White House Sanctions Israeli Settlers For 1st Time Since Clinton Administration
The Biden administration is moving to impose sanctions on Israeli settlers involved in attacks on Palestinians, which will involve banning them from traveling to the United States.
Fresh Axios reporting on Tuesday has cited government officials who specify that multiple dozens of known Israeli settlers will be impacted by the visa ban, expected to be implemented by the State Department.
The US government has not sanctioned Israeli settlers going all the way back to the Clinton administration, but Washington has consistently condemned settler expansion in the West Bank, at least as far as public policy and rhetoric goes.
Gaza sources have said the death toll in the Strip has reportedly surpassed 15,200. Meanwhile the White House has come under increased international pressure to impose limits on Israel’s military operations as well as usage of US-supplied bombs.
The conflict centered on Gaza has received by far most international media attention, but there’s been a parallel war happening in the West Bank. Nablus, for example, last week was declared a closed military zone, and is under blockade by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) for 55 days.
Regional sources say that since Oct.7 more than 250 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank – mostly in army raids and clashes with Israeli security forces, but also as a result of settler violence.
Axios has noted that since the conflict’s start there’s been “a spike in the number of attacks by settlers against Palestinians.”
Two weeks ago the Biden administration circulated a memo to top State Department and other officials asking them to prepare action “against individuals or entities who directly or indirectly engaged in actions that threaten security or stability in the West Bank or take actions that intimidate civilians in the West Bank or actions that significantly obstruct, disrupt or prevent efforts to achieve a two-state solution.”
‘They Came in the Dark’: Settler Violence Intensifies in the West Bank | NY Times | 12/4/23 pic.twitter.com/GjopV4HQ6r
European countries like France are also said to be readying sanctions against settlers. European leaders have long been more vocal in highlighting the problem.
Since the Hamas terror raids which kicked off the Gaza war, individual Israeli citizens have sought to obtain assault rifles in droves. This has sparked concerns over US small arms being used by hardline Jewish settlers to attack Palestinians. Often it’s for the sake of removing entire West Bank families from their land or olive groves.
“Youth crime is out of control” is the refrain heard on many lips around Australia and the Western world.
Another common phrase is “The youth are our future.”
Put those two phrases together and we are left contemplating, indeed fearing for, the future well-being of our society.
The statistics on youth crime regularly adorn newspapers and lead electronic media bulletins. Youth crime is a scourge.
So how did we get here? What can we do about it?
Like with any ingrained social problem, there is no quick fix. Something that took a generation or two may well take a similar time to repair. It takes a lot less time to crash a car than it does to repair it. So it is with society.
1. Start With the Family
The social data is relatively clear. A good home life with a mother and a father who are married in a loving long-term relationship is an important influencer on a child’s positive social behaviour.
Broken homes with a lack of an authority figure tend to produce the opposite. Explore the background of a youth offender there will nearly always be the scars of trauma.
As with all things social data, the statistics deal in generalities and there are exceptions, indeed many exceptions.
Nevertheless, a stable home life with mum and dad is the best start in life a young person can be given. Pro-family policies help to keep families together and reduce cost of living pressures. And the real choice of having a parent stay at home, especially in the formative years, is urgently needed.
2. Bring Back Education on Traditional Values
To back up the home influence, we need a school system that teaches genuine respect for others and parents.
Too often we hear how the education system, which should be complementing the parental role, is undermining it. Rather than emphasising the nuclear family it is denigrated for not being “diverse.”
While parents hope and strive to get their children job-ready, we have a schooling system teaching every “right” imaginable forgetting that “responsibility” comes before “rights” and not only in the dictionary—a book which one suspects the children have not been told about.
While students are encouraged to defy authorities by leaving classes to demonstrate all manner of things, including supporting the terrorist group Hamas rather than learning basic skills, we witness an abhorrent indoctrination of our young.
A reformed education system focusing on virtues, values, service, and equipping our young with real-life skills would be another essential policy change.
The media and entertainment houses have a social responsibility to present role models for young people to whom they can look up.
Social chaos and lack of morals, combined with denigrating parents and vital social institutions, serve to unsettle children and their direction in life.
The idea that a life is best served by asking, “What is expected of me” rather than “What is in it for me” is now totally absent.
A responsible media analysing its duty for partnering to develop a healthy social consciousness is yet another step.
4. Don’t Fear the Preacher
We all need hope and purpose in life. Hope is largely provided through the religious/spiritual institutions.
Individual faith today is ridiculed and besmirched by the education system and the media, even though it is often the religious-based organisations that provide support and offer an alternate pathway.
Closely linked to religious belief, which provides hope, is the need for purpose.
Without it, the young will fall into a life of anti-social behaviour and criminal activity.
5. Power to Law Enforcement
To help counter this trend, law enforcement agencies must be fully empowered to protect the community rather than the perpetrator.
With the vast majority of young perpetrators being released on immediate bail and portrayed as victims (of society), their interaction with the legal system is hardly a deterrent.
To make matters worse we have a justice system more interested in the immediate happiness of the perpetrator than in providing a punishment to drive home the seriousness, and consequences on others, of their unacceptable behaviour.
6. It’s About Personal Responsibility
Rehabilitation has to be the societal goal for those who have offended. However, the desire to rehabilitate is only activated by the recognition that the individual has a problem.
Reinforcing that the issues faced are not really the perpetrator’s fault, and they don’t really possess the agency and capacity to reform, hardly encourages self-reflection.
The future of our society and the well-being of our young requires a wholesale acceptance that the current methodologies are not working.
We need focused pro-family policies, a recognition that agency and responsibility are required of us all, irrespective of our background, together with the strong acceptance that there will be felt consequences for those disregarding their fellow’s rights to safety and protection of property.
The individual well-being of our young demands such changes as does the well-being of society as a whole and our collective future.
Let’s get started.
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or ZeroHedge.
Philadelphia Macy’s Security Guard Fatally Stabbed By Shoplifter With Over A Dozen Prior Arrests
Still wondering why your favorite retailer is in a rush to move its city locations out to the suburbs?
A security guard was stabbed to death and another guard was injured at the Center City Philadelphia Macy’s on Monday morning this week, after an attempted shoplifting that went wrong.
30 year old Tyrone Tunnell “was attempting to steal several hats when he was stopped by security”, according to 6ABC Philadelphia. Guards were able to get the store’s merchandise back, but a confrontation ensued when Tunnell came back to the store 15 minutes after he was caught.
When he returned he was carrying a knife and stabbed one of the security guards. A second guard then came over to help and was stabbed several times.
The first guard was pronounced dead shortly after due to stab wounds in the neck. The second guard, a 23 year old man, is listed as stable condition and is being held in a Philadelphia hospital.
Tunnell “has been arrested more than a dozen times for retail theft, robbery and drug offenses across the region, including Philadelphia and Bucks, Delaware and Montgomery counties,”according to ABC.
Philadelphia Interim Police Commissioner John Stanford said: “There was a scuffle with the second security guard trying to save the first guard that’s stabbed and that security guard sustained several slash wounds as well.”
“Things are just getting worse. People don’t care. They have no heart,” a woman on the scene told 6ABC. Another woman commented: “These young people are just trying to do a job, secure the store, make the customers feel safe and secure and it’s just awful.”
The suspect left the premises and fled on SEPTA, but was eventually found and arrested at the Somerset station.
“It’s just so sad and heartbreaking for the families to have to go through this,” one South Philadelphia resident said. Another resident told 6ABC: “I’m scared right now. It’s like you can’t go to the stores anymore to do your own shopping now.”
Macy’s released a statement saying:
We are heartbroken about the incident that took place today at Macy’s Center City. The store will temporarily remain closed as we work with law enforcement on this investigation and defer any further comments about the case to them. Ensuring the safety and well-being of our customers and colleagues is always our top priority.
We’re sure it won’t be long until yet another retailer picks up shop and moves out of yet another major U.S. city…
This year, Americans had the opportunity to revisit the origins of our nation’s nuclear program with the blockbuster film “Oppenheimer.” But there’s one story line that didn’t make the big screen: those Americans who are still paying the price.
For decades, the federal government poisoned an untold number of its citizens through our atomic program. It happened everywhere, impacting uranium mine workers in Texas, Native Americans living downwind from nuclear tests in the Mountain West, and communities exposed to Manhattan Project waste in Missouri. And that’s just a small sample. Thousands more were poisoned, sickened, and died. Lives were broken – all because our government was careless, and then covered it up.
Now, the law that delivers some justice and compensation to these victims is about to expire. Congress must include a reauthorization of this life-changing program as part of the annual defense bill. It’s our chance to give justice to victims who have been silenced and forgotten for years.
This widespread government-caused poisoning ranks among the worst environmental disasters in our nation’s history. The United States conducted nearly 200 atmospheric nuclear tests from the 1940s until the 1960s. Residents living near or downwind from these test areas were exposed to the fallout – often without any warning of exposure. The radiation fell on their homes, their farms, and their families. And it wasn’t just the testing. Tens of thousands of American workers across the country helped to mine and process uranium and worked in facilities that built our atomic weapons, and they breathed in the toxic substances every day.
These workers answered the call to serve America during a consequential time in our nation’s history. They were a backbone to our national defense from World War II through the end of the Cold War – but many developed cancers as a result. Families and communities suffered.
In 1990, Congress finally acknowledged the government’s egregious neglect and passed the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act to compensate victims who were sickened with cancer from nuclear tests. Championed by then-Sen. Orrin Hatch and signed into law by President George H.W. Bush, the program was reauthorized and strengthened by President Bill Clinton in 2000. President Joe Biden signed a short extension in 2022 with unanimous approval from Congress. Few programs have enjoyed more bipartisan support. As George H.W. Bush said upon signing the law, this will “fairly resolve the claims of persons present at the test site and of downwind residents, as well as claims of uranium miners.”
But in just a few months, funding for the program will be cut off. This cannot be allowed to happen. Since its creation, RECA has helped tens of thousands of Americans and assisted those exposed to radiation rebuild and renew their lives. How can we turn our back on them?
Many more communities still need access to this program before it runs out. In my home state of Missouri, mismanaged nuclear waste from the Manhattan Project era sat exposed for years and contaminated communities in the St. Louis region – and now these areas have elevated cancer rates. In multiple other states, “downwinders” still need compensation. The late Sen. Orrin Hatch wrote in 2020 that updating RECA was “a moral imperative” and “if we let it expire, we leave hundreds of Navajo men and women unable to pay their medical bills for issues directly related to radiation poisoning.” He was right.
Back in July, Congress took the first step to getting this done when the Senate adopted, as part of the defense bill, my amendment with Sen. Ben Ray Luján of New Mexico to extend and strengthen the RECA program. I was proud to see that amendment pass with a bipartisan supermajority, reflecting the broad support among both parties for obtaining justice for victims. President Biden has since supported it as well.
House and Senate leadership must not strip this life-changing program from the final defense bill. It would amount to a slap in the face to victims everywhere if our leaders in Congress decide to kneecap the Americans who suffered from these nuclear programs and instead ship billions and billions to defense contractors or foreign wars. There’s no excuse for forgetting about the people we serve.
When the government poisons its own people, it must make it right. We have no other choice.
Josh Hawley is the senior U.S. senator from Missouri.
Climate Grifters Want $2.4 Trillion Per Year, Much More Taxes To “Solve” Global Warming
Global warming grifters at the COP28 climate summit were focused on phasing out petrol vehicles and fossil fuel power plants.
COP28 🌐 Wow, Next Level Gaslighting 🔥 Hillary Clinton dropping Climate Change Scam Misinfo below..🔥”In Europe last year they recorded 61k Deaths from Extreme Heat, Africa could be see 500k”…I’m 💯 sure these Deaths had nothing to do with an Experimental Vax 🔥 pic.twitter.com/QUWYVmI5Mf
Covid-jab pumper Bill Gates has shifted to ‘green’ grifting at the COP28 Climate Fraud conference. He pushing for Carbon Taxes, and even admits it is about promoting industries like electric cars and hydrogen planes.
While WHO DG is trying to push the narrative that fossil fuels are a cause of climate change, the president of COP28, Sultan Al Jaber, said at COP28 that there is “no science” indicating that a phase-out of fossil fuels is needed to restrict global heating to 1.5C. He also said a… pic.twitter.com/euUmaVmIAq
They were met with a differing perspective when Sultan Al Jaber, the president of COP28, said there was “no science” supporting the idea that eliminating fossil fuels will curb global warming.
Sultan Al Jaber, responsible for leading the world away from fossil fuels, had said there was “no science” to support a phaseout of oil and gas.
Jaber’s comment is a welcoming sign. However, that did not stop discussions from other attendees who discussed the need for billions of dollars, if not trillions, in ‘green’ tech investment by developed countries to defeat climate change.
Coinciding with COP28, Reuters said a new report was published that estimated developed and emerging countries would need a whopping $2.4 trillion a year to cap emissions.
“The world is not on track to realize the goals of the Paris Agreement. The reason for this failure is a lack of investment, particularly in emerging market and developing countries outside China,” said co-author Nicholas Stern, chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.
Stern said, “The central challenge is to accelerate and implement the fostering and financing of this investment from a range of sources.”
In a news conference, Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley, a leading figure in global discussions about mobilizing climate finance, urged countries to increase climate spending and even consider adding new green taxes to boost climate funding.
Mottley suggested that a worldwide 0.1% tax on financial services could generate $420 billion, while a 5% tax on the 2022 global oil and gas industry profits would have produced $200 billion.
“The planet needs global governance not in a big stick way, but in a simple way of us cooperating with each other to be able to work with the institutions that we have,” she added.
The climate change swindle is nothing new, as elites have ripped off taxpayers around the world for decades.
It comes as the latest green bubble is imploding under the weight of high interest rates, elevated inflation, and waning demand.
Private jets in Munich on the way to Dubai global warming conference are literally frozen on the runway, which has turned into a glacier. https://t.co/Q2s9J5cLkE
Some elites who push climate doom fail to admit El Nino has been responsible for drought and heat worldwide this past summer.
In August, a total of 1,609 scientists and professionals from around the world signed the declaration dismissing the existence of a climate crisis and insisting that carbon dioxide is beneficial to Earth.
Watch Live: Taibbi Discusses ‘Hamilton 68’ Link To Government’s ‘Cyber Threat League’
Yesterday, journalist Alex Gutentag covered the “CITL Files,” which stands for Cyber Threat Intelligence League – a Department of Homeland Security partner which sought to implement something called “AMITT,” which stands for “Adversarial Misinformation and Influence Tactics and Techniques.”
Far from simply protecting the public from falsehoods, both government and non-profit actors within Censorship Industrial Complex have followed CTIL’s exact playbook and have waged a full-fledged influence operation against Americans. -Public
Today, Matt Taibbi drops another “CITL Files” report. In conjunction, he’s hosting a livestream to discuss “an odd little detail” which involves “connections between the group and Hamilton 68.
But the CTIL Files, a trove of documents that a whistleblower provided to Public and Racket, reveal that US and UK military contractors developed and used advanced tactics — including demanding that social media platforms change their Terms of Service — to shape public opinion about Covid-19, and that getting content removed was just one strategy used by the Censorship Industrial Complex.
The CTI League, which partnered with the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), aimed to implement something called “AMITT,” which stood for “Adversarial Misinformation and Influence Tactics and Techniques.”
AMITT was a disinformation framework that included many offensive actions, including working to influence government policy, discrediting alternative media, using bots and sock puppets, pre-bunking, and pushing counter-messaging.
The specific “counters” to “disinformation” in AMITT and its successor framework, DISARM, include many we have observed in our study of the Censorship Industrial Complex:
“Create policy that makes social media police disinformation”
“Strong dialogue between the federal government and private sector to encourage better reporting”
“Marginalize and discredit extremists”
“Name and Shame influencers”
“Simulate misinformation and disinformation campaigns, and responses to them, before campaigns happen”
“Inoculate populations through media literacy training”
For issues like the Russiagate hoax to the Hunter Biden laptop to Covid-19, organizations within the Censorship Industrial Complex have used many of DISARM’s offensive methods like tabletop exercises, psychological inoculation, propaganda messaging, and punishment of dissent. Even its extreme proposal of debanking was used against Canada’s Freedom Convoy.
Far from simply protecting the public from falsehoods, both government and non-profit actors within Censorship Industrial Complex have followed CTIL’s exact playbook and have waged a full-fledged influence operation against Americans.
This influence operation has deep ties to security and intelligence agencies, as is evidenced through many examples of collaboration. In one instance of such collaboration, supposedly independent “disinformation researchers” like Renée DiResta coordinated a 2020 election tabletop exercise with military officials.
Defense and intelligence funding supports much of the Censorship Industrial Complex. For instance, Graphika, which was involved in both EIP and VP, receives grants from the Department of Defense, DARPA, and the Navy.
Pentagon-affiliated entities are heavily involved in “anti-disinformation” work. Mitre, a major defense contractor, received funding to tackle “disinformation” about elections and Covid. The US government paid Mitre, an organization staffed by former intelligence and military personnel, to monitor and report what Americans said about the virus online, and to develop vaccine confidence messaging. This government-backed military research group, Public discovered, was present in the EIP and VP misinformation reporting system, and in election disinformation report emails to CISA.
The AMITT framework also includes many counters we have yet to find concrete evidence for, but which we suspect may have been attempted:
“Infiltrate the in-group to discredit leaders”
“Honeypot with coordinated inauthentics”
“Co-opt a hashtag and drown it out (hijack it back)”
“Dilute the core narrative – create multiple permutations, target/amplify”
“Newsroom/Journalist training to counter influence moves”
“Educate high profile influencers on best practices”
Meanwhile, Taibbi wrote this earlier today: “Information Warfare” Comes Home
In March of 2022, shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine, the New York Times published a curious story titled “Fact and Mythmaking Blend in Ukraine’s Information War.” It seemed much-hyped episodes celebrating Ukrainian mettle on the battlefield, like the exploits of the “Ghost of Kiev” ace pilot, “may be a myth,” as the Times put it euphemistically. The paper noted with seeming approval that platforms like Twitter chose not to remove that and other tales that turned out to be not-exactly-true, like the famed “Go Fuck Yourself” send-off of Ukrainian soldiers who reportedly chose to die rather than surrender to Russians on Snake Island.
Who cared if that story sounded just a tad too much like an R-rated version of General Anthony McAuliffe’s “Nuts” reply to Nazis demanding American surrender at Bastogne? What if that was the point, the paper wondered?
“Why can’t we just let people believe some things?” the Times quoted one “Twitter user” as saying. “If the Russians believe it, it brings fear. If the Ukrainians believe it, it gives them hope.” The sentiment was expressed in plainer terms later in the article by former Facebook executive Alex Stamos, head of the Stanford Internet Observatory, which piloted the controversial Election Integrity Partnership social-media-monitoring project:
In exercising discretion over how unverified or false content is moderated, social media companies have decided to “pick a side,” said Alex Stamos, the director of the Stanford Internet Observatory and a former head of security at Facebook.
The theme of the U.S. and its allies not only engaging in informational fakery but boasting about deceptions in public has been a constant since Russia’s invasion. NBC for instance did a story — before you check, yes, it was written by Ken Dilanian, lol — celebrating the Biden administration’s decision to “break with the past” and release “classified” intelligence even if it “wasn’t rock solid.” An example was an announcement that the Russians were considering the use of chemical weapons.
That American officials engage in public deception is no surprise to anyone who remembers the runup to the Iraq War. Still, the eagerness of officials to admit this on TV, or in papers like the Times, and even embrace goofball terms like “false flag,” is a new development.
It’s becoming clear that deploying fake news themes as “information warfare” is a tactic American government agencies are bringing home. Last week, in a story that first broke on Public, Michael Shellenberger, Alexandra Gutentag, and myself began publishing documents provided by a whistleblower about a group called the Cyber Threat Intelligence or (CTI) League, CTIL for short. CTIL, a supposed volunteer organization named as partner in April of 2020 by Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency chief Chris Krebs, ostensibly had a narrow focus on Covid-19 “misinformation.” But the whistleblower’s documents revealed something far more ambitious, and unnerving.
It was obvious right away that the #CTIFiles Michael and I testified about before congress last week were newsworthy, quickly filling gaps in the public’s understanding of the mechanics of state-aided censorship programs. However, as was the case with the Twitter Files, more troubling themes have emerged as we’ve had more time to read through the material. In a piece published on Public yesterday, for instance, Alex detailed the myriad guidelines in the #CTIFiles for “offensive” information operations.
These include discrediting techniques, use of sock-puppet accounts for trolling and surveillance purposes, strategies to divide groups via infiltration, and a long list of tradecraft lunacies called “counter” actions described taxonomically in the AMITT framework pushed by CTI figures like British data scientist Sarah-Jayne Terp and Special Operations Command “technologist” Pablo Breuer.
The punch line of the upcoming #CTIFiles #4 thread is that these documents don’t merely offer instructions in the use of sockpuppets and small-scale trolling operations. They show a through-line to the much larger frauds that spread like wildfire in the legacy news landscape between 2016 and the present, chief among them the Hamilton 68 scamexposed in the Twitter Files.
Subscribers to Racket News can read the rest here…
Zelensky Abruptly Cancels Address To Senators, Lashes Out At Failure To Secure More Taxpayer Funds
On Tuesday Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky unexpectedly canceled at the last minute a planned appearance via video link before US Senators mulling an emergency aid package containing over $60 billion for Kiev.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer was the one to announce it to reporters: “Zelensky by the way could not make it to — something happened at the last minute — to our briefing,” Schumer said.
With just weeks to go before Ukraine aid stops flowing, and amid a row in Congress which threatens to discontinue the war funding, Ukraine is now saying it will lose the war if it can’t access more US funds and weaponry.
If the United States postpones military aid to Ukraine, there is a “big risk” the country could lose its war with Russia, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s chief of staff Andriy Yermak said Tuesday.
Speaking at the U.S. Institute for Peace during a visit to Washington, Yermak said failure by Congress to approve more aid to Ukraine could make it “impossible” to liberate more territory captured by Russia and “give the big risk to lose this war.”
“If the help which (is) now debating in Congress will be just postponed. … It gives the big risk that we can be in same position (where) we’re located now,” said Yermak, speaking in English.
“That is why it is extremely critically important that this support will be voted and will be voted as soon as possible,” he said.
But the reality is that Ukrainian forces were already losing the war, given top US officials have long acknowledged the counteroffensive has stalled and failed, even with all the weapons the US has already poured in.
Thus Yermak’s statements seem more like an early blame-game: Ukraine seems to be saying it will be Washington’sfault when the war is lost and Kiev is forced to finally negotiate and cede territory.
Reporter: Are you saying any member of congress who votes against aid to Ukraine is voting for Putin?
Sullivan: I believe that any member of congress who does not support funding for Ukraine is voting for an outcome that will make it easier for Putin to prevail. pic.twitter.com/UUSItiBmad
Senate Republicans have tied Biden’s foreign defense funding to tackling the migrant crisis at the southern border, prolonging the Ukraine aid holdup further, and maybe indefinitely.
Interestingly, the Senate forum that Zelensky was to address involved a classified briefing. Likely he realized he was not going to convince anyone, and his ‘star status’ has long since been in decline. At this moment, even the mayor of Kyiv is attacking him, calling Zelenskyan “autocrat” and “corrupt” – and saying Ukraine is losing because of this.
Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) wants illegal immigrants to be given the opportunity to join the U.S. Military in return for citizenship.
Durbin made the comments during a recent Senate speech.
Noting how low enlistment levels represent a “grave threat to our national security,” Durbin and that these shortfalls could be met by recruiting illegal aliens.
“Do you know what the recruiting numbers are at the Army, Navy, and the Air Force? They can’t reach their quotas each month. They can’t find enough people to join our military forces. And there are those who are undocumented who want the chance to serve and risk their lives for this country. Should we give them a chance? I think we should,” said Durbin.
Senator Dick Durbin wants to make it possible for illegal immigrants to join the US military: “Do you know what the recruiting numbers are at the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force? They can’t reach their quotas each month. They can’t find enough people to join.” pic.twitter.com/UWuGSfrSkF
Durbin says “undocumented” young people who can pass physical and background tests should be able to “serve in our military and if you do it honorably we will make you citizens of the United States.”
Meanwhile, in related comments, commentator Gavin McInnes wondered if waves of illegal migrants were being allowed to enter the country so they could be used as part of a standing army for World War 3.
“So you know immigration has been so weird recently, with all these men of fighting age and the intense variety. It’s not just Mexicans anymore, Somalians, it’s never families,” he said.
“Are we staffing an army for World War 3?” asked McInnes. “Is that what these 4 million a year people doing here?”
The talk show host noted that if Iran became embroiled in Israel’s war, the entire Muslim world would team up, with China and Russia’s support, against America.
“You need a lot of dead bodies for World War 3, so is that the fucking globalist plan?” asked McInnes.
Analysts Fear Possible Delays Of Grand Theft Auto VI Release
Rockstar Games, owned by Take-Two Interactive Software, revealed on X on Monday evening that the “Grand Theft Auto VI” trailer leaked.
“Our trailer has leaked, so please watch the real thing on YouTube…” Rockstar Games said.
The trailer reveals that the sixth chapter of GTA is coming in 2025.
“Grand Theft Auto VI continues our efforts to push the limits of what’s possible in highly immersive, story-driven open-world experiences,” said Sam Houser, Founder of Rockstar Games.
Houser said, “We’re thrilled to be able to share this new vision with players everywhere.”
Some folks have been waiting a decade since GTA 5 was released in October 2013.
Despite the trailer’s big debut, Wall Street analysts were not thrilled with the release date.
Here’s more from Wall Street analysts (list courtesy of Bloomberg):
Wedbush, Nick McKay and Michael Pachter (outperform)
Release date of 2025 implies it will either appear late in Take-Two’s FY25 (ending on March 31 of that year) or in the following fiscal year
Management’s revised statement on FY25 being “slightly below” $8b in bookings increased McKay and Pachter’s conviction on GTA VI launching in FY26
“There is still an outside chance that Grand Theft Auto VI could launch in FY:25, but it is worth noting that (calendar) 2025 includes three quarters in Take-Two’s FY:26 and just one in its FY:25”
Roth MKM, Eric Handler (buy)
Shares fell in post-market trading over concerns that GTA VI could be an FY26 release rather than FY25, though Handler says this is “overblown” and that he would be a buyer on weakness
Handler believes the game is scheduled for release in 4Q25, noting management’s FY25 outlook on slightly less than $8b in bookings
“Given the sizable pent-up demand for GTA VI, having a release date in the March quarter versus the September or December quarters should not have a material impact on sales”
Morgan Stanley, Matthew Cost (overweight)
Cost sees GTA VI as the “most important catalyst” Take-Two has seen in the past decade
With around 190 million units of GTA V sold since its release in 2013, Cost says GTA VI will “address a massive built-in audience and has clear potential to be the largest game of this console generation”
“In our view now is time for investors to engage with TTWO…and we see any pullback as a strong buying opportunity”
Stifel, Drew Crum (buy)
Key takeaway from the trailer is that GTA VI will be released in 2025; Crum senses that consensus was looking for a holiday 2024 release
“If there’s any disappointment concerning the timing of the game, we’d use weakness to initiate/add to positions“
PT raised to $175 from $167
Baird Equity Research, Colin Sebastian (outperform)
Sebastian was “impressed” with the graphics/details and expects a generally positive reception from fans
There may be some disappointment with generic 2025 release timing, but the overall game quality and commercial reception “are more important than landing in a specific quarter”
“We remain constructive on shares even as we shift some bookings from F25 due to a later release than previously contemplated in our model”
TD Cowen, Doug Creutz and Mei Lun Quach (outperform)
Trailer was roughly what the analysts expected — “long on spectacular visuals and ‘vibes’, but not showcasing any features”
“Given likely meaningful contributions from GTA VI in the post-launch window, this would be a relevant factor for guidance. Obviously, this means that any further delays likely push the game out of FY25 and into FY26.”
Jefferies, Andrew Uerkwitz (buy)
Trailer showing the game is coming in 2025 was “surprising,” Uerkwitz writes; notes that a February/March 2025 release date could deliver on Take-Two’s guidance of ~$8b bookings in FY25 and growth in 2026
“There is still no exact release date, so fears of a delay into holiday 2025 and out of FY24 will immediately ensue”
Shares of Take-Two Interactive Software slumped as much as 1.5% in the US cash session.
The biggest concern among analysts is uncertainty around the release date – with some fears of a possible 2026 release.
The OPEC+ group is ready to take additional measures and deepen the oil production cuts in the first quarter of 2024 to avoid volatility and speculation on the market, Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said on Tuesday.
“The timely actions of OPEC+, thanks to which about 2.2 million barrels per day will be held off the market in the first quarter of next year, will allow the period of low demand to pass painlessly in the first quarter of 2024,” Novak told Russian news agency TASS.
“I would also like to note that if the current actions are not enough, OPEC+ countries are ready to take additional actions to eliminate speculation and volatility,” Novak added.
Last week, OPEC+ announced 2.2 million bpd of cuts for the first quarter of 2024, but these include Saudi Arabia rolling over its voluntary cut, Russia deepening crude and fuel export cuts by 200,000 bpd, and several other OPEC+ members announcing voluntary production reductions for the first quarter of 2024.
Overall, the announcements after the meeting were underwhelming and failed to convince the market that OPEC+ hasn’t had disagreements over cuts and quotas leading to the meeting, as became evident from the lack of a group-wide cut.
The OPEC+ supply decision, which the market found unconvincing, will likely erase the expected deficit early next year but leaves the question ‘what’s next’ unanswered, analysts say.
Novak’s comments on Tuesday follow remarks from Saudi Arabia’s Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, who told Bloomberg on Monday that the OPEC+ production cuts could extend beyond March 2024 if the market requires it, criticizing commentators for failing to understand the output deal.
The Saudi energy minister suggested that this would change once “people see the reality of the deal”.
“I honestly believe that the 2.2 million will overcome the usual inventory build that usually happens in the first quarter,” Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman told Bloomberg.
