GOP group dedicated to electing Republicans at state level highlights record 2021 fundraising . . . A GOP political organization dedicated to electing Republicans to state legislative and executive offices across the nation is spotlighting what it calls a "record" fourth-quarter fundraising haul. The Republican State Leadership Committee (RSLC) will announce Wednesday that, along with its strategic policy partner, the State Government Leadership Foundation (SGLF), it hauled in a combined $14.3 million in fundraising during the final three months of 2021, which the RSLC said is the most it’s ever brought in during the fourth quarter. The RSLC, in sharing its fundraising figures first with Fox News, noted that the $33.3 million it and the SGLF raised in total in 2021 outpaced by $14 million their previous odd-year record set in 2019. Fox Business

 

Pelosi accused of hiding info on her role in security breakdown on Jan. 6 . . . House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is concealing information about her culpability in the security breakdown during the Jan. 6 riot, according to Republican lawmakers who have been pursuing those documents since immediately after the attack on the U.S. Capitol. Rep. Rodney Davis of Illinois said Mrs. Pelosi is stonewalling. He is the top Republican on the House Administration Committee, which oversees the management of the Capitol complex. “The Sergeant at Arms, at the direction of the speaker has refused to provide us their communications surrounding Jan. 6. I believe those records will show there was a lot of communications and coordination between the speaker’s office and law enforcement officials leading up to and on Jan. 6,” Mr. Davis wrote in a statement Tuesday to The Washington Times.

 

 

Manchin floats modest Senate rules changes . . . Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) on Tuesday night floated smaller changes to the Senate rules that would stop short of the filibuster reforms being pushed for by many of his Democratic colleagues. Manchin, coming out of a meeting with Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and other Democrats involved in the negotiations, didn't pledge to vote for any specific rules reforms but appeared open to smaller changes. "I think the filibuster needs to stay in place, any way shape or form that we can do it," Manchin said, asked about keeping the current rule that requires most legislation to get 60 votes to advance through the Senate. The Hill

 

 

North Korea fires suspected missile into sea . . . The Japanese Defense Ministry said Wednesday that North Korea fired what was likely a missile. Wednesday’s launch is the first such firing since North Korea tested a series of newly developed weapons between September and November including nuclear-capable missiles that place South Korea and Japan, both key U.S. allies in the region, within striking distance. Some experts said North Korea was applying more pressure on its rivals to accept it as a nuclear power state and to ease international sanctions on the country. The Biden administration has repeatedly said it is open to resuming nuclear diplomacy with North Korea “anywhere and at any time” without preconditions. The North has so far rebuffed such overtures, saying U.S. hostility remains unchanged. Politico

 

 

South Korea forges ahead with end of war declaration despite US reservations . . . South Korea’s president Moon Jae-in is pressing ahead with his quest to declare an end to the Korean war despite months of fruitless diplomacy that have exposed divisions between Seoul and Washington. Moon told the UN General Assembly in September that a formal declaration to end the war, which was fought from 1950 until the signing of an armistice agreement in 1953, would “mark a pivotal point of departure in creating a new order of reconciliation and co-operation on the Korean peninsula”. But doubts in Washington, Pyongyang and Beijing have frustrated his hopes of securing a long-sought political legacy as a peacemaker, illustrating the complexity of reconciling the competing interests of the four parties to a 70-year conflict. North Korea, China and the US-led UN command discussed signing a peace treaty within three months of the armistice but failed to do so. Financial Times

 

Kazakhstan government resigns amid protests over rising fuel prices . . . Kazakhstan’s government resigned on Wednesday after protesters angry at a sharp rise in motor fuel prices took to the streets in several key cities, marking a big test for the country’s president Kassym-Jomart Tokayev. The protests, described as the biggest in Kazakhstan’s post-Soviet Union history based on unclear footage from social media, are a rare event for the tightly controlled country. Kazakhstan, like Russia and other countries in the region, has been struggling with rising prices for basic commodities amid the economic strain of the pandemic. The price of Kazakhstan’s dollar-denominated debt dropped after the protests and the resignation of the government. The yield on a bond maturing in 2045 rose by nearly 0.2 percentage points to 3.95 per cent, the highest level since May 2020, as its price fell by more than 3 cents on the dollar. The government announced a state of emergency in the capital of Nur-Sultan, with a curfew and restricted access to and out of the city until January 19. It also banned mass gatherings. Financial Times

 

Macron says his strategy is to ‘piss off’ France’s unvaccinated as Covid surges . . . President Emmanuel Macron has come under fire from political rivals for saying he wanted to “piss off” the unvaccinated by depriving them of restaurants, cinemas and social activities to pressure them to get protected against Covid-19. “There is a tiny minority of people who are resistant,” he said in an interview with Le Parisien newspaper published on Tuesday night. “We can reduce that, I’m sorry to say, by pissing them off even more. I am not here to piss off the French, I complain all day long about the administration when it bugs them. But the unvaccinated, I really want to piss them off. So that’s what we will keep doing, all the way to the end. That is the strategy. I am not going to send them to prison, I am not going to vaccinate them by force,” he said. Financial Times

 

It’s Official: More Americans Dead From COVID Under Biden Than Trump . . . President Joe Biden has achieved a historic milestone less than a year into his presidency, but the mainstream media don't want you to know about it. According to "the best available global dataset on the pandemic," which is published and updated daily by Johns Hopkins University and relied on by Google and the New York Times, more Americans have died from COVID-19 since Biden took office than during the final year of Donald Trump's presidency. Despite Biden's campaign pledge to "shut down the virus" if elected, 417,610 Americans have died from COVID-19 since Biden was inaugurated, which is more than the 408,450 deaths from COVID-19 that occurred on Trump's watch. Good luck trying to find any recent reporting on these figures in mainstream media outlets. Their silence is in stark contrast to the breathless "blood on his hands" hysteria with which they covered every new case of the virus until precisely Jan. 20, 2021, when the Washington Free Beacon was forced to launch its Biden Covid Death Tracker to ensure the public stayed informed. Washington Free Beacon

 

 

CDC Updates COVID-19 Isolation Guidance to Include a Section on Antigen Tests . . . The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Tuesday updated its guidelines for COVID-19 isolation to include a section on rapid antigen tests, in which it provides guidance for cases where people wanted to take a test. The updated CDC guidance does not say that isolated people have to test negative before emerging from isolation, but said that if people want to take a test, “the best approach is to use an antigen test towards the end of the 5-day isolation period.” The move comes shortly after the CDC shortened the isolation period from 10 to five days for people with confirmed or suspected COVID-19 who are asymptomatic or are recovering from their symptoms. Isolation is followed by five days of wearing a mask when around others, the CDC advised. Epoch Times

 

Walmart to hire over 3,000 US drivers as it expands home delivery . . . Walmart Inc said on Tuesday it plans to hire more than 3,000 U.S. delivery drivers and build out a fleet of all-electric delivery vans to support its "in-home" grocery delivery service, its latest investment in its last-mile fulfillment network. The retailer, which said it has about 100 drivers at present, expects to be able to reach 30 million homes by the end of the year. It now services 6 million homes. Bentonville, Arkansas-based Walmart in 2019 launched its InHome delivery service through which workers deliver groceries directly into shoppers’ homes, sometimes placing items straight into kitchens or garage refrigerators when people are not in the house. The driver uses a one-time access code to unlock the customers' doors or garages through an app that pairs with a "smart" entry lock. Fox Business 

 

Real Agenda of ‘Transgender’ Movement . . . The true agenda of what has become known as the “transgender movement” is to abolish sex, according to author and self-declared feminist Kara Dansky.  Dansky, author of the new book “The Abolition of Sex: How the ‘Transgender’ Agenda Harms Women and Girls,” not only takes issue with the objective to destroy the concept of sex, but also with the use of the term “transgender.”  The term “transgender” was invented, but the “word has no coherent meaning whatsoever,” Dansky says, adding that “every single person on the face of the planet, all 8 billion of us, are either female or male, and that’s it.” Dansky joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss the history of the term “transgender” and what she thinks the movement’s ultimate objective might be. Daily Signal

 

NASCAR rejects Brandon Brown’s ‘Let’s go, Brandon’-themed car . . . NASCAR has officially rejected Brandon Brown’s “Let’s Go Brandon” sponsorship deal. According to multiple news reports, the auto-racing giant told Mr. Brown’s team that cryptocurrency firm LGBCoin cannot sponsor his car. The company’s first three letters are an allusion to “Let’s Go, Brandon,” the coded form of a vulgar insult of President Biden.
Mr. Brown’s team publicly trumpeted on Thursday the news that LGBcoin — the self-styled “America’s Coin” — will be its full-season primary partner for the 2022 NASCAR Xfinity Series.
The company released a photo of Mr. Brown standing next to his #68 Chevrolet Camaro in a red-white-and-blue trim with “LGBcoin.io” in big blue letters. Washington Times

 

Joe Rogan's Ultimate Life Advice . . . Joe Rogan  is an American stand-up comedian, martial arts commentator (UFC) and podcast host. This is the MOST legendary Joe Rogan's motivational speeches of his podcast "Joe Rogan Experience".