Daily Tech News 15 December 2024

Top Story

• TSMC has announced performance specs for its upcoming 2nm node. (Tom's Hardware)
  
  Compared with the current leading-edge 3nm process, it uses 24% less power for low-power mobile chips, and 35% less power for desktop chips. Or if you keep power the same, it runs about 15% faster.
  
  Compared to 5nm, it uses around 48% to 55% less power, and compared to 7nm (which I'm running right now), the reduction is as much as 70%.
  
  Chips will be coming off the production line in 2026.
  
  
  

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 04:00 AM | Comments (236) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Saturday Overnight Open Thread (Guest Host Edition)

You are welcome Mr. President!

*****

The Saturday Night Joke - Part I

A husband in his back yard is trying to fly a kite. He throws the kite up in the air, the wind catches it for a few seconds, then it comes crashing back down to earth. He tries this a few more times with no success.

All the while, his wife is watching from the kitchen window, muttering to herself how men need to be told how to do everything.

She opens the window and yells to her husband, "You need a piece of tail."

The man turns with a confused look on his face and says, "Make up your mind. Last night, you told me to go fly a kite." (H/T AZ deplorable moron)

Posted by: Misanthropic Humanitarian at 09:47 PM | Comments (384) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Saturday Evening Movie Thread [moviegique]: December Movie Roundup

Some movie capsules to contemplate.

Next time, I'll do my "best of the year". Spoiler: It's Hundreds of Beavers.

I have no idea why these people are smiling.

Posted by: Open Blogger at 07:30 PM | Comments (149) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Hobby Thread - December 14, 2024 [TRex]

Welcome hobbyists! Pull up a chair and sit a spell with the Horde in this little corner of the interweb. This is the mighty, mighty officially sanctioned Ace of Spades Hobby Thread.

We gave the Ace of Spades Wheel of Hobbies(TM) a spin and it landed on a theme of toys and games for this week. Apparently the Wheel is interested in fun and games.

This theme is a mix of nostalgia, hobbying, silliness, and honoring the 8 year old that still laughs at fart jokes. Warning: the content is going to be a bit more random than usual.

Are you wise in the ways of juggling? Did you play with jacks or jarts? Did you walk the dog with your yo yo? Did you play with action figures from television, movies or comics? Did you have a Red Ryder BB gun? If so, did you avoid shooting your eye out? We have covered Matchbox cars before, but seems rude to leave them out. What about other toys of metal and tin? Did you etch a sketch? Did you play tabletop hockey games with the knobs and spindles? Was silly putty in your world? Lincoln logs and tinker toys? View Master? Fisher Price? Marbles? Catch it cup and ball? Jenga? Pick up sticks?

Posted by: Open Blogger at 05:30 PM | Comments (163) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Ace of Spades Pet Thread, December 14

* * *

Good afternoon and welcome to the almost world famous Ace of Spades Pet Thread. Thanks for stopping by. Kick back and enjoy the world of animals.

Would you like a treat?

Let's relax a little with the animals and leave the world of politics and current events outside today.

Posted by: K.T. at 03:31 PM | Comments (64) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Gardening, Puttering and Adventure Thread, Dec. 14

Great shot of a Clivia from Neal in Israel. Love it. A repeat.

New to me is his Jatropha. It's an "evergreen shrub or small tree with stunning flowers that will bring butterflies and hummingbirds to your garden."

The flowers of this species is rather star-like. Very attractive.

Neal says:

As part of the process of replacing annuals with perennials, I planted a jatropha. It produces cute little flowers, each about the size of a dime, and it has grown a bit. Unfortunately, new leaves start yellowing quite quickly. I try to guarantee enough water, and I fertilized the whole garden during the course of October-November, so I'm hoping the plant will strengthen and overcome the problem.

Hope it regains its health.

There is another species grown in places like Florida that is called 'Coral Plant'. Its flowers look very different.

Is everyone ready for Christmas or Hanukkah? Doing any decorating? We are featuring some decorating here today.

Posted by: K.T. at 01:27 PM | Comments (31) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Happy Bill of Rights Weekend

James Madison was the first person who served as a U.S. Congressman and later became a U.S. President. Madison was the Representative of Virginia from March 4, 1789 until March 4, 1797.

James Madison was elected the fourth President of the United States in 1808, and served until March 4, 1817.

Pictured is a statue of James Madison in James Madison Memorial Hall of the Library of Congress James Madison Memorial Building in Washington D.C.

December 15 is Bill of Rights Day. You would think that the National Archives would really feature this commemoration this year, given the part that free speech has played in the recent presidential election. But I haven't seen any big press releases. Have you? Do you plan to bake a cake? Make a pie?

Maybe you plan to support Freedom of Speech in some manner . . .

Posted by: K.T. at 11:00 AM | Comments (302) | Trackbacks (Suck)

The Classical Saturday Morning Coffee Break & Prayer Revival

Love Grok!! I asked to show me a Viking before and after coffee � � � � and yeah good morning ⚒️

(Coffee Meme - H/T Biden’s Dog)

Posted by: Misanthropic Humanitarian at 08:25 AM | Comments (362) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Daily Tech News 14 December 2024

Top Story

• You can't sue your way to AGI, says OpenAI in response to Elon Musk's lawsuit over the non-profit organisation being taken over by snake-oil salesmen. (The Verge)

  Believe us, we've tried.

  AGI stands for Artificial General Intelligence, a term invented by the snake oil salesmen when everyone figured out there was no snake in the snake oil.
  
  OpenAI now says AGI will arrive as soon as next year, as a result of a convenient redefinition of AGI to mean "whatever we manage to ship next year".
  
  
  
• An OpenAI whistleblower has been found dead in his San Francisco apartment. (Tech Crunch)
  
  Suchir Balaji called attention to what he believed was OpenAI's intentional breaches of copyright law in training ChatGPT.
  

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 04:00 AM | Comments (217) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Each Another's Audience Outside The ONT

Hi everyone, welcome to Friday! We're right in the middle of holiday season, what's your favorite holiday?

Posted by: WeirdDave at 10:00 PM | Comments (457) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Poseidon's Wrath Cafe

Supposedly this is a real picture taken on Lake Erie:

explainingtheuniverse

Of the roughly 10,000 photographs Ingersoll, Ont., resident Cody Evans took of Lake Erie in 2022 during the lake-effect storm, one looked just like Poseidon himself!

He said he often heads down to Lake Erie -- in Port Stanley just south of London, Ont. -- whenever he sees there will be high winds, which is what the forecast was calling for at the time.

Evans set up to shoot for a couple of hours that day -- "It was pretty cold...I think it was -11 C or something" -- and he couldn't take photographs immediately due to the snow.

"I watched the water, and when I see waves are gonna collide, I'll just take a burst of photos," Evans said, adding his Nikon Z 9 camera can take 20 photos per second.

Some Instagram videos:

POV drone footage of a rock being skipped along a river.

If this truck's a rockin', don't come a-knockin'. Because a big brown bear somehow locked himself inside the cab.

Bike riders scare the bear.

The wolves came free with the rental.

Building little rat cars so that lab rats can have a more "stimulatory" environment.

Whale songs.

The traditional bumper-car drifting marriage ceremony.

On to the non-IG stuff:

Castaway.

Friday frolic.

Sometimes you just want to hop and skip with your bull.

Another bull who's eager to please. No, I don't mean David French's associate.

I wish I could find a cat who does this but they all seem to hate having their bellies touched.

Golden retrievers are loyal and loving and also dumb.

My ding-a-ling...

Lambada bear.

Posted by: Ace at 07:27 PM | Comments (430) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Nancy Pelosi Suffers Serious Injuries -- a Fractured Hip -- After Falling Down a Staircase in Luxembourg

Any hip injury at age 84 is a major cause for concern.

NYT:

Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi was hospitalized on Friday after being injured while traveling abroad on a bipartisan congressional delegation to Luxembourg, a spokesman said on Friday.

Ms. Pelosi, 84, "sustained an injury during an official engagement," the spokesman, Ian Krager, said in a brief statement that provided no details on the nature of the injury or how it occurred. He said she was admitted to a hospital for evaluation.

Ms. Pelosi tripped going down marble stairs at the Grand Ducal Palace and took a hard fall, according to a person familiar with the incident who was not authorized to comment and spoke on condition of anonymity.

People close to Ms. Pelosi in California and Washington, D.C., speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak for her, said the former speaker fractured her hip when she fell. They said doctors were confident the damage could be repaired with a routine operation, but it was not yet clear whether that would be done in Luxembourg or in the United States.

After Mitch McConnell's recent fall, and Joe Biden's Lived Experience as a Vegetable-American, the demand to implement term limits via a constitutional amendment is going to pick up steam and might actually pass.

You can't pass a law imposing term limits, because the Supreme Court has ruled that the "qualifications" for federal office in the Constitution are complete and can only be modified by amendment. As there are no term limits written into the Constitution, it requires an amendment to impose them.

But the amendment process isn't such an impossible barrier to action when the public wants change. Every month we're seeing problems with the gerontocracy.

I'm not a big proponent of term limits but it just might be we'll finally see them.

Posted by: Ace at 06:28 PM | Comments (374) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Former CIA Director Counter-Terrorism: Tulsi Gabbard is Well-Qualified to be Director of National Intelligence and Rein in the Incompetent and Malign "Intelligence" Community

This is a big endorsement for Gabbard. Bernie Hudson is as qualified a judge as anyone, and he's writing in National Review, to let other institutions-aligned people know that Gabbard is worthy.

The United States has increasingly become a low-trust society, where diminished confidence in the effectiveness and integrity of our institutions is widespread and bipartisan. This now extends to the American national security and intelligence sectors, where that loss of trust is problematic for a country with enduring global responsibilities and interests.

For a vocal portion of the elite national security establishment, however, the remedy for that skepticism is not to entertain that its critics may have a point, but to demand reflexive obedience to an outdated consensus that may no longer be fit for purpose.

This erosion of institutional trust has been fueled, in part, by some of the spectacularly wrong calls the U.S. intelligence community has made over recent years. Its assessment that there was an active weapons of mass destruction program in Saddam Hussein's Iraq set in motion two decades of regional instability. Its prediction that the removal of Libya's Qaddafi would improve regional stability resulted in years of civil war in that country and a torrent of refugees to Europe. Its assessment that the Afghan government could sustain itself once American bayonets departed fell apart when that government collapsed within a long weekend.

These failures have had real, lasting effects on the security and credibility of the United States, as it seems to have effectively pioneered militarism without victory. Compounding this is a sense by many Americans that the security services are immune from consequences when systemic failures occur.

There has also been an unwelcome trend where some of the residual prestige and expertise the security services possess has been repurposed to disparage domestic political figures. These included, but were not limited to, public accusations that a sitting U.S. president was the agent of a hostile, foreign power. This flimsy accusation occupied the nation's attention for years before ending with a whimper. Still, a substantial, partisan remnant of millions of believers in this baseless accusation remains.

These events convinced just as many others on the opposite side of the partisan divide that the same intelligence community that protected the country in the years after 9/11 had perhaps begun to apply to the American people the tactics it had learned against our enemies overseas.

Given all this, restoring the American people's broad faith in the intelligence community is an urgent task. They need to believe that those entrusted with the vast powers of the national security apparatus will perform their duties in a nonpartisan way that prioritizes constitutional rights, meaningful accountability, and democratic safeguards.

Changing these trends will be hard, and that effort must begin at the top. It is vital the director of national intelligence (DNI), who leads the intelligence community, be someone with high integrity, sound judgment, and a clear understanding of the commander in chief's intentions. It would also go a long way toward reestablishing credibility with Americans if the next director were someone with a significant, bipartisan background.

Tulsi Gabbard fits these criteria. She has the right experience, temperament, and professional integrity to restore faith in America's intelligence community.

While Tulsi Gabbard is accused of being a Syrian spy, we're seeing Cultural Enrichment levels not seen since the Visigoths sacked Rome.

I know that American citizens are allowed to own guns, but... are these even citizens?

When police searched the home of two Students for Justice in Palestine leaders, a pair of sisters at George Mason University, their allies painted a sympathetic picture.

The students were targeted, according to the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), for engaging in "anti-genocide events on campus." The Intercept reported that police found "antique firearms" registered to the students' brother and brought gun-related charges as a result of his family's "pro-Palestine activism."

Excluded from those descriptions was the crime the sisters are suspected of committing. A group of student radicals defaced George Mason's student center in August, spray painting messages that warned of a "student intifada." In its coverage of the incident, the Washington Post wrote that "activists spray-painted words on Wilkins Plaza outside the university's Johnson Center."

Those activists caused thousands of dollars in damage, a felony in the state of Virginia, and police suspect the SJP leaders, sisters Jena and Noor Chanaa, led the group of vandals. Weeks after the incident, in November, a county judge granted a warrant--which is under seal until February, according to a Fairfax County court representative--allowing police to seize electronics from the Chanaa family home.

When officers entered the Chanaa family home, they found firearms--modern weapons, not antiques--as well as scores of ammunition and foreign passports, all of which sat in plain view, according to court documents obtained by the Free Beacon and sources familiar with the investigation.

They also found pro-terror materials, including Hamas and Hezbollah flags and signs that read "death to America" and "death to Jews," according to court documents and sources familiar.

Police seized the weapons under Virginia's red flag law, arguing that Mohammad Chanaa, the students' brother and a George Mason alumnus, was "linked to destruction of property in connection with a large group of people with like-minded rhetoric" and posed a danger to others given his possession of "terroristic" materials.

...

CAIR has denounced the "draconian measures used by law enforcement authorities" to "silence or intimidate those who seek to end the Israeli genocide in Gaza." A faculty group at George Mason, meanwhile, released a statement expressing "deep concern about the apparent targeting of two George Mason students for their advocacy for Palestinian human rights."

...

George Mason did not respond to a request for comment. The FBI declined to comment. A spokeswoman for the Fairfax County commonwealth attorney's office, Laura Birnbaum, confirmed that officers found guns, ammunition, and pro-terror materials during their search and declined to comment further.

The Chanaa family attorney, Abdel-Rahman Hamed, did not respond to a request for comment. In a statement provided to the Washington Post, Hamed said the case marks "yet another example of the police state targeting American Muslims without cause." An "about" section on his LinkedIn page states, "I deny, defy, and defeat Zionists, antisemites, and White Supremacists."

Posted by: Ace at 05:30 PM | Comments (225) | Trackbacks (Suck)

New York Times: Is the "Awkward" Era of the "Diversity Blockbuster" Behind Us?

If even the Marxist New York Times is contemplating the end of DEI even in Hollywood, then the era of DEI must really be coming to an end.

Is the Awkward 'Diversity Era' of Hollywood Behind Us?

The past decade's clumsiest attempts to cram new faces into old stories now feel like a moment, and a genre, of their own.

Hollywood has its eras, often apparent only in retrospect. Think back several years: Do you remember packed theaters giving Black-power salutes at screenings of "Black Panther"? Do you remember when an all-female version of "Ghostbusters" was treated as a pioneering development? Do you remember when the writer of a "Star Wars" film described the Empire as a "white supremacist (human) organization" after Donald Trump's 2016 election? Has enough time now passed to say that was all a bit strange?

Looking back, you can see a period when identitarian politics were in cultural ascendancy; you can spot the moments when our media overlords -- on their back feet over rage at the crimes of Harvey Weinstein, the paucity of nonwhite nominees at the Oscars, the aftermath of George Floyd's death -- vowed to change their ways and atone for their past. But what was particular to the Hollywood of the 2010s was the way these politics fused with the industry's insatiable demand for sequels, spinoffs and reboots, giving us a curious and mercenary new invention: the inclusive multimillion-dollar blockbuster. (The BIPOCbuster, if you will.) It's the same old thing, but with a bold and visionary new twist: fewer white guys.

...

The tropes of this passing era are as familiar and easily spotted as with older periods. There is, for one thing, the showy, self-satisfied gender-swapping, as with that 2016 election-year reboot of "Ghostbusters." That movie prompted enough openly misogynistic and racist backlash to make it look as if it must be a noble endeavor -- as if any Hollywood executives who got reactionaries frothing at the mouth must be accomplishing something important, even if all they did was tweak the balance of characters in a dusty franchise.

Then there are the paper-thin "diverse" characters parachuted into major films -- put front and center on every poster but given curiously little to do as the plot unfolds. Brie Larson's Captain Marvel was set up as the most powerful superhero in the Marvel universe but ended up playing no decisive role in its most important films. (She was later joined by a Black woman and a Muslim woman in the sequel "The Marvels," another in a series of firsts, but still a throwaway film.) Many attempts to diversify old intellectual property only emphasized how awkward and unwelcoming those worlds were to the kinds of people they wanted to include: The characters could do nothing to change the old logic of the stories they were dropped into.

I've wanted to discuss Dragon Age: The Veilguard for a while, but the election kept getting in the way. It's a good example of the Wages of DEI.

Dragon Age is -- or rather, was -- a long-running, much-liked, and highly profitable video game franchise. The newest release, The Veilguard, was anticipated to be a huge guaranteed hit.

Then... Wokeness Intensified.

The game showed off its new "inclusiveness" features. In the game, you could make your character trans. Transgender in a psuedo-Medieval fantasy game.

Not only could you make your character trans, but you could give her double masectomy scars as proof of her gender transition:

Posted by: Ace at 04:30 PM | Comments (266) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Merrick Garland's Corrupt DOJ Makes Up New "Rule:" When January 6th Political Prisoners Accept Their Pardons from President Trump, That Counts as a Legal Admission of Being Insurrectionists

Via Twitchy, hilariously biased low-IQ propaganda webzine Politico reports that Merrick Garland's corrupt DOJ has announced that anyone accepting a pardon will be making a "confession of guilt."

That... has literally never been a rule. Ever.

The Justice Department sent a message Wednesday to Jan. 6 defendants: Accepting a pardon from Donald Trump is "a confession of guilt" for your crimes.

"[A] pardon at some unspecified date in the future ... would not unring the bell of conviction," federal prosecutors argued in a Jan. 6 case before U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols. "In fact, quite the opposite. The defendant would first have to accept the pardon, which necessitates a confession of guilt."

The pronouncement is the latest attempt by the Justice Department to salvage the legacy of its Jan. 6 investigation, which leaders say is the most sweeping criminal probe in American history.

Julie Kelly reports that the criminal organization "the DOJ" is ramping up its prosecutions to get the maximum number of people imprisoned before Trump pardons them.

Even as President-elect Donald Trump promised on Sunday to act "very quickly" on pardons for many of the protesters involved in the events of January 6, the Biden administration's Justice Department is continuing to arrest and try people for actions that occurred almost four years ago while opposing motions to delay trials because of the need for "the prompt and efficient administration of justice."

If the defeat of Kamala Harris constituted at least a partial repudiation of the lawfare against Trump and his supporters, the message appears to be lost on top brass at the DOJ. Prosecutors are pushing ahead with what they consider the department's crowning achievement: the so-called "Capitol Siege" investigation into the events of Jan. 6, 2021.

In what Attorney General Merrick Garland describes as the biggest criminal investigation in Department of Justice history, more than 1,560 people have been charged for federal crimes never before used against political protesters, including under a post-Enron obstruction statute overturned by the Supreme Court in June. At least 1,000 of these defendants have been convicted -- either at trial or by accepting plea offers -- with some 650 defendants ordered to serve time in a federal prison. Sentences range from a few days in jail to up to 22 years as the DOJ seeks "terror enhancements" to tack on additional time.

Activity in the J6 investigation accelerated the month before the election. At least 16 individuals were arrested; home security camera footage obtained by RCI shows the heavily-armed pre-dawn FBI raid of a subject in California on October 17.

Shortly after the election, DOJ officials instructed attorneys working on J6 cases to carry on regardless of the pending change in leadership. "[Federal] prosecutors in the Justice Department's Capitol Siege Section received guidance this week about how to proceed in pending Jan. 6 cases ... including a directive to oppose any Jan. 6 defendant's requests for delays," Ryan J. Reilly of NBC News reported on Nov. 9. "Prosecutors are instructed to argue that there is a societal interest in the quick administration of justice and these cases should be handled in the normal order."

At the same time, the Biden Justice Department is continuing to apprehend protesters. On Dec. 4, for example, the DOJ announced the arrest of a 44-year-old Alabama man, Robert James Bonham, charging him with a range of crimes, including "assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers and obstruction of law enforcement during a civil disorder."

If Trump shuts down the department's "Capitol Siege" section, as he is expected to do, Bonham will never go to trial. But this does not appear to concern Matthew Graves, U. S. Attorney for the District of Columbia. Appointed by President Biden in November 2021, Graves has presided over the sprawling J6 investigation and now continues to advance related cases.

His office has opposed the J6 defendants' requests to halt proceedings until after Trump is sworn in next month. Judges began receiving a slew of defense motions starting the day after the election asking to postpone trials and hearings, but Graves said there is "public interest in the prompt and efficient administration of justice" as a reason to continue business as usual.

Read the whole thing.

January 6th Victim and former Trump aide Michael Caputo wrote a searing column about what it's like to be the target of Merrick Garland's brand of political "justice."

He calls victims of political prosecutions like himself "Russiagate Remnants" -- the broken pottery and shattered glass left behind after the left's mob "justice."

Make no mistake, when we all chose politics as a profession, we knew it was bloodsport. But none of us expected the personal toll that impacted not just careers, but health and families -- especially our children.

There are many families like my own, destroyed completely by the Democrats' illegal zeal to Get Trump at any cost. During Russiagate and the subsequent hoaxes, I screamed at the top of my lungs on television several times each week as my wife and daughters lived in fear in our Buffalo-area home.

Most Remnants stayed silent. They were the smart ones.

Those subjects of the bogus Russian collusion investigations are quietly reassembling their lives today. Just six or seven years ago, some pulled their children from school, bullied by students and teachers alike. Both parents in at least one family were fired, and with no money for tuition their son was forced to drop out of the college he worked tirelessly to attend. I don't think he ever returned.

These Remnant stories are commonplace. Many families lost their homes; most lost their life savings. I know of older targets living on meager pensions now that their bank accounts were drained by lawfare legal fees. Those still working are earning less than half the income of their peers.

One family left the country, disheartened by what America had become. Another man, once an international business success, was wrongly debased and finally diminished to serve in a bureaucracy.

Then there is the death and near deaths, the suicide attempts readers will never know, the illnesses brought on by stress. When I fell with head and neck cancer, another Remnant struck by the disease called me twice a week to share our battles. After several months, his calls stopped.

My colleague had finally succumbed to the Crossfire Hurricane plague, unfathomable stress that drives cancer. Readers don't even know his name; his wife and two young children know he was a hero.

He did nothing wrong. He was a Remnant.

The mentally ill, weaponized by brazen Democrat lies, harassed nearly all of us. My frequent media appearances made me more recognizable than the smarter, quieter Remnants. That made my family a target of a local retired mailman who was arrested and prosecuted for harassment.

My youngest daughters, just five and seven years old at the time, were often harassed while playing in our front yard. A local elderly woman, an otherwise benign community museum volunteer, posted dozens of times on social media during her daily walks by our house, including photos showing our address. She screamed at my girls and mocked their safety.

The bitter old lady died recently and the nutty mailman is still creeping around. Our family prays for their souls because, like all the Remnants, we know the banality of evil. Unhinged activists, some neighbors, forced us to leave our beloved hometown forever. We miss it every day -- especially after a big, beautiful Buffalo snowfall.

It's worse for some, like Paul Manafort, Carter Page, and the inimitable Roger Stone. Last year Roger and I had a late lunch a few miles from his home. Out of nowhere, an Antifa activist showed up to threaten him in the empty restaurant. Clearly, these pongos are still tracking Roger closely. He did nothing wrong, yet I still fear for his safety.

I have talked to many of the Remnants since Election Day. Some have high hopes; these patriots still believe in our justice system. Others expect nothing at all after seeing enough corruption to believe justice is dead. Most are somewhere in between.

He says many of the Remnants soon became victims of cancer, which he also says is the fault of the DOJ and Democrats, as high levels of sustained stress can trigger cancer.

He wants these people prosecuted.

I do too.

Posted by: Ace at 03:30 PM | Comments (341) | Trackbacks (Suck)

"That's How Real Journalism Works:" Leaked Emails Show How ProPublica Tried to Manufacture a Smear Against Pete Hegseth

ProPublica -- which my friend Kyle Sheidler noted was not a journalistic operation at all, but a well-funded anti-conservative private intelligence service -- claimed that it had merely followed up on a hot tip, then abandoned a story when that hot tip turned out to be false.

That "tip" was part of the left's Full Kavanaugh smear operation against Pete Hegseth. ProPublica had written a completely false story, based on a claim from a surely hard-left West Point administrator, that Hegseth had "never applied" to West Point, but somehow just got added to the school by some Cigarette-Smoking Man conspiracy or something.

When Hegseth pre-butted the story by posting his acceptance letter from West Point, the editor who was ready to publish this complete fabrication said it was all good because he didn't wind up publishing his defamatory lies.

"That's how real journalism works," the editor at ProPublica claimed.

Is this how journalism works?

Really?

Full story from Reese Reagan at the Daily Caller:

Justin Elliott, a reporter for ProPublica, reached out to Hegseth's lawyer, Timothy Parlatore, on Tuesday about the story. Elliot told Parlatore he had an "urgent request" for comment and gave him just one hour to respond, an email obtained by the Caller shows.

"I'm reaching out with an urgent request for comment for your client Pete Hegseth. We're moving quickly so please let me know if you or he would like to comment as soon as possible. Our deadline is in one hour," the email reads.

Elliott explains that a West Point spokesperson told ProPublica Hegseth never even applied to the school. He then asserts, seemingly based on West Point's statement at face value, that Hegseth was lying.

"Why did Mr. Hegseth say he got in to West Point when that is not true?" Elliott wrote. "How can Mr. Hegseth be Secretary of Defense given that he has made false statements about getting in to the military's most prestigious academy?" he continued. "Is there anything else we should know?"

Elliot's assertion that Hegseth lied appears to have been based on a single email and phone call with West Point spokespeople. Eisenger tweeted that one West Point spokesman told them over email that Hegseth hadn't even applied to the school, citing the Admissions Office. ProPublica then called West Point and a second spokesperson confirmed the falsehood, saying "Absolutely. 100%."

The Daily Caller reached out to ProPublica to ask them a series of questions, including whether or not they would require more evidence than just two statements to accuse a cabinet secretary nominee of lying, and if they did any additional work to verify the story before accusing Hegseth of lying.

The Caller reached out to ProPublica nearly 6 hours before publication.

"Reporters do their job by asking tough questions to people in power, which is exactly what happened here. Responsible news organizations only publish what they can verify, which is why we didn't publish a story once Mr. Hegseth provided documentation that corrected the statements from West Point," a ProPublica spokesperson told the Caller.

The Caller followed up to ask if ProPublica did any additional work to verify their story beyond taking two Army public information officers at face value. The spokesperson said the first statement "speaks for itself" and they have no further comment.

The Caller also reached out to Elliot directly, but the email bounced back stating he was "out of office."

Posted by: Ace at 02:25 PM | Comments (328) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Biden's Selling Off All the Materials Trump Bought for Building a Border Wall, to Prevent Trump From Building It

And he's selling tons of steel and concrete for pennies on the dollar. This will force Trump to re-buy all the material he already bought.

The Biden administration is using its final weeks to haul a massive amount of border wall materials away from the southern border to be sold off in a government auction, an apparent effort to hinder President-elect Donald Trump's effort to secure the border, The Daily Wire has learned.

Videos obtained exclusively by The Daily Wire from a U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agent show unused sections of the wall being hauled away on the back of flatbed trucks from a section of the border just south of Tucson, a hotspot for illegal crossings during the Biden administration. The agent estimates that up to half a mile per day of unused border wall is being moved.

"They are taking it from three stations: Nogales, Tucson, and Three Points," the border patrol agent, who was granted anonymity to speak freely, told The Daily Wire. "The goal is to move all of it off the border before Christmas."

Trump made clear during his campaign that he intends to finish construction of the border wall, making use of the materials that have remained untouched at the border since President Joe Biden took office in 2021. If the material brought to the border during his first term is sold off, it will significantly delay any progress on one of Trump's flagship campaign promises at the border.

The government contractor, DP Trucking LLC, is transporting the pieces of the wall north on Interstate 19 to Pinal Airpark in Marana, Arizona, where it is being auctioned through GovPlanet, a surplus government equipment auction marketplace.

"They just started taking all the wall that was not used, which is still totally good and usable, and they started taking it northbound," the agent said. "They're pulling it all off the border."

Harold Lambeth, the owner of the trucking company, confirmed to The Daily Wire in a phone call that his company is transporting the unused border wall sections north away from the construction sites. He said he is unable to disclose further information about the work.

Video of the GovPlanet auction site where the material is being taken shows seemingly endless piles of unused border wall material. Another video, taken from one of the construction sites on the border, shows DP Trucking LLC trucks passing through with the same style of unused border wall stacked up the back of their flatbeds.

The auction website shows that sales occurred as recently as December 4 for precisely the types of materials being pulled off the border. GovPlanet has online auctions set for Dec. 11 and Dec. 18 for more of the border wall material, which is listed on the company's website as "32.91' X 7.91' Steel Bollard Wall Sections w/Grout."

The bidding for each section of wall panels is set to begin at only $5.00, according to the website.

Posted by: Ace at 01:20 PM | Comments (434) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Duke Rape Hoaxer Crystal Mangum Admits, After 18 Years, She Made Up a Lie for "Validation"

In 2006, a stripper named Crystal Mangum made up a completely-false rape accusation about Duke Lacrosse players.

The leftwing media showed, get this, no skepticism whatsoever for her story and campaigned to have these completely-innocent boys imprisoned.

They still haven't faced accountability.

Only now does she admit she made it all up for "validation."

Crystal Mangum, the woman who falsely accused three Duke men's lacrosse players of rape in 2006, admitted she lied about the allegations and asked for David Evans, Collin Finnerty and Reade Seligmann's forgiveness.

Mangum made her confession in an interview published Wednesday on "Let's Talk with Kat," hosted by Katerena DePasquale, at the North Carolina Correctional Institution for Women. Unrelated to the lacrosse case, Mangum is currently in prison after being convicted of second-degree murder of her then-boyfriend in 2013.

"I testified falsely against them by saying that they raped me when they didn't, and that was wrong, and I betrayed the trust of a lot of other people who believed in me," Mangum said in the interview. "[I] made up a story that wasn't true because I wanted validation from people and not from God."

Then-N.C. Attorney General Roy Cooper did not prosecute Mangum for perjury after the case was dismissed, saying at the time that the investigators thought "she may have actually believed the many different stories that she has been telling." The statute of limitations on perjury charges typically lasts two years in North Carolina law, meaning that Mangum can no longer be prosecuted for lying under oath.

Duke Athletics declined The Chronicle's request for comment on Mangum's statement. University administration, former University President Richard Brodhead, then-head men's lacrosse coach Mike Pressler and Seligmann did not respond to The Chronicle's request for comment in time for publication.

Mangum's statement comes nearly two decades after she asserted that she was raped by the lacrosse players. Until now, she had never publicly stated that it was not true.

In her 2008 book "Last Dance for Grace: The Crystal Mangum Story," Mangum wrote, "I will never say that nothing at all happened that night," after which she provided graphic details of the alleged incident. However, she has told inconsistent accounts of the night throughout the past 18 years.

If you're too young to have watched this story unfold in real time, it's hard to explain how absolutely derangement of the left. You see it now, but this was one of the earliest Masks Off moments where they showed they just wanted to imprison Straight White Boys and it didn't matter to them if they were guilty or not. They wanted Equity in Imprisonment, and if that means that some innocent white boys have go to prison for 20 years to make the numbers look good, so much the better.

It quickly became obvious that this was a complete fabrication, but the left -- by which I mean the media -- bitterly clinged to their religion. Which is a nasty form of racist Marxism.

Posted by: Ace at 12:08 PM | Comments (406) | Trackbacks (Suck)

THE MORNING RANT: Why I’ll Support an Ethically Flawed Politician Who Advances My Agenda

A few days ago in a post about Texas politics, I mentioned that I hoped Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton would challenge John Cornyn in the 2026 primary for the U.S. Senate seat he currently holds. Cornyn is a “Republican” whose actual constituency appears to be the federal bureaucracy rather than the Texas voters whom he takes such pleasure in betraying.

I received via email a very polite and respectful objection from “J.R. in Texas” who feels that Ken Paxton’s ethical history is a bridge too far for him. Without making this post all about the specifics of Mr. Paxton’s ethics, I’ll note that he did at one point accept community service rather than have a securities fraud case go to trial. Paxton is also alleged to have been unfaithful in his marriage. This is what J.R. wrote:

Buck, I almost always agree with you, and look forward to reading your insightful commentaries. However, based on the evidence adduced at the Paxton impeachment trial and discussions with one of the whistleblowers who exposed him, I strongly believe that Paxton is corrupt and unfit for office. And for the record, I have NEVER voted for a Democrat, and strongly support Trump and the ouster of RINOs like Phelan and Cornyn. I want my House rep, Beth Van Duyne, to enter the primary against Cornyn. But under no circumstances will I vote for Paxton - I will skip over the Senate race in the general election if he is chosen (as I did the last time that worthless John Cornyn ran).

Thanks. - JR in Texas

J.R.’s gracious disagreement deserved a gracious response about why I am willing to accept a politician such as Paxton representing me, even though he may have engaged in conduct which I do not condone. Having written and sent the response to J.R., I decided that our correspondence is worthy of being today’s post.

Hi JR:

I respect your opinion. I've read about Paxton's ethical and personal peccadillos, and all things being equal, I would certainly prefer to have a culture warrior whose personal conduct is closer to the standards to which I try to hold myself.

It took me a while to accept that it is better (in my opinion) to elect a person of questionable integrity who will fight the battles I want fought, than to only vote for people of high integrity if the person of high integrity will not fight my battle. In fact, I've been betrayed so many times by people with "high integrity" such as Romney, Ryan, McCain, Bush, etc that I'm not sure what the term even means any longer, at least in politics.

If a reputable, teetotaling Republican who has never betrayed his wife wins office and compromises with Democrats on barbarities such as open borders (e.g. human trafficking) or child mutilation, then his level of integrity is lower to me than anything a Paxton could do for personal pleasure or enrichment.

I also realize that in this era where the media aligns with Democrats to destroy the reputation of any conservative who wants to challenge the ruling class, that incentivizes good people to stay out of politics, and leaves only people with an indifference to being smeared to fight our battles. I personally know plenty of ethical, rock-solid conservatives in the private sector who would make excellent political candidates, but they won't go near the water, because they don't want to be smeared, nor have the worst day in their lives made public. Thus we are left with imperfect people like Trump and Paxton to fight our battles.

So, I am grateful therefore to the Paxtons and Trumps, who - although they may be personally flawed - are willing to take the incoming flak and keep fighting the battles that polite Republicans won't fight. There are so few Paxtons who are willing to fight that I wouldn't dare try to replace him with someone else who probably won't fight. I'd rather have a drunk General Grant than a sober General McClellan in an arena where there are an unlimited number of McClellans but very few Grants.

But - I absolutely respect your opinion and appreciate your values. I suspect we are very much alike in the conduct we expect of ourselves and of those with whom we surround ourselves.

Thank you very much for taking the time to write, and for your kind words.

All the best,
Buck

Among the current battles that Attorney General Paxton is fighting, two weeks ago he filed a lawsuit against three of the largest money management firms for their illegal ESG activities, and he got 10 other red state Attorney Generals to join in the lawsuit.

Paxton is also cracking down on doctors and medical facilities that are trying to circumvent Texas’ ban on transing children.

“Texas Has Sued Three Doctors Over Youth Gender-Affirming Care: All three physicians could lose their licenses” [Medpage Today – 11/20/2024]

In less than a month, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has sued three doctors who provide gender-affirming care to minors in an attempt to enforce a state law that bans such care.

The more I think about, maybe I don’t want Ken Paxton running for the Senate. He is doing more for this country in fighting the culture war as state Attorney General than he could ever accomplish in the U.S. Senate.

[buck.throckmorton at protonmail dot com]

Posted by: Buck Throckmorton at 11:00 AM | Comments (312) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Mid-Morning Art Thread

The Old Shepherd's Chief Mourner
Edwin Henry Landseer

[Hat Tip: EW, for reminding me of a fine artist]

And some bonus art for Friday The 13th!

Posted by: CBD at 09:30 AM | Comments (280) | Trackbacks (Suck)