'War Zone': Massive European protests against COVID-19 lockdowns, vaccine mandates erupt into an 'orgy of violence'

Amid spiking coronavirus cases, Austria announced on Friday that it would implement a full national lockdown, and would also legislate a COVID-19 vaccine mandate for all eligible citizens – the first of its kind in a Western nation. Austria is one of several European countries to dictate more stringent COVID-19 restrictions as a fourth coronavirus wave sweeps the continent. Following the introduction of rigid regulations, protests and riots exploded across Europe.

Three people were hospitalized late Friday after police opened fire on lockdown protesters in downtown Rotterdam in the Netherlands. Rioters reportedly torched cars, launched fireworks, and attacked police. Police attempted to control the crowd with water cannons. Dutch police said that 51 people were arrested during the demonstration against the new COVID-19 restrictions.

Rotterdam Mayor Ahmed Aboutaleb called the riot an "orgy of violence."

Local political party Leefbaar Rotterdam condemned the violence, "The center of our beautiful city has this evening transformed into a war zone," it said. "Rotterdam is a city where you can disagree with things that happen but violence is never, never, the solution."

https://www.theblaze.com/news/europe-lockdown-protests-covid-riots

Hunter Biden’s firm helped China gain control of electric-car mineral: report

Hunter Biden’s investment firm helped broker a 2016 deal that gave a Chinese state-backed company control of a massive African mine rich in cobalt — a mineral essential for the production of electric car batteries.

The deal, first reported by the Washington Free Beacon during the 2020 presidential campaign, was spotlighted by the New York Times Saturday as Congress inches closer to approving President Biden’s $2 trillion social spending plan, which earmarks billions of dollars to promote electric vehicles.

In 2016, an investment firm founded by Hunter Biden with several Chinese partners was cut into a complex $3.8 billion transaction that transferred 80 percent of Congo’s Tenke Fungurum mine from an American company to Beijing-backed China Molybdenum.

President Joe Biden, Hunter Biden’s father, was the sitting vice president when the deal was struck.

The mine is one of the world’s largest sources of cobalt — and China’s control of the mineral “presents a critical vulnerability to the future of the U.S. domestic auto industry,” Biden’s White House reported in June.

A White House spokesman said that Joe Biden had no knowledge of his son’s involvement with the sale, the Times reported.

https://nypost.com/2021/11/20/hunter-bidens-firm-helped-china-get-electric-car-mineral-report/

https://nypost.com/2021/11/20/hunter-bidens-firm-helped-china-get-electric-car-mineral-report/

Pentagon announces new cloud initiative to replace ill-fated JEDI contract

The Pentagon announced a limited request for bids for a new cloud initiative today that replaces the cancelled $10 billion, decade-long JEDI contract initiative. You may recall (or not) that it previously ran a winner-take-all bid it had dubbed JEDI (short for Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure). The new initiative goes by the much less catchy name, Joint Warfighting Cloud Capability, or JWCC for short.

Under the terms of the RFP, Amazon, Microsoft, Google and Oracle have been invited to bid. That multi-vendor approach is markedly different from the JEDI RFP, where just a single vendor was going to walk away with the prize. In fact, the Pentagon makes clear that while it favors Amazon and Microsoft, any of the qualified (invited) vendors could get a piece of this deal.

As the RFP states, “The Government anticipates awarding two IDIQ contracts — one to Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS) and one to Microsoft Corporation (Microsoft) — but intends to award to all Cloud Service Providers (CSPs) that demonstrate the capability to meet DoD’s requirements.”

It appears it limited the number of vendors involved because after researching its requirements, the Pentagon found that there were a limited number of companies out there capable of meeting them. “Market research indicates that a limited number of sources are capable of meeting the Department’s requirements. Currently, the Department is aware of only five U.S.-based hyperscale CSPs (cloud service providers). Furthermore, only two of those hyperscale CSPs — AWS and Microsoft — appear to be capable of meeting all of the DoD’s requirements at this time, including providing cloud services at all levels of national security classification.”

The government is still working out the pricing for this one, but with multiple vendors involved, it’s entirely possible that it will exceed the $10 billion price tag of the now-defunct JEDI contract. “The Department is still evaluating the contract ceiling for this procurement, but anticipates that a multi-billion dollar ceiling will be required. The contract ordering ceiling will be included in any directed solicitations issued to vendors.”

It’s worth noting that each company that wins an award under the terms of the RFP will get a three-year contract for its piece, with two one-year option periods.

JEDI was mired in controversy from the start as top cloud vendors jockeyed for position, and lesser ones also tried to get into the act. There was much drama, complaints to the president, complaints from the president, complaints about presidential interference, formal inquiries galore and several lawsuits. In the end, in spite of everyone believing that Amazon would win the bid, it didn’t. Microsoft did.

https://techcrunch.com/2021/11/19/pentagon-announces-new-cloud-initiative-to-replace-ill-fated-jedi-contract/

Good luck with that! FBI demands motorists return money they grabbed in frenzy after armored truck spewed cash over San Diego freeway when doors flew open: Two arrested

The FBI and the California State Highway are investigating an incident where an armored truck spewed money all over Interstate 5 near San Diego on Monday

Several people were filmed taking the cash off the road

One of was identified as Demi Bagby, a fitness guru with 2.5 million followers, who posted a video on her Instagram

Police are calling for people to return the money or face 'potential criminal charges'

It is unknown if Bagby and her friends are still in possession of the money

An armored truck spewed cash all over a San Diego freeway this week after one of its doors burst open, and now the FBI and the California Highway Patrol are looking for those who ran off with the money.

'If anyone picked up cash, we ask you to bring it to the office in Vista immediately,' a CHP spokesperson told Fox 5. 'I just want to give everyone a head's up that there is a lot of video evidence.'

They are giving people 48 hours to return the money or face 'potential criminal charges.' Two people have already been arrested, officials said.

Drivers stopped what they were doing Monday and scrambled to pick up 'free' money on the northbound side of Interstate 5 near Carlsbad, California.

The trunk was on its way to the Federal Reserve to make the deposit when the back doors burst open around 10 a.m., authorities said.

The FBI and the California Highway Patrol (CHP) are now looking for people who took the money, after already arresting two people who got locked out of their car during the frenzy. It is unknown how much money came out of the trunk, nor how much is still missing.

Fitness guru Demi Bagby, from San Diego, was identified as one of the persons of interest after she posted a video to her Instagram account showing her and her friends picking up money.

'This is the most insane thing I've ever seen, someone dropped money all over the freeway and San Diego has shut down, literally it has shut down. Look at the freeway right now, oh my gosh,' Bagby says in a video she posted for her 2.5 million followers.

'Literally everyone stopped on the freeway to get money off the freeway. This is insane,' she says.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10224353/Armored-truck-spews-cash-San-Diego-freeway-one-doors-bursts-open.html

Peter Navarro: New York Times Keeping Book ‘In Trump Time’ off the Best Seller List

Former senior Trump aide Peter Navarro says the New York Times is keeping his book In Trump Time off the forthcoming nonfiction bestseller list, despite the fact he says that it trumps the vast majority of books on the list in terms of units sold. Speaking to Breitbart News Saturday, Navarro said it shows that the “newspaper of record” is nothing more than a “propaganda rag dedicated to promoting left-wing causes [and] lying about what exists in America.

Navarro, who served as director of the Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy (OTMP) and ran the Defense Production Act during the Chinese coronavirus pandemic, recently released In Trump Time, which exposes the “Faucis” of the world.

According to Book Scan sales data that Navarro provided to Breitbart News, Paul McCartney’s The Lyrics will be No. 1 with 36,954 units sold, followed by Immune with 38,525 units sold and The President and the Freedom Fighter with 28,587 sold.

Navarro said his book should be in third, as he said it has 33,314 sales, 90 percent of which he said were individual sales. Most of the sales, he added, were from Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Even with the bulk sales taken away, Navarro said his book In Trump Time still trumps Kilmeade’s The President and the Freedom Fighter, which will sit third on the Times’ list.”

“The left wing Peril by Woodward — that propaganda thing I destroyed in In Trump Time,” Navarro began, sold 9,760 in the same period.

“I’m trampling these folks. In Trump Time is listed No. 3 on the USA Today list for a similar time period, No. 9 overall on Amazon, yet the New York Times somehow wants to cancel that,” Navarro said, explaining the implications are significant, because a book landing on the bestseller list sends a signal to a broader audience, including independent bookstores.

This serves as “just one more evidence that the New York Times is not a newspaper. It’s a propaganda rag dedicated to promoting left-wing causes [and] lying about what exists in America,” Navarro said, reemphasizing that, even if they took out bulk sales, In Trump Time would still be No. 3.

“It’s like, this is not about me. It’s not about the In Trump Time book per se. It’s about this much larger issue of how the New York Times systematically tries to cancel and effectively burn conservative books. To me, this is the modern equivalent of book burning, and it’s also a clear demonstration of the New York Times’ editorial policy to omit books from its bestseller list that run contrary to its partisan and liberal editorial policy, and the numbers say it all,” he said, adding that the establishment media is playing a role in pushing books that fit its desired left-wing narrative.

You have “big media conglomerates out there that clearly don’t push news. They push narratives,” he said, noting that the Kyle Rittenhouse analogy is another perfect example of how the media distorts the truth in pursuit of its desired narrative.

Navarro pointed to one specific example showing the difference in the narratives, noting that he detailed what happened in the Situation Room when he fought Dr. Anthony Fauci and former President Trump’s former Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney over Trump’s travel ban on China.

“But if you read the Woodward’s rendition, those were the guys who were alleged to have been encouraging Trump to do the real ban and the heroes,” he said.

“Two anonymous sources don’t equal a fact” he said of Woodward.

“What is the New York Times? It is the paper of record. How long should that persist? It shouldn’t persist at all,” Navarro added. “We need alternative sources of real news and Breitbart is certainly one of them.”

Overall, Navarro said the “mission of the book is to get Fauci fired and in jail, hold Communist China accountable for the weapon that they inflicted on the American people, and get to the bottom of what happened on both the November 3 and January 6.”

Navarro’s book In Trump Time is available on Amazon and at Barnes and Noble.

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/11/20/exclusive-new-york-times-keeping-peter-navarros-book-in-trump-time-off-the-best-seller-list/

THE POPE, THE PAEDO & THE ‘PIMP’ Beaming Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell blessed by the Pope – showing their all-powerful connections

BEAMING Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell are blessed by the Pope — showing their all-powerful connections.

The snap sees the paedo billionaire and his alleged “madam” enjoy a private audience with the head of the Catholic Church at the Vatican.

They are understood to have flown to Rome by private jet for the blessing by John Paul II almost two decades ago.

A source told The Sun On Sunday: “Pictures like this show just how powerful Epstein’s connections were and his ability to open almost any door.

“He managed to manipulate his way into royal palaces, the White House and the Vatican, all with Maxwell by his side.”

Our picture shows Epstein, wearing a dark suit and red-patterned tie, kneeling at the Pope’s feet with his ex-lover Maxwell, who is in a striped suit jacket and open-collar blue shirt.

Hands clenched together, they are both smiling and gazing into the eyes of John Paul II, who led the Catholic Church from 1978 until his death in 2005.

The seated Pontiff has his arms raised in the photo, believed to have been taken in 2003.

Flight logs, which chart journeys made by sex beast Epstein, reveal he used his “Lolita Express” jet to fly from Rome to Madrid on May 20 that year.

On it were Maxwell, model scout Jean-Luc Brunel, pilot Pete Rathgeb and two passengers logged as “AM” and “JK”.

Frenchman Brunel, 75, was last year charged with rape and sexual assault of minors.

There is no suggestion Rathgeb knew of or was party to illegal activity.

There is no record of Epstein arriving in Rome, though logs put him in New York on May 12 and again by May 21.

Our papal snap is the latest to show Epstein and Maxwell rubbing shoulders with powerful world figures.

Photos in New York’s Central Park showed Epstein with Prince Andrew — while Maxwell appears with Andrew alongside Virginia Roberts Giuffre.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/16798098/jeffrey-epstein-ghislaine-maxwell-blessed-pope/