Important Takeaways:
- Over 140 House Democrats Demand Ability to Block Veterans from Purchasing Guns
- More than 140 House Democrats are demanding that the ability to bar veterans from gun purchases/ownership under certain circumstances be added back to the Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act.
- For decades, the VA has been reporting veterans to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) for mental issues, and such issues include using a fiduciary to manage one’s VA benefits. But this year, the Clinton-era gun ban was rolled back in the Senate by an amendment put forward by Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA).
- Following the adoption of his amendment, Kennedy said, “Unelected bureaucrats shouldn’t be able to strip veterans of their Second Amendment rights unilaterally. The Senate did the right thing for veterans and all freedom-loving Americans by passing my amendment today.”
- Democrats in the House are crying foul and demanding the gun ban be added back into the appropriations bill.
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Important Takeaways:
- Luxury home burglary wave: LAPD, Scottsdale police intensify efforts against organized South American gangs
- The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) has initiated a task force to combat the increasing incidence of Latin American gangs targeting upscale residences in Southern California.
- LAPD’s Chief Dominic Choi stated that there has been a significant uptick in burglaries carried out by organized groups primarily originating from Chile, with individuals also originating from Peru, Ecuador, and Colombia.
- Meanwhile, in Scottsdale, Arizona, law enforcement has made three arrests linked to “dinner-time burglaries,” part of a broader series of thefts attributed to South American crime rings.
- Scottsdale residents have expressed concern over the professionalism and strategic nature of these criminal operations.
- The criminal groups are known for targeting homes situated adjacent to natural features such as washes or golf courses, typically gaining entry through windows and focusing on valuables in primary bedrooms and closets.
- Despite law enforcement efforts, authorities believe that additional suspects may still be at large, underscoring the ongoing threat posed by South American organized crime groups operating within the United States.
- Scottsdale Police Chief Jeff Walther detailed more on the trio’s arrests on March 12 during a press conference.
- “During questioning, again, not only did they admit to why they were here, they also admitted to the interstate component of that and that they were doing burglaries in the state of California,” he said.
- “All three. All three came here legally on the visa waiver program,” he said.
- “It’s a big deal. It’s impacting Scottsdale, it’s impacting the Valley, it’s impacting the state, it’s impacting the country,” he said.
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Important Takeaways:
- Apple’s MM1 AI Model Shows a Sleeping Giant Is Waking Up
- A research paper quietly released by Apple describes an AI model called MM1 that can answer questions and analyze images. It’s the biggest sign yet that Apple is developing generative AI capabilities.
- “This is just the beginning. The team is already hard at work on the next generation of models.”
- …a research paper quietly posted online last Friday by Apple engineers suggests that the company is making significant new investments into AI that are already bearing fruit. It details the development of a new generative AI model called MM1 capable of working with text and images. The researchers show it answering questions about photos and displaying the kind of general knowledge skills shown by chatbots like ChatGPT. The model’s name is not explained but could stand for MultiModal 1.
- MM1 appears to be similar in design and sophistication to a variety of recent AI models from other tech giants, including Meta’s open source Llama 2 and Google’s Gemini. Work by Apple’s rivals and academics shows that models of this type can be used to power capable chatbots or build “agents” that can solve tasks by writing code and taking actions such as using computer interfaces or websites. That suggests MM1 could yet find its way into Apple’s products.
- “The fact that they’re doing this, it shows they have the ability to understand how to train and how to build these models,”…
- MM1 could perhaps be a step toward building “some type of multimodal assistant that can describe photos, documents, or charts and answer questions about them.”
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Important Takeaways:
- U.S. bankruptcies surged 18% in 2023 and seen rising again in 2024 –report
- U.S. bankruptcy filings surged by 18% in 2023 on the back of higher interest rates, tougher lending standards and the continued runoff of pandemic-era backstops, data published Wednesday showed, although insolvency case volumes remain well below the level seen before the outbreak of COVID-19.
- Total bankruptcy filings – encompassing commercial and personal insolvencies – rose to 445,186 last year from 378,390 in 2022, according to data from bankruptcy data provider Epiq AACER.
- Commercial Chapter 11 business reorganization filings shot up by 72% to 6,569 from 3,819 the year before, the report said. Consumer filings rose 18% to 419,55 from 356,911 in 2022.
- For the final month of the year, total filings dipped to 34,447 from 37,860 in November, though they were up 16% from a year earlier.
- Bankruptcy case counts are expected to keep climbing in 2024, though there is still some distance to go to top the 757,816 bankruptcies filed in 2019, the year before the pandemic struck.
- Household debt did, in fact, stand at a record high $17.3 trillion at the end of the third quarter, according to data from the New York Federal Reserve
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Important Takeaways:
- The Biden administration is warning states to be on guard for cyberattacks against water systems, citing ongoing threats from hackers linked to the governments of Iran and China.
- “Disabling cyberattacks are striking water and wastewater systems throughout the United States,” Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan wrote in a letter to governors made public Tuesday. “These attacks have the potential to disrupt the critical lifeline of clean and safe drinking water, as well as impose significant costs on affected communities.”
- Hackers affiliated with the Iranian Government Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps have attacked drinking water systems, while a People’s Republic of China state-sponsored group, Volt Typhoon, has compromised information technology of drinking water and other critical infrastructure systems, the letter warned.
- “Federal departments and agencies assess with high confidence that Volt Typhoon actors are pre-positioning themselves to disrupt critical infrastructure operations in the event of geopolitical tensions and/or military conflicts,” said the letter.
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Important Takeaways:
- Undocumented Immigrants Have Right to Own Guns, Judge Rules
- A judge this month dropped gun charges against an illegal migrant in Illinois, sparking further debate about the rights associated with the Second Amendment.
- S. District Court Judge Sharon Coleman of the Northern District of Illinois referenced lower court rulings in dismissing firearm possession charges against Heriberto Carbajal-Flores, who was illegally or unlawfully in the United States when he possessed a handgun in the Little Village neighborhood of Chicago on June 1, 2020.
- “The Court finds that Carbajal-Flores’ criminal record, containing no improper use of a weapon, as well as the non-violent circumstances of his arrest do not support a finding that he poses a risk to public safety such that he cannot be trusted to use a weapon responsibly and should be deprived of his Second Amendment right to bear arms in self-defense,” Coleman, who was appointed under President Barack Obama, wrote in her eight-page ruling filed March 8.
- Carbajal-Flores was charged under Title 18 of U.S. Criminal Code, which legally disallows undocumented individuals to possess firearms and ammunition “or to receive any firearm or ammunition which has been shipped or transported in interstate or foreign commerce.”
- The defendant, who contended the firearm was possessed for self-defense and protection of property “during a time of documented civil unrest” in the spring of 2020 [during George Floyd], has never been convicted of a felony, a violent crime or a crime involving the use of a weapon.
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Important Takeaways:
- Shark Tank” star Kevin O’Leary said
- “You think about America, the reason this is the number one economy on Earth is that we have laws and we have due process and we have property rights. It attracts foreign capital from around the world,” O’Leary began on Fox News’s “Outnumbered” Tuesday. “All of that is being shaken to the core here. The concept of seizing assets is on a 30-day bond number has never been issued. No insurance company has ever issued anything near this so there’s no chance it was gonna happen. And only giving 30 days’ notice in time, that’s a really bad message and I think New Yorkers should think well past Trump, whether he’s president or not or either this attorney general is gone [in] four or not, it’s irrelevant.”
- “This is case setting against the American brand. The most stable country on Earth anywhere to put capital for a long period of time, particularly in real estate, is the United States of America,” he continued. “This is an assault on what we believe to be core and I find it extraordinary; I think it’s very troubling, it has absolutely nothing to do with Donald Trump at this point in my view and it is completely bipartisan. This is an attack on America, and I don’t how you can look at it any other way.”
- Judge Arthur Engoron ruled Trump liable for allegedly deceiving banks and insurance companies in September. He ordered the former president to pay $350 million in damages in a Feb. 16 ruling following a three-week trial and banned him from being an officer or director of any company or organization in New York for three years.
- Trump’s lawyers said that Trump paying the full amount by the March 25 deadline is a “practical impossibility,” Politico reported. Engoron denied Trump’s legal team’s request last month to pause the judgment.
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Important Takeaways:
- Abortions have reached their highest level in 10 years, despite bans on the procedure in more than a dozen states.
- A report released Tuesday by reproductive health firm Guttmacher Institute showed that there were 1 million abortions in the US in 2023, the equivalent of 16 per every 1,000 women.
- That was up 10 percent from the 14.4 per 1,000 in 2020 and the highest since 2014, when the rate was 14.6 per 1,000.
- The rise is largely being driven by medical abortions, which can be ordered from pharmacies online and soon-to-be in person, though they are illegal in over a dozen states that have banned abortion.
- The findings come after Vice President Kamala Harris made history as the first vice president or president to visit an abortion clinic last week – which was hailed by pro-abortion campaigners but slammed by critics as a sign that she has ‘spent her whole career in the pocket of Big Abortion.’
- The report also found that 63 percent of abortions performed in 2023 were from medications, such as the two-pill regimen of mifepristone and misoprotol. In 2000, no abortions were done with this method.
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Important Takeaways:
- Keith Olbermann Suggests ‘Hope’ for Trump’s Assassination on Social Media
- Former MSNBC bomb thrower Keith Olbermann is taking heat for posting to social media his apparent hope that Donald Trump would be assassinated.
- The “Biden-Harris HQ” post of the video was captioned: “Trump says he has been treated worse than Abraham Lincoln, who was assassinated.”
- To that, Olbermann responded, “There’s always hope.”
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“When once a Republic is corrupted, there is no possibility of remedying any of the growing evils but by removing the corruption and restoring its lost principles; every other correction is either useless or a new evil.” ~ Thomas Jefferson
Important Takeaways:
- Donald Trump Says $454M Bond Could Force Real Estate Fire Sale: ‘ELECTION INTERFERENCE’
- New York Attorney General Letitia James’ prosecution of Trump essentially tries to bankrupt the president. Trump must post a liquid (cash, securities) bond covering the full amount of the judgment to pause enforcement of the judgment, but 30 surety companies told Trump they would not accept real estate assets as collateral, Trump’s lawyers said Monday. The enforcement will begin on March 25.
- If Trump cannot post the $454 million bond, James could seek to freeze some of his bank accounts and properties.
- Trump said:
- Judge Engoron actually wants me to put up Hundreds of Millions of Dollars for the Right to Appeal his ridiculous decision. In other words, he is trying to take my Appellate Rights away from me when I have already won at the Appellate Division, but he refuses to accept their already made decision.
- “Nobody has ever heard of anything like this before. I would be forced to mortgage or sell Great Assets, perhaps at Fire Sale prices, and if and when I win the Appeal, they would be gone,” Trump added. “Does that make sense? WITCH HUNT. ELECTION INTERFERENCE.”
- Constitutional scholar Jonathan Turley… concluded, “It shocks the conscience that you have to pony up this type of money just to get someone to look at what you believe, and I believe, is an excessive ruling by this judge.”
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