UFC legend Nate Diaz wanted in New Orleans on battery charge after allegedly choking TikToker in Bourbon street scuffle



UFC legend and soon-to-be pro boxer Nate Diaz is wanted in New Orleans, Louisiana, after a scuffle outside a boxing event resulted in an altercation where Diaz reportedly choked a man unconscious.

Diaz is wanted on second-degree battery, according to Fox News, stemming from a Misfits Boxing event Diaz attended in support of a friend on April 21, 2023.

Police responded to a "large altercation" early the next morning, finding a man who appeared to be unconscious whom officers saw "bleeding from the rear of his head."

"After investigation, an arrest warrant was issued for Nate Diaz," according to police. "He has been charged with second-degree battery."

A man appearing to be Diaz was seen on video standing in front of another man before the two engaged. Diaz then rendered the man unconscious with a standing guillotine choke.

\u201cFormer UFC Superstar Nate Diaz catches some dude in a Ninja Choke and puts him to Sleep during a Street Fight last night...\n[\ud83c\udfa5 @PaulLABamba]\u201d
— Fight Haven (@Fight Haven) 1682170200

Former UFC fighter Jake Shields took to Twitter in defense of Diaz, posting a frame-by-frame breakdown of the altercation and saying that Diaz was acting in self-defense.

"I'm biased, but this is clearly self-defense," Shields concluded.

\u201cAfter hearing New Orleans has issued an arrest warrant on Nate Diaz I called my team to carefully brake down the footage\n\nGive this thread a look and give me your opinion of id this is self-defense\u201d
— Jake Shields (@Jake Shields) 1682392841

The man at the other end of the altercation was reportedly TikTok creator Rodney Petersen, who has over 200,000 followers on the platform.

Petersen appeared in a video with what appeared to be a head laceration he suffered after hitting the ground unconsciously.

“So, I don’t know what the hell I did to Nate Diaz,” Petersen said, with blood seemingly on his neck and head. “But I tell you what, I’m going to knock him the f*** out when I know he’s coming. You caught me off guard, dude. What’d you think I was, Logan?”

\u201cThe man choked out by Nate Diaz last night (Logan Paul lookalike Rodney Petersen) reveals the head injury he suffered as a result\u2026\n\n[\ud83c\udfa5 Rodney Petersen/@Overtflow]\u201d
— Michael Benson (@Michael Benson) 1682186921

UFC President Dana White remarked on the altercation, saying that Diaz is "going to get sued like a motherfu**er," according to the Daily Mail.

"That guy's head bounced like a f***ing basketball," White also said.

Diaz's last UFC fight was in September 2022, when he defeated fellow legend Tony Ferguson. The 38-year-old claims he still intends to fight Conor McGregor for a third time, telling McGregor's next opponent, Michael Chandler, in March 2023 not to defeat him.

Diaz is currently scheduled to fight YouTuber turned pro boxer Jake Paul in August 2023.

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!


Leftist media backtracks after false reports that conservative host said at CPAC that transgender people 'must be eradicated'



During his speech Saturday at CPAC, Daily Wire host Michael Knowles said, "For the good of society … transgenderism must be eradicated from public life entirely — the whole preposterous ideology, at every level."

Knowles was underscoring how deleterious the transsexual movement has been, not just on the individuals who have been sterilized and mutilated with the help of pharmaceutical reps and surgeons, but on women and girls whose sex-specific spaces (e.g., prisons, bathrooms, shelters) and events have been infiltrated by biological males masquerading as women.

Multiple left-leaning media outlets — the Daily Beast, the Huffington Post, and Rolling Stone in particular — ran false reports intimating that Knowles had made physical threats, calling for the eradication of transsexuals and their so-called community.

Knowles immediately demanded retractions.

Despite subsequent changes to their headlines and in some cases editorial notes, a number of these liberal outfits and others continue to intimate that opposition to an agenda is tantamount to "genocide."

The speech

Knowles, a conservative commentator, spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Maryland on Saturday, discussing marriage and gender issues.

He noted that conservatives "suffer from low expectations – we think the thing we can most hope for is that we halt the left exactly where it is."

Rather than accommodate the left, making concessions about the age children must be to undergo sex-change surgeries, Knowles suggested conservatives ought to reject leftist ideology outright, especially when it comes to transsexuality.

Knowles said, "There can be no middle way in dealing with transgenderism. It is all or nothing. If transgenderism is true, if men can really become women, then it is true for everybody of all ages. If transgenderism is false, as it is, if men really can become women, as they cannot, then it is false for everybody too. And if it’s false, then we should not indulge it."

Here are the remarks with some context:

\u201c. @michaeljknowles this is deeply concerning language (no matter how bad the idea is). Ideas, good and bad, must flow freely at a public level.\u201d
— Jeffrey Harmon (@Jeffrey Harmon) 1678020850

Leftist apoplexy and disinformation

The remarks were not well received by the left.

John Knefel of Media Matters called the speech "[e]liminationist, genocidal rhetoric."

Adam Vary, a senior entertainment writer at Variety, tweeted, "Pay attention. This is genocidal. That is not hyperbole or alarmist; this rhetoric is calling for the eradication of a group of people for who they are."

The California Democrat, who proposed offering "Drag Queen 101 as part of the K-12 curriculum" and introduced legislation softening penalties for pedophilic statutory rape, suggested Knowles had called for genocide.

State Senator Scott Wiener tweeted, "It’s a straight up call for genocide. That’s what this fight is about. They want us gone."

The liberal media happened to agree.

The Huffington Post ran a piece originally entitled, "At CPAC, A Call For Trans People To Be 'Eradicated' Gets Big Cheers."

The Daily Beast originally ran a piece entitled, "Michael Knowles Says Transgender Community Must Be 'Eradicated' at CPAC."

The Rolling Stone, which has paid out millions in the past for false reporting and defamation, ran a piece with the headline, "CPAC Speaker Calls for Transgender People to Be 'Eradicated.'"

Geoff Wetrosky, Human Rights Campaign’s national campaign director, told Rolling Stone, "Their words rile up far-right extremists resulting in more stigma, discrimination and violence against LGBTQ+ people. The rights and very existence of trans people are not up for debate."

It would appear that, contrary to Wetrosky's suggestion, the inciting language was not in Knowles' speech but in the liberal media's false coverage of his speech.

Pseudo-revisions

Knowles immediately called out the liberal outfits, accusing them of libel.

He tweeted to Rolling Stone, stating, "This headline is libelous, and I demand a retraction."

The Daily Wire host wrote both to Christopher Mathias of the Huffington Post, who also reported on Twitter that Knowles had "called for trans people to be 'eradicated,'" and to the Daily Beast, noting, "I never said that and demand a retraction."

\u201cI never said that and demand a retraction. @HuffPost\u201d
— Michael Knowles (@Michael Knowles) 1677972965

The HuffPost has since amended its article's headline to read, "CPAC Speaker’s Trans Comments About ‘Eradication’ Sound Downright Genocidal."

Previously, it claimed in the body of the article, "There are an estimated 1.6 million trans people in the United States. Knowles told the CPAC crowd that these people should not have a right to exist."

It covertly added in "essentially," so the sentence reads, "Knowles essentially told the CPAC crowd that these people should not have a right to exist."

The Daily Beast changed the headline of its article to "Michael Knowles Says Transgenderism Must Be 'Eradicated' at CPAC."

The Rolling Stone changed its headline to "CPAC Speaker Calls for Eradication of ‘Transgenderism’ — and Somehow Claims He’s Not Calling for Elimination of Transgender People" and provided an editorial note stating, "This post has been updated to include statements from transgender rights activists and additional comments from Knowles."

The augmented Rolling Stone piece contains commentary by Erin Reed, a male transsexual LGBT activist, on Knowles' demand for a retraction, suggesting that it's "an absurd distinction. There is no difference between a ban on 'transgenderism' and an attack on transgender people."

Reed claimed, "They are one and the same, and there's no separation between them."

Following the changes, Knowles tweeted, "I’m pleased to see that both @thedailybeast and @RollingStone have at least partially admitted their dishonesty by changing their libelous headlines. I look forward to seeing the other outlets that are defaming me follow suit!"

\u201cI\u2019m pleased to see that both @thedailybeast and @RollingStone have at least partially admitted their dishonesty by changing their libelous headlines. I look forward to seeing the other outlets that are defaming me follow suit!\u201d
— Michael Knowles (@Michael Knowles) 1678066644

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) commented on the leftist outfits' false headlines, writing, "It is indeed libelous. It’s an example of how a bad Supreme Court ruling from 1964 (NY Times v. Sullivan) has created a monster—giving the news media a license to lie about any public figure who can’t prove that the reporter acted with 'actual malice,' which is nearly impossible."

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

China dismisses FBI director's admission that Wuhan lab is 'most likely' origin of COVID-19, hounds Elon Musk over lab-leak claim



FBI Director Christopher Wray admitted during an interview Tuesday that the bureau has long suspected the COVID-19 pandemic to have been the result of a lab incident in Wuhan, China — a possibility the Chinese Communist Party, Dr. Anthony Fauci, members of the media, and so-called experts have spent years downplaying.

CCP apparatchiks lashed out, suggesting that Wray's recognition of Beijing's possible culpability hurt American credibility.

A CCP-run propaganda outfit similarly lashed out at Twitter CEO Elon Musk over his circulation of a report concerning the lab-leak theory, intimating that doing so may have consequences.

These two incidents, which occurred just hours apart, signal Beijing's growing sensitivity amid mounting Western certainty about the CCP's hand in the deaths of tens of millions of people worldwide.

The FBI's delayed admission

In his Tuesday interview with Fox News' Bret Baier, Wray confirmed a suggestion made in a recent Wall Street Journal report: that the FBI had determined with "moderate confidence" in 2021 that the pandemic was likely the result of a lab leak and maintains this view.

In the same report, the Journal detailed how the Department of Energy has confirmed that it similarly suspects COVID-19 leaked from a communist Chinese lab.

"The FBI has for quite some time now assessed that the origins of the pandemic are most likely a potential lab incident in Wuhan," Wray told Baier. "Here you are talking about a potential leak from a Chinese government-controlled lab."

\u201cJust in: In case there was any remaining doubt that the US intelligence community is actively promoting the COVID lab leak theory, FBI Director Christopher Wray has now voiced his support for the theory.\nhttps://t.co/W1fdfeje8x\u201d
— Michael P Senger (@Michael P Senger) 1677629637

Extra to its possible responsibility for a global pandemic, FBI Director Wray suggested that the CCP has been hard at work on a cover-up, seeking to undermine international efforts to ascertain the origins of the COVID-19 virus.

"I will just make the observation that the Chinese government, it seems to me, has been doing its best to try to thwart and obfuscate the work here, the work that we’re doing, the work that our U.S. government and close foreign partners are doing. And that’s unfortunate for everybody," said Wray.

TheBlaze previously reported that extra to possible culpability over the potential manufacture and release of the virus (i.e., at the Wuhan Institute of Virology lab), Chinese authorities also delayed warning the world about the emergence of the deadly disease, going to great lengths to silence doctors like the late Lie Wenliang, who tried to raise the alarm.

Communist officials waited until Dec. 31 to alert the World Health Organization, then claimed, "The disease is preventable and controllable."

A Five Eyes intelligence dossier accused the CCP in May 2020 of engaging in an "assault on international transparency" to the "endangerment of other countries," reported the New York Post.

The intelligence dossier indicated that the genocidal Chinese regime had scrambled to bury evidence of the virus and its origins, "destroying" lab samples, censoring evidence of spread, and denying sample requests from other countries.

Marty Makary, a professor of public health policy at John Hopkins University, told Congress Tuesday it is a "no-brainer" that a Chinese lab was responsible for the pandemic, reported Newsweek.

"The epicenter of the world [coronavirus pandemic] is five miles from one of the only high-level virology labs in China. The doctors initially were arrested and forced to sign non-disclosure gag documents," said Makary. "The lab reports have been destroyed; they've not been turned over. The sequence reported from the lab to the NIH database were deleted by a request from Chinese scientists that called over early on and said, 'Delete those sequences we put in the database.'"

More denial from Beijing

The Associated Press reported that the Chinese regime's foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning claimed Tuesday that "by rehashing the lab-leak theory, the U.S. will not succeed in discrediting China, and instead, it will only hurt its own credibility."

Ning said, "We urge the U.S. to respect science and facts ... stop turning origin tracing into something about politics and intelligence, and stop disrupting social solidarity and origins cooperation."

Despite China having barred entry to members of the World Health Organization team investigating the outbreak in early 2021, destroyed evidence about the outbreak, and silenced whistleblowers, Ning claimed that China has been "open and transparent" in the quest for answers about COVID-19 and has "shared the most data and research results on virus tracing and made important contributions to global virus tracing research."

Wray was not the only target of the CCP's ire over the renewed interest in the lab-leak theory.

Broken pots

The investigative journalist behind the Substack Kanekoa News tweeted a video compilation concerning Fauci's alleged funding of gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Lab and lies about having done so before Congress.

Noting that "now both the FBI & the Department of Energy have concluded that the coronavirus originated at the Wuhan lab," Kanekoa asked, "Does that mean Dr. Anthony Fauci funded the development of COVID-19?"

Elon Musk, who previously suggested that his pronouns were "Prosecute/Fauci," responded, "He did it via a pass-through organization (EcoHealth)."

\u201c@KanekoaTheGreat He did it via a pass-through organization (EcoHealth)\u201d
— kanekoa.substack.com (@kanekoa.substack.com) 1677436709

As a result of Musk's participation in this particular discussion concerning the "likely" Wuhan lab origins of the virus, the Global Times, a CCP propaganda paper, threatened the tech magnate, suggesting he could be "breaking the pot of China."

CNBC's Eunice Yoon noted that this expression is the Chinese equivalent of "biting the hand that feeds you," likely intimating there could be repercussions, given that China is Tesla's second-largest market and the company has considerable assets in the country, including its factory campus in Shanghai.

Yoon indicated that the Global Times also wrote, "Some may think @elonmusk made those remarks only to attack Fauci," but the posts he retweeted "almost all link the origins of #Covid19 to China and the argument is repeatedly used by the US right wing and anti-China media hostile to China to frame #China."

\u201c#China Communist Party paper warns @elonmusk against pushing #COVID19 lab leak theory. @globaltimesnews posts on social media \u201cElon Musk, are you breaking the pot of China?\u201d (\u201cBreaking the pot after eating\u201d is Chinese \u201cbiting the hand that feeds you.\u201d) https://t.co/iWmMZAOiGt\u201d
— Eunice Yoon (@Eunice Yoon) 1677563235

Some in Washington suspect that this international battle for the truth is backgrounded by a far more significant struggle.

Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) emphasized Tuesday during the first hearing of the House select committee on China, which he chairs, that China cannot be trusted and must be taken deadly seriously: "We may call this a 'strategic competition,' but it's not a polite tennis match. ... This is an existential struggle over what life will look like in the 21st century — and the most fundamental freedoms are at stake."

H.R. McMaster testified before the committee, saying, "You could say that the Chinese Communist Party is the Harry Houdini of Marxist Leninist regimes, the David Copperfield of communism, the Criss Angel of autocracy, but the magic is fading. There's really no excuse any more for being fooled about Beijing's intentions."

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

Hand-to-hand drug deal occurs during jury selection of RICO trial: Report



Two of 14 defendants standing trial in a RICO case regarding alleged gang activity in Atlanta, Georgia, have reportedly made the prosecution's case against them a bit stronger. According to reports, the two conducted a hand-to-hand drug deal in open court during jury selection proceedings this week.

On Wednesday, defendant Jeffrey Williams, 31, better known as the rapper Young Thug, was in the Fulton County Courthouse sitting next to his attorney when fellow defendant Kahlieff Adams stood up in the back of the courtroom and began walking toward the front. Before he turned toward a door, which some have indicated is a restroom, Adams reached out and grasped Williams' right hand, and Williams immediately placed his hand underneath the table in front of him.

Deputies then converged on Williams, suggesting that they sensed Williams and Adams had done more than simply shake hands. Williams then handed over to the deputies an item in his hand, which officials later claimed was a Percocet pill.

\u201cEXCLUSIVE: My colleague @MarkWinneWSB just obtained surveillance video that shows the moment prosecutors accuse Young Thug and his co defendant Kahlieff Adams of conducting a \u201chand-to-hand\u201d drug deal in court.@wsbtv\u201d
— Michael Seiden (@Michael Seiden) 1674169909

When Adams was searched, deputies reportedly found Percocet, marijuana, and tobacco that had been covered with food seasoning to mask the odor. He was later transported to Grady Hospital after he supposedly consumed other contraband in an effort to destroy evidence.

Adams now faces a handful of new charges: possession of schedule II controlled substance, willful obstruction of law enforcement, possession of marijuana less than one ounce, possession of alcoholic beverage by inmate, and willful obstruction of law enforcement officers. He is currently serving life without parole for a previous murder conviction.

Keith Adams, one of Williams’ attorneys, denied that his client has any culpability in the incident. "The reality is Mr. Williams had nothing to do with what went on in the courtroom yesterday," the attorney said. "One of the co-defendants on his way to the restroom attempted to pass something to Mr. Williams, who immediately turned it over to the deputy."

Keith Adams also claimed that Williams did not even know what defendant Adams had allegedly passed to him. "We don’t know what it is, did not know," the attorney stated. "It was turned over to a deputy right away."

The supposed drug transaction forced a delay in the proceedings, which have already become tediously long. Judge Ural Glanville had to read the entire 95-page indictment for prospective jurors that day and had to do it all again for hundreds of prospective jurors the following day as well.

Earlier this week, the mother of one of the defendants was arrested after deputies claimed she tried to hide an envelope containing tobacco wrapping papers and tobacco products in a bag of clothing that she then gave to her son. Latasha Kendrick, the 51-year-old mother of Deamonte Kendrick, aka Yak Gotti, has been charged with one count of criminal attempt to commit a misdemeanor. A warrant has also been issued for Nyesha Cox, the mother of Deamonte Kendrick's child, in connection to the incident, though Cox has not yet been arrested.

All 14 defendants in the RICO case are supposedly members of a gang called Young Slime Life or YSL, which has allegedly committed heinous acts of violence all over the Atlanta area since its inception in 2012. For example, several of the defendants have been implicated in the murder of rival gang leader Donovan Thomas Jr. in 2015. Williams allegedly rented a car used in the commission of that crime. YSL has also allegedly been linked to the Bloods, a notorious gang that began in Los Angeles in the early 1970s but now has affiliations throughout the country.

The defendants deny that their association is a gang and insist instead that they are a collective of local black artists. That prosecutors have submitted as evidence rap lyrics written by Williams and other defendants seems both to undermine and reify that notion, just as it tests the limits of free speech. The entire RICO trial is expected to last at least a year.

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

Biden admin could seek to 'weaponize' government against Twitter if Trump returns, Musk says



Business magnate Elon Musk, who purchased Twitter last year, suggested in a tweet on Wednesday that President Joe Biden's administration might attempt to "weaponize" the federal government to target Twitter if former President Donald Trump returns to the platform.

"Will be interesting to see how the Biden administration reacts to this," Musk wrote when responding to a tweet about Trump potentially returning to Twitter and Facebook. "They may try to weaponize Federal agencies against Twitter."

\u201c@alx Will be interesting to see how the Biden administration reacts to this. \n\nThey may try to weaponize Federal agencies against Twitter.\u201d
— ALX \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\uddf8 (@ALX \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\uddf8) 1674058151

Twitter permanently suspended Trump in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot — but since acquiring the company, Musk has reinstated many accounts that had previously been banned, including Trump's — however, Trump has not posted any content since being reinstated.

NBC News reported that Trump's campaign is aiming to get the former president reinstated on Facebook — he was blocked from the platform in early 2021, with the company later announcing that Trump's accounts would be suspended for a two-year period — but that period has fully passed.

"We believe that the ban on President Trump’s account on Facebook has dramatically distorted and inhibited the public discourse," the campaign wrote in a letter to Meta, according to NBC News, which reported that the campaign asked for a "meeting to discuss President Trump’s prompt reinstatement to the platform." The letter reportedly said that "every day that President Trump’s political voice remains silenced furthers an inappropriate interference in the American political and election process."

The outlet pointed to anonymous sources to report that Trump could start using Twitter again. "Trump is probably coming back to Twitter. It's just a question of how and when," a Republican said, according to NBC News. "He's been talking about it for weeks, but Trump speaks for Trump, so it's anyone’s guess what he'll do or say or when." The outlet reported that someone else said Trump had been seeking input about getting back on Twitter and that campaign advisers had mulled possibilities for Trump's initial tweet.

Recently, in a reference to the controversial issue of environmental, social, and governance investing, Musk quipped that the letter "S" in ESG means "Satanic."

\u201c@ShellenbergerMD The S in ESG stands for Satanic\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1673829001

The billionaire business tycoon tweeted on Wednesday that the World Economic Forum "is increasingly becoming an unelected world government that the people never asked for and don't want."

\u201c@disclosetv WEF is increasingly becoming an unelected world government that the people never asked for and don\u2019t want\u201d
— Disclose.tv (@Disclose.tv) 1673978681

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

'Lowest of the low': Looters pillage Buffalo while police are distracted saving lives and digging up bodies



For many, the blizzard that recently struck Buffalo, burying the city in 43 inches of snow and leaving tens of thousands without power, meant tragedy, particularly for the families of the 27 who perished in freezing whiteout conditions. For others, the wicked storm has meant opportunity.

Stores have been ransacked, businesses looted, and homes burgled by roving looters whom Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown has called the "lowest of the low."

Whereas some have suggested that looters were driven to crime as a result of necessity, WGRZ reported that in most cases, essential items were forgone and luxury items prioritized.

What are the details?

Since the storm hit in full force on Friday, police have been focused on saving lives, recovering the bodies of victims, and tackling the immobilizing snow, suggested Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia.

Looters evidently seized upon the distraction provided by the deadly blizzard, which Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz called the "worst storm probably in our lifetime."

Numerous videos of the looters' alleged exploits have been shared to social media.

Video has been released of the Nickel City Liquor store's break-in. The owner reportedly noted that the looters responsible have "cheap and bad taste."

\u201cLast night Nickel City Liquor in Buffalo was broken into & robbed. $500 worth of alcohol stolen. \n\nOwner had to sleep there, unable to board it up. He said \u201cthey have cheap & bad taste.\u201d\u201d
— Michael Schwartz (@Michael Schwartz) 1671996686

In another video shared to Twitter, looters weighed down with ill-gotten goods can be seen pouring out of a Family Dollar store:

\u201cBlizzard in Buffalo today and......................looting.\u201d
— Veterans Taking Back (@Veterans Taking Back) 1672036047

A 7-Eleven convenience store was smashed, stripped of its products, and unwittingly turned into a bird sanctuary:

\u201cThe aftermath of mass looting today in Buffalo, NY following a storm:\u201d
— End Wokeness (@End Wokeness) 1672030470

Looters also reportedly raided Rick's Sports Apparel, smashing its windows and emptying it of items of value.

Patrick Cichocki, one of the owners of Camellia Meats, told WGRZ that looters were "breaking into the Rent to Own, they're taking TV sets."

An employee at Camellia Meats said, "It's heartbreaking. When this is all over the community will have nowhere to go to get the things they need."

Pastor Al Robinson of the Spirit of Truth Urban Ministry confirmed the community impact of this thievery, telling WKBW that the very businesses vulnerable families rely upon have been pillaged, leaving them in the lurch.

"These people, I just don't understand why they just don't care about their neighbor," said Robinson.

Police began resuming their normal duties on Monday, indicated Gramaglia, although search and rescue operations will continue.

"We have made a few arrests. We have intervened in some of those. We've assisted with at least one location that I am aware of in getting a store boarded up, so our officers are out there," said Gramaglia.

BPD spokesman Mike DeGeorge noted that police will be monitoring social media and "reviewing video and posts in an effort to make arrests."

Buffalo's mayor minced no words when calling out those responsible.

Brown said, "People who are out looting when people are losing their lives in this harsh winter storm, it's just absolutely reprehensible. I don't know how these people can even live with themselves, how they can look at themselves in the mirror."

Brown noted that the "people taking advantage of a natural disaster to take what they want from retailers" are "also potentially putting those services at risk in the communities where they are looting."

According to Daniel Neaverth Jr., commissioner of the county's Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Services, the looting of gas stations has left a number of them inoperable. As a result, the fueling pumps are not working and first responders will be unable to fuel up, reported the Buffalo News.

"So that ambulance that is maybe just going to go a block to refuel now has to go to a facility sometimes outside of the city of Buffalo to be refueled," said Neaverth.

Poloncarz said he was "absolutely devastated to see that many deaths and then to find out that there's looting going on in our community at the same time we're still recovering bodies is just horrible."

Whereas the mayor and other community leaders have denounced the looters, Advocates for Justice attorney Nate McMurray suggested that those questioning the motives and ethics of the looters destroying local businesses should "shut up," intimating that the rampant theft of nonessential items is socio-economically justifiable.

\u201cI just saw a wealthy white guy online say about the looting in Buffalo\u2026\n\n\u201cWhy don\u2019t they take pride in their communities?\u201d\n\nDo me a favor. Move there. Live on the average income in the East Side. Survive a snowstorm without a grocery store nearby, let alone a plow. \n\nOr shut up.\u201d
— Nate McMurray (@Nate McMurray) 1672071255

Mayor Brown made clear that the criminal elements taking advantage of the tragedy that has befallen Buffalo are "not looting food and medicines, they're just looting items that they want so these aren't even people in distress; these are people that are taking advantage of a natural disaster."

Looting a problem after the blizzard youtu.be

Soros org, Twitter, Meta, and NYT all participated in Biden leak 'training exercise' in 2020, a month before laptop story



On an unspecified date in September 2020, about a month before the Hunter Biden laptop story, high-ranking social media representatives and journalists participated in a training exercise to prepare for a possible data leak about the Bidens, according to the Daily Caller and journalist Michael Shellenberger.

Organized by the Aspen Institute, a left-wing think tank that took in over $160 million in 2019, media outlets and social media companies took part in the “tabletop exercise” referring to a "hack-and-dump" operation that was titled "The Burisma Leak."

"Relating to Hunter Biden ... the goal was to shape how the media covered it — and how social media carried it," said Shellenberger.

The exercise detailed potential daily news breaks, such as leak posted by a hypothetical website called BidenCrimes.info. Each subsequent hypothetical news story is detailed with examples from the Drudge Report or Fox & Friends, mockingly stating that they picked up a story from a user named "@HunterLolz."

On day four of the hypothetical story, "President Trump, at podium, pumps his fist as the crowd chants 'Lock Him Up!'" the story reads.

On day five, a hypothetical statement from the director of national intelligence states that he has no reason to believe the story is a forgery or Russian disinformation, with Biden dismissing the story on day seven as "dirty tricks by Vladimir Putin."

Other hypotheticals are eerily close to actual events, such as two "former senior intelligence" officials disagreeing with the intelligence director's statement. The exercise carries on all the way up to and through the second presidential debate.

Attending the exercise and leading the meeting was Vivian Schiller, the former CEO of NPR and head of news at Twitter. She was joined by Yoel Roth, Twitter "Head of Site Integrity," the head of security policy at Facebook/Meta, national security reporters from the New York Times and Washington Post, and even the now-defunct, Soros-backed First Draft News.

The about page for First Draft News describes itself as a fact-checking organization, while its Wikipedia page mentions its ties to Soros' Open Society Foundation.

\u201c31. The organizer was Vivian Schiller, the fmr CEO of NPR, fmr head of news at Twitter; fmr Gen. mgr of NY Times; fmr Chief Digital Officer of NBC News\n\nAttendees included Meta/FB's head of security policy and the top nat. sec. reporters for @nytimes @wapo and others\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1671470648

The event took place just about a month before the October 2020 Hunter Biden story by the New York Post, in which Joe Biden is alleged to have met with Burisma executives, contradicting his prior claims. Another email details a Burisma executive asking for advice on how to stop "politically motivated actions" against the company.

The Aspen Institute, funded in part by the Rockefeller Foundation, also runs an anti-disinformation project called the Commission on Information Disorder.

Elon Musk dissolves Twitter's censorship council



Twitter axed its so-called Trust and Safety Council on Monday night.

Leftist elements of the defunct council have denounced the move and joined the chorus of critics opposed to Twitter's apparent embrace of Elon Musk's "free speech absolutist" ideals.

The dissolution of the council comes just days after three of its members, including the niece of Biden official John Podesta, resigned, citing as partial cause their opposition to the restoration of banned accounts belonging to conservatives such as former President Donald Trump.

Thanks but no thanks

Trust and Safety Council members received an email signed "Twitter" on Monday that said, "As Twitter moves into a new phase, we are reevaluating how best to bring external insights into our product and policy development."

Evidently, the best way forward was without the meddling council's direct involvement.

The letter noted that Twitter will "continue to welcome your ideas going forward" and "will also continue to explore opportunities to provide focused and timely input into our work, whether through bilateral or small group meetings."

An archived version of the council's now-defunct "About" page describes the council as "a group of independent expert organizations from around the world. Together, they advocate for safety and advise us as we develop our products, programs, and rules."

The so-called expert groups that provided the council with counsel included the Anti-Defamation League, the LGBT activist group Black Rainbow, Feminist Frequency, the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, Muslim Advocates, and the United Nations' Association for Progressive Communications.

The group's purported areas of focus included "Online Safety and Harassment, Human and Digital Rights, Suicide Prevention and Mental Health, Child Sexual Exploitation, and Dehumanization."

How dare he!

Alex Holmes, now a former member of the council and a Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation advisory board member, took to Twitter to lament, writing, "Many of us have been in this space for a number of years, each with different expertise, but all with a passion to see healthy and diverse conversations and safety exist on platforms."

"The way this has unfolded and way members have been treated is unfortunate and unacceptable," Holmes added.

\u201cMany of us have been in this space for a number of years, each with different expertise, but all with a passion to see healthy and diverse conversations and safety exist on platforms.\n\nThe way this has unfolded and way members have been treated is unfortunate and unacceptable.\u201d
— Alex Holmes \ud83c\udff3\ufe0f\u200d\ud83c\udf08 (@Alex Holmes \ud83c\udff3\ufe0f\u200d\ud83c\udf08) 1670893482

The Washington Post reported that the council was set to meet virtually to discuss recent developments when it learned that it had been disbanded.

Larry Magid, chief executive at the Silicon Valley nonprofit ConnectSafely, was on the board as of Monday. He told the Post, "By disbanding it, we got fired instead of quit."

Members Eirliani Abdul Rahman, Anne Collier, and Lesley Podesta saved Musk three emails by resigning last week, claiming "the safety and wellbeing of Twitter's users are on the decline."

Rahman alleged in a statement that slurs against black Americans and gay men jumped since Musk's takeover and that anti-Semitism was on the rise.

"Another red line for me was when previously banned accounts such as those on the far right, and those who had incited others to violence, such as then US President Donald Trump's, were reinstated," said Rahman.

While noting that the readmission of the former president and others amounted to unforgivable actions on the part of Twitter's leadership, the trio of quitters claimed that under Musk, Twitter was in danger of losing its reputation as "the platform where anyone could be heard."

In response to these resignations, Musk tweeted, "It is a crime that they refused to take action on child exploitation for years!"

Twitter founder Jack Dorsey suggested that the allegation that the Trust and Safety Council failed to take appropriate action to protect minors was false.

However, Musk doubled down, writing, "When Ella Irwin, who now runs Trust & Safety, joined Twitter earlier this year, almost no one was working on child safety. She raised this with Ned & Parag, but they rejected her staffing request."

\u201c@jack @Cernovich @annecollier @eirliani @podesta_lesley No, it is not. \n\nWhen Ella Irwin, who now runs Trust & Safety, joined Twitter earlier this year, almost no one was working on child safety.\n\nShe raised this with Ned & Parag, but they rejected her staffing request.\n\nI made it top priority immediately.\n\n@ellagirwin\u201d
— annecollier (@annecollier) 1670516715

Roth on the run

While some council members have gone online to complain, the former council head, Yoel Roth, has reportedly gone on the run.

The Washington Post reported that Roth fled his home on account of Musk drawing attention to his doctoral thesis.

Musk tweeted on Saturday, "Looks like Yoel is arguing in favor of children being able to access adult Internet services in his PhD thesis," adding, "This explains a lot."

\u201c@elizableu Looks like Yoel is arguing in favor of children being able to access adult Internet services in his PhD thesis:\u201d
— Eliza (@Eliza) 1670694731

In addition to erroneously claiming investigative journalists Matt Taibbi and Bari Weiss were conservatives and only later making a stealth edit, the Washington Post claimed Musk had "mischaracterized Roth's academic writing about sexual activity and children."

Even if the trust and safety council hadn't been disbanded, Roth still wouldn't be able to hit Musk with a misinformation label, given that he resigned back in November.

The 35-year-old penned an op-ed in the New York Times on Nov. 18, stating, "In my more than seven years at the company, we exposed government-backed troll farms meddling in elections, introduced tools for contextualizing dangerous misinformation, and, yes, banned President Donald Trump from the service."

Roth, who likened members of the Trump administration to Nazis, embraced the descriptor "custodians of the internet" and claimed the "work of online sanitation is unrelenting and contentious."

Online sanitation, for Roth, has involved taking input from the FBI and censoring the New York Post's Hunter Biden laptop story, potentially impacting the 2020 election; de-platforming the democratically elected president of the United States; and censoring satire he personally did not find to be amusing.

Here is the former head of the now defunct Trust and Safety Council claiming that a satire site's conference of a fictitious "Man Of The Year" award to a biological man "is dangerous":

\u201cRoth defends the decision to ban @TheBabylonBee: "Not only is it not funny, it is dangerous" \n\nKara Swisher, no fan of the Babylon Bee, gently disagrees -- noting that the account was engaged in satire. "It's still misgendering," Roth insists\u201d
— Michael Tracey (@Michael Tracey) 1670042298

Poll: Over one-third of San Franciscans plan to leave crime-ridden 'sanctuary city'​



The San Francisco Chronicle conducted a comprehensive survey between June and July of over 1,650 people to "measure attitudes on what's working, what isn't, performance of city government, the future of the city and more." Respondents overwhelming indicated that a great deal isn't working, the city is performing poorly, the future looks bleak, and it may not be worth hanging around much longer.

The results

65% of respondents said the city, run by Democrat Mayor London Breed, was worse than when they first moved there. Only 10% said it was better.

Women reportedly found the city to be worse than did their male counterparts, with 69% reporting a significant deterioration (representing a seven-point gendered change) and only 7% noting there being signs of improvement.

35% of respondents believe things will only be worse two years from now. 43% suggested it will be as bad as it is today.

Between July 1, 2020, and July 1, 2021, over 128,870 fled San Francisco. This exodus represented a numeric decline of 6.7%, the sixth-highest decline in the country during that period. The Chronicle's poll indicated that trend may continue.

37% of current residents plan to be living somewhere beside San Francisco in three-years time. The diaspora will be overrepresented by those in the 18-34 age group, 54% of which suggested they wanted out.

Those who stay might express their frustration by other means.

Last month, a collective of shops in the city threatened not to pay their taxes, citing the city's failure to get a grip on rising crime and homelessness. Dave Karraker, Co-President of the Castro Merchants Association, told KRON4 "Business owners stop paying taxes and stop paying the fees for licenses because the city is not providing the services that are supposed to be guaranteed based on what we’re paying to the city."

Those businesses that Karraker represents, which have been subjected to burglaries are not alone.

45% of respondents told the Chronicle that they had been robbed over the past five years.

Michael Yaki, a former city supervisor, told the Chronicle "that's extraordinarily high ... When a car is broken into, and things have been stolen, there's a sense of personal violation."

Fewer people, although not an insignificant percentage (24%) of San Franciscans, reported being threatened with physical violence or outright attacked.

The cause

San Francisco, the location of Democrat House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's multi-million-dollar mansion, suffers a multitude of problems. Homelessness is chief among them.

According to a 2022 point-in-time homeless count, there are 7,754 homeless people in San Francisco. However, the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing (HSH) has indicated that number may be closer to 20,000 people, comprising 2.5% of the city's population — this despite the city increasing the HSH's budget three-fold since 2016.

\u201cSan Francisco right now\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662731942

The city's worsening crime problem, as partially reflected by the reported victimization in the Chronicle survey, is also a pressing issue.

San Francisco scores a 4 on Neighborhood Scout's crime index (100 being the safest). While the chances of becoming a victim of a violent crime in the Democrat-run city are 1 in 178, the chances of being the victim of a burglary, theft or carjacking is 1 in 22.

According to the San Francisco Police Department, so far this year there have been:

  • 23,587 crimes of theft or larceny;
  • 209 crimes of arson;
  • 4,222 carjackings;
  • 4,086 burglaries;
  • 1,804 assaults;
  • 1,634 robberies;
  • 170 rapes; and
  • 36 murders.

Problems with crime have long been exacerbated at the state level.

Democrats' Proposition 47, for instance, effectively decriminalized shoplifting, whereby thefts of goods collectively valued at under $950 are treated as nonviolent misdemeanors and rarely prosecuted.

\u201cThe Looting going on in war-torn Kiev is INSANE \u2026. \n\nOh wait, this is Democrat controlled San Francisco. \n\nNo one look or RT please. \n\nhttps://t.co/Rrp2Y61hhw\u201d
— Benny Johnson (@Benny Johnson) 1645984209

Sometimes those who attempt to stop such crimes in the city are ostracized, as in the case of one Walgreens employee who, having tried to stop a robbery, was roundly condemned online in July.

Last year, amidst a spike in homicides and assaults, former San Francisco police commissioner Joe Alioto Veronese suggested the city had descended into "a state of chaos and anarchy."

In 2020, Breed, the city's Democrat mayor, announced a $120 million cut from the police department's budget, despite having enjoyed personal armed protection in the previous five years to the tune of $12.4 million.

At the time, the president of the S.F. Police Officer's Association, Tony Montoya, said that Breed's decision "could impact our ability to respond to emergencies."

Fox News Digital indicated that Breed's decision ultimately proved ruinous and Montoya correct. Homicides in the first year of the city's police defunding increased by 20% over 2019, and burglaries increased by 47% over the three previous years.

With out-of-control crime and homelessness, the city has undergone a deadening.

A recent study conducted by the Institute of Governmental Studies at U.C. Berkeley revealed that in the spring of 2022, the city's downtown was only 31% active. The study also showed that the four other cities with the worst post-pandemic recoveries were all similarly Democrat-run.

In the deadened city, drug abuse is rampant. In 2020, there were over 700 drug overdoses. Last year, there were over 640 overdoses. Altogether, there have been nearly 1,700 overdose deaths in the city since January 2020.

Those who indicated they would soon flee San Francisco will be leaving behind worsening crime and homelessness, a fetid waterfront, and a anemic downtown that serves as an epicenter for a tragic drug crisis.

HORRIFYING new video of San Francisco perfectly illustrates how progressive policies do NOT work



It's no secret that California's once-beautiful "City by the Bay" is now overrun with drug addiction, mental illness, and homelessness problems that have only gotten worse after decades of progressive Democratic leadership.

Michael Shellenberger, author of "San Fransicko: Why Progressives Ruin Cities" and lifelong Democrat, has been working to save his home city from ruin by shedding light on California's ever-worsening nightmare which progressive Democratic elected officials have not only failed to address but have actively enabled.

He recently took to Twitter to post an absolutely shocking thread of videos that show how bad things have really gotten in San Francisco and should be required viewing material for all voters ahead of the 2022 midterm elections.

\u201cSan Francisco right now\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662731942

And, for a little reminder of how we got to this point:

\u201c\u201cIf we\u2019re being honest, they pay you to be homeless here\u201d\n\nThey also let you sell fentanyl to children \u2014->\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662731942
\u201chttps://t.co/HpHjg8IYBh\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662731942

Democrats say they are helping homeless people who suffer from mental illnesses and drug addictions with their progressive policies, but here's what the people they are supposedly "helping" have to say:

\u201c\u201cListen to the homeless\u201d\n\nYes, let\u2019s\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662731942

And here's what California's kids get to walk through on their way home from school:

\u201cHere\u2019s what schoolchildren see:\n\nhttps://t.co/YAp0u9Sitz\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662731942
\u201cHow do you get civilized people to dismantle their civilization? \n\nMostly by asking for an inch, and taking a mile. \n\nConsider a few examples of how it\u2019s been done.\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662731942

Preach, Shellenberger, preach!

\u201cPoint out the abuses in psychiatric hospitals. \n\nAsk that they be replaced with community-based clinics. \n\nThen, demand that they be shut down *before* you create the clinics. \n\nAfter you have some clinics, make them optional.\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662731942
\u201cDefend the \u201cright\u201d of people with schizophrenia to live out of grocery carts, sleep on the street, and become addicted to hard drugs. \n\nWhen anyone questions whether that\u2019s humane or safe, call them a fascist.\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662731942
\u201cPoint out the problems with police departments, jails, and prisons. \n\nAsk that they be replaced with social workers, cashless bail, and voluntary drug treatment. \n\nThen, demand that they be shut down *before* replacing them.\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662731942
\u201cDeny and downplay rising crime as long as possible before excusing it as necessary to social justice. \n\nWhen anyone questions whether such policies are fair or safe, call them a racist and fascist.\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662731942
\u201cPoint out the problems with homeless shelters. \n\nAsk that they be replaced with free, unconditional housing. \n\nThen, deprive the shelters of sufficient funding to operate safely and with sufficient beds.\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662731942
\u201cAfter you have some shelters and housing, make them optional.\n\nIf anyone suggests it\u2019s not safe to let the untreated mentally ill and drug addicts sleep outside, denounce them as a fascist and racist.\n\nRepeat these steps with every institution needed for civilization to function.\u201d
— Michael Shellenberger (@Michael Shellenberger) 1662732331