Have nothing to do with the [evil] things that people do, things that belong to the darkness. Instead, bring them out to the light... [For] when all things are brought out into the light, then their true nature is clearly revealed...

-Ephesians 5:11-13

Two More Polls Reveal Democrats in Deeper Trouble Than They Thought

Friday, 20 May 2022 11:52
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Friday, May 20, 2022:  

An internal poll conducted for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (first reported by startup political newsletter Punchbowl News and confirmed by The Hill) revealed that Democrats running for reelection in November are in deeper trouble than they originally thought.

In a generic matchup between Republicans and Democrats, the generic Republican is beating the generic Democrat by eight percentage points, 47-39.

DCCC chairman Sean Patrick Maloney (D-N.Y.) told party leaders at a luncheon on Thursday that the party’s candidates “are getting crushed” by Republicans, particularly in so-called battleground states.

A second poll, commissioned by the Republican super PAC Congressional Leadership Fund (CLF) focused on districts where Biden won in 2020 by more than eight percentage points. Biden is now underwater in those districts by eight points and is dragging down the reelection prospects of Democrats in those districts, from likely to questionable.

As BizPacReview expressed it, “Democrats typically enjoy a three- or four-point advantage in the generic ballot. Not this time. And that spells bad news for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s razor-thin majority. [This] could signal a red wave for House Republicans and a major stomping for House Democrats.”

The news got even worse. Forty-nine percent of voters in those battleground state districts say they prefer having a “Republican in Congress to provide a check on Biden, rather than a Democrat to help pass Biden and Pelosi’s agenda.”

PunchBowl News, in reporting on the polls, declared that “House Dems are getting crushed,” that they are “in worse political peril that they’ve let on publicly,” and that they highlight “the incredibly perilous position Democrats find themselves in.”

In increasing peril are Democratic Representatives Abigail Spanberger of Virginia, Kim Schrier of Washington, Mike Levin of California, Angie Craig of Minnesota, Susie Lee of Nevada, Jahana Hayes of Connecticut, and Kurt Schrader of Oregon.

Early returns show Schrader losing badly in the primaries to a progressive newcomer, making the district increasingly vulnerable to a Republican in November.

RealClear Politics (RCP) confirms the difficulty for Democrats revealed in those two polls. Its present generic congressional vote average shows Republicans leading Democrats by nearly two percentage points. At FiveThirtyEight, the generic Republican’s advantage is larger, at 2.3 percentage points.

Democrats are putting the best face they can on the bad news, declaring that their candidates are actually doing better than Biden in the polls, and that the best strategy would be to use the phrase “MAGA-Republican” in their campaign ads against their opponents. This would tie their opponents to former president Donald Trump, which they believe would help their cause.

At present, Trump-endorsed candidates have won 53 out of 57 contests so far, so the move by Democrats could backfire.

Democratic leaders also note that those polls were taken before the Supreme Court “leak,” which they feel could move pro-abortion voters to close the gap in November. However, other polls show that the average likely voter is much more concerned about high gas and grocery prices, which they are blaming on the current administration.

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Liz Cheney Blames Trump and His Supporters for Buffalo Shooting

Thursday, 19 May 2022 16:13
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Thursday, May 19, 2022:  

Now that Buffalo shooter Patrick Gendron’s 180-page “manifesto” and his 678-page online diary are public knowledge, Representative Liz Cheney (R-Wy.) unashamedly used his crazed rantings as a tool to attack fellow Republicans, especially former President Donald Trump and his followers. She tweeted on Monday:

The House GOP leadership has enabled white nationalism, white supremacy, and anti-semitism. History has taught us that what begins with words ends in far worse. GOP leaders must renounce and reject these views and those who hold them.

When Trump learned of her tweet and learned further that she has rejected efforts by Democrats on her January 6 committee to broaden its investigation to include Capitol Hill security instead of focusing primarily on Trump’s alleged role in that incident, he called her “a crazed lunatic.” According to The Washington Post, he said, “From what people tell me, from what I hear from other congressmen, she’s like a crazed lunatic. She’s worse than anyone else. From what I’ve heard she’s worse than any Democrat.”

She may be crazy, but she’s not stupid. For years, Democrats have been rejoicing over the changing demographics in the United States that appear, on the surface at least, to favor the Democratic Party in future elections.

It’s known in some circles as the “Great Replacement,” a combination of mass immigration (both legal and illegal) and a decline in the birth rate among the white population, which is reducing the percentage of whites in the United States while increasing the percentage of non-whites.

It’s a phenomenon that left-wing Democrats have celebrated for years, as The New American has noted. As Julian Castro said in 2008 while mayor of San Antonio, “In a couple of presidential cycles … on election night, you’ll be announcing that we’re calling the 38 electoral votes of Texas for the Democratic nominee for president … because of the demographics.”

Illinois Democratic Senator Dick Durbin remarked, “The demographics of America are not on the side of the Republican Party.” Senator Joe Biden said, “Folks like me … will be an absolute minority … fewer than 50% of the people in America … will be of White European stock. That’s not a bad thing.”

But when Republicans such as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich or Representative Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) point this out, it’s a sign, according to Cheney, of “white supremacy” and “white nationalism,” and even “anti-semitism.”

Said Gingrich in August 2021:

I think what’s hard for most of us to accept is that the anti-American left would love to drown traditional classic Americans with as many people as they can who know nothing of American history, nothing of American tradition, nothing of rule of law, and I think that when you go and you look at the radical left this is their ideal model is to get rid of the rest of us because we believe in George Washington, we believe in the Constitution, and you see this behavior over and over again.

One of Elise Stefanik’s campaign ads said:

Radical Democrats are planning their most aggressive move yet: a PERMANENT ELECTION INSURRECTION.

 

Their plan to grant amnesty to 11 MILLION illegal immigrants will overthrow our current electorate and create a permanent liberal majority in Washington.

What’s “good for the goose” ought to be “good for the gander,” as the saying goes. But not for Cheney, who continues with her ongoing vendetta against the former president, using facts twisted to reflect badly on him and his followers.

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Pending Missouri Bill Protects Doctors From Sanctions for Prescribing Ivermectin or Hydroxychloroquine

Wednesday, 18 May 2022 14:03
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Wednesday, May 18, 2022:  

When Missouri Governor Mike Parson signs HB 2149 into law as he is expected to, doctors prescribing ivermectin or hydroxychloroquine for their patients won’t be subject to sanctions, penalties, or loss of their medical licenses.

Overwhelmingly passed by a 130-4 vote in the House last week, the bill’s language is crystal clear:

The act of lawfully dispensing, prescribing, administering, or otherwise distributing ivermectin tablets or hydroxychloroquine sulfate tablets for human use shall not be grounds for denial, suspension, revocation, or other disciplinary action by [any state medical] board.

The bill also prohibits pharmacists from questioning or otherwise interfering with the dispensing of these prescriptions to their patients:

A pharmacist shall not contact the prescribing physician or the patient to dispute the efficacy of ivermectin tablets or hydroxychloroquine sulfate tablets for human use unless the physician or patient inquires of the pharmacist about [their] efficacy….

It’s about time. As Nebraska Attorney General Doug Peterson noted when his state passed a similar law late last year:

Ivermectin has been used in humans since the 1980s…. In 2015 its discoverers won the Nobel Prize in Medicine for their work in uncovering it and bringing it to market…. By 2017, ivermectin had demonstrated antiviral activity against several RNA viruses…. Before the pandemic, scholarly literature had also recognized ivermectin’s anti-inflammatory capacity…. For more than three decades, ivermectin has also shown itself to be very safe….

The same goes for hydroxychloroquine:

In 2004, long before the Covid-19 pandemic began, a lab study revealed that chloroquine is an effective inhibitor of the replication of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV) in vitro and thus that it should be considered for immediate use in the prevention and treatment of SARS-CoV infections…. It is widely recognized in the medical community that hydroxychloroquine is generally safe, so safe in fact that it may be prescribed to pregnant women and children of all ages.

Peterson’s opinion is backed up by no fewer than 304 footnotes, with more than 275 of them referring to medical studies, articles from medical journals, statements from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and other medical authorities.

In many states, however, the potential for sanctions has intimidated physicians into shying away from such remedies, despite such evidence of their effectiveness. Henry F. Smith, Jr., M.D., practices medicine in such a state, and posed the following scenario:

Now let’s imagine [a] patient calls in. This patient … has a dry cough, scratchy throat, muscle aches, and a low-grade fever. This patient had a COVID test kit at home and tested positive.

 

The physician wants to prescribe a medication with no risk of bacterial resistance and a very benign side-effect profile.

 

He’s read lots of literature to suggest it will be helpful. There are a significant number of double-blind studies showing it to be effective in the treatment of SARS Co-V2. It has been used in multiple countries with excellent results.

 

Except, in this case, the physician will find it impossible to prescribe that medication. It will be impossible because that medication is Ivermectin. And somehow it has been removed from the market.

Why? Smith follows the money:

[Pfizer’s Paxlovid and Merck’s Molnupivinir] have exactly one company-sponsored study each to vouch for their efficacy. Merck’s drug, by its own testing, is only 39% effective in reducing severe disease and/or death. There are no long-term safety data for either medication.

 

Yet both have received emergency use authorization and have suddenly popped up on government-approved treatment protocols….

 

As I look towards the end of my career, I’ve seen a lot of profit-oriented behavior by pharmaceutical companies.

 

I think of the me-too drugs, molecules that are only slightly different than their now off-patent predecessors aggressively marketed to physicians.

 

I’ve seen pharmaceutical reps actually reimburse physicians for a certain number of prescriptions written for their medications.

 

I’ve seen manipulation of the rules regarding inhaled medications to maintain their patents long after they would have expired.

But this banning of treatments proven to be efficacious is beyond anything Smith has seen in his decades of medical practice:

But if they actively suppressed the adoption of useful medications during a pandemic, then this is beyond the pale. It would suggest a total collapse of any morality or sense of responsibility within the pharmaceutical industry and their partners in the regulatory agencies.

The money flowing to drug companies is nearly incomprehensibly large. According to Morningstar, Pfizer collected nearly $40 billion in sales of its Covid-19 vaccine in 2021, while Merck reported gross sales in 2021 from all sources of nearly $50 billion, 17% over the year before. Merck’s profit rose from $4.5 billion in 2020 to $12.3 billion in 2021, an astounding 273% jump in just one year.

While Big Pharma was raking in obscene profits, even more obscene were the deaths directly attributable to the lack of the two remedies.

As Smith noted:

Let’s do some mathematics. As of this writing [February], there are roughly 890,000 deaths recorded in the United States related to COVID-19.

 

I think most people understand that a lot of these deaths are not due to the virus but from other comorbid conditions. The CDC has long stated that the number of deaths from COVID where there was no comorbid condition (in other words, healthy people who died from COVID) is roughly 7% of the total (65,000).

 

In several meta-analyses, Ivermectin was shown to be roughly 65% effective at preventing serious disease and/or death. So, in the best-case scenario for them, our public health organizations, by suppressing Ivermectin, may be responsible for roughly 40,000 deaths.

Once Missouri Governor Mike Parson signs HB 2149 into law he puts an end to the holocaust in the Show Me State. Missouri will then join more than two dozen other states in the union allowing medical freedom from sanctions for practicing medicine according to the Hippocratic oath: “Primum non nocere”: First, do no harm.

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Musk Demands Hard Numbers of Fake Accounts on Twitter, Stock Drops

Tuesday, 17 May 2022 21:09
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Tuesday, May 17, 2022:  

A tweet by Elon Musk posted early (1:32 a.m.) Tuesday morning sent Twitter stock (TWTR) below $37 a share. That’s 31 percent below what Musk offered to pay to buy the company and take it private.

Musk posted:

20% fake/spam accounts, while 4 times what Twitter claims, could be “much” higher.

 

My offer was based on Twitter’s SEC [Security and Exchange Commission] filings being accurate.

 

Yesterday, Twitter’s CEO [Parag Agrawal] publicly refused to show proof of < [less than] 5%.

 

The deal cannot move forward until he does.

Agrawal had tweeted the day before that he couldn’t provide the proof, even though in SEC filings the company repeatedly estimated that those fake or sham or false bots constituted less than five percent of the total.

From an advertiser’s perspective, that meant that 95 percent or more of the 217 million “daily active users” (DAUs) were really human eyeballs constituting an enormous target market for his product or service. He was willing to pay for that opportunity.

But upon receiving Agrawal’s claim that “we don’t believe that this specific estimation can be performed.… It’s not even possible to know which accounts are counted as mDAUs [million daily account users] on any given day,” Musk responded, “So how do advertisers know that they’re getting for their money? This is fundamental to the financial health of Twitter.”

It’s also fundamental to Musk, as he is pricing his offer to buy on what Twitter tells the SEC.

That 20 percent number that Musk used is confirmed by market research firm SparkToro, which estimates non-human accounts at 19 percent. Although some of those accounts provide automated news updates, inspirational quotes, and stock-price changes, advertisers aren’t willing to pay extra for them. They want to know the hard number of humans actively tweeting every day.

If Agrawal cannot prove the “less than five percent” claim, then Musk has a decision to make: terminate his offer and pay a $1 billion breakup fee, or negotiate for a lower price.

This puts Agrawal and Twitter in a pickle: If they cannot verify the five-percent number and admit that the real number of non-human Twitter accounts is higher — perhaps much higher — then they will have to deal with lawsuits from advertisers claiming they were misled. There will be lawsuits from shareholders claiming they purchased shares at artificially high prices. Bondholders holding the $5 billion in Twitter debt will claim they were defrauded.

And, of course, there are the SEC and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), who would likely sue as well.

Added all up, these lawsuits, if successful, could not only bankrupt Twitter, but end the company’s existence altogether.

Musk is aware of all of this, and has little interest in assuming those enormous and essentially unknowable liabilities.

If Agrawal and the board can provide the proof that Musk is demanding — that real humans constitute more than 95 percent of those 217 million accounts — then Musk should be very happy to proceed with the purchase. In which case, buyers of TWTR at under $40 a share will enjoy a nice gain when the purchase is consummated later this year.

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Does Decline in Consumer Sentiment Portend a Recession?

Monday, 16 May 2022 14:17
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Monday, May 16, 2022:  

According to a report released last week by the University of Michigan,

The University of Michigan consumer sentiment for the US fell to 59.1 in May of 2022, the lowest since August of 2011, from 65.2 in April and below market forecasts of 64, as Americans remained concerned over … inflation.

Behind the headline there was little good news:

The current economic conditions index fell to 63.6, the lowest in 13 years while the expectations gauge sank to 56.2 from 62.5….

 

To make things even worse, the index of buying conditions for durable goods, such as household appliances, fell to the lowest level since the survey began in 1978….

 

Consumers’ assessment of their current financial situation relative to a year ago is at its lowest reading since 2013, with 36% of consumers attributing their negative assessment to inflation.

Economic prognosticators make a handsome living explaining the continuing drop in consumer sentiment. Topping the list is rising prices, incorrectly but repeatedly called “inflation.” Rising prices is the result of the inflation of the currency and the Federal Reserve is responsible for that.

Regardless, consumers see the impact every day at the grocery store and the gas pump. Every day they see their paychecks purchasing less and less. And they’re mad at Joe Biden, pushing his job approval rate to ever lower lows.

There are plenty of other “causes,” including the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the invasion of illegals across the nation’s southern border, China’s internal lockdowns disrupting the supply chain, and the Fed’s belated response to the rising prices that its policies have created.

The Fed is playing catch up. Initially Fed Chairman Jerome Powell said last fall that the rise in prices was “transitory.” Now, to quench the fire he started, he is raising interest rates under the assumption that a slower economy will force prices down. There is little talk of the Fed reducing the money supply, which is the only permanent solution.

The Fed’s recent 50 basis point (half of a percentage point) rise in the Fed Funds Rate is not only the largest single increase in 22 years, but Powell has promised a similar half-point rise in interest rates at each of the next two meetings of the Fed’s Board of Governors.

The trick is to avoid raising interest rates too far and too fast, forcing a contraction in economic output. Two quarters of negative growth is the classic definition of a recession.

Some are blaming Wall Street, which has given up about a fifth of its value just since the first of the year. More than $7 trillion has evaporated from the stock market so far this year.

Others are saying that the decline on Wall Street is a predictor of a recession six months out.

Still others point to the recent “yield curve inversion,” that moment in time when short-term interest rates rise above long-term interest rates. The history is unhappy: That “inversion” has preceded every recession since 1955 — and giving only one “false positive” during that time — according to the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.

Another good living is made by those predicting just how far Wall Street will drop in the event of a recession. One firm doing just that is DataTrek, which is saying Wall Street could drop another 25 percent before finding a bottom. That would bring the Dow, currently trading at 32,200, down to 24,000. And the S&P 500 Index, currently at 4,000, would decline to 3,000.

One prognosticator with a remarkable record of calling tops and bottoms is Barry Ritholtz. His asset-management firm, Ritholtz Wealth Management LLC, has over $2.7 billion in assets under management. His blog, The Big Picture, generates half a million page views every month, and he is one of the few who saw the coming housing implosion and derivative mess long before his peers.

Today he is taking the long view. He wrote on Friday that there are many competing explanations for the selloff on Wall Street, including “inflation, war, rising Fed Fund rates, [the] end of cheap capital, [the] fall-off in liquidity, [the] impending recession, and political unrest.”

He thinks there is a simpler answer: a reversion to the mean. Wrote Ritholtz:

Over the past decade, we have enjoyed returns of above 14% per year … the past two years gained 20% and 28%….

 

Over longer periods of time, equity markets generate average returns of 8-9%….

 

Perhaps [the decline] is nothing more complex than mean reversion.

For the long haul, Ritholtz remains bullish:

This market could/should have another good 5-7 years in it (assuming random events do not mess it up).

 

That is how I have been seeing this market for a while: it is one part history, one part secular theory, [and] two parts wishful thinking.

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Is Bitcoin Collapse a Setback for Global Cryptocurrency Plans?

Friday, 13 May 2022 16:19
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Friday, May 13, 2022:  

The collapse in the price of digital currencies, particularly Bitcoin, has not only significantly damaged Americans who invested or traded in the currency but its credibility as a tool for governments to control its citizens.

An estimated one in every six Americans has owned, invested, traded, or used a cryptocurrency at least once, taking advantage of its encrypted property: No outside agency, including government, can track its ownership or use.

The collapse has been staggering: In November Bitcoin (stock symbol BTC-USD) peaked at $67,802. It closed on Thursday at $28,315, a breathtaking decline of nearly 60 percent. At the same time, Wall Street’s S&P 500 Index (stock symbol SPX) declined by just 16 percent.

Commentators blame a combination of factors, including inflation, the decline on Wall Street, and the tweet from Elon Musk that Tesla will no longer be accepting Bitcoin to purchase his company’s cars.

One underlying cause, however, enjoyed scant exposure: the announcement by the White House, by executive order, that it was moving ahead with plans to develop a “central bank digital currency” (CBDC) as a tool to replace not only the dollar but the entire commercial banking system. Once in place, the U.S. CBDC would be melded into CBDCs of other central banks around the globe, making private cryptocurrencies not only irrelevant, but illegal.

It’s already happening in China, where the communists have banned Bitcoin while developing their own CBDC.

The Executive Order released by the White House on March 9 is just now resonating among supporters of cryptocurrencies who are seeing the implications. As that EO states explicitly, America “must play a leading role in international engagement and global governance of digital assets.” It orders Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell “to continue its research, development, and assessment efforts for a U.S. CBDC.”

Powell is only too happy to oblige, declaring that a CBDC “could serve as a complement to, and not a replacement of, cash and current private-sector digital forms of the dollars, such as deposits at commercial banks.”

This is a canard of the first order. Once installed, all financial transactions will take place with the new digital currency, making those commercial banks irrelevant. Norbert Michel, writing in Forbes, makes it clear that CBDCs will not “complement” the existing private banking system in the U.S. but will replace it altogether. He wrote:

I believe that the Fed should not launch a CBDC. Ever.

 

And I think Congress should amend the Federal Reserve Act, just to be on the safe side….

 

[Under a CBDC] the federal government, not privately owned commercial banks, would be responsible for issuing deposits [which is] a major problem for anything that resembles a free society….

 

The problem is that there is no limit to the level of control that the government could exert over people if money is purely electronic and provided directly by the government. A CBDC would give federal officials full control over the money going into — and coming out of — every person’s account.

No less a worthy than Warren Buffet and his partner, Charlie Munger, have come out opposed to digital currencies, but only for practical and not political reasons. Buffet told his audience of shareholders in April that bitcoins aren’t a “productive asset,” that they don’t produce anything tangible:

Whether it goes up or down in the next year, or five or 10 years, I don’t know. But the one thing I’m pretty sure of is that it doesn’t produce anything.

 

It’s got a magic to it and people have attached magic to lots of things.

But with the collapse in the price of Bitcoin and its close relatives, the magic is gone, and along with it the excitement the White House is trying to gin up over replacing the dollar with it.

Buffet made clear that he wouldn’t touch a Bitcoin even if one were handed to him:

If you said … for a 1% interest in all the farmland in the United States, pay our group $25 billion, I’ll write you a check this afternoon. [For] $25 billion I now own 1% of the farmland.

 

[If] you offer me 1% of all the apartment houses in the country and you want another $25 billion, I’ll write you a check. It’s very simple.

 

[But] if you told me you own all of the bitcoin in the world and you offered it to me for $25, I wouldn’t take it. Because what would I do with it? I’d have to sell it back to you one way or another.

 

It isn’t going to do anything. The apartments are going to produce rent and the farms are going to produce food.

Buffet’s partner Charlie Munger added:

In my life, I try to avoid things that are stupid and evil and make me look bad … and bitcoin does all three.

 

In the first place, it’s stupid because it’s still likely to go to zero. It’s evil because it undermines the Federal Reserve System….

 

And third, it makes us look foolish compared to the Communist leader in China. He was smart enough to ban bitcoin in China.

Munger is mostly correct (China is moving ahead with its own CBDC). But the losses the free market has inflicted on cryptocurrencies since last November have severely damaged their credibility along the way. That damage is likely to delay significantly any immediate implementation of the totalitarian scheme by the Fed.

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Two Federal Agencies Investigating Musk’s Purchase of Twitter Shares

Thursday, 12 May 2022 16:30
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Thursday, May 12, 2022:  

Just when he thought he might escape a federal investigation into his purchase of shares of Twitter, Elon Musk now has two government agencies looking into his initial purchase of shares of the social-media company back in March.

Open Markets Institute (OMI), a George Soros-backed liberal think tank, released a statement in April asking the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the Department of Justice (DOJ), and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to look into Musk’s takeover of Twitter. OMI said “it believes the deal poses a number of immediate and direct threats to American democracy and free speech. Open Markets believes the deal violates existing law, and that the [FCC], the [DOJ], and the [FTC] have ample authority to block it.”

FCC commissioner Brendan Carr rejected the request:

The FCC has no authority to block Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter, and to suggest otherwise is absurd.… We will not entertain these types of frivolous argument[s].

In an interview with Fox News on Tuesday, Carr supported Musk’s purchase:

I’m hopeful that Elon Musk is going to bend Twitter’s content moderation toward a greater embrace of free speech.

No such support was forthcoming from the other two agencies. Instead, the FTC and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) each have launched their own investigations into Musk’s initial purchases of shares that were later followed by his offer to buy the entire company.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Musk violated an SEC rule requiring a timely disclosure of more than five percent of the company’s outstanding shares. He had until March 24 to file that disclosure.

He didn’t file it until April 4.

Daniel Taylor, an accounting professor at the University of Pennsylvania, thinks the SEC has a strong case against Musk but doubts that they will pursue it:

The case is easy. It’s straightforward.

But whether they’re going to pick that battle with Elon is another question.

Musk got sideways with the SEC earlier when he Tweeted that he had arranged enough financing to take Tesla private. The SEC fined him $20 million and requires him not to Tweet about Tesla without first getting his attorney’s approval. Musk says the SEC pressured him into pleading guilty, threatening to bombard him and his company with endless lawsuits unless he complied.

Jill Fisch, a securities and law professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Law School, said that it’s unlikely the SEC would attempt to derail the agreement at this late date. The board has already endorsed and approved the purchase, and the SEC lacks the power to stop such “take-private” transactions, according to Fisch.

Aron Solomon, the chief legal analyst for Esquire Digital, a lead-generating company for attorneys, agrees: “There is no way that the SEC, the DOJ, or any other similarly-situated body will even consider laying a finger on this deal.” It is simply “too big to fail,” said Solomon, adding that intervention “at this point would [hurt] the existing shareholders whose shares Musk is acquiring.”

The Federal Trade Commission is also investigating Musk for failing to file certain reports to various anti-trust agencies that he was taking a substantial stake in Twitter. Those rules don’t apply to passive investors, but when Musk filed that he was seeking to take over the company, the rules kicked in.

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Even Democrats Oppose Protests at Homes of Supreme Court Justices

Wednesday, 11 May 2022 16:53
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Wednesday, May 11, 2022:

The latest poll from the Trafalgar Group reveals that even Democrats think the protests at the residences of conservative Supreme Court justices go too far.

The polling company asked 1,083 citizens, who say they are likely to vote in the upcoming midterm elections, “Do you believe that publishing the home addresses of the five U.S. Supreme Court Justices and calling for protests at their private homes is an acceptable way to protest the High Court’s upcoming decision on Roe v. Wade?”

Three-quarters of them said “no,” with just barely 16 percent saying “yes.” But when sorted by party affiliation, a jaw-dropping 66 percent of Democrats said “no.”

When asked about Biden’s refusal to condemn the protests, a majority (52.3 percent) said that refusal only encourages them to become unlawful or violent. But among Democrats, more than a quarter agree (27.7 percent) that his refusal to condemn those protests only encourages them to become violent.

Such a refusal to condemn has also turned unaffiliated likely voters against the Democratic Party’s soft-headed response. Nearly 55 percent of them told Trafalgar that that refusal to condemn “encourage[s] protests to become unlawful or violent.”

The tin ear of the Democratic Party leadership was exposed by a recent CNN poll showing no political impact of the protests. Instead, as noted by The New American, hopes that such protests would “sway the Court back into the pro-Roe camp … ha[ve] backfired.… They have failed to achieve their hoped-for reaction of swaying both the justices and the public. Instead, it appears that … they have hurt their … cause.”

Undeterred by political reality, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) today is pressing forward for a vote to “codify” Roe v. Wade into federal law, even though he cannot muster the 60 votes needed for passage. In fact, as Guy Benson points out at Townhall, Schumer cannot even secure “the 50 votes needed for hypothetical post-cloture passage.”

The Democratic Party leadership, it seems, is determined to continue its policy of self-immolation despite the rapidly approaching midterm disaster waiting for them.

American voters have awakened to that effort of Democrats to install their radical agenda before the window closes in November. As Benson noted, Democrat protests are “an attempt to replace the rule of law with the rule of mobs.” Benson added:

Today’s Democratic Party is profoundly out of step with the American people.… Their extreme position ignores modern science and public opinion….

 

Democrats’ extreme position is radical … and it is wildly unpopular with the American people … 97% of Washington Democrats support a position that only 19% of Americans want.

Pollster Scott Rasmussen has confirmed Benson’s conclusion. In a memo to the America First Policy Institute, Rasmussen noted that “sixty-five percent [of Americans] think abortion laws should be established by voters or their elected representatives.” And 73 percent of them acknowledge that “there are two lives to consider” in abortion: “the woman’s and the unborn child.”

If the notion that Democrats are determined to install their agenda regardless of the political consequences in November is correct, voters and citizens should be prepared for additional attacks on the foundations of the Republic before November.

 

 

 

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Court Orders North Carolina Sheriff to Stop Delaying Gun Permits

Tuesday, 10 May 2022 14:06
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Tuesday, May 10, 2022: 

Using the Covid pandemic and surging gun sales as an excuse, Mecklenburg, North Carolina, County Sheriff Garry McFadden delayed issuing gun purchase and concealed-carry permits for up to a year. On Monday, the judge for the Superior Court ordered him to stop delaying the issuance of those permits:

After considering the pleadings and other sworn testimony of the parties and after hearing the arguments of counsel, the Court finds as a fact the Sheriff and his office have not issued handgun permits in accordance with the time frames set forth in the applicable statutes.

 

As a result, the constitutional rights of the Plaintiffs to bear arms have been infringed and Plaintiffs are entitled to preliminary relief.

Those plaintiffs include Gun Owners of America (GOA) and Grass Roots North Carolina (GRNC), along with individuals whose rights were violated by the sheriff and his staff.

The judge added:

Furthermore, the Court concludes as a matter of law Plaintiffs have shown a likelihood of success on the merits and are likely to suffer irreparable harm in the absence of injunctive relief … it is therefore ordered that the Plaintiffs’ Motion is GRANTED.

The motion granted now requires the sheriff and his staff:

1.) to process pistol purchase permit applications within the 14 days required by North Carolina statute;

2.) to process concealed handgun permit applications within the 45 days required by statute;

3.) to request mental health records to process concealed handgun applications within 10 days as required by statute; and

4.) to process fingerprints for concealed handgun permits within 5 business days.

GRNC President Paul Valone celebrated the ruling:

In violation of North Carolina law, Sheriff Garry McFadden has been dragging his feet in processing North Carolina pistol purchase permits and concealed handgun permits, often taking up to a year to issue permits and preventing lawful North Carolinians from buying and carrying handguns for defense of themselves and their families.

 

We believe this order sends a clear message to sheriffs in Guilford, Mecklenburg and Wake counties, among others, that obstructing lawful citizens from exercising the right to keep and bear arms will no longer be tolerated.

 

To ensure compliance by a sheriff who has so far dragged his feet, Grass Roots North Carolina advises anyone whose fingerprints are not taken with five business days of completing a concealed handgun application to contact us immediately.

The ruling fails to address the issue of the infringement built into the statutory law that a citizen of North Carolina be required to get permission in the first place. A person ought to be free to decide whether to purchase, keep, bear, and carry a firearm depending on his own personal circumstances. Where does the Constitution allow or require fingerprinting, a mental-health check, or a “background” check, before a law-abiding citizen can exercise that right spelled out in the Second Amendment?

“This case,” wrote Cam Edwards at Bearing Arms, “is yet more proof that we the people shouldn’t have to obtain a state-issued permission slip before exercising a constitutionally-protected right in the first place.” He added:

Why should our rights be put on hold because our county sheriff is having staffing issues?

 

That’s one thing you never have to worry about with Constitutional Carry.

At present, more than two dozen states allow constitutional carry. Perhaps this ruling in North Carolina will galvanize the state legislature to pass such a measure, make Monday’s ruling obsolete, and take sheriffs of all North Carolina counties out of the picture altogether.

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Second Petition to Recall LA’s Progressive DA Has More Than 400,000 Signatures

Friday, 06 May 2022 11:09
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This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Friday, May 6, 2022:  

When the first effort to recall Soros-backed progressive Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascón failed last summer, backers reorganized. The second effort needs to obtain 566,857 signatures by July 6 to put his future on the November ballot. As of May 1, the group has not only obtained more than 400,000 signatures, but it has also raised over $6 million in support as well.

Gascón’s 2020 campaign was well funded by the Left, including George Soros, who contributed $2.5 million, as well as Democrats Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, then-Senator Kamala Harris, California Governor Gavin Newsom, and Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors.

Almost immediately after taking office in December 2020, Gascón began to implement the same far-left liberal policies that got him in trouble as San Francisco’s DA: eliminating cash bail for certain offenses, not seeking the death penalty no matter how violent or outrageous the crime, reopening closed cases against LAPD officers, and “reevaluating” sentences for which the convict had already served time.

And the results were the same. In 2021, there were 52 percent more homicides and 59 percent more shootings than in 2019. LA has seen a 15-percent increase in violent crimes, while arrests decreased by more than 23 percent.

Within weeks of Gascón assuming office, rank-and-file LA prosecutors revolted and attempted to block their new boss in court. DAs elsewhere in California refused to share cases with him. As Association of Deputy District Attorneys Vice President Eric Siddall said, “You can’t just use the law to implement your personal worldview of what society should look like.” Siddall added,

The idea of one man coming in and saying, “You all are wrong, and this is what the law should be,” is … counter to what our entire American system of justice is all about. It’s the antithesis of the rule of law.

When Siddall’s group took a vote on whether to support the recall, 83 percent of them participated in the vote, with 98 percent of them supporting the recall effort.

In addition, the recall effort is supported by several other influential groups, including the Association of Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs and the Los Angeles Police Protective League. In addition, more than 34 California cities, including San Gabriel, Santa Clarita, Beverly Hills, Pico Rivera, Whitter, La Mirada, and Covina have issued votes of no confidence in Gascón.

The Committee to Recall District Attorney George Gascón writes on its website:

As soon as he was sworn into office, District Attorney George Gascón began issuing directives to his prosecutors, instructing them to go soft on crime, coddle criminals, and trample upon the dignity and rights of crime victims.

 

To keep our communities safe, to mete out just punishment to those who break our laws, and to provide justice to crime victims throughout Los Angeles County, we must recall District Attorney George Gascón.

The petition spells out the grounds for the recall:

Since being elected, Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón has deserted crime victims and their families.

 

Gascón has disregarded the rule of law and weakened lawful sentencing requirements for the most violent criminals, including murderers, armed robbers, and rapists.

 

George Gascón’s new policies treat career and repeat violent offenders as if they had never committed a crime, ignoring public safety laws approved by the people.

 

Gascón has reduced sentences on crimes against children, and gun crimes.

 

On behalf of crime victims and their families and in the interest of public safety, this notice of intention to recall George Gascón as Los Angeles District Attorney is submitted.

Even in ultra-liberal Los Angeles County, voters are having serious second thoughts about the DA they elected in November 2020. The recall group is mounting a final push to obtain the remaining required signatures by July 6. Many are persuaded that if this second effort succeeds, voters will likely dump their far-left progressive district attorney into the dustbin of history.

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Many of the articles on Light from the Right first appeared on either The New American or the McAlvany Intelligence Advisor.
Copyright © 2021 Bob Adelmann