Meloni, forty-six, heads a right-wing coalition — comprising her Fratelli d’Italia party plus two junior partners, Matteo Salvini’s Lega and Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia — that won a hefty majority at September’s general election. In doing so, she became the first elected prime minister in Italy since 2011. None of the previous six were leaders of a party or coalition that won an election when appointed. Four were not even MPs.

“Meloni is now leader of the European right,” said Massimo Cacciari, a philosophy professor, former communist MP, ex-mayor of Venice and talkshow regular this week. “And the traditional European coalition of social democratic forces and popular-Catholic forces is losing water… Meloni and those around her will be able to move the axis of European politics at the next elections. That’s the strategy they’re pursuing.”

According to Foreign Policy, Brenton and Borell have been working "on a plan to use €500 million of EU money to expand arms production by financing factory expansion, eliminating supply bottlenecks and placing big orders to stimulate investment."

The president of the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin), Marcel Fratzscher, said earlier in February that since the start of the war in Ukraine, Germany has lost over $106.7 billion. Germany, according to Fratzscher, has been more severely impacted by the economic crisis because it is "extremely dependent on exports and global supply chains." Berlin also has a significant share of an energy-intensive industry that depends on increasing energy costs.

Previously, degree students from Arizona Christian University could perform their student teaching and practical coursework at the Washington Elementary School District's campuses, reported AZ Free News. At their February 23 meeting, board members joined Tamillia Valenzuela in expressing their opposition to having pro-family Christian teachers in the WESD, which serves students across 32 schools in the Phoenix and Glendale areas, and voted to dissolve the district's partnership with ACU.

During her campaign, she stated that she wanted to "promote fair representation... that reflects the diversity of our community." Evidently "fair representation" does not extend to Christians in her community. "While I full-heartedly believe in the religious freedom and people being able to practice whatever faith that they have, I had some concerns regarding looking at this particular institution," she said. "And I think it's a really good time for us to take a moment and really pause about where our values lie."

But last year they decided to go woke. The school’s administrators added language expressing how were an “affirming school” and “stand with LGBTQIA+ and believe in their holiness.” The decision-makers believed this would not be problematic. Immediately following the new language being added, multiple churches withdrew their support, cutting off 80% of the school’s funding.

Now they are no longer in operation.

The dramatic drop-off in donations came quickly. Soon after the new language appeared on the school’s website, eight churches withdrew their support. “We lost our network” of donors, Callaway-George told ABC News. “In December of 2021, right before we publicly supported the LGBTQ community, we raised $333,985. One year later, after we had posted on our website and made a stance, in December of 2022 we raised $14,809.

With a few clicks, this "co-appearance" or "correlation analysis" software can find anyone who has appeared on surveillance frames within a few minutes of the gray-haired male over the last month, strip out those who may have been near him a time or two, and zero in on a man who has appeared 14 times. The software can instantaneously mark potential interactions between the two men, now deemed likely associates, on a searchable calendar.

In the absence of national laws, many police departments and private companies have to weigh the balance of security and privacy on their own. "This is the Orwellian future come to life," said Senator Edward J Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat. "A deeply alarming surveillance state where you're tracked, marked and categorized for use by public- and private-sector entities — that you have no knowledge of."

The software could be abused to monitor personal and political associations, including with potential intimate partners, labor activists, anti-police groups or partisan rivals, Stanley warned.

According to a new study from the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air, China permitted 50 gigawatts of coal-fired electricity in 2022, up 50 percent from the year before. (A gigawatt is a billion watts, enough to power a few hundred thousand homes, depending on the weather.) And Semafor adds “all signs indicate that the surge will continue this year,” such that China will be building new coal plants, every two years, equivalent to existing US capacity.

The Chinese communists say they’re going to deal with climate change, on their own timetable. In 2021, maximum leader Xi Jinping said to the United Nations, “China will strive to peak carbon dioxide emissions before 2030.” Got that? He said they “will strive.” As in, "we’ll keep building more coal plants like crazy till 2030, and then we’ll 'strive' to stop. You trust us, right? Now, no more questions”.

Wormuth’s plan would involve sending more troops and advanced weapons into the region, including hypersonic missiles. She said the buildup would be an effort to deter war with China, although Beijing has been increasing its military activity in the region in response to US actions.

"If we got into a major war with China, the United States homeland would be at risk as well, with both kinetic attacks and non-kinetic attacks. Whether it’s cyberattacks on the power grids, or on pipelines, the United States Army, I have no doubt, will be called to provide defense support to civil authorities," she said.

When asked if the American public could sustain the level of casualties that would come with a war with China, she said they could, just "like we did in World War II." But both the US and China possess nuclear weapons, meaning a potential war could be catastrophic for the entire world. Wormuth is the latest US official to openly discuss the fact that the US is preparing for war with China.

There is much debate in America about the last few decades, and there is complaining that it is China that has gained the most from the interaction. Criteria may vary, but in general it is hard to disagree that Beijing has been the primary beneficiary – at least in terms of the transformation of the country and its place on the international stage. Deng Xiaoping’s strategy of quiet, gradual ascent was entirely in the Chinese spirit, and the result has undoubtedly been justified.

Be that as it may, a new era has dawned. China’s diplomatic revival is intended to demonstrate that Beijing is not afraid to play a role in world politics. The form of engagement so far bears the hallmarks of the previous period and of that very traditional approach – the sterile precision of the wording of Chinese peace proposals on the Ukraine issue is evidence of this.

It means China's military spending will grow at its fastest pace in four years and take up a larger share of its economy, marking the reversal of a two-decade trend which has seen the nation prioritize growth over its military capabilities.

Defense expenditure will increase by 7.2 percent in 2023 which works out as $224 billion - way ahead of the 5.7 percent increase in general public expenditure. The move will no doubt spook the US government which is concerned by Beijing's strategic intentions in the wake of rising tensions with Taiwan.

China has already established one foreign military base in the Horn of Africa nation of Djibouti and is refurbishing Cambodia´s Ream Naval Base that could give it at least a semi-permanent presence on the Gulf of Thailand facing the disputed South China Sea.

The premier stressed the commitment of the Chinese authorities “to take resolute steps to oppose ‘Taiwan independence’.” Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council responded to Li’s comments with a short statement, insisting that the island was not subordinate to Beijing, and urging China to “pragmatically handle cross-strait affairs with an attitude of rationality, equality and mutual respect.”

Chinese leader Xi Jinping said last year that Beijing would “continue to strive for peaceful reunification with Taiwan,” but added that it “will never promise to renounce the use of force, and we reserve the option of taking all measures necessary.”

The Asia Pacific with the exception of China increased emissions by 229 megatons between 2021 and 2022, far exceeding the 100 megaton increase in North America and canceling out the 138 megaton reduction in Europe. “Over half of the region’s increase in emissions came from coal-fired power generation,” the analysis said.

Chinese authorities approved 106 gigawatts of new coal power projects in 2022, more than quadrupling the 23 gigawatts approved in 2021 and sextupling the increases planned by the rest of the world combined, according to an analysis from the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air.

Skeptics of governments which encourage the renewable energy transition have observed that higher emissions from China, as well as India and developing countries in sub-Saharan Africa, are outpacing emissions declines in the West. Western nations have nevertheless advanced landmark climate bills in recent years to decrease their carbon emissions.

Some $369 billion in climate initiatives was likewise approved in the Inflation Reduction Act last year; President Joe Biden said that the legislation would make “the largest investment ever in combating the existential crisis of climate change” and create jobs through the manufacturing of “solar panels, wind turbines, and electric vehicles.”

China has meanwhile surpassed both the European Union and the US in terms of carbon emissions, according to data from the International Energy Agency. The largest share of new carbon emissions arose last year from the remainder of Asia, more than doubling the rise in emissions from the US and canceling out emissions reductions in Europe.

Moore observed that aggressive renewable energy policies enacted in recent years by American lawmakers, including the $369 billion in climate funds approved by the Inflation Reduction Act last year, are incapable of neutralizing the higher emissions from the developing world. “Two-thirds of all the carbon emissions in the world are in Asia,” Moore said. “We are a raindrop in an ocean as it relates to this, so we’re chasing policy that is only at the end of the day hurting the average American citizen.”

“Consistent and cheap energy is something that you obviously need. As it relates to energy in this country, we’re disarming ourselves unilaterally,” he commented. “All of this is just self-inflicted wounds that we have done to ourselves and tied our hands in our ability to be a net exporter and to support our allies. We are diminishing our own economic power and influence.”

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who is considered a close ally of Netanyahu, is also acting to shore up judicial reforms that have been likened to some of the reforms that he has instituted in his own country. The Israeli reforms aim to create stronger checks and balances to rein in courts that have become bastions of left-wing power, and which critics say have usurped the authority of the legislature and executive in recent years.

Many of these reforms simply reflect existing practices in the US and elsewhere. However, the Israeli left has launched a series of increasingly aggressive protests as it accuses Netanyahu of attempting to foment a “coup.”

EVs are built with slave labor. While gasoline is produced almost entirely from domestic supplies of oil, the lithium, cobalt, graphite, and rare earth minerals needed to make batteries mostly come from places such as China, Congo, Indonesia, Iran, and other countries that are noted for gross human rights violations, and are often mined and produced using forced and child labor. “The road many of these materials take to consumers is littered with human rights abuses,” says Human Rights Watch.

EVs aren’t “zero emissions” vehicles. All an EV does is shift the emissions elsewhere — namely, over to gigantic monopoly power companies that burn natural gas, coal, garbage or, horror of horrors, employ nuclear fission. Plus, making electric cars releases far more CO2 than is emitted in the production of conventional cars.

EVs are environmental rapists. Mining and refining the minerals needed to make EV batteries is also an environmental disaster. To make just one EV battery requires 25 pounds of lithium, 60 pounds of nickel, 44 pounds of manganese, 30 pounds of cobalt, 200 pounds of copper, and 400 pounds of aluminum, steel, and plastic.

Writing in these pages, Ronald Stein noted that “you must process 25,000 pounds of brine for the lithium, 30,000 pounds of ore for the cobalt, 5,000 pounds of ore for the nickel, and 25,000 pounds of ore for copper. All told, you dig up 500,000 pounds of the earth’s crust for just one battery.”

There’s also the looming problem of what to do with the mountain of used lithium-ion batteries that will soon pile up, along with their tendency to burst into flames and emit toxins into the air, ground, and water. It’s time to end this hypocrisy. It’s time to admit that EVs are being wildly oversold. It’s time for EV owners and manufacturers to answer for the environmental and human rights crimes they are bankrolling in the name of “climate change.”

Moving on, we argue that EV owners, the policymakers forcing electric cars on the country and the nagging activists who support them will be responsible for a future of blackouts and power shortages. According to PJM Interconnection, a regional power transmission organization that serves 13 states and the District of Columbia, the country faces “a potential timing mismatch between resource retirements.”

“Thermal generators,” meaning power plants that typically produce electricity from fossil fuels and nuclear fission, “are retiring at a rapid pace due to government and private sector policies as well as economics.” These “retirements are at risk of outpacing the construction of new resources.” The climate zealots will continue to ignore salient facts about them, but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist.