Cut to the News
Cut through the clutter to today's top news
March 15, 2021
Good morning
Welcome to today's top news.
Leading the News . . .
Hidden ways Big Tech platforms suck up your data . . . Big Tech companies such as Facebook, Google, and Amazon collect personal user data from many different sources to create "secret identities" of people in order to understand users' personality traits, predict purchasing behavior, and ultimately sell these profiles to advertisers and sometimes the government. Most often, users don't even realize that their data is being collected and
exploited by tech companies. Besides advertisers, millions of people’s personal user data has also been sold to U.S. federal agencies for border control purposes as well as to the military for counterterrorism purposes. Washington Examiner
US Troops in Germany Face Vaccination Delays
Biden admin had planned to vaccinate Guantanamo Bay inmates before soldiers . . . U.S. Army soldiers stationed in Germany are experiencing significant delays in their vaccine rollout after the Biden administration came under fire for now-shelved plans to put detainees in Guantanamo Bay at the front of the line. Troops and their families residing near Landstuhl Regional Medical Center and Ramstein Air Base are facing cancelled vaccine appointments due to shrinking supplies. The doses
may not be available for several weeks, according to the medical center. Washington Free Beacon
FB to label all posts about COVID vaccines . . . Facebook, which has been criticized by lawmakers and researchers for allowing vaccine misinformation to spread on its platforms, said on Monday it has started adding labels to posts that discuss the safety of the shots and will soon label all posts about the vaccines. The social media company said in a blog post it is also launching a tool in the United States to give people
information about where to get COVID-19 vaccines and adding a COVID-19 information area to its photo-sharing site Instagram. Reuters
Only posts expressing 'correct' opinions will be allowed.
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Trump judges key to stopping Biden executive orders, Republican AGs say . . . Republican attorneys general are mounting a judicial attack on President Biden’s record number of executive orders and eyeing a favorable legal battlefield, thanks to scores of conservative judges whom President Trump appointed to the federal bench. Lawsuits against Mr. Biden’s moves on climate change and immigration are working their way through district
courts, where Mr. Trump installed 174 judges. Further up the judicial ladder, Mr. Trump appointed 54 circuit judges and three Supreme Court justices. Red state attorneys general also are looking to the courts to check the Biden administration’s sweeping federal regulations on elections and transgender inclusion in the military and school athletics, as well as national COVID-19 pandemic mandates. Washington Times
‘Is It Really Republican Racists Doing This?’: Tucker, Ying Ma Take On ‘Lie’ That Attacks On Asians Are Trump-Inspired . . . Fox News host Tucker Carlson and author Ying Ma discussed the “lie” that “Republican racists” are behind a recent rash of violence against Asian-Americans. Reports of hate crimes against Asian-Americans have risen significantly since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, a problem Carlson said President Biden linked
to “white supremacy.” After playing footage of some of the attacks on “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” Carlson asked “Is it really Republican racists doing this, as Joe Biden suggested and so many other Democrats have told us?” before bringing on his guest, the author of “ Chinese Girl In The Ghetto.” While Ying Ma acknowledged
that some whites doubtless harbor “hostility or resentment” against Asians because of the virus, she also said that “time and time again” the recent “attackers are not white.” “They don’t look like white voters or Trump voters. In fact, many of these attacks have occurred in heavily Democratic cities where they did not vote for Trump in 2020 or 2016.” Ying Ma blamed Democrats for "their silence and their cowardice before black on Asian attacks that often occur in America’s urban
areas.” Daily Caller
Biden wants public to wait for outcome of sexual misconduct probe of Cuomo . . . President Biden said on Sunday that the investigation into sexual misconduct allegations against New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo was underway and that the public should wait for the outcome. Reporters asked Biden whether he thinks Cuomo should resign while the president was exiting Marine One after a weekend trip to Delaware. The governor has
faced mounting calls from prominent New York Democrats to step down since six women have leveled sexual misconduct allegations against him. “I think the investigation is underway and we should see what it brings us,” Biden responded. The president and Vice President Harris have up to this point stayed mum on the subject of the harassment accusations. The Hill
Noncitizens to register to vote under Dems’ bill, conservatives warn . . . The Democrats’ election overhaul bill will result in registering noncitizens as new voters even though those U.S. residents are prohibited by federal law from doing so, conservative groups contend. This is because H.R. 1 disempowers the 50 states’ election management roles and orders them to automatically register new voters, not from voluntary applications but
from millions of names held by various federal agencies. Given the number of federal spigots from which the names will flow, conservatives say, it is only logical to assume that some of the nation’s 21.7 million noncitizens will be registered. Polling shows that tens of thousands are likely registered now, they say. Washington Times
TX Democrat Running as a Champion of Political Christians But Pans Them in Her Book . . . A Texas congressional candidate running in a special election is promoting herself as a faith-first Democrat, even though she wrote a book that pans evangelical voters. Dr. Lydia Bean, a Harvard-trained sociologist and community organizer, is the Democratic frontrunner in a special election in Texas's Sixth Congressional District. Bean
touts herself as a religious progressive, having founded a nonprofit organization devoted to faith-based political engagement. Bean, however, roundly criticized evangelicals in her 2014 book, The Politics of Evangelical Identity. In her introduction, she wrote, "There is some evidence for the view that right wing activists co-opted evangelical institutions." She accused the broader evangelical community of putting politics on the same level as their faith. "American evangelicals
are not a mighty army of culture warriors, but they vote like one," Bean wrote. Washington Free Beacon
Gun control groups focus all efforts on Senate . . . Gun control groups are now focusing all of their lobbying efforts on the Senate following House passage of two major bills last week that garnered some GOP support. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) is promising quick action on the legislation — to strengthen background checks and to close the so-called Charleston loophole — but advocates face a familiar uphill battle in
trying to win over enough Republicans. Still, proponents are optimistic that a Democratic-led Senate, combined with an ally in the Oval Office and a weakened National Rifle Association (NRA), will help get gun control legislation passed for the first time in decades. Eight GOP lawmakers last week voted for the background check legislation that would require unlicensed or private sellers to conduct a check before they transfer a firearm. The Hill
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US 'systematically undermined' by China as 'radical tendencies' go unchallenged . . . The Pentagon’s top strategist believes communist China poses an existential threat to the U.S. after abandoning its old strategic policy of “hide and bide” — that is, to mask a burgeoning national military while waiting for the right time to unleash an aggressive foreign policy. James H. Baker, who directs the Defense Department’s Office of Net
Assessment (ONA), sounded the alarm during a private talk in July 2017 before a Japanese-U.S. audience. On China, Mr. Baker said “the U.S. is presently not well poised to capitalize on this trend, nor is it clear that U.S. elites across the political spectrum understand the danger that China poses as a competitor.” “Comparative military advantage remains with the United States (and its allies), but is being systematically undermined by increased Chinese investment, focus, training and
basing,” Mr. Baker wrote. Washington Times
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EU considers getting a vaccine boost from Russia's Sputnik . . . Publicly, the European Union has dismissed Russia’s global coronavirus vaccine supply campaign as a propaganda stunt by an undesirable regime. Behind the scenes, the bloc is turning to Moscow’s Sputnik V shot as it tries to get its stuttering efforts to vaccinate its 450 million people back on track, EU diplomatic and official sources told Reuters. An EU official who
negotiates with vaccine makers on behalf of the bloc told Reuters that EU governments were considering launching talks with Sputnik V developers and it would take requests from four EU states to start the process. Hungary and Slovakia have already bought the Russian shot. Reuters
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Biden’s climate agenda likely to push gas prices even higher . . . Gasoline prices topped $3 a gallon Sunday in nine states and the District of Columbia, part of a steady national rise since November that some analysts expect to hit the $4 mark soon. Blame the skyrocketing prices on increased demand as Americans emerge from COVID-19 sheltering, coupled with lower supply driven in part by the recent cold snap in Texas that shuttered
oil refineries. Energy analysts warn that President Biden’s climate agenda likely will exacerbate the rise in fuel costs. The average price for a gallon of regular gasoline ticked up to $2.85 nationally Sunday, according to AAA. Washington Times
Biden’s tidal wave of taxpayer dollars likely to swamp red-state Obamacare holdouts . . . The newly enacted $1.9 trillion spending bill includes additional funding of as much as $22.5 billion for states that have not yet expanded their Medicaid programs under Obamacare. Red states that have long resisted the expansion of the low-income government healthcare program will now find it hard to turn down the money. Indeed, the state of Wyoming
has taken a small, although possibly inadvertent, step toward expansion. Medicaid is funded by both state and federal dollars. The federal government matches what states spend on the program under what is known as the Federal Medical Assistance Percentage. FMAP is determined by a state’s per capita income so that poorer states tend to receive larger FMAPs. For example, Mississippi, the poorest state in the country, receives an FMAP of 84%. Washington Examiner
Former Trump COVID Czarina Birx Takes Job With TX Air Purifier Maker . . . Dr. Deborah Birx, a key member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force during the Trump administration, has taken a job with a Texas-based manufacturer of air purifiers that says its machines can clean the CCP virus from the air in minutes and from surfaces within hours. Dallas-based ActivePure announced that Birx is joining the company as chief
scientific and medical adviser. Birx joined the White House in 2020 as part of then-President Donald Trump’s response to the pandemic of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, commonly known as the novel coronavirus. Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a former mentor to Birx, picked up a position in the Biden administration. Epoch Times
More Hermès scarves for Deborah, yay!
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Meghan Markle eyeing a run for US president: Report . . . A report from a British news organization published Sunday suggests that Meghan Markle, wife of Prince Harry and Duchess of Sussex, is mulling a run for U.S. president. She may have launched her effort already. “Meghan Markle will use the furor over her interview with Oprah to launch a political career which could take her all the way to the White House, if
rumors circulating around Westminster last week turn out to be accurate,” The Daily Mail reported. A senior British official “with strong links to Washington” said that Ms. Markle, 39, “was networking among senior Democrats with a view to building a campaign and fundraising teams for a tilt at the U.S. Presidency.” Washington Times
Trump thinks Meghan Markle is ‘no good’ after Oprah interview . . . Former President Donald Trump thought Meghan Markle was “no good” following her bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey — but didn’t want to say so publicly for fear of being “canceled” like Piers Morgan, an ex-advisor has claimed. Trump’s former advisor Jason Miller shared what he said the ex-commander-in-chief thought of Markle and Prince Harry’s tell-all during an
appearance on Steve Bannon’s “War Room” podcast Wednesday. “She’s no good… I said it and now everybody is seeing it,” Miller said Trump told him. New York Post
Elon Musk just took swipe at 'woke' culture: 'Battle for the Moral High Ground' . . . Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk poked fun at woke culture Saturday, tweeting about a “new game” called “Woketopia.” “Battle for the Moral High Ground in this new game!” he wrote. It’s unclear what prompted the tweet, but Musk has faced criticism over his questioning of the COVID-19 vaccine this weekend and newly released documents showing the Tesla
factory in Fremont, Calif., saw hundreds of coronavirus cases after he reopened it in defiance of a local shutdown order. Fox Business
Daylight saving time: Health experts and lawmakers sound the alarm over changing the clocks . . . Medical professionals and lawmakers warn that going back and forth between two times is unnecessary and unhealthy. On Tuesday, Sen. Marco Rubio and several of his colleagues reintroduced the Sunshine Protection Act, which is aimed at making daylight saving time, the time observed by most of the nation between the second Sunday in March
and the first Sunday in November, permanent. Research has shown an increase in workplace injuries, strokes, and suicides after the clocks change in the spring. But some scientists disagree with lawmakers on how to stop changing the clocks. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine and the Society for Research on Biological Rhythms have recommended a switch to permanent standard time, the time that most of the nation only uses between November and mid-March. Washington Examiner
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102-year-old woman goes viral after joining great-grandson’s virtual gym class . . . This great-grandma knows how to get down! An Arizona centenarian visiting with her great-grandson for the first time in a year — because of the pandemic — set folks around the world giggling with video of her joining the kid’s virtual gym class. In the now-viral clip posted by the boy’s mom, Julia Fulkerson, 102, leaps up, energetically marches in
place and pumps her arms while Brody Contreras, 6, appears to hop around a bit and fall down giggling.
“Great-grandma was like dancing around and doing the PE exercise,” Brody told KETV. Brody’s mom, Angela Groch, said she and her husband were able to finally visit his elderly relative because they’d both been vaccinated. “I was cracking up and taking video after video, but it was also super surreal just kind of watching,” Groch told the station. New York Post
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