For many, own­ing a gun was ta­boo. Now they’re buy­ing them.

PITTSBURGH — Outside of that one time going to target practice with some friends while he was in medical school, the first time David picked up a gun to learn how to use it — this time for protection — was five years ago, when he went to a range a few weeks after Robert Bowers walked into the Tree of Life synagogue and killed 11 people who had gathered to worship not far from David’s home in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh.

“Handling a gun, let alone owning one, was not anything I had ever considered doing in my life,” said David, who asked that his full name not be used for fear of personal safety of himself and his family.

Once a taboo thought

“The ‘tradition’ of gun ownership, historically, in my family was virtually non-existent. Perhaps one of my grandfathers, who both served in World War II, had one — if they did, though, it was never discussed,” explained David, 49, who grew up on the Main Line of Philadelphia.

Under the keen eye of a trained instructor, who was also Jewish, David was surprised at how comfortable he was handling a gun. As someone who grew up in a community in which owning guns was unthinkable, he was surprised at how many of his friends also owned guns.

“Growing up, the mere thought of owning a gun or handling a gun was taboo. However, once I started having conversations with people after Tree of Life, I found the reality is everybody might be somebody who would buy a gun. It just depends on what it takes to get one,” he explained.

Still, he and his wife shelved the idea five years ago.

Then Oct. 7 happened — and everything else that went with it in the following days and weeks, like the brazen antisemitic graffiti splattered on the front wall of Allderdice High School and throughout the Summerset neighborhood, as well as the tire slashings, the defacing and burning of lawn signs that support Israel, and the woman using a hammer to hit the window of Marvista Design where a sign read “We Stand With Israel.”

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1 dead, 2 wounded in shooting overnight involving conceal carry holder on West Side

Chicago police responded to a scene overnight in the Humboldt Park neighborhood where three people were wounded in a shooting involving a concealed carry weapons license holder, police said.

Shortly after 1:15 a.m., officers responded to a call of a person shot in the 1600 block of North Hamiln Avenue and found three people struck by gunfire.

A preliminary investigation revealed a 31-year-old man was outside when he was approached by two people inside of a vehicle who got out with firearms and opened fire at him. The man who is a concealed carry holder fired back, striking them both but suffered a wound to the torso. He was taken in fair condition to Stroger Hospital. police said.

One of the men who was an occupant of the car, 44, was shot in the chest and was pronounced dead at the scene. The other man, 37, suffered a wound to the shoulder, and was taken in fair condition to Mount Sinai Hospital.
A weapon was recovered at the scene and detectives were investigating. .

 

25% of Vaxxed Now Have VAIDS, Cambridge Scientists Warn

A bombshell study conducted by top scientists at the world-renowned Cambridge University in England has concluded that 25 percent of all people vaccinated with Covid mRNA shots now have Vaccine-Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (VAIDS).

According to the study, one in four people who received a Covid mRNA injection suffered an “unintended immune response.”

However, the scientists note in their paper that the “unintended immune response” was “created by a glitch.”

While the Cambridge scientists and corporate media outlets attribute the damage to the immune systems as a “glitch” or “unintended” response, experts have been raising the alarm for some time about the effects on individuals’ immune systems.

Slay News has long been reporting on such findings.

“Cambridge scientists found such vaccines were not perfect and sometimes led to nonsense proteins being made instead of the desired Covid ‘spike’, which mimics infection and leads to antibody production,” the UK Telegraph reports.

“It was thought the minor tweak to uridine caused no problems in cells, but a team of researchers at the University of Cambridge’s Medical Research Council (MRC) Toxicology Unit have now found when this partially synthetic code is read, the protein-making machine in the body sometimes struggles with the uridine analogs.”

“These findings were shared with medicines regulator MHRA around a year ago, the scientists say, and updated vaccines that use the improved form of mRNA are in the works for cancer jabs, and other therapeutics,” the report adds.

Giveaways

 When a man shows you who he is, believe him.– Maya Angelou

Among the great weaknesses of the Right is our powerful desire to believe that our opponents are fundamentally just as decent as we are. There’s actually some rationality behind that assumption. If our opponents are not fundamentally decent – that is, if they don’t share our core convictions about good and evil – we have no chance of reasoning with them. As we’re determined to prevail politically with logic and evidence rather than through bloodshed, the assumption is vital to keeping our guns in the closet.

But the evidence is strong that the Left does not agree with our convictions about good and evil. Now and then we get more of it.

Quite recently, Pramila Jayapal sought to deflect discussion from HAMAS’s rapes and other brutalizations of Israeli girls.
From an open HAMAS supporter, the impulse to dismiss their atrocities might be understandable…but giving in to it indicates a missing moral foundation. Either that, or she’s seriously stupid. And yes, I suppose it could be both, though that leaves her tenure in Congress unexplained.

A few days later, a New York University law professor tried to justify those rapes as less evil than Israel’s military response:

It’s difficult to believe someone that morally empty could hold a law professorship at a prominent law school, but this is 2023.

The most illuminating giveaway of all is a few years old. Regard the little video below: a segment from a “debate” over what European policies should be toward the waves of “refugees” flooding Europe:

Note that the leftists, Simon Schama and Louise Arbour, scoff at the plague of sexual violence – rape, often gang rape, and often of underage girls – that the “refugees” have inflicted on the women and girls of Europe, and imply that the position of the Right is founded on prudery or “newborn feminism.” Mark Steyn’s riposte devastates them, simply by citing a handful of the known incidents the leftists were determined to dismiss with weak sarcasms.

But what does it really signify that Arbour and Schama regard violent sexual predation as something they can dismiss with a flip remark? Are these persons to whom you would entrust the care of a young girl? Would you be confident that they would protect her from the sort of vermin Mark Steyn cited? Or might their attitude be “Well, different cultures” or perhaps “Hey, these things happen” – ?

A man who’s willing to countenance the sacrifice of women’s and young girls’ bodies to debatable “humanitarian” priorities, or for the sake of some political or economic advantage, or perhaps merely to prevail over an ideological opponent, has embraced evil. Arbour and Schama have shed all pretense to the contrary. They have shown us who they are, and we should believe them.

Good men don’t compromise with evil. They don’t try to reason with evil. They fight evil. They do their utmost to destroy it. The rest is left as an exercise for the reader.

December 10

1520 – Martin Luther burns his copy of the papal bull Exsurge Domine (a denunciation of many of Luther’s 95 theses and an order to recant them) outside Wittenberg’s Elster Gate.

1684 – Isaac Newton’s theory of gravity, derived from Johannes Kepler’s laws of planetary motion, titled –De Motu Corporum In Gyrum – On the motion of bodies in an orbit –  is read to the Royal Society by Edmond Halley. Yes that Halley; the astronomer with a comet named after him.

1768 – The first edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica is published.

1817 – Mississippi becomes the 20th U.S. state.

1864 – During Sherman’s March to the Sea, Union Army troops reach the outer Confederate defenses of Savannah, Georgia.

1884 – Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is published.

1898 – The Treaty of Paris of 1898 is signed, officially ending the Spanish–American War, with Spain relinquishing all claim of sovereignty over, and title to: Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines.

1901 – The first Nobel Prize ceremony is held in Stockholm on the fifth anniversary of Alfred Nobel’s death, with Wilhelm Röntgen being awarded the prize in Physics for his discovery of X-rays

1906 – President Theodore Roosevelt is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his role in the mediation of the Russo-Japanese War, becoming the first American to win a Nobel Prize.

1941 – Imperial Japanese forces, under the command of General Masaharu Homma, land on Luzon island in the Philippines.
The Royal Navy’s Battleship HMS Prince of Wales and Cruiser HMS Repulse are sunk by Imperial Japanese Navy torpedo bombers off British Malaya while attempting to stop Japanese landings there.

1949 – President of the Republic of China,  Chiang Kai-shek and his government is forced to retreat to Taiwan when the communist People’s Liberation Army besieges Chengdu, the last Kuomintang held city in mainland China.

1962 – David Lean’s film “Lawrence of Arabia” premieres at Odeon Leicester Square.

1978 – Prime Minister of Israel Menachem Begin and President of Egypt Anwar Sadat are jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for agreeing to the Camp David Accords which leads to a peace treaty between the nations.

2021 – A widespread tornado outbreak hits the Central, Midwestern, and Southern regions of the U.S., killing 89 people with most of the fatalities occurring in Kentucky, where a single tornado kills 57 people, and injures hundreds of others.

How Anti-Gunners Manipulate the Data

Yesterday, researchers from Johns Hopkins said gun-friendly states have the highest rates of gun deaths. The problem with this statement is that ten of the fifteen states with the lowest homicide rates are constitutional carry states.

In a constitutional carry state, you do not need any training or a permit to carry a firearm. The researchers claimed to have used “advanced statistical modeling” to support their claim.

The study looked at 34 states that made it easier to carry a gun between 1980 and 2019 and compared them to “predicted” crime rates using data from “may issue” states.

Professor Cassandra Crifasi said, “If you graph all of the states in the U.S. by their rate of gun death from the highest to the lowest, a very clear pattern emerges.”

Several factors make this study inaccurate, but let’s look at the one that jumped out first. If you sort the data differently, you will get a different result.

The researchers used “advanced statistical modeling,” but @AHistory pointed out on X that ten of the fifteen states with the lowest homicide rates are constitutional carry. These states have some of the least restrictive gun laws since they are constitutional carry states.

Here are fifteen of the safest states based on factual homicide data, not “predicted” crime rates.

constitutional carry safest states

The researchers used the same old talking points that don’t hold up under scrutiny. “When states made it easier for potentially untrained gun owners to carry their weapons in public, assaults with guns increased.”

Part of that can’t be backed up with reliable data because what do they consider assaults?

“While the Supreme Court’s Bruen decision is forcing some states to weaken their concealed carry permitting systems, this study shows that states can reduce the expected increase in gun assault rates by including training requirements.”

This video from @wethepewple tries to explain the confusion since the gun control groups seem to be using fussy math.

 

Greatest Defensive Semi-Automatic Shotguns
While many solid options exist for a semi-auto scattergun to fill the home-defense role, here are three of the author’s favorites

Anytime you read “greatest,” “best” or “top” in a gun article, you can generally assume what follows will be filled with opinion. So, here’s my opinion of what I believe to be the best semi-automatic shotguns ever made for home defense.

Remington VersaMax Competition
Remington VersaMax Competition
In 2010, Remington engineered a gas action that is so simple it’s genius. Rather than using a mechanical gas regulator to cycle the action via two ports in the chamber—ports that easily get clogged—Remington added seven ports in the chamber so that the longer the shell, the more ports it covers up, thereby effectively regulating the gas pressure without adding any mechanical parts. I believe it is one of the most reliable and recoil-mitigating pure-gas actions ever invented.

Around this action Remington designed a gun that has every feature I want in a defensive gun, but none I do not. (To be clear, it made a similar version called the VersaMax Tactical, but I like the nearly identical Competition model slightly more.) The Competition model weighs nearly 8 pounds and has a 22-inch barrel. It comes with an eight-round magazine and a two-round extension, so it holds a total of 11, 12-gauge shells.

What I like most about it is its rubberized stock that features a super-soft buttpad and a gel-comb insert that does wonders for taming kick. Its receiver features oversize controls (bolt handle, action-release button and safety). Some of Benelli’s design influence is evident in its magazine-cutoff switch, trigger guard style and stock-adjusting shim kit, and I’m glad Remington chose this design to emulate.

I think it has the best sights of any shotgun on the market: A fiber-optic front bead combined with a shallow, express-style V-notch rear give it the best of both worlds. It is unobtrusive enough that I can hit running targets with it, but accurate enough for slugs at distance.

In sum, it’s my favorite do-it-all shotgun ever made. It points so well and has such mild recoil, I have actually taken it to the clays range by choice; other than the extended magazine, it fits right in. Its downside? Due to Remington’s recent demise (and reincarnation as Rem Arms), it was discontinued a few years ago. But, you can still find one online for around $1,350. If you don’t have one, I’d buy one now.

Benelli M3 Tactical
Benelli M3 Tactical
Benelli’s defensive dynamo is a top-end, semi-automatic that also comes with an emergency switch. In normal times, when shooting standard or heavy loads, the M3’s inertial, semi-automatic action functions flawlessly. But, when reduced-recoil loads or less-lethal options need to be manually chambered and extracted—or if you failed to clean the gun after a year at sea—the shooter can simply twist a collar mounted under the fore-end cap. This minimal movement unlocks the fore-end and engages the action rods of the pump system, instantly converting the M3 into a pump-action. Returning the control disengages the action bars, locks the fore-end in place and allows the inertia recoil system to function as a semi-automatic. Tell me this isn’t slick.

It wears a 19.75-inch barrel and features a pistol-grip stock. Unlike most Benelli inertia-action guns, the M3’s recoil-return spring is located ahead of the receiver around the magazine tube, so a spring tube in the buttstock isn’t needed. This allows the stock to be swapped for a folding or collapsing style if the user so chooses.

This M3 is often forgotten because the M4 won a military contract and became so popular, but I think the M3 might be the greatest combat shotgun ever made. Its downside? Most models I’ve seen at retail don’t come with an extended magazine tube, so you’ll likely have to buy one and install it (not a difficult task). I also don’t love ghost-ring sights, but they can be easily replaced. As for speed and reliability, however, it simply can’t be beaten because it’s both a semi and a pump.

In my opinion, it doesn’t handle quite as softly or as intuitively as the VersaMax or Beretta’s 1301 (I wouldn’t take this gun to the clays range), mainly because its stock is more of a tactical style, but then again, the VersaMax can’t turn into a pump with a flick of a switch. MSRP for the M3 Tactical is $1,599.

Beretta 1301 Tactical
Beretta 1301 Tactical
Beretta’s excellent 1301 BLINK system is an ultra-fast cycling, self-regulating action that is reliable and very good at recoil mitigation. When combined with Beretta’s useful tactical features—such as the seven- round extended magazine, oversize controls and an 18.5-inch barrel, you get a shotgun that’s fit for just about any Special Forces team on the planet. What I like about it most is that Beretta’s tried-and-true stock dimensions, including the important drop-at-comb measurement, tend to fit most people well, thereby mitigating recoil and making the gun easy to shoot intuitively.

The 1301, like the VersaMax, is another example of a tactical shotgun I could take to the skeet range and shoot a 24 with. What does this have to do with defensive applications? If you can hit fast and tiny flying targets consistently with a shotgun almost subconsciously, then slow, man-size targets become easy. It’s available with a traditional buttstock or a one that has a pistol grip.

As for my perceived negatives, I am not a big fan of the ghost-ring sights, but again, I may be in the minority on this point. Additionally, I can easily replace them with a Big Dot from
XS Sights.

If you asked me what shotgun I like better, the Remington VersaMax or Beretta 1301, I’d probably go with the Remington for the feel of its rubbery stock, its sights and its larger magazine. Then again, the VersaMax is discontinued, so replacement parts and service for it might be difficult to find. The 1301 from the world’s oldest firearms manufacturer, on the other hand, isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. Pricing on the 1301 starts around $1,700, with options, color variations  and configurations adding to the cost.

Gun rights group applauds after federal appeals court deals blow to NY concealed carry law
Gun Owners of America praised the Second Circuit decision but said the court should have thrown out all of the New York gun control law

Gun rights activists cheered Friday after a federal appeals court struck down parts of New York’s expansive concealed carry law.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit blocked three provisions of New York’s “Concealed Carry Improvement Act” (CCIA), a law Democrats passed last year in response to a Supreme Court ruling that declared the state’s previous concealed carry permitting requirements unconstitutional. In doing so, the appeals court allowed other parts of the law to go into effect.

In a 261-page ruling, the three-judge panel struck down a requirement that gun owners disclose their social media accounts for review when applying for a concealed carry permit. The court also blocked restrictions on carrying firearms on private property that is accessible to the public, as well as a restriction on concealed carry in houses of worship.

However, controversial parts of the law remain intact, including a requirement that applicants demonstrate good moral character and disclose household and family members on a permit application. New York will also be allowed to enforce bans on concealed carry in so-called “sensitive places,” including theaters, bars, public parks and other spaces.

Gun rights activists praised the court’s decision but said the judges failed to faithfully apply the Supreme Court’s precedent, arguing the entire law should be thrown out.

“Governor [Kathy] Hochul and her cabal in Albany never seem to get the message, and in turn, GOA is proud to have played a major role in rebuking her unconstitutional law,” Gun Owners of America (GOA) Senior Vice President Erich Pratt said in a statement.

“Nevertheless, this was not a total victory, and we will continue the fight until this entire law is sent to the bowels of history where it belongs,” Pratt added.

Friday’s decision is the first federal court ruling to consider potential limits on where licensed gun owners can carry concealed firearms since the Supreme Court expanded gun rights in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen (2022). Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in that opinion for the court that “the Second and Fourteenth Amendments protect an individual’s right to carry a handgun for self-defense outside the home.”

The consequences of the Supreme Court’s ruling have been far-reaching, upending gun regulations in several states.

The circuit court judges acknowledged their ruling won’t be the final word on New York’s gun control law as the case winds its way through lower courts.

READ THE SECOND CIRCUIT OPINION BELOW. APP USERS: CLICK HERE

Continue reading “”

By the end of 1775, during the first year of the American Revolutionary War, the Second Continental Congress operated as a de facto war government, having authorized the creation of the Continental Army, the Continental Navy, and Continental Marines.

A new flag was needed to represent both the Congress and the United Colonies, with a banner distinct from the British Red Ensign flown from civilian and merchant vessels, the White Ensign of the British Royal Navy, and the Flag of Great Britain carried on land by the British army

The flag became obsolete following the passing of the Flag Act of 1777, passed in June of that year, where the ‘Betsy Ross’ flag we are most familiar with was authorized by the Continental Congress.

File:Betsy Ross flag.svg

December 9

536 – The Byzantine Roman Empire’s general Belisarius enters Rome unopposed as the Goths garrison that had occupied the city flees, restoring the city to Roman rule.

1775 – Underestimating Colonial Militia strength in southeast Virginia by more than half, the British troops and Loyalists under the command of Lord Dunsmore are defeated in battle near Great Bridge, suffering such heavy losses it ends British rule in Virginia.

1835 – The Texian Revolutionary Army captures San Antonio de Bexar, following a siege lasting nearly 2 months and begin to refortify the Alamo Mission.

1861 –  The Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War,  to investigate the progress of the war against the Confederacy, is established by Congress.

1872 – In Louisiana, P. B. S. Pinchback becomes the first Black governor of a U.S. State following the impeachment of Henry C. Warmoth.

1911 – An explosion at the Cross Mountain Mine near Briceville, Tennessee, kills 84 miners despite rescue efforts led by the United States Bureau of Mines.

1917 – During World War I,  the Army of Field Marshal Allenby captures Jerusalem from the Ottoman Empire.

1941 – China, Cuba, Guatemala, and the Philippine Commonwealth declare war on Germany and Japan.
The American 19th Bombardment Group attacks Japanese ships off the coast of Vigan, Luzon.

1946 – The second convening of a military tribunal at Nuremberg begins with prosecuting physicians and officers alleged to be involved in Nazi human experimentation and mass murder under the guise of euthanasia.

1950 – Swiss born American laboratory chemist Harry Henrich Golodnitsky Gold is sentenced to 30 years in jail for helping Klaus Fuchs pass information about the Manhattan Project to the Soviet Union. His testimony is later instrumental in the prosecution of Soviet spies Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.

1968 – Inventor Douglas Engelbart gives what became known as “The Mother of All Demos”, publicly debuting the computer mouse, hypertext, and the bit mapped graphical user interface using the oN-Line System, a predecessor to the ARPANET, which developed into the internet.

1979 – The eradication of the smallpox virus is certified, making smallpox the first of only two diseases that have been driven to extinction. 10 years later, however, the U.S. Army decided to inoculate all troops due to a single case of a soldier coming down with the disease from an unknown source.

1987 – The First Intifada begins in the Gaza Strip and West Bank by Palestinian terrorists.

1992 – President Bush deploys U.S. troops, in Operation Restore Hope, to Somalia to help create a secure environment for humanitarian efforts there.

2006 – Space Shuttle Discovery is launched on STS-116 carrying parts of the International Space Station.

2008 – Governor of Illinois Rod Blagojevich is arrested by federal officials for crimes including attempting to sell the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by President-elect Barack Obama.

 

American Forces Attacked by Iranian Proxies 84 Times in 52 Days and Biden Does Nothing

US military installations in Iraq and Syria have been attacked by Iranian proxies nine times since Friday. According to senior defense officials, this brings to 84 the number of attacks on US forces since October 17, resulting in injuries to 66 American servicemen. The highest profile of those attacks was an attack on the US embassy in Baghdad. It was hit by a volley of 60mm mortar rounds on Thursday, and there were no casualties

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin used the occasion of his phone call with Iraqi President Mohammed Shia al-Sudani to condemn the attacks as “acts of terrorism” that “endanger Iraq’s internal security.”  He also “made clear that attacks against US forces must stop.”

As Austin made clear, it is no secret that Iranian proxy groups are behind the attacks (New Drone Attacks on US Forces in Syria, Iranian Proxies Claim Responsibility).

The same provocations are taking place in the Red Sea by the Iranian-back Houthis in Yemen. A US Reaper drone was shot down over international waters (Yemeni Houthis Shoot Down US Reaper Over Red Sea, the White House Response Is Crickets). Houthi drones targeted a US destroyer.

I’m sure that the usual isolationist fringe will say, “Why do we have troops in those countries? Why are our ships sailing in international waters? Shouldn’t they be on our southern border?” Those may be fair questions, but it is also immaterial and a shameless dodge. The National Command Authority has ordered our military to those locations to carry out American foreign policy. But in an environment where our troops have been attacked on 84 separate occasions in 52 days, we have launched a grand total of six airstrikes in the same time frame.

We allow Iranian proxies to lob rockets and mortar rounds at our troops. We’ve accepted, on average, one American casualty per day since October 17, and It is only a matter of time until Americans get killed. And the reason they do it is that there is zero risk attached to attacking Americans or American ships or aircraft because Joe Biden is so afraid of offending the Iranians that he’d rather see the coffins arrive at Dover AFB than have panties soiled under the man-dresses in Tehran.

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A Rocket Attack Targets the US Embassy in Baghdad, Causing Minor Damage but No Casualties

BAGHDAD — A rocket attack on the sprawling U.S. Embassy in Baghdad caused minor damage but no casualties Friday morning, U.S. and Iraqi officials said.

The attack is the first on the embassy located in the heavily fortified Green Zone of Iraq’s capital to be confirmed since the beginning of the Israel-Hamas war. The Green Zone houses Iraqi government buildings and embassies on the west bank of the Tigris River.

Iran-backed militias in Iraq have claimed responsibility for dozens of attacks that targeted bases housing U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria since Israel declared war on Hamas two months ago. The U.S. military says 78 attacks have been carried out against U.S. facilities over the past weeks, of which 37 were in Iraq and 41 in Syria.

An Iraqi security official said 14 Katyusha rockets were fired Friday, of which some struck near one of the U.S. Embassy’s gates while others fell in the river. The official said the rocket attack caused material damage but no casualties.

A U.S. military official said a multi-rocket attack was launched at American and coalition forces in the vicinity of the embassy complex and the Union III base, which houses offices of the U.S.-led coalition. The official added that no casualties and no damage to infrastructure were reported.

An embassy spokesperson said the U.S. Embassy was attacked by two salvos of rockets at approximately 4:15 a.m. (0215 GMT).

“Assessments are ongoing, but there are no reported casualties on the embassy compound,” the official said, adding that no specific group had claimed responsibility for firing the rockets as of Friday morning but early indications pointed to Iran-aligned militias.

“We again call on the government of Iraq, as we have done on many occasions, to do all in its power to protect diplomatic and Coalition partner personnel and facilities,” the official said. “We reiterate that we reserve the right to self-defense and to protect our personnel anywhere in the world.”

The three officials spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations.

Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani said in a statement that “targeting diplomatic missions is something that cannot be justified.” He called the attack an “insult to Iraq, its stability and security,” and promised to “pursue the perpetratrors of the attack …and bring them to justice.”

Sudani came to power with the support of a coalition of Iran-backed parties. But he also wants continued good relations with the U.S. and has backed the ongoing presence of American troops in his country.

While no group claimed responsibility for the embassy attack, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella group of Iran-backed militias, issued statements claiming separate attacks Friday on the al-Asad airbase in western Iraq, which is used by U.S. forces, and on a base located at the Conoco gas field in eastern Syria.

There are roughly 2,500 U.S. troops in Iraq and around 900 others in eastern Syria, on missions against the Islamic State group. In both countries, Iran has militias loyal to Tehran.

In response to attacks against American troops, the U.S. has retaliated with airstrikes three times in Syria since Oct. 17, targeting weapons depots and other facilities linked directly to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps and the militias. The U.S. also struck multiple sites in Iraq late last month after a militia group for the first time fired short-range ballistic missiles at U.S. forces at al Asad air base.

UN climate summit serving gourmet burgers, BBQ as it calls for Americans to stop eating meat

The ongoing United Nations COP28 climate summit in Dubai is offering a wide variety of gourmet food options from vendors who serve beef, even as it prepares a report that is expected to call for the West to reduce consumption of beef.

According to the summit’s online portal, its food offerings include “juicy beef,” “slabs of succulent meat,” smoked wagyu burgers, Philly cheesesteaks and “melt-in-your-mouth BBQ” in addition to African street BBQ, fast casual Mexican fare and an Asian option that has a “touch of French flair.” The revelation comes as the U.N. faces criticism for preparing a first-of-its-kind report that is expected to be published at the summit and call for lower meat consumption.

The U.N.’s Food & Agriculture Organization (FAO) will publish its first-ever global food systems’ road map during an upcoming COP28 session, which is expected to recommend nations that “over-consume meat” to limit their consumption as part of a broader effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The U.N. has, for years, called for individuals to ditch animal-based diets, which it says “have a high impact on our planet.”

“FAO emphasizes the critical need for an innovative plan and a concrete package of solutions to overhaul agrifood systems,” the organization said in a statement to Fox News Digital. “The Global Roadmap is positioned as a strategic tool to demonstrate that accelerated climate actions can transform agrifood systems, simultaneously addressing food security and nutrition challenges today and in the future without breaching the 1.5 degrees threshold. In this roadmap, FAO is urging for good food for today and tomorrow.”

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Biden/Buttigieg DEI Policies Endanger the Country. They Don’t Care.
The FAA is seeking people suffering from “severe intellectual and psychiatric disabilities” to be air traffic controllers.

The country currently is in the throes of an epidemic of mass insanity and irrationality. The manifestations of the disorder are too numerous to cite, but the explosion of the DEI plague being pushed by the government, many businesses, and the intellectual pigmies in most of the media, must be included in any list of the most egregious. As currently advocated and practiced by our leftist “elites,”1 it is incompatible with rationality, common sense, and morality, among other things, and, as the Wall Street Journal, not to mention the Supreme Court, have pointed out, the U.S. Constitution.

There is a brand of this particular wokeness that is relatively unknown to the general public, but that is particularly irrational and dangerous.  It is the Federal Aviation Administration’s relatively young DEI mandates. These Biden/Buttigieg DEI commands now apply to the employment of FAA air traffic controllers in an insidious way, a way that threatens the safety of our skies and of anyone who flies.

WHAT DO AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLERS DO?

To understand how insidious and dangerous the FAA’s DEI policies are, it is necessary to examine briefly just what air traffic controllers do and the nature of the job. The description that follows includes some detail about their tasks. Bear with me because it shows that being an ATC is not a job for dummies, or even for intellectual giants who cannot make crucial decisions in a short amount of time while under great stress.

First, just to be considered for possible employment, an ATC candidate must first pass a battery of seven tests covering numerical calculations, progressively difficult memory tests, problems involving rapidly changing image relationships, visual computer problems simulating collision avoidance, reading comprehension, logical reasoning, and a personality test. A description of the tests and sample problems are here. Take a stab at some of the sample problems to see how difficult they are and the built-in time limitations and pressures.

By the time they finish their training, ATCs must be experts in a number of areas that affect safety. These include weather, types of aircraft and their characteristics, navigation and the use of multiple types of navigational aids, effective communications with pilots, and radio and radar operations. To ensure pilot and passenger safety, ATCs must be skilled in, among other things, math, including the ability to make quick calculations in a dynamic environment, problem-solving, effective communication, and split-second decision making.

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This CNN Reporter Just Had a Come to Jesus Moment About Hamas.

A veteran CNN Middle East reporter with two decades of experience now admits that “too many of us treated the group more like an opposition party with occasional violent outbursts than a terrorist organization.”

“Journalists working in conflict zones,” Ilene Prusher wrote in a CNN op-ed this week, “too often pull punches in the interest of appearing neutral, or perhaps to ensure that they stay in the good graces of the gunmen in charge.”

Prusher concludes that “if journalists continue to interview members of Hamas, we should report their words more critically and not take their comments at face value. We should provide context that notes how unverifiable their information is and how poor their track record for accuracy has been.”

There’s a word for that: journalism. Let’s give Prusher two cheers for encouraging her colleagues to actually commit some for a change.

I might fairly ask Prusher, “What took you so long?” It isn’t as though she were ignorant of the Middle East and its major players. But since it’s my policy never to interrupt someone when they’re busy talking their way over to my side of an issue, I’ll leave her be.

“By and large, we reporters ate it up,” she explained without prompting, in no small part because “Our editors wanted us to have access to this shadowy group.”

What is access, anyway?

Last month when I was in Miami for the previous GOP presidential debate, Yours Truly (and the rest of the Townhall crew in town that night) were granted access to the post-debate spin room. That meant we would have the chance to speak one-on-one with the candidates or maybe their managers and surrogates.

Please note: It’s called the spin room because that’s where the candidates, their managers, and their surrogates go to put their spin on what just happened. Spin can be anything from putting a friendlier face on a fierce debate performance to literally (not really) polishing a turd and hoping some know-nothing reporter will pick it up and run with it.

But getting and keeping access can be a whole lot more complicit than anything that happens in a spin room between candidate and reporter.

Infamously, CNN used to downplay Saddam Hussein’s atrocities against the people of Iraq to maintain the network’s access to the Hussein regime. That was a case where the appearance of reporting the news — “Hey, we’re talking to all these Iraqi officials, so it must be real news!” — was more important to CNN than actually reporting the news. They were happy to be lied to and to repeat those lies because it filled airtime and sold commercials.

The mainstream media’s dirty little secret is that so much reporting involves little more than getting and maintaining access to important people by giving them the airtime they desire.

And yet, “How often did that stop us from reporting what they told us?” as Prusher asked in her come-to-Jesus column. “That dynamic was on display last month when many mainstream media outlets immediately repeated Hamas’ claim that an Israeli air strike had devastated a hospital and killed a big round figure of 500 Palestinians.”

Prusher and so many others are — or in her case, was — happy to trade integrity for the allure of access to a “shadowy group” who expertly preyed on their vanities.

Except, of course, for the mainstream media’s reporters and stringers who are all-in with Hamas to begin with and never had any integrity to begin with.