Departing Metropolitan Police Chief Pamela Smith had a final message for her critics amid an ongoing investigation into allegations that the department manipulated its data to make crime appear lower in Washington, D.C.

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform released an interim report earlier this week on its investigation into the MPD. The report claimed that department leadership pressured and instructed commanders to downgrade crime classifications to lesser offenses, including those not included in the daily crime report available to the public. Smith was accused of propagating a “culture of fear, intimidation, threats, and retaliation.”

‘This person should’ve NEVER been in ANY position of power.’

The MPD hosted a Friday walkout ceremony for Smith after her resignation announcement last week. Her resignation is effective December 31.

During the ceremony, Smith denied the allegations against her, insisting that she “never will and never would have encouraged, intimidated, retaliated, or told anyone to change their numbers.”

“I hope you can understand this from a spiritual context because the theme of what has resonated in this place is one thing, and that’s God,” Smith said.

She claimed that “some folks” mistook her “passion for being the angry black woman.”

RELATED: DC police chief manipulated crime stats to make city look better, report claims

Pamela Smith. Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images

“My passion is because I love this work. I love God’s people, but I dare not leave without saying something to my haters,” she continued.

Smith was taking on a preacher-like persona by this point, and she raised her gravelly toned voice and offered dramatic pauses as she listed to the crowd all the church-related activities she took part in over the years before declaring “there’s enough Jesus in me that’s gonna get me to heaven if I die tomorrow!”

Then she dropped an F bomb — kinda.

“I’m going to the Bible when I say this to my haters: F you,” Smith declared before issuing another dramatic pause to the crowd, which seemed a bit taken aback.

“I forgive you,” she said soon after. “I forgive you because the Bible makes it very clear. When Jesus was hanging on the cross, when he said to us, ‘Father’ — even in the pit of agony and defeat, he said, ‘Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.’ God bless you, and God keep you.”

RELATED: Whistleblower alleges widespread manipulation of DC crime stats, fueling Oversight Committee probe

Smith also called for an investigation into those who accused her of directing police staff to manipulate crime statistics.

Her departing speech was likened to a screaming meltdown.

“WTF?! DC’s DEI police chief Pamela Smith just had a SCREAMING MELTDOWN while giving her resignation speech, after she was caught fudging crime stats,” independent journalist Nick Sortor wrote in a post on social media. “This person should’ve NEVER been in ANY position of power. Especially in the nation’s capital.”

President Donald Trump has repeatedly criticized D.C.’s Democratic leadership for the district’s crime wave. He previously threatened a potential federal takeover if leadership failed to address the crisis successfully — and Trump did just that when he federalized D.C. police in August.

RELATED: Fact-check: Legacy media’s bogus defense of DC’s safe-streets narrative crumbles under scrutiny

President Donald Trump. Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

Former Police Commander Michael Pulliam was suspended in July after he was accused of participating in the alleged data manipulation.

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​News, Pamela smith, Metropolitan police department, Mpd, Washington d.c., D.c., House committee on oversight and government reform, Crime stats, Crime data, Politics 

Democrats are up in arms after Trump’s White House announced that the Kennedy Center will be renamed in honor of President Donald Trump for his restoration efforts.

The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts will be renamed the Trump-Kennedy Center, according to White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt.

‘The building will no doubt attain new levels of success and grandeur.’

“I have just been informed that the highly respected Board of the Kennedy Center, some of the most successful people from all parts of the world, have just voted unanimously to rename the Kennedy Center to the Trump-Kennedy Center, because of the unbelievable work President Trump has done over the last year in saving the building,” Leavitt said. “Not only from the standpoint of its reconstruction, but also financially, and its reputation. Congratulations to President Donald J. Trump, and likewise, congratulations to President Kennedy, because this will be a truly great team long into the future!”

RELATED: ‘Disastrous program’: Trump administration pauses ‘diversity’ visa Brown University shooter used to enter United States

Photo by Heather Diehl/Getty Images

“The building will no doubt attain new levels of success and grandeur,” Leavitt added.

“The Trump Kennedy Center shows a bipartisan commitment to the Arts,” Richard Grenell said on X.

Maria Shriver, John F. Kennedy’s niece, posted a lengthy statement complaining about the move.

“It is beyond comprehension that this sitting president has sought to rename this great memorial dedicated to President Kennedy. It is beyond wild that he would think adding his name in front of President Kennedy’s name is acceptable. It is not. Next thing perhaps he will want to rename JFK Airport, rename the Lincoln Memorial, the Trump Lincoln Memorial. The Trump Jefferson Memorial. The Trump Smithsonian. The list goes on,” Shriver wrote in part on Thursday.

President Trump praised the “very distinguished” Kennedy Center board for the “unanimous” vote to change the name of the center.

However, several Democratic congressmen who are also ex officio members of the Kennedy Center board issued a statement complaining that they were silenced during the vote for this change.

In part, their statement read, “This whole process displays the corruption that permeates the entire Trump administration, and as ex-officio members of the Kennedy Center Board, we will be unwavering in our commitment to holding this administration accountable.”

The Democrats, however, failed to mention that as ex officio members of the board, they do not have a vote, meaning their input was never needed and does not affect the unanimity of the vote.

On Friday afternoon, videos were posted of the addition of Donald Trump’s name on the facade of the building. It now reads: “The Donald J. Trump and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.”

The Trump-Kennedy Center did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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​Politics, Kennedy center, President trump, Karoline leavitt, John f. kennedy, Trump, Donald trump, White house, Trump-kennedy center 

A Florida man was arrested after getting into a car crash with a vehicle that was reported stolen earlier this month. However, the case took a strange twist when the suspect said he was “teleported” into the stolen BMW by the “X-Men” — but he was now safe from the “aliens,” according to police bodycam video.

The Volusia County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement that a car owner informed police that his BMW convertible had been stolen while he was walking his dog at Bicentennial Park in Ormond Beach.

‘You saved me from the aliens!’

The man admitted to law enforcement that he had left his BMW unlocked and that the car keys were in a “closed cup holder.”

Police bodycam video — recorded Dec. 8 — shows a witness telling a deputy that a man in his 30s with blond shoulder-length hair was in a BMW at the park.

“He kept asking for a light,” the witness told the deputy. “I thought, ‘How does he have a BMW if he doesn’t even have a lighter for a cigarette?'”

A few minutes later, the BMW crashed at Old Dixie Highway and Plantation Oaks Boulevard, the sheriff’s office stated.

Bodycam footage shows the car crash site, with one witness claiming that the BMW was traveling at 130 miles per hour. The wrecked BMW is seen half off the road with the front of the vehicle severely mangled after it seemingly crashed into the trees near the highway in a one-car accident.

A deputy confronted the alleged driver of the stolen BMW — 36-year-old Calvin Curtis Johnson.

Johnson — who is seen with blood on his face — is heard telling the deputy, “I don’t know how I got in the car. I teleported or something.”

When the deputy asks where he got the car from, Johnson shrugs and responds, “I don’t know,” and once again suggests that he “teleported” into the vehicle.

The suspect then appears to blame the situation on the “X-Men.”

According to the bodycam video, the deputy asks the suspect if he had just been to Bicentennial Park, to which Johnson replies, “They told me — the X-Men — to do it.”

A distraught Johnson is heard on video stammering, “I don’t do that stuff. Someone told me to get in there. Someone’s in my head. Thank you for saving me. I don’t know how I got in there.”

Then an excited Johnson exuberantly proclaimed to the deputy, “You saved me from the aliens!”

The police bodycam footage also shows the officer dousing flames from a small fire from the car crash.

RELATED: Florida man with meth pipe steals tourist train, picks up passengers for wild ride — and announces it’s his ‘birthday’: Cops

Johnson was arrested, taken to the Halifax Health Medical Center for treatment, and booked into the Volusia County Jail. Johnson was hit with charges of grand theft of a motor vehicle and driving with a canceled, suspended, or revoked license, according to jail records.

According to Volusia County jail records, Johnson has a lengthy rap sheet with arrests for assault with a deadly weapon, resisting an officer without violence, loitering or prowling, uttering a forged check, trespassing, several charges for failing to appear in court, and operating a vehicle while a driver’s license was suspended, canceled, or revoked.

The Daytona Beach News-Journal reported that Johnson is homeless.

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​Florida man, Florida crime, Weird news, Strange news, Odd news, Car crash, Car accident, Crime 

A quiet, technical ruling about presidential signatures has suddenly become one of the most consequential automotive turning points in decades.

What looked like an obscure constitutional question has reshaped the nation’s energy strategy, reversed federal transportation policy, and put the electric-vehicle transition on a very different path.

Whether seen as restoring constitutional accountability or disrupting environmental planning, the result is unmistakable: America’s automotive trajectory has been rewritten.

The issue is straightforward: If a president did not personally sign an executive action, can it legally stand? President Donald Trump has answered no — and the effects will be felt in dealerships, factories, and garages nationwide.

Sign-off

In late November 2025, President Trump declared that any executive order, regulation, or directive signed with an autopen after mid-2022 is invalid. Oversight reviews suggest this affects up to 92% of actions taken in the final two and a half years of the Biden administration. Trump argues that executive authority cannot be delegated to a machine; the Constitution vests power in the president himself, not staff operating an autopen while the president is traveling or unavailable.

This interpretation has upended large portions of recent federal policymaking.

Nowhere is the impact more dramatic than in automotive and energy policy. The Biden administration’s EV strategy relied heavily on Executive Order 14037, issued in 2021, which set aggressive emissions and fuel-economy goals. While signed early in Biden’s term, nearly all enforcement actions after 2022 — including the rules that gave the order teeth — bear autopen signatures. Those signatures now sit at the center of a sweeping rollback.

Executive Order 14037 formed the backbone of Biden’s push toward zero-emission vehicles. It directed agencies to impose strict emissions rules, raise fuel-efficiency standards, steer manufacturers toward electric powertrains, and work toward a goal of 50% zero-emission vehicle sales by 2030. Automakers spent tens of billions preparing — building battery plants, restructuring supply chains, and cutting production of profitable internal-combustion models.

According to forensic reviews cited by the Trump administration, many of the directives enforcing those standards after mid-2022 were never personally signed by President Biden. Trump maintains this breaks the constitutional chain of authority.

High energy

On the first day of his second term, Trump issued Executive Order 14154, Unleashing American Energy. It revoked Biden’s EV mandates, halted remaining EV-related funds under the Inflation Reduction Act and infrastructure law, and ordered agencies to withdraw aggressive tailpipe regulations. Fuel-economy targets revert to earlier levels. Federal fleet electrification requirements are gone. The 2030 zero-emission sales target no longer exists. The $7,500 EV tax credit will be phased out by the end of 2026.

The industry impact is immediate. Automakers that bet heavily on federal EV mandates are reassessing long-term strategies. Companies focused on trucks, SUVs, and hybrids are now better positioned. EV-only startups face mounting financial strain. Market uncertainty has hit stock prices, delayed launches, and raised doubts about the future of several pure-electric brands.

RELATED: ‘Won’t be the last’: Felon freed by Biden autopen arrested after Omaha shooting

Image composite: Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images, Omaha Police Department

Sweeping consequences

Consumers will notice the shift on showroom floors. Vehicles slated for retirement will remain in production. EVs — still pricier than gas or hybrid counterparts — will face new price pressure as incentives disappear. Charging access and range remain barriers, especially outside urban centers. Without mandates driving adoption, consumer preference — not regulation — will dictate the pace of change.

Legal fights are already underway. Agencies must follow formal rule-making procedures, and environmental groups and states like California are challenging the reversals. California plans to retain its own strict standards, setting up years of litigation over federal pre-emption and Clean Air Act waivers.

Even so, the federal direction is clear. The United States is no longer pursuing a national strategy centered on rapid vehicle electrification. The emphasis has shifted to diversification, consumer choice, and competition among internal-combustion, hybrid, and electric technologies.

The autopen dispute may sound bureaucratic, but its consequences are sweeping. A major climate and transportation agenda is being reconsidered because of how it was signed. Whether seen as restoring constitutional accountability or disrupting environmental planning, the result is unmistakable: America’s automotive trajectory has been rewritten.

The internal-combustion engine, long declared on borrowed time, has a renewed future. Hybrids are likely to gain ground. Electric vehicles will remain — but their growth will depend on price, practicality, and performance, not mandates. The timeline for full electrification has shifted, and the debate over how America powers mobility has entered a new phase.

There’s more to come, and I’ll keep you posted.

​Lifestyle, Auto industry, Ev mandate, Autopen, Emissions standards, Align cars 

What draws people to socialism?

Even after nearly two centuries of ruin brought to those societies that have adopted this governing system, the appeal still remains. Most Western countries have a thriving socialist party occupying portions of the government, including the United States with the Democratic Socialists of America.

The promises of socialists made in today’s media landscape are closely analogous to the serpent’s promises in the Garden of Eden.

Worse still, the DSA experienced a huge win in New York City with the election of outspoken socialist Zohran Mamdani and came close to beating the Republican candidate with another socialist in a special election in Tennessee in December.

Then, of course, there are the legions of leftist online content creators indoctrinating millions of users with socialist messaging.

Is it historical ignorance with the Cold War increasingly far behind us? Is it the leftist teachers simply passing over the horrific genocides of communist leaders like Mao Zedong, Joseph Stalin, or Pol Pot and ignoring the ongoing calamities of Cuba, Venezuela, North Korea, and other socialist backwaters? Is it simply the promise of free stuff? Is it the envy of billionaire elites who seem to wield omnipotent power?

The socialist paradox

No doubt, ignorance, greed, envy, and boredom all play a significant role in the elevation of socialists.

This is why most opponents of socialism generally push back by attempting to teach people about the endless failures of socialism, the basic laws of economics, and the immorality and destructiveness of confiscating property and denying citizens their constitutional freedoms.

Clearly, this approach has not been successful with this latest crop of socialists who now make up a large portion of the Millennial and Gen Z cohorts.

It could just be that human nature is such that it is always vulnerable to toxic ideas like socialism, and digital technology has made this problem even more challenging. After all, the promises of socialists made in today’s media landscape are closely analogous to the serpent’s promises in the Garden of Eden: Do this one thing — i.e., eat this fruit, vote and campaign for this socialist — and you will have everything you want.

Or, more likely, it could be that conservatives are misunderstanding the issue altogether.

Rather than view socialism as an ideology, a movement, or a moral failing inherent in human nature, it would be better to see socialism as a reaction to all these things.

At its core, socialism is what happens when a person consciously rejects political reasoning, morality, and complex abstractions, all in favor of a strictly materialist and existentialist approach to life.

Orwell and the socialist mind

An illustration of this phenomenon comes from the great 20th century writer George Orwell, who unintentionally captures the socialist mind in his personal account of the Spanish Civil War, “Homage to Catalonia.”

Despite being known as a fierce critic of totalitarian surveillance states like the Soviet Union, Orwell himself was an ardent socialist throughout his life. In fact, he was so committed to socialism that he went to Catalonia to fight a war on behalf of the Trotskyist Workers’ Party of Marxist Unification.

His stated goal was not necessarily to write a full account of the Spanish Civil War (though he did), but first and foremost to kill fascists.

RELATED: A socialist New York isn’t just a local problem. It’s a national emergency.

natasaadzic/iStock/Getty Images Plus

What is most surprising about “Homage to Catalonia” is just how little Orwell actually writes about socialism itself. He spends many pages describing the size of rats, the scarcity of tobacco, and the convoluted squabbling between various anarchist, communist, and socialist factions, yet almost nothing about why he is actually fighting in a foreign civil war.

In one of the middle chapters, almost in passing, he devotes a precious few paragraphs on the matter, citing his sympathy with the laborers in their hope of realizing true equality: “The thing that attracts ordinary men to Socialism and makes them willing to risk their skins for it, the ‘mystique’ of Socialism, is the idea of equality; to the vast majority of people Socialism means a classless society, or it means nothing at all.”

Sadly, Orwell quickly follows this reflection with the immediate reality of his situation, “I was hardly conscious of the changes that were occurring in my own mind. Like everyone about me I was chiefly conscious of boredom, heat, cold, dirt, lice, privation, and occasional danger.”

Naturally, these concerns are what make up the bulk of his book.

At no point in Orwell’s narrative does his joy rise above the creature comforts of cigarettes, wine, food, sleep, and personal cleanliness, nor does his sorrow go much beyond beyond the deprivation thereof. Any hope he might have that transcends this narrow worldview — i.e., virtue, ethics, greater truth, life after death (Orwell survives a shot through the neck), or even winning the war — is completely absent.

Orwell is just there, living his life and fighting an enemy. Even though he is aware of the atrocities of the socialist militias — like destroying churches and killing innocent priests and nuns — he hardly thinks about it. Even though he throws a bomb into enemy lines and inflicts a slow and painful death on a fascist soldier, he is more annoyed at the man’s screaming than he is perturbed at the fact that he just killed a man in cold blood for a dubious cause.

Obviously, Orwell was not too dim-witted to think of these matters, nor is it because he was some kind of true believer blinded by misleading propaganda, nor was he a sociopath.

Instead, he has committed to a mode of behavior and thought that negates all moral rationality. His socialism simply does not touch on anything beyond the next meal, the next bus to work, the next cup of coffee, the next nice-sounding idea.

Acting as a socialist only means doing what the other socialists seem to be doing, whether that means joining a protest, fighting in a civil war, or voting for a DSA candidate.

Although some of this mode of behavior betrays a deep streak of nihilism, the socialists themselves never reflect on anything long enough to realize it. For all the observations Orwell makes, with his characteristic wryness, none of it ever leads to a deeper conclusion about his situation.

Much of his general attitude could be summed up with the empty platitude, “It is what it is.” Readers can also find this kind of hopeless shrug in the endings of Orwell’s novels “Animal Farm” and “1984,” where the antagonists triumph and all the efforts of the protagonists prove to be futile as well as pointless.

RELATED: The complete failure of ‘1984’

Mininyx Doodle/iStock/Getty Images Plus

Based on the account given in “Homage to Catalonia,” the biggest precondition that leads to this mindlessness is modernity’s systemic atomization and subsequent loneliness.

Throughout his narrative, Orwell has no real friends about which to speak — yet he does somehow drag his wife to Barcelona while he fights with the Workers’ Party of Marxist Unification. True, he notes with fondness how everyone addresses each other as “comrade,” as well as substituting the formal “usted” (Spanish for “you”) for the informal “tu.”

Yet, this belies the indifference he ultimately has for these men suffering and dying senselessly. This community of soldiers in the trenches — the one example that Orwell can point to as true socialism in practice — is almost entirely superficial. Years later, he still cannot see this and even feels glad for the experience of stinking and starving in trenches with his socialist “comrades” for so many months.

Humanize before you catechize

In light of all this, it should be clear that mere apologetics for free-market capitalism, liberal democratic republicanism, and Christian communitarianism will fall on deaf ears, for the socialists both then and now.

A catchy slogan, a photogenic demagogue, an attractive vibe will win over otherwise intelligent people and lead them down a dark path that allows no light to come in.

In order to bring them back from this path, conservatives and other anti-socialists need to appreciate the content of their worldview (or lack thereof) along with the modern context of today’s postmodern consumerist culture that have made friendship, depth, and moments of quiet reflection next to impossible.

Once they recognize this, they will finally understand that more education and fewer affordability crises will not fix the problem of socialism’s growing popularity. Instead, they will have to meaningfully connect with these people, pull them away from the sources of malaise, and patiently fill up what has been hollowed out.

People must be humanized before they are catechized.

Even though this is a much bigger project, it is a more effective and fulfilling one. One can speculate what would have happened if Orwell found religion and joined a church instead of finding socialism and joining the Workers’ Party of Marxist Unification. Perhaps his eventual novels criticizing Russian communism would have lacked the same insights.

Or, perhaps his cynicism and recklessness would have turned to hope and wisdom, and he could have offered a better way forward to those who fall under the spell of socialism instead of dreaming up horrific depictions of socialism’s excesses.

​Community, George orwell, Homage to catalonia, Ideology, Socialism 

President Trump spoke by phone to his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, on November 24 and later posted on Truth Social, “Our relationship with China is extremely strong!” The warm feelings from Washington came on the heels of the two leaders holding a productive meeting in Korea recently and scheduling several more confabs for the year ahead.

But bubbling beneath the surface is a rivalry between the two countries over the most vital technology of the 21st century: artificial intelligence.

China is not abiding by the rules that are supposed to govern the global economy.

To understand the rivalry, consider a recent announcement by the U.S. Justice Department: On November 20, it charged two Americans and two Chinese nationals with a conspiracy to illegally export about 400 high-performance graphics processing units to China. Federal law requires a license for export of these technologies, which can be used to develop and strengthen AI.

The co-conspirators didn’t have a license — and never even applied for one. In fact, they lied about the destination of the GPUs when shipping them. And for their services, they received a cool $3.89 million in wire transfers from China.

The backdrop to this smuggling scheme is Beijing having set a goal for China to be the world’s leader in AI by 2030. And it’s made considerable headway. According to the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, “China is the global leader in AI research publications and is neck and neck with the United States on generative AI.” Additionally China is “advancing rapidly in AI research and application, challenging the United States’ dominance in this critical field.”

This progress stems from massive investments by the Chinese government. From 2000 to 2023, venture capital funds connected to the Chinese government made $184 billion in investments in China-based companies in the AI sector, according to a study published last year and conducted by professors at Harvard, MIT, and Oxford.

In an amusing coincidence, one day after the smuggling indictment, Huawei — a leading Chinese technology company — announced a tool called Flex:ai that it said “improves the utilization of artificial intelligence-based chipsets.” The announcement also made the obligatory nod to corporate citizenship, saying that the technology will “speed up the democratization of AI.” But the company buried the lede, saving the most important detail — which is curiously attributed to “sources” — for the final sentence: “The new software tool will help China create an analogue AI chip 1,000 times faster than Nvidia’s chips.”

Huawei is not just any company. It is the world’s largest manufacturer of telecommunications equipment. And it’s also been engaged in the kind of skullduggery that resulted in the recent indictment. In 2020, the U.S. Justice Department indicted the company and four of its subsidiaries. The charges mostly revolved around attempts to steal trade secrets from U.S. companies.

The company used an array of tactics, but perhaps most brazen of all, it paid its employees bonuses if they procured confidential information from rival companies. And when U.S. law enforcement was investigating Huawei, the company told its employees not to comply.

RELATED: China’s AI strategy could turn Americans into data mines

iStock / Getty Images Plus

Suffice to say, there’s good reason not to trust the Chinese government and its proxy companies like Huawei.

The Trump administration recognizes the threat. In late June, it approved a merger among two American companies that compete with Huawei: Hewlett Packard Enterprises and Juniper Networks. A senior U.S. national security official told Axios: “In light of significant national security concerns, a settlement … serves the interests of the United States by strengthening domestic capabilities and is critical to countering Huawei and China.” The official said blocking the deal would have “hindered American companies and empowered” Chinese competitors.

Given the economic importance of AI to countries throughout the world, the competition between the United States and China is regrettable. But it’s probably also inevitable. China is not abiding by the rules that are supposed to govern the global economy. And it’s using AI, says the Justice Department, to bolster its military, to test weapons of mass destruction, and to heighten surveillance.

Sometime next year, President Trump is scheduled to make a state visit to Beijing and Xi is scheduled to come to Washington. They’re destined to focus on the cooperative parts of the relationship, but you don’t need to ask ChatGPT to see that the two countries are on a collision course over AI. Buckle up.

Editor’s note: This article was originally published by RealClearPolitics and made available via RealClearWire.

​China, Ai, Tech race, Ai race, Big tech, Trump, Opinion & analysis, United states, National interest, National defense, Artificial intelligence, Strategy