Fewer than 10% ‘Truly Independent’ and ‘Much Less Likely’ to Even Vote:
All the media and political hype over the importance of “independent voters” appears to overshadow the truth about the group — less than 10 percent of Americans are truly independent.And according to a new survey, most of them don’t register to vote and even fewer actually vote. Instead, many of the 38 percent of Americans who describe themselves as “independent” lean toward one party or the other, according to Pew Research Center.
“Independents often are portrayed as political free agents with the potential to alleviate the nation’s rigid partisan divisions. Yet the reality is that most independents are not all that ‘independent’ politically,” said the latest Pew survey. “And the small share of Americans who are truly independent — less than 10 percent of the public has no partisan leaning — stand out for their low level of interest in politics,” said Pew.
How low? Here’s what the survey analysis said: “Those who do not lean toward a party — a group that consistently expresses less interest in politics than partisan leaners — were less likely to say they had registered to vote and much less likely to say they voted. In fact, just a third said they voted in the midterms.”
*7 Years Ago US Handed Him Over to Iraqis; Now Hezbollah Terrorist With US Blood on His Hands Heads Terror Cell in Syria:
Seven years after the Obama administration controversially handed over to Iraqi custody a veteran Hezbollah terrorist accused of executing Americans – only to see him released a year later – Israel says the wanted man now heads a Syria-based terror cell near its northern border. According to the Israeli Defense Forces Ali Musa Daqduq, a Lebanesenational, heads a terror cell comprised of Syrians, based on the Syrian side of the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights.
Israel vowed to prevent Iran and its Hezbollah proxy from operating against Israel from Syrian soil. In New York, its ambassador warned U.N. Security Council members that Israel “will not ignore the conversion of Syria and Lebanon to a military front against us and will act with force against the aggression from Tehran.” Daqduq, who once served as a bodyguard to Hezbollah chief Hasan Nasrallah, was deployed to Iraq in 2005 as part of an Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Qods Force operation to work with Iraqi Shi’ite militia fighting U.S. troops.
*Coca-Cola Admits It Produces 3 Million Tons of Plastic Packaging Every Year:
Coca-Cola has admitted that it produces a mind-boggling 3 million metric tons (3.3 million tons) of plastic packaging a year—the equivalent to 200,000 bottles every minute. The beverage company has previously refused to disclose the information, but has now provided the data to activist Ellen MacArthur, who is urging companies and governments to do more to prevent plastic pollution. The figures didn’t break down exactly how the plastic was used, but The Guardian reports the volume translates to 108 billion 500ml PET plastic bottles bottles a year, more than one-fifth of the entire world’s PET bottle output, which is roughly 500 billion a year.
In its reports published Thursday, the Ellen MacArthur Foundation said: “The decision by more than 30 companies to publicly disclose their annual plastic packaging volumes in the report is an important step toward greater transparency.”
*FBI: 2nd Highest Number of Gun Transactions Processed Through NICS System in 2018:
The calendar year of 2018 had the second highest number of gun transactions on record, and the number of gun background checks this past Black Friday was among the highest volume days on record with more than 182,000 transactions, an FBIofficial told a House Appropriations subcommittee on Tuesday. During her opening statement, Christine Halvorsen, acting assistant director of the FBI’s criminal justice information services division, said that since 2010, the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) experienced “substantial increases in the volume of background checks.”
“This past Black Friday was among the highest volume days in the NICS history. In that one day, the NICS processed over 182,000 transactions. In calendar year (CY) 2018, the NICS processed 26.2 million transactions with only CY 2016 exceeding that volume with 27.5 million transactions,” Halvorsen wrote in her written testimony to the Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies. NICS is a computerized system used to determine whether someone is disqualified from buying or owning a firearm.
*FCC Should Limit Locals from Piling Taxes and Fees onto Cable Bills:
If you “cut the cord” and switch from cable TV to streaming services, you will probably notice that one big difference in price happens because that long section of your bill with taxes and fees is gone completely or dramatically slimmed down. And as more customers go in that direction and competition intensifies on the incumbent franchised cable companies, they are justifiably calling foul on the often outrageous demands local governments place on them that result in more taxes and fees on your bill.
To begin with, there is the maximum five percent franchise fee that localities are allowed to charge on cable service under the Federal Cable Act. That places cable at a disadvantage versus its video competitors, but it’s authorized by law. That five percent fee alone delivers over $3 billion a year to local governments. Unsatisfied with that haul, however, local governments have begun concocting a wide variety of additional taxes, fees, and mandates that go on top of and violate the five percent federal cap.
*Study: More than 7-in-10 California Immigrant Households Are on Welfare:
More than 7-in-10 households headed by immigrants in the state of California are on taxpayer-funded welfare, a new study reveals. The latest Census Bureau data analyzed by the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) finds that about 72 percent of households headed by noncitizens and immigrants use one or more forms of taxpayer-funded welfare programs in California — the number one immigrant-receiving state in the U.S.
Meanwhile, only about 35 percent of households headed by native-born Americans use welfare in California. All four states with the largest foreign-born populations, including California, have extremely high use of welfare by immigrant households. In Texas, for example, nearly 70 percent of households headed by immigrants use taxpayer-funded welfare. Meanwhile, only about 35 percent of native-born households in Texas are on welfare.
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*EXAMINER–INVESTIGATES:
On the first night of sleeping in a new place, one hemisphere of our brain remains more active than the other during sleep. Scientists believe this “vigilant mode” allows us to respond more quickly to unfamiliar, potentially danger-signaling sounds.
*EXAMINER–INVESTIGATES:
Trump supporters who want to grab dinner but are terrified of getting punched by an antifascist “antifa” activist can pull up the app, “63red Safe,” and find a list of Trump-friendly businesses—or at least ones that don’t discriminate against conservatives. “I’m trying to position it as an everyday ‘where can I go eat safely’ app,” Scott Wallace, the app’s founder, told The Daily Beast. 63red Safe works like a conservative Yelp. Instead of reviewing the lighting and ambience, though, the site’s users rate restaurants and other businesses on a series of four questions, including whether the restaurant’s owners make political social media posts and whether they allow customers to carry weapons.
*EXAMINER–VIDEO LINK:
Welcome to Episode # 1 of the revealing TV show “Without Notes” with Eliad Moreh-Rosenberg, curator of the Holocaust Museum in Israel – Episode 1: The Early Years: https://youtu.be/U2TG3r2eF_c
*EXAMINER–SPOTLIGHT:
Chief Zabu, A “Trump” Political Satire Film Thirty Years in the Making
In 1986, the film “Chief Zabu” was shot. This “lost indie treasure” features a New York real estate developer who dreams of being loved, respected and having political power. The “Trumpian character” is played by legendary actor Allen Garfield (The Conversation, Nashville and The Cotton Club, just to name a few). Yet, due to a series of snafus that rival Chief Zabu’s madcap plot (culminating with its distributor going into bankruptcy a week before the film’s Los Angelespremiere), the movie never got released and its negative was lost.
Cut to thirty years later, inspired by the candidacy of Donald Trump, writer-directors Zack Norman and Neil Cohen found their negative, re-cut it, presented their film to festival audiences and officially qualified for nomination to the 2016 Academy Awards.
In order to build the Zabu legend, starting in September 2019, the filmmakers and star will be traveling to 15 major cities for live screening presentations at specialty venues, comedy clubs or in one of the theaters the movie will be opening a week or ten days later. This Interactive Audience Event will include targeted PR and extensive social media coverage beginning three weeks prior to each specific theatrical opening, thereby promoting Chief Zabu and its film debut in all major markets. The aim is to indelibly brand Chief Zabu across the country and eventually throughout the world.
Website: https://www.chiefzabu.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/chiefzabu?lang=en
IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0094859/
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*EXAMINER–COMMENTARY by Maureen Dowd:
Donald Trump specializes in spectacular breakups. First there was Ivana. Then there was Marla. Now comes trouble in paradise with Kim.
Last fall, Trump cooed that the North Korean dictator wrote him “beautiful letters” and “we fell in love,” but then the president canceled their lunch date following their disappointing rendezvous in Hanoi. Yet all the crazy tabloid splits and international spats seem pallid in comparison to the pathetic spectacle in Congress: a heartbroken ex publicly and bitterly processing his relationship with Trump.
This time, it wasn’t just lust, betrayal and secrets splayed across Page Six. This time, it was in Congress, part of an investigation that could lead to legal jeopardy for the Trumps or impeachment for the president.
*EXAMINER–COMMENTARY by Arthur Brooks:
People often say that our problem in America today is incivility or intolerance. This is incorrect. Motive attribution asymmetry leads to something far worse: contempt, which is a noxious brew of anger and disgust. And not just contempt for other people’s ideas, but also for other people. In the words of the philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, contempt is “the unsullied conviction of the worthlessness of another.”
The sources of motive attribution asymmetry are easy to identify: divisive politicians, screaming heads on television, hateful columnists, angry campus activists and seemingly everything on the contempt machines of social media. This “outrage industrial complex” works by catering to just one ideological side, creating a species of addiction by feeding our desire to believe that we are completely right and that the other side is made up of knaves and fools. It strokes our own biases while affirming our worst assumptions about those who disagree with us.
*EXAMINER–A DIFFERENT VIEW:….
