Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com,

In a conversation with Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT) acknowledged that banning TikTok has such strong support in Congress because the social media platform has hurt Israel’s public relations battle.

“Some wonder why there was such overwhelming support for us to shut down, potentially, TikTok or other entities of that nature,” Romney said at the McCain Institute this past Friday. “If you look at the postings on TikTok and the number of mentions of Palestinians relative to other social media sites, it’s overwhelmingly so among TikTok broadcasts.”

Blinken admits that the TikTok ban was motivated by the Israeli PR failure pic.twitter.com/EbPkPtSPP1

— What the media hides. (@narrative_hole) May 5, 2024

The official justification for targeting TikTok is the thus far unfounded allegation that it’s a Chinese spy tool because its parent company, ByteDance, is based in China.

But Romney’s comments suggest the real purpose of the renewed push to ban the app after a similar effort failed years ago was to censor news coming out of Gaza and pro-Palestinian content.

Blinken blamed social media in general when asked by Romney why Israel was losing the global PR war. Palestinian journalists have been able to broadcast to the whole world the atrocities committed by Israel in Gaza using social media, including graphic videos of dead or wounded children being dug out of rubble following an Israeli airstrike.

“Now, of course, we’re on an intravenous feed of information with new impulses, inputs every millisecond,” Blinken said.

“And, of course, the way this has played out on social media has dominated the narrative. You have a social media ecosystem, environment in which context, history, facts get lost and the emotion, the impact of images dominate. We can’t discount that, but I think it also has a very very challenging effect on the narrative.”

A bill to ban TikTok was included in the $95 billion foreign military spending package President Biden signed into law last month. The legislation gives ByteDance nine months to sell TikTok, or else it will get banned. But ByteDance has vowed to fight the ban in court and said it would rather shutdown TikTok than sell.

A bear market in the used car market was confirmed in November and has since worsened through April. At the same time, negative equity values are hitting new record highs while auto insurance rates have soared the most since the mid-1970s. While gas prices at the pump are elevated, the environment to operate a vehicle is probably one of the worst ever. Just listen to Gen-Z and millennial users on X bitch and moan about $1,000 monthly car payments and other absurd costs associated with driving.

The Manheim Used Vehicle Value Index fell to 198.4 in April, a 14% drop from one year ago. This is the index’s lowest print since the first quarter of 2021. As for the bear market, the index is down 23% from the high and quickly falling – there could be air pockets given the rapid upward moves three years ago – and that demand has been suppressed given a high-interest rate environment. 

All vehicle segments of the Manheim Used Vehicle Value Index experienced seasonally adjusted prices that were down double digits year over year in April. Luxury was the only segment that was not hit the hardest, down just 12.9%. The worst-performing segment was compact cars, down 17.6% compared with last year, followed by midsize cars, down 16.8%, and pickups, down 15.2%. EVs were down 17.5%.

This is a significant worry for millions of Americans who bought cars during the pandemic mania, which basically involved spending free money provided by the Federal Reserve, only now discovering that their loans are plunging into underwater territory. 

According to a recent Edmunds note, 20% of new vehicle sales involving a trade-in had negative equity during the October-through-December period—the highest level since 2021. 

Negative equity values soared to a new record high of $6,064 during the period, a massive 46% increase from late 2021. 

We warned readers in 2023 about the worsening negative equity situation for heavily indebted drivers: 

Negative Equity Surges: More Consumers Find Themselves In Underwater Auto Loans
Number Of Americans In Upside-Down Auto Loans Continues To Worsen

Adding to the financial stress for drivers, there’s also the concern that Joe Biden’s sticky inflation continues to send auto insurance rates to the highest levels since the inflation shitstorm in the mid-1970s. 

We’ve pointed out that ridiculous repair bills for newer vehicles (cough, cough, EVs) are likely the main reason rates are higher. 

Rivian Owner Shocked By $41,000 Repair Bill For Minor Damage
“Shocking Number”: Rivian Owner Sees $42,000 Repair Bill For Minor Accident

Right now, drivers are paralyzed as the average used car auto loans tracked by Bankrate surged again – now exceeding 8.5%.

The average new car loan has reached a record high of $40,000. 

In recent months, Joseph Yoon, consumer insights analyst for Edmunds, told Bloomberg: 

“We’re in this situation where combined with the cost of the vehicles being so high and the interest rates being so historically high, you have a lot of people who are in bad car loans.” 

To Yoon’s point, the percentage of subprime auto borrowers at least 60 days past due in September topped 6.11%, the highest ever. 

Source: Bloomberg 

Out of all this gloom and doom for drivers. There’s good news on the inflation front: falling Manheim used car prices will only result in a lower future print for the US CPI Used Car index. 

So the big question is when will the bear market in used car prices bottom? 

Car owners should certaily not be looking for any bailouts from The Fed anytime soon (or Biden, who is too busy paying off student loans). Higher rates and longer is the theme, no matter the jawboning, with less than two cuts now priced in for the whole of 2024 (down from over seven at the start of the year).

By Frank Fang of Epoch Times

China’s communist regime spent $710.6 billion on its military in 2022, more than three times Beijing’s publicly stated totals, according to a report from the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute (AEI).

“Considering that the Pentagon has labeled China the ‘pacing challenge,’ this revelation should cause concern,” the April 29 report reads.

“When compared globally, China’s estimated $711 billion military budget illustrates that China is more of a ‘pacing threat’ than a ‘pacing challenge.’”

Mackenzie Eaglen, a senior fellow at the AEI and the author of the report, explained that she came up with the figure based on her calculation after accounting for economic adjustments, including cheaper labor costs in China, and estimating “reasonable but uncounted expenditures.”

China’s DF-41 nuclear-capable intercontinental ballistic missiles are seen during a military parade at Tiananmen Square in Beijing on Oct. 1, 2019.

In 2022, the Chinese regime announced that its defense spending for the year would be $229 billion.

Beijing’s self-reported military spending should also include the money that it spent on its paramilitary organizations, Ms. Eaglen wrote, since these groups “are increasingly used in tandem with” the regime’s military, which is officially called the People’s Liberation Army.

She estimated that Beijing spent $45.2 billion on its People’s Armed Police Force and $2.1 billion on its China Coast Guard in 2022.

China doesn’t include other relevant expenditures related to its space forces, military satellites, or counter-space capabilities in its defense budget, according to the report.

“Given many satellites’ inherent dual-use capability and Beijing’s general adherence to a strategy of military-civil fusion in space policy, AEI’s model counted this entire budget as a military expenditure,” the report reads.

Ms. Eaglen estimated that China’s space budget in 2022 could have been $21 billion.

Other hidden expenditures included spending on military demobilization, retirement, and pensions, which the author estimated to total $46.1 billion. China likely spent more than $1.8 billion on continued construction of military facilities in the South China Sea and arms imports, according to the report.

A portion of the $711 billion spending also included military research and development expenditures, which Ms. Eaglen estimated to be $45.8 billion. However, she noted that the estimated military research and development spending could be much higher, considering the regime’s military-civil fusion (MCF) strategy, cyberespionage operations, and reliance on state-owned companies.

“If fully evaluated, Beijing’s expenditures via military-civil fusion and dual-use technology investments prove even the much larger $711 billion figure underestimates China’s military investments,” the report reads.

“Pacing Challenge”

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is using the MCF strategy to acquire cutting-edge technologies, such as semiconductors and artificial intelligence.

According to the State Department, the regime is implementing the strategy through “licit and illicit means,” such as theft, to achieve military dominance. Private companies, joint research institutes, and academia are “being exploited” to help the CCP’s military advance, often “without their knowledge or consent,” the department warned.

“In just the past decade, however, China has managed to rapidly build sophisticated missile forces, surpass the United States by building the largest navy in the world, and catch up to and even exceed the United States in many other key national security areas,” the report reads.

“By calculating the true buying power behind the Chinese military budget, it’s easy to understand how Beijing can continue this unprecedented military buildup while, on paper, appearing to spend much less.”

In comparison, the United States spent $742.2 billion on its military in 2022, excluding supplemental spending, according to the report.

However, Ms. Eaglen noted that the approximately equal spending level between the two countries “plays to Beijing’s benefit.”

Continue reading at the Epoch Times

By Charles Kennedy of OilPrice.com

Russian oil product cargos are piling up at sea as their South Korean buyers grow reluctant to go through with their deals amid a government crackdown on sanction evasion, Bloomberg has reported, citing unnamed sources.

According to Kpler data, there are over 2 million barrels of Russian naphtha sitting off the coast of Oman, which is significantly higher than the weekly average for January and February, which came in at some 790,000 barrels.

The Bloomberg sources said that the buildup was caused by the South Korean government’s closer scrutiny of incoming fuel cargos, which has made local refiners and petrochemical producers wary of buying Russian naphtha.

The tightening sanctions on Russia’s oil exports are raising freight costs for moving Russian crude. The estimated direct cost to deliver Russian cargoes now is around 6-8% of the price of a barrel of crude leaving the western ports in Russia for Asia, according to data from commodity price reporting agency Argus crunched by Bloomberg.

Argus estimated in March that shipping a barrel of Russian crude from a port in the Baltic Sea to China has cost around $14.50 since December, with more than half of this per-barrel cost attributable to the Western sanctions.

The likely directly related-to-sanction cost to hire tankers to transport Russian oil is estimated at about $773 million since the end of December 2023, based on shipments tracked by Bloomberg.

Before the war in the Ukraine Russia was the top supplier of naphtha for South Korean petrochemicals makers but the war has changed this, per the Bloomberg report. Now South Korean plastics producers are importing more naphtha from places such as the UAE, Malaysia, Singapore, and Tunisia. South Korean processors are also importing more naphtha from Kuwait and Oman.

Russia, for its part, is shipping more naphtha to China, according to Kpler, as well as Taiwan. Last month, Russian imports accounted for more than half of the total naphtha shipments that Taiwan took in.

Authored by Gary Anderson via RealClearPolitics,

Say what one wants about the Israeli incursion into Gaza, but not a single rocket or missile has been fired from what is left of it since the start of fighting. Compare this with the relative ineffectiveness of American efforts stop Yemen’s Houthis from slinging missiles at shipping in the Red Sea. The difference is simply geography. The Israelis simply have to cross fencing and concrete barriers to directly confront their attackers, the Palestinians of Hamas.

If U.S. wanted to launch such a large scale punitive operation against the Houthis, it would have to be done from the sea with a large scale amphibious assault. An amphibious assault of this scale, requiring sea borne tanks, assault engineers and bridging capabilities that have been divested by the U.S. Marine Corps. Instead, the Marine Corps is building a defensive force built around anti-ship missiles designed primarily to contain the Chinese Navy.

This defensive force is a stark departure from former Marine Corps Commandant Al Gray’s vision to modernize the Marine Corps for future wars.

Back in the 1980s, General Gray had a vision for what he called Over the Horizon (OTH) operations using tilt rotor aircraft, long range helicopters, more capable long-range amphibious vehicles, and air cushioned landing craft. Gray realized that advanced defensive weapons would make traditional linear amphibious operations launched just offshore problematical, but OTH would enable landing in column in places that the enemy did not expect. Gray had the Marine Corps experiment with these capabilities. Throughout the nineties, numerous war games and field experiments took place to explore the physical and intellectual challenges. OTH gradually evolved into Operational Maneuver from the Sea (OMFTS) and a whole new philosophy of littoral campaigning.

In traditional amphibious operations a relatively small portion of potential landing sites in the world’s littorals were open to the kind of linear landings done at Normandy and Iwo Jima. It was relatively easy for a defender to determine which beaches were vulnerable to amphibious landings. OMFTS were designed to open over seventy percent of littorals by landing in column across remote locations such as boat ramps and small coves with access to paths inland. This made the defense against OMTFS far more difficult.

To achieve OMFTS, we planned to use a grid of small micro-robotic ground scouts located at key road intersections, choke points, and bridges. The robotic sensors would give the landing force a map to exploit the gaps in enemy defenses as well as be able to designate targets at enemy strong points and call-in accurate fire on them. We called this advanced reconnaissance and scouting system the Reconnaissance-Surveillance-Target Acquisition (RSTA) Grid. Platforms such as the V-22 Osprey and heavy lift helicopters such as the CH-53E could give a vertical over-the-horizon dimension to this “expanding torrent” of operational capability with the RSTA Grid identifying safe landing zones.

OMFTS and RSTA would only require small assault force initially that would not need an “iron mountain” of logistical supplies on the beach before moving inland. Just-in-time logistics would keep the initial landing force moving until more traditional beaches and ports could be opened by attacking them from the rear. During the initial operation, fire support would come from precision strike until more conventional artillery could come ashore.

One key element that made OMFTS different from traditional amphibious operations and more compatible with the existing Marine Corps’ maneuver warfare approaches, was flexibility. Once the line of departure was crossed in traditional operations, the force was committed; it was “do or die for old Semper Fi.” We saw OMFTS as giving us the ability to launch several probes. The most promising would become the main effort. The rest could be withdrawn or remain for a while as deception to confuse opposing forces. Worst case, the operation could be scrapped enabling us to choose a more promising set of operational targets without causing a Gallipoli-like debacle. 

This amphibious blitzkrieg would be led by relatively small, fast moving task-organizations comprised of elements from infantry and armored battalions. However, more traditional infantry, armored, and artillery units would be needed to defend the eventual force beachhead, assist army follow-on forces in sustained operations ashore, and potential counterinsurgency operations.

All these years of planning never led to the radically reduced Marine Corps that we have today. By 2020, there should have been newer and better tanks, artillery, and amphibious vehicles as part of ongoing Marine Corps modernization, but I came to believe that OMFTS could initially be accomplished with existing Navy LCACs, Ospreys, and CH-53Es. The Advanced Armored Amphibious Vehicle (AAAV) was a failure, but I think most of us came to believe that its absence would not be an operational “showstopper”.

The real technological challenges were in the robotic sensors needed for the RSTA grid, sufficient over-the-horizon communications, some advanced naval mine clearing capabilities (with unmanned underwater systems), and some enhanced just-in-time logistics assets. None of these things were science fiction, and the technologists assured us were doable by 2020 and have been used during the current Russo-Ukrainian war.

We needed to use surrogates for war games and field experiments to simulate OMFTS.

In 1998, a small Special Purpose Marine Corps Marine Air Ground Task Force (SPMAGTF) conducted an over-the-horizon landing in column from the USS Germantown across a boat ramp in Okinawa using Landing Craft Air Cushioned (LCACs) and long range CH 53 helicopters. Later that year, a MAGTF staff from III MEF used LAVs in a force-on-force operation against a Red Team led by students from the Expeditionary Warfare School -also employing LAVs- on the peninsulas of the Virginia Capes. The surrogate RSTA Grid allowed the Blue force to land in an unexpected location and maneuver quickly to defeat the Red Force. Other war games conducted during the period caused us to believe that OMFTS would provide wicked problems to future opponents. By the turn of the century, many of us in the developmental and experimental community believed that OMFTS could be fully implemented within two decades. Indeed, the technologies needed all exist today. What we did not envision was 9/11 and General Berger.

The root of the problem really goes back to 2001 and the 9/11 attacks. At that point, the George W. Bush administration undertook the war in Afghanistan and in 2003 invaded Iraq. The Marine Corps was forced put aside its work on the next Marine Corps to support the war effort, which lasted until 2019 when virtually all conventional units had left Afghanistan. Many serving and former marines hoped to finally get back to work on OMFTS, but the new commandant at the time, General David Berger, had another vision that the dubbed Force Design 2030. OMFTS might have evolved differently if General Berger had chosen that path; the name might even have changed, but OMFTS remains the Marine Corps that could have been, particularly for operations other than island hoping in China’s first island chain.

If it had been allowed to evolve, OMFTs would have been the perfect tool to suppress threats such as the Houthis at the source. A group of retired general officers calling themselves Chowder II have put together an alternate approach to Force Design for the Corps that they call Vision 2035; much of it is based on work done before 2001. Commandants come and go, but the Marine Corps continues to look forward. Under new leadership, Vision 2035 may again include OMFTS or something like it.

Gary Anderson was heavily involved in OMFTS design and experimentation as the Chief of Staff of the Marine Corps Warfighting Lab.

What’s not widely known is that Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ grandfather, Lawrence Preston Gise, helped form the Pentagon’s supersecret Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA—renamed DARPA) in 1958. Years later, DARPA developed the internet and spurred breakthroughs in high-speed networking, voice recognition, and internet search. 

One year before Gise died in 1995, Bezos founded Amazon in the garage of his Bellevue, Washington home.

Or so we’re told… 

John Greenewald Jr., who operates The Black Vault, a website dedicated to revealing declassified government documents through obtaining Freedom of Information Act requests, posted on X that he went after Gise’s “FBI file, but found out if there was one, it has been destroyed.” 

🚨L.P. Gise was Jeff Bezos’ grandfather. In the late ’50s, he helped found what would become DARPA. In the early-mid ’60s, he headed the AEC’s 7 state, 26,000 employee operation.

I went after his FBI file, but found out if there was one, it has been destroyed.#FOIA pic.twitter.com/RdIlpsx3XB

— John Greenewald, Jr. (@blackvaultcom) May 6, 2024

News website Leading Report’s Patrick Webb commented on Greenewald’s findings, saying, “There has long been speculation that DARPA has been involved in the creation of many popular big tech companies, using “frontmen” for the allusion of a startup led by outsiders.” 

There has long been speculation that DARPA has been involved in the creation of many popular big tech companies, using “frontmen” for the allusion of a startup led by outsiders.

— Patrick Webb (@RealPatrickWebb) May 6, 2024

With the contents of Gise’s FBI file unlikely to ever be unearthed and likely never destroyed, just inaccessible to FOIA requests or the public, other X users commented on Webb’s and Greenewald’s posts, pointing out how DARPA possibly created other big tech firms: 

DARPA created FB too.

— Jessica Rojas 🇺🇸💪 (@catsscareme2021) May 7, 2024

We know Facebook is a “cancelled program” out of the DOD… if you look at bill gates family you find similar stuff.

This “theory” is more confirmed every day

— Scott (@Scott89947486) May 7, 2024

LifeLog——>Facebook

— Human Clay (@prayerw62758802) May 7, 2024

Questions swirl about DARPA’s involvement in creating Amazon, given Bezos’ grandfather’s connection to the secret agency. 

Authored by Matt McGregor via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A group of residents in western North Carolina are protesting their county board’s lack of transparency over furtive moves to welcome an electric vehicle (EV) battery manufacturing the residents believe would pollute their waters and ruin their scenic countryside.

A view of the southeast shore of Lake James in Morganton, NC, from the Fonta Flora Trail approximately three miles from the megasite where an EV battery plant could be constructed (Courtesy of Bill Connell).

In October 2023, the North Carolina state legislature allocated $35.8 million to Burke Development Inc. for the purchase of a 1,400-acre property on which to build an industrial megasite in Burke and McDowell counties.

Though the all-Republican board of Burke County Commissioners has made no official decision on approving an EV battery plant to be built within the megasite, Alan Wood, the CEO of Burke Development, alluded to the site’s potential for such a project, according to a local media report.

Mr. Wood listed several EV manufacturing plants sprouting up in the Southeast because of their proximity to a lithium mine in Kings Mountain, North Carolina, which a Charlotte-based chemical manufacturing Albemarle Corporation is set to reopen by 2026 with the help of a $90 million grant from the U.S. Department of Defence.

Since reports surfaced of the development, an organization called the Stop Burke-Lake James Megasite (Stop BLJM) was formed.

A petition with 2,859 signatures is circulating while Stop BLJM members speak out in county commissioner meetings.

In February, Burke County Manager Brian Epley held a Fireside Chat in response to the criticism in which he argued that there’s misinformation surrounding the project and that it’s a more minimal design than what’s been broadcast by those in opposition.

He pointed to country trends that highlight a need for economic development while addressing the dimensions of the project itself.

Economic development within the megasite will create jobs and increase the tax base in a county that will see challenges in the future with maintaining its workforce and population while facing current issues with “pockets of poverty,” he said.

Great Meadows, LLC., owns 1,400 acres of land comprising 14 parcels zoned for industrial, residential, and commercial use.

He said the largest parcel of land is 550 acres, 440 of which is zoned industrial, and the remaining 110 general business.

Out of the 550 acres, the commissioners decided that 165 acres could be developed for manufacturing, he said.

“From an economic development lens, that provides more than enough area to put the needed square footage there to make this a transformational economic development project to create the jobs that would be meaningful to Burke County and to create the tax base that would be meaningful to Burke County,” he said.

This future development would comprise 30 percent of the property, while 70 percent would remain undeveloped.

This undeveloped land would be used for the buffering of noise and light pollution, with room for setbacks for stream remediation and “innovative stormwater retention” that would keep the water source clean while maintaining a natural environment and wildlife habitat, he said.

‘Nature’s Playground’

However, Stop BLJM members aren’t convinced.

Lake James is where tourists come to recreate and residents live for a reason: its quiet rolling hills, panoramic clear skies, clean water, fresh mountain air, and rural community—unlike the more populated cities of Asheville and Charlotte. 

An EV battery plant would “devastate the area,” according to Stop BLJM members who spoke with The Epoch Times.

And the commissioners are making their decisions without any input from the residents, they said.

“It’s clear to me that it’s a boondoggle for personal gain of all of these local politicians, not for the benefit of those in the county or living nearby,” said Daniel Oberer, who owns a home in the area.

According to a report from the Foothills Conservancy of North Carolina, the Lake James Environmental Association, and the Catawba Riverkeepers, Lake James is already “a major economic driver” for the region and home to Lake James State Park in the city of Morganton, which takes in “over half a million visitors annually.”

Lake James is a 10.2 square mile reservoir with over 150 miles of shoreline that makes contact with the Pisgah National Forest.

It was engineered by Duke Power in the early 20th century to serve as a hydroelectric project and named for Duke University benefactor James Duke.

“The lake is also fed by and drains into the Catawba River, classified by the State as ‘trout waters,’ and is a popular paddling and fishing destination,” the report stated. “The Catawba River and surrounding subwatershed areas are classified as a ‘water supply watershed for the City of Morganton.”

A tributary of the Catawba River near Lake James called the Muddy Creek borders some of the parcels of the Great Meadows property, the report said.

Having an EV battery plant on the watershed that could drain chemicals into a water supply for 26 counties downstream is just too risky, Stop BLJM members said.

“We’re doing everything we can to stop it because once it goes in, the area will never be the same,” said Mr. Oberer.

From Lake James tourists can see the tallest peak of the Appalachian Mountains called Mount Mitchell, which reaches 6,684 feet above sea level and is ranked as the highest mountain east of the Mississippi River.

The area has come to be known as “Nature’s Playground” to locals and tourists alike.

The people fighting the development range from locals who fear their way of life will be irreparably destroyed to those who aren’t from the area but own properties there, Mr. Oberer said.

“We all have this common love for the area and common desire to protect God’s natural beauty, and to keep it for future generations to enjoy,” he said.

‘It’s Just a Bad Idea’

Bill Connell, who started the Stop BLJM petition on Change.org, said the commissioners have been “extremely covert.”

“They started this process well over two years ago and we knew nothing about it until last October, so we’re just defending ourselves at this point,” Mr. Connell said. “Now we’re looking into legal counsel and trying to get the public educated.”

Burke County residents have been kept in the dark, Roxanne Reep Fleetwood said.

“We go to meetings, we speak, and then the meetings are dismissed,” Ms. Fleetwood said, adding that the only ones who will benefit from the project are a few people in government and the landowner.

“The glaring problem with this is its location in the Catawba River basin for the Catawba River,” she said. “It’s what feeds our wells. It’s water that everyone drinks from. It goes 26 counties downstream. They can have every intention of keeping people safe but there’s no guarantee.”

In April, the U.S. Department of Labor issued a report finding the South Korean SK Battery Commerce plant in Commerce, Georgia—initially celebrated for its advancement in the Biden administration’s green energy initiative—had exposed employees to toxic chemical fumes even after they had suffered “potentially permanent respiratory damage” in an October 2023 fire.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration cited SK Battery for five violations.

Those violations included exposing workers to hydrofluoric acid, failing to train them on hazardous chemicals with respiratory hazards, and failing to train them on extinguishing lithium battery fires.

Ignited by the Biden administration’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal, a battery belt is beginning to loop itself throughout the Southeast despite a lack of enthusiasm for EV cars.

According to the Pew Research Center, about half of consumers report they are unlikely to buy an EV vehicle, citing little confidence in the country’s infrastructure to support them.

Reports of charging issues in extreme weather, long waits at charging stations, and car malfunctions have slowed the EV industry’s progress since the Biden administration’s war on carbon emissions that scholars who question the narrative argue is erroneously blamed for what others believe to be climate change.

In addition to an EV battery plant, a Norfolk Southern rail line would need to be constructed to the plant that would pass near residents’ homes and wetlands, presumably carrying lithium and other chemical elements, Ms. Fleetwood said.

The railroad company has a poor safety record, which includes its 2022 derailment leading to a chemical spill in East Palestine, Ohio, Ms. Fleetwood said.

According to a 2023 report, Norfolk Southern has seen an average of 163.6 derailments and 2.9 hazardous material releases annually.

“You can’t keep your water clean with a rail line that has a poor safety record that may be transporting lithium,” Ms. Fleetwood said. “And you can’t have tourism if the factory is at your gateway to this massive amount of unspoiled beautiful land which acts as a filter cleaning the water running into the Catawba River. It’s just a bad idea.”

Then there are the chemical elements—cadmium, lithium, magnesium, and cobalt—that must be expelled through the vent systems into the air and back into the ground, she said, which will ultimately find itself in the groundwater.

There are better ways for the commissioners to invest the taxpayers’ money, she said, such as spreading it throughout the county to facilitate the tourism industry that rivals what the EV plant would make without harming the environment or changing the character of the region.

“We are known for tourism and if this site is developed, all of that will go away,” Ms. Fleetwood said. 

‘Why All of This Deception?’

Joanna Kentch, another Stop BLJM member, has several questions related to the ethics of how the project has been handled, like who approved the funding for the megasite, where the money came from, why Commissioner Chairman Jeff Brittain and County Manager Brian Epley are on the Burke Development board that took the $35.6 million from the state, and why it seems the commissioners aren’t listening to the residents.

“Why all of this deception, not telling us exactly what they plan to build on that site?” she asked. “They are using public funds and the taxpayers have every right to know what their money is being used for.”

Ms. Kentch said that since the October 2023 article alluding to the county’s ambitions for EV battery plant, the commissioners have been back-peddling and that the $35.6 million is just the beginning of what will cost taxpayers millions more to make the site “shovel-ready.”

“They’ve been trying to take back these damning statements which was the primary reason the residents of Burke County got so upset,” Ms. Kentch said.

Ms. Kentch said the Fireside Chat was a mere “dog and pony show” in an attempt to frame the narrative around economic development.

“There are a lot of other ways to create jobs, and not at the expense of environmental disaster,” Ms. Kentch said.

In April, the commissioners rezoned the county to “conditional,” a proposal not recommended by the county planning board because “the language was too subjective,” according to Ms. Kentch.

The document states that a conditional zoning district “may be more or less restrictive” than general zoning.

“This means they can approve whatever they want, from residential to industrial, as with the case of the megasite,” Ms. Kentch said. “Now they can turn the remaining parcels to industrial without going through the steps of getting public comment before approving a rezoning application.”

According to Mr. Epley in his Fireside Chat, conditional rezoning means that the commissioners can regulate development standards such as uses, buffers, setbacks, and road access.

“However, Epley doesn’t mention that they can also approve dangerous access options such as railroad spurs, heavy industrial manufacturing uses, and other developments which would be considered hazardous and subject to public scrutiny under general zoning guidelines,” Ms. Kentch said.

For Ms. Kentch and other members of Stop BLJM, the rezoning was just another move by the county to pave the way for an EV battery factory while ignoring the opposition of Burke County residents.

Ms. Kentch said the issue over the megasite has led to two longtime commissioners getting voted out of office.

Stop BLJM-backed Republican candidates Brian Barrier and Mike Stroud won the primary election in March and now await the general election in November when the state will also choose between Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson and Democrat state Attorney General Josh Stein for governor, bringing Democrat Gov. Roy Cooper’s two terms to a close.

‘They Think They Just Know Better’

Mr. Barrier was born and raised in Burke County. He served in the U.S. Army before later becoming the owner and publisher of Blue Ridge Christian News.

He told The Epoch Times that, as a conservative, he was fed up with big spending in government.

He ran a survey on social media to gauge residents’ view of the megasite project and found that out of 300 to 400 responses, “an overwhelming majority” were against it, he said.

He said a government board’s function is to provide essential services, adding that beyond that, government officials risk transgressing their roles as employees who work for the citizens who hired them.

“The commissioners have continued to build buildings, buy property, and overspend,” Mr. Barrier said. “I’m not saying everything they’ve done is terrible, but it’s not been fiscally conservative in providing essential services to the county.”

And like many local government projects, it’s done with “little transparency,” Mr. Barrier said.

He referenced South Carolina state Rep. Adam Morgan’s speech in the legislature highlighting what’s become a great divide between politicians and their constituents, who “want their tax money spent on core government functions” such as roads and schools instead of billion-dollar big corporation projects.

“They don’t want us in here trying to play this government planning thing where we in our bureaus can figure out where the jobs should be, who should be employed, how much money should be allocated where in the private sector,” he said. “It never works. It’s socialism. It’s never worked anywhere before, so what are we doing trying to do it here?”

Mr. Barrier said he couldn’t have said it better himself.

“These people get elected and then they think they just know better what’s best for the citizens regardless of what the citizens want,” Mr. Barrier said.  

If he had found that a majority of residents wanted an EV battery plant, he would have—despite his personal opinions—campaigned in favor of the development, he said.

But this isn’t the case, he added, and Stop BLJM may be putting the commissioners in a position where they will “be forced to listen.”

“I think they’ve brought up enough awareness and they may keep enough pressure on them that things will have to change,” Mr. Barrier said.

The Epoch Times contacted Burke County Manager Epley for comment.

Billionaire investor and Duquesne Family Office Chairman & CEO Stan Druckenmiller slammed Bidenomics and warned the Federal Reserve and federal government “misdiagnosed Covid and thought it was — we were going into a depression.”

Druckenmiller has been irritated by the massive fiscal spending by the federal government, which we outlined last year as a “stealth stimulus” propelling Bidenomics. Meanwhile, Fed chair Jerome Powell has enabled the Bidenomics disaster as the government spends $1 trillion every 100 days. Now, with stagflationary threats emerging, the US economic situation is quickly deteriorating. 

CNBC Joe Kernen asked Druckenmiller: 

Let me ask you how this plays into to — it’s another I think issue of being, you know, things are going, well, and then we totally overspent in terms of fiscally as well in Bidenomics.

Druckenmiller responded:

If I was a professor, I’d give them an F. Basically, they misdiagnosed COVID and thought it was — we were going into a depression. The Fed did, too. I worried about it, too, in early days. The Fed eventually pivoted, better late than never. Treasury — Treasury is still acting like we’re in a depression. It’s interesting because I’ve studied the Great Depression and you had a private sector crippled with debt, with basically no new ideas. So interventionist policies were called for and were effective.

The private sector could not be more different today than it was in the Great Depression. Their balance sheets are fine. They’re healthy. And have you ever seen more innovative ideas that the private sector could take advantage of? Now, you got Blockchain, you got AI, you’ve got the whole thing.

All government needed to do was get out of their way and let them innovate. Instead, they’ve spent and spent and spent, and my new fear now is that spending and the — and the resulting interest rates on the — on the debt that’s been created are going to crowd out some of the innovation that otherwise would have — would have taken place. 

We’ve got a 7 percent budget deficit at full employment. It’s just — it’s unheard of…

Here’s the clip of Druckenmiller speaking with Kernen about Bidenomics failures:

Investor Stanley Druckenmiller on Bidenomics: “If I were a professor, I’d give them an ‘F’.” pic.twitter.com/WfsU4ecO6y

— Squawk Box (@SquawkCNBC) May 7, 2024

In macro, the consumer data just continues to worsen.

The latest consumer credit data published by the Federal Reserve shows credit growth just imploded as credit card APRs hit an all-time high. 

Meanwhile, total credit card debt jumped to a record high while the personal savings rate slid to a record low. 

Last week, one of the loudest stagflationary warnings printed when US GDP unexpectedly collapsed to just 1.6% in 1Q, down more than 50% from the Q4 print of 3.4%, the lowest print since Q2 2022. However, all-important core PCE for Q1 soared from 2.0% to 3.7%, suggesting the US was nearing a stagflationary recession.

The Biden team has understood this failure and dialed back “Bidenomics” propaganda in corporate media headlines. 

We suspect the Gen-Zers who voted for Biden in the first go around won’t make that mistake again: “Bidenomics Failure Shows Up At Polls As Gen-Z Revolts Against Democrats.” 

Authored by Sina McCullough via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

As spring gardening approaches, a new contender has entered the fray—the genetically modified (GM) Purple Tomato. Unlike its GM predecessors, the GM Purple Tomato is not destined solely for the fields of commercial agriculture—it has made its debut in the backyards of home gardeners across the United States.

With claims of heightened antioxidant levels and potential health benefits, this novel creation has stirred both excitement and controversy among consumers and scientists alike. Biotech investors hope it can usher in a new era of public trust in genetically engineered foods while skeptics worry the tomatoes’ near-total lack of regulation or review may hide dangers to human health and/or the environment.

Development 

The GM Purple Tomato was engineered by scientists at Norfolk Plant Sciences in the UK. Led by biochemist Cathie Martin and her team, the project aimed to harness the natural properties of anthocyanins, compounds found in blueberries and blackberries, to enhance the nutritional profile of tomatoes.

In this 2008 handout photo illustration, genetically modified Purple Tomatoes are seen beside red tomatoes. (John Innes Centre UK via Getty Images)

Using genetic engineering techniques, Martin and her colleagues inserted two genes responsible for purple coloration in edible snapdragon flowers into tomato plants. This process enabled the tomatoes to express the genes from the snapdragon and, subsequently, produce high levels of anthocyanins, thereby imbuing the tomatoes with a distinct purple hue and potentially enhanced health benefits.

According to Norfolk Healthy Produce, the U.S. subsidiary of Norfolk Plant Sciences, the Purple Tomatoes are a “rich source of antioxidants” due to the increased content of anthocyanins. Unlike domesticated tomatoes which contain anthocyanins in the skin, the Purple Tomato contains anthocyanins throughout the whole tomato.

The genesis of the GM Purple Tomato marks a significant milestone in agricultural biotechnology. Unlike previous GM crops primarily targeted at commercial producers, this tomato is the first GM food crop directly marketed to home gardeners in the United States, offering an opportunity for individuals to engage with biotechnology in their own backyard.

According to Norfolk Healthy Produce, more than 13,000 Purple Tomato seed orders have already shipped.

Regulatory Approval 

The GM Purple Tomato was deregulated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) in 2022. According to a statement from the USDA, the GM Purple Tomato is not subject to regulation by the USDA because it does not pose a plant pest risk:

“With respect to Norfolk Plant Sciences’ purple tomato, we did not identify any plausible pathways to increased plant pest risk compared to other cultivated tomatoes and issued a response letter indicating the plant is not subject to regulation.”

In 2023, the Purple Tomato received a “no questions” letter from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which means the Purple Tomato is considered “generally recognized as safe” (GRAS) and, therefore, does not require premarket review or approval by the FDA.

To qualify for GRAS status, Norfolk Plant Sciences submitted data from tests conducted internally.

Norfolk Plant Sciences created the Purple Tomato by splicing genes from a purple snapdragon into a tomato. (Illustration by The Epoch Times, Shutterstock, Getty Images)

The lack of safety testing by the USDA and FDA, as well as reliance on data generated by the company that will profit from approval of its own product, has led to some experts calling for a more comprehensive safety assessment.

Safety Concerns and Health Claims 

Data provided to the FDA by Norfolk Plant Sciences demonstrates the company conducted various safety tests. However, critics argue the tests are insufficient to guarantee the safety of the Purple Tomato for human consumption.

According to an FDA memo dated June 13, 2023, tests conducted by Norfolk Plant Sciences mainly focused on six areas.  Of those, four were relatively straightforward while two have raised safety concerns among experts, according to GM Watch.

1. PCR and Southern blot analysis were conducted by Norfolk Plant Sciences to determine if the snapdragon foreign DNA was inserted into the tomato DNA.

The company (Norfolk Plant Sciences) stated that insertion of the foreign DNA was confirmed.

2. PCR and sequence comparison of DNA samples were conducted to confirm the stability of the inheritability of the insertion across generations. Plants were bred to determine if the purple phenotype was inherited in a Mendelian segregation fashion.

The company stated the purple phenotype was inheritable.

3. Compositional analysis was conducted to determine if the Purple Tomato contained similar nutrients at similar levels compared with non-GMO tomatoes, including protein, fat, carbohydrate, fiber, minerals, carotenoids, vitamins, and alpha-tomatine.

The company determined the levels of most of the nutritional components to be similar or with “minor differences.”
(The Epoch Times)

4. Norfolk Plant Sciences assessed dietary exposure levels assuming the complete replacement of red tomatoes in the human diet with the Purple Tomato for two days.

The company concluded the level of dietary exposure to anthocyanins is the same as consuming high-anthocyanin foods.  For example, 8 ounces of Purple Tomato juice is equivalent to consuming 1 cup of blueberries.

The Controversial Tests

1. Bioinformatic analyses were utilized to determine if any open reading frames were generated or disrupted by inserting the foreign DNA. Norfolk Plant Sciences searched the DNA sequences flanking the insertion sequence in the tomatoes.

The company reported no open reading frames flanking the insertion location.

Since Norfolk Plant Sciences did not assess possible damage to the entire genome using advanced laboratory techniques, geneticist Michael Antoniou expressed concern in a statement published by GM Watch.

“There’s no evidence that the developers of the GM purple tomato have carried out the kind of molecular analyses (proteomics and metabolomics) that could help establish whether they only got the change they want, with no unintended changes. As a result, we don’t know if these tomatoes are safe to eat,” said Mr. Antoniou.

“We must also bear in mind that the GM transformation process (plant tissue culture and plant cells transformation) will inevitably give rise to hundreds if not thousands of sites of unintended DNA damage (mutations). These wide scale mutations can change patterns of gene function and alter biochemistry and composition, with unknown downstream health consequences,” he said.

2. Assessment of new peptides of equal or greater than 30 amino acids at the insertion site of the foreign DNA was conducted to rule out toxicity or allergenicity concerns.

The company identified one “putative” peptide, however, they stated, “this peptide has no homology to any known allergen or protein and there was no evidence this sequence is transcribed in tomato.” They concluded the results “do not raise food safety concerns.”

Allergenicity is an ongoing concern regarding the genetic modification of food. For example, a study published in Nature in 1999 reported that bean plants were genetically modified to produce higher levels of methionine and cysteine but were discarded because the expressed protein of the transgene was highly allergenic.

While Norfolk Plant Sciences did not identify a match with any known allergens, that does not guarantee the peptide formed through the process of gene modification is not an allergen. Given that nearly 11 percent of adults and 5.6 million children in the United States have food allergies, it may be prudent to apply the precautionary principle when modifying our food’s genetic makeup.

The Test That Everyone Talked About

Although not included in the 2023 FDA memo, Norfolk Plant Sciences, in conjunction with Cathie Martin, published a pilot feeding study in 2008 in Nature Biotechnology that examined the effects of Purple Tomato supplementation on the life span of cancer-susceptible mice.

According to the study, mice fed the GM tomato lived longer—by an average of 40 days than those fed non-GM red tomatoes.

Publication of the pilot study prompted the John Innes Centre to publish a press release titled, “Purple tomatoes may keep cancer at bay.” (Norfolk Plant Sciences is a spinoff company from the John Innes Centre.)

Read more here…

Isn’t it remarkable that while the military-industrial complex, neoconservative warmongers, and radical leftists in the White House seem to push for further conflict in Eastern Europe without even a hint of suggesting peace negotiations with Russia, some of America’s most advanced military jets are unfit for combat?

The latest example comes from Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport on Monday morning when a Lockheed Martin F-22 stealth fighter jet assigned to the 71st Fighter Squadron, 1st Fighter Wing at Joint Base Langley-Eustis, Virginia, suffered what the US military is calling a “mishap.” 

It was not immediately clear what happened, as the military would not elaborate on the “mishap” involving an in-flight emergency. However, one X user posted audio, allegedly from air traffic controllers at Savannah, that reveals the stealth fighter had a “brake failure.” 

“BURNER34 (F-22) advising SAVANAH TOWER that they have a brake failure and requests another aircraft for a visual inspection which DEMON73 (F-16) performed. BURNER34 came in and successfully hooked the runways arresting gear wire,” X user Thenewarea51 wrote in a post. 

BURNER34 (F-22) advising SAVANAH TOWER that they have a brake failure and requests another aircraft for a visual inspection which DEMON73 (F-16) performed. BURNER34 came in and successfully hooked the runways arresting gear wire.

Audio via @liveatc and thanks to Bill B. for… https://t.co/6Fu2Eo556a pic.twitter.com/ZkozSN8Pl0

— Thenewarea51 (@thenewarea51) May 7, 2024

The F-22 was conducting training exercises at Sentry Savannah, the Air National Guard’s largest fourth and fifth-generation counter-air, large-force exercise, held annually at the Air Dominance Center, Savannah Air National Guard Base, Georgia. 

Don’t even get us started with the latest figures from the Government Accountability Office, which show that only 15% to 30% of Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II stealth fighters are ‘capable of combat.’