Let’s clarify one important issue up front:  Progressives do not believe in democracy.  They use the term frequently as a Pavlovian bell to whip useful idiot activists into a frothing frenzy, but there is no measure by which they have proven they care about Democracy or even know what it is.  And since this is the case, we have to ask – What do they really mean when they use the word?

If we consider the traditional definition of “majority rule”, then this is clearly not what leftists support.  That is to say, they only support majority rule when they represent the majority.  In the case of the 2024 election Donald Trump won both the Electoral College and the popular vote, which means he does in fact represent the majority.  Yet, Democrats and their ilk continue to accuse him of being a “threat to democracy”, and they have openly and actively refused to accept the will of the people.

Therefore, one can only conclude that leftists want something other than democracy.  And, given their track record over the last four years in which they attempted mass online censorship and a global authoritarian coup using pandemic hysteria as a weapon, there is little doubt who the true autocrats really are.  

The hypocrisy is overwhelming when these same people accuse conservatives of authoritarianism.

Such is the case in light of a newly released annual report on the global state of democracy published by a “global watchdog” called the Varieties of Democracy project, or V-Dem.  Headed by Staffan Lindberg of Sweden’s University of Gothenburg, the group boasts that it is one of the largest social science data collection projects on democracy in the world.  V-Dem’s report covers the state of democracy around the world up until the end of 2024.  However, Lindberg provided special notes on Donald Trump, claiming that the President could lead America to lose its democracy status by 2026.

“If it continues like this, the United States will not score as a democracy when we release [next year’s] data…If it continues like this, democracy [there] will not last another six months.” 

Lindberg says Trump is doing many of the same things as Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Turkey, Viktor Orbán in Hungary and Narendra Modi in India — only faster.

“It’s the pace…He’s trying to do in a few months what it took them eight to 10 years to achieve.… It’s very dire.”

Canada’s state funded CBC (the CBS receives almost 70% of its funding from the Canadian government) was quick to jump on the V-Dem bandwagon in a rambling and mostly biased expose on the report and its implications for the Trump Administration.  

“The latest report still ranks the U.S. as a “Liberal Democracy,” the highest of five tiers, one higher than Canada, which is classified as an “Electoral Democracy.” 

The report adds an important caveat: this year’s version does not include events in 2025, meaning it does not cover the start of Donald Trump’s latest presidential term.  But it refers to ongoing events in the U.S. as unprecedented, mentioning Trump pardoning 1,500 criminals who supported him; firing independent agency watchdogs without process; purging apolitical police and military brass; ignoring laws; and his unilaterally deleting federal programs, and even a whole organization, created by U.S. Congress.”

V-Dem warns that the US may fall from the graces of their democracy list into the frightful category to “electoral autocracy”.  Meaning, people are still basically free to do all the things one does in a democracy, but the threat of retribution or retaliation is present.  In other words, it’s a lot like life in the US under the Biden Administration. 

It’s hard to see how Trump’s audits of the federal government and his cuts to government waste and NGO fraud are a “threat to democracy” unless you view democracy as progressive authoritarian boondoggle.  Biden pardoned his criminal son and most of his family retroactively back to 2014 under suspicious circumstances, with some insiders claiming that Biden’s unelected wife and son were running the White House behind the scenes while Biden was turning into a vegetable.

We don’t hear the leftists complaining about that act of autocracy.  Trump pardoning people who were politically railroaded and thrown in prison for up to 20 years for protesting is nothing in comparison.  

It’s also incredibly disingenuous to label the military brass under Biden as “apolitical” when they were entirely political and devout proponents of DEI. 

Finally, Trump’s federal cuts are exactly what he campaigned on and what the American people voted for him to do.  Democrats want to call the will of the people “autocracy”, but this only holds weight with low intelligence legacy journalists that simply don’t want to accept that they are in the minority.  

It should be mentioned that the V-Dem Project gets it’s funding from a variety of interesting sources, including The World Bank, George Soros’ Open Society Foundation, and, yes, you guessed it – USAID.

So, it’s not surprising that Trump’s cuts to agencies that money launder for leftist institutions have triggered V-Dem into a hostile response.  Trump is threatening their money train.  The new Administration is catching so much flak because they’re directly over the target.   

Authored by Arjun Singh via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

The “autopen” is in vogue. On March 17, President Donald Trump announced in a late-night social media post that he would ignore several pardons issued by his predecessor, President Joe Biden, because they were allegedly signed by autopen.

An autopen is a machine that reproduces handwriting. In the case of elected officials, who are expected to sign thousands of official documents on a regular basis, autopens are often used to reproduce their signatures in lieu of them signing each paper by their own hand.

The use of autopens has raised constitutional questions for some after Trump’s accusations of autopen use by Biden. They say that autopen use casts doubt on whether Biden knew the documents were being signed at all, thus implicating their validity.

“I worked in [the White House] for several presidents,” wrote K.T. MacFarland, a former deputy national security adviser during Trump’s first administration, on social platform X. “If Biden himself granted these pardons, there will be paper trail. If not, the guy running autopen machine usurped presidential authority.”

In a Jan. 20 statement that announced the pardons that were later challenged by his successor, Biden stated: “I am exercising my authority under the Constitution to pardon General Mark A. Milley, Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the Members of Congress and staff who served on the Select Committee, and the U.S. Capitol and D.C. Metropolitan police officers who testified before the Select Committee.”

The Epoch Times is unable to independently verify whether the pardons were signed by autopen or not.

The Biden Presidential Library at the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) denied The Epoch Times’ Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for Biden administration records about autopen use, citing a statute that prevents their release for five years after a president leaves office.

The former president, who has not yet established a post-presidential office, is not reachable.

Courts have opined that presidential pardons need not be written, and may be granted orally.

On whether writing is required as part of the president’s exercise of the clemency power, “The answer is undoubtedly no,” ruled the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit in 2024. “The plain language of the Constitution imposes no such limit.”

The Law of Autopens

Aside from the question of Biden’s foreknowledge, the constitutionality of autopen use by a president for official acts has never been determined by a federal court.

Article I, Section 7 of the U.S. Constitution requires that any bill passed by Congress must be signed by the president in order to become law, using the language “If he approve he shall sign it.”

The Constitution specifies no method for affixing the president’s signature. On the issuance of pardons, the Constitution is less specific—in Article II, Section 2, it states that the president “shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment,” with no mention of signature.

For nearly 20 years, the Executive Branch has held that autopen use is constitutional.

In 2005, during President George W. Bush’s administration, the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel issued an opinion that the president may sign a bill, within the constitutional definition, by use of an autopen or even directing that his signature be copied by another person.

“The President need not personally perform the physical act of affixing his signature to a bill he approves … Rather, the President may sign a bill within the meaning of Article I, Section 7 by directing a subordinate to affix the President’s signature to such a bill, for example by autopen,” wrote the office in the caption of its opinion.

The Office of Legal Counsel’s opinion is supported by contemporary legal scholars.

“Presidents are allowed to use the autopen and courts will not presume a dead-hand conspiracy,” wrote Jonathan Turley, a conservative legal scholar and professor at the George Washington University Law School, on social media.

“Many of these were high-profile pardons, including for his own son, that Biden acknowledged publicly … For all of these reasons, this dog will not hunt.”

The Use of Autopens

Machines to copy signatures, such as autopens, have long been used by U.S. presidents. President Thomas Jefferson, during his term from 1801 to 1809, extensively used a “polygraph” machine to copy and sign letters, though it required action by his own hand to work. Modern use of the autopen in government began in 1942, when a machine developed by Robert M. De Shazo, Jr. was acquired by the Secretary of the Navy to duplicate his signature, according to the National Parks Service.

In 1968, President Lyndon Johnson permitted an autopen device he used to be photographed by the National Enquirer, which then ran a story “The Robot That Sits in for the President.” Johnson’s decision confirmed the existence and use of the device, which had primarily been used by presidents and other senior officials to sign correspondence and some documents.

Autopen use, even in these circumstances, has been controversial. In 2004, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld faced public criticism for using an autopen to sign condolence letters to families of soldiers killed during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. In response, Rumsfeld vowed that “in the future I [will] sign each letter.”

The first use of an autopen to sign a bill into law was on May 26, 2011, by President Barack Obama, who ordered its use to sign an extension of the PATRIOT Act’s surveillance provisions into law. Obama was on a trip to France for a G8 Summit at the time and could not have returned to sign the law before the surveillance provisions expired that day, which would have affected national security. At the time, the White House cited the opinion of the Office of Legal Counsel during the Bush administration as a persuasive authority on the matter.

Obama used an autopen a second time in 2011, while at an Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Indonesia, to approve appropriations bills that would fund government agencies. He last used it, for a third time, in 2013, to sign the American Taxpayer Relief Act while on vacation in Hawaii.

Biden, during his presidential term, used an autopen at least once. He signed the Airport and Airway Extension Act into law while visiting San Francisco. The bill averted an expiration of authority for the Federal Aviation Administration, which oversees air traffic control and airline safety, by granting a one-week extension.

Trump, for his part, is not known to have signed any legislation or executive actions by autopen.

“It has been our policy for every legally operational/binding document that President Trump signs to contain his hand signature,” wrote a White House official in a statement to The Epoch Times.

In response to a question on March 17 at the Kennedy Center in Washington, Trump said he has used autopens “only for very unimportant papers.”

“I‘ll sign them whenever I can, but when I can’t, we’ll use an autopen,” he said.

Another day, another incident where a Tesla owner is being harassed…

This time, a Tesla driver in Lynnwood, Wash. says she was harassed and cut off by another motorist in a frightening, unprovoked road incident. 

On her way to a doctor’s appointment, Leigh was honked at near a red light, then cut off by a white SUV that stopped in the road. The other driver got out and began yelling at her, which she described as threatening and harassing, according to MyNorthwest.

The driver said: “He gets out and walks straight up to my door window. So I cracked my window and I said, ‘What? What is the problem? He goes, ‘You need to sell your car. This is a Nazi car. You’re driving it, you need to sell your car.’”

“Being in Seattle, climate’s important, our footprint’s important. This seemed like the right move for our very busy family. We drive a lot, and it saves us on gas. Now it feels like a huge risk; it’s scary,” she added.

Tesla owners have faced rising attacks and harassment since Elon Musk took over the Department of Government Efficiency under the Trump administration.

The MyNorthwest article says that the Justice Department is now prosecuting cases, including suspects who hurled Molotov cocktails at Tesla vehicles in Oregon and Colorado, and one who set fire to charging stations in South Carolina after scrawling anti-Trump messages.

Internationally, four Teslas were torched in Berlin. Locally, six Teslas in Lynnwood were vandalized with swastikas and slurs, and a Tesla was set ablaze in Seattle’s Capitol Hill.

Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

President Donald Trump on Thursday urged the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene after federal judges issued preliminary injunctions blocking the enforcement of his orders to federal agencies.

In a post on the social media platform Truth Social, Trump called on Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts to put a stop to nationwide injunctions that blocked his policies, saying they have caused the country “very serious trouble.”

“It is our goal to MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, and such a high aspiration can never be done if Radical and Highly Partisan Judges are allowed to stand in the way of JUSTICE,” Trump stated. “STOP NATIONWIDE INJUNCTIONS NOW, BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE.”

The Trump administration is facing a barrage of more than 100 lawsuits challenging the president’s executive orders on the federal government and agencies. Some federal judges have issued nationwide injunctions in response to those legal challenges, blocking Trump’s orders including one that seeks to bar transgender-identifying people from military service.

Trump condemned those injunctions as unlawful and criticized what he called radical-left judges, alleging that they “do not care, even a little bit, about the repercussions from their very dangerous and incorrect decisions and rulings.”

“These Judges want to assume the Powers of the Presidency, without having to attain 80 Million Votes. They want all of the advantages with none of the risks,” the president stated.

Trump said that as a president, he should be able to “act quickly and decisively” in matters such as deporting “murderers, drug lords, rapists, and other such type criminals back to their homeland, or to other locations that will allow our country to be safe.”

He was referencing a case concerning his administration’s effort to deport Venezuelan immigrants suspected of being members of the Tren de Aragua criminal gang, a U.S.-designated terrorist organization.

That effort was blocked by U.S. District Judge James Boasberg, who ruled against Trump’s proclamation invoking the Alien Enemies Act and ordered the return of deportation flights already en route to El Salvador.

The White House said on March 16 that deportation flights did not conflict with a judge’s order that blocked such actions because the ruling was issued after the flights had already left U.S. territory.

The Epoch Times has reached out to the Supreme Court for comment but did not hear back by publication time.

Trump has called for the impeachment of Boasberg—who also serves as chief judge of the U.S. Alien Terrorist Removal Court—after the judge blocked his proclamation. Roberts rejected that call.

“For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision,” Roberts stated on March 18. “The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose.”

Trump signed the proclamation invoking the Alien Enemies Act on March 15. It stated that many members of the Tren de Aragua gang have “unlawfully infiltrated the United States and are conducting irregular warfare and undertaking hostile actions” against the country.

Following the deportation flights, Boasberg issued a new order on March 20 demanding that Justice Department officials explain why their failure to return the deported immigrants to the United States did not violate his previous order.

The White House said on Wednesday that its mass deportations will continue as the Justice Department contests Boasberg’s order.

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) announced a plan on March 20 to introduce legislation that will curtail district court judges’ ability to block Trump’s policies nationwide.

“District Court judges have issued record numbers of national injunctions against the Trump administration—a dramatic abuse of judicial authority,” Hawley wrote on the X platform. “I will introduce legislation to stop this abuse for good.”

The senator did not provide further details about the legislation he intends to introduce.

Jacob Burg, Samantha Flom, and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Authored by Dave Carter via PJ Media,

Question: What’s the difference between a federal district judge and God?

Answer: God doesn’t think he’s a federal district judge. 

Or as Winston Churchill once said, “There, but for the grace of God, goes God.” Imagine the sheer hubris and limitless ego needed for an unelected jurist to don a black robe and assume the power of commandeering the national security apparatus and tell an aircraft full of dangerous foreign terrorists to turn around and return back to America to terrorize. Did Commissar Boasberg get his black robe from Hogwarts? 

Of course, there are a few problems with this, the first being purely logistical. If His Royal Awesomeness Commissar Boasberg is taking over the Venezuelan operation, that leaves the remaining 676 Commissars to split the remaining 194 countries into various principalities to accommodate their imperial administration. 

However, I did see that another federal district commissar is assuming operational oversight of the Environment Protection Agency (EPA) to prevent it from ending a $20 million grant program begun by former President Biden even as another federal district liege has assumed control of military readiness by blocking President Trump’s ban on transexuals serving in the military. Still another federal district overlord says that Trump’s dismantling of the corrupt money-laundering machine known as the US Agency for International Development (USAID) is likely unconstitutional. History buffs will recall that the USAID clause is written in the Constitution next to the right to stick a fork in a baby’s head, which itself adjacent to the divine right of federal judges to appropriate the President’s Article II powers. 

The logistical challenge of what to do with 677 otherwise idle Federal District Commissars having been solved by dispersing them, like the witch’s flying monkeys, throughout the Executive Branch, leaves only one remaining problem. No one elected these judges. They are not answerable to the American people, whom they hold in less esteem than foreigners with a knack for assaulting and murdering the innocent. As Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy and Homeland Security Advisor Stephen Miller wrote: 

Currently, district court judges have assumed the mantle of Secretary of Defense, Secretary of State, Secretary of Homeland Security and Commander-in-Chief. Each day, they change foreign policy, economic staffing and national security policies of the Administration. The day the nation arises to see what the craziest unelected local federal judge has decided the policies of the government of the United States shall be. It is madness. It is lunacy. It is the gravest assault on democracy. It must and will end.

In his book, “The Devil’s Dictionary,” Ambrose Bierce defines law as “Compatible with the will of a judge having jurisdiction,” and he defines a lawyer as “One who is skilled in circumvention of the law.” That last little bit was conclusively demonstrated to me a few days ago when a lawyer acquaintance of mine wrote on social media that “[I]n 1798 Congress enacted the Alien Enemies Act, which specifically provides that when war is declared, the President can remove and treat as hostile all foreign enemy agents on U.S. soil over the age of 14. The statute expressly requires war to be declared (which is a power of Congress)…” 

His point is that absent a declaration of war, President Trump cannot summarily remove Venezuelan gang members without each individual having their day in court where a judge will adjudicate whether or not they are members of the Tren de Aragua gang. But the wording of the Alien Enemies Act states: 

…Whenever there shall be a declared war between the United States and any foreign government, or any invasion or predatory incursion shall be perpetrated, attempted, or threatened against the territory of the United States, by any foreign nation or government, and the President of the United States shall make public proclamation of the event, all natives, citizens, denizens, or subjects of the hostile nation or government, being males of the age of fourteen years and upwards, who shall be in the United States, and not actually naturalized, shall be liable to be apprehended, restrained, secured and removed, as alien enemies. 

Seems that the lawyer left something out of his narrative on the requirements for deportation, i.e. “…a declared war between the United States and any foreign government, OR any invasion or predatory incursion…” Ambrose Bierce is correct yet again. 

In his deportation proclamation on deporting Tren de Aragua (TdA) members, President Trump stipulates that “TdA has engaged in and continues to engage in mass illegal migration to the United States to further its objectives of harming United States citizens, undermining public safety, and supporting the Maduro regime’s destabilizing democratic nations in the Americas, including the United States.” 

As the brief exchange with the lawyer continued, he wrote, “We used to believe that it was better for 100 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be imprisoned without trial.” Of course, when the number of guilty parties goes from 100 to many millions, we run into another logistical problem, a problem made possible by the studied inaction of jurists at every level who turned a blind eye to millions of unvetted illegal aliens flooding the country in contravention of standing federal law within the last four years alone. 

The marauding band of savages who beat, stripped, and repeatedly raped Jocelyn Nungary before throwing her body off a bridge didn’t evince so much as a sigh from His Royal Awesomeness Commissar Boasberg or any of the others who are retreating to their fainting couches over a President doing precisely what he was elected to do. They will wax inconsolable over the thought that one of these bloodthirsty savages might not be Mirandized before being spirited out of the country while leaving you to the tender mercies of yet more savages. 

These petty black-robed tyrants are doing nothing less than trying to supersede the will of the American people and bog down the President we elected in the judicial quicksand of what Chief Justice Roberts called “the regular appellate process.” That is judge-speak for “Your republic may well die waiting on us to fix the mess we’ve created.” 

President Trump on Friday revoked the security clearances of more than 15 top Democrats – including former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, former VP Kamala Harris, former Secretary of State Antony Blinken, former national security adviser Jake Sullivan, and Biden’s entire family.

The list also includes former Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, New York Attorney General Letitia James, and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, all of whom have been involved in legal cases against Trump, as well as clearances for former Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney and former Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger – so basically the entire ‘get Trump’ crew.

“I have determined that it is no longer in the national interest for the following individuals to access classified information,” Trump state in his presidential memo.

The move comes after Trump previously announced that he would revoke security clearances for Joe Biden and several officials from the Biden administration – with the recent memo formalizing that decision.

As the Epoch Times notes further, others named in the list are retired Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, former White House Russia expert Fiona Hill, former U.S. ambassador to the Czech Republic Norman Eisen, former federal prosecutor Andrew Weissmann, and lawyer Mark Zaid.

In his memo, Trump directed heads of executive departments and agencies to stop allowing the named individuals access to classified information.

Trump’s order applies to classified briefings and any access to classified information that the named individuals may have had due to their previous tenure in Congress.

“I also direct all executive department and agency heads to revoke unescorted access to secure United States Government facilities from these individuals,” he stated.

*  *  *

You can support ZeroHedge by picking up a waxed canvas hat!

Trump said last month that he decided to revoke Biden’s security clearances due to his previous action and the report by special counsel Robert Hur, who investigated Biden’s alleged mishandling of classified information.

“There is no need for Joe Biden to continue receiving access to classified information,” he stated on Truth Social. “He set this precedent in 2021, when he instructed the Intelligence Community (IC) to stop the 45th President of the United States (ME!) from accessing details on National Security, a courtesy provided to former Presidents.”

When Biden took office in 2021, he revoked Trump’s access to intelligence briefings, citing the Jan. 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol breach. Trump was later impeached by the House of Representatives and acquitted by the Senate.

Former presidents have traditionally been afforded courtesy access to classified information at the highest level, as well as daily intelligence briefings, which enables them to remain apprised of national security issues and provide the incumbent president with advice as requested.

Few former presidents have requested such briefings, though the late President George H.W. Bush—a former director of Central Intelligence during the Gerald R. Ford administration—was known to do so.

After taking office on Jan. 20, Trump revoked the security clearances of former national security advisor John Bolton and 49 former U.S. intelligence officials who signed a letter discrediting credible reports about emails found on Hunter Biden’s laptop.

The former intelligence officials were accused of engaging in partisan politics by discrediting the reports ahead of the 2020 election, while the action against Bolton stemmed from his memoir, which the Trump administration said posed “a grave risk” of exposing classified material.

Separately, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Jan. 28 revoked the personal security detail and security clearance for retired Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Mark Milley, who served as the nation’s highest-ranking military officer during Trump’s first term.

Arjun Singh, Melanie Sun, and Zachary Stieber contributed to this report.

Authored by Rex Widerstrom via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

American winemakers have joined tech companies, beef producers, and pharmaceutical manufacturers in demanding U.S. President Donald Trump impose large tariffs on Australian imports.

The California Association of Winegrape Growers (CAWG) has taken issue with Australia’s 29 percent tax on imported wine, which it says is one of several “unfair, non-reciprocal trade practices” that disadvantage U.S. wine producers.

The formal complaint has been lodged with the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, but the eventual decision will rest with the president, given Trump’s stated determination to impose tariffs as a tool to even out trade relations.

—many of whom have been growing grapes for generations—to go “out of business at an alarming rate.”The CAWG alleges that an “influx of cheap, imported bulk wine” into America is causing vineyards and farmers

The organisation admits the issue is “nuanced,” noting that not only do other countries’ tariffs disadvantage American growers, but many foreign competitors also benefit from lower production costs and “in many cases, generous public subsidies.”

It said the Australian government gives benefits to the local wine industry—including rebates, $100,000 grants, loans, and financial assistance—which “distort competition” for U.S. winemakers.

But while pleading its case to Trump, the CAWG isn’t optimistic that he’ll solve the issues they face.

“Despite the attention surrounding this latest tariff threat, it is unlikely that tariffs of this magnitude will be implemented in a sustainable or long-term manner. However, this moment presents a valuable opportunity to address the need for a level playing field for California winegrape growers,” said CAWG President Natalie Collins.

While bottled wines are an issue, it is bulk wine imports (finished wine shipped in large flexi-tanks, bladders, or containers) that “pose a more urgent and direct threat to California winegrowers,” the organisation said.

“Foreign bulk wine floods the U.S. at below-market prices, allowing companies to bottle and sell it under familiar ‘American’ brands, misleading consumers and undercutting domestic farmers. In 2024, an estimated 300,000 tons (272,000 tonnes) of California wine grapes went unharvested, while 38 million gallons (44 million litres) of cheap foreign bulk wine replaced California-grown grapes.

“Amid all the noise over tariffs, an actual, and very real, crisis is unfolding in California Wine Country. Winegrowers and wineries are being forced to make impossible decisions; ripping out vineyards, ending family businesses, and shutting down operations,” it says.

It also warns that any tariffs the president does decide to impose may be negated by other programmes.

“The federal duty drawback system, in its current form, further incentivises bulk imports by allowing companies to claim refunds on import duties and excise taxes; giving imported wine a competitive advantage in the U.S. market,” CAWG says.

“This flawed program may render tariffs ineffective if companies can simply recover those costs through duty drawback.”

Australia Incentivises Wine Growing for Tourism

Australia does provide support to its wine industry.

The Wine Tourism and Cellar Door Grants Programme allows wine and cider producers to apply for grants of up to $100,000 on eligible cellar door sales.

The government has so far provided $60 million through this programme, though—while it does support grape growers—it targets cellar door sales in Australia as part of tourism promotion and does not directly affect exports.

There’s also support for research and development through the Research and Innovation (R&I) Funding programme, though this is partly funded through a levy on growers, which the government then matches.

Last year, the government also announced a one-off $3.5 million grant package to support the industry’s long-term viability after it found itself dealing with an oversupply of red wine.

And Australian winemakers, along with other primary producers, can also benefit from initiatives such as $2 million in support last year for agricultural exporters to re-establish commercial connections in China and continue to diversify into other markets.

But unlike Australia, where consumption of alcohol has been steadily falling since around 1990, in America it has grown over the same period.

US Incentives for Local Growers

However, members of the CAWG also benefit from generous government assistance.

The CBMTRA (California Beverage Manufacturers Tax Relief Act) provides tax credits for wineries of all sizes, calculated based on the number of gallons produced.

The formula is: $1.00 per gallon for the first 30,000 gallons; $0.90 per gallon for gallons 30,001 to 130,000; and $0.53 per gallon for gallons 130,001 to 650,000. That applies whether or not the wine is exported.

U.S. wineries and their peak bodies can also apply for grant money, which can be used for market research and to help them determine if a particular market would benefit their business.

The U.S. wine industry is currently in crisis (pdf); numerous reports have outlined declining domestic sales due in part to a lack of interest among younger generations.

We’ve reported on many indications of a faltering US economy being propped up by debt, but our latest entry is particularly emphatic: DoorDash has inked a deal with Klarna that will let cash-strapped consumers pay for restaurant food, groceries and other delivery orders in four equal, interest-free installments, or “at a more convenient time, such as a date that aligns with their paycheck schedules.” 

Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) arrangements have surged in recent years. However, what began as a reasonable accommodation for large purchases like appliances and furniture has now metastasized to a point where Americans can finance Friday-night-pizza impulse-buys.   

Klarna derives more than 60% of its revenue from fees paid by merchants who offer the financing option to their customers, with those fees potentially ranging from 1.5% to 7% of the purchase price. With some merchants, Klarna and other BNPL-facilitators also earn interest on long-term credit plans stretching out to upwards of 36 months. 

However, Klarna also has a chance to earn money from consumers who take the interest-free, four-equal-installments plan — in the form of late fees of up to $7 per missed payment, up to 25% of the purchase price. For the financially disorganized or imminently insolvent, the interest-free option could prove to be a siren song that leaves their cash flow dashed against the metaphoric rocks of unexpectedly expensive burritos and Kung Pao chicken.  

what do you mean you have $11k in “doordash debt” pic.twitter.com/pu1h8GqdZg

— adam 🇺🇸 (@personofswag) March 20, 2025

Even for those who make timely payments, the interest-free option can have a destructive effect over time, by encouraging consumers to commit to spending more money than they would in the absence of the appealing, “interest-free” enticement. Indeed, that’s one of the essential attractions for DoorDash and other merchants who choose to partner with the likes of Klarna:  

According to research from RBC Capital Markets…online BNPL offerings boosted average ticket sales by 30% to 50% and increase the share of customers who ultimately made a purchase. — CNN

“The problem is these things start having a very pervasive and very negative influence on people who can’t afford it,” Anish Nagpal, an University of Melbourne marketing professor who studies behavioral decision-making, told the Washington Post. “They just want something now, and they go into this spiral of debt and always trying to chase up and meet the payment requirement.”

In 20 years democrats will be campaigning on DoorDash loan forgiveness

— Dr. Richard Harambe (@Richard_Harambe) March 21, 2025

Naturally, Klarna Chief Commercial Officer David Sykes tried putting a different spin on things: 

“Our partnership with DoorDash marks an important milestone in Klarna’s expansion into everyday spending categories. By offering smarter, more flexible payment solutions for groceries, takeout, and retail essentials, we’re making convenience even more accessible for millions of Americans.”

We must ask: Is it ever “smarter” to finance a sandwich? 

News of the DealDash BNPL arrangement comes against a backdrop of steadily rising consumer debt and signs that Americans are increasingly unable to keep up with their obligations. The New York Fed’s latest quarterly report found that total household debt increased by $93 billion in 2024’s fourth quarter, pushing the total over $18 trillion. Warning lights are flashing:

• The share of subprime auto borrowers at least 60 days past due hit 6.56% in January, the highest percentage since Fitch Ratings began collecting data in 1994. 

• The percentage of credit card holders making only the minimum payment hit 10.75% in Q4 2024, the highest-ever reading in a Philly Fed data series that goes back to 2012.  

• The share of 30-day-delinquent credit-card balances hit 3.52%, more than double the pandemic-era low reached in Q2 2021. 

After the Doordash-Klarna news broke, social media memesters had an absolute field day:  

So then they securitized all the DoorDash loans and sliced them into tranches to sell off to the banks

Rating agencies were slapping AAA on Chick-fil-A orders for credit scores under 500 who didn’t leave a tip pic.twitter.com/sa3YKIqLhw

— Max Gagliardi (@max_gagliardi) March 21, 2025

John, the name of the company is DoorDash. Through a partnership with Klarna, they’ve just unlocked interest-free structured liquidity for high-frequency sustenance transactions. You can finance a carne asada burrito over 4 easy payments, or even defer the charge until payday. https://t.co/VUFounWDTq pic.twitter.com/fzS2iV0RzX

— Adam Singer (@AdamSinger) March 20, 2025

how i walk up to my doordash driver after tipping $0 on the 18 McGriddles i just financed https://t.co/u4ZyZSN0gZ pic.twitter.com/SJiyxZAOEt

— Frosty ❄ (@I_Frosty_) March 21, 2025

“so you financed a $5.29 McChicken on DoorDash but still remain bullish on the economy?” pic.twitter.com/c57aVqbVC0

— Boring_Business (@BoringBiz_) March 21, 2025

“They’re called DoorDash Default Swaps.” pic.twitter.com/rX5ZDGfIEa

— Multifamily Madness (@MultifamilyMad) March 21, 2025

“So we take these DoorDash loans, combine them, and create a whole new instrument where investors can bet on whether borrowers will pay off their Taco Bell Crunch Wrap Supreme within 12 months” https://t.co/cwU484agrg pic.twitter.com/0JBwy8FAfd

— Dr. Parik Patel, BA, CFA, ACCA Esq. (@ParikPatelCFA) March 20, 2025

DoorDash debt collection outside your door because you missed a Chipotle payment https://t.co/pJdr2frU5u pic.twitter.com/LvGS99fdz9

— Archer, Leader of the Gorgonites (@RollxTidexTee) March 20, 2025

the year is 2038 and you owe $50,000 of burrito debt to doordash but you can pay it all off by living in mr beasts minivan for 80 days

— Zack Voell (@zackvoell) March 21, 2025

You are telling me these loans are backed by consumers who ordered burritos on DoorDash? pic.twitter.com/hU76On8Y5N

— Boring_Business (@BoringBiz_) March 21, 2025

Me tipping the DoorDash driver $150 cuz it’s on Klarna’s tab pic.twitter.com/oo05X2sHWM

— Phella (@iamphella) March 20, 2025

The delivery guy watching me sign a 6-year financing deal for my double cheeseburger pic.twitter.com/03KtqAylj0

— piet (@piet_dev) March 21, 2025

“What do you mean your orders? We’re talking about one DoorDash order, aren’t we?”

“I had three. A burger from Five Guys, fries from McDonalds, and a 20 ounce Slurpee from 7/11.” pic.twitter.com/kuDJj6NazJ

— the prince with a thousand enemies ♂️ (@jaketropolis) March 20, 2025

“Alright, so DoorDash makes money whenever any of you orders food instead of cooking. But the problem is, some of you are so broke, you can’t even afford that. You don’t have $15 for a burrito. Which, obviously, means you should just not get the burrito, right?” https://t.co/PCUfJVSJuZ pic.twitter.com/jQG9l0gOBW

— Poe’s Law, Esq: Poe’s Lawyer (@dyingscribe) March 21, 2025

Excited to announce that I closed on a $31.38 transaction to secure a burrito and side of chips

20-year senior fixed rate financing was provided by Klarna

DoorDash provided delivery of the asset

Congratulations to all involved pic.twitter.com/u0DPMHlS8K

— Chase Passive Income (@chasedownleads) March 20, 2025

Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

President Donald Trump is withdrawing an executive order targeting New York-based law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison (Paul Weiss) after it agreed to review its hiring practices and provide tens of millions of dollars in free legal services to support some of his administration’s initiatives.

The March. 14 order suspended security clearances for Paul Weiss lawyers and restricted their access to government buildings and officials, citing the firm’s diversity policies. It also directed federal agencies to take steps to cancel U.S. government contracts “for which Paul Weiss has been hired to perform any service.”

Trump confirmed the withdrawal of the order in a March 20 statement on the social media platform Truth Social.

The decision followed Trump’s meeting with the law firm’s chairman, Brad Karp, “during which Mr. Karp acknowledged the wrongdoing of former Paul, Weiss partner, Mark Pomerantz, the grave dangers of Weaponization, and the vital need to restore our System of Justice,” according to the statement.

No further details were provided regarding the alleged wrongdoing.

*  *  *

You can support ZeroHedge by picking up a waxed canvas hat!

According to the statement, the law firm has agreed to dedicate the equivalent of $40 million in pro bono legal services over the course of Trump’s term “to support the Administration’s initiatives,” including assisting veterans and the president’s Task Force to Combat Antisemitism, among other projects.

It also affirmed its commitment to merit-based hiring, promotion, and retention, and will not adopt, use, or pursue any diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies, the statement said.

“As part of its commitment, it will engage experts, to be mutually agreed upon within 14 days, to conduct a comprehensive audit of all of its employment practices,” the statement said.

Paul Weiss also agreed that “the bedrock principle of American Justice is that it must be fair and nonpartisan for all,” the statement read.

It added that Paul Weiss affirms its “unwavering commitment to these core ideals and principles,” and “will not deny representation to clients, including in pro bono matters and in support of non-profits, because of the personal political views of individual lawyers.”

In response to Trump’s decision to withdraw the executive order, Karp said the firm was “gratified” and is looking forward to “an engaged and constructive relationship with the President and his Administration.”

Trump’s March 14 order also targeted Paul Weiss’s hiring of attorney Mark Pomerantz in 2022, a former partner of the law firm who left to work in the Manhattan district attorney’s office.

During his time at the district attorney’s office, Pomerantz was involved in an investigation into Trump’s alleged payments to Stephanie Clifford, better known as adult performer Stormy Daniels.

Pomerantz said in a statement that he “engaged in no wrongdoing by working as a prosecutor to uphold the rule of law.”

Trump’s order also mentioned a Paul Weiss partner and former leading prosecutor in the office of special counsel Robert Mueller who brought a pro bono lawsuit against individuals alleged to have participated in the Jan. 6, 2021 breach, of the U.S. Capitol, on behalf of the District of Columbia attorney general.

“My Administration has already taken action to address some of the significant risks and egregious conduct associated with law firms, and I have determined that similar action is necessary to end Government sponsorship of harmful activity by an additional law firm: Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP (Paul Weiss),” Trump wrote.

In recent weeks, Trump also signed a presidential memorandum targeting law firm Covington & Burling and an executive order targeting Perkins Coie. In response, Perkins Coie sued the administration in federal court in Washington last week.

A federal judge has temporarily blocked the administration from enforcing portions of the order on Perkins Coie, finding the law firm was likely to win its lawsuit alleging Trump’s actions violated the firm’s rights under the U.S. Constitution.

The Epoch Times reached out to Paul Weiss, Covington & Burling, and Perkins Coie for comment but did not receive a response by publication time.

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Via The Cradle

Turkish police have detained 343 people during overnight protests in several cities against the detention of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, the Interior Ministry said Saturday.

Demonstrations took place across the country, including in Istanbul and the capital Ankara, the ministry said in a statement. It said the detentions were made to prevent “disrupting of public order” and warned that authorities would not tolerate “chaos and provocation.”

The Republican People’s Party (CHP), of which Imamoglu is a member, said the detentions were politically motivated and urged supporters to demonstrate lawfully. The protests are the biggest in Turkey since the massive demonstrations of 2013 to protest the demolition of Istanbul’s Gezi Park, Kurdistan 24 reported.

“There is a great anger. People are spontaneously taking to the streets. Some young people are being politicized for the first time in their lives,” said Yuksel Taskin, a lawmaker from the CHP.

“The feeling of being trapped — economically, socially, politically, and even culturally — was already widespread,” journalist and author Kemal Can told AFP.

The protests began on March 19 after Mayor Imamoglu was detained at his home that morning on terrorism and corruption charges. “I see today during my interrogation that I and my colleagues are faced with unimaginable accusations and slanders,” Imamoglu said in his defense during a counter-terrorism police interrogation, a court document viewed by Reuters showed.

🟡 HAPPENING NOW: Scenes show the massive scale of ongoing protests across Turkey, now entering their third consecutive day.

Demonstrations continue to spread nationwide, as police respond with tear gas, water cannons, and pepper spray in multiple cities. pic.twitter.com/0tpG8tpJvG

— red. (@redstreamnet) March 21, 2025

Imamoglu is considered a prominent rival to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. He was set to run for his party’s presidential primary on 23 March – during which he was expected to be chosen as the CHP candidate for future presidential elections scheduled for 2028.

According to the Istanbul Chief Prosecutor’s Office, Imamoglu and others have been accused of “running a criminal organization, membership of a criminal organization, corruption, bribery, fraud, illegally obtaining personal data, and corruption in a public tender.”

He has also been accused of “aiding” the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) – outlawed in Turkiye – by participating in an “urban consensus initiative” aimed at bolstering the Kurdish group’s influence in last year’s local elections.

Imamoglu’s arrest came a day after Istanbul University nullified his diploma, making him ineligible to run in elections under Turkish law.

Anti-riot measures being deployed by police. The Guardian has said it is becoming a “fight about democracy”…

🟡 BREAKING: Protesters are pushing back riot police and water cannons in Ankara amid massive anti-government protests across Turkey. pic.twitter.com/OvberI0gGu

— red. (@redstreamnet) March 21, 2025

Since the detention, Ankara has identified hundreds of X accounts and detained 37 social media users for “provocative posts inciting crime and hatred,” Turkiye’s Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said on Thursday. 

“Efforts to catch the other suspects are ongoing,” the minister added. Restrictions have been imposed on several social media platforms.