News of the World

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US Military Takes Down ‘Octagonal’ Object Over Great Lakes Region

The U.S. military shot down an unidentified object that was flying over Lake Huron on Feb. 12, according to a U.S. House lawmaker from Michigan, who revealed it had an “octagonal structure.”

“I’ve been in contact with DOD regarding operations across the Great Lakes region today,” Rep. Jack Bergman (R-Mich.) wrote on Twitter at around 3:30 p.m. Washington time. “The US military has decommissioned another ‘object’ over Lake Huron. I appreciate the decisive action by our fighter pilots.”
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“They informed me that an F-16 using an AIM-9 missile had shot down an octagonal structure over Lake Huron. The altitude was about 20,000 feet,” ... Officials are working to recover the debris, he added, saying that there was “no damage to human life or property.”

The Pentagon later confirmed that the F-16 jet had fired an AIM-9x short-range air-to-air missile to down the object.
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The FAA confirmed that it had closed “some airspace over Lake Huron to support Department of Defense activities,” a spokesperson told The Epoch Times on Feb. 12.
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On Feb. 12, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) confirmed to The Epoch Times that it temporarily restricted the airspace over Lake Michigan before that airspace was reopened a short while later. The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) confirmed that it “implemented a temporary flight restriction airspace over Lake Michigan at approximately 12 p.m. EST on Feb. 12, 2023.”
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The Pentagon said in its statement on Sunday that it believes “based on its flight path and data” that the object downed over Lake Michigan was the radar signal picked up over Montana, and that the object flew in proximity to sensitive DOD sites.

Either the spy balloon was super fast or the jets were incredibly slow as to miss their target the first time they were scrambled yesterday afternoon.

Schumer: ‘Until a Few Months Ago’ We Didn’t Know About Chinese Spy Balloons

Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-NY) said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week” that “until a few months ago,” our intelligence and our military did not know about Chinese spy balloons.
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Schumer said "...The bottom line is until a few months ago. We didn’t know of these balloons. Our intelligence and our military did not know. This went as far back as President Trump at least three times.”
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"[T]he military and the intelligence are focused like a laser on first gathering and accumulating the information, then coming up with a comprehensive analysis of what went on before, what’s going on now, and what can go on in the future. You can be sure that if any American interests or people are at risk, they’ll take appropriate action. Until they get that comprehensive analysis, however, we have to look at each balloon individually.”

Let's just say that the US authorities learned about the balloons a couple of months ago.
Then why on earth didn't Biden order the DOD to immediately take down the darn balloon, the very same that ended up crossing the whole country without any issues or obstacles?
He can't claim that he had no good reason to find it quite suspicious or even dangerous. It truly was a legitimate target for his air force jets.

Tens of Thousands Face the Night Without Power:
New Zealand Braces for Cyclone Grabrielle

“The next 24 hours will be challenging for all Aucklanders,” he told reporters. “Please pay attention to [the weather forecast], and remember, things can be worse than expected.”

The national forecaster, MetService, reported that since noon local time, it had recorded wind gusts of 150 to 160 kilometres per hour (93 to 99 miles), and some stations on the east coast of the North Island recorded 15 to 30 millimetres of rain in a single hour.

It has also recorded wind gusts of 130 kilometres per hour in Auckland.

The cyclone is expected to hit the northern tip of New Zealand and then hug the coastline in a southeast direction over the next 36 hours. The northern areas of the South Island will also be affected.

Conditions are expected to begin easing late Tuesday and throughout Wednesday.

NYC Workers Fired Over Refusing Vaccines Must Reapply for Jobs

New York City Mayor Eric Adams on Feb. 10 defended the firing of city employees who refused to comply with the now-sunsetting COVID-19 vaccine mandate, arguing that it “just wasn’t right” for them to decline to get the jab.

Appearing on Caribbean Power Jam Radio’s “The Reset Show,” Adams was asked about the fate of the nearly 2,000 public employees who lost their jobs because of the vaccine requirement. The mayor responded that they will have to reapply for those jobs “just like everyone else.”
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“No New Yorker wants anyone telling them anything,” he said. “That’s just who we are. We don’t want to be mandated. We don’t want anyone to tell us to put on a mask. That’s just who we are. So that was a cultural shift in our mindset to say, ‘We’re fighting this dangerous virus.'”

As for New Yorkers who rejected the cultural shift and remained unvaccinated all this time, Adams said what they have been doing “just wasn’t right.”

 So now they gotta accept whatever the Demo-Comunist Party commands without ever complaining?
And how does that even justify sending their fingerprints and other private data to the FBI?

Manufactured Evidence Planted on Enrique Tarrio to Frame Him
and Other Proud Boys Defendants, Defense Alleges

The most damning piece of evidence in the trial of five members of the Proud Boys was created by the U.S. intelligence community and planted on defendant Enrique Tarrio to frame him and others for alleged Jan. 6 crimes, an explosive defense motion alleges.

Filed on Feb. 10 by an attorney for Proud Boys defendant Dominic Pezzola, the motion asks U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly to declare a mistrial due to “outrageous government misconduct.”

The controversy surrounds a document titled “1776 Returns” that federal prosecutors contend is a blueprint for the Proud Boys to attack the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. That document was messaged to Tarrio, although defense attorneys say there is no evidence he opened, read, or forwarded it.
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Charged in the case are Tarrio, Pezzola, Zachary Rehl, Ethan Nordean, and Joseph Biggs. The Proud Boys defendants are on trial in the U.S. District Court in Washington, accused of seditious conspiracy, conspiracy to obstruct official proceedings, obstruction of official proceedings, and conspiracy to prevent certain federal officers from performing their duties on January 6. Tarrio, Rehl, Nordean, and Biggs face nine criminal counts, while Pezzola is charged with 10.

The trial is about to enter its fifth week in Kelly’s courtroom.
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Samuel Armes, who has done work for the U.S. State Department and the Special Operations Command, located at MacDill Air Force Base near Tampa, Florida, told the Select Committee he gave Flores a copy of his war game scenario document. He testified that he first met Flores in an online cryptocurrency group in 2017.

Armes testified that at the University of South Florida, he had been “groomed to join the CIA and FBI.” He told the Select Committee that he did not write “1776 Returns,” but some of his war-game document was included in it.

According to the defense motion, Flores told the Jan. 6 Select Committee that Armes wrote the entire “1776 Returns” document and asked her to give it to Tarrio. In his appearance before the Select Committee on July 18, 2022, Armes denied authorship and asserted that Flores was “blame-shifting” and “throwing me under the bus.”
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The motion asks for an immediate evidentiary hearing on the origins and authorship of “1776 Returns,” which Judge Kelly ruled in December 2022 could be admitted as evidence in the trial.

If the information presented in the motion is deemed true by Judge Kelly, Roots wrote, the solution would be a “mistrial and dismissal of this entire case, with prejudice.”

Well, if we take into consideration that the Arizona guy named Ray Epps has never been accused of anything like the Proud Boys were...

Border Patrol Chief: Aerostats Are ‘an Advantage’ That’s Being Reduced,
Despite Good Trend in Numbers, There’s ‘Spike in Chinese Nationals’

Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz stated that the January border numbers represent a trend in the right direction, but there has been “a spike in Chinese nationals” and stated that the aerostats — whose numbers are being reduced by the Biden administration — are “certainly an advantage for us. And so, we’re going to try and do everything we can to fund those aerostats for as long as we can.”
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Ortiz responded, “Yeah, we’ve seen a spike in Chinese nationals.”

Jenkins also asked, “You’re losing aerostats, the eyes in the sky. How much will that impact you and do you need those tools?”

Ortiz answered, “Any time we have technology out there, it provides us the situational awareness so we can be able to make those interdictions right on the border — in the immediate border area. It is certainly an advantage for us.

Chiefs Beat Eagles 38–35 to Win 2nd Super Bowl in 4 Years

Patrick Mahomes shook off an ankle injury, turned back into a magician and pulled out another comeback on the biggest stage to help the Kansas City Chiefs win their second Super Bowl in four years.
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The Chiefs won their second Super Bowl following the 2019 season, 50 years after the first one. It took just three years to get another Lombardi.
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Chiefs fans were outnumbered in the stadium, but they did their part to silence the boisterous Philly fans with the tomahawk chop chant.
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The 27-year-old Mahomes became the third player to win his second NFL MVP award before age 28. He also became the youngest QB to start three Super Bowls. Then, Mahomes became the first player to win the Super Bowl the same season he was MVP after nine straight players lost.
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Paul McCartney and LeBron James also were in the crowd of 67,827.