May 162023
 
 May 16, 2023  Posted by at 9:05 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,


Alessandro Allori Self portrait c1555

 

John Durham: FBI Had No Verified Intel When It Opened Probe On Trump (JTN)
IRS Abruptly Removes Investigative Team From Hunter Biden Probe (Straub)
3 FBI Whistleblowers To Testify On ‘Abuses Of Power’ (DM)
Dirty Secrets (Jim Kunstler)
Ukraine Is Not A Symbol of Freedom & Liberal Democracy (Muir)
Prigozhin Denies Talking To Kiev About Selling Out Russian Troops (RT)
Cries and Whispers Along the Russian Watchtowers (Pepe Escobar)
West Acknowledges Direct Involvement In Conflict In Ukraine – UN Envoy (TASS)
Hungary Blocks €500 Million Payment To Ukraine (RT)
Musk Responds To Epstein Subpoena (ZH)
US Empire of Debt Headed for Collapse (Pepe Escobar)
A Disorderly Reset With Gold Revalued By Multiples (Egon von Greyerz)
Nonprofit Hospitals Made Huge Profits During Pandemic (ET)
Climate Sceptics Target Scientists For Vicious Abuse On Musk’s Twitter (G.)
Biden Finally Draws Larger Crowd Than Trump (BBee)

 

 

 

 

Watters


https://twitter.com/i/status/1658283426028605442

 

 

 

 

Zel speech

 

 

 

 

CNN

 

 

Gaetz

 

 

Trump

 

 

 

 

Oz social credit
https://twitter.com/i/status/1657785330936733698

 

 

Macron portrait

 

 

Tom Renz
https://twitter.com/i/status/1658306655090532353

 

 

 

 

There are voices that say Durham intends to go after the FBI next, but I doubt it. He has taken so long with his report that all the usual suspects have had the time to erase -the worst of- their tracks.

The FBI is a cesspit, but fear not: Wray has already made the changes needed. As you were. The smell is hard to bear.

There will be no new charges or arrests. Can you believe it? This has been a coup. There was never any proof for Crossfire Hurricane, but America’s rightfully elected president is gone anyway. And it’s him who’s under investigation, not the people who framed him.

John Durham: FBI Had No Verified Intel When It Opened Probe On Trump (JTN)

Special Counsel John Durham released a damning final report Monday after more than three years investigating the Russia collusion probe, declaring the FBI had no verified intelligence or evidence when it opened the Crossfire Hurricane probe of President Donald Trump’s campaign in the summer of 2016. The prosecutor, however, recommended no new criminal charges. “Neither U.S. law enforcement nor the Intelligence Community appears to have possessed any actual evidence of collusion in their holdings at the commencement of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation,” Durham wrote in a 300-plus page report sent to Congress and others and obtained by Just the News. DOJ was slated to make the report public later Monday.

The prosecutor faulted the department and the FBI for failing to follow their own standards and allowing a probe to persist, including the surveillance of an American citizen, without basis under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. “Based on the review of Crossfire Hurricane and related intelligence activities, we concluded the Department and the FBI failed to uphold their important mission of strict fidelity to the law in connection with certain events and activities described in this report,” Durham wrote. “The FBI personnel also repeatedly disregarded important requirements when they continued to seek renewals of that FISA surveillance while acknowledging – then and in hindsight – that they did not genuinely believe there was probably cause to believe that the target was knowingly engaged in clandestine intelligence activities on behalf of foreign power.”

The report’s release touched off instant outrage and impact on Capitol Hill, where House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan tweeted he planned to summon Durham for testimony next week. The FBI immediately reacted, saying Durham’s findings justified the changes that current Director Christopher Wray made after taking over from fired Director James Comey. “The conduct in 2016 and 2017 that Special Counsel Durham examined was the reason that current FBI leadership already implemented dozens of corrective actions, which have now been in place for some time. Had those reforms been in place in 2016, the missteps identified in the report could have been prevented,” the FBI said. “This report reinforces the importance of ensuring the FBI continues to do its work with the rigor, objectivity, and professionalism the American people deserve and rightly expect.”

Durham specifically faulted the FBI for relying on evidence from the campaign of 2016 Democrat presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, including the now-discredited Steele dossier, saying leadership lacked the necessary distrust of politically motivated allegations. “Our investigation also revealed that senior FBI personnel displayed a serious lack of analytical rigor towards the information that they received, especially information received from politically affiliated persons and entities,” he wrote. “This information in part triggered and sustained Crossfire Hurricane and contributed to the subsequent need for Special Counsel Mueller’s investigation.”

“In particular, there was significant reliance on investigative leads provided or funded (directly or indirectly) by Trump’s political opponents. The Department did not adequately examine or question these materials and the motivations of those providing them, even when at about the same time the Director of the FBI and others learned of significant and potentially contrary intelligence.” The special prosecutor pointedly highlighted what he portrayed as a dual system of justice, noting the FBI never opened a counterintelligence probe of Clinton’s campaign, despite receiving intelligence she had authorized a dirty trick to paint Trump as a stooge for Russian President Vladimir Putin to impact the outcome of the election.

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“..This drastic action allegedly came on the orders of the Justice Department..”

IRS Abruptly Removes Investigative Team From Hunter Biden Probe (Straub)

In an alarming move that has raised eyebrows and suspicions about the integrity of federal agencies, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) abruptly removed the entire team working on the high-profile tax fraud investigation of Hunter Biden, first son of President Joe Biden. This drastic action allegedly came on the orders of the Justice Department, adding to the widespread concern among conservatives about potential corruption and the abuse of power within the federal government. The abrupt reassignment of the investigative team has been perceived by many as retaliation against the supervisory special agent whistleblower, who alleged a coverup of the controversial probe. The agent, who has been overseeing the investigation since early 2020, was informed of this sudden personnel change, according to a letter from his attorneys, Mark Lytle and Tristan Leavitt, to Congress.

In the letter, Lytle and Leavitt suggested that the removal of the investigators not only constituted retaliation but could also be construed as an obstruction of a congressional inquiry. The attorneys pointed out that their client had a legal right to make disclosures to Congress under 5 U.S.C. § 2302 and that any attempt to prevent a federal employee from furnishing information to Congress is a direct violation of long-standing appropriations restrictions. They further emphasized that the removal of the experienced investigative team was the very issue the whistleblower initially sought to expose. Hunter Biden [..] is the alleged subject of the coverup claims. Communications retrieved from his abandoned laptop revealed that he had paid up to “half” of his income to his father, President Joe Biden.

This controversy arose simultaneously with the release of the long-awaited report by special counsel John Durham detailing bias in the FBI’s investigation of former President Donald Trump’s alleged links to Russia. The timing of these events has further incensed conservatives, fueling claims of a biased news cycle. The IRS whistleblower first surfaced last month when Lytle informed congressional leaders that his client wished to expose the “preferential treatment” in the Hunter Biden case and the alleged false testimony to Congress by Attorney General Merrick Garland. Garland had repeatedly reassured lawmakers that Delaware US Attorney David Weiss could unilaterally make charging decisions in the investigation. This information comes amid reports of “growing frustration” within the FBI over Weiss’s failure to bring charges against Hunter Biden, despite the bureau concluding most of its work last year.

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“..they were instructed to pursue Jan. 6 investigations over child sex crime cases, because they were ‘no longer a priority.'”

3 FBI Whistleblowers To Testify On ‘Abuses Of Power’ (DM)

Three FBI officials will testify on alleged ‘abuses of power’ by FBI leadership – ranging from discrimination against conservatives to inflation of domestic terrorism statistics – during a public whistleblower hearing by the House Select Committee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government Thursday, DailyMail.com has learned exclusively. Rep. Jim Jordan, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee and head of the select committee, has secured the in-person testimony of suspended FBI special agents Garret O’Boyle and Steve Friend, as well as former FBI State Operations Specialist Marcus Allen. President of Empower Oversight Tristan Leavitt will also be testifying. The hearing is set to be held at 9 a.m. ET Thursday and will focus on the ‘abuses of power’ the former officials witnessed.

They will be given the opportunity to detail how they have been ‘retaliated’ against by the FBI, according to a source familiar. O’Boyle and Friend participated in a closed door transcribed interview in February conducted by the select committee. According to notes from the interview, the former agents specifically expressed concerns with instructions from FBI leadership that they focus on pursuing ‘domestic violent extremism’ probes and disregard standard investigative procedures in January 6 cases. In addition, the former officials told the committee that they were instructed to pursue Jan. 6 investigations over child sex crime cases, because they were ‘no longer a priority.’ Specifically, the former agents accuse the FBI of inflating statistics on ‘domestic violent extremism’ to fit the Biden administration’s political narrative that extremism is on the rise nationwide.

‘The manipulative casefile practice creates false and misleading crime statistics, constituting false official federal statements,’ Friend wrote in an affidavit. ‘Instead of hundreds of investigations stemming from an isolated incident at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, FBI and DOJ officials point to significant increases in domestic violent extremism and terrorism around the United States.’ Friend had his security clearance revoked last September after he vocalized concerns to his superiors, which he described in an affidavit as being a clear retaliatory move by the agency against him. O’Boyle’s clearance has also been stripped. Allen, who has not yet sat before the select committee, is expected to present new evidence to the lawmakers Thursday.

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“Trump versus RFK, Jr. would bring the people of this country together and refocus the nation’s attention on things that matter. It would also be the Baby Boomer’s last stand.”

Dirty Secrets (Jim Kunstler)

Like myriad institutions in recent decades, the Democratic Party had come to be dominated by women. Women, being hard-wired for safety-seeking, were easily manipulated by the security state into an hysteria fixated on Donald Trump, who was made to represent everything that seemed unsafe. They gave the game away on Mr. Trump’s inauguration day with their women’s march that featured thousands wearing the emblematic “pussy hats.” Message: don’t think you can have your wicked way with this! The hysteria hasn’t let up since then, and now that Mr. Trump is resurging from a thousand attempts to kill him off like some implacable axe-murderer in a horror movie, the corps of useful idiots is showing signs of nervous exhaustion.

The Democratic Party’s front-man, “Joe Biden” (or the claque behind him backstage), has screwed the pooch on just about every matter of vital public interest at home and abroad, and now this president stands revealed as the head of a racketeering operation that specialized in bribery. Yet, oddly, it is Mr. Trump who has been fed into the cogs of the judiciary on an unending set of Mickey Mouse charges. There’s a pretty fair possibility that none of that will work. The Democrats must suspect this, and their nemesis has declared his intentions for a return to power pretty clearly: fire all the seditionists in the security state, pardon all the people on the Right who were unjustly prosecuted, and commence some righteous prosecutions against people who actually deserve it.

Thus, the Left plunges ever-deeper into mental illness — celebrating it at every opportunity and even shoving it America’s face, Joker-style, in defiance: Here, have another drag queen…. A big part of the Left’s mental illness is the inability to even notice their own self-destructive trajectory. There’s a way out for them but it’s pretty drastic. That would be turning to RFK, Jr. for leadership. Trouble is, Mr. Kennedy intends to go after the Democrats’ patron, the security state itself, which he’s publicly blamed for the deaths of his father and uncle. Bobby Kennedy also happens to be an enemy of the US public health agencies and especially a critic of the Covid-19 vaccines that the Left has hung its identity on. They still can’t admit that getting vaxxed and boosted was a tragic mistake.

But an election contest between RFK, Jr. and Donald Trump would be a most salutary exercise for our country. Both of them want to dismantle the overgrown surveillance apparatus and severely reform the agencies under the executive branch. That is, they are both intent on disarming the security state and the Censorship Industrial Complex it spawned. They are both against the stupid Neo-con wars. Trump versus RFK, Jr. would bring the people of this country together and refocus the nation’s attention on things that matter. It would also be the Baby Boomer’s last stand.

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“Ukraine is not a symbol of Freedom & Liberal Democracy. It is a corrupt warmongering Proxy of the US and the Western Globalist Elites”

Ukraine Is Not A Symbol of Freedom & Liberal Democracy (Muir)

Statements from the U.S. and other Western officials, as well as pervasive accounts in the news media, have created a stunningly misleading image of Ukraine. There has been a concerted effort to portray the country not only as a victim of brutal Russian aggression but as a plucky and noble bulwark of freedom and democracy. The conventional narrative would have us believe that Ukraine is an Eastern European version of Denmark. The promoters of that narrative contend that the ongoing war is not just a quarrel between Russia and Ukraine over Kiev’s ambitions to join NATO and Moscow’s territorial claims in Crimea and the Donbas. No, they insist—the war is part of a global struggle between democracy and authoritarianism, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is a leader worthy of nothing less than Winston Churchill’s legacy.

President Biden, in his March 26 remarks on the war, said the conflict was “a battle between democracy and autocracy, between liberty and repression, between a rules-based order and one governed by brute force.” CNN’s John Blake literally compared Ukraine’s cause to America’s in its Revolutionary War. He claimed Ukrainians “are building their own monuments to democracy, with their blood.” The world, he said, “has been transfixed by their battle to repel the mighty Russian army and preserve the birth of democracy in their homeland.” He added that “the war in Ukraine isn’t just a geopolitical struggle—it’s a call to remember. The courage of the Ukrainian people is a reminder of what the U.S. used to be—a ‘beacon of liberty,’ where virtually every schoolchild memorised the ‘Concord Hymn’ poem inscribed at the base of the Minute Man statue.”

In a March 26 USA Today op-ed, John M. Bridgeland, director of the White House Domestic Policy Council under President George W. Bush, similarly expressed fawning admiration for Zelenskyy and Ukraine’s alleged commitment to democracy. “The world is seeing the bravery of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the Ukrainian people, who are willing to die to defend their democracy and freedom,” he wrote. Indeed, Bridgeland said, “No cost is too high [for Ukrainians] to defend their democracy and beloved Ukraine.”

[..] The notion that Ukraine was such an appealing democratic model in Eastern Europe that the country’s mere existence terrified Putin may be a comforting myth to U.S. politicians and pundits, but it is a myth. Ukraine is far from being a democratic-capitalist model and an irresistible magnet for Russia’s groaning masses. The reality is murkier and troubling: Ukraine has long been one of the more corrupt countries in the international system. In its annual report published in January 2022, Transparency International ranked Ukraine 123rd of the 180 countries it examined, with a score of 32 on a one to 100-point scale.

Ukraine’s track record of protecting democracy and civil liberties is not much better than its performance on corruption. In Freedom House’s 2022 report, Ukraine is listed in the “partly free” category, with a score of 61 out of a possible 100. Other countries in that category include such bastions of liberal democracy as Rodrigo Duterte’s Philippines (55), Serbia (62), Hungary (59), and Singapore (47). Interestingly, Hungary—which has been a target of vitriolic criticism among progressives in the West because of Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s conservative social policy—ranks eight points higher than Ukraine, which is the recipient of uncritical praise from the same Western ideological factions.

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This was always a non-story. Makes no sense at all. Next!

Prigozhin Denies Talking To Kiev About Selling Out Russian Troops (RT)

Evgeny Prigozhin, the head of Russia’s Wagner private military company, claims it would have been “physically impossible” for him to meet with Ukrainian military intelligence agents in Africa to make a treasonous proposal to them. The alleged contacts were described by the Washington Post based on purported leaks from the Pentagon. The outlet claimed on Sunday that classified US documents, which made their way to the public through a Discord server, claim there had been communication between Prigozhin and Ukrainian military intelligence (GUR).

The Wagner head allegedly sought to have Ukrainian troops withdraw from the area around the bitterly contested city of Artyomovsk (known in Ukraine as Bakhmut) in order to ease the pressure on his own troops for a while, in exchange for information on Russian troop positions elsewhere. The alleged contacts were said to take place by phone and an in-person meeting in Africa, where the Wagner Group is also active. Prigozhin dismissed the report as “speculation dumped by the Washington Post” and insisted he had not been to Africa since months before the hostilities in Ukraine broke out in February 2022. He suggested that the newspaper was overstating the supposed intel or had fallen victim to planted disinformation.

The Post said two Ukrainian officials confirmed the contacts between Prigozhin and the GUR, but when the newspaper asked Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky about them, he appeared to be angered and demanded to know who the sources in his government were. “Who is talking about the activities of our intelligence? Because this is the most severe felony in our country,” he said, before accusing the newspaper of trying to help Russia. The Post later redacted this portion of the interview on its website. In a statement, Prigozhin alluded to the apparent act of self-censorship, calling into question the Post’s reliability.

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“..the ground will start to be laid for US/NATO to eventually turn rump Ukraine, the Baltic lap dogs, rabid Poland and a few other extras into a sort of Fortress Eastern Europe engaged in a war of attrition against Russia with the potential to last decades. That may be the ultimate argument for Russia to finally go for the jugular, as soon as possible.”

Cries and Whispers Along the Russian Watchtowers (Pepe Escobar)

Trademark American arrogance/ignorance does not erase the fact there seems to be a serious power struggle among the siloviki. Yevgeny Prigozhin, a siloviki, in fact denounced Shoigu and Gerasimov as incompetent, implying they only keep their posts out of loyalty to President Putin. This is as serious as it gets. Because it’s linked to a key question posed across several educated silos in Moscow: if Russia is widely known to be the strongest military power in the world with the most advanced defensive and offensive missiles, how come they have not wrapped up the whole deal in the Ukrainian battlefield? A plausible answer is that only 200,000 members of the Russian army are currently fighting, and about 400,000 to 600,000 are waiting in reserve for the Ukraine attack. While they wait they are in constant training; so waiting works to Russia’s advantage.

Once the famous “counter-offensive” peters out, Ukraine will be hit with massive force. There will be no negotiated settlement. Only unconditional surrender. What goin’ on right now – the Prigozhin drama – is subordinated to this logic, running in parallel to a quite sophisticated media operation. Yes, the Ministry of Defense (MoD) made several serious mistakes, as well as other Russian institutions, since the start of the SMO. To criticize them in public, constructively, is a salutary exercise. Prighozin’s tactics are a gem; he manipulates a degree of public outrage/indignation to put pressure on the MoD bureaucracy by essentially telling the truth. He could even go as far as naming names: officers who are abandoning different sectors of the frontlines. In contrast, his Wagner “musicians” are pictured as true heroes. Whether Prigozhin’s sound and fury will be enough to fine tune the MoD’s entrenched bureaucracy is an open question.

Still, media coverage of the whole drama is essential; now that these problems are in the public domain, people will expect the MoD to act. And by the way, this is the essential fact: Prighozin has been allowed (italics mine) to go as far as he wants by the Higher Power (the St. Petersburg connection). Otherwise he would be in a revamped-gulag by now. So the next few weeks are absolutely crucial. Putin and the Security Council certainly know what everyone else doesn’t – including Prighozin. The key take away is that the ground will start to be laid for US/NATO to eventually turn rump Ukraine, the Baltic lap dogs, rabid Poland and a few other extras into a sort of Fortress Eastern Europe engaged in a war of attrition against Russia with the potential to last decades. That may be the ultimate argument for Russia to finally go for the jugular, as soon as possible. Otherwise the future will be bleak. Well, not so bleak. Remember Putin: “We haven’t even started anything yet.”

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“..Baerbock said that possible arms supplies by third countries to Russia were unacceptable because they could be equated to participation in the conflict..”

West Acknowledges Direct Involvement In Conflict In Ukraine – UN Envoy

The West has outright acknowledged its direct involvement in the conflict in Ukraine, Russia’s UN Ambassador Vasily Nebenzya told a meeting of the UN Security Council on Monday. “Recently [German Foreign Minister] Annalena Baerbock said that possible arms supplies by third countries to Russia were unacceptable because they could be equated to participation in the conflict,” the permanent representative pointed out. “And what about the fact that now the entire military machine of the West is working to keep the war going?” Nebenzya asked. “This is yet another open admission of direct Western involvement in the conflict,” Nebenzya said.

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Hungary seems to always cave in the end.

Hungary Blocks €500 Million Payment To Ukraine (RT)

Hungary has blocked the transfer of €500 million ($544 million) worth of arms and military equipment from the EU to Ukraine, Italy’s ANSA news agency reported on Monday. With Kiev scrambling for Western arms to bolster its long-promised counteroffensive against Russian forces, the package was supposed to be sent next week. The package was supposed to be the eighth drawdown for Ukraine from the European Peace Facility (EPF), a €5.6 billion ($6.08 billion) fund that the bloc uses to finance foreign militaries and reimburse its own members who send arms to foreign conflicts. Prior to last February, the ‘Peace Facility’ had only been used to supply non-lethal equipment to Georgia, Mali, Moldova, Mozambique, and Ukraine, for a total of less than $125 million.

Budapest refused to authorize the latest transfer unless it received “guarantees” that the EPF would remain “global” in its scope, and not be used solely to arm Ukraine, ANSA reported, citing “an informed source.” That Hungary would block the supply of arms to Kiev is not surprising. While Hungary is a member of NATO, Prime Minister Viktor Orban has refused to allow the US-led bloc to send weapons to Ukraine via Hungarian territory. Orban has accused the US and his fellow NATO allies of stoking the conflict “at the expense of European interests,” while his government supports a Chinese plan aimed at resolving the conflict diplomatically. Late last year, Hungary held up an €18 billion ($19.5 billion) tranche of economic aid for Ukraine, which the bloc would have borrowed on global markets. Orban argued that by doing so, the EU would have become “indebted” over Ukraine. He eventually relented when the bloc lifted a freeze it had placed on grant money for Hungary.

In January, Hungary also blocked the release of the seventh tranche of EPF arms for Ukraine, although the package was approved several weeks later. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has repeatedly called on the West to supply him with heavier weapons and more ammunition ahead of a much-vaunted counteroffensive against Russian forces. Zelensky toured Italy, Germany, the UK, and France in recent days and secured further promises of aid from all four, but he still insists he needs fighter jets and longer-range missiles to make good on his promise to retake the Russian territories of Kherson, Zaporozhye, Donetsk, Lugansk, and Crimea. American military officials have publicly expressed doubt that the Ukrainian military can achieve these goals, and leaked Pentagon documents suggest that Washington is bracing for the failure of Kiev’s offensive.

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This stinks.

Musk Responds To Epstein Subpoena (ZH)

Update: Musk has replied news that he’s been subpoenaed in the US Virgin Islands lawsuit against JPMorgan over their relationship with Epstein. “This is idiotic on so many levels,” said Musk, adding “That cretin never advised me on anything whatsoever.” “The notion that I would need or listen to financial advice from a dumb crook is absurd.” Lastly, Musk claims that JPMorgan “let Tesla down ten years ago, despite having Tesla’s global commercial banking business, which I then withdrew. I have never forgiven them.”
* * *
Elon Musk was issued a subpoena by the US Virgin Islands as part of its lawsuit against JPMorgan Chase over the bank’s alleged facilitation of Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking ring, a court filing revealed Monday. According to the filing, the Virgin Islands has attempted to serve Musk since late April, because Epstein “may have referred or attempted to refer” Musk as a client to JPMorgan. “The USVI hired an investigative firm to try to locate an address from Musk, and also contacted one of the CEO’s lawyers, who in the past has waived the requirement of him being personally served with legal documents in past federal cases, according to the filing in U.S. District Court in Manhattan.” -CNBC.


“The Government contacted Mr. Musk’s counsel via email to ask if he would be authorized to accept service on Mr. Musk’s behalf in this matter but did not receive a response confirming or denying his authority,” reads the filing. JPMorgan is accused of servicing approximately 55 Epstein accounts between 1998 and 2013, years after his 2006 arrest for soliciting minors in Florida. Meanwhile, the US Virgin Islands has also been unable to subpoena Google co-founder Larry Page in connection with its investigation into Jeffrey Epstein, according to federal court filings.

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“what’s happening in the banking crisis today is that debts grow faster than the economy can pay..”

US Empire of Debt Headed for Collapse (Pepe Escobar)

Prof. Michael Hudson’s new book, The Collapse of Antiquity: Greece and Rome as Civilization’s Oligarchic Turning Point” is a seminal event in this Year of Living Dangerously when, to paraphrase Gramsci, the old geopolitical and geoeconomic order is dying and the new one is being born at breakneck speed. Prof. Hudson’s main thesis is absolutely devastating: he sets out to prove that economic/financial practices in Ancient Greece and Rome – the pillars of Western Civilization – set the stage for what is happening today right in front of our eyes: an empire reduced to a rentier economy, collapsing from within. And that brings us to the common denominator in every single Western financial system: it’s all about debt, inevitably growing by compound interest.

Ay, there’s the rub: before Greece and Rome, we had nearly 3,000 years of civilizations across West Asia doing exactly the opposite. These kingdoms all knew about the importance of canceling debts. Otherwise their subjects would fall into bondage; lose their land to a bunch of foreclosing creditors; and these would usually try to overthrow the ruling power. Aristotle succinctly framed it: “Under democracy, creditors begin to make loans and the debtors can’t pay and the creditors get more and more money, and they end up turning a democracy into an oligarchy, and then the oligarchy makes itself hereditary, and you have an aristocracy.” Prof. Hudson sharply explains what happens when creditors take over and “reduce all the rest of the economy to bondage”: it’s what’s called today “austerity” or “debt deflation”.

So “what’s happening in the banking crisis today is that debts grow faster than the economy can pay. And so when the interest rates finally began to be raised by the Federal Reserve, this caused a crisis for the banks.” Prof. Hudson also proposes an expanded formulation: “The emergence of financial and landholding oligarchies made debt peonage and bondage permanent, supported by a pro-creditor legal and social philosophy that distinguishes Western civilization from what went before. Today it would be called neoliberalism.”

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Egon talks his book.

A Disorderly Reset With Gold Revalued By Multiples (Egon von Greyerz)

Tectonic shifts lie ahead. These will involve a US and European debt crisis ending in a debt collapse, a precipitous fall of the dollar and the Euro with Gold emerging as a reserve asset but at multiples of the current price. The next phase of the fall of the West is here and will soon accelerate. It has been both precipitated and aggravated by the absurd sanctions of Russia. These sanctions are hurting Europe badly and affecting the US in a way that they didn’t expect, but was obvious to some of us. The Romans understood that free trade was essential between all the countries that they conquered. But the US administration blocks have both the money and the ability to trade of the countries they don’t like.

But shooting yourself in the foot really hurts and the consequences are in front of our eyes. No foreign country will want to hold US debt or dollars. That is a catastrophic problem for the US as their deficits will grow exponentially in coming years. So a debt collapse is not just a looming disaster but a bomb hurling towards the US economy at supersonic speed. With the imminent death of the petrodollar and explosion of US debt, there is only one solution for the funding requirements of the US Government – the FED which will stand as the sole buyer of US Treasuries.

So the DEBT spiral of higher debt, higher deficits, more Treasuries, higher rates and falling bond prices will soon turn into a DEATH spiral with a collapsing dollar, high inflation and most probably hyperinflation. Sounds like default to me but that word will probably never be used officially. It is hard to admit defeat even when it stares you in the face! Yes, the US will probably obfuscate the situation with CBDCs (Central Bank Digital Currencies) but since that is just another form of Fiat money, it will at best buy a little time but the end result will be the same.

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“American life expectancy during this period sharply declined by a staggering 2.5 years from 2019 through 2022..”

Nonprofit Hospitals Made Huge Profits During Pandemic (ET)

Federal officials gave more than $23 billion in COVID-19 aid to the nation’s top 20 nonprofit hospitals, even as a 62 percent increase in their collective net assets led to parallel surges in the institutions’ total profits and revenues during 2018–2021, according to a new report. Only two of the 20 institutions have repaid the government for the COVID-19 aid they received. “The 20 largest nonprofit hospitals in the country continued making massive profits while their cumulative net assets soared to $324.3 billion in 2021, up from $200.6 billion in 2018. “Those hospital systems received congressional COVID bailouts of $23 billion and only two providers partially paid their COVID bailout back,” according to the report compiled by Open The Books, an Illinois-based research nonprofit that compiles and posts spending by all levels of government in the United States.

The two institutions that have partially repaid the government weren’t identified. The biggest jump among the top 20 was 92 percent by the Mayo Clinic, based in Rochester, Minnesota, whose assets surged to $17.7 billion in 2021 from $9.2 billion in 2018. The Mayo Clinic received $350,000 in federal COVID-19 aid, the lowest amount received among the top 20 institutions. The Cleveland Clinic Health System, based in Independence, Ohio, saw its assets rise 60 percent, to $15.7 billion from $9.8 billion, while receiving $118 million in federal COVID-19 aid. Intermountain Healthcare, based in Salt Lake City, the 12th-largest of the top 20, enjoyed a 63 percent growth in net assets to $11.6 billion from $7.1 billion; Intermountain received $518 million in aid.

[..] As the revenue poured in for the 20 hospitals, compensation for their top executives soared, often beyond $10 million annually, according to the report. For example, the CEO of Ascension Healthcare, which is based in St. Louis and is the nation’s second-largest such system, received $13 million in 2021 and more than $22 million over the period covered by the study. [..] The recipient among the top 20 of the most COVID-19 aid was San Francisco-based CommonSpirit Health with $3.6 billion, followed by Providence St. Joseph Center with $3 billion, Ascension Healthcare with $2.7 billion, Livonia, Michigan-based Livonia Health with $2.3 billion and Sutter Health, based in Sacramento, California, with $1.7 billion. Meanwhile, the overall health of Americans got worse between 2018 and 2021. “American life expectancy during this period sharply declined by a staggering 2.5 years from 2019 through 2022. While ‘comparable country averages’ rebounded from a COVID-related drop in 2021, the United States continued declining in life expectancy,” the report found.

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Yeah, “The Science” doesn’t do it anymore. You’ll have to work again.

Climate Sceptics Target Scientists For Vicious Abuse On Musk’s Twitter (G.)

Some of the UK’s top scientists are struggling to deal with what they describe as a huge rise in abuse from climate crisis deniers on Twitter since the social media platform was taken over by Elon Musk last year. Since then, key figures who ensured “trusted” content was prioritised have been sacked, according to one scientist, and Twitter’s sustainability arm has vanished. At the same time several users with millions of followers who propagate false statements about the climate emergency, including Donald Trump and rightwing culture warrior Jordan Peterson, have had their accounts reinstated. Climate scientists say the change has been stark, and they are fighting to make themselves heard over a “barrage” of often hostile comments.

“There’s been a massive change,” said Mark Maslin, professor of earth system science at University College London and the author of popular books including How to Save Our Planet. “I get so much abuse and rude comments now. It’s happening to all of us, but I challenge the climate deniers so I’ve been really targeted.” Maslin says he used to have regular meetings with Sean Boyle, Twitter’s former head of sustainability, who was laid off in Musk’s mass cull of staff shortly after he took over in Aprll 2022. Maslin said Boyle discussed the platform’s work to develop ways of ensuring that trusted information was pushed to the top. “They were using climate change as a good test bed, because it was fairly clear who the good and bad actors were,” Maslin said. “But he was sacked and Twitter became the wild west.”

Maslin said he will stay on the platform and push back against conspiracy theories with scientific evidence. “I want people to understand there are solutions. There is a real need for us to be on social media defending the truth, however nasty the responses get.” But not all scientists have found standing up to regular hostility an easy feat. Doug McNeall, a statistician working on climate change at the Met Office Hadley Centre at Exeter University, said he had blocked or muted many accounts on Twitter even before Musk’s arrival. “I got to the point where it was definitely affecting my mental health,” he said. “I spent years debating quite strongly with climate sceptics, including people I assume were paid,” he added. “But there can be a real personal cost interacting over a long time with people who are abusing you.”

Read more …

El Paso.

Biden Finally Draws Larger Crowd Than Trump (BBee)

The mainstream media has been heaping praise on President Biden for finally drawing a larger crowd than former President Trump. According to reports, hundreds of thousands are gathering in El Paso and it’s all because of President Biden. “These are truly historic numbers we are seeing! Trump could never get this many people even at his biggest rallies,” gushed CNN anchor Anderson Cooper. “This is an incredible moment for President Biden. He’s clearly resonating with the American people — well, the people, anyway — and it’s clear that his policies are making a real difference.”


Upon seeing the massive crowds, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow added, “This just goes to show that people are hungry for real leadership and real strength. President Biden is clearly delivering on that front.” Many news sites praised the crowd for its youthfulness and diversity. “Just look at how young of a crowd Biden pulls!” exclaimed Anderson Cooper. “All those unaccompanied minors — I mean democrat voters and it’s all thanks to Biden.” When asked for comment, even Trump had to admit that it was a “tremendous and unbelievably large crowd of people that — to be quite frank with you — I could never draw, believe me!”

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Smile

 

 

Flower matis

 

 

 

 

Moose
https://twitter.com/i/status/1658079007307444227

 

 

Puma
https://twitter.com/i/status/1657802557731766274

 

 


Blue footed

 

 

Lynx

 

 

 

 

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Home Forums Debt Rattle May 16 2023

Viewing 40 posts - 1 through 40 (of 48 total)
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  • #135264

    Alessandro Allori Self portrait c1555   • John Durham: FBI Had No Verified Intel When It Opened Probe On Trump (JTN) • IRS Abruptly Removes Inves
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle May 16 2023]

    #135265
    Red
    Participant

    What ever happened to:
    Sticks and stones may brake my bones, but names will never hurt me. ?

    As for prosperity:
    #256: A path of logic

    A path of logic? Ha ha ha we’re so f^%*ed!

    #135266
    Dr. D
    Participant

    WHO Pushes “Early Childhood Masturbation” For Toddlers, Encourages Questions About Gender Identity For Kids Aged 4

    What can you add to that?

    John Durham: FBI Had No Verified Intel When It Opened Probe On Trump (JTN) (nor after)

    Cant believe they’re still talking about 2016 and doing nothing.

    However: about timing yesterday and what’s happening and not. As Biden docs come out, Durham docs come out, Judge suddenly (3 years later!) decides Georgia can actually LOOK at the case. Same time, 14 months later, Kari Lake gets similar forward in looking into her election. That’s the new standard: It takes 4 years to check if you won the election or not, at which time you’ve already served the term. Probably that’s not cynical enough; that’s still way too soon. Like all the JFK can other records: you can read them after everyone ever involved are dead.

    Same time, Florida does election integrity stuff…which may be a Trojan horse mandating Digital ID, etc. More fine print.

    Still Durham is the biggest nothing ever. Unless I was unclear on the mandate and he’s literally not allowed to take any actions and arrest any people. Then he’s by definition not a “Special Prosecutor”, emphasis on “Prosecute”. Because “no reasonable person who values his life would press charges against Hillary Clinton,” said Comey.

    “This should be a clarion call for legislative reform.” –Gaetz.

    You’re kidding right? Congressmen should repent and reform themselves? How’s that been working last 200 years?

    “We need to defund and deauthorize government entities that are converted from just[ice]

    Now you’re talking. CONGRESS runs the country, in case you forgot. Remove funding for all Joe Biden’s agency and anyone they ever talked to. Just like during government shutdowns, defund the whole thing and no one even notices. Devolution.

    At the very least, are you going to keep funding people who wiretap the AP, seek and make whistleblowers disappear, jail them openly, wiretap Congressmen, and throw Federal elections? That’s no good even if you’re a Congressman. To say nothing of U.S. Army Anthrax showing up to naughty Congressmen, a number of small planes that disappeared on 9-12 votes, and Whitey Bulger being the FBI-protected cleanup crew in New England express hit man for Mueller as FBI director. If you, as elected Congressman wish to live long enough to serve your term, and out of jail, defund these guys.

    Now: the only answer is Devolution. And that can only happen if the money-power breaks. But the money-power is presently based on confidence. Isn’t that what they’re attacking? Faith in the Federal Government and system? So are they winning, or not?

    [IRS] constituted retaliation but could also be construed as an obstruction of a congressional inquiry.”

    But let me guess: you’re going to do nothing about it.

    61 Hacks who all worked in perfect alignment: There’s no definition of “Conspiracy”, all you Conspiracy Theorists. The entire Federal Government suddenly gets the lead out and accomplishes tasks within days with every member in alignment all the time.

    ““..they were instructed to pursue Jan. 6 investigations over child sex crime cases, because they were ‘no longer a priority.’”

    And this is provable. Like Musk erasing 100,000 child-sex accounts. Let me guess: you’re going to do nothing about it.

    “Trump versus RFK, Jr. would bring the people of this country together and refocus the nation’s attention on things that matter. It would also be the Baby Boomer’s last stand.”

    What I said: let’s flip the script and force them to pick between good and better.

    “Fortress Eastern Europe engaged in a war of attrition against Russia with the potential to last decades.”

    Yes. This is the West’s only option at the moment. Sure Ukr can’t take 300k losses a year, but Russia is too small to take 30k losses for 10+ years either, and why should they? They can nuke London and NY in 15 minutes.

    Musk Responds To Epstein Subpoena (ZH)”

    This is amazing, and why, and why does the judge allow it? Interesting. Remember Musk’s father is a pedophile (who married his daughter) Elon probably grew up with it, and has no tolerance for it, calling his father “A monster”. P.S. Trump was the same, his father sold him off to a gay Jewish millionaire when he was 17 for “Mentoring” if you know anything about the gay community. They were always trying to rub me up on that basis, with that language too. Oh-so innocent! Trust us! Not to fret– probably not that different than what women put up with, but point is these two characters and their predatory childhood, not this author’s life story. (P.S. Hemingway said the same thing and wrote about it, it’s not new, nor is being openly gay. They just LIE. Read a book on all the gay bars in NYC and London while ALSO there were no gay bars or gay people in NY and London through the same history. History a la carte. A = A but A ≠ A too. Whatever lie makes me a victim and gives me power, you sap and sucker.)

    Eden: That of course is the Christian-haters view of the universe, and it’s a good one. But why interpret it that way? The words are wide open to you. You could say that God had a system where you had CHOICE. However, being God, he knows what the various outcomes of the various choices are. So like a parent, he says, “don’t do this”. Not that – I – will punish you, but because YOU won’t like it. It leads to tough places. This is practically identical to the parent drug-talk. So they eat from it, and GOD kicks them out in his hatred for this trap. No. The fruit is the KNOWLEDGE of Good and Evil. You can’t Un-Know. GOD didn’t kick them out, the CONSEQUENCE of KNOWING is that the Garden disappears, it becomes inaccessible, although it is around us every day. …We can’t see it. We are IN the garden. God knew that beforehand, thus his recommendation. We didn’t know that, or not completely, but unless you want no free will – at all – then this has to be an option. So “God” didn’t do anything. Anymore than after you take that first drug, your Parents MADE you take more drugs. No. They didn’t. So knock it off.

    Anyway: Good News/Bad News. Good news is you’re still in the Garden. Bad news is, given enough time, probably someone would have eaten the Knowledge. Good news is, like the Prodigal Son, the one who goes through this, learns and accomplishes all is all the more loved and exulted at home when he becomes wise enough to return. Bad news: no one will like the journey. Still was it better for the universe for us to say at home? Singing “Holy” like boring angels? Or adventure and learn things even though it’s hard?

    Everyone says they want God and more choice. For him to leave them alone. So he does and you curse God and blame him. Sounds like a no-win. If you’re happy to have choice, and so much of it, without interference, if that’s what you’re most proud of, then shouldn’t you say Thank You?

    Macron. Well, they’re hanging pictures that are life-size. Exactly as tall and imposing as Macron is.

    MRNA: We don’t know what we’re eating. Yes, and take that literally: it could be fine, we don’t have any symptoms or processes. …But probably not. When has Science ever led anyone right, to life and health? “We owe a huge debt to Science…for curing all the problems that Science created.” — Jon Stewart.

    ““Under democracy, creditors begin to make loans and the debtors can’t pay and the creditors get more and more money, and they end up turning a democracy into an oligarchy, and then the oligarchy makes itself hereditary, and you have an aristocracy.”

    Or “I believe banks are more dangerous to the Republic than standing armies” (we have one of those too, illegally). The line there – no less true – is that it will require farmers to get into debt, that debt will ultimately be unpayable, so the bankers will reposess the farms…and do what? The bankers don’t know how to grow food, so everyone dies. Something like that, but more complicated and detailed. Right now anyone who makes or does stuff can’t get paid or financing, while all the people who don’t have all the money they want.

    “• A Disorderly Reset With Gold Revalued By Multiples (Egon von Greyerz)

    Sure this article isn’t from 2000? 25 years ago? Or 1994? Or 1979? That’s where timing is the same as being wrong. Generations of pensioners made this bet and died poor.

    ““American life expectancy during this period sharply declined by a staggering 2.5 years from 2019 through 2022..”

    Remember, since the Feds started getting really involved in 1994, the U.S. now has the highest medical cost on the planet – FAR higher than France or Switzerland, where you can get a nurse to visit your home – and nearly the LOWEST health outcomes in the developed world. Where’s my money, Brian? Where is it? #Helping.

    But that’s not the worst part: talk to any doctor, nurse, anyone in the system and they aren’t ashamed of themselves in the slightest. Look all offended if you point out that if you, or the larger society, take that test they recommend you will all be bankrupt and living in a box. “How DARE you???” And how’s living under a bridge for your health? Cost – to anyone – never crosses their minds. So give all the tests! Covers my -ss. I’m not paying…YOU are.

    But this is the certain and immediate consequence of removing ‘capitalism’. Now no market, no valuation, no cost-benefit, and therefore production, consumption, and ability to pay are all absolutely random and totally disconnected. All the things we DON’T need we have millions of, all the things we DO need – like cheap clinic care for working people – we have ZERO of. It’s a cast-iron guarantee. Capitalism is the worst possible system except for all the others. Socialism kills everyone given enough time, and here has already cut life 3 years in unending misery and has barely gotten started.

    “Climate Sceptics Target Scientists For Vicious Abuse On Musk’s Twitter (G.)

    I’m sorry: Scientists have never heard of “the Internet”? They alone are excluded from all the naughty things? They are too weak and stupid to defend themselves there? They can’t use words and are allergic to “debate”? What? It’s toxic and sucking too much time?

    THEN LOG OFF AND GO DO REAL WORK. Write a paper or something, clearly no one reads those. You want to be online, but also be Ms. Priscilla Popular Princess. No.

    Speaking of people who don’t know anything and die 3 years early, they may want to leave that Bull Moose alone.

    #135268
    Oroboros
    Participant

    #135270
    The Markster
    Participant

    Durham works for Joe Biden, who shuffles on and off screen in this fourth consecutive Obama Administration. Obama wants us to know the coup was successful. Funding jihadist mercenaries and US troops stealing oil in Syria while pushing racism hustling and partisan lawfare at home. Killing and injuring millions for DARPA and Big Pharma quarterly profits while throwing free speech, free assembly and 100 years of public health policy lessons out the window.

    Durham is saying nothing new here, the Democrats and their media won. They won and now they own the joint going on almost 14.5 years now. Does anybody really think the ridiculous circus of US politics, elections and media will allow real consequences, transparency and truth to emerge?

    Hail to King Obama. Hail to the forever wars. Hail Death and Mammon and all the pretty, shiny things you can buy at Walmart.

    #135271
    Oroboros
    Participant

    “We’re living the rise of American no-go zones right now…..it’s a sharia of the political left.”

    ~Raheem Kassam

    Empire of Lies® major cities are quickly becoming first world shithole shanty towns.(SSTs)

    They’re taking all the major city commercial real estate that’s been “made redundant” and abandoned by the Covid inspired ‘work from home on the web’ crowd movement and converting into Nouveau Warsaw Ghetto shanty towns

    That won’t stop the banking collapse from unoccupied commercial real estate but it will help to hide the poor folks from public view so they can take a crap OD in private off the streets where they are becoming a PR problem.

    The whole West coast collection of coastal cities are dying (Seattle, Portland, San Franshitsco) and will be the New Rust Belt of the Empire of Lies® in the coming decade. The west coast ports will no longer be wealthy as pacific trade terminals. They will be like the de-industrialized mid-west of the 1980’s

    Bon appetite

    https://twitter.com/i/status/1657831143973048320

    #135272
    John Day
    Participant

    @Figmund Sreud, from yesterday: Martha Stewart, 80, has a really good facial-plastics surgeon, but I also assume a lot of AI post-processing in the digital images to make her skin look so young.

    @D Benton Smith from yesterday: That little vase is mathematically elegant, a riddle waiting thousands of years to be comprehended, and it is perfectly made from solid stone, inside and out, and it could not have been turned on a lathe with those “ears” where strings or loops would be inserted.
    It would be milled by a computer-controlled CNC machine these days, after being mathematically designed by computer.

    “Walk Like An Egyptian” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cv6tuzHUuuk

    #135273
    Oroboros
    Participant

    KunstlerCast 377 — John Michael Greer on Magic and the Reenchantment of Daily Life
    Podcast May 14, 2023

    Very entertaining listen while I weeded the onion patch at the Doomstead ;>)

    What is consensus reality, is it a form of Magic?

    [audio src="https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/traffic.libsyn.com/kunstlercast/KunstlerCast_377.mp3" /]

    .

    Jim’s Eyesore of the month

    Behold, the new Richard Gilder Center for Science — an addition to New York’s American Museum of Natural History, designed by Jeanne Gang, the most-published architect on The Eyesore of the Month!

    Just think of all the homeless you can fit into an urban Eyesore of the Month

    #135274
    Oroboros
    Participant

    #135275
    zerosum
    Participant

    H. Clinton Hate/leadership far reaching
    • Dirty Secrets (Jim Kunstler)

    Yesterday
    • John Durham: FBI Had No Verified Intel When It Opened Probe On Trump (JTN)

    Today
    the Durham Report
    check if this is true or not!
    out of sight out of mind
    an illusion
    • IRS Abruptly Removes Investigative Team From Hunter Biden Probe (Straub)

    Tomorrow
    You will have/need an AI version, a digital ID to exist
    ———–
    real or illusion
    What if A.I. doesn’t agree with you

    It is a corrupt warmongering Proxy of the US and the Western Globalist Elites
    • Ukraine Is Not A Symbol of Freedom & Liberal Democracy (Muir)
    ———–

    #135276
    John Day
    Participant

    I’m off and running, tangentially, but it is Dr D’s fault.

    The Ethical Skeptic has a new post up about The child-abuse qualities of major religions, The Blame-Based Model of Spirituality https://theethicalskeptic.com/2023/05/13/the-blame-based-model-of-spirituality/
    In it he has a link to an ancient Gnostic (Christian) text, buried in a clay pot for almost 2000 years, along with others, which has a different tale of the Garden of Eden, creation, the serpant, and so on.
    It’s here:
    The Nag Hammadi Library http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/hypostas.html
    The Hypostasis of the Archons
    (The Reality of the Rulers)
    I like Adam and Eve’s daughter, Norea. Righteous woman!

    #135277
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    What everyone seems to forget about debt based systems is that the entire concept of financial debt, its most fundamental aspect, the very ESSENCE of what it means, is the belief in a promise of repayment by someone, somehow, someday.

    When either the promise or the belief fails to materialize, then the system(s) it underpins is kaput.

    #135278
    zerosum
    Participant

    Mine or yours,
    real or illusion

    https://www.moonofalabama.org/2023/05/ukraine-air-defense-lessons-.html#more
    Ukraine – Air Defense Lessons
    This is factual:

    Patriot Missiles Won’t Save Ukraine – National Interest – May 9, 2023

    Patriot systems are limited to pinpoint defense of major assets and are designed to operate in tandem with air defenses engaging targets at higher and lower altitudes. Without these additions, Patriot will have too many threats to engage and the result will either be porous coverage that doesn’t protect its defended assets, or coverage that quickly subsides when Patriot runs out of interceptors.
    Moreover, Patriot systems are themselves vulnerable. Operating a Patriot radar system gives away its location, making it an open target for Russian attacks. This means that Patriot is not a one-stop-shop for defending Ukraine’s military assets or its people.

    Those facts were proven last night.

    War Monitor @WarMonitors – 1:23 UTC · May 16, 2023
    ⚡️I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but after careful review of this video, it appears that the air defence battery (most likely patriot) tried to save itself, but failed. It most probably got toasted.
    Embedded video

    Those were expensive two minutes for the ‘West’:

    Fennec_Radar @RadarFennec – 1:45 UTC · May 16, 2023
    I counted 30 Patriot PAC-3 MSE launches here.
    The FY2024 costs of these per missile is about $$5,275,000
    That was $158,250,000 fired in about two minutes. And as we see, the battery or something else likely got blown up. So it failed in its mission.
    Embedded video

    This though is likely not true. Kinzhals are simply too fast to be hit by any of Ukraine’s air defenses:

    Defense of Ukraine @DefenceU – 6:40 UTC · May 16, 2023
    Last night, russian terrorists attacked Ukraine with:
    – 6 Kinzhal aeroballistic missiles
    – 9 Kalibr missiles
    – 3 ground-launched missiles
    – drones

    ALL TARGETS SHOT DOWN.
    Glory to the Ukrainian Air Forces!
    We are grateful to our partner states for strengthening our air defense capabilities.

    The casualty numbers in today’s clobber report by the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation may be a bit exaggerated but the general operational facts are usually true:

    The Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation launched a combined attack with long-range precision-guided air- and sea-based weapons against the AFU units, as well as depots of ammunition, weapons and military equipment supplied by Western countries.
    The goal of the attack has been reached. All the assigned targets have been neutralised.

    U.S.-manufactured Patriot surface-to-air missile system has been struck by Kinnzhal hypersonic glide vehicle in Kiev.
    ————

    #135279
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    I think I may have understated what the consequences actually are when debt based systems lose the last vestiges of faith in the promise or expectation of repayment. The difficulty is in the description of “true zero” . It’s hard to describe “nothing at all at all” because the words used in the description are somethings that we can place our attention upon. In the present case I am trying to more fully convey what it means to say that value drops to zero. It means “gone, baby gone.”

    When such systems collapse and go away they tend to go away so thoroughly that no one even bothers to remember that they have no inclination to be bothered to even try to remembers that such systems ever existed, or would give a damn about it one way or the other.

    Case in point: the little predynastic Egyptian vase I referenced in yesterday’s comment about the actual implications of Earth’s actual history. It’s been really long, guys. And (at times) so advanced that the level of technology used to produce mere doo-dads and trinkets (like little predynastic “Egyptian” vases) was so advanced that our current level of technological is insufficient to even describe it, much less replicate it. Human civilization in the present day is comparable to the cargo cults strewn across Oceania.

    Long story short, I’m coming around to taking a bit of a longer range view of what’s going on around here, and it’s a lot easier on the spiritual (as well as biological) adrenals. Do, however, stay girded up because the interesting times aren’t even close to being over, and I think they are about to become even more interesting before they get boring again.

    #135280
    jb-hb
    Participant

    If you gathered up all the money in existence and paid it all towards paying off existing debt, then you would end up with tons and tons of debt, and zero money in existence.

    This is the inescapable underlying reality of how the worldwide economy functions. That’s not a free market. EVERYTHING must revolve around that debt, aware of it or not.

    Capitalism is the worst system, other than every other system that has been tried? Why don’t we try it without debt based currency, see if its worst excesses magically vanish?

    Everything everywhere essentially working for an unpayable pool of debt isn’t good for anyone. And paying a continual percentage to a chosen megarich few for the privilege of continually working on such a treadmill isn’t helpful either – a double corruption of market forces. What would the world even LOOK like in a few years of the world economy not continually trying to service unserviceable debt and without megarich masters of the universe throwing money around to make things happen nobody wants from the profound to the petty.

    Stop trying to make 2+2=5, jerks. Stop stopping people from solving problems on a continual basis. (but with AI and quantum computing, now we can make 2+2=5 forever!!!)

    #135281
    jb-hb
    Participant

    I was thinking about the new Miller Lite woke ad some more.

    It’s disturbing on a fundamental basis. Someone is thinking like a 4 year old having a fever-dream AND thinks they can project that out into the world and not be laughed at — and this not only came out of someone’s head without an apparent filter, it passed by a whole bunch of other people, people with jobs and responsibilities.

    The weird fever dream transition from “women were amongst the first who brewed beer” > “it was women doing the brewing” > “without women, there would be NO BEER” a strange escalating spinning-up of an alternate reality.

    “And how were the Originating Mothers Of Beer rewarded? (they became saintly and religious in the next escalation of spin-up) They put us in bikinis. (WE women now just became those saints) Look at all this shit” (woman walks into a roomful of old beer marketing paraphernalia featuring righteous babes)

    Were there Bikini Press-Gangs of men that would search the town, find a woman, chain her up, drag her off to a macro-brew dungeon, shove her into a bikini? They PUT them in a bikini? Bikinis seem to be the NORM now where, in decades past, they were definitely not. Putting Women In Bikinis is intrinsically bad? Who is putting women in bikinis right NOW???

    Those were women who wanted a career in modeling and, as we can see the proof, got to HAVE the career they wanted, got paid for it modeling in advertising. Probably phoned up their family and friends, jubilant when they got the gig. Used the money to do things they wanted to do. Yknow. Empowered.

    The idea that they can grind up toxic advertising materials, make compost out of it, and grow things in it is childish, magical — with a weird underlying absence of curiosity “wait a minute. do I even KNOW anything about gardening? mulching? compost?” Will we spray the marketing-swag slurry down with Brawndo to water the hops plants?

    Worse yet, there is a primitive aboriginal quality to the thing. As if women, having their images captured, had their souls captured.

    Gathering up the material and mulching it, then sending the results into the custody of women will, in a sense, free these trapped women’s souls. Didn’t Austin Powers, when he had his mojo stolen, need to drink his bottled mojo to re-absorb it? And when Bart Simpson sold his soul to Milhouse, didn’t he eat the paper representing his soul to re-absorb it?

    In the Dark Ages, people thought that sight TOUCHED things in order to sense it. One’s sight was referred to as one’s RAY, for instance. Something beaming out from the eye, touching the thing, and coming back to your eye. Or perhaps more like an invisible feeler stretching out from the eye. We can see the resurgence of this Medieval thinking in the concept of the Male Gaze, that somehow an actively intrusive thing is occurring, a kind of touching.

    Serious people with six and seven figure salaries and millions – nay, billions – of dollars at stake are pumping out weird fever-dream nonsense with total conviction. Saturating our economy. For everything from the profound to the petty. Had essentially a superstitious reaction to a virus rather than a scientific one.

    To live in a society doing useful things for it, you have to cooperate with all those other people in society. But what if they are so irrational that they cannot be cooperated with? The earth orbits the sun, is round, but nothing prevents people from believing that on a purely religious/superstitious basis. There’s nothing particular to a flat shape that is superstitious but a round shape that is automatically scientific. So we’ve lived amongst people who nodded and agreed that the earth orbits the sun and the world isn’t flat, only to watch the don plague masks and adopt purification rituals, new concepts of original sin, magical formulas to make reality bend if you use the right words – like spells.

    #135282

    Here‘s a reference to the WHO’s insanely creepy ideas about childhood sexuality.

    The most important thing was fire- making it and tending it. The hearth and its shared observations of phenology and lore led to Timekeeping and figuring out the first big secret.
    The first Big Secret uncovered was the male’s part in reproduction. This gave rise to domestication, property and inheritance.
    The second Big Secret uncovered was scaling. This gave rise to art and architecture. (Think of the Nazca lines, which I believe were prayer walks.)

    First pyramid- c2600BCE. First papyrus: c3000BCE. The blueprints were portable and reproducible.

    On a separate note, here’s the smoke map for those who are wondering why the sky where they live is dusty blue today.

    #135283
    zerosum
    Participant

    H. Clinton must be doing a victory lap because the Durham report did not recommend that she should be in jail.
    I expect the democrats to reward, nominate her to run for president. (Even the A.I.’s will support that decision)

    #135284
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Not that everything they say about debt-based fiat systems isn’t true, and not that central banks don’t turbo-charge it, but the essential problems is ALL money is promises. ALL systems are promises.

    We have a complete non-money system and I trade you a canoe for fish and a fishing net. But wait: I haven’t finished the canoe, I PROMISE, as your cousin-in-law who can’t go anywhere, that I’ll finish it. But I don’t. That happens everywhere through all time and that promise must be written off.

    This is no less true under the gold system. Although sophisticated and sound, “Gold” wasn’t traded, but “Gold exchange notes”. That is, yeah, somewhere in the system there’s gold, but you and me “trade” a promise for goods on 30-60 day CREDIT, a PROMISE to deliver wholesale. But that depends on my solvency and me selling the goods off MY shelf. Maybe someone dies. Maybe I’m bad at my job. Maybe a major copper mine caves in. When someone can’t deliver, they can’t deliver on PROMISES and default and are written off. All the way down the chain. And the more stable it’s been, and the more secure people have felt, the more promise-layers build up. That’s a ‘mania’. Cisco and Nortel “Promise” to deliver another planet they can sell routers to.

    Point being, even the gold standard, isn’t. It’s “promise standard”. That’s human beings. Now you can either sell the promissory note for discounted (<100%) gold today, OR collect in gold coins if you wish at the 60-day closing, so it’s a LOT more tied to reality – our system (like health care) now has NO attachment to physical reality, only political reality. But it’s still a “non-gold” “Promise system”. Sort of.

    But like I said, LEAST bad. Ran like a clock for 100 years, and 100 years of greatest human progress on earth in 2,000 (or 12,000) years. When they removed it: instant stagnation, Depression. Just like when they removed law and freedom from Rome.

    This works 50x worse. Can we at least go back to “Less bad”? We know what and where that is, thanks.

    #135285
    Dr. D
    Participant

    We know they exclusively believe in witchcraft and talismans (and Brawdo) because a core belief for decades is guns get up on their own and kill people. Like a cursed magic sword, whoever TOUCHES the sword is possessed, and kills people!

    This is likewise true of magic words: should someone even HEAR the words of Warlock Jordan Peterson, and/or merely GAZE UPON his power, they would be possessed and removed of the True Faith™, having no will of their own.

    The entire world runs this way, that is to say the direct and diabolical opposition to all Western Principles, the Age of Enlightenment. It’s a new Dark Ages, soup to nuts. And they’re the nuts.

    Make Science Great Again.™

    #135286
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Lotus on “Wokefishing” which is just an illustration that modern thought is just close-minded, fundamentalist, exclusionary, sin-religion.

    Why? Because it works. As we say in the West, people have a “religion-shaped hole”, so if you’re a social engineer, and you need a cult that will kill anyone you point at, kill all their children for you, and hand you all their money, you just make a cult that closely matches religion — in this case, long-tested Christianity — as is humanly possible.

    What’s interesting is A) the astonishing speed and B) that these are atheists and should recognize and know better that are Le Maximum, the Most, Fastest, Hardest, Zealots of the Zeal, Intolerants of the Intol, that fell for it. Huh? If I hadn’t seen it, I’d never believe.

    #135287
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    Interesting comments recently. Here’s some thoughts in the same territory. First among them, I think, is a sort of unexpressed dismay about the fact that the only way doing things right has the sufficiently beneficial overall effect is if EVERYBODY (or at least the vast majority) does all of those right things in collaborative tandem at the same time (picture the material and spiritual uplifting of humanity accomplished by all humans lifting themselves by their own bootstraps at the same moment. . . . “On your marks! Ready! Set! LIFT!!)

    Such a feat seems pre-doomed by the sheer mathematical magnitude, so why bother even thinking about it, much less actually trying.

    Well the answer is that incremental improvement eventually does do the trick . . . eventually . . . . just look at a flower (or a galaxy). There are a lot of elemental particles in both, and they seem to be getting their respective jobs done quite nicely.

    P.S.
    I really like the cartoon of the Almighty evicting Adam and Eve from the Garden. Ouch! Way too true for comfort.

    #135288
    John Day
    Participant

    Crimes Without Punishment https://drjohnsblog.substack.com/p/crimes-without-punishment

    John Ward, the Slog, now relocated to The Gambia for reasons of freedom and sanity, which are in short supply in contemporary rural France, has posted about Tucker Carlson’s silencing, postulating that it may be due to his digging in the Kennedy & Nixon years. G. Gordon Liddy was a “Watergate Burglar” who did a little time for it, but he was also, always CIA.
    Ward explores that, but this is what riveted my attention:
    ​ ​On June 23, 1972, Nixon met with the then–CIA director, Richard Helms, at the White House. During the conversation, which thankfully was tape-recorded, Nixon suggested he knew “who shot John,” meaning President John F. Kennedy. Nixon further implied that the CIA was directly involved in Kennedy’s assassination, which we now know it was. Helms’s telling response? Total silence, but for Nixon, it didn’t matter because it was already over. Four days before, on June 19, The Washington Post had published the first of many stories about a break-in at the Watergate office building.” [Little things often tell us a lot. For example, TV crews for the Nixon/Kennedy debates are on the record as saying that Dick Nixon was hugely impressed by Kennedy’s performance, and chatted with him afterwards, ALWAYS referring to him as ‘John’ not Jack. Nixon did indeed have a good idea who’d shot JFK: the CIA Plumber G Gordon Liddy.​..]
    ​https://therealslog.com/2023/05/14/explosive-tucker-carlsons-earthquake/

    rinsing onons in puddle

    #135289
    John Day
    Participant

    ​ The Durham Report (“Special Prosecutor” should just be called “special investigator”, it seems.) politely says that all of the “Crossfire Hurricane” evidence on Trump-Russian-collusion never, ever existed, except for complete fabrications, which were always known by the NSA and FBI to be complete fabrications since before the 2016 election.​ John Leake (with Peter McCullough MD) has this in closing.
    In other words, in its Russian-Collusion reporting, the New York Times published assertions from “four unnamed current and former U.S. intelligence officials” that were entirely false. Thus, the practice of using “unidentified sources”—a practice that was once heavily frowned upon by respectable journalists—enabled the commission of a giant deception that inflicted untold damage to our political system.
    Even at that time (in early 2017) I told anyone who would listen that if it was possible to take down a sitting President of the United States by publishing the assertions of anonymous sources from within the state bureaucracy, then our government by elected officials was over, and our true masters were the “unnamed intelligence officials.”
    https://petermcculloughmd.substack.com/p/special-counsel-john-durhams-report

    Pepe Escobar has an analysis of the Ukrainian “counter-offensive” (which it is not; it’s just a line of tactical counterattacks), which can be summarized as, “nobody anywhere seems to know what is going on in the Ukraine war these days”.
    ​ ​This is as serious as it gets. Because it’s linked to a key question posed across several educated silos in Moscow: if Russia is widely known to be the strongest military power in the world with the most advanced defensive and offensive missiles, how come they have not wrapped up the whole deal in the Ukrainian battlefield?
    ​ ​A plausible answer is that only 200,000 members of the Russian army are currently fighting, and about 400,000 to 600,000 are waiting in reserve for the Ukraine attack. While they wait they are in constant training; so waiting works to Russia’s advantage.
    ​ ​Once the famous “counter-offensive” peters out, Ukraine will be hit with massive force. There will be no negotiated settlement. Only unconditional surrender.
    (​Though, I’ll point out that this has been one of the common predictions since early March of 2022. Russia is prepared to counterstrike any NATO attack.)
    ​https://strategic-culture.org/news/2023/05/12/cries-and-whispers-along-the-russian-watchtowers/

    ​ Moon of Alabama has an update today about extensive Russian missile strikes on Ukraine again last night. It looks like Russia took out a Patriot missile-battery.​
    Nothing can shoot down these hypersonic missiles. The claim last week that Ukraine shot down a Kinzhal was refuted by the pieces of wreckage, which were consistent with a much smaller bunker-buster missile, nothing speedy at all.
    ​ ​I counted 30 Patriot PAC-3 MSE launches here.
    The FY2024 costs of these per missile is about $$5,275,000
    That was $158,250,000 fired in about two minutes. And as we see, the battery or something else likely got blown up. So it failed in its mission.​..
    ​..Ukraine does not have an integrated air defense that can attack all air targets at all levels. Russia though has such an integrated system of systems.
    It makes for a huge difference.
    https://www.moonofalabama.org/2023/05/ukraine-air-defense-lessons-.html#more

    ​ John Helmer has much more on “The Imitation Offensive​”, saying that the UK “Cloud Shadow” cruise missiles, apparently accompanies by HIMARS radar-jamming missiles to interfere with Russian air defenses, are only being used (successfully at first, then later with some shoot-downs) against civilian targets in cities, which are not specifically defended with local missile emplacements. Thanks Christine.
    George Eliason, reporting from Lugansk, confirms in the broadcast that the Ukrainian missile, rocket and artillery attacks are targeting undefended civilian targets, and avoiding Russian military targets whose defences include counter-battery targeting and fire units like the Zoopark. In the case of the two British-supplied Storm Shadow missiles, Eliason confirms they struck unoccupied civilian factories in Lugansk. The blasts from the two strikes blew out windows and inflicted superficial injuries in neighbouring apartment buildings. The area was not defended by main Russian or Lugansk air and anti-missile defence units.
    In a follow-on statement from the Defense Ministry in Moscow, issued after the broadcast went to air, the aircraft which fired the two British missiles have been identified. “On May 12, at about 18.30 Moscow time, combat aircraft of the air forces of Ukraine launched a missile attack on the polymer products enterprise Polypak and the Milam meat processing plant in the city of Lugansk. Storm Shadow aviation missiles supplied to the Kiev regime by the UK were used for the strike, contrary to London’s statements that these weapons would not be used against civilian targets. As a result of the strike, a fire started on the territory of the Lugansk food and chemical industry enterprises. There is destruction of nearby residential buildings. Civilians were injured, including six children. Fighter aircraft of the Russian Aerospace Forces shot down the Ukrainian aircraft which had launched the missile strike

    THE IMITATION OFFENSIVE

    #135290
    John Day
    Participant

    Thanks Christine. Controlling the world’s food supply to “control the people” was Kissinger’s Idea as Secretary of State under Nixon. The legacy is threatened.
    ​ ​US Corn Industry Faces Tough Times In Its Two Largest Export Markets, China and Mexico
    ​ ​After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, China has sought new suppliers, including fellow BRICS members Brazil and South Africa, to reduce its dependence on US producers, while Mexico is determined to push through with its partial ban on GM corn
    ​ Between them China and Mexico accounted for just over half of all overseas purchases of US corn in the last crop marketing year (Sept. 1 2021- Aug. 31 2022)…
    ​..​China has been gradually reducing its corn imports from the US due to a combination of weak domestic demand and cheaper supplies from Brazil. Until recently, China imported roughly 70% of its corn from the US and roughly 30% from Ukraine, according to Brazilian grain exporters group Anec. But after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Beijing has, unsurprisingly, tried to find new suppliers to reduce its dependence on US and Ukrainian producers. Two of the countries it has turned to are fellow BRICS members Brazil and South Africa, Africa’s largest corn grower.
    ​ ​The results are already being felt. As Reuters reported in early May, Chinese buyers cancelled 832,000 tons of orders in the last three weeks of April alone. That was enough to push US corn exports to their lowest weekly total on record.
    ​ ​“China has made a strategic decision that rather than deal with the United States and our political differences, they will just buy from Brazil,” said Jim Gerlach, president of broker A/C Trading in Indiana.
    ​ ​Brazil is not only providing China with cheaper corn but is on track to overtake the US as the world’s largest corn exporter this year.​..​
    .​..​Mexico’s dependency on US staples is largely the result of NAFTA, which eliminated the Mexican government’s protection mechanisms for Mexican farmers while preserving U.S. corn subsidies for US farmers. Two years after NAFTA, the Clinton Administration’s Farm Bill dismantled the last vestiges of U.S. government policies designed to boost prices by limiting overproduction.
    ​ ​The result was as predictable as it was brutal: the US flooded Mexico with staple foods at prices Mexican growers could not possibly compete with, forcing many of them out of business while discouraging others from trying to expand production. According to the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), in 16 of the 28 years since NAFTA took effect, the U.S. exported corn, soybeans, wheat, rice and cotton at prices 5-40% below what it cost to produce them.
    ​ ​Mexico’s President Andrés Manual Lopéz Obrador (aka AMLO) is determined to reverse this trend by reducing Mexico’s dependence on imported foods, though he faces an uphill challenge in actually pulling it off.
    ​ ​“We are going to produce in Mexico what we consume,” he during his presidential campaign. “We are in a tremendous crisis because we depend on foreigners for what we consume. There is no food sovereignty.”..On December 31, 2020 AMLO issued a presidential decree calling for all imports of GMO crops, including corn, as well as the “probably” carcinogenic weedkiller glyphosate to be phased out by the end of January 2024. Crucially, the decree enjoyed the support of Mexico’s Supreme Court, which in 2021 ratified the Precautionary Measure that bans permits to sow genetically modified corn in Mexico.​..​
    ​ ..But the ban would also hurt US farmers, global Big Ag companies and global biotech behemoths. More than 92% of the corn grown in the States is GMO. Domestically, almost all of it is used as animal feed or to produce ethanol and processed food such as corn syrup. The rest is exported, roughly a quarter of which goes to Mexico where it is predominantly used as animal feed. And the US government is determined to ensure that none of this dynamic changes changes.
    ​ ​Amid ratcheting pressure from the US side, including the threat of counter-sanctions, AMLO’s government earlier this year issued a new presidential decree that, among other things, exempted feed corn, which counts for the overwhelming majority of U.S. exports, from the restrictions. The new decree only applies to GM corn used in tortillas and corn-dough, which is supplied almost exclusively by Mexican producers of white and native corn varieties. Only four percent of US corn exports are white corn, and most of that does not go into tortillas.
    ​ ​In other words, the new decree will have minimal impact on US growers. Yet even that did not placate the US government. One reason for this is that the decree still retains plans to prohibit use of glyphosate, the deadline for which was brought forward to March 31, 2024. Plus, if Mexico were to actually ban some GMO imports of corn without suffering huge consequences, it would send a message to other countries in Latin America, one of the biggest markets for GMO crops, that there are alternatives available…

    US Corn Industry Faces Tough Times In Its Two Largest Export Markets, China and Mexico

    ​ From Meryl Nass MD: ​”Can We Reboot the Environmental Movement — So It Protects Freedom, Too?” The Defender
    ​ ​Finally, common sense on how we can retake the environmental movement from the climate changeologist Henny Pennies and focus on what we really need: clean air, water–our commons–and food.
    ​ ​Backlash against the COVID-19 fiasco of the last three years is building among a public that is slowly waking up to the unprecedented power grab and wealth transfer that took place under cover of a pandemic.
    ​ ​The environmental left is deeply worried about climate change, but the backlash against climate policy also is building.
    ​ ​People across the political spectrum are concerned about a top-down, authoritarian response to climate change using the COVID-19 response as the blueprint.
    ​ ​But there’s also a palpable longing for healthier, more sustainable ways of living.​..
    ​..​“As a Davos-dropout,” Bendell writes, “I know how their belief in the myth that their power and wealth are an invitation to shape the world makes them susceptible to overlooking the basic rights of ordinary people like us.”
    ​ ​Bendell was one of the few environmentalists to vigorously criticize authoritarian COVID-19 policies over the last several years, enduring abuse from his fellow greens who were fully invested in official narratives about the pandemic.
    ​ ​Bendell sees climate policy going down a similar path:
    ​ ​“The ideas and policies emerging at Davos primarily focus on accessing more public money for private ventures with dubious ecological credentials and creating digital infrastructures for the control of ordinary people.”
    https://merylnass.substack.com/p/can-we-reboot-the-environmental-movement

    ​ ​The 2000 Year Old Food Forest in Morocco​ , Geoff Lawton returns yet again to a site he and friends discovered long ago, one day when the surf gave out. ​

    #135292
    John Day
    Participant

    Confirmation:
    Russia Says It Took Out US-Supplied Patriot Missile In Hypersonic Strike On Kiev
    The US-supplied systems only arrived last month, and just recently entered operation.

    The MoD said in its latest press briefing that its attacks destroyed “Ukrainian troops positions and places of storage of munitions, weapons and military hardware delivered from Western nations.”
    Russia’s RT followed by stating the following:
    A precision strike by a Russian hypersonic Kinzhal missile has destroyed a Patriot air defense system in Kiev, the Defense Ministry in Moscow reported on Tuesday. The Ukrainian government previously claimed that Kinzhal missiles had been intercepted by the US-made weapons platform.
    https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/russia-says-it-took-out-us-supplied-patriot-missile-unit-hypersonic-strike-kiev

    #135293
    John Day
    Participant

    The Ethical Skeptic makes a case that atmospheric CO2 rises come from the Earth’s core temperature rising. Atmospheric CO2 was the highest in modern record during northern hemispheric winter in COVID-lockdown. (This is quite early in his extensive analysis.)

    The largest rise in atmospheric carbon ppm in 45 years came right on the heels of the hottest year on record, and during the vernal equinox timeframe (for the Northern Hemisphere) – in other words, the carbon increase followed the temperature rise, maintained its normal seasonal arrival distribution, and did not precede that heat increase. Moreover, all of this occurred during a climate change activist’s dream scenario, one in which global fossil fuel consumption was down 16% (~47% in western nations, the villains in this play) – and should have produced a sizeable and measurable effect in ppm and/or temperature, neither of which manifested (except carbon ppm in China alone).

    The Climate Change Alternative We Ignore (to Our Peril)

    #135294
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    It seems that the UkoNazis had to launch all their Patriot missiles to prevent them being blown up on the ground and generating another mushroom cloud.

    Bakhmut about to fall -be evacuated.

    ‘Nice’.

    Where’s the Indian billionaire who is pretending to be PM of the UK?

    #135295
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    ‘The Ethical Skeptic makes a case that atmospheric CO2 rises come from the Earth’s core temperature rising. Atmospheric CO2 was the highest in modern record during northern hemispheric winter in COVID-lockdown’

    Not true, of course.

    Anything but the truth when it comes to the role of CO2 in inducing Planetary Meltdown. Too much vested interest at stake. Better to melt the planet than forgo the use of fossil fuels.

    The Northen summer is going to be very ‘interesting’.

    And 2024 will be even more ‘interesting’, if the anticipated El Nino kicks in the way it is expected to.

    By the way, the Earth’s core continues to cool at a very slow rate.

    #135296
    John Day
    Participant

    @AFKTT: Take a look. The Ethical Skeptic is quite rigorous in his collection and presentation of data. That was the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. https://theethicalskeptic.com/2020/02/16/the-climate-change-alternative-we-ignore-to-our-peril/#respond

    I’m up to the Schumann Resonance Banding Amplitude (correlated to core temperature) analysis, and reading slowly, carefully…

    #135297
    zerosum
    Participant
    #135298
    zerosum
    Participant

    Some interesting cut & paste info
    https://www.moonofalabama.org/2023/05/ukraine-air-defense-lessons-/comments/page/2/#comments
    The main target was the US Patriot anti-aircraft missile system itself. As well as some military-industrial facilities and command posts, ammunition depots and fuel bases.
    The main thing is that the “Patriot” could not shoot down our Kinzhal, which eventually destroyed the American battery. As for our other means of attack, the Ukrainian air defense system managed to shoot down only about 10% of our Kalibr missiles and Geran drones. 90% of them reached the goal.

    So far, there is information that the sky over Kiev was covered by 1 Patriot battery with 16 missiles. Other batteries are only put into combat by the Americans. It is expected that there will be at least 4 such batteries.

    It took one “Kinzhal”. The auxiliary vehicles and units included in the American battery finished off by Calibers.

    This tactic was “prompted” to us by the Americans themselves. First wave were Geranium drones. They were spotted by American radars and thus gave away their positions. Next came anti-radar missiles that destroyed enemy radars. And after that, Caliber and Dagger flew over the already blind Patriot and other objects.

    About the cost of the Kinzhal – there is information that it can cost from 30 to 70 million rubles, depending on the modification. But one Patriot missile is estimated at about $ 4 million – 4-8 times more expensive than our hypersonic ammunition. And the Ukrainians (or Americans?) fired from 16 to 30 missiles at targets. Well, the destroyed Patriot battery itself costs from $ 0.5 to 1 billion – this also depends on its modification.

    Yes, our air defense specialists did not immediately manage to find an antidote for the British Storm Shadow, which in recent days have been hitting Lugansk. As is the case with the American Himars. Now, on some days, we shoot dozens of Himars from the sky. The same thing happened with Storm Shadow. We hit these 7 missiles with the help of Buk-3M, Tor, Pantsir-S and an electronic warfare system that forced foreign missiles to go far from the target.

    By the way, Storm Shadow is a very expensive ammunition. The cost of 1 rocket – Storm $ 1.3 million.

    Viktor Baranets kp.ru

    Posted by: ostro | May 16 2023 17:24 utc | 115

    #135299
    Observer
    Participant

    John Day – That ethical skeptic article is probably the best thought out theory I’ve seen combining the role of geological heat in combination with excess heat load from anthropogenic activities in our overall conundrum – definitely worth following up on (although as a scientist myself I don’t rate the chances of anyone getting funding for it – there is a standing joke that science advances with every old scientists obituary). There is a bit of stuff in the literature on sub-sea vulcanism in and around the Antarctic Peninsula (if I remember correctly) and higher ice melt rates below the massive glaciers terminating in the ocean there. I always thought that if that is the case in that one small zone then there is no reason why it couldn’t be happening elsewhere and adding to the heat load of the planet. As the author points out this is additional heating on top of that induced by the excess approx. 4ppm CO2 misbalance/increase per year via human activity in photosynthetic uptake versus production.
    Being a microbiologist, my posit would be that the excess CO2 derived from human activity has increased the planets energy imbalance enough (possibly toward a tipping point) that this extra (heat) energy has resulted not only in methane release from the arctic but also increased the rate of methanotrophy where microbes in the surface sediments are now metabolically more active and are consuming a proportion of the additional methane from tundra soils and adding further CO2 loading to the atmosphere (those tundra soils are a smoking gun – methane derived from agriculture pales in comparison so targeting farmers is non-sensical IMO. Water pollution derived from agriculture and industry is by far the bigger concern). Microbes have enormous capacity to really F things up for us and are certainly uncontrolable. When we are gone, life will certainly continue, just not as we know it!
    Also we shouldn’t forget that the ocean is not only a heat sink but a CO2 sink – more CO2 can be dissolved in cold water, so the capacity of the ocean to act as a CO2 sink will be slowly decreasing with time as it warms. With such a massive volume of water on the planet, any miniscule change in the capacity of the ocean to soak up CO2 would be huge on the scale of CO2 in the atmosphere.
    Back to the artic region – geological history links massive vulcanism there (Siberian traps) to prior climate change via CO2 release (and no doubt other gases like SO2) into the atmosphere (and mass extinction). If mantle convection leads to differing subsurface heat loading and this happens to be under the artic and is contributing to increasing the rates of methane release and microbiological activity.
    In the words of a colleague – we are farting against thunder.

    #135300
    zerosum
    Participant

    You can go to jail for lying.

    (…the American government was lying to the American people and the major news networks were complicit.)

    #135301
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    “In the words of a colleague – we are farting against thunder.”

    Lol!!! I’m reminded of a brief impromptu Biblical oratorio my best friend and I did in high school one of the first times we’d smoked wind. (literally sophomoric gross body humor alert):

    In whatever we concocted as we sang Zappaesque nonsense, Jehovah somehow became a Giant Asshole in the Sky. Not personality-wise, but the very orifice itself.

    And I sang of its mighty wind:

    “The wind is exhilarating,
    His anus is vibrating!”

    ***

    I don’t think that the WHO is grooming children to be pedosexual phallic fodder. There are already ample sex trafficking corridors to supply upper tier pedosexuals.

    I think they’re just stupid in the way that only collective humans can be. 200 years ago, the moral powers that be in Victorian England preached the opposite of the above WHO language.

    “There were two related concerns that led to the widespread adoption of this surgical procedure at this time. The first was a growing belief within the medical community regarding the efficacy of circumcision in reducing the risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases, such as syphilis. The second was the notion that circumcision would lessen the urge towards masturbation, or “self abuse” as it was often called.

    The tradition of circumcision is said to have been practiced within the British Royal Family, with varying accounts regarding which monarch started it: either Queen Victoria on account of her rumored adherence to British Israelism and the notion she was a descendant of King David (or on the advice of her personal physician), or her third great-grandfather King George.[75] The German-born King George was also the Prince-Elector of Hanover, and rumors existed that the Prince electors were circumcised.[75] This is highly dubious since there is no evidence that Victoria was a supporter of the British Israeli movement, and the links between the royal family and the ancient House of David were only first proposed by its followers in the 1870s, long after she bore her sons (there is also evidence lacking that her sons, particularly Edward, had circumcisions); there is also no indication that the prince electors (or George himself) were circumcised and that the king introduced it upon his arrival to Britain and his ascension to the throne in 1714.[75] If members of the royal family were circumcised, the reason was due to their embrace of a custom popular amongst the upper-classes in the late 19th and 20th centuries.[75] Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex is reported to have been circumcised.”

    The brutal anti-masturbation devices of the Victorian era

    Now we have the reverse:

    #135302
    Celticbiker
    Participant

    Shlomo wants you dead, cripped, sterile or insane. Why is that so hard for you dense, over educated, pre programmed shitforbrains to understand? Wake up Goyim, you’re in the crosshairs.

    #135303
    kultsommer
    Participant

    @Oro
    There is Jim’s “Eyesore of the month” (true) and there is a Masterpiece – TWA airport.

    The TWA Flight Center: Eero Saarinen’s Masterpiece at JFK Airport


    Building technology and trades of the past are not available now days or, more likely, they are cost prohibitive – unless one is in favor of “pastiche architecture” .

    #135304
    kultsommer
    Participant
    #135305
    Oroboros
    Participant

    Netflix ‘black’ Cleopatra gets bitch slapped until she turns white!

    Hahahahahahaha!

    2% audience approval, the lowest rating in the history of ratings.

    Netflix HUMILIATED as Woke “Queen Cleopatra” Unites Audience and Critics in Scorn

    #135306
    ezlxa1949
    Participant

    It occurred to me yesterday that the way the elites are behaving greatly resembles a tontine. Simply put, this is an investment scheme where the last survivor gets everything.

    So, if the elites are indeed conniving to eliminate the bulk of the population, then the time will come when the elites have run out of non-elite targets and must start eliminating each other.

    In the final analysis it’s all totally futile. When I’m safely dead then I’m beyond their reach. And death really is their only weapon.

    I truly don’t know what they propose to do with all their assets and their glorious isolation. C.S. Lewis imagined the gates of Hell as being locked from the inside. The elites seem to be slamming the gates shut even now.

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