Cross-Examination

• Biden’s Hunter trouble continues: And here we thought all whistleblowers were heroes. Dr. Gal Luft, a 57-year-old Israeli American who back in 2019 blew the whistle on Hunter Biden, has been indicted by the Justice Department. Luft claimed to have provided the FBI with damning information about the Biden family’s bribery scheme and ties to the Chinese military. Among the charges Biden’s DOJ has raised against Luft is failure to register as a foreign agent — the same violation as Hunter Biden, though of course he has not been charged. Speaking of Hunter’s violations, the federal prosecutor who was investigating Joe’s son, Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss, denies that he was blocked by Attorney General Merrick Garland from raising charges against Hunter. Weiss’s denial runs counter to IRS whistleblower Gary Shapely’s claim that Weiss told him he had been denied special counsel status. So why was Hunter not charged with failure to register as a foreign agent?

• Bud Light boycott still going strong: Dylan Mulvany may prove to be the iceberg to Bud Light’s Titanic. The formerly best-selling beer in America is seeing its sales continue to sink, now down nearly 28% from this same time last year. Bud Light now doesn’t even make the top 10 list of best-selling beers in America. But it’s not just Bud Light that’s sinking; other beverages of parent company Anheuser-Busch are taking a hit as well. Michelob Ultra sales fell 4.3% from this week last year, and Busch Light is down 8.5%. Consultant Bump Williams noted that this is especially bad news for the beer company: “Budweiser trends have been slipping for a very long time, but it’s the Michelob Ultra negative numbers and now Busch Light negative trends that are most alarming to me.” He added, “They were very healthy prior to April 1.”

• Turkey concedes on Sweden in NATO: Sweden will soon be joining NATO as the final roadblock to membership was removed Monday. Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan agreed to end his nation’s hold against Sweden over his claim that the Nordic nation had not done enough against members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party, which Turkey views as terrorists. Hungary, which has also been a holdout against Sweden’s NATO entry, signaled that it would follow Turkey’s lead. Some believe that the real reason for Turkey’s holdout was to leverage the Biden administration over the sale of F-16 fighters. Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky blasted Biden over his recent rejection of any notion of Ukraine membership in NATO.

• Delta bans TikTok, warns of China data grab: Employees working for Delta Airlines will no longer be permitted to use the popular Chinese-owned social media app TikTok on any devices that connect to company-owned systems. The reason for the ban has everything to do with concern over Beijing’s use of the app to suck up gobs of data. This should come as no surprise since Chinese President Xi Jinping expressly stated his mass data-collecting strategy when he took office back in 2013. “The vast ocean of data, just like oil resources during industrialization, contains immense productive power and opportunities,” Xi explained. “Whoever controls big data technologies will control the resources for development and have the upper hand.” Now, Delta is just the latest American company to act to prevent more of its data from being sucked up by China’s social-media-based espionage efforts.

• Make Fauci pay: Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee sent a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra observing that 13 NIH officials, including the now-retired Dr. Anthony Fauci, were not formally appointed to their positions as of December 2021, and therefore should not have been paid. The letter notes that the law “requires the Secretary of HHS to reappoint NIH IC [institute and center] directors, including those who were serving at the time of the law’s enactment when their five-year terms expired on December 12, 2021.” The problem is, “The failure to reappoint the above NIH IC directors jeopardizes the legal validity of more than $25 billion in federal biomedical research grants made in 2022 alone.” If these NIH officials accepted a federal salary while knowing that they had not been reappointed, then according to Robert Moffit, a former senior official at HHS, “they would be required to reimburse the federal government for their salaries, and the grants would at least be subject to litigation from competitors in the research community who lost grant opportunities in a lawful process.” Fauci “earned” $434,312 in his last year at NIH.

• GDP malaise: India poised to pass U.S.: Last Thursday, Joe Biden touted his economic agenda: “I’m not here to declare victory on the economy. I’m here to say we have a plan that’s turning things around quickly.” Well, talking is one thing, but Americans have been experiencing a much different reality. To wit, a recent forecast from Goldman Sachs Research indicates that if current trends continue, the U.S. economy will fall to third place in the world behind China and India by 2075. This is due to India’s expected GDP growth reaching $52.5 trillion by 2075, over $1 trillion more than the U.S. India is currently the fifth-largest economy with a GDP of $3.73 trillion, while the U.S. is number one with a GDP of $26.85 trillion. If Bidenomics continues, the gap will narrow more quickly.

Headlines

• Federal debt explodes by $1 trillion in five weeks since deal suspending limit became law (Fox News)

• Republicans roll out new national voting law, warn Americans to watch out for Democrat deception (Fox News)

• Axios explains that Joe Biden screaming at his staff is a sign of respect (National Review)

• Judge nixes Biden request that would allow contact with social media companies (Daily Wire)

• Nearly 40% of U.S. attack submarines are out of commission for repairs (Bloomberg)

• DOD destroys last chemical weapons in arsenal (Defense.gov)

• Marine Corps is without confirmed leader for first time in 164 years (Fox News)

• John Kerry: The problem with war in Ukraine is it’s contributing to climate change (Daily Wire)

• The media says “Sound of Freedom” is based on QAnon conspiracies (Not the Bee)

• UN report says anti-LGBT religious beliefs not protected human rights (Christian Post)

• Good news: Kansas judge orders Kelly administration to stop allowing gender changes on driver’s licenses (Kansas City Star)

• Study points to worse mental health outcomes for women who have abortions versus giving birth (Washington Times)

• Chicago suburb starts paying reparations (Hot Air)

• Gavin Newsom watches Fox News “every night” but urges Dems not to appear on the network (National Review)

• Satire: Hollywood confused by new movie that depicts child sex trafficking as bad (Babylon Bee)

• Satire: Democrats conduct investigation to see if Constitution played a role in recent Supreme Court decisions (Genesius Times)

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