Conservative. Idaho. Software engineer. Historian. Trying to prevent Idiocracy from becoming a documentary.
Email complaints/requests about copyright infringement to clayton @ claytoncramer.com. Reminder: the last copyright troll that bothered me went bankrupt.
"And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose." -- Rom. 8:28
"Elon Musk has criticised a Jaguar advert that featured catwalk models in bizarre clothes but no cars.
"The British carmaker on Tuesday debuted a new advert featuring several models with asymmetrical haircuts and brightly coloured, haute couture clothing walking around a Mars-like landscape bathed in bright pink.
"Messages such as “create exuberant”, “live vivid”, “delete ordinary”, “break moulds” and “copy nothing” flash on the sccreen but no actual cars or references to Jaguar as a carmaker are featured."
Tragically, Jaguar seems to have abandoned what they are good at: sports sedans. This is why I have given up on replacing my 2014 XF with anything Jaguar. Jaguar even managed to fix the longstanding problem of unreliability. This and the 2005 X-type have been the two most trouble-free cars that I have ever owned.
Bev Turner, a British television host on the conservative-leaning GB News channel, said the ad looked like Jaguar asked artificial intelligence to create the “wokest, most pretentious, gender-ambiguous piece of self-satisfied A-level art.”
One of the deadly serious films that came out of the Cold War. Looking over the cast is somewhat astonishing: Larry Hagman, Walter Matthau, my distant cousin Henry Fonda, and introducing Fritz Weaver. Oh yes, the big surprise: Dom Deluise. For you younguns', he was a comic actor long ago.
Larry Hagman plays Buck, the Russian translator for the President. My, he was young.
I had forgotten how powerful the last few minutes are.
December America's First Freedom has an article by me: "Now They Want to Use Toy Gun Control as an Excuse for Actual Gun Bans." I am rather proud of it.
Two undersea fibre-optic communications cables in the Baltic Sea, including one linking Finland and Germany, have been severed, raising suspicions of sabotage by bad actors.
The episode on Monday recalled other incidents in the same waterway that authorities have probed as potentially malicious, including damage to a gas pipeline and undersea cables last year and the 2022 explosions of the Nord Sea gas pipelines.
The 1,200km (745-mile) cable connecting Helsinki to the German port of Rostock stopped working at about 0200 GMT on Monday, Finnish state-controlled cybersecurity and telecoms company Cinia said.
A 218km (135-mile) internet link between Lithuania and Sweden’s Gotland island went out of service at about 0800 GMT on Sunday, according to Lithuania’s Telia Lietuva, part of Sweden’s Telia Company group.
Finland and Germany said in a joint statement that they were “deeply concerned about the severed undersea cable” and were investigating “an incident (that) immediately raises suspicions of intentional damage”.
Sweden and Finland have updated guidance to their citizens on how to survive war, as NATO allies bolster defense measures against the backdrop of the Ukraine conflict.
Both nations joined the transatlantic alliance in the past two years, after Russia invaded its neighbor. Many European countries have since ramped up military spending to bolster long-term security in the region.
Booklets distributed to millions of households in the Nordic nations include instructions on how to prepare for the effects of military conflicts, communications outages and power cuts, as well as extreme weather events.
From stockpiling bottled water and sanitary products, to growing edible foodstuffs at home, government authorities offered tips on how residents could sustain themselves in the event of war. The brochures also include advice for parents and caregivers, instructing people to preserve diapers, medication and baby food.
The Swedish government will distribute “Om krisen eller kriget kommer (If crisis or war comes),” to all five million households over a two-week period from November 18, according to the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency (MSB), a governmental agency that compiled the pamphlet.
The fifth version of the Swedish brochure, which was first published in World War II, will place “greater emphasis on preparing for war,” a statement from the MSB said on Monday. The digital version of brochure, released in October, has been downloaded about 55,000 times, the agency added.
The Kremlin announced that Putin had approved an updated nuclear doctrine — a document that governs how Russia uses its nuclear arsenal — including the declaration that Moscow could unleash a nuclear strike if subject to an attack by a nonnuclear country that has the support of a nuclear state.
The Russian Defense Ministry claimed later Tuesday that Ukraine had carried out its first strike on Russian territory using U.S.-supplied long-range weapons, hitting a military facility in the Bryansk region with an ATACMS missile.
I suspect Russian ICBMs and SLBMs may well turn out to be in the functional state as their conventuional forces turned out to be. Viktor Beleno's MiG Pilot recounts how ground crews used the MiG-25's ethanol coolant for drinking. I doubt any part ofb an ICBM is drinkable or smokable (yes, I am imagining an ICBM transformed into a really, reaaly big blunt) but still....
I just found several thousand dollars belonging to my late father-in-law on California's website: stock brokerage accounts he failed to close when he left California, what seems to be funds left over from sales of houses in Orange County and even his Reseda house in the 1960s.
UPDATE: Further examination shows that some of these were another Richard Thorne. The amount likely his is only a few hundred dollars, not worth the effort.
Attempting to get shots on a target at 25 yards with my M1A was not successful. The new scope (okay several years new; it has been a busy couple of years) is clearly far from zeroed. I took off the scope and my son had no problem hitting the 200 yard plate with iron sights. I was pleased to see that the gun safety I taught him elementary school stuck. Admittedly, most is obvious to any intelligent person
After cleaning the rifle, which makes me appreciate the brilliance of the AR-15, I put it back in the safe and found the laser bore sighter. This will be next task this week, to get close enough to reliably get holes in the 25 yard target.
UPDATE: The bore sighter is not long enough to go into the muzzle because of the M1A's flash hider. I might machine a piece of acetal .30" diameter with one end large enough to accept the .30" end of the bore sighter.
UPDATE 2: I ordered a bore sighter that goes in the chamber so flash hider length should not be a problem.
I found this amazing explanation at 6/24/11 NPR. When inflation started to drive ip prices in the 1960s, President Johnson responded to each increase in commodity price with a slightly different solution instead of asking the obvious question:
"When egg prices rose in the spring of 1966 and Agriculture Secretary Orville Freeman told him that not much could be done, Johnson had the Surgeon General issue alerts as to the hazards of cholesterol in eggs."
Florida's do not. Edwin Bruce Cramer was born February 10, 1949. Searching newspapers.com, Chronicling America, and ancestry.com has found no matches. There are 3244 counties in the U.S.; sending a rquest for birth certificates to all of them would be prohibitive. ChatGPT has not been helpful. Suggestions?
He was a teacher (surprise, surprise). Maybe I can pry this out of the state board of education.
"ZHUHAI, China (AP) — A man who authorities said was upset over his divorce settlement rammed his car into a crowd of people exercising at a sports complex in southern China, killing 35 and severely injuring dozens of others, police said Tuesday."
Not even a record motor vehicle mass murder. The 2016 Marseilles truck terrorist attack killed 86.
"Mark Zuckerberg, an avid surfer, sent his $300 million superyacht on a 4,800-mile journey from San Francisco to Tahiti. After spending 12 days on the high seas and burning 400,000 liters of diesel, it now awaits the Meta CEO to embark on his sun-soaked surfing adventure...
"It’s clear that the world’s third-richest man, worth $202 billion, would not have 12 days to spare from his busy schedule to indulge in surfing. Instead, he’d zip in James Bond-style on his $71 million Gulfstream G650ER private jet. At the same time, his shadow vessel, Wingman, worth $30 million, follows suit to the pristine destination."
A CIA official has been charged with leaking highly classified US documents about Israel’s potential plan to strike back against Iran over a missile attack.
Asif W. Rahman, who worked overseas for the agency and held a top secret security clearance, was arrested by the FBI in Cambodia on Tuesday over the leaks, the New York Times reported.
His arrest comes after the top secret materials started circulating online last month detailing Israel’s apparent intention to retaliate after Iran launched a barrage of missiles back on Oct. 1.
The files, which were prepared by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, in part detailed satellite imagery tied to the potential Israeli strike, as well as the various kinds of missiles on hand.
The top secret files were only meant to be seen by those with proper clearance in the US and the other members of the “Five Eyes” intelligence alliance — Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom.
On my webpage is a not very complete collection of early right to keep and bear arms decisions. These were links to PDFs from copies that I made at UC Hasting law school library in the 1980s and 1990s. They weresometimes poor photocopies of old books with tight bindings. I have gone through and changed most of them to links in books.google.com, which means cut and paste will be easier. If you have a few minutes, could you click those links and vberify that they work and point to books with those cases?
This 11/13/24 Jerusalem Post article discusses how an upcoming close approach to Earth by Asteroid Apophis will cause significant disruptions on it, including tidally-induced quakes that may resurface Apophis. This is no surprise. It will be approaching Roche's Limit which is 2.44 radii of a primary. Roche figured out that a body with no internal strength (a liquid) will be torn apart by tidal forces at Roche's Limit.
The Larry Niven story referenced above is an entertaining way to understand how tidal forces tear objects apart. Essentially, different parts of an object (in Niven's story two explorers) are forced into slightly different orbits around a neutron star with catastrophic effects.
"Boris Pistorius’s proposal to increase defense spending to 3 to 3.5 percent of the gross domestic product received the approval of 50 percent of those surveyed. Fifteen percent even consider this figure to be too low. At the same time, the majority of Germans (65 percent) oppose a military leadership role for Germany in Europe. In 2023, this figure was still at 71 percent. When it comes to greater involvement in international crises, Germans remain divided: 46 percent expressed support in September. This is the highest figure since the survey began in 2017. At the same time, 44 percent continue to oppose a stronger international engagement."
Liberals have tried to cast Trump's cajoling of NATO members to increase spending as threatening to abandon NATO but it appears that Trump was just ahead of the curve.
A while back, I presented some material about hatpin laws. Hatpins were popular defensive weapons for women at the close of the 19th and start of the 20th century.
Over dinner, my wife suggested that I might want to look at
fashion and concealed carry. This led to a discussion of hatpin
length limit laws. Published work suggests such laws were to
discourage women defending themselves from "mashers." I found
another explanation; long hatpins on public transit could lead to
accidental, and rarely lethal injuries. Streetwalkers
apparently used them against police as well.
They were also defended as self-defense weapons:
PLEA
FOR BIG HATPINS
Chicago
Woman Wants Them for Protection
on Streets at Night Chicago.
March 4. Alderman Herman
J. Bauier has introduced his widely
heralded 'hatpin" ordinance in the city
council and it was referred to the
judiciary committee, which will have
prepared, if it can be legally done,
an ordinance requiring hatpins of
a shorter length than those lnow commonly
worn by Chicago women.
A
letter protesting against the ordinance
was submitted, by May E. Davis,
No. 309 East Seventy seventh street.
It read: "In
behalf of myself and thousands of
other women in Chicago who are occasionally
on the streets after dark I
want to express an objection which might
not appeal to men against the ordinance
curtailing the use of hat- pins
winch comes before your honorable
body tonight.
"A
hatpin is woman's weapon of defense.
She is no more permitted to
carry a revolver or other weapon than
is a member of the sterner sex.
"I
always feel safe going home late at
night with a hatpin available for protection.
Before leaving a street car
I always carry a hatpin ready in my
hand until I am safe within the door
of my home. Many a time it has
proved its need. Thousands of other
women undoubtedly can speak from
their experience of how a stout hatpin
has been an effective defense in
time of danger. A hatpin is also useful
in repelling 'mashers.' " [The
Bennington evening banner. (Bennington,
Vt.), 04 March 1910, 3,
h]
I see leftists screeching on X that Republicans are going to repeal the 19th Amendment to take away the vote from women. I keep looking for GOP politicians pushing for this. This is especially silly because there are LOTS of conservative women. I am somehow having trouble imagining Gov. Noem, Sarah Palin, Rep. Elise Stefanik, Trump's UN Ambassador nominee going along with this.
Worse, these Chicken Littles do not realize thst even the 19th Amendment was repealed, the voting franchise question would go back to the states where Red States such as Wyoming, Utah, and Idaho led the way to women's suffrage.
Tragically, a lot of leftists imagine that every woman is a fierce pro-choice warrior. In my experience, the most fiercely pro-life people I know are women. Pro-life men are seldom as passionate as pro-life women.
Cecilia
Dhejne, Paul Lichtenstein, Marcus Boman, Anna L V Johansson, Niklas Långström,
Mikael Landén, “Long-Term Follow-Up of Transsexual Persons Undergoing Sex
Reassignment Surgery: Cohort Study in Sweden,” PLOS One, Feb. 22, 2011, doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0016885.
Context
The treatment for transsexualism is sex reassignment, including hormonal treatment and surgery aimed at making the person's body as congruent with the opposite sex as possible. There is a dearth of long term, follow-up studies after sex reassignment.
Objective
To estimate mortality, morbidity, and criminal rate after surgical sex reassignment of transsexual persons.
Design
A population-based matched cohort study.
Setting
Sweden, 1973-2003.
Participants
All 324 sex-reassigned persons (191 male-to-females, 133 female-to-males) in Sweden, 1973–2003. Random population controls (10∶1) were matched by birth year and birth sex or reassigned (final) sex, respectively.
Main Outcome Measures
Hazard ratios (HR) with 95% confidence intervals (CI) for mortality and psychiatric morbidity were obtained with Cox regression models, which were adjusted for immigrant status and psychiatric morbidity prior to sex reassignment (adjusted HR [aHR]).
Results
The overall mortality for sex-reassigned persons was higher during follow-up (aHR 2.8; 95% CI 1.8–4.3) than for controls of the same birth sex, particularly death from suicide (aHR 19.1; 95% CI 5.8–62.9). Sex-reassigned persons also had an increased risk for suicide attempts (aHR 4.9; 95% CI 2.9–8.5) and psychiatric inpatient care (aHR 2.8; 95% CI 2.0–3.9). Comparisons with controls matched on reassigned sex yielded similar results. Female-to-males, but not male-to-females, had a higher risk for criminal convictions than their respective birth sex controls.
The conclusion, of course, is that they need more psychiatric care after surgery. That te problem might be a need for it instead of surgery did not even occur to the authors.
This may seem like an odd request in a time when we are
already trying to reduce spending to solve our deficits, but I suspect this may
actually reduce net spending.At least
it deserves examination as a possible strategy for reducing both spending and
suffering.
In the last few years, scientists studying hearing loss have
found evidence that hearing loss causes dementia.[1]Medicare and Medicaid do not currently cover
hearing aids.If covering hearing aids
reduces Alzheimer’s this would likely reduce health care costs currently covered
by Medicare and Medicaid.
Is covering hearing aids a net gain for government
healthcare costs?I am not sure, but it
seems like it deserves examination.
Very Truly Yours,
Clayton E. Cramer
[1]Timothy D. Griffiths, Meher Lad, Sukhbinder Kumar, Emma Holmes, Bob McMurray, Eleanor
A. Maguire, Alexander J. Billig, William Sedley, “How
Can Hearing Loss Cause Dementia?” Neuron, Nov. `11, 2020, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2020.08.003;
Alexander Chern, Justin S Golub, “Age-Related Hearing Loss And Dementia,” Alzheimer
Disease and Associated Disorders, Jul. – Sep. 2019, DOI: 10.1097/WAD.0000000000000325;
Richard K Gurgel, P. Daniel Ward, Sarah Schwartz, Maria C Norton, Norman L
Foster, JoAnn T. Tschanz, “Relationship of Hearing loss and Dementia: a
Prospective, Population-based Study,” Ontology & Neurotology, Jun.
2014, DOI: 10.1097/MAO.0000000000000313.
Of course, I sent to Senators Risch and Crapo as well.
Residents in seven downstate counties voted in Tuesday’s election to explore the idea of breaking away from Illinois to form a new state.
The counties join a growing number of other right-leaning downstate counties that have approved similar nonbinding measures in recent election years. The movement comes as residents’ distaste for the left-leaning policies pushed through the Democrat-led Illinois General Assembly has also grown.
As the article points out, there is little chance of success.
David K. Randall. This is a gripping story of the first race to fly around the world by teams from the U.S., Britain, France, Italy, Portugal, and Argentina. In spite of American invention of the airplane, the American team was by no means the likely winners. Largely through Billy Mitchell's efforts to drag the U.S. military into the 20th century, U.S. Army Air Service pilots start heading west, while competing teams head east.
There are exciting adventures of dangerous flying, icebergs, storms, sand storms, landings in tropical rice paddies, generous gifts to competing teams in times of trouble. You learn a bit about the technology involved and you cry about a flight that required the flight engineer to hand crank a gasoline pump for four hours over an empty Pacific Ocean.
Have you ever wondered how Douglas Aircraft started. It was Douglas' technically advanced biplanes that won the race.
H.G. Wells The Island of Dr. Moreau. This is easily the most horrifying of Wells' novels, more disturbing than the monstrous Martians of Wsr of the Worlds. There is one part where he describes how Dr. Moreau does monstrous, painful things both surgically and by drugs to make various animals into creatures with some limited human characteristics: speech; walking erect; opposable thumbs; religion with Dr. Moreau as the Divine Lawgiver who uses the fear of the House of Pain where all these Beastmen had passed through as an instrument to create obedience.
It is a horrifying collection of creatures part human, part animal, sometimes several animals. Just close enough to suffer what we now call the uncanny Valley with respect to robots.
The description of the procedures by which he makes them almost human is similar to how World War I plastic surgery techniques for correction of severe mutilation of human bodies was adapted to create artificial and utterly phoney genitals. Moreau's drugs are analogous to the hormonal treatments inflicted on young people to render them perpetually damaged in preparation for barbarous surgery that makes the worst genital mutilation seem almost normal.
It is a profoundly disturbing story of the pursuit of scientific knowledge with no ethical limits. Until you get to the unfortunately real Dr. Mengele, there is nothing more troubling.
"Jamal Simmons, a former aide to Vice President Harris, called for President Biden to resign so that the vice president can have his role for a short amount of time.
“Joe Biden’s been a phenomenal president, he’s lived up to so many of the promises he’s made. There’s one promise left that he could fulfill, being a transitional figure,” Simmons said on CNN’s “State of the Union” on a panel featuring anchor Dana Bash, in a clip highlighted by Mediaite.
“He could resign the presidency in the next 30 days, make Kamala Harris president of the United States,” he continued, drawing shocked reactions from others."
I think the theory is that the only way a woman can become president is if the senile occupant resigns so she csn have a brief time in the office. This is about as blatant a piece of Affirmative Action as I csn imagine. Not good enough for election but she gets a few weeks in the seat anyway.
I confess that it is hard to see how Biden is superior to Harris at the moment, or inferior.
I was organizing my ammunition this afternoon. How did I end up with 1300 rounds of .380 ACP? I have two pistols in that caliber. I do not think anyone makes a carbine that caliber.
I have what I hope is a lifetime supply of .223,.308, 9mm, and a paltry 500 rounds of .45 ACP.
UPDATE: HiPoint makes a .380ACP carbine which depending on the reviewer is either cheap, almost recoilless and cheap, or a Jammatic. I cannot justify $250 for a gun whose only YouTube video starts with a failure to feed, but if HiPoint wants to send me one for review and testing, I am game. .
"But Democratic operatives involved in key races told CNN they don’t know how to figure out what those voters who went for Trump want, or how they’re doing in appealing to them."
Gee, maybe looking at what Trump was selling? They are fully echo chambered. Illegal immigration is not popular, even with Hispanics. LGBT is not popular, especially the T. Inflation is not popular. Preferred pronouns for the military instead of a strong military is not popular. T-5 abortions are not popular even if there is reluctance to completely ban abortion.
"Kamala Harris' presidential election campaign ended the 2024 White House contest "at least $20 million in debt," according to Politico's California bureau chief Christopher Cadelago.
"Cadelago made the claim on X, formerly Twitter, noting Harris' team had "$118 million in the bank" as recently as October 16."
Harris raised a billion dollars and spent all of it and $20 million more to fail. Trump raised $392 million and spent $345 million. Look at the results. Who managed their money better and got more votes. I shudder to think what was promised to raise that billion dollars.
I mean Bush's belief that freeing Iraq of Hussein could lead to a democratic Muslim society, but it appears that Hussein's Baathists were the most progressive part of Iraqi society. 11/7/24 Telegraph:
"Iraq is poised to slash the legal age of consent from 18 to to nine, allowing men to marry young children.
"The proposed legal change also deprives women of rights to divorce, child custody and inheritance."
Underlying this is that Islamic values on this are well outside the norms of not only Western Civilization but most others.
I have been milling all morning, and with no more devices turned on, the GFCI pops. Any ideas? When I reset it and start the mill up again. It pops. Even when it is not cutting, it pops. Any ideas.
UPDATE: My electrician friend noticed the motor was sparking, so I just need a new motor. The one rhat just died has a 2014 manufacture date.
"WASHINGTON, Nov 8 (Reuters) - Federal and state authorities are investigating a wave of bigoted text messages sent anonymously that have spread alarm among Black Americans across the country this week, officials and recipients told Reuters.
"The messages urged recipients in multiple states, including Alabama, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Virginia, to report to a plantation to pick cotton, an offensive reference to past enslavement of Black people in the United States."
I can see why Blacks would find this offensive. If I received such a message6 ordering me to appear at the Episcopalian Church on Sunday (which is why some ofrrif my ancestors came to America), I would categorize it as a stupid nuisance rather like the continual fundraising texts that I get.
"Democrats are reportedly discussing whether to call on Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor to immediately resign in an effort to avoid her replacement potentially being made under President-elect Trump, Politico reports.
"Democrats lost their Senate majority to Republicans in the 2024 election, which, according to one Democratic senator, prompted discussion over whether to initiate an immediate replacement of Sotomayor, 70, during their remaining two months in control of the chamber."
Even aside from whether the Senate could confirm a Biden appointment before inauguration day, wouldn't Sotomayor have to resign first? If as seems likely, a Biden appointee could not be confirmed that quickly, would this not just speed up Trump's opportunity to appoint a new justice?
But looking through the big telescope tonight at the Moom at 152X, the right eye clearly is sharper and gathering more light. Shooting right might not be such a handicap after all.
Why are there small lifeboats on gigantic steel ocean liners? Why do we spend
thousands equipping our vehicles with airbags? Why do we wear seatbelts and place
our infants in safety seats? Why do we build storm shelters under our homes? Why
do we install ground-fault interrupter outlets by sinks and bathtubs? Why do we get
painful inoculations? Why do we voluntarily undergo sickening chemotherapy?
And why do we protect ourselves with firearms?
In life, we face many perils. Some are natural weather phenomena such as
hurricanes, tornadoes, or floods. Some are biological such as viruses, disease, or
malignant cells. Some perils are associated with important products like electricity,
natural gas, matches, automobiles, and pain-reliving medications.
Too often, the perils we face are forced upon us by other people. By people who
are negligent, reckless, insane, impaired, or evil. Sometimes it is the proverbial lone
wolf; sometimes, it is the whole wolf pack. Truly, life comes at you quickly.
And who comes to our aid in times of peril? Sometimes, it is the police or first
responders; other times it is healthcare professionals; and sometimes it is family, friends, or neighbors. Sometimes, it is no one.
Donald
Trump’s return to the White House effectively slammed the door on the
two cases involving federal criminal charges against him.
A
state case against him for allegedly conspiring to interfere with
Georgia’s election in 2020 will go on hold until after his term in
office ends - if it's still alive by then.
But
next week, the fate of the remaining case – his conviction on 34 felony
counts in New York – will be determined. It could stand, or it could be
swept away in the same political and legal tide that has allowed him to escape the others.
Justice
Juan Merchan will decide by Tuesday whether to grant Trump’s
pre-election request to throw out his conviction. Should Justice Merchan
side with Trump, it would almost wipe clean his slate of criminal woes.
But should the judge uphold the
conviction, he would proceed to sentencing later this month. It would
likely spark even more delay attempts from Trump and open up an
unprecedented new front for America’s criminal justice system.
“This is truly uncharted territory,” said Anna Cominsky, a professor at the New York Law School....
Even if Justice Merchan upholds the
conviction and keeps the scheduled sentencing, Trump’s team is almost
certain to seek more delays and appeals.
Todd Blanche, Trump’s lead attorney, did not respond to inquiries about whether he planned to seek a delay.
Because
Trump will be tied up with a presidential transition and the legal
questions about sentencing a president are so complex, some scholars see
very little chance it will stay on the calendar.
“I
think the most likely outcome in the state case is the judge putting
off sentencing until after Trump's term in office,” said Daniel Charles
Richman, a professor at Columbia Law School.
Yes, jail is unlikely. Imagine Secret Service protection in jail. Imagine keeping the "nuclear football" secure.
The Manhattan judge who oversaw Donald Trump’s “hush money” criminal
trial is expected to announce next week if the president-elect’s
historic felony conviction will still stand.
Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan had already delayed sentencing by more than four months to come after the election — and gave himself until next Tuesday to decide if the conviction should be tossed.
Three people have been charged in an alleged Iran-linked plot to assassinate President-elect Donald Trump,
an Iranian-American activist and two Jewish Americans living in New
York, according to a criminal complaint unsealed Friday in New York.
Farhad Shakeri, Carlisle Rivera and Jonathan Loadholt are charged with murder-for-hire, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
Rivera and Loadholt have been arrested, while Shakeri, who the FBI
described as an "asset" of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, is
believed to be in Tehran.
The IRGC tasked Shakeri with surveilling and killing Trump to avenge the death of Qassem Soleimani, the leader of Iran's elite Quds Force, in a U.S. drone strike in Baghdad in January 2020, according to the complaint....
Shakeri emigrated to the United States but was deported in 2008 after
serving prison time for robbery, according to the Justice Department.
While in prison, he met Rivera and Loadholt and hired them to target an Iranian American activist living in Brooklyn, according to the complaint.[emphasis added]
Does anyone besides me find that combinations of ethnicities odd?
Since the election the Dow is up 4 3%, the Nasdaq Composite 5.68%, and the S&P 500 4.5%. If they can keep this up a few more months, I may need a jet to avoid commercial air travel.
The Dow is pretty much flat today but the Nasdaq Composite index is up 1.18% right now. At some point, profit-taking will induce some correction, but I suspect it will not be huge (or Yuge, if you speak Trump) or prolonged.
This is why keeping your money invested for the long term term is a better strategy than trying to do short-term changes. Anyone who panicked the day before Harris' victory left a lot of money on the table.
The Left is going to blame Harris being a weak candidate (so why did they pick her?); Trump's use of mind control rays; media bias in his favor; America is a racist, misogynist nation (especially all those black and Hispanic men who voted for Trump).
The possibility that confusing and mutilating children horrified most Americans; Drag Show Library Hour; terrifyingly transgender officials; a collapsing weconomy from inflation and loss of jobs; subsidies to billionaires that injured most Americans; weaponization of the legal system like a Third World nation; suppressing free speech that exposed a corrupt influence purchasing scheme by the First Pervert, Hunter. None of those could explain why they lost.
Dow Jones 30 Industrials up 1300 points or 3%. This will be a very good day. I am reminded of Krugman's warning about the collapse of the stock market if Trump won in 2016
Tesla is up 14% today.
UPDATE: Dow now up 1500 points (3.57%). I hope Democrats who are a $100,000 dollars richer in their IRAs and 401ks feel appropriately guilt-ridden about it.
We had dinner with my daughter last night. She was explaining that she loves election day because of all the data and how various scenarios are on dependent on the data. My wife stares at her and says, "You really are your father's daughter." She took that as a compliment.
I suppose the Democrats could still insist this was widespread election fraud, assassinate Trump, declare martial law, announce that Trump is really one of those aliens from Men in Black, and ask us to look into the device to make us forget. But with a Republican majority in the Senate, there are going to be a lot more originalist federal judges on the bench these next few years. Expect a lot more whining about the tyranny of the judicial branch.
The U.S. Capitol Police has suspended six officers with pay for their actions on Jan. 6, when a pro-Trump mob attacked the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to stop the certification of President Biden's Electoral College victory, according to a department statement....
The department "has been actively reviewing video and other open source materials of some USCP officers and officials that appear to be in violation of Department regulations and policies," she said on Jan. 11.
A door on the West side of the U.S. Capitol was left open and mostly unguarded for key moments during the Jan. 6 riot, allowing more than 300 people to enter the building unimpeded even as officers fought valiantly to keep protesters out of other sections of the official home of Congress, according to police security footage obtained by Just the News.
The footage -- which confirms concerns first raised by Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., two years ago -- shows an episode in a narrow hallway in the middle of the Capitol that began around 2:30p.m. on Jan. 6, 2021 right after the first breaches were reported elsewhere in the landmark building.
Capitol Police officers usher a few intruders already inside the building through the non-public Upper West Terrace hallway and toward a fire evacuation door, which is clearly marked by a sign declaring it was an emergency exit, the footage shows.
"Emergency exit only," the sign reads, instructing evacuees to "push until alarm sounds" and the "doors will unlock in 10 seconds." After one person exits, the doors appear to open from inside as 309 individuals pass through it over a period of less than 20 minutes from the outside.
Capitol Police officers, who didn't have riot gear or helmets, eventually made their way to the unlocked Upper West Terrace doors but did not block the entrance and more rioters continued to flow into the building, according to the footage reviewed by Just the News and released for publication by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and the GOP-led House Administration Committee.
This might be just incompetence, but it suggests many rioters believed they were welcome.
3/7/23 New York Post:
Newly revealed surveillance footage from Jan. 6, 2021, shows two Capitol Police officers escorting Jacob Chansley, the behorned so-called “QAnon Shaman” who has come to symbolize the riot, through the halls of the Capitol and to the very door of the US Senate.
The footage aired on Tucker Carlson’s Fox News show Monday night shows the officers closely following Chansley as he wanders the corridors of the Capitol, bare-chested and wearing face paint and a luxuriant fur hat with Viking horns.
“Virtually every moment of his time inside the Capitol was caught on tape,” says Carlson, who was granted exclusive access by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to 40,000 hours of surveillance footage from that day inside and around the Capitol, which has never been seen before by the public.
“The tapes show the Capitol Police never stopped Jacob Chansley. They helped him. They acted as his tour guides.”...
At one point, the officers are seen walking Chansley past seven other police officers milling around outside the Senate chamber, who barely give him a second look.
Then they escort him to various entrances of the chamber that appear to be locked. Eventually, they help him open a door, and he enters the chamber.
[Judge] McFadden said it was reasonable for Martin to believe that outnumbered police officers allowed him and others to enter the Capitol through the Rotunda doors on Jan. 6, 2021. The judge also said Martin’s actions were “about as minimal and non-serious” as anyone who was at the Capitol that day.
Martin is the third Capitol riot defendant whose case has been resolved by a trial. He is the first of the three to be acquitted of all charges that he faced. The first two Capitol riot trials ended with convictions, although McFadden acquitted one of those defendants of a disorderly conduct charge after a bench trial last month.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) accused U.S. Capitol Police officers of "opening the doors wide open" for Jan. 6 rioters and said anyone who works in the Capitol is "not safe."
"There were actual officers working with this, and we never got to the bottom of that," Ocasio-Cortez said while clapping her hands for emphasis while discussing the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. "We never got any answers about that and to this day, we're supposed to pretend that this never happened?"
She told reporter Pablo Manríquez of Latino Rebels on Wednesday, "I have no idea what happened to the people on the inside who were very clearly sympathetic with what was going on and opening the doors wide open for that and we're– I'm supposed to sit here and pretend like none of that ever happened."
Capitol Police Told to Hold Back on Riot Response on Jan. 6, Report Finds
Despite being tipped that “Congress itself is the target” on Jan. 6, Capitol Police were ordered not to use their most powerful crowd-control weapons, according to a scathing new watchdog report.
President Donald Trump was still in the midst of an incendiary speech outside the White House last Wednesday when some of his supporters began milling around the front of the U.S. Capitol a mile and a half away.
More followed in waves, their ranks soon multiplying into an angry crowd of thousands who felled the temporary perimeter fencing as if it were made of toothpicks and charged toward the marbled facade.
If enflamed watchers joined, they had a half hour walk at least to join a riot well under way by 2:00 PM.
Here is one of the videos that suggests Capitol Police were neither fighting nor fearful:
Some observers noted that law enforcement had apparently ignored the seriousness of the threat of domestic far-right extremists, as they’ve done for years. Others suggested that police were perhaps complicit with the insurrectionists, many of whom express pro-police beliefs. Lawmakers have called for multiple investigations into the security failures.
One video appears to show a Capitol Police officer taking selfies with the rioters. Another featured several officers removing metal barriers to let the mob freely pass toward the Capitol. In yet another video, an officer appeared to hold a door open so a handful of rioters, apparently allowing them to exit the Capitol building without being arrested or charged.
An FBI informant who marched to the US Capitol with fellow Proud Boys on January 6 testified on Wednesday that he did not know of any plans for the far-right extremist group to invade the building and didn’t think they inspired violence that day....
The informant said he believed he would not get into trouble with the FBI for something “minor” like breaking a window, as long as it could be seen as an “act of self-preservation” in a confrontation with antifascist activists.
I am not sure who Richochet is, but the claim in damning if true. 9/26/24 Richochet:
In testimony today before the House Select Committee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz stated that he has been gathering information for a report and may about to release more precise information on whether the FBI paid individuals to wreak havoc on January 6th, so Democrats and the incoming Biden-Harris administration and the media could immediately lay the blame on the purported insurrection at Donald Trump.
The FBI was working with an informant inside the Kansas City Proud Boys chapter in 2020 who warned the agency about the potential for violence on Jan. 6, 2021, according to records a far-right website says it received from a whistleblower. That informant, a “second-degree” Proud Boy, breached the Capitol along with other members that day, sending text messages to a handler as the insurrection was underway, the records show.
I am not sure how seriouisly to take World Socialist Web Site, but 4/12/23:
Federal prosecutors have already disclosed that there were at least eight FBI informants within the Proud Boys prior to January 6. One of those informants, a member of the Kansas City Proud Boys chapter, texted his FBI handlers on December 21 that the January 6 rally “should be a concern.”
In his filing last week, Roots claimed, “at least two law enforcement agencies each outnumbered the FBI in terms of running undercover agencies, informants, and CHSs on Jan. 6.
“First, the DC Metro Police had at least 13 undercover plain-clothes agents. ... Next, there appear to have been some 19 CHSs on Jan. 6 belong to an agency called HIS [sic]…
There are, of course, vast numbers of websites attempting to refute these claims, but at a minimum when such a range of news organizations report stuff like this, the conventional wisdom about J6 needs careful examination.
A discussion of rejuvenating Mars' magnetic field to help it hold atmosphere includes this warning:
'Hypothetically, one of the ways to keep or rather bring back the atmosphere on Mars would be to create an artificial magnetic field around the planet. Measurements show that covering the equator of mars with a band of superconductor will form a field like that of earth and thus could save mars from the solar winds.
'This method has, however very high impracticalities owing to enormous power requirements and hazards. The power supply necessary to produce such a magnetic field would be enormous and more so, a cut in supply to the superconducting band would result in dangerous levels of energy being expelled in the form of X-rays.
"Such a failure mode is extreme enough that it would probably render most of the solar system lifeless, hence this technique for atmospheric conservation is expensive and impractical."
