New York Seeks Marijuana Dealers ‘With Experience’ High taxes and licensing preferences for ex-cons make a hash of the state’s market for legal weed. By Jonathan Turley

https://www.wsj.com/articles/new-york-seeks-marijuana-dealers-with-experience-convictions-regulation-licenses-dispensaries-commerce-cannabis-weed-11663949176?mod=opinion_lead_pos10

New York state seeks people “with experience” to help establish what could become the biggest legal marijuana market in the country. The explanation sounds like a punch line: New York will offer licenses and subsidies to people with marijuana convictions on their records.

New York legalized the possession and use of marijuana for adults last year and created a licensing system to govern eventual sales in brick-and-mortar stores. New Yorkers will even be able to get joints delivered.

The application window for these licenses closes Sept. 26. The state anticipates the first legal dispensaries will open before the end of the year. The size of the legal marijuana market in New York could ultimately be more than $7 billion annually.

Politicians are eager to tax and regulate all this commerce, and the legal marijuana market could be the source of massive new revenue for New York. Many states have already piled excessive taxes on legal weed sales. New York plans an array of taxes, including a complex tax based on the potency of the pot. There will also be rules preventing cannabis businesses from writing off standard expenses. That is in addition to a 9% state sales tax and any local sales taxes that get tacked on.

But what legislators ignore is that all these taxes have the perverse effect of increasing black-market demand. After Prohibition ended, people didn’t continue to buy bathtub gin when legal and safer alcohol was available. But states also didn’t massively increase the price of newly legal alcohol to make bathtub gin more attractive. In New York there is already a $2 billion marijuana black market.

Broken Border: Biden immigration policies spur ‘staggering’ death toll By Anna Giaritelli,

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/restoring-america/faith-freedom-self-reliance/broken-border-biden-immigration-policies-spur-staggering-death-toll

Biden’s Broken Border is a five-part Washington Examiner series highlighting the border security records President Joe Biden has shattered in less than two years in office and the trickle-down effects that the crisis is having on the United States. Part One  looked at how Biden already broke the record for migrant apprehensions in 2022.  Part Two examined the dramatic shift in demographics of migrants crossing the border illegally. Part Three showed the consequences of children crossing the border alone in unprecedented numbers. Part Four, below, looks at the record number of migrants dying while attempting to enter the United States. And Part Five will examine the deadly fentanyl crisis that has rocked communities deep within the country.

More migrants have died attempting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border illegally under President Joe Biden than ever before — a catastrophic consequence of border policies that have pushed many through dangerous terrain as ports of entry have largely been closed for asylum-seekers .

Senior federal law enforcement officials at Border Patrol headquarters in Washington told the Washington Examiner they expect to surpass 800 bodies recovered at the southern border by the end of September, the conclusion of the government’s fiscal 2022 year.

“It’ll likely hit over 800 for FY22. I thought I would never see that number,” one official not authorized to speak with the media wrote in an email. “This administration does not care about dead Hispanics.”

Internal homeland security data obtained by the Washington Examiner show the government is aware of 746 deceased immigrants found in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California between last October and Sept. 6. Landowners and federal, state, and local police are typically the ones who make the discoveries.

The FBI Paid for Russian Disinformation While Punishing a Patriot Ben Weingarten

https://www.newsweek.com/fbi-paid-russian-disinformation-while-punishing-patriot-opinion-1745574

To understand the state of disrepair of our national security and law enforcement apparatus, look to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s contrasting treatment of Russian disinformation-spinner Igor Danchenko, and whistleblowing Special Agent Steven Friend.

We recently learned the Bureau rewarded the former for his lies, while punishing the latter for his truths.

Danchenko, a Russian national, was the key researcher behind the key document—the Steele dossier—behind the key effort to undermine candidate, and then topple, President Donald J. Trump: Russiagate.

Today, we know Danchenko fabricated communications with the purported central source behind some of the document’s most salacious claims. By lying to the FBI about that, and much else that would have called into question his credibility, as well as the dossier’s veracity, Danchenko played a seminal role in corrupting our political and legal systems. He helped subvert a presidency and the will of the public, foist a fraud on the FISA court, and eviscerate the civil liberties, ravage the reputations, and drain the banks accounts of those wrongfully ensnared in the Russiagate hoax—along with our rotten Deep State.

Compounding the outrage, after the FBI learned Danchenko had misled it, it claimed in multiple FISA warrant applications used to spy on Trump campaign advisor Carter Page and Trump world that Danchenko, Steele’s “primary sub-source,” was “truthful and cooperative.”

Liz Truss showed up Biden at the UN It wasn’t the American president who sounded like the leader of the free world: John Pietro

https://spectatorworld.com/topic/liz-truss-showed-joe-biden-united-nations/?utm_source=Spectator+World+Signup&utm_

British prime minister Liz Truss’s speech at the United Nations this week was spot-on. It was clear, concise and left no question that the UK would do everything in its power to lead in the defense of the West and its values.

President Biden’s address, by contrast, left you feeling overwhelmed and unsatisfied. That’s not to say he failed to speak about Ukraine — he spent a reasonable amount of time on it — but the substance just was not there. Truss made a clear commitment to continue to “sustain or increase… military support to Ukraine, for as long as it takes,” a concrete and actionable statement. Though Biden issued a ringing condemnation of Putin’s war, he only made a vague pledge to “stand in solidarity against Russia’s aggression.”

Proposed US actions were non-existent: there was no promise to bolster defense spending or maintain or increase direct military aid to Ukraine. We were left to assume that, given his touting of American and allied aid to Ukraine, Biden was implying it would continue, but in the context of his speech, that did not seem sufficient. Putin needs to know that he will not get a break, that his threats are not going to change the West’s calculus. Now, as Russia is escalating, explicit statements of strength, unwavering resolve and determined action are essential.

The US is the greatest military and economic power on earth, while the UK is in the midst of a devastating energy crisis and persistent high inflation. Britain should not have to be leading the charge against Russia.

Why does the EU support terror-linked NGOs? – By Moshe Dann

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-717825

The names of the perpetrators of the war against the Jews have changed since the Nazi era but those who support terrorists and entities who wish to destroy Israel have the same goal: Holocaust.

In response to the recent closure of seven anti-Israel Palestinian NGOs for supporting terrorist organizations, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell condemned Israel, claiming that there was no evidence of wrong-doing. But their work is not secret, nor is their message: Israel is a racist, Nazi, Apartheid state. Resistance (violence and terrorism) against Israeli Jews, therefore, is not only legitimate, it’s a sacred duty.

PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas described the work of the NGOs: “to expose the occupation and its crimes against our people.” They are part of a strategy to promote a global intifada against Israel led by Iran, Qatar and the Muslim Brotherhood, the most influential organization for Muslims. The Brotherhood backs Hamas and operates throughout the world and in North America via many front groups, such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), and student groups, such as Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP). It is the basis for the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement and other organizations that seek to isolate, demonize and destroy Israel.

Abbas acknowledged that the seven NGOs are Palestinian institutions, which operate according to Palestinian law, and he offered them offices in the PLO headquarters in Ramallah.

Rosh Hashanah guide for the perplexed, 2022 Yoram Ettinger

The evening of September 25, 2022 will launch Jewish New Year of 5783.

1. Genesis. Rosh Hashanah, the beginning of the Jewish New Year is celebrated on the 6th day of Creation, when the first human-being, Adam, was created.  Adam is the Hebrew word for a human-being (אדמ), which is the root of the Hebrew word for “soil” (אדמה) – a metaphor for humility. Moreover, the Hebrew letter  הis an abbreviation of God, the Creator.

The Hebrew word Rosh (ראש) means first/head/beginning and Hashanah (השנה) means the year.  Rosh (ראש) constitutes the root of the Hebrew word for Genesis (בראשית), which is the first word in the Book of Genesis.

Rosh Hashanah is celebrated on the first day of the Jewish month of Tishrei – “the month of the Strong Ones” (Book of Kings A, 8:2) – when the three Jewish Patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac and Jacob) and the Prophet Samuel were born.   

Tishrei means beginning/Genesis in ancient Acadian. The Hebrew letters of Tishrei (תשרי) are included in the spelling of Genesis (בראשית). Furthermore, the Hebrew spelling of Genesis (בראשית) includes the first two letters in the Hebrew alphabet (אב), a middle letter (י) and the last three letters (רשת) – representing the totality of the Creation.    

2.  Self-examination.  The root of the Hebrew word Shanah (שנה) is both “repeat” and “change.” Rosh Hashanah (ראש השנה) constitutes an annual reminder of the need to enhance one’s behavior through a systematic study of one’s track record, re-studying moral values and avoiding past errors.  Rosh Hashanah ushers in the Ten Days of Repentance, which are concluded on Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement).

VIDEO INTERVIEW WITH DIANE BEDERMAN AUTHOR

https://www.canadiancitizens.org/single-post/c3rf-in-hot-interview-with-author-diane-weber-bederman

Diane Weber Bederman discusses her latest book “Bullies of Woke and Their Assault on Mental Health” and spares no horses as she does so. Always controversial and critical of the post-modern, politically correct, woke narratives that have turned Western society upside down, she comes out swinging on behalf of those who need to be defended from such the most – our children and grandchildren. Is it past time for the guardians of these little ones to rise up to heed Diane’s authoritative research and analysis to protect them? Especially the grandparents of a strong and free Canada? Strap in for a very interesting and topical discussion.

Watch it on Rumble here

Martha’s Vineyard Residents Wallow in Their Disgusting Hypocrisy It will be a long time before many Americans can pronounce the words “Martha’s Vineyard” without the pained eye roll once reserved for the now funereal adjacent island of Chappaquiddick. By Paul du Quenoy

https://amgreatness.com/2022/09/22/marthas-vineyard-residents-wallow-in-their-disgusting-hypocrisy/

“VINEYARD HYPOCRITES!” announced a banner towed by a light aircraft for about 45 minutes earlier this week over the Martha’s Vineyard hamlet of Aquinnah, which until 1997 was known as “Gay Head.”

The demonstration was just one of many hard knocks Vineyard residents have endured since 48 mostly Venezuelan migrants were removed from the “sanctuary” island by the National Guard last Friday. After receiving basic support, but no invitations to stay on an island where 63 percent of homes are vacant in the offseason, the migrants now reside at Joint Base Cape Cod (JBCC), a military installation in mainland Massachusetts.

Critics have been relentless in calling out Vineyard hypocrisy. As a “sanctuary” jurisdiction in a self-proclaimed “sanctuary” state, Martha’s Vineyard joined other such places, which promise never to inform on migrants to immigration authorities. Yet it did precisely that the second even a small number of them appeared in their midst. 

The Vineyard community allowed the migrants to sleep in a church hall and gave them basic meals before the military took them away in the presence of cheering crowds of well-off locals who sincerely believe they did a good and honorable deed.

From the moment their “humanitarian crisis” began, Vineyard residents congratulated themselves and lectured an incredulous world on their monumental virtue and inexhaustible compassion. The church where the migrants stayed, now styling itself “St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church and Sanctuary,” has advertised a service of “prayer, reflection, gratitude, and visioning” to celebrate the Vineyard’s resident “angels,” but not the “Venezuelan friends” they sent away a week earlier. 

It was unclear if any migrants would attend, but they are now so far away it is hard to imagine how they could. The Vineyard’s status as an affluent resort island, where nearly 80 percent of residents voted for Joe Biden, and where signs purportedly welcoming immigrants, refugees, and indigenous peoples abound, enhanced the delicious irony.

Democrats Continue to Lie About Police Deaths on January 6 Joe Biden, Merrick Garland, and congressional Democrats fuel a false narrative intended to stoke outrage in an already deeply divided country. By Julie Kelly

https://amgreatness.com/2022/09/22/democrats-continue-to-lie-about-police-deaths-on-january-6/

U.S. Representative Mondaire Jones (D-N.Y.) is a sterling example of the degradation of an Ivy League education.

Following a lengthy riff about the horrors of the January 6 “insurrection” during which he described his Republican colleagues as fascists, Jones, a graduate of Stanford University and Harvard School of Law, unloaded a whopper. 

“How many more people needed to die to reach your definition of an insurrection?” Jones yelled across the room at Rep. Dan Bishop (R-N.C.) during a House Judiciary Committee meeting on Wednesday. “On January 6, at the direction of Donald Trump, a violent mob stormed the Capitol. In the process, 138 Capitol and D.C. police officers were injured. A Capitol police officer was bludgeoned to death.”

Jones, of course, was referring to Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick. 

On January 8, 2021, the New York Times reported that Sicknick had been killed during the protest by Trump supporters using a fire extinguisher. For weeks, that false account, attributed to two anonymous law enforcement officials, persisted in the news media, prompting public outcry. Sicknick’s remains laid in honor in the Capitol Rotunda; the country’s top political leaders, including Joe and Jill Biden, paid their respects before a hero’s burial at Arlington National Cemetery.

After the theatrical optics served their purpose—to blame Trump supporters for murdering a cop on January 6—the Times retracted the story. In April 2021, the D.C. Medical Examiner’s Office released an autopsy report concluding Sicknick died of natural causes, specifically a stroke.

By bringing up Sicknick’s death, Jones sparked a heated debate between Republicans and Democrats.  “Are we talking about Sicknick or are we talking about someone else?” Bishop asked Jones, who refused to correct his statement, downplaying it as a “minute point in the midst of the gravity of what happened on January 6.” Jones again claimed “multiple police officers” died that day.

Amid pushback from House Republicans to correct the official record, Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.) berated the other side for refusing to concede that Sicknick died as a result of the protest. “You bring shame on this body,” Dean said. “He engaged on our behalf the insurrectionists. The conversation you all engaged in is so shameful, I hope the Sicknick family isn’t watching this.”

‘Europe Should Be Grateful to Erdoğan’ by Burak Bekdil

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18856/erdogan-turkey-russia

Erdoğan is bringing NATO member Turkey more and more into Russia’s orbit.

Turkey is once again blackmailing the U.S. that “it would further deepen its defense cooperation with Russia if Congress blocks its request to buy 40 F-16 Block 70 fighter jets from the U.S.”

“Europe Should Be Grateful to Erdoğan”: The quote is the praise Russian dictator Vladimir Putin bestowed upon Turkey’s Islamist strongman Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Translated into realpolitik, what Putin is saying is: “Russia is grateful to Erdoğan’s anti-Western ideology.” He is right. Erdoğan is bringing NATO member Turkey more and more into Russia’s orbit.

Erdoğan is overtly challenging the alliance of which his country is a member. Here is a brief account of how Erdoğan steered Turkey further away from Western interests, in favor of his Eurasian adventurism, in just a couple of months:

In early July, Erdoğan told a group of top party executives that Putin, during a meeting in Tehran, suggested a deal in which Turkish drone maker Baykar, whose chief engineer is Erdoğan’s son-in-law, cooperates with Russia. “Putin told me that he wants to work with Baykar,” Erdoğan said.
At the end of July, a Russian state-owned company was caught transferring money to a subsidiary that is building a $20 billion nuclear power plant on Turkey’s Mediterranean coast, thereby alleviating concerns that the project could be delayed by war sanctions. Rosatom Corp. sent around $5 billion to the Turkey-based builder, formally known as Akkuyu Nuclear JSC.
The beginning of August. Putin proudly announced that the trade between Russia and Turkey doubled in the first five months of 2022, and had surged 57% in the last year.
After a face-to-face meeting with Putin in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, Erdoğan said that Turkey would now pay Russia in rubles for its natural gas purchases. Meanwhile, Erdoğan happily accepted Putin’s invitation to join the September meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in Uzbekistan. The SCO, launched in 2001, consists of Eurasian member states and declares its mission as combating radicalism and other security concerns in China, Russia and four ex-Soviet Central Asian republics.
As part of the Sochi deal, Erdoğan announced, five Turkish banks adopted Russia’s Mir payments system, another blow to Western sanctions on Russia. Turkey had earlier abstained from joining the U.S. and Europe’s sanctions on Russia after it invaded Ukraine.
In a joint statement after the Sochi summit, Erdoğan and Putin “reaffirmed their determination to act in coordination and solidarity in the fight against all terrorist organizations in Syria.” Shortly after that statement, the Turkish government stepped up its lethal drone attacks against U.S.-allied Kurdish forces in northern Syria ahead of a threatened full-scale invasion. A Turkish drone attack was reported to have killed four people in a town on the Syria-Turkey border.
Dmitri Peskov, Putin’s spokesman, said that “Military-technical cooperation between the two countries is permanently on the agenda, and the very fact that our interaction is developing in this sensitive sphere shows that, on the whole, the entire range of our interrelations is at a very high level.”
A few days after Peskov’s opaque statement, Dmitry Shugayev, the head of the Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation, said that a contract had been signed to deliver a second shipment of the S-400 missile system to Turkey, with the production of some components to be localized [some parts made locally] in Turkey. Now that is a real challenge.

Turkey had earlier been expelled from the U.S.-led, multinational partnership that builds the F-35 fifth-generation fighter jet, and been taken under the scope of the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act.