Month: September 2024

Shots were fired at Trump’s golf club in West Palm Beach on Sunday as the former president was playing a round of golf with real estate investor Steve Witkoff.
Update: “The Secret Service identified the direction” of the shots “and returned fire at that gunman, who fled.
Officials have confirmed that the gunman targeted President Trump.
Trump and everyone who was on the golf course with him is safe.

The suspect escaped in a black vehicle but he was arrested in Martin County.

Per my source, the suspect has been arrested in Martin County.
White male.
— Natalie Winters (@nataliegwinters) September 15, 2024

The suspect was taken into custody and his black vehicle was impounded.

In re possible Trump golf course shooter: suspect was stopped in Martin County after he crossed the Palm Beach County line around mile marker 110-112 on I95. He’s in custody & his black vehicle is impounded
“He crossed into the wrong county. My guys were waiting for him. They… https://t.co/yoBb4oyCj5
— Marc Caputo (@MarcACaputo) September 15, 2024

Fox News host Sean Hannity said he spoke with Trump three times in the immediate aftermath of the shooting.
Hannity said Trump was on the 5th hole about to putt when he heard “pop, pop, pop, pop” — within seconds the Secret Service pounced on the president, covered him.”
“You had snipers with tripods…long story short… the gun has been found, they have identified it as an AK-47,” Hannity said.
Hannity said that law enforcement used drone footage to identify the suspect getting into his vehicle after dropping his firearm.
WATCH:

JUST IN: Fox’s @SeanHannity tells viewers he has spoken to @realDonaldTrump after today’s shooting incident and confirms that the former President is “safe and unharmed” after the “Secret Service pounced on the President” at the fifth hole of the golf course to protect him and… pic.twitter.com/0bmXWVzMKS
— TV News Now (@TVNewsNow) September 15, 2024

Hannity also said that after making sure everyone was okay, Trump joked that he really wanted to finish the hole.
WATCH:

Hannity says he spoke with Trump three times in the immediate aftermath of the security incident on the golf course. He says Trump joked afterward, “I really wanted to finish the hole.” pic.twitter.com/MjHehP3llc
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) September 15, 2024

“I will NEVER SURRENDER!” Trump said in a statement after the shooting outside of his Florida golf course.

Trump: “Nothing will slow me down. I will NEVER SURRENDER!” pic.twitter.com/hgHVyCbHsR
— TheBlaze (@theblaze) September 15, 2024 […]

One of the more fascinating results from Week 1 of the 2024 NFL season came from New Orleans. The New Orleans Saints hosted their NFC South rivals the Carolina Panthers, but the game seemed over shortly after kickoff. New Orleans went right down the first on the opening possession of the game for a touchdown, and following an interception of Bryce Young on Carolina’s first drive of the year, the Saints tacked on a field goal for the early 10-0 lead.
They never looked back, racing to a 47-10 rout of Carolina.
But Week 1 of any NFL season can be the ultimate smokescreen. While the results of the opening week of any NFL season make for incredible overreactions, you often need a game or two to truly make sense of a team. With the Saints traveling to Dallas to take on the 1-0 Dallas Cowboys, we were certain to learn more about both teams on Sunday.
Indeed we did.
For the second straight week — and the third if you go back to the end of the 2023 season — the Saints blew out an opponent. New Orleans opened the scoring against Dallas on Sunday and never looked back, on their way to a 44-19 win over the Cowboys. And while they fell three points short of becoming just the third team in NFL history to score 47 or more points in three-straight games, they accomplished something bigger.
They put the rest of the league on notice.
New Orleans opened the scoring on Sunday, driving right down the field on the game’s first possession. Carr went three-for-three on the drive, and following that third completion, a connection with Chris Olave for 39 yards, Alvin Kamara capped off the drive with this five-yard touchdown run:

A critical component of this touchdown? The lead block from fullback Adam Prentice, who takes on linebacker Damone Clark in the hole. Kamara cuts to the inside off that block, and the Saints are in the end zone.
Following a Dallas field goal, the Saints were quickly back on the scoreboard. While their opening drive required seven plays for New Orleans to reach the end zone, their second possession needed just one play.
This 70-yard strike to Rashid Shaheed from Carr:

As you can see from this end zone angle, Carr does a tremendous job of sliding around in the pocket to avoid late pressure. While the Cowboys have a pair of safeties deep, Shaheed can get over the top of the coverage, and as Tom Brady explains, Carr just drops in a dime:

Dallas settled for another field goal on their next possession, and if you are starting to sense a theme, New Orleans responded.
With their third touchdown of the afternoon.
This passing touchdown was not a deep shot downfield, despite it covering 57 yards, but rather a perfectly executed screen pass to Kamara. With the Saints facing a 2nd and 7, Carr carries a play-action fake to Kamara before setting up in the pocket, looking deep downfield. But the design is a screen to Kamara, who takes the short throw from Carr with blockers in front of him. The Saints running back picks up a block from Lucas Patrick on Eric Kendricks, and heads off to the races:

Kamara added his third touchdown of the afternoon on the Saints’ next possession, this 12-yard touchdown run:

The big block on this play? Again it comes from Patrick, as the left guard climbs to the second level and takes on DeMarvion Overshown, knocking the Dallas linebacker out of the way as Kamara follows him into the Dallas secondary, slicing into the end zone with the 28-13 lead for the Saints.
Dak Prescott threw an interception on the Cowboys’ next possession, and Carr plunged in from one yard out on the quarterback sneak for the touchdown on the Saints’ ensuing drive, and the rout was on.
By the time the game was over Carr had a pair of touchdown passes, Kamara had over 100 rushing yards and four total touchdowns, and the Saints — excluding the final drive of the game when the backups ran out the clock — had scored points on seven-of-nine possessions in the game, and now on 16-of-20 possessions this season.
And perhaps most notably, the Saints were 2-0.
Coming into the season, New Orleans was one of the teams we found the most confusing in the NFL, and we ranked them 26th coming into the year. Here is what I wrote about the Saints in that piece ahead of the season:

A year ago many — myself included — looked at the New Orleans Saints and immediately crowned them as the winners of the NFC South. While the other three teams in the division faced some intriguing quarterback situations, such as Atlanta riding with Desmond Ridder, Tampa Bay picking Baker Mayfield, and Carolina turning to Bryce Young, New Orleans seemed in the most stable position at the game’s most important position, with the addition of Derek Carr.
So much for that.
Now Carr is back hoping to reclaim the promise of 2023. Thanks to a fairly favorable schedule, which includes some teams that are also confusing, such as the Los Angeles Chargers and the Las Vegas Raiders, the Saints could indeed live up to that promise.
But would we bet on that? Absolutely not. This is a roster that still poses many questions, mainly along the offensive line where injuries are an issue. Plus, after last year are any of us truly convinced that Carr is the answer at QB?

Through two weeks, we might just have our answers. […]

Welcome to The Gateway Pundit’s Week-in-Review with Elijah Schaffer, where he covers the top 5 stories throughout the week in around 10 minutes.

ARTICLE 1: A Chris Rufo Investigation: SHOCK VIDEO!… Migrants Caught Killing and Grilling Cats in Dayton, Ohio
ARTICLE 2:  Celebrity’s Fast-Food Chain Suddenly Closes All Locations Following Minimum Wage Hike
ARTICLE 3: 6 Dirty RINOs Sign Pledge with Democrats to Certify the Results of the 2024 Election – Without Knowing the Details 

ARTICLE 4: CNN Data Analyst Reports Why Swift Endorsement May Have to Matter for Dems — And It’s Bad News for Kamala 
ARTICLE 5:  THE ABDUL HOAX: “a Person Who Doesn’t Exist” – Media Leftists “Fake Fact-Check” Trump On Taliban Leader Abdul Ghani Baradar, Get DESTROYED by X Users (VIDEO) 
Please leave your opinions / comments on these stories below as Elijah reads every single one and appreciates your perspective. […]

It seems like only yesterday we covered a project using QR codes to archive data on paper (OK, it was last Thursday), so here’s another way to do it, this time with a dedicated codec using the full page. Optar or OPTical ARchiver is a project capable of squeezing a whopping 200 Kb of data onto a single A4 sheet of paper, with writing and reading achieved with a standard laser printer and a scanner. It’s a bit harder than you might think to get that much data on the page, given that even a 600 DPI printer can’t reliably place every dot each time. Additionally, paper is rarely uniform at the microscopic scale, so Optar utilizes a forward error-correcting coding scheme to cater for a little irregularity in both printing and scanning.
The error-correcting scheme selected was an Extended Golay code (24, 12, 8),  which, interestingly, was also used for image transmission by the NASA Voyager 1 and 2 missions. In information theory terms, this scheme has a minimum Hamming Distance of 8, giving detection of up to seven bit errors. This Golay code implementation is capable of correcting three-bit errors in each 24-bit block, with 12 bits available for payload. That’s what the numbers in those brackets mean.
More after the break…

Another interesting problem is paper stretch during printing. A laser printer works by feeding the paper around rollers, some of which are heated. As a printer wears or gets dirty, the friction coefficient along the rollers can vary, leading to twisting and stretching of the paper during the printing process. Water absorbed by the paper can also lead to distortion. To compensate for these effects, Optar regularly inserts calibration targets throughout the bit image, which are used to locally resynchronize the decoding process as the image is processed. This is roughly similar to how the alignment patterns work within larger QR codes. Finally, similar to the position detection targets (those square bits) in QR codes, Optar uses a two-pixel-wide border around the bit image. The border is used to align to the corners well enough to locate the rows of bits to be decoded.
In the distant past of last week, we covered a similar project that uses QR codes. This got us thinking about how QR codes work, and even if encoding capacity can be increased using more colors than just black and white?
Thanks to [Petr] for the tip! […]

CNN’s John Miller reported on air Secret Service agents returned fire and that President Trump is thought to be the target of the gunshots fired at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida Sunday afternoon. A semi-automatic rifle, a backpack and Go-Pro camera were reported found.

Brian Stelter posted CNN video clips: Breaking from @KristenhCNN and @JohnMillerCNN: “Officials believe the shots fired at Trump International Golf Club were intended for former President Donald Trump, according to sources familiar on the matter.””
“Miller: “The Secret Service identified the direction” of the shots “and returned fire at that gunman, who fled. Witnesses were able to provide a description of an individual and a vehicle. We are told that a vehicle that is close to that description has been stopped” by police.”

Miller: “The Secret Service identified the direction” of the shots “and returned fire at that gunman, who fled. Witnesses were able to provide a description of an individual and a vehicle. We are told that a vehicle that is close to that description has been stopped” by police. pic.twitter.com/f37vlRNK3h
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) September 15, 2024

“ > >@JohnMillerCNN : All this info is preliminary. But “in the area of the shooting, sources say they recovered a backpack and a semi-automatic rifle… and a GoPro camera.” The camera suggests “that this individual may have wanted to record himself in the first person.””

> > @JohnMillerCNN: All this info is preliminary. But “in the area of the shooting, sources say they recovered a backpack and a semi-automatic rifle… and a GoPro camera.” The camera suggests “that this individual may have wanted to record himself in the first person.” pic.twitter.com/ACliktYvHg
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) September 15, 2024

The Secret Service earlier released a statement on the shooting that did not state whether Trump was a target or mention the return fire.

The Secret Service, in conjunction with the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office, is investigating a protective incident involving former President Donald Trump that occurred shortly before 2 p.m. The former president is safe. @pbso will have more details soon. pic.twitter.com/yWNvvKD3IC
— Anthony Guglielmi (@SecretSvcSpox) September 15, 2024

The Bulwark’s Marc Caputo reported a suspect was arrested in nearby Martin County, “In re possible Trump golf course shooter: suspect was stopped in Martin County after he crossed the Palm Beach County line around mile marker 110-112 on I95. He’s in custody & his black vehicle is impounded “He crossed into the wrong county. My guys were waiting for him. They had the BOLO from PBSO.,” Martin Sheriff Will Snyder tells me He said he has no other info he can disclose and they’re awaiting FBI & Secret Service to take the suspect into custody & search the vehicle.”

In re possible Trump golf course shooter: suspect was stopped in Martin County after he crossed the Palm Beach County line around mile marker 110-112 on I95. He’s in custody & his black vehicle is impounded
“He crossed into the wrong county. My guys were waiting for him. They… https://t.co/yoBb4oyCj5
— Marc Caputo (@MarcACaputo) September 15, 2024 […]

Senator Roger Marshall (R-KS) suggested on Friday that a Senate Investigation into ABC News and Kamala Harris’ campaign for suspected collusion in last Tuesday’s rigged presidential debate has begun.
It is suspected that Kamala knew the questions in advance due to her out-of-the-ordinary, well-prepared responses.
As The Gateway Pundit reported, ABC denied that Kamala Harris was given the debate questions in advance amid calls for an internal investigation into the network for debate rigging.
ABC Denies Kamala Harris Was Given Debate Questions in Advance Amid Calls for Internal Investigation Into Network For Debate Rigging… But Their Denial Statement is Suspicious

This denial from ABC came after Former Clinton advisor Mark Penn called for a third party to perform an internal investigation into ABC News. “I think a review of all their internal texts and emails really should be done by an independent party to find out to what extent they were planning on, in effect, you know, fact-checking just one candidate and in effect, rigging the outcome of this debate,” said Penn on the John Solomon Reports podcast.

Going into the debate, there was concern about Harris’ friendship with a Disney executive who oversees the ABC News division. It was later discovered that Kamala Harris and Linsey Davis are sorority sisters in the influential Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., a conflict of interest that was not disclosed prior to the debate. AKA formed a PAC in August after Harris became the Democrats’ presidential nominee.
Linsey Davis also revealed in a post-debate interview that she schemed with debate her co-moderator, David Muir, and ABC to protect Kamala Harris with their one-sided mid-debate fact checks.
It was three against one. They fact-checked Trump at every turn, and they ignored all of Kamala Harris’s lies. Kamala Harris told over two dozen lies and dodged questions, but the moderators did not fact-check her.
In an X post on Friday, Senator Roger Marshall announced, “I will be sending a letter to @ABC and the Harris Campaign demanding all correspondence, records, and potential coordination between the two parties ahead of Tuesday’s presidential debate.”

I will be sending a letter to @ABC and the Harris Campaign demanding all correspondence, records, and potential coordination between the two parties ahead of Tuesday’s presidential debate. https://t.co/lp1Jk74HdE
— Dr. Roger Marshall (@RogerMarshallMD) September 13, 2024

This is a developing story… […]

Biden delivers remarks at Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s 2024 Phoenix Awards Dinner
Joe Biden on Saturday night delivered remarks at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s 2024 Phoenix Awards Dinner in Washington, DC.
Biden received a lifetime achievement award.
During his remarks, Joe Biden said “we are better off today” than when Trump was in office.
“We are better off today than we were four years ago,” Biden said.

WATCH:

Crooked Joe Biden thinks Americans “are better off today” than they were under President Trump.
Who wants to tell him? pic.twitter.com/l9R6MtIGQ3
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) September 15, 2024

Biden also railed against Republicans for wanting election integrity and for their efforts to remove sexually explicit content from elementary schools.
WATCH:

Crooked Joe Biden is BIG MAD that Republicans want election integrity, equality among ALL Americans, and to remove sexually explicit content from elementary schools pic.twitter.com/2UpnsDdWJg
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) September 15, 2024

Meanwhile, Wall Street is alarmed because Americans are struggling to pay bills.
The Wall Street Journal reported:
Signs that Americans are struggling to keep up with their bills are setting off alarms on Wall Street.
Shares of consumer-lending companies slid this past week after executives raised warnings about lower-income borrowers who are struggling to make payments. Dour remarks from banking executives at the Barclays banking conference rattled investors, who were already on edge about the health of the U.S. economy. […]

BALTIMORE — A member of the sideline crew collapsed during the first half of the Raiders’ game against the Ravens on Sunday at M&T Bank Stadium. The official received CPR before being taken off the field on a stretcher. He was taken to a local hospital, according to the Ravens.

A member of the chain gang crew collapsed. He was immediately attended to by medical personnel. Upon leaving the field, he was alert and responsive. He’s being taken to a local hospital.
— Baltimore Ravens (@Ravens) September 15, 2024

The game was delayed for just under 10 minutes as medical personnel attended to the official, who was part of the sideline chain gang crew. He was alert and responsive as he was being taken off the field.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
Contact Vincent Bonsignore at vbonsignore@reviewjournal.com. Follow @VinnyBonsignore on X. […]

NFL teams are attempting to win every week, but even the best teams can struggle at times. A losing streak doesn’t mean a team will miss the playoffs, but a losing streak to open the season can be tough to overcome.
Barring any unexpected ties, 16 teams finished Week 1 with an 0-1 record. A regularly mentioned stat over the years has been the number of teams that start 0-2 that eventually make the playoffs. It’s a small number, but the context of it has changed since 2020 and 2021. In 2020, the NFL expanded to a 14-team playoff field and in 2021, the NFL expanded to a 17-game schedule. An 0-2 start still takes some work to overcome, but an 0-2 start in the 17-game schedule and with an extra playoff berth in each conference is slightly easier than previously.
Over the past three seasons since the expansion to a 17-game schedule, 21 teams have opened the season 0-2. Only two have eventually made the playoffs. In 2023, nine teams started the season 0-2 and the Houston Texans were the only team to make the playoffs. They finished 10-7 and won the AFC South. The year prior, five teams started 0-2 and only the Cincinnati Bengals made the playoffs. They finished 12-4 and won the AFC North. In 2021, seven teams started the season 0-2 and none of them made the playoffs.
In 2020, when the league expanded to a 14-team playoff field, 11 teams started with an 0-2 record and none of those teams made the playoffs.
Prior to 2020, the NFL adopted a 12-team playoff format in 1990. Between 1990 and 2019, 12% of teams that started 0-2 reached the playoffs. […]

The United States began the day with a 10-to-6 advantage over the Europeans, a deficit that has been a bad omen for teams in the past.
Just ask the Europeans who played in the 1999 Ryder Cup or the Americans who donned the red, white, and blue in 2012 at Medinah No. 2.
The 2015 European Solheim Cup team also held a 10-to-6 lead but lost it on Sunday, suffering a brutal loss on their home soil in Germany.
This year’s U.S. team would not join those infamous squads on Sunday. They won the Solheim Cup for the first time since 2017, as Lilia Vu clinched the winning point thanks to her birdies on the 17th and 18th holes.
“I can’t even put it into words. I felt like I didn’t do my part this week, and I wanted to get something done,” Vu said.
“I said to my caddie on 16, I felt like I haven’t done anything for this team, and then 16 comes, and I’m in the back bunker. I feel like, ‘Oh, no, I have to make up-and-down, and she’s been making one-putts on almost every single green, so I thought she was going to birdie that hole too. She didn’t, and then I ended up making up-and-down from the bunker and somehow birdied 17 and got it done on 18 to get the half point.”
Vu faced a 2-down deficit with two holes to play but somehow secured a half-point, getting the job done for the Americans and flexing her clutch genes in the process. Her approach on the 18th landed inches from the hole, thus bringing the Americans to the 14.5-point threshold necessary for the win.

“On the 18th hole in the middle of the fairway, I saw that we were at 14 points,” Vu said.
“I was like, oh, shoot. I better birdie this. Let me try my best.”
Her spectacular shot sent the entire United States team into a frenzy, as they secured their first Solheim Cup since 2017.
It’s been such an amazing week,” said Nelly Korda, who finally won a Solheim Cup in her fourth appearance.
“We all bonded really well. It’s been so much fun from the get-go with the caddies, with the players—honestly a dream week.”
Korda faced Charley Hull in the opening match on Sunday but lost 6 & 4, an eye-opening start to the singles matches. Yet, it was not a harbinger of things to come for the Americans, as they held on to win 15.5-to-11.5 over their European counterparts.
“It really could have gone either way,” said captain Stacy Lewis.
“It’s crazy there at the end how it all unfolded. I was hoping and praying it went our way. Just proud of the team, and Lilia’s finish there was unbelievable. That’s what you expect from one of the best players in the world.”
Jack Milko is a golf staff writer for SB Nation’s Playing Through. Be sure to check out @_PlayingThrough for more golf coverage. You can follow him on Twitter @jack_milko as well. […]