British Prime Minister Boris Johnson paid tribute to conservative lawmaker Sir David Amess who was stabbed to death during a meeting with constituents on Friday. Johnson said Amess was a fine public servant who was loved by friends and colleagues.
The 69-year-old lawmaker died at the scene after he was stabbed multiple times while meeting with constituents at a church in a town east of London. A 25-year-old man was arrested in connection with the slaying. In addition, authorities recovered a knife at the scene.
On Saturday, British Police told BBC they had identified the 25-year-old as Ali Harbi Ali in connection to Friday’s fatal stabbing, noting the Somali man was being held under the U.K.’s Terrorism Act. Reports said Ali was referred to the nation’s anti-terrorism program several years ago, though he was never named a formal “subject of interest.”
The Prime Minister said he’s shocked and saddened by the incident as he praised Amess for his nearly 40 years of service.
“David was a man who believed passionately in this country and in its future. And we’ve lost today a fine public servant and a much loved friend and our thoughts are very much today with his wife, his children and his family,” said Johnson.
Amess leaves behind his wife and five children.
Flags across Parliament are being lowered to half-mast following the news of the killing of Sir David Amess. Our thoughts and prayers are with David’s family, friends and colleagues. pic.twitter.com/0LDI8E5NpU
Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that the supply chain backups at America’s ports “will continue into next year.”
Anchor Jake Tapper said, “We are seeing supply chain disruption causing everything from higher prices to longer waits for products. Moody’s warns that these supply chain disruptions, quote, ‘will get worse before they get better, ‘ unquote. do Americans need to prepare ourselves for this to get worse before it gets better?”
Buttigieg said, “Certainly, a lot of the challenges that we have been experiencing this year will continue into next year. But there are both short-term and long-term steps that we can take to do something about it. Part of what’s happening isn’t just the supply side. It’s the demand side. Demand is off the charts.”
Tapper said, “Many American companies, especially small businesses, as you note, are struggling to cope. One possible solution, President Biden lifting former President Trump’s tariffs on China to try to provide some relief. That’s not a panacea, but it could provide some relief. Will President Biden do that?”
Buttigieg said, “Every idea is being taken seriously. What we’re doing right now is to focus on the operations themselves. A lot of Americans might be surprised to learn our ports have not generally operated on a 24/7 basis. We have secured commitments to change that. The president announced that the ports of LA and Long Beach — Long Beach was piloting this for a few weeks. Collectively, those two ports are 40% of our container traffic. They’re now going 24/7. That’s not a simple thing to do overnight. It was a big commitment.”
DC Comics recently revealed that in an upcoming issue titled “Superman: Son of Kal-El,” the son of Lois Lane and Clark Kent would be bisexual, and that he’s going to fight “real-world problems” such as climate change, that he’ll protest the deportation of refugees, and date a “hacktivist.”
What exactly is a “hacktivist”? Isn’t hacking illegal? Is Superman supporting criminal activity? It’s a chore to keep up with all the different iterations of the current superheroes, but DC Comics is calling it a “bold new direction” for the character. I see nothing “bold” about it.
I say they’re jumping on the bandwagon, but they’re fighting the wrong issues. There is a clear agenda here. It’s globalist, it’s anti-America, but it’s not bold and it’s not brave.
Robin, Batman’s famed red-headed sidekick, came out as bisexual recently, and honestly, who is shocked about that one? The new Captain America is gay. The character of Alex (my daughter in the live-action series “Supergirl”) was lesbian.
A gay or bisexual superhero is not groundbreaking in 2021. It’s banal. I have zero issue with that. I’m all for inclusiveness and acceptance and tolerance. It might be more interesting, however, if they created new characters instead of retrofitting the identity of existing ones.
“Brave” would have been to do some of this 30 years ago. Or to depict Superman, or Jon Kent, fighting for the rights of LGBT people in Iran where they’ll throw you off a building for the “offense” of even being suspected of homosexuality.
And why doesn’t Superman fight the injustices that created the refugees whose deportation he’s protesting? Digging deep into those issues — that would be brave. That would be informative. I’d read that comic book.
“Bold” would be fighting for the rights of Afghan women to attend school and be able to live free and go to work, and fighting for the right for boys to not be raped by men under the supposedly newly enlightened Taliban.
There is genuine evil in the world. Actual corruption and government tyranny. Plenty of real-world things to fight against. Like people being put into Chinese concentration camps because of their religion. Or human trafficking — honest-to-God slavery — taking place all over the world today. It exists.
Right now, and in our own hemisphere. Drug cartels trafficking people across the border, sexually molesting young women. Brave and bold would be to tackle those issues and shine a light into that darkness. I’d love to see the character doing that. I’d read that, too.
“Truth, Justice, and the American Way” is no longer the catchphrase of Superman. The new phrase? “Truth, Justice, and a Better World.” Okay, I’ll buy that, but what’s the vision that accompanies this more expansive view of social justice? What would make for a better world? Socialism? Communism? Forced equality?
To me, a better world is one in which people have more freedom and independence. Protection from government overreach and corruption. Safety and security. In a word, the idea of America. A government of the people, by the people, and for the people – concepts laid out by our Founding Fathers during the creation of the United States of America.
No, America is not perfect. We are constantly striving for a more perfect union, but I believe it’s self-evident that ours is the most free and fair and most equitable country — with the most opportunity — in the history of the world. That’s why so many people are desperately making their way here, through all manner of hardships, from all corners of the globe.
Yet, the cool thing right now is to bash America. But I wonder if most of the people who do so have really traveled and spent real time in other countries — dealing with other governments to see what the rest of the world is like.
I have, and most of the world is nothing like America. Most of the rest of the world lacks our individual freedom, our equality of opportunity, our right to compete in open markets, and, yes, the ability to attain material success. We shouldn’t apologize for any of it. We should revel in these values, which have attracted waves of new immigrants to our shores every year.
In 1938, DC Comics (then called Action Comics) unveiled the story of unique immigrant, a baby from a dying planet who, as an adult, devotes his life to fighting crime, righting wrongs, and defending honest government. This is not hyperbole. In the very first Superman strip, our hero ends up in the U.S. Capitol where he interrupts a corrupt bargain between a lobbyist and a lawmaker.
This, after convincing the governor to spare an innocent woman about to be executed for a murder she didn’t commit, roughing up a wife beater, and (of course) saving the life of Lois Lane. Superman was a fast worker.
What makes America great isn’t our government, and it certainly isn’t an increasingly authoritative “nanny state.” Instead, it’s our commitment to freedom and our traditions of self-reliance. Of course, we should acknowledge the shortcomings of our history and strive to live up to our creed, but we live in a country made great despite Big Government and career politicians, not because of them.
As Ronald Reagan said, “Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them.”
As for the cultural gatekeepers busily rethinking which of our national heroes — or iconic superheroes, for that matter — belong on pedestals, I’d say this: Inclusiveness is healthy, but tinkering with the sexuality or political outlook of fictional heroes does not necessarily improve their character.
Here, after all, was the initial description of the man from Krypton: “Superman, champion of the oppressed. The physical marvel who had sworn to devote his existence to helping those in need!”
That’s a hard mantra to improve on, in my view, and is quintessentially American — it champions both strength and compassion.
Two conservative members of President Joe Biden’s bipartisan commission examining public debate over U.S. Supreme Court reform, including whether to increase the number of justices, are no longer on the panel.
Caleb Nelson, a law professor at the University of Virginia who clerked for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, and Jack Goldsmith, a law professor at Harvard who clerked for retired Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, both resigned from the presidential commission, according to Bloomberg.
“These two commissioners have chosen to bring their involvement to a close,” White House spokesman Andrew Bates said in an emailed statement to Bloomberg. “We respect their decision and very much appreciate the significant contributions that they made during the last 5 months in terms of preparing for these deliberations.”
The White House didn’t specify the reason for Nelson and Goldsmith’s decisions.
The resignations came before the commission held a public meeting on Friday to discuss a draft of preliminary findings, in which the commissioners expressed favorable opinions on creating term limits for Supreme Court justices, but cautioned against adding more justices to the court, an idea championed by the Democrats.
“Commissioners are divided on whether court expansion would be wise,” a readout of the commission’s discussion reads. “Court expansion is likely to undermine, rather than enhance, the Supreme Court’s legitimacy and its role in the constitutional system, and there are significant reasons to be skeptical that expansion would serve democratic values.”
“Recent polls suggest that a majority of the public does not support Court expansion,” the panel continued. “And as even some supporters of Court expansion acknowledged during the Commission’s public hearings, the reform—at least if it were done in the next term and all at once—would be perceived by many as a partisan maneuver.”
That being said, the commissioners agreed that the Congress has “broad power” to change the number of justices to the high court.
“As a legal matter, we conclude that Congress has broad power to structure the Supreme Court by expanding (or contracting) the number of Justices,” they wrote.
The 36-member commission, established in April via an executive order, is comprised of a bipartisan group of experts on the Court and the Court reform debate. The commissioners include legal and political science scholars, former federal judges and practitioners who have appeared before the Court, as well as justice system reform advocates.
The commission’s purpose, according to the White House, is to provide an analysis of the principal arguments in the contemporary public debate for and against Supreme Court reform. The topics it will examine include the genesis of the reform debate; the Court’s role in the constitutional system; the length of service and turnover of justices on the Court; the membership and size of the Court; and the Court’s case selection, rules, and practices.
The number of Supreme Court justices was set at six when George Washington, the first U.S. President, signed the Judiciary Act of 1789 into law. It was briefly changed to 10 during the Civil War under Abraham Lincoln. In 1869, the Republican-controlled Congress passed another judiciary act to set the number back to nine, which has remained untouched for more than 150 years.
U.S. climate envoy John Kerry has admitted that, at least in his role as the carbon-cutting evangelist to the world, he’s not terribly interested in China’s human rights abuses — including the oppression of the Uyghur people of Xinjiang province that some have called genocide.
According to Fox Business, when asked by an interviewer last month about “the process by which one trades off climate against human rights,” Kerry’s answer struck many as shockingly cold: “Well, life is always full of tough choices and the relationship between nations.”
That statement will come under additional scrutiny after financial records revealed Kerry and his wife have a stake in a controversial Chinese investment group that has funded work on facial recognition technology used by the Chinese Communist Party to identify Uyghurs.
The financial disclosure documents filed at the beginning of this year and reviewed by The Washington Free Beacon indicate that the climate czar holds “over $1,000,000” in an investment group called Hillhouse China Value Fund L.P.
“Kerry’s Hillhouse stake is through a trust in which his wife is the beneficiary,” the Free Beacon reported. “While Kerry’s wife is a beneficiary of the trust, he stated in the disclosure that they are not involved in managing the investments.”
Hillhouse, described by Bloomberg as “a $100 billion behemoth that’s made prescient bets on stocks, venture capital and private equity deals,” has made a big bet (prescient or not) on YITU Technology, a firm that is blacklisted by the U.S. because it helps President Xi Jinping’s regime track Uyghurs virtually anywhere.
“The facial recognition technology, which is integrated into China’s rapidly expanding networks of surveillance cameras, looks exclusively for Uighurs based on their appearance and keeps records of their comings and goings for search and review,” The New York Times reported in 2019.
“Chinese authorities already maintain a vast surveillance net, including tracking people’s DNA, in the western region of Xinjiang, which many Uighurs call home. But the scope of the new systems, previously unreported, extends that monitoring into many other corners of the country.”
What’s more, YITU reportedly has plans to expand overseas — meaning other oppressive governments looking to crack down on ethnic minorities could use the software as well.
The U.S. Department of Commerce placed YITU on its trade restriction blacklist in 2019, saying the company is “implicated in human rights violations and abuses in the implementation of China’s campaign of repression, mass arbitrary detention, and high-technology surveillance against Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and other members of Muslim minority groups.”
Intelligence analyst Anders Corr told the Free Beacon that Kerry’s investment in YITU is an “astonishing and disappointing revelation.”
“Kerry leads on the China issue, not just climate talks, and he and his family should be forbidden from investing in a manner that creates even the appearance of a conflict of interest,” Corr said.
Corr added that China’s AI industry is “one of a very few most important strategic sectors for its economic and military development,” and its growth would “enable the achievement of its goal to become globally hegemonic.”
“No American should invest in China’s AI capabilities, which only empower the country in its economic growth, and ultimately the military strength with which it will challenge the benign leadership of the United States,” he said.
By the by, there’s another person in the orbit of the Biden administration who owns a stake in a Chinese AI company implicated in human rights abuses. Want to take a guess at who it is? C’mon, just guess. You’re probably not wrong.
“The president’s son, Hunter Biden, continues to own a 10% stake in a Chinese private equity firm that invested in another Chinese facial recognition company, Megvii, that was also sanctioned by the U.S. government in 2019,” the Daily Caller reported Thursday.
“While White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said in early February that Hunter Biden was in the process of divesting his ownership stake in the Chinese private equity firm BHR Partners, business records accessed Thursday shows he still owns his 10% stake in the firm through his personal company, Skaneateles LLC.”
Perhaps Megvii wants to buy some paintings from a certain up-and-coming artist before Hunter officially ends their business relationship. But I digress.
Hunter isn’t going to be doing much of great importance for the next few years, whereas Kerry is tasked with getting China — the world’s biggest polluter — to go along with carbon reduction plans. He’s also seemingly looking the other way as China commits genocide.
Yes, one assumes his money is being invested in something akin to a blind trust, but Kerry of all people should have made it clear to his financial planners that putting money into firms that invest in companies like YITU is strictly off-limits.
Does that narrow one’s range of investment options? Well, life is always full of tough choices.
A New York City judge has officially taken away a Long Island father’s right to see his young daughter in person because he has not taken the experimental Covid-19 vaccine. Now in order to see his 3-year-old, the father must either get vaccinated or present a weekly PCR test in addition to a biweekly antigen test within 24 hours of a scheduled visit.
The judge – Matthew Cooper – who is presiding over the bitter custody dispute, called the yet-to-be-named father a “danger” to the child and specifically cites “conspiracy theories,” “misinformation,” and “muddled notions of individual liberty” as the bogus reasoning behind stripping his rights away.
“Here, in-person parental access by the defendant is not in the child’s best interests, and there are exceptional circumstances that support its suspension.
The dangers of voluntarily remaining unvaccinated during access with a child while the COVID-19 virus remains a threat to children’s health and safety cannot be understated.
Unfortunately, and to my mind, incomprehensibly, a sizable minority, seizing upon misinformation, conspiracy theories, and muddled notions of ‘individual liberty,’ have refused all entreaties to be vaccinated.”
The father has already had Covid-19 and recovered – which has been proven to provide better immunity than taking any of the rushed vaccines – but Judge Cooper did not factor that into his decision before handing down his ruling. Instead, Cooper was too busy playing political activist from the bench. The only ones trafficking in misinformation are the crazed leftists who are pushing these vaccine mandates and denying that natural immunity exists.
Not to mention, the person being “protected” from her father is three years old – children have effectively zero risk of death to this virus. In fact, they are the least affected group of people, with a recovery rate that is around 99.5-99.9%.
But, according to Bolshevik Judge Cooper, this father is a “danger,” and a conspiracy theorist.
Lloyd Rosen, the attorney representing the father, fired back after Cooper’s decision and explained the father’s reasoning behind not taking the vaccine.
“My client is not a conspiracy theorist. He has concerns about the vaccine. He’s heard about side effects. He once had a bad reaction to the flu vaccine.
This judge must feel that 80 million Americans who aren’t vaccinated are placing their children at imminent risk or harm and, therefore, the courts should intervene and remove those children from their parents. That is an absurd position to take.”
Rosen also said his client has not decided if he is going to appeal and had already rejected the offer to submit to mandatory testing. The father is seeking to have a full hearing on the matter, but his requests have been denied so far by Cooper.
This is the second time in recent months that a crazed left-wing judge has taken away visitation rights for an unvaccinated parent during a custody battle. The last time this happened, a Cook County, Illinois Judge restricted an unvaccinated mother from seeing her kids in person.
The judge in that case, James Shapiro, was forced to recuse himself from the case because of the public backlash to his decision.
Judge Cooper, unlike Judge Shapiro, is an extremely high-profile juror. He has previously ruled over several divorce cases that involve A-listers like Robert De Niro and Uma Thurman. His blatantly political statements in his decision demonstrate that he cannot be impartial or fair over this case. At a minimum, he should recuse himself just like Shapiro did.
Security expert urges secret component be made public.
One study by the Media Research Center already has documented that Big Tech’s suppression of the real-life news story about Hunter Biden’s abandoned computer laptop and the damaging – to Joe Biden – information it contained cost President Trump the election victory in 2020.
But those social-media giants are protected from virtually all liability for what they censor based on Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.
That provides immunity from liability because they are supposed to be “platforms” for speech, not “publishers” of that speech.
Even though virtually every social-media corporation making up the Big Tech cartel in America is known for, and has publicly admitted, censoring statements because of their content, suppressing conservative views and thought and promoting liberal agenda points.
Now one expert is offering a stunning solution to that problem: having those tech companies make public their algorithms that determine what is censored.
The concept comes from Kalev Leetaru, a media fellow at Real Clear. He’s also a senior fellow at the George Washington University Center for Cyber & Homeland Security and previously he was fellow in residence at Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service and member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on the Future of Government.
“Section 230 must be amended to require that in return for the liability immunity they enjoy, Internet platforms must make the real-world rules, algorithms, design decisions and management directives that determine what we see each day accessible to policymakers, researchers, the press and the public at large,” he explained.
“Social media’s reach into Americans’ daily lives is too great to leave our understanding of its harms and undue influence to the courage of whistleblowers. A new Section 230 ‘transparency amendment’ would require that social platforms make an array of key datasets publicly available, thus replacing chance leaks with routine disclosure and enabling policymakers to have informed data-driven debates as they seek to chart a regulatory path forward.”
He said what until now has been a “closed and seemingly capricious system” needs to be changed into “a public process — akin to our legal and electoral systems — that can be scrutinized and publicly debated.”
That, he wrote, “offers a glimpse of what this transparent future might look like, while the full-length research report behind it, “Social Media, Digital Censorship & the Future of Democracy,” details America’s 2½-century journey to a world in which a handful of unelected billionaires wield near-absolute control over digital speech, with the power to censor citizens and governments alike, arbitrate ‘acceptable speech’ for the entire planet, determine ‘truth’ and even silence the presidency.”
He pointed out that both sides of the political aisle are more and more recognizing that increased regulation of agenda-driven social media platforms is needed.
He explained Americans first need to understand what those companies do, and how they do it, in order to fix the problem.
“Much as a doctor cannot prescribe a treatment plan for a patient without first diagnosing the specific ailments from which they suffer, meaningful reform of social censorship requires data-driven interventions. Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen warned last week that ‘as long as Facebook is operating in the shadows, hiding its [work] from public scrutiny, it is unaccountable.’ The problem, as Haugen notes, is that we lack the most basic data on how social platforms function and their impact on society to be able to understand how we might best regulate them,” he explained.
He said the problem with Section 230 is that it didn’t require the companies to provide anything in return for their “near-absolute immunity.”
“States were explicitly barred from narrowing 230’s protections and government was given no oversight role, depriving the American public from influencing or even seeing the rules that govern the digital public square. Most importantly, Section 230 failed to require even the most basic of transparency around how companies wielded its protections,” he said.
That leaves social media companies restricting posts, suspending, banning and demonetizing users based on their views “without any explanation…”
“Even mainstream media is not exempt, as Twitter’s ever-changing explanations for banning the New York Post’s Hunter Biden laptop story reinforces,” he said.
“Moreover, Section 230’s reach now extends beyond the web to the physical world, as Facebook arbitrates which protest marches are permissible to promote; Uber and Lyft ban users over their tweets; Airbnb banishes users over their group affiliations; Amazon refuses to publish books it disagrees with; and even Microsoft crafts acceptable use policies for desktop software. Even foreign-owned TikTok banned Donald Trump, as did its U.S. peers, reflecting the increasingly international reach of Silicon Valley’s rules,” he said.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced Friday it would delay its decision on administration of the Moderna vaccine to adolescents, citing concerns the shot may lead to a heightened risk of a rare heart condition.
The FDA has not yet determined if the risk is higher for adolescents, but the agency is planning to review the data further before extending the vaccine’s eligibility, according to the Wall Street Journal.
“I think people can be reassured that the risk of myocarditis with an mRNA vaccine is low, it appears to be balanced between the different products,” Paul Burton, Moderna’s chief medical officer, told the outlet.
Myocarditis is the inflammation of the heart muscle, with symptoms including chest pain, shortness of breath, and feelings of having an abnormal heartbeat. The inflammation typically occurs a few days after the second COVID-19 vaccine injection, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention .
It is unclear how long the delay on the Moderna vaccine will continue, with one person familiar with the issue saying it could last for weeks, the outlet reported.
Finland similarly announced on Oct. 7 it would pause distribution of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine to younger men after a study found that men 30 and under who took the Moderna vaccine had a slightly higher risk of developing myocarditis.
Swedish and Danish health officials announced on Oct. 6 they would also pause the use of the Moderna vaccine for all young adults and children, citing the same unpublished study as Finland.
The FDA still encourages nonadolescents to get vaccinated, including with the Moderna vaccine.
On Thursday, the FDA panel unanimously endorsed a half-dose booster shot for older and at-risk adults. The panel also supported a booster shot for all adults who received the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine.
Despite some concerns regarding the COVID-19 vaccine, a majority of U.S. residents are vaccinated. Around 65.8% of U.S. residents have received their first vaccine shot, with roughly 56.9% fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to the CDC .
Waving signs like “coercion is not consent,” and “stop the mandate,” some 200 Boeing Co employees and others staged a protest on Friday over the planemaker’s COVID-19 vaccine requirement for U.S. workers.
Boeing said on Tuesday it will require U.S. employees to be vaccinated by Dec. 8 under an executive order issued by President Joe Biden for federal contractors.
“It’s my choice and it’s my body,” one avionics engineer said, his voice nearly drowned out by anti-Biden chants and trucks honking to show support along the busy street outside Boeing’s factory in Everett, north of Seattle.
“It’s an experimental drug given under a pseudo-emergency,” he added.
Another worker, an assembly mechanic, said: “This is America. We don’t just do what we’re told because one person says to.”
Boeing employees and others line the street to wave signs and American flags to protest the company’s coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccine mandate, outside the Boeing facility in Everett, Washi., on Oct. 15, 2021. (Lindsey Wasson/Reuters)
Earlier this week, Boeing said employees must either show proof of vaccination or have an approved reasonable accommodation based on a disability or sincerely held religious belief by Dec. 8.
“Boeing is committed to maintaining a safe working environment for our employees,” a spokesperson said. “Advancing the health and safety of our global workforce is fundamental to our values and a core priority every day.”
Major U.S. airlines including American Airlines have said they will also meet the deadline imposed on federal contractors, as has aircraft parts manufacturer Spirit AeroSystems.
“Now that he has issued the Executive Order, it is our responsibility to comply with that order,” Spirit Chief Executive Officer Tom Gentile wrote in a memo to employees and seen by Reuters on Friday.
Spirit was calling back former employees as it prepares for what Gentile characterized as “one of the fastest increases in production rates in the history of our industry.”
Boeing has said its mandate does not apply immediately to its sites in Texas, where Republican Governor Greg Abbott issued an executive order on Monday barring COVID-19 vaccine mandates by any entity, including private employers.
