A nail in DEI's coffin: American Airlines suspends diversity, equity, and inclusion hiring policies
DECEMBER 23, 2024
Classic Christmas Hits, Cozy Room Fireplace
41 minutes ago
Monday, December 23, 2024
The Democrat Party is an evil cult
Kamala Harris Campaign Advisor Lindy Li Quits Democrat Party: ‘It’s Like Leaving a Cult’ (Video)
Politicians blame others for their greed...gas prices, who profits most!
Debunking The Myth Of Oil Refiner Price-Gouging In California
Authored by Robert Rapier via OilPrice.com,
California's high gasoline prices are primarily driven by state taxes and fees, not excessive profits by oil refiners.
Data from the California Energy Commission reveals that oil refiners often operate on razor-thin or even negative profit margins.
Policymakers should focus on reforming California's tax and regulatory structure to address high gas prices instead of targeting oil companies.
In 2022, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed SB-1322, the Oil Refiner Price Disclosure Act, into law. The legislation was hailed as a major step toward transparency, requiring refiners in California to report detailed monthly data on their gasoline profit margins. Specifically, refiners must disclose:
The cost of crude oil purchased
The wholesale price of gasoline sold
The gross and net profits earned per gallon of refined gasoline
Supporters, including consumer advocacy groups like Consumer Watchdog, argued that SB-1322 would expose “excessive profits” earned by refiners and hold them accountable amid California’s notoriously high gasoline prices. In fact, as captured in this recent TikTok video from Matt Randolph, Gavin Newsom continues to claim that oil companies are fleecing California consumers.
However, a little over two years after signing the bill into law, the data tells a different story.
Far from uncovering windfall profits, the disclosures reveal razor-thin — and often negative — margins for refiners in the state.
Gross vs. Net: The Misleading Narrative
Earlier this year, several public interest groups pointed to California Energy Commission (CEC) data showing that refiners earned gross margins (which these groups mischaracterized as “gross profits”) exceeding $1 per gallon in 2023. They urged the CEC to impose a price-gouging penalty ahead of the summer driving season.
But this interpretation missed a critical point: gross margins do not equal net profits. The CEC defines Gross Gasoline Refining Margin as the wholesale gasoline price minus the cost of crude oil. To derive the Net Gasoline Refining Margin, refiners must subtract operational costs, which averaged just over $1 per gallon during the reporting period.
Since California began reporting net margins in June 2023, the data paints a very different picture than that promoted by supporters of anti-gouging measures. Over the past 11 months that have been reported, refiners posted a positive net margin in only six months. The average net profit margin from June 2023 to April 2024 was just $0.09 per gallon — hardly the excessive profits that critics claim.
Follow the Money: Where Do Gasoline Dollars Go?
If refiners are not the primary cause of California’s sky-high gasoline prices, where does the money go? According to CBS 8 San Diego, Californians pay roughly $1.40 per gallon in taxes and fees — the highest in the nation. Here’s the breakdown:
State Excise Tax: 57.9 cents per gallon (as of July 2024)
Federal Excise Tax: 18.4 cents per gallon
Cap-and-Trade Program: 23 cents per gallon
Low-Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS): 18 cents per gallon
Underground Storage Tank Fee: 2 cents per gallon
Sales Tax: ~3.7% of the retail price
These taxes and regulatory fees combined with California’s stringent fuel standards — which mandate unique summer and winter gasoline blends — drive up prices far more than the refiners’ net margins.
Conclusion: The Real Culprits Behind California’s High Gas Prices
SB-1322 may have been designed to shine a light on oil refiners, but its findings reveal a fundamental truth: California itself profits more from gasoline sales than the refiners do. When operational costs are factored in, the profits earned by refiners are minimal.
If policymakers and consumer groups are serious about tackling high gasoline prices in the state, they would be better served scrutinizing California’s tax and regulatory structure instead of targeting the refiners.
Honduran Came as Unaccompanied Minor, Ordered Deported in 2010, Now Arrested for Texas Murder
Honduran Came as Unaccompanied Minor, Ordered Deported in 2010, Now Arrested for Texas Murder
HOUSTON, Texas — A Honduran migrant who entered the U.S. as an unaccompanied minor now faces a murder charge in Harris County, Texas. The man was ordered removed from the U.S. by an immigration judge in 2010 after failing to show up for scheduled hearings, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials.
The Gulf Coast Violent Offenders Task Force arrested 33-year-old Alex Mejia-Pineda in Huntsville, Texas, last week on a charge that he participated in the murder of Erik Eduardo Zavala-Flores, 28, according to Fox 26 Houston.
Prosecutors say Mejia-Pineda and co-defendant Alex Herrera Calderon, a 24-year-old U.S. citizen, shot Zavala-Flores in the parking lot of a bar in northeast Houston. Police found the victim’s body in a burned truck in San Jacinto County.
A spokesman for ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) in Houston told Breitbart Texas that Mejia-Pineda entered the U.S. illegally as an unaccompanied minor. In 2010, an immigration judge under the Obama-Biden administration ordered the then 19-year-old Honduran man deported. Mejia-Pineda had no further contact with law enforcement until his arrest last week.
ERO officers joined with the Gulf Coast Violent Offenders Task Force and the Walker County Sheriff’s Office to take the Honduran fugitive into custody on December 16.
Mejia-Pineda and Calderon are charged with the murder of Zavala-Flores. Mejia-Pineda is being held on a bond of $500,000. ERO officers placed an immigration detainer on the suspect to ensure he could not released on bond. Court records obtained by Breitbart Texas indicate his next court appearance is scheduled for February 13, 2025, in the 262nd Criminal District Court, Judge Lori Gray presiding.
Court records show that Co-defendant Calderon’s bond is set at $100,000. His next court date is January 16, 2025, in the same court.
Bob Price is the Breitbart Texas-Border team’s associate editor and senior news contributor. He is an original member of the Breitbart Texas team. Price is a regular panelist on Fox 26 Houston’s What’s Your Point? Sunday morning talk show. He also serves as president of Blue Wonder Gun Care Products.
Horrific! What will Alvin Bragg do now?
December 22, 2024
No Daniel Pennys: Migrant sets woman on fire in New York subway as cops bumble and Gov. Hochul touts making subway 'safer'
In a grotesque confluence of all the horrid doings in wokester New York City, a Guatemalan migrant brazenly set a woman on fire in broad daylight in the New York subway just to watch her burn, and no Daniel Pennys came forward to stop the barbaric crime.
According to the New York Post:
A Guatemalan migrant has been arrested for allegedly lighting a sleeping subway rider on fire in Brooklyn on Sunday morning — then watching as his innocent victim burned to death in what the police commissioner called “one of the most depraved crimes one person could possibly commit.”
The savage killing — which happened at about 7:30 a.m. on an idling F train at the Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue station — shocked commuters, MTA workers and NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch, who said Sunday that the heinous crime “took the life of an innocent New Yorker.”“As the train pulled into the station, the suspect calmly walked up to the victim, who was in a seated position at the end of a subway car … and used what we believe to be a lighter to ignite the victim’s clothing, which became fully engulfed in a matter of seconds,” Tisch said at a press conference.
Patrolling cops smelled and saw the smoke, then followed it to the flame-covered woman, the commissioner said.
They extinguished the blaze, but the victim died at the scene.
Horrifying video obtained by The Post showed the suspect calmly looking on as flames consumed the still-unidentified woman, who stood inside the open subway car door.
It's hard to believe anyone could do this to another human being, setting her on fire, just because.
But the individual who is accused of doing it, is reportedly an illegal border surger from Guatemala, probably let into the country under Joe Biden's catch and release, as a gotaway, or through some kind of skeevy migrant parole program as an "asylum seeker." He may have had his case dismissed as so many millions have.
All we know is that officials will try to hide the facts.
The act is so heinous, it suggest he may well have come not merely from Guatemala, but from a depraved cartel subculture in Guatemala where burning people alive or dissolving them into acid stews, or chopping them up and hanging them from bridges is perfectly commonplace.
There is no psychopathic cruelty like cartel cruelty, and here this monster was, walking around in New York with no concerns about being deported -- no matter what he did.
He lit her on fire because he knew he could light her on fire, and no Daniel Penny would appear to save her.
A message was sent with the prosecution of Penny that anyone trying to save people on a subway from psychopaths with fiery murder on their minds would go through the prosecution he did, acquitted or not. That horse has left the barn.
What's more, as the cops slouched by, no one stepped in to try to put out the fire or rescue the victim. One cop bumblingly told the accused murderer, sitting on the subway station bench in order to gloatingly watch the crime, to move along, rather than collar him. He should have known better but didn't, so the alleged perp got away, until a couple of alert high schoolers called in that they saw him on another train. That was much less risk than stopping him, and with all the massive media coverage, the cops got serious about apprehending him, so he was finally picked up. He easily could have gotten away otherwise.
But at the same time this horrific drama was taking place, New York's Gov. Kathy Hochul was out crowing and gaslighting about how much safer she made the subways of New York:
It was a stark reminder that the subways are worse than ever, with unvetted illegals still roaming the city and the population now cowed from stepping in and stopping monsters.
New Yorkers voted for this, but not all of them. Incidents like this should galvanize the impetus for change to come -- or there will be more of it.
Image: Screen shot from X video
We've been warned!
Wild video shows drones dive-bomb Florida Christmas show crowd — multiple injuries reported, including little boy whose moms say is clinging to life
NGO's have become a serious problem and an investigation of them all should be undertaken
NGOs Driving Antisemitism in Europe and around the Globe: Part I
Samidoun ("Steadfast"), a "Vancouver-based terrorist group," was founded in 2012 -- ostensibly to "assist Palestinian prisoners" -- by members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a designated terrorist organization in the United States, European Union and Canada. In practice, Samidoun is a front for the PFLP.
Who funds this terrorist-supporting madness? Samidoun, which does not publish any donor information, has a financial sponsor in the US, the Alliance for Global Justice, a registered 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization that reportedly works to bring about a communist revolution through building coalitions of organizations, many involved in pro-Hamas activity, and, according to its own website: "We also act as fiscal sponsor to over 90 economic, social justice and human rights projects around the world that do not have their own tax-exempt status."
Who funds the Alliance for Global Justice? According to Influence Watch, several of the same megadonors that fund the Democratic Party in the US, such as George Soros' Open Society Foundations, and the Tides Foundation.
The Tides Foundation, which was once described as a "charitable money laundering" organization, and was previously supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, also sponsors anti-Israeli groups such as Jewish Voice for Peace and IfNotNow, both of which are active in the ongoing protests. The Alliance for Global Justice also receives funds from the Arca Foundation, Surdna Foundation, Public Welfare Foundation, and the Brightwater Fund.
The support for groups such as Samidoun by the Alliance for Global Justice led to demands to revoke its tax-exempt status.... It is now six months later, and the IRS has done nothing.
Antisemitism in the West, which has risen to unprecedented levels since the October 7 attacks on Israel, is being deliberately driven by non-governmental organizations (NGOs) with links to Palestinian terrorist organizations.
One of the most active NGOs, Samidoun ("Steadfast"), a "Vancouver-based terrorist group," was founded in 2012 -- ostensibly to "assist Palestinian prisoners" -- by members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a designated terrorist organization in the United States, European Union and Canada. In practice, Samidoun is a front for the PFLP. The PFLP is an active terrorist organization, which participated in the October 7, 2023 atrocities, including in hostage taking, and shared celebratory videos and other material of the massacres online.
Israel designated Samidoun a terrorist organization in 2021, and this October, the U.S. Treasury Department and government of Canada also designated Samidoun, calling it "a sham charity that serves as an international fundraiser for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine".
Samidoun has branches throughout the West: In Belgium, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK and in the United States. Samidoun also has branches in Lebanon, Iran and the West Bank and Gaza.
According to NGO Monitor:
"Samidoun branches, including in Western countries, publicly supportand celebrate the PFLP, its actions and its leaders; campaign for the release of jailed PFLP members; and promote anti-Israel campaigns. Moreover, Samidoun advocates for Palestinians' 'natural right to armed resistance.'"
On October 7, as the Hamas invasion and atrocities were unfolding in southern Israel, Samidoun released a long statement celebrating the attack:
"As the morning dawns on 7 October 2023, the resistance is rising throughout occupied Palestine, smashing the siege on Gaza with a comprehensive offensive confronting the occupier by land and air, taking control of Palestinian land, seizing occupation settlers and soldiers and launching thousands of missiles as Palestinian resistance forces fight to advance return and the liberation of Palestine... From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free."
The first pro-Hamas demonstrations to take to the streets on and after October 7 were not protesting Israel's response to the October 7 atrocities: there were none yet. The demonstrators were celebrating what the terrorists and their European supporters hoped was the beginning of a "Palestine" ethnically cleansed of Jews. Samidoun Netherlands posted to Facebook on October 7, 2023:
""URGENT! ... Come to Rotterdam and show support for the Palestinian resistance during their operation against the Israeli colonial regime. The resistance has successfully broken through the colonial siege in a bold and heroic operation."
Samidoun Spain, on October 7, 2023, shared a poster that said:
"We call for mass assistance in support of the brave and dignified Palestinian resistance that has today proven to be more alive and willing to reclaim the land that has been stripped from them by Israeli colonialism for over 75 years... Our responsibility is to support the right of the Palestinian people to defend themselves by all means within their reach from extermination to liberation and return to a free Palestine from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. SEE YOU IN THE STREETS!"
Despite the undisguised support for terrorism and ethnic cleansing that Samidoun displayed on October 7, 2023 and since, it was allowed to continue its activities, as it does to this day.
In Amsterdam, Samidoun was involved in the encampment at the University of Amsterdam, where in May 2024, the police stood passively by, as Hamas sympathizers beat Jews and other pro-Israel bystanders with bats.
On November 8, 2024, Samidoun hailed the pogrom in Amsterdam and threatened:
"The people of Amsterdam declared last night that Zionism will not be tolerated here. Amsterdam is a Zionism-free city. And if it isn't already, we'll take care of that."
One month earlier, the Dutch parliament had voted overwhelmingly to call for Samidoun to be designated a terrorist organization.
Samidoun's European coordinator, Mohammed Khatib, resides in Belgium. During a webinar, in which he was joined by Hamas leader Basem Naim, he described October 7, 2023 as a "glorious day" that made him proud.
The Belgian government has confirmed that Hamas operates on its territory through shell companies. At the end of September, in the center of Brussels, Samidoun held a rally inciting violence expressing support for Hamas, with participants chanting: "Hassan [Nasrallah] hit, hit Tel Aviv, Please Sir, in the name of Allah... Hamas we are here for you."
Israel's ambassador to Belgium Idit Rosenzweig-Abu tweeted a video from the rally: "And the only organization flag is #Samidoun. It is always Samidoun."
When Germany banned Samidoun in November 2023, its members reportedlysimply fled to Switzerland to avoid charges.
Canada is another central hub for Samidoun. The organization's international leader, Khaled Barakat, also a senior member of the PFLP, has found a haven there. In 2022, Barakat was expelled from Germany for his "violent, antisemitic rhetoric", and his PFLP activities there. Canada, however, under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, evidently saw no problem in hosting him, despite the terrorist designation. Barakat's wife, Charlotte Kates, reportedly a communist since the age of 13, co-founded Samidoun in 2011 and is the organization's international coordinator.
Violent antisemitism in Canada has spiked to unprecedented levels, according to a November 4 report from NGO Monitor, titled "The NGO Network Driving Antisemitism in Canada":
"This dangerous spike is concurrent with an increase in activity by an interconnected and coordinated network of NGOs, whose campaigns of anti-Israel demonization, antisemitism, and intimidation create a hostile environment throughout Canada. A number of the leading groups are linked to Palestinian terror organizations and hide their sources of funding....
"This NGO network is responsible for violent public events, student encampments, statements, and legal actions. Ominously, many of these groups have publicly celebrated the Oct. 7th atrocities, and expressed support for Hamas and other Canadian-designated terrorist organizations....
"Samidoun – a Palestinian terror-linked NGO with chapters in Vancouver, Toronto and Ottawa – is one of the key groups promoting hate and incitement in Canada through its planning and promotion of numerous antisemitic events and extensive partnerships across the country."
Charlotte Kates has traveled around Canada, inciting hatred against Jews and declaring the October 7 atrocities "heroic." At one October 7, 2024 rally in Vancouver, she declared, "And yes, we are Hezbollah and we are Hamas." At another, she said, "We stand with Palestinian resistance and their heroic action on October 7th... Long live October 7th."
For her efforts, Kates was honored with a "human rights award" from the Iranian regime.
In the United States, Samidoun has been involved in countless events, including marches in Washington, D.C., "All out for Palestine" rallies in New York City, and "Shut it Down for Palestine" in Seattle, among others. Samidoun also held a "Resistance 101" virtual training at Columbia University in March 2024 and helped set up the encampment on its campus.
Who funds this terrorist-supporting madness? Samidoun, which does not publish any donor information, has a financial sponsor in the US, the Alliance for Global Justice, a registered 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization that reportedly works to bring about a communist revolution through building coalitions of organizations, many involved in pro-Hamas activity, and, according to its own website:
"We also act as fiscal sponsor to over 90 economic, social justice and human rights projects around the world that do not have their own tax-exempt status."
Who funds the Alliance for Global Justice? According to Influence Watch, several of the same megadonors that fund the Democratic Party in the US, such as George Soros' Open Society Foundations, and the Tides Foundation.
The Tides Foundation, which was once described as a "charitable money laundering" organization, and was previously supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, also sponsors anti-Israeli groups such as Jewish Voice for Peace and IfNotNow, both of which are active in the ongoing protests. The Alliance for Global Justice also receives funds from the Arca Foundation, Surdna Foundation, Public Welfare Foundation, and the Brightwater Fund.
The support for groups such as Samidoun by the Alliance for Global Justice led to demands to revoke its tax-exempt status. US Representative Jim Banks wrote in a June 27, 2024 letter to the IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel:
"[T]he Alliance for Global Justice (AFGJ) has retained its tax-exempt status despite funding Samidoun: Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, a cutout for the designated Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP)... The IRS has previously ruled that organizations that incite civil unrest and violate local ordinances do not qualify as tax-exempt under section 501(c)(3)."
It is now six months later, and the IRS has done nothing.
On November 20, 2024 Jason Smith, Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee wrote in a letter to Werfel:
"Samidoun was designated by the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control as a 'sham charity' that serves as a fundraiser for terrorist organizations. Despite Samidoun's designation, and the Alliance's financial support of Samidoun, the IRS has yet to revoke the Alliance's tax-exempt status. Given this information and recent developments, it is clear that the Alliance's tax-exempt status should be revoked.
"This case is not complicated, which makes the failure to revoke the Alliance's tax-exempt status both concerning and confusing. As you know, if a nonprofit organization conducts substantial activities that do not further its exempt purposes, such activity may result in the loss of the organization's tax-exempt status."
The continued acceptance of terrorist-affiliated groups such as Samidoun in Western countries inevitably leads to the kinds of outcomes that we have witnessed in recent weeks, such as the pogrom in Amsterdam and the pro-terrorism riots in Montreal. When Western governments do nothing, the situation keeps deteriorating.
Robert Williams is based in the United States.
Sympathy for the devil...Biden panders to the criminal element in society.
Biden commutes death sentences of child killers and mass murderers 2 days before Christmas
Like you would for dog poop on the sidewalk
Scranton Officials Demand for Biden’s Name to Be Removed from Landmark
Sunday, December 22, 2024
The problem with faulty research as it's never in the news if it offends the environmentalists
Journal that published viral study on black plastic removed from major index
https://retractionwatch.com/2024/12/18/journal-that-published-viral-study-on-black-plastic-removed-from-major-index/
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
