On this day:
1598
English playwright Ben Jonson kills an actor in a duel and is indicted for manslaughter.
1692
Last people hanged for witchcraft in Britain’s North American colonies.
1776
Nathan Hale is hanged for spying during American Revolution.
1784
Russia establishes a colony at Kodiak, Alaska.
1792
Primidi Vendémiaire of year 1 of the French Republican Calendar as the French First Republic comes into being.
1823
Joseph Smith, Jr. states he found the Golden plates on this date after being directed by God through the Angel Moroni to the place where they were buried.
1941
World War II: On Jewish New Year Day, the German SS murder 6,000 Jews in Vinnytsya, Ukraine. Those are the survivors of the previous killings that took place a few days earlier in which about 24,000 Jews were executed.
1975
Sara Jane Moore tries to assassinate U.S. President Gerald Ford, but is foiled by Oliver Sipple.
2011
CERN scientists announce their discovery of neutrinos breaking the speed of light
English playwright Ben Jonson kills an actor in a duel and is indicted for manslaughter.
1692
Last people hanged for witchcraft in Britain’s North American colonies.
1776
Nathan Hale is hanged for spying during American Revolution.
1784
Russia establishes a colony at Kodiak, Alaska.
1792
Primidi Vendémiaire of year 1 of the French Republican Calendar as the French First Republic comes into being.
1823
Joseph Smith, Jr. states he found the Golden plates on this date after being directed by God through the Angel Moroni to the place where they were buried.
1941
World War II: On Jewish New Year Day, the German SS murder 6,000 Jews in Vinnytsya, Ukraine. Those are the survivors of the previous killings that took place a few days earlier in which about 24,000 Jews were executed.
1975
Sara Jane Moore tries to assassinate U.S. President Gerald Ford, but is foiled by Oliver Sipple.
2011
CERN scientists announce their discovery of neutrinos breaking the speed of light
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"Greg [Abel, the CEO] runs the company; Howard will guard its culture and values — both worth more than anything on our balance sheet. Think of Howard as a policy the shareholders own and hope never to claim against." This was Warren Buffett explaining his appointment of his son, Howard, to Berkshire. But The FT disagreed, calling the decision nepotism "But culture and values do not exist separately from the balance sheet. It is in making balance-sheet decisions where culture and values are tested and realised. That is why experience, not just decency, is required of a chair."
FT doesn't like Buffett's decision-making.
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Start with the hardest number in Washington. Medicare costs about $1 trillion in fiscal 2026. Eliminate it entirely — as politically unthinkable as that is — and you close only about half of the current deficit. Social Security, at $1.7 trillion and rising every year, is even further off the table. Wipe out every domestic federal agency most people call “waste” — the EPA, the Department of Education, the State Department, foreign aid, all of it — and you’ve touched only 13–14 percent of the federal budget. There is no spending-cut path that closes this gap. The math forces the conversation onto revenue.--The Hill, arguing for VAT, acting as if politicians will do the right thing
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When children are the 'tip of the spear':
Nikole Hannah-Jones sent her daughter to an inferior school on purpose to do her part to right what she saw as an educational wrong, just as she sacrificed the truth in her advancement of the nonsense 1619 "Project" to right a wrong. So the innocent,--culture, history, and her daughter--suffered for a greater cause. Ms. Hannah-Jones, however, lives in a $1.5 million NY townhouse and did pretty well.
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Despite my criticism: Cruz has become the third Pirates player to have three straight 20-20 seasons, along with outfielders Barry Bonds (1990-92) and Andrew McCutchen (2011-13). He's been fantastic since coming back from his broken hand, hitting .318/.407/.533 for an OPS of .940 in 29 games, with 34 hits in 107 at-bats, three doubles, a triple, six home runs, 23 RBI and seven stolen bases on 10 attempts.
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Vladimir Putin is preparing to escalate his war against Ukraine and intensify hybrid attacks on Kyiv’s allies in Europe.--Telegraph
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Vladimir Putin is preparing to escalate his war against Ukraine and intensify hybrid attacks on Kyiv’s allies in Europe.--Telegraph
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The Alien Terrorist Removal Court
Sometimes principles are sacrificed on the altar of expediency.
The Alien Terrorist Removal Court was created by Congress in 1996 following the Tim McVeigh bombing in Oklahoma City. A judge reviews the government’s classified evidence alone, in chambers, and neither the accused nor the public may learn what it is or where it came from beyond an unclassified summary. The government may use the results of FISA wiretaps and warrantless physical searches, and the accused is specifically denied the right to suppress evidence. That is, the Federal Rules of Evidence don’t apply. The court allows the government to use classified information, where disclosing that information to the public would pose risks to national security. So there is no due process.
The Alien Terrorist Removal Court was created by Congress in 1996 following the Tim McVeigh bombing in Oklahoma City. A judge reviews the government’s classified evidence alone, in chambers, and neither the accused nor the public may learn what it is or where it came from beyond an unclassified summary. The government may use the results of FISA wiretaps and warrantless physical searches, and the accused is specifically denied the right to suppress evidence. That is, the Federal Rules of Evidence don’t apply. The court allows the government to use classified information, where disclosing that information to the public would pose risks to national security. So there is no due process.
The statutory provisions that establish the court provide paid counsel to the aliens if necessary and also permit either party to appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
In the first-ever case before the United States Alien Terrorist Removal Court (ATRC), Nazira Haji Zada, 47, an Afghan national previously residing in Fort Worth, Texas, was removed from the United States after conceding that she is an alien terrorist. Zada was arrested and appeared before the ATRC’s Chief Judge, Joan N. Ericksen, in Washington, D.C., on Thursday, July 30, at 11:00 a.m.
As the matriarch in her family, she supported a plot to commit an ISIS-inspired mass shooting on Election Day in 2024 for which her son, Abdullah Haji Zada, and son-in-law, Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, were previously arrested and convicted. The ATRC issued an order of removal on Aug. 20 that was unsealed following her return to her country of origin.
This was the first case ever brought before the ATRC, which Congress established decades ago, and which no previous administration had used. Zada is now permanently inadmissible to the United States.
According to court documents, Tawhedi admitted that between June 2024 and October 2024, he conspired with at least one other individual to purchase two AK-47 rifles, 500 rounds of ammunition, and 10 magazines, with the intent to carry out a mass-casualty attack on or around Election Day, Nov. 5, 2024, on behalf of ISIS.
According to the criminal complaint, to raise funds for their attack, in 2024, the family started selling off their property, including furniture, computers, a mobile phone, and the family’s two vehicles. Zada signed a contract to sell the family house. The family also purchased one-way airfare for travel to Kabul, Afghanistan shortly before Election Day 2024 for its members, including for Zada and other minor children but not Abdullah and Tawhedi.
In compliance with the ATRC statute, the government used classified information to establish that Zada is an alien terrorist. Additionally, the government provided Zada and her lawyers, two federal public defenders, with approximately half a terabyte of documents supporting the government’s case. With her lawyers, Zada conceded that she is an alien terrorist and waived her appeal of the removal order, terminating her previous status.
Rumblings on the Left suggest this law runs counter to American tradition and values, and this particular case has fascist qualities. Trump is held responsible--though he is five decades from the writing of it. The usual clichés trot out: ICE, misogynist white supremacists, "Whiskey Pete Hegseth" makes an appearance, Trump's tech bro billionaires--in general, a bigoted, power-obsessed, autonomous and reactionary power structure with a lot of free time.
In the first-ever case before the United States Alien Terrorist Removal Court (ATRC), Nazira Haji Zada, 47, an Afghan national previously residing in Fort Worth, Texas, was removed from the United States after conceding that she is an alien terrorist. Zada was arrested and appeared before the ATRC’s Chief Judge, Joan N. Ericksen, in Washington, D.C., on Thursday, July 30, at 11:00 a.m.
As the matriarch in her family, she supported a plot to commit an ISIS-inspired mass shooting on Election Day in 2024 for which her son, Abdullah Haji Zada, and son-in-law, Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, were previously arrested and convicted. The ATRC issued an order of removal on Aug. 20 that was unsealed following her return to her country of origin.
This was the first case ever brought before the ATRC, which Congress established decades ago, and which no previous administration had used. Zada is now permanently inadmissible to the United States.
According to court documents, Tawhedi admitted that between June 2024 and October 2024, he conspired with at least one other individual to purchase two AK-47 rifles, 500 rounds of ammunition, and 10 magazines, with the intent to carry out a mass-casualty attack on or around Election Day, Nov. 5, 2024, on behalf of ISIS.
According to the criminal complaint, to raise funds for their attack, in 2024, the family started selling off their property, including furniture, computers, a mobile phone, and the family’s two vehicles. Zada signed a contract to sell the family house. The family also purchased one-way airfare for travel to Kabul, Afghanistan shortly before Election Day 2024 for its members, including for Zada and other minor children but not Abdullah and Tawhedi.
In compliance with the ATRC statute, the government used classified information to establish that Zada is an alien terrorist. Additionally, the government provided Zada and her lawyers, two federal public defenders, with approximately half a terabyte of documents supporting the government’s case. With her lawyers, Zada conceded that she is an alien terrorist and waived her appeal of the removal order, terminating her previous status.
Rumblings on the Left suggest this law runs counter to American tradition and values, and this particular case has fascist qualities. Trump is held responsible--though he is five decades from the writing of it. The usual clichés trot out: ICE, misogynist white supremacists, "Whiskey Pete Hegseth" makes an appearance, Trump's tech bro billionaires--in general, a bigoted, power-obsessed, autonomous and reactionary power structure with a lot of free time.
Indeed, it has the feel of a military court in wartime, a legal system of a country under attack, stressed and afraid, turning to a junta for advice. And does the impractical distort the ideal? Once 20 million illegal immigrants, with their unknown proportion of national enemies, are here, what mechanism can deal with the risks? What principles will have to be sacrificed?
Does the citizenry not have some protection through due process themselves? Can't they at least try to protect themselves, interview immigrants, screen them before welcoming them into the country and the paid benefits the country will be responsible for? If an immigrant has entered the country with the admitted purpose of destroying it, does the intended victim have no recourse? "Now that you're here, you get to play by our rules?" Once the immigrant has evaded detection and is ensconced in the victim's home, is he now afforded the same protection as his legal target, shielded by the very concepts he hopes to overthrow? Does he become that strangely American protected species, the squatter?
Horribly, these questions get to be managed by the land's most ambiguous subset who worship the naturalistic fallacy that is the law: politicians and their familiars, lawyers. Seeing a room of ugliness, they would outlaw beauty.
But 20 million illegal immigrants can't be wrong.
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