Defund, Disrupt, Dismantle

by Eric & Todd Gregory at American Thinker 

America’s four-year Weekend at Brandon’s is over.  Now the clean-up and heavy lifting begin.

If confirmed by the U.S. senate to lead the Department of Homeland Security(DHS), Kristi Noem should make her first task to purge the spy network of the leadership that routinely ignores genuine terror threats and instead chooses softer, easier targets to investigate and surveil, including innocent Americans for things like posting conservative memes and satire online, praying in public, and voicing concerns at school board meetings about curricula.

Similarly, DHS’s misconceived stepchild and sub-agency CISA (the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency) needs to be dramatically culled, if not abolished outright.  CISA’s sole objective is to censor truthful information that the federal government doesn’t want the public to know about and to get rich while doing it.

According to DHS’s own website, CISA’s budget nearly doubled in the four years between 2020 and 2024.  With cringe-inducing grandiosity, outgoing CISA director Jen Easterly maintains that CISA’s rapidly metastasizing mission is to protect Americans’ “cognitive infrastructure.”

Ah, yes.  CISA aims to safeguard our “cognitive infrastructure” by insisting, for example, that CISA does not censor and blacklist by proxy; that bogus FBI crime statistics are real; that inflation, budget deficits, and gasoline prices came down under Biden; that you are a Putin-lover and a Russian “asset” if you question the wisdom of America’s deepening involvement in the Russia-Ukraine war; that the bioengineered COVID virus came not from a lab, but from nature; and that mRNA vaccines are safe and effective and have no side-effects (and you’re a MAGA-loving racist who should be scrutinized by the FBI if you insinuate otherwise). 

The irony is that if CISA truly lived up to its own declaration of intent, it would declare itself a reckless purveyor of disinformation and outright lies and would voluntarily shut down and disband.

Republicans are far from blameless here.  Let us not forget that DHS was created under the auspices of the George W. Bush administration, and CISA was birthed under Trump 45 in 2018. 

Given the fact that the rank-and-file Baghdad Bobs and Pravda devotees of DHS and CISA won’t resign voluntarily, every last one of them needs to be strongly encouraged to seek out an honest living in the private sector.   

Similarly, legacy intelligence agencies like the FBI and CIA appear to be totally unreformable, even for newly designated leaders like MAGA mega-fauna Kash Patel, Tulsi Gabbard, and Devin Nunes. Thus, the task is to seek out ways to limit the damage these agencies do.

Given institutional capture and the ideological makeup of these agencies (both leadership and rank-and-file personnel), efforts to revamp or tweak them are beyond quixotic, hence the need to reduce salaries and budgets, lay off personnel, and cut as many superfluous programs as possible.

Although a pitifully small number of whistleblowers from these agencies bravely testified to Jim Jordan’s Weaponization of Government(congressional) subcommittee about serial unconstitutional abuses of conservative citizens (and faced government retaliation for their honesty), the fact that so few whistleblowers from these agencies surfaced over the past ten years is prima facie evidence that those agencies are likely beyond reform.   

In crudely reductive terms, ideologically speaking, virtually every spook of the CIA might as well be John Brennan, every NSA spy Michael “American Christians are not at all different from Hamas terrorists” Hayden, every FBI agent James Comey, and every CISA employee Nina Jankowicz (the Mary Poppins nutcase). 

Such people and the government fiefdoms they lead are as monumentally partisan as they are corrupt, and they will not change their ways.  If these departments cannot be abolished outright, they need to be completely reimagined, their budgets slashed to the bone, and their mission statements and jurisdictions (always expanding due to mission creep) dramatically reduced, with as many personnel as possible pink-slipped.

No government bureaucrat living high off the taxpayer teat wants anything to change.  The selfless, altruistic civil servant toiling for the common good is a Pollyanna portrait of federal government employment. 

The truth is that most civil self-servants are progressive class snobs in it for the easy money and the Club Fed lifestyle.  Mediocrities and worse “fail up” in government, with promotions and COLA (cost of living adjustment) increases, more paid vacation, more sick leave, “working” remotely from home, with huge pensions and early retirement if they wish — all paid for by the demonized non-government taxpayer.  Civil servants don’t serve you; you toil for them.

Even beyond the Intelligence Community, government employees are a protected class, facing little or no accountability for their actions.  With thousands of public school teachers grooming and molesting their students, the Department of Education says no big deal, “pass the trash,” and claims that $36,000 in taxpayer money per student per school year in New York City is “not enough.”

It is never enough.  Progressives believe that bigger government with ever more money for government employees is the solution to every problem. 

Unfortunately, with the departure of Vivek Ramaswamy, DOGE (the Dept. of Government Efficiency) is now managing expectations downward, scaling back its advertised ambitious reform agenda.  DOGE will ultimately issue recommendations, not mandates, to Congress.  Congress and Cabinet heads need to implement those recommendations quickly, before political inertia sets in, and then press for even deeper cuts to government. 

Failing to deliver will likely result in GOP losses in the 2026 midterms, with a resurgent Deep State backed by a new Democrat majority in Congress and DOGE’s efforts coming to naught.

Additionally, it’s no secret that many congressional Republicans understandably fear the power of the intelligence agencies and the administrative state every bit as much as the Democrat party reveres and rewards the omnipotence of the Administrative (Deep) State.

Thus, some GOP geldings (they bristle at the term RINOs) will inevitably try to curry favor with the DOJ, FBI, CIA, news media, et al. by resisting any reforms proposed by DOGE or the Trump administration. 

The media will then lionize these “brave” Republican eunuchs, and they will be feted the same way John McCain, Mitt Romney, and Liz Cheney were for their cowardly betrayals of conservatives and ideals about limited government.

The bigger the government, the smaller the citizen.  Democrats and their voters want an all-powerful, micromanaging government that occupies a central place in your life, seizing half or more of your income for itself while providing you with declining (if any) services, and vilifying you if you object in any way, perhaps harassing you with censorship, surveillance, blacklisting, de-banking, lawfare, tax audits, social ostracism, and other ritualized abuse if you dare to get out of line. 

Decades of marching through the institutions, staffing government with millions of committed progressives whose tenure continues uninterrupted through presidential administrations of both political parties (progressive personnel is progressive policy), have brought America to the precipice of social, economic, and moral ruin.

The GOP congress and Cabinet heads urgently need to work together with — rather than obstruct — DOGE and Trump 2.0.  These are early days for the Trump 47 agenda, but the clock is already ticking.

And we Know, On the Fringe, and more- Jan 25

 

Trump tells WEF that the U.S. doesn’t need Canada’s energy, lumber or auto exports

U.S. President Donald Trump used his World Economic Forum special address to say that his administration could do without Canadian energy or imports from its auto and lumber sectors. 

Trump said that Canada has been very “tough to deal with” while speaking before the World Economic Forum, an elite summit of the world’s political and business leaders in Davos, Switzerland.

“We’re going to be demanding respect from other nations … Canada has been very tough to deal with over the years,” he said in a speech on Thursday.

“We don’t need them to make our cars, and they make a lot of them. We don’t need their lumber because we have our own forests,” he continued. “We don’t need their oil and gas, we have more than anybody.”

The Canadian Chamber of Commerce calculated that approximately $3.6 billion in goods cross the border every day, facilitating a trade relationship between Canada and the U.S. that accounts for across both countries. The sectors Trump mentioned are among the top exports Canada sends to the U.S.

Trump went on to cover familiar ground that the offer remained for Canada to join the U.S. as the 51st state.

He said that under those circumstances the country could avoid its deficit with the U.S. and evade his proposed 25% import tariff on all Canadian goods slated to take effect Feb. 1. 

Economists have warned that a trade war with the U.S. would likely lead to hundreds of thousands of workers being in Canada being laid off.

Ottawa has pledged to respond with sweeping retaliatory tariffs on U.S. imports, potentially ending a longstanding amicable trade relationship between the two nations. 

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told reporters on Thursday that Canada is “ready to respond in a strong way, but in a way that will be stepping up, gradually.”

He said that “two things will happen,” as a result of a trade war with the U.S., the first being Canada’s “strong, robust response,” followed by “prices for American consumers on just about everything” increasing.

“I don’t think he wants that,” said Trudeau.

The prime minister said that if Trump is sincere about ushering the U.S. into a new golden age, he would require “more of the things that Canada is already sending them as a reliable and trustworthy partner.”

Canada currently supplies the bulk crude oil imports south of the border where it is then refined, accounting for 60% of all U.S. production in 2023 and 99% of its natural gas. 

As for the auto sector, Canada exported 92% of vehicles manufactured domestically to the U.S. in 2022, according to data from the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers Association. 

That’s not including auto parts, which cross borders back and forth from Canada to Mexico multiple times in the assembly process. 

Softwood lumber is another major Canadian export and an industry valued at over $45 billion from the U.S. market alone in 2022, according to Statistics Canada.

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre called on Trudeau to reconvene Parliament immediately on Tuesday, citing a national “emergency” due to the tariff threat.

“Liberals have shut Parliament in the middle of this crisis. Canada has never been so weak, and things have never been so out of control,” he said. “Liberals are putting themselves and their leadership politics ahead of the country. Freeland and Carney are fighting for power rather than fighting for Canada.”

The Conservatives are urging Trudeau to reopen Parliament so that new border controls can be passed, along with trade retaliation agreements and a plan to revive Canada’s economy.

https://tnc.news/2025/01/23/trump-us-doesnt-need-canadas-exports/

 https://tnc.news/2025/01/23/trump-us-doesnt-need-canadas-exports/

Is the LA Firepocalypse Part of the Great Reset Gameplan?

posted by Janet Levy at American Thinker 

Are the L.A. wildfires — which have razed more than 38,000 acres (57 sq. miles), the equivalent of a midsize city like Minneapolis — a chance outbreak?  Or is there a design behind this Firepocalypse?  More specifically, is it part of a concerted attempt by the global elite to use fire, floods, and fear to push so-called “sustainable” goals for the Great Reset?

Many may dismiss those suspicions as alarmist.  But a look at the big picture — including fires from recent years, weather manipulation programs, and plans for depopulation and rewilding — shows they are not unfounded. The unpreparedness for the L.A. fires, the mismanagement of fire-fighting ops, and the expertise the government has in weaponizing forest fires — the degree of each of these factors is so high, it points to deliberate action.  Let’s look at the big picture first, then closely examine the L.A. fires.

Wildfires in recent years have been extremely widespread and intense.  Consider these figures:

The in America was 3–4 million from the mid-1980s to 2000.  It has shot up since 2014 to 7 million acres.  Three of the wildfires mentioned above burned down a million acres each, and the smallest — the Lahaina fire — resulted in 100 casualties.

Now consider covert weather manipulation.  Climate scientist Dane Wigington, founder of , has been warning of them despite being ignored by the mainstream media.  He alleges that , on which he has made a documentary, has been achieved by injecting sulphate aerosols in the stratosphere and reflective nanomaterial in the lower layers of the atmosphere.  He believes that such methods have been wreaking havoc on the biosphere for over 70 years.

California, Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Nevada, New Mexico, and Arizona have been using cloud seeding — the release of silver iodide and dry ice crystals into clouds — to cause rain.  The California Department of Water Resources also uses liquid propane and hygroscopic material as supplemental seeding agents.  It is well known that these methods cause several flooding and ecological problems.

“Hydroclimate whiplash” — violent swings between heavy rain and snow and very dry conditions, as witnessed in California over the last two years — has increased exponentially across the world.  Such swings, which could well have been caused by climate engineering, certainly contributed to the L.A. wildfires.  As Wigington says (watch video), “There can be no legitimate discussion of climate anything from any perspective without first and foremost addressing the climate engineering elephant in this equation.”

Part of the “sustainable” goals of the global elite is depopulation — a world of a few hundred million happy serfs who own nothing and are happy — and rewilding — clearing 30% of land of habitation and cultivation by 2030, aka Biden’s 30 x 30 Land Grab.

The timing of recent California laws (AB1287) to increase housing density, Governor Gavin Newsom’s offer to waive building and environmental regulations to help rebuild after the wildfires, and L.A.’s dalliance with programs such as C40, the Livable Communities Initiative (LCI), and SmartLA2028, cast suspicion of a link to the policies of the elitist World Economic Forum (WEF) and the U.N.

In a nutshell, the programs aim to a) use land previously zoned for single-family homes for multi-family housing, essentially, multistory buildings and high-rises; b) replace retail spaces with so-called -minute-walkable communities comprising high-rises, ostensibly to address the climate crisis; and c) turn the megapolis into a “connected and equitable” smart city for the 2028 Summer Olympics.

The destruction wreaked by the wildfires makes many people wonder if these grandiose plans are meant to favor developers.  Coincidentally or not, the 15-minute city plan (LCI) includes a map (slide 13) showing Pacific Palisades, Santa Monica, and Hollywood.  The governor’s statement that a Marshall Plan and a team “reimagining L.A.” are already in place also sparks suspicion.

So, did he and other authorities know that wildfires would break out?  Emerald Robinson, former White House correspondent for One American News, alleges that the number of fires, the lack of preparation, and the sighting of multiple arsonists point to a military op.

And Wigington asks, “Is it just a tragic twist of fate that the firestorm ignitions were in locations that maximized the decimation, given the blowtorch extreme wind trajectories?”  He believes massive ground-based microwave transmission facilities are being used to heat the upper atmosphere and steer upper-level wind currents, precipitation, and weather patterns, causing record heat, drought, and wildfires.

A multiplicity of missteps — too many to be merely accidental — contributed to the L.A. wildfires.  Forecasts had warned of hurricane-force winds bearing down on southern California, but Mayor Karen Bass went off on a taxpayer-funded trip to Ghana with no preparations in place.  The reservoir in the Pacific Palisades had been drained, brush was not cleared, and fire trucks and crew were not deployed in vulnerable areas.  Bass’s budget cut — of $17.6 million plus a request for an additional cut of $49 million — for the fire department certainly contributed to non-functioning hydrants, unprepared substations, unrepaired fire trucks and ambulances, and cars left blocking critical roadways.  But she did take pride in meeting her DEI objectives by hiring L.A.’s first female LGBTQ fire chief.

Governor Newsom, too, had cut $100 million from the state fire budget.  He had also allowed water to run out from the Central Valley to the ocean to protect a tiny fish called the Delta smelt, whose endangered status is in question.  So, despite record rainfall last year, water was in short supply.  State Farm and Allstate had canceled home insurance policies shortly before the fires, adding to the miseries of many who lost homes in the blaze.

Lastly, we cannot ignore two things.  First, the U.S. military is expert in executing forest fires.  A declassified document — Forest Fire as a Military Weapon — was produced in 1970 for use in the Vietnam war.  It is a veritable scientific encyclopedia and practical manual on starting forest fires and sustaining the conflagrations.

Second, after the disasters of the past few years — flooding, fire, chemical spills etc. — rebuilding has been excruciatingly slow, complicated by environment regulations, high insurance rates, and building costs.  One and a half years since the Lahaina fire, only four of almost 1,500 homes destroyed have been rebuilt.  Many of those affected by the East Palestine, Ohio, derailment and toxic burn remain bereft, and the environmental impact of the disaster hasn’t abated.

Does the military document bear any relation to the recent fires?  Will rebuilding in L.A. be stymied the way it was in East Palestine, Lahaina, and other disaster-struck places?  Hard to tell.  But it is difficult not to sense the ominous shadow of the Great Reset looming over America.

Trump calls on Putin to make a deal, end its war against Ukraine or face more economic pressure

Trump says the war has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives and 'has to stop'

President Donald Trump called for an end to the Russia-Ukraine war as part of his first sit-down interview since returning to the White House, saying Russian President Vladimir Putin should never have launched his full-scale invasion in 2022. 

Trump told Fox News host Sean Hannity an estimated 850,000 Russian soldiers and 700,000 Ukrainian soldiers have died since the onset of the war.

"These are human beings that are just being slaughtered on this battlefield by the millions. They've already died, and the cities — the cities are like demolition sites," he said in an interview that aired Thursday on "Hannity."

An interior view shows a kindergarten, which according to Ukraine's military officials was damaged by shelling, in Stanytsia Luhanska in the Luhansk region, Ukraine, in this handout picture released Feb. 17, 2022. Press Service of the Joint Forces Operation/Handout via REUTERS (Press Service of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine/Handout via REUTERS)

The 47th president criticized former President Joe Biden for "allowing" the war to start, claiming his predecessor’s energy policies made Putin richer.

"Putin shouldn't have done it, too. I mean, I'm not blaming only what — Putin shouldn't have done it. He shouldn't have done it, and it has to stop," Trump said.

He threatened the autocratic leader in a Truth Social post on Wednesday, calling on him to make a deal or face more economic pressure.

"Settle now, and STOP this ridiculous War! IT’S ONLY GOING TO GET WORSE. If we don’t make a ‘deal,’ and soon, I have no other choice but to put high levels of Taxes, Tariffs, and Sanctions on anything being sold by Russia to the United States, and various other participating countries," Trump wrote.

Russian President Vladimir Putin chairs a meeting with members of the government via a video conference at the Kremlin in Moscow on July 19, 2023. ((Photo by ALEXANDER KAZAKOV/SPUTNIK/AFP via Getty Images))

PUTIN, XI VOW TO ‘DEEPEN’ ALLIANCE HOURS AFTER TRUMP RE-ENTERS THE WHITE HOUSE

He told reporters at the White House on Thursday that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has already told him he’s ready to negotiate an end to the war.

"He's had enough," Trump told Hannity. "He shouldn't have allowed this to happen either. You know, if he's no angel, he shouldn't have allowed this war to happen. First of all, he's fighting a much bigger entity, OK? Much bigger."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, second left, looks at a map during his visit to the Ukrainian 110th mechanised brigade in Avdiivka, the site of fierce battles with the Russian troops in the Donetsk region, Ukraine, on Dec. 29, 2023 (Ukrainian Presidential Press Office via AP)

ZELENSKYY LAMBASTS PUTIN FOR CHRISTMAS STRIKES: ‘WHAT COULD BE MORE INHUMANE?’

"Zelenskyy was fighting a much bigger entity — much bigger, much more powerful. He shouldn't have done that because we could have made a deal and it would have been a deal that would have been — it would have been a nothing deal," Trump said. "I could have made that deal so easily, and Zelenskyy decided that 'I want a fight.'"

Reuters reported in November that Putin is open to discussing a peace plan. He reportedly could agree to freeze the conflict along the current lines.

Five current and former Russian officials told the outlet Moscow would not tolerate Ukraine joining NATO, nor would it allow the presence of NATO troops on Ukrainian soil.

A public area in Kyiv has been turned into a tribute of Ukrainian flags - each representing a death from the war. (Simon Owen/Fox News)

Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine and Russia, Ret. Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg, told "America Reports" earlier this month that he’d like to see the war come to an end within 100 days of Trump taking office. 

Video link Trump with Hannity :

:https://www.foxnews.com/video/6367602293112

https://www.foxnews.com/media/trump-calls-putin-make-deal-end-its-war-against-ukraine-face-more-economic-pressure?utm_campaign=january24morningnotenonsubs&utm_medium=email&utm_source=iterable&utm_content=morningnote

Victor Davis Hanson: Why Davos Hates Trump—And Democracy

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In this edition of “Victor Davis Hanson: In His Own Words,” Hanson delves into the inauguration of Donald Trump and its coinciding with the annual meeting of the elite, ’smart people,’ the World Economic Forum’ at Davos, Switzerland.

🎭 𝐖𝟑𝐏 𝓓𝓐𝓘𝓛𝓨 𝓗𝓾𝓶𝓸𝓻, 𝓜𝓾𝓼𝓲𝓬, 𝓐𝓻𝓽, 𝓞𝓟𝓔𝓝 𝓣𝓗𝓡𝓔𝓐𝓓

 

Welcome to 

The 𝐖𝟑𝐏 𝓓𝓐𝓘𝓛𝓨 𝓗𝓾𝓶𝓸𝓻, 𝓜𝓾𝓼𝓲𝓬, 𝓐𝓻𝓽, 𝓞𝓟𝓔𝓝 𝓣𝓗𝓡𝓔𝓐𝓓 

Here’s a place to share cartoons, jokes, music, art, nature, 

man-made wonders, and whatever else you can think of. 

No politics or divisive posts on this thread. 

This feature will appear every day at 1pm mountain time. 

EDNY Judge Finds Clear and Compelling Evidence of FISA-702 “Backdoor Search” Violations by DOJ

Sundance reporting for Conservative Treehouse 

A few interested sites are noting a recently published decision in the U.S. v. Hasbajrami case in Brooklyn, New York, where Eastern District Judge LaShann DeArcy Hall identified the misuse of FISA-702 “backdoor searches” regarding defendant, Agron Hasbajrami.

Hasbajrami plead guilty to charges of attempting to provide material support to a terrorist organization, alleging that he intended to travel to the Federally Administered Tribal Area of Pakistan, where he expected to join a terrorist organization, receive training, and ultimately fight against U.S. forces and others in Afghanistan and Pakistan. However, after his guilty plea, while he is serving time in prison, prosecutors admitted some of the evidence against him came as a result of privacy violations, unlawful FISA-702 searches.

Hasbajrami sought to have the evidence against him thrown out on 4th amendment grounds (fruit of the poisoned tree) and withdraw his guilty plea. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals denied Hasbarjami’s blanket evidence suppression motion for the exclusion of all FISA Section 702 collection in his case but did not weigh in on whether the warrantless Section 702 database queries were constitutional, instead remanding the case back to Judge Hall for a review of that question.

Judge DeArchy Hall received the case again and reviewed all of the government motions against the request to suppress the evidence.  What results is a very well-constructed explanation and opinion of how FISA-702 was misused in the case [SEE 60-pg Opinion HERE].

The judge determined that U.S. government officials did factually violate the technical rules and procedures for the use of FISA-702 searches, and the DOJ should have gone to court to obtain a warrant to look at Hasbajrami’s private communication. In essence, yes, the 4th amendment protections of Hasbajrami were violated.  However, the issue of overturning the resulting evidence becomes a matter of legal distinction.

The defendant, who admitted guilt (twice) did not claim the evidence was a result of misuse or a wrongful approach in searching the NSA’s library, from which FISA-702 search results are determined (a structural flaw in the defense motion).  The defendant filed a suppression motion on the issue of his 4th amendment rights being violated.  The judge opinion holds that the FBI’s Section 702 queries violated the Fourth Amendment; however, the court ultimately denied the defendant’s motion to suppress the resulting evidence on separate grounds.

The value in the ruling by Judge Hall, is a few fold:  First, it is an excellent review of the FISA-702 origin and all of the constitutional arguments that surround the controversial law.  Second, the ruling clearly shows that FISA-702 searches are currently being used unlawfully and continually by government officials.  Third, the ruling clearly shows how “backdoor” 702 searches are violations of the Fourth Amendment. [Albeit in this case, of no value to the argument put forth by Hasbajrami.]

[SEE CASE RULING HERE]

All this and a few bucks will buy you a cup of coffee.

The ruling essentially underpins the reality that government officials are using their access to the complete library within the NSA collection and storage database to conduct searches of U.S. communication that removes the constitutional protections of the 4th amendment.

Mr Agron Hasbajrami was ensnared by this surveillance process and admitted his guilt thereafter.

However, the issue is not Hasbajrami’s intent, or even his guilt.  The issue that surrounds us is this constant surveillance state and the tens-of-millions of searches that are done on the private papers of American citizens.

In essence we have a domestic surveillance state looking for suspect people who are operating against the interests of government.

Mr. Hasbajrami was caught wanting to join a terrorist organization.  However, as we have witnessed in the cold and brutal reality of the J6 roundup, that same “terrorist organization” may well be defined as your local “patriot group” or “parent’s advisory committee.”