The International Air Transport Association released new profitability forecasts for global airlines, indicating that despite high interest rates slowing down developed and emerging market economies, carriers are projected to achieve record revenues this year and in 2024. 

The net profits of the airline industry are forecasted to hit $25.7 billion in 2024, equating to a net profit margin of 2.7%. This marks an improvement from 2023, where a net profit of $23.3 billion is expected, representing a 2.6% net profit margin.

IATA said the revival of the airline industry from Covid lows is expected to moderate. Revenue is expected to rise 7.6% to $964 billion in 2024 from this year’s record $896 billion. The trade body noted elevated interest rates and inflation drive up capital costs, hurting profit margins. 

Andrew Matters, IATA’s director of policy and economics, speaking at an event in Geneva, attributed the industry’s robust performance to the reopening of China. 

“China was a big part of that,” Matters, who was quoted by Bloomberg, said. 

He added, “Things came out better than we anticipated in terms of the strength of demand, and the downside risks we’d anticipated just didn’t materialize.”

“The speed of the recovery has been extraordinary; yet it also appears that the pandemic has cost aviation about four years of growth. From 2024 the outlook indicates that we can expect more normal growth patterns for both passenger and cargo,” Willie Walsh, IATA’s Director General, said in a statement. 

In a BloombergTV interview, Walsh said IATA’s 2024 forecasts are “cautiously optimistic.” 

“The recovery we’ve seen in 2023 has been very encouraging and should give the industry reason for optimism next year,” he continued. 

A separate report from Visual Capitalists Pallavi Rao and Marcus Lu shows global tourism has rebounded to pre-pandemic levels. 

Recent data from the Transportation Security Administration’s checkpoint records indicates that the Sunday after Thanksgiving was the busiest day for air travel at US airports ever. 

Even with the bounce in US air travel demand, shares of carriers remain at Covid lows. 

IATA predicts 4.7 billion people will travel in 2024, which is expected to exceed the 4.5 billion recorded in 2019.

Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Modernity.news,

Volodymyr Zelensky failed to prepare Ukraine properly for the war with Russia and will “pay for his mistakes,” warned Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko.

The former heavyweight boxing champion made the comments to Swiss news outlet 20 Minuten.

Klitschko was asked if he was surprised to see Zelensky’s popularity declining across the country.

“No. People see who is effective and who is not, and there were and are many expectations. Zelensky is paying for the mistakes he made,” he responded.

The Ukrainian President failed to heed warnings that his armed forces were ill-prepared and “denied until the end that it would happen,” said Klitschko.

The Mayor questioned “why it was possible that the Russians were able to reach Kyiv so quickly” and chastised Zelensky for providing too much information “that didn’t match reality.”

Although he cautioned that Zelensky “will pay” for his mistakes, Klitschko urged Ukrainians that “we must support him until the end of the war,” while ruling out any prospects of him replacing Zelensky as president, at least until the end of the conflict.

Klitschko’s remarks arrive amidst a wave of disillusionment about the way the war is heading for Ukraine.

As we highlighted yesterday, Sascha Lehnartz, chief correspondent of German newspaper Die Welt, said the Ukrainian “counteroffensive seems to have failed” and that there was a sense Kyiv had “already lost” the war.

“The dispute between the president and the top military officer shows that the unified home front in Ukraine is crumbling,” wrote Lehnartz. “And every doubt expressed in Kyiv about Ukraine’s prospects of success is being reinforced in the corridors of European and American government headquarters.”

Last month, CNN reported on a Time article which quoted a top Zelensky aide as saying, “He deludes himself. We’re out of options. We’re not winning.”

UPDATE UKRAINE 🇺🇦
💥CNN admits failed counteroffensive stalemate😮
💥 Ongoing Battle for AVDEEVKA failing – just like Bakhmut
💥 Arestovich (Zelenski’s possible replacement) ‘time for Ukraine and Russia to make peace’
💥 Will U.S. Congress continue to throw money away? pic.twitter.com/0pjRmBJyxs

— Joni Job (@jj_talking) November 4, 2023

*  *  *

Your support is crucial in helping us defeat mass censorship. Please consider donating via Locals or check out our unique merch.

Authored by Brent Ramsey via RealClear Wire,

“Mission:  The United States is a maritime nation, and the U.S. Navy protects America at sea. Alongside our allies and partners, we defend freedom, preserve economic prosperity, and keep the seas open and free. Our nation is engaged in long-term competition. To defend American interests around the globe, the U.S. Navy must remain prepared to execute our timeless role, as directed by Congress and the President.” 

The preceding statement is from the U. S. Navy’s website.

There are many indicators that the Navy is at increasing risk of mission failure.

1. Missing recruiting goals by thousands for two years in a row, missing its goal for FY 2023 by over 7000 new recruits. The impact of missing recruiting goals is cumulative. Its impact does not subside if in subsequent years deficits are not made up. Lack of manpower adds to the strain of a Navy struggling to meet its national priorities overseas. Failing to recruit enough people to man the Navy is a result of many factors. Since the Afghanistan debacle, the public’s faith in the military has plummeted to new lows. With relatively low unemployment, the competition for young people is high. American youth are less fit, less capable of serving in the military than at any time in our history. Fewer young people want to serve as the political left teaches them to hate our country, academia promotes socialism, and race hustlers malign our country for its supposed racism and white supremacy. Divisive ideologies like Critical Race Theory and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion are now promoted vigorously up and down the chain of command in the Navy. These ideologies alienate the youth of what for generations was the most fertile recruiting grounds, white, southern, Christian Americans. This demographic is now increasingly averse to serving in our new politically correct Navy of DEI, Pride month, correct pronouns, drag queens, and transgender people. If the Navy cannot recruit now for the existing numbers of ships we have, we have no hope whatsoever of filling out the ranks of a Navy with much higher numbers of ships.

2. Recently, due to the international wars simultaneously in Ukraine and Israel, and high tension in the Taiwan strait/South China Sea, the U.S. Navy had an almost unprecedented 8 Carriers at sea at the same time. The only three not at sea were unavailable due to long-term maintenance. Normally, the Navy might have three or four carriers at sea at one time. Navy ships and crews continually operating wear out rapidly. Typical deployments last 6 months. The USS Ford has been deployed for 7 months and SECDEF just extended its deployment in the eastern Med for the second time. The longer the deployment the more worn out the crew and the higher rates of equipment failures become. As deployments go on for longer and longer, the size of the crew shrinks due to illness, pregnancy, injury, and suicides. Typically ships returning to home port after a lengthy deployment are missing a substantial number of the deploying crew. This puts much more stress and strain on the remaining crewmen. The international situation with multiple wars demanding our attention simultaneously is eroding our Navy’s readiness at a high rate. When the ships and their crews wear out, there will be no alternative but to return them to port for re-fit and rest for the crews regardless of whatever pressing mission the ship is on. That the Navy does not have enough ships is now obvious to even the most casual observer when multiple hot spots in distant seas occur. When the proverbial stuff hits the fan, the very first question everyone, including the President asks is, “Where is the nearest carrier?”

3. The Navy’s high suicide rate over a lengthy period demonstrates the leadership’s tragically being unable to ameliorate the problem. The higher the OP tempo, the longer the deployments, the more arduous the maintenance periods are, the more inadequate berthing arrangements are for ships in long term overhaul, aggravate already high stress environments and seemingly make things unbearable for too many of our sailors. The Navy seems content to muddle along with scores of sailors killing themselves year after year and the heart-rending loss of life continuing as an unsolved problem. We Navy folk like to call ourselves warriors and most of us fit the description of selflessly putting ourselves in harm’s way for the benefit of others, for the benefit of our nation. But what does it say about our culture to have so many warriors who end their own lives because somehow our organization does not recognize their despair until it is too late, and they have taken the irreversible step and ended their own life? Considering how extremely selective the Navy is at screening those who volunteer to serve, why do such high numbers of exceptional citizens, with all that the Navy has to offer, choose to end their own lives? Are our leaders so overwhelmed by the work the Navy has them do that they cannot be close enough to their sailors to recognize those who are in extremis in time to help them?

4. Notable institutional leadership failures in multiple major program areas and multiple high profile operational failures are now far too common. Examples include well documented cases such as the LCS and Zumwalt ship classes, the USS Ford class’s cost overruns, lateness, and multiple of its ship systems not being fully operational (EMALS, ammo elevators, arresting gear, etc.) even years after being in commission. An egregious example of a mammoth leadership failure was the loss of the USS Bonhomme Richard, a multi-billion-dollar capital ship that due to negligence was allowed to burn at the side of a pier, a $3B loss with no replacement. A total of 45 Navy leaders were disciplined due to this one incident. The grounding of the USS Connecticut with this vital attack submarine being out of commission for years for repairs. The USS Gettysburg has been out of commission for over 8 years undergoing modernization. Four of the seven cruisers selected for modernization will instead be de-commissioned after the Navy has spent billions on upgrades. The collisions of the USS McCain and USS Fitzgerald with commercial shipping were failures of leadership that led to the deaths of 17 sailors.

5. In the 2018 National Defense Authorization Act the Congress established the size of the Navy to be 355 battle force ships. According to the United States Naval Institute as of 6 November 2023 there are currently 291 battle force ships in the Navy. The predictions from the Congressional Research Service are that the size of the Navy will stay relatively the same for the rest of this decade before it slowly starts to increase in size in the 2030’s. In 2022, then CNO Gilday announced that the requirement is actually much higher, in excess of 500 battle force ships. Multiple other experts’ analyses confirm those higher numbers. The PRC’s PLAN is already at 350 combatants and building at a rate at least four times that of the U.S..

6. In the FY 2023 NDAA there was a provision to establish a Commission to study the Navy and its requirements. The report of the Commission is due to the Congress by July 1, 2024. As of this writing, the commission has not even been formed. The Secretary of the Navy and the CNO should be urgently pressing Congress to get this Commission up and running. Furthermore, the Navy should be proactive in suggesting Navy advocates serve on the Commission or serve on the staff of the Commission. It is vital for the defense of the nation to have the definitive knowledge of what the Navy’s true requirements are in 2023 in the face of multiplying threats all over the world.

Conclusion:  All of these factors outlined above make it clear that our Navy is in extremis. There are not enough ships to do the mission nor enough manpower to man the ships optimally. Deployments are too long, and our people and ships are wearing out. Recruiting is stagnant. Too few ships, not enough people, not enough shipbuilding, or repair capacity have us on the brink of mission failure. To put the size of the Navy in perspective, when this officer went aboard ship in 1970 to conduct anti-submarine patrols looking for Soviet ballistic missile submarines, the Navy had 792 battle force ships in commission. We now have 291. Then we had a cold war against one adversary, the old Soviet Union. Today we have adversaries all over the world and are trying to perform the mission quoted above with a tiny fraction of the ships we had decades ago. As a maritime nation with treaty allies all over the world coupled with our dependence upon the sea for 90% of the commerce that keeps our economy running, it is a travesty that such neglect of the Navy has occurred. Who is at fault for this neglect? Congress is ultimately at fault as it holds the power of the purse. However, it is incumbent upon senior Navy leaders to make the case for the right size Navy. The CNO and every other Navy flag who testifies before Congress should be sounding the alarm about the imminent failure of the Navy to perform its mission now in “peacetime” with multiple hots spots in Europe, the Middle East, and in the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea, and even more importantly in the next actual fighting war. Someone long since should have laid his stars on the table to make the point to politicians that we need more ships and more manpower for the survival of our nation. Our way of life and our very lives are at stake if we do not rebuild our Navy to an adequate size to perform its vital worldwide mission.

CAPT Brent Ramsey, (USN, ret.) is a writer on Defense matters. He has been featured in Washington Examiner, Real Clear Defense, Armed Forces Press, CD Media, American Thinker, and Patriot Post. He is a  Vice President with the Calvert Group, a Board of Advisors member for the Center for Military Readiness and STARRS, and a member of the Military Advisory Group for Congressman Chuck Edwards (NC-11).

The state of New Mexico has sued social media giant Meta and its CEO Mark Zuckerberg for “knowingly” exposing children to ‘sexual exploitation and mental health harm.’

In a Tuesday court filing, New Mexico’s Attorney General’s (NMAG) Office revealed that it had conducted an undercover investigation, creating fake accounts of minors which were then used to fish for offending content, according to a press release reported by the Daily Caller.

“Meta and its CEO tell the public that Meta’s social media platforms are safe and good for kids,” reads the lawsuit. “The reality is far different. Meta knowingly exposes children to the twin dangers of sexual exploitation and mental health harm. Meta’s conduct has turned New Mexico children who are on its platforms into victims. Meta’s motive for doing so is profit.”

Meta is accused of  allowing Facebook and Instagram to become “a marketplace for predators in search of children upon whom to prey.”

Today, #NMAG Raúl Torrez moved to hold @Meta and Mark Zuckerberg accountable for promoting child pornography and facilitating human trafficking of minors instead of protecting New Mexico’s children.https://t.co/zqS3QEUWsN pic.twitter.com/xirh0ZkD79

— NM Attorney General (@NewMexicoOAG) December 6, 2023

“Our investigation into Meta’s social media platforms demonstrates that they are not safe spaces for children but rather prime locations for predators to trade child pornography and solicit minors for sex,” said Democratic New Mexico Attorney General Raul Torrez in the press release. “As a career prosecutor who specialized in internet crimes against children, I am committed to using every available tool to put an end to these horrific practices and I will hold companies — and their executives — accountable whenever they put profits ahead of children’s safety.”

A total of 33 state attorneys general launched a joint lawsuit against Meta related to its platforms’ alleged harmful effects on children, according to a court filing in October. Eight other states and Washington, D.C., launched distinct lawsuits against Meta the same day, according to The Washington Post.

Zuckerberg and other Big Tech CEOs are scheduled to testify about child exploitation in January, according to The Verge. -Daily Caller

“Mark Zuckerberg and Meta … have misled the public and failed to make changes to Meta’s platforms that would protect children and teens,” Torrez told the Caller. “In addition to seeking civil penalties to deter Meta from continuing to jeopardize children’s safety, the NMAG is petitioning the court to permanently stop Meta’s harmful practices and demand a change.”

The lawsuit comes approximately one week after Meta-owned Instagram allowed pedophiles to search for content with explicit hashtags such as #pedowhore and #preteensex, which were then used to connect them to accounts that advertise child-sex material for sale from users going under names such as “little slut for you.” And according to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, Meta accounted for more than 85% of child pornography reports, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A powerful Democrat is refusing to commit to issuing a subpoena for more transparent versions of Jeffrey Epstein’s flight logs.

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, declined to tell a reporter or Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), who wants the subpoena issued, that he would support the effort.

Ms. Blackburn, in late November, tried bringing forth an amendment for a vote that would authorize the subpoena but was blocked by GOP colleagues, who invoked a rule that led to the hearing ending after about two hours.

When Mr. Durbin was asked on Dec. 5 whether he’d issue the subpoena, he demurred.

“I don’t know anything about his flight logs. I know who Epstein was but I certainly don’t know anything about the issue,” he told a Fox News reporter in Washington.

Mr. Durbin also falsely said that the matter “has never been raised by anyone.”

After entering a committee hearing in which members questioned the FBI’s director on various topics, Mr. Durbin told Ms. Blackburn that he was not aware that one of her amendments was a subpoena for Mr. Epstein’s flight logs.

“I do not know anything about this request,” he said.

An aide for Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee earlier this month acknowledged that Ms. Blackburn’s attempt to issue the subpoena was blocked during the Nov. 30 committee hearing before noting that Republicans, led by Ranking Member Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) invoked a rule that ended discussion on amendments for the subpoenas that were ultimately approved for a billionaire and conservative activist linked to Supreme Court justices.

Mr. Graham’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

Mr. Durbin “falsely claimed he was not aware of Senator Marsha Blackburn’s amendment to subpoena Jeffrey Epstein’s flight logs,” Ms. Blackburn’s office said in a statement.

Ms. Blackburn was prevented from speaking in the November hearing by Republicans after Mr. Durbin asked her to kick off the amendment process. But in an earlier hearing in November, she said she’d filed for a subpoena for Mr. Epstein’s flight logs.

“Given the numerous allegations of human trafficking and abuse surrounding Mr. Epstein, we’ve got to identify everyone who could have participated in his horrific conduct,” she said at the time.

Ms. Blackburn blamed Mr. Durbin and other Democrats for there not being a vote yet on the proposal.

“It’s perplexing why Chairman Durbin blocked Senator Blackburn’s amendment request to subpoena Jeffrey Epstein’s estate,” a spokesperson for Ms. Blackburn told The Epoch Times via email.

“I think you are fully aware that I had two amendments, one dealing with Epstein,” Ms. Blackburn said on Tuesday. Mr. Durbin said he was not aware. “I brought it up previously,” Ms. Blackburn said. Mr. Durbin said she did not.

The subpoena “should be at the top of this committee’s to-do list,” she also said.

A request for comment to a spokesperson for Mr. Durbin was not returned.

“I did not know that you offered that amendment. I want a point on the record you and I have never personally discussed this, have we?” Mr. Durbin said.

Ms. Blackburn said they spoke briefly after the abrupt end to the late November hearing.

“You never mentioned what subject matter your amendment was,” Mr. Durbin said.

“In committee, I brought up the subject matter of my amendment three weeks prior,” Ms. Blackburn said.

“Not in my presence,” Mr. Durbin said.

“I will pull the transcript for you,” Ms. Blackburn said.

“There are disturbing allegations that the FBI failed to investigate the sex trafficking allegations,” Ms. Blackburn said, noting that one woman who said she was sexually abused by Mr. Epstein has said she took evidence to the FBI, but the bureau refused to investigate.

Mr. Wray said the FBI worked together with prosecutors to bring the sex trafficking charges and that it has been a while since he looked at the case.

“What we need from you is a complete investigation. Why the FBI did not take this on, and then getting to the bottom of what is an enormous sex trafficking ring and listening to the survivors,” Ms. Blackburn said.

While the flight logs have been released before, that version was heavily redacted. Ms. Blackburn wondered whether a more transparent version could be released.

“Let me offer to get with my team and figure out if there is more information we can provide,” Mr. Wray said.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is running as an independent in the 2024 race, said this week he was on the plane twice.

Mr. Kennedy said on Fox that his now-former wife had “some kind of relationship with Ghislaine Maxwell,” an associate of Mr. Epstein who has been convicted of sex trafficking of minors.

Mr. Kennedy said one of the flights took place in 1993 and that he flew to Florida with his wife and some of his children.

“I went then, and another occasion, I flew again with my family with, I think, four of my children,” Mr. Kennedy said. “I have been very open about this from the beginning. This was in ’93, so it was 30 years ago. It was before anybody knew about Jeffrey Epstein’s, you know nefarious issues. And I agree with you that all of this information should be released. We should get real answers on what happened to Jeffrey Epstein and any of the high-level political people that he was involved with. All of that should be open to the public.”

So much for the ‘stabilizing ties’ narrative… China is blistering angry after weekend remarks by US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, who labeled Beijing “the biggest threat we’ve ever had” while lauding efforts that seek to block it from cutting-edge semiconductors.

China’s response was swift at the start of this week: “The US should stick to the right perception and work with China to deliver on the common understandings reached in the San Francisco meeting,” foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin had said Monday. America must “stop seeing China as a hypothetical enemy and saying one thing but doing another,” the spokesman continued. 

Raimondo called for tighter export controls on advanced tech at the annual Reagan National Defense Forum in California.

“On matters of national security, we got to be eyes wide open about the threat. This is the biggest threat we’ve ever had,” she said. “We can’t let China get these chips. Period,” she said at one point.

She agreed with the Biden administration line about cooperation and managing competition in certain spheres but ultimately concluded, “Make no mistake about it, China’s not our friend.”

But China says its ability to circumvent the US tech curbs is a sure thing: 

Wang, the Foreign Ministry spokesman, said that stance exposed the “Cold War mentality” of the US and its desire for hegemony. He also indicated that his nation would get around the tech curbs eventually.

“The violation of the rules and regulations of the free-trade market is just like building a dam with a sieve,” he said. “No matter how hard you try, the water will just flow through it.”

See more of Raimondo’s remarks at the Reagan National Defense Forum below…

Sec. Raimondo’s speech at the Reagan National Defense Forum felt like a turning point, the birth of ‘Dark Gina.’ She’s fed up with industry and on a mission to stay ahead of China.

Some highlights:
Host: “Huawei released their new smartphone…” Raimundo: “When I was in China… pic.twitter.com/L7cpGGdwIb

— Jordan Schneider (@jordanschnyc) December 5, 2023

Some highlights from Raimondo’s remarks:

* * *

Host: “Huawei released their new smartphone…” Raimondo: “[China’s] capable of doing very bad things, and we’re gonna deny the entire country this class of equipment. We can’t let China get these chips. Period.”

“Listen, America leads the world in artificial intelligence. Period. Full stop. We’re a couple years ahead of China. No way are we going to let them catch up. We cannot let them catch up. So we’re going to deny them our most cutting edge technology.”

She’s fed up with semiconductor firms whining: “newsflash: democracy is good for your business. Rule of law, here and around the world, is good for your businesses. It might make for a tough quarterly shareholder call, but in the long run, it’s worth you working for us to defend our national security.” More export controls are coming…

“Host: Are there other U.S. origin products or types of technologies that you are looking at in a similar fashion right now. Raimondo: Absolutely, in biotechnology, AI models, AI products, cloud computing, supercomputing. So short answer is yes.”

On US-China dialogue: “I would say communication is a good thing but don’t confuse communication with weakness or softness. On matters of national security, we’ve got to be eyes wide open about the threat. This is the biggest threat we’ve ever had, and we need to meet the moment. The world needs us to manage our relationship with China responsibly. To avoid escalation, we’ve got to do all that, but make no mistake about it, China’s not our friend, and we need to be eyes wide open about the extent of that threat.

“I am ready to win, and I’m ready to do that with all of you, but it’s time to open our aperture and challenge the way we’ve done business in every way if we’re going to meet the threat China poses. And if we’re going to do what needs to be done with this technology.”

Authored by George Citroner via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

That plastic water bottle you regularly drink from could one day decompose into tiny particles that wreak havoc in your brain.

New research shows that nanoplastics—microscopic particles broken down from everyday plastic items—bind to proteins associated with Parkinson’s disease and Lewy body dementia.

These stealthy nanoparticles have already infiltrated our soil, water, and food supply. Now, they may pose the next great toxin threat, fueling a wave of neurodegenerative disease.

Plastic Cups and Utensils Identified as Risk Factors

Polystyrene nanoparticles, commonly found in plastic cups and utensils, bind to alpha-synuclein, a protein linked to Parkinson’s disease and Lewy body dementia, the new study from Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment and the Department of Chemistry at Trinity College of Arts and Sciences found. The plastic-protein accumulation was seen in test tubes, cultured neurons, and mouse models.

The most surprising finding was the tight bonds formed between the plastic and protein within neuron lysosomes, according to Andrew West, the study’s principal investigator. Lysosomes are digestive organelles within cells that use enzymes to break down waste materials and cellular debris.

“Our study suggests that the emergence of micro and nanoplastics in the environment might represent a new toxin challenge with respect to Parkinson’s disease risk and progression,” Mr. West said in a press statement. This is especially concerning given the expected increase of these contaminants in our water and food, he added.

Growing evidence indicates that nanoplastics circulate in the air, especially indoors. When inhaled, they can travel from the respiratory tract directly to the blood and brain, increasing cancer risk.

Change Environment Now to Prevent Disease Later: Expert

Our health today is largely a function of our environment in the past, Dr. Ray Dorsey, a professor of neurology at the University of Rochester in New York and an author of “Ending Parkinson’s Disease,” told The Epoch Times.

“For example, the risk of lung cancer is a function of our past smoking habits,” he said. “If we want to live lives free of Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease, and cancer in the future, we should pay attention to our environment today.”

The Duke study adds to evidence that common toxic pollutants may contribute to Parkinson’s disease, Dr. Dorsey said. More research is needed, but evidence from both laboratory and epidemiological studies suggests our environments are fueling Parkinson’s incidence increase.

“Much, if not most” of Parkinson’s cases may be preventable, he added.

Besides reducing our use of plastic, there are other effective precautions we can take to limit our exposure to this environmental toxin, Dr. Dorsey pointed out. These include the following:

• Using carbon filters to protect ourselves from chemicals in the water.
• Purchasing organic food.
• Thoroughly washing all fruits and vegetables.
• Using air purifiers if you live in areas with high air pollution.

Parkinson’s-Linked Pollutants, Pesticides Still Legal Despite Risks

Besides nanoplastics, other toxins like organic pollutants known as polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), banned since 1979 yet still found in 30 percent of U.S. schools, have been linked to Parkinson’s. Researchers have found high concentrations of this pollutant in the brains of deceased people who had Parkinson’s.

“We need to know the full extent of this toxic threat in our classrooms so that we can test for PCBs, remediate it and inform families that their students may be at risk of exposure to these dangerous chemicals,” Senator Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) said in a press statement.

Other toxins linked to Parkinson’s in our environment have yet to be removed from use. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has proposed bans on dry cleaning chemicals and pesticides associated with a 500 percent increased risk of Parkinson’s disease, but there has been no action yet.

Toxic Pesticides Harming Health but ‘Political Will’ Lacking

The EPA banned the pesticide chlorpyrifos (CPF) in 2021, but a court reversed that decision in November 2022. Research identifies CPF as a likely Parkinson’s disease risk factor.

Another pesticide, paraquat, has allegedly been linked to Parkinson’s by its manufacturer Syngenta’s own research, per The Guardian’s report. Syngenta reportedly created a “paraquat SWAT team” to criticize evidence and shift focus to other environmental factors.

“We increasingly know that environmental toxicants from plastics from pesticides are harming our health,” Dr. Dorsey said. “Almost all of these are addressable; the only question is whether we have the political will to do so.”

By Ye Xie, Bloomberg Markets Live reporter and strategist

While stocks in India make new all-time highs, investors in Chinese stocks are staring down a dismal year of losses. In fact, equities from the world’s No. 2 economy have hardly ever traded at such a deep discount to emerging-market peers.

There’s no shortage of negative headlines in China these days. Moody’s Investors Service’s downgrade of China’s credit outlook this week is just another example, underlying the nation’s structural problems of a heady debt load, an aging population and a decline in the potential growth rate.

These structural issues are manifested in the stock market. The MSCI China Index has lost 15% this year, compared with a 2% increase in the gauge for emerging-market shares and a 15% gain in the MSCI India Index and  In fact, the MSCI India Index has outperformed the China gauge by 100% since the beginning of 2021.

It may not be just a flash in the pan. According to Morgan Stanley, China’s underperformance versus India could be just “the beginning of a new long-run trend.”

The MSCI China Index is trading at 8.9 times of earnings over the next 12 months, compared with 11.4 of MSCI Emerging Markets Index. Apart from a brief period at the onset of the pandemic, the 22% discount marks the biggest since Bloomberg started to compare the data in 2006.

The stocks are trading cheaply for a reason. Chinese companies’ return on equity has been persistently declined since 2011, reflecting deteriorating investment opportunities.

They have missed earnings estimates for nine consecutive quarters, and bottoming isn’t likely in the first quarter, according to Morgan Stanley’s strategists including Laura Wang. The strategists expect the MSCI China to return 7% next year, with an upside potential of 25%, and a downside risk of 34%.

Investors are turning to the upcoming Central Economic Work Conference for clues on how Beijing will set the economic agendas for next year. So far, China hasn’t done enough to boost confidence. And “Incremental and baby-step support are not enough to turning around the sentiment,” said Jason Hsu, chief investment officer at Rayliant Global Advisors.

Hunter Biden will be slapped with contempt of congress if he skips out on his Dec. 13 closed-door deposition, according to a Wednesday letter from House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan to Hunter’s defense attorney, Abbe D. Lowell.

“Contrary to the assertions in your letter, there is no ‘choice’ for Mr. Biden to make; the subpoenas compel him to appear for a deposition on December 13. If Mr. Biden does not appear for his deposition on December 13, 2023, the Committees will initiate contempt of Congress proceedings,” reads the letter, issued a week after Lowell suggested that Hunter should instead be allowed to testify publicly.

Hunter was subpoenaed on Nov. 8 to appear for a deposition before the committee. In response, Comer said: “Hunter Biden is trying to play by his own rules instead of following the rules required of everyone else,” adding “Our lawfully issued subpoena to Hunter Biden requires him to appear for a deposition on December 13.”

🚨STATEMENT ON ABBE LOWELL LETTER🚨

“Hunter Biden is trying to play by his own rules instead of following the rules required of everyone else. That won’t stand with House Republicans.

“Our lawfully issued subpoena to Hunter Biden requires him to appear for a deposition on…

— Oversight Committee (@GOPoversight) November 28, 2023

Comer and Jordan are investigating extensive evidence that the Biden family was running an international influence peddling scheme, raking in tens of millions of dollars from foreign business partners despite no obvious product or service in exchange.

House lawmakers are also seeking testimony from Hunter’s uncle James Biden, as well as multiple former business associates.

Authored by Julie Kelly via RealClear Wire,

Defense attorneys have coined the term “January 6 Jurisprudence” to describe the treatment received by the more than 1,200 defendants arrested so far in connection with the events of Jan. 6, 2021. This carve-out legal system involves the unprecedented and possibly unlawful use of a corporate evidence-tampering statute; excessive prison sentences and indefinite periods of pretrial incarceration; and the designation of nonviolent offenses as federal crimes of terrorism.

A universal feature is the requirement that a Jan. 6 defendant, usually a supporter of Donald Trump, face trial in Washington, D.C., a city overwhelmingly populated by Democrats. Federal judges have denied every change of venue motion filed in Jan. 6 cases, arguing those who protested at the Capitol can get a fair trial in the nation’s capital.

The results so far appear to contradict the court’s collective conclusion. Court records show the jury selection process has repeatedly revealed a strong degree of bias against anyone tied to Jan. 6. At least 130 defendants have been convicted at trial – not one has been acquitted by a jury – and hundreds have been sentenced to prison time ranging from seven days to 22 years. Defense lawyers say this track record helps explain why the vast majority of defendants have opted for a plea deal rather than go to trial.

This is the same environment that now awaits the former president as he prepares to stand trial in Washington on March 4, 2024 for election interference, in addition to an array of criminal and civil cases against him elsewhere.

While Special Counsel Jack Smith’s team and Trump’s counsel spar over a number of issues, perhaps the biggest dispute will concern whether it will be possible to seat an impartial jury for the presumptive 2024 GOP nominee in a city that voted 92% for Joe Biden in 2020.

After Smith indicted Trump in August, a Jan. 6 defense attorney who is not representing the former president, J. Daniel Hull, told the New York Times that Washington “is the worst possible place for any Jan. 6 defendant, but especially Donald Trump, to have a trial.”

U.S. District Court Judge Tanya S. Chutkan recently set a jury selection schedule for Smith’s four-count indictment against Trump for the events of Jan. 6. She ordered both parties to begin developing a questionnaire, due Jan. 9, 2024, that hundreds of D.C. residents will be asked to complete so the court can begin the initial step of weeding out unqualified jurors.

Stakes are high for both sides. Trump’s lawyers must navigate constraints on how many jurors can be stricken from consideration to ensure their client gets a fair trial. The Department of Justice must convince the American people that a case brought by a Democratic administration and handled by a Democratic-appointed judge with a record of inflammatory statements about the former president will be heard by unbiased jurors.

The Sixth Amendment guarantees, among other rights, “the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed.” In extreme cases, criminal defendants can petition to move their trial out of the prosecuting jurisdiction for a number of reasons, not the least of which is sustained, negative press coverage that taints the jury pool.

Trump’s lawyers are not discussing their strategy publicly, but sources have indicated to RealClearInvestigations that the defense will file a change of venue motion in the next month or two. Given the partisan composition of Washington, saturation coverage of the former president’s ongoing legal woes, and the city’s relatively small population, Trump will have a strong argument in favor of moving the trial outside of the nation’s capital.

Yet a review of Jan. 6 cases to date suggests the odds are against that. Not a single judge on the D.C. District Court has granted a change of venue motion even for high-profile trials such as those for members of the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys, the so-called “militia” groups involved in the Capitol protest.

Despite nonstop local news coverage and nationally televised proceedings of the Democrat-run January 6 Select Committee that, in some instances, mentioned the defendants by name, Judge Timothy J. Kelly repeatedly rejected motions to move the Proud Boys’ seditious conspiracy trial out of Washington. 

One month before jury selection began, Kelly acknowledged in a November 2022 order that the five defendants “have been the subject of more particularized and extensive media coverage than most January 6th defendants, in part because of the House Select Committee’s hearings this summer.” Nonetheless, Kelly, a Trump appointee, denied the defendants’ last-minute attempt to seek relief in another venue by noting, “the brighter spotlight on Defendants does not support transfer, mainly because the pretrial publicity here is national in scope, available to anyone across the country with access to a television or the internet.”

Jury selection lasted several days, an anomaly for Jan. 6 trials. Despite the lengthy process, the panel still included several D.C. residents who disclosed participation in Democratic protests, including Black Lives Matter and the Women’s March, according to one court observer’s report.

After a four-month trial and six days of deliberation, the jury convicted the defendants in May on multiple charges while returning not-guilty verdicts on a handful of other offenses, including impeding police officers. One juror told Vice News that he and his cohorts unanimously concluded in less than a day that four of the five defendants were guilty of seditious conspiracy, an exceedingly rare charge traditionally reserved for individuals tied to foreign terror groups.

“[The jury] hated us with a passion,” Joseph Biggs, one of the Proud Boys found guilty of seditious conspiracy and other charges, told RCI in an interview from his jail cell in September. “They wanted to see us die. One of them said he wanted to see us buried under the jail.” Despite the individual’s stated desire to see the defendants dead, he was seated on the panel. 

Judge Chutkan’s handling of her first jury trial for a Jan. 6 defendant, Russell Alford, also indicates how Trump might fare. Alford was charged in March 2021 with four misdemeanors for his 11-minute nonviolent walk through the Capitol.

In rejecting Alford’s bid to move his trial, Chutkan downplayed the partisanship of D.C. residents and surveys that indicated higher-than-average prejudice against Capitol protesters. In her April 2022 order, Chutkan insisted that “jurors’ political leaning are not, by themselves, evidence that those jurors cannot fairly and impartially consider the evidence presented and apply the law as instructed by the court.” She also claimed an “expanded examination will effectively screen for prejudice among potential jurors in this case.” 

A review of court transcripts, however, raises questions as to whether Chutkan fulfilled her promise. A jury questionnaire exposed a bias so strong against Jan. 6 protesters that half the respondents were automatically eliminated from consideration. Many who remained were also problematic.

After one day of voir dire, which is the direct questioning of potential jurors, Chutkan still allowed individuals who expressed critical views about anyone involved in Jan. 6 to serve on the panel. One juror said people who were at the Capitol on Jan. 6 “were probably guilty.” Another who worked as an investigator for federal agencies, including DHS and TSA, admitted he had “strong feelings about the individuals who gathered at the Capitol on January 6.” 

Chutkan rejected a defense attorney’s request to remove that juror from consideration. “I’m going to deny it because he said he has training; he’s by nature trained to be skeptical. He has an opinion, but it appears that he is willing to confine his verdict to the evidence presented in the case.”

Did People Lie to Get on Jan. 6 Juries?

A staffer for Sen. Ben Ray Lujan, a Democrat from New Mexico, also got the nod, despite telling Chutkan he knew many Capitol police officers – several of whom are routinely called as government witnesses in Jan. 6 trials – and his confession that the day was “pretty impactful” on him.

On several occasions, Chutkan reassured the skeptical defense team that the selected jurors would set aside personal feelings to objectively weigh the evidence.

The jury returned unanimous guilty verdicts on all counts in less than four hours.

Alford now wonders whether jurors were being honest. “They told us what we wanted to hear so they could get on the panel,” Alford told RCI by phone from a halfway house last month. He had just finished serving 176 days of a 12-month prison sentence imposed by Chutkan. “In any other jurisdiction, we would have won. We thought we could get a fair shake, but they all were connected to the government.”

Alford’s experience is not an outlier. Post-trial interviews with jurors have often revealed bias. In a lengthy discussion with C-SPAN’s Brian Lamb following her service on an Oath Keepers’ trial earlier this year, a woman named Ellen, a former co-worker of Lamb, described how she desperately tried to get selected as a juror. When she finally was selected, Ellen admitted she “was shocked beyond belief.”

Over the course of several days of deliberations, Ellen said she successfully persuaded reluctant jurors to render guilty verdicts against the six defendants, including a 72-year-old who didn’t enter the Capitol and an autistic young man. She worked in tandem with a juror who had worked as a lawyer for the Department of Justice, the same government agency prosecuting the defendants. “How that was allowed, I’ll never know,” Ellen told Lamb. “He couldn’t believe it.”

Ellen also expressed disdain for the people on trial. “They weren’t even from big cities. These were people from, living, on farms in rural places, most of them had no concept of Washington, D.C.,” she told Lamb.

Democrat Mosby’s Change of Venue 

The situation was quite different, however, for a former Democratic elected official recently on trial in neighboring Maryland. A grand jury indicted Marilyn Mosby, the former state’s attorney for the city of Baltimore, in 2022 on four counts of perjury related to COVID fraud. Her lawyers asked the judge to move the trial, set to begin on Oct. 31, 2023, out of the Baltimore area to the southern district of Maryland based on studies that uncovered higher levels of bias among prospective jurors in the northern district, the location where the trial was set to take place.

The analysis, conducted by Trial Innovations, Inc., evaluated “relevant newsprint, television, and social media coverage” and determined that “the Northern Division jury pool has been saturated with prejudicial coverage surrounding the Defendant.” Telephone interviews of eligible residents in the two districts also revealed distinct disparities. For example, 62% of respondents in the northern district had read, seen, or heard of Mosby compared to 42% in the southern district.

Nearly half of the respondents in the northern district considered Mosby “somewhat” or “very” corrupt compared to roughly one-quarter who had the same response in the southern district.

In granting Mosby’s motion in September, Judge Lydia Kay Griggsby concluded that “pre-trial publicity about this case has, to a degree, negatively impacted the views held about the Defendant by potential jurors residing in the Court’s Northern Division more so than their counterparts in the Southern Division.” (Mosby was convicted on all counts on Nov. 9.)

Defense surveys in Jan. 6 cases point to the same, if not higher, level of prejudice among D.C. residents. A May 2022 survey compared attitudes between Washington residents and those living in areas of Florida, North Carolina, and Virginia. While 85% of D.C. residents consider Jan. 6 an “insurrection, attack, or riot,” only 41% of Florida residents agreed with the description. Seventy-two percent of D.C. respondents were more likely than not to find a Jan. 6 defendant guilty, as opposed to 48% of respondents in Virginia and North Carolina and 37% of Florida respondents.

Forty percent of D.C. residents believe the events of Jan. 6 were racially motivated, while less than 20% of the respondents in the three other states believed so.

Unlike the judge overseeing the Mosby matter, D.C. judges are unmoved by such disparities.

While overall public interest in Jan. 6 has waned nearly three years later, it remains a campaign issue for Democrats and a top news story in the nation’s capital. The Washington Post maintains a “January 6 Insurrection” portal on its website, providing updates on Trump’s trial and other proceedings related to the Capitol protest. CBS News’ Washington affiliate has a full-time reporter assigned only to cover the events of Jan. 6.

Jury selection for a November 2023 trial indicated little change in prospective jurors’ intensely negative views about Jan. 6. Voir dire for the trial of Taylor Johnatakis, a man from Washington state charged with multiple offenses for his participation in the Capitol protest, showed a sustained level of prejudice against Jan. 6 defendants. Five of the first 10 individuals were excused after confessing they could not fairly assess the evidence or follow the judge’s instructions to set aside their opinion to reach a verdict.

One man, a historian for the American Historical Association, admitted he had written columns describing Jan. 6 as an “insurrection.” A public school teacher told the judge she uses Jan. 6 as a “teachable moment” for her special needs students and that she still discusses the issue with her fellow educators. Another woman works for a provider that offered mental health services for who she described as “traumatized” police officers who were “victims” of Jan. 6. (All were struck for cause.)

Some seated jurors recalled their emotional reaction to that day. One woman, who has been on disability for 13 years, said she “burst out crying” when she watched events unfold at the Capitol. (Johnatakis, who represented himself, was convicted on all counts after just a few hours of deliberation.)

Court watchers say such attitudes will make it especially hard to seat a fair jury for the most controversial figure in America, Donald Trump.

It is difficult to contemplate how the government and Chutkan will get around years of hyper-critical coverage of Trump – not just related to Jan. 6 but stretching back to claims Trump illegally colluded with Russia to rig the 2016 election and every investigation in between.

Still, it is highly unlikely that Chutkan will consent to Trump’s request to move the trial to another jurisdiction. She will, as she did in Alford’s case, note that court-ordered venue changes are rare, even in trials of wide public interest. (She compared Alford’s trial to that of Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, where the judge refused to move his trial out of the city.)

There are, however, exceptions. In 1996, a federal judge moved the trial of Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols to Denver. After considering intense news coverage of the deadly attack and its impact on the community, Judge Richard Matsch concluded: “There is so great a prejudice against these two defendants in the State of Oklahoma that they cannot obtain a fair and impartial trial at any place fixed by law for holding court in that state.”

The change of venue request was not opposed by the lead prosecutor in that case – Merrick Garland, who now oversees the DOJ as Attorney General of the United States.