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In 2014, Vice President Joe Biden was dispatched to Guatemala by President Barack Obama to implore Latin American countries and their citizens to stop smuggling unaccompanied children into the United States.

“These smugglers routinely engage in physical and sexual abuse and extortion of these innocent, young women and men, by and large,” Biden said in a speech in Guatemala City.

Three months into his own presidency, in March 2021, Biden sent his vice president, Kamala Harris, to Guatemala to convey a similar message: “Do not come.”

Ten years on from Biden’s address in Guatemala City, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General is out with a report that the Biden-Harris administration has lost track of approximately 300,000 migrant children.

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A federal judge has ruled that a Virginia school district may not prevent a transgender student from playing on a girls’ middle school tennis team while the student’s lawsuit against the school board continues.

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DHS Inspector General Joseph Cuffari released a shocking report Tuesday on the status of nearly 500,000 unaccompanied migrant children who’ve entered the country since around 2019, finding that Immigration and Customs Enforcement can’t account for an untold number of them.

According to the DHS IG, ICE has apprehended 448,820 unaccompanied migrant children since 2019.

Once ICE apprehends those children, the agency transfers them to the Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement. The HHS ORR is then supposed to find shelter for those children as they go through immigration court proceedings.

However, more than 32,000 unaccompanied minors have failed to show up to their court dates—and ICE can’t account for all of them, according to the DHS IG. The DHS IG also found that ICE hasn’t served notices for more than 291,000 unaccompanied minors to appear for court—meaning that many of them could be unaccounted for, too.

NavyMatters.

In a previous post noting the deployment of the Lincoln strike group (can you really call a carrier and three destroyers a strike group?), reader ‘BA 1959’ posted a comment asking where all our destroyers are since they certainly aren’t escorting our carriers. This is an excellent question and it illustrates one of ConNavOps’ overarching themes which is that the Navy should be home based, training and maintaining, instead of on deployment or, worse, trapped in the useless phases of the interminable deployment cycle.

How come the Lincoln is deploying with just three escorts? Well, partly it’s the fault of a hopelessly lost Navy leadership that either foolishly thinks carriers don’t need more escorts or believes that destroyers are better employed on worthless tasks like show-the-flag, pirate chasing, freedom of navigation exercises, forward presence, trading one-at-a-time shots with the Houthis and praying that a stray missile doesn’t get through, etc.

Think about it … if the Navy were home ported and engaged in continual training and maintenance, every ship that wasn’t in dry dock would have been available to surge as an escort for the Lincoln. That, in a nutshell, is the justification for home basing the fleet.

New York Times.

Just one day after the World Health Organization declared the deadly mpox outbreak in Africa a global health emergency, Sweden reported its first case of a dangerous strain of the disease (and there may be more cases). The threat of a pandemic of mpox is here yet again. To curb this crisis, the affected countries in Africa need tests, vaccines and people to respond. Now.

Cases of mpox (formerly known as monkeypox), a viral illness spread primarily through close physical contact, are up 160 percent in Africa compared to the first seven months of 2023. So far this year, over 15,600 cases have been reported and 537 people have died, a majority of them children.

The bulk of the spread, which is fueled by a subtype of mpox believed to cause more severe illness and death, is happening in the Democratic Republic of Congo and a dozen other African countries. This includes countries that hadn’t reported mpox cases previously, such as Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda. The Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the reported cases are most likely just the “tip of the iceberg.” Thousands of cases may remain undetected because of cavernous gaps in surveillance, testing and contact tracing.

“ Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help.” — Psalm 146:3.

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For several weeks, social media has been flooded by teachers’ posts with Amazon wish lists, soliciting others to stock their classrooms with basic supplies. Creating these lists has been commonplace in recent years as teachers look outside their schools and districts to fill their supply needs.

Some of the most popular requested items are dry erase markers, Kleenex, Lysol wipes, erasers, tape, pens, colored copy paper, file folders, and pencil sharpeners. Others request educational items such as a microscope, map, or globe, which seem essential for student learning.

This raises an obvious question: Why aren’t school districts providing teachers what they need?

 

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I’ll bet you didn’t know that the Secret Service had a ‘Presidential armored bus’.

Maybe they got the idea from STRIPES.

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The California Senate Appropriations Committee advanced a bill that would allow illegal immigrants to participate in the state’s zero down, no payment home loan program despite saying it would create “significant cost pressures,”…

Nothing is too good for our ‘undocumented’!

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Ten Percent For The Big Guy really adds up.

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PREPARE TO OBFUSCATE … EXECUTE!

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Trayon White, the liberal Washington, D.C., council member who said Jews manipulate the weather in a scheme to “own” American cities, was arrested by the FBI on Sunday for taking part in a $156,000 bribery scheme.

White, who appeared poised to secure a third term on the council this November prior to the arrest, was detained by federal authorities at his “luxury high-rise apartment building” in D.C.’s Navy Yard neighborhood, according to the Washington Post. White allegedly took “thousands of dollars in cash” and other gifts in exchange for ensuring city contracts went to a local businessman, according to CNN, which said the Democrat “agreed to take $156,000 in cash for his work—or 3 percent of the contracts’ value.”

White was reportedly caught asking for cash on in taped conversations with the unnamed businessman who was acting as an informant after pleading guilty to separate federal bribery charges.

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I’ll bet you didn’t know that was a thing.

The Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable searches and seizures extends to the length of a seizure, a federal court ruled last week, significantly restricting how long law enforcement can retain private property after an arrest.

“When the government seizes property incident to a lawful arrest, the Fourth Amendment requires that any continued possession of the property must be reasonable,” wrote Judge Gregory Katsas of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in a unanimous ruling.

Most courts of appeal to pass judgment on the issue—namely, the 1st, 2nd, 6th, 7th, and 11th circuits—have held that, once an item is seized, law enforcement can retain the item indefinitely without violating the Fourth Amendment. These precedents have allowed police to retain personal property without clear legal grounds, effectively stripping people of their property rights merely because they were arrested. The D.C. Court of Appeals’ ruling complicates this general consensus.

Your tax dollars at work. Quiet, slaves!

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One of the great mysteries about the January 6, 2021, events is the lack of curiosity by the FBI about who planted the pipe bombs at the DNC and RNC headquarters. Amid all of the available CCTV video and surveillance technology exploited by the justice department, their transparent unwillingness to identify the pipe bomber has always been a dog that did not bark.

The Occam’s Razor explanation for why DC and federal law enforcement have been incurious, points to law enforcement actually planting the bombs. New CCTV video seems to show exactly that.

Shortly after 12:51pm a DC police SUV appears next to the park bench where the pipe bomb was discovered. [Video Below] A man with a bag exits the SUV, points to the bench, pulls up his right coat collar to obscure his face from the camera located across the street, then walks to the bench with the bag. The “pipe bomb” device allegedly was found at 1:05 p.m. by a plainclothes officer from the Capitol Police.

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Although Apple makes it sound like Californians will be able to ditch their physical driver’s licenses and state IDs in favor of digital versions in the Wallet app, California and the other states supporting digital IDs in Wallet require that you continue to carry your physical ID.

So what’s the point? I remember my father talking about World War II where one of his commanders wanted to destroy a bunch of obsolete and useless documents, and his superiors in the War Department would only let him do that if he made copies of them in triplicate.

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Thank you, Joe Biden.

New York Post.

Washington, D.C. has once again earned the dubious distinction of being the least desirable city in America, according to a new poll.

For the second year running, the nation’s capital has topped the list of places where Americans would least want to live, with a whopping 33% of survey respondents ranking it among the top five worst cities.

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As reported by the Daily Caller, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has filed over 44,000 deportation cases in Massachusetts in the first nine months of fiscal year 2024. If new cases continue at this pace, then the end of the fiscal year could see as many as 59,000 deportation cases. The previous record was 54,000 in fiscal year 2023, which previously set the record for the highest number of cases in about 25 years.

Despite previously voicing her support for open borders and vowing to keep the state a “sanctuary” for illegals, Governor Maura Healey (D-Mass.) declared in July that the state would limit the length of time that an illegal could stay at state-run overflow shelters, bringing it down to just five days per illegal.

This rule was implemented at all four overflow shelters, located in Cambridge, Chelsea, Lexington, and Norfolk. These shelters previously allowed illegals to stay for up to 30 days, with the option to simply re-apply for another 30 days indefinitely.

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My understanding that the only people threatened by Monkeypox are monkeys and homosexuals. Now I can understand why that represents a Global Health Emergency for the WHO, but I don’t see how it affects normal people.

CNBC.

As if anybody will pay any attention. The Federal Trade Commission vies with the Federal Election Commission as being the single most useless government agency.

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As of June, the Dallas Area not-so-Rapid Transit (DART) was carrying 80 percent of pre-pandemic riders, a little more than the national average of 75 percent. The decrease in ridership has minimal effect on its budget, since in 2019 fares covered less than 12 percent of operating costs. Still, officials of several cities in the region whose taxpayers are supporting DART are beginning to wonder why they are spending so much money and getting so little.

DART is basically a jobs program for Dallas county black people.

DART is primarily funded out of a 1 percent sales tax levied on residents of 13 cities served by the agency. Since early July, the city councils of six of those cities have voted to reduce the sales tax going to DART by 25 percent, and the city councils of Dallas and at least one other city are considering similar resolutions. The tax is levied by DART, not the cities, so the votes are more symbolic of general dissatisfaction with how DART is run. To actually reduce the tax, the DART board would have to put a measure on the ballot and residents of each of the 13 cities would decide.

The councillors who voted to reduce DART subsidies are “not against public transportation,” says the mayor of one of those cities. Instead, they want ” efficient system that does not over-rely on taxpayer dollars to service approximately 4% of individuals in DFW.”

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My, what a surprise. Aren’t you surprised? I’m sure surprised.

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“Spend and spend, tax and tax, elect and elect.” — Harry Hopkins (Democrat)

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Yes, really.

The former chief medical advisor to the president, who became the face of the COVID vaccination drive from late 2020 onwards, reacted to catching COVID-19 yet again by thanking the vaccine.

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“Essentially, what’s happening is, the VA was caught moving processors from the VA to support [Immigration and Customs Enforcement Health Services Corps] processing detainee medicals,” he says.

“We’re talking over 1.1 million people,” said Carver, who currently serves as a graduate fellow in the Allison Center for National Security at The Heritage Foundation.

“We’re talking hundreds of thousands of initial medical exams, with follow-up exams, hundreds of thousands of prescriptions being filled, dental appointments, vision appointments,” he added. “I mean, the care that the detainees are getting is better than a lot of what the veterans are getting and without … the hoops to jump through, because they just have access to this once they’re detained.”

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A new audit by the New York City Comptroller’s Office found the city overpaid upstate hotels and other subcontractors by millions to shelter illegal immigrants last spring.

The audit also finds sizable undue commission payments to DocGo, a main city contractor responsible for running temporary shelters in the metro area at an annual cost of $432 million.

DocGo was one of a few city contractors tasked with developing upstate hotels-turned-shelters last May, a novel city practice that auditors deem “unusual,” and has met with strong opposition from several upstate counties, including Rockland and Orange.

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We have previously discussed controversial sentences handed down in cases involving rioters on January 6th, including sentencing orders that, in my view, violate First Amendment rights. That included the case of Daniel Goodwyn, who pleaded guilty to a single misdemeanor count of entering and remaining in a restricted building. That crime would ordinarily not involve any jail time for a first offender.

However, Judge Reggie B. Walton of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia decided that he would use the case to regulate what Goodwyn was reading and communicating with a chilling probation order. After the case was sent back by the D.C. Circuit, Walton doubled down on his extraordinary order. Now the D.C. Circuit has refused to hear an emergency appeal.

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A federal appeals court in North Dakota has found that a rule issued by the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) that restricts ownership of pistol attachments known as stabilizing braces is “arbitrary and capricious,” ordering a lower court to re-consider a motion that would block enforcement of the brace ban.

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When the Washington Free Beacon asked me to review Over Ruled, I was honored, intrigued, and amused. Honored because this was Justice Neil Gorsuch’s latest work that’s not printed in U.S. Reports, the official publisher of Supreme Court opinions. Intrigued because he, along with his sometime coauthor and former clerk Janie Nitze (an accomplished lawyer in her own right) were arguing that our rule of law was suffering because we had not just too many laws—that ground has been well-trod, not least by my former colleague Walter Olson, who founded and for over 20 years ran the first-ever legal blog, Overlawyered—but too much law.

Wally Olson was a friend of mine at Yale, and I follow his Overlawyered blog with interest.

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California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office hired a famous photographer on a $200,000 yearly salary six months ago, Politico reported Saturday.

UPDATE: Newsom Hires $200k/Year Celebrity Photographer For Glamor Shots

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Dr. Anthony Fauci often claims a “DNA of caring” yet his actions reveal a stark contrast. Avoiding direct patient care, Dr. Fauci focused on populations—effecting a mindset aligned with abstract compassion for humanity that nonetheless neglects individual rights. His so-called ‘DNA of caring’ has most recently doubly stranded those subjected to it: first, by amplifying fear about Covid-19 while burying mitigating data; second, by pushing a vaccine in a draconian, methodical, and threatening manner, taking away liberty and jobs to an extreme never seen before in the history of mankind.

Additionally, by fast-tracking and strong-arming an mRNA vaccine-platform technology heretofore devoid of Phase II or III safety studies, Dr. Fauci prioritized hypothetical scientific advancement over actual current health, medical knowledge, and personal liberties—effectively double-crossing both the public’s trust and violating his own integrity: contradicting medically foundational principles he had spent his career enunciating—perhaps influenced by pharmaceutical interests.

Is this ‘Shit on Fauci Day’? I’m in.

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For months, governmental officials around the world have appeared to want to forgo discussing the specter of long COVID. As a new review makes clear, that is wishful thinking—and the latest COVID variants may well kick long COVID into overdrive, a scenario that researchers and experts have been warning about for some time.

“I think they (government agencies) are itching to pretend that COVID is over and that long COVID does not exist,” says Ziyad Al-Aly, director of the Clinical Epidemiology Center at Veterans Affairs St. Louis Health Care System and lead author of the review. “It is much more pleasant to pretend as if emergency department visits and hospitalizations haven’t been rising sharply this summer.”

NavyMatters.

Value – The LCS has almost no combat capability.  Hence, the value for the money is near zero.

Opportunity Cost – The opportunity cost = $27.5B.  What could we have done with $27.5B if we had not spent it on the LCS program?  Well, the alternative opportunities are nearly endless:  munitions, mines, a dedicated minesweeper, ASW destroyer/corvette, air wings, dry docks, etc.  At this point, it’s not even debatable that almost any alternative choice would have been a better use of the funds.  In other words, the opportunity cost-value far exceeded the actual cost-value.

Bear in mind that this is not a case of hindsight.  Almost everyone except the Navy pointed out massive problems with the program from day one:  concurrency, lack of CONOPS, a multitude of design issues, insufficient weight and stability margins, a badly flawed manning model, a badly flawed maintenance model, lack of armament, complete absence of modules, etc.  There was no hindsight involved or required.  The problems were painfully obvious and predictable.  In fact, the term ‘predictable’ implies a small degree of uncertainty.  Regarding the LCS problems, there was no uncertainty.  The problems were 100% certain to occur, as was pointed out by … well … everyone.

The LCS is the poster child for a program that should never have left the back-of-the-napkin stage.  It produced no value and a staggering $27.5B wasted opportunity cost.

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A chilling letter this week from Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel is a reminder that Americans cannot forget about the importance of the judiciary in upholding free speech and our other constitutional freedoms.

On Tuesday – ironically, the day Michiganders went to the primary polls to participate in our constitutional right to vote – Nessel issued a “cease-and-desist letter” against a citizen whom the letter claimed was violating a state law against “misleading or false information” about “polling locations.” The recipient of the letter, Kerry Lynn Elieff, was threatened with “criminal prosecutions” if she did not follow the order.

What raises the biggest red flags is that Nessel’s letter doesn’t ever state what information was false or misleading. Elieff told me after the cease-and-desist letter became public that all she was trying to do was verify that due process was followed in changing polling locations. She actually took down her public posts out of fear of prosecution – and who can blame her? She wasn’t sure what to do after being under surprise threat by a state official.

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The Biden-Harris administration has, for years, vowed to deploy thousands of solar panels to stabilize Puerto Rico’s power grid amid regular blackouts, government mismanagement, and ever-increasing residential electricity rates. But, years after making that promise, a $1 billion program central to that effort yielded only a tiny handful of solar panels, the Washington Free Beacon has learned.

“We’re talking about energy and solar. That’s where the power is, right there,” Vice President Kamala Harris said during a speech in Puerto Rico earlier this year.

During her remarks, Harris touted the so-called Puerto Rico Energy Resilience Fund, a $1 billion fund managed by the Department of Energy and designed by Democrats in 2022 to quickly address Puerto Rico’s electrical grid vulnerabilities via the installation of tens of thousands of rooftop solar and battery storage systems across the island. That fund has taken a central role in the administration’s plans to, as President Biden said in October 2022, “transform the entire” Puerto Rican grid.

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Ahead of Tuesday’s Senate grilling of acting Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe, local Pennsylvania police released a curious diagram from the July 13 rally in Butler that ended in an assassination attempt of former President Trump, the death of rally-goer Corey Comperatore, and injuries of two others.

The aerial photo of the event site, the Butler Farm Show, contained labels for the locations of Butler County and Beaver County police assets, including two local law enforcement “snipers” assigned to cover the American Glass Research building, where shooter Thomas Crooks perched with his AR-15 rifle about 150 yards from Trump’s onstage performance and fired eight bullets at the former president and the crowd.

The diagram includes a narrow red triangle, clearly labeled “Beaver Sniper Line of Sight.” That line of sight is narrowly conscribed between the location of the snipers inside the AGR building to the stage and pointedly does not cover any area of the rooftop where Crooks ran across and then stopped to open fire.

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The top global agency, part of the United Nations system, for promoting preparedness in advance for health emergencies and crises and coordinating national responses, is the World Health Organisation. Unfortunately, its performance in helping the world manage Covid-19 proved, to be kind, very patchy. This makes it all the more surprising that there should be a concerted effort underway to expand its authority and boost its resources.

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Seattle is infested with so much crime, its jails are running out of space. And, because King County Jail is running out of space, the city is now considering a program that “would pay for jail beds at the SCORE jail facility in Des Moines,” according to KIRO 7.

Its a move that the report says “would cost Seattle millions”. And, unsurprisingly, it isn’t winning any fans in Des Moines, as the SCORE facility would be used for offenders who are locked up only for 24-48 hours, before being released.

The report says that the Seattle City Council Public Safety Committee met Wednesday to discuss a pilot plan, with public comments varying from full support to calling it “theatre.” The proposal would fund at least 20 beds, costing $1.5 to $3 million annually, depending on usage.

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It took them four-and-a-half years, but the IRS has issued final rules governing mandatory distributions from traditional 401k’s, IRAs, and other retirement plans inherited in 2020 or later. To the great disappointment of beneficiaries and their financial planners, the agency embraced the most complex procedure possible as it interpreted a law passed by Congress in 2019.

The new rules apply when the deceased IRA owner was old enough to be making required minimum distributions (RMDs) of their own before they died. Currently, that requirement starts at age 73, but in 2020, it was age 72. It’s scheduled to rise to age 75 in 2033. (Yes, we’re only in the second paragraph and things are already getting knotty. Bear down.)

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Historically, many people have had less to eat than they’ve needed to thrive, or simply survive. Hence, many have hailed the Green Revolution: a late 20th-century agricultural project encompassing plant genetic modification, modern irrigation systems, chemical fertilizers, and pesticides that increased food production, especially of wheat, rice, corn, and soybeans.

But the Green Revolution hasn’t been a cost-free, magic bullet. Neither mass nor energy is created nor destroyed; everything physical derives from something else physical. Newer crop varieties yield more because they use more water, synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, expensive farm equipment, and fuel.

Green Revolution practices have caused serious environmental harm. Aquifers are being depleted as irrigation water is pumped from the ground faster than rain recharges it. Unimaginable amounts of fertile soil have been washed or blown away. Fertilizers and pesticides pollute soil, air, and water beyond the agricultural lands themselves, including rivers and oceans. Converting forests, grasslands, and wetlands into farmland has destroyed much wildlife/game habitat and lessened atmospheric carbon uptake. Consequently, the natural resources needed to produce food have been degraded, portending eventual, widespread crop failure and food shortages.

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The Department of Homeland Security is abruptly stopping a program that has allowed close to half a million immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela into the United States following allegations of widespread fraud, reported the New York Post.

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A Texas rancher has filed a lawsuit against President Joe Biden and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) accusing them of adopting policies that have resulted in “the biggest influx of illegal aliens into America in our history.”

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An investigation into a Maryland school system’s electric bus initiative found that it resulted in millions of dollars in “wasteful spending” due to issues with the vehicles, according to a report from the county’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) released in late July.

In February 2021, Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) in Maryland announced it was replacing 326 diesel school buses with electric buses as part of its sustainability initiative, the county OIG concluded in the report.

Due to delayed deliveries and frequent mechanical issues with the electric buses, the county has had to partially resort back to diesel buses despite the roughly $170 million it paid for the new fleet.

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Undercover footage reported by the Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project from Muckracker.com reveals that 14% of illegal immigrants in a single apartment complex in Georgia admitted to being registered to vote. The video, taken by journalist Carlos Arellano, has over 21 million views as of this writing.

Thank you, Joe Biden.

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President Joe Biden’s administration’s rewrite of Title IX went into effect on Thursday, an effort that seeks to allow men in women’s private spaces, athletics, and educational opportunities.

The White House did not appear to issue a statement or weigh in on the rule going into effect, nor had Vice President Kamala Harris or Biden issue statements or social media posts on the matter.

“Today, the Biden-Harris administration‘s harmful Title IX rewrite goes into effect,” said Riley Gaines, a former collegiate swimmer forced to compete against a man. “This rule says sex = gender identity. 52 years of progress & sex-based protections have been erased with the stroke of a pen.”

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Thank you, Joe Biden.

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God forbid that teachers be held accountable for their performance.

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A school that injected a minor with a COVID-19 vaccine despite the boy’s parents telling school officials they did not want him to receive a COVID-19 vaccine is immune under federal law, the Vermont Supreme Court has ruled.

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Federal regulatory costs tax the average American household more than $15,000 per year under the Biden administration, according to a Competitive Enterprise Institute annual report released Tuesday.

Households pay an average of $15,788 in hidden regulatory costs, according to the annual report, written by Clyde Wayne Crews and titled “Ten Thousand Commandments.” That’s more than what they pay for food, clothing, education, or any other household expense other than housing, consuming 17% of income and representing 22% of household expenses.

Federal regulations’ total compliance costs and economic effects add up to at least $2.117 trillion, rivaling individual income-tax costs estimated at $2.328 trillion. Regulatory costs are nearly four times the corporate income tax of $546 billion.