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The Secret Service leadership has accomplished the unthinkable by uniting lawmakers across the political spectrum.With the Secret Service’s ugly nakedness revealing unimagined incompetence and disorganization, Director Kimberly Cheatle made the display far worse by stonewalling congressional Democrats and Republicans at Monday’s House oversight hearing.By adding seasoned professionals to protect the top candidates, the Secret Service under new leadership can quickly improve its capabilities.Cheatle and others have politicized the Secret Service the way the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI, and the intelligence community have been politicized. The effects that DEI and other forms of critical race theory have had on the Secret Service were plain for all to see within seconds of the July 13 assassination attempt on Donald Trump.Apart from the investigations and recriminations for dereliction of duty, what can be done to improve protection for whomever will be our next president and vice president?A quick interim solution is to augment the executive security functions of the Secret Service by hiring skilled private contractors.By adding seasoned professionals to protect the top candidates for the highest positions in the land — personal security detail, counter-snipers, logisticians, drone operators, and others — the Secret Service under new leadership can quickly improve its capabilities.This is not a radical idea. A private company formed the embryo of today’s Secret Service. Allan Pinkerton’s private detectives, working as railroad security, uncovered a plot to assassinate President-elect Abraham Lincoln during an 1861 visit to Baltimore. After the State Department failed its mission to detect and neutralize Confederate spies in Washington during the Civil War, Lincoln hired the Pinkerton National Detective Agency to run United States counterintelligence. The Pinkertons quickly slashed the intense levels of Confederate espionage in the capital city until Lincoln transferred counterintelligence to the Department of War.But the U.S. had no intelligence service behind Confederate lines. Lincoln hired Pinkerton to establish what he called a “secret service” to collect wartime intelligence in the South. A courageous Pinkerton man and former New York City police officer, Timothy Webster, successfully placed himself among Confederate leaders but was caught and died on the gallows.President Lincoln personally paid a private intelligence agent, William A. Lloyd, out of his pocket as a secret back-channel source to evaluate the intelligence he was receiving from his generals. Months after Lincoln’s assassination, the Treasury Department established today’s United States Secret Service.The service would not protect presidents until assassins gunned down two more presidents, James A. Garfield and William McKinley. Congress would wait another 50 years before making the Secret Service responsible for presidential protection under law.Fast forward to recent times. With the extraordinary security required to protect American civilians working in or visiting war zones in Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. military, State Department, and Secret Service have become stretched far beyond their limits. They have turned to private talent for help.As a presidential candidate in July 2008, Barack Obama visited Afghanistan under the protection of the first-rate security professionals with Blackwater. Yes, that Blackwater. The company founded by Erik Prince.Blackwater performed with extraordinary courage, efficiency, and dedication in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere. Over the course of its duty in the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere, Blackwater accomplished its mission to protect 100% of Americans under its care, 100% of the time — even though it lost its own men in the line of duty.Other private companies also served with distinction. Blackwater, though, was the brand. It set the standard. The Obama administration ultimately crushed it for reasons relating to the politics of its founder and CEO.Today’s Secret Service doesn’t merely need additional, immediate help from private companies. It’s clear from the attempted murder of Trump that its dysfunctional personnel quality, driven by politicized policy, runs deep. This is where the privatization of Secret Service functions can help correct the problem quickly.

A 30-year-old male used a handgun to shoot 14 rounds at teenagers playing a "ding-dong-ditch" prank over the weekend and wounded one of them, police in Maine said.Police arrived in Harrison around 1 a.m. Saturday in the wake of numerous reports concerning gunshots and screaming, WMTW-TV reported.'This innocent prank needs to be put on a shelf somewhere and never visited again.'A police investigation revealed that Vincent Martin produced a 9mm handgun and shot 14 rounds at the teens after they rang the doorbell at 91 Waterford Road, the station said.Police said as deputies arrived and found blood on the street, one victim — whose name authorities haven't released — walked into Bridgton Hospital with a gunshot wound to the right calf, which wasn't life threatening, WMTW reported. Martin was arrested on multiple charges, the station said, including aggravated assault and reckless conduct. He was being held on $5,000 cash bail, WMTW reported, adding that a judge ordered Martin to not contact any of the teens or use or purchase firearms and ammunition. There was no inmate listing Wednesday for Martin at the Cumberland County Sheriff's Office website.Cumberland County Sheriff Kevin Joyce told WMTV that "in my mind, the kids should not have been doing what they were doing. However, the individual bringing a firearm and shooting at kids while they’re fleeing is obviously a problem as well."Joyce added to the station, "People are construing the fact that they can defend their residence, their family, et cetera — and maybe taking it a little over the limit in this particular case. We’re living in a world where it just seems like everybody's on edge."But it appears the sheriff is no fan of "ding-dong-ditch” as he added, "This innocent prank needs to be put on a shelf somewhere and never visited again."You can view a video report about the incident here.Anything else?Blaze News last week reported that Canadian police recommended charges against an 85-year-old man they said rammed his car into two of three teens who had played a doorbell prank on him in February.Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

While the U.S. political establishment focuses on Joe Biden’s post-debate resignation imbroglio, and disgraced Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle stonewalls questions about the Trump assassination attempt, the critical question isn’t which faceless White House official is in charge but who is watching Xi Jinping.The current situation with China mirrors the Korea crisis in the fall of 1950. Before a vast human wave invasion in October and early November, the Chinese conducted a stealthy infiltration followed by a series of probes called the “First Phase Offensive.”With luck, these actions might hold Xi in check until the Biden crisis is over and slow any possible Chinese march to war.Washington wrung its hands and rebuffed General Douglas MacArthur’s pleas to bomb the Chinese buildup on the Yalu River. The Chinese assessed the U.S. response and set a trap.As winter set in, nearly a half-million Chinese swarmed across the mountains. With U.S. air power forbidden to enter China to destroy rear areas and key Yalu bridges, the vast Chinese human wave assaults drove U.S. and U.N. forces past the 38th parallel and overran Seoul. It took another two and a half years to regain the 38th parallel and conclude an armistice. And we are still there.Those “probing attacks” foreshadowed Communist China’s decision to launch a war with the United States, using all the military power then at its disposal and doing it in the only place in which China could then operate — the Korean Peninsula.Today, the United States may be in a similar situation, but the stakes are much greater: The relative power and strategic reach of China are of a magnitude beyond that available to them almost 75 years ago and now can reach across the Pacific to our very shores.We believe Joe Biden’s domestic political problems and the resulting national security chaos have not been lost on Chinese dictator Xi Jinping.In the last few weeks, China’s coast guard has clashed with the Philippines' coast guard, blockaded a Philippine shoal outpost, detained a Taiwanese fishing boat and its crew, aggressively prowled an uninhabited Japanese island chain, and flagrantly violated Taiwan’s air and sea space.In the face of those incidents, Monday’s Pentagon briefing was about China ... in the Arctic!Standing on a wooden box to see above the podium, Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks delivered the briefing with the urgency of a bored schoolmarm assigning math homework.China gets more aggressiveMeanwhile, in the South China Sea, widespread Chinese actions across the region are being ignored, much like Washington ignored China's probes on the Korean border in 1950. This neglect is especially concerning given the current American political upheaval generated by Biden’s “difficulties.”Remember that in 2013, Xi Jinping announced that “western constitutional government, universal values, civil societies, and journalism are false ideological trends.” Xi also asserted that China will be number one in the world militarily and economically by 2049, the 100th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China. In short, China aims to become the world’s new hegemon.As Xi continues to strengthen his authoritarian rule, he uses Chinese military power to make his ideas stick. Hong Kong is a perfect example.In 2023, Xi detailed the need for China to meet world-class military standards by 2027, the 100th anniversary of the pre-World War II founding of the People’s Liberation Army. Xi also spoke of “informatization” (i.e., artificial intelligence) to accelerate the construction of “a strong system of strong strategic forces, raise the presence of combat forces in new domains and of new qualities, and promote combat-oriented military training.”We believe Xi’s posture could lead eventually to a war with the United States, as detailed on our website Winning Peer Wars.Xi’s long-term objectives are clear, but he may also make opportunistic short-term moves between now and Inauguration Day in January. These moves, just short of war with the United States, could include taking and holding parts of contested shoals and islands, vigorously provisioning Russia with war supplies, and using Chinese personnel for noncombat duties to free Russian soldiers for combat.Xi could also engage the more than 50,000 Chinese males of military age illegally in the United States in low-level nuisance attacks, such as tampering with railway switches, disturbing pipelines, and sabotaging electric transformers. To map U.S. weaknesses while maintaining deniability, Xi could also conduct nuisance cyberattacks, especially amid the chaos created by the Biden administration's problems.Toward strategic paralysisIn late February, the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party held a hearing that exposed the depth of the current Chinese cybersecurity threat against the United States. The overall outcome was alarming, not because of obvious Chinese capabilities and long-running hacking operations, but because the five top-level U.S. government officials were stovepiped by their respective organizations. This made it difficult for them to appreciate the broad systemic impact of their findings. They are myopic in their understanding of the larger Chinese threat and thus unprepared for the reality of 21st-century warfare with a peer competitor bent on war by “strategic paralysis.”This concept of strategic paralysis was detailed in “Unrestricted Warfare,” the seminal work on Chinese strategic goals and methods written in 1999 by then-Colonels Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui. The book laid out a decades-long plan of creeping, slow-motion warfare against U.S. diplomatic, informational, military, and economic strengths until China would be strong enough to take on the United States in a peer-to-peer conflict.In retrospect, “Unrestricted Warfare” is exactly what China has been doing for a quarter-century, aiming to finish by 2049 or perhaps even sooner. While we have laid out proposals to counter Xi’s plans in the long term at Winning Peer Wars, here are some recommendations for the next few months:Immediately increase reconnaissance by the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command to maximum effort.Declassify sensitive intelligence of Chinese military operations and release it to open sources.Open U.S. ships, aircraft, and bases to world media to ensure extensive coverage in the Indo-Pacific theater.Conduct significant U.S. Air Force and Navy visits to the Philippines, Malaysia, Taiwan, Japan, Vietnam, and other friendly countries.With luck, these actions might hold Xi in check until the Biden crisis is over and slow any possible Chinese march to war.

The Unified Rules of Mixed Martial Arts will soon change and have the potential to overturn UFC records that have long been a sore spot for one of the sport's legends.The Association of Boxing Commissions and Combative Sports voted unanimously in a committee to make changes to the the infamous 12-to-6 elbow rule.The committee included California State Athletic Commission Executive Director Andy Foster, Nevada Athletic Commission Executive Director Jeff Mullen, and veteran referees Herb Dean, John McCarthy, and Marc Goddard. Judges Derek Cleary and Sal D'Amato were also included, among others, Sherdog reported.'Dana White we gotta get that loss out of the history books.'The controversial rule was developed in the early days of mixed martial arts by a committee of which McCarthy was also a part of, with several other representatives of the sport at the time.In 2016, McCarthy explained on "The Joe Rogan Experience" that the rule essentially came from the fear that a downward elbow strike was too dangerous, with one of the committee members citing seeing people break blocks of ice that way.McCarthy said he was told that it wasn't worth the battle by his superior, and that he didn't press on in the fight against the rule.The soon-to-be-defunct rule is as follows:"The use of a linear 'straight up straight down' elbow strike is prohibited. Any variation of this straight up and down linear elbow strike makes the strike legal. Any arc, or any angle change from straight up to straight down makes the strike legal. Any variation of position does not alter the legality of the strike." — (@) This rule change could have significant effect on one of the greatest fighters of all time, Jon Jones. Jones' only loss on his 27-1 record came in a December 2009 first-round disqualification against Matt Hamill due to those illegal elbowsUFC President Dana White has long talked about trying to get the loss overturned. "The guy's never lost a fight ever. That one loss on his record, we're trying to get that [overturned]," White said in 2019, per MMA Junkie. "It was at a time and a place in the Nevada State Athletic Commission when it was at its worst," he added,Commentator Joe Rogan also called it "one of the dumbest rules in combat sports."I’m in agreement with this 100%. The 12-6 elbow rule is one of the dumbest rules in combat sports. At the very least that fight should be a no contest. He was completely dominant.— Joe Rogan (@joerogan) June 25, 2019 Jones, now a heavyweight, responded to news of the rule change on his Instagram page and echoed sentiments White has long espoused."Undefeated then, undefeated now. Dana White we gotta get that loss out of the history books," he wrote, along with a picture that cemented the very second he suffered his only loss.The definition of a grounded fighter was also changed by the committee. A consistent source of confusion for even the most seasoned athletes, a fighter was previously considered grounded if "any part of the body, other sole of the feet touching the fighting area floor."The previous rule continued, "To be grounded, the palm of one hand (a flat palm) must be down, and/or any other body part must be touching the fighting area floor. A single knee, arm, (not fingers) makes the fighter grounded without having to have any other body part in touch with the fighting area floor. At this time, kicks or knees to the head will not be allowed."The rule led to fighters desperately attempting to make contact with the floor with their hands, resulting in slow-motion replays to determine exactly when fighters' hands would come off the floor as they were getting hit in the head.Arguments over the rule had been made for years, with fighters and fans alike asking for clarification or changes to the definition.The new rule is much simpler, eliminating simple hand touches to the ground."A fighter shall be considered grounded and may not be legally kneed or kicked to the head when any part of their body other than their hands or feet is in contact with the canvas (ground)." View this post on Instagram A post shared by Bony (@jonnybones) Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle has finally resigned, 10 days after the attempted assassination of former president Donald Trump. It was not only the actions not taken on July 13 that cinched her resignation, but her testimony to the House Oversight Committee, as it was nothing short of disastrous. “Can you answer why the Secret Service didn’t place a single agent on the roof?” Cheatle was asked by Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.) during the testimony. “We are still looking into the advanced process and the decisions that were made,” she responded, to groans from those present at the hearing. As the questions continued, Cheatle continued to dodge them — not giving one good answer as to why there were no agents on the sloped rooftop. While Americans across the country are relieved that Cheatle resigned, Glenn Beck believes “that should not close this case by any stretch of the imagination.”“When the assassination [attempt] first happened, I looked her up, and I’m like, where did she come from? And I saw that she was head of security for Pepsi, and I’m like, you’ve got to be kidding me,” he adds. Glenn has some questions for the former Pepsi employee turned Secret Service director that he believes need to be answered before her lack of action is memory-holed. “What’s on her devices? Why was she using Signal when talking to the White House from her own personal phone? That’s against the law. Did the White House know that was happening? What were they talking about? That’s really important to find out,” he says. “I think everybody on that Secret Service detail should be brought in front of Congress and have to answer themselves. You know, it’s one thing to be told ‘Shut up, sit down, shut up, don’t say anything.’ It’s another when you’re going to be blamed for it on national television,” he adds.Want more from Glenn Beck? To enjoy more of Glenn’s masterful storytelling, thought-provoking analysis, and uncanny ability to make sense of the chaos, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed Shadows has caused significant uproar in Japan due to creative licenses and historical inaccuracies.The game focuses on the greatly exaggerated depiction of Yasuke, an alleged black samurai from the mid-1500s. Ubisoft turned the vague story of the "black slave" in Japan into a fierce and heroic samurai. As expected, Japanese gamers did not take kindly to the setting of feudal Japan being used for a game inspired by diversity, equity, and inclusion.The game has caused such great offense that Japanese political aides have made comments, and letters have been sent to Japan's Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology as well as to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, among others.'Assassin's Creed games are works of fiction inspired by real historical events and figures.'A petition regarding the "lack of historical accuracy and cultural respect" in the game is nearing 100,000 signatures."This game is based on the samurai of Japan, ignoring the fact that the samurai is the upper class," the petition continued. "Ubisoft continues to misunderstand the essence and role of samurai. This is a serious insult to Japanese culture and history and can lead to racism in Asia. We call on Ubisoft to immediately discontinue the launch."Ubisoft initially decreed complaints to be hateful and essentially racist, with CEO Yves Guillemot making remarks in June 2024."I want to make it clear that we, at Ubisoft, condemn these hateful acts in the strongest possible terms," Guillemot said, according to Game Developer. "I encourage the rest of the industry and players to denounce them, too."As YouTuber Shohei Kondo stated, the game's creative director, Jonathan Dumont, originally said the idea behind the black samurai character came from "looking for a character who could be seen by us as a samurai, someone who is not Japanese."Ubisoft's responseAs the backlash has only piled up, Ubisoft finally issued a lengthy statement in a blog post on July 23, 2024.After a brief apology and recognition of the importance of Japanese history, the company essentially excused its ignorance as artistic license but still reserved the right to use the Japanese historical settings as it saw fit."We have put significant effort into ensuring an immersive and respectful representation of Feudal Japan. However, our intention has never been to present any of our Assassin's Creed games, including Assassin's Creed Shadows, as factual representations of history, or historical characters. Instead, we aim to spark curiosity and encourage players to explore and learn more about the historical settings we get inspired by."The studio added that the game was "designed to be an entertaining video game that tells a compelling, historical fiction set in Feudal Japan."Ubisoft attributed its apparent cultural appropriation to being a work of fiction "inspired" by real events:"While we strive for authenticity in everything that we do, Assassin's Creed games are works of fiction inspired by real historical events and figures. From its inception, the series has taken creative license and incorporated fantasy elements to craft engaging and immersive experiences."The studio then essentially admitted the story of Yasuke, as depicted in the game, is fictional."The representation of Yasuke in our game is an illustration of this. ... While Yasuke is depicted as a samurai in Assassin's Creed Shadows, we acknowledge that this is a matter of debate and discussion."This was always the case, despite Ubisoft's attempt to push its game through without complaint.The few seemingly authentic historical documents from the time allude to Yasuke as being a man-at-arms or apprentice and possibly participating in one-armed conflict but was never mentioned as being a samurai. The documents included the African being seen as a spectacle, with locals paying to see him, having never seen a black person before.Yasuke also allegedly had his life spared after being referred to as "an animal [who] knows nothing." "Since he is not Japanese, do not kill him," a document was translated to say.Ubisoft has made 2024 the year of DEI-laden games and become one of the most- — if not the most- — criticized studios.One of its executives pushed for gamers to accept subscription models and get used to not owning their games, while its subsidiary, Massive Entertainment, dove head-first into DEI with Star Wars Outlaws. The game features a masculine female lead character while the studio made heavy pushes about "trans rights" and Pride on its website and social media.It is worth noting that a female main character is included in Assassin's Creed Shadows as well. Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

On the final night of the Republican National Convention last week, aging pro wrestler Hulk Hogan took to the podium and performed his signature move of ripping off his tank top. As he revealed the Trump/Vance tank top beneath, he exhorted the crowd, "Let Trumpamania run wild, brother!"Millennials are the last generation to remember the glories of pre-digital life, the paradoxical freedom of having fewer choices. It's no wonder they feel nostalgic for the emo bands they used to love. As with anything in Trump's orbit, liberals and conservatives saw this moment very differently. For "The Daily Show," the appearance of the "washed-up fake wrestler" at the RNC was yet another indication of the irredeemable tackiness of Trump world and its inability to land anyone with the slightest cultural cachet. "I think Trump just locked up the vote of every teenager in 1992," quipped host Jordan Klepper. Conservatives, of course, were in on the joke. The goofy, tongue-in-cheek nostalgia of having the Hulkster prepare the way for Trump's big, post-assassination-attempt comeback was the point. In the meme-sphere, Hogan killed it. Klepper also mocked the performance by Kid Rock, who performed a Trumpified version of his almost 25-year-old hit "American Badass," complete with a chant echoing Trump's call to "fight!" as the Secret Service hustled him off the Butler, Pennsylvania, rally stage. Again, Klepper's jabs didn't really land. Rock certainly wasn't selected with the approval of an outlet like "The Daily Show" in mind. Still it's worth asking: why all the oldies acts? Consider that both WWE and rap-rock peaked at the end of the 20th century, which was also more or less the the peak of the pre-internet, American monoculture. While neither Rock nor Hogan commands the attention he did in his prime, in today's fractured entertainment landscape, hardly anyone does. The wrestler and the redneck are living embodiments of a different, more unifying sort of pop culture, before everything got so politicized. Trump himself used to enjoy this kind of apolitical fame. Most notably with his reality show but also with his many movie and TV cameos before that. Like Trump, both Hogan and Rock exude a kind of cheerful vulgarity, one far removed from today's ideologically driven displays of "LGBT awareness" and the like. Hogan is an especially potent symbol in this regard. He engaged in vice (making a sex tape with his friend and her wife) the old-fashioned way — in private. It was the left-leaning website Gawker that took it public, no doubt emboldened by Hogan's low status among media tastemakers. But then billionaire Peter Thiel took up Hogan's case and used it to put the sneering hipsters out of business. Democrats might laugh at RNC geriatrics rallying around such celebrity dinosaurs, but what would it look like for the GOP to court younger generations, especially at a legacy-media-type event like the party convention? Gen Z has no mass culture; it's broken up into specialized "scenes" that are all online. Millennials are the last generation to remember the glories of pre-digital life, the paradoxical freedom of having fewer choices. It's no wonder they feel nostalgic for the emo bands they used to love. "I'm not supposed to be here tonight," said Trump as he took the stage to accept the nomination. It was a nice bit of serendipity that his opening acts also weren't supposed to be there, in a sense. But like Trump, and the many Trump supporters the culture has done its best to leave behind, they're survivors — relics of a time when shared cultural and commercial incentives brought Americans together.