Things to Keep an Eye On

The Kerry Howley Pentagon profile, VOA Parsi back to work, Fulbright board resigns, CCP accepts underground bishop appointment, Sakal Ventures bust

Pete Hegseth at yesterday’s parade, live on Fox, screenshot via YouTube

Pete Hegseth’s spiraling Pentagon

Kerry Howley’s big story on Pete Hegseth’s Pentagon is the sort of literary assassination you don’t see very often anymore. It’s brutal. There’s so much irony and contrapasso in it, it could be one of Dante’s cantos. A media obsessed guy who goes on about warfighters all the time. He’s standing up at a White House event saying “we are fighting hoaxsters!” when the people around him are initiating the fake investigations.

Like most Fox News personalities, Hegseth is a character. Roopit Murdoch and his Chinese spy ex-wife think Americans are stupid and want ‘em stupider, and what better way than putting an IRL GI Joe in charge of the Pentagon. It’s extremely funny, but some of the details Howley highlights show Hegseth really is a piece of shit. He threw his longtime friend Dan Caldwell under the bus for Israel, demonizing him to Brian Kilmeade.

Now, I’m familiar with Kilmeade’s work. Tucker was a good soldier over in Roopit’s Chinese circus, and he used to make sure I had Kilmeade’s awful books reviewed. Let me tell you, it’s no small task finding someone to lie that there’s anything edifying about his little turds with wurds he holds up on camera from time to time.

I said so on this blog when Hegseth was appointed, but the two nonprofits he ran badly, Vets for Freedom and CVA, left it ambiguous whether he was going to be pro-America or pro-Israel, the former being an Israel first vets cut-out funded by Adelson and Singer, and the latter being funded by the Kochs. If when he got there, he went with the Israelis, all the better people in the second tier at the Pentagon would be at risk, and that’s precisely what has happened.

Naturally it was Timothy Payne, alias Parlatore, who made the false claim of an NSA wiretap, though he has denied it. Parlatore was close to the late lamented crook Bernie Kerik, who was tight with the Israelis. The Free Press, which is an Israeli information operation, reported “Caldwell had photographed secret documents on his phone and leaked them to an NBC reporter,” which is typical of how these guys lie. The fix is in on Hegseth himself, too, after they got him hooked on the shtetl hooch before he started wanting to build the Third Temple and bomb Iran. Naturally, the stink never gets on Steve Feinberg, who got his start at the neocon criminal Michael Milken’s firm.

Howley is right to be watching Laura Loomer, who is the most brilliant placement in the whole mise-en-scéne. She’s the one whose pro-Israel credentials cannot be questioned, but who gets all the guys who are in with the Israelis fired.

VOA back to work, they’re needed for operations in support of Israel

David Sacks divests of AI stock

From Axios:

David Sacks, the venture capitalist advising President Trump on crypto and AI policy, is apparently divesting his holdings in foundational AI companies and hyperscalers like xAI and Meta, according to a White House memo posted online Friday.

Dutch Ministry of Defense orders Shield AI drones

Eight of them, via Intelligence Online

Entire Fulbright board resigns

Via Substack:

Effective immediately, members of the Congressionally mandated Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board voted overwhelmingly to resign from the board, rather than endorse unprecedented actions that we believe are impermissible under the law, compromise U.S. national interests and integrity, and undermine the mission and mandates Congress established for the Fulbright program nearly 80 years ago.

CCP accepts Pope Leo’s appointment of underground bishop

This is a reversal of the Vatican-China concordat under Francis, via the Pillar:

The Holy See announced Wednesday the appointment of formerly underground Bishop Joseph Lin Yuntuan as auxiliary of the mainland Archdiocese of Fuzhou.

The appointment, the first involving a mainland bishop under Leo, marks a departure from the previous pattern of episcopal nominations under the terms of the Vatican-China deal: The pope made the appointment and the Chinese state subsequently agreed to accept it, instead of the other way around.

Sakal Ventures charges

This guy got good press in Business Insider and a local Fox affiliate:

A former Miami-based hedge fund manager was arrested today in connection with his alleged role in a multi-million-dollar insider trading scheme and obstruction of justice.

Kris Bortnovsky, a/k/a “Kris Bort,” 44, of Bal Harbour Village, Fla., has been charged in a six-count indictment unsealed today. The indictment charges Bortnovsky with two counts of securities fraud; two counts of conspiracy to commit securities fraud; one count of making false statements; and one count of witness intimidation. The defendant was arrested today in the Southern District of Florida and will appear in federal court in Boston at a later date.

Guilty pleas in huge USAID bribery and securities fraud case

Good news:

In addition, Apprio and Vistant, both of which contracted with USAID, have agreed to admit criminal liability and enter into three-year deferred prosecution agreements (DPAs) in connection with criminal informations filed today in the District of Maryland. As part of these resolutions, both Apprio and Vistant admitted to engaging in a conspiracy to commit bribery of a public official and securities fraud. The DPAs entered into with Apprio and Vistant require each company to, among other obligations, provide ongoing cooperation with and disclosures to the Justice Department, implement a compliance and ethics program, and report to Justice Department regarding remediation and implementation of these compliance measures.

Guilty plea for tax evasion by NASCAR owner

This guy was from NOVA:

Former NASCAR team owner Ronald Devine, 68, of Burke, Virginia, appeared in federal court today and pleaded guilty to failure to pay payroll taxes, announced Russ Ferguson, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina

Donald “Trey” Eakins, Special Agent in Charge of the Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation, Charlotte Field Office (IRS-CI), James C. Barnacle, Jr., Acting Special Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Charlotte Division, and Rodney Hopkins, Inspector in Charge of the Atlanta Division of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, which oversees Charlotte, join U.S. Attorney Ferguson in making today’s announcement.