Friday, December 9, 2022
Biden Exchanges a Russian Blood-Thirsty Murderer for Brittney Griner who Hates America
WNBA star Brittney Griner was freed by Russia on Thursday in exchange for an infamous arms dealer who schemed to kill US pilots in Colombia — sparking outrage from critics who blasted the deal and called it a “surrender” by President Biden.
The 6-foot-9 basketball player — missing her iconic dreadlocks following nearly 10 months in Russian custody — was traded for “Merchant of Death” Viktor Bout on the tarmac of an Abu Dhabi airport in a dramatic scene reminiscent of Cold War prisoner swaps.
“She’s safe, she’s on a plane, she’s on her way home,” Biden said at the White House, where he was joined by Griner’s wife, Cherelle.
But the controversial deal left ex-Marine Paul Whelan languishing in a Russian prison on what the US has called baseless espionage charges.
“I don’t understand why I’m still sitting here,” Whelan told CNN from the penal colony where he’s being held.
“I am greatly disappointed that more has not been done to secure my release, especially as the four-year anniversary of my arrest is coming up,” Whelan, 53, told CNN.
“My bags are packed. I’m ready to go home. I just need an airplane to come and get me.”
Former White House national security adviser and American ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton also blasted the exchange.
“This is not a deal. This is not a swap. This is a surrender,” he told CBS News.
"And terrorists and rogue states all around the world will take note of this, and it endangers other Americans in the future who can be grabbed and used as bargaining chips by people who don’t have the same morals and scruples that we do.”
Laura Loomer gets Her Twitter Back
Over recent weeks, Elon Musk has proven to be serious about his intention to restore free speech to Twitter, and continues to reinstate Twitter accounts taken down by the previous management.
On Thursday, Twitter reinstated the account of Laura Loomer, a political activist who has been banned on Uber, Lyft, Uber Eats, & even getting her bank account shut down.
Loomer was banned in 2018, after she posted a tweet criticizing Rep. Ilhan Omar.
The tweet that caused her to be cancelled, was when Loomer called Omar “anti-Jewish”, and said she is a member of a religion in which “homosexuals are oppressed” and “women are abused” and “forced to wear the hijab.”
At the time, Twitter decided that Loomer violated their rules against hateful conduct.
Loomer never accepted the suspension, all the while maintaining that no rules were violated. “Everything I said is 100 percent true and factual. It’s not malicious, it’s not mean, it’s not hateful,” she said.
Around a week after the suspension, Loomer handcuffed herself to the front doors of Twitter’s New York headquarters, while wearing a Yellow Star of David and carrying a bullhorn and several printed-out tweets.
She told reporters she was protesting Twitter’s double standard of banning her for hateful coneduct, while allowing vicious Jew haters, such as anti-Semitic Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan to remain on the platform.
On Thursday, Loomer tweeted, “After getting BANNED on Twitter in 2018, and being digitally exterminated on nearly every other social media site, payment processor, Uber, Lyft, Uber Eats, & my own bank, I’M BACK!!!!! Elom Musk has finally unchained me from the doors of Twitter HQ! Thank you, Elon!”
Thursday, December 8, 2022
2,200-year-old Greek sling bullet used against Jews in Hanukkah story found in Yavna
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| The archaeological site in Yavne, with the city in the background, in an undated photo released on December 8, 2022. (Assaf Peretz/Israel Antiquities Authority) |
Some 2,200 years ago, a Greek soldier stood in battle in what is now the Israeli city of Yavne, aimed his sling at Jewish Hasmonean troops, and launched a projectile at them during battles that would later become part of the story of Hanukkah.
At least, that is one option suggested following the discovery in Yavne of a sling bullet made of lead and bearing a Greek inscription reading “Victory for Heracles and Hauron” — a possible attempt at psychological warfare against enemies.
The Israel Antiquities Authority, which revealed the finding, told The Times of Israel that the sling bullet was discovered about a year ago and has been studied since then. It timed the announcement for Wednesday, 10 days before Hanukkah.
The IAA said in a statement that the sling bullet found in Yavne’s major archaeological site is 4.4 centimeters (1.7 inches) long and around 2,200 years old. Its age places it around the time of the battles between the Seleucid army against the Hasmoneans, who were seeking to prevent the Hellenization of the Jews.
The researchers, however, acknowledged that it isn’t known in what context the slingshot was used, and that there was no conclusive evidence that it even belonged to a Greek soldier.
“It seems that we will not be able to know for sure if the sling bullet belonged to a Greek soldier, but it is not impossible that it is related to the conflict between the Greeks and the Hasmoneans,” said Pablo Betzer and Dr. Daniel Varga, who directed the excavation on behalf of the IAA, in the statement.
.Israel Ranked as the 5th Safest Country in the World to Visit
Despite recent terror bombings and rockets launched from Gaza, Israel is ranked as one of the safest countries for visitors, according to travel website The Swiftest.
Israel was ranked as the 5th-safest country in the world to visit, just behind Singapore, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Switzerland.
According to The Swiftest’s scoring system, Israel is safer for tourists than the U.S., the UK and Japan.
The site compared the world’s top 50 countries for tourism and used metrics such as the murder rate, road traffic deaths, natural disaster risk, and deaths from unsanitary conditions in order to give each country a score.
Data on those risk rates was pulled from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Health Organization, and World Bank.
The least-safe countries in the world for tourism were listed as South Africa, India, Dominican Republic, Mexico and Brazil.
Countries received a grade, from A (excellent) to F (very poor) in a number of categories, along with an overall letter grade score summarizing the general safety situation of the country.
Israel earned an overall score of A for tourist safety, while the U.S. trailed behind with a C minus score.
The U.S.’ score was lowered by an F in the murder rate category, due to a high number of per capita homicides.
The U.S. State Department has a medium risk-level travel warning for Israel.
“Terrorist groups, lone-wolf terrorists and other violent extremists continue plotting possible attacks in Israel,” reads the warning on the U.S. site.
“Terrorists and violent extremists may attack with little or no warning, targeting tourist locations, transportation hubs, markets/shopping malls, and local government facilities. Violence can occur in Israel … without warning.”
According to recently released figures from the Tourism Ministry, some 2 million tourists visited Israel between January and October 2022.
The Ministry expects that 2.5 million people will have visited Israel by the end of the year after nearly two years of a pandemic-induced blanket ban on non-citizens, which devastated the local tourism industry.
In 2019, Israel reached an all-time tourism high of 4.5 million visitors.
AOC Under Investigation Over Possible Ethics Violations
AOC is being investigated by Congress over possible ethics violations.
The House Committee on Ethics is investigating NY Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, according to a statement the panel released on Wednesday.
The statement said that the panel will announce its course of action after its organizational meeting in the next Congress.
Although few details have been released, the socialist’s chief of staff Saikat Chakrabarti has been accused of diverting more than $1 million in campaign donations into a slush fund controlled by two private companies registered to him.
A spokesperson for AOC said that she is confident that the case would be dismissed. “The Congresswoman has always taken ethics incredibly seriously, refusing any donations from lobbyists, corporations or other special interests,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
The Office of Congressional Ethics forwarded its inquiry into Ocasio-Cortez to the House ethics panel in June. Typically, when that office refers an investigation, it is because the office has reason to believe an ethics law was broken.
Wednesday’s statement was attributed to acting Chair Susan Wild (D-Pa.) and Ranking Member Michael Guest (R-Miss.).
The House Committee on Ethics recently voted to extend the investigation, triggering Wednesday’s disclosure.
Wednesday, December 7, 2022
How to scrub your phone number and address from Google search
This is important to know in case any of your personal (NOT professional) information gets posted publicly.
That means if your cell phone number that you don't want clients or anyone you don't know to have comes up in a Google search for your name, you can request this to be removed.
You can use this request feature if personal information has been shared (on a website you don't control or in a news story to harm you, for example) against your wishes.
If you don't have a Google account, use this form to request information be removed from a Google search result.
If you do have a Google account, follow these steps.
1. Go to Google.com and search for your name
2. Find the search result that includes personal information (email, phone number, or home address) you don't want to appear in this search result
3. Next to the link of every Google search result, you'll see three vertical dots, like this:
Tap the three dots to request that Google remove information from a search result.
4. Tap the three dots to reveal menu options
5. Tap Remove result
6. Tap It shows my personal contact info
7. Fill out the information (be sure to use the exact information shown on the search request) and submit your request.
8. Click I'm done
You'll receive an email confirmation that your request was submitted within a few hours.
Requesting this be removed does not guarantee it, but it's helpful to try and remove any personal information you don't want online.
DemonRats Ignore The Biden Crooks and Investigate the Kushner family business dealings
Demonrats on a pair of congressional committees have launched an aggressive new effort to obtain information about whether Jared Kushner’s actions on U.S. policy in the Persian Gulf region as a senior White House adviser were influenced by the bailout of a property owned by his family business.
Citing previously undisclosed emails and other documents related to former president Donald Trump’s son-in-law, the committees on Monday night sent letters to the State and Defense departments requesting material that they say could shed new light on whether “Kushner’s financial conflict of interest may have led him to improperly influence U.S. tax, trade and national security policies for his own financial gain.”
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