From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Jason Lewis

If you were to ask the question: Why are so many drones the size of cars flying over New Jersey? You would think someone in the government might know.

Alas, this is the “deep state” era and after a history of coverups (from Russian collusion to COVID lab leaks to Hunter Biden’s laptop), the Feds are either lying or incompetent. If it is a high-tech repeat of the Chinese balloon fiasco, you have to wonder what Xi Jinping has on the Biden family.

OK, not really.

Regardless, the drone sightings have spread across the Northeast, near sensitive locations and even temporarily shutting down a local airport — yet federal officials insist there is no security threat. But how would they know unless they are the ones putting them up?

Which, by the way, is one of the so-called conspiracy theories that suggests the Feds might be looking for something nefarious they don’t want the public to know.  The bottom line is no one is being told what is going on, but more and more folks know exactly what they would like to do about it.

Shoot the damn things down.

Predictably, craven New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (who had eagerly reiterated there were “no public safety risks,”) quickly reminded his constituents they don’t have authority to shoot down unmanned aircraft systems (UAS).

It is indeed illegal under federal law to shoot at aircraft within the National Airspace System (NAS). And for good reason if you’re talking about protecting lives engaged in military, commercial or personal air traffic.

But as we are witnessing, the centralization of power has its limits. Especially when it comes to preventing state officials from doing their duty. Relying on bureaucrats in Washington to handle local exigencies is still a fool’s errand.

The main obstacle to giving local authorities more leeway has been the largest and most powerful of commercial (and hobby) interests. Amazon and Google haven’t been shy about flexing their lobbying muscle in support of federal preemption of state law that might get in the way of delivery drones constantly buzzing over your house en route to your neighbor’s.

The invasions of privacy could get even worse. Imagine a perverted neighbor with a camera mounted drone hovering outside your bathroom window?

So, who ‘ya supposed to call? Why, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), of course. They’ll get right back to you.

Above and beyond the bureaucratic inertia, homeowners are supposed to count on an FAA that fast-tracked Alphabet’s Wing Aviation drones for consumer-goods deliveries? That was 2019, about a year and a half after I introduced the Drone Innovation Act preventing the Feds from authorizing UAS within the “immediate reaches” above someone’s property without the owner’s permission.

Navigable airspace above 400 feet was left in the hands of Washington, but the legislation allowed for the traditional “police powers” of state and local government to protect common law rights to privacy from an aerial nuisance or trespass.

Not surprisingly, the special interests marshaled their forces to block a bill that would have put reasonable limits on federal preemption of state and local laws, which are especially prevalent in areas “affecting commercial UAS operators.”

Somewhere, Jeff Bezos must still be smiling.

Former Rep. Jason Lewis (R-Minn.) writes at jasonlewis.substack.com and is the author of Party Animal, The Truth About President Trump, Power Politics & the Partisan Press now out in paperback.

Legislators had 24 hours to read through 1,547 pages. Ramaswamy read them. Musk presented an alternative. The process collapsed.

Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy are flexing their muscles even before President Elect Donald Trump’s inauguration, spiking a bipartisan spending bill.  The bill was introduced on Tuesday with voting scheduled for Wednesday.  Legislators were under massive pressure to approve of the spending bill or risk a government shut down.  Problem is, the bill was over 1,500 pages long!

Chances are, the bill would have passed and in the ensuing weeks as details became known the public would have been outraged by all the extra plans to spend / waste taxpayer dollars.  Legislators would have apologized by saying they simply had no time to read everything and they were desperate to avoid a shut down.

That’s where the new DOGE comes in.  First Ramaswamy somehow read the bill and posted a video to TikTok and X to inform voters what they were going to be paying for in this new bill.

@vivekramaswamy

Congress wants to waste your money without telling you, make sure that doesn’t happen

♬ original sound – Vivek Ramaswamy

From MXMNews

The newly formed Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, successfully campaigned to halt the bipartisan continuing resolution (CR) in Congress. Musk and Ramaswamy took to X, rallying conservatives against the 1,547-page stopgap funding measure they argue is riddled with wasteful spending and unnecessary policy provisions.

Musk, a billionaire entrepreneur and vocal advocate for government reform, characterized the bill as a “pork-barrel” monstrosity. “Unless @DOGE ends the careers of deceitful, pork-barrel politicians, the waste and corruption will never stop,” Musk posted on X, adding that lawmakers who support the bill should be “voted out in two years.”

Meanwhile, Ramaswamy, a former Republican presidential candidate and DOGE co-chair, proposed an alternative to the bulky spending bill. Sharing a draft of his one-page resolution, he described it as a minimalist approach that avoids exacerbating historical spending excesses. “This is what a clean CR looks like,” he wrote, emphasizing the need for fiscal restraint.

Musk and Ramaswamy posted this to X.

Shorter = better. This bill is only 116 pages, instead of 1,500+ pages. Took a LOT less time to read. Glad to see the following garbage from yesterday’s bill removed in the current version: – Congressional pay raise/health benefits – 17 miscellaneous commerce bills – Random new pandemic policies, like funding for “biocontainment research laboratories” – Renewal of the “Global Engagement Center,” a key player in the federal censorship state

In record time, the public was informed, politicians were influenced by outraged taxpayers, and politicians blamed each other for a faulty bill and were forced to go back to the drawing board.

It’s all explained very well in this video presentation from Kaizen Asiedu, a Harvard graduate in philosophy who makes videos informing Americans about complicated political matters.

Friday’s deadline to avoid a government shutdown looms. Musk posted on X that a shutdown would be “infinitely better than passing a horrible bill.” His DOGE partner Vivek Ramaswamy urged Americans to contact their representatives to “stop the steal of your tax dollars.”

And President-elect Donald Trump posted this: “If Democrats threaten to shut down the government unless we give them everything they want, then CALL THEIR BLUFF,”.

Should the spending bill fail, it will mark a significant victory for DOGE and a potential turning point in efforts to reform Washington’s spending habits.