News and Headlines: In The News, Politics, World News, Commentary/Opinion.
In The News:
Ex-Officer Chauvin Guilty of All 3 Charges in Death of George Floyd
Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was found guilty of all charges in the death of George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man whose restraint and death while in police custody were caught on camera and quickly went viral, inspiring a summer of protests and riots across the nation.
The verdict on Chauvin, 45, was delivered just shy of one year after Floyd’s death on May 25, 2020, and comes amid another increase in racial tension nationally – but especially locally; members of a National Guard and Minneapolis police team were the apparent targets in a drive-by shooting Sunday morning that injured two Guard members.
Derek Chauvin found guilty of all three charges
Former police officer Derek Chauvin has been found guilty of all three charges against him over the death of George Floyd last year.
After deliberating for 10 hours, the jury found Mr Chauvin guilty of unintentional second-degree murder while committing a felony, as well as guilty of third-degree murder perpetrating an eminently dangerous act.
He was also found guilty of second-degree manslaughter – culpable negligence creating an unreasonable risk.
Mr Chauvin’s was bail revoked and he will be sentenced in eight weeks.
Nevada Death-Row Inmate Wants Firing-Squad Option
“This is not a delaying tactic,” Brad Levenson, a federal public defender representing Floyd, said Monday.
But a challenge of the state execution protocol requires the defense to provide an alternative method, and Levenson said gunshots to the brain stem would be “the most humane way.”
“Execution by firing squad … causes a faster and less painful death than lethal injection,” the attorneys said in a court filing Friday.
Nevada once allowed firing squads, but state law now requires the use of lethal injection in capital cases.
Anti-Semitic car ramming attack in Brooklyn injures five Jews
The driver of a minivan deliberately backed up twice over five Hasidic men as they stood on a street corner in the Williamsburg area of Brooklyn on Saturday evening after Shabbat before speeding away.
The attack was caught on camera and began circulating on social media. The attacker was arrested a day later after a neighborhood watch group found his van.
The surveillance footage clearly shows the parked minivan backing up, even though there are no parked cars in front of it, and hitting a group of Hasidic men standing on the street corner.
The car backs into the five men, who fall to the ground. The driver pauses and then backs over them a second time being fleeing the scene.
New website allows parents, teachers to upload what they consider evidence of radical curriculum
The Schoolhouse Shock site was launched Monday by Education First Alliance and allows users to anonymously upload videos, pictures, documents and other material.
“Racial discrimination and critical race theory matter, not just because they erode the fabric of this nation, or threaten our freedom, they matter because they fly in the face of the belief that every person, every child, is just as important as the next,” the group says.
Group President Sloan Rachmuth the members’ goal is to help parents and teachers “fight against” these types of curriculums by allowing people to see for themselves what is being taught at their children’s schools, according to The Washington Free Beacon.
Sheriff: Woman purposely drove into teens playing basketball
The news release said that Daina Renee Forrest, 35, of Greenville, had been driving around and threatening the three teens by waving a knife and cursing. The release said Forrest “intentionally veered her car off the roadway and partially into the yard to strike the children.”
One teen was taken to the hospital for treatment and Forrest’s car had damage to the front that was consistent with hitting a person, according to the release. Sgt. Lee Darnell, a sheriff’s spokesman, said the injuries appeared to be minor.
Deputies said when they searched her car, they found marijuana, crack cocaine and a knife.
Forrest was charged with three counts of assault with a deadly weapon and a count of felony cocaine possession. Jail records indicate she was being held Tuesday.
Idaho woman arrested after body of missing granddaughter, 8, found in trash bag: reports
Connie Ann Smith, 54, first reported Taryn Summers missing on April 12, telling deputies she had run away, according to court documents obtained by KTVB-TV.
On April 13, investigators carried out foot and drone searches of the area but found no sign of Taryn, the documents said. Idaho state forensic teams returned the next day and found a spot of blood on Taryn’s bedroom wall.
A subsequent search of the area led to the discovery of a girl’s body inside a black plastic trash bag in the backseat of a black Lexus parked in front of Smith’s home, Idaho News 6 reported.
The Lexus was reportedly registered to a family member and Smith was seen driving it the day Taryn went missing.
1 killed, 2 others shot at suburban New York grocery store; manhunt underway
Police believe a current or former employee named Gabriel DeWitt Wilson, 31, opened fire at a Stop & Shop grocery store in West Hempstead, in Nassau County on Long Island, shortly after 11:15 a.m. Tuesday, Nassau County Police Commissioner Patrick Ryder said.
When asked if Wilson was considered armed and dangerous, Ryder responded: “Absolutely.”
“We probably had a couple of hundred shoppers in the store at the time,” Ryder said. “You saw the line trying to get out, we stopped to question to make sure we have anybody that was a witness. Their information is being given to a homicide unit who is doing the investigation.”
Police named Wilson as a person of interest and decribed him as wearing a black baseball cap and a black sweatshirt. A motive for the attack was not yet disclosed.
YouTube rival seeing ‘tremendous’ growth, welcomes users on the ‘left or the right,’ Rumble CEO says
But in recent months, as Republican lawmakers take on Big Tech, amid claims of censorship of conservative viewpoints and ideas, Rumble is seeing “tremendous growth.”
Pavlovski said his focus is on “creating a fair ecosystem for all—small, large, left, right, doesn’t matter.”
“My goal is to keep it as fair as possible. We’re not interested in taking any position on any type of content, we just want to be a platform, and I believe that’s why we’ve seen so much growth,” Pavlovski said, adding that the company “hasn’t moved the goal posts on our policies—we’ve stuck to our core policies we started with in 2013.”
Facebook Preparing to Censor Posts Ahead of Chauvin Trial Verdict
Monika Bickert, Facebook’s vice president of content policy, stated in a blog post: “We know this trial has been painful for many people.
We want to strike the right balance between allowing people to speak about the trial and what the verdict means, while still doing our part to protect everyone’s safety.”
Facebook has repeatedly claimed to be a platform for free speech but has become increasingly quick to police and censor content that it claims could lead to real-world violence.
Facebook has been under fire from many for some time over its handling of sensitive news events.
DHS LEAK: Known Associate of Yemeni Men on Terrorism Watchlist Apprehended Near Border
Project Veritas released a new video today featuring leaked Department of Homeland Security [DHS] documents that showed how the U.S. government tracked a suspected Yemeni terrorist by the name of Al-Bokari.
Starting his route in Panama, the Yemini terror suspect was able to make his way to the Mexicali airport in Northwest Mexico before being detained by Mexican authorities on Monday, April 12.
Al-Bokari was soon after released back into the general public by the country’s government.
Eric Garcetti Replaces Police with Therapists in New ‘Justice Budget’ for L.A.
One new program was one that Garcetti dubbed “Therapeutic Unarmed Response for Neighborhoods,” or TURN:
Garcetti also proposed more spending on community mediators to deal with gang violence — again, rather than police:
Garcetti did not announce any new spending on the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), whose budget he slashed by $150 million last year — in the midst of Black Lives Matter riots — to redistribute the money to “communities of color.”
Los Angeles County — a separate governing entity — is cutting its gang and narcotics units by half under new, George Soros-backed Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón, who is pursuing a drastic agenda of criminal justice reform.
Tucker reads ‘angry’ parent’s letter to ‘woke’ private school
Tucker Carlson Tonight’ host asks how long we will pretend these schools are impressive.
The Media Lied Repeatedly About Officer Brian Sicknick’s Death. And They Just Got Caught.
It was crucial for liberal sectors of the media to invent and disseminate a harrowing lie about how Officer Brian Sicknick died.
That is because he is the only one they could claim was killed by pro-Trump protesters at the January 6 riot at the Capitol.
But the gruesome story of Sicknick’s “murder” was too valuable to allow any questioning.
It was weaponized over and over to depict the pro-Trump mob not as just violent but barbaric and murderous, because if Sicknick weren’t murdered by them, then nobody was (without Sicknick, the only ones killed were four pro-Trump supporters:
FOX NEWS VIDEO: FAA asks advisory panel to examine gender-neutral language for drones
Commentary/Opinion:
Fox Nation host Tammy Bruce responds on ‘Tucker Carlson Tonight’.
Politics:
Liberal think tank took $2M from Qatar while its future president pressed White House for Doha
Just the News obtained June 2017 emails between retired U.S. Marine Corps Gen. John Allen, who led a Brookings program at the time, and then-National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster.
They show Allen, the former commander of the NATO International Security Assistance Force, requesting that McMaster take specific actions beneficial to Qatar. The national security advisor later responds that he has taken some of those actions.
The issue of think tanks’ involvement in foreign lobbying or pressure campaigns surfaced in the Hunter Biden-Burisma scandal when documents unearthed by Just the News last year in an open-records lawsuit revealed that John Herbst, a former ambassador working for the Atlantic Council, had made contacts with State Department officials in fall 2016 concerning Burisma. At the time, State officials considered the Ukrainian company that had hired Hunter Biden to be corrupt, and officials there viewed Herbst’s efforts as part of a public relations campaign to burnish Burisma’s image with the U.S. government.
Shortly after Herbst’s intervention with officials in the U.S. embassy in Kiev, including senior official George Kent, Burisma made a large donation to the American think tank, the memos show.
Oklahoma Legislature Passes Bill Banning Abortions When Unborn Baby’s Heart Begins Beating
On Tuesday, the state Senate passed the heartbeat bill and two other pro-life measures, the Associated Press reports. The vote on the heartbeat bill was 37-10, and Stitt, a pro-life Republican, promised to sign the bills into law.
Sponsored by state Sen. Julie Daniels, R-Bartlesville, House Bill 2441 would require abortionists to check for the unborn baby’s heartbeat and prohibit the abortion if the heartbeat is detected.
Typically, that occurs about six weeks of pregnancy. Exceptions would be allowed if the mother’s life is at risk or a doctor certifies in writing that her pregnancy is “medically futile.”
Abortionists who violate the law could be charged with homicide.
Newt Gingrich: Policies of Rashida Tlaib and Maxine Waters ‘Endanger the Lives of Innocent Americans’
Waters has encouraged “the rule of the mob over the rule of law” while “urging people to mobilize against the court and the police at a time of great tension,” Gingrich asserted, a clear violation of her responsibility to uphold the rule of law and the Constitution.
Moreover, Waters’ promotion of “confrontational” coercion to force society to render the result the mob wants creates “an immediate threat to public safety,” Gingrich noted.
As bad and dangerous as Waters’ call for mob rule is, however, Tlaib’s call to abolish the police and close prisons may be worse still, Gingrich proposed.
If followed, her policies would produce “years of violence and predatory assault on the innocent” that would “utterly destroy the rule of law and eliminate public safety,” he said.
Burgess Owens Eviscerates Democrats’ ‘Jim Crow’ Narrative on Election Integrity
On Tuesday, Senate Democrats held a hearing to condemn election integrity efforts that they characterized as “Jim Crow 2021.”
Rep. Burgess Owens (R-Utah) testified at the hearing, and he ripped the Democrats’ argument to shreds. Owens grew up in the age of Jim Crow, so he knows the evils of segregation first-hand.
He contrasted the true racism of that era with the absurd complaints Democrats raise against the Georgia election integrity law. He also exposed the true racism at play in this debate: the bigotry of low expectations.
“As someone who has actually experienced Jim Crow laws, I would like to set the record straight on the myths regarding the recently-passed Georgia state law, and why any comparison between this law and Jim Crow is absolutely outrageous,” Owens declared.
Conservative Black leaders defend Georgia voting bill, hit ‘biased news media’ coverage
Media pundits such as MSNBC’s Joy Reid have followed President Biden’s lead and referred to the Georgia measure as a modern form of “Jim Crow.”
But the conservative leaders pushed back against critics of the law who have replaced “hysteria for judgment,” arguing the bill “will help rebuild voter confidence, and make sure every vote counts.”
“Instead, critics of the law have substituted passion for reason, hysteria for judgment,” the leaders write in their letter to Senate Judiciary Committee leaders Dick Durbin, D-Ill. and Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa.
“They have launched a despicable smear campaign against supporters of the law and economic reprisals against the state of Georgia – punishing the very people they claim to champion.
They have tarred with the brush of racism people whose only sin is a desire for confidence in our elections.”
Biden’s Defense Budget Death Spiral with Rep. Ken Calvert
Commentary/Opinion:
Biden’s Defense Budget Death Spiral with Rep. Ken Calvert.
Varney: China is laughing at us
FOX Business’ Stuart Varney discusses President Joe Biden’s stance on climate change and why “China is laughing at us.”
Gen. Keane on China’s Xi calling for fairer world order, Biden foreign policy
Fox News senior strategic analyst Gen. Jack Keane weighs on on Chinese President Xi Jinping calling for fairer world order and Russian President Putin trying to create ‘sphere of influence’ to regain control of former Soviet Union.
Rep. Mace: Half of infrastructure plan is Green New Deal in ‘sheep’s clothing’
Rep. Nancy Mace, R-SC, says Democrats and Republicans are working on an alternative infrastructure package on ‘Kudlow.’
FOX NEWS VIDEO: Tucker: Maxine Waters believes in mob violence for political ends
Commentary/Opinion:
‘Tucker Carlson Tonight’ host explains how the left relies on ‘intimidation’ to get what it wants.
You are not required to prove your innocence. That’s China. In the United States, the government has to prove your guilt. If they can’t prove your guilt, they have to let you go.
That’s the American system. There’s no other system that you would want to live under, but then you’re not Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif.
Waters has never believed in Western justice. For decades, she supported the totalitarian government of Cuba, which replaced jury trials with summary mass executions of entire groups of people.
That was fine with Maxine Waters. She’s never had a problem with killing political enemies. Waters is now among the most powerful Democrats in Congress.
World News:
Ukraine Says Russia Will Soon Have Over 120,000 Troops on Its Borders
Washington and NATO have been alarmed by the large build-up of Russian troops near Ukraine and in Crimea, the peninsula that Moscow annexed from Ukraine in 2014.
Western officials say the concentration of forces is now larger than during that annexation. The figure given by Kuleba is higher than Ukraine’s previous estimate of 80,000 Russian troops, of which 50,000 were new deployments.
“Russian troops continue to arrive in close proximity to our borders in the northeast, in the east, and in the south. In about a week, they are expected to reach a combined force of over 120,000 troops,” Kuleba told an online news conference.
Kuleba also called for Moscow to re-commit to a ceasefire in eastern Ukraine, where Russian-backed forces have fought Ukrainian troops in a conflict that Kyiv says has killed 14,000 people since 2014.
Israel Defense Establishment stands by U.S. vs Iran; EU concerned over Lebanon TV7 Israel News 20.04
1) Israel’s defense establishment has evidently come to terms with the United States’ intention to jointly return into compliance with 2015 nuclear agreement with Iran.
2) Western diplomats accuse EU Foreign Policy Chief Josep Borrell of “pro-Iranian bias.”
3) The most’ senior Christian Maronite cleric affirms that the problem facing Lebanon today is not a domestic issue – but rather – Iran’s use of Lebanese territory with the aim of confronting Israel.
6 Countries Where Elites Got Caught Using Coronavirus Crisis for Personal Gain
Not all that power has fallen into good hands, however, leading several presidents and senior government officials to have to explain the disappearances of gigantic emergency funds, the vaccination of seemingly healthy but well-connected people over the elderly and infirm, and other perks that materialized for politicians while average citizens were largely left to fend for themselves.
Below, six countries where senior officials were caught abusing their powers — stealing vaccines, making money for health worker protective gear vanish, or otherwise profiting from the pandemic.
Peru
Peruvian Foreign Minister Elizabeth Astete, in charge of coordinating with the international community to import vaccines against the Chinese coronavirus, and Deputy Health Minister Luis Suárez Ognio were forced to resign in February after admitting they personally received a dose of a vaccine candidate by the Chinese firm Sinopharm illegally, prior to Lima authorizing citizen vaccinations. They were, President Francisco Sagasti admitted then, part of a group of nearly 500 senior government officials and associates who illegally vaccinated themselves, cutting a line Peru’s health workers should have been at the front of.
Merkel defends German/Russian pipeline construction
Nord Stream 2 is owned by Russian state company Gazprom, with investment from several European companies, and Merkel noted that it had appropriate EU approvals.
It is being built under the Baltic, bypassing Poland and Ukraine and raising objections in both those countries. The United States has also vocally opposed the pipeline, saying it would make Europe too dependent on Russian gas.
Merkel said Germany has “great concerns” about Navalny’s treatment, and is part of European Union sanctions on Russia related to his case, as well as over Ukraine. But the idea of terminating the Nord Stream 2 project raises broader questions, she said.
Commentary/Opinion:
Jordan Peterson REVEALS What’s Really Going At Universities
Dr. Jordan Peterson joined Dennis Prager for a fascinating discussion at the 2019 PragerU Summit.
Activists Are Pushing Climate Hysteria
We need a more balanced conversation on climate change, not alarmism.
The Nuclear Option
“Climate change is the existential threat!” warns Bernie Sanders and others.
But if he really believed that, he should support nuclear — the only technology that has a track record of rapidly replacing fossil fuels.
50 years ago, the fastest decarbonization ever happened when France successfully switched to nuclear power.
But environmentalists in the U.S. rarely support nuclear. Some even protest against it.
Nuclear is better than the alternatives.