Weird! It is just SO SURPRISING this guy takes the Kremlin’s position on Ukraine Aid. Isn’t it? #traitor


“News of money previously given to House Speaker Mike Johnson's congressional campaign by Russian nationals has re-emerged after the Republican rejected a $95 billion foreign aid bill passed in the Senate.

In 2018, a group of Russians were able to donate to Johnson's bid for the Louisiana seat he eventually won as the money was funneled through the Texas-based American Ethane company.“

Login to view embedded media

Former president Donald Trump’s social network Truth Social is facing “substantial doubt” about its future after burning through tens of millions of dollars in operating costs, a new filing shows.
A financial filing Monday by Digital World Acquisition, the investment partner of Trump’s start-up, said the accountants of Trump Media & Technology Group believed the Trump company’s “financial condition” had left it at risk.


Tech is not your friend. We are. Sign up for The Tech Friend newsletter.

In the first six months of the year, Trump Media lost $22.9 million on only $2.3 million in net sales, according to the document, which was filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
“TMTG has suffered negative cash flows and recurring losses from operations that raise substantial doubt about its ability to continue as a going concern,” the document said, citing a report from Trump Media’s independent registered public accounting firm.



In the filing, Digital World said that Trump Media’s management believes that the money they expect to raise from a proposed merger would be “sufficient to retire existing debt and to fund existing operations should projected cash flow be insufficient.”
Digital World, which announced plans to merge with Trump Media in October 2021, has seen its progress toward the deal delayed for months, preventing Trump Media from tapping the $300 million Digital World raised from shareholders.
The document, which runs more than 500 pages, is a revision of its initial registration form and was filed by Digital World in an attempt to complete the merger.
It offers some of the first internal details of Trump’s company, which was launched after he lost the White House and has become the centerpiece of his post-presidential business ambitions. Trump posts almost exclusively to Truth Social, the company’s primary business.



Trump Media chief executive Devin Nunes said in a statement that the filing was a “monumental milestone” toward completing the merger and said Truth Social aspires “to become the centerpiece of a movement, as well as a method for Americans to invest in their freedom.”
In July, the SEC said it had settled fraud charges against Digital World related to “material misrepresentations” the company had made about its initial merger plans with Trump Media. In its original registration statement, known as a Form S-4, Digital World “mischaracterized and omitted information about the history of its interactions with TMTG,” according to an SEC statement.
The SEC said then that Digital World had agreed to file an amended S-4 that is “materially complete and accurate.” The SEC also said that, as part of the settlement, Digital World had agreed to pay an $18 million penalty once the merger is completed.



The filing also said that Trump Media has a number of outstanding promissory notes worth millions of dollars that are scheduled to come due within the next year.

Trump Media’s revenue included $2.3 million in net sales in the first half of this year and $1.4 million last year, according to the Digital World filing. For comparison, X, the social network formerly called Twitter, took in more than $2.3 billion in revenue in the first six months of 2022, according to an SEC filing last year.
Truth Social has struggled to build an online audience.
Trump Media projected in 2021 that the site would have 41 million total users by the end of this year, but its online traffic has so far remained below those expectations. In the United States in July, Truth Social’s mobile apps had roughly 500,000 monthly active users and its website was visited about 1 million times, according to estimates from Similarweb, a data firm that analyzes web traffic.



In 2021, Trump Media pledged that its merger with Digital World would create a Big Tech-style giant worth $875 million at the start and potentially up to $1.7 billion, depending on its stock performance. In a campaign financial filing in April, Trump valued his stake in the company, of which he owns 90 percent, at between $5 million and $25 million.
Trump Media had also pledged in 2021 to build up other media businesses, including a subscription video service, TMTG+, that pledged to offer “Trump-specific programming” and other “non-woke” entertainment. In the Monday filing, Digital World said Trump Media eliminated several jobs that had “significantly impacted TMTG’s streaming video on demand (SVOD) and infrastructure teams.”
The filing said Trump Media’s business is heavily dependent on the former president’s “popularity and presence” and noted that Trump is “the subject of numerous legal proceedings, the scope and scale of which are unprecedented for a former president.” An “adverse outcome” in those cases could hurt the company, the filing said.



“The death, incarceration or incapacity of President Trump,” the filing stated, could also “negatively impact TMTG’s business.”
Digital World has faced its own financial issues, telling the SEC in filings earlier this year that its financial statements for 2021 and 2022 should “no longer be relied upon” due to “a material weakness in its internal control over financial reporting.”
In an amended statement this month, Digital World said it had spent $10.8 million, or nearly half of its total expenses, on legal fees related to government investigations in 2021 and 2022.
Digital World has said in filings it has faced investigations by the Department of Justice, the SEC and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority related to stock trades made before the company’s merger deal was announced.

The filing Monday warned that Digital World faces “mandatory liquidation” unless it can complete its merger deal by September 2024.


In June, the SEC charged a former Digital World board member, Bruce Garelick, and two others with insider trading related to the deal. In July, Digital World said it had settled charges with the SEC related to “material misrepresentations” in its filings and agreed to pay an $18 million penalty if the merger deal completes.
In October, Digital World said investors had pulled out of roughly $467 million in commitments to what’s known as a private investment in public equity, or PIPE, and that the company was working to cancel the remaining $533 million.
The company, which once said the $1 billion PIPE would be key to growing the business, said in a statement last month that ending the PIPE was a positive move that would help finalize the deal “as soon as possible.”

SIAP, but clearly the 4th was not like the other quarters on multiple levels.

"We got away from Iowa basketball in the fourth quarter,” Martin said after the Hawkeyes saw their 71-57 lead slip away. “I think we’ve been playing to not lose instead of playing to win. It’s really important down the stretch, playing to win. We can’t just take the ball out, get comfortable. I think we’ve been doing that in certain situations.”

That is quite a trifecta. She was totally on fire that first qtr

Other than Iowa's game (of course), the three other B1G games of note for me today are:

Indiana v. #12 Duke (Duke is up 1-0 in T5; Indiana is "home" team)
Nebraska v. Baylor (0-0 in T2; Nebraska is "away" team)
Ohio State v. Boston College

A few contests against opponents in traditionally strong baseball conferences.

Tonight's OSU beatdown of Nebraska just makes the Iowa loss look even worse than it already was.

Listened to an NPR interview of the case of this movie that was released at Sundance. Essentially played a war game that reenacted (basically) January 6th--but with more insurrection--n with members of 5 administrations. Sounds really interesting as well as concerning. Invocation of the Insurrection Act was a big part of the discussion. As well as the fact that the US doesn't really have rules or statutes to address a lot of the things that arise if there isn't a peaceful transition of power--a lot of our history in this space is based on norms.

Don't know when it's slated to be released for streaming: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2024/jan/22/war-game-documentary-sundance-january-6

Go Hawks!

The Bears cut two veterans who were drafted by former general manager Ryan Pace and combined to make three Pro Bowl appearances.
Safety Eddie Jackson, who had a resurgence under coach Matt Eberflus, and center/guard Cody Whitehair were released Thursday. Both had contracts set to pay them an outsize amount in 2024.
Whitehair’s departure was a near-certainty. He was benched last season after having issues with his snap accuracy and was due a $13.25 million cap hit in 2024. Jackson, who had four interceptions in 2022 and one last year, had an $18.1 million cap hit due to him in 2024.



The Bears will pay about $10 million in dead-cap charges to the two players and free up about $21 million in cap space. They have an estimated $70 million in cap room entering the offseason, which will be enough to give cornerback Jaylon Johnson the franchise tag — and, perhaps by the summer, a multiyear contract extension — and still have plenty of room to sign free agents.
Jackson and Whitehair were clear-eyed about their future as the season was winding down.
“Lord willing, I hope I’m here next year,” Jackson said in late December. “God always has a plan, so I feel like I’ll always land on my feet. I hope it’s here.”
Whitehair said moments after the season-ending loss to the Packers that being benched was “tough” but that he planned to play in 2024, whether it be with the Bears or another team.

The 30-year-old Jackson was one of Pace’s best draft picks: a fourth-rounder from Alabama coming off a broken leg who reached the Pro Bowl in his second and third seasons.
In his second year, Jackson had six interceptions. He totaled three defensive touchdowns, which led the NFL, en route to an All-Pro honor. Jackson was revitalized under Eberflus, winning the team’s Ballhawk Award in 2022 despite having his season cut short by a Lisfranc injury to his foot.
General manager Ryan Poles praised Jackson’s communication with second-year strong safety Jaquan Brisker, whom the Bears consider an up-and-coming star, this season.
“When Eddie was in, you could tell Brisker felt really, really comfortable,” Poles said last month.


The 31-year-old Whitehair, a second-round pick in 2016, admitted he wondered whether he’d get cut last offseason. Instead, the Bears moved him from guard back to center.
He totaled only 87 snaps there, though, because of injuries to linemen and a series of erratic snaps on Oct. 15 that allowed Lucas Patrick to supplant him. Whitehair didn’t play another snap at center, serving as a backup guard in the second half of the season.

Tell me Bibi isn't trying to eradicate Palestinians.

Nearly 30,000 Palestinians have paid the price due to Hamas and Bibi

The University of Iowa will keep housing students in the 56-year-old Mayflower Residence Hall for at least one more year despite having announced last year its plans to sell the “last-chosen and first-transferred-from residence hall.”



The need to keep the eight-story former apartment building in the residence hall rotation for the upcoming 2024-25 academic year became evident when the current application process opened for admission to the university.


Although the university didn’t immediately provide specific numbers, officials reported a “record level of applications for fall 2024” and that more than 1,500 returning students — those going into their second, third or fourth years — have applied to live on campus.




In fall 2023, the university counted 1,281 returning students living in its residence halls.


“The university announced in February 2023 that it intended to sell Mayflower,” according to the UI Office of Strategic Communication. “However, when the housing application process for 2024-25 opened, it became clear the space would be needed next fall.”


Mayflower can house 1,032 students in suite-style rooms that include kitchens and bathrooms — although it currently has 888 student residents and, being more than a mile from the main campus and its amenities, is the least popular dorm.


The university “plans to discontinue use of Mayflower Hall and is considering the construction of more desirable spaces closer to campus,” administrators told the Board of Regents in February 2023, when the university anticipated its total residence system capacity would dip from 6,376 to 5,679 beds next year “without Mayflower.”





“The number of returning students will need to be closely managed, with not all returning students able to return to live in the residence system until new beds are constructed,” officials said at the time.


With the university’s decision to keep Mayflower open to accommodate returning students, officials Thursday reported, “Campus leaders are working with students to determine what additional supports and amenities may be offered.”


For starters, the university is adding study spaces and more single rooms. Officials also are promoting it as “optimal for students who desire additional privacy and independence but still prefer campus housing.”


“Cambus routes service Mayflower, enabling students to easily get to campus locations such as academic buildings, dining halls or campus cafes, athletic facilities, and other residence halls to visit friends.”

Mayflower sale​

The university told The Gazette on Thursday it still is planning to sell the 326,287-square-foot property, about 40 years after buying the former apartment building.


“Because we have an immediate need for the building, any sale would be conditional upon the university occupying the building for the upcoming academic year,” spokesman Chris Brewer said.


The university has listed Mayflower, with its 523 rooms, for sale for $45 million. The Iowa City Assessor’s Office last summer performed an updated property-value assessment estimating its worth at $30.7 million.


A real estate broker on the project last August said interest in buying the property was strong — with eight to nine groups in talks, including one local prospect and other national collaborators.


UI officials have said they plan to use the Mayflower sale proceeds — plus any borrowing they need to do — to build a $40 to $60 million residence hall just for returning students.

A bill that was amended in the Iowa Senate on Thursday would now prohibit the state’s regent universities from researching “manufactured protein products.”



Senate Study Bill 3162, which pertains to meat labeling, had previously received early bipartisan support as a way to help consumers distinguish between food that contains meat or meat substitutes, but it was rewritten Thursday by Republicans on the Senate Agriculture Committee.


A copy of the amended bill was not immediately publicly available, but Sen. Dawn Driscoll, R-Williamsburg, said in the committee meeting that the new version “prohibits the Board of Regents from conducting research into the production or use of manufactured protein products.”




Meat look-alikes that are derived from cell cultivations, insects or plants also cannot be labeled as beef, chicken, goat, lamb, pork, sheep or turkey, the bill says, and wrongly labeled and “cell-cultivated products” should not be purchased by schools.


“Lab grown products are made in a petri dish and are not the same as the high-quality beef, pork, poultry, goat, lamb raised by hardworking Iowa farm families,” Driscoll said. “The taxpayer dollars should not be used to support these products over the real meat raised on Iowa farms.”


Democrats of the committee were incensed by the abrupt changes to a bill they previously supported.


“The clarity of labeling — wanting to make sure people understand when they’re getting a plant-based product versus an actual beef or pork product — those things are important,” said Sen. Nate Boulton, D-Des Moines. “But when we go a step further, and we do it right before a committee meets, and we restrict research, all of a sudden we’re getting way, way, way far away from the original point of this legislation.”





Sen. Bill Dotzler, D-Waterloo, said the amended bill improperly favors one type of Iowa agriculture — livestock production — over another type — soybean production, which is a source of protein for meat substitutes.


“I don’t understand what the beef industry’s worried about, because I don’t know anybody who wants to grill soy burger when they have people over,” Dotzler said. “Iowans and people across this country love beef. Why are you worried?”


This article first appeared in the Iowa Capital Dispatch.

Where can one get a copy of the paper that players were holding during post game activities. My edition of DM Register had nothing. TIA

Best Letterman intro ever?
Login to view embedded media

I have people who want to know. I cant find an answer online.

Car insurance premiums around the U.S. are soaring. Here's why.

It is great to be an Iowa Wrestling fan.

Go Hawks!

Login to view embedded media
What in the actual fvck... surely not even Huey can agree with this stance by the DoJ..

Classy act after the game . Gave CC a congratulatory gift after the game was over.

One of the poster children for the mentally disturbed Left. Lock her up


http://www.foxnews.com/us/2018/07/0...-released-on-welfare-fraud-other-charges.html

Some bands are surprisingly expensive for who they are and the last time they were relevant. Others seem surprisingly affordable.

For $200k we could put together a pretty good 80s rock festival:

Warrant: $25k
LA Guns: $10k
Skid Row: $35k
Slaughter: $30k
Great White: $20k
Jackyl: $30k
Winger: $20k
Stryper: $25k

What is something unique about your home you are proud of or like showing off?

Did you DIY? Did it come with?

For me my basement is unfinished and I turned it into an Iowa dive bar. I laid down fake grass for a floor, fastened a fake stud to hold a shot dispenser and made a nice 3 hole putting green, finally black and gold ceilings and walls.

What about you guys? I'd post pics but apparently am not allowed to do so.

125, 141, 157, 165, and 197 all seem highly likely.

but that's only 5.

133--iffy
149-looking better
174--tough assignment
285--same

184-a virtual no

I'm hoping for 8

7pm Peacock

Michigan (16-9, 7-6) comes to Carver 5-5 in their last 10 games. Including a recent 6 point home loss to Nebby. UM also beat OSU by 9 pts back in December.

Iowa (22-3, 11-2) is coming off the epic collapse in Lincoln and fighting for its life to stay in the BT title race.

I will be quite happy when CC breaks the points record and we can focus on the team as a whole.
I really hope this a get well game and we can get some confidence in other players.

Give me hawks 93-81