The government of Ukraine is asking western nations to fund their budget.  Volodymyr Zelenskyy has asked for $7 billion per month in financial assistance to retain their government obligations.  Yesterday, Ukraine Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal reiterated that demand saying, “the cash, in sense of our budget, is very important for social and humanitarian responsibilities of our state to our people.”

l am not wanting to belabor a point that many have discussed here, but there really does come a time when the American people must draw a red line and ask, ‘to what end?‘  The United States government, both the white house and congress, have already pledged $14 billion dollars to Ukraine without a single representative asking the American people if they support it.

Certainly, there is an argument to be made that Ukraine needs the support of the world as they struggle with a conflict in their nation.  However, charity begins at home, and for too long our national leadership has been willing to use our income taxes as tools for their own political agenda.  The brazen expectation by leaders of Ukraine for the United States citizens to finance their government is, in my opinion, the last straw of a series of straws.

The issue would not be so significant if that request was not also accompanied by the visibility of western European nations, supposedly NATO allies, barely spending any money of their own wealth to assist their direct neighbor.  The U.S. financial support is ridiculous when compared to how Europe is responding to the Ukraine crisis.

Compounding this issue is our own American economy and the serious pain being felt by American workers and taxpayers as the spending creates even more massive inflation that we have to cope with.   We gained national independence around the premise of taxation without representation from England, and yet here we are again sending scarce income, without consultation or representation, to DC elites who send that money overseas.

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According to multiple media sources Twitter has reached a deal with the representatives of Elon Musk for the tech billionaire to purchase the social media company.  According to the Wall Street Journal, over the weekend the outlines of the deal were agreed and last night the final assembly of the purchase came together.

Keep in mind that Twitter is slated to report first-quarter earnings this Thursday, and originally the board was going to wait until after that earnings announcement to respond to the bid.

Something changed.

My suspicion is the financials of the Q1 earnings report will not support the $54.20 high end evaluation offer originally proposed by Musk.

If the low Q1 earnings rumors are accurate; and if Twitter had declined or fought the offer; the board would have been in the position of declining a deal that was substantially higher than the company market value, a tenuous position legally.   Thus, a deal was made.

(Wall Street Journal, update) – “Twitter is in advanced discussions to sell itself to Elon Musk and could finalize a deal Monday, people familiar with the matter said, days after the billionaire unveiled his $43 billion bid for the company.

The two sides worked through the night to hash out a deal that would be valued at $54.20 a share, or $44 billion, the people said. Assuming there isn’t a last-minute snag, the deal is expected to be announced after the market closes Monday, if not sooner.

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On his evening broadcast, Fox News host Tucker Carlson outlined the left-wing collective effort to target and intimidate the social media account LibsofTikTok.   WATCH:

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SIDEBAR – A few weeks ago I accidentally ended one Sunday morning at a fascinating Glenn Greenwald article giving a deep dive around the Washington Post “reporter” Taylor Lorenz, who is at the center of this story.  READ IT HERE  As an outcome of that Greenwald article, I traveled though the internets to find a fascinating YouTube expose’ on the same Taylor Lorenz.  WATCH IT HERE

You’ll never get the time in your life back that it takes to see the fulsome picture of how 49-year-old Taylor Lorenz operates.  However, the background of her insane ideological effort is quite remarkable.   If you are ever bored, or perhaps laid up with a broken leg and looking for something to take your mind off the situation, check out the Greenwald article and complimentary video.  This Taylor Lorenz character is seriously disturbed.

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According to multiple media outlets [CNN here – Reuters here] Joe Biden is sending another $800 million in weapons to Ukraine.  This is the third delivery of U.S. military hardware bringing the total weapons deliveries to $3.4 billion since late February.  Congress has allocated $14 billion for the laundry operation, which *may* include authorization for much of this current distribution.

In the last several days the Russian military have been posting on their ground reports, about the capture of many millions in U.S. weapons as the Russian army moves more forcefully and methodically to secure the Eastern Ukraine Donbas region.

While western media talks about an ongoing battle for the Russia-Ukraine city of Mariupol, the reality is the remaining Ukraine regiment in the city is now located in a steel factory where they took civilians to provide cover.  The Russians have given them a deadline to surrender.

At this point Mariupol is a western media talking point, a created Alamo narrative, about to disappear.

(VIA CNN) – The US is prepping another $800 million military assistance package for Ukraine, according to three senior administration officials and two sources familiar with the planning.

Details of the latest package are still being privately discussed and could change, but earlier Tuesday, President Joe Biden said the US plans to send more artillery to Ukraine.

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On one hand, Joe Biden needs to appease the base of his Covidians who identify themselves through the prism of COVID. On the other hand, the overwhelming majority of Americans are done with the COVID fear mongering.  What to do, what to do?

Trying to split the baby, Biden’s DOJ announces [SEE HERE] it will appeal the federal court ruling that overturned the federal Transporation covid mask mandate, but only if the CDC tells them to.

DOJ PRESS RELEASE – […] “The Department of Justice and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) disagree with the district court’s decision and will appeal, subject to CDC’s conclusion that the order remains necessary for public health.”

“If CDC concludes that a mandatory order remains necessary for the public’s health after that assessment, the Department of Justice will appeal the district court’s decision.” (link)

Keep in mind, the federal court ruling specifically centered around the arbitrary nature of the original mandate, which exceeded the scope of CDC legal authority, compounded by the CDC breaking its own rules for public feedback in the implementation.

The mandate created by Joe Biden did not have legal structure.  It was a dictatorial fiat that exceeded the capacity of the executive branch to create.

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Jumpin’ ju-ju bones, Governor Ron DeSantis detonated a thermonuclear political bomb on the Disney Corporation today.

A special legislative session has been called to approve the new congressional districting map.  However, in an unexpected announcement, the Florida governor said that, in addition to a new congressional map they’re voting on, lawmakers “will be considering termination of all special districts that were enacted in Florida prior to 1968, and that includes the Reedy Creek Improvement District.”

As NBC notes, “The Reedy Creek Improvement District in the Orlando area shields Disney from local government regulations and from local property taxes, which could be worth as much as $200 million per year, by one lawmaker’s estimate.  Legislators in both chambers predicted the legislation — which could end the 55-year-old taxing district next summer — would pass by Friday.”  WATCH:

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DeSantis knows he has a sky-high approval rating in the state, and he is moving fast while the public still has the cultural antagonism and political weaponization by the Disney Corporation in the headlines.

The Disney Corporation previously announced they were going to fund political attacks against the Florida Legislature for creating laws that protect children from sex predators in schools.  Disney openly announced they support grooming efforts by teachers in K-3 education to sexualize children and discuss gender identity issues for children under 9-years-old without parental consent.

Ron DeSantis and the Florida Republican Legislature are about to deliver big revenge against Disney for that decision.  In the political, cultural and all things corporate business world inside Florida, the removal of Disney’s special district status is huge.

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Obviously, the office of White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain is urgently contacting pollsters to measure how the base of the party would feel if the administration did not challenge the federal court ruling that overturned the federal mask mandate for transportation.

The far-left is on its heels after a Tampa judge overturned the CDC’s legal framework for the mask mandate rule, and the TSA changed their guidance.  Most of the Biden support base, the Covidians, define themselves through the virtue signaling of wearing a mask. However, all of the airlines quickly abandoned rules for masks during travel, and the overwhelming majority of Americans cheered.

Now, the Biden DOJ finds themselves in a hot political place.  Biden is stuck between the mentally and emotionally unstable Covidians (10%) and the normal Americans (90%).  If the DOJ doesn’t challenge the ruling, the Covidians will be even more mad. [Psaki Transcript Here]

(WASHINGTON DC) – […]  White House press secretary Jen Psaki, speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One en route to New Hampshire, said the Justice Department was still reviewing the ruling and noted that these reviews typically take a few days. She pointed out that the CDC had said previously it needed 15 days to evaluate public health data related to the mask mandate.

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Lots of people talk about an inflation driven recession.  Essentially, that’s a total economic contraction in the value of goods and services produced, sold and purchased, due to rising prices.   However, as CTH has been pointing out for more than six months, if you subtract the federal COVID infusion money from the overall economy, we have been in a contracting demand economy for almost nine months.

A negative GDP outcome is quite possible, perhaps likely, when the first quarter GDP figures are released on the last Friday of this month.  The most recent sales and economic data shows that U.S. consumers are prioritizing spending and high priced durable good sales are negative.

Now, Fannie Mae is delivering a rather stunning shift in their economic forecast.  In addition to projecting a recession for 2023, these revised home purchase figures are remarkable:

...”We have downgraded our total home sales forecast for 2022 to a decline of 7.4 percent (previously a 4.1 percent decline) followed by a decrease of 9.7 percent in 2023 (previously a 2.7 percent decline).” (link)

That is a very significant change in home sales forecast to the negative position.

We already have serious energy inflation to contend with and low wage growth.  We already know a third inflation wave on highly consumable goods is coming this summer, likely around 30% or more in food prices at the grocery store.

The professional forecasts are always tilted toward the positive for this administration, so this new statement by Fannie Mae should be considered accordingly.  Remember, Boy Scouts motto.

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The latest developments in the effort to purchase the unsustainable magic coffee shop are quite revealing.

According to the New York Post, “Musk himself is willing to invest between $10 billion and $15 billion of his own cash to take Twitter private, two sources close to the situation said. That’s up from the current 9.1% stake in the company he revealed on April 4, which is worth about $3.4 billion.”

However, more revealing about the overall issue are the comments from the PR firm of the U.S. Intelligence Community, The Washington Post:

(WaPo) […] “Putting so much power in the hands of one company is bad enough, but putting it in the hands of one person, as is largely the case with Facebook shareholder Mark Zuckerberg and would be the case if Twitter were owned by Musk, would be incompatible with democracy.” 

“There are simply no checks and balances from any internal or external force,” … “It would leave Musk, like Zuckerberg, with an amount of assembled data about people and the ability to use it to manipulate them “that cannot be compared to anything that has ever existed, and allows intervention into the integrity of individual behavior and also the integrity of collective behavior.” (read more)

People are starting to catch on to the reality that costs for data processing on many social media platforms (the free coffee), exceeds the ability of the platform to generate revenue.  People are starting to understand that behind the scenes of the Big Tech consortium, there is something else, some other operational construct and mechanism, that subsidizes & facilitates their existence.

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Put this in the tracking file for ratios and such.  Axios is reporting that CNN+ is likely to collapse as Warner Bros has suspended all external marketing and product development and fired the Chief Financial Officer.  The network has spent $300 million, and only generated 150,000 subscribers.  A major fail by any measure.

(Via Axios) Warner Bros. Discovery has suspended all external marketing spend for CNN+ and has laid off CNN’s longtime chief financial officer as it weighs what to do with the subscription streaming service moving forward, five sources tell Axios.

• Why it matters: Inside CNN, executives think the launch has been successful. Discovery executives disagree.

• CNN+ has roughly 150,000 subscribers so far.

• Warner Bros. Discovery wants to eventually build one giant service around HBO Max.

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