'I think it's a legitimate concern'

'He said he was homeless'

Deflated by the resounding November defeat, the Left now believes it can magically rebound by destroying President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet nominees. Many of Trump’s picks are well outside the usual Washington, D.C./New York political, media, and corporate nexus. But that is precisely the point—to insert reformers into a bloated, incompetent, and weaponized government who are not part of it. Trump’s nominee for FBI director, Kash Patel, is already drawing severe criticism. Patel’s furious enemies cannot go after his resume, since he has spent a lifetime in private, congressional, and executive billets, both in investigations and intelligence. Instead, they claim he is too vindictive and does not reflect the ethos of the FBI. But what will Patel not do as the new director? He will not serially lie under oath to federal investigators, as did interim FBI Director Andrew McCabe, a current Patel critic. He will not forge an FBI court affidavit, as did convicted felon and agency lawyer Kevin Clinesmith. He will not claim amnesia 245 times under congressional oath to evade embarrassing admissions, as did former FBI Director James Comey. He will not partner with a foreign national to collect dirt and subvert a presidential campaign as the FBI did with Christopher Steele in 2016. He will not use the FBI to draft social media to suppress news unfavorable to a presidential candidate on the eve of an election. He would not have suppressed FBI knowledge that Hunter Biden‘s laptop was genuine—to allow the lie to spread that it was “Russian disinformation” on the eve of the 2020 election. He will not raid the home of an ex-president with SWAT teams, surveil Catholics, monitor parents at school board meetings, or go after peaceful, pro-life protesters. Decorated combat veteran Pete Hegseth is another controversial nominee for secretary of defense. What will Hegseth likely not do? Go AWOL without notifying the president of a serious medical procedure as did current Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin? Install race and gender criteria for promotion and mandate training in diversity, equity, and inclusion, or DEI? Insinuate falsely that cabals of white supremacists had infiltrated the military—only to alienate that entire demographic and thus ensure the Pentagon came up 40,000 recruits short? Oversee the scramble from Kabul, Afghanistan, that saw $50 billion in U.S. military equipment abandoned to Taliban terrorists? Watch passively as a Chinese spy balloon traversed the continental United States for a week? Allow the chairman of the Joint Chiefs to promise his Chinese communist counterpart that the People’s Liberation Army would first be informed if the president of the United States was felt to issue a dangerous order? Rotate into the Pentagon from a defense contractor boardship and then leave office to rotate back there to leverage procurement decisions? Oversee the Pentagon’s serial flunking of fiscal audits? Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump’s nominee to head the Department of Health and Human Services, is certainly a maverick. He may earn the most Democratic hits, given his former liberal credentials. But what will RFK also not do as HHS secretary? Oversee his agencies’ circumventing of U.S. law by transferring money to Communist China to help it produce lethal gain-of-function viruses of the COVID-19 sort—in the manner of Dr. Anthony Fauci? Organize scientists to go after critics of mandatory masking and defame them? Give pharmaceutical companies near-lifetime exemptions from legal jeopardy for rushing into production mRNA vaccines not traditionally vetted and tested? Leave office to monetize his HHS expertise and thus make millions from the pharmaceutical companies? Trump’s nominee for national intelligence director, former House member and military veteran Tulsi Gabbard, will soon be defamed in congressional hearings. But what has Gabbard not done? Joined “51 former intelligence authorities” to lie on the eve of the 2020 election that the Hunter Biden laptop “had all the hallmarks” of a Russian information/disinformation operation”—in an effort to swing the election to Joe Biden? Lied under congressional oath like former DNI James Clapper, who claimed he gave only the “least untruthful answer” in congressional testimony? Encourage the FBI to monitor a presidential campaign in efforts to discredit it—in the manner of former CIA Director John Brennan, who lied not once but twice under oath? Fail to foresee the American meltdown in Kabul, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Hamas terrorist attacks on Israel, or the Houthis’ takeover of the Red Sea? We are going to hear some outrageous things in the upcoming congressional confirmation hearings. But one thing we will not hear about are the crimes, deceptions, and utter incompetence of prior and current government grandees. The current Biden-Harris crew, not their proposed Trump replacements, prompted the sick and tired American people to demand different people. Voters want novel approaches to reform a government that they not only no longer trust but also now deeply fear. (C) 2024 Tribune Content Agency LLC We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post What the Trump Nominees Have Not Done—and Will Not Do appeared first on The Daily Signal.

If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. Riot Games – the US games developer and publisher (but owned by China’s Tencent) that publishes titles including League of Legends and Valorant, has updated its terms of service to give itself the right to punish users for what it calls “off-platform conduct.” Creators must align their content with the new ToS, which includes this rule, by January 3, 2025. Riot is “defining” what off-platform conduct can occur in the usual, for the wider tech industry, broad terms that are open to interpretation: “The various places that touch (users’) gaming experience.” It is added that Riot will not scour social media, but is instead depending on gamers reporting each other, even when “hateful slurs” are not happening in-game. Much of the ToS changes refer to Valorant. This game’s director Joe Ziegler has said that the goal is to prevent “the sort of toxicity seen in League of Legends.” Eligible for punishment could be a live stream with a Riot game appearing as “the background of the content produced.” Penalties range from suspensions to “Riot-wide” bans, and those penalties will be handed down “as if that behavior occurred in-game,” the new ToS states. If a gamer is violating this or other similar rules, their Riot accounts can get permanently banned. More vague language can be found in the company’s threat of hitting users with bans and penalties for a violation that’s “seriously egregious,” represents “something painful,” not to mention, “problematic” behavior. It’s not only the latest version of the ToS, but Riot execs, too, that “speak like it’s 2021” – Senior Vice President Anna Donlon was caught talking about Riot needing to “do better,” players not needing to “grow a thicker skin,” and such. Riot showed a little more character in a separate statement – although some gamers might easily find it to be, let’s say, “most seriously egregious, and painful:” “Evil statements under the guise of shit talk (are) not welcome here,” the company said. Riot does seem to be doing a lot, if not “better,” to present itself as a company complying with the gaming-centric censorship that has been burgeoning in recent years, and at times spilling outside the confines of games themselves. With in-game infractions of ToS that are seen as particularly grave – as Riot chooses to interpret that – users can even expect hardware bans. If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. The post Gaming Giant Riot Expands the Rules to Police Player Behavior Everywhere appeared first on Reclaim The Net.

This Is Our Future If We Don't Fight Back

2024 has been a great year for roguelikes all around, but one of my favorites has been Ravenswatch. At first look, you might be forgiven for thinking it’s in the Hades mold, and there are certainly some similarities, but developer Passtech Games has built a much more open-ended ARPG with character-driven combat reminiscent of games like Diablo. Filled with a fantastic cast of immediately recognizable fairytale faces, Ravenswatch has won itself a ‘very positive’ Steam rating so far, and it’s about to get even better in 2025 with the addition of not one but two new heroes coming as free DLC. Continue reading Free Ravenswatch DLC will bring a pair of new characters to the Steam roguelike MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Best co-op games, Best RPG games, Best roguelike games

I remember sitting in the press room during TennoCon 2023 when Digital Extremes gave fans a first look at its upcoming fantasy RPG, Soulframe. I'd seen the gameplay the day before, and knew that as soon as the Envoy summoned Orengall, the gorgeous, hulking winter wolf, people would lose their minds. Turns out I was right, as the thunderous applause that greeted the towering creature reverberated through the exhibition hall floor down to where we were sitting. It was certainly quite the moment. Since then, however, we haven't seen Orengall in the Soulframe Preludes - but don't worry, she's coming. Continue reading New Soulframe update adds the wolf from the trailer, but you can’t mount it yet MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Best MMOs, Best RPG games , Best fantasy games

Path of Exile 2 could have been a much safer game. The first PoE has spent a decade growing and evolving, earning ever more fans over the years, and sits tall atop the pinnacle of rich, rewarding action RPGs, fending off strong challenges from contenders such as Diablo 4 and Last Epoch. Yet Grinding Gear Games has always been one to experiment. And so in PoE 2 - a game that started life as a simple model update for its predecessor, only to grow into a standalone beast - GGG rips up its own rulebook to create something that feels definitively new and exciting. Continue reading Path of Exile 2 is a bold and brilliant new breed of ARPG MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Path of Exile 2 Witch, Path of Exile 2 classes, Path of Exile 2 release date

What are the best Path of Exile 2 settings? If you can't wait to start your great adventure from Wraeclast to Oliath, but aren't sure how best to set up the game to make it look great and run smoothly, we've got the guide for you. Right out the gate, you can rest assured that, as a top-down RPG, the frame rate required to get a great experience isn't anywhere near as high as in a typical first-person shooter or racing game, for instance. A frame rate of 60fps is ample for a great time while playing Path of Exile 2. So, if you don't have the very latest and best graphics card in your system, you should still be able to have a great time. In fact, you can check here for the Path of Exile 2 system requirements, which aren't overly demanding. Continue reading Best Path of Exile 2 settings for max fps MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Best graphics card, Best gaming PC, Best SSD for gaming

What are the Path of Exile 2 quests? While there are more missions to come as PoE 2 continues its journey through early access, taking a look at the quest list should give you an indication as to what you've completed and how much of your adventure is still to come. Once you have a good idea of what Path of Exile 2 quests await you, check out our best Path of Exile 2 builds which we’ve painstakingly put together. As you make your way through all the PoE 2 quests, you may want to look at every Path of Exile 2 ascendancy to understand how you can take your character to another level. For now, let's take a closer look at all the Path of Exile 2 main quests currently on offer. Continue reading Path of Exile 2 quest list - all main and side missions MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Path of Exile 2 Witch, Path of Exile 2 classes, Path of Exile 2 release date