News From Around the Web
#10 Overlooking Big Pharma, Garland’s DOJ Announces Health Care Fraud Enforcement Action - Tracy Beanz and Michelle Edwards for The HighWire, and OIG at HHS, and Epoch Times on X
In late June, the U.S. Department of Justice announced the 2024 National Health Care Fraud Enforcement Action, which recently indicted numerous doctors, nurse practitioners, and other licensed medical professionals in 32 federal districts across the country for allegedly participating in health care fraud schemes involving roughly $2.75 billion in intended losses and $1.6 billion in actual losses. In introducing its new 2024 Health Care Fraud Unit, the Justice Department noted that “health care fraud is a crime that impacts every American,” adding that “when health care providers and executives place greed above patients’ needs, it increases the cost of care for all Americans.”#9 The Fraud Of ‘Monetary Policy’ (Mortgage Rates Rising With Magical Fed Money Printing) - Anthony B. Sanders Confounded Interest, and WPORTBILL on X
MMT is mostly magic! The Federal Reserve relies on “The Power of Magic” to fool people. For example, the massive increase in money printing following Covid and Biden’s disastrous economic policies (or FOLLICIES).Modern monetary theory (MMT) is not convincing to most trained economists of various schools of thought. This causes many to balk at MMT and mock it, some of which is warranted as a reductio ad absurdum, especially given some of MMT’s more outlandish claims. In fact, my own thesis was an Austrian critique of MMT. But there is also a fair amount of hypocrisy in the non-Austrian (e.g., mainstream, Keynesian, monetarist) critiques of MMT by mainstream economists. The truth is that most, if not all, of these economists share the same faulty presuppositions regarding what is euphemistically called “monetary policy.” The difference between mainstream and MMT economists is usually one of degree, not of kind...
#8 FBI Targeted Pro-life Americans, Now It’s Eliminating Conservative Agents - Joshua Mercer for Life News and Steve Ertelt on X
Per the FBI whistleblower, the Bureau’s “Security Division has been suspending or revoking clearances for employees whose political affiliation or COVID-19 vaccination status are suspect,” The New York Post reported Tuesday. The Post identified the whistleblower as “a registered Democrat” who had once worked in the Security Division. The agent disclosed that “if an FBI employee fit a certain profile as a political conservative, they were viewed [by the Security Division] as security concerns and unworthy to work at the FBI.” The Post’s report highlighted the example of former FBI Staff Operations Specialist (SOS) Marcus Allen, who “was suspended without pay for more than two years after he told supervisors he would not take the COVID-19 vaccine shot.”
#7 Large Study Links Daily Multivitamin Use to Increased Mortality Risk - Sheramy Tsai for Epoch Health, and Aldhissla, and MR Michael Robertson on X
A comprehensive study of healthy U.S. adults found that daily multivitamin use does not promote a longer life and is linked to a 4 percent higher risk of mortality.
Researchers from the National Cancer Institute conducted the study, published on June 26 in JAMA Network Open. The study challenges the common perception that multivitamins improve health and longevity. The findings come as nearly one in three U.S. adults regularly takes multivitamins, often expecting to prevent chronic diseases and extend life...
#6 ‘Victory Only Postponed’ — Le Pen Hails ‘Rising Tide’ as Her National Rally Wins Most Seats in History of Party - Kurt Zindulka for Breitbart, and Cillian on X
Marine Le Pen celebrated the “rising tide” of populism in France, declaring that victory for her National Rally is “only postponed” after winning the most seats in the National Assembly in the history of her anti-mass migration party on Sunday. A backroom deal between President Emmanuel Macron and the far-left New Popular Front group of communists, environmentalists, and socialists to tactically stand down in selective races and therefore artificially boost support for leftist or liberal candidates depending on the district was effective in blocking a majority for the Le Pen party in the parliament...
#5 Student Loan Debt Quadrupled in Past 20 Years: Report - Elaine Mallon for Washington Examiner, and Stan Smith on X
Student loan debt has skyrocketed since 2003 by 430% as household debt has reached historic highs in the last 20 years. Student loan debt is now tied with automobile loan debt, consisting of 10% of overall household debt. Auto and mortgage debt have outpaced inflation, while credit card debt has grown by 33%, though from 2010 to 2016, it was even lower than in 2003. The report by the Kaplan Group found that Generation X on average possesses the highest amount of student loan debt, at $44,290, and has the largest number of federal loan borrowers, at 21.2 million. With the oldest members of Gen X being 59 years old, there is great concern about the generation’s ability to save for retirement due to the hefty student loan debt...
#4 Newsom's California: Delivery Drivers Now Being Accompanied By Armed Guards Due To "Crime Concerns" - Tyler Durden ZeroHedge, and Global Dissident on X
Things have gotten so utopian in the state of California, delivery drivers are being accompanied by armed guards due to "crime concerns" while out making deliveries. One company, Core Mart, has started hiring the guards to escort its drivers. Which means that somewhere, in a board room, it likely made more financial sense to pay for all new security staff than it did to continue to allow drivers to get robbed (and inventory lost) as was happening prior. California: sounds like a wonderful place to do business. San Jose police reported a slight uptick in delivery truck robberies two years ago, but no recent surge has been observed, NBC Bay Area reported.
#3 South Dakota Gov. Noem’s Official Social Media Accounts Seem to Disappear Without Explanation - The Associated Press and George on X
Longstanding official social media accounts belonging to South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem appear to have been deleted without explanation. The accounts on Facebook, Instagram, and X, the site formerly known as Twitter, had reached hundreds of thousands of followers. As of Monday, links to them on the governor’s official website led to pages that said the accounts were no longer active.A fourth link from the governor’s website to her official YouTube page remained active, as did Noem’s personal accounts on Facebook, Instagram, and X. A new X account for the governor’s office was created this month and had just over 300 followers as of Monday morning, far fewer than the roughly half-million of her old account...
#2 Trump’s Narrowed His Veepstakes Down to Two Names - AJ McDougall for The Daily Beast and Carpe Donktum and The Nightly on X
With the Republican National Convention just days away, Donald Trump reportedly is down to two candidates to fill the second slot on his 2024 ticket. Sources told the New York Post on Monday that Trump’s pick for his vice president, “barring a last-minute surprise,” will be either Gov. Doug Burgum (R-ND) and Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH). The insiders added that Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) is not entirely out of the running, but is a longer shot. Although the three names at the top of Trump’s shortlist have long been known, the denizens of MAGA World continue to insist they aren’t sure which one he’ll tap, “with many believing the choice is still in flux,” the Associated Press reported Monday. One thing is for sure—the announcement will be made before July 15, the first day of the RNC’s gathering in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. “It could happen anytime this week,” senior advisor Jason Miller said in a Monday appearance on Fox News...#1 At Least 7 Dead and More Than 2M Without Power in Hurricane Beryl Aftermath - Patrick Smith for NBC News, and 10 Tampa Bay, Ted Cruz, and Hendrik R Hannes
At least six people have died in Texas and one in Louisiana from Hurricane Beryl, as a huge clean-up and restoration operation gets underway to reconnect 2.3 million energy customers who lost power during the storm's disastrous procession through the region. A 53-year-old man and a 74-year-old woman both died when trees fell onto their homes in separate incidents in Harris County, Texas, police said. Montgomery County Emergency Management confirmed the deaths of three people: a man in his 40s who was struck by a tree while operating a tractor, and two people whose bodies were found in a tent in a wooded area in Magnolia. Houston Police Department confirmed Monday that information security officer Russell Richardson, 54, “was caught in rising flood waters and tragically lost his life.”
And Now for Something Special 
A Breathtaking Swarm of 100 Million Butterflies - BBC Earth
Deep in the forests of Mexico, millions of monarch butterflies spend their winter sheltered from the cold. Once spring arrives, it is time for them to awaken and take to the skies, in what is truly an amazing spectacle.
