Recent Appearances...

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Recent Appearances...

Dupe entry: [The Ingraham Angle 5-23-25 - Segment starts at 46 minutes in - verbatim]

2025-05-24

FoxNews Anchors Continue to Dance Around the Big "O"
[The Ingraham Angle 5/23/25 — Segment starts at 46 minutes in - verbatim]

Lisa Boothe anchors. A clip is shown of The Weekly Show with Jon Stewart [YouTube Podcast — Thursday 5/22/25 Entitled OBAMA BRO: I WANTED BIDEN TO WIN]

Lisa: A former Obama aide was admitting why he wasn’t honest about Joe Biden’s mental decline.

Aide: It was April and he was rambling and was hard to follow and repeated a story, but we were assured that he was just exhausted by the people around him.

I remember feeling I want to talk about this as a hugh liability, I want to talk something that Joe Biden can overcome. But I think that Joe Biden must drop out — he’s too old to be President, but I don’t know exactly what was going on behind the scenes.

If Joe biden is the candidate, I want him to f__ g win! Because I care about the country.

Lisa then interviews Jason Rantz, the Auto Radio(?) host and Terry Schilling, the President of some organization.

Jason: They lie about Donald Trump so he loses. They will say and do anything if it satisfies some sort of political agena of theirs.

I think you’ve got the point here. I wonder who writes this guy’s speeches.

[Related: Rantburg 2025-05-21, see comment #5]
https://rantburg.com/poparticle.php?D=05/21/2025&SO=&HC=4&ID=760913

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Home Front: Politix

Voice of America layoffs to result in dozens of deportations

2025-05-24

[TheDesk] Many independent contractors laid off by the broadcaster last week hold work visas that require continued employment to stay in the United States.

Dozens of independent contractors who were laid off at the Voice of America (VOA) last week are likely to be deported within the next month as a result of their job losses, The Desk has learned.

The contractors — around 60 in total — participate in the Exchange Visitor Program, which entitles them to J-1 visas to live and work in the United States as long as they are engaged in certain roles, including the production and distribution of journalism.

The workers were among more than 500 whose contracts were terminated last week by the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM), the parent organization of VOA. The layoffs come about two months after President Donald Trump

...Oh, noze! Not him!...
signed an Executive Order that required USAGM and six other agencies to significantly reduce their operations and fire employees accordingly.

More than 1,000 VOA workers were laid off and hundreds of contracts were temporarily suspended, triggering legal challenges across the board. Those challenges have resulted in favorable decision by lower courts, some of which have been partially reversed by appellate judges.

Earlier this month, USAGM special advisor Kari Lake said the agency intends to partner with right-of-center news broadcaster One America News (OAN), which will license news packages that VOA can use on its radio and TV networks and digital platforms. So far, VOA has yet to broadcast or publish any OAN material, but the partnership served as a partial catalyst toward the independent contractor layoffs last week.

The 60 visa holders are required to maintain employment as part of their ongoing participation in the J-1 program. Their status remains in limbo after VOA ended their contract employment last week. Without new employment, many face the likelihood of having their work permits revoked, which would lead to deportations.

In a note circulated to employees last Thursday, VOA Director Michael Abramowitz said he was "heartbroken to learn about today’s mass terminations of personal service contractors [PSCs] working for Voice of America."

"PSCs have been a critical part of VOA’s mission, and they have made enormous contributions to VOA’s important work," Abramowitz wrote. "Some of VOA’s most talented journalists have been PSCs — many of whom have escaped tyranny in their home countries to tell America’s story of freedom and democracy. Many have served VOA’s viewers and listeners for years and are deeply versed in the markets in which VOA broadcasts."

Abramowitz called the firings "inexplicable, and, to my knowledge, no rationale has been provided by USAGM for this decision."

"We will continue to make efforts to help individual PSCs, especially those who face possible return to hostile countries, in any and every way we can during this difficult time. This remains among my most important priorities, and I hope it will be a priority for USAGM as well," he affirmed.

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Government Corruption

Thar's Gold In Them Thar NGOs!

2025-05-24

[HotAir] You'll remember one of the biggest drop-mic revelations was the $20B slush fund new Environmental Protection Agency head Lee Zeldin, along with Musk's DOGE waste-huntin' hounds found stashed in a sketchy secret Citibank account.

That money was allocated to just eight climate-related NGOs in last-minute 'awards' from the Biden administration as they shoveled bucks out the door like a steam-driven locomotive's fireman flings coal. The most egregious of which was an earmarked $2B award to a Stacey Abrams-connected NGO called 'Power Forward Communities,' which was only a little over a year old and had less than $100 in the bank.

The Washington Free Beacon reports that the Biden EPA awarded a group linked to Stacey Abrams with no real track record a 2 billion dollar environmental grant in 2024.

Everyone has been dying to know more as Zeldin turned to clawing back the money.

In the meantime, other folks started digging into the Power Forward Communities (PFC) NGO, and one of them uncovered the web of deep money progressive tentacles that run all through these seemingly humanitarian organizations. Sadly, they are, in fact, usually only money laundering schemes for progressive elites and their foot soldiers.

Integral to the PFC story is a fellow named Shaun Donovan, who cut his political progressive teeth as the Commissioner of the NYC Department of Housing Preservation and Development. He left the city to become, first, Obama's Secretary of Housing and Urban Development and then his director of the Office of Budget Management.

When Obama left, Donovan knew he needed a new gig, so he slid on over to the Ford Foundation, which lobbies the federal government using Henry Ford's fortune. Eventually, through all his connections, he became the new CEO of Enterprise Community Partners (ECP).

The previous CEO of this non-profit NGO - one wealthy enough to boast about investing $72B for a million energy efficient homes - earned $900K a year, which is quite a chunk for a charity, you'd think. But, according to Mr Chavous' research, the co-CEO pulled down a cool $800K, and the NGO spent over 27% of all its considerable income on salaries.

What does this have to do with Power Forward Communities (PFC)?

For one thing, the well-compensated and connected CEO of ECP, Mr Donovan, is the one who then formed that NGO and bragged about scoring the $2B award for his umbrella organization.

Small, incestuous, lucrative world, these NGOs, aren't they?

It also explains what went down in Lee Zeldin's testimony to Congress yesterday about the specifics that they have been finding about the proposal that came with PFC's grant paperwork.

What was in the documents required to meet the 'eligibility requirements' for the federal handouts was so outrageous, it blew even the Biden administration EPA staff's mind. To the point where, when they were screening the paperwork, as internal documents have subsequently revealed, they wrote notes and memorandums about it to cover their own asterisks. One staff member reviewing the proposed salary structure thought they were so out of whack that they worried it might look bad should the public catch a glimpse.

But, if you look at the mothership, ECP, that's where they all are as far as numbers go.

On 12 May, PFC filed a status report with the D.C. district court claiming 'irreparable harm,' as they still could not access their Citbank funds because of mean old Lee Zeldin.

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Economy

US Treasury gives final decisions on pennies…. and it creates a new problem

2025-05-23

[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] One cent coins will stop entering circulation next year.

After more than two centuries the US government has finally decided to kill the penny.

The Treasury Department will stop minting new pennies and putting them in to circulation by early next year.

Soon there will not be enough pennies in circulation to fulfil cash transactions.

As a result, businesses will have to round up or round down their prices to the nearest five cents, the Treasury said in a statement.

The penny currently costs more than four times its value to make and the Treasury lost $85 million minting the coins last year alone.

As a result, businesses will have to round up or round down their prices to the nearest five cents, the Treasury said in a statement.

The phasing out of the penny may save the Treasury some immediate cash, but it raises the next currency problem, that of the nickel.

'If you get rid of the penny, it will increase the amount of nickels,' Rhett Jeppson, a former chief executive of the US Mint said.

'You lose more on a nickel than you do on a penny,' Jeppson told the New York Times.

Nickels, worth five cents, are also a loss-maker for the treasury, leaving an $18 million hole from their production last year.

The problem could be exacerbated by the end of the penny because demand for nickels is likely to shoot up in their place.

Since the Treasury loses more per coin on nickels - they cost around 14 cents to make - an increase in their production to meet demand could soon outweigh any savings made by axing the penny.

The decision to stop making pennies comes after years of bipartisan efforts to eradicate the coins.

President Obama was critical of the penny during his time in the White House.

Most recently, President Trump asked the Treasury to halt penny production in a social media post in February.

'For far too long the United States has minted pennies which literally cost us more than 2 cents,' he wrote on Truth Social.

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-Land of the Free

Secretary Of The Army Dan Driscoll: Army unveils modernization plan because, ‘No lobbyist ever won a war'

2025-05-21

[FoxNews] Army pledges to prioritize drone capabilities, AI-driven systems and combat readiness over 'parochial interests'

Since becoming secretary, I have been alarmed to find that our Army is at risk of falling behind other major powers across the globe, including China. Why? For decades, antiquated processes and bureaucratic bloat shackled our innovation and modernization efforts. If we continue business as usual our national security will be at risk.

The gap between the Army we have and the Army we need is growing fast. Our soldiers are innovative, resourceful and capable – they are our nation’s best. But they are being held back by lobbyists and complacent stakeholders who prioritized parochial interests over our soldiers’ lethality and readiness.

No lobbyist ever took a hill. No lobbyist ever won a war. Our soldiers deserve better. And our nation deserves better. That’s why Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth recently directed the Army to accelerate change.

We got to work immediately.

The Army Transformation Initiative (ATI) is how we break free from entrenched government bureaucracy, enable our soldiers and outpace our adversaries.

This is the way forward:

1. Get battle-winning gear to the front lines

Our soldiers must out-survive and outfight the enemy on the battlefield. Today, they need drone and counter-drone capabilities, AI-driven decision-making and lethal, battle-ready tanks and attack aircraft. We have been slow to put these tools in our soldiers’ hands, not for lack of vision, but because of outdated acquisitions practices. That ends now. Our mission is clear: cut red tape so we can quickly equip troops with the best capabilities available.

2. Out-innovate the enemy

We will channel America’s bold and innovative spirit, not just in words, but in action. We will fuel market competition, back industry-led research and development, and streamline the process by placing users, testers and developers shoulder-to-shoulder in the field. We will embrace change and fight system inertia, keeping us agile, lethal and one step ahead of our enemies.

3. Unloading what we don’t need

For far too long, our hands have been tied by parochial interests propped up by swarms of lobbyists. We have been forced to buy gear that we no longer want or need. With ATI, we’ll ensure that we use American taxpayers’ hard-earned dollars effectively. If a capability no longer benefits our soldiers and does not make our Army more lethal, we will not buy it.

4. Efficiency over bureaucracy

We are transforming the Army from the ground up, not just upgrading our processes and equipment. We are building an organization that will drive process improvements, leading to better products and better outcomes for soldiers. As a start, we will consolidate organizations within the Army to eliminate redundancies and reduce bureaucratic overhead.

5. Getting soldiers out from behind desks

We will refocus resources on our fighting formations by cutting overhead, starting within the Army headquarters. We will get our soldiers back where they belong: training to dominate the battlefield and win wars.

Our soldiers and the American people deserve an Army that is equipped to fight and win anywhere, anytime, against any adversary. Under the leadership of President Trump and Secretary Hegseth, that’s exactly what the Army Transformation Initiative will deliver.

Make it so. They’re having issues over on the watery side of the Service:

Trump’s shipbuilding agenda is sinking.

I returned this week from shipyard tours in California to a flood of calls and DMs from DC and none of the news is good.

Friday marks 45 days since the president signed the Executive Order mandating a full shipbuilding review in 45 days.… pic.twitter.com/UAt84Zz0gx
— John Ʌ Konrad V (@johnkonrad) May 20, 2025

…in 45 days. So far, only one Cabinet Secretary has shown any urgency, and only in the past few days.

I pray I’m missing something, but sources inside every relevant department say otherwise. There’s no indication
@SecDuffy
,
@KristiNoem
, or
@SecDef
are prioritizing this effort.

Reports from inside DOT are disturbing: they’re 20 years behind on their mandated shipyard survey to Congress. DOT should be the lead agency on this—but they’re failing.

Trump’s pick to lead
@DOTMARAD
—known for shaking things up had his nomination pulled by Duffy days before confirmation. No explanation, but rumors swirl about ties to Project 2025 and the anti-Jones Act Heritage Foundation.

The replacement is a strong candidate on paper, but shipbuilding is his weak spot and he has deep ties to
@Maersk
, which prioritizes Chinese shipyards.

No Deputy Administrator at MARAD has been named. DOT also hasn’t filled the critical Assistant Secretary role for policy and planning.

The acting head of MARAD is a West Point classmate of Mark Esper—yes, the same Esper who helped auction off the Army’s watercraft fleet. Sources claim he’s undermining both Trump’s and Esper’s maritime goals.

Lobbyists hold major sway at MARAD, making the General Counsel role crucial. A well-known, pro-Trump maritime executive with a stellar résumé applied, he was sidelined by Duffy. Instead, a woman with zero shipbuilding experience was installed this week. Initial reports about her are terrible.

Several of the most capable Trump loyalists at MARAD who held the line during the Buttigieg years have resigned in frustration.

On the Navy side, there’s no serious effort underway to reorganize the 83,000-person shipbuilding & repair enterprise. The critical SUPSHIP AGM role is still up in the air.

No admirals have been fired. No CNO appointed. The acting CNO is offering nothing but bureaucratic word salad.

The Secretary of the Navy remains verbally committed but no action plan has been released. Sources say he’s overwhelmed with internal crises & not getting enough support from the admirals and SES

Not one admiral has publicly endorsed shipbuilding as a national priority.

At USCG, a culling of admirals is underway & DHS is quietly investigating but the rot runs deeper than expected. Until that’s fixed, real shipbuilding effort is impossible.

Meanwhile, the individual making the most shipbuilding waves in DC? A former Obama donor who runs a CIA-linked registry exposed by
@DataRepublican
.

Trump promised a dedicated shipbuilding office during his state of the union speech. This idea was nixed along with shipbuilding desks at OMB, NEC, and a new White House office. Instead, Waltz expanded his NSC maritime team but progress stalled as Waltz fell out of favor. A leaked memo lists staffers to be purged this week & two of them work on maritime.

Interim Director Rubio has barely been seen or heard from at NSC. Nothing’s moving.

At State, the maritime team is small, and slow.

No one with real, hands-on experience building commercial ships at world-class yards has been hired.

Finally, after a promising bipartisan start, several top maritime leaders are breaking ranks publicly voicing concern about last-minute changes made to the bill and there are rumors that Mark Kelly’s strong anti-Trump rhetoric could sink the effort.

The clock is ticking. We started drifting without power when the dedicated WH shipbuilding office idea was nixed then lights went out Duffy pulled the nomination for MARAD. Now the ship is taking on water.

Silver lining? Trump & JD are, by all accounts, more interested in shipbuilding lately, not less. They just seem to be too trusting that Hegseth, Duffy and Noem are following commander’s intent.

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Government Corruption

Biden's Presidency Is a Scandal of Historic Proportions

2025-05-21

A taste.

[ZeroHedge] Biden's Was The First Fully Deep-State Presidency

The “presidency” of Joe Biden is one of the greatest scandals in American history. The legacy media is only now covering the mental incapacity of a president who apparently left the entire ship of state to the unaccountable bureaucracy.

On Friday, Axios released Friday night news dump audio of Biden’s 2023 interview with special counsel Robert Hur.

If you heard the tape and haven’t been in a coma for the past four years, then nothing here is truly surprising. The former president sounded senile and evasive when answering questions about his handling of top secret documents.

Some of my colleagues went through the full tapes and found that Biden “forgot the names of President Barack Obama’s former secretary of defense and comedian Jay Leno; referred to Africa as a country, not a continent; and was unaware he had in his possession a notebook with war advice in it for Obama during his interview with special counsel Robert Hur and investigators in October 2023.”

Biden certainly did not sound like someone who could be trusted to make large-scale national decisions or even small-scale personal ones.

This is entirely unsurprising unless you are a left-leaning corporate media journalist on the political beat.

If you are, then I’m sure that the reports coming out about Biden in office are jaw-dropping, gob-smacking revelations to you.

The media elite are shocked, shocked to discover that Biden may have been unfit for office.

The release of these tapes was followed by a Sunday afternoon reveal that Biden has been diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer.

The cancer diagnosis is certainly a terrible thing. But the idea that this should end the story about what happened the last four years is a farce. It couldn’t be clearer now that due to mental and physical ailments, Biden was a diminished man from the moment he assumed the president’s office.

Despite some of the aforementioned elite journalists calling for a lid to be put on conversations about Biden’s presidency due to his health, the reality is the cancer diagnosis only raises more unsettling questions. Is this really a new diagnosis? Did Biden’s doctors really somehow miss the signs of treatable cancer?

And that makes this situation entirely unprecedented.

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Home Front: Politix

Trump administration revives English language requirement for truck drivers

2025-05-21

[FoxNews] Transportation Secretary Duffy cites safety concerns, reversing Obama-era policy that relaxed enforcement

The Trump administration on Tuesday took steps to begin enforcing a law that requires truck drivers to speak English.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy was in Austin, Texas, where he signed an order to direct the Department of Transportation to enforce the law.

Duffy framed the move as a safety issue for America's roadways.

"For too long, misguided policies have prioritized political correctness over safety of the American people," Duffy said.

Under federal law, a driver must "read and speak the English language sufficiently to converse with the general public, to understand highway traffic signs and signals in the English language, to respond to official inquiries, and to make entries on reports and records."

The move came after President Donald Trump signed an executive order on April 28 directing the Department of Transportation to include English literacy tests for our truckers.

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Government Corruption

'President Trump asks a Looming Question, Who Was Behind the Biden Auto-Pen?

2025-05-18

[Last Refuge] At first blush the question seems curious, but when you further think about it the question becomes rather important. If Joe Biden was not cognitively aware of what was happening around the office of the president, then who exactly was controlling the use of his signature via the auto-pen?

In a functioning democracy with a purposefully curious media, the fourth estate would be demanding a congressional investigation to get the answers and context for who was really carrying out the agenda of the Biden administration. Unfortunately, as a nation we lost that ’fourth estate’ a long time ago, and congress is of no help. President Trump:

..."Whoever had control of the "AUTOPEN" is looking to be a bigger and bigger scandal by the moment. It is a major part of the real crime, THAT THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION OF 2020 WAS RIGGED AND STOLEN! Millions and millions of people knew that, but the Radical Left Democrats waged a campaign of inoculation and innocence like none that had ever been waged before. THIS IS WHY THE UNSELECT COMMITTEE OF POLITICAL THUGS, WHO WERE GIVEN A FULL AND COMPLETE PARDON BY THE PERSON WHO WIELDED THE NOW ILLEGALLY USED AUTOPEN, DELETED AND DESTROYED ALL EVIDENCE AND INFORMATION FROM THEIR CORRUPT AND VICIOUS WITCH HUNT AGAINST ME, AND MANY OTHER PEOPLE, WHOSE LIVES WERE COMPLETELY SHATTERED AND DESTROYED BY THIS HISTORICALLY CRIMINAL EVENT. Remember, it all began with DIRTY COP James Comey, Obama, a hapless and cognitively impaired Sleepy Joe Biden, and my now very famous ACCUSATION that,"THEY SPIED ON MY CAMPAIGN!" Whoever had control of the Autopen is just the beginning. The biggest crime of all is that THE 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION WAS RIGGED! I (MAGA!) WON THE ELECTION BY MILLIONS OF VOTES, AND EVERYONE KNOWS IT. GOD BLESS AMERICA, FOR THE FIGHT HAS JUST BEGUN!!!" (source)

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Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Trump says he’s not frustrated with Netanyahu: ‘He’s an angry man, and he should be’

2025-05-18

[IsraelTimes] As reports claim there’s a rift between them, US president says Israeli PM has ‘been hurt badly’ by Hamas-led October 7 attack, adds ‘he’s got a tough situation’ on his hands

US President Donald Trump
...They hit him with slander, they impeached him twice. Nancy Pelosi tore up his State of the Union address on national TV. They stole an election and put his adherents in jail. They vilified him. They couldn't crucify him, so they shot him. Still, they can't keep him down...
said in an interview Saturday that he is not frustrated by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, appearing to downplay claims of a rift between the two leaders, saying that he understands Netanyahu’s anger with Hamas
..the braying voice of Islamic Resistance®,...
Trump visited the Middle East this week, skipping Israel but stopping in Saudi Arabia

...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula, largely made up of sand and oil rigs. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual haj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. Formerly dictatorial and steeped in Olde Tyme Religion, deferring to Salafist holy men on all issues, it has now done a 180 and is making a serious effort to modernize, so as not to be left in the sand by its Gulf Arab neighbors. The holy men have been shoved to the background and the nation is now still dictatorial but somewhat rational. That doesn't make them trustworthy, but it's a start...
, Qatar
...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi...
and the United Arab Emirates, leading government critics to warn Israel was being left out of Washington’s regional diplomatic initiatives as Netanyahu’s government continues the war in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response...
Asked by Fox News if he was frustrated by the prime minister, Trump responded: "No, look, he’s got a tough situation. You have to remember, there was October 7 that everyone forgets. It was one of the most ~~violent~~ mostly peaceful days in the history of the world — not the Middle East, the world, when you look at the tapes."

Trump claimed, as he often has, that the massacre in southern Israel by Hamas-led bully boyz on October 7, 2023, would have never happened under his watch, arguing that Iran
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate ~~Jews~~ ~~Zionists~~ Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol...
had been broke under his first administration and would not have been able to fund the Paleostinian terror group’s activities.

That attack, which sparked the ongoing war, killed some 1,200 people in southern Israel and resulted in the capture of 251 hostages who were taken to Gaza. Of them, 57 are still held captive, 34 of whom are confirmed dead by Israel.

"Bibi, he’s an angry man, and he should be because of October 7, and he’s been hurt badly by that, but in another way, he’s been sort of helped because I think he’s fought hard and bravely," Trump added, using Netanyahu’s nickname.

Trump has repeatedly denied reports of a rift between him and Netanyahu, insisting that his choice to not visit Israel during his trip to the region was not a snub, despite making several policy decisions without Israeli input or against Israel’s wishes, such as the ongoing Iran nuclear talks, the decision to restore ties with and lift sanctions from Syria, and the US ceasefire with the Iran's Houthi sock puppets
...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The legitimate Yemeni government has accused the them of having ties to the Iranian government. Honest they did. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews They like shooting off... ummm... missiles that they would have us believe they make at home in their basements. On the plus side, they did murder Ali Abdullah Saleh, which was the only way the country was ever going to be rid of him...
rebels in Yemen
...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of...
On Wednesday, Trump said his visits to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates was "good for Israel," adding that "having a relationship like I have with these countries... I think it’s very good for Israel."

Netanyahu also denied the reported rift, calling his relationship with Trump "excellent."

Despite the denials, Channel 13 reported last week that people in Netanyahu’s inner circle have expressed unusually harsh criticism toward the Trump administration in recent weeks.

"There’s chaos in the Trump administration — the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing," said a senior figure close to the premier, according to the report.

"It’s not even clear if this has anything to do with us. Everything operates according to the president’s whims. Sometimes that works in our favor, and sometimes it doesn’t," the source said.

Citing unnamed US officials, NBC reported last week that Netanyahu was growing increasingly frustrated with the US approach to Iran amid the nuclear talks, seemingly the largest point of contention between the two leaders.

Speaking to NBC, one US official said Israel was "worried about any deal" that the US could sign with Iran to thwart its nuclear ambitions.

To that end, two US officials said Netanyahu has privately dismissed the negotiations as a waste of time, arguing that even if a deal is forged, Tehran would inevitably break it.

Israel would rather take action and strike Iran’s nuclear facilities, the report said, and believes that the opportunity to do so is shrinking further the longer talks continue.

Jerusalem is reportedly unhappy that the ongoing US-Iran talks are said to be developing into a largely similar framework to the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, which was signed by then-US president Barack Obama
They get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them...
and was panned at the time by Netanyahu as disastrous for Israel. Trump withdrew from that deal in 2018.

Under the terms now being discussed, according to reports, Iran would limit stockpile size and centrifuge types, and dilute, export or seal its 60 percent uranium stock under unprecedented ineffective International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) scrutiny, in exchange for substantial sanctions relief.

This approach has not aligned with Netanyahu’s longtime position, which is that Israel will not allow Iran to attain nuclear weapons and is opposed to any talks that don’t lead Iran to agree to a "Libya-style agreement," under which Tehran’s entire nuclear program — both military and civilian — would be dismantled completely.

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Government Corruption

FBI agents raided a prominent lobbying firm, uncovering alleged links to a Panama-based shell company connected to eight Democratic members of Congress.

2025-05-18

[PUBLISH.TWITTER] Any connection to this story from two days ago?

FBI agents raided a prominent lobbying firm tied to the military-industrial complex this morning, uncovering alleged links to a Panama-based shell company connected to eight Democratic members of Congress.

Thoughts? Should I arrest all of them? pic.twitter.com/1J6hte6NFG
— Tulsi Gabbard Intelligence Report (@TulsiGabbardDNI) May 17, 2025

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Home Front: Politix

Newly Released Biden-Hur Audio Captures President''s Stumbles, Mishaps from Special Counsel Interview

2025-05-18

[NATIONALREVIEW] Newly released audio from then-President Joe The Big Guy Biden
Joe <q>The Big Guy</q> Biden

...46th president of the U.S. I'm not working for you. Don't be such a horse's ass....
's lengthy interview with Special Counsel Robert Hur captures Biden's diminished mental acuity in his failure to recall the year his son Beau passed away, the year his vice presidency ended, the year President Donald Trump
...dictatorial for repealing some (but not all) of the diktats of his predecessor, misogynistic because he likes pretty girls, homophobic because he doesn't think gender bending should be mandatory, truly a man for all seasons...
was first elected, and why he possessed certain classified documents.

Biden's long pauses and incoherent ramblings in response to light questioning from Hur are apparent in over four minutes of audio first reported by Axios on Friday night. The partial release fulfills expectations that the Trump administration would finally disclose the long-anticipated interview tape after Biden's administration obstructed its disclosure at every turn.

Mistakenly, Biden said in the interview that his son Beau died in 2017 and had to be reminded that he passed away in 2015. Biden also said Trump was first elected in 2017 and had to be corrected that Trump won the presidency in 2016.

''OK, yeah. In 2017, Beau had passed and — this is personal — the genesis of the book and the title Promise Me, Dad, was a — I know you're all close with your sons and daughters, but Beau was like my right arm and Hunt was my left,'' Biden said at one point in the interview audio, with lengthy pauses peppered throughout.

Biden also can be heard stumbling over his words and whispering throughout the audio, two aspects of the interview the transcripts fail to fully capture. Biden struggled to explain why he possessed classified documents, and he veered into rambling, storytelling territory about his decision not to run for president in 2016. Hur interviewed Biden over the course of two three-hour-long sessions on October 8 and 9, 2023.

Courtesy of NoMoreBS:

[X]

Biden’s mental capacity was severely compromised. It is obvious everyone around him knew the problem. We all saw it even before he took office and the answer to the question is the same today as we discussed in 2020, 2021 and beyond. These tapes only confirm what we already… https://t.co/qSKhMfUPYK
— TheLastRefuge (@TheLastRefuge2) May 17, 2025

… confirm what we already knew.

The State Dept was being run by Tony Blinken, Victoria Nuland and Samantha Power. The Clinton and Obama networks, along with their allies in congress and in various political organizations, were being paid and financed through various NGOs and stood up non-profits organized by the beneficiaries of the funding. All of those connections were revealed by the DOGE audits of USAID and other agencies.

Keep in mind that Susan Rice was part of the White House network up to the day Biden announced his intent to run again in 2024; so, she obviously knew his mental state. Others in the White House, again part of the Obama and Clinton networks were running the day-to-day operations. Biden was a figurehead, an avatar for the handlers operating in the background.

The DOJ, Main Justice and the FBI were being run by Lisa Monaco, again an Obama operative. The job at Main Justice was to use their Lawfare strategy to protect the fake and corrupt administration, keep everyone in line and attack all of their political opposition.

Obviously, Jill Biden was/is a power-hungry enabler for the entire dynamic. Sick and twisted people operate like this. Think of all the COVID-19 nonsense this crew carried out in 2021 and 2022, including the vaccine mandate and all of the authoritarian rules that came with the “Biden” COVID response stuff. These are sick people.

Congress, both parties, knew all of this. In fact, the entire Washington DC system was well aware of the cognitive state of mind behind the false presidency.

Biden wasn’t in control of anything – that’s transparently obvious when you listen to the tapes.

The media covered for all of it. They all knew, yet they attacked anyone who dare question the obvious. There is no one associated with the preceding four or five years around the 2020 campaign and administration that followed who did not know of the mental issues. Additionally, they all knew who was running things and they lied to the American people because these are power-hungry psychopaths.

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-Lurid Crime Tales-

Homicides in Denver drop 58% and in Aurora 36% after Trump ICE deportation raids on killer Tren de Aragua gang members

2025-05-17

[PUBLISH.TWITTER] Ten percent of the miscreants do 90% of the crimes? I recall discussions here about old cop wisdom to that effect, though the actual numbers might be skightly different. At any rate, read it as a very few cause most of the problems.

BREAKING: Homicides in Denver drop 58% and in Aurora 36% after Trump ICE deportation raids on killer Tren de Aragua gang members.

Of course, the Democrats with their mainstream media clowns and radical Obama judges want to keep these illegal alien thugs here in America. pic.twitter.com/SGJUercVNJ
— Dapper Detective (@Dapper_Det) May 16, 2025

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