AUSTRALIA - A senior Taiwanese official has urged Australia and other “like-minded” countries to be wary of Chinese military ambitions in the Indo-Pacific, citing a recent security pact signed with the Solomon Islands and Beijing’s alleged creeping “authoritarianism” in the region. Speaking during an interview with Australia’s SBS News on Friday, Taiwanese Foreign Minister Joseph Wu argued that China had expanded its influence into Canberra’s sphere of interest, calling on local officials to devote more energy to the alleged threat.

USA - California regulators on Thursday rejected a $1.4 billion desalination plant on environmental grounds, dealing a setback to Governor Gavin Newsom, who had supported the project as a partial solution for the state's sustained drought. The California Coastal Commission voted 11-0 to reject the proposal by Poseidon Water, controlled by the infrastructure arm of Canada's Brookfield Asset Management, to build the plant on a low-lying coastal site at Huntington Beach, near the town of Costa Mesa, about 30 miles (50 km) south of Los Angeles. The plant was designed to convert Pacific Ocean water into 50 million gallons (189.3 million liters) of drinking water a day. That is enough for 400,000 people, but the plant would use a process that staff experts at the commission said would devastate marine life and expose the plant to future risk of sea level rise while producing expensive water too costly for low-income consumers.

UK - In the UK as well as Germany, food and industry leaders are sounding the alarm, warning of a looming energy crisis which will lead to serious food shortages and collapsing industries. The intransigent political pro-Ukrainian positions of European and British leaders will soon be punishing consumers severely. President Vladimir Putin has demanded that “unfriendly countries” settle their energy payments in rubles after the EU and UK called for debilitating economic sanctions against Russia. Although calls for sanctions against Russia were criticised by many opposition politicians as extremely shortsighted, European leadership has ignored them. The dire predictions are sadly coming true. In The UK, the National Farmers’ Union has warned the UK was “sleepwalking” into a food crisis. This has become inevitable with soaring energy and fertilizer costs impacting the already small margins of producers.

AUSTRALIA - Australian consumers were flabbergasted to learn that thousands of avocados were being dumped amid the highest food price inflation in years. A Queensland resident described the discarded mountains of fruit as "tonnes and tonnes and tonnes of avocados going to waste". But farmers have defended the waste, saying it was the only way to secure a profit. Jan De Lai, a resident of Atherton in far north Queensland, said the fruit were perfectly fine but left to rot on a waste dump. When asked why farmers were not lowering the price to drive up demand, he said it would not be worth it for farmers. “The cost of putting that stuff in a package, including the labour and the cost of packaging and the cost of transport is just not worthwhile.” He added: “It doesn’t pay to put the money into packing the fruit or to pay someone the freight costs to send it down to Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne.”

HUNGARY - After Ukraine and Russia, two of the largest grain producers in the world, the Hungarian government has decided to ban grain exports from Hungary. Because of the rise in grain prices, the Hungarian government on Friday banned the export of grain from Hungary with immediate effect. Hungarian Minister of Agriculture István Nagy stated: “All grain exports are still prohibited by the government today because of the price increase caused by the Russian operation in Ukraine.” The reason for this is the concern expressed by Hungarian cattle breeders. Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orbán also commented on the challenges facing agriculture. At a congress of the Hungarian Association of Farmers’ Groups and Cooperatives, he said “the most important thing is that Hungary stays out of this war conflict”. It is about preventing “Hungarians from having to pay the price of the war”.

USA - Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene was widely denounced for saying that Satan encourages women to get abortions, but it turns out she was right. During an April 21, 2022 interview, Greene said, “Abortion is a lie that Satan sells to women… When Satan sells a sin, it’s not loud… it’s whispered, softly and gently into your ears and into your soul… and he tells you it’s OK… and he says. ‘It’s just this one thing. You’re just gonna get it done, get it over with.” Pro-abrtionists took to social media calling her a crazy stupid conspiracy theorist who doesn’t know what she’s talking about. But like the iconic Woody Alan/Marshall McCluhan scene from Annie Hall, Satan appeared out of nowhere and told the pro-abortionists, “You know nothing of my work!”

USA - The Satanic Temple, though it calls itself a religion, is by its own stated terms indistinguishable from secular humanism. Its members do not worship or even believe in Satan or anything supernatural. Like Saul Alinsky and his followers, the Satanic Temple has simply co-opted a metaphoric literary representation as a symbol of revolt against traditional religion. “To embrace the name Satan is to embrace rational inquiry removed from supernaturalism and archaic tradition-based superstitions.” The Satanists have no fixed beliefs and instead insist that their beliefs “must be malleable to the best current scientific understandings of the material world — never the reverse.” The pro-abortionists who openly and willingly identify with Satan, have done a great service to the non-Satanist community (or as the Satanists may refer to us, “gentiles”). Satan is not simply an ally to pro-abortionists. The values set forth by the Satanic Temple are identical with those of the pro-abortionist in particular, and secular humanists in general. While not dispositive, when faced with two competing ideas, it is always helpful to know which side is right and which side is with Satan.

CHINA - President Xi Jinping is suffering from a deadly brain aneurysm, reports claim - as he faces a coup over China's devastating Covid lockdowns. The Chinese president, 68, reportedly wanted to be treated with traditional medicine rather than undergo major surgery after he was rushed to hospital. According to news agency ANI, Xi suffered the "cerebral aneurysm" at the end of 2021. Fears of a coup over Xi's extreme Covid lockdown measures have also been mounting. Instead of learning to live with the virus, the totalitarian regime's response to the pandemic is to instead aim to have zero cases with tightly shut borders, mass testing and sweeping quarantines. China's brutal strategy sees extreme restrictions imposed on towns and cities with just a handful of infections, with entire buildings sealed off even if only one case has been recorded as those who test positive are shipped off to horror quarantine camps. "China is reaching the point where the need for a genuine debate about whether the price being paid for further lockdowns is worth the economic damage." Experts have already claimed Xi could be ousted by rivals fed up with the country's regime within the next 18 months.

USA - Why are Colorado teachers taking students to gay after-school programs? Erin Lee, whose daughter attended Wellington Middle School in Wellington, announced during an interview with Conservative media that her daughter was invited to the club by her art teacher last May and that students in the club were told by an outside speaker that “what you hear in here, stays in here.” “She explained to my daughter that if she is not 100% comfortable in her female body, then she’s transgender,” Lee stated. “She then told the kids that parents aren’t safe, and that it’s OK to lie to them about where they are to attend this meeting.” “She doubled down that parents aren’t safe [and] that heterosexuality and monogamy are not normal,” the mother claimed. The Poudre School District confirmed the club's existence and that its conversation “may be confidential.”

USA - Three students at Kiel Middle School have been placed under investigation for "sexual harassment" for not referring to another student using "they/them" pronouns. Defence lawyers for the students stated: “The District’s position appears to be that using what the District calls “incorrect pronouns” “after being informed that a student’s preferred pronouns were ‘they/them’’’ automatically constitutes punishable sexual harassment under Title IX.

UK - My jaw hit the floor during the Stonewall discrimination trial this week when the LGBT charity’s ‘head of trans inclusion’ Kirrin Medcalf took the stand and declared: ‘Bodies are not inherently male or female. They are just their bodies.’ But as those words sank in, my heart sank to my boots too. I was one of the six co-founders of Stonewall in the 1980s. Along with the others, I poured all my energy into making the organisation a formidable force for gay and lesbian rights.

USA - How is it that in the exceptional and indispensable USA, a former American president [Trump] can be denied his constitutionally guaranteed freedom of speech by a private communications company? How can a mere private company cancel the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights? How is it possible that the Constitutionally guaranteed rights of Americans (including a former US president) is dependent on who owns Twitter? And Facebook? And Google? And the New York Times? How can Americans, especially conservatives, think they live in a free country when a former president of the United States can have his Constitutional Rights cancelled or granted by a private company CEO? Isn’t this a case of the “private sector” controlling the government? End times approach while Americans worry about transgender rights and the boundaries of Nazi Ukraine. Americans have entirely forgotten their own rights guaranteed by the US Constitution and do nothing to protect them. Freedom in the West has been thrown into the trash bin of History, not by conquerors but by the West itself.

CHINA - As global food prices remain at record highs and war wages in Europe between two of the world's largest grain suppliers, troubling videos from China show farmers slashing winter wheat production ahead of harvest times, adding even more uncertainty about food security. An analyst at Melbourne-based Thomas Elder Markets, Andrew Whitelaw, said it's not surprising that farmers are cutting their wheat early for hay as this may be a better return on their money because of poor crop conditions. "If China has a poor crop this season, then they will likely have to continue with a strong import program ...there are already question marks around China's food security ambitions," Whitelaw said, adding that the country has ramped up wheat imports this year. The situation in China adds to wheat production concerns in Ukraine, Russia's unlikeness to ship the crop to "unfriendly" countries, India's threats of wheat export bans due to severe weather, and planting issues in the US Northern Plains and Canada because of wet conditions. As a result of all of these issues that may tighten global food markets even further, US wheat futures hit a 14-year high on Monday.

EUROPE - A German member of the European parliament warned EU citizens that they soon “will no longer have any political influence over who they entrust with the administration of their fundamental rights” after treaty changes made by the WHO with its member states. “I asked the Commission to what extent it would ensure that the principles of the people’ s rule would be respected and that citizens would not be subjected to the arbitrariness of an unelected entity,” Anderson said in a new video she posted May 8 on her YouTube channel. “The answer I received to my question a few hours ago is clear and brief: not at all!” “With this, the rule of the people, the basic principle of any democracy, has been finally laid to rest,” Anderson said. The German MEP explained that the composition of the WHO is “not based on democratic elections” and that, therefore, “the decision-makers sitting there can issue instructions to you but are not accountable to you and cannot be held politically responsible by you.”

USA - Major trucking fleets across the eastern half of the US are preparing for an "imminent" diesel shortage, according to logistics firm FreightWaves. Founder and CEO of FreightWaves Craig Fuller said "3 very large fleets" are preparing for diesel pumps at fuel stations to run dry. Drivers of these fleets received notifications about fuel shortages that could materialize in the coming weeks across the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast regions. Fuller tweeted several messages that drivers received from fleet operators. The notifications were alarming. He also tweeted what appears to be an unnamed industry insider explaining the historic mess hitting Mid-Atlantic and Northeast markets is a combination of crude being diverted from the US to Europe and supply chains issues along the East Coast. Diesel supply is short worldwide due to the invasion of Ukraine disrupting energy markets and resulting Western sanctions. The writing has been on the wall for months about developing shortages…