Ozempic Archives - The Automatic Earth

CNN: "We are just living in such a different universe if you‘re a Republican versus a Democrat, on the basic fundamental question of being proud to be an American."

Democrat leaders are brainwashing their voters to hate America. pic.twitter.com/2N8m5Hmnxi
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) June 30, 2026

Egypt forgot how to build the pyramids.

Rome forgot how to build the aqueducts. Some still carry water today. What they built still stands. Neither civilization remembers how they did it.

Musk: “You look at great civilizations like ancient Egypt, and they were able to make the… pic.twitter.com/XLyLn3a7Mg
— Dustin (@r0ck3t23) June 30, 2026

VP Vance on the communist takeover of the Democrat Party: "It is communism… This is abolishing the police, let criminals run amuck in the cities, flood your country with low-wage, third-world immigrants, and confiscating wealth, not because we want to make anybody's life… pic.twitter.com/AGluRIyE1C
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) June 30, 2026

https://twitter.com/warDaniel47/status/2072003087397429449?s=20 https://twitter.com/nicksortor/status/2072011455457640624?s=20 https://twitter.com/defense_civil25/status/2072125550450344056?s=20

Almost every major country on earth bans birthright citizenship because they aren’t idiots. Here’s a list of major countries who don’t allow birthright citizenship

– China
– Germany
– United Kingdom
– France
– Italy
– Russia
– Japan
– India
– South Korea
– Indonesia
– Turkey
-… pic.twitter.com/0rqOTjojm0
— Wall Street Apes (@WallStreetApes) June 30, 2026

“There is no longer an apple, it’s all worms.”

Birthright citizenship is a 150-year old theme that is being recast. It deserves the attention.

• SCOTUS Strikes Down Trump EO and Establishes Birthright Citizenship (CTH)

Like many of you I am profoundly angered by the Supreme Court decision that fractures our nation and conveys citizenship to the children of illegal aliens born in the United States. In fact, I was so angered to my core, I went for a long walk before doing any further commenting on the matter. U.S. Citizenship is now determined by how good at violating our nation’s borders, by conniving, by scheming and by deception to create a qualified child where no adult qualification exists. This is the most detrimental decision by the Supreme Court in generations and will profoundly impact our nation. There is no longer an apple, it’s all worms.

Today, the Supreme Court on Tuesday struck down President Donald Trump’s executive order seeking to end birthright citizenship – the guarantee of citizenship status to everyone born in the United States. In a decision authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, five supreme court justices agreed with the challengers saying Trump’s order cannot be reconciled with the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which confers citizenship on anyone “born … in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.”
(6-3) Writing for the majority, Roberts emphasized that the “children born of parents unlawfully or temporarily present in the United States” “satisfy both elements of the Citizenship Clause.” “Under the Constitution,” he concluded, “they are citizens at birth.” Roberts was joined in the majority by Justice SOTOMAYOR, KAGAN, BARRETT, JACKSON and KAVANAUGH. nbJustice THOMAS filed a dissenting opinion with GORSUCH and ALITO.
SCOTUS BLOG – In his dissenting opinion, Justice Samuel Alito called the ruling, “one of the most important decisions in the history of the Court” and “a serious mistake.” “Careful analysis of the text of the Fourteenth Amendment and the process that led to its adoption,” Alito argued, “shows that it does not degrade the concept of United States citizenship in this way. Instead,” he contended, “the Fourteenth Amendment confers citizenship on only those children who, at birth, owe allegiance solely to this country.”
Justice Brett Kavanaugh agreed with the result that the court reached – that the president’s executive order is invalid – but not its reasoning. In his view, Trump’s order “does not violate the Fourteenth Amendment” but does violate a federal law providing that children who are “born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof” are U.S. citizens. Congress, Kavanaugh suggested, “could amend” that law “or otherwise enact new legislation establishing exceptions to birthright citizenship for children born to foreign citizens unlawfully or temporarily in the country. But,” he noted, “Congress has not yet done so.”
Justice Clarence Thomas penned a lengthy dissent, which Justice Neil Gorsuch joined. He called the majority’s account “not historically accurate” and said that it “adds to the sad history of the Fourteenth Amendment, which was designed and understood to secure equal rights for the freed blacks but has instead been repurposed for political projects that the Reconstruction Congress did not support.” Gorsuch also wrote a separate brief dissent, in which he appeared to suggest that Trump’s executive order might violate the Constitution as it applies to the children of undocumented immigrants who intend to live in the United States permanently.
“If those parents are not domiciled here,” Gorsuch queried, “then where are they domiciled? And if the answer is nowhere,” he continued, “how can we reconcile that conclusion with this Court’s longstanding recognition that every person is domiciled somewhere?” Because the challengers in this case have argued that Trump’s order is invalid in all circumstances, rather than just some, Gorsuch explained, “these questions may not be properly before us. But their answers are undeniably important to a Nation committed to a view of citizenship open to all children born here to parents who can call this country their home.” (SOURCE)
Consequences and possibilities to come in the next few articles on the matter.

“.. the Fourteenth Amendment, which was designed and understood to secure equal rights for the freed blacks but has instead been repurposed for political projects..”

• Justice Thomas Says Birthright Citizenship Ruling ‘Devalues’ US Citizenship (ET)

Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas issued a lengthy dissent criticizing the high court’s majority ruling against President Donald Trump’s executive order restricting birthright citizenship, saying the decision would effectively devalue American citizenship as it was understood by those who created the Constitution’s 14th Amendment. Thomas said the majority is attempting to repurpose the 14th Amendment “to protect its own set of preferred rights that the Reconstruction Congress never contemplated and that cannot find support in its text,” referring to the post-Civil War era of the mid-to-late 19th century.

Further, he argued that the June 30 ruling denigrates the idea of U.S. citizenship, saying that it has been used by “foreign birth tourists and illegal aliens.”“I am not sure that today’s opinion will stand the test of time,” Thomas wrote. “The Citizenship Clause ‘added greatly to the dignity and glory of American citizenship.’ Today’s opinion devalues that citizenship.” The order issued by Trump aimed to exclude children of illegal immigrants and temporary visitors from gaining automatic birthright citizenship. In 1898, the high court delivered the landmark birthright citizenship ruling in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, which effectively stated that any child born in the United States to immigrants is granted citizenship regardless of the nationality of the child’s parents.
In addition to Thomas, Justices Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch dissented and indicated that they would allow Trump’s executive order to stand. Justice Brett Kavanaugh partially concurred with the majority in saying that he thinks the Trump administration’s executive order does violate a federal statute but that the constitutionality of birthright citizenship is an open question and that the executive order doesn’t violate the 14th Amendment. “The Court today takes the extraordinary step of holding facially unconstitutional the President’s Order excluding from citizenship the children of foreign temporary visitors and illegal aliens,” Thomas said in the 91-page dissent, which is significantly longer than the majority’s opinion.
Thomas indicated that he sided with the Trump administration’s arguments that the 14th Amendment, ratified three years after the end of the Civil War in 1868, was intended to give citizenship to black people who were freed from slavery rather than automatically giving it to the children of immigrants. “In doing so, the Court adds to the sad history of the Fourteenth Amendment, which was designed and understood to secure equal rights for the freed blacks but has instead been repurposed for political projects that the Reconstruction Congress did not support,” he said. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion and was joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, Amy Coney Barrett, and Ketanji Brown Jackson.
“Citizenship, then and now, was the right to have rights—to freely participate in our political community. The Framers of the Fourteenth Amendment extended that promise to ‘every free-born person in this land,’” Roberts wrote, citing congressional debate over the 14th Amendment. “We keep that promise today.” Multiple lower courts have blocked the executive order, signed by Trump early in his presidential term last year, and it has not taken effect anywhere in the United States. The high court ruled on the president’s appeal of a lower-court ruling from New Hampshire that struck down the birthright citizenship restrictions.
Birthright citizenship was the first Trump administration immigration-related issue to reach the Supreme Court for a final ruling. Since he took office, Trump has rolled out policies designed to deport large numbers of illegal immigrants, namely those with criminal records. He has also canceled temporary protected status for hundreds of thousands of people living in the United States, bolstered U.S. border security, initiated policies encouraging illegal aliens to self-deport, and issued other rules. In response to the June 30 ruling, Trump said, “[The ruling is] too bad for our Country, but we can easily make it up in Congress through Legislation.”
“Congress should start TODAY to work on ending expensive and unfair to our Country, Birthright Citizenship,” he wrote on Truth Social. “They will have my Complete and Total Support!” In a previous post, he argued that “dumb judges and justices” allow wealthy women from China and elsewhere to come to the United States with the sole purpose of giving birth so that their children will be American citizens. He noted that few other countries have such a policy.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) hailed the majority opinion, saying that the “decision reaffirms a fundamental American promise—if you are born here, you are a citizen.” “A president cannot change the Constitution by executive fiat,” ACLU National Legal Director Cecillia Wang said in a statement. “Our brave clients and our legal team stand with millions of people around our country who spoke up for one of our most cherished rights. The Constitution’s guarantee of birthright citizenship stands strong.”

“Nor presumably would they have wanted to grant constitutional birthright citizenship to children of foreign citizens unlawfully in the country while simultaneously denying constitutional birthright citizenship to children of tribal American Indians.

• A Roadmap To Fix Birthright Citizenship (Dmitri Bolt)

Despite Tuesday’s disappointing ruling on birthright citizenship, one of the conservative justices outlined a potential path forward that could address concerns such as birth tourism and the automatic granting of citizenship to the children of illegal immigrants.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh joined the majority in striking down President Trump’s executive order but wrote separately in partial dissent. He concluded the order conflicted with existing federal law, not that it was unconstitutional. In his opinion, he also outlined a framework for addressing concerns surrounding birthright citizenship through legislation, making clear that any path to lasting change would likely require an act of Congress.
“Significant illegal immigration into the United States is a new circumstance that was largely unknown as of 1868 and that the Framers of the Fourteenth Amendment could not have fully anticipated,” Justice Kavanaugh wrote. “And the Framers likely would not have anticipated (and presumably would not have intended) the odd result of granting a substantial birthright citizenship benefit to (i) those foreign citizens who violate U. S. immigration law and illegally enter or overstay and then have children in the United States over (ii) those foreign citizens who follow U. S. immigration law and have children in their home countries while seeking to lawfully immigrate to the United States. Nor presumably would they have wanted to grant constitutional birthright citizenship to children of foreign citizens unlawfully in the country while simultaneously denying constitutional birthright citizenship to children of tribal American Indians.”
“Consistent with the Fourteenth Amendment, Congress could amend §1401(a) or otherwise enact new legislation establishing exceptions to birthright citizenship for children born to foreign citizens unlawfully or temporarily in the country,” he added. “But Congress has not yet done so.”
The likelihood of Congress taking up the issue remains slim, making Kavanaugh’s proposed path a difficult one. More importantly for the Trump administration, the Court did not merely hold that birthright citizenship is a matter for Congress to regulate. The majority reaffirmed that the Citizenship Clause applies to the children of individuals in the country illegally or on temporary visas, while noting that only narrow exceptions were historically recognized, including the children of foreign diplomats.
Even if Congress were to pass legislation altering the rules surrounding birthright citizenship, the law would almost certainly face immediate legal challenges before making its way back to the Supreme Court. It remains unclear whether Justices Amy Coney Barrett or Chief Justice John Roberts would alter their positions, though there is little indication they would. If not, the Court’s majority would likely continue to uphold its current interpretation of birthright citizenship.

Not a mistake. They didn’t have the guts to touch it.

• The Supreme Court’s Birthright Citizenship Mistake (Ben Shapiro)

The Supreme Court has now settled, at least for the foreseeable future, one of the most contentious questions in American immigration law: A child born in the United States is a U.S. citizen, regardless of whether the child’s parents entered the country legally or came solely to give birth. That remains the law after the court’s 6-3 decision in Trump v. Barbara. Chief Justice John Roberts, joined by the court’s liberal justices, concluded that the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment guarantees citizenship to virtually anyone born on American soil. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch dissented, arguing that the majority has fundamentally misread both the Constitution and American history.

The ruling itself is hardly surprising. Federal courts have interpreted birthright citizenship this way for generations. What is remarkable is the historical reasoning Roberts employs to justify that conclusion. The 14th Amendment states: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States.” The debate has always centered on these words: “subject to the jurisdiction thereof.” If mere birth within U.S. borders automatically settled the matter, the jurisdiction language would seem unnecessary. Why include it at all? That question lies at the heart of the case.
Roberts traces the answer back to English common law, arguing that the American understanding of citizenship grew directly out of Britain’s doctrine of birthright subjecthood. Under that rule, even a foreign woman who entered Britain briefly, gave birth and immediately departed still produced a child who owed allegiance to the Crown because the sovereign protected the child at birth. According to the majority, the American Founders largely carried that principle forward after independence, replacing “subjects” with “citizens” while preserving the underlying rule. The dissenters reject that premise entirely.
Thomas argues that the American Revolution was a rejection of the British conception of political allegiance itself. Americans ceased to be subjects of a monarch and became citizens of a republic. In his view, importing British common-law doctrines wholesale into the 14th Amendment ignores the very political philosophy that gave birth to the United States.Thomas contends that “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” requires more than physical presence. It requires complete political allegiance to the United States, not merely temporary subjection to American laws while visiting the country. Under that interpretation, citizenship would depend in significant part on the legal status and allegiance of the parents.
That approach is not without precedent. American law already looks to parental status in several contexts. Children born to foreign diplomats, for example, are not automatically granted U.S. citizenship because their parents are not fully subject to American jurisdiction. Thomas also disputes the majority’s historical account. He argues that the court relies heavily on the 1898 decision in United States v. Wong Kim Ark while overlooking evidence from the years immediately following the ratification of the 14th Amendment. According to the dissent, all three branches of the federal government initially rejected the sweeping interpretation the court now embraces, and 19th-century Americans generally viewed exclusive national allegiance as incompatible with widespread dual citizenship.
Alito argues that the court is allowing practical concerns about modern immigration to shape its constitutional interpretation. Reversing the current understanding of birthright citizenship, he acknowledges, could create enormous legal and political complications for millions of people. But, Alito writes, avoiding difficult consequences is not a valid reason to adopt what he considers an incorrect reading of the Constitution.
In one of the sharpest passages of his dissent, Alito argues that the 14th Amendment does not require the nation to extend citizenship to the children of so-called birth tourists or others whose parents came to the United States solely to secure citizenship for their children. He concludes that the majority’s historical narrative is fundamentally flawed, beginning with its assumption that America simply inherited Britain’s rule of birthright subjecthood after independence. Whether one agrees with the majority or the dissent, the practical consequence is clear. Birthright citizenship remains the law of the land, and it is likely to remain so unless the Constitution is amended or the court revisits the issue in the future.
That places the responsibility squarely where it has long belonged: on Congress and the president. If policymakers believe current immigration policy encourages abuses of birthright citizenship, the remedy lies not with constitutional reinterpretation but with enforcing immigration law and reforming the nation’s border policies. The Supreme Court has spoken. The constitutional debate will continue, but the political branches can no longer avoid confronting the immigration system that made this controversy so consequential in the first place.

“Each female visa applicant must present a valid negative pregnancy test taken no longer than 10 days prior to travel to the United States.”

• The Roberts Requirement – Pregnancy Tests for U.S. Travel Visas

What is proposed below is regulatory, lawful and entirely intended to create hardships and burdens. Thus, a new era in State Department visa requirements respond to newly established guidelines by the Supreme Court. As a pragmatic and patriotic American I respectfully suggest and recommend the U.S. State Department immediately institute the “Roberts Requirement” following similar visa entry protocols previously used for COVID-19 tests prior to U.S. admittance. The Roberts Requirement: Each female visa applicant must present a valid negative pregnancy test taken no longer than 10 days prior to travel to the United States.

The certified document, negative pregnancy test, together with all related visa approvals must be presented to Customs and Border Patrol at each port of entry. Failure disqualifies the traveler. This is the same protocol as COVID-19, only using pregnancy status as the disqualifying health issue. It is a lawful regulation, born from a new standard established by the Supreme Court, that does not need congressional approval. Don’t get stuck on details about why it will not work, it will. Start thinking like a person who realizes the goal is to create severe antagonism through regulation. That antagonism can then be directed.
Aim isolation, ridicule and marginalization at those who created the problem. This can be done without visible vitriol. The objective is not just making sure pregnant women do not get visas; that is one small element. The bigger objective is to make it extremely difficult to come to the USA and THEN pin that global compliance requirement on Chief Justice John Roberts, making him live every day with the consequences of his blinded American stupidity; facing him, belittling him, ridiculing him, sitting on the front pages of his peers and global friends. Chief Justice John Roberts created this mess, now put it on his doorstep every day. But people will lie – doesn’t matter. But people will create fake documents – doesn’t matter. But people will still overstay their visas – doesn’t matter.
You are putting the emphasis on the wrong aspect. Make every overburdensome visa rule and travel permit regulation specifically attributable to John Roberts decision. Pre-screenings, pregnancy tests, supplemental bond requirements for 15-to 45-year-old females, shortened visa terms and much more. No exclusions for diplomats, sports figures, foreign actors, employees, H1Bs, student entry or any other visa type – the works. Make the total visa entry system subject to a regulatory and compliance nightmare at a scale that is unheard of. That is the scale of the problem Roberts has created. Now blame John Roberts for it.
This ‘Roberts Requirement’ applies to all visa types. The objective, and it can accompany many other requirements such as a “bond” attachment required for 15- to 45-year-old females to travel, is to create such an overwhelmingly restrictive visa process that it creates ridicule on the SCOTUS decision. Make every regulation specifically cited to the Supreme Court decision and make it exceptionally burdensome. Make SCOTUS own the outcome. Canadians and Mexicans also need to comply. The same rules apply to every nation and no longer are visas determined by timeline, but by the number of extensions required or allowed within it. Every visa has a maximum duration of 3 months, with various extensions possible.
A one-year visa becomes a three-month visa with 4 extensions allowed. At each extension the same origination requirements must be fulfilled. A two-year USA visa, is now a U.S. visa with 7 extensions allowed, etc. Student visas carry the same requirement for 3-month extensions. Require a – refundable at exit – surety bond purchase valued at $500,000 for any non-tourist visa. [Later the bond issuer, sell those non-refunded bonds and release the bounty hunters.] No visas are exempt from the entry requirements. This is a new era with new rules that specifically come as an outcome of new judicial rulings. This is not a White House or State Department issue. This is an issue created by the Supreme Court that needs an immediate response.
Congress can fix it, but in the interim – maximum regulatory pressure is applied directly to the wound. Example of point and counterpoints. POINT: Canada, Mexico, India or [XXX] will scream this is unfair given the nature of our collaborative visa designations. Counterpoint: Yes, you are correct. That was then; this is now. The nature of our visa system has changed because SCOTUS has just codified new distinctions on citizenship that now become new visa factors.
Your nation does not convey birthright citizenship, so I understand your inability to accept our new terms. Unfortunately, our nation now does convey birthright citizenship, and as a consequence changes are needed. Don’t back down. Make SCOTUS own it. Sure, there will be legal challenges, all the way up to the same SCOTUS, and what are they going to do? Think about it! Make everyone live by the new rules – that are created by those who didn’t think about the consequences.

“The potential charges include visa fraud, money laundering, identity theft, and wire fraud.”

• The DOJ Goes to War on Birth Tourism After Losing at SCOTUS (Margolis)

It ain’t over until it’s over, and the Department of Justice says it ain’t over. For sure, the Supreme Court handed the left a win Monday, but the Department of Justice didn’t spend much time licking its wounds. The court ruled on Tuesday that President Donald Trump’s executive order limiting birthright citizenship was unconstitutional. The ruling held that the 14th Amendment guarantees citizenship to anyone born on U.S. soil regardless of their parents’ immigration status. This terrible ruling effectively protects “birth tourism,” the scheme in which pregnant women overstay visas or enter the country illegally specifically to give birth and secure U.S. citizenship for their children.

Jesse Watters addressed it on The Five on Tuesday. “Now, the Chinese communists could take their pregnant wife to Guam, have a baby, fly the baby back to Beijing with a U.S. passport, and then that baby, when he’s older, can get welfare, he can vote,” Watters said. “Technically, when he’s 35, he could become President of the United States. That’s the stupidest thing anyone ever thought of.” DOJ senior official Colin McDonald issued a department-wide memo directing federal prosecutors to prioritize investigations and criminal charges against people who travel to the United States under false pretenses to give birth. The potential charges include visa fraud, money laundering, identity theft, and wire fraud.
“The Department of Justice will zealously protect the sanctity of United States citizenship by investigating and prosecuting those who fraudulently exploit our immigration system,” McDonald wrote in the memo, which he posted publicly on social media. The DOJ had already telegraphed this move before the ruling came down, calling birth tourism a “national security threat” and pledging to “prioritize the prosecutions of birth tourism schemes across the country.” The Supreme Court can hold the line on the 14th Amendment. The DOJ intends to go after the fraud. The fraud, by the way, is real.
Back in 2019, Chinese national Dongyuan Li ran a company called You Win USA Vacation Services, which helped pregnant Chinese women travel to the United States to give birth. Li claimed to have served more than 500 customers, charging each between $40,000 and $80,000, and she received $3 million in wire transfers from China over two years. Li coached clients to lie on visa applications and at U.S. consulate interviews in China, claiming a two-week stay while planning to stay up to three months, and trained them to conceal their pregnancies from customs officials.
You Win USA marketed the service by promising children “13 years of free education,” “less pollution,” “an easier way for the whole family to immigrate to the United States,” and “priority for jobs in U.S. government, public companies, and large corporations.” Citizenship as a premium package, complete with step-by-step coaching on how to fool the U.S. government. Li pleaded guilty to federal charges in 2019. A judge sentenced her to 10 months in prison for running a multimillion-dollar operation that turned U.S. citizenship into a product. The Supreme Court may have blocked the executive order, but the DOJ hasn’t walked away from the fight.

“Slams Biden’s “heinous” policy of flying migrants en masse into Springfield and the Midwest”.

• Miller: Every Single Haitian Migrant Is GOING BACK to Haiti Under Trump (MN)

White House Homeland Security Adviser Stephen Miller delivered a clear and forceful message: every Haitian national on Temporary Protected Status will be returned to Haiti under President Trump. The Biden administration’s last-year extension of TPS turned what began as a short-term response to a 2010 earthquake into a permanent pipeline. Miller called the deliberate importation of these migrants into places like Springfield, Ohio, one of the most heinous acts the government has ever committed. Miller laid it out without hedging:

Stephen Miller: "The illegal alien Haitians are going back to Haiti. They can build their country there."
pic.twitter.com/l56e2Tu5fH
— Defiant L’s (@DefiantLs) June 30, 2026

“There’s an earthquake in Haiti. So she’s (Former DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano) announcing TPS for a few months while they’re recovering from an earthquake. That was in 2010, 15 years ago. Then the Biden administration in its last year extends TPS to every single illegal alien from Haiti while they are flying them en masse into Springfield, Ohio, across the Midwest.” He continued, “It was a formal policy of replacing the communities that lived in, settled, and sustained these communities for generations. It was one of the most heinous things this government has ever done.”
“And yes, under President Trump, let me be very clear, the illegal alien Haitians are going back to Haiti. They can build their country there,” Miller further urged. This directly follows the Trump administration’s earlier termination of TPS protections for 353,000 Haitians, with those designations set to expire. The move reversed Biden-era renewals that kept hundreds of thousands in the country long after any temporary justification had passed. Springfield became the most visible example of the fallout. Local residents watched as federal policies funneled large numbers of Haitian migrants into their city, straining housing, schools, and public resources.

Stephen Miller says every single Haitian on temporary protected status is going back

He says The Biden Admin specifically imported them into Ohio to replace the native population and “It was one of the most heinous things this government has ever done”

“There's an earthquake in… pic.twitter.com/4mfehuGJkM
— Wall Street Apes (@WallStreetApes) June 30, 2026

Americans reported being priced out of apartments while migrants received housing assistance. Parks saw geese and other wildlife targeted. In one city commission meeting, Springfield City Manager Brian Heck admitted he had “heard about” reports of Haitian migrants eating pets. The conditions many of these migrants left behind in Haiti only underscore why prolonged TPS extensions made little sense. Armed gangs, including groups with documented histories of extreme violence and intimidation tactics, have dominated large parts of the country.
Earlier coverage highlighted how some media outlets appeared more exercised by conservatives simply stating these facts than by the violence itself. In a separate but related immigration development today, the Supreme Court issued a 5-4 ruling striking down President Trump’s executive order limiting birthright citizenship for children born to illegal immigrants.

BREAKING: In a 5-4 ruling, the Supreme Court struck down President Trump’s executive order limiting birthright citizenship for children born to illegal immigrants in the United States. pic.twitter.com/XZDld7UkxT
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) June 30, 2026

The decision keeps in place a policy that automatically grants U.S. citizenship to children born on American soil regardless of their parents’ legal status. Critics have long argued this creates powerful incentives for unlawful entry and serves as a form of chain migration that complicates enforcement.

One of the most destructive and outrageous decisions in the long history of the Supreme Court. American citizenship is not the birthright of the world. It belongs only and solely to Americans. No provision of the Constitution can be read to require our national self-obliteration. https://t.co/qZuwzZq5tr
— Stephen Miller (@StephenM) June 30, 2026

The 14th Amendment’s citizenship clause was crafted in the aftermath of slavery to secure rights for freed people, not to function as a standing invitation for foreign nationals to secure citizenship for their offspring through illegal presence. While the birthright ruling hands open-border advocates a victory and adds another layer of legal friction to enforcement, Miller’s remarks show the administration is not pausing on other fronts. TPS designations were always meant to be temporary. Extending them for 15 years while actively importing large numbers into specific American communities was never about humanitarian relief — it was about demographic engineering.
American towns like Springfield paid the price in drastically altered neighborhoods, and lost quality of life. Restoring the original meaning of temporary protection and returning those without ongoing legal status is not radical. It is the baseline responsibility of any government that puts its own citizens first. The message from the White House is consistent: the replacement experiment is over. Those here under expired or terminated protections are going home. Haiti’s future will be built by Haitians in Haiti, not by continuing to offload its population onto American communities that never asked for the burden.

Antagonizing Trump will not work out well.

• The Canadian Dollar is Collapsing – Here’s What to Expect Next (CTH)

The Canadian dollar is starting to feel the effects of long-term uncertainty. It will get worse.

…”Since the start of June, the currency has weakened 2.9%, which would be its steepest monthly decline since October 2024, as Canadian bond yields fell further below U.S. yields.”…
Now, this is where you really need to pay attention to details. Remember, the U.K and EU have a vested interest in protecting Canada from economic collapse. President Trump doesn’t want immediate collapse either -because Xi will move in fast- but Trump is not going to provide the same financial and economic lifelines that the other four-eyes will trigger. Reuters is reporting that tomorrow the U.S. will formally declare a “non-extension” of the USMCA trade agreement and that triggers a 10-year period to decoupling. It is very important to understand there is a difference between announcing a “non-extension” and announcing a “withdrawal“. The Canadians are completely confused about what is about to happen.
In a non-extension announcement, the USA is saying they do not want to extend or renew the terms of the agreement beyond the current trade agreement terms. Yes, this is a 10-year exit. However, that’s not the part that matters. Announcing a decision to exit the USMCA (CUSMA), a full withdrawal from the trilateral deal, triggers a six-month countdown to exit. The deadline to announce the decision to extend is July 1st. There is no deadline on the timeline to announce an exit or withdrawal from the USMCA. That announcement can happen at any time. Put simply, announcing a non-renewal is a 10-year exit. Announcing a withdrawal is a 6-month exit. The announcement to withdraw can come at any time after the statement of non-renewal.
You can see the confusion in this article:
WASHINGTON, June 30 (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration is expected to formally declare on Wednesday that it will not extend the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement on trade, starting a decade-long clock to wind down the 32-year-old North American free trade zone as the three countries haggle over proposed changes. That declaration will kick off a six-year review session, part of a “sunset clause” negotiated by President Donald Trump’s first administration. However, it will do little to alter contentious negotiations over the pact’s future, including sweeping demands to boost U.S. and regional content in North American automotive production and trade protections to block Chinese goods from benefiting from USMCA. (read more)
The most likely scenario is Trump/Greer first say the USA is not renewing (not extending). Then, at a later date determined by them (in my opinion it will be after the U.S-Mexico agreement is finished), Trump and Greer will then announce the withdrawal, which will trigger the 6-month countdown to exit. There is no rush to announce the withdrawal; the only immediate action is to announce a USMCA renewal is not happening. What this scenario does is put maximum pressure on Canada. As soon as President Trump says the USA will not extend the agreement, all investment into Canada becomes extremely tenuous. The Canadian dollar will weaken further; a slow contraction will begin.
However, Canada will still be oblivious to what comes next because their media will tell them they have a decade to work things out. They don’t. At a time determined by President Trump and USTR Jamieson Greer, they will announce a decision to exit the USMCA which then triggers a 6-month phase before the agreement is terminated. This is where Canada will be caught off guard and the economic collapse will likely be rapid and catastrophic. Canada will only just begin to think about the “exit” scenario, once the non-renewal announcement is made. It will take them a while to realize how vulnerable they are – they are currently in full denial mode.
During this period, President Trump carries massive leverage against Canada. He will likely probe their trade position and willingness to comply with reciprocity after the non-renewal announcement. The outcome of those probes will determine the timeline of his exit announcement. During this non-renewal phase, we may even see President Trump tease the exit, then retract, then tease the exit again. Each time Trump tests the Canadian government with statements, the Canadian economy will pulsate and weaken; it will drive the Canadian government to either extreme anger, or defeated compliance.
Timing the completion of the U.S-Mexico deal within the probes of Canada will be super interesting. At some point as the U.S. closes in on the deal with Mexico, Canada is going to realize they are naked without any agreement. The worst-case scenario for Canada is President Trump announcing the USMCA exit on the same day he announces a completed bilateral deal with Mexico. It would be the worst-case scenario for Mark Carney because the ignored voices of those few people in Canada who have been trying to warn about this would suddenly get a lot of attention.

The “everything app” is not an app.

• Elon’s Next Move: Your Money (Adam Sharp)

For years, Elon Musk has dreamed of turning X (formerly Twitter) into the “everything app”. Now that X is part of SpaceX (SPCX), and the combined company just raised $112 billion, the time looks ripe. Elon envisions X as a single place where you can bank, chat, earn, advertise, use AI, shop, and more. X Money is a key part of that vision. And we just got the first idea of what it will look like. The program just launched to a small group of users. To attract deposits, X is offering some pretty crazy (and likely temporary) perks:

6% APY on cash, no deposit limit
3% cash back on purchases (with exceptions)
$10 million FDIC insurance (by splitting deposits up between banks)
A 6% yield is not sustainable long-term (at current interest rates). It’s a teaser rate to get people to switch to X Money. Same goes for 3% cash back. That’s 3x higher than the industry average, and will almost certainly not last long. These teasers may get a lot of people to switch. But it’s unclear how long the perks will last, and it’s currently only available to a small group. X is not a bank. At least not yet. It’s more like a “neobank”, which manages the marketing and customer relationship, while licensed banks handle the deposits. But for the user, it feels like a bank account and debit card. Deposits, yield, wire transfers, autopay, P2P payments, etc.
The WeChat Model
Musk’s desire to build the “everything app” may have been inspired by China’s WeChat. WeChat is owned by Chinese tech firm Tencent. It started out as a simple messaging app. But Tencent rapidly expanded its utility, and today it is basically a digital operating system for the country. In China, WeChat is used for payment, invoices, government interactions, making appointments, videos, shopping, games, chatting on social media, and much more. WeChat Pay holds a massive 38% share of payments in China. More than a billion people use the app. It’s so ubiquitous that many Chinese people essentially run their lives through the app. Largely as a result of WeChat’s success, Tencent has become a $488 billion tech giant. This is what Musk is aiming for. If X Money succeeds, it could help justify SpaceX’s lofty valuation of $2.2 trillion.
SpaceX’s Huge Ambitions
X (formerly Twitter) has been the least-discussed part of SpaceX. All the attention has been on rockets and AI. For good reason. Those are both very exciting areas. But X deserves attention as well. Musk aims to turn the social network into a super-app, much like WeChat. Musk purchased Twitter for $44 billion. If he succeeds, it could be worth much more over the long term. But running what is essentially a combination bank and social network is no easy matter. For one thing, it makes security far more important (and challenging). It’s going to require a massive customer support team. And that’s one area where Elon’s X has struggled.
X Money is going to be a critical part of building the “everything app”. And the team is going big on the launch. Think about the 6% APYs X is offering on deposits. Let’s say that X Money attracts $10 billion in deposits over the first year. Paying a 6% yield on that much cash could cost SpaceX $240 million a year in losses. That’s assuming their own internal return on cash is around 3.5%, plus bank fees and other transaction costs. This is why I assume the 6% APY is temporary.
And the 3% cash back? That appears to be on a debit card, which doesn’t have the same fee support as a credit card. So that could be another very expensive tool to attract users. But the losses could be worth it. The market they’re targeting is massive. Payments, banking, and eventually – everything.So will X succeed in becoming a “super app”? Honestly? I think it’s a long shot. X Money would probably need to be wildly successful and run away with the market.
One problem is that Meta/Facebook (META) will copy anything that looks to be working. The company is notorious for it. And they have a much larger user base. Meta also already has WhatsApp pay and several payment integrations with Facebook. Another problem is that American banks are extremely profitable, and in some ways act like a cartel. They won’t appreciate X stepping onto their turf, and may fight back. With lawfare, lobbying, or other means.
A Beautiful But Difficult Model
The “everything app”, or the WeChat model has been the dream of every social media company in the world for a while. But it’s going to be very difficult to pull off at this stage of the game. Then again, we should never count Elon out. If he’s going to go hard after this market, SpaceX certainly has a shot at winning it. SpaceX just raised $87 billion in its IPO, then another $25 billion in bond sales. That is a massive war chest. SPCX has big aspirations. And with a $2.2 trillion market cap, it has a lot of growing to do in order to justify that lofty price. X Money is a calculated risk by SpaceX. One that could pay off big.

“Everything app” device.

• SpaceX Takes Aim At Smartphone Market With New AI Device (ZH)

The story around Elon Musk’s SpaceX positioning Starlink as a potential mobile carrier to challenge legacy telcos and cable dinosaurs continues to gain momentum. A new Wall Street Journal report says the AI and rocket company has shown investors a prototype of a handset-like device, suggesting SpaceX may be looking beyond satellites and broadband toward vertically integrated consumer devices to take on smartphone giants like Apple and Samsung.

SpaceX has developed a prototype for a handset-like device designed to reshape how humans interact with artificial intelligence: WSJ

The prototype features a sleek design that is slimmer than an iPhone; it was shown to some investors and other stakeholders ahead of the company’s…
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) July 1, 2026

The device, described by people familiar with the matter as slimmer than an iPhone with a “sleek design,” is still said to be in the prototype stage. It is expected to run on a Qualcomm Snapdragon chipset, suggesting SpaceX may be testing a consumer hardware layer that could eventually tie together Starlink connectivity, xAI software, and a proprietary operating system. Last week, TD Cowen analyst Gregory Williams told clients that if SpaceX/Starlink fails to secure an MVNO/retail mobile deal, then the next logical move would be to acquire T-Mobile. SpaceX told some investors that the project was at an early stage. The design could change and it is unclear whether such a device will be made.
…
The project is a sign of Musk’s sprawling ambitions as he builds a leading global satellite connectivity network, grows his rocket company and creates new AI tools. AI companies are placing a variety of bets on the future form and functionality of AI-powered devices. The Wall Street Journal has reported that Musk has in the past weighed building a smartphone due to frustration over how Apple controls distribution of third-party apps such as X. It isn’t easy, however, for a newcomer to break into the hardware business. -WSJ
SpaceX Builds A Regulatory Moat Around Its Starlink Empire
The read here is that Musk appears to be eyeing the entire consumer connectivity stack in one swoop. Starlink is the network layer, xAI provides the intelligence layer, a proprietary operating system would control the software experience, and a handset-like device would serve as the consumer endpoint. In other words, Musk is not just challenging telcos and big cable. It is also a shot across the bow for smartphone makers, app stores, and the AI assistant layer now being embedded across consumer devices.

They need Trump to go along. Or it will be after his term. But war it will be.

• NATO Chief Admits To Sleepless Nights Over Russia (TASS)

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte believes Russia to be the main threat to the alliance and admits that this keeps him up at night. “Usually, I try to sleep at night, but if something keeps me up, it’s Russia. <…> China is having a massive buildup of its own military, will have 1,000 nuclear warheads by 2030. So, let’s not be naive about China. But <…> Russia is the main threat now and in the longer term,” the NATO chief told the Anadolu news agency in an interview ahead of the upcoming NATO summit in Ankara on July 7-8. He added that one of the alliance’s priorities is “maintaining support for Ukraine.”

When asked about his expectations for the summit, Rutte said he hopes that, once it concludes, “people will say it was a summit that implemented the commitments made in The Hague [last year].” These were increasing defense spending and strengthening the military-industrial complex. “There are several successful examples, and things are generally getting better. One of the most important priorities is increasing production output in the defense industry. We will address this issue first at the NATO Defense Industry Forum on the summit’s opening day,” the NATO chief noted.

“Bringing back cheap Russian energy would help the German economy recover, AfD leader Alice Weidel has said..”

She makes sense. But they’ve long since decided on war.

• Leader of Germany’s Most Popular Party Wants To Restore Ties With Russia (RT)

Germany urgently needs to lift the ban on Russian oil and gas imports to prop up its struggling economy, Alice Weidel, the co-chair of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, has said. She also vowed to restore economic ties between the two countries if her party comes to power. The German economy was dealt a major blow when the country took part in the Western sanctions on Russia in 2022. Before the escalation of the Ukraine conflict, Germany relied on Russia for 55% of its natural gas. Russian oil giant Rosneft’s operations also accounted for around 12% of Germany’s total oil-processing capacity.

“Cheap energy from Russia was the secret of the success of ‘Made in Germany’. We need it back,” Weidel said in an interview with Reuters published on Tuesday. “The loss of this energy has set us back years. Hundreds of thousands of jobs have been lost. It has made us dependent on the United States, which sells us energy at far higher prices.” The decision to abandon cheap Russian energy played a major role in slowing down the German economy, which contracted in 2023 and 2024 – the first back-to-back annual drop since the early 2000s.
In January, the country’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DIHK) reported an alarmingly high number of bankruptcies. In March, the Federal Statistical Office said the nation’s industrial output fell by 1.2% year-on-year. In both cases, high energy prices were cited as a key factor. The German Environmental Aid Association (DUH) reported in January that 96% of the nation’s liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports in 2025 came from the US. The AfD has argued that Germany essentially became dependent on one country.
The AfD has steadily gained support in Germany amid record-low approval ratings for Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s policies. Berlin has been actively pouring money into a military buildup, citing the supposed ‘Russian threat’, which Moscow has dismissed as “nonsense.” Merz has also blamed the country’s economic problems on the German people, urging them to “work more,” while announcing plans to slash social spending.
An INSA survey published on Tuesday suggests that the AfD enjoys the greatest support among all German parties (29%), seven percentage points ahead of Merz’s Christian Democratic Union. The right-wing party’s popularity has grown despite being boycotted by all other major German parties as part of the ‘firewall’ – an informal ban on any coalition or coordinated voting with the AfD. The next general election in Germany is expected in 2029.

“Ozempic is a story of pharmacological success, but also of entrepreneurial failure.”:

• Ozempic Sat Unused for Decades (QTR)

Led by Ozempic and Wegovy, glucagon-like peptides (GLP-1s) have become a global phenomenon, with one in eight US adults currently taking one. Those two branded compounds, both made by Novo Nordisk, emerged from attempts to develop a diabetes drug. It effectively lowers blood glucose, slows gastric emptying, and reduces hunger, leading many patients to experience profound weight loss. In a world plagued by increasing obesity, the drugs’ utility extends far beyond diabetes treatment. So why did the formula sit untouched for 30 years after it was licensed?

Ozempic is a story of pharmacological success, but also of entrepreneurial failure. The tale provides a strong reminder that inventions and discoveries mean little unless they are combined with sound entrepreneurial judgment. According to a paper published in the Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, a startup produced a GLP compound in the late 1980s, and pharma giant Pfizer sponsored human trials that confirmed the drug’s efficacy in reducing blood glucose levels and slowing gastric emptying. One member of the startup team, Jeffrey Flier of Harvard, explained what happened next:
I was shocked when told that senior Pfizer leadership had concluded that there would never be another injectable therapy for diabetes other than insulin. What led them to this conclusion was never explained….I had been deeply impressed by their rapid decision to invest in our company, and I was equally dumbfounded by their decision to end their investment despite convincing early evidence of the program’s success. Confident in its own conclusions, Pfizer pulled the plug on the drug in 1991. The startup folded.
Under the terms of Pfizer’s agreement, the license remained with the Boston hospital where researchers discovered GLP-1’s mechanism and conducted the human trials. It was then acquired by Novo Nordisk in 1992, where scientists used it to develop what eventually became semaglutide, the pharmaceutical sold as Ozempic and Wegovy. While it is unclear whether, as Max Marchione put it on Twitter, the GLP-1 agonist data simply “sat in a filing cabinet for 30+ years,” Pfizer’s decision to abandon the project likely delayed its development…

“ If he does tell the truth, he’s going to have to admit he lied to us previously.”

• How Fauci Can Still Face Prosecution Despite His Pardon (Margolis)

Joe Biden thought he handled it. Well, at least whoever wrote the preemptive pardon and signed it with the autopen did. That was supposed to be the insurance policy that kept the former NIAID director from being held accountable. The good ol’ get-out-of-jail-free card before Anthony Fauci was even charged with anything. Biden pitched it as protection from lawfare, but we all know what it really was, and we’ll soon get the truth, one way or another.

As you know, on her final day as Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard released a tranche of previously unreleased documents and communications laying out what many Americans have suspected for years. Fauci, as head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, funneled millions in U.S. taxpayer dollars into dangerous gain-of-function research on bat coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the lab now widely believed to be the source of COVID-19. He did it.
And then he lied about it. “Before the COVID pandemic, Dr. Fauci, as head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, provided millions in U.S. taxpayer dollars to fund dangerous gain of function research on bat coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology,” Gabbard said in a video she posted to X, “work which is now widely viewed as the source of the unintentional lab leak that sparked the pandemic.”
According to Gabbard, Fauci funded the research tied to Big Pharma’s multi-trillion-dollar pursuit of a universal vaccine, then pressured handpicked experts to promote a natural-origin narrative, deflecting blame from the Wuhan lab. Then, he used his media access to amplify his version of events while crushing any dissent. “These documents expose Fauci’s direct role in influencing and manipulating IC assessments on COVID-19 and how Fauci lied to Congress in 2024 when under oath, he denied knowledge of or participation in discussions with intelligence officials about viral research,” Gabbard said.
Compare that to what Fauci told the Senate in 2021, when he told Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.): “With all due respect, you are entirely and completely incorrect that the NIH has not ever and does not now fund gain-of-function research in the Wuhan Institute of Virology.” He said that under oath. The documents say otherwise. Independent journalist John Solomon argues that Fauci could still face prosecution, spelling it out in an interview with Bill O’Reilly.
“We know that in the end days of Joe Biden, Anthony Fauci got a pardon,” Solomon began. “He can’t be prosecuted for anything before January 20, 2025. But if Rand Paul puts him on the stand next week, as he’s going to compel him to do, and Anthony Fauci does not tell the truth this time in the body of evidence that’s there, he could be instantly prosecuted by the Trump Justice Department. If he does tell the truth, he’s going to have to admit he lied to us previously.”
Basically, Fauci, under oath again, has a choice: lie about what he did under oath and face prosecution, or admit he lied under oath before. Since Biden’s pardon only covered what Fauci did before Biden officially left office, if he commits perjury, there’s nothing that can protect him. It left him completely exposed to everything that comes after. With Gabbard’s documents on the table and Paul’s committee waiting, that reckoning is no longer hypothetical.
Both options for Fauci will be devastating for his legacy.

The left media has been hateful and dishonest about Elon for 20 years. Now they have upped their game. There must be lots of money coming their way. They depend on their readers and viewers being stupid and crazy. Fortunately, we have X. Angry mom. https://t.co/01jSR9IGGJ
— Maye Musk (@mayemusk) June 30, 2026

Neuralink has solved through-dura electrode implantation!

This is a very big deal, as it greatly improves the safety and ease of interfacing with the brain. https://t.co/NV59xKAE22
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 30, 2026

RFK Jr. Announces He's Ending Emergency Liability Protection For COVID-19 Vaccine Makers https://t.co/vkZg1Cg9YD
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) July 1, 2026

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Debt Rattle March 31 2024

Mar 312024

March 31, 2024 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 8:40 am Finance Tagged with: Bitcoin Cash, ceasefire, DOJ, Elon Musk, Jan 6, mail-in ballots, money transfers, Odessa, Ozempic, Trump 20 Responses »

Titian Christ Carrying the Cross 1565

• Why Americans Have Little To Smile About These Days (Bridge)

• Trump Pushes Legal Challenges In Two Cases (BBC)

• We Need A Ceasefire In Ukraine – Orban (RT)

• ‘Odessa Will Fall’, Musk Warns Ukraine (RT)

• Ukraine Was Testing Ground for Western Big Pharma (Sp.)

• Money Transfers Proof That Crocus Terrorists Followed Orders From Ukraine (Sp.)

• US Marines Struggle to Adapt to Fighting Adversary That Can Fight Back (Miles)

• Biden Claims Saudi Arabia, Qatar ‘Ready To Normalize’ With Israel (Cradle)

• Israel Believes Only 60-70 Out Of 134 Hostages Are Still Alive (ZH)

• The Never-Ending Federal Surveillance Crime Spree (Bovard)

• Republicans Score Win In Court Battle Over Pennsylvania Mail-In Ballots (ET)

• Behind Massive Mail-in Ballot Push Is a Little-Noticed Executive Order (ET)

• Judge Rebukes DOJ Arguments Against Release Of Jan. 6 Defendant (ZH)

• $935 Diabetes Jab Ozempic Costs Less Than $5 To Make (ET)

• Why is $BCH So Hot Right Now? (Kim Dotcom)

How Joe Biden chooses to celebrate the resurrection of Christ.

Maher Trump

Trump's Truth Social success lives rent free in the minds of liberals everywhere:
Bill Maher: "This is America in a nut shell. They [Democrats] have this big fundraiser there. They have ex-presidents, singers, dancers, Lizzo. They raised 26 million dollars. Trump sold Twitter for… pic.twitter.com/UYen2sQQg6

— Eric Abbenante (@EricAbbenante) March 30, 2024

Habba

Trump Attorney Alina Habba SLAMS lawfare trials being weaponized against Trump, Responds DIRECTLY to Hunter Biden after making UNHINGED claim:

"No one is above the law, Hunter!" pic.twitter.com/L7b2Nt19u8

— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) March 29, 2024

Mike Davis Fani

Top Legal Scholar Mike Davis EVISCERATES Fani Willis:

"Why aren't Al Gore, John Kerry, and Hillary Clinton IN PRISON?!" pic.twitter.com/EeMS7ESUf5

— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) March 29, 2024

DeSantis

Gov. DeSantis ENDS "squatting" in Florida after illegal aliens openly BRAG about invading Americans' homes:

"What New York does, what California does, we will do the opposite. The squatters scam is over in Florida." pic.twitter.com/e6SBo2L0pQ

— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) March 29, 2024

Lie
https://twitter.com/i/status/1773809245504278628

“Not since the Civil War period have the American people witnessed such stark political divisions, and it seems to be just a matter of time before the Blue and Gray battle fatigues are back in style..”

• Why Americans Have Little To Smile About These Days (Bridge)

From a sputtering economy and high inflation to a lack of trust in political leadership, Americans are expressing displeasure with many facets of their daily lives. In the annual World Happiness Report, the United States plunged eight places to 23rd, a historic low for the land famous for its pearly white smiles. It’s the first time since the report launched back in 2012 that the US did not feature among the world’s 20 happiest countries. So what’s dragging Americans down? Perhaps the best place to start is with the economy, which has left many people in the dust as the rich just keep getting richer. Consumer prices for basic grocery items remain above what they were in January 2021, when President Joe Biden assumed office. Prices for chicken (+26%), bread (+30%), sugar (+44%), and butter (+27%) are enough to trigger many shoppers, while a simple trip to a restaurant has become a rare luxury for many financially strapped consumers. Meanwhile, rent costs have surged by 20% over the same period.

Amid this sticker shock at the checkout line, Americans have also expressed a heavy amount of skepticism with the political system. A comprehensive Pew Research Center survey reveals high levels of dissatisfaction with the three branches of government, the Democratic and Republican parties, as well as the candidates for office. Among the findings, just 4% of US adults say the political system is working extremely or very well; another 23% report it is working somewhat well. About six in ten (63%) express not too much or no confidence at all in the future of the US political system. A growing proportion of Americans are expressing contempt for both political parties. Nearly three in ten (28%) express unfavorable opinions of both parties, the highest share in three decades of polling. And a comparable share of respondents (25%) do not feel well-represented by either party.

While trust in government has remained near historic lows for much of the last two decades, today it stands among the lowest levels dating back nearly seven decades. And now, three years after the January 6 protests at the Capitol Building, more Americans believe their country is heading for a political smash-up. According to a CBS/YouGov poll released in January, 49% of respondents expect some sort of violence in future political contests, like the upcoming showdown between Donald Trump and Joe Biden on November 4. Meanwhile, a full 70% agreed with the statement that American democracy is ‘threatened’. Not since the Civil War period have the American people witnessed such stark political divisions, and it seems to be just a matter of time before the Blue and Gray battle fatigues are back in style, albeit over entirely different issues.

The Democrats and Republicans are trapped inside of their own iron-clad echo chambers, where they are prevented from hearing their political opponents just across the aisle. This lack of a national dialogue, worsened by an overtly pro-liberal media, is what spawned the so-called insurrection on January 6, and could easily trigger a new bout of violence sometime down the road. Feelings of loneliness is another thing dragging Americans down. In May 2023, US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called loneliness a “public health epidemic.” The latest Healthy Minds Monthly Poll from the American Psychiatric Association (APA) reveals that, early in 2024, 30% of adults said they have “experienced feelings of loneliness at least once a week over the past year, while 10% say they are lonely every day.”

When you don’t take it as “News”, the MSM is a delight. Take the new Trump gag order, “barring Mr Trump from attacking court staff and their family members”. What happened is Judge Merchan’s daughter uses a pic of Trump behind bars as her avatar. But he cannot say now that that is inappropriate.

“Contrary to the People’s suggestion, the Court cannot ‘direct’ President Trump to do something that the gag order does not require..”

Another gem: “Ms Willis had described Mr Wade as a “trusted friend..”

Michael Cohen boinked Stormy Daniels and paid her for it using Trump’s money. When that ran out, he claimed it was “hush money”. The paper trail was already there. Does that sound about right?

• Trump Pushes Legal Challenges In Two Cases (BBC)

Donald Trump’s attorneys pushed two legal challenges before Easter weekend. His camp is appealing against a verdict from a Georgia judge allowing Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis to stay on an election subversion case. They also aim to stop the expansion of a gag order, limiting Mr Trump’s speech, in a New York hush money case. The Republican presidential nominee faces four legal cases, and these two are the most likely to be heard in court before the US elections. Mr Trump has pleaded not guilty in all the cases, and claimed he is being politically persecuted. Mr Trump and his co-defendants in the Georgia case, which accuses them of plotting to overturn the 2020 election, have alleged that Ms Willis financially benefitted from an improper romantic relationship with Nathan Wade – a prosecutor she hired to lead the case. Judge Scott McAfee – who is overseeing the case – held two weeks of chaotic hearings that included fiery testimony from Ms Willis.

She admitted to the relationship but denied benefitting from it financially. In the end, the judge sided with Ms Willis, though he said the relationship had the “appearance of impropriety” and demanded Mr Wade or Ms Willis step down. Mr Wade did so within hours. In a 51-page motion filed on Friday before the Georgia Court of Appeals, Mr Trump and eight of his co-defendants argued Ms Willis should also be removed – which would greatly delay the case or could lead to it being dismissed. Mr Trump and other co-defendants’ lawyers said Mr Wade’s resignation did not sufficiently address the “appearance of impropriety” that “cast a pall over these entire proceedings”. “The trial court was bound by existing case law to not only require Wade’s disqualification (which occurred) but also to require the disqualification of DA Willis and her entire office,” the attorneys said in the filing. CBS News, the BBC’s US partner, has reported that Ms Willis intends to play a prominent role in the case, which the judge has ordered to proceed if Mr Trump appeals.

Meanwhile, in New York, Mr Trump is embroiled in other legal battles while he awaits the start of his first criminal trial over the alleged falsification of business records related to a payment made to adult film star Stormy Daniels. This week, the justice in the case, Juan Merchan, granted a request from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office to impose a gag order on Mr Trump barring him from making statements about jurors and witnesses or intimidating court staff. On Friday, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg sought to clarify – and possibly expand – the gag order barring Mr Trump from attacking court staff and their family members. His motion came after Mr Trump insulted Justice Merchan’s daughter in a social media post before the gag order was issued.

Mr Bragg asked Justice Merchan to “make abundantly clear” that the gag order applied to “family members of the Court”, the district attorney and other individuals mentioned in the gag order. He also asked the judge to “warn” Mr Trump “and direct him to immediately desist”. If Mr Trump does not, the prosecutor argues, he should face sanctions. The former president’s attorney, Todd Blanche, denied that his client had violated the gag order and argued that the judge’s daughter was not a part of it. He wrote that there was nothing wrong with the social media posts. “Contrary to the People’s suggestion, the Court cannot ‘direct’ President Trump to do something that the gag order does not require,” he said.

“There is no remaining “reasonable dispute between Russia and the West,” Orban added..”

• We Need A Ceasefire In Ukraine – Orban (RT)

Ukraine’s path to peace and security could lie in establishing a buffer zone next to the Russian border, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has said. With the conflict between Moscow and Kiev in its third year, the Western flow of military and financial aid to Ukraine is dwindling, while its army is losing ground. Orban suggested that now is the time for a ceasefire, Hungarian magazine Mandiner wrote on Friday, quoting the prime minister’s interview with former Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schussel in Budapest. There is no remaining “reasonable dispute between Russia and the West,” Orban added. “People in Europe are not happy that their governments want to provide more financial assistance to Ukraine,” he said, explaining that Europe cannot provide the kind of support that would result in a military victory for Ukraine. EU states have allocated €77 billion ($83 billion) in aid to Kiev, while pledging €144 billion since the beginning of the conflict in February 2022, according to Germany’s Kiel Institute.

Ukraine has lost several strategically important cities in Donbass in the last month. Officials in Kiev have repeatedly cited the lack of Western-supplied munitions as the reason for their battlefield setbacks. Orban doubled down on his idea of a buffer zone next to the Russian border as Ukraine’s ideal peace solution, provided there are “additional security guarantees.” Without this, he said, “they could lose their country.” He stressed that Russia will never accept Ukraine joining NATO. Moscow has stated that one of the main causes of the conflict was the expansion of the US-led military bloc towards Russia’s borders. President Vladimir Putin has said one of the key goals of the Russian military operation is to force Kiev away from its goal of joining NATO – an ambition enshrined in the country’s constitution in 2019. While the Hungarian prime minister condemned the Russian military operation, he has repeatedly spoken out against the EU’s handling of it. Unlike the other EU states, Hungary has not sent any armaments to Kiev, limiting their contributions to humanitarian aid.

Mearsheimer

Professor John Mearshiemer, who has consistently and fearlessly predicted the disastrous outcome of US Foriegn Policy in Ukraine, has been right all along.

And he's right now.

If only the Think Tank fantasists in Washington and London had listened pic.twitter.com/G3KTAdIicP

— Chay Bowes (@BowesChay) March 30, 2024

“Whether Ukraine loses all access to the Black Sea or not is, in my view, the real remaining question..”

• ‘Odessa Will Fall’, Musk Warns Ukraine (RT)

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has reiterated his belief that Ukraine’s position is weakening with each passing day of the hostilities, warning that the “real question” is how much territory Kiev will lose and how many lives it will waste before sitting for talks with Moscow. The entrepreneur claimed in a post on his X platform on Saturday that “any fool could have predicted” that Kiev’s much-touted counteroffensive last year would fail, adding that even if Kiev had followed his recommendation to “entrench and apply all resources to defense,” it would be “tough to hold land that doesn’t have strong natural barriers.” “It was a tragic waste of life for Ukraine to attack a larger army that had defense in depth, minefields and stronger artillery when Ukraine lacked armor or air superiority!,” Musk wrote. Kiev has lost over 444,000 troops killed and wounded in two years of hostilities against Moscow, including more than 166,000 during last year’s counteroffensive, according to last month’s estimates from the Russian Defense Ministry.

However, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky claimed in February that Kiev’s forces lost only 31,000 soldiers killed since the start of the conflict. The billionaire went on to argue that “the longer the war goes on, the more territory Russia will gain until they hit the Dnepr, which is tough to overcome.” However, if the war lasts long enough, Odessa will fall too… Whether Ukraine loses all access to the Black Sea or not is, in my view, the real remaining question. I recommend a negotiated settlement before that happens. Elon Musk has shifted his position on Ukraine several times since the conflict began in early 2022. He initially supplied Kiev with free Starlink internet terminals and access to the satellite-based network, but declined to activate the service near Crimea for fear that Ukraine would use it to guide drone attacks on Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. If this had happened, he explained last year, SpaceX would have been “complicit in a major act of war and conflict escalation.”

Musk has also used his X account to speak extensively about the trajectory of the conflict. More than a year ago, he proposed that Kiev abandon its claim to Crimea, declare neutrality, and allow the four new Russian regions – Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson, and Zaporozhye – to hold fresh referendums on joining the Russian Federation. This proposal is similar to the terms offered by Russia to Kiev and the Western powers before the conflict began, except Moscow initially called only for autonomy in Donetsk and Lugansk. Moscow has stressed that it remains open to meaningful talks with Kiev and has blamed the lack of a diplomatic breakthrough on the Ukrainian authorities, who refuse to accept the “reality on the ground.” Ukraine must take into account the fact that its borders have changed drastically since 2022, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Saturday, commenting on Zelensky’s suggestion that a return to 1991 borders was no longer a precondition for negotiations.

Biolabs.

• Ukraine Was Testing Ground for Western Big Pharma (Sp.)

Ukraine was one of the main testing grounds for trials of a drug that could potentially cause various forms of cancer and that was used on patients in the psychiatric ward of Mariupol Hospital No. 7 with the support of local officials in the interests of Western pharmaceutical companies, according to documents seen by Sputnik. In particular, the trial involved the experimental drug SB4 for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis. The drug inhibits the action of molecules of the so-called tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF), which plays an important role in the immune system, and its use creates the possibility of developing various forms of cancer, including in the lymphatic and hematopoietic systems, as well as skin. The manufacturers of SB4 were Biogen Idec Denmark Manufacturing ApS (Denmark), Catalent Pharma Solutions (Belgium), and Fisher Clinical Services UK Limited (UK). The study was sponsored by South Korea’s Samsung Bioepis, the documents read.

An application from Quintiles Ukraine for approval by the state expert center of the Ukrainian Ministry of Health and the Ethics Commission at the medical and preventive institution for conducting clinical trials of SB4 was found among the documents. Quintiles Ukraine was established as a division of the US outsourcing pharmaceutical company Quintiles Transnational. According to the application, signed in February 2013, at that time it was planned to test the drug in Ukraine on 152 patients (later this number increased to 180), and in total on almost 500 patients around the world. According to the periodic report of the SB4-G31-RA project on SB4 trials, by November 2013, 777 patients had been selected for testing, including 285 in Poland, 143 in Ukraine, 108 in the Czech Republic, 77 in Bulgaria, 60 in Lithuania, 37 in the Republic of Korea, 34 in Mexico, 17 in Hungary, 14 in Colombia, and two in the United Kingdom.

The documents found in Mariupol Hospital No. 7 were collected between 2008 and 2016. The results of the initial inspection show that drugs with numbers and without names were tested on people, with the tests also conducted on toddlers. Companies such as Pfizer (US), AstraZeneca (UK, Sweden), Celltrion (South Korea), Novatris International AG (Switzerland, US), IQVIA (formerly Quintiles and IMS Health Inc., US, UK), Sanofi (France), Galapagos NV (Belgium), Janssen Pharmaceuticals (now Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine, Belgium), Abbott Laboratories (US), Covance (now Labcorp Drug Development, US), and Merck KGaA (Germany) are mentioned in the documents.

“..In order to save face, and to hide the fact that Ukraine itself is a huge terrorist organization..”

• Money Transfers Proof That Crocus Terrorists Followed Orders From Ukraine (Sp.)

It is of paramount importance that data in the technical devices seized from the suspects in the Crocus City Hall terrorist attack has confirmed their connection with the Ukrainian side, Kirill Kabanov, chairman of the National Anti-Corruption Committee, told Sputnik. Initial data received from those detained in the case related to the terrorist attack indicated Ukraine pulled the strings. However, the fresh report by the Russian Investigative Committee points to the Ukrainian special services, and “we must understand that they are directly connected with the CIA and MI6 and MI5,” Kabanov said. “That is why the West is trying to cover this up, blaming an outlawed international terrorist organization for everything. In order to save face, and to hide the fact that Ukraine itself is a huge terrorist organization,” Kabanov, who is also a member of the Human Rights Council, said.

The ongoing investigation into the attack at Crocus City Hall has discovered proof of the connection of the terrorists who carried out the heinous crime with Ukrainian nationalists, the Russian Investigative Committee said on March 28.”The initial results of the investigation fully confirm the planned nature of the terrorists’ actions, careful preparation and financial support from the organizers of the crime. As a result of working with the detained terrorists, analyzing the technical devices seized from them, analyzing information about financial transactions, evidence of their connection with Ukrainian nationalists has been obtained,” the Russian Investigative Committee said on Telegram.

The terrorists received significant amounts of money and cryptocurrency from Ukraine, Russian investigators added. Russia’s special services have completed their task by uncovering this proof, yet they “refuse to hear us in the West, the world’s mechanisms don’t work,” said Kirill Kabanov. “The Americans can get away with brandishing an empty vial and using it as a pretext for starting a war and destroying an entire state, as was the case with Iraq. Unfortunately, I am not at all sure that our evidence of cryptocurrency transfers will be heard. Although for citizens of many countries this might add to their perception of reality,” the expert noted. For people in Western countries whose leaders remain committed to supporting the regime holed up in Kiev, a reality check as to what is really happening in Ukraine is long overdue, the analyst believes.

“..the United States has deployed its military forces almost 400 times during its short history..”

• US Marines Struggle to Adapt to Fighting Adversary That Can Fight Back (Miles)

After killing at least 3.6 million people in its so-called “War on Terror,” US armed forces are regrouping to combat adversaries capable of mounting a resistance. In a hagiographic article entitled “Preparing for a China war, the Marines are retooling how they’ll fight,” ruling class stenographer Ellen Nakashima blithely considers the prospect of fighting a war against a nuclear-armed country of 1.4 billion people. The piece, appearing in The Washington Post, details the US Marine Corps’ efforts to adapt to what she appears to believe is an inevitable, and desirable, conflict with China. “The Marines are striving to adapt to a maritime fight that could play out across thousands of miles of islands and coastline in Asia,” writes Nakashima, admitting the armed service has devoted the last 20 years to fighting less capable forces in the Middle East. “Instead of launching traditional amphibious assaults… nimbler groups are intended as an enabler for a larger joint force.”

“Their role is to gather intelligence and target data and share it quickly — as well as occasionally sink ships with medium-range missiles,” it is explained, “to help the Pacific Fleet and Air Force repel aggression against the United States and allies and partners like Taiwan, Japan and the Philippines.” The country she imagines launching this aggression has not been at war since 1979, while the United States has deployed its military forces almost 400 times during its short history. “New regiments are envisioned as one piece of a broader strategy to synchronize the operations of US soldiers, sailors, Marines and airmen, and in turn with the militaries of allies and partners in the Pacific,” the piece continues. “Their focus is a crucial stretch of territory sweeping from Japan to Indonesia and known as the First Island Chain. China sees this region, which encompasses an area about half the size of the contiguous United States, as within its sphere of influence.” Naturally, China needs to understand its coastal waters are not its own concern, but the United States’, Nakashima’s logic suggests.

“China not only has the region’s largest army, navy and air force, but also home-field advantage,” Nakashima writes, apparently under the impression the United States will be allowed to attack China without suffering retribution on its own shores. “Taiwan, a close US partner, is most directly in the crosshairs.” China’s links with Taiwan go back hundreds of years. In the 1950s the United States attempted to cleave the island off from the country after the Chinese Civil War. As the defeated Kuomintang retreated to Taiwan the US threatened to use nuclear bombs if leader Mao Zedong crossed the Taiwan Strait, seeking to balkanize China as the US did in Korea and attempted to do in Vietnam. Nakashima writes of the disastrous consequences for shareholder profits of a war over Taiwan: “A successful invasion would… have catastrophic economic consequences due to disruption of the world’s most advanced semiconductor industry and of maritime traffic in some of the world’s busiest sea lanes — the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea.”

“..either a “multinational force” or a “Palestinian peacekeeping team” to oversee the affairs of a post-war Gaza..”

No use without involving Russia and China.

• Biden Claims Saudi Arabia, Qatar ‘Ready To Normalize’ With Israel (Cradle)

US President Joe Biden said at a campaign event on 28 March that Arab states, including Saudi Arabia and Qatar, are ready for a full normalization of ties with Israel. During the event – which was meant to show unity in the Democratic Party ahead of US elections in November this year – Biden was joined on stage by former presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton. “I’ve been working with the Saudis and with all the other Arab countries, including Egypt and Jordan and Qatar. They’re prepared to fully recognize Israel. There has to be a post-Gaza plan, and there has to be a trade to a two-state solution. It doesn’t have to occur today. It has to be a progression and I think we can do that,” Biden said. Since the outbreak of the war in Gaza, which has seen Israel kill over 32,000 civilians, Saudi Arabia has repeatedly stated that normalization with Tel Aviv is still on the table.

However, Riyadh has doubled down on its demands for concessions to the Palestinians, including, most prominently, the demand for the eventual realization of statehood. Washington has been devising a plan for post-war Gaza, which includes the idea of a “reformed” Palestinian Authority (PA) assuming control over administration in the strip. In late February, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unveiled a similar plan, which included demilitarizing Gaza, forming a local governing authority, and a broader normalization pact with Arab states, including the Saudis. Politico reported on the same day as Biden’s campaign event that the White House, State Department, and Pentagon are discussing the potential establishment of either a “multinational force” or a “Palestinian peacekeeping team” to oversee the affairs of a post-war Gaza.

Yet Israel has yet to achieve its goal of dismantling the Palestinian resistance and is continuing brutal and incessant airstrikes daily. “There are too many innocent victims, Israelis and Palestinians,” Biden added at the event. “We’re in a position where Israel’s very existence is at stake. You had all those people massacred,” the president said about 7 October, adding: “It’s understandable Israel has such a profound anger and Hamas is still there, but we must in-act, stop the effort that is resulting in significant deaths of innocent civilians and particularly children.” Several pro-Palestine activists erupted in chants throughout the campaign event, accusing Biden of complicity in the genocide being carried out against the Palestinian people in Gaza.

How many Palestinian hostages?

• Israel Believes Only 60-70 Out Of 134 Hostages Are Still Alive (ZH)

Israel’s official count for the number of people still being held hostage in the Gaza Strip remains at 134 mostly Israeli citizens as well as some foreigners, which includes possibly deceased victims. Amid stalled truce negotiations in Qatar, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz has revealed that Israeli officials believe only 60 to 70 Israeli hostages in Gaza are still alive. “According to the IDF, a total of 134 hostages and bodies are being held in Gaza,” Haaretz wrote Thursday. “Thirty-six of the people were confirmed by the army as killed – some on October 7, when their bodies were taken into the Strip. Of the 98 living hostages, 10 are foreigners (eight Thais, one Nepalese national, and one man with Mexican and French citizenship).” What’s more is that a month ago some of the families of the hostages were informed that 20 captives were in life-threatening condition.

An unnamed source close to the crisis told Haaretz, “I hope I’m mistaken, but the number may even be lower”—suggesting there may be even fewer that are alive. Given the intense battles unfolding across most of the Gaza Strip, it is widely speculated that the hostages are being held somewhere within the miles of underground tunnels below, where Hamas also has command and control centers. There’s a possibility that some of the hostages could have been killed by Israeli’s relentless bombing campaign which has decimated entire neighborhoods. A horrifically tragic incident last December saw three Israeli hostages shot dead by Israeli forces who mistook them for Palestinian militants. Israeli leadership under Netanyahu has been accused by the hostages’ families of prioritizing the military operation to defeat Hamas far and above hostage recovery.

Some recent testimony of hostages freed in last year’s truce and exchange with Hamas said the following: Echoing this sense of an indiscriminate and haphazard policy, testimonies from newly freed Israeli hostages, who were released as part of exchange deals for Palestinian prisoners during a temporary ceasefire in late November, as well as from some of the hostages’ families, indicate that one of the main fears of those held captive in Gaza was the threat of being hit by Israeli airstrikes and shelling. Many of the hostages, according to these testimonies, were held above ground rather than in tunnels, and were therefore particularly vulnerable to such attacks. Large-scale anti-Netanyahu protests led by victims’ families have persisted in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Pressure has also mounted on Washington to strike a ceasefire. Prime Minister Netanyahu is currently facing accusations from within his own government of ‘sabotaging’ the truce process with an aim to prolong the war, and also thus his political future in the top office.

“..a much more lenient standard for wiretaps than the Constitution permitted for American citizens..”

• The Never-Ending Federal Surveillance Crime Spree (Bovard)

Last December, one of the most intrusive provisions in the federal statute book was set to expire. Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) authorizes the National Security Agency to vacuum up trillions of emails and other data. A bevy of bipartisan members of Congress called for radically curtailing those nullifications of Americans’ privacy. But the effort to put a leash on the federal surveillance failed dismally. Congress voted for a four-month extension of FISA, which will likely be followed in April by a much longer extension. There was a bipartisan congressional conspiracy to entitle the Deep State to continue trampling the Constitution. In 1978, Congress passed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to outlaw political spying (such as the FBI had committed) on American citizens. FISA created a secret court to oversee federal surveillance of suspected foreign agents within the United States, permitting a much more lenient standard for wiretaps than the Constitution permitted for American citizens.

The FISA court “created a secret body of law giving the National Security Agency the power to amass vast collections of data on Americans,” the New York Times reported in 2013 after Edward Snowden leaked court decisions. The court rubber-stamped FBI requests that bizarrely claimed that the telephone records of all Americans were “relevant” to a terrorism investigation under the Patriot Act, thereby enabling National Security Administration (NSA) data seizures later denounced by a federal judge as “almost Orwellian.” In 2017, a FISA court decision included a 10-page litany of FBI violations, which “ranged from illegally sharing raw intelligence with unauthorized third parties to accessing intercepted attorney-client privileged communications without proper oversight.” The latest controversy involved FISA Section 702, first enacted by Congress in 2008.

That section authorizes the National Security Agency to surveil targets in foreign nations regardless of how many Americans’ privacy is “incidentally” destroyed. The NSA collects vast amounts of information as part of that surveillance and then permits the FBI to sift through its troves. The Electronic Frontier Foundation warned more than a decade ago that Section 702 “created a broad national-security exception to the Constitution that allows all Americans to be spied upon by their government while denying them any viable means of challenging that spying.” Professor David Rothkopf explained in 2013 how Section 702 worked: “What if government officials came to your home and said that they would collect all of your papers and hold onto them for safe-keeping, just in case they needed them in the future. But don’t worry … they wouldn’t open the boxes until they had a secret government court order … sometime, unbeknownst to you.” Actually, the law in practice is much worse.

From the beginning, federal agencies brazenly lied about the number of Americans whose privacy was ravaged. In 2014, former NSA employee Edward Snowden provided the Washington Post with a cache of 160,000 secret email threads that the NSA had intercepted. The Post found that nine out of ten account holders were not the “intended surveillance targets but were caught in a net the agency had cast for somebody else.” Almost half of the individuals whose personal data was inadvertently commandeered were American citizens. The files “tell stories of love and heartbreak, illicit sexual liaisons, mental-health crises, political and religious conversions, financial anxieties and disappointed hopes,” the Post noted. If an American citizen wrote an email in a foreign language, NSA analysts assumed they were foreigners who could be surveilled without a warrant.

“..this 3rd Circuit ruling roundly rejects unlawful left-wing attempts to count undated or incorrectly dated mail ballot..”

• Republicans Score Win In Court Battle Over Pennsylvania Mail-In Ballots (ET)

Pennsylvania rules that require mail-in ballots to be dated are legal, a federal appeals court has ruled. A state law that says voters must fill out, date, and sign envelopes containing the ballots is not prevented by the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a majority said in the March 27 ruling. The act bans denying “the right of any individual to vote in any election because of an error or omission on any record or paper relating to any application, registration or other act requisite to voting.” But that provision “only applies when the state is determining who may vote,” U.S. Circuit Court Judge Thomas Ambro, appointed by former President Bill Clinton, wrote for the majority of a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit panel. “In other words, its role stops at the door of the voting place. The provision does not apply to rules, like the date requirement, that govern how a qualified voter must cast his ballot for it to be counted.”

The same court ahead of the 2022 election ruled that state officials must count undated ballots but the U.S. Supreme Court vacated that order. After the state’s acting secretary of state said counties should still count undated ballots, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that counties could not count mail-in ballots with missing or incorrect dates. About 7,900 ballots were not counted in the 2020 election because they were missing a signature or date, or had an inaccurate date, according to state officials. U.S. District Judge Susan Paradise Baxter later ruled that the Pennsylvania law violated the Civil Rights Act provision, meaning Pennsylvania officials had to count mail-in ballots even if they lacked dates, or contained inaccurate dates. “Federal law prohibits a state from erecting immaterial roadblocks, such as this, to voting,” Judge Baxter, appointed by former President Donald Trump, wrote at the time, referring to the Pennsylvania law.

According to the law, a voter casting a ballot by mail must mark the ballot, then place it inside a provided envelope. That envelope must then be placed into a second envelope, which contains the areas for the date and signature. “The elector shall then fill out, date and sign the declaration printed on such envelope,” the law states. The Republican National Committee (RNC) and other groups appealed Judge Baxter’s ruling, arguing that her conclusion was wrong. “This is a crucial victory for election integrity and voter confidence in the Keystone State and nationwide. Pennsylvanians deserve to feel confident in the security of their mail ballots, and this 3rd Circuit ruling roundly rejects unlawful left-wing attempts to count undated or incorrectly dated mail ballot,” Michael Whatley, the RNC’s chairman, said in a statement after the new ruling was handed down.

“This is Zuckerbucks on steroids because instead of $400 million, it’s unlimited funding and resources and the reach of the federal government and all its offices located across the country..”

“..the president’s unprecedented effort to deploy federal agencies in support of partisan voting operations and fortify politically aligned private organizations working to circumvent state election integrity laws.”

• Behind Massive Mail-in Ballot Push Is a Little-Noticed Executive Order (ET)

A federal effort to register voters using the government’s vast reach, including throughout the U.S. prison system, is raising concerns from critics who have said it won’t benefit Democrats and Republicans equally. Mississippi Secretary of State Michael Watson wrote to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland on March 6 alleging that agencies under the attorney general’s charge are “attempting to register people to vote, including potentially ineligible felons, and to co-opt state and local officials into accomplishing this goal.” The allegation relates to President Joe Biden’s Executive Order 14019, which states, “The head of each agency shall evaluate ways in which the agency can, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law, promote voter registration and voter participation.”

Among other things, this order has forced U.S. Marshals to modify more than 900 contracts with prisons and jails to provide voter registration documents and facilitate mail-in voting for inmates, Mr. Watson wrote. “We have worked extremely hard to restore the confidence of Mississippi voters in our election process,” Mr. Watson told The Epoch Times. “To have the Biden administration and the DOJ purposefully undermine these efforts and jeopardize the integrity of Mississippi’s elections is unacceptable.” The secretary of state is the chief election officer in Mississippi. The work by the Department of Justice to register voters in prisons, critics say, is just the tip of the iceberg. Other agencies, including the Department of Education, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development, are also carrying out campaigns to sign up new voters.

On Feb. 26, Vice President Kamala Harris lauded a federal plan to use work-study grants to pay students to register voters. In addition, President Biden’s executive order directed federal agencies to select “approved, nonpartisan third-party organizations and state officials to provide voter registration services on agency premises.” President Biden’s executive order was called “visionary“ by Ceridwen Cherry, a former staff attorney on the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Voting Rights Project, who said, ”In a democracy, governments at all levels should be doing everything they can to help eligible people register to vote.” However, critics say elections are under the purview of states, not the federal government.

“The reason it’s such a big problem is that, with the president, it’s only one political party that’s in power,” Stewart Whitson, legal director of the Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA), a conservative think-tank, told The Epoch Times. “If you allow the president to be the one to decide where all these massive resources are channeled, that’s problematic,” he said, adding that this is why the Founders gave election authority to states and not to the federal executive. The plan has been called “Bidenbucks” by some of its detractors, referencing the injection into state election programs of $400 million in 2020 from Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg, dubbed “Zuckerbucks.” “This is Zuckerbucks on steroids because instead of $400 million, it’s unlimited funding and resources and the reach of the federal government and all its offices located across the country,” Mr. Whitson said.

[..] In July 2021, the FGA filed a FOIA request regarding President Biden’s Voting Access plan. The group sought information about what federal agencies were doing to implement the plan, as well as records from planning and strategy meetings among President Biden’s staff, federal agencies, and the architects of EO 14019. “These documents, in any other context, would be handed over much more quickly,” Mr. Whitson said. “So this indicates to us that there’s something there the Biden administration really does not care to share, because they’ve withheld it for nearly three years now.” The America First Legal foundation, another plaintiff in a FOIA suit, characterized EO 14019 as “the president’s unprecedented effort to deploy federal agencies in support of partisan voting operations and fortify politically aligned private organizations working to circumvent state election integrity laws.” More than two years later, court battles over the information requests are ongoing. The administration has brought in White House counsel and the Department of Justice to fight the requests.

Can’t find anywhere what he’s supposed to have done, other than: “obstructing an official proceeding among other charges..”

“..the appeal raises a substantial question likely to result in a significantly lesser sentence or reversal..”

That will be true for most. But then they will have been locked up for years.

• Judge Rebukes DOJ Arguments Against Release Of Jan. 6 Defendant (ZH)

A Jan. 6 defendant seeking to be released from prison was granted in part by the United States District Court for the District of Columbia this week. The order, signed by U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden on March 26, will grant the release of Kevin Seefried, a defendant convicted for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol breach, pending the appeal of his conviction. This decision comes despite stark warnings from the Justice Department regarding the implications of such a move. Mr. Seefried received a three-year prison sentence for obstructing an official proceeding among other charges, facing a potential maximum sentence of 23 years. After his conviction, he appealed and requested release pending appeal, a request that gained new relevance when the Supreme Court decided to review a related case, Fischer v. United States, which could impact many Jan. 6 defendants.

The high Court’s decision on this case may influence the outcome of Mr. Seefried’s conviction, suggesting it could be vacated depending on the justices’ ruling. The decision to release Mr. Seefried is grounded in the ongoing legal debate over the application of 18 U.S.C. § 1512(c), the obstruction of an official proceeding statute, beyond the context of “evidence impairment.” “Seefried’s current motion is déjà vu all over again,” Judge McFadden wrote. This legal question is currently under review by the Supreme Court in a related case, Fischer v. United States, which directly challenges the scope of § 1512(c) and its application to the Jan. 6 defendants. Judge McFadden, in his memorandum order, outlined that the release is premised on two conditions mandated by 18 U.S.C. § 3143(b): a defendant is not likely to flee or pose a danger to the community if released, and that the appeal raises a substantial question likely to result in a significantly lesser sentence or reversal.

Judge McFadden found that Mr. Seefried met both conditions, noting a lack of evidence to suggest Mr. Seefried would flee or pose a danger, and that the Supreme Court’s review of Fischer represents a substantial question of law that could materially affect Mr. Seefried’s conviction. Judge McFadden noted the argument of the Justice Department that, in their belief, he now knew the “day-to-day reality of confinement in prison” and was therefore “more likely” to flee than return to prison. Judge McFadden also noted U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves’s argument of 2024 being an election year involving “what will likely be another fiercely contested presidential election” and if released, the Court “would be releasing defendant into the same political maelstrom that led him to commit his crimes in the first place.”

Why not focus on preventing diabetes? Easier, healthier and cheaper.

• $935 Diabetes Jab Ozempic Costs Less Than $5 To Make (ET)

It costs Novo Nordisk less than $5 per month to produce its top-selling diabetes injection, Ozempic, even as it charges nearly $1,000 for a month’s supply before insurance, according to a new study. The study, published Wednesday in the journal JAMA Network Open, raises questions about the prohibitive cost of the popular diabetes treatment and other weight loss drugs that belong to a pricy class of medications based on GLP-1 technology. Those medicines work by mimicking a hormone called glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1), which stimulates the pancreas to release insulin when blood sugar rises too high, slows down the emptying of the stomach, and targets brain receptors involved in reducing appetite. Over the past year, demand for GLP-1 agonists has exploded despite soaring costs and limited insurance coverage.

For their study, researchers at Yale University, King’s College Hospital in London, and the nonprofit Doctors Without Borders looked at the cost of manufacturing insulin and compared it with that of GLP-1 agonists. They estimated those prices by combining manufacturing costs for the weekly injection with costs of formulation and other operating expenses, plus a profit margin with an allowance for tax. The foundational price for a weekly dose of injectable semaglutide—the generic name for Ozempic—ranges from $0.89 to $4.73 per month, the study found. By contrast, a vial of human insulin can be manufactured at a cost between $2.37 and $5.94 per month. A month’s supply of Ozempic is $935.77 for those in the United States without health insurance, according to Novo’s website.

The Danish company’s GLP-1 weight loss drug, Wegovy, is listed as $1,349 per month. Wednesday’s study concluded that GLP-1s “can likely be manufactured for prices far below current prices, enabling wider access.” “High prices limit access to newer diabetes medicines in many countries,” the researchers wrote. “The findings of this study suggest that robust generic and bio-similar competition could reduce prices to more affordable levels and enable expansion of diabetes treatment globally.” Citing the findings, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) called on Novo to slash prices for both Ozempic and Wegovy, highlighting the price gap for the identical drugs sold in America and other developed countries.

“A new Yale study found that Ozempic costs less than $5 a month to manufacture. And yet, Novo Nordisk charges Americans nearly $1,000 a month for this drug, while the same exact product can be purchased for just $155 a month in Canada and just $59 in Germany,” the senator said in a statement. “As Chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, I am calling on Novo Nordisk to lower the list price of Ozempic—and the related drug Wegovy—in America to no more than what they charge for this drug in Canada,” he continued. “The American people are sick and tired of paying, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs while the pharmaceutical industry enjoys huge profits.”

Kim has promoted Bitcoin Cash for a while now.

• Why is $BCH So Hot Right Now? (Kim Dotcom)

Bitcoin Cash is launching a new innovation on May 15th. The adaptive blocksize limit algorithm. This is an important step for BCH in preparation for substantial growth and one of the reasons why BCH is gaining popularity with Miners and Investors. The algorithm automatically adjusts Bitcoin Cash’s block size limit to reduce infrastructure costs during periods of lower usage while enabling up to a doubling of the maximum block size per year at peak growth. The block size limit caps the technical requirements of network infrastructure, enables reliable infrastructure cost projection, and prevents attacks that increase the cost of participating in the network. Excessively large blocks could require users and businesses to waste resources on unnecessary infrastructure, switch to cheaper and less secure validation strategies, or even to abandon running their own infrastructure and instead rely on third-party service providers – reducing the overall privacy, independence, and financial freedom of all users.

To limit block size, most bitcoin-like networks employ a static block size limit. For Bitcoin Cash this limit is currently 32MB. If a payment network is growing, usage will eventually approach any previously established static limit. If this limit is reached before a successfully coordinated upgrade, network service degrades, transaction fees and confirmation times become less predictable as size-limited blocks become more common. Uncorrected, market actors begin to adapt to this artificial scarcity by using alternatives to on-chain transactions, custodians, intermediaries, and competing networks. This in turn compromises the long-term economics of mining, cumulative transaction fee revenue is suppressed, and long-term network security grows to rely on continuous inflation via block subsidies.

Because static block size limits can only be changed as part of a widely coordinated network upgrade, they present a focal point for network interruption or capture by motivated attackers, rent seeking institutions, competing networks, opponents of peer-to-peer cash, etc. To make matters worse, the attackers have a significant coordination advantage – while honest network participants must achieve near-unanimous consensus to activate an upgrade, attackers must only create sufficient uncertainty among the honest participants to delay limit increases, as inaction results in degradation of the network’s functionality and long-term security.

Adaptive block size limits resolve the economic vulnerability of static limits by automatically adjusting the maximum block size over time. While an adaptive block size limit could still diverge from a hypothetical “ideal” size due to significant changes in the rate of technological advancement or the availability of capital, such divergences would likely remain much smaller than with static limits, and attackers are no longer afforded an advantage. Bitcoin Cash’s Adaptive Algorithm is conservative and based on observed usage. In cooling-off periods of falling network usage, the limit slowly decreases to preserve the resources of infrastructure operators. On the other hand, during periods of rapid growth, the limit can increase at a rate of up to 2x per year.

Exciting times for Bitcoin Cash.

Kory

Dr. Pierre Kory advice to people who got a Covid-19 vaccine: "Do not get vaccinated ever again with an mRNA vaccine. Do not let family members get vaccinated…From epidemiologic data it's my sense that the farther you are out from your last vaccine, the more likely you're gonna… pic.twitter.com/FQ0l5YVxZ0

— Camus (@newstart_2024) March 30, 2024

Denier
https://twitter.com/i/status/1774045305509446045

Coyote