Important Takeaways:
- A significant earthquake just hit the Los Angeles area, striking two miles southwest of Pasadena, California.
- According to the U.S. Geological Survey, the earthquake was magnitude 4.4 and felt through the nearby counties.
- The tectonic plate responsible for the LA quake is the same one responsible for the Japan quake last Thursday, sparking fears of a ‘megaquake.’
- Emergency response groups have warned residents to “be prepared for aftershocks.” The quake caused no injuries or major damage, and the National Weather Service said a tsunami was not expected.
- The quake comes less than a week after a 5.2 magnitude temblor hit southern California and was also widely felt in Los Angeles.
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Important Takeaways:
- The U.S. economy has remained remarkably strong even amid persistent inflation and high interest rates.
- And yet, 59% of Americans falsely believe that the U.S. is currently in a recession, according to a recent survey of 2,000 adults by Affirm in June.
- Citing higher costs and difficulty making ends meet, most respondents said they think a recession started roughly 15 months ago, in March 2023, and could last until July 2025, Affirm found.
- Still, regardless of the country’s economic standing, many Americans are struggling in the face of sky-high prices for everyday items, and most have exhausted their savings and are now leaning on credit cards to make ends meet.
- Economists have wrestled with the growing disconnect between how the economy is doing and how people feel about their financial standing.
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Important Takeaways:
- “The Council” and everyone and everything that emanates from them, has controlled the United States for the past fifty years for the purpose of extracting our nation’s wealth.
- They use the tools of indictments, obstruction, and government agencies they have weaponized to attack their enemies under false color of law. They alone select who will be winners and losers in politics, business, the economy, media, elections, education, and do so with complete amorality.
- The Council is an “untouchable,” legislatively codified, sui generis[1] organization with tentacles embedded in every government agency and branch of government except for the Supreme Court of the United States.
- From their perspective, they own the United States of America. It is “theirs,” and “they” are its self-appointed stewards. Anyone who is “not them” are “useful idiots,” “useful innocents,” or human chattel to be discarded to necro-politics.[2] The rest of us are expendable “carbon units” assigned positive and negative values depending on our relative usefulness to them. This is their language.
- To this end, “The Council,” in addition to controlling weaponized government agencies through the seventy-four (74) Inspectors General embedded in government agencies, controls a Political Arm, an Intelligence Arm, an Infiltration Arm, a Business Arm, a Propaganda Arm, and an Entertainment Arm.
- “The Council” aka “CIGIE” aka “Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency”
- Every “investigation” of public official malfeasance and corruption falls within the realm of their purview. They unilaterally decide the trajectory of “justice” in the United States, and hence, who is “punished” and who is not. Any appointed or elected public official – including the President of the United States – is ripe for their “investigation,” isolation, smearing, persecution in the guise of prosecution, and destruction at their whim.
- “The Council’s” “Political Arm” are those politicians selected, installed, and protected – by “The Council” – to do their bidding and implement their directives and policy. In return for these politicians’ fealty and submission, they indirectly wield the power of “The Council” with complete immunity from laws and the Constitution. “The Council” is solely responsible for investigating crimes, or obstructing investigations and attacking and disposing of anyone who might attempt to hold them, and their agents, accountable. All federal “whistleblowers” must, as a matter of law, report to their respective Inspectors General, and defacto “The Council.”
- [The depth of this article is longer than what could be posted. To learn more of the Who’s Who follow the link below]
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Important Takeaways:
- Los Angeles earthquake follows cluster of California temblors: ‘Almost don’t believe it’
- A magnitude 4.4 earthquake rumbled underneath Los Angeles on Monday, less than a week after a bigger one jolted much of Southern California.
- The U.S. Geological Survey placed the epicenter of Monday’s quake near the Highland Park neighborhood in the city’s northeast and three miles from Pasadena, California, site of the New Year’s Day Rose Parade. The tremor, which struck about 12:20 p.m. PT, was felt as far north as Bakersfield, California, and further south in San Diego, both more than 100 miles from Los Angeles.
- “No significant infra/structure damage or injuries have been noted within the city”, the Los Angeles Fire Department said after conducting a survey.
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Important Takeaways:
- One of America’s biggest flooring suppliers has filed for bankruptcy – the latest in a long line of retailers this year to face money problems.
- LL Flooring will shut 94 of its 442 stores, which are spread out across 47 states, to cut costs and make the company attractive to a buyer.
- The retailer, which specializes in hardwood flooring, has faced falling sales over the past year as families cut back on remodeling their homes.
- As well as cutting costs under the Chapter 11 bankruptcy, bosses at LL Flooring are talking to several potential buyers for the 30-year-old company.
- Bosses say they expect the company will survive and will meet all existing orders while it reorganizes.
- LL Flooring is the latest to shutter stores this year, with the US on course to lose nearly 8,000 physical locations by the end of 2024.
- Macy’s is closing 150 shops – a third of its total – while Dollar Tree is shutting 1,000 and drug store Rite Aid will close almost 800.
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Important Takeaways:
- Ukraine’s shock incursion across the Russian border into Kursk Oblast may force important strategic decisions on Moscow as President Vladimir Putin’s troops are taken as prisoners of war and supply lines are threatened. The Ukrainian attack took Russian forces by surprise, according to one U.S. official who was not authorized to speak publicly.
- According to the Institute for the Study of War, Ukraine’s cross-border gambit has allowed Kyiv to seize the battlefield initiative, long held by Russian forces who were able to dictate the time and place of fighting and force Ukrainian troops to expend manpower and equipment on defensive operations.
- “It’s been a very real success,” former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine John Herbst, now a senior director at the Atlantic Council, told USA TODAY. “The latest data, not confirmed, says they’ve taken as much as 750 square kilometers and may have gone as far as 35 kilometers from the border.”
- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy acknowledged the operation in a post Saturday to X, formerly Twitter, describing a push to drive the war into “the aggressor’s territory.” Zelenskyy thanked international partners for implementing sanctions against Russia and the United States for new defense aid, including Stinger missiles, HIMARS mobile artillery ammunition and 155mm artillery shells.
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Important Takeaways:
- Israel is preparing for a large-scale military attack from Iran, defense minister Yoav Gallant, has told his US counterpart.
- It comes as the US defense secretary, Lloyd Austin, has ordered a nuclear-powered guided-missile submarine to the Middle East and is telling the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier strike group to sail more quickly to the area, as well
- The US and other allies continue to push for Israel and Hamas to agree to a ceasefire agreement over the war in Gaza that could help calm soaring tensions in the region.
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Important Takeaways:
- 5.4-magnitude earthquake in Syria and Lebanon felt by northern Israel residents
- Arabic media says a 5.4-magnitude earthquake just shook Lebanon and Syria, with the epicenter being in the latter country.
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Important Takeaways:
- The nation’s disaster agency is being stretched to the limit by a spate of storms and wildfires so far in 2024, and the busiest time of year for the Federal Emergency Management Agency is just beginning.
- FEMA issued 100 disaster and emergency declarations — for 58 severe storms and flooding events and 42 fires — through the first week of August, according to the agency’s database. That is nearly as many as all of last year (114) and well past the 90 declarations of disasters and fire emergencies the agency issued in 2022.
- It is still short of the all-time high of 315 declarations issued by FEMA in 2020, but with the expected active hurricane season ahead and the threat of wildfires continuing in the West, that record isn’t out of reach.
- The flurry of emergency responses comes as FEMA shifts into what is known as “immediate needs funding” mode, in which new obligations not necessary for lifesaving and life-sustaining activities will be paused, the agency announced on Aug. 7.
- And last week the Department of Energy announced it will invest $2.2 billion in projects to make the electrical grid more resilient.
- Meantime, FEMA officials are anxiously waiting for Congress to return in September and consider providing additional disaster aid, including $9 billion for FEMA that was part of an administration request last October.
- FEMA has said the deficit in its disaster relief fund could reach $6 billion by Sept. 30, the end of the current fiscal year.
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Important Takeaways:
- Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told his Iranian counterpart Ali Bagheri Kani on Sunday that the Chinese Communist Party supports Iran “defending its sovereignty, security and national dignity” prior to an expected Iranian attack on Israel.
- In the context of highly elevated tensions between Israel and Iran, exacerbated by Iran’s belligerent remarks, the Chinese government moved to lend its support to the world’s premier sponsor of terrorism, which is believed to spend $100 million a year on Palestinian terrorists such as Hamas.
- “China supports Iran in defending its sovereignty, security and national dignity in accordance with the law, and supports the Iranian side in its efforts to maintain regional peace and stability,” Wang reportedly told Bagheri, according to the Chinese government newspaper Global Times.
- “Wang said that China has always upheld justice in Middle East affairs and supported all parties in safeguarding their legitimate rights and interests,” the newspaper continued, “especially in supporting the restoration of the legitimate national rights of the Palestinians.”
- On Haniyeh’s killing, Wang reportedly said that China “firmly opposes and strongly condemns the act of assassination and considers it a serious violation of the basic norms of international relations.”
- Wang further described the incident with Haniyeh as “a grave infringement on Iran’s sovereignty, security and dignity, and a direct undermining of the cease-fire negotiation process in Gaza, as well as an impact on regional peace and stability.”
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