USA – Page 396 – Blazingcatfur

US Military’s Failing Deterrence Against China

‘They Are Putting Capability in the Field Faster Than We Are’

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin gave a stern warning about US competition with China earlier this month at the Reagan National Defense Forum:

“These next few years will set the terms of our competition with the People’s Republic of China. And they will determine whether our children and grandchildren inherit an open world of rules and rights — or whether they face emboldened autocrats who seek to dominate by force and fear…

“The PRC is the only country with both the will and, increasingly, the power to reshape its region and the international order to suit its authoritarian preferences.”

One of the Pentagon’s main concerns is China’s continued accelerating nuclear buildup. Every year, the Pentagon’s estimates of China’s nuclear buildup appear to grow exponentially.

by Blazingcatfur•December 26, 2022December 26, 2022•0•"China - Communist Slave State", USA

The U.S. Government Funded Chinese Military Research

This story isn’t over – and neither is the story of the COVID cover-up.

Last week, a bombshell intelligence report on the origins of COVID-19 was released by House Republicans with the explosive discovery that the United States government funded genetic manipulation of coronaviruses, not only at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, but at a Chinese Military research facility.

While the U.S. routinely, and rightly, lectures China on being more transparent and cooperating more on the COVID investigation, we don’t expect much. Admitting mistakes or failure under a totalitarian regime often has terminal consequences.

by Blazingcatfur•December 26, 2022December 26, 2022•0•"China - Communist Slave State", USA, WTF?

US winter storm: Stranded Native Americans burn clothes for warmth

Native American tribal leaders in South Dakota are appealing for urgent help as snowed-in communities run out of vital supplies amid a winter storm.

The Pine Ridge Indian Reservation has been buried in more than 30in (76cm) of snow, but powerful winds have stacked snow drifts 12ft (3.6m) high.

“We’re fighting a losing battle,” Oglala Sioux Tribe President Frank Star Comes Out told BBC News.

by Blazingcatfur•December 24, 2022December 24, 2022•0•USA, WTF?

Lott blasts CDC over defensive gun use shenanigans

The CDC isn’t likely to be on many gun owners’ Christmas card lists this year. Not after revelations that they removed defensive gun use statistics at the behest of gun control advocates. The decision to do that made it very clear that while the CDC may have been prohibited from advocating for gun control, that didn’t mean they wouldn’t help push it any way they can.

by Blazingcatfur•December 24, 2022December 24, 2022•0•Gun Control, Gun Rights, USA

There’s No Shortage of Immigrant Workers

… Some may respond, “If Americans won’t work, let’s bring in immigrants who will.” But consider the implications of this argument. It’s well established that the decline in labor-force participation is associated with a host of undesirable outcomes: substance abuse, welfare dependency, poor mental health, crime, lack of family formation, and early death. The fiscal costs associated with all these problems are paid for by taxpayers. Furthermore, the social disorder that plagues communities where many men do not work isn’t confined to those areas. To be sure, a significant share of the millions of the less-educated Americans who have dropped out of the labor force have made poor choices in life. But they are our fellow Americans, and we have a greater responsibility for them than for prospective immigrants overseas who want to come here.

by Blazingcatfur•December 24, 2022December 23, 2022•0•"Mass Immigration - Follow the money", Canada, USA

A showtrial of populism: The pawnshop McCarthyism of the January 6 Committee is a menace to democracy.

So the ‘January 6’ Committee has spoken. It has decreed that Donald Trump was to blame for the storming of the Capitol building on 6 January 2021. He was the mastermind of a ‘multi-part conspiracy’. He whipped the 2,000-strong mob into a frenzy of insurrectionary behaviour with the aim of overturning the 2020 presidential election result and keeping himself in power. And because he was ‘engaged in an insurrection’ – an insurrection being a violent uprising against government – he should be barred from public office, the committee advises. No Trump 2024. No Trump the politician ever again.

by Blazingcatfur•December 23, 2022December 23, 2022•0•Populism, USA

COVID, overdoses drive US life expectancy to lowest level since ‘96: CDC

Life expectancy in the United States is at its shortest since 1996, dragged down by an increase in COVID and drug overdose deaths, according to federal data.

Coronavirus caused the third-most deaths in the US in 2021, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday, with only heart disease and cancer causing more.

Drug overdoses, which are counted among accidental injuries, were the fourth-leading cause of death.

by Blazingcatfur•December 22, 2022December 22, 2022•0•USA

Saudi Arabia Welcomes China’s Xi as US Snubs Allies, Courts Enemies

China is fully exploiting the cooling of US-Saudi relations engineered by the Biden administration’s repeated public personal attacks on Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) as well as perceived decreased support for the Saudi-led coalition’s efforts to blunt Iranian expansionism in Yemen.

China’s first summit with Arab state leaders in Saudi Arabia occurs at a propitious time for both Chinese President Xi Jinping and MBS. Xi is at the height of his power, having been approved in November by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Central Committee for an unprecedented third term as party General Secretary. MBS, already Saudi Arabia’s de facto leader, was just appointed as the Prime Minister by his father, King Salman bin Abdulaziz.

by Blazingcatfur•December 22, 2022December 22, 2022•0•"China - Communist Slave State", Saudi Arabia, USA

Kari Lake trial reveals 42.5% improper ballots in random sample under examination, testimony points to voter disenfranchisement

Ballots reviewed in Wednesday’s examination of ballots cast in Maricopa county for November’s gubernatorial elections were not valid, according to Republican Candidate Kari Lake’s legal team. A tweet from the Lake War Room said that 48 of 113 ballots reviewed during the examination were “19-inch ballots produced on 20-inch paper,”

“This one-inch discrepancy cause chaos on Election day.

by Blazingcatfur•December 22, 2022December 21, 2022•0•USA, WTF?

US Returns to the Philippines to Fend Off China

The more U.S. and allied military power is based on and along these island chains, the more readily China can be contained in the western Pacific.

Thirty years ago, as the post–Cold War era dawned, the United States formally transferred control of the U.S. Naval Base Subic Bay to the Philippine government. The Washington Post reported on Nov. 24, 1992, that the transfer ended 94 years of U.S. military presence in the archipelago. The previous year saw American air forces depart from Clark Air Base. The United States seized the Philippines from Spain after its victory in the Spanish–American War in 1898. But with a new Cold War brewing in the western Pacific, Kyodo News reports that the U.S. Navy will likely return to Subic Bay as part of a U.S.–Philippines Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement.

by Blazingcatfur•December 21, 2022December 21, 2022•0•"China - Communist Slave State", Philippines, USA

‘The Iran deal is not our focus right now,’ National Security Council spokesman John Kirby says after leaked footage captures Biden ADMITTING that Obama’s Iran nuclear deal is ‘dead’

New video has emerged of President Biden saying a revised version of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal his White House was brokering is ‘dead’ and claiming Iran has a nuclear weapon.

White House national security spokesman John Kirby shortly after confirmed the U.S. is not focused on the Iran deal, though he would not say it is ‘dead.’

‘The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action is just not our focus. Right now. And it’s not on our agenda. We simply don’t see a deal coming together anytime soon while Iran continues to kill its its its own citizens and selling UAVs to Russia,’ he told reporters.

by Blazingcatfur•December 21, 2022December 21, 2022•0•Iran, USA, WTF?

Iranian drones deployed by Russia contain up to 82% of US manufactured components

Joe Biden has launched a task force to investigate how US and western components are ending up in Iranian-made drones being used to wreak havoc in Ukraine.

Despite strict export controls in place to prevent Iran from obtaining such materials, evidence has emerged that Tehran is finding more than enough commercially-available tech – including US-made microelectronics – to manufacture the drones.

UK-based investigative organization Conflict Armament Research found last month that, upon examining drones downed in Ukraine, 82 percent of their components were made by companies in the United States.

by Blazingcatfur•December 21, 2022December 21, 2022•0•"Ukraine - Russia", Iran, USA, WTF?

China’s Deal with Saudi Arabia is a Disaster for Biden

Nothing better illustrates the utter ineptitude of the Biden administration’s dealings with the Middle East than Saudi Arabia’s decision to forge a strategic alliance with China.

This is a time when Washington should be working overtime to strengthen its ties with long-standing allies like the Saudis to combat the mounting threat Iran poses to the region’s security.

Apart from the deeply alarming progress the ayatollahs are said to be making with their efforts to produce nuclear weapons.

by Blazingcatfur•December 20, 2022December 20, 2022•0•"China - Communist Slave State", Saudi Arabia, USA

Liberal attacks on our freedom catching eye of Americans

Tulsi Gabbard is an Army Reserve officer who served in Congress from 2013 to 2021. She was the first Hindu member of Congress and also the first Samoan American voting member of Congress. She ran for the Democratic nomination for president in 2020, before becoming an independent.

Gabbard said “we have the autocratic leader in Canada who’s resorted to genuinely authoritarian and tyrannical means to suppress a peaceful mass protest against the power elite there.

by Blazingcatfur•December 20, 2022December 20, 2022•0•Canada, USA

Millions in Hundred Dollar Bills Flown to the Taliban for “Humanitarian Aid”

As the Taliban were taking over Afghanistan, I predicted that Biden would fund the Taliban using “humanitarian aid” as a pretext. Since then, Biden has provided $1.1 billion in Afghan aid.

Despite assurances that the money would not go to the terrorists, the Biden administration issued global licenses authorizing financial transactions with the Taliban and the Al Qaeda allied Haqqani Network that include the “delivery and provision of humanitarian aid”.

h/t Ingenui

by Blazingcatfur•December 19, 2022December 19, 2022•0•"Joe Sleazebag Biden", Afghanistan, USA, WTF?