You'll notice that for Drudge now it's NOT an echo of the eight-hour unknown whereabouts of Obama during the Benghazi attack

 

Obama Aide Pfeiffer: "Largely Irrelevant Fact" Where Obama Was During Benghazi Attack

Ailes on Benghazi: Where Was Our Commander-in-Chief?

 

President Obama didn’t make any phone calls the night of the Sept. 11 attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, the White House said in a letter to Congress released Thursday

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta testified this morning on Capitol Hill that President Barack Obama was absent the night four Americans were murdered in Benghazi on September 11, 2012

General on Benghazi: 'We Never Received a Request for Support from the State Department'

Live video from a drone flying over the U.S. Consulate during the Sept. 11 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, was monitored at a Defense Department facility, but was not fed to the White House, senior officials say

 

 

While America has been bogged down in Afghanistan, China has been building nukes

 From Bill Gertz:

China is building a third missile field that will hold more than 100 new DF-41 intercontinental ballistic missiles, The Washington Times has learned.

Construction of a silo array for DF-41s was identified from satellite imagery by U.S. intelligence agencies in the past several weeks and appears equal in size to two other new Chinese missile fields recently identified, according to Pentagon officials familiar with intelligence reports on the strategic development.

Adm. Charles Richard, commander of the U.S. Strategic Command, said Thursday that the first two missile fields being built are part of China‘s “explosive” expansion of nuclear forces. ...

Analysts at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Monterey, California, first told The Washington Post in June that commercial satellite photos had revealed the construction of scores of silos near Yumen in China‘s Gansu province for the new missiles. Some missile sites were placed underneath a 230-foot cover in an attempt to conceal the silos from the prying eyes of satellite spies.

Last month, the Federation of American Scientists discovered the second DF-41 field some 240 miles northwest of Yumen near the city of Hami in Xinjiang Province. Xinjiang is also the location of China‘s active nuclear testing site, which the Pentagon said recently had begun increased operations after years of limited, irregular activity.

Mark Schneider, a former Pentagon nuclear policymaker, said the discovery of a new missile field is significant and indicates that Beijing’s ICBM force will soon be more powerful than U.S. nuclear forces were at the height of the Cold War.

“It is now beyond any reasonable doubt that China is going for large-scale strategic nuclear superiority over the U.S.,” said Mr. Schneider, now with the National Institute for Public Policy. “The new silos will give China the ability to deploy thousands of strategic nuclear warheads on DF-41 ICBMs.”

Mr. Schneider said he believes the main motivation for the large buildup is that Beijing is planning some type of military action in the next few years and hopes to deter a U.S. military response to action against one of China‘s neighbors, such as Taiwan. ...

Until the discovery of the DF-41 silos, China‘s land-based, silo-deployed ICBM force consisted of around 20 DF-5 ICBMs.

More.

 

 

As China expands illegal military operations in the Spratly Islands, the Biden administration is reiterating strongly its support for the Philippines

“The most significant change in military posture in 2021 is the appearance of Chinese special mission aircraft and helicopters at Subi and Mischief Reefs, indicating the PLA may have commenced routine air operations from those airfields,” Mr. Dahm said in an interview. ...

Beijing officials on Monday denounced a statement by Secretary of State Antony Blinken hailing the fifth anniversary of an international tribunal ruling that ruled against China’s claim to own 90% of the sea under the “Nine-Dash Line” boundary.

Mr. Blinken reaffirmed Sunday a year-old policy shift announcing that any Chinese military attack on Philippine military or civilian vessels or aircraft in the South China Sea would trigger the U.S.-Philippines Mutual Defense Treaty.

More.

Ice-Out in Nenana Alaska happened and I didn't even realize it

When I checked the Nenana Ice Cam yesterday the Tripod was still standing on the ice, but I didn't realize the event was already over.

It seems the ice broke up just enough to allow the Tripod to move a short distance to trip the clock in the tower it is attached to by a long cable.

The hitch was most of the ice was still in the river, and the Tripod evidently flowed upstream only just a little, which is to the right on the screen, and very odd. Normally it flows downstream, obviously.

I should have realized something was up because the flag rope was down, lying on the ice.

When I checked a few hours later the Tripod was gone and the water was flowing and I realized I had missed it as the ice cam page had the message:

THE ICE OFFICIALLY BROKE AND THE CLOCK STOPPED ON APRIL 30TH, 2021 AT 12:50 PM AST. THE 2021 JACKPOT IS $233,591.00 

Should have looked for that message the first time.

The Washington Times had the story here.

So add another Ice-Out to the period April 30-May 7 when the vast majority of them have occurred anyway since 1917. The National Weather Service pretty much nailed it predicting April 29-May 5.

Hard to go wrong with that in any year, to be honest.

National Popular Vote to become law in Nevada, making it 15 states and DC trying for an end run around the Electoral College

Nevada passes National Popular Vote bill in bid to upend Electoral College:

The compact would take effect after states totaling 270 electoral votes, and with Nevada, the total would reach 195.

President Donald Kushner to recognize Israeli sovereignty over Golan Heights

It would be nice if we had sovereignty, too, over America's 500 cities giving sanctuary to illegal aliens.

I guess we have to go to war to do that now.

ICE officers diverted from their jobs by DHS, assisting Border Patrol in catch-and-release of illegals, which is now in overdrive under Trump

Support for Trump dwindles among ICE officers:

ICE officers who endorsed President Trump in 2016 now say he has failed to follow through on his get-tough promises, saying catch-and-release of immigrants living illegally in the U.S. is not only still happening, but has gone into “overdrive.”

Our so-called friends the Israelis sold management of Haifa to China for 25 years for $2 billion

Israel-China port deal triggers U.S. Navy pushback:

While the Israeli Transportation Ministry struck the agreement with SIPG — a company in which the Chinese government has a majority stake — back in 2015, the Jerusalem Post reported Saturday that the deal is now coming under interagency review.

Citing Chinese state-run media reports, the Post noted the deal granted SIPG control over Haifa for 25 years in exchange for a commitment by the company to invest $2 billion in a project to transform Haifa’s bay terminal into the largest harbor in Israel.

The catch is that Haifa, Israel’s largest port city, regularly hosts joint U.S.-Israeli naval drills and visits from American vessels — a situation the Post claimed has triggered concern among U.S. officials.

 

Wow, Liawatha's actually JUST LIKE John Kerry, says "I'm gonna GET ME a beer"

"Can I get me a huntin' license here?"

Here.

Yeah, they're just like us.

Florida, laughstock of the world

Federal judge blasts Florida for bungled election: 'Laughingstock of the world':

“We have been the laughing stock of the world, election after election, and we chose not to fix this,” U.S. District Judge Mark Walker said in court, where he is at the center of the legal battle over the election recount.

Ford became "popular figure on the Dewey Beach bar scene" in the summers after alleged assault

Young Christine Blasey Ford remembered as popular figure in Dewey Beach bar scene in 1980s:

DEWEY BEACH, Delaware — Christine Blasey Ford grew up in Washington’s affluent Maryland suburbs, graduated from an expensive all-girls private high school and spent summers immersed in the wild nightlife of this Eastern Shore resort town. ... Longtime residents of Dewey Beach, a Delaware resort known in the late 1980s as a place where the college students who worked the other resorts lived and partied, remember her nights waitressing at the Waterfront, a raucous bayside bar. ... Ms. Blasey Ford was a popular figure on the Dewey Beach bar scene.

Russian non-citizen of the US was registered to vote in San Fran Freako without her knowledge, as a Democrat

Story here.

Seems the scam kicks into motion if you sign a petition on the street. The activists then turn in stacks of registrations with the petitions:

Ms. Shuvalova was signed up — possibly without her knowledge — by an organization circulating a petition for a 2013 ballot initiative to stop a massive condominium development on the San Francisco waterfront. A signed registration card was submitted with the petition to qualify Ms. Shuvalova as a petition signer, said John Arntz, director of the San Francisco Department of Elections. Activists often hand in stacks of registration cards with their petitions, he said. Election officials say they conduct routine cross-references of voter registration information with databases at the state’s Department of Motor Vehicles and the secretary of state’s office but did not flag Ms. Shuvalova as a noncitizen. The box for “vote by mail” was checked on her registration card, and the county began sending her ballots. County records show she received nine ballots but never voted.

Strzok testimony confirms partisan channel for accusations against Trump was through Ohr at DOJ, whose Russia expert wife worked for Fusion GPS, Democrat bankrollers of the dossier

From the story here:

The first-time disclosure is significant because it confirms an unusual and continuing channel for collusion accusations that started outside the government with anti-Trump people and reached Mr. Ohr at the Justice Department and then the FBI. Around that time, Mr. Ohr was communicating with dossier writer Christopher Steele. Mr. Ohr’s wife, Nellie, a Russia researcher, worked for Mr. Steele’s paymaster, investigative firm Fusion GPS, which was trying to damage Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump. Mr. Ohr met with Fusion co-founder Glenn Simpson after the November 2016 election. ...

Republicans now know that the dossier trail started with Mr. Steele, Mr. Ohr, Fusion GPS and Mr. Simpson and a journalist. Mr. Corn has denied he worked with the FBI. ...

“Bruce Ohr, the fourth-ranking official at the Department of Justice, his wife works for Fusion GPS in the summer. He gets information and passed it to the FBI. That becomes the basis to spy on the Trump campaign, plain and simple,” Mr. Jordan said. “This is the first time to my knowledge the FBI has admitted that . . .."

Hogg jumps shark, now calls for boycott of Blackrock and Vanguard over guns

Story here (photo here).

Rotza ruck with that, kid.

The president doesn't need any stinkin' reason to revoke any Executive Order, legal or otherwise

The judges in this country need a good ass whoopin'.

If Trump has any balls he'll ignore this.

The story, "Court orders full restoration of DACA program", here.

Trump has already caved on The Wall in the "negotiations", settling for 700 miles instead of 2,000

What a loser.

The Washington Times reports here:

Mr. Trump, meanwhile, is seeking a much less dramatic wall than the “sea-to-sea” version he touted during the 2016, campaign, presenting Congress with a scaled-back version that would cover 700 miles and cost $18 billion over a decade — though the president said he figures it can be built much faster and cheaper. ... Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer this week also declined to draw red lines on the wall, saying he saw progress in Mr. Trump no longer seeking a 2,000-mile-long barrier. ... A proposal from the Homeland Security Department, submitted to Congress last week, called for $18 billion in fencing and another $1 billion in new roads to patrol the fencing. The fencing would involve upgrading existing barriers and adding new ones, extending the current 654 miles of barriers to about 970 miles, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Senator Grassley says Comey's leak of his own memos included classified information

From the story here:

A top Republican senator said Wednesday that it appears former FBI Director James B. Comey leaked classified information in his effort to shape the narrative surrounding President Trump’s decision to fire him. ... He said he’s personally reviewed the seven memos, but was forced to do so in a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility, or SCIF. “The FBI insisted that these reviews take place in a SCIF because the majority of the memos are classified,” he said. “FBI personnel refused to answer factual questions during the document reviews, including questions about the chain of custody of the documents I was reviewing, the date that they were marked classified, and who marked them as classified.”

Joe Curl at The Washington Times is a lonely voice on the right speaking out against the Republican tax "reform"

Here in "Middle class gets trickled on again in tax-cut bill".

Or, as Fletcher might have put it, don't piss down my back and tell me it's rainin'.

House Republicans won't allow floor amendments to tax reform, will ram it through instead

House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Rep. Kevin Brady, quoted here:

He also said that there would be no House floor amendments to the bill, and that changes would be made in his committee and potentially in a conference with the Senate down the road.

Campaign Legal Center files complaint with Federal Election Commission over Clinton/DNC hidden dossier payments

From the story here:

The complaint from the nonprofit Campaign Legal Center said the Democrats effectively hid the payments from public scrutiny, contrary to the requirements of federal law. By law, campaign and party committees must disclose the reason money is spent and its recipient.