RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2023/03/liberating_ourselves_from_dystopia.html

More Americans grasp how the U.S. government actually works.  Large corporate interests pay off politicians and bureaucrats to advance their financial interests.  In return, those politicians and bureaucrats are responsible for creating new problems for the American people that can be exploited to justify spending huge sums of money — the bulk of which falls into the laps of the large corporate interests. 

The pharmaceutical industry, for instance, would love for lawmakers to mandate that Americans purchase and use their products in perpetuity.  Big Pharma then pays hospitals, research scientists, and medical doctors to push its products.  It privately funds public health agencies, while rewarding ostensibly objective bureaucrats with research grants and promises of future lucrative employment.  Through its lobbying arms, Big Pharma fills the campaign coffers and family foundations of elected officials and works hand in glove with lawmakers to craft legislation that simultaneously expands Big Pharma’s profits and lawmakers’ personal stock portfolios.  Lawmakers who refuse to play this corrupt game end up becoming the electoral targets of all those extra dollars in industry profits, and the stick-or-carrot system effectively works to eliminate ethical politicians, while elevating criminals.  It’s plain old bribery and extortion, and it is how Washington, D.C. operates.

Notice that for this system to thrive, industry and government agents must continue to create new crises for the American people.  Far from being motivated to build a healthy future where humans are free from disease, Big Pharma has an incentive to invest in viral gain-of-function research or other dangerous experimental work that might inadvertently leak from a lab and unleash the next big pandemic.  A healthy world is profitless.  Likewise, defense industry interests have every incentive to see mortal threats throughout the globe and no incentive to sue for peace.  Only endless war can sustain regular investment growth.  If politicians and bureaucrats were slightly less immoral than they really are, then perhaps they could agree to just pay off Big Pharma and Big Defense with big bags of printed bills, rather than force their products on new victims around the world.  Alas, as the stick-and-carrot machinery continues to corrupt the system, the politicians and bureaucrats become only more committed to total destruction both here at home and abroad.  

That operation to destroy everything for an extra buck is D.C.’s mission, and if you are willing to concede that Big Pharma and Big Defense might have nefarious motivations but are still 100% convinced that government agencies are reliably warning about the “existential threat” from man-made climate change out of some altruistic obligation to humanity, then you have deluded yourself into thinking that evil government actors will, from time to time, generously tell the truth.  Evil liars are evil liars; they do not lie about health emergencies, open borders, election integrity, and the need for war while embracing honesty when it comes to “global warming,” “white supremacy,” or “transgenderism.”  There is no spectrum where this subject is held reverently off-limits from government manipulation, while this other subject is deemed not worthy of providing the public with accurate information.  Once you accept that the government is in the business of lies, you must scrutinize anything that it says and act accordingly.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/biden-is-su-ing-america/

Joe Biden hails Julie Su as a “tested and experienced leader” and has tapped her for Labor Secretary, subject to confirmation by the Senate. The hearing gives senators a chance to expose Su’s leadership of California’s Labor and Workforce Development Agency (LWDA) which oversees the Employment Development Department (EDD) responsible for unemployment claims.

On Su’s Watch the EDD sent more than $31 billion in fraudulent unemployment claims to people in California, out of state, and even out of the country. In 2020 alone, Su confirmed, fraudsters stole at least $11.4 billion in California unemployment benefits. As it happens, fraud was not a new problem at the EDD.

As California’s state auditor reported, “EDD had no comprehensive plan for how it would respond if California experienced a recession and UI claims increased accordingly.” Su had failed to modernize outdated EDD technology, and in the early days of the pandemic relaxed eligibility requirements for EDD claims. Criminals took full advantage.

The state approved more than $140 million for at least 20,000 prisoners. Convicts who made fraudulent claims included convicted murderers Scott Peterson and Cary Stayner. Death row inmates accounted for at least 158 claims landing more than $420,000 in benefits.

Inmates used their real names, fake names and fake Social Security numbers. One convict filed a claim under the name “poopy britches,” but Fontrell Antonio Baines of Memphis, Tennessee, took it to another level. The rapper obtained debit cards pre-loaded with unemployment benefits administered by the California Employment Development Department, issued in the names of third parties and victims of identity theft.

Baines, also known as “Nuke Bizzle,” posted a video titled “EDD,” bragging about “my swagger for EDD,” as a second rapper says “You gotta sell cocaine. I just file a claim.” And as Nuke Bizzle explains,  “I done got rich off EDD. . .I just might swipe me a lump sum. I’m in Dior havin’ money fun. . . Ten cards, I’m swiping 10K a day. Counting up bills like a CPA.”

https://www.frontpagemag.com/5-of-the-most-important-stories-in-the-history-of-america/

I’ve written literally thousands of commentaries, and I’ve never had this problem before. I have five of the biggest stories in the history of America to tell you about — all at the same time. They’re all so important, I can’t decide which one to write about. So, I’m going to write about all five.

I’ll let you choose which one I should write about in expanded detail next week. Send me an email. Vote for the story you’d like me to write about in detail: WayneRoot@gmail.com

In the meantime, here is a short and sweet “Cliff Notes” version of all five.

STORY No. 1: Of Course China Likely Intentionally Released COVID-19. But Even More Shocking is Who Helped Them

Everyone in power is finally in agreement that COVID-19 most likely came from a Chinese biowarfare lab. I told you that three years ago. But even that is not the real shocker. Tucker Carlson had a doctor who escaped China on his show this week. She says China intentionally released COVID-19 to destroy America and the Western economies. This was a planned attack upon America.

I’ve been predicting that story for three years too. China had just lost the trade war. Their entire economy was about to collapse. At that exact moment, COVID-19 was unleashed on America and the Western world. That was never a coincidence. But I’ve got an even bigger shocker…

The biggest story is that China did not do this alone.

https://pjmedia.com/columns/stephen-kruiser/2023/03/13/the-morning-briefing-some-walls-might-be-closing-in-on-the-biden-crime-family-n1677755

We here on the right have long known that the Biden family has business ties all over the place that are rather unsavory. Honestly, most people on the left do too, they just don’t care. That’s why various forms of leftmedia were scrambling before the 2020 election to pretend Hunter Biden’s laptop was a nothingburger story. Their overreaction was the only reaction we needed to know that we were correct.

There is no bombshell news, but it looks like some progress has been made in exposing the depths of the Biden business depravity, especially when it comes to the commies in the country with which we will soon be fighting a war.

Kevin was the bearer of good news over the weekend:

Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), the Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, told Fox News’s Maria Bartiromo on Sunday that people are finally starting to cooperate in the investigation into Hunter Biden’s “business dealings” with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Of course, that’s been the problem thus far. Papa B has been using the full power the federal government that’s under his control to block any inquiries into what his ne’er-do-well son has been doing as a side hustle to support his art career.

My friend Stephen Green is fond of saying that “Joe Biden is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Chinese Communist Party.” Obviously, the ChiComs got a package deal and Hunter was thrown in.

https://thehill.com/opinion/judiciary/3895242-post-decency-politics-house-democrats-use-a-hearing-to-attack-free-speech-and-a-free-press/

“At long last, have you left no sense of decency?” Those words were first asked by lawyer Joseph Welch in his confrontation with Sen. Joseph McCarthy (R-Wis.) during the Senate’s infamous Army-McCarthy hearings. This week, nearly 70 years later, Welch’s words seem more relevant than ever after House Democrats savaged two journalists who attempted to explain a government effort to censor citizens. 

It was only the latest of a series of hearings in which FBI agents and other whistleblowers, experts and journalists have been personally attacked for raising free-speech concerns. This week’s hearing showed definitively that we live in a post-decency era.

The latest attacks came as journalists Matt Taibbi and Michael Shellenberger testified about breaking the “Twitter Files” story, detailing how the FBI and other agencies secretly sought to censor or ban citizens from social media. In her opening statement, Delegate Stacey Plaskett (D-Virgin Islands), the ranking member of the House Judiciary subcommittee, attacked them as “so-called journalists” and said they were “a direct threat” to the safety of others by reporting the censorship story.

Taibbi pushed back, saying that “I’m not a ‘so-called journalist’” and giving a brief description of his award-winning career at Rolling Stone magazine and other publications. Yet other committee members also attacked the honesty of the two journalists. And after failed efforts to claim they were Elon Musk’s corrupt “scribes,” or limited by him in their investigations, the committee members attacked their ethics.

The witnesses were attacked on everything but their choice of socks.

https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/israel-middle-east/articles/protest-porn

A few days after the November 2016 elections, I sat down to write out my feelings, which consisted mainly of fear and loathing. The president-elect, I intoned, was a dangerous lunatic, one likely to recall the ghosts of Fuehrers past. His election meant the death of America, of democracy itself, and maybe even scores of Americans. “Assume the worst is imminent,” I advised. Celebrities I’d admired my entire life praised the piece on Twitter. NPR came calling. Seven years later, my cri de coeur remains one of Tablet’s most widely read articles. As a piece of writing, it was moving, forceful, and … entirely wrong.

You can find much to dislike about Trump—his policies, his personality, and an assortment of other failings—and, over the next four years, I did just that, often and with gusto. But my piece remains an embarrassment, more hysterical ululation than an attempt at the kind of useful or correct analysis that readers deserve. Reading it today, I realize that, for a brief moment there, I lost my goddamned mind.

So, what happened? It’s important for all of us, but particularly for those of us who make a living asking others for their trust, to give an honest accounting of our mistakes, so here’s a very brief one of mine. Trump’s ascendance was a time of uncertainty, and I felt scared. The language of moral absolutes offered some solace; so did the company of so many others who treated me to encomia like “morally courageous” or “a fierce and clear-eyed defender of democracy,” and with whom I relished text threads in which we shared articles and tweets and posts that enabled us to soak together in a pool of ever-expanding righteous fury.

The resistance offered purpose and community, and something else too: It offered the pleasure of letting yourself get caught up in something. The Women’s March, BLM, Russiagate—they all seemed to offer, in the moment, the irresistible possibility of coming-together-ness to promote or defend justice. And in every single one of these cases, the core leadership or premise which we held as solid was later proven wrong, or worse.

And now, the same fever is taking over Israel.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/silicon-valley-bank-doesnt-deserve-a-taxpayer-bailout-federal-reserve-fdic-risk-startups-treasury-interest-rates-ad440fe9?mod=opinion_lead_pos5

Mr. Ramaswamy, a candidate for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, is a co-founder of Strive Asset Management.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen announced Sunday evening that Silicon Valley Bank’s uninsured depositors would gain access to their deposits on Monday. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. insures only deposits up to $250,000. The bailout creates incentives for risky behavior, teaching large depositors that they can throw money at risky banks without diversifying or conducting diligence. SVB long lobbied for looser risk limits by arguing that its failure wouldn’t create systemic risk and thus didn’t merit special intervention by the U.S. government. Yet on Sunday, Treasury deemed SVB “systemically important.”

To the extent that failing to make SVB’s uninsured depositors whole would have heightened the risk of a run on other banks, the Federal Reserve should have played its role as lender of last resort. Another option would have been to increase the FDIC coverage limit to a level that would avert a run, shoring up public confidence in other U.S. banks without showing favoritism toward SVB.

SVB’s situation is different from that of most U.S. banks. Only 11% of its deposits were insured. While the operating accounts of small businesses often exceed the FDIC limit, large banks usually sweep the excess into cash-management programs that buy Treasury bills and other securities. As the nation’s 16th-largest bank, SVB simply chose not to do so. For some reason Roku, the publicly traded maker of streaming devices, had a $487 million balance with the bank.