Tag: taxes

More Woke Craziness Uncovered by DOGE

The Trump Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) continues to uncover shameless misuse of our taxpayer dollars for insider payoffs and woke activism. 

It really is stunning what our elected officials and unelected bureaucrats believe they have the right to spend our money on. Besides the Taliban condoms, European DEI musicals, and Iraqi muppets already exposed by DOGE, the new department led by Elon Musk has found yet more leftist nonsense and grift to cancel.

DOGE on Thursday revealed the following initiatives on which our money was set to be spent, but which fortunately have been shut down:

– $60M for “Indigenous Peoples and Afro-Colombian empowerment”

– $74M for “inclusive justice” in Colombia

– $79M for “primary literacy” in Kenya

– $37M for “female empowerment” in Colombia

– $8M to “Reduce stigma, discrimination, and violence against LGBTQI+ communities” in Lesotho

– $3.3M for “being LGBTQI in the Caribbean”

– $25k to increase “Vegan Local Climate Action Innovation” in Zambia

Earlier this week, DOGE identified a substantial amount of cash going to the insidious World Economic Forum and the plan for you to “own nothing” and “have no privacy.” Other ridiculous initiatives also included “$69mm for the Eurasia Foundation to do ‘digital transformation activity’ in Europe.” Whatever the heck that means.

From DOGE:

-$32mm to Internews for programs including “media enabling democracy, inclusion, and accountability in Moldova” and the promotion of “sustainable media outlets”

-$7mm for the American Bar Association to promote the “resilience” of the “Eurasian legal sector and civic society”

-$520mm for a consultant to do ESG investments in Africa and “mobilize private sector resources and expertise”

-$25mm to “promote biodiversity conservation and promote licit livelihoods” by developing “socially responsible” behaviors in Colombia

-$40mm to “improve the social and economic inclusion of sedentary migrants”

-$42mm for Johns Hopkins to research and drive “social and behavior change” in Uganda

-$45mm to “address [] the needs, opportunities, and challenges identified by activists and other civic actors engaged in nonviolent collective action”

-$52mm for the World Economic Forum

Nor is that all. DOGE is out to identify unused buildings on which millions of dollars are spent annually. It provided one sobering example of why reform is needed on Feb. 26. “A former ICE employee and Biden transition team member joined Family Endeavors in early 2021 and helped secure a sole-source HHS contract for overflow housing from licensed care facilities,” DOGE explained.

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Secretary of State Marco Rubio Terminates US Support of Ukraine’s Power Grid

Secretary of State Marco Rubio terminated the US’s support for Ukraine’s power grid.

The State Department ended a USAID initiative that has given hundreds of millions of dollars to the restoration of Ukraine’s power grid.

Ukraine has been struggling with power outages because of Russia’s attacks on its power grid over the last few years.

USAID will also drastically reduce its presence in Ukraine, according to NBC News.

NBC News reported:

The State Department this week terminated a U.S. Agency for International Development initiative that has invested hundreds of millions of dollars to help restore Ukraine’s energy grid from attacks by the Russian military, according to two USAID officials working on the agency’s Ukraine mission.

Power outages have been applied overnight in some regions of Ukraine due to the attacks on energy facilities. The country’s systems have sustained near-constant impact throughout the course of the three-year war.

“It significantly undercuts this administration’s abilities to negotiate on the ceasefire, and it’d signal to Russia that we don’t care about Ukraine or our past investments,” one USAID official involved in the Ukraine mission told NBC News.

The official continued: “Russia is fighting a two-pronged war in Ukraine: A military one but also an economic one. They’re trying to crush the economy, but USAID has played a central role in helping it be resilient, [including] shoring up the energy grid…We’ve provided vast amount of support to the Ukrainian government to avoid a macro economic crisis.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky arrived at the White House on Friday to meet with President Trump to discuss his rare earth mineral rights proposal.

However, President Trump canceled the joint press conference with Zelensky on Friday afternoon following an explosive Oval Office meeting.

Trump and Vance absolutely lit Zelensky up as he folded his arms and tried to lecture the United States.

“You don’t have the cards right now. With us, you start having cards … You’re gambling with the lives of millions of people! You’re gambling with World War III!” Trump said.

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Perspectives From A Senior Staffer And NIH Loyalist: The Dark Side Of NIH Leadership

As someone who works directly with the NIH Director’s office, I am dismayed by the disingenuous coverage of NIH in places like the New York Times and Science Magazine. Very little of what I read comports with my own experience and I am worried that scientists and the general public are getting a false view of the real problems inside the world’s largest funder of biomedical research.

Every large institution is fraught with palace politics, but today’s NIH is suffering from a deeply entrenched senior leadership in the director’s office that is plagued by enmity, distrust and isolation. The NIH Director works in Building 1 and oversees 27 other Institutes that research various diseases—the one most people have heard of is the National Cancer Institute. But to most of these institute directors, Building1 is a dark hole they both fear and despise. If you’re a running a research lab in Wisconsin this probably doesn’t matter to you; if you’re bed ridden with an undiagnosed, complex neurological disease—a life put on hold—why would you care?

But at every level today NIH’s management is distanced further away from its overall mission to advance science that improves health.

NIH scientists are quite busy with their research and don’t always read news about NIH scandals. I don’t, because I don’t really have time, nor do I care. But turmoil from the recent election has caused me to read about the retirement of Dr. Lawrence Tabak, who served as Principal Deputy Director, the number two position at NIH. I have worked with and observed Dr. Tabak’s ascent to this commanding position at NIH, from which he weaponized systems and processes to harm those who disagreed with his views or decisions.

Yet, I saw none of this in a news account by the New York Times and much of the reporting seemed to describe a different person than the Larry Tabak that I know. According to this New York Times reporter, Tabak’s retirement was “surprising” as he was “long considered a steadying force” and “someone who could work across party lines.”

Tabak’s retirement was not “surprising.” After Trump won office, Tabak told senior NIH officials several times in private meetings that he might be forced to retire or step down. And he was only a “steadying force” if he liked you personally and you didn’t dare to question his decisions or those made by his favored staff.

I find it odd that the New York Times would report that Tabak was “someone who could work across party lines.” Like almost every NIH leader, Tabak is a committed Democrat who can work with Republicans if he holds his nose, but he despised President Trump. Several have heard Tabak say several times that he couldn’t stand to be in the same room as Trump.

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India’s First Transgender Clinic Shuts Down After Losing Its USAid Funding With ‘No Hope of Resuming’

India’s first transgender clinic has closed after losing its funding from USAid.

Mitr Clinic, located in the south Indian city of Hyderabad, had its USAid slush fund cut off as part of the recent 90-day freeze imposed by President Donald Trump.

All of the staff have been fired and customers have been urged to go elsewhere.

“We were informed that the funds had been cut off because president Trump ordered a freeze on our clinic’s funding,” a former clinic official told The Telegraph.

“We had been serving hundreds of transgender patients, providing mental healthcare and transition-related medical services.”

”We stopped operations in early February, with no hope of resuming.”

The clinic was founded in 2021 by USAID in collaboration with Johns Hopkins University under the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR).

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‘Maximally transparent’ DOGE now tells federal court its records are ‘not subject to FOIA’ requests 

While standing next to President Donald Trump in the Oval Office earlier this month, billionaire Elon Musk, the de facto head of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), claimed that his team had been “maximally transparent” as the Trump administration seeks to gut the federal workforce. But in recent court filings, the government said it will not provide DOGE records to the public under Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, claiming that the organization is exempt from the law.

Justice Department attorneys on Thursday filed court documents in connection with a FOIA lawsuit in Washington, D.C., wherein they state that Trump’s executive order redesignated the U.S. Digital Service as the U.S. DOGE Service, removing the organization from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to make it a “free-standing component of the Executive Office of the President.”

As such, the government claimed that DOGE is “not subject to FOIA.”

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Teary-Eyed Federal Employee Compares Filling Out Elon Musk’s Email to “What I Imagine Living in North Korea to be Like”

Leftist federal workers are having a rough time completing Elon Musk’s request to respond to an email about the work you did last week.

Elon explained at President Trump 47’s first cabinet meeting that this was an attempt for government workers to show a “sign of life” since they were receiving government paychecks.

It will be interesting to see how many are NOT returned and how many go to dead accounts!

One pretty little snowflake had a particularly difficult time with the task. She cut an 8 minute video due to the trauma the email caused her. She also compared the task to living in North Korea.

Government Employee: I have plenty of things to report. I did plenty of work last week. But the feeling of just absolute existential dread that I felt typing out a response to that email is something that I wish I could convey to everyone because it felt like such a glimpse into the reality that they are trying to create, and it was terrifying. It felt like, You will do what I say or else. The email that we received did not say that failure to respond would be taken as a resignation. But the Host on X did say that…

… The feeling that I felt responding to that email was such a glimpse into a possible future here, probable future here, if we don’t fucking do something about it. It felt so scary and so heartbreaking. It felt much like I would imagine living in a place like what I always imagine North to be like would be like, where the energy is, Yes, master, your wish is my command.

What an ignorant nutcase!

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Study: Majority of EBT-Eligible Food Products Are Ultra-Processed

We’ve all been there: you’re waiting in the checkout line at your local Save money. Live better™ Walmart, or wherever fine groceries are sold, and in front of you is a family of four — all obese if not morbidly so — with a cart chock full of Dr. Thunder (Walmart’s Dr. Pepper knock-off) and Hot Pockets and stuff like that.

“EBT,” they say when the cashier reports their bill.

Then you realize — with a disparate mix of revulsion, empathy, and helplessness — that you have just subsidized their slow-burning suicide and the homicide of their equally fat children.

One advocacy group recently attempted to quantify this phenomenon.

Via GoCoCo (emphasis added):

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) has come under increasing scrutiny for how its benefits are spent. Critics point out that the program may be “encouraging families to eat highly processed, unhealthy junk food” rather than nourishing them with wholesome options. This concern prompted us to conduct a detailed investigation into the foods eligible for purchase with Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) cards (which deliver SNAP benefits) at one of the nation’s largest grocery retailers…

Our analysis of more than 13,000 SNAP-EBT eligible products reveals a stark nutritional reality. The vast majority of items that SNAP recipients can buy are highly processed. Notable findings include…

62% of EBT-eligible products studied are ultra-processed foods…

Nearly half (47%) of the products contain artificial flavorings…

8% of products contain additives that are banned in California or in California schools…

Over 160 products contain Red Dye No. 3, which has been recently banned by the FDA.

Of course, one of the biggest reasons this mass-scale human tragedy is allowed to play itself out is the influence of big food lobbyists in Washington (and at the state level) who bribe politicians and policymakers to include ultra-processed foods manufactured by mega-corporations like Nestle, Coca-Cola, et al. in the EBT program.

Often, these lobbyists go as low as weaponizing accusations of racism against anyone who objects.

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‘Fraud On A Mass Scale’ – Why Trump Should Repeal Real Estate Tax

This is the short version of the Amicus created for ZeroHedge. For the full print version of the Amicus Brief Supporting Property Owners and School Districts and Accounting Fraud, both of which are being delivered by hand to President Trump click here and here.

Introduction of Argument 

The Home Affordability and Probability of Bankruptcy graphic below shows Taxation of Unrealized Gains, which is a violation of the 16th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Market Value is the mechanism in Texas and most States in the Union, from which the Assessed Value is created. 

Under current Texas Law you can protest your Market Value but not the Assessed Value. If the Market Value is fraudulent, then so is the Assessed Value. 

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Denver Mayor Mike Johnston floats 20% service charge to tackle restaurant woes

Denver Mayor Mike Johnston wants to add a 20% service charge to local restaurant tabs — and then tax it — to help restaurants cope with the city’s minimum wage and promote what he called pay equity among tipped and non-tipped employees.

On Monday, Johnston told City Cast Denver, a popular podcast, that he has already been discussing the idea with restaurant owners. He didn’t say whether they are on board. He also did not discuss if increasing people’s dinner costs would decrease restaurant visits. 

Johnston has incurred the ire of some local restauranteurs, who this month penned a letter expressing their frustrations with the city for everything from public safety worries and negative perceptions of downtown to parking and infrastructure needs.

They pointed to a series of stabbings on the 16th Street Mall over a January weekend that left two dead and two more injured.

“You ran your entire campaign platform on restoring our Downtown Denver business districts,” Dave Query, owner of Jax Fish House & Oyster Bar, said in his letter to Johnston. “It has gotten worse since you took the position of Mayor, even though you have received $550M towards stewarding it in a different direction.”

He added: “This is the current vibe and energy on our downtown streets, and our long-time LoDo and Larimer guests are now driving to Cherry Creek and NorthField and Golden for dinner and entertainment.”

“We know it’s a challenge,” Johnston told City Cast Denver, noting that restaurant labor costs have increased by 200% over the past decade. “We’ve had 400 restaurants close in Denver over the last three or four years and we know that a big part of that is the increase in the minimum wage, and we want folks to make more money.”

The challenge, he said, is ensuring an equitable and livable wage, while allowing restaurants to thrive.

Johnston said a recent restaurant tour group told him that wage disparities exist across the industry, with tipped servers making as much as $120,000 in annual salary because they have both the city’s minimum wage, plus tips, compared to the back-of-the-house staffers, such as cooks and dishwashers, who, he said, make $40,000.

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Arizona Lawmakers to Vote on Proposal to Pay Cops $2,500 for Each Illegal Alien They Help ICE Deport

Arizona lawmakers will be voting on legislation to pay police officers a $2,500 bounty for each illegal alien they help Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deport.

The legislation states that the bounties will be paid by taxing international money transfers.

Under the proposal, each international money transfer under $500 will be taxed $25, and those over $500 will be taxed $25 plus five percent of the additional amount.

Opponents of the legislation have argued that it will lead to racial profiling and distract police from handling their local duties.

Democrat Arizona Senator Lauren Kuby called the bill “racist” and compared it to the “wild west.”

“But it’s Wild West with a twist, it’s a racist bill,” Kuby said.

“This is a critical mission that Arizona voters overwhelmingly support, and we want to reward the efforts of our hardworking officers,” the bill’s Republican sponsor Senator Jake Hoffman said in a statement obtained by Reuters.

The report adds, “Missouri and Mississippi recently considered bills to pay civilian bounty hunters $1,000 for each illegal immigrant they caught. The legislation was shot down in Mississippi and looks set to fail in Missouri, with state Republicans reluctant to pay for immigration enforcement.”

The bill passed through committee last week and will now go to the state’s House and Senate for votes.

Arizona’s Democrat Governor Katie Hobbs has said she will veto the bill if it passes.

To override the veto, there would need to be a two-thirds majority vote in each chamber.

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