China’s Psychological Warfare on America

Another leading Chinese PLA strategist, Zeng Huafeng of the National University of Defense Technology (NUDT), wrote of a cognitive, or mind, war on the United States, and proposed how to defeat us without firing a shot. NUDT works with ByteDance on national artificial intelligence projects involving the Chinese military. Zeng defines the “cognitive space” as “the area in which feelings, perception, understanding, beliefs, and values exist” and argues that this is where the battle can be won. To that end, he said, Beijing must use “information and popular spiritual and cultural products as weapons to influence people’s psychology, will, attitude, behavior and even change the ideology, values, cultural traditions and social systems.” According to Zeng, these cultural tools, including apps, video games, and films, should be used to “target individuals, groups, countries, and even people around the world.”

Stop and contemplate what these two prominent strategists in China are saying about the “cultural products” we invite into our homes and minds: they are to be used to steer people’s psychology and change their values and cultural traditions. Zeng argues that Beijing can win “mind superiority” through:

• “Perception manipulation” via propaganda, by changing how people look at the present
• “Cutting off historical memory” by warping their views of their own country’s past so people will be open to changing their values
• “Changing the paradigm of thinking” by targeting people to change the way they view problems and thereby changing their beliefs
• “Deconstructing symbols,” by getting people to reject certain traditional symbols and thereby modifying a nation’s identity

But here is the kicker: “The ultimate goal is to manipulate a country’s values and achieve strategic goals without an actual overt military battle.” (Emphasis added.) Sun Tzu could not have said it better.

Source:  Blood Money: Why the Powerful Turn a Blind Eye While China Kills Americans (2024) by Peter Schweizer.

Pentagon’s AI initiatives accelerate hard decisions on lethal autonomous weapons

From AP News.com (Nov. 25, 2023):

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. (AP) — Artificial intelligence employed by the U.S. military has piloted pint-sized surveillance drones in special operations forces’ missions and helped Ukraine in its war against Russia. It tracks soldiers’ fitness, predicts when Air Force planes need maintenance and helps keep tabs on rivals in space.

Now, the Pentagon is intent on fielding multiple thousands of relatively inexpensive, expendable AI-enabled autonomous vehicles by 2026 to keep pace with China. The ambitious initiative — dubbed Replicator — seeks to “galvanize progress in the too-slow shift of U.S. military innovation to leverage platforms that are small, smart, cheap, and many,” Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks said in August.

While its funding is uncertain and details vague, Replicator is expected to accelerate hard decisions on what AI tech is mature and trustworthy enough to deploy - including on weaponized systems.

There is little dispute among scientists, industry experts and Pentagon officials that the U.S. will within the next few years have fully autonomous lethal weapons. And though officials insist humans will always be in control, experts say advances in data-processing speed and machine-to-machine communications will inevitably relegate people to supervisory roles.

That’s especially true if, as expected, lethal weapons are deployed en masse in drone swarms. Many countries are working on them — and neither China, Russia, Iran, India or Pakistan have signed a U.S.-initiated pledge to use military AI responsibly.

It’s unclear if the Pentagon is currently formally assessing any fully autonomous lethal weapons system for deployment, as required by a 2012 directive. A Pentagon spokeswoman would not say. [read more]

I hope the autonomous weapons can distinguish between friendly and enemy combatants enough. And what about firewalls to prevent the enemy (or any mischievous person for that matter) from hacking the weapons?

A Woman Renewed Her Driver’s License, Ended Up With Photo Of Empty Chair

From Daily Wire.com (Aug. 12, 2020):

One might not think there could be any humor coming from an experience involving the Department of Motor Vehicles, but Jade Dodd’s case shows otherwise. As CNN reported, Dodd renewed her license on July 24, but when she received her new one in the mail, instead of her photo along with her personal identification, there was simply a picture of an empty chair in front of a blue background.

“I was with my Mom and we were going to eat lunch and I said, ‘you need to see this, this isn’t right,’” Dodd told WKRN.

“The lady at the DMV did not really believe me when I was like hey, I need my license fixed,” Dodd told the outlet. “Then, she looked it up in the system and goes, ‘oh, I need my manager for this.’”

Currently on hold with the dmv since this is what I got in the mail when I renewed my license…. ‍♀️

Posted by Jade Dodd on Wednesday, August 5, 2020

Dodd told WKRN that her boss joked with her about the incident.

“My boss thinks it’s funnier than anyone. I was at work Friday and he pointed to a chair outside of his office door and was like, ‘I thought this was you, I waved at it this morning’ and I was like thanks,” she told the outlet.

Dodd also posted about the incident on her Facebook page. By the time WKRN reported on her story, the post had been shared more than 17,000 times. Many responded to Dodd’s post with jokes.

“People have been sending me memes that they made and telling me happy late birthday,” she told the outlet. “It’s been weird.”

Wes Moster, a spokesman for the Tennessee Department of Safety and Homeland Security, told WKRN that the department immediately rectified the situation upon learning about it.

“When the customer visited the Driver Services Center a few years ago, during the transaction, an examiner made an error by capturing and saving the wrong photo (of an empty chair) to the customer’s profile. When the customer recently renewed her driver license online, she received an image of a chair because that was the last picture taken on file. When the Department was made aware of her situation, we immediately made things right with the customer and provided her with a license with her actual photo and have addressed this situation internally,” Moster said.

He added that this was the first time such a mistake had occurred.

Dodd appears to hold no ill-will against the DMV, finding the situation humorous at a time when so many are suffering due to the coronavirus pandemic.

“One of my coworkers was like keep it in a picture frame, you can use it as a wall decoration and it’s a conversation starter when you have dinner,” Dodd told the outlet.

Dodd already received her new, fixed driver’s license earlier this week. [source]

Funny. Well, at least the mistake was remedied.

Trump Envoy Grenell Gets US Veteran Released From Venezuela

From Newsmax.com (May 20, 2025):

A U.S. Air Force veteran unlawfully imprisoned in Venezuela was released Tuesday after secret talks between dictator Nicolás Maduro's representatives and President Donald Trump's special envoy, Richard Grenell, Newsmax has learned.

Grenell flew on a secret mission to Antigua Tuesday to meet with top Venezuelan officials and secured the release of Joseph St. Clair, a 33-year-old combat-disabled veteran.

Newsmax also learned that Grenell and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Tuesday extended the waivers for U.S. companies' oil licenses in Venezuela by 60 days.

Grenell also met with Venezuelan officials to discuss continued cooperation with the U.S. on deportations. Already, Venezuela has accepted more than 3,000 illegal aliens from the U.S.

The release of Joseph St. Clair is another gesture that the Maduro regime wants to do business with the Trump administration.

He and a friend from Colombia were traveling as tourists near the Venezuelan border in October 2024 when they were arrested by Venezuelan authorities, Stars and Stripes reported.

After being detained, he was transported across the border to a prison that has been condemned by human rights groups for abuse violations, according to his family.

"We learned that Joe decided to take a trip near the border with one of his friends to visit [the friend's] family member and got too close to the border and got abducted by the Venezuelan police," said Scott St. Clair, Joseph's father, Stars and Stripes reported.

"They were shaken down, questioned and searched. All their possessions were taken."

Washington's two Democrat senators, Sen. Patty Murray and Sen. Maria Cantwell, sent Trump a May 2 letter asking that he personally seek Joseph St. Clair's release. Scott St. Clair and wife Patti live in Washington state.

Joseph St. Clair served as a tech sergeant in the Air Force until 2019, when he was honorably discharged after nine years of service, his family said.

"Joe St. Clair endured four combat tours in Afghanistan to protect this country. Now, he is the one who needs protection," Patti St. Clair said, Stars and Stripes reported.

Little more than a week after Trump took office Jan. 20, Grenell earned the release of six Americans detained by Venezuela's government under Maduro.

Grenell traveled to Caracas to demand that Maduro's government accept the unconditional return of Venezuelans deported from the U.S. or face consequences.

He and Maduro met at the Miraflores presidential palace in one of the first known meetings by the second Trump administration with a government it considers hostile.

Trump commended Grenell after the six Americans were freed.

"Just been informed that we are bringing six hostages home from Venezuela," Trump wrote in a post on X. "Thank you to Ric Grenell and my entire staff. Great job!"

In February, Trump wrote after Grenell's visit that the Maduro government had agreed to receive "all Venezuela illegal aliens who were encamped in the U.S., including gang members of Tren de Aragua," and pay for their transportation.

In March, Maduro said the flights to bring migrants back from the U.S. were affected when Trump canceled a license that allowed Chevron to continue to operate in his country, citing a lack of progress on migrant returns and electoral reforms.

Less than a week later, Venezuela reached an agreement with the U.S. to resume repatriation flights of migrants. Maduro announced the deal in a televised address.

The State Department has indicated that the U.S. has not been negotiating with Caracas, but sources tell Newsmax that Trump ordered that direct negotiations continue. [source]

Nice. Welcome back home!

3 Questions Angry Democrats Need To Answer About Illegal Alien Deportations

From The Federalist.com (May 2, 2025):

Democrats and their supporters in the corporate media are still attempting to controversialize the Trump administration’s efforts to remove illegal aliens from the country, as required by federal law. But there are three questions they should all be forced to answer before anyone has to hear more of their whining. Here they are, in no particular order.

1. Can You Identify a Single Alien You Would Deport?

This is the most important question because the answer is no, they can’t, because they don’t want to deport anyone. We know that because they’re on record opposing the most innocuous efforts during President Trump’s first term to remove violent Latin American gang affiliates.

In 2018, Democrats, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Kristen Gillibrand, pushed to “abolish ICE.” That same year, Senate Democrats blocked a vote on a bill that would have withheld federal funds from “sanctuary cities” that refused to comply with federal immigration law enforcement. They shouldn’t get to pretend they’re not opposed to deporting illegal aliens if they can’t answer this simple question.

2. How Many Appeals Should an Illegal Alien Get for It to Be Considered ‘Due Process’?

Most irksome about the never-ending Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia saga is Democrats’ repeated and false claim that the Salvadoran national was denied “due process” when feds placed him on a flight in March to be sent back to his home country. This is a lie. Abrego Garcia had been residing in the U.S. for more than a decade.

In 2019, he was arrested, he admitted in court to being in the country illegally, and he was determined by a court to be a violent Latin American gang affiliate. A second judge upheld that opinion. He had multiple immigration court proceedings, one of which resulted in a judge issuing an absurd ruling that he could be deported, but not back to where he came from.

How many appeals and hearings should an illegal alien be entitled to, sucking up court hours in hopes of eventually landing on some trick that allows him to stay? If Democrats can’t state a clear number, it’s simply another way of admitting they don’t want to see anyone deported.

3. What Would the Ideal Deportation Look Like?

There is no end to the list of complaints Democrats have about any given deportation: The plane was inappropriate, the home country is terrible, the illegal alien is just a “gay makeup artist,” and on and on.

They don’t actually care about the planes or return destinations or the character profiles of any given deportee. These are just more excuses for why Democrats oppose deportations. If they’re going to trifle with the logistics, they should have to offer alternative, acceptable conditions for deporting aliens.

But they wouldn’t be able to do that, because that’s not the point. The point is stopping deportations altogether. [source]

The first answer to the first question the Left would answer: No.

The 2nd answer: Never ending appeals.

The 3rd answer: Deportations should not exist.

Yea, that's, pretty much, their answers since illegals could be potential Democrat voters or make redistricting more in their favor.

Along the same lines...

ICE Rescued Kids From Likely ‘Exploitation’ At Marijuana Farm And Democrats Are Furious

The Weight of Too Much “Choice”

From John Stonestreet & Maria Baer on Breakpoint.org (Aug. 24, 2022):

Regular listeners to the weekly Breakpoint This Week podcast know that my co-host Maria and I are fans of the reality competition show Alone. Ten wilderness experts are dropped in the middle of nowhere, usually a place that is cold and full of bears, forced to fend for themselves. Whoever stays the longest wins.

In the latest season, a military veteran with strong survival skills and extensive experience overseas seemed poised to win. Instead, he called it quits just a few weeks in. In an interview afterwards, he explained, “When I was in the military and separated from family, I didn’t have a choice. Out here… I had that opportunity to get on the radio or the phone and say, ‘Hey, I’m going to go back to where I’m comfortable.’” In other words, having the choice to go home made staying much harder.

According to conventional wisdom, at least the kind accepted in this cultural moment, the opposite should have been true. More control and more choices are supposed to bring easier and more satisfying lives.

That misconception is, in fact, a feature of life since modernism. For most of human history, humans held no illusions of being masters of their own fate. Writing back in 1976, American sociologist Peter Berger identified what changed, especially for Westerners. Because of the dramatic progress brought by science and technology, humans in the modern period began to believe that the world would eventually be fully understood. And if understood, it could also be mastered, as well.

“What previously was experienced as fate now becomes an arena of choices,” Berger wrote. “In principle, there is the assumption that all human problems can be converted into technical problems… the world becomes ever more ‘makeable.’”

A mark of our late postmodern era is the obsession with having choices. The higher the stakes, the more acute is the illusion of freedom. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy described this impulse in his now overturned Planned Parenthood v. Casey decision, when he wrote that “At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.” In his view, the “freedom of choice” extends to even choosing what is real. Is it any wonder that people now believe that choice extends beyond sexual behavior to sexual identity?

However, if happiness truly comes from the control made possible through infinite choices and the ability to “make the world,” why did the military officer competing on Alone find the opposite to be true? Why did his freedom of choice turn out to be too much of a burden? Why do so many studies show that we are less happy than ever?

The postmodern assertion that we can “make the world” exploits a weakness inherent to our fallen humanness and especially acute today. We struggle to delay gratification. We might fool ourselves into thinking that we can, in fact, define our existence or choose our gender. We may think our decision about whether to stay married or whether to bring an unborn child to birth is based on deep reflections. However, because we can, we tend to choose comfort now at the expense of flourishing later. If we have the option, we call the producers and tap out.

Justice Kennedy was wrong. No matter how many choices we have, we cannot remake the world. Everywhere we turn, we butt up against the limits of creation. According to a Christian worldview, this is actually good news. God created the world with limits: physical and moral laws, bodies, certain geographic locations and times in history, and not other ones. He gives us specific parents and siblings and children, whose specific needs constantly impose limits on our choices.

Even if, in modernity and postmodernity, such limits are anathema, to be resisted and fought against with all the science and technology we can muster, true freedom is found by recognizing and resting in God’s good limits, both physical and moral. If God is good, then the limits He imposes are not burdens. They’re blessings. [source]

No matter what you believe about Reality, Reality always has the last say and doesn’t care what you believe. If your beliefs don’t match Reality then you are deluding yourself.

How Attacks on Faith, Family, and Conscience Threaten All Our Freedoms

From Daily Signal.com (Aug. 6, 2020):

During these tumultuous times, as practically every American institution comes under attack from the far left and its allies, two of our most essential values seem to be especially targeted in an effort to “transform America.”

Those values are faith and family, the two essential pillars that serve as true stabilizing factors in any society.

The attacks on faith and family seem to be relentless.

In Nevada, amid the COVID-19 crisis, casinos are open, but churches are told they must remain closed. In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom told churches that their congregants no longer could sing worship songs, even though they are wearing protective masks while doing so. In Portland, Oregon, radicals not only are burning the flag but Bibles as well. And tragically, in the same vein, vandals are targeting churches.

So, how did we get to this point? It didn’t happen overnight.

It is not a coincidence that our current cultural condition, and the turn to hard-left progressivism, began in the late 1950s and into the 1960s, as these values started to erode and lose influence in American society.

Those on the far left actively were launching attacks—sometimes stealthily—through seizing all the major corridors of cultural and political influence.

When these pillars of faith and family—both of which are key components of the Judeo-Christian principles upon which our nation was founded—started to come under attack, all other principles such as fiscal restraint, freedom of conscience, and limited government came under assault as well.

Regarding the family, several factors led our nation down the progressive path and away from conservatism. The social engineering of President Lyndon Johnson’s liberal Great Society of the mid-1960s devastated the family, as fathers no longer had to accept fiscal responsibility for the children they bore.

Legalized abortion greatly devalued human life and further enabled personal irresponsibility and selfish, rather than selfless, behavior. No-fault divorce made it easy for either spouse to walk away from the commitment of “until death do us part,” leaving a trail of broken children behind.

And attacks on the fundamental beliefs of the faithful created a culture where those beliefs not only were mocked but increasingly criminalized. One example: the persecution of those who do not wish to use their skills to participate in facilitating abortions.

On the faith front, many mainline denominations swapped out the Gospel for social justice and the abandonment of absolute truth. This left a spiritual vacuum for progressive thought—which sought governmental, rather than faith-based, solutions—to fill. Lost were the virtues of prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance—all of which are needed for society to thrive.

Thus, once the pillars of faith and the family were weakened, the rest of the house started to collapse, just as Abraham Lincoln warned the nation in 1858 that “a house divided against itself cannot stand.”

With the gap that was left by the removal of these two pillars of faith and family, progressives were able to introduce policies that destabilized rather than stabilized society. One such policy: encouraging single parenting, which has led to the tragic loss of fathers—an essential individual in every child’s life—in ever-increasing numbers.

Progressives attacked religious freedom and the role churches play in creating a “safety net” that government never could—by feeding both the body and the soul. [read more]

Learning Styles Don’t Actually Exist, Studies Show

From FEE.org (Aug. 12, 2022):

Are you a visual, auditory, reading/writing, or kinesthetic learner? For millions of students, this question has become so familiar that they already have an answer ready to go. Some identify as visual learners, which means that, in theory, they learn best by seeing concepts in pictures and diagrams, perhaps on a blackboard or in a video. Others identify as auditory learners, which means they learn best by hearing, or reading/writing learners, which means they learn best by reading books and taking notes. Still others identify as kinesthetic learners, which means they learn best when they can physically engage with things, such as in a chemistry lab.

For most of us, the idea that different people have different learning styles is so obvious that it is simply common knowledge. But there’s a problem here, a big problem. No matter how hard scientists have looked, they haven’t been able to find any good evidence for the learning styles theory. Indeed, many academics who study this for a living consider learning styles to be one of the biggest myths in education.

“There is no credible evidence that learning styles exist,” write psychologists Cedar Riener and Daniel Willingham in a 2010 paper titled The Myth of Learning Styles. “Students may have preferences about how to learn, but no evidence suggests that catering to those preferences will lead to better learning.”

If that sounds far-fetched, well, there’s plenty more where that came from.

In a 2009 review paper entitled Learning Styles: Concepts and Evidence, researchers investigated the “meshing hypothesis,” which is the idea that students learn better when instruction is provided in a format that matches their learning style. Their conclusion is a hard pill to swallow. “The contrast between the enormous popularity of the learning-styles approach within education and the lack of credible evidence for its utility is, in our opinion, striking and disturbing,” the researchers wrote. “If classfication of students’ learning styles has practical utility, it remains to be demonstrated.”

A 2006 study looking at multimedia instruction came to a similar conclusion. “There was not strong support for the hypothesis that verbal learners and visual learners should be given different kinds of multimedia instruction,” the authors concluded.

But perhaps this is just a few fringe studies? Perhaps there is still some debate on this within academia? Not so, says the American Psychological Association. “Many people, including educators, believe learning styles are set at birth and predict both academic and career success even though there is no scientific evidence to support this common myth,” the APA wrote in a 2019 press release titled “Belief in Learning Styles Myth May Be Detrimental.” The release goes on to say that “numerous studies have debunked the concept of learning styles,” and that there is a “lack of scientific evidence supporting them.”

This lack of evidence stands in stark contrast to popular opinion. Indeed, surveys show that 80-95 percent of people in the US and other industrialized countries believe in learning styles.

Having said all that, it’s important to be clear about what exactly researchers are criticizing when they talk about the myth of learning styles. They aren’t saying there are no differences between students, or that tailored teaching approaches can never be helpful. There are plenty of individual differences between students, such as talent, background knowledge, and interest in the field, and researchers agree that teaching with these differences in mind can have a positive impact.

There is also evidence that using multiple teaching approaches together (such as words and pictures) tends to improve learning across the board, a phenomenon known as the multimedia effect. Again, researchers don’t take issue with this. What they dispute is the idea that each student has a particular learning style, and that teaching to a student’s preferred learning style will improve their educational outcomes. [read more]

A Satanist Pedophile Gang Is Torturing Kids. The FBI Didn’t Seem To Care Unless It Could Blame White Supremacy.

From Daily Wire.com (Nov. 16, 2023):

A Satan-worshipping cult of pedophiles is blackmailing girls into cutting themselves — but the FBI didn’t seem interested in that so much as the fact that one of its members once used the n-word, a Daily Wire investigation found.

For years, the group known both as 764 and Harm Nation has tortured what is believed to be hundreds or thousands of girls. But the FBI didn’t put its cybercrimes or violence-against-children investigators on it. Instead, its interest appears to have piqued mainly by the fact that the group — most of whose victims are white teens — was once racist to a black girl.

The domestic terrorism unit is investigating the Satanist pedophiles for white-supremacy RMVE, or “racially motivated violent extremism” — even though the sole known arrest by the FBI is a Hispanic man who called the judge a “cracker” in court, according to court records and interviews.

Angel Luis Almeida was indicted in January in New York City on charges of sexual exploitation, violation of the Mann Act, and possession of Child Abuse Sexual Material, with prosecutors writing that, “The defendant was an outspoken member of ‘764,’ a neo-Nazi network.” One of the group’s leaders is a 19-year-old called Yuri who calls himself a “femboy,” a term associated with left-wing queer culture.

Critics say, at best, it’s an example of the FBI misclassifying cases in order to tell Congress that right-wing domestic terrorism is the greatest threat to America. At worst, they say, it’s an example of the heinous torture of girls by pedophiles not being a priority — unless there was an angle making it politically appealing to Democrats.

Advocates for children say what it should be is a reminder that children of all types are being exploited online by bad people, and they need help. [read more]

Just terrible. I guess the Briben FBI is too busy going after Christians and J6 protesters or anyone critical of the Demented One. So glad his regime is no longer in power and the FBI is more competent.

China using AI as ‘precision instrument’ of censorship and repression, at home and abroad

From The Register.com (Dec. 3, 2025):

China has embraced AI to help it censor and surveil its citizens and is exporting its techniques to the world, according to a new report by think tank the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI).

Titled “The party’s AI: How China’s new AI systems are reshaping human rights” and published yesterday, the report observes that in Europe and the US the concept of “AI safety” is largely understood as making the technology safe and fair.

In China, the report says, the definition of AI safety is “ensuring that AI serves ‘core socialist values’ and the political stability of the state.”

The report says AI helps China to meet those goals in several ways, one of which is censoring large language models so they refuse to respond, omit sensitive details, or restate official narratives. ASPI tested four Chinese AIs – Baidu’s Ernie Bot, Alibaba’s Qwen, Zhipu AI’s GLM and DeepSeek’s VL2 – using a dataset of images depicting the 2019 Hong Kong protests, the Tiananmen Square protests and related memorials, leaders of the Chinese Communist Party, Falun Gong demonstrations, and eight other sensitive topics.

“Those tests show that Chinese-developed models display stronger censorship behaviours in response to politically sensitive imagery than their US-developed counterparts,” the report found. “The most direct censorship behaviour was an outright refusal to respond, which was especially common in models accessed using inference providers headquartered in Singapore rather than the US, where sensitive prompts frequently triggered error messages or blank outputs.”

ASPI thinks those non-responses matter because Chinese AI is becoming accessible and popular around the world.

“The threat lies less in overt propaganda than in quiet erasure, when the machine that describes reality begins deciding which parts of reality may be seen,” the report states.

Erasure is already happening online, because China has made it plain that its publishers and web giants should use AI to filter material on their platforms.

“In China, AI now performs much of the work of online censorship, scanning vast volumes of digital content, flagging potential violations and deleting banned material within seconds,” the report finds. China requires its web giants like Tencent, Baidu and ByteDance to develop AI to filter content, and those companies have productized their efforts and therefore become part of the AI-powered censorship apparatus.

The report notes that China’s censorship regime still needs human content reviewers, because AI can’t yet interpret satire, keep up with evolving idioms, or understand all minority languages.

China has therefore “effectively ‘deputized’ small and medium-sized enterprises, under the principle of ‘self-discipline’ (自律), to police their users on behalf of the authorities, thus showing how they adopt AI tools and train censorship workers in a system in which human judgement remains indispensable – for now.” [read more]

Big AI is watching China's citizens. 1984 part two. The ultimate in high-tech surveillance. I wonder if George Orwell could dream this up. He probably wouldn't be surprised though.

More tech used on its citizenry:

China’s sci-fi spherical Death Star-like robot cop uses AI, facial recognition to track criminals

FBI arrests Wisconsin judge for obstruction of ICE agents: Kash Patel

From Axios.com (Apr. 25, 2025):

FBI director Kash Patel said Friday his agency had arrested a Milwaukee judge who allegedly tried to help an undocumented defendant avoid arrest.

Why it matters: Hannah Dugan, a Milwaukee County Circuit Court judge, was arrested on charges of obstruction of an immigration arrest operation, Patel's post said.

• Dugan appeared briefly in federal court Friday before she was released from custody, the Associated Press confirmed.
• "Judge Dugan wholeheartedly regrets and protests her arrest. It was not made in the interest of public safety," her lawyer, Craig Mastantuono, said during the hearing, per AP.
• Patel had announced the arrest on the social media site X then deleted it. He later reposted the announcement after Dugan appeared in court.

Driving the news: "We believe Judge Dugan intentionally misdirected federal agents away from the subject to be arrested in her courthouse, Eduardo Flores Ruiz, allowing the subject — an illegal alien — to evade arrest," Patel said.

• Patel added that Flores-Ruiz is currently in the FBI's custody.

Catch up quick: The Journal Sentinel reported this week that the FBI was looking into whether Dugan tried to help an undocumented immigrant avoid arrest after that person was scheduled to appear in her courtroom last week.

• In an email to judges, Chief Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Carl Ashley said Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrived at the Milwaukee County Courthouse on April 18 with an arrest warrant, according to the Journal Sentinel.

• Ashley's note didn't mention Dugan or an FBI investigation into her conduct. His office did not immediately respond to Axios' request for comment.
• Dugan's office did not immediately respond to Axios' request for comment.

[source]

Good. I agree . The judge definitely interfered. The ICE agents didn't even enter the courtroom. They waited outside for the illegal to come out. Saying she had a right to do what she did is stupid. Once she exited her courtroom, her domain ends. Letting that illegal escape outside is potentially dangerous for the public.  Not once did the judge care or even think of that. Prosecute her to the full extent of the law.

Another article on the judge:

Power-Grabbing WI Judges Are Learning From Rogue Federal Jurist

In Canada, Euthanasia for “Mature” Minors?

From Breakpoint.org (Aug. 31, 2022):

In 2016, Canada legalized euthanasia through the euphemistically titled Medical Aid in Dying (or MAiD). Since passing, the number of Canadians who either “enthusiastically” or “cautiously” support the practice has risen slightly from 75% to 80%. The response from communities representing those with disabilities, however, has remained consistently opposed. Their fears, that Canada’s end-of-life policies would prove to be only the cliff edge of a moral abyss, have proven to be largely accurate.

As Maria Cheng of the Associated Press has reported, Canada “arguably has the most permissive euthanasia rules [in the world.]” Just last year, over 10,000 lives were legally taken, an increase of a third from the year before. Patients can request aid in dying without informing family members and for any reason, including, beginning in 2023, mental health issues and not just physical suffering. Doctors, as well as nurse practitioners, can raise the topic of euthanasia with any patient and are not required to first exhaust all other treatment options. Though the government keeps track of yearly deaths by euthanasia, it does not have a commission to review troubling cases, a practice used by other permissive nations like Belgium and the Netherlands.

Next year, euthanasia will likely be extended to so-called “mature” minors. At a time when so many efforts are being made toward suicide prevention among teenagers, they will be taught that death is an acceptable way out of mental anguish. Horrific.

The deadly cocktail of adverse incentives, little accountability, and ineffective “safeguards” have led to a context in which, as AP’s Cheng wrote, “Some disabled Canadians have decided to be killed in the face of mounting bills. .… Other disabled people say the easy availability of euthanasia has led to unsettling and sometimes frightening discussions.”

The worst impact of this slope Canada is sliding down could be a perversion of the word “care.” For example, one Canadian armed forces veteran was outraged after a healthcare worker raised the possibility of assisted death as a “treatment” option for his PTSD. Alan Nichols was a 61-year-old man who was hospitalized in 2019 over fears he might be suicidal. “Within a month,” Cheng described, “Nichols submitted a request to be euthanized and he was killed, despite concerns raised by his family and a nurse practitioner.” The only physical health condition listed on Nichol’s form of consent was hearing loss. According to his brother Gary, “Alan was basically put to death.”

Stories like these are shocking, but we can’t say we were not warned by nearly every disability group in Canada, observers from the UN, and even the American Medical Association. When it comes to euthanasia and doctor-assisted death, abuses and loopholes are not anomalies. They are inevitabilities of a system that operates from a cheapened view of human value and a redefined understanding of healthcare.

The AMA’s official opinion makes clear, “Euthanasia is fundamentally incompatible with the physician’s role as healer, would be difficult or impossible to control, and would pose serious societal risks.” Particularly in a single-payer health care system like Canada’s, the decision of who lives and who dies will inevitably be influenced by crass factors such as money, access to medical resources, and arbitrary decisions about what constitutes “quality of life.”

Against such cultural headwinds, mere “consent” is not enough. In fact, whenever and wherever it is legalized, the so-called “right” to die soon becomes a perceived “duty to die.” Patients consistently report making decisions about not wanting to be “a burden” on friends or family, or because they are convinced, as law and disability professor Theresia Degener described, “a life with disability is automatically less worth living and that in some cases, death is preferable.”

Euthanasia is at odds with any civilized vision of human value. As Alan Nichols’ sister-in-law said, “Somebody needs to take responsibility so that it never happens to another family. I am terrified of my husband or another relative being put in the hospital and somehow getting these (euthanasia) forms in their hand.”

Let’s pray the rest of the world learns from Canada’s terrible example and in nation after nation the lid of this Pandora’s box will be slammed shut. [source]

Canada is becoming a death cult. That’s too bad.

Multiplanet system around sunlike star photographed for 1st time ever

From Live Science.com (July 24, 2020):

For the first time ever, astronomers have directly imaged multiple planets orbiting a sunlike star.

The European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope (VLT) in Chile photographed two giant planets circling TYC 8998-760-1, a very young analogue of our own sun that lies about 300 light-years from Earth, a new study reports.

"This discovery is a snapshot of an environment that is very similar to our solar system, but at a much earlier stage of its evolution," study lead author Alexander Bohn, a doctoral student at Leiden University in the Netherlands, said in a statement.

Before this historic cosmic portrait, only two multiplanet systems had ever been directly imaged, and neither of them features a sunlike star, study team members said. And snapping a photo of even a single exoplanet remains a rare achievement.

"Even though astronomers have indirectly detected thousands of planets in our galaxy, only a tiny fraction of these exoplanets have been directly imaged," study co-author Matthew Kenworthy, an associate professor at Leiden University, said in the same statement.

Bohn, Kenworthy and their colleagues studied the 17-million-year-old star TYC 8998-760-1 with the VLT's Spectro-Polarimetric High-contrast Exoplanet Research instrument, or SPHERE for short. SPHERE uses a device called a coronagraph to block a star's blinding light, allowing astronomers to see and study orbiting planets that would otherwise be lost in the glare.

The newly reported SPHERE imagery revealed two planets in the system, TYC 8998-760-1b and TYC 8998-760-1c. Astronomers already knew about TYC 8998-760-1b — a team led by Bohn announced its discovery late last year — but TYC 8998-760-1c is a newfound world.

The two planets are huge and farflung. TYC 8998-760-1b is about 14 times more massive than Jupiter and orbits at an average distance of 160 astronomical units (AU), and TYC 8998-760-1c is six times heftier than Jupiter and lies about 320 AU from the host star. (One AU is the average Earth-sun distance — about 93 million miles, or 150 million kilometers. For comparison: Jupiter and Saturn orbit our sun at just 5 AU and 10 AU, respectively.)

It's unclear whether the two worlds in TYC 8998-760-1 formed at their present locations or were pushed out there somehow. Further observations, including those made by huge future observatories such as the European Extremely Large Telescope (ELT), could help to solve that mystery, study team members said.

Other questions remain about the TYC 8998-760-1 system as well. For example, do the two gas giants have company? Might several rocky planets circle relatively close to the star, as they do in our solar system?

"The possibility that future instruments, such as those available on the ELT, will be able to detect even lower-mass planets around this star marks an important milestone in understanding multiplanet systems, with potential implications for the history of our own solar system," Bohn said.

The new study was published online July 22 in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. [source]

More planet articles:

• These 10 extreme exoplanets are out of this world
• A massive cotton candy-like exoplanet stumps astronomers
• This strange lava-rich alien planet is making itself a new atmosphere
• Astronomers detect first known ‘death wish’ planet
• Astronomers discover new moons orbiting Uranus and Neptune

‘Biocomputer’ combines lab-grown brain tissue with electronic hardware

From Nature.com (Dec. 11, 2023):

Researchers have built a hybrid biocomputer - combining a laboratory-grown human brain tissue with conventional electronic circuits - that can complete tasks such as voice recognition.

The technology, described on 11 December in Nature Electronics, could one day be integrated into artificial-intelligence (AI) systems, or form the basis of improved models of the brain in neuroscience research.

The researchers call the system Brainoware. It uses brain organoids - bundles of tissue-mimicking human cells that are used in research to model organs. Organoids are made from stem cells capable of specializing into different types of cells. In this case, they were morphed into neurons, akin to those found in our brains.

The research aims to build "a bridge between AI and organoids", says study co-author Feng Guo, a bioengineer at the University of Indiana Bloomington. Some AI systems rely on a web of interconnected nodes, known as a neural network, in a way similar to how the brain functions. "We wanted to ask the question of whether we can leverage the biological neural network within the brain organoid for computing," he says.

Harnessing brainpower

To make Brainoware, researchers placed a single organoid onto a plate containing thousands of electrodes, to connect the brain tissue to electric circuits. They then converted the input information into a pattern of electric pulses, and delivered it to the organoid. The tissue's response was picked up by a sensor and decoded using a machine-learning algorithm.

To test Brainoware's capabilities, the team used the technique to do voice recognition by training the system on 240 recordings of eight people speaking. The organoid generated a different pattern of neural activity in response to each voice. The AI learned to interpret these responses to identify the speaker, with an accuracy of 78%.

Although more research is needed, the study confirms some key theoretical ideas that could eventually make a biological computer possible, says Lena Smirnova, a developmental neuroscientist at John Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. Previous experiments have shown only 2D cultures of neuron cells to be able to perform similar computational tasks, but this is the first time it has been shown in a 3D brain organoid.

Better brain model

Combining organoids and circuits could allow researchers to leverage the speed and energy efficiency of human brains for AI, says Guo.

The technology could also be used to study the brain, says Arti Ahluwalia, a biomedical engineer at the University of Pisa in Italy, because brain organoids can replicate the architecture and function of a working brain in ways that simple cell cultures cannot. There is potential to use Brainoware to model and study neurological disorders, such as Alzheimer's disease. It could also be used to test the effects and toxicities of different treatments. "That's where the promise is; using these to one day hopefully replace animal models of the brain," says Ahluwalia.

But using living cells for computing is not without its problems. One big issue is how to keep the organoids alive. The cells must be grown and maintained in incubators, something that will be harder the bigger the organoids get. And more complex tasks will demand larger 'brains', says Smirnova.

To build upon Brainoware's capabilities, Guo says that the next steps include investigating whether and how brain organoids can be adapted to complete more complex tasks, and engineering them to be more stable and reliable than they are now. This will be crucial if they are to be incorporated into the silicon microchips currently used in AI computing, he says. [source]

Welcome to the brave new world.

Docs: Hamas Hatched Oct. 7 to Stop Saudi-Israel Deal

From Newsmax.com (May 18, 2025):

The Hamas terrorist group plotted the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel in part of keep Saudi Arabia from signing on to a peace deal with Israel and marginalizing the Palestinian cause, according to newly discovered intelligence.

The now-deceased Hamas terrorist leader Yahya Sinwar told his terrorists on Oct. 2, 2023, that they needed the "extraordinary act" to keep Saudi Arabia from normalizing relations with Israel, according to minutes documenting a Hamas meeting discovered in a cleared-out terrorist tunnel war-torn Gaza, The Wall Street Journal reported in an exclusive Sunday.

While the terrorist attack might have delayed Saudi Arabia's signing on to President Donald Trump's first administration's Abraham Accords with Israel, Trump said in his Middle East tour this week that peace in Gaza and normalized relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel are still expected to come.

"You'll do it in your own time," Trump told Saudi Arabia and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in a speech this week.

The Israeli Defense Forces have not only killed Yahya Sinwar, but his replacement, his brother, Mohammed Sinwar was targeted in a strike Tuesday and might be dead now, too.

"There is no doubt that the Saudi-Zionist normalization agreement is progressing significantly," Yahya Sinwar told his terrorists, according to the minutes of a top-level meeting just five days before the terrorist attacks on southern Israel.

Ultimately, Saudi Arabia and Israel normalizing diplomatic relations would "open the door for the majority of Arab and Islamic countries to follow the same path," Yahya Sinwar feared, calling for the terrorists "to bring about a major move or a strategic shift in the paths and balances of the region with regard to the Palestinian cause."

The minutes also noted Hamas' then-leader expected support from Iranian terrorist proxies in the region after years and weeks of weapons and training support from Iran, according to the report.

Sources told the Journal that Iran met with Hamas and Hezbollah officials in Beirut on Oct. 2, 2023, and approved the attack.

Existing Hamas leadership declined to comment to the Journal on the authenticity of the document or its messaging, but Arab intelligence officials close to Hamas told the paper the minutes appear to be genuine.

Many of the Hamas terrorist leaders in place on Oct. 2, 2023, are now dead, the Journal reported.

Other documents found in the terrorist tunnels shed light on fears of Saudi Arabia's normalization with Israel would marginalize Hamas' hopes for a Palestinian state in Gaza.

"It has become the duty of the movement to reposition itself to," a document marked "secret" from August 2022 read, the Journal reported, "preserve the survival of the Palestinian cause in the face of the broad wave of normalization by Arab countries, which aims primarily to liquidate the Palestinian cause." [source]

Evil goat fornicators. 

More on Oct. 7:

• Israeli Gaza Airstrike Kills Architect of Oct. 7 Attacks
• US Families of Oct. 7 Victims File Lawsuit Against Iran
• Barbaric Norms: Hamas, Israel, and Just War    
  

NEW: Shocking and Disgusting Revelations Emerge About the USCP Officer Who Killed Ashli Babbitt

From Red State.com (Dec. 13, 2024):

New, shocking revelations have emerged regarding the USCP officer who shot and killed Ashli Babbitt on January 6th, 2021. According to a new report, then-Lt. Michael Byrd, who claims to have saved "countless lives" that day, was paid tens of thousands of dollars in taxpayer money after the shooting and even demanded cash from a memorial fund meant for the families of slain officers.

The report also reveals Byrd's long history of professional misconduct. Naturally, after a House Oversight subcommittee requested more information, the USCP claimed it could not find any records associated with the officer's disciplinary record. One Internal Affairs investigation involved him leaving his post to play cards.

The 2001 investigation of Michael L. Byrd, 56, was the first known disciplinary case brought against the lieutenant who crept from his blind near the doors to the Speaker’s Lobby on Jan. 6, 2021, and shot Babbitt to death. The 2001 incident is the fourth such disciplinary case disclosed since Nov. 20.

A source with detailed knowledge of the Internal Affairs Division case told Blaze News that Byrd was charged with abandoning his post, eating and drinking at his post, and lying to investigators — a terminable offense. It is one of three Byrd disciplinary cases for which records could not be found when a House oversight subcommittee requested them in early 2024, the source said.

According to sources, surveillance video proved that Byrd had committed the alleged breach of protocol. Instead of admitting to it, he ended up lying to investigators, leading to a recommendation that he be fired. USCP administrators never took action, though.

   The USCP disciplinary officer recommended that Byrd be fired.

   “So they charge him with eating, drinking on post, abandoning post,” the source said. “They charge him with untruthful statements with the recommendation to terminate.”

   Even with the evidence and firing recommendation, Capitol Police administration did not part ways with Byrd.

If that isn't a perfect illustration of the federal government, I'm not sure what is. Byrd had multiple disciplinary investigations take place against him, with at least one involving a recommendation of termination, and he was still on the job in 2021 to shoot Ashli Babbitt. That leads me to the most disgusting part of these revelations. While other officers were paid $3,000 in retention bonuses following January 6th, Byrd was given $36,000. He was also reimbursed for another $21,000 in "security upgrades" for his home in Maryland and housed at Joint Base Andrews at a cost of $35,000 from July 2021 until January 2022.

Byrd was given $36,000 in unrestricted funds as a “retention bonus” in 2021, while other Capitol Police officers received around $3,000 each. Byrd was reimbursed for more than $21,000 in security upgrades for his personal residence in Prince George’s County.

Capitol Police paid to house Byrd at the Joint Base Andrews military facility from July 2021 until late January 2022 at a cost of more than $35,000, according to records obtained by Judicial Watch Inc. When he left the base for any reason, Byrd was provided with a Capitol Police dignitary protection detail, which a source told Blaze News could easily cost $425 per hour.

This is where Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) comes into the picture. Sounding like a mob boss, the then-Speaker of the House ordered that Byrd be "taken care of." The first thought was to promote him to a position requiring a top-secret security clearance. USCP General Counsel Tad DiBiase, who will come into play again momentarily, concluded that he likely couldn't obtain one. Why? Because Byrd not only had serious financial issues, but he was on the USCP's "Lewis List," which is for officers with significant issues of integrity and credibility who can not be relied upon in criminal trials.

This story gets even worse, though. According to emails exchanged with DiBiase, despite being paid tens of thousands of dollars that other officers didn't get after January 6th, Byrd was still desperate for more. He went so far as to demand money from a Memorial Fund set up for the widows of slain officers.

There was an early plan to provide Byrd with a payment from the Capitol Police Officers Memorial Fund, which was founded to honor fallen officers and support their survivors. Byrd expressed frustration that the fund was being opened to officers who were injured on Jan. 6.

“What you proposed could take months,” Byrd wrote in an email to DiBiase at 8:47 p.m. Nov. 16, 2021. “Our expectation was that this would be done soon. Now you’re telling me we got to wait for the rest of the department to even file claims, get evaluated and go through the process we have endured for months.

“That is blatantly wrong to treat us like this,” Byrd wrote. “This was never proposed to us in this manner. Now we’re being grouped in with everyone else. Wow! This is really bad for you all to do this when you know we’re expecting to have funds soon. So disappointing!”

In a reply email one minute later, DiBiase was taken aback by Byrd’s attitude.

“I’m sorry you are disappointed,” DiBiase wrote. “I find that surprising since we have already provided you $36,000 in unrestricted retention funds. You know what the rest of the department is receiving? $3,000 each. Yes, you are being lumped in with the other 91 officers who suffered injuries that day. The Memorial Fund is for the entire department, not one officer.”

Byrd would go on to complain that his wife was "vividly upset" by the news, noting that he hadn't gotten permission yet to set up a "GoFundMe" to collect more money. For reference, Byrd was not injured on January 6th, yet he complained to DiBiase that the fund was being opened up to officers who were, describing himself as being "grouped in with everyone else."

Ultimately, he was promoted to Captain in 2023 despite his record and the questionable nature of his decision to shoot Babbitt. Byrd is clearly a very disturbed individual who should have been fired long before he raised his service pistol on January 6th. His troubled history is a testament to the sheer corruption of the United States federal government, and he serves as a microcosm of just how bad things are in the bureaucratic state. [source]

A travesty. If Byrd would have been fired, Ashley Babbitt would still be alive today.

Another article on Byrd: Capitol Officer Who Shot Ashli Babbitt Promoted

Trump: Venezuela's Maduro 'Captured' After 'Large-Scale Strike'

From Newsmax.com (Jan. 3):

Venezuela's Nicolas Maduro has been captured after the U.S. conducted a "large-scale strike" on the country early Saturday morning, President Donald Trump announced.

"The United States of America has successfully carried out a large scale strike against Venezuela and its leader, President Nicolas Maduro, who has been, along with his wife, captured and flown out of the Country," Trump wrote on Truth Social at 4:21 a.m. ET.

"This operation was done in conjunction with U.S. Law Enforcement. Details to follow. There will be a News Conference today at 11 A.M., at Mar-a-Lago. Thank you for your attention to this matter! President DONALD J. TRUMP."

Attorney General Pam Bondi announced the indictment of Maduro and his wife on terrorism and weapons charges in the Southern District of New York.

"Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, have been indicted in the Southern District of New York," Bondi wrote Saturday morning on X.

"Nicholas Maduro has been charged with Narco-Terrorism Conspiracy, Cocaine Importation Conspiracy, Possession of Machineguns and Destructive Devices, and Conspiracy to Possess Machineguns and Destructive Devices against the United States. They will soon face the full wrath of American justice on American soil in American courts.

"On behalf of the entire U.S. DOJ, I would like to thank President Trump for having the courage to demand accountability on behalf of the American People, and a huge thank you to our brave military who conducted the incredible and highly successful mission to capture these two alleged international narco traffickers."

In an overnight phone interview with The New York Times, Trump called the covert operation "brilliant."

"A lot of good planning and lot of great, great troops and great people," Trump said. "It was a brilliant operation, actually."

Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez, who is the next in line for the presidency, is demanding "proof of life."

"The cradle of the Liberator was attacked. In the face of this situation, we do not know the whereabouts of President Maduro," she said in a phone interview posted to X. "We demand from Donald Trump proof of life of President Maduro. People to the streets." [read more]

Hopefully, Venezuela will be prosperous and peaceful again. This operation has shades of capturing Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua except quicker and more efficient.

Other articles on the matter:

• AG Bondi: Maduro, Wife Indicted in SDNY for Narco-Terrorism Conspiracy
• Trump: 'We Are Going to Run' Venezuela Until 'Safe Transition'
• Trump: Maduro to Be Tried in US, 'Face Full Might of American Justice'
• Maduro Now in New York Jail as Trump Says US to Run Venezuela
• Maduro proclaims his innocence in first court appearance on American soil
  
• Trump: US Firms to Rebuild Venezuela Oil Fields
• Adios, Maduro
• Venezuela: A Warning to Avoid the Quicksand
  
• If America doesn't lead, who will? Venezuela EXPLAINED
  
• The Venezuela Raid Was A Win For America First Anti-Interventionism
  
• WSJ: The Biggest Loser in Maduro's Capture May Be ...
  
• Fetterman: If We Didn’t Want Maduro Removed, Why Did Biden Have a Bounty on Him?
  
• Awkward: Biden Forced To Pay Trump The $25 Million Bounty For Capturing Maduro
  
• Trump’s Maduro Capture Is A Warning For China: Stay Out Of Our Hemisphere
  
• History Supports Trump’s Operation To Take Down Maduro
  
• The Founders, Venezuela, and the Just War Question | George AI | 1/5/26 [audio]
  

Parents or the State: What Kuyper Can Teach Us About Managing Social Media

From Breakpoint.org (Sept. 7, 2022):

The Institute for Family Studies has published a list of legal and policy recommendations to protect teens from the dangers of social media. Among the recommendations are age-verification laws, parental consent requirements, and shutting down social media platforms at night for teens. Other nations have already attempted to restrict young people’s access to technology. For example, a couple of years ago, France banned cell phone use in schools up to age 15.

Monitoring teens’ engagement with social media should be a no-brainer. Anyone still not convinced that something needs to be done need only consider the teens on TikTok exhibiting Tourette-like tics, not to mention the rapid onset gender dysphoria crisis initiated within social media communities.

However, the fact that government may now be the last line of defense in providing some boundaries for social media means that the other lines have failed. Most notably, families have failed to protect children from that which threatens them the most.

This is a modern-day application of one of the most helpful ideas of Dutch theologian Abraham Kuyper, who lived at the turn of the 20th century. Kuyper has jokingly been called the Colson Center’s “patron saint.” Near the end of his life, Chuck Colson described how influential Kuyper’s thought was to his own, specifically in understanding how Christians were called to interact with and influence the culture around them.

Christians could best influence society, according to Kuyper, through the sphere of our family, the basic building block of society. During his lifetime, Kuyper worked across various spheres of culture, not only writing as a theologian but founding a university, leading a newspaper, and eventually becoming prime minister. Throughout his various careers, Kuyper proposed and championed a concept called “sphere sovereignty.”

“Spheres,” as Kuyper understood them, are the social groupings, or domains, that keep society running. He saw them as interlocking “cogs” that work together. In his message at the inauguration of the Free University in the Netherlands, he explained that each sphere—such as science, art, business, government, and family—has “its own law of life” and “its own head” or leadership. Ultimately, Christ is sovereign over all of life. His most famous quote is, “There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human life of which Christ, Who is Sovereign of all, does not cry: ‘Mine!’”  It is Christ who moves “the wheels to turn as they are destined to turn. Not to oppress life nor to bind freedom, but to make possible a free exercise of life for and in each of these spheres, is not this a beckoning ideal for every noble State Sovereign? [or leader].”

His idea, that the duty of the head of a state is to facilitate “free exercise of life,” reveals that, in many ways, Kuyper lived in a time period similar to ours—a time when people were calling for revolution. Kuyper was so uncomfortable with this lawless approach that he called his political party the “Anti-Revolutionary Party.” According to the author Michael Wagenman, Kuyper believed, “Human beings are called to responsible human agency in which ‘the course of our historic development may be altered only through gradual change in a lawful way.’ But this is accomplished through responsible reforms rather than outright revolution that seeks to usher in a manufactured utopia.”

If the language of ushering in a “manufactured utopia” doesn’t sound familiar, just search for “antiracist” and “revolution” on Twitter. The crisis in the state, Kuyper believed, revealed a crisis of family.

Kuyper saw family leadership as “responsible for the good order in the family,” rather than the “head of the state.” Government should only step in if parents did not do their job. He insisted that “the central government may only take on and carry out what is not (and for so long as it is not) properly taken care of in the smaller spheres of life.”

If government control of the good order of the family has to occur, it should be only temporary. Thus, the government can incentivize good family order, such as tax deductions for college saving plans, but a secular government controlling family life can get weird fast, such as removing a child seeking a transgender identity from a Christian family’s home. It’s one of the reasons Christians should recognize and champion parental rights.

Coming back to the topic of teens and social media, we can say that restricting their access to social media is a good idea. But this is the job of the family, not the government. When families fare well, society fares well. That’s those cogs of spheres working together well. A society is only as virtuous as its families. [source]

The family is a fundamental building block of society. Sociologists know this. Probably anthropologists understand this too. Socialists and communists perceive the family as a threat though—because they want to be your only family.

When Has War Even Been ‘Proportional?’

From AM Greatness.com (Nov. 16, 2023):

Proportionality in war is a synonym for lethal stalemate, if not defeat.

When two sides go at it with roughly equal forces, weapons, and strategies, the result is often a horrific deadlock—like the four years of toxic trench warfare on the Western Front of World War I that resulted in 12 million fatalities.

The purpose of war is to defeat the enemy as quickly as possible with the least number of causalities—and thereby achieve political ends.

So, every side aims to find superior strategies, tactics, weapons, and manpower to ensure as great a disproportionate advantage as possible.

Hamas is no exception.

Its savage precivilizational strategy to defeat Israel hinged on doing disproportionate things Israel either cannot or will not do.

First, Hamas spent a year planning a preemptive butchery spree inside Israel. Its ruthless murdering focused on “soft targets” like unarmed elderly, women, children, and infants, mostly asleep at a time of peace and holiday.

Second, it sought to collectively shock Israel into paralysis by the sheer horror of decapitating civilians, burning babies, mass raping, and mutilating bodies.

Another apparent aim of such premodern barbarity was to blame Israel’s “occupation” for turning Gazans into veritable monsters, with hopes of derailing the renewed Abraham Accords.

Third, the gunmen took more than 240 hostages back with them to Gaza.

Again, that was a disproportionate tactic designed to meter out the release of captives in exchange for “pauses” and “cease-fires” to save Hamas.

Additionally, Hamas made implicit threats of gruesome executions of captives unless Israel ceased their retaliation for October 7.

Fourth, all the while Hamas shot rockets into Israel, more than 7,000 in total, and all aimed at civilians.

Not one launch was preceded by dropping leaflets or sending text messages to Israeli civilians to vacate the intended target areas—a protocol often used by the Israel Defense Forces.

The unapologetic aim was to kill thousands of Israelis at random and disproportionately.

In fact, in just the last few four weeks, Hamas has launched more than twice as many rockets into Israel as Nazi Germany managed to launch V-2s into Britain in five months.

Fifth, Hamas sought to create a multibillion-dollar tunnel city beneath Gaza. The labyrinth’s sole purposes were to stockpile weapons and ensure safe havens for terrorists to shoot rockets and regroup after their terrorist missions.

Sixth, the subterranean headquarters of Hamas elites, along with weapons depots, were strategically placed under hospitals, mosques, and schools to “shield” them from Israeli attacks.

The expectation was that the IDF would be hesitant to target such “civilian” and “humanitarian” areas in a way Hamas never would.

Seventh, Hamas forced the civilians of Gaza to remain among the street fighting. They often shot those who resisted.

They also killed Gazans who fled the city. Hamas sought to increase civilian fodder as collateral damage from Israeli attacks. Such deaths were to be broadcast worldwide to win sympathy for Hamas terrorists and force a cease-fire.

Eighth, Hamas bragged that it could repeat strategies 1-7 endlessly on the supposition Israel would tire, the world would turn against it, and it at last could murder enough Jews to end Israel altogether.

Israel in turn seeks its own disproportionate response to defeat Hamas.

First, it seeks to single out and kill the actual Hamas terrorists, and especially the 2,000 or so killers of October 7.

Second, it tries to warn civilians to flee anywhere that Hamas masses. Just as Hamas wants its own civilians killed for propaganda purposes, so Israel seeks to avoid killing them.

Third, by targeting Hamas and warning civilians to keep their distance, Israel does not deny that there will be collateral damage.

But it hopes to convince the world that any civilian deaths are mostly the fault of Hamas and not the IDF.

And to the degree that Gaza City is left in rubble, Israel wishes to remind its enemies that the wages of murdering Jewish infants unfortunately will be a disproportionate response, whose full effects will deter any future attack.

Fourth, Israel understands that a country of 9-10 million is facing a virulently hostile 500 million-person Arab Middle East. The United Nations is on the side of Hamas. A now anti-Semitic Europe has been hijacked by immigrants from the Middle East. Israel’s sole patron the United States is buffeted by a hard-left new Democratic Party that is not a reliable partner.

The result is that Israel still cannot conduct a fully disproportionate war without endangering its source of military resupply in the United States, and a wider conflict with the Islamic world.

And so, the war continues.

Hamas strives for a more disproportionate terrorist agenda to prolong the war. And Israel strives for a more disproportionate retaliation to end it.

The anger arises at Israel mostly because it is Jewish, and thus far its conventional disproportionality is proving more effective than the terrorist disproportionality of Hamas. [source]

More great points from VDH that are hard to disagree with.

Critical Race Theory for the Rest of Us

From The Public Discourse.com (Nov. 8, 2023):

What is Critical Race Theory?

A movement that was virtually unknown for decades is now, thanks to prominent national activism, a household name. The United States continues to grapple with the legacy of slavery and the persistence of racism. For many, Critical Race Theory (CRT) seems to be the most plausible and coherent framework through which to view the history of racism and its lasting impact on modern life. But as Edward Feser argues in All One in Christ: A Catholic Critique of Racism and Critical Race Theory, CRT does more harm than good for racial harmony, an ideal that is better served by such Christian principles as those embodied in the Catholic Church’s social teaching. In Feser’s book, Catholics, other Christians, and even non-Christians will find much to help them confront CRT and the perennial challenges of living in a racially diverse society.

The Christian Response to Racism

The Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church states:

The Incarnation of the Son of God [Jesus Christ] shows the equality of all people with regard to dignity: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:28).

Since something of the glory of God shines on the face of every person, the dignity of every person before God is the basis of the dignity of man before other men. Moreover, this is the ultimate foundation of the radical equality and brotherhood among all people, regardless of their race, nation, sex, origin, culture, or class.

Only on such a principled basis, Feser says, could one overcome racism. Biology can refute many racist claims, but hardened racists can always find genetic differences between races to rationalize their prejudice. Defenders of universal human dignity, like the Church, therefore ultimately appeal to the transcendent human nature that we all share in our spiritual soul—which cannot be reduced to genetics.

From each man’s soul—“by which he is most especially in God’s image”—spring his distinctly human capacities to know and love God and other people. It creates a “bond between the human person and the Creator,” the Church says, that grounds his “fundamental inalienable rights, of which God is the guarantor.” God alone, and not one’s parents, creates the soul. It is immortal, and after separating from the body in death it will reunite with the body “at the final Resurrection.” And if he develops his spiritual capacity to love, even the humblest, least educated person—like St. André Bessette—will, after this life, surpass in eternal glory kings and popes who were reckoned among the mighty on earth.

Given the Church’s beliefs, it is not surprising that, when race-based slavery first appeared in the early modern era, Feser notes, “[t]he Church immediately condemned [it] in the harshest terms possible.” In 1537, Pope Paul III bluntly called the opinion that the native peoples of the New World were mere animals the invention of

[t]he enemy of the human race, who . . . in order that he might hinder the preaching of God’s Word of salvation to the people, . . . inspired his satellites . . . to publish abroad that the Indians of the West and the South, and other people of whom We have recent knowledge, should be treated as dumb brutes created for our service, pretending that they are incapable of receiving the catholic faith.

In other words, Feser says, “in this document from five centuries ago, the pope characterizes as nothing less than satanic” the racism that underlay slavery. The same natives, the pope said, “and all other people who may later be discovered by Christians, are by no means to be deprived of their liberty or the possession of their property, even though they be outside the faith of Jesus Christ.”

Although many Catholics ignored the pope, the Church’s teaching was clear and emphatic. Over centuries, the teaching was repeated and extended to condemn the enslavement of Filipinos and black Africans. Leo XIII applauded slavery’s abolition in Brazil in 1888. And when Nazism emerged, Pius XI condemned its racist nationalism. Throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, popes have continued to speak out against the mistreatment of minorities. [read more]

Another article on CRT: Critical Race Theory is the new segregation across schools nationwide

J6 Bombshell: Secret Service got intel on 'high potential' for violence but didn't tell agents

From Just the News.com (Aug. 1, 2024):

The Secret Service developed intelligence that there was a “high potential for violence” before the Jan. 6 Capitol riot but failed to share that information with its agents guarding Donald Trump, Mike Pence or Kamala Harris that fateful day, according to a bombshell report delivered to Congress on Thursday that exposed a fresh round of failures by the presidential protection agency.

Homeland Security Inspector General Joseph Cuffari's report was forced into the public by pressure from House Administration Oversight Subcommittee Chairman Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga., and it confirmed earlier Just the News reporting, including that the Secret Service whisked Harris, then the Vice President-elect, within 20 feet of an undetected pipe bomb at Democrat National Committee (DNC) headquarters in Washington because it failed to employ its normal explosive detection tools.

“The Secret Service had not employed all its explosive detection tactics and measures for the security sweep, instead providing only canine teams at the DNC building that day. Afterward, the Secret Service did not report the buildings evacuation as an unusual protective event, as required by its policies,” the inspector general concluded

The report, obtained by Just the News, not only adds dramatic new details about security and intelligence failures on Jan.6, 2021 but it also offered powerful new evidence to the growing inquiry into how the Secret Service failed to detect the gunman who wounded Trump at a July 13 rally in Butler, Pa.

Congressional aides briefed on the report said its findings and six recommendations for improved communication, training and other security tactics were delivered to Secret Service management in April, three months before the Trump assassination attempt. Cuffari, himself, made a point in the report to stress that the shortcomings exhibited during the Capitol riot 3 1/2 years ago should be a learning event for the Secret Service.

"The events of January 6 were unprecedented and the issues we identified during our review presented an opportunity for the Secret Service to be better prepared in the future," the report implored.

The report also revealed some friction between Cuffari's office, the chief watchdog for Homeland Security, and Secret Service managers, who disagreed with some of the report's findings and recommendations.

The report shows that the Jan. 6 events exposed some of the same failures now suspected to be at the center of the rally tragedy, including problems with communication with local police, faulty security sweeping and inadequate threat identification. [read more]

Is this general incompetence (which is bad in of itself) or something more? 

Another J6 article:

Vicious FBI Agents Accused of Terrorizing Innocent J6 Families and Harassing Children Sue to Keep Their Identities Hidden

Docs: FBI Believed It Lacked Probable Cause To Raid Mar-A-Lago But Did So Anyway

From The Federalist.com (Dec. 16, 2025):

The FBI did not believe it had probable cause to raid President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence in 2022, but did it anyway after pressure from then-President Joe Biden’s Department of Justice, according to newly uncovered emails.

Emails released by Sen. Chuck Grassley’s office show that officials at the FBI and DOJ communicated about FBI concerns about the warrant in the months leading up to the August raid.

In one June 1 email an unidentified FBI assistant special agent in charge wrote to FBI official Anthony Riedlinger, “Very little has been developed related to who might be culpable for mishandling the documents.”

“[FBI Washington Field Office] has been drafting a Search Warrant affidavit related to these potential boxes, but has some concerns that the information is single source, has not been corroborated, and may be dated. DOJ CES opines, however, that the SWs meet the probable cause standard.” The same agent described the “potential boxes” as “presumably of the same type as were sent back to NARA [National Archives and Records Administration] in January.”

Notably, the unnamed FBI official said that while they “continue[d] down the path towards a search warrant, WFO believes that a reasonable conversation with the former President’s attorney (stating that the FBI and DOJ are readying a search warrant, and have developed information that there are more documents at Mar a Lago), ought not to be discounted.”

A separate email (sent weeks after the aforementioned, on July 13) to Robert Stuart Sinton, Lisa R. Gentilcore, and Anthony Riedlinger from a redacted official states: “We haven’t generated any new facts, but keep being given draft after draft after draft. Absent a witness coming forward with recent information about classified on site, at what point is it fair to table this?”

Another email dated July 29 noted that the scope of the search was being “widened.”

Another redacted email sent on July 20 shows the FBI’s Washington Field Office did “not believe (and has articulated to DOJ CES) that we have established probable cause for the search warrant for classified records at Mar a Lago. DOJ has opined that they do have probable cause, requesting a wide scope including residence, office, storage space. … Continued investigation and additional interviews have not found any witness who has reported seeing classified records at Mar a Lago since the return of records via [Redacted] compliance on June 3, 2022.”

In fact, FBI officials were purportedly worried about the optics of executing such an uncertain search warrant.

According to an Aug. 4 email from an unidentified agent, then-Deputy Assistant Attorney General George Toscas said in a meeting that he “frankly doesn’t give a damn about the optics” of the search warrant despite concerns of FBI officials and their apparent desire to execute the warrant in “a professional, low key manner.”

“I understand that this request may not go well at DOJ, however, it is FBI serving and executing the search and it will be our personnel who will have to deal with the reaction to that first contact,” the email from the unidentified agent reads.

The FBI raided Mar-a-Lago on Aug. 8. Special Counsel Jack Smith then brought charges against Trump stemming from the raid as part of Democrats’ “get-Trump” lawfare. Smith alleged Trump mishandled classified documents. Smith’s prosecution against Trump was dismissed last July after Judge Aileen Cannon found his appointment unconstitutional, as then-Attorney General Merrick Garland lacked the authority to appoint Smith. [source]

Abuse of power. All because the Briben regime wanted to get President Trump.