Apple Archives - The Automatic Earth

Maria Zakharova:

“At yesterday’s meeting in Washington, the President of Finland, Stubb, literally said the following: “Finland has an extensive border with Russia and has its own experience of interacting with this country during World War II. We found a solution in 1944, and I… pic.twitter.com/G9cPC9PTTm

— Zlatti71 (@Zlatti_71) August 19, 2025

Stubb: "We found a solution in 1944, I believe we can in 2025."

Completely unprompted, Finland decides to remind world it fought against Russians alongside the Nazis.

In a war it lost, which resulted in Finland ceding its territory, paying reparations, and charging its own… pic.twitter.com/rbgldl1EoR

— Margarita Simonyan (@M_Simonyan) August 18, 2025

The fake "Abduction" of Ukrainian Children by Russia is one of the most pernicious and false lies peddled by Kiev and its corrupt backers.

Kiev says that Russia "Kidnapped" 20k Ukrainian kids, The BBC says 30k? Meanwhile, researchers from Yale in the USA say it's 8.4k?.

And… pic.twitter.com/w4YhWAYQUy

— Chay Bowes (@BowesChay) August 19, 2025

Lest we forget. It’s all a hot air bubble.

“Europe will spend $100 billion it does not have, to buy weapons from America that it does not have, to arm soldiers that Ukraine now lacks…”

• Europe Has No Money, US Has No Weapons, Ukraine Has No Soldiers (ZH)

Part of Zelensky’s motive for wearing a suit Monday to the White House has become clearer with fresh reporting in the Financial Times, which reviewed a document showing Ukraine will promise to buy $100 billion of American weapons financed by Europe in a bid to obtain robust US security guarantees. Additionally, “Under the proposals, Kyiv and Washington would also strike a $50bn deal to produce drones with Ukrainian companies that have pioneered the technology since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022,” the report continues. Ukraine pitched its plan during the Monday White House summit, which also involved seven EU leaders – and the $100BN arms deal became part of the key talking points pushed by the European allies. This is an effort by design meant to ensure Ukraine can procure what it wants – and that its war efforts can still be funded uninterrupted – while still ultimately appeasing Trump.

“We’re not giving anything. We’re selling weapons,” Trump had said Monday in response to a reporter’s question on the matter. It remains very obvious that Europe’s demands of keeping up huge pressure on Russia, including through sanctions, are intended to stymie any US-backed deal seen as too favorable to Moscow. The FT report comments on this as follows: The document details how Ukraine intends to make a counter-pitch to the US after Trump appeared to align himself with Russia’s position for ending the war following his meeting with President Vladimir Putin in Alaska last week. It reiterates Ukraine’s call for a ceasefire that Trump had espoused but then dropped after his Putin meeting in favor of the pursuit of a comprehensive peace settlement. Geopolitical analyst and commentator Glenn Diesen has pointed out, however, that Kiev is essentially attempting to create leverage out of nothing.

“Europe will spend $100 billion it does not have, to buy weapons from America that it does not have, to arm soldiers that Ukraine now lacks,” he wrote, explaining further: “This is to confront Russia, which for 30 years warned it would respond to NATO militarizing its borders.” Diesen followed by doing something that Washington policy-makers refuse to do, and that is look at the big picture of how we got here [emphasis ZH]: There was no threat to Ukraine before 2014, as only a tiny minority of Ukrainians wanted to join NATO, and Russia laid no claim to any of Ukraine’s territory. Western governments then supported a coup to pull Ukraine into NATO’s orbit – something that CIA Directors, Ambassadors, and Western state leaders had warned would instigate a security competition and likely trigger a war.

Russia predictably reacted fiercely. Ever since then, the only acceptable narrative has been that Russia wants to restore the Soviet Union and that Putin is Hitler. Any dissent is labelled as “disinformation”, “propaganda”, “hybrid warfare”, or even treason. The war has now been lost, and the Americans are pulling away from it, asking the Europeans to absorb the consequences. How do the Europeans respond? By doubling down on this madness, which will destroy Ukraine, our economies, and our relevance in the world – and possibly trigger a nuclear war. – What is the strategy? More of the same? The best thing for Ukraine is to remove it from the frontlines of the geopolitical struggle over where to draw the new dividing lines in Europe: End the war, rebuild Ukraine, and replace expansionist military blocs with the principle of indivisible security.

“While the immediate effort may have failed, “most likely, Europe will soon try again…”

• Kiev’s Backers Fail To Sway Trump On Russia – Poletaev (RT)

The White House meeting on Monday between US President Donald Trump and Ukraine’s European backers produced no major results, political analyst Sergey Poletaev has told RT. Trump met to discuss the Ukraine conflict with Vladimir Zelensky and some European leaders in Washington just days after holding a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska. “Just like in Anchorage, no decisions were announced afterward. And that, in itself, is a sign that something important is happening,” Poletaev said, noting that the talks are part of a larger diplomatic struggle, the ultimate goal of which is to win over the US president.

He suggested that Moscow is seeking to draw Washington out of the conflict, while Europe and Ukraine are pushing to keep the US firmly entangled. Following what Poletaev called Putin’s “gambit” in Anchorage, the European delegation hurried to Washington to persuade Trump to toughen sanctions against Moscow and maintain weapons deliveries to Kiev. So far, it looks like they came up empty. Poletaev pointed out that, unusually for the US president, he did not repeat European talking points after the meeting. Instead, Trump reminded the European leaders at the start of the summit that “they had no real power,” the analyst said. While the immediate effort may have failed, “most likely, Europe will soon try again,” Poletaev stressed.

According to the analyst, the key issue at Monday’s summit was security guarantees for Ukraine. Russia has insisted “from day one” that any such commitments must be tied to “neutrality and disarmament,” he said. Europe and Kiev, meanwhile, are desperately trying – by hook or by crook – to preserve Ukraine’s armed forces, and even to push for a NATO presence on Ukrainian soil. According to Poletaev, the attempts are “naive and desperate,” but whatever form security guarantees take in any eventual peace deal will ultimately determine “the fate of the Kiev regime.” “For now, there’s no compromise in sight,” Poletaev concluded. “And as Ukraine continues to lose ground on the battlefield, the room for maneuver – for both Kiev and its European backers – is shrinking fast.”

“So yes, the Ukraine can have ‘security guarantees’. But the conditions of those will be set by the main guarantor – which has to be Russia..”

• ‘Coalition Of The Willing’ Failed To Outplay Trump – Medvedev (ZH)

Former Russian President and top Kremlin national security official Dmitry Medvedev said on Tuesday that European leaders had failed to outplay Donald Trump, and that it remains unclear just how Ukraine’s Zelensky will prevent the issue of territorial concessions. White House officials, including Trump himself in prior statements, have made it known that compromise regarding territory is indeed on the table. “The anti-Russian warmongering Coalition of the Willing failed to outplay @POTUS on his turf,” Medvedev said on X. “Europe thanked & sucked up to him.” The below optics certainly don’t contradict Medvedev. One commenter observes that Trump had likely “been waiting for a moment like this his whole life”…

I suppose Trump had been waiting for a moment like this his whole life…

If you truly represent a sovereign nation, you don’t just go along. You tell the host that this spectacle is humiliating, that he can play those games with others – but you don’t allow yourself to be… pic.twitter.com/t87UOaKgH8

— Zlatti71 (@Zlatti_71) August 19, 2025

Medvedev said the question remains “what tune” Zelenskyy would play “about guarantees & territories back home, once he’s put on his green military uniform again.” It is true that far-right elements within his own military and political establishment would react fiercely to any acts of territorial concessions – which would likely result in acts of violence, and possibly even threats on Zelensky’s life. At the same time, coming off his Alaska summit with Trump, Russia’s President Putin remains firmly in the driver’s seat, amid steady ground advances on the battlefield. During a break in Monday’s meeting among seven EU officials and Zelensky, German Chancellor Merz revealed during a break in talks, “the American president spoke with the Russian president on the phone and agreed that there would be a meeting between the Russian president and the Ukrainian president within the next two weeks.”

But whether this happens or will largely depend of what happens in the interim, and Kiev’s attitude and statements on what it’s willing to concede. The geopolitics source Moon of Alabama highlights the perspective of former MI6 official and diplomat Alastair Crooke in the following: Alastair Crooke suggests (video) that the peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine will follow the outline of the Istanbul Agreement negotiated in March 2022 between Ukraine and Russia. Ukraine, under pressure from the West, had at that time refrained from signing it. The Istanbul Agreement did include security guarantees (emphasis added): The agreement assumes:
…
2. Possible guarantor states: Great Britain, China, Russia, the United States, France, Turkey, Germany, Canada, Italy, Poland, Israel. The free accession of other states to the treaty is proposed, in particular the Russian Federation proposes Belarus.
…
4. Ukraine does not join any military alliances, does not deploy foreign military bases and contingents, and conducts international military exercises only with the consent of the guarantor states. For their part, the guarantor states confirm their intention to promote Ukraine’s membership in the European Union.

5. The guarantor states and Ukraine agree that in the event of aggression, any armed attack on Ukraine or any military operation against Ukraine, each of the Guarantor States, after urgent and immediate consultations between them (which shall be held within no more than three days), in the exercise of the right to individual or collective self-defense recognized by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will provide (in response to and on the basis of an official request from Ukraine) assistance to Ukraine, as a permanently neutral state under attack, by immediately taking such individual or joint action as may be necessary, including closing airspace over Ukraine, providing necessary weapons, using armed force in order to restore and subsequently maintain the security of Ukraine as a permanently neutral state.

Any such armed attack (any military operation) and all measures taken as a result thereof shall be immediately reported to the Security Council. Such measures shall cease when the Security Council takes the measures necessary to restore and maintain international peace and security. The mechanism for implementing security guarantees for Ukraine, based on the results of additional consultations between Ukraine and the Guarantor States, will be regulated in the Treaty, taking into account protection from possible provocations.

Again: … such guarantee will of course come with conditions attached to it. Either Ukraine will accept those or it will never be secure from outer interference. So yes, the Ukraine can have ‘security guarantees’. But the conditions of those will be set by the main guarantor – which has to be Russia. Trump seems to have understood that. How long will it take those European ‘leaders’ to get it?

Or for war, for that matter. Europe had 80 years of calm, and wasted them.

• Europe Isn’t Prepared For Peace (Wolfgang Munchau)

There are many more ways in which a peace process can fail than succeed. But for either to happen, it first needs to start. And that is often the most difficult step. But after his big summit in the White House, Donald Trump seems to have pulled off the unthinkable: A summit has been organized between Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelensky which would kick-start peace negotiations. What did it take to get here? While a cease-fire will not be a precondition, the Europeans have been granted some of the assurances they wanted on security guarantees. Whether these can be enforced is an entirely different matter — but America’s agreement, in principle, to help the Europeans meet their obligations does mark an important shift in this seemingly endless war.

Since it is now unlikely that Trump will change his mind and revert to the Biden-era policy of unconditional, if hesitant, support for Ukraine, we are now left with two possible scenarios for how the war plays out. In the first, Ukraine and Russia will agree to a peace deal, and the US and Europe will try their best to make the post-war security arrangement work. It is our baseline scenario, but it will be hard to pull off since the question of land is a particularly difficult one. The starting point of the talks would have to be the existing military situation — not Russia’s or Ukraine’s maximal demands — and would then need to be followed by detailed negotiations. In the second scenario, the peace talks will go ahead but fail. Trump will then blame Zelensky and actively disengage from supporting Ukraine. Beware of extrapolating yesterday’s show of support: The smiles are deceptive.

Trump wants to get out. Like the real estate developer he once was, who has first put a deposit down, Trump has invested political capital into a peace process and he is not going to back down. This scenario would be very bad for Ukraine and for Europe. America would withdraw — for real this time. The Europeans would be left having to support Ukraine and build a new security infrastructure without US support. This is not really a viable financial or military option for European leaders. After all, their engagement would have to be major. The Ukraine-Russia front line is, at the moment, about 745 miles – around the length of the Cold War-era inner German border. Nor does this include the rest of Ukraine’s de jure border to the north and east with Russia, and with Belarus. There have been some comparisons with the situation in Korea — but the demilitarized zone there is barely 155 miles in length.

Adequately securing such a large border on the Ukrainian side would take a huge amount of troops — one estimate suggests as many as 150,000 European soldiers. This is a far larger deployment than anyone has envisaged; Emmanuel Macron mentioned troop numbers in the thousands earlier in the year similar to the so-called trip-wire deployments in the Baltic States. And even if they wanted to, European leaders don’t have the troops needed to provide genuine assurances to Kyiv. Johann Wadephul, the German foreign minister, recently admitted that Germany probably wouldn’t have the capacity to send troops to Ukraine. And while the UK might be keen to voice its political commitment to the country, it’s doubtful that it can meaningfully back this up. A RUSI piece last year indicated that Britain does not have enough equipment to sustain a proper three-brigade armored division.

Even deploying a single brigade would use up 70%-80% of the British Army’s total combat engineering capabilities. There are other challenges too. At this stage, the easiest way to blow a deal, by either side, would be to refuse concessions on land. The Russian claim for the entirety of the Donbas region, including the parts they don’t occupy, is a maximalist one, from which Russia would have to retreat if the negotiations were to succeed. There are some commercial assets in the region of interest to Moscow — mines and industrial companies based in the Russian-occupied parts — but it has military significance for Ukraine.

Meloni: “Russia has 1.3 million soldiers – how many should we send to be up to the task?”

• Italy Opposes Western Troop Deployment To Ukraine (RT)

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni is opposed to proposals by some European leaders to send troops to Ukraine, the daily Corriere della Sera reported on Monday. The issue reportedly arose during consultations before several European leaders and Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky traveled to Washington for talks with US President Donald Trump. The visit follows Trump’s meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Friday. According to the report, French President Emmanuel Macron spoke in favor of a joint European deployment, prompting Meloni to respond: “Russia has 1.3 million soldiers – how many should we send to be up to the task?”

In early March, Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced the creation of a “coalition of the willing” to provide ground and air forces in a peacekeeping role if Kiev and Moscow reach a truce or a peace deal. The Italian prime minister instead advocated extending Ukraine protection akin to NATO’s Article 5, which provides for collective defense in case of aggression, without however formally admitting it to the bloc, Corriere reported. In March, she assured lawmakers in Rome that “sending Italian troops to Ukraine is a topic that has never been on the agenda.”

Germany, Poland, Spain, Romania and Croatia have all also refused to participate in a hypothetical military mission in Ukraine. Earlier this month, The Sunday Times quoted an anonymous UK defense official as acknowledging that “no one wants to send their troops to die in Ukraine.” Back in April, Sergey Shoigu, secretary of Russia’s National Security Council and former defense minister, warned that the arrival of NATO troops in Ukraine could trigger a third world war.

I can’t decide what sounds more stupid: ‘Coalition of the Willing’ or ‘Security Guarantees’.

• Trump ‘Assures’ No US Boots On Ground To Enforce A Peace Deal In Ukraine (ZH)

President Trump has made it clear that he will not send American troops to enforce a possible peace agreement in Ukraine centered on ‘security guarantees’ – despite having appeared possibly open to the idea just a day earlier. In a phone interview on Fox News Tuesday morning, Trump was asked what assurances he could offer that American forces wouldn’t end up defending Ukraine’s borders, and beyond his time in office. The question was based on his campaign and opening months in office – when he repeatedly vowed no more boots on the ground in entangling conflicts abroad. “You have my assurance, and I’m president,” Trump responded. European leaders are pressing for the strongest possible security guarantees for Ukraine, to ensure it can never be attacked in the future, once a peace settlement is reached.

A White House official additionally confirmed on Tuesday that Trump has definitively ruled out deploying US ground forces to Ukraine, according to CNN. Security guarantees for Ukraine were a central focus between Trump, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and seven EU leaders – among them NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte. The Europeans want clarity on what level of American military support Trump is willing to offer to prevent Russia from regrouping and pursuing further territorial advances after a potential peace deal. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who was in the White House yesterday alongside France’s Macron, is still vowing to press for the most robust guarantees possible. “Turning to next steps, the Prime Minister outlined that Coalition of the Willing planning teams would meet with their US counterparts in the coming days to further strengthen plans to deliver robust security guarantees and prepare for the deployment of a reassurance force if the hostilities ended,” a Downing Street spokesperson said in a statement.

“The leaders also discussed how further pressure – including through sanctions – could be placed on Putin until he showed he was ready to take serious action to end his illegal invasion,” Starmer’s office added. In some ways, this can easily be read as the Europeans saying they are actively trying to sabotage peace, as the fear is that it will be settled on Moscow’s terms. Additionally, Bloomberg is reporting that “Security guarantees for Ukraine will be formalized in the coming days and as soon as this week, European Council President Antonio Costa tells reporters in Lisbon following virtual meetings of ‘Coalition of the Willing’ and EU leaders. President Putin has repeatedly emphasized that Russia will never allow Western boots on the ground in Ukraine as part of some peacekeeping force or entity patrolling frozen front lines. At least Trump is saying he’s on the same page, and fully understands this, at least for now.

You go girl, and I do mean you.

• Macron Wants ‘Boots On The Ground’ In Ukraine (RT)

European forces should take part in future peacekeeping operations in Ukraine, French President Emmanuel Macron told journalists on Monday. The proposal has repeatedly been rejected by Moscow as unacceptable and dangerous. Macron made the comments in Washington after a White House summit on Monday with US President Donald Trump, Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky, and several European leaders, who met to discuss possible terms for ending the conflict. Speaking to reporters following the meeting, Macron said that Ukraine must have a “strong army” and that Western Europe “will need to help Ukraine with boots on the ground.” He added, “We will need peacekeeping operations which allies of Ukraine are willing to supply.”

The French president has raised the idea several times in recent months, alongside British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, but the proposal has not gained support from other European leaders. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has opposed the plan, according to the daily Corriere della Sera, and reportedly challenged Macron ahead of the Washington talks by noting that Russia has 1.3 million soldiers and asking, “How many should we send to be up to the task?” Germany, Poland, Spain, Romania, and Croatia have all also ruled out participation in a hypothetical mission. Earlier this month, the Times reported that British military chiefs had “given up” on large-scale deployment plans, despite Starmer’s public support.

Moscow has repeatedly stated that any Western troop presence in Ukraine is unacceptable. Multiple Russian officials, including National Security Council secretary Sergey Shoigu, have warned such a deployment would amount to an occupation and could trigger a third world war. After several British officials brought up the idea again this month, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova accused London on Monday of being “hell-bent on constantly upping the ante in the conflict and pushing its NATO partners to a dangerous line, beyond which a new global conflict lies.”

They don’t care, they want war.

• Trump Tells Europe: “You Can’t Wait Weeks, Thousands Are Dying” (CTH)

President Trump called into Fox & Friends show this morning to explains some of the details within the Ukraine Peace Summit held at the White House with President Zelenskyy and European leaders. There’s some interesting insight into the urgency, held by President Trump, as he describes talking about the need to stop the killing now, not next week. President Trump notes he told the EU leadership, it is ridiculous to say meet again in a few days; thousands of people are dying each week. Trump told them they need to get into action tonight. In his generally off-the-cuff remarks, President Trump provides some remarkable insight into the status of current events.

Yeah, while playing piano.

• Trump Tells Zelensky To ‘Show Flexibility’ (RT)

US President Donald Trump has renewed his push for talks between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky, urging the latter to be more flexible. Trump made the remarks on Tuesday after a meeting in Washington with Zelensky, several European leaders, and the heads of NATO and the European Commission. The discussions centered on conditions for a possible peace deal with Russia. The talks followed Trump’s summit with Putin in Alaska last week. In a phone interview with Fox News, Trump claimed he had resolved “seven wars” during his political career but described the conflict between Russia and Ukraine as the toughest one yet.

Trump, who wants to arrange a meeting between Putin and Zelensky, expressed hope that the Ukrainian leader “will do what he has to do,” adding that “He has to show some flexibility.” Trump had earlier suggested that a trilateral meeting with Putin and Zelensky could be held soon, saying “there will be a reasonable chance of ending the war when we do that.” Trump met Putin on Friday in Anchorage, Alaska, in their first face-to-face encounter since 2019 in the American president’s first term. He described the talks as “warm,” while Putin called them “frank” and “substantive.”

He followed up on Monday with a phone call to the Russian president, briefing him on the talks in Washington. According to the Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov, the call lasted 40 minutes, with both sides expressing readiness to continue discussions on a resolution with Zelensky. Moscow maintains that any lasting settlement must eliminate the root causes of the conflict, address Russia’s security concerns, and recognize current territorial realities, including the status of Crimea and the four former Ukrainian regions that voted to join Russia in 2022.

Remember why the ICC arrest warrant was issued? Because he was accused of having kidnapped 10s of 1000s of Ukrainian kids. That accussation still does the rounds today, though by now it is clear what he did was he made sure a few hundred of them were rescued from being in the line of fire. “At the Peace negotiations in Istanbul in 2025, Ukraine handed over a list of 339 “children” allegedly “abducted” by Russia. ”

• Switzerland Offers Putin Immunity For Ukraine Peace Talks (RT)

Switzerland has indicated it would allow Russian President Vladimir Putin to attend possible Ukraine peace talks on its soil without facing arrest under an International Criminal Court warrant, according to media reports. Following a weekend during which Putin was welcomed to the US by President Donald Trump, who days later hosted Vladimir Zelensky and his key Western European backers, Moscow confirmed its readiness to participate in further talks on a lasting resolution to the Ukraine conflict and indicated that its diplomatic presence at such talks would be raised. A possible venue for such talks has not been identified.

The Hague-based ICC issued arrest warrants in 2023 for Putin, as well as Russian Commissioner for Children’s Rights Maria Lvova-Belova, over alleged unlawful deportation and transfer of children from former Ukrainian territories. Moscow has dismissed the allegations as politically motivated, explaining that it evacuated the children out of the war zone for their own safety. On Tuesday, Swiss Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis told a press conference that, under certain circumstances, the Russian president would be allowed to set foot in Switzerland. The Swiss government last year defined “the rules for granting immunity to a person under an international arrest warrant. If this person comes for a peace conference – not if they come for private reasons,” Cassis said as quoted by various news outlets.

He added that his country was “ready for such a meeting,” saying “We have always signaled our willingness, but it naturally depends on the will of the major powers.” According to the foreign minister, Switzerland could host such a summit “despite the arrest warrant against Putin because of our special role and Geneva’s role as the European headquarters of the UN.” Russia, like the US, China, and Israel, is not a signatory to the ICC’s founding treaty and does not recognize its jurisdiction. French President Emmanuel Macron, who also took part in Monday’s talks with Trump, has reportedly raised the possibility of a peace summit being held in “a neutral country, maybe Switzerland.” “I’m pushing for Geneva,” he told French news channel LCI on Tuesday.

“Europe has even ramped up weapons factory production to triple speed, according to the Financial Times. Now sit back and watch them screw it up. One-one-thousand. Two-one-thousand…”

• EU Leaders Went To Washington Begging Daddy Trump To Spank Them (Marsden)

Can the EU manage to go even a single week without begging to be cucked? Spoiler alert: Nope. This time, they even boarded a plane for a transatlantic booty call. “Security guarantees.” That’s what the Western European establishment keeps demanding for Ukraine. And now it looks like US President Donald Trump has found a way to monetize it at the EU’s expense – a cost that will, naturally, be passed down directly to European citizens. When the idea of a peace deal was first floated earlier this year, the UK and France tried to hype up the concept of putting 30,000 EU troops in Ukraine – but only if peace broke out long enough to render the exercise glaringly useless and redundant. The plan depended on US air cover babysitting them while they did pushups, burpees, and awkward small talk with the American corporate contractors who would no doubt move in to monetize the latest frontier of shock-and-awe liberation.

But EU citizens seemed unmoved, and the elected officials who rely on them to remain in their cushy seats of power knew it. Apparently, a militarized Burning Man in a “liberated” Ukraine doesn’t exactly sell to Europeans. Next, Western Europeans were carpet-bombed with stereoscopic rhetoric about the necessity to blow a ton of cash on weapons so Europe could guarantee BOTH its own security and Ukraine’s. Without even actually being in the EU, Ukraine was already being treated like the free perfume sample tossed into every shopping bag at Sephora – the one that makes your groceries reek whether you wanted it or not. And because Ukraine had become rhetorically inseparable from the EU, the Eurojokers in charge started invoking a future Russian invasion date for Europe of 2030.

It’s like a new form of hypochondria. Except instead of reading about a disease online and convincing yourself that you have it, they started believing that Russia was invading them just from observing events in Ukraine. This “2030 invasion” propaganda seems to have originated from NATO-adjacent think tanks like the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, which last year cited 2030 as the date of Russia’s “military reconstitution.” The RAND Corporation has also warned of a “revanchist Russia” in a report on the “future of warfare in 2030” that will fight “its neighbors.” NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte then parlayed all this into a demand for European members of the US-led weapons lobby to cough up 5% of GDP in defense spending, up from the 2% previously demanded at Trump’s insistence.

The Euroclowns started trying to get buy-in through active audience participation, telling citizens to pack canned tuna and water into go-bags in preparation for Putin’s 2030 arrival. They even floated the idea of citizens investing in special financial products to fund European defense. If you forego just one Starbucks visit per week, maybe you can help buy a whole tank someday for someone who really needs it. Scary times indeed! Better obey Daddy Trump via NATO and pledge 5% of GDP on weapons while the local boulangerie struggles to crank out baguettes thanks to insane energy costs. Maybe we can all make life easier for the clowns trying to triangulate all this and just eat bullets instead? It became clear a while ago that this whole “security guarantee” charade was a pretext for the weapons racket. Europe has even ramped up weapons factory production to triple speed, according to the Financial Times. Now sit back and watch them screw it up. One-one-thousand. Two-one-thousand…

“The war can be “ended tomorrow” – or also would have never started, if the US simply but firmly declared NATO will not expand to Ukraine…”

• The Ukraine War Could ‘End Tomorrow’ If The US Wanted: Jeffrey Sachs (ZH)

Just the day after the historic Trump-Putin summit in Alaska to discuss finding peace in Ukraine, the famous economist and UN adviser Jeffrey Sachs made his first ever appearance before the Ron Paul Institute’s (RPI) annual conference in Washington DC. Sachs’ Saturday speech presented essentially a ‘Blueprint for Peace’ – which was precisely the title and theme for this year’s event, attended by several hundreds of independent-minded people. Daniel McAdams, Executive Director of RPI, had previewed in a media statement that “Professor Sachs has become one of the most courageous voices challenging the Washington foreign policy establishment.” Former Congressman from Texas Ron Paul also underscored that “We are facing a perfect storm of reckless foreign policy, unsustainable debt, and attacks on civil liberties” and “Professor Sachs brings the kind of intellectual rigor and moral courage we need to chart a different course.”

While President Trump and his top officials have been commenting on the incredible “complexity” and significant hurdles to achieving peace in Ukraine, Sachs in his Saturday speech demolished this notion, arguing that on the contrary it’s not so complicated at all – that the reality is raging wars from Ukraine to Gaza could be ended in a single day if Washington wanted to. The war can be “ended tomorrow” – or also would have never started, if the US simply but firmly declared NATO will not expand to Ukraine, Sachs at one point emphasized. “It’s not so complicated actually to end these conflicts. It’s a little surprising how long it takes and how hard it is to to accomplish this, but it’s not so hard in substance because the underlying reasons for the conflicts that the United States is in perpetually are not sound reasons from the point of view of America’s interests, from the point of view of our security, from the point of view of our well being or our economy,” Sachs began by explaining.

“All of the conflicts that we are in and those that we could get in are misguided, misdirected, provoked by us to a very large extent and um… solvable. That’s the basic point. It really is not so complicated.” This is a point which should resonate with the majority of war-weary populations in both America and Europe, who have seen billions siphoned from taxpayers into heavy arms shipments for Ukraine and Israel. Washington could cut off the weapons which help keep these hotspots raging, and could do it tomorrow while pressing hard for peace if it wanted to – as we at ZeroHedge have also long emphasized. But Sachs pointed out that the establishment, from the military-industrial complex to the media to members of Trump’s own administration, remains stacked in favor of forever wars and is largely dead set against Trump – which means the US leader has a lot working not in his favor if he truly does want to strike a peace deal with Putin.

Sachs called out the mainstream media for wanting to slap a ‘failure’ label on the summit from the beginning (or even before it began): “I was looking at all of the the banner headlines about the failure yesterday [Friday] in Alaska. The failure because we didn’t launch World War because the two presidents had a good meeting together, because they announced progress,” Sachs observed sarcastically. “This is taken as failure in our media which of course is hawkish by the moment and manipulated by, controlled by, paid by, or simply aligned with the military industrial complex in the country. So, it’s extraordinarily hard to hear a word about peace in this country.”

I like Victor Davis Hanson, I do. But when someone tells me ‘Stalin killed 20 million of his own people during WWII’, I switch off.

• Trump, Putin, and the Future of Ukraine’s War (Victor Davis Hanson)

President Donald Trump met Russian President Vladimir Putin last week for the much-anticipated summit, I guess we would call it, in Anchorage, Alaska. Remember the last time American diplomats of a high ranking—Jake Sullivan and Antony Blinken, the respective secretary of state and national security adviser to the Biden administration—met with the Chinese, they were humiliated and nothing came of it. Trump thought he could get a ceasefire. After three hours, both Trump and Putin came out to give statements to the press. There was no question-and-answer. Putin gave a long harangue. How would you characterize it? It was mostly a recital of Russian grievances and the need to be friendlier to America. It was an outreach, not to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy or Ukraine or Europe, but to America.

And it was in line with Russian strategy that they think Donald Trump is a strong leader, but also, he is more forgiving, or at least more malleable, about seeking a peace settlement rather than the “whatever it takes” attitude of the Biden administration. And he also believes that the Europeans are tired—after three and a half years—that Ukraine is exhausted. And so, he can appeal to Donald Trump to put an end to it on Russian terms. What are the terms? Well, Trump didn’t outline them in his portion of the post-summit report to the media and to the world. He wasn’t depressed. He didn’t say we should have had a ceasefire. He just said that there were a lot of elements that were, more or less, concluded successfully between Putin and Trump. But more importantly, for the big sticking points, he would have to talk to the Europeans, as was noted and necessary, and President Zelenskyy.

And we know what the outlines are, don’t we? We’ve talked about them. Ukraine will not be in NATO. They don’t have the military wherewithal. They have the moral edge and the moral right—but they don’t have the military wherewithal. Nor does Europe or the United States want to go to that length to give it to them against nuclear Russia to reclaim the Donbas—all of the Donbas—or Crimea. So, what the sticking point is, right now, these two armies are locked inside the Donbas. Basically, 50 to 100 miles on an undulating line from the Russian borders. And there could be a DMZ, like the one in Korea, and then that could be the basis for a permanent border. But the problem is that Putin has not got the entire Donbas and the regions around it. And the Ukrainians are stiffening. Both sides are worn out. There’s been a million and a half casualties that are wounded, dead, missing, captive. But Russia has greater reserves than does Ukraine. So, there’s a desire on both sides to have an armistice.

The sticking points is that the Constitution does not allow Zelenskyy without an assent from his parliament to give away land to a foreign interloper. And Putin does not think, at this point, he has ground down the Ukrainians enough or acquired enough of their eastern territory to justify the full hearty invasion that’s cost probably a million Russians. But here’s what I want to get to, very quickly. There’s a lot of criticism of Donald Trump because he didn’t blast Vladimir Putin. I don’t quite understand that. Just remember that during World War II, Josef Stalin had killed 20 million of his own people. He had invaded free Poland, along with Nazi Germany. He had attacked free Finland in 1939 and ’40 and then annexed 10% of it. He had helped Germany from Sept. 1, 1939, to June 22, 1941. He was our enemy. And then suddenly, and only when Germany turned on him, did he come to us.

And we accepted that alliance on the principle that he was useful. And we gave billions of dollars in aid. Thirty percent of the wherewithal of Stalin came from the British Empire or the United States government. So, you know, President Franklin D. Roosevelt met with him at Yalta. He even called him “Uncle Joe.” This was a man who killed 20 million of his own people. In 1972, President Richard Nixon went to China, and he tried to have a reboot of the strategic global order and play off Russia against China to the self-interest of the United States. But the point was, he sat down with the greatest mass murderer in history, Mao Zedong, who was responsible for 70 million people dead. Was Donald Trump not to meet with Putin? Or was he to employ the vocabulary of President Joe Biden? “You’re a murderer. You’re a thug. You’re a criminal,” as Biden said of him. “And we’re gonna do whatever it takes.”

Does he have support for that? For an unlimited blank check to Ukraine? No. So, he’s trying to get along with a killer in a way that past presidents have reached out to mass murderers. The other thing is, very quickly, while there are the contours of a peace settlement, Donald Trump is not responsible for this war. He’s the most powerful man in the world. He wants to help Ukraine get a just settlement. He is working with the Europeans. He’s beefed up NATO. But remember this, in the last four administrations, Putin has invaded Georgia under President George Bush, they invaded Crimea and Donbas under President Barack Obama, they tried to take Kyiv under Biden. It didn’t go anywhere under Donald Trump. Donald Trump was not the author of the failed “reset.” Remember the 2009 Geneva debacle, where Hillary Clinton pushed that “reset button” and we were supposed to be friendly with Russia.

And basically, what we did is we said, “You should be democratic. You gotta be Western. You’re gonna have to have a liberalizing … ” Well, they didn’t back it up. So, they were loud but carried a twig, rather than spoke softly with a club.Donald Trump had nothing to do with American diplomat Victoria Nuland and all of that earlier effort to put Ukraine in NATO and to interfere in the government of Ukraine. He had nothing to do with that. His children, he, none of them went over to Ukraine and tried to shake down the Ukrainian government to pour money into a presidential family, and then, as Joe Biden did, went over there and fired the prosecutor on threats. And he used our money to threaten the Ukrainians. He has no history of that.He sent offensive weapons to Ukraine that Biden had embargoed. He was pretty tough on the Russians, in a way Biden never was. He said, “Don’t do the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, Germany. Don’t do it.”

He killed a lot of the Wagner Group. He got out of an asymmetrical missile deal. But he had no fingerprints on the Ukrainian war. He didn’t say, as Joe Biden did, when he came into office, “Our reaction as America will be contingent on whether it’s a minor invasion.” Think of that. That was a green light to Putin, as was his suspension of offensive military arms to Ukraine. So, what am I getting at? The summit was about what we could expect. Putin wants to win over America so that America will back off from Ukraine, and so it can get some more mileage westward and further deteriorate or erode or detrite the Ukrainian military. The Ukrainian military is pretty tough. It’s hanging in there. It wants enough aid to leverage Putin. And between those two poles, there will be a DMZ.

And if there is a peace settlement, it will be the work—whether the Left likes it or not—of Donald Trump, the one world leader, among the three, that has nothing to do with this war. Didn’t start on his watch. It wasn’t a result of his policies. And it surely was not his responsibility that Vladimir Putin found himself inside Ukraine and threatening to destroy the independence of the Ukrainian people. That was not Donald Trump’s doing, but it may well be his doing to stop it.

Normally they get to keep them, but these guys took the mess to another level.

• Tulsi Revokes Security Clearances For 37 Former, Current Intel Officials (JTN)

Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Tulsi Gabbard on Tuesday announced that she directed her office to revoke the security clearances of 37 former and current intelligence officials over the Russiagate scandal. Just The News has broken several stories recently about Russiagate, which found that high-ranking government officials during the Obama administration tried to damage Trump during and after his 2016 presidential campaign by promoting false conspiracies, to the benefit of former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. Gabbard claimed the 37 officials, including a former top aide to former President Barack Obama’s DNI James Clapper, abused public trust with their participation in the scandal, per the New York Post.

“Being entrusted with a security clearance is a privilege, not a right,” Gabbard said in a post on X. “Those in the Intelligence Community who betray their oath to the Constitution and put their own interests ahead of the interests of the American people have broken the sacred trust they promised to uphold. In doing so, they undermine our national security, the safety and security of the American people and the foundational principles of our democratic republic.” Gabbard said her order comes at the request of President Donald Trump, and targets people who abused public trust by allegedly politicizing and manipulating the intelligence, leaking classified intelligence, and violating the department’s standards.

“Our Intelligence Community must be committed to upholding the values and principles enshrined in the US Constitution and maintain a laser-like focus on our mission of ensuring the safety, security and freedom of the American people,” Gabbard said.

“..it has “never built a backdoor or master key to any of our products or services and we never will.”

• UK Agrees to Drop Demand for Apple to Create Backdoor Access: Gabbard (ET)

The UK government has agreed to drop its request that Apple provide it with backdoor access to user data, U.S. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said on Monday. Gabbard stated on X that the agreement came after months of working with UK partners, alongside President Donald Trump, and Vice President JD Vance, to ensure Americans’ private data and civil liberties are protected “As a result, the UK has agreed to drop its mandate for Apple to provide a ‘back door’ that would have enabled access to the protected encrypted data of American citizens and encroached on our civil liberties,” she said. Earlier this year, reports emerged that the UK government had issued Apple a “technical capability notice,” requiring the company to provide access to encrypted user data under the Investigatory Powers Act of 2016.

In response, Apple halted its Advanced Data Protection (ADP) feature for users in the UK, citing concerns over data breaches. The iPhone maker stated in a Feb. 24 blog post that it has “never built a backdoor or master key to any of our products or services and we never will.” The ADP feature provides end-to-end encryption for iCloud storage, preventing non-account holders—including governments and hackers—from accessing data such as photos, documents, and notes. Without ADP, certain types of iCloud data will no longer be fully encrypted, making it potentially accessible to third parties with the proper legal authority. “Apple remains committed to offering our users the highest level of security for their personal data and we are hopeful that we will be able to do so in the future in the United Kingdom,” Apple stated at the time.

In May, U.S. House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan and U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Brian Mast sent a letter to UK Home Secretary Yvette Cooper, urging her to allow Apple to disclose the order’s existence to the U.S. Department of Justice so the department can assess whether the order complies with a U.S.-UK bilateral agreement under the CLOUD Act, which prohibits orders requiring companies to decrypt data. According to the letter, U.S. companies are prohibited under UK laws to disclose or confirm the existence of such an order, and doing so constitutes a criminal offense, even if the disclosure is made to the company’s home government. The U.S. lawmakers warned that the UK’s order for Apple to create a backdoor could lead to some implications, as it might be exploited by cybercriminals and authoritarian regimes. “These vulnerabilities would not only affect UK users but also American citizens and others worldwide, given the global nature of Apple’s services,” they stated in the letter.

By the time Europeans figure out these shenanigans it’ll be way too late: “..Ursula von der Leyen’s EU budget proposal for 2028–2034, projected at around €2 trillion—a 40% increase over the previous period..”

• On The Road To A Hyperstate: EU Commission Circumvents Financing Rules (ZH)

The European Union is funded by contributions from its member states. At least, that’s what the founding treaties say. In practice, however, the EU has long been taking other paths. At the core of Europe’s financial architecture lies a clear separation of responsibility and liability: Article 125 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), the so-called “No-Bailout Clause.” It states, unequivocally, that neither the Union nor individual member states may assume the debts of other states. The purpose of this provision is to prevent free-rider effects (moral hazard) at the expense of other member states: each state is responsible for its own obligations. Still, the clause does not exclude political support, as long as it does not mean assuming the existing debts of other states. A notable example of this practice were the bailout programs for Greece during the sovereign debt crisis one and a half decades ago.

Article 310 TFEU further regulates the EU budget: revenues and expenditures must be balanced every year, and the budget may only be financed through own resources such as member contributions, tariffs, or approved revenues. Independent loans by the EU Commission exceeding the approved framework are prohibited. Together, these rules form the legal backbone of EU financial policy: no automatic liability, no autonomous EU debt, and only fully covered spending. This design was deliberately chosen to prevent the emergence of a supra-state in Brussels and to defend the national scope of action of member states against an expanding Brussels bureaucracy. That’s the theory. In practice, the EU has steadily increased its presence as a borrower in the bond market. It began in 1976 with the first European Community bond to support Italy and Ireland during the oil crisis.

In the 1980s and 1990s, further issues followed for France, Greece, and Portugal—always aimed at demonstrating collective solidarity and easing fiscal tensions. The 2008/2010 financial crisis marked a decisive turning point: with the European Financial Stabilisation Mechanism (EFSM) and, in 2012, the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), the EU began deliberately supporting over-indebted member states via bond issuance. In 2010, the European Central Bank announced it would purchase euro sovereign bonds on the open market to prevent the collapse of the monetary union—always in close coordination with EU institutions.

The COVID years saw a new dimension in 2020: for the first time, the EU issued Social Bonds under the “SURE” fund. At the same time, the “Next Generation EU” program started, providing around €800 billion in crisis aid. Since 2025, the Union has increasingly relied on so-called “sustainable bonds” (Green Bonds) and plans to issue short-term treasury bills for improved liquidity management. The EU and ECB now operate in tandem, integrating ever-new financing instruments into the capital markets. The signal to the market is clear: we are ready to meet growing demand for euro bonds. And as collateral, not only the European taxpayer but also the ECB’s virtually unlimited liquidity is on standby. What could possibly go wrong?

For the second half of 2025, the European Commission plans to issue up to €70 billion in EU bonds across six auctions with maturities ranging from three to thirty years. Already in March 2025, the Commission achieved the world’s largest bond issuance increase, totaling $30.62 billion; three placements alone amounted to €13.7 billion. Demand is plentiful, thanks to dual backing from member states and the ECB: an October 2024 issuance of a seven-year bond was oversubscribed 17 times. Green bonds are especially in focus: up to €250 billion are planned under NextGenerationEU, with €48.91 billion already issued. Yields on these bonds currently trade about 40 basis points above German Bunds, making them attractive for investors.

The European Union is undeniably moving toward a form of autonomous statehood. Its rigid ideological directives and the apodictic tone adopted by Commission representatives toward member states recently culminated in the Commission unilaterally negotiating the EU-US trade agreement. Regardless of the agreement’s outcome, this sends a clear signal: decision-making power and political competence are shifting markedly from national capitals to Brussels, where a centralized bureaucracy increasingly calls the shots. A return to national autonomy and a Commission limited to core functions appears out of the question. This is reflected in Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s EU budget proposal for 2028–2034, projected at around €2 trillion—a 40% increase over the previous period.

IMMUNOLOGIST SAYS SURVIVE 10 YEARS AND LIVE 50 MORE

Immunologist Derya Unutmaz claims that those who survive the next decade could gain an additional fifty years of life or potentially live without limits.

Advances in artificial intelligence, immunity, and anti-aging research… https://t.co/0NPSm7xOHG pic.twitter.com/w3QOp4QczI

— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) August 19, 2025

Hegseth

President Trump set the example by putting forth efforts to make America healthy again.

That’s why we are introducing the Pete and Bobby challenge.

100 push-ups. 50 pull-ups. 10 minutes. pic.twitter.com/ppRrwqSUm0

— Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth (@SecDef) August 18, 2025

Mackinac

Mackinac Island in Northern Michigan, where cars are banned and Amazon delivers by horse.pic.twitter.com/J1URGjsEC6

— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) August 18, 2025

Spa

Spa day for pup
pic.twitter.com/w7tOHwKxAq

— Science girl (@gunsnrosesgirl3) August 19, 2025

Okinawa
https://twitter.com/Rainmaker1973/status/1957670109272531404

Foxfalcon

Watch as a fox dodges a falcon’s capture not once, not twice, but three timespic.twitter.com/kB5PIqwJ4G

— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) August 19, 2025

Support the Automatic Earth in wartime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

Debt Rattle May 16 2025

May 162025

May 16, 2025 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 9:23 am Finance Tagged with: 8647, AI, Apple, autopen, Comey, Dmitriev, DOGE, ICAO, Istanbul, MH17, pardons, Putin, Trump, UAE 47 Responses »

Marc Chagall The soldier drinks 1912

• ‘Nothing’s Gonna Happen Until Putin And I Get Together’ (JTN)

• Putin-Trump Meeting ‘Imminent’ – White House Official (RT)

• Trump Team Has ‘Made The Impossible Possible’ – Putin Envoy (RT)

• Istanbul 2.0: Know When To Hold ‘Em, Know When To Fold ‘Em (Proud)

• Russia’s Top Negotiator Unveils Goal of Talks With Ukraine (RT)

• Ukraine Won’t Survive A Decade Of Conflict – Zelensky (RT)

• UK Sending Security Adviser To Work With Zelensky – Guardian (RT)

• Talk of Direct US-Russia Clash Contradicts Trump’s Policy –Scott Ritter (Sp.)

• Trump Tells Apple Not To Build In India (RT)

• Trump Touts 1.4 Trillion Investment In AI, Tech From UAE (ZH)

• Justice Thomas Destroys the Case for Nationwide Injunctions (Margolis)

• Biden’s Autopen Pardons May Just Get Invalidated (Margolis)

• DOJ Pardon Attorney Ed Martin To Review Biden’s Outgoing Pardons (JTN)

• DOGE Still Hard at Work Cutting Fraud and Waste (Salgado)

• Trump Admin Urges SCOTUS to Permit DOGE Access to Social Security Records (ET)

• The US Has Pushed The ICAO To Declare War On Russia (Helmer)

• “86 47” – Comey Posts-Then-Deletes Creepy Threat Aimed At Trump (ZH)

https://twitter.com/Real_RobN/status/1922694242973122575

Qatar

NOW – Senator Kennedy Just Unleashed a Brutal One-Liner About Qatar — “I trust Qatar, like I trust a rest stop bathroom.”

During a Fox News appearance, Senator John Kennedy (R-LA) shared his thoughts on President Trump’s recent meeting with Qatari officials.

He dropped an… pic.twitter.com/MP4a23Zi4O

— Overton (@overton_news) May 14, 2025

Crazy facts about Qatar: It has the #1 GDP per capita in the world, on a per citizen basis, because it only has 320,000 Qatari citizens, and the other 90% of its 2.6 million population are all foreign labor workers. Because of this, 75% of Qatar’s population is male – a 3-1… pic.twitter.com/rId4Vkvp5b

— Mike Benz (@MikeBenzCyber) May 15, 2025

USAID

USAID, CIA, and regime change tactics exposed!

Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) and investigative journalist Michael Shellenberger examined how USAID funding underpinned a 2019 whistleblower report that led to President Trump’s impeachment. Shellenberger revealed the whistleblower was… pic.twitter.com/NoxYHEnKc4

— Camus (@newstart_2024) May 14, 2025

Clown

Maria Zakharova: "Who is Zelensky calling a 'theater prop' delegation? Who is he to use that language? A clown, a loser, a person of unknown education talking about people who have qualifications, academic achievements and a history of distinguished service to their fatherland."… pic.twitter.com/vOB5zyim28

— Margarita Simonyan (@M_Simonyan) May 15, 2025

Orban

⚫⚪ Ukraine’s EU accession in black and white: they want to rush it through but this decision will shape Europe’s future. There is no undo button. That is why in Hungary we are asking the people. Let’s stop them now! pic.twitter.com/GtfKFGhQv9

— Orbán Viktor (@PM_ViktorOrban) May 15, 2025

Zoom out

The media pushes the lies about Ukraine and now we see the truth! pic.twitter.com/LV8josiFy7

— Johnny Midnight ⚡️ (@its_The_Dr) May 15, 2025

Lutnick

This is worth the watch! pic.twitter.com/IHDSord8NM

— Johnny Midnight ⚡️ (@its_The_Dr) May 14, 2025

Energy

Dude has a conversation with AI over the 5G Grid & it’s off the charts wild.

What ever the millions of 5G Masts are actually intended for – rest assured it’s not to give you better internet. pic.twitter.com/eMrQyj4pEp

— Concerned Citizen (@BGatesIsaPyscho) May 14, 2025

China energy

China didn’t build all this solar for the purpose of lowering emissions.

They’re tapping the largest energy resource on Earth.

Emissions reductions are a side effect. https://t.co/5o6mdGA3vN pic.twitter.com/DjAd4jc69p

— Jesse Peltan (@JessePeltan) May 15, 2025

US and Russia haven’t talked in 3 years. it takes a lot of groundwork talks first now to catch up, weeks, months of talking. That’s not what presidents do, they’re too busy. That said, the two should certainly meet asap. But Ukraine is just a side topic for that. And all the complaining about Putin not showing up for talks he initiated is empty blabber.

“And obviously, he wasn’t gonna go — he was gonna go, but he thought I was gonna go. He wasn’t going if I wasn’t there. And I don’t believe anything’s gonna happen, whether you like it or not, until he and I get together..”

“Why would he go if I’m not going?” “I wasn’t planning to go and I didn’t think he would if I didn’t.”

• ‘Nothing’s Gonna Happen Until Putin And I Get Together’ (JTN)

President Trump said Thursday regarding the Ukraine-Russia talks in Turkey that “nothing’s gonna happen until Putin and I get together.” The president made the comments as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky arrived in Turkey for peace talks with Russia on Thursday regarding the ongoing war between the two countries, but Russian President Vladimir Putin chose not to attend and sent a lower-level delegation, Politico reported. “Look, nothing’s gonna happen until Putin and I get together, okay?” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One while heading to the United Arab Emirates.

“And obviously, he wasn’t gonna go — he was gonna go, but he thought I was gonna go. He wasn’t going if I wasn’t there. And I don’t believe anything’s gonna happen, whether you like it or not, until he and I get together. But we’re gonna have to get it solved because too many people are dying.” Ukraine’s high-level delegation includes Zelensky, his top aide, and foreign and defense ministers in an effort to show Trump that Russia is the country against making peace. Ukraine was frustrated with the lower-level Russian delegation and doubted whether there would be any negotiations at all.

“The Russian chair in Turkey is de facto empty,” a Ukrainian diplomatic official told Politico on the condition of anonymity. “Because it makes little difference whether Mr. Nobody, sent by Putin, and his insignificant colleagues sit in their chairs or not. They are not the ones making decisions. And the person who does — Putin — is either afraid to come or does not take the U.S.-led peace effort seriously. “Still, we are considering sending someone at the appropriate level to at least hear what these people have to say and whether they are able to decide at least anything. If they are willing to have a serious conversion, we may engage in it. Otherwise, we will have the right to conclude that this is a Russian charade, not meaningful work for peace,” the official added.

“Deals are all about timing. When the time is right, that’s when the president is in the room with Putin..”

Sebastian Gorka is always around. His curent job description is ‘senior director for counterterrorism’.

• Putin-Trump Meeting ‘Imminent’ – White House Official (RT)

US President Donald Trump will meet his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to help Russia and Ukraine finalize a peace agreement, a deputy assistant to Trump, Sebastian Gorka, has said. The meeting between the two leaders is “imminent” he told a security summit organized by Politico. “Deals are all about timing. When the time is right, that’s when the president is in the room with Putin,” he stated, while maintaining that the right moment is “imminent.” He did not elaborate and did not provide any further details about a possible meeting between Putin and Trump. Trump is currently on a tour through Middle East, and has mulled going to Türkiye on Friday “if something happened.”

Moscow’s and Kiev’s delegations were expected to hold discussions there after Putin suggested resuming the Istanbul talks which were broken off three years ago. Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky responded to Putin’s call by declaring that he would personally fly to Türkiye and demanded that the Russian president do the same. The Kremlin answered by saying that the Russian president had no plan to travel to the country. Trump then said on Thursday that Putin had no reason to go, since the US leader himself had not committed to going.Moscow has said that its core agenda for the Istanbul talks remains unchanged from 2022, as it believes that a lasting peace can only be achieved by addressing the conflict’s root causes, including Ukraine’s desire to join NATO.

Zelensky initially insisted on Putin personally coming to the talks before deciding to send a delegation led by Defense Minister Rustem Umerov to Istanbul. According to TASS, the meeting between the two sides is now expected to start on Friday. The Trump administration has been actively pushing both sides to engage in peace negotiations since he took office in January. The US president has recently expressed frustration over the slow pace of the process and demanded both sides engage in direct talks.

Kirill Dmitriev is Putin’s ‘investment envoy’. Russia’s Witkoff.

• Trump Team Has ‘Made The Impossible Possible’ – Putin Envoy (RT)

US President Donald Trump and his team have “made the impossible possible” by bringing Moscow and Kiev to the cusp of their first direct negotiations since 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s investment envoy, Kirill Dmitriev, has said. Dmitriev complemented Washington’s mediation efforts ahead of much anticipated talks in Istanbul on Thursday. The meeting is set to happen “against all odds/fierce resistance,” he said on X, adding that if “not derailed last-minute, this could be a historic step to peace. ”Dmitriev specifically named US Vice President J.D. Vance, Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and Secretary of State Marco Rubio as major contributors to the mediation effort. Putin suggested Thursday as the day direct engagement between Russia and Ukraine could happen in a televised address last Sunday.

Moscow has indicated that negotiations could continue from where they left off in 2022, when Kiev pulled out and tried to score a victory on the battlefield with Western military assistance. The U-turn came after then British Prime Minister Boris Johnson told Kiev to discard a draft peace treaty, which had been pre-agreed in Istanbul.At the moment of writing, there was no certainty that a new round of negotiations would commence as expected. Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky, who is currently in the country to meet Turkish President Recep Erdogan, said the Ukrainian government had yet to make a final decision on how to proceed. Zelensky announced his intention to go to Türkiye in response to Putin’s proposal, claiming that the Russian leader must reciprocate to prove his seriousness.

Zelensky and leaders of European NATO nations supporting him have threatened to impose new sanctions on Russia unless Moscow agrees to a 30-day unconditional ceasefire – an idea that Russian officials have called a ruse to give Kiev time to regroup. The initial deadline on Monday has been postponed until the end of the week, pending the outcome of talks.While Moscow has stated that it will seek a path towards lasting peace in Istanbul, which it says will require addressing the root causes of the conflict, Kiev has been vague about its goals. Some media reports have suggested that the Ukrainian delegation will focus on the proposed ceasefire first. Previously, Kiev insisted that no direct talks could happen without a truce.

Former UK envoy Ian Proud has, like so many, also lost his thread. It’s not easy.

• Istanbul 2.0: Know When To Hold ‘Em, Know When To Fold ‘Em (Proud)

The biggest achievement of today’s Istanbul talks is that they are even taking place. U.S. engagement will remain vital to getting a peace deal over the line. Russia’s desire for a reset with Washingtonmay keep them on track. I have a sense of déjà vu as I contemplate these long-overdue peace talks between Ukraine and Russia in Istanbul. In April 2022, Ukraine and Russia were close to agreeing a peace treaty, less than two months after war started. However, this came crashing down amid claims that western governments, in particular the United States and the United Kingdom encouraged Ukraine to keep fighting. It’s worth recapping very briefly what was close to having been agreed. By far the best summary of negotiations between both sides was produced by the New York Times in June 2024. Those negotiations ranfor almost two months. The talks started with Ukrainian officials being spirited over the border into Belarus on February 29, 2022 while the fighting raged around Kyiv, and eventually led to the now famous talks in Istanbul in March and April.

What has changed since then? Ukraine will enter the Istanbul talks in a weaker position that it held in 2022. Western support for Ukraine financially and economically is not as sound as it was then. No big ticket economic aid and assistance has been made available since the G7 agreement of a $50 billion package of loans, in June 2024. While European states scratched together new economic aid to Ukraine in April, this cannot make up for the reduction in US support. In territorial terms, Russia withdrew from Kyiv as a concession to the first Istanbul talks and lost ground in Kharkiv and in Kherson in late 2022. However, Russia has gone on steadily to gain further territory in the Donbas since the end of 2023. So while both sides have scores on the board, Russia now maintains the military upper hand on the battlefield and that seems unlikely to change. These two factors in particular were behind President Trump’s February assertion that Ukraine has no cards to play.

What has stayed the same? NATO membership is still off the table. The verified documents shared by the New York Times last June confirmed that Ukraine’s neutrality and non-membership of NATO was the central issue agreed upon in 2022. Ukraine was ready to become a “permanently neutral state” that would never join NATO or allow foreign forces to be based on its soil.There seems no route for Ukraine to resile from that given its currently weakened negotiating position and President Trump’s stated view that NATO membership for Ukraine is not practical. Although Germany’s new foreign Minister, Johann Wadephul recently repeated the line that Ukraine’s path to NATO is irreversible, most have agreed, privately and publicly, that Ukraine’s path to NATO is a fraught if not impossible one. Right now, just having the talks is a huge breakthrough

The Istanbul talks would not be happening had the Trump administration not pushed for it so hard. We don’t need to rehash the “did they or didn’t they” debate around why Ukraine abandoned the Istanbul agreement in April 2022. What is clear, is that Ukraine became entrenched, not only in not negotiating with Russia, but in excluding Russia from all discussions on peace in Ukraine from then onward. Having agreed in principle for Ukraine to accept neutral status Zelensky was pushing his own ten point peace plan. This included, among other things, Russia withdrawing its troops to the pre-2014 border, i.e. giving up Crimea and the Donbass and creating a Euro-Atlantic Security Architecture, by which he meant Ukraine joining NATO. Peace summits were organized in various countries that explicitly excluded Russia, culminating in the Switzerland event on June 15, 2024.

At this event, President Zelensky was dug in deeper on resisting any engagement with Russia until a full withdrawal of its troops from Ukraine, which was a completely unrealistic proposal. “Russia can start negotiations with us even tomorrow without waiting for anything – if they leave our legal territories,” he said. Even after President Trump was elected, European leaders clung to the line that “only Ukraine can decide what peace means.”’ I see no circumstances in which a Kamala Harris presidency would have cajoled President Zelensky to enter into negotiations. Tomorrow’s talks wouldn’t be happening unless the Trump administration broke a whole load of Ukrainian and European eggshells to get to this point. The biggest issue now is territory.

Even though he was wrongly derided at the time by mainstream media, Steve Witkoff correctly pointed out in his March interview with Tucker Carlson that the territorial issues in Ukraine will be most intractable. Russia’s decision in October 2022 to formally annex the four oblasts of Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk, and Luhansk changed the calculus. However, Russia does not have full territorial control of any of those oblasts, which are cut through the middle by a hotly contested front line. Resolving the line of control when the war ends is, by some margin, the most problematic challenge. This will be a hugely sensitive topic, and European allies will shoot down any major concessions to Russia, as they did when the idea surfaced that the U.S. might de jure recognise Russia’s occupation of Crimea.

The most obvious settlement is a de facto recognition of occupation, a Cyprus-style scenario, that does not stand in the way of Ukraine’s future membership of the European Union. Even that will require detailed agreement on issues around demilitarization of the line of control and enforcing any ceasefire. Sanctions are probably tricky, but also tractable. As I have said before, there is enormous scope to a plan that allows for the immediate lifting of the bulk of zero-impact measures, phasing out the remainder at points agreed to by both sides. The toughest issue remains the $300 billion in frozen Russian assets, mostly held in Belgium. Russia has shown a willingness to concede this funding to support reconstruction in Ukraine, including those parts that Russia occupies.

But there is texture here. Freeing up those funds for reconstruction would immediately remove the source of interest payments that are meeting Ukraine’s obligations on its $50 billion in debt to the G7, agreed to in June 2024. But the more general policy question arises, how much of the freed up funding would be spent in Ukraine itself and how much in Russian-occupied Ukraine, where most of the war damage has occurred? The U.S. must keep the pressure on to ensure the talks stay on track. A U.S. presence in Istanbul will be vital, to prevent, in particular, Ukraine from bailing on the talks. That’s why sending Steve Witkoff and Keith Kellogg makes sense.

The former is trusted by the Russian side while the latter has built relationships in Ukraine. Their presence serves to keep the process moving forward until a deal can be pushed over the line and the fighting can stop. Bear in mind that the 2022 talks ran for a month and a half and the circumstances have materially changed as I have indicated above. While there has been speculation that President Trump might drop into Istanbul, I am not sure that this is necessary if President Putin doesn’t himself attend. Knowing the Russians, I assess that Putin will want his own “‘meeting moment” with the U.S. President on terms that the Russian side can better choreograph. Indeed, that may be a prize for Russia’s engagement in the process, given its desire for a more comprehensive reset of relations with the U.S.

Lots of talk of Putin sending a lightweight crew, but he didn’t. He sent those, led by Medinsky, who were stiffed by Zelensky (+ Boris Johnson?) 3 years ago. They know the territory better than anyone.

• Russia’s Top Negotiator Unveils Goal of Talks With Ukraine (RT)

Moscow seeks to engage Ukraine in direct negotiations in Istanbul to secure a lasting peace, Russia’s chief negotiator, Vladimir Medinsky, told journalists on Thursday. The current effort represents a revival of the peace process he took part in that Kiev broke off three years ago, he added. Both Russia and Ukraine have sent delegations to Türkiye following Russian President Vladimir Putin’s offer last week to resume direct talks aimed at resolving the conflict. Moscow’s team is prepared to work constructively towards viable solutions. “It possesses all necessary qualifications and authority to conduct negotiations,” the presidential aide said in Istanbul. The Russian delegation also includes Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin, Deputy Defense Minister Aleksandr Fomin and the head of Russia’s military intelligence, Igor Kostyukov. They are joined by several senior military and civil officials, as well as diplomats.

Here is Vladimir Medinsky’s speech in full:

“Dear colleagues. Last night, as previously reported, Russian President Vladimir Putin held a special meeting to prepare our delegation for the upcoming negotiations in Istanbul. The meeting was attended by the leadership of the Russian Security Council, the Russian government, the Minister of Defense, the Chief of the General Staff, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, as well as the heads of state security, intelligence, and the commanders of all Russian armed forces groups participating in the military operation [against Kiev]. Members of the delegation present here also took part in the meeting.

Foreign policy and security matters were discussed, with additional reports presented on the state of the economy and the defense industry. The Minister of Defense, the Chief of the General Staff, and all commanders of Russian army groups involved in the military operation [against Kiev] reported on the situation in the combat zone. A detailed joint discussion followed. Based on the participants’ reports, the president issued instructions and outlined the negotiation position for the Russian delegation in Istanbul.

We view these talks as a continuation of the peace process in Istanbul, which was unfortunately interrupted by the Ukrainian side three years ago. Our official delegation has been approved by presidential order and possesses all necessary qualifications and authority to conduct negotiations. The delegation is adopting a constructive approach, focused on finding viable solutions and areas of common ground. The aim of direct negotiations with the Ukrainian side is ultimately to secure lasting peace by addressing the fundamental root causes of the conflict.

“..Zakharova has also stressed that there was never any talk of Putin travelling to Türkiye for the talks and branded Zelensky a “clown” ..”

• Ukraine Won’t Survive A Decade Of Conflict – Zelensky (RT)

Vladimir Zelensky has said that although he does not know how long the conflict with Russia will last, his country would not be able to survive another ten years of fighting. Speaking to the French newspaper Liberation, the Ukrainian leader conveyed his insistence on a personal meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Türkiye to discuss an exchange of all prisoners and establishing a ceasefire.On Sunday, Putin proposed restarting direct peace talks between Russia and Ukraine, which were unilaterally abandoned by Kiev in 2022. The president stated that Moscow would send a delegation to Istanbul to engage with the Ukrainian side, stressing that Russia is set on “serious negotiation” that would contribute to a “long-term sustainable peace” and address the root causes of the conflict.

Zelensky, who had previously ruled out any negotiations with Moscow, welcomed the proposed talks in Istanbul and has personally traveled to Türkiye to potentially take part in the meeting. Ahead of the talks, he admitted to Liberation that Ukrainians have been growing tired of the conflict and that talks on ending the fighting have given people some hope. Asked if he should instead be preparing his citizens for another ten years of war, Zelensky stressed that “Ukraine wouldn’t survive” another decade of conflict. “I look at the morale of the population, what people want. I look at our economy… It’s costly for everyone,” Zelensky said. “In fact, this war can’t last very long,” he predicted. At the same time, the Ukrainian leader has dismissed the delegation sent by Russia to the talks as “props,” insisting on personally meeting with Putin. Moscow has slammed Zelensky’s position, with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov calling Zelensky a “pathetic person.”

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has also stressed that there was never any talk of Putin travelling to Türkiye for the talks and branded Zelensky a “clown” with no right to dismiss professionals in any field as “props.” Meanwhile, Medinsky, who is leading Moscow’s delegation in Istanbul, has stated that Russia is ready for dialogue with Ukraine and is prepared for “possible compromises” in reaching a peace deal. “We are in a working mood,” the presidential aide said. On Thursday, after meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Zelensky stated that he would have “nothing to do” at the talks without Putin’s participation and said that Ukraine’s delegation in Istanbul would instead be led by Defense Minister Rustem Umerov. He added that Kiev is engaging in the negotiations “out of respect for [US President Donald] Trump and Erdogan.”

“..Powell’s advice is expected to focus on making sure that Zelensky does not do “anything that alienates Trump”.

So his job is to stoke up the fire whenever Trump mentions peace.

• UK Sending Security Adviser To Work With Zelensky – Guardian (RT)

London is reportedly sending an adviser to Istanbul to give its recommendations to Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky ahead of talks with Russia, the Guardian reported on Wednesday. On Sunday, Russian President Vladimir Putin offered to restart direct negotiations with Kiev to find a peaceful resolution to the Ukraine conflict. While Zelensky had previously ruled out talks with Moscow, he welcomed the proposal and agreed to personally travel to Türkiye to take part. Moscow has barred Western European leaders from participating in the negotiations, accusing them of a biased approach to the conflict and trying to prolong the fighting. Nevertheless, the UK is reportedly sending Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s security adviser, Jonathan Powell, to meet with Zelensky ahead of the talks to provide “background advice” on how he should handle the meeting.

The Guardian reported that Powell’s advice is expected to focus on making sure that Zelensky does not do “anything that alienates Trump” and equip him to persuade the US president that Putin is the “obstacle to peace.” The meeting is set to become the first direct talks between Russia and Ukraine since Kiev unilaterally aborted peace negotiations with Moscow in 2022 after being advised to do so by London. At the previous talks, shortly after the pre-approval of a draft treaty, former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson personally traveled to Kiev and persuaded Zelensky to abandon peace efforts and continue fighting, according to the head of the Ukrainian delegation David Arakhamia.

Ahead of Friday’s discussions, Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov has stated that they will have to take into account the points that were already worked out by both sides in 2022, plus the “real situation” on the ground that has developed since then. In his announcement of the talks, Putin stated that Russia is set on “serious negotiations” with Ukraine and is seeking a “long-term, sustainable peace” that would address the root causes of the conflict. He also suggested that Friday’s meeting could yield “a new ceasefire” that could pave the way for a comprehensive peace settlement, depending on the decisions of “the Ukrainian authorities and their supervisors.”

True enough, but I haven’t heard such talk recently.

• Talk of Direct US-Russia Clash Contradicts Trump’s Policy –Scott Ritter (Sp.)

There are “several plausible pathways” for the Ukraine conflict to escalate into a direct US-Russia war, claimed Gen. Gregory Guillot, head of US Northern Command, who labeled Russia as one of the US’ “principal adversaries.” Is this a veiled threat – or just the Pentagon beating the drums of war again? This statement signals brewing tensions within the Pentagon, military analyst and former Marine Corps intelligence officer Scott Ritter tells Sputnik. However, it’s just a “speculative pronouncement,” not reflective of Trump-era defense policy, according to the pundit. Ritter was struck by the fact that: • Guillot is speculating on a conflict beyond his remit, which belongs to US strategic command. • His stance contradicts Trump’s, who acknowledged Russia’s special military operation was provoked by NATO expansion:

“We had Trump say that there was justification for Russia’s actions, that they understood that the expansion of NATO served as a provocation,” Ritter stresses. What else rings the alarm bells of the Pentagon’s warmongering? Guillot also claimed the US could be drawn into a “direct military conflict” with Iran, China, or North Korea. He went even so far as to claim that “war with one adversary could quickly expand into war with an enemy coalition.”

“..Trump’s latest directive to Apple to cease manufacturing in India oversimplifies the complexities of global supply chains and risks unintended economic consequences..”

i.e. $3,000 iPhones.

• Trump Tells Apple Not To Build In India (RT)

US President Donald Trump has advised Apple CEO Tim Cook to avoid expanding the company’s manufacturing operations in India, according to reports. “I had a little problem with Tim Cook yesterday,” Trump was cited as saying in Doha on Thursday by CNBC. “I said to him, ‘my friend, I treated you very good. You’re coming here with $500 billion, but now I hear you’re building all over India.’ I don’t want you building in India.” The US president added, “I said to Tim, I said, ‘Tim look, we treated you really good, we put up with all the plants that you build in China for years, now you got build us. We’re not interested in you building in India, India can take care of themselves … we want you to build here.’” Trump claimed that as a result of his conversation with Cook, Apple would increase its production in the US, according to CNBC.

Apple has been expanding its operations in India, where it is ramping up its local production. Reuters reported in April that Apple planned to manufacture the majority of iPhones sold in the US in India by the end of 2026. Earlier this month, local media reported that Apple told India’s Ministry of Communications that it planned to move the assembly of all iPhones to the country from China. Industry watchers believe Trump’s latest directive to Apple to cease manufacturing in India oversimplifies the complexities of global supply chains and risks unintended economic consequences. Establishing iPhone manufacturing in the US, where Apple lacks existing facilities, would require significant time and investment, Sonam Chandwani, managing partner at KS Legal & Associates, told RT.

"I told Tim Cook we're not interested in you building (Apple) in India, they can take care of themselves, you up your production here (US)," claimed Trump. He added that India was one of the highest tariff-imposing countries & has now made an offer to reduce tariffs significantly… pic.twitter.com/11p9okfjTg

— CNBC-TV18 (@CNBCTV18News) May 15, 2025

On Tuesday, India approached the World Trade Organization (WTO) with a proposal to impose retaliatory duties against the US over American tariffs on steel and aluminum.The move comes after the US imposed a 25% tariff on steel and aluminum imports in March, which was an extension of measures initially introduced in 2018 during Trump’s first term as president. New Delhi is currently putting the finishing touches to a bilateral trade deal with Washington. US Vice President J.D. Vance announced last month that the two countries have agreed on terms for bilateral trade negotiations, calling it a roadmap to a final deal.

AI is the only game in town.

• Trump Touts 1.4 Trillion Investment In AI, Tech From UAE (ZH)

After the several massive announcements and deals to come out of Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia and Qatar, developments during the last leg of the US President’s Gulf tour in United Arab Emirates actually seem a bit humdrum by comparison. But the visuals and spare no expenses official welcome and ceremonial events have certainly been interesting…

⚡️Trump arrives in the UAE

(Don’t ask me what’s happening)pic.twitter.com/dtUsPwF25W

— War Monitor (@WarMonitors) May 15, 2025

Among the more notable statements has been Trump’s touting a 1.4 trillion… yes that’s trillion… investment in AI and other tech sectors from the Emirates. The White House had previewed this longtime in the works deal as related to artificial intelligence infrastructure, semiconductors, energy and manufacturing.Further, Emirates Global Aluminum will “invest in the first new aluminium smelter in the United States in 35 years, which would nearly double US domestic aluminium production.”

According to more developments out of the UAE:
• The White House said that Trump and Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani signed agreements that would “generate an economic exchange worth at least $1.2 trillion”.
• The agreements are said to include a $96bn deal with Qatar Airways to buy up to 210 Boeing 787 Dreamliner and 777X aeroplanes, and a statement of intent for $38bn in investments at Qatar’s Al Udeid Airbase and other air defence capabilities.
• A meeting is scheduled for later today of US, Turkish and Syrian officials to discuss details of Trump’s announced dropping of sanctions against Syria.
• Trump’s three-country tour of the Gulf state region will conclude in the United Arab Emirates on Thursday.

Amid lots of awards ceremonies, accolades, and a state dinner…Trump has also been filling in more details of fresh arms deals inked with Qatar. “Yesterday we signed an agreement for Qatar to purchase $42bn-worth of the finest American military hardware including THAAD missile batteries,” he said Thursday while speaking to US troops at Al Udeid airbase.The commander-in-chief further detailed that the deal includes “Pegasus refueling aircraft, Desert Vipers, light armored vehicles, amphibious combat vehicles, the MQ-9B and the Sky Guardian drones.” As for Qatar, the president says he’s still ready to accept a donated jet from the tiny oil and gas rich country, a flying palace of a future Air Force One, which Dems have been warning would be a violation of the US Constitution’s prohibition on foreign gifts. Certainly he’ll come back to Washington awaiting immense controversy and backlash from the corporate media and his political enemies.

“So we survived until the 1960s without universal injunction?” he asked.

• Justice Thomas Destroys the Case for Nationwide Injunctions (Margolis)

During Supreme Court oral arguments in the Trump v. CASA, Washington, and New Jersey cases, Justice Clarence Thomas delivered a surgical takedown of the legal rationale for nationwide injunctions, using just one line. The case centers around whether lower courts can issue sweeping injunctions that block federal policies nationwide, even when only a handful of plaintiffs are before the court. Representing the United States, Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued that such broad orders violate established legal norms and Supreme Court precedent. “We believe that the best reading of that is what you said in Trump against Hawaii, which is that Wirtz in 1963 was really the first universal injunction,” Sauer told the Court. “There’s a dispute about Perkins against Lukens Oil going back to 1940. And of course, we point to the Court’s opinion that reversed that universal injunction issued by the D.C. Circuit and said it’s profoundly wrong.”

Sauer continued, listing key precedents that have rejected expansive injunctive relief. “If you look at the cases that either party cite, you see a common theme. The cases that we cite — like National Treasury Employees Union, Perkins, Frothingham, and Massachusetts v. Mellon, going back to Scott v. Donald — in all of those, those are cases where the Court considered and addressed the sort of universal — well, in that case, statewide — provision of injunctive relief.” He emphasized, “When the Court has considered and addressed this, it has consistently said, ‘You have to limit the remedy to the plaintiffs appearing in court and complaining of that remedy.’” That’s when Justice Thomas stepped in and cut through the legal weeds with a devastatingly simple observation. “So we survived until the 1960s without universal injunction?” he asked.

Sauer didn’t hesitate: “That’s exactly correct. And in fact, those were very limited, very rare, even in the 1960s.” He went on to explain that nationwide injunctions didn’t truly explode until 2007. “In our cert petition in Summers v. Rhode Island Institute, we pointed out that the Ninth Circuit had started doing this in a whole bunch of cases involving environmental claims.” Thomas’s concise question — “So we survived until the 1960s without universal injunction?” — hit the heart of the issue. With that simple question, he challenged the idea that such drastic judicial remedies were historically essential, even during one of the most tumultuous and morally urgent periods in American history: the civil rights era, a time when federal courts began issuing broader remedies to dismantle Jim Crow laws and enforce desegregation.

In other words, if the courts managed to confront segregation, enforce Brown v. Board of Education, and make tremendous progress for civil rights without needing to impose blanket nationwide injunctions, then why are they supposedly necessary today over what amounts to policy disputes? In just one sentence, Thomas accomplished what pages of legal briefs failed to do. He exposed the historical and constitutional weakness of the left’s favorite legal tactic.

“When these people, like the January 6 Committee and particularly Adam Schiff, are charged and try defending their bogus pardon, then we will start to learn who was really running the White House..”

• Biden’s Autopen Pardons May Just Get Invalidated (Margolis)

Ed Martin, the new DOJ pardon attorney and head of the Weaponization Working Group, isn’t wasting time. This week, he announced a review of the shady “autopen” pardons Joe Biden’s team rushed through in its final days. “These deserve some scrutiny,” he said. That’s an understatement. As PJ Media has previously reported, Biden’s White House frequently used an autopen to sign executive orders and pardons, which raised serious doubts as to whether Biden was even involved in the process. In March, the Oversight Project dropped a bombshell memo detailing 32 instances where the Biden White House used an autopen to sign off on clemency warrants — pardons and commutations that impacted thousands, including preemptive pardons for members of the January 6 Committee. The report raises a chilling question: Were these acts of mercy issued by a president or by a rogue staffer who had no constitutional authority to do so?

“They need scrutiny because we want pardons to matter, and to be accepted, and to be something that’s used correctly. So I do think we’re going to take a hard look at how they went and what they did,” Martin said. The Blaze has more:”The Justice Department’s probe could spell trouble for controversial Biden pardonees such as Anthony Fauci, retired Gen. Mark Milley, members of the Biden clan, and former members of the House Jan. 6 select committee — including Liz Cheney, Adam Kinzinger, Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), and Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), whom President Donald Trump and other Republicans have faulted for various alleged crimes and improprieties. For instance, Trump has suggested that Milley may have committed “treason.”

While previously serving as Trump’s most senior uniformed adviser, Milley called his communist Chinese counterpart, communist Gen. Li Zuocheng, on two occasions — four days before the 2020 election and on Jan. 8, 2021 — to reassure Zuocheng that he would provide him with actionable warnings should Trump decide to attack. Milley received a pardon just hours before former President Joe Biden left office. Fauci, the fifth director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, received a “full and unconditional” pass for possible federal crimes going back to Jan. 1, 2014 — around the time the Obama administration supposedly halted funding for dangerous gain-of-function research. “The American people were promised accountability, and I think Ed Martin is our best shot at it,” Mike Howell, president of the Oversight Project, told The Blaze.

“These pardons are fake and invalid, and the president has already said that is his view.” He’s right. Martin’s investigation may be the first serious step toward cleaning up the mess that Biden left behind. “When these people, like the January 6 Committee and particularly Adam Schiff, are charged and try defending their bogus pardon, then we will start to learn who was really running the White House,” Howell added. “We need to answer the question everyone is asking: Who was running the government the last four years?” The presidential autopen has been around since the 1950s, but its use has always raised legal eyebrows. In 2013, Barack Obama became the first president to sign a bill into law with an autopen while vacationing in Hawaii. His office leaned on a 30-page memo from George W. Bush’s legal team claiming it was fine as long as the president authorized it. But Biden’s situation is far murkier. What no one seems to know is who was operating the autopen and whether Biden even knew it was being used.

“On Biden’s last day in office, he pardoned his brother Jim, his sister-in-law Sara, his sister Valerie and her husband, John Owens, his brother Francis, Dr. Anthony Fauci, retired Gen. Mark Milley, and members of the House Jan. 6 committee.”

• DOJ Pardon Attorney Ed Martin To Review Biden’s Outgoing Pardons (JTN)

Ed Martin, who is leaving his Trump appointment as interim U.S. Attorney for Washington, D.C., to become the Justice Department’s U.S. pardon attorney, said that he will review former President Biden’s outgoing pardons. “I do think that the Biden pardons need some scrutiny,” Martin told ABC News on Tuesday. “And they need scrutiny because we want pardons to matter and to be accepted and to be something that’s used correctly. So I do think we’re going to take a hard look at how they went and what they did. “If they’re null and void, I’m not sure how that operates, but I can tell you we’ve had already, I’ve had in my current position, or my position as US Attorney, we had been taking a look at some of the conduct surrounding the pardons and the Biden White House.”

In addition to the pardon attorney post, Martin will be the director of the department’s Weaponization Working Group. President Trump pulled Martin’s nomination for U.S. Attorney for Washington, D.C., because Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., said he would not support it, over Martin’s involvement in the defense of people who breached the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, according to NBC News. Tillis is a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which was overseeing Martin’s nomination. His no vote would have effectively prevented Martin’s from getting a final confirmation vote. The DOJ attorney said that he doesn’t believe that Biden’s use of “auto-pen” for pardons is a problem, despite Trump suggesting that it makes them invalid. On Biden’s last day in office, he pardoned his brother Jim, his sister-in-law Sara, his sister Valerie and her husband, John Owens, his brother Francis, Dr. Anthony Fauci, retired Gen. Mark Milley, and members of the House Jan. 6 committee.

The amounts are less spectacular, but the work must be done.

• DOGE Still Hard at Work Cutting Fraud and Waste (Salgado)

The Department of Government Efficiency is still continually occupied investigating fraud, waste, and abuse in our federal government. Now, if only Congressional Republicans would agree on a budget that includes all these necessary cuts. On May 12, DOGE’s X account provided a contract update: “Since Friday, agencies terminated 242 wasteful contracts with a ceiling value of $646M and savings of $200M, including a $118k USDA contract for the ‘Democratic Republic of Congo youth climate corps coordinator’, and a $23.5k USAID contract for the ‘garden landscaping and pool services at official mission director’s residence’ of South Africa.” Obviously important uses of our taxpayer dollars. On May 14, DOGE added an update:

“Current year non-defense federal obligations are down 20.5% as compared to 2024. Cash outlays will follow as obligations come due. Persistent government wide contract reviews for wasteful spend, consistent with the DOGE Cost Efficiency Executive Order, are bearing fruit.” It seems review of federal contracts has been a DOGE priority lately. Earlier this month, DOGE shared, “Over the last two days, agencies terminated 522 wasteful contracts with a ceiling value of $285M and savings of $110M, including a $181k @USDA contract for a ‘technical climate advisor for central Africa’.” The grift is endless. DOGE has been investigating federal credit cards, too. Earlier this month, DOGE announced, “The program to audit unused/unneeded credit cards has been expanded to 32 agencies. After 10 weeks, more than 500K cards have been de-activated. As a reminder, at the start of the audit, there were ~4.6M active cards/accounts, so still more work to do.”

No wonder we are over $36.8 trillion in debt. Of course, DOGE also partners with multiple agencies, and the Department of Energy “has announced 47 deregulatory actions for an estimated $11 billion of savings to Americans. Previously, this quantity of deregulation would take years to initiate,” per DOGE. Energy Secretary Chris Wright issued his own proud statement on May 12, explaining his department “assembled a task force to work on the BIGGEST deregulatory push in modern history. The idea was simple: get a bunch of smart people in a room & work through the problem. We cut through the red tape to deliver 47 deregulatory actions on behalf of the American people!” What a novel idea — government actually working for We the People!

Crazy that someone can block the elected government from scrutinizing its largest expenditures.

• Trump Admin Urges SCOTUS to Permit DOGE Access to Social Security Records (ET)

The Department of Justice urged the Supreme Court on May 13 to let the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have access to Social Security data after lower courts blocked that access.President Donald Trump issued Executive Order 14158 on Jan. 20, implementing DOGE, an advisory body that recommends cost-cutting measures. The order directed the entity to “implement the President’s DOGE Agenda, by modernizing Federal technology and software to maximize governmental efficiency and productivity.” Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued in the new filing that the lower courts have overreached and are attempting to turn themselves into “the human resources department for the Executive Branch.”

The filing came after Ellen Lipton Hollander, a Maryland-based federal district court judge, issued an order on March 20 preventing DOGE from viewing Social Security Administration (SSA) records because such access “violates” the federal Privacy Act.The lawsuit was brought in February by labor unions and retirees represented by the Democracy Forward Foundation.“The DOGE Team is essentially engaged in a fishing expedition at SSA, in search of a fraud epidemic, based on little more than suspicion. It has launched a search for the proverbial needle in the haystack, without any concrete knowledge that the needle is actually in the haystack,” the judge wrote in granting a temporary restraining order against the federal government.

DOGE’s team at the Social Security Administration has had “unbridled access to the personal and private data of millions of Americans, including but not limited to Social Security numbers, medical records, mental health records, hospitalization records, drivers’ license numbers, bank and credit card information, tax information, income history, work history, birth and marriage certificates, and home and work addresses,” Hollander wrote. Hollander directed DOGE to delete any personally identifiable data in its possession. On April 17, Hollander upgraded the temporary restraining order to a preliminary injunction. On April 30, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit voted 9–6 to maintain Hollander’s order while the appeal process continues. On May 2, the Trump administration filed an emergency appeal with the Supreme Court, asking the justices to pause the preliminary injunction.

In the May 13 filing, Sauer argued that the district court erred in preventing “the 11 members of the Social Security Administration (SSA) DOGE team—from accessing data … for purposes that are unquestionably lawful.” The district court “dictated to the Executive Branch which government employees can access which data and even prescribed necessary training, background checks, and paperwork for data access,” Sauer wrote. “When district courts attempt to transform themselves into the human resources department for the Executive Branch, the irreparable harm to the government is clear,” he wrote. When the courts “stymie the government’s initiatives to modernize badly outdated systems and combat rampant fraud—leaving those initiatives on a litigation track that may halt them for months or years—the irreparable harm is even clearer.”

Reviewing Social Security Administration data is important because the agency has “one of the largest documented histories of improper payments,” Sauer stated. In a brief in opposition filed on May 12, the lead respondent, the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, said that after years of honoring “its data security obligations,” the Social Security Administration “now seeks to throw open its data systems to unauthorized (and often unvetted) personnel who have no demonstrated need for the personally identifiable information … they seek.”The April 17 preliminary injunction should be left in place because it is “narrow and, contrary to the government’s assertions, permits SSA to disclose both anonymized and non-anonymized data to DOGE Team members,” the brief said.The Supreme Court could rule on the government’s emergency application at any time.

How to spell “inside job”.

Helmer is an expert on MH17.

• The US Has Pushed The ICAO To Declare War On Russia (Helmer)

On Monday, May 12, the United States pushed the Council of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the aircraft safety watchdog, to vote behind closed doors to adopt a secret resolution convicting Russia of shooting-down Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 on July 17, 2014. Unlike the Dutch show trial which in November 2022 convicted two Russians and a Ukrainian of the same crime, the ICAO reached its verdict without the appearance of an open proceeding or of openly tested evidence. It’s a put-up job.William Raillant-Clark, the ICAO communications chief at the Montreal headquarters, was asked to provide a text of the resolution and identification of the countries voting for, against, abstaining, and absent. Raillant-Clark replied: “In accordance with the Council’s Rules of Procedure, the vote was taken by secret ballot.” He refused to disclose the resolution itself; the numbers of votes without the names of the countries; or the reason for keeping everything but the conviction of Russia secret. He answered: “The Council’s considerations based on reason of law and fact, will be issued in the coming weeks.”

The spokesman was then asked for a copy of ICAO’s Rules of Procedure. He refuses to answer. The decision of ICAO to go to war with Russia, using its aviation safety mandate to cover up the evidence of what really happened to MH17, destroys the organization for the future. It follows the destruction of the global organization for the safety of nuclear power generation, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW); the International Committee of the Red Cross; and the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres.

The downing of MH17 on July 17, 2014, with the deaths of all 298 passengers and crew, was a Ukrainian government operation, backed by the Obama Administration led by then-Vice President Joseph Biden, to start the economic sanctions war against Russia; US and NATO military preparations for the Ukrainian attack on the Donbass; it almost led to a NATO military intervention. Read the full story of what happened, and the subsequent faking of evidence in the Dutch trial, in the book. This new ICAO fatality, weaponizing aviation safety into war against Russia, was inflicted by the US, the dominant member state on the 36-member Council of the ICAO. Collaborating with the State Department’s delegate at the Council, Anthony Clare, the Dutch and Australian governments promoted the resolution and pushed for adoption by the allied states.

The list of permanent and elected member states on the ICAO Council can be viewed here. The ICAO session on May 12 does not appear in the advance schedule of meetings for the ICAO this month. The Council vote which took place on May 12 is not listed in the Council proceedings for the month. An internal notice of the Council for the May 12 meeting shows the text of the resolution is “restricted”. Raillant-Clark has refused to explain. As soon as the vote was taken, the Dutch Government and Foreign Ministry issued a press release. The Australian Foreign Ministry followed. The Netherlands and Australia, whose nationals comprised the majority of the 298 victims on board MH17, sponsored the ICAO resolution. Both governments are fighting Russia on the Ukrainian battlefield. The Dutch may now attempt to divert Russian state funds frozen in The Netherlands to pay compensation to the families of the victims.

Only after the two government releases had appeared, and Raillant-Clark was questioned personally, did ICAO reveal its press release.

The Russian government issued its response on May 13. “Russia,” the Foreign Ministry said, “is not part of the ICAO Council. In its press release, this body alleges that the responsibility for downing this flight rests with the Russian Federation. However, the text of the ruling, including its reasoning part, is not available. Therefore, this amounted to a blind vote – it is quite obvious that this decision does not hold water. Once again, the ICAO Council demonstrated its political bias. It takes its decision while guided by momentary considerations. This is not the way it must operate.” “Russia withdrew from these proceedings last year, on June 17, 2024, in view of the multiple procedural violations by the Council and the ICAO Secretariat, which made an impartial fact-finding effort all but impossible. That said, Moscow’s principled position remains relevant to this day – Russia was not involved in the MH17 crash, while all the claims to the contrary coming from Australia and the Netherlands are at odds with reality.”

“The ICAO Council is not an independent body. It includes 36 ICAO member states out of 193. They get their voting instructions from their respective capitals. Most of the countries represent the West and their immediate satellites. This makes the way the Council operates a matter of arithmetic. There was simply nobody to tackle this matter in a professional manner and on its merits.”

“There is nothing new about using the ICAO Council against countries which are viewed as being undesirable by the West. This can hardly come as a surprise to anyone these days. Suffice to recall the investigation of the landing of a Ryanair flight at the Minsk airport on May 23, 2021. At the time, the interested Western countries were not satisfied with the preliminary report by the Investigative Team. They used their majority within the Council to force the team to re-write the report to ensure that it condemns Belarus. Moreover, the ICAO Council ruled that it was competent to review the Great Britain, Sweden, Ukraine, Canada v. Iran case regarding the crash of a Boeing aircraft near Tehran after a vote held behind the curtain. There was also a recent example when the Council refused to take up Venezuela’s claims in its dispute with Argentina regarding unilateral restrictions in civil aviation.”

NB: the chance that a former FBI director doesn’t know what 8647 stands for is zero.

• “86 47” – Comey Posts-Then-Deletes Creepy Threat Aimed At Trump (ZH)

Former FBI Director James Comey posted a photo of sea shells arranged into the numbers “86 47” on his Instagram account today, before shortly deleting the post.The immediately preceding post shows Comey lounging at the beach while pretending to read his own crime novel, his presence at the beach lending to the fact that this was not a hack. Many are blasting Comey for issuing a not-so-thinly-veiled threat at sitting President Donald Trump, including the President’s son and Congressman Andy Biggs:

Just James Comey causally calling for my dad to be murdered.

This is who the Dem-Media worships. Demented!!!! pic.twitter.com/4LUK6crHAT

— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) May 15, 2025

And here is his explanation for the ‘shells’ and the deletion……you simply cannot make this shit up!!!

[..] As covered previously in a ZeroHedge piece titled “From Epstein To Diddy: Spotlight Shines On James Comey’s Prosecutor Daughter”, Comey’s offspring smell a little swampy as well. From the piece: In a thinly covered news story from December that’s suddenly relevant again (read on), New York Prosecutor Maurene Comey – whose father James Comey famously refused to prosecute Hillary Clinton for mishandling classified information & then participated in the Russia collusion hoax – joined the prosecution against Combs. The younger Comey has previously worked as lead prosecutor on both the Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell cases, as well as that of former Epstein cellmate Nicholas Tartaglione.
…
Maurene Comey became a US attorney in the Southern District of New York in 2015. In 2019, when she was just 30-years-old, Comey became one of the lead prosecutors in the Jeffrey Epstein case before he was found dead in his jail cell in August 2019. Two years later, she became one of three lead prosecutors in the trial of Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s partner in crime and daughter of suspected Mossad operative Robert Maxwell.

Before becoming a US attorney, Comey clerked for US District Court chief judge Loretta Preska of the SDNY – who notably oversaw a long-running defamation case filed by Epstein victim Virginia Giuffre against Maxwell. Comey was also involved in the case of Nicholas Tartaglione, a former NYPD officer who was convicted of killing four men in 2016, and who was briefly Epstein’s cellmate in the Manhattan Metro Correctional Center. Tartaglione claims to have helped Epstein after ‘finding him unconscious’ (and totally not trying to kill him) prior to Epstein’s actual death. In 2016, Tartaglione suspected a man named Martin Luna had stolen money from him – for which “Tartaglione tortured Martin and then forced one of Martin’s nephews to watch as he strangled him to death with a zip-tie,” according to a statement by the US Attorney’s Office.

Two days after Epstein’s death, NY Times reporter James B Stewart, who had spent 90 minutes with Epstein a year prior, wrote “The overriding impression I took away from our roughly 90-minute conversation was that Mr. Epstein knew an astonishing number of rich, famous and powerful people, and had photos to prove it. He also claimed to know a great deal about these people, some of it potentially damaging or embarrassing, including details about their supposed sexual proclivities and recreational drug use. And so, whether this is just a case of ‘it’s a small world’ or something a little (or a lot) less innocent, James Comey’s daughter is now involved in a second case where high-profile celebrities and politicians may have been secretly filmed engaging in sexual activity with minors. Comey’s deep state tentacles make the cryptic Instragram post that much more unsettling. Might there be some hints in Comey’s shitty novel? Donald Barr’s Space Relations anyone?

CHD
https://twitter.com/NicHulscher/status/1922833502430450150

Xifaxan

This should infuriate every American

An American doctor goes undercover to buy the EXACT SAME antibiotic in America and in Mexico to show you the difference in cost

“I’m gonna show you some absolute garbage”

Drug name Xifaxan

America price: $1,454
Mexico price: $24 pic.twitter.com/wXi9321L1f

— Wall Street Apes (@WallStreetApes) May 14, 2025

Missing link

A medical breakthrough suppressed by politics

Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, renowned surgeon, scientist, and innovator, is breaking his silence on a discovery that could redefine medicine. In a candid conversation, he revealed the staggering potential of the Spire Shield, a molecule… pic.twitter.com/y59WRpbakl

— Camus (@newstart_2024) May 15, 2025

Mad honey

On steep Himalayan cliffs, honey hunters risk all to harvest hallucinogenic “mad honey”.

The honey contains grayanotoxins from Rhododendron flowers, which can have psychoactive effects.
pic.twitter.com/lp5ZcfChhH

— Science girl (@gunsnrosesgirl3) May 15, 2025

Escape

Forget every escape scene you've ever seen…pic.twitter.com/Or6Ix9ii62

— Interesting things (@awkwardgoogle) May 14, 2025

Dance

Let's dance together…

Animals understand more than many humans. pic.twitter.com/DSqVN4jfOs

— The Figen (@TheFigen_) May 14, 2025

Camel

Theses horses saw a camel for the first time and ran away, the camel chased them to persuade them to be friends
pic.twitter.com/vyji7S8vtZ

— Science girl (@gunsnrosesgirl3) May 15, 2025

Mercury and Aluminum

The reaction between Mercury and Aluminum
pic.twitter.com/ZVGOhVlhP5

— Science girl (@gunsnrosesgirl3) May 15, 2025

Pop
https://twitter.com/TansuYegen/status/1922749376956444819

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Debt Rattle April 9 2025

Apr 092025

April 9, 2025 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 10:02 am Finance Tagged with: Apple, assassination, Boasberg, China, financial literacy, iPhone, Japan, Meloni, Musk, Navarro, tariffs, USAID, Von der Leyen 54 Responses »

Salvador Dali Christ of Saint John of the Cross 1951

• Trump Assassination ‘Justified’ For Half of Left-Leaning Americans (RT)

• Trump Slaps ‘Proud’ China With 104% Tariffs (RT)

• White House Lacks Financial Literacy – ‘Tariffs’ Show (MoA)

• Don’t Like Trump’s Plan for the Economy? Let’s Hear Yours (Victor Davis Hanson)

• US Chamber of Commerce Considers Block on Trump’s New Import Tariffs (Sp.)

• EU Commission Eyeing 25% Tariffs on US Goods (Sp.)

• Von der Leyen Endorses Meloni As Main Tariff Negotiator (Sp.)

• The Tariff Issue (Paul Craig Roberts)

• President Trump Bestows Great Honor on Nation of Japan (CTH)

• Musk Wants Trump To Cancel Tariffs – WaPo (RT)

• Billionaires Slam Trump Tariffs (RT)

• Officials Quietly Drafting Plan To Cushion Trump Tariff Fallout – Bloomberg (RT)

• Apple Staged Emergency iPhone Airlift From India (RT)

• More Than 900k “Biden-App”Migrants Told to ‘Self-Deport’ (NYP)

• USAID Operations Rebooted in Several Crisis Zones (Sp.)

• Judge Boasberg Scraps Trump Hearing On Deportations After Scotus Ruling (JTN)

• Legal Experts Sound Alarm On Judge Blocking Trump’s Deportations (DC)

https://twitter.com/itscarterhughes/status/1909334208536846529

MAGA
https://twitter.com/gaborgurbacs/status/1909348105675211192

Bessent

Almost 70 countries have now approached us wanting to help rebalance global trade.

On behalf of @POTUS, I'm glad to join @USTradeRep to open talks with Japan as we work to enact the President’s vision for a new Golden Age of Global Trade.pic.twitter.com/PGUGjh7JkH

— Secretary of Treasury Scott Bessent (@SecScottBessent) April 7, 2025

GOAT
https://twitter.com/iam_smx/status/1909347460960653353

Rubio

Sec of State Rubio is becoming one of my favorites ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ pic.twitter.com/SVmBTX6bBh

— G-PA (@IndianaGPA) April 7, 2025

Bondi

NOW – AG Pam Bondi Sounds Off on Rogue Judges, Vows Criminal Alien Deportations Will Continue

Attorney General Pam Bondi just torched the rogue judges attempting to block President Trump's deportation efforts.

She made it clear: Criminal aliens are getting deported whether… pic.twitter.com/7Y80QhRWj4

— Overton (@overton_news) April 8, 2025

Won’t surprise too many people. And that’s not good at all.

• Trump Assassination ‘Justified’ For Half of Left-Leaning Americans (RT)

More than half of all left-leaning Americans believe there would be some justification for the assassination of US President Donald Trump, according to a new survey. The alarming finding was reported on Monday by the Network Contagion Research Institute (NCRI). The organization monitors radical ideologies and examines what it refers to as “assassination culture” in America. The nonprofit conducted an opinion poll to assess whether American citizens would condone lethal attacks on Trump and his government efficiency tsar, Elon Musk. Among the 1,264 individuals surveyed, 31% and 38% expressed at least some justification for murdering Musk and Trump, respectively. The figures increased to 48% and 55% among respondents identifying as center or left-leaning. In the latter group, 9.1% would deem the assassination of Musk to be “completely justified,” while 13.2% said the same about Trump.

A majority of 57.6% indicated that attacking Tesla dealerships to protest Musk’s involvement with the Trump administration was at least somewhat acceptable. Commenting on the poll’s findings and claims that Democratic leaders have “incited” the situation, Musk branded the political organization “the party of violence.” He previously characterized arson attacks on Tesla-affiliated businesses in the US and abroad as “terrorism.” Last weekend, thousands of Americans marched in various cities to protest Trump’s policies and his support for Musk’s approach to reducing government spending. Critics have labeled the activities of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by Musk, as an “illegal power grab” orchestrated by the president.

Trump barely escaped death during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania last July, when a shooter opened fire at him, killing and injuring several supporters of the Republican candidate. The NCRI said its survey confirms broader “troubling trends” within US political culture, suggesting that the endorsement of violence is rooted in a particular far-left ideology. The institute also posits that this ideology fuels the online “memeification” of Luigi Mangione, the alleged murderer of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. Some Americans view Mangione, against whom the Trump administration is seeking the death penalty, as a folk hero, arguing that his actions could be seen as justifiable vigilantism against a predatory corporate healthcare system.

Went into effect at midnight.

• Trump Slaps ‘Proud’ China With 104% Tariffs (RT)

The US has hiked tariffs on all Chinese imports to a staggering 104%, escalating the ongoing trade conflict and wiping out another $1.5 trillion from US stock markets on Tuesday. China was originally set to face a 34% tariff increase on Wednesday, as part of President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” measures targeting virtually all US trade partners. However, after Beijing responded with a proportional 34% duty of its own, the US president raised the blanket tariff to a total of 104%. “After all of the abuses they’ve perpetrated, China is attempting to impose additional unjustified tariffs,” Trump said at a National Republican Congressional Committee dinner in Washington on Tuesday. That’s why additional tariffs on Chinese goods are in place, effective midnight tonight at 104 percent. Until they make a deal with us, that’s what it’s going to be.

The White House published an amendment to the April 2 executive order in which Trump declared a national emergency over the US trade deficit and imposed a baseline tariff on all imports to the US. The administration said that nearly 70 countries had sought negotiations to mitigate the impact of the tariffs, as Trump pursues “tailored deals” with individual nations. The president went on to say that Beijing will have to “make a deal at some point,” claiming that “they just don’t know how to get it sorted because they’re proud people.” Until then, he added, China “will now pay a big number to our Treasury.” “Right now, China is paying a 104 percent tariff, think of it… Now, it sounds ridiculous, but they charged us for many items 100 percent, 125 percent,” Trump said. “They’ve ripped us off left and right. But now it’s our turn to do the ripping.”

Beijing previously condemned the escalating trade war as a form of “blackmail” and “economic bullying.” A spokesperson for the Commerce Ministry said on Tuesday that “China will fight till the end if the US side is bent on going down the wrong path.” The latest escalation has had a significant impact on US and global stock markets. Major indices such as the S&P 500, Dow Jones, and Nasdaq suffered further declines after a brief surge earlier this week, wiping out an estimated $1.5 trillion from US markets on Tuesday. Trump acknowledged that the fallout from his move was “somewhat explosive,” but defended his strategy, claiming that “sometimes you have to mix it up a little bit.” He insisted that the tariffs are necessary to address trade “abuses” and to promote domestic manufacturing, adding that the US is already generating $2 billion a day from the tariffs.

BOOM: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent Just Warned China They're Bluffing—and Holding a Losing Hand

China threatened more tariffs after Trump hit back with his own. But Bessent says they’re playing poker with a pair of twos.

“That is a losing hand for them.”

He says Trump has… pic.twitter.com/JSNdRpOAQs

— Overton (@overton_news) April 8, 2025

A good fried pointed to this Moon of Alabama piece from a few days ago. It gives the impression that the Trump team is being sloppy with the tariffs. The only thing is, they say their numbers come “including Currency Manipulation and Trade barriers”. And those are not very clearly defined. But the impression of sloppy is still not a good thing.

• White House Lacks Financial Literacy – ‘Tariffs’ Show (MoA)

‘The foundation of American economic prosperity is a society empowered with the knowledge and tools to make informed financial decisions to achieve the American Dream. … ‘ I welcome that message. Teaching financial literacy must start at the top. The members of the Trump administration obviously lack the knowledge and tools to make informed financial decisions. It is the only possible explanation for how they came up with these numbers:

China does not have a 67% tariff on U.S. goods (it’s 7.3%). The EU does not have a 39% tariff on U.S. goods (it’s 5.2%). The numbers are bollocks. So where do they come from? The official explanation from the U.S. Trade Representative is here. Its baloney:

“James Surowiecki @JamesSurowiecki – 0:22 UTC · Apr 3, 2025 “Just figured out where these fake tariff rates come from. They didn’t actually calculate tariff rates + non-tariff barriers, as they say they did. Instead, for every country, they just took our trade deficit with that country and divided it by the country’s exports to us. So we have a $17.9 billion trade deficit with Indonesia. Its exports to us are $28 billion. $17.9/$28 = 64%, which Trump claims is the tariff rate Indonesia charges us. What extraordinary nonsense this is.
…
Even given that it’s Trump, I cannot believe they said “We’ll just divide the trade deficit by imports and tell people that’s the tariff rate.” And then they decided to set our tariffs by just cutting that totally made-up rate in half! This is so dumb and deceptive. .. it’s actually worse than I thought: in calculating the tariff rate, Trump’s people only used the trade deficit in goods. So even though we run a trade surplus in services with the world, those exports don’t count as far as Trump is concerned.”

The last point is a major one, for China, but especially for the EU :

“EU-US trade in goods and services reached an impressive €1.6 trillion in 2023. This means that every day, €4.4 billion worth of goods and services cross the Atlantic between the EU and the US. … The total bilateral trade in goods reached €851 billion in 2023. The EU exported €503 billion of goods to the US market, while importing €347 billion; this resulted in a goods trade surplus of €157 billion for the EU. Total bilateral trade in services between the EU and the US was worth €746 billion in 2023. The EU exported €319 billion of services to the US, while importing €427 billion from the US; this resulted in a services trade deficit of €109 billion for the EU. …EU-US goods and services trade is balanced: the difference between EU exports to the US and US exports to the EU stood at €48 billion in 2023; the equivalent of just 3% of the total trade between the EU and the US.”

Despite that Trump has decreed a 20% on all goods from the EU. The natural countermeasure from the EU will be to put a 20+% tariff on all import of U.S. services. Trump also decreed a minimum 10% tariff on imports from every country. Products made by the penguins of the uninhabited Heard and McDonald Islands in the Antarctic will now come with a 10% surcharge.”

There is really no economic reasoning behind these numbers. “Arnaud Bertrand @RnaudBertrand – 4:16 AM · Apr 3, 2025 “To illustrate just how nonsensically these tariffs were calculated, take the example of Lesotho, one of the poorest countries in Africa with just $2.4 billion in annual GDP, which is being struck with a 50% tariff rate under the Trump plan, the highest rate among all countries on the list…. As a matter of fact Lesotho, as a member of the Southern African Customs Union (SACU), applies the common external tariff structure established by this regional trade bloc. … So since the tariffs charged by these 5 countries on U.S. products are exactly the same, they must all be struck with a 50% tariff rate by the U.S., right? Not at all: South Africa is getting 30%, Namibia 21%, Botswana 37% and Eswatini just 10%, the lowest rate possible among all countries.

Looking at Lesotho specifically, every year the U.S. imports approximately $236 million in goods from Lesotho (primarily diamonds, textiles and apparel) while exporting only about $7 million worth of goods to Lesotho (https://wits.worldbank.org/CountryProfile/en/Country/LSO/Year/2022/TradeFlow/EXPIMP/Partner/by-country). Why do they export so little? Again this is an extremely poor country where 56.2% of the population lives with less than $3.65 a day (https://databankfiles.worldbank.org/public/…), i.e. $1,300 a year. They simply can’t afford U.S. products, no-one is going to buy an iPhone or a Tesla on that sort of income… The way the tariffs are ACTUALLY calculated appears to be based on a simplistic and economically senseless formula: you take the trade deficit the U.S. has with a country, divide it by that country’s exports to the U.S and declare this – falsely – “the tariff they charge on the U.S.”

And then as Trump did in his speech last night, you magnanimously declare that you’ll only “reciprocate” by charging half that “tariff” on them. As such, for Lesotho, the calculation goes like this: ($236M – $7M)/$235M = 97%. That’s the “tariff” Lesotho is deemed to charge this U.S. and half of that, i.e. roughly 50% is what the U.S. “reciprocates” with. It’s extremely easy to see why this makes no sense at all. ”

Lesotho has a comparative advantage over the U.S. as it can dig up and sell diamonds. But it lacks the purchasing power to buy U.S. goods and services. The calculations by the Trump administration ignore those basic facts. No tariffs were by the way introduced against Belarus, Russia and North Korea. This because of sanction, the U.S. has allegedly no trade relation with them. (Other than buying enriched Uranium for its nuclear power stations?) Did the Trump administration anticipate how this nonsense will explode in its face? It is Smoot-Hawley writ large.

“If you don’t believe that what Donald Trump is trying to do on debt, budget, workforce, trade, then come up with a better agenda. And show why it will work and why his will fail..”

• Don’t Like Trump’s Plan for the Economy? Let’s Hear Yours (Victor Davis Hanson)

Hello, this is Victor Davis Hanson for The Daily Signal. I’d like to talk about the economy and politics very quickly. Whether you like it or I like it or whether the administration likes it or whether the Congress or the American people like it, the success or failure of President Donald Trump will hinge on the status of the economy. It will overshadow the miraculous achievement on the border, where he went from a rate of about 2 million people a year to almost zero illegal immigration. It will even outrank the question of peace and stability in Ukraine or the Middle East. It’ll outrank everything. So, here’s my question. There is now outrage, hysteria over the last 24 hours to 48 hours that Donald Trump has outlined his tariff program to bring down the nearly $1 trillion trade deficit, and the stock market has taken hits.

So, here’s my question, though, when Sen. Cory Booker stands up for 25 hours, does he give an alternate agenda on the economy? Does Rep. Nancy Pelosi talk about the economy? She used to. Does The Wall Street Journal, when they criticize Donald Trump, why don’t they get a columnist and say, “These are the 10 points that are preferable in addressing our economic challenges”? Now, what are our economic challenges? Well, the first is debt. We owe $37 trillion. We’re paying $3 billion a day in interest. We’re running a $1.7 trillion deficit. So, if you were on the left and you were part of the machine that borrowed $7 trillion under President Joe Biden, created these huge new programs, why don’t you make an argument? Just say, “I believe in modern monetary theory. I believe, if we can just get down to 1% or 2% interest, you can service any debt because the bondholders, they’re wealthy anyway. So, that’s what we’ve been doing. And I don’t—I believe money’s a construct. It’s just an idea. So, there is no such thing as, you know, red or blue ink—any of that. So, just keep spending. There’s no problem—$37, $40 trillion.” Say that.

Or, if you’re on the right, say, “I prefer to look at the debt in a different way. If you’re going to cut, why select particular fraud, waste, and abuse areas? Why not just go across the board and treat everybody the same with a 4% or 5% or 10% cut?” Or, if you don’t believe in cutting government to reduce the debt, then say, “Let’s just go completely laissez-faire and let’s grow the economy so it’s growing at 4% or 5% gross domestic product. And it will solve the problem.” Or, if you’re in the middle and you’re an independent, why don’t you just say, “We had three balanced budgets. We were reducing the debt because former House Speaker Newt Gingrich controlled taxes and former President Bill Clinton controlled spending. And he was able to find an incentive plan to increase revenue and Bill Clinton decreased spending. OK? Why not we go back and follow their model?”

I really like how he explains this, he lets you make your own decision and just gives you the information about Tariffs. This is actually the best one. pic.twitter.com/jaiatOzwgf

— Johnny Midnight ⚡️ (@its_The_Dr) April 7, 2025

But the problem is none of these areas—right, center, and left—nobody in these disciplines is offering any alternative agenda. It’s just attack Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump. Let’s go to trades. So, we have, again, about a trillion-dollar trade deficit. We haven’t had balanced trade for 50 years. Our opponents, challengers, allies, whatever you want to call them, feel that protected tariffs in China, in India, in Europe, in South Korea, in Japan have been very conducive to their economic miracle—postwar miracles. And they feel that there must be some wisdom in them because they continue to perpetuate them. They have not run deficits for a half-century. They’re not, in terms of GDP, debt, quite like we are. So, maybe you can argue that tariffs are just an American problem. An obsession. And they don’t really matter. Or you can say that we should have reciprocal tariffs based on each one. But tell us what you want to do.

Why don’t you just say that if you—and I have read this from scholars as diverse as the American Enterprise Institute, the Cato Institute. This is just a construct, trade deficits, they don’t matter. Because the people, if they run up a surplus, they buy our bonds or they invest, and it’s a circular process—just say that. Or, if you believe that trade deficits matter, then you say, “Well, the answer is not through tariffs. It’s through greater productivity. And here’s how I want to do it.” But again, there’s nothing. And then we get, finally, into foreign investment. Donald Trump is bragging, I think justifiably so, that he may have $3 to $5 trillion in foreign investment. Nobody says a word about it. Nobody says this many trillion dollars will result in this many new jobs created. No, they just kind of ignore it. So, give us a reason why. Just say, “You know, the new massive amounts of foreign aid will have no effect on either our trade deficit or our budget deficit. It’s just a construct that Trump says.”

Or say that it will but it won’t nullify the pernicious effects of tariffs. But what I’m getting at, in conclusion, is what if Cory Booker had said, “I’m going to speak for 25 hours on why Donald Trump’s trade, debt, and federal workforce investment are all wrong. And here’s da, da, da, da”? Or what if House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said, “Here is our contract for America on the economy. The economy”? No one is giving any alternatives. No one is talking in any way that they have an antithetical and a better plan than Donald Trump. So, what we’re left with is just naysaying, nihilism, criticism. And the American people are confused. If you don’t believe that what Donald Trump is trying to do on debt, budget, workforce, trade, then come up with a better agenda. And show why it will work and why his will fail. But don’t just scream and yell and cause all hysteria and go to street theater because that’s no answer. It only amplifies the problem.

Guess they can try.. But so could anyone.

• US Chamber of Commerce Considers Block on Trump’s New Import Tariffs (Sp.)

The US Chamber of Commerce, the country’s most powerful corporate lobby, is considering filing a lawsuit against the administration of US President Donald Trump to block the entry of new import tariffs into force, the Fortune magazine reported, citing sources familiar with the discussions of the lawsuit. The Chamber of Commerce may claim that Trump’s use of emergency powers to impose tariffs was illegal. According to the publication, some of the organization’s largest members are calling for the lawsuit. Sources also say that other organizations might join the lawsuit. The head of the US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) Elon Musk personally asked US President Donald Trump to reconsider new US tariffs on imports from a number of countries, the Washington Post reported, citing two sources.

According to the publication, over the weekend, when Elon Musk unleashed a stream of messages on social media criticizing one of the White House’s top advisers, trade aide Peter Navarro, for Trump’s aggressive tariff plan, he personally approached the president. The attempt, however, has not yet been successful: Trump on Monday threatened to add new 50% tariffs on imports from China on top of those already announced if Beijing did not abandon its retaliatory measures, the newspaper said. On Sunday, Musk announced his support for the creation of a free trade area with the EU, despite President Trump’s previously imposed trade tariffs against the union. The US President signed an executive order on April 2 introducing “reciprocal” tariffs on imports from other countries, calling it a “liberation.” The basic minimum rate will be 10%, and 20% for goods from the European Union. The US President promised budget revenue from tariffs of $6-$7 trillion.

They have no idea what to do, zero consensus.. And all 27 of them will have to agree.

• EU Commission Eyeing 25% Tariffs on US Goods (Sp.)

The European Commission is proposing to impose reciprocal tariffs of up to 25% on a number of goods from the United States, in particular on clothing, yachts, fruit juices, nuts and diamonds, the RMF FM radio reported. Bourbon was excluded from the preliminary list after protests from France and Italy, which feared that the United States would impose 200% duties on wine, prosecco and champagne, the report said on Monday. EU countries are expected to vote on this proposal on Wednesday, the report added. However, the commission is still counting on negotiations with Washington, and it has proposed reciprocal zero tariffs on industrial products, including cars, the report read.

At the same time, French Minister Delegate for Europe Benjamin Haddad said that Paris is in favor of a tough response to the US tariffs and will support the European Commission’s decision to impose 25% tariffs on some US imports. On April 2, US President Donald Trump announced reciprocal tariffs on imports from other countries. For the UK the baseline rate of 10% was set. However for each country the tariff will be calibrated and will be half of what they charge companies importing US goods. Trump said this will be a “declaration of economic independence” for the United States. The EU is subject to 20% tariffs.

Ursula von der Leyen is afraid of the White House.

• Von der Leyen Endorses Meloni As Main Tariff Negotiator (Sp.)

As the White House prepares to receive the Italian PM on April 17, Ursula von der Leyen believes Giorgia Meloni is the only EU leader who can facilitate dialogue with Trump, the WP reports, citing Italian officials. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen supports the upcoming visit of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni to Washington and believes that she is the one who is capable of facilitating dialogue between the European Union and US President Donald Trump, The Washington Post newspaper reported, citing an Italian official. On Tuesday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that Trump would receive Meloni in Washington on April 17.

“Von der Leyen is telling [Meloni] that if there’s one leader more in contact with the US, who’s capable of facilitating the conversation between the EU – not just Italy – and Trump, that’s her,” the official was quoted as saying by the newspaper on Tuesday. Von der Leyen was in favor of Meloni’s trip to Washington, the report added.

“..returning to tariffs as the source of government revenues and abandoning the income tax. This is consistent with correct economics and with freedom. Such a change would be possibly the most important reform in American history.”

• The Tariff Issue (Paul Craig Roberts)

The tariff controversy is being colored in the most scary ways possible, because the Democrats, media, and ruling establishment want rid of Trump. It is also important to understand that tariffs are not the only way to limit imports. There are other means, such as quotas. Quotas on imports into the US of Japanese cars were part of the US auto producers bailout negotiated in the final year of the Carter administration. I will attempt to put the issue in a correct perspective. It is not Trump’s intention, at least at the present time, to institutionalize a tariff regime. Trump is using tariffs as a threat to secure agreements that he thinks are in America’s interests. So far 50 countries have, according to reports, agreed to remove their tariffs on US goods. The countries responding aggressively seem to be China and our European allies.

I explained yesterday how Trump could better have gone about his task. Nevertheless, as the Commerce Secretary said, Trump’s tariffs are not expected to extend beyond a few weeks or a few months of negotiation. During this time there could be supply disruptions. Apparently, Trump is aware and has released an 11-page appendix that exempts all sorts of imported items that US producers require to continue their operations. Whatever disruption does occur, should be small compared to the Covid lockdown supply disruption, the basic cause of the current inflation. The Covid disruption was pointless and counterproductive. The tariff disruption, if there is one, is the cost of establishing a fair and uniform trading system. So, Trump is not being arbitrary or on a rampage to destroy international trade. Tariff negotiations, especially with so many countries and products can go on for years.

Trump might think that he only has two years to get anything done before the Democrats steal the midterm elections and bring his renewal of America to a halt. President Trump has spoken of tariffs in a wider and much more important context. Over most of American history until the First World War, tariff revenues were the source of government revenues. An income tax was unconstitutional and a violation of freedom. The definition of a free person is a person who owns his own labor. A slave does not own his own labor, and a serf only owns part of his labor. A person required to pay an income tax does not own that part of his labor that he must provide to government in order to avoid imprisonment. The difference between a medieval serf and an American taxpayer is the serf paid the tax in kind as hours worked, and the American pays the tax in money as a percentage of his income.

Classical economists, real economists unlike the faux ones of today, understood that factors of production–labor and capital–should not be taxed, because the supply of both to the economy is reduced by taxation. Supply-side economics is based on this principle. Thus, its emphasis on lowering the marginal rates of taxation. Reducing the supply of factors of production, reduces the economic growth rate and the national income. The century that the US economy has labored under income tax has costs us substantially in lost income. The classical economists said that taxation should fall on consumption not on factors of production. Traditionally, imported items are finished goods–German cars, French wines and perfumes. High priced goods are for the wealthy, so tariffs fall on the rich. The working class does not indulge in Porsche cars and Clicquot champagne. However, for about 30 years much of our imports have consisted of the offshored production of US firms.

When Apple, for example, brings its products made in China to the US to be marketed, they come in as imports and worsen the US trade deficit. Instead of beating up on China, Trump should call the US corporations that offshore their production for US markets to a White House conference and point out to them the consequences of their policy: the shrinkage of the American middle class, the loss of tax base, decaying infrastructure, and loss population of America’s former manufacturing cities, the pressure on city and state pension systems, the pressure of lower ratings on municipal bonds. Trump should ask the executives if they went too far in maximizing profits that benefitted a relatively few at the expense of the many, and what they think they should do about it. Capitalism ceases to serve the general interest when it separates Americans from the incomes associated with the production of the goods and services that they consume.

Trump has spoken of returning to tariffs as the source of government revenues and abandoning the income tax. This is consistent with correct economics and with freedom. Such a change would be possibly the most important reform in American history. It would be a difficult reform to achieve, because ideological, not economic, considerations intervene. Taxing the rich became the agenda of mass democracy. Taxing the rich was not seen as punishing a person for being successful. A successful person was portrayed as having become rich by exploiting labor. As fortunes were “stolen” by exploiting labor or resulted from government preference or legal privilege, income taxation was perceived as an instrument of justice. It is certainly perceived that way today by the liberal/left and the Democrat Party.

As an income tax is emotionally satisfying to the liberal/left, we are stuck with slower economic growth and less national income. It is disturbing that the liberal/left agenda has made American politics so highly partisan. What we see today is literal hatred of Trump, Republicans, conservatives, and white heterosexuals by the liberal/left. Hatred makes democracy dysfunctional. Politics cannot function as each side is intent on destroying any achievement by the other side. As democracy ceases to function, dictatorship becomes the means of governance. The liberal/left’s agenda to remake America by destroying its roots and recasting it into a different kind of society means the death of democracy and the rise of dictatorship. This is our real problem.

“Prime Minister Abe knew what President Trump was trying to achieve. In turn, President Trump knew Abe would remain a fierce Japan-first trade competitor to the America-first program..”

• President Trump Bestows Great Honor on Nation of Japan (CTH)

The decades long relationship between former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and President Donald Trump permeates through a recent announcement that Japan will be the first nation to enter the new era of trade negotiations with the United States. Shinzo Abe was assassinated in July 2022, as he traveled throughout Japan gaining support for increased national military development. As businessmen and later politicians Donald Trump and Shinzo Abe (RIP) had a decades long friendship grounded in mutual respect and competition. To understand the dynamic of President Trump giving the nation of Japan the position as the first nation to enter new trade negotiations, a high honor, is to understand the business relationship between the U.S and Japan in the post-World War II (40 yr) period between 1950 and 1990. The formative years for both Japanese industry and President Trump’s business empire.

For Europe the U.S. gave them money through the Marshall Plan, a process of one-way tariffs which helped them rebuild their nations. For Japan we gave them W Edwards Demming, an industrial engineer and extraordinarily brilliant mind in the processes of efficiency and industrial production. In essence, to generate the reindustrialization of both economies, we gave the EU a fish (money), but we taught Japan how to fish; how to be create and build exceptional industry. In the decades that followed, the EU rebuilt their capitalistic industrial base from the trade and tariff money we permitted them to exploit. The EU rebuilt from their historic systems, upgrading to newer industrial technology. Japan, however, learned deeper more technical skills from the Demming process of industrial capacity building, a critically strong excellence in quality manufacturing and attention to specific details in all processes.

It did not take long before the results of quality in design and Japanese manufacturing surfaced in the sector of automobiles, and later consumer electronics. The U.S. auto industry was slow to adapt to the Japanese quality focus and began losing market share to Toyota, Datsun, Nissan and Honda. Throughout this period, President Trump and Shinzo Abe were on opposite sides of the industrial competition. Trump railing about Japan, and later aggregate Asia exploiting our generosity; Abe smiling and joking with his friend that despite Trump’s grievances, tomorrow Eric will be purchasing 1,500 Sony televisions for his next Hotel. And so it went…. The friendship grew, the competition was intense but incredibly respectful, and both Shinzo Abe and Donald Trump became men of great influence whose partnership in competition was always visible.

Prime Minister Abe knew what President Trump was trying to achieve. In turn, President Trump knew Abe would remain a fierce Japan-first trade competitor to the America-first program. Tremendous respect and mutual admiration underpinned their geopolitical efforts. No single picture better exemplified the nature of Trump and Abe as the G7 summit picture taken in Canada as the ripple effects of Trump’s first-term trade and tariff program against China (mostly) started to hit the global economy. As China started to feel the pressure from President Trump forming new ASEAN partnerships, China started pulling back from ordering heavy industrial goods from Europe. The EU, specifically the German economy, felt the lessening of Chinese manufacturing via diminished orders. However, a respectful Japan positioned their trade agreements for benefit, but also for benefit of American workers.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe knew there was nothing to fear from President Trump’s global trade reset. Unless, that is, you were a nation taking unfair advantage of the generosity provided by America. It makes total sense in the big picture for President Trump to honor the legacy of Shinzo Abe, and the respectful connections to Japan by granting them the first position in the schedule of the global trade reset. Total sense.

Musk’s private war with Navarro doesn’t define his relationship with Trump.

• Musk Wants Trump To Cancel Tariffs – WaPo (RT)

Elon Musk has made direct appeals to US President Donald Trump, urging him to reconsider his decision to impose steep tariffs on American trade partners, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday. According to the outlet, many business and tech leaders who supported Trump’s candidacy have also criticized the move, calling it overly aggressive. Trump unveiled sweeping new tariffs on global imports last week, including a 34% duty on Chinese goods. In response, Beijing pledged to retaliate with a matching 34% tariff on American exports – prompting Trump to threaten an additional new 50% tariff. Over the weekend, Tesla and SpaceX CEO Musk – who serves as Trump’s government efficiency czar – fired off a series of social media posts criticizing White House trade adviser Peter Navarro, a central architect of the president’s aggressive tariff strategy.

“A PhD in Econ from Harvard is a bad thing, not a good thing,” Musk wrote. Musk also reportedly reached out to Trump personally. The attempted intervention has so far failed to yield results, two people familiar with the matter told the Washington Post. As the head of Tesla, Musk has long viewed tariffs as harmful to the company’s goals, given that both the US and China serve as major manufacturing bases and key markets. Many business leaders who supported Trump’s candidacy were also frustrated by their inability to influence the policy and suggested that a basic 10% rate combined with negotiations with other countries would have been sufficient, according to the Post.

People close to Musk reportedly made direct appeals to allies within the Trump administration, including Vice President J.D. Vance and Musk himself, advocating for what they saw as more rational, pro-free-trade policies. One of Musk’s associates, investor Joe Lonsdale, posted on X that he had recently urged “friends in the administration” to reconsider, warning that tariffs would harm American companies more than Chinese ones. Over the weekend, a group of business leaders began organizing an informal coalition to lobby members of the Trump administration for more moderate trade policies, one person familiar with the effort told the Post. Trump has defended his actions, stating that “sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something,” and promised that jobs and investment would return to the United States, making it “wealthy like never before.”

They’re the big losers.

• Billionaires Slam Trump Tariffs (RT)

A host of American financiers and billionaire investors have criticized President Donald Trump over the sweeping tariffs he announced last week, calling the measures “poorly advised” and warning of serious consequences for the US economy. On April 2, Trump imposed a minimum 10% tariff on all imports and introduced “reciprocal” duties ranging from 11% to 50% on dozens of countries he accused of maintaining unfair trade imbalances. China responded with a reciprocal tariff of 34% on US imports, while a number of other nations signaled willingness to negotiate with Washington but threatened countermeasures if talks fail. Global markets have reacted sharply, with major indexes in the US, Europe, and Asia falling for three straight days.

JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon slammed the tariffs in his annual letter to shareholders, warning they “will probably increase inflation” and the risk of recession, with the negative effects difficult to reverse. Ken Langone, billionaire co-founder of retailer Home Depot, criticized the tariffs as too high and rushed. In an interview with the Financial Times published on Monday, he described the additional 34% tariff on China – on top of the existing 20% – as “too aggressive, too soon,” and called the 46% levy on Vietnam “bullshit.” “I don’t understand the goddamn formula,” Langone said, urging a more measured approach, such as a 10% across-the-board tariff with waivers negotiated on a case-by-case basis. He added that he expects Trump to eventually pursue talks with trade partners because “right now, what everybody’s terrified of is a tariff war.”

Hedge fund investor Stanley Druckenmiller, a close mentor to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, posted a brief statement on X on Sunday: “I do not support tariffs exceeding 10%.” Billionaire investor Bill Ackman called the tariffs an “economic nuclear war” in a post on X. He called for a 10% flat tariff for “the privilege” of access to the US market but suggested pausing the reciprocal duties for 90 days to allow private negotiations. He lambasted Trump for relying on advisers for economic calculations, which he labeled incompetent. “The global economy is being taken down because of bad math,” he wrote.

Even tech mogul Elon Musk, Trump’s government efficiency czar, joined the criticism. He posted a series of comments on social media targeting White House trade adviser Peter Navarro, a key architect of the tariff plan, saying he “ain’t built sh*t” with the policy. Musk’s brother, Tesla board member Kimbal Musk, also condemned the tariffs, calling them a “structural, permanent tax on the American consumer.” Treasury Secretary Bessent said on Monday that Washington is open to “meaningful negotiations” in the coming weeks with trade partners, but only those who have responded “positively” to Trump’s tariffs. He criticized China for its response levies, accusing Beijing of “choosing to isolate itself by retaliating and doubling down on previous negative behavior.” China, in turn, described the new US tariffs as “economic bullying” and warned they could destabilize the entire global trade system.

“..any tax proposals or initiatives Bessent may pursue would be aligned with “his full support for President Trump’s America First Economic Agenda.”

• Officials Quietly Drafting Plan To Cushion Trump Tariff Fallout – Bloomberg (RT)

US officials are exploring ways to mitigate the potentially harmful effects of the sweeping tariffs announced by President Donald Trump, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday, citing sources in Washington. The talks are reportedly being held without Trump’s knowledge and reflect internal unease over his shift in trade policy. Last week, Trump imposed a minimum 10% tariff on all imports and introduced “reciprocal” duties ranging from 11% to 50% on dozens of countries he accused of maintaining unfair trade imbalances. The new measures included an additional 34% duty on imports from China, on top of an existing 20% rate implemented earlier, and a 20% levy on goods from the EU, among others.

On Monday, Trump threatened to slap a further 50% tariff on all Chinese imports unless Beijing reverses the 34% hike it announced in response to the new US levies. A number of other countries have slammed Trump’s tariffs over the past few days and vowed to implement countermeasures. According to Bloomberg, Trump administration officials fear that retaliatory tariffs will damage US exports, hurting American firms trying to sell goods abroad. Sources said discussions are underway about a potential exporter tax credit, which would serve as a subsidy for US firms selling products and services overseas. The credit, which would require congressional approval, could be issued at the end of the year.

Officials are also reportedly weighing a credit for importers to shield US companies from rising costs when sourcing goods from countries affected by Trump’s tariffs. These measures would aim to soften the economic blow to both exporters and importers once the tariffs take full effect. Sources told Bloomberg that neither Trump nor Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has been formally briefed on the deliberations, and the proposals have yet to receive full backing from the administration’s economic team. A Treasury spokesperson confirmed the discussions but stressed that any talk of “specific provisions” are “still early.” The spokesperson added that any tax proposals or initiatives Bessent may pursue would be aligned with “his full support for President Trump’s America First Economic Agenda.” The White House declined to comment on the report.

Trump’s tariffs and the threat of retaliation have raised fears of a global trade war. Several investment banks have raised their recession risk forecasts for both the US and global economies over the past week. Stock markets have been rattled, with major indexes in the US, Europe, and Asia all trading lower the past three days. Despite the criticism, Trump has defended the tariffs as essential to correcting trade imbalances. On Monday, he claimed on social media that the measures were working and delivering significant economic benefits to the US.

$3,000 for an iPhone? Make a deal with India.

• Apple Staged Emergency iPhone Airlift From India (RT)

Apple transported five planeloads of iPhones and other devices from India to the US within a three-day period in late March, according to a report by the Times of India, quoting unnamed senior officials. The move was reportedly made to evade a new 10% reciprocal tariff introduced by US President Donald Trump, which came into effect on April 5. The company’s factories in India, China, and other key locations have shipped their products to the US in anticipation of higher tariffs, a source was quoted as saying in the report. The existing stock, which was imported at lower rates, will protect the company from higher costs for a while, until new shipments are made under the new tariffs, a source told the paper.

Although production has been partly shifted to Vietnam and India, the majority of iPhones are still manufactured in China. However, these countries are now facing tariffs as well, with Vietnam and India being hit with tariffs of 46% and 26%, respectively. Chinese products currently face a 34% import tax in the US. Apple is analyzing how different tariff structures across manufacturing locations will affect its supply chain, according to market watchers. Apple sells more than 220 million iPhones a year; its biggest markets include the US, China, and Europe, according to market data.

The cheapest iPhone 16 model was launched in the US at $799. This could now rise by 43% to $1,142. if Apple passes on the burden to consumers, Reuters said, citing calculations based on projections from analysts at Rosenblatt Securities. Apple currently does not plan to increase retail prices anywhere in the world, the Times of India added. Earlier today, a Wall Street Journal report said Apple is ramping up efforts to export more iPhones from India to the US in an attempt to mitigate the effects of the high tariffs on Chinese products imposed by Trump.

The welcoming app to facilitate the entry of illegals.

• More Than 900k “Biden-App”Migrants Told to ‘Self-Deport’ (NYP)

The Department of Homeland Security is urging nearly 1 million asylum seekers who entered the US through the CBP One app to “immediately” begin to “self-deport.” “Canceling these paroles is a promise kept to the American people to secure our borders and protect national security,” a DHS spokesperson said, following anecdotal reports from migrants that they had been told to return to their countries of origin. The CBP One smartphone app launched in January 2023 and through December 2024 was used to admit more than 936,500 people claiming persecution in their homelands, according to DHS data. Users were granted permission to live and work for two years in the US as they awaited the outcome of often backlogged local immigration proceedings. “Formal termination notices have been issued, and affected aliens are urged to voluntarily self-deport using the CBP Home App. Those who refuse will be found, removed, and permanently barred from reentry,” the DHS spokesperson said.

President Joe Biden’s administration launched the app to tamp down record-high illegal border crossings, but congressional Republicans accused Biden of illegally exceeding the traditional “parole” authority, which they said could not be granted categorically. The Trump DHS spokesperson said: “The Biden Administration abused the parole authority to allow millions of illegal aliens into the US which further fueled the worst border crisis in US history.” Precise data about the number of people impacted by the move are unclear for a variety of reasons — including the fact that some may have already been granted asylum, while others may be shielded by additional legal protections. The CBP One app was launched with a goal of facilitating the orderly movement of would-be illegal border crossers into the US from northern Mexico. Although geared to nationalities such as Haitians and Venezuelans flocking to the southwest border, Mexicans and citizens of other countries could participate.

Migrants who entered the US as part of programs for Afghan and Ukrainian citizens are not impacted by the latest announcement, according to DHS. DHS Secretary Kristi Noem also is revoking parole for 532,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans who flew to the US at their own expense with a financial sponsor — effective April 24. Additionally, the Trump administration is moving to end Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for 600,000 Venezuelans and about 500,000 Haitians — though that effort is paused by litigation. TPS grants 18-month reprieves for residents of designated countries and can apply to all residents of a particular nationality living within the US at the time of the protection’s declaration.

Illegal US-Mexico border crossings have plummeted since Trump took office in January with pledges to launch the largest mass deportation campaign in American history. That drive initially has focused on migrants accused of committing crimes — with Trump coercing their home countries to accept deportation flights, while sending some to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and others to a mega-prison in El Salvador.

If you can keep out the politics, their infrastructure may be useful…

• USAID Operations Rebooted in Several Crisis Zones (Sp.)

US President Donald Trump and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) chief Elon Musk have repeatedly accused USAID of fraud, while Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the agency had long “strayed from its original mission.” At least 6 previously terminated USAID programs are being revived for emergency food assistance funding in Lebanon, Syria, Somalia, Jordan, Iraq, and Ecuador, Reuters reported. The move reportedly followed pressure from inside the administration and from Congress. US president Donald had previously frozen foreign aid and dismissed hundreds of USAID employees as part of DOGE-led efforts to slash federal programs and departments with little oversight, with Elon Musk calling labelling the agency a “criminal organization.” By bankrolling so-called civil society groups, USAID has long functioned as a covert enabler of American influence, sowing unrest and paving the way for regime change while packaging it all as “promoting democracy.”

Turns out, he’s not (more powerful than) the president after all…

• Judge Boasberg Scraps Trump Hearing On Deportations After Scotus Ruling (JTN)

U.S. District Judge James Boasberg on Tuesday canceled a deportation hearing for the Trump administration after the Supreme Court ruled the U.S. could continue to carry out deportations under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act. The hearing was to determine whether Boasberg would change the temporary restraining order he issued last month to block those deportations into a longer preliminary injunction, according to ABC News. On Monday, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that the Trump administration could use the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to deport suspected gang members of Tren de Aragua. The ruling overturns Boasberg’s March 15 order that temporarily blocked deportations under the wartime act, by granting the Trump administration’s request to vacate temporary restraining orders Boasberg placed on the order.

Miller

NOW – Stephen Miller Declares Supreme Court Ruling Trump’s Biggest Legal Victory To Date—Boasberg HUMILIATED, Deportation Powers UNLEASHED

“Those monsters can now be hunted down and expelled from this country with speed, force, and efficiency.”

Stephen Miller just reignited the… pic.twitter.com/LhIRU874O4

— Overton (@overton_news) April 8, 2025

“..his job isn’t to create policy—that duty belongs to the Executive Branch and Congress,” he said. “Instead, Judge Boasberg was charged with applying the relevant law to the facts of the case..”

• Legal Experts Sound Alarm On Judge Blocking Trump’s Deportations (DC)

As U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg continues to be a thorn in the side of the Trump administration’s effort to deport gangbangers, legal experts have begun to raise questions about his handling of the case. The Barack Obama-appointed judge in March blocked President Donald Trump from using wartime authorities to send suspected Tren de Aragua gangbangers to a mega-prison in El Salvador, prompting incredible pushback from the president himself. As the challenge to the deportations play out in court, some legal experts have argued Boasberg should recuse himself from the case entirely, while others say he appears to be “making policy from the bench.” Critics have pointed to the fact that Boasberg’s daughter, Katharine Boasberg, works for an organization whose founder openly celebrated her father’s decision to halt the deportations.

“Under Canon 3 (C) (1) of the ‘Code of Conduct for United States Judges’ it states that judges must disqualify themselves from a case ‘in which the judge’s impartiality might reasonably be questioned,’” Hans von Spakovsky, a senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation, said to the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Given that his daughter works directly for an organization that supports illegal aliens, opposes deportation of aliens, and has voiced its support for Boasberg’s action in this very case, the impartiality of his judgment is obviously open to be reasonably questioned.” “He should have recused himself given his immediate family’s involvement in advocacy for illegal immigration,” Spakovsky continued.

The debate began on March 15, when Trump officially invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, a seldom-used wartime authority, to expeditiously arrest and deport Tren de Aragua gang members. Boasberg quickly issued a temporary block on the flights and ordered any deportation flights in the air to turn around. However, three planes carrying 238 suspected and confirmed Tren de Aragua gangbangers and 23 MS-13 gang members managed to land at the El Salvador International airport. The Trump administration immediately ripped Boasberg for the decision. “Tonight, a DC trial judge supported Tren de Aragua terrorists over the safety of Americans,” Attorney General Pam Bondi stated after Boasberg’s order. “This order disregards well-established authority regarding President Trump’s power, and it puts the public and law enforcement at risk.”

In a court filing the following Monday, the Justice Department appealed the order and called for Boasberg to be reassigned. The administration further ripped the judge for “highly unusual and improper procedures” and accused the court of a “hasty public inquiry” into sensitive national security matters involving a criminal syndicate. “If a President doesn’t have the right to throw murderers, and other criminals, out of our Country because a Radical Left Lunatic Judge wants to assume the role of President, then our Country is in very big trouble, and destined to fail!” Trump posted on Truth Social. Questions over possible conflicts of interest arose after Boasberg’s family connections to a liberal organization surfaced. His daughter, Katharine, works for Partners in Justice, a nonprofit group based in New York City that provides client advocates to public defenders.

The group removed her biography from its website after Boasberg was assigned to the Alien Enemies Act case, according to the New York Post, but an archive of the page was saved. Before landing at Partners for Justice, Katharine worked at the Center for Justice Innovation, a left-wing organization that advocates for “racial justice” in the court system. Emily Galvin-Almanza, the founder and executive director of Partners in Justice, said Boasberg’s decision to block the wartime deportations was done “rightly” and she previously took to social media to rip the Laken Riley Act, a law mandating federal immigration authorities detain illegal migrants who commit theft-related crimes. The Code of Conduct for U.S. Judges makes clear that judges must recuse themselves from a case “in which the judge’s impartiality might reasonably be questioned,” including instances when a child of a judge is “known by the judge to have an interest that could be substantially affected by the outcome of the proceeding.”

However, there is debate over whether Boasberg fits this description. “Generally the employment of an adult child of a judge does not mandate recusal, even if the adult child is employed by a law firm representing a party in the case,” Richard Painter, a law professor for the University of Minnesota, said to the Daily Caller News Foundation. “However, if the adult child is at all involved in the representation of a party, recusal of the judge is generally required.” “Although nonprofits that don’t provide legal representation do not represent parties, I would apply the same rule,” Painter continued. “The involvement of an adult child’s employee in a matter is not sufficient grounds for recusal, but the involvement of the adult child herself is.”

Appointed to the bench by President Barack Obama in 2011, Boasberg has since presided over a number of high-profile court cases over the years, including those involving the Trump administration. In addition to the Alien Enemies Act case, the 62-year-old judge is also ruling over a lawsuit challenging top government officials’ use of Signal to discuss sensitive military operations in Yemen. Boasberg ripped the administration for allowing the deportation flights on March 15 to continue on to their destination in El Salvador, ostensibly in defiance of his order, and has demanded the DOJ answer a litany of questions regarding the flights. The administration has pointed out the judge’s written order didn’t get released until after the flights were already over international waters. While hesitant to declare whether Boasberg has any conflicts of interest in the deportation case, Matt O’Brien, a former immigration judge, questioned the immense scope of his ruling.

“The real problem with Judge Boasberg’s ruling isn’t any kind of bias. Rather, it is that, in this particular case, he rendered a decision which appears to have been intended to effectuate a specific policy outcome,” O’Brien, who now serves as Director of Investigations for the Immigration Reform Law Institute, said to the Daily Caller News Foundation. “However, his job isn’t to create policy—that duty belongs to the Executive Branch and Congress,” he said. “Instead, Judge Boasberg was charged with applying the relevant law to the facts of the case. Rather than doing his job he engaged in judicial activism (making policy from the bench).” Similar to O’Brien, the administration and other Republicans have voiced consternation over the level of authority a single district court judge is able to wield over an entire administrative branch of government.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, a top ally of the president, introduced legislation in March that calls for limiting federal court orders to parties directly before the court. If passed and signed into law, such a move would essentially squash universal injunctions and rein in the scope of judicial activism. The desire to see such reforms in the judiciary appears to be quite high within the GOP. Grassley’s bill, which was very recently introduced, already touts more than 20 co-sponsors in the upper chamber. “And by engaging in such behavior, Judge Boasberg intruded upon powers that the Constitution and the Immigration and Nationality Act very clearly assigned to the Executive Branch,” O’Brien said. “That upends our system of checks and balances and throws the whole machinery of government off kilter.”

Jesus

AI reveals 'true face of Jesus' based on the Turin Shroud pic.twitter.com/5plpMfkubu

— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) April 8, 2025

85 million

BREAKING: 85-Million-Person Study Finds Increased Risks of Stroke, Heart Attack, Coronary Artery Disease, and Arrhythmia Following COVID-19 Vaccination

Big data shows big damage to the vaccinated population. COVID-19 mRNA and viral vector injections linked to stroke (+240%),… pic.twitter.com/k5jrpTBrW6

— Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH® (@P_McCulloughMD) April 8, 2025

Cancer
https://twitter.com/VigilantFox/status/1909374230585635102

DMSO

Dr. Pierre Kory highlights DMSO, an industrial solvent like chlorine dioxide, accidentally found to treat diseases, especially strokes. He’s told his wife to rub it on his neck if he shows neurologic deficits, citing cases of stroke reversal. Though it sounds unusual, he believes… pic.twitter.com/LojVUlMC7Z

— Camus (@newstart_2024) April 7, 2025

Pasta

Why pasta and breads feel different in Italy when eaten. pic.twitter.com/RLuqp14u66

— Suhr Majesty™ (@ULTRA_MAJESTY) April 6, 2025

3D cube
https://twitter.com/gunsnrosesgirl3/status/1909527032414757129

Capy

Good morning…

While the markets melt down, remember to take some time to relax pic.twitter.com/fYfE4bPX7Z

— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) April 7, 2025

Ripley

This is Ripley. He was nervous about taking the stairs. May have panicked a bit. 12/10 pic.twitter.com/zUBfQFaHXj

— WeRateDogs (@dog_rates) April 7, 2025

Puddle

The man, who prepared a small puddle in the forest, wondered and recorded the creatures that would benefit from this water;

pic.twitter.com/Htv3ttR494

— Enezator (@Enezator) April 7, 2025

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Debt Rattle February 6 2025

Feb 062025

February 6, 2025 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 10:30 am Finance Tagged with: Apple, CIA, DOGE, Five Eyes, Gaza, Medicare, Pam Bondi, Trump, USAID, Zelensky 108 Responses »

Raphael The school of Athens 1509-11

• CIA Facing Major Trump Shake-Up (RT)

• USAID Worldwide Staff Placed On Leave (RT)

• USAID Will Continue Regime Change Ops on Behalf of CIA – Former US Marine (Sp.)

• Why Was USAID Kicked Out of Russia? (Sp.)

• “This Is Where The Big Money Fraud Is Happening”: DOGE and Medicare (ZH)

• Trump Administration Agrees To Restrict DOGE Access To Treasury (RT)

• Trump Repeats Call For Complete Ethnic Cleansing Of Gaza (Cradle)

• Saudi Arabia Reacts To Trump’s Gaza ‘Takeover’ Plan (RT)

• Donald Trump’s Gaza Mirage (Larry Johnson)

• Kremlin Comments On Talks With ‘Illegitimate’ Zelensky (RT)

• Zelensky Accuses Tucker Carlson Of Working For Vladimir Putin (JTN)

• Why China Would Win A War With The United States (Unz/Whitney)

• Pam Bondi Is Your New Attorney General (Victoria Taft)

• Court Denies Apple’s Request to Intervene in Google Search Monopoly Case (ET)

• Why Has Hillary Clinton Declared War on Elon Musk? (Sp.)

• How the CIA Spawned Google (Sp.)

• Did Closest US Intelligence Allies Spy on Trump? (Sp.)

• EU States ‘Fed Up’ With Von Der Leyen – Politico (RT)

Nicole Shanahan: "On the topic of of DOGE, I don't think people are hearing exactly what DOGE is. It's yes. It's an efficiency agency, but what really is it? I've heard from, an incoming agency head that what DOGE is, it's a data mining research arm that can answer any budgetary… pic.twitter.com/yPGOMjC3D0

— Camus (@newstart_2024) February 5, 2025

CNN

WATCH: CNN Forced to Admit That ALL of Trump's Picks Are Extremely Likely to be Confirmed |

"You can't really get much higher than 99%."

That’s a tough pill for CNN’s audience.

Harry Enten broke down the numbers, revealing that nearly all of President Donald Trump's cabinet… pic.twitter.com/DYHLRriSEF

— Overton (@overton_news) February 4, 2025

Stephen Miller
https://twitter.com/i/status/1886861956205961532

Benz

"I'm telling you right now if USAID did not exist Bolsonaro would be the president of Brazil and Brazil would still have a free and open Internet"

"That's what USA does they kill domestic populism because it gets in the way of their foreign policy"

Mike Benz @MikeBenzCyber… pic.twitter.com/7MTZIQrdYa

— Culture War (@CultureWar2020) February 5, 2025

Train

President Trump announced an investigation into California's high-speed rail project, which appears to some as a giant money laundering scheme.

"I built for a living, and I built on time, on budget. It's impossible that something could cost that much."

Californians should be… pic.twitter.com/o64vUR2aTQ

— George (@BehizyTweets) February 4, 2025

Gaza

Steve Witkoff on Gaza: "When the president talks about 'cleaning it out,' he talks about making it habitable … it is unfair to have explained to Palestinians that they might be back in five years. That's just preposterous." pic.twitter.com/ylNm2Sidiu

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) February 4, 2025

Bondi
https://twitter.com/i/status/1887120253005537576

Leavitt

NEW – Karoline Leavitt Steamrolls Democrats Over Violent Rhetoric About DOGE & Musk, Demands Accountability |

"May I just point out——If you heard that type of violent, enticing rhetoric from our side of the aisle from, Republican leaders on Capitol Hill, I think there would be… pic.twitter.com/FyQJm2KrrI

— Overton (@overton_news) February 5, 2025

https://twitter.com/i/status/1887208773699395661

“..Ratcliffe is seeking to establish a “more aggressive spy agency..”

• CIA Facing Major Trump Shake-Up (RT)

The CIA has offered so-called buyouts to its agents as part of US President Donald Trump’s effort to downsize the federal government, CNN and the Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday. The idea behind the proposal is reportedly to hone the agency into a “more aggressive” tool better suited to exerting influence on the country’s immediate neighbors. According to both outlets, the buyout program – officially called ‘Deferred Retirement’ – will allow employees to resign with about eight months of pay and benefits. The overall initiative, which could potentially be applicable to 2.4 million federal employees, is designed to streamline government operations, promote efficiency, and save tens of billions of dollars in public spending. CIA Director John Ratcliffe personally decided the agency should participate in the program, according to a CNN source.

A CIA spokesperson told the outlet that the decision will “help infuse the agency with renewed energy.” The WSJ reported that the CIA has also frozen hiring for applicants who had already received conditional job offers. An aide to Ratcliffe told the paper that some of them could be pulled back if candidates are deemed unqualified to advance the agency’s new agenda. The source said that Ratcliffe is seeking to establish a “more aggressive spy agency,” adding that the CIA from now on will be more focused on the Western Hemisphere. The new efforts will reportedly include espionage to gain leverage in trade negotiations, particularly when it comes to a trade dispute with Mexico. The agency will also prioritize fighting Mexican drug cartels, which the Trump administration has designated terrorist.

However, according to the WSJ, the interest in the proposal is relatively low, with questions looming over whether the soon-to-be ex-agents are legally allowed to take another job during the payout period or whether they can return to government in the future. The buyout program has been applied to most government agencies, except for the military and Postal Service. As part of the overhaul, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) – which Trump labeled “radical lunatics” – has been significantly downsized, with its main office reportedly closed. The White House has accused the agency of mismanaging funds and failing to advance US foreign policy goals. According to Axios, only about 20,000 federal employees have agreed to take part in the blanket buyout program, which accounts for roughly 1% of the federal workforce, despite the administration’s plans to cut between 5% and 10% of all federal employees.

CIA

Holy shit…

Trump is offering a buyout to the entire CIA workforce!

The USAID was just the beginning! First Trump cut off the money supply, now he goes for the nucleus of the cell.

The CIA is about to get purged!

pic.twitter.com/dLSEG9PwRo

— Clandestine (@WarClandestine) February 5, 2025

Medvedev: “Smart move by @elonmusk, trying to plug USAID’s Deep Throat.”

• USAID Worldwide Staff Placed On Leave (RT)

The US Agency for International Development (USAID) will place nearly all of its employees on administrative leave, it announced on Tuesday. According to a notice on the USAID website, the change concerns all directly hired employees, with the exception of “essential personnel.” Established in 1961, USAID is Washington’s primary agency for funding political projects abroad, responsible for administering billions of dollars in so-called ‘foreign aid and development programs’ to promote American interests under the premise of humanitarian development. However, under US President Donald Trump’s new administration, the agency’s operations have come under review as part of a broader reassessment of US foreign policy.

Shortly after being sworn in last month, Trump issued a sweeping executive order pausing all foreign aid for 90 days, leading to widespread confusion, layoffs, and program shutdowns. The website notice reads that “On Friday, February 7, all USAID direct hire personnel will be placed on administrative leave globally, with the exception of designated personnel responsible for mission-critical functions, core leadership, and specially designated programs.” Employees who are expected to continue working will be reportedly notified individually later in the week. The notice gives affected employees 30 days to return to the US. Around two-thirds of the 10,000 people USAID employs work in any of 60 countries the agency has a presence in.

The State Department will fund the return of employees to the US and will consider exceptions and extensions for personal reasons and safety concerns. The notice concluded with a brief message to staff: “Thank you for your service.” The development comes after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced on Monday he was assuming the role of acting administrator of the agency. Speaking to journalists during a visit to El Salvador, Rubio pledged to make a program-by-program review of the agency in order to put everything that USAID does “in alignment with the national interest and the foreign policy of the US.” USAID’s main office in Washington, DC was closed on Monday, with staff instructed to keep out.

Trump earlier accused the agency’s leadership of being “radical lunatics” and proposed major changes to the organization. Speaking to reporters on Sunday, Trump said he plans to make a decision on USAID’s future after clearing it out. USAID has also come under the scrutiny of the newly created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by tech billionaire Elon Musk. Musk has been a fierce critic of the agency, describing it as a “criminal organization.” During a live session on X Spaces on Monday, Musk, who is now among Trump’s key advisers, said the president “agreed” that USAID should be shut down. Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev praised Musk’s actions against the aid agency in a post on X on Monday: “Smart move by @elonmusk, trying to plug USAID’s Deep Throat.”

You got this global organization built up over 60 years, all this knowledge and people and connections, someone will want to use it…

• USAID Will Continue Regime Change Ops on Behalf of CIA – Former US Marine (Sp.)

USAID’s controversial activities – along with its partnerships with George Soros’ Open Society and similar entities – have been exposed in recent years by alternative journalists, making them increasingly difficult for the public to ignore, former US Marine Brian Berletic tells Sputnik. Berletic suggests that has created the need for a rebranding aimed at protecting and streamlining the organization’s work. He believes the ongoing reform seeks to “create a left-right and liberal-conservative divide in response to growing bipartisan opposition to US interference abroad.” “By claiming these organizations are ‘bad’ because they are ‘liberal,’ the Trump administration can rebrand it as ‘conservative’ an ‘America first,’ bringing at least part of the American population back on board to support it and its activities,” Berletic explains.

The pundit emphasizes that the USAID’s coup-plotting will continue, either under the auspices of other agencies or Geroge Soros’ global network of NGOs. “Whether this regime change takes place under USAID, is transferred back to the CIA – which originally carried out the activities USAID assumed upon its creation – or the US begins depending more on private foundations including Open Society, the main point to understand is that it will continue nonetheless,” Berletic says. He notes the US makes no secret of its plans to continue regime change operations against Iran, Venezuela and possibly even Panama. The White House “isn’t even talking about the actual subject of foreign interference as an issue of USAID’s activities, and instead is complaining about wasteful programs connected to political wedge issues like ‘DEI’ [diversity, equity, and inclusion],” he says.

2012. We can guess why.

• Why Was USAID Kicked Out of Russia? (Sp.)

President Trump has promised to “make a decision” on USAID’s future after getting rid of the “radical lunatics” running it after DOGE chief Elon Musk said it was time for the “criminal” agency “to die.” Russia banned Washington’s long-favored soft power tool in 2012. Here’s why. Russia knew about the US Agency for International Development’s “criminal” nature long before Elon Musk’s epiphany. USAID was expelled from the country after post-election street protests in Moscow verging on an attempted color revolution, with the agency accused of using its grant network to try to influence politics and civil society after the 2011-2012 Russian parliamentary and presidential elections.

20 Years of ‘Democracy Promotion’
USAID’s mission in Russia was narrowed to political influence operations in the 2000s, including funding for civil society groups like the Golos* election watchdog, the Memorial* and Moscow Helsinki Group* rights organizations, and others. These organizations engaged in increasingly sharp criticism of the Russian government prior to the US aid agency’s ouster, helping to radicalize a portion of the population toward more pro-Western opposition views through the popularization of their positions. USAID first entered Russia in 1992, immediately after the USSR’s collapse, and spent nearly $3 bln over 20 years on ‘democracy, human rights and civil society promotion’ programs.

In reality, USAID’s work in the 90s was aimed at cheerleading the gutting of Russia’s social and economic system during the painful transition to a market economy, and meddling in politics in support of liberal, pro-West politicians against conservative, populist and neo-communist forces. Nowhere was this more evident than during the 1993 constitutional crisis and the 1996 elections, which saw radical opposition to liberal reforms crushed and the voting rigged, with USAID-backed “independent media,” publishing houses and NGOs cheering on the processes. The US amassed a literal journalistic empire during its stay in Russia. Up to the year 2000 alone, its National Press Institute held 2,300 briefings and seminars attended by over 57,000 journalists, provided training for 2,700 media specialists, management and consulting services for 84 newspapers, and support for other print, TV and internet media.

On the economic front, USAID provided “technical advisory services and material support” for the infamous voucher privatization scheme. This program cemented immense wealth transfers worth hundreds of billions of dollars from the state to private and foreign coffers. In the 90s, USAID ambitiously outlined 14 “strategic objectives” for Russia, from fiscal, monetary, social service and energy reforms to US “joint ventures,” civil and legal training, environmental programs and even women’s reproductive health. Political stabilization and the maturing of the modern post-Soviet Russian state ultimately sealed USAID’s fate. But perhaps the greatest damage done by USAID to Russia has been in its backyard, where billions of dollars spent over the past 35 years helped to put neighbors on a path to NATO and EU membership, and literally rewrite history books to cast Russia as an enemy. Nowhere has this effort paid off more than in Ukraine.

“..the current level of access is “read-only,” preventing Musk’s team from making modifications to the systems.”

• “This Is Where The Big Money Fraud Is Happening”: DOGE and Medicare (ZH)

Representatives of Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) – who just obtained security clearances, have been embedded at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) this week, gaining access to critical payment and contracting systems, according to the Wall Street Journal, citing multiple individuals familiar with the situation. The DOGE representatives have been on site at the agency’s offices this week, the people said, and they are looking at the systems’ technology as well as the spending that flows through them, with a focus on pinpointing what they consider fraud or waste. DOGE representatives are also examining the agency’s organizational design and how it is staffed, the people added. Musk confirmed his interest in CMS oversight in a social media post, writing on X: “Yeah, this is where the big money fraud is happening.”

Yeah, this is where the big money fraud is happening https://t.co/jXqXrlKDGp

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 5, 2025

The White House and DOGE officials declined to comment on the matter. In the last week, Musk’s DOGE team has been moving swiftly to gain access across multiple federal agencies, including the Treasury Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to uncover fraud, abuse, and excessive spending. A CMS official told the Journal that the agency has assigned “two senior agency veterans who are leading the coordination with DOGE,” and that leaders are “taking a thoughtful approach to see where there may be opportunities for more effective and efficient spending in line with meeting the goals of President Trump.”

CMS sits at the heart of the nation’s healthcare economy, managing a budget of approximately $1.5 trillion in fiscal 2024 – roughly 22 percent of total federal spending. The agency employs around 6,710 people and administers Medicare, Medicaid, and other healthcare programs vital to millions of Americans. Many of its employees have spent decades navigating the complex regulatory and operational framework underpinning the healthcare system. Among the systems DOGE representatives have accessed is CALM, the CMS Acquisition Lifecycle Management system, which contains contract data, sources said. However, they noted that DOGE personnel have not yet gained entry to databases containing personally identifiable health information of Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries.

They also have not accessed HIGLAS, the Healthcare Integrated General Ledger Accounting System, a key accounting platform for CMS payments. One person familiar with DOGE’s work at CMS emphasized that the current level of access is “read-only,” preventing Musk’s team from making modifications to the systems. The intervention has raised concerns among CMS veterans and healthcare policy experts. The agency’s payment structures are notoriously complex, involving multiple layers of contractors and private insurers, especially within Medicare. Medicaid, jointly administered by federal and state governments, follows different financial pathways, with federal funding typically flowing to state agencies.

“..such access to payment records will be ‘read only’.“ “..until the legal hearing on February 24..”

• Trump Administration Agrees To Restrict DOGE Access To Treasury (RT)

Lawyers with the US Justice Department have agreed to a proposed order that would temporarily restrict Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) from accessing sensitive financial data at the Treasury Department. The move by the administration of US President Donald Trump late on Wednesday comes in response to a lawsuit by a group of union members and retirees accusing the Treasury of engaging in “unlawful action” by providing information on payments and private data to DOGE. “The Defendants will not provide access to any payment record or payment system of records maintained by or within the Bureau of the Fiscal Service,” the proposed order read.

An exception would only be made for two special government employees at the Treasury associated with Musk — Tom Krause and Marko Elez. According to the document, the duo would be permitted access “as needed” to perform their duties, “provided that such access to payment records will be ‘read only’.” Krause is the former CEO of Cloud Software Group, while Elez, 25, has worked as an engineer at Musk’s X and SpaceX. Once approved by US District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, who is overseeing the case, the restrictions on DOGE’s access to Treasury data will remain in place until the legal hearing on February 24.

Trump said it’ll take 5 years to clean up Gaza, with all the tunnels and munitions. Hamas/Palestinians won’t be allowed to move back in as is.

• Trump Repeats Call For Complete Ethnic Cleansing Of Gaza (Cradle)

US President Donald Trump once again called for the complete ethnic cleansing of the Gaza Strip following a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House on 4 February. “It could be Jordan, and it could be Egypt, and it could be other countries,” Trump said, adding that Palestinians in Gaza have “a guarantee they’re going to end up dying. The same thing is going to happen again, over and over again.” “I think that Gaza is a demolition site right now … You can’t live in Gaza right now. I think we need another location, a location that’s going to make people happy,” the US President told reporters before saying that “it’s all death in Gaza.” “I believe we can do it in areas where leaders currently say no,” he said, adding that funding for the forced displacement of over two million Palestinians will come from “other people, really rich nations, and they’re willing to supply it.”

Tuesday’s statements from the US president marked the fourth time he has called for the complete ethnic cleansing of Gaza and claimed that allies Egypt and Jordan would take in displaced Palestinians. In response, Cairo and Amman have issued repeated rejections while making overtures to their ally. On Tuesday, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and Jordanian King Abdullah II held a phone call to discuss the need to adopt a “united position” to maintain “regional peace.” In response to Trump’s latest statements, Hamas leader Dr Sami Abu Zuhri called them “a recipe for creating chaos and tension in the region.” “Our people in the Gaza Strip will not allow these plans to pass, and what is required is to end the occupation and aggression against our people, not to expel them from their land,” said Zuhri.

Palestinian UN representative Riyad Mansour replied to Trump’s demands by saying that instead of ethnically cleansing Palestinians, survivors of the US–Israeli genocide should be able to return to their family’s original homes “in what is today Israel.” “For those who want to send the Palestinian people to a ‘nice place,’ allow them to go back to their original homes in what is now Israel,” said Mansour. “The Palestinian people want to rebuild Gaza because this is where we belong,” he added. Trump’s meeting with Netanyahu came hours after Hamas announced that talks for the second phase of the ceasefire agreement sealed in January. Hundreds of Palestinian detainees and over a dozen Israeli captives have been released in four prisoner exchanges over the past few weeks.

“Everyone’s demanding one thing. You know what that is? Peace,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office before turning to Netanyahu and claiming the premier “wants peace also.” “We’re dealing with a very complex group of people, situation and people, but we have the right man. We have the right leader of Israel. He’s done a great job, and we’ve been friends for a long time.” For his part, Netanyahu said he still plans on “meeting all our war goals.” “That includes destroying Hamas’s military and governing capabilities and making sure that Gaza never poses a threat to Israel,” he added. Asked about whether Saudi Arabia is demanding the establishment of a Palestinian state to normalize ties with Israel, Trump replied with a definitive “no.” Before he met with Netanyahu, the US president signed an executive order withdrawing the country from the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) and from participating in UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

“Permanent peace” cannot be achieved without Palestinians securing their “legitimate rights” to statehood..”

• Saudi Arabia Reacts To Trump’s Gaza ‘Takeover’ Plan (RT)

Saudi Arabia rejects any attempts to displace the Palestinians from their land, the country’s Foreign Ministry stated on Wednesday, reiterating its “firm and unwavering” commitment to the establishment of a Palestinian state. The comment followed US President Donald Trump’s proposal for an American takeover of Gaza. Speaking at a joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House on Tuesday, Trump said the US could assume control of the enclave, clear the remains of damaged buildings, and transform Gaza into the “Riviera of the Middle East.” He also reiterated his position that Palestinians should be permanently resettled outside of Gaza. While not directly addressing Trump’s remarks, the Saudi Foreign Ministry released a statement that appeared to be a response to his proposal.

The ministry said it was reaffirming its “unequivocal rejection of any infringement on the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, whether through Israeli settlement policies, annexation of Palestinian lands or attempts to displace the Palestinian people from their land.” “Permanent peace” cannot be achieved without Palestinians securing their “legitimate rights” to statehood, the statement added, urging more “peace-loving countries to recognize the State of Palestine” based on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital. The ministry stressed that Riyadh would not establish ties with Israel unless this key condition is met, insisting that its stance towards the Palestinians is “non-negotiable.”

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has praised Trump for thinking “outside the box” with his proposal for a US takeover of Gaza. A key element of the proposal involves relocating Gaza’s roughly two million population to neighboring countries such as Egypt and Jordan. Trump asserted that regional leaders supported his plan but did not provide specifics on how the relocation would be carried out. The idea has drawn widespread criticism in the Middle East and beyond, with human rights organizations describing it as a form of ethnic cleansing. The Palestinian ambassador to the UN, Riyad Mansour, stated on Wednesday that rather than being relocated to other countries, Palestinians in Gaza should be allowed to reclaim their former homes in what is now Israel.

“For those who want to send” Gazans “to a happy ‘nice place,’” Mansour said, “let them go back, you know, to their original homes inside Israel. There are nice places there, and they will be happy to return to these places.” Around 47,500 Palestinians have been killed and over 111,500 wounded during the 15 months of Israeli attacks on Gaza, according to the latest data from the enclave’s Health Ministry. UN data suggests that 90% of Gaza’s population has been displaced by the fighting. Israel launched its military operation in Gaza after a Hamas cross-border raid killed about 1,200 people and 250 others were taken hostage. A US-brokered ceasefire is in place with ongoing prisoner exchanges. Israeli authorities report 79 hostages remain in Gaza, 35 of whom are presumed dead.

” I continue to believe that one of Trump’s emissaries is working out a deal for Trump to meet with Iran’s president.”

• Donald Trump’s Gaza Mirage (Larry Johnson)

I owe Danny Davis an apology. I speculated during our conversation today that one possible explanation for Trump’s recent rant declaring that the Palestinians of Gaza would be relocated to Egypt, Jordan or some other countries was simply a negotiating ploy. I opined that Trump would be able to tell Netanyahu, “Look, I proposed the idea but the Egyptians, Jordanians and Saudis turned me down.” With that no longer an option, Trump would be in a position to put some pressure on Netanyahu for a political settlement. I was wrong. Trump announced tonight he wants to take over Gaza:

“The US will take over the Gaza Strip, and we will do a job with it, too. We’ll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous, unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site, level the site, and get rid of the destroyed buildings, level it out, create an economic development that will supply unlimited numbers of jobs and housing for the people of the area. Do a real job, do something different. Just can’t go back. If you go back, it’s going to end up the same way it has for 100 years. Trump also insisted that the Palestinians will be relocated to a third country (unspecified) and will not have a right to return. This was scripted. You can see Trump is reading from a note card. Trump claims he has talked this over with Arab leaders in the region and that they are in favor of the deal. That is a lie.

“Powerful Arab nations rejected President Trump’s suggestion to relocate Palestinians from Gaza to neighboring Egypt and Jordan. Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, the Palestinian Authority and the Arab League released a joint statement rejecting any plans to move Palestinians out of their territories in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.” One of the executive orders Trump signed today eliminates US funds for the UN that support UNRWA, which means other countries will have to step in and make up the difference. Any hope that Trump will help the Palestinians was dashed today. However, maybe Trump’s public comments about taking over Gaza were intended to keep Netanyahu from ending the ceasefire unilaterally. Now that Trump has pledged to put additional troops on the ground, it will make it more difficult for Netanyahu to resume military operations.

Trump’s grandstanding on Iran during the Netanyahu visit has to be taken with a big grain of salt. Trump vowed that Iran will never be allowed to get a nuclear weapon. However, Iran has made no declaration that it was trying to build one. Iran’s chief spiritual leader, the Ayatollah Ali Khamenie, apparently remains committed to eschewing a nuclear weapon — it is forbidden under Islamic law: “Despite having nuclear technology, Iran has never pursued building or using nuclear weapons, which its religion forbids, the country’s highest political authority, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said on Wednesday. “Building and stockpiling nuclear bombs is wrong and using it is haram (religiously forbidden) … Although we have nuclear technology, Iran has firmly avoided it,” State TV quoted him as saying. Iran has repeatedly denied ever having sought to build a nuclear bomb.” I think Trump’s statement was intended to prevent Israel from launching any attacks on Iran. I continue to believe that one of Trump’s emissaries is working out a deal for Trump to meet with Iran’s president.

Way past his best before date. It’s all rot from here on in.

• Kremlin Comments On Talks With ‘Illegitimate’ Zelensky (RT)

Moscow is ready for talks with Kiev even though Vladimir Zelensky currently has no legal right to lead Ukraine, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said. On Tuesday, Zelensky told British journalist Piers Morgan that he could hold talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The comments marked a significant shift from the stance Zelensky adopted in the autumn of 2022, when he signed a decree banning any negotiations with the Russian leadership. “If that is the only setup in which we can bring peace to the citizens of Ukraine and not lose people, definitely we will go for this setup, for this meeting,” Zelensky told Morgan. Asked to comment on Zelensky’s remarks on Wednesday, Peskov said there is “no place for emotions” when it comes to the settlement of the Ukraine conflict.

“What is needed here is legal analysis and absolute pragmatism… Zelensky has significant de jure legitimacy issues within his own country,” the spokesman pointed out. Peskov referred to the Ukrainian leader’s refusal to hold a presidential election and the fact that his term expired last May. Moscow maintains that the legitimate power in Ukraine now lies with the parliament and its speaker. “Despite this, the Russian side remains open to negotiations,” Peskov stressed, arguing that Moscow’s successes on the battlefield “clearly suggest that Kiev should be the one to demonstrate openness and interest in such negotiations.” Peskov also weighed in on Zelensky’s suggestion that the West could give Ukraine nuclear weapons as a substitute for NATO membership to guarantee its protection.

“In general, such statements are borderline madness. There is a nuclear non-proliferation regime,” the spokesman said. Peskov suggested that EU politicians, despite their flaws, should understand the “absurdity and potential danger of discussing such a topic.”Ukraine agreed to relinquish its nuclear arsenal inherited from the Soviet Union in exchange for security guarantees from Russia, the US, and the UK as part of the 1994 Budapest Memorandum. Ukraine has repeatedly accused Moscow of violating the deal after Crimea voted to join Russia following the 2014 Western-backed coup in Kiev. Russia has argued that the deal was fundamentally undermined by NATO’s expansion towards its borders. Putin has said that Russia would not allow Kiev to create or obtain nuclear weapons “under any circumstances.”

Everyone’s against the poor little man..

• Zelensky Accuses Tucker Carlson Of Working For Vladimir Putin (JTN)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Tuesday accused former Fox News host Tucker Carlson of working for Russian President Vladimir Putin, after he supposedly parroted the Kremlin’s talking points.Carlson, who published an extensive exclusive interview with Putin last year, appeared to defend Russia in an appearance on Piers Morgan’s show “Piers Morgan Uncensored” last week, where he claimed Zelensky was a dictator and that Russia had a right to try and control the Crimea. Zelensky claimed that Carlson merely repeated Putin’s words, even though he allegedly knew better, according to Mediaite. Carlson had recently appeared on Piers Morgan Uncensored, during which he criticized Zelensky for what he called his persecution of political opponents and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, according to the outlet.

“Regrettably, this blogger or journalist, whatever he wants to call him, he unfortunately fully repeats words of the Putin,” Zelensky said. “He works for the Putin because he wants to lower me to the level of Putin. This is what he wants. He wants us to be equals.” The Ukrainian president stated that Carlson needed to “stop working” for Putin and learn more about what was happening in Ukraine. “Honestly, it seems to me very important. It seems to me that the person, no matter where he lives, must understand things,” Zelensky continued. “When he simply says something, you know, just throwing the words. Has he for one time in his lifetime lost his close ones?

Read the whole thing.

• Why China Would Win A War With The United States (Unz/Whitney)

Is the western media even-handed in its coverage of China? And how has this impacted public perception of China in America?

Ron Unz — I think the Western media has been overwhelmingly biased against China, a bias that stretches back for decades but has steadily grown worse during the 2010s and especially the last few years. Coverage has recently become so extremely dishonest and distorted that it reminds me of how the old Soviet media portrayed the West even as the USSR went into severe decline and eventually collapsed, and I think that unfortunate analogy is a very relevant one. Furthermore, much of our academic world has followed this same pattern of totally distorting the reality of China and its relationship with the U.S. Some of the worst examples of these media falsehoods only came to my attention during the last decade.

For more than 35 years the American media has annually denounced the Chinese government for its supposed 1989 massacre of protesting students at Tiananmen Square, but there seems overwhelming evidence that incident never happened, and was just a Western propaganda-hoax, endlessly repeated by our media. For example, the former Beijing bureau chief of the Washington Post personally covered those events at the time, and he later published a long article setting the record straight, but his account has always been ignored. Articles published in the New York Times by its own Beijing bureau chief said much the same thing, but these also had no impact. Numerous other sources, including secret American diplomatic cables disclosed by Wikileaks have confirmed these facts, but our biased, lazy, or ignorant journalists have never paid any attention and for decades continued to promote the myth of the Tiananmen Square Massacre.

Last year I published a long article summarizing all of this evidence. Another egregious example was the 1999 American bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade, an illegal attack that killed or wounded nearly two dozen Chinese. Our government and media have always described this as a tragic accident, while denouncing and ridiculing China for claiming that the bombing was deliberate. But once again, there is overwhelming evidence that the Chinese government was entirely correct and our own government was lying, with our dishonest media endorsing and amplifying those lies. Indeed, a NATO officer was even quoted in a leading British newspaper as bragging that the guided bomb had struck exactly the intended room in the embassy.

One of the first things Bondi did was freezing funding for sanctuary cities.

• Pam Bondi Is Your New Attorney General (Victoria Taft)

Former Florida attorney general and former attorney for Donald Trump, Pam Bondi, sailed through her confirmation hearings. Then, all of a sudden, Democrats dammed up the vote. Upset over President Trump doing what he promised to do as president, they decided to hold Bondi’s AG appointment hostage until he did their bidding. But the floodgates opened up on Tuesday night when Bondi won Senate confirmation 54-46. Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman was the only Democrat to cross the aisle to vote for Bondi. I don’t know if anyone has noticed, but the Democrats’ limp-wristed take-their-ball-home strategy isn’t working. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) promised Democrats that if they didn’t allow a vote, he’d make sure their next few nights and weekends would be spent cooling their heels and knocking back cold-brew crack coffee.

After senators inexplicably took the weekend off, on Monday night, Bondi’s nomination was sent to the Senate floor after a vote to limit further debate, setting the stage for Tuesday night’s vote. Before Bondi was even AG, there were high-level (and some not-so-high-level) firings at the Department of Justice. At the FBI, Kash Patel hasn’t even been confirmed, and all of a sudden, the 7th-floor executive wing has taken on the look of a ghost town. That’s all happened without Bondi, who is now the boss of both after the Senate vote on Tuesday night. Imagine what will happen when she takes the helm. Bondi has never described herself as the president’s “wingman,” as terrorist defense attorney Eric Holder described his role as Barack Obama’s AG. But her proximity to Trump World was a sore spot for Democrats, who presumably preferred to have an attorney general who hated the president as one of his top legal advisors.

That’s apparently what Ranking Member Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) had in mind when he pretended to be upset about Bondi being too “faithful” to Donald Trump. “I fear Ms. Bondi will only protect and remain faithful to one person throughout this whole experience, and that’s the president who’s given her this opportunity,” said the oily Durbin, who’d apparently forgotten Bondi’s successful public legal career long before she’d ever met Donald Trump. Is there a misogyny hotline where we can report the Illinois Democrat? Durbin said with a straight face that he worried somehow Trump’s AG office would fail to be a “nonpartisan” department, like, you know, Merrick Garland’s weaponized law enforcement arm that spied on Catholics, parents at school board meetings, and—hey, are all the January 6 trespassers out of the Gulag yet?

Shockingly, no Republican senators laughed in his face, but Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) came close. The Senate Judiciary Committee chairman pinned the Democrats’ ears back on this point when he noted, “Some of my colleagues also suggest that Miss Bondi’s loyalty to President Trump is somehow disqualifying. It is not persuasive in any way.” Grassley explained, “There’s nothing wrong with President Trump appointing someone who seriously defended him to a high position.” He told Democrats, as if they didn’t know, “Ms. Bondi publicly supported President Trump, just like 77 million Americans who voted him back into office in November. So this, too, is not a disqualifying attribute.” Bondi cleared the Judiciary Committee on a party-line vote last week. Now that Bondi’s been confirmed, let’s get going—we’ve got a country to save.

Apple’s trying to safeguard its money maker: “In 2022, Google’s revenue share payment to Apple was an estimated $20 billion…” About 20% of Apple’s operating profit.

• Court Denies Apple’s Request to Intervene in Google Search Monopoly Case (ET)

Apple’s attempt to intervene in litigation related to Google’s search engine monopoly was denied by a district court on Sunday when a judge refused to stay the remedial proceedings in the case.Back in October 2020, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and a coalition of state attorneys filed a case against Google, accusing the tech company of engaging in anti-competitive practices.Google was accused of establishing exclusive agreements with browser developers, mobile device manufacturers, and wireless carriers which prohibited them from pre-installing rival search engines. This resulted in most U.S. devices coming preloaded with Google search, negatively affecting competitors in the market.

In August 2024, Judge Amit Mehta from the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia sided with the plaintiffs, ruling that Google violated antitrust laws. “Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly,” he wrote, saying that the default search engine setting “is extremely valuable real estate.” A hearing on remedies in the case was scheduled for April 2025. In December, Apple filed a motion to intervene as a defendant in the case, aiming to take part in the remedial phase of the litigation. However, the motion was denied by Mehta, who called the request “untimely.”Apple then filed an emergency motion seeking to stay the remedial proceedings pending its appeal of Mehta’s order denying the intervention request. On Feb. 2, Mehta denied the stay request as well.

“First, Apple has not established a likelihood of success on the merits” for the stay, Mehta wrote. The company also failed to show it stands to suffer “irreparable harm absent a stay,” he said. “Because Apple has not satisfied the ‘stringent requirements’ for obtaining the ‘extraordinary relief’ of a stay pending appeal, its motion is denied.” Apple claims the December motion was filed to protect the company’s existing contract with Google and its ability to enter into future contracts with the search engine giant. Google pays the company to keep its search engine default on Apple’s Safari mobile and desktop browsers, according to a court document from the August 2024 monopoly decision.
“In 2022, Google’s revenue share payment to Apple was an estimated $20 billion,” said the document. “This is nearly double the payment made in 2020, which was then equivalent to 17.5 percent of Apple’s operating profit.”

Meanwhile, a potential breakup of Google’s business could be on the cards during the remedy phase of the litigation. In November, the DOJ together with 38 states and territories outlined a proposed remedy that would force Google to divest its Chrome browser. Regulators argued that Google uses the browser to reinforce its monopoly. At the time, the government was reportedly looking at potential divestiture of Google’s Android operating system. Google opposed these suggestions, saying the forced sale of Chrome and Android would “endanger the security and privacy of millions of Americans, and undermine the quality of products people love.” The move may end up chilling the company’s investment in artificial intelligence, it said.

“..her current bleating is hardly surprising – that’s what stuck pigs do!”

• Why Has Hillary Clinton Declared War on Elon Musk? (Sp.)

Hillary Clinton’s outrage over Elon Musk’s overhaul of USAID and other government agencies stems from her fear of being exposed for multimillion-dollar fraud, according to Wall Street analyst Charles Ortel, speaking to Sputnik. “Hillary and her family could face jail time and massive financial penalties, so her current bleating is hardly surprising – that’s what stuck pigs do!” Charles Ortel says. Clinton has accused Musk of orchestrating a “blitzkrieg-style administrative coup of the US government” and expressed concern over his access to “everything from Social Security payments to private taxpayer information.” The Clinton Foundation became the largest single example – counting all of its known affiliates – of charity fraud, particularly involving illegal personal enrichment,” Ortel emphasizes.

Hillary Clinton’s attempt to rally public support against Donald Trump and Elon Musk will ultimately backfire on her and the Democratic Party, as many Americans are fed up with wealthy liberal grifters, according to the Wall Street analyst. “Average Americans who work in the private sector don’t own three mansions, secure off-market book and speech deals, or fund their personal lifestyles by using ‘charities’ to cover support staff, luxury offices, and extravagant travel,” Ortel says, referencing the bonanza Clinton has long enjoyed. Clinton-backed protests under the slogan “Nobody elected Elon” will instead push young voters toward Team MAGA, he argues. Clinton seems to have forgotten that “nobody elected Hillary” either, he stresses.

Will Hillary Clinton tell Musk Where Ukraine’s Money Went? Hillary Clinton and Olena Zelenskaya, the wife of Volodymyr Zelensky, positioned themselves to profit from Western aid to Ukraine, the analyst notes. “Perhaps ‘Saint’ Hillary could explain what happened to the funds that Zelensky recently claimed never reached Kiev?” Ortel asks, referencing Clinton’s 2023 deal with the Zelenska Foundation.

“The design of the search engine and algorithms that ultimately evolved into Google was funded by CIA grants through a program aimed at enhancing mass surveillance capabilities.”

• How the CIA Spawned Google (Sp.)

American tech giant Google has faced regulatory scrutiny on numerous occasions amid accusations of antitrust violations. Google’s relationship with the CIA, ranging from early financial support to collaborative efforts have been decried as undermining privacy rights and free speech in the digital landscape. Google’s creation played a crucial role in the US intelligence community’s scheme to attain global dominance by controlling information.

How it Started
The Pentagon founded its private sector project the Highlands Forum during the Clinton administration in 1994, according to the INSURGE INTELLIGENCE project. Together with defense contractors, the group hammered out a strategy for “network-centric warfare.” The 9/11 terrorist attacks were seized upon by US spy agencies to justify not only military invasions across the Muslim world, but also mass surveillance of civilian populations.

CIA Steps In
The CIA’s Massive Digital Data Systems (MDDS) program, which originated in the 1990s, was designed to enhance query techniques and track users’ digital footprints. To better serve its goals, in 1999, the CIA established its own venture capital firm, In-Q-Tel, to invest in potentially useful technologies. Ph.D. students at Stanford University, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, were working on precisely such a tech start-up. The design of the search engine and algorithms that ultimately evolved into Google was funded by CIA grants through a program aimed at enhancing mass surveillance capabilities.

PRISM
Whistleblower Edward Snowden revealed in 2013 that the NSA had direct access to Google’s systems through its secret PRISM program, enabling the agency to harvest vast amounts of data on American citizens, Washington’s allies, and foreign nationals. Ex-CIA spooks are employed in almost every department at Google, according to a 2022 report based on the analysis of employment websites. Google has been slapped with multiple lawsuits stemming from its history of data misuse and privacy violations.

“..evade their own governments’ restrictions on domestic spying upon their citizens by tasking foreign partners to carry out such missions..”

• Did Closest US Intelligence Allies Spy on Trump? (Sp.)

Washington’s Five Eyes allies may have guilty secrets about the Russia collusion hoax – and fear US President Donald Trump’s government will find out, Wall Street analyst Charles Ortel tells Sputnik.”Years ago, Judge Andrew Napolitano revealed on Fox TV that he believed the US and the UK – possibly with other Five Eyes nations – had an understanding that members would cooperate to evade their own governments’ restrictions on domestic spying upon their citizens by tasking foreign partners to carry out such missions,” Ortel says. In March 2017, the White House accused British eavesdropping center GCHQ of spying on Trump. Napolitano claimed Obama used GCHQ to snoop on Trump, exploiting the Five Eyes partnership to flout domestic spying rules.

GCHQ’s NSA access could have enabled operatives to obtain transcripts of Trump’s conversations.”We do not yet know most of the truth, but it certainly seems to me that the US government and partisan operatives in media, academia and the corporate world are centrally involved in attempting to rig elections inside and outside America,” Ortel says.”We also know that UK elements have never stopped meddling in US affairs, likely from 1782 onwards. By comparison, Russian meddling in US politics, if any, seems minute.”

Too late?!

• EU States ‘Fed Up’ With Von Der Leyen – Politico (RT)

EU member states are growing frustrated with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen over her unilateral approach to foreign policy, Politico reported on Wednesday, citing diplomats. The latest criticism reportedly comes after von der Leyen announced a partnership agreement with Jordan.The deal was inked last week following talks between von der Leyen and King Abdullah II. It aims to assist Jordan in facing the socio-economic impact of the Syrian crisis and broaden avenues for investments and business opportunities in the Arab country. The deal will be complemented by €3 billion ($3.1 billion) in financial resources, comprising grants, investments, and macro-financial assistance.However, according to two sources who spoke to Politico, von der Leyen made the decision to allocate the funds to Jordan without consulting EU member nations.

“We were confronted with a fait accompli while we’re the ones footing the bill,” an EU diplomat who spoke on condition of anonymity told the news outlet. “It’s not the first time von der Leyen pulls a stunt like this because she wants to make nice with world leaders. [Member countries] are increasingly fed up with it,” he added. The source did not mention other instances when the commission chief had failed to discuss her decisions with EU members. According to the report, there has been much discontent over von der Leyen’s power-grabbing tactics, especially in foreign policy – an area traditionally managed by the European Council and the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs.

“Ursula von der Leyen has been grabbing the [smallest] crumb of foreign power on every occasion,” MEP Nacho Sanchez Amor told the news outlet. He argued that the growing concentration of foreign policy decisions within the European Commission runs counter to the bloc’s foundational treaties, according to which foreign policy should remain under the purview of member states. “We have assumed uncritically that foreign policy is bending towards the commission, and this is not the treaties’ framework,” he said, calling for a formal debate on the issue.

Von der Leyen’s centralized approach has reportedly been a point of contention since her first term, resulting in strained relationships with former European Council President Charles Michel and the bloc’s former top diplomat, Josep Borrell. Prior to von der Leyen’s reelection for the top job last year, there were also reports that many EU states were dissatisfied with her excessive focus on climate and the weakening economy, along with nepotism and non-transparency of her policies. Von der Leyen has changed her agenda since being reelected in June, placing more emphasis on the bloc’s competitiveness and defense.

Pfizer

This is mind blowing! Pfizer whistleblower releases internal documents showing they had received over 158,000 adverse reaction reports within 2 months of it's release. pic.twitter.com/RE2QeM5cLM

— Dr David Cartland BMedSci MBChB MRCGP (2014) (@CartlandDavid) February 5, 2025

Asli Ana

Palestinian recording artist Zeyne released this stunning track in 2024, titled, “Asli Ana”, a tribute to the people of Gaza and the Palestinian identity, and has gained western media coverage in outlets like Vogue, Rolling Stone & Grazia.

There is a reason this kind of music… pic.twitter.com/KFWFXioxxL

— Patrick Henningsen (@21WIRE) February 5, 2025

Horses

Dogs and horses are God's way of putting a smile on your face. pic.twitter.com/mLpBdnYbgW

— The Disrespected Trucker (@DisrespectedThe) February 4, 2025

Frens

Best friends

pic.twitter.com/WB083OVPYF

— The Goddess (@TheGoddessF) February 4, 2025

Me too!
https://twitter.com/i/status/1887242183431905351

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Debt Rattle August 5 2024

Aug 052024

August 5, 2024 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 8:37 am Finance Tagged with: Apple, Belarus, Buffet, catastrophic war, Civil War, F-16, Kamala, Poland, Putin, Trump 85 Responses »

Pablo Picasso Portrait of Ambroise Vollard 1910

• If You Thought Things Were Bad Under Biden, Just Wait (Moore)

• We Reap the Harvest of Lies (Bell)

• Guess Who Kamala Harris Blames For Disastrous Jobs Report? (ZH)

• Kamala Harris and the Masque of Magical Thinking (Kimball)

• What Donald Trump Should Beware of In The Debate With Kamala Harris (Bridge)

• Trump Congratulates Putin On ‘Great Deal’ (RT)

• Israel and US Stoke the Fire as China Pursues Peace (Manley)

• US Sends Forces to Middle East, Fear Catastrophic War Is Imminent (Sp.)

• Why is Poland Massing Troops on Frontier With Belarus?

• American Jets Spotted Over Ukraine (RT)

• Destruction of NATO F-16s Sent to Ukraine Will Boost Russia’s Image (Sp.)

• Warren Buffet Unloads Apple Shares (RT)

• New York State Supreme Court Blocks Attempt to Pause Migrant Arrivals (ET)

• Elon Musk Speculates Civil War ‘Inevitable’ as Violence Sweeps UK (Sp.)

• British Rioters Torch Migrant Hotel (RT)

Snipers

I don't know what shocked me more, finding out that the Secret Service had never provided Trump counter sniper protection until the Butler rally or that they didn't provide the Secret Service snipers radios but told them to use their personal cell phones to text each other. pic.twitter.com/7Y16GNiFaE

— @amuse (@amuse) August 4, 2024

Kama cloud
https://twitter.com/i/status/1819807929442193629

Debate
https://twitter.com/i/status/1819896389897224365

Michaela
https://twitter.com/i/status/1819831108558864468

Rogan

"Before COVID, I thought vaccines were the most important invention in human history.

After COVID, I don't think we went to the moon

I think Michelle Obama’s got a d___

I think Pızzagatə is real"

Joe Rogan is awake, are you?

Share this everywhere!!
pic.twitter.com/DLgM9TBPtz

— TaraBull (@TaraBull808) August 4, 2024

ICYMI – Joe Rogan jokes about dying of Covid; “The funniest way for me to die is if I die from Covid. Don’t think I didn’t think it. When I got Covid the first thought I had was ‘Oh my god you better not die.‘ I talked SO MUCH shit. I talked so much shit!”pic.twitter.com/7PeZxtp8xc

— Overton (@OvertonLive) August 4, 2024

“This was a man who pledged to unite the country and did just the opposite..”

• If You Thought Things Were Bad Under Biden, Just Wait (Moore)

President Joe Biden’s time in the White House is mercifully coming to an end. He is now officially a lame duck with six months to go. How could they be so unpatriotic? From his first days in the Oval Office, Biden governed from the far left on everything from climate change, to radical income redistribution, to massive government expansionism, to racial politics, to a “blame America first” foreign policy, to his dangerous weaponization of every agency of government from the Internal Revenue Service to the FBI to the Justice Department and, perhaps, even to the Secret Service. He made President Richard Nixon look like an amateur. It is hard to point to a single policy that he got right. On the economy, he was catastrophically bad. The trillions of dollars of debt he rung up bought nothing. He sent inflation to the highest levels in almost forty years.

The average family lost $2,000 of income after inflation during his reign. More people died of COVID during his presidency than Trump’s — despite the availability of the vaccine. Interest rates rose. Biden declared war on American energy. He put America back into the Paris Climate Accord—and the rest of the world went on using more fossil fuels than ever. By impeding U.S. oil and gas production and pipelines he played into the hands of our enemies — China and Iran. Gas prices rose. Small business confidence sagged. Poverty rates rose. Then there was the sheer incompetence. The bungled Afghanistan withdrawal was a national security disaster. The border became a broken dam with millions seeking to illegally enter the country. The government spent $7.5 billion on electric vehicle chargers and only a handful got built. Biden gave away hundreds of billions of dollars for an illegal and immoral student loan forgiveness program. He put regulators in charge of key agencies even though — or because — they hate business.

A majority of his appointees had no business experience. It showed. When he departs the White House in the months ahead he will leave the nation poorer, weaker, more divided, more in debt, more vulnerable, and less respected than when he entered office. This was a man who pledged to unite the country and did just the opposite. He deserves to go down in history as one of the five worst presidents of the 20th and 21st century. Here is my list starting with the worst: 1) Woodrow Wilson; 2) Herbert Hoover: 3) Jimmy Carter; 4) Joe Biden; 5) Barack Obama. Now the Democrats want to run Vice President Kamala Harris, who was on board with every Biden policy and helped oversee the worst border catastrophe in modern history. Just when you thought things could not get any worse.

“.. the fourth estate that was to shed light on them has embraced the darkness.”

• We Reap the Harvest of Lies (Bell)

Public life has become disorienting. Most people, by and large, previously expected to hear the truth, or some semblance of it, in daily life. We would generally expect this from each other, but also from public media and authorities such as governments or international agencies set up ostensibly for our benefit. Society cannot function in a coherent and stable way without it, as so much in our lives requires us to place trust in others. To navigate the complexity of existence, we generally look for guidance to certain trusted sources, freeing up time to sift through the more questionable ones. Some claim they always knew everything was fake, but they are wrong, as it wasn’t (and still isn’t). There were always liars, campaigns to mislead, and propaganda to drive us to love or to hate, but there was a core within society that had certain accepted norms and standards that should theoretically be followed. A sort of anchor.

Truth is indestructible but the anchor cable connecting us to it, ensuring its influence, has been cut. Society is being set adrift. This really broke in the past four or five years. We were already in trouble, but now public discourse is broken. Perhaps it broke when governments elected to represent the people openly employed behavioral psychology to lie to their constituencies on a scale we had not previously seen. They combined to make their peoples do things they rationally would not; accept bans of family funerals, cover faces in public, or accept police brutality and the isolation and abandonment of the elderly. The media, health professionals, politicians, and celebrities all participated in this lie and its intent. Virtually all our major institutions. And these lies are continuing, and expanding, and have become the norm.

We are now reaping the harvest of untruth. The media can openly deny what they said or printed just months earlier about a new candidate for presidency or the efficacy of a mandated vaccine. A whole political party can change its narrative almost overnight about the fundamental characteristics of its leader. People paid as “fact-checkers” twist reality to invent new facts and hide the truth, unflustered by the transparency of their deceit. Giant software companies curate information, filtering out truths that run contrary to the pronouncements of conflicted international organizations. Power has displaced integrity. Internationally, we are pummeled by agencies such as the UN, World Bank, G20, and World Health Organization to give up our basic rights and hand their new masters our wealth on claims of threats that can unequivocally be shown to be false.

Paid-off former leaders, grasping legitimacy through the legacy of greater minds, reinforce mass falsehoods for the benefit of their friends. Once aberrations that a free media might highlight, fallacies have become norms in which the same media is openly complicit. The frightening part is not the lies, which are a normal aspect of humanity, but the broad disinterest in truth. Lies can stand for a time in the presence of a people and institutions that value truth, but they will eventually fail as they are exposed. When truth loses its value, when it is no longer even a vague guide for politics or journalism, then recovery may not occur. We are in an incredibly dangerous time, because lies are not just tolerated but are now the default approach, at the national and international level, and the fourth estate that was to shed light on them has embraced the darkness.

“..what was the true shock in Friday’s “data” is the long overdue admission that the US is effectively in a recession..”

• Guess Who Kamala Harris Blames For Disastrous Jobs Report? (ZH)

Following last week’s horrendous jobs report, the Kamala Harris campaign issued a statement blaming – you guessed it – Donald Trump! “Donald Trump failed Americans as president, costing our economy millions of jobs, and bringing us to the brink of recession,” said Harris for President spokesperson James Singer in a statement. “Now, he’s promising even more damage with a Project 2025 agenda that will decimate the middle class and increase taxes on working families, while ripping away health care, raising prescription drug costs, and cutting Social Security and Medicare — all while making his billionaire donors richer.”

According to Singer, “We’ve made significant progress, but Vice President Harris knows there’s more work to do to lower costs for families,” and “will make building up the middle class the defining goal of her presidency, taking on greedy corporations that are price gouging consumers, banning hidden fees, and capping unfair rent increases and drug costs.” So – robotic talking points centered around blaming the guy who’s been out of office for 3.5 years. On Friday the Labor Department revealed that US job growth cooled sharply in July, while the unemployment rate unexpectedly rose to the highest level in nearly three years. According to the report, the US added just 114K payrolls, a huge miss to expectations of 175K and also a huge drop from the downward revised June print of 206K, now (as always ) revised to just 179K. This was the lowest print since December 2020 (at least prior to even more revisions)…

As we wrote in response, these being numbers published by the corrupt Biden, pardon Kamala Department of Goalseeked bullshit, the previous months were revised lower as usual, with May revised down by 2,000, from +218,000 to +216,000, and the change for June was revised down by 27,000, from +206,000 to +179,000. With these revisions, employment in May and June combined is 29,000 lower than previously reported. It gets better because as shown in the next chart shows, 5 of the past 6 months have now been revised lower.

But while we have long known that the real payrolls number is far worse than reported, what was the true shock in Friday’s “data” is the long overdue admission that the US is effectively in a recession because as the rule named for pro-Biden/Kamala socialist Cluadia Sahm indicates, a recession has now been triggered. The rule, for those who don’t remember is that a recession is effectively already underway if the unemployment rate (based on a three-month moving average) rises by half a percentage point from its low of the past year. And that’s what just happened, with the unemployment rate surging 0.6% from the year’s low.

“Once her views are made known to the public,” Piereson notes, “Harris’s support will begin to melt away. . . . [B]y mid-September, Trump will have opened up a six-point lead in the polls that will remain intact for the balance of the campaign.”

• Kamala Harris and the Masque of Magical Thinking (Kimball)

Although the last few weeks have had their alarming aspects – chief among which was the attempted assassination of Donald Trump on July 13, the odds-on favorite candidate for president – they have also had their amusing moments. In the latter category, I place the sudden queen-for-a-day-like coronation of Kamala Harris. True, that coronation was in the nature of an anti-democratic semi-soft-coup (or anti-democratic “inversion of a coup”). Biden and his handlers, right up until the morning of July 21, were insisting that he was not dropping out, that he was “in it to win,” etc. But someone made him an offer he couldn’t refuse and out he went. Here’s the amusing bit. Until the moment Biden was chased out of the race, Kamala Harris functioned primarily as political life insurance. “You might not like me,” Biden communicated, “but if I go, you’re stuck with her.” Biden’s polls were in the toilet and, following his catastrophic debate with Donald Trump, were circling the drain, poised for oblivion.

But Kamala’s polls were even worse. She was cordially disliked by—well, by everyone. Her staff, her colleagues, but above all, by voters. In the 2020 race, she got no delegates: none, zero, zip. She dropped out of the race for president but was then tapped to be VP only because this half Indian, half Jamaican woman was swarthy enough to pass as black and Biden had promised to select a black female as a running mate. Kamala truly is, as Biden himself acknowledged recently, a DEI vice president. And sure enough, Kamala was every bit the disaster people predicted she would be. As a matter of clinical interest, she proved that senility is not the only cause of supreme rhetorical incoherence. Some people, and she is one, come by it naturally. Her tenure as vice president is littered with examples, and she provided another doozy just a couple of days ago when she attempted to comment on the prisoner exchange with Russia.

It’s painful, as are all the many video clips of Harris angrily denouncing people who say “Merry Christmas,” of her presiding as “border czar” over the disaster of our non-existent southern border, of her outlining how she wants to give Medicare, as well as the franchise, to all illegal immigrants, and how she wants to develop a national data base of gun owners so that she can confiscate firearms by force. Can such a person win the presidency? No. Then, how can we explain the sudden efflorescence of Harrismania? Democrats are wetting themselves with glee over their sudden fundraising windfalls ($200 million in a week, it is said) and sudden surge in the polls. New York magazine just beclowned itself with a cover showing Kamala sitting on top of the world with Barack Obama, Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, and even Joe Biden dancing and whooping it up below. “Welcome to Kamalot,” we read: “In a matter of days, the Democratic Party discovered its future was actually in the White House all along.”

Was it? Again, the answer is no. It is a temporary sugar high caused partly by the feeling of liberation following the sudden release from Joe Biden, partly by the slobbering media jumping all over the reinvention of Kamala like dogs vibrating over a bitch in estrus. The feeling of intoxication may linger through the Democratic convention, but there are already signs that it is fading. I think James Piereson is correct. Kamala’s position now is akin to that of Michael Dukakis (remember him?) in 1988. Dukakis was way ahead of George Bush in the summer of 1988. Then it all unraveled. His helmet-moment in the tank sealed the deal. But it was his whole left-wing outlook that really did him in. And Dukakis was Ronald Reagan compared to Kamala Harris. “Once her views are made known to the public,” Piereson notes, “Harris’s support will begin to melt away. . . . [B]y mid-September, Trump will have opened up a six-point lead in the polls that will remain intact for the balance of the campaign.”

Although I would hesitate to be quite so arithmetically precise, I think that Piereson is also by and large correct in his electoral prediction. “Notwithstanding the euphoria today,” he writes, Trump will win the election by six points—forty-nine to forty-three percent—winning 339 electoral votes, including all of the so-called swing states, plus the Democratic-leaning states of Virginia, Minnesota, and New Hampshire. Republicans will pick up three or four seats in the Senate and perhaps twenty seats in the House, giving them safe majorities in both chambers. This will give Trump the margins he needs to implement a good piece of his agenda in 2025 and 2026. I think this is right—though, again, I hesitate to be quite so exact in attaching numbers to Trump’s victory.

He’ll be labeled racist, sexist, misogynist: “..she attempts to portray herself as the deserving underdog in a white man’s game..”

• What Donald Trump Should Beware of In The Debate With Kamala Harris (Bridge)

Mark your calendar, ladies and gentlemen, Kamala Harris has done something extraordinary. She has become the only candidate in half a century to become the presidential nominee without winning a single primary vote. Biden’s vice got enough delegate votes in the virtual roll call process to become the official Democratic nominee. Interesting how not winning votes has had an uncanny way of getting this severely unqualified woman one cackle closer to the Oval Office. But the shock and awe does not stop there, so be advised to have a seat. The absolutely, positively 100% legitimate corporate media monstrosity with blood-soaked hand to its heart reports: Harris is now more popular than Joe Biden or Donald Trump have been at any point in the 2024 election cycle.

Yes, a Morning Consult poll of 11,538 registered voters between July 26 and 28 found 50 percent have a favorable opinion of the sitting vice president, while 46 percent have an unfavorable opinion. According to the pollster, “Harris’s 4-point net favorability is a higher rating than Biden or Trump have posted all cycle.” Is anyone really buying any of this, aside from those people who would rather see Donald Duck, for example, as commander-in-chief than Donald J. Trump? Incidentally, let’s not forget that this is the same unbelievable, super-sensational candidate who had her presidential dreams (temporarily) demolished in less than five minutes by a tenacious Tulsi Gabbard during the 2020 Democratic primary debates. The problem, however, had nothing to do with the deeply unlikeable Deep State darling, of course, but rather with a little problem known in the world of politics as cash flow, the primary grease responsible for slipping the most despicable people into positions of power over the years.

As CNBC reported shortly after the debate debacle, “[w]ith Harris falling behind former Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, among others, some of Harris’ lead bundlers have struggled to convince members of their networks to write checks to her campaign. In some cases, many of her supporters have told the campaign that they will not host events for her.” Now, just four lackluster years later, without a serious signature project to call her own, cash is no longer a problem for female, Black and Asian-American Kamala Harris, the Democratic Party’s ultimate DEI hire. The Harris campaign announced over the weekend it had raised $310 million in July, more than double Trump’s take last month, thereby strongly pointing to the obvious: for whatever reason, the money and media machine is churning in high gear for the political left, as it has since time immemorial, and woe to the mortal who thinks this has anything to do with power-hungry vultures perched on Capitol Hill, waiting for their next feeding time.

And this is where Trump has all the reason in the world to distrust the merchants of media – even if they happen to be the notorious backstabbers at Fox News – as it plays ‘neutral’ arbitrator in the upcoming debates. As proof, as if proof were needed, here is something that Harris and not some AI-generated body double uttered just a few days ago during a rally: “Donald Trump does not care about border security; he only cares about himself,” the invisible border czar told a crowd of worshipful supporters. “And when I am president, I will actually work to solve the problem.” The fact that Kamala Harris is able to utter such inanities without any pushback or laugh track shows that the media is seriously gas-lighting the American people, and not playing fair with Trump. But in the perennial fight against left-wing media forces, Trump has a knack for being his personal Darth Vader, namely due to his willingness to speak his mind, and occasionally the truth, no matter who it hurts. In a less moronic age that was known and welcomed as candidness.

[..] On top of the race card, Trump will also be entering the lion’s den as a climate-change-denying “convicted felon,” misogynist, and an anti-abortion supporter – quaint little sound bites that Harris is certainly remembering by heart. However this tragicomedy plays out, expect lots of handwringing and lecturing from the female (check), Black (check), Indian (check) candidate as she attempts to portray herself as the deserving underdog in a white man’s game.

“We got our people back, but boy we make some horrible, horrible deals..”

• Trump Congratulates Putin On ‘Great Deal’ (RT)

Former US President Donald Trump has blasted President Joe Biden’s prisoner exchange deal with Moscow, suggesting that Russian President Vladimir Putin got the better end of the bargain. The US and Russia exchanged a total of 26 prisoners held in several countries earlier this week, in the largest such deal since the end of the Cold War. Wall Street Journal correspondent Evan Gershkovich and former US Marine Paul Whelan – both of whom were convicted of espionage in Russia – were sent to the West, as were 14 other foreign agents, opposition activists, and criminals. In return, ten Russian nationals were sent to Moscow, among them alleged intelligence agents and cybercriminals. The most prominent name on the list was Vadim Krasikov, an FSB agent who was convicted of the murder of a former Chechen militant commander in Germany in 2021.

“I’d like to congratulate Vladimir Putin for having made yet another great deal,” Trump declared at a campaign rally in Georgia on Saturday. “Did you see the deal we made? They released some of the greatest killers anywhere in the world, some of the most evil killers they got.” “We got our people back, but boy we make some horrible, horrible deals,” he continued, adding that “it’s nice to say we got them back, but does that set a bad precedent?” Prior to the swap, Trump claimed that only he could secure the release of Gershkovich. In a post to his Truth Social platform in May, he wrote that the Wall Street Journal reporter “will be released almost immediately after the election, but definitely before I assume office,” and that the US would be “paying nothing” for his return.

With Gershkovich back in the US, Trump has switched tone, arguing that Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris – who is running for the presidency against Trump – are inept negotiators who paid too high a price for his freedom. “We got 59 hostages, I never paid anything,” he told his supporters on Saturday. However, while Trump did secure the release of dozens of American prisoners during his presidency without making any concessions, he did trade captives on multiple occasions. Among these deals were two one-for-one swaps with Iran, and the 2019 exchange of an American and an Australian for three senior Taliban leaders held in an Afghan jail.

“The facts are that the US will lose. It cannot fight a multi-pronged war against superpowers but it seems dead set on continuing to do that..”

• Israel and US Stoke the Fire as China Pursues Peace (Manley)

Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh was killed Wednesday in an attack on his residence in Tehran. Hamas has blamed Israel and the US for Haniyeh’s death and vowed retaliation. On Friday, Intelligence Minister Ismail Khatib said Israel ordered the strike after receiving a green light from the US. The Global Times reported Thursday that China firmly opposed and condemned the assassination of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh that took place on Wednesday in Tehran. Fu Cong, China’s permanent representative to the United Nations, said the act was a blatant attempt to “sabotage peace efforts and wantonly trampled on the fundamental UN Charter principle of respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity of all states.” Fu added that China is “deeply worried” the incident could trigger further upheaval in the Middle East.

KJ Noh sat down with Sputnik’s The Critical Hour program this week to discuss China’s response to the assassination of Haniyeh. Noh, who is a political activist, writer and teacher, suggested China is open to peaceful negotiations while Israel and the US appear to be escalating tensions. “China’s approach is to settle differences through dialogue and negotiation and reconciliation and to develop, to look for win-win solutions, to have mutual respect, to build and not to bomb,” Noh explained. “And what Israel has done [is] they’ve essentially toppled any chance of a political settlement by assassinating their interlocutor. [It] can’t get any more naked than that.” “If you kill the person across the table who you’re talking to, that means you’re not interested in any peaceful negotiation,” the writer added. “What’s clear, both in the case of Ukraine and in the case of Israel, is I think the US does not want negotiation. It wants what Israel wants, which is ethnic cleansing and genocide.”

On Tuesday, US Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell said the US is “far behind” China in Africa and other regions in the Global South and has “much more work to do” in competing with China. In an opinion piece, the Global Times suggested the US’ call for “more work to do” in the Global South is a “strategy to manipulate and weaponize these nations, using them as tools against China.” “Kurt Campbell wants war, and he has said that he would unleash a magnificent symphony of death. That’s the way he thinks, but he also knows that the US cannot fight China by itself,” Noh said. “And so, everything that the US is pivoting to do right now is to weaponize as many proxies as possible, and therefore this is their strategy towards the Global South – force them into blocs and turn them into weapons against China.”

“The US wants more and it wants to block confrontation and it wants win-lose relations or lose-lose relations. China wants win-win relations and it wants to develop the world on the basis of mutual benefit and equality,” he added. “That’s the foundational difference. And we can see that the US, by appointing Campbell and everything else they’re saying and doing is doubling down on this pathway to planetary destruction.” The US is at risk of losing in the event of multiple conflicts with adversaries due to a lack of capabilities and capacity reported Sputnik Monday, citing a report from the US Congress affiliated Commission on the National Defense Strategy.

“They want to come to a different conclusion, despite being confronted by the same facts. The facts are that the US will lose. It cannot fight a multi-pronged war against superpowers but it seems dead set on continuing to do that,” said Noh. The report also found that the US military lacks both the capabilities and capacity required to be confident in its ability to deter and prevail in combat. It added that China remains the “preeminent challenge” to US interests and the country’s most formidable military threat. “So, once again, having come to the same conclusions, they do not suggest a way out or a reasonable accommodation with the rest of the world. They still want to double down on US supremacy. They want more war, preferably spending more money, using more proxies and more instruments of death,” the activist added.

“On Saturday, Tehran told Arab diplomats that they did not care if their response leads to war.”

• US Sends Forces to Middle East, Fear Catastrophic War Is Imminent (Sp.)

Nearly 40,000 people in Gaza have been killed since Israel’s operation in Gaza began in October, according to the territory’s health ministry. Fears of an imminent regional or world war are rising as the United States sends military forces to the Middle East to safeguard Israel after its latest escalation in the region. On Friday US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said he had ordered more ballistic missile defense-capable cruisers and destroyers to the Middle East and Europe. An additional fighter jet squadron will be sent to the Middle East as the US increases their “readiness to deploy additional land-based ballistic missile defense,” it was reported. The USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier strike group will also be moved to the Middle East as a way to “maintain a carrier strike group presence”, the report added. Fears of a regional war in the Middle East have been growing since the assassination of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh, who was killed in an attack on his residence in Tehran.

Just hours prior, Israel also struck south Beirut and killed Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr. Hamas has blamed Israel and the US for Haniyeh’s death and vowed retaliation. On Friday, Intelligence Minister Ismail Khatib said Israel ordered the strike after receiving a green light from the US. Israel’s provocation has resulted in Iran-backed groups in the Middle East swearing vows of vengeance. Groups from Lebanon, Yemen, Kiraq and Syria have already addressed the war in Gaza between the Palestinian group Hamas, and Israel whose military efforts have been supported by the US. The US has given Israel more aid than any other nation since World War II. On Sunday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Iran had refused to moderate its response to the assassination of Haniyeh and was planning to launch a massive retaliatory strike against Israel, with analysts claiming Tehran’s barrage could last multiple days.

On Saturday, Tehran told Arab diplomats that they did not care if their response leads to war. Iran said on Saturday that it expects Hezbollah to strike deep within Israel and to no longer confine their attacks solely to military targets. A Lebanese security source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said a Hezbollah member was killed in an “Israeli drone” strike on a vehicle in south Lebanon Saturday, according to an AFP report. Late on Friday Israel carried out strikes on truck convoys entering Lebanon from Syria, the report added.

“Some Poles also consider the lands of western Belarus as the Polish ‘borderlands’..”

• Why is Poland Massing Troops on Frontier With Belarus?

Poland kicked off a large-scale military operation along the border with Belarus on August 1, ostensibly to secure the frontier in the face of what Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz characterized as a migrant-fueled “hybrid war” against Warsaw. Why does Minsk have reason to be wary of Warsaw’s official justifications? The Polish border defense operation, dubbed ‘Safe Podlasie’ (referring to the northeastern Polish province of Podlaskie) involves about 17,000 troops led by the 18th Mechanized Division of the Polish Armed Forces, with the officially-stated aim of the deployment being to fight illegal migrant flows in a dispute with Belarus that goes back to 2021. “Our soldiers will counter illegal crossings in places that are not intended for this. This operation is a response to illegal immigration from the east, which poses a challenge to Poland’s internal security,” Kosiniak-Kamysz said ahead of the deployment.

Poland has already built a 186 km long, five-meter high, $400 million anti-immigration border fence along part of the border, and plans to construct a massive, 200-meter to 2 km-wide “buffer zone” at some point in the future. But Operation ‘Safe Podlasie’ was kicked off simultaneously with Operation Eastern Aurora, a NATO mission ostensibly meant to secure Polish airspace “in the face of unpredictable Russian actions,” thus potentially betraying Warsaw’s true intentions and rationale for the troop buildup. Belarus has long been skeptical of Warsaw’s military deployments on its western frontier. With over 216,000 personnel under arms (the Belarusian military has about 65,000 troops total, for comparison), Poland has the third-largest military in NATO after the US and Turkiye, and has dramatically ramped up the deployment of alliance assets and troops (including a new American missile defense facility in Redzikowo, northern Poland with offensive capabilities) in recent years.

In March, Poland hosted the Dragon 24 wargames, involving some 20,000 NATO troops and 3,500 pieces of military equipment. Successive Polish governments have had long-standing ambitions to topple Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko to install a more European Union and NATO-friendly government, sponsoring and lending other forms of aid to radical opposition forces in the country, most recently in 2020. Some Polish geostrategists see Belarus as a key piece of the ‘Intermarium’, a geopolitical concept first conceived by Polish statesman Jozef Pilsudski in the first part of the 20th century to ‘reunite’ the territories of the old Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth to contain Russia from the Baltic to the Black Seas. Some Poles also consider the lands of western Belarus as the Polish ‘borderlands’. In 2020, Lukashenko accused Warsaw of harboring plans to annex Grodno region amid the foreign-backed post-election unrest facing Belarus at the time. The Polish government vocally denied the claims.

“These planes will appear, their number will gradually decrease, they will be shot down and destroyed..”

• American Jets Spotted Over Ukraine (RT)

US-made F-16 fighter jets have been spotted in Ukrainian airspace, according to videos shared online by local residents. They appear to show at least one jet conducting a surveillance flight over the city of Odessa. Kiev was promised the planes in 2023 by a number of NATO states, including the US, France, Bulgaria, Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, Canada, Luxembourg, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, and Sweden. They formed the so-called ‘F-16 coalition’, pledging to provide Kiev with the fighter jets and train Ukrainian pilots to operate them. No delivery date was set, however, and Kiev has recently expressed its impatience. A report by Bloomberg, citing sources in Kiev, indicated that the first batch of jets arrived earlier this week, and that the number delivered so far was “small.” Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky confirmed the delivery in a statement on his official Telegram channel on Sunday.

He did not disclose the number of planes supplied but singled out Denmark and the Netherlands to express his gratitude for the delivery. The two countries were to provide Kiev with 24 and 19 F-16s respectively from their own stocks. Zelensky hailed the long-awaited arrival of the jets, claiming they will help Kiev deliver “exactly such combat results that will bring our victory closer – our just peace for Ukraine.” Moscow has warned that F-16s, just like any other Western weapons provided to Kiev, will not change the outcome of the conflict and will only prolong it. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said earlier this week that there is no “magic pill” for Kiev and that it will not have this “panacea” for long. “These planes will appear, their number will gradually decrease, they will be shot down and destroyed. They will not be able to significantly influence the dynamics of events at the front,” Peskov stated.

“Russia’s air defense systems would make it too risky for Ukraine to try to use the jets to support its troop movements on the front line..”

• Destruction of NATO F-16s Sent to Ukraine Will Boost Russia’s Image (Sp.)

The first F-16s have been delivered to Ukraine, media reported earlier in the week. Promised to the Kiev regime a year ago, it took far longer than predicted to train Ukrainian pilots on the jets, with media speculating about what the F-16s will be used for, citing air defense as an option. Deliveries of aging F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine will play into Russia’s hands and improve its image, The Independent has speculated. Russian President Vladimir Putin “would savor the image that destroying F-16s from NATO countries would bring,” the UK media outlet noted. Russia’s Armed Forces will likely “destroy the F-16s on the ground with long-range missiles,” the publication further predicted. It went on to underscore that Russia’s Su-35 fighter jet would be “one of the biggest threats” to the F-16s, and noted that sophisticated air surveillance radars would be used against them. Russia’s air defense systems would make it too risky for Ukraine to try to use the jets to support its troop movements on the front line, analysts cited by the outlet acknowledged.

The fact that Kiev’s pilots only got a nine-month training “crash course” on using the F-16s as compared to the typical three-year course Western pilots receive was also noted. Ukraine recently received a handful of F-16s from the Netherlands. Denmark, Belgium, and Norway have promised to provide the Kiev regime with more over the next few months. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov warned the United States and its NATO allies that Moscow sees the presence of nuclear-capable F-16s in Ukraine as a nuclear threat. President Vladimir Putin emphasized that Western-supplied F-16 jets to Ukraine would not have the power to alter the situation on the battlefield. He warned that if these fighter jets are deployed from the territory of third countries, they will be considered legitimate targets for Russian forces. Every previous alleged game-changing weapon has failed to turn the tide of the West’s proxy conflict in Ukraine, as Russia has had effective countermeasures ready and waiting for each of them.

Apple does so well, he’s taking a break.

• Warren Buffet Unloads Apple Shares (RT)

Billionaire investor Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has significantly cut its investment in Apple, offloading nearly half of its holding since the start of the year, according to a quarterly earnings report released on Saturday. The value of the holding company’s stake in Apple dropped from $174.3 billion as of the end of last year to $84.2 billion on June 30. In the final quarter of last year, Berkshire also sold around 10 million Apple shares, or roughly 1% of its holding. Despite the sell-off, Apple remains the largest investment in Berkshire’s portfolio. Nevertheless, the persistent offloading of Apple shares is notable for Buffett, who is famous for being a long-term investor and a vocal Apple fan. During the Berkshire annual meeting in May, Buffett said he believed the tech giant would remain one of the conglomerate’s core holdings.

However, during the same meeting, he hinted that his selling of Apple stock is partly motivated by tax considerations, and also by his plans to build up Berkshire’s cash position. In total, Berkshire sold off $75.5 billion in stock in the second quarter, a move that lifted its cash holdings to a record high of $277 billion, up from $88 billion in the first quarter of 2024. It was the seventh straight quarter in which the company sold more stock than it bought. Cash now represents roughly 30% of Berkshire’s market value of over $900 billion. Some analysts say the company’s cash buildup may signal Buffet’s concerns about the US economy.

“I would be getting a little worried,” Jim Shanahan, an analyst for Edward Jones told MarketWatch in a note. Buffett’s recent moves “make me concerned about his outlook for the markets and economy. It’s incredible how much the cash has grown,” he wrote. Apple stock had a rough start to this year amid concerns over weakness in iPhone sales and competition from other tech majors, but started rapidly gaining after the company unveiled Apple Intelligence, its batch of new AI features, in early June. A rally last month pushed the iPhone maker’s stock price to over $230 per share and its market cap to over $3.5 trillion, the highest any publicly traded company has ever achieved. The shares have since given back some of the gains, closing at roughly $219 per share on Friday.

First you welcome them, but then you file a lawsuit against 17 charter bus companies?! Shouldn’t you sue Texas, if anyone? Yourself, perhaps?

• New York State Supreme Court Blocks Attempt to Pause Migrant Arrivals (ET)

The New York State Supreme Court has denied New York City Mayor Eric Adams’s request for a preliminary injunction against busing illegal immigrants from Texas to the city. Adams, who faces challenges from New York City Comptroller Brad Lander and others in his reelection bid next year, filed a lawsuit against 17 charter bus companies in January. His goal was to stop the companies from busing migrants, many of them undocumented, from communities in Texas to New York. The mayor cited Social Services Law 149, which stipulates that any person “who knowingly brings, or causes to be brought, a needy person from out of state into this state for the purpose of making him a public charge” has an obligation “to convey such person out of state or support him at his own expense.” But in her nine-page July 29 ruling, Judge Mary V. Rosado found that the lawsuit was “unconstitutional.”

The judge found that the matter was similar to a 1941 Supreme Court case, Edwards v. California, in which the Supreme Court found that an “essentially identical” law in California was unconstitutional for violating the Interstate Commerce Clause. She cited the ruling, saying, “The Court finds that it cannot grant the … request for injunctive relief as the merits of [the] claim are dubious at best given myriad constitutional concerns.” The state supreme court’s ruling is a setback for the Adams administration, whose legal moves had succeeded in getting one bus company, Roadrunner Charters Inc., to enter into an agreement to pause busing migrants to the city until the court reached a decision. Now, Roadrunner Charters and other bus services are free to continue transporting migrants to New York. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott quickly responded to the ruling on X, formerly Twitter, writing, “Another WIN! … Until the Biden-Harris Administration secures the border, Texas will continue to send migrants to sanctuary cities.”

Adams’s position was that dropping thousands of people in New York strained social services and the amount of available shelter space past the limit, costing more than $700 million. In a similar spirit to the busing lawsuit, the mayor has sought to enforce a 60-day limit on shelter space for asylum seekers in the city. In the past two years alone, a reported 205,000 migrants have arrived in the city, straining existing social services and prompting the Adams administration to set up more than 200 emergency shelter sites.

The New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU), which filed an amicus brief in the case, argued that people have a right to come to New York regardless of their immigration status or whether they are self-sufficient and that the injunction Mayor Adams sought was unconstitutional. “The court has rightly rejected the city’s cruel attempt to limit newly arrived immigrants from traveling to and making a home here in New York City. Everyone, whether or not they are a citizen and no matter their resources, has the right to travel and reside anywhere within the United States—including Texas and New York,” Beth Haroules, a senior staff attorney at the NYCLU, said in a statement. “New Yorkers deserve better than xenophobia and discrimination masquerading as policy,” she continued, adding that the NYCLU looks forward to the court’s full dismissal of the mayor’s case.

What inept looks like. It doesn’t matter what government, they’re all the same.

• Elon Musk Speculates Civil War ‘Inevitable’ as Violence Sweeps UK (Sp.)

Angry anti-migrant protests have swept across the UK, with the latest unrest set off by the horrific stabbing of three children in Southport by the 17-year-old son of Rwandan immigrants. Manchester, Liverpool, and Birmingham have witnessed violent demonstrations, with mosques attacked, police premises ransacked, and cars and buildings set ablaze. US billionaire Elon Musk has speculated that the UK is heading towards civil war. Musk weighed in on the wave of violence sweeping across the country amid uncontrolled migration and soaring crime, posting on X a succinct post that read, “Civil war is inevitable.” The Tesla CEO and owner of X made the comment under one of many videos showing scenes of unrest gripping towns and cities in Britain during the past days. The latest wave of interethnic violence was triggered by a recent tragedy in the town of Southport, where a 17-year-old teen of Rwandan origin stabbed three girls to death on July 29.

Police arrested dozens of people on Saturday, as projectiles and fireworks were set off, and storefronts set on fire. Footage posted on social media shows crowds chanting anti-immigrant slogans such as “stop the boats” in Liverpool, in a reference to the dinghies used by asylum seekers to cross the English Channel to the UK. Former Home Secretary Priti Patel denounced Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and his Labour Party for complacency amid the riots, writing on X that Parliament ought to be recalled from summer break. The UK’s newly minted Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who has inherited the migrant crisis from his predecessor, faces an uphill battle to tackle illegal migration. The number of people crossing the English Channel is currently estimated to be more than 10,000 this year alone. Previous measures resorted to by the UK government have failed to stanch the tide of illegals.

“..Starmer did not discuss any of the root causes of the unrest. Instead he pinned all blame for the violence on “far right hatred” and online “misinformation.”

• British Rioters Torch Migrant Hotel (RT)

Right-wing protesters in the English town of Rotherham have set fire to a hotel housing asylum seekers, as demonstrations against immigration and Islam continue across the country. Prime Minister Keir Starmer has vowed that the rioters will “face the full force of the law.” Hundreds of people gathered outside the Holiday Inn Express in Rotherham on Sunday afternoon, pelting police officers with wood and bottles and chanting “get them out,” referring to the 130 asylum seekers housed in the hotel since 2022. South Yorkshire police said at least ten officers were injured in clashes with the rioters, who broke windows and set dumpsters ablaze outside the building, before setting a fire inside the hotel’s ground floor. Multiple arrests were made, and the fire was extinguished shortly afterwards.

Dozens of British towns and cities have been rocked by right-wing protests and riots since Monday, when a British teenager of Rwandan descent stabbed three children to death and injured ten others in the town of Southport, near Liverpool. Although initially sparked by a false rumor that the knifeman responsible for the stabbings was Muslim, the demonstrations have since grown into a wider backlash against Islam, mass immigration, and the perception that political leaders are more concerned with suppressing right-wing dissent than tackling immigrant crime. More than 150 people were arrested after riots in Liverpool, Manchester, Stoke, Leeds and other cities on Saturday. Similar riots took place in locations including Middlesbrough, Blackburn, and Tamworth on Sunday. Mobs of Muslim protesters, some armed with knives and machetes, have been seen in some cities, including Bolton and Stoke.

In a speech on Sunday, Starmer warned that more arrests would follow. “Those who have participated in this violence will face the full force of the law,” he declared, warning that those responsible “will regret taking part in this disorder.” In Sunday’s address and in a similar speech earlier this week, Starmer did not discuss any of the root causes of the unrest. Instead he pinned all blame for the violence on “far right hatred” and online “misinformation.” Rotherham is infamous for its Muslim ‘grooming gang’, a group of predominantly British-Pakistani men who sexually abused around 1,400 young girls between the late 1980s and 2013. Three separate reports published in 2013, 2014, and 2015 found that local politicians and police covered up the gang’s crimes, partly out of fear that identifying and punishing the perpetrators would be seen as “racist.”

Tucker coast guy

Neil Oliver: "There was no pandemic."

"What we ended up with was a pandemic of testing, with the misapplication of PCR tests that were never designed, according to their designer, to be used as diagnostic tools."

"They simply took an opportunity to do something that they were… pic.twitter.com/q7762NG7Sv

— Wide Awake Media (@wideawake_media) August 4, 2024

Renz

“We Incentivized MURDERING Patients in Hospitals”

• “If you go to the hospital and you get a positive COVID test, then the hospital gets more money.”

• “If you get put on remdesivir, the hospital gets more money.”

• “If you get put on a vent, the hospital gets more money.” pic.twitter.com/buDwJ75qLM

— (Honest/Ethical/Safe Dr) David Cartland (@CartlandDavid) August 4, 2024

Dog toy
https://twitter.com/i/status/1820101192543768864

Cubs

So beautiful story.

pic.twitter.com/rjogSPyREt

— The Best (@ThebestFigen) August 4, 2024

Moose

5. The size of a moose pic.twitter.com/GacO97pqSa

— Creepy.org (@creepydotorg) August 4, 2024

Newquay
https://twitter.com/i/status/1820091457086071157

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Debt Rattle June 11 2024

Jun 112024

June 11, 2024 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 8:10 am Finance Tagged with: Apple, Azov Brigade, creepy spyware, Democrat lawfare, electric war, goldmine, Lindsey Graham, OpenAI 46 Responses »

Utagawa Hiroshige Sudden Evening Shower on the Great Bridge near Atake 1857

• Ukraine Is A ‘Gold Mine’ – Lindsey Graham (RT)

• Zelensky Not The One Running Ukraine – Times (RT)

• Russian General Staff Aims At Ending The Ukraine By Electric War (Helmer)

• Russia Ready To Strike NATO Airfields Hosting Ukrainian Jets – MP (RT)

• US Lifts Arms Ban On Notorious Azov Brigade (RT)

• The Three Key Messages From St. Petersburg to the Global Majority (Pepe Escobar)

• Can Democracy Survive the “Defenders of Democracy”? (Turley)

• Defense Rests In Hunter Biden Gun Case Without Defendant Testifying (JTN)

• Democrat Lawfare Has Failed To Derail Trump Campaign So Far (JTN)

• It’s Trump vs WWIII – Martin Armstrong (USAW)

• Elon Says Will Ban Apple’s Creepy Spyware Devices If They Integrate OpenAI (ZH)

• 1000s of Californians Lose Jobs Thanks To Newsom’s $20/hr Minimum Wage (RT)

• If Wishes Were Fishes – a Teachable Intermezzo (Kunstler)

Trump 51

JUST IN: Donald Trump suggests prosecution is coming for the 51 intelligence "experts" who lied about the Hunter Biden story.

The comment came while Trump blasted Biden for defaming him with the "suckers and losers" hoax.

Trump compared the hoax to the Russian collusion hoax,… pic.twitter.com/J4VlQy2K88

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) June 9, 2024

Trump jail

This Influencer Is Related To BlackRock CEO Larry Fink

He says Donald Trump will be put in jail ahead of the 2024 Election

“So you guys just need to accept the fact that Donald Trump is going to go to jail. The Democrats are in absolute desperation mode, and they have to do… pic.twitter.com/xIW9zGx4gS

— Wall Street Apes (@WallStreetApes) June 9, 2024

Trump tips

BREAKING: Trump's plan to eliminate taxes on tips for restaurant and hospitality workers will influence over 12 MILLION Americans, the majority of which are in larger cities

I predict a few more million voters are switching to Trump because of this one statement

GENIUS pic.twitter.com/YJlDwmZqFr

— George (@BehizyTweets) June 9, 2024

Michael Cohen

NEW: TikTok influencer Michael Cohen says people will be thrown out of windows and end up in gulags if Trump is elected president.

lol.

“It is all about him… and just like Putin, once you start to get too big for your own britches, people will start flying out of windows.”… pic.twitter.com/uhYov5z7iq

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) June 10, 2024

Bannon Epstein

In 2019, Steve Bannon taped more than 15 hours of interviews with Jeffrey Epstein.

Bannon was accused of giving Epstein media training for an upcoming 60 Minutes interview that never occurred. However, Bannon said he was not media-training the pedophile but instead making “a… pic.twitter.com/SJevvukSjg

— LIZ CROKIN (@LizCrokin) June 9, 2024

“..They could be the richest country in all of Europe… If we help Ukraine now, they can become the best business partner we ever dreamed of..”

• Ukraine Is A ‘Gold Mine’ – Lindsey Graham (RT)

Washington “cannot afford” to allow Russia to achieve victory in the Ukraine conflict as this would mean losing direct access to vast mineral assets, US Senator Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) has said. In an interview with ‘Face the Nation’ on CBS on Sunday, Graham accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of being a “megalomaniac” who is attempting to “re-create the Russian Empire by force of arms,” starting with Ukraine. He further claimed that if Moscow wins the current conflict, it will then take over Ukraine’s wealth and share it with China. Graham described that prospect as “ridiculous,” suggesting it would be better if this “gold mine” were available to the US instead. “They’re sitting on 10 to $12 trillion of critical minerals in Ukraine.

Lindsey Graham
https://twitter.com/i/status/1799887947363393859

They could be the richest country in all of Europe… If we help Ukraine now, they can become the best business partner we ever dreamed of, that $10 to $12 trillion of critical mineral assets could be used by Ukraine and the West, not given to Putin and China,” Graham stated. This is a very big deal how Ukraine ends. Let’s help them win a war we can’t afford to lose… They’re sitting on a gold mine. To give Putin $10 or $12 trillion for critical minerals that he will share with China is ridiculous. Graham, a longtime Russia hawk and one of the staunchest supporters of Ukraine in the US Senate, also called on the West to speed up the seizure of $300 billion in frozen Russian sovereign assets. He reiterated his demands for Russia to be designated “a state sponsor of terrorism” under US law, a suggestion which earlier this year landed the senator on Moscow’s list of extremists and terrorists.

One day prior to Graham’s remarks, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban argued that the West wants Kiev to win the conflict with Russia so that it can control Ukraine’s wealth. In an interview with Hir TV, Orban accused the US and its allies of seeing Ukraine as a potentially huge source of revenue which they will be able to control, provided Russia is defeated. He also said the conflict is a major boost for Western “arms suppliers, creditors, and speculators,” arguing that this is the reason it has dragged on for so long. Moscow has repeatedly stated throughout the conflict that its goals are to protect the largely Russian-speaking population of Donbass against persecution by Kiev, and to ensure Russia’s own security in light of NATO expansion toward its borders. Moscow has never spoken of any intention to take over Ukraine’s resources, but has repeatedly stressed that the former Ukrainian regions which have chosen to join Russia, including Crimea, must remain under its control.

“..Yermak is a former film producer whom Zelensky – an actor turned politician – brought into the government in 2019. He has recently begun moving into the spotlight..”

• Zelensky Not The One Running Ukraine – Times (RT)

Multiple Ukrainian officials have complained to The Times about the growing power of Vladimir Zelensky’s chief of staff Andrey Yermak, who they say de facto runs Ukraine. The 52-year-old has previously been described as “Zelensky’s right-hand man” and “Ukraine’s real power broker.” Officials in Kiev who spoke to the British outlet now say he has become something more. “Yermak’s authority has surpassed that of all of Ukraine’s elected officials bar the president,” The Times’ Maxim Tucker wrote in the article published on Friday. “Some sources went so far as to describe him as the ‘de facto head of state’ or ‘Ukraine’s vice-president’ in a series of interviews.” Tucker claimed to have spoken with “senior government, military, law enforcement and diplomatic sources,” many of whom requested anonymity. He described Yermak as Zelensky’s “greatest flaw,” and his behavior as “thirst for power.”

“Concern is mounting that Zelensky is increasingly reliant on a handful of sycophantic domestic voices,” Tucker noted, as the number of people with direct access to him shrinks while Yermak’s team expands. Zelensky’s “big mistake has been to entrust so much authority to Yermak, who is clearly intoxicated with power,” said Daria Kaleniuk, executive director of the Anti-Corruption Action Center. Military officials have also blamed Yermak for arranging the firing of General Valery Zaluzhny in February, because he saw him as a rival. A spokesman for the Zelensky’s office denied this, saying Zaluzhny was not fired but promoted to ambassador to the UK, “which signifies a high level of trust.” A spokesperson for the presidential office, which Yermak runs, dismissed all criticism of the chief of staff as “propaganda attacks.”

Yermak has a “direct but efficient management style,” they said, which has delivered successes such as the Swiss “peace summit” next week. Zelensky “is the one who makes all the key decisions,” the spokesperson insisted. Yermak is a former film producer whom Zelensky – an actor turned politician – brought into the government in 2019. He has recently begun moving into the spotlight, attending the ‘Democracy Summit’ in Denmark alongside former NATO secretary general Anders Fogh Rasmussen, himself a paid adviser to the Ukrainian government. It was Yermak and Rasmussen’s ‘International Working Group on Security Issues and Euro-Atlantic Integration of Ukraine’ that first proposed lifting all the restrictions on the use of Western weapons supplied to Kiev, which was quickly amplified by former British PM Boris Johnson. The talking point then spread to NATO capitals until the White House eventually agreed to it.

“DTEK has lost some 86 percent of its generating capacity..”

• Russian General Staff Aims At Ending The Ukraine By Electric War (Helmer)

As the Ukraine’s peak summer electricity season approaches, the list of the Russian General Staff’s Electric War targets is shrinking. This is because almost all the Ukrainian electricity generating plants have been stopped. What remains for destruction are the connecting lines and distribution grids for the Ukraine’s imported electricity from Poland and other European Union neighbours. The microwave and cell telephone towers, and the diesel fuel stocks which are powering the back-up generating sets are next. “There’s no keeping the Ukrainian cell network up any more than there is keeping up the electrical grid,” comments a close military observer. “The General Staff have set the flow of Ukrainian refugees west as inversely proportional to the flow of data and electrons over Ukrainian airwaves and transmission lines. We can expect that relationship to be set to highly inverse before the summer is out. What calculations have been made regarding things further west are just beginning to become evident.”

The Electric War is now accelerating faster to the Polish border than the Russian army advance along the line east of the Dnieper River. In the very long history of siege warfare, there has never been a case of letting the enemy’s civilian population run safely away from his castles and cities until the fortifications and army which remain must choose between surrender and destruction. The geographic spread, the explosive yield, and the cost of each of the raids are accelerating. On June 1, the Russian military bloggers, which continue to be the semi-official source of battlefield news each day, reported that energy facilities had been attacked in five regions of the Ukraine – in the east in Zaporozhye and Dniepropetrovsk; in the west in Kirovograd and Ivano-Frankovsk regions. Two thermal power plants were seriously damaged, following a salvo which the Ukrainians counted at 53 missiles and 47 drones.

The next day, June 2, the Russian sources, quoting Ukrainian electricity company bulletins to consumers, reported emergency blackouts and restricted power supply schedules were in effect in Kiev and its surrounding region. On June 5, the situation in Kiev was worse, according to DTEK, the dominant privately owned utility, and Ukrenergo, the state operator of the country’s high-voltage transmission lines. On June 6-7, The Washington Post – editorial motto, “Democracy Dies in Darkness” – reported Ukrainian utility managers and state officials as confirming that at least 86% of the country’s electricity generating capacity has now been destroyed. “We are catastrophically short of electricity for our needs,” the newspaper quoted Sergei Kovalenko, chief executive of the Ukrainian private electricity distributor YASNO, ….The power cuts have divided Kiev into the haves and the have-nots — with even residents at some privileged, high-end addresses suddenly finding themselves in the latter category.”

“DTEK has lost some 86 percent of its generating capacity, [DTEK chief executive Maxim] Timchenko said. What makes the situation worse is that many of the electrical facilities have been targeted repeatedly — a cycle of destruction, recovery, destruction, he said.” “Next week will be better,” Ukrenergo spokesperson Mariia Tsaturian said. “The week after that could be worse.” “The scheduled outages will continue — the only question is how severe they will be, Ukrenergo CEO Volodymyr Kudrytskyi said.” “We are talking about a huge loss of generation,” said Yury Kubrushko, founder of Imepower, a Ukrainian energy consultancy. “I can hardly see from where Ukraine can get new extra capacity just this winter.” On June 7, a video recorded stroll down one of Odessa’s shopping streets revealed an emergency generating set providing electricity for almost all of the commercial establishments.

“This is in no way sustainable,” comments a NATO military engineer. “Note how each shop has its own genset. The generators in the video are not designed for the duty cycle they’re being run at. They’ll wear out soon enough. The military, including deployed NATO personnel, use the shops and the gensets, too. The idea of pooling their resources, sharing load among gensets, thus reducing wear and tear on the whole network, while collectivizing fuel and maintenance costs, doesn’t seem to have occurred to them. To be sure, what follows will be no lack of electrocutions, carbon monoxide poisonings, and fires. We can bet the manifestations of the social pathology we’re seeing here have been factored in by the General Staff. Their attack point will now be to stop fuel, engine oil, spares, and replacements from getting through. ”

Independently of one another, Russian and Ukrainian reporters are confirming the impact of the power losses on the operation of water and sewerage systems in the majority of Ukrainian cities. According to Oleg Popenko, a Ukrainian expert on energy for communal services, “Armageddon has already arrived. We just don’t feel it yet. But the residents of Poltava, for example, feel it, because since May 5 of this year, 120,000 residents of the city receive water by the hour and use sewerage by the hour. You can imagine what happened in Zhitomir when the central sewerage collector didn’t work there for a week, but now in Poltava [it’s been] a month. And this is the problem with water utilities in 70% of Ukrainian cities. Water utilities are probably more important than rest of the infrastructure in the city. Heat and electricity can be replaced somehow, and you can go somewhere. But if the sewer system breaks down in a city, the city is no longer viable in principle.”

“..Moscow would perceive the deliveries of F-16 fighters to Ukraine as a nuclear threat..”

• Russia Ready To Strike NATO Airfields Hosting Ukrainian Jets – MP (RT)

F-16 fighter jets and any airfields they are based at will be legitimate targets for the Russian military if they participate in combat missions against Moscow’s forces, the chairman of the Russian State Duma Defense Committee, Andrey Kartapolov, has warned. The comments come as Kiev prepares to receive the first delivery of US-made fighter jets from its Western backers, after Ukrainian pilots were trained to fly them. In a statement to RIA Novosti published on Monday, Kartapolov clarified that if the F-16s “are not used for their intended purpose” or are simply held in storage at foreign airbases with the intent to transfer them to Ukraine, where they will be equipped, maintained, and flown from Ukrainian airfields, then Russia would have no claims against its “former partners” and would not target them.

However, if the jets take off from foreign bases and carry out sorties and strikes against Russian forces, both the fighter planes and the airfields they are stationed at will be “legitimate targets,” according to Kartapolov. “As for [our ability] to shoot [them] down, we can shoot down anyone, anywhere,” the MP insisted. Kartapolov’s statement comes after the chief of aviation of Ukraine’s Air Force Command, Sergey Golubtsov, stated in an interview with Radio Liberty on Sunday that some of the F-16 fighter jets donated to Kiev by the West would be stationed at foreign airbases. He explained that only a portion of the jets would be stationed directly on Ukrainian territory, corresponding to the number of pilots trained to operate the aircraft. The other jets would be kept in reserve at “safe airbases” abroad so that they are not targeted by the Russian military.

Golubtsov stated that so far four countries have agreed to transfer F-16s to Ukraine, namely Belgium, Denmark, Norway, and the Netherlands. While he did not specify exactly how many aircraft would be donated, he claimed it was between 30 and 40 planes, with potentially more to come in the future. Meanwhile, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has also warned that Moscow would perceive the deliveries of F-16 fighters to Ukraine as a nuclear threat, given that the jets have long been used as part of the US-led bloc’s joint nuclear missions. At the same time, the minister stressed that the US-designed jets would not change the situation on the battlefield, and would be shot down and destroyed like any other foreign weapons supplied to Ukraine.

Poking the bear.

• US Lifts Arms Ban On Notorious Azov Brigade (RT)

The State Department has allowed the delivery of US weapons to Ukraine’s Azov Brigade, whose members openly espouse ultranationalist and neo-Nazi views. The flow of arms had previously been restricted due to the unit’s ties to hateful ideology. “After thorough review, Ukraine’s 12th Special Forces Azov Brigade passed Leahy vetting as carried out by the US Department of State,” the agency said in a statement to the Washington Post on Monday, referring to the legislation that bans military aid to units that were implicated in human rights violations. The State Department added that it found “no evidence” of such violations committed by Azov. Azov was founded as a volunteer battalion in 2014 and participated in the war with the breakaway republics of Donbass after they chose to secede from Ukraine in the wake of the Western-backed coup in Kiev. The unit’s core fighters were active and former members of ultranationalist and neo-Nazi groups, as well as far-right football hooligans.

The unit’s primary co-founder Andrey Biletsky was a member of a white supremacist organization in the 2000s. He has since toned down his rhetoric and denied ties to neo-Nazism. Nevertheless, many Azov fighters continue to sport Nazi tattoos and memorabilia associated with the Third Reich. The brigade continues to use banners with the Wolfsangel symbol, which was used by several German divisions during World War II, including the 2nd SS Panzer Division Das Reich. The unit was incorporated into Ukraine’s National Guard in 2015 and has significantly grown in size over the years. In 2018, Congress banned the delivery of arms to the Azov Brigade, citing its ties to neo-Nazi ideology. Ro Khanna, a Democrat from California, said at the time that “white supremacy and neo-Nazism are unacceptable and have no place in our world.”

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), which combats anti-Semitism and monitors hate groups, described the unit in 2019 as a “Ukrainian extremist group” with ties to US-based neo-Nazi organization Atomwaffen and similar white supremacist movements in Europe. The ADL has since changed its view, however, writing in an email to The Grayzone news outlet in late 2022 that it no longer considered Azov as the “far-right group it once was.” Many Azov fighters surrendered to Russian troops during the siege of the city of Mariupol in 2022. Moscow has accused the members of the unit of war crimes, including torture and execution of civilians.

“The Unit, [..] an apolitical, transactional form of cross-border payments, anchored in gold (40%) and BRICS+ currencies (60%)..”

• The Three Key Messages From St. Petersburg to the Global Majority (Pepe Escobar)

In the year of the Russian presidency of BRICS, the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) had to deliver something special. And deliver it did: over 21,000 people representing no less than 139 nations – a true microcosm of the Global Majority, discussing every facet of the drive towards a multipolar, multinodal (italics mine), polycentric world. St. Petersburg, beyond all the networking and the frantic deal-making – $78 billion-worth clinched in only three days – crafted three intertwined key messages already resonating all across the Global Majority.

Message Number One: President Putin, a “European Russian” and true son of this dazzling, dynamic historic marvel by the Neva, delivered an extremely detailed one-hour speech on the Russian economy at the forum’s plenary session. The key takeaway: as the collective West launched total economic war against Russia, the civilization-state turned it around and positioned itself as the world’s 4th largest economy by purchasing power parity (PPP). Putin showed how Russia still carries the potential to launch no less than nine sweeping – global – structural changes, an all-out drive involving the federal, regional, and municipal spheres. Everything is in play – from global trade and the labor market to digital platforms, modern technologies, strengthening small and medium-sized businesses and exploring the still untapped, phenomenal potential of Russia’s regions.

What was made perfectly clear is how Russia managed to reposition itself beyond sidestepping the – illegitimate – sanctions tsunami to establishing a solid, diversified system oriented towards global trade – and completely linked to the expansion of BRICS. Russia-friendly states already account for three-quarters of Moscow’s trade turnover. Putin’s emphasis on the Global Majority’s accelerated drive to strengthen sovereignty was directly linked to the collective West doing its best – rather, worst – to undermine trust in their own payment infrastructure. And that leads us to… Glazyev and Dilma rock the boat.

Message Number Two: That was arguably the major breakthrough in St. Petersburg. Putin stated how the BRICS are working on their own payment infrastructure, independent from pressure/sanctions by the collective West. Putin had a special meeting with Dilma Rousseff, president of the BRICS New Development Bank (NDB). They did talk in detail about the bank’s development – and most of all, as later confirmed by Rousseff, about The Unit, whose lineaments were first revealed exclusively by Sputnik: an apolitical, transactional form of cross-border payments, anchored in gold (40%) and BRICS+ currencies (60%). The day after meeting Putin, president Dilma had an even more crucial meeting at 10 am in a private room at SPIEF with Sergey Glazyev, the Minister for Macro-Economy at the Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU) and member of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Glazyev, who had previously provided full academic backing to the Unit concept, explained all the details to President Dilma. They were both extremely pleased with the meeting. A beaming Rousseff revealed that she had already discussed The Unit with Putin. It was agreed there will be a special conference at the NDB in Shanghai on The Unit in September. This means the new payment system has every chance to be at the table during the BRICS summit in October in Kazan, and be adopted by the current BRICS 10 and the near future, expanded BRICS+.

Message Number Three: It had to be, of course, about BRICS – which everyone, Putin included, stressed will be significantly expanded. The quality of the BRICS-related sessions in St. Petersburg demonstrated how the Global Majority is now facing a unique historical juncture – with a real possibility for the first time in the last 250 years to go all-out for a structural change of the world-system. And it’s not only about BRICS. It was confirmed in St. Petersburg that no less than 59 nations – and counting – plan to join not only BRICS but also the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and the Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU). No wonder: these multilateral organizations now finally have established themselves on the forefront of the drive towards the multimodal (italics mine) – and to quote Putin in his address – “harmonic multipolar world”.

“..the line that sends many of us into a fetal position: “I’m a Democrat and I am here to save democracy.”

• Can Democracy Survive the “Defenders of Democracy”? (Turley)

In 2024, the greatest test for our Constitution may be whether it can survive the “Defenders of Democracy.” Ronald Reagan often said, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the government and I’m here to help.” Today, Reagan’s line cannot compare with the line that sends many of us into a fetal position: “I’m a Democrat and I am here to save democracy.” The jump scare claim is that unless citizens vote for democrats, the end of democracy will begin shortly. In 2022, House Majority Whip Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.) told “Fox News Sunday” that “democracy will be ending” if Democrats lost the midterms. The rhetoric has continued to ramp up with the upcoming election. From President Joe Biden to a host of progressive politicians and pundits, the 2024 election is all about saving democracy. The public has been told that if the Democrats lose power, citizens will be living in a tyrannical hellscape.

Vice President Kamala Harris stated in one interview that 2024 “genuinely could be” the last democratic election in America’s history. Dozens of Democrats have said that democracy will end if Biden is not reelected. The Washington Post even ran an op-ed titled, “A Trump dictatorship is increasingly inevitable. We should stop pretending.” Many Americans have tuned out the overheated rhetoric, as shown by Donald Trump’s continuing lead in many polls even after his conviction in Manhattan. The warnings also ignore that our system has checks and balances that protected democracy for centuries as the world’s oldest and most successful constitutional system. These dire predictions would require all three branches to fail in an unprecedented fashion. While these figures cite the Capitol riot on Jan 6., 2021 as evidence of the pending collapse of democracy, the system worked as designed on that day. Congress refused to be deterred by the riot and virtually every court (including many presided over by Trump-appointed judges) rejected challenges to the election.

The most obvious threats today to the democratic system are coming from the left, not the right. Democratic secretaries of state sought to block Trump from the ballot in 2024, and Democratic members sought to bar roughly 120 colleagues from their respective ballots. It seemed that the greatest threat to democracy was its exercise by voters. Fortunately, a unanimous Supreme Court rejected the theory and added, “Nothing in the Constitution requires that we endure such chaos.” There has also been a push by Democrats to keep third-party candidates off ballots. Again, the last thing democracy needs is for voters to have more democratic choice. In New York, Democratic congressional candidate Paula Collins even suggested that, after the election, the focus must be on “re-education” of MAGA voters, although she acknowledged that “that sounds like a rather, a re-education camp. I don’t think we really want to call it that. I’m sure we can find another way to phrase it.”

Democratic operatives are using the same rationalization to call for biased reporting to help Biden get reelected. Democratic strategist James Carville this week demanded more “slanted” media coverage against Donald Trump to save democracy. Carville was triggered by New York Times editor Joe Kahn suggesting that the newspaper report the news in a fair and neutral manner. The suggestion sent many pundits into vapors at the very thought of reembracing objectivity in journalism. “I don’t have anything against slanted coverage,” Carville insisted. “I really don’t, I would have something against it at most other times in American history, but not right now. F— your objectivity. The real objectivity in this country right now is we’re either going to have a Constitution or we’re not.”

There has also been a push by Democrats to keep third-party candidates off ballots. Again, the last thing democracy needs is for voters to have more democratic choice. In New York, Democratic congressional candidate Paula Collins even suggested that, after the election, the focus must be on “re-education” of MAGA voters, although she acknowledged that “that sounds like a rather, a re-education camp. I don’t think we really want to call it that. I’m sure we can find another way to phrase it.” Democratic operatives are using the same rationalization to call for biased reporting to help Biden get reelected. Democratic strategist James Carville this week demanded more “slanted” media coverage against Donald Trump to save democracy. Carville was triggered by New York Times editor Joe Kahn suggesting that the newspaper report the news in a fair and neutral manner. The suggestion sent many pundits into vapors at the very thought of reembracing objectivity in journalism.

“I don’t have anything against slanted coverage,” Carville insisted. “I really don’t, I would have something against it at most other times in American history, but not right now. F— your objectivity. The real objectivity in this country right now is we’re either going to have a Constitution or we’re not.” It was particularly galling to hear the call for “slanted coverage” in the same week that the Hunter Biden laptop was authenticated and used as evidence in his Delaware trial. The government has called the widely reported claim that the laptop was “Russian disinformation” a debunked “conspiracy theory.” Carville was making his pitch for more biased reporting to the very media that buried the laptop story before the last election and spent two years in denial of its authenticity. Yet, many journalists agree with Carville. Some journalism schools have been teaching that reporters need to dump concepts of objectivity and neutrality to achieve political and social reforms.

This week, reporters were irate after Washington Post publisher and CEO William Lewis issued a blunt message that the newspaper could not survive after losing half of its readership and tens of millions of dollars last year. He told the staff: “People are not reading your stuff. Right. I can’t sugarcoat it anymore.” The fear that these newspapers might cover Biden and Trump in a fair and balanced way was immediately denounced as . . . wait for it . . . a threat to democracy. After Carville’s meltdown, the Washington Post’s Margaret Sullivan warned Kahn and others that “our very democracy is on the brink, and how the Times covers that existential threat is of extraordinary importance.” She then asked whether the paper will “forthrightly identify the problems posed by a radicalized Republican Party that is increasingly dedicated to lies, bad-faith attacks and the destruction of democratic norms.” Sullivan expressed alarm that the media would “try to cut the situation straight down the middle as if we were still in the old days — an era that no longer exists?”

Let’s see them acquit him..

• Defense Rests In Hunter Biden Gun Case Without Defendant Testifying (JTN)

Hunter Biden’s defense rested their case in his Delaware gun trial Monday without calling the first son to testify. The gun trial is now in its sixth day, with closing arguments starting after lunch. The trial resumed after a week of witness testimony from ex-girlfriends, an ex-wife and other Biden family members. The unprecedented trial of of the child of a sitting American president is expected to enter its final stages with closing arguments beginning shortly. The prosecution rested its case last week and the defense spent the weekend contemplating whether or not to call Biden to the stand to testify in his own defense. “We are down to that last decision,” Lowell told the judge last week. Hunter Biden was charged in Delaware by Justice Department special counsel David Weiss with three felony crimes in connection to 2018 firearm purchase while he was using drugs.

The accusations include lying to the licensed gun dealer, making a false claim on the application used to screen firearm’s buyers by declaring he was not a drug user, and illegally possessing the firearm for 11 days. Several witnesses told the jury they witnessed Hunter Biden’s crack cocaine addiction first hand at the time when he purchased the firearm at a Wilmington gun shop. President Joe Biden said last week that he would not consider a pardon for his son and said he would accept the outcome of the trial. Hunter Biden is set to face other charges in California before the 2024 election on federal tax charges after he failed to pay $1.4 million in taxes over four years. His debt has since been settled, the Associated Press reported. That trial is set to begin in September after the judge recently granted a delay.

“..more campaign funds were given to this campaign than any campaign they think in history, almost $400 million..”

• Democrat Lawfare Has Failed To Derail Trump Campaign So Far (JTN)

Four indictments and one set of convictions later, a Democrat-led lawfare strategy has failed so far to derail Donald Trump’s bid to return to the White House, but it has triggered an avalanche of financial support as the former president hold leads in most battleground states that will decide the 2024 election. No where was Trump’s resilience more obvious than his travels across the West Coast this weekend, where he collected $12 million at a Silicon Valley fund-raiser at the home of a Big Tech executive who used to support Hillary Clinton, scored millions more at events in blue southern California and then jetted off to Las Vegas for a boisterous rally in Nevada where a post-conviction poll showed him leading that once-Biden-friendly state by five points. Experts say the narrative and imagery last month of a Democrat prosecutor in Manhattan securing a conviction against the opposition party leader just six months before Election Day galvanized support for Trump among the GOP base while motivating complacent independents and Never Trumpers to choose sides.

This created a painful boomerang for Democrats who hoped the May 31 conviction would sink the 45th president’s election efforts. “People are motivated,” former New York Rep. Lee Zeldin told Just the News. “They woke up the next day wanting to do something about it, realizing that they have to fight even harder […] They’ve turned their energy, their emotion into activity into wanting to make a difference. If someone goes out to the WinRed platform and donates $5, they might be willing to donate 25 more dollars. They may be willing to sign up to volunteer today, if you ask.” “There are people who were on the sidelines altogether on President Trump,” he added. “I know of one person just a few weeks before the verdict came out. I called him up I tried to talk him into supporting President Trump. He had supported another candidate. He wasn’t yet ready. Right after the verdict came out, he wired in $800,000 to President Trump’s joint fundraising committee. I just learned that his mother matched him for another $800,000. This these are two people were actually on the sidelines before the verdict.”

The data confirms Zeldin’s anecdotes. Trump campaign officials said the candidate raised more than $50 million in the first 36 hours after the verdict, much of it from first-time donors. Trump and the Republican National Committee reported their best fundraising month ever in May, with a $141 million haul. Officials said June could be on track for closer to $200 million, positioning Trump to be cash flush for a fall run after months of trailing Biden in the fundraising contest. The former president has embraced the surge, repeatedly portraying himself as a persecuted political martyr while warning the Democrat strategy is backfiring. “Right after the announcement of this, more campaign funds were given to this campaign than any campaign they think in history, almost $400 million,” Trump boasted at a Turning Point Action event last week.

“This is why they need war. This is why Europe is going into war. . . . If you cannot sell the new debt, you have to default. If you have war, and that is what is really behind this, if you go into war, they get to default and blame Putin..”

• It’s Trump vs WWIII – Martin Armstrong (USAW)

Legendary financial and geopolitical cycle analyst Martin Armstrong says we are going to have a wild close to 2024. Let’s start with Biden’s new job approval rating from Martin Armstrong’s “Socrates” program, which is now only 6% to 7%. Armstrong explains, “It’s the old story of draining the swamp, but now, the swamp is an ocean. This is completely crazy. The cases against Trump show you how desperate they are here. The reason they want Biden, and they even blocked RFK Jr. from getting on the Democrat ticket, the reason they want him is he is just a sock puppet. He’s not really in charge. He’s not making any decisions.”

Are the Deep State globalist Democrats panicking over the 6% to 7% Biden approval rating? Top people on both sides know this is an accurate number. With about four months to go before the 2024 Election, are they now panicking over these dismal approval numbers? Armstrong says, “Oh, yes, they are panicking. I have been in politics for more than 40 years. I know how it works. All of a sudden, you see in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, oh, Biden is slipping behind closed doors. That would not make the press unless they wanted it to. They are floating a ballon to see how it goes. All of a sudden, they want Biden to do a debate. Before, no debates. Why? Because they know he’s going to look bad. . . . At the Democrat Convention, they will draft someone else, and that is most likely going to be Hillary.”

The economy and war are linked in a big way, according to Armstrong, and he explains, “You’ve got about $10 trillion of US debt that is maturing this year. . . . You’ve got Secretary of State Blinken threatening China with war. China dumped $53 billion in US debt in the first quarter of 2024. That means China are sellers and not buyers. You had Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen flying to China asking, ‘Please don’t sell.’ It didn’t work. This is why they are talking about raising the capital gains to 44%. Why? If nobody is going to buy the debt, that’s when default comes. If you cannot sell the new debt to pay off the old debt, guess what? It’s done. This is how governments fall, and I have been warning them for decades that this is how it’s going to end. . . . This is why they need war. This is why Europe is going into war. . . . If you cannot sell the new debt, you have to default. If you have war, and that is what is really behind this, if you go into war, they get to default and blame Putin. . . . In November, it’s going to be Trump vs World War III regardless who is on the other side. If you get Hillary or you get Biden, it’s the same thing. Hillary is a neocon, and Biden says yes to whatever the neocons want.” And the neocons clearly want war–a big one.

“Apple has no clue what’s actually going on once they hand your data over to OpenAI. They’re selling you down the river.”

• Elon Says Will Ban Apple’s Creepy Spyware Devices If They Integrate OpenAI (ZH)

In the end, Apple’s 2024 Worldwide Developers Conference proved to be a flop, with the stock sliding 1.9%, its worst WWDC performance since 2010 and the 4th worst in the iPhone era. It wasn’t supposed to be like this: Apple was supposed to make the grand introduction of (Open AI’s ChatGPT) artificial intelligence features and pretend they are the company’s, leading to the long-overdue surge in AAPL stock which has painfully underperformed most pure AI names. However, once the market realized that Apple [can’t] even in house its own AI module, that’s when the wheels fell off (the “introduction” of a calculator for the iPad did not help Apple’s trailblazing image). But the slump in AAPL stock was just the start of its woes.

Shortly after the close, in response to OpenAI founder Andrej Karpathy’s observation that the laughably named “Apple Intelligence” as it will be called (and which Elon Musk said it is “neither Apple nor intelligent”) will be a persistent layer on top of the entire Apple operating system, Elon Musk made the casual observation that Apple’s approach means that “we can never turn it off”, in other words it is an always on spying system feeding the OpenAI LLM (and who knows what and who else) with constant data.

That’s when the fireworks started. Realizing that his sworn enemy Sam Altman (whose “non-profit” ChatGPT only exists thanks to funding from Musk in the first place) is using his chatbot to supplant Amazon as the most ubiquitous spyware system in the world by having it installed across the entire Apple ecosystem, Musk first responded to an X user that he might have to launch his own phone “if Apple actually integrates woke nanny AI spyware into their OS”… … before directly telling Tim Cook that “he doesn’t want” the latest Apple product, and adding that “either stop this creepy spyware or all Apple devices will be banned from the premises of my companies.”

And just to underscore that point, the Tesla CEO said that “If Apple integrates OpenAI at the OS level, then Apple devices will be banned at my companies. That is an unacceptable security violation” and “visitors will have to check their Apple devices at the door, where they will be stored in a Faraday cage.” Musk saved the piece de resistance for last, slamming Apple as a dumb company which can’t even come up with its own AI, and even dumber for promising it is “somehow capable of ensuring that OpenAI will protect your privacy” even as it is “handing your data over to a third-party AI that they don’t understand and can’t themselves create is *not* protecting privacy at all!”

The punchline: “Apple has no clue what’s actually going on once they hand your data over to OpenAI. They’re selling you down the river.” While we assume that much of Elon’s outrage is genuine (mixed in with just a smidge of personal self-interest to have Grok handle the world’s AI requests), this particular eruption by the world’s richest man (or 2nd, or 3rd, or wherever he is now) is a good example of the coming AI wars where competing AI vendors will do everything in their power to have their LLM be the sofrware of choice for the entire world due to its ubiquitous data gather and analysis which will make China’s “always on” spying nanny state seem like amateur hour by comparison.

“You can only raise prices so much..” [..] “..people are not going to pay $20 for a Big Mac. It’s not going to happen.”

• 1000s of Californians Lose Jobs Thanks To Newsom’s $20/hr Minimum Wage (RT)

Californian fast-food restaurants have had to slash some 10,000 jobs in recent months due to the state’s new minimum wage hike, according to a recent report by the California Business and Industrial Alliance (CABIA) trade group. The report comes after California’s Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom signed a bill dubbed AB 1228 in September of last year, raising the state’s minimum wage from $16 to $20 an hour. The law came into effect in April and many companies have since been forced to close down, raise prices, or lay off employees. CABIA president Tom Manzo has told Fox News that Californian businesses had already been “under total attack and total assault for years,” and claimed that the state’s lawmakers were living in a “fantasy land” if they thought that drastically raising wages would help workers and businesses.

“You can only raise prices so much,” Manzo said, insisting that “people are not going to pay $20 for a Big Mac. It’s not going to happen.” He also stated that jobs in the fast-food industry were never meant to be long-term or high-paying, calling it a “starter industry” in which people start out working as kids to gain a good work ethic for the rest of their careers. Last week, CABIA ran a full-page ad in the California edition of USA Today, featuring mock “obituaries” of restaurants that have been harmed by the new minimum wage law. These include popular chains such as Pizza Hut, Subway, Burger King, McDonald’s and Cinnabon. According to the trade group, one taco chain, Rubio’s, has had to close as many as 48 outlets in the state due to the “rising cost of doing business,” including 24 stores in the Los Angeles area, 13 in San Diego, and 11 in Northern California.

Meanwhile, the owner of 140 Burger King franchises in the state has announced he will slash workers’ hours and expedite the rollout of self-service kiosks to offset the impact of the new minimum wage law. Similar measures will be taken by a McDonald’s franchisee, who said he will hike menu prices and delay renovations at his 18 restaurants. As restaurants across the US have also been forced to gradually raise their prices due to rampant inflation, a survey conducted by LendingTree last month has also found that nearly 80% of consumers now consider fast food to be a “luxury” purchase due to how expensive it has become.

Bad management as a feature not a flaw.

• If Wishes Were Fishes – a Teachable Intermezzo (Kunstler)

Forgive me for reiterating a basic principle driving this moment in history: everything organized at the gigantic scale is steaming toward failure: big governments, giant companies, the huge capital investment firms, global shipping, energy production, chain retailing, mass motoring, big electricity, big medicine, big education, big anything. They are all fixing to fail while our politicians and economists make plans based on consolidating them into one super-gigantic mega-system that will run flawlessly on computer tech magic. The failures of each giant system will only amplify and ramify the failures in all the other systems. Take that as axiomatic. For instance, the fantastic failures in higher education now on display, largely due to the Marxian defeat of excellence, will implant a generation of incompetents in all hierarchies of management.

That will result in an insidious matrix of bad decision-making. The Pareto 80-20 principle will ensure that 80-percent of all institutional energy will focus on propping up failing institutions with bad decisions that add up to broken business models (while 20-percent goes into actually carrying-out the bad decisions as policy). That explains how Pete Buttigieg’s Department of Transportation spent $7.5-billion to build seven electric car charging stations. Similarly, if you have an urgent medical problem, the 80-percent of administrative clerks in your primary care doctor’s overgrown practice (with an assist from the health insurance company cohorts they must coordinate with) will actually manage to delay your treatment as long as possible, with a fair chance of disallowing it altogether. And if you happen to get treatment, there’s also an excellent chance you will be misdiagnosed and subjected to iatrogenic injury.

The 80-20 principle explains the stupendous mismanagement of the Covid-19 event, especially the “marketing” of mRNA vaccines as miracle remedies that turned out to be the opposite of beneficial. The result of that chain of bad decision-making will ensure that any widespread health crisis arising from the long-term effects of the Pfizer and Moderna Covid vaccines will destroy the hospital system. (It is already underway.) You can extrapolate that grandiose failure of competence to the World Health Organization and its efforts to orchestrate a new pandemic crisis. You might have noticed that it is increasingly difficult to get replacement parts for any machine, most particularly cars. That’s a symptom of failure in several integrated systems that are breaking down now: the manufacture of products in distant lands, price disorder in the container-ship business, the collapse of the US trucking system (and with it, the just-in-time inventory model), and the inability of auto dealers to find competent mechanics (while the sinking middle class can no longer afford to buy the cars they sell under the most liberal financing schemes). Expect all that to intensify.

You’ll see similar dysfunction in the system that delivers food to the people of our country. Even as currently operating, with the supermarkets amply stocked, the triumph of poor decision-making has led to 80-percent of the products sold being some form of processed corn syrup and GMO grains marketed as “fun” snack-foods that have destroyed the health of a great many citizens (and overwhelmed the medical system with chronic illness). The breakdown of the US food system is now proceeding with idiotic policy from our government (actually every government in Western Civ is doing it) undermining farm operations, and most especially small farms, with egregious regulation. The pretext for this is the delusional hysteria over “climate change.” It gives the managers something to manage badly.

Elon autonomy

Elon Musk explains in 2019 why Tesla went all in on autonomy as soon as 2014: "If we did not participate in the autonomy revolution, then our cars would not be useful to people relative to cars that are autonomous." pic.twitter.com/grDIlau4Lp

— ELON DOCS (@elon_docs) June 9, 2024

Optimus

Optimus is expected to be priced between $20,000 and $30,000.

一 Elon Musk

pic.twitter.com/JsTdvmNlJh

— DogeDesigner (@cb_doge) June 9, 2024

Redfield
https://twitter.com/i/status/1799930774793130076

Boop

Predators exist

Hooman: boop pic.twitter.com/ljKMMnrnBF

— Nature is Amazing ☘️ (@AMAZlNGNATURE) June 10, 2024

Ripe banana

Your ripe banana is honking. Please keep petting him. pic.twitter.com/DoNO6UH2xz

— Nature is Amazing ☘️ (@AMAZlNGNATURE) June 8, 2024

Kids
https://twitter.com/i/status/1799912861885780311

6 minutes

A wonderful 6 minute movie …pic.twitter.com/Mt9E8bhcgY

— Figen (@TheFigen_) June 9, 2024

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Debt Rattle December 1 2022

Dec 012022

December 1, 2022 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 9:25 am Finance Tagged with: Apple, Assange, BRICS, China, Cryptome, Elon Musk, Eric Idle, free speech, Twitter, Ursula, Yellen, Zelensky 75 Responses »

Pablo Picasso Coffee maker 1943

• More Than 100,000 Ukrainian Soldiers Have Died In Conflict – EU (RT)

• Von der Leyen’s Comment On Ukrainian Military Losses Retracted (RT)

• Kiev Reacts To Redacted EU Assessment Of Its Casualties (RT)

• The Global South Births A New Game-Changing Payment System (Escobar)

• China Wants More Russian Gas (RT)

• Russian Coal Exports Shift To China (RT)

• Poland To Charge Ukrainian Refugees For Government-Provided Housing (Az.)

• Congress Wants $45B Tacked on to Biden’s Military Budget Request (Celente)

• Washington Goes to War Against Twitter and Free Speech (Turley)

• Yellen Hints At ‘National Security’ Probe Into Twitter Purchase (RT)

• EU Threatens Musk With Twitter Ban (RT)

• Musk Says Twitter Clash With Apple A ‘Misunderstanding’ (AFP)

• Ex-Twitter Safety Chief: Hunter Biden Laptop Censorship Was A ‘Mistake’ (Fox)

• Eric Idle Insists He Wants To Be ‘Cancelled’ (DM)

• Cryptome Founder Asks to Be Indicted With Assange (Lauria)

Brilliant T-shirt sold in Japan.

Reed Hastings

“@elonmusk is the bravest, most creative person on the planet”, says Netflix’s Reed Hastings
pic.twitter.com/5zBlvu9gGV

— Tesla Owners Silicon Valley (@teslaownersSV) November 30, 2022

Tucker DealBook

NYT lesson: Good liberals can always be forgiven pic.twitter.com/EkPObMiCiq

— Wittgenstein (@backtolife_2023) December 1, 2022

Clare Daly

After 11th anniversary of #Gaddafi's death during #NATO's assault on #Libya – all in the name of freedom, democracy & human rights – we'd do well to remember what happened next: terror, death, lawlessness, rape, poverty, starvation. Libya riven by conflict. That's NATO's legacy. pic.twitter.com/7CUgdSvcmJ

— Clare Daly (@ClareDalyMEP) November 30, 2022

Ursula didn’t get the memo. In 3 parts. First, she posts the number -with video. Then Zelensky protests. Then the video is removed and re-done. Finally, Ukraine reacts: if you post these numbers, we can’t manipulate them anymore.

• More Than 100,000 Ukrainian Soldiers Have Died In Conflict – EU (RT)

European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen has presented the total number of losses estimated to have been suffered by Ukraine in its conflict with Russia. “More than 100,000 Ukrainian military officers have been killed so far,” von der Leyen claimed on Wednesday, while adding that around 20,000 civilian lives have also been lost amid the fighting, which has continued since late February. The head of the European Commission didn’t reveal the sources of the information she provided. In late September, Russia’s Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu stated that Ukrainian losses had to date amounted to more than 61,000 troops, which was ten times higher than those of Russia.

In her address, von der Leyen also proposed to set up a specialized, UN-backed court to investigate and prosecute what she described as “Russia’s crime of aggression.”She also said that a special structure would be created by the EU to manage and invest 300 billion euro (nearly $311 billion) in Russian Central Bank reserves and 19 billion euro of Russian business figures’ assets, which the EU froze after the outbreak of the conflict. The plan is to use the proceeds from those activities to rebuild and assist Ukraine, according to the commission president.

Here is the original clip. pic.twitter.com/nD0xChqc8O

— The Sirius Report (@thesiriusreport) November 30, 2022

Some people are convinced it was retracted after US protest. But Ukraine protest would have been enough.

• Von der Leyen’s Comment On Ukrainian Military Losses Retracted (RT)

A claim about the number of Ukrainian soldiers killed during its conflict with Russia has been removed from a speech by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on the executive’s official website. “More than 100,000 Ukrainian military officers have been killed so far,” she said during an address earlier on Wednesday, adding that around 20,000 civilians had also died in nine months of fighting. The source of this information was not provided. However, the reference to Kiev’s death toll soon disappeared from the text of the speech on the European Commission’s website. It was also cut from a video of the address on the website and on von der Leyen’s account on Twitter.

The editing was noticed by some media outlets and social media users, who compared the two versions of the statement online. The move was then officially confirmed by the European Commission. The EU executive body’s spokeswoman Dana Spinant took to Twitter to thank those who had “pointed out the inaccuracy” in von der Leyen’s speech. “The estimation used, from external sources, should have referred to casualties, i.e. both killed and injured, and was meant to show Russia’s brutality,” she wrote. In late September, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu stated that Ukrainian losses had by then amounted to more than 61,000 troops, which was ten times greater than Russia’s.

Judge Nap Macgregor

Oh yeah, she also talked about the stolen Russian assets.

• Kiev Reacts To Redacted EU Assessment Of Its Casualties (RT)

A claim that Ukraine has lost more than 100,000 personnel in the conflict with Russia has been deleted from the Twitter account of European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. Kiev had objected to the figure, saying it was up to President Vladimir Zelensky and top Ukrainian officials to voice such numbers. Zelensky’s spokesman, Sergey Nikoforov, told Ukrainian media on Wednesday that such “sensitive” information should only be made public by the country’s top military commander General Valery Zaluzhny, Defense Minister Aleksey Reznikov, or the president himself. Earlier in the day, the head of the EU executive branch cited an assessment that more than 100,000 Ukrainian troops and over 20,000 civilians have been killed in the conflict with Russia.

The video statement has since been pulled from her Twitter account and replaced with a new version, which omitted the figures. Von der Leyen did not identify the source of the assessment. Earlier in the month, US General Mark Milley, who serves as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that over 100,000 soldiers may have been killed and wounded on each side of the conflict, with 40,000 civilians killed as collateral damage. Milley, speaking at the Economic Club of New York, said that the winter season would cause hostilities to go “static” and open “a window of opportunity” for negotiations. The call for diplomacy reportedly outraged officials in Kiev, who pledged to continue fighting against Russia until it fully regains pre-2014 positions. In her Wednesday address, von der Leyen urged the UN to convene a special tribunal to try Russia for its alleged crimes against Ukraine.

The Commission chief also shared the EU’s plans to invest seized Russian national reserves and “oligarch” money for profit that would later be used to rebuild Ukraine. She estimated Ukraine’s damage at €600 billion ($621bn) so far, which dwarfs the €319 billion ($330bn) of Russian funds blocked by the EU. The assets would only be unfrozen after anti-Russia sanctions are lifted, to be paid in compensation to Ukraine, the official stated. Top Russian officials, including President Vladimir Putin, have criticized the freezing of assets by the US and its allies, including the EU. At first, they devalued national reserves denominated in dollars and euros through inflation, and later “pawed and pocketed” them, Putin remarked in October.

In the background, these preparations continue.

• The Global South Births A New Game-Changing Payment System (Escobar)

The Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU) is speeding up its design of a common payment system, which has been closely discussed for nearly a year with the Chinese under the stewardship of Sergei Glazyev, the EAEU’s minister in charge of Integration and Macro-economy. Through its regulatory body, the Eurasian Economic Commission (EEC), the EAEU has just extended a very serious proposal to the BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) which, crucially, are already on the way to turning into BRICS+: a sort of G20 of the Global South. The system will include a single payment card – in direct competition with Visa and Mastercard – merging the already existing Russian MIR, China’s UnionPay, India’s RuPay, Brazil’s Elo, and others.

That will represent a direct challenge to the western-designed (and enforced) monetary system, head on. And it comes on the heels of BRICS members already transacting their bilateral trade in local currencies, and bypassing the US dollar. This EAEU-BRICS union was long in the making – and will now also move toward prefiguring a further geoeconomic merger with the member nations of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). The EAEU was established in 2015 as a customs union of Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus, joined a year later by Armenia and Kyrgyzstan. Vietnam is already an EAEU free trade partner, and recently enshrined SCO member Iran is also clinching a deal. The EAEU is designed to implement free movement of goods, services, capital, and workers between member countries.

Ukraine would have been an EAEU member if not for the Maidan coup in 2014 masterminded by the Barack Obama administration. Vladimir Kovalyov, adviser to the chairman of the EEC, summed it all up to Russian newspaper Izvestia. The focus is to establish a joint financial market, and the priority is to develop a common “exchange space:” “We’ve made substantial progress and now the work is focused on such sectors as banking, insurance, and the stock market.” A new regulatory body for the proposed joint EEU-BRICS financial system will soon be established. Meanwhile, trade and economic cooperation between the EAEU and BRICS have increased 1.5 times in the first half of 2022 alone.

Not using Russian oil and gas does nothing for climate. You don’t want it, others will use them. And you will be cold.

• China Wants More Russian Gas (RT)

Russian gas export to China via the so-called eastern route, the Power of Siberia pipeline, should be steadily increased, according to Huang Yongzhang, Vice President of China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC). The 3,000 kilometer (1,864 mile) cross-border pipeline started deliveries of Russian natural gas to China in 2019. Its capacity is 61 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas per year, including 38 bcm for export. Last year, Russian gas supplies to China increased by 10.4 bcm via the mega pipeline. “It is necessary to steadily increase gas supplies from Russia to China via the eastern route. The parties continue cooperation in this area, using all its advantages, strengthening and deepening business cooperation,” Yongzhang said on Tuesday at the Russia-China Energy Business Forum.

He also called for the strengthening of the scientific and technical cooperation between the two nations in order to improve the quality of joint work in the oil and gas sector, as well as in the field of green and low-carbon energy. The agreement on gas supplies via the Power of Siberia pipeline was reached in 2014, with Gazprom and CNPC signing a 30-year contract. The $400 billion agreement is Gazprom’s biggest deal ever and the Power of Siberia is the first natural gas pipeline between Russia and China. The Russian energy company is currently working on the Power of Siberia 2 project, which involves construction of a gas pipeline to China through the territory of Mongolia. The pipeline will be capable of delivering as much as 50 billion cubic meters of gas, once operational.

You can hear the Chinese laughing in the background.

• Russian Coal Exports Shift To China (RT)

Russia has this year become the second most important supplier of coal to China, the head of oil giant Rosneft Igor Sechin announced at the Russia-China Energy Business Forum on Tuesday.“Deliveries of high-quality Russian coal to China in [those] ten months of 2022 amounted to 53 million tons. This is about 23% of total imports to China, second place after Indonesia, which supplies 134 million tons,” Sechin said. According to the CEO, in order to further increase coal supplies to Asia, Russia is investing in the development of the Eastern Range of the country’s train-services supplier Russian Railways (OAO). The project is expected to increase transportation capacity to 195 million tons per year.

Russia has dramatically increased exports of energy commodities, including coal, to Asian buyers after the EU suspended coal purchases from the country earlier this year as a Ukraine-related sanction. Chinese purchases of the Russian fossil fuel, in particular, reached a five-year high in September, soaring to 8.54 million tons. It was a 57% year-on-year rise, according to data from China’s General Administration of Customs. Beijing has also been stocking up on Russian oil. Total Russian crude exports to China in the period January to October jumped by 9.5% to nearly 72 million tons, slightly less than what Saudi Arabia, China’s largest supplier, exports to the Asian nation, Sechin said.

The head of Russia’s biggest oil company stressed that both Moscow and Beijing are looking forward to further developing trade relations, particularly in the field of energy. Sechin also noted that the overall trade turnover between Russia and China jumped 33% this year, reaching $153.9 billion in the first ten months. “If these rates are maintained, by the end of this year the trade turnover may reach a record high of $180 billion. We can expect that the goal of reaching $200 billion in trade turnover will be achieved even before the set target date, 2024,” he said.

“More than a million Ukrainian refugees made a temporary home in Poland..”

• Poland To Charge Ukrainian Refugees For Government-Provided Housing (Az.)

Poland plans to charge Ukrainian refugees for food and housing after four months of staying in state accommodation, the government said, Report informs referring to Reuters. More than a million Ukrainian refugees made a temporary home in Poland, Ukraine’s western neighbor, after Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, relying on the kindness of strangers who opened up their homes and government aid. But after an initial outpouring of public support for refugees, resources are drying up and refugees are having a harder time finding flats and getting support with Poland facing a cost of living crisis and budget strains.

“Citizens of Ukraine who stay in Poland in collective accommodation centers will participate in the costs of housing and meals,” the government said in a statement. Those staying in such accommodation, for example government-funded hotel rooms or school dormitories, longer than 120 days will have to cover 50% of the cost up to 40 zlotys ($8.87) per day, per person. After 180 days it would be 75% of the cost up to 60 zlotys. Those unable to work because of their age or disability would be excluded, as would pregnant women, according to the plan. The government wants the new rules to apply from March 1, 2023. The bill will go to parliament where it is expected to pass comfortably.

“..the deal would set the budget at $847 billion for national defense..”

• Congress Wants $45B Tacked on to Biden’s Military Budget Request (Celente)

We have long noted that the one issue that can bring together the most hardened liberal Democrats, and the most conservative Republicans is the vote for war. After all, what other issue would you find Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Mitch McConnell agreeing on? It was reported Wednesday that members of the House and Senate Armed Service committees agreed to add $45 billion more to President Joe Biden’s already gargantuan 2023 National Defense Authorization Act, according to a newly released report on Wednesday. Politico, citing four people familiar with the negotiations, reported that the deal would set the budget at $847 billion for national defense, with the possibility of reaching as high as $858 billion.

We reported in July that the House voted in favor of an $850.3 billion national security budget that members say will help the U.S. respond to continued threats and surging inflation. The House passed the bill in a 329-101 vote. The “no” votes included 62 Republicans and 39 Democrats.“With inflation factored in, it is a good increase but it’s essential because of inflation and also the need to continue significant programs,” Sen. Jack Reed, the chair of the Senate Armed Services, said in an interview, according to Politico.As the global economies sink into recession, as world hunger escalates, as inflation spikes and people pay much more to buy a lot less, as world poverty levels increase and the middle class shrinks…countries around the world have increased their military budgets and built up their defenses since the Ukraine War began in February.

But the War Machine Always Wins. And Bill La Plante, the undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment, said months ago that he expected Congress—no matter what party was in control—would approve new weapons purchasing power at levels not seen since the Cold War. “They are going to give us multiyear authority, and they’re going to give us funding to really put into the industrial base,” he told George Mason University at the time. “And I’m talking billions of dollars into the industrial base—to fund these production lines. That, I predict, is going to happen, and it’s happening now. And then people will have to say: ‘I guess they were serious about it.’ But we have not done that since the Cold War.”

“Despite a creepy Facebook advertising campaign to convince the public to embrace censorship, it has not worked. The public is not buying. They are buying Free Twitter…”

• Washington Goes to War Against Twitter and Free Speech (Turley)

Washington this week is in full wartime footing. No, it’s not over the Russian invasion of Ukraine or North Korean missiles or even Chinese expansionism. It is about Twitter and the threat of Elon Musk to restore free speech protections to social media. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has emerged as the bellicose general rallying others to the “censor or die” pressure campaign against Twitter. The problem is that citizens are flocking to Twitter and signing up in record numbers. They want more, not less, free speech. The over two million new sign-ups per day represent a 66% increase over the same period last year, according to figures released by Musk.

A reporter this week was so alarmed that she asked the White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre about the concern that millions are still signing up at Twitter and demanded to know who is “keeping an eye on this” for possible federal action. Unable to convince users to embrace censorship, Clinton and others are pressuring corporations and foreign governments to deter Musk from restoring free speech. Since users are embracing the new Twitter, the campaign has focused on preventing them from signing up by removing the app from the Apple and Google stores. In the meantime, Apple is joining the boycott by withholding advertising revenue to coerce Musk to reverse his free-speech pledge.

Musk, however, is sitting on the ultimate weapon to bring this war to an end: free speech itself. However, it will require more than rhetorical recriminations like Musk asking why Apple executives “hate free speech in America?” The fact is that these media and political figures are becoming more and more alarmed as Musk threatens to release files on the past censorship of stories like the Hunter Biden laptop. Musk has reason to wonder why Apple CEO Tim Cook would join this anti-free speech campaign. The reason is as obvious as it is craven. These boycotts are not about corporations or shareholders. If anything, they are more likely to diminish profits. It is about the executives themselves. Many are allies of figures like Clinton. Others are yielding to these demands to avoid being attacked or tagged by the left.

[..] If Musk carries through on his pledge, the public will have a free speech alternative and they are already speaking loudly by signing up with the company in record numbers. Despite a creepy Facebook advertising campaign to convince the public to embrace censorship, it has not worked. The public is not buying. They are buying Free Twitter. So, the only way to regain control is to prevent people from getting the app or threaten to force Twitter into insolvency. The problem is Musk, an eccentric billionaire who is not easy to intimidate. Musk now stands against a massive alliance of governments, corporations, celebrities, and politicians. He has only the public and free speech on his side. He needs to use both.

DeSantis

Heavy D with a message for Tim Cook. pic.twitter.com/9D61CHfQ7R

— Cernovich (@Cernovich) November 29, 2022

Yellen is so out of her depth here, I suspect that’s why they let her do the talking.

• Yellen Hints At ‘National Security’ Probe Into Twitter Purchase (RT)

US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has said federal officials could seek to launch a review into billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk’s recent purchase of Twitter if it were deemed to carry national security risks, backtracking after she downplayed any chance for a probe. Speaking at an event hosted by the New York Times on Wednesday, Yellen claimed she had “misspoke” when she said there was “no basis” to investigate Musk or his finances during an interview earlier this month, now saying the government could take that step after all. “I’m not going to say specifically what we are looking at. We don’t comment on what’s in progress,” she said, but added the Treasury “does look at transactions that involve foreign investments in the United States to see if they create national security risk.”

While she stopped short of confirming that a probe was underway, Yellen said “if there are such risks it would be appropriate for the Treasury to have a look.” The secretary’s comments follow earlier reports that the Treasury had already requested approval to begin reviewing Musk’s Twitter deal, though sources told the Washington Post at the time that such actions are “fairly routine” and do not always result in a full-fledged investigation. Earlier this month, President Joe Biden also stated that Musk’s “relationships with other countries is worthy of being looked at,” following reports that foreign investors such as Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal now hold significant stakes in Twitter. However, Biden stressed that he was not claiming the billionaire had done anything “inappropriate,” and did not indicate that he was under investigation.

Musk has faced pressure from abroad as well, with the European Commission recently threatening to ban Twitter outright should the platform run afoul of the EU’s digital regulations. According to a Wednesday report in the Financial Times, the bloc has presented Musk with a “checklist of rules” and demanded he submit to an “extensive independent audit” sometime next year, insisting Twitter must continue to “aggressively” police disinformation and hate speech. The billionaire has repeatedly vowed to make Twitter a bastion of free expression, even suggesting an “amnesty” for previously banned accounts so long as they did not violate the law or post spam. However, critics have argued the more hands-off approach will foster hatred, extremism and misinformation online, with some even urging major platforms like Apple and Google to remove Twitter from their app stores.

“Musk replied that the DSA [EU’s Digital Services Act] was “very sensible” and should be applied worldwide.”

• EU Threatens Musk With Twitter Ban (RT)

As Elon Musk pledged to run a more fair and transparent Twitter that won’t interfere in elections, the EU’s internal market commissioner, Thierry Breton, on Wednesday demanded tougher censorship, reportedly warning that the platform might be banned if it doesn’t comply with the bloc’s laws. “Twitter has failed in trust & safety for a very long time and has interfered in elections,” Musk tweeted on Wednesday, responding to claims by former executive Yoel Roth published by Reuters that his takeover had made the company less safe. “Twitter 2.0 will be far more effective, transparent and even-handed.” Within the hour, Breton tweeted that he welcomed Musk’s “intent to get Twitter 2.0 ready” for the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA), a law scheduled to come into force in 2024.

He added that the platform would have to “significantly reinforce content moderation and tackle disinformation,” among other things. Breton attached a short video from a call he held with Musk, though without any sound. According to the Financial Times, however, the EU commissioner actually threatened Musk with a ban unless Twitter complies with a list of demands. This includes not having an “arbitrary” approach to reinstating banned users, “aggressively” pursuing “disinformation” and agreeing to an “extensive independent audit” by next year. Failing to do so would infringe on the DSA, which could expose Twitter to massive fines or even a ban in the EU, Breton reportedly said. According to FT’s sources, Musk replied that the DSA was “very sensible” and should be applied worldwide.

Musk bought Twitter for a reported $44 billion and took ownership of the company on October 27, declaring “the bird is freed.” Within hours, Breton responded that “In Europe, the bird will fly by our rules.” The DSA was approved by the bloc earlier this year. It requires “content moderation” from major social media platforms, so they can swiftly censor “hate speech” or any information that Brussels deems false. The EU has already invoked these powers to ban RT and several other Russian media outlets, with most US-based platforms eagerly complying. The video hosting service Rumble, however, chose to turn off their service in France rather than comply with demands from Paris to censor certain Russian outlets.

Declaring “free speech” – as guaranteed in the US Constitution – to be his guiding principle, Musk has rolled back some of Twitter’s censorship policies and lifted the bans on many “permanently suspended” accounts, including former US president Donald Trump. The decision to reinstate Trump and declare a general amnesty for accounts that hadn’t broken the law was put to a vote on Twitter, with most users voting in favor in both cases.

“Tim was clear that Apple never considered doing so.”

• Musk Says Twitter Clash With Apple A ‘Misunderstanding’ (AFP)

Twitter owner Elon Musk said he met with Apple chief Tim Cook on Wednesday and “resolved the misunderstanding” that prompted him to declare war on the iPhone maker’s App Store. “Among other things, we resolved the misunderstanding about Twitter potentially being removed from the App Store,” Musk tweeted. “Tim was clear that Apple never considered doing so.” Musk also tweeted a video clip of “Apple’s beautiful HQ” in Cupertino, California, noting that he had had a “good conversation” with Cook. The world’s richest person opened fire on the planet’s most valuable company early this week over fees and rules at the App Store, saying Apple had threatened to oust his recently acquired social media platform.

The billionaire CEO had tweeted that Apple “threatened to withhold Twitter from its App Store, but won’t tell us why.” Apple, which has not issued a public statement on the matter, typically tells developers if fixes need to be implemented in apps to conform to App Store policies. Analysts told AFP the clash may have came down to money, with Musk irked that the App Store takes a commission on transactions such as subscriptions. Musk has delayed the relaunch of the Twitter Blue subscription tier intended to have users pay for perks such as account verification check marks. Twitter rolled out Blue early in November, but pulled the plug after impersonators paid for check marks to appear legitimate in what former head of safety and security Yoel Roth referred to as “a disaster.”

Both Apple and Google also require social networking services on their app stores to have effective systems for moderating harmful or abusive content. But since taking over Twitter last month, Musk has cut around half of Twitter’s workforce, including many employees tasked with fighting disinformation, while an unknown number of others have quit.

Tucker Apple

Tucker Carlson: Apple has done plenty to eliminate free speech pic.twitter.com/d0uK90bLgW

— Wittgenstein (@backtolife_2023) November 30, 2022

Musk has promised full disclosure.

• Ex-Twitter Safety Chief: Hunter Biden Laptop Censorship Was A ‘Mistake’ (Fox)

The former head of trust and safety at Twitter recently admitted that the social media company’s decision to censor the Hunter Biden laptop story in 2020 was a “mistake.” During a sit down with journalist Kara Swisher, ex-Twitter safety chief Yoel Roth said that despite concerns about the authenticity of the laptop story, it still did not reach a point where he wanted to remove the content — which was later censored anyway. Initial reporting suggested that Roth blocked user access from the October 2020 story, but the former Twitter division lead said the decision was not up to him. “We didn’t know what to believe, we didn’t know what was true, there was smoke — and ultimately for me, it didn’t reach a place where I was comfortable removing this content from Twitter,” Roth said.

“But it set off every single one of my finely tuned APT28 hack and leak campaign alarm bells.” Roth repeatedly reiterated that despite Big Tech companies’ high-alert status and his personal feeling of responsibility to protect the “integrity of conversations” from foreign governments attempting to interfere in elections, it never rose to the level where he believed the story should be censored. “But — so it was a mistake?” Swisher asked. “In my opinion, yes,” he responded. Roth planned to meet with the Department of Homeland Security’s now-defunct Disinformation Governance Board, where the government was expected to ask Twitter to become more involved in efforts to monitor misinformation.

Both Roth and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed they were approached by the FBI prior to the 2020 election, warning the platforms about foreign propaganda and misinformation. When the New York Post’s bombshell report was first published with weeks to go before the 2020 election, Twitter and Facebook were quick to limit or block sharing of the story in an unprecedented display of coordination. Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey has also admitted the social media platform was wrong to intervene in the Hunter Biden story. Last week, Twitter’s new CEO Elon Musk said that he might release more information on how the social media company censored the Biden laptop story.

‘I would like to be cancelled so I can go home and read a book and not have to make an a**e of myself all over the world..’

• Eric Idle Insists He Wants To Be ‘Cancelled’ (DM)

Famed English comedian Eric Idle says he wants to be ‘cancelled’ for his comedy. The 76-year-old funnyman, who first rose to fame in the 1960s as a founding member of the Monty Python comedy team, is outspoken about political correctness. He says that there is a lot of bullying going on in the name of decency. ‘I would like to be cancelled so I can go home and read a book and not have to make an a**e of myself all over the world,’ Idle joked in The Daily Telegraph on Tuesday. Idle, who is in Australia to perform a show in Sydney this week, explained in the chat that he thinks comedy is about saying the wrong thing at the right time. ‘You have to remember that Python was offensive when it started. We were not the cuddly old f***ers we are now,’ he told the publication.

‘It was very offensive. The point was absolutely to upset and insult the bourgeois.’ Idle, who is in Australia to perform a show in State Theatre on Thursday, explained that comedy is about saying the wrong thing at the right time, Pictured: Idle in Monty Python’s Life of Brian, a box-office smash despite offending audiences After debuting on the BBC in 1969, Monty Python earned a reputation for outrageous, surreal, often violent and sexual humour. Idle says the point of comedy is to test boundaries and say the ‘unsayable’. ‘And so who are the people saying you can’t do that?’ he says. ‘I don’t understand that. Who is the committee that does this? ‘It sounds a bit like the French Revolution committees, who said, ‘off with his head’. I think a lot of bullying goes on in the name of decency.’

Monty Python, who formally disbanded three decades ago, often attracted notoriety and scandal. Their films Monty Python and The Holy Grail (1975), and Monty’s Python Meaning of Life (1983) became box office hits, while shocking audiences. But it was their 1979 smash Life of Brian, a parody of pious religious movie epics that created a storm of protest around the world. Set in the time of Christ, the film features a climax where the hero, Brian (Graham Chapman), a Jew, is crucified because he has been mistaken as a messiah by the Romans. As he and others hang on crosses, they sing ‘Always Look on The Bright Side of Life,’ a jolly sing along composed by Idle. Condemned by a diverse range of religious groups as blasphemous, Idle says the film would never be made today because ‘you don’t laugh at religion.’

“Cryptome published the decrypted unredacted State Department Cables on September 1, 2011 prior to publication of the cables by WikiLeaks..”

• Cryptome Founder Asks to Be Indicted With Assange (Lauria)

The founder of a U.S.-based website that earlier published the same un-redacted documents that WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange was later indicted for has invited the U.S. Department of Justice to make him a co-defendant with Assange. “Cryptome published the decrypted unredacted State Department Cables on September 1, 2011 prior to publication of the cables by WikiLeaks,” John Young wrote in a Justice Department submission form, which Young posted on Twitter on Tuesday. “No US official has contacted me about publishing the unredacted cables since cryptome published them,” he wrote. “I respectfully request that the Department of Justice add me as a co-defendant in the prosecution of Mr. Assange under the Espionage Act.”

Assange has been charged with possession and dissemination of classified information, some of the same material that Young possesses and disseminated. Young founded Cryptome, which he calls a “free public library” in 1996. It was a precursor of WikiLeaks in publishing raw, classified and unclassified government documents on the internet. Young testified at Assange’s extradition hearing in London in September 2020. His sworn statement says: “I published on Cryptome.org unredacted diplomatic cables on September 1, 2011 under the URL https://cryptome.org/z/z.7z and that publication remains available at the present. … Since my publication on Cryptome.org of the unredacted diplomatic cables, no US law enforcement authority has notified me that this publication of the cables is illegal, consists or contributes to a crime in any way, nor have they asked for them to be removed.”

A cornerstone of the Justice Department’s case against Assange is that he recklessly published State Department cables leaked to him by Army Intelligence Analyst Chelsea Manning, which, the U.S. says, endangered the lives of named U.S. informants. Young is asking the Justice Department why he too hasn’t been prosecuted for publishing these names before Assange did. At Manning’s court martial, Brig. Gen. Robert Carr, testified under oath that no one was actually harmed by the WikiLeaks releases. Then Defense Secretary Robert Gates called the leaks “awkward” and “embarrassing” but said they did only “fairly modest” damage to U.S. foreign interests.

Musk 2008

When @elonmusk predicted the future during this 2008 interview. pic.twitter.com/et1d8xqlLZ

— History In Pictures (@HistoryInPics) November 30, 2022

Parking

Watch until the end. Really funny. Not mean, just genuinely funny. pic.twitter.com/wYW4wcIsi6

— James Woods (@RealJamesWoods) November 29, 2022

DogBrush

Very clever
pic.twitter.com/ObFYvI1TAO

— Tansu YEĞEN (@TansuYegen) November 30, 2022

Holidog
https://twitter.com/i/status/1597858949772234752

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Debt Rattle November 30 2022

Nov 302022

November 30, 2022 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 9:20 am Finance Tagged with: Apple, Big Pharma, censorship, deposition, Elon Musk, Fauci, Grenada, Iran, SBF, Serbia, Twitter, Zelensky 35 Responses »

Pablo Picasso Coffee maker 1943

• Twitter Stops Enforcing COVID-19 Misinformation Policy (ZH)

• ‘Negative Efficacy’ Should Have Stopped COVID Vaccine Recommendations (ET)

• 12 Ways To Hold Big Pharma Accountable For Covid Evils (Fed.)

• A Look from Inside – The Fauci Deposition

• Elon Musk’s Twitter Is A Monster Of The Left’s Own Making (QTR)

• Musk Says Exposé of Twitter’s ‘Free Speech Suppression’ Coming ‘Soon’ (ET)

• Kremlin Outlines Conditions For Ukraine Talks (RT)

• NATO Says ‘Door is Open’ for Ukraine Membership….But (Celente)

• EU Fails To Agree On Russian Oil Price Cap As Full Ban Looms (ZH)

• Rand Paul Calls Out Complete Lack Of Oversight On Ukraine Aid (SN)

• The Four Fuckeries (Jim Kunstler)

• Will The US Try To Pull Off A “Grenada” In Serbia? (Saker)

• US Paralyzed By Islamic Republic Of Iran’s Strategic Swing (Escobar)

• Apple Turns Off China Protest Communication Tool (SN)

• SBF Doesn’t Know What Happened To His Twitter Stake (Axios)

Actual scientists are speaking out. Watch. “Most of them fall asleep crying.”

https://twitter.com/i/status/1597663704044408832

Finland PM Marin Sanna visits New Zealand.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1597825029324296192

A good step, but only step no. 1. You will have to address the lives lost due to censorship of for instance doctors, on top of the whole Pfizer/Fauci/White House/EU terror. Twitter is complicit in this.

• Twitter Stops Enforcing COVID-19 Misinformation Policy (ZH)

Twitter will no longer enforce its Covid-19 misinformation policy, under which users who deviated from prevailing establishment narratives frequently had their accounts locked or suspended. The longstanding policy did not apply to misinformation from government officials, who regularly lied about things such as transmission, masks, vaccine efficacy, side effects, or any of the other ‘science’ which turned out to be patently false. Twitter did not officially announce the change, rather, the company added a note to a page on its website outlining its Covid-19 policy. “Effective November 23, 2022, Twitter is no longer enforcing the COVID-19 misleading information policy,” reads the note, which follows a line that still reads: “As the global community faces the COVID-19 pandemic together, Twitter is helping people find reliable information, connect with others, and follow what’s happening in real time.”

What’s more, Sky News reports that the company’s Covid-19 ‘misleading information’ policy was nuked, which showed that the company operated on a strike system in which those who had a label added to their tweets were given one strike, while those with deleted tweets were given two strikes. Users with two to three strikes would have a 12-hour lockout, while those with four strikes were permanently suspended. “The platform suspended more than 11,000 accounts and removed nearly 98,000 pieces of content for violating its COVID misinformation policy between January 2022 and September 2022, according to information published by Twitter. The site also reduced the visibility of tweets or accounts believed to be in violation of the policy by stopping tweets or retweets from those accounts appearing in certain parts of Twitter, displaying their replies in lower positions in conversations and excluding their tweets or account from recommendations on the site.” -Sky News

Of note, half of Twitter’s content moderation, human rights and communications teams were laid off when new owner Elon Musk took over. Hundreds more left after Musk issued an ultimatum to staff requiring them to sign up for “long hours at high intensity” or leave.

Twitter reports that since January of 2020, 11.72M accounts were “challenged,” 11,230 accounts were suspended, and 97,674 pieces of content were “removed.”

Talk about sliding scales. Not even when we knew the mRNA was endangering and killing people, did we stop.

• ‘Negative Efficacy’ Should Have Stopped COVID Vaccine Recommendations (ET)

It is a well known fact that COVID vaccine effectiveness wanes quickly as time goes on; this is confirmed by countless studies. Although the official narrative for COVID-19 vaccines nowadays only emphasizes its efficacy on protection against ICU admission and death rates, it actually implies the indisputable fact that vaccines don’t protect, contrary to their design, against infection or even symptomatic infection, especially after the emergence of various Omicron variants. Even the protection two shots offers against hospitalization drops to about 40 percent after less than a year. It’s actually looking worse for protection against severe symptoms, as efficacy rates seem to drop into the negatives about five months into full vaccination.

When a vaccine’s efficacy drops into the negatives, it means that vaccination actually elevates the risks of hospitalization and severe diseases rather than reducing the risks. In simple terms, it does more harm than good when the efficacy is negative. During the time prior to the pandemic, any vaccine with an efficacy less than 50 percent would be regarded as a poor product. When a product shows negative efficacy, it should be banned. It seems that the pandemic isn’t only bad for our health, but also is tugging at our common sense.

No room for all twelve here.

• 12 Ways To Hold Big Pharma Accountable For Covid Evils (Fed.)

What is the common denominator between the pharmaceutical companies, the public health bureaucracy, medical associations, the corporate media, and Big Tech companies when it comes to censorship and medical misinformation? Money, of course. According to Statista, the pharmaceutical and medical industry spent $5.6 billion on U.S. television advertising in 2021, second only behind the life and entertainment industry at $10.1 billion. For reference, total U.S. TV ad spending is expected to exceed $68 billion in 2022. According to eMarketer, pharmaceutical and health care companies combined spent an estimated $9.5 billion on digital media in 2020, with 56 percent going toward search advertising, dominated by Google and Facebook, which have aggressively censored medical information that deviated from the official public health narrative.

This accounted for about 7.1 percent of all U.S. digital ad spending. The pharma industry pays, in the form of user fees, for 75 percent of the FDA’s drug review budget, according to Forbes, and 45 percent of its overall budget. One investigation showed that 40 of 107 physician advisers on the FDA committees examined “received more than $10,000 in post hoc earnings or research support from the makers of drugs that the panels voted to approve, or from competing firms.” According to an analysis by the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has numerous conflicts of interest, including openly accepting private gifts through the CDC Foundation, accepting supposedly “prohibited” donations, and “automatic” conflict of interest waivers for advisory committee members.

In 2010, the CDC inspector general noted a “systemic lack of oversight” of its ethics program. The CDC uses taxpayer money to develop patents and then receives money from pharma companies in the form of licenses and royalties. The NIAID, headed by Fauci, also accepts donations, such as a $100 million pledge by Bill Gates for work on gene therapies. Individual public health officials and scientists, including Fauci and former NIH Director Francis Collins, receive royalties on patents used by the industry, teaching hospitals accept industry donations, and doctors accept “consulting fees,” and other travel and meals payments from pharma companies when they promote their products.

Strange story: a 7-hour Fauci deposition, and absolute crickets from the media.

Jim Hoft and attorney John Burns were present at the deposition. Excellent read.

• A Look from Inside – The Fauci Deposition

Here are some observations and highlights from the Fauci deposition: ** Fauci is a skillful liar. As we have seen now for months in his public comments, he lies when he feels he can get away with it or when he feels there will be no meaningful consequences. ** Fauci frequently lied unless and until he was confronted with alternate facts. For example, he claimed he really wasn’t familiar with Ralph Baric (creator of the COVID virus) or Peter Daszak (who brokered Fauci’s NIAID grant money to the Chinese biolab in Wuhan), until he was confronted with evidence that his own chief of staff emailed him describing Daszak and Baric as being part of Fauci’s team! ** Fauci claimed that he had no knowledge that his communications team did not coordinate with social media companies to stop “misinformation and disinformation” until he was forced to admit that he actually did know of certain instances of coordination.

** Fauci continued to push the now-debunked assertion that COVID-19 was a naturally occurring virus. ** Fauci said disinformation and misinformation (information he disagrees with) puts lives at risk. ** Fauci refused to define “gain of function” research saying it was too broad of a term to define. ** FUN FACT: until VERY recently, Fauci’s daughter worked for Twitter. ** FUN FACT: Fauci is a hypochondriac. In a bizarre and stunning segment during the deposition, Fauci blew off some of his frustration on the poor court reporter. The court reporter transcribing the deposition sneezed, and Fauci stopped the deposition and scolded the court reporter: “WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU??? Do you have some sort of respiratory illness, because in the era of COVID, I’m concerned about being near you.” Court Reporter: “I’m not sick, I just have allergies. I can wear a mask though.” Fauci: “Ok. Thank you, because the last thing I want is to get COVID. [notably, (1) Fauci himself did not wear a mask at any point during the deposition, and (2) he appeared to be several feet away from the court reporter].

** FUN FACT: in another Fauci hypochondria spasm, Fauci conspicuously mean-mugged Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry after Landry sneezed into his suit coat jacket. ** Gamesmanship. Whenever introduced to a difficult topic, he dishonestly refused to define key terms so he could avoid being pinned down and held accountable. For example, when discussing the topic of “gain of function” research, he refused to acknowledge what the term meant, objecting that it was a term so broad it could not be defined. ** Fauci repeatedly claimed that he “couldn’t recall” or “couldn’t remember,” and attempted to bolster these incredible statements by appealing to the volume of emails he would receive or issues or studies that would come across his desk. This is simply not credible for nearly all of such statements, because the incidents in question were either recent or within the past three years, and they were all highly politically charged.

[..] ** Other Fauci deceit tactics: throwing subordinates under the bus. Fauci is a famous survivor among bureaucrats. One way he has survived this long is by only taking credit for wins and pawning off losses on hapless subordinates. This trend continued in his deposition, in which he brazenly argued that, while he is the head of the NIAID and its $6 billion dollar budget, he repeatedly didn’t have any knowledge about what his immediate direct reports were doing right under his nose. Fauci supports accountability, so long as he has a subordinate to sacrifice.

“The social media platform had been the topic of political discussions about censorship, but no one had really done anything about it.”

• Elon Musk’s Twitter Is A Monster Of The Left’s Own Making (QTR)

I don’t believe Musk about everything, as my long-time followers know, but I do believe him when he says the platform has become more popular since he took it over. Not only is it more entertaining than its ever been, it’s simply a nice feeling not to have to run my Tweets over in my head before publishing them, thinking: “What would some hyper left-wing hipster in a beret in an office in San Francisco working a 4 hour work week as a content moderator think of what I’m about to post?” But this article isn’t just for those who are enjoying Twitter’s re-birth. More importantly, it’s for those who are having emotional meltdowns over it. What these users, former users, advertisers and general fragile individuals need to understand is that Elon Musk buying Twitter never even happens without an environment that creates the impetus for it to take place.

Putting Musk’s actual motives aside (I have often wondered if he actually wanted to buy Twitter when it came down to brass tacks), he projected publicly that his interest in taking a stake in the company was because they were actively suppressing free speech. Soon, a public discussion about Twitter’s censorship – which had kicked off years prior when Tim Pool publicly skewered head Twitter censor Vijaya Gadde on Joe Rogan’s podcast – was on the table. The social media platform had been the topic of political discussions about censorship, but no one had really done anything about it. Nobody made drastic moves to affect change. And love him or hate him, that’s exactly what Elon Musk did. The impetus for Musk to throw his hat in the ring on the discussion wasn’t just run-of-the-mill moderation issues, either. It was, instead, an incessant and burning need to eliminate content that Twitter didn’t view as favorable to its political leanings.

No matter what side of the aisle you’re on politically, it’s tough to push back against the idea that conservatives were targeted for suspension disproportionately on the platform. Furthermore, legitimate news stories that otherwise would have been worthy of Pulitzer Prizes – like the New York Post’s Hunter Biden laptop story – were actively blackballed from the platform and users who discussed them risked being suspended or banned. These are nearly the very same actions that Beijing takes on Chinese social media when a story or narrative gets out that isn’t stamped with the government’s approval. Now, it looks as though we’re going to find out exactly what was going on behind the scenes at Twitter when the decision to actively censor a major story that could have had an impact on the 2020 election was made. And I don’t care who is running the platform, that type of transparency is sorely needed.

This goes back to the lives lost to mRNA. Let’s see you do it.

• Musk Says Exposé of Twitter’s ‘Free Speech Suppression’ Coming ‘Soon’ (ET)

Elon Musk said Monday that Twitter’s internal files on the company’s “free speech suppression” will be revealed “soon,” raising expectations that light will be shed on the circumstances around Twitter’s censorship of the New York Post’s explosive story that exposed information on a laptop allegedly belonging to Hunter Biden. “The Twitter Files on free speech suppression soon to be published on Twitter itself. The public deserves to know what really happened …” Musk said in a post late Monday. Critics have long held that Twitter has used vague standards to censor or suspend accounts and that the ones targeted are predominantly those expressing conservative views. Twitter has denied any bias in its actions, repeatedly insisting it is simply following its content moderation policies.

Weeks before the 2020 presidential election, the New York Post published an article that allegedly detailed meetings President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, had with a Ukrainian energy firm before then-Vice President Biden pressured Ukrainian government officials to fire a prosecutor probing the company. The story was seen by Biden’s political opponents as evidence of corruption and the news quickly spread across Twitter, prompting the social media firm to start removing links to the article and, for a period of time, suspending the New York Post’s Twitter account. Conservatives saw Twitter’s actions in this regard as evidence of the company’s pro-Biden, anti-Trump bias. Twitter said at the time that it was simply enforcing its rules on hacked materials, which prohibit distribution of information that is obtained through hacking.

Musk in April spoke out in opposition to Twitter’s decision to temporarily suspend New York Post’s Twitter account. “Suspending the Twitter account of a major news organization for publishing a truthful story was obviously incredibly inappropriate,” Musk said in April, responding to a post about the Hunter Biden laptop story. Musk, who took over Twitter in late October, has vowed to make the platform into a politically unbiased bastion of free speech. He said in an open letter following his acquisition of Twitter that he bought it because “it is important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated in a healthy manner, without resorting to violence.” “There is currently great danger that social media will splinter into far right wing and far left wing echo chambers that generate more hate and divide our society,” Musk added.

“Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky emphasized that “there will be no Minsk-3 [agreement], which Russia would violate right after sealing it.”

Of course Zelensky knows full well Russia didn’t violate Minsk 1 and 2. Ukraine did. And US.

• Kremlin Outlines Conditions For Ukraine Talks (RT)

Peace negotiations could start between Russia and Ukraine if Moscow sees genuine “political will” on the part of Kiev to engage in dialogue, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov has said. Earlier this month, he noted that the Ukrainian leadership seemed reluctant to sit down for talks at present. When asked by Russian journalists on Tuesday whether there are any preconditions for any potential dialogue to begin between Moscow and Kiev, Peskov said: “It has to be political will, readiness to discuss those Russian demands which have been known for long.” Speaking via video-link during the G20 summit in Indonesia’s Bali in mid-November, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky emphasized that “there will be no Minsk-3 [agreement], which Russia would violate right after sealing it.”

The Ukrainian head of state was referring to the Minsk-1 and Minsk-2 agreements brokered by Germany and France back in 2014 and 2015, respectively. The accords, among other things, envisaged special status for Donetsk and Lugansk regions within the Ukrainian state. Russian President Vladimir Putin cited Kiev’s failure to implement the agreements as one of the reasons for the start of Moscow’s military campaign against its neighbor in late February 2022. Commenting on Zelensky’s remarks at the G20 summit, Peskov argued at the time that they “absolutely confirm” Kiev’s unwillingness to engage in talks. Addressing leaders in Bali, the Ukrainian head of state proposed ten steps that, in his view, would lead to peace. Among the key points of his plan is the complete withdrawal of Russian forces from all Ukrainian territories and respect for the country’s borders drawn up in 1991, following the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Meanwhile, Moscow claims some of those regions, most notably Crimea, as its own, following referendums it had held there. It came shortly after The Washington Post reported in early November that the Biden administration had privately asked Zelensky to signal willingness to hold talks with Russia, if only just for show. Washington was reportedly concerned that Kiev’s irreconcilable position could see support from some of its Western allies dwindle amid what anonymous White House officials described as a growing “Ukraine fatigue.” The article claimed that Washington was not serious about getting Kiev to negotiate, and only sought to ensure that weapons and other aid kept flowing from as many nations as possible.

Escalation tactics. Anytime it’s clear Russia is winning, they bring in heavier weaponry. Forcing Russia to follow suit. Same with dangling NATO membership in front of Zelensky. The war must go on.

• NATO Says ‘Door is Open’ for Ukraine Membership….But (Celente)

Jens Stoltenberg, the secretary general of NATO, dangled the possibility that Ukraine may someday, in the future, join the Alliance and benefit from the protection of Article 5 that, when distilled, says: an attack on one, is an attack on all. He made the comment during a two-day summit in Bucharest where Ukraine’s electric grid and Russia’s relentless air campaign took center stage. The Russian strikes have left millions in the dark as temperatures hit 19 degrees in Kyiv. “NATO’s door is open,” he said, according to The New York Times. But he noted that the calvary is not coming during this conflict. “NATO will continue to stand for Ukraine as long as it takes. We will not back down.” In September, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, announced that Kyiv filed a new, expedited application to join NATO in light of Russian President Vladimir Putin annexing four occupied regions in the country.

Zelensky, correctly said in a statement that Finland and Sweden benefited from an accelerated accession into the Alliance. (But neither of those countries are members.) “De facto, we have already proven interoperability with the Alliance’s standards, they are real for Ukraine — real on the battlefield and in all aspects of our interaction,” Zelensky said. “Today, Ukraine is applying to make it de jure. Under a procedure consistent with our significance for the protection of our entire community. Under an accelerated procedure,” the statement continued. Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security adviser, killed the idea and said, the issue should be taken up “at a different time.”

NATO’s refusal to accept Ukraine into the fold is understandable because it would assure the beginning of WWIII. But it has still been a sensitive subject in Kyiv. Last summer, Ihor Zhovkva, the deputy chief of staff for Zelensky, said in an interview that Kyiv was told by NATO that it is “not a member because we do not want you.” “NATO is telling us we are not giving you anything,” he said in an interview with a local news outlet in Kyiv, according to Bloomberg. Some could argue that Ukraine was the victim misleading public statements from the U.S. and NATO prior to the invasion. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Stoltenberg said Moscow would be met with a“forceful” response if there was an invasion. Blinken went further and said the U.S. has a “sacred obligation” to defend its allies.

Under Article 10 of the 1949 Washington Treaty, NATO has the right to invite any willing European country into the fold. But Stoltenberg made it clear, before the invasion, that there is a distinction between a NATO partner and ally. Kyiv is a partner. NATO is compelled to only defend allies. NATO countries never embraced Ukraine as an ally because it meant certain war with Russia.

“(see, it was all theater, everything – from day one – and politicians knew it as soon as they did the math)”

• EU Fails To Agree On Russian Oil Price Cap As Full Ban Looms (ZH)

In its relentless pursuit of virtue-signaling hills that it is willing to die on within minutes, several months ago the EU had a brilliant idea: let’s implement a toothless oil price cap on Russian oil exports, one which actually has zero impact on deeply discounted Russian oil and thus doesn’t lead to any more European energy shocks, but because of the optics and the much “lower” permitted transaction price, it will make for great headlines and show the world just how powerful the EU is. Well, the plan almost worked… until Poland and the Baltics forgot to read the fine print, thought that Europe actually does mean business, and blew up the deal. Recall on Friday, negotiations on the Russian oil price cap were suspended – despite a willingness by most European nations to just cross the checkmark and move on – as Poland and the Baltic states objected to a proposed ceiling of $65.

There was some hope that this opposition was just for show, and that come Monday the Poles would relent after some “closed door” negotiations, Europe would slap a $65 price cap, Russia would continue to sell its oil to China and India, and – quietly – to Europe, and gradually renormalize a fractured oil market where India and China pay a 25% discount for oil while the rest of the world has to pay a premium as an offset. However, it was not meant to be, and on Monday European Union governments again failed to agree on a price cap on Russian seaborne crude oil, as Poland again insisted that the cap had to be set lower than proposed by the G7 to cut Moscow’s ability to finance its invasion of Ukraine, diplomats told Reuters. “There is no deal. The legal texts have now been agreed, but Poland still can’t agree to the price,” one diplomat said.

No new date for talks has been set yet, diplomats said, even though a far worse outcome may await Europe in just one week: as a reminder, the price cap mechanism is to enter into force on Dec. 5. And if there is no agreement on the G7 price cap idea by next Monday, the EU would implement harsher measures agreed at the end of May – a ban on all Russian crude oil imports from Dec. 5 and on petroleum products from Feb. 5, Polish diplomats said. That would be a truly catastrophic scenario, and one which could promptly send the price of oil into the stratosphere as JPMorgan explained not too long ago. To be sure, it’s not too late for Poland to fall in line: Hungary and two other landlocked central European states secured exemptions from that ban for the pipeline imports they rely on.

Meanwhile, even the G-7 group of nations has proposed a softer version of the EU ban to keep oil supply to the global economy steady, because Russia supplies 10% of the world’s oil (see, it was all theater, everything – from day one – and politicians knew it as soon as they did the math). It proposed that the EU and other global customers keep buying Russian crude, but only if its price is at or below a G7 agreed level. That would cut the Kremlin’s revenues. The G7 has proposed a cap of $65-70 per barrel, but Poland and some others argue this will not hurt Moscow because Russian crude is already trading below that range at $63.50, and after today’s oil price rollercoaster, the “Russian” price briefly dipped below $60. With Russian production costs estimated at around $20, Moscow has a very large profit from its oil exports. Poland, Lithuania and Estonia have been pushing for a price cap of $30 per barrel.

And yet, despite consensus that Polish opposition would be overturned, the country’s resolve has only hardened: “The Poles are completely uncompromising on the price, without suggesting an acceptable alternative,” the EU diplomat said. “Clearly there is growing annoyance with the Polish position.” Which is hilarious because only Poland is adhering to the principle of what the price cap was supposed to achieve – namely choke off Russian oil profits; and yet for all the pompous rhetoric by G-7 nations, everyone is happy to keep the spectacle going knowing full well that this is just one giant virtue-signaling scheme. Everyone, except Poland that is… and as a result the “annoyance” is not with Putin but with the “Polish position” which is keeping fat European technocrats away from their well-deserved 3-star meals for a fake job well done.

“..the Biden administration inspected only 10% of 22,000 weapons the U.S. has provided to Ukraine..”

• Rand Paul Calls Out Complete Lack Of Oversight On Ukraine Aid (SN)

Senator Rand Paul reacted Monday to news that the Biden administration is struggling to account for some $20 billion in aid that was sent to Ukraine, noting that both political parties ignored his call for an inspector general to overlook it. A report from Fox News, linked in a tweet by Paul, notes that according to the Washington Post, the Biden administration inspected only 10% of 22,000 weapons the U.S. has provided to Ukraine between February and November. It also outlines how Republicans could push for audits to determine where all the military aid is going and how much of it is ending up in the wrong hand.

“Didn’t someone try to legislatively mandate a special inspector general to scrutinize Ukrainian spending?” Paul urged, adding “Oh, that’s right, it was my amendment and most Democrats AND Republicans opposed any semblance of oversight.” Just a fortnight ago, following the throughly debunked “Russian missile attack” on a Polish border town, which turned out to be a Ukrainian missile that had stayed off course, Biden asked Congress to provide another $37.7 billion in emergency aid to Ukraine. The United States has already pledged more than 52 billion euros in military, financial and humanitarian aid to Ukraine since the war began in February 2022 and October 3, way more than any other nation or nations combined.

“..and also stranded the media in an endless loop of ass-covering they are still locked into..”

• The Four Fuckeries (Jim Kunstler)

“We want to save the planet, and the life upon it, but we’re not willing to pay the price and bear the consequences. So we make up a narrative that feels good and run with it.” — Raul Ilargi Meijer.” I doubt there is another era in the history of Western Civ when the forces in-motion acting on society were so mystifying to those acted upon. And isn’t it especially galling that this is so in an age after rational scientific practice had decoded so many of nature’s secrets? Did that project somehow fail in the end? Has the Enlightenment been defeated? How have we become trapped like frogs being boiled haplessly in our own pond-water? I have reduced these forces to four obvious streams of the sheerest seemingly evil fuckery, which is to say nefariously managed events meant to harm us. They are surely all related in some way. Let’s try to de-mystify them to understand what we’re up against.

First: Covid-19. How is it that we don’t know for sure how this organism came into the world, or understand what ensued after it did? Answer: the people who caused it to happen in the Wuhan lab have been busy covering their asses for three years, and successfully so. Yet we know exactly what Anthony Fauci, Francis Collins, Peter Daszak, Ralph Baric and others did. The paper trail in correspondence and patents alone is clear. We just can’t seem to do anything about it. We don’t know why they did it yet, too, but there are plausible guesses. Maybe Dr. Fauci wanted to cap his long, checkered career with a final heroic triumph: the introduction of world-saving mRNA vaccines — incidentally, a great financial boon to himself and the pharma industry he secretly served. Like everything else Fauci worked on for forty years, this experiment ended in disaster: a Frankenstein disease that persists in the population and vaccines that maim and kill people. How did Fauci and company get away with it? Here’s how:

Two: Government’s war on its own citizens. I’d date this for the sake of simplicity to the DOJ’s and FBI’s campaign to defenestrate Donald Trump starting in 2016 for the crime of winning an election. What began as the Russia collusion prank morphed into RussiaGate, another ass-covering extravaganza in which public officialdom gave itself blanket permission to lie about everything it was doing. The likes of James Comey, Andrew McCabe and Barack Obama’s girl squad in the White House — to name just a few of many participants — also managed to hook in the mainstream news media under the supposition that they were the good guys fighting a disgusting, pussy-grabbing supervillain, which disposed the news media to go along with all the FBI and DOJ lies, and also stranded the media in an endless loop of ass-covering they are still locked into.

“..it was simply impossible to fail no matter how inept and incompetent the entire invasion was..”

• Will The US Try To Pull Off A “Grenada” In Serbia? (Saker)

Remember the 1983 US invasion of Grenada aka “Operation Urgent Fury”? It all began on October 23, 1983 when two truck bombs blew up the buildings housing the US and French “Multinational Force in Lebanon”. This attack resulted in 307 people killed including 241 U.S. and 58 French military personnel. Following the bombings, US diplomats engaged in their usual frantic flag-waving and promises to never ever give in to terrorism. The biggest problem for the US was that it had no way to retaliate in a way which would satisfy the flag-waver’s desire for blood. Just blowing up random buildings in Lebanon made very little impact, as for the promises to stay for as long as needed, it was obvious PR – it was clear to everybody that the time to pack and leave had come.

Of course, this was very humiliating for the wannabe “indispensable nation” cum “city upon a Hill”,,, So Reagan, with his undeniable genius for PR and optics, ordered the invasion of Grenada just two days after the bombings in Beirut. Why Grenada? Well, for one thing it was barely defended (mostly by Cuban engineers and locals with small arms) and truly tiny (so tiny, in fact, that the overwhelming majority of US Americans had no idea where it was or why there was suddenly an urgent need to invade. Second, it was very close to the USA, so everybody could get a slice of the cake, including the 1st and 2nd battalions of the US Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment, the 82nd Airborne and the Army’s rapid deployment force, U.S. Marines, Army Delta Force, Navy SEALs, and ancillary forces totaling 7,600 troops.

In terms of hardware, the US brought in 7,300 troops, 4 tanks, 1 LHA (USS Saipan LHA-2), 1 aircraft carrier, 3 destroyers, 2 frigates, 1 ammunition ship and even 27 F-14A Tomcats. All that against a few hundred construction workers armed only with small arms! I won’t go into all the details here, but let’s just say that this invasion was one of the worst and most poorly executed operation in the history of warfare: a truly HUGE US force was brought in to strike at a basically defenseless tiny island nation with the sole purpose of changing the optics of the disaster in Lebanon.

But, no to worry, the Pentagon handed our more medals than the number of participants, while some US special forces who wanted to press charges against helicopter pilots for cowardice (who abandoned the SOF on a runway because of small arms fire) were “counseled” against the idea. Bottom line is this: after the epic disaster in Beirut, the US wanted a quick and easy war to restore the “prestige” of the US armed forces, only to end up with yet another epic disaster, but at least in the case of Grenada, it was simply impossible to fail no matter how inept and incompetent the entire invasion was.

Iran=BRI, SCO, INSTC, BRICS+.

• US Paralyzed By Islamic Republic Of Iran’s Strategic Swing (Escobar)

Iran’s parliament has just approved the accession of the Islamic Republic to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), previously enshrined at the Samarkand summit last September, marking the culmination of a process that lasted no less than 15 years. Iran has already applied to become a member of the expanding BRICS+, which before 2025 will be inevitably configured as the alternative Global South G20 that really matters. Iran is already part of the Quad that really matters – alongside BRICS members Russia, China and India. Iran is deepening its strategic partnership with both China and Russia and increasing bilateral cooperation with India.

Iran is a key Chinese partner in the New Silk Roads, or Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). It is set to clinch a free trade agreement with the Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU) and is a key node of the International North-South Transportation Corridor (INSTC), alongside Russia and India. All of the above configures the lightning-fast emergence of the Islamic Republic of Iran as a West Asia and Eurasia big power, with vast reach across the Global South. That has left the whole set of imperial “policies” towards Tehran lying in the dust. So it’s no wonder that previously accumulated strands of Iranophobia – fed by the Empire over four decades — have recently metastasized into yet another color revolution offensive, fully supported and disseminated by Anglo-American media.

The playbook is always the same. Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei actually came up with a concise definition. The problem is not bands of oblivious rioters and/or mercenaries: “the main confrontation”, he said, is with “global hegemony.” Ayatollah Khamenei was somewhat echoed by American intellectual and author Noam Chomsky, who has remarked how an array of US sanctions over four decades have severely harmed the Iranian economy and “caused enormous suffering.”

Apple is not looking good lately.

• Apple Turns Off China Protest Communication Tool (SN)

As it mulls kicking Elon Musk’s Twitter off the app store, it has now been revealed that Apple restricted the use of AirDrop in China, a move that harmed the organizational efforts of demonstrators protesting against the CCP’s lockdowns. Over the past week, multiple major cities across China have seen massive protests against lockdowns, with the normally compliant Chinese exploding into rage in response to their government’s ‘zero COVID’ policy. Much of the unrest blew up in response to an incident in Xinjiang’s capital Urumqi, where at least 10 people, some say up to 40, were killed during an apartment fire because lockdown rules stopped residents from fleeing the burning building.

Most of the city’s residents have been prevented from leaving their homes for over 100 days as a result of the draconian rules, which are still in place nearly three years after the pandemic began. With Beijing now trying to contain what some are calling the most serious mass uprising since Tiananmen Square, Apple is apparently helping them to crush dissent. Earlier this month, Apple restricted the use of AirDrop in China, which protesters had been using to evade censorship. AirDrop allows local connections between devices, meaning it cannot be monitored or censored by local authorities. However, Apple launched an update to the app in China that restricted usage to just 10 minutes, making it harder for protesters to communicate with other activists, as well as send messages nearby bystanders and tourists.

AirDrop was also being used by protesters in Hong Kong, who were brutally suppressed by the CCP during months of unrest in 2019. The smartphone company chose to roll out the new “feature” in China only right as the country experienced its biggest demonstrations in decades, which some would suggest is more than just a coincidence. “Apple has helped Beijing to suppress public dissent multiple times, mostly by complying with its requests to remove apps used by protestors for information and communication,” reports Reclaim the Net. “Apple also helps the Chinese Communist Party prevent users from remaining private by banning VPNs in the region.”

“..Bankman-Fried, as of Nov. 10, either believed that Alameda owned a stake in Musk’s Twitter, or that he was uncertain, and therefore misleading potential investors.”

• SBF Doesn’t Know What Happened To His Twitter Stake (Axios)

Sam Bankman-Fried tells Axios that he always intended to roll over at least a portion of his former firm’s $100 million Twitter stake into the new, privately held entity led by Elon Musk. But the former FTX CEO said in an interview on Monday night that he’s not sure that ever happened with the Alameda Research controlled stake. It’s the first time Bankman-Fried has addressed the question around his Twitter stake since Musk said last week that neither SBF nor FTX ever held a position in the privatized Twitter, a statement that contradicted a Semafor news report. Alameda Research, the entity that Bankman-Fried said owned the Twitter stake, is the trading firm that he controlled and is the entity at the center of FTX’s implosion.

A text message seen by Axios that Bankman-Fried sent to Musk said the Twitter stake Alameda owned was worth around $100 million. “I believe that that it was intended for Alameda to rollover at least $20 million or more,” Bankman-Fried told Axios. “I don’t know for sure whether that ultimately happened.” Bankman-Fried noted that at least some of the Twitter stake may have been sold prior to Twitter going private, but he could not confirm. Bankman-Fried, through his advisers, had offered to help Musk buy out Twitter in the spring with potentially billions of dollars. But he later backed out of his offer after the two spoke by phone, Axios previously reported.

Bankman-Fried said at the time that he was interested in rolling the stake into the privatized company, with Musk acknowledging that Bankman-Fried was “welcome to roll.” The Twitter stake was listed on a Nov. 10 balance sheet shown to prospective FTX investors before the company went bankrupt, according to the Financial Times. The balance sheet, upon which Semafor also relied for its reporting, listed $43.3 million of Twitter stock as an illiquid deliverable — or sellable — asset. That suggests that Bankman-Fried, as of Nov. 10, either believed that Alameda owned a stake in Musk’s Twitter, or that he was uncertain, and therefore misleading potential investors.

Big house cats. Sound on.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1597818714631852033

Backwards dog

I must move in stealthily! pic.twitter.com/axCMfPRqCT

— Figen (@TheFigen_) November 29, 2022

Blob top jellyfish
https://twitter.com/i/status/1597658696481312768

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Debt Rattle November 29 2022

Nov 292022

November 29, 2022 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 8:55 am Finance Tagged with: Apple, Assange, audits, Boeing, Crimea, Dutch farmers, Elon Musk, Luciferian, Twitter, Zelensky 88 Responses »

Salvador Dali Cubist self portrait 1926

• The US Is a Luciferian Project (Garlington)

• About Saving Face: Some Advice to Volodymyr Zelensky (Batiushka)

• Kiev Planning To ‘Retake’ Crimea In 2023 – The Economist (RT)

• Beijing Protesters Spooked By Phone Calls From Police (AFP)

• NYT: Lockdowns Are Draconian When China Does Them (Eugyp)

o US Diplomat Reveals Contents Of Spy Chief Talks (RT)

• Boeing Offers To Make Bombs For Ukraine – Reuters (RT)

• Putin Confession Suggests Ukraine Conflict Could Last For Years (Trenin)

• Biden Admin Scrambles To Track $20B In Ukraine Aid As GOP Warn Of Audits (Fox)

• EU Gets Tough on China as US Steals European Industry (Gallagher)

• Netherlands To Forcefully Shut Down 3,000 Farms (CS)

• New Twitter Sign Ups Hit All-Time Record Despite Cancel Campaign (Turley)

• Twitter Owner Musk Signals New ‘War’ Against Apple (AFP)

• UK Deployed 15 Staff On Secret Operation To Seize Julian Assange (Dec.uk)

• Media Groups Urge US To Drop Julian Assange Charges (G.)

J6 FBI
https://twitter.com/i/status/1597293108857032704

It takes 15 SECONDS to understand the Ukrainian genocide

“People are not gods. They must not act like gods or assume godly authority. If they do, terrible retributions are in store.”

• The US Is a Luciferian Project (Garlington)

All of this is the regression of human development, not its advancement. It is consonant with the spirit of Antichrist, as described in the Book of the Holy Prophet Daniel (7:23-25):‘”Thus he said: `As for the fourth beast, there shall be a fourth kingdom on earth, which shall be different from all the kingdoms, and it shall devour the whole earth, and trample it down, and break it to pieces. As for the ten horns, out of this kingdom ten kings shall arise, and another shall arise after them; he shall be different from the former ones, and shall put down three kings. He shall speak words against the Most High, and shall wear out the saints of the Most High, and shall think to change the times and the law; and they shall be given into his hand for a time, two times, and half a time.’

St. Jerome provides a commentary: ‘The Antichrist will wage war against the saints and will overcome them; and he shall exalt himself to such a height of arrogance as to attempt changing the very laws of God and the sacred rites as well. He will also lift himself up against all that is called God, subjecting all religion to his own authority.’ The modern American project of god-like, autonomous individuals is Promethean/Luciferian at its core, attempting to ‘change the times and the law’ given by the All-Holy Trinity in ever more disturbing ways – by pursuing genetically modified crops and animals; synthetic biology; transgenderism; transhumanism; etc. Is it any wonder that many tradition-respecting countries are becoming reluctant to ally with Washington City and its friends in the wider apostate West?

Within the US itself there is, nevertheless, resistance; there are dissenting voices and views. The people of New England and their descendants in Utah and in the cities along the Pacific Coast have always been at the forefront of pushing new, subversive ideologies – feminism, communism, polygamy/Mormonism, homosexual rights, man-boy love, polyamory. But outside of Yankeedom we meet with more reasonable, more traditional voices. The South, for instance, the South shorn of Yankee-imposed ideologies, that is true to her history and character and inherited customs – Southerners of this kind insist on the ‘given-ness’ of creation, on its immutability, that man must respect certain boundaries regarding it or risk experiencing great cataclysms and tragedies.

Wendell Berry, a typical Southern agrarian of this sort, writes in his essay ‘The Gift of Good Land,’ ‘It [the land}s a gift because the people who are to possess it did not create it. It is accompanied by careful warnings and demonstrations of the folly of saying that “My power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth” (Deuteronomy 8:17). Thus, deeply implicated in the very definition of this gift is a specific warning against hubris, which is the great ecological sin, just as it is the great sin of politics. People are not gods. They must not act like gods or assume godly authority. If they do, terrible retributions are in store. In this warning we have the root of the idea of propriety, of proper human purposes and ends. We must not use the world as though we created it ourselves.

“As the US realises that the free nations of the world are turning against it, it will not hesitate to blame the Kiev regime. The US must save face. Kiev has been warned: it will have to start negotiating with Russia again.”

• About Saving Face: Some Advice to Volodymyr Zelensky (Batiushka)

It is now dawning on the US elite that they totally underestimated Russia in all respects. For instance, on 25 March 2014 the arrogant Obama contemptuously called Russia ‘a regional power, threatening others out of weakness’ (sic!). (Clearly, he was talking about the USA). As a result, blinded by hubris, some in the US are now admitting that the Ukraine, the most corrupt country in Europe, is a dead duck, the game is simply no longer worth the candle. Apart from being a black hole for Western money and military equipment, the Ukraine is no longer the problem. It is a sideshow, a distraction, a mere symptom of something far more important. The real problem is what is now happening worldwide under Russian leadership – the ending of the unipolar world, of US global hegemony, camouflaged beneath the more innocent-sounding term ‘globalism’.

Following Russia’s decision and ability to stand up to the world’s bully, the whole Non-Western world is now also standing up to him. For example, at the recent G20 meeting in Indonesia, the debate was not about the Ukraine, but about whether or not to continue to accept American Fascist rule (‘the rules-based international order’). All the Latin American and African and four Asian countries said no, it’s finished, the world is now multipolar. Taiwan will inevitably be Chinese and soon – and wait till Chinese troops appear in Mesopotamia to take control of Iraqi oil and gas and rebuild that tragic country. Freedom beckons. Long-deluded Western elitists must be shocked: other ‘regional powers’ are now also standing up to the bully. Perhaps also out of weakness?

Zelensky must have suspected that his boss, until now the self-imagined master of the universe, is going to get rid of him. He is a loser and the Yanks cannot stand losers. As the US realises that the free nations of the world are turning against it, it will not hesitate to blame the Kiev regime. The US must save face. Kiev has been warned: it will have to start negotiating with Russia again. Zelensky had better plan his escape now, because Ukrainians will not forgive him for stringing them along with a pack of lies. Regardless of Zelensky’s delusional assertions that there will be no negotiations with Russia and that it will re-occupy Russian territories, including the Crimea, there are three reasons for him to throw in the towel now, before it all gets much, much worse.

Not going to happen. Zelensky’s Waterloo.

• Kiev Planning To ‘Retake’ Crimea In 2023 – The Economist (RT)

Ukraine’s armed forces are reportedly preparing for an assault on Crimea, to “retake” the peninsula which voted to reunite with Russia in 2014. A former Ukrainian commander told the Economist that the operation was being planned for 2023, but declined to give more details. Former air assault commander, Mikhail Zabrodsky told the outlet that if the army announced its intentions on social media or television, it would “never achieve anything.” He did admit, however, that an operation designed to retake the peninsula would not be a “senseless frontal assault” and would be done using a combination of land troops, sea landings, and air attacks, including the use of drones. “We will surprise people—and many times—again,” he said.

However, Zabrodsky, who claims to remain close to the military planning process in Kiev, stressed that there are still many battles to win before the army could consider a timeframe for such an attack. Military experts have warned that an effort to forcefully retake Crimea or the territories of the Donbass republics, which recently joined Russia after holding public referendums, could prove costly for Kiev and drive Moscow to escalate, perhaps even to the use of tactical nuclear weapons. “There is a real prospect that things will end in a bloodbath. That is an operation Ukraine does not need,” retired navy captain Andrey Ryzhenko told the Economist. Top US General Mark Milley said earlier this month that the probability of a Ukrainian military victory which included taking Crimea was “not high” and not likely to be happening “anytime soon.”

Nevertheless, Kiev has insisted it is determined to seize the peninsula, with President Vladimir Zelensky saying he has no desire to seek a peaceful settlement to the ongoing conflict with Moscow without “de-occupying” the territory. Ukraine’s Deputy Defense Minister Vladimir Gavrilov also suggested earlier this month that Ukrainian forces could step into Crimea “by the end of December.” Crimea overwhelmingly voted to join Russia in 2014 following violent riots in Kiev that ousted democratically elected President Viktor Yanukovich. This autumn, the two Donbass republics, as well as Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions, also voted to become part of Russia in referendums not recognized by Kiev or its Western backers. In late September, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Moscow would defend its new territories “with full force and all the means at our disposal.”

I can see how this would freak you out.

• Beijing Protesters Spooked By Phone Calls From Police (AFP)

Beijing protesters have been interrogated by police via phone call after attending rare large-scale protests calling for an end to China’s harsh zero-Covid controls, one told AFP on Monday. Hundreds of mostly young people braved icy temperatures to gather near a riverbank in the capital Sunday evening, as a vigil for victims of a deadly apartment blaze in northwestern China’s Xinjiang region turned into calls to end zero-Covid. People have taken to the streets in major cities and gathered at university campuses across China in a wave of protests not seen since pro-democracy rallies in 1989 were crushed. A woman protester told AFP that by Monday evening she and five of her friends who attended the protest had received phone calls from Beijing police, demanding information about their movements.

In one case, a police officer visited her friend’s home after they refused to answer their phone. “He said my name and asked me whether I went to the Liangma river last night… he asked very specifically how many people were there, what time I went, how I heard about it,” she told AFP, asking to stay anonymous for safety reasons. “The police stressed that last night’s protest was an illegal assembly, and if we had demands then we could submit them through the regular channels. ”She said that the police officer was mostly “even-toned” during the brief call and urged her not to attend future events. “I had previously prepared for this, but of course I was still agitated,” she said, adding she would “try her best to continue” attending similar protests in the future, and “prepare better” next time. “I never thought that this kind of civil society activity could ever happen in China,” she said.

“Western lockdowns were necessary to save lives. Chinese lockdowns are the repressive tactic of an undemocratic regime.”

• NYT: Lockdowns Are Draconian When China Does Them (Eugyp)

Three years ago, Zero Covid was the aspiration of public health bureaucrats and politicians across the West. Charlatan techbros like Tomas Pueyo appeared on national television to demand nationwide house arrest; leaders like Angela Merkel surrounded themselves virus-eradicationist modellers and imposed unprecedented months-long closures upon their countries. When protests inevitably broke out, they were violently suppressed; the protesters were slandered as conspiracy theorists and fascists. The New York Times played a leading role in this long and excruciating charade. In April 2020, they reported that “an informal coalition of influential conservative leaders and groups, some with close connections to the [Trump] White House” was responsible for “quietly working to nurture protests and apply … pressure to overturn state and local orders intended to stop the spread of the coronavirus.”

In March 2021, they ran an obnoxious opinion piece about What Happened When Germany’s Far-Right Party Railed Against Lockdowns, which called the German protesters “an amorphous mix of conspiracy theorists, shady organizations and outraged citizens” and appeared to accuse the right-populist party Alternativ für Deutschland of opportunism for joining their ranks. What a difference a few years have made. China Protests Break Out as Covid Cases Surge and Lockdowns Persist is a lead headline in today’s New York Times: “Strict Covid restrictions are hurting the country’s economy and angering members of the public, who are taking to the streets,” we read in the article that follows. Western anti-lockdown protesters are fascists and conspiracy theorists; Chinese anti-lockdown protesters, on the other hand, are ordinary people protesting their oppression:

“Lift the lockdown,” the protesters screamed in a city in China’s far west. On the other side of the country, in Shanghai, demonstrators held up sheets of blank white paper, turning them into an implicit but powerful sign of defiance. One protester, who was later detained by the police, was carrying only flowers. Over the weekend, protests against China’s strict Covid restrictions ricocheted across the country in a rare case of nationwide civil unrest. There had been signs of dissent, but the new wave of anger may pose a bigger challenge for the government. Some demonstrators went so far as to call for the Communist Party and its leader, Xi Jinping, to step down. Many were fed up with Mr. Xi, who in October secured a precedent-defying third term as the party’s general secretary, and his “zero-Covid” policy, which continues to disrupt everyday life, hurt livelihoods and isolate the country.

Western lockdowns were necessary to save lives. Chinese lockdowns are the repressive tactic of an undemocratic regime.

“The diplomat noted that the ongoing Ukraine conflict was not on the officials’ agenda.”

o US Diplomat Reveals Contents Of Spy Chief Talks (RT)

The heads of American and Russian intelligence agencies have discussed the risk of a potential nuclear confrontation between the two countries, Washington’s Charge d’Affaires in Moscow, Elizabeth Rood, has told RIA Novosti. The diplomat noted that the ongoing Ukraine conflict was not on the officials’ agenda. In an interview with the Russian media outlet published on Monday, Rood said: “The US and the Russian Federation have [communication] channels for risk management, especially in terms of nuclear risks, and precisely this issue was the goal of CIA Director [William] Burns’ meeting with his Russian counterpart.” She pointed out that the two spy chiefs had not, however, discussed the situation in Ukraine or ways to end hostilities there.

The American diplomat added that Washington and Moscow could hold consultations in a similar fashion down the road, if necessary. “For now, as far as I know, nothing is being planned,” Rood noted. The high-level meeting in Türkiye’s capital, Ankara, was first reported by Russia’s Kommersant newspaper in mid-November. It is believed to have been the first in-person contact between top US and Russian officials since Moscow launched its military campaign in Ukraine in late February. Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, confirmed that a high-level meeting had taken place in Ankara on November 14, stopping short, however, of revealing any details regarding the participants or the topics discussed there. “It was the American side’s initiative,” he explained.

Recent comments by Rood about Ukraine not being on the agenda of the meeting between Sergei Naryshkin, chief of Russia’s SVR foreign intelligence service, and Burns echoed those made earlier by an unnamed White House official cited by Reuters. That source was also quoted as saying that the two spy chiefs had touched on the issue of American citizens in Russian custody and Russian nationals held in US prisons, and the possibility of a swap deal. Earlier this month, US President Joe Biden expressed hope that his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, would be willing to discuss such an exchange, which would involve US basketball star Brittney Griner, who is serving nine years in a Russian prison for drug offenses. According to media reports, in exchange, the US could release Viktor Bout, a Russian national and alleged arms dealer, who is serving a 25-year jail term in America.

When they make them they want them to be used.

• Boeing Offers To Make Bombs For Ukraine – Reuters (RT)

The Pentagon is reportedly considering an offer from Boeing to mass-produce cheap precision bombs for Ukraine using existing US stores, as Washington and its allies struggle to keep up with Kiev’s military aid requirements. According to Reuters, Boeing has proposed supplying Ukraine’s forces with the so-called Ground-Launched Small Diameter Bomb (GLSDB) system, which would pair the $40,000 GBU-39 Small Diameter Bomb (SDB) with the relatively abundant M26 rocket motor. The weapon has been in development since 2019. In a document seen by the outlet, the manufacturer claims the availability of the necessary components would enable it to produce the ordnance and start delivering it to Ukraine as early as spring 2023.

However, there are still logistical obstacles to overcome, as at least six suppliers would have to expedite shipment of parts in order to produce the weapons quickly. Boeing’s plan also asks for a price discovery waiver, which would exempt the contractor from an in-depth review to ensure the Pentagon is getting a fair deal. According to SAAB AB’s website, who manufactures the weapon together with Boeing, the GPS-guided GLSDB is capable of striking targets at a range of up to 150 kilometers, which would potentially allow Kiev to strike Russian forces far beyond the front line. While both the US military and Boeing have declined to comment on the report, Pentagon spokesperson Lt. Cmdr. Tim Gorman told Reuters that Washington and its allies “identify and consider the most appropriate systems” that would help Kiev.

He refused to elaborate on providing any “specific capability” to Ukraine. Moscow has repeatedly warned the US and its NATO allies against supplying weapons to Ukraine, arguing that it only serves to prolong the conflict and could eventually lead to a direct confrontation between Russia and the West. As countries like the US and UK have made more advanced weapon systems available to Kiev’s forces, capable of reaching deep behind the front lines, the Kremlin has described the ongoing conflict as nothing short of a proxy war against NATO. President Vladimir Putin has also stated Russia is fighting “the entire Western military machine.”

“..he now regards the Minsk agreements of 2014 and 2015 as a mistake..”

Because they stopped Russia’s advance in the Donbass. They were a trick.

• Putin Confession Suggests Ukraine Conflict Could Last For Years (Trenin)

Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin commented, during a meeting with soldiers’ mothers, that he now regards the Minsk agreements of 2014 and 2015 as a mistake. This concession makes a powerful contribution to the possibilities of peace negotiations to end the fighting in Ukraine. It is worth remembering that in 2014, Putin acted on a mandate from the Russian parliament to use military force “in Ukraine,” not just in Crimea. In fact, Moscow did save the cities of Donetsk and Lugansk from being overrun by Kiev’s army, and defeated Ukraine’s forces, but rather than clearing the whole region of Donbass, Russia stopped, and agreed to a cease-fire brokered in Minsk by Germany and France.

Putin explained to the mothers that at the time, Moscow did not know for sure the sentiments of the Donbass population affected by the conflict, and hoped that Donetsk and Lugansk could somehow be reunited with Ukraine on the conditions laid down in Minsk. Putin might have added – and his own actions, as well as conversations with then-Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko, confirm it – that he was prepared to give the new Kiev authorities a chance to settle the issue and rebuild a relationship with Moscow. Until rather late in the game, Putin also hoped that he could still work things out with the Germans and the French, and the US leadership. Admissions of mistakes are rare among incumbent leaders, but they are important as indicators of lessons they have learned.

This experience has apparently made Putin decide not that the decision to launch the special military operation last February was wrong, but that eight years before, Moscow should not have put any faith in Kiev, Berlin, and Paris, and instead should have relied on its own military might to liberate the Russian-speaking regions of Ukraine. In other words, agreeing to a Minsk-style ceasefire now would be another mistake which would allow Kiev and its backers to better prepare to resume fighting at the time of their choosing. The Russian leader realizes, of course, that many nations in the non-West, those who refused to join the anti-Russian sanctions coalition and profess neutrality on Ukraine, have called for an end to hostilities. From China and India to Indonesia and Mexico, these countries, while generally friendly toward Russia, see their economic prospects being impaired by a conflict that pits Russia against the united West.

The Western media also promote the message that global energy and food security is suffering because of Moscow’s actions. Russia’s arguments and protestations to the contrary have only limited impact, since Russian voices are rarely heard on Middle Eastern, Asian, African, or Latin American airwaves. Be that as it may, Moscow cannot ignore the sentiments of the larger part of humanity, which is now increasingly referred to in Russian expert circles as the Global Majority. Hence, official Russian statements that Moscow is open for dialogue without preconditions. However, any Russian delegation to talks would have to take into account the recent amendments to the country’s Constitution, which name the four former Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson, and Zaporozhye as part of the Russian Federation. As Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has put it, Russia will only negotiate on the basis of existing geopolitical realities. It should be noted that the Kremlin has not retracted the objectives of the military operation, which include the demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine, which means ridding the state and society of ultra-nationalist, anti-Russian elements.

“If America pulls back, Putin could snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.”

• Biden Admin Scrambles To Track $20B In Ukraine Aid As GOP Warn Of Audits (Fox)

President Biden’s administration is scrambling to track the nearly $20 billion in military aid it has sent to Ukraine as Republicans warn of impending audits when they take control of the House in January. Likely future House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has said his party will not be giving Ukraine a “blank check” to fend off Russia’s invasion. A potential audit would determine how much, if any, of the U.S. aid is ending up in the wrong hands. The Biden administration’s previous tracking efforts have inspected only a fraction of the aid provided to the country. The Republican push to ramp up oversight enjoys some bipartisan support in Congress. Some staunch Ukraine allies fear the party will cut off aid to the country entirely, however.

Firebrand Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., has vowed to “hold our government accountable” for Ukraine spending, and some of her colleagues across the aisle are echoing the message. “The taxpayers deserve to know that investment is going where it’s intended to go,” Rep. Jason Crow, D-Colo., told the Washington Post. “In any war, there can be missteps and misallocation of supplies.” The lawmakers agree that current monitoring efforts appear woefully inadequate, with the Biden administration inspecting just 10% of the 22,000 weapons the U.S. has provided to Ukraine between February and November 1, according to the Post. U.S. allies in Europe have expressed hope that Republican skepticism of Ukraine aid will not lead to a widespread cutting of funding, however.

“You’d be playing into Putin’s hands,” U.K. Parliament member Tobias Ellwood said in October. “If America pulls back, Putin could snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.” McCarthy has based his criticism of the aid packages on America’s economic situation as the economy threatens to fall into a recession. “I think people are gonna be sitting in a recession and they’re not going to write a blank check to Ukraine,” McCarthy said last month. “They just won’t do it. … It’s not a free blank check.”

The entire continent is made up of sock puppets.

• EU Gets Tough on China as US Steals European Industry (Gallagher)

European leaders have finally woken up to the fact that Washington is benefitting at their expense with the US/NATO proxy war against Russia in Ukraine. Despite their economies being harmed by Washington, the EU continues to take a much tougher stance against Beijing. NATO leaders are set to meet Nov. 29-30 in Bucharest and will discuss ways to “reduce dependency” on China. At the same time, EU leaders are debating how to deal with their US “ally” coaxing European industry to American shores. Ahead of French President Emmanuel Macron’s visit to Washington, Paris is signaling that Europe would be more willing to go along with a more hardline China stance if the US backs down on efforts to poach European industry with its subsidies in the Inflation Reduction Act.

Yet, there are reasons to believe that’s a dead end, and some Europeans are already waving the white flag. While the EU is suddenly in emergency mode over its industry being wiped out by American rivals – something that’s been obvious to many for months – its focus all year has been on Moscow and Beijing. Here’s a brief roundup of the China focus: The bloc is busy hammering out an Anti-Coercion Instrument, which aims to take countermeasures against outside countries that attempt to pressure bloc states using the member states’ economic dependencies. China, which implemented a de facto trade embargo against Lithuania after it allowed Taiwan to open a liaison office in Vilnius, is widely seen as the primary target of the rule.

European lawmakers are also finalizing new rules to curb acquisitions or bids for public contracts by subsidized foreign companies. Again it is widely believed the rules are aimed primarily at China. It came on the heels of the uproar over Chinese efforts to obtain a controlling stake in a Hamburg port terminal. In the end, Berlin approved a sale of 24.9% of the terminal to Cosco. American companies could also face scrutiny from the new legislation due to the Inflation Reduction Act, which has subsidies for US-based manufacturers of electric cars, batteries and renewable energy products and consumers who buy such American-made products. But it would only apply to American companies if they try to buy EU companies or in public procurement bids and not in the case of EU companies relocating production or building of future factories.

China’s Global Times argues that Europe should blame the US for its decline in competitiveness but doesn’t believe that will be the case: Europe has a kind of concern or fear about the rise of China, which is also consistent with the strategy of containing China pursued by the US, Zhao Junjie, a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences’ Institute of European Studies. [..] He added that this decision by the EU is very unwise, especially when European economic prospects are unclear, as the implementation of trade protectionism and blocking of normal market business behavior will ultimately damage European companies.

Pre-Covid this was seen as following the science. But now things are different. Now it’s just WEF. And people won’t follow that.

• Netherlands To Forcefully Shut Down 3,000 Farms (CS)

To comply with the European Union’s radical climate laws, the Dutch government of World Economic Forum acolyte Mark Rutte will force up to 3,000 farms to shut down for good. Farmers will be made an offer on their farms, which the government claims is “well over” market value. According to nitrogen minister Christianne van der Wal, the government purchase will be compulsory. “There is no better offer coming,” claimed van der Wal. Recent EU nature preservation rules require member states to reduce emissions across sectors of the economy. As one of Europe’s most prominent farming nations, half of the Netherlands’ emissions come from agricultural activity. Rutte has warned that those who refuse to comply could face government force.

When the Dutch government announced a nitrogen fertilizer reduction mandate, the country saw nationwide protests from farmers. Former agricultural minister resigned from his position as a result of the movement. The Dutch farmer protests received international attention, with protests popping up in Canada in support of the uprising. Rutte’s government policies have many observers concerned about the direction he is taking the country. Earlier this month, the country’s finance minister Sigrid Kaag proposed a law to allow banks to spy on transactions of citizens which totaled more than €100. Privacy watchdog Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens called the bill an unprecedented “surveillance of the Dutch” people.

“Biden is accusing Twitter of “spewing lies all across the world” by seeking to reduce one of the largest censorship systems in history.”

• New Twitter Sign Ups Hit All-Time Record Despite Cancel Campaign (Turley)

Since Elon Musk bought Twitter with a pledge to restore free speech protections, the media and political establishment have maintained an unrelenting campaign to use pressure from corporations and foreign governments to force him to restore censorship policies. Reporters have covered seemingly every celebrity declaring that they are leaving the site or even selling their Teslas in protest. As companies joined the boycott, commentators gleefully announced the “death,” “collapse,” and “demise” of the social media company with some mocking Musk’s endangerment of billions for free speech. New figures, however, appear to show that the public is solidly with Musk on the free speech issue. New signups at Twitter are at an all-time high with two million new signups per day.

As these companies and activists demand censorship, customers are signing up in mass to embrace the greater diversity of viewpoints and expression at the company. While companies are yielding to demands from the left that they cut off ad revenue until Musk restores censorship, users are flocking to the site. The over two million new sign-ups per day represent a 66% increase over the same time frame last year, according to figures released by Musk. Of course, it has long been known that the public wants more, not less, free speech. It is the political establishment that is struggling to retain control over speech on social media at any cost. Facebook even tried a massive commercial campaign to convince the public to embrace censorship.

President Joe Biden has led calls for censorship on social media, which have been largely heeded by companies like Facebook and Twitter. Biden is accusing Twitter of “spewing lies all across the world” by seeking to reduce one of the largest censorship systems in history. President Biden has previously accused social media companies of “killing people” by refusing to impose robust censorship over a wide range of subjects. Many of those banned or censored were doctors with opposing views on the data and the science related to the pandemic. Some of those doctors were the co-authors of the Great Barrington Declaration, which advocated for a more focused Covid response that targeted the most vulnerable population rather than widespread lockdowns and mandates.

“It’s not even that they worry about the content. Twitter is a tainted brand, a brand non grata companies don’t want to be associated with..”

• Twitter Owner Musk Signals New ‘War’ Against Apple (AFP)

Twitter owner Elon Musk on Monday opened fire against Apple over its tight control of what is allowed on the App Store, saying the iPhone maker has threatened to oust his recently acquired social media platform. Musk also joined the chorus crying foul over a 30 percent fee Apple collects on transactions via its App Store – the sole gateway for applications to get onto its billion plus mobile devices. A series of tweets fired off by Musk included a meme of a car with his first name on it veering onto a highway off-ramp labeled “Go to War,” instead of continuing onwards towards “Pay 30%.” The billionaire CEO also tweeted that Apple has “threatened to withhold Twitter from its App Store, but won’t tell us why.” Both Apple and Google require social networking services on their app stores to have effective systems for moderating harmful or abusive content.

But since taking over Twitter last month, Musk has cut around half of Twitter’s workforce, including many employees tasked with fighting disinformation, while an unknown number of others have voluntarily quit. He has also reinstated previously banned accounts, including that of former president Donald Trump. Yoel Roth, the former head of trust and safety at Twitter who left after Musk took over, wrote in a New York Times op-ed that “failure to adhere to Apple’s and Google’s guidelines would be catastrophic,” and risk “expulsion from their app stores.” Describing himself as a “free speech absolutist,” Musk believes that all content permitted by law should be allowed on Twitter, and on Monday described his actions as a “revolution against online censorship in America.”

He also tweeted that he planned to publish “Twitter Files on free speech suppression,” but without clarifying what data he had in mind to share with the public. Though Musk says Twitter is seeing record high engagement with him at the helm, his approach has startled the company’s major moneymaker — advertisers. In recent weeks, half of Twitter’s top 100 advertisers have announced they are suspending or have otherwise “seemingly stopped advertising on Twitter,” an analysis conducted by nonprofit watchdog group Media Matters found. Musk on Monday accused Apple of also having “mostly stopped advertising on Twitter.” “Do they hate free speech in America?” he asked, before replying with a tweet tagging Apple CEO Tim Cook.

In the first three months of 2022, Apple was the top advertiser on Twitter, spending some $48 million on ads which accounted for more than 4 percent of the social media platform’s revenue, according to a Washington Post report citing an internal Twitter document. Sarah Roberts, an information studies expert at University of California, Los Angeles, told AFP that “Musk didn’t understand that Twitter itself was a brand, had cachet.” “Now companies don’t even want to be associated with it. It’s not even that they worry about the content. Twitter is a tainted brand, a brand non grata companies don’t want to be associated with,” she added.

The swamp is putrid.

“..he watched a live-feed of Assange’s arrest from the Operations Room at the top of the Foreign Office alongside Pelican personnel. After Assange had been imprisoned in Belmarsh, Duncan had a drinks party at his office for the Pelican team.”

• UK Deployed 15 Staff On Secret Operation To Seize Julian Assange (Dec.uk)

The British government assigned at least 15 people to the secret operation to seize Julian Assange from the Ecuadorian embassy in London, new information shows. The WikiLeaks founder was given political asylum by Ecuador in 2012, but was never allowed safe passage out of Britain to avoid persecution by the US government. The Australian journalist has been in Belmarsh maximum security prison for the past three and a half years and faces a potential 175-year sentence after the UK High Court greenlighted his extradition to the US in December 2021. ‘Pelican’ was the secret Metropolitan Police operation to seize Assange from his asylum, which eventually occurred in April 2019. Asylum is a right enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The operation’s existence was only revealed in the memoirs of former foreign minister Sir Alan Duncan which were published last year.

The UK government routinely blocks, or obfuscates its answers to, information requests about the Assange case. But the Cabinet Office recently told parliament it had seven officials working on Operation Pelican. The department’s role is to “support the Prime Minister and ensure the effective running of government”, but it also has national security and intelligence functions. [..] Other government ministries refused to say if they had staff working on Pelican, including the Ministry of Justice (MoJ). The MoJ is in charge of courts in England and Wales, where Assange’s extradition case is currently deciding whether to hear an appeal. It is also in control of its prisons, including Belmarsh maximum security jail where Assange is incarcerated. When asked if any of its staff were assigned to Pelican, the MoJ claimed: “The information requested could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.”

Sir Alan Duncan, foreign minister for the Americas from 2016-19, was the key UK official in the diplomatic negotiations between the UK and Ecuador to get Assange out of the embassy. In his memoirs he wrote that he watched a live-feed of Assange’s arrest from the Operations Room at the top of the Foreign Office alongside Pelican personnel. After Assange had been imprisoned in Belmarsh, Duncan had a drinks party at his office for the Pelican team. “I gave them each a signed photo which we took in the Ops Room on the day, with a caption saying ‘Julian Assange’s Special Brexit Team 11th April 2019’”, he wrote. Ecuador’s president from 2007-17, Rafael Correa, recently told Declassified he granted Assange asylum because the Australian journalist “didn’t have any possibility of a fair legal process in the United States.”

Given all of the Guardian’s efforts to paint Assange as a traitor, writing such letters takes gall.

• Media Groups Urge US To Drop Julian Assange Charges (G.)

Twelve years ago, on November 28th 2010, our five international media outlets – the New York Times, the Guardian, Le Monde, El País and Der Spiegel – published a series of revelations in cooperation with WikiLeaks that made the headlines around the globe. “Cablegate”, a set of 251,000 confidential cables from the US state department, disclosed corruption, diplomatic scandals and spy affairs on an international scale. In the words of the New York Times, the documents told “the unvarnished story of how the government makes its biggest decisions, the decisions that cost the country most heavily in lives and money”. Even now in 2022, journalists and historians continue to publish new revelations, using the unique trove of documents.

For Julian Assange, publisher of WikLeaks, the publication of “Cablegate” and several other related leaks had the most severe consequences. On April 12th 2019, Assange was arrested in London on a US arrest warrant, and has now been held for three and a half years in a high-security British prison usually used for terrorists and members of organised crime groups. He faces extradition to the US and a sentence of up to 175 years in an American maximum-security prison. This group of editors and publishers, all of whom had worked with Assange, felt the need to publicly criticise his conduct in 2011 when unredacted copies of the cables were released, and some of us are concerned about the allegations in the indictment that he attempted to aid in computer intrusion of a classified database.

But we come together now to express our grave concerns about the continued prosecution of Julian Assange for obtaining and publishing classified materials. The Obama-Biden administration, in office during the WikiLeaks publication in 2010, refrained from indicting Assange, explaining that they would have had to indict journalists from major news outlets too. Their position placed a premium on press freedom, despite its uncomfortable consequences. Under Donald Trump however, the position changed. The DoJ relied on an old law, the Espionage Act of 1917 (designed to prosecute potential spies during world war one), which has never been used to prosecute a publisher or broadcaster. This indictment sets a dangerous precedent, and threatens to undermine America’s first amendment and the freedom of the press.

Obtaining and disclosing sensitive information when necessary in the public interest is a core part of the daily work of journalists. If that work is criminalised, our public discourse and our democracies are made significantly weaker. Twelve years after the publication of “Cablegate”, it is time for the US government to end its prosecution of Julian Assange for publishing secrets. Publishing is not a crime.

The editors and publishers of:
The New York Times
The Guardian
Le Monde
Der Spiegel
El País

Julian Assange speaking in 2011: "We need a Cablegate for the CIA, we need a Cablegate for the SVR [Russian intelligence], we need a #Cablegate of the New York Times, actually, to see all the stories they're censoring…" #Cablegate12 #FreeAssangeNOW pic.twitter.com/MjhU44tVOU

— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) November 28, 2022

You have 2 cows
https://twitter.com/i/status/1597106643329687552

Kitty tail
https://twitter.com/i/status/1597423159367847936

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Debt Rattle December 8 2021

Dec 082021

December 8, 2021 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 9:29 am Finance Tagged with: Apple, boosters, breakthrough, FDA, Green Pass, mandate, NIH, Omarova, Omicron, Pfizer, Ukraine, WHO 81 Responses »

Gustave Caillebotte Paris Street, Rainy Day 1884

• Judge Blocks Biden’s Vaccine Mandate For Federal Contractors Nationwide (JTN)

• South Africa Healthcare Chief Says Omicron May Signal the End of COVID-19 (SN)

• Green Pass and COVID-19 Vaccine Booster Shots in Israel (SSRN)

• Beyond Omicron: What’s Next For Covid’s Viral Evolution (Nature)

• SARS-CoV-2 Breakthrough Infections In Vaccinated Individuals (Nature)

• WHO Europe Says Covid Vaccine Mandates Should Be ‘Last Resort’ (Y!)

• Vaccine-Resistant Mutations Correlate Strongly With Vaccination Rates (NIH)

• Study Shows Omicron Variant Partially Evades Vaccine’s Protection (GR)

• FDA Wants Until at Least 2096 to Fully Release Pfizer’s Vaccine Data (Siri)

• New NIH Records Reveal Information About Research Into Coronavirus (JW)

• Controversial Biden Banking Nominee Omarova Bows Out (JTN)

• Apple Signed Secret $275 Billion Deal With Chinese Government (ZH)

• Putin To Biden: ‘Finlandize’ Ukraine, Or We Will (Pat Buchanan)

EU ministers conference: After February 1, free travel in all of EU for every citizen who’s had a booster shot within 9 months of their second shot.

BUT: people already know the Omicron shot is supposed to come in 100 days.

Yeah, the unvaxxed occupy all hospital beds… Just not in Wales?!

The judge ruled that federal contractors nationwide are no longer subject to Biden’s vaccine mandate.

This prevents a lot of misery.

• Judge Blocks Biden’s Vaccine Mandate For Federal Contractors Nationwide (JTN)

A U.S. district court judge blocked the Biden administration on Tuesday from enforcing a COVID-19 vaccine mandate on employees of government contractors across the nation. This conservative win adds to a string of losses for President Joe Biden in federal courts. Southern District of Georgia Judge R. Stan Baker ruled in favor of multiple contractors across seven states – Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, South Carolina, Utah and West Virginia. A district judge in Kentucky last week issued a preliminary injunction prohibiting the Biden administration from enforcing their vaccine mandate on contractors, but it only applied to three states – Kentucky, Ohio and Tennessee. Because one of the plaintiffs in the Georgia decision, Associated Builders and Contractors, Inc., is a trade group with members across the United States, Baker’s decision applies nationwide.

Baker, a Trump appointee, wrote that the plaintiffs “will likely succeed in their claim that the President exceeded the authorization given to him by Congress” when Biden issued an executive order on Sept. 9 mandating federal contractors to receive COVID-19 vaccines. The White House announced last month that it was delaying federal contractors’ vaccine mandate deadline until January, not December as previously planned. Last week the Biden administration also pushed back its deadline requiring federal workers to be vaccinated. Federal workers now have until January to be vaccinated. A federal judge in Louisiana issued a preliminary injunction earlier this month to stop “Biden’s national vaccine mandate for healthcare workers,” Just the News reported.

“There have been zero deaths from Omicron worldwide and in countries like the UK it hasn’t even caused anyone to be hospitalized.”

• South Africa Healthcare Chief Says Omicron May Signal the End of COVID-19 (SN)

The CEO of South Africa’s largest private healthcare network says that the Omicron variant is “so mild” that it “may signal the end of COVID-19.” According to Richard Friedland, chief executive officer of Netcare Ltd., the early days of the variant suggest there is absolutely no need to panic and that it might actually be a good thing. “If in the second and third wave we’d seen these levels of positivity to tests conducted, we would have seen very significant increases in hospital admissions and we’re not seeing that. In our primary care clinics it is mainly people under 30-years-old,” he said. “So I actually think there is a silver lining here and this may signal the end of Covid-19, with it attenuating itself to such an extent that it’s highly contagious, but doesn’t cause severe disease. That’s what happened with Spanish flu.”

“We are seeing breakthrough infections of people who have been vaccinated, but the infections we’re seeing are very mild to moderate. So for health care workers who have had boosters, it’s mostly mild. I think this whole thing has been so poorly communicated and so much panic generated.” Friedland’s comments won’t be welcomed by Big Pharma, which continues to make vast profits from endless booster vaccines. Not will his remarks be amplified by the corporate media, which has enjoyed a huge boost in ratings from endless COVID fearmongering. However, the CEO’s statement correlates with what other health experts on the ground in South Africa have said about Omicron.

The doctor who first discovered the variant says the it is “mild” and hasn’t caused an uptick in hospitalizations. Angelique Coetzee, chair of the South African Medical Association, echoed Dr. Barry Schoub’s sentiments, noting that the patients infected with omicron had “symptoms (that) were so different and so mild from those I had treated before.” There have been zero deaths from Omicron worldwide and in countries like the UK it hasn’t even caused anyone to be hospitalized.

Twitter comments: “Notably, the new Israel booster study finds highly negative VE for the first month after booster administered and only afterwards turns positive which makes overall VE low (35% for first 3 months).”

“This says vaccines not very effective for first three months, but boosters are being recommended at 3 months intervals for some. So right when they become most effective, get another one? Maybe I’m not understanding.”

• Green Pass and COVID-19 Vaccine Booster Shots in Israel (SSRN)

The paper describes an analysis based on data published on November 1, 2021, by the Israeli Ministry of Health (MOH) on its control dashboard about returning Israelis through the national airport. The data include the respective numbers of Vaccinated and Unvaccinated individuals and the number of positive COVID-19 cases identified in each group. These reflect the modified definitions of Vaccinated and Unvaccinated status after the Pfizer booster vaccination campaign in Israel (August-October). In particular, to maintain a Vaccinated status and specifically the “Green Pass”, individuals who received the initial 2 doses more than 6 months ago were required to receive the booster vaccine.

Israel national airport is a unique setting, where the Vaccinated and Unvaccinated individuals all have to test, which allows a more objective assessment of both the booster and Green Pass efficacy in preventing infections. The analysis suggests that the positivity rate (number of cases divided by number of tests) among the Vaccinated cohort throughout August-October is only 1.54-fold smaller than the one among the Unvaccinated cohort (about 35% relative protection). More specifically, compared to the Unvaccinated group, the Vaccinated group has a significantly higher positivity rate during the month of August, then in September it shows a 3.45-fold smaller positivity rate (71% relative protection), and this protection decreases to 2.66-fold (62% protection) during October.

The analysis suggests that the relative protection of the booster shot against infection is likely to be significantly smaller than the initial estimates of 10-11-fold (over 90%) reported by the MOH, probably around 60% at best. This also implies that the absolute number of infected individuals in the Vaccinated group is likely to be at least as high as in the Unvaccinated, raising serious concerns that the new Green Pass is inefficient in preventing infection spread, and could expose high risk individuals to risk.

Two long and detailed articles from Nature. Which leave me with the impression that they’re more sophisticated sales jobs for the vaccines.

• Beyond Omicron: What’s Next For Covid’s Viral Evolution (Nature)

Delta and its descendants now account for the vast majority of COVID-19 cases worldwide. Most researchers expected these Delta lineages to eventually outcompete the last holdouts. But Omicron has undermined those predictions. “A lot of us were expecting the next weird variant to be a child of Delta, and this is a bit of a wild card,” says Aris Katzourakis, a specialist in viral evolution at the University of Oxford, UK. Teams in Botswana and South Africa identified the variant in late November — although researchers say it is unlikely to have originated in either country — and health officials have linked it to a rapidly growing outbreak centred in South Africa’s Gauteng province. The variant harbours around 30 changes to spike, many shared with the other variants of concern, and scientists worldwide are working to gauge the threat it poses.

The swift rise in cases of Omicron in South Africa suggests that the new variant has a fitness advantage over Delta, says Tom Wenseleers, an evolutionary biologist and biostatistician at the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium. Omicron carries some of the mutations associated with Delta’s sky-high infectivity. But if increased infectivity were the sole reason for its rapid growth, it would translate to an R0 in the 30s, Wenseleers says. “That’s very implausible.” Instead, he and other researchers suspect that Omicron’s rise may be largely due to its ability to infect people who are immune to Delta through vaccination or previous infection.

Scientists’ portrait of Omicron is still blurry and it will take weeks before they can fully assess its properties. But if the variant is spreading, in part, because of its ability to evade immunity, it fits in with theoretical predictions about how SARS-CoV-2 is likely to evolve, says Sarah Cobey, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Chicago in Illinois. As gains in SARS-CoV-2’s infectivity start to slow, the virus will have to maintain its fitness through overcoming immune responses, says Cobey. For instance, if a mutation or set of mutations halved a vaccine’s ability to block transmission, this could vastly increase the number of available hosts in a population. Cobey says it’s hard to imagine that any future gains in infectivity could provide the same boost.

That evolutionary path, towards immune evasion and away from gains in infectivity, is common among established respiratory viruses such as influenza says Adam Kucharski, a mathematical epidemiologist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. “The easiest way for the virus to cause new epidemics is to evade immunity over time. That’s similar to what we see with the seasonal coronaviruses.”

Oh yeah, boosters!

• SARS-CoV-2 Breakthrough Infections In Vaccinated Individuals (Nature)

Vaccines against viruses work by generating immune responses that inhibit the infection process (mainly serum antibodies that bind and/or neutralize virus particles and, for mucosally applied vaccines, also mucosal secretory IgA) and by creating immune memory in the form of antigen-specific memory B cells and T cells that are primed to produce a rapid anamnestic response when the infection reintroduces the vaccine antigen into the body. These mechanisms can prevent initial proliferation of the virus or, failing that, rapidly control it, reducing the amount of virus to which the host is ultimately exposed and the duration of the exposure. While the amount of circulating antibody present following vaccination (or any antigenic stimulus) increases rapidly, on a timescale of days to weeks, it also declines rapidly from its peak on a timescale of weeks to months, and then more slowly over a time scale of decades.

The first phase reflects antibody secreted by short-lived plasmablast populations, which expand right after antigen exposure as a first line of defense. They typically die within 1–2 weeks after antigen exposure and the antibody they secreted declines based on the specific antibody half-life (approximately 21 days for IgG). The second, usually very slow, phase of decline likely reflects the kinetics of long-lived plasma cells, which migrate to the bone marrow and from there secrete antibody into the blood, often maintaining stable titres for many years. Importantly, although peripherally injected vaccines can induce low levels of IgG and monomeric IgA antibodies at the mucosal surfaces of the upper respiratory tract (which are the main entry portal for respiratory viruses) they do not induce secretory IgA efficientl2. The small proportions of IgG and IgA that land on the mucosal surfaces of the upper respiratory tract after intramuscular vaccination disappear relatively quickly as serum antibodies wane.

Whether a breakthrough infection occurs when a vaccinated host is exposed to an infectious person depends on whether the immune response present in that person at the moment of exposure is sufficient to abort or rapidly control the infection (Fig. 1). Given the kinetics of immune responses, it is not surprising that the amount of protection offered by a vaccine against infection might decline over time, allowing more breakthrough infections as the immune response wanes over months (as observed for influenza virus vaccines) and/or as immune memory wanes over years (as observed for mumps vaccines). Likewise, protection might increase after a breakthrough infection or after a subsequent vaccine dose, which enhances the person’s immune response. It is also unsurprising that older individuals, whose neutralizing antibody responses to COVID-19 vaccines are typically lower, appear to be at greater risk of breakthrough infections at any given time following vaccination.

Covid has exposed the WHO as a failed entity.

• WHO Europe Says Covid Vaccine Mandates Should Be ‘Last Resort’ (Y!)

The World Health Organization (WHO) in Europe on Tuesday cautioned against making Covid vaccines mandatory, while urging better protection of children among whom cases are high. Europe is battling a fierce surge in the pandemic, with the WHO registering 120,000 Covid-related deaths on the continent since November 23 when it warned of up to 500,000 more deaths by March 2022. Regional director Hans Kluge said compulsory vaccines should be “an absolute last resort and only applicable when all other feasible options to improve vaccination uptake have been exhausted”. Noting that mandates have increased vaccine uptake in some cases, Kluge said these were “context specific”, and added that the effect mandates may have on “public confidence and public trust” must also be considered.

The regional health bloc also noted that the number of cases had increased “across all age groups, with the highest rates currently observed in the five to 14 years age group.” “It is not unusual today to see two to three times higher incidence among young children than in the average population,” Kluge told a press conference. “The health risks extend beyond the children themselves,” Kluge added, noting that children risk passing the infection to parents and grandparents in the home. Improved ventilation and the use of masks should be a standard at all primary schools as part of a safe learning environment, while avoiding school closures and remote learning, the regional director said. “Vaccinating children should be discussed and considered nationally,” Kluge added.

The WHO’s European region comprises 53 countries and territories, and includes several in Central Asia. The organisation also expressed concern about rising cases of the recently discovered Omicron variant of the virus, but stressed that the fight should still be focused on the currently dominant Delta variant. “The problem now is Delta and however we succeed against Delta today is a win over Omicron tomorrow, before it eventually surges,” Kluge said. Meanwhile in Norway, where 29 cases of the Omicron variant have been confirmed, health authorities warned that the new variant would likely add to the stress on health services to a “significant degree”.

Is anybody tracking this on a broad scale?

• Vaccine-Resistant Mutations Correlate Strongly With Vaccination Rates (NIH)

The importance of understanding SARS-CoV-2 evolution cannot be overlooked. Recent studies confirm that natural selection is the dominating mechanism of SARS-CoV-2 evolution, which favors mutations that strengthen viral infectivity. Here, we demonstrate that vaccine-breakthrough or antibody-resistant mutations provide a new mechanism of viral evolution. Specifically, vaccine-resistant mutation Y449S in the spike (S) protein receptor-binding domain, which occurred in co-mutations Y449S and N501Y, has reduced infectivity compared to that of the original SARS-CoV-2 but can disrupt existing antibodies that neutralize the virus.

By tracking the evolutionary trajectories of vaccine-resistant mutations in more than 2.2 million SARS-CoV-2 genomes, we reveal that the occurrence and frequency of vaccine-resistant mutations correlate strongly with the vaccination rates in Europe and America. We anticipate that as a complementary transmission pathway, vaccine-breakthrough or antibody-resistant mutations, like those in Omicron, will become a dominating mechanism of SARS-CoV-2 evolution when most of the world’s population is either vaccinated or infected. Our study sheds light on SARS-CoV-2 evolution and transmission and enables the design of the next-generation mutation-proof vaccines and antibody drugs.

Trying to confuse natural immunity and vaccine “protection”.

• Study Shows Omicron Variant Partially Evades Vaccine’s Protection (GR)

Researchers studying the effects of Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine on the Omicron variant announced on Tuesday that the variant is partially capable of evading the vaccine’s protection. The team, which has been working in South Africa since the discovery of the new variant, said that those who have recovered from Covid and are fully vaccinated, as well as those who have received a booster shot, are well protected against the variant. The team conducted tests in lab dishes with samples from a dozen people who were fully vaccinated with Pfizer’s vaccine. The results indicated that Omicron is capable of escaping the vaccine’s protection– but only partially.

“There is a very large drop in neutralization of Omicron by BNT162b2 [Pfizer/BioNTech] immunity relative to ancestral virus,” said Alex Sigal, the study’s lead author, on Twitter. Sigal works for the Africa Health Research Institute in Durban. “Omicron escape from BNT162b2 neutralization is incomplete. Previous infection + vaccination still neutralizes,” Sigal said. Sigal told CNN that these results were much better than what he and his team had expected: “I thought this news was very positive. I expected worse,” Sigal said in an interview. Many experts were expecting Omicron to almost completely bypass the protection of vaccines. “This is not a variant that has completely escaped. It certainly escapes. It is certainly bad. But it looks to me like there are ways of dealing with it.”

The study analyzed human lung cells and blood to find their results. It has yet to be peer-reviewed. “Previous infection, followed by vaccination or booster, is likely to increase the neutralization level and likely confer protection from severe disease in Omicron infection,” the study read. Some of the samples had a 41-fold reduction in neutralizing antibodies deployed against the Omicron compared to the levels of antibodies present in earlier Covid-19 variants. But Sigal said that that number is fluid and subject to change with further tests and variables, including if the person had been previously infected. The news comes as evidence is mounting that Omicron may be producing less severe infections than previous Covid-19 variants, like Delta.

On Saturday, the South African Medical Research Council published a report about an Omicron-driven outbreak in the Tshwane district in South Africa’s northern Gauteng Province, one of the first areas in the world where Omicron has overtaken Delta as the dominant strain. The researchers wrote that in the last two weeks there has been an “exponential” rise in caseloads, but significantly, the surge has not corresponded to a significant uptick in hospitalizations and deaths. “The relatively low number of COVID-19 pneumonia hospitalizations in the general, high care, and ICU wards constitutes a very different picture compared to the beginning of previous waves,” the report said, examining data from the Steve Biko and Tshwane District Hospital complex.

How does “never” sound to you? Just dump Pfizer, it’s the only way out of the pandemic.

• FDA Wants Until at Least 2096 to Fully Release Pfizer’s Vaccine Data (Siri)

A prior post explained that the FDA has asked a federal judge to make the public wait until the year 2076 to disclose all of the data and information it relied upon to license Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine. Literally, a 55-year delay. My firm, on behalf of PHMPT, asked that this information be disclosed in 108 days – the same amount of time it took for the FDA to review and license Pfizer’s vaccine. The Court ordered the parties to submit briefs in support of their respective positions by December 6, 2021. The FDA’s brief, incredibly, doubles down. It now effectively asks to have until at least 2096 to produce the Pfizer documents. Not a typo. A total of at least 75 years. Other than producing an initial ~12,000 pages in around two months, the FDA thereafter only wants to commit to producing 500 pages per month. The FDA also disclosed that it actually has approximately at least 451,000 pages to produce.*

Each side gets to file response briefs on December 13, 2021, and then there is oral argument on December 14, 2021 before the Judge. If you want to read the response to the FDA’s position, a copy of the introduction in the brief my firm filed is below. And below that, a downloadable copy of each side’s full briefing is available. Enjoy. And if you find what you are reading difficult to believe – that is because it is dystopian for the government to give Pfizer billions, mandate Americans to take its product, prohibit Americans from suing for harms, but yet refuse to let Americans see the data underlying its licensure. The lesson yet again is that civil and individual rights should never be contingent upon a medical procedure.

Why is all this stuff heavily redacted? Who has the right to be kept secret, and what is that based on?

• New NIH Records Reveal Information About Research Into Coronavirus (JW)

Judicial Watch announced today that it received 221 pages of records from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) which include a grant application for research involving the coronavirus that was submitted in 2018. The grant application appears to describe “gain of function” research involving RNA extractions from bats, experiments on viruses, attempts to develop a chimeric virus and efforts to genetically manipulate the full-length bat SARSr-CoV WIV1 strain molecular clone. The documents were obtained by Judicial Watch through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit for records of communications, contracts and agreements with the Wuhan Institute of Virology. The lawsuit specifically requests records about National Institute of Health (NIH) grants that benefitted the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

On January 27, 2020, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) official David Morens emailed Chief of Staff Greg Folkers in a heavily redacted thread, writing: “[S]ome background on our support of the Ecohealth group (Peter Daszak et al), which has for years been among the biggest players in coronavirus work, also in collaboration with Ralph Baric, Ian Lipkin and others. [Redacted]”. NIAID has been funding Peter’s group for coronavirus work in China for the past 5 years through [grant] R011R01A|110964: “Understanding the Risk of Bat Coronavirus Emergence.” That’s now been renewed, with a specific focus to identify cohorts of people highly exposed to bats in China, and work out if they’re getting sick from CoVs.… Collaborators include Wuhan Institute of Virology (currently working on the nCoV) and Ralph Baric.

The results of the work to date include: • [Redacted] • Discovered Swine Acute Diarrheal Syndrome Virus (SADS-CoV) killing >25,000 pigs in Guangdong Province (Published in Nature) • Found SARS-related CoVs that can bind to human cells (Published in Nature), and that cause SARS-like disease in humanized mouse models. • [Redacted] Also, prior to the above R01, Peter’s folks worked under an R01 with Eun-Park as Program Officer on viral discovery in bats, and originally identified SARS-CoV as having a likely origin in bats (published in Science). Folkers forwards the message to Anthony Fauci and others.

In a “Notice of Award” dated July 13, 2020, the NIH increased the amount of NIH money going to Peter Daszak’s firm, EcoHealth Alliance, by $369,819 with a project period that runs from June 1, 2014, through June 30, 2025, for Daszak’s project “Understanding the Risk of Bat Coronavirus Emergence.” EcoHealth was to receive $637,980 in each of the years 2019 through 2024 under the grant.

Did they really think they could push through Marx in the US?

• Controversial Biden Banking Nominee Omarova Bows Out (JTN)

Cornell Law Professor Saule Omarova withdrew her nomination for comptroller of the currency following Senate Republicans voicing concerns about her Marxist ties. In Omarova’s withdrawal letter posted Tuesday by the White House, she wrote that while it was an honor to be nominated by President Joe Biden, “it is no longer tenable” for her to continue as a nominee and ultimately lead the agency in charge of regulating American banks. Biden responded that he accepts Omarova’s withdrawal, and says she “was subjected to inappropriate personal attacks that were far beyond the pale.” Biden described his former nominee as “a strong advocate for consumers and a staunch defender of the safety and soundness of our financial system” who would have “brought invaluable insight and perspective to our important work on behalf of the American people.”

Republicans, moderate Democrats and banking industry officials disagreed with Biden’s nomination. Omarova, a Kazakh native educated in the USSR, was under scrutiny for a history of leftist statements, as previously reported by Just the News. In 2019, she tweeted, “Until I came to the US, I couldn’t imagine that things like gender pay gap still existed in today’s world. Say what you will about old USSR, there was no gender pay gap there. Market doesn’t always ‘know best.'” A video surfaced earlier this year of the Moscow State University alumna cheering for oil and gas companies to go bankrupt. Gov. Greg Abbott (R-Texas) responded by calling on Biden to withdrawal Omarova’s nomination. As recently as October of this year, a paper by Omarova was published titled, “The People’s Ledger: How to Democratize Money and Finance the Economy.”

The professor called for “replacing commercial bank reserve accounts with universally available deposit accounts” so “all U.S. citizens and law-abiding citizens and lawful residents, local governments, nonbanking firms and nonbusiness entities” can bank at the Federal Reserve. Her proposed plan would have the Federal Reserve take money from these accounts when “it is necessary to expand the money supply in order to stimulate economic activity.” Her thesis at Moscow State University was “Karl Marx’s Economic Analysis and the Theory of Revolution in The Capital,” but she declined to provide it to the Senate Banking Committee to review.

No word on what is in the deal. Over a quarter of a trillion dollars.

• Apple Signed Secret $275 Billion Deal With Chinese Government (ZH)

Investors and journalists have been openly questioning whether Apple CEO Tim Cook, once praised for his deep-rooted connections within the CCP, has allowed his relationships in China to sour as the US has stepped up criticisms over human rights – treatment of the Uyghers in Xinjiang and elsewhere – and Taiwan. These ties have grown intensely controversial, eliciting criticism from lawmakers, rivals and even the company’s own employees. And just as the SEC prepares to boot dozens of Chinese companies off of US stock exchanges for refusing to comply with US audit standards (something the CCP has expressly forbidden under the auspices of data privacy), reporters with the Information have just published a bombshell: At some point in the not-too-distant past, Cook struck a $275 billion deal with the Chinese government while facing pressure from the CCP.

The deal emerged after a series of meetings between Cook and Chinese officials back in 2016. China is Apple’s second-biggest market after the US, and has long been targeted as a critical market for growth. Apple’s iPhones have seen growing popularity despite rising tensions with the US. This year, Apple became the second-biggest smartphone maker in China. The deal, which was forged over the span of years, represents a five-year plan, according to documents from inside Apple that have been seen by the Information. Whether talks on another five-year plan are in the works isn’t yet clear.

The fact that Apple never disclosed this deal to the US – it’s only just now being publicied – will likely trigger an angry response from lawmakers, who are bound to question Apple’s loyalty to the US, along with whether it prioritized profits and growth over respecting human rights (so much for all that climate virtue signaling). Before the deal was struck, documents show, Apple executives were scrambling to salvage their relationship with Chinese officials, who had accused Apple of not contributing enough to the local economy. Amid the government crackdown and the bad publicity that accompanied it, iPhone sales plummeted, though they have since bounced back.

Yesh, just try and put US missiles on Ukraine soil. Buchanan’s view is from the Cold War.

• Putin To Biden: ‘Finlandize’ Ukraine, Or We Will (Pat Buchanan)

Either the U.S. and NATO provide us with “legal guarantees” that Ukraine will never join NATO or become a base for weapons that can threaten Russia — or we will go in and guarantee it ourselves. This is the message Russian President Vladimir Putin is sending, backed by the 100,000 troops Russia has amassed on Ukraine’s borders. At the Kremlin last week, Putin drew his red line: “The threat on our western borders is … rising, as we have said multiple times. … In our dialogue with the United States and its allies, we will insist on developing concrete agreements prohibiting any further eastward expansion of NATO and the placement there of weapons systems in the immediate vicinity of Russian territory.” That comes close to an ultimatum. And NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg backhanded the President of Russia for issuing it:

“It’s only Ukraine and 30 NATO allies that decide when Ukraine is ready to join NATO. … Russia has no veto, Russia has no say, and Russia has no right to establish a sphere of influence trying to control their neighbors.” Yet, great powers have always established spheres of influence. Chinese President Xi Jinping claims virtually the entire South China Sea that is bordered by half a dozen nations. For 200 years, the United States has declared a Monroe Doctrine that puts our hemisphere off-limits to new colonizations. Moreover, Putin wants to speak to the real decider of the question as to whether Ukraine joins NATO or receives weapons that can threaten Russia. And the decider is not Jens Stoltenberg but President Joe Biden.

In the missile crisis of 60 years ago, the U.S., with its “quarantine” of Cuba and strategic and tactical superiority in the Caribbean, forced Nikita Khrushchev to pull his intermediate-range ballistic missiles, which could reach Washington, off of Fidel Castro’s island. If it did not do so, Moscow was led to understand, we would use our air and naval supremacy to destroy his missiles and send in the Marines to finish the job. Accepting a counteroffer for the U.S. withdrawal of Jupiter missiles from Turkey, Khrushchev complied with President John F. Kennedy’s demand. Russia’s missiles came out. And Kennedy was seen as having won a Cold War victory. Now it is we who are being told to comply with Russia’s demands in Ukraine, or Russia will go in to Ukraine and neutralize the threat itself.

When the Warsaw Pact collapsed and the USSR came apart three decades ago, Russia withdrew all of its military forces from Central and Eastern Europe. Moscow believed it had an agreed-upon understanding with the Americans. Under the deal, the two Germanys would be reunited. Russian troops would be removed from East Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria and Romania. And there would be no NATO expansion into Eastern Europe. If America made that commitment, it was a promise broken. For, within 20 years, NATO had brought every Warsaw Pact nation into the alliance along with the former Soviet republics of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. Neocons and Republican hawks such as the late John McCain sought to bring Ukraine and two other ex-Soviet republics, Georgia and Moldova, into NATO.

Putin, who served in the KGB in the late Soviet era and calls the breakup of the USSR the “greatest geopolitical catastrophe” of the 20th century, is now saying: Enough is enough. Translation: “Thus far and no further! Ukraine is not going to be a member of NATO or a military ally and partner of the United States, nor a base for weapons that can strike Russia in minutes. For us, that crosses a red line. And if NATO proceeds with arming Ukraine for conflict with Russia, we reserve the right to act first. Finlandize Ukraine, or we will!”

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