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The International Monetary Fund sounded the alarm on the Biden administration’s rampant spending as “out of line with what is needed for long-term fiscal stability.” The latest forecast from the IMF — a Washington-based group tasked with fighting financial crises worldwide — warned that the ballooning national debt and the fiscal deficit threatened to exacerbate sky-high levels of inflation while posing a long-term risk to the global economy. The IMF noted in its forecast that the US federal budget deficit grew from $1.4 trillion in fiscal 2022 to $1.7 trillion last year. ... The debt held by the public, which...

President Joe Biden has helped balloon the number of foreign nationals living in the United States who are eligible or receiving Temporary Protected Status (TPS), making them ineligible for deportation, to nearly 1.2 million. Analysis from the Pew Research Center reveals that as of late last month, almost 1.2 million foreign nationals are eligible or receiving TPS so they can stay in the U.S., secure work permits, and avoid deportation.

You’ll be dropping a lot of dollar on that Whopper. Menu prices at fast food chains across California have increased, as a new law went into effect requiring them to pay a $20-an-hour minimum wage to workers from Monday. The Post checked menus at several restaurants in the Los Angeles area to see if the costs are already being passed onto consumers — with mixed results. The biggest leap on was at a Burger King, where a Texas Double Whopper meal cost $15.09 on March 29, but surged to $16.89 on April 1, a price whopping increase of $1.80 for...

The pilot of a gas balloon that crashed into power lines in North Texas earlier this week said he and his co-pilot were being shot at and attempted to make an emergency landing. "We heard more and more automatic guns. It was not one shot. It was, ‘Do, do, do, do, do, do!’" Krzystotf Zapart, who along with Pjotr Halas, were competing for the Polish national team in the Gordon Bennett Gas Balloon Race, told FOX 4 Dallas-Forth Worth. The men's hydrogen-filled balloon burst into flames after it hit the power lines Monday, but they were saved by some good...

FORT HUACHUCA — For decades, the large, helium-filled aerostat has floated silently against the horizon above Sierra Vista, time enough for both long-time residents and new arrivals to possibly lose sight of the skyborne equipment’s mission as an important link a chain of detection spanning the entire international border. The Tethered Aerostat Radar System, or TARS, traces its origins back to the 70s and 80s, when traditional, ground fixed radar systems were being evaded by the newly airborne efforts of South American drug cartels.

Top-secret intelligence documents allegedly leaked by Massachusetts Air National Guardsman Jack Teixeira reveal that U.S. intelligence agencies were aware of up to four more Chinese spy balloons in addition to the one that flew over the country earlier this year. One balloon flew over a U.S. carrier strike group, another, code named Bulger-21 by U.S. officials, circumnavigated the Earth from Dec 2021 until May 2022, a third named Accardo-21 is also mentioned in the documents and a fourth is said to have crashed in the South China sea. The documents also identify the balloon that crossed the continental U.S. in...

One of the previously undisclosed balloons flew over a US carrier strike group in the Pacific, according to the Washington Post. Another Chinese craft, code-named Bulger-21 by US officials, circumnavigated the Earth from December 2021 until May 2022, according to top-secret documents reviewed by the news outlet. A third balloon named Accardo-21 is mentioned in the documents and a fourth is referenced to have crashed in the South China Sea, the Washington Post reports, noting that it is unclear if Bulger-21 and Accardo-21 were the same balloons that crashed and flew over the carrier strike group. Department of Defense/MegaThe documents...

Old blood clots in lung arteries can obstruct blood flow and lead to pressure build-up in the affected arteries. When this happens, symptoms such as shortness of breath, fatigue, chest pain, and fainting spells may develop, which severely impair quality of life. While this condition, known as chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension (CTEPH), is often effectively treated with open heart surgery, many CTEPH patients cannot undergo surgery, because of other medical problems or because blockages in their arteries are beyond the reach of surgery. Said Riyaz Bashir, MD, FACC: "CTEPH patients treated with balloon pulmonary angioplasty come away having fewer symptoms,...

General Florg taken to Brandon to protest shooting down balloon-shaped entry vehicles.

The quote in the title comes from a new op-ed published at Politico by Ryan Graves, a Navy F/A-18 fighter pilot who was one of many military officers who encountered anomalous objects in our restricted military airspace off the coast of Virginia in 2014. In the article, he reviews some of the recent activity of balloons (or “objects” or “balloon-like entities” or whatever we’re calling them this week) in American airspace and the Pentagon’s response to them. Graves has plenty of experience with UFOs because “those damn things” had been plaguing his fighter squadron for eight months during the period...

Environmental advocates are celebrating in Laguna Beach — but it won’t be with balloons. The hilly seaside city known for stunning ocean views and rolling bluffs is banning the sale and public use of balloons to curtail the risk of devastating wildfires and eliminate a major source of trash floating near the community’s scenic shores. The Laguna Beach City Council voted Tuesday night to ban in public the popular mainstay of birthday and graduation parties, whether inflated with helium or not. Beginning in 2024, the balloons cannot be used on public property or at city events. The move in the...

Small pico balloons typically range between $12 and $180 while an F-22 Raptor is estimated to be around $200 million ... Sen. Ted Cruz took to Twitter Thursday to criticize Joe Biden for ordering an F-22 fighter jet to shoot down what may have been a hobby club’s science project off the coast of Alaska earlier last week. Cruz, R-Texas, joked that Biden’s decision to authorize the $200 million fighter jet to use a $400,000 missile to shoot down what may have been a $12 balloon serves as a "powerful deterrence" to high school students interested in creating their own...

In the days since the Air Force shot down three unidentified objects out of the sky, questions linger about just what these objects actually were. On Thursday, a report by Aviation Week offered an hypothesis about what one of those three objects could be: a "missing in action" globe-trotting balloon belonging to an Illinois-based hobbyist club. In this photo provided by Chad Fish, a large balloon drifts above the Atlantic Ocean, just off the coast of South Carolina, with a fighter jet and its contrail seen below it, on Saturday, Feb. 4. In this photo provided by Chad Fish, a...

The US military is conducting wide-area surveillance tests across six midwest states using experimental high-altitude balloons, documents filed with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) reveal. Up to 25 unmanned solar-powered balloons are being launched from rural South Dakota and drifting 250 miles through an area spanning portions of Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin and Missouri, before concluding in central Illinois. Travelling in the stratosphere at altitudes of up to 65,000ft, the balloons are intended to “provide a persistent surveillance system to locate and deter narcotic trafficking and homeland security threats”, according to a filing made on behalf of the Sierra Nevada Corporation,...

This is why the gov won't tell us exactly what they shot down. They don't want to be accused of covering up a murder.

"It's clear to me this is not a recent phenomenon," he told reporters, saying "this has been going on" since at least 2017. Calling for more transparency, he said: "If you are confused, you understand the situation perfectly." Concluding his comments to the gathered media, Kennedy added: "Lock your doors tonight."

Takeaway from the video: The government doesn't know what we're dealing with at this time These objects are not new. They've been around a long time, at least since 2017 ("last week we were told 2019").Here's a quote from transcript at the 4:14 mark at youtube: "What I took away from from the briefing today more than so than the briefing last week is that this has been going on for a long, long time, at at least 2017 and last week we were told 2019, um, that's what I took away from today. Thanks guys appreciate it...LOCK YOUR DOORS...

The Biden administration was caught unawares regarding a Chinese spy balloon that breached US airspace earlier this month. It was detected over Montana and floated for days before being shot down off the Carolina coast. It was a device launched from Central China, and there were multiple opportunities to shoot down this surveillance vehicle. It was not seen as a threat, so everyone moved like molasses. Also, I’m betting that the Biden administration felt no one would care, which was a gross miscalculation. When the White House press pool is all wondering the same thing, like how could this spy...

Feb. 12: Lake Huron Location and altitude: The object was around 20,000 feet, soaring near the eastern portion of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. It was shot down over Lake Huron, "about 15 nautical miles east of the Upper Peninsula," VanHerck said. Size and shape: "It presented as an octagonal structure with strings hanging off but no discernable payload," a senior Biden administration official said. What shot it down: An F-16, firing an AIM-9X Sidewinder missile. Reason given: "We did not assess it to be a kinetic military threat to anything on the ground," the North American Aerospace Defense Command said, "but...

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin claimed on Monday that American high-altitude balloons have flown through Chinese airspace more than ten times since the beginning of 2022. Wang contrasted China’s supposedly “reasonable and professional” response to these incursions with the United States shooting down the Chinese spy balloon that flew over North America two weeks ago and the destruction of several other unidentified flying objects over the weekend. Wang claimed to know nothing about the other UFOs. “We have made it clear time and again that the entry of the Chinese civilian unmanned airship into U.S. airspace was a purely...