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Biden Drains Entire Northeast Gasoline Reserve In Bid To Lower Gas Prices As He Trails Trump By Double DigitsOriginal article here. Back in March, when reading the mammoth, 1050-page bill that was meant to avert government shutdown, but was yet another pork filled free-for-all bonanza authorizing $1.7 trillion in in discretionary spending, we stumbled upon something that was truly shocking: after Biden singlehandedly drained half of the US strategic petroleum reserve to avoid obliteration for Democrats in the 2022 midterm elections, Congress has snuck in a provision that would sell off and shutter the Northeast Gasoline Supply Reserve, a move that while perhaps keeps gas prices lower for a day or two, would also leave the entire continental northeast defenseless to any true environmental catastrophe or shock. We were so dismayed by the inclusion of this particular text, we wondered if it hadn’t been put there solely for the benefit of America’s enemies… The entire US 1 million barrel Northeast Gasoline Supply Reserve will be required to be sold and closed in fiscal 2024, according to bill text of government funding legislation unveiled Sunday Did China write this bill? https://t.co/d8qLXZ5Gi6 pic.twitter.com/8B2flG0CZw — zerohedge (@zerohedge) March 3, 2024 … because surely nobody in their right mind, not even the illegitimate senile occupant of the White House, would ever pursue such short-term gains at the expense of potentially disastrous long-term consequences to the entire nation. We were wrong: earlier today, just two months after the bill was signed by Biden into law, the panicking administration announced that it would sell the nearly 1 million barrels of gasoline in the US managed stockpile in northeastern states, the Department of Energy said, effectively closing the reserve. The department created the Northeast Gasoline Supply Reserve (NGSR) in 2014 after Superstorm Sandy left motorists scrambling for fuel. But, according to some megabrains hoping to justify the dumping of gas so its price drops for a few weeks ahead of the summer and avoid even more anger aimed at the president, storing refined fuel is costlier than storing crude oil, so closing the reserve was included in U.S funding legislation signed by President Joe Biden in March. Bids to buy the gasoline located at the two NGSR storage sites in Port Reading, NJ (900,000 bbl) and South Portland, ME (98,824 bbl), are due on May 28 and the Treasury Department’s general funds gets proceeds from the sale. Incidentally, the proceeds from the reserve liquidation – which will amount to roughly $125 million gross (and far less net) – is roughly how much the government spends every 15 minutes! So is it better to have a gasoline reserve for unexpected events, or to fund a quarter hour of US government’s spending? Don’t answer that. Of course, the answer is neither – the whole point of selling the gasoline is to depress prices at the pump if only for a few days to help Americans forget about the great inflationary nightmare they have been in for the past 3 years. The volumes will be allocated in quantities of 100,000 barrels with each barrel containing 42 gallons, the department said and said it would require that fuel is transferred or delivered no later than June 30. That will ensure the gasoline can flow into local retailers ahead of the Fourth of July holiday and that it will be sold at competitive prices. Translation: Biden just drained the Northeast strategic gasoline reserve to push gas lower by a few cents on July 4. For context, gas prices at the pump this Memorial Day will be the second most expensive in a decade – dramatically above the ten-year average of $2.91… “By strategically releasing this reserve in between Memorial Day and July 4th, we are ensuring sufficient supply flows to the … northeast at a time hardworking Americans need it the most,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said in a release. “The Biden-Harris administration is laser-focused on lowering prices at the pump for American families, especially as drivers hit the road for summer driving season,″ Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said in the statement. “By strategically releasing this reserve in between Memorial Day and July 4th, we are ensuring sufficient supply flows to the tri-state (area) and Northeast at a time hardworking Americans need it the most.” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said release of gas from the Northeast reserve builds on actions by President Joe Biden, a Democrat, “to lower gas and energy costs — including historic releases from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and the largest-ever investment in clean energy.″ Biden significantly drained the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in 2022 following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, dropping the stockpile to its lowest level since the 1980s after selling about 280 million barrels to keep prices low. The election year move helped stabilize gasoline prices that had been rising in the wake of the war in Europe but drew complaints from Republicans, and frankly anyone with half a brain, that the Democratic president was playing politics with a reserve meant for national emergencies. The Biden administration has since very theatrically begun refilling the oil reserve, which had more than 364 million barrels of crude oil as of last month, by purchasing a couple million barrels every other month or so, setting it on pace for refilling some time in the 2100s. “While congressional Republicans fight to preserve tax breaks for Big Oil at the expense of hardworking families, President Biden is advancing a more secure, affordable, and clean energy future to lower utility bills while record American energy production helps meet our immediate needs,” Jean-Pierre said. As for the real reason behind the latest myopic decision by the Biden admin, today we learned that Trump’s lead over Biden has widened to 13pp in the betting market, the largest difference since mid-March. Meanwhile, political event prediction website PredictIt places higher betting odds on Trump than Biden for the first time since March. Trump is also leading in the latest polls of all swing states. Trump is leading by 2% in the latest polls in Pennsylvania. If Biden loses Pennsylvania but wins Wisconsin and Michigan, he then at least needs to win one state from Georgia and North Carolina in addition to one state from Arizona and Nevada to secure a second term. Meanwhile, closing arguments in Trump’s “hush money” case in New York are set to being on May 28. If the jury finds Trump guilty, it is possible for the former president to receive prison time, and judging by how weaponized the “legal system” of the current fascist regime has become, we would not be surprised if Biden goes there.
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Western Civilization Is Being Destroyed by Self-Hating Whites
Guest Post by Paul Craig Roberts Dear readers, I recommend that you watch the video about how white people are intentionally framed by black agitators and other white people for hate crimes that never happened. If you don’t care to watch the documentary, at least read the short article about how the life of University of Virginia student Morgan Bettinger was ruined by a lie. https://dailycaller.com/2024/05/20/...Xt2_o4oxRmi04D_oT3V7ap5Kun6n61q3uH1CBxkQMy comments on the event go beyond Gage Klipper’s rendition of the story. It is much more than Morgan Bettinger’s story. It is a story of what white people have done to themselves. Critical race theory, which finds racism in everything white–works of art, literature, language, math, science, history–has its origins in the Jewish Frankfort School of Cultural Marxism. It is now an obligatory part of the American professoriate’s world view. Even if you don’t believe it, you have to profess it, or you are done for. To deny that white people are racist is considered proof that you are a racist. When a Black Female Lives Matter agitator accused Morgan Bettinger of saying something she never said, which witnesses confirmed she never said, no white person came to her defense. Not the white University of Virginia students, the white professors and university president and administrators, and not the white media. All the whites jumped on denouncing the racist Morgan Bettinger. Even when she got cleared, the charge was replaced by another. She was found to be “insensitive” to the hurt that the charge against her represented. In other words, she was supposed to apologize and ask forgiveness for something she did not do. Her failure to grovel was insensitive. So she was sentenced to community service, re-education sessions, and conditionally expelled if she failed to complete her sentence. It sounds absurd, but this is the position of White People today throughout the Western World. European women who complain of being raped by open borders immigrant-invaders risk being presented as making “racist accusations” and committing a “hate crime.” A European man who goes to the defense of a women being raped risks being charged with “the use of violence against a protected category.” Whites have lost the ability to protect themselves against immigrant-invaders and people of color. Remember the case in St. Louis, Missouri, when Antifa & Black Lives Matter marched through the closed gates of a white community threatening mayhem. One white couple stood in front of their home with guns warning the trespassers not to damage their property. None of the trespassers were arrested, but the white couple who defended their property was arrested by a white Democrat and were coerced into a plea bargain. This is what it means to be a white person in America today. Even President Donald Trump can be indicted on trumped-up charges by illiterate black quota hires put in power by gentile-hating billionaire George Soros’ money. Most black Americans are not part of this extraordinary unprecedented assault on white Americans. The assault comes from white Woke intellectuals and cultural Marxists and from a few blacks singled out for privilege in university admission, employment, and hiring. It is brainwashed whites and a small privileged class of blacks who are assaulting the large white majority, and the white majority has submitted to the assault. As I recently reported, thanks to indoctrinated white executives in companies with 100 or more employees, 94% of the new jobs went to blacks who comprise 12.6% of the US population. Whites who are 59.3% of the population got 6% of the jobs. Blacks are also favored in promotions. Soon blacks, a small percent of the population, will have as many top jobs as the majority whites. Indeed, this is the announced policy of the black Secretary of Defense who has put all white military promotions on hold because “there are too many white officers.” How long before we hear, or have we already, that there are too many white people? White majorities in the United States and indeed the entirety of the Western World, having accepted their demonization, have enabled their conquest and reduction to second class citizenship. Indeed, Joe Biden and various European political leaders have welcomed the transfer of moral authority from the native ethnicities to the immigrant-invaders. Biden said that it is a good thing that white Americans are being replaced. A US federal judge has just ruled that a Florida state law that prevents non-US citizens from engaging in voter registration drives discriminates against non-citizens. If the judge’s ruling stands, immigrant-invaders are now protected identically with citizens by the US Constitution. In other words, the meaning of citizenship has been destroyed. Immigrant-invaders have the same rights as citizens. https://hotair.com/david-strom/2024...nated-against-in-voting-matters-n3788693The unasked question remains. Why does the US spend an annual fortune defending against Russia, China, and Iran, but refuses one cent to be spent to halt the 3.6 million (official figure) immigrant-invaders who enter the US annually? America, indeed the entire Western world, is being transformed far more by immigrant-invaders than the West would be by Russian invasion. Why does the West spend huge amounts of money in defense of Ukraine’s border but refuses to defend its own borders? Western insanity goes even further. It has been documented that the US government spends white taxpayers’ money to recruit immigrant-invaders from 160 countries, and works with NGOs to provide, lodging, food, health care, and maps to help the immigrant-invaders make the trip with the least discomfort. It is OK with the California government for immigrant-invaders to be police officers with the ability to arrest US citizens and it is OK with the New York city council for immigrant-invaders to vote in city elections. Some members of Congress are proposing that immigrant-invaders be recruited for the US military. While immigrant-invaders are being conflated with US citizens, where are conservatives and Republicans? They are focused on saving Ukraine and Israel.
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It's too early to say what will happen in Iran following the long-overdue death of Ibrahim Raisi, but somepeople in Tehran were celebrating his death with fireworks. New elections will take place in June, but Iran has never been known for its free and fair elections, and this one is likely to be a farce too. How long before the people rise and and say "Enough!"? I don't know. The Shah stayed in power for decades before he was tossed out. I honestly though it might happen about twelve years ago - and it likely would have, if Obama hadn't turned his back on the situation. Yesterday, I reported on the death of Iran's Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian and President Ebrahim Raisi—seen as the likely successor to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who is 85—in a helicopter crash near the border with Azerbaijan. Some of Tehran's residents, who live in opposition to the regime, celebrated with fireworks in the streets.
Raisi's rival for succession had, up until the president's death this past weekend, been Mojtaba Khamenei, the ayatollah's 55-year-old son.
This presents a bit of a crisis domestically. "With previous supreme leaders arguing that hereditary rule under the shah was illegitimate, 'they would be hard-pressed to sell hereditary leadership to the Iranian people now,'" Shay Khatiri, senior fellow at the Yorktown Institute, told The New York Times. In other words, the fact that Mojtaba is Ayatollah Khamenei's son is going to look mighty bad if he is indeed picked to be Raisi's successor.
But it's not like Raisi (nicknamed the "butcher of Tehran" for his role in ordering executions following the Iran-Iraq war) had been a shoo-in: a notoriously uncharismatic man, who was perceived as merely a foot soldier of the ayatollah, was not particularly effective except insofar as he allowed the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps lots of leeway to do whatever they wanted.
New presidential elections will take place at the end of June. If past elections, in which the ayatollah has put his thumb on the scale to disqualify certain candidates (80 percent of candidates in a 2016 election and 50 percent in a 2020 election), are any indication, these one will be a sham, too.
It's worth noting that the helicopter accident really does look like an accident. But also, Iran has quite a history of tech malfunctions that take powerful people out. "In previous years, at least two cabinet ministers and two leading military commanders have died in similar crashes," writes Arash Azizi at The Atlantic, adding that "suspicions will inevitably surround the crash" and for good reason: "Air incidents that killed high political officials in Northern Rhodesia (1961), China (1971), Pakistan (1988), and Poland (2010) are still often subject to speculation." Onward and upward, airforce |
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Secretly. In the shadows. But with plenty of violence nonetheless.[/url] Britain's signals intelligence spy chief raised eyebrows this week with warnings that Russia is coordinating both cyberattacks and physical acts of sabotage against the West. There's evidence to back her claims—and the West may be returning the favor. Coming soon after FBI Director Christopher Wray warned that China is targeting American infrastructure, it looks like the world is not only fracturing once again, but that the hostile blocs are engaged in covert warfare.
Rumors of War
"We are increasingly concerned about growing links between the Russian intelligence services and proxy groups to conduct cyberattacks as well as suspected physical surveillance and sabotage operations," Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) Director Anne Keast-Butler told an audience at the United Kingdom government-sponsored CyberUK 2024 conference. "Before, Russia simply created the right environments for these groups to operate, but now they are nurturing and inspiring these non-state cyber actors in some cases seemingly coordinating physical attacks against the West."
Keast-Butler, whose agency is comparable to the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), also called out China, Iran, and North Korea as cybersecurity dangers. But naming Russian officials as being behind "physical attacks" raises the stakes. Sadly, her claims are well-founded.
Sabotage, Espionage, and Other Mischief
"A 20-year-old British man has been charged with masterminding an arson plot against a Ukrainian-linked target in London for the benefit of the Russian state," CBS News reported last month. That wasn't an isolated incident.
"In April alone a clutch of alleged pro-Russian saboteurs were detained across the continent," The Economist noted May 12 in describing what it called a "shadow war" between East and West. "Germany arrested two German-Russian dual nationals on suspicion of plotting attacks on American military facilities and other targets on behalf of the GRU, Russia's military intelligence agency. Poland arrested a man who was preparing to pass the GRU information on Rzeszow airport, the most important hub for military aid to Ukraine. Britain charged several men over an earlier arson attack in March on a Ukrainian-owned logistics firm in London whose Spanish depot was also targeted."
The GCHQ chief's warnings coupled with reality on the ground are alarming in themselves. Worse, they come after FBI Director Christopher Wray issued similar cautions in April about China.
"The PRC [People's Republic of China] has made it clear that it considers every sector that makes our society run as fair game in its bid to dominate on the world stage, and that its plan is to land low blows against civilian infrastructure to try to induce panic and break America's will to resist," Wray told the Vanderbilt Summit on Modern Conflict and Emerging Threats in Nashville, Tennessee.
Wray clarified that, by "infrastructure," he meant "everything from water treatment facilities and energy grids to transportation and information technology."
If that doesn't make you want to check that your pantry is stocked and that the water filter and generator are in working order, nothing will.
A Game Both Sides Can Play
Of course, in war of any sort, the implication is that both sides are involved in conflict. Western intelligence officials are loud in their warnings about foreign threats, but less open regarding just what their own operatives might be doing in Russia, China, and elsewhere. Still, there's evidence that this is hardly a one-sided war, shadowy though it may be.
In June 2022, The New York Times reported that Ukraine's defensive efforts relied heavily on "a stealthy network of commandos and spies rushing to provide weapons, intelligence and training." In addition to Americans, the story noted, "commandos from other NATO countries, including Britain, France, Canada and Lithuania, also have been working inside Ukraine."
American journalist and combat veteran Jack Murphy goes further, claiming the CIA, working through an allied spy service "is responsible for many of the unexplained explosions and other mishaps that have befallen the Russian military industrial complex." The targets include "railway bridges, fuel depots and power plants," he adds.
And if you wonder who blew up Nord Stream 1 and 2, well, so do a lot of people. Russia was initially accused, but it didn't make a lot of sense for the country's forces to destroy pipelines that generated revenue and fed western dependence on Russian natural gas. Since then, Denmark and Sweden have closed inconclusive investigations, journalist Seymour Hersh blamed American officials, and a report by Der Spiegel and The Washington Post placed responsibility on a rogue Ukrainian military officer.
The Wider War Is Here
Taken all together, the warnings from Keast-Butler and Wray, as well as acts of sabotage and arrests of foreign agents suggest that fears of a wider war resulting from Russia's continuing invasion of Ukraine may miss the point; the war could already be here. People looking for tanks and troops are overlooking cyber intrusions, arson, bombings, and other low-level mayhem.
"Russia is definitely at war with the West," Oleksandr Danylyuk of the Royal United Services Institute, a British defense and security think tank, told NBC News earlier this week.
Russian officials seem to embrace that understanding, with Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov commenting in March that the invasion of Ukraine, originally referred to by the euphemism "special military operation," is now more serious. "It has become a war for us as the collective West more and more directly increases its level of involvement in the conflict," he said.
Fortunately, a shadow war of the sort around us is less destructive than open military conflict, especially when the hostilities involve nuclear-armed powers. It's far better that spies hack the email accounts of government officials, as happened in the case of a Russian cyberattack on Germany's ruling Social Democrats, than that cities burn. But civilians still must live with the consequences of combatants attempting to do each other harm—particularly when the harm is to infrastructure on which regular people rely.
So, welcome to the world of global shadow war. Try to not become collateral damage. Onward and upward, airforce
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