John Cena has opened up about his decision not to have kids.  The wrestling legend and actor discussed his choice during a recent appearance on the Club Shay Shay podcast, hosted by former NFL star Shannon Sharpe. “I don’t want them. I have a certain curiosity about life, and I also know the investment that it takes,” Cena told Sharpe. “As somebody who’s driven, many times stubborn and selfish, I try to approach the world with kindness and curiosity but I don’t think I’m personally ready, nor will I ever be, to invest the time [needed] to be a great parent,” he said, per HuffPost. Tickets for “Am I Racist?” are on sale NOW! Buy here for a theater near you. “I want to live life for all it is,” Cena added. “I still have a lot to do.” Cena said he and his wife Shay Shariatzadeh are “on the same page” when it comes to becoming parents and have had “open conversations” about it.  “We both got to lean into these uncomfortable moments and address this stuff and now, we’ve actually built a foundation where, whenever one of us is feeling bothered, nothing’s off the table,” he said. “We have our disagreements, but we handle them right then and there. And nothing is too uncomfortable to be unapproachable. … Those conversations have helped me, at least, personally, and her forge a path together as a team.” Cena previously discussed his decision not to have kids during an appearance on “The Drew Barrymore Show” in 2022.  He responded to the talk show host saying he would be “the world’s greatest father.” “I think just because you might be good at something, for me, is not a strong enough reason to do that,” he said at the time. “You have to have a passion for it. You have to have a fuel for it.” WATCH THE TRAILER FOR ‘AM I RACIST?’ — A MATT WALSH COMEDY ON DEI During his latest podcast appearance, Cena told the host that he had given his decision a lot of thought. “I can tell you this is not a knee-jerk reaction. I thought long and hard about this. My opinions only hit that gray area during emotionally difficult times,” he said. “And I’m very happy with where I stand. I have a lot of joy and fulfillment in my life. And that’s pretty much where I stand on it.”

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“Promising” antibiotic candidates were found by Finnish scientists in microbes under the seafloor in the Arctic Ocean. 70% of all currently licensed antibiotics have been derived from actinobacteria in the soil, but most environments on Earth have not yet been searched for them. Scientists say that focusing the search on actinobacteria in other habitats is […] The post Potential New Source for Drugs to Fight Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria Found Deep in Arctic Ocean appeared first on Good News Network.

This Labor Day weekend, the AAA expects tens of millions of drivers on the road—10% more than last year—most of them in safe, affordable cars and pickup trucks.   Consumers have choice, based on their own preferences and needs, not the dictates of government. Now you can travel in your choice of electric vehicle, hybrid, or gasoline-powered car. But in 10 years you will likely not have that choice, once the stealth regulations of the Biden-Harris administration force you into buying electric vehicles. That’s because President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have imposed regulations through the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Transportation that mandate that 70% of all new passenger cars sold in America be battery-powered electric or plug-in hybrid by 2032, up from about 8% in 2023. By 2027, 32% of new vehicles have to be electric or plug-in hybrid; by 2029, the share is 47%. The stated objective of the mandate is to reduce global temperatures due to climate change. But even if all fossil fuels were eliminated from the United States immediately, this would make a difference of only two-tenths of one degree Celsius by 2100, according to government models. If automakers don’t sell the required share of electric vehicles under the mandate, the government levies fines and manufacturers must purchase credits from companies selling more electric vehicles. Currently, automakers buy Zero Emission Vehicle credits from Tesla, which sells two-thirds of all EVs in the United States. The financial penalties faced by auto companies for breaking the law already force them to reduce production and raise prices of popular cars, such as pickup trucks and sports utility vehicles, and increase their production of electric vehicles. As the required share of EV sales rises, more desirable brands will be priced higher—or disappear. Since Americans prefer pickup trucks to EVs, auto companies price EVs artificially lower than cost and raise prices of gasoline-powered cars to compensate. Raising car prices to unaffordable levels removes choice. Even with favored pricing, and with the $7,500 tax credit to purchase an electric vehicle, dealers are not selling enough EVs to meet the mandate. Over 4,000 car dealers wrote to Biden in November 2023, stating: “The reality, however, is that electric vehicle demand today is not keeping up with the large influx of [battery electric vehicles] arriving at our dealerships prompted by the current regulations. BEVs are stacking up on our lots.” In January 2024, over 5,000 car dealers wrote again to Biden, saying: “Electric vehicle sales are not remotely on trend to meet those [EPA] requirements. Indeed, the day supply of electric vehicles on dealer lots today is nearly twice the supply of conventional vehicles … We now ask that you hit the brakes.” For those who can afford electric vehicles, who can recharge them at home or at the office, and who don’t have to travel too far during the day, EVs are ideal. They are quiet and don’t require trips to the gas station. But for others, the Biden-Harris EV mandate doesn’t work, and these drivers should be allowed their choice of gasoline-powered cars. Electric vehicles cost tens of thousands more than their gasoline-powered equivalents. Some people can’t recharge at home or on the job, such as many who work in businesses that require travel, or who work in farming. Extreme hot and cold temperatures reduce battery life. And those who travel with children know that several delays along the road to recharge can ruin a family vacation. The mandate for electric vehicles increases America’s dependence on China, which produces 80% of EV batteries, as my recent Heritage Foundation report details. The mandate also specifies that 25% of all heavy trucks sold must be electric by 2032. As with EVs, electric trucks cost more than diesel trucks, raising transportation costs. A diesel truck costs about $120,000; an electric truck costs in the range of $450,000 to $500,000. America doesn’t even have the electrical grid capacity, the charging stations, or the technology to operate long-haul electric trucks—and won’t have them by 2032. Harris has said that she doesn’t want to take away Americans’ choice of vehicles. If so, the Biden-Harris administration indeed needs to hit the brakes on the EV mandate. The post Biden-Harris Admin’s EV Mandates Destroy Car Choice appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Some ideas are like horror movie villains. They’re dangerous, and no matter how many times they’re defeated, they never seem to die. The misguided idea of taxing unrealized capital gains is back on the scene. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., floated a proposal to tax unrealized capital gains in 2021. It was widely debated in 2022, when Congress was considering a multitrillion-dollar tax and spending package. Opposition from Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., to taxing income before it’s earned helped defeat the idea then. But the idea was far from dead. President Joe Biden included a version of the tax in his latest budget. Vice President Kamala Harris also has endorsed the idea. The first step in killing a bad idea is to recognize it for the scourge it is. A realized capital gain—which we currently tax—is the difference between the price you sold an asset for and the price you paid for it. An unrealized gain, on the other hand, is an estimate of what that difference would be if you had sold an asset that you still hold. The difference between taxing realized capital gains and unrealized gains is the difference between the government taxing people on income they’ve actually received versus the government taxing them on income they might receive later. It would give the government the first claim on income, taking a big slice before the supposed owner of the asset ever sees a penny. In effect, it would turn property owners into property renters, with Uncle Sam as their landlord. Consider how an unrealized capital gains tax would work if it was applied to housing. You would be taxed on the increase in the value of your house regardless of whether you sold it and received any income out of it. If you bought a house for $300,000, and the value rose to $500,000 a couple years later, you could be stuck paying tax on the $200,000 of gain even as you’re struggling to make mortgage payments. At a 25% tax rate, it would cost you $50,000 in federal taxes. It would be like having a second mortgage, but in some ways worse. At least mortgage payments end after 30 years. But you would never finish paying off your unrealized capital gains tax payments, as long as you owned the asset and its value was increasing—even if that increase was only from inflation. And unlike mortgages, which give homeowners clearly defined payment terms, unrealized capital gains tax payments would be unpredictable, rising or falling depending on the housing market, inflation, and subjective assessments of a house’s value. Unrealized capital gains taxes on business assets wouldn’t be much better. The value of company stocks fluctuate wildly, year to year and even day to day. If a company’s stock price skyrocketed at the end of one year and then plummeted at the start of the next, its shareholders could face devastating capital gains taxes that they may have no way of paying—even if they were to sell their shares. Unrealized capital gains are often—as the name suggests—not real. But the taxes on the phantom gains would be very real. Under an unrealized capital gains tax, the federal government would exert its primacy over Americans’ investments, taking the first dividends on profitable endeavors. But although the government would reap the first rewards, individual investors and business owners would bear the risk of losses. Taxing the unrealized gains from ownership in a small, closely held business would present many of the same challenges as taxing unrealized gains on corporate stock or on housing. And it would present unique challenges. Stock prices may be used to estimate public companies’ prices, but an unrealized capital gains tax on small business assets would require administratively burdensome business valuations. Small business owners—with limited access to capital markets—would be especially ill-prepared to deal with sudden surges in taxes whenever the company’s estimated value rose. As soon as small businesses achieved some success, the government would slam them with new taxes and stop their momentum. Those in Washington who propose taxing unrealized capital gains generally include broad exemptions for certain asset classes and based on income or asset thresholds. These exceptions would give investors a path to escape from the tax, which is better than the alternative. The tax would have fewer direct victims as a result. But the tax-induced capital flows still would wreak economic havoc—and without managing to raise much government revenue. So, the new tax would do little to satiate lawmakers’ appetite for more tax dollars. And once a horror movie villain—or a bad idea—gets a foot in the door, it quickly can swing the door open wide and claim more victims. When the income tax was first implemented in 1913, it applied to less than 1% of the population, and most of those who paid it paid only a 1% rate. That small initial income tax spawned something far worse and more widespread over time. Allowing the government to tax income that doesn’t exist sets an even more dangerous precedent. Americans should slam the door on the idea of taxing unrealized capital gains, and lawmakers should kill the idea once and for all. The post The Danger of Taxing Unrealized Capital Gains appeared first on The Daily Signal.

If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. America First Legal (AFL) is attempting to shed light on the role that the Biden-Harris administration may have played in the arrest of Telegram CEO Pavel Durov. The French-Emirati citizen was arrested in France and charged with a large number of alleged crimes – in effect, failure to censor third-party content that can be qualified as criminal behavior. However, there is suspicion that the real reason is to force Telegram to censor all content, in the style of Google or Meta. The charges also attack encryption. Announcing its Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests regarding the US State Department’s possible involvement in the arrest, AFL noted that the encrypted app is one of the world’s largest, based on the premise of protecting its users’ free speech from what the non-profit dedicated to promoting the rule of law calls “government-sponsored” censorship. We obtained a copy of the letter for you here. AFL cites statements made by Mike Benz, founder of the Foundation for Freedom Online and former State Department official, as the reason to suspect the current White House either had advance knowledge or has had its hand in the highly controversial arrest. Display content from Twitter Click here to display content from Twitter. Learn more in Twitter’s privacy policy. Always display content from Twitter Open "content" directly If true, AFL doesn’t see this as out of character for the Biden-Harris administration, given its own track record regarding online censorship. AFL puts its FOIA requests in the context of working to protect freedom of speech, which is guaranteed – or is supposed to be guaranteed – by the First Amendment in the US. Durov’s arrest is described by AFL Legal Executive Director Gene Hamilton as “troubling.” “The American people have a right to know whether the Biden-Harris Administration had advance knowledge of the plans to arrest Mr. Durov,” Hamilton is quoted as saying. The FOIAs state that Telegram is, among close to a billion users, used by millions of political dissidents and freedom fighters around the world, and is endorsed by digital rights groups. The FOIAs specifically request records that should show whether the administration, prompted by domestic political reasons, engaged in influencing “the criminal justice apparatus of an important ally.” To this end, AFL wants access to communications with French nationals and/or diplomatic cables that contain the words “Pavel Durov,” “Paul du Rove,” and “Telegram,” and documents or records relevant to the arrest. The material requested via the FOIA covers the period from May 1 this year, to the date the requests are processed. If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. The post Biden-Harris Administration is Probed for Potential Role in Telegram CEO Pavel Durov’s Arrest appeared first on Reclaim The Net.

If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. Andy Yen, CEO of Proton – which develops a suit of encrypted, privacy-focused services including Proton Mail – has spoken out against France’s charges against Telegram’s Pavel Durov, slamming them as “insane.” Yen commented on the developments in the context of the position France has put itself in, as a place for tech companies – either in terms of doing business there, or merely for their founders traveling to the country. In the wake of Durov’s arrest, and in light of the nature of the charges pressed against him, the perception of France as a desirable destination for the tech industry is changing “rapidly and permanently” as far as investors and founders are concerned – and not in a good way. France has committed “economic suicide” – that is how Yen describes the situation, in addition to the damage done to its image as a free country. He makes note of the fact that even though Durov faced problems in Russia, and refused to comply with the demands of the authorities there several years ago, France turned out to be the one to arrest him. “Imagine the outrage,” Yen continues, if the situation was reversed – if Russia arrested the CEO of a major US tech company, for example, Mark Zuckerberg. (The outrage would most certainly include branding Russia as an “authoritarian” country, but something of the kind is entirely missing in legacy media reporting about France, in the context of the scandalous arrest in Paris.) Yen expressed another concern regarding France’s decision to subject a platform operating on servers in other countries to its jurisdiction, making the charges extrajudicial. “The only French connection (when it comes to jurisdiction over servers) is that Durov made the mistake of obtaining French nationality,” the Proton CEO writes. Some of those who commented on Yen’s reaction made an interesting observation that, at least up to the point it was posted, very few other founders of privacy-friendly and encrypted services had raised their voices against the arrest and the charges. And they, among other things, accuse Durov of providing “cryptology services aiming to ensure confidentiality without certified declaration.” If you're tired of censorship and dystopian threats against civil liberties, subscribe to Reclaim The Net. The post Proton CEO Slams France for Arresting Telegram Founder appeared first on Reclaim The Net.