The News Cycle is almost impossible to track these days. At least, to do so fully.
That’s where we come in.
In the Badlands News Brief, the Badlands Media team hand pick news items of interest from the previous days to give you an overview of the biggest goings-on relevant to the Truth Community.
Some items feature original (and subjective) commentary. Feel free to follow the corresponding link to see our writers’ corresponding Substack accounts and check out their other work.
Now, onto the news from the Monday, January 1 …
Secretary Of State That Kicked Trump From Maine Ballot Wants 'Better Leaders' In Power To Prevent 'Election Sabotage'
The precedent being set by states like Colorado and Maine could change the political landscape of America forever if allowed to go unchallenged. Removing presidential candidates from the ballot based on unilateral opinion rather than any kind of legally arbitrated decision or criminal conviction is the most slippery of slopes for a number of reasons. The most dangerous implication being that a handful of officials can decide for the entire population of their states (or the entire population of the country) what leaders they are allowed to vote for based on a "guilty until proven innocent" ideology.
Meaning, all they have to do is make accusations of criminal behavior or criminal intent and then remove a candidate based on those accusations alone.
No person or group should have that power.
One could argue that this is already the case and that the two party system filters out candidates on a regular basis. However, the notion of state ballot removal is a decidedly leftist/Democrat affair clearly engineered to benefit the progressive power structure for many years to come.
It's not only about Donald Trump - Woke bureaucrats could use this trend in the future to deny ballot access to any conservative candidate on the grounds that they "might" represent a "threat to Democracy."
This is essentially the message conveyed by Secretary of State Sheena Bellows, now well known as the person responsible for single-handedly removing Trump from the 2024 election ballot in Maine.
She argues "better leaders" must be put in positions of power to prevent "election sabotage" and the end of Democracy. The hypocrisy is mind blowing, and of course we have to ask: Isn't it the job of the American public to decide what leaders are "better leaders?" — ZeroHedge
Our Take: “From this piece: ‘It's not only about Donald Trump - Woke bureaucrats could use this trend in the future to deny ballot access to any conservative candidate on the grounds that they ‘might’ represent a ‘threat to Democracy.’
Yeah. That’s what I said. Like, a bunch of times for the past two months.
I said it because it is the most important part of this 14A effort across the nation; that is, what building blocks, precedents and small ‘wins’ are the communists arranging with their ‘findings of fact and conclusions of law’ in these 14A cases.
Legal scholars were quick to declare that the Colorado 14A case didn’t matter because there was no way the courts would allow a state to disenfranchise tens of millions of voters and endorse the unequal treatment of voters in a Presidential election. It didn’t matter, they claimed, because the case would ultimately end up in President Trump’s favor.
That’s obviously true and President Trump is on the primary ballot in Colorado. So what was the point?
The point was the finding of fact that January 6 was an insurrection in the trial court, and it being upheld by the Colorado Supreme Court. That confirmation gave this Secretary of State in Maine all she needed to act unilaterally in barring 45 from her state’s primary ballot.
SCOTUS must rule on the underlying findings when the Colorado GOP and President Trump’s appeals in Anderson vs. Griswold come before the high court. Just ruling on the 14A is unacceptable. Why? Because it's never been about ballot access. Communists are using progressive courts to punish their political opponents and neutralize opposition and dissent.
As I wrote last month:
‘If the high court fails to correct the state courts’ error, then the insurrection finding could (and, in Colorado, will) bar military veteran J6ers from running for office. It will also green light the uniparty’s next phase of lawfare-as-election-interference, and affirm that fake insurrections are effective change tactics.’
That’s my theory, and we can test it. USAF Veteran and former State Representative Ron Hanks swore the oath twice, in two different official capacities. It is broadly known that he attended January 6, like thousands of other Coloradans. He was named the 6th Most Dangerous Election Denier in Colorado by Colorado Newsline in September 2021.
(Newsline won an award for that article, by the way. Also, for the sake of transparency, I’m number five on the list.)
Hanks recently announced that he is running for Lauren Boebert’s abandoned seat. Let’s see if anyone in commie lawfare land makes a 14th Amendment claim against Ron Hanks’ candidacy. I’m always happy to be wrong about the level of communism we’re in, and the idealist in me desperately wants to believe in justice. Also, for the record, Ron Hanks is an honorable man and an excellent choice for Colorado’s third congressional district.
Colorado will remain a battlefield in the election lawfare domain, as Anderson vs. Griswold heads to the US Supreme Court, Tina Peters’ trial is coming up in early February, and another trial challenging the lawful First Amendment activities of the Colorado grassroots is currently scheduled for that same week.
As for the despotism in Maine, from NBC:
‘Trump’s campaign says it plans to immediately appeal Bellows’ decision to the Maine Superior Court, the state’s top trial court. The statute mandates the court move fast, with a decision expected by Jan. 17 to either affirm or overturn Bellows’ decision.’
January 17th, huh?” — Ashe in America
Bill Clinton 'will be named as John Doe 36' when a list of Jeffrey Epstein associates from court filings are made public next week
Former US president Bill Clinton is expected to be named as 'John Doe 36' when a list of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein's associates from court filings are made public.
Clinton, 77, will allegedly be named among dozens of Epstein's high profile associates in documents set to be released in the first days of 2024.
The pedophile's powerful friends and acquaintances are set to be exposed as part of a vast unsealing that a judge ordered just before the New Year.
That will take the release day to January 1 – but as that is a holiday it is likely the files will be made public the following day.
Some 177 people will be identified across hundreds of files which will shed new light on the late financier's sex trafficking operation and his network of influence. — The Daily Mail
Our Take: “Most in the Truth Community are well aware of the term, 'Limited Hangout' and how the tactic has been used by the Deep State's power projection apparatus (specifically, the CIA-controlled Mockingbird Media,) to disguise lies with cleverly-gilded bits of Truth.
Perhaps the most famous example of this is the JFK Assassination 'Conspiracies' that first ran rampant from the 1960s through the 1980s, including the 'Shooter on the Grassy Knoll' and other tales that were directly inserted BY the CIA in order to distract from very real rabbit trails based on the Actual conspiracy that resulted in the murder of a sitting president.
While it's likely that we'll get some tantalizing bits of Truth disseminated to the Collective Mind this month regarding Epstein's operations (& his clients,) I feel that the MSM has been amplifying the coming info dump a little too much, and that we're as likely to see Victims and Targets of the Epstein Influence Op smeared alongside the guilty.
Watch & Discern.” — Burning Bright
Ohio Gov Who Vetoed Trans Bill Protecting Minors and Girl's Sports Received Over $40K From Hospitals Supporting Trans Treatments
In a recent development, Republican Governor Mike DeWine of Ohio vetoed House Bill 68, which aimed to prohibit doctors from prescribing puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to minors and ban boys from competing in girls’ sports.
This decision came just hours before the deadline and has stirred up a heated debate among Republicans.
DeWine’s veto has been met with criticism, as it appears to be influenced by substantial donations from organizations supportive of transgender medical care.
A review of donations from 2018 to 2023 reveals that the governor received a total of $40,300 from the Ohio Children’s Hospital Association (OCHA), Cincinnati Children’s, Nationwide Children’s Hospital, and ProMedica Children’s Hospital.
The OCHA donated $10,000 to the Mike DeWine and Jon Husted Transition Fund on Dec. 28, 2018, and another $10,000 on Dec. 7, 2022, according to the report. This transition fund allows candidates to spend donations for “transition activities and inaugural celebrations,” as outlined in Ohio’s campaign finance handbook. — The Federalist Papers
Our Take: “To sum up, the people of Ohio and their legislature agree that they don’t want to sterilize and mutilate children, but the people who want to sterilize and mutilate children paid the Governor tens of thousands of dollars. So he vetoed their agreement.
Then he gaslit all the people of Ohio about why he did it:
‘Were Ohio to pass HB68, it would be saying that the state knows better, what is medically best for their child, than the two people who love that child the most: their parents.’
Ohio had mask mandates and vaccine mandates, and parents there were stripped of their rights during covid (and probably ongoing). Medical freedoms didn’t exist back then — when people were first learning the impact and injury of mask and vaccine compliance initiatives.
Parents don’t have the right to make mask decisions for their kids — because science — but they can totally consent to sterilize and mutilate their kids, according to the chief executive of the state of Ohio.
Protecting the innocents and most vulnerable should be our primary social objective. DeWine and those like him appear to prioritize the opposite. It’s exploitation wrapped in manufactured empathy through which they treat the rights and protection of children as an inventory management or supply chain optimization issue — not, rightfully, as a matter of criminal negligence and systemic abuse.
It’s as simple as human rights for all humans.
I fear we’re all going to be judged for this.” — Ashe in America
Iran Dispatches Warship To Red Sea, Houthis Warn Of "Repercussions" After US Forces Kill Rebels During Maersk Ship Attack
Regional instability risks mount in the Red Sea following the Iran-backed Houthi attack on a Maersk container ship on Sunday. US Forces responded with attack helicopters that eliminated three small boats and ten rebels.
After the skirmish, a spokesperson for the Yemeni militia group warned of "consequences and repercussions" for the US aggression.
Houthi military spokesman Yahya Sarea confirmed on the Yemeni TV channel Al-Masirah that US forces killed ten of its fighters.
"US enemy forces attacked three boats belonging to the Yemeni Naval Forces, which led to the martyrdom and the loss of ten people from the Naval Forces," Sarea said.
The spokesman said its fighters were "performing their humanitarian and moral duty" to deter Israel-related commercial vessels from transiting the Red Sea "in solidarity and support for the Palestinian people." — ZeroHedge
And …
Israel Says It Will Pull Several Brigades From Gaza Strip
The Israeli military said on Monday that it would begin withdrawing several thousand troops from the Gaza Strip at least temporarily, in what was the most significant publicly announced reduction since the war with Hamas began.
The military cited a growing toll on the Israeli economy after nearly three months of wartime mobilization with little end in sight to the fighting. Israel had been considering scaling back its operations, and the United States has been prodding it to do so more quickly as the death toll and privation in Gaza rose.
More than 20,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the beginning of the war, most of them civilians, according to the local health authorities, primarily in Israeli bombing. With aid delivery restricted and aid workers unable to move safely within the territory, half of Gaza’s roughly 2.2 million people are at risk of starvation, according to the United Nations.
Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, the Israeli military spokesman, emphasized that the move to demobilize some soldiers did not suggest any compromise of Israel’s intention to continue fighting until it destroys Hamas, and the fighting across Gaza remained intense. Admiral Hagari, who had said he expected “warfare throughout this year,” indicated that some troops would be called back to service in 2024. — The New York Times
Our Take: “There’s a somewhat strange and even contradictory pattern emerging in the Middle East as it relates to the Escalation and Acceleration Narratives we’re paying close attention to as the most momentous year … since the last momentous year kicks off in earnest.
While Escalation seems to be the name of the game in the Suez canal, with reported kinetic attempts by Iran-backed Houthi rebels increasing in both frequency and (we’re told,) effect, now Iran itself is apparently mobilizing warships to the Red Sea in a major marker of attempted intimidation.
At the same time, Israel is both signaling a draw-down in kinetic deployments in the Gaza Strip, while also maintaining a rock-solid, ‘war throughout 2024 and beyond’ stance in their public communications.
And, a story that ran somewhat under the radar was the announcement that the USS Ford Carrier is returning to the US after an extended trip monitoring said Israel Crisis. Of course, the Carrier is being replaced by another with 2,000 marines onboard, we’re told, but any mass change in operations in this theater should be watched closely.
These moves could all be explained away (and perhaps legitimately) purely in terms of logistics and strategy, but, it’s important to try to pay attention to what the various players on the game board are saying … but more importantly, what they’re doing.
I’m not convinced these conflicts are long for this world, as the respective players on the game board seem to be hedging between peace and war, but maybe I’m just being too optimistic at the start of the year.” — Burning Bright
BONUS ITEMS
Israel’s Highest Court Strikes Down Controversial Law to Curb Its Power
Israel’s highest court has struck down a controversial judicial overhaul law enacted last year by the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that would have limited the justices’ power.
Israel’s Supreme Court ruled against a central piece of a judicial overhaul that Netanyahu was pushing before the war in Gaza erupted last October. The court struck down a law, which was passed in July and was akin to a constitutional amendment, that would have taken away the court’s powers to abrogate government decisions it deems to be “unreasonable in the extreme.”
The ruling could revive the deep political and social strife generated by the judicial reform last year, just as the country reels from the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas militants on southern Israel and is embroiled in a devastating war in Gaza.
Before the Oct. 7 attack, hundreds of thousands of Israelis came out weekly to protest against Netanyahu’s push to limit the powers of the court and give more control to the elected government.
Eight justices ruled in favor of striking down the law, with seven against. — The Wall Street Journal
Pro-Palestinian caravan snarls New York traffic around JFK, LaGuardia Airport
A caravan of pro-Palestinian demonstrators snarled traffic around John F. Kennedy International and later LaGuardia Airport on one of the busiest travel days of the year.
Videos obtained by Fox News Digital showed protesters with a bullhorn shouting: "NYPD, KKK, IDF they’re all the same!"
Port Authority later shut down all entrances to JFK for people without a boarding pass. Airtrain services were closed, and cars could not get into the terminal without pro
The group said the airport was "swarming with all kinds of law enforcement," adding that "organizers were forcibly removed from Terminal 4."
Video posted to social media shows dozens of vehicles waving Palestinian flags, honking horns, and shouting at police officers. — FOX News
Putin Says Russia Will 'Intensify' Strikes on Ukraine After Belgorod Attack
President Vladimir Putin said Monday that Russia will "intensify" strikes against Ukraine after a deadly attack on the Russian city of Belgorod over the weekend left at least two dozen people dead and more than 100 injured.
Saturday's attack on Belgorod came after Moscow's large-scale air assault on cities across Ukraine the day before, killing 23 people.
"We're going to intensify the strikes. No crime against civilians will rest unpunished, that's for certain," Putin said Monday during a visit to a military hospital.
"Of course, we can strike public squares and Kyiv, and any other city. I understand. I'm burning with rage myself. But do we need to attack civilians? No, we hit military targets, and we'll continue to do that," the Russian leader added. — The Moscow Times
We hope you enjoyed this brief look back at the major news items you might have missed in this ever-escalating and ever-accelerating news cycle as the Information War continues to rage on around us.
As always, if you have any thoughts on these news items or the MANY others swirling in the digital ether, drop into the comments below to share them with your fellow Badlanders.
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To expand on Ashe's thought's on the 14th Amendment case. I see the Uniparty using this as a way to attack the SCOTUS and especially Justice Thomas. Since Pres. Trump started appointing Supreme Court Justices and Federal Judges, the left has attacked the Judicial system, they have openly called for stacking the Supreme Court, to enforcing term limits on Justices, remember the speech Sen. Schumer gave on the steps of the Supreme Court building concerning Abortion?
They have been going after Justice Thomas very hard as of late because his wife openly supports Pres. Trump, (yet it is perfectly fine for Liberal Judges spouses to attack Pres. Trump in the most vile ways) so they are now setting the stage for when the SCOTUS rules in favor of Trump, as they should, they will all then delegitimize the ruling claiming Pres. Trump packed the SCOTUS with "His loyal Justices."
I believe Justice Thomas is the Chief Justice now, I say this because it is my understanding that it is the Chief Justice who always swears in new Justice's to the Bench and when Justice Amy Cohen Barrett was sworn onto the Bench it was Justice Thomas, not Justice Roberts, who swore her in at the Rose Garden at the White House.
The left is doing everything they can to destroy our faith in the Justice system and equal Justice under the Law by bending the Law and the meaning of the Law to extremes, coddling criminals, harassing patriots and Law abiding citizen's to enrage us all the while claiming extreme partisanship on behalf of Judges and Justice's who rule in favor of the Constitution, Law or Pres. Trump.
Happy New Year Badlands Media Team and all! Thank you for your diligence and commitment.
In his book "A Conflict of Visions", Thomas Sowell provides a contrast in visions and the accompanying philosophies - which inevitably lead to one's choices and actions. On one side - those who graciously recognize the limitations of mankind as a whole and each ember of it (whose vision is constrained - meaning they believe it is better for power to be spread over as many members of society as possible) and therefore require limitations on any and all members of our race . On the other side: those who believe there are a select few who should be allowed unfettered control , whose vision is (or should be) unconstrained by limitations due to their exceptional perception of what the rest of our race "truly needs". In his typical grace, Mr Sowell extends validity and goodwill to both - I am afraid I have no such reservoir of grace.
BB - thanks for the reminder (I know, I should be ashamed of myself for needing it) that the media is as bad as it is despite the lack of support from the vast majority of the population BECAUSE it is the "CIA-cotrolled" arm of their "power projection apparatus". (Interestingly enough - C.S. Lewis addresses that very concept in his novel "That Hideous Strength" published in 1945).
Last (from BB): “There’s a somewhat strange and even contradictory pattern emerging in the Middle East as it relates to the Escalation and Acceleration Narratives we’re paying close attention to as the most momentous year … since the last momentous year kicks off in earnest." YEP!! The Hebrew word (check me on this - I may have missed a jot or tittle) for "year" - contains the idea of going around again. Hold on tight!