AwesomeCapital

Monday, September 2, 2024

‘Meet the Press’ host falsely claims Harris met Gold Star families of troops killed in Afghanistan

Kristen Welker, the moderator of NBC’s weekly Sunday political interview show “Meet the Press,” falsely asserted that Vice President Kamala Harris met with the Gold Star families of the 13 American troops who were killed during the ill-fated US withdrawal from Afghanistan.

Welker made the comment as she interviewed Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), who took the Biden-Harris administration to task for their treatment of the families.

Cotton noted that Harris, the Democratic nominee for the presidency, had not yet met with the kin of the 13 service members who were killed when a suicide bomber detonated an explosive device at an entry point to the Kabul airport during the chaotic evacuation on Aug. 26, 2021.

The blast killed 183 people and wounded at least 150 others — among them US and Afghan personnel as well as Afghan civilians seeking to escape aboard US military planes.

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The Arkansas senator drew a contrast between Harris and Trump, who was invited by the families to appear alongside them at Arlington National Cemetery on the third anniversary of their deaths.

Trump’s appearance at the wreath-laying ceremony at Arlington, which included a photo of the former president smiling and giving a thumbs up just feet from the fallen soldiers’ tombstones, prompted Harris and other Democrats to accuse him of using the hallowed space for a campaign event — which is forbidden by federal law.

When Welker brought up the Democrats’ claim, Cotton pushed back, saying: “They (the Gold Star families) wanted President Trump there.”

“They wanted to take those photos. You know who the families also invited? Joe Biden and Kamala Harris,” Cotton said, adding: “Where were they? Joe Biden was sitting on the beach. Kamala Harris was sitting at her mansion in Washington, DC.”

Harris, according to Cotton, “was four miles away, 10 minutes.”

“She could have gone to the cemetery and honored the sacrifice of those young men and women, but she hasn’t,” Cotton said.

“She never has spoken to them or taken a meeting with them.”

Welker then spoke up in defense of Harris, telling Cotton: “Well, they did met with them during the dignified transfer, they were there with them at the dignified transfer.”

Fact-checkers noted that Harris was not present at the dignified transfer of the fallen service members, which took place at Dover Air Force Base on Aug. 29, 2021 — three days after the Abbey Gate attack.

The ceremony was attended by Biden, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and First Lady Jill Biden.

NBC News admitted that Welker erred, writing in an X post: “On our broadcast this morning, we incorrectly implied that both President Biden and Vice President Harris attended the dignified transfer of 13 American service members killed during the Afghanistan withdrawal.”

“Biden was in attendance but Harris was not,” NBC News wrote on its official “Meet the Press” X account.

After the 2021 ceremony, Gold Star families were particularly incensed at Biden, who was photographed during the event looking down at his watch.

Psaki had said that those who accused Biden of looking at his watch were spreading “misinformation” and that the images of him were used to make “him appear insensitive, concerned only about how much time had passed.”

But photographs and firsthand accounts from the event contradict

https://nypost.com/2024/09/02/media/nbc-news-kristen-welker-falsely-says-kamala-harris-met-gold-star-families/

Venezuela's Newest News Agency Says AI Anchors Protect Reporters Amid Govt Crackdown

One of Venezuela's newest news anchors sits on a stool, dressed in a flannel shirt and chinos as he delivers the day's headlines.

He goes by "El Pana," Venezuelan slang for "friend."

Only, he's not real.

El Pana, and his colleague "La Chama," or "The Girl," are generated using artificial intelligence, though they look, sound and move realistically.

They were created as part of an initiative dubbed "Operation Retweet" by Colombia-based organization Connectas, led by director Carlos Huertas, to publish news from a dozen independent media outlets in Venezuela and in the process protect reporters as the government has launched a crackdown on journalists and protesters.

"We decided to use artificial intelligence to be the 'face' of the information we're publishing," Huertas said in an interview, "because our colleagues who are still out doing their jobs are facing much more risk."

At least 10 journalists have been arrested since mid-June and eight remain imprisoned on charges including terrorism, according to Reporters Without Borders.

"Here, using artificial intelligence is... almost like a mix between technology and journalism," Huertas said, explaining the project looked to "circumvent the persecution and increasing repression" from the government as there would be no one who could face arrest.

The country's opposition and human rights groups have said recent arrests of protesters, opposition figures and journalists are part of a government crackdown meant to quiet a sometimes violent, month-long election dispute.

Venezuela's communications ministry did not respond to a request for comment about the AI journalism initiative. No official has responded to repeated requests for comment by Reuters about the arrests of journalists in recent weeks.

Both the opposition and President Nicolas Maduro claim victory in the July 28 election.

Maduro, in power since 2013, is backed by the supreme court and the electoral authority, which has not published full vote tallies because of what it says was a cyber-attack.

The opposition has shared what it says are more than 80% of vote tallies, showing a resounding win for its candidate Edmundo Gonzalez. Some international observers and many Western countries have said election conditions were unfair and demanded full tallies.

Protests since the vote have led to at least 27 deaths and 2,400 arrests, and detentions of opposition figures and protesters have continued as part of the government's "Operation Knock Knock."

Maduro and his administration have called protesters fascists and said they are inciting hate at the behest of countries like the United States, which Washington denies.

https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2024-09-02/venezuelas-newest-news-agency-says-ai-anchors-protect-reporters-amid-government-crackdown

BMW Worldwide Recalling Mini Cooper SE Electric Models Due to Battery Issues

German automaker BMW is recalling electric Mini Cooper SE vehicles due to problems in their batteries, which could potentially affect more than 140,000 autos worldwide, a company spokesperson told Reuters on Monday.

Around 39,000 vehicles could be affected in Germany, the company said in a statement on Monday, adding that there are no known accidents or injuries in this context.

Problems in the battery system can lead to overheating. "A vehicle fire, even when the vehicle is parked, cannot be ruled out," the statement said.

The software of the car contains a diagnostic function that recognises a malfunction of the battery and alerts the driver. Customers who received the messaged are asked to visit a Mini partner, the company said.

https://money.usnews.com/investing/news/articles/2024-09-02/bmw-worldwide-recalling-mini-cooper-se-electric-models-company-says

ASU Event Offers Dystopian, Anti-Capitalist Vision Of America

by Jonathan Turley,

In my new book and prior columns I have described a “radical chic” in academia, faculty who thrill audiences with extremist rhetoric and calls for radical reforms, even revolution. The latest example comes from Arizona State University where professors laid out their dystopian vision of America, a vision that apparently can be avoided by “dismantl[ing] capitalism” and “elect[ing] a female president.”

At the outset, it is important to note two things. First, the program covered by the conservative site College Fix was a small event. Second, these faculty members have every right to espouse these views and it is good for students to have a wide variety of viewpoints on campus.

My objection in the past has not been the presence of far left faculty on campuses but the purging of conservative, moderate, and libertarian faculty.

It is also important to address what are becoming common and extreme arguments on our campuses, including a growing anticapitalist movement.

The event titled “Jenny Irish’s HATCH: A Speculative Future for Reproductive Rights” was held both in person and via Zoom. Jenny Irish, an ASU English professor, was joined by Angela Lober, director of the Academy of Lactation Programs at ASU’s Edson College of Nursing and Health Innovation.

Lober, who runs major programs at the school, offered some of the most extreme viewpoints, including the assertion that “the United States hates women and everything the female body does.”

It was a remarkable claim for a nation that has been a leader in the world in women’s rights for over a century and has long had major female leaders from the Vice President to the Speaker of the House of Representatives to cabinet members.

Not to be outdone, Irish expressed her fear that the United States could see “forced breeding camps” and “cannibalism.” She told the students and faculty that “so much of our reality points toward those futures.” She was less clear on what specifically is pointing to that future other than the Supreme Court’s decision to leave abortion to the states.

Lober was, however, clear about the solution in calling for the audience to help “dismantle capitalism” and “elect a female president.”

The event was co-hosted by ASU Lincoln Center for Applied Ethics, which hosts events that aim to design “a future keyed to human flourishing.”

Putting the hyperbolic rhetoric to the side, the anti-capitalist calls have become ubiquitous on campuses. Socialism has become a rallying cry with polls showing that young people have a more positive view of socialism than capitalism.

There is an interesting dynamic to the push for socialism in the United States. Advocates may have a harder time convincing new migrants and citizens who fled socialist countries like Venezuela.

The draw of a “land of opportunity” has been due to not just our laws but also our economic system. The ability to sustain that growth (or support the existing social welfare systems) depends on a competitive economic system.

The irony is found in comments like those of Fidel Castro who declared that “my idea, as the whole world knows, is that the capitalist system now doesn’t work either for the United States or the world, driving it from crisis to crisis, which are each time more serious.” Cuba was (and continues to be decades later) an utter economic basket case without either liberty or prosperity.

Hugo Chavez made the same claim before driving his country into an economic tailspin.

As a student at the University of Chicago, I was fortunate enough to attend lectures by Milton Friedman and, despite being a liberal, I was convinced that there was a connection between capitalism and individual liberty. There are liberty-enhancing economic systems and those that are liberty-reducing. The freedom of economic choice in a capitalist system has historically reinforced individual liberty in my view.

The ASU event captures a rising call for dismantling an economic system that helped drive industrial innovation and massive wealth creation. It has also left great wealth disparities. We have sought to address poverty with social programs that offer greater opportunity for those who have not been able to escape cycles of poverty. We have much work to be done. However, the anti-capitalist movement often offers few specifics on the alternatives, as at the ASU event.

This is a debate that should be welcomed but not in this type of one-sided, jingoistic presentation. Imagine how much more substantive this panel would have been with an alternative viewpoint. Let’s have a discussion on the merits of capitalism and the record of alternative systems. That would offer educational and not merely emotive benefits to our academic community.

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Jonathan Turley is a Fox News Media contributor and the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. He is the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage” (Simon & Schuster, June 18, 2024).

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/united-states-hates-women-asu-event-offers-dystopian-anti-capitalist-vision-america

NY ruining its business reputation with legal campaign against Trump

Though former President Donald Trump’s criminal prosecutions have gotten most of the attention — and rightly so, given their unprecedented effect on an election campaign — it’s the civil investigation of the former president, his associates (including children) and his companies that may have longer-lasting effects.

Indeed, New York’s status as America’s business capital is tottering after a suspect, and excessive, judgment against the Trump Organization.

Back in September last year, after a four-year investigation by New York Attorney General Letitia James into financial fraud allegations that boiled down to presenting inflated property values to potential lenders, presiding Judge Arthur Engoron ordered the termination of the defendants’ business licenses and the dissolution of various limited liability companies.

In February, Engoron concluded that the defendants “failed to accept responsibility or to impose internal controls to prevent future recurrences” of having “submitted blatantly false financial data” to “borrow more and at lower rates” and assessed Trump and his companies $354 million of disgorgement of ill-gotten gains (plus interest).

These were odd developments because the law giving the AG authority to investigate civil fraud had never been applied to so-called victimless crimes, where no banks had complained because they knew to price in the puffery that is normal business practice in New York’s sophisticated real estate industry.

The case is now on appeal to the First Department of the Appellate Division, the state intermediate appeals court that handles cases arising in Manhattan. We filed an amicus brief for the Manhattan Institute, arguing that Engoron’s rulings are troubling exemplars of the kind of lawfare that discourages investment in the United States and undercuts job creators’ confidence.

The appeal, to be argued in the teeth of a presidential election, will set global perceptions of New York’s business climate for decades.

The heart of this case relies on a fundamental error in basic civil procedure. James uses a “preponderance of the evidence” standard — a “more likely than not” burden of proof typically reserved for ordinary civil disputes — even as she accuses Trump of quasi-criminal fraud rather than garden-variety civil infractions.

And the penalties sought are severe, including hundreds of millions of dollars in fines and a “business death penalty” akin to the kind of punitive sanctions one would expect in a criminal case.

Traditionally, when the state seeks to impose such draconian remedies, it has to prove its case by “clear and convincing evidence” — a higher standard that appropriately reflects the seriousness of the charges and potential consequences.

By accepting James’ lower standard of proof, Engoron set a dangerous precedent that undermines the principle of equal justice under law.

If his decisions are allowed to stand, it will open the door for future cases where individuals and businesses are subjected to severe penalties based on insufficiently rigorous evidence.

The implications extend beyond this case — and beyond Donald Trump, whatever you might think of him and his business practices.

New York, once the center of America’s commercial and financial might, is at risk of becoming a pariah for entrepreneurs and established firms that fear they could be targeted by politically motivated prosecutions.

When the rules of the game are manipulated to achieve political ends, the investor confidence necessary for economic growth quickly erodes. We’re already seeing that James’ actions have hurt the city and state, with businesses reconsidering their operations and some choosing to leave entirely.

And those harms are already occurring in the context of a broader business-unfriendly agenda by the state’s executive officers — with sales tax receipts shrinking, global businesses departing, and commercial properties showing record rising vacancy rates.

Indeed, New York’s actions here appear to be the tip of the spear of an onslaught of legal abuse: James’ sketchy multimillion-dollar scalp-hunting is emblematic of a broader trend in which the rule of law gets compromised in favor of political expediency.

The erosion of legal standards in high-profile cases not only undermines confidence in the judiciary but creates an unpredictable business environment.

Courts must remain impartial and uphold consistent legal standards that protect all citizens, regardless of their political affiliation or public profile.

New Yorkers — and all Americans — should be deeply concerned about the precedent this case sets.

A business can be slapped with a multimillion-dollar judgment for a seemingly victimless course of action, any impropriety of which need not be definitively proven.

If James can sacrifice the rule of law on the altar of her political ambition, New York is no longer a functioning democratic society or a suitable place to do business.

The ball is in the Appellate Division’s court.

Ilya Shapiro is director of constitutional studies at the Manhattan Institute, where Tim Rosenberger is a legal policy fellow. Adapted from City Journal.

https://nypost.com/2024/09/02/opinion/ny-ruining-its-business-reputation-with-legal-campaign-against-trump/

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