Can anyone who is more familiar with CA property tax laws confirm or explain @LauraPowellEsq 's work?

The TL;DR is that when CHIRLA bought their new headquarters at 1730 W Olympic Blvd in 2023 for 16.5 million, they still are paying property taxes as if it were valued at 4 million.

I spent the last hour or so researching alternative explanations, and I'm not able to come up with one.

🔍💰 𝐖𝐡𝐨 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐨𝐥𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐌𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐚? 🧠📺

Remember this thread? Yes, AI gets the facts of Soros wrong because AI is trained on mainstream media. But this IMO goes way beyond biased journalists:

By any objective standard, Soros should be a central historical figure. His role in creating post-Cold War foreign policy, funding regime change efforts, working with the US government, and bankrolling NGOs is massive.

And yet, mainstream media insists he's just a "philanthropist," with no meaningful political legacy to examine beyond financing a few Democrats. That's a serious historical erasure.

US taxpayers spend billions funding media abroad to promote "democracy." Media is a key soft power tool used to steer public opinion and culture.

But this also means other countries are spending the same billions to have the same impact! What does this mean for US media?

In 2021, the FCC tried to require U.S. broadcasters to disclose foreign sponsorship. The National Association of Broadcasters sued to stop it, and won. That rule was struck down.

Additionally, media outlets aren't required to disclose who funds their "training." This creates a backdoor: through "journalism training" programs, funders (including foreign and NGO actors) can influence media narratives without transparency.

NBC, for example, had a known relationship with Soros as early as the 1980s.

This means: US media is likely awash in NGO, corporate, and foreign money, but there's no requirement to disclose it.

We critique other nations for media blackouts, like how Chinese citizens are kept in the dark about the Tiananmen Square massacre. But ask yourself:

Are we really so different?

Why is one of the most influential policy leaders of the modern era erased from mainstream historical narrative?

And what does that say about who controls the information we're allowed to see?

And what else is being hidden from us?

Dear Mr. Kristol,

Nice try with the motte-and-bailey routine. The "motte" is that Iran must not get nuclear weapons, a point nearly everyone agrees on. But the "bailey" you're really defending is that we should intervene and force Iran to become a liberal democracy.

Rejecting globalism is not the same as isolationism. "America First" means protecting U.S. interests with strength. Neutralizing Iran's offensive threat without dragging us into another nation-building fiasco would be a textbook example of "America First."

But let's switch topics.

I've been digging into the history of globalist "successes." One recurring theme is how elite efforts to democratize foreign regimes often lead to the opposite of what was promised. Look at Russia in the 90s: after the fall of USSR, Western NGOs rushed to make a liberal democracy out of Russia.

They enriched oligarchs, fueled resentment, and laid the groundwork for the rise of Putin. But nobody speaks of this history. Globalists swept this under the rug, without any accountability. The same thing is happening in South America, but I digress.

Let's pivot to Afghanistan, a failure that became too publicized to hide.

After 2001, we launched a war that cost thousands of American lives and left tens of thousands more wounded. Hundreds of thousands of Afghan civilians died, millions more became refugees. But there was a moment of hope: the drafting of Afghanistan's 2004 constitution.

The Journal of Democracy, the flagship publication of the NED (our quasi-governmental soft-power front), published an article by Barnett Rubin noscriptd "Crafting a Constitution for Afghanistan." Rubin, who advised the UN during the process, openly admits that this constitution was written not by Afghans, but by NGOs, foreign governments, and elite consultants.

Apparently, democracy doesn't mean government by the poeple. But... let's look at the end of the article.

"My work on Afghanistan's constitution has been supported by the Open Society Institute."

So the man who helped draft Afghanistan's new government, and documented it for America's own soft-power journal, gives full credit to George Soros for funding the process.

Let that sink in.

The UN's constitutional adviser in a U.S.-backed war zone was financially backed by Soros. And we wonder why the effort failed.

So take note:

America First is very much alive.

But the Open Society's ideology of NGO-run democratization is dead. It failed in Afghanistan. It failed in Russia. It failed in Iraq. It fails wherever it's imposed.

It's now up to the MAGA movement to give it a proper burial.

Hello Senator Schiff,

Please don’t confuse the fact that you weren’t shown certain evidence with the idea that no evidence exists. You were never going to see it, and you know exactly why.

You repeatedly leaked classified information. Even Kevin McCarthy found your behavior so reckless that he removed you from the Intelligence Committee, along with Eric Swalwell, who was compromised by a Chinese spy. Donald Trump called you the biggest leaker in Washington, and few disagreed.

Now you’re demanding access to sensitive intelligence, as if anyone believes you’d handle it responsibly. Thank God you didn’t get it, because history says it would have ended up in Iranian hands.

Instead of throwing a tantrum over not being consulted, you should count your blessings. You’re lucky you aren’t in jail right now.