Category: You Can’t Make This Up

Kamala campaign flip-flops on EV mandates.

The former senator cosponsored legislation banning gas-powered cars by 2040

A campaign official for Kamala Harris said Tuesday that it is a “lie” that the vice president Kamala Harris supports implementing an electric vehicle mandate, even though she cosponsored legislation doing exactly that in 2019.

Harris’s director of rapid response, Ammar Moussa, wrote in a campaign email ahead of Trump running mate J.D. Vance’s remarks on the economy in Michigan that the Ohio senator would “undoubtedly lie, gaslight, and try to run away from the truth.” One such lie, he cautioned, is that “Vice President Harris wants to force every American to own an electric vehicle.”

“Vice President Harris does not support an electric vehicle mandate,” Moussa claimed, before citing several news stories that argued the Biden administration only incentivized, rather than mandated, electric vehicle production by car manufacturers. The administration spent billions to build just a handful of electric vehicle chargers and introduced tax credits for electric vehicle purchases. In addition, however, the Biden administration pushed through a new tailpipe emissions rule through the Environmental Protection Agency that would force car manufacturers to significantly scale back production of gas-powered cars. “The regulation would essentially require automakers to sell more electric vehicles and hybrids by gradually tightening limits on tailpipe pollution,” the New York Times reported in March.

Even more damningly, Harris also supported an electric vehicle mandate when she serves as the junior senator from California. In April 2019, months after announcing her bid to become the 2020 Democratic presidential nominee, Harris cosponsored the Zero-Emission Vehicles Act of 2019. The bill, which was introduced by Senator Jeff Merkley and Representative Mike Levin, presented “bold plan for transitioning the United States to 100% zero-emission vehicles.”

The original version of the Zero-Emission Vehicles Act of 2019 would require 50 percent of new passenger vehicle sales to be automobiles that use zero emissions — electric or hydrogen-powered cars and trucks. The bill would require all new car sales be zero emission vehicles by 2040, according to text of the bill and a press release from Senator Merkley’s office.

The legislation gave authority to the EPA administrator to issue an “injunction on the manufacture of any passenger vehicles other than zero-emission vehicles by a vehicle manufacturer” by 2040.

Harris supported an even more aggressive version of the legislation that would ban non-zero-emission vehicles by 2035, according to an archived page of her 2020 campaign website obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.

Harris’s campaign has also claimed that she no longer supports a fracking ban and other key policies of her 2020 Democratic primary campaign. Harris herself has not walked back any of these positions or explained why and how she changed her mind so radically in just one election cycle.

The Houthis have defeated the US Navy

Operation Prosperity Guardian (OPG) was set up in December 2023 in response to the Houthi attacks on commercial shipping passing through the southern Red Sea. The aim was to provide a unified international front that would both deter the Houthis from further attacks and reassure the shipping companies who due to reasons of risk and associated insurance costs were already starting to take the long route round the Cape of Good Hope.

The problem was, it didn’t work. The Houthis were not deterred and continued taking pot shots at anyone and everything from ships with the most tenuous links to Israel, to Iranian grain carriers to Russian dark fleet oilers. For relatively little effort and money, they achieved their desired end states of ‘improved local influence’ and ‘challenging international shipping’ almost immediately. Their line that they would stop if there was a ceasefire in Gaza convinced only a few.

This led to Operation Poseidon Archer starting in January 2024, with US and UK counterstrikes on Houthi targets. But as Saudi Arabia proved between 2015 and 2023 (and repeatedly told us) trying to disable the Houthis by kinetic strikes is like punching smoke, and so it proved.

None of these efforts were helped when the EU formed a splinter coalition called Aspides so as not to associate with the US posture in Israel. The West’s inability to agree on how to perform a relatively basic task did not go unnoticed by potential adversaries. It was certainly noticed by the shipping companies we were trying to reassure.

Since January, not only have the attacks steadily increased in number, they have diversified too. Drones and cruise missiles were accompanied by hijackings and ballistic missiles. April saw the first use of a surface drone and there has been a steady increase in this method since.

Recently the Houthis have started following up their attacks with small arms fire from fast boats and the last few weeks have seen the amount of attacks increase above what was an average of 2.5 a week.

Even Russia doesn’t want to risk it at the moment. Earlier this month, Russian tankers Arpus and Arlan, which could have gone through the Suez Canal, instead transferred their oil into the Gold Pearl – too big for the Canal – and she duly went round the Cape.

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Deer hunting causes gun violence, researchers claim
Researchers admit their data was flawed, use it anyway.

In what may be the most poorly conceived and horribly researched study ever published by The Journal of the American Medical Association during its entire 141-year history, a trio of anti-gun researchers now claims deer hunting is associated with a substantial increase in firearm violence.

To arrive at their laughable conclusion, the authors used data from the infamous Gun Violence Archive, which has been debunked dozens of times and is well known for its shoddy research and biased statistics.

Even the authors admitted there were problems with the GVA data. “Our study relies on shooting data from a single source, the GVA. Data from GVA have been shown to have a bias toward incidents that receive more media attention and do not include comprehensive counts of firearm suicides,” the report states.

Despite these inherent biases, the researchers used the GVA data anyway. They didn’t allow the facts to interfere with their preconceived and biased narrative.

The report, “Deer Hunting Season and Firearm Violence in US Rural Counties,” which was released Wednesday, was written by Patrick Sharkey, PhD; Juan Camilo Cristancho, BA, and Daniel Semenza, PhD.

Sharkey is affiliated with Princeton University’s School of Public and International Affairs. Cristancho works at the University of California, Irvine’s School of Education, and Semenza is affiliated with the New Jersey Gun Violence Research Center at Rutgers University.

The researchers sought to investigate “the association between the start of deer hunting season and shootings in rural counties of the US.”

They compared shootings during the first three weeks of deer season to a week prior to the season opener. The authors claim there was a “substantial increase in shootings” during the start of deer season, which they said calls for additional gun control, of course.

“The findings highlight the role of firearm prevalence in gun violence and suggest the need for focused policies designed to reduce firearm violence in areas with substantial hunting activity during the first weeks of deer hunting season,” the report states.

About the author

Patrick Sharkey, PhD, led the research team.

“Dr. Sharkey had full access to all of the data in the study and takes responsibility for the integrity of the data and the accuracy of the data analysis,” his report claims.

According to his Princeton bio, Sharkey’s research focuses on “urban inequality, violence, and public policy.” He is also the creator of AmericanViolence.org, a website that claims it provides “comprehensive, updated data on violence from as many of the largest 100 largest U.S. cities as possible.”

AmericanViolence.org, like Sharkey’s recent study, relies upon debunked data. “In the latest iteration of the site we have drawn more heavily on data on fatal and nonfatal shootings published by the Gun Violence Archive, an excellent resource that has tracked all forms of gun violence in the United States over time,” the website states.

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“So, Biden has to drop out because his record is so good?”

It’s all right there. Joe had to drop out because his not dropping out would have damaged democracy. He dropped out to protect democracy.

That’s literally what he SAID. – Henry Bowman

Trump Gunman Flew Drone Over Rally Site Hours Before Attempted Assassination
Discovery adds to growing list of stunning security lapses that almost led to former president’s killing

The gunman who tried to kill Donald Trump was able to fly a drone and get aerial footage of the western Pennsylvania fairgrounds shortly before the former president was set to speak there, law-enforcement officials briefed on the matter said, further underscoring the stunning security lapses ahead of Trump’s near assassination.

Thomas Matthew Crooks flew the drone on a programmed flight path earlier in the day on July 13 to scour the Butler Farm Show grounds ahead of Trump’s ill-fated rally, the officials said. The predetermined path, the officials added, suggests Crooks flew the drone more than once as he researched and scoped out the event site.

The 20-year-old would-be assassin fired at least six rounds from the roof of the American Glass Research building roughly 400 feet away from where Trump spoke, killing one spectator, critically injuring two others and leaving Trump with a graze wound to the ear. A Secret Service sniper team shot back, killing Crooks, whose motive remains a mystery.

Multiple investigations are under way into how a gunman was able to climb onto a rooftop with a clear line of sight to Trump and open fire with an AR-15 rifle. Police had become suspicious of Crooks more than an hour earlier, when officers saw him milling about the edges of the rally with a range finder and a backpack.

Secret Service agents respond after the Trump rally shooting on Saturday in Butler, Pa. PHOTO: EVAN VUCCI/ASSOCIATED PRESS

The use of the drone was just one way in which authorities have said Crooks planned his attack. Crooks, described by friends as very smart yet withdrawn, began researching the site shortly after the Trump campaign announced the rally on July 3, and registered for the event on July 7, officials said. He visited the farm show grounds a few days later to scope it out.

On July 13, officials said, he returned with a pair of homemade bombs that appeared to be designed to be set off by remote control, as they were fitted with a receiver like the kind used to set off fireworks remotely. Investigators found the rudimentary explosives in Crooks’ car parked close to the grounds, along with a ballistic carrier, or vest, with three, 30-round magazines in it, an indication that he might have wanted to cause greater carnage.

Crooks in recent months had received several packages to his home marked “hazardous materials,” officials said. He did online searches for dates of Trump rallies, but also searched for information about next month’s Democratic convention and President Biden, providing a mixed bag of clues for investigators to sort through as they try to determine what, if any, ideology he ascribed to.