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Fri, Aug 14, 2026

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The election questions Democrats refuse to answer

The election questions Democrats refuse to answer

President Donald J. Trump participates in a press conference at the G7, Wednesday, June 17, 2026, at La Grange au Lac in Evian-les-Bains, France. (Official White House photo by Daniel Torok)
(Official White House photo by Daniel Torok)

On July 16, President Trump gave a long and detailed speech describing various ways noncitizens are impacting American elections and violating our sacred right to determine the political future of our own country.

Democrats roundly dismissed the president's speech, called him a liar, and mocked his obsession with voter fraud.

But just days after the Trump speech, The Thing That Never Happens happened again, as New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill was forced to admit that more than 6,600 noncitizens had been added to the state's voter rolls, and 400 of them actually voted in elections going back to 2023.

The real number of noncitizens in New Jersey who are registered to vote could actually be much higher, as DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin announced their records matched with as many as 19,500 noncitizens on publicly available voter

New York City transit officials threw recyclables in trash

New York City transit officials threw recyclables in trash

(Photo by Joe Kovacs)
(Photo by Joe Kovacs)

Topline: New York City's bus depots and maintenance facilities are legally required to recycle their paper and cardboard, but it rarely happens.

The Metropolitan Transit Authority's inspector general visited 40 NYC Transit facilities and found that 21 of them mixed trash and recyclables together in the same dumpster. The other 19 facilities' employees properly separated the material, but the company they hired to pick up the waste mixed it all together in the same truck.

The inspector general estimates the city lost $800,000 over five years by unnecessarily paying to send the recyclables to landfills and by failing to claim credits from selling the materials.

Key facts: Seven maintenance facilities did not have any recycling bins. Sixteen others had bins that were not clearly labeled to distinguish them from trash cans, the audit found.

China’s special maritime law enforcement ops near Taiwan

China’s special maritime law enforcement ops near Taiwan

Chinese warships (Video screenshot)
Chinese warships

Introduction

This article reviews China's heavy-handed response to an announcement by Japan and the Philippines that they intend to delimit their exclusive economic zone (EEZ) maritime boundary east of Taiwan. It will first briefly discuss the some of the outcomes of the May 2026 Japan-Philippines Summit meeting, where the two nations announced (inter alia) their intention to delimit their maritime boundary. It will then discuss China's diplomatic response to the proposed delimitation, as well as China's special maritime law enforcement operation east of Taiwan intended to discourage Japan and the Philippines from negotiating the boundary agreement without China's participation. The article will then discuss the relevant international law applicable to maritime delimitations and the authorities coastal States enjoy over foreign-flagged vessels in the various maritime zones. The article will next review the legality of China's unprecedented special maritime law enforcement operation and will conclude with the observation that the operation was inconsistent with international law, as it impeded high seas freedoms of navigation of foreign-flagged vessels and violated the principle of exclusive flag State jurisdiction applicable beyond the territorial sea.

Japan-Philippines Summit Meeting

During a

The urgent need to restore America’s amphibious readiness

The urgent need to restore America’s amphibious readiness

U.S. service members aboard amphibious assault ship USS Boxer support flight operations day and night from the Arabian Sea as CENTCOM enforces the naval blockade against Iran in July 2026. (U.S. Central Command photo)
U.S. service members aboard amphibious assault ship USS Boxer support flight operations day and night from the Arabian Sea as CENTCOM enforces the naval blockade against Iran in July 2026. (U.S. Central Command photo)

Most Americans seldom hear the term "amphibious operations" outside of an entertainment context: John Wayne as Sgt. John Stryker in The Sands of Iwo Jima or Tom Hanks as Capt. John Miller in the opening scenes of Saving Private Ryan. For service members, though, it's a different story.

Historically, the ability to project power onto a hostile shore is a critical element of national security and a mainstay of a maritime nation. Military strategist B. H. Liddell Hart explains that “Amphibious flexibility is the greatest strategic asset that a sea power possesses.

Yet, despite its strategic necessity, America's amphibious readiness faces critical funding and organizational challenges that demand immediate action from Congress and the Department of the Navy.

The Pentagon can build killer drones: It needs to move faster

The Pentagon can build killer drones: It needs to move faster

An MQ-25 Stingray sits parked at Scott Air Force Base, Illinois, May 12, 2023. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Solomon Cook)
An MQ-25 Stingray sits parked at Scott Air Force Base, Illinois, May 12, 2023. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Solomon Cook)

The debate over U.S. autonomous weapons policy is dominated by concerns over moving too fast. Detractors warn that we may risk losing control of the systems themselves or the escalation dynamics they will impact. But, as we argue in a recent report, the reality is that the Pentagon is moving too slow owing to funding, procurement, organizational, and oversight systems that are poorly suited to fielding and continuously updating the most decisive capability on the modern battlefield. While increasingly autonomous systems are not preferable in an ideal world, they are being developed in the real one. If the U.S. neglects to develop them proactively, it risks having to develop them reactively in a crisis, with far less time to conform with our ethical standards.

The moral questions that frame the debate are important and reflect a serious unease captured by Pope Leo's

Climate crusaders turn to flimsy ‘extreme event attribution’ schemes

Climate crusaders turn to flimsy ‘extreme event attribution’ schemes

(Photo by Julius Drost on Unsplash)

This article was originally published at The Empowerment Alliance and is republished here with permission. 

Earlier this year, the Trump administration removed a chapter on climate change from a manual used by judges, prosecutors and defense attorneys "to better interpret the scientific complexities of the cases before them." For those of us who don't believe in coincidence, the response to that removal offers a textbook case of how liberal climate crusaders and their media allies spring into action to rescue a struggling leftwing cause.

First, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, a non-governmental institution, soon issued a report designed to advance the cause of "extreme event attribution," a questionable scientific premise designed to point fingers at specific corporations and activities based on how much they contribute to worsening weather calamities.

Second,

Smart energy built Iowa. Now voters need to protect it

Smart energy built Iowa. Now voters need to protect it

(Photo by NASA on Unsplash)

Iowa was first.

In 1983, before climate anxiety became injected into the American bloodstream by Washington, D.C. consultants, Iowa passed the nation's first Renewable Portfolio Standard. It wasn't driven by ideology — it was pro-agriculture and smart market-hedging behavior. A farming state hedged against energy price volatility the way farmers hedge against weather: practically, locally, without waiting for permission from the federal government.

The result is that Iowa today generates more than 60% of its electricity from wind and still pays roughly 13.5 cents per kilowatt-hour, well below the national average of about 18 cents. When energy policy is written by people who pay energy bills, good things happen.

Christina Bohannan has a different model in mind, and it's a model invented by people who know a lot more about making lattes in Brooklyn than bringing in the corn in Clinton County.

Marijuana is America’s most commonly used drug now, and the reason may be worse than you think


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Barack Obama smoking in his youth
Barack Obama smoking in his youth

Cannabis-related hospitalizations are climbing as more young Americans appear to be embracing it to cope with how they perceive the state of the world.

Emergency room visits for cannabis hyperemesis syndrome (CHS) — cyclical vomiting caused by frequent cannabis use — rose roughly 16% from Oct. 2025 through May 2026, according to a Thursday report by the Centers for Disease Contro

l and Prevention (CDC).

The report comes after the 2025 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) found that approximately 21.4 million people in the U.S. use cannabis daily or near-daily, surpassing the consumption frequencies of roughly 19.9 million cigarette smokers and 17.2 million alcohol

‘Scariest thing we’ve ever had happen’: Shock video shows more than 30 shots fired at home of state election official

‘Scariest thing we’ve ever had happen’: Shock video shows more than 30 shots fired at home of state election official

(Video screenshot)

More than 30 shots were fired at a Georgia elections official's home shortly after midnight early Thursday morning.

Three suspects fired shots at the home of Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger's Communications Director Robert Sinners.

Shocking surveillance video shows three suspects firing more than 30 shots at Robert Sinners' home on Wellington Street SW in Atlanta.

Sinners was asleep in his bed next to his fiancé at the time of the shooting.

Nobody was injured.

"We are still confused why 30 shots hit our home last night," Robert Sinners told WSB-TV.

"Scariest thing we've ever had happen to us," he added.

Police pursued the suspects and exchanged gunfire with them.

Two suspects, Jermaine Howard, 29, and Gregory Vaughn, 26, have been arrested. A third suspect is still

‘Congress must finish the job’: Vance asks for help waging war on fraud


Vice President JD Vance, leader of the White House's Task Force to Eliminate Fraud, has uncovered $230 billion in fraud since January 2025. Now, he is calling on Congress to help combat fraud, protect social programs, and restore social trust.

Vance called Republican members of Congress to the White House to ask for their help and announce policy priorities.

"We will fundamentally always have a limitation unless our colleagues in the House and the Senate are working with us," Vance said Wednesday at the roundtable event. "There are a few things that we really need to do, and that we can't do at the federal government without the cooperation of Congress."

‘Good guys with a firearm’: L.A. County waves white flag in concealed carry case

‘Good guys with a firearm’: L.A. County waves white flag in concealed carry case

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The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) announced that a California sheriff's department has settled a lawsuit regarding the issuance of concealed carry permits.

Pro-Second Amendment organizations and individual plaintiffs originally filed the suit in December 2023, accusing California jurisdictions of charging excessive fees and being dilatory in processing applications for carry permits. The group celebrated the settlement with the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department (LASD) in a Thursday release.

Other plaintiffs in the case included Gun Owners of America (GOA), Gun Owners Foundation, seven individuals and the California Rifle and Pistol Association (CRPA). The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department did not respond to requests for comment from the Daily Caller News Foundation.

"CRPA and our strategic partners have been monitoring local jurisdictions to make sure

Latest poll: Democrat Talarico leads Republican Paxton in Texas U.S. Senate race


James Talarico and Alfred E. Neuman
James Talarico (Video screenshot)
James Talarico

(The Center Square) – Less than 100 days from the midterm election, a Democrat is ahead in the polls for the U.S. Senate race in Texas.

State Rep. James Talarico, D-Austin, has surpassed Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton by at least 2 points. The race remains statistically tied.

A new Texas Southern University Barbara Jordan Public Policy Research and Survey Center poll has Talarico leading Paxton 47% to 45%. Six remain undecided with 2% supporting Libertarian Ted Brown, according to the poll.

Talarico holds a lead among women, Hispanic and Black voters. Paxton holds a lead with white and male voters, according to the data.

Talarico's favorable and unfavorable ratings are nearly tied, 46% and 47%, respectively. Paxton's unfavorable rating of 57% is higher than his favorable rating of 39%.

The poll was conducted among 1,200 likely Texas voters between July 27 and 30. It has a margin of error of 2.83%.

A new Beacon Research and

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