#1
25 years in school, 35 years in some government sinecure, and 20years living like a wealthy person on the public dime was NEVER going to work, but Euroland tried to make it seem like it could since the 1930s. It fails in terms of money, and it fails socially. It's finally breaking down for them.
Those here who dream of that system should take note.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
05/24/2025 4:48 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Things change.
Are you living longer and healthier than when the prior retirement age was set?
Is the population at replacement level? If not, then the collection side of the equation for payments is decreasing to support the system.
[JustTheNews] The witnesses initially agreed to voluntary interviews but pulled back after President Donald Trump signed an order instructing the Justice Department to probe ActBlue, correspondence shows.
The chairmen of three powerful House committees on Thursday threatened to issue subpoenas after several current and former top officials of the Democrat online fund-raising platform ActBlue declined to testify in a probe into possible foreign and fraudulent political donations, according to correspondence obtained by Just the News.
House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, House Oversight Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., and House Administration Chairman Bryan Steil, R-Wis., revealed in the letters that several of the witnesses initially agreed to voluntary, transcribed interviews, then pulled back through their lawyer earlier this month after President Donald Trump signed an order instructing the Justice Department to probe the platform.
“As we have explained, the Committees are examining allegations that ActBlue, a leading political fundraising organization, allowed bad actors, including foreign actors, to exploit the company’s online platform to make fraudulent political donations,” the chairmen wrote in letters to the witnesses, which were sent to a lawyer representing them, Danny Onorato.
"Fraudulent political donations corrupt American elections could amount to interstate criminal conduct," the letters also state.
The letters laid out the testimony flip-flops for each of the witnesses, including ActBlue’s former chief revenue officer, Peter Slutsky.
“On April 21, Mr. Onorato indicated that you had agreed to appear for a voluntary transcribed interview and began the process of scheduling your appearance. However, on May 7, Mr. Onorato notified the Committee that you had changed course and now would not appear for a voluntary transcribed interview,” the chairmen stated.
“He cited a reported Executive Branch investigation into ‘the unlawful use of online fundraising platforms to make ‘straw’ or ‘dummy’ contributions or foreign contributions to political candidates and committees’ as the basis for your refusal to cooperate voluntarily with the Committees,” the letter to Slutsky and Onorato also states.
You can read that letter here:
Similar language was used for nearly all the witnesses who got the letters, which told the witnesses that an ongoing DOJ probe wasn’t a valid excuse for refusing to testify to Congress.
“The relevant precedent is clear that the mere existence of state or federal law enforcement investigations has no bearing on Congress’s oversight power,” the lawmakers wrote. “As such, an Executive Branch investigation into matters related to versight by the Committees is not a legitimate basis on which you may decline our request.”
The letters demanded each witness schedule their interview by no later than May 29 or risk facing a subpoena.
“The Committees are prepared to resort to compulsory process, if necessary, to obtain compliance with our requests,” the lawmakers warned.
The committees have been probing ActBlue over lax security measures and whether those vulnerabilities allowed foreign entities to donate to U.S. political campaigns, which is illegal.
In October, Steil and Sen. Ron Johnson, a fellow Wisconsin Republican, wrote to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, FBI Director Christopher Wray and Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines about concerns that four U.S. adversaries may have donated through the platform.
“We write to you to raise an urgent concern regarding potential illicit election funding by foreign actors,” the lawmakers wrote Yellen in a letter dated Thursday. “CHA has been investigating claims that foreign actors, primarily from Iran, Russia, Venezuela, and China, may be using ActBlue to launder illicit money into U.S. political campaigns.”
They also said: “Our investigation has indicated that these actors may be exploiting existing U.S. donors by making straw donations without their knowledge.”
The lawmakers specifically demanded access to any Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs) related to money passing through the fundraising platform generated by any U.S. financial institution as part of their anti-money-laundering activities. Congress has been pouring through those SARs in recent days after gaining access to them under the Trump administration.
ActBlue has acknowledged to Congress that it has updated its donor verification policy to automatically reject donations that “use foreign prepaid/gift cards, domestic gift cards, are from high-risk/sanctioned countries, and have the highest level of risk as determined,” by its solution provider, Sift.
The change occurred just three days after Steil introduced the Secure Handling of Internet Electronic Donations (SHIELD) Act, on Sept. 6, 2024, to ensure foreign money stayed out of online political fundraising. Before the change, Steil said, donations made with foreign gift cards were not automatically rejected by ActBlue before the change, Just the News reported.
ActBlue has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and says that it is fully cooperating with ongoing investigations.
"Democratic and progressive campaigns have trusted ActBlue’s two-decade-long track record of innovation and dependability to deliver during big fundraising moments," the firm said in a statement in June 2024 celebrating its 20th anniversary in business.
According to internal company documents reviewed by the committees, during the 2024 campaign cycle, ActBlue issued new standards encouraging staff to “look for reasons to accept contributions.” Before the policy change, the platform already failed to require CVV numbers for credit card transactions, increasing fraud risks.
An internal assessment by the company determined the policy change led to “between 14 and 28 additional fraudulent contributions each month,” the committees said.
The documents also show the platform began monitoring potential fraudulent donations from several foreign sources, including hundreds of donations from Brazil, Colombia, India, Iraq, the Philippines and Saudi Arabia, and other countries.
The lawmakers and Trump have both asked DOJ to probe ActBlue for possible criminal conduct.
Following up on a story we shared with you on April 25, more states are looking for their own “DOGE,” or Department of Government Efficiency.
In Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis launched a “DOGE task force” to audit spending, cut bureaucracy, and eliminate DEI programs. Earlier this year, the Georgia Senate passed a bill aimed at reducing costs and increasing accountability for state agencies by having them review and update rules and regulations every four years. Iowa’s Gov. Kim Reynolds announced the creation of an official state DOGE task force. Similar efforts in Kansas, Missouri, New Hampshire, North and South Carolina, and Oklahoma are looking to find those places within the bureaucracy that have become overgrown.
While most DOGEs won’t be led by someone as enigmatic as Elon Musk, they will all need direction. Virginia’s version of DOGE is the Office of Regulatory Management and has been around since 2022, when Gov. Glenn Youngkin issued Executive Order 19 creating it.
Most magicians don’t want to give away the secrets to their act, but Reeve Bull, the director of Virginia’s Office of Regulatory Management, sits down with The Daily Signal to explain how he and the Virginia government agencies that he’s been working with have made nearly 25% of Virginia’s regulations and fees “disappear”:
[TheDesk] Many independent contractors laid off by the broadcaster last week hold work visas that require continued employment to stay in the United States.
Dozens of independent contractors who were laid off at the Voice of America (VOA) last week are likely to be deported within the next month as a result of their job losses, The Desk has learned.
The contractors — around 60 in total — participate in the Exchange Visitor Program, which entitles them to J-1 visas to live and work in the United States as long as they are engaged in certain roles, including the production and distribution of journalism.
The workers were among more than 500 whose contracts were terminated last week by the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM), the parent organization of VOA. The layoffs come about two months after President Donald Trump ...Oh, noze! Not him!... signed an Executive Order that required USAGM and six other agencies to significantly reduce their operations and fire employees accordingly.
More than 1,000 VOA workers were laid off and hundreds of contracts were temporarily suspended, triggering legal challenges across the board. Those challenges have resulted in favorable decision by lower courts, some of which have been partially reversed by appellate judges.
Earlier this month, USAGM special advisor Kari Lake said the agency intends to partner with right-of-center news broadcaster One America News (OAN), which will license news packages that VOA can use on its radio and TV networks and digital platforms. So far, VOA has yet to broadcast or publish any OAN material, but the partnership served as a partial catalyst toward the independent contractor layoffs last week.
The 60 visa holders are required to maintain employment as part of their ongoing participation in the J-1 program. Their status remains in limbo after VOA ended their contract employment last week. Without new employment, many face the likelihood of having their work permits revoked, which would lead to deportations.
In a note circulated to employees last Thursday, VOA Director Michael Abramowitz said he was "heartbroken to learn about today’s mass terminations of personal service contractors [PSCs] working for Voice of America."
"PSCs have been a critical part of VOA’s mission, and they have made enormous contributions to VOA’s important work," Abramowitz wrote. "Some of VOA’s most talented journalists have been PSCs — many of whom have escaped tyranny in their home countries to tell America’s story of freedom and democracy. Many have served VOA’s viewers and listeners for years and are deeply versed in the markets in which VOA broadcasts."
Abramowitz called the firings "inexplicable, and, to my knowledge, no rationale has been provided by USAGM for this decision."
"We will continue to make efforts to help individual PSCs, especially those who face possible return to hostile countries, in any and every way we can during this difficult time. This remains among my most important priorities, and I hope it will be a priority for USAGM as well," he affirmed.
Hostile takeover stuff. Deep State intelligence folks played politics for years — now the swamp is being drained, as promised.
[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] Donald Trump is ordering a major overhaul of the National Security Council that will shrink its size by over 100 staffers in the wake of the 'SignalGate' scandal.
The move will see the ouster of some political appointees and return many career government employees back to their home agencies.
The number of staff at the NSC is expected to be significantly reduced, according to the officials, who requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive personnel matter.
CNN reported over 100 employees are going to be given a pink slip in the mass reshuffle.
The shakeup is just the latest shoe to drop at the NSC, which is being made over after the ouster early this month of Mike Waltz over the SignalGate scandal.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio has been serving as national security adviser since the ouster of Waltz, who was nominated to serve as Trump's UN ambassador.
The move is expected to elevate the importance of the State Department and Pentagon in advising Trump on important foreign policy decisions.
The NSC, created during the Truman administration, is an arm of the White House tasked with advising and assisting the president on national security and foreign policy and coordinating among various government agencies.
Trump was frustrated in his first term by political appointees and advisers who he felt gummed up his 'America First' agenda.
There were roughly 395 people working at the NSC, including about 180 support staff, according to one official.
About 90 to 95 of those being ousted are policy or subject matter experts seconded from other government agencies. They will be given an opportunity to return to their home agencies.
Not much of a punishment, unless they’re no longer wanted in their old place under its new management.
Many of the political appointees will also be given positions elsewhere in the administration.
Biden political appointees???
The NSC has been in a continual state of tumult during the early going of Trump´s second go-around in the White House.
Waltz was ousted weeks after Trump fired several NSC officials, just a day after the influential far-right activist Laura Loomer raised concerns directly to him about staff loyalty.
Loomer told journalist Tara Palmeri earlier this month that she had sounded the alarm about Waltz's anti-Trump past and claimed he hadn't vetted his staff to weed out liberals.
Waltz has been a lightning rod for controversy in the still-nascent second Trump administration. He has been to blame for accidentally leaking military plans to the press via an unfortunate Signal group chat.
And the White House, days into the administration, sidelined about 160 NSC aides, sending them home while the administration reviewed staffing and tried to align it with Trump´s agenda.
The aides were career government employees, commonly referred to as detailees.
This latest shakeup amounts to a 'liquidation' of NSC staffing with both career government detailees on assignment to the NSC being sent back to their home agencies and several political appointees being pushed out of their positions, according to the person familiar with the decision.
It wasn´t just Loomer who viewed Waltz suspiciously. He was viewed with a measure of skepticism by some in the MAGA world who saw the former Army Green Beret and three-term congressman as too tied to Washington's foreign policy establishment.
On Russia, Waltz shared Trump´s concerns about the high price tag of extensive U.S. military aid to Ukraine.
But Waltz also advocated for further diplomatically isolating President Vladimir Putin - a position that was out of step with Trump, who has viewed the Russian leader, at moments, with admiration for his cunning in dealings with Trump´s predecessors.
His more hawkish rhetoric on Iran and China, including U.S. policy toward Taiwan, seemed increasingly out of step with Trump.
Before getting rid of Waltz, the president fired several members of his National Security Council team. The individuals fired were Brian Walsh, Thomas Boodry and David Feith.
The president - setting aside belligerent rhetoric about taking over Greenland from Denmark - has tilted more toward military restraint and diplomacy in facing some of the United States' most challenging issues with adversaries.
[Breitbart] California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) was fuming Thursday as Congress passed a repeal of California’s electric vehicle (EV) mandate, which relied on a special waiver from the outgoing Biden administration in December.
“Make America Smoggy Again,” he announced, sarcastically. The Senate voted 51-44 to repeal the waiver, after a bipartisan majority in the House had done the same, as Breitbart News reported earlier this month.
The repeal relies on the Congressional Review Act, a Bill Clinton-era law that allows Congress to repeal regulations that are not presented to it for timely approval. Newsom says the waiver is exempt from review.
In a press statement, he vowed to sue:
Governor Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Rob Bonta announced today the state will file a lawsuit as Republicans in the U.S. Senate target California’s clean vehicles program – a move that will “Make America Smoggy Again.”
The Republican-controlled Senate is illegally using the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to attempt to revoke California’s Clean Air Act waivers, which authorize California’s clean cars and trucks program. This defies decades of precedent of these waivers not being subject to the CRA, and contradicts the non-partisan Government Accountability Office and Senate Parliamentarian, who both ruled that the CRA’s short-circuited process does not apply to the waivers.
However, as Ashley Zavala of Sacramento-era NBC affiliate KCRA reported, neither California voters nor American voters generally have ever voted to approve Newsom’s EV mandate.
[GEO.TV] A US judge on Friday blocked the Trump administration from revoking Harvard University's ability to enroll foreign students, a move that ratcheted up White House efforts to conform practices in academia to President Donald Trump ...Perhaps no man has ever had as much fun being president of the US... 's policies.
US District Judge Allison Burroughs' order provides temporary relief to the thousands of international students who were faced with being forced to transfer under a policy that the Ivy League school called part of the administration's broader effort to retaliate against it for refusing to "surrender its academic independence."
The Trump administration may appeal Burroughs' ruling. Spokespeople for the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
In a lawsuit filed in Boston federal court earlier on Friday, Harvard called the revocation a "blatant violation" of the US Constitution and other federal laws, and had an "immediate and devastating effect" on the university and more than 7,000 visa holders.
"Without its international students, Harvard is not Harvard," the 389-year-old school said in the lawsuit filed in Boston federal court.
If not Harvard, will whatever it becomes be safe for Jewish, Zionist, white male, and conservative students?
Harvard enrolled nearly 6,800 international students in its current school year, equal to 27% of total enrollment.
The termination of Harvard's Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification, effective with the 2025-2026 academic year, was announced on Thursday by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.
#4
I don't think POTUS has the authority to tell a private school who they may or may not enroll. OTOH, he certainly has the authority to keep the riff-raff from getting into the country where they could be enrolled.
#6
Trump does not have the authority to tell a private school who they can enroll. But he does have the authority to revoke their visas and kick them out.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[ZH]
...Oh, noze! Not him!...
