Financial Big Brother is Watching You
A brief note on an overlooked nightmare.

A few weeks ago, Ohio congressman and Judiciary Committee chairman Jim Jordan’s office released a letter to Noah Bishoff, the former director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, or FinCEN, an arm of the Treasury Department. Jordan’s team was asking Bishoff for answers about why FinCEN had “distributed slides, prepared by a financial institution,” detailing how other private companies might use MCC transaction codes to “detect customers whose transactions may reflect ‘potential active shooters.’” The slide suggested the “financial company” was sorting for terms like “Trump” and “MAGA,” and watching for purchases of small arms and sporting goods, or purchases in places like pawn shops or Cabela’s, to identify financial threats.

Jordan’s letter to Bishoff went on:

According to this analysis, FinCEN warned financial institutions of “extremism” indicators that include “transportation charges, such as bus tickets, rental cars, or plane tickets, for travel to areas with no apparent purpose,” or “the purchase of books (including religious texts) and subscriptions to other media containing extremist views.”

During the Twitter Files, we searched for snapshots of the company’s denylist algorithms, i.e. whatever rules the platform was using to deamplify or remove users. We knew they had them, because they were alluded to often in documents (a report on the denylist is_Russian, which included Jill Stein and Julian Assange, was one example). However, we never found anything like the snapshot Jordan’s team just published:

The highlighted portion shows how algorithmic analysis works in financial surveillance. First compile a list of naughty behaviors, in the form of MCC codes for guns, sporting goods, and pawn shops. Then, create rules: $2,500 worth of transactions in the forbidden codes, or a number showing that more than 50% of the customer’s transactions are the wrong kind, might trigger a response. The Committee wasn’t able to specify what the responses were in this instance, but from previous experience covering anti-money-laundering (AML) techniques at banks like HSBC, a good guess would be generation of something like Suspcious Activity Reports, which can lead to a customer being debanked.

If Facebook, Twitter, and Google have already shown a tendency toward wide-scale monitoring of speech and the use of subtle levers to apply pressure on attitudes, financial companies can use records of transactions to penetrate individual behaviors far more deeply. Especially if enhanced by AI, a financial history can give almost any institution an immediate, unpleasantly accurate outline of anyone’s life, habits, and secrets. Worse, they can couple that picture with a powerful disciplinary lever, in the form of the threat of closed accounts or reduced access to payment services or credit. Jordan’s slide is a picture of the birth of the political credit score.

There’s more coming on this, and other articles forthcoming (readers who’ve noticed it’s been quiet around here will soon find out why). While the world falls to pieces over Tucker, Putin, and Ukraine, don’t overlook this horror movie. If banks and the Treasury are playing the same domestic spy game that Twitter and Facebook have been playing with the FBI, tales like the frozen finances of protesting Canadian truckers won’t be novelties for long. As is the case with speech, where huge populations have learned to internalize censorship rules almost overnight, we may soon have to learn the hard way that even though some behaviors aren’t illegal, they can still be punished with great effectiveness, in a Terminator-like world where computers won’t miss anything that moves.

What a crazy time we live in! See you from the Nevada caucus, and watch this space for other news soon.

Special Counsel Finds Biden Is Too Old to Be Charged in Classified Docs Scandal

“Your Honor, my client was clearly too drunk to have made it anywhere near I-25 from that maze of one-way streets in downtown Denver, and cannot be held accountable for how he or his car might have been found trying to enter the highway from the off-ramp.” —The World’s Best Defense Attorney back in my younger days

Some legal defense moves are so unscrupulous that it would take a high-caliber lawyer to think of them and a true scoundrel to implement them. I’m looking at you, Johnnie Cochran, in your $4,000 suits, with a combination of awe and horror.

But that’s just trial law. Where things get really very quite seriously unsettling is the even twistier world of special counsels, where Washington agrees to investigate Washington insiders using Washington insiders who pinky swear that everything will be on the up-and-up and that the truth will be brought to light and justice will be served — no matter which Washington insiders might be punished or suffer public shaming as a result.

Then the Washington insiders all pour one another stiff portions of 21-year-old single-malt scotch and have a good laugh at our (literal) expense.

The latest example of just that comes from the Department of Justice™ headed up by Biden administration crony Merrick Garland.

ASIDE: I swear this actually just happened. When I started to type “Department of Justice,” a moment ago, I quickly corrected myself after typing “Derpartment.” I wish I’d let it stand with a [sic] at the end.

As you’re probably aware, the Biden administration was doing one of those pinky-swear investigations of itself because of that time Biden accidentally left boxes and boxes of classified doc in his garage with his Corvette. At first, Biden was prompted to tell people that his garage is a secure location because, unlike the Trump compound on many well-guarded acres at Mar-a-Lago, Biden’s garage door has one of those twisty lock handles on it.

That garage is practically a SCIF, they claimed.

That excuse held about as much water as my wife when she was 40 months pregnant and had to pee from just looking at a faucet, so Garland appointed pinky-swear special counsel Robert K. Hur to look into whether he should find some special excuse for Biden’s mishandling of classified documents immediately or if it would be better to draw it out longer so they’d have a chance to truly savor that bottle of Glenfarclas.

That was in August. Today, we have the Mother of All Justifications — and it has me laughing harder than it has Biden’s reelection campaign team breaking out in hives. Here it is from Hur’s findings:

We have also considered that, at trial, Mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury, as he did during our interview of him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory. Based on our direct interactions with and observations of him, he is someone for whom many jurors will want to identify reasonable doubt. It would be difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him—by then a former president well into his eighties—of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness.

Never mind the weasel language about how Biden would present himself to a jury because an “elderly man with a poor memory” is how he presents himself to members of the press, gathered audiences, and various deceased foreign dignitaries from countries he gets mixed up sometimes.

Remember those reports from a month or three ago that Biden was getting all upset about the public perception that he’s too old and feeble for the job? Yeah, his own DOJ just used that as the reason Biden can’t be held accountable for storing classified documents next to the case of 40 Weight Motor Oil and expired boxes of Fix-O-Dent.

But don’t you worry. I don’t think anyone in Beijing or Russia or Tehran pays much attention to what goes on in the Biden White House. So you can rest assured, Jack, that when the fella from that place, you know the one, tries to threaten Corn Hole with the asufutimaehaehfutbw that old Joe Biden is gonna make sure they feel the trunalimunumaprzure like the what was I saying?

And you can take that to the bank and smoke it.

Why Self-Defense Is The Only Type Of Violence The Left Won’t Endorse

After years of anti-cop rhetoric, violence is out of control in America’s cities. Smash and grabs, sidewalk attacks and old ladies being mugged in broad daylight — all just factored into the cost of living a metropolitan lifestyle. But these are not simply passive inevitabilities that somehow come to pass. They are active policy choices of a revolutionary left, firmly in control of every major city, that sees violence as a tool toward its political aims. In fact, there is only one type of violence the left will not condone — and the key to understanding it lies in these political aims.

The radical left may talk often of high-minded goals, but their ultimate goal is to eradicate hierarchy — the central push of the “equity” agenda. All must be made equal in order for all to be equally free. For classical liberals, this meant equal treatment under the law, unaffected by circumstances of birth. Yet for the radical outgrowth, this now means leveling all aspects of genuine human diversity. However, they do not truly seek egalitarian reforms, but merely to rejigger any form of traditional hierarchy (much of which had already been dismantled by their liberal forebears) and instead place themselves at the top. So the attack on hierarchy really becomes a spiteful, resentful attack on any form of tradition. This is the true nature of the radical left.

Traditional morality posits that the criminal is the “oppressor” of the “victim,” whom he victimizes with his crime. This has been the basis of virtually every legal system throughout human history. Yet radical left morality flips this notion on its head. The new “victim” becomes the criminal himself, victimized by the injustices of a hierarchical society that drives him to desperation: the thief stealing to feed his family or violence as the “language of the unheard.” The person on the receiving end becomes merely a casualty in the putsch to upend traditional morality, while the priests of the new morality consolidate their right to rule.

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Flint man was shot and killed after breaking into a home

FLINT, Mich. (WJRT) – Police are investigating a home invasion in Flint in which the home’s residents shot and killed one of the intruders Saturday.

The incident occurred on Saturday around 12:30 a.m. in the 500 block of Spencer Street.

According to the Michigan State Police, a 34-year-old Flint man was shot and killed, and a 41-year-old Flint man was shot during an alleged home invasion and felonious assault. Police say the residents of the home who shot at the men have been identified, interviewed and released by detectives pending further investigation.

Drone strike in Baghdad kills high-ranking militia commander

BAGHDAD — A U.S. drone strike blew up a car in the Iraqi capital Wednesday night, killing a high-ranking commander of the powerful Kataib Hezbollah militia who is responsible for “directly planning and participating in attacks” on American troops in the region, the U.S. military said.

The strike came on a main thoroughfare in the Mashtal neighborhood in eastern Baghdad, attracting a crowd as emergency teams picked through the wreckage. It came amid roiling tensions in the region, and is likely to further anger Iraqi government leaders, who U.S. officials said were not notified before the strike.

Security forces closed off the heavily guarded Green Zone, where a number of diplomatic compounds are located, amid calls for protesters to storm the U.S. Embassy.

There were conflicting reports on the number killed, with U.S. officials saying the initial assessment was one, and saying there were no civilians hurt or killed. But two officials with Iran-backed militias in Iraq said that three died, including Wissam Muhammad Sabir Al-Saadi, known as Abu Baqir Al-Saadi, the commander in charge of Kataib Hezbollah’s operations in Syria. Kataib Hezbollah announced Abu Baqir’s death “following the bombing of the American occupation forces” in a statement.

Those officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak to journalists.

In a statement, U.S. Central Command said “there are no indications of collateral damage or civilian casualties at this time.” It added that the U.S. “will not hesitate to hold responsible all those who threaten our forces’ safety.”

The strike came days after the U.S. military launched an air assault on dozens of sites in Iraq and Syria used by Iranian-backed militias and the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard in retaliation for a drone strike that killed three U.S. troops in Jordan in late January.

The U.S. has blamed the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a broad coalition of Iran-backed militias, for the attack in Jordan, and officials have said they suspect Kataib Hezbollah in particular of leading it.

The Islamic Resistance in Iraq has regularly claimed strikes on bases housing U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria against the backdrop of the ongoing Israel-Hamas war, saying that they are in retaliation for Washington’s support of Israel in its war in Gaza that has killed 27,707 Palestinians, according to the Health Ministry in the Hamas-run territory.

Kataib Hezbollah had said in a statement that it was suspending attacks on American troops to avoid “embarrassing the Iraqi government” after the strike in Jordan, but others have vowed to continue fighting.

On Sunday, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq claimed a drone attack on a base housing U.S. troops in eastern Syria killed six fighters from the Syrian Democratic Forces, a Kurdish-led group allied with the United States.

The latest surge in the regional conflict came shortly after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday rejected terms proposed by Hamas for a hostage-release agreement that would lead to a permanent cease-fire, vowing to continue the war until “absolute victory.”

Also on Wednesday, the media office of the Houthi rebels in Yemen reported two airstrikes in the Ras Issa area in Salif district in Hodeida province.

The American Colonies were all democratic governments, where the power is in the hands of the people and where there is not the least difficulty or jealousy about putting arms into the hands of every man in the country.

European countries should not be ignorant of the strength and the force of such a form of government and how strenuously and almost wonderfully people living under one have sometimes exerted themselves in defence of their rights and liberties and how fatally it has ended with many a man and many a state who have entered into quarrels, wars and contests with them. — George Mason

Of course you interview Putin: The media now opposes freedom of the press. We live in Bizarro World.

Tucker Carlson announced on Twitter that he will be interviewing Vladimir Putin. It will be posted on Twitter.

Carlson explained why: “Here’s why we’re doing it. First, because it is our job. We’re in journalism. Our duty is to inform people.”

He went on for another four minutes but in 20 words, he gave the only explanation that matters. I wish he would drop the imperial first-person.

Among the many replies, Ian Miles Cheong said, “Massive credit to Elon Musk for allowing the video to be posted uncensored. It’ll surely be banned elsewhere.”

Alex Barnicoat tweeted, “Tucker Carlson is about to save us from World War 3 with Russia. The West needs to hear the other side of the story.”

Preventing World War 3? This is why they hate him and why they hate Trump. These idiots want another world war and they really don’t care if America loses.

All evidence points to their desire to lose so they can set up a totalitarian government. The traitors in Washington have emasculated the military and literally cut the balls off generals. They opened the border to allow our enemies in. The traitors welcome Muslim terrorists and Chinese spies. The traitors depleted our military supplies by giving them away to Afghanistan and Ukraine.

You know, FDR never gave away a daggone thing. He made our allies take out loans to pay for the war materiel we sent them.

The traitors oppose giving Putin’s side of the story, as self-servingly ridiculous as it likely will be. Carlson told the Swiss magazine, Die Weltwoche, last fall that the Biden administration prevented him from interviewing Putin.

Carlson said, “I tried to interview Vladimir Putin, and the U.S. government stopped me. By the way, nobody defended me. I don’t think there was anybody in the news media who said, ‘Wait a second. I may not like this guy, but he has a right to interview anyone he wants, and we have a right to hear what Putin says.’

“You’re not allowed to hear Putin’s voice. Because why? There was no vote on it. No one asked me. I’m 54 years old. I’ve paid my taxes and followed the law.”

Nevertheless, Adam Kinzinger of CNN, a former congressman, tweeted, “He is a traitor.”

Not to be outdone, Bill Kristol said, “Perhaps we need a total and complete shutdown of Tucker Carlson re-entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on.”

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Judge dismisses Alvin Bragg’s felony case against vax card forgers, says DA has let criminals off for much less

Bragg and his office “move to dismiss significantly more serious counts or entire indictments,” the judge wrote.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg attempted to charge two New York residents with felonies for having false vaccine passports while he has let off others charged with far worse crimes scot-free.

New York State Supreme Court Justice Brendan T. Lantry dismissed the felony charges against the residents, identified as J.O. and R.V. in the decision, who had bought the forged vax passports, usurping Bragg’s decision.

The judge said the two were among 16 others that Bragg had “cherry-picked” to prosecute, according to the case.

Lantry slammed Bragg in the decision decided at the New York Supreme Court on Jan. 30.

The judge wrote in the opinion, “Clearly, Criminal Possession of a Forged Instrument in the Second Degree (Penal Law § 170.25) is not among the most serious crimes in the New York Penal Law, nor are the factual allegations against Defendants R.V. and J.O. particularly serious in nature.”

“Moreover, the factual allegations — that the Defendants purchased fake COVID-19 vaccination cards so that they could provide same to their employer (R.V.) and school (J.O.) — do not rise to the level of the majority of the crimes adjudicated in Supreme Court, New York County, namely homicide, sexual assault, drug sale, robbery, burglary, and other violent and non-violent serious felony offenses,” Lantry continued.

The judge expanded on the decision that Bragg and his office almost daily “move to dismiss significantly more serious counts or entire indictments” and avoid harsher penalties for far more violent and convicted felons. Bragg also recently allowed a group of all but a single illegal immigrant to be released without bail after they allegedly beat up two NYPD officers. He later defended this saying that the video evidence was not enough to hold the foreign nationals.

NYC government officials, including Bragg, have faced increasing scrutiny over the government’s lackluster effort to control crime in the city as well as the high influx of illegal immigrants.

Kristi Noem: ‘Somebody’s Running the White House. I Don’t Believe It’s Joe Biden’
‘We see the president undermining our country by allowing this invasion at the southern border, it’s destabilizing our country,’ the South Dakota governor said.

South Dakota governor Kristi Noem said President Joe Biden is not running the White House, but someone else is governing the country as she raised concerns over the border crisis that is “an extreme remaking of America.”

During an interview on Fox News on Feb. 4, when asked by host Maria Bartiromo why President Biden is providing free housing and health care to illegal immigrants, Ms. Noem said, “He’s weak. Somebody’s running the White House. I don’t believe it’s Joe Biden. He’s never been this extreme. This is an extreme remaking of America.”

“It is a socialist-communist agenda. I think that they’ve so infiltrated the Democrat party that it’s no longer the Democrat Party of 20 years ago; it’s now a socialist party that does not want a strong America,” she added.

Ms. Noem is one of over a dozen GOP governors who have visited Texas to show their support for Gov. Greg Abbott in his fight with the Biden administration over the influx of illegal immigrants crossing the border in Eagle Pass.

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) estimated throughout the 2023 fiscal year, 2.4 million people illegally crossed the border, up from 2.3 million the previous year. In contrast, between Oct. 1, 2019, to Sept. 30, 2020, before President Biden took office, there were only 458,000 encounters with illegal immigrants by border patrol agents.

In the interview, South Dakota’s governor criticized the Biden administration for the border crisis. “We see the president undermining our country by allowing this invasion at the southern border, and it’s destabilizing our country,” she said.

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Why Burn Books When You Can Bury Them? The White House Pressured Amazon to Target Dissenting Books

The House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government on Monday revealed yet another facet of the Biden Administration’s sprawling censorship system that targeted dissenting books. It appears that, as with social media companies, it succeeded in getting the company not to promote disfavored books.

Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan revealed on X that the White House was directly involved in the censorship campaign. That includes a 2021 email from one Biden official asking to discuss “the high levels of propaganda and misinformation and disinformation of [sic] Amazon?”

Amazon in turn appears to ask only how high the Biden White House wants it to jump on censorship: “[i]s the [Biden] Admin asking us to remove books, or are they more concerned about search results/order (or both)?”

After the meeting, Amazon confirmed in an email that it was actively doing what the government demanded in suppressing sales by not promoting disfavored books: “As a reminder, we did enable Do Not Promote for anti-vax books whose primary purpose is to persuade readers vaccines are unsafe or ineffective on 3/9, and will review additional handling options for these books with you.”

This effort notably parallels demands from Democratic leaders who have called for enlightened algorithms to frame what citizens access on the internet. In 2021, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) objected that people were not listening to the informed views of herself and leading experts. Instead, they were reading views of skeptics by searching Amazon and finding books by “prominent spreaders of misinformation.”

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Government should be good for the liberty of the governed, and that is when it governs to the least possible degree. It should be good for the wealth of the nation, and that is when it acts as little as possible upon the labor that produces it and when it consumes as little as possible. It should be good for the public security, and that is when it protects as much as possible, provided that the protection does not cost more than it brings in…. It is in losing their powers of action that governments improve. Each time that the governed gain space there is progress.
-Augustin Theirry