The now-64-year-old Texas woman who fatally shot superstar Selena in 1995 is seeking parole after 30 years behind bars. 

'It's a moment that will live with me forever'

Looking Back at Some of the Hate Crime Hoaxes of 2024

On Friday, former CNN host Don Lemon took to his YouTube channel, The Don Lemon Show, to react to the internal GOP argument over immigration and HB1 visas. What could have been an explanation of all sides of the argument with an appropriate opinion to close, quickly became an opportunity to harshly criticize conservatives, cursing out the party members, laughing his way through the entire video.Nothing productive was added to the conversation, only a further division in an already divided political scene, something which Lemon does best. With Sriram Krishnan, an outspoken advocate for HB1 visas, selected as Trump’s AI advisor, arguments around the culture of America’s success surrounding immigration began. Lemon was explaining the effect illegal immigration had upon the tech industry just as it does with blue collar industries, stating:  They come here, they overstay their airplanes and they overstay their visas. And guess what? The tech folks like that and they're part of the problem. Because they're keeping those people here because they want them.  Just as if you try to get rid of the migrants and some of the folks who come here, quite honestly illegally, then you can't – then folks, in the farming industry, in the service industries [laughs] and in any other industries they won't be able to do their jobs. Some farmers say without these workers they have about two days that they can run their farms and then after that it's over! In one moment he was calling out illegal immigration as a problem, and in the next he emphasized how necessary illegal immigrants were. His point was to mock Trump fans as idiots who don't recognize they're being played by corporate elites. This is Don Lemon, who was often called the dumbest pundit on cable TV.     He discussed the impact of immigration on Silicon Valley, his approach was not contributing to either part of the discussion, but rather ridiculing the party altogether and cursing them out as “stupid fucking idiots” with their “stupid MAGA brain”: Oh my gosh, I love this. Now you’re finding out, you dumb fucking idiots. Now you’re just figuring this shit out. You’re so fucking stupid, and you deserve it. And you fucking deserve it because you’re so dumb. It’s hypocrisy. So go with me here. Yes. I am gloating over your stupidity and how you were taken. I’m cracking. I’m cackling – I am. You have been co-opted because you’re in a fucking cult and you don’t even realize it because you have stupid MAGA brain, and you don’t get it. How stupid and dumb are you? Lemon’s place as an uncouth reporter and left-wing propagator on YouTube continues from his roots at CNN, more distasteful now more than ever before. The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read: Don Lemon Show 12/30/2024 5:45 (...) DON LEMON: And so if you were taken by this whole Tech-Bro-Doge thing – Oh and also you know we're going to deport migrants – [Laughs] Oh my gosh! Do you guys know how most people come here? I told you this, I've been telling you this for years. They come here, they overstay their airplanes and they overstay their visas. And guess what? The tech folks like that and they're part of the problem. Because they are keeping those people here because they want them because they are –  they believe they are good workers. They're are people  – and they don't have a lot of leverage right? If you don't do  – if you don't work hard they can't – they mostly cannot unionize. And they work in the tech fields a lot of them, in Silicon Valley a lot of them. [Laughs]  And no now they're figuring out without these people, “We cannot do our tech jobs.” But guess who knew that? The tech bros knew that, the folks who are supporting Donald Trump, the folks who you want to put in charge of the Doge’s already knew that. And so it is the same thing there's a correlation here. They're realizing if you get rid of these and it's HB1 visa folks, that's what they're fighting over. I'll get to that and explain. If you get rid of those folks then the tech folks can't do their jobs, the technology industry. Just as if you try to get rid of the migrants and some of the folks who come here, quite honestly illegally, then you can't – then folks, in the farming industry, in the service industries – [Laughs] - and in any other industries they won't be able to do their jobs. Some farmers say without these workers they have about two days that they can run their farms and then after that it's over! [Laughs] Oh my gosh, I love this! Now you’re finding out, you dumb fucking idiots! Now you’re just figuring this shit out! You’re so fucking stupid, and you deserve it! You fucking deserve it because you’re so dumb. Jim, it’s hypocrisy. So go with me here. Yes. I am gloating over your stupidity and how you were taken. I’m cracking. I’m cackling in Kamala, Ishanti – I am. You have been co-opted because you’re in a fucking cult and you don’t even realize it because you have stupid MAGA brain, and you don’t get it. How stupid and dumb are you? (...)  

After 38 years, Univision’s longtime anchor Jorge Ramos recently stepped away from the anchor desk and sailed off into the unknown. His career at Univision has certainly come to a close, but as we see in a recent column, his Trump Derangement rages on. In a screed titled “Planet Trump”, originally published at Mexico’s Reforma before posting on his eponymous website, Ramos self-righteously huffs about Trump’s proposed moves within our hemisphere. He opens with: Let's start with three facts: one, the Panama Canal is from Panama; two, Greenland is not for sale; and three, the Mexican territory belongs to Mexico and no one else. But all these things don't seem to matter to Donald Trump, who believes that the world is his. Trump has not yet taken office and already wants to change the geography. In a 90-minute speech before a conservative group in Phoenix, the still president-elect presented his vision of how he would like to reorganize the world. And without caring about the sovereignty of various nations, he exposed his new maps for a Planet Trump. Reasonable individuals can conclude that Jorge Ramos never recovered from the gradual loss of influence and credibility resulting from his Trump derangement. His staged ejection from Trump’s 2015 Iowa press conference turned out to be his career apex. He wrote several books and won several “journalism” awards, but his influence among everyday Hispanics waned. Despite his howling at Trump, both on Univision air and in print, Hispanics increasingly voted the other way- with Trump garnering a record 46% of the Hispanic vote in 2024. Having lost the ability to advocate for Hispanics in the United States, Ramos now takes his unsolicited advocacies to Panama and Greenland.  He wants to take away Panama's canal. Trump said it was “stupid” for the United States to return the canal to Panama in 1999 through the Torrijos-Carter agreements (signed in 1977). “It was returned to Panama, and to the people of Panama, but it has some conditions,” Trump said. “They are ripping us off in the Panama Canal, just like they are ripping us off everywhere.” He was referring to the costs to cargo ships for crossing the canal, which he described as “ridiculous” and “very unfair.” … Trump wants to take the island of Greenland, the largest in the world, away from Denmark. In fact, he wants to buy it even though it is not for sale. “For reasons of national security and freedom around the world,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social network, “the United States feels that ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity.” … Trump undoubtedly suffers from billionaire syndrome, believing that everything is negotiable and can be bought. Making an attempt to buy Greenland – even if it has great strategic and military importance – is as absurd as trying to take over Australia or Madagascar. There are things that are priceless. “Billionaire syndrome” is the tell that Ramos just wants to reflexively lash out at Trump, who won despite years of his “advocacy”. And, in many ways, Ramos reveals that his “contrapoder” gimmick is not a serious one. This is the column that Ramos writes on the heels of the National Archives’ lawsuit-induced release of photos depicting then Vice-President Biden introducing his son Hunter to Xi Jinping and other assorted Chinese businessmen, and of the devastating Wall Street Journal  exposé of the Biden White House’s conspiracy to hide his obvious mental decline from the American people. On these issues, Ramos conveniently looks the other way, as do his comrades in Spanish-language media. So much for standing opposed to corruption and public lies.  Jorge Ramos might be gone from the airwaves for the time being but, as his latest column reveals,  he has not yet grasped that his audience left him long beforehand. Or understood why. Click “expand” to view a full transcript of the aforementioned column, as published on jorgeramos.com on Monday, December 30th, 2024: Let's start with three facts: one, the Panama Canal is from Panama; two, Greenland is not for sale; and three, the Mexican territory belongs to Mexico and no one else. But all these things don't seem to matter to Donald Trump, who believes that the world is his. Trump has not yet taken office and already wants to change the geography. In a 90-minute speech before a conservative group in Phoenix, the still president-elect presented his vision of how he would like to reorganize the world. And without caring about the sovereignty of various nations, he exposed his new maps for a Planet Trump. He wants to take away Panama's canal. Trump said it was “stupid” for the United States to return the canal to Panama in 1999 through the Torrijos-Carter agreements (signed in 1977). “It was returned to Panama, and to the people of Panama, but it has some conditions,” Trump said. “They are ripping us off in the Panama Canal, just like they are ripping us off everywhere.” He was referring to the costs to cargo ships for crossing the canal, which he described as “ridiculous” and “very unfair.” The response from the president of Panama, José Mulino, was immediate. “Every square meter of the Panama Canal and its adjacent area IS FROM PANAMA,” he said in capital letters in a statement published on social networks. “The sovereignty and independence of our country is not negotiable.” To which Trump responded, also on social media: “we'll see.” In addition, he posted an image with the American flag and the phrase “Welcome to the United States Canal.” Trump wants to take the island of Greenland, the largest in the world, away from Denmark. In fact, he wants to buy it even though it is not for sale. “For reasons of national security and freedom around the world,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social network, “the United States feels that ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity.” But Greenlanders, who have never been asked if they want to be Trump's fellow citizens, see it differently. “Greenland is ours,” Prime Minister Mute Egede responded in writing. “It is not for sale and will never be for sale. We must never lose our fight for freedom.” Greenland is a semi-autonomous nation and constituent of the kingdom of Denmark. Trump undoubtedly suffers from billionaire syndrome, believing that everything is negotiable and can be bought. Making an attempt to buy Greenland – even if it has great strategic and military importance – is as absurd as trying to take over Australia or Madagascar. There are things that are priceless. And with respect to Mexico, the situation is more complex. It is not about invading or appropriating Mexican territory, but about opening the possibility of carrying out military operations or US special forces against drug cartels within Mexico. Trump said in Phoenix that as soon as he takes possession of the White House, “he is going to immediately designate the cartels as terrorist organizations.” This would put them on the same State Department list as Isis or Al-Qaeda, among many others. Trump has blamed Mexican cartels for the deaths of tens of thousands of Americans due to fentanyl overdoses. The president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, is right to clarify in her morning press conference that Trump never spoke “about the intervention of Mexico, ever.” But the reality is that other groups designated as terrorists have been attacked directly and in several countries by United States military forces, without any concerns about the question of sovereignty. In fact, a recent Rolling Stone magazine report quotes an official on Trump's transition team asking: "How much should we invade Mexico?" The options, according to the magazine's sources, range from drone attacks on safe houses and laboratories, to the use of advisors and special forces to assassinate or kidnap cartel leaders. Sheinbaum, however, is confident that there will be a cooperation agreement in several areas, including drug trafficking, with the United States. The problem is that Trump can never be trusted. He does only what suits him. Trump is neither an intellectual nor a historian and, as we have seen, he has very little respect for borders. Now he is inventing his own planet—Planet Trump—and in that imaginary world, the United States would recover the Panama Canal, buy Greenland, and stop, in its tracks, immigrants and drugs crossing the border with Mexico. Trump also claims that, if he had been president, Russia would not have invaded Ukraine or Hamas attacked Israel. Trump operates with a very basic concept—peace through strength—and believes that power is not hidden, it is exercised. And when Trump gets an idea in his head, almost no one can convince him otherwise. Get ready: in less than a month he will feel unstoppable.  

Egregiously biased online “credibility” arbiter NewsGuard rates several right-leaning U.S. media outlets as less reliable than several state media outlets from tyrannical foreign powers Qatar, communist China and Russia. Media in China is almost entirely under the control of the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP), making outlets propaganda arms for a genocidal government. Tyrannical Russia and Qatar also fund and run state media outlets. China Global Television Network (CGTN) and Global Times, designated by former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in 2020 as “foreign missions,” and South China Morning Post have higher NewsGuard ratings than multiple U.S. outlets. So do Qatar’s Al Jazeera and Russia’s RT. NewsGuard gives harsher ratings to Newsmax, OANN and LifeNews than it does foreign state propaganda. Last year, MRC Free Speech America found for the third year in a row that NewsGuard rated left-leaning media sites 26 points higher on average than right-leaning media sites. But recent MRC research shows that NewsGuard also continues to rate foreign state propaganda higher than several U.S. media sites. NewsGuard attempted to deny its anti-free speech behavior in a recent letter to the Federal Communications Commission, but MRC research shows otherwise. For instance, NewsGuard gives a Qatari state media outlet a score of 82.5/100: Al Jazeera English.  Al Jazeera is funded by and answerable to the Qatari government, which actively harbors Islamic terrorists. Al Jazeera also gives voice to pro-terrorist propaganda, particularly Hamas. Even NewsGuard had to admit that Al Jazeera had promoted egregiously false information about the ongoing Israel-Hamas war, including by falsely blaming Israel for a Gaza hospital explosion, which was actually caused by a misfired Hamas rocket. The New York Times also perpetuated this same falsehood along with several other outlets, for which MRC Free Speech America lambasted NewsGuard for still doling out perfect scores to them at the time.   NewsGuard also admitted that Al Jazeera “promotes violent Islamism, antisemitism, and anti-Americanism, and that it harshly covers government at odds with Qatar,” but ultimately concluded that this applies more to the Arabic version of Al Jazeera than the English version. The Middle East Media Research Institute accused Al Jazeera of complicity in the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks after it aired “exclusive” clips of the massacre, enthusiastically describing the terrorist onslaught as collapsing the “settler walls” and “arrogant occupation army.”  Another state media outlet that receives a higher rating than some U.S. right-leaning media sites is CGTN, a Chinese Communist Party state media outlet. While NewsGuard does not give CGTN a very high score at 39.5/100 —  warning that it “severely violates basic journalistic standards” — the so-called media ratings firm still gives CGTN a higher score than at least three American media sites. Global Times, like CGTN, is a Chinese state media site. NewsGuard gives Global Times a credibility rating of 39.5/100. While NewsGuard does disclose the extreme bias of Global Times, including its justification of the ongoing Uyghur genocide in China, it does not mention the fact that Global Times has repeatedly threatened other nations with war, including Australia, the United States and Taiwan. South China Morning Post (SCMP) is owned by Alibaba, a company founded by Jack Ma and largely owned and controlled by the CCP, according to The National Pulse and Forbes. NewsGuard gives SCMP a stellar rating of 85/100 credibility rating. NewsGuard does not acknowledge SCMP’s CCP ties, though it does admit that the site has become noticeably more pro-China in recent years. Contrast the ratings NewsGuard gives Al Jazeera and CCP-run CGTN with the 20/100 credibility rating for American media site Newsmax. NewsGuard rates Newsmax as lacking credibility because it disagrees with the authorities that Newsmax cites and claims that certain evidence-based opinions on the media site are false. One of NewsGuard’s main complaints is that Newsmax published an article based on research made public by the surgeon general of Florida, Dr. Joseph Ladapo. NewsGuard denies that the surgeon general is a credible medical authority and instead picked a medical authority, Dr. Paul Offit, who pushed the left’s narrative on COVID-19 vaccines. NewsGuard apparently considers Offit’s statements sufficient to discredit Newsmax for reporting on Ladapo’s research and justify an abysmal rating. NewsGuard also accuses Newsmax of lacking credibility because it reported that President-elect Donald Trump called for National Guard troops on Jan. 6, 2021, which retired U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg has testified is true.  Outrageously, NewsGuard gives Russian state media outlet RT the same score as Newsmax: 20/100. Though NewsGuard gives RT a negative rating in almost every category, it still rates the Russian media site higher overall than American site LifeNews. NewsGuard gives LifeNews a 17.5/100 credibility rating and takes issue with the website’s exposure of the harms of abortion and the benefits of pro-life treatments, further exposing its bias by going so far as to call the America media company “anti-abortion.” NewsGuard justifies abortion pills, which doctors have said killed at least two women this year, claiming that abortion pill reversals, which have reportedly saved over 6,000 babies’ lives, are an “unproven process.” NewsGuard likewise gave another American site, OANN, a horrible rating: 25/100. One accusation NewsGuard makes is that Covid-19 was engineered in a Wuhan, China, lab, a theory for which multiple scientific experts have argued. NewsGuard took issue with OANN interviewing investment expert and data analyst Edward Dowd, who discussed some of the data relative to COVID-19 vaccines. As always, NewsGuard rates websites as lacking credibility based on whether or not the website promotes sources and opinions with which NewsGuard agrees. Yet one of the categories in which NewsGuard rates Newsmax so badly is handling the difference between news and opinion and gathering and presenting information responsibly. NewsGuard outlandishly claims on one hand that Newsmax, OANN and LifeNews fail to present information responsibly and publish false content, while at the same time claiming Al Jazeera and SCMP have a positive score in both of these categories. It further rates CGTN and Global Times well as far as supposedly not repeatedly publishing false content. NewsGuard also absurdly uses the same language for LifeNews and OANN as it does for RT and CGTN: “severely violates basic journalistic standards.” But it appears that NewsGuard is the one severely violating basic journalistic standards. NewsGuard has come under scrutiny from Federal Communications Commissioner Brendan Carr, who cited previous MRC research on NewsGuard’s ratings. In 2023 and again in 2024, congressional Republicans put forward legislation concerning the Department of Defense in the National Defense Authorization Act to prevent contracting with online blacklisters, like NewsGuard. Conservatives are under attack. Contact ABC News (818) 460-7477, CBS News (212) 975-3247and NBC News (212) 664-6192 and demand they report on NewsGuard’s clear left-wing bias, and contact your representatives and insist that they defund and investigate NewsGuard.

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Here's an idea for my colleagues in the media business that run news properties with declining readerships: You could always take a page from Meta, and just ... pad your customer base with AI-generated users. I kid, sort of, but that's literally what Facebook and Instagram are about to do -- specifically, they're reportedly launching AI-generated accounts soon that will share content and interact with real, human users, even though the accounts are bots that are as real as the Easter Bunny. Honestly, it baffles me that this is a real idea, one that actual humans dreamed up, but this is apparently where we are in the life cycle of Meta. Bots are about to become the new influencers on Facebook and Instagram. "We expect these AIs to actually, over time, exist on our platforms, kind of in the same way that accounts do," Connor Hayes, Meta's vice-president of product for generative AI, said in an interview with the Financial Times. "They'll have bios and profile pictures and be able to generate and share content powered by AI on the platform . . . that's where we see all of this going." Like every major tech company right now, Facebook's parent is going all-in on AI -- and has, honestly, launched or teased some pretty interesting offerings along these lines that range from a text bot reminiscent of ChatGPT and various video creation and photo-editing tools. That said, I can't help but feel incredibly cynical about this whole fake user idea. Seriously, how do those investor calls with analysts go during quarterly earnings presentations, once this idea starts getting under way? "It was another great quarter, with user engagement through the roof -- and next quarter, we anticipate creating even more users." Already -- right now! -- I see so much AI-generated slop on Instagram and Facebook that it's one more factor dampening the experience for me. It takes me all of two seconds to rattle off all sorts of downsides to this AI-generated user account idea, from these accounts potentially exacerbating misinformation to AI spreading propaganda, fake news, scams, or even just dumb crap that makes people want to user Facebook and Instagram less. To that last point, the only way I can use Facebook now without wanting to tear my hair out is by immediately ignoring the main News Feed, which is overrun with suggested posts that I never care about, and heading over the "Feeds" tab to check in on the pages that I've liked and the people I'm connected to. Imagine that, a user who (wait for it!) simply wants to keep up with the things he likes. I can hear the condescending laughter from Meta executives here, all the way from the company's executive suite in California. Don't Miss: I’m a European iPhone user, and Meta’s DMA requests to Apple worry me The post AI-generated accounts are coming to Facebook and Instagram, just what we all wanted appeared first on BGR. Today's Top Deals Amazon gift card deals, offers & coupons 2024: Get $375+ free Today’s deals: $279 iPad 10, SanDisk storage sale, $130 Beats Studio Buds+, $300 off Pixel 9 Pro Fold, more Today’s deals: 20% off Amazon gift cards, $100 Beats Pill, $60 Oral-B iO electric toothbrush, $100 Nextmug, more Today’s deals: $289 Nintendo Switch OLED, $130 Ninja blender, 50% off Samsung PRO Plus microSD, more