[JustTheNews] DHS was "very clear" in a meeting with lawmakers that they're planning this asylum system so individuals can claim asylum online "from anywhere in the world," said Oklahoma Republican James Lankford.
Oklahoma Republican Sen. James Lankford, who recently visited the U.S.-Mexico border, is warning that President Joe Biden's online asylum system is an "open invitation for Chinese spies" and all of Yemen to enter the U.S.
Under the emerging plans, asylum seekers "can just say, 'I have credible fear,' fly into the country, be here for eight years while they await their hearing," Lankford told Just the News after speaking at the America First Summit last week. "This is an open invitation for Chinese spies to be able to come into the country. It's an open invitation for everyone to come from Yemen, to say it's a war-torn country.
"Immigration is not designed to be just open to anyone who wants to come. Asylum is the same definition as refugee. If you're a refugee, you go to the next safest country, andthcoming you go there. They're turning this on its head, saying if anyone wants to come to America for any reason, just come here, and we'll just take you from everywhere. That's not what we're designed to be able to do."
Lankford, a member of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, argued that such a system would flood U.S. airports.
"It will dramatically increase the amount of illegal immigration into our country," he said.
"They're facilitating this catch-and-releasing," Lankford noted, referring to Biden's policy of allowing illegal immigrants who arrive at the U.S.-Mexico border to claim asylum to get released into the U.S. to wait for their court date. "We have catch-release at the border, and now they're looking for catch and release to happen at the border and at our airports."
Just the News asked Lankford if DHS officials responded to his concerns during a meeting with lawmakers.
"It's in design, we're discussing it, we're looking at it ... we're trying to evaluate how we're going to do it," he said, paraphrasing the department's responses.
"But they're very clear," Lankford emphasized. "They're planning this asylum system to be able to do asylum from anywhere in the world."
A fistful of black letters flicker atop the pale yellow background. When they first built the place eleven letters burned a hole in the dark southern sky. But the strength has gone out of most of them from years of signaling weary, wayward souls towards a hot meal.
The sign is broken, but few care. Because they are broken too. What few letters still shine serve as a beacon, reminding all comers that there is a place, like God and grandmother’s house, where the door is always open.
You may find better food elsewhere, but you won’t find better food for the money. They have a menu, though I have never needed it.
Two eggs, over medium; bacon, hash browns covered, smothered, and covered; one waffle with butter and maple syrup; and a cup of black coffee. That has been my standing order for decades and there’s been no need to get any more ambitious than that.
When you sit down at the table or the bar you will likely be greeted by someone who calls you “honey,” or “sugar,” or “baby,” or sometimes “boss.” But you will be greeted, and usually with a smile. And by someone who knows what it means to work long and hard for very little.
Some of them are working their way through college. Some of them are single parents trying to pay the rent and keep the lights on at home. Some are ex-cons trying to hold down a job by wiping tables and desperately trying to believe the rumors of second chances.
Waffle House is at once mainstreet and back alley, cosmopolitan and parochial.
On any given day there might be a family of five seated near you with three small children scarfing down jellied toast and scrambled eggs. They’re here because the food is cheap and sometimes dad doesn’t want mom to have to cook after working twelve hours at the shirt factory.
There’s a trucker driver sitting by himself, now on his sixth cup of coffee. He’s flirting with the waitress. But he isn’t trying to pick up a date, he’s just trying to survive the loneliness of a life of endless mile markers and few trips home.
On one side of you will be three bikers and a war veteran swapping stories about close calls and near misses.
On the other side will be an elderly couple who come every Thursday night. They come just to hear the voices. Their own kids have long since stopped visiting, and they’ve already buried all of their other friends.
And then one Thursday night he will show up alone. A waitress will pour him a cup of coffee and lightly touch his shoulder. She knows she can do nothing about the empty chair, but she can at least keep his cup full for an hour or two.
At one table sits a group of college kids, drunk off their asses. Beside them is an addict wishing he could tell them to quit while they still can.
In the corner a Baptist preacher is pleading with a teary-eyed backslider over ham and buttered grits.
It doesn’t matter what you’ve done or where you’ve come from, you are welcome here. Straight-laced or strung out, drunk or sober or in that fuzzy place in between. In blue jeans, a business suit, or pajamas. No one is turned away.
Waffle House may not be a church, but I know several people who have met God there. And many of our churches could stand to learn a few things about open arms, hot meals, and second chances from this wild, wayside diner.
#3
...This is so, so accurate and true. Won't say that Waffle House is a holy place, but it is a sanctuary in the finest sense of that word.
No matter where you walk into one, you know exactly what you're going to find. And in my own humble experience - YMMV, of course - it's always been a good thing.
#6
1990's
R.T.P. I-440, while 90% of the area was without power (Hurricane Fran?) the Waffle house had Power??? BTW: Power crews ate free at that Waffle House ☺ with customer paying their tabs.
The WH off I-85 near Commerce GA. (Atlanta Road Race week) sitting in the Acey-Ducey seating. We watched the Waitress serving "Special Order" Orange Juice for $5 a pop (Vodka added).
Having some fun with a new WH waitress, My I.T. team all asked for "Left Handed" Coffee cups. Yep! she went looking for them
#9
Re#2 Don't go there on the graveshift unless you want dinner and a show. That's when the bars let out, and from the fight vids I've seen , Waffle House employees are like 75-0.
Posted by: Chris ||
08/03/2022 11:55 Comments ||
Top||
#10
GREAT article, Bad.
Less pretentious than Denny's.
I have taken refuge.
#12
Chris! Late night with a meal is the best!!! You will get introduced to the finest law enforcement officers as they deal with the drunks, hookers, and brawlers!
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
08/03/2022 14:42 Comments ||
Top||
#14
A couple of years ago when the St. George of Floyd riots were in full swing we had an article which included the fact that the mostly peaceful protesters in Atlanta refused to attacked a Waffle House. "Not the Waffle House! No! No!"
Posted by: Matt ||
08/03/2022 16:06 Comments ||
Top||
#15
His hash brown order is wrong, scattered, smothered, covered, diced and peppered
#16
I found the waffle house near my work to be quiet, with only a few customers who were probably truckers or tradesmen. The food was perfect and they claimed to have messed up my first pecan waffle so I got another and was allowed to eat the first. The second I took home to use as a bribe for going to waffle house without the wife.
[USSA News] There’s little doubt that the Historical American Nation is about done. Even without the draconian directives of Big Brother about to crash down upon us, cash has been gradually elbowed out to make the change seem less drastic even as our pocket change dwindles. Cash transactions now only account for 15% of all retail sales in terms of value, and it has been widely speculated and predicted that physical cash and the accompanying pocket change would become redundant by just examining the trends. Personal check usage in retail outlets has virtually been checked although it remains a major means of sending payments via the "post."
One of the objectives of the pandemic pandemonium was to make contactless payments the preferred — and eventually the only way to exchange currency for services and products. Future lockdowns accompanying the next big virus bugaboo will permanently lock in contactless payments as well. The current availability of physical cash, although diminishing in use, allows the effects of the system’s staged gradual collapse to be less noticeable and therefore less frightening much as is the case with our gradual loss of freedoms! These are not causing any revolutions because the losses have been done in stages just as the frog in the pot of water adjusts to the gradually heating of that water before it reaches a boil and kills him. It all boils down to the fact that conservatives will have very little left to conserve by that time and what is left will hardly seem worth the effort by then.
Increasingly, consumers and customers carry credit cards vice cash as it is more convenient, safe, and just feels like less of a loss. All kinds of inducements are offered for use of the cards such as cash and travel "rewards", special insurance coverage, and the ability to better dispute fraudulent charges. Some businesses resist use of the cards for payment because of the service charges they thus incur, but the trend is to accept these charges as a cost of doing business, and pass the additional costs on to customers by charging higher prices. All the problems associated with the digital dysphoria such as the reality of cyber hack attacks, "phishing" and all manner of identity theft and scams are accepted as just one of those things one is supposed to accept as an accepted reality with advancing technology. All of this presents no worry to the controllers who are wont to make us feel the squeeze of unease and worry in order to better squeeze us into the small-minded paradigm boxes they have prepared for us. All credit card transactions are traceable within the banking system, but using cash allows for discreet donations to the charities and causes dear to our patriotic/nationalist hearts, so restricting use of cash will put a big damper on our support of, and philanthropy towards our favored groups and causes.
All of this is only the beginning of the woes associated with the woeful system presaged by the Biblical sages. The new system will be accompanied by a control of all money transactions by the GovMint as all your accounts will be consolidated into one big account whereby all your politically incorrect or questionable transactions that run afoul of phony "community standards" or politically correct viewpoints will be rejected as if you used an incorrect password to access your account. You may also be denied access if your "social credit" score is too low. Such scores will replace the current purely financially oriented current scores presently extant. You will be forced to use mobile or cell phones to function under the new system, whether you like it or not, or you may wind up in a cell or some other form of social purgatory. That will be a prerequisite to get to first base under the new system.
Currencies will become "digital currencies" and this transition is already in the process of occurring in various stages in the West. It has been fully adopted in Communist China — a communist tyranny that the rest of the world is becoming tethered to economically — so it will be soon be universal. The digital yuan was introduced in Communist China last February during the Winter Olympics. They required patrons to pay for meals, hotels, transportation, etc. using funny looking square "QR" codes on their mobile phones that linked to their digital yuan accounts. Nine countries have already launched systems in line with this lunacy. A digital euro is being tested right now. The US has been lagging but with the Chinese now in control — at least unofficially! — we are catching up fast. The Fed is presently studying implementation of this system and though the dollar will remain the dollar, it will not exist in its present physical form. It will become digital and ownership will be recorded on a ledger maintained by a central bank.
Banks and credit card companies as well as Pay Pal and similar payment systems will be phased out. The result of all of this "advancement?" The GovMint will have control of your money and will have the ability to place you under constant surveillance. Under the NWO, the GovMint will know every purchase you make, every transaction you conduct, and even your physical whereabouts at the point of purchase. It is a short step from there to "negative" interest rates, account freezes, tax withholdings from your account and the ability to place you under government investigation if you vote for the wrong candidate or give donations to the wrong political party — always assuming that any such will remain in our Brave New World. If that sounds like a stretch, be advised that it is not. The system will be used to deny travel and educational opportunities to political dissidents. Canada seized the bank accounts and even the crypto accounts of the non-violent trucker protestors last winter. This kind of oppression will be easy to conduct once the new system is fully in place.
There will be only two ways to counter this tyranny short of a revolution. There is only one non-digital, non-traceable, non-hackable form of money you will be able to use and that is physical gold and probably silver. However, for these to work, there has to be an "underground economy" that will support its use. At present, these can be purchased in a certain manner to avoid this tyranny. Throughout recorded history, precious metals have always been the form of money of last resort that have been universally accepted in the toughest of times. But remember, FDR confiscated Americans’ gold reserves with the blessings of our "democracy." In the assumption that first, an underground economy does exist and second, Americans are able to obtain and keep such "precious metals, the form called "junk silver" is the easiest modality to use in such situations, especially in everyday small transactions. Junk silver are US dimes, quarters, and half-dollars minted before 1965 when these coins actually contained 90% real silver. They are sold in bags of $1,000 face value. Such bags are currently worth over $20,000 and their value will further skyrocket as conditions deteriorate! If this is the way you are going to go, it is imperative that you get started on a program to accumulate these assets right away if you have no program of "hard" money accumulation now. It might pay to take some money you have in the bank or under your mattress and accumulate some junk silver with it now. More details on this strategy will be explored in future editions of the Freedom Movement Action Newsletter in articles labelled "Prepperism". We have already posted two articles on prepperism in past issues of this newsletter.
The other option to survive in the coming cashless society will be to create local currencies enabled by a local trading system a/k/a: LETS — as in let’s do it! This type of system was used and was very popular in Canada at one time. LETS allows members to obtain goods and services through their local currency which is accepted by local retailers who are enrolled in the system. Members who provide goods and services are able to earn credits in the local currency which are expended within the local system. This type of system could not replace the conventional economy in its entirety, of course, but it would make living under the dictatorship bearable especially for those in more rural areas. This system is not to be confused with barter systems which are much more limited in applicability. This type of system is one that patriots should have been employing for generations now to help form viable and strong local communities based on shared values or important commonalities such as race, religion or ethnic group, such as what the Mennonites and Mormons employ to some extent now. The potential for the state to break up or proscribe such groups is a real challenge but its efforts would be greatly lessened by the cohesiveness of such groups. However, the other day, it was reported that an Amish farmer has been fined many thousands of dollars as a result of his efforts to sell his produce. Never put anything mean, rotten, criminal and downright despicable as being beyond our political and social "leaders."
A new law is set to take effect in Israel starting August 1 that will ban payments of large sums of money in cash and bank checks. The goal of the reform, according to a statement issued by Israel’s Tax Authority, is to fight organized crime, money laundering and tax non-compliance.
Under the new law, any payment to a business above 6,000 NIS ($1,700) must be made using alternative methods, such as a digital transfer or a debit card. Trading between private citizens who are not listed as business owners will be limited to 15,000 NIS ($4,360) in cash. This is another step in Israel’s fight against the use of cash. Previously, cash up to the amount of 11,000 NIS ($3,200) could be used in business deals.
“We want the public to reduce the use of cash money,” adv. Tamar Bracha, who is in charge of executing the law on behalf of Israel’s Tax Authority, told The Media Line. “The goal is to reduce cash fluidity in the market, mainly because crime organizations tend to rely on cash. By limiting the use of it, criminal activity is much harder to carry out.”
#5
I use cash almost exclusively for local purchases. The demise of cash is the demise of privacy in virtually every aspect of your life. Not only will it mean your every financial act is monitored and recorded, so is where, when and to whom. Equally, you cannot hold wealth external to a government controlled institution, thus ending the fundamental concept of property and prosperity independent of government control. And, the power to destroy your life by the simple act of judicial fiat through locking down your financial access devices makes you instantly helpless and obedient. This is the power of a police state being hidden behind the myth of convenience. This must be resisted!
#7
You are hereby geofenced to within a radius of 1 km around your domicile. Financial transactions, including transit, will not process outside that radius, and your driver's license is similarly invalid.
Attached is a list of items and quantities you may purchase. It will be updated as required.
Your activities have been noticed. Oh, yes, they've been noticed.
[Trade For Profit] A little over six months ago, when stocks were still trading near all time highs, former NY Fed repo guru and current Credit Suisse strategist Zoltan Pozsar made an immodest proposal to the Fed: crash stocks to contain inflation, to wit:
The FOMC has one big problem: inflation. There are two ways to slow inflation: by hiking short-term interest rates or by forcing long-term interest rates higher. Historically, the Fed used rate hikes to engineer recessions that generated the slack needed to keep inflation in check ("opportunistic disinflation"). With the Fed’s "updated dual mandate" of inclusive low unemployment and the political imperative of redistribution through firmer wage growth at the bottom of the income distribution, the Fed aiming to slow inflation via a recession is unimaginable. Hikes today then are meant to slow inflation without a recession... which is not something that the Fed has ever managed to achieve before.
Zoltan was also confident that "lower risk assets won’t kill growth" and his solution to contain inflation and "to improve labor supply, the Fed might try to put volatility in its service to engineer a correction in house prices and risk assets — equities, credit, and Bitcoin too..." In short: crash everything.
Fast forward to today when once again the Fed has followed Zoltan’s advice to a tee with stocks in a deep bear market, bitcoin in another crypto winter, commodities soared then plunged (with the exception of nat gas and oil), the economy in a technical recession... and yet inflation remains sticky to the upside.
Of course, with oil and gasoline sliding in anticipation of Biden’s recession, and most other commodities at or below Ukraine war levels, it’s unlikely that inflation will remain quite so sticky, especially when considering that yesterday, we saw the ISM-Prices Paid sub-index print 60.0, down from 78.5 prior. This, JPMorgan writes, "...feeds into our house view from Mike Feroli that between now and the September FOMC we should continue to see CPI levels cool due to energy prices/base effects and along with likely softening in jobs data, indicative from higher initial claims recently, leaves us expecting a 50bp hike in September and a more dovish stance for the rest of the year. Jackson Hole at the end of August could deliver more support for the dovish pivot."
Here we completely agree with JPM for once, as it has been our base case for a long time that the Fed will use this month’s Jackson Hole to hint at the coming dovish reversal.
But let’s assume that’s not the case and inflation remains deeply entrenched, Friday’s jobs come in hot, wage growth continues to beat expectations as the wage-price spiral proves unbreakable, and next week’s CPI print comes in far hotter than expected. Well, that in a nutshell is what Zoltan Pozsar’s latest note is all about.
According to the repo guru, inflation is now so embedded, that the US economy may need to undergo a deeper and longer recession than investors (and he himself) anticipate before sharply higher prices can be brought under control.
#6
Depression is a bit of an overstatement. See 1979.
But if a 1979-style recession is necessary now, as it was then, then bring it on.
Better that than to have the half-hearted recessions of the early- and mid-70s which did nothing for inlfation and only made the ultimate cure much worse (again, see 1979.)
Posted by: Tom ||
08/03/2022 13:30 Comments ||
Top||
[Guardian] The chemical imbalance theory of depression is well and truly dead. A paper by Joanna Moncrieff and colleagues, longtime critics of the effectiveness of antidepressants, has caused a splash. The paper provides a summary of other summaries that confirm there is no evidence to support the idea that depression is caused by disturbance of the brain’s serotonin system.
They have done us a favour by corralling the evidence that says as much, even if we knew this to be the case.
But the death of the chemical imbalance theory has no bearing on whether antidepressants that affect the serotonin system are effective. These medications weren’t developed on this premise. In fact quite the opposite is true — the chemical imbalance theory was based on an emerging understanding of how antidepressants were shown to work.
How did the ’chemical imbalance’ theory start?
The first two antidepressant medications, both discovered in the 1950s, were observed to have positive effects on mood as side-effects of their hoped-for functions. Iproniazid was developed as a treatment for tubercolosis, and imipramine as an antihistamine.
We know now that ipronizaid is a monoamine oxidase inhibitor — it stops the enzyme that breaks down serotonin and similar brain chemicals. But we didn’t know this when its antidepressant effects were first observed in 1952.
Imipramine is a tricyclic antidepressant and, among other effects, it blocks the reuptake of serotonin after it has been secreted, also allowing more to stay in the brain.
A simple hypothesis then presented itself: if both classes of antidepressants were shown to increase brain levels of serotonin, then depression must be caused by low levels of serotonin.
Researchers set out to demonstrate this in patients with depression, showing that serotonin and its metabolites and precursors were lower in the blood, in the cerebrospinal fluid, and so on.
But these studies suffered from what we now know plagued many studies of their era, leading to the so-called "replication crisis". Studies used small sample sizes, selectively reported their results and, if they failed to demonstrate the hypothesis, were often not reported at all. In short, the findings were unreliable, and since then larger studies and meta-analyses (which summarised the many smaller studies) made it clear the hypothesis wasn’t supported.
What’s the link between the theory and antidepressants?
In the meantime, pharmaceutical companies spotted a clear line to communicate the effectiveness of their medications. Depression was caused by a "chemical imbalance" that could be corrected by antidepressants.
This coincided with the development of a new class of antidepressants, the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, which, as their name suggests, were more selective than the tricyclic antidepressants in targeting serotonin reuptake as their mechanism of action.
These drugs — then known as Prozac, Zoloft, and Cipramil — became blockbusters, and remain widely used today (albeit with a variety of names since expiration of their patents).
Few psychiatrists with an understanding of the nuance of brain function believed the chemical imbalance theory. It never fitted with the way they could see that SSRIs worked, with serotonin function changing hours after taking the medication but depression not showing improvement for about four weeks.
But there were, and are, many medical practitioners with less sophisticated understanding of depression and neurochemistry who were happy to repeat this message to their patients. It was an effective message, and one that took hold in the popular imagination. I have heard it repeated many times.
So are antidepressants effective?
The new paper by Moncrieff and colleagues, while not saying anything new, does us all a favour by reiterating the message that has been clear for some time: there is no evidence to support the chemical imbalance theory. Their message has been amplified by the extensive media attention the article has received.
But much of the commentary has extrapolated from the study’s finding to suggest it undermines the effectiveness of antidepressants — including by the authors themselves.
This shows a misunderstanding of how medical science works. Medicine is pragmatic. It has often established that a treatment works well before it has understood how it works.
Many commonly used medicines were used for decades before we understood their mechanisms of action: from aspirin to morphine to penicillin. Knowing they worked provided the impetus for establishing how they worked; and this knowledge generated new treatments.
The evidence for SSRIs being effective for depression is convincing to most reasonable assessors. They are not effective for as many people with depression as we might hope, as I have written before, but they are, overall, more effective than placebo treatments.
Critics suggest the magnitude of the difference between the medications and placebo isn’t great enough to warrant their use. That is a matter of opinion. And many people report significant benefits, even as some people report none, or even that they have caused harm.
How do antidepressants work?
In truth, we still don’t really know how or why antidepressants work. The brain is a complex organ. We still don’t have a clear idea about how general anaesthetics work. But few people would refuse an anaesthetic when contemplating serious surgery on this basis.
In the same vein, when contemplating whether an antidepressant might be an option for someone with depression, it is of little consequence that its mechanism of action is incompletely understood.
So let’s put the chemical imbalance theory to bed. We should continue our efforts to understand the nature of depression while we keep searching for better treatments.
Attending to diet, exercise and sleep is effective for many people with depression. Psychotherapy can be very helpful too. But many people struggle with depression despite trying these things, and it is for them that we need to keep up our efforts to find better treatments.
They "work" just like weed works. They mask the anxiety and depressive moods.
Notice the lack of discussion here about addiction and the long-term impacts of antidepressant usage, potential cures, or the tens of millions of people in the US currently taking the drugs ?
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.
[Trade For Profit] A little over six months ago, when stocks were still trading near all time highs, former NY Fed repo guru and current Credit Suisse strategist Zoltan Pozsar made an immodest proposal to the Fed: crash stocks to contain inflation, to wit:
