HISTORY OF THE BAR CODE

Education, Entertainment, Food, History, Scientific 7 Minutes

Every few years, the small town of Troy in Miami County, Ohio celebrates an historic occasion that for a few giddy weeks puts it on the world map of the grocery trade. At the time, National Cash Register, which provided the checkout equipment, was based in Ohio and Troy was also the headquarters of the Hobart Corporation, which developed the weighing and pricing machines for loose items such as meat. It was here, at just after 8 a.m. on June 26, 1974, that the first item marked with the Universal Product Code (UPC) was scanned at the checkout of Troy’s Marsh Supermarket.

It was treated as a ceremonial occasion and involved a little bit of ritual. The night before, a team of Marsh staff had moved in to put bar codes on hundreds of items in the store while National Cash Register installed their scanners and computers. The first “shopper” was Clyde Dawson, who was head of research and development for Marsh Supermarket; the pioneer cashier who “served” him, Sharon Buchanan. Legend has it that Dawson dipped into his shopping basket and pulled out a multi-pack of Wrigley’s Juicy Fruit chewing gum. Dawson explained later that this was not a lucky dip: he chose it because nobody had been sure that a bar code could be printed on something as small as a pack of chewing gum, and Wrigley had found a solution to the problem. Their ample reward was a place in American history.

The first item marked with the Universal Product Code (UPC) was scanned at the checkout of Troy’s Marsh Supermarket. Courtesy of Yale University Press

Joe Woodland said himself it sounded like a fairy tale: he had gotten the inspiration for what became the bar code while sitting on Miami Beach. He drew it with his fingers in the sand. What he was after was a code of some sort that could be printed on groceries and scanned so that supermarket checkout queues would move more quickly and stocktaking would be simplified.

That such a technology was needed was not his idea: it came from a distraught supermarket manager who had pleaded with a dean at Drexel Institute of Technology in Philadelphia to come up with some way of getting shoppers through his store more quickly. The delays and the regular stocktaking were costing him his profits. The dean shrugged him off, but a junior postgraduate, Bernard “Bob” Silver, overheard and was intrigued. He mentioned it to Woodland, who had graduated from Drexel in 1947. Woodland was already an inventor, and he decided to take on the challenge.

So confident was he that he would come up with a solution to the supermarket dilemma, Woodland left graduate school in the winter of 1948 to live in an apartment owned by his grandfather in Miami Beach. He had cashed in some stocks to tide him over. It was in January 1949 that Woodland had his epiphany, though the brilliance of its simplicity and its far-reaching consequences for modern existence were not recognized until many years later.

Joe Woodland (here) and Bernard Silver filed a patent in 1949, which was granted in 1952. Courtesy of Yale University Press

It was Morse Code that gave him the idea. Woodland had learned it when he was in the Boy Scouts. As he was sitting in a beach chair and pondering the checkout dilemma, Morse came into his head: “I remember I was thinking about dots and dashes when I poked my four fingers into the sand and, for whatever reason—I didn’t know—I pulled my hand toward me and I had four lines. I said ‘Golly! Now I have four lines and they could be wide lines and narrow lines, instead of dots and dashes. Now I have a better chance of finding the doggone thing.’ Then, only seconds later, I took my four fingers—they were still in the sand—and I swept them round into a circle.”

The patent illustrates the basic concept of a bull’s-eye-shaped bar code.

Back in Philadelphia, Woodland and Silver decided to see if they could get a working system going with the technology to hand. They first filed a patent in 1949, which was finally granted in 1952. Woodland and Silver had the right idea, but they lacked the minicomputer and, critically, a very bright light with which to “read” the black and white bar code. On July 16, 1960, Hughes Aircraft Company made one of the most sensational announcements in the history of science. One of their research scientists, Theodore Maiman, had made an “atomic radio light brighter than the center of the sun.” Maiman produced for the newsmen his “laser,” an acronym for Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation.

Theodore Maiman looks at the ruby used to create the first laser beam. Bettmann/Corbis

A booklet produced in 1966 by the Kroger Company, which ran one of the largest supermarket chains in North America, signed off with a despairing wish for a better future: “Just dreaming a little . . . could an optical scanner read the price and total the sale. . . . Faster service, more productive service is needed desperately. We solicit your help.”

A small research team at the powerful Radio Corporation of America (RCA) was looking at a few new projects, including the possibility of an automatic bank cash machine, which they decided would not go because “the customer would not buy the concept.” Finally, they lighted on the bar code. They soon found the Woodland and Silver patent. Printing the bull’s-eye bar code proved to be one of the greatest difficulties, because any imperfections would make the whole system unworkable.

The first real-life test of RCA’s bull’s-eye bar code was at the Kroger Kenwood Plaza store in Cincinnati. Courtesy of the ID History Museum

On July 3, 1972, the first automated checkstands were installed. More checkstands were installed and a comparison with other Kroger stores told an undeniable and very promising story: the bull’s-eye bar code hit the target, with superior sales figures. But this was just one store in a nationwide grocery and supermarket business worth billions. If the laser and bar code were to revolutionize the checkout counter, they would have to be near universal.

The goal of the Ad Hoc Committee of the Universal Product Identification Code could be stated very simply. The representatives of the grocery trade were charged with finding a way to introduce a Universal Product Code, a bar code of some description that would be common to all goods sold in supermarkets and imprinted by the manufacturers and retailers. The code would carry information about the nature of the product, the company that made it, and so on. In-store computers would “read” this information with scanners and introduce their own variations, which might involve special offers and reductions.

In the end, seven companies, all of them based in the United States, submitted systems to the Symbol Committee, a technical offshoot of the Ad Hoc Committee. International Business Machines (IBM) made a surprise bid. IBM’s George Laurer was handed the specifications for a bar code that had been determined by the Symbol Selection Committee: it had to be small and neat, maximum 1.5 square inches; to save money it had to be printable with existing technology used for standard labels; it had been calculated that only ten digits were needed; the bar code had to be readable from any direction and at speed; there must be fewer than one in 20,000 undetected errors.

Like so many inventions, the UPC was not an immediate success. It was when the mass merchandisers adopted the UPC that it took off, Kmart being the first. In fact, bar code technology was almost made for companies like Walmart, which deal in thousands of goods that need to be catalogued and tracked. The bar code took off in the grocery and retail business in the 1980s, and at the same time began to transform manufacturing. In 2004, Fortune magazine estimated that the bar code was used by 80 to 90 percent of the top 500 companies in the United States.

Test tubes with blood samples are marked with bar codes. AB Still LTD/Science Photo Library/Corbis

Though the inspiration for the bar code was the plea by supermarkets for technology that would speed up the checkout, its greatest value to business and industry is that it has provided hard, statistical evidence for what sells and what does not. It has transformed market research, providing a rich picture of people’s tastes, and it has made production lines more efficient.

Hospital bracelets for newborns and their mothers have bar codes. © Vladimir Godnik/fstop/Corbis

After many years of anonymity, the man whose knowledge of Morse Code inspired the familiar black and white stripes finally got some recognition. In February 1992, President George H.W. Bush was photographed at a national grocery convention looking intently at a supermarket scanner and having a go at swiping a can with a bar code over it. The New York Times correspondent wrote this up as evidence that it was the first time Bush had seen a supermarket checkout. In other words, he was out of touch with everyday American life.

His aides insisted that he was not struck by the novelty of the technology but by the fact that it could read a damaged bar code. Apocryphal or not, the story stuck and was regarded as damaging to Bush. However, as Woodland’s local newspaper put it: “George Bush isn’t one to hold a grudge. No Sir.” A few months after the checkout incident, Bush presented Woodland with a National Medal of Technology.

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Published by NebraskaFilly

Army veteran (1976-1979), retired with entirely too much time on my hands

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207 thoughts on “HISTORY OF THE BAR CODE”

  3. Liked by 1 person

  4. she makes good points…

    Liked by 1 person

  5. Liked by 1 person

  6. thread reader ap on confirming Trump’s whereabouts on the dates he was supposedly in NY committing the “crimes”

    Huh, the first 4 charges place the President in New York committing the crimes on 2/14/17.

    Yet Comey’s memos place Trump in the White House in Washington, DC. He wasn’t even there…

    assets.bwbx.io/documents/user… ImageImage
    The next count is on Mach 16th or 17th, Counts 6 & 7 are on 3/17/17.

    Trump was also in the White House, in Washington DC. ImageImageImage
    8th count occurred sometime between April 12, 2017 & June 19, 2017.

    Couldn’t pin it down any better than that huh? But on April 12th, Trump was in the White House in Washington DC. ImageImage
    Count 9 & 10 isalleged on June 19, 2017.

    Trump is again in the White House on that date. ImageImage
    Count 11 & 12 are on May 22, 2017. Count 13 is on May 23, 2017.
    President Trump is in Israel & the Palestinian Territories, not NYC. ImageImage
    Count 14 occurred between June 16-19, 2017.
    Count 15 & 16 on June 19, 2017
    Trump was in Florida, Camp David Maryland & the WH in DC, not in New York. ImageImage
    Count 17, 18, & 19 occurred on July 11, 2017.

    It appears President Trump was at the White House that date. Preparing to fly to Paris. ImageImage
    Counts 20, 21, & 22 occurred on August 1, 2017.

    Trump was again at the White House in Washington, DC, not in NYC. Image
    Counts 23 & 24 occurred on Sept 11, 2017.
    Count 25 on Sept. 12, 2017.
    Trump was at the Pentagon in Virginia & the White House in Washington, DC, not in NYC. ImageImage
    Count 26, 27 & 28 occurred on October 18, 2017.

    President Trump was in the White House in Washington, DC, not in NYC. ImageImage
    Count 29 & 30 occurred on November 20, 2017.
    Count 31 on November 21, 2017.

    President Trump was at the White House in Washington, DC, not in NYC. ImageImage
    Count 32 & 33 occurred on December 1, 2017.

    Count 34 on December 5, 2017.

    I’ll have to find another source but no indications that Trump was in New York at the time. ImageImage
    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_…
    Timeline is from Wikipedia as it had everything in one place.
    Timeline of the Donald Trump presidency (2017 Q4) – Wikipedia
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_Donald_Trump_presidency_(2017_Q4)#timelinetuesday
    But it seems that D.A. Bragg’s indictment of President Trump for crimes in New York charged 34 crimes all on dates when President Trump was not in New York.

    This is going to be fun!
    Confirmed: December 1st, 2017 that President Trump was in the White House.
    Today in Trumpworld — Dec. 1
    Trump will have lunch with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Secretary of Defense James Mattis at the White House.
    https://www.politico.com/story/2017/12/01/today-in-trumpworld-dec-1-274455
    Also confirmed that President Trump was in the White House on December 5th, 2017.

    All 34 counts occurred while President Trump was not in New York.
    Today in Trumpworld — Dec. 5
    Trump and first lady Melania Trump will host the Congressional Ball at the White House.
    https://www.politico.com/story/2017/12/05/trump-schedule-today-white-house-280946
    For those who are dismissing the relevance of the fact that D.A. Bragg’s prosecutors chose 34 events that occurred while President Trump was not in the state of New York.

    The 1st element of the crime is that to prove the crime was committed in a NY County.
    nycourts.gov/judges/cji/2-P… Image

    Liked by 1 person

  10. sunnydaze
    April 5, 2023 12:25 am

    Thread

    Renee Diresta wrote the Senate Report on Russian bots. The New York Times later exposed her company for creating fake Russian bot accounts to sway an American election.

    In response, she was promoted to lead the Election Integrity Project and the Virality Project, where she… https://t.co/HOOBnwzcoo pic.twitter.com/YYBmksIiIi

    — kanekoa.substack.com (@KanekoaTheGreat) April 3, 2023

    Liked by 2 people

        2. she does.
          and we do have to be cautious, but it’s exhausting not believing in anything or anyone. and it’s depressing to always believe we are losing.

          Liked by 2 people

    2. Snicker – love this! McCarthy seems to have stepped up – his outrage against the Trump indictment seems authentic and passionate. Maybe McCarthy will be the antidote to both Pelosi and McConnell.

      Liked by 1 person

  13. California Joe
    April 5, 2023 12:46 am

    John Bolton on the absurdity of the Bragg indictment especially the Federal Campaign Finance angle. Apparently, Bolton represented two Republican Presidential candidates when that law was passed. Bolton points out that President Trump’s $130,000 payment clearly does not violate the federal law because the law specifically does not address it. If it did cover the payment the law would violate the First Amendment.

    John Bolton on Alvin Bragg’s indictment: “This is even weaker than I feared it would be and I think it’s easily subject to being dismissed or a quick acquittal for Trump.”pic.twitter.com/K8Cbw8d6Ru

    — ALX 🇺🇸 (@alx) April 4, 2023

    Liked by 1 person

  14. j x
    April 5, 2023 12:48 am

    The Indictment is a recitation of charges in the form:

    “The defendant, in the County of New York and elsewhere, on or about February 14, 2017, with intent to defraud and intent to commit another crime and aid and conceal the commission thereof, made and caused a false entry in the business records of an enterprise…”

    This is prospective. An intent to commit a crime. False business record entries were made with the intent to commit a crime and conceal it.

    Yet the Statement Of Facts claims “falsified New York business records to conceal criminal conduct that hid damaging information from the voting public during the 2016 presidential election”.

    This is retrospective.

    The Indictment and Statement Of Facts are at odds with each other.

    Liked by 2 people

        1. OK – I’ll look for that poster. I like to read posts and comments and have been commenting again at CTH – though I was banned there. I’m still in constant moderation there, and probably always will be. But that’s OK. They do allow my posts about the same sex issues now, however. Previously, they were stuck in Episcopal church mode, approving the alphabet agenda, seeing them as victims, etc. As the agenda has progressed and become more heinous in its gender stuff, I guess the mods at CTH have wised up.

          Liked by 1 person

          1. I thought that was you!
            I only get to read the Presidential thread there most days, but the gravatar image is the same as the one you use here. The only reason i thought it was you, if you edit something, it shows it was edited by GA/FL

            Liked by 1 person

          2. I was banned there, too – many of us were – and I’ve posted a comment or two that did get approved. It does seem that there was a mod or two back then who went all haywire and I get the feeling they are gone now, perhaps? Or SD reined them in.

            Liked by 2 people

            1. Each blog has its own strengths and great commenters. We are going to need each other more and more as the heat is turned up as predicted:

              But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: Men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure . . . 2 Timothy 3:1-4

              Seems like we are getting a good dose of that.

              Enjoy your loved ones! Have a great day! :8-)

              Like

  16. Liked by 3 people

      1. Hoping beyond hope that James Comer will be the ethical legal antidote to that despicable poseur effete partisan political tool, James Comey

        Liked by 1 person

  18. Liked by 2 people

  19. Liked by 2 people

  20. My daughter and her family had planned on coming up for their annual Easter visit late Friday evening, but they decided to leave earlier and are now coming up Friday morning. this, of course, throws my whole spring clean-the-house schedule into a tailspin…LOL
    but it’s always good to see them!

    my granddaughter took 3 medals at the track & field event last week, so she’s pumped…lol
    and we’re going shopping Saturday–for her birthday and then to the Texas Roadhouse for lunch. She’s a farm girl who loves all things cowboy and is just growing up sooo fast!

    My son and his wife are also doing well. They talked about her grandfather’s funeral in February–apparently a cardinal was in attendance and delivered some of the mass. They are also going this weekend to attend a celebration of her uncle–who has been a priest for 50 years.

    Liked by 2 people

      1. Morning GA!
        hope so!
        usually we bake something together when she’s here but I didn’t plan on it cuz I didn’t think there would be time. now i have to figure something out…lol

        Liked by 2 people

        1. Keep us posted on the festivities. I’m not cooking and not planning to go to the Village. I might attend a sunrise Easter service at the gardens here, sponsored by the conservative Lutheran Church.

          I’ve ordered parts and will go to Sally’s for a week when they all come in – to make a new modification for her three wheelchairs.

          Liked by 2 people

          1. wow!
            you truly are a marvel GA!
            I can create just about anything with a pattern and cloth, but I know my limits.

            my hubby is very pragmatic–an accountant thru and thru. But his creativity and problem solving amazes me at times. The plastic handle broke off my dryer. I looked on amazon and could buy a replacement one for $5 and change. By the time I told him, he had already fashioned a “new” one from an old eyeglass holder (you know the kind with loops on the ends that your eyeglasses slip into and you can wear them around your neck?)
            it was in the Miscellaneous drawer in the laundry room. It’s bright pink (a gift from my kids when they really young) but he managed to loop it and secure it and it works WONDERFULLY!

            and every time i see it, it reminds me how awesome hubby is!

            Liked by 2 people

      1. well, both my kids lean liberal and my daughter is a teacher…
        so my tongue will definitely be sore from biting it all weekend long…LOL

        Liked by 1 person

        1. Good luck with that! I’m doing ok with keeping my trap shut with my GS…..so far, anyway! LOL – I’m much more careful of how I word things now that I know about my oddly wired brain, and he is much more mature after our trip thru hell so we are able to talk in ways we couldn’t before. I dread thinking about what he is taking on, tho. It’s going to be a VERY rough road for them. From the frying pan into the fire is what it’s looking like! SMH

          Liked by 1 person

          1. when I first remarried, I actually contemplated writing a book about the experiences and how difficult a second marriage can be when there are children involved. I even came up with a title…Don’t Take That Step…that’s how hard it was.
            But we persevered…and things got so much better after they went off to college…

            Liked by 1 person

        1. I’m not even going to try to find out how my bro, Red, voted – he’s even more of an odd duck than me! Sometimes, he leans left, others – not so much. It’s almost impossible to get a straight answer out of him anyway. He goes off on tangents and never gets to the actual point.

          Liked by 2 people

  25. But the illegals will still get free healthcare on OUR dime!!!!

    EXCERPT: “Residents in Arizona, Arkansas, Idaho, New Hampshire and South Dakota will be the first to feel the pain of redeterminations. Healthcare in America is notoriously expensive with an estimated 79 million Americans struggling with medical debt. Despite this, several Republican members of Congress are toying with the prospect of drastically cutting funding for government healthcare.

    States will unwind protections over the course of about 14 months. Roughly one in six of the 84 million Americans on Medicaid stand to lose their coverage over the next 14 months. Medicaid is the federal government’s health insurance program serving the very poor and the disabled. It is jointly funded by federal and state governments, meaning the latter guarantees funds to match the state’s expenditures on the program.”

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-11937955/20-MILLION-Americans-lose-health-insurance-week.html

    Liked by 1 person


  30. “I saw this ad pop up on that Facebook Marketplace thing yesterday. I’m not buying that this guy’s a farmer and needs to get rid of the rock so he can ‘plow his crops’. That’s a million dollar house in this neighborhood. I think the guy’s fulla shit, and besides, who needs a friggin’ boulder like that?”


    “How many times do ya suppose that hadda happen before they decided they needed a sign? Asking for a friend)”

    “See – it usta mean something completely different.”

    (Maxfield Parrish – Ecstasy, 1922. That is spectacular.)

    Liked by 2 people




  31. “A black soldier of the Union army sits in front of a storefront with the boldly lettered sign ‘Auction & Negro Sales’. This is a colorized version of an actual photo taken in 1865 in Atlanta, Georgia after the fall of the Confederacy…”


    “Honest to god I wouldn’ta watched this dog and pony show for any reason but I happened to be sitting down for lunch and it was on, and I spotted this cop immediately. I’m sure she was wearing a vest, but it doesn’t matter – she’s cute as fuck. AND – she kept messing with her hair whenever she was on camera. I’m very happy to see that I’m not the only troll out there who noticed her. She has yet to be identified, but I’ll give you even money the New York Post does a feature on her tomorrow…”

    Liked by 2 people

  33. “Dark Agendas Gift Wrapped as “Social Justice” — Sprinkle a little virtue signaling glitter on the narratives to make them look like democracy instead of the commie crap they are…”
    Jordan Sather
    13 min ago

    ENTIRE ARTICLE: “Here’s something to keep in mind about how the New World Order conducts their social engineering of society. It’s difficult to force humans to do something they don’t want to do. We are quite the rebellious and stubborn beings. So to control us, the Powers That Be need to make us into gullible participants who choose to go along with the agendas, unwitting to the real goals of them and without the realization that we are being controlled. We need to be lead to believe that we are making informed choices and that these choices are going to improve our lives – but do they?

    And of course, we are easily lead by fear. We tend to make instinctual, knee-jerk reactions while fearful rather than critically thinking through the situations. Our predictability can be leveraged – and golly gee is it.

    For the Deep State bring forth their self-serving agendas in ways that the gullible sheeple in society will not just accept, but even violently demand, a crisis must be present – or at least the appearance of a crisis. Typically, there are no actual crises present, but with the power of media programming through the mainstream news, celebrities, and social media, it’s quite easy for the elites to inject the fear of “imminent disaster” into the minds of the people.

    Order out of chaos. This is otherwise known as problem/reaction/solution, or the Hegelian Dialectic tactics used by the Cabal. They manufacture a problem, or the appearance of a problem, to get society to be influenced and react in a specific way. The Cabal then has a solution which was pre-planned before the problem was created, and then they get society to believe that this solution will solve the problem and make everything better, when underneath the surface this solution will actually lead to more centralized power and control for the Cabal – they control every step of the way. And by doing things this way, society will not realize they are being controlled, they think they have free will and the change being brought will actually benefit society.

    Useful idiot activists are then engaged to promote the propaganda talking points. The use of virtue signaling and fear porn is rampant in their efforts. “We must make this change to save the planet, if not we will all die!”. The fear gets people to accept their agenda easier, along with the illusion of “you’re making a difference”.

    For instance: climate change. Is man causing the climate to change? No, the main driver is the Sun. Yet the Deep State will fake some science (typically through United Nations connected science groups) to make it look like man is causing the climate to change. Activists and controlled media will run the narratives that it’s humanity’s fault and if we don’t reduce carbon emissions then sea levels will rise and our civilization with perish. Activists use direct action tactics to give the appearance of grassroots and majority support for the agenda, and the government pushes carbon taxes and their greenwashing ESG initiatives that ultimately give them more control over society and more money in their pockets.

    Hurray Social Justice! Another example: mass shootings and gun control. To advance their gun control agendas, the Deep State will create a false flag shootings, or a few of them, to give the appearance that guns are a threat to society. Controlled mass media runs the narratives with padded statistics, and unwitting social justice warriors protest for more gun control thinking that’s the real issue at hand. Society is lead to believe we need legislation, which allows government puppets to introduce laws attempting to further regulate firearms.

    Problem/Reaction/Solution in the name of wokeness. We could continue down the list of examples, from BLM/Antifa activism to the LGBTQ movement to numerous other woke movements politicized at their core working to advance control agendas in the name of Social Justice.

    Why yes, the climate is changing – but we are not causing it. Why yes, racism is bad – but BLM is a Marxist money laundering scheme. Why yes, people with whatever sexual orientation they deem for themselves do deserve equal rights – but what rights don’t they currently have? And why do they have to push their sexual ideologies onto children? Why yes, mass shootings are bad – but guns aren’t the problem, deranged criminals are, along with CIA sleeper cells.

    The real issues at hand is masked and hidden, with society’s attention diverted to the perceived problem which is, as described, fabricated to push agendas with woke virtue signaling. Don’t fall for the Social Justice Warrior tactics and fear porn trying to pull at your heart strings. Stay strong in the face of their wokeness. Facts and logic will defeat their inversion of reality. Stay strong!”

    Liked by 2 people

    1. What do you think of this guy, Filly? He’s got 9 sites/outlets and 8 ways to donate to his income. College drop out – but so is Gates, as I recall.

      Liked by 1 person

  34. Bessie2003
    April 5, 2023 10:44 am
    Reply to Arminius

    It’s an Alex Bruesewitz tweet that says:

    “I just learned last night that @JusticeDanKelly thought he could win without Trump’s support in the great state of Wisconsin.

    “Wisconsin is my home state and Trump is beloved by the people.

    “Foolish Dan didn’t want Trump’s help – guess we know why he lost now.”

    with that tweet followed by additional tweets by Alex Bruesewitz showing previous Dan Kelly comments about being able to win on his own.
    Last edited 44 minutes ago by Bessie2003
    2

    Liked by 2 people

  35. WeThePeople2016
    April 5, 2023 10:59 am

    NORTH CAROLINA 🚨 Democratic lawmaker, State Representative Tricia Cotham, announced in a news conference this morning that she is becoming a Republican, saying she had been bullied by her fellow Democrats and had grown alienated from the party on issues like school choice.

    “The modern-day Democratic Party has become unrecognizable to me and to so many others throughout this state and this country,” she said. (NYT)

    https://t.me/THEREALTORIABROOKE/33532

    Liked by 1 person

  36. “Wisconsin Supreme Court Race Marred by Yet Another Voting Machine Malfunction — U.S. elections continue to be haunted by voting machine issues.”
    Kyle Becker
    3 min ago
    ENTIRE ARTICLE: “Another contentious election, another voting machine controversy. A voting machine in Green Bay broke down and needed to be replaced during Tuesday’s critical Wisconsin Supreme Court election, as reported by local Fox affiliate WLUK. “City clerk Celestine Jeffreys said the machine at the Green Bay Botanical Garden wasn’t working,” WLUK reported. “Backup machines also did not work.”

    The city had to borrow a voting machine from Brown County. “Those machines had been serviced, so we have to take a much more close look after this election as to whether or not we need to purchase new machines and exactly how we can ensure that that doesn’t happen again,” Jeffreys said. “It’s the same problem we’ve been having at that ward for a couple of different election cycles.” Jeffreys said more than 7,000 absentee ballots had been returned to the city as of 4 p.m. About 30% of the city’s ballots are cast absentee, she added.

    According to Wisconsin Right Now, Brown County, where Green Bay is located, has ES&S ExpressVote voting machines. According to ES&S, “the paper-based ExpressVote Universal Voting System uses touch-screen technology that produces a paper record for tabulation.” ES&S, based in Omaha, Nebraska, controls around 50% of the country’s election system market. [NF: Warren Buffett]

    As reported by election watchdog Pro Publica in 2019, ES&S’ systems has been “plagued by mishaps at the local level.” Nonetheless, many experts and election officials say “the manufacturer remains dominant because there’s little government regulation and almost no oversight,” according to the report. “ES&S is owned by the McCarthy Group, a private equity firm, and thus its financial records — revenue, profits, salaries — are not public,” ProPublica noted.

    In an interesting twist, the City of Green Bay had actually sued the State of Wisconsin in federal court in 2020 an attempt to stop in-person voting on April 7, which was “a spring election date still supported by Gov. Tony Evers and the Republican leaders of the Legislature.” The lawsuit, argued that holding the election during the pandemic without changes “endangers not only the public health, but also the legitimacy of that same election process.”

    “I don’t feel at all comfortable asking people to choose between either their health or their right to vote,” Green Bay Mayor Eric Genrich said in an interview. “…Having an in-person election on April 7 is not at all practical or possible, isn’t lawful or just.” Now, with the Supreme Court essentially falling under Democratic control, the state’s election integrity laws will likely suffer a major blow. This could mean an extension of the mass absentee ballots seen during the 2020 election, as well as the end of voter ID laws. The contentious Wisconsin election broke records for outside money poured into the state, particularly $1 million donated by billionaire George Soros for the race.

    But some state legislatures are fighting back. In Harris County, Texas, there were multiple reports of voting machine malfunctions in the critical election, which swung strongly in Democrat’s favor in the tight race. Earlier this week, Republican members of the Texas state legislature would even allow the Texas Secretary of State to overturn results of elections based on conclusive evidence of fraud.

    The Arizona governor’s race in particular was egregiously marred by voting machine malfunctions that ended in extensive litigation and allegations of election malfeasance. On election day in Arizona, when most Republicans turn out to vote in elections, voting machine problems caused delays in at least 25 percent of the polls in Maricopa County.

    The New York Times reported on the technical glitches that had struck Maricopa County, which had affected mostly red districts. “Officials in Maricopa, one of the nation’s most populous counties and a focus of efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, said the problem affected ballot tabulation machines in about 60 of the county’s 223 voting centers,” the report added. “In the afternoon, the county said it had isolated the problem: printers were not making dark enough markings on the ballots.”

    Former Secretary of State Katie Hobbs nonetheless certified her own election and became governor. And the Wisconsin Supreme Court will turn blue ahead of the critical 2024 presidential race.”

    Like

    1. Troublemaker10
      April 5, 2023 12:13 pm

      WI Supreme Court Justice vote…

      Kelly was an establishment candidate who openly rejected Trump, which likely affected the maga voter turnout.

      ****

      Kiss of death! Such a dumb move by @JusticeDanKelly. Explains why he lost last night. And it was an important seat to win! Now we’re stuck with a Soros funded WI Supreme Court Justice. pic.twitter.com/Jdzz07oSAn

      — Alex Bruesewitz 🇺🇸 (@alexbruesewitz) April 5, 2023

      Liked by 1 person

  38. clarion
    April 5, 2023 11:54 am

    BREAKING #2A NEWS: New York’s Temporary Extreme Risk Protection Order, a.k.a. Red Flag law found unconstitutional.

    BREAKING #2A NEWS: New York’s Temporary Extreme Risk Protection Order, a.k.a. Red Flag law found unconstitutional. https://t.co/i9kM2DlwUF

    — Matthew Kolken (@mkolken) April 5, 2023

    Liked by 2 people

  39. the gift that keeps stealing…obummer
    entire article
    Residents of Chicago’s South Side are reportedly being displaced as home and rent prices soar around the area close to the construction site of the $500 million Obama Presidential Center.

    Since the Obama Presidential Center was announced in 2015, residents of Chicago’s South Side have seen a dramatic increase in costs of living. Rents have increased as much as 43 percent and home values more than 130 percent over that span, the Washington Post reported. More than 50% higher than the U.S. average, the increases have worked to “exacerbate existing affordability challenges for many low-income residents of Woodlawn and South Shore,” Professor William Sites of the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice at the University of Chicago, told the outlet.

    The $500 million Obama Presidential Center has been pitched as a transformative boost for the South Side of Chicago. Will longtime residents be able to stay to enjoy it? https://t.co/YH26sELRJq

    — The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) April 4, 2023

    The increase has forced many residents out of their homes, as developers and real estate investors have moved in to snatch up pieces of now-prime real estate. “I get these phone calls almost every day, like, ‘Are you looking to sell your home?’” Linda Jennings, 73, a retired nurse who has lived in her South Shore condominium for nearly 20 years, told the Washington Post. “I tell them no, because this is my home.” (RELATED: Stuff From Chicago City Planners Says Obama’s Presidential Center Would Have ‘Adverse Effect’ On Surrounding Communities)

    Lifelong South Shore resident Tahiti Hamer, 42, was forced to vacate her home last year after her landlord raised her rent by nearly 40 percent. A single mother of three, Hamer urged the landlord to negotiate the rent to make it more affordable for her. “She said, ‘Oh, you know, the area is changing. My taxes have gone up,’” Hamer recalled to the Washington Post “So, that’s it, then. I’m a working mother who can’t afford to live in my own community that I’ve lived in for 42 years.”

    The Obama Foundation has maintained that the presence of the presidential library will improve some of Chicago’s poorest neighborhoods, providing opportunities for people who live there. Yet nearly 90 percent of South Side voters have complained about the lack of affordable housing and are urging city officials to do more to secure their homes. (RELATED: Obama Just Dropped The First Detailed Images Of Hs Presidential Library – Yikes)

    One such resident, Dixon Romeo, founder of the community organization Not Me We, told the Washington Post he doesn’t want Obama’s legacy to be tarnished by the displacement of thousands of black families. “This is the community that sent him to the White House, and we should be the community that gets to stay and benefit from the presidential center,” Romeo said.

    Former President Barack Obama selected the Chicago site out of four possibilities because of the ties he and former First Lady Michelle Obama have with the city.

    “It feels natural for Michelle and me to want to give back to Chicago and to the South Side in particular,” the former president told an audience at the groundbreaking in 2021, according to the Washington Post. “The Obama Presidential Center is our way of repaying some of what this amazing city has given us,” he stated.

    https://dailycaller.com/2023/04/04/chicago-south-side-residents-displaced-obama-presidential-center/

    Liked by 1 person

  40. putin was scared of hitlery after shs sold him our uranium? hardly…and piglosi calls her president…foreshadowing?
    FTA
    “Well, I appreciate that question, but I also appreciate your leadership in this regard when president –” Pelosi replied, before catching herself and dramatically throwing her hands in the air, shifting in her seat and touching her hand to her chest. She tried to recover by declaring that Clinton as president was “my hope.”

    Pelosi continued, “But when Secretary Clinton was in the Senate and first lady, but especially as secretary of State in more recent time – she has been and at that time implemented many things showing America’s support for democracy.”

    She went on to scapegoat Russian leader Vladimir Putin for stealing the 2016 election from Clinton, saying it was because he feared her the “most.”

    “It was her clarity and position to the present – Putin – present occupant leader of Russia, that made him turn around and ensure, in an illegal way, come out against her in her campaign and interference in our democracy by Vladimir Putin, because Hillary Clinton was the person he feared most in terms of his lack of democracy in Russia. That’s, I think, self-evident, so thank you for what you have done,” Pelosi said.

    https://www.foxnews.com/media/nancy-pelosi-struggles-recover-accidentally-referring-hillary-clinton-president

    Liked by 1 person

  41. so these cranes at American ports are capable of shutting down the ports and alerting ccp as to what and where shipments are going in our country? wth?
    FTA
    These cranes pose a “trojan horse” threat and could be allowing the Chinese Communist Party to know what is coming and going from American ports — such as military equipment — and even allow such ports to be shut down without a single shot being fired, a reality that “increases the cybersecurity risk to business operations systems and terminal industrial control systems,” according to lawmakers.
    snip
    As described recently in the Wall Street Journal, these cranes “contain sophisticated sensors that can register and track the provenance and destination of containers, prompting concerns that China could capture information about materiel being shipped in or out of the country to support U.S. military operations around the world.”If this report is correct, data collection of military shipments and visibility into our nation’s defense industrial base presents an enormous threat to our military strategic competitive advantages.

    Even more concerning, the parent company of ZPMC, China Communications Construction Co. (CCCC), is a leading Belt and Road Initiative contractor with close ties to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and participates in military civil fusion. In July 2018, the CCCC’s “military-civilian fusion office signed a ‘strategic cooperation’ agreement with the PLA’s Naval Logistics Academy, pledging to collaborate on matters related to the development of maritime defense projects, theoretical research and big-data, among other areas.” ZPMC’s relationship with CCCC is disconcerting, especially given the prevalence of ZPMC cranes in U.S. ports.

    Furthermore, if an adversary exploits the operational technology (OT) system of these cranes, port operations could completely shut down, suspending all commercial activity which would also disrupt our nation’s military and commercial supply chains. According to a former top U.S. counterintelligence official, “[c]ranes can be the new Huawei.” Any potential port shutdown could create catastrophic economic and security consequences. These vulnerabilities could provide opportunities to near-peer nation-state adversaries, such as China, to cripple our economy from behind a computer screen.

    https://townhall.com/tipsheet/spencerbrown/2023/04/04/lawmakers-demand-answers-on-chinas-trojan-horse-cranes-in-us-ports-n2621516

    Liked by 1 person

  44. OMG! I’m watching Castle re-runs and one of the pics used to depict the character of Sleeping Beauty is the Me-again bitch who castrated Harry! The actual actress playing the character, tho, is a different actress. I’ve seen this episode more than once and never noticed that before!!!

    Liked by 1 person

      1. It’s a Boston police detective show that used to be on once a week. From Wiki:

        “Castle is an American crime mystery/comedy-drama television series[1] that aired on ABC for a total of eight seasons from March 9, 2009, to May 16, 2016. The series was produced jointly by Beacon Pictures and ABC Studios.

        Created by Andrew W. Marlowe, it primarily traces the lives of Richard Castle (Nathan Fillion), a best-selling mystery novelist, and Kate Beckett (Stana Katic), a homicide detective, as they solve various unusual crimes in New York City. Detective Beckett is initially infuriated at the thought of working with a writer and goes to great lengths to keep him out of her way. However, the two soon start developing feelings for each other. The overarching plot of the series focused on the romance between the two lead characters and their ongoing investigation of the murder of Beckett’s mother.

        Liked by 1 person

  45. wth? they’re getting bolder and bolder

    Troublemaker10
    April 5, 2023 1:20 pm

    Oh h3ll no. Here’s an idea…let’s seize all JPMorgan and Jamie Dimon’s property to build solar and wind farms….and then not. Who do these climate Nazis think they are?

    ***

    JP Morgan CEO Says Government Should Seize Private Property to Build Wind and Solar Farms

    https://watcher.guru/news/jp-morgan-ceo-says-government-should-seize-private-property-to-build-wind-and-solar-farms

    Liked by 1 person

  47. Troublemaker10
    April 5, 2023 2:10 pm

    Rep. James Comer
    @RepJamesComer
    🚨

    @GOPoversight has now learned that when Joe Biden left the vice presidency, boxes containing classified info were stored in 3 locations around D.C.

    Documents were not in a ‘locked closet’ at the Penn Biden Center. They were scattered & Americans deserve answers.
    @FoxNews

    (Video linked in tweet)…

    Quite stunning some were stored in Chinatown..

    Chilling that Joe Biden took classified documents as a Senator …

    ***But DOJ’s main focus is on Trump ***🤔 https://t.co/cqdwW7T9Sq

    — Lawyerforlaws (@lawyer4laws) April 5, 2023

    Liked by 1 person

  48. Myfairlady53
    Myfairlady53
    April 5, 2023 2:22 pm

    People are trying to ignore the other important things that Trump addressed in his speech.
    ===========================================

    Raheem J. Kassam

    @RaheemKassam

    READ: Trump’s Massive Mar-a-Lago Speech Prophesied Dollar Decline, and Worse Times For America Under Biden.

    READ: Trump’s Massive Mar-a-Lago Speech Prophesied Dollar Decline, and Worse Times For America Under Biden. https://t.co/Wz5vMDoA5p

    — Raheem J. Kassam (@RaheemKassam) April 5, 2023

    0

    Liked by 1 person

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