced questionable results on the border and with voting rights legislation.

The office will reportedly act as a coordinated effort between the Biden White House, the Community Justice Action Fund, and Everytown for Gun Safety. Activists argue that the office will allow the administration to coordinate on gun control issues across the federal government.

“Our promise to the American people is this: we will not stop working to end the epidemic of gun violence in every community, because we do not have a moment, nor a life, to spare,” Harris said.

However, Harris’s leadership on key policy issues such as gun control, artificial intelligence, and the migrant crisis has either been fraught with gaffes or has produced no substantive change.

During a roundtable in July, Harris attempted to explain artificial intelligence to a group of labor and civil rights leaders and instead her speech became a word salad.

Captain Zig and Captain Zag of the major parties take their turns in the wheelhouse, the destination is on the horizon now, it has a very noticeable red tinge.

Australian states and “five eyes” countries have been flooded with covert communists, with the exception of Britain which was diverted by Boris Johnson, himself later punished by being unseated with a mighty storm-in-a-teacup “Covid party” furor. The left typically rises during an economic downturn, when the public appetite is stronger for handouts, but there is also a suggestion of vote-rigging or corruption in many of these elections, noticeably also in Brazil, where the outgoing leader (“just a little flu” Bolsonaro) fled the country as if there had been a bloody coup.

When communists take over, an early priority is control of information, after that comes a barrage of rules, restrictions and curfews of various types and ever rising costs, duties and imposts, followed by attacks on certain minorities, conscientious objectors et al, while the communist clique itself receives increasingly favourable treatment from and via the state.

Eventually they declare war on their entire citizenry and purges follow.

Here in Australia we have Communications Minister Michelle Rowland working on censoring information with draconian punishments for offenders. This is the clearest possible indication that worse is to come. But don’t hold your breath, this is being done slowly, and by stealth.

Ohio Republican Rep. Jim Jordan is demanding the testimony of Special Counsel David Weiss, the man who is in charge of the Hunter Biden investigation.

The representative sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland in which he requested documents and testimony as part of the investigation his committee is having to see if the Department of Justice has been politicized, Fox News reported.

It comes the same week that the representative and the attorney general had a fiery exchange during a hearing in the House.

“Mr. Weiss asked to be made special counsel. I had promised that I would give him all the resources he needed and I made him special counsel,” the attorney general said at the hearing, but the representative had more questions.

“Mr. Garland, What changed on July 10th, 2023? David Weiss wrote to Senator Graham and said, I have not requested special counsel designation. August 11th, you announced that he’s now the special counsel. What happened in that 31 days?” he said.

A fundraiser has been launched for Dove spokesperson and fat liberation and BLM activist Zyahna Bryant. The pitch for donations is that Bryant needs to feel "SAFE and protected" as a graduate student activist due to the "hate mail and threats" that have recently "become worse." 

Bryant was a student at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville in the summer of 2020 and took part in BLM protests. The fundraiser lists her as a "young Charlottesville activist," and the ask is to help keep her safe. 

Bryant was recently criticized in media after she announced a partnership with Dove beauty brand on her Instagram. The criticism was leveled at Bryant's continuing to be outspoken about the marginalization of minorities, while she brought heaps of hate onto a classmate when they were both studying at the University of Virginia. She alleged that a white student was racist and ruined the woman's life. That woman was able to prove that she had not said anything racist at all, and that Bryant had misheard her.

There were no consequences for Bryant who smeared the woman mercilessly. The woman was not able to continue her education and had to leave school for a time before being able to finish her degree. Her future plans were also derailed by the baseless accusations.

A new government report detailed the dire living conditions some military members face in their barracks across the country, highlighting a problem military leaders have so far struggled to fix.

A report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that young troops living in barracks on military installations have been forced to confront everything from pests such as roaches and bed bugs to toxic waste and even squatters, potentially putting the health and safety of members at risk while damaging morale.

The 118-page report, which was published Monday by the GAO, concluded that military leaders at the Pentagon have not been able to provide proper oversight over the problem and have mostly left the issues up to each individual service to fix. 

Republican Rep. Scott Perry told Newsmax that $20 million in unexplained payments to President Joe Biden's family and associates constitutes "probable cause."

Appearing Friday on "The Record With Greta Van Susteren," the Pennsylvania lawmaker emphasized that the circumstantial evidence obtained by Republican-led House panels was just as substantial as direct evidence.

"There's a mountain of it," Perry said of probable cause that Joe Biden, as vice president, was involved to some degree in the foreign business dealings of his son, Hunter Biden.

Perry noted that "we don't know" what the service or product was that led to the family hauling in tens of millions of dollars, other than it mostly came in through foreigners "of questionable repute."

'We've got about 175 suspicious activity reports, reporting from the banks to Treasury on the Bidens' bank accounts," he continued. "We have bank accounts or transactions listed as Biden, but no first name."

An award-winning Harvard Business School professor and researcher spent years exploring the reasons people lie and cheat. A trio of behavioral scientists examining a handful of her academic papers concluded her own findings were drawn from falsified data.

It was a routine takedown for the three scientists—Joe Simmons, Leif Nelson and Uri Simonsohn—who have gained academic renown for debunking published studies built on faulty or fraudulent data. They use tips, number crunching and gut instincts to uncover deception. Over the past decade, they have come to their own finding: Numbers don’t lie but people do. 

“Once you see the pattern across many different papers, it becomes like a one in quadrillion chance that there’s some benign explanation,” said Simmons, a professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and a member of the trio who report their work on a blog called Data Colada. 

Simmons and his two colleagues are among a growing number of scientists in various fields around the world who moonlight as data detectives, sifting through studies published in scholarly journals for evidence of fraud. 

At least 5,500 faulty papers were retracted in 2022, compared with 119 in 2002, according to Retraction Watch, a website that keeps a tally. The jump largely reflects the investigative work of the Data Colada scientists and many other academic volunteers, said Dr. Ivan Oransky, the site’s co-founder. Their discoveries have led to embarrassing retractions, upended careers and retaliatory lawsuits. 

Webmaster addition:

Why should we not just blindly trust science?

Alchemy, for one.

Phlogiston Chemistry, for another.

Prior to the 14th Century Astronomers thought the Earth was the center of the universe, because, well, that's what the church wanted, and spent hundreds of years of scientific research on the theory of Epicycles, trying to reconcile the Earth centered model with the observed motions of the planets. Epicycles hold the record for longest running scientific goof in history!

17th Century doctors thought rubbing chicken dung into your scalp would cure baldness! They also thought leeches sucked disease out of patients.

18th Century Geologists thought the Earth was 6000 years old, because, well, that's what the church wanted!

Prior to the 1950s, scientists thought proteins carried our heredity.

Until the 19th Century, doctors thought infection was caused by bad air, from which we get the term "Malaria."

Scientists claimed cigarettes were good for you up until the 1950s. They even had a machine to pump tobacco smoke into your anus...

... the origin of the phrase "blowing smoke up your a**!"

In 1948, the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine went to the discovery of DDT. A few years later it had almost collapsed the food chain.

In 1949, the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine went to the discovery of the "therapeutic value" of lobotomy! Patients had their brains butchered by having what was essentially an ice pick shoved up their nose into their brains!

Until 2005, doctors thought ulcers were caused by stress.

National Geographic ran an article in 2015 whining why people don't believe science. But science is not about belief but about facts! And National Geographic should not be questioning why people do not trust science after its own 1999 "Piltdown Chicken" scandal!

Science is not perfect. Science does make mistakes. The beauty of science is supposed to be that they admit it, not use the label of "science" like a modern religious icon to push agendas onto people! Anyone who says the "Science is settled" is not being scientific, they are being propagandistic!

The Mayo Clinic which has been touted by many as the best hospital system and medical research center in the United States, recently made an interesting update on their website regarding the drug Hydroxychloroquine.

In the new update on their site, it now says “Hydroxychloroquine may be used to treat coronavirus (COVID-19) in certain hospitalized patients.”

Previously the Mayo Clinic claimed Hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine were “malaria drugs authorized for emergency use by the FDA during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the FDA withdrew that authorization when data analysis showed that the drugs are not effective for treating COVID-19.”

Per Mayo Clinic:

FDA Approves "Emergency Use" Of Experimental Vaccines – Is It Time To Stockpile Critical Medications Before The Government Restricts Them Again?

Here’s Mayo Clinic’s previous stance on the drug:

We previously discussed the defunct Disinformation Governance Board and its controversial head Nina Jankowicz. After the outcry over the program, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas finally relented and disbanded the board while insisting that it was never about censoring opposing views.

Jankowicz has sued over the portrayal of her views.

Now, Americans for Prosperity Foundation (AFPF) has exposed just how broad the scope of the censorship efforts were under the board in combatting “misinformation, disinformation, and malinformation (MDM)."

This range of authority in what the agency called the “MDM space,” included targeting views on racial justice and the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan.

As the winds whip through the canyons of Chicago's skyscrapers, a storm is brewing between the city's derivatives powerhouses like DRW, IMC, CME, and Cboe, and a new mayoral administration desperate to fill its half-a-billion-dollar budget chasm, Bloomberg reports.

The city's financial giants, traditionally known as the fulcrum of the global derivatives market, have been greasing the gears of global trade for decades in what's now a $75 billion industry. Now, they find themselves in the crosshairs of an $800 million tax proposal from Mayor Brandon Johnson. The plan? levy every financial transaction. The response? Chicago's financial elite are rattled - particularly as crime rates surge.

Now, a quiet mobilization is underway. These giants of trade, who typically spend their days outfoxing each other in the markets, are now colluding to push back against what they see as punitive policies. This new front sees them sharing data to amplify their value proposition, making it crystal clear to policymakers the vast economic benefits they bring to Chicago.

"We don’t want to leave... But we cannot be disadvantaged in the world's most competitive markets," said Ed Tilly, the CEO of Cboe Global Markets.

Shareholders in these companies have felt more pain than strikers in recent months, with shares of Stellantis falling by more than 7 percent and shares of Ford and GM falling by more than 20 percent. Compare that to rising inflation, which is less and hits the pocketbooks of both shareholders and workers.

Yet union bosses want to grab even more value from shareholders in a manner that's ultimately a small win and big loss for not only the workers and companies, respectively, but also for the entire economy. What a tiny percentage of U.S. unionized auto workers hope to gain in increased wages, shareholders lose in multiples, and Americans as a whole lose in our market’s competitiveness.

Investors prefer to invest in countries where they aren’t compelled to share profits when times are good. That’s why investors risk their capital. With no significant upside, investors will keep their money in lower-profit but more reliable investments such as bonds, a preference that, if widespread, would impoverish not only the auto industry but all of the American industry. It's an inefficient form of investing and removes the critical element to the economic growth of risk-takers as decision-makers with skin in the game.

Shareholders aren't all billionaires. In fact, 158 million Americans own shares in companies—about three-quarters of all adults. As should be clear from those numbers, most shareholders are regular folks, and those regular folks are getting fleeced by the union (full disclosure: This author is a regular guy who holds GM shares).

The problem isn't just with the unions. The problem is with our politicians, who can't stand up to the unions, or they get voted out of office. That's why both Republicans and Democrats avoid angering unions, and why they silently endure strikes that debilitate not only the affected companies but the entire economy.

Alzheimer’s disease is now one of the leading causes of death in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Alzheimer’s is a degenerative and incurable brain disease that predominantly affects older people.

Early symptoms include memory loss and lapses in judgment, but at a later stage these can progress to problems with a wider range of functions too, such as balance, breathing and digestion.

As Statista's Anna Fleck details below, while heart disease, cancer and Covid-19 claimed by far the highest numbers of lives in 2021 (which was the latest available data), Alzheimer’s disease ranked in a high seventh place with 119,399 deaths that year, equating to 31 people per 100,000 population.

After years of condemning ballot harvesting and early voting, Republicans are switching course for 2024 and embracing both policies wholeheartedly. The results, experts say, can bear good and bad consequences. Some foresee legal challenges.

"Ballot harvesting" is a practice where third-party individuals or organizations collect completed mail-in ballots and deliver them to election officials on a voter's behalf.

Hans von Spakovsky—Election Law Reform Initiative Manager and Senior Fellow at The Heritage—prefers to call the practice "Ballot Trafficking."

"You play by the rules that are in place wherever you are but that doesn't mean that you allow the status quo to stay that way," Mr. von Spakovsky told The Epoch Times.

He also suggested that the GOP's decision to play the ballot harvesting game should not stop voters from trying to convince their state legislators "to change the rules to get rid of ballot trafficking and allowing third-party strangers to go pick up a voter's ballot because the risks in allowing that are too great."

On Friday, New York City Mayor Eric Adams unveiled a Knightscope K5 Security Robot that will be deployed in the crime-ridden Times Square Subway Station.

"$9 an hour… $9 an hour. I know you wanted to write how we're wasting money, but I'm sorry I'm taking your thunder away. We're leasing at $9 an hour," Adams said at the robot's big reveal press conference. 

Somehow, the mayor and fellow Democrats believe this robot will deter criminals who have only been emboldened by failed social justice policies over the years. 

From afar, the fully autonomous security robot looks like a giant trash can on wheels. It's armed with cameras and will record video but not audio.

The robot comes as the mayor has slashed budgets citywide by 5% amid worsening financial conditions in the metro area, fueled by outflows of residents and businesses and a migrant crisis sparked by the Biden administration's disastrous open southern border policies. 

"This is below minimum wage," Adams said, adding, "No bathroom breaks, no meal breaks."

However, not everyone was thrilled about the robot, and there seems to be some in-fighting among Democrats in the metro area. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) posted on X, "NYC schools got defunded to pay for these privacy disasters on wheels." 

The four-star general in charge of the US Air Force’s Air Mobility Command has defended a memo he sent to his officers earlier this year where he predicted the US would be at war with China in 2025.

"My assessment is that war is not inevitable, but the readiness I’m driving with that timeline is absolutely essential to deterrence and absolutely essential to the decisive victory," Gen. Mike Minihan said last week when asked about his prediction, according to Defense One.

Ukraine has received billions of dollars in aid from the United States to help with its war with Russia. Despite this, Democrats in Congress want to send even more to the war-torn country. And they are willing to do so even if it means a government shutdown in this country.

It’s a fiscally irresponsible move and detrimental to the U.S., and it’s precisely why Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) declared he would not support any more aid to Ukraine.

“I rise to put the leadership of the House, the Senate, and the president of the United States on notice. I will not consent to any expedited passage of any spending bill that provides any more American aid to Ukraine,” Paul said in a press release from Sept. 20. “It’s as if no one has noticed that we have no extra money to send to Ukraine. Our deficit this year will exceed $1.5 trillion.”

Paul is correct and should be applauded for his statements. What has happened in Ukraine is tragic, and innocent people are suffering because of the tyrannical whims of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Nevertheless, it is not the nation’s responsibility to fund the war in Ukraine. Politicians in this country have a duty to do what’s best for the public, not Ukrainians.

“As elected officials, we have an obligation to pursue a foreign policy that advances the security and prosperity of our country. Funneling billions of dollars that have to be borrowed into the meat grinder of eastern Ukraine does neither,” Paul’s press release read. “The longer this conflict continues, the greater the risk that miscalculation or purposeful escalation draws the United States into direct conflict with Russia.”

Arizona was the focal point of electoral cheating scandals during both the 2020 and 2022 elections, with Maricopa County at the center of the storm. While many theories swirl about what actually transpired in Arizona during the 2020 election, one important thing has been overlooked  – and it could be the key in unraveling the mystery – it’s all about the choice of paper that used for printing the ballots. Pollster Rasmussen has just shared some possible game-changing election fraud findings out of Arizona, and the one point, among many, that really caught our eye was something that was singled out in Maricopa County involving the ballots – but not in the way you may think. It looks like one of the biggest moves Dem may have made to secure AZ was with paper. It turns out that in AZ, there was only one type of paper that was approved for ballots. However, for some mysterious reason there were 10 different types of paper used. What does that tell you? Well, for most critical thinkers, that would mean there were a whole helluva lot of fake ballots out there, to the tune of about 200K. That’s less than what Biden won the state by.

Things that make you go “hmm,” right?

For months, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has said he plans to continue his long-shot challenge against President Biden in the Democratic primary rather than dropping out to launch a third-party bid.

But lately Mr. Kennedy’s message has seemed to shift, including publicly telling a voter who asked about his plans that he was keeping his “options open.”

If Mr. Kennedy does decide to leave the party of his famous father and uncles to run in the general election, one potential landing spot may be the Libertarian Party, which at the moment lacks a widely known candidate but has excelled at securing ballot access.

In July, Mr. Kennedy met privately with Angela McArdle, the chair of the Libertarian Party, at a conference they were both attending in Memphis — a meeting that has not previously been reported.