Frustration with Biden among Black leaders rises . . . Black voters and activists are increasingly frustrated with Democrats and the Biden administration in the wake of the party's latest failure to advance voting rights legislation. In his first days in office, President Biden signed a flurry of executive orders to advance equity throughout every aspect of the federal government, but his campaign promises were far loftier, and Democrats have struggled to make good on them. Now, after nine months during which not a single voting rights bill made it to the president’s desk, pressure is mounting on Biden to turn things around as projections for next year's midterms are starting to look bleak for Democrats. NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson delivered a stark warning to Biden in a statement released after a failed cloture vote on the Freedom to Vote Act Wednesday afternoon: “Don't forget that Black voters landed a victory for this President and this Congress, so don't fail us again.” The Hill

 

 

‘Plan Z’: With Afghanistan lost, U.S. weighs help from Taliban, adversaries in terror fight . . . America’s top generals say a counterterrorism partnership with the Taliban is a possibility. They have even explored a potential deal with Vladimir Putin to use Russian military bases as a launchpad for U.S. strikes on extremists. The drastic measures under serious consideration in the Biden administration underscore the daunting challenges facing the U.S. in its effort to halt the expansion of the Islamic State group in Afghanistan, slow a seemingly inevitable resurgence of al Qaeda and otherwise manage threats emanating from a country that is on the fast track to once again become the global epicenter of Islamist terrorism. That such moves are even on the table, critics say, offers more proof that President Biden’s decision to proceed with the military withdrawal from Afghanistan has left America and its allies in a dangerous, compromised position. Washington Times

 

 

 

So much for President Biden’s “compassionate” border policy. What a tragedy. Ironic that when Democrats sell their social welfare ideas, it’s always about “the children.”

 

 

New internet protocol to boost China state hacking . . . The Chinese government recently announced it now leads the world in upgrading its wired infrastructure, and security analysts are warning the new Internet Protocol Version 6 will only increase the danger from Beijing‘s state hacking operations.
Han Xia, chief engineer at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said Oct. 11 that in China the number of applied addresses for IPv6, as the new protocol is called, ranks first in the world, state media reported. Internet communications protocols are used to identify and locate computers and networks, and route traffic throughout the global network. New IPv6 will better support the emerging “internet of things.” “What it means: Prepare for cyberattacks out of China to be bigger, harder to block and harder to track,” said a cybersecurity analyst who asked to remain anonymous to protect his privacy. Washington Times

 

Bennett meets Putin at Sochi . . . PM Naftali Bennett holds his first meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Black Sea resort town of Sochi on Friday morning. At the airport, Bennett said that the relationship with Russian was an Important pillar of Israel’s foreign policy – owing both toe Russia’s special status and the million Russian-speaking Israelis, who act as a bridge between the two countries. Iran’s nuclear program and its presence in Syria figure high on the topics the two leaders are expected to discuss as well as reciprocal tourism. Israel earlier announced that Russian tourists with the Sputnik V vaccine against coronavirus would be acceptable from Nov. 1, as a goodwill gesture. After cases of the new variant of the Delta virus were discovered, the date was postponed to Dec. 1. DEBKAfile

 

 

Putin says Russia could deliver 10% more gas if Nord Stream 2 approved . . . Russia can increase gas supplies to Europe as soon as Germany approves the new Nord Stream 2 pipeline, President Vladimir Putin said, underlining Moscow’s conditions for help to resolve the continent’s energy crisis. Putin said Gazprom, the Kremlin’s gas monopoly, could increase flows by an extra 17.5bn cubic metres via the new pipeline “the day after tomorrow” if regulators approved it “tomorrow”. The amount, equal to roughly 10 per cent of the gas Russia shipped to Europe and Turkey in 2020, would provide significant additional supplies at a time of record prices in Europe, even before the pipe’s second line is fully filled in December. But it is also likely to provoke anger that Russia clearly believes it has gas in reserve but is making its delivery to Europe contingent on Nord Stream 2 being approved. Financial Times

 

 

Queen Elizabeth, 95, spent night in hospital to be checked . . . Palace Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II spent a night in a hospital for checks this week after canceling an official trip to Northern Ireland on medical advice, Buckingham Palace said Thursday.
The palace said the 95-year-old British monarch went to the private King Edward VII’s Hospital in London on Wednesday for "preliminary investigations." It said she returned to her Windsor Castle home at lunchtime on Thursday, "and remains in good spirits." Fox News

 

NIH admits Fauci lied about funding Wuhan gain-of-function experiments . . . Two years after Wuhan hosted the 2019 Military World Games, determined to be one of the planet's first superspreader events of the novel coronavirus pandemic, a top official at the National Institutes of Health has conceded that the agency did indeed fund highly dangerous gain-of-function research on bat-borne coronaviruses in the Wuhan Institute of Virology. In a letter to Kentucky Republican James Comer, the ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, Lawrence A. Tabak of the NIH admitted that "out of an abundance of caution," and, of course, after two years of conspicuous indignant behavior that anyone would consider the lab-leak hypothesis, the nation's top medical research agency conducted an additional review of how the funds authorized by Dr. Anthony Fauci and friends were used by EcoHealth Alliance, the New York City-based nonprofit organization headed by frequent WIV collaborator Peter Daszak. Washington Examiner

 

Intel Assessment: ‘High’ Chance Of International Conflict Over Water By 2040 . . . There’s no shortage of near-future fiction in which a lack of water is the source of all mankind’s woes — and, apparently, fire-guitars. But while screenwriters may take artistic license, increasing tensions over water availability is a very real security concern for US analysts and will only get worse if the world fails to address climate change, according to a new intelligence report. “[A]s temperatures rise and more extreme effects manifest, there is a growing risk of conflict over water and migration, particularly after 2030, and an increasing chance that countries will unilaterally test and deploy large-scale geoengineering — creating a new area of geopolitical disputes,” reads a National Intelligence Estimate on climate change, published today by the Director of National Intelligence. Breaking Defense