Watch: Iraqi Protesters Storm Parliament Amid Record Run Without Government

On Wednesday hundreds of followers of the hardline Iraqi Shia cleric, militia leader, and politician Muqtada al-Sadr overwhelmed security in Baghdad's Green Zone, where they were able to breach and storm the country's parliament building.

The protests came amid political friction which pits al-Sadr's bloc, which won a majority as the largest faction in the 329-seat parliament during prior October elections, against the pro-Iran Coordination Framework faction. The latter group's nomination for prime minister, Mohammed Shia al-Sudani, is being fiercely opposed by al-Sadr's followers.

The high secured Green Zone has since the US invasion and occupation of Iraq been home to all major government branches, embassies and diplomatic missions, and international institutions. However, some local correspondents have suggested based on video to emerge of the protests that security stood down after being overwhelmed by the crowds. Police were seen milling about the building alongside protesters.

There were reportedly no Iraqi lawmakers inside parliament at the time, with the crowds occupying the building and chanting political slogans.

Caretaker Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi demanded that the demonstrators "immediately withdraw" from the Green Zone, warning that he would send additional security forces to ensure "the protection of state institutions and foreign missions, and prevent any harm to security and order."

The country's politics have been gridlocked and essentially without a new government ever since the October vote.

Reuters notes that "Iraq marked its longest post-election deadlock on Wednesday, as lawmakers’ failure to form a government hampers reforms needed for a country struggling to recover from decades of conflict."

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/watch-iraqi-protesters-storm-parliament-amid-record-run-without-government

Tucker Carlson Exposes Big Pharma’s Murderous Antidepressant Scheme: Drugs For Depression Cause Birth Defects, Sexual Dysfunction And Suicide

Tens of millions of people have been prescribed psychotropic “wonder drugs” for depression.

Pharmaceutical companies chemical marketed drugs, Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors like Prozac designed to boost the feel good” chemical serotonin, to treat depression allegedly caused by chemical imbalances.

New research confirms the “chemical balance theory” is a myth.

“In the most comprehensive review of the research on links between depression and serotonin ever carried out, researchers from the UK, Italy and Switzerland looked at 17 major international reviews that had documented the findings from more than 260 studies, involving 300,000 patients,” Daily Mail reports.” Their findings, published in the journal Molecular Psychiatry, undermine the basis for decades of prescribing of the most commonly used antidepressants, Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors, or SSRIs.”

“We can safely say that after a vast amount of research conducted over several decades, there is no convincing evidence that depression is caused by serotonin abnormalities,'” contends Professor Joanna Moncrieff, a professor of psychiatry at University College London and a consultant psychiatrist at North East London NHS Foundation Trust.

Tucker Carlson called attention to the side effects caused by SSRIs, including birth defects, sexual dysfunction, infertility and homicidal ideation and the U.S. suicide rate that has increased by 35 percent since the drugs have started being prescribed for depression.

“Antidepressants are supposed to cure depression. That’s why they’re prescribed. And yet, over the same period that SSRI prescriptions have risen 3,000 percent, the suicide rate — that may be the most reliable indicator of all depression — has not fallen in the United States. In fact, the suicide rate has jumped by 35%. That’s a huge increase,” Carlson argued on his Monday night broadcast. “That’s a lot of dead people.”

“Now, drug makers admit that their products may be part of the reason for the increase in suicide. The makers of Prozac, for example, can see that young people who take that drug have an increased risk of suicide compared to those who took a placebo. Think about that for a second. A drug that’s supposed to make you less sad may make it more likely that you will kill yourself. How is that allowed? Well, it’s been allowed because virtually no one has said a word about it.”

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/07/tucker-carlson-exposes-big-pharmas-murderous-antidepressant-scheme-drugs-depression-cause-birth-defects-sexual-dysfunction-suicide/

Kash Patel: If AG Garland Does Job, Hunter Will Be Charged Before Midterms!

https://rumble.com/embed/v1b7qvm/?pub=4

33 Members of a Violent Gang Charged With Drug Trafficking and Firearms Violations in Fajardo, Puerto Rico

https://www.justice.gov/usao-pr/pr/33-members-violent-gang-charged-drug-trafficking-and-firearms-violations-fajardo-puerto

Nick Sandmann's libel lawsuits against five national media companies dismissed by federal judge; Sandmann's lawyer vows appeal

A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit brought by former Covington Catholic student Nick Sandmann against five major news outlets that reported on a confrontation between Sandmann and a Native American activist at the Lincoln Memorial in January 2019.

Sandmann, who was 16 at the time, became the center of a national controversy after a video emerged that showed Covington (Kentucky) Catholic High School students standing in front of a Native American man who was banging a drum and chanting. The students were attending the March for Life that year, which coincided with the Indigenous Peoples March. Multiple media organizations reported that students — including Sandmann, who was wearing a "Make America Great Again" hat — had mocked, surrounded, and were trying to intimidate the man, Nathan Phillips, but additional video disproved those claims. Sandmann became a focal point of outrage and smears because he had smiled at the man in the video.

After it became clear that initial reporting of the incident was false, Sandmann filed defamation lawsuits against eight news organizations. Three companies settled with Sandmann, but on Tuesday, a federal judge threw out the remaining lawsuits against the New York Times, CBS, ABC, Gannett Co. Inc., and Rolling Stone.

Sandmann's attorney, Todd McMurtry, told the Lexington Herald-Leader he was "disappointed" with the decision from United States District Eastern Kentucky Court Judge William Bertelsman and planned to file an appeal.

“We’re fully prepared to argue these cases in the 6th Circuit," Sandmann said in a statement.

Bertelsman's opinion was centered on statements published by the news outlets in which Phillips had claimed Sandmann had "blocked" and "would not allow" him to retreat from the Lincoln Memorial.

Sandmann's legal team argued that the reports had "conveyed false and defamatory charges," and that the media companies had malicious intent in publishing them.

But the judge found that Phillips' statements about Sandmann's actions were "objectively unverifiable and thus unactionable opinions.”

"Instead, a reasonable reader would understand that Phillips was simply conveying his view of the situation. And because the reader knew from the articles that this encounter occurred at the foot of the Lincoln Memorial, he or she would know that the confrontation occurred in an expansive area such that it would be difficult to know what might constitute 'blocking' another person in that setting," Bertelsman wrote.

The judge said the press did not defame Sandmann by reporting Phillips' version of the incident, since his statements were opinions and not facts.

“The media defendants were covering a matter of great public interest, and they reported Phillips’s first-person view of what he experienced,” he wrote. “This would put the reader on notice that Phillips was simply giving his perspective on the incident.”

Bertelsman added, "Phillips' statement did not imply the existence of any nondisclosed defamatory facts, and only under such circumstances does a statement of opinion lose its constitutional protection."

“Therefore, in the factual context of this case, Phillips’s ‘blocking’ statements are protected opinions,” he concluded.

https://www.theblaze.com/news/nick-sandmann-loses-libel-lawsuits-against-five-national-media-companies-over-covington-catholic-controversy