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 "When the incompetence and arrogance of its creator was revealed, the jokes began in earnest, as the internet is the perfect place to make light of serious issues. The readiness to make fun of the feckless and arrogant is understandable. In fact, there is a positive side in the willingness to engage in schadenfreude over the deadly debacle. After all, no one should argue against hostility to rule by the wealthy. Yet there is a missing side of this story about the wealthy and how they create suffering and death. The concentration of wealth grows more and more extreme and depends entirely upon exploiting millions of people and putting their lives at risk." -- Margaret Kimberley, talking about how the connection between OceanGate incident and other capitalism-driven disasters .

The introduction of this CNN story speaks volumes: The January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol was “essentially planned in plain sight on social media” and yet the FBI and Department of Homeland Security appeared to have “completely dropped the ball,” a Senate committee concluded in the latest highly critical assessment of the security failures. A new report released by Democrats on the Senate Homeland Security Committee paints a freshly damning portrait of various intelligence failures by the FBI and DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis, agencies tasked with preventing domestic terrorism. Internal communications from both agencies, obtained by Democrats on the panel, reveal new details about how top officials either ignored or dismissed clear indicators of potential violence by pro-Trump actors ahead of the US Capitol attack – leaving law enforcement unprepared for what ultimately unfolded that day. Here's one possible explanation as to why "top officials either ignored...

 Can't let a counter-narrative get in the way of the capitalist-driven Military-Industrial Complex:

 The city tries to shut the church down:

 There's a reason the story of five rich people in a shoddy sub controlled by a video game console is getting more eyeballs than other maritime tragedies:

 Just goes to show that tipping is an outdated concept and people should be paid a real wage instead of expecting gifts. How about CEOs living off tips for a change?

 If you're fine with the government having access to ALL of your financial information in exchange for making quick transactions, then by all means:

 When looking for unfiltered, non-mainstream information about foreign policy, my go-to is usually a combination of Richard Medhurst and Danny Haiphong (who surprisingly, haven't teamed up as much I expected they would but hey, people have lives). They both like to do deep dives and aren't so insecure that they can't have guests one who might (*gasp*) know something they don't.  So when the news bobbleheads were freaking out about Russia and Wagner, I thought it best to see what Haiphong and Medhurst (again, separately) had to say: I think the big take away is: governments should not outsource their military operations.  Anyway: Medhurst and Haiphong need to do more collaborations. 

 

 Now officially the US stance on Taiwan is, " The United States approach to Taiwan has remained consistent across decades and administrations.  The United States has a longstanding one China policy, which is guided by the Taiwan Relations Act, the three U.S.-China Joint Communiques, and the Six Assurances.  We oppose any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side; we do not support Taiwan independence; and we expect cross-Strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means. We continue to have an abiding interest in peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.  Consistent with the Taiwan Relations Act, the United States makes available defense articles and services as necessary to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability -– and maintains our capacity to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system, of Taiwan ." Sounds a bit weird to say the "one China poli...

  More here .

  File under , "Petty Bosses:" The Georgia autoshop owner who in 2022 paid one of this employees his final wage by dumping 91,500 oil-covered pennies in his driveway has been ordered by a federal judge to pay nearly $40,000 in additional back wages and damages to his employees, court records show. Miles Walker, owner of A OK Walker Autoworks in Peachtree City, Georgia was ordered to pay back wages in the total amount of $19,967.09, plus liquidated damages in the amount of $19,967.09, the consent judgement shows. Last year, the US Department of Labor filed a lawsuit against Walker for violating federal labor law, after he retaliated against a former employee who contacted the agency when he didn’t receive his final paycheck. He eventually paid the ex-employee, named Andreas Flaten, with roughly 90,000 pennies and a note expressing a short expletive. Flaten quit his job at A OK after an argument with his boss and contacted the Labor Department in January 2021 to say he was owed...

 

 

From the Military Times : The U.S. Navy will begin rolling out a conversational artificial intelligence program known as “Amelia” that’s capable of troubleshooting and resolving the most commonly asked tech-support questions from sailors, Marines and civilian personnel. The full rollout, expected in August, is the latest step in the $136 million Navy Enterprise Service Desk venture, meant to modernize and consolidate more than 90 IT help desks into one central node. General Dynamics Information Technology announced it was awarded the NESD indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity contract in late 2021. Sailors, Marines and civilians with a common access card and who can be verified through the Global Federated User Directory will be able to contact Amelia via phone or text. The program should serve more than 1 million users around-the-clock responses based on a depth of training and insider know-how. Additional applications, such as in a classified environment, could follow. “Predominan...

  Source (with some very interesting information). The more you know about this this tank , the more you'll understand why the groups/companies on that infographic act the way they do. 

 For Blackstone, the answer is just under $5 billion : Blackstone Group Inc BX.N said on Wednesday it agreed to acquire genealogy provider Ancestry.com Inc from private equity rivals for $4.7 billion, including debt, placing a big bet on family-tree chasing as well as personalized medicine. Ancestry.com is the world’s largest provider of DNA services, allowing customers to trace their genealogy and identify genetic health risks with tests sent to their home. Blackstone is hoping that more consumers staying at home amid the COVID-19 pandemic will turn to Ancestry.com for its services. “We believe Ancestry has significant runway for further growth as people of all ages and backgrounds become increasingly interested in learning more about their family histories and themselves,” David Kestnbaum, a Blackstone senior managing director, said in a statement. The deal is Blackstone’s first acquisition out of Blackstone Capital Partners VIII, the largest-ever private equity fund that raised ...

 Danny Haiphong met Chen Weihua and discussed the more propagandistic views the West seem to have about China:  

W hether it's JP Morgan , Google or Amazon , the big companies who should be thinking about how they treat their employees better have decided to lament how in-person collaboration is the key to their success, and sharing ideas virtually is problematic. Never mind that attitudes seemed to change after the COVID aid ran out , or when people started using that extra time from driving or being in public transportation to spend time with their families (and in the later, some of them decided they didn't want to spend more time with families!). Or that working from home has shown to be more productive .  Maybe it's the fact people were learning things and doing things the CEOs of these companies may not approve.  Here's a solution for the anti-work-from-home crowd : pay employees for their commuting to work: gas, car maintenance, parking. If you're saying that they must physically be there, those workers who are leaving an already suitable work environment at home sh...

 

 Broken during his interview with Katie Halper: Covered by Due Dissidence and Status Coup (via Ron Placone): Thoughts & Questions: Apparently Chris Hedges played an important role in this . What will the pro-Democratic Party Leftists say now? Dr. West has a platform that is distinctively different from RFK, Jr. and Marianne Williamson, and now he will be running with a party that has more ballot access. Has MPP missed their moment? Odds are that the conversations were civil, but factoring the accusations from former MPP members and other left-leaning critics, the visuals play out like this: rather than stepping down or conceding any power, Nick Brana preferred to let Dr. West go and run as a Green. It's even more interesting considering that (again, according to ex-MPP members) Brana's model for electoral victory hinged on having a political celebrity run for president (which in theory would bring people to register locally). If any candidate would have helped make MPP a po...

  What climate crisis ? Hundreds of thousands of fish washed up dead along Texas beaches over the weekend as a "perfect storm" of weather, water, and temperature conditions depleted the oxygen they needed to survive. While die-offs like these are naturally occurring, the climate crisis can make them ever more likely. "As we see increased water temperatures, certainly this could lead to more of these events occurring," Katie St. Clair, who manages the sea life facility at Texas A&M University at Galveston, told The New York Times Sunday, "especially in our shallow, near-shore or inshore environments." Thousands of dead fish began washing up on local beaches in Texas' Brazoria County Friday, Quintana Beach County Park wrote on Facebook. The park wrote that the fish were mostly Gulf menhaden. The carcasses continued to wash in on Saturday. Park supervisor Patty Brinkmeyer told CNN that the dead fish numbered in the "hundreds of thousands...

 Iran would be the third country to have developed a missile system that can reach targets in record time ( the US is still working on it ):

 

There will be a few legit ones; in addition to some of the " cons " I listed. One, for example, is that at the end of the day West is a reformist.  But instead of focusing on that or actual policy issues, mainstream gatekeepers have opted to use Dr. West's collaborations themselves to discredit the new presidential candidate. For example: take this MSNBC post from Joy-Ann Reid acolyte Ja'han Jones : First, Dr. West is attacked for co-writing an op-ed with a conservative that highlights one specific policy that Florida Governor DeSantis supports; instead of going into that policy, it's DeSantis' other more public and divisive policies (that West doesn't endorse) that gets highlighted. Then West's association with the company involved with this policy is brought up as a red flag (for what it's worth, even the company's CEO thinks that this is rather ridiculous ). Next West's association with Russell Brand is smeared; apparently being a comic ...

 Like, a lot .

  Transcript here .

 Lee Camp has some ideas:

 PROS Forces the Democratic Party to addresses issues/policies they would normally ignore. Forces third-parties (like the Green Party) to up their game. Forces Democratic voters who like Dr. West to reconcile his platform with their party allegiance.  Automatically becomes the most left candidate running for president, making Republican attacks calling the Democratic Party "far-left" and Democratic claims of being the most progressive irrelevant (NOTE: the only real recourse is to say that West is not really that left, and to do it ingeniously ).  Forces the People's Party to either work to get ballot access and/or local candidates, or risk becoming a empty, shapeless organization. Can expose the flaws of the Electoral College, which is one of the major problems in electoral politics. CONS Will be labeled "socialist" further re-defining that term in political circles. Smears and attacks by the media may dissuade other potential third-party candidates (but it sho...

  Via this tweet post.

 

 Naturally, they have a lot to talk about .

The GOP strategist had some choice things to say about young voters : “They basically put the polling place next to the student dorm so they just have to roll out of bed, vote, and go back to bed,” she said at one point. She also took aim at the use of same-day voter registration by students in Michigan last fall. “There were hundreds of votes that were cast by students who were registered after the deadline, after the polls closed,” Mitchell alleged , adding, “but those ballots all still counted.” Just in case you wanna see/hear it: video & audio !

Oh, Canada : Millions of people across the Midwest are under dangerous air quality conditions Monday, as smoke from wildfires in eastern Canada wafts over the region. Hazy skies have blanketed a wide swath of the country from the Ohio Valley to as far south as the Carolinas. Air quality advisories are in effect Monday in southeastern Minnesota and parts of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, as well as in more than 60 counties in Wisconsin. The spike in air pollution comes from wildfires that have been raging in the Canadian provinces of Quebec and Nova Scotia. “A band of smoke from wildfires in Quebec will continue to linger across east central and southeast Minnesota today due to very light winds,” the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency tweeted Monday, adding that air quality should improve in the evening as thunderstorms help disperse smoke particles from the air. Canada is experiencing one of the worst starts to its wildfire season ever recorded. More than 6.7 million acres in the cou...

 

 It's illegal to give food and water to people waiting in line to vote, so why not arrest people who are providing bail and legal help for Cop City protestors ?  Attorneys representing an activist arrested while protesting against the building of “Cop City” in Georgia have launched a legal challenge to the use of a state domestic terrorism statute against protests, claiming an “act of free speech” is being unconstitutionally targeted, the Guardian can reveal. The move comes amid the unprecedented arrests of organizers at a bail and legal defense fund that has helped some of the people arrested while protesting against the multimillion-dollar police and fire department training center planned for a forest south-east of Atlanta. Cop City came to global attention after police shot dead an environmental protester in a raid on the forest and its defenders on 18 January – the first incident of its kind in US history. Police staged a Swat-style raid on Wednesday on the Atlanta Solida...

 Unlike RFK, Jr. or Marianne Williamson Dr. West is running for president under the People's Party instead of trying to primary Joe Biden within the Democratic Party.  QUESTIONS!  Will Dr. West address his endorsing Biden last election, and why he's apparently changed his tune? Will RFK, Jr. and Marianne Williamson backers embrace another non-Biden candidate, even if it's not within the duopoly? The People's Party was pushing Jimmy Dore to run; what made them change their mind and decide on Dr. West? How will mainstream media respond? What does Dr. West (and the People's Party) plan to do to differentiate from the Democrat and Republican parties? 

  Via MintPress News : Amid a crisis in recruitment, the U.S. military has found a new way of convincing a war-weary Generation Z to enlist: thirst traps. Chief among these attractive young women in uniform posting sexually suggestive content alongside subtle (and sometimes not-so-subtle) calls to join up is Hailey Lujan. In between the thirst traps and memes, the 21-year-old makes content extolling the fun of Army life to her 731,000 TikTok followers. “Don’t go to college, become a farmer or a soldier instead,” she instructs viewers in a recent video. “Just some advice for the younger people: if you’re not doing school, it’s ok. I dropped out of college. And I’m doing great,” she adds . If Lujan feels like a psyop (a psychological operation) it is because, technically, she is. Lujan is a psychological operations specialist; one of a small number of Army personnel whose job is to carry out influence and disinfo operations, either on or offline. Thus, she is using her femininity to ...

 

 This tale of unemployment irony involves ZipRecruiter : Fewer employers looking for workers means 270 employees at job search site ZipRecruiter will soon be out of a job. The company is cutting 20% of its staff by the end of this month, the company disclosed in a filing late Wednesday. “This action was taken in response to current market conditions and after reducing other discretionary expenses, with a view toward driving long-term efficiency,” according to the filing. [SNIP] About half of the 270 employees losing their job are in the sales and customer support teams. The company will take a charge of between $7 million to $9 million to cover severance costs. It expects to still make the same level of profits, excluding special items such as severance, as in its earlier guidance.

 It's helping Russia avoid the more nasty consequences of US sanctions: And it's paving the way for a new global economic world order:

 

  C-SPAN clip here . In other words: "Don't debate or try to make this bill any better for the American worker. We need to screw them over to keep the status quo going." And notice how this is always about "solving the problem" just long enough to have another mid-term or presidential election; it's never about finding a permanent solution.  BONUS: Apparently, Chuck Schumer also lied about the Mountain Valley Pipeline being part of the "deal":

Here's Kyle Kulinski going over how CNN is covering Pentagon corruption: And here's Lee Camp going over how MSNBC is covering corruption: Now of course they have different approaches, but the story of the Pentagon being shady beyond all belief is still there.