Hamas, Hezbollah: We're Escalating Unless Israel Surrenders

New live imaging methods have shown what’s behind the release of eggs.

Let’s explore what psychologists call the “left-cheek bias”.

It’s not the year’s busiest meteor shower, but sitting off the shoulder of Orion it has a special place in the public imagination, and this year there’s an extra attraction.

The U.S. Secret Service needs a new leadership team with significant experience from outside the agency in order to address a long list of critical failures laid bare by the nearly successful attempted assassination of former President Donald J. Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, a review panel recommends. A four-member investigation group appointed by Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas restated many of the weaknesses identified by other investigators since the July 13 assassination attempt. The group said the Secret Service needs a new director and leadership team to address everything from risk-based threat assessment to the lack of critical thinking by personnel. Among the most shocking aspects of the attempted assassination was how easy it was for a young man barely out of his teens to defeat what was supposed to be world-class security. “The Secret Service as an agency requires fundamental reform to carry out its mission,” the panel wrote in a letter to Mayorkas. “Without that reform, the Independent Review Panel believes another Butler can and will happen again.” The Independent Review Panel said the Secret Service “does not perform at the elite levels needed to discharge its critical mission.” “The Secret Service has become bureaucratic, complacent, and static even though risks have multiplied and technology has evolved,” the panel wrote. “The work of the Independent Review Panel uncovered not only numerous mistakes that led to the events of July 13 in Butler, Pennsylvania, but also deeper, systemic issues that must be addressed with urgency.” The 52-page document released Oct. 17 is the first final report from the nearly dozen probes under way in Congress, the FBI, the DHS Office of Inspector General, and other groups. Members include Janet Napolitano, DHS secretary under President Barack Obama; Mark Filip, a former federal judge and deputy attorney general under President George W. Bush; Frances Townsend, former Homeland Security adviser to President Bush; and David Mitchell, former superintendent of the Maryland State Police. ‘With striking ease’ The panel conducted 58 multi-hour interviews, surveyed the Butler Farm Show Inc. site, and amassed some 7,000 documents. Among the most shocking aspects of the attempted assassination was how easy it was for a young man barely out of his teens to defeat what was supposed to be world-class security. “The July 13 assassination attempt was not the work of a trained foreign adversary prepared to conduct a multi-dimensional attack and willing to sacrifice themselves in the process,” the report said. “Rather, a young, local Pennsylvania man who had seemingly conceived of and executed his assassination plot within days after the former president’s rally was publicly announced had managed, with striking ease, to circumvent the Secret Service’s ‘no fail’ protective mission.” Would-be assassin Thomas Matthew Crooks climbed onto the American Glass Research roof just after 6 p.m. July 13 and ran the length of the complex until he reached Building 6, where he made his sniper’s nest. A SWAT operator looks to access the roof of the American Glass Research building after the July 13 shooting of former President Donald J. Trump in Butler, Pa. Butler Township Police Department via Judicial Watch A Pennsylvania State Police trooper saw Crooks running on the roof and broadcast a warning on police radio, but Secret Service officials said they never heard it. Acting Director Ronald Rowe Jr. said the first indication of a threat came when Crooks unleashed the first of eight shots from an AR-15 rifle. A SWAT team operator — Sgt. Aaron M. Zaliponi of the Adams Township Police Department — stopped Crooks’ attack when he shot and damaged the buttstock on his rifle. A short time later, a Secret Service counter-sniper killed Crooks before he could attempt any more gunplay. Trump was struck in the ear by the first shot. Other rounds killed volunteer firefighter Corey Comperatore and seriously wounded David Dutch and James Copenhaver. Overall 10 people were injured during the tragedy, including seven law enforcement personnel and one Secret Service agent, the report said. Major blunders by the Secret Service included failing to secure the rooftops in the AGR complex 130 yards north of the event stage and not taking steps to prevent the gunman’s direct line of sight to the former president, the report said. Lack of effective communication between the Secret Service and state and local law enforcement agencies helped Crooks escape early detection and prevented Trump’s protective detail from removing him from the stage or even preventing him from appearing at the podium, the report concluded. The Butler County Emergency Services Unit set aside pre-programmed radios for use by various Secret Service personnel — including counter-sniper teams — but the radios sat untouched. The panel recommended that the Secret Service work in the same command center as local law enforcement instead of the separate accommodations used in Butler “with the integration of a real-time incident command management system.” The failure to have counter-drones in the air during a “critical period of time when it could have detected Crooks operating a drone” indicates a “deeper concern” by the panel “regarding a general lack of technology to support the Secret Service’s protective mission.” Secret Service agents cover former President Donald J. Trump after he was shot in the ear by a would-be assassin in Butler, Pa., July 13. Photo by Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty Images The Secret Service did not have drone coverage through most of the day. Crooks surveilled parts of the site with his own drone, starting at about 3:50 p.m. and running for about 11 minutes, the FBI has said. Security experts told Blaze News that Crooks was likely checking his planned route to ensure that conditions had not changed since he first surveilled the site. An inexperienced Secret Service staff member could not get the counter-drone system working and ended up repeatedly calling technical support for the drone manufacturer, according to the House Task Force to Investigate the Attempted Assassination of Donald J. Trump. The Independent Review Panel recommended “a mandate that all outdoor events are observed by overhead technology.” Changes to site security planning should include better identification of line-of-sight threats and “significant training” on how to use a risk-based threat identification system rather than basing resource decisions on a protectee’s title, the report said. The panel said a clean sweep needs to be made of top leadership of the Secret Service, with a new director coming from outside the agency. This will help address systemic or cultural issues that show in a lack of critical thinking, a lack of ownership for site planning and other issues, and the need for extensive training. The group also recommended some internal reorganization to place an emphasis on the Secret Service’s protective mission as opposed to investigative or other functions. The panel said that while additions to the Secret Service’s $3.1 billion budget “would be helpful,” the focus should first involve “dialogue around the failures of July 13” or the “critical lessons from July 13 will have been lost.” Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

On Thursday, Harvard University released its fiscal year 2024 financial report, which revealed a nearly 15% decline in donations compared to the previous year, marking the most significant drop in a decade.According to the report, the Ivy League school received $1.38 billion in donations in 2023, which plunged to $1.17 billion in 2024.'Launched efforts to understand where and how we can improve.'Despite the decline, Harvard did not lose its spot as the wealthiest university in the world. In fiscal year 2024, the Ivy League school generated a 9.6% return on its endowment fund, valued at $53.2 billion.The significant donation dip can be attributed to several of Harvard’s top donors vowing to halt their funding over the university’s poor handling of the pro-Hamas campus protests.In January, Kenneth Griffin, the founder and CEO of Citadel LLC, a hedge fund, called Harvard students “whiny snowflakes” and said he would no longer donate to the institution.“I’d like that to change, and I have made that clear to members of the corporate board,” Griffin stated. “But until Harvard makes it very clear that they’re going to resume their role as educating young American men and women to be leaders, to be problem solvers, to take on difficult issues, I’m not interested in supporting the institution.”He accused Harvard and other elite universities of “being lost in the wilderness of microaggressions, a DEI agenda that seems to have no real endgame.”Griffin previously donated over $500 million to Harvard.Bill Ackman, founder and CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, a hedge fund firm, also declared he would no longer donate to his alma mater. “I came to learn that the root cause of antisemitism at Harvard was an ideology that had been promulgated on campus, an oppressor/oppressed framework, that provided the intellectual bulwark behind the protests, helping to generate anti-Israel and anti-Jewish hate speech and harassment,” Ackman wrote in a lengthy X post.Leonard V. Blavatnik, a billionaire philanthropist, stopped donating after previously providing Harvard Medical School with $200 million, the single largest donation to the school.Former Harvard President Claudine Gay resigned in January following a massive plagiarism scandal amid already mounting criticism for her failed handling of the pro-Hamas protests. Harvard’s new president, Alan Garber, wrote a message in the Ivy League school’s latest financial report, stating that the institution has “launched efforts to understand where and how we can improve.”“Our task forces to combat antisemitism and anti-Israel bias, and anti-Arab, anti-Muslim, anti-Palestinian bias are focused on rebuilding not only a sense of belonging but also genuine acceptance among members of our community,” Garber wrote.He noted that two of the school’s working groups “have outlined paths to more meaningful communication and constructive disagreement.”Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

Officials in Rhode Island, one of the bluest states in America, reportedly sent out notices to possible noncitizens, urging them to register to vote.In 2021, Rob Rock — who was then the director of elections at the Rhode Island State Department and is now deputy secretary and director of administration — was corresponding via email with Kyle Upchurch, program manager at the Center for Election Innovation & Research, the Federalist reported.During their exchanges, Upchurch inquired about a group of residents referred to as "eligible but unregistered" to vote. In response, Rock claimed that the state had sent mailers to so-called EBUs, some of whom were flagged as noncitizens."We sent two versions of the EBU," Rock wrote, according to emails viewed by the Federalist. "One to people who have a 'Y' citizenship flag and one to those who have a 'No' citizenship flag. Each PDF contains the English and Spanish versions."How many mailers were sent overall and how many were sent to noncitizens specifically remains unclear. However, the purpose of the mailer, according to a statement to the Federalist from Department of State Director of Communications and Public Affairs Faith Chybowski, was to identify recently naturalized citizens.The text of the mailer appears to support Chybowski's explanation."Our records show that you have not been eligible to vote due to your U.S. citizenship status. If your status has changed recently, you may now be eligible to vote," the mailer reads, according to a copy ostensibly reviewed by the Federalist.The mailer also reportedly warns recipients that they must be U.S. citizens to register to vote.'Why do you care whether voters are 22 or 63, other than younger voters tend to lean left?'Unfortunately, recent attempts to clean up voter rolls in other states revealed that noncitizens are regularly registering to vote, despite the federal prohibition against doing so. Virginia recently removed from its voter rolls more than 6,300 noncitizens who, according to Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin, "accidentally or maliciously" registered to vote. The Biden-Harris DOJ responded by suing the state.After facing a series of lawsuits late this summer, Arizona discovered that perhaps as many as 97,000 residents had registered to vote without ever providing proof of citizenship. The state supreme court ruled late last month that these residents could still vote in state and local elections in 2024.Rhode Island claims to have removed nearly 150,000 names from its voter rolls since 2020.Despite a nationwide problem of noncitizens appearing on voter rolls, officials in Rhode Island may not compel someone to provide documented proof of citizenship when registering to vote, the Rhode Island State Department told the Federalist. Instead, registrants provide "an attestation that the signer is a citizen," Chybowski said.Perhaps even more alarming, Rhode Island sent the mailer soliciting more voter registration because of its membership in the Electronic Registration Information Center, better known as ERIC.ERIC bills itself as a "nonpartisan" organization designed "to help election officials" in member states "maintain more accurate voter rolls and detect possible illegal voting." It is also funded entirely through fees paid by its 25 members, including the District of Columbia. In other words, taxpayers pay for its existence.Far from "nonpartisan," though, ERIC was founded by David Becker, a former DOJ attorney characterized by a former colleague as "a hard-core leftist" who "couldn’t stand conservatives."Just a few weeks ago, Becker dismissed concerns about noncitizens voting in American elections, indicating that such reports were a "made-up threat" coming from former President Donald Trump and his Republican allies."Remember to seek out only OFFICIAL election info, from trusted sources like election officials," he wrote in mid September.Becker is no longer listed on the ERIC website, but the organization still seems to make election-related demands that favor Democrats. For instance, ERIC shares with third parties certain demographic information about voters, including age."Why do you care whether voters are 22 or 63, other than younger voters tend to lean left?" asked Michael Greibrok of the Foundation for Government Accountability, a federal watchdog group.Among the third parties with which ERIC coordinates is the Center for Election Innovation & Research, the group Kyle Upchurch represented when he mentioned "eligible but unregistered" concerns with Rob Rock of the Rhode Island State Department back in 2021.And indeed ERIC appears fixated on EBUs. On its website, the group laments that America has perhaps as many as 51 million EBUs scattered throughout the country. Tens of millions of EBUs in a free country are only a problem if those individuals desire to register to vote but have been prevented by external circumstances beyond their control. In all likelihood, they do not want to register to vote and may even have deliberately elected against doing so. ERIC apparently wants them to register anyway."ERIC was established to clean up the voter rolls in member states. However, the member agreement only mandates adding voters, not removing them," Ned Jones, director of the Citizens Election Research Center at the Election Integrity Network, noted to the Federalist."Under the ERIC agreement, member states may be registering noncitizens," he added.Since 2021, at least nine states have parted ways with ERIC, perhaps on account of its partisan activism: Alabama, Florida, Iowa, Louisiana, Missouri, Ohio, Texas, Virginia, and West Virginia."ERIC is a bipartisan organization that operates in a nonpartisan manner," ERIC Executive Director Shane Hamlin told the Washington Examiner in December 2023. "We valued the states that resigned, but we will continue to work on behalf of our remaining members in improving the accuracy of America’s [voter] rolls and increasing access to voter registration for all eligible citizens."Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

What are the Steam Next Fest best demos? The weather’s turned chill, the nights are drawing in, and Valve has given us the best excuse to cozy up in front of the PC. Steam Next Fest has never been more popular, and there are far too many excellent demos than can reasonably fit into a single list. That’s where yours truly comes in. I’ve combed through Steam Next Fest to bring you the best demos to play right now, so you can pack out your wishlist just in time for the holiday Steam sale. While the PCGamesN hive mind has been digging into Delta Force and Supervive with abandon, my top picks aren’t necessarily the games topping the Steam Next Fest charts. These hidden gems constitute some of the best upcoming PC games across multiple genres, so you should find plenty on this list that takes your fancy. Continue reading The best Steam Next Fest demos for October 2024 MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Steam FAQ, Steam family sharing, Steam in-home streaming

The range of options available to those seeking a quality set of 2.1 computer speakers is fairly limited these days - outside of putting together a Hi-Fi system - but the Edifier S350DB is doing its bit. These speakers deliver superb sound quality, with huge amounts of volume and bass presence when needed, all while looking classy and for a very fair price. The combination on offer from Edifier here is enough to make these easily the best computer speakers you can buy if you're seeking a quality 2.1 set. The lack of gaming extras means they miss out on our overall pick for the best gaming speakers, but if a more varied set of uses is your main concern, these deserve your attention. Continue reading Edifier S350DB review: 2.1 computer speakers with true class MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Best graphics card, Best gaming PC, Best SSD for gaming

The Razer Viper Mini Signature Edition in white has been revealed, and it's going to be hard to get your hands on one for several reasons. Not only will stock be limited and only available in pre-determined drops, but this super-light gaming mouse also has a hefty price tag attached to it. The Razer Viper sits among the best gaming mouse options that your money can buy. Whether it's the Viper Hyperspeed or Viper Pro, this esports-focused gaming mouse offers incredible performance at a reasonable price. However, the Razer Viper Mini Signature is a completely different kettle of fish and is more of a designer product than one built with market domination in mind. Continue reading This new metal Razer gaming mouse costs $300, has glass feet MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Razer Viper V2 Pro review, Razer BlackShark V2 Pro (2023) review, Best gaming mouse