America’s Woke Military Has Never Been This Weak - Daniel Greenfield

 

by Daniel Greenfield

But Biden’s National Security Strategy says diversity is our strength.

 

[Check out our Disloyal Military Campaign: HERE.]

For the first time the Heritage Foundation’s index of American military strength has ranked us as ‘weak’. The index warns that the Army “remains ‘weak’ in capacity with only 62 percent of the force it should have”. And even the Army has admitted that it has missed its recruiting target by 10,000 personnel which is expected to climb to over 20,000 by the end of the next fiscal year.

As Heritage and the Wall Street Journal note, “From 2005 to 2020, the U.S. fleet grew to 296 warships from 291, while China’s navy grew to 360 from 216.” The Navy however is focused on inclusion and diversity. The situation at the Air Force is much worse with the Heritage report warning that “the munitions stockpile” would probably “not support a peer-level fight that lasted more than a few weeks”. But the Air Force is also focused on diversity and inclusion.

The Navy is rated as very weak in capacity and weak in readiness. The Air Force ranks as very weak due to “problems with pilot production and retention, an extraordinarily small amount of time in the cockpit for pilots, and a fleet of aircraft that continues to age”. The Heritage index warns that “there is little doubt that it would struggle in war with a peer competitor”.

The Space Force is described as weak because “there is little evidence that the USSF has improved its readiness to provide nearly real-time support to operational and tactical levels of force operations or that it is ready in any way to execute defensive and offensive counterspace operations.”

Only the Marine Corps is rated as strong. Even our nuclear capabilities are slipping with “Russia and China are aggressively expanding the types and quantities of nuclear weapons in their inventories. Nearly all components of the nuclear enterprise are at a tipping point with respect to replacement or modernization and have no margin left for delays in schedule.”

It’s no coincidence that the ‘wokest’ service branches also show up as the weakest.

The takeaway from the Heritage report that “the current U.S. military force is at significant risk of not being able to meet the demands of a single major regional conflict while also attending to various presence and engagement activities” should be a grave warning and a wake up call.

Anyone worried about these numbers will find scant comfort in Biden’s new National Security Strategy released earlier in October. The NSS is supposed to define an administration’s vision. And Biden’s NSS is depressingly faithful to the woke obsessions that have made us so weak.

The National Security Strategy asserts that “we have broken down the dividing line between foreign policy and domestic policy”. America’s strength lay in a dividing line between foreign and domestic policy. Weak, troubled and totalitarian nations conflate the two. As does Biden.

That dividing line meant that America could aggressively confront foreign enemies abroad while maintaining civil liberties at home. The Biden administration, like its Obama predecessors, has insisted on conflating domestic and international political conflicts, defining the domestic opposition as a “threat to democracy” on the same spectrum as foreign autocratic regimes.

Without the dividing line, the Biden administration is free to insist that the welfare state, its corrupt green subsidies and every single leftist agenda item are actually part of our national security strategy. The NSS even defines Biden’s open borders as “investing in our people”.

Wokeness is at the heart of the NSS with the assertion that “we are building on the work of generations of activists to advance equity and root out systemic disparities in our laws, policies, and institutions. Indeed, pluralism, inclusion, and diversity are a source of national strength in a rapidly changing world.” This same rhetoric about DEI has been rolled into military doctrine so that unprecedented military weakness appears like a strength because it’s a diverse weakness.

Racial and identity politics quotas are also national security. Or as the NSS asserts, “Prioritizing diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility to ensure national security institutions reflect the American public they represent.”

Tellingly, “modernizing and strengthening our military” comes at the very end of the second subsection behind agenda items like Biden’s corrupt special interest giveaways, and, most damningly, “strengthening our democracy”. Only a totalitarian banana republic would include attacks on domestic opponents in its national security strategy. And that, sadly, is what we have.

“As Americans, we must all agree that the people’s verdict, as expressed in elections, must be respected and protected,” the NSS pointedly jabs, before reciting talking points about federal takeovers of elections and the need for “critical reforms continue to be needed to strengthen our system of governance.” Defining political opponents as a national security threat and the lack of legislation favoring its faction’s electioneering as a national security problem is coup talk.

And the military? Modernizing the military gets a meager 5 paragraphs in a 48 page national security strategy.

The Biden NSS admits that “our competitors and potential adversaries are investing heavily in new nuclear weapons. By the 2030s, the United States for the first time will need to deter two major nuclear powers, each of whom will field modern and diverse global and regional nuclear forces.”

The good news is that the Biden regime will be “taking further steps to reduce the role of nuclear weapons in our strategy and pursuing realistic goals for mutual, verifiable arms control”.

And the concluding plan for the military, as summed up in the final paragraph is to “strengthen the effectiveness of the force by promoting diversity and inclusion” and “rooting out violent extremism”.

Biden’s National Security Strategy for strengthening and modernizing the military is to impose political tests, purge political opponents and appease foreign enemies. It’s no wonder that Putin and Xi look at this administration and begin making moves on Ukraine or Taiwan.

The NSS isn’t the document of a world power, but of a declining nation squabbling with itself, but incapable and unwilling to assert any kind of meaningful presence at home or abroad.

The National Security Strategy is fixated on the endless bureaucratic lists of global internationalism. It’s European in its view of the United States as benefiting most from a globalist system “governed by the UN charter” rather than taking independent action for its own interests.

The NSS names China and Russia as threats, but remains too fixated on fighting conservatives at home to take foreign threats seriously. And so the NSS Global Priorities section concludes with warnings that the real threat comes from “a range of domestic violent extremists, including those motivated by racial or ethnic prejudice, as well as antigovernment or anti-authority sentiment”. It urges “Congress to advance commonsense gun laws and policies” and address “the crisis of disinformation and misinformation”. Which is to say, speech it doesn’t like.

Having eliminated the “dividing line between foreign policy and domestic policy”, the Biden administration now treats Americans like foreign enemies and makes domestic woke obsessions, like global warming and equity, into the pivot of our foreign policy. The military is there to be made “diverse” and inclusive” while being completely unready to fight and win.

The Heritage Index and the Biden National Security Strategy are documents that come from wildly different worlds. The NSS is a vision of a world where most things can be solved with meetings and equity while the Index warns that if we face a war against a serious military power, we could lose or at the very least suffer casualties and severe setbacks beyond what we expect.

It’s been a long time since our military has been this weak. And it’s never been this woke.

The two reports warn us in different ways that we are at risk of losing a war if we end up in one. We’re not ready for a serious fight and if history is anything to go by, that is exactly when we are likely to find ourselves in a war.

Daniel Greenfield

Source: https://www.frontpagemag.com/americas-woke-military-has-never-been-this-weak/

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How Joe Biden Spits on Sound Economic Theory - David Ennocenti

 

by David Ennocenti

What is happening today is similar to what happened in the 1970s. And that's bad.

The White House recently disclosed the fact that President Biden tried to convince Saudi Arabia to postpone the cuts in oil production until after mid-term the elections.  This was an attempt to prevent the inevitable increase in the price of gasoline that would follow.  Basic economic theory states that as supply decreases, price increases and vice versa.

To keep the prices down, Biden has been releasing oil from the nation's oil reserves.  That began in November of 2021.  He just announced that he will release another 10 million barrels.  This is an attempt to keep gas prices from rising before the elections in November.  The cost of gasoline is rising again and is expected to continue to rise.

What has happened in a nutshell: "The great and sudden increase in the price of imported crude oil had a substantial effect on both the national and international economies.  It helped to create inflation at home and transferred tens of billions of dollars from the oil-consuming nations to the oil-producing nations."

That previous paragraph is in quotes because it comes from a term paper I wrote as a junior at the State University of N.Y. at Buffalo, School of Management.  My Managerial Economics class required everyone to develop an econometric model explaining the demand for a chosen commodity.  I chose gasoline.

At the time, the big deal in the world was an energy crisis.  We were told to wear sweaters and cut down on driving because the world was going to run out of oil in the near future.  That was in 1980.  We were told there was an energy crisis, a future where the world was going to run out of oil, and we were headed for a new ice age because of global cooling.  Check these magazine covers here.  Seriously, read it in the December 24, 1979 issue of Time Magazine.

A new ice age, the "fact" that we were running out of oil, and we were in an energy crisis was that period's climate change!  The powers that be in Washington, D.C. created the Department of Energy in response to all the fear created when OPEC nations cut oil production.  The following is right from the Office of Legacy Management and the history of the Department of Energy:

Until the 1970s, the Federal government played a limited role in formulating national energy policy in an era of relatively cheap and abundant energy. The nation relied on the private sector to fulfill most of its energy needs. Historically, Americans expected private industry to establish production, distribution, marketing, and pricing policies. When free market conditions were absent, Federal regulations were established to control energy pricing. were established to control energy pricing.

It's interesting to note that until 1977, the United States relied on the private sector to deal with energy.  The question is, has the department of energy done anything about the so-called energy crisis since its inception?  We still seem to be in one crisis or another since 1977.  Up until the Department of Energy was created, the private sector seemed to do a better job of managing itself in the free market.  That should come as no surprise to those who adhere to a free-market economy.

What is happening today is similar to what happened in the 1970s: inflation at home, and the transfer of tens of billions of dollars from the oil-consuming nations to the oil-producing nations.  This began to occur beginning January 2021 with President Biden signing an executive order canceling the XL Pipeline.  Many other restrictions on the production of energy have led to a shortage and increased prices which add to inflation.

Many believe that inflation is caused only by the government's printing of money, however, increases in the costs of products that are considered necessities also cause inflation.  One of the biggest contributors to inflation is the cost of gasoline.  In June of 2022, gasoline increased by 59.9 percent.  During that same period, inflation in the United States was 8.5%.  In the "energy crisis" of the 1970s and '80s, gasoline inflation peaked at 68.1% in March of 1980, and inflation also peaked that same month at 14.8%.  This is available at the U.S. inflation calculator.

Biden's policies are defying the logic of economic theory — in a bad way.  One of the facts that I discovered with creating my econometric model is that gasoline demand is seasonal.  This means the time of year has an effect on the demand for gasoline.  It's a fact that the highest demand for gasoline occurs during the year's third quarter; that would be July, August, and September.  Demand begins to decline as we approach winter.  The second lowest demand occurs in the years fourth quarter — October, November, and December.  Demand falls to its lowest level in the first quarter — January, February, and March.  It begins its rise in the second quarter, which is historically slightly higher than the fourth.

With gas prices rising in October and expected to continue to rise, this is in contrast to what usually occurs.  Demand slows in the fourth quarter and places downward pressure on price.  While the price may not drop, it is not typical to expect price increases.  Yet that is exactly what we have due to the foolish policies of the Biden administration.

Supporters of Biden claim that his policies are not the cause of the price increases around the world.  They claim that the problem is global.  They are correct.  That's exactly why cutting production anywhere leads to price increases everywhere.  Again, this is the fallout the world's economies are feeling from Biden's "war on the fossil fuel industries."  He did campaign on putting the fossil fuel industry out of business.  He appears to be succeeding.

When talking about fossil fuel executives, Biden has also said, "We should put them in jail."  He also endorsed a carbon tax on the American people, which will force households to pay much higher gasoline, heating, and cooling bills.  If there is a serious concern about too much carbon, why would they write a law that allows people to buy and sell carbon credits?  Does that help the environment if one company can create more carbon than the law allows but buy credits to offset the tax?

With great arrogance, Biden has blamed the oil companies and gasoline stations for the rise in prices.  This is either great audacity to blame the oil companies for his decisions or great ignorance of the laws of economics.  They are called laws of economics for the same reason gravity is defined as the law of gravity.  They always work in the same way.  President Biden and the Democrats have blamed corporations for the price increases since shortly after inflation began.  These accusations go back to November 2021.  The accusation were wrong then, and they are wrong now.

It seems everything this administration does flies in the face of reality.  The Inflation Reduction Act is by its substance a great oxymoron.  Everything in it is inflationary.  Again, it involves the printing of more money.  But then again, perhaps the real purpose of the bill is to transfer money from one group to another — something the Democrats seem to be doing since the 2020 election.  Inflation is at its worst when there is too much money in the hands of too few people chasing too few goods.  This is exactly what the Inflation Reduction Act actually does. 

The country and the world are in a mess right now.  The current administration appears to be at the center of it. 

Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.

David Ennocenti is a retired accountant and graduate of the State University of N.Y. at Buffalo, School of Management with a degree in Accounting and Finance.  He passed the CPA Examination in 1983.  His writing has appeared in American Thinker, USA Today, The New York Times, and several other publications.  His screenplay, Sniper Queen, was an official selection of The Artemis Women in Action Films Festival.  He is a past winner of the Writer's Digest Annual Competition.  His essay "1984 Arrived: Now What? How Progressive Policies Decimated a Once Vibrant Community" is available on Amazon.

Source: https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2022/10/how_joe_biden_spits_on_sound_economic_theory.html

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Will a Biden Go to Prison Instead of Trump? - Douglas MacKinnon

 

by Douglas MacKinnon

The biggest threat to the Biden machine is not from Republicans or conservatives.

 

Soon after he announced his run for President in June of 2015, the Democrats – along with their obedient lap dogs in the media – went after then New York City businessman Donald J. Trump hammer and tongs.

In collusion with elements of the “Deep State” within our own Federal government, fabricated accusation after fabricated accusation was hurled at then candidate Trump.  Once he was elected President, the left’s smear machine went into overdrive.

Why?

The main reason being that “They” – meaning the Democrats, the entrenched Republican-elites, and the Deep State – could not control him.  Ever.  President Trump was not part of the DC “Club” or “Cabal.”

He didn’t need their fawning approval nor their special interest connections or money.  He was in it to put forth what he believed to be the best policy initiatives designed to benefit the vast majority of the American people.  Most especially the working and middle-class.

As far as President Trump was concerned, it was: “Damn the partisan; special interest; and corrupt-liberal-media torpedoes.  Full speed ahead.”

Except…if you are instituting policies to help protect the vast majority of the American people, you will invariably expose numerous politicians as outright frauds, while identifying countless organizations and individuals greedily feeding from the tax-payer trough at the direct expense of the American people.

As the entrenched-elites in it for the power, the money, or petrified that they would soon be exposed as the charlatans they are could not have that, the “Russian Collusion” hoax was created in the darkest, most putrid shadows of the DC sewers and rolled out on multiple liberal, far-left, and “Never Trump” fronts.

To cover their “Russian Collusion” bet, they next scooped up gobs and gobs of freshly created mud and threw that at the walls in ever increasing fanatical fits of desperation.  Months and now years later, nothing has stuck.

What to do?

Even though former President Trump has been out of office for almost two years, the Democrats, the Deep State, the liberal media, and the entrenched Republican elites still fear him.  More than fear him, they fear the influence he still strongly maintains with tens of millions of American voters.

Hence, the partisan, despicable and truly disreputable FBI raid on former President Trump’s private residence in Florida.

Look, former President Trump is not perfect.  If I had his ear in the White House, I would have asked him to temper some of the school-yard rhetoric.  A President can easily take the public high road, while completely neutralizing – or even crushing — the opposition privately behind the scenes.  The fact is, by and large, then President Trump had exceptional policies which were dramatically reshaping our nation into a better and more secure version of itself.

But, for those willing to be honest with themselves, it was never about President Trump’s colorful rhetoric nor his policies.  It was always because he was beyond the control of the DC Club and Cabal.  Period.

Ironically – and quite relevantly – current President Joe Biden has been a charter member of that DC club for decades.  One of his many nicknames being: “Go along, Joe.”

The question for many being: “How much did he ‘Go Along’ with the schemes of his son, Hunter Biden?”

The biggest threat to the Biden machine is not from Republicans or conservatives, but from the entrenched Democratic-elites and their servants in the media.  At some point, the Democratic “leadership,” the liberal and Big-Tech special interests, Woke CEOs, members of the liberal “Deep State,” and certain mainstream media executives may decide for the good of them all, the “Biden Clan” has to be thrown overboard.

Should that come to pass – and it is more likely with each passing day – then a number of the alleged “Biden corruption” crumbs which have been repeatedly swept under multiple DC rugs, will magically start to creep back out onto the open floor for all to see.

“Crumbs” leading back to the Hunter Biden laptop as well as his business deals and contacts in Ukraine and The People’s Republic of China.

If I were a betting man, I would say they will never get former President Trump on any of the invented charges they have repeatedly orchestrated.

That said, I would not want to be part of the greater Biden family if the Democratic Cabal decides that all of them are suddenly and permanently, much more trouble than they are worth.

Should that come to pass, expect several very controversial “Presidential Pardons” to be announced at the end of the Biden administration in the wake of that Liberal-entrenched-elite “Save our own corrupt backsides” desperation move.

Douglas MacKinnon is a former White House and Pentagon official and author of the book:  The 56 – Liberty Lessons from those who risked all to sign The Declaration of Independence – Before they and the 4th of July are Banned.

Source: https://www.frontpagemag.com/will-a-biden-go-to-prison-instead-of-trump/

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Is transgender ideology third rail of midterm elections? Poll, politicians suggest yes - Charlotte Hazard

 

by Charlotte Hazard

A hefty majority of Americans believe schools shouldn't be pushing gender ideology on students, according to a survey conducted by pollster Scott Rasmussen.

 

While inflation and crime are the dominant issues heading into the Nov. 8 midterm elections, political leaders and activists interviewed by Just the News, backed up by recent polling data, suggest there may be a third force moving voters: a palpable sense that liberal transgender ideology seeping into America's schools is a bridge too far for most parents.

"It has been that electrifying third rail that has galvanized this movement to say, 'No more of this foolishness,'" North Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson told Just the News on Wednesday. "We need to get back to educating our children and move all the social garbage out of the way."

A whopping 72% of voters interviewed earlier this month declared they do not believe school should teach students they can change their gender, according to a survey conducted by pollster Scott Rasmussen for the America's New Majority Project.

When testing to see if age was a factor, 62% stood firm and said they believed it was inappropriate for schools at any level, including high school, to teach transgender transition.

"You have a cult of transgenderism, which is really a cult in a religious sense," said Newt Gingrich. 

"They just have an absolute passion for maximizing the number of people who go through a transgender process," the former House Speaker said in an interview on the John Solomon Reports podcast. "And I think people are going to conclude that having 9-, 10-, 11-, 12-year-old kids use puberty blockers and having 13-, 14-, 15-year-old girls having double mastectomies for no medical reason is just pure child abuse."

Democrats like President Joe Biden have a different take, arguing preventing children from choosing their own gender and modifying their bodies is wrong. Biden called state bans on transgender treatments for minors "immoral."

"No state should be able to do that in my view," Biden said in an interview over the weekend with a transgender activist. 

Biden's position, however, is rejected by a large majority of American voters.

Rasmussen's poll revealed that 80% of voters believe that if a child is thinking about changing their gender, then parents should be notified, not kept out of the loop. 

Well-known pollster John McLaughlin said that 65% of voters think that the transgender movement has gone too far in regard to encouraging minors to go through a medical gender transition. 

"65% of all voters said the transgender movement has gone too far by encouraging minors to use drugs and surgery to transition to the opposite sex," McLaughlin said on the John Solomon Reports podcast. "Only 21% said no." 

Virginia's Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin made news recently when his administration changed the state Department of Education's policies regarding transgender students. Under the updated policies, a transgender child is defined as "a public school student whose parent has requested in writing, due to their child's persistent and sincere belief that his or her gender differs with his or her sex, that their child be so identified while at school."

FreedomWorks Senior Advisor for Strategic Partnerships Tamra Farah also said that the transgender agenda being pushed on children is an issue that will drive parents to the polls. 

"Bringing that ideology into the classroom is a whole different level," Farah said Wednesday on the "Just the News, No Noise" TV show. "And schools do not have the right to do that. Federal law says that parents are full partners with the school in their child's education, and that they are able to influence it. And so this nonsense that somehow parents don't have rights in the school to influence things and determine what their kids can opt out of, is just wrong."

Farah said she believes kids being taught gender ideology so young can cause them trauma. 

"I would love to see a study done on this," she said. "You know, asking kids what pronouns they want to use, asking kids if they want to be a different gender, if they want to change their clothes in the gender-affirming closet — all of this without talking to parents — I believe that can be traumatizing. And that can cause confusion that can even lead to depression."

Charlotte Hazard

Source: https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/polling/thurs-transgender-ideology-may-be-third-rail-upcoming-midterm-elections

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Election 'misinformation' policing returns as Twitter flags JTN ballot harvesting report - Greg Piper

 

by Greg Piper

Twitter's Musk era begins with throttling of JTN report on Democrat alleging ballot harvesting in Florida. Fed-backed consortium flags "rumors" about arrest of poll worker management firm's CEO for alleged storage of data on Chinese servers.

If it's true that, as the adage has it, personnel is policy, then billionaire Elon Musk has already made an indelible mark as the new owner of Twitter by firing the top executives responsible for its strategic removal of purported misinformation and hate speech and deplatforming of high-profile users.

Whether and how quickly those censorship practices will meaningfully change is another question.

Not only do scores of prominent accounts, from the Christian satire website The Babylon Bee to former President Donald Trump, remain inaccessible to their owners or permanently suspended, but Just the News reporting continues to be throttled.

Shortly before Musk took ownership Thursday night, Twitter slapped an "unsafe" warning on a JTN report about a former Democratic candidate's sworn affidavit alleging years of illegal ballot harvesting in politically important central Florida, which prompted a state criminal probe.

The warning tells readers the "misleading" content "could lead to real-world harm." It's not inherently tied to the report's web address, but only displays as an interstitial when shared by certain accounts, including those of JTN founder John Solomon and Upward News.

 

Democrat blows whistle on alleged ballot harvesting scheme, Florida opens criminal probe | Just The News https://t.co/HH3GZFkb9B

— John Solomon (@jsolomonReports) October 27, 2022

 

It appeared on polling firm Rasmussen Reports' tweet within a minute of its posting. Twitter appears to be suppressing search results for tweets sharing the report — not even Solomon's shows up.

Twitter put the same warning on a JTN report about the legal distinctions between fully approved and emergency-use COVID-19 vaccines last year. It also suspended Solomon for sharing that vaccine report and a subsequent report about a peer-reviewed study of COVID vaccines.

The platform has apparently taken no punitive action comparable to suspension against recent provably false claims in favor of Democrats, such as President Biden's claim that gas prices averaged more than $5 a gallon when he took office or that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis met with Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas a day before Roe v. Wade was overturned. (It did add a reader note to Occupy Democrats' viral tweet about the latter.)

Hey @EricMGarcia from the @Independent,

Is June 23th, 2021 a day before June 24th, 2022? pic.twitter.com/VuvwsljSSD

— Jeremy Redfern (@JeremyRedfernFL) October 28, 2022

 

Monitoring and censorship of purported election "misinformation" was systematized and integrated with social media content moderation practices in 2020, with the formation of the Election Integrity Partnership, a Department of Homeland Security-endorsed private consortium that claimed tech platforms took action on 35% of URLs it flagged for election misinformation. The consortium has kept a close eye on Just the News since its after-action report on the 2020 election listed JTN among other news organizations on the 20 "most prominent domains across election integrity incidents" that were cited in flagged tweets.

JTN showed up in EIP's Oct. 28 blog post on "conspiratorial narratives" on election vulnerability disclosures. The consortium noted Solomon tweeted JTN's report on a University of Michigan computer scientist's warning about a "serious privacy flaw" in Dominion Voting Systems' machines.

"The conversation about the disclosure itself remained largely factual on the platform, though notably it spread primarily among accounts on the right who were already mistrustful of the security of Dominion voting machines," the post said.

 

Reports about the flaw were amplified by conservative and right-wing media outlets and influencers. The story obtained relatively low spread on Twitter. The interactive graph linked here allows for exploration of this spread. https://t.co/4TmzGWXSq2 pic.twitter.com/H1pGfjVBFy

— Election Integrity Partnership (@EI_Partnership) October 20, 2022

In the consortium's Oct. 10-16 weekly report on its activities, it sought to dispel "rumors" about "potential foreign interference in elections" triggered by the arrest of poll worker management systems firm Konnech's CEO on charges related to storing data on Chinese servers.

EIP has a history of trying to knock down allegations of ballot harvesting, regardless of their factual grounding.

While acknowledging that the legality of third-party ballot collection and delivery varies by state, and that it can't flag harvesting narratives with "no falsifiable claims," EIP said two years ago the term "harvesting" is "increasingly disassociated with its original meaning and applied broadly to vote stealing and vote tampering allegations," usually against Democrats.

In an unsigned statement to Just the News, consortium member UW Center for an Informed Public said the EIP did not take action to encourage Twitter to flag the recent JTN story on ballot harvesting. It emphasized that "platforms are independent entities and make their own decisions about whether and how to respond" to submissions by EIP and others.

This spring UW's Center for an Informed Public aimed to knock down the related narrative of ballot "trafficking" made popular by the Dinesh D'Souza documentary "2000 Mules."

Such rhetoric, the center declared on its web site, "encompasses a potentially misleading framing of ballot collection violations and invites confusion of the ultimate impact of such violations," implying that ballots themselves are "invalid or illegal" and connecting to "terms popular in conspiracy theory communities."

In a spring presentation on the consortium's "rapid response coding schema" in anticipation of the 2022 midterm elections, a CIP researcher said they did a "small scale proof-of-concept test with the codebook" on the phrases "ballot trafficking" and "2000 Mules" on Twitter. She said they also worried about "disinformation" that makes people "fearful of becoming vaccinated."

Musk has tried to play both sides of the free-speech debate. In a statement to advertisers, some of whom reportedly threatened boycotts if Trump is reinstated, Musk said he wants to make the platform "a common digital town square where a wide range of beliefs can be debated" without becoming "a free-for-all-hellscape, where anything can be said with no consequences!"

 

Dear Twitter Advertisers pic.twitter.com/GMwHmInPAS

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 27, 2022

Free speech advocates, including Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression CEO Greg Lukianoff, are pushing the Tesla CEO to adopt First Amendment principles in Twitter's content moderation practices.

Alliance Defending Freedom senior counsel Jeremy Tedesco, who manages its Viewpoint Diversity Score Business Index, told Just the News that Musk's actions "so far are a good indicator that he's serious about implementing change for the better."

Twitter can raise its 6% index score by "eliminating speech codes that rely on vague terms like 'misinformation' and 'hate speech,'" which functionally protect "popular ideas and powerful people," Tedesco said.

It has a history of hypocrisy by using "hateful conduct" or "misinformation" policies to "crack down on viewpoints concerning gender ideology, Covid lockdowns, and other contentious issues its employees disagree with."

Whatever limits it places on content "should be shaped with surgical precision to give users clear notice of the boundaries and prevent employees' biases from infecting their enforcement decisions," Tedesco said. His index won't "penalize or reward advertisers" based on how they respond to Twitter policy changes, however.

 

Greg Piper

Source: https://justthenews.com/accountability/cancel-culture/election-misinformation-group-denies-reporting-just-news-twitter

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Congressional Dem Staffer Caught Working for China - Daniel Greenfield

 

by Daniel Greenfield

If you're gonna work for Communists, why settle for anything less than the real thing?

 

If you’re gonna work for Communists, why settle for anything less than the real thing?

I had just wrapped an article on Communist Chinese influence on the midterms, but there’s always more. Beijing understands that personnel is policy and they’re getting their people in anywhere they can and subverting our people where possible. Even at the congressional staffer level.

One congressional aide told NR that after he ignored several emails from Chinese embassy staff requesting a meeting about one of his boss’s bills earlier this year, Hamlett, a 34-year veteran of Capitol Hill, called his office and then showed up in person, asking him to step outside for a conversation.

“So she comes to my office and asks that we step out into the hallway, and she says she is friends with the embassy and that they have been trying to get in contact with me,” the congressional aide said, on condition of anonymity. She wanted to schedule a lunch. He agreed to coffee.

But when the aide showed up for the meeting in June, Hamlett didn’t participate in the discussion. In fact, she sat at a different table with a female embassy staff member, NR was told. The aide then had a one-on-one discussion with a male embassy staffer, who was “talking about one of my boss’s bills. They do not like it.”

Staffers aren’t paid well. China apparently pays better.

In recent weeks, NR has learned, Hamlett had also attempted to schedule a separate meeting between a Republican aide and a Chinese diplomat after that aide had, likewise, ignored emails from Chinese embassy staff.

She introduced herself in a message sent from an official House of Representatives email account. “I have worked on The Hill for nearly 34 yrs. and worked 5 of those years as Deputy Scheduler to the late Senator Arlen Specter,” she wrote, inviting the staffer to a lunch meeting. “I would like to introduce you to some friends of mine that work at the Chinese Embassy who would like to meet you and have a chat,” the email continued.

And she didn’t think that this would be a problem. But in the current swamp that is D.C., there are no more standards.

Or fairly few ones.

Hamlett didn’t seem to know how the game was played. You’re supposed to leave your job and get a job with a lobbying firm in which you use your knowledge of the system to conduct outreach to target other staffers.

Instead, she jumped the gun.

A House Democratic staffer was fired after her outreach to other congressional aides allegedly on behalf of the Chinese embassy was revealed this week, National Review has learned. After an investigation found that the staffer had acted improperly, her boss, Representative Don Beyer, swiftly removed her.

Is Podesta hiring?

Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical Left and Islamic terrorism.

Source: https://www.frontpagemag.com/congressional-dem-staffer-caught-working-for-china/

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Russia and Iran, New "Axis of Evil," Emboldened by Biden Administration - Majid Rafizadeh

 

by Majid Rafizadeh

It is now time to abandon the "nuclear deal" with Iran permanently, "close the sky" over Ukraine, and quickly defeat Putin.

• Despite this escalation [Iran supplying suicide drones to Russia], the European Union would not admit that the Iranian regime was entrenched in the war on Ukraine: EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell wanted "proof"....

• Iran's regime, apparently even more emboldened, then began sending troops to Crimea to assist Russia in its attacks on Ukraine's infrastructure and civilian population and to increase the effectiveness of the suicide drones.

• "Ukraine currently doesn't have effective air defense systems against ballistic missiles," Ukraine Air Force spokesman Yuriy Ihnat pleaded. "Iran will likely supply those (to Russia), unless the world finds a way to stop it".

• There is still clearly a need in Ukraine to "close the sky," a request that Speaker of the US House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi rejected.

• So, as a result of the Biden administration, the new "Axis of Evil," Russia and Iran, are becoming more empowered and emboldened than ever. It is now time to abandon the "nuclear deal" with Iran permanently, "close the sky" over Ukraine, and quickly defeat Putin. At least it will show the other aggressors there is no way they can win.

Pictured: Firefighters in Kyiv, Ukraine try to put out a fire in a four-story residential building, in which three people were killed when it was hit by a "kamikaze drone" (many of which are supplied to Russian forces by Iran), on October 17, 2022. (Photo by Paula Bronstein/Getty Images)

Thanks to the Biden administration's leadership, or remarkable lack thereof, the ruling mullahs of Iran have become a key player in Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The Iranian regime and Russia are ratcheting up their military cooperation and adventurism.

On March 2, Iran abstained from the United Nations General Assembly Resolution ES-11/1 condemning Russia's invasion and demanding Moscow's withdrawal from Ukraine. Tehran then voted against UN General Assembly Resolution ES-11/3, which suspended Russia's membership in the UN Human Rights Council.

The Biden administration and the European Union, all the same, continued negotiating with the ruling mullahs to revive the toxic Iran "nuclear deal" and lift the sanctions in place against the Islamic Republic.

Russia and Iran, evidently further emboldened and empowered, then organized a visit by Russian President Vladimir Putin to the Islamic Republic, where he received huge support for Moscow's invasion of Ukraine from the Iranian regime's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. After that visit, Iran's supplying of kamikaze drones to Russia became the first instance seen of military cooperation between Moscow and Tehran.

On September 23, the Ukrainian foreign ministry stripped Iran's ambassador in Kyiv of his accreditation and reduced the embassy's diplomatic staff there, according to the Ukrainian foreign ministry's press service. Despite this escalation, the European Union would not admit that the Iranian regime was entrenched in the war on Ukraine: EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell wanted "proof".

"We will look for concrete evidence about the participation [of Iran in the Ukraine war]", he told reporters as he arrived for a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg on October 17.

The EU ultimately acknowledged that the Iranian regime was indeed "provid[ing] military support for Russia's unprovoked and unjustified war of aggression against Ukraine" via "development and delivery of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles to Russia".

"These cowardly drone strikes," British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly noted in a statement, "are an act of desperation. By enabling these strikes, these individuals and a manufacturer have caused the people of Ukraine untold suffering."

Iran's regime, apparently even more emboldened, then began sending troops to Crimea to assist Russia in its attacks on Ukraine's infrastructure and civilian population and to increase the effectiveness of the suicide drones.

The White House actually admitted on October 20, 2022 that it had evidence that Iranian troops were "directly engaged on the ground" in Crimea supporting Russian drone attacks. "The systems themselves were suffering failures and not performing to the standards that apparently the customers expected," National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby acknowledged. "So the Iranians decided to move in some trainers and some technical support to help the Russians use them with better lethality."

Now the Iranian regime, presumably even more emboldened, will be providing ballistic missile to Russia in addition to the drones. Iran's regime has the largest and most diverse ballistic missile arsenal in the Middle East.

"Ukraine currently doesn't have effective air defense systems against ballistic missiles," Ukraine Air Force spokesman Yuriy Ihnat pleaded. "Iran will likely supply those (to Russia), unless the world finds a way to stop it".

There is still clearly a need in Ukraine to "close the sky," a request that Speaker of the US House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi rejected.

Several top Iranian generals are directly involved in the war against Ukraine; they most likely received their orders from the Supreme Leader. Major-General Mohammad Hossein Bagheri, who is the Chief of Staff of Iran's Armed Forces and supervises Iran's military Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) program, is a key player in Iran's military cooperation with Moscow. He is "involved in the expansion of Iranian-made UAVs abroad; in this capacity, he inaugurated an assembly line in Tajikistan destined for the export of Ababil-2 drones. He also participated in the development of Mohajer-6 drones and their supply to the Russian Federation for their use in the war of aggression against Ukraine."

Also Brigadier-General Saeed Aghajani, who is the Commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps's Aerospace Force Unmanned Aerial Vehicle "oversees and directs the planning, equipment and training for Iran's UAV operations, which include also the supply of drones to international allies of Iran, including the Russian Federation".

General Sayed Hojatollah Qureishi, in charge of the Supply, Research, and Industrial Affairs Division at the Iranian Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics (MODAFL), was behind "negotiating the agreement with the Russian Federation in relation to the supply of Iranian-made Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) for their use in the war of aggression against Ukraine."

So, because of the Biden administration, the new "Axis of Evil," Russia and Iran, are becoming more empowered and emboldened than ever. It is now time to abandon the "nuclear deal" with Iran permanently, "close the sky" over Ukraine, and quickly defeat Putin. At least it will show the other aggressors there is no way they can win.

• Follow Majid Rafizadeh on Twitter

 
Dr. Majid Rafizadeh is a business strategist and advisor, Harvard-educated scholar, political scientist, board member of Harvard International Review, and president of the International American Council on the Middle East. He has authored several books on Islam and US Foreign Policy. He can be reached at Dr.Rafizadeh@Post.Harvard.Edu

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19051/russia-iran-evil-emboldened

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PA: More Lions’ Den gunmen expected to surrender - Khaled Abu Toameh

 

by Khaled Abu Toameh

Last week, four Lions’ Den gunmen surrendered to the Palestinian security forces in a move that is seen as a first step toward dismantlement.

 

PALESTINIANS ATTEND the funeral of five terrorists belonging to the Lions’ Den group who were killed by Israeli forces in Nablus on October 25

(photo credit: NASSER ISHTAYEH/FLASH90)

More members of the Lions’ Den armed group in Nablus are expected to hand themselves over to the Palestinian Authority security forces in the coming days, a senior Palestinian official said on Saturday.

The official told The Jerusalem Post that negotiations were continuing between senior Palestinian officials and members of the group to persuade them to lay down their weapons in return for being recruited to the PA security forces.

“Our goal is to prevent more bloodshed,” the official told the Post. “We have good reason to believe that more gunmen will accept our offer to join the Palestinian security forces.”

Last week, four Lions’ Den gunmen surrendered to the Palestinian security forces in a move that is seen by many Palestinians as a first step toward dismantling the armed group, which has carried out a series of shooting attacks against Israeli soldiers and civilians in the Nablus area over the past few weeks.

One of the gunmen who surrendered is Mahmoud al-Banna, a senior commander of the terrorist group. The move came after Israeli security forces raided the Old City of Nablus and killed five Palestinians, including another top commander of the group, Wadee al-Houh.

In the Lions' Den Resistance Brigades Emblem, there is a Cresent, which inside of it is Arabic text reading ''Lions' den,'' on top are briefly two AR-15 assault rifles across from each other. (credit: Wikimedia Commons)

The surrender of the four gunmen is considered a blow to the Lions’ Den, which said in a statement that those who handed themselves over to the PA security forces did so on their own and not as a result of a decision by the group.

Lions' Den say they are here to stay

In another statement on Friday night, the Lions’ Den said that those who think the armed group has disbanded are laboring under an illusion. The group added that its members have been divided into three parts: those who have already been killed, those who have been injured and those who are still ready to continue fighting.

After the statement was issued, hundreds of Palestinians took to the streets of Nablus to voice support for the group, chanting “With our blood, with our soul, we redeem you Lions’ Den.”

Some of the group’s gunmen who participated in the rally said they will “continue to fight until the last bullet and last man.”

In a related development, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) have expressed opposition to the PA’s effort to persuade the gunmen in Nablus to lay down their weapons.

Hamas spokesperson Abdel Latif Qanou said the presence of the Lions’ Den marks the beginning of a new phase of “resistance” against Israel. “The West Bank is witnessing an escalating revolution against the Zionist enemy,” Qanou said. “The occupation will not succeed in eliminating the Lions’ De.”

Senior Islamic Jihad official Khaled al-Batsh also warned about attempts to eliminate the armed group, calling on West Bank  Palestinians to support the “resistance.” Batsh also called for the establishment of a “unified national leadership” to manage the work of the armed groups both in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Khaled Abu Toameh

Source: https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/article-720958

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Turkey: A NATO Ally? - Burak Bekdil

 

by Burak Bekdil

Western bigwigs did not even get the message when in 2013 Erdoğan spoke of Eurasian dictatorships as "countries with which we have common values." He was just speaking what, to him, was the truth.

• What do members, future members, dialogue partners and future dialogue partners of this exotic blend of nations [the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, SCO] have in common?

• With their growing democratic deficits and authoritarian-to-dictatorship regimes, they are at cold war with the world's democratic bloc of nations.

• "I told Putin... Let us in so we'll break up with the EU. The Shanghai Five is better [than the EU]. It is much more powerful. [With membership] we'll have a chance to be together with the countries with which we share common values" — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, January 2013.

• And finally, in September 2022, Erdoğan became the first head of a NATO state attending an SCO summit, in Uzbekistan.... Erdoğan went to the summit upon Putin's personal invitation.

• This is the natural outcome of West's deaf ears and blind eyes. When Erdoğan first spoke of SCO membership for Turkey a decade ago, Western capitals reacted with shy laughter and a misdiagnosis: that Erdoğan was just bluffing to win quicker membership accession to the European Union.

• Western bigwigs did not even get the message when in 2013 Erdoğan spoke of Eurasian dictatorships as "countries with which we have common values." He was just speaking what, to him, was the truth.

• Funny, Erdoğan became the first NATO head of state attending an SCO summit while pressuring Congress for the delivery of U.S.-made F-16 Block 70 fighter aircraft for his air force. Behind closed doors in Washington, his envoys and back channels will be telling their U.S. audience that "Turkey's future is in the Western bloc, that the SCO talk is for Turkey's balancing act between its commitment to the West and its inevitable proximity with Russia."

• Turks are living in a totally different economic realm than the recent past. Turkey's official annual inflation climbed to a fresh 24-year high of 80% in August -- though ENAG, an independent research organization, estimated the true annual inflation rate at 181% for the same period. Worse may be yet to come.

• Meanwhile, Turkey's currency, the lira, has lost more than half of its value against the US dollar since 2021.

What do members, future members, dialogue partners and future dialogue partners of the exotic blend of nations that is the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) have in common? With their growing democratic deficits and authoritarian-to-dictatorship regimes, they are at cold war with the world's democratic bloc of nations. Pictured: Leaders of member states, observers and partners of the SCO pose for a photo at the SCO Summit in Samarkand, Uzbekistan on September 16, 2022. (Photo by Sergei Bobylyov/Sputnik/AFP via Getty Images)

The Shanghai Five group, which later became the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), was created on April 26, 1996 with the signing of the Treaty on Deepening Military Trust in Border Regions, in Shanghai by the heads of states of China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Tajikistan.

Full members of Russian President Vladimir Putin's de facto answer to NATO, in addition to the Shanghai Five group, are Uzbekistan, Iran, India and Pakistan, with Belarus going through the accession process. Afghanistan and Mongolia are observer states. Sri Lanka, Turkey, Cambodia, Azerbaijan, Nepal, Armenia, Egypt, Qatar and Saudi Arabia are dialogue partners.

What do members, future members, dialogue partners and future dialogue partners of this exotic blend of nations have in common?

With their growing democratic deficits and authoritarian-to-dictatorship regimes, they are at cold war with the world's democratic bloc of nations.

A brief chronology:

• "Let us [Turkey] in and we'll review our European Union (EU) membership bid" -- Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said in July 2012 -- the same year Turkey became a dialogue partner of SCO.
• "I told Putin... Let us in so we'll break up with the EU. The Shanghai Five is better [than the EU]. It is much more powerful. [With membership] we'll have a chance to be together with the countries with which we share common values" -- Erdoğan, in January 2013.
• "Why should Turkey not be in the Five?" – Erdoğan, in March 2016.
• And finally, in September 2022, Erdoğan became the first head of a NATO state attending an SCO summit, in Uzbekistan. "Our relations with these countries will be moved to a much different position with this step," Erdoğan said there. When asked if he meant membership of the SCO, he said, "Of course, that's the target." But it is also Putin's target, like putting another slow-fuse time bomb at NATO headquarters. Erdoğan went to the summit upon Putin's personal invitation.

This is the natural outcome of West's deaf ears and blind eyes. When Erdoğan first spoke of SCO membership for Turkey a decade ago, Western capitals reacted with shy laughter and a misdiagnosis: that Erdoğan was just bluffing to win quicker membership accession to the European Union.

Western bigwigs did not even get the message when in 2013 Erdoğan spoke of Eurasian dictatorships as "countries with which we have common values." He was just speaking what, to him, was the truth.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said last month that he was "very irritated" by Turkey's attempts to join this Central Asian security-and-everything-else bloc dominated by Russia and China. Sorry, too late.

Funny, Erdoğan became the first NATO head of state attending an SCO summit while pressuring Congress for the delivery of U.S.-made F-16 Block 70 fighter aircraft for his air force. Behind closed doors in Washington, his envoys and back channels will be telling their U.S. audience that "Turkey's future is in the Western bloc, that the SCO talk is for Turkey's balancing act between its commitment to the West and its inevitable proximity with Russia."

Putin announced at the SCO summit on September 16:

"Our agreement on deliveries of Russian natural gas to Turkey should come into effect in the near future, with 25% of payment for these deliveries in Russian roubles."

After Western sanctions hit Russia, five Turkish banks joined the Russian Mir payment system (although two later withdrew), effectively crippling the sanctions imposed in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February. Some Turkish banks suspended their corporate lending after the Turkish government's latest raft of regulations raised their costs and forced many to cut their balance sheet risks.

All the same, Erdoğan's Eurasianism, his revisionist neo-Ottoman policies, and aggression against Greece and Cyprus may not work like the miracle tools he might have been hoping for in the run-up to presidential and parliamentary elections in June 2023. He has recently threatened to invade Greek islands in the Aegean Sea. He has threatened to launch a new military incursion into Syria, where Turkish soldiers are already fighting U.S.-backed Kurdish groups. In the past, such tools always worked to lift up Turks' nationalist spirit and earned Erdoğan votes. But Turks are living in a totally different economic realm than the recent past.

Turkey's official annual inflation climbed to a fresh 24-year high of 80% in August -- though ENAG, an independent research organization, estimated the true annual inflation rate at 181% for the same period. Worse may be yet to come.

EPDK, the Turkish electricity regulator, and its natural gas distribution counterpart Botas, have just decided to increase electricity and gas prices by 20% for private individuals, and 50% for companies. This measure should further accelerate inflation in the country.

Among member states of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Turkey has seen the highest increase in energy prices in the last year. According to Euronews, Botas' natural gas wholesale price rose 1,330% for electricity generation, 997% for industrial use and 216% for residential use. Meanwhile, Turkey's currency, the lira, has lost more than half of its value against the US dollar since 2021.

According to the findings of the pollster Optimar, 76.6% of Turks say their top problem is inflation and unemployment. This is not a good omen for the leader of a country where the per capita income in the last decade fell from $13,000 to $8,000, and who is heading into a presidential election.

Burak Bekdil, one of Turkey's leading journalists, was recently fired from the country's most noted newspaper after 29 years, for writing in Gatestone what is taking place in Turkey. He is a Fellow at the Middle East Forum.

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19028/turkey-nato-ally

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Democrats, media jump the gun to pin Paul Pelosi assault on Trump, Republicans - Natalia Mittelstadt

 

by Natalia Mittelstadt

The alleged attacker, David DePape, identified himself as a Green Party member.

Following the attack on Paul Pelosi, Democrats and the media quickly framed the alleged assailant as a right-wing conspiracy theorist incited to violence by rhetoric from former President Donald Trump and Republicans.

The husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was allegedly attacked in their home by 42-year-old suspect David DePape with a hammer as police arrived on the scene. Paul Pelosi was rushed into surgery Friday morning with a fractured skull but is expected to make a full recovery.

San Francisco Police Chief William Scott said DePape — who reportedly yelled, "Where's Nancy?" — will be charged with "attempted homicide, assault with a deadly weapon, elder abuse, burglary and several other additional felonies."

In CNN's original story on the attack, it noted that DePape "posted memes and conspiracy theories on Facebook about Covid vaccines, the 2020 election and the January 6 attack, and an acquaintance told CNN that he seemed 'out of touch with reality.'"

According to CNN, one post on the suspect's since-removed Facebook account was titled "Democrat FARCE Commission to Investigate January 6th Capitol Riot COLLAPSES in Congress!!!"

Another CNN story, which was updated after the original article, began by mentioning the above "conspiracy theories" before adding later in the story, "A 2013 article in the San Francisco Chronicle identified him as a 'hemp jewelry maker,' and said that he lived with a nudist activist."

The Chronicle reported on a blog removed on Friday that was reportedly authored by DePape, noting that many of the posts "repeated far-right conspiracy theories or included bigoted language about Black people, Muslims, Jews, immigrants and LGBTQ people."

Another post on the blog was titled "The woke are Racists with a guilty conscience," according to the Chronicle.

The outlet also noted that photos from its 2013 story "show a fully clothed DePape dancing with famed nudist activist Gypsy Taub and her new husband Jaymz Smith," as he "was the best man at the wedding."

"DePape was one of a number of activists who took to the streets to promote public nudity in 2011 and 2012," according to State Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), the Chronicle reported.

Years ago, "DePape listed himself as a member of the Green Party," according to another story the outlet wrote on him.

MSNBC opinion columnist Ruth Ben-Ghiat was quick to link the attack on Pelosi to violent Trumpian rhetoric.

"Trump's fateful speech — which directly preceded the breach of the U.S. Capitol — shows how demagogues can get people into this different state of mind," Ben-Ghiat wrote on Friday. "Much ink has been spilled in recent years worrying whether increasing polarization in the United States is to blame for increased likelihood of political violence. But that view misses the mark. Trump and his followers engage in something wholly different from polarization: survivalism."

The MSNBC Twitter account posted the article with the caption: "The far-right preaches violence and fear. Then an armed man broke into Nancy Pelosi's home."

 

The lunatic who allegedly assaulted Paul Pelosi is a Berkeley resident and a ‘Former Castro Nudist Protester’ and hemp ‘jewelry maker’ ...sounds totally MAGA Republican to me. 🤣🤣

— Tim Young (@TimRunsHisMouth) October 28, 2022

Meanwhile, actor and outspoken progressive Democrat Rob Reiner tweeted on Friday: "Donald Trump has been spreading The Big Lie for 2 years. The violent assault on Paul Pelosi and the attempt to murder Speaker Pelosi is directly related to that Lie. Donald Trump is 100% responsible for this and Jan.6. He must be indicted and never be allowed to hold office."

 

Or maybe a billionaire-fueled propaganda channel that regularly generates high volumes of death threats to elected officials while pumping propaganda for an extreme right-wing that openly embraces fascism is what’s creating “the environment where it happened” https://t.co/wfCYKWXU8N

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) October 28, 2022

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) retweeted a clip of Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) on Fox News. Letting "dangerous criminals out on the streets with bail and not put them in prison, you're just asking for this sort of incident to happen," McCaul says in the clip. "And I think it created the environment where this happens."

The New York congresswoman responded in her tweet: "Or maybe a billionaire-fueled propaganda channel that regularly generates high volumes of death threats to elected officials while pumping propaganda for an extreme right-wing that openly embraces fascism is what's creating 'the environment where it happened.'"

Others, like author and comedian Tim Young, weren't entirely persuaded by the instant effort on the left to identify Pelosi's attacker with the populist right. "The lunatic who allegedly assaulted Paul Pelosi," he tweeted drily, "is a Berkeley resident and a 'Former Castro [District] Nudist Protester' and hemp 'jewelry maker' ... sounds totally MAGA Republican to me."

 

Natalia Mittelstadt

Source: https://justthenews.com/accountability/media/right-wing-extremist-or-nudist-activist-disparate-theories-emerge-pelosi

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