PrairiePundit

 Washington Examiner: Convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell is giving up the fight to protect the identities of eight "John Does" who allegedly preyed upon the girls she groomed, leaving the decision to unmask the men to the court, according to her attorney. The names are part of a 2015 defamation lawsuit brought against Maxwell by Virginia Giuffre , who has long claimed that the British socialite and her cohort, Jeffrey Epstein , sexually abused her as a minor, pimping her out to his high-profile friends, including Prince Andrew. Giuffre claims Maxwell aided in the abuse. ... "Each of the listed Does has counsel who have ably asserted their own privacy rights," Maxwell lawyer Laura Menninger wrote to Judge Loretta Preska on Jan. 12. "Ms. Maxwell therefore leaves it to the Court to conduct the appropriate review." However, just because Maxwell is no longer objecting does not mean all of the names will be made public any time soon. Preska will likely

 Robert Spencer: The family of Malik Faisal Akram, the Islamic jihadi from Britain who took hostages in Congregation Beth Israel synagogue in Colleyville, Texas, Saturday, has “demanded to know how he was allowed into America despite a long criminal record,” says the UK’s  Daily Mail . More than just his family should be asking this question. How was this man able to storm a synagogue in Texas and take people hostage at gunpoint when he shouldn’t have been allowed into the United States in the first place? If anything shows how broken our immigration system is under the regime of Biden’s handlers, it is this entire episode. Malik Faisal Akram’s brother Gulbar asked: “He’s known to police. Got a criminal record. How was he allowed to get a visa and acquire a gun?” Yeah. U.S. immigration law  states  that “any alien convicted of 2 or more offenses (other than purely political offenses), regardless of whether the conviction was in a single trial or whether the offenses arose from a single

  Cassy Garcia receives the endorsement of the National Border Patrol Council today, showing immense confidence in her ability to effect change at the Southern Border. The endorsement is significant for Garcia, as the Council endorsed Henry Cuellar in has last re-election campaign for the same seat. "I am honored to have received the NBPC's endorsement. They trust me to fight for them in Washington, and they know I'll always have their backs, " said Garcia. "Border security, and a strong advocate for the NBPC in Washington, is vital for the District. I've seen too many families suffer as a result of the politicization of the crisis, and I'm not going to sit by and continue to let it happen." Garcia has also received the endorsement of Texas U.S. Senator Ted Cruz. ... This is from a press release sent by the Garcia campaign.  It gives you an idea of how the climate for Democrats on the Border has changed.  Cuellar has the difficult task of explaining

  Yahoo News: The campaign to ban gas stoves is heating up Cooking with gas is far more efficient than cooking on an electric stove.  It is much easier to control the cooking temperature and it takes less energy with gas.  Wind and solar are among the least efficient ways to produce electricity and it takes more coal and gas to push electricity through the powerlines than using gas directly. 

 Red States: Frustrated. Disappointed. Nervous. Those are the three of the main things Joe Biden is making Americans feel right now, according to a new CBS/YouGov poll. Only 26 percent of Americans think things in the country are going well. The poll found that a huge majority of Americans believed he wasn’t sufficiently focused on the economy (58 percent) and inflation (65 percent). Only 38 percent approved of his handling of the economy, while a whopping 62 percent disapproved. It’s even worse when it comes to inflation — 30 percent approval, 70 percent disapproval. He’s about to dip into the twenties on the approval of his handling of inflation. If he thinks their opinion is going to go up if he was able to raise the Build Back Better bill back up from the dead, the answer is no, it wouldn’t. The poll showed that that wouldn’t help him at all: 76 percent said no, their opinion of him wouldn’t improve if he was able to pass the BBB bill. The poll indicated that what they want is a c

  Niall Stanage: Speculation has begun about the 2024 Democratic presidential ticket, almost three years before the election. Some of the suggestions are blasted as risible. But the early chatter itself reveals the nervousness that permeates the party. In the past week alone, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman held out the possibility of anti-Trump Republican Rep. Liz Cheney (Wyo.) being added as President Biden ’s 2024 running mate. A Wall Street Journal column by Douglas Schoen and Andrew Stein posited the possibility of a third Hillary Clinton presidential candidacy. And a thinly source suggestion that Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) might make her own quixotic run lit up social media Friday. All those ideas were met with ridicule from many quarters. But more serious discussions are simmering in Democratic circles, especially if Biden does not seek a second term. Would Vice President Harris be too flawed a candidate? Would a more left-wing figure such as Sen. Elizabeth Warre

  Breitbart: Germany ‘Dramatically Behind’ its Emissions Target After Abandoning ‘Dangerous’ Nuclear Energy Liberal energy policies look like a bigger disaster than "climate change." 

 Breitbart: Mexican federal authorities arrested a group of smugglers who fled from U.S. authorities and drove through a port of entry into Mexico in an attempt to escape. Citizen journalists documented the chase and the conclusion. The chase in Roma, Texas, this week when Texas Department of Public Safety troopers and U.S. Border Patrol agents tried to stop a group of men riding in a red Ford pickup. Instead of stopping, the vehicle sped away leading authorities on a high-speed chase along U.S. Highway 83. ... The smugglers drove towards the international bridge in Roma as they tried to cross the border into Miguel Aleman, Mexico. Authorities in the U.S. were not able to stop the fleeing suspects who crashed their vehicle into a wall on the Mexican side and then attempted to run away. ... Mexican authorities at the port of entry apprehended five individuals. ... There is more, including video of the chase on both sides of the border. I blame Joe Biden for the border lawlessness.  See,

 The Hill: ... By the fourth quarter of last year, more Americans said they identified with the right compared to the left, 47 percent to 42 percent. The shift in the political affiliations of Americans followed a similar pattern as the popularity of Trump and Biden over the course of 2021, Gallup noted. Biden entered office in January with a strong approval rating, which slowly decreased amid a surge of COVID-19 cases driven by the delta and omicron variants, the messy withdrawal from Afghanistan and rising inflation. ... Biben has demonstrated pure decision-making and poorly thought out policies that have made things worse for most Americans.  He makes many want to vote against every Democrat on the ballot. See, also: Joe Biden promised to unify us, and he has. Most voters agree that they don't like him   Opinion: President Joe Biden may be upside down on COVID-19 and the economy, but he's delivered on a promise to unify us. Most agree on the poor job he's doing

  Just the News: Winter storm ices roads, leaves 200,000 on East Coast without power   Not a single part of the East Coast was left untouched by the winter storm. Predictions of the climate warming appear to be overrated. 

 Dee Duncan: President Biden entered office one year ago promising his presidency would be about turning the page on COVID, revitalizing our economy, and getting back to normal. Democrat-controlled Washington, however, has produced one broken promise after the next, and the president’s failed leadership and utter incompetency have only accelerated more chaos across our nation.  The failed tax-and-spend agenda of D.C. Democrats has given us empty shelves, labor shortages, soaring prices and one lackluster federal jobs report after the next. Each week brings another self-inflicted crisis for our economy and caught in the crosshairs are hardworking Americans struggling with the shrinking value of each paycheck and the rising cost of living.  What’s more, Washington liberals’ Green New Deal-inspired policies have significantly decreased domestic oil production, taking America from being energy independent to facing the highest gas prices in nearly a decade. Their weakness has turned our

 Washington Examiner: Hundreds of Honduran and Nicaraguan migrants were prevented from crossing through Guatemala by Guatemalan security forces while traveling as a caravan intended to approach and cross the U.S. southern border. A group of 300 migrants crossed into the Guatemalan province of Izabal on Saturday, where anti-riot agents from the national police and army stopped them. Local officials are attempting to encourage migrants to return to their home countries. "People are being returned, everything in order, humanely," Guatemalan Migration Institute director Carlos Emilio Morales told Voice of America . "We are protecting our borders; we are protecting the health of all Guatemalans." Those who want to remain in Guatemala have been asked to provide identification documents, vaccination cards, and a negative coronavirus test. The caravan left Honduras days before liberal politician Xiomara Castro was sworn in on Jan. 27, reported Reuters . The migrants be

 PJ Media: A  recent study from South Africa (currently in preprint)  attempts to explain why the omicron wave of the COVID-19 pandemic caused less severe illness and death than prior waves of other variants. To complete the study, researchers compared the outcomes of 5,144 patients from the fourth wave, where omicron was prevalent, to the outcomes of 11,609 patients from prior waves. They looked at deaths, severe hospitalizations, and all hospitalizations in the 14 days after diagnosis for people aged 20 and older. The study controlled for vaccination, prior infection, comorbidities, age, and sex. The team concluded: In the Omicron-driven wave, severe COVID-19 outcomes were reduced mostly due to protection conferred by prior infection and/or vaccination, but intrinsically reduced virulence may account for an approximately 25% reduced risk of severe hospitalization or death compared to Delta. Their assessment is hopeful for several reasons. First, the risk from COVID has always been ag

 Epoch Times: Alarming even insurance companies, something has driven the death rate up 40 percent among working Americans within a one-year period, and it’s not COVID-19. As we’ve seen over the past two years, data and statistics can be manipulated and skewed in a wide variety of ways. One of the most reliable data points we have is all-cause mortality. It’s very hard to massage that statistic, as people are either dead or they’re not. Their inclusion in the national death index database is based on one primary criteria—they’ve died—regardless of the cause. From there, their cause of death, as identified on their death certificate, is added in to more granular statistics, such as the number of people who died from cancer and heart disease in any given year, for example. But while the cause of any given death can be manipulated and altered, the fact that there was a death is more certain. What’s more, death rates tend to be very stable. “We are seeing, right now, the highest death rate

 Jamie McIntyre: In 1994, the US succeeded in convincing Ukraine to give up its nukes but failed to secure its future ...   In return for becoming a nonnuclear weapons state as a signatory of the Nonproliferation Treaty, Ukraine would get financial compensation, economic assistance, and essential   security assurances   from the U.S., United Kingdom, and Russia recognizing Ukraine’s “independence and sovereignty” and specifying its existing borders could be changed “only peacefully by mutual agreement.” Those assurances would prove worthless two decades later when Putin’s Russia illegally annexed Crimea and, through proxies, took control of the Donbas area of eastern Ukraine. When the Soviet Union broke up in 1991, Ukraine inherited nearly 2,000 nuclear weapons, including 176 ICBMs and some of the Soviet’s most modern bombers armed with long-range nuclear-tipped cruise missiles. Had Ukraine retained the Soviet arsenal, it would have been the third most powerful nuclear nation on Earth

 Jeff Dunetz: One of the most sacred rights and responsibilities of American citizenship is voting. We are supposedly guaranteed that every person’s vote is worth as much as every other person’s. That guarantee has never been perfect. Blacks weren’t allowed to vote until the 15th amendment in 1870, and women until 1920’s 19th Amendment, but the tradition of the United States has been to aspire toward honest elections. The Democrats are trying to move responsibility for elections from state to federal governments and remove state laws protecting against voter fraud. President Biden and the Democrats are pushing a bill that bans voter ID and other protections against illegal voting. According to the President, anyone who doesn’t support his “voting rights” bill is a racist. I submit to you that the President’s bill itself is racist. The Democrats are pushing to reduce the value of every legal vote, including those of African Americans. The bill destroys a fundamental principle of our dem

 Epoch Times: On Jan. 9, an ill wind blew into the Fragrant Harbor. Peng Jingtang, a blood-thirsty paramilitary chief from Xinjiang , was appointed by China ’s dictator Xi Jinping to lead Chinese troops in Hong Kong. For years, Peng led the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) crackdown in Xinjiang—where there is an ongoing genocide. From 2018, Major General Peng was chief of staff of the People’s Armed Police (PAP) in the region. He was also the overall deputy chief of staff of the PAP. The PAP is primarily charged with countering riots and protests. But Peng led “counterterrorism” efforts in Xinjiang, where there is little terrorism other than that imposed by the CCP itself. In Xinjiang, the CCP uses the excuse of Uyghur terrorism to enforce its Han bigotry on the territory through a network of concentration camps, “reeducation” centers, and factories in which forced laborers are subjected to slave-like conditions, including torture, rape, mass surveillance, forced abortion, and state-

 Washington Examiner: ... The FBI confirmed on Sunday that the hostage-taker was 44-year-old Malik Faisal Akram, a British citizen. Faisal, who investigators said was "singularly focused on one issue" that was "not specifically related to the Jewish community," was reported dead during a Saturday night press conference, and all the hostages were released. ... The FBI statement about the intent of the hostage-taker does not sound credible.  He deliberately selected a synagogue knowing that he was taking Jews hostage for his nefarious purposes. If it was not specifically related to the Jewish community, why didn't he take Muslims as hostages? See, also: INSPECTOR CLOUSEAU STANDING BY

  Washington Examiner: Twitter suspends account of Iranian leader who posted animation of Trump assassination The Iranian religious bigot has other accounts he may try to use to get his murderous desires out.  He is angry with Trump for responding to threats against Americans in Iraq by Soleimani who was engaged in directing attacks against Americans in the US embassy.

 PJ Media: It’s official: Democrats are the biggest drama queens on earth. In 2022, Democrats will be faced with a very difficult problem. They have no issues and no accomplishments on which they can run successfully. By next November, the economy will be a political dry hole for Democrats as it’s very unlikely that inflation will ease, and chances are getting better for the double-whammy of inflation and a slowing economy. Domestically, their agenda is stalled and doesn’t appear to have much chance of getting through the Senate. All the goodies they want to give away — very popular because voters believe the goodies are “free” — are in danger of being permanently shelved unless Democrats can pull a rabbit out of the hat and hang on to the House and Senate. How can they manage that? Democrats will go to the well-worn playbook used by Hitler, Stalin, and other authoritarians and dictators in an attempt to stampede the electorate into voting their way. They must create a crisis. And not

  Breitbart: Large Migrant Group Wearing Camo Arrested in Remote West Texas Border Sector I suspect these people are associated with the Mexican cartels and could be drug mules or some other affiliates of the cartel.  They could also be potential terrorists taking advantage of Biden's absurd border policies.  See, also: Armed Human Smugglers Arrested in Texas After Crash on Railroad Track near Border

 Dailywire: The National School Boards Association (NSBA) continues to struggle following its controversial letter to the Biden administration urging the Department of Justice to target parents who speak out at school board meetings. According to The Washington Post, the organization is “ at risk of total collapse ” following the ongoing controversy. “Nineteen mostly GOP-led states have withdrawn from the association or promised to when this year’s membership expires, and six members of what was a 19-person board have left. Several states are discussing forming an alternative association for school boards. A new executive director of the National School Boards Association (NSBA) is working to save the organization, lobbying individual states to reconsider, but so far he has not persuaded any of them to change their minds,” the outlet reported. John Heim, the new executive director, told the Post that he hopes “they’ll give us a chance” and that his goal is to “rebuild trust” in the org

 Karen Townsend: Texas Dems work around election integrity law as they mail out "hundreds of thousands" of mail-in ballots The only people eligible for mail-in voting are generally those over 65.   I am well past that age but have never felt the need to mail in my vote.  I generally vote early at the courthouse.  I like filling out the ballot and running it through the computer, knowing it will not be subject to the vagueries of the postal system.

 Robyn Dolgin: During the 2020 campaign, Joe Biden launched a blistering attack on (then) President Trump alleging that he was responsible for more than "200,000" deaths in the first wave of the COVID epidemic, never thinking that number would be dwarfed on his watch. Those people were dead, Biden alleged, because the president failed to perceive the danger of the virus.  He didn't "take it seriously."  In a well-rehearsed line, Biden looked into the camera in a presidential debate and asked the viewers: "How many of you got up this morning and had an empty chair at the table because someone died of COVID-19?" He's no longer asking such pointed questions.  None of these searing indictments has come back to haunt Biden in the mainstream media, but he may soon find himself confronting a blizzard of criticism as the nation heads into the 2022 election.  Voting cycles are an excellent time for political pundits to capitalize on the winds of change — es

 Wolf Howling: ... The progressive left is  going all out  to paint conservatives as “domestic terrorists” and to claim that the January 6 riot—a riot of a few hours by people with no weapons and carried out virtually without violence (and that may have been part of an  FBI entrapment scheme )—is tantamount to our Civil War of 1861-1865. This is so far beyond ludicrous it is stunning. Yet progressives fully embrace this tactic as their only hope to stop a popular vote that promises to be a wave election in 2022 and an Electoral College vote that might return Trump to power in 2024. The despicable Marc Elias, the man who paid for the Steele Dossier, stated in a  series  of  tweets  last month: Before the midterm election, we will have a serious discussion about whether individual Republican House Members are disqualified by Section 3 of the 14th Amendment from serving in Congress. We may even see litigation. ... I am making clear that members of Congress who engaged in insurrection or r

 USA Supreme: ... But a little help from the DA would be nice, because t seems that “woke” and “progressive” policies are the real reason why we have these raids on the trains! Kristine Lazar from the local CBS Los Angeles station spoke with Union Pacific police about train theft and they forwarded her this letter they sent to LA County DA in December. UP says they arrested > 100 people in last 3 months but many were fined and released within 24 hours. ... Union Pacific says about 90 containers a day have been attacked.  They have made over 100 arrests and have not received one notice from the LA prosecutor for a trial of the perps.  The Soros-backed LA prosecutor is not keeping his community safe from thieves.  

  Daily Mail: Fed-Ex proposes to install laser-based missile defense system on its cargo planes as a countermeasure against heat-seeking missiles ...   'The FedEx missile-defense system directs infrared laser energy toward an incoming missile, in an effort to interrupt the missile’s tracking of the aircraft’s heat.' ... Civilian aircraft have been targeted by MANPAD portable missiles in recent years.

Trending Politics:   Hasta la Vista, Brandon: 61% of Hispanics Disapprove of Biden Biden's Hispanic approval number is 28%.  That is bad news for all Democrats in states like Texas and Arizona. 

 Fox News: U.S. Sen. Rand Paul hit back at YouTube "censors" on Saturday after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention acknowledged that cloth masks do not work as well against the coronavirus as N95 makes. The Kentucky Republican wondered if YouTube would be apologizing for suspending him earlier this year for saying the same thing. "Does this mean snot-nosed censors at YouTube will come to my office and kiss my … and admit I was right?" Paul wrote. ... In a New York Times article cited by Paul, who is a certified physician, the CDC revised its previous position on masks, saying that "loosely woven cloth products provide the least protection" and recommended surgical masks instead. ... In August, YouTube suspended Paul over a three-minute video questioning the effectiveness of cloth masks, which several studies have shown are not effective in stopping the spread of viruses like the coronavirus. ... I think censorship is usually a mistake and

 PJ Media: Nick Searcy was at the huge Trump rally on Jan. 6, 2021, in Washington, D.C., and was so unnerved and shaken by what he saw that day that he made a movie about it. The actor/producer/director’s movie, Capitol Punishment, is the most complete story about that day and its aftermath that anyone has attempted to date. It’s a must-watch, even if you think you know all there is to know about that day. ... “Everything that we are being told [about Jan. 6] is a lie and Americans are being persecuted to support that lie,” says Searcy who features national security experts in the film who attest that the assault on the Capitol for political ends “was years in the making.” ... Searcy’s idea for the movie with filmmaker and director Chris Burgard began when the two men attended the Jan. 6 rally because they “believed the election had been stolen” stolen from Donald Trump. Searcy told me on my Adult in the Room Podcast that they figured any story they told would be about the typical an

 Newsmax: Iran officials have not been banned by Twitter for making calls to assassinate former President Donald Trump, and now Iran has released a video showing Trump being killed by a drone as he plays golf in Mar-a-Lago. Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei's website has published a video vowing revenge against Trump for the killing of QUDs Force Cmdr. Qassem Soleimani in January 2020, according to the Sun. Iranian Americans for Liberty tweeted out the Iran propaganda video to bring to light Iran's call for violence, while being permitted on Twitter. "Outrageous. There must be a swift and strong reaction from @jakejsullivan and @JoeBiden," Grenell tweeted . "And why is @Twitter allowing this guy to use their platform?" ... "So, the leftist oligarchs at Twitter will allow the [guard corps] to tweet death threats at President Trump but will deplatform him for calling for a peaceful protest?" Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., of the House Foreign A

 Washington Examiner: All hostages were rescued at Beth Israel Synagogue in Colleyville, Texas, where authorities said an armed man had them trapped for roughly half the day on Saturday, according to Gov. Greg Abbott. The governor announced the rescue, which involved roughly 60 to 70 officials from Washington, D.C., after reporters on the scene said they heard a loud explosion. The four "unharmed" hostages, all of whom are adults, are "not in need of medical attention," officials said at a press conference at 10:15 p.m. local time. ... Authorities had responded to the area, and the Colleyville Police Department tweeted it was evacuating the surrounding area after it was reported an armed man was holding a rabbi and at least three others hostage and demanding the release of Aafia Siddiqui, who is serving an 86-year sentence for the attempted murder of a U.S. soldier. ... The man was heard saying he was the brother of Siddiqui, but Muhammad Siddiqui, the biological b