News Burst: April 18, 2017 (Patreon)
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Hey All,
I hope you are all doing very well!
First off, thank you for the kind feedback on yesterday’s North Korea video. I’m so pleased so many of you enjoyed it. I’ll be doing another “off the cuff” video for Thursday, further kicking the second CalExit video down the road a bit, though how far remains to be seen (I’d like to just get it up and out of the way as soon as possible, frankly).
Erin and I heard back that we are essentially good to go with our Santa Monica apartment, so, if all falls into place, we’ll be moving out of San Francisco in fewer than two weeks. I’m excited! Can’t wait to get the fuck out of here and start again somewhere else
With that said, let’s jump into the news!
Cleveland Murderer Takes Coward’s Way Out: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/18/us/facebook-killer-suicide-erie.html
My Take: As usual, the perpetrator of a terrible crime in which another person is killed and a family is left heartbroken has taken the easy and cowardly route out, and killed himself. Steve Stephens, the Cleveland-based psychopath who killed a completely innocent elderly man by shooting him in the head on camera and then posting it to Facebook, was found in Erie, Pennsylvania after a multiple day manhunt in which, somehow, the police were unable to find him. (That will always mystify me.)
We all know what happened and what this human piece of shit did, so we don’t have to recount it. I will say that I personally didn’t watch any of the video he posted. I felt like it was too much. Too far. Too disgusting. But I know a lot of people did watch it, and I hope you have no regrets there, because I feel like that’s the kind of shit that sticks with a person.
What I will do, instead, is to first give props to the McDonald’s employees who wisely held him up when he was trying to order food, giving the police time to respond to the scene. And I will also leave you with this: For me, this is a great example of why the death penalty exists. I’ll just leave it there, because I anticipate doing a video on the death penalty in the coming weeks, and I don’t want to be redundant.
In the meantime, I’m wishing the family of the victim the absolute best.
Man Shoots Up Fresno, Kills Three: http://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/crime/article145234709.html
My Take: The hits just keep on coming. Today in Fresno, California, a man named Kori Ali Muhammad killed three white men and injured another. Unlike piece of shit Steve Stephens above, Muhammad was captured alive, so that justice can hopefully be served.
Now, I don’t bring up the race of the victims as an inconsequential piece of the story: The perpetrator of the crimes reportedly posted on Facebook of his dislike of white people, and he appears to have radical Islamic ties of some kind, as some accounts have him screaming Allahu Akbar, while other accounts claim his social media posts make the same statement.
This story still seems to be developing, so I’ll leave it to you to read the story I’ve provided here from the Fresno Bee. Nonetheless, this is yet another example of what appears to be perhaps not radicalized Islam in the purest sense, but another killing inspired by radical Islam. I bring this up not to feign any sort of surprise -- this kind of shit just isn’t surprising in the least anymore -- but because we really do have to have a national (and international) conversation about this shit, and about what’s driving so many people to act in this way. It’s becoming more and more frightening in its predictability.
Will the US Shoot Down the Next North Korean Missile Test?: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/18/us-military-shoot-down-north-korea-missile-tests?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
My Take: It sure seems possible. This story from The Guardian, which is an exclusive, claims that The Pentagon is at least looking at the possibility of actively engaging with a future North Korean missile test in a way to further frustrate the advancements being made by Kim Jong-Un and his pack of flunkies. Note that The Guardian’s story says that the US is “considering” the move, and not “planning” on the move, which is a pretty important distinction. I’m sure there are all sorts of contingency plans in place.
The obvious gist here isn’t what the US does -- the US can easily shoot down a North Korean missile -- but rather how North Korea would react to a provocative move countering its equally provocative tests. Sources tell the paper that the US wouldn’t shoot down a missile unless it was adjacent to a nuclear test; still, Secretary of Defense Mattis has apparently briefed Congress on this contingency, and knowing Donald Trump, it’s distinctly possible.
Yesterday’s episode of Colin’s Last Stand goes into North Korea in-depth, so I won’t waste too much more of your time here, other than to say that North Korean leadership is profoundly unhinged, and I’d find it hard to believe that they wouldn’t react violently -- even in a limited way -- to their missile being shot down. Yet, it’s also worth noting that it’s rumored the US hack is responsible for the failure of the previous failed missile launch out of North Korea from days ago. So… who the hell really knows what’s what.
UK Planning to Hold Special Elections on June 8th: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4420886/Theresa-calls-General-Election-June-8.html
My Take: I find parliamentary politics so fucking strange, but that’s just me. I’m American, after all. Prime Minister Theresa May has revealed her plans to ask the House of Commons to allow for an early, special election on June 8th, one aimed to further reinforce her own legitimacy as Prime Minister, and to allow for a greater governing majority to be created in order to execute on Brexit and other such policy initiatives.
What’s interesting about this is that May has repeatedly promised not to hold snap elections. But, it appears that with opposing forces attempting to stymie the advancement of Brexit and other conservative initiatives the majority of the British population seemingly want, May has been left with no choice but to make such a bold move, one that apparently caught even those close to her by surprise.
It seems May is making an aggressive move to further strengthen her standing, which is wise. Yet, this is why I find parliamentary maneuvering so odd. I’m not saying the American system is the best, but we have elections on schedules. You can’t just rearrange the deck whenever you feel like it, whenever the political winds blow in a different direction. I understand that this makes countries like Great Britain far more agile than the United States, but I also feel like it means things are so much more politically driven on the other side of the Atlantic. And that’s really saying something.
I’ll be eager for feedback on this from CLS’ British audience, in particular.
Jon Ossoff is a Carpetbagger: http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/329235-georgia-dem-no-issue-i-dont-live-in-district
My Take: You know how I feel about carpetbaggers.
If you haven’t been paying attention, there’s a special election being held in Georgia today for an open House seat in the state’s sixth Congressional district. Thing is, the Democrat running for the seat, Jon Ossoff, doesn’t even live in the district, something traditionally looked far, far down upon in American politics. (This is one of the major reasons I loathe Hillary Clinton; she moved to New York, pretended to be a New Yorker, and represented us in the Senate without having any ties to the state. It’s bullshit.)
The seat is up for grabs because Tom Price of Georgia is now the Secretary of Health and Human Services in the Trump administration. Naturally, the Democrats hope to scoop up the seat, just as they tried (and failed) to in Kansas last week. Still, that Kansas race in a deep red district was closer than it probably had any right to be, and the same thing can happen here.
An important thing to note is that we’re unlikely to have an answer on this race tonight. This is a so-called Jungle Primary, meaning there are a ton of candidates running, and it’s unlikely anyone will reach 50 percent. If that’s the case, the top two runners in today’s count, regardless of party or affiliation, will run against one another in a final race in just a little while.
A US-Canada Trade War Over Milk?!: http://www.jsonline.com/story/news/politics/2017/04/18/kenosha-ready-president-donald-trump-visit-tuesday-afternoon/100595832/
My Take: The talk of Washington D.C. (and the rest of America) since Donald Trump was elected has partially revolved around protectionism and matters of trade. We’ve heard a lot about Mexico and China, a lot about steel and cars. But we haven’t heard a whole lot about dairy products and Canada, at least until today. Because it appears that President Trump may be taking aim at our friends to the north in order to protect down-and-out American dairy farmers.
This is actually a far more interesting story than it may sound. What’s basically happened is that a large number of Wisconsin-based dairy farms that typically do business with Canada have been told their contracts are being voided. The US blames Canadian policy; the Canadians blame the United States for creating a glut of milk that is flooding the marketplace. I had no idea this was happening at all until I read this story.
This is affecting dairy farmers outside of Wisconsin, making it more than just a political play (keeping in mind a narrow victory in Wisconsin contributed to Trump’s win over Clinton). Just an interesting little story to keep an eye on, one that won’t get a lot of airtime, but one emblematic, in its own way, of our increasing challenges on free trade markets all around the world.
Is Bill O’Reilly Going Down?: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/bill-oreilly-hot-chocolate_us_58f66fece4b0de5bac41a5cd?54f&ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009
My Take: I’m not so sure Bill is going to survive this ordeal, and it makes me wonder how it got so far and so out of control to begin with, considering the nature of the accusations against him, the scope of these accusations in terms of how many people are involved and how much time has elapsed, and the seriousness of the accusations combined with the front-facing job O’Reilly has. He’s essentially the face of Fox News, and has been for like two decades.
Accusers are coming out of the woodwork over these last couple of weeks, accusing O’Reilly of sexual harassment and other forms of misconduct that would get a normal person canned (and the company sued) in about two seconds. Fox News has admitted to settling some of these accusations monetarily, basically admitting guilt on behalf of O’Reilly in at least some of the cases. Making matters worse from an optical perspective is that Roger Ailes, who used to run Fox News, was run out of the company not too long ago for a similar string of accusations that are currently plaguing O’Reilly.
The major brunt of the story is that, according to reporting from New York Magazine, the Murdoch family is leaning more and more towards eliminating Bill O’Reilly’s position, which would be a major shift for Fox News, a company that hasn’t really existed in any way, shape, or form without him. It’s hard to overstate how dominant O’Reilly is in the ratings, both compared to others on Fox News and especially compared to his competition on CNN and MSNBC. Still, advertisers are jumping ship and O’Reilly seems radioactive. If he’s guilty of these charges -- and where there’s smoke, there’s often fire -- he should be canned posthaste. I’ve personally lost pretty much all respect I had for the man over the last couple of weeks, and I suspect all of you feel the same.