Dems try to strip candidates from the ballot, in the name of democracy

 Across news sites, Democrats are warning of the imminent death of democracy. Hillary Clinton has warned that a Trump victory would be the end of democracy. MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow is warning of “executions.” Even actors like Robert DeNiro are predicting that this may be our very last democratic election.

Yet these harbingers of tyranny are increasingly pursuing the very course that will make their predictions come true. The Democratic Party is actively seeking to deny voters choices in this election, supposedly to save democracy.

Henry Ford once promised customers any color so long as it is black. Democrats are adopting the same approach to the election: You can have any candidate on the ballot, as long as it’s Joe Biden.

This week, the Executive Committee of the Florida Democratic Democracy told voters that they would not be allowed to vote against Biden. Even though he has opponents in the primary, the party leadership has ordered that only Biden will appear on the primary ballot. 

And if you want to register your discontent with Biden with a write-in vote, forget about it. Under Florida law, if the party approves only one name, there will be no primary ballots at all. The party just called the election for Biden before a single vote has been cast.

This is not unprecedented. It happened with Barack Obama in 2012 and, on the Republican side, with George W. Bush in 2004. It was wrong then, and it is wrong now. 

As Democratic presidential candidate Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minn.) noted, “Americans would expect the absence of democracy in Tehran, not Tallahassee. Our mission as Democrats is to defeat authoritarians, not become them.”

In Iran, the mullahs routinely bar opposition candidates from ballots as “Guardians” of the ballots.

There is good reason for the Biden White House to want the election called before it is held. A CNN poll found that two out of three Democrats believe that the party should nominate someone else. A Wall Street Journal poll that found 73 percent of voters say Biden is “too old to run for president.”

The party leadership is solving that problem by depriving Democratic voters of a choice. 

In other states, Democratic politicians and lawyers are pursuing a different strategy: “You can have any candidate, as long as it isn’t Trump.”

They are seeking to bar Trump from ballots under a novel theory about the 14th Amendment. In states from Colorado to Michigan, Democratic operatives are arguing that Trump must be taken off the ballots because he gave “aid and comfort” to an “insurrection or rebellion.” Other Democrats have called for more than 120 other Republicans to be stripped from the ballots under the same claim tied to the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. 

This effort is being supported by academics such as Laurence Tribe, who previously called for Trump to be charged with the attempted murder of former Vice President Mike Pence.

In a recent filing supporting this effort, figures as prominent as media lawyer Floyd Abrams and Berkeley Dean Erwin Chemerinsky have told the Colorado Supreme Court that preventing voters from being able to cast their votes for Trump is just a way of “fostering democracy.” So long as courts believe that a candidate’s speech is “capable of triggering disqualification,” that speech is unprotected in their view.

I have long criticized this theory as legally and historically unfounded. It is also an extremely dangerous theory that would allow majorities in different states to ban opposing candidates in tit-for-tat actions.

So far, these efforts around the country have met with defeat in court after court, but the effort continues, and with the support of many in the media.

Some national polls show Trump as the most popular candidate for the 2024 election, while a few show Biden slightly ahead. Yet, despite 74 million voters supporting Trump in the last election, these Democrats are insisting that voters should not be allowed to vote for him, in the name of democracy.

In fairness to Democratic partisans like Clinton and Maddow, they could well be right. The 2024 election could well prove the end to democracy — if these efforts succeeded in purging ballots of opposing candidates.

It is all part of an electoral variation on the Vietnam War claim that it is sometimes necessary to destroy a village in order to save it.

Democrats claim to be right and to have the best of motivations, which is why they feel justified in saving democracy by denying it to the voters. After all, it is all about motivation where any means are justified. They are trying to save democracy by limiting it.

Thus, it is an assault on democracy for Republican lawyers to challenge elections based on alleged problems with voting machines, but it is protecting democracy for former Clinton general counsel (and founder of the “Democracy Docket”) Marc Elias to claim that a machine could flip the results in favor of the GOP.

In Tehran, a popular joke emerged after the “Guardian Council” approved only one candidate, Chief Justice Ebrahim Raisi, to appear on a ballot. Democracy, the joke went, was safe, because the Guardians would allow Raisi to run against six other spellings of his own name. 

The American election guardians in Florida did one better. They have arranged for there to be no ballot at all. Who needs the pretense of a primary when you can simply dictate the result?

Yet, rest assured, you may be able to cast a vote for an approved slate of candidates of healthy choices. Consider it a type of “Big Gulp” election, where you are protected against your own bad choices like a sugary drink at 7-11.

Actor Seth Rogen has pledged to “vote for whoever is the Democrat. That’s all I need to know.” If these efforts are successful, many voters could be left with that single liberating choice and no other.

Jonathan Turley is the J.B. and Maurice C. Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at the George Washington University Law School.

https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/4338242-democrats-try-to-strip-candidates-from-the-ballot-in-the-name-of-democracy/

COP28 host faces scrutiny over oil ties, human rights

 As the 28th United Nations climate change conference (COP28) begins in Dubai, the venue itself is facing scrutiny over the influence of the United Arab Emirates’s (UAE) oil industry and reported human rights abuses in the country.

Critics have pointed out the irony of holding a climate summit in a nation heavily reliant on the production and burning of fossil fuels — which drive the climate crisis.

The UAE is the seventh largest producer of oil worldwide and is a member of a group of oil-producing countries called OPEC.

And the leadership of the conference by Sultan Ahmed al-Jaber — head of the UAE’s national oil and gas company — has invited skepticism about the sincerity of the discussions.

When al-Jaber’s appointment as the head of the conference was announced, environmental activists criticized the decision as hypocritical.

He faces fresh scrutiny after documents published by the Centre for Climate Reporting and the BBC this week appeared to show the UAE COP team’s plans to further the interests of the national oil company during the conference.

The news outlets described these documents as including briefings prepared by the COP28 team for meetings held by al-Jaber.

Some of the documents were posted online and list “potential discussion areas” relating to the oil company.

On Wednesday, al-Jaber pushed back against the reports, which he said were “false, not true, incorrect and not accurate.”

“I promise you never ever did I see these talking points that they refer to or that I ever even used such talking points in my discussions,” he said, arguing that the UAE didn’t need to use its position as COP leader to make oil deals.

Al-Jaber received significant condemnation over the reporting, including from a group of U.S. senators who said it “raises alarms about the integrity of the entire summit.”

“COPs are the world’s best shot to address the global climate crisis. We can’t let COP28 fall victim to fossil fuel industry malfeasance and greed before the summit even starts,” Sens. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) and Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) said in a statement.

The reports are also emboldening some critics of the COP summits. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) posted on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, in response, saying that “everyone knows that global ‘climate goals’ are a joke except the Biden administration.”

Rubio also said that the UAE intends to expand its oil and gas industry and “is using the climate conference to do it.” The government last year announced plans to spend $150 billion to produce new oil and gas developments that would turn out 10 times as much of the fuels as what the International Energy Agency has calculated would keep the climate at a safe level.

Some experts have made the counterargument that the UAE’s position as an unabashed stronghold of fossil fuels — and al-Jaber’s recent embarrassment — makes the country the ideal venue to secure an endgame for fossil fuels.

After the allegations, “the UAE now has even more reason to push for a fossil fuel phase-down agreement to show the world that it is serious about becoming the first post-petroleum OPEC country,” former U.S. State Department climate lawyer Nigel Purvis, CEO of Climate Advisers, told The Associated Press.

Debate at COP28 is likely to focus on the question of whether fossil fuel extraction and use — which last year hit record levels — should ultimately be ended or simply reduced.

In conference terms, the debate will be between whether the world should pursue a “phaseout” — the ultimate end of global dependence on the fuels — or a “phasedown,” in which their use continues at lower levels.

In a July interview with The Guardian, al-Jaber, signaled support for the second option, at least in the short term. “Phasing down fossil fuels is inevitable and it is essential — it’s going to happen,” he said.

“What I’m trying to say is you can’t unplug the world from the current energy system before you build the new energy system. It’s a transition: Transitions don’t happen overnight, transition takes time.”

The leaked news of oil deals potentially being pursued COP are “a real big cause for concern,” said Gillian Cooper of the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty — a movement to create a binding treaty to end fossil fuel expansion whose signatories include the European Union.

But Cooper noted that al-Jaber “has made some really important statements on the necessity and the inevitability of phase out, and he seems to be considering this as a really historic moment for COP28.”

She also noted, however, that the risk remained of “loophole” terms being inserted into a final deal: “terms like ‘unabated fossil fuels,’ or ‘inefficient fossil fuel subsidies,’ which are politically expedient but meaningless terms. Because there are no effective approaches for abating emissions. And, you know, there’s no such thing as an efficient subsidy.”

“So we are hoping that there’s clear language that is unequivocal about the need for the phase out of fossil fuels,” she added.

On the other hand, Sarang Shidore, director of the Global South Program at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, called concerns about the UAE’s oil production “a bit of a distraction from getting to solutions.”

“It’s one of those things where the public can get distracted if it focuses on these micro questions of [the] UAE’s worthiness,” said Shidore, whose think tank is anti-war. “The problem is so much bigger than that.”

The climate concerns have been amplified by the issue of human rights — also a big factor in last year’s COP27, which took place in Egypt under the repressive regime of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

The concerns on both counts — and what critics point to as the contradictions of COP28 — come together in the conference’s location, Dubai’s Expo City.

The city is powered entirely by a new fleet of renewable energy projects. But recent reporting by rights group Equidem has suggested that these very projects — which were funded by fossil fuel money — were built on the backs of migrant workers subjected to poor working conditions and inadequate rights protections.

Expo City has not responded to requests for comment from The Hill.

Public works projects across the Gulf States are largely built under the “kafala” labor system — Arabic for “sponsorship” — in which migrants are brought in directly by corporations, which maintain a great deal of control over their movements. Unions are illegal in the country.

The labor that went into building Expo City is characterized by “deep-rooted labor abuses and inadequate heat protections [that] contribute to climate injustice in multiple ways,” said Michael Page of Human Rights Watch, which noted earlier this month that workers building the city are often entrapped by debt.

In 2016, the UAE passed reforms to the kafala labor that in theory allow the 9 million migrant workers in the country — 90 percent of the population — to leave it without their bosses’ permission and to more easily change jobs.

But reports of abuses remain widespread. Several Equidem interviewees, for instance, told investigators that workers were unable to change jobs or retrieve their passports from employers until they worked off the debt they had incurred to come to the UAE.

“The company insists on deducting [about $2,400] in expenses from my monthly salary, and I can only reclaim my passport after these costs have been completely covered,” one worker said.

One worker told reporters of wage theft — which he said led to something like debt peonage.

“I did not get paid according to my written agreement. I submitted a complaint to the HR manager and supervisor. I complained but nothing happened,” he said.

“Since I paid a lot of money to come here, I have no choice but to keep working,” he added.

Equidem reporting also found that 57 percent of the migrant workers in Dubai — particularly those involved in the construction of the city’s infrastructure and renewable energy projects — were migrants from nations ravaged by the planetary heating caused by fossil fuels.

“Every year in my area, there is flooding during the rainy season due to which there is a lot of damage to agriculture and crops,” one Indian now working as a solar panel installer told Equidem reporters.

Back home, he said, that flooding meant that “there is no use in farming. That’s why I have come here to work.”

Many of these workers reported being made to work unpaid overtime in unsafe heat, while the vast majority said they couldn’t afford healthy food and had to sleep in dormitories stuffed to more than three times their intended capacity. About 40 percent said they were skipping meals.

Asked for comment by Equidem, Expo City asked for “details of the companies and, where possible, the workers, in order for us to fully investigate and rectify any issues.”

All this casts a grim pall over the negotiations, critics say: A principality that made its wealth heating up the planet is now using that money to build a glittering mirage of future progress — on the backs of the very people that heating has displaced.

That is a risky charge, however, to make from the conference itself. Because UAE law makes it illegal to criticize either the government or the countries attending it, “we are avoiding speaking publicly on anything that could be interpreted as criticism of the COP presidency or UAE as the host,” one leader of a U.S.-based Indigenous rights group told The Hill.

“We are waiting to publish our opinion on that until we have returned stateside safely,” they added.

https://news.yahoo.com/cop28-host-faces-scrutiny-over-103000326.html

As demand for EVs plummets, Biden’s green fantasy is pummeling US auto dealers

 From inflation to gas-stove bans, it’s clear President Biden and his top officials are living in an alternate reality. Perhaps no issue proves this point more than their unrealistic mandate for electric-vehicles, a multibillion-dollar effort to force Americans into cars they simply don’t want and can’t afford.

In a recent speech President Biden bragged that billions of taxpayer dollars were being spent to convert auto-manufacturing factories to produce electric vehicles and “build a network of 500,000 electric-vehicle charging stations all across America.” These actions, he claimed, will help “working families” and “create good-paying union jobs.”

But facts are stubborn things, and now more than 3,000 auto dealers are finally speaking up. Although not widely covered, Ford, GM, Chrysler, Volkswagen, and others have collectively laid off thousands of workers this year, due in large part to cratering demand for electric vehicles. Ford admitted this summer that its electric vehicle business will lose $4.5 billion this year. Globally, the number of jobs lost due to Biden’s mandated electric vehicle transition sits at 80,000. So much for “creating” jobs.

The promised build-out of charging stations has been equally disastrous. At Biden’s request, Congress set aside $7.5 billion in 2021 to build tens of thousands of electric vehicle chargers across the country. A recent analysis found that, despite the influx of funding, the program has yet to install a single charger. A $7.5 billion taxpayer “investment” with no return two years in is a tough economic pill to swallow.

Low market demand for electric vehicles should not be surprising. Technical experts have been sounding the alarm for years that actual adoption rates and fleet turnover — the rate at which old cars are replaced with newer cars — is significantly lower than the green agenda’s inflated political projections would have it. The EPA’s 2018 Mid-term Evaluation of Light-Duty Vehicle Greenhouse Gas Emissions Standards for Model Years 2022-2025 found that assumptions surrounding electric vehicle adoption, in particular, were grossly overstated and “didn’t comport with reality.”

In 2016, electric vehicle sales accounted for just 2.44 percent. Realistic projections from our nation’s top auto engineers were less than rosy. As candidly laid out in the official notice, “customers are not buying electrified vehicles at a rate sufficient for compliance.”

Biden has tried to manipulate this reality in many ways. Gas prices have certainly skyrocketed, from the moment his day one executive order initiated his plan to eventually ban all fossil fuels. Team Biden and Capitol Hill Democrats have shifted billions of taxpayer dollars toward a charging infrastructure that has failed to materialize, while also seeking to buy off the auto-manufactures.

Ford, for example, has received a $9.2 billion loan to build more batteries. For context, a Wall Street Journal analysis revealed that this is “$3.3 billion larger than what the company borrowed during the Detroit meltdown of 2008-09.” Ford is not alone; GM and LG have received $2.5 billion for similar commitments. Perhaps this is why their layoffs and production cuts have gotten so little attention.

While the manufactures roll in the billions of taxpayer dollars aimed at sweetening the otherwise unrealistic transition, American auto-dealers, and by extension their customers, are left holding the proverbial bag. Most Americans cannot afford or simply don’t want EVs. “Range anxiety” is very real, as it still takes hours to recharge batteries, versus minutes to fill up gas tanks. This is one leading reason why the majority of current EV owners still rely on gas-powered vehicles — 78 percent own a second gas-powered car to supplement their transportation needs.

Given the inflationary effects of Bidenomics, not even generous taxpayer subsidies can make the idea of buying a $56,000 electric car (on average) palatable for most consumers.

Despite these inconvenient facts, Team Biden is full steam ahead. The EPA’s latest regulatory mandate would require 50 percent of new car sales to be totally electric by 2030. Not only is this unrealistic, but any serious attempt to achieve it will waste money while severely damaging both the economy and the planet.

Auto-dealers with electric vehicles stacking up on their lots are pleading with the administration to at least pause the madness. It’s past time Biden started to listen.

Mandy Gunasekara, the former chief of staff at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, is a visiting fellow at the Heritage Foundation. She is also a contributing author to Project 2025.

https://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/4337224-as-demand-for-evs-plummets-bidens-green-fantasy-is-pummeling-us-auto-dealers/

Kirby says US would do the ‘same thing’ if it was attacked like Israel

 National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said the United States would do the “same thing” Israel is doing if it was attacked like Israel was on Oct. 7 as the country ups its bombardment of Gaza.

Kirby reiterated that Israel has a right to defend itself in the wake of the deadly attack launched by militant group Hamas on Oct. 7 when Fox News’s Shannon Bream asked about some proposals suggesting that the U.S. place restrictions on aid to Israel.

“Israel is a sovereign nation attacked in a brutal way on the seventh of October,” he said on “Fox News Sunday.” “They have every right and responsibility to go after the terrorist group that perpetrated these attacks and planet and oh, by the way, has made clear they’re going to do it again and do more. They every right and responsibility to go after them.”

“We would do the same thing — any nation would,” he said.

Israel’s retaliatory attacks on Gaza, which is where it says it is targeting Hamas, have resulted in more than 13,000 Palestinians killed, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry. Many critics have suggested that the situation in Gaza has turned into a humanitarian crisis as life-saving supplies like medical supplies, water, food and fuel run low in the territory.

Israel ordered more evacuations in southern Gaza on Sunday, where thousands of residents have already fled to escape the heavy bombardment in the north. This came after a weeklong truce ended on Friday after Hamas failed to produce a list of hostages to be released.

The weeklong truce resulted in more than 100 hostages released by Hamas in exchange for about 240 Palestinian prisoners released from Israeli prisons. However, it’s unclear when or if talks will resume to negotiate another temporary cease-fire.

Kirby said the U.S. has continued to share “perspectives and our lessons learned about urban warfare.” He emphasized that the U.S. is not going to stop giving Israel security assistance that it needs.

“Of course, we’re going to share that that’s what friends do, but they’re making these decisions. They’re deciding the targets that they’re going to hit,” he said. “We obviously will continue to talk to them about being as careful and cautious as possible.”

“We don’t want to see any more innocent civilians killed,” he added.

https://thehill.com/policy/international/4339889-kirby-says-us-would-do-the-same-thing-if-it-was-attacked-like-israel/

AstraZeneca, AI biologics firm Absci tie up on cancer drug

 Anglo-Swedish drugmaker AstraZeneca has signed a deal worth up to $247 million with U.S. artificial intelligence (AI) biologics firm Absci to design an antibody to fight cancer, the Financial Times reported on Sunday.

The collaboration aims to harness Absci's AI technology for large-scale protein analysis to find a viable oncology therapy, a leading focus of AstraZeneca, the report said. It did not say what kind of cancer they plan to target.

Absci and AstraZeneca did not immediately respond to a Reuters requests for comment.

The deal includes an upfront fee for Absci, research and development funding and milestone payments, as well as royalties on any product sales, the newspaper said.

Sean McClain, Absci’s founder and chief executive, was quoted as saying the application of engineering principles to drug discovery improved the potential of success and reduced time spent in development.

Absci applies generative artificial intelligence to design optimal drug candidates based on target affinity, safety, manufacturability and other traits.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/finance/news/astrazeneca-ai-biologics-firm-absci-062755722.html

Number Of Kids Put On Puberty Blockers Doubles Despite NHS Promising To Stop

 by Steve Watson via Modernity.news,

The number of children placed on puberty blockers for ‘gender affirming care’ has doubled in the UK in a year despite the government run National Health Service saying it would stop the practice outside of clinical trials.

Dr Cass warned that puberty blockers could permanently disrupt the brain development of adolescents, and irreversibly rewire neural circuits.

Cass also charged that Tavistock clinic, where the ‘treatment’ is carried out, operates an “affirmative, non-exploratory approach”, diagnosing children with gender dysphoria without proper oversight. 

NHS England agreed with Cass’ findings and announced that “due to the significant uncertainties surrounding the use of hormone treatments” puberty blockers for children would be halted.

The report notes that Freedom of Information requests for referrals from the Tavistock’s Gender Identity Development Service have revealed that hasn’t happened.

The figures also do not include those given the drugs by GPs or privately, and are likely to be much higher.

Commenting on the findings, Psychotherapist Stella O’Malley charged that “This demonstrates that the culture war is more important than the medical war.”

Consultant psychiatrist Dr David Bell commented that the drugs cause “considerable damage,” adding “There are serious concerns about bone mineralisation and long-term cognitive effects.”

“We know 98 per cent of children starting puberty blockers go on to take opposite-sex hormones, and a very significant proportion of those go on to have surgery,” he continued, adding “They are being started on a pathway which is highly likely to be irreversible. Once you start them on that path, it creates a self-fulfilling prophecy.”

Bell also noted that “autism, depression, family trauma or sexuality” are not considered as factors which goes “completely against the Cass recommendations”.

Stephanie Davies-Arai, director of Transgender Trend, which campaigns for evidence-based healthcare, said “How many more children will be given blockers before they stop?” adding “I don’t understand how the NHS can sit back and let this continue when they know the harms that were described in Dr Cass’ interim report.”

As we highlighted earlier this week, NHS midwives have revealed that they are being forced to assign gender identities to new born babies on a new computer system, rather than register their biological sex.

https://www.zerohedge.com/medical/number-kids-put-puberty-blockers-doubles-despite-nhs-promising-stop

Trump calls on supporters to 'guard the vote' in Democrat-run US cities

 Donald Trump, the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination, told his supporters on Saturday to "go into" Philadelphia and two other Democratic-run cities to "guard the vote" in 2024, repeating his unfounded claims of widespread election fraud in 2020 as justification for the call to action.

Speaking at a campaign event in Iowa, Trump said it was important to scrutinize the vote in the battleground states likely to determine the general election. He singled out the biggest cities in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Georgia.

"So the most important part of what's coming up is to guard the vote. And you should go into Detroit and you should go into Philadelphia and you should go into some of these places, Atlanta," Trump said in Ankeny, a suburb of Des Moines.

Trump's comments foreshadow what is likely to be a contentious election in November 2024. Despite the failure of dozens of lawsuits filed by Trump and his allies challenging the outcome in 2020, Trump continues to claim, without evidence, that he lost to U.S. President Joe Biden due to fraud.

Trump did not specify who he was asking to "go into" the battleground-state cities. A campaign aide, when asked to clarify, said he was referring to poll-watchers and volunteers whose objective would be to ensure a secure election.

That would mesh with plans outlined by the Republican National Committee, which is aiming to recruit and train tens of thousands of poll workers and watchers in states that are hotly contested because their voting preferences could swing either to Republicans or Democrats.

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/trump-calls-supporters-guard-vote-014414157.html