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Debt Rattle March 3 2025

Mar 032025
 
 March 3, 2025  Posted by at 11:02 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  Add comments


Gustave Courbet The village maidens 1852

 

• Europe Unveils Rival Ukraine Peace Plan (ZH)
• UK, France, Ukraine Agree To Work On Cease-Fire Plan To Present To US (ZH)
• We Won’t Give Kiev Money Until Zelensky Seeks Peace – Lutnick (RT)
• US National Security Advisor Mike Waltz Suggests Zelensky May Need To Go (RT)
• Trump, Vance, and the New New World Order (Soukup)
• Musk Backs US Withdrawal From UN and NATO (RT)
• Without The US There Is No NATO And No Ukraine (ZH)
• NATO Chief Urges Zelensky To Make Peace With Trump (RT)
• Hollywood Celebrities Were Paid Millions To Back Ukraine – Orban (RT)
• Ukraine’s Future Now Rests With A New President, After White House Fiasco (Jay)
• US Approves New Russian Ambassador As Part of Major Reset Underway (ZH)
• Trump Impressed By Vance’s Handling Of Zelensky – WSJ (RT)
• Putin Ally In Secret Talks With Trump Admin To Restart Nord Stream 2 (ZH)
• Top DOJ Attorneys Involved In Biden-Era Prosecutions Demoted (JTN)
• Exposing Elite Degeneracy – Mr. and Mr. Macron (Karganovic)
• The Press Falls to Another Record Low in Public Trust (Turley)

 

 

 

 

https://twitter.com/i/status/1896167156863381762

Rubio

Schiff

Kolomoisky

Georgescu
https://twitter.com/i/status/1895891169407877562

Rogan Elon

Mearsheimer 2015

Sachs

 

 

 

 

For three years, Europe has done nothing to establish peace in Ukraine, quite the opposite. They want to keep the war going. But now that Trump acts, they do too. Or they at least want to give that impression. Still, they don’t want peace, they want the fight to continue. That’s why they inject their voice at this point in time, when Trump threatens to get results. They call it a peace plan, but it’s a war plan. Given a chance, they will simply add some point(s) they know Putin cannot accept. That’s all it takes to provide a forever war. The idea of boots on the ground might be enough.

Perhaps the only way out for Trump is to leave NATO.

• Europe Unveils Rival Ukraine Peace Plan (ZH)

Is the UK trying to pull Trump into starting WW3? During Sunday’s security summit of European leaders to find an alternate peace plan to Washington’s, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced a “coalition of the willing” to step up efforts in support of Kiev. Starmer said he hopes this coalition will gain support and leadership from the Trump White House. “We are at a crossroads in history today,” Starmer said after the summit of 18 leaders – which included Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Starmer unveiled a four point agreed-to ‘peace plan’ (..though not agreed to by the US):
• to keep military aid flowing into Ukraine, and to keep increasing the economic pressure on Russia
• that any lasting peace must ensure Ukraine’s sovereignty and security and Ukraine must be present at any peace talks
• in the event of a peace deal, to boost Ukraine’s defensive capabilities to deter any future invasion
• to develop a “coalition of the willing” to defend a deal in Ukraine and to guarantee peace afterwards

But one crucial line in his remarks detailing the plan caught many people’s attention – the expressed willingness to put Western/NATO boots on the ground in Ukraine: “The UK are prepared to back this with boots on the ground and planes in the air,” Starmer said. He also announced a £1.6bn missile deal for Ukraine, saying this “support for Ukraine is unwavering.” His rationale was that “We have to learn from the mistakes of the past, we cannot accept a weak deal… which Russia can breach with ease, instead any deal must be backed by strength.” He further in the wake of the disastrous Trump-Zelensky meeting said Europe will have to do the “heavy lifting” – and that’s when he said it would be backed by boots on the ground:

The PM said his coalition “will intensify planning now, with real urgency” and reiterated that the “UK is prepared to back this with boots on the ground and planes in the air”. He said: “Together with others, Europe must do the heavy-lifting but to support peace in our continent and to succeed, this effort must have strong US backing. We’re working with the US on this point.” Speaking to journalists after the summit, the PM said he did “not accept that the US is an unreliable ally”, and that the discussions formed a plan that would see the US as allies. Of course, being this antagonistic to Russia – at the very moment the US is trying to forge ahead on peace – is in reality a scenario that eventually forces Trump’s hand to react. It also appears a deliberate effort by Europe to keep the US on a hawkish path, and to sabotage US-Russia talks in the process.

***
After essentially being kicked out of the White House on Friday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky went to London where British Prime Minister Keir Starmer immediately offered a warm embrace: ‘we stand with you’ – was the message after the major public clash with President Trump and Vice President Vance in the Oval Office. “You have full backing from the United Kingdom and we stand with you with Ukraine for as long as it may take,” Starmer, who was also just at the White House on Thursday, said in a presser with Zelensky on Saturday. “And I hope you’ve heard some of that cheering in the street, that is the people of the United Kingdom coming out to demonstrate how much they support you, how much they support Ukraine, and our absolute determination to stand with unwavering determination,” the UK leader added.

Zelensky is also meeting with the UK’s King Charles on Sunday. CNN and other are presenting this moment as a consolation of sorts after the “nightmare Trump meeting”. Currently, European leaders are meeting at Lancaster house, hosted by the UK’s Starmer, reportedly to work with Ukraine on a peace plan. The leaders in attendance include NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, French President Emmanuel Macron, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson. Starmer said Sunday before the meeting that Kiev and Europe will work together toward a plan to “stop the fighting” with Russia before presenting it to the White House.

The British PM told BBC: “We have agreed that the UK, along with France and possibly one or two others, will work with Ukraine on a plan to stop the fighting. Then we will discuss that plan with the US.” The fact that these European leaders are now talking about urgently drawing up an official new peace plan is without doubt due to the pressure of the Trump presidency as well as the controversial mineral deal and Zelensky’s apparent rejection of it. While these leaders may still not actually be interested in peace, given many of them have urgently called for the West to keep transferring weapons to Ukraine’s military, they are at least making a show of it as an alternative approach to Washington. This older interview clip of Zelensky is making the rounds again after Friday’s fireworks at the White House…

https://twitter.com/i/status/1891830368459792863

Meanwhile, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has bluntly acknowledged that the Western allies appear weaker and more divided than ever at this point, per FT: Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has warned that fractures in the traditional transatlantic alliance will “leave us all weaker”, while suggesting that the UK and Italy can together “play an important role in bridge-building”. “We are all committed to the goal that we all want to achieve — which is a just and lasting peace in Ukraine,” Meloni told Starmer at the start of a bilateral meeting before the summit. “It is very very important that we avoid the risk that the west divides.”

The Kremlin will meanwhile likely bypass engaging these European leaders altogether, in preference of continuing to deal with Trump on the cause of achieving ceasefire in Ukraine. Russian leadership also understands that Europe will ultimately fall in line based on whatever Washington finally achieves on the peace negotiations front, as has been the historic pattern, and given the US shoulders the bulk of defense funds and hardware for NATO. The US has continued to pursue bilateral talks with Moscow, yet without European or Ukrainian representatives in the room.

Read more …

Note: all these guys have terrible polling numbers domestically. Scholz, Macron, Starmer, Trudeau, Zelensky. The only one who does not is Trump.

• UK, France, Ukraine Agree To Work On Cease-Fire Plan To Present To US (ZH)

[..] perhaps in response to the latest toothless European summit, which Poland’s PM summarized best as follows…
*TUSK REITERATES POLAND WON’T SEND ITS TROOPS TO UKRAINE
*TUSK: SECURITY GUARANTEES FOR UKRAINE NOT DISCUSSED IN SUMMIT
… or in other words, once again nothing of significance was agreed upon, Donald Trump posted in his Truth Social account a quote from Gartner analyst Michael McCune, according to whom Zelensky now has “no choice but to back down and accept Trump’s terms” suggesting that Trump clearly is content with the outcome of the Friday debacle in the White House.

Earlier, from Jacob Burg of the Epoch Times:

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on March 2 that Europe must continue to provide funding for Ukraine to sustain its position during peace negotiations, while also committing to roughly $2 billion in export financing to supply Ukraine with 5,000 air defense missiles. Starmer hosted a security summit in London on Sunday with other European and world leaders as Britain, France, and Ukraine work on a cease-fire plan to present to the United States as an effort to end the Russia–Ukraine war. Starmer emphasized that despite the breakdown in talks at the White House on Feb. 28, the United States remains an important ally to Britain. “The U.S. has been a reliable ally to the U.K. for many, many decades and continues to be,” Starmer said. “There are no two countries as closely aligned as our two countries.” Starmer said he is working on a Ukraine peace plan intended to receive U.S. backing and warned that Europe must do the heavy work of defending itself.

Starmer’s March 2 summit of leaders stands in contrast to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s meeting in the White House on Feb. 28, during which U.S. President Donald Trump scolded him for not being ready for peace and not being grateful for America’s support in his nation’s defense against Russia’s three-year-long invasion. Starmer said he’s working on restoring discussions of peace and is using the breakdown on Feb. 28 as an opportunity to reengage with Trump, Zelenskyy, and French President Emmanuel Macron rather than “ramp up the rhetoric.” “We’ve now agreed that the United Kingdom, along with France and possibly one or two others, will work with Ukraine on a plan to stop the fighting, and then we’ll discuss that plan with the United States,” Starmer told the BBC, adding that he and Macron have both spoken to Trump since the latter’s meeting with Zelenskyy.

At the Feb. 28 summit, European leaders will look toward shoring up the continents’ defenses in defending Ukraine, including discussions to create a European military force to send to the war-torn country to cap a cease-fire. Starmer suggested the military force would include a “coalition of the willing.” While he does not trust Russian President Vladimir Putin, Starmer said he trusts Trump. “Do I believe Donald Trump when he says he wants lasting peace? The answer to that is yes,” he said. Starmer added that “intense discussions” to obtain a security guarantee from the United States are one of the three components of lasting peace. “If there is to be a deal, if there is to be a stopping of the fighting, then that agreement has to be defended, because the worst of all outcomes is that there is a temporary pause, and then Putin comes again,” Starmer said. “That has happened in the past. I think it is a real risk, and that is why we must ensure that if there’s a deal, it is a lasting deal, not a temporary pause.”

The summit, which will be held at Lancaster House—a 200-year-old mansion near Buckingham Palace—will also include leaders from France, Germany, Denmark, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Spain, Canada, Finland, Sweden, the Czech Republic, and Romania. Other attendees include the Turkish foreign minister, NATO secretary-general, and the presidents of the European Commission and European Council. Zelenskyy received support from European leaders after the contentious Feb. 28 meeting at the White House in which a rare earths deal was abandoned and Trump told Zelenskyy to come back when he was ready for peace. After the Ukrainian president arrived in Britain on March 1, Starmer embraced him. “As you heard from the cheers on the street outside, you have full backing across the United Kingdom,” Starmer said. “We stand with you, with Ukraine, for as long as it may take.”

Starmer also pledged to boost military spending to 2.5 percent of GDP by 2027. Other European nations might follow suit. On Saturday, Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala said European countries must increase military spending to at least 3 percent of GDP as the continent faces a historic test in defending itself. “If we don’t increase our effort fast enough and let the aggressor dictate its conditions, we won’t end up well,” he said. In calling for unity among his European neighbors, Macron embraced more defense spending after saying it was legitimate for the United States to shift its military focus to China and Asia. “We should have woken up earlier,” Macron said. “I’ve been saying for years that we need a more sovereign, more united, more independent Europe.”

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“Zelensky needed to hear it directly from the funding mouth of the United States of America: We’re not going to give you money unless you’re here for peace..”

• We Won’t Give Kiev Money Until Zelensky Seeks Peace – Lutnick (RT)

Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky was given a clear message during his meeting with US President Donald Trump on Friday, that further financial support hinges on Ukraine’s willingness to negotiate peace, US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has said. His comments follow Zelensky’s heated confrontation with Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance. Zelensky visited the White House on Friday, intending to finalize a minerals agreement. However, the discussion deteriorated when he insisted that Trump back Kiev rather than act as a neutral mediator in talks with Moscow. In response, Trump and Vance accused Zelensky of “gambling with World War III” and showing reluctance to pursue peace with Russia, portraying him as ungrateful despite the billions in US military assistance.

In a Sunday Fox News interview, Lutnick stressed that US president made clear he “just wants to make peace.” However, he said that Zelensky did not come for that, and made “ridiculous” requests to Trump and Vance. “Zelensky needed to hear it directly from the funding mouth of the United States of America: We’re not going to give you money unless you’re here for peace,” Lutnick stressed. He added that Trump had tried to reason with Zelensky, stressing that the Ukrainian leader can’t say “[Russian Presiden Vladimir] Putin’s a terrorist and then call the guy up and try to make peace with him.” During the Friday meeting, Zelensky insisted on US security guarantees while fighting is still ongoing with Moscow. Trump dismissed these requests as “ridiculous.” The confrontation ultimately led to Trump cutting the meeting short.

Not only did the visit conclude abruptly without signing the minerals agreement, but it also raised concerns about the future of US military assistance to Ukraine. According to The Washington Post, the Trump administration is now reconsidering its financial and military commitments to Kiev. US National Security Adviser Mike Waltz also hinted at a possible shift in Washington’s stance, suggesting that Zelensky may need to step aside if he refuses to pursue a diplomatic solution. Speaking to CNN, Waltz stated, “it’s unclear whether President Zelensky, particularly after what we saw on Friday, is ready to transition Ukraine to an end to this war and negotiate a compromise.” US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that while Washington seeks peace for Ukraine, some European allies seem to prefer prolonging the conflict to further weaken Russia. As of January 2025, the US had provided $65.9 billion in military assistance to Ukraine since February 2022.

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“Waltz compared Zelensky to an “ex-girlfriend that wants to argue everything that you said nine years ago, rather than moving the relationship forward.”

• US National Security Advisor Mike Waltz Suggests Zelensky May Need To Go (RT)

Washington is unsure whether Vladimir Zelensky is the right man to lead Ukraine at this juncture, the US National Security Advisor Mike Waltz has told CNN. The official argued that Friday’s tumultuous spat between the Ukrainian leader, President Donald Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance indicated that Zelensky may not be ready to talk peace. When asked by Dana Bash on Sunday to share his view of Zelensky, Waltz said that “it’s unclear whether President Zelensky, particularly after what we saw on Friday, is ready to transition Ukraine to an end to this war, and to negotiate and have to compromise.” He noted that it is President Trump’s conviction that both Kiev and Moscow would have to make concessions in order to stop the bloodshed. According to the national security advisor, during the US president’s meeting with Zelensky on Friday, “it did not appear to us that [he] was ready to go to peace.”

When pressed by a CNN presenter as to whether the White House wanted Zelensky to step down, Waltz clarified that “we need a leader that can deal with us, eventually deal with the Russians, and end this war.” The official added that “if it becomes apparent that President Zelensky’s either personal motivations or political motivations are divergent from ending the fighting in his country, then I think we have a real issue on our hands.” In an interview with Breitbart Radio on Saturday, Waltz compared Zelensky to an “ex-girlfriend that wants to argue everything that you said nine years ago, rather than moving the relationship forward.” Speaking with ABC news on Sunday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that he had not “had any contact with [Zelesnky] since Friday.” The diplomat stressed that the Trump administration’s goal is to bring Ukraine and Russia to the negotiating table, with the US head of state being the “only person on Earth who has any chance whatsoever” of accomplishing this.

“Don’t do anything to disrupt that, and that’s what Zelensky did unfortunately – he found every opportunity to try to Ukraine-splain on every issue,” Rubio stated, recounting Friday’s shouting match at the White House. Commenting on Zelensky’s demeanor at the White House on Friday, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham told Fox News later that day that his altercation with Trump and Vance represented a “missed opportunity.” Addressing the Ukrainian people, the lawmaker added, “I don’t know if Zelensky can ever get you to where you want to go with the United States. Either he dramatically changes or you need to get somebody new.” The senator, who hailed Zelensky as the “ally I’ve been hoping for all my life” during the Munich Security Conference earlier this month, wrote in a post on X on Saturday that the Ukrainian leader’s “behavior was beyond unacceptable and [his] lectures are wearing thin.” Graham also lauded President Trump for standing up to him in defense of American interests.

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“Wilson’s goal, of course, was “global governance” under the League of Nations, a goal that the U.S. Senate, mercifully, denied him..”

• Trump, Vance, and the New New World Order (Soukup)

This past week, the venerable Martin Wolf, chief economics commentator for The Financial Times, used his column to declare the Trump administration and, by extension, the United States “the enemy of the West.” “Today,” Wolf wrote, “autocracies [are] increasingly confident,” and “the United States is moving to their side.” According to the subhead on the column, “Washington has decided to abandon…its postwar role in the world.” Meanwhile, Wolf cites the (in his estimation) august Franklin Roosevelt, as he complains that the United States “has decided instead to become just another great power, indifferent to anything but its short-term interests.” The ironies here—as well as the historical ignorance—abound.

To start, one would imagine that Wolf, an educated man with two degrees from Oxford, might know that it was his countryman (and two-time Prime Minister), Henry John Temple (i.e. Lord Palmerston), who declared in a speech in the House of Commons that “We have no eternal allies, and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual, and those interests it is our duty to follow.” Wolf might also be expected to know that this statement was repeated—more famously and more pithily—by Henry Kissinger, perhaps the quintessential American diplomat in the supposedly vaunted postwar order. Kissinger, like Palmerston and Trump (apparently) understood that a nation that pursues anything other than its interests is foolish, faithless, and, in time, doomed.

What bothers Wolf, it would seem, is that American interests are diverging from British and continental European interests. That is unfortunate, but it is also more than likely the case that this divergence is the result of Britain and Europe’s abandonment of the principles, values, and ambitions the allies once shared, rather than the other way around. For example, Wolf criticizes the speech given by J.D. Vance in which the vice president defended the traditional American dedication to free speech and attacked the British and European rejection of that principle. Yet again, Wolf might be expected to know that the American preoccupation with this and all other negative rights is something the nation’s Founders inherited from their British forefathers. If the two nations now differ on the importance of this fundamental right, then that’s hardly Vance’s, Trump’s, or any other American’s fault.

More ironies are found in Wolf’s praise of the now-dying postwar order and his citation of FDR as the architect of that order. While Wolf is correct that Roosevelt was one of two Americans most responsible for the creation of the postwar order, he is wrong in believing that the order was virtuous by design and that it played out precisely as Roosevelt intended. Indeed, he couldn’t be more wrong if he tried.

Almost from the moment the United States entered World War II, Roosevelt was planning how best to achieve the goal he inherited from his former boss and Progressive predecessor, Woodrow Wilson. Wilson’s goal, of course, was “global governance” under the League of Nations, a goal that the U.S. Senate, mercifully, denied him. Regrettably, Roosevelt shared Wilson’s dream. The political scientist and historian of the Cold War, Amos Perlmutter, wrote that Roosevelt’s “vision for a postwar world was neo-Wilsonian, totally at odds with reality. He would help create a new international order, presided over in an equal partnership by the two emerging superpowers, the United States and the USSR, and buttressed by the newly created world organization, the United Nations.” Like Wilson, Roosevelt sought to fix the world by bringing the whole of it under the control of a handful of its most benevolent and brilliant men—himself included, naturally.

The catch, of course, was that in order to believe that he could effectuate his plan for the postwar global order, Roosevelt also had to believe that it would be received positively by the man who turned out to be the most proficient mass murderer in the war, Josef Stalin. Remarkably, Roosevelt did, in fact, believe just that. He repeatedly told his staff and others that he was convinced that the man he affectionately called “Uncle Joe” would eagerly welcome his friendship and American entreaties to share governance of the world jointly. They would, he believed, be the closest of allies and the best of friends. In 1943, before ever even meeting Stalin, FDR told his first ambassador to the USSR, William Bullit, that “I have just a hunch that Stalin doesn’t want anything but security for his country, and I think that if I give him everything I possibly can and ask nothing from him in return, noblesse oblige, he won’t try to annex anything and will work for a world democracy and peace.”

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First, set the DOGE guys on them?!

• Musk Backs US Withdrawal From UN and NATO (RT)

Billionaire Elon Musk has publicly endorsed the idea of the US withdrawing from both the United Nations and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Responding to a social media post advocating such a move on Sunday, Musk, who leads the US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), commented, “I agree.”US President Donald Trump and Republican lawmakers have vowed to reconsider Washington’s participation in the UN, as well as in the US-led military bloc. In February, Senator Mike Lee of Utah introduced the Disengaging Entirely from the United Nations Debacle (DEFUND) Act, proposing a complete US withdrawal from the UN. Lee criticized the UN as a “platform for tyrants” that attacks America and its allies, arguing that despite significant funding, the organization has failed to prevent wars, genocides, human rights violations, and pandemics.

Echoing Lee’s sentiments, Musk wrote on X that “America provides way too much funding to the UN and associated entities.” During his 2016 campaign, Trump described the UN as weak and incompetent, stating it was “not a friend of democracy… freedom… the United States.” Last month, the Trump administration opposed a UN General Assembly resolution demanding Russia’s immediate withdrawal from Ukraine. Musk, now a key advisor to Trump, has taken the lead in looking for ways to cut costs and reduce the federal workforce. In February, DOGE released its first savings report, claiming an estimated $55 billion in savings through cost-cutting measures.That same month, Elise Stefanik, Trump’s nominee for US Ambassador to the UN, advocated the global adoption of Musk’s DOGE initiative.

She criticized the UN’s financial practices and called for a “Global DOGE” effort to reform international governance. Stefanik also pledged to push for defunding and dismantling UN-affiliated organizations accused of corruption and antisemitism. Musk has also voiced skepticism about NATO. In February, he labeled the alliance “anachronistic” and called for a full review, questioning its relevance in the post-Cold War era. He also questioned the rationale behind American taxpayers covering a significant portion of Europe’s defense costs, highlighting that the US pays for approximately 67% of NATO’s military expenses, despite spending only 3.5% of its GDP on defense. His position aligns with Trump, who has frequently criticized NATO, urging members to increase defense expenditure and threatening to withdraw, arguing the US bears an unfair financial burden for European security.

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“The western split over Ukraine is a profound event in history. Some will say it was the moment the US “abandoned their allies” and let Russia win. Those with sense will say that this was the moment the US stopped contributing to the problem..”

• Without The US There Is No NATO And No Ukraine (ZH)

Well before the fireworks at the White House between the Trump team and Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky European governments were increasingly discussing the possibility of an “EU army” and a NATO without US involvement. UK officials along with those in Germany and France have been playing with the notion of boots on the ground in Ukraine, an action which would no doubt precipitate WWIII with Russia. Political leaders and media proponents have been flooding social media to show support for Zelensky as the new savior of the EU and many have suggested that Europe can easily fill the void that the US leaves behind. This is dangerous delusion. For example, the US represents around 70% of the entire annual combined defense spending of NATO countries. No other nation comes close.

In 2023-2024, this expenditure amounted to over $860 billion. The closest NATO member in terms of budget for the alliance is Germany with $68 billion. NATO funding is included in America’s total defense spending package. According to RAND Corporation’s Defense Spending Index, the US carries 47% of the burden share, vastly outweighing any other NATO member. While NATO’s official budget is $3.5 billion, this does not represent the burden share if NATO goes to war. Members with the largest armies and spending the most on defense will be expected to expend the most resources in a conflict. The media consistently misrepresents the NATO spending imbalance by comparing NATO fees as a percentage of GDP. This is nonsense. The sheer amount of defense spending is what matters, not the ratio to GDP. When examined in true terms there is no argument to be made – The US is essentially the military cash cow for the entire western world. Without the US there is no NATO.

When it comes to Ukraine the waters are more muddy but the conclusions are the same; the US is expected to bear the brunt of the burden. US aid to Ukraine so far ranges from $120 billion to $180 billion depending on the source. Zelensky claims that $100 billion of this money “never reached Ukraine”. There is no verification of this either way. For now let’s assume Zelensky is misinformed. A graph of total expenditures between the US and other western nations shows the EU with a large amount of aid, but take a closer look at military commitments and it’s clear that the EU has spent a minimal amount on Ukraine’s actual defense. The US is the primary provider of weapons, ordnance and other equipment used to actually fight the war. Without the US, Ukraine’s defenses will suffer an expedited collapse.

To be clear, Ukraine is not entitled to US tax dollars or US military aid. Europe insists that the war must continue even without US help, but their ability to fund and fight the war is limited. They would trigger WWIII in the process, and they would lose. The belief that more money or more armaments will prevent a Ukraine loss or land concessions to Russia is irrational. Ukraine’s biggest problem is manpower, not money, and no amount of money is going to triple Ukrainian forces on the eastern front. A peace deal should have been negotiated a long time ago. For now it appears that the European elites are frantically trying to rally public support around extending the conflict and forming a centralized EU military. This will take them years and it will never come close to the same funding levels that the US provided. Not to mention, younger native born Europeans have no interest in joining to fight. The western split over Ukraine is a profound event in history. Some will say it was the moment the US “abandoned their allies” and let Russia win. Those with sense will say that this was the moment the US stopped contributing to the problem and offered a solution while Europe foolishly refused to listen.

Read more …

Too late.

• NATO Chief Urges Zelensky To Make Peace With Trump (RT)

NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte has called on Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky to mend ties with US President Donald Trump following a heated exchange at the White House. The meeting between Trump and Zelensky on Friday, which Rutte described as “unfortunate” in an interview with the BBC on Saturday, was originally set up to finalize a minerals agreement. It escalated into a tense exchange. The Ukrainian leader maintained that Washington should increase its support for Kiev rather than position itself as a neutral mediator with Moscow. Trump criticized Zelensky for what he perceived as a lack of gratitude for American assistance and an unwillingness to make concessions to resolve the conflict with Russia. The confrontation led to the day’s events being cut short, with the US president reportedly dismissing his guest from the White House.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio described the encounter as a “fiasco,” with Trump telling Zelensky to return when he was “ready to pursue peace.” “I said: I think you have to find a way, dear Vladimir, to restore your relationship with Donald Trump and the American administration. That is important going forward,” Rutte said, referring to a call he had with Zelensky on Friday. He reminded Zelensky of the support provided by the Trump administration, particularly the provision of Javelin anti-tank weapons in 2019, which were crucial in Ukraine’s defense when the conflict escalated in 2022. Without the Javelins, “Ukraine would have been nowhere,” Rutte stated. The NATO chief emphasized the importance of acknowledging the assistance from the US, which remains Kiev’s biggest donor. The US has provided $65.9 billion in military aid since 2022, according to a US Department of State posting on January 20, 2025.

“We really have to give Trump credit for what he did then, what America did since then and also what America is still doing,” Rutte said. The heated Trump-Zelensky exchange has drawn diverse international reactions. European leaders, including French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, reaffirmed their support for Ukraine. Conversely, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban endorsed Trump’s stance, praising his peace efforts. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova called the meeting a “complete political and diplomatic failure” by the Ukrainian side.

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New Oscars category? “..Jolie had received $20 million for her trip to Lviv in April 2022, and that Penn, Stiller and Bloom were written checks of $5 million, $4 million and $8 million, respectively, by USAID.”

• Hollywood Celebrities Were Paid Millions To Back Ukraine – Orban (RT)

The Hollywood celebrities who visited Ukraine to ‘support’ the country during its ongoing conflict with Russia didn’t do it out of sympathy, but because they were paid millions, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has said. Stars’ trips to Kiev were paid for with money from USAID, Washington’s primary mechanism for funding political projects abroad, Orban said in an interview with Hungarian broadcaster TV2 on Saturday. “People were given money for their opinions. I am talking about big celebrities and movie stars. They were given money to go to Ukraine, so they did not do it from the heart or out of sympathy for the Ukrainians – which could have actually been the case – but because they were given money,” he said. The payments received by the stars amounted to “millions of euros or dollars,” the prime minister claimed, without providing any names.

Angelina Jolie, Sean Penn, Ben Stiller and Orlando Bloom were among the most prominent Western celebrities to have visited Ukraine since the escalation of the conflict between Moscow and Kiev three years ago. In early February, reports emerged on social media claiming that Jolie had received $20 million for her trip to Lviv in April 2022, and that Penn, Stiller and Bloom were written checks of $5 million, $4 million and $8 million, respectively, by USAID. Back then, Stiller rejected the accusations, calling them “lies coming from Russian media.” The actor insisted in a post on X that his visit to Kiev was “self-funded.” Penn’s lawyer also said that reports of his client being paid by USAID to meet with Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky were “completely false, misleading and reckless.”

Several Western media outlets, including AFP and Reuters, said that their fact checking teams had found that the claims of stars getting USAID money originated from a fabricated video and that there were no available records of the agency paying the celebrities. Shortly after taking office, US President Donald Trump launched a clampdown on USAID, accusing it of widespread corruption and inefficiency. He imposed a 90-day funding freeze on the agency and transferred oversight of its programs to the direct control of the US State Department.

Orban said in his interview that the activities of USAID in recent decades could be “the biggest corruption scandal in the history of the Western world.” “I have never seen anything like this before – when billions of dollars are being transferred from the US budget to foundations and various forms of support, and then they are being distributed around the globe and given to those who represent the ideals, spirituality, programs and specific interests demanded by the Americans, and they receive money for that,” he stressed.

Read more …

“Ukraine needs a new cookie monster.”

• Ukraine’s Future Now Rests With A New President, After White House Fiasco (Jay)

Rarely do we see such a showdown in the White House between a leader of an allied country and the president of the U.S. For many, it was surreal to the point where they questioned its authenticity. But if we were ever looking for a crystalized example of what is wrong with Ukraine and how the West got into this quagmire, it was all there in a tense, live exchange where Trump and JD Vance wanted to essentially use the moment to put Zelensky in his place. But he resisted. He believed he was a player and had many moves ahead of him. “You don’t have enough cards,” Trump exploded. Zelensky responded by “this is not a game.” And yet it is a game and Zelensky just proved himself to be the main, if only obstacle to peace in the country. The arrogance and delusion was stunning but understandable given that a number of western leaders have been rallying even more support for him.

Does Zelensky and his support base actually believe they can just ignore Trump and Putin and continue with their game? When watching the sensational crossfire, all becomes clear. The dictator is pumped up on something which carries him and leads him to believe that he is there to negotiate when in reality he is just there to be Trump’s bitch and sign whatever is given to him. The delusion was amazing. And like so many dictators, you can see the lack of preparation; where are the advisors and media experts to prepare him? Doesn’t need ‘em. The result, which could have worked out for him if he was smarter, was a bloodbath, a slaughter which in many ways made everything now clearer and simpler for Trump. He can’t work with Zelensky and so therefore, he will have to go as he is really the obstacle to anything being achieved in Ukraine. Perhaps the Russians already knew this and were just biding their time for the Trump camp to work it out.

Of course, the resentment was so thick you could cut it with a knife. The way JD Vance spoke to him was like you talk to your 12-year old boy who has been expelled from school. Trump and JD saw Zelensky as a creation of Biden and Obama of course and gave him one last chance to cross a divide and say ‘no, actually I’m with you guys’. But he couldn’t. Europe is of course to blame for making him feel so unique and irreplaceable and no doubt this will just make Trump more determined than ever that a quick fix to Ukraine will simply come in pushing for early presidential elections. Critical now will be how Zelensky’s cabal will stay with him or be peeled off one by one by a sweeter deal offered by Trump. Most likely, Trump and JD are already looking for their own replacement although it may well be that no interfering will be necessary as many Ukrainians will be disappointed with Zelensky’s performance.

Politically within Ukraine, the White House stunt will cost him a lot which he might not understand fully if his European support base is telling him not to worry. We’ve got your back. What Zelensky did in 2022 with Boris Johnson – to reject a very favourable peace deal – was foolish and will go down in history as a mistake which cost the lives of hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians who were fed into the meat grinder and sent to the front lines. But what he then did in the White House with Trump and JD was stupid beyond belief as not only did it enrage Trump – to the point where he actually asked Zelensky to leave the Oval Office – but it amalgamated support for him from EU leaders even more – the very gesture which will push Trump into an even more belligerent position.

sHe will put Zelensky and the EU in its place and now show the whole world how ineffective Europe is when it wants to play at being a superpower but doesn’t want to pick up the tab. Can Europe go it alone in Ukraine is not the question. The question is whether Trump will let it. This might have been one scenario which could have been bandied about and might have been given some oxygen, but now the EU position has to be tackled head on. Trump will be thinking ‘I have to teach the EU a lesson.’ ‘America is running the show and I call the shots,’ will be Trump’s thinking now. It is hardly a great act of prescience now to predict that Zelensky will now have, at the very least, lost all the U.S. support he had before; and at the very best a new political dynamic which will emerge in the coming weeks which will have a support infrastructure probably more than the puny 5 billion dollars that Victoria Nuland blew on the 2014 elections which installed Poroshenko. Ukraine needs a new cookie monster.

Read more …

I think the restoration of direct commercial flights will be a BIG step.

• US Approves New Russian Ambassador As Part of Major Reset Underway (ZH)

The two rounds of high level US-Russia talks in Riyadh and Istanbul in the last two weeks appear to already be bearing fruit, as Russia’s Foreign Ministry has announced it’s received approval from Washington to send Aleksandr Darchiev as Moscow’s new ambassador to the United States. Current bilateral US-Russia dialogue has been focused on fully restoring relations and putting back in place all embassy staff in Washington and Moscow, respectively. There had been several rounds of hostile mutual booting of diplomats as relations deteriorated under Biden. According to Russian media, “Darchiev, a senior diplomat with more than 30 years of experience, currently heads the Foreign Ministry’s North Atlantic Department. He previously served as Russia’s ambassador to Canada from 2014 to 2021 and has held several high-ranking positions within the ministry, including deputy director of the North America Department and counselor at the Russian embassy in Washington.”

This is no doubt part of the “concrete initial steps” being taken by both sides toward resuming regular contacts and diplomatic engagement, with a higher aim of finding a permanent peace solution to the Ukraine war. Darchiev’s predecessor, Anatoly Antonov, served as Russia’s ambassador to the US throughout much of the Ukraine crisis and the entirety of the war until now. He ran the Russian embassy in D.C. for seven years, and just recently returned to Moscow. Just as Moscow is poised for a reset with the US under the new Trump administration, Washington relations with Ukraine are at a low point after Friday’s Zelensky fireworks in the Oval Office. Russian media has been busy hailing and welcoming these developments, which may soon result in the following:

US President Donald Trump’s administration is considering ending all ongoing shipments of military aid to Ukraine, The Washington Post wrote citing sources. Military supplies could be halted “in response to remarks” by Vladimir Zelensky at a meeting with Trump in the White House and “his perceived intransigence in the peace process,” according to the publication. The decision, if made, would apply “to billions of dollars of radars, vehicles, ammunition and missiles awaiting shipment to Ukraine through the presidential drawdown authority,” an official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive topic, was quoted as saying. Ukraine frontlines have already been steadily collapsing, so without a future flow of American heavy weapons, this collapse will only accelerate, and the war would likely reach finality within a few months or less.

President Putin has meanwhile been touting the chance for “major” cooperative economic and diplomatic initiatives with the US under Trump, and as bilateral talks progress. Russia has even offered its own minerals access deal as a possibility of closer cooperation, and as Trump floats potentially dropping sanctions in the future. The next step may be the restoration of direct commercial flights between the two countries.

Read more …

JD got himself some new fans, not just Trump.

• Trump Impressed By Vance’s Handling Of Zelensky – WSJ (RT)

US President Donald Trump was impressed with how Vice President J.D. Vance handled himself during a tense Oval Office exchange with Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky, unnamed administration officials told the Wall Street Journal. The politicians met on Friday in the White House Oval Office ahead of what was expected to be a celebratory signing of a minerals deal between Washington and Kiev. The WSJ dubbed Vance a “MAGA champion” after the confrontation in a piece published on Saturday. Vance sat mostly silent as Trump and Zelensky answered questions. But then a reporter asked the US president if he aligned with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin. Vance, a critic of US aid to Ukraine, interjected to praise Trump’s diplomatic efforts and criticize past policy under President Joe Biden.

The conversation escalated when Zelensky pushed back. During the intense discussion, Vance highlighted Ukraine’s challenges in conscripting additional troops and said that Zelensky should be “thanking” Trump for efforts to resolve the conflict. Vance criticized his recent public appearances highlighting war devastation, accusing him of hosting “propaganda tours,” and labeled the Ukrainian leader “disrespectful.” The confrontation led to the day’s events being cut short.Trump has reportedly told White House staff that his former vice president “would have never done that.” Former Indiana Governor Mike Pence was vice president during Trump’s first term. Their political alliance ended acrimoniously over the January 2021 riots at the US Capitol, after Pence refused to comply with Trump’s demands to prevent Congress from certifying Joe Biden the winner of the 2020 US presidential election.

The White House later circulated statements of support from Republican lawmakers and administration officials. “I was very proud of J.D. Vance, standing up for our country,” US Senator Lindsey Graham said. While Senator Mike Lee called Vance the “GOAT,” an acronym for “greatest of all time.”The 40-year-old Vance is the third-youngest vice president in US history. His relationship with Trump has evolved significantly since the president’s first term. Once a vocal critic of Trump, Vance opposed his candidacy in 2016, calling him “cultural heroin” for conservatives and questioning his character. However, he later shifted his stance, securing Trump’s endorsement in his successful 2022 Senate bid, a move that cemented his place within Trump’s inner circle.

Last month, during his first foreign trip as vice president, Vance sent shockwaves with a speech criticizing European leaders at the Munich Security Conference, accusing them of censoring free speech and neglecting public concerns over migration.Vance’s relationship with Trump remains strong, though the president has so far demurred on naming him his successor. Trump told Fox News in February that he considers Vance “very capable” but noted that “there are a lot of very capable people.” However, tech billionaire and Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) chief Elon Musk referred to Vance as “our future President” on Saturday.

Read more …

It’s easy to get confused, but “restart” is not the correct term here. Nord Stream 2 was never activated. Neither of its 2 arms.

• Putin Ally In Secret Talks With Trump Admin To Restart Nord Stream 2 (ZH)

A close friend of Vladimir Putin – and like the Russian president, also a spy – has been engineering a restart of Russia’s Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline to Europe with the backing of US investors, a once unthinkable move which according to the FT, shows the breadth of Donald Trump’s rapprochement with Moscow. According to the Nikkei-owned publication, the efforts on a deal were the brainchild of Matthias Warnig, an ex-Stasi officer in East Germany who until 2023 ran Nord Stream 2’s parent company for the Kremlin-controlled gas giant Gazprom. Warnig’s plan involved outreach to the Trump team through US businessmenas part of back-channel efforts to broker an end to the war in Ukraine while deepening economic ties between the US and Russia. If this was just some unilateral attempt to get the pipeline that was bombed by Western intelligence agents and assorited Ukrainian hangers-on back online, it would hardly be a surprise.

However, according to the report it appears that at least several “prominent” Trump administration figures are aware of the initiative to bring in US investors, and they see it as part of the push to rebuild relations with Moscow. While there have been several expressions of interest, one US-led consortium of investors has drawn up the outlines of a post-sanctions deal with Gazprom. Meanwhile, senior EU officials have become aware of the Nord Stream 2 discussion only in recent weeks, and leaders of several European countries are concerned and have discussed the matter, although it is unclear what the prevailing sense on the ground within the corridors of Brussels. It is far easier, for example, to guess what Germany thinks about a return of much cheaper and far more abundant Russian energy if virtue signaling and politics were not an issue.

One of Nord Stream 2’s two pipelines was blown up in what now appears to have been a US attack in September 2022 that destroyed both pipelines of its older sister project Nord Stream 1. The other Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which has an annual capacity of 27.5bn cubic metres of natural gas, is undamaged but has never been used. The latest plan would in theory give the US unparalleled sway over energy supplies to Europe, after EU countries moved to end their dependence on Russian gas in the aftermath of the invasion. That said, the obstacles are considerable: a deal would require the US to lift sanctions against Russia, Russia to agree to resume sales it cut off during the war, and Germany to allow the gas to flow to any potential buyers in Europe.

“The US would say, ‘Well, now Russia will be dependable because trustworthy Americans are in the middle of it’,’” said a former senior US official, who was aware of some of the dealmaking efforts. The US investors would collect “money for nothing”, he added. The talks come as the Trump administration races to seal a peace deal through bilateral discussions with Russia that have excluded Europe and Ukraine, spooking deep-state apparatchiks in European capitals who fear a US détente with Moscow could threaten the continent. Trump has promised deeper economic co-operation with Russia if a peace agreement can be reached. Putin has talked up the economic benefits he says the US could reap with the Kremlin in the event of a settlement in Ukraine, claiming that “several companies” were already in touch over potential deals.

Nord Stream 2 AG, the pipeline’s Swiss-based parent company, received an exceptional stay on bankruptcy proceedings in January by at least four months. According to a redacted court document, Nord Stream 2’s shareholder — Gazprom — argued that the new Trump administration, as well as the German election in February 2025, “presumably can have significant consequences on the circumstances of Nord Stream 2” to warrant a delay. The submission pointed to “complex geopolitical affairs” and the sanctions regime.

Read more …

“Martin, a Trump ally, previously worked to help Jan. 6 defendants and [DOGE] in their respective legal fights..”

• Top DOJ Attorneys Involved In Biden-Era Prosecutions Demoted (JTN)

Ed Martin, the interim U.S. Attorney in charge of the Justice Department’s Washington office, reportedly reassigned several senior leaders to entry-level positions. Among those demoted were Kathryn Rakoczy, Reuters reported, who secured convictions of several members of the Oath Keepers for their roles in the Jan. 6 riots on Capital Hill. Among those convicted was the founder of the group, Stewart Rhodes, who Trump pardoned along with 13 others previously convicted in the riot.

Elizabeth Aloi, who prosecuted former Trump White House advisor Peter Navarro for defying a congressional subpoena, was another prosecutor demoted in the Justice Department shakeup. Martin told Reuters that he needed to assign attorneys where he believed they could best contribute. The reassignments to misdemeanors, he noted, are not temporary. Martin, a Trump ally, previously worked to help Jan. 6 defendants and the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in their respective legal fights, including by helping to orchestrate the pardons of hundreds of people convicted for their actions on January 6.

Read more …

“Mr. and Mr.” I’ve been following Candace’s latest on X a bit, and it seems she may now be ready for prime time. But who will stand up against Macron/Rothschild with her?

• Exposing Elite Degeneracy – Mr. and Mr. Macron (Karganovic)

It goes almost without saying that the “elite” referenced here is located in the collective West. It would be exceedingly difficult to associate the leading segment of any other society or civilisation, as a class, with degeneracy. Our archetypal case study are the Macrons, the French power couple situated at the apex of their country’s political pyramid. Our French sources assure us that in France anomalies concerning the birth gender of the allegedly female member of that pair have been suspected for a long time. Those suspicions, however, have had to be voiced sub rosa, because of the establishment’s extreme hostility to any speculations on that subject. The few investigative journalists and investigators who had ventured to question those anomalies, many of which are obvious even to the naked eye, have been hounded by the media and persecuted by the French judicial system in a variety of vicious ways.

That plainly gives the lie to what remains of France’s historical reputation of being a haven of enlightened tolerance for diverse views. American journalist Candace Owens has assembled evidence that compellingly (and almost conclusively) demonstrates that the individual passed off to the public under the identity of Brigitte Macron, the official wife of the French President, is neither Brigitte nor a biological woman. Candace Owens’ professional trajectory parallels in many ways that of her colleague Tucker Carlson. Like Tucker, Candace laboured for many years in the ranks of establishment media until her conscience became so conflicted by the constraints on truthful reporting and honest commentary that for her remaining within the system was no longer an option. Like Tucker, Candace was able to parlay the respect and trust that she had built up over the years into an independent investigative journalism platform.

There, without censorship, she can discuss topics and articulate opinions that are off limits in the discourse of the pseudo liberal democratic world of mainline journalism that had expelled her, as it did Tucker, from the ranks of its licenced professionals. Intrigued by the rumours swirling around France’s “first lady,” Candace Owens made the bold decision to dig into the story and share the findings with her audience, which by now numbers in the millions. The result was Becoming Brigitte: Gaslighting the public, a series of investigative reports that for the first time brought to the attention of the Anglophone world the tangled web of lies and misrepresentations surrounding not just the true identity of Emmanuel Macron’s putative spouse, but also his own vertiginous (and it appears unmerited) rise to prominence and ultimately the Presidency of a major European country.

In essence, Candace’s disclosures are that “Mme. Macron” has been, so to speak, misgendered, but by deliberate design, having been born a male and subsequently undergoing surgical procedures to alter her sex. But by degraded contemporary criteria that revelation is standard fare compared to the really sleazy part of the story. It turns out that most of what we have been told about the inception of their relationship is provably false. Even the assertion in the official account that at seventeen Emmanuel was almost of legal age when he and his teacher, the allegedly thirty-six year-old Brigitte, “fell in love” is as false as “Mrs.” Macron’s official gender identity. Meticulous research has revealed that at the critical stage when he succumbed to the charms of his middle school literature teacher, Emmanuel was in fact a child of fourteen, whilst his seductress (or perhaps more precisely, seducer) was thirty-nine.

Not only does that significantly increase the age difference between the lovers, but more importantly it places the affair within the legal ambit of statutory rape, even by the notoriously permissive French standards. That, of course, is just the bare bones of the polemical contentions that Candace Owens corroborates with ample proof, leaving little room for reasonable doubt. No summary of the details can do justice to what Candace calls “a look back at the murky, hidden background of Emmanuel and Brigitte Macron,” so viewing the entire series of six episodes, culminating with the just posted incisive recapitulation, Epilogue, is highly recommended to all wishing to savour the particulars of this sordid tale of debauchery, deceit, paedophilia, and betrayal of the public trust.

Read more …

“Objectivity has got to go.”

• The Press Falls to Another Record Low in Public Trust (Turley)

We have previously discussed polling showing the media at record lows in public trust. Well, the latest survey from Gallup shows that the media hit another all-time low. What is most impressive is that plummeting readers, revenues, and layoffs have done little to convince the mainstream media that the problem is not the public but themselves. The only institution with a lower level of public trust is Congress, and that says a lot. It is like beating Ebola as the preferred communicable disease.Some 69 percent of Americans now say that they have no or little trust in the media. Only 31 percent say that they have a great deal or fair amount of trust. The trending line looks like the sales of buggy whips after the introduction of the Model T Ford. Gallop put it into sharp terms:

“About two-thirds of Americans in the 1970s trusted the “mass media — such as newspapers, TV and radio” either “a great deal” or “a fair amount” to “[report] the news fully, accurately and fairly.” By the next measurement in 1997, confidence had fallen to 53%, and it has gradually trended downward since 2003. Americans are now divided into rough thirds, with 31% trusting the media a great deal or a fair amount, 33% saying they do “not [trust it] very much,” and 36%, up from 6% in 1972, saying they have no trust at all in it.” In my book, The Indispensable Right, I discuss how journalists and journalism schools have destroyed their own profession by rejecting objectivity and engaging in open advocacy journalism. The mainstream media has long echoed the talking points of the left and the Democratic Party, particularly in its one-sided coverage of the last three elections.

While Bob Woodward and others have finally admitted that the Russian collusion coverage lacked objectivity and resulted in false reporting, media figures are pushing even harder against objectivity as a core value in journalism. We have been discussing the rise of advocacy journalism and the rejection of objectivity in journalism schools. Writers, editors, commentators, and academics have embraced rising calls for censorship and speech controls, including President-elect Joe Biden and his key advisers. This movement includes academics rejecting the very concept of objectivity in journalism in favor of open advocacy. Columbia Journalism Dean and New Yorker writer Steve Coll decried how the First Amendment right to freedom of speech was being “weaponized” to protect disinformation.

In an interview with The Stanford Daily, Stanford journalism professor Ted Glasser insisted that journalism needed to “free itself from this notion of objectivity to develop a sense of social justice.” He rejected the notion that journalism is based on objectivity and said that he views “journalists as activists because journalism at its best — and indeed history at its best — is all about morality.” Thus, “Journalists need to be overt and candid advocates for social justice, and it’s hard to do that under the constraints of objectivity.” The Washington Post’s former executive editor Leonard Downie Jr. and former CBS News President Andrew Heyward released the results of their interviews with over 75 media leaders and concluded that objectivity is now considered reactionary and even harmful. Emilio Garcia-Ruiz, editor-in-chief at the San Francisco Chronicle said it plainly: “Objectivity has got to go.”

Lauren Wolfe, the fired freelance editor for the New York Times, has not only gone public to defend her pro-Biden tweet but published a piece titled “I’m a Biased Journalist and I’m Okay With That.” Former New York Times writer (and now Howard University Journalism Professor) Nikole Hannah-Jones is a leading voice for advocacy journalism. Indeed, Hannah-Jones has declared “all journalism is activism.” This is why the whole “Let’s Go Brandon” chant was as much a criticism of the media as President Biden. There is clearly an effort by owners like Jeff Bezos to change this culture rather than bankroll newspapers like the Washington Post vanity projects for the left.

Robert Lewis, a British media executive who joined the Post earlier this year, reportedly got into a “heated exchange” with a staffer. Lewis explained that, while reporters were protesting measures to expand readership, the very survival of the paper was now at stake: “We are going to turn this thing around, but let’s not sugarcoat it. It needs turning around,” Lewis said. “We are losing large amounts of money. Your audience has halved in recent years. People are not reading your stuff. Right. I can’t sugarcoat it anymore.” The response from staffers was to call for the new editors to be fired. One staffer complained, “We now have four White men running three newsrooms.” The Post has been buying out staff to avoid mass layoffs, but reporters are up in arms over the effort to turn the newspaper around.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Malhotra

 

 

Rogan Bill Murray

 

 

Grizzly

 

 

Horsenado

 

 

First steps

 

 

Retriever

 

 

Gong

 

 

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Home › Forums › Debt Rattle March 3 2025

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  • March 3, 2025 at 11:02 am #183415
    Raúl Ilargi Meijer
    Keymaster

    Gustave Courbet The village maidens 1852   • Europe Unveils Rival Ukraine Peace Plan (ZH) • UK, France, Ukraine Agree To Work On Cease-Fire Plan
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle March 3 2025]

    March 3, 2025 at 12:30 pm #183417
    Dr D Rich
    Participant

    “No one here is worshipping” Zelensky but “we’re gonna have to apply the same Marco Rubio rule about having to negotiate with a guy that might never win a Nobel Peace Prize” while my boss Vance JD, er ah, President Trump sends $8 billion more Not War but Peace Dollars to The Nobel Peace Prize nominee, Benjamin Netanyahu who wore a suit to The Oval while POTUS butlered for Benjie.

    Victory!
    Peace…

    Clearly someone is paving the way for JD to be POTUS before the end of Trump’s term.
    Same suit
    Same tie
    Same emotional beatdown of Zelensky, America’s “ally”.

    Waltz could say put boots on the ground in The Ukraine are coming home but in the name their idea of peace those words won’t be spoken, you know, in the Name of Mutual Prosperity.

    March 3, 2025 at 1:21 pm #183421
    zerosum
    Participant

    Watch TAE. New/old journalism.
    Listen to Jeffrey Sachs.
    New bubble Makers.
    Reality/Illusions

    A Peace Plan
    A War Plan
    Food insecurity
    Housing insecurity
    Growth insecurity
    Ignorance produces conspiracy theories
    Secrets and Lies
    ————–
    Made before “deep fake.”
    Here’s a 2019 video from RFERL on then candidate Zelensky and his oligarch backer, Ihor Kolomoisky.
    Don’t expect our media to ever cover this.
    You will not see any of this in stories by our media on Zelensky.
    Instead they tell us that Zelensky is above reproach, someone we should have no problem giving a blank check to.

    https://x.com/mazemoore/status/1895925342264504587?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1895925342264504587%7Ctwgr%5E5368420aa848ad4c4b9c73b8040d5be581012a70%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theautomaticearth.com%2F2025%2F03%2Fdebt-rattle-march-3-2025%2F
    ———
    “coalition of the willing”
    • Europe Unveils Rival Ukraine Peace Plan (ZH)
    It also appears a deliberate effort by Europe to keep the US on a hawkish path, and to sabotage US-Russia talks in the process.
    ———–
    • We Won’t Give Kiev Money Until Zelensky Seeks Peace – Lutnick (RT)

    • Musk Backs US Withdrawal From UN and NATO (RT)
    The organization, (UN), has failed to prevent wars, genocides, human rights violations, and pandemics.
    ————–
    • Without The US There Is No NATO And No Ukraine (ZH)

    To be clear, Ukraine is not entitled to US tax dollars or US military aid.
    Europe insists that the war must continue even without US help, but their ability to fund and fight the war is limited.
    They would trigger WWIII in the process, and they would lose.
    The belief that more money or more armaments will prevent a Ukraine loss or land concessions to Russia is irrational.
    Ukraine’s biggest problem is manpower, not money, and no amount of money is going to triple Ukrainian forces on the eastern front.
    A peace deal should have been negotiated a long time ago.
    For now it appears that the European elites are frantically trying to rally public support around extending the conflict and forming a centralized EU military.
    This will take them years and it will never come close to the same funding levels that the US provided.
    —————
    • The Press Falls to Another Record Low in Public Trust (Turley)
    ———-
    I FELT SHAKING/EARTHQUAKE IN B.C., AT 5:00 AM

    March 3, 2025 at 1:32 pm #183422
    zerosum
    Participant

    https://www.opm.gov/about-us/
    The U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) serves as the chief human resources agency and personnel policy manager for the Federal Government.
    DOGE is operating from OPM.

    March 3, 2025 at 1:32 pm #183423
    Dr D Rich
    Participant

    Waltz could say Those Boots on the Ground in The Ukraine are coming home but their idea of peace won’t permit those words to be spoken, you know, in the Name of Mutual Prosperity.

    It’s complicated, but our side has Marco Rubio on it and according to John Day Marco’s diplomatic statesmanship on the Topic The Ukraine had already been rejected, all sides knew it and The Oval Office CosPlay that ensued was all staged.
    I mean it’s never staged for public consumption, but with bonafide psychopaths, actors, actresses and Spellbinders it’s hard to get a read sometimes.
    However, contrary to Ds assertion, Zelensky never looked “genuinely upset” but JD presidential timber did. “”JD”

    Marco Rubio…..my god n holy crap.

    March 3, 2025 at 1:43 pm #183424
    Dr. D
    Participant

    “Europe Unveils Rival Ukraine Peace Plan Backed By ‘Boots On The Ground & Planes In The Air’
    .. what the escalation ‘plan’ really does is forces Trump’s hand to react.

    Very predictable. Also in the news: “Zelensky Now Leader of the Free World.”

    Most

    Russia going to Collapse!!! –UK Media. Bombshell. Walls are closing in. Plan A is about to kick in, any time now. …Now that Russia has a million men mobilized and Oreshniks that can hit Manchester. You know you’re supposed to jump in AFTER 3/4 of all men are already dead, like the Allies did in WWII, right? NOT after 3/4 of your OWN men are dead.

    “When Zelensky challenged JD Vance for advocating diplomacy with Russia, the Ukrainian president invoked his December 9 2019 agreement with Putin and claimed: “We signed the exchange of prisoners, but he [Putin] didn’t do it.”

    Here are pictures of Zelensky attending a December 29th, 2019 ceremony welcoming the return of Ukrainian prisoners…” –Aaron Mate’

    So many lies, so little time. Well, he opened his mouth, so lie fell out.

    “Can Europe Ever Catch Up On Defense Spending: US Spent $8.4 Trillion In Past Decade… Rest Of NATO Just $3.8 Trillion

    Huh. That’s odd, since they’re what, 20% larger than we are? And if they spent that much where are their soldiers? Britain has 12 guns? Really??? It’s almost as if they don’t want to fight the war but have the U.S. do it for free. Too complicated, can’t figure it out.

    Addition? Our spending is THEIR spending. That is, we print money and spend it on NATO...in Germany. Into the GERMAN economy. Etc. What do you think happens when Rammstein closes with 200,000 people leave with 200,000 mouths and all the food supply chain trucks vanish. That’s why you can have $1T and not cause inflation. But that’s also why you can CUT $1T in overseas spending and not have a U.S. Collapse: that spending was never in our economy in the first place, it isn’t being removed.

    “Waste Of The Day: Congo Splurged At Davos On USAID Dime. The equivalent of $488,000 on a six-night hotel stay”

    Why do Republicans hate the Poors so much? They finally dug into USAID and found something not evil: teaching kids to read in Kenya. Like $100M? Well, assuming a single dollar got there, what kind of country is Kenya if they can’t teach their kids how to read on their own? Like, this is our job, worldwide now? We’re the entire student budget for China, Mongolia, Indonesia…? And I certainly wouldn’t TRUST, say, Iran to teach all of American students, would you? Since they’re sending teachers from Baltimore, I assume no one in Kenya can read now.

    “US Gives Israel Green Light To Stay In Lebanon ‘Indefinitely’

    Israel slowly being drawn out way past their abilities. They’re not fools, it seems, so it’s taking some time to get them deeper into Syria where they haven’t a chance of holding. I mean you do know there are million(s) FEWER Israelis than last year, right? You’ve already burned through all your soldiers? And you’re going to expand? Of course you are.

    “We need to figure out — is there a way to get them to stop the war? And the only way you’re going to do that is to get Russians engaged in negotiations.”

    Much, MUCH too complicated for them.

    Shiff: Well, obviously opened mouth, lie fell out. The FBI hasn’t been around for 100 years, sir. 2) Bongino hasn’t done anything yet, so it may be premature to say what he already did in the office he hasn’t arrived at yet. 3) Every Conspiracy theory about Trump so far has been true: they were wiretapping him, the RussiaRussia was a staged witch hunt, etc. 4) A Covid denier that got the vaccine. Yeah, he sounds super serious and ready to fall for anything when he provably believed the Covid thing right off. 20 more meta-levels, which is why you can’t let people like this speak. They are so twisted up, your mind needs decontamination after listening to them. It just a bad use of time.

    “Churchill” Now remember folks, Trump is Hitler AND Chamberlain at the SAME TIME. So is everyone else. Isn’t it really about seeing the Hitler/Churchill/Chamberlain/Jesus/Devil in all of us? Besides, Hitler was Russian, right?

    All things are all things! All things equal their #Opposites! If all things are all things, they sure can’t be false!

    “Two years ago, I was a hero of the left. How can I go from hero to villain at age 53 suddenly?’

    How? Because all things are all things, sir! Hero = Villain. I thought that up in my head a minute ago, now it’s true.

    Stochastic terrorism with Elon and the Left. It’s FEMALE. They are girlie men. Male approach: Elon is Hitler, he should die: walk up, investigate, shoot him in the dick, bye. FEMALE approach: say bad things that are deniable, bleat “Will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest?” Sigh and look sad, do some passive-aggressive AOC things, deny it, complain of oppression constantly…do nothing, don’t lift a finger, hope someone will do the work for you. It appears path #2 doesn’t work very well, if at all, and certainly takes far too long. Turns out complaining is more work than just working. …But then you’d have to admit who you are and not LIE. Telling the Truth: why I say sir, what do you take me for? That is just Impossible.

    [Mearshimer] analysis from a decade ago remains undeniably accurate…”

    But nobody knewd! Nobody could have seen this coming. …Except Jimmy Dore, high as a kite, said this half-asleep on the couch the day it started. Me since 1995.

    Elon: “They will be a permanent one-party, Socialist state.”

    Hey, is that exactly what me and JB have been saying? Because THEY have been saying it? They tell you openly, this is their plan, sign their names, publish it, go on TV and confirm, day after day, year after year?

    Reminds me of Covid. They’re like, “Why are you resisting? Why are you denying Covid??” Sir: I am using YOUR data! All the data, the charts, the quotes I have…are from YOU. YOU are where I get these crazy ideas. Remember they did that with Candice Owens, I think about Ukraine Nazis or something. She said, NY Times? CNN? Where did I get this data? FROM YOU, then quoted the 99 stories they’d published on it over the years.

    True = Not True. Real = False. BothNeitherAi. Everything. With every word. The only way to exist is for all things to be true and false at the same time, the only way the mind can make sense of Trans gay lesbian women, presenting female. …That is to say: Women. Who look like women, and sleep with men.

    Now WHYYYYYY do they always do this? They don’t care if it’s false, they WANT it to be false, the more transparently false the better. Because normal operation of a human mind is to adhere to TRUTH, because that’s operationally functional. Gravity exists and we don’t deny it by jumping off bridges and live longer. But what happens when everything is operationally FALSE? You don’t adhere to Truth, so the only next default setting is to adhere to POWER. You do, believe, act, however the POWERFUL tell you to.

    …And that’s why it’s identical to being in a narcissistic abuse household. Torture means, for the moment, it no longer matters what’s TRUE. The only thing that matters is BEING BEATEN. Human drops down a level to survive torture and live another day. “Pretending” or really beyond pretending, functionally believing absurdities is part of this, and the Abuser LIKES the torture because he feels safe. If they are going to escape, they are going to resist IN THEIR MIND first. So he knows you’re not escaping if you’re believing the lies still. It’s his tripwire. Most people can’t go from 0-100 and just stab him in the neck all at once, but have to build up to it in the normal human way. More’s the pity, but that diffuses all human conflict, the way rams butt heads first and walk, where no one’s really injured. Just this outlier situation where it’s a hack.

    There are exploits in the patterns of narcissistic abusers as well and we should use them. Mostly by discrediting serial liars: crazy, I know.

    Anyway, so Trump here is rapidly smashing the public into the Truth. I’m sure there are PR strategists, but really, just to say Realpolitik, that Ukraine isn’t winning is about as far as Overton will allow now. And IF that is true, THEN the next things are obvious: If we, they, lost, THEN we withdraw. Simple. Europe both can’t – they will instantly collapse financially – but it’s also not in their nature. That’s why they’re the most psychopathic place on the planet for the last 1,000 years. Because they have a sort of “Family” structure, they work and create “Togetherness”, “We” believe this. If you don’t also believe this, you are cast out of the “family” – whatever that is: party, country, Europe, economy – and you will literally die, not kidding. BUT! What happens if what they’ve all settled on via endless, painful, long negotiation turns out not to be TRUE? They can’t let it go, because it’ll take another 10-20 years to hammer out the new “reality” consensus (which also won’t be true. Bc: “Committee”). So they have the terrible (in that it causes terror and constant genocide) habit of hanging on to it, going down, and taking the ship with them. There’s really no logical reason for it. As I’ve said, right now, Ukraine can flip to an Irish Resistance approach, and should. LOGICALLY that fits all the same goals here. But they are NOT logical. They are in a Relationship Structure.

    Trump isn’t hammering on it, but Rubio’s press releases “They don’t want peace” “they have no cards” is leaning into the same space. It’s not engineered at this level, I think, it’s just a natural expression of being practical. If anything, you can see Trump/Vance as being far too accommodating, they’re way outside the bubble of “Reality” in Ukraine, but it’s as far as they can extend themselves while still being realistic.

    The “Evil” side here runs only on lies, of course, that’s the essence of “Evil” as a form: it is separated from the Whole, from Logos, from Truth. It depends on Pretending. So you merely win by telling the Truth and letting the Light in. They’re not throwing Moltovs at that right now, although it may seem so, but ANY action on their part causes this drift toward Truth, #Logos, and away from Lies, Evil. …Which Europe cannot tolerate.

    …Which is back to the point here: IF Trump is being realistic, THEN the only thing Europe can do is reveal to themselves what genocidal diabolical warmongers they are, way ahead of the United States. …Which is really saying something! That they not only risk, but HUNGER for WWIII…as Armstrong says. And want every Ukrainian dead, if possible, and have gone further than anyone in history so far in accomplishing that.

    …They now admit that not to us – we already know – but to THEMSELVES. Just as Canada, going all-in does. Or the DNC. Okay, you did that. Now FACE it, in the mirror. This is YOU now: do you like what you see?

    Term

    “Zelensky: “If the US stops giving us money, we will demand at least $250 billion from Europe”

    Your terms are acceptable.

    McCune, U.S. protecting our mining interests.

    Uh, no, Russia would bomb the f—k out of us. However, Trump could use that card to SELL them, to end it plausibly, in the same way it was already going to be ended. Then we walk away and do NOT spend $1Trillion during a national bankruptcy to protect $200B of rocks that would be bombed to powder on their way out of the country. Sir.

    It’s so f-d up that we have to back up into valueless abstractions, of chits that aren’t real, in order to navigate the actual world, and get a peace slipped through levels of infantile denial heretofore never seen.

    “Starmer also pledged to boost military spending to 2.5 percent of GDP by 2027.”

    Hahahahaha! Yeah, no, he’ll collapse. They all will. But they have no choice, so…

    “I’ve been saying for years that we need a more sovereign, more united, more independent Europe.”

    What do you mean? None of those statements are logical. If you are “United” you, your nations, are no longer “Sovereign.” What would you be independent of? The EU commissioners? That you can’t say any of this plainly means you’re lying.

    Translation: The EU unelected central Soviet needs unlimited money and power to raise a supra-national army unaccountable to the now-impoverished and unfree People, which can then attack BOTH the people, AND Russia, as well as America if necessary, in their larger plan to conquer and colonize the world. Do I have that about right?

    …Just say so, it’s a lot easier for all of us. This is FEMALE approach, of lying, denying, diverting, projecting. Dare I say trying to conquer the planet via a WOMAN’S approach has not been a historical winner? Like if you’re on the march, you need to tell the Generals “You’re on the march, burn everything.” Otherwise literally every sentient being will take you at your word that you’re not “really” attacking, and resist you. You DENY you’re burning everything, so let’s take the chance and find out.

    ““Waltz compared Zelensky to an “ex-girlfriend that wants to argue everything that you said nine years ago, rather than moving the relationship forward.”

    I guess in this context that confirms everything I just said.

    “• Trump, Vance, and the New New World Order (Soukup)

    So what is NATO with no U.S.? Or we’re nominally in but allow England to be bombed to ash? What is a U.N. without us either? What is it? Reality. Bye. The U.N. etc only exist for Mr. Rockefeller and Soros. Are those the guys and reasons you want?

    NATO chart: well, you can erase 90% of the U.S. “military” funding since it’s all fraud and graft. …But then you’d have to remove 70% of the other nations’ so….

    “• Top DOJ Attorneys Involved In Biden-Era Prosecutions Demoted (JTN)

    On what basis? How were they demoted but not indicted? They either did, or did not, do something wrong.

    “While Bob Woodward and others have finally admitted that the Russian collusion coverage lacked objectivity and resulted in false reporting,”

    Great example of both being true. We can say Woodward was involved in decades of “Making it all up” then in the next breath say “It’s a new Watergate” from a fearless, truth-seeking press.

    “”When I read ‘Wired’ by Bob Woodward about John Belushi, I read like five pages of ‘Wired’ and I went, oh my God, they framed Nixon. If he did this to Belushi, what he did to Nixon is probably soiled for me too.”

    Bill Murray remains a normal enough human to get this. I don’t know what he used to be – ordinary comedian I guess – but at some point he seems to have transcended into his character from Groundhog’s Day. Both normal and super-normal, meta-normal at the same time. Like stories, crashes a random, ordinary person’s party on a lark: does the dishes then goes home. Lots of such stories. He’s being like the Neutral-Good version of Kaufmann.

    “Texas Company Lands On Moon In “First Successful Commercial Landing”

    Why were these CGI images? Can’t afford digital cameras for the landing? Too big and heavy? And they’re posting camera shots from OUTSIDE the vehicle. Where’s the camera placed? Is Brian Williams there with a Minolta?

    Dr. Rich: as usual and saves me a lot, I have no idea what you’re saying. But what we’re all proposing is extremely complicated, entirely hidden, constantly changing, and hard to figure out. I just propose the ideas mostly I’m picking up elsewhere, and my bag of what I’m sure it happening, certain is true, is very light. 4 or 5 possible paths with 3×5 card clues stacked up in them pointing in each direction.

    March 3, 2025 at 3:14 pm #183427
    phoenixvoice
    Participant

    Golden Retriever & tigers

    I often wonder if the big cats really are much different than “house cats.” Have the small cats that live among us really been “domesticated?” Or are they just safer to be around because humans are so much bigger than they are? When I watch videos of large cats I notice the same attitudes and behaviors that I see in my small cats. It is funny to see a small cat with the same attitude as a lion or tiger.

    March 3, 2025 at 3:18 pm #183428
    zerosum
    Participant

    Canada did not declare war against Russia.
    Hypocrite.
    Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau: Shameful Warmonger & Liar for Hire Until the Next One Takes Over

    …We’re going to be there to support Ukraine with whatever it takes for as long as it takes.

    Because Ukraine is not just defending its own territories, but defending the very principles and values that underpin all of our democracies.

    Obviously I’ve spent a lot of time with Volodymyr Zelensky over the years…I continue to emphasize to him that Canada will always stand with Ukraine.

    First of all, I think it’s important every chance we get to lie out the facts as clearly as possible.

    In 2014, Russia chose to invade Ukraine, to occupy Crimea and parts of eastern Ukraine. For that they were kicked out of G7.

    In 2022, they chose to violate the existing cease-fire and invaded Ukraine with the intention of taking Kiev in 3 days and the entire country in 3 weeks. That has failed.

    Russia continues to try to fight to claim more land in Ukraine. We could see an end to this war tomorrow if Russia decided to stop its illegal invasion of Ukraine.

    On Friday, in the Oval Office, President Zelensky pointed out, in so many words, that Vladimir Putin is a liar, a criminal and cannot be trusted to keep his word in any way shape or form, because he has demonstrated time and time again that he will break any agreement.

    I stand with Vladimir Zelensky. I stand with the people of Ukraine.”

    ————
    Now, with almost all of the “statesmen” of the Western bubble, you have to admit that their school education is terrible.
    They have twisted history so many times until it fits their narrative that they themselves no longer know what they are talking about.
    The German Chancellor says in an interview in front of cameras that Crimea has always belonged to Ukraine.
    The crazy Canadian says that Putin marched into Ukraine in 2014.
    The really bad thing about it… 85% of all those who hear and read this believe it because their school education probably took place in a tree nursery.

    Posted by: berthold | Mar 3 2025

    March 3, 2025 at 3:23 pm #183429
    Dr D Rich
    Participant

    D,
    You can watch tha Oval Office video again. JD and Trump “infantilize” Zelensky and then blame Zelensky for acting like the Object, child/infant, of JD’s and Trump’s shared Projection.
    Say thank you.
    Say it again.
    Respect me!
    Nice suit, chuckle.
    JD was “into it”.
    Trump?

    You gotta work on that cause n effect thingy, admittedly a confusing thing because it makes JD and Trump “look” like, your choice, mommy, daddy, boss, manage, director, CEO, Captain, Skipper, priest, rabbi, principal, Leader, SoS sans stuffed suit.
    It’s elemental, primitive, archaic ad nauseam.

    March 3, 2025 at 3:30 pm #183430
    Doc Robinson
    Participant

    Dr. D. – “They finally dug into USAID and found something not evil: teaching kids to read in Kenya. Like $100M? Well, assuming a single dollar got there, what kind of country is Kenya if they can’t teach their kids how to read on their own?”

    Whatever money Kenya can round up has to first pay the loan shark bankers.
    USAID will “help”, using taxpayer dollars to help bankers get more money out of Kenya.

    Kenya could run out of money to repay massive debts: how to avoid this

    Unless it secures a debt write-off, debt rescheduling, or similar deal to reduce the debt burden, Kenya will almost certainly end in debt default. The country must use every effort to avoid this possibility.

    When creditors believe that a country is likely to default, they seek to protect themselves from possible losses. Sometimes they force the government to take austerity measures.

    Austerity means reducing public spending on most needs, including education and health, physical infrastructure such as roads, and social programmes such as food subsidies. It may also force a country to raise revenues by increasing taxes or selling state-owned enterprises.

    https://theconversation.com/kenya-could-run-out-of-money-to-repay-massive-debts-how-to-avoid-this-237044

    March 3, 2025 at 3:33 pm #183431
    zerosum
    Participant

    “Where are our billions?!” – Ukrainians in panic over possible U.S. aid blockade

    The Ukrainian portal Defense Express is sounding the alarm: if Trump cuts off the flow of dollars, Kiev could lose tens of billions of American aid planned under Biden.

    $1.05 billion from the 2024 budget has not been used, and $2.8 billion discovered after an accounting error in 2023 were simply “forgotten” in Washington;

    The main threat is the potential halt of the USAID program, through which $30 billion has been allocated since 2022 for contracts with weapons manufacturers. Their fulfillment is stretched until 2026-2027, and the fate of these supplies is now in question;

    $3.3 billion remained in Pentagon warehouses for transferring weapons to Ukraine under the PDA program, but now these supplies may also be frozen.

    In total, more than $39 billion in aid is at risk.

    American taxpayers, get ready – there will be even more complaints from Ukrainians!

    Posted by: Jo | Mar 3 2025

    March 3, 2025 at 4:02 pm #183432
    Dr. D
    Participant

    RockAroundtheClock

    March 3, 2025 at 4:05 pm #183433
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    Trump and his cabinet have always known the score with Zelensky and the EU but were severely hampered by the fact that the American public did not know the score because they’re been steadily propagandized by the captured blobulist media for so many years. So, how can Trump get the word out?

    Well why not arrange a public meeting in which Zelensky says it in his own words right to their faces?

    Someone calls that a “setup”? The only thing that Zelenski was “set up” to do was expose the public to the same lies that he’s been saying behind closed doors since the day he was “elected” under totally false pretenses to use as a disposable battering ram to attack Russia and steal it’s stuff.

    Anyone who thinks that shining a light into the darkness is unfair play needs to save their breath and immediately seek moral and psychological guidance from a dependable source.

    March 3, 2025 at 4:25 pm #183434
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Sort of: if you come in acting like a child, you’re going to get treated like one. That’s no surprise, it’s not mean, it’s reality, it’s treating things as the way they really are.

    Nor is this a social, diplomatic thing. He’s not there for tea. He wants $300 Billion dollars we don’t have, unlimited backup, and to cause WWIII, which the U.S. quite honestly, will lose. So the ball is in his court. He is the SUPPLICANT, the beggar, the Sub position in this exchange. — I — didn’t put him there. Trump didn’t put him there. He didn’t have to come, and he didn’t have to ask.

    IF you ask for $300B, $2,000 from every working adult in the country, THEN I would expect you to yes, ACT as if that was a favor, a special condition, not taken for granted and dismissed. I’m not all kinds of broken up about it — his country’s being wrecked and is about to cease to exist, he and everyone he knows it about to be shot in the gutter — it’s an emotional time! Too bad. Sucks to be you. Nothing can change that YOU are here, begging US for $300B WE DO NOT HAVE, in order to kill more human beings, IN A WAR YOU WILL LOSE.

    So yeah, dusting off that suit he obediently wore for the WEF might be a good idea. Trump was GIVING HIM THE MONEY. For no good reason at all. Shut yer mouth and exit quietly.

    It’s about dominance? Yes, actually it is. The debtor is slave to the lender. This is worse. OBVIOUSLY the street beggar, about to be killed by his bookie, is lessor to a rich guy who’s just walking down the street.

    You now diagnose narcissists everywhere. Everyone is Cluster. Show me on the doll where Vance touched you. Now they may BE narcissists, probably are, and I could dgaf. I bloody hope they are since that makes them far MORE likely to slap the right people senseless who richly deserve it. But this is the world’s worst situation to identify and complain about it.

    As an American, I’d tell Ze no, just because he exists. I’d tell him hell no if he followed me dressed like that. I’d tell him never until every city is fixed, every battalion is re-fitted, and every American is rich. AFTER that, why then I’d STILL tell him no. And I’d have a list as long as your arm for reasons, starting with Washington’s Farewell Address, and ending with his stupid haircut. No. No means no. http://Www.no.com. Knock knock. Who’s there? No. No, nay never. No nay never no more.


    “You’re going to have to work very hard just to stay alive, Nick”

    That’s about where I am in negotiating with selling pencils to Ukraine. Hopefully he never comes back, and Don and Vance fly to Kiev to do this to him again, just for the lols on Pay Per View. Get thee gone.

    March 3, 2025 at 4:35 pm #183435
    Michael Reid
    Participant

    March 3, 2025 at 4:36 pm #183436
    Dr D Rich
    Participant

    It’s now weekly.

    Christ, these stupid fucks must be feeding at the same trough.
    What say you, D?

    March 3, 2025 at 5:06 pm #183437
    Dr D Rich
    Participant

    I guess you don’t genuinely understand it.
    Conditioning.
    Tractable.
    Brainstemming +/-, +/-, +/-
    Reflexive and it strikes to the very core.
    Wingmen gotta carry that water.
    The beauty of The Flying Monkey is he/she never has to be asked to protect Bad Daddy.

    Or perhaps it’s those not so subtle cues, patronizing hand pats, “you guys”, “you people”, demand for appreciation, demand for respect, identical red ties, the suits, always the suits.
    Trump adjusted Bibi’s chair earlier…not so much Volodymyr’s lately.
    No lunch for you. Now got to your room.
    $8 billion for you people!!

    March 3, 2025 at 5:38 pm #183438
    zerosum
    Participant

    In total, more than $39 billion in aid is going to be available to American taxpayers.

    March 3, 2025 at 6:10 pm #183439
    citizenx
    Participant

    candidate Zelensky and his oligarch backer, Ihor Kolomoisky

    Kolomoisky, a corrupt bank owner flees to Switzerland where Zel meets him numerous times. Then Kolomoisky move to Tel Aviv, Israel, where Zelensky continues to meet him...

    U.S. out of NATO, nato is strongarm for mic
    U.S. not a penny for Ukraine
    U.S. not a penny for Israel

    Why every U.S. President is beholden to Israel is a question for JFK?
    But ‘they’ blew his head off…

    The links between JFK, 9/11, Epstein, Ukraine, the media/ entertainment machine, Global Rothschilds banking, AIPAC…and Israel are irrefutable. Raise the points and, well, ‘conspiracy theorists’ anti semitic assaults inbound…

    It’s a mystery that’s not a mystery wrapped up in mystery of untouchable… WHY?

    I toured the WW2 battlefields, wept at Dachau…they had me psy-op’d too.
    Explore Ed Bernays and it all starts to unravel and spill forth…yet the average Joe and Jill just can’t fathom or comprehend reality.

    Shameful.

    Give any human the choice between total freedom vs no rules or laws…and the majority will choose slavery through subjugation. Humans simply cannot and will not trust each other to do the right thing, regardless of ‘laws’.

    Those of you asking why no arrests?
    We have all the laws…plain to see.
    They do not work as long as humans are filled with fear, anger, ignorance and corruption, eternity basically.

    Three poisons- anger, greed, ignorance fueled by desire. Oh well.

    Subservience to Israel remains for the West.
    Subservience to anything is obedience to insanity.

    Supposedly truth will set one free…

    …

    Elephants first steps… the journey of a thousand miles begins with the first.

    Can humans or humanness set ourselves free…?
    Not yet…worth a walk on or off the path, either way.

    March 3, 2025 at 6:49 pm #183440
    citizenx
    Participant

    Ursula van der Crazy, President of the unelected EU-

    “We must turn Ukraine into an indigestible steel porcupine….for future invaders.”

    How can any of these reporters not burst out laughing and interrupt this Nazi heir witch, and ask her if she is fucking retarded?

    The “leaders” of the war conference are blistering fucking morons…they’re f’n retarded.
    It’s the same insanity of woke tards, vax tards, leftists blm tards…. the mind virus is everywhere.

    Idiocracy 2025 on display. What is wrong with these people ?
    Are they all suffering from mad cow disease brain rot from the vaxz ?

    March 3, 2025 at 6:58 pm #183441
    citizenx
    Participant

    Alex Christoforou-

    These people are insane, they’re making me insane….

    Yep, they are f’n insane.
    When to do an intervention of the criminally insane?

    March 3, 2025 at 7:13 pm #183442
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    NATO is the product of the Blob (via the “American” D o D, via the equally phony “American” CIA), and the EU of course is the product of NATO.

    Nothing about the purpose of either or both of those institutions has anything at all to do with Russia, outside of the ultimate goal of robbing it to death.

    The purpose of the EU and its de-facto Department of Defense, NATO, is simply to centralize control over the decentralized independent nations of Europe. To do that they need a compellingly scary opponent as a reason and excuse for those nations to yield their individual sovereignty to a single command center (posing as an “Alliance”). First choice for boogeyman was the Communism and sheer Might of the vast and powerful Soviet Union.

    China might also serve that purpose in a pinch, but first lets focus on the Big Bear of the North.

    As of the present moment both the EU and NATO have chosen to proceed with that plan regardless of whether their old pal Uncle Sam wants in on the fiasco or not. US involvement isn’t really needed. In fact, the absence of the USA from the fight makes prospects even scarier and thus easier to use as a scare tactic on the helpless citizens of Europe’s many countries. To survive any kind of a serious war with Russia would require truly extraordinary and extreme yielding of power to a centralized European mutual defense command center (a military, economic and political command center, actually.)

    Trump wants out of that mess and has (so far successfully) managed to present a rather compelling explanation to the general public on why sitting this one out is a good and valid choice for America.

    He could not have espoused or presented that case without the express permission of the enormous Military Industrial Complex owners who have been using that mess for great personal profit for many years. Trump needed PERMISSION from the Blob (globalist-capitalist-communist-Zionist-Israeli-BlackRockist, Banker, MONEY-OWNERS) and he got that permission his favorite way. He cut them a deal for it. The deal was that he would trade Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip (which they get to keep) in exchange for which they let the Trumpians take Ukraine back from the globalist-capitalist-communist-Zionist-Israeli-BlackRockist MONEY OWNERS who have been trying to take it all for themselves.

    It was a straight-up “this for that” transaction, and not very nice at all, but that’s the way the game gets played in the Big League.

    The Bad Guys reckon that its an acceptable deal because they basically get the thing that’s really important to themselves. They get to rule Europe as a “One Europe Government” which keeps them, personally, owning a chair at the table (and the legal immunity and other perks that go with it.) Losing the war in Ukraine doesn’t cost them, personally, any damn thing at all, and from the position of Lords Of Europe they can resume the business of trying to do the same damn thing with the rest of the world. Fat chance of that, but so what? That doesn’t really interfere all that much with their lifestyle.

    It takes years to prep for a war, and even more years to fight one (regardless of whether you win or lose), the point is that IN THE MEANTIME they have what they need to become Lords of Europe. And THAT, dear friends, is why Europe wants war with Russia and will settle for nothing less UNLESS the peasants in their nations give them so much trouble that the would-be King & Court (NATO & EU) can’t manage to actually accomplish true consolidation. That’s what I see happening in the real world. They haven’t got the money, guns and information control to pull it off, and Europe returns to a more primitive state of independent nations with 3rd World economies.

    March 3, 2025 at 7:46 pm #183443
    kultsommer
    Participant

    …..Nor is this a social, diplomatic thing. He’s not there for tea. He wants $300 Billion dollars we don’t have, unlimited backup, and to cause WWIII,………

    How about “The Plan” did not work out and everything is about face-saving exit – regardless how clumsy and graceless it is and for a thinking people to see through.

    March 3, 2025 at 7:54 pm #183444
    ram
    Participant

    NATO is nothing more than a renamed Nazi Germany and conquered territories. One moment people were Nazi SS Intelligence Officers and then suddenly they became NATO Intelligence Officers. I personally knew quite a few people this happened with.

    March 3, 2025 at 8:17 pm #183445
    Dr. D
    Participant

    No

    Caption: “Can I just say one more thing?”

    March 3, 2025 at 8:25 pm #183446
    Dr. D
    Participant

    What’ if it’s “The Plan” to win Iraq and/or make money by killing random people and/or “The Plan” to take over Ukraine and steal Russia, and if it doesn’t work out say “Oops, Ackshully, we never meant that”?

    Oh yeah, I’m totally good with that. That’s #2 Theory on my list, right after “Fight among oligarchs”. Make your case and lift it to #1.

    “We lost but we didn’t actually lose, ACKSHULLY we never wanted that dirty Ukraine anyway. It were the other guy whut dun it.”

    March 3, 2025 at 9:28 pm #183448
    Dr D Rich
    Participant

    The mature hand-waving gets you every time in that photograph, right?

    Not my money.
    He wants my money
    ((Wave hand, gesticulate))

    March 3, 2025 at 9:56 pm #183449
    John Day
    Participant

    Trying To Have A World War https://drjohnsblog.substack.com/p/trying-to-have-a-world-war

    Over the weekend I saw Alex Krainer in 2 videos, explaining what happened Friday in the White House, with Trump and Zelensky. It appears to have been a set-up on the part of globalists, using Zelensky, who was pre-coached by Starmer, Macron, and just before the meeting, by Democratic Senator, Chris Murphy, extracting a commitment from Zelensky to “not back down”. Zelensky and his party had been instructed to follow protocol and to come wearing suits. Ukraine’s #2, Yermak, who never wears a suit, wore a suit. Zelensky did not, and was dinged by Trump upon arrival.
    The September 2024 proposal by Zelensky to candidate Trump, for “$500 billion” of Ukrainian rare-earth and other mineral resources, was meant to keep Team Trump engaged on Ukraine’s side.
    That deal also looked good to The City of London, it appears, so a few days before Trump took office in January, Kier Starmer signed a 100 year friendship agreement between the UK and Ukraine, whereby the UK would give Ukraine $3 billion/year “as long as necessary”. It appears that there is a secret addendum to that treaty, which is the deal Zelensky offered Trump, already turned over to the UK/City-of-London.
    It is presumed that Russia knew and Trump knew that this signing of a vague “framework” without specifics on Friday would have been empty ceremony, but it was used by Zelensky as a stage to play a specific part to American and global audiences, the part of a noble Ukrainian victim of a Trump-Vance ambush.
    Following the White House drama, Zelensky left without lunch, and went to London, where he was embraced by Starmer with words of succor, and numerous EU heads tweeted their support, then arrived for a summit, to promise support, and propose a combined war plan, called a peace plan, which will still need US troops as a backstop, and is a non-starter. It proposes a ceasefire, followed by the insertion of “peacekeepers” of nuclear-armed Britain and France, which Russia would target as belligerents. European finance is locked-into a large European war through financial commitments, by every rumor. Martin Armstrong says that chances for a hot WW-3 n Europe rise sharply after mid May. Another EU summit will happen Thursday in Brussels, with a lot of division already apparent. Hungary and Slovakia will not make war on Russia, and very much want Russian gas and oil.
    There is an ongoing rumor, now more fleshed out, that negotiations are underway through back-channels to get Nordstream delivering gas to German industry again, which is pro-nationalist and anti-globalist in the current array of interests.
    As global resources, especially energy resources, are about to terminally decline, the globalist approach wants to subordinate individual humans with AI, digital money and smartphones, while subordinating national governments through bribery and coercion of government officers. Global oligarchs would rule. Nationalist interests might ultimately be interested in the granular electronic control of individuals, but for the moment seek populist support for nationalist reconstruction of productive industries, in which deal working people will be offered a good enough deal to raise families and participate enthusiastically.
    I think this could buy 20 good years for our world, but the nature of the real situation would need to be engaged openly and constructively.

    Alex Krainer: The Hidden Wars Ukraine’s Minerals and Global Power Plays https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tO7bhSRGhoI

    Hal Turner: Europe SMASHES Trump Peace Effort for Ukraine; Adopts untenable position
    It turns out that the British had already signed a deal that provided Ukraine “security guarantees” and right of access to Ukraine’s gas, oil, rare earth minerals, oversight of Ukraine’s ports, and opportunity to invest in the rebuilding of Ukraine, (signed between the two nations three days before President Trump’s inauguration, on the 17th of January 2025). They were looking to sucker the United States into providing security for THEIR exploitation of Ukraine. https://halturnerradioshow.com/index.php/news-selections/world-news/europe-smashes-trump-peace-effort-for-ukraine-adopts-untenable-position

    Gilbert Doctorow from Saturday, The Trump-Zelensky fracas in the White House
    Yesterday’s Trump-Zelensky press conference marks a historical turning point. We were all witnesses to the moment that Ukraine was ‘thown under the bus,’ meaning when Washington said it will not provide security guarantees to Ukraine and will not supply further arms. We all understood why this is happening. I borrow from the remarks of Donald Trump yesterday when I say it is to spare the world a progression to World War III that Zelensky and his backers in the European Union are blithely courting by backing a lost cause. Kiev does not have the manpower for a fair-and-square victory on the field of battle. Kiev is using physical force to dragoon men off the city streets and send them to the field of battle, as Trump correctly observed.
    In telling Zelensky point blank that he ‘has no cards to play,’ Donald Trump was calling for a Technical Knock-Out if I may introduce the language of boxing matches…
    ..Russia has also publicly declared its readiness to use its tactical nuclear arsenal to annihilate any NATO ‘peacekeeping’ troops that Britain, France and other Allied nations are foolish enough to send into Ukraine. They are saying that they have no intention of going into the trenches to shoot down NATO soldiers. No, they will wipe out 10,000 troop concentrations at a blow with their nuclear arms, and will not have any regrets because they have given fair warning to the enemy…
    ..To anyone with eyes to see, ears to hear it is clear that the game is up, that Trump has washed his hands of Zelensky. https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2025/03/01/the-trump-zelensky-fracas-in-the-white-house/

    Promises… Starmer vows to support Ukraine ‘for as long as it takes’ https://www-kommersant-ru.translate.goog/doc/7550199?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp

    March 3, 2025 at 10:00 pm #183450
    John Day
    Participant

    Zelensky Met with Dems Before He Met President Trump
    Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) encouraged Zelensky to reject deal with Trump, confirms my suspicion the Dems have been acting as agents for Ukrainian oligarchic state. https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/zelensky-met-with-dems-before-he

    Money from where? Macron announced hundreds of billions in aid to Ukraine https://www-kommersant-ru.translate.goog/doc/7550195?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp

    France & Britain put nuclear weapons in Poland and Germany? Macron reopens debate on European nuclear umbrella after Trump-Zelensky showdown https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20250301-macron-reopens-debate-on-european-nuclear-umbrella-after-trump-zelensky-showdown

    Gilbert Doctorow, Keir Starmer’s 4-point Ceasefire plan
    Day by day the blindness and obtuseness of British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and of his French comrade President Emmanuel Macron reach new and unimaginable heights.
    This is perfectly clear from this morning’s Financial Times’ extensive report on the outcome of the meeting of 19 European leaders that Starmer convened in London on Sunday…
    ..Starmer and Macron have decided to speak to Trump on Ukraine’s behalf. They are proposing a one-month Cease Fire that will cover hostile actions in the air, sea and relating to energy infrastructure. They do not propose to watch the 1000 km long battlefront, presumably because that is beyond their capabilities…
    ..Here it is stunning that they are not listening to the flat refusal of President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Lavrov in their public statements of the past week to allow any stationing of foreign troops in Ukraine as guarantors of security…
    ..Zelensky gave a rambling answer in line with the boorish remarks he delivered in the Oval Office. He said that the much-awaited deal on rare earth was still ready for signing, but quietly added that it had to include a U.S. security guaranty for his country after the war. Very good, but such a guaranty was explicitly refused by Trump. https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2025/03/03/keir-starmers-4-point-ceasefire-plan/

    Celia Farber, Starmer/Zelensky/EU “Securing Our Future” Summit Culminates With Starmer Pledging New Billions To Ukraine And Committing To British “Boots On The Ground And Planes In The Sky”
    Zelensky Says Americans “Will Have To Send Their Sons and Daughters To Fight…” (Invoking NATO) “…And They Will Be Dying.” How Will The Crown Drag The US Into A World War It Doesn’t Want THIS Time? https://celiafarber.substack.com/p/starmerzelenskyeu-securing-our-future

    March 3, 2025 at 10:01 pm #183451
    John Day
    Participant

    Gilbert Doctorow, European leaders commit collective suicide at a support Ukraine meeting convened by PM Keir Starmer in London
    Among the 19 whom I counted when they posed for the obligatory group photo were Emmanuel Macron, Donald Tusk, Georgia Meloni, Justin Trudeau, Mark Rutte, Ursula von der Leyen.
    In the few introductory words delivered by Keir Starmer, we heard that their common mission is to provide for European security, in which defending Ukraine plays a vital role. They seemingly wish to arrive at a common position on defending Ukraine that they will later present to Washington.
    The problem with this is that they are knowingly running directly against the now crystal clear position of Donald Trump to wash his hands of Zelensky and to allow the Russians to finish up this war as they see best…
    ..By their present gathering, these leaders are setting the stage for a U.S. pull-out from NATO. They forget how the United States under any president, not just Donald J. Trump, reacts to defiance from allies…
    ..As for Keir Starmer, he must be the stupidest of the lot. When in Washington meeting with Donald Trump, he was offered a tariff free trade deal with the USA that his country has sought ever since Brexit. He failed to see that this was the deal: you get tariff free trade if you just shut up about Ukraine. But shut up this oaf could not do. https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2025/03/02/european-leaders-commit-collective-suicide-at-a-support-ukraine-meeting-convened-by-pm-keir-starmer-in-london/

    European Reality Check: Without The US There Is No NATO And No Ukraine https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/european-reality-check-without-us-there-no-nato-and-no-ukraine

    Europe is descending into energy-death, soon to become irreversible: No Escape from Fantasy Land https://thehonestsorcerer.substack.com/p/no-escape-from-fantasy-land

    Putin Ally In Secret Talks With Trump Admin To Restart Nord Stream 2 https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/putin-ally-secret-talks-trump-admin-restart-nord-stream-2

    German factories counting on return of Russian gas – Bloomberg
    As rising energy costs pressure EU economies, industrial leaders are reportedly advocating for resuming imports if peace in the Ukraine conflict is achieved https://swentr.site/news/613537-german-factories-counting-on-return-russian-gas/

    March 3, 2025 at 10:02 pm #183452
    John Day
    Participant

    Hungary has a complaint against Ukraine at the EU for this: The Ukrainian Armed Forces attempted to attack the Turkish Stream infrastructure in order to cut off gas supplies to Europe https://en.topcor.ru/57197-vsu-popytalis-atakovat-infrastrukturu-tureckogo-potoka-chtoby-perekryt-podachu-gaza-v-evropu.html

    Europe is Falling & Needs War with Russia – Martin Armstrong
    It looks like Zelensky intentionally started a fight with Trump in the White House. It also looks like every country in Europe is backing more war in Ukraine. And now, there is renewed talk of an EU army. Armstrong says, “Why? Because they all are facing the collapse of the European Union. The debt is just unbelievable. They never consolidated. Between Covid, Climate Change and sanctions on Russia, the German economy has shrunk . . . 3% to 5%. The economic growth (of the EU) is appalling. Europe is falling, and this is why they need war. So, they are backing Zelensky.”…
    ..In a new report released yesterday, Armstrong lays out the case why war in Europe is coming and coming soon. Armstrong points out, “In this report, I gathered a bunch of headlines: London Financial Times, what’s the headline? ‘America is Now the Enemy of the West.’ This is why Trump is saying ‘We are out.’ …
    ..So, why are all these reports coming out in the last few months about gold coming to America from Europe? Armstrong says, “Last week, I was on the phone, and I can’t tell you how much, but when you are about to go into war, capital moves. . . . Right now, I am concerned from about May 15th on. https://usawatchdog.com/europe-is-falling-needs-war-with-russia-martin-armstrong/

    Putin-Trump Summit Being Expedited In Wake Of Zelensky White House Row https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/putin-trump-summit-being-expedited-wake-zelensky-white-house-row

    Bessent “Shocked” By Scale Of Fraud Already Uncovered By DOGE
    “I think we can make a pretty big hit here,” he replied, explaining that if DOGE identifies $300 billion in savings – which he suggested is possible – it could reduce the annual deficit by approximately 1 percentage point as a share of gross domestic product (GDP). https://www.zerohedge.com/political/bessent-shocked-scale-fraud-already-uncovered-doge-mocks-msms-biden-vibecession-narrative

    We won’t give Kiev money until Zelensky seeks peace – US official
    Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky was given a clear message during his meeting with US President Donald Trump on Friday, that further financial support hinges on Ukraine’s willingness to negotiate peace, US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has said. His comments follow Zelensky’s heated confrontation with Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance. https://swentr.site/news/613589-us-wont-give-kiev-money-unless-zelensky-wants-peace/

    March 3, 2025 at 10:02 pm #183453
    John Day
    Participant

    US State Department slashes USAID assistance to Ukraine https://swentr.site/news/613530-usaid-slash-energy-aid-ukraine/

    US Reportedly Halts Offensive Cyber Ops Against Russia As Trump Pulls World Back From Brink
    Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered a suspension of offensive cyber operations against Russia. The length of the pause is uncertain but the purpose seems clear: To demonstrate good will as the Trump administration earnestly seeks a negotiated end to the three-year-old war in Ukraine. https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/us-halts-offensive-cyber-ops-against-russia-trump-pulls-world-back-brink

    Celia Farber: GO ROMANIA! A Very Bad Day For EU, Election Rigging Crime Gang, As Romanians Take To The Streets In HUGE Numbers To Take Their Country Back: “We Are Romania And Cālin Georgescu Is Our President!” “This Time We Won’t Let Them Arrest Him.” https://celiafarber.substack.com/p/go-romania-a-very-bad-day-for-eu

    FBI Returns 33 Boxes Of Trump Property Seized During Mar-a-Lago Raid https://www.zerohedge.com/political/fbi-returns-33-boxes-trump-property-seized-during-mar-lago-raid

    Celia Farber, Epstein File Initial Release Contained Child Po*N, Says Victim’s Lawyer. FBI Subverted Bondi’s Orders, Have Possibly Gone Rogue. DOJ Uploads Epstein Files. Nobody Seems To Be Driving The Narrative Bus https://celiafarber.substack.com/p/epstein-file-initial-release-contained

    March 3, 2025 at 10:03 pm #183454
    John Day
    Participant

    Celia Farber, Why Don’t We Talk About The Very Well Documented Organ Trafficking Rings (US-Ukraine-Germany-Turkey-Israel) Preying On Ukrainian Soldiers And Even Children? USAID Funded NGO Ran Organ Trafficking. Americans and Europeans Alike Know NOTHING About This War, And It Receives 0.0 Media Coverage. https://celiafarber.substack.com/p/why-dont-we-talk-about-the-very-well

    Trump impressed by Vance’s handling of Zelensky – WSJ, Trump has reportedly told White House staff that his former vice president “would have never done that.” https://swentr.site/news/613584-trump-impressed-vance-zelensky-handling/

    Musk tips Vance to become US president
    Tech billionaire and Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) chief Elon Musk has called US Vice President J.D. Vance “our future President,” fueling speculation about Vance’s political ambitions.
    Musk’s remarks followed a post on X addressing the tense exchange between Vance and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer over free speech policies during an Oval Office meeting on Thursday. https://swentr.site/news/613535-musk-says-vance-future-president/

    Caitlin Johnstone, Trump Sends Netanyahu Weapons While Talking Tough To Zelensky https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/trump-sends-netanyahu-weapons-while

    Israel Blocks All Humanitarian Aid To Gaza As Ceasefire Could Collapse https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/israel-blocks-all-humanitarian-aid-gaza-ceasefire-could-collapse

    March 3, 2025 at 10:03 pm #183455
    John Day
    Participant

    Caitlin Johnstone, Israel Begins Choking Gaza Again, Backed By Adelson Stooge Trump https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/israel-begins-choking-gaza-again

    Israeli army preparing to resume fighting in Gaza if no agreement reached to extend ceasefire​ https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20250301-israeli-army-preparing-to-resume-fighting-in-gaza-if-no-agreement-reached-to-extend-ceasefire-report/

    ​ Israeli gov. unilaterally agrees to US proposal for truce extension
    The Israeli occupation has agreed to extend the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip during the month of Ramadan and Passover, as the government continues to escape 2nd phase talks.​ https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/israeli-gov–agrees-to-witkoff-s-plan-for-extended-truce-in

    ​ UNICEF says half a million children in Lebanon unable to attend school amid Israeli bombardment
    UNICEF’s deputy representative in Lebanon highlights significant toll that Israel’s ongoing attacks on Lebanon taking on people, particularly children, who are enduring severe trauma and hardship​ https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/unicef-says-half-a-million-children-in-lebanon-unable-to-attend-school-amid-israeli-bombardment/3496339

    Israeli DM: US Gave Israel Green Light to Stay in Lebanon ‘Indefinitely’​, Occupation of southern Lebanon not ‘time-dependent’​ https://news.antiwar.com/2025/02/27/israeli-dm-us-gave-israel-green-light-to-stay-in-lebanon-indefinitely/

    March 3, 2025 at 10:04 pm #183456
    John Day
    Participant

    ​ $4BN In Military Aid To Israel​
    ​ Zelensky got his dressing down on Friday for basically never being satisfied even after the billions in US taxpayer dollars poured into Kiev’s coffers over several years. He was accused by President Trump and VP J.D. Vance of being ungrateful and rude in the Oval Office meeting.
    ​ As for the other country which routinely receives billion in US defense funds and foreign aid​; should we expect Netanyahu to receive the same treatment? ​…
    US Secretary of State Marco Rubio unveiled on Saturday that he has signed a declaration to expedite delivery of some $4 billion in military assistance to Israel.​ Rubio added that the Trump administration “will continue to use all available tools to fulfill America’s long-standing commitment to Israel’s security, including means to counter security threats.”
    ​ “Rubio said he had used emergency authority to expedite the delivery of military assistance to Israel, which is now in a fragile ceasefire with U.S.-designated terrorist organization Hamas in their war in Gaza,” Reuters writes.
    ​ Almost $12 billion in major foreign military sales has already been approved by the Trump administration since January 20, even as the White House has hailed the fragile Hamas truce and hostage handover as happening because of Trump taking office.
    ​ While Americans have by and large turned on Zelensky, and have grown weary of the persisting Russia-Ukraine war, support for Israel among the US public remains high – and so Trump is unlikely to come under fire from his base.​ https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/us-back-turned-ukraine-rubio-expedites-delivery-4bn-military-aid-israel

    Egyptian, UK leaders stress need for Gaza reconstruction without displacement of residents​ https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/egyptian-uk-leaders-stress-need-for-gaza-reconstruction-without-displacement-of-residents/3496719

    Israeli bulldozers demolish homes in Nour Shams refugee camp on 1st day of Ramadan​ https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20250301-israeli-bulldozers-demolish-homes-in-nour-shams-refugee-camp-on-1st-day-of-ramadan/

    “​Defend” recently-captured Damascus suburb from counterattack: Netanyahu, Katz instruct Israeli army to ‘defend’ Syria’s Jaramana
    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Security Minister, Israel Katz, instructed the Israeli occupation forces to prepare to “defend” Jaramana in the Syrian capital Damascus’ suburbs.
    ​ On Saturday, a statement issued by Netanyahu claimed that “Jaramana was under attack by the Syrian regime’s forces,” adding “We will not allow the terroristic Islamic extremist regime in Syria to harm the Druze community. If it were harmed, then we will harm it [the regime] back.”​ https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/netanyahu–katz-instruct-israeli-army-to–defend–syria-s-ja

    ​ Andrew Korybko, Why’s Israel Reportedly Lobbying The US To Keep Russia’s Bases In Syria?
    The little that was revealed sheds light on what Israel might have in mind, namely an informal trilateral arrangement centered on their shared interests in preventing Turkiye from dominating post-Assad Syria.​ https://korybko.substack.com/p/whys-israel-reportedly-lobbying-the

    March 3, 2025 at 10:05 pm #183457
    John Day
    Participant

    From Friday: PKK Founder Orders Kurdish Group To Lay Down Its Arms, Dissolve In Historic Statement
    ​ A grand deal involving Turkey, Syria, and the Kurds is in the works, and on Thursday a historic announcement was made by the leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
    ​ Abdullah Ocalan, speaking from a Turkish prison, has called on the group that he founded to lay down its arms and disband. This is the result of years of running Turkish-PKK battles as well as fragile negotiations. The PKK has long been in an official state of war with the Turkish government, which considers it a terrorist organization.
    ​ “Convene your congress and make a decision,” Ocalan said in the statement, read aloud both in Kurdish and in Turkish. “All groups must lay down their arms and the P.K.K. must dissolve itself.”​ https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/pkk-founder-orders-kurdish-group-lay-down-its-arms-dissolve-historic-statement

    ​From Eleni in Athens: Kurdish militant chief Ocalan’s peace call prompts hope, scepticism in Turkey http://www.defenddemocracy.press/kurdish-militant-chief-ocalans-peace-call-prompts-hope-scepticism-in-turkey/

    Also from Eleni: SDF chief says PKK disarmament call ‘not related to us in Syria’
    Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) commander Mazloum Abdi said he welcomed the historic call by Abdullah Ocalan for the PKK to drop its decades-long armed struggle against the Turkish state, which he said would have positive consequences in the region.
    ​ But Abdi said the long-imprisoned Ocalan’s announcement on Thursday applied only to the PKK and was “not related to us in Syria”.
    ​ Abdi’s comment signalled Ocalan’s announcement would have no immediate impact on the SDF despite the affiliation of Syria’s main Kurdish groups at the core of the SDF – the People’s Protection Units (YPG) – to the PKK.​ https://www.defenddemocracy.press/sdf-chief-says-pkk-disarmament-call-not-related-to-us-in-syria/

    ​ Just Hours Until Trump Tariff Barrage On China, Canada, & Mexico: Here’s The Latest
    ​ On Tuesday, absent any last minute surprise, President Trump will slap new tariffs on Canada and Mexico while doubling a levy on China, moves that would dramatically expand his push to revive domestic manufacturing, tap new revenues and rebalance ties with the biggest US trading partners.
    ​ The long-promised tariffs scheduled to take effect at midnight on Tuesday would be among the most sweeping of the Trump era, applying to roughly $1.5 trillion in annual imports. They would put a 25% tariff on all imports from Canada and Mexico, except Canadian energy, which would face a 10% rate. He has also said he’ll double a tariff on China to 20%.​ https://www.zerohedge.com/economics/just-hours-until-trump-tariff-brrage-china-canada-and-mexico-heres-latest

    ​Meryl Nass MD, The facts about measles in a one minute read, written by me and published in the BMJ https://merylnass.substack.com/p/the-facts-about-measles-in-a-one

    March 3, 2025 at 10:06 pm #183458
    John Day
    Participant

    Meryl Nass MD, Measles: deaths since 1980 According to Our World in Data https://merylnass.substack.com/p/measles-deaths-since-1980

    ​ Meryl Nass MD​, I clarify the Associated Press’ article on the Texas measles outbreak and RFK
    It is really disturbing to see how the press spins things, when you happen to know the subject.​ https://merylnass.substack.com/p/i-clarify-the-associated-press-article

    RFK Jr. Says Vaccinations Available As Texas Measles Outbreak Expands​ https://www.zerohedge.com/medical/rfk-jr-says-vaccinations-available-texas-measles-outbreak-expands

    ​ Jessica Rose Ph.D. shows that COVID gene-therapies increase risk of catching COVID, as we have seen elsewhere. I must wonder what the relative-risk of catching measles is: Breakthrough Infection Signal In VAERS Corroborates IgG4-Mediated Increased Susceptibility To SARS-CoV-2 https://jessicar.substack.com/p/breakthrough-infection-signal-in

    Alex Washburne, The Strength of Evidence for a Lab Origin
    ​ Time, forensic analyses of the SARS-CoV-2 genome, and further evidence has only strengthened the case for a lab origin. We can further strengthen the case with more evidence, but with information in the public domain we already have enough evidence to justify probable cause to investigate DEFUSE PI’s, preponderance of evidence in civil suits of DEFUSE PI’s, and beyond-reasonable-doubt confidence that SAR-CoV-2 emerged from a lab even if we don’t know who held the pipette. I’ll let lawyers figure out if bypassing biosafety safeguards and accidentally killing 20 million people constitutes negligence, if causing a global pandemic is a crime.​ https://alexwasburne.substack.com/p/the-strength-of-evidence-for-a-lab

    March 3, 2025 at 11:36 pm #183459
    WES
    Participant

    Ukraine Prefunded and Trump Proofed:

    Biden and his Globalist masters prefunded and Trump proofed Ukraine in every way they could.
    Trump may simply be waiting until all the existing money and arms run out so the Trump proofing matters little anymore.
    Trump is exposing the Globalists desire to stop peace and continue the war.

    This gives Russia more time to crush the Ukraine and the Globalists.

    March 4, 2025 at 12:23 am #183460
    Michael Reid
    Participant

    March 4, 2025 at 1:03 am #183465
    zerosum
    Participant

    https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/03/further-amendment-to-duties-addressing-the-synthetic-opioid-supply-chain-in-the-peoples-republic-of-china/

    FURTHER AMENDMENT TO DUTIES ADDRESSING THE SYNTHETIC OPIOID SUPPLY CHAIN IN THE PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CHINA
    EXECUTIVE ORDER
    March 3, 2025
    By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701 et seq.) (IEEPA), the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1601 et seq.), section 604 of the Trade Act of 1974, as amended (19 U.S.C. 2483), and section 301 of title 3, United States Code, I hereby determine and order:

    Section 1. Background. With Executive Order 14195 of February 1, 2025 (Imposing Duties to Address the Synthetic Opioid Supply Chain in the People’s Republic of China), I determined that the failure of the Government of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to act to blunt the sustained influx of synthetic opioids, including fentanyl, flowing from the PRC to the United States constituted an unusual and extraordinary threat, which has its source in substantial part outside the United States, to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States. To address that threat, I invoked my authority under section 1702(a)(1)(B) of IEEPA to impose ad valorem tariffs on articles that are products of the PRC, as defined by the Federal Register notice described in section 2(d) of Executive Order 14195, as amended by Executive Order 14200 of February 5, 2025 (Amendment to Duties Addressing the Synthetic Opioid Supply Chain in the People’s Republic of China).

    Pursuant to section 3 of Executive Order 14195, I have determined that the PRC has not taken adequate steps to alleviate the illicit drug crisis through cooperative enforcement actions, and that the crisis described in Executive Order 14195 has not abated.

    Sec. 2. Amendment. In recognition of the fact that the PRC has not taken adequate steps to alleviate the illicit drug crisis, section 2(a) of Executive Order 14195 is hereby amended by striking the words “10 percent” and inserting in lieu thereof the words “20 percent”.

    Sec. 3. General Provisions. (a) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:
    (i) the authority granted by law to an executive department, agency, or the head thereof; or
    (ii) the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.
    (b) This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations.
    (c) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.

    THE WHITE HOUSE,
    March 3, 2025.

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