It is sad that there are what you might call professional Catholics who make a living on their Catholicism, but in whom the spring of faith flows only faintly, in a few scattered drops. We must really make an effort to change this.
Orémus.
Sanctíssimæ Genetrícis tuæ spónsi, quǽsumus, Dómine, méritis adjuvémur; ut quod possibílitas nostra non óbtinet, ejus nobis intercessióne donétur.
Qui vivis et regnas cum Deo Patre, in unitáte Spíritus Sancti, Deus, per ómnia sǽcula sæculórum.
℟. Amen.
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With the last half of March upon us, the blackout of stock buybacks threatens to reduce one of the liquidity sources supporting the bullish run this year. If you don’t understand the importance of corporate share buybacks and the blackout periods, here is a snippet of a 2023 article I previously wrote.
“The chart below via Pavilion Global Markets shows the impact stock buybacks have had on the market over the last decade. The decomposition of returns for the S&P 500 breaks down as follows:“
Yes, buybacks are that important.
As John Authers pointed out:
“For much of the last decade, companies buying their own shares have accounted for all net purchases. The total amount of stock bought back by companies since the 2008 crisis even exceeds the Federal Reserve’s spending on buying bonds over the same period as part of quantitative easing. Both pushed up asset prices.”
In other words, between the Federal Reserve injecting massive liquidity into the financial markets and corporations buying back their shares, there have been no other real buyers in the market.
Given the increasing amount of corporate share buybacks, with 2024 expected to set a record, the importance of that activity has been a critical support for asset prices. As we noted in October 2023, near the bottom of the summer correction:
“Three primary drivers will likely drive markets from the middle of October through year-end. The first is earnings season, which kicks off in two weeks, negative short-term sentiment, and the corporate share buyback window reopens from blackout in November.”
Notably, since 2009, and accelerating starting in 2012, the percentage change in buybacks has far outstripped the increase in asset prices.
As we will discuss, it is more than just a casual correlation, and the upcoming blackout window may be more critical to the rally than many think.
Unsurprisingly, the market rally that began in November correlated with a strong surge in corporate share repurchases. Interestingly, while the media touts the strong earnings growth shown in the recent reporting period, such would not have been the case without the surge in buybacks.
The result is not surprising given that the majority of earnings growth for the quarter came from the companies that are the most aggressive with share repurchases. However, given current valuation levels, it should make one question precisely what you are paying for.
Nonetheless, the buyback surge has supported the market surge since the October 2023 lows. We saw the same at the bottom of the market in October 2022. The chart shows the 4-week percentage change in share buybacks versus the S&P 500.
The end of October tends to be the inflection point for the market, particularly over the last few years, because that is when the blackout period for share buybacks fully ends. While many argue that buybacks have little to do with market movements, a high correlation exists between the 4-week percentage change in buybacks versus the stock market. More importantly, since the act of share repurchases provides a buyer for those shares, the .85 correlation between the two suggests this is more than just a casual relationship.
Currently, investors are very exuberant about the current investing environment. As discussed in “Market Top or Bubble?”, little seems to deter investor enthusiasm.
“The ongoing ‘can’t stop, won’t stop’ bullish trend remains firmly intact.“
Investor sentiment is once again very bullish. Historically, when retail investor sentiment is exceedingly bullish combined with low volatility, such has generally corresponded to short-term market peaks.
At the same time, professional managers are also very bullish and are leveraging portfolios to chase returns. When professional investor allocations exceed 97%, such has historically been close to short-term market peaks.
The risk to these more optimistic investors is that with the blackout period beginning, corporate demand, the largest buyers of equities, will drop by 35%. Therefore, given the correlation between buybacks and the market, a reversal of that corporate demand could lead to a market decline. Any decline will likely lead to a reversal of positioning by investors, further exacerbating that correction process.
While there is no guarantee of anything in the markets, it is likely a short-term risk worth paying attention to.
While the blackout of share buybacks may lead to a short-term market correction, the Federal Reserve may provide additional support over the long term.
The Federal Reserve has been transparent and likely done with hiking interest rates for this cycle. Given the massive surge in the Fed funds rate, the economy has withstood that impact quite well. Of course, the reason was the enormous surge in fiscal support through deficit spending and a massive increase in the M2 money supply as a percentage of GDP.
However, if the Federal Reserve lowers interest rates, it will reduce corporate borrowing costs, which has historically been a boon for share buybacks. Such is particularly the case for large corporations like Apple (AAPL), which can borrow several billion dollars at low rates and buy back outstanding shares. As shown, share buybacks rose sharply following the “Financial Crisis” but slowed during periods of higher rates. Corporations are now “front-running” the Federal Reserve in anticipation of increased monetary accommodation.
With corporate buybacks on track to set a new record this year, exceeding $1 Trillion, corporations will need lower rates to finance the purchases.
As we have discussed for the last month, the market is exceptionally bullish, extended, and deviated from long-term means. With the beginning of the “buyback blackout,” removing an essential buyer of equities is a risk worth watching.
Even if you are incredibly bullish on the markets, healthy bull markets must occasionally be corrected. Without such corrections, excesses are built, leading to more destructive outcomes.
What causes such a correction is always unknown. While the removal of buybacks temporarily may lead to a price reversal, those buybacks will return soon enough. And with $1 trillion in anticipated purchases, that is a lot of support for asset prices this year.
Does this mean the market will never face another “bear market?”
Of course not. There is a consequence for buying back shares at a premium. As Warren Buffet recently wrote:
“The math isn’t complicated: When the share count goes down, your interest in our many businesses increases. Every small bit helps if repurchases are made at value-accretive prices.
Just as surely, when a company overpays for repurchases, the continuing shareholders lose. At such times, gains flow only to the selling shareholders and to the friendly, but expensive, investment banker who recommended the foolish purchases.“
Eventually, the detachment of the financial markets from underlying economic realities will be reverted.
However, that is not likely a problem we will face between now and year-end.
The post Blackout Of Buybacks Threatens Bullish Run appeared first on RIA.
It wasn’t until 2019, while running for president of the United States, that Joe Biden decided it was no longer expedient to support the Hyde Amendment, which for forty-plus years had not only saved countless children from abortion but had spared taxpayers from having to pay for it all. At the time, he had been one of only a few remaining Democratic politicians determined to hold the line.
We cannot understate the current crisis facing young men in America. In the wake of the sexual and cultural revolutions, young men have been aimlessly drifting in an ever-hostile culture. Fatherlessness, pornography, video games, and drugs are just some of the problems facing men today. The men of the sexual revolution feel alone and isolated, clinging to anything that gives them a quick fix.
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“We see signs of . . . a growing disconnect between people’s own religious beliefs and their perceptions about the broader culture,” Greg Smith, associate director of research at Pew Research Center says. 80 percent of U.S. adults say religion’s role in American life is shrinking – higher than it’s ever been – and 49 percent of U.S. adults say diminished religious influence is bad.
The post Most Americans say religion’s influence is waning; half think that’s bad appeared first on The Catholic Thing.
Former President Donald Trump intends to push for abortion legislation that would win the support of both parties. “I would like to see if we could make both sides happy,” the former president said on Sunday. He also emphasized the exceptions to any abortion ban that he would support: instances of rape, incest, or if the life of the mother is endangered by a pregnancy.
The post Trump says he’ll compromise on abortion appeared first on The Catholic Thing.
The entire LGBTQ movement is a counter-religion, which accounts for why it is held with deep religious fervor and why it is always accompanied by a deep loathing for the traditional Christian construal of the sacramental anthropology of the sex act. Yet Cardinal Robert McElroy supports the LGBTQ movement, which is why he calls traditional Catholic sexual ethics “defective.”
The post Cardinal McElroy, homosexuality, and the repudiation of doctrine appeared first on The Catholic Thing.
All was taken away from you: white dresses,
wings, even existence.
Yet I believe you,
messengers.
There, where the world is turned inside out,
a heavy fabric embroidered with stars and beasts,
you stroll, inspecting the trustworthy seams.
Short is your stay here:
now and then at a matinal hour, if the sky is clear,
in a melody repeated by a bird,
or in the smell of apples at the close of day
when the light makes the orchards magic.
They say somebody has invented you
but to rue this does not sound convincing
for humans invented themselves as well.
The voice–no doubt it is valid proof,
as it can belong only to radiant creatures,
weightless and winged (after all, why not?),
girdled with the lightning.
I have heard that voice many a time when asleep
and, what is strange, I understood more or less
an order or an appeal in an unearthly tongue:
day draws near
another one
do what you can.
The post On Angels appeared first on The Catholic Thing.
Are there certain metropolitan areas that are more religious than other ones? Yes. And San Francisco tops the list, with Seattle not far behind. The big-city trend is nationwide, but San Francisco may take the crown for most secular – just 12 percent of folks in that city attend church at least once a month, and a whopping 71 percent of white people living there attend religious services once a year . . . or less.
The post America’s least religious cities appeared first on The Catholic Thing.
The term “philanthropist” is usually applied to CEOs who retire from their corporate jobs or business owners who sell their businesses so they can engage in “philanthropy,” understood as “giving money to good causes.”
I have no wish to be critical of such people. Yes, some may be engaged in philanthropy to look good with the “in” crowd. But I prefer to think the best of people. And obviously, people can do what they want with their money. So, I am always grateful when money they could have spent on a yacht or penthouses in New York and Paris goes instead to provide more financial aid for my students or better educational resources for my university.
What I am concerned about is how often business leaders are applauded only when they sell their business or leave their corporate jobs to devote themselves full-time to various philanthropic causes. It’s as though “being in business” is something seedy and ignoble, but selling your company so you can spend your time and money ensuring women in Africa have birth control is virtuous and high-minded. But that is probably not the best example.
I am not as supportive of some “causes” as others, but (a) it’s not up to me, and (b) there are also very good and important causes that wealthy people fund. And for those, we should be grateful. So please understand, for our present purposes, the issue is not “good” causes versus “bad,” or causes I do or don’t agree with. The issue is the underlying assumption that people need to quit their businesses to “do good.”
People rarely seem to ask what happens to the employees when an owner sells his company to a hedge fund or when a company goes from private ownership to one publicly traded on the stock market. Contrary to the reputation the media portrays of “greedy owners” who want ever more money, when companies go public and sell stock to people around the country, the demand for profits skyrockets.
An owner may treat his employees as more important than profit. He or she may make taking care of the employees one of his or her main goals. “They make this company.” “They’ve been with me since the beginning.” Not all business owners act this way, but I have known many who did. Most did alright for themselves, but they did a lot for those around them as well.
That disposition is harder to maintain in a publicly traded company. The stock market can be a cruel mistress that makes big demands. When a CEO lays off 5000 employees, he is often doing so because he does not want the stock price to take a hit. He has a fiduciary duty to the owners, and the owners are the stockholders. Yes, his compensation is often pegged to increases in the stock price, but the representatives of the stockholders on the board arranged it that way precisely so he or she would have the incentive to “make the tough choices” to keep the stock price going ever upward. It is rare, if not impossible, for owners of stocks or mutual funds to say, “this is enough; don’t worry about making more profit.”
*Pierre Toussaint by Nathaniel Fish Moore, early 1850s [Columbia University Archives, New York, NY]But make no mistake. This means that we, whoever we are who own that stock, or a mutual fund invested in that stock (perhaps not even knowing it), have constantly demanded that the stock price go up or we sell. So who is responsible for laying off 5000 workers? We are. We have little patience if the stock is not going up and up. “But I’m taking care of my workers. People have been sick. Mary’s mother is in the hospital.” All this goes out the window. We, who are insulated from such issues, take no account of them.
So let’s consider again that owner who sells his company to do “good things.” What happens to the employees left behind? They are often worse off, no longer treated the way he or she would have treated them. Now the profit motive is paramount. The crowd demands it.
So perhaps we could take a page from Milton Friedman’s playbook. Friedman argued that corporations should not engage in philanthropy because those profits belong to the investors so that they can spend the money on the philanthropic activities they choose. I am arguing something similar. I suppose it’s nice that Bill Gates is spending his billions on what he takes to be good things. But evidence suggests that there is usually greater wisdom when those decisions are made more widely. There would likely be greater wisdom had that money been spread among the workers to spend on the charities they prefer.
That’s probably unrealistic, although it might be worth considering. But there’s something else. Why aren’t the owners taking care of their workers and seeing to their welfare not credited with “doing good for humanity”? Those of us who have worked for great employers know how wonderful this can be and how much they mean to people’s lives.
So why don’t we see men and women like this as “philanthropists”? I am happy there are people who help feed starving children in Haiti. But I don’t want those businessmen and women who devote themselves to producing a good product at a fair price while doing the hard job of taking care of their workers to be portrayed perpetually as “greedy” and not to be recognized for the philanthropy they do, embodying the principles of Catholic justice.
If you continually portray business owners as greedy, immoral, manipulators who care only about themselves, then young people will think this is true, and that is what you’ll get. If you repeat the message that it’s best to quit business to “do good,” then what you’ll get is people who take a large buyout to go spend it on “effective altruism” when the most effective altruism most of us can accomplish is taking care of the people sitting across from us at work.
The post Of Doing Business and Philanthropy appeared first on The Catholic Thing.
Not content with the multitude of disasters that they’ve helped set in motion over the past three years, the Biden administration now seems to have put another target in its sights: Central Europe. On Friday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken swept through Vienna and in keeping with the longstanding wishes of Brussels and Washington … Continue reading "Biden and Co. Take Aim at Central Europe"
The post Biden and Co. Take Aim at Central Europe appeared first on Antiwar.com.
In the early days of the war in Ukraine, France’s President, Emmanuel Macron, was somewhat isolated as Europe’s leading dove. But in more recent days of the war, he is somewhat isolated as the leading hawk. And even as the hawk, he seems to fly whichever way the wind blows. From the day Russia invaded … Continue reading "Has Macron Become Unmoored?"
The post Has Macron Become Unmoored? appeared first on Antiwar.com.
“I saw the fatal consequences of this counterfeit church;
I saw it increase; I saw heretics of all kinds flocking to the city.”
—Bl Anne C. Emmerich
Five more were wounded.
The post <I>Iraq Weekly Roundup</I>: Four Killed appeared first on Antiwar.com.
Let’s see. March 2020. You had just shut down the country. Millions of jobs lost, companies out of business, death snorkels being built by Ford and GM, nursing homes turned into death camps, schools emptied, Fauci and Birx running the country (and you never, ever, fired them).
Many, many people saw through this from the very beginning. In fact the first post on the topic on this site was Feb 29, 2020. It was transparent even at that early date, before anything had been shut down.
But now that you shut it all down, let’s print trillions of dollars to save the day, and eventually over two straight years of runaway inflation. Hurts so good.
Oh and what about Operation Warp Speed? Spending 15 minutes on the internet yielded the knowledge that, 1. ModeRNA had never brought a vaccine to market, 2. mRNA vaccines don’t work, 3. Coronavirus vaccines don’t work (even worse, they tend to damage or kill the patient).
Then came 2021 and the great jab resistance. You were out of office at this point, because you failed to use the means you had to stop the steal. Anyway, as 2021 wore on, the rotten fruits of Operation Warp Speed became more and more apparent. On the one hand, the jabbed were being injured, or else contracting covid multiple times (“but thank God I’m ‘vaccinated'”). On the other hand, the purebloods were getting fired from their jobs and being called grandma killers. Fun times.
To this day, you tout the beautiful beautiful jab, despite all its terribleness now being public record.
But I do have one last question:
What was it that they told you on the morning of March 16th, 2020? What was so terrifying that you completely reversed course and decided to implement 15 Days to Flatten America? You owe us that answer, sir. Did they admit to the biolabs and bioweapons, and that this thing could have a very high death rate? Why is it that the Delta strain, a supposed mutation from the original virus, had twice the death rate of all the other variants?
Answers, please.
First published on November 26, 2022
***
We are being accused of “spreading disinformation” regarding the Covid-19 vaccine.
The Reuters and AP media “trackers” and “fact checkers” will be out to smear the testimonies of parents who have lost their …
The post The Covid “Killer Vaccine”. People Are Dying All Over the World. It’s A Criminal Undertaking appeared first on Global Research.
What was until recently a niche question for a few special employees or particularly cutting-edge companies is now, in a post-COVID world, fair game for the white-collar professional class: Should employees be able to work remotely, or is the physical office the proper work environment? Plenty of opinions have been penned about whether companies should stay remote, return to the traditional in-person offices, or implement some type of hybrid arrangement. But the arguments are typically limited to a few repetitive back-and-forths about the benefits of the physical office such as “culture, collaboration, team bonding, [and] communication”—and the responses from remote work proponents about the opportunity for “increased employee productivity, reduced attrition, and access to a global talent market.”
The practical considerations of efficiency, communication, and productivity are legitimate concerns for companies and employees alike. Companies need to be profitable and so figuring out where workers are most efficient, and what work arrangement allows for better recruiting, is necessary to navigate a world where many employees have the technology (and strong desire) to work from home.
But, if a healthy (and profitable) alternative is available, is it worth considering?
The Modern Novelty of the “Workplace”
A much more interesting aspect of the remote work problem emerges when one considers how recent this whole business of working outside the home really is. Mary Harrington makes an easily forgotten historical point in her excellent book Feminism Against Progress: In pre-industrial society, most of the economy, and therefore most work, was based in and around the home and the family. The subsistence economy meant that many families created what they needed to survive on their own property: they grew food, raised animals for meat, eggs, and dairy, and made and mended clothing at home. Many also kept the shops where they sold their goods, or the offices from which they offered professional services, in (or very close to) the family home. Of course, this was not universal: many poor people who did not own property would have traveled to work on the farms of others, and some people did commute into town to operate stores and offices. But “going to the office” was not the norm, especially not for the class of persons who owned property.
This changed rapidly with the Industrial Revolution and the massive movement from producing goods at home to producing goods in factories. Technological changes meant that everything from food to clothing was much more efficiently produced by machines. These machines were too big and expensive for individual families to own, so all of a sudden the subsistence economy was undermined, and most people were moved from their homes to “workplaces” to earn their livelihoods. With this growth of technology came the emergence of ever-larger corporations and firms, in which wealth increasingly was concentrated. It thus became more efficient to centralize not only manufacturing but professional services as well. Over two hundred years, the norm became less the lawyer practicing from his home office with a shingle out front and more the large law firm; less the woman who sews and weaves from home and more the factory; less the local shop and more the department store.
Thus the economy has been steadily moving out of homes and into centralized locations for the last two centuries or so. Yes, this has meant mass production of cheaper goods, including those essential to keeping people alive. But there has been a massive downside: it has become the norm for people to spend more of their waking hours at a workplace than at home. Critics of feminism (properly) lament that the cultural norm for new mothers is to leave their children in another’s care in order to work outside the home (and they face increasing pressure to do so in light of a poor economy). Conservatives also speak (correctly) about the disastrous effects of fatherlessness on children and family life. Might it not be worth asking, then, if there ought to be a conservative case against normalizing traffic-jammed commutes and long hours in an office when it isn’t strictly necessary?
Remote Work: A Return to Family-Centered Life
The massive move to remote work has opened many eyes. All of a sudden, fathers spent their lunch breaks with their wives and children rather than alone in a cubicle or with colleagues. Work breaks meant stepping outdoors with children or holding babies, rather than idly gossiping with co-workers. Working professionals realized that it was possible to fulfill their professional responsibilities, get their work done . . . and still live in the midst of their own families. For many workers, remote work is not primarily about cutting out commuting time or luxuriously working in sweatpants, but about a return to a family-centered economic life. This is about much more than an equation to properly achieve “work–life balance”; it is about an opportunity to rediscover a properly ordered life.
Of course, there are jobs where remote work is not possible. Policemen must be on the streets, pilots must be in the cockpits, and laborers must be in the factories where things are actually made. But for white-collar workers, the “laptop class,” there is no universal reason why they must leave their homes and families to do their laptop work in a central office rather than at home—at least not every day.
As this question presents itself to employers, typical for-profit businesses will of course have to analyze questions of efficiency, profitability, and the like. If there is real evidence that a company’s particular industry or business model truly suffers without the regular interaction of employees in a physical workplace, then perhaps limiting or eliminating remote work makes sense for that company. But even these companies primarily concerned with their bottom line should make sure this question is not being taken lightly. With all the talk of work–life balance, rebuilding culture, and making space for working mothers, employers should take the option of remote work seriously. A more flexible approach to remote work would also open such organizations up to many more qualified candidates from around the nation, even around the world.
Creating a Healthy Remote Work Culture
There is a legitimate cultural counterargument to the call for remote work: the in-person office is not simply about efficiency, but about creating a healthy work culture that fosters community. After all, not all workers have families; for them, wouldn’t remote work further the loneliness and isolation that are already prevalent in the culture? Plus, how would employees receive the proper training and mentorship necessary to succeed at work if they are never in the office to meet, interact with, and learn from experienced leaders and employees?
Before addressing these questions, it is worth pointing out that the workplace should not be one’s primary source of socialization and community. It is true that the unmarried single worker may prefer the office to a remote work arrangement. But unmarried single people should be part of a church community, book clubs, local organizations, and a variety of other healthy social outlets. If one is looking to the workplace as the primary solution to his loneliness, something is amiss.
That aside, there are two ways to address the question of how to implement remote work. The first is to adopt a flexible model, one that maintains an in-person office to accomplish all the social and professional benefits listed above, but that offers generous remote work policies for those who prefer them. In this case, those with young children and growing families, those who are particularly pressed with caretaking obligations or are otherwise going through a “busy season” of life, or talented employees who simply live far from the office, are free to work remotely. Those who are new and require in-person training, who live alone and therefore would be isolated by remote work, and those who simply prefer the experience of the in-person office, are free to work in the office. This model accommodates both approaches to work, but it also presents the challenge of effectively having to manage two very different types of work arrangements within a single company.
The second approach is to lean into the remote work model completely: that is, the entire organization works remotely. If remote workers are an exception rather than the company-wide rule, it is easy for them to slip through the cracks. Everyone else receives training, has team lunches, and chats around the water cooler, while the odd remote workers miss out. But effective communication and team building are quite possible in a remote work environment, as long as they are developed intentionally. My own organization has a Signal thread where we communicate daily; this medium allows everything from questions about a work project to sharing personal stories and pictures of our families. Each team member has a weekly check-in with his supervisor via Zoom. We have regular team “coffee house meetings” that do not have a formal agenda, but where the team just socializes. By intentionally forming a remote workplace where communication and socialization are built into the culture, the threat of isolation can be overcome.
Conservative Organizations Should Lead the Way
The potential for cultural renewal via remote work should be championed by conservative institutions in particular. Right-of-center think tanks, nonprofits, policy institutions, and other organizations in this country have a chance to lead on a major conservative cultural issue. Failure to do so is quite striking. Many of these institutions rightly call for a focus on families, more involved fathers, the importance of local communities, and an emphasis on rebuilding strong towns across middle America rather than allowing a few big, blue cities to dominate the nation.
These are all good priorities. Yet many of these organizations require their employees to work in a centralized office location. Therefore, to work for such conservative institutions, people often have to leave their hometowns, move to big, blue cities like Washington, DC, live in overpriced neighborhoods where they wouldn’t ordinarily choose to live, fight rush hour traffic through brutal commutes, and spend eight to twelve hours a day away from their families in order to work in an office. All organizations should take this cultural issue seriously. Conservative organizations that fight for cultural and family values should be at the forefront of encouraging this family-friend work reform.
If conservative organizations want to promote an economy that centers around the family, one that rebuilds the small town and restores a healthy culture, they need to do more than promote the right family policies and tax credits. Imagine a job posting that says, “We want the best and brightest scholars to work on the policies that will shape the future. But we want those scholars to be pillars of their families and communities. Remote work is welcome.”
I understand the hesitancy. Employers are used to physical offices, to seeing what their employees are doing on a daily basis. But in the era of modern technology, minor adjustments can address most concerns. The work product of the laptop class is easy enough to track: if the essays get penned, the spreadsheets get completed, the projects get published, then clearly the employees are being productive from home. And in an age of Zoom calls and Signal threads, it is easy enough to keep remote employees in constant communication. It is surely not the same as an in-person workplace, but we can adapt.
This is not a call to return to a subsistence economy or the pre-industrial era. This is not a call to return to the past at all, but to take an opportunity provided by present technology and circumstance to improve the future. For the first time since the Industrial Revolution, employers have the opportunity to allow vast segments of the workforce to work and live at home, in their communities, among their families. This is not just an attractive recruitment option, but an opportunity for massive cultural renewal. Conservative organizations should lead the charge, embracing the best opportunity in centuries to return more workers to a family-centered home economy.
Image by pikselstock and licensed via Adobe Stock.
A recently released study that involved focus groups and a national study explores how high school students and non-enrolled adults ages 18-30 view the prospects of a college degree.
New data suggests that prospective college students are finding fewer and fewer reasons to obtain a degree.
Inside Higher Ed recently highlighted a new report by the Gates Foundation-funded HCM Strategists and Edge Research revealing that high school students and young adults have a declining view of the benefits of a college degree.
The study, ”Continuing to Explore the Exodus from Higher Education,”compares the results of focus groups and a national survey conducted in 2023 to findings from a 2022 Gates Foundation report titled, “Where are the students?.”
Researchers found that high schoolers and non-enrolled adults ages 18-30 still associate some benefits with attending college, but those perceived benefits were in decline compared to findings from 2022.
The percentage of non-enrolled adults surveyed who consider reasons to go to college, such as to gain more money or get a better job, as important or very important has also dropped from the year before.
At the same time, however, non-enrolled adults continue to perceive an increasing benefit to other options such as licenses, certificates, and trade schools.
In conclusion, the study’s researchers write that, “Despite our understanding of the value of higher education, perceptions among these high school students and non-enrolled audiences make it clear that institutions need to prove their value to them.”
”In particular, why does the value of a 2-year or 4-year degree outweigh the value of credentials and job training programs?,” the researchers write.
“Both High Schoolers and Non-Enrollees see and select other paths that are shorter, cheaper, and/or more directly linked to specific job opportunities.”
“At the end of the day, higher education has a lot of work to do to convince these audiences of its value,” HCM consultant Terrell Dunn told Inside Higher Ed.
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Google has denied a new report by the right-leaning Media Research Center (MRC) alleging 41 instances of "election interference" since 2008.
According to the report, Google has "utilized its power to help push to electoral victory the most liberal candidates…while targeting their opponents for censorship."
This article understates the magnitude of the problem – Google interferes to help Democrats thousands of times every election season!
This is to be expected when their censorship (aka “Trust & Safety”) teams are have far left political views. https://t.co/y36yzdzIUQ
MRC also claims that Google "targeted support for Hillary Clinton for censorship" by "suspending the accounts of writers who wrote blogs critical of Obama during his primary race against Clinton."
In 2008, MRC alleged that Google threw its support behind then-Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) as he faced off against Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination. -NY Post
Four years later, Google - which "once again favored Obama over Mitt Romney," refused to correct a "Google bomb" that smeared GOP primary candidate Rick Santorum, the report reads.
In 2019, 950 pages of Google's internal documents were leaked, revealing evidence of Google utilizing blacklists and machine learning algorithms to censor Republicans, conservatives, and populists.https://t.co/AAbichiMpg
— KanekoaTheGreat (@KanekoaTheGreat) March 18, 2024According to Dr. Robert Epstein, who is cited in MRC's report and has conducted "dozens of controlled experiments" to uncover bias, Google's search algorithm "shifted at least 2.5 million votes" to Hillary Clinton in the 2016 US election.
In 2018, President Donald Trump accused the search giant of rigging search results to display only left-wing and negative stories about him.
"Google search results for ‘Trump News’ shows only the viewing/reporting of Fake New Media. In other words, they have it RIGGED, for me & others, so that almost all stories & news is BAD, Fake CNN is prominent. Republican/Conservative & Fair Media is shut out. Illegal," Trump said in a now-deleted post on X.
In response, Google claimed "Search is not used to set a political agenda and we don’t bias our results toward any political ideology."
Google denies
A company source told the NY Post that Epstein's claims have been "widely debunked." In one instance cited by the MRC report, Google is alleged to have "targeted" then-Democratic Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard (HI), by "disabling Gabbard’s Ads account just as she became the most searched candidate following the first Democratic Party primary debate."
Google's source told the Post that the company's automated systems flagged 'unusual activity' due to large spending changes in an effort to prevent fraud - and the issue was resolved within six hours, per the source, who noted that Gabbard's subsequent lawsuit against the company was dismissed.
The MRC also alleged that Google’s left-leaning bias impacted the 2022 Georgia Senate race between former football great and Republican Herschel Walker and the eventual winner, the Democrat Raphael Warnock.
According to the report, Google’s search results “favored [the] incumbent” Warnock “in the swing precinct where greater proportions of undecided voters likely reside.”
A source close to Google told The Post that third parties who have looked at our results and “found no evidence to support claims of political bias.” -NY Post
"There is absolutely nothing new here — just a recycled list of baseless, inaccurate complaints that have been debunked by third parties and many that failed in the courts," a Google spokesperson told the outlet.
Of course, one can't help but be skeptical considering that just before the 2016 presidential election, among the many leaks published by Wikileaks as part of its Podesta email leak was Google's "strategic plan" to help democrats win the election and track voters.
Google head Eric Schmidt's secret strategic plan for the US election #PodestaEmails https://t.co/LskJODXyXn
More: https://t.co/ZUfh7WDAT5 pic.twitter.com/llq5G9kp5V
The statewide pro-life group in Kansas has issued an endorsement for Donald trump has he takes on ardent abortion activist Joe Biden.
In an email to LifeNews, Kansans for Life explained that Trump compile a pro-life record as president while Biden has been a radical abortion supporter pushing abortions at every turn.
“Kansans for Life Political Action Committee (KFL PAC) is pleased to announce its endorsement of former President Donald J. Trump for President of the United States,” KFL PAC told LifeNews.
“During his previous term in office, President Trump supported efforts to safeguard both the lives of preborn babies and their mothers from the abortion industry by nominating quality candidates to the U.S. Supreme Court, Circuit Courts, and District Courts, opposing taxpayer funding of abortion, supporting the provision of medical care to babies born alive after surviving an abortion attempt, and becoming the first president in American history to speak at the national March for Life,” KFL added.
The pro-life group said the contrast with Biden couldn’t be more clear.
“In contrast, the Biden Administration continues to support unfettered abortion, up to the moment of birth, and paid for with taxpayer funding. As recently as last week, the present administration clearly demonstrated its extreme pro-abortion stance with Vice President Kamala Harris’s campaign stop at an abortion facility – a first for any president or vice president,” KFL said.
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Trump talked about abortion on Sunday in an interview where he suggested he would push for abortion legislation that could get through Congress with the support of both Republicans and Democrats. While the political reality is that is an impossible task, Trump says he believes he can get both sides to agree on a bill, perhaps a 16-week abortion ban patterned after Europe’s laws.
There is essentially no compromise on abortion between pro-life Republicans who want to protect unborn babies and pro-abortion Democrats who want to kill them in abortions without limits and force taxpayers to fund ending human life. Ultimately, you can’t just kill half a baby.
The Dobbs decision, which finally allowed states to protect mothers and babies for the first time since Roe v. Wade in 1973, has created a patchwork of laws — where many red states protect unborn children starting at conception or a detectable heartbeat and blue states allow killing unborn children up to birth.
Trump has previously floated a 16-week ban that would allow pro-life states to continue protecting babies but at least offer some legal protection for unborn children in blue states — with federal law superseding their unlimited abortion agenda. Although he didn’t talk specifically about the 16-week ban this weekend, Trump referred to some sort of middle ground legislation in his new comments.
“Pretty soon, I’m going to be making a decision. And I would like to see if we could do that at all. I would like to see if we could make both sides happy,” Trump told Mediabuzz.
Trump said he would “sit down with both sides and negotiate a deal that everyone will be happy with.”
But therein lies the rub. Radical pro-abortion Democrats like those in Congress will never settle for anything other than abortion on demand for 9 months. They have voted against a 20-week ban and won’t even support protecting babies who survive abortions from infanticide — which makes it incredibly unlikely that they would ever support such a bill.
Trump’s additional remarks almost make it clear that his attempt to find a compromise is meant to attract voters with a less stringent abortion position.
“If the Republicans spoke about it correctly, it never hurt me from the standpoint of elections. It hurt a lot of Republicans,” Trump said. “But I tell people, No. 1, you have to go with your heart. You have to go with your heart. But beyond that, you also have to get elected, and if you don’t have the three exceptions, I think it’s very, very hard to get elected.”
After the interview Trump’s campaign released an additional statement on abortion.
“President Trump appointed strong Constitutionalist federal judges and Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade and sent the decision back to the states, which others have tried to do for over 50 years,” campaign spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said in a statement.
During his prior term in office, Trump crafted the most pro-life record of any president in history. His election would be a marked change from Biden, who is without a doubt the most pro-abortion president ever.
The post Pro-Life Group Endorses Donald Trump: He “Supported Efforts to Safeguard Preborn Babies” appeared first on LifeNews.com.
Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,
If Democrats win the trifecta with a clean sweep of the Senate, House, and White House in November, taxes would rise by $7 trillion over 10 years.
The House Ways and Means Committee reports The Biden Tax Hike Will Likely Exceed $7 Trillion.
I believe they mean would not will.
President Biden Quietly Pledges to Let Trump Tax Cuts Expire
Sending Jobs and Companies Overseas with Higher Business Taxes than China
Global Tax Surrender Allows Foreign Governments to Take American Tax Dollars
President Biden’s proposal to raise the top rate to 39.6 percent goes after small business owners who pay their business taxes via their individual tax return – despite his pledge not to raise taxes on small businesses.
A Tax on Wealth You Haven’t Even Earned Yet.
Higher Prices for Energy Bills and an Energy Insecure America.
An IRS That Would Terrify Godzilla
A friend of mine asked when will the tax hikes cause a recession. I replied never. I suspect my friend was confused over the title that said “will” it should say “would”.
I did not total up all of those details because I don’t believe it’s going to happen. However, It is a warning shot as to what would happen if Democrats did win the trifecta.
The Hill comments Biden’s populist budget marks the overdue end of trickle-down economics
Trickle-down refers to the idea that tax cuts for the wealthiest “trickle down” to the rest of us. It’s long been a popular idea in Washington, but it’s just not true. A few years ago, the London School of Economics studied 50 years of such “trickle-down” policies in 18 industrialized nations, including the U.S., and found that their only result was increasing the wealth of the already wealthy.
So how do we get prosperity for the rest of us? By taxing extreme wealth and investing those revenues in social goods like education, housing, food and health care. President Biden’s recently released federal budget plan follows that blueprint, putting the value of investing in American families and communities ahead of slashing taxes for the rich.
The budget for the fiscal year 2025 would generate about $5.3 trillion in revenues over the next decade. That’s a $388 billion boost compared to last year’s budget — and it all comes from fairer tax policies targeting wealthy individuals and large corporations. Households earning less than $400,000 would see no tax increases, with many seeing reductions.
The proposed budget invests $2.3 trillion towards essential public services for hard-working families while reducing the national debt by almost $3 trillion. That’s a great start toward filling critical investment gaps for families and communities.
Take housing. The National Low Income Housing Coalition reports a shortfall of more than 7 million affordable housing units for poor and low-income Americans. Biden is requesting $33 billion for the Housing Choice Voucher program, which currently helps over 2 million households afford housing and would expand access to homeownership for first-time homebuyers. His request will help to support the existing vouchers and add about 20,000 more.
Though much more is needed, this effort to reduce homelessness by providing access to safe affordable housing in a tight housing market — with high rent prices and often insufficient wages — is a step in the right direction.
Normally writers for The Hill are not nutzoid liberal like the above article.
But it’s not going to happen unless you think Democrats can pull off a trifecta.
Nonetheless, the budget is instructive as are CBO and Fed projections. I will have some comments on those projections Sunday or Monday.
Optimism reins supreme, and it won’t happen.
After Russian President Vladimir Putin's post-election victory speech and Q&A with the press wherein he first unveiled the possibility of creating a buffer zone between Ukrainian land and Russian border regions, the Kremlin has issued more details of the plan being mulled.
Putin had initially described Sunday, "I do not exclude that, bearing in mind the tragic events taking place today, we will be forced at some point, when we deem it appropriate, to create a certain ‘sanitary zone’ in the territories today under the Kyiv regime." He referenced the "tragic events" of cross-border attacks in regions bordering Ukraine which have left scores of civilians dead and wounded over the past several months.
Putin described without elaborating further that the security zone "would be quite difficult for the adversary to overcome with its weapons, primarily of foreign origin."
Refinery ablaze last week in Ryazan, Ryazan Region. via ReutersOn Monday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that as part of the plan Russia "would take measures to safeguard [its] territories" from Ukrainian drone and artillery attacks on critical infrastructure and civilian areas and residences. These areas can be made safe, he explained in follow-up to Putin's words, "some kind of corridor, some kind of… buffer zone that [would put] out of reach any means that the enemy might use to launch strikes."
From Moscow's perspective, this is laying the foundation and likely even 'legal framework' for seizing and solidifying hold over border territories inside Ukraine for the purpose of creating this proposed buffer. In many cases thus far throughout the war, Ukraine forces have been able to send drones hundreds of kilometers inside Russia, reaching even Moscow and St. Petersburg in rare instances.
Oil refineries have been especially targeted, with a dozen or more instances in merely the last few months alone. Crimea too has come under increased drone swarm attack.
The attacks on energy are clearly beginning to have significant impact on a chief source of revenue, part of which no doubt goes to fund the Russian war machine in Ukraine.
"Gunvor Group Ltd. Chief Executive Officer Torbjörn Törnqvist estimates about 600,000 barrels of Russia’s daily oil-refining capacity has been knocked out by Ukrainian drone strikes," Bloomberg reports based on a Monday report. According to some key quotes:
“It is significant because obviously this is gonna hit the distillate exports straight away,” Törnqvist said during an interview at the CERAWeek by S&P Global conference in Houston on Monday. “So that will probably take down exports by a couple of hundred thousand barrels, so to me it’s a distillate problem.”
...Broadly writ, crude oil markets are mostly in balance and fairly valued, Törnqvist said, adding that US supplies are likely to grow this year by about half the rate of 2023’s 700,000-to-800,000 barrel-a-day pace. Still, non-OPEC supply growth overall is likely to be flat this year, he said.
*GUNVOR ESTIMATES DRONES SHUT 600,000 BARRELS OF RUSSIA REFININGhttps://t.co/jCsNCOmSdu
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) March 18, 2024The past week has seen consecutive days of drone strikes on oil facilities inside Russia, with a noticeable uptick in attacks confirmed over the weekend, as Russians went to the polls to vote in the presidential election. Just before the three-day election period began, there was an attack on Rosneft's largest refinery:
Russia's Ryazan oil refinery, controlled by Rosneft, was set ablaze after a drone attack, a regional governor said on Wednesday.
The plant, with installed capacity of around 350,000 barrels per day, refines about 12.7 million metric tons of Russian crude a year (around 317,000 barrels per day), or 5.8% of total refined crude, according to industry sources.
On Sunday alone, 35 drones were launched on Russia, disrupting electricity in a number of border regions, including resulting at another fire at an oil refinery. One drone made to Moscow, and was shot down as it flew near Domodedovo airport.
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In December I wrote about how “the biggest contributor to inflicting death in Gaza will likely be the Israel government causing the loss of necessities for health, including nutrition, sanitation, shelter, and medical aid.” Sad confirmation of this prediction continues to appear.
In particular, a Monday United Nations-backed report warns of serious health threats in Gaza. The report states that “[t]he entire population in the Gaza Strip (2.23 million) is facing high levels of acute food insecurity” and even that famine conditions are imminent in part of Gaza. The report also details massive disruption of the provision of other necessities of life including health care, clean water, trash removal, and sewage systems. In such a situation, the threat from debilitating and deadly illness can be expected to rise sharply.
The first horror of the Israel government’s military attacks has killed and injured an astounding number of Gazans in just five months. An additional horror for Gazans, largely displaced from their attacked homes, is a daily struggle to survive in the face of the Israel government systematically working to deprive them of all means of even minimal sustenance.
In the first application of its unborn victims law, the state of New Hampshire has filed double murder charges against a man who killed a pregnant mom and her unborn baby.
William Kelly, 28, appeared in Carroll County Superior Court in Ossipee with his lawyer, Caroline Smith. He did not address the judge. Smith said she planned to file paperwork that Kelly was waiving his arraignment and pleading not guilty. An email seeking comment was left for Smith.
Deputy Chief Medical Examiner Mitchell Weinberg determined that Christine Falzone, 33, was about 35 to 37 weeks pregnant at the time of her death in December.
The Legislature passed a bill in 2017 that defines a fetus at 20 weeks of development and beyond as a person for purposes of criminal prosecution of murder. Republican Gov. Chris Sununu signed the bill into law. It took effect in 2018.
Kelly’s case is the first time the state had charged someone with murder in the death of a fetus, said Michael Garrity, a spokesperson for the attorney general’s office.
Kelly was indicted by a Carroll County grand jury on Friday on two counts of second-degree murder. He recklessly caused the deaths of Falzone and her fetus, according to the indictment.
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Even aside from abortion, violence against unborn babies and pregnant mothers is pervasive. Homicide is one of the top causes of death among pregnant women, according to a 2021 study in the journal “Obstetrics & Gynecology.” In some cases, the violence is directly related to the pregnancy. LifeNews has documented numerous crime stories in which pregnant women were abused or killed because they refused their partner’s demands to abort their unborn baby.
Sadly, many Democrat-run states provide no justice for women and unborn babies killed outside of abortion. Democrat-controlled states, including New York and Colorado, refuse to provide justice for unborn victims of crimes because such laws may interfere with their pro-abortion agenda.
New York lawmakers repealed their fetal homicide law in 2019 as part of a larger pro-abortion bill. Just a few weeks later, a pregnant woman was stabbed in Queens, killing her and her five-month unborn baby.
Police said the attacker targeted Jennifer Irigoyen’s torso, possibly in a direct attempt to kill her unborn baby. However, authorities said they were forced to drop charges related to the unborn baby’s death because of the legislature’s action.
In Colorado, where abortions are legal for any reason up to birth, state lawmakers also refused to enact protections for unborn babies – even after a brutal 2015 crime in which a woman cut a seven-month unborn baby girl out of her mother’s womb.
Illinois also repealed its fetal homicide law in 2019.
Most states do provide justice to unborn victims of violence in at least some circumstances. Now that Roe v. Wade is gone, 15 states protect unborn babies by banning or strictly limiting elective abortions, and more are fighting in court to do the same.
Other states allow the “choice” to violently end an unborn baby’s life in an abortion, but do provide legal exceptions when the violence is not a choice by the mother.
More than 30 states allow charges to be filed against defendants who injure or kill unborn babies in criminal acts, according to the National Right to Life Committee. The federal Unborn Victims of Violence Act, enacted in 2004, also provides justice to unborn victims of federal and military crimes.
The post Man Faces Two Murder Charges for Killing Pregnant Mom and Her Unborn Baby appeared first on LifeNews.com.
Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
The State Department confirmed that it will try to evacuate Americans who are still stranded in Haiti as the country’s security situation continues to deteriorate.
Police officers patrol a neighborhood amid gang-related violence in downtown Port-au-Prince on April 25, 2023. (Richard Pierrin/AFP via Getty Images)On March 16, the U.S. Embassy in Haiti stated that it will organize a charter flight for U.S. citizens who still remain in the country, coming months after the embassy issued a warning that Americans should leave.
“We are arranging a charter flight for U.S. citizens from Cap-Haitien to the United States, assuming the security situation in Cap-Haitien remains stable,” the embassy said in a security alert issued over the weekend, noting that the airport in the city is “opened periodically for departing flights.”
But, it warned, the “overland trip from Port-au-Prince to Cap Haitien is dangerous,” and the embassy recommended that people head to Cap-Haitien only if they believe they can reach the airport safely.
“We cannot provide overland travel from other parts of Haiti to Cap-Haitien,” the statement reads. “We continue to work on options for departures out of Port-au-Prince and will let you know about them as soon as we are able to safely and securely arrange them.”
It also states that U.S. citizens who choose to depart using federal government-backed flights have to sign a statement agreeing to pay the U.S. government back for the flight’s cost.
“The security situation in Haiti is unpredictable and dangerous. Travel within Haiti is conducted at your own risk. The U.S. government cannot guarantee your safety traveling to airports, borders, or during any onward travel,” the embassy warned on March 16. “You should consider your personal security situation before traveling anywhere in Haiti. Only attempt to depart Haiti or travel within Haiti if you believe it is safe for you to do so.”
The statement from the embassy comes about two weeks after U.S. military officials confirmed that it evacuated some embassy personnel in the country. Weeks before that, Haiti declared a state of emergency because of escalating violence from armed gangs while then-Prime Minister Ariel Henry was in Nairobi, Kenya, seeking a deal for a long-delayed U.N.-backed security mission. He resigned last week.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said a transition council would be named, after which Mr. Henry would step down.
“This is never going to be smooth and never going to be linear,” Mr. Blinken told reporters during a visit to Austria. “So that’s a work in progress, but we’ve seen that move forward.”
U.S. aid chief Samantha Power announced $25 million in humanitarian assistance for Haiti on March 15 to cover food, essential relief supplies, relocation support, and emergency health care. That was on top of the $33 million announced on March 11.
But some analysts say the transition plan isn’t working.
“It’s starting off very, very badly,” Frederic Boisrond, a sociologist at McGill University, told Radio-Canada, pointing to the dissent within the groups proposed for the transition council by leaders in Jamaica, reported Reuters.
“Elections are very long-term prospect.”
He pointed to the need to, after restoring security, recreate an electoral roll and reappoint mayors, senators, and deputies.
“This is a huge machine to reinstall. Haiti is in year zero of democracy,” Mr. Boisrond said.
Over the weekend, a powerful gang leader in Haiti, Jimmy “Barbecue” Cherizier, issued a threatening message aimed at political leaders who would participate in a planned transition council, as fires broke out amid a fresh surge of violence in the Caribbean nation’s capital.
“Don’t you have any shame?” said Mr. Cherizier, directing his remarks at politicians who he said were looking to join the council. “You have taken the country where it is today. You have no idea what will happen.
Jimmy "Barbecue" Cherizier, leader of the "G9" coalition of gangs in the metropolitan area of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, looks on after speaking to members of the media on Oct. 26, 2021. (Ralph Tedy Erol/Reuters)“I'll know if your kids are in Haiti, if your wives are in Haiti ... if your husbands are in Haiti. If you’re gonna run the country, all your family ought to be there.”
In his remarks, Mr. Cherizier said the resignation of Mr. Henry was only “a first step in the battle” for the island nation of about 11 million.
Nearby countries have bolstered their border security and withdrawn staff from embassies, while plans to send a long-awaited international security force remain uncertain, Reuters reported.
Reuters contributed to this report.
Authored by Matthew Lysiak via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),
Crime and violence in New York City’s subway system have spiraled out of control and are “significantly higher” than the agency’s official numbers have publicly indicated, according to a New York Police Department (NYPD) source.
The official number of arrests made in the city’s subway system rose by 45 percent this year, with more than 3,000 arrests made underground in the first two months of the year, many of them of repeat offenders, according to figures released by the NYPD Transit Bureau. However, the publicly released data only scratch the surface of the amount of crime in the nation’s largest transit system, a law enforcement source told The Epoch Times.
“The numbers they are putting out are a complete joke and everyone knows it,” the source, who requested anonymity out of fear of retribution, said. “The sense of lawlessness (on the subway) is so bad that unless you have personal experience in the system, especially at night, it is impossible to understand.
“It’s like the Wild West.”
NYPD officers have also been incentivized to not report minor offenses in an effort to keep the numbers as low as possible, according to the source, who said pressure has come from higher-ups to maintain the narrative that crime has plateaued or is going down.
However, not even the city’s own agencies can agree on how much crime is occurring in the subway system. After Transit released figures showing that violent subway crimes went up by 13 percent this year, the mayor’s office quickly pushed back, disputing the numbers released by the agency and claiming that crime actually dropped last month.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams, a former police chief, said that “overall crime is down.”
However, a “significant majority” of the crimes that do occur on the subway go unreported by the victims, according to the source.
“People understand that the majority of those who commit larceny or assaults are never going to be apprehended, so why go through the trouble of making a report?” the source said.
The mayor’s office did not respond to a request for comment by press time.
The topic of commuter safety has risen to the forefront of the national dialogue after several recent high-profile crimes in New York’s subway system, including a shooting caught on film at the Hoyt-Schermerhorn station in Brooklyn on March 14 during a rush-hour commute.
The crime spree provoked New York Gov. Kathy Hochul to order 750 New York National Guard troops and 250 New York State Police troopers be deployed into the subway system to conduct bag searches and combat the surge in crime. The new deployment is in addition to the 1,000 New York City police officers who were ordered to patrol subway lines and do security checks on bags.
“Since taking office, I have been laser-focused on driving down subway crime and protecting New Yorkers,” Mrs. Hochul told reporters at the March 6 news conference. “I am sending a message to all New Yorkers: I will not stop working to keep you safe and restore your peace of mind whenever you walk through those turnstiles.”
“No one heading to their job, or to visit family, or to go to a doctor’s appointment should worry that the person sitting next to them possesses a deadly weapon.”
Morale among NYPD officers is at an all-time low as crime and police resignations have been on the upswing, according to officials.
In recent years, an increasing number of New Yorkers, including police, have been assaulted. From Jan. 1 to March 31, 2023, citywide, 1,251 on- and off-duty police were assaulted, compared with 949 in the first quarter of 2022, according to NYPD crime statistics.
A total of 2,516 officers resigned from the department in 2023, according to police pension data previously obtained by The Epoch Times. It is the fourth most in the past decade and 43 percent more than the 1,750 who resigned their positions in 2018. Further, the data show that the number of officers quitting before they reach the 20 years required to receive their full pensions has increased by 104 percent since 2020.
In January, officers’ jobs became more difficult after the New York City Council pushed through controversial legislation dubbed the “How Many Stops Act,” which requires police to officially document any encounter they have with the public, including logging the race, gender, and age of any person to whom they speak.
The recent exodus comes on top of years of officer attrition, eroding the ability of the nation’s largest police force to serve and protect to dangerous levels, according to Police Benevolent Association President Patrick Hendry.
“This is truly a disaster for every New Yorker who cares about safe streets,” Mr. Hendry previously told The Epoch Times. “Cops are already stretched to our breaking point, and these cuts will return us to staffing levels we haven’t seen since the crime epidemic of the ’80s and ’90s.”
How can Joe Biden really be a “devout Catholic” when he is totally at odds with the Catholic Church’s important pro-life teachings?
That’s a pretty significant question on the minds of many Americans who apparently don’t think Biden is a serious Catholic.
In fact, according to a recent poll conducted by Pew Research, a significant portion of the American population remains unconvinced by Biden’s portrayal of himself as a devout Catholic.
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In late February, the survey revealed that only 13% of Americans view Biden as “very religious,” while 41% perceive him as “somewhat religious.” Meanwhile, a substantial 44% of respondents categorized him as “not at all” or “not too religious.”
These findings stand in contrast to Biden’s own characterization of himself as a committed Catholic who regularly attends church services. The White House has also used the term “devout Catholic” to defend Biden’s radical pro-abortion views.
The post Americans Say Pro-Abortion Joe Biden is Not Really a “Devout Catholic” appeared first on LifeNews.com.