Category: Just Desserts

BLUF
The bottom line is that it looks like the free ride for some 3,700 Twitter employees is over. Dems like AOC, who’ve enjoyed having the power of the Big Tech censorship lords on their party’s side, are obviously super triggered because Musk intends to transform into Twitter to the even playing field of free speech that it should have always been.

Elon Musk to Pull a Trump-Level ‘You’re Fired!’ on HALF of Twitter’s Workforce.

Even for a guy like Elon Musk, $44 billion is quite a chunk of money to spend on anything, even for the most valuable and influential social media platform in the world.

As often happens in the business world, cost-cutting measures are typically deployed upon acquiring a new business. According to a bombshell Bloomberg report Wednesday night, it appears the first money-saving cuts could come Friday in the way of firing roughly half of Twitter’s entire workforce.

That would be about 3,700 jobs, according to the report. Musk is also set to require a majority of whichever workers are left standing to actually come to work at the office, as we did back in the good ol’ days, effectively ending the work-from-home situation that became the new normal over the course of the pandemic.

Musk, as of this writing, hasn’t commented on Bloomberg’s report, but one Twitter user perfectly summarized why such a massive round of layoffs is probably the logical move at this point. Too many useless managers, and not nearly enough workers.

Bloomberg:

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Elon’s Twitter Just Fact-Checked Joe Biden’s Official Presidential Account

A few moments ago, less than 24 hours after Elon Musk took over as Chief Twit of Twitter, a fact-check has been placed on one of Joe Biden’s @POTUS tweets because… he’s lying. Biden tweeted, “Let me give you the facts. In 2020, 55 corporations made $40 billion. And they paid zero in federal taxes. My Inflation Reduction Act puts an end to this.”

Not so fast, homie. Twitter took the opportunity to add context that said, “Out of the 55 corporations the tweet referenced only 14 had earnings greater than $1 billion and would be eligible under Biden’s tax law.” LOL

Twitter also linked Glen Kessler’s fact-check of the claim in the Washington Post in which he concluded, “This ’55 corporations’ number is probably in the ballpark but readers should be aware that it’s not based on actual tax returns but instead is an estimate of taxes paid based on corporate reports.” Though Kessler could not bring himself to call it what it is — a lie — he had to admit that it’s not accurate.

I like this new Twitter. Well done, Elon!

 

 

Texas Sends Buses of Migrants to Chicago for First Time, Dropped Off at Train Station

Two buses carrying migrants from Texas arrived in Chicago on Wednesday night.

The buses arrived at Chicago’s Union Station at around 7:30 p.m., carrying migrants who crossed the southern border illegally.

An estimated 80-100 people were on the buses, which include 20-30 small children. Many of the migrants said they’re from Venezuela.

Chicago is the latest city where migrants have been bused to from Texas, following New York City and Washington, D.C., all of which have Democrat mayors.

Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said in a statement that he looks forward to seeing Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot welcome the migrants since Chicago is a sanctuary city.

“President Biden’s inaction at our southern border continues putting the lives of Texans—and Americans—at risk and is overwhelming our communities,” Abbott said. “To continue providing much-needed relief to our small, overrun border towns, Chicago will join fellow sanctuary cities Washington, D.C. and New York City as an additional drop-off location. Mayor Lightfoot loves to tout the responsibility of her city to welcome all regardless of legal status, and I look forward to seeing this responsibility in action as these migrants receive resources from a sanctuary city with the capacity to serve them.”

A statement from Abbott’s office said that Chicago is being added as a “drop-off location” for future migrant buses in response to “President Biden’s open border policies overwhelming border communities in Texas.”

A spokesperson from Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s office said in a statement that Abbott is “without any shame or humanity.”

“As a city, we are doing everything we can to ensure these immigrants and their families can receive shelter, food, and most importantly protection. This is not new; Chicago welcome hundreds of migrants every year to our city and provides much-needed assistance,” a spokesperson for Lightfoot’s office said. “Unfortunately, Texas Governor Greg Abbott is without any shame or humanity. But ever since he put these racist practices of expulsion in place, we have been working with our community partners to ready the city to receive these individuals.

New York City Democrat Mayor Eric Adams, upon meeting the migrants on Aug. 7, said that the actions of Abbott are “horrific.”

“This is horrific when you think about what the governor is doing,” Adams said.

After sending the migrants to New York, Abbott said that the area is an “ideal destination for these migrants.”

“In addition to Washington, D.C., New York City is the ideal destination for these migrants, who can receive the abundance of city services and housing that Mayor Eric Adams has boasted about within the sanctuary city,” said Abbott. “I hope he follows through on his promise of welcoming all migrants with open arms so that our overrun and overwhelmed border towns can find relief.”

Abbott began sending migrants to Democrat-run cities in April, with the first migrant-buses being sent to Washington, D.C.

When the first buses arrived in Washington D.C., a spokesperson for Mayor Mayor Muriel Bowser told ABC News that “Our Administration continues to work with NGOs [Non-Government Organizations] who are providing resources to the arriving individuals and families. Our partners were able to triage the first bus, which included individuals hoping to settle outside of the region.”

Bowser requested assistance twice from the National Guard to help with the thousands of migrants that have been arriving in the area. Both requests have been rejected.

She first asked the National Guard for help on Aug. 4, then again on Aug. 11, requesting the deployment of 150 National Guard troops to “help prevent a prolonged humanitarian crisis in our nation’s capital resulting from the daily arrival of migrants.”

Uvalde School Police Chief Pete Arredondo Fired by School Board Three Months After Robb Elementary Shooting

Uvalde school police chief Pete Arredondo was terminated by the district’s board on Wednesday, exactly three months after a shooting at Robb Elementary School that left 19 children and two teachers dead.

Arredondo, who has been harshly criticized for his response to the shooting, did not attend Wednesday’s meeting, his attorney said.

“Chief Arredondo will not participate in his own illegal and unconstitutional public lynching and respectfully requests the Board immediately reinstate him, with all backpay and benefits and close the complaint as unfounded,” Arredondo’s attorney, George Hyde, wrote in a 17-page letter that was sent out less than an hour before the meeting.

Angry parents and family members of the 21 victims voiced their anger at the beginning of the meeting. After Uvalde resident Brett Cross criticized Arredondo for not appearing at his own termination hearing, the crowd yelled, “Coward!”

“Our babies are dead. Our teachers are dead. Our parents are dead. The least y’all can do is show us the respect to do this in the public,” Cross said, pushing the board to hold the termination vote in an open session.

Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steven McCraw identified Arredondo as the incident commander and blamed him for the more than 70-minute delay in confronting the gunman.

Hyde argued in Wednesday’s letter that Arredondo did not consider himself to be the incident commander and wasn’t aware that children were wounded in the classroom.

“It is important to note that Chief Arredondo, along with several other officers in the hallway, were completely unaware of any occupants in the room with the shooter until entry was made, the shooter was engaged, and the officers stopped him,” Hyde wrote.

Arredondo was originally suspended in June and his termination hearing had been delayed twice.

He told a Texas House committee investigating the shooting that he thought the suspect was contained in the classroom.

“Although the encounter had begun as an ‘active shooter’ scenario, Chief Arredondo testified that he immediately began to think of the attacker as being ‘cornered’ and the situation as being one of a ‘barricaded subject,'” House lawmakers wrote in the report.

“With the benefit of hindsight, we now know this was a terrible, tragic mistake.”

Dicken Drill:
Start on beep. Draw from concealment. Fire 10 rounds on standard silhouette at 40 yards. Par time 15 seconds. Pass = 8/10 hits on target or greater.

Wilson Drill:
Start on beep. Draw from concealment and fire 1 round to the head box on standard silhouette at 10 yards. Par time: 3 seconds.

Uvalde drill:
Start on beep. Sanitize hands. Check phone. Wait 70 minutes. Eat lunch.

Here’s a Fun Way for You to Stick It to Putin

Drones for Ukraine has a unique fundraising tool: Donate $1,000 or more to their effort to procure modern drones to defend against the Russian invasion, get a genuine piece of aircraft skin from a downed Russian jet fighter.

“Have you always wanted a Su-34 ‘Fullback’ strike fighter?” the Twitter pitch goes. “But $50M is a little bit pricey?”

As a matter of fact, $50 million is a little pricey. I’ve got two boys, and you should see our monthly food bill.

But: “Just donate $1000+ to support Ukrainian army and we’ll send you this tag recycled from a downed Russian plane (it’s literally a piece of it with little engraving).”

(Image courtesy of Drones for Ukraine.)

“Made in Russia, Recycled in Ukraine” is a pretty gutsy tagline, too.

“Your donations will help us supply the defenders in Ukraine with modern drones and equipment to counter the invasion,” according to the website. So your donation in exchange for a piece of a shot-down Russian jet might just help Ukraine shoot down another one.

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Chris Wallace walks away from a nice soft cushy gig on Fox because he’s a proggie and can’t stand his co-workers -which he likely had little to no contact with anyway. Gets hired by CNN to be a host on a new streaming channel and the channel falls-flat-on-its-face

Nobody Wants a Piece of CNN History
CNN offers NFTs of opening moments of its streaming service. They’re not flying off the shelf.

An attempt by CNN to promote its new streaming service by selling NFTs of the opening moments of its programming has backfired, with a large majority of the product still available more than 24 hours after the initial broadcast.

The video NFT, or non-fungible token, features host Kate Bolduan welcoming viewers to the “first live broadcast” on CNN+, and is being sold for $50 on CNN’s NFT marketplace. The news network appears, however, to have overestimated the demand for the piece of digital history—of the 250 NFTs made available, only about 80 were purchased.

The head of CNN+ told the Hollywood Reporter, which decided to write an actual news story announcing the NFT offer, that he expected interest from “digital collectors.”

“CNN+’s debut is a historic moment for CNN,” said CNN+’s Andrew Morse in a statement. “We’re excited to raise the curtain on this new platform and making CNN+’s first live moments available as an NFT is the perfect way to celebrate our launch with digital collectors.”

The trendy pieces of digital property have taken off in recent years, with demand for even mundane offerings such as a picture of a New York Times column about NFTs going for over half-a-million dollars. Anticipated releases of NFTs typically sell out extremely quickly and for large sums of money. In 2021, an NFT collection sold by Brazilian artist Monica Rizzoli sold out in one hour for roughly $5.55 million.

The failure of the CNN+ NFT is the latest piece of bad news surrounding its launch. Fox News reporter Charlie Gasparino said just a day after the product launched that employees were already bracing for layoffs due to lackluster sales projections. The report was bolstered by CNN’s decision to slash prices for the service, offering users 50 percent off for life if they agree to shell out over $2.99 a month.

“CNN+ already showing no confidence in their product,” wrote reporter Saagar Enjeti. “Throwing away [subscriptions] at discount rates to fake their initial sign up numbers.”

The network has made a large investment in the streaming service, poaching reporter Chris Wallace from Fox News specifically for a show on CNN+. Other daily programming will come from Kasie Hunt, who previously worked for MSNBC, as well as longtime CNN hosts Wolf Blitzer and Brian Stelter. It is unclear whether any NFTs featuring Stelter will be offered.

Unintended consequences often result in just desserts.

AMAZON EMPLOYEES SUPPORTED GUN CONTROL, DEFUND POLICE. CRIME FORCED THEM OUT.

By Larry Keane

Seattle is the home of Amazon’s corporate headquarters, employing more than 80,000 people. It is also one of the nation’s epicenters of crime, rioting and looting that erupted in 2020 which remains a concern today.

The online sales behemoth that embraces gun control and defunding police is now witnessing the effects of those policies. Amazon is moving employees out of a downtown corporate building over concerns of rising crime.

“Given recent incidents…, we’re providing employees currently at that location with alternative office space elsewhere,” an Amazon spokesperson recently told media. “We are hopeful that conditions will improve and that we will be able to bring employees back to this location when it is safe to do so.”

To understand how the neighborhood became so violent as to force them to relocate their employees to safer confines, Amazon may want to look in the mirror.

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New Reports Suggest Russian Losses in Ukraine Are Absolutely Catastrophic

How many Russian soldiers have been killed in Ukraine? It’s tough to know. We have Ukrainian sources saying their land has become a killing field for Russian forces, with at least 11,000 killed since the start of the war.

It is true that the Russian offensive has become stuck in the mud. Tanks are running out of gas. That 40-mile Russian convoy outside of the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv has yet to move. What’s going on? Other estimates of the Russian war dead are in the 4,000-6,000 range which is probably a tad more accurate. Still, that’s more Russians killed in less than two weeks in Ukraine than all American losses during the entirety of the Iraq War and occupation. The Ukrainians are holding on, mounting a dogged defense against a superior adversary. We’ll see how long that lasts after the Russians clinch air superiority which they have so far been unable to do.

Yet, let’s circle back to the 10,000-plus Russian war dead figure. Keep an eye on it. We have reports of hospitals in southern Belarus that are totally filled with Russian bodies. There’s allegedly not enough refrigeration. Bodies are starting to rot. This also circles back to the story about the Russian military wheeling in mobile crematoriums to cook the books on their casualty rates. We may never know the true death toll. There’s also the suspicion that mass graves for dead Russian soldiers are also being dug to hide the true body counts.

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North Korea Hacked Him. So He Took Down Its Internet

For the past two weeks, observers of North Korea’s strange and tightly restricted corner of the internet began to notice that the country seemed to be dealing with some serious connectivity problems. On several different days, practically all of its websites—the notoriously isolated nation only has a few dozen—intermittently dropped offline en masse, from the booking site for its Air Koryo airline to Naenara, a page that serves as the official portal for dictator Kim Jong-un’s government. At least one of the central routers that allow access to the country’s networks appeared at one point to be paralyzed, crippling the Hermit Kingdom’s digital connections to the outside world.

Some North Korea watchers pointed out that the country had just carried out a series of missile tests, implying that a foreign government’s hackers might have launched a cyberattack against the rogue state to tell it to stop saber-rattling.

But responsibility for North Korea’s ongoing internet outages doesn’t lie with US Cyber Command or any other state-sponsored hacking agency. In fact, it was the work of one American man in a T-shirt, pajama pants, and slippers, sitting in his living room night after night, watching Alien movies and eating spicy corn snacks—and periodically walking over to his home office to check on the progress of the programs he was running to disrupt the internet of an entire country.

Just over a year ago, an independent hacker who goes by the handle P4x was himself hacked by North Korean spies. P4x was just one victim of a hacking campaign that targeted Western security researchers with the apparent aim of stealing their hacking tools and details about software vulnerabilities. He says he managed to prevent those hackers from swiping anything of value from him. But he nonetheless felt deeply unnerved by state-sponsored hackers targeting him personally—and by the lack of any visible response from the US government.

So after a year of letting his resentment simmer, P4x has taken matters into his own hands. “It felt like the right thing to do here. If they don’t see we have teeth, it’s just going to keep coming,” says the hacker. (P4x spoke to WIRED and shared screen recordings to verify his responsibility for the attacks but declined to use his real name for fear of prosecution or retaliation.) “I want them to understand that if you come at us, it means some of your infrastructure is going down for a while.”

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Foxx is another one of the leftists elected with the help of massive donations from George Soros, so…no surprise here.
But there’s always the unintended consequences of giving such additional powers to goobermint. It may be better to ‘fire’ an underperforming prosecutor by electing a new one.

Police In Chicago Suburbs Want To Bypass Cook County Prosecutor

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot isn’t the only public official in the Chicagoland area complaining about Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx’s inability or unwillingness to prosecute felony cases. Several Illinois Republicans and suburban police chiefs in northern Illinois are also speaking out about policies, which they say are exacerbating the violence in their communities.

State Rep. Jim Durkin and Sen. John Curran have introduced a bill that would empower local police departments to bring charges against criminal suspects, even if local prosecutors take a pass, and Durkin says it’s already being warmly received by many departments in the Chicago suburbs.

Durkin held a meeting with over two dozen police chiefs from Cook County last week.

“The frustration they have is profound,” he said. “The crime in Chicago is moving out to the suburbs. We’re having carjackings at a record pace in suburban Chicago, kidnappings, murders. Things you typically see in a large metropolitan area are making it into the suburbs. The same frustration you see with the Chicago police is now with the suburban police.”

One of the recent incidents that motivated Durkin to propose the bill was a recent shootout between two groups of suspected gang members in Chicago. Despite some of the shootout being captured on the bodycams of the first officers to arrive on scene, and the arrest of three individuals in connection with the shooting, Foxx declined to press charges claiming that police hadn’t presented her with a strong enough case. As we’ve previously documented, however, there are inexplicable charging decisions coming out of Foxx’s office on an almost daily basis. Just today the website CWB Chicago highlighted a man accused repeatedly stabbing someone, only to be charged with a misdemeanor.

A man who has a history of attacking passers-by and transit workers allegedly stabbed a 66-year-old man five times near Union Station late last month. But he is only charged with one count of misdemeanor battery, even though a CPD report says the victim wanted to pursue felony charges.

The story was brought to our attention yesterday after we reported that a woman who only received misdemeanor probation for stabbing a CTA worker in the neck was arrested over the weekend when she allegedly brandished a knife and stole a purse from a wedding party in Millennium Park. She was only charged with misdemeanors. Again.

Why are so many accused stabbers only being charged with misdemeanors? Is it because these incidents can’t be classified as “gun violence” and are therefore not as much of a priority? Or is this just another case of Foxx’s office going soft on crime?

According to a CPD report, police responded to a “person stabbed” call on the 400 block of West Jackson around 9:30 p.m. on September 28.

When they arrived, they met with Amtrak police officers who said they saw Leonard Hall, 51, running away from a 66-year-old man who was lying on the ground with multiple stab wounds. Amtrak cops detained Hall and recovered a bloody knife before Chicago officers arrived, the report said.

Hall told Amtrak police that he stabbed the victim, according to court records.

The victim was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital with three stab wounds to his forehead, one to his left flank, and another to his left ear, the CPD report said. Doctors used stitches and staples to close him back up.

Chicago officers noted in their report that the victim specifically wanted to pursue felony charges against Hall.

But prosecutors did not approve any felonies.

Instead, Hall is charged only with one count of misdemeanor battery. He was released from the police station on his own recognizance the next afternoon, according to CPD records.

So, prosecutors have a victim willing to testify. They have a bloody knife as evidence. They have a confession by the alleged attacker. And they went with a charge of misdemeanor battery?

I don’t know if Durkin’s bill has a chance in the Democrat-controlled legislature, but at least he’s trying to find a fix for Foxx’s willful ineptitude. I hope while he’s at it he’ll support measures to get rid of the state’s Firearm Owner ID requirement for all gun owners, which has proved to be an unconstitutional burden on Illinois residents and has deprived tens of thousands of them their Second Amendment rights thanks to months-long delays in processing FOID applications on the part of the Illinois State Police. The right to keep and bear arms is fundamentally important even in the most peaceful communities, but when prosecutors and judges are releasing violent criminals back on to the streets with a slap on the wrist, not being able to exercise that right can literally mean the difference between life and death.

Edgar Allen Poe wrote a story about a party, and Vincent Price starred in a movie version. …The Masque of The Red Death.
Maybe Obammy’s will turn out the same

Good grief. It took him long enough. If I was a voter in the Ft Smith area, I might be looking for a better candidate to replace this goober in the next election.

Prosecutor says deadly physical force justified in Fort Smith shooting

FORT SMITH — A Fort Smith man who stopped a shooting rampage in May by killing the gunman won’t face criminal charges, prosecutors said.

Sebastian County Prosecutor Dan Shue announced his decision Wednesday in a letter to Police Chief Danny Baker. Shue said after reviewing the investigative reports surrounding the shooting, his office concluded Wallace A. West, 58, was justified under Arkansas law in the fatal shooting of Zachary Brian Arnold, 26.

West shot Arnold after Arnold killed Lois Hicks, 87, in her home at Three Corners Apartments at 3600 S. 74th St., according to police.

“Mr. West acted lawfully when he shot Mr. Arnold and likely saved a number of lives in the process,” a Police Department news release states. “At last count, Mr. Arnold had fired 93 rounds from his semiautomatic rifle before Mr. West was able to stop him. There were no other fatalities or injuries, though a number of residents were home at the time of the assault.”

The Police Department started receiving calls of a shooting at the apartment complex about 7:15 a.m. May 15, according to Shue. Arnold came out of his apartment firing a semiautomatic rifle while yelling at his neighbors to come outside, according to police.

Hicks came outside to check on Arnold, who chased her into her apartment and shot her multiple times.

West, identified in the Police Department news release Wednesday as an off-duty employee of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, woke to the sound of gunshots, Shue wrote. He ran outside and saw Arnold shooting into Hicks’ apartment.

West then grabbed a bolt action rifle, which was scoped and loaded, from his gun cabinet, stepped onto his balcony and fired once at Arnold, missing him because he was “shaking so badly,” according to his witness statement.

Arnold turned and fired several rounds at West.

Arnold went back into his apartment, presumably to reload, and he came back outside, Shue wrote. He began walking down the complex, rifle in hand, according to West. West took a second shot, which struck Arnold in the head and killed him.

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AhhhhhhHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

Atlanta councilman Antonio Brown, who voted to defund police, has car stolen

An Atlanta mayoral candidate who voted to defund millions of dollars from the local police department’s budget reportedly had his car stolen by a group of young thieves this week.

City Council Member Antonio Brown had just gotten out of his white Mercedes coupe to speak to fellow community leader Ben Norman in northwest Atlanta’s Dixie Hills community Wednesday when he spotted four or five kids — the youngest only 6 or 7, WAGA-TV reported.

The children were walking around a store — and within seconds were inside Brown’s car, he said.

“One kid was in the driver’s seat,” Brown told the outlet. “Ben attempted to open the door to get him out of the car. He fought with Ben. I then engaged and tried to get him out of the car. The three other kids were trying to figure out how to get in the car or stay out of the car. He started to hit on the gas. Ben let go.”

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