Kari Lake spoke out against Ron DeSantis this week on Newsmax for so far losing his war with Disney and explained why she thinks the Governor “should stay in Florida.”

China has repeatedly locked horns with the US over Taiwan, which is seen by Beijing as a part of the country, while Washington pumps the island with increasing amount of weapons.

The House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and Chinese Communist Party has rolled out ten "policy recommendations" and proposals on how to "preserve peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait."

In a report on Wednesday, the Republican-led panel expressed hope that the findings would be included in the fiscal 2024 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). The House earlier postponed consideration of the 2024 NDAA while Congress works to resolve an impasse over the US’ debt ceiling.

Dozens of giant turbines on Scotland’s windfarms have been powered by diesel generators, the Sunday Mail can reveal. Scottish Power admitted 71 of its windmills were hooked up to the fossil fuel supply after a fault developed on the grid.

The firm said it was forced to act in order to keep the turbines warm during very cold weather in December. But a whistleblower has told the Sunday Mail the incident is among a number of environmental and health and safety failings.

The worker, who asked to remain anonymous, said: “The Scottish Government wants to make our country attractive to foreign investors as 40 per cent of the wind that blows across Europe blows across Scotland. However, that should not mean we put up with our waterways and nature being polluted with carbon from diesel generators and hydraulic oil.

New filings in the messy lawsuit between the US Virgin Islands and JP Morgan Chase over who bears responsibility for Jeffrey Epsteins sex-trafficking operation are dragging former US Virgin Islands First Lady Cecile de Jongh in the spotlight.

 Two private islands in the Caribbean, called Little St. James and Great St. James, that once belonged to Jeffrey Epstein first hit the market last March with an asking price of $125 million.Rick Friedman Photography/Corbis via Getty Images; REUTERS/Marco Bello

On Tuesday, US District Judge Jed Rakoff, who is overseeing the lawsuit, ordered Jeffrey Epstein's estate to produce all emails and other documents referencing de Jongh to JP Morgan, which is defending itself in the lawsuit. On the same day, JP Morgan alleged in its own filings that de Jongh was "Epstein's primary conduit for spreading money and influence throughout the USVI government."

A Canadian police officer who donated $50 dollars to the Freedom Convoy last year was told by an adjudicator he must work 80 unpaid hours as punishment.

Last Thursday, Constable Michael Brisco of the Windsor Police Service in a penalty hearing was given his sentence by retired Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) Superintendent Morris Elbers.

Elbers said the $50 donation was a “serious” violation and that the hours will be worked on vacation or rest days.

“As a police officer, there comes a time when you must take the political issues out of your head when you are making decisions,” Elbers wrote in his decision.

He said Brisco must “obey the policies, procedures and directives of the police service which is paying your salary.”

Lawyers for Windsor police wanted Brisco to work 140 unpaid hours as punishment.

On February 7, 2022, Brisco made his $50 donation to the Freedom Convoy’s GiveSendGo account. At the time, he was on unpaid leave after choosing not to comply with a mandatory COVID jab policy then in effect.

In a bold move, Iraq has prohibited transactions in US dollars. This surprise announcement last week was an effort to stabilise the Iraqi Dinar. But increasingly, the US dollar’s dominance is being challenged in West Asia. Palki Sharma tells how the de-dollarisation trend is catching on.

But still, let’s look at the substance, as DeSantis actually came off quite nicely, all things considered. Too bad it won’t be the mainstream narrative.

1. DeSantis proved himself to be the substance candidate. He was asked at length about his various policies and the negative connotations that came along with them for some. He spun his answers seamlessly. The point that stood out was the response to someone’s question about the NAACP issuing a travel advisory warning for minorities wanting to visit Florida. DeSantis noted that his state has the most amount of black owned businesses in the nation. That black kids had the best education in his state. He explained his divisive policy point by well, sounding the opposite of divisive. In fact, even supportive of the black community. It’s a contrast to Trump’s approach. He also shrewdly pointed out the high-ranking NAACP officials who have recently vacationed in Florida or call the Sunshine State home.

A handful of GOP members of Congress demanded an update on the January 6 pipe-bomb investigation in a letter addressed to FBI Director Christopher Wray on Wednesday evening. The letter revealed that the FBI used nearby surveillance to identify a license plate number from a vehicle the suspect was seen entering. While this key piece of information is reportedly in the bureau’s possession, the FBI has not named a suspect at the time of this report.

On January 5, 2021, an unidentified male was seen placing what appeared to be two pipe-bombs near the headquarters of the Republican National Committee (RNC) and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) in Washington, D.C.

While FBI whistleblower Kyle Seraphin later revealed that the bureau knew the devices were inoperable, the incident has been repeatedly referenced by left-wing entities as an example of domestic terrorism committed by Trump supporters. Given the Biden DOJ’s aggressive prosecution of January 6 protesters –hundreds of whom have been sentenced to prison time for simple trespassing charges — the department and FBI do not appear to be in a hurry to find the pipe-bomb suspect.

Those vaccinated against COVID-19 have a 26 percent higher mortality rate on average compared to those who declined the jab – and the death toll is even more staggering for vaccinated people under 50 years old, where mortality is 49 percent higher than for those unvaccinated.

The shocking numbers are based on government data from the United Kingdom and were brought to Senator Ron Johnson’s (R-WI) attention by Josh Stirling, one of the nation’s top insurance analysts and formerly Senior Research Analyst for U.S. nonlife insurance at Sanford C. Bernstein & Co.

Iran successfully test-launched a ballistic missile with a potential 2,000-km range on Thursday, state media said, two days after the chief of Israel’s armed forces raised the prospect of “action” against Tehran over its nuclear program.

Iran, which has one of the biggest missile programs in the Middle East, says its weapons are capable of reaching the bases of arch-foes Israel and the United States in the region.

Despite US and European opposition, the Islamic Republic has said it will further develop its “defensive” missile program.

“Our message to Iran’s enemies is that we will defend the country and its achievements. Our message to our friends is that we want to help regional stability,” Iranian Defense Minister Mohammadreza Ashtiani said.

The popular outdoor apparel company The North Face is trying its hand at customer alienation through a new ad partnership with a drag queen.

Not content with seeing the returns of Bud Light’s decision to go down that road, or with Target’s elevation of gay satanism, The North Face is now asking customers to join a “party” with a man in women’s clothing.

The company’s Instagram page is celebrating a collaboration with a cross-dressing gay man who goes by the nickname Pattie Gonia.

Customers are fuming after the company unveiled a “Summer of Pride” partnership with the flamboyant mustached individual.

Webmaster addition: Think that's bad?

Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu says NATO’s military activity in Eastern Europe has taken a “most aggressive” direction

NATO is using the Ukraine crisis as an excuse to build up its forces in Eastern Europe and deploy weapons which are being aimed at Russia and Belarus, Moscow’s Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu claimed on Thursday during a meeting with his Belarusian counterpart Viktor Khrenin.

"Additional military contingents and military infrastructure are being deployed, combat training and reconnaissance activities are being activated near the borders of the Union State (of Russia and Belarus)," Shoigu said, adding that the US-led military bloc has already launched the next stage of its expansion, and is now modernizing military infrastructure in Eastern and Central Europe.

Shoigu also noted that Western governments are intentionally “doing everything possible in order to stretch out and escalate the conflict in Ukraine” by continuing to provide military aid to Kiev’s armed forces.

“Today we are together resisting the collective West, which is waging an essentially undeclared war against our countries," he said, noting that NATO’s military activity has acquired a “most aggressive direction.”

Pride Month — formerly known as June — is right around the corner, and with that comes the annual rainbow lighting of the White House, heaping of praise upon people like the Nashville shooter, and the continued denigration of religious institutions by American corporations.

In this instance, and countless others, the public and private sectors work hand in glove to advance both an ideological and political agenda. When, recently, Ohio Republican Sen. J.D. Vance said that “[t]here is no meaningful distinction between the public and the private sector in the United States of America,” he was describing situations like this, in which state and corporate entities move in lockstep towards common, predetermined goals with such strength and vigor that dissent becomes impossible.

Whether we call it economic fascism (stripping the 20th-century relic of its emphasis on national identity) or corporatism, the point remains the same: members of the managerial elite who fill out the ranks in government and corporate America alike use their respective spheres of influence to form a public-private regime dedicated to immanentizing a disordered eschaton.

Webmaster addition: In political theory and theology, to immanentize the eschaton is a generally pejorative term referring to attempts to bring about utopian conditions in the world, and to effectively create heaven on earth.

A whistleblower from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) revealed his identity in an interview with CBS News on Wednesday and charged the Department of Justice (DOJ) with hampering a tax probe into Hunter Biden.

Gary Shapley, a 14-year employee of the IRS, told CBS News in the exclusive sit-down interview that federal prosecutors were giving the president’s son preferential treatment.

“When I took control of this particular investigation, I immediately saw it was way outside the norm of what I’ve experienced in the past,” said Shapley, who was assigned to the case in 2020.

The Biden-Harris presidential transition team confirmed the existence of the federal tax probe by the Delaware U.S. attorney’s office weeks after the 2020 election. James Rosen, who worked for Sinclair at the time, first reported the ongoing investigation weeks before the contest. The corporate press, however, ignored the story along with the rest of the scandals surrounding the Biden family in the days leading up to the election.

Whether Israel’s escalating threats of war with Iran over its nuclear program are saber-rattling or something more serious is a mystery even to the CIA, according to a portion of a top-secret intelligence report leaked on the platform Discord earlier this year. The uncertainty about the intentions of one of the U.S.’s closest allies calls into question the basis of the “ironclad” support for Israel publicly espoused by the Biden administration.

The report — which was first covered by the Israeli channel i24 News and subsequently posted by DDoSecrets, a group that publishes leaked documents — reveals an undisclosed military exercise conducted by Israel. “On 20 February, Israel conducted a large-scale air exercise,” the intelligence report, produced by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence on February 23, states. The exercise, it says, was “probably to simulate a strike on Iran’s nuclear program and possibly to demonstrate Jerusalem’s resolve to act against Tehran.” There have been several joint U.S.-Israeli military exercises in recent months, including one proudly billed by the Pentagon as the largest “in history.” 

Clare Lahey has lived with her husband in the home he grew up in, just up the street from the Housatonic River in the town of Lee, Massachusetts, for nearly five decades. Now, in the twilight of their lives, they’re watching as the same chemicals that have ravaged the health of people living along the river for years are now being dredged and dumped near their home. 

Lahey has had bladder cancer twice, 15 years apart; her husband is wracked with illnesses including chronic obstructive pulmonary disease even though he never smoked. She believes that proximity to the river is to blame for their health problems, and she’s not alone: The Environmental Protection Agency, or EPA, warns that the river’s PCBs are likely to cause cancer in humans, and a Massachusetts Department of Public Health study on the cancer link is scheduled to be released this year.

“Why don’t we just move away?” Lahey asked. “Well, because he’s 85 and I’m 82, and we want to finish out our lives here.”

An exclusive archive of formerly classified U.S. military documents — assembled from the files of a secret Pentagon task force that investigated war crimes during the 1970s, inspector generals’ inquiries buried amid thousands of pages of unrelated documents, and other materials discovered during hundreds of hours of research at the U.S. National Archives — offers previously unpublished, unreported, and underappreciated evidence of civilian deaths that were kept secret during the war and remain almost entirely unknown to the American people. The documents also provided a rudimentary road map for on-the-ground reporting in Southeast Asia that yielded evidence of scores of additional bombings and ground raids that have never been reported to the outside world.

The Hill reported that US military funding to Ukraine could be suspended indefinitely due to proceedings in Washington over the public debt ceiling. Effectively, the public debt situation will force the US to reduce its financial support to Ukraine since it is no longer possible to expect as much support as before.

Congressman Andy Kim, a House Armed Services Committee (HASC) member, was quoted by The Hill as saying that lawmakers had conversations about what needs to be a part of the following package but expressed doubts about the timing of the legislation and highlighted that the ongoing fight over the debt ceiling was putting Ukraine aid at risk.

“It’s delaying our ability to focus on these issues,” Kim said. “That really shows that it has national security implications because we’re not able to have that kind of earnest conversation about Ukraine or the [National Defense Authorization Act] until they’re done with that.”

For his part, Congressman Bill Keating said aid to Ukraine would ultimately depend on its counteroffensive, something that will seemingly miss its long-anticipated spring deadline.

Webmaster addition: It sounds good, but the US will keep sending your money to Ukraine no matter what!

A discussion on housing migrants in Chicago turned into an intense confrontation Wednesday before the City Council meeting.

One of the top issues for the City Council is finding funding for the thousands of asylum seekers who landed in Chicago.

Several alderpersons and activists have proposals for a situation they called a crisis.

Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez (25th) said the last administration failed to collaborate with communities when dealing with migrants bussed to Chicago.

The group introduced plans to use city spaces for migrant housing and for Chicagoans who are unhoused.

The Dutch government continues its war on the country's farmers and has proposed new regulations that would roughly limit two cows per acre in order to reach the European Union's climate change targets by 2030, The Telegraph reports.

The proposal, which has not yet been approved by Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, would limit "0.35 hectares of grassland per livestock unit" in an attempt to tackle nitrogen emissions by reducing methane gas, which will place an even greater strain between the country's farmers and Dutch government.

Webmaster addition: Is this part  of the "You will eat ze bugs" agenda of the New World Disorder?

The American Left’s tendency to enforce its ideological speech codes reminds commentator and radio host Dennis Prager of the Soviet oppression of Jews, which he studied in his youth. He calls this phenomenon totalitarian and “nightmarish.”

Prager studied Russian in school in order to study communism. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, he traveled to the Soviet Union, helping Jews and hearing about their struggles. This foundation helped Prager sell plenty of bestselling books and launch his online video platform, PragerU.

“If you’d have said to me when I was in graduate school, ‘You’re learning about the American future,’ I would’ve thought you were out of your mind,” Prager told The Daily Signal on Monday at the National Religious Broadcasters Convention in Orlando. “But I studied communism and the Soviet Union, and it prepared me for what is happening in America today.”

“You can ask almost any person who lived in a communist country and they will say to you, ‘I can’t believe what I fled is now happening in America,’” he added.

Russia and the West are “in solidarity” to the extent that the conflict in Ukraine cannot be frozen, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said in an interview with Russia’s TASS news agency on Wednesday.

Asked whether Russia was considering putting the fighting on hold, Peskov stated that Moscow is only considering the option of “completing the special military operation,” which means securing Russia’s interests and achieving its goals either through military, or other available means.

The spokesperson noted that it is premature to talk about a peaceful resolution to the Ukraine conflict, as there are no prerequisites for such an outcome yet.