The CDC argued that evictions could promote COVID-19 transmission by forcing people to move into "Congregate or shared living setting(s)." It said its moratorium therefore was authorized by a 1944 law that allows regulations deemed "Necessary" to prevent the interstate spread of "Communicable diseases."
"It is hard to see what measures this interpretation would place outside the CDC's reach, and the Government has identified no limit," it noted, "Beyond the requirement that the CDC deem a measure 'necessary.'".
The justices said it "Strains credulity" to assert that Congress gave the CDC that "Breathtaking amount of authority." They said the statute's list of specific disease control measures "Informs the grant of authority by illustrating the kinds of measures that could be necessary: inspection, fumigation, disinfection, sanitation, pest extermination, and destruction of contaminated animals and articles."
"CDC's claimed authority" would "Counsel against the Government's interpretation," since "We expect Congress to speak clearly" when it means to authorize powers of "Vast 'economic and political significance.'" Notably, no one seems to have noticed the sweeping powers that the CDC claimed to discover last fall until 76 years after the law was enacted.
The Department of Education cited a different, more recent law on Monday, when it announced investigations of five states that have defied the CDC's advice by forbidding mask mandates in public schools.
Since the CDC has decided that mask mandates are appropriate, he seems to think every public school in the United States is obligated to impose them.
The Biden administration seems determined to anoint the CDC's director as the nation's COVID-19 dictator, no matter what the law says.
It's becoming increasingly difficult to discern fact from fiction, and unfortunately the media has a strong bias. They spin stories to make conservatives look bad and will go to great lengths to avoid reporting on the good that comes from conservative policies. There are a few shining lights in the media landscape-brave conservative outlets that report the truth and offer a different perspective. We must support conservative outlets like this one and ensure that our voices are heard.
Wednesday, September 1, 2021
Biden Keeps Pushing Dubious Arguments for CDC Supremacy
FBI Investigating Ducey Tax Refund Campaign
The FBI's Public Corruption unit has begun investigating efforts by Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey's past and current staffers - including one who is now a federal judge - to push for a closed-door deal to issue tax refunds worth as much as $100 million to aid one of Ducey's campaign supporters.
Grant Nulle, former deputy director at the Department of Revenue, said an FBI agent contacted him in mid-July, shortly after an Arizona Republic investigation uncovered how the Ducey administration had pushed the department to agree to refund sales taxes on fuel for mining companies, even though that tax had been in place for decades.
The top three deputies in Ducey's administration left their government jobs and went to work for Ryan to push for the tax refund.
Ducey said he was not aware of any FBI investigation.
That investigation appeared to go dormant until February when The Arizona Republic inquired about the refund campaign and the involvement of former and current Ducey staffers.
That's because the tax break would have resulted in about a $10 million refund for international mining firm Freeport McMoRan, where her father, Harry "Red" Conger, was president and chief operating officer, and also was a major campaign contributor to Ducey.
Ducey's administration fired both Woodruff and Nulle shortly after Christmas 2020, following the Revenue Department taking a position contrary to Ducey on a ballot measure.
Biden pressured Ghani to create 'perception' Taliban wasn't winning
President Biden pressured Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani to create the "Perception" that the Taliban weren't winning, "Whether it's true or not," in a phone call just three weeks before the insurgents seized control of the country, a bombshell leaked transcript shows.
Biden and Ghani spoke for roughly 14 minutes on July 23 in what would be their final call before the Taliban overran the government and Afghanistan descended into bloody chaos amid the botched US withdrawal, according to a transcript and audio obtained by Reuters.
"I need not tell you the perception around the world and in parts of Afghanistan, I believe, is that things are not going well in terms of the fight against the Taliban," Biden said.
Biden told Ghani that Afghanistan's prominent political figures - including former Afghan President Hamid Karzai - should give a joint press conference that backed a new military strategy on how to defeat the Taliban, saying: "That will change perception, and that will change an awful lot, I think."
"I'm not a military guy, so I'm not telling you what that plan should precisely look like, you're going to get not only more help, but you're going to get a perception that is going to change in terms of how , um our allies and folks here in the States and other places think you're doing," Biden said.
Biden also heaped praise on Afghan security forces - which were trained and funded by the US before dissolving in a matter of weeks amid the US withdrawal - and offered aid if Ghani could publicly put out a plan that showed he could control the spiraling situation.
In a readout of Biden and Ghani's call, the White House only said at the time that the two leaders "Discussed the situation in Afghanistan and reaffirmed their commitment to an enduring bilateral partnership."
https://nypost.com/2021/09/01/biden-pressured-ghani-to-create-perception-taliban-wasnt-winning/
Fact-Checked: Gavin Newsom Shouldn't Have Dared Us
In an interview performance that has been described as "Unhinged," "Odd," "Testy," and "Angry," Gov. Gavin Newsom claimed Texas middle-class families "Pay more taxes than middle-class families in California."
Fuel taxes, hardest on lower- and middle-income Americans, are punitive in California, where the combined state taxes on gasoline are 67 cents per gallon.
The Tax Foundation figures the combined state and average local sales taxes in California are 8.68%, ninth highest in the nation.
Thanks to California's Proposition 13, the state ranks no worse than 20th. The effective rate is about 1%, when other fees and taxes are figured in.
The median-price home in California was $811,170 in July, according to the California Realtors Association, while the Texas Quarterly Housing Report reports the median-price home there is $300,490.
The average fee in California, says the Institute for Justice, is $486, a little less than half of what is required in Texas, $253. The Lone Star state also licenses fewer occupations than does California, though the gap could be far greater since the Golden State, whose "Tangle" of licensing laws is virtually impenetrable, admits it "Has no way of knowing how many occupations it licenses."
One day later, Robert Gutierrez, president and CEO of the California Taxpayers Association, and Allan Zaremberg, retiring California Chamber of Commerce president and CEO, pointed out that proposed tax hikes are neither new nor rare in California.
https://issuesinsights.com/2021/09/01/fact-checked-gavin-newsom-shouldnt-have-dared-us/
U.S. Govt's Crisis Response Director Resigned After Biden's State Dept Canceled 'Lifeline' Group Over Trump Links.
"In July, at Antony Blinken's State Department, bureaucratic decisions affecting the Afghan withdrawal, one insider said, were 'slightly more organized than a Choose Your Own Adventure novel'," the article begins, before detailing how newly minted Crisis and Contingency Response bureau director Dr. William Walters had resigned on July 9th of this year.
As the Taliban took Kabul, The National Pulse reported that a bureau green-lit by former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the Trump administration had been canceled by Biden's pick for the role, Anthony Blinken.
A week later, on August 19, State's Ned Price would tell reporters, in a sort of semantic jujitsu, that CCR was never actually created, which begs the question: Why have Price's colleagues at State been preparing to notify Congress of a decision to "Abolish" something that never existed?
The academic debate over CCR's existence obscures a far more elemental issue, which, at this date, remains unresolved: Why did Antony Blinken and his lieutenants rejigger and possibly degrade State's in-house crisis planning and response capabilities on the eve of ending the longest war in American history?
In May, while setting up to destroy the Trump-era plans for a formal response unit inside the State Department, Blinken told Vanity Fair the unit was a "Lifeline for the Department of State and the American people. Though perhaps lesser known outside of the Department, it's vital to our operations. That's because OpMed provides the platform and personnel to save American lives around the world, especially in times of crisis."
One source told Vanity Fair's Adam Ciralsky that the State Department was plagued by "Pathologic optimism." Other State Department sources said the problem was hubris.
So while the Taliban captured city upon city, and Team Biden began plans for the evacuation of U.S. troops, civilians, diplomats, and those eligible for Special Immigrant Visas, his State Department was hindering a potential response.
U.S. Intel Hits Biden Again, Leak Transcript and Recording of Call With President Ghani – Biden: “there is a need, whether it is true or not, there is a need to project a different picture”
After Joe Biden delivered his speech to the nation claiming no-one saw the collapse of the Afghan government coming, the intel group leak the transcript and recording of a July 23rd phone call between Biden and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani showing everything Biden said today was a lie.
Reuters reviewed a transcript of the presidential phone call and has listened to the audio to authenticate the conversation.
In much of the call, Biden focused on what he called the Afghan government's "Perception" problem.
"I need not tell you the perception around the world and in parts of Afghanistan, I believe, is that things are not going well in terms of the fight against the Taliban," Biden said.
"And there is a need, whether it is true or not, there is a need to project a different picture."
In a follow-up call later that day that did not include the U.S. president, Biden's National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, General Mark Milley and U.S. Central Command commander General Frank McKenzie spoke to Ghani.
Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Ghani "The perception in the United States, in Europe and the media sort of thing is a narrative of Taliban momentum, and a narrative of Taliban victory. And we need to collectively demonstrate and try to turn that perception, that narrative around."
Investigate Pelosi and Her January 6 Committee
CNN reported Monday that the January 6 Committee will ask companies like Verizon and AT&T to preserve the phone records of members of Congress who participated in the "Stop the Steal" rally.
The House Select Committee investigating the deadly January 6 riot has requested that a group of telecommunications companies preserve the phone records of a group of GOP members of Congress and former President Donald Trump, as well as members of the Trump family, who played some role in the "Stop the Steal" rally that served as the prelude to the Capitol insurrection.
If the members of the January 6 Committee are going to play this dangerous and despicable game, then they themselves should be subjected to the same treatment.
Demands for the same material sought by Speaker Pelosi and the committee members should be made of Pelosi and the committee members themselves.
There must be a request that "a group of telecommunications companies preserve the phone records" of Pelosi, her staff, the entire January 6 Committee and its staff, the entire Democratic leadership of the House and staff plus the heads of relevant committees - like, say, Rep. Adam Schiff, the chair of the House Intelligence Committee.
There must be a "Larger preservation request to 35 social media and telecommunication companies including Verizon Wireless, AT&T, T-Mobile, US Cellular and Sprint" that targets, again, Pelosi, her staff, the entire membership of the January 6 Committee and staff, the entire Democratic leadership of the House plus the heads of relevant committees and staff.
If, as now seems likely, Republicans win the House back in 2022, these investigative demands should be immediately made for, again, Pelosi, her staff, the entire January 6 Committee and its staff, the entire Democratic leadership of the House and staff plus the heads of relevant committees.
https://spectator.org/investigate-pelosi-and-her-january-6-committee/