Tag Archives: substack

Ignoring Some Violence–Amplifying Other Violence

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On March 9th, Don Surber posted an article at Substack about how lawlessness is sometimes treated. Please read the entire article as it has multiple examples of inconsistencies on law enforcement’s handling of ‘mostly peaceful’ protests.

The article notes:

CNN reported on January 21, 2017, “Six police officers were injured and 217 protesters arrested Friday after a morning of peaceful protests and coordinated disruptions of Donald Trump’s inauguration ceremony gave way to ugly street clashes in downtown Washington.

“At least two DC police officers and one other person were taken to the hospital after run-ins with protesters, DC Fire Spokesman Vito Maggiolo told CNN. Acting DC Police Chief Peter Newsham said the officers’ injuries were considered minor and not life threatening.

“Bursts of chaos erupted on 12th and K streets as black-clad ‘antifascist’ protesters smashed storefronts and bus stops, hammered out the windows of a limousine and eventually launched rocks at a phalanx of police lined up in an eastbound crosswalk. Officers responded by launching smoke and flash-bang devices, which could be heard from blocks away, into the street to disperse the crowds.”

The limousine in question was hired by former CNN presenter Larry King and destroyed by rioters. A Muslim owned the vehicle. It was his livelihood.

The media sided with the Inauguration Day insurrectionists.

Esquire reported on April 12, 2017, “How the Government Is Turning Protesters Into Felons.”

The magazine whined, “While scattered vandalism and punching (a neo-Nazi) were deemed headline-grabbing militancy, the media relegated the most extreme incidents involving anarchists and antifascists — namely, recent treatment of them — to footnotes.”

Scattered violence and punching someone you claim is a neo-Nazi is OK.

Sitting in Nancy Pelosi’s office chair is an insurrection.

A year after the Inauguration Day violence, all charges were dropped.

The article concludes:

“Also, why is it hard to understand that when an election takes place during a pandemic, with millions of people shipping ballots rather than showing up at voting centers on election day, many people would be skeptical about the results of that election, especially when the candidate who lost won the election day vote?

“Instead of labeling people election deniers, is it not better to ensure that even the appearance of fraud is eliminated by having most people vote in-person on election day and with proper identification?

“When a country decides to live a lie and chases shadows, it conducts false investigations with predetermined outcomes and ends up blaming people like Tucker Carlson for showing the other side of the story. And that is a shame!”

It was not a security failure. It was a deliberate solicitation of protesters and an invitation for rioting in order to disqualify Trump in 2024. Thanks to Tucker Carlson, the Constitution and the truth, it won’t work.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. Then ask yourself why the violent protestors of 2017 had all of their charges dropped and the mostly non-violent protestors of 2021 are still in jail.

Following The Money On Transgender Surgery

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Have you ever wondered where teenagers get the money for the drugs and surgery needed to be transgender? The procedures involved are not cheap. The drugs involved are regulated–you cannot pick up a prescription that contains a steroid without signing for the prescription. So who is paying for the sudden increase in transgender surgery–the American taxpayer.

On March 1, Don Surber posted an article at Substack about transgender surgery in America and who is paying for it.

The article reports:

Technavio reported in November, “The gender reassignment surgery market is estimated to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 10.73% between 2022 and 2027. The size of the market is forecast to increase by $321.48 million. The growth of the market depends on several factors, including the increase in the number of people opting for sex change surgeries globally, favorable government policies, and increasing insurance coverage for gender reassignment surgical procedures.”

Nothing medical, it’s just business.

You can see why “The AMA opposes policies preventing transgender individuals from accessing basic human services and public facilities consistent with gender identity, including the use of restrooms.”

The article explains the origin of taxpayer-funded transgender surgery:

The story said, “The authors of the aforementioned study point to Medicare’s decision in May 2014 to lift a coverage ban on transgender surgeries as the turning point in access to care, noting that the share of patients seeking gender-affirming procedures covered by Medicare or Medicaid increased from 25% in 2012-2013 to 70% in 2014. After Medicare and Medicaid started covering transgender surgeries, and after the implementation of the Affordable Care Act in 2010, private insurance companies followed suit.”

Taxpayers fund 70% of these surgeries thanks to Obama.

In 1981, Reagan banned billing taxpayers for this elective surgery. Between Obamacare and Medicare/Medicaid reimbursements, Obama and his administration produced a cottage industry that Technavio is really pushing.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. This is another example of a seemingly minor change in the law that has had huge ramifications. It is another example of the reason all Americans need to pay attention to any changes in government regulations.

A Logical Question About The Balloon

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Robert DuChemin, a Florida lawyer, noted the following in an article at Substack:

So, if three Chinese balloons came over the United States during the Trump Administration how come there is not a single picture of any one of them? I live in Florida, where one of the alleged incursions supposedly occurred. I have a feeling we have many more people looking at the sky than they do in Montana and we are not all too old to see the sky. Yet no pictures.

How could they have been “undetected” when the DOD just showed us that our satellites can track a balloon from the moment it leaves a Chinese launch site?

The answer is simple. The White House, just like it has done during every other day of this administration, decided it was better to lie to the American people than to tell us the truth. The truth is that our current administration has no earthly idea what is going on outside of Joe’s fake White House studio across the street.

When something happens, the Democrats have three favorite responses. It is either racist, President Trump‘s fault, or something that has been going on since President Trump was in office.

On Friday, the White House had a trifecta. They claimed that inflation, like invading Chinese balloons, has been around since the Trump administration. They claimed that they are still trying to fix a border problem that was Trump’s fault, and they followed the dumbest elected members of their party down the road by claiming that the US congress, which removed four congressmen from committees (including one who withdrew from the committees in lieu of discipline) was racist.

The truth is that neither of the first two things occurred during the Trump administration, the current administration created the border problem (If they were going to fix Trump’s border problem they would start by finishing the wall he started and our US Congress approved.), and three of the four congressmen removed from committees are white men.

It’s amazing what the mainstream media expects you to believe.

Sometimes The Only Way To Deal With Washington Is To Laugh

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Don Surber is a retired newspaperman. He writes columns at Substack. Recently he wrote one about the wit and wisdom of Louisiana Senator John Kennedy.

Here are a few excerpts:

Early in his days in the Senate, the Republican John Kennedy said, “This is Washington, D.C. Politics is in everybody’s blood, kind of like herpes.”

…At a hearing on October 9, 2017, he said something that shocked the Advocate, Louisiana’s biggest newspaper.

It reported, “During a Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee hearing last week, members of Congress expressed bewilderment that credit reporting company Equifax, under siege after a data breach affecting more than 145 million people, has received a $7.25 million contract with the IRS to validate the identity of taxpayers communicating with the agency on the telephone or through its website.”

At the hearing, Kennedy said to former Equifax CEO Richard Smith of that contract, “You realize, to many Americans right now, that looks like we’re giving Lindsay Lohan the keys to the mini-bar.”

…Six days earlier, he questioned Wells Fargo CEO Timothy Sloan about the bank’s creation of 3.5 million unauthorized deposit accounts and more than 500,000 unauthorized credit card applications.

Kennedy said, “I am certainly not anti-business. You can’t be for jobs if you are against business. What I am curious about is what in God’s name were you thinking? I am not against big business. With all due respect, I am against dumb.”

…On June 9, 2022, he told Fox, “In my state, the price of gas is so high that it would be cheaper to buy cocaine and just run everywhere.”

…“Just because you’ve seen My Cousin Vinny doesn’t qualify you to be a federal judge.”

…Kennedy told Neil Gorsuch when his nomination came up, “I guess what I want is a cross between Socrates and Dirty Harry, and I believe you just might be that person.”

He told Brett Kavanaugh, “I want someone who is willing to protect the United States Constitution and the Bill of Rights and understands that the Bill of Rights is not an a la carte menu.”

The article notes that Senator Kennedy is not uneducated:

He plays the blunt good old boy so well, he could have been Buford T. Justice in Smokey and the Bandit, but without the swearing. He also graduated from Vanderbilt, got a University of Virginia law degree and was educated at Oxford. Good old boys ain’t dumb, as Northerners who underestimate them learn over and over again.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. Senator Kennedy definitely knows how to disarm his opponents with a smile.

An Interesting Twist

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On Thursday, Substack posted the following headline:

Court orders production of Seth Rich laptop

As you remember, Seth Rich was murdered in Washington, D.C., in July 2016. He was shot twice in the back and the police declared it a botched robbery– his wallet, expensive gold, cell phone and gold necklace were not taken. There has been a theory that Seth Rich was the one leaking information about the Democrat campaign to Wikileaks.

The Substack article reports:

This case involves a multi-year fight by attorney Ty Clevenger to obtain records relating to the FBI/DOJ investigation of Seth Rich, particularly whether Rich was involved in the hack of the DNC or had communicated with Wikileaks.

This fight dates back to 2017 and includes two FOIA lawsuit. In the first lawsuit, the FBI produced no responsive documents. The parties knew the FBI had something, and so this sparked a second lawsuit – where the FBI somehow found 20,000 pages of potentially responsive documents.

…Of those 20,000 pages, the government found 1,596 pages of responsive documents, of which the government withheld 1,469 pages under various FOIA exemptions (privacy, law enforcement exemption, etc.).

The FBI also withheld the contents of Seth Rich’s personal laptop, which it possesses, in its entirety, alleging the privacy of Rich’s family in “preventing the public release of this information” outweighs the public interest in disclosure.

The court rejected that argument, stating “the FBI has not satisfied its burden of showing more than a de minimis privacy interest that would justify withholding information from Seth Rich’s laptop.”

The article concludes:

What might be more interesting is the FBI’s complete records on Seth Rich. The FBI has fought production of those records – first by failing to “find” its own documents, and now by alleging documents must be withheld due to “national security grounds” and the “basis that disclosure of the information would threaten intelligence-gathering efforts.”

The information in the FBI’s possession includes that which was “provided by foreign government agency authorities under an implied assurance of confidentiality.” It also may – or may not – include whether the FBI used a “code name” associated with Seth Rich. And, if FBI representations are to be believed, it also includes “details of intelligence activities, sources, and methods related to national security.”

Unfortunately, the court won’t require the production of this information. Some questions will remain unanswered. Read the full order here.

There are a lot of valid questions regarding Seth Rich’s death. It would be nice to see them answered.

The Story Behind The Story

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On Monday, The Conservative Treehouse posted an article with a rather different viewpoint on the origins and purpose of the current war in Ukraine. It is a long, involved article, so I suggest you follow the link to read the entire article. I will try to provide some  highlights.

The article notes:

Current CIA Director William “Bill” Burns was the former ambassador to Russia and Jordan.  Bill Burns had a 33-year career at the State Department under both Republican and Democratic presidents and speaks fluent Russian. If the people in the background of Joe Biden wanted an intelligence operative to trigger a specific result from Russia, there’s no one more strategically perfect for the job than CIA Director Bill Burns.

The article by Beinart (Peter Beinart on substack {SEE HERE}) is mainly focused on pointing out the irreconcilable nature of Joe Biden implying Ukraine could join NATO, while his own CIA Director has a history of giving serious warnings emphasizing the “brightest of all red lines” about that specific point.

[…]  “Two years ago, Burns wrote a memoir entitled, The Back Channel. It directly contradicts the argument being proffered by the administration he now serves. In his book, Burns says over and over that Russians of all ideological stripes—not just Putin—loathed and feared NATO expansion. He quotes a memo he wrote while serving as counselor for political affairs at the US embassy in Moscow in 1995. ‘Hostility to early NATO expansion,” it declares, “is almost universally felt across the domestic political spectrum here.”

On the question of extending NATO membership to Ukraine, Burns’ warnings about the breadth of Russian opposition are even more emphatic. “Ukrainian entry into NATO is the brightest of all redlines for the Russian elite (not just Putin),” he wrote in a 2008 memo to then-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. “In more than two and a half years of conversations with key Russian players, from knuckle-draggers in the dark recesses of the Kremlin to Putin’s sharpest liberal critics, I have yet to find anyone who views Ukraine in NATO as anything other than a direct challenge to Russian interests.” (read more)

The article reports the following:

The CIA Director is crystal clear that Russia would be seriously triggered about any prospect of Ukraine entering NATO.

Yet, in December of 2021, the exact same time when U.S. backchannel intelligence was being shared with China about Russian troop movements on the border with Ukraine, Joe Biden was telling Ukraine that membership in NATO was in their hands.

The war in Ukraine now can be conveniently blamed for economic woes, the high price of gasoline, the empty supermarket shelves, other supply chain problems, etc.

Please follow the link above to read the entire article.

The Courage To Stand Up And Be Heard

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Yesterday a cousin posted on my Facebook page that he would never buy Levi’s again. I wondered what in the world he was talking about, but wasn’t concerned because I don’t wear Levi’s. When I heard his reason, I wished I wore Levi’s so that I could not wear them anymore.

Jennifer Sey is an accomplished lady. Her biography includes being a 17-year-old gymnast, the reigning national champion in 1986, and going to the Soviet Union. She was smart enough to bring 10 pairs of Levi’s 501s with her. She eventually became brand president of Levi Strauss & Co. Jennifer is a lady who speaks her mind. She recently resigned her position with Levi Strauss & Co. so that she could continue to speak her mind.

Substack posted her story on Monday.

The article reports:

In 2008, when I was a vice president of marketing, I published a memoir about my time as an elite gymnast that focused on the dark side of the sport, specifically the degradation of children. The gymnastics community threatened me with legal action and violence. Former competitors, teammates, and coaches dismissed my story as that of a bitter loser just trying to make a buck. They called me a grifter and a liar. But Levi’s stood by me. More than that: they embraced me as a hero. 

Things changed when Covid hit. Early on in the pandemic, I publicly questioned whether schools had to be shut down. This didn’t seem at all controversial to me. I felt—and still do—that the draconian policies would cause the most harm to those least at risk, and the burden would fall heaviest on disadvantaged kids in public schools, who need the safety and routine of school the most. 

I wrote op-eds, appeared on local news shows, attended meetings with the mayor’s office, organized rallies and pleaded on social media to get the schools open. I was condemned for speaking out. This time, I was called a racist—a strange accusation given that I have two black sons—a eugenicist, and a QAnon conspiracy theorist.

In the summer of 2020, I finally got the call. “You know when you speak, you speak on behalf of the company,” our head of corporate communications told me, urging me to pipe down. I responded: “My title is not in my Twitter bio. I’m speaking as a public school mom of four kids.” 

When Jennifer began speaking out against school closings due to Covid, pressure from the company became more intense.

The article reports:

Then, in October 2020, when it was clear public schools were not going to open that fall, I proposed to the company leadership that we weigh in on the topic of school closures in our city, San Francisco. We often take a stand on political issues that impact our employees; we’ve spoken out on gay rights, voting rights, gun safety, and more. 

The response this time was different. “We don’t weigh in on hyper-local issues like this,” I was told. “There’s also a lot of potential negatives if we speak up strongly, starting with the numerous execs who have kids in private schools in the city.”

I refused to stop talking. I kept calling out hypocritical and unproven policies, I met with the mayor’s office, and eventually uprooted my entire life in California—I’d lived there for over 30 years—and moved my family to Denver so that my kindergartner could finally experience real school. We were able to secure a spot for him in a dual-language immersion Spanish-English public school like the one he was supposed to be attending in San Francisco.   

National media picked up on our story, and I was asked to go on Laura Ingraham’s show on Fox News. That appearance was the last straw. The comments from Levi’s employees picked up—about me being anti-science; about me being anti-fat (I’d retweeted a study showing a correlation between obesity and poor health outcomes); about me being anti-trans (I’d tweeted that we shouldn’t ditch Mother’s Day for Birthing People’s Day because it left out adoptive and step moms); and about me being racist, because San Francisco’s public school system was filled with black and brown kids, and, apparently, I didn’t care if they died. They also castigated me for my husband’s Covid views—as if I, as his wife, were responsible for the things he said on social media.

All this drama took place at our regular town halls—a companywide meeting I had looked forward to but now dreaded. 

The article notes:

In the last month, the CEO told me that it was “untenable” for me to stay. I was offered a $1 million severance package, but I knew I’d have to sign a nondisclosure agreement about why I’d been pushed out.

The money would be very nice. But I just can’t do it. Sorry, Levi’s.

The article concludes:

I’ll always wear my old 501s. But today I’m trading in my job at Levi’s. In return, I get to keep my voice.

That’s called courage.

Following The Science?

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Yesterday The Conservative Treehouse posted an article about a response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request made to the Health and Human Services Department.

The article includes the response from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC):

So the letter states that the CDC has no information on whether people who have recovered from Covid have become infected again or have transmitted the disease to other people. It seems to me that in the world of looming vaccine mandates, that might be important information.

The article links to a substack article which states the following:

You would assume that if the CDC was going to crush the civil and individual rights of those with natural immunity by having them expelled from school, fired from their jobs, separated from the military, and worse, the CDC would have proof of at least one instance of an unvaccinated, naturally immune individual transmitting the COVID-19 virus to another individual.  If you thought this, you would be wrong.

My firm, on behalf of ICAN, asked the CDC for precisely this proof (see below).  ICAN wanted to see proof of any instance in which someone who previously had COVID-19 became reinfected with and transmitted the virus to someone else.  The CDC’s incredible response is that it does not have a single document reflecting that this has ever occurred.  Not one.  (See below.)

In contrast, there are endless documents reflecting cases of vaccinated individuals becoming infected with and transmitting the virus to others.  Such as this study.  And this study.  And this study.  And this study.  It goes on and on…

But it gets worse.  The CDC’s excuse for not having a shred of evidence of the naturally immune transmitting the virus is that “this information is not collected.”  What?!  No proof!  But yet the CDC is actively crushing the rights of millions of naturally immune individuals in this country if they do not get the vaccine on the assumption they can transmit the virus.   But despite clear proof the vaccinated spread the virus, the CDC lifts restrictions on the vaccinated?!  That is dystopian.   

At some point, Americans are going to have to realize that this is not about the vaccine or the virus and begin to reclaim their freedom.