Edward Hopper Rooms By The Sea 1951
NATO
Now everything is clear – this is a new NATO strategy — not to defeat Russia, but to convince it that it is losing.
"The sooner we can convince Moscow that it will not win on the battlefield, the sooner we will be able to reach a peace agreement in which Russia understands that… pic.twitter.com/8TJ9RcrPzy
— Victor vicktop55 (@vicktop55) April 3, 2024
Sickos
Here’s 2 and a half minutes straight of Democrats explicitly calling for political v*olence. Biden hasn’t denounced them. pic.twitter.com/mbGYXTWAN7 https://t.co/0FABva6m4p
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) April 3, 2024
Neilsen
https://twitter.com/i/status/1775307290289061994
2001
2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY was released 56 years ago today. Acclaimed as one of the most influential films to come out of Hollywood and a Stanley Kubrick masterpiece, the story of how it came to the screen is as mind-boggling as the Stargate…
1/57 pic.twitter.com/7LoAwMOkwN
— All The Right Movies (@ATRightMovies) April 3, 2024
Let’s check our terminology. Is this the Deep State or just the Democratic party? Or is that now the same? And moreover:
“It is becoming difficult to argue that the U.S. judicial system has not become a political arm of the Democratic Party..”
“Nations are either based on the rule of law or the rules dictated by the powerful.”
• Deep State Goes After Trump and Musk’s Financial Assets-Who’s Next? (ET)
Is America as we know it over? Are we in the middle—or perhaps the end—of the transition from a national republic to a single-party regime that rules by fiat instead of law? If we look at what’s happening to two, high-profile cases, the answer is less than comforting. It is becoming difficult to argue that the U.S. judicial system has not become a political arm of the Democratic Party. Nations are either based on the rule of law or the rules dictated by the powerful. The former is meant to restrain, or better said, eliminate the possibility of the latter. But, as we’ve witnessed with the relentless political persecution of former President Donald Trump and, lately, of Elon Musk, laws only work when they’re fairly applied and enforced. Neither of those things are happening with President Trump or Mr. Musk. President Trump was found guilty of fraud by a left-wing judge who determined this without considering, or despite, mountains of evidence to the contrary.
The New York Attorney General Letitia James accused President Trump of over-valuing his real estate to obtain loans. Coincidentally, Ms. James ran for the office of attorney general in 2018 with the campaign pledge to go after Trump, showing clear political animus toward President Trump. What’s more, Judge Arthur Engoron has been accused by Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York of violating “political giving rules with financial contributions to Democrats as recently as 2018, and ignored a decision on the appropriate statute of limitations in the case,” according to NBC News. Ms. James prosecuted President Trump in a civil trial, which was by design; criminal court cases require a trial by jury and proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Somehow, Deutsche Bank was “defrauded” by President Trump into lending him hundreds of millions of dollars on a property, the value of which the bank determined by their own analysis. Talk about shifty business dealings.
Then, after a period of time, the former president had the audacity to sell the property at over $130 million profit and then pay the loan back, with interest. Despite all of this exculpatory evidence that showed no fraud and no money loss or any other determinable damages, the judge refused to allow President Trump to give his closing argument in his own defense and found him guilty of fraud, fined him $354 million plus interest, and forced him to forfeit the profit he made on the deal with Deutsche Bank. President Trump was also ordered to pay $111,000 per day in interest. The financial penalty is excessive under the Eighth Amendment, which disallows “excessive fines,” which is the case because it doesn’t reflect the value of the “damages,” which are nil, nor the profits he made. What’s more, President Trump is barred from doing business or getting loans in New York for three years, and two of his children are also barred from their executive roles in the Trump Organization for two years. All of this for paying back loans on properties that the bank made willingly, according to its own value assessments, and profited from.
Meanwhile, a Delaware judge voided Elon Musk’s $56 billion Tesla payout. The judge arbitrarily determined that the record-breaking compensation granted by the Tesla board was an “unfathomable sum” and was “unfair” to shareholders. The payout was the result of a 10-year pay plan that the board agreed to with Mr. Musk back in 2018. Mr. Musk is not only an entrepreneur extraordinaire, he’s also a fan of America and our constitutional right of free speech. He attracted the left’s wrath after acquiring Twitter (renamed X) and making it a bastion of free speech for conservatives who were formerly censored by Twitter and other social media outlets. In short, Mr. Musk single-handedly broke the stifling monopoly on speech and thought control the left had allegedly in close coordination with the federal government, prior to the acquisition.
The rationale for the judge’s unlawful decision was that the board was, in some way, “beholden” to Mr. Musk. Kathaleen McCormick of Delaware’s Court of Chancery speculated if the payout plan was necessary in order to keep Mr. Musk involved in Tesla and achieve the EV maker’s business goals. By that logic, the entire EV market is “beholden” to Mr. Musk since he is the single biggest influencer in the industry. There is no indication that the judge has a seat on the Tesla board or possesses expertise in the Tesla business model or investing strategies. So far, Mr. Musk’s response has been to begin moving his companies out of Delaware to the business-friendly states of Texas and Nevada.
“He has to recuse himself now. There’s clearly at least an appearance of a conflict here. That’s enough in itself.”
• Wife of Judge In Trump ‘Hush Money’ Trial Worked for AG Letitia James (ET)
Lara Merchan, the wife of the judge presiding over former President Donald Trump’s “hush money” case in Manhattan, once worked for New York Attorney General Letitia James, who brought the massive $350 million civil fraud case against the former president, with the revelation reviving claims of bias and calls for the judge’s recusal. Records reviewed by The Epoch Times show that Ms. Merchan worked for 21 years as a Special Assistant to the AG in New York, including three years under Ms. James. She changed jobs over two years ago. Ms. James is a Democrat who fixated on President Trump as she campaigned for New York attorney general, calling him a “con man” and vowing to shine a “bright light into every dark corner of his real estate dealings.” She began investigating the former president soon after taking office, eventually suing him for allegedly misleading banks and others about the value of his assets.
Ms. James eventually won the case on Feb. 16, with New York Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron ordering President Trump and Trump Organization executives to pay $350 million in damages, and barring the former president from doing business in the state for three years. Judge Juan Merchan is presiding over a separate criminal trial involving President Trump in New York, in which the former president is accused of falsifying business records in order to conceal a $130,000 “hush money” payoff to an adult performer to stay quiet about their alleged affair. President Trump on his Truth Social platform accused Judge Merchan of bias and corruption, while labeling the case against him “election interference” and also demanding the judge’s recusal. The former president has also alleged that the judge’s daughter, Loren Merchan, has a partisan interest in the case because she leads a political marketing firm and has represented President Trump’s political opponents, receiving millions from them.
Judge Merchan imposed a gag order against President Trump in the case and, on April 1, expanded it to include family members of the judge and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg. The judge wrote in the order that President Trump’s speech “injects fear in those assigned or called to participate in the proceedings that not only they, but their family members as well, as ‘fair game’ for Defendant’s vitriol.” Laura Loomer, an independent journalist and popular conservative commentator who on social media shared records that Judge Merchan’s wife worked for Ms. James, wrote in a post on X that this fact represents “another major conflict of interest!”
Various conservative accounts reacted to Ms. Loomer’s post, arguing that the revelation adds to evidence that the judge should recuse himself from the case. “And this is why they expanded the gag order on Trump,” Paul A. Szypula, a popular conservative commentator on X with over 140,000 followers, said in a post. “It’s even more obvious how biased Judge Merchan is. He has to recuse himself now. There’s clearly at least an appearance of a conflict here. That’s enough in itself.”
“President Trump acted as an ‘original classification authority’ while he was President of the United States” to declassify the records..”
• Trump Lawyers Reveal He Kept Classified Documents in Trump Tower (ET)
Lawyers for former President Donald Trump revealed in new court filings that the former president kept classified materials at his Trump Tower in New York City and his estate in New Jersey. The former president kept the classified documents at those two locations as well as his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida while he was in office, and also during the months before he was inaugurated in 2017, the filings revealed. His lawyers were responding to a deadline to support U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon’s proposed jury instructions. “You may consider evidence that government officials discussed classified information with President Trump and provided classified briefings and documents to President Trump before and during his Presidency—including inside President Trump’s private offices and residences, such as at Bedminster, New Jersey, and Mar-a-Lago, in Palm Beach, Florida, as well as at Trump Tower in New York City,” they wrote to the judge.
President Trump, the GOP presumptive presidential nominee for 2024, is facing dozens of felony counts related to alleged mishandling of classified documents, according to an indictment. Part of his defense centers around how he personally designated presidential files as his personal items before he left the White House in early 2021. In Tuesday’s court filing, his attorneys said that jurors could be told that President Trump had the legal power as president to make those documents his personal belongings. “President Trump acted as an ‘original classification authority’ while he was President of the United States” to declassify the records, it said, adding that it “means that all classification decisions during his term as President were based on his authority, and that he also had absolute and unreviewable authority to declassify documents and information.”
There also is “evidence relating to former Presidents, Vice Presidents, and other public officials being authorized to possess documents containing classified information without criminal prosecution by the government after they left their positions,” his attorneys continued to say. “You heard evidence during the trial that President Trump exercised that authority, at times verbally and at times without using formal procedures, while he was President,” the proposed Trump jury instructions read. “I instruct you that those declassification decisions are examples of valid and legally appropriate uses of President Trump’s declassification authority while he was President of the United States.”
“..the government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the document you are considering is a ‘presidential record’ and not a ‘personal record.’”
• Jack Smith Urges Federal Judge to Change Course in Trump Case (ET)
The federal judge overseeing former President Donald Trump’s classified documents case in Florida needs to clarify recent instructions to parties so the government can seek a higher court ruling, special prosecutor Jack Smith said late April 2. In March, U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, who was appointed by President Trump, ordered prosecutors and the defendant’s lawyers to file proposals for jury instructions. The parties must offer “alternative draft text” that assumes two “competing scenarios” are “a correct formulation of the law to be issued to the jury,” she wrote. The scenarios are former presidents being able to retain personal records under the Presidential Records Act (PRA), and presidents being able to designate records as personal. But both scenarios rest on a “fundamentally flawed legal premise,” Mr. Smith and his team wrote in the new filing.
The distinction in the PRA between personal and presidential records is irrelevant because President Trump has been charged under the Espionage Act, prosecutors said. “Based on the current record, the PRA should not play any role at trial at all,” they wrote, urging Judge Cannon to “decide whether the unstated legal premise underlying the recent order does, in the Court’s view, represent ‘a correct formulation of the law.’” If Judge Cannon wrongly decides that it does, the filing states, then the government may seek intervention from a higher court. They cited a ruling by an appeals court in a separate case that concluded, “the adoption of a clearly erroneous jury instruction that entails a high probability of failure of a prosecution—a failure the government could not then seek to remedy by appeal or otherwise—constitutes the kind of extraordinary situation in which we are empowered to issue the writ of mandamus.”
A writ of mandamus is an order to a lower court. “The question of whether the PRA has an impact on the element of unauthorized possession … does not turn on any evidentiary issue, and it cannot be deferred,” prosecutors said. “It is purely a question of law that must be decided promptly. If the court were to defer a decision on that fundamental legal question it would inject substantial delay into the trial and, worse, prevent the government from seeking review before jeopardy attaches.” President Trump, charged with 32 counts of violating the Espionage Act for retaining what the government described as national defense documents and other sensitive materials after his presidency, has stated that under the PRA, he could designate even classified records as personal and retain them upon leaving office.
“There is no basis for the special counsel’s office, this court, or a jury to second-guess President Trump’s document-specific PRA categorizations,” his lawyers wrote in a separate filing on April 2. Proposed jury instructions from President Trump said that to establish unauthorized possession of the records in question, “the government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the document you are considering is a ‘presidential record’ and not a ‘personal record.’”
There’s Letitia James again. And New York State Supreme Court Judge Sabrina Kraus.
• In America the Legal Process Is the Punishment (Paul Craig Roberts)
The white-hating blacks to whom insouciant New Yorkers turned over the prosecutorial system have made it impossible to support the existence of, or advocacy for, a white ethnic nation. The First Amendment is also a victim of “black justice.” In New York today, speech is free only for sexual deviants and “preferred minorities.” Peter Brimelow, founder of VDARE and a former Forbes editor, writes: “I launched VDARE.com on Christmas Eve 1999. So it is perhaps appropriate that, on Good Friday 2024, the anniversary of Christ’s death, I must announce VDARE.com’s crucifixion by New York State’s communist Attorney General Letitia James.
On March 27 2024, in another of her lightning-fast NYAG James-compliant rulings, New York State Supreme Court Judge Sabrina Kraus held us in Contempt Of Court because we have not yet complied (because we were fighting it) with her January 23 2023 order that we meet NYAG James’ massive and crippling subpoena demands. Judge Kraus did modify her earlier order to reflect the intervention (much appreciated) of the Institute for Free Speech. So now we no longer have to reveal, explicitly, the names of our pseudonymous writers, some of whom would certainly be fired from their jobs if their identities leaked. But we are still required to review 40 gigabytes of emails, an enormous amount.
And of course these would in fact reveal the names of those pseudonymous writers, as well as our donors, privileged communications with lawyers etc. Judge Kraus has also now allowed us to redact these emails. But this is a huge task, which our lawyers estimate could cost as much as $150,000. An observer tells us this order is more typical of major corporate litigation, not a tiny charity. And, perversely, although Judge Kraus has now modified her January 23 2023 order, she is nevertheless now fining us $250 a day for not complying with it. We have fought NYAG Letitia James, at a cost of up to $1 million, for nearly three years. But now we are literally hanging on the cross. REMEMBER, VDARE.com HAS NOT BEEN CHARGED WITH ANYTHING—BECAUSE IT IS NOT GUILTY OF ANYTHING.
“..invited House Speaker Mike Johnson to explain why he would want Congress to “fund a doomed war.” “Of course, he hasn’t responded,” the journalist said. “We also sent multiple requests to Zelensky himself for an interview to explain his position. Of course, he ignored that as well.”
• Zelensky Ignored Interview Requests – Tucker Carlson (RT)
American journalist and political commentator Tucker Carlson has said that Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky snubbed multiple invitations for an interview. Carlson had previously recorded a lengthy interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin, where they discussed the ongoing conflict in Ukraine and Russia’s standoff with NATO. The journalist revealed his attempts to contact Zelensky in a video on X (formerly Twitter) on Wednesday. In a monologue before his interview with Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, Carlson said that he had invited House Speaker Mike Johnson to explain why he would want Congress to “fund a doomed war.” “Of course, he hasn’t responded,” the journalist said. “We also sent multiple requests to Zelensky himself for an interview to explain his position. Of course, he ignored that as well.”
The conservative commentator went on to argue that, no matter how much foreign money Kiev will receive, it cannot defeat Moscow on the battlefield, given Russia’s bigger population and industrial capacity. “It’s not working. Two years in, the war is still going,” Carlson told his viewers. “Ukraine can’t win. Everybody knows that around the world. People are very clear on that. There is not one informed person outside the United States who thinks that somehow Ukraine is going to beat Russia.” A vocal critic of Zelensky, Carlson has accused US news organizations of not being truthful about the origin and nature of the ongoing conflict. He stated that the media bias was one of the reasons he had sought an interview with Putin.
During a conversation in Moscow in February, Putin reflected on the centuries of shared history between Russia and Ukraine, and stressed that he has no intention of attacking NATO unless Russia is attacked first. Zelensky, however, dismissed Tucker’s interview with Putin as “more than two hours of bull***t.” The Ukrainian leadership has been increasingly pressuring the Western countries to provide more military aid in an effort to reverse the tide after a string of battlefield losses. Kiev has been particularly frustrated by House Republicans who refused to back President Joe Biden’s $61 billion aid package that has been stuck in Congress for several months.
They’re afraid Trump will win. So they think up schemes he can’t stop.
• NATO Seeking To Insulate Kiev From Trump Pressure (RT)
NATO leaders are devising ways to limit Donald Trump’s potential leverage over Ukraine by ensuring the continued supply of arms to Kiev does not depend on Washington, according to Western media reports. Trump has suggested he would reassess aid to Ukraine, should he be reelected to the White House later this year. The plans are set to be discussed at a meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Brussels this week, sources have told news outlets including Politico, the Financial Times, and Euractiv. Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for the November US presential election, has claimed on his campaign trail that he could end the Ukraine conflict in 24 hours by making phone calls to Kiev and Moscow. He has declined to explain the specifics of his scheme, but presumably intends to pressure both sides of the hostilities to force a compromise.
Ukraine has declared a full military victory as the only acceptable outcome, but its army is heavily dependent on Western aid. One of the proposed shifts in assistance to Kiev would affect the so-called Ukraine Defense Contact Group, which holds monthly meetings at the US Ramstein Air Base in Germany to coordinate weapons deliveries to Ukraine. It is currently led by Washington and includes non-NATO states that follow the US lead in the conflict. The idea is to formally incorporate the group into NATO structures, according to the reports. “There’s a feeling among, not the whole group but a part of the NATO group, that thinks it is better to institutionalize the process just in case of a Trump reelection,” Jim Townsend, a former Pentagon and NATO official, told Politico.
Outgoing NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has reportedly suggested the creation of a fund to pay for arms supplies over the next five years. Dubbed Mission for Ukraine, the war chest would amount to up to $100 billion or €100 billion ($108 billion), conflicting reports have said. In addition to “Trump-proofing” and entrenching arms deliveries, giving NATO a formal role would supposedly allow it to push Ukraine into implementing reforms required for its eventual accession to the bloc, according to justifications cited by Euractiv. Moscow considers the Ukraine conflict to be part of a US-led proxy war against Russia, in which Kiev and NATO serve as tools of American hegemony. The US-led bloc’s expansion in Europe and its intention to absorb Ukraine were among the key triggers of the hostilities, according to the Russian leadership.
Luke Harding still works at the Guardian. What a disgrace.
• Ukraine Can’t Win On The Battlefield, Military Intel Admits (RT)
Kiev has no other option but to launch attacks inside Russia, including on oil infrastructure, as its army faces continued setbacks on the battlefield, The Guardian has reported, citing the leadership of Ukraine’s military intelligence service, GUR. Officers who spoke to the British newspaper’s Luke Harding were candid about Ukraine’s desperate military situation. Brigadier-General Dmitry Timkov said his country was like a patient on life support. ”We are attached to a drip. We have enough drugs to stay alive. But, if the West wants us to win, we need the full treatment,” he said, referring to dwindling military aid. Major General Vadim Skibitsky, the deputy head of GUR, said Kiev’s wished-for battlefield victory was impossible at the moment, which is why the agency had “no choice” but to launch strikes deep inside Russia. He described this as a “NATO-standard procedure, known as center of gravity, or COG.”
The concept was first developed by Carl von Clausewitz, the famous Prussian general and military theorist, and essentially refers to targets that have the most value for the enemy, physically or morally. The GUR officials that spoke with the outlet claimed credit for a recent string of Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian oil infrastructure. This contradicts public statements by the head of SBU, the Ukrainian civilian security agency, who said it was his agents who were responsible for the operations. Both branches have been overhauled in the years since the 2014 armed coup in Kiev with the CIA’s help, according to reports in the Western media. Both were allegedly involved in targeted assassinations of persons deemed to be enemies of Ukraine, since before the hostilities with Russia escalated in 2022.
The newspaper said GUR intends to launch a new major attack on the Crimean Bridge –and to disable it– “in the first half of 2024.” Ukraine has previously targeted the structure, twice in 2022 and 2023. The first plot involved a powerful bomb hidden in a truck, which killed the vehicle’s driver and four other civilians in nearby cars. Moscow said GUR masterminded this attack. The second strike involved naval kamikaze drones that SBU said were deployed by its agents. That bombing killed two civilians. Moscow has accused Kiev of engaging in terrorism as a method of war. The regime in Kiev has adopted the tactics, Russian officials are claiming, because it is unable to score victories on the battlefield.
“Putin has absolutely no incentive to invade any of these nations, which are NATO members. What do they have that he wants?”
• Ukraine’s Starting to Get Dangerous (James Rickards)
A lot of people seem to have forgotten about the war in Ukraine. That’s a mistake. Russia is slowly but steadily defeating Ukraine, which is becoming increasingly obvious to everyone except the most anti-Russian diehards. That’s leading to desperation in elite Western circles determined to stop Russia one way or the other. In their minds, they simply can’t let Putin win. They think that if Putin wins in Ukraine, he’ll next move on to the Baltic states, Poland and elsewhere. You know the West is getting desperate based on recent threats by France’s Emmanuel Macron to send troops to Ukraine. The vice president of the Russia Duma, Pyotr Tolstoy (descendant of the great Russian writer Leo Tolstoy), warned that French troops would be priority targets for Russian forces if they entered Ukraine.
Even though France would send troops independent of NATO, that puts us on a very dangerous path that ultimately leads to direct conflict between NATO and Russia. And that path ends in nuclear war ultimately. Tolstoy added that it would take “just two minutes to nuke Paris.” It’s not hard to envision how quickly things could escalate if France decided to send troops to Ukraine. Meanwhile, NATO is preparing to send F-16s to Ukraine. Airfields in Ukraine are highly vulnerable to Russian attack, especially since Ukraine’s air defenses are heavily depleted at this point and the Russian air force is becoming increasingly active in Ukraine. But if NATO allows the F-16s to be based on its own airbases, Putin has warned that these airfields would become a “legitimate target” if strikes against Russian forces were launched from them.
By the way, Russia has hypersonic missiles that NATO has no practical ability to shoot down, so these attacks would likely be successful. Of course, NATO would have to retaliate in kind. You can imagine where all this could lead. We’re already well along the escalation ladder. And the higher you go, the more face you stand to lose if you back down. I warned about that from the outset of the war. But the entire notion that Russia poses some existential threat to NATO or Europe is absurd. First off, the theory that Putin will invade other countries if he wins in Ukraine is nonsense. The Russian army lacks the men and materiel to occupy Ukraine while simultaneously invading other countries.
This isn’t the Soviet Union with its massive tank armies poised to roll over Western Europe. And Soviet communism is long dead, so there’s no ideological basis for Russia to invade Europe. These days Russia is a conservative, Orthodox Christian nation. But more importantly, Putin has absolutely no incentive to invade any of these nations, which are NATO members. What do they have that he wants? All it would do is trigger Article 5 of the NATO Charter, which stipulates that an attack on one member is an attack on all, inviting a massive NATO response. At that point, you’re on the fast track to nuclear war. Putin is fully aware of that.
“..It is difficult to believe that 20 years ago Russia looked to the West with hope..”
• A New Russia Has Emerged (Paul Craig Roberts)
Dmitry Trenin reports that Russia has come to its senses and, as I have long recommended, turned her back on the West, a morally debauched, socially dysfunctional, and politically disunited and disintegrating polity. For years Russia was handicapped by its pro-Western intellectuals, but the West’s demonization of Russia has forced them to change their spots or to leave. Free of the former influence of these Russian traitors, everyone of whom Stalin or Lenin would have shot, Russia has emerged as the leader of the world majority that is tired of Western bullying. The fools in Washington, instead of undermining Russia in the interest of US hegemony, have created their replacement by Russia as world leader.
The fools in Washington fail to comprehend that a country blinds itself when it curtails freedom of speech, discredits truth in the interest of self-serving agendas, and destroys the patriotism and security of its ethnic base. All across America and its empire everything is failing. Schools and universities are propaganda centers against white Americans, the military is a disunited tower of babel, massively expensive weapons systems are problem-plagued, the social and economic infrastructure is disintegrating, health care has been turned into a profit machine–at the public’s expense–for Big Pharma. Both water and food are polluted. Government bureaucracies have taken control over children away from parents. Economic opportunity is shrinking. Integrity cannot be found. People who insist on truth in place of propaganda are persecuted. It is difficult to believe that 20 years ago Russia looked to the West with hope.
“In just two years, the European Union, which only recently accounted for 48% of foreign trade, is down to 20%, whereas Asia’s share has soared from 26% to 71%.”
• Russia Is Undergoing A New, Invisible Revolution (Trenin)
When President Vladimir Putin, back in February 2022, launched Russia’s military operation in Ukraine, he had specific, but limited objectives in mind. It was essentially about assuring Russia’s security vis-à-vis NATO. However, the drastic, expansive and well-coordinated Western reaction to Moscow’s moves – the torpedoing of the Russo-Ukrainian peace deal and the mounting escalation of the US-led bloc’s involvement in the conflict, including its role in deadly attacks inside Russia – have fundamentally changed our country’s attitude towards our former partners. We no longer hear talk about “grievances” and complaints about “failures in understanding.” The last two years have produced nothing less than a revolution in Moscow’s foreign policy, more radical and far-reaching than anything anticipated on the eve of the Ukraine intervention. Over the past 25 months, it has been quickly gaining in strength and profundity.
Russia’s international role, its position in the world, its goals and methods of reaching them, its basic worldview – all are changing. The national foreign policy concept, signed by Putin just a year ago, represents a major departure from its predecessors. It establishes the country’s identity in terms of it being a distinct civilization. In fact, it is the first official Russian document to do so. It also radically transforms the priorities of Moscow’s diplomacy, with the countries of the post-Soviet ‘near abroad” on top, followed by China and India, Asia and the Middle East, and Africa and Latin America. Western Europe and the United States rank next to last, just above the Antarctic.
Unlike in previous decade, when Russia’s “turn to the east” was first announced, these are not just words. Our trade partners, not just political interlocutors, have also switched places. In just two years, the European Union, which only recently accounted for 48% of foreign trade, is down to 20%, whereas Asia’s share has soared from 26% to 71%. Russia’s use of the US dollar has also plummeted, with increasingly more transactions being conducted in Chinese yuan and other non-Western currencies: such as the Indian rupee, the UAE dirham, as well as the instruments of our partners in the Eurasian Economic Union, and the ruble itself.
Russia has also ended its long and tiresome efforts to adapt to the US-led world order – something which it enthusiastically embraced in the early 1990s, grew disillusioned about in the following decade, and unsuccessfully tried to establish a modus vivendi with in the 2010s. Instead of surrendering to a post-Cold War set-up, in which it was left with no say, Russia has begun pushing back more and more against the hegemonic US-centered system. For the first time since the Bolshevik Revolution, albeit in a very different way from then, the country has de facto become a revolutionary power. While China still seeks to improve its position in the existing world order, Russia sees that state-of-affairs as being beyond repair, and is instead seeking to prepare for a new alternative arrangement.
For the time being, instead of the “one world” concept, which the Soviet Union even accepted in 1986, under Gorbachev, Moscow’s contemporary foreign policy has now split into two. For Russian policymakers, the post-2022 West has turned into a “house of adversaries,” while partners for Russia can only be found in the countries of the non-West, for whom we have coined a new description, “the World Majority.” The criterion for being included the group is simple: non-participation in the anti-Russia sanctions regime imposed by Washington and Brussels. This majority of over 100 nations is not considered a pool of allies: the depth and warmth of their relations with the Russia vary greatly, but these are the countries that Moscow can do business with.
The West is pushing the narrative hard.
• WaPo Report About Crocus City Hall Attack Is a “Hoax” – Zakharova (RT)
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has rejected the Washington Post’s claim that the US alerted Russia that the Crocus City concert hall could be attacked by terrorists two weeks before the tragedy, calling it completely false. On Tuesday, the paper reported, citing unnamed US officials, that Russian authorities had received an alert with a “high degree of specificity” that the popular venue could be targeted by terrorists. According to the news outlet, the notice came one day before the US Embassy in Moscow warned Americans on March 7 to stay away from public gatherings for the following 48 hours because of the heightened threat. At a press briefing on Wednesday, Zakharova dismissed the report, noting that Moscow has grown “accustomed to American misinformation” as well as the Western media’s repeated attempts to retract their own assertions.
“I would really like… to receive factual material on this topic from the American side. That is, to whom and when did they give this information?” she added. In the aftermath of the Crocus City Hall massacre, the White House said that the US had shared data with Moscow about a potential terrorist attack. The head of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), Sergey Naryshkin, has confirmed this, but noted that “the information was too general and did not allow us to fully identify those who participated in this terrible crime.” On March 22, a group of armed men stormed the venue, killing at least 144 people, including six children, and injuring over 500 others. The terrorist act was the deadliest on Russian soil since the early 2000s.
Russian law enforcement agencies arrested several suspects in the aftermath of the attack, including four suspected gunmen who were caught fleeing towards Ukraine. Russian President Vladimir Putin has described the culprits as radical Islamists, saying that a “window” was arranged for them on the Ukrainian border. Moscow has suggested that the Ukrainian intelligence services may have been involved in the attack, a claim vehemently denied by Kiev. The US and its allies have insisted that the atrocity was orchestrated by Islamic State terrorists. Meanwhile, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has accused the West of obsessive attempts to clear Ukraine of any culpability. He also advised against jumping to conclusions before the investigation is over.
“..We should also bear in mind that ISIS*, Al-Qaeda* and other terrorist organizations were created by Washington..”
• Crocus Terror Attack Well-Organized, With Pre-Orchestrated Media Blitz (Sp.)
The terrorist attack at Crocus City Hall was well organized, it was accompanied by extensive and pre-orchestrated media coverage in the West, Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev said on Wednesday. *”The terrorist attack was well organized and was accompanied by extensive, pre-orchestrated coverage by Western media in the right tone for them,” Patrushev said at the 19th annual meeting of security council heads of Shanghai Cooperation Organization member states.= On March 22, several armed men broke into Crocus City Hall and started shooting at people. They also started a fire in one of the auditoriums, which was full of people ahead of a concert. The attack left 695 casualties, including 144 dead, according to the latest data from the Russian Emergencies Ministry.
The Islamic State – Khorasan Province* (ISKP, also known as ISIS-K) terrorist group has claimed responsibility for the attack. The four main suspects in the case — all citizens of Tajikistan — tried to flee the scene in a car but were detained and charged with terrorism. Russian authorities believe their plan was to flee to Ukraine, where the masterminds of the attack had arranged a safe haven for them. An investigation is underway. “It is well known that the Kiev regime is not independent and is completely controlled by the United States. We should also bear in mind that ISIS*, Al-Qaeda* and other terrorist organizations were created by Washington,” Patrushev noted, commenting on the alleged role of ISIS* in the terrorist attack on Crocus in Moscow.
The reaction of Volodymyr Zelensky who said that the Russian authorities were responsible for the Crocus City Hall terrorist attack is inadequate, Patrushev pointed out. “The inadequate reaction of Zelensky, who accused the Russian authorities of organizing the terrorist attack, is also typical. At the same time, Slovakia directly says that the Kiev regime has been sheltering ISIS* militants on its territory for a long time and is using them for its own purposes,” Patrushev stressed. Immediately after the terrorist attack, phone calls from Ukraine to the Russian emergency services with false reports of mining of buildings began en masse, the official added.
Patrushev highlighted that terrorist groups are increasingly being used for geostrategic purposes, and they are given modern weapons and intelligence equipment, Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev said on Wednesday. “Terrorist groups are increasingly being used for geostrategic purposes. Terrorists are given modern weapons, advanced types of tracking and reconnaissance equipment are provided, and intelligence information is supplied,” Patrushev said at the 19th annual meeting of security council heads of Shanghai Cooperation Organization member states. The official called for resolutely and harshly condemning terrorism in all its manifestations and the actions of countries that support or condone it.
“Israel has pledged to conduct a thorough investigation..” Pretending it was a accident…
• Biden Calls For Swift Probe in Israel Attack on WCK Workers (Sp.)
US President Joe Biden in a statement called for a swift probe into the incident that killed seven humanitarian workers from World Central Kitchen in Gaza. “Israel has pledged to conduct a thorough investigation into why the aid workers’ vehicles were hit by airstrikes. That investigation must be swift, it must bring accountability, and its findings must be made public. Even more tragically, this is not a stand-alone incident. This conflict has been one of the worst in recent memory in terms of how many aid workers have been killed,” said Biden in a White House release. The president added that Israel has not done enough to protect civilians and that the United States will continue its humanitarian efforts in Gaza while urging Israel to do more to facilitate the aid.
On Monday, WCK staff were traveling “in a deconflicted zone” in two armored cars branded with the organization’s logo, and a soft skin vehicle, the NGO said. The humanitarian convoy was attacked as it left the Deir al Balah warehouse, where the team had unloaded more than 100 tonnes of food aid brought to Gaza by sea. The organization said that its convoy had coordinated its movements with the IDF. The Israeli strike against the staff of the WCK killed seven employees from Australia, Poland, the United Kingdom and Palestine, as well as a dual citizen of the United States and Canada. The organization suspended its operations in the Gaza Strip after the deadly incident.
“The rewrite of Braveheart is going to be a real disappointment..”
• Scottish Minister Doubles Down on Anti-Free Speech Law (Turley)
There is global criticism of the new anti-free speech law in Scotland, including a dare from author J.K. Rowling to arrest her for her criticism of transgender policies. The law is so bad that even the British Prime Minister, in a country widely denounced for attacks on free speech, has demurred from supporting the Scottish law. Now Humza Yousaf, first minister of Scotland, has doubled down in supporting the draconian law while misrepresenting its language. Yousaf bizarrely claimed that critics have ignored that the legal threshold of “the new offences is very, very high indeed. Your behaviour has to be threatening or abusive and intended to stir up hatred.” It is almost comical in its absurdity. No, a standard based on “stirring up hatred” is not very very high. Moreover, the showing can be based on a showing that stirring up hatred was “likely” rather than “intended.”
In signature form, Yousaf reportedly then lashed out at critics like Rowling and Joe Rogan as “right-wing actors” who have “[no] sympathy for the fact we are bringing in legislation that is clamping down on hatred.” He insisted that this is merely an extension of the fight against “disinformation.” The critics include virtually the entirety of the free speech community. Rowling’s objections to transgender policies are rooted in her feminist principles and the concern over the erasure of the gains of women generally.
By declaring opposing views as hateful, many on the left like Yousaf seek to shutdown any debate through a chilling effect on speech. Many do not want to face the cancel campaign or abuse directed against Rowling, who has the means and the following to weather this storm. The Scottish law is a disgrace to the nation, which once distinguished itself in the Scottish Enlightenment as a haven for free thought. The rewrite of Braveheart is going to be a real disappointment when Wallace asks what Scots will do without their freedom and Yousef steps forward to accuse him of “disinformation” and delivers him over to the English:
“.. it is the type of posting that one would expect from the DNC, not the WHC.”
• White House Flack Raises Legal Concerns Over Biden Corruption Scandal (Turley)
In a city of flacks, Ian Sams is prototypical. Quotable, punchy, and fast on social media, he stays ahead of the news cycle. Those traits are greatly valued by clients in this city where losing control of a narrative can allow a controversy to metastasize into a full fledge scandal. What is different is the client. Sams, a well–known Democratic operative, is not working for a Democratic campaign, but a Democratic president and speaks for the White House Counsel. That position continues to raise eyebrows, as it did this week when Sams issued insulting and taunting postings after the House Oversight Committee asked the President to answer ten questions from its impeachment inquiry. Sams posted images of signs mocking the inquiry next to his title reading “White House spokesman for oversight and investigations. Deputy Assistant to the President & Senior Advisor to WH Counsel’s Office.”
The White House Counsel’s office has historically avoided engaging in political spin and attacks. It prides itself on representing the office of the Presidency, not the president as a person. President Biden has personal counsel to look after his interests as an individual. What is striking is that his personal counsel has shown far more circumspection and restraint in responding to such inquiries. Sams has been previously questioned by the White House press corp over the accuracy of his statements and that fact that he is routinely cited as speaking for White House Counsel’s office on a variety of legal questions, but lacks any law degree. He was also the subject of a complaint from the head of White House press corps over his giving them “marching orders” on how to control the allegations against the President.
[..] I have previously raised concerns over the role of Sams in the impeachment inquiry. In my testimony in the first Biden impeachment hearing, I noted that the Biden White House was approaching a dangerous line in pushing false claims on the corruption scandal, including repeating President Biden’s past denials that he never spoke to his son or had knowledge of his son’s foreign dealings. It can lead to the same blurred lines that led to not just the impeachment articles but the criminal charges in the Nixon Administration. Those concerns became magnified this month when the House send the ten questions to the President to address glaring contradictions in his past public statements. Sams immediately responded on behalf of the White House Counsel:
“LOL. Comer knows 20+ witnesses have testified that POTUS did nothing wrong. He knows that the hundreds of thousands of pages of records he’s received have refuted his false allegations. This is a sad stunt at the end of a dead impeachment. Call it a day, pal.” Again, it is the type of posting that one would expect from the DNC, not the WHC. Yet, Siskel clearly approves of this type of taunting, sarcastic response from an office that has fought to maintain its image of professionalism and prudence. Sams, not Siskel, is now the face of the White House Counsel’s office. That is certainly welcomed by the Biden campaign, but it is often difficult to distinguish postings between the two operations. With an impeachment inquiry in the field, that aggressive media role can produce more than favorable media articles. It can become the basis for actual impeachment articles.
17
Father takes a photo of his daughter every week until she turned 17 pic.twitter.com/veKVEvzibE
— Historic Vids (@historyinmemes) April 3, 2024
Whacker
This will make you smile ear to ear I promise…
⛏️ Someone tried to kill Whacker and nearly did
✈️ We got him saved and he flew from Thailand to Scotland to a forever home
🥳 He'd been a street dog his whole life. His owners threw him a 1st ever birthday party pic.twitter.com/KMAGPiGqfM
— Niall Harbison (@NiallHarbison) April 3, 2024
Wild crazy
Be careful when dealing with wild crazy animals. pic.twitter.com/1Njj8QPhLg
— Nature is Amazing ☘️ (@AMAZlNGNATURE) April 3, 2024
Frens
https://twitter.com/i/status/1775572374248689794
Otter
This otter teaching a human how to pet it gets me every time pic.twitter.com/sjTpdxW8oj
— Nature is Amazing ☘️ (@AMAZlNGNATURE) April 3, 2024
Support the Automatic Earth in wartime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.
