%20(1)%20(4)%20(1)%20(1).jpg)
Until then, demand for energy will continue to be met by oil, gas (natural as well as liquid), coal and eventually hydrogen.
From an investment standpoint, I recognize stocks that produce the above will remain cyclical but they will also make investors money and are likely to increase their % share of the S&P Index.
Greens are dreamers, ahead of the curve and zealots rather than rational beings.
So are those who believe marijuana is not harmful and does not eventually lead to more powerful drug usage resulting in death.
Call me old fashioned.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
Democrats are truly shameless. How so? They have perfected the ability to accuse others of what they are doing and do not give a damn about the visible hypocrisy. Hillary, Obama, Biden all crooked as twisted snakes. Schumer, Waters, Pelosi and Schiff no better. Moving away from actual politicians we then come upon the Hollywood elites and the social media titans and in the financial world the corrupt Wall Street tycoons.
There are cracks beginning to develop in their ranks and this is making them paranoid. In order to retain power they are now going after entire agencies like the Justice Department IRS, FBI, Department of Education and EPA to name a few.
The Democrat Party has become a cancer which must be eradicated.
And:
SECURE OUR ELECTIONS
FIRST- Democrats did everything in their power to ban Voter ID and supported other measures that make it easier to cheat in our elections.
THEN- Democrats opened our southern border to pretty much anyone and everyone who wanted to come across.
NOW- They want to expedite the process to let non-citizens vote for major positions starting in our nation’s capital!
To no surprise, the Democrats are pulling out all the stops just weeks before the midterm elections!
We are down to the wire and time is of the essence, Richard! You signature is needed to secure our elections and BLOCK the Dems from opening up the floodgates to fraud.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ We have a perfect opportunity to seed Iran with discord but Biden will not move forward.
+++
Sure the Ayatollah shaking in his robe:
+++
Breaking: Biden Warns Iran That They Will ‘Face Costs’ Over Protests
+++
Iran Protests Reignite as Universities, Schools Reopen
President Raisi is heckled as he accused the West of orchestrating unrest
By Sune Engel Rasmussen
As large street rallies have mostly subsided, the protest movement has moved inside universities and schools. As they reopened on Saturday, the first day of the Iranian week, protests broke out after two days of relative calm.
The streets of the capital Tehran were clogged throughout the afternoon with cars honking their horns in solidarity with the protest movement, drivers shouting “we want freedom” to each other. On the sidewalk, schoolgirls and women marched without the legally mandated headscarf, or hijab, the shedding of which has become the main tool of protest. Some of them shouted “death to the dictator.” In some parts, security forces used teargas to disperse them.
Thousands of protesters gathered outside Amirkabir University of Technology in Tehran, according to video posted online.
Protesters clashed with security forces around the city’s main bazaar, where shopkeepers went on strike. Footage showed a police post on fire. Joining the widening national strike, shopkeepers across the country, particularly in the western region of Kurdistan, also kept their shutters down.
In Tehran, Mr. Raisi visited the all-female al-Zahra University to speak to a crowd of supporters to mark the new academic year. He used the opportunity to claim the antigovernment protests were orchestrated by Iran’s foreign enemies, likely referring to the U.S. and Israel as in the past. Such claims are a familiar tactic for the country’s leadership.
“The enemy assumed that it could pursue its goals in universities, ignorant that our students and professors are vigilant and don’t let the enemy’s inadvisable goals come true,” Mr. Raisi said. “I am confident that this generation will defeat the enemy.”
Meanwhile, students in other parts of the university heckled the president: “Raisi, get lost!” according to video posted online.
At Tehran University, protesters clashed with pro-government people, according to state media, which said the students were locked inside the university to prevent outsiders from meddling in the gathering. Special forces had secured the area.
One of the university’s most prominent political-science professors, Sadegh Zibakalam, was banned from teaching at Tehran University by the school’s security department, and his course was given to another professor, he told the Tehran-based reformist daily Shargh on Saturday.
The protest movement was ignited by the Sept. 16 death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in custody of the morality police, after she was detained for allegedly violating Iran’s strict Islamic dress code.
Since then, protests have spread widely and morphed from calls to abolish mandatory veiling to an outright ouster of the Islamic Republic leadership, which has been in power since 1979
The government has imposed tight Internet restrictions, particularly on cellphone networks. Iran’s telecommunications minister Saturday confirmed that Instagram and WhatsApp had been blocked due to their alleged refusal to accept Iranian rules. Four years ago, Iran justified the censoring of Telegram by saying the app didn’t accept Iran’s requirements to apply for permission to operate in the country, follow Iran’s privacy regulations and move some servers to Iran to process Iranian users’ data inside the country.
As the government has sought to suppress the uprising with lethal force, the number of identified children killed in clashes is growing, adding fuel to public anger and increasing the number of faces the protest movement is now rallying around.
Earlier in the week the protests found new impetus when word spread on social media that a 16-year-old student, Nika Shahkarami, had died after taking part in a women’s rights rally, and that authorities had taken her body to prevent her family from giving her a proper burial.
A lawyer in Tehran posted on Twitter what he said was the burial certificate of a 14-year-old boy killed by a bullet to the head during the protests. “Do not announce tomorrow that he committed suicide or [died] due to previous illness,” the lawyer, Ali Sharifzadeh, said. The Iranian government has claimed that Ms. Shahkarimi fell from a roof, and that Ms. Amini died of illness.
Another teenager, Sarina Esmailzadeh, died while participating in protests, according to social-media posts and rights group Amnesty International. Amnesty said she died after being severely beaten in the head with batons. Iranian authorities say Ms. Esmailzadeh also died after falling from a roof.
Aresu Eqbali and Benoit Faucon contributed to this article.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Perhaps our Jew hating ant-Semitic Ambassador could spend an equal amount of time working toward eliminating Palestinian terrorism and wanton murders.
+++
Ambassador Nides Boasts: I Work Every Day to Eliminate Jewish Settlements
By David Israel
Ambassador Tom Nides told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in an exclusive interview last Friday he was enamored with Prime Minister Yair Lapid for “his brave comments on the importance of the two-state solution” in Lapid’s recent speech before the United Nations General Assembly.
“We are under no illusions here that I will be standing in the Rose Garden receiving the Nobel Peace Prize for getting the two-state solution, but it’s important that we create the conditions on the ground for a two-state solution,” Nides said, adding: “And that includes helping the Palestinian people.”
And, naturally, while helping those nice “Palestinian people,” Nides reiterated the Biden administration’s policy on Jewish communities on the same lands, saying, “We do not support settlement growth. Period. I work every day behind the scenes, with the Israelis, to try and eliminate, slow down, or avoid that.”
He defended his right to meddle in Israel’s affairs, saying, “We can’t dictate to them what they can or can’t do, but I can put as much pressure as I can to make sure they understand our position.”
The ambassador also defended Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Robert Menendez’s right to warn Benjamin Netanyahu that should he include Ben-Gvir in his future government it would damage Israel’s relations with the US. Nides stressed that he “won’t get involved in the politics of Israel before an election,” but insisted that American politicians have the right to voice their opinions on anything and anyone.
“We are free to articulate our anxieties or concerns vis-a-vis making sure that the values that we state are played out here in Israel as well as we believe they should be,” Nides said.
Otzma Yehudit, MK Itamar Ben Gvir appeared on Channel 13 News and Ynet and accused Prime Minister Yair Lapid of enlisting US officials to prevent Ben Gvir’s inclusion in the next government. He insisted that this is a dangerous precedent when a prime minister invites the Americans to interfere in the elections in Israel. He also invited Lapid to file a defamation suit against him – Ben Gvir is ready to drop his Knesset immunity.
On Tuesday, Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Ca), a pro-Israel good guy, urged Israeli politicians to “ostracize” Ben-Gvir, declaring that Ben-Gvir’s “outrageous views run contrary to Israel’s core principles of a democratic and Jewish state.” Sherman insisted that “these extremists undermine Israel’s interests and the US-Israel relationship, which I and my colleagues have worked to strengthen.”
Of course, I would be astonished if Menendez or Sherman were familiar with Ben Gvir’s political agenda before the calls from Lapid’s people.
Finally, another takeaway from Nide’s JTA interview, to set us straight both about the ambassador and the news outlet: “Nides, who grew up in Minnesota as a liberal Reform Jew and went to synagogue only during the High Holidays, is a firm believer in equality at the Western Wall in Jerusalem,” writes JTA’s Jotam Confino. He quotes the ambassador who declares: “I have no tolerance for anyone being hurt or attacked for doing what they believe is their religious belief at the Western Wall. Both on the Orthodox and Reform sides, and for women and men. I think everyone should use this religious site for their own spirituality.”
Go to the interview and plug in the words “Temple Mount.” I did, looking to see if Nides feels similarly about the religious rights of Jews, 20 meters or so above the Kotel. Nothing. Nada. Gurnisht. Crickets.
Folks, we once had a friend in the US embassy. We no longer do.
++++++++++++++++++++
Good morning. Frustrated and isolated, North Korea is conducting more missile tests than ever.
By Ian Prasad Philbrick
North Korea has for decades been testing nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles in defiance of international demands to stop. North Korea’s authoritarian leader, Kim Jong-un, has picked up the pace this year, testing a record number of missiles so far. The North fired 12 in the past two weeks alone, including two early today. Last week, one flew over Japan, the first such launch since 2017, setting off alarms and panicking residents.
I called Choe Sang-Hun, The Times’s bureau chief in Seoul, who also covers the North, to learn more.
Sources: Center for Strategic and International Studies; The New York Times
Ian: Why is Kim escalating his country’s weapons program now?
Sang-Hun: North Korea is protesting recent military exercises by South Korea, Japan and the U.S. But more frequent weapons tests are also part of Kim’s long-term goal. He wants to expand his country’s nuclear and missile capabilities for self-defense. He may also want to use them as a bargaining chip to get diplomatic and economic concessions from the U.S. and its allies. Under American-led U.N. resolutions, North Korea has been banned since 2017 from exporting its major commodities — including coal, iron ore, seafood and textiles — which hurts its economy.
North Korea is frustrated, isolated and uncertain about its future. Kim sat down with President Donald Trump in 2018 and 2019 and tried to use North Korea’s nuclear capabilities as leverage to get the U.S. to lift or ease the sanctions. It didn’t work. So Kim has tried to force the Americans back to the negotiating table. To do that, he has to test weapons, ratcheting up the threat to the U.S. and its allies.
That’s a major reason for North Korea to build up its capabilities now; it has to have a deep arsenal to be able to negotiate some of it away. North Korea wants recognition as a nuclear power, but some analysts think it will eventually offer to arm itself only with short-range nuclear weapons, which can still serve as a deterrent, but give up its longer-range missile capabilities in exchange for economic concessions from Washington.
How do people in South Korea live with the nuclear threat from North Korea?
For South Korea, missile tests have become routine. The government condemns them as provocations, and North Korea policy is a perpetual political issue, but ordinary people don’t really pay attention to them. They’re more concerned about inflation and domestic political scandals. South Koreans like to say that when North Korea does something provocative, their relatives in the U.S. — who read American media — are more concerned than they are.
Tensions are not as high as in 2017, when Kim and Trump were exchanging insults and threats of nuclear holocaust. There was tangible fear then, even in South Korea.
How do North Koreans regard the tests?
While we don’t have independent journalists doing interviews in North Korea, we do know that state propaganda and totalitarian control work there. My only visit to Pyongyang was in 2005, shortly after I joined The Times. I remember seeing what are called the Arirang Mass Games. It’s a totalitarian spectacle. North Korea has one of the largest stadiums in the world, and it was crammed with thousands of young children who had trained for months to perform while holding colored signs, moving like robots in such perfect synchronization that they actually created moving pictures that flashed communist slogans. They were like human pixels.
I witnessed how ordinary people’s lives are affected by propaganda. It’s clear that many North Koreans consider the country’s nuclear weapons a matter of national pride, a symbol of dignity, independence and empowerment. The government tells its people that the U.S. wants to invade North Korea and that nuclear weapons will protect them from the evil, imperialist Americans and their lackeys in South Korea and Japan.
North Korea likes to compare itself to a porcupine bristling with needles, deterring the American tiger. That’s how it justifies spending resources on developing and testing weapons. You can go hungry, but you can’t give up your pride is a common theme in North Korean propaganda.
You’ve reported on North Korea for decades. How do you cover such a closed society?
I talk to analysts in South Korea and to North Korean defectors. But because it’s difficult to travel internally, defectors from one part of the country often don’t know what’s happening elsewhere.
For me, the best way to understand North Korea’s government is to follow its state media. You learn to screen out the propaganda and see what the government is really saying, and develop an understanding of the ideological, historical and diplomatic context of its actions. When the outside world began noticing North Korea’s nuclear weapons program decades ago, there were many theories about its motivations. If you look back on official statements, state media articles and speeches by leaders, it’s clear that it’s been the government’s aim to build nuclear weapons all along.
More about Sang-Hun: He grew up in a village in southeastern South Korea and went to graduate school in Seoul. He didn’t plan to become a journalist but followed a friend into the field and landed a job at the English-language Korea Herald. He joined The Times after 11 years with The Associated Press.
Related: The U.S. penalized businessmen and companies it said had helped North Korea evade sanctions. It’s bracing for Kim to conduct another nuclear test.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
GOP May FLIP These Blue Seats After All...
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++https://freebeacon.com/democra
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
China has opened several police stations in Canada as well:
+++
CCP Runs Police Outpost in New York City, Part of Global Network of Transnational Repression:
By Dorothy Li
Chinese authorities have opened at least one “overseas police service station” in the United States as part of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) global transnational repression, according to human rights group Safeguard Defenders.
“These operations eschew official bilateral police and judicial cooperation and violate the international rule of law, and may violate the territorial integrity in third countries involved in setting up a parallel policing mechanism using illegal methods,” the Spain-based group said in a recent report.
The report, titled “110 Overseas: Chinese Transnational Policing Gone Wild,” examined the initiative first launched by ten “pilot provinces” in 2018. These stations were also called 110 Overseas, named after the country’s police emergency services phone number.
An outpost in New York City was among the “first batch” of 30 overseas police service stations in 21 countries set up by the Public Security Bureau in Fuzhou city, the capital of the southern coastal province of Fujian. Other Chinese cities also set up their own outposts abroad.
The Chinese police authorities’ division in New York was opened on Feb. 15, according to Dongnan News, a media outlet backed by Fujian provincial government. The center, called Fuzhou Police Oversea Service Station, is located at 107 East Broadway, inside the headquarters of the American ChangLe Association (ACA), a non profit with close ties to the Chinese regime.
Safeguard Defenders identified 54 overseas police service stations across five continents, including in cities from Toronto to Dublin.
Yet the total number of such stations is unclear. “There is no complete list of such “110 Overseas” police service stations available,” the report stated. “[T]he number is undoubtedly larger and such stations more widespread,” it added.
ACA
Established in 1998, the ACA is one of the most influential communities for immigrants from Fujian Province in the United States, according to its website.
The ACA cooperated with Fuzhou city’s Public Security Bureau to set up the Fuzhou police service station this year, the association’s chairman said at an April event at the group’s office hosting the deputy Chinese consulate general in New York, Wu Xiaoming, Dongnan News reported at the time. Wu, according to the report, recognized the association’s contribution to “promoting Sino-U.S. friendship and supporting China’s peaceful reunification.”
The New York community group, like many purportedly grassroots Chinese organizations, is linked to the Chinese Communist Party’s sprawling “united front” system. This refers to a network of thousands of overseas groups loosely overseen by the United Front Work Department, a powerful Party agency, that work to advance the regime’s interests abroad, including by carrying out foreign influence operations, suppress dissident movements, gather intelligence, and facilitate the transfer of technology to China.
The ACA has maintained close ties to the regime and has been praised for its efforts in supporting CCP and its leaders. Photos displayed on its website include the certificate of appreciation from the Chinese consulate in New York in 2015. The consulate praised the ACA for playing an active role in organizing overseas Chinese nationals to welcome Chinese leader Xi Jinping when he traveled to New York to attend the United Nations meetings at that time.
The group’s former president Zhang Zikuo in 2019 attended an official ceremony in Beijing marking the 70th year of CCP rule over China as a representative of overseas Chinese nationals in the United States, according to a 2020 report by the Fuzhou City Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese.
In May 2020, Zhang, then-president of the ACA, attended an online seminar organized by the United Front Department of Fuzhou city’s Changle District, during which they had an “in-depth study of the spirit of the two sessions,” read the report. “Two sessions” refers to annual meetings held by the regime’s rubber-stamp legislature and political advisory body.
‘Sinister Goal’
Ostensibly, the overseas police service stations serve administrative purposes, with many tasks the report said that would be “traditionally considered of a consular nature.”
For example, the New York station’s most popular service was assisting overseas Chinese in renewing driver’s licenses without returning to the country, according to an August report by Dongnan News. The report said that between March 1 to April 27, 36 applications completed an online physical examination at the station and got their driver’s licenses renewed.
The stations make overseas Chinese feel the “care and love” of the motherland, Lu Jianshun, the ACA chairman, told Dongnan News. The report mentioned that Lu is also a staff member of the New York police service station.
Safeguard Defenders, however, said such 110 overseas have a “more sinister goal as they contribute to ‘resolutely cracking down on all kinds of illegal and criminal activities involving overseas Chinese.’” Some of the stations have already been “implicated in collaborating with Chinese police in carrying out policing operations on foreign soil,” the group said.
One example provided in the report was the successful return of a Chinese fugitive surnamed Xia, who was accused of fraud and fled to Serbia.
After identifying Xia’s location in Serbia’s Belgrade, Chinese police authorities “successfully [got] in touch” with Xia through its overseas service station, the report stated, citing a 2019 article by Chinese state media. Police in Qingtian city then “directly carried out persuasion to return” through the Chinese social media app Wechat and video calls with the support of staff members of the overseas service. Chinese police, the report stated, educated Xia about “relevant policies, laws and cases” at least once every week before Xia finally actively cooperated with the police to return to China in October 2018.
From April 2021 to July 2022, an estimated 230,000 overseas Chinese nationals have been “persuaded to return” to the country to face criminal charges, according to a Chinese state media report.
Safeguard Defenders noted such “persuasion to return” involves harassment and intimidation of the target’s relatives in China. If the target refused to comply, their families could face punishment, such as their children being denied education.
“These methods allow the CCP and their security organs to circumvent normal bilateral mechanisms of police and judicial cooperation, thereby severely undermining the international rule of law and territorial integrity of the third countries involved,” the report stated.
“It leaves legal Chinese residents abroad fully exposed to extra-legal targeting by the Chinese police, with little to none of the protection theoretically ensured under both national and international law.”
The Epoch Times has reached out to the ACA, the FBI, the Department of Justice, the State Department, and the New York attorney general’s office for comment
Dorothy Li is a reporter for The Epoch Times based in Europe.
+++++++++++++++
Why Is Hollywood So Woke?
Entertainment journalist Christian Toto explores why almost everyone in Tinsel Town—from the top star to the lowest crew member—seems to fall on one side of the political spectrum. There is no shortage of reasons. But that doesn’t mean those reasons are commendable.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
This is a time lapse video of Ft. Meyers Beach and the confrontation with Ian:
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Queen Elizabeth and the Horse
Only Her Majesty could pull this off....her wonderful sense of humor is part of her legacy.
I was on Guard of Honor duty, waiting for the King of Saudi Arabia, on Horse Guard. On the right flank: Scots Guard (100 guardsmen) a gap; Her Majesty The Queen, mounted in uniform; alongside her the Commanding Officer Colonel Gerald; another gap; then, on the left flank, the Queen’s Company Grenadier Guards (100 guardsmen).
We were standing at ease, waiting . . .
Suddenly the silence was broken by Colonel Gerald’s charger erupting with horse farts at full volume for two minutes.
Embarrassed and staring straight ahead Colonel Gerald said, “Sorry about that your Majesty!”
She replied , “That’s alright Gerald, . . . I thought it was your horse!”
Two hundred guardsmen, barely able to hold in their laughter, tapped their rifle butts on the gravel. From that moment, every one of them adored her !
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
No comments:
Post a Comment