As the noose tightens on Hunter and President Joe Biden and allegations of influence-peddling with foreign companies during the Obama-Biden White House, the Department of Justice has taken over the news cycle with another announced indictment of former President Donald Trump.
A grand jury on Tuesday announced a four-charge, 45-page indictment against Trump relating to his role in the Jan. 6, 2021 march to the U.S. Capitol that ended up disrupting the certification of the Electoral College.
The indictment was not unexpected, as special prosecutor Jack Smith had already warned the Trump legal team that it was coming.
The grand jury named three conspiracies that Trump is accused of: Conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct the election, and conspiracy against people’s rights.
The indictment says, “Despite having lost, the Defendant was determined to remain in power.”
Trump already faces several other charges, including financial dealings in New York, a supposed hush-money payment to Stormy Daniels, and federal charges for mishandling classified documents.
On Saturday, Trump held a campaign rally in Erie, Penn., attended by over 4,000 people at Erie Insurance Arena. A few days before that, an estimated 50,000 people came to see him in Pickens County, S.C.
Minutes before the indictment was announced on Tuesday, Trump wrote on his social media platform, TruthSocial: “I hear that Deranged Jack Smith, in order to interfere with the Presidential Election of 2024, will be putting out yet another Fake Indictment of your favorite President,” he wrote.
He wrote that the indictment is timed to take attention away from damaging testimony earlier this week about the Biden criminal activities.
Trump will appear Thursday before Magistrate Judge Moxila A. Upadhyaya at the E. Barrett Prettyman Courthouse in Washington, D.C., less than two miles from the White House.
The biological gear required to bear offspring is one of the scientific hallmarks of being a female. Not all women have all that gear, but men don’t have any of it. This is a scientific fact that applies to all mammals except for that extremely rare hermaphrodite who has both male and female sexual traits.
But in the most recent report on congenital (born with) syphilis in Alaska, the Alaska Department of Health has decided that women who are pregnant are now known by the politically correct term, “pregnant people.”
Pregnant people a phrase that is now commonly in use among scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as the medical profession turns away from science and biology and adopts an attitude that gender is something that is “assigned at birth,” rather than observed at birth (or in utero), and that men can become pregnant.
As for the baby boys and girls born with syphilis in Alaska, they came into the world with a condition that can be fatal if left untreated.
The current uptick in syphilis in Alaska was detected in 2018, and seems to have been exacerbated by the Covid-10 pandemic policies. The same trend has been observed nationally.
During 2018–2022, 26 congenital syphilis cases were identified in Alaska, one of them being fatal.
In Alaska, most cases have occurred in people who self-identify as heterosexual and are living in urban environments, with 29% of the people diagnosed with syphilis having been identified as either experiencing homelessness or a great deal of housing instability in 2021. Most (69%) of the infected mothers reported heroin, amphetamine, methamphetamine, or cocaine use within 12 months of the case investigation.
All mothers giving birth to babies with congenital syphilis were between 16 and 37 years. Some 85% were Anchorage residents and 58% were identified as Alaska Native/American Indian only on the infant’s birth certificate. Sixty-five percent of the mothers had the equivalent of a high school diploma or more education. Addiction and drug use is a big factor among these women, the State report says.
Yet the report is confused on the matter of gender and sex. In one instance, the Health Department talks about mothers. But then, when the syphilis report talks about fetuses and pregnancy, the scientists switch and refer to moms-to-be as “pregnant people.” It is tiptoeing around the gender ideology debate by avoiding gender altogether at times, while at other times, it can’t seem to avoid the word “mother.”
“While no inherent aspects of a mother’s race or education create risk, the disparate social conditions surrounding these factors, such as housing instability and substance use, can be contributing risk factors. Third, further investigation of these CS cases, such as through a multi- disciplinary review committee, should examine the factors and conditions that impact access to adequate prenatal care to ensure early syphilis detection among pregnant persons.“
CDC data indicate that the rate of primary and secondary syphilis among American Indian and Alaska Natives in 2021 was 42.2 per 100,000, nearly five times that of white individuals, up 520 percent from 8.0 per 100,000 among American Indian/Alaska Natives in 2016. In the same time period, congenital syphilis has increased over 900 percent among this group (rate of 37.7 per 100,000 live births in 2016 compared to 363.7 in 2021) and is almost 10 times higher than among whites.
“Screen all pregnant people (regardless of risk factors) during their first prenatal visit, during their third trimester of pregnancy, and at the time of delivery.
“Screen pregnant people seen for medical services unrelated to their pregnancy (e.g., during an outpatient clinic, urgent care, or emergency department visit) if they have not already had prenatal care with appropriate syphilis screening or if they are at increased risk for syphilis acquisition (e.g., sex with multiple partners, sex in conjunction with drug use or transactional sex, late entry to prenatal care or no prenatal care, methamphetamine or heroin use, incarceration of the pregnant person or their partner, and unstable housing or homelessness).
“Diagnostic considerations for pregnant people are available on CDC’s Syphilis During Pregnancy website.
As for treatment, the State Health Department notes that there is a shortage of the type of penicillin needed to cure this disease:
“The FDA listed a shortage of penicillin G benzathine injectable suspension products (Bicillin L-A®) on April 26, 2023. Pfizer provided an availability update on June 12, 2023, with an expected recovery in the second quarter of 2024. There are no emergency stockpiles of this medication, and product is being allocated with limited inventory released, resulting in the supply not meeting demand.
“Bicillin L-A® is the only CDC-recommended treatment for some patients, including pregnant people infected with or exposed to syphilis, and babies with congenital syphilis. Although Bicillin L-A® remains the treatment of choice for patients with syphilis, CDC has recommended that healthcare providers prioritize the use of Bicillin L-A® to treat pregnant people and babies with congenital syphilis. ®
“Consider prioritizing unstably housed/homeless persons for Bicillin L-A treatment after pregnant people infected with or exposed to syphilis and babies with congenital syphilis.
“Doxycycline is an alternative therapy for non-pregnant patients diagnosed with or exposed to syphilis; however, doxycycline is an FDA Pregnancy Category D medication, and is not recommended as an alternative treatment for pregnant individuals.”
The National Institutes of Health considers “pregnant people” to be an inclusive and acceptable phrase for the medical community when referring to women who are pregnant but who are masquerading as men through transgender medical treatment.
Kenai Borough Mayor Peter Micciche has filed with the Alaska Division of Elections for reelection to the seat he won earlier this year in a special election to fill out the term of former Mayor Charlie Pierce.
A Republican, Micciche was previously the mayor of Soldotna and a member of the Soldotna City Council. In 2013, he won election as a state senator, and rose to become Alaska Senate President before choosing to not run for another term last year so that he could stay in his home district while his children grow up. When Mayor Charlie Pierce resigned, Micciche won that seat to fill out the remainder of Pierce’s term, which ends in October.
Peter Micciche was born in Valley Stream, N.Y. He earned a bachelor’s degree in business from Alaska Pacific University and worked as a commercial fisherman and small business owner. He was an LNG/NG facility manager of the Kenai LNG Facility for ConocoPhillips.
At this time, Micciche is unopposed. Although he is registered with the Alaska Public Offices Commission as a candidate, borough’s official filing period opens Aug. 1 and closes at the end of business on Aug. 15. The election will take place on Oct. 3. Absentee in person voting begins Sept. 18.
Anchorage Assemblyman Kevin Cross, embattled in his own community for being the primary architect of a rewrite of the planning document governing development of housing and commercial buildings in Anchorage, has started switching gears.
After getting pushback from residents in Chugiak and Eagle River, communities that have their own land use plan protected by state statute, Cross has called for a meeting with the community councils of Chugiak and Eagle River to discuss “Comprehensive Plan and Housing Future in the Chugiak-Eagle River Community.”
The meeting is Wednesday, Aug. 16, from 6:30 to 8:30 PM in Room 170 of the Eagle River Library Building.
Cross is the sponsor of an ordinance that tears up the current land use plan for the city and borough from Chugiak to Girdwood and replaces it with essentially two zones — housing and not housing. That means density, which is pat of a drive to create “diversity, equity, and inclusion” in Anchorage.
In the early draft of the ordinance, “density” was named as a good attribute to aspire to in 13 sentences. In a later draft, the word was crossed out and replaced with “simplified.”
Those who support Cross’ density-equity ordinance say it will solve the housing shortage in Anchorage and that it will grow more diversity and inclusion. They say it will lend itself to better use of public transportation like buses, which are currently underutilized in Anchorage.
Those opposing Cross’ plan say that density won’t allow emergency vehicle street access during winter, when snow piles up on residential streets. Vacant lots and open spaces are used in winter for snow storage. They also point out that during the passage of the Title 21 comprehensive plan decades ago, Chugiak, Eagle River, and Girdwood were carved out as unique communities with their own plans.
The entire process has been a legislative learning curve for Cross, who is a successful real estate broker elected to the Assembly to represent Chugiak and Eagle River. He has been caught on recordings saying that he plans to make the changes in spite of what his own community council thinks.
“I’m nobody’s bitch,” he told a group of realtors, when describing how he plans to light a match to the entire land use plan. He also said the Title 21 plan would be unrecognizable once he gets through with it, according to recordings played on the Amy Demboski Show.
But he apparently is ready to have a conversation with those community councils in his district and may present to them a new plan that addresses their concerns before the matter is taken up by the Anchorage Assembly again later in August.
Another month, another bank collapse. On Friday, Heartland Tri-State Bank was closed by the Kansas Office of the State Bank Commissioner.
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation was named the receiver and Dream First Bank of Syracuse, Kansas assumed all deposit accounts and substantially all the assets.
Heartland Tri-State Bank is the first community bank in the nation to fail in 2023. It is a small bank, with some $139 million in assets in the first quarter. The deposits are now assets of Dream First Bank.
Elkhart Financial Corporation of Elkhart, Kansas, owned all shares of Heartland Tri-State Bank stock before FDIC took the bank. The holding company was not included in the closing of the bank or the resulting receivership.
The Kansas bank failure adds to other major financial institutions this year that have failed, and at least one bank that voluntarily liquidated when caught up in the cryptocurrency collapse related to the FTX exchange bankruptcy.
First Republic, Silicon Valley Bank, and Signature Bank collapsed in the first few months of 2023. First Republic was acquired by JPMorgan in May after efforts to rescue the bank were unsuccessful.
Silvergate Capital folded operations at its bank, which catered to crypto traders.
PacWest, a sixth bank, late week merged with Banc of California, in what appears to be an attempt to avoid collapse. For years PacWest had been on a buying spree, swallowing up smaller financial institutions. At the time it was folded into Banc of California, it was said to have over $41 billion in assets
No banks failed last year, according to FDIC, but in 2019 and 2020, four banks failed in each of those years. This year, the number now stands at six, including mergers under duress and voluntary closures.
Which is more environmentally friendly, an energy source that uses one unit of land to produce one unit of electricity, or a source that uses 100 units of land to produce one unit of electricity?
The answer should be obvious. Nevertheless, green energy advocates call for a huge expansion of wind, solar, and other renewables that use vast amounts of land to replace traditional power plants that use comparatively small amounts of land.
Vaclav Smil, professor emeritus of the University of Manitoba in Canada, extensively analyzed the power density of alternative sources used to generate electricity. He defined the power density of an electrical power source as the average flow of electricity generated per square meter of horizontal surface (land or sea area). The area measurement to estimate power density is complex. Smil included plant area, storage yards, mining sites, agricultural fields, pipelines and transportation, and other associated land and sea areas in his analysis.
Smil’s work allows us to compare the energy density of electricity sources. If we set the output of a nuclear plant to one unit of land required for one unit of electricity output, then a natural gas-powered plant requires about 0.8 units of land to produce the same one unit of output. A coal-fired plant uses about 1.4 units of land to deliver an average output of one unit of power.
But renewable sources require vastly more land. A stand-alone solar facility requires about 100 units of land to deliver the same average electricity output of a nuclear plant that uses one unit of land. A wind facility uses about 35 units of land if only the concrete wind tower pads and the service roads are counted, but over 800 units of land for the entire area spanned by a typical wind installation. Production of electricity from biomass suffers the poorest energy density, requiring over 1,500 units of land to output one unit of electricity.
As a practical example, compare the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System in the eastern California desert to the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Plant near Avila Beach, California. The Ivanpah facility produces an average of about 793 gigawatt-hours per year and covers an area of 3,500 acres. The Diablo Canyon facility generates about 16,165 gigawatt-hours per year on a surface area of 750 acres. The nuclear plant delivers more than 20 times the average output on about one-fifth of the land, or 100 times the power density of the solar facility.
To approach 100 percent renewable electricity using primarily wind and solar systems, the land requirements are gigantic. “Net-Zero America,” a 2020 studypublished by Princeton University, calls for wind and solar to supply 50 percent of US electricity by 2050, up from about 14 percenttoday. The study estimated that this expansion would require about 228,000 square miles of new land (590,000 square kilometers), not including the additional area needed for transmission lines. This is an area larger than the combined area of Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, West Virginia, and Wisconsin.
This area would be more than 100 times as large as the physical footprint of the coal and natural gas power systems that would be replaced.
The land taken for wind and solar can seriously impact the environment. Stand-alone solar systems blanket fields and deserts, blocking sunlight and radically changing the ecosystem, and driving out plants and animals.
Since 2000, almost 16 million trees have been cut down in Scotland to make way for wind turbines, a total of more than 1,700 trees felled per day. This environmental devastation will increase the longer Net Zero goals are pursued.
Wind and solar are dilute energy. They require vast amounts of land to generate the electricity required by modern society. Without fears about human-caused global warming, wind and solar systems would be considered environmentally damaging.
Net-zero plans for 2050, powered by wind and solar, will encounter obstacles with transmission, zoning, local opposition, and just plain space that are probably impossible to overcome.
Steve Goreham is a speaker on energy, the environment, and public policy and the author of the new book “Green Breakdown: The Coming Renewable Energy Failure.” This column first appeared in The Western Journal.
With less than three weeks of summer vacation remaining, the Mat-Su Education Association, the union that represents teachers and other employees in the Matanuska-Susitna Borough, has approved an agreement with the Mat-Su Borough School Board.
The union had authorized a strike in May if a new contract could not be hammered out.
According to details obtained by Must Read Alaska, the agreement gives teachers a 3% raise and changes terms relating to the health insurance package. The district had offered a 2% raise during negotiations. The new contract will go through 2026.
The new contract was approved by over 72% of those members voting. 27.41% voted against the contract. About 1,030 of the 1,226 union members voted.
MSEA represents 3,400 teachers and support staff and has been without a contract since last year. The teachers’ union, an affiliate of the National Education Association, is suffering from a marked decline in membership since the Janus decision by the U.S. Supreme Court allows public employees to work without having to join a public employee union. Now, more than 35% of all Alaska public employees have opted out of paying the unions that represent them.
The Mat-Su Borough School Board will vote on the agreement on Aug. 2 at its regular meeting. School in the Mat-Su Valley starts on Aug. 15.
Mayor Dave Bronson announced details of his decision to move the Sullivan Arena back to the use for which taxpayers paid: A venue for events such as sporting competition and .
He said the Municipality of Anchorage had signed an agreement with O’Malley Ice and Sports, which is already running the Ben Boeke and Dempsey Arenas. As the Boeke and Dempsey returned to use as ice arenas, the revenue to the city has returned to the 2017 and 2018 levels, Bronson said.
Under the agreement, O’Malley Ice and Sports is essentially renting the Sullivan to develop entertainment, trade shows, and other uses. John Stenehjem, who is the general manager of O’Malley Ice and Sports, will oversee the redevelopment of the arena.
The damage to the restrooms and the plumbing system that occurred while the building was occupied by the hardcore vagrant population under the Berkowitz Administration has been fixed and the building should be available by Nov. 1.
“This building is in remarkably good shape,” said Bronson, adding that the parking lot will be repainted with stripes soon and there is some glass that still needs to be repaired. The sound system is from the 1980s, he said, and at some point will need to be replaced.
The cold-weather plan for the homeless will be announced next week but will not include the Sullivan.
When asked by reporters what he will do to address the increasing number of street deaths in Anchorage, the mayor said that the recent deaths are not caused by exposure and that most of the deaths occurred after the Sullivan Arena was closed as a shelter in May.
A lot of the street deaths “are drug-related and alcohol abuse, fentanyl, we suspect, the indicators, it looks like fentanyl,” Bronson said. “”Winter is going to add to that unless, quite frankly, the assembly comes up with a shelter.”
Mayor Bronson had earlier announced his plan to give people plane tickets so they can either move back with their families or head to a warm climate. Assembly Chairman Chris Constant called that a bad idea, since he believes that Anchorage is Dena’ina-owned property, and Natives should not be invited to leave.
Bronson said, “We’ve spent $161 million in homelessness in this city. But we do not have a shelter. We need a shelter,” People are “better off living on the street in a wam climate than they are dying on the streets of Anchorage because of exposure.”
The Anchorage Assembly has blocked the mayor from being able to address the homeless situation. The Assembly blocked his development of a purpose-built structure that would serve the homeless as a navigation center. The Assembly instead has used homelessness as a political battering ram against a mayor that they openly despise, knowing that, with the help of the mainstream media in Anchorage, a crisis in homelessness over the winter could tilt the vote against the mayor in the March-April 2024 election.
Alaska Attorney General Treg Taylor filed a brief with the U.S. Supreme Court challenging the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s authority over a sizable piece of Alaskan land in Western Alaska — land that contains the Pebble deposit.
The state contends that the EPA’s restrictions effectively converted 309 square miles of state property into a national park without the state’s consent, an act which it describes as “confiscating State property.”
In January 2023, the EPA issued a final determination, commonly known as a 404(c) veto, under Section 404 of the Clean Water Act, prohibiting any future permits for mining operations in a specific region surrounding the Pebble deposit in Southwest Alaska.
The veto was targeted at not only the proposed Pebble Mine under a 2020 mining plan, but any future mining endeavors within the demarcated area. This act has curtailed Alaska’s ability to govern its natural resources, leading to the current legal contention.
“An original action, where a case is heard directly by the Supreme Court instead of first progressing through the lower courts, is an extraordinary ask, but it’s appropriate given the extraordinary decision being challenged,” explained Attorney General Taylor.
The brief filed emphasizes Alaska’s unique dependence on its lands for its economic health. It also points out the state’s constitutional obligation to ensure the maximum benefit from its natural resources for its people.
Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy expressed his dissatisfaction with the decision, highlighting the crucial role of Alaskan natural resources in supporting the state’s population. He criticized the federal authorities in Washington D.C., claiming they were stifling open discussion regarding the matter.
The concern over EPA’s authority isn’t confined to the mining industry. Attorney General Taylor warned that if the EPA can bypass state and federal permitting processes using vague terms and subjective standards, it could potentially obstruct even smaller projects, such as family housing.
Commissioners of the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, Alaska Department of Fish and Game, and the Alaska Department of Natural Resources also voiced their grievances. They argue that their established processes were not respected by the EPA and that the agency’s actions disregard Alaska’s entitlement to manage its own resources under the cooperative federalism framework of the Clean Water Act.
Alaska is now seeking a declaration from the Supreme Court that the EPA’s veto is unlawful and is calling for an order to set it aside and enjoin its enforcement.
